At the crack of dawn, Rainbow Dash flew west, gliding back towards the sleepy, misty town of Amulek. Her bleary eyes blinked, tired from a full night of chatting with Princess Luna. She stretched her neck, grunting slightly. The pendant felt like it weighed a ton on an exhausted mornings like this. Sighing, she stared down at the rows of fir trees drifting beneath her.
The landscape hung in quiet dimness below. The first of several shadows were born in the faint golden dawnlight. Bands of illumination split through the trees like the strings of a harp. One by one, birds woke up, fluttering to life with faint song and melody.
Rainbow Dash took several deep breaths. In her exhaustion, she felt her heartbeat pulsing in her ears. Closing her eyes, she turned her flight into a gentle glide. She concentrated on the throbbing in her skull, her breaths shuddering between the thuds... thuds... thuds...
THUD! TH-THUD! THUD!
"Just what in the creepy peepee's is that?!" Props' voice crackled out of the intercom of the Noble Jury's cockpit. "It sounds like it's hitting Nancy from all over!"
"It must be manafeedback from the force field!" Pilate shouted, bracing himself against a bulkhead. "The energy is simultaneously resisting and scanning the Jury!"
"Oh y-yeah?!" Rainbow Dash wheezed, hovering in place as she looked over Floydien's shoulder. "Scanning us for what?!"
"My guess is for interference along the leylines that the Val Roans have manifested here!"
"Manifested?!" Floydien sputtered, gnashing at his teeth as he struggled to keep the ship steady. "Who in the spit can construct shimmer out of thin air?!"
"If it was technological, then I might be able to explain it!" Pilate stammered, his runic plate flickering. "Nnngh!"
"Pilate!" Rainbow Dash shouted. "What's the matter?"
"I don't b-believe it..." The zebra wheezed, stumbling sideways amidst the turbulence. "The field is affecting O.A.S.I.S. I'm st-starting to see actual sparks!"
"Go downstairs with Belle and Kera!" Rainbow shouted. "Brace yourself until we've passed over—"
"That's not going to make any difference!" Pilate shouted. "The leylines are entangled with the entire Jury!"
"But—"
"You need me here, Rainbow!" Pilate sputtered. "After all we've planned, it'd be foolish for me to back out now!"
The ship shook again. Everypony inside the cockpit jolted.
"Mmrrffnngh!" Floydien hissed, yanking at the controls. Beyond the cockpit, all that could be seen was a fluctuating wave of translucent green energy. The faint hint of desert mountains lingered beyond, along with a smattering of city lights. "No no no! Nancy can't take much more of this shake shake!"
"Just maintain our velocity and carry us past the distortion, Mr. Floydien—" Pilate began.
"What d-does striped boomer think Floydien has been attempting to do?!" The elk pointed at the console. "Engines are at full power and Nancy is still decelerating!"
"Snkkkt!" Props voice crackled once again. "Bad news boobies! The tome is bouncing around like a Mexicolt jumping bean!"
"Darn it!" Rainbow hissed, then leaned into the intercom. "How's the lavender light?! Has it dimmed yet?!"
"I-I can't tell, Dashie! It's hard enough just k-keeping an eye on the instrument panel with all this interf—" Distortion, then more crackling. "Zaidy Waidy! Quick! The steam reserves—SKKKT!"
The whole ship shook, buckled. Everypony inside the cockpit gasped.
"Nancy's falling!" Floydien yelped. "Down with the flash flash!"
"Can you stabilize her?!"
"Yes yes yes! But not for much more shimmer!"
With a grunt, Roarke climbed up from the crawlspace below. She peered up, reached a hoof up to her helmet, and opened the faceplate. "Bad news. Steam is venting all throughout the engine room."
"Crud!" Rainbow hissed. "Did Props send you up here to tell me that?!"
"She could if she could get to me," Roarke uttered, eyes thin. "Do not confuse this with cowardice: but we should reconsider this current venture."
"Roarke, we are so close!" Pilate growled, teeth clattering. "I made all of the calculations!"
"Pilate, we're obviously dealing with something way over our heads!" Rainbow's voice cracked. "These Val Roans—"
"Just a little while longer, we'll emerge on the other side!" Pilate said. "If we can just break past the leyline entanglement—"
Just then, a loud alarm blared across the cockpit.
Roarke twisted towards the elk. "What is that?"
"Shimmer glimmer!" Floydien hollered. "Shimmer glimmer, inbound to nose nose!"
"Huh?!" Rainbow Dash peered past Floydien's antlers. Her pupils shrank upon sight of a bright cluster of green energy being hurled at the vessel like a missile. "Luna Poop!"
"What?! What is it?!" Pilate shouted.
"Some kind of projectile!" Rainbow exclaimed. "And it's headed this way!"
"We need to evade it!" Roarke hollered.
