Saligia

by Firebrand

Superbia I - A Proud Look

Rainbow Dash leaned to one side, stretching her wing as she sat nervously in the locker room. She was surrounded on all sides by her five closest friends, who were taking turns at reaffirming her as she hesitantly prepared for the upcoming race.

"Don't worry so much, Rainbow." said Applejack, slapping her hoof playfully against the pegasus' shoulder. "You got this."

"Yeah!" piped Pinkie Pie. "Dashie's the raciest fasthorse I know! There's no way she could lose!"

"Um, Pinkie…" began Twilight. "I don't think that word means what you think it means."

"Which word? 'Yeah?' That's hardly a word," the pink horse began, dissecting her previously-spoken sentence word-by-word as Twilight planted her face into her hoof. " 'Dashie' is just Dashie's name. 'The' is pretty self-explanatory—"

"I think we'll just be going now, darling." said Rarity, dragging Pinkie Pie towards the door as she continued to ramble inanely (" 'Fasthorse' is a word I made up. It means a horse that's fast!"), and the other three ponies followed suit, each issuing their respective wishes of good luck, leaving Rainbow Dash alone in the locker room with a dozen ponies she'd never met before, all just as athletic and, surely, loadss more confident than she.

"Those your friends?" asked the contestant next to her, a light grey mare with a short, pale red mane and golden eyes; her cutie mark was a pair of silver wings with bolts of electricity arcing between them. "Quite a bunch."

"Y-yeah, we—" Dash stammered, only to be cut off as an official called into the room:

"Five minutes! Everypony, to the gates!"

With this, the dozen-or-so ponies in the locker room began shuffling towards the exit which led onto the track, and forming a clumsy line before the door. An official was posted on the other side, with a stack of numbered cards, each with a name one it. The first pony in line, a light blue stallion, gave his name to the official and was handed his number card, and then the line began moving quickly. Rainbow Dash was directly behind the grey mare whose locker was next to hers, near the end of the line.

"Name?" asked the official.

"Mercury." said the grey mare, who was then presented a white card with a large, black "7" on it before marching off confidently to the starting line.

"Name?" asked the official again, clearly not to happy with his job.

"Rainbow Dash."

The official shuffled through the stack of cards, and then produced one stamped with her name and a large, black "6."

"Name?" he said again, asking the next pony in line before the Dash's sign had even left his hands.

Dash stepped through the door and towards the starting line. Fifteen small cages, numbered in sequence, were lined up there, and about half of these currently held ponies. Just ahead of her, Mercury stopped and turned into the cage next to her, numbered "7." Rainbow Dash entered her own cage, and the two turned and nodded at each other.

"You're Rainbow Dash, right?" asked the grey mare. "I've heard about you."

"You have?" Rainbow Dash smirked. "Then you must know that I'm gonna be winning today."

"Yeah, probably." Mercury chuckled awkwardly. "Either way, second place is all right."

"Oh really? Got a lot of confidence, do ya?"

"Well, I am pretty damn fast."

Rainbow Dash smirked, and then the two stood in silence as the last few racers moved into position.

"Ready?" called a voice from over an electronic speaker system, and the audience fell silent.

The caged ponies all dropped low and spread their wings, winding up to pounce at the announcer's call. This was the Ponyville Final, an important race. The first five placers would be qualified to compete in the Equestria Races, a prestigious country-wide tournament with the winners of other local tournaments, and the winner of that got an opportunity to meet Princess Celestia herself.

This was the first year that Ponyville had been included in the Races, and so the turnout was massive: the entire town, at the very least. Many ponies had come from out of town just to see the race.

Several thousand ponies now sat on a several massive sets of bleachers in near-silence (as silent as that large a group can be), watching the cages at the starting line.

"Set?"

The fronts of the cages opened, and the pegasi all shifted their weight, preparing to take off.

Meeting Princess Celestia wasn't that big of a deal; not to Rainbow Dash, at least, being an Element of Harmony and all. Dash's motivation was the fact that the Wonderbolts used the Equestria Races as a major recruitment pool. If she got in—and especially if she won—then she was a shoe-in for the Wonderbolts!

A unicorn referee standing next to the starting line produced a small pistol, levitating it above his head and pointing it upwards before putting his hooves over his ears.

"Go!"

