Sick day (backdated to 13th October)

[rewritethis]

Characters: Rainbow Dash and Edward Elric
Location: Dorm A110
Rating: PG-13 for angst and potty mouth
Open/Closed/Finished: Finished
Summary: Sleep deprivation does a number on even the stubbornest immune system. And this one is very, very stubborn.

As usual, Rainbow barges in with her usual amount of tact and empathy...

"Where the hay WERE you!? I was waiting for about three hours!" In other words, fifteen minutes. "What are you doing just lying around?!"


He's surprised and indignant enough to jump to his feet and angrily inhale - probably about to ask how the hell she got in here at all, there was a door - but then he doubles over, and all that comes out in response is an extended series of hacking coughs.

When they've mostly died down, he straightens up, glares at her like it's her fault, opens his mouth, again... and exactly the same thing happens, except with more obvious pain this time.

Defeated (and still wheezing a little), he slumps back down onto the couch and promptly scowls off into space, refusing to give her another glance. Because if nobody's seen him ill, he obviously can't be, right?


Rainbow watches all this with wide eyes. When he'd first started flailing, she'd been on the verge of laughing, but... hey, this actually looks serious.

So she trots herself right around into his line of sight.

"Hey, are you okay? What happened?"

...yeah, sometimes Rainbow's brain takes a moment to catch up with her.


He shoots her a withering look for a moment - it's not like he just hacked up what felt like both of his lungs right in front of her; obviously he's broken his leg or something - before stubbornly looking away. "Nothing," he insists. It's barely a whisper (well, okay, a rasp), but even that seems to be enough of a strain to get him coughing again.


That whisper is all it takes to convince her it's SERIOUS. Because... you know. Ed. Doesn't whisper. Conversational volume is subdued for him.

"Whoa, whoa, what did you DO to yourself?! Don't answer that. Why didn't you say someth-- never mind that too. Umm. Okay, no more talking, feel free to just glare at me instead of doing that."


Using only body language, he attempts to convey the approximate sentiment of 'DAMMIT, WHY WOULD I WANT TO DO SOMETHING LIKE THIS TO MYSELF (if there was anything actually wrong with me, which there isn't)'. It mostly involves violently waving his arms around without caring what they hit in the process, although he does point emphatically at his throat once or twice.


"I KNOW you messed up your voice," she says. Because obviously that's what he's trying to communicate. "Look, you hold on for just a second."

She zips off in a rainbow flash.


Nope. As soon as he sees she's gone - which takes his eyes a moment of adjusting thanks to that sudden bright, physically improbable rainbow trail in this slightly darkened room, but never mind that - he springs up and bolts for the window. Well, it would be bolting if he didn't have to pause after every few steps for another coughing fit, but he's doing his best.


He's interrupted, though.

"WHAT are you DOING?"

You didn't think you could outrace a pony, did you, Ed? Rainbow hovers in the door for one outraged moment before zipping ahead to interpose between window and alchemist.


And suddenly his escape route is a pony. Wonderful.

Without bothering to make eye contact, he stomps past her and pointedly tugs one of the curtains to the side, letting a bit more light into the room. It's clearly what he intended to do all along, and not just a show he's putting on because he can't exactly walk through her.


She glares at him the entire way, and is going to keep glaring at him until he sits his flank back down. With a couple of encouraging shoulder-pushes along the way. Why shoulder instead of hoof? Because she has a big thermos clamped firmly between her forehooves.


He reluctantly complies and sprawls back onto the couch, all the while eyeing that thermos with the kind of wariness most people would reserve for ticking bombs. Even if she's not about to poison him, deliberately or otherwise (because what the hell does a pony know about toxicity to humans?), he can think of at least one liquid he doesn't want to find in there.


Still watching him, she sets the thermos down, carefully unscrews the mug-cap and sets it down on the endtable as well, then picks up the thermos in her teeth and pours. Luckily, what spills into the mug never came from a cow -- it's steaming-hot tea.

She sets the thermos down, then points a hoof. "Drink. It'll soothe your throat."


He manages to suppress a sigh of relief, sparing not only his dignity (insofar as he has any by this point) but also his throat from the coughing he'd probably have set off otherwise. The tea does smell pretty good right now...

But with the cap halfway to his mouth, he stops, looks up at her, points at the thermos with his free hand and quirks an eyebrow. So she just happened to have one of these lying around, huh?


"Hey," she says, "training doesn't stop just because the weather is cold, y'know. I have to keep in shape in ALL conditions. Even really, really cold ones." Days where she'd RATHER just spent the whole day in bed doing nothing, and only raw dedication to a dream keeps her going.


Hey, is that an accusation? Look, he's perfectly fine! And to prove it, he jumps right back up so he can glower at her eye to eye... splashing hot tea all over his left leg, the couch behind it and maybe a couple of other places at the same time. Not that he notices.


How could that even be--?!

"You're spilling all over!" Rainbow yells at him. "Sit down and DRINK YOUR TEA!"


Because she was clearly stating that she manages to stay well enough to train in any weather and he can't, of course! ...Even though he patently can!

He glances down only when she mentions the spill, and discovering it doesn't improve his mood - he's going to have to clean that up, isn't he? Grumbling under his breath as he settles onto the couch again isn't really an option, but he contrives to give the impression of it all the same before gulping the tea down and shoving the cap back at her. "Happy now?"


She takes the cap carefully between her forehooves as her wings beat, frowning.

"Well, you didn't start coughing horribly, so we're definitely making progress. There's more if you want more."

She sets the cap down next to the thermos, then reaches up to plant her foreleg on his forehead appraisingly. How's that temperature, Ed?


"Hey, I'm not...!" That bursts out at a more normal volume, which he quickly regrets. He still has enough of his act together to firmly push her leg away the instant it touches him, though - even as the rest of his body is racked with, yes, more painful coughing. "I'm... fine, okay? Stop it."


"Aaand progress gone again. You are NOT fine and you oughtta be ashamed that you even think for a second you can fool me into thinking you're fine.

"Now, we can do this the hard way, where you put on this big, strong act like everything is fine, except you'll be coughing and miserable the whole time through it and I still won't buy it, or we can do this the easy way where you don't do that, and I promise not to tell anyone there was a brief period of time where you weren't tough and strong and completely invincible."

It's a better deal than her friends give HER when she ends up in the hospital with a broken wing or something.


But acting like everything's fine is what he does...

He steadily avoids looking directly at her for a few seconds, then swings both of his legs up so that he's lying down rather than sitting (he hardly has to bend them to comfortably fit on top of there) and rolls over onto his side to give himself a better excuse. "You didn't have to. 'S just a cough." He might be willing to concede he's not completely well right now if she's going to be pushy about it, but that's as far as he intends to let it go.


It's about as big a step as anyone could reasonably expect, especially Rainbow, who usually needs to be subject to gross physical harm before slowing down. She watches him for a moment, then pours another mug of tea for him and offers it up. That last coughing fit had to have hurt.


[At the sound of pouring, he at least looks over his shoulder, but he still doesn't want to face her properly - and when she brings the mug cap near him, he just bats at it with the back of his hand. "No, I mean it. He's starting to sound more ragged already; that last word comes out as basically a cough. "Didn't have to. I don't need it."


Okay, fine. Is that how we're gonna play it?

She sets the mug down near him, then takes to the air to fuss with the curtains he'd opened, adjusting them to bring in light without him getting too much sun to the face. Then she quickly ducks into the next room for a moment, puttering about in there vaguely but noisily.

No one will see you drink the tea, Ed.


Oh, come on, that's so obvious. He doesn't even wait for her to finish leaving the room before pulling a face at her retreating back. Who does she think she's fooling?

Then he drags himself upright, furtively glances over to the window and door just in case, downs the entire mug none too quietly and sets it back down in the same place. As an afterthought, he reaches over to the thermos and refills the mug to exactly the level it was previously at. Purely for cover-up.

Finally, he lies back down, looking for all the world like he hasn't moved an inch.

"Hey... what're you doing? Get out of there." It still doesn't quite have his usual amount of belligerence behind it, and it's muffled a bit since he is talking into the back of the couch, but it's definitely audible.


