I knew something was wrong with my Wonderbolt uniform the moment I tugged it off the hanger, and it snapped back at me like a triggered rubber band.
Sure, it was aerodynamic and made me rainboom-capable even after I put on a little weight, but the tightness was a high price to pay. “Ugh, I hate this part…”
It didn’t care. It never cares. Wonderbolt flight fabric is basically sentient and always chooses violence.
I slipped a foreleg in. Or tried to. The sleeve got halfway up my leg before clinging like I owed it money.
“Oh great,” I muttered. “You shrank. Why‽ I clearly overheard Sorin say that it shrinks in the cold, and I washed you on extra hot.” I supported my chin with a hoof. “He was talking about the uniform… right?”
I yanked harder. The sleeve yanked back. I growled. The zipper growled back. “Resistance is futile!” I was the one resisting…
When I finally wrestled the suit on, I had achieved a look somewhere between “elite athlete” and “compressed sausage.” My coat tingled from how tight the furtight bodysuit was. Standing still felt uncomfortable and if I tried to move, my clothes touched me even more.
Most ponies would’ve stopped right there. But most ponies aren’t me. Only one of all the ponies is me. I’m unique like that.
Most ponies also don’t take cloud-clearing patrol in the middle of the night to earn extra bits in order to pay off the debts from repairing the Cloudsdale factory I clogged up.
Most Wonderbolt mares also don’t need a large uniform size. And neither do I! I can’t possibly be fat if I can squeeze myself into a small-sized uniform, right?
I remembered how a blast of freezing air stabbed me directly in the kidney earlier, and the forecast was an even colder front rolling in. I made a decision.
A terrible decision.
“…I’ll just put on another one.”
When making a bad decision, I always double down. Quite literally this time around. Since the first uniform had already forcefully flattened me, the second shrunken uniform shouldn’t feel too tight. My math told me so and the fact that I’ve always failed math was completely irrelevant. Completely. Irrelevant.
The second uniform slid on even worse. It suctioned around the first like a clingy ex-marefriend. Every movement made a muffled squelch from the trapped air pockets. The chest was so tight it felt like I was cosplaying as my own internal organs.
I looked at myself in the mirror. A piñata stuffed inside another piñata stared back at me with utter desperation in her eyes.
“Perfect,” I said, lying to both of us. “Warm. Cozy. Totally… breathable.”
I was sweating from the exertion and tried to walk to the edge of my home-cloud to catch a breeze.
Nothing happened. It was as if I was frozen in place.
Subconsciously, I knew that if I moved even a little, the fabric would pull at my hair and press even more in the areas I didn’t want to be touched. My legs didn’t just refuse to move; they sent a politely worded, itchy letter to my brain saying they were on strike until working conditions improved.
I narrowed my eyes. “Fine. Be that way. Who needs legs anyway?” Without moving any of my trapped limbs, I repositioned my stiff self using only my wings.
As I performed a landing crouch upon touching down at the edge of the cloud, the entire double-layered suit compressed around me like a hydraulic press with no workplace safety measures.
I heard a wheeze.
It was me.
I wheezed.
But I wasn’t going to back down. I’m Rainbow Dash. I make bad decisions all the time!
A cold gust of wind hit me—
—and did absolutely nothing.
I was so insulated my body perceived summer instead of winter.
I started my patrol by circling a soft cloud, as if its softness could overcompensate the unsoftness of the force pressing from all sides on my… everything.
The process of getting dressed already exhausted my energy supplies and I was getting sleepy. Actually, dizzy might have been a better word since my brain lacked any oxygen because breathing felt like a chore under the relentless pressure.
I passed out on the insulated cumulus in my insulated, double-layer clothes.
I dreamed of a supernova sunrise burning me alive.
But it wasn’t sunrise that woke me up. Neither was it the sweat inside my personal sauna. And neither, neither was it the attire that would under any other circumstances require a safe-word.
What actually woke me up from my oxygen-deprived delirium was a snowball.
It slammed into my muzzle—too heavy, too wet, and absolutely illegal by Equestrian snowball standards.
I jerked awake, rolled right off the cloud, and plummeted like a disgraced anvil straight into a snowbank. Face first. Wings trapped. Dignity was left somewhere above cloud level.
