Tomorrow is Always a New Day

by Wheller

Chapter 11

Chapter 11

Dawn. Not a lot of time.

Then again, the sooner they escaped the better. Razorwing had become more frustrated with the ponies than anything else; their personal safety was in danger. If the kangaroos were really going to help them, then they couldn’t get here sooner.

The problem was Rainbow Dash. She was still unconscious.

Twilight had snuck into the infirmary, the gryphons had made the mistake of leaving her unguarded... or either they figured they just didn’t need to. Rainbow had been strapped down to the table, if she woke up, she wasn’t going anywhere.

“Rainbow?” Twilight asked of her friend, to which she received no reply other than breathing. “Rainbow... I don’t know what’s wrong, but we really need you to wake up!”

Twilight frowned, no response. “I need you to wake up!” In her frustration Twilight brought a hoof down onto the pegasus’ side.

It had an effect. Just not the one Twilight expected.

...

Rainbow Dash’s mind was in a haze. She’d completely forgotten what she was supposed to be doing. Nothing in this world made sense anymore. She made it to Twilight’s Library on her journey to... wherever she was supposed to be going, before stopping and sitting on the ground in despair. She didn’t see the point in continuing further, her mind had made the irrational decision that she was going to spend the rest of her life in this spot. She wasn’t going to move for anypony.

“Nightshadow... I, OH! Hello!”

Rainbow Dash looked up from her spot to discover that the Library window was open. Twilight had a guest, it seemed.

“I don’t know Nightshadow... I mean, I don’t really know what to... oh!” Twilight’s voice said.

“That’s the beauty of it. You don’t have to do anything... All you have to do is lie back... and relax,” this voice, clearly belonged to Twilight’s visitor, Nightshadow, the unicorn stallion that she had met the other day.

Wait a minute. Rainbow Dash said to herself. They’re not...

They were.

Rainbow Dash heard Twilight groaning loudly. She knew what was going on.

“Why am I hearing this?!” Rainbow Dash screamed at the top of her lungs.

The inside of the library went silent. Rainbow looked up to discover that Twilight had crossed over to the open window, and was looking down at her, an extremely embarrassed look had formed on her face.

“Oh... Hi Rainbow Dash! What are you doing down there?” Twilight asked her.

Rainbow sighed. “Contemplating hanging myself after what I just heard.”

Rainbow kicked herself mentally, she realised how insensitive that remark had been. Twilight looked horrified. Rainbow Dash couldn’t take it anymore, she dashed off at full speed, not even bothering to fly. She ran a few hundred metres towards the outskirts of town and stopped. Why continue? There wasn’t a point.

She dropped to the ground, lying down, defeated, on the grass. This would be her new spot.

“Rainbow Dash? What’s wrong?” Twilight asked. Rainbow Dash turned around to look at her. Obviously, she had departed from the library in a rush, her mane was messy, and her tail tangled.

“Go away,” Rainbow Dash just sighed at her. “I’m sorry for taking you away from... you know.”

Twilight frowned and lied down next to her. “Nightshadow agreed that helping a friend is more important than... that,” she was blushing heavily at the slightest mention. “But that’s not important now, you have my undivided attention.”

Rainbow sighed, she related to her what she remembered, how the world had stopped making sense, and she related the story of meeting Derpy in Sugarcube Corner, rounding out with her stabbing which seemed to have not happened. She showed Twilight the note she’d found in the cloud, for some reason, she still had it on her. She related her feelings of apathy about the world.

She told Twilight that she wanted to die. The world had become so wrong, and she no longer wanted a part of it.

Twilight didn’t say anything; instead, she just gave her friend a hug. Rainbow returned it. She smiled and whispered into Twilight’s ear. “You smell like him.”

Twilight turned bright red in embarrassment.

Rainbow Dash laughed, and she smiled at her friend. She felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off her back. Life was returning to Rainbow Dash, she felt happy again. It was so small, so insignificant, but it was better than the depression she’d been experiencing.

“Rainbow?” Twilight asked.

“Yeah?” Rainbow replied.

“Rainbow... I don’t know what’s wrong, but we really need you to wake up!” Twilight said.

“Huh?” Rainbow asked. Oh wonderful, she was having a good moment, but the world was making it weird again.

An exasperated expression formed on Twilight’s face, one of panic. “I need you to wake up!” without another word, Twilight gave her a hard kick in her flank.

The world turned to white, and Rainbow Dash saw nothing more.

...

Rainbow Dash’s eyes opened, something felt wrong. She couldn’t breathe! There was something in her mouth and she was choking on it.

Twilight was panicking; she bit down on Rainbow’s feeding tube and slowly pulled it out of Rainbow’s mouth until it cleared. Rainbow took a good breath of fresh air.

“What did you kick me for?” Rainbow Dash asked.

Twilight threw herself around Rainbow in a hug. “Oh thank Celestia! You’re okay! We’ve been worried sick about you!”

Rainbow remembered. Gilda! She had hit her!

“We need to get out of here.” Twilight said, she used her magic to start undoing the straps that held Rainbow to the table.

“Where is that gryphon!?” Rainbow Dash said, hate seething in her voice. “I’m going to return her the favour!”

Twilight stopped undoing the straps and ever so softly, she whispered. “Rainbow? I need you to trust me right now. We have more important things to worry about than revenge. If we don’t leave, right now, we’re going to die. You, me, and Vinyl are all going to die if we don’t get out of here. Do you understand?”

