Queen Dawnbreaker has been assasinated and her daughter Nova foalnapped. Rainbow Dash must restore her honor and save Fallen Equestria from a deadly plague, all while a familiar shadow lurks overhead.
Canterlotian and all its Districts - The shinning jewels of Fallen Equestria are no more...
Queen Dawnbreaker has been assassinated and her her daughter Nova - foalnapped. All blame falls upon their Royal Protector Rainbow Dash who has been sent to execution. But little do they know, that the city has fallen into the oppressive hooves of the Corrupted Elements that have come to power after the fall of the Queen.
As the underworldly plague rips what is left of Equestria to shreds, Rainbow, along with a rag-tag team of Loyalists, set off to find the missing foal and restore the land to its once shimmering glory. But little does the prismatic mare know, darkness is rising.
A Dishonored crossover, no knowledge necessary. Feedback, much appreciated! First two chapter proofed by Landee & Midge.
The hull creaked, gentle winds rocking it back and forth. The air was heavy with humidity as the brilliant golden sun shone down across the ruined plains of Fallen Equestria.
It was truly a grand spring day.
A lone pony sat deep within the bowels of the airship as it circled around the endless spires of the unnamed mountain. Her body was clad in leather, sharp weapons resting against her slim form. Two graying cyan wings with tips of bronze blades rested against her sides.
She had bitten down on a quill, scribbling away in the quiet room. A single Spark-gem lantern illuminated her form with an orange light. The old airship’s deck swayed and creaked, the aged mare paying it no mind.
A brilliant, crimson lightning bolt weighed heavily on her armor clad chest.
The mare sighed, quietly spitting out her quill. Something was there. Bothering her. The dampness of the air and the pressure she felt building inside her feathery chest of the oncoming storm made her prismatic mane stand on end. There was something there…
“Kirahn’…” the pegasus muttered under her breath, one of the three gems on her choker lighting up with a rusty glow as the sword on her right hoof extended forward, the enchanted metal gleaming in the Manalight.
The mare closed her eyes, nostrils flaring.
The floorboard creaked.
Her rose eyes burst open as her body snapped around, her hoof bearing the sword going in a wide arc, stopping only a few hairs away from a faded yellow neck. The blue mare slowly exhaled.
Her rose gaze traveled across the intruder, a wave of emotions suddenly surging through her mind as she collapsed back against the desk with a loud groan, her sword clicking back into its holster. She closed her rosy eyes once more as the intruder giggled and moved closer.
The intruding mare ran her faded yellow wing across the fallen assassin’s upturned belly as she walked behind her. She nudged the leather hood aside as she brushed her cheek against hers and gently nibbled the cyan pegasus’s ear, her side-combed, orange mane tickling her neck.
“I swear to Lacunae, if you keep doing I am going to accidentally kill you, ya’ know that, right?”
The blue mare turned her head to meet those beautiful yellow eyes just before the two unceremonially pressed their lips together. They held their kiss for longer then ether of them expected. The yellow one broke free first and stuck out her tongue at the other mare.
“Pfft, I know you would never do that, ya’ softy.” She playfully flicked her dulled, fiery tail and turned around to walk away without another word.
“Hardy-har-har, Spitfire…” The cyan pegasus took flight, her wings quietly flapping after her lover. As they traveled through the bowels of the old and quiet ship, they never exchanged a single word, simply basking in eachother’s presence.
As they broke free from the dust filled innards of the airship, a beautiful glint of the golden sun caught them, the single spot of light in the stormy day making the two mares shine.
Spitfire stopped, her graying yellow coat seemed just as bright as it was so many years ago, the colorless, gray streaks in her fiery mane, made unnoticeable. She closed her yellow eyes that shinned like gems of citrine. The cyan pegasus quietly stood by her side, mind wandering back to days of old when her prismatic colors were not dull and her life so very simple.
She quietly sighed and rested her rose eyes as she pressed her head against her lover’s shoulder. Quietly, they stood until the tiny spot of that wonderful, golden sun was gone, colors dulled once more and the world turned to the gray it always seemed to be.
And she spoke, breaking the harmonious silence.
“Didn’t think I’d see you so soon.” She reopened her eyes and looked at Spitfire, that beautiful firebird of a mare. She turned and smiled that confident, playful smirk she’d always wear when the two were together.
“Surprise, Dashie.” Spitfire grinned before leaning over and laying a soft kiss of the pegasus’s forehead. “Couldn’t have ya’ coming home and not seeing me first.”
Without a word, Rainbow Dash wrapped her hooves around Spitfire’s neck and pulled her as close as she could. “I missed you. I really did.” she whispered and closed her eyes again, voice trembling just the slightest bit.
The faded yellow mare paused, before warping her own hooves around Dash’s neck. She held her close for several long moments before reeling back, that confident smile spread across her face once more.
“It’s only been two months, dum-dum.” She playfully kissed the tip of Rainbow’s nose.
“Still…”
“Still - nothing, Dashie. Don’t go all teary on me, alright?”
The two smiled. Rainbow flapped her wings a few times and flew a few steps apart, a little blush on her cheeks.
“I still gotta’ go meet Dawn before we can head home.” Rainbow quietly spoke as they turned and began walking down the length of the ship, more and more workers and sailors appearing around them. All of them, however, trying to stay as far away from the prismatic assassin as possible.
“Psh, cant you have like, I dunno, a day off, maybe?” Spitfire half-heartedly protested as they came up to a break in the airships railings. Below them stretched Fallen Equestria.
The once beautiful and bountiful land now lay bleak and colorless. Gray and untamed clouds rolled above, filling their bodies with rain for the oncoming storm.
Canterlotian. The once great city now stood as the last bastion for pony kin’, their numbers dwindling every day. From the Central District atop the unnamed mountain all the way to the Everfree District stretching deep within the once forbidden forest. Once pristine, now gray and crumbled, the buildings were strewn across the landscape in between.
Where a homely town called PonyVille and a grand relic of the times gone by with the name of Cloudsdale once stood, now nothing but the same, gray ever-after lay in its place. They world was gray now, that much was certain.
The once lush grasslands were covered in ash, the few places where sickly greens still sprouted were overwhelmed, the buildings of the three agricultural Districts around them, closing in, threatening to crush them.
The Fall of the Celestials was truly the day Equestria ceased to exist… Lucky for those who still walk the barren world nowadays, there was a pony like Dawn who was willing to sacrifice all she had for her people. A pony like Dawn…
The low rumble of the thundery skies above snapped Rainbow Dash out of her thoughts as she gazed across the gray world she now lived in. She couldn’t help but to look up, that stray strand of her once bright mane hung limply. Red fading and yellow dulling… but then again… she was simply getting old…
“I’ll be home before you know it.” She spoke after a timely pause, her spunk returning to her in mere seconds. “I’ll just go report back at Haven, say hi to Dawn, play tag with Nova and be back with you in ten seconds flat!” The cyan mare grinned. “Okay, maybe ten minutes flat…” she quietly added with a chuckle.
Spitfire laughed, yet didn’t say a word, her gem-like eyes speaking for her. One quick, last kiss on the lips before Rainbow Dash turned and bolted away, the ruby lightning bolt around her neck blazing brightly with each flap of her blue wings, as if trying to return the colors to the dull world. And failing.
o.O.o.O.o
The pegasus softly touched down, her graying wings flapping one last time before folding against her sides, weapons setting down with a silent clank. She threw back her leather hood and her rose eyes gleamed in the dull daylight.
Rainbow Dash began a light tort, hoofsteps echoing against the worn stone of the crumbled District as she ascended towards the palace at the highest point of the mountainous city.
As she walked down the street, the few ragged looking ponies fell quiet, their terrified glances following her form as she paid them no mind. A long, long time ago, many years ago, she would have cowered from those gazes and try her best to prove that she was still her, not some cold-blooded killer they saw. Now, now they didn’t matter. Hadn’t mattered for over two decades.
The pegasus sighed, a wave of silent terror washing before her as she walked. Ponies retreated into their homes, and didn’t spare their dirty glances. She brushed them off and turned the corner, only to look upon that familiar, massive flight of stairs seemingly leading up to heaven itself. If only a place like that existed nowadays.
She couldn’t help it. She could never, ever, ever help it… she looked back. Back at those bleak, stone streets…
Once made of pristine, shinning marble, buildings lay crumbled. Roofs painted in shades of the sun and the twilight sky were now nothing more than broken clay shingles and rotting wooden planks, like skeletons trying their best to keep themselves skyward.
Black smog rolled upwards from makeshift chimneys, adding another tint of darkness to the cloud covered sky. The distant storm rumbled once more, shaking the few remaining pieces of the former city.
Rainbow grit her teeth, hating herself every single time for looking back.
A well, by far the most intact structure of the District, stood beneath a stone pedestal. Two statues, weathered by time, stood proudly, the two pairs of gems in their eyes still gleaming proudly.
Their forehooves were stretched skyward, bodies, fit and strong, carved in gray stone. With confident and serine smiles on their faces, wings open wide, horns pointed at the once blue sky. A pair of yellow sunstones and a pair of purple moonstones shone within their eyes, graceful symbols, carved on their flanks, to remind ponies, to remind them of a once golden age before the Fall…
Rainbow’s own rose eyes traveled along their cracked, stone forms, past the ponies dressed in rags against the bitter night’s cold, foals and mothers slowly pacing to nowhere. She looked for those two familiar and holy emblems.
A sun and a moon.
She uttered a prayer. A small, inaudible whisper… She never prayed, but never had now fallen across Equestria. She turned to continue her journey up the steps.
o.O.o.O.o
By the time she had reached the top of the broken stone stairs, all the light from the sky was gone. Thicker clouds replacing the, now familiar, gray smog with their black, thundery bodies.
There was something uneasy about this storm... after all, it was just a storm. Yet, Rainbow Dash remained vigilant. She passed the charcoal trees, once lush and green, now lay charred, their branches gnawing up at the sky, trying to reach beyond the clouds, into the wide open blue. Good luck with that…
After a few minutes of trotting through what once was a grand park and royal animal sanctuary, Rainbow spotted the first living beings in a long while. The guards that wore golden armor in a time gone past, now stood with their battered iron plates covering them from chest to flank.
The pair that were idly standing around, quickly fumbled to their hooves and straightened their weapons as the pegasus walked by. A long time ago she used to spare them glances and nods and smiles. No more. It was just a waste of time, she’d never see the same faces again anyway… The Plague made sure of that...
She didn’t walk with her head held high. No, she had put her black hood back on and hid behind it. There was no shame. Only stifled sorrow. But that was a part of the daily life now.
The dirt path turned to crumbled stone, and then to cracked marble. Collapsed pillars rose on both sides, old statues of ponies, missing limbs and features, still stood proudly. Rainbow Dash walked forward, more and more guards and staff appearing around her, yet, never nearing her.
She walked through the charred arc of what once was a massive hedge and passed another row of black trees. She heard a light shuffle behind her, though there were no guards around, only the ones ahead, watching the massive palace door.
The cracks and creaks grew louder until a branch finally snapped. There was a voice.
“AUNTIE WAINBOW!” A tiny voice screamed from behind her. In any other scenario, Rainbow would’ve uttered her magic chants and her hoof-blade would’ve soared behind her, slashing the pony flying at her into two. Not this time though.
The little red filly slammed into Rainbow’s back as she let her graying cyan wings fling in whichever direction they wanted. A massive smile broke her cool exterior as the aged pegasus felt the youngling’s weight settle on her leather-clad back.
She gleefully played along and collapsed forward. A motion a little too fast for the little filly that was playfully ambushing her as she flipped over the mare’s head and landed on the cracked marble pathway with a thud.
Rainbow cringed at the maculation. That’ll leave a bruise… She threw her hooves forward and grabbed the filly and shot upwards into the gray sky, wings beating furiously to manage the extra weight.
The little pony instantly forgot about her injuries and squealed in delight as Rainbow Dash twirled in the air, the ruby lightning bolt on her chest burning brightly.
Her fur was a soft vermilion along with a bright crimson mane, a tiny, little horn peeking out between her frizzy locks. The filly looked no older than six as she squealed in pure joy, her frail, leathery wings aimlessly fluttering by her sides. She opened her bright green, draconian eyes with her slit, lavender pupils and smiled at her ‘auntie’. Little, sharp fangs gleamed from her mouth as she stuck out her tongue. She was missing her left incisor.
“Auntie Wainbow!” She giggled as the two fluttered to the ground and Rainbow Dash nuggied her as the filly laughed, the little black claws at the tips of her forehooves scratching against the assassin’s armor.
“Hey kiddo, whassuuup?” Rainbow grinned as she placed the dizzied filly on the ground and stretched out her hoof for their greeting. The vermilion filly casually chewed on the tip of her tongue and bumped her little hoof against Rainbow’s.
“Dusk and dawn, ladybugs awake!” They shouted in union. The two spun around in circles and collapsed against each other’s back. They opened their wings and jiggled them as they continued. “Flap your wings and do a little shriek!”
The two jumped back onto their hooves and faced each other with a playful, yet determined snarl. They both pulled a face, as silly as they could, two sets of white teeth gleaming before they collapsed with laughter.
For once in a long time, Rainbow Dash was truly happy.
o.O.o.O.o
“… and it was soooooooooooo boring!” The little vermilion filly slumped against Rainbow Dash’s leathery back as she ended her little story. They were slowly pacing through the Royal Palace, all the way through to the inner gardens and the Harmony Prism where they would most likely find Dawnbreaker.
“That really does sound superbly boring, Nova.” The graying pegasus laughed. “But what I'm more interested in is how did ya’ loose a tooth?”
“Oh, that? Weeeell… me and one of the pwetty ponies momma always talks to pwayed tag. And, and then we were pwaying and, and I twiped and then my tooth went pop!” The draconian filly named Nova tossed her little hoofs into the air before continuing.
“And, and, and then the pwetty pony got weally scared and then we went to momma and momma did her super-amazing-magicky-momma-powers and made my tooth-hole stop bweeding and then she towld us that that was a baby-twooth and that is supposed to fall out and momma said that means I'm getting bigger! Maybe when my twooth grows bwack, maybe I can be as big as momma!”
“I'm sure you will, kiddo.” Rainbow smiled and fell into silence. There was something serine about simply feeling the filly’s weight on her back. Felling her little heart beat against her once cyan wings and her little claws running through her dull, rainbow mane.
Something that she was sure Dawn felt every day. Motherly love. Or maybe she was just daydreaming about the foals she never had…
“Sai’ree!” The filly squeaked as she unintentionally tugged on Rainbow’s mane. Only now the mare realized they were already at the doors to the inner sanctuary.
A circle of runes lit up with a golden glow as the word left Nova’s lips, the filly’s eyes sparking up with a crimson light for a split-second along with the ruby lightning bolt on Rainbow’s chest. The hinges groaned and the silver-rimmed door slowly swung open.
What greeted the two ponies was far beyond anything that their dreams could make. From the small patch between the stormclouds the bright, golden sun shone down across the lush, green grass. The voices of chirping birds filled the air as they darted from tree to tree that gently swayed in the soft breeze, carrying the wonderful scent of fruits and flowers along with it. Haven. This paced was called Haven…
Nova leaped off the pegasus’s back, staggering the assassin. Yet, she paid it no mind, she was too occupied by the beauty around her. Back when, when… She never really noticed the wonderful flora around her until it was gone. Two months in the wastelands to the far east had made her forget what green grass looked like.
“Momma!” The silky, yet squeaky voice of her niece made Rainbow turn back to the task at hoof… those delicious looking daisies won’t be going anywhere anytime soon.
The cyan mare began her elegant trot after the filly running ahead. Her rose gaze looked forward to reveal one of her dearest friends - Queen Dawnbreaker.
The mare stood proudly, her slim body twice the size of the two unicorns standing before her. A long horn stretching from her head and two massive, feathery wings folded against her back. Her coat shined in the shade of lavender, a little bit of magenta shinning through. Her spectral mane was billowing around like the pure cloud of magic it was, deep sapphire blue with a streak of gold and crimson twirling within, tiny bobbles of light shining like stars.
Her armor looked like it was clad from the twilight sky. A darkened crimson-purple plate covering her chest, slippers stretching up to her knee and a massive crown with a pink starburst gem atop it. Her eyes burned bright violet.
“Momma!” Nova squealed and leaped at the alicorn mare. She managed to look just as the filly slammed into her with a force too big for somepony so tiny. The two fell over in a fuzzy ball of foalish giggles.
Nova shot upwards, a bright raspberry aura mixing with a golden glow suspending her in midair as the alicorn got back onto her hooves with a smile. One of the unicorns that was talking to the Queen beforehoof opened her mouth to interrupt, but suddenly found herself face-to-face with Rainbow Dash.
“Ya’ wanted to say something?” The pegasus inquired with a little snark in her voice, her gaze drifting back to Dawn and Nova for a split second.
“Yes, actually, we have business matters that need the Queen’s utmost attention, if you would kindly get your unwashed mane out of our face we could-”
“You can insult my personal hygiene all you want, even you’re not the one who’s been actually doing something useful, but once that little filly over there goes near your precious ‘Queen’, its ta-taa for all of you.” Rainbow stiffly hissed back, cutting off the crème unicorn and leaving her speechless.
“My word! I have you know we are from the Blueblood kin and this audience with the Queen was scheduled three weeks ago and we must discuss the failure of the plague victim charity fund and furthermore, I will have the guards remove you if you even dare to-”
“Lady, if I were you I’d not mess with the mare with a seventeen pony kill streak in the Apple Civil War nine years ago and the first and living Lady Protector of the Queen. Just sayin’…” Rainbow casually interrupted her again and that seemingly shut her up for good.
“Now if you’d excuse me, I have a friend to greet and a niece to tickle, the guards that you wanted to sick on me will shove you out… ta-taa!” She turned, not even bothering with a response and began to walk to the soft shade of the blooming cherry tree Dawn and Nova had run off to.
