Chapter 1
“Come on, slowpoke! You can do better than that!”
As if my ears hadn’t been burning enough from the wind whipping them flat against my head, now I had to listen to her taunt me from behind. At the speed we were flying, it was a wonder I could hear anything.
Oh, I’m gonna do better. Just you watch.
I locked my back legs together as tight as I could, lowered my head, and stretched my front legs as far as I could in front of me. I put every bit of strength I had into propelling my wings faster and faster. Soon, I could hear nothing but the whooshing of air by my head at speeds I had only dreamed of touching. I could feel tears being sucked from my eyes and blown across my cheeks. My lips felt like they were about to be ripped off. I was pretty sure I was losing hair from head.
Come on, come on!
The wind resistance began to increase exponentially. It felt like the air was beginning to solidify around me. I knew I was approaching the breaking point. A few quiet, nagging doubts popped into my head, but I couldn’t let them bother me now. It was do-or-die time. I reached for the last little bit of energy I had and put it into my wings as my vision began to blur.
I’m gonna do it! I’m gonna do it!
Suddenly, everything went white. The nagging fears I had pushed aside resurfaced with renewed vigor. I tried to ignore them, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong, even though I knew that this was supposed to happen. It still bothered me every time.
Don’t give in! Battle through it!
I struggled to maintain velocity, but I knew I was losing the fight. I could feel myself slowing to a stop, like I had been thrown into a safety net. There was no safety here, though.
Oh, no...
Suddenly, I was being launched through the air, like a bullet from a gun, backwards along the route I had just flown. As my vision returned to me, I saw the ground retreating from me as I hurtled through the atmosphere. This was an all too familiar feeling; I had completely lost control. There was no stopping me now. All I could do was hang on and pray to Celestia I didn’t crash into something before I slowed down. Fortunately, that didn’t seem to be a problem. The sky was totally clear ahead of me, except for that giant…
Thunderhead, not good!
I silently panicked to myself. The nagging doubts in my head had now become my screaming reality. I knew one of two things was about to happen. Either the cumulonimbus cloud would be heavy enough to stop my flight altogether, or it would be light enough to let me pass through, leaving me open to be pelted by raindrops and ice crystals on my way through. Either way, I was in for a world of hurt.
This is just like flight camp all over again.
There was nothing I could do. I closed my eyes and braced myself for the ensuing impact.
BAM!
It didn’t hurt like I thought it would. I knew I had made contact with something. So why wasn’t I serious pain?
I opened my eyes to two light blue legs wrapped underneath my front shoulders. I looked up and saw the familiar polychromatic mane whipping in the wind. I was never so happy in all my life to see that face as I was at that exact moment.
“Thanks, Rainbow Dash. I owe you one.”
She remained silent as we looped around and landed on top of the cumulonimbus that had only moments before been a detriment to my overall health. She set me down on the cloud, and my legs immediately gave out and I fell, panting heavily.
“Capriccio, you were so close! What happened?”
I looked up at the Pegasus pony hovering in front of me. She had a look of disappointment and concern on her face.
I sighed, my face down towards the cloud. “Sorry, Rainbow Dash. I guess I just lost my nerve again.”
She floated in front of me with her front legs on her haunches. “You know it’s going to happen! Why can’t you just slug your way through it?”
I looked up at her. “But it’s so strange! All I see is white, and it feels like I’m trying to fly submerged in a tub of molasses.”
“That’s what it’s supposed to feel like! But it’s not like that lasts forever! Once you break through that barrier, you don’t feel anything! You just gotta be able to make that last push.”
I rolled my eyes a little bit. “I know, I know! You’ve told me a million times how wonderful it feels to do a sonic rainboom, and how simple it should be since I know all the basics. And you’re right, I get it. I really want to do this. It was my idea. But it’s still difficult for me. I’m really trying, Rainbow. Honest to Celestia, I’m trying so hard.” I knew she could see the fire in my eyes, even if it was starting to dwindle at yet another failed attempt. “Every time I try, though, I keep thinking...about it.”
