//------------------------------//
// Dancing Along the Line 
// Story: Flying to the Future 
// by moguera 
//------------------------------//

Chapter 22: Dancing Along the Line

Scootaloo didn't need to say anything.  When Dawn and Perlin started moving, everypony saw it.  Only a second before, there had been nothing.  Then, without the slightest pretext or warning, she saw a faint blurring of motion from Dawn and both he and Perlin were swallowed up by the massive whirlwind he'd created.  The swirling vortex drew up water from the ocean below, transforming into a vicious waterspout that climbed up into the sky.
"My word!"
Scootaloo grinned, just barely catching the Mayor's gasp over the roar of wind and water.  A second later, the waterspout exploded outward, shattering and scattering a rain of water for miles around.  The spectators gathered along the cape sputtered in surprise as they were hit with a stinging, salty spray.  Scootaloo flicked her free wing, creating a slight buffer to deflect the water coming at her and Coco, expanding it to encompass the Mayor, for politeness' sake.
Where the ocean had been smooth almost to the point of being like a glass mirror a few seconds earlier, ferocious waves now roared, crashing up against the cliffs, throwing even more sprays of white into the air.  Meanwhile, out over the sea, where the waterspout had first emerged, thunder cracked and lightning flashed in a cloudless, blue sky.



The powerful tornado swept Perlin into it before he could even react.  There had been no warning, no rise of intent before Dawn had gone into motion.  One second, the younger stallion had been still, the next he'd seemingly turned the world upside down.  The winds dragged Perlin inwards.  He had the presence of mind to know better than to fight them, riding the currents, letting them carry his body.
His eyes picked up a flash of motion off to one side.  He whipped around, one wing flashing out.  There was Dawn, doing much the same thing.  Dawn had extended one wing, which was surrounded by a shining haze that seemed to extend outward.  Perlin's wing blazed with light, even as the air around it turned darker by comparison.  He clashed with the shining hammer of wind Dawn wielded, the impact between the two of them creating a shockwave that exploded outward, obliterating the massive tornado Dawn had created in an instant.
Perlin was sent scudding backwards through the air.  As he did, he swept his wings around him, detaching his feathers.  They vanished into rifts cleaved through space itself, emerging all around Dawn, closing in around him from all sides, shining brilliantly as they cut swaths of darkness through the air.  Though there should have been no space for evasion, Dawn's body seemed to blur and become indistinct, flowing between the blades.  He slipped out of Perlin's enclosure-style attack with seemingly perfect ease, coming out in a roll and sweeping one wing up at Perlin.  Arcs of white electricity crawled across its surface, converging down to focus at the tip of this leading primary.
The orb of condensed energy exploded outward with a crack like thunder, an upsweeping wave of energy that threatened to take Perlin from below.  Perlin flicked one wing off to his side, sliding into the rift he'd carved.  He emerged off to the side and slightly behind Dawn, one wing already poised to attack.  However, Dawn continued his roll, bringing his opposite wing around another shining orb of light hovering at its very tip.  Dawn jabbed it at Perlin and the light extended into a lance of concentrated energy, charging towards Perlin like a spear, sending another crack of thunder ahead of it.
Perlin's body blurred as he swung his wing across him, moving it so fast that the appendage itself released a small boom.  The line of darkness it cleaved through the air intensified directly in the path of Dawn's attack, suddenly exploding outward in a sphere of pitch-black.  Dawn's shining lance impacted that sphere and was seemingly sucked down within it, vanishing from the world.
"That's a new trick," observed Dawn.
Perlin smiled.  "I've had years now to plumb the depths of what my wings can do.  I'm constantly discovering new things about them."
"Then please show me all that you have learned," said Dawn with an eager smile as he snapped his wings outward, lightning once again crawling across their surfaces.
"Gladly," replied Perlin, several of his feathers detaching once again.
This time, the lightning on Dawn's wings condensed into six separate orbs that floated up to hover in an arcing formation above his back.  A sweep of his wing sent them whirling in a circular path around his body.  Across from him, Perlin's detached feathers vanished into spatial rifts and emerged in circular spinning formations in front of him, their tips pointed outwards and their quills pointed inwards.  They spun rapidly in place, forming shining circles of light within wider disks of darkness.
