Price of Pride
The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rocks and make your home on the heights, you who say to yourself, 'Who can bring me down to the ground?' - Obadiah 1:3, The Holy Bible
Price of Pride
“Rainbow Dash this is a bad idea,” Fluttershy said, teeth chattering out of nervousness.
“Come on Fluttershy. We have been in the Everfree plenty of times lately. Besides we can’t let this thief get away. and if things get too hairy we can just fly out above the trees.” Rainbow Dash said pushing her yellow friend along.
“But Rainbow we don’t even know if the thief went this way.”
Rainbow Dash quickly got in front of her friend and pointed a hoof at the ground.
“Yeah we do” she said with a bit of a smug smile forming across her face.
Imprinted on the ground where oval shaped tracks with strange patterned grooves inside of them. This alone made the owner of the tracks a mystery. However Rainbow Dash was determined to catch the thief that had been stealing stuff from all over Ponyville.
The thefts started a few days ago. First it was food missing from many of the food vendors in town, things like breads and vegetables. Then books started to disappear from the town library. Lastly tools, from hammers to saws, started missing from the outline farms. The reasoning behind the thefts was as mysterious as the thief itself. However Rainbow Dash had enough of it. She was going to find the thief and bring him in before anything else got stolen.
“Oh,” Fluttershy said sheepishly as she looked down at the tracks.
Rainbow Dash continued deeper into the Everfree, Fluttershy reluctantly following her. The two traveled through the underbrush of the Everfree following the tracks. Their trek lasting close to an hour before Fluttershy stopped.
“Rainbow Dash do, do you smell that?” she asked.
Rainbow Dash stopped and sniffed the air. A smile crept across her face knowing that the thief could be nearby.
“It’s a fire.”
Rainbow then broke into a full sprint following the tracks leaving Fluttershy to catch up. She barreled through the brush. The sound branches snapping and plants being crushes could be heard clearly as she ran.
The smell of smoke changed on her however as she got closer. She no longer smelt just the burning of wood but something else filled her nostrils. It smelt both warm and appetizing and Rainbow Dash’s stomach started to growl in anticipation.
She broke through the underbrush and found herself in a small clearing in front of a cave. The first thing she noticed the campfire she was hoping to see. However there was also two fish impaled on sticks and set up to roast over the fire. Rainbow Dash was a little disappointed by the cooking fish. It smelt so good and appetizing yet she couldn’t eat it.
Next she saw the miscellaneous tools laying around. All of them scattered around the camp. An Ax was laying next to a saw near a crude pile of lumber. A shovel by the fire where a ring of earth was dug to keep the fire from spreading. Rope and a tarp was used to make a lean-to just buy the cave entrance. Yet whatever stole and used them in the first place was nowhere to be found.
Rainbow Dash’s ears started to flick as the sound of heavy steps started coming from the cave. She eyed the cave entrance ready to pounce at whatever was coming. Then it appeared and Rainbow Dash was momentarily stunned at what she saw. What came out should not have been real and Rainbow Dash’s mind was trying to grip the sudden reality of the situation. Out of the cave stood a creature of myth, a human.
The human’s clothes were ragged to say the least, holes and tears littered his clothes. His skin was pale and dripping sweat. And his eye were bloodshot and swollen. His one hand was wrapped up with in a bloodstained cloth. In the other hand he held a hammer. It was clear this human was not in the best of health.
Rainbow Dash stared at it for a moment unsure what to make of the situation. A creature of myth was standing in front of her. Then she noticed the hammer in its hand and remembered why she came out all this way to begin with.
“You stole that didn’t you?!” Rainbow Dash yelled know the answer already.
“Please leave,” The human said in a sickly whorse voice.
“Not till you return what you stole!”
“Leave!” the human said again trying to increase the volume of his already weak voice.
“You want to do this the hard way?!”
“GO AWAY!” this time the human started coughing.
“Fine! We’ll do this the hard way!”
Rainbow Dash shoot out at the human, flying at breakneck speeds. The human could not dodge the incoming charge and Rainbow collided with the human sending him back and knocking him to the ground. The two tumbled back into the cave. Before the human could recover from the blow Rainbow Dash was on top of him, pinning his back to the ground.
“You give up?”
The human responded to the question with the hammer he still held onto and with a mighty swing hit Rainbow Dash right between the eyes. The force of the hit knocked her unconscious along with splitting the skin as blood started coming out from the point of impact. He struggled to get back up, coughing unhealthily the whole time. He grabbed Rainbow Dash be her rear legs and drug her out of the cave back into the camp.
“Rainbow!” Fluttershy yelped.
She had just caught up and broken through the underbrush into the camp to see Rainbow being drug out, the human immediately let go of Rainbow Dash and turned to Fluttershy. The human despite his sickly appearance gave a very annoyed look. Fluttershy however was full of fear, her legs shaking at the very sight that had unfolded in front of her.
------
Rainbow Dash groaned in pain as she woke up. She opened her eye but she saw nothing but blackness. Fear started to grip as she tried to recall what happened. Then it came to her, the human, the camp, the hammer. Then she remembered an even more important fact.
