Apply couldn't resist banging on the headboard over and over.
"Rainbow? Dash can you hear me? I know you can hear me"
she'd say.
Rainbow would never answer, despite how thin these shared walls really are.
The banging would just echo and muffle through the building.
"SHUT UP" shouted someone down the hall.
"mmh..."
"Rainbow—" she started one more time.
"i'm really, really sorry... i was a little too harsh... if you could please just talk to me?"
no answer, as usual.
She thought this would be satisfactory, so she settled back down into her puzzle.
She couldn't focus ugh!!! Why wouldn't that brat talk to her?!
Next time the nurses came to check on her, she told them to bring her to her.
"But she explicitly requested no visitors."
"even made a sign."
"Just... just bring me to her door. Let me try knocking."
One nurse stayed to use Apply's bathroom, the other brought her out into the hall on her wheelchair.
But when she brought her into the hall, there was a bit of a strange sight. A ruffled up pegasus dripping with some kind of mysterious substance fluttered in Rainbow's doorway, hooves hanging in the air in strange ways. Upon closer inspection, they were painting a weird symbol on the door.
"what the hay...?"
but the horse's focus was unshakeable.
Apply craned her neck back and forth.
"You can't be doing that" said the nurse.
the horse's focus unwavered.
The nurse looked up and down the hall for someone who could help her sort out this situation. Nope, nothing. Everypony was busy with their patients. But the carpet was getting stained with whatever that stuff was... fine, fine, it's been through worse. She could count on strands of fur how many times she's seen it stained with every bodily fluid under the sun.
"hey wait now, I've seen you before. One of raimbow's friends?"
Flutterby startled suddenly and tripped on air, wings pulsing at random, nearly falling to the floor before catching herself with a final synchronized beat.
Her eyes whipped around before her head did (and the rest of her body) . Her eyes stabilized before the rest of her body did as well, focused on her.
"A... Apply jack! Don't mind me, i, j'm just—"
"woah now, no need for all that. I see we're both visitors?"
"uh, uhhhhhh—"
"the thing the sign there says there should be 'no' of?"
"well, I—"
Flutterby quickly returned to her painting. She tapped the wood of the door a few times before the next stroke.
"i... I'm just about to get going... But i'm painting, a uh, protection spell? On the door for her here... You know... I know it's weird... It's a kind of magic pegasi can use... I'm learning about it..."
Flutterby could feel apply's judgement burning the back of her neck, setting her spine on fire. The nurse even more so. She started shaking so much she could hardly fly.
"look look, it's not demonic or anything! It's a simple protection sigil... A hoof up for gentleness, a hoof down for power... This scene here symbolizes the banishment of Discord, and... It calls for..."
"...oh, I recognize this! Someone taught me this one as a filly. I think a great-aunt or something."
"th—"
Flutterby's sensitive ears caught the hint of a rustle in Rainbow Dash's bed and she sprinted mid-sentence, tracking herbal-scented ink down the halls.
"she's acting so suspicious, are you sure she's not just a prankster?"
"leave it" asserted apply jack. "It's something a unicorn wouldn't get. No offense. I'll help you scrub down that there carpet, but leave the sigil intact."
Apply leaned down to scrub, but the nurse stopped her. She forgets about her injury everyday, even now. She gives it up. The nurses do all the work.
