//------------------------------//
// Chapter 7 
// Story: Archimedes Constant 
// by Wheller 
//------------------------------//


Chapter 7


Rainbow Dash stumbled out of the Ponyville Library, continuing to rub the sleep from her eyes, and unfortunately, nearly being run over at the same time.

‘Out of the road!’ cried a, from Dash’s perspective, disembodied voice from in front of her.

Rainbow Dash opened her eyes to discover the gryphon self propelled artillery gun was about ready to run her over; she leapt backwards and smacked her head hard on the library door, causing a roar of laughs from the gryphons mounted on the gun carriage.

Rainbow Dash started rubbing the back of her head, considering herself lucky she hadn’t gotten a concussion from the force. She opened her eyes to discover a gryphon looming over her.

‘Rainbow Dash’, Gilda said coldly.

‘Gilda’, Rainbow Dash returned in just as cold a manner. Rainbow Dash remembered the last time she had seen Gilda, and for her trouble she’d gotten a bashing in the head, not this time. Though this time, Gilda’s rifle was slung over her back rather than in her talons. If this was going to get violent, Rainbow Dash was on her guard.

‘Let’s set some ground rules, I don’t want anything to do with you, and I know you don’t want anything to do with me, so you stay away from me? I’ll stay away from you’, Gilda snarled. ‘And keep the pink one away from me, or I will hurt her. Got it?’

‘Loud and clear’, Rainbow Dash said sarcastically.

Gilda said nothing; she turned and ‘accidentally’ swatted Rainbow Dash in the face with her tail. Rainbow Dash’s anger soared, if she weren’t still recovering from the bullet she had taken to her wing caused by Métis Retslaf in the divide, she’d have likely leapt at the gryphon and beaten her senseless for it.

I used to be the pony that nobody wanted to mess with; then I took a bullet to the wing. Rainbow Dash thought to herself with a sigh. She watched as Gilda spread her wings and hopped back into the gun carriage, and it quickly sped off, only to park several hundred metres down the road, behind the Lord Stuart, and the Welaran armoured car, where they’d take the Whitetail road into Whitetail Wood and up the mountainside towards Canterlot in only a few hours time.

Rainbow Dash glanced along the road where the gryphon self propelled gun had rolled in from and saw Twilight and Pinkie Pie walking towards her, joined in company by Fusilier Benjamin Willoughby. Rainbow Dash got up and trotted over towards them wearing a bright smile on her face. She noticed that Pinkie Pie’s mane had puffed back into its normal shape; she knew what that meant instantly. Pinkie Pie was doing better. Rainbow Dash threw her forelegs around Pinkie Pie in a tight hug.

‘Good to have you back Pinkie!’ she said, nuzzling her friend affectionately.

‘It’s good to be back Dashie!’ Pinkie Pie said, returning her friends affection. ‘Now all we got to do is think about what we’re gonna do about mean old Gilda!’

...

A few hours passed, several more groups had arrived in Ponyville, Afrikneigher ponies from Zhosa-Borwa arrived in a scout car, not unlike the one that Vinyl Scratch had ‘borrowed’ from South Island. Which Willoughby discovered parked behind the Library and asked how it had gotten there, to which Twilight and Rainbow Dash promptly denied knowledge of.

Likewise a Schäferhund medium tank showed up not long after that, and then a maori gryphon group from New Seeland in a South Island M3 Light tank, but was most impressive was the delegation from Bharat. The leaders where ponies, a Welaran Viceroy and technically, King George being the Emperor of Bharat, the soldiers however, were of a species called Tigers, which Benjamin Willoughby had described as felines, big cats.

What he did not elaborate on was just how big was big. One of them was about twice the size of a pony, and looked like they could swallow one whole without difficulty. They stuck out thanks to their orange fur and black stripes, and very large teeth. Despite, however, the fact that they were physically very intimidating, they were all quiet friendly.

At sun down, Benjamin Willoughby was forced to big his friend’s farewell. He returned to the Lord Stuart, and climbed up on the back of it. Soon enough, the entire parade of armoured vehicles was off towards Canterlot.

Everypony quickly lost interest as the final vehicle disappeared from sight and went into Whitetail Wood.

Rainbow Dash, Twilight Sparkle, and Pinkie Pie looked at each other with a smile. They had each other, and that was what matters.

‘You know what this calls for!?’ Pinkie Pie asked cheerfully.

‘A party?’ Twilight and Rainbow Dash asked in a deadpan tone in unison with each other.