“Oh, and when I said shove - I meant it!” Rainbow couldn’t help but to add that as she saw the two being escorted away.
o.O.o.O.o
“…the Blueblood twins just being Blueblood twins, like always.” Dawnbreaker giggled as she lay in the soft, green grass, the fragrant cherry blossoms shade stretching over her lavender form like a cooling blanket. Nova was curled in her embrace like a fuzzy little vermilion ball, little squeaks and whistles from her missing tooth escaping the filly as she napped.
“I still can’t believe how awesomely you deal with all those annoying, little-” Rainbow Dash was sprawled all over the ground, her leather-hooded head remaining in the shade with Dawnbreaker, and the rest of her body enjoying the small patch of the warm sun as the distant rumbles of thunder rolled over the plains of Fallen Equestria.
“You have no idea how many pillows have been beaten to death because of those two.” Dawnbreaker smirked, her melodic, yet familiar and snazzy voice sounding off into the distance like a phoenix’s song.
“Heh-he-he,” Rainbow laughed her odd little laugh as she re-opened her rose eyes only to see the softy smiling face of Dawnbreaker. “So, I'm guessing by that face, you need a little more from me than just getting rid of pesky nobles.” She smiled, only the happiness was slowly draining out from her system.
Just like her own, Dawn’s face dropped, her gentle smile replaced by a worried frown. Without a word the alicorn stood up, her red-and-gold aura picking up her daughter and placing her between her large magenta wings.
“Walk with me…”
She turned and trotted into the fading sunlight once more, the clouds slowly patching the sky closed as the thunder grew louder. Without a word Rainbow Dash hopped to her hooves, weapons that she never took off loudly rattling.
She began a brisk gait to keep up with the alicorn’s long legs as their hooves carried them forward, down the path of blissfully smelling flowers and blooming trees swaying in the wind that was steadily picking up.
As Dawnbreaker walked she graced the guards and gardeners in their path with small, yet humble nods. Rainbow, however, held her head high, stiff, rose eyes locked forward as she puffed out her chest. She even counted four ponies that quickly skidded out of her way as the two walked, little Nova mumbling in her sleep.
“Rainbow… Tell me something, be honest… Do I look like a pony with a plan?” After a long pause and walking down the elegant and polished marble pathway, flanked with flowerbeds of irises and daisies and small and posh vinegar trees, Dawnbreaker finally asked.
The graying-blue pegasus took a moment to dwell on the Queen’s words until she came to a conclusion. “I have no idea what you’re talking about…”
Dawnbreaker sighed as she pressed her lips together, brow furrowing as she slowed her pace.
“What I mean is… do they think I can do it? Do you think I can do it? Can I figure out how to finally end the Parasprite Plague? Do you believe in me? Because I'm starting not to…” She turned to her fateful protector, half her height, standing next to her, her own eyes pleading for something… Comfort? Help? Forgiveness?
Rainbow Dash raised her rose eyes looking into those deep violet pools, something sparking between them as the two best friends simply stood there. The pegasus looked at that pleading gaze and just as that, she knew what to do.
She gently placed her right hoof under the Queen’s chin, the extendable hoof-blade making the task just a little bit difficult. She gently raised the alicorn’s lavender head and spoke in her calm and confident voice.
“You are Queen Dawnbreaker - Goddess among ponies. There is a reason you are a queen not just a princess and it’s not because you have a daughter. No, it’s because you are the greatest pony that has ever walked this earth. And you will keep doing that. Why? Just cuz’. Just cuz’ you named yourself Dawn. Because dawn is the beginning. A good beginning. You sacrificed your name, the only thing that could be considered the purest you and you gave that up for ponies who might not even deserve it. Why? Because that’s who you are… am I right…? Twilight Sparkle?”
Dawnbreaker bit her lip, eyes clenching shut as she finally let sudden tears freely flow down her silky cheeks after such a long time. She collapsed to her knees and hastily buried her face in Rainbow’s armor-clad chest as she sobbed.
The once-unicorn took sharp breaths as she fought her tears and sobs, Rainbow gently wrapping her gray hooves around her as the two sat in the middle of the bright green garden, birds falling quiet, letting the Queen quietly cry.
The sky grew darker and thunder louder as the minutes passed. The tears slowly ended and the sobs slowly faded to quiet sniffles. The alicorn never let go of her pegasus protector. Her voice was quiet and somewhat pained as she spoke.
“Thank you. Thank you Rainbow, I don’t know how I’d be able to live without your loyalty by my side.” Twilight smiled, the last of her tears still glistering in the corners of her eyes.
The cyan pegasus threw back her black hood with a smile, revealing her dulled rainbow mane to the dying sunlight before softly wiping the tear from Twilight’s eye. The two pulled each other close in a tight embrace and held on for as long as they could.
“And then, they kissed…” Nova smirked, appearing out of nowhere, her little red tongue sticking out from the side of her mouth and her bright, emerald eyes gleaming.
The two mares froze in their embrace, shock plastered on their faces before they exchanged a look, only to fall over with laugher seconds later. As they lay on the marble pathway, side by side, Nova loudly giggled as she bounced in circles around her mother and her auntie until the two mares staggered to their hooves, large smiles spread across their faces.
Rainbow Dash managed to tousle the filly’s already frizzy crimson mane before Dawnbreaker, or should we say Twilight, nuzzled the little pony before scooping her onto her back as the three continued their unspoken trek to the Harmony Prism.
o.O.o.O.o
There was no rain. Why wasn’t it raining? The skies had been thundering for the better part of an hour, the thick clouds with their black, rain-filled bodies ready to burst, yet, they didn’t. It was like something was stopping the rain from cascading down onto the ashen earth and turning the once lush grasslands to never-ending fields of mud.
It was a question Rainbow’s mind constantly drifted to as the three ponies slowly paced their way through the hedge maze, Twilight insisting on the scenic route, just like she always used to before the Fall.
As the silence and the surge of unease in the pegasus’s mind came to a boiling point, she finally spoke, just to escape the corners of her own mind.
“Soooooooo… What’s Spike been up to?” She casually inquired, though her voice seemed a bit off. Nova was just a six-year-old filly so she didn’t notice, nor even pay much attention as she watched a glowing blue butterfly pass her, hairs away from her adorable little nose. But Twilight noticed, yet stayed silent.
“Oh, he came back about three days ago and he’s somewhere in the Haven but I'm not exactly sure where…” Twilight replied, the cheer back in her voice. “Still can’t figure out how you can lose a dragon twice my size in a garden.” She giggled but Rainbow didn’t seem so pleased.
“You shouldn’t have sent him away, Dawn, you left yourself vulnerable and with all the Chaosblessed turning up ever since the plague… Never do that again, alright?” Rainbow Dash spared her a glare, much like a mother looking at her disobedient foal.
The alicorn sighed.
“I know, I know… I should always have at least one of you here, but I just need as much information I can get if I'm ever going to figure out a way to stop the plague and if it means leaving myself without two of my most fateful protectors… It’s a risk I'm willing to take.”
“Wut’s a pwague?” Nova squeaked as she peaked out from behind Dawn’s back, the glowing butterfly perched atop her stubby little horn. The two mares froze, unsure what to do next. Was it right for such a young filly to know of the horrors of the dark world? Her entire life she had been living in Haven, not even knowing the ash-coated wasteland beyond the crumbled palace’s walls and what horrors lay beyond the charred streets of the Central District…
Was it right for the little blank-flank filly to even try and comprehend the fact that every minute they breathed, another pony stopped. The never-ending Parasprite Plague that was slowly killing pony kind?
Was it right for her to know?
“It’s really bad adult stuff, Nova. You shouldn’t bother with it, it’ll go away real soon anyway.” Rainbow replied, her voice with that usual, arrogant undertone. Yet, she didn’t even think of the way her words tugged at Dawn’s brain. What she said was a promise. A promise for this dark chapter in history to finally close and the thousands of deaths to finally end. An unintentional promise she would keep until her heart stopped beating.
o.O.o.O.o
The clicking. That unholy clicking. For the first time in nineteen Celeste-damned years Rainbow heard the clicking.
She was slowly pacing back and forth, the horrible unease chewing away at her mind. As she walked, every four Lacunae-cursed steps there was the clicking as the hoof-claws on her back left leg made contact with the ground. And the clicking! Have mercy, it was unbearable!
The mare grit her teeth, her breaths becoming uneven the more time passed. Her black leather hood weighed heavily atop her once-bright mane, the ruby lightning bolt on her chest seemingly dragging her to the ground. The choker with three gems embedded within, making it hard to draw breath.
Her extendable and enchanted sword seemingly burned her weathered hoof, saddlebags strapped over her leather-clad flanks full with manabullets, runestones and crossbow bolts weighing her down. Firefly pulsed with every heartbeat as she rested against the pegasus’s left side in her beautifully ornamented holster. The mother of all rune pistols, she was.
Rainbow closed her eyes and let the wind whisk away at her form. Bronze blade-tipped feathers spreading open at her sides once more, doing her best to keep away the unnatural unease.
“Rainbow?”
“Huh-what?” The pegasus turned to see gently smiling Dawnbreaker, Nova bouncing behind her.
“Enjoying the wind?” Dawn gently tilted her head, the pink starburst gem atop her head threatening to fall off.
“Eh-he-heh, I guess you could say that…” The once-cyan pegasus folded her wings as she turned to the alicorn, only now noticing something off about her. The twilight-colored chestplate the Queen always wore was missing something.
Four empty sockets lined the violet armor, each of a different shape. Rainbow didn’t even have to look to know what they were - a balloon on the left, an apple to the right, a butterfly in the bottom-middle and a diamond above it. Something deep inside her made the aged mare gulp.
“Whoah, hold up egghead, what the hay did you do to the Elements?” she asked as she raised an eyebrow, walking towards Dawnbreaker.
“Oh, right…” The alicorn slightly cringed. “I gave them back to our friends not long after you left, I’ll explain more, but now we have to go, the Prism is starting to act up.”
Rainbow grunted as she watched the Queen turn around and begin walking towards…
The Harmony Prism, the heart of Haven, was the greatest mana-well in Equestria’s history, its heavenly beam that pierced the heavens was the only thing besides Dawnbreaker that could sustain the day and night cycle, not to mention the Sun and Moon itself.
The pure force at which it released the magical energies was overwhelming. Constant management was a necessity, and only eight entities were physically capable of nearing it, and one of them was a young filly and the other one was trapped within the ice in the far northern reaches, never to be seen again.
The Prism had to be maintained by the harmony energies that had manifested within the six Bearers, each contributing their essences to the creation. Of course, none of it would have ever been needed if only the Celestials hadn’t…
Rainbow Dash felt it. The pure energy that radiated around her as her hooves carried her with renewed vigor, towards the massive, crystalline structure. The lightning bolt around her chest was ready to melt through her flesh as her gaze came to the ‘home’ of the damned Prism, believed to be the only thing that kept Fallen Equestria in one piece.
Goliath crystals erected from the ground, their shinning, lavender bodies creating a massive cone from which a bright beam of pure energy shot upwards into the black, stormy sky. The structures shined in every shade of light and dark, a beautiful dance of shadow play reflecting from within.
Rainbow watched Dawnbreaker stagger ahead, the pure power overwhelming even somepony like her. All the while the graying pegasus bravely trudged ahead, pain being an everyday part of her new existence. Little Nova held a sour expression, yet seemed largely unaffected by the Prism’s vast power.
As they entered the crystalline structure, the surge of magic suddenly disappeared. It was like they could breathe again, no more unseen smog slowly drowning them.
The massive beam of light heading skyward glowed in shades of magnificent cerulean and light green, intervened with soft heliotrope and faded gold. It seemingly came from a low, sharp pillar that held a small purple gem atop it. The gem itself was constantly shifting between crimson and violet and deep, midnight blue with each pulse.
The entire beam was surrounded by twelve stone pillars placed in two circles, a sharp contrast from the lucid interior of the magical structure, the inner circle holding up six stone spheres.
Rainbow Dash and Dawn stepped forward, both very familiar to what came next, except this time something felt different. The outer circle glowed ominously with its pale golden light, a lot brighter than the prismatic pegasus ever remembered.
The draconic filly trotted forward, a particular liveliness in her step getting cut short as her mother shoved her lavender hoof in front of her.
“Nova,” Dawnbreaker began with a strict hiss in her voice that drew a questioning glace from Rainbow Dash. “What did I tell you, young lady?”
The vermillion filly pouted before answering with an annoyed tone. “Don’t go near the big light-thiwngy or you’ll get zawpity-zapped…”
“That’s right, zapped. Now go stand over there, I don’t want you to yourself hurt, alright?”
“Ooooo-kay…” The filly grimaced and dragged her way to the entrance from where the gray sky could be seen, her leathery wings flopping behind her.
Now that her innocent ears and eyes were further away, Rainbow Dash could finally ask what had been bugging her the entire time inside the Harmony Prism. But first...
“She can’t be hurt by the Prism ya’ know. You made the enchantments yourself… granted Cadence helped but-”
“Not anymore, Dash.”
“Saywahtnow?” The pegasus paused, confusion hitting its highest point. But as she looked at those sorrowful eyes, she knew this was only the beginning of something much, much darker.
Dawnbreaker didn’t say a thing and turned around to walk through the light barrier of the outer circle, the energy wafting around her as she harmlessly passed through. She turned back to Rainbow Dash and gently smiled.
“It’s alright to come through.”
At first the mare seemed skeptical, but never, ever doubtful. She took a few deep breaths and stepped forward. Instantly, as the field touched her leather-clad body, she felt a warmth spread through her system. It was like her coat became a tone brighter and her careless and blissful arrogance re-surfaced after many, long years.
As her body left the barrier, the pegasus couldn’t help but shiver, even under all that warmth it just felt so cold… She turned to Dawnbreaker only to see her already standing before one of the inner pillars - opposite of herself.
Rainbow rolled her eyes as her leather-bound hooves carried her to the familiar symbol etched in the crystalline floor and the dark stone pillar holding a light-gray sphere with a hexagon depicted into its smooth surface.
The aged mare took a deep breath, another attempt to calm her edgy nerves. She watched across the blinding light of the core of the Prism as Dawnbreaker prepared to cast the spell, her massive horn beginning to glow with the familiar raspberry and golden light.
Rainbow closed her eyes. She could already feel the Prism’s energies tugging at her chest where the ruby lightning bolt rested. She felt the light grasps of invisible tendrils gently warping around her body, drawing her closer and closer, wanting her for her inert magic but nothing more.
She didn’t have to look. She didn’t even have to open her eyes, she knew this by heart. So many years gone by, it was almost hurting, but this was Rainbow we were talking about.
She furrowed her brow just before her eyes burst open, burning brighter than two red suns, as she watched with her blind gaze. The magical tendrils swimming around her and her Queen as she warped her trained mind around the arcane magic’s the pegasus would never truly understand.
Barely a second passed as Rainbow watched the magical currents and leylines cross her vision before it was too much for her simple understanding. She clenched her eyes shut and leaned forward, pressing her forehead against the hexagon on the smooth sphere before her.
Images flashed through her mind, like a violent river surging through her consciousness as she tried to make sense of it all. She saw so many memories, ponies, adventures as they bolted through her closed eyelids. She hated this part of the spell…
Four stars burning in the night sky. Five pale spheres gleaming in moonlight. Two golden papers fluttering before her. Bags under her emerald eyes. Brown wings and an infinity of pranks. A star-ridden cape. Angry golden eyes and billowing smoke. The storm ripping at her home. Bright eyes and black stripes. The tambourines. The snow melting away in the sunlight. Her tied last place. Twenty percent cooler. Her greatest moment with those dewy wings. Her daughter’s song. Monsters beneath the earth. Train-wrecks and new friends. Their intertwined destinies. That straight and dull mane. And finally the night that ended all nights…
But it never stopped, the memories kept going.
Him. Them. The disturbed picnic. That nightmare and candy filled night. Her newest and life-long companion. Her greatest failure. Party at the Central District. His envious rampage. The fire of friendship. Chasing after the one that ran. She can do it in her sleep. Her undiscovered secret pleasures. The horrible butterfly migration. Her love and loyalty tested. Disappointments and lies from the pony she loved. And finally the burning shadow over Canterlotian.
The mare winced, this was always the worst part. Just before it all ended, that final year before hell broke across her homeland and ripped it and her friends apart.
The northern winds slashing at her sides. The dark monstrosities forming from shadows and smoke. A friend one too many. Her hooves pressed against the glass dome. The night her daughter nearly died. The days she saw the true her and those bright citrine eyes. His return and disappearance into the spirit realms. One trip before it fell apart…
And one final memory as she opened her lavender wings.
Darkness.
o.O.o.O.o
Rainbow Dash groaned as she opened her blurry eyes. Her head was throbbing like hell and it felt like the entire world was doing a Sonic Rainboom around her.
As her weary eyes centered she managed to pick out a lavender and vermilion blur looking down at her. And… light? There was no sunlight in the Prism, only the magical beam itself!
“Hey! She’s not dewd!” A very familiar and squeaky voice announced as Rainbow blinked repeatedly, trying to get her teary eyes to work.
“Don’t say that about your auntie, young lady!” Dawnbreaker tried to scold her daughter but it wasn’t very successful as she tried to stifle a chuckle.
“Wakey, wakey - sweepy weepy!” Nova chanted as she placed her soft, little hooves on the pegasus’s chest, her tiny black claws making imprints in her leather gear. Rainbow Dash faintly smiled as she rubbed her hoof against her temple and tried to raise on all four’s. While she did so, she managed to figure out where exactly she was.
The mouth of the small cave opened up behind her, Spark lanterns hanging from the gray and gem-ridden walls. She was lying on a small plateau, flat and light gray stone blocks below her, a small stream tickling beside filling the air with its cheery tones.
