Return to Flight

by Outlaw Quadrant

13 - Night Pursuits

Catch the flag, no holds barred.

Swift would’ve never agreed to that but Rainbow Dash’s patented pouty face had something to say about that. It struck him right in the heart and for that, he now had a bull’s-eye painted on his chest. Rainbow had tried hitting it twenty times.

“I got you now,” Rainbow yelled, hooves outstretched for tackle attempt number twenty-one.

His body swung left, missing a collision. Then, he pounded the gas pedal, his wings responding with a deafening flap that violently shoved the air behind him.

Rainbow covered her face, unable to attack from the rear until the effects from his sudden burst subsided. When she was back underway, he had pulled a sizable gap but she didn’t worry at all. Reflexes would only carry him so far and even better, she had no fear to slow her down. Time would wear him down and that’s when she’d strike. In the meantime, she would continue the chase within the training chamber, humming the tune of a predator of the sea.

Swift performed a head check, his ears folding at the sound of doom closing in on him. Why does she have to do that?

He aimed for the ceiling and once Rainbow copied his maneuver, Swift dove straight down toward the cloud floor.

She grinned, confident that she figured out his plan. He can avoid a collision much better than she can, so he would turn at the last second, forcing her to an all stop. Rather than fall into that trap, she can anticipate which direction he would go and attack from above. It was all a matter of timing.

Seconds from impact, she tapped the brakes and then waited. When she saw the slightest flinch, Rainbow chose left and down.

Almost! She belly flopped onto the smooth surface and then spun around like a top. Other than scuffed-up pride, she had no injures but it exposed her to a sweeping dive from the stallion.

Offense, huh? I’ll show you true offense!

She got up and went straight at him at full speed.

“Oh shoot!”

Swift raised his nose, allowing Rainbow to pass by below him with only a foot to spare. Too close for comfort. No more time to fool around.

Ok, Fly. Nice and straight.

He eased off the gas. Rainbow inched even closer, just as expected. Not wanting to arouse suspicion, he eschewed a look back along with his best act of labored breathing.

C’mon. Take the bait!

His prey had closed to within ten feet. Perspiration ran down his face, knowing that any sudden movements would unravel his plan. She had to lunge straight at him; any other angle would be disastrous.

Wait for it. Wait for it!

Five feet! He heard Rainbow’s wings go off-sequence. Tackle imminent!

Now!

Swift flared his wings and swung his muzzle back, the rapid movement flipping his body up and over the lunging Rainbow Dash. As he completed the rotation, he snatched his prize and slammed the brakes. Victory was his but she continued looking in every direction except straight behind her. Eventually, his increasing laughter gave away his position.

“Wh–what?” Rainbow peeked at her flank. “My flags! That’s impossible! What just… h–how did you do that?”

He used his foreleg to demonstrate the maneuver. “Like that.”

Rainbow hovered right up to his face, scowling. “I see! Think you can make me look like a fool and get away with it?”

A lump travelled down his neck. Then her hoof tickled his noggin.

“Heh. You’re such a scaredy cat!” She took back her red flags. “You’re pretty clever. I’ll have to be more careful next round.”

His head tilted slightly right. “Next round? There’s a next round?”

Indeed, they continued on whizzing about the chamber for a second time. Once more, Rainbow played the role of a patient pursuer. No unnecessary dives, no falling in traps, just a constant high-speed pursuit. It might’ve taken fifteen minutes but fatigue finally did slow him down. With a shoulder bump, she popped him right into the chamber wall and then stole his blue flags.

“Yes! I finally got, uh oh.”

Swift wasn’t moving off the vertical cloud, save for a twitching wing. “Ow.”

She cusped her mouth. “Oh my gosh! I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“Not permanently,” he wheezed, pulling himself off the wall and holding his midsection. “I’ll need a few minutes, if you don’t mind.”

Rainbow gave him the time to relax, sort of. While he lay down on the cloud floor, she regaled him about her most glorious hits during Junior Speedsters. Every excruciating detail added sympathy pain to his tender body, especially the tale about knocking down three fliers at once.

“Bam!” She smacked together her hooves. “They went down like bowling pins! Wow! I got in big trouble that day. Lousy tattletales can’t take a hit without whining to the counselor.”

“Shoot. Sounds like your Camp was rougher than mine was. Whew! Glad I wasn’t there.”

She started making circles on the cloud, “Oh.”

Swift raised his head. “No, Rainbow. I didn’t mean—”

“It’s okay. I understood what you meant. Um, but can I ask you something? If we were in the same Camp, do you think we would’ve been friends?”

He nodded. “That’s what I wanted out of Camp. But too many just wanted to think of me as a rival.” He chuckled, “Like you did at Pinkie’s party.”

She scoffed but with a sly smile. “Hey, give me a break. I didn’t really know who you were. I’m just glad I gave you a chance.”