"Not enough quick quick!" Floydien spun a dial and pulled two levers, venting steam from the bow. "Blonde boomer! Cut engines and divert all of Nancy's steam—"
"Too late!" Roarke exclaimed, then yelled down the crawlspace. "Everypony, brace for impact!"
WHAMMMM! The green pulse struck the Jury... then surged through it. Everypony wheezed for breath as the ship's interior turned a bright emerald. Instantly, consoles sparked and panels exploded with bursts of manaflare.
"Aaaaugh!" Floydien twitched in pain, his antlers sparkling from branch to branch. "Gnnngh-augghhh!"
"Gnnngh... Fl-Floydien?!" Rainbow sputtered, watching in horror as smoke rose from the points in Floydien's forehead where the antlers connected. "Floydien! What's wrong—?!"
A body was rattling across the floor beside Rainbow.
The pegasus looked down and gasped once more. "Pilate!"
The zebra was convulsing all over, gripping his plate as the runes trailed with green energy. His clear eyes rolled back as he foamed at the mouth.
"Pilate! Pilate!" Rainbow knelt down and shook him. "Stick with me, buddy! Just try to stay calm!" She shouted across the cockpit. "Roarke! Pilate's having some kind of a seizure and Floydien's passed out! I think that projectile zapped them right in the magic gut or something! Get Zaid or somepony up here! We need to bring the Jury around!"
Silence.
"Roarke?!" Rainbow crawled over and stared down the vertical passage. "Roarke, where—?"
The metal mare far down on the floor of the bottommost deck. She winced in pain, a prisoner to her own sparkling armor.
"Roarke? Roarke?!" Rainbow hyperventilated. Suddenly, she felt a warm trickle running down her brow. She dragged a hoof across her muzzle and looked at it. Blood clung to her fetlock. Nervously, she touched her forehead, feeling two points where chaotic bone was piercing her flesh. She seethed, "Oh Celestia, no..." She glanced down at her pendant; it was flickering like mad.
Breep Breep Breep Breep!
Gasping, Rainbow Dash looked up.
Past Floydien's slumped figure, past the distorted energy field, the Noble Jury was soaring straight towards a desert mountainside.
Rainbow shivered, her eyes flickering red-on-yellow as the entire vessel buckled around her. Then, with a gasp, she—
—jolted forward, overcome with dizziness.
"Guh! Mmmrnnngh!" Rainbow's eyes bulged as she clutched her pendant, hissing under her breath. Through tearing vision, she spotted the fir trees of East Amulek looming closer and closer below. "Sonuva..." A prolonged snarl, and she caught the wind once more in her wings. "Okay... okay... just stay calm." She gulped, descending slowly in spite of her dizziness. "It's not as bad as before. Nothing is as bad as before. Just... easy... easy..."
She found a stretch of dirt road leading through the forest, marred with wagon wheel trails.
"Perfect... one sexy runway..." She nevertheless gnashed her teeth as she glided down, her body heavy as an anvil. "Slow and steady... that's right... that's—"
She plouded into the earth, belly-first.
"Poopsicle!" The pegasus rolled and rolled and collapsed in a sweaty heap by the side of the road. "Ooof!... Unnnnghhh..." She slumped on her back, wheezing for breath. "...what's with this friggin' town anyway?" She covered her eyes with sweaty forelimbs, panting and panting. "Mmmmff... just let it pass... let it pass..."
She lay still under the dim hush of dawn. Eventually, after several minutes, she felt the first warm kiss of sunlight. It eased her, and the dizziness almost instantly vanished. Breathing easier, Rainbow Dash lowered her hooves and simply lay there on the dirt path, legs spread as if she was about to make snow angels with no snow.
The mare was almost completely oblivious to the heavy hoofsteps until they lingered right beside her skull.
"Ahem... 'Rainbow Dash'... is it?"
"Mmmnngh..." Rainbow squinted one eye, then the other.
The dark, hairy face of Drakshaa peered down at her.
"Mrmmff..." Rainbow rubbed her eyes, grumbling tiredly. "'Douchebag,' is it?"
The stallion's nostrils flared. "Oh... so you're still on about that."
"Fella..." Rainbow Dash sat up, grumbling. "I'll always be on about that." She tried to stand, but fumbled. "Mmmrfff... how about I drive a giant hardened dog-turd into the wheel-spokes of your 'save the whole friggin' world' machine and see how you like it?"
"Are you always this eloquent in person?"
"No, normally I kick the crap out of creatures I don't like, present company included."
"I see." Drakshaa nevertheless reached down, hooked his hoof with hers, and yanked her up into a standing position.
Rainbow wobbed slightly, then blinked awkwardly at the stallion as he brushed her off. She raised an eyebrow. "Gonna size me up for a dress next?"
"Get over yourself," the stallion grumbled, flicking dirt and leaves off her shoulders. "You always this moody after crash landing?"
