• Published 22nd Feb 2015
  • 1,487 Views, 82 Comments

Lessons in quirks - Mike84



When a student from Fillydelphia appears in Ponyville to continue his studies on the field of cutie marks there at the recommendation of Princess Celestia, Twilight Sparkle and her friends are in for another adventure.

  • ...
5
 82
 1,487

PreviousChapters Next
Chapter LIV

Rainbow Dash didn't stay on the ground after she entered the town hall. Not only would she be faster if she flew rather than climbed up the stairs, but also she wouldn't make as much noise to alarm... whatever was there.
"It wants to kill him!" Pinkie Pie had shouted and there had been no time for any explanations. But in spite of all the urgency, Rainbow Dash couldn't help thinking that it would be nice to have any clue at all whom Pinkie had meant. The royal guard they had been talking about when her sudden realization had struck? Rainbow Dash listened closely for any sounds from above, but there was utter and complete silence. Maybe Pinkie Pie's warning had been just in time for Twilight and her to show up here before... whatever else did.

She landed at the foot of the stairs that led up to the storeroom in which Frank was locked up, when suddenly she spotted something from the corner of her eyes that caught her attention. The door to Featherscribe's office stood open and bright moonlight fell through its window. And there in the moonlight... Rainbow Dash's heart skipped a beat ...there he lay. Featherscribe lay half concealed by his desk in an oddly twisted position. One wing outstretched, the other folded, his tongue was lolling and Rainbow Dash had to think of a marionette whose strings had been cut. Fighting an urge to scream and a sudden feeling of nausea, she bowed down and for her boundless relief noticed that Featherscribe was breathing. She poked him with one hoof but was not surprised that he didn't wake up or react to her lifting one of his eyelids. This was just like Inkhorn and Rainbow Dash realized that the suspicion against Featherscribe had lost its basis and that she was more than ever at a loss about who was left to be behind everything that had happened. It occurred to her that whoever had attacked Featherscribe was likely to be still around, possibly watching her right now and she braced herself for any sudden assault. She listened closely and cast a look in every direction. But there was nothing to be heard or seen. The silence was eerie, unnatural almost. And where was Twilight? Wouldn't she have reached the office floor by now or at least be heard upstairs?

Suddenly there was a sound of breaking glass somewhere outside. She pricked up her ears and the next moment a bang, deafening after the intense silence, gave her a surge of adrenalin and made her whirl around towards the center of the building from where the noise had come. There was another bang and also the sound of splintering wood. Rainbow Dash rushed to the office door. There was the banging noise again and she saw a part of the hatch to the upper floor break loose and the hatch was opened. A figure rushed down the stairs in such a hurry that he tripped and almost toppled over. He was looking neither left nor right, but just rushed on for the next stairs, not taking any notice of Rainbow Dash at all. Had it not been for the bizarre hat sitting askew on the head of the figure, she might not have been able to recognize Frank Blanket at all.

"Breaking out after all?" Rainbow Dash wondered, but for the moment her main concern was about Twilight. She'd be able to catch up with Frank after checking out the upper floor. As she made for the stairs leading up, she noticed the strong stench of scorching and she saw the wisps of smoke drifting through the scarce rays of moonlight that fell into the storeroom.
The room looked as if it had been hit by a bomb. Trashed up furniture, a smashed shelf, the stairs leading up to the cupola blasted apart, a hole in the bell roof, a broken window and the entire floor was scattered with downs, papers, folders and books. Some of the books looked torn apart and scorched and Rainbow Dash was sure the sight would have given Twilight a screaming fit. Not even Derpy could have caused such havoc by accident and Rainbow Dash understood that she was seeing the scene of a fight.

"Twilight?" she called. "Twilight, are you here?"
There was no response and Rainbow Dash hastily strode through the room, dreading the prospect of the drifting smoke revealing Twilight lying on the ground much like Featherscribe did one floor below. But all she found were the badly battered remnants of Frank Blankets saddle-bags. The colt certainly had some answers on what had happened here and what he was running away from. With a grim look, Rainbow Dash rushed for the broken hatch and spread her wings as she dived down headlong.