As Rainbow successfully rose up to her hooves all of Haven opened up before her. The green trees and colorful flowers lay beneath as the mare gazed outwards from the highest point of the little slice of heaven. The magical beam of the Prism shinning to her far left. As much as she wanted to watch the storm roll overhead and shower the blissful place in its heavenly dew, she couldn’t.
The faded blue pegasus ripped her rose gaze from the scenery and turned to Dawnbreaker who was calmly waiting for her to finish her remembrance. One word was on Dash’s blue lips and she spoke in one of her coldest tones.
“Talk.”
Dawnbreaker sighed and turned her gaze back for a few seconds to see that Nova was skipping around the gray, stone tiles, oblivious to any other ponies around her .
“I guess I’ll start from the beginning, then.” The Queen closed her eyes and with a massive and disruptive crack disappeared, only to reappear next to her prismatic protector in a golden flash. She turned her gaze over Haven, over at the ashen land of Canterlotian against the dark horizon.
“By Lacunae’s horn, I totally forgot you could do that…” Rainbow hissed through her teeth not wanting to spare a glance at Dawn.
“Some time after you left I began thinking…” The alicorn began. “Without you and your selflessness and fatefulness beside me I realized we were slipping. All of us. As Elements, I mean.” She paused. “Except for you, Rainbow.”
“I began noticing the little notions, a small slip or a missed hug… We are losing ourselves and our friendship, Rainbow, and I don’t want to believe it but I am growing suspicious…” She hung her head with a loud sigh. “The Elements were held in the Prism, accessible only by the six of us and Nova. Not anymore.” She lightly stomped her armor-clad hoof.
“I locked the Prism. And I am keeping it locked until we can sort this out, you and I, Dash.” She turned her pleading violet eyes to her best friend. “For the first time since the Fall I fear for my life, and the worst part is knowing who is going against you…”
Rainbow didn’t say a word as she let the words settle in her mind. It wasn’t possible that her own flesh and blood would plot against her and Dawn… But then again… She saw it as well. The Queen was right, they were slipping.
Applejack was the façade of it all, she was lying in the face of everypony. About the plague, about everything… because who would accuse the Element of Honesty to lie?
Rarity was quiet. Still designing the new fashion lines but barely seen in public all because her charities were failing. Rainbow remembered seeing the mare around Haven just for the sake of it, after all, unicorns stick together. Not anymore.
Pinkie was losing it in more ways than one. She had taken the ‘fun’ part too far. No wonder, her mane was always straight just like her two sister’s that she’d dragged into all of this.
And Fluttershy… Rainbow didn’t even want to think about what the shy pegasus was up to. After all, everything that went down in the Everfree District was a secret.
“Then why not seal the Elements in the Prism?” The cyan pegasus asked. Words. The less the better.
“…”
“Well?”
“I… Somewhere deep down inside I hoped that they would help them… That maybe, just maybe they would help them get better… But I know that’s not true, the Elements of Harmony draw power from the Bearers and just like when He came… It’s useless is what it is.”
The Queen turned her face to Rainbow her expressions turning to numbness, the entire topic weighing heavily on her heart. “And if I were you, I’d look behind.”
Rainbow paused, unsure what the words meant. Just as she was about to shrug it off as one of Dawnbreaker’s crazy, cryptic messages she felt a breath tickle the top of her exposed, blue ear.
The pegasus’s rose eyes snapped wide as she realized there was not enough time to utter her chants so the option of drawing her sword was gone. Within a heartbeat she had lowered her head and clamped her jaws around Firefly and snapped around. Her skilled tongue wrapped around the rune pistol’s trigger as she spun her body around to meet a massive green eye.
“Boo.” The creature before her exclaimed with no enthusiasm, his massive emerald eyes looked at her with half-closed eyelids.
The pegasus’s jaw clenched around the pistol so hard it was nearly bitten in half. She took a few seconds until she spat it in the eye of the beast before her and let out a massive roar of utter frustration before falling over with her hooves over her eyes and rolling around on the stone tiles, mumbling in mental anguish.
“Geee, what’s her problem?” The large beast muttered as he rubbed his sore eye with a massive violet hand ending in four sharp claws. As he laid down next to Dawnbreaker, his gaze still centered on Rainbow who was wallowing in… something… he arched back his arm and scratched the mossy green scales on the top of his head that ran down the entire length of his back ending at the tip of his tail like a bony blade.
“I have no idea, but I'm guessing she doesn’t like when friends sneak up on her…” Dawnbreaker casually pointed out as she felt the twin emerald orbs with slit pupils gazed down at her and the beaming filly beside her.
Nova grinned, her little fangs showing and the ominous missing tooth giving her a mischievous appearance as two sets of emerald eyes met.
“SPWIKEY!” The vermillion filly shouted as she leaped forward, trying her best to act like a predator as she drove her fangs into the dragon’s scaled palm. Granted, he didn’t feel a thing, but he played along, his massive, leathery wings opening wide as he rolled over on his back. Dawnbreaker had to step aside if she didn’t want to be crushed by the dragon twice her size, a small smile breaking her saddened mood.
Spike picked up the little filly between his massive claws and held her up in the air much like Rainbow had, the youngling squealed and giggled. He smiled and placed the filly atop his head and with one mighty flap of his wings turned around, only to look down at the once cyan pegasus who had seemingly given up on life.
He smiled as he kneeled next to Rainbow and nudged her with his mighty claw, Nova nibbling on the lime-green scales on the side of the dragon’s head. The aged pegasus didn’t respond. Spike rolled his emerald eyes and reached over to where she had dropped her beloved pistol.
As he gently placed Firefly atop Rainbow’s chest she finally opened her rose eyes with an annoyed growl. “Is it really that hard for ponies to realize I can kill them with a single flap of a wing?” She glared at the two creatures before her as she slipped her leather hood back on and got back to her hooves, Firefly back in her ornate holster.
“It kinda’ is…” Spike smirked as the two exchanged a bro-hoof, Nova leaping off his back and crashing into her mother. Rainbow managed a smile. Besides all the horrors that’d been dropped on her in the past half an hour she felt happy. Happy to see her friends safe and sound.
“Mummy?” Nova asked as her gaze drifted over Haven as she leaned against the back of her mother’s head.
“Yes sweetheart?” Dawn gently replied her mind concentrated on her two most fateful guardians.
“Why are thowse ponies dwessed in blawk?” She tilted her head and pointed to the small pathway that lead to the Prism and to the plateau where they were standing.
“Black? Sweetie, what are you…” Dawnbreaker’s gaze slid across the gardens below them as her violet eyes caught a glimpse of a black mist disappearing into nothingness. “CHAOSBLESSED!” the alicorn mare screamed seconds before a dozen black forms blinked into existence before them.
“Kirahn’!” Rainbow Dash didn’t waste a second as she yelled her chants, the rust-colored gem on her choker burning brightly as her sword extended forward from her right hoof. Her mouth once more clamped around Firefly, ripping the rune pistol from its holster on her left side.
Barely two seconds had passed since Dawn’s scream and Rainbow had already thrown herself into combat.
Half of the black-armored ponies threw themselves at Spike, the rest, splitting up and going after the two Elements of Harmony.
Dawn wrapped her lavender wings around Nova that had driven her claws into her mother’s back for dear life. The alicorn’s horn glowed raspberry and gold, erecting shield and magical bursts around her. Rainbow didn’t see any of that.
Her wings flapped furiously as she lurched forward driving her sword ahead of her speeding form. Nopony could match the fastest flier in all of Fallen Equestria and the earth pony didn’t even see the faded rainbow coming his way before it was too late.
He managed to shoot from his pistol once, manabullet going astray before Rainbow’s sword had been driven through his neck. The Chaosblessed didn’t even hit the ground before his body turned to black mist and disappeared.
Rainbow didn’t spare him a glace as another pegasus mare brought her sword down on her. The prismatic protector met the blade with her own mid-air, her strength proving greater as she threw the two swords skyward staggering her opponent. Rainbow planted her forehooves on the ground, her right hoof going in a bad angle due to the sword strapped atop it, as she twisted her body so her rainbow tail met with the black assassin’s head. And she bucked as hard as she could. She drove her rear hooves into the other pegasus’s muzzle shattering it to a hundred fragments.
Once all her hooves were back on the ground and the pitter patter of the attacking mare’s blood had hit her saddlebags, Rainbow could exhale. Within the second she took another deep breath she could only confirm the attacker’s identities.
Several years after the Fall of the Celestials, after order had finally been established and Dawn at her throne they had shown up. The Chaosblessed as they called themselves, followers of Discord - a more common name. They had had an irk against the Queen and all her loyalists since the Fall, always trying their best to kill or capture her, always foiled by Rainbow Dash when she was a lot younger.
But as the group became bigger a certain entity began to take notice. Discord himself, after being released from his stone form and retreating to the spirit realms, began to communicate with the Chaosblessed. His favorite pony was the leader of the cult of sorts - Master Assassin Bloodmoon.
As they joined forces to wreak chaos across already dying Equestria, he had found some powers to spare. And so were born the Chaosblessed Rainbow despised so very much, their dark powers granting special magic’s to every type of pony, ether earth of sky or stars.
And using those powers of darkness another earth pony teleported just before Rainbow Dash’s nose. And his brain blew out the back of his head coating Dash and still smoking Firefly in a shower of crimson. One runestone gone, five to go. The mare exhaled.
She slightly bent her knees lowering her body closer to the ground. Rainbow filled her lungs with air once more as she leaped upwards in an impossible angle, her strong legs and hollow pegasi bones letting her shoot upwards. Her bronze-tipped wings jerked open and began to furiously flap sending the mare skyward as she crooked her body into a flying position.
As she darted above the battlefield she managed a few more shallow breaths before a Chaosblessed pegasus rammed into her side knocking the little bit of air out of her lungs.
Two massive steel claws were attached to each of the leather-clad buck’s forehooves as he snapped around in the air, charging at Rainbow once more. A pair of unnecessarily massive amber goggles were draped around his eyes, orange mane and tail flowing freely as the thundering storm above trashed the two pegasi in its whisking wind currents. Spike’s roar and the torrent of flame sounded below.
The Chaosblessed managed to ram one of the steel claws through Rainbow’s enhanced armor, digging into her faded blue coat and drawing the mare’s blood. His other claw missed the right side of her exposed neck by an inch as Rainbow managed to slap the attacker’s hoof away just in time.
She thrust her blue hoof against the blades in her shoulder, halting any further movement into her damaged limb as she wrapped her other extremity around the freely-swinging assassin and began to draw circles around his limb. Faster and faster she moved, much like she hoped, it disorientated the attacker but only just. Her leather gear caught the tip of the hoof-claw and she began to finally twist the buck’s hoof.
She kept circling her hoof as she twisted the Chaosblessed’s shoulder further and further, the buck’s screams muffled by the Spark-gem respiration in his mouth. At this point she remembered the fact that the two were actually flying.
The moment Rainbow heard a loud crack a malicious grin spread across her face. She had worn out her opponent and now it was time to take him out. She summoned all her strength as she ripped her trapped hoof free from the buck’s totaled limb. A few straps of her black leather armor still hung from the steel claw as the assassin’s hoof fell limply against his side.
It was a second too late for him to realize what would come next. Rainbow didn’t have to see his face to know how much his eyes widened in shock. She didn’t enjoy it.
The prismatic protector slammed her right hind leg straight into the other pegasus’s black-armored chest. The force was enough for her to feel at least one rib shatter from the blunt blow as it knocked the buck backwards making him rip the other hoof-claw from her shoulder.
Rainbow Dash’s mind exploded from the sudden burst of pain as the sharp blade exited her body, a spatter of blood following the falling pegasus buck. But he wasn’t quite done with her yet. Too bad the cyan mare was a step ahead.
She faintly placed her forehooves atop the Chaosblessed’s shoulders as she cartwheeled over his hovering form. At the end of her gymnastic act she once again slammed both her hind legs into the other pegasus’s back. She felt the dull throb resounded inside her own body as another bone shattered and she ended her act with a somersault away from him.
She hovered in place for a fraction of a second before she thrust her body forward, wings swatting against her sides. She re-positioned her forehooves on the pegasus’s shoulders the second she slammed into his back with all four’s. With a loud grunt Rainbow lifted up her left hind leg as it bore three titanium claws that began to cleave through the buck’s back.
At that point he could take no more, his form limply plummeting down to the battle beneath, Rainbow didn’t even know if his body turned to black mist as she once again exhaled, fresh blood dripping down her side. The mare drew another breath and within a heartbeat she thrust herself into the battle below. Her mind finally became aware of the rune pistol clenched between her jaws, spit soaking the ornate mahogany handle and tickling down her neck.
Rainbow’s faded blue wings arched downwards as she positioned her forehooves in front of her bullet-like body. The ground rushed closer and closer, her mind kicking into overdrive as her rose eyes picked out several entities, already devising a plan of attack.
The mare suddenly snapped her wings closed, momentum carrying her forward. “Vryn’n!” she hissed through her teeth, another layer of spittle coating the precious rune pistol in her mouth.
The miniature crossbow on her left hoof opened up, glowing bright green just like the gem or Rainbow’s choker. The parts slid into place powered by the six Spark-gems in the thick leather wristband it was attached to. A few beads of sweat broke out on Rainbow’s forehead. She wasn’t sure if there’d be enough time.
But it seemed like somepony was watching over her, the crossbow’s string pulling back and then fired an iron bolt straight forward. It now became a race, which was faster? Rainbow or the crossbow bolt.
The faded cyan mare lost the race as the iron bolt dug into the side of another Chaosblessed, if the enchantment held it should’ve torn her insides apart.
And just like that the pony turned black mist and disappeared, the prismatic protector shooting through the fading magic as she braced for impact. Her hooves touched down onto the smooth stone below, wings re-opening as she skirted next to a Chaosblessed, her bronze-tipped wings making large gashes on her body and slowing down the protector’s descent. She inhaled.
Rainbow caught a loose tile with the tip of her hoof and twirled around, the momentum finally ending as she slid next to Dawn. The alicorn looked battered, large, bloody gashes ran down her neck and forehooves as her horn and crown of the pink starburst gem glowed brightly.
The longer the aged mare stared the more the injuries healed, cuts closing and blood soaking back into her body. The once prismatic mare even felt her shoulder slowly mending as she stood in some sort of magical bubble created by the lavender alicorn.
The second she felt time was being wasted, Rainbow sprung to action. Her tongue contracted around Firefly’s trigger, the rune pistol firing with a loud crack, runestone rushing out of the metal cylinder with such speed and force it managed to take a leg off one of the attackers. He spasmed and tried to warp his magic around the stub of his forehoof, crimson blood gushing out of the severed limb like a fountain.
Rainbow didn’t see any of that. Her hoofs burned from the heat the traction had caused as she ran forward, only to slam into a unicorn wielding two rune pistols and a dagger on the side.
“Kirahn’!” Rainbow shouted over the sound of battle, her sword once more extending forward as she drove it ahead of her. She heard stone crack and the foul sounds of bones crunching beneath a mighty force just behind her. Spike was giving the assassins a hard time, that’s for sure.
The faded blue pegasus leaped at the unicorn mare. But just before her crimson-coated sword met with the Chaosblessed’s side she felt herself being tugged away. The mare had grabbed Rainbow’s sword in her magical grasp and threw the prismatic protector away.
As Rainbow collided with the ground with a loud thud, the grip on Firefly weakened, rune pistol slipping out of her mouth. Rainbow cringed in agony, the blunt landing making her old back injury resurface after ten Celeste-damned years.
The mare wheezed as the same unicorn she had attacked stepped on her exposed chest, this specimen in particular just had to be wearing the heaviest horseshoes in all of Fallen Equestria. The leather-clad mare smirked behind her mask, amber goggles gleaming, as she pointed both rune pistols at Rainbow’s head and knocked Firefly further away.
The prismatic protector snarled as she tried to wiggle free, a loose stone digging into her injured back causing her torrents of pain each second. The unicorn slowly drew back both the two-bullet pistol’s hammers with a little click, probably savoring the moment as she was going to be the one to finally end the Chaosblessed’s greatest enemy.
Rainbow was growing desperate. Many times before she had been in a sticky situation, but this was bad. Very bad. The mare tried to move her forehooves, just to try and swat away the metal cylinders filled with doom and death, but found them pinned to the ground by a green aura. She once more tried to wiggle her body from under the mare’s heavy hoof.
It was no use as another burst of pain shot through Rainbow’s brain. She mentally cursed Bloodmoon, after all, it was that lucky hit all those years ago that now guaranteed the pegasus’s downfall. On that note, where the hell were the guards?!
“S-s-s-sa-a-ah…” Rainbow tried her damndest to utter at least one chat, something just to get her on her hooves, just something, damnit!
An emerald glint flashed at the corner of her eye.
A spark ignited within the prismatic protector, her crippling back injury momentarily forgotten, the ruby lightning bolt around her neck blazing like a sun as she ripped her hoof out of the unicorn’s magical grasp and struck the side of the rune pistol.
The weapon fired wildly on impact with Rainbow’s armored hoof and broke free from the surprised unicorn’s grasp flying in the same direction Firefly had gone. Rainbow threw her head out of the line of the other pistol as she reeled in her hooves and thrust them upwards, right into the Chaosblessed’s abdomen, finally knocking the pony off herself.
That very second before the mare could realize what happened a massive torrent of flame engulfed her falling body. Lightning flashed overhead, its blazing golden tones turning emerald in the light of Spike’s dragonfire.
Rainbow hastily slumped to her hooves, her back still throbbing as her rose eyes could not turn away from the burning unicorn. Her screams grated the pegasus’s ears as she watched her black leather armor shrivel and fall away, her flesh burning endlessly, turning to nothing more but coal, the amber goggles melting together with her eyes as everything that was once pony whisked away in an endless stream of agony.
Only moments later a tiny pile of blackened bones fell to the stone ground as thunder boomed above, mourning another lost life.
