Rainbow Dash didn’t fall asleep easily that night, and when she did, it was fitful. Upon waking, she found she had sweated through her sheets, and immediately she was beset with a tight abdomen and throat; an antsy urge in her body that made her alert within seconds. She sat up stiff and with a mild headache. A glance at her clock told her it was nearly four in the morning. Her alarm still had yet to go off. Across the room, Sunset was still sleeping.

Grumbling, Rainbow kicked off her damp sheets and went to take a shower. In the stall, as the water stream wet her hair and trailed down her taut body, her thoughts became plagued with a certain bashful pre-vet student. Rainbow Dash held her breath and stood with her face in the stream. The heavy droplets struck her lips, and they tingled with the memory of Fluttershy’s soft fingers, sticky and sweet from butterscotch ice cream. She shuddered and let her chin fall to her chest, her lungs sucking in air. She glared down at her feet, watching the water stream from her head to the stall floor—and again, her mind flashed with the sight of Fluttershy staring up at her, her big blue eyes wide, her lovely chest heaving from that time Rainbow had made her chair tip backwards in the library. The athlete groaned, her fingers digging into her eyes.

Damn it, Dash. Stop it. You’re tougher than this!

Rainbow reached for the body wash. After squeezing some onto a loofa, she started to scrub her body. It was when she passed the loofa along her left side that she flinched, the nerves along her skin firing up the memory of Fluttershy’s body pressed up against her from when they were in the dressing room. Rainbow bared her teeth and hastily rinsed herself.

When she was through showering, she got dressed and started to prepare her duffel bag for the gym. Her eyes felt scratchy and her movements were lethargic. One moment she’d be searching for clean socks, only to get distracted momentarily and forget what she was doing entirely. She’d sit down to sort through her bag, stand up and pace, then sit down again, staring into space. All the while, little thoughts continued to invade her focus:

Why did Fluttershy have to say Bulk Biceps? Why?

I can’t be crushing on her. I just can’t.

Am I going to see her before tonight?

My dad’s right. I’m too soft.

This is Sunset’s fault. It’s like she flipped a switch!

What am I going to write for Shy’s song?

Can I see her before tonight?

When Rainbow Dash had finally gathered everything she needed, she looked to the clock and realized with a start that she was late by almost an hour.

“Damn!” She grabbed her duffel and hurried to the door, but she jerked to a stop when Sunset’s alarm went off.

Her roommate groaned and slammed the device off. Rubbing at her eyes, she raised her head and squinted at Rainbow Dash. “Dashie?” she mumbled. “You’re still here?” Sunset looked at her clock in confusion. “I didn’t wake up early, did I?”

“No,” Rainbow said with some tension roughening her voice. She stood at the door with her hand on the knob, but didn’t turn it. “I’m running late today.”

“Oh.” Sunset yawned and sat up, scratching at her scalp. She batted her eyes, some of the sleep leaving her as she noticed that Rainbow was practically glaring daggers at her. “Rainbow? You look upset. Something up?”

Rainbow laughed caustically and threw her bag down onto the floor. She leaned back against the door and crossed her arms high on her chest, her shoulders bunched so tight they ached. “Is something up?” she repeated with a sneer. “Oh, I dunno, Sunset. Could it be the weird mind trick you pulled on me last night?”

Sunset stared at her, confusion tensing her face. “Huh?”

Rainbow jabbed a finger in her roommate’s direction as she felt her face heat up with frustration. “You’ve been on my case ever since you found out me and Fluttershy were working together, and now you’ve gone and done some crazy magical pony thing to my brain!”

The other girl let out a disbelieving chuckle. “Are you serious?” Sunset Shimmer sighed and pushed her covers back to place her feet on the floor. She arched an eyebrow. “Rainbow, I didn’t cast a spell on you.”

Rainbow kicked at her duffel bag. “Then how do you explain what I’m feeling right now, huh? Four days ago, everything was normal. Now I’m—!” She broke off, her hands clenching and unclenching like she could grab the spirit of her problems and strangle the life out of it.

“You’ve got feelings for Fluttershy, Rainbow,” Sunset finished, as if stating that the sky was blue.

