Chase
Faith was almost to the edge of Ponyville by the time she heard Rainbow. A faint whistling reached her ears as she sprinted, growing higher in pitch and volume by the second. Higher and higher it went, yet she didn’t look back, arms and legs pumping, sending her across the hardened soil.
“Gotcha!” At that moment, Faith ducked, and veered off to the right, pulling a perfect 90 degree turn without losing a single stride. Rainbow, who had foolishly made her presence known by shouting, was left dumb folded as her hooves gripped at nothingness as she flew through the air, certain that Faith was there mere milliseconds before. Damn, she’s fast. Grinning competitively, her wings buzzed and pulled into a tight corkscrew turn, levelling out on her right, and back behind the sprinting figure.
Faith, knowing she couldn’t pull that off again, began weaving left and right, making headway to the settlement. Rainbow tried to follow her, but having a larger wingspan meant that whilst she was faster than all pegasi, she didn’t have as much agility on her wings. This was what Faith was relying on, dodging and fainting movements with as much orientation as the common house fly. A few times Rainbow’s cyan hooves almost closed around either chest or waist, but each time Faith seemed to disappear, and re-appear a few feet away, a mischievous grin on her face.
Suddenly, grass changed to gravel, and buildings started passing by on both sides of her.
She’d reached to edge of Ponyville.
A multitude of ponies surrounded her, every shade and colour imaginable. Many were earth ponies, with a handful of Pegasus’ and even less unicorns, but all of them slowly noticing her presence, and becoming silent in fearful anticipation. Small cottages flanked either side of the path, but with sturdy roofs, and were quite close to each other, but the path was around twenty meters wide, and still quite open. This worked to Faith’s advantage. Rainbow knew she was fast, knew she was agile, but hopefully this would put her off guard.
After taking only two steps and half a second to process this, she veered left again, and ran straight towards the front of a cottage, a small cart filled with stacks of flour bags between her and her destination. Behind her, Rainbow smirked, and swung towards the cottage doors, hoping to intercept her, winning this impromptu contest quickly. She could see faith sprinting towards the cottage over the flour as she planted all four hooves into the ground, still a challenging grin on her face and a glint in her magenta eyes.
What happened next made every pony gasp. Faith didn’t veer around the cart. Nor did she slow down to avoid any collisions with passing ponies or the cart itself. Once again, Faith’s vision tinged blue, and time seemed to slow for her. She could hear, with great clarity, the breathing of every equine around her. She could feel her thunderous heartbeat sending a constant stream on adrenaline and energy to her muscles, keeping them moving, keeping her moving. She could see, just beyond the wooden flour cart, the magenta eyes, framed by the short bangs of red, orange, and yellow hair around a head of cyan fur.
Three ponies blocked her path, frozen solid in fear by the approaching creature. Without missing a beat, Faith drove her feet into the ground, and leapt over a red stallion and green mare, their heads, to Faith, moving slowly as Faith passed by over. The third, a larger blue stallion, suddenly spotted this leaping creature, and broke out of his stupor to begin fleeing off to his side, turning before running.
But he was too slow. Barely a millisecond after landing, Faith pulled her legs from under her, and slid across the gravel, and directly under the stomach of the fleeing stallion, his knees brushing the hair upon her head. And she still wasn’t done. As soon as her body was clear, she sprang back to her feet, and in the few steps between her and the cart, gained enough momentum to leap again. But not over it, like Rainbow had anticipated, but onto it.
Faith leapt of the ground, and her padded foot made contact with the edge of the cart. The other followed, landing upon a raised bag of flour. With them, she pushed off with all her might, thrusting her arms upwards as she dived over the remainder of the path, over a stunned Rainbow, and onto the sloped roof of the cottage.
The entire event, from start to finish, lasted 7.23 seconds. For Faith, it lasted minutes. And for Rainbow, no more than two seconds, and the creature had disappeared.
“What the- Ah buck!” Rainbow finally came to her senses, but not before Faith had scrambled to the top of the roof, and was now leaping across the gaps between the cottages, gaining distance every step. Rainbow leapt off the ground and into the sky, scanning the rooftops for Faith.
