//------------------------------//
// My Kingdom for a Dust Devil 
// Story: Bulletproof Mirage 
// by PaulAsaran 
//------------------------------//

Amidst the smoke and fire and carnage, Mirage stared at Rarity. And not just any Rarity, but a gunslinging anthro Rarity who, despite the bruises and spots of dirt and sweat, managed to be startlingly hot. Rarity stared right back, the two of them still pointing guns at one another. At this point, however, pulling the trigger was far from Mirage’s mind.

“Sunset Shimmer,” Rarity repeated, as if doing so would change who was in front of her.

“Uh… Rarity?” Mirage replied in equal bewilderment.

The unicorn’s eyes drifted for a moment. “You have wings.”

Said wings gave a weak flap, prompting her to dumbly remark, “So I do.”

A long, uncertain pause passed between them as they each tried to place their new circumstances into reality and still make sense of things.

Then Rarity’s eyes narrowed and her jaw tensed. Ignoring the gun aimed between her eyes, she stomped forward and pressed the barrel of her ruby-lined weapon under Mirage’s jaw. “After everything I did for you, this is the thanks I get? You sent thugs after me. You shot down an airship, just to get to me. I thought we were friends!”

"Me?!" Mirage countered, feeling a flare of anger within her. Even if this didn't make sense, there was no chance that she would betray such a fine spec—friend! She batted the gun under her chin to the side, leaning in to glare at Rarity herself. "I wouldn't have come here guns blazing and hurting ponies if you hadn't sent goons after me! What, are alicorns illegal here or something?! What did I ever do to you? 

"I made sure I didn't hit anyone with my spells! Ponies weren't supposed to die today, alright?!" She huffed, leaning back and crossing her arms. "I wasn't trying to kill you, but— Damn it!" She turned away from the other mare, holding her stomach, which was starting to register the pain from Rarity's earlier backwards shot. 

The adrenaline was fading and all that remained was the anger that had kept her going and the hole through her stomach. Had she been in her normal body, she'd probably be bleeding to death on the floor by now. She summoned a healing pack and pressed it against her wound, watching it dissolve alongside the pain. 

Throwing caution to the wind she tossed her guns into the air, where they burnt into nothing. She sighed in relief as the healing completed and glanced over her shoulder at Rarity. "Do you need healing? Or would you rather I didn't get too close right now?"

Rarity didn’t stop glaring, but at least she wasn’t pointing the gun at her anymore. “‘Ponies weren’t supposed to die’, she says after shooting an airship out of the sky. As if that somehow wouldn’t lead to any fatalities.” She moved as if to holster her guns, then paused, looking around. “Wait. Your weapons. Where did they—?”

Feeling guilt build up again, Mirage turned halfway to point a finger at her. "Look, it's not my fault that the captain couldn't control the dive, alright? I waited until it wasn't that high! If he had kept steady, the small wings would have guided you to a rough, but relatively safe landing!"

Rubbing her forehead, Rarity heaved a sigh. “We’re getting off track. What is this about me sending some hit squad out on you? Because I can assure I would never do such a thing to my enemies, much less my friends.”

"Right," Mirage muttered, pulling out the note she had fished from one of the dead bodies. "I followed their trail here because they had agreed to meet here to be picked up. They came up to my camp really early this morning and went on about how justice did pay, since they were working for you. Since I didn't know who the hell the Bulletproof Heart was, and that was my only lead, I decided to confront you." She glanced at the wreckage. "Granted, I thought it would be less… spread."

“Didn’t know?” Rarity scowled at her. If Mirage didn’t know any better, she’d think the mare felt hurt by the statement. “Sunset, I’m the one who taught you how to shoot in the first place. I was in your hometown, fighting Bad Apples. Why are you acting like you don’t know me?”

Mirage grimaced. "Teach me? What are—? Oh. Of course. I'm such an idiot. Alright, this needs some explaining, but how about we clean up the area first? It's a long story, and I'm looking for a mare with a weird horn. She stole something from me."

The look she received would have scorched her to cinders were Rarity able to weaponize it. Mirage wondered if Rarity wasn’t considering shooting her anyway. Yet, after a few seconds of glaring, she finally put her weapon away under her vest. “When I helped you become an independent and free mare, I hadn’t expected anything like this. You disappoint me, Sunset. But I suppose if we can agree that you’re not going to try and shoot me anymore?” At the searching query, Mirage gave a weak nod. “Fine. Then we’ll talk when this is done. You do what you have to. I’ve got a lizard to—” Rarity let out a yelp as she began to turn around, nearly falling after putting weight on her injured leg.