Skipping the tight facemask before patrol proved to be the worst mistake yet. With nothing to protect the exposed neckline, the suits didn’t stop the snow like they were designed to do—they scooped it.
When I hit the drift, the elastic collar flexed wide under the force into a large gape, and the packed snow surged inward with the force of my landing.
Snow drifted without any resistance along my sweat-soaked fur. Inside, it spread EVERYWHERE! Down my chest. By my ribs. Along my legs. Between them… Every movement dragged it farther, grinding icy slurry directly into my coat like I’d been flash-packed for long-term freezer storage.
And the thing about wet fur is… it doesn’t insulate. It conducts.
As I wiggled under freezing shocks all over my body, the neckline closed under double elastic pressure, trapping all the snow inside. Two layers of tight bodysuits pressed it through my coat to the skin like rubbing salt into the wound. And the trapping tomb of snow taunted me with, “There’s more where that came from,” as it shoved itself in my mouth and ears.
Something tapped my flank. Not snowball this time but a hoof. A guilty one.
“Rainbow?” A muffled Fluttershy’s voice made me perk up both ears from the snow. “Oh goodness—I didn’t mean to startle you… I just hoped we could talk…”
I pulled my head out of the snow and spat out a mouthful of winter. “Brr!” I shivered. “My bodysuits are filled with snow.”
“Bodysuits?”
“I wanted to be warm, so I squeezed myself into two of them. It’s not weird, okay?”
“It’s weird,” she said simply.
“They’re pressing all the snow into my coat.”
“Why didn’t you wear the mask as well to protect your neckline?”
“Agh!” I threw her an angry look. “Because I don’t want to be touched by tight fabric.”
She looked me up and down along the body, fully wrapped in two layers of tight fabric. “I see…”
I hoofed at my zipper, but two layers of rubber over my hooves made the grip impossible. “Ugh! So cold.” I gave her a narrow glance. “Why didn’t you just fly to me if you wanted to wake me up‽”
Fluttershy pawed at the soft, white ground. “I shouldn’t be seen here with you right now and especially not flying.”
I smirked from inside my compressed-snow armor. “Aw, c’mon. Why’d you ground me then if you don’t even want to see me?”
“No! I mean… I did want to see you, but not like… oh dear…Let me just…”
Fluttershy leaned closer to brush snow from my mane. Her wings were tucked tight against her sides, feathers puffed from the cold. She inched in closer. Her eyes dropped to the tangled twin zippers running down my chest.
Fluttershy bit her lip, thinking hard. “I can help you get out of the closet-worth of clothes.”
Get out of the closet? How does she know I’m still in the closet? She must have noticed me glancing at her flank one too many times.
“You don’t mind, do you?”
“Don’t… mind…” My heartbeat decided to test new rhythms. She was acting out my wet dreams exactly.
Fluttershy leaned in. Warm breath on my neck. Mane brushing my cheek. She gently gripped the top zipper with her teeth and tugged. One foreleg anchored itself around my shoulder while the other leaned on my chest for leverage. Her closeness made me shiver. Or maybe it was the snow in my bodysuits that was the cause of my body shaking.
“I wanted to talk to you about something…I’ve always wanted to… embrace the pegasus inside,” she murmured around the zipper. “You know what I mean, right? You’ve done it, and I want to do it too.”
My wings flared. Everypony thinks Wonderbolt uniforms are cool, but Fluttershy seemed to think of them as gift wrapping. And I seemed to be the gift. It was really happening. She thought of me the same way I secretly thought of her.
A distant “Fluttershy!” call cockblocked me from a distance.
She blinked and leaned her head back, dropping the zipper from her mouth. “Oh no. He’s looking for me.”
Discord. Of course. Worse timing ever… If he saw us together, tangled in half-unzipped uniforms, he’d surely think I was stealing her.
Fluttershy shuffled back. “I shouldn’t be out in the cold with you. He worries. I really shouldn’t let him find me here…”
“It’s okay.” I brushed a hoof on her shoulder. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
“Uh, what?” She glanced at me, then back to the distance. “Gotta go.” She ran behind the bushes onto the path.