Dawn surged forward, a sweep of his wings sending the white orbs of lightning flying at Perlin, their paths twisting and curving along multiple vectors, as though they were dandelion seeds being carried upon swirling gale-force winds.  Perlin tilted his wings and twisted his body, the movement translating itself to the feather formations in front of them, their positions changing to meet the paths of Dawn's attacks.  Their rotation intensified even further and low booms echoed through the air as orbs of darkness erupted into being in front of them, swallowing Dawn's plasma orbs and erasing them.
Perlin's feathers scattered before quickly retreating back into his wings.  It was just in time.  The miniature pseudo-black holes had not merely swallowed Dawn's attack, they'd actually created a powerful pull that yanked Dawn straight towards their position like he was attached to a tether.  Now Perlin surged forward, riding the pull of his own attack from the opposite side, the residual effects of it bringing the two young stallions together once again.
Dawn didn't try to resist the pull.  Instead, he used it to lend momentum to his movements as he once again kneaded the air around his wing, condensing it in, infusing it with his will and the image in his heart and mind, the image of a shining wind that would wipe away everything before him.  Perlin met him head-on, his own wing shining brilliantly, leaving a path of shadow as he swept it before him to meet Dawn's attack.  Perlin's wing accelerated sharply, the motion approaching the speed of sound.  An ebony void, a violation of the laws of nature and existence, swept out like a wave, meeting Dawn's shining wind.  The waves of black and white met and exploded across the sky with a roar.
Down below the two combatants, the surface of the ocean pressed down and exploded outward, throwing up sprays of white froth in every direction.  Above the them the sky itself seemed to fracture.



"This is madness!" said the Mayor, having to yell to be heard over the surging crash of waves against the shore and the echoing booms of thunder as white and black exploded in the air above the sea.
"We warned ya," said Scootaloo a trifle smugly.
All around them, ponies were shouting in surprise and amazement, some in fear.  Ponies who'd come expecting to enjoy a leisurely picnic while they watched the match were forced to hurriedly pack away their blankets and food.  A few of them were too late and Scootaloo saw a couple blankets yanked up by the wind and sent sailing across the cape before they fell down into the waters of the bay on the other side.  Likewise, a few baskets of food were scattered across the park as their owners scrambled to clean them up.
Even though, at this distance, the winds weren't large enough to dislodge a pony, more than a few spectators were hunkered low against the ground.  Some were even clinging tightly to the trunks of trees or the poles of pavilions.  Others huddled behind benches.  All around, manes were damp with seawater as each new exchange between Dawn and Perlin threw up new waves, making the ocean seem to boil at times.  Only Scootaloo, Coco, and the Mayor were still dry, shielded by the wind barrier Scootaloo had put up in order to deflect the spray.
"They're monsters!" gasped the Mayor.
"Hey, that's my coltfriend you're talking about," said Scootaloo, flicking her eyes in a sharp glare at the Mayor, who flinched.  "And Perlin is Coco's coltfriend."
"My apologies," said the Mayor.  "That was quite rude of me.  I'm sorry to have doubted their statements about their skills.  Otherwise I would have urged the spectators to take quite a few more precautions."
"They know not to do anything that would get anypony over here hurt," said Coco softly, giving the Mayor a gentle smile.  "Though I'm afraid there might be a few complaints about lost property later."
"I'm afraid I opened myself up for that," said the Mayor, casting her gaze around to take in the ponies scrambling to recover scattered items before the next surge of wind sent them flying away altogether.
Scootaloo opened her mouth to say something more.  However, she completely forgot what she was going to see as white and black exploded outward, two halves of a sphere that seemed to be pushing against one another.  The sea and the sky seemed to split entirely.  The force of the explosion was such that even Scootaloo was almost overwhelmed, barely managing to strengthen the wind buffer she'd created as an even more intense barrage of spray washed over the cape.  The explosion vanished and the split seas rushed back inwards, collapsing together and unleashing a jet of white foam upwards with a low roar of its own.
"That was something else," said Scootaloo, grinning wryly at the Mayor.



