“Are you okay?!” shouts Clear Skies, the pink pegasus mare the first to arrive on the scene. She skids to a stop in her haste to get to the pair, nearly drying out the road all by herself.

Doug groans loudly, “Not this crap.” He lets go of the pickaxe slung over his shoulder, the metal head dropping into the still muddy ground with a wet, sucking plop. His sore muscles, already straining to carry not only the heavy backpack full of gems, but also all the equipment and Rarity’s saddlebags, barely have the strength to raise hands to head, tugging at his hair with clenched fists.

“Are you hurt?” Clear Skies flits right up to Doug’s face, frowning as he gives the longest, most exasperated sigh she’s heard that didn’t turn into a whinny. Hooves reach towards his head, and he doesn’t visibly protest when she gently grips and turns him, peering into his eyes. He stares forward, fuming, trying not to focus on the five pegasi buzzing around him while the last lands next to Rarity.

“No! We’re fine!” Rarity shouts, impeded from reaching her stallion by the swarming pegasi. She pace in place, but only with her hind legs. “I’m fine, he’s fine!”

“He’s not responding!” Clear Skies calls. She points a hoof at Sunshower, then Raindrops. “Get those bags off him! And the coat!” The two yellow pegasi hover near him, hooves grasping at the various straps criss crossing his body. Her frown deepens to a scowl as she glances at Rarity. “Don’t worry, Fluttershy is on her way! Hopefully she’ll know what to do.”

“I can respond just fine,” Doug says acidically, swatting away the two mares trying to pull his packs off of him. They back off, unsure glances aimed at each other. He first unbuckles Rarity’s saddlebags, bandoleered across his chest, and goes to drop them.

“No!” Rarity shouts, her horn lighting and yanking at the bag. “Not the mud!” She winces not just at the exertion; she’d probably need to rest her horn the rest of the day to get back to normal, and she hates living like an earth pony.

Doug merely rolls his eyes as the bags settle on her back, much to the consternation of the pegasus trying to assess her injuries.

A third yellow pegasus enters the fray, Fluttershy’s pink mane a sharp contrast to the two weather pegasi’s blue and purple. She lands, splashing everypony, nearly tumbling from her fast approach. Wings fumble around in the two stuffed saddlebags at her side, pulling out a black capped bottle with clear liquid and a roll of gauze. Her eyes flick over Rarity, then settle on Doug.

Fluttershy’s demand is almost apologetic. “Where’s the injury? Is it so bad it needed to be concealed? Oh, you poor thing!” She flits up to Doug, trying to peer under the heavy trenchcoat.

“Ah’m comin’!” Applejack shouts as she breaks through the orchard to the north. She leaps over the picket fence, one of her smaller carts right behind her. She skids to a stop just in front of the cluster of ponies. “Ah saw the commotion; what’s the emergency?” She quickly looks over Doug and Rarity, frowning at the bloodstained coat. “What happened here?”

“Why isn’t that coat off?” demands Clear Skies, drawing up to do it herself.

“Because I’m not hurt,” Doug responds coldly, glaring down the pink pegasus. She frowns but backs off. “Rarity’s the injured one.”

“How’d that happen?” Applejack practically ignores the cart sinking into the muddy road, wrenching it behind her to get a closer look at the unicorn.

“I was hurt during the expedition. Purely my fault.” Rarity offers a bleak smile as she motions her injured hoof to her chest. “A small... hmm, I’m not exactly sure. An animated obsidian gemstone ambushed me. It cut me with its sharp edges, but I fought it off with my magic and a pickaxe. I was hurt, but nothing too major, and I was able to walk the rest of the way back.”

“Oooh,” Clear Skies draws out. “We thought he’d gotten hurt, and you wanted to conceal it with the coat, and then you were going to take him to the secret underground laboratory inside the library and try to fix him without anypony else knowing about it!”

The rest of the pegasi, other than Fluttershy, nod in agreement.

“Th-that’s absurd!” Rarity exclaims, shaking her head wildly.

