//------------------------------//
// Guard Flutter, Part VII: On The Edge of Collapse 
// Story: Guard Flutter 
// by Impossible Numbers 
//------------------------------//

Rainbow Dash watched the red streak of grimly lit darkness: watched the city. Up here, it looked so earthy, like she was flying over oil-soaked soil. Towers and wedge-like roofs stuck out as rotting teeth from buried, scattered compost.

It’s always dirty, she thought. All that mud and rock and stuff. Just all that… stuff. The stuffness gets everywhere.

Higher, higher, higher she went, but still she was staring down at the black grime. Each light only showed just how grimy it was, like how a mud-splattered slab of white marble looked dirtier than an actual mud pool. Higher and higher and higher, but the sheer darkness was now all that was left, surrounding the lot.

They always said it was OK. There was water, and clean plants, and people washed the temples so they sparkled with metal. But it was still earthy. It clung. She just had to look at it, and it clung to her brain until she had to go up and away from it.

Rainbow flipped over, ignoring the stretch on her skin, the tug around her eyelids, and the way her hair rippled across her back and chest.

Over her head – or rather, under her now, for her hooves hovered near it and she could see the city if she tilted her head back far enough – the cloud glowed with a hellish tint. It was the same redness, too close to the browns and the fiery colours of the city, but in the smoothness of the clouds and the wisps around them, she could kind of see the air. It was ghostly, or like a welcoming spirit.

It didn’t cling. Now that she was approaching the sky, it washed over her, and then she stopped and it was there, everywhere and nowhere at once. The tingle of gravity fell over her bones, and she spread her limbs wide, and she spread her wings wide, and she fell.

Far below, the lights of the city stayed as small as stars, but she could almost feel the incoming gravity as though the entire planet were gearing up to smack her.

She used to stay in the air a lot. Not that she was that much better these days, but back then she hated the earth.

A long time ago, she’d learned to stay away from the ground. The soil pulled her down all the time. Dust clung to her stubbly fur. Mud seeped in and she used to wriggle and moan as though it were a poison.

Some pegasi had told her she could never get away from it. The world was too big. It would pull her back down in the end.

“I don’t care!” she used to shriek. “I can fly up all the time. All and all the time, if I want to! I’ll go up to the clouds and live on them instead! You’ll see!”

And they’d laughed and ruffled her hair, and she’d blushed, and then they forgot about it.

Gently, the rushing wind peeled away the memory, and she narrowed her eyes against the flailing locks of her hair.

Rainbow Dash flipped over, and now she could see the stratus. Smoke lit by the fire underneath. She liked smoke. It was just a cloud with class. And fire; now there was something magical about fire. She wasn’t the sit-and-watch type, but she could watch a fire dance and curl and glow in the midst of shadows all day. She sighed and then breathed in, and she felt the life rush through her mouth and down her throat. Her lungs were almost bursting with a surge of energy. It stretched all the way to her limbs and she felt herself, her mind, her comforts click back into place.

A few flakes of white snow drifted by…





Young Rainbow Dash was so unkempt that her rainbow mane was nothing but a spiky tangle of colours, with no order to them at all. She hovered at the front gates that arched over her, that swung back like the maw of some alien beast. There was the plateau, a monolith that filled her entire future, and perched on top was the ancient pegasus temple. She could already see tiny dots flitting around it like flies.

She glanced up at the letters carved over her head. Pegasine wasn’t her strong suit, but she knew the word “Flight” when she saw it.

Rainbow Dash gulped.

“OK,” she mumbled to herself, “OK, Dash. This is it. Act cool. Don’t do anything silly. It’s just a camp, right? Lots of foals go to camp. Everyone does. No one fails at camp, so you should be OK, right? You should be OK. You can’t fail. They’d laugh at you if you failed. They’d hold you back, that’s all they’d do. You’d stay behind, forever and ever, until you get it right…”

She slapped herself around the face.

“Come on, Dash! Deep breaths. Deep breaths!”

Keeping an eye on the carved letters in case one fell off and crushed her – silly, yes, but, well, maybe it wouldn’t happen, but it might, and she didn’t want to be the one when it did, right – Rainbow tilted herself forwards, and her hovering became a drift over the white, unblemished snowscape. She was already beginning to pant short and sharp pants. Perhaps she shouldn’t have hovered all the way here.