Light and darkness faded from the sky.  Dawn emerged unscathed, his entire world surrounded by a torrent of swirling air that obscured everything from view.  The light from the explosion had been such that he'd been force to squeeze his eyes shut to avoid being blinded.  However, even now that they'd faded, his vision was still blurry and he couldn't catch sight of Perlin.  The winds roiled unceasingly around him, completely distorting everything.
Then Dawn felt the air split behind him, like a clean line suddenly drawn across countless random swirls on a page.  Perlin emerged from the rift in a flat spin, a wing sweeping out to slash at Dawn's neck.  Dawn's legs kicked out and he threw his entire body into a roll, sweeping up and around so that he was now above Perlin.  In the course of his roll, he drew the swirling, turbulent winds around him, winding them around his body, adding to their force, infusing them with his will and magic so that, when he emerged from the roll, he directed a sweeping wing downward, unleashing the wind in the form of a spearlike tornado that thrust directly down at Perlin's back.  Perlin, seeing Dawn's maneuver to escape his attack, continued his spin, barely bringing up his other wing, just in time for his shining appendage and the nimbus of darkness that surrounded it to meet Dawn's concentrated whirlwind as it stabbed down at him.
Perlin was driven down towards the ocean's surface.  Gritting his teeth, Perlin strained against the whirlwind and let out a roar of his own, slashing upwards with the very wing that he was using to block Dawn's attack.  A black line slashed up and along the length of the whirlwind, splitting it and scattering streamers of white across the sky.  Dawn jumped to the side to avoid being split in the same way his own attack had been.
Perlin rolled over backwards righting himself and arresting his fall barely above the surface of the water.  The surging waves actually lapped at the tips of his hooves before he launched himself skywards with a mighty sweep of his wings.  Dawn dove down to meet him, a white haze clinging to his wings.  Just as the two of them were about to collide, Perlin slashed one wing in front of him and disappeared into a rift, Dawn's attack blazing through the space he'd just vacated.
Through the air, Dawn felt another rift open up to one side of him.  Whirling to meet it, Dawn swept one wing around in a circular motion, creating a swirling disk of shining wind that deflected the feathers that lanced out from the rift like arrows.  At the same instant, another rift opened above Dawn.  Perlin dropped out of the opening, descending towards Dawn's back, twisting his body around to bring his wing in a wide slash.
Dawn rotated his own body, using his wing to guide the same whirlwind he'd just used as a shield upwards so that it's edge collided with the feathers of Perlin's wing, buzzing against them like a circular saw.  Behind it, Dawn went into a full roll, gathering as much air as he could around his opposite wing, infusing it with all his will and intent.  Completing the roll, he thrust it upward, sending a shining column hammering up through the disk of his own shield, its trajectory forcing Perlin to use the recoil of his own attack to bounce away before it slammed into his head.  In the same movement, he slashed the wing opposite his attacking one out behind him and vanished into yet another rift.
He emerged almost immediately a little below Dawn.  However, Dawn could sense that the feathers of one of his wings were missing and immediately directed a wave of charged air behind him, deflecting the feathers as they slashed out at him from more rifts.  At the same time, Perlin slashed upward with his wing, sending a wave of darkness washing out towards Dawn.  Dawn lunged forward, sweeping his wings ahead of him so that his primaries pointed out in front of his head.  A massive, shining column of air and light slammed into the edge of Perlin's slash and another explosion rocked the combatants, sending them tumbling away from one another again.
As Dawn allowed his momentum to play out and righted himself, he smiled, realizing just how much he'd missed this sensation, the feeling of testing himself against an equally strong opponent.  However, he couldn't afford to lose himself in the wave of nostalgia as Perlin emerged from a rift behind him.
"This is all stuff I've seen before," teased Perlin with a grin as the feathers of his attacking wing blazed brilliantly and seemed to stretch outward toward Dawn as he stabbed the appendage at him.  "Show me something new."
Dawn smiled back and flicked his wing.  Perlin caught several flashes of light out of the corner of his eye.  He went into a rapid roll, surrounding himself in a spiral of darkness and using both his wings to deflect a rapid series of attacks that clashed against the shining feathers of Dark Matter.  Amidst all of that, Dawn charged straight at Perlin, thrusting at him with the feather of one wing in a motion that was eerily similar to the one Perlin had been using just before.  Just like Perlin, the feathers of Dawn's wings seemed to shine, though from their own luminance, rather than light drawn out of the air, lengthening and stretching out towards Perlin, threatening to impale him.
