Finding Friends Around The World
Chapter 3: Chapter 1: Hecklers
Previous Chapter Next Chapter“Miss Flanksy, I present to you; Cloudsdale!” Trixie announced in her overdramatic way as she pulled the wagon towards the floating city.
Sunset pulled her head out of the wagon and looked up at the pegasus capital. She had seen it before during the Young Flyers Competition, but from this angle, the city looked immense, bigger in diameter than the mountain Canterlot stood on.
“How many pegasus live up there?”
“70% of the total pegasus population. The other 30% are scrambled all over Equestria.”
“70%? Do they never leave their home?”
“The city does move around to better control the weather in Equestria, so they would be technically nomads.”
“Like you?” Sunset joked.
Trixie turned towards her and smiled. “If you ask me, even with the downsides, being able to be all over Equestria makes my trade worth it. I don’t think I could just stay in one place forever after so many years on the road. Maybe when I get too old to pull the wagon.”
Sunset put a hoof under her chin as she leaned on the windowsill. “Honestly, moving to Ponyville after living all my life in Canterlot made me realize the need to see more things than the usual. It certainly changed a lot in me.”
“It’s something you need to experience. I’ve met all kinds of creatures that just picked a few places to visit, drew a line, and traveled to them with only what they could carry on their shoulders. They tell the best stories when they come back.”
As they talked, they approached a small cloud cabin with a large cloud elevator which marked the entrance to Cloudsdale for any non-pegasus visitors.
Flanksy got out of the wagon as Trixie locked it, and a unicorn worker walked up to them. “Welcome to Cloudsdale. How long do you plan to stay?”
Trixie looked at Flanksy. “A day, maybe two?”
“Let’s start with a day,” she answered with a smile.
“Well, you can certainly stay as much as you want,” the worker said looking at Flanksy’s pegasus form. “But your friend and her wagon will need the spell casted again. 200 bits for the wagon, 50 for her.”
“Oh, I can–” Sunset was about to say she could cast the spell, but she wasn’t supposed to have access to magic, so she looked at Trixie with an apologetic look. “I can pay for the rest of the days.” Trixie sighed and took out her pouch, counting the bits before paying the unicorn.
After having the cloud-walking spell casted on the wagon and Trixie, with Sunset forced to jump on top of the wagon to not fall through the clouds, they both started their accession to the cloud-city.
“Okay, a bad start,” Sunset admitted with a bit of embarrassment.
Trixie frowned a bit. “More than bad, we only have 23 bits left.”
Sunset cringed a little. “Sorry, but I can cast the spell from now on.” She showed it by casting it on herself and jumping at her side.
“How? You will blow your cover.”
“Come closer.” Trixie did what she was told and, making sure nopony was looking, Sunset touched the magician’s horn with her own, casting a spell that made her red aura change into the same color as Trixie’s. “Now that our auras have the same color, ponies will think that all my spells come from your horn.”
Trixie touched her horn, checking that her friend didn’t do something funny to it. “That’s impressive, but we’re still almost broke.”
“How about a little show?” Sunset offered with a smile, but Trixie seemed hesitant. “Come on, once they see you in action, they won’t be able to do anything other than praise you.”
“I don’t know, I–” She was suddenly side-hugged by Sunset’s wing.
“Just imagine their eyes mesmerized by your tricks. The little fillies looking at you in wonder and amazement. Everypony chanting your name; Trixie! Trixie! Trixie! Trixie!”
“Okay okay!” Trixie exclaimed laughing, pushing her friend away with a smile. “You’ve struck The Great And Powerful Trixie’s ego enough to convince her. But she will need a brave assistant for this task.”
Sunset took a bow. “It would be my honor, Great Trixie.”
They both laughed all the way to the base of Cloudsdale, where they finally had a moment to admire the architecture.
The older buildings had a clear romarean design, with cloud pillars holding cloud rooftops that Sunset found weirdly adorable how they spilled over the structure, like if they had given hair to the houses.
One could tell how the city had been advancing from their most primitive, war-like era to the modern world by how the romarean style mixed with more modern techniques, and materials other than clouds started to be used. But what impressed Sunset the most was the literal rivers of rainbow, in fact some even used it as fences for their houses.
“You can’t tell me those are actual rainbows,” Sunset exclaimed.
