//------------------------------//
// Chapter 12: Fading Light 
// Story: The Engineer’s Wings 
// by Keeper of time RD 
//------------------------------//

Everything shook and the door slammed shut as Sweetie Belle’s magic flowed through the runic pattern on the pedestal, transforming its light from its purple to her light green. Once the glow of Sweetie’s magic had replaced all of the purple light in the pedestal's runes her horn flared up.

The light on the pedestal shattered, leaving the runic pattern nothing but dark etchings in the surface of the stone. At the same time a pulse of green light ran along both visible parts of the spirit barrier, like a ripple in the surface of the walls of light. In the wake of the pulse the spirit barrier shattered like glass. Glass whose fragments flickered out of existence rather than fall to the ground anyway.

For a moment the rumbling came to a stop, but was quickly followed by another rumbling. This time the sound came from the ornate door that Shining Armor and the other’s were near as it slid into the floor, opening the way for them.

Once that chain of events was over and silence had returned long enough to announce that the temple was done reacting to the dispelling of the spirit barrier, the unicorn of the Royal Guard quickly moved forward, into the previously sealed part of the temple. Spitfire managed to spare a worried glance at the ponies in the anchor room, and gave a nod to those who now had no choice but to go into another unexplored part of the temple. Then she darted out of sight to catch up with the Royal Guard captain.

Back in the anchor room, Rainbow Dash took a moment to give the door that had cut off their escape route an upward push. One hard push was all it took to make her say, “Yeah… that’s not budging. No choice but to see what’s further in.”

The party of fillies and a Wonderbolt proceeded slowly down a short hallway and soon found themselves standing in the entrance to a long room. Cautious gazes searched the room for any signs of traps. Yet the gray tiles that made up the floor seemed uniform in appearance. They didn’t see any trip lines, nor did any of them dare to touch the glow-stone-topped rods that served as torches as they inched forward. At the far end of the room were two doorways. The one on the right was open, but the one on the left had a closed stone door.

When they passed the halfway point of the room a pulse of magic ran through the air. Most of the ponies felt a tingle across their fur as the wave of magic passed over them and that was it.

“Let me go!”

Sweetie Belle’s cry drew everypony else’s attention to her as she was lifted up, wrapped in an aura of purple magic.

Scootaloo was first to react. “Oh no you don’t!” she said as she leapt up and grabbed onto her floating friend. Wrapping her hooves around Sweetie, she buzzed her little wings for all they were worth. And though her effort clearly interfered with the magic pulling the unicorn toward the roof, it wasn’t enough to stop it.

Apple Bloom and Rainbow Dash acted next. Apple Bloom by jumping up and biting down on Sweetie’s tail, adding her own weight to group. Whether that had any effect or not could be debated, but it was the only thing she could think to try and help on such short notice.

Rainbow Dash abandoned her position on point to follow Scootaloo’s lead. Wrapping her hooves around the floating fillies and flapping her wings to pull the wayward unicorn from the unwanted levitation spell. And with the addition of Dash’s more flight-worthy wings, the purple glow around Sweetie shattered and she was able to pull the lot of youngsters free. As she set the trio of fillies down an unknown male voice spoke from all around.

“You protect the pony, even though her worth as a key is spent. You are worthy of the greatest treasure this place has to offer. Go, and rejoin those you deemed worthy of that treasure.”

As soon as the mysterious voice finished, the stone door slid to the side, opening the left path.

Yet, Dash’s ears perked up at the words, and looking to Sweetie Belle, she asked, “What did he mean ‘those you deemed worthy’?”

“Oh! Well you see, when I dispelled the spirit barrier, I didn’t have to release the seal on the door Shinning Armor was interested in. So I guess I could’ve left him locked out. But what would be the point in that? I mean, with the barrier dispelled I got what I wanted, so why shouldn’t I let him get what he wanted?”

“Fair enough,” Dash answered as she dusted herself off. “Well Come on! Let’s go see what all this fuss is for!”

A unified nod came from all present, and with that they set off down the newly opened pathway.

Yet, they hardly got more than a few steps before they heard an agonized cry sound out from the destination ahead of them.

Rainbow Dash’s eyes went wide. “That sounded like Fleetfoot!” she called.

Then she spread her wings and shot down the path in a hurry, while the three younger ponies galloped after her as fast as their little legs could carry them. And yet, even as they rushed forward they heard thuds, thumps and pulses, making it sound as if they were running toward a fight.

Scootaloo darted through the doorway and emerged from the hallway just in time to hear Rainbow Dash shout, “What the hay are you doing!”

The young pegasus and her friends came sliding to a halt as they took in the scene before them.

The room they had emerged into was large, large enough to hold a small rodeo in. Arranged about the room were many small pedestals, most holding gold object like cups or jeweled boxes. The noteworthy exception being the area near where Scootaloo and friends had entered the vault room. Here the void of display pedestals created a round clearing.