The pitter-patter of a light drizzle overhead, finally breaking the heavy smog all around, soothed Rainbow. Her rose gaze traveled from the charred bones to two massive emerald eyes with slit, black pupils looking at her.
“Watch out.” The massive dragon mumbled in his low, rumbling voice that nearly matched the storm above. For a fraction of a second his eyes were locked at something behind the faded pegasus. But that was all of it as he tossed around, claw coming down on one of the assassin’s reinforcements in a bloody splat.
The drizzle had turned to rain as it cascaded down from the untamed heavens soaking Rainbow Dash from tail to hoof as she let the water run down her mane, black hood long since tossed back.
Four silent splashes came from behind, making the mare’s ears perk as she closed her eyes, blade-tipped wings unfurling. She slowly turned around.
The second her rose eyes snapped open she finally saw her. Unlike most Chaosblessed her armor did not consist of simple, black leather strips draped around her form, hiding the color of her coat and making her blend with the starless night.
No, no, a heat-treated, light steel plate rested against her chest, two more plates jutting to the sides, over her shoulders. Three more plates ran down the front of each of her forehooves, held together with bolts and black strips, allowing her free and easy movement.
Another plate, divided into three fragments, stretched over her back and connected to two more over flanks - each bearing the symbol of Chaos. A snowy white tail fluttered behind her.
Around her eyes were the same amber goggles, yet, instead of a full-mask, her muzzle was covered with a black neckerchief, the familiar Spark-gem respirator loosely hanging around her neck. The rest of her body was concealed in the same black leather as everypony else.
An azure horn erected from the middle of her forehead, a chopped, snowy mane falling to one side of her head accompanying it. A rune pistol and two swords hung from her sides.
Bloodmoon.
“Took you long enough.” Rainbow Dash rasped as the assassin stood before her, unmoving.
“Indeed. And we must say, Rainbow Crash, it is time we finally end you, one way or another.” She calmly replied in the royal ‘we’ as she placed her hooves further apart, the enchanted gems within her boots silencing her hoofsteps.
“Yeah, about that,” Rainbow smirked. “Not gonna’ happen.”
Her mouth moved the very second another bolt of lightning flashed from above, thunder obscuring her voice as the rusty gem on her choker began to glow. The light rain had long since turned vicious, pounding the ponies of the stone plateau with its cold mist.
Both mares did not want to miss the opportunity of striking first as they leaped at each other, Rainbow taking the air and Bloodmoon drawing both swords with a pink glow of magic.
The Master Assassin crossed both swords and held them above her just as Rainbow brought the enchanted blade down on her. The weapons met with a loud clang, sparks flying through the rain as the prismatic protector twirled over the assassin and landed behind her with a splash, sword folding away.
Rainbow reared up, ready to buck her opponent right in the rear. As she threw her legs back, instead of meeting a steel plate, she met thin air. The cyan pegasus lost her balance and fell to her stomach with a gasp, Bloodmoon popping out of thin air before her outstretched hooves.
“Vryn’n!” Dash shouted and an iron bolt flew out of her crossbow, barely grazing Bloodmoon’s shoulder guard. That was all the distraction the mare needed, her wings shoved against the ground and tossed her skyward as she gained ground on the pesky Chaosblessed.
The second the pegasus thought she’d gained leverage she felt her flapping wings go taunt. She tossed her head back to see her feathery features concealed in pink aura just before she was tugged and tossed out of the sky.
With her wings involuntary pinned against her sides, Rainbow twirled through the sky, plummeting down like a comet. The pegasus managed to lean her body so her head didn’t take the blunt of the blow, only to crash into something relatively softer than stone seconds after.
Her head spun and her body aced all over. Her ringing ears managed to pick out a very un-equine roar as the stars retreated from her vision. Rainbow looked up to see the massive purple dragon rubbing the side of his head as she was flopped against his scaled belly. One of his leathery wings hung limply to his side.
She couldn’t even draw breath as she heard the faint sound of Bloodmoon’s shout, at least a dozen Chaosblessed popping into existance around them.
The ponies threw themselves at Spike, most of them not making to their destination as they tasted the dragon’s fiery rage. Rainbow swiftly propped herself on her hooves only to have Spike shove her away from his side, sending the battered mare tumbling.
The green-scaled dragon let out an ear-piercing cry before he released another torrent of emerald flame at his attackers. Rainbow once again hopped to her hooves, much more slowly this time as the battle was wearing her out, only to witness the impossible.
As the assassins once more piled on Spike, five managing to hang on at once, Rainbow saw their eyes flare behind their amber goggles and there was blinding flash. As her rose eyes came to, there was nothing left of Spike or his attackers, only the same, lingering black mist where he just stood.
“No…” Rainbow gasped. The Chaosblessed had just mass-teleported her greatest asset. The mare didn’t get much time to dwell on her and Dawn’s horribly declining odds and the fact that she’d personally murder the pony responsible for the lack of royal guards if she made it out alive, as something rammed into her side.
It felt like Rainbow had been run over by an airship as her body slid all the way across the rain-and-blood-soaked, pony-made plateau to where Dawn was fending off a microscopic amount of Chaosblessed.
Bloodmoon’s monstrous strength was once more displayed as she came crashing down from above, her minions scattering out of her way as the gray stone shattered at her descent. Rainbow could see her malicious smirk behind her black neckerchief.
To both the mare’s surprise Dawn stepped forward, the rain creating rivulets of blood that ran down her face as the alicorn snarled. Nova clutched her mother’s neck with her tear-streaked face and puffy, emerald eyes, a small cut running across the young filly’s cheek.
Without a warning Dawnbreaker’s horn lit up with a blinding gold and raspberry light as a massive burst of magic exploded from her forehead. Bloodmoon flashed up a weak shield as the Queen’s fury was unleashed upon her, flinging her back to where Spike had vanished.
It was a two-player game now.
Rainbow didn’t bother with her sword anymore as she panted before leaping at one of the remaining Chaosblessed. The blue mare stood up on her hind legs, wings keeping balance as she threw punch after punch. Behind her, Dawn began battling the other two attackers.
The alicorn leapt into the air and crashed down at the hooves of another leather-clad mare. She tossed her head, horn aglow, and the pony was tossed far away, her body twitching and spasming as electricity burned her inside out. Dawnbreaker shifted her weight and slid to the side, her wings fighting against instinct to open, stayed cocooned over her foal. Another burst of magical fire left her long, lavender horn, sizzling in the heavy rain as it engulfed another attacker, yet, they just kept coming. What was this, an army?
Rainbow Dash threw one last punch into the assassin’s abdomen making the pony give in as she collapsed to the ground only to disappear in a haze of black, seconds after. Rainbow turned to run to Dawn’s side only to be cut off by another buck.
Without a second thought she hurled herself forward and slid under the gun-wielding stallion, her hind leg traveling skyward as she smashed it right in his privates’. A high-pinched squeak later he disappeared and Rainbow flapped her wings and bolted in the alicorn’s direction.
Rainbow was steps away from her friend and niece as she was once more bashed aside. Bloodmoon stood above her, the lower parts of her legs charred and reaking of cooked flesh, her tail completely singed off and one of her amber lenses cracked.
“Pony go bai-bai.” she snarled as she brought both forehooves down on Rainbow’s chest. The prismatic protector spat blood as she felt half of her ribs crumble under the heavy collision.
Bloodmoon suddenly left her with one more silent pop as she teleported back to the Queen, black mist trailing behind her.
Rainbow tried to breathe with her totaled ribcage, but found it impossible. She hacked and gasped but there were no lungs to be filled with air. The mare’s vision began to blur, darkness seeping into her mind as she so very desperately tried to rummage through the bags on her flanks for a savior.
And once more, some goddess was looking over her as Rainbow managed to rip a healing potion from her saddlebag. Along came about a hoofful of rune ammo but she didn’t care as her shaky hoof raised the glass vial to her lips. As the sweet, red liquid touched her tongue the darkness retreated, air began to fill her chest as the bloody indents began to raise up and her bones began to crunch back into place.
The faded blue mare hacked up some more blood as she poured the remeinder of the potion over her chest, speeding up the painful process as she shoved herself to her shaky hooves, the healing magic still coursing through her insides.
The rain was growing even heavier as it began to obscure her vision. The mare’s head spun and throbbed as she began to drag, pace, trot and finally run at the Master Assassin one last time, her olden body nearly giving up on her.
Dawnbreaker and Bloodmoon were locked in a tight dance of blades, the Queen had stolen one of the unicorn’s swords and was now hacking at her as they both sidestepped the other's attacks.
Rainbow leaned her head to her left, only to bite on thin air as she remembered poor Firefly lost somewhere on the battlefield. The mare snarled as she raced towards Bloodmoon, a desperate attempt to give Dawn a chance at victory, but before the mare was even half-way to her target Bloodmoon snapped around. The Chaosblessed unicorn leaped backwards as she wrapped her pink magic around an abandoned rune pistol and fired straight at Rainbow.
The runestone ripped through her barding and into her already violated shoulder, sending the tired mare tumbling backwards. Luckily the healing potion was still in effect as Rainbow felt the magic stone being painstakingly pushed out from her body as she desperately tried to rise, her blood cascading down her forehoof along with a river of rainwater.
Two quiet pops and she found four hooves holding her down to the ground. Two massive bucks had thrown their limbs around her and pinned her to the soaking ground. The prismatic protector roared and trashed her as best she could, the battle long since worn her out as she tried to use her hoof-claw to rake at one of the ponies holding her down, purely in vain.
She was trapped…
Rainbow watched as the remaining Chaosblessed disappeared into black mist that quickly washed away in the downpour, leaving only a shocked Dawnbreaker and a turbulent Bloodmoon.
The alicorn had let her guard down for just a second as her violet eyes were on Rainbow, a little vermilion blur on her back quietly sobbing, audible even through the rain.
That one opening was all the Master Assassin needed.
Bloodmoon lunged forward, her own sword swatting away the stunned alicorn’s only weapon. She thrust her powerful hoof forward as it clamped at the top of the crimson-purple plate around Dawn’s chest. The unicorn vigorously ripped the armor away, revealing the vulnerable, lavender chest of her Queen.
“NO!” Rainbow screamed and trashed her limbs harder than before, one of buck’s letting go. But it was all too late and she could only watch. Only watch as Bloodmoon jammed something resembling a poisoned crossbow bolt into Dawnbreaker’s chest and leaped aside.
The golden glow around the alicorn’s horn died in an instant as her eyes glossed over, all the strength leaving her body. Dawnbreaker trembled as she fell to her knees, Nova screaming into her ear as he mother fell over in a heap.
Rainbow threw the assassin that was still holding her down aside as she rushed for the fallen mare. Bloodmoon still didn’t give her a chance as she cut her off, leaping at the screaming filly that was hunched over her fallen mother.
Rainbow became hysterical. Her vision blurred once more, her breathing almost forgotten as she ran, wings limping against her sides. All she could see was the Chaosblessed dive at the filly in slow motion.
Rainbow Dash stepped on one of the dropped swords and slipped, world returning to full-speed as she fell forward on her face. She toppled over her head and hooves, only to see the Master Assassin reach out and wrap her destroyed hooves around the petrified filly crying out for a saviour.
“AUNTIE!” Nova screamed, tears running down from her emerald eyes across her rain-soaked face just before the hated unicorn and her captive disappeared with a quiet pop.
The faded blue mare’s breaths turned to chokes and sobs as she dragged herself over to Dawnbreaker’s still form. Rainbow tossed her leather-clad hooves on the alicorn’s chest as she pushed her head in her lap, the rain gushing over them like a river.
“No-no-no-Dawn! DAWN! Dawn wake up! WAKE UP, DAMNIT!” The mare screamed and hyperventilated, rummaging through her saddlebags as she stared into those glassy, violet eyes.
“TWILIGHT! TWILIGHT, DO YOU HEAR ME!? TWILIGHT!” She kept screaming, mind ignoring the fact that every last one of the attackers had vanished and the rain had washed away all the blood, her own injuries long since healed.
Rainbow pulled out three more healing potions from her bags as she began to violently rip them open, showering the fallen alicorn in their sweet liquid, her cuts and gashes healing, the deadly green still there.
Dawnbreaker’s chest rose slower each time as her vivid colors had turned bleak, magical mane reverting back to actual hairs in that deep, sapphire color. From where the poisoned bolt had been driven into her spread a spider web of green. Her bloodstream, becoming infected and poisoned as Rainbow poured the very last, useless potion she had into the mare’s throat.
“No, please, Twilight, please, don’t die, for the love of Celestia and Luna don’t die… we can’t do it without you… I can’t… without you I can’t…” Rainbow Dash whispered, her tears mixing with the cold rain. “Nova, please, she… please, Twilight…” The prismatic protector choked on her sob as she lowered her head and pressed it against her best friend’s forehead, tears rolling along with Twilight’s, down her lavender coat.
“S-save her…” the alicorn croaked, her voice fragile like a glass figurine.
“I can’t, not without you, Twi… please, you’re going to make it… please…” the pegasus whimpered.
“…I'm sorry…” Twilight began to close her eyes.
“NO! Twilight…” Rainbow gasped as she tried to shake the goddess.
“I'm sorry…”
“PLEASE!”
“Save her…” Twilight closed her eyes, her last breath leaving her lips. A single tear rolled down her cheek as Rainbow finally collapsed against her limp form and cried. The mare hadn’t cried in years, so very many years… and she finally could.
o.O.o
They found her sobbing, the heavy rain long since turned to a light drizzle as the first rays of the ownerless sun broke through the clouds above Haven.
And they yelled at her, they didn’t believe her, and blamed her no matter how much she yelled and begged, the limp form of Queen Dawnbreaker at their hooves.
The crossbow bolt was identical to hers, same poison only stronger, same model, same everything. No bodies, no injuries, no fight. But she kept yelling.
Pink saw her cry, Pink had know her the best before the Fall and she didn’t believe her as they yelled. Orange was standing her ground and fought alongside Pink, her silver tongue spinning truths from lies. Lies! All lies!
White stood aside. She didn’t want to be there. She didn’t say a word, she only cried, makeup streaking her face. White didn’t say a word.
They yelled. So much yelling as Pink raged, beleving that she hid Nova and wasnt telling where their niece was. She yelled so very much.
“You are going to DIE for your crimes!” Was the last thing Pink shouted in a fit of rage at her begging and wallowing, yet, determined form. All before the guards bashed her in the head and carried her away to her prison and death.
Twilight Sparkle and Queen Dawnbreaker were gone forever.
Rainbow Dash grunted as her wingtips pushed her body up from the ground for the ninety-eighth time… ninety-ninth… hundredth…
With a sharp exhale the faded cyan mare ended her exercise, her hooves slipping under her as she rose up. She flexed her wings while she walked to the front of her tiny, two-by-four, concrete cell. Silver rings were clamped around both her wings, transparent Spark-gems glittering with a rainbow light within, along with small rubies embedded on both, quietly hummed.
The mare came to the thick metal bars of her prison and hunched over a large clay jug. She gently pushed her hoof through the loop of the fragile pottery and lifted it to her lips only to find it empty.
Rainbow grimaced and got up, the jug still hanging from her hoof as she leaned against the rusty metal bars. She stuck the jug through the gap and began to wave it around, catching the attention of the single guard that had been with her all those months in prison.
“Oi, my drink’s empty, mind fetching me a new one?” The mare cried out with a light snark in her voice as she grinned at the approaching guard.
The brown earth pony with his yellow mane and moss-green uniform glared at her before snatching the jug from her hoof, all while mumbling to himself. He walked over to a rusty faucet on the other side of Rainbow’s cell and twisted it, filling the jug with sparkling water.
The pegasus mare hung against the metal bars, her outstretched hoof casually swinging back and forth as she tried not to think about her great thirst. Finally, after what seemed like forever, a loud squeak sounded throughout the half-empty prison as the water faucet was turned off.
The guard turned around, carefully balancing the piece of pottery, and walked over to Rainbow, an odd smirk spread across his face. The mare took the jug out of his hoof with a suspicious look, but instead of gulping it down instantly she paused to look at the smiling guard.
“You spat in it, didn’t you?” she said with a roll of her rosy eyes.
“Yep.” the guard casually answered. Rainbow sighed and without much effort swung the full jug upwards, the water cascading over the surprised guard. He sputtered as he got soaked from head to hoof and couldn’t help but snarl at Rainbow, the mare holding back a torrent of chuckles.
“I hate you.”
“Aww, that’s so sweet of you, Pudding.” Rainbow smiled at the fuming stallion.
“You do realize you’re dying tomorrow?” He hissed back in a cold tone. A little gasp died in the mare’s throat as she paused, just before her arrogance overtook her once more.
“Yeah I know, so I might as well make the most of it.” Rainbow stuck out her tongue at Pudding Pie. She had always teased him about his name.
“Screw you Dash…” The buck mumbled as he took off his little moss-green hat and squeezed the water out of it before balancing it on top of his head once again.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Rainbow casually retorted. The stallion’s yellow eye twitched a few times as he kept staring down the wild mare.
“I'm done. I am Celeste-damned done.” He turned around without another word and stomped away.
“Hey, could you get me a spit-less refill?” Rainbow shouted after him as she continued to wave around her empty clay jug.
“DONE!” was all that echoed through the corridor as the guard’s shadow disappeared around the corner.
o.O.o.O.o
Rainbow lay on her moldy mattress, hind legs propped against the wall as she stared at the small beam of sunlight slowly creeping across her dirty floor from the barred window above. Her head was hanging over the edge as she looked at the hallway upside-down and through the metal bars sealing her in.
She flexed her blue wings a few times. If it weren’t for those stupid magical braces clamped around them she’d be flying all over the place, and by place she meant her cell. The mare grumbled and let her legs slip down from their post against the wall to her bedding as she rolled onto her stomach.
She ran her hoof through her messy, unwashed and overgrown mane only to have it limp back down in front of her eyes. The bright red had turned even grayer than she remembered and the yellow had long since lost its vivid appearance.