Trixie smiled as she tied herself to the wagon again. “Rainbows are surprisingly versatile, either by unicorn or pegasus magic. I honestly wonder much about it myself, but I know enough to use it in my shows if the opportunity appears.”
“Interesting. Do you think we could get somepony to teach us?” Sunset questioned, walking at Trixie’s side.
“I don’t know. Rainbow-making is usually left to the pegasus at either the Weather Factory or one of its subsidiaries, generally some construction company.”
“Well, let’s look around and see if we can find someone on our way,” Sunset proposed, and with a nod of Trixie, they started to explore the older areas of Cloudsdale.
As Celestia’s sun shined its light on Twilight’s face, the purple unicorn moved her eyes away and slowly opened them. “Morning already?” She questioned, not feeling like she had slept enough, but she was accustomed to short sleeps, so she soldiered through and went to brush her teeth and prepare for the morning.
She exited her room, walking in autopilot through the long halls until a particular sight made her remember where she was.
Right next to her was a large, charred hole two or more floors deep, where Sunset’s room once stood. Some pegasus were doing their best to repair the damages, chipping at the molten marble, and clearing the debris.
It pained Twilight, knowing that all of Sunset’s treasured memories had been destroyed. The amber unicorn had always been a bit territorial with her room, but Twilight knew that a piece of Sunset was kept inside those walls. A part that may have been lost forever.
Twilight continued her march with determined steps. She had stayed in Canterlot Castle to study how to help Sunset, and she was going to pour all of herself into it till a solution was found. She opened the door to the library, and her determination wavered.
“Good morning,” Moon Dancer greeted her without looking in her direction, sitting in front of a large pile of books.
Twilight looked at her old friend once more, noticing how much she had changed. “Because of Sunset, or because of me?” She wondered as she stepped inside. “Good morning,” she finally answered. “You woke up early.”
“I slept early.” The bespectacled mare pointed at a nearby pile of books. “Those are what I could find about the Crystal Empire and Sombra, we can trade if you prefer.”
“Are you looking into a way to separate Sunset from her other part?” Twilight questioned as she picked up a few books.
“Sorry if I’m stealing your idea,” Moon Dancer answered, and Twilight couldn’t tell if she was angry or just joking.
“It was Celestia’s actually. I’m not as smart as I think,” Twilight admitted with a nervous smile, but it got no reaction from her study partner, so she just started reading one of the books.
As the time passed, Twilight found herself taking glances at Moon Dancer, not being able to bear the silence that normally would be a blessing for a study session. “What do I do? What can I say? That I’m sorry? I don’t think that would be enough. Maybe I can propose to take turns, so we aren’t in the same room together?”
A groan escaped Moon Dancer’s lips as she put down the book she had been failing to finish reading since Twilight entered the room. She then turned to her startled partner. “Look, what I said at the tower… I don’t take it back but… it’s not important right now. We solve this first, and then we decide how we feel about each other. Okay?”
Twilight stared at Moon Dancer, her mouth opening and closing, but only uhs, and ehs managed to get out of it. The bespectacled unicorn groaned and rubbed the bridge of her nose. It wasn’t going to be so easy.
“Is it my fault?” Twilight finally managed to shyly ask.
Moon Dancer sighed. “If you’re asking about my mane, yes, it’s because of you. I…” She closed her eyes and clenched her teeth. “I looked up to you. You were the most amazing mare in my eyes, and I was happy to be your friend. We had a lot in common, and I pushed myself to just stay at your side during magic school, but then… you didn’t care.” Moon Dancer stood up and started walking towards Twilight. “I was distraught. It was as if all the time we spent together didn’t mean anything to you. And when you told me that things would change, I believed you, but once again you just threw me aside. Five mares that you met in one night meant more than the friend that was with you since magic kindergarten. So, I stopped believing in you. I stopped looking up to you.” Moon Dancer exposed the tiny bits of purple hair that remained on her mane. “And decided to be myself, whoever that mare was.”
Twilight was speechless, slowly processing all the words to come up with the best answer, but all of them seemed insufficient.
Finally, after a few long seconds, she managed to ask a question. “Did you get a letter from Sunset?”
Moon Dancer raised an eyebrow. “I did. She’s my friend.”
“Then I will help you save your friend, and my sister.” She offered her hoof to Moon Dancer. “We can part ways after it.”
Moon Dancer looked to Twilight’s hoof, and then at the false brave smile she was putting on to hide the tears in the corner of her eyes. “Partners then.” She shook her hoof, and they both went back to their studies.