“No way!” Rainbow snarled. She winced and buried her hands in her hair. “I mean, I can’t.”

“But do you want to?”

Rainbow squinted one eye. “What kind of question is that?”

Sunset took a deep breath. Slowly, she said, “What I meant was—the feelings and thoughts you’re having about Fluttershy…do they all feel unpleasant to you?”

Rainbow blushed and shrugged one shoulder. “I mean…no, but—”

“You feel conflicted because you were only supposed to appeal to her crush on you, to convince her to do your project, but now you’re wondering how you can do that if you actually have a crush on her too.”

“Well, yeah. But it’s more than just that!” Rainbow sighed roughly and brushed her hair back with both hands. “My dad told me not to get attached. He doesn’t want me dating between now and the championships because he thinks it’ll dull my edge.”

Sunset scowled. “He has no business dictating your personal life. He doesn’t own you, Rainbow.”

Rainbow Dash tensed, instinctively wanting to defend her father, but she was held back as she recalled what Star Weld had said to Fluttershy the night before:

That’s pretty fair, sis. Okay. You can date.

The athlete frowned and looked down at her sneakers.

I wish it was that easy with my dad…

Sunset stood and started to make her bed. She glanced over at Rainbow. “I told you I wouldn’t get on your case about what was going on between you and Fluttershy. You know why?”

Rainbow shrugged half-heartedly.

Sunset smiled at her as she tucked her blankets in. “Because I had a feeling this would happen.”

The athlete stared as her roommate smoothed out her comforter, then straightened and fluffed her pillows. Sunset went into the bathroom and shut the door. By that point Rainbow Dash still hadn’t moved. Behind the door, the shower head turned on, the stall squeaking shut.

She knew? How could she know!? What is she? Psychic? Then Rainbow’s eyes widened. Woah…hold the phone!

---

Sunset Shimmer had just put the shampoo into her hair when she heard the bathroom door burst open and Rainbow shouted:

“Sunset, did you read my mind!?”

Sunset screamed, her body hitting the back of the shower stall as her heart beat faster than a hummingbird’s wings. Her eyes opened, some of the shampoo suds trickling into them, and she yelped in pain. “Ow, ow, ow!” She put her face into the water stream and gingerly tried to rinse her eyes of the painful shampoo. “Darn it, Rainbow Dash, have you completely lost it!? In case you haven’t noticed, I’m in the shower!”

“Sunset Shimmer, you had better answer me!” Rainbow said from outside. Her voice sounded hoarse. “Answer me, Sun, cause I am freaking out!”

“What for?” Sunset snapped. “You’re acting like the world is ending!” She growled and stuck her head under the water stream, scrubbing the shampoo away as quickly as she could. “It’s just a crush, Rainbow! Not terminal cancer!”

“But you said you saw this coming!”

“No! I said I had a feeling this would happen to you! In no way was that a premonition via Equestrian magic! I’m kind of insulted you’d think I’d invade your privacy like that… Hint, hint.” Sunset stepped out of the stream and finally dared to open her still-stinging eyes. She glared at the vague human-shape of Rainbow through the stall door. Her roommate was leaning on the bathroom sink with her head hanging. Sunset’s expression cleared.

Oh. She really is torn up about this.

With a heavy sigh, she opened the stall door and peeked out, her two-tone hair dripping onto the floor. “Rainbow Dash, you wanna know how you and Fluttershy looked to me? How you both looked to all of us?”

Rainbow looked at her, tension writ across her face.

Sunset’s gaze softened. “You looked like bad timing.”

The other girl snorted, her rainbow bangs falling into her squinted eyes. “What does that even mean?”

“Your first girlfriend was Lightning Dust—”

“Yeah? So?” Rainbow looked away, but Sunset could see her grip on the sink tighten, and the muscles cord in her forearms.

Sunset’s brow wrinkled. “So Fluttershy was still sorting out what she felt when you two were dating. By the time she accepted that she liked you, you’d sworn off anything serious. But I think the moment you knew she had a thing for you, a part of you became interested. That’s totally normal! It doesn’t mean you didn’t think she was pretty or nice before—obviously you two are friends—but sometimes a door has to open for a person to realize they can even look inside.”

