Rainbow Dash loved her new wings, but right now they were straining hard with every pump and she wasn't going anywhere. With her legs anchored to the floor and her arms at her side, she fought gravity itself with her flapping.
"Okay, another ten," Short Track said. "Come on, give me eight… six… two… and bring it down."
Dropping to her hooves and even one hand, Rainbow could feel her heart thudding away in her chest. "How'd I do?"
Short Track began unhooking the leg straps keeping Rainbow in place. "You pulled nearly six hundred with your wings, that's on top of your own body-weight. About forty percent more than before the new upgrade."
"Upgrade. I like it. What next?" Rolling her shoulders, Rainbow Dash slowly worked her wing muscles to let them cool off. Though she loved flying and running, the work she'd been putting in had impressed even her when—yesterday—she'd needed it. "You hear about yesterday?"
The question was one thing Short had been waiting for. His favorite client had been quiet on the topic so far and it had been eating away at him. "Only rumors. Saw the light show. Something big?"
"Yeah. Imagine something like a Chinese dragon that can do all kinds of weird shit. Didn't lay a claw on me. Kicked my time thing into high gear and just ran circles around it. Is there anything we can do about training with that?" Grabbing her bottle of water, Rainbow tried to ignore the hunger in both her belly and a little deeper.
"That would be more fighting. I can teach you the basics of actual fighting, but I think you'd outpace me pretty quickly. Come in tomorrow after ten. I hold a late night Aikido class." Making notes on his clipboard, Short Track paused. "No time stuff, not even to show off."
"I might take you up on that. Spicy showed off a little of his stuff. One of my friends got mind-whammied, and he stood toe-to-toe with her. She could bench-press a truck, but she never landed a hit on him." It was utterly impossible for Rainbow not to sound impressed at what Spicy had done.
Putting his hand on his hip, Short Track raised one eyebrow. "And why isn't she in here?"
"She works on her family farm most days, though she'll be starting college soon. We all will be, that is. Two more weeks." Looking across to her favorite machine in the gym, Rainbow felt a smile pull wider across her muzzle. "Can I have a run?"
"Go for it, but use the rubber soles on your hooves, and no messing with time."
What Rainbow Dash didn't tell Short Track was she couldn't not mess with time. She could, however, focus on keeping pace with it. "Oh, one more thing before I get in the zone. I have a friend who smokes, uh, weed."
"I wouldn't recommend it. It doesn't do any actual harm, but it tends to get in your head a bit. Makes it harder to get motivated and do other things while you have it. Like alcohol, if you have a bit here and there with friends, it's not a problem."
"I kinda tried a little. It seemed really freaky. Slowed me down and made me focus in real time. I think I'll try it again, but not—like you said—make a habit of it." Rainbow grabbed the rubber braces she'd gotten Rarity to make for her and started strapping them on her hooves. "Thanks for the heads-up."
"No problems, Rainbow. It's good that it slows you down in a way. Could you imagine being stoned and moving as fast as you can?"
The idea of it hit Rainbow as a little funny. "I think I'd go a little crazy if I had to be like that for how long my time thing makes the day feel. Anyway, thanks, Short."
As Rainbow Dash walked away, Short Track couldn't help a little sigh. She was just about the most amazing athlete he'd ever met, to say nothing of her attitude for life. Walking to the drink cabinet, Short pulled out one of the bottles and then took it back to Rainbow's side. "Don't forget to keep this with you, even if you're not doing your time thing."
Stepping onto the machine, Rainbow rolled her eyes. "Yes, Mom."
The treadmill was different to all the rest. The belt on it was heavy duty, and the display had far less features than the others, but it could go almost double their speed. Stepping onto the device, Rainbow turned it to medium and started moving.
Slowly getting up to speed, Rainbow waited until the treadmill told her she was doing twenty miles an hour. It wasn't a run yet, even keeping at a normal speed. Tapping the controls, Rainbow told the machine to build up to its full speed.
25mph.
30mph.
35mph.
40mph.
42mph.
Now Rainbow was into, for her, a run. Her body moved with perfection, and she could let all the worries of the world drift away. The treadmill didn't let her run even full paced, but the advantage was she could spend a whole hour on it and not be in another zip code.
"Rainbow Dash?"
The female voice startled Rainbow out of her zone. She jerked her head to the side and looked the woman up and down. Red/purple seemed to be her colors. Her skin tone was so dark it made her black shirt almost seem bright. Hair that was a few shades brighter stood up in a spike-do that looked carefully random. But even her startling green eyes didn't take Rainbow's attention away from the badge being flashed at her. FBI. Agent Fizzlepop Berrytwist.
"Yeah. You texted me yesterday?" Rainbow asked.
"We did. Agent Fizzlepop Berrytwist. I'd just like to ask you a few questions about yesterday." Fizzlepop was even more confused than the previous two people she'd interviewed. So far she'd met a friendly type D that looked almost completely human, and a human (according to his license details) that looked like a type A, But this was something else. The girl (Fizzlepop was still wondering about that) was running as fast as a car on the treadmill and barely looked to be straining.
