The air crackled with chaotic flame.
Rainbow Dash jerked to the side, twirling like a damaged kite.
The first volley of fire dropped past her and the Lightning-Bearer, but it was followed soon by a second plume of aquamarine death.
Rainbow strafed to the other side, still struggling to keep up her pace with the stolen dreadnaught. This was not something that pleased Nevlamas, and soon the air resonated with her howling song as she angled her massive wings plunged like an armored mountain towards the flailing pegasus.
The pendant around Rainbow's neck had shorted out. Musical praises flew from the mouths of those on board the airship. Rainbow looked everywhere at once. All was chaos, fire, and starlight. Panicking, she dove towards the only patch of air that was still dark. From the shifting fluids in her ears, she sensed that she was plummeting toward the earth, though her eyes couldn't tell from all of the flames suddenly erupting before her. Rainbow Dash found herself plunging into a sea of chaotic plasma, and she did all she could to pull up.
Evening out, Rainbow realized that she had sunk below the Lightning-Bearer. With the ship having slowed immensely, she found herself skimming the bottom hull of the vessel. She spun until the battleship's dark surface became her lower horizon, and she raced towards the bow looming in front of her across quivering starlight.
Before she could blink, the hull lit up with an aquamarine sheen. Nevlamas had descended until she was below her target, and she let loose an ear-splitting shriek as she closed the distance between her and the petite pegasus in her enraged sights.
Rainbow Dash looked behind her. All she saw was the Dark Divine's crown of antlers sweeping through the air after her. Sparks flew as the crystalline tips scraped the metal belly of the Lightning Bearer on a path towards eviscerating the pegasus.
In a split second, Rainbow Dash relied on utter stupidity. She stopped flapping her wings altogether, kicked against the hull with her hooves, and flipped backwards. Angling her body, she miraculously twisted and slipped her way between the razor-sharp branches of Nevlamas' antlers.
Twirling, Rainbow pivoted herself upright and flew in theopposite direction, threading her way between the hull of the Lightning Bearer and the undulating spine of her possessed foe. This required careful zig-zagging, since the chunks of chaos crystals embedded in Nevlamas' backside constantly thrusted into Rainbow's face like a forest of teeth.
At last, she reached the thrusters of the dreadnaught again, and she felt as though she was in the clear.
Nevlamas' thrashing tail disagreed. With one massive swoop, it swung within meters of Rainbow Dash's position. The sheer concussion blast of the distorted air around the Divine's appendage was enough to knock Rainbow off her flight like a wrecking ball.
"Aaaaugh!" Rainbow's voice cracked as she twirled wildly towards the desert valley below. She had lost all of her senses for a brief blink in time. By the time she uprighted herself, the horizon was still reeling. Rainbow pivoted until she was facing northwest, and the Lightning Bearer loomed hundreds of feet away, growing more and more distant as the Xonans resumed accelerating the battleship beyond the pegasus' reach.
Before she could even resume her flight, two shrieking jaws consumed her vision, spitting fire.
With a yelp, Rainbow dove below the plumes of flame. She had to dive a second and a third time as Nevlamas' claws raked across the air, followed by her deathly tail. Rainbow flew northwest, but it had become a haphazard act. Having to dodge the attacks of Nevlamas caused her to lower to sea level, and now she was skimming the desert floor so closely that dust flew past her wings and obscured the stars to her left and right.
The entire time, Nevlamas' beating wings gave the moment its deadly percussion. Rainbow could easily see each boulder and crag of rock that she had to skirt around thanks to the light emanating from the Divine's gaping jaws.
As the air heated up, Rainbow's racing mind quivered between adrenaline and memories. When it came time that Axan actually wanted to kill her, the pegasus had barely lasted ten seconds before her body was torn to ribbons. Now a Divine of Chaos wanted her deader than dead. How could anypony outrace that?
A loud bass noise echoed from above. Rainbow's eyes darted up in time to spot the Lightning Bearer accelerating in a burst of magically imbued speed. It soared towards the northwest horizon... towards Seclorum's headquarters... without her.
