//------------------------------// // Wipe Away the Dash // Story: Odrsjot // by Imploding Colon //------------------------------// Rainbow slept in the Noble Jury’s observation room. That dawn, like every morning previous, she dangled precariously over the edge of a swaying hammock, snoring doggishly towards the rattling bulkheads. Beyond the bubbled windows, the clouds parted, and the rays of the rising sun tore in through the glass frames as regularly scheduled. Their golden beams swam over the wall, the hammock supports, and finally over Rainbow Dash’s blue coat. Her muzzle twitched from the warming touch. She flinched, clamping her drooling mouth as she curled up into a fetal position with a trilling sound of protest. There was no escaping the dawn. As always, the sunlight thoroughly engulfed her. With a prolonged groan, she squinted her filmy eyes open, immediately wishing she didn’t. She clenched her eyes shut and sat up, stretching each joint with sloth-like motions. As her limbs crackled, she tossed back her mane of bed hair and squinted towards the source of the rude spotlight. “Mmmmmfff… nnnghhh…” She brought a hoof up and rubbed tight circles across her muzzle, flicking her ears as she tossed off the weight of the night, as well as the trailing words of a moon princess who was continents away. She flapped her wings and prepared to hover. She stopped midway through, choosing to yawn instead. After a thorough stretch of her forward limbs, she gazed lethargically at the window. Her wings stopped twitching. With a pensive breath, Rainbow Dash raised both eyebrows. “Httt!” She forward-flipped from the hammock, landed nimbly on the observation room’s floor, and pressed herself up against the glass, squinting. Her breaths quickened nervously, casting a layer of condensation against the translucent surface. Nevertheless, she managed to look beyond the sheen, the clouds, and the mist beyond. There were shapes in the sky… dark shapes and shifting shapes. Rigid. Metallic. “Crud…” Hissing, Rainbow Dash backtrotted, tripping over a blanket that had fallen from one of the many hammocks. “Crud crud cr-crud!” Galloping now, she sped into the adjacent corridor and clambered up the vertical crawlspace. “Megacrud on a crud cracker!” her voice echoed. Josho trotted limply down the middle level from his quarters in time to see her. “Mmmmf--Hey…” He spoke while telekinetically brushing his teeth. “The lavatory’s down that way if you gotta go so bad, ya windsock.” Rainbow Dash paid the stallion no attention. She shot into the cockpit like a blue torpedo, almost tackling Bellesmith and Props. “Whoah! H-hey, Rainbow!” Bellesmith giggled, smiling pleasantly. “Bright and early! That’s new!” “No time to laugh it up!” Rainbow Dash squawked, pointing a flailing hoof out the window. “Bogeys at twelve o’clock! Ledomaritan battlecruisers are on the horizon!” “Shhh…” Belle calmly placed her hooves on the hysterical mare’s shoulders. “Rainbow, relax…” “No time for that! They’re gonna attack us!” Rainbow’s voice cracked. “We gotta pull around and find a higher altitude to speed off from!” “Will some boomer put a cork in her spithole?!” Floydien grumbled, his antlers sparkling away as he pulled the ship fearlessly towards the floating black masses. “Is too early for paintbucket to spill all over Nancy Jane’s skull.” “Are you guys crazy?!” Rainbow Dash snarled. “You wanna become flak fodder?!” “My hometown isn’t gonna turn us into flak fodder, silly!” Props said with a gigglesnort. “Huh?!” Props raised her goggles and pointed out the cockpit window. “Take a gander for yourself, gander-goose!” Rainbow Dash brushed aside Belle to squint over Floydien’s brown shoulder. The clouds parted some more, allowing the sunlight to illuminate the immediate horizon in greater clarity. The black masses congealed into one singular structure, floating amidst the heavens and conjoined in several swiveling, swaying places. Buildings and platforms came into focus, affixed to gigantic cylinders broiling with steam and mana. Before Rainbow Dash, a floating city port appeared, framed by clouds, swarming with zeppelins of all sizes and shapes, and not a single one of them bearing the flag of Queen Ledo. “I… I don’t see any enforcers at all…” Rainbow Dash murmured. “That’s because Gray Smoke doesn’t fall under Ledomaritan jurisdiction!” Props grinned wide. “It’s run by a bunch of smart airheads who know how to keep ahead of the air!” “Basically, they fly just within close enough range of the battlefront below that the airspace above is nebulously defined,” Belle added. “According to Props, here, they’ve been keeping this up for the past thirty years. That’s how Gray Smoke remains neutral.” “Making bits off of stabby stabby war…” Floydien almost spat into the consoles. “Would be most sick sick of boomers if it wasn’t so cleverific. Yes yes?” “Hey! It’s how Uncle Prowse always raked in the bits!” Props shrugged. “So long as ponies leave their guns inside their ship, it’s free range to barter, boast, and barf!” She pumped her hoof, cheering towards the ceiling. “Wooohooo! Back home in the heavens!” “Not so loud!” Floydien grumbled. “Nancy Jane has sensitive ears and so does her beloved!” “Woops! Sorry, handsome!” “It’s not very…” Rainbow Dash shrugged. “...’gray.’” “Wait till you see it from the inside.” Props said with a wink. “The grime is tasty! I promise you!” She brightened. “Oooh! I gotta go tell Ebony! No doubt the smell has woken him by now!” She scampered over to the wall and slid down the nearest crawlspace. “Hey! Ebonyyyyy! Whip out the sky spatulas! We’re home! We’re home! Heehee!” Belle leaned against a wall, sighing with wonder. “Isn’t it marvelous?” The mare shook her head with a smile. “Amidst all of this chaos and imperialism, some ponies have figured out how to live… relatively free.” “Yeah, well…” Rainbow Dash fidgeted. “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Belle winked at her. “Something tells me you’re about to.” Rainbow Dash gazed back at her, then looked towards the window as Floydien cruised the Noble Jury carefully into the dense traffic buzzing around the outer docks of the sky metropolis.