Equestria has been attacked. Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash both rush to join the defense, but as the rules of war change and objective's shift, how will our ponies deal with the new reality of a brutal hit-and-fly war of attrition?
Equestria has been attacked, without provocation or warning. Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash both rush to join a newly forming Equestrian Royal Army, but as the rules of war change and objective's shift, how will our ponies deal with the new reality of a brutal hit-and-fly war of attrition?
Prince Shining Armor, Captain of the Equestrian Royal Guard, sat in the Crystal Empires throne room, on his own throne. I will probably never get used to any of this, he thought to himself, as he looked around at those in attendance. Some of the ponies gathered were nobles, but the majority were common folk, here to speak with the Princess.
Princes Mi Amore Cadenza, acting ruler of the Crystal Empire, sat on her throne to Shining Armor's left. He took a moment to appreciate how lucky he was to be married to such a beauty, who had such a kind and loving heart; even if it meant being stuck here listening to the common ponies problems—problems he usually had no authority to fix anyway—and, worse the noble ponies problems, which were usually not problems at all, yet they would fuss and make demands all day.
Cadance finished giving her speech, or administering justice, or answering whatever legal, moral or scholarly question she had been asked, and the farm pony smiled and bowed, before turning to leave. They usually smiled when Cadance was finished; even when two ponies would come with deep disagreement Cadance could often find an answer to their problems that benefited both. As the next pony in line approached something in his hallow, deep set eyes told Shining he would be one of the few to leave in a fury after hearing the Princess speak.
Shining stat up straight, and took a moment to look over his guards that stood arrayed around the room. Most simply stood at attention, but a few looked up to meet his gaze and gave him a quick nod; he was not alone in his suspicions.
Princes Cadance showed no sign of noticing the strange ponies angry eyes, speaking in her standard kind yet forceful tone. Cadance had long ago done away with the Royal Herald, preferring to instead address her subject's directly herself.
"Good day. What brings you to my royal court?"
The pony, his fur a dark forest green in a tangled mess, looked up at the Princess, and did something Shining Armor honestly had not expected; he broke into tears. He did not sob, but simply stood breathing heavily as tears streamed from his squinted eyes, and his mouth wrapped into a tight grimace. "I... I bring terrible news from the east..."
"I'm sorry; what news is it that pains you so?" Cadance asked after a long moment of waiting.
"An army of ponies came through the valley, and surrounded our village. Most moved on deeper into the Empire, but those that stayed behind told us to stay in the village. Late in the night I escaped, but they gave chase. I managed to escape but as I ran they shouted at me, telling me if I continued my family would be... I..."
"Umm, excuse me," Shining started, sitting stiff at attention, "but what do you know about your attackers? Were they bandits? I'll have a detachment move directly to your town, and force them to leave."
"They were no bandits," the pony said flatly, his squinted eyes widening. "They moved with purpose, and en-mass. The few they left behind to guard my village numbered in the hundreds, but their main force was thousands strong. I do not know anything more, but we must do something! I'm no more than a day ahead of them, unless they slowed."
Shining prepared to ask more questions, but his wife spoke first. "We thank you for your great service, and will do our best to deal with the situation as it develops. If you could follow my husband he will escort you to someplace private to ask you some followup questions, and then we will begin formulating a plan." She then turned to address Shining directly, "Go, and deal with this situation as you feel is best. Remember, you carry my full authority as well as your own."
"Of course," Shining whispered, bowing his head to his wife and princess, before rising to lead the disheveled pony away. With just a small, discrete motion two of the guards followed as well. Shining lead the small entourage down the main hall, passed the line of ponies waiting to see Cadance, and down to the guard's main barracks. It was as good a place as any for what he believed would be a short interrogation, and he would be able to dispatch the guard immediately.
"What do you know about our attacker's, and are you sure that's what they really are?" Shining did the best he could to keep his voice friendly, and to hide his disbelief; there were guard's ponies spread throughout the Empire and all along the boarder, and nothing had been reported in. There was something that had caught his attention yesterday; the guard's station at the Rhine rivers northern crossing had failed to send their weekly report, but he wasn't expecting to hear back from the messenger he had sent for them until tomorrow.
"I am sure of it! They came into our village like a flood, with weapons raised and shouting! They collected up all of the outlying farm ponies, and forced them into the town, then surrounded us. They took what food they could easily find, then the majority continued on their way, but those that remained swore they'd kill anypony who tried to warn our empire. Warn you of what, I asked myself... This must be an invasion; I can think of no other reason to march so many through our lands in secret. Please, you must prepare... I feel it is already too late for my people."
"It isn't too late for anyone," Shining said forcefully, truly believing what he said. I can't risk all of the guard at once, and if what this pony says is true we may be under attack in just a matter of days.
Shining turned away from the farm pony before him, and turned to the closest of the two guards that had accompanied him. "Head to dispatch and have them round up as many Pegasi as we have, and have them scout every path between here, and the Rhine's North Crossing. Send our fastest flier directly to the guard's station there, and have them report back immediately. I expect them back by tonight. Everyone has strict orders not to engage, and to keep their distance; if we really are about to be at war we need every pony alive and well to prepare our defense, but we also need to know what's happening. Every member of the guard is to report back by tomorrow evening for new orders. Understood?"
"Yes, sir!" the guard snapped, before turning to leave.
Shining himself turned to go. "Where are you going?" the farm pony asked as Shining marched away.
"I'm going to speak with the Princess before sending a letter to Celestia. If we are being invaded the Royal Guard will not be enough; we will need the Royal Army, and the sooner they arrive the better. And thank you for coming to us, if we really are under attack you will be treated as a great hero."
"And if we are not?" the pony asked, following Shining, doubt for the first time seeping into his voice.
"Well, then I will personally be rather annoyed with you for messing up my guard rotations, but the alternative, being caught unprepared by a large scale invasion force, is far worth the risk of wasting my Guard's Ponies time." Besides, Shinning thought to himself, I'm only sending the Pegasi; the rest of the guard will be on standby, ready to prevent the assassination attempt that this distraction likely serves for. If it's not a distraction this is a prudent first step all the same.
Shining turned to his remaining guard, "take this pony to one of our guest rooms, and make him comfortable. Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to stay there until further notice, in case we have more questions or are in need of your help," or to interrogate you to root out your supporters if this does turn out to be a ruse to open an assassination attempt, Shining finished in his head.
Shining walked the way back to the throne room on his own, passed the guard's standing on either side of the doorway and back to his wife's side, who was in the middle of getting an earful from a self-entitled noble, ranting about some unfair law cutting into his profits. Cadance had looked up at Shining, and given him a warm smile before smoothly forcing her face into a calm neutral.
Shining was about to whisper to Cadance, asking her to excuse herself as soon as possible so they could discus this, when he heard the heavy steel shod hoof-falls of a guard's pony coming into the room, working hard to catch her breath. "Sir!" the guard's mare shouted, ignoring the noble's glare, "and ma'am! We are under attack!"
Shining rose immediately. So, it was all for an assassination attempt. "Get the civilians out and clear, now! Alert all guard's ponies to standby now!" As the rooms guard's began ushering the crowd out of the throne room, Shining turned back to the guard's mare who had come to warn them. "Where are the assassins, and how many?"
"They are not assassins sir, and we don't know! I was sent after the first hundred poured into the valley! They'll be to the city in just a few hours if they keep their pace up."
"Where?" Shining repeated.
"They're coming up from the south, near the train depot to Canterlot."
That doesn't make sense, Shining thought, if the civilian earlier was right, and they came across the Rhine's Northern Crossing, then it would be faster if they attacked through the mountains, directly into the back of the Crystal Castle and it's surrounding city, rather than cross the entire valley from the south, in full sight of everypony the whole way...
"Cadance, we need to send a letter to Celestia, and get the Royal Army here as soon as possible. Failing that we need to sound the evacuation."
"But Shining, we can't abandon—"
"I'm not sure how long our Guard can hold off in a siege, and it will be far easier to rebuild a burned town, than to clean the street's of the corpses. If we can not protect the civilians here, we must get them to safety."
Another guard, this one a large Earth Pony stallion, charged into the room. "Thank Celestia, Prince, Princess, they!—"
"have an army approaching from the south," Shining finished for him.
"What? No, they're attacking from the north!"
"How many?" If they're still in the mountains, we'll have less than an hour.
"Thousands, sir. They're at the gates!"
"What?! What happened to our post in the northern pass?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Cadance, we need to leave—"
"I will not abandon our people," Cadance stated.
"I think it's too late to escape," the guard's mare from earlier said. She was standing near the exit to throne rooms northern balcony. "Their Pegasi are already circling the town!"
"What happened to our own Pegasi?" Cadance asked, concern darkening her beautiful features.
"I split them up and sent them to figure out what was happening," Shining stated flatly. He moved up, and pressed passed the guard's mare to stand on the balcony. From outside he could clearly hear the sounds of fighting echoing up from the city below; they were inside the city, murdering their way towards the castle right now, with a flock of at least a hundred Pegasi circling above, ready to catch any who tried to leave by air. As he watched, a group of about twenty Pegasi broke from the flock above, and moved to dive towards the castle, seaming to come straight at Shining Armor himself.
"Guards, to the throne room!" Shining shouted, projecting his voice across nearly all of the castle. "Cadance, we need to barricade ourselves—"
"We will face them here," she said, calmly.
"They out number us greatly, and there are too many entrances—"
"The only easy way into this room—"
"There is a group of at least twenty Pegasi flying to the balconies as we speak!"
"...Then I shall clean them from our skies." Shining Armor had only seen Princess Cadance angry a handful of times, and only once while wielding her powerful magic. As she moved towards the balcony, Shining honestly felt bad for what the attacking pegasi were about to endure.
As the couple argued, guard's ponies had filtered into the room; Shining counted just fifteen total. "We must hold them here. Cadance can stop the Pegasi coming from the north. I and you two will stop any coming in the southern balcony. The rest of you will barricade the main door. Now!"
This is bad, this is very bad, Shining chanted to himself as he moved to the southern balcony. He allowed the two guards to step in front of him; he was still in his dress wear and without his armor, and he planned on fighting solely with his magic. If the best laid plans always go wrong, will this one have a chance?
The Pegasi were already approaching Cadance as she stood on the northern balcony, her light teal magic pulsing across her long horn. "Come no closer, or you will be turned to dust!" she screamed at them.
Shining considered telling her not to waste her strength, that they would need her fighting with maximum efficiency if they were to survive this, but they were not going to survive this, so what did it mater?.
Before Shining could think further, four Pegasi landed on the balcony, immediately stepping forward to make room for four more to land behind them. They were clearly not guards, or Royal Army, or even members of the Wonderbolts, and Equestria didn't have a proper Royal Air-Force anymore. They wore mostly thick leather armor, but a few had thin metal plates on parts of their armor, but none were very heavy; not like the guards.
Shining didn't give them any warning; none was needed, as they had made their intentions perfectly clear. Shining pushed a large amount of power into his horn as he focused on the simple spell designed for the pure and simple job of cutting, then cast it in four quick bursts, aimed at the exposed throats of the attacking Pegasi. The right most three fell to their knees, blood pouring across the balcony, but the fourth on the left jumped up just in time to take it across his lightly armored chest; screaming in pain he immediately took flight.
The back four Pegasi shoved passed their dieing companions, still grasping at their throats in a vain attempt to stop their lives from pouring away. Four more took their place, pressing in behind them. The Guards mare took a quick swing at the left most Pegasi, while the guard stallion on Shining Armor's right slammed his helmeted head into the right most Pegasus's chest, pushing him back into the balconies entryway.
This left Shining with the middle two. He had no weapon, and was unarmored, so he responded in the only way he could; with his magic. He cast a simple flat one way shield spell, and smashed it forward into the two Pegasi face's, throwing them back into their comrades. The guards mare had managed to overpower the Pegasi on her side, and slashed his neck with a fatal swipe. As the guard on Shining Armor's right failed to push the Pegasi back, he stabbed up into his chest, burying his short-sword deep in the Pegasus's ribcage.
Shining expanded his magic shield to cover the entire doorway. The rapidly growing group of Pegasi outside began bashing on his shield with their weapons, but Shining could hold them back for quite some time. I likely have nearly an hour before this becomes to stressful, he thought, taking a look around the room.
Cadance's balcony was slick with blood, and for a moment Shining Armor's heart threatened to explode, but he forced himself to calm as he looked over Cadance, who was clearly unharmed. I guess she decided turning them to ash would waste too much energy, so she's simply gutting them. As the bodies piled up around her Cadance was forced back into the throne room.
Shining was about to order his guards to help her, when the throne rooms main door was smashed open. A swarm of Earth ponies rushed towards the small gathering of guards.
"Back up the others!" Shining shouted at his two guards, as he rushed towards Cadance. He ignored the sounds of battle as he rushed to her side, and sealed the entryway just as he had on his side. Feeling the strain of both spells, he likely only had about thirty minutes in him if the Pegasi kept up their assault, but that was plenty all things considered.
"Let me take over the spell," Cadance said, her jaw clenched tightly. "I... I can't hurt anypony, anymore today..." There were tears in her eyes.
Unable to come up with a better idea, Shining Armor transferred the weight of his spell onto his wife; one of the most powerful beings in Equestria. After taking a moment to make sure Cadance could hold it, and receiving a slight nod, Shining Armor turned to the battle that was rapidly expanding across the throne room. Counting the number of enemy corpses scattered across the ground it was tempting to say the guard was winning, but Shining could only see eight of them still fighting.
Rushing down from behind the thrones, Shinning forced his way directly into the middle of the fight, projecting a shield passed his guards and pressing the attacking Earth ponies back. He considered attempting to kill some of them, but as he struggled not to slip on all the blood already spilled he pushed the thought from his mind; there was no way he could possibly kill them all, so he may as well just concentrate on protecting his own.
He managed to get all the living enemies pressed back outside the main room, and he telekinetically slammed the doors closed, before sealing them with a more energy efficient spell. This should have been our game plane from the start, he realized, and we should have gotten word to Celestia; I would feel a lot better if I knew the Royal Army was coming to save us.
Shining moved back to Cadance, and after receiving another slight nod from her he merged their spells together, so they could share the upkeep between themselves. His remaining eight guards moved between the bodies laying across the room, some ponies on both sides were still alive and would need medical help soon if they were to live.
"Who are these ponies?" Cadance suddenly asked. She didn't look good; he knew it wasn't her's but the blood smeared across her coat put Shining Armor's nerves on edge.
"I have no idea, but they are well organized to have made it this far with so many." He had no idea what else to say, or do. It was over, as far as he knew. At least we can hold out for a few hours, together.
He immediately regretted thinking that, as a lance of pain shot from his horn deep into his head, as the upkeep on his shield spell's skyrocketed. Cadance shrieked and backed away from the balcony, where a blue coated unicorn mare was standing, just on the other side of their shield spell. She pressed her horn into the spell, and it pulsated with a deep violet.
Again Shining Armors head exploded, filling with sharp pain as colors blurred and shifted before his eyes. Again, Cadance shrieked, but she stood strong. A second wave of pain hammered into Shining Armor's mind, this time with enough force to drop him to his knees, and bow his head to the ground. He tried to rise, to meet this new enemy head on, but a final wave of pain pushed him to the edge of consciousness.
He felt the strain of maintaining the spells double as Cadance passed out. Unable to open his eyes, let alone rise and fight, Shining Armor very nearly joined her, but he managed to find the energy to shout one word that might possibly save the lives of his few remaining guards. "Surrender!"
The eight guards still in fighting condition rushed to help their fallen leaders. While four attended to the unconscious Cadance, the other four helped Shining to stand. Shining let the shield spell falter and fade, and once again shouted the command, "surrender."
The guards attending Cadance pulled her gently back, then stood in a row in front of her, while the guards around Shinning stood on either side of him.
Behind them Pegasi from the southern entrance rushed into the room and spread out, and Earth ponies flooded into the throne room from the far side. In front of them, the Unicorn mare tried to back away from the entryway, but was shoved forward by the mass of Pegasi behind her, so she ducked into the room and immediately to the side to let the Pegasi through. They were quickly surrounded, on all sides.
"We surrender," Shining told them. "Guards, lower your weapons; this fight is over."
"A wise decision," the Unicorn spoke. She was young; not much older than Twilight or her friends, and she was quite petite. It was a little hard to believe that such a small pony had overpowered both Cadance and Shining Armor, but he had gotten into magical sparing matches with his little sister before, and knew first hoof how irrelevant size was when it came to magic.
One of the Pegasi, impressively tall and well built for the normally graceful race, stepped forward. "Step away from the Prince and Princess," he ordered in a quick bark. Shining couldn't place the accent, but it was somewhat thick and very noticeable. He didn't recall hearing much of one when the Unicorn spoke.
"Listen to them," Shining mumbled as he stepped back, and made his way to Cadance. The Princess had regained consciousness, and was looking around, eyes wide. "It will be ok," Shining told himself as much as her as he approached.
"You two, go to your chambers and you will not be harmed," the massive Pegasi ordered.
"Not unless you spare my guards," Shining barked back, although he knew he had next to no energy to force a resolution.