"Rarity, you… Yeah, let's wait until this is done. Here, let me heal your wounds." She pulled a classic mid level potion out of her inventory, hefted it and threw it at Rarity's head.

"And how do you plan to do—?" Rarity managed to partially turn around with an icy glare just in time to get decked in the forehead by the potion. Which didn't break. Rarity fell on her rump from the impact, clutching her skull and letting out a hiss of pain. "What the hell?! Are you trying to bludgeon me to death now?"

Mirage quickly scrambled back, hands up. "No! No, I promise! That was supposed to burst! It will heal your wounds immediately!"

Rarity moved as though she intended to grab her gun yet again, but seemed to think better of it and grabbed the bottle instead. She sat up, blood running between her eyes, and looked at the blue liquid. “In what world do you think bottles full of liquid just magically break upon impact? I’m starting to wonder if you haven’t taken leave of your senses.”

“I’m sorry!” Mirage waved at the bottle. “Trust me, just… just drink the thing.”

“I’m not inclined to trust the word of a mare who thought shooting an airship’s hull and balloons wouldn’t lead to disaster, to say nothing for how she tried to kill me.” She tossed the bottle back at Mirage, who caught it in one hand. “Much less one I used to think was a trusted friend.”

"Oh, for Celestia's sake." Mirage sighed. "First, I was trying not to kill you, thank you very much. But, I suppose I did come in somewhat aggressively. Here, let me show you." She sat down across from Rarity then, using her teeth, pulled off the cork and spat it to the side. She then made a show of dropping a small but steady stream of the contents on the leg she had injured earlier. "See? Nothing bad happens if I pour it over a wound. Now, will you let me just splash your shoulder or something with it?" She offered the bottle. "Or you can do it yourself."

Rarity peered at the liquid on Mirage’s leg, sniffing in disdain. “I’m still not inclined to—”

“Oh, for Luna’s sake!” Mirage threw caution to the wind yet again and just poured the potion on the mare.

With a cry of alarm, Rarity tried to back away, an act that wasn’t made easier by her injured leg. “Y-you brute! You best hope that stuff washes out or so help me, I will feed you to a dragon! Don’t think I won’t, I happen to know one and he… He…” Her attention was grabbed by the wounds in her leg rapidly healing up. “It’s working.”

"Yeah, and no need to call on Spikey-wikey, the stuff fades away on its own," Mirage added with a smirk. "Now… where is that damned mare?" She scanned the area just as the bow-side the airship wreckage crumbled under its own weight and the damage from the fire. She cringed. "Say, Rarity, you didn't mention if you had seen the weird mare. Red mane, horn split in two at the top, sound familiar?"

“The color,” Rarity huffed, “is moderate tangelo. But yes, I did meet her. She’s the one who told me that you had infiltrated the ranks of the chancellor’s organization with the specific intent of using his resources to find and kill me.” She stood slowly, testing her leg as if expecting the wound to come back. Finding it stable and unhurt, she went to retrieve her other weapon from the dirt. “She was in the same room as me when the airship went down. Which was…” A pause. “Should I even be telling you this?”

"Look." Mirage bit her lip. "I don't have any idea who this chancellor is. The first time I heard of him, some priest in a town due southeast of here informed me that the mare that stole my stuff worked for him. I've been chasing her for two days. I didn't have time to send ponies after you, not that I even would."

Rarity stared at Mirage, and for once it wasn’t with anger or frustration. No, it was a long, quiet, considering look, with the face of a pony putting pieces together in her head. “Let me get this straight. A mare with a strange horn and moderate tangelo mane stole something from you. Presumably the same mare who told me that you’re out to kill me. Am I hearing this correctly?”

Mirage nodded. "Like I said. I had no reason to go after the Bulletproof Heart, except that apparently she sent ponies to murder me, and also happened to work for the chancellor, who is the boss of the mare that stole my things. Why else would I go through all this trouble?"

Rarity pursed her lips. Her fist clenched once, twice. Then, abruptly, she was marching past the wreckage, moving for the collapsed bow of the airship. “When I get my hands on that kirin, I swear to Discord… Come on, hopefully she hasn’t gotten very far.”





