Rainbow Dash Around the World

by MagicS

So Long, Merlantis

Ballast stood atop The Breakwater while Dredge and the others all climbed aboard his ship. They had made it back without issue and would pretty much be ready to leave as soon as Rainbow Dash and the others got back here. But suddenly the room they were in shook just ever so slightly and the water of the entry pool bubbled and rippled. Dredge and Ballast both looked around confusedly before glancing at each other.

“What was that?” Dredge asked.

“I don’t know,” Ballast shook his head. “But probably not anything good.”

Ballast ducked inside The Breakwater and started getting it ready for departure, leaving the hatch on top open. He had the gut feeling that they were going to need every extra second. Dredge quickly got into his vessel and closed his own hatch, and probably really wanted to leave immediately, but he stuck around for now.

The two had their state of the art submersibles side by side in the exit from the underwater city now. Waiting.

---

In one of the central dome’s hallways, Senax, Daylight Gleam, Gilbert, and Breakwater all came to a stop. A slight tremor had just gone through the building and it was followed by a continuous low rumbling coming from deeper inside. In the direction they had been going until just now.

“Did anyone else feel that?” Breakwater asked.

“Yeah, what was it?” Gilbert wondered.

“It felt like an earthquake,” Daylight said.

Senax bit her lip as the rumbling refused to stop—it elicited a worrisome feeling in her chest. “I really don’t like the sound of that. It’s coming from the direction Rainbow Dash should be in.”

Daylight and Gilbert shared an uncomfortable look.

“Let’s hope she’s okay but… she is the type to get into trouble,” Daylight said.

“What can be worse trouble than what she was already in?” Gilbert said.

Daylight scoffed. “That’s a good point, but let’s still not tempt fate.”

“We still going her direction then?” Breakwater asked.

Senax nodded. “Y-Yes, she might need our help.”

Gilbert smiled and started ahead at a faster pace, staying in front of the others. “We need to just believe in her, like she’s always said. It’s Rainbow Dash—how bad could things be?”

---

“Oh crud, oh crud, oh crud, oh crud, oh crud.”

Rainbow Dash flew at top speed through the white hallways of Merlantis. Behind her she could hear and feel the unrelenting torrent of ocean water that was proceeding to drown the entire central dome. The ocean wanted to claim the city and as far as Rainbow knew, nothing could stop it. If there was some kind of barrier that could stop the water from reaching everywhere else in Merlantis she wasn’t aware of it. You’d think the ancient merponies would have some kind of failsafe in case something like this happened. Just one more thing she’d like to chew them out over.

Of course maybe they did and Rainbow and her friends just hadn’t come across it.

She sped down a corner as she heard the water violently filling up the rooms just a few spots behind her. She’d need to get her friends quickly for them to escape.

That’s if they were okay. Rainbow remembered the unfortunate situation she had left them in.

She might still have another horrible problem to deal with right now.

Rainbow shook her head, trying to dispel the bad thoughts. No, no, no. Don’t think like that. Believe in your friends! They’re okay, and you’re all going to get out of here safely! I just really, really, wish I knew where they were right now!

That was the big issue. While they would’ve had a general idea of where she was when they had parted ways, Rainbow had no idea where they could be in Merlantis. The best she could do was head away from where the water was coming in and go back in the direction The Breakwater was docked. Hopefully her friends would already be heading there if they were safe. If they had dealt with Heartless on their own they might have moved to get on the way with getting out of here and waiting for Rainbow Dash to finish her fight with Godfrey. After all, since Rainbow had the Trident—had, the Trident—there wasn’t any other reason for them to stay down here in Merlantis once the dangers were taken care of.

“Just please be safe,” Rainbow whispered.

Thankfully she was still the greatest flier in the world and she was able to make quick work of these hallways and actually get some distance on the encroaching ocean. The water had to spread out and fill everything up after all, not just follow her path. It wouldn’t last forever but she was comfortable with how she was handling herself for now.

