Butterfly in the Sky, I Can Go Twice As High

[elementofloyalty]

Characters: Rainbow Dash, Ed Elric, and Twilight Sparkle
Location: Twilight's room to start
Rating: PG (Ed is kinda foul-mouthed)
Open/Closed/Finished: Closed
Summary: Rainbow and Ed have a deal. Ed, if you will forgive the term, is ponying up his part first.



Knock knock knock. There's a Rainbow at Twilight's door.

"Twilight! Hey Twilight! I need your magical expertise!"

The pegasus pony practically radiated delight. She'd been looking forward to this for some time, now, and finally having the chance to put it into motion meant she was just plain thrilled.

Comments

[rewritethis]

That made one of them. The biped in the vicinity was hanging a short distance back in the corridor, looking slightly despondent about his lot in life. But mostly irritated at Rainbow Dash, which was standard.

How was this even going to work? Would he have to take his shirt off?

It could be worse, he tried to remind himself. Maybe everyone around here would be too busy doing, you know, break things not to pay too much attention to them. Or, maybe...

"You think she's in?" There was no disguising the small note of hope in his voice.

[marearcana]

The door opens, and out comes the sought-after pony.

"What for, Rainbow Dash? I take it something to do with Edward here?"

[elementofloyalty]

Rainbow leaned back, slung an arm around Ed's shoulders, and hauled him forward with a grin.

"Yep. Remember the spell you used to give Rarity wings? Can you make it work on a human? We have a deal where HE does something I think he'll enjoy, and then I'll do something he thinks I'll enjoy!"

[rewritethis]

Well, so much for hope.

He attempted to lift Rainbow's foreleg off his shoulder, just in case he wasn't properly conveying his reluctance already. "Yeah, except she never said a thing about order. But close enough."

Tell her you're busy, Twilight. Please.

[marearcana]

"You don't really sound excited about this, and I'm not sure how much you know about that spell..." she told Ed. Flying was all well and good, but...

...butterfly wings. (Fragile ones, at that.)

"But it is break. Sure I'll do it."

[rewritethis]

His fleeting look of despair quickly gave way to one of his more usual scowls. "Not a damn thing, obviously. You're the magician here."

Then he paused. "There's... gotta be some kind of catch, right? I'm guessing a really stupid one, too." He jerked his neck towards Rainbow, and never was there a more appropriate verb. "She said some crap about building wings out of ice..."

Nope, no clue about the butterfly wings so far. Or, for that matter, any uncannily apt mythological allusions.

[elementofloyalty]

"He agreed," Rainbow said, more for Ed's benefit than Twilight's. "And I promised not to laugh at him, at all."

More directly, she continued, "You can't fly too high or the wings burn up. But we'll go later in the day when the sun isn't high up and as strong, so you shouldn't have a problem."

[rewritethis]

Ed waved a hand quickly, without looking away from Twilight. "Yeah, I get it, you said. But is there anything else? Are they made of ice? 'Cause if it's normal ice, I can see you running into some other problems there... And, I don't know - where are they supposed to go? Do I have to move them, or what?"

Nobody could accuse him of not trying to make the best of the situation.

[marearcana]

"They're not made of ice, they're gossamer and morning dew, both of which have a rather low burning point. Ice wings would be too heavy and fragile to be practical. The real issue is what they look like - Rainbow may have promised she wouldn't laugh, but that doesn't prevent anyone else from doing so," said Twilight, failing to provide any more relevant information.

"As far as moving them, it shouldn't be that hard. The spell was designed to be easy for the recipient to use properly."

You know, like that fairly recent potion. She was almost surprised she didn't make that connection sooner.

[rewritethis]

He'd never thought there'd be an occasion when he actively resented being right. "So the other catch is, they're gonna look so stupid even you think..." He stopped himself, though. He was outnumbered here. ...And he had no way of knowing if rants like that upset Twilight as much as Rainbow said they upset her, anyway.

So he just shrugged. "Well, anyway, glad that's clear." And, silently, started going over the composition of spider silk in his head. Just in case.

[elementofloyalty]

"Twiliiiiiiight!" From behind Ed, Rainbow furiously waved a hoof, then motioned across her throat. "Ixnay on the aughing-at-lay! Don't worry, we're gonna be up in the sky, there's no one who's gonna see," she said to Ed. "Except me, and Twilight, and I promised. And Twilight doesn't laugh at people like that."

[rewritethis]

A bit late there, Rainbow.

"You mean except you, her and anyone who happens to look up?" Never mind the idea of being high enough above them that they wouldn't be able to see!

He sighed distractedly, the back of his mind still buzzing with half-remembered protein structures and the names of compounds. This almost made him wish more of his work back home had involved animals. Almost.

"Honestly, though, I don't care." And he meant it, whatever that was worth. He'd already set aside plenty of time for revenge later.

[marearcana]

"I'm going to laugh, either," she said, confirming the words of her friend. "I take magic very seriously."