A gunshot shattered the silence, and thousands of ponies began screaming as the pegasi all shot forwards and upwards, darting towards the first waypoint. The sky, otherwise perfectly clear, was dotted with ring-shaped clouds, through which the racers had to pass in a specific order before landing at the finish line.

Dash pulled ahead quickly, but Mercury slowly caught up to her, trailing behind by only a couple of feet. Their contrails—one rainbow, and one dull red—blurred together as the distance in between them closed. By the time they were reached the first ring, the two were already significantly ahead of the other racers.

"Not too bad!" Rainbow Dash called back as the pair sharply redirected towards the second gate. "You done this before?"

"Tons!" Mercury shouted back. "I race all the time!"

"Then how come I ain't seen ya on the track before?"

"I've never done a big race before. My friends entered me and I..." she trailed off, her voice becoming too quite to be heard over the rushing air buffeting the pegasi.

"I see." said Dash, nodding before turning her attention forward again and narrowing her eyes. "Anyway, see ya later! Good luck!"

"Wha—" Mercury was cut off by an explosive clap as Dash accelerated violently, leaving a brilliant chromatic corona blooming in her wake.

Dash rocketed away from the grey pegasus, passing through the second ring and altering her course slightly to align herself with the third.

Mercury, taken aback by Dash's sudden burst of speed, grimaced before redoubling her own efforts, passing through the second gate only seconds after Dash, who was already about halfway to the third gate. Mercury's ears were ringing and her eyes watering against the air currents blasting them, but she pressed on, straining her wings and slowly closing the distance to the blue mare.

Dash, barreling confidently towards the third mark, was caught completely off-guard when a sharp crack split the air, causing her to miss a beat and drop a couple hundred feet, passing well under the waypoint ring, before she regained composure.

She regained her lost altitude and began re-accelerating, barely reaching the ring before she was nearly winged by a ballistic red blur which zipped through the third gate and swung around to move towards the fourth.

"Hey!" she shouted indignantly. "I..." She smirked. "It is on."

Dash wound up briefly and launched into full-speed flight, pursuing the speeding red flash. She risked a look behind herself to ensure she hadn't lost too much of her lead, and was shocked to see Mercury's contrail flared outwards into a now-fading halo of red light, much like her own signature Sonic Rainboom. Dash gaped, and then shook her head and refocused ahead of her. The distance between them closed quickly, and Dash managed to catch up by the fourth gate.

"Not bad!" called Dash, trailing only a couple of feet behind Mercury as the pair passed through the fourth ring, barely fitting side-by-side. "You ever done that before?"

"Done what?" Mercury called back. Both pegasi were now flying almost straight up towards the fifth, penultimate gate, causing even harsher currents of air to rush past them, and making communication difficult. "The sonic boom? Only a couple of times."

"To be able to do that at all..." Dash mumbled, shaking her head and grinning.

Dash passed through the fifth gate first, but the two quickly returned to adjacent flying positions, one occasionally pulling ahead of the other only to be overtaken again. The sixth gate was below the fifth at about a forty-five degree angle, which meant that the flight to it was going to be one continuous dive. Dash spread her wings wide and angled them to cut through the air like blades, minimizing her air resistance, then entered the dive, with Mercury right beside her, her wings spread the same.

Both pegasi began shooting downwards, battling g-forces and acceleration in their controlled fall to the final ring. They each took turns pulling slightly ahead of one another, neck-in-neck in the final stretch, before Dash pulled ahead once again, this time propelled by a burst of speed brought about by the brilliant rainbow blast released from her contrail as she broke the sound barrier, knocking Mercury aside and causing her to briefly lose control before she, too, passed the sound barrier, releasing a dull red shockwave and quickly reaching terminal velocity only a couple hundred feet behind Dash.

There was nothing Mercury could do to increase her speed: if she spread her wings in order to flap them, the flow of supersonic air would catch them like a parachute and slow her down tremendously, if it didn't simply break them, and if she brought her wings closer to her body, she would lose any modicum of control she had at this juncture. She had already lost.

Dash passed through the sixth gate and touched down at the finish line, situated just below the final ring, skidding to a halt and turning to face Mercury, who trailed behind her by barely more than a second.

"Good race." said Dash, extending a hoof to the grey pegasus.

"You too." said Mercury, shaking Dash's hoof and nodding.

The third place winner—a mint-green stallion—touched down, followed in short order by the fourth and fifth, and then the remaining 7 racers poured in over the next minute, all of whom were in silent awe at the spectacular performance the two mares had put on.