And it was along the edges of this otherwise clear space that the Wonderbolts were sprawled out on the floor. Spitfire and Soarin were slowly pulling themselves up while holding a hoof to their own chest, as if they’d each just taken a serious kick to the body. Rainbow Dash had landed beside the motionless Fleetfoot, closer to the small doorway that she and the fillies had entered through.

In the middle of the curricular space was Shining Armor. And wrapped in his magic aura was a white, metal staff topped with a clear crystal.

“What the hay is going on!” Dash demanded.

“Shining Armor… betrayed us…” Spitfire groaned between heavy breaths.

An evil smirk appeared on Shining Armor's face. “What’s going on is THIS!” As he said ‘this’ he slammed the staff to the ground, snapping the shaft in half and shattering the crystal at the top.

The instant the crystal shattered a pulse of prismatic light flashed outward. As it passed over Scootaloo the magic actually felt comforting. Yet it sent a shiver down her spine in the way that it confirmed that something good had just been destroyed.

Looking up from the shattered remnants of the staff, Shining Armor grinned and said, “Now that the Staff of True Light is gone, nothing can stop us!” With that his horn flared up one more time and he vanished in the flash of a teleportation spell.

“What- what happened?” Dash demanded looking at Spitfire and sounding slightly less angry then before.

Now on her hooves, Spitfire shook her head once before she answered.

“I’m not sure. One second we’re following him through the vault, and the next he spins around and blasts us. Fleetfoot knocked us away from the shot, but… she took the direct hit. How… is she?”

Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and shook her head slowly as she held her fallen coworker.

“No pulse.”

Spitfire opened her mouth to utter a curse. Maybe she even did. But a sudden and loud rumble drowned out any sound that might have escaped her lips.

“What now! An earthquake?” she called out instead.

The captain didn’t really expect an answer to her question, but much to everypony’s surprise one did come. And it came in the form of the disembodied voice from the judgment room shouting back from down the hall.

“I’m afraid that would be the self destruction enchantment. It would seem your traitorous friend took the time to trigger it on his way out. I strongly advise you evacuate before this cavern comes crashing down on your heads.”

With little more than a nod, Soarin took Fleetfoot from Dash just in time for Spitfire to yell, “Everypony fly!”

Spitfire took off, though it was clear she was fighting through a great deal of pain in order to fly. Soarin followed as quickly as he could while carrying the fallen Wonderbolt in his grasp. And being the only healthy and unburdened Wonderbolt in the room, Rainbow Dash bolted for the fillies, where she scooped up Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle

As she was pulled away Sweetie reached out with her magic and grabbed the shattered remnants of the staff, bringing the crystal fragments with her. Although the shaft halves fell behind as she was unable to pull the heavier pieces at the speed she was being carried away.

Dash slowed for only a moment as she flicked her tail at Scootaloo and shouted, “Come on, Squirt! Move!”

The orange filly needed no further prompting to snap out of her stunned panic. She burst into a gallop and her wings buzzed to life adding thrust and allowing her to run far faster than any earth pony or unicorn could dream of moving.

Yet even injured, the ace pegasi of the Wonderbolts pulled away as they flew ahead of Scootaloo despite her impressive running speed. With the exception of Rainbow Dash, who was actually flying slower than she could precisely to make sure the third filly she’d promised to protect was still with her.

As they fled toward the landing platform the rumbling was getting worse. Cracks were forming in the walls and the sounds of things falling behind them joined the sounds of destruction around them.

By the time they arrived at the landing platform Soarin had already taken off. Also stalactites were now falling from the cavern ceiling. Rainbow Dash was quick to deposit the two fillies she had in the cockpit of Scootaloo’s plane before darting over to her own plane. And while Spitfire had had her engines glowing, she waited until she spotted the small orange pegasus scampering toward her own plane before throttling up and taking off.

With a soaring leap Scootaloo cleared the wing of her plane, hooked the rim of the cockpit with her hoof, and landed square in the pilot seat. She quickly started flipping switches, running through the start up process.

As the two planes stared rolling for take off, cracks began to form in the stonework floor of the platform. Yet with no other choice open to them, they both jammed their throttle in and sped up for takeoff anyway, just hoping the damage to their makeshift runway didn’t catch their landing gear before they could get off the ground. And by now chunks of the cave ceiling had joined the stalactites in raining down.

Scootaloo felt her jet plane take flight mere seconds before the platform crumbled away beneath her. Yet any relief she or Rainbow Dash might have felt from their nick-of-time takeoffs was crushed when they saw the pathway Spitfire had just left through collapse in her wake.

“What do we do now!” Scootaloo cried out over the radio.

“Follow me! I see another large opening on the other side of the chamber!”

“Do you even know where that goes? It wasn’t on the map Spitfire showed us!”

“No clue, Squirt! But anywhere is better than staying here!”

As if fate intended to punctuate Rainbow Dash’s point, a boulder fell from the ceiling and smashed Fleetfoot’s plane into the crumbling platform, releasing a flash of prismatic light as its fuel splashed out among the debris.