"Making sure there's not some breeze or something!"

Sorry Ed, you can't cover up your VOICE... but Rainbow Dash promised she'd pretend, and she'll even do that here in private. She wings her way back into the room, all innocence.

...buuuut she isn't sure how else to treat him. So she just hovers there for a moment, looking down and pondering her options.


What do you mean? This is totally how he sounded right from the beginning!

The annoyed look he gives her is probably a little more bleary-eyed than he was meaning to show. "What? What is it? Something on my face?"

And he curls up slightly so she isn't right on top of his feet.

"I'll watch your flight practice some other time. Dunno why you care. They all look the same to me."


She drops down to the floor next to him. Not TOO close, but... what she hopes will be comfortingly close without being obviously so. (In other words, exactly as close as she'd want someone to be if SHE were all laid up.)

"All the same?! Today was --"

She stops, then ducks her head a little. He's sick, missing one flight practice is understandable.

"Next time, I'll show you my notes for the routine. Then you'll know what to look for."


"You make notes for -" His distinctly hypocritical incredulity is cut short after the rest of it sticks in his throat. He coughs again. "Yeah, okay. Next time. You're gonna make it, I don't know, tomorrow morning or something."

Could just be his imagination, but it feels like it's getting kind of warm in here... He shifts a little so he can rest his right hand on his forehead and still have it look reasonably casual.


"Of course I make notes. Flight routine design doesn't just happen, y'know. There's a lot of art and science behind it. They go through a lot of work on paper before I even get them up into the air.

"You didn't really think I just... got up there and did whatever, did you?"

She's so indignant, and struggling not to be more so, that she hasn't become suspicious of his gesture. He's just being exasperated with her for no good reason again, right?


He moves his head to look at her rather than take his hand away. "Could've fooled me." It's uncharitable even by his standards, but c'mon, he's ill.

He's contemplating getting up again and opening the window. For some reason, it suddenly seems like a bigger ask than it did, say, five minutes ago.


Ouch. She lowers her head.

"So you think I'm just a lazy slacker, too, huh?"

Rainbow, Ed is sick, stop getting moody and pay attention to him!

...yeah, Dash is just a little self-centered, ya know.


That makes two of them... But he can tell when he's upset someone inadvertently for a change. He props himself up slightly unsteadily and sets his feet back down onto the floor. "Hey, nobody said that. I'm the one who couldn't be assed to do anything today over a cough."

Speaking of actually doing things? He's decided to go ahead and trudge over to the window, inexplicably encroaching light-headedness be damned.


Neither of them is TRYING to guilt the other... which is probably why it's all so successful, going both ways.

"Hey, hey, what are you doing?"

She springs up, stepping along beside him in alarm.


If she's walking alongside him, she's likely to notice his ever so slight weaving before long, but he's not going to make a big deal of it.

"What do you think? Letting some air in. It's too hot in here." Despite the actual temperature outside being somewhat cooler than the past few days, and the fact that he's only wearing one layer of clothing.


"Uh, the temperature hasn't changed since I got here..."

Yes, she's noticed the weaving. Which just means she's prepared to dive and catch him on her back at a moment's notice. Because obviously, pointing it out to him isn't going to make him act any smarter.


He opens his mouth to ask her how she'd know when she's been zipping around this whole time, but it turns into just a wordless irritated noise after he realises that would mean she'd think it was warmer than it really is. See? Logic. He's being totally rational about all of this.

And he's not about to fall over or anything, sheesh. In fact, he makes it to the window, pushes it open a crack and gets back to the couch perfectly upright. Once there, of course, he immediately slumps - carelessly enough to knock over the thermos cap of tea still sitting there, though whether the root cause is dizziness or frustration is anyone's guess. (Including his.)


Aww jeeze. She picks the cup up and moves it out of the way, then sits back down next to the couch, spreads her wings, and begins to fan him with them. All the while looking like she's just mildly irritated.


Hey, that's not bad. When did they install a fan in - oh.

"Look, I know I told you I don't need anything like that. I heard it." His point is kind of undermined by the coughing that follows.


"I'm drying the couch. Some tea got spilled on it."

She's completely deadpan when she says that, and looking not terribly innocent about it.


The only response that deserves is more glowering, which he happily delivers. Then, without even bothering to move from where he's lying, he claps and presses his hands to the bottom of the couch. Water promptly spurts out of the fabric, and... well, some of it lands in the mug. Whatever caused his carelessness just now is clearly still a problem.

Having done that, he rolls over and covers his face with his automail again. He doesn't really care about subtlety this time. "Did it for you."


"...I'm amazed you even had the energy for that."

But he hasn't told her to stop. So she doesn't. She's frowning, instead, at the expression on his face before it vanishes behind his sleeve.


"I said, cut that out! If I wanted pity, I'd ask for it!" Now he's told her. In a voice that's sounding increasingly scratchy, too. ...Though he hasn't outright told her to go away.


So she'll drop the pretense, but not the fanning.

"It's not pity. Trust me, I could speak to you like you're a newborn colt and act like you've got three hooves in the grave, but if I did I'd punch myself in the teeth before you even got the chance to."


"That a suggestion?" Given how weakly he says it, she wouldn't have much to worry about if it was. Which is annoying in itself.

He lifts his hand and looks sideways at her. "Well... doesn't matter what it is. I didn't ask for anything."


"Funny thing about friendship. You don't have to ask."

She says that casually, but there's care and concern in those big red eyes of hers.


He doesn't move or reply for what feels like the longest time, although it really isn't even half a minute. Then his hand goes back down onto his forehead. "Give me a break. It's a cough."


"Awesome alchemist Edward Elric doesn't let 'a cough' slow him down." She says that without a hint of irony or sarcasm, too. Even if she IS just flattering him a little to soothe his ego, she doesn't think he's a loser. "And since this IS slowing you down, it's not just a cough.


Flattery will get you everywhere, Rainbow. Though in this particular situation, improving his mood mostly means less explicit hostility and more sarcasm, which might not be the effect she was hoping for. "Right... because you're suddenly a medical expert. On humans." He coughs. "...And who said anyone was slowing down?"


She can handle sarcasm. She's not bad with it herself, after all.

"Because you wouldn't have missed my flight practice otherwise."

Simple logic, but compelling in her mind.


"You don't know that. Maybe I just wasn't bored enough." His expression suggests she's right anyway, but at least his hand is covering most of it.


She grits her teeth for a second before she realizes what he's trying to do, and then she actually laughs a little.

"Nice try. Almost got me. So, if you're running a fever, that's supposed to be good because your body is fighting whatever you've got... we just need to make sure you get lots of fluid in you."


"Don't need you for that, either. Tell me something I don't know." Keeping up the unwarranted jabs at her is one way of continuing to sound coherent even when the inside of his head isn't feeling a whole lot like it.


So long as she keeps reminding herself that he's being a jerk because he hates being sick and she's reminding him that he is, those barbs slide right off her. She's had enough real attacks aimed at her, in her time, to dull these.

"Something you don't know, or don't wanna hear? Because you need more to drink. How about some cold juice? I figure the tea is too hot now..."


At this point, it's not as sophisticated as that - he's being a jerk largely because it's less effort than any alternative.

"Heard you the first time, okay? I'll... get some later." He still hasn't moved, and shows no sign of wanting to any time soon.


Without asking or acknowledging him, she flies off. It should be no surprise at all that she comes back with a glass of juice for him, which she sets down on the endtable for him. Then she picks up the mug of tea in her teeth and the thermos between her forelegs, and flies off to put them away properly. And, y'know, let him drink without nagging him.


A combination of stubbornness and inertia keep him just lying there at first, but eventually the pain in his throat wins out - he unfolds into something approaching a sitting position and reaches for the glass. She might even catch him in the act, although he's still feeling self-conscious enough to hope otherwise.


She comes back in cheerfully, then immediately turns around and leaves as if she's seen nothing.

After a moment's pause, the sound of hooves on the floor proceeds her coming back into the room. She has a wet washcloth gripped in her teeth by one corner, and she's looking at him expectantly.


By the time she's back, the glass is back on the table, about half empty - and someone apparently put it down in a hurry, if the little splashes around its base are any indicator.