But she had disappeared. Frustrated, Rainbow circled the area a few times, glancing in gardens and alleyways, before landing back where she started with an annoyed huff. Then, an idea came to her. She never said anything about getting backup. With a triumphant laugh, she took to the skies once more, searching for a few specific ponies. Of course, this meant that Faith could then hide anywhere within Ponyville, but with a large enough search party, this would be over and done before sundown. But I underestimated her… she’s good.
Faith held her breath as she hid behind a shed in a garden. Twice she saw Rainbowdash pass by overhead, the second time gliding barely ten feet above her. Minutes passed, and with nothing indicating a trap, she slowly eased herself out of the gap between fence and shed, grunting with disgust at the cobwebs and rotting vegetables littered within the small space. Too close… she thought, but grinned to herself. She didn’t know how long this would go on for, but she knew she had the upper hand/hoof over Rainbow, although a nagging feeling in the back of her head told her things were not going to be so easy from here on out. Yes, she had surprised Rainbow by pulling of that relatively simple leap, but she highly doubted that that pony would fall for it a second time. She needed to keep her on her toes, figuratively, and that meant pulling off something new each time. But she only had a limited amount of moves and by passes. Some of which she highly doubted she could pull off in such a rural community.
She crouched in a corner of the garden, careful not to trample the carrots growing in a vegetable patch. Even though she was running like a convicted felon from a pack of wild dogs, she still had courtesy for the other inhabitants here. Idly brushing off the much and grime from her bare arms, and adjusting her thin elbow pads, she slowly sneaked to the edge of the garden, and pulled herself up to peak over the fence, and fully understand her surroundings.
The town did appear rural, although such buildings as a hospital and a large city hall indicated that it was developing either recently, or at a relatively quick rate. What more, she noted with bizarre amusement, that some of the buildings were drastically different from the basic cottages and housed that she was around. From here, she could see the top of a fairly large oak tree with a balcony and a large telescope, and further in the distance, a building that looked to be a massive cupcake. This didn’t throw her off, but actually gave her a sense of comfort. Should she get lost in this new world of theirs, at least she had highly distinguishable landmarks she could work off. The town itself was very flat, another disadvantage when you’ve spent a large proportion of your life above everyone else, the only company being others like you, or the occasional flock of pigeons or news helicopter.
Lastly, and very faintly in the distance, she could see the faded shape of a mountain, and strangely enough, a whole city built on one side of it, faint waterfalls flowing to the ground level. It certainly looked large, and with its unique placement, she hazard a guess at that being the capital city of sorts, if such a thing existed here. It was no issue to her, as it appeared at least a half week journey on foot… er, hoof, although she still didn’t know how technologically advanced these ponies were, even if they did appear to have tacked a whole city on a near vertical mountain face.
She dropped back down from the fence, although the drop itself was only a few inches. With ponies being smaller in height meant that everything here was to be smaller, but only a little. When stood next to her, she guessed that their heads came up to her chest, and their ribs in line with her waist. Around five feet tall, she assumed, and the Pegasus’ appeared to be slightly smaller, and earth ponies that largest; but this was only going by rainbow and her two other friends, Twilight and… Applejohn was it? …Applebob? Apple… Applejack, that was it. Earth ponies were physically strong, so she’d have to avoid any combat with them if the need arose. Pegasus’ had the supreme advantage on flight, so her usual tactic of ‘get higher than them and run’ would be highly ineffective here. And lastly, unicorns, from what she saw, could be highly skilled in magic and physical manipulation. She just hoped that in such a peaceful location, none of them had bothered to learn any form of offensive magic. Thankfully, the main population here appeared to be earth ponies, and Unicorns rare in these parts.
Finally done contemplating about her current situation, she bounced on the balls of her feet a few times, then slowly made her way out of the garden, keeping one eye in front and around, and the other on the sky, looking for any rainbow-maned figures diving for her from a cloud.
“Cloudkicker! Cloudchaser!” Rainbow shouted at two ponies sat lazily on a higher-up cloud over Ponyville. One, a small grey Pegasus with a long, butter-blonde mane, sat snoring gently beside the other, a blue-grey Pegasus with a spiky, ice-blue mane and tail, who was flicking through an out-dated edition of the Wonderbolts magazine. Cloudchaser, the latter of the two, looked up slowly from her reading, seeing Rainbowdash flying towards them with a look on her face; a mixture of both anxiety and cocky challenging, like she had been betted something, and proved to win.
