//------------------------------// // Chapter 5 // Story: Imperfect // by Wheller //------------------------------// Chapter 5 “I think that Twin 8mm Light Machine Guns might be a little overkill Left-tennant,” Twilight said. Rainbow Dash blinked, she was standing in the middle of the Ponyville Library, and it felt as if she was carrying another pony on her back. She looked back and discovered that she might as well have been, at her flanks were two long kangaroo made guns, a curved magazine sticking out of the top of each, both guns were nearly as long as Rainbow Dash was and mounted to her sides by a saddle harness. In front of her was a small control yoke, in order to engage the weapons, Rainbow would have to bring the yoke up into her mouth, and would fire it by biting down. Rather ingenious design. Not that she’d come up with it herself, there was a chalkboard in the room explaining it, that Rainbow was reading off of. The weapons that Rainbow Dash was wearing had apparently been dubbed as the “Ponyville Pattern” Sen Light Machine Gun. Well, wasn’t that just lovely? “Considering who our enemy is? Overkill is necessary Twilight Spackle.” Rainbow Dash recognised the kangaroo who was standing in the room with them was Sergeant Tebbs. She did her best to stifle her grin at the South Islander’s mispronunciation of her friend’s name. The accent made it impossible to get it right. Rainbow Dash couldn’t believe she’d been roped into this. Twilight and the kangaroo had convinced her to don the “Ponyville Pattern” the moment she’d stepped through the door to Twilight’s Library. Apparently, Twilight Sparkle was helping the now-Lieutenant Tebbs in the creation of weapons that ponies could use. “Ammunition management is going to be a problem. Ponies aren’t exactly able to swap magazines on their own,” Twilight stated plainly. “Regular Sen Guns are operated by teams. One actually wields the weapon, the others carry the ammo. Give all the ammo to a unicorn, problem solved.” Twilight nodded her head side to side, thinking about the possibility. “Uh? Is anypony going to ask what I think about it?” Rainbow Dash asked. Twilight was shaken out of her thought induced trance. “Of course Rainbow, what do you think of it?” “It’s heavy!” Rainbow Dash complained. “There’s no way I could ever fly in this thing!” “Fly?” Tebbs exclaimed. “I should hope not! Even if you could fly in that thing, recoil from firing it in the air would send you tumbling to the ground! The 8x60 mm SI is not something to be trifled with!” “This isn’t meant for you Rainbow, this is just a prototype for the militia,” Twilight explained. Rainbow Dash was getting annoyed. “Somepony really needs to explain what’s going on right now, or Celestia help me my brain is going to explode!” Twilight blinked, she turned to her kangaroo companion. “Lef-tenant? Could you give us a moment?” Tebbs nodded leaving the two mares alone. Twilight helped Rainbow Dash out of the Ponyville Pattern. “What exactly is it that you wanted to know about?” “Why is everypony armed to the teeth, and why does everypony hate me?” Rainbow Dash asked simply. Twilight frowned. “We’re at war with the Twin Gryphon Kingdoms. Almost a year now since they took Manehattan Province from us. Gryphon Airborne Infantry raid us here every week or so because we have the highest concentration of kangaroo forces here. Everypony carries a gun in case they have to use it.” Rainbow Dash’s eyes grew narrow. Could things really be that bad? “… I’m assuming you mean how Pinkie Pie and the others react to you when they see you? Truth is. It’s because you’re a hero.” Rainbow Dash looked at Twilight in confusion. “I don’t get it.” Twilight sighed. “Apart from the capital itself, there is nothing in Canterlot Province that the gryphons want badly enough to launch a full out assault on, they’re not going to do it as long as the South Island XX Corps is garrisoned within the city walls. But this wasn’t always the case; there was one town that would have been very useful in gryphon claws, Cloudsdale.” Rainbow Dash began to see where she was going with this. Cloudsdale was in charge of weather control for Canterlot, Marenassas, and Fillydelphia Provinces. In Gryphon control, they could manipulate the weather any way they wanted. “You, Derpy Hooves, and the Doctor sabotaged the Cloudsdale weather engine so that it would be useless, gryphons never mastered weather control, they wouldn’t know how to fix it… the night that you did it was the coldest one that Equestria had ever had.” “How was that