“Sunset, get to the point!” Rainbow groaned.

Sun pursed her lips. “The problem, Rainbow, is that if you’re going to get into a relationship with Fluttershy, the only thing it’s ever going to be is serious. That’s what kept you from seriously considering Shy, up until this project thing forced you two together. Now that it’s staring you in the face, it freaks you out.”

“I’m not scared!” Rainbow snarled through her teeth.

“No?” Sunset snapped. “So then what did you interrupt my shower for?”

“Because you still forget to lock the door, and I wouldn’t even be feeling this way if you hadn’t toyed with my head last night!” Rainbow struck the sink with a fist. “None of this was on my radar a few days ago! Now all of a sudden, I’m like—mushy and sappy and—gah!” Rainbow kicked the cabinet beneath the sink.

Sunset shook her head. “Rainbow, think back for a minute… When you started dating Lightning Dust, how long did it take for you to fall for her?”

Rainbow shot her a withering look.

The former-Equestrian rolled her eyes. “How long did it take for you to ‘get the hots’ for her?”

Rainbow Dash shrugged. “Not long?”

Sunset raised an eyebrow. “Exactly. There’s a reason they say ‘love strikes like an arrow’.”
She shut the stall door to resume her shower. Just as she squeezed some conditioner onto her hand, she stiffened, her gaze taking on a dangerous glint. “Rainbow Dash, earlier, did you say I forgot to lock the bathroom door ‘again’?”

Her roommate let loose an awkward cough. “I’ll just, uh…leave now.”

---

Rainbow ended up going to the gym, if only because she knew that skipping her workout wouldn’t help her mood. Today she was focusing on her lower muscle groups, and it was when she was in the middle of her split squats, an idea came to her. It got her so excited, she nearly stopped training right then to go back to campus. Rainbow managed to control herself, and finished her workout—though she did cut out on sauna time and shortened her shower just to leave faster. As she left the gym and hurried to her car, she dialed Sunset Shimmer on her phone. It rang several times before going to voicemail.

“Hey, it’s Sunset! I’m either in class, or asleep. Leave a message and—”

Rainbow Dash ground her teeth and ended the call. If I was a physics major, where would I be right now? she wondered as she started her car.

When she arrived on campus, she actually had to stop at the visitor’s center for a map of the university. Due to the size of Everfree, there were plenty of areas that Rainbow Dash had never even set foot in. After a minute of searching, she found the Physics Building on the map. It was on the eastern side of campus, closer to the city streets, and a ten minute walk.

Rainbow set off, a determined look on her face. That day she had her survey class on urban sociology, but in contrast to her psychology lecture with Dr. Axon, it was very lax. She had no intention of sitting in on another dummy session. She’d email her instructor with some excuse about soccer or illness. Her classmates did it all the time.

Besides, if I sit still, I might just explode, she thought with a tense scowl.

The Physics Building was squat and concrete with heavy dark wood doors at the greek-style entrance. Inside, the conditioned air made Rainbow Dash shiver. She paused to raise an eyebrow at the large Foucault pendulum swaying side to side as it made lines in a sand pit in the middle of the lobby. A staircase wound its way up, around the structure. A hallway also branched ahead of Rainbow, and voices echoed softly.

She decided to start her search on the first floor. After poking her head into a number of rooms, some with ongoing classes, she failed to find Sunset. It was upstairs, passing one of the smaller research rooms that Rainbow’s ear tweaked from a familiar voice—

“Spike, did I pack that research paper on bosonization?”

Rainbow doubled back and poked her head through the open door, and her eyes fell on Twilight Sparkle gazing sternly down at her faithful talking dog, Spike, who was sitting on a round table. They were standing in a room barely bigger than an average office. Sunset Shimmer was just behind the other girl, standing at a whiteboard covered in equations. From the looks of things, Rainbow surmised they had reserved the room to work on the project they had mentioned at their group’s last dinner.

Spike’s head tilted to the side. “Um… I saw it on your desk?”

Twilight crossed her arms. “Yes, but did I pack it?”

His furry face bunched. “Twi, just because I was in your backpack doesn’t mean I know everything you keep in it! I don’t even know how bo-so-nye-zay-shion is even spelled!”