“Come one, come all, come and witness the magic of The Great and Powerful Trixie!” Flanksy announced with a megaphone, catching the attention of dozens of pegasus around the large plaza that they had set their stage on.
There wasn’t anything else around other than a big fountain that spewed rainbows instead of water and a few games for children, so the crowd had plenty of space to gather in front of them. Once the pegasy started coming on their own to see what was happening, Flanksy went backstage where Trixie was looking at herself in the mirror.
“Are you ready to confront the crowd?” Sunset asked, but her friend was clearly lacking her usual enthusiasm.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” Trixie confessed, staring at the mirror.
Sunset walked up to her and put a hoof over her shoulder. “Come on Great and Powerful Trixie, you can’t make your epic comeback with this attitude. You’ve years of experience, wowing a crowd is easy for you.”
“But what if something goes wrong again?”
“Then I will come over and help you. You’re not alone this time.”
Those words seemed to have the desired effect on Trixie as her lips formed a smile. “The Great and Powerful Trixie is ready.”
Outside, the large crowd started to get a bit impatient. It was rare that some sort of spectacle other than the Wonderbolts came to their hometown instead of the other way around, so their interest was picked, but they also hadn’t planned to put their day on pause for a long time.
Their patience was rewarded when an explosion of fireworks revealed the caped figure of Trixie.
“Pegasus of Cloudsdale! Today you’ve been visited by the magnificence of The Great, and Powerful, Trixie!” As the magician shouted these words, her magic took hold of the smoke generated by her fireworks and started to coalesce it along with some hidden water to form a small storm cloud that discharged lighting behind her.
The pegasus were amazed at Trixie’s display of weather magic, and even Sunset was surprised she could do that.
“Wait, I heard about you!” A pegasus shouted from the back of the crowd.
Sunset looked in the direction the voice had come and saw a dark brown pegasus with dirty white mane wearing the white workwear of the weather factory.
“Yeah, she’s the one that brought an ursa major into a town in a failed magic show,” a second pegasus shouted, this one much taller, with a lighter shade of brown coat and dark brown mane.
A third one, smaller and with grey coat and dark mane, laughed before adding. “I’m surprised she didn’t zap herself with lighting!”
“It wasn’t Trixie’s fault. And it was an ursa minor. If you’re going to try and ruin my show, you should at least get your facts right,” the magician shouted back, trying to keep a dignified pose.
“It isn’t much of a show, really. Anyone here could’ve done that,” the dark brown pegasus said, and the crowd looked like it was agreeing with him.
“For a pegasus may be, but not any unicorn can. That’s what makes Trixie the greatest and most powerful of them all!”
Sunset could see a bit of a nervous shake in Trixie’s stance.
“Oh yeah? If you’re so special, why don’t you prove it?” the tall pegasus challenged.
“Yeah, I bet we can do a better show than your dangerously lame flank!” the short one added.
The shaking in Trixie’s body was now visible, and her voice lost almost all confidence. “T-Trixie doesn’t take challenges anymore.”
“Right, because the unicorn that defeated Nightmare Moon exposed that you were just a boastful farce.”
“And she calls herself great and powerful.”
“More like The Lame and Cowardly Thick-xie!”
The three pegasus started laughing, and Trixie looked like she was about to start crying on stage.
“Great and Powerful Trixie, these three hecklers are clearly below you, allow me to face them instead,” Flanksy announced, taking the magician’s side.
“Sun- Flanksy? What are you doing?” Trixie exclaimed.
“But you’re a pegasus!” The leader of the three bullies pointed out. “You can’t do magic stuff.”
“With The Great and Powerful Trixie as my teacher, I don’t need a horn to be magical,” Flanksy announced, giving the magician a wink. “I will best each of you in your preferred challenge.”
The three bullies looked at each other, not expecting an actual challenge, but then the leader announced. “Very well. The apprentice of a loser shouldn’t pose too much of a challenge!”
Trixie pulled Sunset closer to her. “Are you sure about this? You can’t use magic! Do you have anything else besides immunity to fire?”
“Don’t worry, it’ll be okay,” Sunset assured her, not mentioning the lack of a plan in her mind.
“I hope we don’t regret this,” Dawn said, not helping at all.
As expected, the leader of the bullies was the first challenger. He went to a cart he and his goons had been transporting from the weather factory and took out two large crates a bit larger than him. “My challenge is you and I will do pushups with one box on our backs. Whoever does more wins.”