bad?” Rainbow Dash asked in confusion. “It was the middle of July, Rainbow,” Twilight said sadly. “All the crops died, food shortages were a big problem, and there simply wasn’t enough from the southern provinces to spare… But as for the reason that you asked… Apple Bloom, Sweetie Bell, Scootaloo? They were outside camping, trying to get their cutie marks for being survivalists… They froze to death.” Rainbow’s heart sank. “Naturally, Applejack and Rarity were devastated, you were sorry that they died, of course, but you weren’t sorry that you did it… Let’s just say that they didn’t have much reason to like you after that… Fluttershy was appalled that you killed hundreds of animals that live in the area, throwing the ecosystem into chaos, she was never directly hostile to you, but she’s refused to say a single word to you since you did it,” Twilight reported. Rainbow’s heart continued to sink. “What about Pinkie Pie?” Twilight frowned at this question, she chose her words carefully, not out of any concern that Pinkie Pie would retaliate, but that she didn’t want to blemish their memories of her. “Pinkie Pie... is insane, Rainbow Dash,” Twilight finally managed. “That mare has more guns than she knows what to do with, and believe me, she’s come up with some very... creative ways to put them to use. Remember that Rock Farm she grew up on? It’s not so much a farm anymore. It’s more like a strip mine. She’s rich from all the gems she’s had dug up, and she uses them to buy more guns, and with all that concrete she’s mixing? Pinkie Pie has turned this town into a fortress.” “Why should I not be interacting with the Doctor?” Rainbow Dash asked. “If he helped me save Ponyville, why is he bad?” “He’s not... bad. His goals don’t coincide with ours. Equestria and South Island want to win the war... he just wanted Cloudsdale taken out of commission. He got what he wanted, Cloudsdale is just a city now, and Equestria’s weather forms on its own now,” Twilight explained. “He’s not trustworthy. He does things for his own agenda.” Rainbow almost wished she hadn’t heard any of it. This information was far heavier than the Ponyville Pattern had been. She sat down on the sofa, tears forming in her eyes. Twilight sat down with her. “I don’t like this Twilight, not one bit,” Rainbow Dash said. “I hear you,” Twilight said, she put her forelegs around Rainbow Dash, embracing her and setting her head on her shoulder. “I want nothing more to go back to the time when we were all young and innocent, and I didn’t know things like what an eight-bore shot does when it hits something, or how to calculate just how high to aim a gun to hit a far away target... I envy you sometimes in that.” Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and hugged the mare back, they sat silently holding each other for what seemed like hours. ... Rainbow Dash awoke to find herself lying on the floor in Twilight’s Library. She’d flashed back to the present, but she couldn’t remember what she was doing on the floor. Pinkie Pie! Rainbow Dash jumped to her hooves and looked at the clock, three hours had passed, and Pinkie Pie the rope thief was long gone. Rainbow Dash rushed up the stairs, Twilight was asleep, and likely had been for the entire time that Rainbow had flashed-forward. Though how Twilight had been able to sleep through Pinkie Pie’s attack, Rainbow was not sure. Twilight had to have been a heavy sleeper, or more likely, was an effect of medication. Rainbow did not wake her; there was nothing to be done about it right now. Pinkie Pie had made off with her prize. Though Rainbow couldn’t think for the life of her what the earth pony could possibly want with a coil of rope. ... “What are you doing?” Pinkie Pie did not respond. She merely tossed the rope she had stolen from Twilight Sparkle over a tree branch at the edge of Everfree. “What are you doing?” Pinkie Pie looked at the source of the voice, standing there was another copy of herself, glaring angrily at her. She was hallucinating. Pinkie Pie gave herself an insane grin, and climbed into the tree. Expertly, she tied one end of the rope into a loop, and the other end to the tree branch and let the loop fall, it extended about a metre above the ground. Pinkie Pie grinned, it was perfect. She pulled her home made noose back up and placed it around her neck. “Pinkamina Diane Pie! What are you doing!?” the reflection screamed at her. Pinkie looked at it and grinned. “Keeping you away from my friends,” she said softly, and without another word. She leapt from the tree.