It's day after that crazy race, and I mostly just want to sleep in, but oh no, Ponyville's most overqualified weather technician has a shcedule to keep. Get out of bed, shake the wisps off, and just keep trying to open those eyes or they'll take forever to adjust.
I looked out my bedroom window, and casually propped myself up against the cloudy frame as I rubbed my eyes with a fretlock. A slow yawn helped, and I felt the brisk air wake me from already forgotten dreams. "Okay, start your preflight checklist." I said to the empty air as I stared out, my mind already aloft, charting courses long before my body could follow.
Perfect summer sky. A few clouds blew in overnight, just enough to build a simple course with later. The sun is already high in the eastern sky, perfect for flying straight downwind. Humidity? A little, but not enough yet to worry about overheating. The updrafts are weak, but they'll be helpful, and get better as the temperature rises.
I stretched once, then stepped away from the window, heading down to the lower levels, even though I used to launch myself out the window in the morning and glide back in that night, I now had RESPONSIBILITIES. ME. A few years ago, this house was halfway to turning feral again and could have dropped everything I had collected all across the countryside. I probably wouldn't have noticed for days if it had happened.
Flight mantras ticked through my head as I fought to keep jumping out each window I passed. That was a luxury a rainbow filly had to give up. Check yourself just as much as you check the weather. Eyes both adjusted to daylight, and no joints feel stiff or loose. Every muscle limber and strong, but a few tiny twinges that could be a sign my diet is lacking, that I overexerted them yesterday and they only just noticed, or they're just as restless as me. Be sure to make a note, better safe than sorry. I jumped the last few steps, wings spreading to glide a short distance. I promptly veered off course and bounced off the wall, wobbling as I landed heavily.
"Oh yeah, that feather." I muttered to myself as I reached the simple kitchen. I grabbed an apple from the basket where I stuffed the coldest clouds I could find, and supplimented the quick and easy breakfast with a large cup of water, poured right from the house's condenser unit. That bit of magic made up a large percentage of the house's value, especially considering how far it lay from any of the major flight paths. I'd probably make more bits if I just bundled that up, sold it in cloudsdale, and let the rest of the place go feral. It looked absurd when I got the place, and it still does, but the place had grown on me over the years, even if most of the time it was just a place to rest and recouperate between training flights.
I sat down on one of the pair of pony seats to examine the errant feather, an uncooperating member of Team Rainbow Dash. I took a large bite of the apple, considering my options. Crushed under a boulder just a day ago, I should be glad I got away with the rest of myself in one piece. I had recovered yesterday to return home yesterday evening, even if Fluttershy had helped bring Tank to his home in the cloud. I was able to fly yesterday, maybe it had just weakened, and I outright broke it by letting it fold over in my sleep. Not cool.
"It's going to take ages for you to grow back. I just can't leave you in, that crushed shaft will disrupt my airstream. But if you're taken out I'll be so unbalanced there's no way I could fly straight!" I heard a small grunt, and turned to see Tank at the doorway, small wrinkled head tilted to one side.
"Um, Morning! I wasn't talking to you!" I tried to explain, which clearly made things worse as he looked down at the ground. Oh crud. "No, I didn't mean it like that!" I squeaked, my voice breaking for a moment as I explained. "I... was talking to my feather." I finally admitted.
Tank lumbered in, walked around me, and looked down at my wing. A quiet mumble, as if the large tur-- tortoise actually understood my problem, and then wandered out of the kitchen, presumably to do tortoise things.
Finishing the apple, I stood up, grabbed one of the training notebooks scattered around the house, and a short pencil, perfect for my poor penmaresship. Turning to the daily page, I saw it was marked as a day a few years ago, but didn't pay it any mind. One side had a top-down view of an adrogynous pegasus, legs and wings stretched uncomfortably outward to show all the major muscle groups and feathers. It looked slightly rediculous, a pose a real pony would adopt only if they had stalled and were minimizing vertical airspeed.
Of course, I never stalled.
A small circle on rear right calf, another on rear left thigh, and a one-word note "twinge". I gave a sigh, and put an ugly asterisk over my right wing's outermost feather. I didn't want to write what that meant, but a single word note would be better than nothing. Beside the diagram, I wrote "cracked".
Shoving the notebook across the table, I buried my head in the table. Yes, I pushed at the cloudy surface until I felt it surround my head, blocking out the events of the last few days. Stupid Dash for racing through the gorge. Careless Dash for not looking where she was going. And worst of all, I just knew what would happen if I went crawling to Twilight or one of the nurse unicorns to get it mended, I'd be told off for being such a showoff, for begging for help on what they'd see as a tiny injury compared to how much worse it could have been.
