Rainbow Dash's Unstoppable Ego

by MagicS

A Mammoth of a Problem XLVII

Down. She wasn’t falling down but gently floating with her eyes squeezed shut and all the sensation from the rest of her body gone. It was strange, this didn’t feel like floating through the air, like a feather in the wind, but there was something else reminiscent about it. And she was so warm too. Rainbow Dash couldn’t remember the last time she had felt this warm and serene. Even though her eyes were shut tight she could tell how bright the world was right outside them, the light was trying to sneak in past her eyelids. A smile pulled across her face as she shifted around, trying to curl up and rest her head on her hooves as if she was getting ready to take a nap on a cloud. So peaceful. So nice as she just kept floating down and down. Rainbow Dash felt a pure, blissful peace inside her body and mind. What had she been doing just before this? Who cares. Things were nice, things were the way they should be. That steadily increasing warmth around her body, the tugging in every direction, the pounding of her heart, it was all fine. Deeper she went. Deep, and deep… deep? Like into water. Like down to the bottom of a lake.

Rainbow Dash opened her eyes and the brightness poured in. Above her she saw the surface of the Sacred Spring getting further and further away as she sunk towards its depths. Bubbles floated up all around her and she waved her limbs around trying to stop her descent.

But it was like the water was actively pulling her down, like there was some kind of current that made it impossible even for a pony like her to swim and escape it. Her legs and wings flailed about uselessly as her cheeks puffed out to keep the air inside as much as possible. But how much longer could she hold her breath? Her body was telling her to just give in and let the Spring soothe her but her mind fought that impulse. She had a mission and even with her heart beating so hard and fast she was worried it might burst she kept fighting and fighting to swim back up to the surface before she ran out of air.

Is this what happened to unworthy creatures that entered the Sacred Spring? Or did everyone go through this?

Rainbow Dash had no way of knowing but she certainly wasn’t the type of pony to just sit back and see what happened. She was a fighter and she’d fight the whole way through this. It was getting tough to hold her mouth shut though, her lungs were burning and her struggling in the water was just making it worse.

Come on, come on! Rainbow Dash pressed herself, trying every single type of stroke she knew to swim up.

It was to no avail. The water was impossible to swim in, the strange relaxing and exhausting effect it had on her body kept spreading, and soon she found herself with no more air in her lungs. She squeezed her eyes shut and brought her hooves to her mouth, trying to keep herself from breathing in and swallowing water. Rainbow Dash shook her head the whole time and kept her jaw clenched until the last little bit of air in her lungs was used up.

She couldn’t stop anymore. With a gasp she helplessly opened up her eyes and mouth in her body’s reflex of trying to breathe in more air. She expected the Spring water to rush into her and that would be the end…

But it didn’t. Despite her floating there with her mouth wide open no water rushed into her lungs to drown her. Instead the feeling of her lungs being filled with air rushed into her chest. The warm water ignored her, or perhaps it was the cause of this strange sensation and phenomenon. Was she really breathing underwater? Was this happening?

She took a few more experimental breaths and quickly realized that it was just like if she was breathing in air normally. As if she wasn’t submerged a hundred feet deep in a lake but was instead walking or flying about up above.

I can breathe in here… Rainbow Dash thought to herself, blinking a few times as her body and mind adjusted to the miraculous truth.

She was still descending deeper into the water though and so far had no way of getting back to the surface. What would happen if she didn’t gain the power of the Spring and couldn’t swim out of here? She didn’t really want to think about it. Now that she was a bit more conscious and aware of what was going on though she took a look at her situation and tried to figure out what she could do right now.

Her eyes roamed over to the sides of the Spring and another realization hit Rainbow Dash. Despite the brightness of the water from up above that made it impossible to look into, now that she was submerged the water was clear enough for her to see through the entire Spring. It was the clearest water she had seen in her entire life. Even with the massive size of the Spring it didn’t become murky in the slightest and she could see from her point in the center to the very edges and the rock that contained the Spring. The walls were a stark white that was almost like quartz or agate. So perfectly smooth that if there was any doubt in Dash’s mind about the creation of this place being unnatural that it was now stamped right out. And they just descended straight down and down, Rainbow Dash had probably already drifted two hundred feet at this point. The surface of the Sacred Spring was getting further away and depending on how far down she went it would soon become nothing more than a dot above her head.

They didn’t tell me how deep it actually is or what’s at the bottom. Rainbow Dash thought and turned over in the water to watch herself sink.

Her eyes widened in shock and she failed to suppress a gasp of fear at what she saw at the approaching bottom of the Sacred Spring.

Skeletons.

She couldn’t even see the actual bottom of the Spring because of the hundreds, maybe even thousands, of skeletons that rested down there. So many mammoth skeletons, perfectly preserved and pearly white in the water. But not just mammoths either. She saw massive ribcages that could’ve held an entire mammoth, skulls that looked like they belonged to huge dragons, huge serpentine skeletons all coiled up, the bones of great beasts bigger than houses, it was a graveyard of bones. Most of it was mammoths on the top—the ones who failed to gain the Spring’s power while under Tarmok’s rule. And not a single skeleton looked as small as Rainbow Dash was. They all belonged to massive creatures. Rainbow Dash was pretty sure there was even the skeleton of an Ursa Major sitting down there, resting up against the walls of the Spring.

Was she going to sink on past them? Was the water going to keep pulling her down until she hit the bottom or landed on all those bones and couldn’t go any further?

She gulped. Rainbow didn’t like the idea of disturbing the skeletons in here, that was just rude and kind of creepy.

