The massed crowd gasped in awe at the aerial spectacle of precision bravery that was a typical Wonderbolts show. Spitfire had retired two years ago and the new Captain; Rainbow Dash had made some changes to the choreography, increasing the number of pegasi flying at any event to nine and overseeing a recruitment drive to ensure that there were plenty of flyers available for any display.
Attracting new trainees had never been a problem for the Wonderbolts, but Rainbow was a one pony personality cult, the star who only served to enhance the team’s appeal. Indeed, a special section had been set up within the Wonderbolts Academy just to cope with the increase in applications.
Having more flyers allowed Rainbow more flexibility to invent a whole library of new moves, each one of which was meticulously practiced before being unveiled to the admiring public. Whilst she had not set about trying to overshadow her predecessor, there was no doubting the surge in popularity currently being enjoyed by the team.
Her friends had travelled to see all of her shows during her first year in charge, but now in the second season they had started to take her daring and professionalism for granted. The most important pony in her life, her marefriend had only ever attended occasionally, but Rainbow didn’t mind, she was after all the Princess of the Night and daytime displays occurred right in the middle of her sleep cycle.
They had been a steady couple for so long now that there had been much talk within the Court and beyond of a Royal Wedding. Whilst there was no shortage of love and devotion from either of them, many ponies across Equestria still held outdated views on same sex relationships, and between them, all the Royal Princesses and Rainbow had decided with heavy hearts that a wedding would not happen, at least not any time soon.
The nine pegasi climbed vertically and peeled off one at a time in perfect synchronisation to follow each other down at precise spacings and burn up at low level just in front of the crowd line to admiring applause. From her position out front, Rainbow smiled; the display was going well and the crowd was cheering enthusiastically. The nine broke into three groups at the end of the runway, three making a climbing circuit to the right, while three more performed a mirror image manoeuvre to the left, and the three remaining pegasi climbing inverted to meeting the other two groups at altitude exactly in the middle to cross and recross each other’s tails in a tightening plait before exploding into nine equally spaced roll-off–the-top moves.
Spitfire was in the crowd today witnessing the changes her protégé had made since having taken over and was naming to herself every move the synchronised pegasi were making. She held an impressed smile on her face whilst her eyes still sheltered behind her trademark sunglasses, nodding gently in approval as the show proceeded.
She had been instrumental in getting Rainbow top spot on the team, and not a day went by that she hadn’t congratulated herself on having made a good judgement call. Rainbow had earned a reputation every bit as strict as she herself had maintained over the flyers and took no truck from anypony. That was not to say that she only recognised the best performers; she would also encourage newbie flyers by introducing them to proper display flying as they neared the culmination of their training. In fact, if she wasn’t mistaken, there was one of them in the team today, a white stallion with yellow tail flying as Rainbow’s wingpony.
All nine pegasi now formed into an arrow formation and corkscrewed high in a climbing spiral, two breaking off and diving in opposite directions while the others climbed once more to be ready to dive in a flourish once the two solo flyers had completed their showpiece flypast. The two solo flyers, one trailing a rainbow tail, continued their dives while they increased speed for a high speed back to back pass just in front of the crowd line; a spectacular manoeuvre that always drew a sharp intake of breath from the crowd.
Rainbow’s lips were buffeting with the speed of the airflow as she could see her wingpony narrowing the gap to her really very fast. Just like practice, no great shakes, then it would be up to close the show with a sonic rainboom; she was always planning at least one or two steps ahead. All they had to do was follow what they had practiced during copious training sessions and it would be a piece of cake.
"Closer … closer … 90 degree roll to the left to pass back to back … WHAT THE?"
Rainbow suddenly saw to her horror that her novice wingpony had rolled too far over, and neither had time to make any further corrections! Her eyes went wide realising that nothing could save either of them now. There was no time to shout, to swear or to pray – they were going to hit …
The crowd knew the show was drawing to a close and all were looking forward to the sonic rainboom from the Wonderbolts’ ever-popular Captain, but first there were still a few more moves to go including the high speed back to back pass. Everypony had been treated to an exceptional quality of flying and looked forward with relish to the remainder of the highly polished display.
Spitfire gasped, her glasses falling off as her trained eye picked up on what Rainbow could see. She didn’t even have time to stand. One second the two blue suited pegasi were closing very fast, and the next they appeared to bounce off each other. The crowd gasped as they had already intended to do, but then it went quiet for a few brief seconds and a sickening whump sound spread over the crowd as the two performers plummeted towards the ground.