“What’s inside them?” Flanksy asked out of curiosity.
“Liquid rainbows, so be careful not to drop it,” the tallest bully said before laughing.
Flanksy and the leader got into position, the two heavy boxes were placed on top of them, and she immediately started regretting her decision. The weight of the box was already threatening to crush her into the soft cloud surface.
“Ready?” One of the bully’s friends asked, and before Flanksy could respond, he gave the signal.
The lead bully moved effortlessly up and down, showing formidable strength for a pegasus.
Sunset, instead, struggled just to lift the crate on her back, and barely made one push up while his opponent had already done ten. “Hey, Dawn, a bit of help?”
The trapped entity tried to think of a way to help, but she could only–
Suddenly, Sunset felt a surge of strength, and the crowd watched as Flanksy started to move faster and faster, quickly reaching and surpassing her opponent.
“Thank you!” Sunset cheered in her mind.
“You’re welcome…” Dawn focused her mind on Nightmare, making her appear in the mindscape. “Are you helping her?”
Nightmare shrugged. “This is entertaining.”
Flanksy smiled as her opponent started to sweat from the effort while she didn’t feel even a bit of exhaustion. “Ready to give up?”
The pegasus gritted his teeth and did an extra effort to try and catch up to her, but his legs finally buckled, and he was buried into the soft ground, giving her the victory of the first challenge.
The crowd stomped their hooves in celebration for her victory as Flanksy took the crate off her back by herself. “Who’s next?”
The tallest of the bullies stepped forward to the challenge. “I challenge you to a race around the city.”
Flanksy looked at the pegasus, noticing his three-basketball cutie mark, but other than that, she couldn’t tell how well he could be at flying. She certainly had aerodynamics in her favor, but he was an actual pegasus. “Very well, where will the finish line be?”
“Right there.” He pointed to the two crates on the cloud floor.
They both got into position, wings up and ready, and the leader of the bullies, still rubbing his beaten ego, gave the signal. “Ready…”
“Hey, are you going to help with the flight too?” Dawns asked Nightmare.
“Set…”
“I don’t have how,” Nightmare answered.
“Go!”
Both contestants sprung from the ground, taking flight in an instant. Sunset thanked Rainbow’s teaching’s as she was able to keep up with the more experienced flier. The crowd also took to the air to follow their trajectory at a distance, leaving Trixie behind to worry about her friend.
Sunset had to admit, his rival was really fast despite his large size, and she was starting to feel a lot of strain on her body, but she was keeping up, and it would only take one miscalculation from the stallion to give her the advantage. However, when they were halfway around the city, Dawn shouted a warning.
“Sunset, you need to slow down!”
The disguised unicorn was confused, but then remembered her wings were fake. She looked back and saw that the feathers were starting to fly off, and the enchantment on her coat was slowly fading away to reveal its true colors.
Biting down some swears, Sunset was forced to slow down till her disguise stopped falling apart, but now she couldn’t keep up with her opponent.
The large pegasus arrived at the finish like with time to spare and raised his hooves at the cheer of the crowd. Flanksy arrived a few minutes later, and the three bullies immediately went against her.
“I think it’s fitting that the unicorn that can’t do magic has a pegasus that can’t fly as a friend!” the leader shouted, with his goons laughing immediately after.
“This only means we’re tied!” Flanksy shouted. “There’s still one more challenge.”
She looked at the shortest of the group, who seemed to shrink at her glare. “Uh… you should quit before you embarrass yourself even more.”
The leader of the bullies looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “That’s the point dude.”
“Yeah, what’s wrong?” The tall one asked.
“I don’t know what to challenge her with!” he whispered to them.
“Invent something!”
“Are you guys getting scared?” Flanksy challenged, and the crowd looked like they were agreeing with her.
The short bully stammered as he looked around, till his eyes settled on the crates they had been using. “I challenge you to drink a jar of liquid rainbow!” The crowd gasped and murmured at his words.
“Isn’t that dangerous?” Flanksy asked, cocking her head.
“Y-yeah, but I’m no chicken!” he said more to himself than any other pony. “Do you accept or not?”
Sunset took a moment to think. “You can heal me if things go wrong, right?”
“You can heal her, right?” Dawn asked Nightmare.
“Maybe? Neither Luna nor I have tried eating a rainbow before,” Nightmare answered.
