Light blinded Rainbow Dash as she entered the stadium. When she regained her vision, the sight awestruck her. The stadium was filled with lights and thousands of screaming fans and booing critics. On four sides of the stadium was giant jumbotron screens with one showing Rainbow looking up. Next to her was the rest of her teammates, Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, and Spike, ready to fight their biggest battle yet. In front of her was a field of concrete with rising and low dipping slabs everywhere, providing almost unlimited possibilities on where she could go to ride.
On the other side of the stadium, Rainbow saw the opposing team. Upon entering, the crowd erupted in cheers for the defending team as they entered the stadium with cries for Rainbow’s team to not only lose, but lose hard. Both teams continued to the center until they were face to face, Rainbow seeing her adversary in the eyes. After the rules of the match were explained, each team separated to opposite sides of the field, ready to battle. Just before the buzzard signaling the start of the match, Rainbow and her team readied their signature battlecry.
“Ready guys?” asked Rainbow. Upon seeing all the nods, Rainbow and the team pulled their right sleeves and presented their fists to the enemy team and cried, “Lets kill em’ dead!”
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“Rainbow dash wake up!” yelled a voice. Rainbow Dash was in the middle of a really comfortable nap dreaming of being asked to be in the Wonderbolts again when she was rudely interrupted. Rainbow opened her eyes to see her boss Cloudkicker looming over her with a scowl.
“Come on Cloudkicker, you know I can get rid of the clouds easily. Just let me sleep.” pleaded Rainbow.
“No Rainbow! It’s your job to get rid of the clouds over Ponyville while I get the surrounding area. I already did my job and you haven’t even started yet!” yelled Cloudkicker, “Besides, were supposed to bring clouds here! Not get rid of them, you know we have a scheduled storm today!” Rainbow groaned, hating to get off a comfortable cloud.
“Alright alright, you know you don’t have to be so hard about it.” said Rainbow as she readied her wings to fly.
“I’m not being ‘so hard about it’ Rainbow, we’ve already been written up twice in a month because of your napping and I’m not working double shifts because of your laziness!” yelled Cloudkicker.
Rainbow, not wanting to deal with Cloudkicker’s yelling anymore, quickly shot off as fast as she could away from her yelling boss as fast as she could. Of course, being the fastest flyer in Equestria, that wasn’t that hard. After getting away from Cloudkicker, Rainbow Dash got to work on collecting clouds to bring to Ponyville. Why anyone would schedule a rainstorm so soon after winter was beyond her since everything outside of Ponyville was covered in snow and ice. Not wanting to deal with more yelling however, Rainbow double timed on gathering all the clouds.
After hours of work and many missed comfortable clouds becoming nasty rain clouds, Rainbow was finally finished amassing a rain cloud big enough for Ponyville. But just as she was about to get ready to move it, she heard the familiar sound of her boss yelling at her.
“Rainbow Dash wait!” cried out Cloudkicker. Rainbow stopped her process and turned to her boss as she flew up to Rainbow, out of breath in her haste. “Rainbow, there’s been a mistake. The rainstorm was actually scheduled for next week. The guys higher up says you have to get rid of all the clouds.” said Cloudkicker in short breaths as she regained her breath.
“Me! Why aren’t you going to help!” asked Rainbow Dash.
“I have to go back to Cloudsdale to get all the papers. And since you can apparently clear all the clouds in ten seconds flat, I figured you’d be perfect for the job” said Cloudkicker as she started in the other direction, “Sorry Rainbow but I have to get going, bye!” yelled Cloudkicker as she flew away.
Rainbow Dash was furious. She had spent hours amassing this huge raincloud only to find that she did it for nothing. Not only that, but she had to do all of Cloudkicker’s work too while she got off easy!
In a fit of rage, Rainbow started destroying her cloud into pieces before moving onto Cloudkicker’s work. What Cloudkicker hadn't told Rainbow Dash was that she was almost done with the mile wide circle around Ponyville by the time she found Rainbow, meaning that there was no way Rainbow could clear all the clouds in short time. Now even angrier, Rainbow started to violently fly through clouds destroying them instantly. What Rainbow hadn’t accounted for in her rage infused mind was the possibility of moisture already forming in the clouds.
As Rainbow flew straight down through the cloud, the water that formed there had gotten in her eyes. With the combined irritation of the water in the wind further increasing it, Rainbow couldn’t see where she was going. Trying to rub the water out of her eyes, she cleared them unfortunately just before seeing she was going to crash into Applejack’s tree orchard. Not even having enough time to brace herself, Rainbow Dash collided into a tree trunk, actually splitting it thanks to her sheer speed in her rage fit. After colliding through the tree, she banged back and forth between branches. Deep cuts and scrapes slashed at her until she finally landed in a small crater on the edge of the orchard.