He takes one look at the cloth she's holding, turns away and shuts his eyes, steadfastly pretending he has no idea what she's getting at. He's about to say as much too, except that's when the coughing starts up again.


Great! While he's busy coughing, she trots on over to slap the washcloth on his forehead. It's nice and damp and cool, and she's relying on inertia and the fact that it actually feels good to keep him from tossing it away. She's not gonna baby him by keeping it pressed there or anything, at least.


He is about to throw the cloth away - he even reaches up to pull it off his head. But then he stops, and just leaves his hand there. His head does feel slightly clearer for it... which only makes him more determined to think about anything other than being sick.

"You know," he says jerkily, "if screwing around in here means you're missing out on anything important... I'm gonna kick you in the teeth."


"Even if I was, I sure wouldn't TELL you after you said that. Applejack's the weirdly honest pony, not me."

Meanwhile, she's heading into his bedroom!


"Wait, the hell are you -" It takes him a second to realise where she's going... after which he not only scrambles to his feet, but finally musters the energy to really shout after her. "Dash!!" Though, given the amount of coughing that follows, it doesn't seem to do him much good.


Not only does that get her out in a hurry, it gets her shoving him back down on the couch!

"What the hay is wrong with you?! Lie back down!"

She grabs the juice glass from the end table and holds it pointedly up for him. Try and undo at least a little of that damage, Ed!


Shove him and he'll shove back, dammit! ...however ineffectually.

He knows better for the time being than to try and vocalise the entire rant on the tip of his tongue, but the glaring and pointing over at the door to his room probably say most of it.


"I'm looking for a blanket! Or at least a sheet or something. If your fever gets worse, you're gonna be shaking and shivering, and I want to be prepared!

"What, is there something in there you're embarrassed about me seeing?"


"It's not gonna get worse!" It's getting gradually harder to make his words out through all the scratchiness, which shouldn't be much of a surprise. "And my notes are in there, what do you think?!"

He stands up again and attempts to march over to his bedroom door himself, defiantly and only a little unsteadily.


"Why would I care about your notes?! I'm not gonna touch your notes! You're gonna fall over and mess them all up!"

In a fit of extremely bad but well-intentioned judgment, she bites the back of his shirt to haul him back to the couch.

...hey, if he were a pony, she'd be grabbing his TAIL, but he inconveniently doesn't have one.


"Get...!" Near-instantly, he twists round, either to push her away or just yell in her face - but he doesn't quite get there before losing his balance and dropping heavily to the floor. ...He's not feeling great.


Not quite to the floor -- as soon as she sees him going down, she all but throws herself between him and it, to take his weight on her back and shoulders. Her muscles are solid beneath him, but softer than the floor by far, and she pushes herself up without any real effort whatsoever. Hate it though he might, she's strong enough to bear his burden.

"Would you feel better in your bed, instead of on a couch?"



"Who cares? I said it's not gonna get any worse." That stumble was just a fluke! And to prove it, he drags himself right back up. "'m just getting my coat so you shut up about it. That's all."


When his weight is off, she flies into the air in front of him, putting her hooves on his shoulders so she can look him straight in the eyes. This has gone a bit too far for her comfort, and as much as she absolutely HATES to do it, it's time for another round of being... ugh, open and honest about sentimental stuff.

"Ed. You're sick. I know you don't like it, but you can't just pretend it away. Your body needs time, rest, and care to get better. You're always complaining about science and stuff, well... that's biology, isn't it? If you could clap your hands and make it go away you would have."


He hangs his head, but she'll be disappointed if she thinks he's surrendering - it's only to try and break that eye contact. "Well, medicine's not as simple as that. It's not just equivalent exchange - gotta be careful you're not interfering with the body's natural processes, either. And make sure you're only working on the pathogen itself, not accidentally trying to perform human transmutation. It's not my field."

Of course he's doing it on purpose. Open and honest aren't two of his favourite adjectives.


All she really hears out of that is 'blah blah blah you're entirely correct Rainbow Dash but I'm trying to admit it in a way that sounds like I'm not admitting it.'

"...You're always on about 'equivalent exchange,' aren't you."


Admitting things? Who? What? Where?

"'Course I am. Why wouldn't I be? You try pulling off one of your..." Another bout of coughing cuts him off. "...one of your fancy flight shows without using your wings.


"Friendship, Ed." She puts a hoof on her chest. "Equivalent." And then moves it to his. "Exchange. You look out for me, I look out for you. And that means right now, when you're sick, I'm here. So rely on me.

"It's okay."


He wants to push that hoof off of him and pretend he didn't hear any of that. He even raises his hand to move it. But instead of following through, he lets his arm fall to his side. There's been something darker than normal eating away at him for a little while, and it's that which seems to force the uncharacteristically honest words out.

"Dash... if you think that's an equivalent exchange, you don't know anything about me."


"What I think is that friendship doesn't have numbers. You can't make math out of it. All you can do is stick by your friend and they'll stick by you, and it'll all work out in the end.

"That's equivalent, right?"


He makes another attempt at lifting his hand, but instead of pushing her, finds himself hiking up the neck of his shirt a little. Is it getting colder in here again?

"Equivalent... means equal value." He pauses for what feels like a long while. Candor isn't his thing at the best of times; why'd it suddenly have to show up when he's in this kind of state? And after three nights of that... Dammit, dammit, dammit. "...You're probably worth a lot. Not all of us are."


She gives him just the tiniest shake, just enough to startle him into meeting her eyes again.

"Your worth to me is what I say it is. You don't get to choose what you're worth to me. And according to MY price scales, your worth to me is one friendship."


She wanted him to look at her; he stares at her, for some time. The corner of his mouth twitches once or twice.

Then he hunches over and launches into another coughing fit - which might start off sounding just a little forced, but certainly doesn't stay that way for long.


Rainbow looks worried. "Awww, jeeze. Hold on."

She ducks to the side, grabs the half-full juice glass, then brings it back over to him.


He glances at the proffered glass and then ignores it, already making his way back to the couch. Never mind fetching his coat. He'll be fine if he can just sit down for a bit.

"Your scales don't work, Dash. Get some new ones."


She stubbornly follows along, setting the juice down where he can still see it.

"Yeah, uh, me doing that just because you told me to is about as likely as you deciding to abandon your alchemy and become a wizard just because I told you to."


He bends down for the washcloth he dropped earlier, slaps it back over his forehead (and eyes - look, he can't see the glass, clearly it's not there) and sinks into the couch. Again.

"Then what would get you to do that? I'm listening."


"Speaking from experience? Being mind-controlled by the spirit of disharmony. And I'll pass on that, thanks. Once was enough."

Even if she doesn't remember it clearly, she was told what she did and how she acted then.


He turns his head a tiny bit sideways so he isn't lying on so much of his braid.

"Yeah, that's not an option for me... Anything else?"


"I dunno. Do you really want me to go away?"

Rainbow means that in a very absolute sense, which as casually as she asks it, nevertheless comes through quite clearly. She expects this to be answered with at least a game attempt at an angry yes, which she will read as an explicit no.


Neither - just a dead silence. He hopes she'll get the impression he's abruptly fallen asleep, passed out or something along those lines, because that would mean she isn't looking closely enough to see he's gritting his teeth.


...she's not that stupid, Ed. Come on, you're not even trying.


Worth a shot.

After another pause long enough to be uncomfortable but not nearly long enough to have actually fooled anyone, he stirs, pushes the cloth slightly further up his forehead and opens one eye in order to shoot her an annoyed look. "...What?"


She looks right back at him with steady determination and says nothing. Not one thing. She very pointedly lets her question hang, unanswered, in the air still.


Oh, so it's going to be an ellipsis-off, huh? Bring it!

...is how he'd respond if he had the energy for it. He doesn't.

"Don't ask me." Back to the whispering. His voice is sounding kind of strained after that last bout of coughing in particular, although that might not be the only reason.


No. That'll do. They both know the answer to the question now, and more importantly, he knows she knows it.

