Fresh air! Dinky’s lungs filled with the sweet, clean air of the open wildlands that surrounded her home of Ponyville, staring down at the ground far below them. She could see they were now above the Unicorn Range- not far off from Ponyville, but a new experience nonetheless. It was a sight her young eyes had never seen, and the small filly was enthralled. She doubted many unicorns had seem them from such a height!
Derpy shifted her wings and gave a small flap, beginning to scan the ground for a place to land. She slowed her rate of speed and began to descend, taking a slow spiral to ensure the safety of the filly atop her back. Her crossed eyes blurred her vision, but she remained steady. If she just did it by instinct, she could make this easily. Reducing her vision to mere slits helped cancel out the wobble her gaze was so tormented by-
“Look out, Mommy!” Dinky cried suddenly. Derpy looked about and suddenly found her vision obscured by a large, dirty-white balloon that had appeared as if from nowhere.
It was too late to change course. The pegasus did her best to slow her rate of speed but went face-first into the rubber, the material enveloping her and Dinky for a few moments, then spitting the two of them back out and down to the heard earth below.
“Mommy!” Dinky cried, desperately trying to perform a teleportation spell with her horn, but summoning only sparks.
“I’m coming, sweetie!” Derpy gasped, folding her wings beneath her and diving underneath her daughter, catching her with outstretched hooves before she hit the ground. Sailing back upwards, Derpy gently flapped her wings for a gentle descent, settling on the ground and immediately falling to the ground.
Dinky jumped up and shook herself, trembling from head to toe. “Mommy, are you OK?” she asked, turning around and staring at her mother in concern.
Derpy was out of breath, her heart racing a mile a minute, but she gave her child a weak smile, determined to alleviate her worries. “I’m fine, Dinky, don’t worry,” she managed to spit out. “Mommy’s just very glad you’re alright. Tell me, are you hurt? Do you feel anything wrong?”
Dinky shook her head. “I’m sorry I couldn’t help, Mommy. I tried to teleport myself to the ground but it was too hard.”
“It’s alright, dear, don’t fret,” Derpy replied gently, rising to her feet to comfort her daughter. “You’re not quite ready to use spells like that, it’ll just take some time. Besides, we’re safe now, aren’t we?”
“I guess so,” Dinky said meekly. She looked up at the white balloon that hovered above them, gently drifting east in the currents of wind above. “Where did that balloon come from, Mommy?”
Derpy studied the balloon with her fractured gaze for a moment, then replied, “I don’t know, Dinky. It looks like a weather balloon, but I don’t know why it’s here. We pegasi stopped using weather balloons a long time ago, we don’t need them thanks to unicorn magic.”
“Hey! Hey, are you all alright?” said a panicked voice. Derpy turned to her right and saw an Earth Pony the color of dust running towards them as fast as his legs would carry him, a panicked expression on his face. “I’m so sorry! I hope you all aren’t hurt!”
“We’re fine,” Derpy replied politely. “Is this balloon yours?”
“Yes, ma’am, it is,” the dust-colored stallion replied, clutching his chest as he gasped for air. “I’ve been trying to catch up with it for the last hour and a half, it got pulled away from me due to a circular updraft that put it out of reach. It must have risen all the way up to standard flight routes if you ran into it!”
Derpy was not the brightest pegasus in Equestria, but she knew enough of the basics to know that standard flight routes were at a far greater altitude than what she and Dinky had been flying at. Not that she expected any Earth Pony to know that; it was, as Flitter might say, a pegasus thing.
“Well, no need to worry, we’re fine,” she replied casually, watching Dinky as she examined the balloon above her.
“What’s that balloon for, sir?” the little filly asked inquisitively. “My mommy says it’s a weather balloon, is that true?”
The stallion turned his attention away from Derpy and knelt down next to Dinky, a smile on his face. “Yes, little one, it’s a weather balloon. I study the weather, hence my cloud cutie mark,” he said, shaking his hindquarters for extra effect, which indeed bore the symbol of an ashen cloud.
Now Derpy was one of the most gentle and kind-hearted ponies anyone would meet, but she wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about a complete stranger talking with her daughter. So, being the kind mare she was, she decided to make him less of a stranger. With a polite cough, she asked, “Excuse me, sir, but I don’t believe I was told your name?”
“Oh! Of course, where are my manners,” the stallion exclaimed, getting back to his hooves. “Stormwatcher is my name, and stormchasing is my game. I’m a weather pony!”
“But I thought only pegasi could be weather ponies!” Dinky said, a confused look upon her eager young face.
“So did I, little one,” Stormwatcher replied, “but I love weather, all kinds of it! Thunderstorms, hurricances, floods, even tornadoes- though we don’t get many of those here in Equestria! I do wish pegasi didn’t have to control the weather all the time, just think of all the exciting weather events we could have then!”