"Fine," the Pegasi spat, "stay and watch if you must. Stallions, you have your orders." As the massive Pegasi turned to leave, the remaining Pegasi stepped forwards, attacking the now unarmed guards ponies from every direction at once. Shining looked down at his wife, and dragged her face up to force her to look back at him. Tears came to both of their eyes as a guard laying wounded from the earlier fight screamed, as he was stabbed through the chest.
"Why?" Cadance cried out, burying her muzzle in Shining Armor's chest.
"What ponies would refuse to spare even the wounded?" Shining demanded. With the massive Pegasi gone, his eyes found the blue Unicorn. She wasn't looking very happy either, but she was able to hold Shining Armor's gaze.
"You heard the Stallion; we have our orders," and with that the little blue coated mare looked around the room. "Collect our wounded, but leave the rest. We don't have much time." She sat in the corner and watched as the Pegasi collected up the few of their own to survive the encounter with the guards, and check to make sure those that had fallen were truly gone, before the Pegasi started filing out onto the balconies, and the Earth ponies began leaving through the main entrance.
The Unicorn turned to look at Shining and Cadance one last time, before she to trotted out onto the northern balcony, before disappearing in a violet flash.
It took Shining a minute before he managed to speak. "We need to get a message to Celestia, now."
Cadance only nodded as she rose from the cold marble floor.
Twilight Sparkle had a rather sheltered life, living first with her parents in their large house in Canterlot and then living in the Castle proper itself as Princess Celestia's personal student. Now, she was a princess herself, and one of the land's most powerful spell casters, and as an Alicorn she commanded the flight of a Pegasus, and the strength of an Earth pony for good measure.
This was part of why she was leaving. It was only yesterday they had received the news; that the Crystal Empire was attacked, and most of the Royal Guard was dead. Twilight simply couldn't stand by as thousands of ponies joined the Royal Army to fight back, especially not considering just how powerful she was. Yes, she would need a lot of training, and yes she would need a lot of practice before she could truly face an enemy in battle, and it would be hard to overcome her fear, but she needed to, and there was no pony that could stop her.
She had already told her friends goodbye; all except Rainbow Dash. She had gone to Rainbow's cloud home twice, but both times Rainbow had slept through her knocking and Twilight couldn't wait any longer; she needed to go now, or she might lose her nerve. The last of her friends she had spoken too was Spike, and he had not taken to her leaving very well.
He didn't understand why she had to go, and worse he didn't understand why she couldn't take him with her. They had argued for nearly an hour, and the best lie Twilight could come up for was I want you to look after the town, and all our friends, while I'm gone. She simply couldn't tell Spike the truth; that he needed to get used to what it was like without her, in case she didn't come back.
So Twilight had left, then and there. Her original plan was to wait for the train and leave at noon, but she couldn't take it anymore and needed to be out of Ponyville now, so she was flying to Canterlot. It's not so bad, she thought to herself. I've made this flight before... Everything is going to be ok. I just wish I didn't have to go alone. Applejack need's to look after her family, especially if Big Macintosh leaves to join. Rarity and Fluttershy simply are not cut out for army life. Pinkie Pie... is Pinkie. Rainbow—
"Twilight!" Rainbow Dash's nasal voice echoed up behind her, cutting off her thought, "you left without me!"
"Oh, Rainbow I'm sorry," Twilight shouted back, without turning to look. She couldn't bring herself to look towards Ponyville. "It's—"
"Hard to say goodbye," Rainbow finished, popping into view just below Twilight, flying upside down. "I understand, I... skipped out on Rarity and Fluttershy... and Scoots."
"Skipped out on what?" Rainbow was easily keeping up with Twilight, even though Twilight hadn't slow from what she believed was a vary rapid pace. Rainbow was even flying upside down!
"I didn't tell Fluttershy or Rarity goodbye. Common Twi, listen."
"What?"
"I'm coming with you Twi; I'm too great a flyer to waste checking up on the weather, and I'll never let a friend go it alone!" She emphasized the point with a jab to Twilight's ribs. "You need a friendly face to help you through this, and I'm as friendly as it gets!"
Twilight rubbed her side with a skeptical smirk spreading across her muzzle. This actually isn't a bad idea; I can use the company, and it really would be a shame to prevent Rainbow from using her potential, but... "I don't want to lose you Rainbow, and I'm not prepared to risk your life for mine."
"Good; I don't want you risking my life either, but Twilight," Rainbow said, moving closer and putting a hoof on Twilight's chest, "I don't want you risking your life, but that's not my decision, just like I'm not yours. The best thing we can do is keep each other safe!"
"How are you the one thinking logically about this? You know what, forget it," Twilight said brushing Rainbows hoof away. "Fine. Do whatever you feel you have to... I'm happy to have you around."
"I knew you'd come around! Now!" Rainbow shouted, still flying upside down with no apparent effort, "let's have a race to Canterlot to get warmed up, you know, before they put us through hell. I know you're not as experienced a flyer as me, so I'll make the flight upside down! Ready!?"
"Rainbow, that wouldn't be fair." She's fast, but Canterlot is a far ways off making it an endurance race, not a sprint, and not even Rainbow can fly upside down for long...
"I know, I know; but even if I fly zig-zags through the sky, it still won't be fair for you Twi. I'm the fastest pony in—"
"Ok Rainbow, if we must."
"Great!" Rainbow's upside-down flapping became erratic as she S'd back and forth in excitement. "I'll go easy on you, but you have to push yourself! We're going to need to be ready for whatever they throw at us, and you've spent far too much time reading to be in any shape for what's to come. Now lets fly!"
Rainbow would have looked rather silly, flying along upside-down with her head leaned back to watch where she was going, if she wasn't outrunning Twilight by such a large margin. Twilight knew she wasn't ready, but thats is the point of joining an army, right? To be trained and pushed to be your best? This was going to be difficult.
Twilight pushed herself, trying to catch up to Rainbow, who was still flying inverted.
***
She couldn't manage it; no matter how hard she pushed herself Rainbow effortlessly maintained her lead. By the time Canterlot poked over the horizon Twilight wasn't quite sure she could make it. Everything hurt, but her wings and the muscle group across her chest burned, horribly, and her breathing had decayed to ragged gasps. I've made the flight from Canterlot to Ponyville before, but trying to keep up with Rainbow apparently hasn't done any favors for my range.
"Common Twi, we're almost there!" Rainbow shouted, looking up at her, still flying inverted. She didn't sound at all out of breath.
Twilight pressed on, her wings feeling heavier with every flap. Slowly Canterlot approached, tucked away under the Areion Peak; the tallest mountain in the Unicorn Range. 1,000 years ago the Unicorn Range marked the northern boarder of Equestria, until the Crystal Empire was annexed and it suddenly became the center of the Empire. Twilight loved books, a lot, but there was one thing she loved more; maps.
If I survive this flight I'll have to show Rainbow the Canterlot libraries map collection; I'm sure she'll love it. Is it my imagination, or is the ground getting closer? It was; despite Twilight's best efforts to propel herself forward she was barely doing more than gliding at this point.
"Hey Twilight! Look!" Rainbow was pointing to the east, into the small mountain valley just outside of Canterlot. There was a good sized collection of Pegasi and even a few Griffons standing in an open field a ways off the main road. "It looks like the first wave of requites are already beginning their training!"
"You should... join them Rainbow," Twilight managed to force out between gasps.
"Just focus on flying. I promised you a race to Canterlot and I'd rather not let you fall to your death when you pass out." Rainbow had moved closer to Twilight, so the gasping pony wouldn't have to shout her reply, and so Twilight could see her smirk more clearly.
"What do you... mean when?" They were approaching the town now, coming in a little low thanks to Twilight's exhaustion.
Canterlot had a very long history, far longer than the Equestrian Empire, and it had spent much of that history as a fortress and a boarder town. Even though it had been more of a cultural capital these last thousand years, it's military heritage could clearly be seen in it's high walls; while they were beautiful white marble trimmed in gold, they were still imposingly tall, with spires reaching high into the mountain air.
Twilight had to strain to climb, regaining enough of her lost altitude to clear the walls; it was all she had left. After clearing the walls she attempted to hold her wings spread, to glide to the central courtyard, but her muscles failed her and her wings collapsed, trailing in the wind behind her. She didn't even have enough air in her lungs to scream as she fell, although she tried to.
"I gotcha," Rainbow said, expertly matching her speed to Twilight's fall, before gently spreading her wings to slow them both, and she was still flying upside-down! How long do I have to practice until I can do that? Twilight thought as Rainbow brought them in, flaring her wings and finally, for the first time since leaving Ponyville, righting herself to land on her hind-legs, still holding Twilight up with her forelegs. "Are you good?"
"Yea... Thanks, I... ok... Ugh." Twilight hadn't realized her legs had cramped during the flight until she put weight on them. "I just need a minute."
"Ok, no rush Twi," Rainbow said letting her friend go and stepping back, flexing her wings as she looked around.
Twilight was swaying a bit, but had mostly managed to catch her breath by the time one of Celestia's Royal Guards made his way from the Canterlot Castles gates, to where Twilight and Rainbow were standing in the middle of the main plaza. "Miss Sparkle?"
"Twilight's fine, thank you." Twilight's legs still ached, but they were nothing compared to the sharp pain in her wings; it felt like she had turned her delicate wing bones to dust, and melted most of her flying muscles. I'm going to be sore for weeks after that flight.
"Celestia instructed us to bring you to her right away." The guard was looking at Rainbow, his face unreadable behind his helmets visor. I don't think I've ever seen a Royal Guard in anything but their open faced helmets, but I guess I've never seen them in wartime either... "She only told us of you miss Sparkle," the Guard interrupted Twilight's thoughts.
"It's ok, if you have Twilight under control I'll be checking out what those Pegasi are doing now. You good, Twi?" Rainbow already had her wings spread and hind-legs tensed for takeoff.
"Yea, Rainbow, I'll be ok. Thank you. Be careful."
"Of course," Rainbow said with a smirk, launching herself into a near vertical climb. Twilight still wasn't sure how Rainbow could do that, climbing straight into the sky against the pull of gravity, while Twilight could barely gain altitude in a hover.
"Right this way," the Guard said, turning away and beginning the short trek into the castle grounds. Twilight followed, still stretching her wings to stop them from cramping.
***
The walk to the castles throne room wasn't actually all that long, but it was still uncomfortably painful given how tired Twilight was. The guard accompanying her kept looking over his shoulder at her, a concerned look in his eyes just visible through his visors slit.
It took Twilight awhile to realize what it was; she was still flexing her wings, flaring them out from her sides. In Pegasi (and Alicorns) the wings could often show a lot of emotion, from excitement to anxiety to attraction. Twilight must have looked rather ridiculous, constantly stretching her wings up and down.
"I'm still tired from the flight in. I'll be ok, but my wings are going to be sore for days after that, he-he," Twilight said, blushing slightly.
"Of course," the guard said in a perfectly neutral tone. Twilight wasn't sure if he truly understood; he was a Unicorn and Twilight knew first hand that you needed wings to truly understand what it was like, but at least he stopped glancing back at her as she shuffled her wings around.
They reached the throne room, but the guard continued beyond the thrones, into the base of the spire that lead to Celestia's and the royal guest rooms. Twilight had stayed there a few times over the years as Celestia's star pupil. She tried hard to not grunt while climbing the spiral stairs, but as the guard renewed his worried glances she assumed she had failed.
Finally they reached the top floor, and after exchanging nodes with the two Guards standing on either side of Celestia's door, the Unicorn Guard firmly knocked and said in a booming voice, "Princess Twilight Sparkle here to see you Princess Celestia."
"You may enter," Celestia's voice resonated through the door.
As it always did Twilight's heart soared upon hearing her beloved mentors voice. The moment the Unicorn Guard had opened the door and moved aside Twilight broke into a trot, wincing only slightly as her tired, achy body protested.
"Good morning, Celestia!" It wasn't actually morning anymore; it was actually a bit passed noon.
"Morning?" Celestia asked, looking up from where she lay on the bed matting in the middle of her room. A book (History of the Crystal Kingdom; it was written centuries ago, well before the Crystal Kingdom would become an Empire, and well before it's unification with the Equestrian Empire. Twilight had read it twice, although not recently) lay open in front of the Princess.
"Oh," Twilight began, "it originated as a joke at Rainbows expense. You see whenever anypony would first see her, she was usually just waking up, despite sometimes being rather late in the day. I'm not sure but I think Pinkie Pie was the one who originally started it. I've gotten so used to saying it despite the time of day I guess I forgot."
"I like it," Celestia muttered, slowly rising to her full, and quite impressive height. "Now, I know what you plan to do Twilight, but I'm afraid I cannot allow you to do it."
"What?" Twilight spouted, stepping forward.
"The front line of battle is no place for a Princess Twilight, even myself and Luna must take caution. Even when we chose to lead personally in the field, we do so as the center of the formation, not as a foot soldier taking orders. You are no military leader Twilight, you have no experience in battle and we don't have enough time to train you to the point I'm willing to risk hundreds of our soldiers lives on your call."
"But!"
"And," Celestia continued, raising a hoof, "I'm not about to let you rip yourself apart trying to compete with the other ponies flocking to our banner. You are a scholar Twilight; that is nothing to be ashamed of."
"How can you say that? I'm nearly as powerful as you, Celestia!" Twilight's wings had flared up with her rising temper. "How can you expect me to sit around while ponies are risking their lives to protect us? I could save thousands with my talents! Or maybe not, but even one would be worth it."
"Twilight, I can not stop you from doing what you feel you have to, but I can offer you an alternative." Celestia, as (almost) always, spoke in a calm but firm voice, echoing with well over a thousand years of wisdom. "Even you can only do so much with your strength against an entire army of battle hardened soldiers. The largest contributions myself and Luna have is not our strength, but our leadership. While you have no combat leadership to give, I feel you are in a unique position to help with one of Luna's recent ideas."
Celestia's voice was firm as ever, but it was beginning to take on a deeply sad note. "Luna believes that Sombra plans not for a traditional war, were ponies fight for supremacy over one another, but instead for a war of attrition, were ponies fight to the death. The Reiter ponies that Sombra has unified are no strangers to war, but they are poorly trained for large scale combat. His only hope is to break up our battle lines, and focusing not on defeating our army and driving us to retreat, but instead maximizing our causalities. The Reiter ponies my not be the best trained, but they out number us greatly.
"It is not yet widely known, but despite Sombra's early push being massively out numbered we suffered terrible losses, and they retreated on their own before our main force was able to join the battle. I believe Sombra is attempting to draw us into the Reiter ponies lands, to extend our supply lines and cut our army off. Not to defeat and send our army running, but to trap and slaughter them. We can not let this affront go unpunished, but I am not prepared to enter their lands until we have built up our forces, and I doubt Sombra will strike into our lands again with our army camped just outside the Crystal Castle."
As Celestia paused Twilight dove deep into though, "Ok, but what does Luna plan to do?"
"My sister," Celestia was looking at the ground between herself and Twilight, and her ears had flattened back against her head, "plans to fight back as Sombra would fight us, with small mobile squadrons attacking, inflicting as much damage as possible, then retreating before a decisive battle can begin. Sombra is trying to defeat the individual superiority of our soldiers by dividing our forces where the Reiter ponies can gain local superiority. Luna plans to use our soldiers individual superiority to over-match their local numerical advantage. It's a sound tactic...
"But I feel that changing the strategic objective from gaining ground and securing a strategic victory, to simply killing Reiter ponies..." a single tear rolled down Celestia's snout. "I don't like it, and I do not approve, but we will do what we must to defend the Empire. If Luna's right, and Sombra intends to fight to the last, then I will be glad to have taken her seriously now and allowed her to train her strike teams, even though I desperately hope she is wrong and we can secure a strategic victory without senseless killing."
Twilight wasn't quite sure what to make of this; she pictured war like those she had read about, with ponies fighting violent battles, but always accepting their opponents surrender when given, with deaths a rare but necessary possibility. The objective was to gain enough of an advantage to force your opponent to give it, not to outright kill them although it sometimes happened (running around swinging swords at each other, someone was bound to end up without a head eventually). "...you said I was in a unique position earlier. What did you mean?"
"Most of Luna's envisioned strike teams are Pegasi only, but since Pegasi are extremely vulnerable to magic, they would need to take at least one Unicorn with them. This would slow them drastically as they would need to carry the Unicorn while flying in and out. An Alicorn can fly herself to and from the battle, making the group far more self sufficient, and faster."
Celestia had perked up a bit, but the situation still weighed heavily on her. Twilight hadn't though how Celestia would feel about her prized student throwing herself into a war head first. Joining one of Luna's strike groups would be safer in the short term; they may not even be needed at all.
This must be what Celestia was hoping for; that Twilight wouldn't be needed, but if her group was used for it's intended purpose she'd be thrown into battle with just a few Pegasi, against a much larger force to... kill as many ponies as she could before retreating, trying to out run and hide from the Reiter Pegasi that would be hunting them.
It would be extremely dangerous, but it also seemed like the best way for Twilight to focus her strength, to contribute the maximum possible effect with her limited energy. It was a good idea in theory, and if it failed (and she survived) they could always join a normal battle group down the line.
"Ok Celestia, I'll join with Luna's strike group. For what it's worth I hope you're right and we're not needed."
"So do I, Twilight. I'm just sorry I'm sending you into a group of unfamiliar ponies."