With a sigh, she closed her magazine, and stuffed it in the cloud for later, before leaning over and nudging Cloudkicker awake; giving a rather large snore, and slowly opening her purple eyes. Meanwhile, Rainbow had landed beside the two, still with the eager smile on her face.
“What now, Rainbow? Someone beat your sonic Rainboom?” Chaser asked, whilst Kicker still attempted to rouse herself from her mid-afternoon nap. Rainbow pretended not to hear, but whipped her chromatic mane from her face, and stared at the two with the same impatient look.
“Did you two hear a loud bang earlier?” Rainbow asked the pair, 'Kicker finally rousing herself so much that she could pay attention to the conversation.
“I heard something,” Chaser admitted, looking down at Ponyville below her. “I just thought it was Twilight experimenting with a new spell; remember last month with the growth potion she created?” She didn’t finish her sentence; all three of them knowing full well the extent Twilight’s spells and potions could go wrong.
“Well it wasn’t; something- someone, has come to Ponyville. Three of them.” Rainbow said at the pair. Kicker’s eyes widened slightly at the mention of this, and she suddenly looked down at the town below them, half expecting to see some form of mutant running rampage throughout the town; even though they were so far up, ponies appeared to be tiny blobs of colour.
“Are you sure?” Kicker asked, whilst Chaser got to her hooves, stretching her legs from laying down for so long. She two glanced down, but with less panic, actually scanning the town for something out of the ordinary.
“I’m sure.” Rainbow said, bouncing slowly on the cloud with the others impatience.
“What do they look like? Are they hostile?” Chaser asked. Below were some very vulnerable fillies and colts. Should something with murderous, or even dangerous capabilities run wild within the town, a death toll would be inevitable; something that hadn’t happened in Ponyville for over two hundred years.
“They walk on two hooves, and are practically furless.” Rainbow continued searching the streets from her vantage point, but she knew that Faith had gone into hiding; and with the sun making its constant journey to the horizon, it was slowly becoming harder and more urgent to find her. “Two of them remained by their metal box of sorts,” –she pointed a hoof over to the field, where the AC building could be seen, along with a handful of figures, some taller, and definitely standing on two limbs. “But a third, by the name of Faith, ran straight to Ponyville. I’ve been chasing her, but she’s given me the slip.” She paused at the look of worry on Chaser’s face, then gave a wan smile of reassurance. “Don’t worry; as far as I know, they are not aggressive, and for some reason even speak our language.” This was a surprise to the other two, although Kicker showed it less, still scanning the streets hundreds of feet below.
“The last time I saw her was-”
“There.” Cloudkicker cut her off, pointing a hoof down towards Ponyville. “Running north of Sugercube corner.” Both Rainbowdash and Cloudchaser looked quizzically at Kicker for a moment, and decided she was right, following where her hoof was pointing to below them. Eventually, all three had sight of the bi-pedal, making its way through gardens, occasionally scaring a pony or two who she happened to come across. Even though hedged, fences, ponds and trees blocked her path, she passed by them with expert ease, flowing from one obstacle to the other without breaking her stride.
“How does she move like that?” Chaser asked, awed at the dexterity of the being. “Are they all like that?” She asked Rainbow, who was glaring challenging daggers at the back of Faiths skull.
“Yeah, pretty much. The stallion’s a bit larger, but they all seem to move with so much… grace.” She admitted, before shaking herself and looking at the two Clouds.
“We need to catch her, but not to kill her. She’s fast, agile, but has one major flaw; she’s highly visible. We may have to fight, but if any serious injuries happen apart from being knocked out, then everypony stops. In all honesty, it’s just a massive game of tag.” Rainbow chucked, preparing to dive off of the cloud the others sat upon. Kicker and Chaser paused for only a moment, before imitating their fellow Pegasus’ position. They still had visual on Faith, who had ended up in the open, running full speed across one of the few parks dotted around in Ponyville.
“And what happens if we catch her?” Kicker asked, extending her wings and giving them a few experimental flaps.
Rainbow turned her head to look at Kicker, her magenta eyes looking at the other pony.
“If we catch her.” Rainbow said, before setting her sights on the town below.
“GO!”
