//------------------------------// // Act 2 - Chapter 2: Rainbow's Tedium // Story: A Rainbow Rises // by xXOriginXx //------------------------------// With the window now open to allow some fresh air to reach her, she went about arranging various odds and ends that cluttered the work desk in the corner. It had been some time since she last seen her old bedroom which made the surprise of finding it the same way she left all the more, well, surprising. Having lost Celestia to her royal advisor soon after arriving from their hour long ride and with Dash currently occupied by a tour of the Castle somewhere with the High guard, she had been left alone, wondering around without much of a goal. So, as to not waste time she had decided to search for some of her old notes on basic magic, hoping that they may somehow prove useful in educating Dash in the magic arts. Sadly, finding said notes was proving rather difficult as they were lost among all of the other notes that she had accumulated over the years of study under Celestia. Nearly a thousand pieces of wrinkled paper lay strewn about the desk in large piles, they hadn’t started in this disorganised way of course, no; their current state was thanks to none other than the alicorn currently rummaging through them. She levitated each one by her face before placing them into a new stack on the floor, occasionally removing any relevant ones for later use. While it was a much more productive use of her time than just walking around the castle for the rest of the day, it was not in any way more fun. She giggled at some of the old scribbles, finding her own past naivety amusing which did make the repetitive task of shuffling through them slightly less dull, if only slightly. There was another reason she was performing the mind numbingly boring task of sifting through a thousand hastily written notes or rather the real reason she had dedicated the afternoon to the task was that she had no clue as to where to start with the newly ascended alicorn. Alicorn’s normally would have already learned a great deal of magic by the time they were ascended, however, in Dash’s case the opposite was true. Without any prior knowledge of magic she was practically an accident waiting to happen and this was the root of her problem. In order for Dash to not cause everything in a ten meter radius to explode she would need learn a number of important lessons in a short amount of time but which one to start with first was unclear. She could teach her how to stop herself from detonating inanimate objects only for her to start doing it to live ones. For her it had only taken a week to learn the basics of controlling one’s alicorn power but that was thanks to much of what she learned as a unicorn, trying to teach such complicated ideas to a novice level magic user was almost impossible. She immediately dropped the large stack of papers back onto the desk, causing her to wince as it toppled every other stack like a set of dominos. An idea had formulated in her mind, she wasn’t going to start from the basics but from the beginning, as in the earliest spells she was taught and as long as she kept a watchful eye on Dash’s aura she could prevent her from accidently ripping Canterlot from its foundations, brilliant, eh at least it was something. Realising that the sooner she started teaching the better, she lit up her horn, restacking the papers into six neat towers and galloped out the room closing the door behind her. Around the third long hallway she managed to slow herself down, knowing that sprinting to find her friend would look a tad strange for a princess to be doing, possibly even make some of the staff panic that disaster was on its way. She couldn’t stop herself from smiling though; the thought of spending time with a friend doing the one thing she loved most was new and exciting. Her plan was already running into its first hitch when she passed by the royal throne room, she had no idea where Dash was. By this point she could be in any number of Canterlot’s extravagant rooms, finding her by herself would be a challenge even for her, she needed help. Luckily a pair of guards stood vigilant not too far away, standing by the throne room’s door. They stood to attention as she approached them. “Have either of you two seen Rainbow Dash?” They looked to each other and blinked, returning their gaze towards her shortly after. The younger of the two nervously shrank away under her questioning, the older stallion however, stepped forward to speak. “Princess Rainbow Dash is being shown the castle’s facilities, I am sorry to say that we do not know her current location” This time the stallion was the one to shrink back from the displeased look on her face, she didn’t even notice his reaction right away. Once she did though, she tried her best to appear calm and pleased, remembering a lesson from Celestia about how much a guard feared a disappointed alicorn princess, or any royalty for that matter. “That’s alright, thank you for your help” They nodded and returned to their positions. Not wishing to dawdle she started off again down the hallway with the hopes that at least one pony knew where her friend was. A memory of a past nightmare started