Perlin swiped up one wing, managing to deflect the attack.  However, the force behind the blow knocked him backwards, sending him tumbling across the sky.  Coming out of it, Perlin gaped as he stared at Dawn.
Dawn's feathers and wings hadn't changed at all.  Rather, it was as though Dawn had sprouted additional feathers, feathers forged from pure light (most likely plasma).  They sprouted from the spaces between Dawn's outstretched primaries and secondaries, with additional rows fanning out through the air behind those and even more hovering in layers both above and below them, giving the impression that Dawn had suddenly sprouted several extra wings, wings composed almost entirely of magic and will.
"The Wings of Light?" asked Perlin, stunned by the sight.  The Wings of Light, the pinnacle of pegasus magic, was a technique that had only been mastered by two ponies in Equestria.  Dawn was not supposed to be one of those ponies.
"Not exactly," replied Dawn, not bothering to hide his smirk.  "You might call this my critique of that technique."
Perlin found himself grinning again.  "Now this is what I'm talking about!" he said eagerly.  "Show me what you can do!"
"Gladly," replied Dawn.
He and Perlin surged towards each other once more.  The feathers of light seemed to swarm about Dawn's wings and then scatter on the wind.  However, that lasted less than a second before they converged on Perlin slashing through the air like blades, coming at him from nearly every conceivable angle.
That's no good, thought Perlin in amusement, slashing the air in front of him and vanishing into a rift.  His technique allowed him to ignore one of the most important issues of combat, the passage through space.  While it behaved differently, his technique had a similar function to a unicorn's teleportation spell.  It allowed him to move from one point to another without passing through the intervening space.  Closing off every angle of escape to try and confine him would not work, because his technique allowed him to create an angle of escape that did not naturally exist within the world.
Perlin danced out of the rift off to Dawn's left, aiming to attack him while he was busy directing his feathers of shaped plasma on the attack.  However, as Perlin emerged from the rift, his eyes widened as he saw the feathers converging on him, almost to the point of striking him already, as though he hadn't moved an inch when he'd dodged.
Sweeping his wings out, Perlin detached his feathers on both of them, sending them out through rifts of their own, where they emerged on a variety of paths to counter Dawn's feathers.  Light trailing darkness met humming plasma and the air was filled with the cracks of electrical discharge and the claps of thunder.  Dawn's light feathers did not dissipate upon being countered, but were knocked away.  However, to Perlin's amazement, more feathers swept in, moving almost like wind-blown leaves, homing in on his body with incredible speed.
Desperate to avoid them, Perlin recalled his feathers and dove through another rift, barely managing to escape before the humming blades cut into his flesh.  He emerged again, only to find that more of Dawn's plasma feathers were already swirling about him and closing in, their motion once again reminding him of leaves caught on a gale.
Perlin went into a rapid spin, using his wings to bat away the feathers as they came at him.  However, more of them seemed to converge on him in their place.  As he fended them off, Perlin caught sight of the feathers he'd deflected actually circling back around and coming back at him.  If anything, he felt as though he were caught in the center of a whirlwind that was always drawing the shining blades back to him.
A surge of much more substantial motion drew Perlin's attention and he saw Dawn coming right at him, even more feathers forged from that shining plasma formed up around his wings, forming several extra rows extending from his regular feathers.  As Dawn passed through the scattered feathers that had been attacking Perlin from a variety of angles, they were drawn back towards him, forming up above and below Dawn's wings, actually making him seem to grow two extra pairs of wings in the process.
I suppose he probably wouldn't be flattered if I pointed out that he looks somewhat like Wight Shade now, thought Perlin wryly.  On the other hoof, that might be where he got the idea from.
Perlin released his own feathers, sending them off through rifts in space to attack Dawn from different directions.  Just as he expected, Dawn's extra wings whipped around, easily deflecting the incoming strikes and confirming Perlin's suspicions.  I don't believe it!  What Wight Shade did with his unique magic, Dawn's managed to do with pure technique.
