Chapter 10
Chapter 10
The guns sailed into the pond, and that went according to plan. Rainbow’s hooves connected with the Feldwebel’s chin and knocked him on his back, and that too was according to plan. What was not according to plan were the three goats that suddenly leapt out of the bushes behind the collapsing Feldwebel, nor the two more that stepped out into the open from behind some big trees, pointing their submachine guns at Rainbow Dash. One of them yelled, “Freeze, or vee vill shoot you!”
Rainbow hesitated for a moment and took in the situation. Twilight’s breath caught as she feared the aggressive pegasus would attack regardless and get shot, but luckily she decided to step down.
“Get on ze ground, put your vings behind your head”, one of the newcomers harshly ordered. Rainbow Dash obeyed while the other goats moved in closer, on full alert, guns pointed at her. The one goat who had joined the group before the attack wiped the camouflage paint off his face and turned to Rainbow Dash.
“Hornmeyer!” she cried in surprise. Twilight took in a sharp breath as she as well recognized the Hauptmann. He’d set them up! And he had Rainbow Dash!
“Vell, vell, Fräulein Do”, he said with a triumphant smirk, loud enough so that Twilight could hear him from her position where she still lay in hiding. “It is my pleasure to meet you again. Especially under zeese circumstances.” He began pacing in front of her. “You have been, how do you say, a major pain in ze flank. But I guess your days of interfering viz the great Goat Empire have finally come to an end!”
“So you’re gonna kill me?” Rainbow spat. “I’m not afraid of you!” Twilight’s eyes filled with tears at her friend’s courage, or was it fear of losing her? She couldn’t tell.
“Maybe later. But I sink for ze next ten or tventy years you vill be a good vorker on one of zee Empire’s rock farms. Vee vill take you viz us!” He laughed cruelly. Twilight started sobbing silently at the prospect of the proud pegasus being held in a forced labor camp.
The Hauptmann turned towards Twilight’s general direction. “And you, Fräulein Assistentin! Do you vant to come out now, or do you vant us to come get you? You vill not like it venn vee get you, zat much I can promise.”
Suddenly, she heard Rainbow’s voice in her head. “You gotta get outta here, Twi. I’m gonna distract them, but you gotta run as fast as you can!”
“No! I won’t leave you!”
“You gotta! I’m counting on you to get me out of here!”
“But you’re much better at this than I am. Let me distract them, and you get away. I can still drop that branch and –“ Twilight blabbered.
“I am getting impatient!” Hornmeyer called out. “I von’t vait forever! Reveal yourself now!”
“Twi, listen! Are you listening? They want me, not you”, Rainbow hastily explained. “They won’t shoot me, no matter what this loudmouth says, they wanna bring me to their empire and lock me up or something. But they don’t give a horse apple about you; they have no reason to keep you alive! I can’t let them get you! I won’t let them hurt you, understand? Now, on the count of three – “
“Rainbow, I – “ Twilight had no idea how to continue.
“I know, Twi.” And then, instead of words, she sent Twilight an emotion: the feeling of their first kiss. Suddenly Twilight could feel the excited happiness Rainbow Dash had felt when they had kissed; she could feel the strong affection she felt for her, and her unwavering desire to keep the unicorn safe. “One – two – three!”
Tears running down her cheeks freely, Twilight watched as Rainbow suddenly launched herself at the Hauptmann who was still scanning the jungle, his back turned towards the captured pegasus. She managed to hit him in the back of his head and make him stumble before the other goat soldiers launched themselves on her and knocked her out. Twilight threw herself around and started running into the jungle. Two shots were fired after her but went high into the trees.
Sobbing, sniffing, her vision blurred by her tears, her heart heavy, she ran through the jungle, the only thing on her mind the face of the courageous, loyal pegasus. She ran for what felt like an eternity, until she finally collapsed under a shrub, not able to carry on, her worries about the pegasus too heavy, and cried.
Rainbow Dash…
Eventually Twilight’s tears dried up, and a fierce determination took hold of her. Rainbow Dash was counting on her to get her out of the hooves of the goats. She picked herself up and started retracing her own steps. Soon she reached the little pond where the goats had captured Rainbow. She carefully sneaked closer, but the goats were gone. She quickly peeked into the pond, and seeing the goats’ guns in the clear water caused her a grim satisfaction. Next to the bank of the pond she found an alpaca spear, probably the one Rainbow had taken from the village the night before.
She tried to contact Rainbow telepathically, but got no response. She told herself that Rainbow Dash was unconscious after having been knocked out by the goats, but she had to put some effort in suppressing her fears about the cyan pegasus. Sighing, she followed the traces of the goats. It was easy enough now, since they were quite a big group.
