//------------------------------// // The Inevitable Meeting // Story: End of the Rainbow (Factory) // by alexanderhunt88 //------------------------------// "Soarin, where are we going?" Scootaloo asked Soarin as she followed him, or more precisely he told her to follow him, as they started to walk along the cliff side. There seemed to be walk path that moved alongside the mountain, but she didn't know where it would lead. Soarin had stayed eerily quite, she noted, which scared her a little. He hadn't said anything else after he told her to follow him. Actually, the blue-maned pegasus telling her to follow himself was the only thing said since the outburst, the yell of hatred he spat as he called out to the Rainbow Factory, the shout of pure anger as he watched his house burn to the ground. Afterwards he said nothing else and simply just stared at the burning remains of his cloud home. This happened about 3 hours ago, and Celestia's sun was already beginning to appear on the horizon. They seemed to have set off around the time dusk began. "Soarin?" She tried again, but this time he reacted as he stopped walking but still stared straight forward; his stoic face as expressionless as ever. "Were here." He said simply. Scootaloo looked and saw he was looking at another cliff side; this one smaller and the only thing that appeared for this side to be out of the ordinary was the fact that slap-bang in the middle was a wooden door lying on the ground. It was the opening to an outside basement. "There's something you need to meet." He said to her in his deadpan manner. Reaching for the door then opening it up, allowing fresh air and bright sunlight to enter the lower room since the whenever it was opened last. "Come." Soarin gestured to the young mare. "Lets not beat around the bush any longer." Scootaloo followed Soarin as he lead her down the steps of the basement until she reached the bottom, her breath lingering in her mouth as her body was tense; she herself had no idea what awaited her inside the below-ground room. When she hit bottom of the stairs she managed to get a good look at the desolate room. There was not truly anything to say about the basement; it was cold, dark and practically empty. There was barely anything there, apart from few tables and a bunch of rusted tools that look past their use-by-date. The place looked like it hadn't been used in years, decade's even. It was old, damp and lacked any source of care or color. Except one thing. Right there, straight in front of her was a pile of molded muddy blue added with mixture of other common colors. The strange mass was quivering, shaking even, and had what appeared to be legs sprouting out it's body covering what seemed to be its front half. But Scootaloo knew once away what was in front of her, or more preciously, who was in front of her. She gulped. Taking a slow and precocious step towards the off-blue mass, she opened her mouth and slowly said "Rai...Rainbow....Dash?" Soarin remained silent, watching the events that will unfold with his ever-steel eyes. The quivering mass stopped shaking and, ever-so-slowly, looked up from underneath her legs and peered out, her cerise eyes opened wide, and any onlooker would see them being a swollen red and stained with tears. "Scoo....Scootaloo?" The trembling mess, remembered to be named as Rainbow Dash, barely spoke back, her voice hoarse and dry. "Is that you?" "Rainbow Dash?" Scootaloo repeated as she took another step towards her. "Is that really you?" Rainbow Dash asked again. Her voice seemed to become slightly uplifted. "Rainbow..." Scootaloo started, but was unable to finish her sentence as a wave of something foreign washed over her. A new feeling that had arisen the moment she laid upon the falling pegasus, the same one that many years ago she idolized like an older sister, the same pony that tried to kill her by her the rainbow-maned pony's own hooves. This feeling made her body tense, her teeth clench, and a new instinct take over her mind. Rage. Pure, unbridled, hatred-filled rage. And in one unexpected instant she let out all the anger she didn't even know she had contained onto the weakened pegasus and one feel strike; in just a few second after muttering the first half of her name, Scootaloo quickly followed this by spitting it all out in one, quick, loud go: "DASHHHHHH!!!!" She practically screamed as she immediately lunged forward and before Rainbow Dash, Soarin or even Scootaloo could properly react the orange pegasus strook the chained mare flat across in one singular punch to the face, the sounds of thrown around chains and an attacked pony hitting the wall resonated in the small barren basement. Soarin watched on with wide-eyes as he witnessed the young mare smack down the older equine, her body becoming limp as soon as she was smacked at the wall and fell to the floor. He didn't even dare breathe. He just simply stood and and looked on as Scootaloo let out heavy loud breathes, her body standing their frozen, as if it didn't know what the next course of action it should take. Meanwhile, the stricken pony known as Rainbow Dash had just then managed to regain her senses and knowledge of her surroundings, unsure of what exactly had just happened. Looking up, she saw the face of something she never, ever wanted to see in her life; the face of the pony she once cared about looking down at her with mixture of disgust, anguish and hatred. If looks could kill, she would have been dead the second she looked at her. "Scoo...Scootaloo..." The chained pony murmured out, trying to reason to the angry pegasus standing before, but her voice carried to no avail as directly after Scootaloo raised her hoof up again and looked down at her with a face full of nothing but anger and malice. "YOU HEARTLESS BITCH!" Scootaloo roared as she threw her hoof down directly forward towards Rainbow Dash's face, to which she responded by tensing her body, awaiting her fate. But nothing happened. Daring to look up, Rainbow's eyed widened as she Scootaloo's held back by the grip of Soarin, his face remained seemingly unchanged, even after what he just witnessed before him. "Do you have any idea how many ponies have died by your hooves?" Scootaloo snarled at the quivering mare, spitting out as much disgust and hatred a pony of her caliber was able to say. "Do you? No, you don't! Because you're nothing but a soulless, cold, cruel...thing that doesn't even deserve to even exist!" Hearing enough, Soarin, by unfolding his wings and using them as balance, started to pull back, silently moving back away from the chained mare done by use of his hind legs. "Soarin what the tartarus do you think you're doing?" Scootaloo's attention suddenly changed to the pegasus currently carrying her away from the scene, struggling to get out from his grasp but his strength overpowered her own. "I ain't done yet, put me down right now." "No." He replied simply as he was already on the steps of the basement. "I said put me down right now!" She ordered but to no avail. "This isn't over you here me!" She yelled back straight to the chained bruised pony lying meekly on the ground as she started to disappear from sight as she was being carried out. "You hear me!" Scootaloo shouted just before the door was shut, as her shouts, though still noticeably heard, inaudible to the pony still there. With the silent, lonely, light-absent room all to herself. Rainbow Dash immediately broke down not for the first. Crying into her own hooves, she let out in a whispered tone. "Scootaloo...I can't blame you. I deserve worse." She sobbed. "Much worse."