“B-o-s-o-n-i—”

The dog put a paw on his face. “Oh brother…”

Sunset glanced over her shoulder at them. “Don’t worry, Twilight. I think I have a copy of that paper you’re talking about—” She froze as her gaze landed on Rainbow Dash.

The athlete entered, shutting the door behind her. “Sunset! Geez, I’ve been looking all over for you!”

Sunset put the marker down and turned to stare at her as if she’d grown a new head. “Rainbow? What in the world are you doing here? Don’t you have class?”

Rainbow shrugged the question off as she approached, opting instead to greet the others. “Hey Sci-Twi—I mean,” she winced at the pout the nerdy girl gave her, “Twilight Sparkle.” Rainbow held up a fist and Spike bumped it with his paw. “Sup, Spike!”

“Rainbow, not to make you feel unwelcome, but I hope you aren’t here for that thing we were talking about this morning,” Sunset Shimmer warned. “We’re kind of in the middle of something important, here.”

Rainbow Dash squinted at the equations on the board. She understood none of them. “Uh, yeah. Real egghead business, I’m sure.” She stepped closer to Sunset and put an arm on her shoulder, turning her away from the others. Under her breath, she said, “So listen, I’ve got an idea that can solve everything.”

Sunset groaned, one hand covering her face. “Rainbow Dash, no! Not this again!”

Undeterred, Rainbow whispered eagerly, “You can cast a spell on me that makes my crush go away!”

Her roommate let her hand drop from her eyes to level a stare so profoundly frustrated, even the athlete pulled back.

“What?” Rainbow said defensively. “I’m asking you for a favor!”

“As opposed to accusing me of magicking your brain against your will like last time?” Sunset shot back.

“Yeah! That’s better, right?”

“No,” Sunset snapped out loudly, making Rainbow jerk away in surprise. “No, that is not better, Rainbow! Honestly, I am trying to be sympathetic to your situation, really I am, but this is starting to get ridiculous!”

Rainbow jabbed a finger into Sunset’s shoulder. “Hey, buddy. I wouldn’t even be in this mess if it weren’t for you!”

Sunset’s jaw dropped. “Ex-cuse me!?”

“Yeah! You heard me, Sunset Shimmer! If you hadn’t started guilt-tripping me, I wouldn’t have found myself feeling what I am!”

Sunset’s nostrils flared as she took a deep, deep breath. With closed eyes and exaggerated calm, she said, “Dash, I know you’re probably under a lot of stress, and it’s true, you’re caught between a rock and a hard place, but nothing will be solved by throwing around blame and trying to chase quick fixes.”

“So you can do it, though?” Rainbow pressed.

Sunset’s lips pursed. “You can’t erase emotions, even in magic.”

“Erase emotions?” Twilight asked. They both turned to look at her. She had a quizzical look on her face. “Why would you want to do that, Rainbow?”

“Because she can’t handle things on her own like a big girl, that’s why,” Sunset muttered irately.

“What did you say!?” Rainbow sputtered, her body flushing hot. “You had better take that back, Sun!”

“Or what?” Sunset said with a look of suffering. “You’ll punch my lights out?” She snorted and shook her head. “Rainbow, you have got to see that this stuff you’re feeling is not a bad thing! You can’t wish it, bribe it, or threaten it away!”

“But what is she so upset about?” Twilight interjected, making them look at her again.

“It’s none of your—!” Rainbow broke off as her eyes widened. “Actually…” She smiled slyly and glanced at Sunset. “You can help me instead.”

Sunset Shimmer gave her a death glare. “Rainbow, don’t you dare—!”

“If there really isn’t a spell that can make me stop feeling what I am,” Rainbow said to Twilight, “Then maybe you can make me forget the stuff that’s causing them? There’s gotta be a spell for erasing memories, right?”

Sunset cut in before Twilight could answer. “Bad idea.” She looked at Twilight. “Just ignore her. She doesn’t know what she’s asking!”

Twilight frowned at her, “But I still don’t understand!” She looked at Rainbow and adjusted her thick glasses. “Rainbow Dash, if you really want me to agree to try this, I’m going to need the full story to decide. Especially if I’d be doing it against the advice of Sunset.”