No one had come to see her off. They were busy, or something. They were always busy.

The foal, blushing and curled up in front of her wings, drifted across the endless white. Someone shrieked from the top of the plateau, and she stopped, hovering higher again and cocking an ear.

Two shadows rushed over her. She looked up to catch a pair of foals zipping out beyond the plateau wall, and then they curved round and disappeared back within its range.

“Whoa,” she said. They could’ve fallen and broken their bones. How brave was that? Maybe she’d try it.

Her gaze shifted. The wall of granite was ridged, but there were no holes where hooves could wedge themselves. She glanced left and right, but there was no ledge or sloping path either.

“I have to get up there,” she muttered. “But how? I’ve never flown that high before. And look at it! It’s a big rock! What if there’s an avalanche? I could DIE.”

A catch caught in her throat. She shook herself down, resembling for a moment a chickadee throwing off the rain. More snowflakes tumbled softly down around her.

“I’m so cold…” she murmured. “What if I freeze before I get up there? AND they’ll all come and watch. Well, not if I don’t make a sound, huh, Dash?”

More giggles and shrieks of joy followed. From the lip, a head poked out quickly, and then ducked out of sight. Rainbow’s heart, already at a hummingbird’s pitch, now beat so fast and so hard it was a fire in her chest.

“They’ve SEEN me! They know I’m here! Come on Dash! Show ‘em what you’re made of. But what if I’m made of fail? I might never get a chance again. They’ll send me home. They’ll say, ‘Look! That’s the pegasus that failed! She can’t do anything right!’ Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh…”

“Hello?” said a whisper behind her.

Rainbow screeched and leaped behind a boulder, wings now locked behind her back. She cocked her ears, waiting for another jump of sound, and then her brain caught up. It had been a foal’s voice. She clambered up and peeked over the boulder.

A pair of blinking wide eyes peered back at her. “It’s OK,” it whispered. “I’m not scary. At least, I don’t think I am. Uh… Do I look scary to you?”

When Rainbow raised her head, she saw the rest of the filly. It was the colour of cream, and so gangly and stick-legged that it seemed like a puff of breath would’ve blown it to bits. The pink hair put her in mind of cascading clouds near sunset.

“I was up there. I saw you.” The pegasus pursed her lips thoughtfully. “Hm. It was you, wasn’t it?”

Rainbow cocked her head. The other filly did the same. Blinking in surprise, Rainbow took a few steps backwards, almost stumbling off the edge of the boulder, and at this, the strange filly glanced up.

“And you’ve got all kinds of stripes in your mane. I’ve never seen that before. Two stripes, yes. No stripes, lots of times. Lots of stripes? No. Not ever.”

Cautiously, Rainbow’s wings whirred into life again. She rose up, and then yelped at the stab of pain and dropped into the snow. At once, the cold began biting into her skin. With a thrashing of limbs, she leaped onto the top of the boulder and tried to rub the irritating clumps of snow off her wet fur.

“Oh my goodness!” The filly hopped forwards. “Are you hurt? Let me get that for you so you’re clean again.”

The filly reached for the snow and began brushing it down, but Rainbow batted her away and continued rubbing. It was nearly all off anyway.

“My name’s Fluttershy,” said the filly.

Rainbow ignored her and turned back to the wall of rock. More squeaks and shouts came from above, and she felt her face burn.

The filly shuffled through the snow to walk around the boulder and face her. Rainbow watched with envy as legs that should’ve snapped cut through the white froth with ease. She felt her own legs shivering, and tried to force them to stop.

Her wings blurred, but the stab of pain made her yelp and she stopped at once. What was wrong with her? Already, she’d got a cramp, and they said new foals had to fly to the top all on their own. It was some kind of test.

When the filly tried to peer closer at her rainbow mop of hair, Rainbow leaped off the boulder and tried to run around the plateau, away from her. Stubby legs were scolded in the mush. Gritting her teeth, she tried hopping over the lot, and on the fourth leap her chin went too far down and she was stung up her nostrils. Immediately, she curled up and tried to squeeze the pain out. She had to cover up her eyes; they were getting all hot and blurry.

“Do you want some help?”

The filly was leaning down like some tiny giraffe. Rainbow sighed and curled up tighter. Skin peeled away from the bowl of snow she’d formed around her.