“Hold on now. It’s more the other way around. I all but walked out on you” Swift winked. “Remember?”

She grabbed a cloud chunk off the floor and threw it at his face.

He dodged it without any effort. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

Rainbow delivered a raspberry. “Whatever. Looks like you’ve had enough rest. I know what I wanna do next?”

“I’m scared to ask but what?”

She pointed at the thunderclouds spread across one corner of the chamber.

Swift hovered into the air. “Let me guess. Dodge lightning at the max setting?”

Rainbow grinned. “You learn quickly.”

“You do realize even I might not be able to dodge every bolt at that setting?”

“So you want me to rescue you then?” she teased.

He released an exasperated sigh. “You’ll see how hard this is gonna be, Rainbow.”

Rainbow watched him land on top of the clouds and then work his hooves through the dark layer. Right away, the thunder’s rumble doubled in decibels, making her yelp. The flashes lit up the chamber from dim evening to a summer’s day. Her mind did all in its power to discern any resemblance of a pattern but it was no use. This was chaos in action, constantly jumping from thundercloud to floor at velocities too fast even for eagle eyes. She’d seen her share of bad storms but this was at a level approaching insanity. Her valor was no match for nature’s fury and her trembling hooves showed it.

The returning stallion read her fear but rather than rib her for it, he took the high road. “Hmmmm, how about you just follow me? I’ll stick to the edges in case either of us has to bail.”

“All right, we’ll play it safe,” she answered, feigning disappointment.

Swift flew toward the thunder fields followed by a perspiring Rainbow.

“Umm, so” – Rainbow rubbed her forehead – “how are you so good at this?”

“Some skill but mostly luck. You really gotta be watching and feeling what’s going on, you know?” He watched the upcoming light show, his blue globes darting all over the place. “Like now, there’s a certain rhythm to the lightning but it’s going to change any second now.” Three bolts flashed. “Right there! I knew that because of the temperature flux.”

All she spotted was disorder. “Oh-kay.”

Swift moaned. “Just follow my lead.”

Rainbow kept behind his trail a pony’s length apart as they slipped under the frothing cloud layer. A booming crack rendered her eardrums out of commission, save for a constant painful high-pitch tone. A few seconds in, her nose shut down, thanks to an overpowering burning metallic scent. With every light flare, Swift become more of a moving blob and then a blur.

Zap! Lightning came down all around them, one bolt coming inches from Rainbow’s right. Thankfully, the raucous sound hid her screech but she all but exited stage left.

C’mon! Shake it off! She slapped her face. You can do this!

Another close bang came, then a third, fourth and a pair. Each one stopped her heart and tested her vocal chord’s upper range – both ached once the initial siege ended. Then, Swift’s mouth moved but she wasn’t able to decipher his message.

At Rainbow’s maximum volume, “I can’t—”

Swift slammed the brakes while swerving up and right. Right as Rainbow inputted the same command, another bolt emerged right in front of her nose.

Boo.

With all the power she had, Rainbow left the thunder fields, leaving behind a trail of feathers. That was one defeat she could swallow and when she swiveled back toward the dark clouds, she expected Swift to have done the same.

To her shock, he was further within the phenomenon that had taken a life of its own, attacking the stallion with an incessant lightning barrage. No doubt in her mind that he wanted out except the electric currents dictated his erratic path. His moves, the untrained eye would perceive it as a performance piece practiced a million times but she knew that every twitch, every flex, every flap was raw instinct. At her best, she could match his precision flying but not for the thirty seconds he avoided gigawatts striking him down his impunity while searching for an exit. For a moment, the light show ceased.

“Now’s your chance,” Rainbow shouted. “Go! Go!”

Swift went full speed towards her, only for the clouds to make one final attack. Two bolts crashed down but he dodged left. A pair anticipated that move and attacked – Swift swerved right. Three put up an electric wall, so he went around it. He was home free, just a few feet to go but that’s when the lightning decided to cheat. Right before he crossed the border, five lightning bolts emerged all at once around him.

One too many.

Rainbow covered her eyes a second too late. The sight of malevolent current striking a flying pegasus was forever burned in her retinas. Then, an overpowering burning scent caused her to peek.

There he was, flat on the cloud floor a few feet away with ash sprinkled across his barely moving figure. Smoke billowed from his rear. The moment her ears picked up his faint moaning, she approached him with haste for assistance.

Swift gingerly got up on all fours. “’Sup.”

She didn’t know her next line. Rainbow should be rushing him to the closest medical facility and yet, he was upright and talking as though nothing happened. Then again, his hair needed treatment from a salon or at least a run-through with a hoof. She tried doing just that, but his forelock zinged her in response.

“Careful,” Swift responded achingly. “I’m so overloaded with juice.” A sudden electric pop made him wince. “Stand back! Have to let it out!”