When she left the clearing, she suddenly heard the war cries of the tribal alpacas again from somewhere behind her. It might just have been the general state of anxiety she had fallen into after Rainbow being captured, but they sounded much closer than she would have expected. Far too close for her comfort at least. She decided to not walk directly on the trail the goats had left, as she figured it might be too easy for the alpacas to find her, and instead pushed through the jungle on the right side of the trail, close enough to not lose it and hopefully far enough so she wouldn’t run into any tribal warriors.
Twilight estimated that her flight and little breakdown had provided Hornmeyer with a margin of no more than half an hour, and that they would reach the goats’ base at the banks or the Rio Moreno in no more than three hours. She’d probably not catch up with them before they reached the camp, so she had to free Rainbow Dash from there. While she walked through the by now loathsome endless green of the jungle, her mind set to work to come up with a plan of attack.
It didn’t help that she was thoroughly fed up with the jungle, a fact that was only made worse by her now having to face the walls of plants all by herself. It had been much less of a strain when she trotted on side by side with Rainbow, chatting, simply not being alone. And of course it had been a thousand times better when they had been walking with their tails entwined, shooting shy smiles at each other every now and then.
She had to fight back fresh tears. She missed the cyan pegasus horribly. Even though no more than an hour had passed since they had been separated, she missed her encouraging presence around her, and even though they had only been on this trip for a little more than two days, she found it hard to remember what it was like being without the pegasus. Well, judging from how she felt now, probably not too great.
Wiping her nose with a hoof she continued on, brooding over how to free Rainbow. She would have to be stealthy, as there was no way she could take on all those goats in combat, and that was even before she counted in their guns. After all, there were alone ten goats now escorting Rainbow Dash to the base.
Oh, and Manehattan Silver, the traitorous jerk who had gotten them into all of this! Without even noticing, Twilight let out a small growl at the thought of the brown stallion.
She passed by some banana plants and picked one of the fruits. Trotting on, she ate the banana, sadly thinking back to the fruits she had shared with Rainbow Dash. Again some tears were trying to flow from her eyes, and she let them. It was only just to cry a little about Rainbow being held captive, she assumed.
Without any conscious effort, her thoughts turned back to the kiss they had shared only moments before everything had gone so terribly wrong. To her big surprise, the memory made her smile and even caused the butterflies in her tummy to reappear. Once more she relived the sensation of Rainbow’s lips on her own, this time enhanced by the emotion the pegasus had shared with her before she’d run away. The amount of Rainbow’s love she’d felt back then was heartwarming and gave her strength and confidence for her upcoming task.
Twilight suddenly realized that the war cries of the tribal alpacas had ceased, and potentially some time back while she’d been pondering over the goats and her feelings for Rainbow Dash. She had absentmindedly meandered back onto the goats’ trail. Before she could so much as think 'It is too quiet', with a dull thunk!, a spear impacted in a tree trunk nearby, and an alpaca warrior jumped in her way. Twilight let out a terrified shriek as the alpaca came charging at her, his spear raised.
For a second the shock had her paralyzed. It wasn’t the first time she got into a fight today, but with all her emotional turmoil over Rainbow Dash being captured, she needed to consciously pull herself together to be able to move. With an exasperated groan she grabbed the alpaca’s spear with her magic and pulled it out of his hoof, levitating it towards her and turning it around. The alpaca, now unarmed, came to a halt and looked at her uneasily.
Another alpaca broke out of the underwood, aiming a blowpipe at Twilight. Without even thinking, she extended her magic reach to his weapon and just snapped it in half. But the first alpaca used her short distraction to start charging at her again. Before Twilight could react, he had already taken hold of the still floating spear and tried to wrestle it away from her magic grip. She concentrated harder on the telekinesis spell, trying to keep control of the weapon, when she realized that the other alpaca was charging at her, also armed with a spear.
With the second alpaca charging at her, she only had a moment to deal with the one wrestling with her over the other spear. Unfortunately, her – Rosetta’s – magic was so weak that a determined pony or alpaca had reasonable chances to keep hold of an item despite the magic pull. Thus Twilight, without warning, stopped pulling on the spear and just pushed it into the same direction the alpaca was pulling it in. Surprised by the sudden lack of resistance, the alpaca lost hold of the spear, and the blunt end hit him in the face, knocking him over.
Twilight jumped to the left to evade the other attacker, but her timing was off, and the alpaca hit her with the shaft of his spear, causing her to topple over. As she tried to get to her hooves again, the alpaca jumped on her, trying to impale her with the spear. Twilight managed to roll away, but the spear that had been aimed for her throat still nicked the skin of her front leg, sending a sharp hot pain through her body. She shrieked, more in surprise than in actual pain, and instinctively took the spear in her magic and flung it into the jungle in a high ballistic arch.