Running as fast as he could, Frank Blanket crossed the town square, thinking angry thoughts. He needed to be furious and not just to overcome his fear. Here he was, in hot pursuit of the selfsame fiend he had wished himself away from just moments ago. He had escaped with his life only by a combination of utterly inexplicable luck and the timely arrival of Twilight, who was now facing an enemy she didn't know, and not knowing how her own disposition could work against her. He headed on into a deserted alley when suddenly a group of ponies appeared round a corner ahead, rushing towards him. Frank stopped dead in his tracks and cast a hasty look to both sides. There were no side alleys to avoid the arrivals and in spite of the darkness he knew immediately who they were. The outlines of a stetson on one of the ponies' heads was as unmistakable as the outlines of his own hat probably were to Applejack and the others. Frank heard a sudden sound of hooves right behind him. He cast his head around and recoiled a little as he spotted a black smeared pegasus he might not have recognized in the dark, but for the rainbow colored streaks of mane shining through between what appeared to be soot.

"Rainbow... don't sneak upon me like that!" he shouted.
"Frank Blanket!" Applejack called as she came closer, followed by Rarity and Pinkie Pie. "What are you doing out here?"
Frank gritted his teeth. With what he thought had to be done, it would have been a lot easier if he had remained by himself, but he saw no way in the world he could expect them not to come along. At the same time he couldn't and wouldn't tell them everything, for their sake and for his own, but he couldn't allow for them to turn him from the disposition he was trying to get into and to maintain for the time being.

"There's no time for talking here", Frank said firmly and set in motion to step past Applejack and the others to continue his rush down the alley.
"Hold it!" Applejack shouted, jumping into Frank's way. "You got some 'splainin' to do, Mr. Blanket!"
"On the way!" Frank insisted as he tried to get past Applejack. "The princess is in danger and there's no time to waste!"
"Twilight!" Rarity shouted. "Mr. Blanket... Frank... what happened to her?"
"Featherscribe needs help too!" Rainbow Dash interjected. "He's lying in the town hall like Inkhorn did! Scoots, is Zecora still with Inkhorn? Get her to the town hall immediately!"

Frank hadn't noticed the Cutie Mark Crusaders in the darkness, but there they were in the wake of their elder sisters and Pinkie Pie. Scootaloo nodded to Rainbow Dash's order and sped back down the alley with her Scooter.
Frank used the little distraction to get past Applejack and hurry on down the alley at so fast a trot it was only just slow enough not to be mistaken by the others as him running from them. The others rushed after him and by the looks of it, Applejack seemed quite ready to wrestle Frank down if necessary. Rainbow Dash overtook them all and flapped beside Frank.

"Now wait a moment... I mean... go on, but tell us what's going on! What happened up there in the town hall? The place looked like the Wonderbolts had held their tornado practice in there!"
"The one who is behind all this came up there", Frank said matter-of-factly, keeping his look fixed on the way ahead almost as if he was talking to himself.
"Wanted to kill me. Would have, but for the princess showing up just at the right time."
"My goodness!" Rarity gasped.
"And who is that?" Applejack called.
"Hmm... more like what is that. Up there it looked like a member of Princess Luna's royal guard."
"Are you okay?" Pinkie called as she caught up. "I knew it wanted to kill you."
"You knew? But how?" Frank asked surprised.
"Her Pinkie Sense", Rainbow Dash said. "That's why Twilight and I came to the town hall and why Pinkie got the others."
"It was a very unfunny epicfunny, Frankie!" Pinkie Pie said with a tone in which her disturbance about the experience resonated.

Frank understood that but for this 'epicfunny' of Pinkie Pie he would probably be dead now and he would have liked to give her a hug for it, but he couldn't allow himself that, not while, unless he was utterly mistaken, a lot depended on him not getting dissuaded. These ponies made it everything but easy not to get dissuaded.
"Are you alright?" Rarity asked the same question Frank had dodged when Pinkie had asked.
"Are these... burns?" she pointed at some scorch marks with her horn.
"It is okay. It is not much", Frank assured her. Indeed, he was surprised he barely noticed anything from his earlier suffocating of the fire on his saddle-bag with his own body.

"Now what about Twilight?" Applejack demanded to know. "Where is she? What happened to her?"
"She was pursuing the attacker last time I saw her. The attacker flew away and she went right after."
"You just let her go after that attacker alone?" Applejack bristled.
"I'm not so good at flying!" Frank snarled. It was really unfair, but it was just what he needed right now.
"I tried to call her back, but she didn't even hear me. The attacker had cast a sound-barrier spell."
"So that's why I didn't hear anything at all?" Rainbow Dash asked.
Frank nodded. "If you were there. I didn't even see you back in the town hall."
"You were just rushing out, looking nowhere. You were gone before I could even say anything."
The colt didn't say anything in response and a frown appeared on Rainbow Dash's face.
"So you were running after Twilight and the attacker, right?" she asked. "That's where we are running now, right?"
"Right", Frank confirmed.