Rarity had been upset before, but this was something a touch more than that. It was by no means ‘taken advantage of in a bar’ levels of rage, but it was still enough to make her question whether Autumn Blaze would be coming out of this situation alive. She couldn’t believe she’d been manipulated so easily! Not that she’d had any reason to suspect after Sunset literally shot the airship down. Really, what had the mare been thinking? How was Rarity supposed to see that as anything but wanton, unprovoked aggression? Who knocks holes into a ship and doesn’t expect ponies to die?

She stomped into the area between two halves of the airship. The stern-side remained surprisingly intact, but the bow was little more than smoking rubble. The fires had died down a bit, though smoke still filled the area. “Do you think you can do anything about the air?” she asked in a short, tense tone.

"Sure!" The other mare gathered magic in her horn, then conjured a breeze through the area using several beats of her magic-empowered wings. As the smoke dispersed she dowsed the nearby fires with some water spells. "How's that?"

“Perfectly envy-inducing.” Rarity paused as the smoke cleared, getting a good look at both parts of the wreckage. Her heart abruptly began to ache. Somewhere in the stern of the ship was the stables. Her heart gave an agonizing twist, but… it was still standing. Maybe there was a chance.

Turning back to the bow of the ship, she pointed. "The mare you were hunting was having a meeting with me in that side of the ship. Good luck finding her.” She promptly started jogging to the gaping wreckage of the stern.

“And where are you going?” Sunset called after her.

“To make sure you didn’t kill my baby with your foolishness!”

“Baby?”

Ignoring the mare, Rarity hurried into the wreckage. Sunset’s spell might have removed the smoke from the exterior, but in here it was still thick. “I’m coming, Ophelia,” she muttered, squeezing between two fallen timbers. “Please be alright. Mommy’s coming.” If her lizard was dead, Celestia herself wouldn’t be able to stop Rarity from taking that blasted mare and her chancellor out. She’d make garters out of their insides and necklaces out of their horns.

She could hear hoofsteps behind. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Sunset pursuing. No time to think about that now. If the mare wanted to help, then she was welcome to try and keep up.

It took a lot of searching, and more than once Rarity came to a stop to listen for any signs of life. The wreck seemed abandoned save for the occasional shriek of breaking metal and rumble of falling wood. And crackling fire. That was all over the place. No flames were visible, but the heat of the hallway suggested it wasn’t far away.

At last, Rarity reached the door she knew led to the stables. Her heart sank at the sight of wooden wreckage blocking the entry. Whimpering, she tugged at the material, hoping to find a space big enough to squeeze through, but there was nothing of the sort. She tried peering through it all. “Ophelia? Can you hear me, Darling?”

"Rarity…" Sunset whispered. "I can try to levitate the wreckage around the door for long enough for you to get in and… um, take a look."

There was no time for second guessing. Rarity stepped back hurriedly. “Do what you have to, but please try to keep the roof from falling. That wreckage might be the only thing keeping the place stable.”

“Got it.” Focusing on the door, Sunset began to work her magic. Rarity watched with bated breath and teeth massaging her lip as, slowly, carefully, the timbers and bits of ceiling were shoved into the room and aside. It didn’t move too much, just enough to let Rarity squeeze through.

“Go,” Sunset instructed. “I’ll follow once I’ve got it big enough.”

Not wasting any time asking questions, Rarity pushed herself through the small space. The stable was half-collapsed, a fact that had Rarity’s blood running cold. “Ophelia! Ophelia, come on, make a sound.” Oh, why hadn’t she stayed behind to check which stall was hers?

There came a trill, the sound instantly vaporizing the ice in her blood to steam and sending her running. She found Ophelia stuck in a stall. Heaving a sigh of relief, Rarity tried to open it, but the gate had been warped by the destruction and wouldn’t budge. “Damn it, what is with this night? I am not losing my lizard, do you hear me, Celestia!?”

Sunset was finally in the room, and when she spotted Ophelia her wings went slack. “A lizard. That’s your ‘baby’?”

“Bite your tongue!” Rarity reached out to pet Ophelia’s muzzle through the gate. “Don’t listen to her, sweetie. You’re the most precious lizard in the world and she doesn’t know your worth.”

Ophelia let out a faint grunt and nuzzled Rarity’s hands. Her blue eyes shone with worry as she tried to push against the gate to no avail.

“Don’t worry, Big Girl,” Rarity cooed. “Mommy’s gonna get you out.” She stepped back and observed the scene. “Somehow.”