And she's sorry to have to do that to you, Ed, but you crossed the line from 'acceptable stubbornness' to 'pushing away a friend'. You know... seriously pushing, not just... pushing pushing, and... look, the important thing is that somewhere a line was crossed in some way that it shouldn't have been crossed!

"Anyway. Will you let me get that blanket if I Pinkie-promise not to mess up your notes?"


He lets the damp cloth droop back over his eyes - he's barely moved, but somehow he looks pretty deflated anyway. "Do what you want." He forces another cough to try and clear his throat a little. "But you're not gonna find one in there. What am I, a two-year-old?

"...My coat's in the back."


"Well what the hay do you sleep under when it's COLD out?! Because if you say 'my coat' I'll..."

She doesn't say what she'll do, just flies off to get his coat, all the while making a note to buy him the warmest winter blanket she can find once it gets out.


Pretty much, actually!

"You'll wh-"

His indignant retort is as predictable as the coughing that interrupts it. Okay, okay - while he's apparently being browbeaten anyway, he'll sneak a drink. And to be honest, he's not bothering to do it especially sneakily any more.


Aided and abetted by the fact that she's casually counting to twenty, out of sight, once his coughing stops. That's enough time, right? She comes back with his coat draped over one foreleg.

"I'll wonder how come you're not always sick if you're sleeping in the cold like that!"

She tosses his coat over the back of the couch, then gathers up the glass to go refill it without comment.


Oh, he sits right up at that remark. "What's the big deal? I've slept in worse!"

Still looking distinctly huffy, he tugs the coat over his shoulders and settles back down to stare blankly at the opposite wall.


"Ugh! You're not good at taking care of yourself, are you. Do I even wanna know what you eat?"


Okay, make that scowl at the opposite wall. And dodge the question at the same time, just to be efficient. "Hey, nobody told you to worry about it..."


She rolls her eyes, because once again, not answering is as good as answering. "Like I'm gonna stop now! Great, now I have to read up on the normal human DIET so I can make sure you're living up to it. No wonder you're sick!"


"You..." His expression as he looks over his shoulder at her hovers somewhere between defensive and pleading. "I'm eating fine, okay? I should know." It's true. He just also happens to be eating a load of junk on top of that... but he's pretty sure he's safe as long as she doesn't start going through his stuff.


Hey, junk is okay so long as you're eating healthy. Anyone around Pinkie Pie has to have that attitude.

She softens a little at his tone of voice, recognizing it as at least close to the truth, because he didn't say it as obnoxiously as possible.

"And are you sleeping properly, or staying up all night writing notes on stuff?"


...crap, he knew this would come up.

"Okay, you got me," he says, and it's not entirely a lie; it's not as if he's been going back to sleep after some of those dreams. "Sorry some of us have work that doesn't involve cartwheeling around in mid-air like gravity went on vacation."


"How much work are you getting done because you didn't take care of yourself and got sick?

"Also, I only make that midair cartwheeling look easy."


He makes an annoyed noise, turns away from her and lies down, pulling his coat further around him. "Not like it's gonna happen again." He hopes.


"Please. You know, if I didn't know better, I'd think you were enjoying all this, with the whole 'leave me to suffer' attitude."

Actually... Rainbow stops short as she says that, putting a hoof to her chin in revelatory shock.

"Hey, wait a minute. That IS what this is about! You're just using this as some crazy proof that you're tough and don't need anyone, and don't need to take care of yourself, even when you're sick!"


He determinedly shuts his eyes. That light-headedness from earlier is rapidly coming back, and so is that unpleasant, lurking mood from earlier. The combination is starting to wear down even his impressive reserves of bloody-mindedness.

"I... know, okay? I know. So just let me."

He blames all that sentimental crap she was pushing on him just now. Ugh, this is why he tries to avoid it.


"It'd be one thing if you were trying to prove it to me. Believe it or not, even I sometimes have problems with admitting that I can't do something to even my best friends."

She assumes he'll see the immediate truth in this completely-not-an-understatement and agree implicitly, and so continues on.

"But you're just trying to fool YOURSELF."


"Isn't everyone?" She might be too used to the outright dodges by this point, but it's not too late to try and deflect this conversation with cynicism instead.


...Is he shaking? She'll be fine right up until he starts shaking.

"Yeah, but... you're sick," she says plaintively.

Okay. Maybe not entirely fine.


For protesting so vocally about the mere suggestion that he owns a blanket, he sure is gripping the side of that coat pretty tightly right now.

"Listen... this is nothing. You don't even know. You don't know a damn thing about me, I told you. I didn't -" '...come all this way just to let a few damn coughs slow him down,' he meant to say, but they're doing a decent job of cutting off his sentences regardless. His legs jerk involuntarily with the force of them.


"Stop, Ed! Just -- stop."

She drops to the ground next to the couch, then reaches up to put a hoof on his shoulder -- half to stop him from talking, as ineffective as that is, and half to just give some comfort.

"Maybe it's nothing compared to other stuff, but that other stuff isn't here and now and this IS. You can't compare it. And being sick doesn't care what else you've been through."


He's coincidentally lying on the right side to actually notice the weight of her hoof, and tenses up.

"It's always here. Being sick doesn't care about it, you don't care about it... and that's okay. But I care. That's why I'm gonna get over this... even if you think I can't."

Since she displaced it when she put her hoof down, he lifts his right hand to tug the coat further around him again.


"You dummy."

She says that with fond irritation, because let's face it, either you feel fond towards someone so capable of grossly misinterpreting her as Ed is, or you strangle that person.

"I didn't say you can't get over it. Of COURSE you're going to get over it. You just can't do it instantly.

"Trust me, if I thought you were the sort to just milk being sick and use it as an excuse to goof off and whine, I wouldn't be here."


"...I can try."

It's getting gradually tougher to keep his eyes open. He makes an effort anyway. Another of those damn dreams is all he needs right now.

"Hey," he says eventually. "If you wanna go, just go. You already did a lot. I'll be okay."


"I know you'll be okay."

She says that a little sharply. And, though she puts her hoof back on the floor, she doesn't leave.


He finally shuts his eyes. "Just as long as we're clear... on that."

Then he falls quiet. A few smaller bouts of coughing continue to break up his silence for some time, but eventually - and pretty soon, all things considered - his breathing eases a little, and slows. For the first time in a few days, he's fast asleep.

He would've liked to stave it off a bit longer, but no, there wasn't any way he was staying functional like that. At least now he won't be holding her up; she probably did have something important to get back to.

And if he isn't holding her up any more, she won't be around to hear him talking rather loudly to himself.

"Hey... Hey, Al? 'm gonna be a while... No, don't. Just tell her, Al. Tell her I'm sorry."


Yeah... watching over a sick friend is important. She'd sat down to just keep an eye on him, and she's kind of glad she did... but kind of embarrassed as she mutters to herself.

"Oh great, he's dreaming. Ugh, I forget if you're supposed to wake feverish people up out of their bad dreams, or let them sleep through it..."

She stands up, reaching out to tap him on the shoulder, but she hesitates, then lowers her hoof again. Then lifts him again. Then hesitates again.

"...this is gonna be one of those situations where whatever I pick ends up being wrong."


By pure happenstance, he appears to flinch just as she reaches out a second time. "No, he's my only..."

He trails off and is quiet for another minute or two - still breathing deeply, but his forehead is visibly starting to break out in a sweat.

"Get away from her! She's a fake Mom, Al! This is... I had to..."

The thing is, he knows he talks in his sleep. Whenever he wakes up - which may not be far off, given how much louder he's getting - he's going to be at least as embarrassed as she is right now.


Aww, jeez. She reaches out, hesitates, and then, being Rainbow Dash, does something entirely too dramatic and reckless: she straightens up on her rear hooves and just puts her forelegs around him.

She makes a note to yell at him later for making her do mushy stuff, but he seems like he could really, really use a hug right now.


And his eyes fly open, wildly. "Mom...?"

The word hasn't even fully escaped him before he's awake enough to remember, no, his mother definitely was not a pony. But he hears it nonetheless, which immediately implies there were words before it, and that means... well, crap. So much for seeming tough.

"What - what're you doing? I said you could go."

He doesn't move yet, though. His head's still spinning, to the extent he's not sure he could successfully coordinate an attempt to squirm free... even if he unreservedly wanted to.