"Oh, actually I'm sure Rainbow Dash would love to join as well! Besides, the main reason she's even here is to keep me company, and I'd hate to leave her to go it alone with the standard troops."
"No one ever goes it alone in the military Twilight, but I see your point. I'm sure Rainbow Dash will be welcomed as well." Celestia looked out of her massive west facing window. "I'm afraid my time here is running out."
"Oh?"
"I'm needed in the Crystal Court; Cadance is having a hard time keeping everypony calm, and our army may need leadership soon. I hope you'll forgive the short visit?"
"Of course Celestia, I understand completely." Twilight gave a quick bow, her muscles only protesting slightly this time.
Celestia began walking towards her balcony door, and Twilight moved to follow. "Luna will send for you when it is time to begin, likely later this night. She insists on night training, as most of your battles will be at night when our enemies are unsuspecting, and that's the time she's usually up anyway. I'll inform her Rainbow will be joining as well before I leave. You two may have your choice of guest rooms while staying here."
Celestia spread her wings, sparkling slightly in the mid-day sunlight. "Stay safe my faithful student," and she gracefully floated into the air, heading towards Luna's Spire, situated on the opisite side of Canterlot Castle.
Twilight was left alone with her racing thoughts. I should probably go find Rainbow. Are my wings up for a short flight into the fields? She tensed her wings up and down a few times. Still sore and weak, but I should be able to make it if I pace myself. Hopefully Rainbow won't mind carrying me back, he-he.
Rainbow Dash powered herself into Canterlot's mid day sky, climbing almost vertically. After the flight to Canterlot she had to admit her wings felt a bit weak. She'd flow upside-down for some significant time before, but never that far or fast, and the muscles across her back, that were normally only used to pull her wings up in preparation for the next flap, had noticeably tired after having held her weight for so long. That was a silly choice I made, but thankfully, as always, I'm awesome enough to pull it off anyway!
Now, where are they... It didn't take Rainbow long to locate the pegasi and griffons she'd spotted on the way in, still standing in the grassy field off the main road. She entered a shallow low speed dive heading in their direction, suddenly not so existed about being the center of attention. Is this a good idea, jumping into the middle of a military training exercise? Eh, I'm sure I'll live.
Rainbow folded her wings back and entered a steep dive, only pulling out a few feet above the ground. The pegasi and few griffons were standing in a lose rectangle, four rows back and about ten wide standing at attention. Another griffon was pacing back and forth in front of them as she talked.
Rainbow flared her wings out, stalled them, and expertly landed dropping into a comfortable sitting position on the soft grass, only about 10 feet from the pacing griffon. The griffon, still deep in her speech, ignored Rainbows arrival entirely.
Since Rainbow had arrived quite late she expected her speech to be nearly over, unfortunately it wasn't.
"—all this stuff you hear about Equestrian's not wanting to fight, wanting to stay out of the war, is a lot of bull. Equestrian's love to fight. All real Equestrian's love the sting and clash of battle. When you were foals, you all admired the champion marble shooter, the fastest flyer, and the toughest Equestrian Football players. Equestrian's love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Equestrian's play to win all the time. That's why Equestrian's have never lost and will never lose a war. The very thought of losing is hateful to Equestrian's. Battle is the most significant competition in which a pony or griffon can indulge. It brings out all that is best and it removes all that is base and standard.
"You are not all going to die. Only a few of you right here today will be killed in a major battle. Every pony is scared in their first action. If they say they're not, they're a gods-damned liar. But the real hero is the pony who fights even though they're scared. Some ponies will get over their fright in a minute in combat, some take an hour, and for some it takes days, while others are never able to. But the real ponies never let their fear of death overpower their honor, their sense of duty to their country, and their innate bravery.
"An army is a team. It lives, eats, sleeps, and fights as a team. This individual hero stuff is bull. The cowards who write that stuff for the Equestrian Evening Post don't know any more about real battle than they do about procreating. And we have the best team—we have the finest food and equipment, the best spirit and the best ponies and griffons in the world. Why, by Celestia, I actually pity these poor cowards we're going up against.
"Why are you here?" the griffon asked, suddenly turning to Rainbow.
Rainbow stared back, blinking a few times before her mind was able to get her body to respond. "To do what I can to shorten this terrible war, keep my friend Twilight from getting herself killed," Rainbow said jumping to her feet, "and because I'm the fastest flyer in all of Equestria, and it would be a shame to waste my abilities in our time of need."
All in all, she was rather proud of her impromptu speech; she just wished Twilight was here to see it.
"Fastest flyer," the griffon commander (Rainbow recognized the rank insignia she was wearing; I wonder if she knows Spitfire?) stated more than asked. "How is that going to help you?"
"Umm," Rainbow was take aback, "excuse me? How wouldn't it help me?"
"Will you run away every time we commit to battle?"
"What? No!"
"Then you will rush ahead into the storm, leaving your squadron-mates behind?"
Rainbow had to consciously stop her wings from rising as her anger built. "Of course not! But I can cut through and run interference on a flank, play hit-and-run at their rear, or you can hold me back to rush and counter breakthroughs, or," Rainbow continued, shrugging with both her shoulders and wings, "you can use me as a scout, or heck, even a messenger pony. I don't really care; I just want this war to end, and to keep my friend's safe."
"You want to keep ponies safe? Then why not join the guard?"
"I... don't like standing around all day." This statement drew some snickers and even an outright laugh from the ponies and griffons standing at attention; even the griffon commander—I should really get her name—smiled at the remark. If there's one thing a pony could always count on, it would be the competitiveness and distrust between the service branches. They're as bad as sports teams sometimes.
The commander suddenly dropped from the smirk into an angry glare, and the ponies and griffons went silent. "What is more important," she shouted at the new recruits, turning away from Rainbow Dash, "speed... or strength?"
Griffon Commander's glare was all Rainbow needed to be reminded the question was not directed at her.
"Strength," about half the requites shouted, while the rest remained silent, not sure what to say.
"What is more important, speed or strength?" the griffon asked, looking at Rainbow.
"It really is strength," Rainbow answered, completely confident in her answer.
"Well, I know what we can do!" the Commander shouted. "Strength," she shouted, thumping herself in the chest with a fore-claw, "vs speed!"
It took Rainbow a second to put it together. "Me? But I'm one the the strongest ponies I've ever met! I'm not exactly the incarnation of pure speed. When I win, how will we know it was my speed and not my strength that beat you?"
"Because I'm not a pony," the Commander said, digging a small trench with one of her claws, "and you're not going to win. I'm stronger. We stop at first submission, or when one of us losses consciousness." She began pacing around to Rainbows left, her massive wings flaring out to her sides. "When you're ready, little pony."
Rainbow wasn't expecting to get into a fight with anyone, but she was up for it. She started pacing in the same direction as the Griffon, both of them moving in parallel, away from the recruits. This is going to be... interesting. Rainbow had gotten into fights with griffons before, and had also spent a lot of time sparring with her griffon friend Gilda.
Gilda was only a few inches taller than Rainbow, but she weighed about twice as much and that weight had played into her advantage during their fights. This griffon was over a foot taller than Rainbow, and weighed probably close to four times as much as she did. Just one of her wings was longer than Rainbow was from nose to the base of her tail.
The Commander suddenly turned straight on with Rainbow and lunged forward, her rear legs digging into the soft grass.
Rainbow turned straight on as-well, paused until right before the Commander landed on her, then jumped sideways to her left using her wings to add extra speed to the jump.
The Commander landed where Rainbow had been, then sprung sideways after Rainbow, twisting to her right and lashing out with her left claw.
Rainbow smashed her front hooves into the ground as she landed and flapped her wings, rearing up and back. The Griffons claw passed where her shoulders had been, passing harmlessly an inch from where her stomach was now. Rainbow then sprung forwards off her back legs, and planted her fore-hooves into the griffons left shoulder. The impact sent a shock-wave through Rainbows entire body, and sent lances of pain though both of her forelegs.
Rainbow then flapped hard, rebounding off the griffon to get some distance between herself and the counterattack she expected to come immediately, but none came. Landing she felt a small spike of pain in her forelegs, but nothing very severe, nothing that would slow her down or weaken her strikes.
"Congratulations," the griffon cooed, "you landed the first strike."
"Yea, you're not so ba—" Rainbow was cut off as the griffon lunged again, this time coming in straight rather than a slow high arc as she had with her first lunge.
Rainbow dove to her right, putting herself on the side of the griffons injured fore-claw. It didn't help; the griffon still managed to rake her claw across Rainbow's flank and left thigh as she darted passed, cutting deep into her skin and muscle.
Stupid, stupid; you didn't have to do that! You could have just dodged back and away, or even up, and she'd have never hit you! Rainbow had already committed though, so she did what she could to make it pay off. She flared her wings, using them to turn her momentum around in a hard left turn, directly back into the griffon who was still recovering from her powerful swipe.
Rainbow planted her forelegs into the grass, and pivoted around, lashing out with her hind-legs in a powerful buck that would make Applejack proud. Her back hooves connected with the griffons rear-left leg, and with a loud 'pop,' it crumpled under the force of the strike. Rainbow didn't look to see what had happened, instead once again using her wings to power herself away from the griffon before she could counter.
"Ugh, Gods," the griffon exclaimed behind Rainbow, "you'll pay for that!"
"Umm, actually," Rainbow began, landing and checking her wounds—it wasn't as bad as it felt, just three dark red slashes down her left flank, starting just below her ribs and going back to halfway down the top of her thigh; no arteries, no tendons, just muscle and skin. It was bleeding a bit, but not enough to be dangerous and it only burned slightly—before looked back at the griffon; it was exactly what Rainbow had feared, she had broken the griffons leg. "I don't think you should try and continue with that leg."
"I will not submit!" the griffon shouted, pushing herself into the air on powerful flaps.
"Ok," Rainbow muttered under her breath, also taking to the air. "What's it going to take then?" she asked herself; this could get messy.
The griffon powered herself forward, building speed far quicker than Rainbow would have expected such a large creature to be able too, but it didn't matter. Rainbow began a pure vertical climb; while she probably could out run the heavy griffon in level flight by a decent margin, she could easily double her rate of climb.
She was right; the Griffon Commander tried to strain after her, but was unable to continue the vertical climb, and was forced to fall into a loose spiral climb, making altitude at less than half of Rainbows rate, and opening herself up to attack.
Rainbow quickly transitioned into level flight, extending away from the griffon, then as the griffon tried to follow, still in a steep, slow climb rainbow reversed and flew back over the top of her, just out of reach. As the griffon slowly tried to turn, her wings struggling to cut into the thinner medium altitude air. Rainbow used her wings to pull into a tight half loop, to position herself directly above the griffon, and then dove directly down on top of her. The griffon tried to pull her nose up, to meet Rainbows attack head-on, but her wings couldn't grab the air with enough force to hold her up at such low speed.
Rainbow drove both of her forelegs directly into the griffons back, right between the wing joints. The griffon, howling in fury and pain, attempted to twist to the right, lashing out with a backhand claw swipe, but Rainbow dove with the roll and stayed directly behind the griffon as she turned. Rainbow then lashed out with her rear-legs as she flew away, connecting with the base of the griffons right wing. It wasn't hard enough to break the joint, but it had to hurt.
After gaining about 15 feet of separation Rainbow slowed into a comfortable hover (the air at this altitude was still thick enough for her to easily support her weight even on her small wings, not something the griffon could say; it pays to be light up here), and turned to face the griffon, who was glaring at her as she struggled to maintain her own hover.
"Are we done yet?" Rainbow asked. She didn't want to have to cripple the griffon to the point she couldn't fly; if she fell from this height it may kill her. "You've already lost this; you're not fast enough to hit me, especially not injured as you are now."
"...why?"
"...What? Because I've been pounding on you!"
"No!" the griffon shouted, worrying Rainbow she may attack again, even in her crippled state. "Why is strength more important that speed? That's not what it looks like from my side right now."
"Oh, well... you can't fly fast on weak wings!" Seeing the griffon's confused and angry look, Rainbow elaborated, "on the ground your weight can be an asset, but up here, were you can't corner me there's nothing you can do to counter my speed, but I'm only fast because I'm so strong!"
"But I'm stronger," the griffon spat. Her wings, especially the one Rainbow had injured, were starting to tire and she was starting to slowly lose altitude.
Rainbow descended with her. "Yea, you're at least twice as strong as I am, but you're also four times as heavy and it takes a lot of strength to move that weight! Just trust me, you can't have speed without strength but it's also important not to have any unnecessary weight, especially not up here. So are we done, do you submit?"
They were nearing the ground now. Rainbow looked down, and spotted Twilight among the recruits, standing a bit to their side. She looked back at the griffon, not wanting to look away from her potential opponent for too long.
"Yes," the griffon finally said, just as she was coming in for a gentle landing. "I submit."
A rustle of hushed whispers arose from the gathered recruits.
"Ah yea, Rainbow takes down another one!" Rainbow then exploded over towards Twilight, approaching from the left then looped around behind Twilight, landing in line with and on her friends left (keeping the injury on her left flank hidden from Twilight the entire time). "Enjoy the show?"
"No," Twilight said, shaking her head, "I didn't arrive until you two were in the clouds. Where did that blood come from." Twilight was gesturing to the small pool of blood Rainbow had left on the ground, just after she had been slashed.
"I..."
"You did not mention your friend was this Twilight," the griffon Commander suddenly said, a bit of reverence slipping into her voice. "Princess Twilight Sparkle, I am sorry if I caused your friend any excessive discomfort," she finished with a bow.
"Naw, nothing that wasn't expressly called for... and sorry about the leg." Rainbow added after a seconds though.
"What? What did you do to her leg?" Twilight asked, anger creeping into her voice.
"Oh, I, umm... kinda broke it."
"Rainbow, we've only been here an hour," Twilight started, moving towards the griffon, "and you've already injured one of the few wing commanders Equestria has left!" Twilight moved in to inspect the griffons broken leg.
Rainbow folded her left wing down to cover her injuries, but pulled the wing back when she felt it stick to her side. On closer inspection the gashes in her side where still bleeding, and had made a bit of a mess. The bright red contrasted beautifully with her cyan fur, although Rainbow doubted Twilight would think so.
"Oh my, even at full strength I don't think I'll be able to fix your leg with magic," Twilight told the griffon.
"It is not your fault Princess Sparkle. The leg will heal in it's own time."
"Please, Twilight will do. What is your name, commander?"
"Geora Patton, and Geora will do for you miss Sparkle," the griffon Geora said kindly, "but will remain commander Patton to you!" she added, fiercely addressing her still fresh troops. "I was planning on having the troops do strength and stamina training for the first few weeks anyway. I can yell at them just fine while resting on the sidelines, and I can still fly well enough if I have to."
"Ok, "Twilight said, backing off. "Please be sure to get in to see a doctor at some point though; you need to have that leg set and caste as soon as possible."
Twilight turned back to Rainbow. Rainbow had already turned to the side so Twilight couldn't see her injured side; she'd tell her after they left so not to disturb Geora's training any-longer. Rainbow had done far more than enough.
"Let's go Twi," Rainbow said spreading her wings.
"Yea, I think I'm still strong enough to make it up to Celestia's tower." Twilight and Rainbow took off into the mid day sky, Twilight swaying a little but holding together.
It was a relatively short flight back to Celestia's tower. They landed on a small balcony that lead into the floor with all of the guest rooms, two floors below Celestia's room. The floor between them was were most of Celestia's Guard slept and their main armory was located.
"Are we checking in already?" Rainbow asked as Twilight lead her into the tower.
"Oh, I forgot to ask you," Twilight said glancing over her shoulder but continuing into the tower, so Rainbow followed her in. "Princess Celestia thinks the two of us are better suited to joining a sort of... 'fast strike team' that Princess Luna is preparing."
"Well yea, fast pretty much has my name on it!" As Rainbow walked along pretty much every guard they walked by on her left looked her up and down, with a quizzical look on their face. She gave each a quick smile that she hopped said, 'yea I know it looks bad, but at least I'm not bleeding on your carpet.'
"Luna plans on the team mostly operating at night," Twilight continued up ahead, "so she want's to train us at night, so we should get to sleep as early as we can. I don't think we're going to have much time, although after that flight I feel like I may pass out anyway. Would you like your own room or are we having a slumber party?"
Rainbow was sort of hoping to get by without Twilight noticing her injury, but it would be nice to have help cleaning it... Twilight was going to need to get comfortable with the sight of blood some time soon anyway, and there was no reason to take up more space than they needed too. "We can use the same room, and besides, I'm sure the beds here are enormous."
Twilight stepped into Celestia's guest room. The room's were, in theory, intended to house Celestia's diplomatic visitors, but the Empire had expanded to such an extent the area's not ruled over directly by Celestia herself were so distant that visits from their rulers were uncommon. The resurgence of the Crystal Empire a few years ago had changed that to an extent, but Princess Cadance and Prince Shinning Armor could only visit so often.
The room, like all the others, was larger than it needed to be, with it's right wall dominated by a massive bronze framed bed. It was easily large enough for the two ponies to sleep together without disturbing each others rest, or putting their platonic friendship at risk. As the palace staff were never entirely sure what type of guests the Princess would be catering for, the bed was stacked with an assortment of pillows and comforters ranging from the firm style preferred by most Earth Ponies, to the fluffy and soft style championed by most Pegasi, as well as the full spectrum in between. While not all ponies bent to their breeds stereotypes, Twilight was fairly confident Rainbow would given her well known love of 'cloud napping.' Although that love very well may be more for the napping than the clouds, Twilight had to admit to herself.
