//------------------------------// // Part 1 - Rainbow's Morning // Story: Griffon the Heave-ho // by CrowMagnon //------------------------------// Griffon the Heave-ho by CrowMagnon Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and took a slow, deep breath. Her wings were spread out behind her as she kept herself off the ground, but they provided balance rather than lift. Instead of hovering as most pegasi would, she stood on one hoof atop the head of a gnarled wooden staff. "Clear mind... silent, serene heart..." she whispered, her body reflexively twitching and adjusting itself in order to maintain her precarious pose. "Clear mind... silent, serene heart..." Meditation had never come easily for Dash. So many times, her mentor, Zecora, had attempted to teach her to clear her mind of extraneous thoughts and open herself up to the flow of the realm's energies around her. Sitting still and doing nothing had proven to be torturous for the young pegasus during her time living in Zecora's hut in the Everfree. Despite her eagerness to learn from the zebra shaman, her attempts to do so typically just resulted in her growing more and more tense, like a spring being wound too tight. The balancing staff, though technically intended for use by those who had already mastered the basics of meditation, had been a compromise to the hyperactive Rainbow Dash. One that saw mildly improved results as the effort of remaining upright gave her body something to do while she let her mind venture inward. As she repeated her mantra, the twitchy, jerking motions that kept her aloft slowly calmed as she gradually found her center. "Clear mind... silent, serene heart." With her eyes closed, she could see nothing but darkness. In time, though, her balance stabilized to the point where her body was smoothly swaying and adjusting itself without having to devote conscious effort to it. With her wings outspread, she could feel a warm Spring breeze blow in from the open window of her cottage. A pleasant change from the Winter chill of just a few weeks ago. The breeze wrapped around her, and despite the crippled wing which left her permanently grounded since childhood, Rainbow Dash felt as though the wind were lifting her back up into the sky. Up, up into the clouds where all three dimensions were hers to explore again, and nothing could constrain her. Memories of freedom blossomed like flowers in her mind. And speed. That sweet rush of zooming through the air without restraint or-- A small but very pointed cough seemed to grab her by the wing and yank her back down. Her body jerked, and nearly fell off the staff before she flapped her wings to right herself again. Opening up her eyes, she glared down at the source of the cough, which was a small white bunny who was grumpily tapping his foot next to an empty food dish. Rainbow glanced to the nearby wall clock and replied, "Settle down, rabbit, and stop looking so sour. Lunch time's not for another hour." Taking a deep breath, she chanted, "Clear mind... silent, serent heart..." and attempted to return to where she had left off. Yes... yes, there it was. She was flying through the sky, without restraint or limitation. Even though it was the gentlest of breezes that blew over her, within her mind, she was flying up... up through the very highest clouds and into the stratosphere, pushed aloft by winds that were not winds, but the very will of the universe. The vast, infinite blue of the sky as seen from down below peeled open into a vast field of twinkling stars, and even then she continued to race faster and faster. Pinpoints of light turned into streaking lines as she shot through the vastness of-- The tapping of the bunny's food intensified into a loud, rapid-fire thumping, distracting her yet again. "Lay off, rabbit! It can wait," she asserted without even opening her eyes this time. "Clear mind... silent, sere--" The bunny didn't even wait for her to finish the mantra before he began clanging two pans together, startling Rainbow enough to nearly make her tumble off of her staff. As she tilted toward a nearby bookshelf, she flailed around before stopping her fall by catching the edge of the shelf with her unbroken wing. In doing so, though, her wing also brushed against a small picture frame standing on display, knocking it off the shelf. Rainbow let out a yelp as she saw the photograph, one of the very few keepsakes she had taken with her when she left home, tip over and fall toward the ground. While straining to keep from falling to the floor altogether, Rainbow's forelegs stretched down as far and as fast as they could, just barely catching the picture frame between her front hooves before it could fall out of reach. She held her breath, terrified that it would still slip from her grasp, but she let it out in a relieved sigh when that didn't happen, and she looked down fondly at the photograph within. A tiny filly with a rainbow mane grinned cockily back at her from the picture, alongside a smirking young griffoness who had one foreleg wrapped around Dash's younger self, the other held toward the camera with two talons pointed upward in a 'V'. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw the bunny standing beside the base of her balancing staff, which was still propping up her hind legs even at the awkward angle she was now holding herself aloft. Narrowing her eyes, she asked, "So that's how you want to play it, huh? Maybe I won't feed you at all, tonight. How would you like that, not even getting a bite?" The bunny responded by narrowing his own beady little black eyes of evil, then slowly turned his gaze toward the staff she was perched so precariously on. "Don't. Even. Think about it," Rainbow muttered threateningly, realizing where the bunny's train of thought was leading. Indeed, as soon as she said it, he pulled back his hind leg and took careful aim... ... Only to get startled enough to flop over onto his face when they were both interrupted by a trio of ear-piercing screams. Rainbow took the opportunity to push herself back upright and hop to the ground, setting the photo down on her dining table on her way to the door. Stepping outside, she saw three earth pony mares whom she recognized quite easily as florists that she had pranked on numerous occasions during her infamous stint as the 'Rainbow Witch of the Everfree Forest'. They could always be depended on to completely flip out over the most harmless prank, but seeing them screaming in terror while running toward her was a new experience for Rainbow Dash. "What the...? What's got you three so shrill? You're acting like there are dragons rioting through Ponyville." Skidding to a stop in front of her, the trio started shouting in a panic, yet somehow did so without talking over each other. "We're being invaded!" Lily wailed. "A griffon swooped in and started terrorizing the market square!" Rose shrieked. Rainbow Dash blinked in surprise. "A griffon? Oh no... Gertrude didn't go nuts again, did she?" she asked, thinking back to the Winter Wrap-Up of just over a week ago, which had been crashed by an insane, Windigo-possessed immortal. Thanks to Rainbow Dash and her friends using the Elements of Harmony to exorcise the Windigo and restore her sanity, they had been able to reconcile with the griffon, who had turned out to be one of Princess Celestia and Luna's old friends as well as the Warden of Winter, and a former Element bearer herself. Daisy put fears of a re-match with the icy immortal to rest, at least, when she exclaimed, "No! This was an Imperial griffon, shaking ponies down and demanding to know where you are!" "The Empire is going to take over Equestria!" "They're going to capture us and turn us into livestock!" "The horror! THE HORROR!" Rainbow ignored the speculation in favor of the relevant points. "So a griffon from the Empire flew into town and started asking about me? And you came all the way out here to tell me that? Wow, that's actually really--" Before she could finish, Rose gasped. "Oh my gosh, she's right! That griffon is going to be coming here!" The trio looked at each other, then let out a scream in unison before running off farther down the path. Rainbow Dash gave a bemused look at the retreating florists before letting out an exasperated sigh and calling out after them, "If you keep going that way, you're just gonna run straight into the Everfree!" Realizing that this stuck them between the most terrifying forest in Equestria and a murderous griffon coming to devour their sweet pony flesh, the three of them let out another horrified scream and decided to simply faint on the spot. Rainbow rolled her eyes upward, then felt an insistent paw poking at her leg. Looking down at the grumpy bunny, she replied, "Ugh, fine. Go drag those three inside, and you can have an extra serving for dinner. I'm gonna go into town and see what's going on." With that, she took off at a brisk trot toward Ponyville, leaving the bunny to look over at the three fully-grown mares, then start shaking his fist and chittering angrily at the retreating pegasus.