The Rainbow in The Grime

by Glitternight

Chapter 3- The Cruelty Of Reality

The cold of the night was just starting to set in. In a foggy alleyway in Detroit, Michigan, Rainbow Dash lay on the floor, her aching lungs contracting painfully with every chilly breath against her bruised and battered rib cage. The exhilaration of solitude she felt just hours ago had completely disappeared, for her body and pride had been both brutally attacked. She bent her left front leg slightly, seeing if she could handle the movement. Indeed it stung, but she fought through it, attempting to lift her devastated body. One hoof at a time, she supported her body weight into standing position. Well, she finally thought to herself, That was rude.

Everything hurt and throbbed unbearably. Rainbow Dash just stood there for a moment, crying and unable to move or accept what had just happened. They had broken her, for she was completely defenseless against these creatures, these complete and utter monsters. She was now alone and friendless. There was no way she could survive.
I need to keep a level head, she thought, shaking her head, trying to snap out of this hopeless fear that was so unknown to her, so bizarre. You're Rainbow Dash, she told herself, as though that was all the reassurance she needed. So come on, just get dashing, darn it! Move!

She lifted one hoof at a time and moved it before her, and started limping out of the alley, one step at a time. She stopped at a puddle that beheld her reflection. Gosh, you look like you were hit by a stampede.

There was a stream of blood flowing from her muzzle, a knob of swollen flesh at the base of her nose. Her mane was disheveled and tangled with gray rocks, standing out like shrapnel in a rainbow. Purple bruises splattered her body like paint over the cyan coat, but the saddest part was the fear and sadness that was so out of place in her normally defiantly laughing face.

She sniffled, sending a shock of pain through her nostrils. But then, she saw her wings. No. Just no.
Her left wing was swollen and crumpled, bent in three places, the feathers snapped and overlaying at odd angles.
She had lost her flying. The thing that made her who she was, that gave her purpose. Without it, she wasn't Rainbow Dash.

So now, what was she?

Just a crying broken pony in a grimy dark alley.

Careful of which hooves she distributed the most weight to, she fumbled out of the alley. She heard screaming and something like a Sonic Rainboom; a loud bang in the distance that resonated through the constant shrieking of sirens. What the hay was that? But she decided against investigating. The sun was setting and the city's true colors were showing in the dark. Through the separation of apartments on either side of her, she saw the world unfurl before her once more, only this time, there was no awe or wonder in it; just a fear of being hurt again.

To her left, she saw an open door welcoming her into one of the buildings. It was either walk out of the alley, into a street of monsters when she was more vulnerable than she had ever been, or head inside and take her chances in shelter.

Yeah, walk in front of them like live bait.... or nice warm building. It seemed like a no-brainer.

It was, indeed, warmer in the building, and while she walked deeper into the dark of the hallway, a sense of security lay over her like a blanket.

All I got to do is find a place to stay safe... just until my wing heals... if it's ever the same.

She froze for a second, shaking her head in an attempt to clear the terrible thought from her mind. No. It's gonna heal. I AM going to fly again.
Because if she didn't fly, she couldn't really live.

As she passed by random doors in the maze of a hallway, she heard different voices, different sounds, from laughing children to roaring hard rock music.

At one door, she froze, hearing a noise like something being thrown repeatedly and sobbing screams. Someone was being hurt, but Rainbow Dash knew she was in no position to help anyone.

Just keep walking. Maybe back home in small safe Ponyville, she would have. But the world she fell into was dark and unpredictable; a world where one would hurt a pony for the fun of it. She didn't understand it, nor did she want to. They're sick, she decided. And they need help.

She limped to the end of the hall, and looked up to find a staircase before her, the steps way too steep for her hurt pony legs. Seriously? I can barely stand! How am I supposed to get up there?!

“WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?”

She heard the scream from the door she had just passed. A female, but not an adult, rather a small filly. Rainbow Dash stopped in her tracks and looked back. No Rainbow. You got to keep walking. You can't just waltz in and help when you can barely help yourself! She kept telling herself this, like a repeated track of background music to her loud impulses to go in and save the day.

“I SAID SHUT UP!”

It was a male, shouting from the same door. The voice echoed right before a heavy slam and more shouts from the young female voice. Rainbow struggled to keep walking, knowing she was useless in this condition. She teared up a bit, but didn't look back.