But flying was, no, is who I am, I can't just become an old kite for months while I wait for the feather to regrow, if I pulled out the feather now, ouch, I'd be completely unbalanced. I could pull out the feather on my other wing, DOUBLE OUCH, but I'd lose so much lift I'd be nowhere near my fastest for months, even that pegasus filly could outfly me without breaking a sweat.
With a resigned sigh, I pulled my head out of the table, hooves smoothing the indentation out of the surface. I extended my right wing, eyes already clenched shut as I anticipated the pain of tearing the feather from the pinion.
And my wing, rather than extending fully, collided with a hard object that hadn't been there last time I looked. "Huh? Tank? You're back already?" I looked at him in confusion. "Did I forget something you needed?" I asked before seeing what he held in his mouth. A toothbrush. I was not going to be using that one again. "What's that for?" I asked, willing to wait him out, mainly to put off the self-mutilation.
He simply waved the brush around, rubbing the bristles across the feather's shaft. "Yes, brushie brushie, I appriciate the gesture, but it won't fix... Oh! You're a genius!" I jumped up in excitement. The solution wasn't perfect, I'd still have a tiny imbalance, but no more than a less than perfectly balanced sidebag set, and best of all, no stupid lecture before it's fixed!
I galloped down the hall to the bedroom, and snatched up the floss in my teeth, and returned just as fast, eager to put the plan to action. I stood up by the table, laid out my wing on the table, and over the course of several minutes, false starts, and yelps of pain, we righted the damaged shaft, aligned the brush to it, and slowly bound it in place, breaking the fine blue barbs in as few places as possible.
Once the Rainbow Tank team had tied it as firmly as I dared, I gave an experimental flap. Near perfect balance. "Woohoo! Yeah! I'm a-- We're a regular Machoover!" I lightly rattled my forehooves on Tank's shell while I cheered, relaxing into a smile as I saw his wide eyes, and a small smile he'd been building since I started my cheer. "I've GOT to try this out!" I said, getting to the front door as quickly as I dared, and then waited for Tank. And then waited some more. YEARS later, we stepped outside, and I was surprised to see it was still daylight.
"Well, here goes nothing!" I exclaimed as I headed toward the edge of the cloud bank, reached a gallop, spread my wings and ran off the edge. Once airborne, I stretched myself into the optimal airstream position, rear legs out behind me, forelegs foreward. That first moment where the wind starts to hold your body, when wind and wings both keep you aloft, is absolute bliss. Make your body the same shape as your path, and you don't need to fight the wind, flight wasn't just pointing where you wanted to go and flapping. Each beat of your wings has purpose, the angle of the beat changes your lift and your velocity. Tiny, measured inequalities between how your wings ar all that keep you from a slow turn or a full barrel roll, or an uncontrolled spin ending in a small crater. The way the air touches you can slow you down or speed you up, perhaps in a direction you weren't expecting.
Unicorns say they're the only ones with magic. Earth ponies say they're the strongest. Pegasi let them say that so they don't get jealous. My flight leaves a complete spectrum as a contrail! I can go faster than sound itself! I live in a castle in the sky! I. AM. AWESOME. I. AM. RAINBOW! DASH!
Somewhere wasn't right though. My warmup routine, which helped get me to the point of perfection required for my most advanced stunts, was failing me. Each time I went through the motions, there was imbalance. Focusing on pushing my right wing harder helped for a few beats, and then the imbalance was noticable again. I let up on my left, increased the force on my right, and began a shallow dive, building up airspeed for a slow large loop.
When the wind blowing past me felt strong enough, I began the flight path change, only a fraction of my strength of my good wing in use, all the applied force used in lifting me out of the dive, and as I arched myself up. I gradually dedicated more and more of my speed into the rise, slowing as I reached vertical, slowing father as my wings reached their limits, unable to angle farther back to offer more lift, they stretched to the limit, holding as much air as they could, but in vain. The rushing wind faded. The pressure on my wings was gone. In that single second of silence, I screamed. Then the stall's peak was over, and I started to fall.
A toothbrush and floss! Are you absolutely insane?! My mind raced as I began to fall, and worse, tumble through the air. I curled up, trying to ignore the spinning world around me, staring at the machoovered fix. The floss had come loose, of course. What I hadn't expected was what the floss had done next, which was wrap around the next feather, and with each beat and stretch, shred more barbs from what had once been a perfectly intact feather. I desperately bit at it, only managing to shred more barbs. That way lay madness and worse. Stay calm, remember flight school, you were trained for this even though it never happened to you. Turning my head, I tried to keep facing at least my head in one direction.