“Go away,” she said.

“But you have to fly up.”

“I’ll fly up in a minute. Go away.”

The filly frowned down at her and stamped a hoof; Rainbow half-expected it to crack. “I’m not leaving. You hurt your wing, didn’t you?”

Rainbow growled, but in her tiny voice it sounded more like a deep croak. “No,” she lied.

“Well…” The filly cast about for inspiration. “If you change your mind, I’m right here. And I’m not leaving until you do.”

The blizzard picked up, slicing through the air and leaving trails of white dots and slashes. Rainbow curled up tighter until her head was touching her belly.

When the gusts passed on, she uncurled and saw the filly standing and glaring at her. Rainbow sighed the sigh of one who knows she’s been beaten.

“You’re not going away, are you?” she said gloomily.

“Uh-uh.”

Rainbow glanced around in case anyone else had joined them, and then looked up to check the plateau. “Look, I can fly up this thing all by myself if I want to. I’m not… weak, or anything. I’m just tired.”

The filly didn’t move.

“I flew all the way here, you know,” Rainbow added, just in case the filly hadn’t got the message. “Not every pegasus could fly all the way here, and I live far away, like really far away. And I did it by myself, too.”

The lack of movement on the filly’s part continued unabated.

“I was… born to fly. I could go up to the clouds in my sleep, if I wanted. And one day, I’m gonna fly around the whole world. I won’t be tired then, you’ll see! I’ll be amazing.”

Nothing had changed about the filly’s policy of non-movement. Rainbow heaved herself out of the hole and sat up. She was now feeling the chill creep up to her jaw, and it was an effort to stop her teeth chattering.

“I’m cold,” she whispered.

Finally, the filly smiled. “I flew up to the clouds once.”

Rainbow’s jaw dropped. She’d never have guessed this filly could so much as fly against a breeze.

“You!?” she managed to say.

“It was pretty. There was all white everywhere, like snow but not so cold. And there was no wind up there. And I saw stars. Oh, they were so beautiful. I think there were hundreds! Hundreds and hundreds of shiny little stars. And I saw the… con… st’lations. I think I saw the bear one.”

Now her face was burning again. Rainbow rubbed a foreleg and glanced up the plateau.

“Since I’m tired from all that flying just this one time…” Rainbow gulped and forced herself to continue, “could you… maybe give me a lift?”

The filly hummed thoughtfully.

“Just this one time,” Rainbow added.

With a smile, the filly nodded. Rainbow felt herself prickle at the sight of that smile. She wasn’t sure she could trust it yet.

Wincing at the sting of cold, Rainbow hobbled a couple of steps, but the filly leaped forwards and ducked her head to let her clamber up. Sitting on coat hangers was less lumpy and uncomfortable, but Rainbow swallowed her discomfort. It was warm on her back too. She’d never been this close to someone else before. It felt wrong.

“Here we go,” said the filly.

A breeze tickled Rainbow’s front limbs, and she turned to see the yellow wings become a fan-shaped blur. Snowflakes tumbled out of their wake. A moment later, the jolt told her she was going up.

Rainbow didn’t dare look over the edge. She’d never actually been this high up before. The sight of the rock wall streaming past set her mind into a panic, and she could hear the laughter and thought they were mocking her overhead. It didn’t take long before she shut her eyes tight, and then she clung on harder when she started slipping off.

“What’s your name?” whispered the filly gently. “It’s OK. You can get off when we’re at the top. We’ll be OK then. Just don't tell anyone what we did. We might get into trouble if they think I helped you cheat.”

“R-Rainbow Dash.” She shook herself down. “Uh. Th-Thanks. Flutterby, was it?”

“No, silly. Fluttershy. Flutter-shy. See? Just keep saying that, and we’ll get to the top in no time. It’s a trick I picked up, whenever I get scared.”

“I’m not scared!”

The wind whistled through her ears, which were stiff. Long since, her nostrils had frozen and couldn’t smell anything no matter how much she sniffed. Never mind her mouth; that felt like a mouse had curled up and died in it. She’d never been so tired before.

“OK…” She held on tighter, and despite the frosting on her back, her front burned as she squeezed. “Fluttershy, Fluttershy, Fluttershy…”





“Fluttershy,” Rainbow whispered. She opened her eyes.