to creep its way forward in her mind, seeing the guard’s reaction had reminded of it. It was nightmare that she had been all too happy for Luna to remove. Not strictly dark or a detailed nightmare but it had had her shaken for the two days that followed. In it, she would move from place to place, watching as every last pony she knew cowered before her, bowing to her title. Even her friends were not exempt from it, one or two even looked beaten and she knew why. She shook her head to dispel the horrid memory; she never wanted to be like that, ever. Thankfully a passing High guard got her mind back on track; she had a feeling that he would know where she was. “Excuse me, hey err, High guard? Do you have a moment?” He stopped, turned around and nodded to her. Without allowing his impressive height to intimidate her she walked over to him, craning her neck upwards a little bit to look him in the eyes. “Hi, I’m looking for Prin...Rainbow Dash, she’s on a tour of the castle and I need to find her, do you know where she is?” He extended a hand towards the direction he had come from, pointing a single finger out the same way. “The tour finished some time ago, she is currently in the upper assembly hall, south side” Had she really spent that long in her room? No matter, she hadn’t time for idle dwelling if she was ever going to start teaching, she thanked the High guard and was quickly on her way to the aforementioned room. Locating her had been a lot easier than she had thought; then again, she hadn’t gotten to hard part yet. Celestia had a thousand years of practice in the magic arts and all that time had aided in her ability to pass on that knowledge, she had all of about seven hours teaching experience and that was for just one spell. The enormity of the task was starting to overwhelm her again with a stray hair popping out from the rest of her brushed mane. To stave off the oncoming panic attack she tried to distract herself by considering what basic spell to start with. Teleportation was fairly important, good for getting around not to mention that its usefulness in a number of bad situations, though, thinking about it Dash would most likely use it whenever she got bored in lessons or meetings and it was already hard enough catching her with her speed, adding the ability to teleport would make her almost untouchable. Perhaps restoration may prove a more useful one, especially after catching a glimpse of her medical bill last month, but that would just give her an excuse to take even bigger risks if she knows that she could just magic herself back to health. She continued to consider what spell would be best, allowing her body to go on autopilot, letting her legs guide her to where she wanted to be. By the time she reached the excessively large doors of the hall she had decided upon what to teach first. Levitation, an essential for any aspiring to be a magic master and as a bonus it wasn’t anything she could accidently use to blow up Canterlot. Oddly enough there were no guards to be seen, neither the royal ones nor the High guard variety. She sighed as she pressed her hooves against the large door but stopped before exhausting herself in an attempt to push them open. Her horn lit up as she focussed on the doors handles, creating a field that formed into a strong force that gripped onto the two handles. A sigh escaped the cyan pony’s lips, for what felt like forever she had been going through task after task with the high guard and it was borderline boring. Thinking about having to do that much work every day was daunting; she was starting to understand why Celestia didn’t visit more often. She had zoned him out around number twelve on the list, answering yes to every question so far. The entrance to the doors slowly opened snapping Dash out of her boredom induced trance. “Oh hey Twilight, how’s it going?” She thanked Celestia that the lavender alicorn had showed up; she didn’t know how much longer she could go on sitting there answering questions. “I was looking for you actually” The high guard glanced at her for a moment before continuing on with the list attached to the tightly gripped clipboard. “Item number seventeen, selecting a number of High guards to act as your Imperial protectors ” Four High guards lined up in front of her, cutting Twilight off from her friend. Seventeen tasks ago she had been on a dull tour of the fancy Canterlot castle, home of Equestria’s rulers, for almost an hour, her motivation to do anything had been basically drained. At least she wasn’t worrying about her every action around Celestia, she was probably the one pony that acting her regular cocky self around was not a good idea, she could recognise that to aggravate the immortal Goddess of the sun would be the equivalent to poking a sleeping Ursa major, though she had been rather relaxed during her time with the six of them. “And Xavier has three victories against dragon raiding parties” She really had to start paying attention if she was going to get anywhere. “Yes, very good, I approve” Five words that she had repeated around thirteen times now, her wondering mind was definitely going to get her into deep trouble one day. The High guard next to her turned to the