10 Days, 3 Adventures - Part 3 - "Cloudsdale Reunion"

by TP Night

Chapter 13 - ''Operation Storm Breaker'' (Part 1)

Rainbow landed next to Spitfire, who was monitoring the progress of a nearby
Weather pony group, currently bucking a row of rain clouds.

"All safe houses are intact, minus a broken window on one, but they patched it up,
sort of. At least as much as they could, using an old table." She said as her hooves
set down on the ground. "How are things here?"

"So far it's going relatively good. This group is, as you can see, taking care of
those rainers. All other groups are spread out around Cloudsdale to work the
clean-up from as many points as possible. Now, I have a new job for you.
I sent some ponies down to the ground, to fix a few things in the village.
They'll be back any minute now, and once they return, I want you to go with them
around Cloudsdale and give each group leader a little... gift."

"Sure, but what's the gift?"

"Radio headsets. So we can keep in contact."

"Awesome, but... I'm no tech expert, but doesn't electrical storms interfere
with radios and stuff? Will they work up here in this weather?" Rainbow asked,
with a thoughtful expression.

"Normally, the storms would interfere, yes. That's why I sent them down to the
village first. There are unicorns down there. They can put a anti-interference spell
on the headsets, making them 'immune' to the weather, so to speak.
Which in turn means, we can use them even in the storms."

"Awesome!" Rainbow smiled. "But while we wait, should I help kick a few clouds?
I mean, I can literally just fly straight up and start kicking."
Rainbow pointed a hoof upwards, to the literal ceiling of grey and black clouds.

"Sure, you might as well do that. I'll stay on the ground and keep watch from here.
Once you see ponies with boxes land here, you land too, Understood?"

"Understood!" Rainbow replied shortly, gave a quick salute,
and launched herself straight up with a jumping motion,
as she quickly unfolded and flapped her wings, gaining height
very fast. Within seconds, she reached roughly 30 meters above the ground cloud,
and looked around. Rain clouds in all directions. Dark grey, but no lightning.
Only rain, in large cold drops. Autumn rain clouds. Rainbow thought to herself
as she observed them. Most of these will take two kicks each to break...
Maybe even three kicks for the biggest ones.

She aimed, and started kicking the weak spots on the clouds, and just as she had
thought, they did take a couple of kicks before starting to dissolve and break apart.
She kicked a few more, but they seemed never-ending. For each clouds she kicked,
a new one moved closer instead.

At least I barely need to move... The clouds come to me! She thought, as she started
flying around in a small circle and kicking outwards around her.

She figured her circular motion would cause some inwards drag,
which would pull the nearby clouds closer, Kinda like a tornado.
Once every few seconds or so, she looked down to see
if anypony had arrived at Spitfires location with the headsets yet.
So far, she only saw Spitfire, so she kept circling and kicking.

Another minute passed, after which she looked down again, this time seeing
a group of pegasi approach and land near Spitfire. Assuming it was the
headset delivery, Rainbow made one last spin-kick to take out a couple more
clouds, and then made a small loop-and-dive, followed by a landing next to the
others.

"Headsets?" She asked as she set down her hooves.

"Yeah." One of the pegasi nodded, a dark grey stallion with pale blue short-cut mane.

Spitfire grabbed one of the sets from the box, and put it on her head.

"Dash, you grab one too." She said, and then turned to the grey stallion.
"I assume these are pre-set to the same frequency?"

"Should be, as far as I know." he replied with a small shrug.

"...Okay, we're gonna have t do this the hard way then... Dash.
I'm going to keep this one on, and you're gonna grab the rest. Try each one on,
and see if you can hear me, and I can hear you. Basic sound check. Once they're all
tested, you keep one on your own head, and deliver the rest where I tell you to."

"Roger that!" Rainbow replied, and grabbed a headset. She flew away a bit,
out of earshot but not out of sight from Spitfire. That way, they could test each set and
still remain in vision to use hoof-signals if any of the sets failed.

"Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3..." Rainbow started.

"I hear you loud and clear." Spitfire replied. "Now repeat the same process,
every single set."

The testing took a few minutes, but all sets checked out. Perfect sound quality on
every single one.

"All sets checked. Where do you want them?" She asked.

"First one on you, like I said. Second one, get to the 'Bolts over at the East side of
town. You'll find Fleetfoot and Thunderlane there. Give them one set each.
After that, head on to the North, and find the Cloudsdale Weather Unit,
give a set to whoever is in charge over there. And while you're in the area,
give a set to the boss at the factory too, just in case."