---

---

"Wow-ee! You were amazing up there!" chirped Pinkie Pie, bouncing alongside Rainbow Dash, now walking away from the coliseum with her head held up high, her friends in tow and a shining gold medal hung around her neck. "I've never seen somepony go so fast, except for that other mare that was also there!"

"Yeah, she was alright." conceded Dash, pausing to shrug slightly before continuing her gallant, proud march back into town, no doubt fantasizing about what kinds of celebration was in store for her victory.

"Alright?" Applejack scoffed. "She was darn near good as you were!"

"Hey," Rainbow Dash shot back defensively, "You're here to support me. And besides, I won, she didn't, so..."

Dash trailed off as the mare in question came into view, walking in the same direction as them and surrounded by a group of three ponies, all commending Mercury on her performance.

"Really, Mercury, that was excellent!" said a tall, blond earth stallion, slapping his hoof on her shoulder rather hard. "Y'know, that chick is a legend, and you had her neck'n'neck the whole way."

"Yeah. It was..." said Mercury, walking slowly and looking down at her silver medal.

"You glad to have finally raced in the big leagues?"

"Well, I mean..." she mumbled, looking away from the stallion.

"Yeah, finally spread your wings, y'know? You got it in you, I know you do!"

"You could've totally beaten her, anyway." one of her other friends, a lanky orange unicorn mare, chimed in. "That was a low blow, what she did."

"Yeah!" cried the blond stallion. "Freakin' Supersonic Rainblast or whatever. What a load. Whaddaya think, Cree? Think you could take her in a fair race?"

"I don't know... maybe. I don't think it was really unfair, though, because—"

"Don't matter, 'nyways, who got first prize." chimed in the third friend, a short, thick, and androgynous lime-green pony. " 'cause you're nice, and she seems like a right cunt."

Rainbow Dash huffed at this, and picked up her pace, approaching Mercury's group and leaving her worried-looking friends behind.

"Yeah, what a bitch." said the second friend. "Why would she even want to compete in this? I'm sure if she wanted into the Equestria Races, they'd let her, just 'cause, y'know."

Mercury heard hoofsteps behind her, and, risking a quick glance, saw Rainbow Dash only about ten feet behind her small crew.

"Probably already a Wonderbolt, and just wants to show off to us mere mortals." said the first one, chuckling.

"Arrogant bitch." agreed the orange unicorn.

"Guys, stop, she's—" Mercury began to plead, only to be cut off by Rainbow Dash clearing her throat loudly, making Mercury and her friends all freeze in place and turn towards the rainbow pegasus.

"Something to say to me?" Dash asked, bellicose.

"Um! I—" Mercury swallowed hard.

"Yeah!" the blond one cried, stepping between Rainbow Dash and Mercury. "She wants a rematch."

Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow.

Mercury shrunk back a little. "I'm fine with second place, really, it's fine guys..."

"Nonsense!" said the orange unicorn. "You deserve that medal more than she does." She flung a hoof towards Rainbow Dash. "She probably has hundreds of them."

"C'mon!" said the stallion, prodding Mercury's side, making her flinch. "You can beat her and you know it."

"Guys..." Rainbow Dash said, bringing the hazing to an end as all three ponies harassing Mercury looked up at her. "You're embarrassing her."

She took a step forwards, and the blond stallion stood aside, clearing her path to Mercury, who took half a step back as Rainbow Dash advanced.

"You want a rematch?" Rainbow Dash leaned forward, menacingly. "Fine. Tomorrow, two o'clock, Sweet Apple Acres."

"Oh..." Mercury chuckled weakly. "Perfect..."

Rainbow Dash turned around and headed back towards her friends with her head held high.

"Cunt." said the lime-green pony.

Rainbow Dash did an immediate about-face and marched right up to the offending pony, who promptly squealed and attempted to flee, instead somehow tumbling hooves-over-head before landing on her—for the pony was, evidently, a mare—hooves and scurrying down an alleyway.

Dash turned to look at Mercury, before raising one hoof and pointing it at her own eyes, then Mercury's, then her own again.

I'm watching you.

Author's Note:

Mercury might seem like a very inconsistent character at this point, but just bear with me.
(and no it is not one of those mary-sue grimdark split-personality, get-out-of-jail-free card for bad character writing kind of things)