"Go back to sleep, Ed."

She doesn't let go. Her head is resting against his shoulders and her chest against his back, so her voice is a warm vibration there as well as audible words.


It's not that easy, is it?

He takes a few deep breaths, trying to calm himself down a little, or at least stop his heart from pounding right out of his chest.

"You idiot..." That's probably the least hostile line he's come out with since she showed up, to be honest. It mostly sounds tired, but there's a shade of disbelief in it too. "I know you have better things to do than listen to me all day.... so why the hell aren't you doing them?"


She smiles a little, though he can't see it.

"'Cuz clearly you need a lullaby. I'm trying to remember the one that Fluttershy likes."


"'Course I don't need a damn lullaby! I'm not a kid! That spurs him to start trying to shake her off, but he doesn't get much further than lifting his head before dizziness sets in again and he sinks back down, groaning a little.


"Grown-ups can get lullabies too, if they need them."

Then she giggles. "Come on, can you actually imagine ME singing a lullaby?"


Ass. But despite his general indignance, he actually relaxes noticeably when she starts laughing at him - any more sappiness and he would've had to get up to find where she hid the real Rainbow Dash.

"...How long were you planning on just sitting there?"


"Same plan I make for everything: till I get bored."

Yeah, Rainbow Dash sticks to singing songs about how awesome she is and how to find a pet. And also how to wrap up winter. ...this doesn't seem a good time to explain how ponies change the season by hoof, though, does it.


He closes his eyes again. "You aren't already? I would be." Because there's no way she could've entertained herself listening to whatever he was ranting about in his sleep. Hopefully.


"Guess we've proved that I'm not you. And I think we're both glad."

If anyone asks, she's just lying here like this because she's lazy. She's certainly still not hugging him comfortingly.


"Yeah." Might even be a hint of a smile there.

With his eyes shut, it's much easier to focus on how the bright blue forelegs draped around him actually feel. Which is to say... kind of heavy. He's trying not to make any assessments more subjective than that.

"I didn't... say anything, right? You know, weird dreams, sometimes... wouldn't want to freak you out, make you think I was awake or something." He's lying. They're not weird. And he's hoping she will, too.


And warm. She's keeping him warm, which obviously he NEEDS, since she'd be so out of here if SOMEpony didn't have to do it. ...right?

"You muttered some stuff into the cushion, but I couldn't make it out."

She's had this lie prepared since he woke up, so her delivery is flawless.


He's glad she sounds convincing. It means he doesn't have to feel stupid for deliberately buying it.

"Well, that's a relief." He coughs again, and the movement makes him even more acutely aware of her body pressing against his back. His tiny smile turns a little more wistful than it already was. "You wouldn't believe the crap Al says I come out with some nights."


"Al's your armor brother, right?"

She's only heard about him in passing. And just a little bit more a moment ago...


"That's him. My little brother." Although his eyes are still closed, he's openly smiling now. It won't last if she decides to latch onto the word 'little'. "Y'know, normally it's his job to tell me when I'm being a dumbass. And there's something else that's novel: an almost apologetic note in his tone of voice.


"Guess he's pretty busy then, huh."

She's teasing, but it's hard to tease someone more warmly than she just did.


"...Hey." It's mock indignation, though. After all, he can't really contest that without explicitly lying.


"You're hard on yourself because you have a younger brother to look after, aren't you."


He shifts just slightly uneasily. "It's... not like that. If I could really look after him, I wouldn't have to be."


"...Whaddya mean?"

She asks carefully because she knows she's stepping into a minefield, practically begging loud angry yelling Ed to come back by prying. But it's nothing more than he'd do normally, so nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?


Loud angry yelling, no. More willing to clam up than even attempt to be honest about anything personal...

Well, he does break the silence eventually, a while after he stops smiling.

"Could be wrong," he says, "but... I bet you've never done anything really dumb your whole life."


This is a question she wouldn't ordinarily answer. Obviously. But if he's talking to her like this, she feels she owes him an answer.

"...I once tried to win acclaim as Ponyville's top hero by mowing a lawn and opening a jar of peanut butter."

She braces herself, tensing slightly in anticipation of his laughter. She deserves it.


That gets him to open his eyes. For a second his expression makes it seem like he is about to laugh, too, but then his cough beats him to it.

It leaves his voice even hoarser than before, but he hardly seems to notice. "Yeah, okay... no kidding, that's pretty dumb. But it's not what I meant."

Distantly - if he's looking at anything right now, it's certainly nothing physically located in this room - he flexes his toes. His left foot clatters a bit.

"Dumb as in... it hurts people. Real people. The kind of thing you only think is a good idea 'cause you think you know everything, you think you know better than God. And if it was just you who got hurt, well - you'd be okay with that. You were asking for it. Equivalent exchange, it's only fair. But... it's never you. Someone else takes the fall, and you get away with nothing. Every time. So you don't learn a damn thing, and it happens again."


"This is what you meant when you said he's armor, isn't it."

Rainbow isn't stupid, she just... acts like it sometimes. She takes in what he says, thinks it over, absorbs it, digests it.

"Tell me what happened."


His sudden, sharp intake of breath makes it plain he really wasn't expecting her to join those particular dots. Either he underestimated her, he was too wrapped up in himself to be careful about what he was saying, or some combination of the two.

...He shouldn't tell her. He's not worried her lack of a reference frame will mean she won't understand - he's worried she'll understand anyway.

No, not even worried. Scared.

"You don't wanna know."


It's not a hard puzzle to put together, Ed. Brother is armor, long speech about doing harm to other people... yeah, you're underestimating Rainbow if you think she can't put two and two together. She's not Applejack.

"If you don't wanna tell me, I won't make you.

"But that means you don't get to tell me that what I think and feel about the whole thing is wrong, because I'm just going on what I DO know. If you really want to convince me you're the bad guy and did something horrible, you aren't doing it just by saying you are."


He wouldn't have put it past her to think being armour would be kind of cool...

"There isn't just one thing to tell." He's hesitant. "Every bad decision I ever made, I got off easy, and... he doesn't even blame me. Whatever the details are, you can't say that's right."


"Easy?

"...Sounds like one of the 'scales' things, Ed. You may think you got off easy compared to him, but if he doesn't blame you, then he must not think the same way."


"Because he's an idiot!" He thumps his fist on the arm of the couch.

Then he stops, and deflates. Still light-headed. Outbursts like that... probably not the wisest idea, under the circumstances.

He buries his face in the same hand, taking a few deep, shuddering breaths, forcing himself back under control. "It's... not up for debate. Any way you look at it, he has it worse! Anything I ever gave up, he had to give up more... And I always had a choice. No scale in the world could change that."


And it's out of respect for him being sick that she's not making her point at the top of her lungs, like she WANTS to. There's irritation threaded in as she speaks, but she manages to stay calm.

"You don't get to choose that for him, though. I mean... Ed, he's your brother. That means you're HIS brother. And that means that for everything bad that may have happened, he still has an older brother who loves him.

"That's a really big thing."


"He -" He falters, and the dryness in his throat isn't the only reason. "He deserves one who won't screw him over every chance he gets."

The slight shaking in his voice is thankfully covered up for the most part by the raspiness already there.

"...I heard there's another world out there where he got one, too. Too bad it wasn't me."


Things are rapidly falling into place in Rainbow's mind. She frowns, then at last lets go of him -- not because she's repulsed or disgusted or fed-up like he probably assumes, but because she's gonna try and get a hoof in between his arm and his head, and tug up his chin.

"Okay, you know your brother better than I do, so, you tell me. What would he say if you said something like that right to him? You know, 'You deserve a better brother' and all."


He grits his teeth and makes a vain attempt to look anywhere apart from at her. "Just 'cause he wouldn't want to hear it doesn't mean it's not true."


Look wherever you want, Ed. Those bright red eyes are focused clearly on you.

"You're the brother he loves. Not some other guy. You just don't get it because you don't count all your guilt as something bad. Even though it's really messed you up."


"I'm not...!" Okay, that was a reflexive response; he's pretty obviously messed up by this point.