The alpaca was still above her, now trying to hit her with his front hooves. Twilight managed to deflect the first two, but the third hit her on the temple, and for a moment she saw stars. It was clear to her that the alpaca was a far more experienced fighter than she was. In panic, she grabbed the alpaca in her magic. Rosetta was far too weak to fling him away like the spear – which had been her initial plan –, but at least she could slowly float him out of punching distance. She turned around and bucked him with all the force she could muster before she let him collapse on the ground.
Afraid there might be more attackers she looked around, but for the moment she was alone. Deciding that the jungle was way too dangerous to be out and about unarmed, she took the remaining spear and started running into the jungle, now some meters off the goats’ trail again. Her injured leg hurt, and she would have to do something about the bleeding soon, but for now she really needed to get away from here before more alpacas showed up.
She walked for ten minutes until she allowed herself some rest to check up on her leg. The cut was along the outside of the upper thigh, luckily not very deep, but it was still bleeding a bit, and it hurt enough to hinder her walking. She looked around and found some huge leaves that she wrapped around the cut using her magic, fixing them with her trusty hairpin. The vivid memory of Rainbow Dash pulling it out of her hair back in the alpacas’ village made her well up again, but she swallowed down the tears. Now was not the time to feel sorry for herself. Rainbow needed her!
Gritting her teeth, she continued on, now paying more attention to potential attackers, but the jungle remained comparatively quiet.
***
Her estimations proved correct, as around three hours later she reached the goat camp. It was easily visible from afar, the trees plastered with the black-white-red flags of the Empire, and part of the jungle had been cleared around the camp. Her leg was still hurting, but the bleeding had stopped, and that was at least something.
The camp itself was located directly at the banks of the river. It was a wide open area with a handful of primitive huts, surrounded by a wooden fence, and a wooden pier floating in the river. A small river boat and a water plane were tied up at the pier. The only gate that allowed entrance inside the wood was even guarded by a small watchtower. Twilight could easily see the goat standing guard on that tower.
Twilight took position behind a large tree trunk about a hundred meters away from the fence – close enough to keep her eyes on the installation, but not close enough to be in actual danger of being found by the goat guards. The sun slowly set over the river, painting the sky in magnificent hues of orange and pink.
Suddenly, she heard Rainbow’s voice in her head again. “Twilight? You out there?”
“Rainbow Dash!” She almost started crying again, now out of joy to hear Rainbow’s voice again. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. They got me locked up in a boat. Where are you?”
“I’m outside their camp. I can see the boat.” She resisted the urge to wave.
“Great! Now listen, they said they’re gonna transport me tomorrow morning, so you have all night. I can see some stuff through the porthole. You see the hut next to the banks, a little away from the pier, with the porch? That’s where Manehattan Silver is staying.
Now, I can see a guard patrolling around the huts, and one guy is sitting on the pier. There’s one more on the boat, I guess on the deck.”
“Rainbow, that’s great, but – are you alright? Do they treat you well? Did they – “ The questions bubbled out of Twilight.
“Twi, relax”, Rainbow good-naturedly admonished her. Twilight could almost see her lopsided smile. “I’m okay. But I’m counting on you to get me outta here. Can you do that?”
“Y-yes, of course! Let me think about it.” She desperately tried to clear her thoughts. All she seemed to be able to think about was that Rainbow Dash was alright. She forced herself to focus on the positions of the guards, and the layout of the camp. Her mind, ruthlessly efficient and rational, began to set in motion, and the first rough sketch of a plan took shape. “Okay, I think I have a plan. I will start in a couple of hours, after midnight. You have to be awake then.”
“No problemo.”
“Erm, Rainbow? Can I ask you something?”
“Yeah?”
“How can you stay so calm?”
The pegasus audibly smiled as she replied, “Rainbow Dash is way too cool to lose her cool”, she stated with mock arrogance, before she added more seriously, “but mostly because I trust you, Twilight.”
Filled with a weird mix of emotions, of missing Rainbow Dash, of being worried about her, of being indescribably happy about the trust she placed in her, Twilight trotted back into the jungle. She had some preparations to take care of before she started her rescue operation.
When she was out of sight, she returned to the river banks in a wide curve so that the goats wouldn’t see her, now downstream of the camp. Several patches of reeds grew along her side of the river. The water of the river was still, and no crocodiles were visible.
Taking cover between the reeds, she sneaked up to the goats’ camp again, careful to remain unseen. She made it to the edge of the cleared area around the camp, now with a much better view at the pier, the boat, and the plane.
The pier was a simple construction, not much more than some planks nailed to a few barrels that kept the pier afloat. She saw the guard Rainbow had mentioned dozing on a chair in the middle of the pier, gun leaned against a crate next to him. On the crate there was also a lantern.