She played around with the purple lock that came from the back of her head, dark violet faded to washed-up lavender. As she twirled her mane between the tips of her bare hooves she began counting the months she’d been imprisoned. Four? Five? It was hard to keep count at this point.
Her eyes rolled to the back of her head as she groaned again fighting her daily boredom. She threw her head against the mattress and laid there for the longest time as her drool slowly pooled around her cheek.
Her rose gaze traveled across her cell. The floor was littered with papers, small, empty bowls and vials splashed with paint. The wall she had lain her hind hooves against was covered in black text, little verses, odd ideas, dreams… nightmares… apologies and denials. In the corner where the small hole in the ground stood as a toilet, tallies counting the day and night cycles were etched into the concrete.
The other two walls were brimming with drawings. Little sketches: ponies, figures, locations, weapons… A large picture covered most of the smaller ones on the left wall. Four crudely yet carefully drawn ponies, colored to the best of Rainbow’s abilities.
A small vermilion filly stood in front of the other three, to her back-left stood a large lavender mare with a bright smile, her hoof on the filly’s shoulder. Next to her was an aged yellow pegasus that was hugging a young, copper mare as they giggled. Under the picture was an oval splotch of paint. A red horseshoe was depicted next to a little scribble of words.
With a heavy exhale Rainbow lifted herself from her soggy mattress and dragged her suddenly unwilling body to the drawing. She slumped back down right in front of it, tail brushing away the dirt under her. She lifted up her faded blue hoof and pressed it against the painted 'shoe.
She held it there for several long minutes, eyes never once traveling to the words scribbled underneath.
The mare’s ears perked as she heard shuffling coming in her direction. She lazily turned her head to see her favorite guard - Pudding Pie - slide a tray with a single plate atop it under the bars, next to the half-empty jug of water.
“Sup’?” she casually asked. The guard paused as he stared at the miserable mare before him.
“I'm officially resigning. So congrats’ Rainbow Dash, you singlehoofedly made me stop wanting to be a guard.” he muttered as he looked away only to have Rainbow shuffle to her hooves in the speed of light and suddenly found himself staring at the mare’s rosy eyes. In full seriousness, she continued.
“Oh come on Pudding, I'm not that good, am I?” she asked with a light smirk.
“Gee, modest much?” the young buck muttered, a single chuckle escaping him.
“Not one bit.”
“Figures.”
The two faintly smiled as they stood there facing one another. Pudding was the first to turn away as he began to walk down back the hall. However, just before he was out of earshot he whispered something that managed to make Rainbow’s mane stand on end. “Good luck.” And he vanished around the corner.
“Good luck? Good luck for what?” Rainbow grumbled as she slid down to her haunches, eyes still gazing where her favorite guard had vanished. She shook her head, clearing any and all thoughts as she looked at what Pudding had brought her.
The metal tray held a single paper plate and atop that plate was a wonderfully smelling apple fritter. Rainbow licked her lips as she looked at the beautiful morsel with lustful eyes.
She swallowed the ocean of spit that had gathered in her mouth from the aroma alone. She gently picked up the treat, almost as carefully as cradling a foal, and raised it to eye level. She licked her lips again as she savored the moment, reminding herself that she hadn’t eaten anything other than hay, water, oats and maybe an apple once a week at best.
The second her teeth bit into the fritter her mind exploded, the pure flavor rushing through her senses. Her mind spun in a canopy of forgotten flavors, her nose tingling from the fresh apple scent as her tongue danced around the small bite in her mouth.
After what seemed hours of pure bliss the mare finally swallowed the tiny piece of the pasty as it entered the endless pit in her stomach. She tried to make sense as she recovered from the explosion of forgotten wonder. With a massive smile the mare looked down only to see something odd about the paper plate. Where the fritter had laid, there were some black loops that were now shinning through the paper due to its greese.
The mare migrated the pastry to one hoof as she reached over to the paper with a questioning expression. She lifted it and turned it around only to see an entire letter scribbled on the bottom. Rainbow being Rainbow, stuffed the rest of the fritter in her moth as she began reading the odd note.
Rainbow, For the given moment you do not need to know who we are, but all we can say is that we believe you didn’t kill Twilight. In the fritter is the key to your cell. Once you’re out, head for the new recruit bedrooms, there will be scattered materials for a Spark-gem bomb. Once you assemble it, leg it to the back of the prison where the sewage is pumped into the waterfalls. Blow the wall and run, go downstream, the rest you will pick up along the way.
~ Copper and Gold
Her mind stopped.
The mare belched the fritter out from her mouth in the speed of light, the half-chewed morsel colliding with the gray wall with a wet splat. Rainbow coughed a few times, her blood running cold. She watched the foodstuff slowly slide down the wall in a pile of mush.
The mare reached out with a trembling hoof as she gently shifted the chewed fritter around, until her hoof felt something hard, slim and tiny. She pulled out a small bronze key and gazed at it with absolute awe.
Rainbow gulped as she slowly moved to the door of her cell. She pushed her hoof through the gap in the bars and fumbled around until she managed to slide the key into the hole. She gently twisted the fragile contraption until she heard a soft click and the door opened with a groan.
Her heart skipped a beat as her breaths became faster, but the mare kept it under wraps. She pulled the key out of the keyhole and took it into her mouth as she closed the door and ran back to her mattress.
She hastily slid her hoof under it and felt the few roaches scatter about as her fur met with something cold and metallic. The mare pulled out something resembling a tiny dagger, crafted from a metal tray as it hung in a loop made from her torn bed sheets. Rainbow gently slid the key in one of the knots on the makeshift holster and slipped the entire thing over her head and left forehoof so it stood where her rune pistol once did. She took a deep breath and walked back to the front of her cell.
The mare looked at the fritter still lying on the floor. She shrugged and lowered her head to the pasty and took a big bite from the part that hadn’t touched the floor. She washed it down with remainder of the water from her clay jug as that activity helped her calm her jumbled nerves.
One chance. One chance and if she mucked it up her execution was tomorrow anyway. No mistakes. Not this time.
The prismatic mare pushed the barred door open with a creek. She cast one last glace around her cell, the place she thought she’d live the last days of her life in. Her rose gaze slid over the scribbles and drawings and stopped at the big picture of the four mares.
She looked at the writing just below the bloody hoofprint.
~Family~
With shaking limbs she stepped outside.
o.O.o.O.o
There was something unsettling about big open spaces…
As a pegasus, Rainbow had spent her entire life in the skies, the wide open blue stretching before her for an eternity. But after living in a tiny concrete cell for four months, marks were left. It felt just like the claustrophobia Rainbow had felt for those first few weeks of her imprisonment except the other way around. The mare didn’t know the word though. Agro-? Verti-? Vertograph? Something like that, she was sure.
Rainbow Dash took deep and hushed breaths as she crept along the wall and down the hallway she knew so very well. The lights above quietly buzzed and flickered, making the mare jump each time. Her body was tense, ears perking in every direction as she listened to her own breathing and soft hoofsteps. She was really out of practice…
The mare blew her overgrown mane out of her face before peeking around the corner. She had visited the jail numerous times over the years, mostly interrogating captured Chaosblessed or working with Rarity’s spies. She knew the layout by heart.
The hallway ahead was empty, even the cells, but she could hear faint voices in the distance. New recruit barracks. That should be easy enough… Hopefully…
Rainbow flapped her wings a few times, only to have them uselessly limp by her sides. In the name of Celeste, she hated those stupid magical braces. The mare quietly snorted before she stepped into the corridor.
As she briskly trotted down the hallway, the light shuffle of her long tail dragging behind her echoing all around, as she tried to figure out a safe route. She knew that she had been kept in the furthest and deepest corner of the prison and that the ‘sunlight’ from her ‘window’ was a simple mirror-enchantment, mimicking something that was outside in the District above, when in reality the prison rested within what was simply known as Canterlot Undercity.
The pegasus came to somewhat of a junction. The wall to her right opened up to a large room, yet the corridor stretched onwards. The mare took a moment to revise her options. If she went straight she could, maybe, just maybe, get into the maintenance rooms and then leg it all the way along the pipes to the kitchen from where it was literally a hop, skip and a jump to the barracks.
She pushed up against a wall as she listened to the voices that seemed right next to her as she let her mind quickly mill it over.
“-and I hear it’s gonna’ be grand!” a young buck exclaimed.
“I still don’t zee wants ze big zeal about an execuzion.” an older mare scuffled in response. By her accent, Rainbow could tell she was from one of the colonies to the north.
“She killed Dawnbreaker for goddess’s sakes!” The buck whined. “I know you Northern’s don’t care much about what happens here ever since the Cadence incident, but c’mon…”
“Zon’t care.” The mare interrupted with a hiss and Rainbow heard her suddenly come in her direction. The prismatic pegasus let a tiny shriek escape her as she bolted backwards and leaped behind a few large slabs of plaster that were leaned against a wall next to a few crates and scattered tools. Luckily the prison had been under renovation before the plague broke out almost a year ago, so everything was halted and all the construction equipment just where it was.
Rainbow Dash felt her heart pounding in her chest so loudly she was concerned that it might give her away. She listened to the light taps of horseshoes as the guard-mare walked by her hiding place. Beads of sweat had broken out from Rainbow’s forehead and lightly dampened her coat as she stood frozen in place for what seemed like hours.
After a lot of convincing, and her mind screaming at her to move, she finally mustered up the courage to peek out from safety. As her eyes gazed across the empty hallways she felt a massive, mental boulder roll off her chest.
Rainbow took a few tentative steps forward, careful not to make a single peep. She cautiously snuck to the doorway that opened into the large room. Why was the room even there? Nopony knew, but then again, Canterlot and its Undercity were basically built under the rule of Princess Platinum, so who knew what had gone down in the crazy unicorn’s mind before He took over.
Rainbow poked her nose around the corner and saw the young buck as he sat against a column of the empty and quite frankly ugly room. The interior was bare, similar faded slabs of concrete lined the walls and floor. Eight pillars were placed in two rows along the longer walls, holding up the stone roof which was probably holding up the entirety of the streets of Central District.
The young buck looked about Pudding’s age, wearing the same green uniform. His messy blue mane spiraled from under his silly green hat as he lifted his lit cigarette to his dark-blue lips and inhaled. As the smoke from his exhale cleared Rainbow saw the metal wall on the other side of the room, bars in-between two large slabs of shining blue alloy, holding it up so there was a gap to see through. There were two other guards milling about and Rainbow could’ve sworn she heard the guard-mare with her heavy accent all the way over there.
Her choice of escape was clear.
The mare gently backed up, after a weary glance in every direction, and took a few deep breaths. She flapped her wings as they flopped against her sides like ragdolls and she crouched down, involuntarily inhaling the dust and dirt that had gathered on the banged-up concrete floor. Rainbow exhaled, scattering the grime just under her nose and did a small hop forward, her body beyond tense. She galloped a few steps, as quiet as she could, and leaped.
Her wings opened up as she soared through the air, catching just the smallest updraft and glided those few steps across the exposed doorway in lightning speeds. Her hooves skidded against the floor, her outstretched wings managing to lighten her fall and absorb most of the sound she had made. The mare touched down and tucked into a roll as she landed, just to be sure.
Rainbow’s head spun as she hopped straight to her hooves the second her small roll across the ground was done. She stuck to the wall as she let her heart slow down and her mind clear up. The mare’s frantic rose eyes flew all over the place but the hallway was clear and quiet all the way to the turn that went right, far away so nopony could hear anything from where Rainbow stood. The mare let out a sigh of relief as she let her hooves go limp, just for a second.
After a few moments of calming herself by taking breaths so deep it made her head spin even more, Rainbow hopped to her hooves as she tucked her wings back to their default positions by her faded-cyan sides, and began to scout out the large corridor ahead.
If her mapping was correct, Rainbow could head down the tunnel like structure to a maintenance room that should be on her side somewhere down the line. From there she could easily access the water and sewage and probably stream pipes that ran along the ceilings and just sneak along them to her destination.
The blue pegasus let a small smile grace her lips as she began to quietly sneak along the walls to where the hallways crossed once more. There was something that had clicked inside her, something that made her smile again as she walked and didn’t notice her focus slowly slipping.
The mare began to grin and her hoofsteps grew louder, a shuffle ahead that she didn’t notice.
“Left…”
A faint whisper sounded from what felt like within Rainbow’s mind. The blue mare jumped in pure terror. Had she been discovered?
And suddenly she heard the hoofsteps from the hallway ahead.
Not much thought went into her next actions as the mare leaped to her left, following the cryptic whisper, and through the only wooden door in the entire damned facility. Rainbow held her breath as the thin door slammed shut behind her and the mare scrambled up a stack of boxes before leaping at three small pipes just above the door that swung open the very second her hooves touched the heated metal.
She was still holding her breath as a guard appeared just below her dangling rainbow tail. She tried to lift it up but she had never really practiced doing stuff with her rainbow feature and all she did was make a light breeze.
The guard dressed in blue glanced around and looked at the pile of wooden boxes Rainbow had used as an escape and scowled.
“Frigen’ Undercity… Ah’ swear, ah’ rather be working over at t’ Everfree District t’n ‘ere.” the aged guard grumbled. “Next thing ya’ know there’s gon’ be ghosts of dead prisoners throwin’ cheese sandwiches around…”
He snorted at his own joke and exited the small room, letting Rainbow Dash finally draw a few shallow breaths. The mare’s poor heart was pounding so hard it was ready to rip through her chest. As if all her senses had suddenly rushed back to her, the prismatic mare felt her hooves burning against two of the three pipes. In a heartbeat she leaped in the air, her back smashing against the ashen roofing of the small, pantry like room.
Rainbow let out a hushed moan as she dropped down to the floor with a thud. She grabbed her aching and bruised head with both her burnt forehooves as she laid there and cringed while she let the pain pulse and fade away. Landing on rocks was never a good experience.
With a grimace of discomfort the mare staggered to her hooves and looked around the tiny room. She noted the increased heat as she searched for anything useful. Other than the large wooden boxes she had scrambled up on which seemed to be filled with more unused construction equipment, the room was bare. There were, however, about two dozen small pipes and half a dozen big ones running along the walls and through holes at the ceiling and floor.
Rainbow grinned before turning and closing the door. Goddess’ bless whoever invented doors that didn’t need keys for locking from the inside.
The faded pegasus crept along the vertical, copper pipes that came from the floor and began running along the ceiling, and glanced at their valves. Lots of them looked like steam pipes, for whatever reason steam was used, Rainbow didn’t know, and others actually weren’t pipes but rather concealed electricity and intercom wires. Rainbow looked around the room with an unimpressed glace until her rosy eyes fell upon three large, round and thick pipes that curved up to a panel against the roofing that went parallel to the hallway behind the wooden door.
The mare began to grin again and was ready to jump onto the pipe and just hug it for the sake of it being there. But she stopped just before she had made a painful mistake. The mare paused, her burnt hoof hovering over the closest pipe, the gears of her mind turning. After a lengthy pause for thinking she let her hoof continue its descent, only less eagerly this time. Her blue limb gently tapped against the metal, an inaudible rings echoing through the valve filled room.
Rainbow let out another sigh of relief as the metal had been room temperature. But then she saw her error. The pipe she had tapped was leading backwards, probably in the direction of her cell, and quiet utterly useless to her. The mare groaned and moved to the other two pipes, checking where they lead beforehoof.
A lot more hastily the mare tapped the two large pipes and found them to be lukewarm and chilly respectively. She smiled and muttered, “Thank you, Tia…” with a quick glance skyward and gingerly placed her forehooves against the metal, as if testing its strength.
Rainbow skillfully climbed up onto the chilly pipe and scrambled up its length, her burnt hooves feeling refreshed and soothed. The mare shivered as he back touched the cool ceiling. But she pushed her discomfort aside and pressed her back against the concrete slab for better balance, her hooves creeping along the top of the pipe.
Rainbow felt like she was tiphoofing along as she came to the grate in the wall. She spread her wings once more and pushed them against the roof of the room and turned her head to withdraw her makeshift knife from the loop around her neck.
She pushed the fragile blade in the gap where the grate met the wall and began to pry. It didn’t take long and the weak metal blockade disconnected from the wall, ground up concrete dust cascading to the ground. Rainbow gently pulled the grate from the wall after her blade her been holstered. She grabbed the light metal and slid it down her side, hanging it behind some of the smaller pipes to make sure it would not be seen.
With a surprisingly happy huff Rainbow folded her wings and laid her belly against the crisp metal as she began to shove and pull herself along the pipeline. Onwards! To freedom!
o.O.o.O.o
Rainbow Dash had absolutely no idea how long it had been since her escape, mind still wondering about the tiny chances, as she slowly crawled atop the large pipes. The prison was massive, at least half the size of the Undercity itself. Tunnels and passages stretched and looped to an eternity. It was like a labyrinth. A very, very deadly and you-will-probably-get-shot-if-you’re-seen kind of labyrinth.
Rainbow shuddered. The thick, unknown metal tube, while refreshingly cool at first, had now turned icy cold. The mare hated to admit it but she was freezing to the bone. Even her nose had gone runny, and if you had to sniffle every two seconds, it was hard to be very stealthy.
The trip had taken only ten minutes at best in Rainbow’s mind. In reality, when she had to stop and hold her breath every single time a guard shuffled by and that half of the corridors were inaccessible and some of the pipes ether dipped into the lower layers or the District above and there was way too much backtracking, it probably took hours.
Rainbow placed her cold blue hoof against her muzzle, a futile attempt to stop her clattering teeth, just as somepony came around the corner. The faded pegasus tensed, rose eyes glaring at the scene below, ready for anything.
A single stallion crept around the corner.
Rainbow gasped and instantly fell quiet as she watched the pony go through the same motions she had when she exited her cell. It was obvious that the young buck was a fellow prisoner. He was obsidian black with a soft gray mane that fell over his face. He wore a similar silver collar to Rainbow’s around his neck and brace around his horn. The emeralds from the magic devices gave an almost inconspicuous green glow.
