//------------------------------// // Chapter 9 // Story: Daring Dash and Rosetta Sparkle in the Jungle of Perils // by elPossenreisser //------------------------------// Chapter 9 They were awakened early the next morning by the angry war cries of the tribal alpacas combing through the jungle. They only shared a quick look before they stumbled to their hooves. Rainbow quickly took wing to orientate herself and was able to point them in the right direction, and they didn’t hesitate to get moving. Both of them had to fight yawns, as this early hour, shortly after sunrise, was clearly not their favorite time of the day. Before they had gotten any further than twenty meters, they already almost bumped into an alpaca warrior, and even though they hastily retreated, he noticed them and gave off a loud alarm cry. Within seconds they heard alpacas closing in on them from all sides. “Get on my back! I’ll fly us out of here!” “And if they hit you with their blowpipes again we’ll crash”, Twilight replied worriedly. “I’m afraid we’ll have to fight them.” Without waiting for Rainbow’s reaction, she grasped a huge tree trunk that was right above one of the approaching warriors, twisted it, and caused it to fall down. With a little push of her magic, she managed to hit the alpaca right on the head, and the tribal warrior collapsed. As if this had been the starting signal, at least half a dozen alpacas started charging them from all sides. From the corner of her eye she saw one alpaca take aim and fire a dart at Rainbow Dash. Without thinking, she caught the dart with her magic in mid-air and made it fall down. In the meantime Rainbow bucked the frontmost alpaca in the chest and made him crumble against a huge tree trunk. Then another alpaca armed with a club lunged himself at Twilight. She barely managed to duck underneath his attack and meekly punched him with her front hoof. The alpaca grunted, but took another swing at her. Twilight jumped to the left and rolled over as she landed. The alpaca jumped after her, but she was back on her hooves just in time to spin around and buck him in the head. The alpaca crumbled like a puppet whose strings had just been cut off. At the same time, Rainbow Dash was attacked by two alpacas, one with a club and one with a spear. With a cocky smirk, she blocked the attacker’s spear with the one she still carried with her, but the alpaca, much more experienced with this kind of weapon, whirled his spear around the shaft of Rainbow’s spear, and the quick and unexpected spinning motion tore the weapon out of her hooves. The alpaca grinned maliciously. She noticed that the alpaca with the club was trying to flank her, and quickly took wing. She grabbed the first attacker’s spear and pulled it up as she flew. The alpaca, refusing to let go of his weapon, was thrown on his back. Rainbow Dash launched herself at him from midair and smashed her hooves against his chin, knocking him out cold. Before the club-armed alpaca could even react, she darted towards him and picked up the horrified alpaca. She took to the air in a nice ballistic angle and let go of her opponent, launching him into the jungle at high speed, and he crashed into some bushes. As she landed, she saw Twilight shooting a big rock at one alpaca who was standing a few steps back and was reloading his blowpipe. The alpaca was hit in the chest and fell over, letting go of his blowpipe. Rainbow quickly glanced around and saw that of the group that had attacked them, only one more was still standing, aiming at Twilight with his blowpipe. “Hey, woolface!” she yelled at the top of her lungs. The alpaca was distracted for just a second and lost his aim on Twilight, and Rainbow took the opportunity and shot over to the alpaca. She knocked him out with a few well-placed punches. “Woohoo!” Twilight shouted, panting. Rainbow, a little out of breath herself, didn’t rest. She quickly flew over to Twilight and picked her up and carried up, above the canopy. “Let’s get out of here before more of them show up!” Twilight, still enthused about their victory, wrapped her hooves around the pegasus and cheered in her ear, causing her a broad smile. Rainbow didn’t plan to fly far, just enough to be out of reach of the alpacas. But suddenly Twilight who was now eagerly looking around shouted, “Look, there! Smoke!” She almost pointed in the direction with her hoof, but then resorted to using her horn instead. “Over there!” “Silver?” Rainbow asked through gritted teeth. “Not unlikely!” Without waiting for an invitation, Rainbow changed course and flew in the direction that Twilight indicated, while the unicorn bent her neck to keep the smoke in view. It was a tiny column of white smoke, potentially from a camp fire, and not even two kilometers away. “Don’t fly right into it”, she advised. “Land somewhere nearby, so we can have a careful look first.” “I’m not scared of him!” Rainbow protested. “He has a gun”, Twilight pointed out. “What if he shoots us while we’re still in mid-air?” “Yeah, I guess you’re right”, Rainbow reluctantly agreed. “We’re still kicking his flank”, she growled. “You bet”, Twilight agreed with a grim smile. Rainbow carefully carried them on, now flying very low above the canopy. Not before long began to descend, and Twilight had to press her face against the pegasus’ shoulder as she was zigzagging around tree trunks at what seemed like breakneck pace. Almost an eternity later they touched the