"Okay, sister..." Rainbow Dash suddenly snarled. "You wanna have a race?" She pivoted so that she flew backwards, thrusting an angry sneer at the burning maw of the dragon behind her. "Then you darn well better keep up!"
Nevlamas answered with a breath of fire.
"Come on!" Rainbow Dash howled into the distorted vapor as she juked to the left, then barreled over the flames in a beautiful corkscrew. "Ngggh-Yaaaaaugh!" She shouted against the deafening roar as she pushed her body just inches past the skin-roasting plasma.
Her body darted behind a craggy mesa. Instantly, the air cooled, but Rainbow Dash didn't revel in the moment. She kept accelerating, keeping her eyes locked to her left. In a matter of seconds, she cleared the plateau, and aquamarine daylight swam parallel to her in the shape of an enraged dragon.
Nevlamas spat two more fireballs to her right, launching them at her speeding target.
Rainbow dodged the first one, dove down, and squeezed her way past a pair of boulders in order to narrowly escape the second. The rocks exploded behind her; Rainbow used the concussive blast to get a boost. It was good timing too; Nevlamas had launched a liquid plume of chaos flame, and it trailed after Rainbow's tail as the pegasus pushed her wings to the limit.
Squealing with strained muscles, Rainbow pulled up. The stream of aquamarine fire trailed after her. In a daring move, Rainbow backflipped, twirled around the flame, and curved her wings at an angle. Air-braking, she stalled, spun, and then flapped her wings so that she shot to the left... and straight at Nevlamas' mutated skull.
The Divine's eyes actually twitched. Her nostrils flared, and two mucousy crystals spat out from her snout. They fell and then hatched in mid-air, giving birth to a pair of hissing serpents that swam upwards on chaotic currents of energy. With hissing fangs, they launched themselves at Rainbow's figure.
Rainbow was already twirling before the snakes latched onto her. With a deep-throated growl, she spun and spun and spun until the twin serpents were dangling loosely like a pair of windsocks. At last, she thrusted her wings out, and the summoned beasts flew into dissolving starlight. Angling herself towards Nevlamas' skull, Rainbow growled and fired a bolt of ruby energy from her pendant.
The crimson beam flew true, lopping off a tiny branch at the end of one of Nevlamas' antlers. Before the Divine knew what was happening, Rainbow snatched the crystalline barb in her teeth, clutched the dragon's crown, twirled down the central shaft of the antler, and landed with her hooves planted atop the monster's brow. With a muffled scream, Rainbow stabbed the sharp end of the branch deep into Nevlamas' forehead.
Tainted blood sprayed across the night, followed by Nevlamas' howling scream. All the Divine had to do was toss her head once, and Rainbow Dash was thrown off like a prismatic tick.
Holding her breath, Rainbow Dash used the momentum of the dragon's toss and flapped her wings until she controlled her own velocity. She angled herself northwest, breathless. With twitching eyes, she caught the distant glow of the Lightning Bearer. She flew after the sight before it could disappear against the horizon, a task made intensely difficult as the angry snarl of Nevlamas grew closer and closer to her tail, followed by her heated breaths.
Sensing another burst of flame coming, Rainbow Dash looked everywhere. Glancing down, she saw the desert valley dipping into a series of craggy ravines. Soon, she dove along with it, quivering at the sight of the rocky walls lighting up with demonic aquamarine firelight.
Ninja update!
Whew...
Apparently the Loyalty pendant is a laser now.
I'm perfectly okay with this.
Stay on target. Stay on target!
derpicdn.net/img/2013/9/15/428497/large.png
3674655
Shame it doesn't have the same efficiency as the Friendship Orbital Cannon.
Let the battle commence!!
3674655 It's definitely a ray-type spell of pure law.
It's been a while since we've seen the whole "I'm going to fly right at you after turing around so I can dodge some more" trick.
>wrecking ball
3674840
I FLEW IN THROUGH YOUR GAPING MAAAAW!!!!!
I NEVER SAW YOU FLYING ABOOOOOVE!!!!!!