She put a hoof on my shoulder and looked at me sympathetically. “I know you do, and that’s why I keep at you. I want you to beat this. You already have beaten this. I mean, look at how far the rest of your hard work has gotten you.”
I paused for a moment to remember how it all came to this point...
8 months ago, I had approached Rainbow Dash and asked her to be my flight teacher. Even if I was a Pegasus, as I grew older, the art of flying took somewhat of a backseat to everything else in my life...especially since my little incident. That all changed for me after I saw Rainbow Dash’s performance at the Best Young Fliers Competition. I had never seen anything like it in my life. Even if her routine had a few hiccups, the courage and daring she displayed by rescuing Rarity and the Wonderbolts really caught my attention. And the sonic rainboom…wow. The epitome of grace, splendor and raw adrenaline rolled into one meteorological phenomenon. It was then and there that I decided to learn everything I could about flying.
And maybe try to beat this thing once and for all.
At first, things had not gone so smoothly. Rainbow Dash had decided to first teach me about the weather and how she exerted her control over it, a completely foreign concept to me. Even if I was a competent flier, I knew next to nothing about controlling the atmosphere around me. And Rainbow Dash? Well she could clear the skies in ten seconds flat without batting an eyelash. So needless to say, the disparity was readily evident, and quite often very frustrating. My first few attempts at being a weatherpony were…less than stellar. I would try to dissipate clouds and end up kicking them in Rainbow’s face. I accidentally made it rain on several outdoor events in Ponyville. I’m sure I still have a few burn marks from being singed by lightning when I handled my first thunderstorm. But for all my mishaps, Rainbow Dash was a real trooper about making sure I learned everything, and so I knew I had to work as hard as I could for her. And it paid off. Soon enough, I had control over every aspect of the weather, almost as expertly as she did, and thanks to the work the two of us put in, Ponyville’s weather was never more orderly.
Next came the advanced maneuvers, or “Flight School 102” as she called it. She knew I already knew the basics of flying. She still put me through a few tests just to see where I was, but she was satisfied with my understanding of the elementary concepts, and she felt comfortable enough to try me on the more complicated moves. Of course, it wasn’t exactly smooth sailing for me. It took us almost a month just to work out how to fly upside down. You want to talk about difficult? I would have rather tried to clear out a hurricane over Ponyville than spend 5 seconds with my hooves facing the heavens. I never thought I’d be able to do it. I was always terrified that my wings would push me towards the ground instead of towards the clouds, but when I stopped flapping them, I would still fall right out of the sky. So many times, I came close to giving up and forgetting the whole thing. But I knew I had to put all my effort into it for Rainbow Dash. She was working so hard to teach me everything she knew, and I wasn’t going to let it go to waste. Slowly but surely, I learned how to trust that my wings could still function properly even when I was fully inverted, and eventually I was flying upside down everywhere I went. From there on out, the rest of her advanced maneuvers were a piece of cake; loops, barrel rolls, corkscrews, cobra rolls, you name it, I learned it.
The final phase of her instruction was easily my least favorite: speed. For the longest time, I hated flying fast. Just thinking about it took me back to that fateful day…
Once upon a time, I used to be a flying prodigy. I had learned to fly before any of my schoolmates, and I built up a reputation as one of the fastest colts in Cloudsdale. I loved to race; I couldn’t get enough of it. One summer during Junior Speedsters Flight Camp, my friends and I had decided to have a race through the obstacle course at night when nopony was watching. Racing outside of pre-designated locations during predetermined times without any staff around was strictly forbidden, but that wasn’t going to stop us. We wanted to race, and dammit we were going to race. We managed to sneak out of our rooms unnoticed after everypony had gone to bed, and we made our way to the obstacle course.
We raced all night, just gallivanting around the sky like the crazy foals we were, without a care in the world. As we began to wind down, I challenged my friend Pizzicato to one final race, and this time the stakes were raised. If I won, he had to do all my chores around the camp for a week, and if he won, I had to do his. We lined ourselves up on that starting line, and our other friend gave us the signal.