The brilliant mage and architect of Perlin's wings had created more than just the appendages on Perlin's back.  Wight Shade's primary weapons had been a sextet of wings built from feathers of Dark Matter to act both offensively and defensively for him.  Because Wight himself was not particularly skilled in combat, he had used his magic to create an auto-defense program for his wings, allowing them to respond to attacks and aggressors, even if Wight himself was unaware of them.  The responses written into the magic of the program surpassed even a master martial artist's reflexes in terms of sheer speed.
Dawn's feathers of solidified plasma were probably governed by Dawn's wind-sense, responding to the electric potential difference created by shifting air currents that allowed them to automatically trace a path towards their target or incoming attacks.  They reacted automatically when Perlin emerged from one of his rifts, even faster than Dawn normally did, riding the currents of air Perlin himself created to close in on him.
Perlin found himself grinning as Dawn lunged at him with his physical wings, sweeping those rows of blazing feathers at him in an imitation of Perlin's own attack.  Perlin responded by actually mimicking one of Dawn's attacks, sweeping one wing around in a wide arc, putting the force of his entire body behind the motion.  His feathers left a black line in their wake.  At the apex of his swing, when the speed and force behind the motion were at their highest, that line exploded outward into a black void that swallowed the feathers of light that Dawn had created, disintegrating them completely.  In fact, the extra wings of those feathers on the right side of Dawn's body vanished as well.
If Dawn was surprised by what his opponent had done, he didn't show it.  Instead, he immediately attacked with all the feathers on his left side, including the two extra wings on that side.  Almost as though he were answering Perlin's imitation of his technique, Dawn swept his right wing, which had been stretched forward to attack Perlin, around and back in a wide arc, twisting to put the force of his body behind the motion.  However, he did it at an angle so that the resulting whirlwind extended directly towards Perlin like a massive, whirling spear.  The wind drew in all those plasma feathers that Dawn had created, merging them together and then merging them with the wind itself, transforming it into a tornado of crackling energy and light, something that seemed to sit somewhere between fire and wind, blazing white as it accelerated at Perlin, producing its own sonic boom in the process.
Perlin went into a rapid roll, spinning his body along the axis of his spine over and over, going faster with each revolution.  As he did so, he released the feathers on his wings with sharp sweeping motions.  The feathers, shining from the light they drew in from the air around them, emerged in a circular formation, like the spokes of a wheel, directly between Perlin and the incoming attack.  For the briefest of instants, they shined together inside a larger disk of pitch black, the image of a star twinkling in the night sky before they vanished and another spherical, black void exploded outwards, swallowing the force of Dawn's attack, breaking it down completely as the alien laws that governed Perlin's Dark Matter mixed with the laws of the mundane world and clashed against the force of Dawn's will and magic, which were able to evoke otherworldly phenomena of their own.
The black orb shattered like glass, the pieces of darkness scattering before resolving back into Perlin's feathers, which quickly retracted back through rifts and returned to Perlin's wings.  However, behind that first wheel of feathers Perlin had defended himself with was a second one that had been spinning in the opposite direction.  A second, smaller void burst into being.  However, having none of Dawn's attacks to draw in, it abruptly collapsed upon itself.  The black orb shrank into a black dot, taking Perlin's feathers with it.  There was a brilliant, blinding flash from the point where it had been, like the strobe of a camera, but millions of times brighter, even brighter than the sun itself.  It lasted for less than a second, but the flash completely blinded Dawn, who hadn't been prepared for its emergence.  Back on the cape, the onlookers who had been trying to keep up with the battle found themselves dazzled by the flash as well.
However, that was only the beginning of what Perlin had unleashed.  The flash blinded Dawn, but that was the least of his worries as his wind sense told him that it was accompanied by a massive explosion that sent a shockwave rushing straight at him.  The force of the attack was so great that the resulting blast pressed down the surface of the ocean below into a bowl shape even as it rushed straight for Dawn.
There was no time to think, no time to analyze the attack.  The energy that had been released was of some indefinite nature.  It was all but invisible to the naked eye, save for the faint ripple caused by the refraction of light resulting from the bow-wave of compressed air the explosion pushed ahead of itself.  Even that was moving at supersonic velocity...not that Dawn would have seen anything, given that he was still blinded by the flash of light that had accompanied the explosion.