Rainbow stepped backwards, not wanting an unexpected electric shower. However, for all of Swift’s grunts and huffs, nothing came out of him except erratic prancing.

“Itchy! So itchy! Why isn’t this working?”

She leaned in, “Can I do something?”

“Stay there!” He stomped the floor repeatedly, “Shoot! All this static! Get out of my body! Get out! Out! Out!”

In a flash, a translucent blue aura surrounded the stallion. Rainbow’s mouth unhinged, her beady eyes dissecting something she saw only in comic strips, a heroic figure with electricity flowing across his tangled hairdo.

“What the?” Swift examined his glowing body, “What in Equestria is—?”

Just like that, the sudden phenomenon ended and with it, whatever forces kept him upright. He collapsed onto the floor and remained there, despite Rainbow calling out his name. She wasted no time shaking him profusely, begging for a response.

Rainbow slapped his face. “Swift! Answer me!”

“Ow,” he whispered. “Not so hard.”

Seeing that he was still with her, Rainbow hit him again, albeit much gentler. “Do you need something?”

A grumbling sound from his abdomen answered for him. “Juice would be nice.”

---

Eight bottles. Swift counted them a second time and he was right. Adding the six plastic wraps that once were around sandwiches, he just finished enough meals to fill him up for a week. Even so, he was anything but bloated.

“Whew.” He wiped crumbs off his lips. “I’ve never been that hungry in my life.”

Sitting next to him, Rainbow finished the last of her sandwich. “So, are you ready to tell me what’s up?”

He blinked at her a few times. “Um, are you talking about the whole lightning made me look weird thing?”

Her eyes narrowed. “No, I want to know if you dye your mane. Yes, that whole thing that happened.”

As usual, his hoof rearranged the many strands on top of his head. “I have no clue whatsoever. Maybe when I tried discharging, I did something wrong because I felt, different.”

“Different?”

Flexing his hoof, “It was like a sugar rush but way way more intense. I’ve never felt so pumped up!” Then he let his hoof flop back onto the surface. “So was the crash but I’m all good now. Well, maybe except for one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Dye my mane? Really?”

Rainbow gave him a leering look, “Sometimes, I wonder.”

“I’d ask the same question about your mane,” he answered in kind.

“This is one hundred percent natural and awesome,” she said, brushing her hair. “And it’s six colors versus two. No need to do the math which is clearly better.”

“Whatever,” he answered along with a chuckle. “Well, I’m ready. So, what do wanna do now?”

The moon’s position overhead reminded Rainbow that this night wouldn’t last forever. “You still owe me that race and, believe me, we’re gonna race but there is one thing I wanna get out of the way first.” She scanned the obstacle course, “I’ll admit that I still have some rust to shake off so I need to work those hoops a little more. I do need somepony to set some times for me, though.”

“Gee. I wonder who’s gonna do that.” Swift pointed at his chest.

“You’ve got it!”

“I know what you’re trying to do. You want to go after my records.”

Rainbow took out a stopwatch. “You know how hard some of your records were back in Camp? I’m just curious how much easier they would be to knock them off.”

He floated in mid-air and crossed his hooves, confidence trickling into his voice. “You do realize I did a lot of runs in one try and that was a long time ago. I’d like to think that I could do much better now.”

“Oh, I see.” She joined him in the air, “That sounds like you’re defending your pegasus pride.”

He slapped his forehead. “I wasn’t, Rainbow. I was just… this whole thing about pegasus pride is… don’t give me that look!”

Nothing he could say could sway her that he was finally shedding some of that ho-hum humility. A few obstacle course runs would aid some more, she thought, and what better way to start than with a path where her speed advantage would come into play.

She chose a route that was nothing more than a simple S-shape through the floating hoops. Easy work for the stallion who finished it in thirty seven seconds but she controlled her pace just enough to edge him, just as planned. All she needed was to waggle her behind at him as bait.

“You got served!”

He shrugged “So? I wasn’t—”

“Slowpoke! Slowpoke! Slowpoke!”

“C’mon, Rainbow,” he whined. “It was only—”

She patted her flank, “Can’t touch this! Can’t touch this! Can’t touch this!”

“Set the watch,” he said in a hushed tone.

Bingo. After a button press to reset the device, “Don’t hold back!”

“No worries about that,” he answered, moving in front of the first cloud hoop.

“Ready?” She raised the stopwatch above her head. “Set, go!”

Her fast count made no difference – Swift’s reflexes were that of a cat. More stunning was his rapid progress through the course, confirmed by the final time. Thirty-two seconds the timer read, a benchmark worthy of her mettle.

Once he returned, Rainbow tossed him over the stopwatch. “Watch! I’ll do this in less than thirty seconds!”