Eventually, faith had no choice but to run in the open. The row of houses had ended, and with the streets being to widely spaced out, she had no way to stay of the streets, and thus was why she was now sprinting past a cupcake-looking building, headed towards a more densely built part of the town. Thankfully, the pones she passed were either too confused about her presence to do anything, or she had passed them before they truly realised.
She spied a good point to make a disappearance; a waist-height fence which stood in front of a dense park, the sunlight struggling to stream through the high-packed canopy. She sprinted towards it, arms pumping and her breath coming in controlled gasps. Twenty meters... ten meters.
Wumph! Faith skidded to a halt, eyes wide in shock and amusement. In front of her hovered Rainbow Dash, flapping her wings to keep her head on the same level as Faiths, grinning from ear to ear as she knew Faith couldn't possibly jump over her. Her gaze glanced at Kicker and Chaser, who landed on all fours around Faith, forming a pony triangle with a human in the center. Faith followed her gaze, glancing at first a blue-grey pegasus on her behind left, then at a slightly smaller grey pony with a butter-blonde mane. Both were evidentially female, to which Faith wondered for a moment. Surely there were more males than a small handful? But no matter, she had a problem t deal with.
Turning back to face Rainbow, she gave a small nod of the head. “Nice to see you haven't given up yet, although I find it quite cheap how you've resorted to backup, Dashie.” Faith used what she guessed would be a pet name of hers, trying to aggravate or taunt her so she'd be put off. By now, a good few ponies of all species were gathered round the four, none of them deciding to join in.
Rainbow gave off a snarl at the name. She hated that name. Despised it. She dropped onto all fours, glaring daggers up at the human a few paces away. Then she blinked. She's trying to taunt me. Rainbow grinned slightly as she said to Faith “I'd like you to meet Cloudkicker, and Cloudchaser, and you never said I couldn't. Faithy.” And Rainbow was mightily pleased to see a reaction come from Faith, her maroon eyes squinting to glare daggers at the rainbow maned pony.
Faith felt her blood boil at the mention of the name. Only Jacknife called her that, and she hated Jacknife; after everything he had done. Images blurred past Faith's vision; a dead Pope, An injured Merc, Celeste's betrayal, and a burning helicopter.
Faith shook herself. That was the past, this is the now. And now, she had three ponies to show who was boss. With a confident smirk, she took a step forward, pleased to see all three ponies tense in anticipation to leap, or flee; whichever option seemed more logical.
“You've made a big mistake, Rainbow. And now,” She paused, smiling devilishly, “I'm gonna claim my victory.” The trio had barely any time to react before Faith had flipped sideways, pouncing on an unsuspecting Cloudkicker. She landed heavily on the mares back, both hands around her neck, as she used her momentum to pull 'kicker onto her rear hooves, bring Faith back on to her own, and using 'Kicker as a meat shield. The small crowd of ponies gasped in unison, but none made a move to help, not even to call for guards.
The butter-blonde-maned pegasus' eyes widened in terror, her wings snapping to attention as a natural response, inadvertently giving Faith more body to hide behind. Faith held 'Kicker in a griplock; enough that it would restrain her from moving, but not as to knock her out.
Both 'Chaser and Rainbow stared wide-eyed at Faith, disbelief in their eyes. However, nearly simultaneously, they came to their wits, and Rainbow put herself in front of Faith, whilst Cloudchaser began circling around her.
“You're fast, I'll give you that.” Rainbow muttered, realising the stares of many a pony were fixated upon the four of them. If she lost this little showdown, her ego would be ruined, and her reputation, in shatters.
Her wings snapped to attention, ready to pounce. “But not fast enough.” Faith tried to keep her eye on both ponies, but 'Chaser eventually left her field of vision, and just a sideways glance was all it needed. As soon as Faith moved her head, Rainbow lunged, using all fours to force her mass as fast as possible to the human whilst she was distracted. At the same time, 'Chaser lunged from the rear, aiming low to try to knock Faith's feet from under her, trying to use her bipedal stance to their advantage.
Now! Faith thought. Her head whipped back to Dash, just enough time to work out her rough trajectory; her chest and head. She didn't use the paralysed 'Kicker as a shield, but instead decided to shove the mare right into the oncoming path of Rainbow, hoping to buy a few valuable seconds.