The left wall of the room was lined with a large table. It was easily long enough for two families to eat together with room to spare, but there were only four chairs present. The table was bristling with various types of hard skinned fruit; the type that could sit in warm air for several days before going bad. These rooms may have been completely excessive, but at least the ponies in charge of maintaining them were efficient.
On the far side of the room was a wide doorway leading to the rooms balcony. I was not as large as Celestia's private balcony, complete with it's small garden, but it was large enough for even the largest Griffon visitors to have an easy time taking off or landing, which Twilight believed was it's primary purpose.
Twilight's eyes wondered back to the bed, and it's assortment of plush pillows. It's been a long day, Twilight thought, stretching her wings for what must have been the twentieth time, if not more.
"We should get to sleep soon," Twilight said, turning to look at Rainbow Dash. "I know it's only around three but Luna will probably send for us around nine, or at best ten, then we'll be up all night." Rainbow Dash was still standing in the door, partially obscured behind the door frame.
"Yea," Dash said, looking down. "Hey Twilight, promise me you won't freak out."
"Hmm? What do you mean Rainbow?"
"Just promise me Twi."
"Ok, I promise, I won't freak out. You are ok, right?"
"Yea, I'm fine. It's not half as bad as it looks," Rainbow finished with a chuckle.
"What's not? Rainbow, get in here!"
"Ok Twi, don't yell. I mostly just need help washing the blood out of my fur." Rainbow stepped around the door-frame and stood sideways in front of Twilight.
"Oh my, Celestia, what happened?" Twilight moved forward, looking over every inch of Rainbows side, trying to find the source of all this blood. "Your fur is more red than blue!"
"I know, that's why I need help cleaning it. Seriously though, Twilight, you've never seen the results of a fight with a griffon before?"
"Well, no, I haven't." Twilight was running her hoof across Rainbow's side, pushing her fur out of the way to trace the deep cuts. The muscles along Rainbow's side twitched periodically and she pulled away a few times.
"...That tickles," she said when Twilight turned to look into her eyes. "It's ok, Twi, really. She hit nothing but muscle!"
"Rainbow, you are nothing but muscle!" Rainbow was already blushing, but hearing Twilight say this she broke eye contact and looked away. "She could have speared you clean through, hitting nothing but muscle, and you'd still be bleeding to death!"
"But I'm not, Twi," Rainbow muttered, her eyes on the floor. "She didn't get any arteries, or any major veins for that matter. I'm fine. Bleeding's already stopped. I just need to get cleaned up."
Twilight went back to tracing the cuts along her friends side. Rainbow was, to an extent, right: after getting passed all the blood caked in her fur the wounds did appear easily survivable, if rather messy. Twilight also had a point though; Rainbow really was all muscle, reminding Twilight just how hard it was going to be to catch up.
"Ok, Rainbow, I'll help you wash the blood out, but then I'm going to do my best to close these cuts." Twilight lead the way into the guest rooms luxurious bathroom; it was nearly as large as the main room. Twilight had spent a lot of time living in one of these guest rooms during her time as Celestia's personal student, and while her parents home in Canterlot proper was not quite as excessive as this, it was also quite extravagant.
Judging by the look on Rainbow's face, she did not have quite such a privileged upbringing. "Whoa, what is all this? This place is bigger than my bedroom! Do you have spare rooms this big in your castle, Twi? If so, I may have to move in!"
"No, nothing this... exuberant," Twilight said, suddenly feeling a bit like Rarity.
There was a good sized shower along the far wall, but the center of the room held a tub easily large enough for Celestia to comfortably lay on her flank without touching the sides, and deep enough to allow her to submerge herself if she wanted too. Twilight stepped down into tub.
"Wouldn't the shower make more sense?" Rainbow asked, but still followed Twilight into the Celestia sized tub.
"No, this will do."
The faucet was also far larger than it needed to be; it's opening was about the diameter of Twilight's head and was at about eye level. Twilight reached out with her mind and magic to throw the water on, and only took a moment to approximate the temperature.
Rainbow turned around to give Twilight her wounded side. "This thing's more like a swimming pool than a tub!"
"Remember, not all of the creatures Celestia rules over are ponies. Would it be more inconvenient to have a bathtub that's too small, or one that's too large?" Twilight asked, levitating a hoof sized ball of water from the stream exiting the faucet and splashing it down Rainbows side. "Is the temperature ok?"
"I don't know," Rainbow said, with a grin spreading across her muzzle, "you tell me." Rainbow whipped her tail through the faucets small waterfall, blasting Twilight in the side with a truly impressive volume of warm water.
"Rainbow Dash! That's not funny!" Twilight tried hard to suppress her own smile as Rainbow broke into her signature high pitched cackle. "Just let me get this blood out! We can have a water fight later."
"Yea, ok Twi," Rainbow mumbled, looking away, a sly smile still gracing her lips.
Twilight knew Rainbow well enough not to trust her with that look on her face, so she readied herself. Sure enough a moment later Rainbow whipped her tail through the waterfall again, but this time Twilight was ready. She cast a simple spell, using only slightly more energy than Rainbow had expended with the flick of her tail. The spell, guided by Twilight's quick mind, collected up the fine spray of water into a loose ball, then swung it around directly into the back of Rainbow's head, drenching her mane and rocking her head forwards.
"Whoa! Twi, what the hay?" Her voice cracked a little; apparently she hadn't expected Twilight's reprisal. "Ok, ok; fine. You don't need to take my head off!"
That's better, Twilight thought as she began to levitate more water onto Rainbow's side, working the blood out of her friends fur.
"So, Twi? Are you ok?" Rainbow asked after a few moments.
"Hmm? Yes, I suppose." The blood was coming out quickly, partly because it was still mostly fresh but also because Rainbow kept her coat trimmed extra short, even in these winter months. "Why do you ask?"
As Twilight worked Rainbow's tail twitched in and out of the heavy waterfall several times, but she made no attempt to splash Twilight again. "It's just... it was just yesterday after noon you received Celestia's letter, and we learned... that we're at war. Do you even know anything about these...?"
"Reiter ponies," Twilight finished for her friend. "No, not much. They live in the Northeast and their territory boarders the Crystal Empire, which means they boarder us now. They have a long history of great kingdoms and somewhat recently even their own empire, although it collapsed a few hundred years ago. I know a lot about their ancient history, but as far as I know they've done nothing of note recently."
"But is Sombra really back? Didn't Cadance... kill him?"
"I don't know. Celestia said we didn't have to worry about him anymore."
"Well that didn't work, did it!"
"Don't yell at me, Rainbow."
"Sorry Twi, I just... I don't understand." Rainbow was watching Twilight work with a lack of interest in her eyes, but now she looked into Twilight's eyes as the Alicorn paused her work. "Why didn't we just kill him?"
"Because killing is wrong."
"How many guards-ponies died in the attack?"
Twilight shook her head, feeling a bit uncomfortable under Rainbow's gaze. "Celestia didn't say, but... too many."
"Killing is wrong, Twilight, but so is letting other ponies kill each-other, or letting them kill us. We don't have a choice."
"I know Rainbow, that's why I'm here, but that doesn't make it right... I'm scared Rainbow. I don't want other ponies deciding if I live or not."
"Me neither. Twilight, don't tell anypony, but I'm scared too." The last sentence came of out Rainbow at a hardly audible wispier, and she looked away the moment she finished saying it.
"Thank you Rainbow Dash; that means a lot coming from you," but shouldn't I be worried? Doing something that scares even Rainbow doesn't seem like a good idea.
In only a minutes effort the last of Rainbows exposed blood was washed away, and swirled down the drain.
Now for the hard part. "Rainbow, I'm going to do my best to close your wounds, but I don't think I'm strong enough to completely heal them."
"What? Twilight, it's fine! I'll heal up soon enough." Rainbow started to walk away, but Twilight reached out with her mind and telekinetically grabbed her tail, dragging her back.
"I know Rainbow, but I may need to heal far more life threatening wounds in the future, and I need to get what practice I can. Healing magic is very difficult; you need to put all the energy your body would normally use over months into a spell in just a few moments, making it extremely inefficient. Please Rainbow, will you be my test subject?" Twilight backed the question with the cutest sad face she could muster.
"Wow Twi, that makes it sound much better... Fine, but please don't waste too much on me." Rainbow's eyes started wondering around the room again, and her tail strayed back into the waterfall. Twilight knew how hard it was for Rainbow to sit still so she wasted no time.
She started with a simple scrying spell, that would map out Rainbows injury to give Twilight a more exact mental image of the wounds dimensions. Knowing this Twilight did some quick mental calculations to estimate just how much energy it would take to heal the gashes. It wasn't very accurate, but she realized quickly she would not be able to fully close all of them.
So she opted for an alternative tactic; starting with the middle and deepest gash she focused on the edges of Rainbow's wound, and as gently as she could drew the wound closed with a telekinetic tug. She then began dumping raw energy into Rainbows skin, accelerating her natural healing process as much as Twilight could risk without bleeding herself dry of energy.
"Whoa! That feels really, really weird! Like somethings crawling under my skin." Rainbow was twitching, her eyes wide as she craned her neck around to watch her flank.
"Rainbow, hold as still as you can please," Twilight whispered. Twilight could feel her mental energy rapidly draining away to match her already tried body. She staggered back as the last of the center gash on Rainbows side closed.
"Are you ok?" Rainbow asked stepping up to Twilight after spending only a moment checking her side. "You got the worst one at least," she said happily, a wide grin across her snout.
"Yea... I'm ok. It's not really healed; all I've done is seal the top layer. You still have a bad tear underneath the skin that will need to heal on it's own." Twilight was having a hard time focusing as her vision swam and two Rainbow's drifted around the room, both staring at her with concerned looks on their faces.
"Ok Twi, thanks a bunch for that," Rainbow said sincerely, sparing a quick glance at her flank. "It's not even going to scar now: you saved my cutie mark, but now I think it's time for bed."
Rainbow turned the water off, then helped Twilight out of the tub and quickly rubbed Twilight's fur and mane down with a towel. Rainbow then stepped back, admiring her work.
"Hahahaha, Twilight, you look just like when we met. Do you remember? When I dried you off with my 'rain-blow-dry?'" Rainbow doubled over, her laughter loud enough to hurt Twilight's ears.
"Yes, Rainbow; I remember. It was right after you tackled me into the mud!" Twilight took a moment to stare at her reflection in the rooms great mirror; she didn't actually look half as bad as the day she met Rainbow, but her mane was still standing up rather aggressively.
"Ok Twi, you seriously need some sleep. Go on, I'll dry myself off and be in in a minute."
"Alright Rainbow, don't be long."
Twilight wandered up to the bed; it appeared to be arranged softest to hardest pillows from left to right. Not really caring too much Twilight dragged herself onto the right side of the bed, and buried herself in the mass. Despite being only mid-day, her body and mind were both extremely tired and it took only moments for the exhausted Alicorn to slip deep into sleep.
Rainbow's short mid day nap had come to an end; the trailing edge of her short dream was already fading from her memory. Rather than her soft cloud bed, she was surrounded in a nest of soft pillows on a normal bed. I'm in Canterlot, and I'm likely not going to see my friends again for several months. This is why I'm here, Twi, so you're not alone. You can't do this without me. Rainbow would never admit it, not even to herself, but the reason she knew Twilight couldn't do this without her, was because she couldn't do this without Twilight either.
Rainbow allowed herself to sink even deeper into the pillows that surrounded her. As her mind wandered out of her conscious control she became aware of a mild irony; she was an extremely active pony, even by Pegasi standards, but for whatever reason mornings were always hard for her.
She tried to gather her willpower to force her head up, but the lack of urgency, and lazy logic that she had nothing better to do, completely sapped her efforts leaving her completely unable to move. It was a strange feeling; she could feel every inch of herself, from her hind-legs cast lazily to her side, up her lithe body to her forelegs curled together supporting her head. She could even feel the warm fur of her foreleg pressed against her cheek, and the warmth of her soft breath blowing against her chest.
After awhile she began to realize the problem wasn't that she couldn't convince her muscles to move, but instead that she couldn't convince her own mind that she wanted to move. Just to prove to herself that she was in fact the master of her own body, she rolled onto her back and stretched her legs above her. There, I can get up if I want to; I just don't want to. Feeling happy with her new-found logic—and feeling a vague sense of Déjà vu—she relaxed her legs, once again slipping into the edge of concussions, and began the lazy mental drifting once again.
Some time later Rainbow's pleasant thoughts were interrupted by movement from the other side of the bed. "Rainbow? Are you awake?"
"Yea, Twi. I'm just napping now." Rainbow put out some effort to open at least one eye, but the effort failed and her eyes remained stubbornly shut. "What time is it?"
"Umm... Around nine I guess? Maybe ten; it looks like the sun recently set." Twilight had hopped out of the bed and was walking out onto the balcony. "Yea, Luna's just bringing to moon up. We don't have long to wait now. Common, lets get ready!"
"I am ready Twi," Rainbow told her pillow. "Wake me when they send for us."
Three firm knocks echoed through the door.
"Why?" Rainbow rolled deeper into the bed, feeling a desperate need for more sleep.
"It's ok Rainbow, you'll live." Twilight cantered to the door, and answered with warm enthusiasm.
Rainbow's mind drowned out their short conversion trying to come up with excuses not to go.
All too soon the door was closed and Twilight came around the bed to shake Rainbow Dash awake. "Common, we should get down there soon. We don't want to be late!"
Rainbow's pride began to win out over her laziness; there was nothing she couldn't do, and besides this was likely to be fun. Rainbow rolled over to edge of the bed and threw herself off; with a quick flap of her wings to orient herself she landed on all four hooves, already feeling the heavy weight of sleep lifting from her mind.
"Ok, where are we heading?" she mumbled, shaking her head violently trying to speed the process.
Twilight had already moved onto the balcony, stretching her wings as she looked at the stars above. "The field in front of Canterlot; same place the Pegasi were practicing last night."
"Awesome." Rainbow exploded forward into flight, pulling up and away from Twilight at the last moment. "Try and keep up!"
"Rainbow!" Twilight shouted, struggling to climb into the sky behind her.
Rainbow ignored the cries coming up behind her, and pressed into a steep climb. With the icy mountain wind pressing hard into her face and howling down her flanks, it didn't take long for the last wisps of sleep to be driven from her mind.
Rainbow leaned forward into a gentle glide, high above Canterlot, and took a moment to appreciate the stars. Canterlot wasn't that far up the Areion Peak—the posh unicorn's that built Canterlot would never take themselves too far into the uncomfortably thin air—but it was still far above Ponyville, and the starts truly looked closer up here. Rainbow knew the stars were so far away the paltry few thousand feet elevation change wouldn't actually bring them noticeably closer; instead she simply had less air between herself and the stars, making them look brighter as less light was blocked by the air. Twilight's explained it to me enough times. I bet if I mention the stars she'll explain it again.
Rainbow looked down, spotting her companion flying just over Canterlot's wall's. After taking one last look at the night sky, taking a quick mental picture of all the dim stars she couldn't normally see from down in Ponyville, Rainbow eased into a shallow dive, deciding for the first time today not to push herself. She still caught up and pulled alongside Twilight before the larger mare made it to the field.
As they approached, in a low, slow glide, Princess Luna's unmistakable form slid into view. She was tall and slender, with a surprisingly delicate appearance for Equestria's second most powerful being, but the calm determination in her eyes as she watched Rainbow and Twilight approach betrayed her immense inter strength.
The other ponies, and two griffons, were already there, sitting in a lose line in front of Luna, with their backs to the lights of Canterlot. Rainbow's quick internal count came to just 10. She wasn't sure what she was really expecting, but this somehow didn't seem like enough.
Rainbow landed on the far right side of the line with practiced ease, while Twilight stumbled a bit, coming to a stop on Rainbows right. Twilight was still having problems with her landings, even after all this time. Be fair, Rainbow, she's only been at this for a year... but are the Reiter Ponies going to be fair to her? I think I need to do something about...
"I'm pleased you could all make it on such short notice," Luna's calm voice cut off Rainbow's thoughts.
The two griffons and most of the ponies present snapped to attention as the Princess began, but a few ponies didn't. Good; me and Twilight aren't the only ponies here without experience. I hope Luna doesn't insist on that discipline stuff.
"I've asked you here, because I think the very nature of war is about to change. For centuries ponies, zebras, and even the griffons have fought to win, not to kill. We have fought for many reasons. For territory. For power. For honor. In these wars, we have always recognized two key truths about warfare; it is easier to rule a conquered population, if you return as many sons and daughters to them unharmed as possible, and it is easier to break an army's moral than it is push their back against a wall and exterminate them. If our enemies are shown that when they surrender they will be treated honorably, and fairly, they will be much more likely to surrender to us when defeated, rather than fight on and inflict far greater losses.
"But the Reiter Ponies can not hope to stand against our armies. If they fight us in the open they will be cut down, and their moral will be broken. Even though they out number us nearly two-to-one, when our backs are covered by our brothers and sister at arms, and we can bring the full might of our formations to bear, they will have no hope of standing against us. We could likely win a desisive victory against an army of them four times our size if necessary; that's how big the gap is. This worries me.