The room was already filled with a heavy amount of smoke, and that was becoming even denser by the second. Rarity scanned the area, hoping to find something useful, and her eyes landed on Sunset. “Can you help?”

Sunset examined the gate, then made a show of cracking her knuckles. “Compared to that wreckage earlier, this should be a piece of cake.”

“Enough boasting,” Rarity hissed. “More magicking.”

“Right.” Sunset lit her horn and, with an ease that made the little pony in Rarity’s head practically green, ripped the gate away and sent it crashing against the opposite wall. “There you go.”

Rarity immediately jumped into the stall and wrapped both arms around Ophelia’s neck, pressing her face against the lizard's frills with a grin. “Oh, Ophelia, I’m so sorry! I’ll never leave you alone like that in some airship again, mark my words. You deserve so much better.” The lizard cooed and nudged her, prompting her to giggle. “That’s right, Mommy loves you. Yes she does, you adorable thing, yes she does!”

"Huh, I usually just shoot lizards that size," Sunset noted. "Some of them are good eating."

Rarity gasped and slapped her hands around Ophelia’s head as if to cover her nonexistent ears. “You beast! Do not speak such things around my poor lizard, you’ll frighten her.”

Sunset chuckled and shook her head. “Why is it half the Rarities I meet have a thing for lizards?” She coughed as the smoke finally started to reach the level of their heads. She cast a quick spell with her horn and, with a flap of wings, sent the smoke away. “We need to get out of here.”

“Quite. Come along, Ophelia.” Rarity was mildly surprised, but not displeased, to find that the Dust Devil still had her saddle and panniers on. Either the stablehands were lazy oafs or they didn’t expect to keep her for long enough for it to make a difference. She guided Ophelia to the open area, looking around with a grim frown. “Now how are we going to do that?”

The door they came through was too small for the lizard even without the wreckage, and the double doors intended for lizards were hot upon approach. Now that she got a good look, Rarity realized that much of the smoke was coming from that direction. “Oh dear. This might be a problem.”

Sunset stood at her side, also examining their surroundings. Her fuzzy amber ears perked to the sound of something crashing in the distance. “This place is coming apart. We’re lucky this room is as intact as it is.”

“I am not leaving Ophelia here,” Rarity growled.

“I’m not saying you should.” Sunset peered at the walls. “Okay, I’ve got a crazy idea, but hear me out: What if we blow this joint?”

Rarity raised an eyebrow. “Is that some Little Longhorn slang I failed to catch while I was there?”

“Sure, let’s go with that.” Sunset approached the only undamaged wall, carefully placing her hand against it. “This direction seems cool. Maybe it’s more stable than the others. I say I blast it.”

“Blast it?” Rarity gave the reins a squeeze as the floor shook under her boots. Ophelia let out a faint whine and bumped her shoulder with her snout. “With what, dynamite?”

Sunset turned back to her. “Remember how I shot this thing down in the first place?”

“Of course,” Rarity growled. “The laser that practically blinded me as it went through the floor a foot away from my hooves.”

“It's plasma, not—” A beat. “Nevermind. Look, I’ve got enough juice in me to do that again. I make a hole, we run through it.”

“A brilliant plan,” Rarity acknowledged, cringing to the sound of another crash. Flames were beginning to appear against the back wall. “Except that it’ll probably bring the whole thing down on our heads.”

Sunset nodded, grim. “Yeah, but you’ve got a pretty tough shield. Tougher than mine. We get on your lizard and ride it through the hole. You keep your shield up.”

Rarity tried to envision the act. She swallowed to ease her dry throat. “I think you may be overestimating my abilities.”

The cabin rocked yet again, making both of them wobble. Sunset hurried to her side. “Maybe, but your shield is clearly better than mine, if how you handled that fight is any indication. If you’ve got a better idea, I’d love to hear it.”

Rarity wanted to have one, she really did. To trust their lives to her meager shield? It worked fine against bullets, could even take a shotgun blast at point blank range, but they were talking about having an entire airship falling on top of them! Still, there was no time left to argue. That wall was starting to be replaced entirely by fire. “Alright, if we’re going to do this, best not dawdle.” She deftly got on Ophelia, having to duck her head lest it hit the ceiling. “Climb on up.”

Sunset stepped beside the lizard and gripped the saddle. Then she hoisted herself up… a lot too quickly. With a yelp, she grasped Rarity’s shoulders, fighting not to fall off the opposite side. Her head whacked against the ceiling as she struggled to right herself.