Barely the instant her hands left the warm touch of 'Kicker's fur, Faith jumped, tucking her knees into her chest, as Cloudchaser, realising they'd been had, pulled a very tight upwards turn as she passed Faith, soaring between the human and the entangled pair of ponies with only centimetre to spare on each side.
Thankfully, after a few curses, the other two ponies had untangled themselves from their impromtu collision, and once again faced Faith, who never seemed to drop her smile, as the trio of ponies readied themselves for a second attack. Rainbow was panting, glaring daggers at this irritating creature, whilst 'Kicker and 'Chaser had varying degrees of worry and fear etched into their facial features, but no matter, because In a single moment, without even having to look at one another, the ponies pounced, hooves flying out to make contact with Faith.
For the next few minutes, there was only a flurry of hooves, wings and hands as Faith fought off the ponies. Hit after hit, she blocked and parried, twirling and dancing to a violent song, as the trio became more and more infuriated that they couldn'd simply knock Faith out.
She ducked, weaved, rolled and lunged, all within the confines of the circle created by the increasing number of watchers, all deadly silent in anticipation of the result.
Blue hoof met pink palm, forearms met wings. Their strength was remarkable, and faith had to stop herself from nearly staggering back each time a hit came. Faith started on the defensive, arms poised in a boxers pose, an effortless smug smile on her face as she kept a skilful eye on each moving limb, blocking when possible, and dodging the rest.
Then she went of the offensive. She began not just blocking, but parrying hits that came her way. Using the momentum of Rainbow's hoof to send her over her head as she gripped the limb. Tripping Cloudchaser when she was uncoordinated to leave most of her weight balanced on a single hoof, bringing her crashing to the ground. Even so, she couldn't block them all. For every few hits she delivered, she received one or two in return, bright purple bruises blossoming on her thighs, forearms, and a rather nasty one on her cheek, where Dash had managed half-a-buck amidst the flurry. Her smile slowly fell,, turning into a snarl of concentration, aiming to incapacitate them before they did her.
But she couldn't hold them off forever. Three-on-one isn't the best of odds, although faith had managed worse. But that was against humans, who could be cleanly knocked out with a simple hit to a cluster of nerves. The hit's began building up and up, until she was back onto pure offensive, protecting her chest and face, both beginning to bruise badly, even though no-one- pony or human, made the offer to back down. Flickers of indecision occasionally flashed on Dash's face, but the relentless combat she was engaged in caused her to act now, think later.
Then, Rainbow managed to slip past her defences. Whist Faith was preoccupided blocking a flurry of strikes from Cloudchaser, she leaped around and delivered a sideways kick to the back of Faith's knees.
The effect was instantaneous. With a yelp, Faith tumbled onto her knees as her support fell from below her. Immediately after, 'Chaser, who failed to react in time to Faith falling, accidentally delivered a solid hit to Faith's face, sending the bipedal tipping backwards. The strength in the hit was immense; a sickening crack snapped through the air as the hoof made contact, accompanied by a spray of blood from Faiths nose.
“Oh, Shit!” Rainbow cursed, realising their friendly, if somewhat combative engagement had taken a turn for the worst. None of them had actually intended to cause serious damage to each other, that much was evident as both Rainbow and Faith had lessened the impacts around the face on what would have been possibly lethal hits.
Faiths eyes widened in realisation that this wasn't meant to happen, the back of her head cracking painfully onto the hard-packed ground that made up the street. Her vision blurred, both by the concussion, and the swelling in her left eye that was forcing her eye shut. Coloured shapes swam in her vision; blue and rainbow, grey and gold, electric blue. Murmurs of voices and gentle hooves made themselves known as something tried to rouse her, but to no avail.
“Faith! Get up!” Rainbow said in panic, shaking Faith's shoulder. She had all intentions earlier to knock Faith out, but cleanly, with the only repercussion being a rather mild headache the following morning. Not like this, with her face covered in blood from her broken nose, and a small pool of red substance leaking from the back of her head. The crowd of ponies were silent, unsure what to do.
“Faith, listen! We-we'll get you s-some help.” Rainbow muttered frantically as 'Chaser and 'Kicker stared in shock.
Faith wasn't responding. Her vision flickered, faded, and all sound left her ears as she passed out.