Not that Scootaloo had any choice in the matter. With no floodlight attached to her Mark 1, she could only follow Rainbow’s Mark 2 wherever it went anyway. And so the two planes flew down the unknown path as quickly as they could, weaving and dodging falling stones, all the while avoiding smashing into the sides of the tunnel with every sudden turn or dip in the path.

It was truly beyond Scootaloo how the elder pilot was managing to weave her way through the falling debris and navigate the tunnel, let alone choose which forks in the path to take while miraculously not leading them to smash into a dead end path. It was all the filly could do just to follow the glow of the lead plane’s lights and pray that she didn’t get hit by anything along the way at these speeds.

Then they rounded a bend and saw the light of day.

Hope turned to horror as Scootaloo saw a stalactite impale the right wing of Rainbow Dash’s aircraft.

Dash clearly fought with the controls for a second, but as soon as her plane cleared the mouth of the cave, a prismatic motion blur proved that she'd abandoned her plane and taken flight on her own wings.

At the same time the cave collapsed completely just behind Scootaloo’s plane, launching it out of the cave in a blast of dust and dirt. She emerged from the dust cloud just in time to see Dash’s plane smash into the rolling hills that made up either side of the wide valley outside the cave.

As much as she wanted to breathe a sigh of relief when she spotted Rainbow Dash soaring high and to the side as her Mark 1 zoomed passed the blue pegasus, she couldn’t.

“Scootaloo, why’d it get so quiet?” Apple Bloom asked, clearly having perceived the problem Scootaloo already felt.

In return the young pegasus in the pilot seat flipped all of the switches to the off position and repeated the started up process.

“Scootaloo?!”

Frowning, she finally answered her friend. “No good. We lost the engine. Buckle up, this is going to be a bumpy landing.”

Thankfully the electrical systems worked well enough to get the landing gear down and the flaps in a landing configuration. All that was left now was to hope the grassy fields of the valley were as smooth as they looked, or at the very least, that they'd luck out and avoid hitting any large rocks or holes with the landing gear when they landed.

They touched down and for a good three seconds Scootaloo was able to slow the plane normally. Then her worst fear came true. One of the landing gear hit something and snapped clean off. As the plane fell the shifting of the weight put impossible stress on the two remaining struts and they too ripped off at the first less than perfectly smooth patch of ground to add to the stresses on them.

Fillies screamed and the plane rattled like mad as it went sliding down the field on its belly, rocking back and forth violently every time one of the wings bounced off the ground.

Finally the plane came to a stop. And it do so a good three seconds before the two fillies in the back seat stopped screaming and realized that they were going to be okay.

Scootaloo opened her eyes to look out at the world through the cracked lenses on her goggles. Several more instances of cracked glass on the instrument panel told the story of how she got the massive headache she had right now. And yet, the more she looked around, the more the pain of her body ceased to matter, the more it was eclipsed by an even greater pain.

Rainbow Dash tapped gingerly on the canopy, as the twisting of its frame had cracked the glass.

As Scootaloo did nothing but stare blankly into space, Apple Bloom released the latches and helped Dash slide the canopy open.

“Is everypony alright?” the Wonderbolt asked as she hovered above the fillies.

“Ah think so. We’re all alive at least.”

The aircraft was without question in a sorry state. While the warping of the frame wasn’t too bad, many of the skin panels had been cut, bent, or outright ripped off. Not a single pane of glass had escaped un-cracked or unbroken. And of course there was the whole landing gear stopping a good hundred feet sooner than the rest of the plane thing.

Looking the airplane over and coming to the obvious conclusion, Rainbow Dash said, “Come on, let’s fly, I can carry these two.” She motioned to Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle as she finished talking.

“I can’t fly.”

Misunderstanding the young pegasus’ response and looking to how low the sun was on the horizon, Dash replayed, “Yeah, our planes are shot. But if we leave now we can probably get back to HQ with our own feathered wings before nightfall.”

“I can’t fly,” Scootaloo repeated, this time her voice was cracking and a tear came rolling down her cheek. “My wings don’t give me the sky,” she continued, her voice turning pain into rage to steady itself. “Only dad’s wings! These wings!” She tapped a hoof on the frame of the cockpit in the direction of the jet plane’s wings. “And unlike you, I can’t just go back to base and get assigned a new plane! This was it! And… and it’s ruined… I’m ruined…” The anger in Scootaloo’s voice lessened as what she’d said sank in, the sound of despair returned as she continued, “It’s all over. I’ll… I’ll never fly again…”

With that, she curled up into a ball right there in the pilot seat and began sobbing.

Apple Bloom tried to reach forward to comfort her friend, but Rainbow Dash put her own hoof in the way and shook her head. “There’s no point wasting your breath when they’re beyond listening.”

Scootaloo was only loosely aware of what was happening around her as she cried her heart out. All she really knew was that she felt the presence of Rainbow Dash leave after saying something. Then after a while, when it started to get dark, she felt somepony drape a blanket over her before she truly fell asleep.