The plane was fixed to the near side of the pier, the boat on the opposite side, so she couldn’t see it too closely. For now she just had to assume the guard was somewhere on deck. The plane itself was of goat origin – since there were no winged goats, they had come up with other means of flying, and the Goat Empire’s aeronautic industry was one of the most sophisticated in the world. The plane had one engine and was probably big enough for about a dozen passengers. It was completely deserted.
On the banks where the pier was tied in place, there was another pile of crates. Between that spot and the huts where Manehattan Silver had taken residence stood two other huts; one would probably have to sneak through the passageway between them. Manehattan Silver’s house, on the other hoof, partially blocked sight to the gate and the guard tower.
Lights were on in the Manehattan Silver’s hut and the two huts between it and the pier, and also behind some windows of the boat. The other three huts were dark. Hopefully there weren’t many more goats in the camp than Twilight already knew. With a satisfied nod Twilight sneaked back through the reeds. It looked like her plan was likely going to work.
She found a nearby bush with big leaves and curled up underneath it. After a whole day of hiking and fighting she was completely exhausted physically, and worrying about Rainbow Dash had worn her out emotionally. She needed a rest. And she wasn’t going to take action before it was late at night anyway.
Rainbow’s face on her mind, her injured leg throbbing, she fell into a deep slumber.
Stats
Page generated in 0.041 seconds
Total duration
975 users online
2,293,519 hits today, 2,561,572 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
You're savior, i was soo bored
how many chapters there are approximately left
?
2855707
Three more chapters. We're almost there!
2855716
Mostly because I'm a horrible person... :D
2855748 Okay LOL
2855748
YAY
This story is ridiculous in all the right ways.
2856698 agreed.
I am enjoying the premise of the story thus far, however the later chapters seem to be of a lower quality than the earlier ones. Some of the word choice is awkward or poor at times. I am assuming that at this point you are in a rush to finish before the contest deadline.
This seems so COOl!!!
I can't wait to read it all!!!
This is extremely well done. I enjoyed the twist of "Rosetta" having to rescue "Daring"; clearly that was what Dash had in mind in saying that Twilight would not see Rosetta as just a sidekick in this story.
2856698 2857051 2857252 2857408 2858143
Thank you guys
2857345
As much as it pains me I can't really disagree. The first chapters have simply been around for much longer and have been re-read and re-written a gazillion times, but the later chapters are just too new for this. I'll take it as a lesson for future stories that chapters need more time to mature.
A little rough in spots, but overall, I'm definitely enjoying this. It's just the right mix of sweet, silly, and swashbuckling.
2859618
Thanks
2860195
)
Thanks, that's right what I was aiming for (except for the roughness
2860630 2860775
Thanks for the keen eye, fixed it
2858445
Hopefully the ending will clear up a thing or two 
Hah, I wanted to reply something deep and clever and thoughtful, but instead ended up wondering about the inner workings of my own story. Well done
Where is chapters 11,12,and13
2862272 2862371
Thank you, fixed it
The Epicnesh iz @ 100%!
Hm, two things I wonder about:
1) Isn't this kinda like brainwashing? I mean Twi didn't liked DoxRosetta nor could see herself in a relationship with Dash before entering this dream machine, yet the fic story, cause it was written this way, changed all that in a matter of minutes.
2)Isn't it kinda cheating that Twi and Dash can talk telepathical? I really doubt Dash wrote the story in a way that Dash and Rosetta can read/hear each others thoughts.^^
I dunno, I think I would have liked it more if Twi and Dash couldn't talk this way and "bloom" into their roles aka become Rosetta and Do with the changes compared to their true selfs, as in Do being more scholar than Dash and Rosetta being less powerful/magical varianty rich than Twi. Lik they stop adressing each other with Rainbow and Twi over time and call each other with their role names, actually living, behaving and thinking just like them. And thus Twi would come to understand at the end of the fic so much better why Dash likes Do with Rosetta cause she WAS Rosetta and felt exactly like her. So it feels more like Twi and Dash in costumes, cosplaying as Do and Rosetta but not behaving like them but acting like their real selfes.
I'm not saying that's bad, i like it else I wouldn't read it, but I think it would had a greater impact and carry far more tension if Twi and Dash couldn't talk with each other and if they would "be" Daring Do and Rosetta Sparkle and not Twi and Dash looking through their eyes in first-person TV watching.
Heh, Dash is going full Mareison Ford.
So far I really like the fic, but I do have one small gripe. You seem to be suffering from a pretty severe case of Lavender Unicorn Syndrome, or in your particular case, Cyan Pegasus Syndrome. There are a lot of ways you can refer to Rainbow Dash, try experimenting with them, particularly in short stretches. During Twilight's breakdown scene I believe you used "cyan pegasus" to refer to Dash 3 times in as many paragraphs. Since this is an older fic and unlikely to be edited, just something to be cognizant about in the future. Good stuff!