“If you don’t accept the challenge, then we win!” the leader of the bullies announced, trying to scare her out of it but completely misunderstanding the meaning of reverse psychology.
“I’ll do it!” Flanksy declared, shocking the audience. “What’s the worst that could happen?”
“Your death triggers a supernova that consumes half of Equestria and burns the rest into ashes.”
“Dawn!”
“You asked!”
After a few minutes, one of the crates was opened, and both contestants got a jar of liquid rainbow each. The crowd was lowly murmuring to each other, some wanting to stop this before it got out of hoof, but the curiosity of the majority kept them from interfering.
“Bottoms up!” The short bully announced, pressing his lips as tight as he could to make them impermeable before placing the tip of the jar against them.
Flanksy took a deep breath and was about to down the entire jar in one go, but a pinkish aura took it away from her.
“You three win,” Trixie declared, throwing the jar back to the bullies before looking at Flanksy. “It’s not worth the risk.” Sunset was about to object, but Trixie interrupted her with a whisper. “My reputation isn’t worth you getting hurt.”
Sunset’s objections were replaced with surprise at her words before a smile formed on her lips.
The sweet moment, however, was ruined by the loud celebrations of the three bullies who were dancing and making mocking gestures towards them.
“I would also be celebrating if a unicorn just saved me from losing my job,” a stern voice talked from behind the three pegasus, making them freeze in place, and when they slowly turned around, they saw a middle-aged pegasus mare with orange hair and yellow coat wearing a purple blouse and a pearl necklace.
“B-boss! What are you doing here?” The leader of the bullies asked.
“I wanted to see why one of my employees was flying around the city, still wearing his workwear, instead of doing his job!” the angry mare pointed at the cart missing half of its cargo. “And honestly, finding not only him, but three of my employees, not only messing around during work hours, but also endangering a civilian tourist, was the last thing I was expecting.” The mare stared at them with an intensity that usually precedes brutal beatings. “So, if you three want to keep your jobs and livelihoods, I suggest this cart gets to its destination in the next five minutes!” The three bullies’ response was to load the cart and take off at breakneck speed, leaving behind dust clouds with their shapes slowly fading away.
After they were gone, the mare glared at the crowd that had done nothing to stop the event before looking at the two magicians. “I hope this incident doesn’t dissuade you from future shows, it’s already hard enough to get some outside entertainment to come into the city with the ground being intangible.”
Trixie and Flanksy looked at each other before the magician disappeared in a cloud of smoke, reappearing back on stage. “The Great and Powerful Trixie has yet to show the full extent of her magic!” she announced, and the crowd quickly gathered around her, giving another chance for the mare to amaze them with her tricks.
“Again, sorry for the rude welcome. Those three have a history of causing problems,” the older mare apologized as she walked closer to Flanksy.
“Don’t worry, everything seems to have worked out in the end.” Flanksy smiled, seeing Trixie’s confidence return now that she was on stage. “I’m Flanksy by the way.” Sunset offered her hoof.
“I’m Stormy Flare.” The mare shook her hoof. “And why don’t you two enjoy some of Cloudsdale‘s shows? I can give you and your friends tickets for the Wonderbolts show. You would only need to wait some days till it starts.”
Flanksy had stars in her eyes. “You can get us tickets? That would be awesome!”
“Sure, my daughter’s in the team. I will come to your show tomorrow with the tickets.”
“Seriously, thank you!” Flanksy exclaimed, resisting the urge to hug the older mare.
Flare let out a small chuckle. “It’s the least that I can do.”
Both mares sat down with the crowd, doing some small chat while Trixie continued with her show, and once it was over, Flanksy said goodbye to Flare and shared the news with her companion.
“Tickets to the Wonderbolts show?! Those are probably more valuable than what we earned today!” the magician exclaimed as they set everything to sleep after a long day.
“You want to sell them?” Sunset questioned, feeding some sulfur to Philomena.
“Well, normally I would, but Trixie would feel bad depriving you from the show,” the magician said as she took off her show attire.
Sunset stored the magic tools in several chests. “You don’t need to feel bad. We do need the money.”
Trixie jumped on one of the hammocks they had set for them to sleep. “Well, if we’re staying a few days, we will surely earn more than what the tickets are worth.”
Sunset got on her own bed. “You feel confident enough to make more shows?”