ground, barely making a noise. They could hear faint voices from ahead, where the fire had been, but too far to make out who was speaking or what was being said. “Th-thanks for the lift”, Twilight whispered, still a little shaky from the rough ride. “Sorry, Twi”, pegasus chuckled sheepishly. “Force of habit, you know. But you were absolutely safe, promise”, she added, looking Twilight in the eyes earnestly. Twilight couldn’t pull herself away from those beautiful magenta eyes. It took a good part of her willpower to care about Manehattan Silver, Hauptmann Hornmeyer, and the Golden Alpaca Princess right now, and even then she wasn’t even halfway successful. Rainbow pulled away from the gaze first and started prowling through the dense underwood, towards the voices. Twilight shook her head to clear it at least partially and followed her. Soon they were close enough to distinguish several voices. One was clearly Manehattan Silver’s, the others sounded decidedly like goats. So he had met up with some soldiers. Rainbow Dash hissed “Jerkface” as she prowled even closer. “How come you get to still be the same awesome flier anyway and I only have Rosetta’s average magic?” Twilight wondered. “I guess Daring is just as awesome as I am”, Rainbow replied matter-of-factly. "Very funny", Twilight said, even though she had to admit that it made sense. It was still a little bit frustrating. They sneaked closer, ever so carefully and slowly. The voices became clearer, and they could even smell the fire now. Finally, they reached the edge of a small clearing. Peeking out from the shrubs edging the clearing, they could see their prey. Manehattan Silver was sitting around a small campfire with four goats wearing grey military fatigues and Goat Empire armbands, one of them with the beret of a Feldwebel – the same four goats they had met in the saloon in Malatierra. Each goat was holding a rifle across their lap. Twilight pointed at the weapons. “We have to be careful here”, she told Rainbow. “We should strike right now”, Rainbow advocated. “We can surprise them!” “Too dangerous”, Twilight disagreed. “They have their guns on them; if they are quick enough they might be able to shoot us.” She tapped her hoof against her chin, thinking about what to do. “I think our best bet is to follow them and see if there is a better opportunity.” Rainbow’s response was an unarticulated growl, but she didn’t argue back. The two of them settled down under their lookout shrub. They didn’t have to wait for long until the goats extinguished the fire and set out with the traitorous pony amidst them. Again Rainbow Dash was about to dart straight after them, and again Twilight stopped her with a hoof on a shoulder. “Let them get ahead a little, so we don’t run the risk of being found”, she suggested. Again, she received Rainbow’s grunted acceptance. They waited until the goats were almost out of earshot before they followed them across the clearing. Despite the situation and the diverse threats they had to face – heavily armed goats in front, angry alpacas behind – , the whole ordeal felt a little but like a friendly walk to Twilight. She was still exhausted from the day before, but she couldn't keep her mind from circling around herself and Rainbow Dash, and what this story would develop into. The point was, she was getting impatient. Twilight recognized this sentiment from when she had been reading Daring Do and the Devious Doctor Negative – she didn’t want to wait! She hungered for the romance to finally happen. After all, there were enough signs. The irony that she was rooting for a pairing – and actually believing in it – that she had only days before flat out denied wasn’t lost on her and made her smile. She was curious how it would play out, and the anticipation of being part of said romance herself was causing her a warm, fuzzy feeling in the stomach that was not entirely unpleasant. Maybe she should just give the whole thing a little push? Walk with her tail entwined with Rainbow’s, for example? Fighting back a sudden trace of fear of being rejected by Rainbow Dash, she reassured herself with the knowledge that this was, still, in fact, undeniably, a story about her and Rainbow Dash getting together. The rational knowledge that she would probably not be shot down and would probably not make things very awkward helped a lot in alleviating the fear. She gulped down the last bit of uncertainty and, with an air of utmost nonchalant innocence, wrapped the tip of her tail around Rainbow’s. The pegasus seemed to get out of step for the shortest moment but caught herself immediately. Twilight looked at her with a shy smile, and Rainbow smiled back at her, her cheeks flushed in a soft pink. Twilight took a deep breath, trying not to let Rainbow hear it, and turned to taking in the new situation. Since she had never been in a romantic relationship, she had never held tails before. It felt like little more than a little tugging on her tail, with the odd stray hair occasionally tickling the back of her legs. With other words, it was amazing walking through some imaginary jungle, holding tails with this beautiful pegasus mare. She couldn’t help but let a broad smile creep onto her face, and from the corner of her eye she saw that it was the same with Rainbow. They continued on for over an hour when suddenly Rainbow’s stomach gave off a loud rumble. They were far enough from their prey so that they were in no danger