“Fluttershy!” she yelled but was only answered only with silence.
She then noticed the bandage over her head that covered her eyes. She fumbled along as she tried to undo them. As they came off she noticed her surroundings. She was not in the cave in the forest that she was expecting but that of a hospital ward. The only illumination coming from the moonlight through the windows.
How and when she got to the hospital was a mystery to her. However the image of the human and his camp came to her mind. A bit of anger started to rise in her. She knew well that all the stolen goods could easily be replaced but it was the principle of the matter that was eating at her. This human had not only stolen from her friends and neighbors but also made a fool of her by knocking her out with just one blow.
Laying her head back on the bed pillow of the hospital bed. She started thinking of how she could get the stuff back. Tomorrow she would prove that she could get the stolen goods back, no matter what.
“I won’t be made a fool of, not by a thief,” she whispered to herself before drifting into sleep.
-----
The rays of morning light came through the hospital windows waking Rainbow Dash from her slumber. She didn’t wait for a doctor or nurse to come in. She needed out, and she needed to prove to herself that this human, no this thief wasn’t better than her.
She had no trouble sneaking out of the hospital as the nurses and doctors were too busy with other patients. And now she was off to her destination, she was going to show Ponyville just how awesome she was by capturing the thief and returning what was stolen.
It did not take her long to find the cave, and like the first time she was there the tools lay scattered on the ground. Still flying in the air she spotted the thief in front of a tree. He was breathing heavily that much she could make out but like before he had the same sickly look to him.
“Why is he so sickly looking?” Rainbow mentally asked her self, then immediately dismissed it.
She was going to get him this time, She knew it. She’d get the jump on him, knock him over then kick him in on the head to knock him out. It would be crude and violent but with her speed she was confident she could pull it off. And thus began her charge from the sky.
Rainbow Dash fell from the sky like a rocket. Her target getting closer by the second. She was going to do it. She was almost there!
The thief didn’t see or hear her coming. His mind was on another task as he raised a double sided ax, readying it for a swing at the tree.
Time slowed down for Rainbow Dash as she saw the ax being raised. It was out of view before and now she was dive bombing straight for it. She swerved trying to avoid the blade. Her eyes followed the blade edge as it passed by her face however she could not avoid the running into the thief. They collided and Rainbow Dash bounced off the thief and skidded across the ground. The thief as well was knocked down to the ground.
Rainbow Dash picked herself up off the ground. She winced as she felt a sharp pain coming from her side. Her eyes went wide when she looked to see what was causing her pain. Where one of her wings was supposed to be was only a bloody stump. She couldn’t help but eye the trail of blood. Her eyes followed it all the way back to the ax. Next to which her wing laid.
Rainbow Dashes mind couldn’t take it. The very source her abilities and talent was just striped from her. With it went her dreams or joining the Wonderbolts and being the best flyer in Equestria. Her body started to shake uncontrollably and her vision start to fade.
-----
Rainbow Dash awoke once again in the hospital ward. However this time she cared little for how she got back. The event of her injury was fresh in her mind. Her wing was gone. She would forever be a grounded pegasus from this day forth.
“You're awake.” Fluttershy said.
“Hi...” Rainbow said emotionlessly.
“Why did you go back Rainbow.”
“He was a thief! I wasn't going to let him get away with what he was doing.”
“
Why did you not read my note?”
“What note?”
“I left a note for you for when you woke up, I thought you would have found it. It explained the condition the human was in.”
“Condition? Fluttershy are you taking the thiefs side?”
“Rainbow it wasn’t his fault. He was sick and-”
“A thief!”
“RAINBOW!” Fluttershy yelled, “He was bit by a Timberwolf! He had Scalps!”
Rainbow remained silent.
“He didn’t even know where he was, or what he was doing!”
Fluttershys expression changed from anger to sadness as she started remembering the next part.
“The delusions had already set in. When I got to the cave and saw you being dragged, I yelled. Do you know what he said after that?” Fluttershy gave a pause seeing if Rainbow Dash would answer, and continued when none came. “He said, ‘Mom is that you?’”
Rainbow Dash finally winced. She knew what Scalps could do to a pony. It would make them look sick and fevered yet the pony would still feel fine, but in the last stage they would start hallucinate. If not treated before the hallucinations started death was all but certain.
“I ended up singing him to sleep before getting you out of their. He was in the last stages Rainbow and I figured it would have been best just to wait. Then you snuck out of the hospital. We were all worried about you Rainbow...”
“I knew you didn’t read the note at that point. I had a feeling you would head back there. I went and got Twilight and a few of the local guards. We found you on the ground, not far we found your wing next to his corpse.”
Rainbow Dash just stared at her friend. a look of shock and horror came over her face.
“I’ll leave you be for now.” Fluttershy said as she left the ward.
Rainbow but her hoof in her face and started crying. She had let her pride and arrogance blind her of the obvious...
And she paid a price...