He carefully lurked around the corner and yet another stack of wooden boxes, his head tossing in every direction. For a moment Rainbow wondered what had he been sent to prison for? But then that moment ended as he looked straight up into Rainbow’s rosy eyes.
A pair of hearts skipped a beat, Rainbow’s skipping two as she finally saw the buck’s eyes. His left eye was graceful lavender with a peculiar shade of magenta shinning through. Such a hue that made Rainbow’s soul clench as she was reminded who the color once belonged to. But the color of his right eye was what made the prismatic mare’s heart burn with anger.
The young buck’s right eye seemed so very distorted. Where the milky white had to be there was nothing but a sickly shade of gold, almost glowing against the humming lamplight. His pupil did not match the other even the slightest as it was the bright shade of crimson, almost the color of fresh blood.
At first Rainbow hoped, prayed, that he was just a Discordant, just a worshiper, just misguided, but then he blinked and she saw it. His mark.
A large, bloody-crimson oval was tattooed over the pony’s eyelid and stretched beyond it, nearly covering half of his face. From the middle of the circle eight sharp arrows shot out, almost resembling a compass. The pony’s discorded eye flicked with black magic and died as he looked up at Rainbow in pure terror. The mare guessed there was not a single thing scarier than her for Bloodmoon and her Chaosblessed cult. After all, The Rainbow Butcher was her nickname.
Rainbow snarled, her runny nose and freezing hooves long forgotten. She wiggled her body only slightly, her food-tray blade glimmering as it slapped against her hide in a demonstrative manner. The buck squeaked and backed away a few steps, his petrified eyes never leaving Rainbow’s stiff gaze. A life ago she’d jump him, pin him to the ground, knock him out, something, anything, just because who he was. Chaosblessed - the enemy.
A life ago.
This was her new life. Her fourth time? Maybe more? It wasn’t much but Rainbow knew, she’d ether die tomorrow or live a life against everything she’d dedicated her existence to. And her new life started this moment.
Rainbow Dash, former Lady Protector of the Queen, master assassin and most loyal friend looked away.
She reopened her eyes to see the obsidian buck trying to scramble away as he once more caught her gaze. The mare grit her teeth for a single heartbeat before nodding to the pipe. She paused to make sure the pony saw her before she tucked her hooves under her and resumed her own escape, leaving the scared stallion behind. He was on his own.
But Rainbow couldn’t help to think, to wonder, he was just so very young… And his life was already over. The chaos marks were like brands: there to stay for an eternity. The mare shuddered. She didn’t know if it was the icy pipe or her own thoughts, but she pressed onwards. She was so close to her goal she could practically smell it.
o.O.o.O.o
And smelled, she did. The pegasus mare had hoped to beeline to the guard barracks but it seemed like somepony thought it was a good idea to put a giant, Celeste-damned wall where the hallway once was.
Now Rainbow was sitting behind a ventilation grate and peering into the kitchen as she watched several ponies work the pots and pans. She could smell the oats and vegetables as they boiled in massive vats. The sheer amount of Spark-gems humming and sparking in the room was overwhelming. Rainbow could even feel the silver bracelets around her wings tremble and supercharge from all the magic before her.
The cold pipe of unknown contents spiraled to Rainbow’s side and curved downwards along the wall and into the floor. Some part of the aged mare’s mind was grateful to be off the freezing contraption as she watched room below. It was warm and humid and Rainbow was beyond thankful for a chance to warm her limbs as she devised a plan.
There was none.
It would be almost impossible to crawl out of the vent unnoticed. Rainbow would have to pry it open first, then put it away, then sneak down to the floor and with all the ponies running around it was basically impossible.
The prismatic mare groaned inwardly and let her head, lightly and quietly, smash against the vent in a moment of pure frustration. She knew she just couldn’t wait it out, somepony would notice their most dangerous criminal had escaped.
“Just wait a little more…”
Rainbow’s blood froze. She tossed around as fast as the small and dark concrete shaft would allow her, rocky dust rising into the air from her swift movements. There it was again. That voice. This time Rainbow could distinguish that it was male, but what about it? Had she just gone mad at some point and it was now starting to show? No, no, that want possible, Rainbow’s grand plan was to remain sane and concentrate on the things most important till the very end…
Then what just happened?
The mare didn’t have much time to ponder as she turned around, once more facing the kitchen that had unintentionally doomed her as the intercoms crackled, a ding ringing through them before a metallic voice of a stallion began to echo through the device.
“ATTENTION! ALL NON-ESSENTIAL PERSONNEL IMMEDIATELY REPORT TO ATRIUM B2. GRADE TWO EMERGENCY. REPEAT. ATTENTION! ALL NON-ESSENTIAL PERSONNEL…”
A frightening and massive grin spread across Rainbow’s features as she listed to the monotone voice and watched the staff turn off the Spark-gem ovens and funnel out into the corridors. Just what the doctor ordered.
The mare continued to smirk and she reached over and withdrew her homemade blade from its ‘holster’. It didn’t take long and the mare set her hooves on the glossy tiles of the kitchen with a soft click. Instantly, Rainbow crouched down behind a large metal counter, the handles pressing into her ribcage as she slowly began to creep along the cool, checkerboard tiles. She had changed her philosophy from ‘brash and careless’ to ‘better safe than sorry’ in the later years of her life. Mostly because of her situation being the Lady Protector, had forced her to.
The prismatic mare poked her head upwards and glanced around the kitchen. She smiled inwardly as she spotted something delicious just in front of her muzzle. Rainbow wasted no time and snagged a slice of bread from the countertop before quickly tip-hoofing to the three large vats where the staff boiled the prisoner’s food.
She slipped in-between two of the three metal cylinders and pressed against the wall. The light from above didn’t at all reach behind the contraptions and Rainbow was happy to finally be hidden in a veil of shadow.
The mare eagerly munched down on the slice of white bread she held in her mouth. It tasted heavenly and wasn’t at all stale, like a puffy cloud of flour, a little bit of corn thrown in for flavor. Rainbow took a moment to relax her nerves. That was the one thing she had learnt in her many years. Naps, breaks and an embrace with a lover every once in awhile kept her from going insane with the stress of her job. But the second the mare pressed her freezing hooves against the warm metal vat her brain nearly melted from the wonderful feeling.
A clank just outside the door made her snap back to reality. She had to stop getting distracted or she might never make it out alive.
Rainbow poked her head through the small gap from where she had came into her hiding place and took a better look around the kitchen. To be fair, there wasn’t much there. The floors were lined with dirtied square tiles of black and white made into a checkerboard pattern. Four long metal countertops lined the entire room. They were littered with utensils like knives and bowls and such and even several sickly looking vegetables of undistinguishable origin. There were also sinks and several small ovens built inside the tables. Overall it didn’t look all that hygienic, with the two rats snacking on vaguely potato-looking veggies, but then again Rainbow and the others were ‘unworthy’ prisoners, so they didn’t matter.
The pegasus mare had a strong stomach but even she couldn’t help but gawk as she thought back about all the things she had been forced to eat all these months. She shivered before making sure there was nopony in sight and continued her sneak to the door.
Her trip went without any incidents as she dashed across the hallway and stuck to a wall just outside the entrance to the new recruit barracks. The mare took a few rushed breaths and wiped the sweat of terror off her brow. Rainbow closed her eyes and puffed out her chest before leaning around the corner.
What greeted her wasn’t a room full of guards that would be happy to rip her head clean off because that would mean a promotion, instead, she was met with white sheets and thin, empty metal bed-frames.
Rainbow wasted no time and slipped around the corner. She thought back to the note that she had left crumpled on her floor like an idiot. The mare mentally slapped herself before inspecting her surroundings. The room was very long and lit by the Spark lamps above, both walls were lined with identical, two-story beds and chests stuck in the middle. Most were untouched and some had little trinkets strewn about.
Rainbow ran through the room twice over before stuffing herself in-between two beds, away from vigil eyes. The mare had found a hoofful of various items, hopefully useable. She had found a sword under one of the beds and threw it over her shoulder atop her little food-tray blade. In her hoofs she held two Spark grenades a few rechargeable gem-batteries, a few manabullets and runestones but no gun. She had also found roll of copper wire and some bobby pins and the mare hoped they would help. Rainbow wracked her brain for several long moments trying to remember what her daughter and Dawnbreaker had taught her about explosives before setting off to tinker.
Before long the pegasus held an odd device in her graying blue hooves. Two Spark grenades were strapped together with a jungle of copper wires, their fuses safely disabled and removed to make sure they would blow only when they had to and in an instant. Below their round bodies all the gem-batteries Rainbow could strap on were tied and held in place by bent bobby pins and more wire to add that extra explosive-y goodness to the bomb. Finally, the tops of the fuse-less grenades were pushed as close together as possible, a manabullet and two runestones on each side were fastened in place.
Rainbow knew; when rubbed together, runestones usually produced magical sparks that were similar to what pistols used to fire. It just so happened that manabullets were very sensitive to magic, their purpose after all, was to produce a shock powerful enough to disable magic in all its forms for a second or two while doing maximum damage with their sharp, crystalline bodies.
All Rainbow needed to do set her creation ablaze was a spark from the manabullet and boom, there goes anything in a five meter radius.
The mare grinned as she stripped two pillows of their worn pillowcases and placed the bomb in one and the runestones she needed to set it off in the other before tying the two together and throwing them over her flanks. She felt comfortable to have something at the least resembling her old gear strapped around her body, she almost felt naked without it.
Rainbow began to trot to the entrance into the corridor, intently listening to her surroundings. Before she knew it, a small chuckle came from what sounded just next to her. Without a second to waste Rainbow leaped to the side and slid under a bed just by the entrance to the barracks. It was a stupid plan and due to her relatively bright mane and tail she was easily noticeable but it was better that nothing.
The cyan mare pressed herself against the far wall as two guards entered the barracks. They both were tangled up in conversation and Rainbow cringed as one sat on the bed she was hiding under. The mattress groaned and pushed against her head as she stuck to the cold concrete floor.
“But seriously though, he is in soooooo much trouble!” The guard that was sitting on the bed snickered as he fumbled with something up top.
“But they don’t even know if it was him.” The other replied less eagerly.
“So what? I mean, he was the only one to hang around that wing of the prison. Maybe she like, brainwashed him or something?”
“Don’t be an idiot, idiot.”
The two guards laughed as Rainbow tried to figure out who they were talking about. She had a vague idea that the ‘she’ was herself but who was the other pony they were talking about? The mare didn’t have time to dwell, nor did the two bucks have much time to talk as a stiff cough of attention came from the doorway. The two guards and one prisoner turned to see who was standing there.
“Gentlecolts.” A mare’s voice rang through the empty room. “What is ze meaning of zis?”
“S-s-sergeant! Ma’am! W-what appears to be the problem?” the stallion that was standing up almost yelled with more fright in his voice than necessary as he turned to see the mare with a salute. Rainbow recognized her from before and guessed that she was probably the head of something-or-other around here.
“Move yer lazy flanks, we have a situation on our hoovez.” She grumbled and Rainbow had a chance to glance at the mare as she felt the guard sitting above her shuffle around. The mare seemed old and she was dressed in a blue uniform and Rainbow could’ve sworn she saw a medal or two. Her coat was deep, dark blue with a chopped, coal black mane and azure eyes. A unicorn horn stuck out from her forehead.
“What’s ze holdup?”
“I-I’m sorry sergeant, I can’t find my sword, I swear I left it here somewhere…” the guard sitting above Rainbow muttered as he leaned over the side of the bed. Rainbow breathlessly gasped.
The buck hung over the side of, presumably his, bed and looked under the rows upon rows of metal bed frames. It was like some magical force of destiny and Lady Luck herself crouching next to her, the guard looked under all the other beds instead of his own. When he saw nothing he began to turn his head but before he could lay his eyes on the prismatic mare the young buck was yanked into the air by a blue glow of magic. The sergeant dragged the pony to her side and dropped him on the floor by her hooves with a heavy thud.
“Нет времени, ты дебил!” the guardsmare rattled something in her native tongue as the guard picked himself up and walked over to his friend’s side. Without another word she sharply turned around and walked out into the corridor. Rainbow could finally exhale.
o.O.o
It wasn’t until the sound of clopping hooves had died down, did Rainbow emerge from her hideout. She brushed the dust off her body and stretched out her limbs before creeping to the door and peaking out. It seemed like the entire prison had gone still, not a single living soul in sight. For that, Rainbow was thankful.
With a huff she slipped around the corner and galloped down the hallway, to the next intersection and turned right. She hugged the wall the entire way as she snuck to her next destination. Rainbow had already figured out her next plan of attack while she was sitting under the recruit beds. If the prison remained as eerily still as was her entire escape, Rainbow could easily dash through the hallways to the sewage pumps.
Rainbow made her way in total silence except for the light shuffle of her hooves through the bland concrete halls. As she rounded what seemed the hundredth corner that day she finally heard a mutter of voices. The mare lowered herself closer to the ground and slowed her trot.
“Please, we muszn’t alert her…” Rainbow heard the faint voice of the Northern mare she had run into on several occasions today. The faded pegasus noticed a small grate not too far from the archway into what was presumably one of the many atriums and a wonderful idea struck her. Rainbow clamped her teeth around the sword’s handle that lay against her side before quietly prying off the small grate that covered the hole in the wall. What was it for? She didn’t have a clue, yet Rainbow noted the familiar taste of nicotine on the blade’s hilt. After holstering her sword Rainbow leaned over to the tiny hole in the wall and propped her ear as close to the sound as possible.
“We will spread into several groups, at least five guards ranging from a uni’ to a pegasus for each. Dash is crafty and probably sneaking around somewhere. She won’t get far since I ordered the prison to engage a total lockdown, only way she’s getting out is through a wall.”
Rainbow Dash found the last sentence to be somewhat ironic before returning her attention to the male speaker.
“We have the presumed pony to be responsible for this mess in interrogation but he defiantly isn’t a squealer.”
Rainbow wondered who that could be. Probably somepony from the kitchen since that’s where she got the apple fritter with the key from.
“Pinkie’s gonna’ have my head for this…”
That struck a chord with Rainbow. She couldn’t help but jerk away from the wall in shock, some part of her still not believing the fact that she was betrayed by the ones she trusted the most.
“Alright everypony move out.”
As if she had been slapped across the face Rainbow jerked away from the wall and backpedaled into the corridor behind her before snapping around and skidding around the corner she just came from. Her heart raced in her ears and she couldn’t tell the difference between it and hoofsteps.
With frantic breaths Dash continued to creep backwards until her flank brushed against something cold and metallic. She looked to her side to see a large steel door with a small barred window on the top part. It defiantly wasn’t a cell since she was too far into the complex so it could only be one thing. The interrogation room…
With the entire prison now crawling with packs of guards like an ant’s nest Rainbow made the only mildly-sensible decision she could. As quickly as she could she pushed the massive door into a tiny opening and slipped into the chamber. Bolting the thing shut, Rainbow could finally relax as she slumped against the door with a tired moan.
“Please… Please, I told you that I don’t know anything….” a faint voice of a young buck echoed through the darkened chamber. Rainbow perked her ears and looked around for the first time since her entry.
The soundproof room was just as bland and dusty as everything else in the complex and looked exactly the same as the previous times the mare had been inside it. A small cell was stuffed in the corner of the room for temporairy confinement, barely lit by the single lamp that hung overhead, casting its pale light over a chair that held a single pony facing away from the door. There was a table on each side of the chair. The trays atop both were full of rust-colored tools of varying sharpness.
With a deep and slightly trembling breath Rainbow raised to her hooves. She took a few steps forward, much louder than she had wanted as she crept in half-circle around the chair that lay dead-centre of the room.
She stopped her gait just before walking into the buck’s field of view. He was strapped down to the crude metal and wood chair that rested on a pole driven into the concrete below. Thick leather belts held him across the chest and stomach, three smaller ones tying down his limbs and the only thing left dangling was his head that hung low with his face hidden behind his messy yellow mane.
The young stallion sniffled as a few droplets of crimson blood fell from his light brown nose to the ruffed up mossy green uniform he was wearing. Something clicked in Rainbow’s mind.
The faded blue pegasus placed her hoof on the back of the seat as it creaked from the movement. She watched as the buck’s ears perked for a split-second before falling back down.
“Please… please don’t hurt me…” he whimpered. Rainbow clenched her teeth and pulled back the chair making her rose eyes meet with the unfortunate pony strapped down.
Pudding Pie’s face was a mess. His left eye was completely swelled shut and blood streamed from his nose and lips as his frantic pink eyes finally met with Rainbow’s.
“R-rainbow…?” he stammered as the mare let go of her grip making the chair lurch forward. Dash quickly withdrew her sword and began to cut away the leather binds without speaking a single word, a large frown spread across her face.
“In the name of the gods is it really you? What the hell are you doing here?! You have to get lost before they find you!” Pudding Pie frantically shouted as he began to trash around in the chair making Rainbow’s work that much harder.
“Quiet you stupid foal,” Rainbow hissed. “I am not leaving you here! What the hell happened to you anyway?”
The last strap binding Pudding’s hoof snapped and Rainbow quickly moved to freeing his hind legs as the young buck began untying his other forehoof. It didn’t take long for the two to free the trapped guard and just as Pudding slid off from the chair and wiped what little blood he could from his muzzle he found himself pulled into a hug by none other than the prismatic assassin.
“What did they do to you?” Rainbow pestered as she backed up before useing the corner of her makeshift-pillowcase-saddlebags to try and wipe the blood from Pudding’s face. All the while the young buck pulled a brave-face.
“I don’t know, I just wanted to tease you with the entire ‘going to quit’ thing, ya’ know? I was sitting in the barracks when one of the captains or sergeants or whatever the hell she was came and dragged me here.” He paused as he winched when Rainbow pressed too hard on his swollen eye. “They said I let you out and now you were going to go murder everypony in sight!”
