//------------------------------// // Not a Clever Pony // Story: Ofolrodi // by Imploding Colon //------------------------------// "Rainbow...???" Twilight Sparkle gnashed her teeth as the lavender forcefield pulled her after Rainbow Dash's rapidly ascending figure. The mesa containing Dark Reach became a distant speck against the slate gray blankness below them. "Rainbow Dash?! What are you doing?!" "I'm not doing," Rainbow grumbled. "I'm flying!" "Okay! Why are you flying?!" Twilight squinted into the whipping winds and starlight. "Where are you flying to?!" "Hold on!" Rainbow's wings blurred faster and faster. "I gotta pick up some speed!" "What for?" Twilight strained, concentrated, and finally "glided" alongside her anchor. "Rainbow," she spoke firmer, and sterner, once she was adjacent to Rainbow's curved ears. "Rainbow, if you were planning on making a long-distance flight, you really really should have alerted the rest of the Herald." "Uh huh." "Don't 'uh huh' me! This is serious! They're all you've got! Besides the girls and me, of course... but... you know what I mean—!" "I can sense where they are at any time," Rainbow said calmly amidst her speeding ascent. The air grew colder and colder as she gained more and more altitude, nonstop. "If I get lost..." A shrug. "...I'll just wait until Fluttershy wakes up and find my way back to them!" "You call that a plan?!" Twilight grimaced. She fidgeted even more. "Rainbow, tell me! Where are you going?!" "I'm just testing something." "Testing what?" "The fastest way to a destination is a straight line." Rainbow struggled to speak firmly against the beating winds. Fog formed against Scootaloo's goggles and she had to wipe them clean every once in a while with an agile fetlock so she could see. "We all might be slaves to the curve, but that doesn't mean we've gotta live by it." "Huh?" "In other words, buck the circle." Rainbow's body angled Curveside as she repositioned her beating wings. "If there's a way to avoid all of the struggle and crud that Gwen's company went through, then I'd best darn well find it." Twilight blinked curiously. She looked at where Rainbow's body was now angled. Rainbow Dash kept the faint golden glow of the Midnight Armory dead-center in her sights. And even though she was flying straight towards it now, the curved landscape bent and fell away. Dead ahead was a monumentally large space that filled the void of the bent plane. It was continents in size, and it cast just as thick a shadow. "Rainbow..." Twilight gulped. "Rainbow, you can't do this." "Why not?" "Look, I don't have time to explain the physics to you!" Twilight frowned. "The world isn't the only thing that's bent. The atmosphere is too!" "You don't know that," Rainbow said, flying straight into the void that separated her from her golden goal. "This is a realm of chaos!" Something flicked. The goggles glinted with brief red and yellow "So long as we don't know what makes it all work, then what's to stop us from working things out ourselves?!" "Rainbow, don't be stupid!" Twilight sputtered. "As awesome as you are, there are some things you just can't do!" "And where has believing in that gotten me, huh?!" Rainbow frowned as she pushed herself against the freezing altitudes. The air grew thinner and thinner; she had to wheeze to produce her words. "Verlax tried to strip me of all I'm good for. Well screw that. Maybe what I need to do here is take control!" "Rainbow, Verlax tried to do exactly what you're doing right now!" Twilight exclaimed, flailing her forelimb. "And it drove her crazy!" "Verlax was never crazy." Rainbow clenched her teeth. Frost was starting to form on her mane and eyelashes. She fought the urge to shiver. "Just pathetic." "Rainbow, even if you can make it far enough to pierce the heavens—you'll still have countless tens of thousands of miles to fly alone in deep space! Don't you get it?! You'd starve to death before you were done!" "I just need to know... th-that I can..." Rainbow's teeth was chattering. Her coat had turned two shades bluer. "...that... th-that I didn't push us all against the meat grinder d-down below for nothing..." "Remember, Sparky... the foundations of home will crumble without you." Rainbow's eyes twitched. "Rainbow!" "A right selection or a big mistake..." "Rainbow!" Twilight's face flickered beyond the fog. "Don't listen to him!" Rainbow gnashed her teeth. She swung a numb fetlock up and wiped the fog away. Fangs. Antlers. A mischievous grin. "What a nuisance. How about tossing the Element off?" A glinting smile. "You'll never have to hear her nag you again." "Grnnngh!" Rainbow Dash flipped a few times, "punching" and "bucking" the air. "Get away from me! Go! Leave!" She hyperventilated and shrieked. All the while the heavens spun, freezing and bone chilling. "I'm never going to... listen..." She coughed. "...to you... a-again..." She wheezed. It was impossible to breathe. "Rainbow—!" Twilight cried. Rainbow's eyes rolled back in her head. Her body went limp, and so did her wings. A great black crescent twirled beneath her... ...and soon she was plunging towards it. Cold... numb... And unconscious.