And we took off, blitzing in and out of the slalom courses and screaming around the turns. I had never flown so fast in my life, and I was building up a huge lead. Coming out of a turn into a slalom course, I turned to see where he was behind me, maybe give him a smug little grin to let him know I had already won. When I turned my head back around, one of the pillars on the slalom course was racing directly at me. I tried to dodge it, but I ended up clipping it with my left wing, sending me into a tailspin on a collision course with the wall. I connected with the embankment, and immediately I heard this sickening crunch, followed by a complete loss of sensation in my left wing, which was subsequently replaced by a searing pain like none I had ever felt before. I flopped down onto the cloud beneath me, clutching my wing and screaming bloody murder. My friend on the sideline had seen the crash and had immediately went for help, and Pizzicato had raced to my side, telling me to hold on and that everything was going to be alright. All I can remember was feeling woozy, and everything starting to fade away, except for the pain in my wing.
When I came to, I was in Cloudsdale General Hospital, surrounded by a doctor, Pizzicato, one of our flight instructors, and my parents. I had an enormous cast on my left wing that was suspended on wires hanging from metal bars above my bed, which prevented me from leaning on it. I had a morphine drip IV attached to my right front leg; it was helping to relieve some of the pain, but I was still incredibly sore, and trying to move my left side at all brought a stab of pain to my wing. The doctor informed me that the collision had almost completely destroyed the connection of my wing to my body, and that I had already been through 2 surgeries just to have all the bones reset. He told me how lucky I was that they were able to save functionality in my wing. Apparently, explained the doctor, I was still young enough that my wings had not fully finished developing, and as a result the bones were not completely solidified. So even though they were still broken, they had not shattered the way an adult Pegasus’s bones likely would have. He told me he expected me to make a full recovery, and that after some physical therapy, I would be able to fly again as if nothing had happened.
Of course, that obviously wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. The doctor predicted that it would take 4-6 months for me to be back at full capacity. To add insult to injury, my instructor informed Pizzicato and myself that we were suspended from flight camp for the remainder of the summer. And my present condition didn’t stop my parents from laying into me about the importance of following rules and using common sense, and they decided to ground me until next summer. It was undoubtedly the worst day of my life.
Since that day, I’d always been reticent to fly fast, fearing that I would once again suffer a potentially devastating injury. When I was allowed to return to flight camp the next summer, I refused to participate in any races that were not mandatory, and unlike the previous summer, I didn’t win a single race that I did participate in. It was obvious to all the instructors at the camp that something was wrong, but none of them were willing to push the issue. They let me be satisfied with completing all the rudimentary skills and nothing more. The following summer, I didn’t even bother attending flight camp. I figured I knew all I needed to know about flying, and I had no desire to subject myself to anymore racing.
Needless to say, when Rainbow Dash began my speed training, I wasn’t exactly on board with it. At first, she couldn’t understand why a Pegasus would not want to be able to increase their speed in flight. I fed her every lame excuse that I could think of. For a while, she bought it, and most of our training was focused on correcting whatever nonexistent issues I threw at her. She soon caught on, though, that there was a deeper reason, some psychological motive for avoiding flying fast other than the ones I was giving her. After a great deal of prodding, I finally broke down and told her the whole story.
‘So that’s why you hate flying fast, huh?’
‘I was so careless, Rainbow Dash, and it nearly cost me my ability to fly!’
'But you've done everything else I've taught you flawlessly. All the loops and spins and tricky maneuvers like that gave you no problem.'
'It's not the same, Dash. I can still feel like I'm in control even when I'm upside down at the top of a loop. But when I'm going fast, one false move and it's game over. I've never felt more helpless in my life than when I was careening into that wall. And it's all because I wasn't paying attention.'
‘I understand why you’d be afraid, but you need to understand you’re not the same foolish colt that you used to be. You’re much more sensible and mature. You wouldn’t let anything like that happen again.’
‘How do you know!?’