"But it's good to see that you have this planned out," she continued, "Are you going to do this now or some other time?"

She had nothing planned at the moment, a rare thing for her, but that didn't mean either of them didn't.

...Okay, it didn't mean Edward didn't.

[elementofloyalty]

The sky was vast, gorgeous, and blue with just a hint of clouds. Not even by Rainbow's doing -- this just happened to be a beautiful day.

Up she surged, wingbeats calm and even, before she turned a couple of rolls and a loop. Showing off, of course. He'd appreciate what she could do better for seeing what it's like now.

"Come on!"

[rewritethis]

Appreciation would probably come when he'd settled down a bit... which was to say, not just yet. Right now, he was torn. The view was stunning, even he had to admit; his (not so) inner scientist wanted to get a closer look at the clouds lazily drifting around them, take notes on the stray birds passing by, climb higher to get a better sense of the lay of the land below - but his inner scientist was also the part of him watching all of this and screaming what the hell is this, this is wrong, gravity is going to figure out what you're doing any moment now and it's not going to like it!.

While privately wrestling with himself to determine which reaction made more sense, he fell back onto grumpiness for the time being. It was usually a safe bet.

"Like hell I'm doing that..."

[elementofloyalty]

She could tell he was lightening up a little -- that was downright civilized for him. "I don't mean follow-the-leader," she said with a laugh -- like he could! "I mean, come on!"

Which seemed to mean 'higher'.

[rewritethis]

"Whatever!" He glowered. An ego was an ego no matter how far from the ground it was, and he could take a damn hint.

He shut his eyes briefly (seriously, if he overthought this, he was going to fall, he was sure) and swept both wings down in one powerful stroke. It didn't quite have the desired effect - that is, of sailing smoothly past her so he could rub it in her face, almost literally - but it did propel him higher. More or less. And backwards.

[elementofloyalty]

She promised, promised, promised she wasn't going to laugh and she will stick to that.

"Well, halfway there," she said, still cheerfully. "You want to take some time and try out everything?"

Maybe she should've offered that before she started challenging him to follow, she had belatedly realized.

[rewritethis]

From the look on his face, the damage was done regardless - although admitting that would have been tantamount to admitting it was remotely possible for him to look uncool, so he didn't. All he did was scowl and look off to her side. (Nothing particularly interesting there except for a passing wisp of a cloud, but at least it wasn't down.) "Everything? That include landing?"

[elementofloyalty]

She ducked beneath him, then came up behind him in one smooth streak. "You'll enjoy it a lot more when you've relaxed a little, you know. Here, this time actually follow me."

She slapped a hoof on his (left) shoulder lightly, then ducked around in front of him with a grin. "You know I wouldn't have brought any OTHER human up here, right? I picked you because you can handle the challenge." She winked, then spread her wings to put a few feet between them before she turned to lead the way in straight, level flight.

A mix of flattery and and a challenge? She was only using what she knew she couldn't resist if it was tried on her...

[rewritethis]

"The way you say that, it's like you know any other humans dumb enough to agree to it," he pointed out - sounding only slightly mollified, because the flattery went further than he cared to show.

He followed, anyway. Better that than being left in the middle of the vast, empty sky. Not that he was scared, obviously, but it vaguely reminded him of some other things...

It wasn't as if he'd be sweeping past her any time soon, but he was definitely picking up a little speed as he went.

[elementofloyalty]

She turned onto her back to face him, giggling. "Oh come on, Ed! 'Dumb' is just a word people use when they're not brave enough or strong enough to do what we can!"

Rolling back rightside-up, she banked into a lazy left turn, then an equally-casual right one, letting him learn by doing behind her.

And yes, the sky is vast and empty, miles and miles of blue above, green fields and forest and oceans stretching out miles below.

[rewritethis]

"The hell does any of that have to do with mag-" he started to say, but she'd already turned her back.

At the moment he felt about as far from relaxing as he was high up in the air, but he tried to concentrate on her movements, if only as a distraction. Then, still frowning a little from the surreality of the whole situation, he mimicked them, weaving from side to side in a controlled fashion. Despite a little shakiness - he couldn't copy her exactly, of course; however many other things that stupid spell had messed with, it at least hadn't turned him into a quadruped - he was slowly but steadily gaining ground. Sky. Whatever.

...No, goddamnit, this was still weird. If she wanted him to calm down, she was probably going to have to work at it.

[elementofloyalty]

She looked over her shoulder to check on him, but spying his expression, she slowed down a bit to fall into pace beside him. Rainbow really did make it look easy; flying was as natural to her as walking.

"You don't trust things you don't understand, huh?" she said. "That's what's got you on edge."

[rewritethis]

She might have given him a bit too much of an ego boost; it hadn't quite been enough to make him comfortable about any of this, but it sure as hell made him reluctant to say it out loud. Especially if he thought about this as a challenge... After all, when had he ever encountered anything he didn't turn out to be good at with enough effort?

He didn't look at her. "Who's on edge? I didn't hear anyone say a damn thing about being on edge."