//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: Waking Up // Story: Bare Hooves // by Redric Carrun //------------------------------// /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ Ptosi Ferto “The Falling Feather” A traditional pegasus fighting style which uses solid, flowing strikes and a pegasus' natural flying ability to out-maneuver ground based opponents with unconventional movements. The main advantage of this style is its complete dissimilarity to any solely ground-based style, and its utilization of a full three-dimensional zone of combat. This style was historically used as the basis for all other pegasi martial arts, and, as such, was disdained by experts of the time as being too generic. Its effectiveness was also hampered by its own widespread nature, as familiarity with certain tricks and weakness of the style spread rapidly due to the fact that any pegasus fighter was likely to know and employ it. Because of this, the Falling Feather was, for a long time, out of vogue with the martial arts world. However, that all changed when a practitioner named Butterfly Sting revitalized the sport. By introducing a detailed analytical approach to the choice of moves in combat, Sting was able to effortlessly achieve the “flow” of battle that had been the goal of the technique since the beginning, and had previously required years of training to master. By providing a guideline on which moves to use in which situation, the Falling Feather was opened to a much wider audience. It has since been enjoying a resurgence of favor among younger pegasi worldwide, who enjoy it as much for its history as for its deadly grace. \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/ The first thing Rainbow Dash felt was a splitting headache. The pulsing from her scalp reminded her of the morning after her only experience of getting completely, totally wasted. It was not something she had ever wanted to feel again. She groaned. The sound had a hollow ring to it, an empty un-noise which rattled around inside her skull and made the aching worse. She tried to clutch her head between her fore-hooves, but they stopped half way up. There was a clinking noise, and she felt a band of pinching cold wrapped around both pasterns. Rainbow's eyes snapped open. She wasn't in her cloud house. She didn't seem to be anywhere at all. There was the ground, where she was lying – a hard floor, made of smooth stone tiles – and then it just dropped off. There was nothing in front of her; no wall, only blackness. There were chains shackled to all four of her legs. Dash jumped to her hooves. The chains rattled, but there was enough length in them for her to move around. Not that there was anywhere to go; she was standing on a square pillar, in the middle of nowhere, with nothing but empty space to all sides. Her wings flared in irritation. “Hey,” she called out. “What gives?” There was no echo. It was subtle, the way it worked, but there was no wall for the sound to bounce off of; her voice and the noise from the chains sounded ever so slightly off. Everything sounded... hollow. Her ear twitched involuntarily. “... Hello?” It was very cold, Rainbow realized. The stone and the metal of the chains sapped away at her body heat, and although she could still see, the sourceless light did not warm her. A chill ran down her spine. She shivered. 'Where am I?' Dash wondered. 'Who did this? This is so weird... How did I get here? I was –' Her brain felt muddled. 'I can't remember anything about this place...' Images flashed in her mind. Aching joints. A cloud. Twilight's grand-kid – stupid, stubborn brat. Couldn't fly. Panic-falling-chase. The ground. Old. Pain. Old-old-old-pain-slow-black. '... Am... am I dead?' There was a lurch, and Rainbow almost fell to her knees as the platform began to rise. The sound was deafening, a grating of stone on stone that was transmitted through the ground into her bones and teeth. It was almost painful. In an effort to escape the noise, Dash lifted herself in the air the meter or two that the chains would allow, straining her wings to keep ahead of the pillar as it accelerated. The light changed. It grew brighter, and Dash glanced up at where it was coming from. Above her, there was – something – a hole in the darkness. A square of light, a square that she was rapidly approaching. Rainbow Dash felt the tug of the chains as the platform slowed down, and her speed began to drag her away from her bonds. The noise of the stones began to die down, and she landed again. There was a new noise coming from above the light. It was a sound she recognized: the roar of a crowd. The voice of an announcer came into focus. “... a big round of applause for our four-round winner! What a guy, to have come all the way to the end, struggling through so many opponents and coming out on top despite all odds, just for a chance to go up against our newcomer today. He's been a great sport about this, and he's put on one heck of a show for us. But can he face certain death one more time? Let's all give a warm welcome to our newest contender! For the first time ever on the big screen: the Element of Loyalty, Savior of Equestria, the one and only, Rainbow Dash!” The crowd cheered. There was the stomping of hooves, and whistling, and the sound of a dragon roar. When the pillar entered the light, it was blinding. Rainbow had to shield her eyes with a wing. With no warning, the cuffs of the chains snapped off from her legs, and Rainbow was free. She squinted to see what was happening. The first thing she saw was a pony body, lying lifeless on the sand. The next thing she saw was the manticore lying just beyond that, just as still as the pony was, and with a hole in its side that showed it was just as dead. She was in a stadium, the likes of which she had never seen. The floor was huge, with enough space to fit four derby tracks, and covered entirely with loose sand. Bodies littered the ground, bunched up into little groups or left to lie alone. Beyond them were the stands – boxy things with slanting roofs, made of shining silver metal that shielded the audience from harm and view. Overhead were racks upon racks of flood-lights, and hanging from the massive domed roof was a large, rectangular panel showing images of a red earth pony driving a forehoof into the scaly underbelly of a hydra. The image repeated, showing the scene from different angles, and once even slowing down the action in a surreal manner that made the impact seem all the more violent. Rainbow Dash would probably have appreciated the effect more in other circumstances. Just across the field, next to a prone hydra, was the earth pony from the images. He was battered, bruised, and his left ear was completely missing, but as he turned to face her, a cold steel came into his eyes that left her chilled. He leaned back on his hind legs like it was second nature to him, and held a hoof out in her direction. Just like he had been standing before he struck the hydra. “Ponies and Minotaurs, Dragons and Diamond Dogs, get ready to watch two titans of history as they tear each other apart! The final round of today's Death Battles is about to begin!”