Rainbow stared around at her surroundings as she glided through the portal, fanning her wings to maintain height as it closed behind her. Far below her, a sea of molten rock sprayed spouts of lava into the air on occasion, with strange creatures swimming within it. Spike towers dotted the sea, rising out of the lava as though desperately seeking to pierce the roiling clouds and escape to the crimson sky. Lightning flashed repeatedly in the distance, the thunderous booms left in their wake echoing off the towers in fell howls, mingled with the cries of the creatures desperately struggling to survive.
...on the plus side, the updrafts were seriously choice!
Rainbow glided through the landscape, spilling air every so often to keep from getting too high, while doing her best to stay high enough she didn't end up roasted. As she flew, she eventually caught sight of something different in the landscape. In the far distance, a crimson four-armed giant towered over the landscape, staring straight at her. Frowning, Rainbow made her way towards the figure, assuming this was the one she was supposed to be meeting.
As she got closer, the creature began to chuckle, an awful sound that echoed across the dead lands around them and made the very lava shiver. "So, you are the one he sent here," he stated, his voice seething with barely suppressed fury. "I am Mehrunes Dagon, and I reign here supreme!"
"Says the one doing Discord's dirty work!" Rainbow taunted, refusing to allow herself to show the fear she was feeling.
Dagon snarled angrily. "Oaths or no, the day will come when I take back that which was stolen from and denied to me," he growled, the intensity of his voice causing a nearby spike tower to crumble.
"Blah, blah, blah!" Rainbow teased, pushing every button she could to hide her own terror. "Are we gonna fight or what?"
Dagon blinked at her, then burst into wicked laughter that sent a shiver up her spine. "You, fight me? I could crush you like an insect without even trying. No, your trial here will be quite simple." He held up his two lower hands, closed tight. "In my right hand, I hold the artifact you are here for. In my left, I hold...something else. When I open my hands, you will have to choose which you seek to retrieve, for even as fast as you are you will only have time to retrieve one before my fists descend, crushing that which I hold so it can never be retrieved."
Rainbow snorted, amused. "You really think you can have anything that would make me betray my friends?" she barked out in defiance, idly gliding towards his right hand. "It was in Discord's rules. We all gotta win here, or we all lose!"
"Indeed," Dagon confirmed. "In that case, this should be a very simple choice for you." Slowly, he opened his hands.
In his right hand, something glittered in the colors of metal. But in his left, a small form in dark orange and purple cried out, "Rainbow Dash! Help!"
Rainbow went pale. She knew that voice. "Scootaloo!" she screamed out in terror. Without even thinking about it, she blurred for the left hand.
Dagon smirked as his fists came down. Before Rainbow could correct the distance she'd shifted away, both hands had come down. Scootaloo's last scream echoed in her ears. "Scoot, no!" she cried out, banging on Dagon's fist with her forelegs.
Dagon burst into laughter. "Well, well, well...betrayed your friends for the little one, and in your eagerness you betrayed her by not waiting to understand the stakes. Truly, you belong here-"
"Shut up!" Rainbow roared, shooting straight up and uppercutting Dagon on the point of his chin hard enough to snap his head back. "Give her back!" Sweeping around, she slammed hard into his eye.
With a roar of pain, Dagon brought his hand up to clutch his eye as the pressure of the blow caused it to pop like a balloon.
"Give her back!" Rainbow wailed, diving straight down and ripping through Dagon's loin armor to slam into his crotch as she passed, going dangerously close to the lava.
Dagon bent over to clutch at the fork of his legs, beginning to wonder if he'd made a mistake.
"Give her back!" Rainbow screamed shrilly, using the heat of the lava to shoot straight up, flipping Dagon end over end as she shot into the sky.
Dagon clutched at his head as he landed on his back in the magma. He paused, realizing the artifact - which hadn't been destroyed - had somehow gone missing. A thunderous boom that wasn't thunder caught his attention, dragging his eyes upward to a rainbow that was endlessly arcing outwards and tearing his sky apart. "What the-"
"GIVE! HER! BACK!" The scream cut the air like a banshee's wail, defying physics as it reached his ears long before the rainbow streak that blazed towards his skull at hypersonic speeds. With all the force of the Sonic Rainboom, Rainbow slammed Mehrunus' Razor into his own skull.
The power of the Rainboom supercharged the artifact...and Mehrunes Dagon, the Prince of Destruction, lay dead in the lava of his own domain as his own dagger claimed his soul. The shockwave of his death echoed across his realm, and the molten rock slowed, cooled, and went still.
Jerking the small dagger back out, Rainbow flapped over to Dagon's still left hands...and found nothing. "Scoot..." she whimpered softly, tears in her eyes. "Give...give her back..." She slumped down onto the now cold stone.
"So do you think Rainbow and the others will be here soon?"
Rainbow's head jerked up as she heard that voice. "S-Scoot?" Spinning towards the source, she saw a shimmering disc of light.
"Oh, I'm sure they will," Discord's voice echoed through the portal. "Don't tell the Daedra this, but I've stacked things against them in who went where. It's just so much more fun that way." Three familiar giggles followed that statement.
In desperate hope, Rainbow flapped her way into the disc of light...