of being heard. “We kinda missed breakfast this morning”, she said and rubbed the back of her head with her hoof. She quickly looked around, scanning the area for edibles that she knew. “You keep going, I’ma get us some snacks!” Although she was hungry too, Twilight felt a small pang of regret when Rainbow let go of her tail and soared away into the jungle’s canopy. She kept going to keep contact with the goats, and only a few minutes later Rainbow Dash landed at her side. She offered her a papaya which the unicorn happily accepted, but what made her even happier was that Rainbow, without hesitation, wrapped her tail around Twilight’s again as they walked on, eating their papayas on the go. The jungle was less dense in this area, and walking was much less strenuous then their way to the ruins had been the day before. There was very little underwood here in between the large pillars of the tree trunks. The wildlife didn’t seem to care in the slightest though and made the same cacophonic noise as always, but after spending a day out in the jungle they were pretty much used to it. Between the trees there were occasionally little ponds, most of them very shallow and with questionably green water and colorful frogs sitting on strangely shaped lily pads. Others had a longer, bent shape and were deeper. But with the pace the goats set they didn’t have too much time to enjoy the scenery. The goats kept marching for a couple of hours. Rainbow Dash took wing several times to get a better overview of their whereabouts and reported that they were making good progress towards Rio Moreno. Eventually they heard the voice getting louder as they came closer; apparently the goats had stopped. Carefully, they sneaked closer, cowering down as they went, until they were in sighting range. The goats had settled down near a small deep pond. There was a fifth goat talking to the Feldwebel; the newcomer wore different fatigues, his face was smeared with camouflage paint, and he carried a lighter gun. He and the Feldwebel had their heads stuck together and were discussing something in low voices so that they couldn’t hear anything. Then, suddenly, the Feldwebel barked an order, and the other goats visibly relaxed. They put down their guns, kicked off their combat boots, and lay down in the grass. One of them pulled out some cigarettes, and another one started munching on some snack. Manehattan Silver put down his saddlebags. “What about now?” Rainbow Dash eagerly asked. “They dropped their guns, they’re not expecting anything!” Her wings were flaring in anticipation. “But we need a good plan!” “Well, I fly in, kick Feldwebel numbnuts in the face, and we improvise from there. You could use your magic to get their guns away, maybe into the lake?” Rainbow quickly outlined a possible battle plan. “Levitating their guns into the pond is a good idea”, Twilight agreed. “We should probably start with that. And while they are distracted, you fly in and go for the Feldwebel.” Rainbow nodded eagerly. Twilight closely examined the trees standing around the pond and continued, “When I’m done with the guns, I’ll drop that branch up there on some of them. That should take out two, then there will be two left.” “One”, Rainbow disagreed with a cocky smirk in her voice. “Or how long do you think it takes me to wrestle down that goat jerk?” “Alright, alright”, Twilight chuckled. “I’ll join you when I’ve dropped the branch, and we take out the last goat.” “What about Silver?” Rainbow asked with hardly suppressed anger. “Hmm, you’re right; he’ll just run off the second something happens. Change of plans, then. I’ll hit him with the branch first, at the expense of hitting more goats if need be. So you’ll have to deal with three or four goats until I’m there. Think you can manage that?” Rainbow’s response consisted simply of a snort. “I’m still worried”, Twilight confessed after a few seconds of going over her plan in her mind again. “These are real weapons. One of us could get hurt.” Rainbow Dash grabbed her and pulled her into a hug. “Don’t worry”, she mumbled in Twilight’s ear. “You’re with the Dash!” Despite her worries, that made Twilight giggle. Rainbow released her and grinned at her. “See? Much better!” They kept staring into each other’s eyes. Twilight was once again fascinated by the deep magenta color of Rainbow’s eyes. She knew she could get lost in these eyes. She suddenly felt like she had scores of butterflies in her stomach. Her head moved closer to Rainbow’s as if acting on its own behalf. “Twi –“ Rainbow’s voice was raspy. She closed the last few inches between them and shut her eyes as their lips met. Twilight reveled in the sweet taste of Rainbow’s lips, her breath on her face. She slowly moved her own lips, opening her mouth a little, and felt Rainbow mirroring her movements. Almost without her own doing, her hoof moved up and gently stroked Rainbow’s cheek. They broke the kiss after a few moments, both breathing heavily, grinning into each other’s faces. “Let’s go kick some flank”, Rainbow whispered. Twilight nodded in agreement end tried to put the voice inside that giddily kept yelling ‘I kissed her!’ aside and focus on the task at hoof. “Ready? Go!” Twilight grabbed the stack of guns in her magic and with one quick pull flung them into the lake. Rainbow Dash darted towards the Feldwebel, hooves stretched out, ready to hit him in the head. That was when things started to go horribly wrong.