Derpy raised her eyebrows at that remark. If the pegasi of Equestria didn’t control the weather, there certainly would be a lot more weather events. There would also be a whole heaping lot more of dead ponies to go along with them. Controlling the weather had been keeping Equestria safe for centuries.
“So what were you doing with this weather balloon before you lost it?” Dinky asked excitedly, ignorant of the potentially catastrophic events Stormwatcher had been telling her.
“Well, little one,” he began, “I was trying to get some valuable data on the weather here in the Unicorn Range! You see, the pegasi keep all their knowledge of the weather to themselves, so there’s not a lot for an Earth Pony like me to read about,” (Derpy was starting to wonder if Stormwatcher hadn’t noticed her wings or if he was deliberately trying to goad her), “so I have to perform a lot of experiments by trial and error, and without any help. With this balloon, I was hoping to record what weather occurs here in the Unicorn Range and see if it fits my theory!”
“What’s your theory, Mister Stormwatcher?” Dinky asked.
Stormwatcher peered both left and right, as if looking out for eavesdroppers. “My theory is that the Unicorn Range is a storm magnet! And that someday, someday soon, there’s going to be a mammoth storm with unbelievable power! And I want to find a way to harness that storm’s energy!”
Of all the things Derpy had heard this stallion say, this one might have been the most ridiculous. She rolled her eyes at the thought. For being a weather pony, Stormwatcher sure didn’t seem to know his facts, for even the most ignorant of pegasi knew that the Unicorn Range was a natural barrier to weather formation. It was one of the perfect places to find good weather nearly every day.
“What do you have the balloon for? Is it going to make a storm?” Dinky asked eagerly.
“No, but I do hope all the instruments I have connected to the balloon will be able to tell me if my calculations are correct or not,” Stormwatcher answered. He gave the little unicorn a sly look. “I could use an extra hoof for the day, if you’re interested.”
Dinky gave a cry of delight, her excitement for learning bubbling up once more. “Yes, please! Oh, hold on.” She turned around to face her mother, her eyes wide with longing and her lip trembling. “Can I help Mr. Stormwatcher, Mommy, can I, please?”
Derpy considered the thought for a moment, examining the stallion out of the corner of her lopsided eyes. Stormwatcher certainly seemed to have no knowledge of actual weather, nor did he seem all that attentive to Derpy, though that didn’t really matter. But he did have an unusual interest in Dinky, and that overly wide smile of his made her wonder if he was completely sane. However, Pinkie Pie was somewhat of a nutter, and she hadn’t hurt anyone. She decided to just keep an eye on him for now. She gave a soft smile and nodded at her daughter, who squeaked in delight.
“My Mommy says I can help, Mr. Stormwatcher!” Dinky cried.
“Excellent, little one!” Stormwatcher replied. “Let’s get started!”
As Derpy had expected, the rest of the day passed fairly uneventfully. Stormwatcher and Dinky had a wonderful rapport, as the Earth Pony rattled off his (Inaccurate) knowledge on weather and she listened on eagerly. All of the stallion’s misinformation made Derpy hope that Cherilee wouldn’t hand out a meteorology test at school when they returned. Her daughter would be sure to flunk.
Stormwatcher made his way to the highest hill of the Unicorn Range (Which, for the Unicorn Range, wasn’t very high at all) and told Dinky to release her grip on the balloon’s rope. The three of them watched as the contraption floated up higher and higher until Stormwatcher grabbed hold of the rope and held the balloon at an elevation of about 1,000 feet. Just as it had been during almost the entire time they had met, Derpy knew Stormchaser’s methods were faulty. The balloon wasn’t high enough to record the kinds of weather patterns Stormwatcher was hoping for, not if he was seeking out a major weather event.
“Now what do we do, Mr. Stormwatcher?” Dinky asked.
“Now we let the balloon’s instruments record the data,” the Earth Pony answered, sitting down on his hooves and watching the balloon patiently. After a while, he tugged at the rope to bring the balloon down, examining the instruments with utmost care and precision. It might have looked halfway professional if his tail hadn’t been flicking about madly the entire time.
“So what’s gonna happen? Huh? Huh? Is there gonna be a storm?” Dinky asked, bouncing around on her hooves.
“Hmm…” Stormwatcher reached for his saddlebags, pulling out a notebook and a pencil, jotting down some calculations. He studied them for a moment, when suddenly his expression brightened. “Aha! This is wonderful!” Turning to Dinky, he said, “If my calculations are correct, we’re going to have a very big storm! And we’re going to have it very soon!”
“Yay!” Dinky cried exultantly, leaping for joy. “So are we gonna wait for it to come?”