He hangs his head, at least as well as he can with a pastel blue forehoof propping it up. "If I told you what it was for, you wouldn't think it was bad either."


He must be sick if that's the best defense he can put up.

"Well you didn't, aside from the real general 'your brother's a suit of armor now' thing. And yes, I would think it was bad anyway."


"It isn't." Although he doesn't look all that certain, he says it as firmly as is possible with a sore throat. "It's just a way of keeping score. I don't want to forget, Dash. Not before I get a chance to put some of it right."

Some detached part of him wonders how long he can mope before she gets tired of playing the therapist. Or, more directly, he could shut up now. Sure, she'd be stuck with the wrong impression, but that impression probably isn't much worse than whatever she thought about him before.


"Wow, okay. See, that's messed up. Friendship and family aren't about score..."

She trails off, as a thought hits her.

"But you're not gonna listen to that, are you. You know what you got out of all this, Ed? Your brother got a body of armor, right?

"Well, you got a heart of armor."


For a second, his guard is down enough for him to look stunned - and more than that, hurt. It's as if he hadn't really been listening to her till now.

It passes, mostly. There's just a tiny crease in his forehead to hint at it by the time he looks her in the eye again.

"Used to wish I did. Or even had one before any of that happened. Would've saved us a lot of trouble, that's for sure."

He reaches up with his right hand - pointedly his right hand - and puts it to the side of the foreleg she was trying to hold his head up with, though he doesn't actively push her away.

"I just got this."


"Yeah, you do. I mean what's your entire argument here? 'I did something stupid, now no one should ever like me ever again.' You're just trying to keep everypony else out.

She pauses and looks at his hand, wondering what he's getting at. Sure, she's seen it before. What, is it made out of armor from his brother or something? ...that would be kinda weird...


"Something stupid?" He nearly smiles. "Weren't you listening? I could fill a book."

He's a little surprised by her staring - but, oh yeah, he hasn't really been keeping track of who he's explained automail to. All he remembers is that it's not an especially long list.

"You know... it's not that weird. A lot of people lose limbs. Got a friend back home - lives in the middle of nowhere, and she still makes a killing off this stuff." To a not inconsiderable extent off of him, but that's beside the point.

He pauses for a fraction of a second, staring at his feet. It seems longer to him, though - maybe because his head's starting to spin again.

"Losing a whole body, though... that takes a special kind of stupid."


She steps away, but only briefly -- she comes back a moment later with the glass of juice she'd refilled what seems like ages ago, offering it. He needs fluids and some energy, right? That's what the juice is for.

She doesn't say anything because she doesn't have the words. She'll wait for his explanation... as long as necessary.


He continues to sit there. There's still a part of him that doesn't want to let the explanation out, even at this point. He barely gives the glass a second glance.


"Drink the juice, Ed." It's not quite an order and not quite an insistence. This conversation has taken such a weird turn that it's really... just a statement. She continues to hold it out, wings beating, as she looks at his hand.

"Did your arm turn into armor at the same time your brother did?"

She still associates it with a transformation, not a replacement.


He gives her an odd look as he lifts the glass out of her forehooves - with his right hand, since his other one has gone kind of limp. (It might as well be an order for all the resistance he can muster.) "Lost, Dash. Can't turn any part of a human body into armour. There's no way. And even if you could, that'd be..." He stops. "Well, I guess 'human transmutation' doesn't mean a thing to you either."

Then he takes a sip of the juice, and promptly coughs a lot of it out.


"...But I thought your brother got turned into armor."

At some point you're going to have to explain this all, Ed. Everything you say just keep raising more questions in her mind. (Let alone the fact that the armor she's familiar with is pony armor so her mental image of Al is pretty off.)


The glass he's holding gives him an excuse not to look at her.

"The armour... was after that. I put him in there. The rest of him, I mean. Couldn't see anything else close by to use, and I was kind of in a rush."

He grips the glass a little more tightly. His fingers clink against its sides.

"That was alchemy, though. There's a lot you can do with automail these days, but it's just a machine. You gotta have something left to attach it to. He didn't... I didn't even leave him that much."

There, an explanation. And a surprisingly matter-of-fact one, too - with at least one gaping hole in it.

"...You get it now? You say I shouldn't need to keep score when it comes to him, but the world keeps score. That's what equivalent exchange is all about. And it's not like a human being. It knows what's equal value, but it doesn't know what's fair. He... he lost more than I did. If that's not a fact, I don't know what is."


"You... turned him into armor on purpose? I mean, put him in the armor."

Despite the serious conversation and the sheer pathos of the moment, Rainbow's voice hits a seriously skeptical note there. As much as he may be trying, intentionally or otherwise, to present it as a deliberate and horrible act, that isn't the Ed she knows and she doesn't believe it.


He tilts his head slightly, eyes dull - though mainly because he's thinking about something else. It would've been more surprising if she wasn't sceptical. "Put him in it after he lost his body, yeah. That's what I said."


"After he lost his body."

Yes, she notices that and expects further details before she judges him.


"Least I could do." A few more tiny clinking noises come from the glass as he fidgets with it. "Doesn't really make up for anything. I might as well have lost it for him."

He can't bring himself not to carry on skirting around that particular hole in the exposition.

"But me... you can see I didn't lose that much. Not even close."


"Ed."

She drops to the ground, or at least her rear hooves. Her front ones go to his shoulders.

"Tell me how it happened."


As long as that's the hardest she's going to press him, willfully misunderstanding her is easy.

"I -" He coughs, and contrives to make it sound annoyed. "I just did. You wanted to know how he got in the armour, right? That's how. And the cost was this arm." He rests his left hand on it. "That's the whole story."


"...You're sick, so I'm gonna forgive you for how stupid you clearly think I am!"

Yeah... 'forgive'. That's totally happening, here, clearly. Actually, she IS being a lot milder than she would be otherwise...

"How. Did he lose his body to begin with."


"Told you that, too. Thinking you know everything..." His voice cracks for a moment. If anyone asks, it's the pain in his throat. Again. "It has its own cost. Just happened to be him who paid most of it. Like every time after that."

It's unspoken, but his tone makes it at least as loud as any of his actual words: 'just leave it there'.


"You know, Ed... if there's one thing I'm sure of, it's that whatever you're not telling me is something that proves it's not all your fault."

Rainbow may be, by his viewpoint, innocent and naive... but she's not stupid. And he's gone to so much effort to portray himself as the bad guy, and so stubbornly refused to give the whole story, that her conclusion isn't hard to reach. Especially since she's noticed he claimed he lost nothing at first, when here he is, pointing a metal arm at her.

"You don't have to tell me. But I'm not gonna believe you're a bad guy. And you're just gonna have to live with that."


"What... What's wrong with you?"

His face twists a little. It's obvious that if his voicebox would actually let him, he'd be shouting.

"You think there's anything in the world that could justify doing all of that to him? He's my brother, Dash! Nobody else is gonna look out for him! Even if I was trying to... I don't know, end war, or some other good reason to go against God... Even if that was the last time I let him down, how the hell could anything make it okay?! You tell me!"


"I told you... you don't tell me everything, you don't get to complain about what I think about what you DO tell me.

"But what I do know is that you love your brother and never meant for it to happen." Even Ed couldn't deny those things, right? "So it was a mistake. And mistakes don't make a person bad."


He slams the glass he's holding onto the end table, and it's a wonder that both of them stay in one piece. "But the mistake was me! I knew...!"

...No. Even right now, fully aware of the raw, caustic emotion building up just behind the defences he's so used to maintaining, he can't explain himself.

His brief surge of anger spent, he folds up - gripping his knees with both hands to keep himself upright, letting his hair fall over his eyes.

"That last time, I really thought... I thought it'd fix everything."


Honestly...?

Rainbow Dash quietly feels terrible for pushing him on this. She can see how close it is to making him break, and how much it hurts him to talk about. Let alone the fact that he's getting all mushy and messed-up, and she HATES dealing with stuff like that, but...

But... he's her friend. And he needs her. Well, what he really needs is his brother, or maybe a friend that's better with all this stuff, but right now she's what he has. And she can't leave a friend who needs her. Even if he doesn't want her around. Because this sort of feeling is killing him inside, and it shows.

