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// Prompt #272: Airborne 
// Story: Ponywatching 
// by ThunderTempest 
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Rainbow Dash’s wings beat in perfect sychronicity with the rest of the Wonderbolts as the seven of them soared through the air. At the twitch of a wing, Rainbow and the others pulled in close to Spitfire, letting their momentum peter out, their wings tucked tight against their bodies. 

Just as they were about to collectively stall out, wings snapped open and with a single synchronised movement, they all pushed away, forming a perfect starburst pattern.

As they all dropped back down and rejoined into formation, Spitfire called out.

“Nice work, everypony. Now, let’s practice formation 37, variant A. Dash, Soarin’, you’re on top and bottom.”

With wordless nods, the ponies took their positions, following Spitfire’s course. This was heaven to Rainbow Dash. She was being pushed to her limit every single time she practiced with the Wonderbolts. Not from a speed or agility point, but from a sheer technical standpoint. As she had come to learn, solo flying was vastly different to what the Wonderbolts did. There was a certain skill to flying in tight formation like this, and Rainbow was enjoying the challenge.

From her vantage point on the top of the whole formation, Rainbow caught sight of something pink gently rising through the clouds.

“Captain, I have unknown object in sight. One o’clock, rising,” she called down to Spitfire.

Below her, Spitfire turned her head to the indicated direction.

“Break formation,” said Spitfire, and instantly every pegasus slipped out of the formation, and came to a stop around Spitfire.

“Alright, Dash,” said Spitfire, “You saw it, you go check it out. It probably isn’t hostile, but just be careful.”

Rainbow Dash nodded, and flew towards the mass of pink. As she got closer, she saw that rather than a single mass of pink, the object was made up of balloons. Lots and lots of balloons.

“Hiya, Dashie!”

“Hey, Pinkie,” sighed Rainbow Dash, as Pinkie floated out of the bank of cloud, still rising, “You wanna explain what you’re doing?”

“Well,” began Pinkie Pie, “it was totally Pumpkin Cakes’ fault. She said something about physical impossibility and string tension when she saw me floating around Ponyville on a few balloons, and then she dared me to tie one hundred balloons to myself, but I only had ninety nine.”

“Pinkie, Pumpkin Cake is still a baby. She’s still chewing on stuffed animals.”

Pinkie Pie had the grace to look embarrassed.

“Okay, so Cheese Sandwich was in town again, and he had this awesome machine that could, like, inflate a bunch of balloons at once and it sort of got out of hoof. Last I saw him, he was going south.”

Rainbow Dash sighed.

“Pinkie, you know that you’re in restricted airspace, right?”

Pinkie Pie nodded. “It wasn’t my fault! I can’t steer! Look, just pop some of the balloons, please Dashie? It’s getting cold up here.”

Rainbow Dash stared up at the mass of balloons attached to Pinkie Pie.

“Hold on, Pinkie. Gotta go tell Captain Spitfire about this,” said Rainbow.

“Okie dokie! Be quick, I can’t really feel my hoofsies,” said Pinkie, twitching her hooves.

Rainbow flew back to Spitfire.

“It’s one of my friends from Ponyville. She had the bright idea to attach a whole load of balloons to herself, and she accidentally got blown here.”

Spitfire sighed.

“Okay, what does she want us to do?”

“Pop some of the balloons so she starts descending. She can get home after that. We aren’t that far from Ponyville,” said Rainbow Dash.

“Alright,” said Spitfire, after a moment’s thought, “we’ll go and help out.”

A few moments later, Pinkie Pie was descending back through the clouds rather more rapidly than she’s ascended, waving goodbye to Rainbow Dash the whole way.