But so far the water kept wanting to bring her closer and closer to them. Hundreds of feet down into its depth where all these skeletons permanently resided, so easy to see, as clear as day thanks to the water’s transparency. They almost didn’t look real because of how immaculate they were. Not a single crack or fracture in any bone, all of them cleaner and whiter than she could ever remember seeing a bone. The Sacred Spring preserved them.

Rainbow Dash sincerely hoped her skeleton would not be joining them.

She hook her head. I don’t need to hope, I know that aint happening.

It was when she continued drifting down, almost to the point where the skeletons started to pile up, that the feeling of the water around her started to change. Bubbles came up from deeper in the Spring and the water got warmer until it was practically scalding her skin. Then a shining light—one she couldn’t tell if it came from the water of the skeletons themselves—shone through the Sacred Spring and lit up the skeletons.

What’s going on? Rainbow Dash thought as the pulling current of the water stopped and she floated freely in the middle of the water.

She swam around in a circle, still stuck from going any higher or lower but able to turn around at least and watch as the light glowed brighter. It looked like steam or some sort of smoke was rising from the skeletons now and it was all coalescing and traveling towards her. Rainbow Dash didn’t know what that meant but she didn’t like it. She tried swimming away but now even though the current wasn’t pulling her anywhere she still couldn’t swim anywhere else, she felt like she was caught in a bubble. No matter how she moved her legs and wings through the water she didn’t gain any momentum or move herself.

The underwater smoke came to her, swirling around Rainbow Dash and for the first time making the water murky and obscuring her vision. She felt a pounding in her skull and a sudden feeling like she was dissolving into the water and becoming part of it.

No! Rainbow Dash beat her wings against the smoke to get it to dissipate but it all just stayed around her.

The first in a very long time…

Rainbow Dash’s eyes shot wide open. “Uhh...” Her hooves moved to her throat. “Oh. So I can talk now?”

Yes.

“Okaaayyy… so who—what are you?” Rainbow Dash asked the disembodied voice, eyes shifting around the gathered smoke.

A mistake. No more and no less.

“Really helpful,” Dash rolled her eyes.

All you seek is the power of this place. That is all you need to know.

Dash narrowed her eyes. “Yeah but I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. I’m just doing this to help others, alright? I’m not some crazy pony who’s gonna start or war or do something bad after I get stronger.”

I care not.

“Then why are we even talking?” Dash threw out her hooves. “Hurry up! I’ve got something really important to do up there.”

Your body can not handle it. You will be-

“Okay, let me stop you right there,” she interrupted. “I can handle it. I know myself better than anybody. I don’t know why some mammoths could take it and some couldn’t or what was wrong with all those other guys down there at the bottom of your Spring or whatever, but I’m Rainbow Dash. You got that? I’m the fastest flier in the world, the most awesome pegasus ever, Element of Loyalty and friend to like half a dozen different Alicorn Princesses. I’ve saved the world more times than I can count and I’m planning on saving it a bunch more times cause that’s just the kind of thing I think is fun. So you don’t tell me what I can’t handle. I’ve got friends to help.” She narrowed her eyes. “So hurry up.”

...

“Well?” Rainbow Dash impatiently folded her hooves over her chest.

You’re an odd one. I had a whole speech prepared.

Dash snorted. “Yeah? Well sorry, but I really don’t have time for that.”

It doesn’t matter if your desires are selfish or selfless though. All the others who came here before you have been selfish, but some had the strength of will and body to still use the power. One such as you will be torn apart regardless of your boasting.

“No I won’t be,” Rainbow Dash confidently stated.

...

Are… are you really arguing with me? Do you think I’m actually wrong or are you just trying to bluff? You can’t just say you’ll be okay. That’s not how it works. You’re just denying reality.

“Hey. I’m not doing anything like that. I’m a pony who knows how to make the impossible possible. I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again. Simple as that. There’s nothing I can’t do or overcome and I’ve got a whole life of seemingly impossible feats to prove it. So give me your power or whatever and I can prove you wrong too and add another previously impossible accomplishment to my list, it can never be long enough for my taste. So don’t tell me I’m denying reality, I’m making reality with my own wings.”

I suppose good luck then. You’re very unusual. And far more amusing than anyone else who has come into these waters. I don’t think your body will withstand what’s about to happen, but obviously you aren’t backing down.

“Obviously.”

The power though… even if you live your body wont be able to contain it for long.

“The Sages up there already told me that. I don’t care. All I need to do is beat the crud out of one mammoth.”

Good, because you won’t remember this conversation once you reemerge.

“Huh?”

No one ever does. You will reawaken and rise from the surface of the Spring as if from a deep slumber, and this will be less than a dream to you. Farewell.

“But what-”

The words died in her throat as the smoke flared up and shined brighter than the sun, Rainbow Dash winced and curled up as the heat from the Sacred Spring overtook her and a great pressure came at her from every direction. Water, power, magic, something, was all rushing into her at once with crushing force. If she could scream she would’ve but every part of her body was clamped down shut by the swirling mass of power. Before long, despite the incredible radiance, darkness ebbed away at her vision until it finally conquered her completely, and Rainbow Dash’s mind was washed away with it.

Comments

[THERDSTORYWHISPERER]

Great chapter!

[redmar]

The voice in the spring is odd. I doubt we'll ever hear the full story.

[MagicS]

10674000
You are correct, I like to leave plenty of things to mystery.

[Maud of Sterner Stuff]

That's a rather brusque manner of speech for a supposedly divine spirit.

[MagicS]

10718342
Well it's not very divine, as it says its creation was a mistake in the first place. It did try though, Rainbow Dash just annoyed it. A skill of hers.