She moves up a little closer, to pat his shoulder.

"It's not wrong to want to fix a mistake. But the only way to not MAKE mistakes is to not do anything, ever. And that's no way to live."


His only immediate reaction is a tiny metallic rattle as he grips his knees tighter.

"Sometimes, I... I gotta wonder if maybe I didn't."


"Didn't li--?"

Wait a minute...

"Hey, this isn't a crack about how you must be dead because you're in a world with talking ponies, is it?"

...frankly, it's really kind of amazing that she'd managed to not have an epic sensitivity fail before this.


After a few seconds of complete silence, he... laughs. It's low, guttural and probably not doing his throat much of a service, but it's something. Look at him - feverish, hardly able to stand, curled up on a couch a world away from home, telling sob stories to a talking, flying horse. None of those are things that could actually happen, never mind all of them! And wherever he looks right now, thanks to that conversation, there's one person he can't make himself not see... Of course he's losing it.

He only stops once the laugh devolves into yet another cough. By that time, he's back to whispering out of necessity instead of choice. "Yeah... yeah, there's that, too."


"Yeah, well... dead people don't get SICK!"

Rainbow's not certain if that was a good laugh or not. Maybe it helped him feel better, but possibly it pushed him over the ragged edge of insanity. That would be bad.


"You don't know that." He's smiling, after a fashion, but she might not see it - all through that fit of slightly unhinged laughter, he didn't once look up. "You don't know where they go. You just know they don't come back. Which fits, right?"

It's easy to sound like you're saying something perfectly lightly when you physically can't raise your voice.


"Okay, fine, but their bodies don't go with them. So how could they get sick?"

...this discussion sure took a weird turn, which Rainbow is going to insist on following in all seriousness.


No, let's not talk about getting separated from bodies again. He was doing so well! (He wasn't.)

He coughs. "Don't see why you wouldn't in hell."


"Okay, fine, you wouldn't have waited THIS long to get sick."

She's still going to stubbornly argue this! Also Ed you are going to be a terrible influence on Rainbow's language in the long run.


It could be worse! No f-bombs in the anime!

"Maybe it thought I needed a reminder." If her empathy fail just then had lightened his mood, it apparently didn't last.


"Then I wouldn't be here to try and take care of you."

She's drifting from argumentative to plaintive. Not consciously, but his insistence that he's dead is... starting to get to her.


"Well..." His head droops even lower, if that was possible. "It's only sometimes. Wish I could believe it. It'd mean everything worked out after all... the way I thought it would."


"Cut it out, Ed. This isn't funny any more. Can we go back to 'I can't be sick and I'm not gonna let it stop me'?"

Yes, she had spent a lot of time trying to get him out of that mindset. No, she ISN'T HAPPY about where it had gotten him instead.


"...Yeah, okay."

He doesn't argue or say anything else. He doesn't even move. If those warning bells weren't going off before, they probably should be.


Rainbow stares at him a moment in shock and dismay -- then rears back and whacks him a good one on the shoulder with her forehoof.

...the wrong shoulder, meaning she lets out a yelp as she bounces into the air, waving her hoof furiously, and what could have been a kind of painful situation ends up just being a strong shove.

"You -- stop being so selfish!"


Even though the shove doesn't hurt, the impact is enough to jolt him out of whatever distant world he was trying to lose himself in. When the initial shock wears off, he defiantly meets her eyes - and makes a game attempt to ensure defiance is the only thing readable in his expression. "I'm not!"


"You are SO! Urrrrrgh!" She puts a hoof to her head in frustration. "Wishing you had died is the most. Selfish. Thing. You could POSSIBLY wish for! How would your brother feel if you were dead?! How would I feel?! How would anypony at all who cared about you feel if you were dead?!"

She drops down abruptly to jab him in the chest with a hoof.

"All because YOU either feel so guilty you think you deserve to be punished, or you're so stupid you think it'll make things better! Well, I know you're not stupid, so it's gotta be the 'punished' thing, and that's -- that's even STUPIDER! You're so not stupid you're stupider, that's how stupid this whole thing is!

"YOU'RE ALREADY BEING PUNISHED! Your life is already messed up because you'll never be satisfied till you fix all these mistakes you keep telling me you made, because that's just how you are!

"So QUIT!" Her voice cracks on that word. "Talking about death! You want things to be better, then you've got to stick around to make that happen!"


Treasure this moment, Rainbow, since it probably isn't happening again for a long while: he's utterly lost for words. He hardly reacts to the jab in the chest, although that one definitely stings. He opens his mouth - maybe to yell right back at her, maybe just to plead - but there's nothing to say.

Well, no, that's not true - there's a lot, and none of it wants to be said. How can he explain "one is all, all is one" without hitting too close to the subject he's been avoiding this whole time? Or admit how he knows exactly what Al felt, right after having bluntly told her that dead people never come back? Or acknowledge that she's not even wrong; he's always been kind of selfish, and that was the reason he...

"But..." His voice falters. He tries again, with a shade more aggression. "But I...! He..." It doesn't help.

Instead, he hangs his head again. He is not this pathetic. So why can't he act any other way right now?


She drops to the floor, then turns away with as much deliberate huffiness as she can muster.

"No one wants you dead. It won't help anything. It's not 'just' or 'fair' or 'equivalent' to anything. So quit even thinking it."

Then her real reason for turning away becomes a little transparent, because though he may not be able to see her face, there's no real way to disguise lifting a hoof to wipe at her eyes as anything but what it is. If any of her huffiness is real, it's at herself for getting all mushy like that.


Oh, he notices. It almost reminds him of someone else back home, actually. He isn't sure how to feel about that, but since his emotions are currently a mess anyway, it doesn't really change anything.

He slumps back against the couch again.

"...Sorry, Dash. Didn't mean to upset you."

If he was just a little braver, he'd tell her everything. Then she'd agree. Of course she would.


"I'M NOT C--"

Oh, he hadn't said anything about her -- that is, he'd just said she is upset. Well, she is. So. Yeah.

Awkwaaaard.


"Yeah, you were." He says it totally without rancor - it's not even an accusation.


She clears her throat and tries to be angry again as she turns back to face him.

"Yeah, well... Don't talk like that any more."


He coughs. "...I don't talk about it anyway."


"I just --"

She stamps the floor angrily.

"You just --"

Now she practically jumps, except each foot lifts and lands at a different time. She looks at him, actually growls a little bit in sheer frustration from lack of words -- then all but jumps at him to sling her forelegs around him and yank him into a fierce hug.

"You big dummy..."


As pale as he is from being ill, he manages to flush faintly pink. Good thing she isn't looking.

"Like I never heard that one before..."

He doesn't resist. It's probably the closest he'll ever come to hugging someone back.

But he does ruin the moment before long, when he abruptly folds up in another coughing fit and involuntarily slams his face into her shoulder.


"Oh! Right! The horrible sickness! Here, you have some more to drink, and I just thought of something."

She lets go of him and shoots off in the same motion -- though she IS careful not to catch him in the face with her tail when she does a midair turn. The little things, you know?


"Hey, it's not that bad..." Well, she did all but order him to start pretending he wasn't sick again. The fact that his protest is more of a croak than anything only slightly undermines it.

As she scoots away, he lifts his left hand to rub his eyes. Unexpected fur isn't a pleasant thing to get in them. (There is, of course, no other reason. Really, there isn't - although, honestly? For just a fraction of a second there, he thought there was going to be.)


Actually, she's gone for much longer than one might think a pony of her velocity would be. When she comes back, it's with a big, steaming bowl of water between her forelegs, and a few candles in her teeth.

She sets the water bowl and candles down, then zips back off, but this time comes back much more quickly with a metal stand. She drops that on the end table, lifts the water bowl onto it, then starts setting the candles up underneath it. Already the steam is humidifying the air.


He'd lain down on his side and almost dozed off before she brought the bowl in - that fever isn't getting better by itself - but the noise makes him open his eyes. Given the fallout when he fell asleep just a little while ago, he's not sure whether to be irritated about that or not.

He settles for quiet exasperation - not that he has a choice about the "quiet" part. "Where do you get all of this crap...?"