“Why of course, little one!” Stormwatcher replied. “Just let me deflate this balloon, then we’ll be able to just relax, sit here, and wait for it to arrive. Soon, it’ll be soon.”
The rest of the afternoon came and went, and not a single cloud was in the sky. Derpy had discreetly asked Dinky to bring her Stormwatcher’s calculations, and she had studied them herself for a few moments, struggling to read with her poor vision. However, after some difficulty, she had come to a predictable conclusion: the calculations were garbage. Stormwatcher was waiting for a storm that would never come.
As the hours had ticked by, Dinky’s excitement had begun to fade. After an hour of waiting on her haunches, she had asked the stallion, “How much longer, Mr. Stormchaser?”
“Soon, it’ll be soon,” he had replied, in a delicately soft voice that hinted at impatience. “Soon, it’ll be soon.”
After another two hours of solid waiting, Dinky began to yawn, eventually curling up at her mother’s hooves to fall asleep. She was in a deep slumber now, worn out by the excitement of today’s events.
Derpy and Stormwatcher, however, were wide awake. Stormwatcher was studying the clear horizon with a positively manic expression on his face. Unbeknownst to him, he himself was the subject of study, for Derpy was staring at him with a scrunched look on her face.
She wondered to herself how it was possible that such a pony had come to believe in himself when it came to meteorology, for it was clear to her, a fairly dim pegasus, that he was completely incompetent. She wondered if any pegasi had ever come to him and told him he was wrong, or what had put him on such a path, but it certainly wasn’t wise counsel. He was terrible at this. Her cross-eyed stare, at the moment, was more focused on his cutie mark. The more she studied it, the less it looked like a simple cloud to her. In fact, if she was honest with herself, it looked more like smoke. And smoke only came from fire.
She gave a cough, trying to get the Earth Pony’s attention. “Excuse me, Stormwatcher?” she asked. Noticing that he didn’t budge an inch, she wondered if he hadn’t heard her. “Stormwatcher? I had a question about some of your formulas, if you don’t mind hearing me.”
Stormwatcher shifted for a few seconds, then said tersely, “Go on ahead.”
Derpy said, “I don’t know if you realize this, but… well, your formulas are all wrong. You’re basing your theories on insufficient data. There’s not going to be a major weather event here. You do know that, right?”
“It’s coming, I know it is,” he said rapidly, still not facing her. “Soon, it’ll be soon. Soon.”
“No, it’s not coming,” Derpy replied flatly. “No storm is going to form over the Unicorn Range. It never has, and it never will. It’s the way this part of Equestria work. Besides, the pegasi would never allow it to happen.”
It was if she had caused an explosion. Stormwatcher whirled around so quickly that Derpy immediately covered Dinky with her large wings, maternal instinct automatically kicking in. Gone was his wide smile, which had been replaced by a leering snarl, and his mad eyes danced with insanity.
“It’s coming!” he hissed, positively snorting at her in rage. “I know it’s coming, I know it will! You’re wrong, just like all the others who keep telling me I don’t know what I’m doing! I’m smarter than you think, you stuffy, blind bat!”
Dinky peered out from behind her mother’s protecting wings at the stallion that had doted on her all day, backing away fearfully at the sight of the enraged stallion.
“You pegasi are all the same,” he spat. “You all think you’re so great and wonderful and that you know everything about everything! Well guess what- I know a few things too, and I know there’s going to be a storm here! So why don’t you keep your big fat mouth shut and just leave, and take your stupid child with you, because I bet she’s just as dumb as you are!”
Derpy felt Dinky rustle at her feet, and the pegasus unfurled her wings as her daughter crept slowly backwards and onto the safety of her mother’s back. “She’s smarter than you could ever hope to be,” Derpy said coldly, turning her back on the Earth Pony and stalking away, eventually taking flight to gain some distance from the angry stallion.
Dinky peered out and watched as Stormwatcher set his sights on the horizon once more, seemingly intent on ignoring them and focusing on the nonexistent storm that would never form. She couldn’t understand what had caused such anger when he had been so nice to her all day. “What happened, Mommy?” she asked Derpy. “Why did Mr. Stormwatcher get all mad?”
“Because he didn’t like it when I told him his weather formulas were wrong,” Derpy answered, shaking her head. “He’s been telling you all sorts of misinformation about weather all day.”
“But isn’t he a weather pony, Mommy? He said he was,” Dinky protested.
“I don’t think he really is, sweetheart,” Derpy replied. “But he certainly wants to believe he is.”
“Why wouldn’t he let you tell him he was wrong?” the little unicorn inquired.
“Someponies just can’t take being told they were wrong,” Derpy answered softly, flapping her wings and soaring off into the night sky.