I WAS DODGING ALL YOUR FIRE BAAAAALLLSSS
ALL YOU EVER DID WAS SNORT THINGS AT MEEEEEEE!!!!!!
YOU JUST, SNO.. ORT AT ME!!!!!!!!!!!
Nevlamas needs some harmony. Pronto.
~Basso
Yeah, but is Nevlamas queen under the mountain?
Rainbow Dash used to bag whomprats in her T-16 in Beggars Canyon. Nevlamas has no chance. Death Star, meet Skywalker.
So, is Axan still keeping an eye on RD? Because I remember ages ago there was a chapter to that effect.
I'm a bit surprised Rainbow Dash hasn't pulled off a sonic rainboom yet. She's pulled off three (if you include the rain-nuke, four if you include her foalhood one) in three seasons of the show, but not a single one in four books of this story.
Im wondering something so horribly complex and excessive I highly suspect it has nothing to do with whats going to actually occur, but who cares, its spectacular.
I wonder what the effect would be, on that tiny chaos antler electrode embedded in that divines head, of that dragons plasma fire, being captured and redirected, focused by the blast of a rainboom, which occurs right in the energy reflective transitional gap of a rupture in the machine world, like microwave emmision occurs in the gap of a cavity magnetron in a microwave oven, but with the broad band pulse compression effect of the NOVA laser array?
Its bound to at least get her attention.
3674689
You magnificent bastard.
3675949
She did use a rainboom to break into Axan's lair.
BOSS FIGHT
CUE MUSIC
Damm she kick da booty hard!
3674689 I am SO glad I am not the only one who thought of this.
3674974
3674689
I saw both of these and just lost it. Congrats you two. I had my first guffaw in many weeks. I 'm still spontaneously chuckling thinking about this image.
So Rainbow now knows Dazzling Gleam/Moonblast? Cool.
3676989
Okay, but... so many other awesome opportunities.
In the Canterlot wedding episode, she did one flying straight UP! Now she's like, super-powered. Couldn't she pull one off to catch up to the Lightning Bearer??
Or you know, rain-nuke Nevlemas.
Oh, so she can shoot lasers out of the pendant... She should do that more.
Also, points for actually hurting her instead of dying immediately like with Axan
3682218
Well, she can NOW.
I think she/the pendant gained a bunch of useful tricks when the book problem was solved.
Ah yes, the only thing that can really wound a dragon: their own natural weapons. I recall a novel where they killed an otherwhise nearly invincible dragon by placing a spell on it that caused an itch so extreme that it started tearing itself apart with its own claws. Then again, looking at Nagu'n's dermal hygiene, I don't think it can get that much worse. And being stabbed with her own antlers at least puts her in the same league as Floyds.
3674655 You know what it does to Chaos.
3675344 I broke the darn thing myself.
>she angled her massive wings plunged like an armored mountain
>flew in theopposite direction
3674974 LEL
3674706
Wow, you're the first person I've ever come across that remembers/knows of that fantastic game. Good on ya!
IIIIIt's Dashie's Second Get-Backing Adventure!!
Well...damn. That was bloody. But at this rate, Dash'll have to take care of Nevlamas, already a nigh-impossible task, fast bough so that she doesn't lose the Lightning Bearer in complete darkness. Even for Dash, all of the odds are stacked against her. These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
P.S. I'm almost there...just a few more nights of this to go...
3674974
This is bad. Very very bad.
So that was pretty awesome. For some reason, I almost thought that this would be the entire boss battle, but I'm happy to know that Loyalty lasers and badassery is in the future to come.
Man, Odrsjot is really coming in handy. Harmony guided lazer beams!
5916057
5916057 DR OCTOGUANOPUS BBBLLLAAHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Set phasers to Harmony.
I'm surprised she hasn't tricked the dragon into wrecking the ship.
6200709 same here.
She really seems to have a thing for stabbing attackers with their own dismembered body parts when she's angry.
Ah, the old ripping bits off your enemy and stabbing them with it. Never gets old.