“Secret underground laboratory?” Doug asks with more than a hint of disbelief.

Fluttershy hunkers down, a forced smile on her muzzle.

Nopony else acknowledges Doug as Rarity continues, “I would never do something like that! He was just wearing the trenchcoat because it was raining!”

Open Skies pointedly looks up to where Clear Skies is flying around, her gaze taking about the same three hours that the sky has been clear to get back to Rarity. “It’s not raining now,” she observes, as dry as the coat on Doug’s back.

“I am kind of hot,” Doug says as he shrugs off the last of the bags into Applejack’s cart, then pulls the trenchcoat off. He winces a little at once again being pantsless. Well, he never had pants, but the trenchcoat was kind of close, like body armor that covered his legs.

“Is your mouth dry?” Fluttershy asks as she hovers next to him. She tries, unsuccessfully, to peer into his mouth. “Are you dehydrated, and need something to drink?”

“Ah can get some cider,” Applejack offers as Fluttershy pulls out a bottle of clear liquid from her saddlebags, this time with a white cap.

“Look, this pampering is great and all, but I’m fine.” Despite his words Doug grabs the water bottle, cracks the top and drains half of it.

Clear Skies rubs her muzzle with a wing, peering at Rarity. “So you didn’t make him carry everything to disguise that he was injured, and his constant falling could be attributed to the weight of the packs?”

“That’s how I walk normally,” Doug interjects. “And I offered to carry everything because Rarity is injured.”

“Oh, you poor thing,” Fluttershy wails, except it’s directed at Doug instead of Rarity. She puts away the disinfectant and bandages to hover next to Doug, stroking his sundried hair.

The unicorn is obviously more than a little put out by this. “Excuse me!”

Clear Skies rolls her eyes. “Oh, shush. Your injuries aren’t that bad, or you wouldn’t have made the walk back from the Gorge.”

“They do still sting a little,” Rarity says defensively. She presses her hoof against the ground, wincing at the pain.

“Don’t worry,” Doug adds as an aside to Rarity. “They haven’t tried accusing you of offing me because you want to get with one of the guardsmen.”

“Guard-stallions,” Rarity corrects with a roll of her eyes, “and you aren’t helping.”

“Wasn’t trying to,” Doug mutters, still miffed about this whole thing.

“So, just a false alarm?” Clear Skies says with relief, ignoring the bickering. “Better that the alternative.” She glances around, nodding to her fellow weatherponies.

“Thanks, y’all, for lookin’ out for ‘em,” Applejack says with a broad smile.

“‘Course,” Clear Skies replies, mimicking Applejack’s accent. She winks, the farmpony chuckling. They collectively take off, leaving Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Doug.

“What about me?” Rarity asks with a note of incredulity. She inspects Applejack’s cart, but with all the bags there isn’t enough room for her.

“Ah’m disappointed in you, Rarity.” Applejack scowls as she lets the words hang in the air. Even though she knows it hurts her friend to see it, she has to let her true feelings show. “Ah thought you knew better than to do somethin’ dangerous with Doug around.”

“Excuse me, but I’m the one who was injured here,” Rarity says woundedly.

“Exactly.” Applejack points at the cut across Rarity’s chest, barely noticeable except for the dried red stain. “What would’a happened to Doug if’n he was the one who came across that monster?”

“Well,” Rarity stammers, trying to imagine the situation.

“Lemme give you a hint,” Applejack states harshly.

Rarity shies down a little, a soft mewl dying in her throat.

“He would’a been cut to ribbons. He don’t have the luxury of your horn, blastin’ it away from ‘im. He don’t have your range, or your aim. Maybe he only would’a lost an arm fendin’ it off. Or maybe he’d get lucky, and escape unscathed. Happened to me more times’n Ah care to count when Ah’ve made deliveries.” Applejack shrugs blithely. “Or maybe it would’a nicked his belly, an’ by the time you got him to the hospital it’s too late. ‘Cause they don’t have the first clue how to treat him an’ the infection’s already set. And Fluttershy,” Applejack whips her hoof towards the yellow pegasus, “much as she cares, is stuck in the same shed.”