Pudding backed away and shook his head. “Why are you here? Are you really here to kill me? I didn’t squeal, I promise!”
“Dude, chill!” Rainbow snapped at him. “I'm not here to hurt you, I didn’t even know you were here!” She took a few seconds to take a deep breath. “Who gave you the apple fritter? Did you know about the note?”
“Note? What note? No! I just wanted to spook you ‘lright?! If that ended up with me getting the shit beat out of me and being stuck in a locked room with the Queen’s murderer, then I am never pulling a single joke in my entire life ever again!” The young stallion rambled as he backed further away from Rainbow.
“So… you don't know anything about this?” Rainbow tentatively asked with a tilt of her head.
“No!” Pudding desperately muttered as he pushed against the steel door with his pink eyes as wide as dinner plates. Rainbow stared at him for several long moments, nothing but the sound of their breaths filling the dark room. Finally, she sighed.
“Run. Hide, and when hell breaks loose leg it out of the prison and Central and never look back. Lay low, get a life, go work in the orchards I don’t know, get married, whatever, just walk away with your life. Please.” Rainbow trotted up to him and pushed him aside from the steel door only to unbolt it seconds later. A quick peak outside to make sure the hall was clear before she turned to still terrified Pudding.
“You have a life ahead of you. Use it, okay?” Rainbow pushed the door completely open and walked out into the empty hallway, lined with nothing but empty crates and dust. Pudding stared at her in disbelief as he crept out behind her and into the hall.
“You can get out, right? Through the emergency exit with the key every guard has?” Rainbow turned her rose eyes to him and he could only gulp and nod. “Good.”
Dash began walking away from the single guard that had been her only company during her imprisonment. She stopped and peeked around the corner only to see a patrol group run by the next intersection. She turned back to see if Pudding had left, only to find him staring at her in disbelief.
With a grunt Rainbow walked back the way she came and glared at the young guard once she got close. Before any words left her lips he muttered something at made her heart flutter.
“I believe you.”
“That I'm not a murderer?” Rainbow whispered with a smirk. He sacredly nodded. “Good. Now scram.” Before anything could be done the pegasus thrust her head forward and pressed her lips against his. It was a short kiss, no real meaning behind it other that Rainbow might be losing it completely.
What it did, however, was leave Pudding Pie in a daze long enough for Rainbow to slip away around the next corner. The prismatic mare was well on her way to freedom when the young buck finally snapped out of it to begin his own escape. He shook his head, unsure if he had just imagined all of it before muttering something under his breath as he began to sneak down the corridor in the opposite direction.
“Wasn’t she married?”
o.O.o.O.o
“ATTENTION! PRISONER #742 - FORMERLY: LADY PROTECTOR RAINBOW DASH HAS ESCAPED. ALL GUARDS ARE TO BE ON HIGH ALERT, DO NOT LET ANYPONY OUT OF THE FACILITY! ATTENTION! PRISONER #742…” The announcement kept on looping through the Spark-gem intercom system as Rainbow Dash made her way to the sewage pumps.
She had already come close more than once with a group of guards that had appeared around the corner all too suddenly, so the mare had retreated to the pipeline that ran along the top of the corridors. It wasn’t the best way of traversing the prison but at this point, it was the safest.
Rainbow waited for the clip-clops of hooves to vanish before she slipped off the side of the pipe, landing on the crumbly concrete with a loud thump. If she wasn’t mistaken, her destination lay just beyond the large doors in front of her.
With a giddy grin she pushed the doors open and slipped inside only to be greeted by the mother of all atriums. The cavernous ceiling rose three stories tall and was littered with tiny gems that glowed with a faint rainbow light. Giant containers were lined throughout and along the wall: full of trash, supplies or just empty. Rainbow disregarded all of that.
A loud rumble and the sound of metal grinding against metal filled the room, all of it coming from a device tucked by the far wall. The pump was about an alicorn and a half tall and goddess knows how wide. Two massive pipes, much larger than the ones Rainbow had used as an escape route, fed into the machine as a multitude of pistons pumped the water through it, power being fed through thick, black wires that ran along the floor to several Spark-engines in the other corner.
Rainbow cautiously approached the metal behemoth. She guessed the thing once had a color, but now it was completely rusted over, even sporting a layer of mold in a few spots near the bottom. The machine hissed and rattled as Rainbow came closer, as if knowing its fate and the mare’s intentions.
Rainbow reached into one of the pillowcases tied over her flanks and retrieved her precious device. With a grasp as gentle as cradling a foal, Rainbow placed the bomb several hooves away from the water pump against the concrete wall. She straightened it out to make sure it was easy to hit the top when she threw the runestone.
After making sure the bomb wouldn’t fall over, Rainbow backed up, looking for a good spot in which to hide when things went boom. She didn’t get the chance as there was a crash at the double doors she had came from. There, piled up and with frantic stares, stood a group of seven or eight guards, ready for anything.
“She’s here!” one of the ponies shouted as Rainbow’s heart skipped a beat. A dark blue unicorn mare with a coal black mane stepped forward, her sword and pistol pointed at the prismatic pegasus. Rose met cold azure eyes and Rainbow recognized the Northern mare she had been running into the entire day. The guard opened her mouth and barked out a single sentence before all hell broke loose.
“GET HER!”
Everything after that shout became a slow-motion blur for the prismatic mare. Rainbow shoved her hoof into her ‘saddlebag’ and by pure luck that didn’t seem to run out, pulled out a runestone.
She turned and threw the measly item as hard as she could at the bomb. Years of practice aiming Firefly and a few failed attempts at using throwing knives paid off that single second of her life. Rainbow’s throw hit home as the runestone bounced off the top of the bomb, a small magical spark jumping from the impact zone before the creation went ablaze.
The Spark-batteries were too much and the explosion was twice the size it should’ve been. The thin concrete wall imploded in the blast and the massive sewage pump and its pony-sized pipe did as well.
Rainbow’s ears rang and her entire world was lost in an explosion of light. Shrapnel from the metal device and chunks of the wall crashed against her body was she was thrown back into the group of guards, followed only by a gigantean wave of water from the destroyed pump.
Rainbow gasped for air, sound being lost to her as the torrent of water filtered away and across the floor. Her entire body ached like a million beestings and her vision was a selection of flickering bobbles of light. To top it all off, there was no sound received by her ears, only one constant stream of ringing.
On pure instinct the rainbow mare hobbled to her hooves and began to limp to the massive hole in the wall, her senses slowly clearing enough for her to break into a gallop. The guards had picked themselves up, the Northern mare at their lead, a massive piece of shrapnel lodged in her temple.
“Zon’t let her escape!” she barked as she grabbed a pistol from the guard laying net to her with her magic. Without much thought the mare fired both bullets in Rainbow’s general direction. The first one pinged off the shredded remains of the sewage pump, the blasted pipe next to it steadily spewing water all across the floor. The second bullet struck the floor just behind Rainbow’s tail and it made the mare hop forwards, yet she never once broke her gallop.
The soaked and dazed guards gave chase the second Rainbow leaped through the wall, not risking her hooves getting caught in the rebar. Rainbow still tripped and tumbled due to her disorientation but quickly recovered, her head still dunning with a sound similar to a church's bell, except she was slowly starting to hear distant thuds and cries.
Behind the prison’s wall stretched a forest of pipes in a rocky and barely lit cavern. Rusted metal walkways lined both sides of the cave, linked with rickety bridges in places, as a river of muck sloshed beneath. Hundreds of pipes, big and small, gushed their chunky contents out into the brown water as it all surged forward into a speck of light in the distance, no doubt one of city’s many waterfalls.
That was Rainbow’s final destination.
Another bullet pinged off the railing to her right, a fizz and a crackle as the manabullet discharged it energy. Without a second to waste Rainbow turned to her left and began to run towards the light, the metal path groaning beneath her thundering hooves.
Rainbow’s world was agony. Her forehooves and stomach stringed with every step and every breath, blood matting her faded blue body as it leaked from her cuts. Her vision was nothing but a narrow hallway as she pushed all her energy into her limbs, pushing them way beyond their limit as she kept zooming forward.
Her numb mind barely registered the pack of guards that had appeared in her path. Her pace slowed but never stopped as Rainbow quickly revised her options. Before the guards could even register her presence, Rainbow rushed by their noses and soared to the little bridge on her right that connected the two sides of the river of waste, only to be stopped in her tracks.
On both sides of the path there stood a group of ponies with their guns, swords and magics’ ready for firing. Rainbow skidded to a halt, the wet metal making a tad difficult as the two groups slowly began to move towards her.
She heard mutters and saw mouths moving but her ears still hadn't recovered enough to hear their words. Rainbow began to hyperventilate as the two groups slowly pressed forwards, only a hoof’s reach away as Rainbow’s flank bumped against the rusty railing that loudly creaked.
She was trapped…
Unless…
A spark of stupidity mixed with desperation in its liquid state made Rainbow’s rose eyes light up for just a second. A grin cracked her worn-out face as the mare pressed harder against the rickety railing as she raised her hoof to her forehead in a salute.
“Adios’, boys.” she muttered as the railing gave out behind her and Rainbow tumbled backwards and off the walkway into the murky water beneath. Screams echoed through the air before her world was swallowed in silence once more. The currents thrashed her about as she felt the few unicorns trying to grasp her body with their feeble magic, but to no avail.
Rainbow Dash kicked against the churning waters and broke the surface of the raging rapids and managed to grasp a lungful of air before the currents swallowed her up in their black embrace once more. The escape plan suddenly felt a whole lot less appealing.
The water thrashed the pegasus mare like she was nothing more than a ragdoll, granting her seconds where she could poke her head above the icy water and gasp for air. As the currents carried her to the end of the cavern Rainbow realized what was about to happen.
Light exploded from every direction and Rainbow Dash felt the familiar sensation of weightlessness take hold of her as the water disappeared. She flapped her wings on impulse, only to have them uselessly flail against her sides. She felt the familiar sensation of falling take hold of her. Falling…
Falling…
FALLING!
o.O.o
Rainbow plummeted through the air as wild winds hissed by her ears nearly drowning out the roar of the accursed waterfall below her. A spray of sludge trailed behind her as she pumped her wings in a desperate attempt to fly or at the least slow her fall.
Low gliding clouds and black smoke from bellow did nothing to slow her descent as she tore through them and the ground began to rush closer and closer, awaiting her in its ashen embrace.
Like many times in her life time seamed to slow down just as she realized how hopeless her situation was. Was it really worth plummeting to her death if it meant spiting her captors? Rainbow wondered that as Canterlotian drew closer through the smog of its own creation.
The blue mare spread out her limbs and stretched her wings in a flying form as if readying them for a magical current to catch her in its grasp and whisk her away and above the cloud cover and into the untainted horizon.
That never came however, but the fall from the top of the mountain to the ruined plains of Fallen Equestria was a long one, Rainbow’s wings somehow managing to slow her descent despite their obvious uselessness.
Like slamming into a crystal dome after doing a Rainboom, Rainbow’s descent sharply stopped. Her body jerked and came to a halt in the middle of her fall with an explosion of bone-crunching pain, before getting yanked back up from where she came by an invisible force.
Rainbow’s lungs retched as she tried to regain the air that had been knocked out of her by the sudden halt of her unintentional suicide. As the black bobbles retraced from the corners of her eyes she managed to raise her head and try and find the source of the magical grasp that was slowly pulling her up to the side of the mountain.
What Rainbow saw next made her already beaten and tortured heart leap and burst through her chest in agony.
The light from the dying sun through the patchwork clouds made the pony’s body light up in that magnificent shade of lavender, with a peculiar hint of magenta shinning through. From under her cloak her mane shimmered like the brightest of sapphires from the depths of the world and from under had dark hood stretched a magnificent horn aglow with the color of the golden sun.
Rainbow couldn’t tell apart her imagination from reality anymore. It was like the magical mare’s presence had broken some fundamental part of her brain that separated the two worlds. Or maybe she had already died from the fall that was much shorten that she thought and was now living some sort of fantasy before the final tethers of her life had been severed from her olden body.
No.
No, it couldn’t be…
The mare stood with her hooves, draped in yellow boots, wedged between the rocks of a small path on the side of the raging waterfall of muck rushing to the rivers below. The pitter-patter of the wild spray of water danced across her brown cloak that concealed everything but the tip of her nose and horn with a few stray curls poking from the sides.
As she drew Rainbow closer the dazed pegasus watched her initial vision drastically change as the clouds closed over the patchy sky, hiding the remnants of the sun from the world below.
The mare’s frizzy mane no longer seemed to be that wonderful shade of the ocean depths, but more of the almost forgotten dusky sky. Her coat no longer reflected the deep violet glow of something on her chest and only showed its ashen-white color. The magic concealing Rainbow as she was gently dropped on a mountain path many ways away from the cloaked mare no longer shone gold as there was no more sun to reflect in it like a dewdrop, and the mare’s horn faded to a light blue overglow.
The prismatic protector’s words died in her throat as her wild fantasies faded to bitter reality. Dawnbreaker was dead. She had died in Rainbow’s hooves and was buried in the last meadow in this world of ash that rested at the base of the unnamed mountain she had nearly fallen from.
She wasn’t coming back…
Rainbow hunched forward as she coughed and spat out the water she had managed to inhale in her tumble through the tides before groggily raising to her hooves to look at her mysterious savior.
The two mares stood still as they watched one another. Rainbow was panting as her heart began to race in her chest once more. She shifted her weight and reached over to her side to draw her sword, eyes never leaving the cloaked pony.
Rainbow bit thin air and realized the sword must’ve washed away with the current and she cursed her lack of weapons. Sure, the mare could easily go hoof-to-hoof if it came to that, but the near-death swim had left her drained of strength and willpower.
With no other options left Rainbow swallowed the lump in her throat, involuntarily swallowing some of the sewage she has taken a swim in, nearly making her puke. With a hoarse voice she looked the cloaked pony in the eye and asked a single question.
“Who are you…?”
Rainbow’s confident tone came out barely a whisper but it seemed like the other pony had gotten the gist. Her horn lit up with a bright blue light as magic flowed around her ragged brown cloak making her glow like a firefly in the hastily approaching nightfall.
With a mighty tug the unicorn mare ripped off her cloak and tossed it over the side of the mountain path, paying no mind to the fabric that fluttered to the inky depths of the Canterlotian waters. Once Rainbow’s mind came to a conclusion on the mare’s identity she could only stare in disbelief at the pony standing further up the mountain path.
The ashen-white mare was wearing one of the most posh dresses Rainbow had seen in what seemed decades. The fabric was a little worn around the edges but it only displayed how much the unicorn loved the particular piece of clothing.
The thing was just a few tones lighter than Rainbow’s bright and rosy eyes. The sleeves stretched halfway down the unicorn’s forehooves and fluttered freely over a dark-grey and white striped shirt that neatly tucked into her yellow shoes with a tiny, multicolored opal adorning on each. Around the unicorn’s waist was a thick, sunny-yellow belt made from soft fabric that turned into a short, layered skirt of light crimson and yellow.
Both her ears held two amethyst earrings and a small golden loop that nicely complimented her curly mane that was the same color of the twilight sky. But what rested against the mare’s chest made Rainbow fill with an unspoken rage she had not yet seen in her many years of serving the Crown.
Held by an engraved golden necklace, a large violet gem the shape of a rhombus laid snuggly against Rarity’s breast.
That was the moment when Rainbow roared like a wild animal and launched herself at her former friend, her fatigue fading away like a paper thrown into an inferno.
The earthbound pegasus closed the distance between herself and Rarity so fast the unicorn couldn’t even react before she was grabbed by her dress and violently smashed against the rocky mountainside. Rainbow snarled as she kept thrusting Rarity against the rocks, the unicorn only whimpering every time she impacted the jagged stones.
Only as the rage and adrenaline subdued and her aching limbs began to announce themselves, did Rainbow realize what she had done. Her forehooves were propping Rarity against the mountainside as the limp unicorn could barely manage to look up. A cold chill passed through Rainbow’s spine as she let go and let the beaten unicorn shag to the ground.
A patch of fresh blood stained a spot where Rarity’s head was mere seconds ago. A tickle of the same crimson liquid was slowly crawling its way down the unicorn’s white neck. Rainbow could’ve sworn she heard something faintly crunch with every breath Rarity took. But what made Dash feel horrible was the smile still held by Rarity’s lips. It was warm and welcoming; much like any friend would show after months of separation. That terrified Rainbow.
Rarity raised her crystal-blue eyes to look at Dash as slowly backed away, down the winding path, the roaring waterfall just beside them - completely forgotten. The white unicorn weakly chuckled as she tried to prop herself back to her hooves. With a pained winch, Rarity managed to rise to her shaky hooves before looking at terrified Rainbow once more before speaking the first words exchanged between them for over a year.
“Is that any way to greet an old friend, dearie?” Her accent hadn’t changed the slightest over the two and a half decades that had been added to her life. Rarity was still the same old Rarity, but not to Rainbow. To Rainbow she was a murderer, and that was exactly what the mare spat back, her initial fright of her own outburst and Rarity’s sudden appearance already forgotten.
“You’re not my friend,” Rainbow sternly hissed. “And you never will be after what you did… What the hell are you doing here?”
“Oh, don’t worry about it, saving your life was no big deal after you jumped of a bloody cliff like the suicidal maniac you are, it’s just what friends do!” Rarity patronized Dash with a roll of her blue eyes as she magiced out a small healing potion from one of the hundreds of pockets in the folds of her short dress. All the fondness in her voice was gone, replaced by cold bitterness and resentment.
The mare lifted the vial up to her lips and drank the red liquid with one mighty swig in the most unladylike of ways. She paused and took a few deep breaths before effortlessly throwing the empty vial off the side of the mountain as her body began to heal itself, her Element of Harmony glowing bright violet while she used her magic.