Golden Oak Library had by now come within sight and as they approached, they saw Spike who was standing at the door and ran to meet them as soon as he spotted them, a small pouch dangling from his shoulder. They could tell he was counting them as he came closer.
"Where's Twilight?" he called.
"Seems she flew in the direction we're running in", Applejack said. "Pursuing... who exactly?"
Applejack had called out the last words for Frank to hear, but the colt was just running on.
"Oh for...", Applejack suppressed a course.

"I think I saw her", Spike said. "I wasn't sure, but I saw two shapes passing by in the sky. I couldn't tell for sure it was her, but there were some flashes... like magic spells cast."
"Which way did they fly?" Applejack asked and Spike pointed in the same direction in which Frank was already running ahead; the direction that would lead them past Fluttershy's cottage to Everfree Forest. The group set in motion again and Spike was desperately trying to keep up until Rarity took mercy upon him and levitated him onto her back, even though she was struggling herself to keep up with Applejack and Rainbow Dash, who in turn were in hot pursuit of Frank. The colt was by now no longer keeping back but ran as fast as he could. Without the load of his saddle-bags on his back, Frank turned out to be a runner who would make for a decent competitor in the running of the leaves, but right now they were not running for a harmless competition.

Rainbow Dash spread her wings to take off and close up to Frank, but Applejack hissed a quiet, "Wait Rainbow", between two steps.
"What is it, AJ?" Rainbow Dash asked.
Applejack cast a brief look at Frank and slowed down her pace a little as if to deliberately increase the distance to him. The colt was wearing his hat, but Applejack hoped that the hearing improving effect of the twisted brim caught mostly sounds from ahead of him. She cast a look back. Pinkie Pie and Rarity with Spike on her back were some distance behind and even further back were Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. Applejack frowned slightly. In all the chaos she had totally forgotten about the two fillies who should definitely not be part of this chase and decided that she would very strictly order them to stay at Fluttershy's cottage when they passed by there.

"What is it?" Rainbow asked again.
"Doesn't Mr. Blanket seem... different to you?" Applejack whispered while she was still running on.
Rainbow Dash didn't answer immediately, though she too had noticed something.
"No time for talking, you mean?"
"It's not just that. He's... grimmer than he was."
"Perhaps Frank is being touchy about the whole hearing and somepony trying to murder him?" Rainbow Dash suggested, but she didn't sound very convinced.
"We've seen some ponies acting strange lately and as far as we can tell they had somehow been under the influence of that attacker about whom Mr. Blanket doesn't want to talk."
"What are you saying?" Rainbow Dash asked, knowing exactly what Applejack was saying but still wanting for the cards to be put on the table.
"Just thinking that maybe it is not really Mr. Blanket we are following right now and that perhaps it would be a good idea to make certain about that before following him into Everfree Forest of all places!"
"But Spike says he saw Twilight flying that way. She may need help! We got to hurry!"
"Let's hurry up to make certain then!" Applejack said and accelerated her pace again.
Rainbow Dash had rather mixed feelings about this, but she swung up into the air and prepared to overtake the colt who was just crossing the little bridge near Fluttershy's cottage.

Suddenly Frank uttered a little scream and as they looked, they saw a dark figure swooping down in front of him. A large pony clad in the armor of Princess Luna's royal guard. Rainbow Dash darted forward past Frank and pounced upon the dark figure. She sent the guard staggering backwards and he uttered a surprised call. Rainbow Dash heard the hoofbeats of Frank and the others drawing closer as she tried to wrestle the guard to the ground. The guard however was not tackled down easily. Rainbow heard some shouts from the others and the next moment she felt that she was grabbed from behind. She cast her head around and stared right into the metal-masked face of yet another royal guard.
"Another one?" she thought aghast as she struggled to break free.
"STOP THOU HOTSPUR FOOL! WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?"
The booming voice made everypony freeze in motion except for casting their looks into the direction from where it had come.

From the pool of light provided by the bright moon in the clear dark night sky descended a figure larger than any of the ponies below or either of the additional royal guards in her wake.
With an imposing bristling and a resounding clanking of metal horseshoes and greaves, Princess Luna of the Night landed next to her guards, Rainbow Dash and Frank. Her fierce look flashing from underneath the helmet she was wearing left no doubt that she was not in a joking mood.

Author's Note:

Last edited on December 17th 2015.

PreviousChapters Next