“Of course, The Great and Powerful Trixie was just a bit rusty, that’s all,” the magician declared, raising a hoof in the air.
Sunset smiled, looking at her friend smiling with a confidence once lost before turning to sleep in her hammock, Trixie joining her soon after.
When both of them fell into deep sleep, Sunset’s horn shined softly with a blue aura, and seconds later, Trixie’s did too.
Thorax reread Fluttershy’s profile as he tended to her animals inside the cottage. He was lucky her mother’s spies recorded even the most basic interaction any pony had to make a perfect replacement, otherwise the animals would’ve discovered him and possibly mauled him to death.
However, after the initial tension of getting discovered by Fluttershy’s pets was gone, he found the mare’s life to be quite relaxing. She lived far away from the town, had a pleasant pastime, at least from a changeling’s perspective, and a comfortable home.
He could imagine far worse situations he could be in.
There was a knock on the door, and he quickly hid the profile and mentally got in character before opening. “Yes?”
“Hey Flutters,” Rainbow said with a smile. “How’re you doing?”
“Pretty well, I was just feeding the animals. Would you like some tea?”
“Sure.”
Fluttershy let her in, but then her brain reminded her of something. Rainbow wasn’t the kind of mare that drank tea. “Is something wrong?”
Rainbow turned around, showing a bit of concern in her features. “I was going to ask the same.”
Fluttershy grew more nervous, but hid it well. “Why?”
“Well...” Rainbow seemed unsure of how to phrase her worries. “You haven’t been in town in a while.”
Fluttershy cursed herself for her lack of foresight. “Oh… you’re right… it’s just… with everything going on I...”
“I get it,” Rainbow interrupted her. “I’m also nervous.” The rainbow pegasus landed in one of Fluttershy’s chairs as she sighed. “Honestly, I feel… useless.”
“Why useless?” the yellow pegasus asked with genuine concern.
“Because I’ve been useless. I stole the Elements only for them to get taken away immediately after. I got tricked by Discord and made you lose the game, and then you had to literally chase me down to make me snap out of it. And when Luna pushed us into a corner, I did nothing.”
“You confronted her about Sunset’s innocence,” Fluttershy reassured her as she took a seat next to her.
“And look what good it did!” Rainbow shouted, making her friend shy away, and immediately regretted it. “Sorry, it’s just… I feel like I’m failing her by just sitting around waiting for Luna of all ponies to find her.”
“You still think she wants to hurt Sunset?”
Rainbow rubbed her temples. “I don’t know. Honestly, I’m not sure of who to trust right now.”
“Can you trust in me?” Fluttershy offered her hoof to Rainbow, making her smile.
“Of course I do, we’ve been friends since the start, we can share anything, and not even the Lord of Chaos will keep us apart for long.” Rainbow’s words had a strange effect in Thorax. One that he couldn’t describe right now. “Speaking of which, I totally sidetracked you to dump all my problems on you.”
Fluttershy gave her a reassuring smile. “It’s okay, it looks like you needed it.”
“Still, how are you feeling?”
Fluttershy took a long moment to come up with an answer. “I guess scared for the most part. I’m not sure how things will play out in the future, and I’m not sure if I’ll be able to… handle it? That sounds close enough.”
“I get you. We can’t prepare ourselves for what will happen next, be it Sunset returning or Luna screwing us over or some other ancient evil threatening Equestria. And we don’t even have the Elements now.”
Fluttershy lowered her head. “It was what made us special.”
“That’s not true.” Rainbow moved closer to her friend. “It was our friendship. We lost a bunch of awesome rocks, but we still have each other.”
“Do we? Twilight’s far away in Canterlot, and F-” Thorax managed to stop himself. “And I’m hiding here.”
“We’re all doing what we can.” Rainbow pulled her friend against her, taking her by surprise with a hug. “It’s okay that you’re scared, and it doesn’t make you less than us. We’re your friends, and we’ll be there for you if you need it.”
Fluttershy felt herself relax in the hooves of the pony. “I just… I don’t want to fail.”
“You won’t,” Rainbow assured her. “And if you feel scared, I can come over more often if you want.”
Thorax had to refuse. Having her come over would put himself at risk of being discovered. Rainbow was Fluttershy’s closest friend, she would be the one to see through his disguise.
“I would like that.” His weak will would be the end of him. “Thank you.”
"You know, how about we go to Cloudsdale? I got tickets for the Wonderbolts show!"