Four Hundred Words Too Long
“You want me to do what now?”
“Read the story I wrote!”
Such was the culmination of the beginning of the conversation between Spike and Rainbow Dash. The latter had entered the ground floor of Golden Oaks Library carrying a stack of papers underneath her sky blue wing and dropped them at the foot of the former. Spike briefly glanced down at the pages before meeting Rainbow Dash’s earnestness with a concerned look.
“So, uh, why exactly are you coming to me?” Spike asked.
Rainbow Dash pursed her lips in thought for a moment before responding. “Because you, like, write all the time. I figured you’d be a good judge of if my work is awesome or just, y’know, pretty good.”
Spike picked up the papers and walked them over to a short wooden table on the far side of the oblong reading room next to a cubbyhole filled with scroll parchment. A sign hung over the table reading, in messy block lettering, “Dragon’s Office”. He set them down next to his capped bottle of ink and cup of quill-pens before turning back to Rainbow Dash.
“Okay, first off, just because I write doesn’t mean I write,” he said. “Ninety percent of what I do is take Twilight’s dictation.”
“So what’s the other ten percent?” asked Rainbow Dash as her wing began to twitch and she tapped her forehoof against the heartwood floor.
Spike scratched his tiny chin with his right claws for a second, his vertically slitted green eyes scanning his surroundings. He replied quietly, “Mmn, mostly writing fan letters to Excelsior and Hermet Quoi, the geniuses behind the Power Ponies comic. One of these days they’ll write back.”
That prompted a grin from Rainbow Dash. “See? You understand!”
“Understand what?”
“You understand what it’s like to be a fan of someone else’s work and want to make stuff about it!” she gushed.
Spike shrugged. “Fan letters aren’t the same thing as being inspired to create art.”
“Whatever,” Rainbow Dash said with a wave of her forehoof. “You’re still the best po— uh, dragon to look over my story.”
Spike sat down on the squat little stool by his table and stared at the stack of papers. “So, what is your story about?” he asked without looking up.
“Daring-Do, of course!” Rainbow Dash replied with a smirk. “I’m gonna send this to the Do Daring Quarterly fanzine!”
Spike’s eyes widened at this. He blinked. “Are you really sure you want me to read this?”
“Of course!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. “You get it. The others don’t. Twilight said egghead stuff about eye-pee or something and wouldn’t read it.”
“Sounds like Twilight,” replied Spike with a nod. “What about the others?”
Rainbow Dash pawed the floor as she answered. “Well… Rarity started reading it and broke down crying by the third page. Applejack got about halfway through and told me to get off her farm or she’d have me shot. Pinkie was on the fifth page and suddenly went to creepy-town; her mane went all limp and she walked away without saying anything. Fluttershy, you know she can’t even do a book by the book, started at one of the last pages but then she got that look on her face like she wants to throw up and said she couldn’t finish it. Weirdo. They’re all weirdos.”
“…I see,” Spike said, concern mounting in his voice.
“So. Let’s get to reading,” Rainbow Dash said to Spike as she nodded impatiently to the stack of papers.
With a sigh and a shrug, Spike began to read.
“You, uh, have a very… interesting way of writing, Rainbow Dash,” he said as he moved his head towards the papers, squinting.
She tilted her head. “Yeah well I don’t exactly have fancy Unicorn powers to move a quill, so I had to be creative.”
Spike held his dexterous hands up in contemplation for thirteen seconds before nodding and returning to reading in silence. Rainbow Dash began tapping her hoof.
“How are the schools in Cloudsdale?” Spike asked, breaking the quiet.
The question startled Rainbow Dash. “Uh…? I guess… boring. School was never my thing. Unless it was flight school.”
“I see. Does Cloudsdale speak a different dialect or use a different writing system?”
“No. Not really.”
“Okay. Did your parents ever, uh, take you to a doctor about, um, reading?”
Rainbow Dash lowered her head to Spike’s level. “No. What are you getting at?”
“Your spelling style is just… really unique. And so is the way you structure a sentence.”
This caused Rainbow Dash to smirk and nod. “Yeah, my teachers always tried to talk to me about that. I don’t remember what they said. Not like it mattered.”
“Uh-huh. So, I guess this is your main character? Prizm Flash?”
The smile across Rainbow Dash’s face grew. “Yep. She’s cool. A lot like me, except instead of having a boring government job, she gets to travel the world with Daring-Do! So awesome. But not as awesome as Daring-Do, of course.”
“Of course not,” Spike agreed flatly as he continued to read. As he set aside another page, he stopped. “Why are you focusing so much on this new character instead of Daring-Do?”
“Everyone already knows Daring-Do. They know she’s awesome. But no one’s ever heard of Prizm Flash. So they need to know she’s great too,” said Rainbow Dash.
“Riiiight,” Spike replied.
“I mean, it just kinda goes without saying, doesn’t it,” Rainbow Dash said to the mostly empty room. “Daring-Do would never go on adventures with a useless pony that couldn’t help her. Right? Right. So I’ve gotta make Prizm Flash as awesome as possible so everyone can believe Daring-Do would take her on.”
“There are illustrations.” Spike said, his tone a mixture of surprise and concern.
“Yep!” replied Rainbow Dash proudly. “I thought everyone would want to see Prizm Flash. My words are good, but they can’t do all the things. And yeah I’m kinda new to the art thing, but I think my drawings turned out pretty good. A few more weeks of practice and I’m sure I can get it to awesome!”
Spike did not react, merely continued reading. Then he stopped, his eyes squinting at what he saw on one particular page.
“That’s Daring-Do and Prizm Flash. And… uh… they’re…” he trailed off.
“Yeah, that’s right after they get out of the Lava Pit Of Doom.”
Spike’s face screwed up into every possible permutation. “It looks like… oh god.”
“What?” Rainbow Dash asked, cocking her head.
Spike rapidly shuffled through the following pages, his eyes widening and his mouth contorted in rising horror with each new revelation.
“That… isn’t even anatomically possible. The spine doesn't work that way. And, her tongue is… in the… with her hoof… why. ‘Your resistance makes my… *ahem*… harder’. Eh?! Yeah, I bet this is where Fluttershy started reading. Poor girl.”
“Is there a problem?” asked Rainbow Dash, suspicious. “Surely you, of anyone in this town, knows a good story when they see it.”
Spike turned to face her. His left eye twitched involuntarily as his mouth hung agape for a few seconds. Eventually he found words.
“Your story is… certainly something,” he concluded.
Rainbow Dash nodded in agreement. “I know, right? Maybe after the fanzine, I’ll send another copy to A.K. Yearling. Or… have you send a copy. Her editor is kind of a jerk. Tch! ‘Restraining Order’. As if any pony or monster in this world can restrain me!”
Spike sighed as he buried his face in his hands. “Y-you know what? Do it. Send this to Yearling. I’m sure she’ll be thrilled to see it. She might even bring you on as a co-writer,” he said as he choked back an unhinged chuckle.
At that, Rainbow Dash’s eyes widened as a grin spread across her face. “Yeah!” She patted Spike on the shoulder with enough power to knock him out of his seat. He lay face-down on the floor as she continued. “That’s exactly what I thought! I knew you were the right one to go to! I’d better take this piece of gold to the Post Office! Thanks a bunch, Spike!”
She gathered up her papers and zoomed out the door quickly enough that several small objects followed in her wake. Spike, meanwhile, refused to budge.
“I wonder if Mayor Mare is up for social drinking today. I could use some.”