four below and held a hand out above them. “Do you recognise and accept this duty, to be the last ones standing between Equestria and its enemies?” They raised the swords into the air keeping their heads aimed towards the ground and their shields to the side. “We will take on this responsibility and fulfil our duty” All four spoke in unison, placing their weapons tip first onto the ground, surprising both alicorns when they remained upright in perfect balance, not wavering for even a second. Taking his own sword from its sheath he held it above them, it illuminated itself in a bright light that spread to the others below him. Twilight had to squint her eyes as the four High guards started to glow, their armour lighting up in the same blinding light. Eventually it was too much forcing her to close her eyes as to not go blind by the light’s intensity. After a few seconds it died down, making it possible for them to open their eyes again. The four High guards that had previously occupied the area in front of the platform had been replaced by four seven meter tall, staff brandishing giants. Twilight was at a loss for words, what few she did find only came out as confused gibberish. Dash in her usual excitable nature was veritably giddy, with eyes wide in amazement. She very well may have been less than half the size of their legs but it didn’t matter, their tough looking dark blue armour and impressive bulk drew her attention away from the fact they could accidently crush her if they tripped. “That’s, their, awesome!” Their metal staffs each had blades on either end as well as being coated with the same runic symbols that covered even more of their armour now. Shields donned either arm, leaving both hands free to handle the staff weapon that they carried. But the most important, most interesting addition to their armoured bodies was the wings. “Xavier and Artemis guard the door” Those addressed bowed and turned to leave, acknowledging Twilight on the way out with a ‘Miss’, they closed the two doors behind them. With them gone the remaining improved High guards walked to either side of Dash, holding their staffs with one blade against the ground. It took about a minute more for Twilight to recover from the sudden appearance of the giant creatures, once she did she moved over to Dash to sit facing her on the platform. Dash smiled at her gleefully, a smile that she didn’t quite return as Twilight’s was more forced due to their proximity to the super sized High guards that stood nearby. “Item number eighteen; do you require any concubine’s? You can select them personally of course” Twilight’s attention, that had been previously on the oversized High guard near her, switched onto the smallest High guard painfully fast as a fiery blush pushed its way into her lavender cheeks, turning them a shade of dark pink. Judging by the puzzled look on Dash’s face, she had no idea what a concubine was, thankfully. Dash went to open her mouth to answer but Twilight beat her to it. “No she most certainly does not!” The High guard along with Dash looked at the flustered alicorn, blush still refusing to disappear from her face. She directed her gaze elsewhere to avoid their stares as she started to cool down. “Erm, what’s a concubine?” That mild blush that had been so close to leaving came rushing back, she quickly found herself wishing to be somewhere else. Dash raised an eyebrow but decided not to push the matter further; knowing that if Twilight was freaking out then it was something she didn’t want. “I guess I don’t want any concubine’s then” She shrugged, stretching her wings out to wake them up, being cooped up inside for so long wasn’t her style, she needed fly. Twilight managed to rain in her raging blush and regain her composure. “So what did you want to talk about Twi?” She thought for a moment, remembering the reason why she had been looking for Dash in the first place. “Ah right, I was just thinking that we could start on your magic lessons, seeing as we have some free time, if you want” While learning wasn’t her ideal way of spending her free time it did seem a like a better idea than sitting around in the training hall with her wings cramping up and even though she wouldn’t admit it, it did seem fun. “Yeah sure, I guess I could fit that into my busy schedule” Twilight rolled her eyes, she looked to the smaller High guard. She had a nagging feeling that they were going to want to tag along on their journey to the training Hall, which was confirmed when the pair went to move towards the exit and the High guards followed. She stopped halfway to the door to spin around and talk to the smaller High guard, thinking it to be unwise to tell the seven meter tall ones to stay where they were. Really she was worried that if they were to seen by anypony then they may cause some questions to pop up, such as why seven meter tall giants are following a cyan coloured alicorn they never seen before. “Maybe we shouldn’t bring all of you with us, it’s just that err, it might cause some ponies to err, panic you know” The nervous feeling welling in her gut was making it hard to talk without stuttering, she could barely keep eye contact with the set of blue orbs that burned into