"I didn't crash land."
"Harumph... I saw what I saw."
Rainbow looked past him, spotting a wagon full of mining tools leading away from Amulek. "Going to work so soon?"
"Always the first to go in and the last to go out," Drakshaa said. "Thanks to you and your gang."
"Yeah. You're welcome, by the way."
"Rainbow Dash..." Drakshaa leaned back. "I get the distinct suspicion that you don't like me."
"Wow, somepony truly was born yesterday."
"You're a strong mare," he said. "I imagine you would do anything to save the zany bunch of adventurers you fly around with."
"I do and I have." Her eyes narrowed. "What's it to ya?"
"Merigold and I would do the same for this town, under any circumstance." He took a deep breath. "We haven't flown around like you and your air-buds. We haven't seen quite as many fantastical sights as you. So, when a giant flaming dragon attacks our encampment like any giant flaming dragon would do... we're apt to respond to it like it's a god-damn giant flaming dragon."
"You should have trusted me," Rainbow Dash said. "It would have made things easier."
"Would it? Would it really?"
She squinted at him.
"Follow me," he said, trotting down a beaten path that led away from the main road. "I want to show you something..."
"Show me what, exactly?" Rainbow Dash stared after him. "Shouldn't a punk like you be wearing a trenchcoat first?"
"Just shuddup and follow me already..."
"Mrmmmf... fine." Rainbow trudged after him. "This should be golden..."
After an awkwardly quiet ten minute walk, both ponies emerged into a forest clearing right as the sun came out. Drakshaa shuffled to a stop, then stepped aside. He gestured at the patch of grass ahead of him.
Rainbow Dash trotted forward, then halted in her tracks. Her lips pursed. "What is this...?"
"What's it look like?"
Before Rainbow Dash there lay several mounds of dirt, each with a freshly-planted wooden stake in the ground. On several of the dirtpiles, a few flowers had been gathered, along with tiny trinkets and effigies.
"These are fresh," Rainbow said. She gulped and looked Drakshaa's way. "But... I-I don't get it. Is th-there some horrible plague in Amulek or something? Because surely Merigold would have told me—"
"These aren't for the villagers of Amulek," Drakshaa said. "That cemetery isn't too far from here. No..." He shook his head and sighed. "These graves are special for a whole different reason."
Rainbow Dash blinked. Her ears folded. "The changelings..."
Drakshaa paced slowly past the wooden stakes. "It's been two months, and we're still finding them. That is to say... pieces of them." His nostrils flared. "Those horribad chaos creeps really did a number on your shape-shifting pals. We... really c-can't guess what leg belongs to who... or whatever parts we find. But once we're certain we've found enough to account for a single changeling, we bury them in this plot of land." He paused, staring up at the nearby mountain. "It's the least we can do, I suppose. I mean... not all of us can zip around the countryside willy-nilly. This is our home. We're stuck here... with both the beauty and the carnage that you left behind."
Rainbow Dash winced. "I... I-I never asked them to give their lives for me the way they did."
"I didn't say that." Drakshaa pivoted towards her. "What I am trying to say is that we're grateful." He shuffled towards Rainbow. "We, the ponies of Amulek, would have lost our necks if it weren't for the sacrifices that those bug-eyed things made." He came to a stop. "As well as the one you're making."
"Heh... what are you talking about?" Rainbow smirked bitterly. "I'm still here."
"I know that." Drakshaa nodded. "I also know that you and your air-buds are dead-set on getting to Val Roa. But you're not there yet..."
Rainbow winced slightly.
"Instead, you're hopping all over the countryside, saving the butts of other villages just like Amulek. And for what?" Drakshaa leaned his head to the side. "What could you possibly be benefitting from all this?"
"Uhm..." Rainbow shrugged. "A good night's rest?"
"Bullshit," Drakshaa spat. "I know profit-loss when I see it."
"We're not in it for that."
"No. You're in it for something else. And that's some rare crud right there," he said. He glanced back at the stakes. "I just hope that somepony won't have to be burying you like these poor guys. That's a pretty lousy reward."
"I dunno..." Rainbow Dash gulped. "From where I'm looking, it doesn't seem that lousy at all."
"Yeah, well, if a pony like you bites it—believe me—it'd be pretty lousy. Nevertheless..." Drakshaa looked at her dead-on. "You should know that what y'all are doing out here is greatly appreciated. Perhaps sometime you should stick around long enough to find out just how much."
Rainbow Dash took a deep breath. She smiled faintly. "I think I may have been wrong about you."
"Yeah, well, we all may have been dicks." Drakshaa brushed past her. "Now, if you don't mind, I've got work to do. I'll let you get back to your own as well."
Rainbow stayed in the clearing, her ears twitching to the sound of his departing hoofsteps. She sat before the graves, took a deep breath, and hung her head.