‘Because you’re asking me that question, that’s how I know! Were you asking yourself if you knew whether or not you were going to plow into the wall when you were having that race?’
‘Well, no, but still—’
‘But nothing, Capriccio! You’re not a stupid little foal anymore! You’re not about showing off or winning everything all the time! You’re willing to learn from others! You think things through! You understand that your actions have consequences!’
‘Dash, I don’t think you—’
‘What is there not to understand!?’
‘I…don’t…I don’t know! *Sigh* Maybe you’re right, maybe it’s all just in my head. But how do I get past this when I won’t let myself move on?’
‘You don’t have to fight these fears alone, Capriccio. I can help you. I want to help you. Please, let me.’
Never had somepony been so willing to help me move past this. Most everypony seemed uncomfortable bringing it up. After I completed physical therapy, I didn’t fly for months. My parents re-enrolled me at the flight camp to try and help me discover the spark I’d once had, but that didn’t work. None of my instructors would dare bring it up so close to where it happened, and Pizzicato and my other friends wouldn’t either. When I did finally fly again, everypony figured I had gotten as far past it as I was going to, and most just acted like the whole accident had never happened.
Rainbow Dash was different, though. It seemed like she had a vested interest in helping me rekindle my old love for flying. I had never seen that in anypony, and it made me wonder if she could be the one to finally break me out of this malaise. As difficult as it was, I began to trust her more and more as she guided me towards rediscovering my confidence.
We practiced together daily, first in open airspace, then on several of the expansive flying courses throughout Cloudsdale. Slowly but surely, I began to feel the young and brash Capriccio resurface within me, but this time I was able to suppress the immature desires and maintain a clear head about what it was I was doing. I was beginning to feel like my old self again.
One day, after a long day of practice, Rainbow Dash had blindfolded me and taken me somewhere. I had no idea where we could be going or what we were going to do when we got there. I wasn’t ready for what she was about to show me.
‘Ok, Capriccio. You can take off the blindfold now.’
‘Ugh, finally. Now can you please tell me why we’re here…wherever that is?’
‘Just take a look. I think you’ll understand.’
I removed the blindfold, blinked a couple of times as my eyes adjusted to the setting sun…and immediately tensed up. We were at the obstacle course where I had my accident. I couldn’t believe it. How could she?
‘Why did you bring me here, Rainbow Dash?’
‘You and I are going to race.’
‘No, we’re not.’
‘Oh yes, we are. It’s all set up and ready to go for us.’
‘No, Dash, we’re not. I’m not racing you here.’
‘Give me one good reason why not.’
‘I think you know exactly why.’
‘Because of something that happened years and years ago?’
‘Because of something that almost destroyed my life, Rainbow Dash!’
‘I thought you wanted to move past this, Capriccio!’
‘How is bringing me here of all places supposed to help me move on!? You’re just dredging up every bad memory I’ve ever had about my accident! Is that how you’re going to “help” me?!?’
‘Don’t you want to be able to conquer the one thing that you fear the most!? Or would rather just go through the rest of your life knowing that the source of all your pain, all your suffering, all your doubts and fears, is still there and can still taunt you day after day after day? Is that what you want!?’
I had nothing to say to that. I knew she was right. I couldn’t let that instant in time control my life any longer. I had to defeat it, right here, right now.
‘Now you and I are going to race, and we’re not going home until you beat me. And I don’t let anypony win. Ever.’
‘Ok, Dash. You’re right. I’m trusting on you this…let’s do it.’
We took our positions at the starting line. I was sweating bullets. In my head, I was running through every possible worst-case scenario. Seriously, what the hell was I doing here?
‘On your mark.’
I looked over at Rainbow Dash. She wouldn’t look at me. She had her eyes trained straight ahead. I could tell she was serious, about everything. She was going to race me like her life depended on it, which meant I had to race her like mine did as well. And I knew it did. I would never be my old self unless I beat Rainbow Dash here, on this very obstacle course.
‘Get set.’