The shadows twisted. A ripple of warm air formed and Discord stepped out, wearing a Hearth’s Warming scarf long enough to lasso a thunderhead.
“Oh, it’s just you,” he said, sounding equally relieved and annoyed. “Rainbow Dash, right? You’re vibrating…”
Before I could retort, he snapped.
The world blinked. "
--- CHAPTER BREAK ---
I was dropped onto Fluttershy’s rug like a bedraggled parcel.
Instead of something normal for once, like “Welcome” or “Sorry I teleported you without your consent,” he simply said, “Sit!”
I used all my muscles to break through the rubbery resistance and forced my plot onto the rug.
Discord lounged beside me and floated a steaming mug into my hooves. I took a sip right away to warm myself. It was spicy, strong and suspiciously purple.
“We need to talk,” he said, quiet and serious.
My ears flattened instinctively. Oh no. This is it. He’s going to warn me off. Or ask about my feelings toward Fluttershy. Or, sweet Celestia, he thinks Fluttershy and I already…
“Our concerns should be aligned,” he said gravely. “She can’t be doing anything risky with you now.”
My heart flipped. My wings twitched. I was the risk in that sentence.
Steam lifted off my feathers in lazy curls. My mane stuck to my face. The last shred of dignity was already frozen on the other side of the teleportation spell. Warmth from the fireplace felt heavenly, but the atmosphere around it? Not so much.
Discord kept pacing. Not dramatic pacing. Not annoyed pacing. Nervous pacing. He had that restless tail-swishing thing going on—the one he probably thinks nopony notices. Something was eating him, and I already had a pretty good guess what.
Of course, he didn’t want me around Fluttershy.
Not tonight. Not ever. And especially not after what happened earlier. Not after she’d made her… interest clear.
I hadn’t done anything. I handled it respectfully. I’d made my fake boundaries obvious. But Discord was Discord. If he even suspected I’d been involved in Fluttershy, he’d be paranoid for days.
Fine. I could play it cool. I could keep things calm until I dried. The trick was acting like nothing happened. Fortunately, acting cool was kind of my thing. Also, nothing happened to begin with! Nothing. Happened.
He finally stopped pacing and stood beside me, arms folded—protective, defensive, anxious, all in one.
“Rainbow Dash,” he said, carefully, “we need to talk before Fluttershy gets home.”
Oh, that tone… Yeah, he was definitely worried about me ‘stealing’ her. Great. “Sure,” I said. “Talk away.”
He hesitated. Discord. Hesitated. “There’s something she’s determined to do. Something she shouldn’t do. And before she gets back, I need to know you’ll be… responsible.”
Responsible. Right. Meaning: Don’t seduce my marefriend, Rainbow Dash, or else. I sighed. Ugh. Nopony was seducing anypony! Right? I kept a straight face. “I always am.” I never was.
He exhaled, relieved—but still wired. “Good. Very good. I just want her safe. She’s stubborn when she thinks she has something to prove.”
Ah. There it was again. He thought Fluttershy was trying to prove something to me. The event from earlier suddenly made sense; that forbidden moment that we both agreed to pretend never happened. She’d made her first move, and I was already secretly on board for years.
Now he was bracing for some rivalry he invented in his head. Or discovered? Were we discovered? I clenched my teeth.
Either way, I wasn’t about to feed that wildfire. “You can trust me,” I said simply. I’ve never been trustworthy.
He nodded, then scanned me from wing to hoof. He frowned.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me…”
“You’re not leaving until you’re dry,” he added, invalidating my escape attempt. “You’re still soaked. Why are you soaked?”
“Discord, I’m fine. I wasn’t doing anything that would make me sweat, I swear!”
“You’re steaming, Rainbow Dash.”
“There was no steamy action. I swear!”
“If you stepped outside right now, you’d turn into a sparkly ice sculpture.”
He had a point. Unfortunately.
“Fine,” I said, settling back in. “But once I’m warm, I’m out of your tail.”
He nodded, satisfied.
I could practically hear his thoughts: Good. Safe. Contained. Supervised. The sooner I dried, the sooner I could escape this jealous-chaos-creature energy. I shook out my wings slightly and leaned closer to the fire. I wanted to dry as soon as possible, but at the same time didn’t want to singe my feathers by getting too close to the flame.