Typically, her bodacious claims fell short of expectations but she had extra motivation. If this Friday were her last day of holding the Best Flier in Equestria crown, she’d do everything in her power to prove it. Grit flowed through her body while every system calibrated to optimum efficiency. Those round white circles in the skies were no match to the cyan bullet rushing right through them and neither was Swift’s mark. She knew it the moment she noticed his blank stare at the small device’s readout.

“Twenty-eight seconds,” he mumbled, showing her watch.

She spared no time giving Swift a repeat celebratory performance. “Ah, yeah! Ah, yeah! I’m Number One! I’m Number One!”

“Now, hold on!” Swift pointed at the course, “That challenge was so easy, it might as well have been a drag race! Now, how about something much harder instead of this filly stuff?”

Rainbow reeled back. Whoa! I wasn’t expecting that!

“My bad,” he said, looking somewhat away from her. “I don’t know what came over me.”

“It’s alright. A little competitive juice is good for you. Now, let me pick out a really hard route and we’ll see who’s really the best.”

Swift moaned aloud. Rather than a gradual difficulty increase, he watched Rainbow plot a path through the obstacle course with many bends turns and twists. Then he rubbed his chin, noticing she was attempting to recreate of the toughest test in Junior Speedsters, the much-acclaimed agility run. The biggest obstacle to Rainbow’s emulation was lack of natural barriers such as mountains and trees, so she mashed cloud parts together as a substitute. Swift believe it a valiant albeit ugly looking effort.

“That looks great!” Rainbow said aloud, patting together what looked like melting ice cream.

With a few last touches, she finished her work. Swift moved toward the ceiling, the presumed starting point, only for Rainbow to stop him.

“I’ll go first this time. Take good notes, Swift.”

He rolled his eyes. I don’t need em. This should be right up my… wait a minute. Did she say my... Shoot. She’s ready to go!

He pressed the watch’s button just as Rainbow accelerated from her starting point at the chamber’s top. Soon, she traversed through a fabricated tunnel and then made a u-turn toward hovering pillars at a speed too fast to attempt a slalom based on his internal calculations. Yet he remained in position, hoping she would rectify her own mistake and slow down.

Splat! Rainbow crashed right into the pillar face-first. Moments later, she pushed off the flat surface and after checking for damage — none found – she whipped up an excuse to the timekeeper.

“That was just a practice run,” Rainbow bellowed.

Eventually, she found a way to say that phrase in seven different ways before finally putting a time on the board.

“A minute twenty?” she grumbled. “Terrible! I left at least five seconds on the table.”

Rainbow was wrong. As her eyes did her best following the zipping stallion, her mind checked off every spot where Swift gained time on her. In the end, the combined mistakes could fill out a chalkboard as a long formula, with the final answer being fifteen seconds.

“Shoot,” said the returning Swift, shaking his head. “That should’ve been under a minute.”

“Huh?” She pored over her math, finding no errors. Was he playing mind games on her to knock her off her game, she thought. It couldn’t be. His expression had no inkling of such deviancy. If Swift could go even faster, it became her task to not only beat his current time but also obliterate it.

Instead, her frantic efforts in maximizing turning speed destroyed the entire course little by little. First went the pillars – she sliced through most of them in ten minutes. Then she poked holes through the cloud tubes, turning them into Swiss cheese. Rainbow’s pretend mountains crumbled every time she left her body imprint on them. Swift did all he could with hasty repairs but her unintentional destruction was too fast for his hoof work. By the point she closed the gap to five seconds off his mark, there was no more recognizable course to run through.

“There’s still a little bit left,” Rainbow complained as she worked on a bent hoop. “See? I fixed it! Good as new!”

Swift watched the chunk she added slide off the obstacle. “Yeah, I don’t think that’s gonna work.”

Her head slumped, knowing that with all the damage, it would take hours of reconstruction. “Alright. Guess that’s a draw.”

“Eh?” He checked the watch – one minute and ten seconds. “How is that a draw?”

“Because you obviously had an advantage, so I have to add five seconds to your time,” she answered, pacing back and forth. “With the other course, it was the other way around but since it was much shorter, I would only add—” Rainbow did the math in her head – “three seconds to my time. That means—”

Swift’s raucous laughter ricocheted off the chamber walls.

Hoofs on her hips, “What’s so funny now?”

“That’s just like—” The tickles had him wriggling in the air –“just like you, Rainbow.”

“Huh?”

“You, the time.” He patted his chest to restrain his mirth. “You made up those numbers just so that you could call yourself a winner. It doesn’t work that way. You won the first one fair and square but I won the second one in the same way.”

“It didn’t look that way to me. You’re supposed to celebrate when you win.”

“Oh, really? You mean like this?” Swift waggled across Rainbow’s sight like a dancing snake. “Yeah! Yeah! You got burned! Can’t touch this! Number One!”