her. If there were a time to test the extent of the High guard’s friendliness, this was it. “Agreed, multiple Imperials may stir up panic among the civilians, Alison you will remain here, Thompson, you are on escort duty” Settling for one instead of two seemed to be the best she could do, so she started for the door again with the High guard, Imperial and Dash following behind her. They walked for some time through the many extensive halls of the large castle chatting about whatever came to mind, occasionally suppressing laughter whenever one of the maids spotted the Imperial. He had to duck every time they moved between hallways, the doors never having quite enough height for him to fit through naturally, one time ending with part of the doorframe missing. Eventually they reached the outside courtyard where one could find a number of restaurants, shops or any other place of business imaginable. There wasn’t much of rush going on, most walked at a leisurely pace, many could be seen enjoying lunch outside in the warm sunlight, though when the Imperial came into view many stopped to stare as they walked by. Dash breathed in the delicious smell of pastries that floated in the air tempting her to indulge in their sugary delight. Every shop she passed made the temptation to eat even greater, her stomach rumbled in protest as they passed by yet another bakery. “Are you feeling hungry Dash?” Having missed breakfast she had not eaten anything since yesterday, then growing hunger pains were informing that it was time to scoff the nearest thing that could count as food. She didn’t need to reply, her grumbling stomach did that for her. “I’ll take that as a yes then” She chuckled at the sheepish look on her friends face. She stopped to check the closest store, looking for something they could eat. Admittedly she herself felt fairly hungry, being taken to Canterlot before lunch did mean she had missed the midday meal, leaving her stomach mainly empty save for the half of breakfast she did eat. “Well, let’s get some food and we can take it to the training hall” Knowing where they were going now was good, food was better. She practically started drooling over all the delicious smells that filled the air. They started for the nearest stand but were quickly stopped by the High guard and the Imperial standing in their way. “We shall acquire food for you both and be back momentarily” Before she could say a word they were off, walking towards a very nervous looking cashier. This left the two alone standing awkwardly in the middle of the street with watchers switching between staring at the two strange creatures trying to order food and them. “How nice it is to see you two out here” It would have been more difficult not to recognise the voice but they spun around just same as if a stranger had spoken to them, in any case, Celestia stood behind them having somehow approached unnoticed, probably due to the excessive amount of noise made by the big metal boots of the Imperial. “Princess!” Both bowed, though only Twilight realised that she didn’t have to, leaving Dash staring at the Goddess’s royal shoes for half a minute longer until a gentle nudge got her to stand up straight again. “Sorry Princess, force of habit” As always the Goddess had a peaceful smile on her face that radiated warmth. “Oh there’s no need for apologies Twilight, where are you off to anyway?” Somewhere in the back of her head an alarm went off as the worry that the Princess may not appreciate her starting lessons earlier than planned started acting up, it was quickly ignored as ridiculous. “We were on our way to the training hall, I thought we could start lessons early” With the worry alarm still banging away at her barrier of calmness she waited anxiously to hear her former tutor’s opinion, it had always been like that. “Ah the earlier the better, now, I did wish to talk to you about something privately, if neither of you have problem with that of course” Who would have a problem with the extremely powerful Goddess’s will? Certainly not them, that would be plain foolish. “No not at all, Dash I’ll be with you in a minute” Dash held a look of disinterest, she wasn’t particularly bothered by the delay, the fresh air was nice, just being outside was already making her feel better. “Take all the time you need, I’m just going to be over there” She pointed to a not so terribly interesting patch of pavement nearby and walked off towards it, looking rather bored as she went, kicking small pebbles that she found on the ground. Once she was out of earshot Twilight and Celestia faced each other like a pair of old friends. “I haven’t much time to talk but I wanted to apologise for how I behaved at the hospital, it was inappropriate” The princess apologising? To her? Now that was most certainly not something that occurred often or ever really, it nearly caused her to snap similar to how she did in one of her less than proud moments, the catastrophic event so suitably titled, want it need it, after the very spell that she had used to nearly cause a real disaster; the only thing that stopped her was the Princesses company. “I allowed my emotions to get the better of me and I’m sorry that I shocked you like that” She