"My sister insists this war will be quick, and we can capture the majority of their soldiers in only a few months. She does admit we do not have the numbers necessary to do so now, which is why the call to arms has gone out and we're taking a few months to train the new recruits up to standard before committing to the war. I hope, against all of the evidence to the contrary that she is right, and the war will end quickly, but I do not believe it will.
"I have spent a lot of time these last few days, not thinking about what we should do to win this war, but instead thinking about what our enemies must do to have any hope of victory. Our enemies must see how futile a conventional war will be for them, every bit as easily as we do, so I suspect they will try something... different." Luna's voice trailed off as her eyes shifted from the gathered troops to the lights of Canterlot behind them.
Luna just sat there, bright cyan eyes shimmering in the moonlight. Her eyes are nearly the same color as my coat! How have I never noticed that before? I wonder how close my eyes are to her coat...? No, my eyes are more much more purple, sort of a mulberry, more like Twilight's coat than Luna's sapphire blue. Thinking of the mare, Rainbow looked to her right: Twilight was also lost in though, eyes unfocused still pointing in Luna's direction.
Ok, so... Rainbow couldn't stop herself from fidgeting, and her left fore-hoof kept pawing at the ground without her consent.
Only a moment before Rainbow herself did, a young fiery voice far to her left spoke up. "What do you think is going to happen, Princess?"
Most of the ponies and both griffons snapped their heads around to glare at the pony who had spoken up. Everypony who snapped to attention earlier, Rainbow realized. The offending Pegasus mare looked slightly taller than Rainbow—although not quite as tall as Twilight—and her coat was a bright gold, very reminiscent of Spitfire, but her mane was much longer and was a solid, dull red, rather than Spitfires vibrant two tone orange. She would have looked too young to be here if she wasn't so tall.
"Please," Luna began, resting a hoof on her chest, "simply call me Luna. I get enough 'princess' talk as it is, and I will not be your field commander, so I see no reason to command your respect as most commanders do. No, you will instead be lead by one of your own. Our ultimate goal here it to create a fully automatons elite squad, who's only mission is to out maneuver and crush the enemies skirmishers, which brings me to the answer of your question..." Luna trailed off, looking directly at the gold mare.
"...? Oh, Rapidfire!" the gold mare shouted, rearing back and giving the air in front of her two good foreleg kicks.
"Yes, miss Rapidfire, what do I think is going to happen in this war. Our enemies have enlisted the aid of one of our most powerful enemies, the exiled King Sombra, who was always a brutal commander; pushing his forces to the very brink. In our passed conflicts with him this left his troops exhausted before the battle even began, and their moral wavred and collapsed after suffering only minor losses, but the Reiter Ponies are different.
"The Reiter Ponies have lived hard lives in these last hundred years, and are no strangers to conflicts, and unlike us they have no qualms with killing. They are not savages, or beasts that lash out blindly, but they do not share our deep love of all living things. I fear this will lead to a drastic shift in their tactics against us.
"Usually a war is fought with a clear goal in mind, and this one is no different. Their goal, is no less than the conquest of the Crystal Empire. To do so, in the passed, their army would have to advance through our lands, and siege our cities, to take them from us by force, but they do not have the strength or the equipment for such an operation, and I doubt they would be able to mobilize enough supplies to feed such an army so far from their homes. As long as the Equestrian Royal Army stands, they will be unable to complete their goals.
"All they have done so far is attack a single city, and while the Crystal Castle is the center of our northern government, taking a single city will not win them half of our great Empire, but that was not their goal in this attack. During the attack, they focused all of their strength on a narrow part of our defenses, and managed to force their way into the city. The Crystal Guard was badly outnumbered and could do little to stop them, but rather than taking the Guard, and Princess Cadance hostage, they slaughtered them. They moved through the city, killing every guards-pony they came across, and when the last of the guard moved to surrender, they cut them down too."
As Luna spoke, her voice began to strain and Rainbow could have sworn the night was getting darker.
"But... what happened to Cadance, and...?" Twilight blurted out. Her eyes had grown wide, and her wings were half open at her sides, feathers gently brushing against Rainbow's own wing.
"Cadance and your brother are safe, Twilight. After breaching into the castles throne room, and killing most of the remaining guards, the Reiter Ponies made no attempt to press deeper into the castle, were Cadance and her few remaining guards were hiding. They may be starting what will become a terrible war, but they are not stupid."
"What do you mean?" Rainbow asked. "Wouldn't they want to... at least capture Cadance?"
"No," Luna stated bluntly. "What would they gain by killing Princess Cadance? Would we lay down our arms, and accept their rule of our norther lands? Of course not, and they know this. If they killed Cadance then thousands of Crystal Ponies, as well as many of our Southern Ponies would be lining up to join our armies. Even our looser allies would be eager to help us avenge our great loss. Killing Cadance would do nothing to further their goals, and would grant us great strength in opposing them.
"I'm afraid they intended to destroy our armies, and leave us with no defenses. I believe their intent is to draw us into their lands, cut us off from our supplies, and do their best to kill every last fighting member of our army, but they can not do that in a decisive battle, so I believe they will instead use hit-and-run tactics to keep us on the defensive, and wear us down. By staying fast and mobile, with a low troop density they can live off the land, at least to some extent, which will free them from supply lines. This will make it extremely difficult for us, and it will cost us thousands of lives just to move our armies, let alone attempting any counteroffensives.
"This is why we're here; I believe the best counter to their strategy is to have our own skirmishers ready, to move even faster than they can, and to keep the pressure on them and let it off our own conventional troops. If we can kill off their scouts, they will be blind. If we continue to stab at them in the night, they will be forced to spend resources on patrols. If we attack those patrols with overwhelming force, they will have to post larger patrols, warping up even more of their ponies, leaving fewer to attack our own forces. If we can get them to clump up enough, then maybe Celestia's decisive battle will happen, and we can win this war without too many losses. If not this will be a fight to the last."
"What exactly is Celestia's current plan?" Rapidfire asked, her excitement lost in the gravity of Luna's speech.
"Celestia plans on a conventional offensive war. She thinks if we can siege and hold the majority of the Reiter Ponies towns we can force them to surrender. She also hopes at some point the Reiter Ponies will be forced to stand and defend one of their major cities, and we can defeat them in a deceive battle, leaving them with little in the way of an army."
"That sounds reasonable, and that's how most wars have been won in the passed," Twilight said. "What was it...? When the enemy is too strong to be attacked directly, then attack something he holds dear?"
"Very good Twilight. The original meaning of that phrase is 'when an enemy is too strong to attack directly, you can often gain an advantage by forcing them to react and move from their position of strength,' but it has another meaning. Celestia hopes that by attacking their cities, and threatening a total conquest of their lands, they will surrender or at least be forced to fight in the open rather than continue their hit-and-run tactic's. By forcing them to defend a fixed objective, we will take away their greatest strength, their mobility.
"I fear that is a lost cause, however, as most of the Reiter Ponies live in the country side, with very little of their strength in their cities. I find it more likely they will let us have their cites, only to surround us and cut off our supplies, leaving us to starve in their streets.
"But enough of this talk; you all know why you're here. Of all the traits I wish to instil in you, independence is foremost among them. Most squadrons fight together, under the direct command of a superior, and any hesitation in following their orders can result in tragedy. We are not like that; here you will be expected to operate on a very small scale, far away from the next highest commander. You will often be asked to split into very small groups, to hunt scouts and perform scouting yourself.
"Your greatest strength will be your speed and unpredictability. This means you can not slow down long enough to send for new orders so you must all learn to be quick and independent thinkers, and commanders in your own right. I ask you one thing; rather than learn to respect your commanders authority, learn to respect each others intelligence and your own ability to make fast decisions, because your lives will depend on it.
"Most of you already know how to fight, and those that don't will have time to learn later; for now I want you all to work on your endurance. I don't care if you can happily fly all night at cruise speed; no matter how strong, fast, or how far you can fly right now, you will need to be stronger, faster and fly much further.
"Two hours. I want you all to run out of energy in two hours. If you have to pace yourself to stay in the air for that long, do so. If you don't think you could possibly run out of energy by then, they I want you to push yourself as hard as you physically can until then. The only way you can fail, is to return to me in two hours and still be able to hover in front of me. Do you under stand?"
"Ma'am, yes ma'am!" the military veterans shouted in chorus.
"Umm, yea I guess," Rainbow muttered, receiving a quizzical glance from Rapidfire.
"Yes, Luna," Luna said with some force. "I am not your commander, I am your teacher."
"Yes Luna!" Rainbow shouted with a little hop. "Is there anywhere specifically you'd want us to fly?"
"No, but I would ask you to stay away from the larger towns. I know how loud your yelling can be while flying, Rainbow Dash, and I'd rather you not wake anypony from their dreams."
"Oh, yea that makes sense," Rainbow muttered at the ground, feeling her face going flush.
Luna gave Rainbow a brief nod, a small smirk gracing her muzzle. "I will raise the moon directly above when it is time for you to return. Now go."
As the ponies and griffons all spread their wings and flew in various directions, Rapidfire skipped over to Rainbow. "Hey! No one told me a celebrity would be here!"
"Two," Rainbow said, motioning to Twilight. "Rapidfire? Are you a Wonderbolt?"
"No, and no relation to them either," the golden coated pony said, a cocky crooked smile growing even wider. "I can see why you'd think so though. I may not have it in my blood, but I'm confident I'd make a great addition. I'm no stunt flyer though," she added quickly, scrunching her nose in a quick grimace.
"No?" Rainbow asked, taking a quick glance around, just now noticing Twilight had already left. "Well, it looks like my friend wants to fly alone tonight, so do you think you can beat me to... the top of the Areion Peak?"
Rapidfire took a glance at the mountain over her shoulder, her long dull red mane flopping to the opisite shoulder. "No, I don't think I'm faster than 'Equestria's fastest flier,' but how about a different challenge? I bet I can fly at my top speed longer than you can fly at yours."
"What? How's that fair? You'd win just because you have less strength in your wings that I do!" Speaking of her wings, they were flared out at her sides again. I need to control myself.
"What's that?" Rapidfire took a few steps forward, with her head leaned back. "I'd win? Well then I guess that means..." She leaned forward, lowering her head to glare into Rainbows eyes. "You'd lose."
"What!" Rainbow lost all conscious control of her wings, as they rose above her head, ready to flap. "I never lose! You're on Rapidfire."
Rapidfire's cocky grin only widened as she turned towards the mountain and crouched, ready to take flight. That's when Rainbow noticed her legs. Unlike Rainbow Dash, who's well toned but small muscles gave the illusion on a normal sized, average strength mare—right up until I tare an Earth Ponies leg off in hoof-wrestling, as AJ found out, haha—Rapidfire was as well muscled as most farm ponies; even Applejack looked a little 'petite' by comparison.
"Go!" Rapidfire's shout drew Rainbow out of her thoughts, as the gold pony jumped into the air.
Rainbow gave a startled flap, but then steadied herself, allowing Rapidfire to gain some lead. A few seconds later, Rainbow Dash exploded into forward flight, her wings kicking up a furious wind—sorry Luna—as she threw everything she had into the flight. It was surprisingly difficult to catch Rapidfire, but Rainbow managed it in just a few moments, before steadily pulling ahead.
Sitting in the field, with calm once again setting in as the young headstrong Pegasi bolted from sight, Luna smiled. In only a moment the smile faded as Luna's mind was filled with dread. You don't deserve what's going to happen to you, the Princess of Night thought.
Rainbow Dash and Rapidfire had been flying laps around the Areion Peak for well over an hour now. They were circling about half way up the mountain, far above Canterlot. Rainbow hadn't been counting the laps themselves—we have to be well over a hundred by now—but she was counting how many times she had lapped Rapidfire. This is going to be thirteen now, she though, as she closed in on Rapidfire again.
Every time she passed the golden pony it had taken her longer to come around behind her again, and this time she had to fight tooth and feather for every inch she gained.
"That's thirteen!" Rainbow shouted, wobbling in the air as her she struggled to catch the breath she had wasted with the shout.
"I'm, happy, for, you," Rapidfire replied, muttering the words between quick gasps, timed between her flaps. Sweat had darkened her coat to a much less vibrant gold, but the look of youthful determination was as bright as ever.
With her lungs on fire, and every flap bringing a sharper and sharper pain to her sides and chest, Rainbow slowed slightly to match pace with Rapid. Whoa, this really, really sucks; but I'm winning! I'm so winning!
"Hey, Rain, bo... wow. It's, been, awhile, ha." Rapidfire was still maintaining a very good pace; faster than most Pegasi could manage fresh. "Why, did, you, slow?"
"This is it," Rainbow only slightly lied. Every flap further the two Pegasi flew, Rainbow could steadily feel her energy fading; if Rapidfire didn't slow soon she might start to out run Rainbow. I won't let that happen! Rainbow pushed harder, and harder to stay by Rapidfire's side, but as she once again closed in on the limit of her endurance Rapidfire began to slowly inch ahead.
No, no, no! Rainbow pushed herself back to her limit, and managed to hold steady with Rapidfire for a few more minutes, but soon enough Rapidfire began to pull ahead again, and no matter how hard she strained her wings forcing all of her strength into every flap, Rainbow couldn't quite keep up. Slowly, over the course of several minutes, Rapidfire opened a solid lead over Rainbow. Yea, well... I'm still twelve full laps ahead.
As Rainbow tried to push herself to close in again, her vision began to swim, and Rapidfire's tail appeared to blur and distort, eventually splitting in two. The pains in her side began to turn from sharp, hot spikes, into a cold throbbing and the world began to lose what color it had in the rock and snow. Soon, a dark blur began to close in around her vision.
"Ah hay, I think I'm out," Rainbow finally admitted to herself as she began to slow. I just need a moment to rest my eyes a little; they can hardly see anything anyway...
"Hey... are... you... napping?" Rapidfire's voice came from behind. She was panting now, and her words came very strained.
"No..." Rainbow managed, forcing her eyes open. A grey scale version of Rapidfire poked into her field of view, putting a concerned hoof on her shoulder.
"You don't... look so good," Rapidfire forced out, wobbling unsteadily.
It took Rainbow a moment to realize both of them were struggling to hold themselves in a glide. I could have sworn I was flying...
"I think we're done," Rapidfire said shakily. "I sure as hay can't hover; can you?"
Rainbow smiled, remembering Luna's order's. "No, I don't think I can."
"Then we better get back before you pass out; I can't carry you like this."
As they descended into the thicker air Rainbow was watching Rapidfire, and the color in her mane and coat began to return. It's my eyes, Rainbow realized; I've run myself out of air to the point of going color blind. I've never done that before.
Approaching the area they'd left Luna, Rainbow also spotted Twilight sitting by her sided. They were having a discussion about magic; Rainbow wasn't sure she could follow the conversation even if the world didn't sound like it was underwater, but with everything muffled and blurry she didn't even try listening.
Her landing was not as graceful as usual, but she was proud to have not stumbled, unlike Rapidfire who ended up with her muzzle in the grass.
"Ouch," Rapidfire muttered, rolling onto her side. "Well... that was fun."
"I hope so; I plan on having us start all of our training sessions this way," Luna offered, turning away from her quiet discussion with Twilight. "I think it is time to call the others back," she added, eyes going unfocused as she manually advanced the moon's position, in a way only the Princes Of The Night And Moon could.
Luna looked exactly as they had left her, mane sparkling in a constellation of stars Rainbow could almost recognize, but Twilight had changed noticeably. Her fur was ruffled, and her mane was frayed quite badly, and her eyes were filled with concern as she stared back at Rainbow.
"Do I really look that bad?" Rainbow asked with what little air she had collected in her lungs, before returning to her painful panting. When nopony answered—although the childish smile on Luna's snout gave her an idea—Rainbow turned her head around to inspect her flank. Oh... Her fur was more disjointed that she had ever seen before, with patches bent in every direction held up by sweat, and her feathers looked like they would take days to straighten out, while her tail and mane, that usually flowed straight, was spiked worse than Scootaloo's usually was. Honestly, my mane's not a bad look, she thought, but had to admit the rest of her looked like it had been buried for several days.
"Whoa, I look as bad as I feel!" Rainbow declared, turning back around. Her expression elicited a grin from Rapidfire and a giggle from Luna, but Twilight still wore a deeply concerned expression.
Before Rainbow could ask the rest of their comrades began arriving. They all looked truly terrible; one of the griffons specifically, a male with obsidian black fur and gleaming silver feathers, looked like he had been badly mauled. He was the only one present that truly rivaled Rainbow's own disheveled appearance.
"Now, are we all here? Good," Luna began in a calm voice. "Now I want each of you to hover in place."
Rainbow was a bit confused for a moment, but quickly connected the dots with a smile. Oh, Luna, why do you tease us so? Rather than cheat, Rainbow leaped into the air on her still reasonably strong legs, with every intent set on hovering in place and failing Luna's earlier challenge. Unfortunately—or should I say fortunately?—her right wing crumpled under the strain of the very first flap and she collapsed heavily on her right side.
"That was terrible," Rapidfire commented from the sidelines.
"Let's see what you can do!" Rainbow shouted, without the strength to raise her head, and remained on her side.