Her guffaws were that from a pig, sounds reserved for the truly comical. He stopped his gyrations, unable to hold back his laughter.

After a minute, she collected her breath. “Wow. What was that all about?”

Swift beamed. “I’m just trying to loosen up the mood for ya. I just wanna forget about all our worries, even if it’s only a little while.”

“I hear that! So, how about we get ready for our race?”

“Gotcha, Rainbow! Guess it’s time to cover this up.”

That snapped her off her upbeat demeanor. “Cover this up? What do you mean?”

“Well, we don’t really need this space anymore so might as well hide the evidence now, right?”

He made it sound so simple but her quivering heart said otherwise.

“It’s funny,” he continued, rubbing his mane. “I’m sorta gonna miss this place.”

Rainbow felt something wet running down her cheek. Struggles aside, the memories she created within these training grounds were those she didn’t want to forget. “Yeah. I will too. Good times.”

---

The Ponyville Dam, a mammoth concrete structure that stood between the low-lying town and raging waters threatening to wipe it off the map. The dam performed its crucial duty with ease on most days but with the persistent rain, the river level had risen to the maximum designated safe level. Rainbow noticed this right away as she and Swift landed on the walkway running over the top of the dam. It was rather damp and full of leaves but otherwise, the rain did not fall in this area.

“Wait a minute.” Rainbow peered through the darkness. “What’s that over there?”

“Eh?”

Rainbow squinted upriver at trenches from the banks leading to multiple reservoirs. All of them had reached its limits, with some spilling its contents onto the dampened soil. “What in the… why is it…whaaaat?” She spotted a few nearby trees with their trunks snapped clean off. “Swift? What happened here?”

He grinded his teeth. Something called letting Thunderlane be in charge for the whole day. “No worries,” he answered, adding a half-hearted laughter. “All of that was just part of a training exercise.”

Rainbow arched an eyebrow. “A training exercise?”

That’s right. An exercise on my patience. “Gotcha. He walked toward the dam’s edge, “Shall we get ready?”

“Do you want me to go over the route again,” she asked as she followed him.

Swift hopped onto the wall’s top, “You’ve told me the route four times.”

“I just wanna be sure. Oh, and one last request. I don’t want you to hold back.”

“I won’t,” he answered plainly.

“I’m being serious.” Rainbow focused on the skies shrouded by clouds. “If this will be my last race, I want it to be the best one I’ve had. I picked this route because you actually have a real shot of winning. I won’t let you, obviously, but make me work for it. Can you do that for me?”

Racing wasn’t in his blood and yet, excitement pumped through his body. He didn’t know where it came from or why but it tasted like a fattening slice of cake. It was bad for his diet but he wanted more. “Rainbow, I’ll let my wings do the talking.”

Such a fiery proclamation caused Rainbow’s ears to quiver in sheer pleasure. This was coming together so well, the cool spring night, the reduced visibility, a course with a blend of speed and cornering and a friend who granted her wishes because that’s the pony he was. All she needed was to drop the green flag.

“Get ready to eat my rainbows! On your mark!”

Both pegasi leaned over the dam’s edge, spreading wide their sleek appendages.

“Get set!”

Rainbow paused for dramatic effect.

“Go!”

Two blurs of light traversed down the concave concrete fascia before turning parallel to the river. Their wake pulled up the water and turned it into an explosive mist that splashed into the canyon walls and loosened up some rocks. Rainbow ignored the falling debris and focused on her competitor. As expected, he had a nose on her but this wasn’t a drag race to the upcoming waterfall. Even then, she would’ve gotten him anyway. She erased the gap and began pulling away by the time they reached the pitch-black air and aimed at some roundish terrain hundreds of feet below them. Swift tucked in behind her, limiting his loss of distance.

Soon, they approached a field of apple trees. Rainbow spotted the widest dirt path snaking across Sweet Apple Acres and descended close enough to it that their wings kicked up dust and pebbles. The multiple fruits hanging from the branches were nothing more than red dots whizzing around them, a visually distracting sight if the ponies traversing the farm weren’t so focused on the winding road. They followed it everywhere it went – a steep incline, a gentle decline, a tight S-bend cutting through young saplings and then another upward ascent in between two mammoth hills. When Rainbow reached the crest, she performed a head-check. About three seconds behind was her competitor, a fair distance for the next major obstacle on the makeshift course, a dimly-lit barn at the road’s end with its massive doors wide open.

As they flew over a painted fence, bales of hay stacked to the ceiling within the red barn came into focus. On opposite ends were two openings leading to the route through the structure. Rainbow chose left while Swift headed right.

Right into a maze.

All corners were right angles, requiring perfectly timed body drift to keep up momentum. That was right up Swift’s alley; he nailed every turn using every inch of space. Rainbow, on the other hoof, bounced off the yellow squares, earning her some scrapes on her coat. Three quarters of the way through the maze, she pushed off an unstable stack, which started a chain reaction of plummeting hay.