‘Well duh! Who do you think you’re talking to? Silly fillies!’ Pinkie Pie called out, and she dashed off to Sugarcube corner to throw something together.

‘Oh Pinkie Pie’, Rainbow Dash said. ‘So random’.

Twilight nodded in agreement. This really couldn’t be any better. Pinkie Pie was genuinely happy. She no longer had to pretend.

...

Early the next morning, Vinyl Scratch awoke to discover Surprise staring at her, she jumped in surprise sitting up and hitting her head against the concrete wall of the room. She clutched her head and began to rub it, hoping to alleviate the pain.

‘Okay, new rule, don’t do that, it’s creepy’, Vinyl said as she looked down at the Pegasus sharing the cot with her.

‘Sorry!’ Surprise called out cheerfully. ‘You look so happy when you’re sleeping, I didn’t want to wake you!’

Vinyl Scratch couldn’t help but smirk, she took her hoof and ruffled Surprise’s mane playfully, finding it only mildly strange that she couldn’t even feel the chain knife that was hidden in it. Surprise’s mane must be bigger on the inside than the outside, a line of thought that Vinyl Scratch could only grin at.

The door to the room that they were sharing slid open as Archimedes walked in. ‘Rise and shine Vinyl Scratch, or you’ll waste the day away in bed!’

Surprise and Vinyl Scratch hopped off the cot and walked up to him. ‘You know, I don’t appreciate you holding us here against our will’.

‘Holding you against your will? Hah! Hardly!’ Archimedes said with a slight chuckle. ‘Is there somewhere else you’d rather be right now?’

Vinyl Scratch opened her mouth to say something, but then promptly closed it again. He had a point, as much as Vinyl hated to admit it.

‘It’s not holding you against your will if this is exactly where you want to be, if anything, I’m holding you here in compliance with your will!’ Archimedes said.

Vinyl found herself to be unable to argue with that, though the fact of the matter was she found it to be extremely annoying. ‘Are you ever going to let us go?’ she asked.

‘Of course, I’m going to be using you just as the false machine intended to use you. You’re going to carry a message to her’, Archimedes said simply.

Vinyl’s ear twitched at the mention of the false machine. She had heard Archimedes use this term before. ‘Who is the false machine?’ she asked.

‘The false machine, the voice over the radio, the savant, these are the names we refer to the one who controls the spritebots, we have spoken to her several times though the spritebots, though she refuses to tell us her name’, Archimedes said simply. ‘So we refer to her as such, for lack of a better term’.

‘Uh huh’, Vinyl Scratch said, losing interest rather quickly. ‘This message then, what is it?’

‘It’s not ready yet, you will be given it when you are ready to go’, Archimedes said. ‘And that won’t be after Brother Scribe Ulan’s return’.

‘You’re rather sure about that, aren’t you?’ Vinyl asked.

‘It’s simply the way it is’, Archimedes said.

The door behind them opened again, Archimedes turned around to see the blue robed earth pony trot into the room.

‘Well fortunately for all of us, we don’t have to wait long’, Montana Ulan said simply as he trotted into the room.

‘Ah, Brother Scribe Ulan! I was worried you had run into trouble, taking so long to return’, Archimedes said.

‘Had to take the long way back’, Montana said with a shrug. ‘Lest I be seen by those going to the World Leaders Conference in Canterlot’.

‘The World Leaders Conference?’ Vinyl asked. ‘But that’s always in Manehattan!’

‘Safety concerns were brought up after there was a somewhat minor accident with a train not being able to stop... the conference was moved to Canterlot at the last minute’, Montana explained. ‘I may have had something to do with that’.

‘I will leave you three alone then, you do have much to talk about’, Archimedes said simply.

‘That we do’, Montana said simply. ‘That we do’.

Archimedes left the room and shut the door behind him. Montana Ulan smiled slightly at her. ‘Well, now that he’s gone, I suppose I can get a little more comfortable’, Montana Ulan brought his hooves up to his face and rubbed at his eyes, Vinyl noticed that he was pulling something out of them. He closed his eyes and shook his head slightly.

‘Much better, those are incredibly annoying’, he said, and opened his eyes again.

Vinyl Scratch and Surprise’s mouths dropped open. Vinyl Scratch pulled her goggles off her eyes to make sure she was seeing things properly. As it turned out, she was. Montana Ulan’s eyes were blood red. He gave them a small smile and asked: ‘Let’s get down to business, shall we?’