Chapter 21:

Rainbow Dash groaned softly as she woke up from her sleep, after a late night of scaring fillies and colts and stuffing her muzzle with Nightmare Night candy and chocolates. When she woke up completely, she saw there was the odd empty wrapper that once held a bit of candy or chocolate. The mare smacked her lips softly, trying to get the dryness that formed in her sleep.

She looked around, seeing the early morning lightly pouring in from the open cloud window, that she strangely didn't block with another cloud for the morning. Rainbow Dash wanted to stay in bed for a short while longer, but now that she was already awake, she knew that she couldn't get back to sleep after all the candy she ate last night. Rather reluctantly, Rainbow Dash got up from her bed and looked out of the window.

Even with all of the candy she had ate last night was making her feel a bit sick, Rainbow Dash had something else that was on her mind that was much more important than how much she ate last night; what she saw through Rarity's window, with Thunder Light and Spitfire.

When she had first seen the two of them in the same room, she first thought that she was seeing things; there was no way that the Captain of the Wonderbolts knew her friend; but even she couldn't mistake the Pegasi mare that she idolized the most for somepony else, even if it was with one of her best friend's cousin.

A sigh followed behind Rainbow's thoughts afterwards, shaking her head to try and clear it of what she saw last night. But she knew it was going to take a lot more than that to forget about Thunder Light and Spitfire; she'd talk to Thunder Light about that later, but right now, all she really wanted to do was spread her wings and go for a fly…

'Yeah, I'll do that,' thought Rainbow Dash to herself, getting out of bed completely and lazily making her bed before heading downstairs. She couldn't find Tank, but make him a bowl of breakfast for when he did come out from where he was hiding. She then opened the front door of her cloud house, spread her wings and took off for a morning flight.

As she flew further away from her house and Cloudsdale at a steady pace, her wings idly flapping to keep her flying, her mind started to clear the more time she spent in the air. She felt much more at home in the sky or on the clouds than she ever did when she spent her time on the ground. She felt the stiff muscles in her wings starting to loosen up; she must have been sleeping on them or something for them to be that painful when flying.

Rainbow Dash neared the sky over Ponyville, the early morning sun baring moving over the horizon, leaving the small town of Ponyville in a gentle and warm morning glow. The confident mare would never admit this to anypony else, but she actually found this sight very nice; it seemed like the whole world seemed to be at peace, at this one point of the day.

As she unknowingly began to lower towards Ponyville, she let her mind wander towards the stallion that had been on her mind for quite a few weeks now; Thunder Light, that mysterious stallion that she knew little about, but still felt strangely attracted towards him.

She began reviewing her time that she had spent with Thunder Light. From that moment when she had accidently crashed into him and rendered him grounded for a few days; after that rocky start, they did seem to kick off quiet well. Rainbow Dash remembered that she accidently began ditching a few days of her work at the Weather Factory to spend some time with Thunder Light. Sure, she had received a bit of trouble with the Boss for the absence, but, in her opinion, she thought it was worth it. She had enjoyed that time with Thunder; she remembered the few pranks they had pulled on a few ponies, as well as the time they had spent simply enjoying the time.

The next thing that came to mind when she thought about Thunder Light was when they went to the Wonderbolt performance; she was still wondering how he managed to get that autograph of all of the Wonderbolts before anypony in the line…

'Wait a minute…' thought Rainbow Dash, an idea slowly starting to form in her head; the thing with Spitfire and Thunder Light in the same room back at Rarity's shop, and he managed to get the autographs of all of the Wonderbolts before anypony else…this appeared to be making sense to Rainbow Dash.

"I'm asking him," said Rainbow Dash to herself firmly, before sharply turning and heading straight down to Ponyville at high speed; a faint rainbow trail following behind her tail and mane as she picked up more speed. She burst through the early morning clouds that she was flying over and separated her from Ponyville. She instantly looked over the top of the town, only a few ponies actually up and about at this time of day. Rainbow Dash spotted the Boutique that Rarity lived and Thunder Light was staying at for his time in Ponyville; she changed course and headed straight for the shop, flapping her wings quickly to keep her speed up to get there as quickly as possible.

She landed just outside of the shop and rapidly knocked on the door, not caring how loud she was being; she needed to know if she was right or not, since it was tearing her apart inside. She didn't care if she woke up all of Ponyville; she just wanted to get Thunder Light up. After a few minutes and a series of rapid knocking, she heard the faint, "Alright, alright! Keep you mane on!" of the mare that was Rarity. Even though it wasn't who she wanted up in the first place, Rainbow Dash knew that it was at least a way of getting Thunder Light up.

Soon enough, the door opened up sharply and Rarity, her mane still slightly curled up in some areas, indicating that she had really just woke up and she started, "What sort of time do yo-Oh, Rainbow Dash; it's you. Well, what time do you call this?!"

"Hey, nice to see you too Rare," said Rainbow Dash, diverting away from the angered question from the mare and getting straight to the point. "Look, is Thunder Light up; I need to talk to him about something. It's real important."

Rarity looked at Rainbow Dash suspiciously, to which the Pegasus simply smiled back at her fellow Element of Harmony; she wanted to talk to Thunder as quickly as possible, "Hmm…fine, I'll see if he's up," said Rarity, leaving the door open for Rainbow Dash as she turned and headed back inside, to see if she could wake up Thunder Light at this time.

