Flying beneath shining stars and above clouds of silver, she soared gracefully amidst the peaceful nighttime sky, feeling the cold wind rustle through the feathers in each of her wings. She surveyed the darkened landscape below habitually, as she had always done, making notes of all the scenery and any events that may be taking place beneath her from the skies above. The rolling green plains surrounding Ponyville were empty and dark, and the town below glowed warmly from all of the lights. The moon above her shone down with a peaceful light, and the sun had long since fallen below the horizon.

Nopony seemed to be out at this time of night, but that was what she loved most about her nighttime flights. It gave her space to think and collect her thoughts, reminisce on memories, or just clear her mind from the troubles of the day. But tonight, she didn't think much about what had happened that day. She couldn't remember much anyways. Instead, she dreamed. She manifested cheerful scenarios in her mind about saving somepony heroically, or beating up a bad guy. Or becoming a Wonderbolt.

Her dreams always drifted towards that, ever since she was just a filly. She had spent years of her life fantasizing about it, and as she grew older, they became both more fanciful and realistic as time went on. She worked hard, trained diligently and above all else, she had the heart and determination to become a Wonderbolt. Everypony knew it, including her. Without a doubt, it was an eventuality. An inevitable end to the culmination of all her hard work and perseverance. It was only a matter of time until her dreams would finally be fulfilled.

Suddenly, a bolt of lightning and resounding thunder struck powerfully from above her seemingly from nowhere, startling her and causing her to lose her balance and veer slightly right and downwards as she tried to regain her balance. She tried to lift her right wing up to recover, but suddenly the wind was gusting hard all around her in every direction. Her mind raced at the sudden terror that came into her heart. What's going on? The winds picked up and she was suddenly falling through a thunderstorm as lightning crashed in every direction around her, causing the cloudy gray skies to glow briefly as they did. The air grew colder and wetter as she struggled in agony to save herself. Panicking as she plummeted helplessly through the dark and stormy skies towards the ground, she flailed her wings and hooves in a desperate attempt to regain her balance, but it was to no avail. She dropped out of the darkened gray thunderclouds and could see the ground. Her eyes widened in horror as it approached rapidly beneath her.

With an ear-shattering thud, she smashed forcefully into it and her vision sharply faded to black.

Rainbow Dash flailed helplessly underneath the covers of her bed, crying out in a perceived agony from crashing into the ground. A few agonizing moments passed, her heart beating so hard and rapidly that she could feel the blood pulsating in her extremities. Her body was frozen stiff from shock and her eyes widened completely staring up at the ceiling above her, her mind in a state of daze and confusion. It was at this moment that she remembered the countless nightmares every night for the past several days, every one of them similar to the last. All of them started and ended the same; a cruel self-inflicted punishment brought on by her own subconscious.

As her heart still beat rapidly as she tried to calm herself down, a nurse rushed into her room in the dead of the night and flipped on the light switch. "Rainbow Dash, are you okay?"

Rainbow Dash propped herself up from the bed with her wing, untangling her hooves from the blankets on top of her. "...yeah," she replied with a deep sorrow in her voice.

The nurse sighed deeply. "Is it the dreams again?"

"...yeah," she repeated once more, this time more quietly.

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

She pondered for a brief moment, but nothing came to mind. There was nothing anypony could do to help her now. She felt hopeless. She replied with a barely audible 'no' as she stifled an urge to cry. Not wanting to talk about it to this pony, Rainbow Dash pulled the covers over herself with her one good wing and pushed her face into the pillow, her tears absorbing into the soft, silky fabric.

The nurse frowned again and flipped the lights off before walking out of the room. "You have some visitors coming tomorrow," she said through the crack of the door before slipping out of the room completely. "I'm sure they're very excited to see you soon."

I know, thought Rainbow Dash. It had been several days since the incident occurred, but she wasn't in any shape to have visitors until just now. The doctors had tried their best to reconstruct her wing, but it was simply too badly damaged to fully repair. She wondered for a moment if maybe there was some way she could ever get it back to its former state, but quickly gave up on the thought. Who am I kidding, she thought to herself, half my wing isn't even THERE. A sob welled up in her throat as she looked at her right wing. Tattered and sliced from the incident mere days ago. She had broken and fractured bones before, but this wasn't something a Pegasus could come back from. The doctors had told her that she could get a prosthetic, but it wouldn't ever be as good as the real thing. She wasn't being pessimistic either. This was as real a tragedy as it could get, short of dying of course. She would never be able to fly nearly as well as she had before, and she would be partially disabled for the rest of her life.

She would never become a Wonderbolt.

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