"Right, right. So what do you want to know? Things were a bit crazy, but I was kinda in the thick of it." Rainbow didn't bother to slow the treadmill. After all, she thought, it's not like she asked to talk elsewhere.
"Let's start with what, if any, interaction you've had with either type Ds since the incidents at Canterlot High School." Fizzlepop tried to ignore the physical impossibility of the obviously type A beside her. It wasn't against the law to be a type, but there was still something simply amazing about it. That Rainbow wasn't really straining anymore.
"Right. Adagio and Aria." Ensuring she kept Sonata's name out of that grouping, Rainbow Dash started to adjust her own time a little just to make it easier to talk and run. "The first I encountered them was Aria in the parking lot of a—club. She claimed that Adagio had gone nuts and was threatening her."
"Did you believe her?"
"I mean, a little. I like to give people a second chance, you know? Anyway, that didn't really go anywhere at the time. She left without getting any overt help from us." Too much time and Rainbow didn't enjoy the workout. Dialing things back, she made it so she had to work harder to keep up with the machine. "The next time I saw her was at Trixie's place."
Fizzlepop had been scribbling everything down in her notepad, though she also had a voice recorder running. "How exactly did you come to be aware of the goings-on at the Lucky Star Estate?"
"Uh. I got a text from my friends saying they'd found Trixie and she was brainwashed or something. I think Marble sorted her out. Anyway, they found out from Trixie that Adagio and Aria had Applejack." It took a lot of focus for Rainbow Dash to talk slow enough to be understood, but she'd been getting used to it. "We called some friends in to bring their cars for sound—Derpy and Flash—and called in everyone we knew that could help."
When Rainbow didn't say anything more for a bit, Fizzlepop cleared her throat. "Go on."
"The plan was for me to get in fast and distract them while Trixie, Marble, and So—" Rainbow tripped on the word, but thankfully not her footing.
"Sonata Dusk. A former associate of Adagio Dazzle and Aria Blaze. She has shown no acts of aggression since her defeat at your hands in the Canterlot High School 2nd Incident, and has in fact shown a willingness to play by the rules. She submitted a tax return for this financial year, and has a credit history in good standing. She assisted with the take-down of her former associates." Fizzlepop Berrytwist set her metaphorical cards on the table. "We know who Sonata Dusk is, and she's not under investigation."
"Right." Rainbow certainly wasn't going to mention Sonata's full history. "So they were going to help any hostages in getting out while my other friends set up the equipment." Her mind returned to the moment she was running around and doing her best to piss the sirens off. "I did my thing to distract them and keep Applejack from interrupting anyone."
"Your thing? Running?"
"You want a demonstration?" Rainbow Dash's competitive side sparked to the fore and she grinned. "What about—"
It was just a flicker. A flash of rainbow light that seemed to leave the girl on the treadmill, swirl around herself, then return to the treadmill. Fizzlepop was confused until she realized she was now holding her phone in her hand and pen and pad were in her pocket.
"I don't just run." Rainbow was back to her normal pace on the treadmill again. "I'm kinda fast, ya know? Anyway, that's my thing."
Fizzlepop put her phone away and took out her pad and paper again. "Right. And when your friends were set up and the civilians—the other civilians—were clear?"
"That's where things got a little crazy. My boyfriends jumped in. Totally didn't know they'd turn up, but I guess the magic lightshow that was already going on kinda tipped them off."
"Them. That would be Spicy Hot—I've spoken to him already—and who's the other one?" Fizzlepop was doing everything within her power not to judge or let her feelings color the account she was taking down, but it wasn't easy for a girl who'd been raised with the idea of monogamy.
"Thunderbolt. He's the dragon."
"The dragon. Eight feet tall, wings, claws…" The concept of the girl before her being with the dragon Fizzlepop had had described to her was a little beyond what she was ready to quietly accept.
"Kind, smart, understands how important life is—Yeah, that dragon." Defending her boyfriend came naturally, but having to do so put her on edge. "Is that all you wanted?"
Wincing inside at the way she'd just turned a cooperative witness into a hostile one, Fizzlepop Berrytwist closed her eyes and mentally kicked her preconceptions. "I'm sorry. That was out of line."
"Damn straight it was." Rainbow settled into her run a little and kept her mouth shut.
Anger boiled in Fizzlepop. It was an old problem she had. Clamping down on it as much as she could, she closed her notebook. "If you want to let me know anything else, or want me to get you a drink to say sorry for being an ass, call me."
Rainbow held her hand out on instinct and took the card Fizzlepop offered her. She looked down at it for a second before flicking her fingers and sending it winging away to the bin the corner behind her.
Watching the suited woman walking out of his gym, Short Track made his way over to Rainbow Dash. "Not a friend?"
"Nope." Straining to hold herself into normal time, Rainbow wanted to run ten times faster than the treadmill would let her. "Gives me a condescending look when I mention I have two boyfriends, then outright insults me and one of them. Forget that. I don't care if she's a fed or what."