Uh oh!

Now the route to the exit was changing by the second. Amidst the falling bales, Swift squirted through the small openings and came charging back outside with the lead. Rainbow soon followed three pony lengths back, a bad omen as what laid ahead was a deep field of orchards or as she saw them, posts hidden in the dark.

Don’t lift, Rainbow! Full speed!

Rainbow pursued the gray dot into the trees, which started swaying back and forth in a rhythmic fashion. This wasn’t too bad, Rainbow thought. She was learning something watching Swift attack the trees with smooth and precise motions. Unfortunately, his maneuvering put her in a trance long enough that when he finally moved up and straight, she hesitated. That’s when a dilapidated shack appeared directly ahead. She could’ve slammed the brakes but that cracked wall appeared ripe to blast through.

Swift checked his rearview in time to watch Rainbow karate kick through the small shed with nary a drop in speed.

She’s completely bonkers!

After weaving through a few more apple trees, he emerged on the road leading toward Sweet Apple Acres’ front entrance. However, he went the opposite way that quickly led to a split in the path. The sign spelled out the two destinations, Ponyville and the Whitetail Woods. He chose the latter, leading him through more trees with abundant leaves that would’ve remained attached until the fall. They were no match for about thirty wing power combined rumbling through the forest.

The debris was but a minor inconvenience and with the pebbled path’s relative straightness, this section was all Rainbow Dash. Swift could hear her flaps increasing in volume and pace but he had no recourse other than shoving more coal into the boiler. Good fortune came to him, however, via some overgrown branches up ahead crisscrossing the road. While he weaved through them, they slowed down Rainbow enough that by the time he approached a bridge by a waterfall, a head check confirmed a twenty-five foot gap.

I’m still ahead! Whoa! How am I still ahead?

He traversed up the waterfall and then travelled upstream. A gentle left bend lay ahead but he went straight into rising terrain littered with tall pine trees. Soon enough, a rolling fog hid their trunks, making Rainbow gulp.

Why did I pick this course? Oh, stop complaining, Rainbow. This isn’t supposed to be easy!

Despite the limited visibility, neither moved the throttle from full. The shadowy bark was no wider than their bodies but grew in density the deeper they flew into the forest. Rock formations soon jutted off the ground, ready to cut their race short. At this point, Rainbow was ready to slow but Swift had a different idea, rotating sideways. That was nothing out of the ordinary; she duplicated the move with ease. However, she could only hold the position for ten seconds before switching back to normal, but he continued darting through the pines with the bare minimum of motions to avoid impact. Area that needs improvement, Rainbow added to her internal notebook.

That’s Ghastly Gorges up ahead! I should’ve been in the lead by now!

Going past the last towering trees, they were now above the ravine with its stream running three times its usual height. The fog thinned but she still couldn’t see much of her opponent. That did nothing to stymie Rainbow’s yell.

“Swift! Get back here!”

He heard the call, a mix of annoyance and delight. He laughed aloud not out of mockery but for the rush of of leading against the fastest flier in all of Equestria. Even he had to acknowledge the sense of gratification, too much to hold back.

“Come on and get me! Come and get it!” he taunted before banking into the gorge.

Once he neared the splashing water, Swift checked on what was an angry rocket ship.

Oh, shoot! Me and my big mouth!

Swift followed the gorge’s contours, a simple route that did nothing to slow down the cyan bullet. Then he spotted a tunnel that inexplicably generated a headwind that dragged down his velocity. With a switch flip, his wing strokes changed to shorter quicker bursts to counteract the opposing force. Inside, the raging waves splashed all the way to the ceiling, and with scant space, both pegasi became drenched in water. They found little relief on the other side as the area past the tunnel was under a drizzle.

Swift rubbed his eyes to clear up his vision while switching back to normal flying mode. That’s when a surprise laid ahead, twisted vines peeking above the water’s surface. It was the next course section that would’ve given him another advantage except it was now underwater. Much to his chagrin, he skipped over it and soon enough, she had cut his lead in half.

“You’re gonna get it!” Rainbow bantered.

Another surprise appeared in front of him, holes on the left side of the towering canyon walls.

Eh? I don’t remember Rainbow telling me about—

A huge red eel suddenly popped out the opening.

“Ahhh!”

Swift dived down, avoiding digestion only to dodge another hungry monster. Then the whole clan appeared for a lean meat appetizer but Swift was too fast a food. As such, they missed a slightly meatier Rainbow Dash who went by them with a friendly wave.

Heh! Thank you, guys! Nice and easy section next! That lead is mine!

Rainbow pushed all she could to get it. Twenty feet was all she needed to be within hoof’s reach of his tail. In seconds, she was close enough to attempt a slingshot.