A few minutes went by before Rainbow Dash heard the hoofsteps coming down the stairs of Rarity's upper house and eventually saw Thunder Light, his mane sticking up in places, which indicated that he had just woken up himself, and he blinked sleepily as he approached the door. "Dash? W…What are you doing here at this time of the morning?" asked Thunder sleepily, pausing for a second to stifle a yawn mid-sentence.

"Look; I need to ask you something. It's kinda important," said Rainbow, getting right to the point; she didn't want to beat around the bush when it came to this important thing she had to find out. She took a few idle steps forward, slowly stepping into the house and closing the door behind her; Thunder Light didn't seem to mind this, and closed the door behind Rainbow Dash as he watched the Pegasus.

"K; I'm going to be blunt here. Are you dating Spitfire?" asked Rainbow, being as straight to the point as she could with the stallion.

Said stallion, who had been half-asleep from this point, was instantly fully awake when he heard the question coming from Rainbow Dash. He blinks a few times, allowing the question to bounce around in his head a few times to make sure that he heard Rainbow Dash correctly. "W…What would ever make you think I was going out with Spitfire?" asked Thunder Light, his eyes showing his confusion and shock at the sudden question.

"Well, I did kinda see you last night, during Nightmare Night; I knew I saw Spitfire when I saw her. It was kinda hard not to when to see the coat colour," said Rainbow Dash, admitting that she had seen them last night. Before Thunder Light could retort to that, she continued, "And! And, when, um, you were able to get an autograph before any of the other Pegasi in the lines. That does kinda put up a good reason."

Thunder Light was about to respond to Rainbow Dash invading his privacy, but he slowly closed his mouth after a long pause; he had to admit, the evidence did seem to stack against him when it was presented like that. 'Well, at least it's better than her thinking I'm a Wonderbolt,' thought Thunder Light, trying to find some piece of good news out of this.

'Alright, see if you can work your way out of this one, Lights,' thought Thunder again, trying to think his way out of this one; he assured himself that he had been in worse situations beforehand…he could think of one right of the bat.

"Um, hmm…well, with what you saw last night," said Thunder, adding a slight glare at Rainbow Dash; to which she just shrugged and smiled innocently at him. "Me and Spitfire are just…old friends. Yeah, me and Spitfire have known each other for a while. We're not dating or anything like that' we just look out for each other. That was also how I managed to get that autograph from the Wonderbolts; I know the 'Bolts through Spits, and well, I think you know then."

"Hmm…" said Rainbow Dash, narrowing her eyes suspiciously at the stallion; she had noticed a few flicks of Thunder's eyes that she found suspicious, but she just thought that it was something to do with the nervousness. And after what he had said, she could kinda understand why he was nervous about saying that. "Well, that's awesome! You are actually friends with Spitfire?" she asked, her eyes wide in wonder with a smile on her muzzle.

"Yeah; that's what I didn't want you to find out. You've got to promise me that you won't tell anyone that me and Spitfire are close; I don't want this to ruin her career or anything. Please; promise me, Dash," asked Thunder Light, a slightly desperate look in his eyes as he looked at the Pegasus mare. Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes slightly again at this, tapping her hoof against the floor of the Boutique; she still felt as though Thunder Light wasn't telling her all there was to his secret, but she knew that she had to respect his privacy.

For now.

"Ah…alright, fine; I promise. You're 'secret' is safe with me," said Rainbow Dash, winking at Thunder Light with a confident smile. She then turned to head out of the building, saying, "Well, I'd better get going…Don't want to get in anymore trouble with the Weather Factory than I already am." With a soft and boyish chuckle, Rainbow Dash turned and opened the door, before taking off after she'd open it.

Thunder Light watched the cyan mare leave the Boutique, and he quickly closed the door behind him and pressed his back against the door; breathing quickly. That had been too close to comfort for his liking.

"I really should tell her…" mumbled Thunder Light, running a hoof through his mane as she thought about this; Rainbow Dash had been the first pony he had met when he was in Ponyville, and she and him had become quite close in the amount of time that he had been here. Perhaps she was the right, and only, mare he thought he could tell his real secret. But then his mind wandered towards the fact that Rainbow Dash was a big fan of the Wonderbolts, and might think that he was pulling her hoof or something like that. If it took a different turn from that, Thunder Light thought that she would turn to hate him; and he couldn't lose his closest friend.

The stallion sighed heavily, getting up wearily from the door and slowly walked up the stairs that led to the upper half of the building that acted as a normal house, and headed towards the open door that was his temporary room.

Since the room was meant to hold anypony, it was painted white, a neutral colour. There wasn't much else; Rarity had struggled to keep herself from decorating the room with something that would make the room mostly apply to one gender; and it had been rather hard for her to do so, having to see a room so bare and so lifeless.

Thunder walked over to the simply bed that was pushed against one side of the room, and all but collapsed on the bed with a soft sigh; not even bothering with covering himself with the blanket. He turned his head, resting his cheek against the bed as he looked over at a medium-sized picture on his desk. It was one of him and Spitfire, both of them in Wonderbolt uniform and smiles on their faces. Spitfire had her front leg around Thunder's neck affectionately, but Thunder from even back then knew that it was nothing more than friendly affection. He still smiled softly at the memory; it was when he had first officially joined the Wonderbolts.

Thunder Light was in silence for a short while, before he finally closed his eyes and tried to get back to sleep. But not before whispering to himself, "I've got to tell her…"