I looked behind me to my left wing and gave it a little shake. It felt good. Really good, actually. All the training I had went through with Rainbow Dash had not caused me any problems in my repaired joint. The doctor had been right all those years ago. Physically, I was in the best shape of my life. I could win this race if I allowed myself to.
A wry smirk crept onto my face. I would win this race. I really didn’t have any other choice. I set myself on the line, and waited for Rainbow’s signal.
‘GO!’
I took off from the starting line like a shot out of a cannon. I glanced to my side; Rainbow Dash was right there. No head start, no going easy on me. This was the real deal, alright.
As we went through the first turn, the layout of the course came back to me. I remembered where all the obstacles were, where and how tight the turns where, what happened on the last slalom…
No, that’s in the past. And that only happened because you were too foolish to pay attention. You won’t make that same mistake again.
And I didn’t. Not once did my eyes deviate from the course in front of me. I couldn’t give a damn where Rainbow Dash was. She could have been ten lengths behind me, or she could have already completed the race. I didn’t care. All that mattered was staying focused on the course and running through it as quickly as my body would let me.
As I headed into the penultimate turn, I suddenly realized where I was about to end up. The dreaded slalom course. I was quickly beset by those nagging doubts, and I almost slowed myself down. But then, another thought popped into my head.
Rainbow Dash.
I wondered why I was thinking about Rainbow Dash at a time like this. I wasn’t about to check and see where she was; I refused to let myself lose focus on the pillars that were starting to appear around the bend. But I couldn’t help but wonder why I was thinking about her.
Rainbow Dash. The one I’m racing against. The one I’m racing…for.
It hit me all at once. I wasn’t racing just for me. I was racing for her, too. For her concerns about me, for all the help she had provided, for all the love and care she had shown me. That’s why I was racing. I wasn’t about to let all of that go to waste.
I finished the turn and stared down the slalom course. I smiled.
Alright, Rainbow Dash. I’m gonna win this race. For us.
I whipped through the slalom in a matter of seconds, dodging in and out of pillars as fast as I could. I yanked myself around the last turn and threw myself across the finish line. Skidding to a halt, I turned myself around, and I came face to face with Rainbow Dash. She had the biggest smile on her face that I had ever seen. Before I knew it, she had tackled me to the ground and threw her front legs around my neck. I gingerly wrapped my front legs around her as well, smiling to myself.
‘So, I guess I won, huh?’
She pulled herself up and looked down at me. There were tears staining the corners of her eyes. She gave a little sniffle as she stared at me with a huge grin on her face.
‘Yeah, you won.’
I wrapped my legs around her again and pulled her in even tighter. She didn’t try to hide the sobs that sprang forth, and neither did I. We stayed there together, holding each other and crying tears of joy over the curse that had finally been broken.
‘Thank you, Rainbow Dash. Thank you for bringing me back.’
“—Capriccio?”
I snapped back to the present. Rainbow Dash and I were still sitting together on top of the thunderhead. I smiled to myself as I remembered the happiness that day had brought.
“What do you say, Capriccio? One more go before the sun goes down?”
I sat there, still mulling over everything that I had just thought about. Rainbow Dash was right, I already had beaten this. That race should have been the final nail in the coffin. I no longer had reason to fear anything. This last test was really unnecessary…and yet, I still felt like I needed to do this. One final act to prove to myself that I was truly my old self again. And I knew that I had it in me; there was really nothing standing in my way. Gradually a smile crept back onto my face.
“Yeah, let’s do it. But this time, I want you to be by my side the whole time.”
She grinned. “I think I’d like that.” And with that, we leapt from the thunderhead and took off for the heavens.
I began going over in my head the order of events that were about to take place. The slow free-fall back to earth, picking up speed with my wings, the air solidifying, the flash of white, the silence…
Rainbow Dash.
I stopped flapping my wings and let gravity take over. My mind was completely clear as I began my plummet towards the ground. I had stopped thinking about the procedure, letting each step just come naturally. All I could think about was…
Rainbow Dash.