The result was a wobbly view of the sky, and my slowly fading contrail, vanishing as I reached the peak of that fatal manouver. That wasn't all though, my contrail reformed into a twisting, chaotic swirl of colors as I plummeted. Maybe actually going out in a rainbow crash would be less humiliating than the alternative. Below me lay the outskirts of Ponyville, but I couldn't tell where I would land, it wouldn't be fair to them to suffer for my idiocy, and someday they'll look past my mistakes and pay attention to my awesomeness.
I gave a sigh, and being glad I didn't have much to eat this morning, I began yet another humiliating sequence. I definitely didn't feel awesome at the moment. My good wing spread out, slowly so as to find my rotation and slow it by feel alone, finally reducing the chaotic spin to a slow rotation head over hooves, my half useless wing came out to help until I was the right way up. Unable to glide straight without risking even more damage, I began a game I remembered from fillyhood. my glide curved, the arc would have grown if I had let it, but I wanted some control over where I landed, so with each rotation I pulled in tighter, the spinning increasing as I decended, shedding most of my vertical momentum as spin. The world was whirling blur but for a single focused point, where I stared and intended to land.
When I hit ground, I only managed a few drunken steps, the world still reeling as I looked up, then fell over. "How can fillies do that for fun?!" I yelled at the air, failing to get my legs back under myself. My stomach tried to rebel, but I managed to keep my small meal down through sheer will. My forelegs wrapped around my head, and they futily tried to stop it and the world spinning in opposite directions.
***
As I felt every internal organ from my brain to my stomach spin, I heard voices. Near, far, near again, I couldn't tell without looking, which I wasn't going to do any time soon.
"Did she fall?" Of course I did, you can probably see the twisted contrail like smoke from my burning dignity.
"Is she okay?" Only a bruised everything, I can get a new one.
"Call a doctor!" I'll be able to walk again once the world stops acting like a carousel, don't bother.
"Twilight! Rainbow Dash just crashed outside!" Oh horseapples, that voice I recognized, heck, I didn't need that to know who would be racing to help.
"Crashed, or crashed crashed?!" Yelled Twilight, and I heard a distant slam as the library door opened hard a hundred ponylengths away.
"I. DO. NOT. CRASH!" I yelled at the unseen Twilight as loud as I could, obviously straining my vocals in the process, which wouldn't help my case if I had any hope of getting away before I triggered one of her lectures.
"Spike, get the crash cart, oh Celestia, she's still concious, traquilizers, we don't want her to hurt herself more!" Twilight yelled as unicorn hooves galloped on the town's packed dirt road. Oh no. A lecture was something I could bear. Being knocked out for spectacularly managing to land without a scratch after ruining more than a quarter of a wing would be just perfect.
The world managed to settle back down, my internal compass finally righting myself. I lifted my head, bobbling around to face the incoming Unicorn of all trades. "I'm fine Twi... Just... practicing emergency landings." I said, getting up one hoof at a time dispite the loud objections that were coming my way, with powerful magic to back up her good intentions.
"No! Stop! You'll hurt yourself more!" Twilight whimpered as she approached, slowing her pace as she got closer, eventually stopping put when she planted her hooves in the dirt, and began to draw all her will up from her body, into casting some kind of spell. I doubted it was a feather fixer upper.
"Ididnotcrashokaythanksbye!" I dropped my head foreward, woah, that nearly toppled me over, and tried to race off, I just needed to get some distance and she'd see I was fine.
I heard another gallopping rhythm overlap my own. She was chasing me? Twilight, The bookmare of Equestria was chasing me, undisputed fastest flier and disputed fastest runner? And I heard her getting closer? She was actually gaining on me? I had to get away now or never, wings don't fail me now!
My right wing didn't get the memo. As it spread to nearly full, I actually felt through my pinions that a third feather had managed to get tangled in the mess. New rule, no string, twine, floss, rope, or any other tanglable line anywhere near my wings. While we're at it, no glue, clay, mud, honey, cream, or any other substance Pinkie Pie has at her disposal, no matter how fun it might sound.
To feel what I felt next, if you're not a pegasus, is probably impossible. The closest analogy I can think of is imagine your forehoof cracking in half, then each side being pulled and twisted in crazy directions. I simply couldn't muffle my scream as my abused wing helped lift me off, veer wildly off course to the right, and out of Twilight's view.
***
"DASH! WHERE ARE YOU?" The yell echoed around me minutes later, after I had landed on the carousel boutique's upper balcony, the perfect place to hide while dealing with this triple ruined wing. Twilight's voice again, but with a reverberation and distance that had to mean a magically amplified voice.
"I'm okay! Stop acting like it's a big deal!" I yelled out, before turning to my huddled wing, it was just a matter of finding one end and unwinding the ugly mess from there before more of my wing was shredded, right?
"IF IT IS NOT, WHY ARE YOU HIDING?" The voice was louder now, closer. It also had a good point. I'd go mute if I tried to explain everything at the top of my lungs, so keep it short.