The tense silence between us was cut by the crunch of hoofsteps from outside the cottage.
Fluttershy made it back the normal, non-magic way.
The door opened.
A gust of cold air swept in, rattling the windows, and Fluttershy stepped through it like she’d wrestled the wind and won.
Her mane was windblown. Her wings half-open. Her cheeks flushed with determination. Something had lit a spark under her tonight, and it was more than just the innocent Hearth’s Warming spirit.
She locked eyes with Discord first.
Then with me.
Her expression softened into that warm, earnest optimism that always, always foretold certain doom.
“Rainbow,” she said breathlessly, “I’m so glad you’re here.”
I cringed.
Discord’s eyelid twitched.
I shot him a tiny, reassuring look. Don’t worry, big guy. I’m not here to steal your marefriend. I’m just here because you kidnapped me with chaos magic and nothing else. Nothing else at all!
She could have handled our ‘first’ meeting today more convincingly than that. In order to hide our earlier surprise date, pretending to have some emotional distance would be a must. I knew she never officially graduated from kindergarten because she was too busy playing with butterflies after falling from Cloudstale. Still, the need for at least some basic discretion was self-evident even without kindergarten-level knowledge. Regardless, as long as she acted normally from that point on, Discord couldn’t pin anything concrete to either of us. Besides, nothing happened between us, so she couldn’t mess this up even if she tried.
Fluttershy trotted closer, shaking snow off her wings. “Sweet Rainbow,” she sang lovingly. “I need you!”
Discord made a choking noise.
I blushed.
Fluttershy took a breath.
I took an even bigger one because she was about to open her chatty muzzle again.
“My body is ready.” She took a step toward me.
“No, it’s not!” Discord slid between us.
Fluttershy continued, “And I choose you to do it with, Rainbow Dash.”
The snow under my bodysuits had already melted, but I froze nonetheless. Can’t she see Discord right there in the room with us?
“I’m glad you understood my hints earlier,” she said.
“Earlier?” Discord asked.
I heard myself squeak.
“Hints?” Discord asked.
How could anypony be this bad at hiding a secret‽
Fluttershy dug our grave deeper, “I want to do what I should have done years ago. And I want to do it with you, Rainbow Dash. Maybe even tonight if possible.”
Discord’s wings flared. “Fluttershy!” "
--- CHAPTER BREAK ---
“Discord, please. It will just be a quicky.”
“No!” Discord raised his voice. “There shall be no sudden movements. I forbid it.”
“Fine. Then nice and slow. How does that sound?” She looked at me. “Rainbow Dash, you’re on board with this, right?”
I was not on board. I mean… I really liked her… Maybe I was on board? I always tried to hide it, yet she must have seen right through me. But why would she out me to Discord like that?
I braced for an argument. A big one.
I sat up straight. I wanted to calm things down before chaos magic set the chimney on fire or Fluttershy talked both of us into intensive care with her lack of discretion. “Guys!” I said, then added the most diplomatically innocent non-statement possible. “I’m happy to help however I can.”
Both of them gasped.
Did I just step on a landmine? Oh, horsefeathers, how could they possibly take issue with a complete non-statement?
Fluttershy nearly dropped her cup.
Discord coughed sparks.
What did I just offer? What ‘help’ did they think I meant? A threesome? I supported my chin with a hoof, trying to decide if I’d be down with that.
Discord muttered something about ‘manageable risks’.
Fluttershy whispered something about ‘baby steps’ under her breath.
It was time to enact my secret mantra: When in doubt, do anything. “I’m sure we can figure it out,” I said, smoothing my feathers with a practiced, professional flick. “I can help both of you pass this point.”
Discord’s eyes pierced me. “Pass the kindergarten? Me? Don’t get me involved in your affairs, Rainbow Dash. I’m not doing it with you.”
I blinked. Did he actually think me and him would…
“This is only Fluttershy’s affair."
Oh, thank Celestia. But is he really okay if I did it with Fluttershy? Then again, is it really cheating if it’s agreed upon?
“...and I would prefer it if there was no affair to begin with.”