"I have my place pretty much set up the way I'm used to. You know, for it not being a floating cloud." Which she wishes it was. She had the most awesome house in Ponyville! "There's probably some gadget that'll do this but I don't know what it is, so you get the Equestria solution."

She gets the candles all situated, then steps back to make sure the water is heating properly. It's not the best humidifier, but it has to be good for a sore throat.

"There, that'll feel better to breathe on your throat."


"You and your clouds..."

He coughs again, but it's not quite as harsh as the last few times.

"...I could heat that thing up easier than that, you know." If he could muster the energy to get to his feet. Arguing about it is better than lying around feeling totally useless, that's all.


"Yeah, by putting in on your forehead. Besides, you can't just keep --" She claps her forehooves together, then flings them outwards. "-- all day, you gotta use your energy to rest. Let the candles do the work."


It's not really possible to deliver a sharp glare when you're lying curled up and distinctly muzzy on a couch with a coat pulled halfway over your head. He tries anyway. "I'm resting, okay? I just don't like doing nothing."


She's half a syllable into a snappy response by reflex before she actually hears what he said, which brings her right up.

"Well, can I bring you a book? I'm not very good at telling stories... um... you're probably not feeling well enough for a game..."


And he's dragged his legs halfway off the couch to attempt to fetch some of his notes before he realises, no, he doesn't really want to deal with them right now. Not so soon after all that sentimental crap.

To disguise the movement, he squirms a little more until his head is resting on a cushion again.

"Keep your stories. I got plenty." It's almost an invitation - because, hey, why not? Telling them would at least take his mind off the other stuff.


"Oh yeah? I bet you don't have any stories about beating..."

She plants her hind legs, then lifts her forelegs upwards spookily.

"The ultimate evil of... Nightmare Moon."


He looks on, thoroughly unspooked - wasn't that the name of the weirdo who magically locked all the doors when he wanted to go shopping that one time? - though he'd probably laugh harder if he wasn't wary of triggering more coughs. "You're right there. Not with such a stupid name, anyway. But that's pretty common for you, isn't it?"

Making fun of her is another way of keeping his mind off himself...


"Stupid name?! That's a laugh coming from you. Ed. Sounds like the noise you get when you bonk your head off a rock wall."

Sure, he's sick, but that doesn't mean she's not gonna give as good as she gets. If she knew about his alchemist name, hoo boy would she be laying into him, that hypocrite!

"Seriously, how'd you like to go up against some incredible power coupled with the ability to bring eternal night?"


That was low. To spare his voicebox, he briefly sticks his tongue out at her instead of commenting on how familiar she probably is with the sound of crashing into walls. (At least his title is a title! ...And actually cool!)

He doesn't have the energy to muster more indignation or contempt than that, but he half raises an eyebrow. "I don't know. Humans are scarier."


"Okay, then, I know what you'd really hate: Discord! Spirit of Disharmony! With the power to throw all the rules of sanity and logic COMPLETELY out the window!"

She leans in to nudge him with an elbow. "Yeah, I know what you're thinking -- 'you ponies don't make sense anyway!' But trust me, for all the sense you don't think we make, we've got nothing on Discord. You know how we found out he was loose? Chocolate rain."


"Worse than you? Must've been something..." That he finds funny, but apart from that, he looks unmoved. "But it all sounds pretty similar to me."


She sits back, folding her forelegs irritably.

"Okay, Mr. Wise Guy, you don't think that's scary? Well, imagine he gets his hands on you and suddenly you're not you. You don't care about your brother any more, and you think alchemy is boring and just use it for selfish personal gain."


"Sure it's scary. Don't get me wrong. Monsters and gods and demons, they're supposed to be. That's what they're for. But they're not real." He looks down. "Well, you know what I mean." Okay, she might not, but that's fine too.


"But Discord is real."

No, she doesn't really get it.

"Your scary stuff back home is completely different, huh?"


"Yeah, 'real' isn't the right word. Distant, I guess. 'Cause I'm never gonna suddenly wake up as a personification of... whatever you said, but when you start talking about some of the things humans do? I... could see myself there. Some of them, I've been there. Storybook villains don't have anything on that."

Also: needles, and Izumi. But Rainbow doesn't need to know about either of those.


"Well, you probably oughtta tell me. "

She looks at him for a moment, and then has a sudden and startling revelation.

"...you didn't get that we could probably find a way to visit each other, did you."


If she thinks he'll go into detail without either having it dragged out of him or being beaten into an emotional wreck beforehand, she clearly hasn't been paying attention.

"Visit? So... what do you call what you're doing right now?"


"No, I mean... someday you're gonna go home and find your brother and work on fixing things again, right? Well, somepony will be able to come up with some sort of spell that means I can come help you. It's just... really long teleportation, that's all."


Well, she's optimistic.

"Could be a bad idea. You, showing up in a world where gravity works like it's supposed to? You wouldn't last a minute. ...And besides, you'll have other stuff to do."


She snorts, rolling her eyes. "Nothing that important. I'd drop everything to help out Sweetie Belle or Apple Bloom, why should your brother rate lower?"


Speaking of stupid pony names...

"Distance wouldn't be the only problem, you know. We're bad enough at dealing with our own species."


"Yeah, I know."

Look how hung up Ed still is ponies, even though they're good friends able to tolerate each other.


He sounds like he's beginning to drift off again.

"But I think you'd get along... if you did meet him. He's good at that."


She'll keep talking, and hope he DOES drift off.

"Still, what's important is what's important, no matter how difficult, right?"


"Yeah... that's true. We'll be okay on our own, though. Always have been. Nowhere to go but forward."

It might be the steam or just the amount of venting he's done, but it's getting a little easier to breathe in here.


"Sure you might be okay, but it's important. I mean...

"I know you're tough and strong and don't need anybody, but that doesn't mean your friends don't want to help you anyway."


He shifts woozily. "Can't say the same for visiting you, but... I guess you don't need it, huh? Sounds like you got everything under control."


"...Wouldn't you WANT to come visit? After you got everything taken care of? I mean, I know Equestria's strange and weird for you, but it's home, and you'd at least get a good welcome there. You could call it a vacation. Once you're all done, you'll have earned one!"


...He's heard that somewhere before.

"There's not much point talking about stuff that couldn't happen. No such thing as magic where I'm from, remember?" Even half-asleep, he dodges questions.


She lifts herself up to just pat him on the shoulder again. Soft, friendly, comforting.

"Magic's everywhere, Ed. Even if it's just the sappy ways like 'friendship' or 'family' or 'sheer pony' -- uh -- 'human spirit'."


"Well..." He hazily considers this. "Maybe you're right. I guess none of those things make sense either."

It's a pat on the wrong shoulder, but he relaxes a tiny bit under it anyway.

"...Hey. You're gonna go before I wake up, right?" Is that a request or a prediction? He's not sure, so it's just as well he says it indistinctly enough that nobody else would be able to guess one way or another. "It's just... I don't want to owe you too much."


"Who's counting?"

She's worried he'll have bad dreams again, but if she's not here, he'll at least sleep through them. She nods.

"I'll pop back around and see how you're doing later. Believe it or not, somepony used up all your juice."


"Didn't I tell you? I'm counting. Someone has to."

He feels vaguely reassured when she agrees, but doesn't say anything else. Most of his mind is already somewhere far away.


"Dummy." She musses his hair affectionately with a hoof, which is a surprisingly gentle gesture considering it's, well, a hoof. Then she drops back down to all four feet on the floor, watching him for a moment to make sure he's drifting off properly.


He definitely is. One more tiny noise escapes him - as if he had something else to say, to her or to whoever else he imagines he can see - but then it's gone, and the only sound left is the steady rhythm of his breathing.

Lying there, curled up in warm, dreamless sleep, he looks smaller than ever.


Ha, seeing him not all fluffed up with arrogance and crankiness really does make a difference. She doesn't really want to leave him alone, but she understands that there are limits to how much his pride will allow him to take, and she's pushed them probably much father than either of them would have expected.

So she watches a moment more -- just to be sure -- then carefully steps out of the room to leave him to his rest.