Rainbow grimaced but pulled out a chair at the table. She took a deep breath. “Okay…” She glared up at Twilight. “But you can’t tell anybody! It’s all just a misunderstanding anyway!”

Twilight sat down in a chair opposite of Rainbow, and Spike jumped into her lap.
“All right,” she said with laced hands and a professional tone. “Tell me the whole story.”

By the time Rainbow was through recounting the major events of the week, and all her reasonings for her decisions, over forty minutes had passed by and Sunset Shimmer was erasing the equations on the whiteboard with a sense of slow defeat.

“So much for our project,” she mumbled.

“I can’t believe Rainbow Blaze would sanction such a bad idea!” Twilight exclaimed.

Spike growled in her lap. “If I saw Blaze, I’d bite him!”

“Guys, come on. He’s still my dad,” Rainbow muttered with discomfort. “The point is, I get that my idea was a crappy one. So, I think… I think I won’t be able to go through with it.”

“Thank Celestia!” Sunset sighed as she wiped the last of the equations off the whiteboard. “It took you long enough to see that!”

“But that still doesn’t entirely solve my problems! I still need Fluttershy’s help to finish my project, but I can’t be crushing on her the whole time!” Rainbow said, her voice strained to the point of reediness.

Twilight stood to her feet, displacing Spike. Her hand was rubbing her chin. “Rainbow, you’ve told me your reasons for wanting me to cast the spell… Do you want me to help you?”

Rainbow perked up. “You mean you’ll do it?”

Twilight Sparkle held up a finger. “First, I want to make some things clear.” She went to the whiteboard and drew a circle. Inside of it, she wrote Fluttershy’s name. From it, she drew three lines, and three more circles. In the left circle, she wrote in Pros, in the right, Cons, and at the top, Facts.

Pushing her glasses up her nose, Twilight Sparkle looked at a bemused Rainbow and tapped Cons. “You told me the cons of starting a relationship with Fluttershy from your perspective. Those were…” She started writing more branches on the web. “Your dad feeling like you betrayed him; your competitive edge being dulled; your belief that you and Fluttershy are incompatible due to her demure nature; and your concern that a relationship with Fluttershy will only ruin your friendship.”

“Right,” Rainbow said, scratching her head. “And what’s ‘facts’ doing up there?”

“I’ll get to that,” Twilight said, moving to the other side of the board. She started drawing branches on the Pros side of the web. “You gave me plenty of negatives. But it wouldn’t be a crush if there wasn’t something you enjoyed about Fluttershy. Can you give me some positives?”

Rainbow stiffened in her chair, her gaze falling to her lap as her cheeks tinged pink. “Uh…”

Spike went to sit at her feet, his ears perking up. “Come on, Rainbow. It’s Flutters!” He wagged his tail. “Someone who gives belly rubs as good as she does has got to have lots of nice qualities!”

Sunset and Twilight giggled at him.

Rainbow smiled weakly. “Yeah.” She rubbed the back of her neck and said to her knees: “Um, well, her hair smells nice.” She swallowed through a tight throat and mumbled. “It smells like lavender. And mint, I think.” She cast a sideways look at Sunset. “Like those teas you’re always drinking.”

Twilight nodded and wrote the note down. “Great! What else?”

Rainbow slouched in her seat and bounced one knee. “She…looks good in a skirt?”

“All right.”

“She’s great at music. I like the lyrics she writes, and she has a pretty rad singing voice.”

“Really?” Sunset cut in, taking Twilight’s seat across from Rainbow. “But I remember it being hard to get her to speak up just for sound checks on the backup mics!”

Rainbow grinned, her head lolling back to rest against the back of the chair. Her eyes stared through the ceiling as her head became filled with Fluttershy’s singing. “She’s been hiding some aces up her sleeve, I think.”

“Grr-eat…singing…vo-ice…” Twilight said slowly as she wrote the note down. “Fantastic. Next?”

“She has a cute laugh, and I like her blue eyes. She kind of glides when she walks. Watching her eat ice cream is really interesting. She has great taste in lingerie—” Rainbow’s eyes widened and she looked at the others. Sunset and Twilight were blushing. The athlete sank deeper into her seat. “N-nevermind…”

Twilight cleared her throat. “Er, what else?”