I began flapping my wings. I looked over to my right. She was right next to me doing the same. I wondered if she was thinking about me as much as I was about her. She looked over at me. The look in her eyes gave me all the answer I needed.
We were picking up speed, faster than I could ever remember accelerating before. The whoosh of the air rushing by was enough to drown out all my thoughts, except for one.
Rainbow Dash.
I felt the air begin to solidify. I felt the tug of the wind on every square inch of my face. But I also felt something I hadn’t felt before. I looked down. Her hoof was in mine.
Rainbow Dash.
Silence.
Empty white.
Every nerve in my body felt like it was being stretched like a fibrous rubber band.
I strained against the barrier that had formed around us.
No more doubts.
We were going to do this.
Together.
I could feel the pressure begin to give way.
I made my last push.
Rainbow Dash.
The tension broke with a flash of light and an explosion unlike any I had ever heard. I looked back, and I saw the most vivid rainbows I’d ever seen, two rings of prismatic beauty expanding outward in a vibrant shockwave. I cheered as loud as I could. We had done it. We had created not one, but two sonic rainbooms. I looked over at Rainbow Dash. She had the same look on her face that she’d had when I won our race through the obstacle course. I could only imagine the joy she must have been feeling. She looked over at me, and we nodded to each other. We broke off and flew in separate directions.
For the next few minutes, we traced our rainbow contrails across the sky, forming intricate shapes and patterns with each other. I couldn’t help but laugh aloud; the feeling was incredible. The combination of reckless abandon and controlled precision was unlike any other sensation I had ever experienced.
Soon enough, we both had run out of rainbow to trail across the heavens. I made my way back towards the cloud from which we had started. I landed on my two hind legs and immediately flopped down on my back, laughing and panting the whole time. I couldn’t even begin to describe how good I felt. The very last of my fears had vanished. I was truly no longer afraid to be the pony I used to be. All I could think about was the speed, the adrenaline, the beauty of the whole experience, and of course…
Rainbow Dash.
She came screaming out of the sky above me. I stood up to greet her, but before I knew it, she had tackled me, and we went tumbling over each other across the cloud. When we finally rolled to a stop, she was wrapped around me tighter than she ever had been before. I heard a muffled sound coming from her as she pressed her face into my shoulder; it sounded like she was both crying and laughing. She pulled her face up and looked at me, tears still streaking the corners of her eyes, a huge grin on her face.
“You did it, Capriccio. You finally did it.”
A stray tear made her way down her cheek. I reached up and wiped it away.
“We did it, Rainbow Dash. Together.”
The smile on her face was even bigger than before. She looked as though she wanted to say something, but all that came out were a couple of choked sobs. I grabbed her and pulled her in close again, and I could feel her begin to cry some more. I smiled to myself as I let a few tears of my own roll down my cheek. There was so much I wanted to say to her, so much emotion that wanted to be spilled out.
I could never begin to thank you enough, Rainbow Dash. You understood me when nopony else did. You took me at my lowest and built me back up to what I used to be. And for that, I could never begin to fully show my appreciation.
I said nothing, however. Some things don’t need to be said, and I knew that just by holding her tight, she would understand my feelings in a way that my words could never communicate. I felt her crying cease and her breathing begin to slow. I laughed quietly to myself; she must have been as knocked out as I was. Slowly, my eyes began to close as well, and I felt myself succumbing to sleep.
“Thank you…Rainbow Dash,” I whispered drowsily. She must have heard; I could feel her snuggle up just a little bit closer to me. With a contented sigh, I drifted off to sleep. I couldn’t have imagined a better picture. Just two Pegasi, in each other’s arms, sleeping atop a cumulonimbus cloud as it lazily floated in the twilit sky.
When the sun rose the next day, I would still be there, holding Rainbow Dash tight as I snoozed. But things would be different. I would no longer have reason to be troubled by my past. I could exude the confidence that used to define me. The sonic rainboom had been the exclamation point on my triumph. And I owed it all to her.
Rainbow Dash.