"Yea, that's a no. I can't even stand!" Rapidfire dragged herself along the ground into Rainbows field of view, and then relaxed on her side. "I honestly wasn't expecting you to have that level of endurance, Dash; I though stunt ponies only trained for speed!"
"I'm also our towns Weather Manager; I spend a lot of time flying around chasing clouds, with nothing better to do than push myself." Rainbow tried to shrug, but stopped to focus on her breathing for a minute. "...What about you? You look more like an Earth Pony than a Pegasus!"
Rapidfire blushed quite heavily, but managed not to look away. "I... grew up on a rock farm, and when I finally managed to get out, I ended up working on a corn farm. I don't know why, I just never really fit in with Pegasi."
A few of Luna's students had managed to hover for a few moments, but it seemed none of them could stay in the air for long.
"Very good everyone! I was not expecting this level of commitment so early." Luna wore a large smile as she spoke. "We all have a long way to go, but endurance will be the cornerstone that all of our tactics will be built from. The longer you can fly, the longer we can train. There is one more thing we will do tonight; we will sometimes need to fly long distances to spot our prey, so we must become adapt at fighting when low on energy, and we must learn to conserve what we have and know when to use it."
Luna paused as she looked around at those arrayed in front of her. "I see one of you has a question. Do not be afraid to speak up; we are all comrades in arms here, and the better we know each other the better we can support one another." When the black furred griffon refused to ask his question, Luna spoke again. "Do not be afraid to speak to me, as I have no patience for those that lack initiative. If you must always be told what to do, and are afraid to make your own moves and voice your concerns, you will find no succsess with this squadron."
"Yes... Luna." The griffons voice was far deeper than Rainbow had been expecting. As far as griffons went he was not actually very large; he looked to be about the same size as Gilda, possibly a little smaller, but he spoke with the well honed precision of a trained warrior. "I am beginning to understand why I am here, and what you're planning to do, and I see great wisdom in your plan. You are looking to maximize our effectiveness while minimizing the number of soldiers at risk, but I don't understand why she is here."
The griffon gestured at Twilight.
"Hey!" Rainbow shouted, jumping to her hooves, her bodies painful protests ignored. "What do you mean—"
"Rainbow," Luna cut her off. "Let us hear what he has to say before we judge the validity of his complaint."
Rainbow held her tongue, but she remained standing, finding herself suddenly filled with energy she didn't know she had.
The griffon continued. "I don't see why you would be willing to risk somepony as powerful, and as valuable as a princess. If you must put an Alicorn in charge, you would make a far better leader than her." There was nothing personal about how the griffon spoke of Twilight, if anything his speech was tinted with humble respect. It still set Rainbow's ears back and flared her wings wide to hear him speak of Twilight like that.
"What is your name, griffon?" Luna's voice was still calm and friendly, but was tinged with authority.
"Procyon, ma'am," the griffon replied with a quick bow.
"Call me Luna, Procyon," Luna said, giving Procyon a curt bow of her own, before turning to address the entire group. "Twilight is not here to be your leader. I will be placing the very best of you in charge of the group as a whole, but no one is subject to anyone else in this squadron. You will all be your own leaders by the time we're done here. Have I answered your question, Procyon?"
"No," Procyon said plainly. "If she is not here to lead us, then why is she here? There are hundreds of other griffons that could—"
"Silence." The word was gentle, even as it was sharp. "Are you questioning my decision, Procyon?"
"I—"
"If so you're coming along far more quickly that I would have expected, given you're strong military background. There is nothing wrong with questioning my decisions, if anything you must learn to question your leaders, because if they make a mistake it can get you all killed. As I've explained, you will be operating alone and heavily out numbered; one wrong call and it's over for all of you. We do not lead our little squad with authority, we lead it with respect, but part of respecting each other is not judging someone's worth until you have seen what they are capable of. Have I answered your question now?"
"Well... no. I've seen what she can do; she was hardly flapping along after just an hour, and she returned to you well before we were finished. I don't know what you—"
As Procyon was speaking Luna's eyes had began to narrow, but he froze as her expression twisted into a scowl. "It is true; Twilight is not ready to fly into combat yet, but none of you are; not the type of combat I'm asking you to commit to. She may be the furthest from ready, but that also means she has the most room to improve, and will likely improve the fastest. I understand your concerns perfectly, but there is no one in all our armies that can do what Twilight can to replace her. You still have a question; ask it."
"...What can she do?" Procyon's was standing his ground, but there was fear in his voice. Rainbow Dash couldn't blame him in the slightest.
Luna's expression softened back to cool contentment, and any hint of anger was gone when she spoke. "That is a very wise question, and I feel a demonstration is in order. Twilight Sparkle, do you feel up for a challenge?"
Twilight's ears snapped up and her eyes widened. "Luna, I don't kno—"
"Good. Rainbow Dash, would you lend me your strength?" All eyes shifted to Rainbow at Luna's request.
Like you even need to ask. "Of course, Luna."
"Good. There is a game we're going to use to practice our... energy conservation. Most soldiers fight in formation, supporting each other, and since a formation cannot dodge attacks they must stand their ground to protect those next to them. If we tried to fight like that we would be bowled over by even a token force, so instead we must fight swiftly and as individuals only loosely supporting each other.
"The focus of this game is to practice the skills necessary for this type of warfare. The goal is not to land repeated strikes, or grapple with your opponent. If you latch on to an opponent, and attempt to defeat them with strength alone, then you will be an easy target for their allies. Instead we will strike quickly, and retreat before they can counter. We will dodge by staying out or reach until they leave an opening, and then you will strike.
"So in this game, the goal is to land a solid connection with the opponent, while denying them the opportunity to strike back. When you two are ready you may begin. Strikes to the legs or wings will not be counted yet, and while you may attempt to block strikes understand this is an unnecessary risk and a waste of strength."
Luna and the rest of her students had moved a good distance away, creating a loose and disorganized circle around the two friends. Rainbow crouched low to the ground and began pacing around Twilight, who slowly turned in place to watch her but otherwise stayed still.
Rainbow took a tentative flap of her wings. Ouch, well... I guess I'm on hoof for the time being. While her wings where out of action, she hadn't put much stress on her legs today and they were still responding well, even though she had very little energy. Twilight had to be feeling the same way, and even at full strength Twilight was not a very fast runner and her reaction's were relatively slow. She may have been exhausted, but Rainbow was confident this would be a quick win.
She cantered up to Twilight, staying just out of her slightly longer reach, but Twilight backed away. Oh really? Rainbow moved forward again, curving to Twilight's left before pressing in quicker this time. Again Twilight tried to move away, but she stumbled slightly. Rainbow took the opportunity to leap forwards, leading with her left fore-hoof. Before she made contact Twilight disappeared in a bright purple flash, leaving Rainbow to land awkwardly in her place.
Twilight reappeared a short distance away on Rainbows left. "You can't keep this up all night, Twi," Rainbow said, rushing at Twilight before she could recover from the short distance teleportation, but once again before Rainbow could make contact Twilight winked out. Rainbow nearly fell on her face this time as her legs buckled under the strain of the rough landing.
"Twilight, you are doing very well, but stop wasting opportunities and energy," Luna spoke from the sidelines.
Before Rainbow could turn around she heard Twilight teleport again, then felt a weight drop on her from above, forcing her legs to give out and pressing her belly into the ground. "Twilight!"
"Oh, I'm sorry, but isn't that a point?" Twilight asked Luna as Rainbow struggled to lift both her own weight and Twilight's.
"Technically yes, but as I said grappling is an unnecessary risk," Luna answered.
"But why—" Twilight began.
"Point!" Rainbow shouted, reaching a hoof behind her to hit Twilight in the side. It wasn't strong enough to be a real punch, more of a hard pat, but the whap if hoof striking soft fur echoed through the still night air. "Poi—" Rainbow began to shout again, intending to strike Twilight's other side, but during her windup a great weight set in across her entire body, pressing all four of her hooves into the soft grass.
"Rainbow, that wasn't very nice!"
"We're preparing you to go to war, Twilight," Luna said coldly. "This is not going to be nice, and what we're training you to do to others is even less nice. Still, you have proven your strength admirably. Get up from Rainbow Dash, but keep her pinned down if you'd please."
Rainbow could feel Twilight climb off of her back, and watched her walk away in front of her, before turning back to face her captive, and through it all the weight holding Rainbow pinned to the ground did not waver. It only took Rainbow a moment to realize what was happening; her right foreleg was cast in front of her face and she could clearly see the purple glow of Twilight's magic shimmering across her own fur.
"Rainbow Dash, would you please rise," Luna asked politely.
Rainbow strained every muscle in her body, dumping what strength she had left into finding any part of her that would move. Her only reward for her efforts was seeing Twilight's expression strain as she was forced to put extra concentration into her spell. I can't, she tried to say, but Twilight's spell had clamped around her muzzle too, and it came out in an unintelligible mumble.
"You may release her, Twilight. Procyon, have we now addressed your concerns over Twilight's value?"
As Rainbow struggled to her hooves, helped by Twilight's gentle push, she turned to look at the black and silver griffon. He was slowly nodding his head, a curious look directed at Twilight.
"Good. As I'm sure you have just noticed, a powerful Unicorn can leave even the strongest and fastest of us helpless. Luckily, powerful Unicorns are relatively rare, and there are tactics you can employ to reduce their effectiveness that I will teach you, but as the best defense is a powerful offense, the best counter for a Unicorn is another.
"This puts Twilight in a very powerful position, as she will allow you to bring a truly massive amount of magical firepower to bear, without being slowed down by a ground bound pony. I hope you understand why I have given Twilight a larger room for error, as she is truly irreplaceable, but by the end of our training she will be judged every bit as fairly as the rest of you.
"Now, I was planing on having you begin practicing with our little game, but I see most of you have yet to adapt to our new sleep schedule, so we are ending for today. Get some rest, as we will be doing the same thing tomorrow. Twilight, would you stay to have a word with me please."
"Um, yea, sure," Twilight answered, turning to Rainbow. "Are you ok?"
"Yea, I'm perfectly fine. All of me hurts now, so I hardly notice the gashes on my side." Rainbow spared them a quick glance; they hadn't been reopened and the center cut, the one Twilight had sealed, was hardly visible. "I'll see you back at the room." Rainbow gave Twilight a gentle—by her standards—bump as she turned to fly away. She managed to get airborne through shear stubbornness; Equestria's fastest flier will not be forced to walk back!
⁂
Twilight watched as Rainbow somehow managed to find the strength to fly. Watching her climb towards Canterlot made Twilight's own wings ache.
"Twilight, I... there is something I should share with you about our dear friend." Luna was looking up at her night sky, eyes shimmering with the light of billions of stars, all at her command.
"What is it Luna?" The others had all gone, most trotting towards Canterlot but a few, most notably Rainbow's new friend Rapidfire, flew in other directions. Rapidfire had also somehow managed to find the strength to fly, although she looked almost intoxicated as she wobbled down into the valley below Canterlot. She must live somewhere nearby if she's flying home in this condition... maybe I should invite her back to the castle with us some time; I'm sure there's room.
"Twilight, do you know how we become Alicorns?"
"Well that's an odd question. Is Rainbow being considered?" Twilight had never even considered what it would be like to have another one of her friends become an Alicorn, but Twilight couldn't imagine Rainbow would even want to be a princess; that sound's more like Rarity if anyone.
"We do not consider ponies for the position Twilight; so I take it you don't know everything?" Luna had moved close, standing just to Twilight's side at a comfortable distance for a close friend.
"I suppose not."
"But you know Alicorns are made, not born. That is enough for this discussion. What do you think Cadance was before she became an Alicorn?"
"I've always known her as an Alicorn, but after becoming one myself I asked Cadance, and she told me everything. She was born a Pegasus, and raised by Earth Ponies before Celestia adopted her."
"That is true, Twilight, she was. What do you think I and Celestia were?"
The thought had never even occurred to her; in all of Twilight's readings Celestia and Luna were always referred to as Alicorns, with the exception of translation errors were they where referred to as Pegasus Unicorns. "I honestly have no idea," Twilight admitted with wonder creeping into her voice.
"I'm not sure I should actually be telling you this... I was born a Pegasus, and Tia..." Luna paused, her eyes shifting towards Canterlot's Castle, were Celestia was undoubtedly fast asleep.
"...Luna! You know I'll find out somehow; there are a lot of books in the Canterlot library, and I'm sure Celestia will give me full access!"
"Calm yourself, Twilight. Celestia was born an Earth Pony. I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell Celestia how you know," followed with a quick wink.
"An Earth Pony...? But isn't magic a necessary part of the tests, or was that unique to me?"
"No pony alive today knows exactly what the test's are; if we did we might be tempted to push our students through, and then the tests may as well not exist in the first place, but this is not relevant to our discussion on Rainbow Dash."
"Wait, how is any of this relevant to Rainbow?" Twilight was thoroughly confused now, with no solution in sight she forced her mind to stop, and waited for Luna to explain.
"Even before becoming an Alicorn, Cadance showed extreme gifts in magic, being able to master powerful illusion spells; spells even a power Unicorn would struggle with. Despite being on simple Earth Pony Celestia showed great potential at mastering complex spells. I, personally, became one of the most powerful spell casters in the Republic, and both myself and Celestia were trained by Star Swirl personally, well before becoming Alicorns."
"The Republic...? Oh! You and Celestia became the first Alicorns during the Empires founding! I always forget you and Celestia are not actually as old as the Empire, but even older than it. I still don't get what this has to do with Rainbow, so all Alicorns can use magic even before?"
"We don't know if magic is truly required to become an Alicorn, but that's not the point. Twilight, it's not just pre-Alicorns that can use magic without a horn, many other ponies can too."
Twilight's mind went blank for a minute. "Well, yes, Pegasi can walk on clouds and effect the weath—"
"Yes, but that's not what I mean. Some Pegasi and Earth Ponies can gain conscious control of their magic, and cast spells as Unicorns do."
"...Why isn't this common knowledge? How am I just now hearing about this? Is it rare?"
"We are not sure exactly how rare it is, but the first two questions are part of what we must talk about. While Pegasi and Earth Ponies can control magic, it is much more difficult for them, and much more dangerous. It requires great focus and concentration to control. If they do not have these traits, they can become an extreme danger to themselves and those around them. When Rainbow Dash was struggling against your telekinesis I could feel her emotions pushing outward, and I could feel her inter power. With training and great practice I feel she may even rival you and I."
Twilight spent a full minute considering this, and allowing time for the truth to sink in. Rainbow Dash is as strong as I am? That's great; we could really use the extra push... but will she be able to control herself? "Why have you told me this?"
"I do not know Rainbow Dash well enough to judge if she can be trusted with the truth. Some things you must consider, Twilight; even if Rainbow proves not to be a threat to herself with these abilities, she may not have enough time to train before we're at war, so even if we take this great risk—and do not be fooled for a moment, a great risk she is—it may not pay off in time to be relevant. I will trust your judgment, Twilight Sparkle, but understand her actions will reflect on you, and recognize that this knowledge is a state secret; if it became common knowledge countless ponies could be injured, or killed. You must share this with no one else without consulting myself or Celestia."
"...What about Cadance?" Twilight wasn't sure why she asked, but the thought of her old foal-sitter was comforting.
"...Cadance does not know."
It took a moment for the words to sink in. "What? How does Cadance not know about this? She was one of the ponies that could do magic without a horn!"
"She believes her magic was simply her gift; much as your friend, Fluttershy, believes the illusion magic she calls 'the stare' is part of her gift as well. It is not, she is casting a spell by instinct alone. This is not dangerous, but if she were to learn that she could consciously control her magic, she would inevitably start 'modifying' it, and trying new spells. You, of all ponies, great Bearer of Magic, should recognize how dangerous wild magic can be, made even more dangerous by the lack of a focal point." Luna tapped her own horn.
"...I don't... Does Celestia know?"
"That I'm telling you this? We discussed the possibility, of telling and training some of the Pegasi if they showed talent, and we agreed you would be the best pony for the job. After feeling Rainbow Dash's power... I had to tell you, and Celestia will understand and approve."
"Luna, I... have no idea what to do."
"I wouldn't expect you to. If I had known what to do, I would have simply told you, but I do not know Rainbow Dash well enough to make this choice for her. Take some time to think it through, and do not rush into a decision. We will not have enough time to train her this coming week anyway. Just remember, Twilight, that once she knows, she will never be able to forget what power is within her grasp, and she will use it, with or without training. If you chose to walk this path with her, you must do it together all the way to it's conclusion, which will carry on even after the war has ended."
There were too many questions Twilight wanted to ask, and they all blurred together, choking her thoughts to a standstill. "...I'm going to need some time to think about this."
"Of course, and remember no matter the time of day or night Celestia or I will be able to answer your questions." And with that Luna rose into the air on gentle flaps, moving hardly any air as she slipped into the sky. "Any time, Twilight," she called down, then turned and climbed into the sky.
Mind still awash in noisy questions, Twilight considered attempting to fly back to the Castle. The ache as she tried to stretch her wings answered a resounding, no. With one of the questions answered, she began the long walk back into Canterlot.
Twilight had woken up rather early, at just about noon. While she would normally consider that waking late in the extreme, Luna had made it clear that she was expecting everyone to get their sleep schedule around for their night based training. She had tried to wake Rainbow twice now; the first attempt ended with some vague mumbling, while the second attempt a few minutes later received a very curt 'go away.'