“Pegamedics!” shouted Spitfire, her reactions already having given her a head start over any other pony. Her authoritative voice reached a solitary pegasus medical orderly who was ringside, jerking him into life and he responded immediately by launching himself towards the two falling bodies. He would not be able to catch both, so he went for the star of the show, the one with the rainbow mane and tail, just intercepting her before she hit the ground. A hundred yards away there was the most horrible sound of splintering bone and snapping cartilage as the yellow tailed pegasus hit the ground hard and bounced, legs, wings and head flailing before hitting the ground again and coming to rest in a crumpled heap like a discarded ragdoll. Mercifully, nopony heard his last few seconds over the screams of the crowd.
In her bedchamber at Canterlot, a nocturnal blue alicorn awoke with a start.
***
“She’s coming round” said a disembodied voice that bounced around inside her head.
She opened her eyes just a crack. Too bright.
She tried to move. She couldn’t. It hurt. Everything hurt.
She tried to speak. She groaned.
“Rainbow” whispered a familiar voice “It’s me, Lulu. You’re OK.”
Her thoughts were groggy, hazy. Nothing made sense. What was happening to her?
She redoubled her efforts to speak and a peculiar rasping noise came out, nothing like she had been expecting.
“You’re in hospital” said the kindly voice “They’re going to make you better.”
Her memory wasn’t functioning. What did this mean? She couldn’t remember anything.
As she lay there, her marefriend kept talking to her. It was reassuring and soothed her as she slipped out of consciousness again.
She experienced a number of these brief waking episodes, before parts of her memory began to return. Sometimes there were different voices, but all carried the same tenderness and concern. The longer she stayed awake, the more she began to feel the needles and pipes in her body, feeding her, keeping her alive.
Each of her visitors brought something different; Twilight would read to her, Rarity would gossip, Pinkie would tell her jokes, but most of all her marefriend’s words exuded a love that reached out and cuddled her inside her prison of plaster casts and pipes. Some other ponies came by too, but she couldn’t work out who they were or where they fitted in; they were familiar but distant.
Piece at a time, her life started to come together; comments, observations, memories; each one acting as a nucleus around which the larger perspective of her life started to pull together. Along with her newly awakened self-discovery she also started to feel frustrated, cooped up, when what she really wanted to do was fly. She had remembered that she enjoyed it and was good at it, so was itching to try her wings out again, but any requests and pleas along these lines were met with an embarrassed silence.
Before long, Rainbow had regained a good memory of all aspects of her life except for her final display; a subject that all her visitors skirted around. It struck her as odd that since she had been Captain of the Wonderbolts why nopony had been complementing her on her flying.
One long awaited day, she was told that the casts would be coming off and she would be able to get up. This was such a small step, but for her it was a giant leap after which it would surely only be a brief matter of time before she would be flying again. Sure, she would probably be a bit slow to start with, but she would be performing sonic rainbooms again in no time.
Princess Luna, a regular visitor at her marefriend’s bedside, arrived early, trying hard to suppress the obvious tension she felt. Once a team of hospital staff was assembled, they all rallied round to cut Rainbow from her cast while Luna looked on apprehensively. She had rehearsed this moment many times, but when it came it was still shocking and she put a hoof to her mouth to cover the involuntary gasp.
Rainbow leaned upright relishing the delight of being released from the servitude of lying down. In celebratory mood she flexed the muscles that extended her wings and immediately overbalanced, caught by a medical orderly before she fell.
“What the …” she said in disbelief.
“It will be alright, really it will …” reassured Luna.
“What will be alright?” asked Rainbow accenting each of the words nervously. Then she turned her head and noticed for the first time what the hospital staff and her marefriend had known all along; she had lost one of her wings.
She stared in disbelief at what must have been a cruel prank. She wiggled the other wing; that was fine, but what had happened to the other one?
The colour drained from her face as the truth she wanted so desperately to avoid hit home.
“What? … Why didn’t you tell me?” she whispered hoarsely, the joy of her release having been suddenly replaced with utter horror.
Everything went uncomfortably quiet.
“We so very nearly lost you” whispered Luna, tears streaming down her muzzle.
“I – I’m a pegasus that can’t fly!” exploded Rainbow “I’m a freak!”
“No, it is not like that …” began Luna, but the lump in her throat chose that moment to choke off anything further, even if she could have found the right words.
“I WISH I WAS DEAD!” screamed Rainbow.