“I’ll ask again. What are you doing here?” Rainbow’s patience was quickly slipping as her hatred for her former friend burned like an emerald flame deep in a particular dragon’s throat.
“I’m rescuing you, of course. What do you think I was doing, taking an evening stroll?” Rarity snapped back. Rainbow’s brow only furrowed as she stared down the unicorn in the fleeting light, slowly wrapping the world in a veil of shadow.
“I don’t need rescuing, especially from you.” Rainbow kept her voice cold and low as she glared at the unicorn through her overgrown mane. Rarity glared back. There was nothing in her blank stare other than masked hatred and anger, except it wasn’t as deep-rooted as Rainbow’s, it was more like being mad at somepony for taking the last slice of pizza than wishing death upon their gut.
“Oh, so you definitely didn’t need my help after you tumbled off a mountain, hmm?” Rarity snarled in an oblivious tone at the faded-blue pegasus as she came closer, step by step, until the two mares were only a few hoofs away. Rainbow Dash didn’t repeat the question.
“Do you really, honestly think I ever wished death upon Dawnbreaker?” Rarity began. “Do you really, really think I wanted this to happen? To murder one of my best friends, to wreck what I have sacrificed so much to make, to scar a little filly by making her see her mother’s death in the most gruesome of ways? You might think that I don’t care for her but I do… do you really think I would ever do that to her? Do you?”
Rarity pushed her face so close to Rainbow’s their noses almost brushed together. “Do you think I don’t know I have blood on my hooves? I know what I did, Rainbow, and I know you will never forgive me. And you don’t have to.”
Rainbow raised an eyebrow.
“I came here because I need one thing from you and one thing only. I need you to trust me when I say I never wanted any of this… And I can fix it.” Rarity whispered the last part and leaned back giving Rainbow some space. The darkness around them was closing in and the mare did the only thing she could. She whispered something under her breath and her Element lit up like a lantern as she watched every move Rainbow made as the mare mulled over her words.
“You can’t fix dead.” That was the only thing Rainbow spat out before she turned her tail to Rarity. “I appreciate you saving me from the fall and all that crap but you can now fuck off. Why should I even consider trusting you? Why should I even bother to trust anyone anymore? I shouldn’t, you all betrayed me, that’s why. As a thanks for catching me I’ll let you walk away tonight, but don’t think I'm not coming after you for what you did.”
“You don’t even have a sword.” Rarity darkly muttered. “You’re injured and malnourished. You don’t have a place to stay, a plan or even any information. I do.” Rarity took a step after Rainbow but stopped when the prismatic pegasus glared back at her.
“One reason Rares’. Give me one frigen reason to not throw you off the mountainside right here, right now, and it better be a good one cuz’ I ain’t feeling very generous.” Rainbow grit her teeth as she stared Rarity into backing up, concern breaking through her composure.
The pallid unicorn stood quiet as she stared at Dash’s rose eyes that seemed to pierce her very existence. Finally, she sighed.
“I can’t. There are many reasons but I know you well enough to know just how petty they are to you,” She paused. “I can’t make you come with me, dear, I know that. And I know I can’t make you believe me. So all I can do is pray that you do.”
Rarity hung her head with a defeated sigh and turned around and began walking up the mountain trail, a faint magical barrier appearing around her and shielding her from the murky waterfall. She glanced back, and unmistakable sadness suddenly crossing her features before she stepped into the rushing waters that concealed her and her magical light, leaving Rainbow alone in the darkness with nothing but the moon shining through the patchy clouds above.
The prismatic pegasus stared after her through the grimy waters, their song lost to her. She involuntarily slumped to her haunches as something about what Rarity had said still clung to her like an invisible spider’s web. Always there, but never seen.
A part of Rainbow was determined to sit there until the sound of the world faded, leaving her and her thoughts on the slippery slope of the mountain she had just escaped. But there was something there. Something deep inside her that made her trust Rarity’s words for whatever irrational reason there was.
Rainbow clenched her jaw as she felt tears push their way out of her eyes. She had promised not to cry, to stay focused, for Dawn, everything for Dawn. But now that she sat there… wet and alone, she realized just how vulnerable she was.
But there was something else. Something…
Rainbow didn’t even realize what she was doing until she felt a gentle warmth brush against her chest. She looked down to see her hoof pressed against something that wasn’t there anymore. She didn’t know if it was real or just her damaged mind when she saw a ruby glint flicker where a crystalline lightning bolt once hung from its golden necklace.
Rainbow bit her lip as realization dawned on her. The only reason she had ever gone so far, so deep and so long for all this time was now reminding her what she truly was. She was Loyalty.
And Loyalty was calling her back.
o.O.o.O.o
With a gasp Rainbow broke through the waterfall only to tumble over her hooves for the billionth time that day. The cavern she was splashing in was perfectly hidden behind the rushing waters and it lay completely untouched by ponies.
Faintly glowing, neon blue mushrooms the size of Rainbow’s head sprouted from the walls and floor and dark allege covered every little indent and puddle. Small crystals pushed out from the walls, a flickering rainbow light shinning from within. Water dripped form the ceiling forming stalactites and stalagmites, Rainbow could never tell them apart as she began to slowly walk deeper into the cavern. Rainbow could’ve sworn she saw a rat or some other mini-monstrosity skitter by.
The odd and probably magical plants provided about as much illumination as the stars through the grey clouds, but Rainbow didn’t mind. She didn’t mind at all as she saw a bobbing, violet light from around a corner of the cave as it narrowed down and began to lead deeper inside the mountains.
Rainbow began to gallop, careful not slip on the mushy plant-life under her hooves, as she closed the distance. When she slid around the corner she saw none other than Rarity staring back at her. Her worried expression instantly faded as she saw a faint smile on Rainbow’s lips.
The pegasus took a few more steps closer but stopped, keeping at a distance a she watched Rarity winch when the unicorn shifted her weight to her right forehoof, quickly changing her stance.
“Rarity, I…” Rainbow tried to say something but couldn’t. There were no words to say because the rational part of her mind was screaming to shed blood that wasn’t hers. Rainbow swallowed a lump in her throat along with the morbid thoughts surfacing in her brain. “I won’t forgive you. I will never, ever, ever forgive you for what you did, but that doesn’t mean we can’t work together. I will trust you just enough for us to join forces and save Nova and what is left of our and Dawn’s life work. And that’s it.”
Rarity could barely suppress her giddy smile about finally having just a fraction of the former-assassins trust, but that quickly faded. With a grim tone she sighed and tried her best to not lose what little she had.
“I know I’ve done horrible things, Rainbow. And I know that you will never forgive me, but that is not what I came here for and I can very well live knowing I took part in murdering one of my best friends…” She paused to take deep breath. “But it’s not about me, or Dawnbreaker, or you or any of us. It’s about little Nova. And we are going to save her, Rainbow, I can promise you that much.”
Rarity smiled with determination and watched Rainbow do them same, except the pegasus was much more reserved about her feelings. Without another word exchanged between them, Rarity turned back to where she was heading and began a brisk trot, Rainbow trailing behind her. Now, it was only a matter of time before all the pieces could fall in place.
o.O.o
“Soooooooo, Rares’… Where ya’ taking me anyway?” Rainbow finally spoke after a long, long while of silence between the two as they traversed the murky caves of the massive mountain. Water dripped from the low ceiling of the cave as Rarity bravely trudged forward, her Element of Harmony aglow.
“There is a small checkpoint we were using while trying to get you out of the Undercity, it shouldn’t be far now.” Rarity explained.
“We?” Rainbow raised an eyebrow. “There’s more of you?”
“Of course!” Rarity chirped in her sing-song voice. “What, do you really think it’s just me who wants the Sparkle kin’ back on the throne? Don’t humor me, Rainbow.”
“Then who is it? It better be somepony I know.” Rainbow continued to prod with a skeptical tone.
“Like I said, we’re not far now. You’ll see when we get there… and yes… I'm pretty sure you know all of them.” Rarity cut off the conversation and the two mares continued their trek in silence.
It wasn’t long until the dripping of water was replaced by a full-out roar of a rushing river. As Rarity entered a larger cavern the light from her Element revealed a massive crevice splitting the alcove in half. Crystal clear water rushed through the bottom of the ravine and Rainbow guessed it was some kind of mountain stream. As she walked closer the pegasus noticed the rotten remains of a wooden suspension bridge that hung limply over the obsidian colored edge.
“Woah…” It was the only thing Rainbow managed to mutter as she watched several pebbles crumble from under her hoof and tumble into the inky depths below. The mare shuddered remembering her latest swim and backed away from the edge.
She turned to Rarity with a questioning glance but before she cloud even say anything, the while unicorn gently placed her hoof between Rainbow’s folded wings. She pushed a spot between the pegasus's shoulder blades which made the her graying wings pop open. After a quick inspection Rarity lit her horn and the silver braces around Rainbow’s wings began to hum.
It barely took a second and the bracelets popped open and fell to the stone floor with a quiet ping. Surprise and amazement lit up on Rainbow’s face as she gently flexed her wings, no longer feeling her inherent magic being dampened. It was an almost forgotten sensation.
She turned to Rarity with a thankful smile and opened her mouth to speak. “But how are you-” Before Rainbow could finish her question Rarity’s horn sparked up and the mare disappeared with an ear-shattering crack and a bright flash of blue and white light. A second later the same crack could be heard on the other side of the ravine where Rarity appeared, slightly dazed.
Rainbow's ears drooped. “What else did Dawn teach you…?” she grimly muttered as she peered over the side of the crevice. It was pretty wide, further than a running jump, but an easy task for any pegasus… especially the best flier in all of Fallen Equestria.
With an arrogant grin Rainbow backed up to the opening from where the two mares had come from. Without Rarity by her side, the cavern was much darker, but it didn’t matter the slightest. With a few deep breaths and scraping her hoof against the ground like a bull readying for a charge, Rainbow dashed forward. Her wings flapped by her sides with purpose and great strength as the mare rushed closer to the edge of the ravine.
As her forehooves came down just on the edge of the jutting rock, Rainbow kicked back with her hind legs and leaped into the air. She furiously flapped her wings but her heart sank as she felt something was wrong. Her wings couldn’t find and grab any magical currents. It was like there weren’t any and the pegasus began to fall.
She kept flapping her wings but to no avail as Rainbow’s forehooves crashed into the rock just below the ledge she was aiming for. The mare clung to the stones for dear life as they crumbled under weight and she pumped her wings as hard as she had ever done before, just to keep her afloat. It felt like they were about to rip her torso in half when two white hooves bound in yellow sippers reached down and grabbed Rainbow by her forehoof before yanking her upwards.
With a mighty tug Rarity pulled Rainbow Dash over the ledge and onto the flat surface of the other side. Rainbow panted and coughed as she felt her insides twisting and turning from the strain and shock her body had just experienced. Before she could do anything a wave of nausea washed over her and she did the only thing she could at that moment. She puked.
The chunky, grey bile gushed out of her mouth and over her hooves as the poor mare tried to cling onto the stones in fear of helplessly falling into the churning waters once more. Rainbow emptied her stomach all at once, what little she had eaten for the past day or two was now on display and all over her face and chest as she weakly collapsed in the puddle of her own vomit.
The mare coughed as she drew raspy breaths, the acidic muck burning her throat and nose. Rainbow closed her eyes and let the mushy puke cool against her face as she simply lay here, her aged body finally giving up on her after a day in hell.
It was only when something pressed against her lips, did Rainbow realized she was held up in a field of blue magic. Rarity pressed a small water bottle against the pegasus, coaxing her to take a sip. Rainbow weakly groaned in protest against being treated like a sick foal but Rarity didn’t give in. Eventually, with a sigh of defeat, Rainbow closed her lips around the neck of the small bottle and took a mouthful of refreshing water.
Rarity had set her down on her haunches and was using a small napkin to clean off most of the vomit as Rainbow gurgled and swooshed the water around her mouth. After getting the taste of bile out of her mouth and taking a few more gulps of water Rainbow could bring herself to speak.
“What just happened…?” she weakly muttered as Rarity pulled out a third napkin and began to wipe the corners of the pegasus’s muzzle. After a hefty sigh, Rarity answered.
“You’ll have to forgive me, dearie, I didn’t expect you to be so… frail… But I had to prove a point. And that is the fact that magic is gone.”
Rainbow shoved away the napkin Rarity was holding in her magical grasp to prove a counterpoint. The unicorn got her gist but still shook her head as she rose to her hooves.
“Let me elaborate that. Magic is fading. Common unicorns can no longer even levitate a quill and pegasi can no longer fly. Food is running short since the orchards and fields no longer yield nearly as much produce and earth ponies can’t do anything about…” Rarity began rummaging through the bigger pockets on her dress. “It’s like the Fall all over again…” she grimly added as she pulled something out of a pocket much too small for the item.
Rainbow Dash’s eyes sparked when she saw what Rarity was holding in her outstretched hoof. Made from the purest of gold, engraved by Lords of Magic themselves and the gem cut so perfectly to reflect the shine of light and cast a ruby glint of a lightning bolt wherever it was pointed.
The Element of Loyalty pulsed with a warm light as it sensed its owner’s presence. With weakened hooves Rainbow reached out and grasped the necklace with more care that she had ever displayed. She let her limbs run over every edge and engraving as she reminisced in days gone by before placing the Divine creation around her neck.
Instantly, as the gold clasped together a jolt passed through Rainbow’s body, empowering her, driving a sensation much like the one she had felt at the waterfall through her body. Her coat became brighter and her sickness and weakness retreated and this time the power was there to stay. With a confused expression the rainbow mare gazed up at grim looking Rarity.
“The Elements are the only tidbits that still alow us to use magic. Dawnbreaker was what was holding this realm together. Now, without her or Nova there to anchor the magic of this world, it’s slowly fading away. The sun and moon are frantic and inconsistent, the Harmony Prism is a maelstrom or a still sea on a seconds notice. Everything is going to hell, Rainbow, and the only way I can fix it is with your help… So I had to show you just how grave our situation is… forgive me.”
Rarity hung her head in shame only to be surprised by a pair of cyan hooves that wrapped around her and pulled her close. Rainbow didn’t say a single world as she hugged the white unicorn. Once she let go, she helped Rarity to her hooves and with a smile nudged them onwards.
o.O.o
Rainbow Dash had once thought that she could never mend the broken ties between her and the other Elements. That their betrayal had forever severed their connection, that they were no longer her friends, but hollow shells wearing the skins of ponies she had once loved like the sisters she never really had.
And maybe that was true.
But all that time while she walked by Rarity’s side, their Elements aglow with a red and violet light, she truly believed that things could be fixed… at least for one… But still, in the back of her mind she knew what she was fighting against. Three ponies. Three mares. Three targets that had to be crossed out for Dawnbreaker’s daughter Nova to ascend the throne.
And Rainbow knew it could only be her that did the dirty work. That’s what she was trained to do, that’s what she matured to be, that’s what she was doing her entire life ever since the Fall of the Celestials. And that’s what she was going to keep doing, no matter what.
“Rainbow, dearie?” a soft voice snapped Rainbow Dash out of her thoughts. She raised her head and found herself staring at a massive metal door, a circle of runes etched in the middle. She turned to Rarity that stood by her side.
“This is it?” Dash flatly asked. She cast a glance back the way they came only to see nothing but the eerie darkness of the damp cave. The pegasus had no idea how far in the mountain they were but judging by the way they moved and how much her legs ached, they were in pretty deep.
“Yes, dearie, this is it. On the count of three?” Rarity eagerly asked as she faced Rainbow. The prismatic pegasus only shrugged and turned to the door. She silently counted to three with each exhale and opened her mouth to shout in unison with her unicorn companion.
“SAI’REE!” The two mares shouted in perfect sync in a tongue not their own as their necklaces flashed ever brighter. The circle of runes began to glow with a red and violet light as the massive door groaned and swung open, granting the two ponies entry to what lay just beyond. But what greeted Rainbow made her pause at the sheer sight of it.
The door opened up to reveal a giant cavern. It reminded the pegasus of the Harmony Prism - massive and glowing crystals thrusted up from the ground and the sides of the cave, a rainbow glow pulsing from within, illuminating the darkness. Dozens of small openings were strewn about as they showed their maws to the crystalline light.
In the middle of it all laid a small shack, long forgotten by time, hundreds of broken and dripping pipes running through it like blood vessels to a heart. The rotten walls were barely holding it upright, half of its clay shingle roof long since caved in on itself. Rainbow guessed it used to be colored in some kind of blue, paint shriveled and washed away over the years.
But what caught the aged mare’s attention wasn’t the shack nor the pipes, nor the giant crystals burning as bright as the sun. Instead, it was a small group of ponies hunched over a warm fire that flickered from within an old oil drum just at the rotten doors of the structure.
Just as that, two figures rose to their hooves, eyes darting between the two Elements. One of the ponies, coat of copper, stepped forward, a running jump away from Rainbow Dash, as their eyes met. Her lip quivered as disbelief crossed her features and tears gathered at the corners of her dull-purple eyes.
Rainbow stared at the young mare in front of her, something fundamental inside her shattering. She gulped and turned back to Rarity who was wearing and warm smile. The prismatic pegasus couldn’t get any words over her lips as she stared at her unicorn friend. Rarity’s smile brightened as she slightly tilted her head to the side before speaking, true, caring warmth shinning in her voice.
“Welcome home, dearie.”
Rainbow stared at her for the longest time before turning back, a dry gulp sliding down her throat. As her eyes once more were cast at the copper mare Rainbow couldn’t help but feel surreal. The young pony had stepped closer, a hoof’s reach away from Rainbow, trying to make sure her narrowed eyes weren’t deceiving her.
And they stood there, unmoving, trembling, barely breathing, bright rose clashing with faded violet. The copper mare finally spoke, nothing more than a faint whisper.
“M-mommy…?”
Rainbow bit her lip as it curled into a smile, eyes tearing up as her heart quivered.