By this point Rarity is in tears, sinking down into the muddy road, not caring what it does to her coat. Her mind evokes images of the possibilities, or memories of Doug laying broken in front of her Boutique except his legs really are at wrong angles.

Fluttershy doesn’t look much better, having gone from stroking Doug’s head to holding onto him for dear life, like she’s afraid of that actually happening to him.

Applejack takes a single forceful step towards Rarity, the mud splashing onto her white coat. The unicorn doesn’t even flinch or look down to acknowledge it. “An’ if you ain’t gonna take him where it’s safe, then you ain’t gonna take him anywhere.”

Doug’s hard voice echoes among the trees. “Applejack, that’s enough.”

Applejack’s hard gaze turns to a frown as she barely spares a glance to Doug. “Ah’m just sayin’ that it ain’t safe out there for ya, and-”

“No.”

“Excuse me?” Applejack nearly shouts, spinning around to face her stallion.

“I refuse.” Doug folds his arms across his chest, staring down the earth pony. “I may not be as strong in a fight as Rarity, but I’m not worthless.” Doug points to the cut across Rarity’s chest. “Maybe she wouldn’t have gotten that if I was around. Or maybe, since she got that from the ambush, I could have spared her the injury to her hoof. But I could have been a distraction, a tank, drawing agro while our damage dealer goes to work.”

“Ah don’t like the sound of that one bit,” Applejack spits out, glaring up at Doug. “Ya could get hurt, or worse, goin’ out and bein’ foalhardy like that.”

“And it’ll be my choice when that happens. Not yours.” Doug straightens up, Applejack mirroring the motion as best she can. “Remember what you said about not tying me down?”

“Circumstances change.” Applejack points a hoof at Rarity. “Ah thought Ah could trust her judgement. An’ clearly, Ah-”

“-Careful how you finish that sentence,” Doug cautions. Applejack scowls, but keeps her muzzle shut. “Because while it might not be perfect, no one… no pony’s is. And she’s trying.”

“I am,” Rarity whispers, chancing a glance at Applejack. The farmpony returns a harsh but queuerying gaze. “I truly am.”

Applejack’s boring gaze makes Rarity’s work on the stone wall seem like a foal playing with a single nail. Eventually she spits out a single, “Fine.” She unhitches herself from the cart, taking a few deep breaths as she walks away. Just before hopping the fence she turns to Doug. “Ah expect you back on the farm ‘soon as you deliver that. Lotta work to be done, fixin’ up after that storm.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Doug says, relieved. He turns to Fluttershy, the pegasus currently wiping at Rarity’s chest with a red tinged cloth. “So, why did you come?”

“Um,” Fluttershy says meekly, turning her attention to Rarity’s hoof, “They just said that a creature was hurt. And Doctor Fauna must have been too far away. But they didn’t know by what, so I brought my first aid supplies.” A wing pulls open her saddlebag, revealing various labeled bottles of antivenom, steroids, gauze, and rolls of white tape.

Doug reaches, grabbing one of the offered bottles. It feels cool to the touch despite there being no ice. He raises an eyebrow. “You treat a lot of snakebites?”

“A lot?” Fluttershy’s eyes go wide, shaking her head. “Oh, Celestia, no! Maybe one a year? But I do treat a lot of injured critters. They’re all quite friendly!” She grins at the thought, “Would you like to meet them?”

Doug chuckles to himself. “Sure, why not. But not today.” He glances to the farm as he grabs the cart. It’ll be a lot easier dragging that than the bags. Maybe they should do something like that on future expeditions? Especially if they are getting larger hauls. “Applejack sounded like she could use some help.” He stretches his back before taking off at a slow pace, the two mares trundling along. He doesn’t even mind terribly when Fluttershy grabs one of the bags, making enough room for Rarity to ride in the cart.

He hopes things can stay quiet. For once.

Next Chapter: Ch. 63 - Rainbowstride Estimated time remaining: 7 Hours, 28 Minutes