Chapter 4: The Painting
Rainbow Dash woke up to an unfamiliar environment. She looked around and realized that she was still at the hospital. Groaning, she began the remember the events of the previous day. As if on cue, a doctor strolled into the hospital room.
"Rainbow Dash," he said," You're awake!" He began to start talking about complicated medical information pertaining to Rainbow Dash's wing injury from the bite and fall, but Rainbow Dash wasn't listening.
"So am I better now?" she asked, wanting to get to the point.
"Well ye-" but the doctor never finished his word. Rainbow Dash had disappeared and had just left the door swinging behind her. She dashed straight to her house on the outskirts of Ponyville.
When she reached her cloudy floating home, she saw a stormy grey Pegasus loitering in front of her front door.
"Hey Rainbow Dash! You finally came!" called a tired sounding Storm Chaser.
"How long have you been waiting here?" asked Rainbow Dash.
"Well, uh, the hotel was full so about all night!"
"Really?"
"No. Just kidding!" Storm Chaser put on a cheesy grin. Rainbow Dash only mumbled a sarcastic "Ha ha ha" at Storm Chaser's second joke. She unlocked the door saying," If you want to be funny, at least try to be original!"
Storm Chaser's grin turned back into his customary frown. The Rainbow maned pegasus lead Storm Chaser into her cloudy house. The inside was surprisingly comfy; the room was small and housed multiple sofas and a kitchen with a counter and small stove. There were three hallways leading to other rooms.
"That's my room, the bathroom and the guest room, your room." She said emotionless pointing to each room. Without any further dialogue, she walked to her room and slammed the door loudly. Storm Chaser sighed and also entered his own room.
Rainbow Dash returned to her house after an uneventful day of tending to the weather of Ponyville. She was surprised to see her tenant sitting on the edge ot the cloud platform looking into the horizon. Since he was facing the opposite of direction of Rainbow Dash, the cyan pegasus thought of the funniest prank. She smiled evilly as she began to dash towards Storm Chaser. Just as they were about to collide, Storm Chaser turned around with a priceless expression of pure panic as Rainbow Dash stopped, millimeters away from Storm Chaser. The victim tumbled backwards and disappeared from view for a few seconds. Storm Chaser flew back up looking very annoyed. Wordlessly, he plopped back where he was sitting earlier and ignored the laughing Rainbow Dash. She soon settled down and sat next Storm Chaser.
"You have to admit, that was pretty funny!"
Storm Chaser just grunted in response.
"What's the problem? Thinking about your brother?" Rainbow was now more serious.
Storm Chaser sighed. "Sometimes I just like to sit down and think about the loved ones I have lost and the ones I never had."
"Parents?" asked Rainbow Dash. Storm Chaser shook his head.
"You know Storm Chaser. I'm an orphan too."
"Really?"
"No. Just Kidding." Rainbow put on a cheesy grin.
"Very funny," Storm Chaser replied sarcastically.
The two sat silently and watched the now beautiful sunset.
The silence was broken by Storm Chaser,"I heard that the Elements of Harmony live in Ponyville."
"Really? Well then let me introduce you one of them!" She pointed to herself. "The Element of Loyalty/Awesomeness!"
"You're the Element of Loyalty? I heard the element of Loyalty was especially stupid."
"Haha. You wouldn't want a second black eye, now would you?"
Ignoring the warning, Storm Chaser said," So you and your 5 friends are the Elements?"
"Yup!" Storm Chaser knew that knowing the Elements of Harmony would come in handy.
The sun was beginning to set and Rainbow yawned. "I'm going to go to sleep. So if you want to watch the sun set all day then be my guest!" She flew back into the house. Storm Chaser looked down to the small plot of empty land that was below the house and in front of the mountain he had to climb to get to Ponyville. Looking at the blank, empty spot started to make his creative juices flow. 'If I am going to live here for the rest of his life,' he thought,' Then I might as well make the best of it.'
Storm Chaser woke up the next day feeling happy. After getting ready for the day, he locked the door, closed the curtains and got out a large fold-able canvas from his saddlebags.
After about half an hour of work, he picked up his masterpiece and left the house. Standing on the cloudy floor, he looked at the empty plot of land he had gazed at the previous day. He held up his painting and admired his work. Smiling, he thought peacefully about his work only to be interrupted by a loud crash.
Rainbow Dash flew out of the front door of the house looking confused.
"Uh, are you alright?" asked a puzzled Storm Chaser.
"It was um... nothing... I was just having a bad dream." Storm Chaser raised an eyebrow. "I sometimes sleepwalk," Rainbow Dash clarified. She walked over to the picture that Storm Chaser was holding. "Did you paint that yourself?"
Storm Chaser nodded. Rainbow Dash could not deny that it was pretty good. Beautiful actually. Though awesome would be a better description. The painting showed the area of land in front of the house. Except it wasn't empty. There in the center was a round house. The sides of the house were decorated with a repeating hexagonal pattern and the flat top was adorned with a square chimney and a telescope. The door was wooden with a simple window in it. But what made the house spectacular was what was attached to the side. A small tube was hooked onto the side leading up into the air. It was white and fluffy. This cloudy tube lead up to another cloudy round house identical to the one on the ground in every way except the material. A house half wood and half cloud was an amazing idea.
Seeing Rainbow Dash's jaw slowly dropping, Storm Chaser couldn't help but brag. "The design allows it to be fireproof, stormproof, and allows extra security and privacy for pegasi."
Rainbow Dash now was really puzzled. She looked at the background. There she saw Ponyville. Perfect Ponyville. She could make out each individual house and little ponies in front of each house. The ponies coloring matched the actual owners of the house. She saw a big tree library and a little purple unicorn looking through a telescope. She couldn't see who in front of a cupcake themed bakery but it was sure to be Pinkie Pie. She could even see a farm and above the house was Rainbow Dash's own house with a blue pegasus flying around. The background was literally picture perfect. He would have to use a photograph or maybe even magic to draw something so exact to reality.
"How is it?" Storm Chaser asked the now silent and thinking Rainbow Dash.
"Its...incredible!" Rainbow replied.
"There's only one problem. I don't know how to work with clouds. And since you live in a house that is made of clouds, I was wondering if you could help me buil-" But Rainbow Dash cut him off.
"Fine," Rainbow Dash sighed.