Dawn reacted automatically, sweeping his wing out vertically, the feathers splayed out as he slashed it through the air like a blade.  A crescent-shaped wave of pure white stretched out from his feathers, meeting the shockwave of Perlin's attack and splitting it in two.  Down below, the concavity in the ocean split as well, forming a pair of trenches in the water that flowed around Dawn on either side.
Perlin had been sent spinning and flipping by the recoil of his own attack.  It was one that he'd experimented with in the past, but was unable to practice extensively, particularly because it required him to sacrifice some of his feathers to execute.  While the feathers would grow back eventually, it ultimately hampered him if he couldn't take down his enemy with the attack itself, reducing his effectiveness for the remainder of the fight.
Though he was whirling around, Perlin saw the ebony blur of Dawn as he closed in.  Relaxing his body, Perlin cooperated with his own spin, bringing it back under control and coming out of it, just as Dawn came into striking distance, a shining white wind gathered at the tip of one of his wings.  Perlin met Dawn's wind with his own feathers, which drew light out of the air around them.  They met as the concavity in the ocean created by Perlin's attack flowed closed, throwing up a towering wave of white spray that nearly reached the two fighters themselves.  They collided together before separating, then coming back together again, dancing through the skies, leaving ripples of distortion and motes of dancing light in their wake as they exchanged blows at a pace that was impossible for the untrained eye to follow.
Neither of them spoke.  Neither of them even thought about what they were doing.  Their surroundings, their audience, even their loved ones in said audience all dropped away, leaving nothing but the two of them, dancing alone in the endless sky.  The excitement of battle, the sensation of dancing along the line between life and death made their veins and bones thrum with excitement.  A second's indecision, an instant's miscalculation, anything could spell instant death for one or the other of them.  Yet, in that very moment, they never felt more alive.
They reared back, shining wind gathering around Dawn's feathers as he surged forward, sweeping his wing back in a wide arc, putting the force of his whole body behind it.  Perlin met him head-on, a wave of black erupting from his wing as he ironically mimicked Dawn's motions.  Their attacks collided, forming a twisting column of white and black that only vaguely resembled a tornado, but took on strange, otherworldly connotations as the water drawn in by it seemed to evaporate into nothingness, the column stabbing straight down to the ocean floor.  It cracked and shattered like glass, leaving a momentary vertical tunnel stabbing straight down through the ocean, revealing the rocky seafloor below before the waters finally rushed in, sending a geyser of white spray rushing up as the two young stallions collided once more.
They froze in place.  A shining blade of white plasma, extending out of Dawn's wing like an extra feather, rested less than an inch away from Perlin's throat.  One of Perlin's feathers extended through a rift in space, emerging a similar distance away from Dawn's throat.  Neither of them moved, their eyes locked with one another.
"Looks like a draw," said Dawn.
"I'm fine with that," replied Perlin.
By unspoken agreement, they both relaxed their wings.  Dawn's plasma blade dissipated into the air, while Perlin retracted his feather through the rift he'd created.  The two of them backed away from each other.
"That was fun," said Perlin cheerfully.  "When was the last time we fought like that?"
"Canterlot," answered Dawn.
"Oh...right," said Perlin as they began their flight back to shore.  "We should do this more often."
"Though we may want to find a different venue," said Dawn, sweeping his gaze across the cape to take in the stunned visages of their audience.  "I think we left a rather troubling impression."
Perlin chuckled.  "They were the ones who wanted to make an event out of it."
For a moment, Dawn was a bit worried about what kind of reception they would have, once the sense of stunned awe wore off.  He wouldn't have been surprised if many of the ponies who had come to watch them that day were frightened or even petitioned the Mayor to ask them to leave.  He was glad they'd decided to wait until the final day of their vacation before he and Perlin had fought.
As Dawn and Perlin drifted in, landing gently on the grass of the cape, the assembled ponies exploded into cheers and whistles, clopping the ground hard in a show of adulation that left both Dawn and Perlin stunned.
Perlin leaned over, smirking as he spoke to Dawn.  "I think they liked it," he said.
Scootaloo and Coco rushed over to them.  Scootaloo wrapped Dawn in a tight, enthusiastic hug before pulling back and kissing him fully on the lips.  "That was awesome!" she exclaimed as she pulled back from the kiss.