“Yeah, that’s reasonable. It’s totally understandable.” Nothing since I first touched the assaulting latex in my closet was reasonable, and nothing since the anti-air snowball shot me from the cloud was understandable that day.
Fluttershy smiled. “It’s not like we’ll keep doing it throughout my pregnancy.”
My jaw dropped. She wants me… to impregnate her?
Fluttershy closed it with a hoof. “Please don’t make a big deal about it, Rainbow.”
Discord grimaced like I’d just agreed to help her jump off a cliff. “But it is a big deal!”
I braced myself as if I was already caught cheating with Fluttershy, even though nothing had happened between us yet. I mean, she did try to strip the clothes off me, but… Nothing happened!
I replayed the scene from earlier. Has Discord seen us? Fluttershy tapping me on my flank then stripping me…
I ignored the chatter in the background while trying to build a defense case for myself in my mind.
“As a Wonderbolt, she can pass you,” Discord said. “You don’t even have to do the stupid kindergarten graduation test that you missed out on.“
“The test is just flying from point A to point B. I want to do it properly.”
“Do you intend to just pass her or test her out first, Rainbow Dash?”
“Hm?” I looked at them upon hearing my name. “Either. Neither. Nothing happened. What‽” I had no idea what the question was, much less the context.
“Discord!” Fluttershy banged a hoof on the floor. “I know she’d do it fast for me if I asked her to, but I don’t want it fast. I want it proper.”
For the love of Celestia, have you never heard of discretion, Fluttershy?
The fire had settled into a low, steady rumble. I was finally warm—too warm, honestly. My feathers itched like crazy, half-dry and bristling. But it was nothing compared to the itching of my fur under two layers of furtight bodysuits.
Fluttershy and Discord sat across from me. Stiff backs, tight wings, no eye contact. The kind of silence that precedes a blowout.
Fluttershy cleared her throat first. “Discord… we talked about this.”
Oh, great, relationship talk. Right in front of the involuntary guest.
Discord laced his mismatched fingers. “Yes. We did.”
I leaned back a little. If they were about to implode, I wanted at least a few hoof-lengths of clearance.
Fluttershy kept her voice steady, soft but determined. “We agreed that after Hearthswarming, I would finally finish what I didn’t finish years ago.”
Discord went rigid. Like, statue-rigid. “Yes, but not recklessly.”
“I am being careful,” she said. “I just want to complete it before… before everything else starts.”
“It’s already started, and you’re not taking it seriously at all.”
“Discord, I’m not risking anything,” Fluttershy continued. “It’s kindergarten-level.”
He flinched. Hard.
I stiffened too. Kindergarten? Does she really think I’m that inexperienced in kinky matters? Am I that obvious?
Discord snapped back, “Nothing involving you is ‘kindergarten.’ Not when you’re in this condition!”
“Condition?” I echoed quietly.
Neither heard me.
Hmm, estrus can be a tough time. I’d know.
Fluttershy folded her wings tightly. “I need this. Before I move on. It’s just one last step. One old fear I want to put behind me.”
Discord actually hissed. “That phrasing! Ponies only say that sort of thing before flinging themselves into disaster!”
“It’s not a disaster! It’s… It’s basic practice!”
“Basic practice done at the worst possible time!”
I raised a hoof. “Uh, guys…”
Ignored.
I sighed internally. This was classic: I get dragged into their emotional thunderstorm, then they forget I exist until they need a referee.
Fluttershy looked down at her hooves. “I want to feel ready for everything that’s coming next. I want to finish this tiny, silly thing and finally move forward.”
Discord crushed a throw pillow like a stress ball. “Why now? Why when you’re… you’re… at your most delicate?”
His voice cracked on that last word.
Wow. Jealous and scared. That combination was combustible. I needed to defuse the situation fast! "
--- CHAPTER BREAK ---
I stepped in. “Hey. Let’s calm down. Fluttershy, you’re awesome, okay? You don’t need to prove anything. And Discord, err, you’re being… supportive. In your own way.”
They both turned toward me with the same exhausted, tragic expression.
Discord waved his arms. “Rainbow Dash, tell her she’s being reckless!”
Fluttershy threw her own hooves up. “Rainbow Dash, tell him you’ll be gentle!”
