//------------------------------// // A strange letter arrives // Story: Rainbow and the Factory // by witegrlninja //------------------------------// Rainbow awoke the next morning completely refreshed. All her angst and worries about what happened yesterday had disappeared along with her dreams. It all seemed so simple now; of course the police would eventually find... Dewdrop, wasn't it? Right. And now that Twilight had gone with Spritz to tell them about her ideas, surely they'd take her much more seriously and find him even sooner now. She was sure she'd read about how he was found alive and well in the Foal Free Press within a couple of days. Days turned to weeks, and Rainbow had nearly forgotten all about the little filly. She came home from running some errands one afternoon, excited to see if her new Daring Do book had finally arrived in the mail. Opening the hatch on the front, she peeked inside and grabbed the contents, feeling a touch disappointed that she didn't feel anything book-shaped. "Bah... bill, ad, ad, bill, coupons- huh?" One of the envelopes was not like the others. It was mint green in color and somewhat thick, with purple writing that spelled out her address. "I put my P.O. Box address on all my merch, who took the time and effort to get my real address?" Her first thought was that it was a piece of fan mail; although she did enjoy the massive boxes of letters and small gifts she frequently received, she had learned long ago that she did not enjoy opening her mailbox every day and being suffocated by a pile of mail. So she had bought herself a P.O. Box and made sure her fans knew to send their mail there. She would usually wait to collect it from the post office on Fridays and spend the rest of the week slowly going through the whole collection. Then her mind traveled to her parents, but they always wrote their names and return address on their letters. This one had nothing of the sort. Maybe it was some other distant relative? Maybe a secret admirer? Maybe somepony attempting to blackmail her that she could find and beat up later? The possibilities were endless. Intrigued, Rainbow went inside, threw the rest of the mail haphazardly on her kitchen table and tore open the letter. Inside was three pieces of neatly-folded paper: one the same mint green as the envelope, one brown and one that was somewhat transparent and flimsy. She decided to open the mint paper first. ~ Dear Rainbow Dash, By the time you should get this, I'll already have gone on ahead. I hope you can meet me here. I found it. My brother was right all along. The Shrouded Mountain does exist! My parents and the police ponies here still don't believe me, even after Princess Twilight Sparkle insisted they listen. They said they would look into it but it's been weeks and nothing's been done. So I've been looking myself. I went to the library to see if they had a map of the Undiscovered West. The one they had looked almost completely different than the map my brother saw, except for one tiny part that matched exactly. The Shrouded Mountain is in the exact same spot as Mount Thunderclap in the Storm Peaks Mountain Range. They have to be the same place! I made copies for you to prove it and find me. And when you get here, I'm sure we'll find Dewdrop and we can all go home. And maybe they'll finally listen to me after that. Please, help me find my brother! I know you can do it! ~Spritz ~ Rainbow quickly read through the entire letter again. She couldn't believe it. "She did WHAT?!" An icy pit of darkness gripped her heart and dropped it into her stomach. Dread washed over her like a flight through a rain cloud. Breathing suddenly became very difficult as her body shivered. They didn't listen to her. Nopony did. Not her or Twilight. Now she's gone off on her own. Her hoof slammed the tabletop. She spat out a profane word. I should've helped her. I could've found Dewdrop within the day if I had looked! It really wouldn't have taken that much time... And then a crazy thought came to her. ...But I can help her now. Rainbow quickly unfolded the other two pieces of paper. One of them was the same map Spritz had shown her all those weeks ago, while the other appeared to be a photocopy of a map from a large atlas, imposed onto transparent paper. She smoothed out the creases as best she could, then carefully began to search for two identical mountains. It took her a few minutes, but finally she found the match. The Shrouded Mountain, or rather Mount Thunderclap, was located in a mountain range near the bottom left of the atlas map. At her maximum speed, it'd only take maybe two hours to fly there herself. She'd better be there. And I'm gonna chew her out once I find her, there's a reason they say 'leave things to the professionals'! No time to waste, Rainbow committed the image to memory, flapped her wings and blasted out of the nearest window, headed due west. ~ To her relief, the flight to the Storm Peaks was a half-hour shorter than she had anticipated. But that was really the only positive thing Rainbow could think of upon her arrival. A black mountain range quickly rose from the horizon, lying in the midst of a desolate, grey desert. Massive cumulonimbus clouds darker than she had ever seen cradled each and every peak, lightning pulsing downwards every few seconds and thunder so loud she could hear it even from that distance. But one mountain in particular stood out from the rest, taller than all that surrounded it. Its peak was completely covered in thick storm clouds punctuated by static flashes. That must be it... Mount Thunderclap. Rainbow's wings beat even faster as she began her ascent. Within minutes she entered the outer layers of the clouds. Thunder boomed in her ears, the wind began to churn violently, she felt the soft peppering of hail hitting her body. She flew further in; suddenly her fur stood on end, and she came to a screeching halt as a lightning bolt zapped downwards mere inches from her