Rainbow twirled a finger through the air. “She twirls her hair around her index finger when she gets nervous. Usually it’s whenever she wants to ask a question or has to point something out.” The athlete’s eyes closed, and she continued absently: “She pouts when she feels like I’m teasing her, too. It’s cute, and stuff. Makes me want to keep messing with her. That would have felt impossible before, because I woulda been afraid of making her cry or something—I freaking hate it when she cries—but now I know when I start to go too far with her when she turns into Mothershy—”

Spike snickered. “‘Mothershy!’ That’s a good one!”

Rainbow chuckled, casting him an amused glance. When the laughter faded, she puckered her lips in thought for a moment. Then she murmured, “I know she can be a doormat, and that totally annoys me, but...I get the sense that she has these limits. All you gotta do is tap ‘em, then wham!” She sighed wistfully, her eyes turning lidded. “Even then, for her to even say anything at all is like, huge for her. That’s kinda sorta brave, I guess? She’s still kind of a wuss, but she makes you wanna cheer for her. It pisses me off that she always puts herself second, though.” Rainbow’s brow wrinkled. “Like, who’s being nice for Fluttershy? Who’s looking out for her when she’s bending over backwards being all sweet and kind to everyone else? Did you guys know they treat her like crap at her job? It makes me wanna go over there and—arrgh!” Rainbow ruffled her hair.

“Er… Rainbow?” Twilight prompted.

Rainbow Dash looked at her bookish friend. The other girl had on a pursed smile as she gestured at the white board. The corner that had been dedicated to pros had run out of space. Rainbow bolted upright, her eyes going wide. “No way!” she exclaimed.

Sunset Shimmer crossed her arms and smirked at the board. “Hmm… Twilight, correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe Dashie forgot she was just listing pros for your mind map there!”

Twilight smiled, one eyebrow arching. “I think you are correct, Sun!”

Rainbow got to her feet, her face burning red. “Now hold on just a second. We already knew I was crushing, okay? The point is that this stuff—” she gestured at the pros, “Doesn’t outweigh that stuff!” she gestured at the cons.

Twilight raised the dry erase marker with an eager grin. “I thought you’d say that!” She started writing at the top of the mind map, over Facts. “One. We can establish that Fluttershy is a timid and primarily non-confrontational person—except under certain extreme and special circumstances. I can confirm this. Do you also confirm this, Sunset?”

Sunset was leaning on her chair’s armrest with her fist against her temple and a wry half-smile on her lips. “I do,” she said.

Twilight nodded perfunctorily. “Two. By your own personal observations, Rainbow, we know that Fluttershy does not wish to be limited by her own weaknesses. Sunset, why do we know this is true?”

“You mean besides all those times she fought alongside her friends to stop a magical threat from taking over the world?” Twilight and Sunset smirked at each other. Rainbow detected an inside joke. “Because,” Sun continued with a toss of her hair. “When we first started performing as the Sonic Rainbooms, Fluttershy struggled with a debilitating stage fright that made it impossible for her to even participate during private practices.” She raised her eyebrows and looked at Rainbow. “She overcame that in just a few weeks, just in time for the Battle of the Bands. She did this because she wanted to be there for her friends.”

“This is super interesting, but what point are you guys trying to make?” Rainbow snapped.

Twilight was already writing her next note. “So thanks to deductive reasoning, we can determine that while it’s true Fluttershy suffers from a variety of anxieties that hold her back, she actively struggles against these anxieties in an attempt to be there for others and improve her own life.” Twilight Sparkle paused to grin over at a nonplussed Rainbow over her shoulder. “Your belief that you and Fluttershy would not work out because she’s too shy and you’re too aggressive… Well, that doesn’t hold up too good, in light of the evidence explored. You see, what Fluttershy both wants and needs,” Twilight started drawing new branches and circles with a feverish energy. “Is for someone who will push her out of her comfort zone. Not someone who will treat her with kid gloves.”

“In other words,” Sunset Shimmer said with a gentle smile at Rainbow. “She needs a catalyst.”