Darnit!

The walls began narrowing and twisting at increasing angles, so she tucked in behind him to wait for a better opening. Together, they leaned right, avoiding protruding rocks and then zoomed below a natural arch formation before reaching a tight but straight section. She pulled aside to overtake him except she chose right instead of left, the direction of the next bend. Swift blocked her path on the entry and for the next few tight turns through the ravine, he was in command. Left, right, left right, he executed his moves with extra crispness and his reward was adding some breathing room for an approaching juncture point. The gorge continued north but per Rainbow’s earlier instructions, he headed northeast.

Past the turning point was a tall flat wall with a small vertical crevice running across its surface, an opening Rainbow had told him was wide enough for pegasi. His eyes couldn’t gauge that but the wisps of air emanating from the opening did.

Meanwhile, Rainbow started scrubbing off speed as she always had when performing this run.

What? He’s going full speed! She gulped. Okay. If he can do it, I can too!

Swift slipped into the crack at an angle past forty-five degrees. Rainbow performed the same move, doing all she could to avoid a nervous flinch. She made it inside, only to realize she had to change her bank angle closer to ninety and then quickly back to level. She did the best she could but near the crevices’ end, her left wingtip touched rock. Rainbow hissed at what was a paper slicing through skin.

The race leader emerged inside a limestone chamber with water dripping from the ceiling and running down the walls. Stalactites and stalagmites dominated the surroundings but well across the other side was his next destination. It should’ve been a simple matter of weaving through the rock formations.

Then the whole world started to shake. Parts of the ceiling began raining down.

Swift had an eye twitch. “Really? It’s like somepony does stuff like this to me on purpose!”

No matter how many jagged rocks tried to take him down, he predicted their paths and moved out of the way. When larger chunks fell from the ceiling, Swift used them to his advantage, running on one of its walls before pushing off for a momentary burst. He was almost in the clear when a massive slab threatened to crush him like a bug. Swift descended while sliding toward the limestone wall, trying to escape its expanding shadow.

“Ahhh! It’s gonna hit me! It’s gonna hit me!”

Close call. Swift performed a second wall run to build up his speed but by the time he approached the opening, his competitor had erased his lead. The earthquake and all the falling fragments must have been a big Rainbow Dash fan.

“You’re mine now!”

At the cave’s entrance, she went side-by-side to his right, only to reduce speed because this route was winding, devoid of light and particularly narrow. The sane option was allowing one of them through and attack the course it single-file but neither acquiesced their air space. Instead, Rainbow and Swift navigated the slowly inclining path an inch apart from each other. Their wings sang a song of what true pegasi power sounded like, a rowdy and shrill noise amplified by the hard surfaces all around them to the volumes in which even a cheering crowd couldn’t match. Rainbow wished there was an audience to witness such flying prowess in action but that would be asking far too much. What she wanted was the win, and she was ready to seize the opportunity.

When the tunnel stopped its constant curving, Rainbow finally sped ahead of his friend and retook the lead. Perfect timing too for lights installed on both sides illuminated the way so she knew exactly where she was going: through an archway with its wooden door down on the floor, up a hole, down a wider corridor with a slight upward slant for the first few hundred feet and then vertical to a shaft leading to the outside world.

Through the clouds and this race is mine!

If only ascending to the heavens was that easy. A race this long had taxed her wings so she ran out of momentum by the time she passed through the exit. Rainbow switched to short and quick wing flaps much faster than Swift did, costing her half her lead. “Push! Push!” She told herself but her competitor was doing the same while switching strategy. Longer flaps, he chose, a decision that cost him some ground on the upstroke but made up for the loss and then some when his wing surged him upwards. If he could just hold this pace, he could pass her.

Not letting you off… shoot! His breathing became raspy.

He stole the lead, then lost it, took it back again before losing it once more. Rainbow pushed to solidify her top spot, but all it did was throw her off rhythm. Neck and neck, they disappeared into the clouds, where the one coming out first would be the winner.

The trip through the white mist should’ve taken thirty seconds but nopony emerged for about a minute. Then, a shadow emerged on the cloud’s surface, followed by a pair of hooves breaking through the cotton and finally the head with the unmistakable hair.

It had all the colors of the rainbow.

Even though Rainbow crossed the checkers, she continued climbing as her mind was slow to remind her that she could stop. The moment she turned around, Swift popped from the clouds and immediately shut off all power. He collapsed onto the soft surface, out of breath and with nothing to say, much like the mare who eventually rested next to him. Rainbow didn’t need words, however. Her wide grin told the tale.

“Aren’t you gonna gloat?” Swift finally spoke with an asthmatic voice.

That was her standard procedure, especially after a race that intense. This situation, though, was much different. This might be her last victory she would earn. While she could have races on the ground for the rest of her days, that wouldn’t be the same. Bragging just wasn’t in her right now, not with some sadness escaping her tear ducts. Even so, she held a small smile.