Her attitude was about to change as things got even more hectic when she turned the next corner.

Her four friends were right in the middle of the hallway, running towards her.

Rainbow’s pupils shrank.

Daylight’s mouth opened up as she started to say something-

“No time!” Rainbow Dash loudly interrupted her. “No time, no time, no time! Gilbert—grab Breakwater and fly with me, I’m grabbing Senax and Daylight, just follow me as fast as you can—we have to move right now!” She shot like a rainbow lightning bolt at them.

“What are you-” Daylight again tried to say before Rainbow picked her and Senax off their hooves, she tossed the merpony on her back and grabbed the unicorn, holding her tight to her barrel, and sped down the hallway without slowing down. Gilbert thankfully knew when it was the right time to shut up and listen to Rainbow Dash and had also quickly tossed the captain onto his back and was flying right beside her now.

“Can we please learn what’s going on?!” Breakwater shouted.

“Uhh…” Rainbow grimaced. “Well the good news is, I won. The bad news is that sound you’re hearing right now? That’s the ocean coming in to bury all of Merlantis underwater. Uh, double underwater.”

“Excuse me?!” Daylight yelled.

She and the others turned their heads to look behind them—and caught sight of a massive wall of water turning the corner and crashing towards them now.

“Oh dear… that’s not good,” Gilbert gulped.

“Yeah you know that glass dome in the big chamber with the map painted on the floor? Kind of sort of got broken while we were fighting,” Rainbow said.

“You did what?” Senax glared at her.

“It was Godfrey’s fault!” Rainbow complained, trying to defend herself.

Daylight whined in disgust from beneath her. “You’re bleeding all over me...”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Okay, I’m sorry about that, but could you maybe wait to complain about it until we’re not about to die!”

“T-That’s fair,” Daylight nodded.

Rainbow and Gilbert were both flying at full force with their passengers through the halls of Merlantis, back the way they had come in. It would be quite the trip to reach where The Breakwater was waiting for them but they’d have to do it. Both were going to push their wings to the limit. Rainbow’s were already burning, but she found in times like this, where her friends really needed her, she had an inexhaustible energy inside her.

They reached the exit from the central dome quite quickly, no time to look around or gawk at anything anymore. And from here it was one straight—though very long—path back to their ship.

Breakwater was quietly praying to Mother Ocean on Gilbert’s back, saying something about moving to Meer if he survived this.

Daylight was grumbling in annoyance. Typical, thought Rainbow Dash.

Senax was quiet with a grim expression on her face. Rainbow couldn’t even begin to imagine the mess of thoughts and emotions going through her right now.

And behind them the unstoppable wall of water was coming. It made an unnatural, monstrous noise, as it came for them. Almost like it was actually trying to catch and drown them. It couldn’t be, it couldn’t, but it didn’t stop Rainbow’s imagination from going places. No matter what it was so loud, now as it was shooting down the long hallway with them, towards the outer domes and buildings, it smothered all other noise. Rainbow couldn’t hear herself think, she couldn’t hear what anyone else might have been saying, the only sound was the crashing and tumbling wall of water behind them. They still had distance on it, and it would get better once they reached some of the other buildings down here where the path branched off, but it was still much too close for comfort.

Rainbow Dash pushed herself harder, a little more distance would be nice. If they just had a little more time to get onboard The Breakwater before the water reached them. Gilbert saw the necessity of speeding up and tried his best as well.

After a short time they reached the first of the other buildings on their path. They had to maneuver around some tighter corridors and some old artwork and statues, but otherwise it was still a mostly straight path back out. Rainbow Dash figured that if they made it to the hall of mirrors in decent time that they’d be in good shape. As long as they could get through it without the water being in that long corridor at the same time, they should be okay.

Behind them the sound of the raging water lessened slightly—that was a good sign.

“Please don’t let me die down here, please don’t let me die down here...” Daylight started repeating.

“Yeah, right there with you,” Rainbow said.