She was about to give up right then and there and head back to the alley-- there was no way she was going to get up those stairs. But then, she heard a slam directly behind her. The door had opened.

She saw one of the creatures, this one dark brown, tall and rippling with muscles. There was a red hot anger in his eyes as his grip tightened on the arm of the younger one-- the female child Rainbow had just heard sobbing. Both of them had their brown eyes fixed on the blue pony.

“Rainbow Dash?” The little girl said it in so fragile a voice, like a fine crystal so close to breaking. The pony's eyes widened at the sound of her name, but then her eyes met those of the tall masculine monster and the bewilderment was replaced by fear.

“What the fuck is that?” He said in a loud booming voice, the stench of alcohol reaping from his mouth. He took a step towards Rainbow, dragging his daughter with an iron grip that bruised the young one's arm. “Daddy, no!” she screamed. “Don't hurt Rainbow Dash!”

The father took a pause to turn to his child. “Didn't I just tell you to shut up?”

Rainbow Dash bolted out of the hallway, through the father's wobbling legs as he ranted to his daughter in a cussing intoxicated slur. She barely noticed the bruises on the young one's arms as she ran back outside, as fast as her battered body would go. The pain was barely registered through the fear.

She ran out of the mouth of the alley, ignoring the looks of the shocked creatures around her, their eyes wide and small shouts escaping from all around. There was a blinding light at her right, and a blaring horn; she had just barely avoided being hit by one of those zooming metal capsules by mere inches. She ran to the sidewalk on the opposite side, flapping her right wing as hard as she can, though her left stuck to her side swollen and useless, trying to fly on one wing. She only managed to float an inch or two of the ground before plopping back painfully on her hooves.

All she could do at this point was run. Run until she was as far from these things as possible, run until she was alone, until she was safe.

The young one knew her name. She knew her name, and there was no reason that she should have. How did they know her, while she knew nothing of them?

Somewhere close by, she heard another shot of raw noise, a bang shook her inside out. She didn't turn to where it came from, ignored the sirens still cackling in the distance. She jumped, but kept running, as fast as if she was soaring, ducking beneath a highway underpass, out of the vulnerability of the streetlights.

______
The man lived alone with his madness for too many years, until it was more than idle company, but a habit. His pinky finger twitched frantically as he sit perfectly still, his unblinking eyes watching the television yammer on before him on channel 7's action news, not a single word of it attracting his attention. Surrounding the recliner he sat in, piles of astrophysics books consumed the room around him, so much that you could barely see the light blue carpet on the floor. Many of them hadn't been opened in years, but only because he had already memorized every word of the pictureless walls of text.

The room he sat in was as dark and cold and lonely as his miserable mind, the gears of his brain relentlessly turning through their rust. There were no photos of loved ones to warm the walls, just hand drawings in crayon of stick figure colorful ponies, scribbled on the paint on the wall, as though drawn with all the skill of a three year old.

His eyes stared at the TV, his mouth mumbling something without moving his lips, his pupils dilated fully against the lime green irises.

It was when the blue blur appeared on the television that he awoke from his daze, blinking for the first time in hours, as he started to actually hear the words spoken by the anchor woman.

“... was found running through downtown Detroit, near Michigan Avenue, as seen by this cell phone footage, capturing the small horse. No one knows where the pony came from, but it appears to have been dyed or painted in a fashion similar to the fictional character 'Rainbow Dash' as seen on the popular kid's show 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic', complete with a set of glued on wings.”

The mans eyelid twitched as his green eyes watched with a nearly inhuman amount of attention, capturing every pixel of the cyan pony dash down a crowded Detroit street.

“It was a strange sight,” the anchorwoman continued, “and while no one has claimed ownership of the pony, Animal Control has been called to scout the area for it so that it may be released into a safer environment. Anyone who has information on the animal should call the number below so--”

The mad man heard no more, as he broke out into an insane cackle that echoed through the small apartment.

“It worked!” He screamed it in a nasally voice through his shrieks of laughter. “By God, It actually WORKED!” His cackles echoed through the building as nighttime consumed the city.

Comments

[Genesis1212]

what?! o.0 oh god RD is suffering because of this guy!? my thinking proccess just blinked out i need to read the next chapter >w>