"Thanks," replied Dawn.
Coco and Perlin were a bit more understated in sharing their affection.  Coco pressed her neck against Perlin, gently nuzzling up its length, running her muzzle along the contours of his head and face, as though trying to reassure herself that he was all right.  "It was beautiful to watch," she admitted when she pulled back.  "You looked so happy out there."
"I was," said Perlin, leaning in to steal a quick kiss from Coco.
"I must say, that was quite the show," said the Mayor as she approached the group.  "This has probably been the most exciting thing to happen to our little town since that hurricane two years back."
"An apt, if troubling comparison," said Dawn, raising an eyebrow as Scootaloo and Coco giggled.



Much to their relief, it appeared that nopony bore them any ill will over lost or destroyed property that had resulted from the fallout of the battle.  The docks and the boats moored to them had been effectively sheltered by the cape.  A few houses had lost shingles from the intense winds that had raged, but the worst of it had been abated by the harbor's sheltered location.  Dawn, Perlin, Coco, and Scootaloo returned to the village proper, finding themselves to now be minor celebrities.  They were the recipients of enthusiastic attention wherever they went.  Ponies were happy to offer them free food and souvenirs.  Dawn and Perlin wound up turning down quite a few invitations to various bars for free drinks, while Scootaloo made sure she headed off any mares who showed any definitive interest in the two young stallions, making it absolutely clear that they were already taken.
Worn out after the intense fight, Dawn and Perlin retired to the cottage with their fillyfriends for their final night in Gallopoli.  As he laid in bed, Scootaloo curled up against him, Dawn stared at the ceiling thoughtfully.
"Something on your mind?" asked Scootaloo.
"I was just thinking about the fight," said Dawn.
"Was it fun?"
Dawn smiled.  "It was.  I think it's the most fun I've had in a long time...not that being with you isn't fun.  It's just different in a way.  It felt good to be out there and to use everything I had against an opponent."
"I thought you were having fun too," said Scootaloo.  "I can't wait until the day we can do that with each other.  It makes me think..."
"Think of what?" asked Dawn.
"It makes me think about what Spitfire keeps talking to us about," said Scootaloo.  "I mean, we've always considered it, becoming Knights.  I've kinda wondered if it was the right thing for either of us.  But...now..."
"Yeah," agreed Dawn, tightening his hold on her.  "I think you might be right.  Let's think it over some more and, hopefully, the next time we see Spitfire, we might have an answer for her."
"Right," said Scootaloo, tucking her head into Dawn's neck and drifting off.



The next day saw the four of them at the train station as the Mayor, along with quite a few of the townsponies, bade them an enthusiastic farewell.  The Mayor made a point of inviting them back again, possibly for another fight.  Dawn could tell she was hoping to make a regular event out of it, possibly even using it as a hook to attract more tourists.  He wasn't sure he wanted to be a tourist attraction though, even temporarily.
They spent their time on the train chatting and resting, whiling the hours away as the train made its way back to Ponyville.  Outside, the landscape changed, going from the warm climes around Gallopoli and back to the snow-covered scenery that decorated most of the rest of Equestria.  After spending so much time enjoying the warmth and sunshine of the seaside town, it was a bit jarring to be reminded that the rest of Equestria was in the midst of winter.  Dawn idly wished that they had scheduled a bit more time to spend in Gallopoli, though that wish vanished when their train pulled into the Ponyville station and he saw his family and friends lined up on the platform.
They were subjected to an enthusiastic greeting as Larksong leapt happily into Dawn's arms before quickly transferring her affections to Scootaloo.  Rarity intercepted Coco and Perlin, already trying to grill them for the details of what they had done on their vacation, if the flushed looks on the two lovers' faces was any indication.  Naturally, Pinkie Pie proposed a Welcome Back Party, though Dawn and the others were quick to dissuade her.
As they traded greetings with their friends and family, Dawn looked over at Scootaloo, who looked back at him.  Their eyes met and Dawn sent a gentle breeze to caress Scootaloo's back.  She returned the gesture and the two of them traded fond smiles before turning their full attention back to the others.  Be it ever so jumbled, thought Dawn as he observed more of Pinkie's antics, there's no place like home.