Rainbow blinked at her. Slowly, she said, “I know you think that’s supposed to clear things up for me, but—”

“They mean, Fluttershy needs a kick in the butt, not a lollipop and a pat on the head,” Spike clarified.

“Ohhh!” Rainbow said, nodding. “Now I gotcha.”

Twilight, now sporting an annoyed frown, cleared her throat. “Yes, well… Given that conclusion, this further cancels out your concern that simply entering into a relationship with Fluttershy would somehow ruin your friendship. The romance itself wouldn’t do that. Only your intentions, should you decide to end the relationship, have that capability. The solution to that? Don’t try to hurt her on purpose. It’s simple.” Twilight started scribbling out more notes. “As we all know, Fluttershy is incapable of holding a grudge, and you are far too loyal, Rainbow, to turn your back on a friend just because things didn’t work out.”

“And what about my focus for soccer?” Rainbow argued obstinately. “My dad has a point! If I’m dating, I’ll just get distracted!”

“Weren’t you dating Lightning Dust during soccer season in high school?” Sunset asked with a frown.

Rainbow looked at her in surprise. “I think so?”

Twilight snapped her fingers. “Sun, you’re right. Rainbow was a nervous wreck halfway through the season because she didn’t want to have to compete against Crystal Prep! Lightning Dust was their team captain, right?”

“Yeah, she was,” Rainbow answered acerbically. “And you know what? That season sucked because I had to choose between my girlfriend and doing right by my team!”

Sunset shrugged. “Fluttershy isn’t a soccer player. You both go to the same school. What I was trying to make clear to you, was that you can maintain your competitive edge while in a relationship. You beat Crystal Prep back then, didn’t you?”

“I did.” The athlete’s fists clenched. “And you know how that turned out afterwards, Sunset,” Rainbow muttered resentfully, her hand reaching up to touch just under her right eye. She could almost feel the pain again.

Sunset flinched, her gaze averting. “You’re right. I do remember how that turned out. But you know what?” She dared to meet Rainbow’s eyes again. “Fluttershy will never do that to you.”

Rainbow exhaled hard through her nose and paced in a tight circle in front of the whiteboard. Her eyes scanned Twilight’s slanted handwriting, the scrawled words taunting her in bright red marker.

It can’t be this easy… Can it?

“That still leaves my dad,” Rainbow said, putting her hands on her hips and shifting her weight to one foot. “He’ll think I’m stabbing him in the back!”

Twilight snorted. “Blaze? Oh, that solution is easy.” She drew a crude picture of Blaze’s head and crossed it out. “He’s a big jerk and you should just ignore him.”

“An excellent conclusion, Twilight Sparkle,” Sunset Shimmer said with a slow clap.

Twilight gave a flourishing bow.

Rainbow threw her hands up into the air. “Well I appreciate that you two think this is one big joke, but I’m still out of luck!” She glared at Twilight. “So after all this, I guess you’re trying to tell me the spell is a no-go?”

Twilight Sparkle bit her lip and shrugged. “I’m sorry, Rainbow. I have to agree with Sunset—you’re making this into something bad, when in fact, it could be very good for you!”

Rainbow groaned and buried her face in her hands. “I’m doomed!”

“Aw, cheer up, Rainbow Dash,” Spike said. She looked down at him, and his furry face pressed up into a smile. “If you can’t get rid of your feelings… Why not enjoy them? I know when I’ve got an itch, I always feel better when I scratch it!”

Rainbow nodded slowly. She wagged a finger at the dog. “Y’know what, Spike? Maybe…” she frowned, her eyes glazing. “Maybe you’re right. I just have to scratch the itch, and then things will just work out. They’ve got to, one way or another, right?”

Sunset Shimmer snorted into laughter as Twilight tossed the dry erase marker onto the floor. “You agree when my dog tells you it’s okay? Really?” she huffed. She swept an arm at the white board. “What about my mind map!?”

Rainbow knelt down to scratch Spike behind his ear, making him lean into her hand with his tongue lolling. “What?” she said with a teasing grin. “The guy’s a genuine canine philosopher!”

Next Chapter: Chapter 13 Estimated time remaining: 11 Hours, 50 Minutes