Rarity might have laughed were the situation not so serious. Besides, Sunset probably wouldn’t appreciate it. Once the alicorn was properly in the saddle – as best she could be considering it was sized for only one pony – her larger size forced her to bend forward and place her chin on Rarity’s shoulder. The mare took a long, slow breath, her muzzle pressed deep in Rarity’s mane.

Rarity smirked at the relieved sound. “You alright back there?”

“Y-yeah. Just fine.” A beat. A cough. “So, uh, point us in the right direction and I’ll do my part.”

With a tug of the reins, Rarity got Ophelia facing that one undamaged wall. The smoke Sunset had pushed away was already making a comeback and the area behind them was getting a little too warm for comfort. “Okay, Ophelia,” she muttered, taking a moment to rub the lizard’s head. “I need you to be fast. I apologize in advance for putting you through this.”

Sunset’s arms squeezed a little more tightly around Rarity’s middle. “You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

“Okay.” The alicorn’s horn, pointing ahead of Rarity, began to glow a bright teal. “You might want to close your eyes.”

Rarity did so, and a few seconds later she felt the intense, familiar, stinging heat of Sunset’s beam attack. Wood splintered and cracked, metal shrieked, the airship shook!

“It’s done, go, go, go!”

Opening her eyes, Rarity was presented with a perfectly circular hole to the outside, the wood and metal still smoking from the blast. She threw up a shield around them and whipped their ride into motion. “Fly, Ophelia!”

The lizard needed no extra urging, going straight into a gallop through the opening. The world trembled, and already Rarity could feel things slamming against the top of her barrier. For the second time that night, everything was noise and explosive crackling and shrieking metal! She grit her teeth and willed Ophelia to go faster, faster, faster! Something slammed into the shield, the impact like a sledgehammer against her skull. Eyes clenched, hands taut, she hissed her pain and forced herself to keep the shield going.

Cool air washed over her, and her eyes flew open when she realized they were weightless. Ophelia had leapt out the side of the airship, the ground more than a dozen feet below and rushing up to meet them. They hit the ground so hard that Rarity was nearly thrown off the saddle, recovering only because Ophelia was conscientious enough to twist and stay under her.

Sunset let out a whoop. “Alright! I knew it would work! I knew it! I should have recorded this, Luna will never believe me.”

Ophelia slid across the dirt to a rough stop, panting from the sudden effort. Rarity leaned forward to give the creature a hug around the neck. “Very good, Ophelia! Mommy’s so very proud of you. I’m getting you all the rabbits you can eat.”

Their celebration was barely disturbed by the sight and sounds of the airship stern collapsing completely behind them, reduced to nothing more than twisted metal and flaming wood.

Sunset smirked. "We should do it again. For posterity, and this time I'll be recording!"

"If you want to do that, you’ll have to do it on your own. I’ve had enough airships to last a lifetime." Rarity turned to eye the pony at her back. "Weren't you looking for that kirin?"

The alicorn blinked and turned to face the remains of the ship, then shook her head with a sigh. "There's no chance she's even in there, is there?"

“That’s not the part of the ship she was in,” Rarity reminded her, pointed to the other, equally collapsed part of the wreckage. “That being said, we’ve given her plenty of time to flee. Perhaps you could use those wings to search the area?”

Sunset shook her head. "I threw off the night vision glasses, and I'm fairly certain they broke. Without them, spotting her around here is going to be really hard, if not impossible. And if anything, that mare has proven that she's very good at hiding."

Rarity mouthed the phrase ‘nightvision glasses’, rather amazed at the very concept. Not that it mattered now. “Alright, then we’ll have to figure out what to do next. Tonight, however, we get some food and rest. After we move a bit away from the wreckage, that is. Something like that is going to draw attention, and I don’t want to be close by when ponies come looking.”

“It’s the middle of the night,” Sunset noted. “Who would even notice? And I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty tired.”

“In my experience, being ‘pretty tired’ is one of the things that prevents you from being ‘pretty dead’.” She flicked the reins, guiding Ophelia back east.

Sunset was silent for a moment. She gave Rarity a tight squeeze around her middle. “You’ve been through some shit, haven’t you?”

Rarity pursed her lips, fighting back a wave of unpleasant memories. “That’s certainly one way to put it.”

Sunset studied her for a moment, then nodded. "I'll follow your lead." She looked over at the remains of the airship once more. "Besides, I don't think there's anything else we can learn here."