There was the wall of red cloud. With a flip, she was glaring down at the boulevard rising up to swat her. Wind rippled across her belly. Both wings burst into life.

Flocks of pigeons and crows fanned out ahead of her, squawking with fright. Rainbow seized her momentum and threw herself upwards. She shot across the buildings, and she almost felt the edges of the chimneys under each of her splayed limbs, and then she tucked them in and fought harder against the wind until the streets and the people became blurs and impressions on the edge of a rushing world of grime.

Now she was a creature of air. Never still, never tied down, always rushing like the winds. She was a ghost looking down on the little lives of mortals…

There was a flash of chimaera.

Around her, the air screeched as Rainbow forced herself to curl round and fan herself out as though to embrace everything. In anger, the air slugged her with the force of treacle. It snatched itself out of her lungs, slashed at her eyes, braced itself against her torso. Gritting her teeth, the blur of rooftops resolved themselves into flashes of activity as people ran or galloped or flapped across the streets among other people.

In the next one, she saw it crouched low. A foal was stumbling in a pathetic attempt to flee. Now she was slow enough to catch the scream.

“HEY!” Rainbow shouted.

She threw her limbs forward for the impact. At the noise, the tiger’s head whirled round in annoyance and the snake swayed as though trying to hypnotize her.

Ignoring her, the goat’s head leaned down and bared its fangs at the foal, who tripped and fell onto his face.

Rainbow landed with a thump between them.

“Get lost!” she yelled.

Tiger, goat, and snake rose over her with the inevitability of a tidal wave. Growls, bleats, and hisses of irritation met her words.

“We came back for more,” said the tiger head, and it bent its muscular forelimbs. “Why shouldn’t we have a shot in the city of a hundred species?”

“YYYeeeaaahhh!” bleated the goat’s head. “I thought this was the land of freeeedoooom. We should be freeee to do what we liiiiike.”

Rainbow pawed the cobbles. “I said get lost! You blew your chance when you tried eating people! I said beat it!”

“Or what, tiny?” roared the tiger. Flecks of spittle rained on Rainbow’s face, but she didn’t so much as blink.

“Keep pushing your luck, and find out!” She crouched low for the spring.

“Well,” hissed the snake. “You sssssaid it. Not ussss.”

Roaring, the chimaera lunged, but her jaws snapped on thin air, showering sparks. Horns scythed after the rainbow blur, and the lightning strike of scales missed the tip of Rainbow’s tail. As the giant threw its weight back for another attack, the whirlwind of colour rose up around it.

“What’sssss your issssssue with ussss?” hissed the snake while the goat tried to snap at the rainbow tornado. “Why musssssst you pick on usssss outssssssidersssss?”

In frustration, the tiger raised a paw and swiped blindly into the vortex. Its goat leg lashed out behind it. All three heads turned and swung to try and spot the body among the blurs.

“There!” Snake fangs snapped, almost snagging the hoof before Rainbow could pull it back.

A second lunge threw Rainbow into the tiger’s mouth, but she sprang from its tongue and was lost again to the twister. Rainbow’s third attack bounced off the lowered horns, but the goat was too slow to strike back.

The impasse was getting to the creature. A final roar of impatience, and the chimaera leaped through the spectrum and blocked the foal that had been crawling towards the end of the street.

“That one’s a little too spry,” growled the tiger. “You’ll be the first to go.”

“Yesssss. They alwaysssss try to keep usssss down,” hissed the snake in the foal’s ear, ignoring the whimper. “But you’ll be a good little dear and keep nicccccce and ssssstill for my sssssisssstersssss, won’t you?”

It ducked; Rainbow soared over the snake, her leading hoof missing the back of its head, but in turn she jerked away from the tiger’s paw, and then drew back from a second swipe.

“Doooon’t bother with thaaaat one!” bleated the goat. “Taaaake the fooaaal!”

“For once, sister,” growled the tiger, “I agree with you.”

The foal squealed and covered his face.

Both paws stamped down onto the cobbles. When the tiger raised them to check, the foal was gone.

“WHAT?” she roared.

The snake turned around to spot Rainbow hovering nearby, the foal clasped between her hooves. Rainbow blew a raspberry and rose out of the path of its angry leap. Paws and hooves skidded across the tiles of the nearest roof.