Fine. If I could I would continue sleeping in too, but I have too much to think about. With nothing better to do Twilight flew into Canterlot Proper for a mid day breakfast, before flying to the Canterlot Library. I need to know more about the potential issues non-unicorn magic users face.
Twilight very quickly ran into a bit of a problem however; as far as the recorded history of Equestrian Magic was concerned, Pegasus and Earth Pony casters simply didn't exist. Luna told me herself and Celestia were apprenticed to Star Swirl well before they were to become Alicorns. Some record of their time must exist somewhere... Twilight had already read every scrap of information on Star Swirls life, and his studies and postulations of magic theory, and even knew the major sources by heart; none mentioned any of his apprentices other than Celestia, and she was only mentioned in books written in post-republic era's.
That's when Twilight started realizing something; the magic that Star Swirl had cast to bind the Republic together, and gift Luna and Celestia with their great Alicorn powers was the transition between the Republic and the Equestrian Empire. Star Swirl had to know them before the transition; he would have never trusted the future of our entire nation to strangers.
Twilight moved to the 'forbidden' wing of the Canterlot Library. It wasn't actually truly forbidden, more just heavily restricted. Twilight was given access years ago after annoying Celestia with enough questions on Equestria's ancient history she had decided to let Twilight discover the answers on her own.
She had read most of even this remote section of the library, so she knew exactly what she was looking for; the book Imperium Occupare Sol et Luna. The basic translation was 'Empire Of The Sun And Moon,' but the more literal translation was akin to 'Empire Which Controls The Sun And Moon,' which was—in Twilight's opinion—a very accurate description. It was the oldest book to detail the Equestrian Empires history that still existed, written about two hundred years after the Empire was founded while it's early days were still fresh.
It was mostly about the brutal unification wars that Celestia had waged to bring the southern lands together after the Republic had dissolved. It didn't take Twilight long to find the section she was looking for; it detailed the ceremony that crowned Celestia ruler of all ponies. There was no date given, and it read more like a folk tale than a first hoof account, likely because it was written so long after the event had taken place.
Later in the book was another chapter, this time detailing Luna's ascension. Still no date was given, but it was mentioned to be a significant time after Celestia, to the extent that Celestia's rule had mostly stabilized locally, and during this ceremony Celestia named their empire after the two of them, and their respective gifts. This was also the time Celestia gave up the monicker queen, commanding all ponies to refer to both herself and her sister as princesses. At least that's how Twilight translated the text; it was difficult as the original language was long dead, and did not translate into modern Equestrian one-to-one, with words instead combining and changing each others meaning significantly in strange ways.
Twilight was still able to find what she was looking for; upon their ascensions both Celestia and Luna had used their new found powers that very first day as part of their ceremonies, to raise their respective celestial body. Both Celestia and Luna had total—or at least significant—mastery of their magic from day one of being Alicorns.
Twilight knew just how difficult it was to learn how to fly after having suddenly sprouted wings in her late teens; and if she was translating the book properly it looked like Celestia and Luna were even older when they become Alicorns, and yet both could use difficult magic the very first day they had grown horns. They must have been powerful mages before... Luna has to be right. Twilight's realization was reinforced as she re-read Celestia's chapter again; Celestia didn't fly, at all, during her ascension celebration, or ritual or however this translates. Celestia didn't know how to fly, because she was just an Earth Pony before, but both her and Luna had great experience with magic.
Up to this point Twilight's main question was 'is it possible Luna was right.' Now that she had evidence that it really was true, a much more difficult question came to mind; what do I do about this? So Luna was right; you don't need a horn to cast magic. How much harder will it be? Will Rainbow even want to become a mage? If she doesn't want to become a mage, will she be able to completely block out her natural talent, or will she be forced to try and master it anyway?
Oh, what if she really could be as strong as I am? Is it fair to her that I keep this opportunity from her? And how will I ever forgive myself if I don't tell her, and she gets hurt because she was unable to defend herself? But if I tell her she may end up hurting herself anyway! WHY DID LUNA GIVE ME THIS RESPONSIBILITY?!
Twilight had to work hard to control her breathing and focus her mind. I can't make this choice for her, it's not fair to either of us, but I can't explain to her everything, because if she knows about this the choice will have already been made... And if I do tell her, will I explain everything, that any pony can learn this, or do I... lie and tell her she's special, like Luna...? Well, that's not really a lie; she is special because of all the power she holds.
I can't tell her everything, because if I do she may be tempted to tell Fluttershy that she can cast spells too, and Fluttershy would have to be trained too, and she may not want to spend so much time training. At least Rainbow is already committed to a full time training regime; I know she'd see it through, even if she didn't want to.
"Ugh!", Twilight shouted, angrily putting Imperium Occupare Sol et Luna back on the shelf were it belonged. "I need to talk to Rainbow about this before we're busy tonight."
Twilight flew back into Canterlot, and ordered a quick sandwich for herself and two for Rainbow. Twilight was in the library for far longer than she realized; the sun was just setting, and dark clouds were moving in from the west. Please don't rain. Please don't rain. Please don't rain. I like my coat not covered in mud, thank you.
Rainbow was somehow still asleep when Twilight flew back into the room.
"For the love of Celestia!" Twilight shouted, setting the food on the table before jumping onto the bed. "You've been asleep for over seventeen hours!"
"And I'll sleep for another..." Rainbow rolled away from Twilight, and tried to cover her head with a pillow.
Twilight ripped the pillow away and tossed it to the far side of the bed. "No. There's something I would like to talk to you above before practice today, which is probably only an hour away! Up, now." When Rainbow did nothing more than moan, Twilight began telekinetically pulling the pillows out of Rainbow's makeshift 'nest,' and stacking them neatly on the opisite side of the bed.
After a minute of this Rainbow was out of pillows, laying spread haphazardly on the empty bed. Releasing a massive sigh Rainbow finally stood up and gently hovered off of the bed. "Ok Twi, what?!"
"How do you feel about magic?" Twilight asked abruptly.
"Magic? Why would I care?" Rainbow still looked rather sleepy, but she was standing and looking back with her eyes reasonably focused.
"Just because you can't use it doesn't mean it doesn't effect you."
"Well... I don't know. I never really thought about it until last night." Rainbow gave a loose shrug.
"Ok, so what do you think about it?" Twilight asked with a little hop. "This is important; I need to know, but I don't know how much I can tell you without making the choice for you."
"...? Ok Twi, you're starting to lose me."
"I need to know how committed you'll be."
"Ok, committed to what?"
"That... telling you would defeat the purpose of asking you."
"Yea, you lost me." Rainbow had discovered the sandwich's Twilight had placed on the table. "I hate alfalfa..."
"That one's mine; the two blue berry and jam's are for you."
"Oh, thanks Twilight! How did you know?"
"Well Rainbow, I've only known you five years now. My magic is strong indeed."
The confused look Rainbow gave as she began stuffing her muzzle let Twilight know she hadn't understood the joke.
"It doesn't mater," Twilight said, gently shaking her head. "What I'm trying to ask is... what are you willing to do to protect yourself from magic users?"
"Well," Rainbow struggled to say before swallowing, "—that's really good—I'm not sure. A lot, I guess."
"So, a lot? Like training to master a technique for months, and still needing to be careful and focus even well after the war is over, a lot?" Twilight really wasn't sure how much more she could say.
"Yea, I guess."
"Why?"
"What do you mean, why?" Rainbow bit back, sounding very defensive.
Her rapid shift in tone caught Twilight a bit off guard. Rainbow took the opportunity to bite back into her sandwich. "Why are you willing to sacrifice so much?"
"Well, duh," Rainbow spat, "I can already counter other Pegasi and even Griffons in the air, and I can even match most Earth Ponies on the ground if I really need to, but I can do nothing about Unicorns! Twilight," Rainbow had set down what was left of her first sandwich; the last of her long sleep firmly driven from her face, "last night, on the field when we were sparing and you pined me down with magic... that really sucked. If it was anypony but you I likely would have had a panic attack!"
"Really? You were scared?"
Something in Rainbow snapped. "Of course I'm bucking scared! Think about it Twi, I'm one of the strongest and I am the fastest pony in all of Equestria, and now I'm going to have several mouths of real military training to back up my instincts; I beat a militarily trained Griffon in single combat for Celestia's sake! And do you know what that means? NOTHING! All of my talent, and all of Luna's training and you, or any Unicorn comparable to you, can still pin me to the ground, slit my throat, or just turn me into a fine cyan paste with a thought!"
"Actually, your fur is cerulean, not cyan—"
"THAT'S NOT THE BUCKING POINT TWILIGHT! There's nothing I can do, but hope I catch them off guard! All of my strength, and all of my speed, and my only hope is to club them in the back of the head while they're not looking! That sucks! Twilight... if I didn't have you here, to protect me from them, I probably would have left the moment I learned just what Unicorns are capable of. I considered leaving anyway, but I can't leave you here alone, and I trust you to keep us safe from what I can't deal with myself."
"Rainbow that's... I never thought of it that way. Luna says that she's going to teach you tactics to make the fight more fair."
"Sure Twilight, to make it a little more fair to try and fight a creature that can pull my legs off as easily as if I was a insect? That sounds so fair."
"Well, it's not that unfair for venomous spiders; do you remember last summer, when I was bitten by that widow spider!"
"Yea Twilight, and you're still doing fine, and the spider is gone."
"No he's not; I gave him to Fluttershy and she said sh—"
"AND how long would the spider have lived if you wanted him dead, like the Reiter Ponies want us dead? You wouldn't even need magic... I don't want to talk about this anymore, Twilight. What's the point." Rainbow picked up the remaining half of her fist sandwich and turned away from Twilight.
"I'm sorry Rainbow; I let the conversation wonder off topic. What would you give to be able to match even the strongest Unicorns, and possibly even me?"
"We can start with my front right leg," Rainbow stated mater-of-fact, turning back towards Twilight and extending said limb, as she took a bite of her sandwich.
"That's not quite what I'm asking you to sacrifice. Would you be willing to train every bit as hard as we already are, and studying under my guidance? I can't promise it will be exiting, although it will be dangerous, and if Luna's right potentially life threatening."
Rainbow frowned as Twilight spoke, but she gave a slow firm nod.
"Ok, well I guess I'm willing to commit the time to teach you," Twilight began, "and take responsibility for... anypony you hurt... Are you sure about this, Rainbow? I could give you some time to think."
Rainbow finished her food, and took a moment to stare at the floor. "I'm sure, Twi. I don't want to be at any-ponies mercy, ever. What did you have in mind?"
"One last time, you are sure? There's no going back from here."
"I'm sure, Twilight. I trust you."
Twilight took her time explaining to Rainbow almost everything Luna had told her. She explained that Luna and Celestia were both able to become powerful casters before having a horn, and that Rainbow also had the potential to do so. Twilight left out the part about any pony theoretically being able to cast spells, as Rainbow would not benefit from this knowledge, and it could put a lot of ponies at risk and give her an unnecessary burden to bear.
"So, Luna was a Pegasi?" was the first question Rainbow asked when Twilight's explanation ended.
"Yes, and like you she had a massive internal power source. You just need to learn how to access it, and control it."
"Ok, so what's the big deal? How is that dangerous?"
"You might go power mad, like Sombra, or you may just randomly explode one day, or you might hurt somepony if you lose control, or you could hurt yourself, and even if we practice you will never have very good fine control, and your magic will be inherently unstable making it much more likely for spells to misfire, and—"
"Ok, Twi; I get it. So, were do we begin?"
Rainbow looked a lot more exited than Twilight had imagined. Part of Twilight had honestly expected Rainbow to be disastrously board by all of this, although there was still plenty of time for her to get board later.
"Well, Rainbow... I don't actually know. The last time a Pegasi was trained in the arcane arts was, to my knowledge, when Luna was trained by Star Swirl nearly two and a half thousand years ago. I've been looking for any references to their time together, but I've been unable to find much. I'm sure Luna can help us some time later, maybe even tonight."
"Ok, way to get me all exited then tell me to wait Twi," Rainbow said with a wry grin, "and don't doubt yourself, Twilight; I'm sure you'll figure something out. Until then is there anything I shouldn't be doing?"
"Well, Luna said the moment you knew what power you could potentially wield, you would never be able to let it go, so I guess if we wait long enough your mind should be able to make the connections on it's own. Basically you just need to gain conscious control over your instinctual magic that you already cast, and then we go from there."
"Ok?"
"I'm sorry Rainbow, but at least we know what we're going to do now, even if we don't know how yet. Tomorrow before practice I'll get back to the library and try and dig up some information on how to cast without a horn. I've never seen anything on it before, but I'm sure there must be something."
A firm three knock pattern echoed through the door.
"Well, I guess it's time. Thanks for telling me this Twilight, and I'm sure you'll make a great teacher, as soon as, you know, you figure out how to start teaching me." Rainbow turned to answer the door, even though they both knew what it was for.
Twilight grabbed her own sandwich off the table and quickly started nibbling it away. As Rainbow returned from the door she put on a gentle smile and gave a quick nod, picking up her second sandwich as the two friends prepared to fly into the dark night.
⁂
Luna issued the same challenge she had the first night, and her students once again scattered in their own directions. Rainbow Dash and Rapidfire once again competed in a circling contest about mid way up the Areion Peak, but unlike last time Rainbow paced herself a bit better, coming up on lapping Rapidfire for the thirteenth time just as Luna raised the moon directly overhead, signaling her students to return.
Even though she hadn't pushed herself to near death like she had the first time, Rainbow didn't need to fake exhaustion when Luna asked them to hover in place. She managed to drag herself into the air, and held her hooves off the ground for a moment, but her wings simply refused to hold her up for more than a few flaps at a time.
"Very good," Luna told her exhausted students. "If any among you find your endurance rising to levels were you can no longer exhaust yourself in a mere two hours, I expect you to begin earlier in the night, before we meet. Eventually you will all need more time, and we will begin to go for longer, but not for awhile.
"Today, as you are still getting used to operating on low energy, I will begin training your minds instead of training your bodies. Our game of strategy I introduced you to last night will help you master the tactics and techniques you will need to compete with opponents who can afford to use more of their energy than you, but tonight we will talk about how you will deal with your most dangerous opponents; magic users."
Rainbow felt the fur on the back of her neck stand up, as she dreaded what Luna was going to say next. Rainbow had never had a proper phobia before, but she wasn't sure if she would call her new found fear of magic a phobia or not. Is being afraid of a being who can rend you limb from limb with a thought and flicker of energy a phobia, or is that just smart?
"You are lucky," Luna continued, "that the worlds only four Alicorns, two of which stand before you now, are all firmly on our side. This means any powerful mages the enemy has will be ground bound, and slow to move and react to your presence, but you simply can not face them head on. I would like to give you an example, for those that do not yet respect the gravity of your disadvantage.
"I wish for all of you, except for Twilight, to try and attack me." Luna turned and glided a good distance away from her students, before landing and turning to face them. "I will not move from this spot, and all you need to do to win is touch me. Go." Luna sat, with a calm expression on her face.
The small Griffon, Procyon, glanced at the other students, a smile spread across his beak. "I'll go first," he crooned. He turned back to Luna, and launched himself at her, using what strength he had left in his legs to shove himself forward into a low glide. He didn't even make it half way to Luna before he froze, fixed in place mid-air.
"Foolish," Luna whispered, "It's going to take all of you to have even a slim chance." Her eyes unfocused for a moment, before a small boulder came flying in from her right, glowing in the same midnight blue aura as the frozen Griffon. Luna levitated the rock directly in front of the Griffons face; it was about the same size as his head.
"This is what would happen if we were in a true battle, Procyon." As Luna's words came to their conclusion, the rock was torn in half, and one half was then ground to dust. Luna then placed the remaining half of the rock, flat side down, on Procyon's head. "That looks good on you; you should wear rocks more often."
Some of the students giggled, and Rapidfire broke into a full laugh, rolling on the ground, but Rainbow could see nothing even remotely funny about the Procyon's predicament. Rainbow looked at Twilight; she was siting far to the right, a calm neutral expression on her face as she watched Luna, but when she turned to look back at Rainbow her expression shifted to concern. Is it that obvious? she thought to herself; I guess the days of Rainbow fearless Dash are over.
The other students had begun moving forward, some flanking around both sides as they approached, but all were moving far too slowly to have any real chance.
If I could fly maybe I could get around behind her quickly enough, but it will take too long on hoof to circle around without getting too close; by the time I'm ready I'll be the last one left, and all Luna will have to do is turn around and I'm done. Hay, maybe she won't even need to turn around to trap me... what am I going to do?
As it turns out, nothing; she hadn't even moved from her sitting position when Luna's telekinetic touch gripped down around her, pinning her in place with a cold, completely immovable force.
"I am not disappointed in any of you," Luna began, as she levitated all of her students into a lose semi-circle a few feet in front of her. To Rainbow's rising horror she did not release them. "None of you have any experience in fighting truly powerful magic users. Maybe you once got into a brawl with a Unicorn and tasted a little of it, and those of you with a military background will have trained with and against Unicorns, but none of you have faced a being like myself or Twilight, or of Sombra's apprentices. Your first step is to understand and recognize how vulnerable you are."