had always been regal and composed but at that moment, at the hospital, she couldn’t help it. Twilight was in the strange position of both understanding and not understanding; she understood that a prank was a bit inappropriate at the time and that’s what confused her, it was prank wasn’t it? So why was Celestia talking about emotions? “I don’t understand, emotions Princess?” For a second she thought that she had said something wrong as the Princess bit her lip, looking around as if to see if anypony could hear them. Twilight was not only a Princess but an alicorn, by one way or another she was going to have to hear it and she preferred it if it came from her. She stared at Rainbow dash momentarily before looking back to Twilight again. “When Rainbow Dash was lying there in that bed, hurting, it reminded me of my...” She choked slightly; a thousand years did nothing to sooth the pain. “Of my own daughter and seeing her like that brought back a lot of old memories, it overwhelmed me” Possibly it was the calming breeze or the fact that she was currently surrounded by a number of high standard royals, not to mention one of the co-rulers of Equestria, but somehow she managed to not have a mental break down at the idea that Celestia had a unheard of daughter and everything that entailed, though it did reduce her ability to think by a substantial amount, leaving her only able to ask one simple question. “You have a daughter?” The puzzled expression brought back the same peaceful smile to the white alicorn's lips. “Once, a long time ago, there were...problems, and I lost her” Out of respect she stared at the brick pavement below her hooves. Very little was known about the Princess’s history past nightmare moon and a scattering of other major events.While she did pride herself with knowledge that the Goddess felt that she could share such a sensitive matter with her, right now she had to be sympathetic. “Oh, I’m sorry Princess I shouldn’t have asked” She still kept the same smile, though it was weakened slightly by the reminder that only a few would ever know about her daughter. “It’s quite alright Twilight, you don’t have time to be feeling sorry for a pony long gone, you have a friend to teach after all” With a head gesture behind her she went to take her leave. “Wait Princess, I actually wanted to ask you about something” Celestia ceased her departing and turned back around to face Twilight again, a raised eye brow questioning her. “Oh and what is that?” “I just wanted to know why, why we are letting these creatures treat Dash like some kind of ruler?” Celestia hadn’t really considered them much since she saw them, she knew what they were doing, she had seen it before. “Honestly, I believe it would be a useful experience if Dash is to be a Princess” Even if Dash didn’t realise it yet, one day she would have ponies looking to her for answers and she would need al the experience she could get to be able to handle that. “But they follow her around all the time now, what if they hurt somepony?” Celestia looked up to see the Imperial and the High guard walking towards Dash from apologising for a trampled table. “I doubt they’ll do anything Dash doesn’t want them to, besides, do you wish to be the one telling them to stop?” It was a scary imagine, the massive Imperial towering over her while she kindly asked it to leave. “I suppose they haven’t really done anything yet” “Don’t worry Twilight, trust me, everything will be fine, Now I really must be going before my council starts to panic” With that she left, leaving Twilight to return to the trio that was stood nearby drawing in the attention of everypony that walked by. Dash, surprisingly, was laughing about something while the High guard and the Imperial stood next to her. The Imperial held a paper bag containing what she could only guess was lunch; silently she pondered how they had paid for it, hoping that it hadn’t been through the same persuasion that had been used on the assistant back at the hospital. “You ready to go” Unable to speak through her heavy breaths she nodded and followed Twilight’s lead while wiping tears from the corners of her eyes.Their little group continued onwards towards the training hall where she could finally get on with what she had set out to do half an hour ago. She knew exactly how to begin, she still remembered her very first lesson her former teacher. As they turned the next corner into the gardens they caught sight of a royal guard bickering with another earth pony by a couple of odd looking statues that didn’t quite fit with the rest of the garden’s pieces. Three were of giant odd looking creatures that held resemblance to Ursa major’s, the rest were small pony shaped statues though they too weren’t quite right. “I have the order right here, Princess Celestia signed it herself!” The stallion’s angry scowl showed the loss of patience, they must have been arguing for some time. “Wait what? No, the order was from Princess Luna and it was not for whatever these things are!” They paid them little attention as they passed by, too enthralled in their argument to even glance at them. The guard scanned over the papers he had been given, moving them closer to his face every