"Because!" She'll need more than that. "I don't have time to get dragged through a hospital! I don't need another lecture on how many ways that race could have gone worse! I'm fine, really!" Was I making the tangles better or worse? I managed to fumble around and pull a long strand free, but at the same time the tangle had tightened. Second and third feathers were pulled painfully close together, and a dozen of my precious barbs had been littered across the balcony floor.
"YOUR HEALTH IS IMPORTANT, I JUST WANT TO HELP! I WON'T TALK ABOUT THE RACE!" You promise while making sure even deaf ponies will hear about it. She was getting closer. Of course she was getting closer you birdbrain, she's hearing you yell back at her! Maybe I can get Rarity to help stop this chaos and cut this tangle free before Twilight pulls her into her "Save Rainbow Dash from imagined dangers" delusion.
Rather than responding to her goading, I got up and knocked on the balcony's door, hoping Rarity was currently upstairs, hoping she had been muffled enough to not hear my exchange with Twilight. Knock knock knock. Click. The door opened with the slightest touch of the handle. That was odd. Did Rarity forget to close it properly? Is she so sure of that cat's power to maim any bird burgulars? Ooh, does she have a secret pegasus trist planned?
I let myself in, sure I could explain if Rarity was there, otherwise I'd just borrow something to cut myself free, and she'd never know I was here. It definitely felt wrong though, sneaking into Rarity's house was one thing, but sneaking in through her bedroom's door? I pushed at the curtain, a mix of dread and excitement eating at my lungs. I hoped Rarity was there, so I could explain right away and get out. I also saw a small hope that she'd suggest I use the same door again later, even if such an invitation was as likely as me growing a horn.
For better or worse, the room was empty of life. The bed looked like it had never been slept in, and not even that horrid cat was up here. "Okay, operation seagull is go." I whispered, looking around the amazingly large room for my primary goal. The ceiling was so high a three-high pony pryamid could stand inside it with ease. The bed was absolutely enormous, a pony could stretch out in each quadrant and not touch. That conjured even more taudry actions to mind. No! No time for such primitive distractions, you've got feathers to save!
Stacks of drawers, Several closets, more clothing packed away up here than actually for sale in the totality of the town! Not what I need. Scissors? A knife? A file to sharpen a point on my hoof?! If they were in here, I was unlikely to find them without leaving obvious signs of my presence, or worse, finding some secret neither of us deserved exposed. if I was likely to locate something sharp, I'd have to go into the attached bathroom, I'd be sure to find some kind of blade among her silly collection of primping tools. At worst, I could use the tiny cutter on her box of floss.
I stepped over to the smaller of the doors, silently begging gravity to be on my side. Without a single creak of the floor, I reached it, and touched just my ear to the surface, holding my breath and straining to hear any sign of life on the opposite side of the door.
"Rarity! Rarity!" A filly's reathless exclaimations. My head slammed away from the door, mind racing, filling in rather embarressing gaps. Looks like the bathroom was out of bounds. I really should get out of here, and forget these last few minutes ever happened.
A muffled voice took over moments later, presumably the white unicorn's, and I was about to turn and run and forget about being unheard, I didn't want to hear Rarity doing that. What prevented me from announcing my presense with a tromp of hooves was the realization that this voice was far more muffled than a simple door would, and more obviously, was coming from below me. So obviously I leaned down, and rested my head on the floor, which made hearing what the ponies below were saying.
"...a breath Twilight, you look awfully pale!" Just as I thought, she's tracked me down and is going to lasso my other unicorn friend into "helping" me.
"Dash is in trouble!" I haven't done anything wrong! "She just crashed outside the library, but before I could get to her she actually got up again!" What's so bad about that? If you can walk away, it was what we call a Good Landing. "I nearly stopped her, but she took off, and her wing, her wing looked like it had been torn apart, it hurt her but she still managed to take off!"
"Oh Twilight, what could have happened to her?" Oh sure, speculation and rumours. It's flight school all over again.
"She hurt her wing, but wouldn't let me examine it." I told her it was fine, why didn't she just listen to me? "I heard her near here, but I can't find her with my spells. This spell only works if the target wants me to find her." That's good to know. I still don't want to be found. "I think something, maybe somepony attacked her, or she got into an aerial fight, she has to be hiding from whatever did that to her wing." What? An aerial fight?! Even I'm not that crazy! And if I was, I wouldn't have been the one to fall to ponyville, oh no.
I stood up, and entered Rarity's... well, it looked more like a fully stocked private salon than a bathroom. The scents that poured out were intense! Not bad exactly, any one or two of the smells would have been pleasant. This was the nasal equivilant of a thousand ponies all trying to get my undivided attention.