“Poniessss are all hypocritesssss,” hissed the snake sadly, while beside it a tile dropped to the street. “We only want to exxxxpresssss oursssselvesssss. That’sssss what you alwaysssssss talk about, issssssn’t it?”

“I’m giving you to the count of ten!” shouted Rainbow. “Get out of my city!”

“There are mooooore fooaaals where thaaaat one came frooom!” yelled the goat. “And you’re still aaaaallll alooooooone.”

The tiger grunted and heaved itself further up. All four limbs were now fully erect, and the creature turned to focus on the hovering figure. Muscles strained as it tried not to provoke any more sliding tiles.

Rainbow smirked and blew a raspberry. Under her chin, the foal buried itself in her chest. Even the goat roared at this one.

“One!” she yelled down. “Two!”

“Come cloooooooser, little peeeeeeegasus.” The goat grinned up at her. “Weeeee waaaaant to give you a taste of ooooouuuuuur cultural tradiiiiiitiiiiions!”

“Three!” Rainbow glanced around, but she couldn’t see anywhere safe to drop the foal off. With her front hooves full, she couldn’t do much more that deliver a few rear kicks. And there was no way she was letting the thing out of her sight.

It was dawning on her that she might have made a tiny little error on this one.

“Four!” she yelled. “F-Five…”

“Isn’t it shameful, sisters?” purred the tiger, and its eyes gleamed with malice. “And this is what we get for trying to join the civilized ones!”

“Six…?”

“Yeeeees,” bleated the goat. “IIIIIIIt’s blaaaaatant preeeejudiiiiiice!”

On the edge of her vision, she noticed a few heads poking around corners and out of doorways. Quickly, she counted about a dozen potential targets. Too many to keep track of at once.

“Seven!”

The goat and the tiger chuckled. They were watching her with a growing calmness, and even with interest. There was no sign of the snake; it must have ducked behind the body.

“Eight… Nine…”

The snake cracked like a whip.

Rainbow dodged the lobbed tile, but at the same moment the beast lunged, and when she dodged again, the goat’s teeth clamped around her tail and threw her down into the square. Paws and hooves bounded on the cobbles. Rainbow rolled and there was a squeak as the foal was thrown away from her. Something flashed over her head, and when she whipped round, the chimaera was galloping over to the bundle of fur lying on the ground. Spectators screamed and retreated out of sight, or stared in gaping horror.

“NO!” Rainbow threw herself into a gallop.

The foal screamed and scrambled to its hooves. Behind the thundering chimaera, Rainbow shot into the air, passed the undulating snake; she seized the scaly tail, dug her hooves into the cobbles, and pulled as hard as her aching limbs would allow.

Slow down, she thought urgently. Slow!

Up ahead, the foal’s wings were flapping in panic. Tiger jaws spread wide. Sparks leaped from Rainbow’s rear hooves through sheer friction against the ground.

There was a snap.

The tiger growled in confusion. All four limbs pumped and stretched, but the creature was going no further. Wide-eyed, the tiger watched as the foal scampered into the open doorway, and the pegasus there slammed it shut.

Rainbow barely had time to sigh in relief when she shrieked; scaly coils snapped tight around her, lifting her clean off her hooves. She bared her teeth and struggled to free herself.

“Bad move, pegasssssussss,” hissed a voice in her ear.

The goat’s head turned around and smirked at her, fangs glinting under the street light. Rainbow was still struggling and growling in frustration when the snake curled round and brought her up to the tiger’s mad eyes.

“You know,” growled the tiger, “this is why my sisters and I hate pegasi!”

“Yeeeeaaaah!” bleated the goat. “You all think yoooouuuuu’re the heroes and weeeeee’re the monsters, but you never think how deliiiiiiiiciiiiiiiiiiooooooouuuuuus it is to eat filly flambéééééééé!”

“SSSSSSSo closssssed-minded,” sighed the snake.

Rainbow tried to stretch herself out of its grip. If only she could get a wing free, or a leg…

“You! Won’t! Hurt! Anybody!” she shouted.

The tiger snorted in her face. “EXCEPT YOU!”

Jaws opened; hot breath blasted over her like a furnace. She snapped her eyes shut –