I froze.
Amazing. They’d managed to make their personal crisis my problem.
Fluttershy pushed on, voice trembling. “This is the last thing I want to get through before everything changes. Before we… before we start a family.”
Who’s we in that sentence‽
Discord nearly combusted. His tail frizzed into smoke. “WHICH IS WHY YOU SHOULDN’T BE DOING IT!”
They spiraled into silence. Tense. Knotted. Awful!
After a while, Fluttershy whispered, “I’m in good hooves.”
Discord banged a hoof on the floor. “Pregnant pegasi don’t fly, and if they can, they shouldn’t!”
“Where did that come from?” I raised my eyebrows, “And what in clear skies are you talking about? Pegasi don’t stop flying when they’re pregnant. They fly more.”
Discord's jaw opened, but no words came out of his mouth.
“Flying alleviates the pressure,” I continued. This was basic weather-school stuff. “Walking dumps the weight down with every step. Flying skips all that roughness. Core stays balanced, belly doesn’t wobble. Wings do half the work. Less strain, fewer stumbles, I can go on and on…”
Fluttershy looked at Discord with a hardly noticeable smug grin.
“Late pregnancy especially,” I added. “Ground balance gets annoying, air balance doesn’t. Pegasi bodies are literally built for it. Ask any Pegasi doctor, and they’ll all say the same. It’s not even a dilemma.” I shrugged. “Some mares even prefer giving birth in the air.”
“…They do?”
“Yeah, natural rhythm helps contractions and all that. Flying is always the default state for a Pegasi.”
Discord stared at me.
Then he blinked. Slowly.
“Obviously, they won’t deliver a foal mid-stunt or during a race. That would be too radical. But normal flying, that’s the safest way in every regard.”
The tension in the room shifted.
Discord’s posture eased, like a knot loosening that he hadn’t realized he was clenching. His shoulders sagged like deflating balloons.
Fluttershy smiled at him. Soft. Reassuring.
I nodded, firm. Whatever I said seemed to calm both of them down.
Fluttershy touched Discord’s paw gently. “You worried for nothing.”
And just like that, all the tension was gone.
I sighed with relief.
Discord looked at me. “So, you’re doing the deed with Fluttershy tonight, Rainbow Dash?”
I yelped.
He drilled deeper. “Are you ready to do it now, Rainbow Dash?”
My own tension just reached a new maximum. I slowly shook my head. The words came after like jet-lag. “It’s Hearth’s Warming Eve, you guys should spend it together. And I should get myself home and find me some scissors.” I looked at Discord and explained myself further, “Actual scissors, not positional scissors. No scissoring!” I looked at Fluttershy and tried to let her down easy. “Also, I’m dry. No moisture at all inside. Like, really, really dry.” I made sure to emphasize the last word.
Their eyes met and they smiled.
I stood, stretching my finally-dry wings. “Sooo… am I free to go before you two invent a new kind of awkward issue for me?”
Fluttershy nodded sheepishly. “Of course. Thank you, Rainbow. I’ll see you tomorrow then.”
I sighed. Did she still not get it?
Discord snapped and the door vanished. “Fly safely, Element of Loyalty.”
I took the opportunity and flew through the empty doorframe before anything else exploded.
Outside, the snow glittered untouched.
I took a deep, long breath.
The night tasted sharp and clean.
No panic. No drama. No misunderstandings. Not anymore.
Finally, apprehending the situation fully and completely without a shadow of possible misinterpretation, I could give Fluttershy and myself the closure we both needed.
Before flying to my home in the sky to spend another Hearthworm’s Eve alone, I hovered just above the fresh, white surface in front of her cabin. Fluttershy belonged with Discord, not with me. That was the simple truth of it all.
“I might not have a special somepony…” I looked at my strong forehoof, “... but I bet I still get more action than Twilight.”
With the same hoof, I wrote big letters into the snow in five lines.
As I gained height on my way home, I glanced back down to confirm that my written words below would end all drama forever:
Please tag your art as ai if you used ai. The image is clearly a generated one and people like me really don't want to see it. So add the tag when you post.
Please tag your art as ai if you used ai. The image is clearly a generated one and people like me re