“Thanks for making that fun, Swift.” She brushed his foreleg before getting up. “Do you think we can do something like that again, someday?”

His first answer was a big, fat no. Every muscle in his body throbbed, his lungs burned, and when he stumbled onto all fours, his vision turned Rainbow’s face into a haze. Even if he did enjoy his duel with Rainbow, Swift couldn’t possibly make this a regular habit. Then his sight cleared up and he saw her magenta eyes, its gleam brighter than the stars behind her. Suddenly, he forgot all his reasons along with the art of speaking properly.

“Well, I, um, you see, it’s sorta—” Swift clutched his mane – “We’ll see.”

She snickered at his stumbling. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

Swift’s logic center reactivated. “T–that was a maybe.”

“That’s not what I heard.”

“Then clean your ears.”

Rainbow rubbed off some earwax. “See? I heard you loud and clear.”

That earned a chuckle. “Rainbow, if we’re talking about this after tomorrow, then I might just say yes.”

“Yeah, tomorrow.”

A small breeze made Rainbow’s hair sway as she surveyed the faraway stars and the cratered celestial body that had all but finished its climb on this Friday evening. Fatigue settled in and forced some yawns.

“Guess it’s time to head on over to Fluttershy’s, huh?”

“Yeah, but we don’t have to go right now,” Swift answered.

Rainbow broke her vigil for a headshake. “It’s okay. We need a good night’s sleep anyways.”

Moments later, they headed toward Ponyville’s direction at a leisurely pace. They were in no hurry to leave the air, at least until breaking through the clouds.

“So, how about we race back to Fluttershy’s,” Rainbow asked.

Swift snickered for he saw that question coming a mile away. “No.”

---

One in the morning was well past Swift’s bedtime.

This evening, he made an exception.

Sitting on a red cushion in the middle of Fluttershy’s living room, he had his nose buried in a thick book. Besides him was a wax candle providing him just enough brightness to understand the printed text without disturbing Angel, who slept within a basket beside the front door.

Another source of light lay on the small table next to the green chaise lounger where Rainbow should’ve been asleep ages ago. However, she insisted in helping him find any potentially useful information. Her book was thinner and with a more interesting cover – multiple colorful explosions – than the more drab ones spread across the wooden floor.

After trying to appear interested in reading for half an hour, however, she tossed her choice along with the other rejects. “That cover was so false advertising.”

Swift flipped a page, eyes trained on the text. “Told ya it was going to be full of technical junk.”

“They could have—” Rainbow stifled a long yawn. –“added more pictures, you know?”

“Did you at least find something?”

Rainbow blinked several times. “Um, no. I don’t, um, don’t think I did.”

Swift moved his head to check on what sounded like a sleepy mare. Indeed, the only motions she did was breathing and the constant fight to hold up her eyelids. “You really should go to sleep, Rainbow.”

Again, her response was on delay. “But I–I wanna help.”

“You’ve done more than enough. I’m just about done here anyways. I won’t be up much longer.”

Rainbow raised her hoof from the lounger’s side and then let it fall. That was all the protest she could muster. “Ok. Just do me a favor, wontcha?”

“Yeah?”

Her head nodded ever so slightly at two objects, the nearby candle on the coffee table and a cotton blanket just out of her reach.

“Really?”

Rainbow moaned like a little puppy.

He sighed. “One sec.”

Once he found his footing, Swift performed one wing flap directed at the orange flame, snuffing it out on his first try. Then he picked up the sheet and with one motion, made his friend warm and toasty. Before he could stumble back onto the red cushion, Rainbow said something unintelligible.

“What do you want now,” he asked through a yawn.

“Um, remember what you said about, um, your dream? When you heard me?”

“What about it?”

“If you’re in trouble again when you sleep, I’ll call out to you again, okay?”

“Eh? Oh-kay but how are you gonna do that? Was that even you I heard during my nightmare or was it just my imagination?”

She reached out for a hoof bump. “Don’t worry about that. I’ll find a way, okay?”

Maybe it was because of the tenderness of her voice or sleep deprivation but Swift clasped hooves and held it there for a few seconds. “G–gotcha, Rainbow.”

She released her grasp. “Have a good night, Swift.”

Rainbow shut her eyes, but only until hearing the turn of a page. Then, she took the occasional peek of the stallion who was returning to his task of boring himself with books. Every time, he caught her in the act and returned the smile. Eventually, she snuggled deeper into the pillows, hoping that she would see him again in the morning in the same state she was leaving him now.

Comments

[Dustchu]

Lots of awesome in this chapter, hehehe, nicely done man, nicely done!
I love how Rainbow is in this story, its awesome.

keep it up!

[redmar]

I liked the race they had it was fun.

[blaukit]

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