As she landed, she slid through the dirt causing her small wounds to open even further. Her wings eventually even got caught underneath her, causing them to bend at unnatural angles until snaps could be heard. When she finally came to a stop, he was barely conscious. She had never before felt so much pain in her life, not even all the accidents before compared to what felt like thousands of stinging fire ants gnawing at her.
“Rainbow Dash!” cried a voice that sounded like an echo. Rainbow looked up to see her friend Applejack running towards her. But before she arrived, Rainbow had slipped into unconsciousness.
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In her unconsciousness state, Rainbow was dreaming about the first time she flew. Except instead of experiencing it again, she was seeing it as a spectator. She saw her parents sitting at the cloud bench at the park in Cloudsdale as she was playing with the other fillies. Rainbow was chasing another pegasi filly while playing tag, desperately trying to catch her. But just before she caught the filly, the filly flew into the air to avoid being tagged.
“Hey no fair! You know I can’t fly!” yelled the young Rainbow Dash.
“Too bad.” said the filly as she blew a raspberry at Rainbow. Despite not being able to fly, Rainbow continued to chase the filly, hoping to tire her out. But without realizing it, as she ran after the filly, she was flapping her wings harder than usual. Before she knew it, she was hovering off the ground. Then higher and higher, until she was at level with the filly. And she was gaining.
When Rainbow tagged the other filly, she had finally realized that she was flying and immediately flew as fast as she could to her parents to show them that she could finally fly. The older Rainbow watched her excited younger self laughing and looking so amazed. Discovering her new gift made her so happy as she heard her parents congratulate her and shower her with praise. The older Rainbow looked with a smile on her face at the sight before realizing that there was an annoying beeping noise coming from somewhere. As the beeping got louder and louder, the scene before got darker and darker until it was pitch black around her. The beeping becoming louder and louder until finally Rainbow saw an intense light, making her shut her eyes.
When she opened her eyes, she was staring up at a ceiling. The beeping noise got her attention as she turned to her left and saw a heart monitor machine. “Rainbow!” yelled a familiar voice. Rainbow Dash turned to her right to see her friend Twilight looking at her with excitement and relief. Twilight quickly rushed towards the door nearby and yelled out for the rest of the Mane Six to come in to see Rainbow wake up. As the rest piled in, the doctor also came in and started to inspect Rainbow Dash as she conversed with her friends.
“How ya’ feelin’ Rainbow?” asked Applejack.
“Not too bad, my right wing still stings like crazy, but other than that I feel fine.” replied Rainbow Dash.
“What happened Rainbow? Did you try to fly with your eyes closed again?” asked Pinkie Pie.
“Not exactly, I got some water in my eyes and couldn’t see. Plus I was going way too fast and crashed into Applejack’s trees.” said Rainbow Dash. The doctor finished up his inspection of Rainbow, putting away his stethoscope.
“Yes well I have to say Miss Dash, you are extremely lucky that you’re almost in one good piece.” said the Doctor. Rainbow Dash sighed, then cringed in pain as her side hurt from the chest movement.
“Well that’s good at least.” said Rainbow.
“Doctor, what exactly do you mean ‘almost’ in one good piece?” asked Twilight. The doctor sighed as he turned to Rainbow after addressing her friends.
“Well concerning her injuries I do have some good news and bad news. The good news is, you didn’t suffer any damage to your spinal cord when you landed so you should still be able to walk.” said the Doctor. Rainbow smiled at the news that she would still be able to do most of her activities.
“And um, what’s the bad news?” asked Fluttershy. The doctor took another sigh as he took off his glasses in a serious manner.
“Well the bad news is, and I’ll be blunt, because of the way Miss Dash landed on her wings she popped them out of their sockets. Not only that, but completely shredded through the nerves connecting them to the body. Miss Dash, I’m sorry to say this but, you won’t be able to fly again.”
Rainbow’s smile slowly turned until it was gone. “What?” asked Rainbow.
“I’m sorry, but your wings can’t be used for flying anymore.” said the Doctor. Rainbow sat in shock at what she was hearing, almost at the edge of tears. Her friends looked on in horror, Fluttershy in tears, as their friend received the bad news.
“Doctor, you can’t just fix them? I’ve had bad landings before.” asked Rainbow in a sobbing voice.
“I’m sorry Miss Dash, but the damage was just too great to fix.” said the Doctor. Upon hearing that there was nothing that could be done, Dash broke down in tears. Her tears turned into sobbing as it soon turned into full crying. Her friends rushed to her side, hugging her to try to comfort her.
In just a few sentences, Rainbow had learned that her life was all but over. Her job, gone. Her home, practically gone since she can’t get to it anymore. And worst of all, her dream of becoming a Wonderbolt. Shattered, never to be. Rainbow continued to cry her heart out realizing all the horrible things that has happened to her. Everything she worked for gone and what was worse for her was that she knew it was all her fault. Realizing this brought more tears to Rainbow’s eyes as she continued her crying into more to come.