Rainbow saluted and took off, speeding through the storms,
narrowly avoiding lightning and wind bursts. Mostly. A couple of burst
knocked her off balance, but she quickly regained it both times,
and she managed to avoid all the lightning strikes.

By the time she reached the east side, she scanned the area.

"Lots of snow clouds here..." she mumbled.
She clicked the 'on'-button on the headset.

"Spitfire? Can you hear me?"

"Loud and clear. Progress report?" Spitfires voice replied in her ear-piece.

"Just arrived at East Side, lots of snow clouds here. Going to look for Fleetfoot
and Thunderlane now, I'll find them in no time!"

"Good. As soon as they have headsets, have them report to me immediately."

"Understood, Will do. Dash out."

Rainbow scanned the area again, more carefully, for any signs of movement.
She could hear voices. Her ears perked as she focused on the voices.

"Let's see... From... above, I think..." She said to herself, and tilted her head upwards.
"Probably above the clouds, kicking them from the top-side to avoid all the
snowfall... Good thinking."

She flapped her wings and broke through the clouds, and just as she suspected,
she found a group of ponies kicking them from above.
She got the attention of a random pony.

"Hey. I'm looking for Fleetfoot and Thunderlane. Are they here somewhere?"

The mare nodded and pointed toward a huge cloud a little bit away.

"On the other side of that big cloud, trying to find its weak spots. It's been
causing blizzards down below, and almost buried a house in snow already.
We've managed to push it away from the houses, but now it's burying a park
in literal meters of snow."

"Impressive... in a bad way. Gotta go find them, no time for small talk, sorry."
Rainbow gave the mare an awkward smile and sped off toward the cloud,
and made her way around it. Just like the mare had said, she found Fleetfoot and
Thunderlane there, scanning for weaknesses. They were both wearing their Bolt
uniforms, complete with the goggles over their eyes.

"Hey Dash. Come to help us with this Blizzard-cloud?" Fleetfoot asked when she
noticed Rainbow approaching.

"Sorry, no. I'm here to deliver headsets, so you can keep in contact with Spitfire,
me, and the other groups once I deliver sets to them too. You're the first delivery."

"Oh, that sounds good too."

Thunderlane kept staring at the cloud. "You know what, Fleet?"

"...You're gonna do something reeeeally stupid, aren't ya?" Fleetfoot replied
with a deadpan look.

"Yup. See, I think I figured out a weak spot. I'm gonna kick it."

"And the stupid part is...?" Rainbow asked, not even trying to hide her curiosity.
After all, she loved stupid ideas. She's known for having them herself sometimes.

Thunderlane pointed at the cloud. "The weak spot on this thing is the core."

"You mean you're going inside it?" Fleetfoot asked.

"Yes." Thunderlane replied shortly.

"That's both awesome and crazy at the same time." Rainbow said.
"I mean, you do have a point, clouds of this size often have a sensitive core,
so a good kick or two there would probably work. The problem is,
you'd have to get there first, and this thing is pretty solid. You'd need a really
high entry speed to break through..." Rainbow said, but stopped talking before
she had finished her sentence.

"I have an even dumber idea..." She said. "Hold these." She added, giving Fleetfoot
the box of headsets.

"What in Celestias mane are you going to..." Fleetfoot started, but then realized what
Rainbow was planning. "Ooooh, I see... You're gonna do that, right?"

"I am." Rainbow said in a serious tone. "Straight through the center, like a bullet."

Rainbow tapped the 'on'-switch on her headset again.

"Come in, Spitfire. Dash here. I located Fleetfoot and Thunderlane,
but they need my help with a blizzard-cloud before I can proceed to next location.
And in order to help them with that cloud, I'm gonna need to do something stupid."

"On record, This conversation never happened, Understood?
Off record... Go ahead. Do whatever you need to get that cloud evaporated.
I'll probably be able to see the boom from here."

"Probably, yeah. Dash out." Rainbow said, with a grin forming on her face.
"This is gonna be awesome..."

Comments

[OmniFox]

Sonic Rainboom?

[TP Night]

8144413

Yeah. Not really a secret, I did make it pretty obvious.

I thought that it would fit her, since that's exactly the kind of "controlled reckless-ness" Dash
is known for, and it IS her signature move, so I figured I need to get it in somewhere in this story...

And this just happened to be a perfect opportunity to do so