“You said this was Godfrey’s fault but I swear I’ll haunt you anyways,” the unicorn frowned.

“Save your energy for later, Daylight,” Breakwater said to her.

“Save your energy he says...” Gilbert huffed and panted heavily as he flew along. “Easier for some of us than others!”

“We’re almost there!” Rainbow shouted to try and keep them focused. She left out the “Sort of” that came at the end of that sentence.

They kept flying while the walls of Merlantis around them continued to shake—and now with greater force as more and more water was flowing through it. It didn’t matter that they had gotten some distance on the rushing water behind them, the chaos and sheer volume of water that had already entered Merlantis was causing tremors to reverberate throughout the entire city. When Rainbow Dash saw the hall of mirrors she smiled, hoping they had enough room. If she could’ve pulled Gilbert along right now she would have, but since she refused to leave him and Breakwater behind she stayed at essentially the same speed he was going. They were all getting out of this.

Their reflected bodies was almost a dizzying experience as they jetted past the mirrors. It truly was not much further now.

If Ballast wasn’t there they might have a big problem.

---

“This is seriously bad...” Ballast said as he looked around the entry room. The water in the pool had started to rage for some reason and his and Dredge’s ship both were bouncing around in it. Right now Ballast himself was standing inside the hatch, holding it open and looking ahead in the hope that any second his friends would burst through the door and they could leave.

He found himself counting the seconds while the tremors continued to shake the walls around them unceasingly.

37 seconds later and the doors practically exploded when Rainbow Dash and Gilbert flew through them while carrying the rest of his friends.

Ballast’s eyebrows shot up. “You’re-”

“No time!” Rainbow Dash yelled as she and Gilbert flew right towards The Breakwater. “Get down to the wheel and get us out of here!”

Ballast gulped. “C-Can do!”

Next to him he saw Dredge’s vessel finally sink down into the water and get ready to leave. He was pretty surprised that his former apprentice and rival had actually stayed here for this long. It was impressive, it spoke better of him than Ballast would have ever thought. But he definitely had the right of it—it was time to go, whatever was happening, Rainbow Dash’s attitude told him they had to get out now. He dropped from the hatch and got right into the driver’s seat, thanks to earlier the vessel was primed and ready to go as soon as the hatch was closed.

Once Rainbow Dash reached the hatch she practically threw both Daylight and Senax down into it, where they both landed with a painful thwump on the floor, and stood by to let Gilbert and Breakwater head down just as quickly. As soon as the griffon and earth pony were inside, she spared one last glance down the hallway and saw the rushing wall of water coming closer. It was almost about to pour in and drown this room along with the rest of Merlantis it had already raged through.

Rainbow Dash frowned and jumped down as well, pulling the hatch closed.

“Take us out of here!” She shouted.

“Working on it!” Ballast replied and had The Breakwater start to submerge.

Just outside the viewport, directly in front of them and right before the ship submerged completely, the great wall of water burst into the chamber and swallowed everything up. Gilbert screamed as The Breakwater was tossed about, Ballast grit his teeth as he almost lost control of the wheel and fought to keep them steady. It was like they had sailed directly into a powerful whirlpool, the ship and everyone inside was being treated like a rag doll, a loud bang erupted through the interior as they smacked into the wall of the pool room. The water was so chaotic they couldn’t see anything clearly out of the viewport, Ballast was moving it on pure instinct.

Senax nearly slammed against the bulkhead before Rainbow Dash grabbed her to keep her safe. But another sharp and sudden turn of The Breakwater sent them careening the other direction.

And Rainbow Dash’s head smacked against one of the metal lockers.

Everything went dark while The Breakwater spun around in the water.

Comments

[RoboRed]

Ouch. Lights out.

“Save your energy he says...” Gilbert huffed and panted heavily as he flew along. “Easier for some of us than others!”

All those races with Rainbow really paying off right now.

[redmar]

Hopefully by the time Rainbow regains conciousness they are on their way back to the Heart of Azure.