Rainbow understood, Twilight had basically said the same thing three times. She agreed, but made no promises that she wouldn’t go after Gilda if she saw her.

Twilight didn’t have time to argue, the sun was coming up, and she hurriedly undid the rest of Rainbow’s straps.

Pop! Vinyl had just set off the firework. Time to go!

Twilight and Rainbow Dash burst through the door of the Infirmary, only to find that their progress was impeded.

Gilda and Lieutenant Razorwing were standing just outside the door, Gilda was pointing her rifle at them, Razorwing held a smaller, claw-held version of it, but despite being smaller, Razorwing’s weapon looked just as, if not more menacing. There was dried blood on hers.

“My little ponies... Going somewhere?” Razorwing sneered at them with a sort of playful malevolence. “I think it’s time you joined your ambassador in an unmarked grave. Would you not agree Lance-Bombardier?”

Gilda smiled cruelly at the question. “Permission to personally take care of the pegaus, sir?”

“Granted.”

The mare’s spirits sunk.

Rainbow Dash’s ear twitched. She heard something, something the likes of which she had never heard before.

The gryphons heard it too.

Through the trees, a large sloped metal box on tracked wheels burst from cover at high speed, a smaller box on top it rotated towards the gryphons, Rainbow Dash recognised the danger from it and tackled Twilight to the ground.

The operators took this a sign, and a large flash was seen, followed by a cracking sound that definitely belonged to a firearm, but fired much faster than the ones they had seen before.

Gilda ducked, but Razorwing was caught in the fire, ripping her to pieces and splattering blood all over them.

Gilda panicked, dropping her rifle and fleeing into the forest. These were tanks.

The rest of the gryphon camp leapt into action. Gryphons crewed the autocannon, swinging it around and trying to take shots at the Kangaroo tanks that had burst from the tree line.

Vinyl Scratch ran to the fallen ponies, she ushered to them that they needed to move, and quickly.

Rainbow nodded, she looked down her right flank, disgusted to see that she was covered in gore that had once been Razorwing. Not the time to think about it. The trio of ponies took off towards the tree line.

The tank that had saved them from Razorwing manoeuvred through the camp and fired its main gun at the autocannon. Vinyl and Twilight noted that it acted much like the QF 26 pounder that they had been shown upon their arrival, but obviously on a much smaller scale.

The shell from the tank gun stuck the autocannon’s crew seating, turning the gryphons into piles of gore, and causing the autocannon to swing wildly, still firing off in random directions.

To Twilight and Vinyl’s horror, the autocannon had swung around and fired into a small cave in the mountain side that had never really been something for them to pay attention to. But what they did know of the cave was that was where the gryphons kept the ammunition for the 26 pounders. They had seen several gryphons caring ammo to and from it the last several days.

“Run!” Vinyl screamed. They did not want to be around that when that autocannon shell actually hit something. They did not have long to wait. The Kangaroo tanks had clearly taken notice of the danger and had already driven backwards at full speed trying to get away from it. The ponies had just turned to run when the mountain exploded.

...

Applejack was in the middle of her afternoon chores at Sweet Apple Acres, sweeping out the stalls in the barn.

“Applejack!” Big Macintosh called out to her. Applejack set down her broom and went outside to find that Big Macintosh, Braeburn, and Apple Bloom were looking off at the northern sky.

Applejack looked on in horror; there was a large cloud of billowing smoke that had to be several hundred kilometres high. “Big Macintosh? What am ah lookin’ at?”

Big Macintosh looked at his sister. “Ah don’ know. Whatever it is, it’s big, and its real high up if we can see it from here.”

...

Twilight was lying face down in the snow, she poked her head up in confusion, she turned around and looked back at the mountain, smoke billowed from the top of it, and small particles of dirt and dust were falling from the sky. The Gryphons must have kept the ammunition deep inside the mountain. It was still standing, but it had thrown the snow off, burying the Gryphon encampment under several tonnes of snow.

Vinyl Scratch and Rainbow Dash were lying beside her, the shockwave from the explosion had thrown them a hundred or so metres from the camp, they were lucky to have landed on soft snow, and missed all the trees around them, if they had hit one they’d surely all be dead.

Vinyl and Rainbow perked their heads up.

“We’re never doing this. Ever again,” Rainbow Dash moaned, slightly sore from the landing.

“Spoil sport,” Vinyl said grinning at her. Twilight smiled, not realising how much she’d missed the white unicorn’s insane grinning.

They were all alive, a little sore, but alive.

Twilight barely noticed the Kangaroo tank as it approached them from behind, stopping several metres from where they lay.

The top hatch popped open and a kangaroo poked his head out. Twilight almost mistook him for Roy Melbourne; the kindly kangaroo she’d met in the Mohoofie Desert, except this Kangaroo was much younger looking.

“Well lookie here! You all right down there little ponies?” the kangaroo said.

Yes, Twilight was sure that they were going to be just fine.

Comments

And they've just been traumatized a little bit more by watching a minor tank battle. Well, minor to the gryphons and kangaroos...to people kept hidden away by an alicorn with a Messiah complex in what's probably an analog to the Japan before the black ships, it's a baffling scene from a horrifying and inexplicable Hell.

black ships?

[Csquared08]

Well this got really interesting.