so often. “This can’t be right” Soon enough they dropped out of earshot and not long after out of sight completely. Twilight ignored the idea of inquiring as to the problem knowing that if they were going to get anywhere today they would have to start soon, it was already midday. It only took a few more minutes of walking before they reached the tower that contained their destination. The Imperial jaunted forward to hold open the tower’s large wooden doors for them. In contrast to the castle hallways here were not decorated in royal gold or white. Each wall was adorned with a number pictures all being of great sorcerers or sorceresses along with one their signature spells, all of which were unrecognisable to Dash though she had a feeling the giddy alicorn next to her could name them off by heart. The windows detailed a number of, at a guess, important developments in the history of magic giving the whole place a strange feeling of power. Twilight broke away from the rest of them, walking just fast enough to keep ahead and lead way towards her old training grounds. The doors creaked open in their age but she didn’t care, seeing the old place once more brought a smile to her face and warmth to her heart. A number of guards stood around the edges of the room, prepared to deal with any magical mishap that could occur. A massive table laid up against a wall was the most noticeable aspect except for the window panes of the two Celestial sisters. Twilight was very excited, it was her first time really teaching, her usual crippling nervousness had been pushed to the back of her mind. She turned to Dash who sat down next to her giving casual glances around the room while the High guard and the imperial stood by the door, making the closest royal guard cautiously take a few steps away from them. “Are you ready to start learning the wonders of magic Dash?” While it may have been the same cheesy line she had heard from the teacher at the beginning of magic kindergarten it did still hold meaning, in any case, she was brimming with excitement, the thought of having another magic user like herself gave way to many possibilities, even if it would take some time to catch Dash up on a life’s experience on the subject. “I’d thought we could start with Levitation” She smiled excitedly at Dash, however her excitement was not mirrored. She quirked an eyebrow trying to pronounce the word, failing numerous times. “Is that that thing you do when you float stuff around?” She giggled at the very basic description. “It’s the ability to manipulate any object using only magic to do so” She closed her eyes, breathed deeply and concentrated on a number of objects behind her. They became engulfed by a purple aura that lifted them off the ground towards the lavender pony controlling them. She placed the assembled clutter in front of her before dispelling the magic. “We’re starting with the basic magic for now, so you won’t be doing spells like turning things to stone quite yet, it’s fairly easy, first, you need to close your eyes and reach deep within yourself” Dash did as she was told, closing her eyes and concentrating hard. After a minute or so of concentrating without finding anything, she was starting to lose her confidence. “Err Twilight? Nothing’s happening” Twilight put a hoof to her chin, trying to remember back to how she had been taught it. “I want you to imagine a pool” Dash cracked an eyelid open to question the strange request but shut again, not ready to waste energy protesting. “Imagine putting your hooves into the pool and spreading it to these weights here” She tried as best she could to imagine it, the calm tranquil waters of the pool mirrored the nothingness that was around it,, the waters had blue hue to them. She moved close to it, dipping her hooves into the pool of the glowing blue liquid and felt as it touched her fur, it tickled. She moved onto to concentrating on the objects, allowing the strange liquid substance to run up her legs towards her horn. For a second nothing happened but then, a small flicker of a magic around appeared around the weights, encompassing them in it's grip. It was still quite ethereal and weak but it was definitely there. Twilight held her breath expectantly, leaning in close to inspect the weights as the aura began to increase in intensity. It continued to grow until Dash felt a sudden shift in her imaginary pool. The waters started to swirl around her hooves and in one quick sudden up burst it threw her away from it, calming again after the removal of the intruder. Back in the real world the aura that had managed to lift the objects off the floor by an inch fizzled away into nothing, allowing the objects to fall back down to the ground. Needless to say Dash was disappointed as well as confused as to why her own pool had rejected her. The disappointment was clear on her face. “Don't worry that was good, it takes time to start okay? Just try again” And so she did, again and again and again, each time lifting the objects the same height only for them to clang noisily against the floor soon after they had left it. “Hmm, this might take longer than I had thought” Dash couldn’t hear her, already trying again, refusing to be beaten.