face. The heat alone told her that just one hit would hurt very, very much. But it would take far more than some lightning to make her turn back. Rainbow flew even deeper into the clouds. Soon the thick water vapor blocked out much of the sun's light, and the winds and hail intensified. The lightning struck downwards with ever-increasing frequency, forcing her to duck and dodge and turn on a dime to avoid them in time. The roaring peals of thunder were deafening to the point she almost couldn't hear herself think. The elemental barrage only worsened the deeper she went, she wondered if it was possible for anypony to break through. Finally, as she began to believe the hurricane-force winds, Parasprite-sized hail and rapid-fire lightning bolts were impenetrable, she reached the peace in the eye of the storm. She gasped audibly at what lay beneath her. The mountain's summit was charred black from countless lightning strikes, leaving very little intact. Stray puffs of darkest clouds floated lazily along the ground like ghosts in a cemetery. But in the center of the summit sat a strange sight, indeed: a blackened building no bigger than a toolshed stuck out from a floor covered in storm clouds. What might be the entrance lay within a sheltered alcove. "She has to be there, that's really the only place she could be," Rainbow uttered quietly to herself. She began to quickly descend towards the building, only barely noticing that the stray clouds were now sparkling with electricity. Suddenly they fired bolts of lightning at the Pegasus, forcing her to bank sharply and fly back up to avoid them. Rainbow shivered uncomfortably; the heat from those bolts told her they were lethal. "How can such a little cloud make such a powerful burst of lightning?" she asked herself. Drawing from her time as a weather Pegasus, it shouldn't have been possible. Still, she had a little filly to find. She inhaled deeply a few times to steady her nerves, then stretched backwards to prepare for her next try. With a final deep breath and a battle cry, Rainbow flapped her wings as hard as she could, hurling herself towards what she hoped was the safety of the building. Her heart leapt into her throat a couple times as bolts of lightning grazed her tail, but within seconds she was inside the alcove. She quickly flopped on her belly and covered her head and neck with her forelimbs instinctively, cringing as she envisioned being electrocuted, but after a few moments of nothing happening, she opened her eyes and slowly stood up. Sighing in relief, Rainbow then turned her attention to the entrance. Aside from a vertical seam that split the wall in half, the only marking was a large emblem in the center, circular and about three feet wide. Within the circle were three identical rectangular shapes with slanted tops arranged side by side... more buildings? Skyscrapers? Chimneys? The leftmost one had a left wing sticking out of the side, mirroring the rightmost one and its wing. They all sat upon a cloud with a single lightning bolt striking downwards, it and the wings extending past the circular boundary. "Never seen anything like this before," Rainbow muttered as she put her front hooves against the wall and pushed. Nothing happened. "Hello?" She cautiously knocked on the wall. Nothing happened. "Hey! Anypony in there? Spritz?" She banged on the wall loudly. Still nothing happened. The harder she hit it, she could tell it was indeed hollow inside. But the fact that the assumed entrance had no means of entering stumped her. She has to be here, right? The two maps said this was the place... but did she really make it all the way here? Through the storm and all those weirdly-powerful lightning clouds? Rainbow went over what she had seen on the way to the Undiscovered West in her mind. She definitely didn't remember seeing any teal and pink Pegasi on the way here. It was during these thoughts that Rainbow's wandering eyes noticed something on the floor, stuck between the slit in the wall. Something singed. Something pink. A few strands of Spritz's hair. Now she was certain the filly was inside. But how? Nothing she did even made the wall budge. Realizing that she would never get anywhere herself, Rainbow sat down and put a hoof to her chin in thought. Welp, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna need some help getting inside... Her first thoughts were of Fluttershy, which were extinguished as quickly as they formed. She'd never be able to weather the storm, let alone the lightning clouds. Applejack? With her raw strength, she could probably buck the door right open. But she also hated flying or being carried while flying, which was definitely much faster than running or some other form of transportation. Time was of the essence here. Not to mention the whole storm and lightning issue and all. Pinkie Pie? She didn't mind flying or being carried, and her Pinkie Sense would probably keep her safe from the weather, but unless she could pancake herself or defy physics enough to noclip through the door, she probably wasn't the best choice. Rarity also didn't mind flying, she had really taken a liking to that butterfly wing spell all that time ago. And her magic might be able to open the door. But was it also strong enough to keep her safe from the weather? And Twilight- "Ack! Duh!" Rainbow tapped herself on the forehead. Why didn't she think of Twilight first?! Being an Alicorn, Twilight could not only fly, but her magic was ridiculously powerful. She could probably just shield-bubble her way through the storm and lightning, no problem! "Twilight! I need to go get Twilight!" she shouted as she nearly tripped over herself standing up. Then she remembered the lightning clouds just outside the alcove. Deep breaths. One final breath and she rocketed out of the alcove, banking upwards as steeply as she could to avoid the lightning clouds as much as possible, then evened herself out and made her way back through the storm.