As Luna spoke, Rainbow didn't hear a single word; she was too busy trying to control her rising panic. Why is she doing this? Luna, let me go! Oh, Celestia, I can't even speak! Calm down, Luna would never hurt you, but why won't she let you go! I understand, Luna, I know have exposed we really are! Twilight, do something! Stopping stuff like this is why you're here!
The weight of Luna's magic was far more stiff than Twilight's was, and while Twilight's magic grip was just strong enough to prevent Rainbow from moving Luna's grip squeezed tightly even though Rainbow was making no attempt to move. While Twilight's touch was warm, Luna's was unbearably cold and distant in the still night air.
As Rainbow felt her body break into a cold sweat as her limbs grew cool and numb, she began to feel a somewhat familiar, and yet strangely alien sensation growing in her chest. She could feel a warmth spreading through her ribcage. It felt a lot like when she was pushing her flying hard to preform a Sonic Rainboom, or when she was climbing into the sky as fast as she could; but she wasn't even moving, let alone flying, making the sensation feel weirdly out of place.
She normally wouldn't have thought much of it, but she clung to the sensation like a drowning filly would cling to anything to keep her head above water. It did nothing to stop her rising panic as her heart thundered in her chest. For a time that's all she thought it was; just her heart working to move her blood as she freaked out, but the sensation continued to grow and began spreading through her, chasing the cold out of her legs.
Rainbow started to think back to what Twilight had said just a few hours ago; that despite being a Pegasus she had a massive reserve of magic power in her; she just needed to learn how to control it. She pushed on the warmth in her legs, and it moved! Since she had never felt the warmth anywhere but in her chest before, it felt strange having it spread through all of her, so she began trying to pull it back into her chest, so at least something would feel normal as she sat there, trapped.
As the warmth was focused and compressed back into her chest, she felt the heat grow in intensity. As the heat built, it threatened to sear her fur; she could actually feel the hot air rising from her chest under her muzzle. It's not just the sensation of heat, it's actually really heating me up! What is happening?
The temperature in her chest, especially now that it was contrasted by the chilling cold that returned to her legs, was becoming unbearable, so she started shifting the temperature into her wings intending to use their large surface area as radiators, and because her wings had a much higher temperature tolerance than any other part of her.
As Rainbow felt Luna's telekinesis squeeze around her she had panicked, and flared her wings to her side. They were still pinned there, feathers spread wide in an attempt to take off, shimmering with Luna's dark midnight blue magic. As she began dumping the surging heat into her wings, the glow began to shift to a slightly lighter blue hue.
Rainbow still wasn't sure what was really happening, but the slight change in the magic's color, a subtle hint that Luna's spell was not completely impenetrable after all, flooded her with excitement. Even as the excitement mixed with her still visceral terror, she felt more heat radiate from her chest and she continued to shove it into her wings as fast as it would come. That's not just heat, she realized, it's power! As she dumped more and more power into her wings, the color shifted to a sap green, and she found her wings had become mobile again.
As she flexed her wings, and spread them out in front of her still trapped face to look at, Luna abandoned her speech to stare at Rainbow. Suddenly Luna's horn flared blue and the color of the glow surrounding Rainbow's wings shifted back to a muted cyan. She could still move her wings, but they felt as if they were under water as the magic squeezed in around them.
No, I will be free! Rainbow tried to shout, for the first time not just taking what power her fear pushed to the surface but activily trying to drag up as much as she could from wherever it was hiding in her.
Luna abandoned the rest of her students, letting them collapse to the ground, as she shifted her full focus onto Rainbow, and as her horn flared brighter, the glow over Rainbows wings shifted back to a dark blue, locking them in place, even as the power within them continued to build.
Rainbow Dash's fear began to shift to anger; anger that Luna would fight so hard to trap her against her will, anger that Twilight would stand by and do nothing to stop her, but mostly anger that there was nothing she could do, that she wasn't strong enough. I will not lose!
The heat in her wings had grown so intense she began to worry that she might set her feathers on fire, and the massive weight Luna was putting on her wings threatened to grind her fragile bones to dust. She began letting the power build across the rest of her, and found that Luna's hold was growing weaker; she could finally force her eyes closed against the blinding light of Luna's immense magic.
"I will win!"
She couldn't hold the power back any longer. She wrapped her wings around her midriff, tensing for a moment before throwing her wings outward and releasing her hold on the power. There was a thunderous crack as the heat fled her body, shooting out in every direction. A moment later the ground slammed into her legs and she collapsed onto the warm dirt. I thought we were in a grassy field?
She managed to force her eyes open; Luna stood crouched, furiously blinking her eyes as they began to water. The rest of the students had backed away from their struggle, but most were still close enough to be partially blinded by the flash. Rainbow was laying in a small circle of dirt left behind as her power had burnt away the grass.
Forcing herself to stand, Rainbow slowly approached Luna; her eyes were still unable to focus, and a small trickle of blood ran from the corner of her left eye. Rainbow calmly walked up to Luna's right side, and gently placed a hoof on the Princesses side.
"It looks like I've won," Rainbow declared.
Luna turned her head to look down at Rainbow, her eyes finally able to partially focus. "What?" she shouted, a confused look spreading across her features.
"I win!" Rainbow shouted into her ear, patting her on the side again.
A smile slowly spread across the wounded princesses face. "It seams you have," she shouted back.
Rainbow Dash wasn't quite sure what she was expecting from this whole joining the army affair, but this wasn't it. After a full week of training Luna had added nothing to their regime. Every night a two hour sprint followed by nearly ten hours of Luna's Game. Rainbow Dash simply called it tag, because to her that was all it really was, but Luna insisted there was more to it than that.
The game was simple enough; tag the opponent without being tagged yourself. It was kind of fun at first, but even as tried as she was no pony or griffon could touch her if Rainbow was paying even half attention, and she was rapidly getting board. Rapidfire had proved to be close to matching Rainbow at first, but after figuring out her few trick moves and developing counters to them even she couldn't put up much of a fight. The small griffon Procyon, while much faster than the larger griffon Rainbow had fought the day they arrived, was still far too slow to catch her.
Twilight had actually been the hardest to beat out of everyone here. By using her teleportation it simply wasn't possible to close in on her, and she could attack from any direction at any time. This had stumped Rainbow at first, and Twilight even won two matches against her, but soon Rainbow figured it out; anytime she heard Twilight teleport Rainbow would dive in a random direction. Twilight would then come out of her teleport—which took about a second and a half from the moment she winked out to when she'd wink back in—to try and tag Rainbow were she had been, only to be on her own. Sometimes Twilight would even come out with her back to Rainbow, giving Rainbow the opportunity to score a quick tag of her own.
Even with all her tricks, Twilight proved to be no challenge after Rainbow had figured this trick out. Twilight had tried trying to anticipate what direction Rainbow would dive in, but the best she ever achieved was to wink back in directly in front of Rainbow, ending with the two of them crashing into each other and both scoring a single tag. If Twilight was lucky they would stay even with each other, but you can't win a match by simply matching the opponent; you need to score points and escape without giving the opponent one too, and that was something no one could manage against Rainbow.
Procyon, in a fit of rage, had tried to convince Luna that her game was flawed, that it put to much emphasis on speed and mobility. Rainbow had stepped up to defend Luna's teachings—even if she was having a hard time understanding them herself—and challenged Procyon to a submission fight. Luna had allowed the fight, but made it clear that if one of them was injured, the other would be forced to skip practice too.
Procyon had held nothing back, and while he was fast Rainbow knew him too well by now, and had no difficulty staying completely out of reach. After a few minutes of keeping her distance Rainbow made her move. She cantered up directly in front of Procyon, nearly close enough to touch her nose to the end of his beak. Procyon had then lunged forward in a high leap, obviously expecting Rainbow to try and bolt away as she had for the last few minutes, but instead Rainbow simply ducked under his charge.
As she passed underneath him she felt the fur on her back brush against his chest. They were so close she could have turned her head sideways and pulled one of his feathers out with her teeth if she wanted to. Ducking out under one of his sides, she planted her fore-hooves into the grass, collected up her forward momentum into her midriff, then sprung back and lashed out with her hind-legs. Despite holding some strength in reserve she still managed to break four of his ribs, staggering him, and dropped him to his knees.
Rainbow was worried that Luna would make good on her threat and she would have to sit out as Procyon recovered, but to her surprise Procyon was able to stay active and participate in their drills despite his injury. He even seemed to not hate Rainbow anymore.
Rarity always says the quickest way to win over a stallion is to flutter your eyelashes and look vulnerable, but as it turns out all a mare has to do is break a few of his ribs, and he's yours. Rainbow found the thought immensely amusing, but Procyon was not a stallion, and he did not like her; he respected her, which was enough.
Now, a full week after their training had begun Rainbow Dash was getting desperate for some fun. She had challenged all three of her friends—since Procyon had stopped treating her and Twilight so poorly Rainbow had decided to give him a pass—to a three against one match. Luna hadn't given them exact rules for the scoring system they would use, so they adapted it as necessary.
Rainbow had already tried facing three to one odds, and they found giving each team the same number of lives actually favored the side with fewer combatants, as they had more opportunities to score. The last time Rainbow had faced all of her friends at once, each of them had three lives while she had five, but even starting with a five to nine disadvantage, Rainbow still won having two lives left. She had lost all three having even exchanges with Twilight, then mopped up Rapidfire and Procyon without losing one.
This time all four of them had five lives, putting Rainbow down fifteen to five from the very start. As they began Rainbow started to circle around to her right as Procyon and Rapidfire scattered away from each other. Twilight simply sat and watched Rainbow.
Twilight was going to be the real challenge; it was always difficult to get anything more than an even trade from her, and starting with such a heavy disadvantage Rainbow couldn't afford it. She had to take Twilight out early, or her teleport spam would become exhausting, but Rainbow couldn't catch Twilight either, as she'd always just teleport away if she got close.
Rainbow shifted her focus to Procyon and Rapidfire; the two were trying to close in from two directions at once. Rainbow began running around them again, keeping both in front of her. If they spread too far to try and get behind her, then they would be to slow to come to each others aid if Rainbow pressed one of them, but if they stayed too close together Rainbow could easily maneuver against both of them at the same time, as if they were one enemy, making their numbers strategically irrelevant.
Rapidfire began to extend far to the side, breaking into a gallop to try and come around behind Rainbow. Rainbow took the opportunity to press in close to Procyon, circling around him to keep Rapidfire in her line-of-sight and put Procyon between them. This put Twilight behind her, but even at full gallop Twilight couldn't catch Rainbow if she stayed fast enough, and if Twilight teleported Rainbow would hear it.
As Rainbow arced in close to Procyon, she heard Twilight teleport from where she was sitting behind her. Twilight never teleported in front or Rainbow—she was afraid of being run over—so she would come out to one of her sides, and knowing Twilight it would likely be the side away from Procyon, to try and corner her. Rainbow landed on her forelegs, pivoting her hind-end around behind her and quickly skidding to a complete stop, facing the opisite direction she had been running. Rainbow loved to keep the fight fast and mobile, to never stop running, and never sit still, and Twilight knew this.
Twilight was very smart, and she had begun to anticipate Rainbow's actions. Twilight winked in, prepared to intercept Rainbow as she dodged to the side, she instead came in immediately beside Rainbow, facing away from her in the direction her momentum should have carried her. Gotcha. Rainbow gave Twilight a quick jab in the side, then side-stepped away from her, and directly towards Procyon.
To Procyon's credit he took advantage of the situation immediately, rushing Rainbow as she was looking away, just as Rainbow anticipated he would. This is why Rainbow had turned herself all the way around; she could have easily skidded to a stop and turned to face Twilight as she came out, but then she would have turned her back to Procyon. By turning herself sideways neither were behind her.
As Procyon lunged at her, he knew she would attempt to dodge, and giving her facing the obvious response would be to dash forward to get out from between him and Twilight, so he would be angling in front of her to cut off her escape. Why would I want to escape, Rainbow thought to herself as she tensed to perform one of her favorite ground based maneuvers. How am I going to beat you if I run away? You should know me better by now.
Instead of dashing forwards, Rainbow Dash reared up on her hind-legs, stretching her torso nearly vertical, and flapped her wings as if she were attempting a vertical takeoff. The result was a very rapid backwards jump; something the strongest of earth ponies would struggle to match. Procyon sailed passed in front of her, unable to match the rapid maneuver. Rainbow landed on her hind-legs, tensed, and sprung forwards again, pounding both fore-hooves into his flank—being careful to stay away from his still healing ribs—and pushed off to the side away from him and Twilight, and straight at Rapidfire.
Rapidfire was charging straight at her, rushing to get involved in the short skirmish. Rainbow only had enough time for two quick strides before the encounter. Rapidfire was attempting a suicide rush; by forcing an even exchange she would be draining Rainbow of her few lives. She was prepared to sacrifice her own lives if she had to, as she usually was.
Rainbow faked a hard left dodge, even turning to the side to make the dodge look as real as possible. Rapidfire fell for it, diving in the same direction to force the head-on encounter. Instead of diving left Rainbow simply skidded sideways, coming to a stop for the second time in the passed few moments. I know exactly what you're thinking, Rapidfire; but Rainbow Dash never stops! Gotcha.
As Rapidfire's momentum carried her passed, Rainbow reached forward and jabbed Rapidfire in the flank hard enough to turn her sideways in the air, so when she landed she stumbled and nearly fell. Now that all three were on the same side Rainbow could safely turn her back to gallop away.
That's exactly what Rainbow did, and as she pushed into a brief full speed sprint she was happy with the knowledge that no one could catch her; she didn't even need to keep an eye on them as she retreated. Twilight could always teleport at her, but the sound would give her away, as it always did.
***
The game continued in this vein for half an hour. Rainbow Dash fell back on her usual tactics, keeping the fight fast and mobile. If she slowed down too much the other three could more easily coordinate their actions, and start to put plans into motion to herd Rainbow in and trap her. By staying unpredictable, and never focusing on one target for long before switching to another, or performing a quick retreat, Rainbow could keep them disorganized and if she waited long enough one of them would slip up, or they would spread too far apart, and Rainbow could press in for a point.
Twilight was, by far, the biggest threat; even though the sound would warn her, she could attack Rainbow at any moment, regardless of how much distance Rainbow could put between them. She could be sitting, patiently waiting hundreds of feet away, and yet still be just a second away from attacking, and there was nothing Rainbow could do but counter attack after Twilight acted. It reminded Rainbow of just how important magic was going to be when they started getting into real battles.
Thankfully Twilight hadn't even attempted to use telekinesis against Rainbow, and after her show against Luna on the second night the Lunar Princess had not attempted it either. Rainbow was thankful for what reprieve she had been granted, but she knew they would have to revisit telekinesis again, and likely sometime soon.
Rainbow forced her focus back into the present; Rapidfire was circling around to her left and was becoming a threat, but it looked like Procyon was playing to cautiously and keeping his distance. Perfect.
Rainbow suddenly turned and dashed straight at Rapidfire, who froze in place under the unexpected attack. The vast majority of Rainbow's points were always scored on counterattacks, after dodging an attack. Rapidfire clearly wasn't expecting to have to play defense, and was unprepared for the assault.
As Rainbow closed, Rapidfire attempted to circle around to Rainbow's left, putting Rainbow between her and Procyon. This would have worked beautifully, if Procyon hadn't been too far away to seize the opening, and if Rapidfire hadn't hesitated long enough for Rainbow to easily tag her flank as she passed. Rainbow continued her gallop passed Rapidfire, before circling around to put Rapidfire between herself and Procyon, who was rapidly moving up beside Rapidfire.
Rapidfire was now down to just one life, Procyon had two and Twilight had just one. Rainbow only had two; all three were lost to Twilight, as she teleported in faster than Rainbow could react and was forced to give a fair trade. All they had to do to force a draw, was take one last life from Rainbow, then Twilight could teleport in and force the draw. Worse, if they could take a life from Rainbow before they both lost, Twilight could win it for them.
Rainbow pressed in again, building into a hard gallop, straight at Procyon. Rapidfire separated slightly, to flank on Rainbow's right as she closed in. Rainbow continued to press in straight, and just before plowing into Procyon she reared up and performed her horizontal-vertical take off—I need to think up a better name for this move; I use it so often now—not just bringing herself to a stop, but also pushing herself backward to reopen the gap between herself and Procyon.
Procyon did exactly what she expected; he lunged forward to follow her backward retreat. Rapidfire also did exactly as she expected; she lunged in from Rainbow's right, taking the opportunity for a flank attack. When an opponent willingly gives you their flank, you should be more hesitant to attack it.
Rainbow landed from her backward leap, and pushed off with all four hooves to her left, directly away from Rapidfire's lunge. Rapidfire was faster than Procyon, and landed where Rainbow had leaped from before hesitating to follow. Procyon, unable to halt his forward motion plowed into Rapidfire's flank, driving them both to the ground.
Rainbow, using her wings to twist herself around in the air to land facing them, immediately sprung forward to tag out Rapidfire and take another life from Procyon. They were almost done now.
As Rainbow again extended away she heard Twilight blink out. Rainbow picked a random direction: one that she hoped Twilight wouldn't expect; straight ahead.
Twilight blinked in on her right, expecting Rainbow to dodge in that direction. Instead Rainbows forward gallop carried her clear well before Twilight could react. Glancing over her shoulder, Rainbow caught an angry glare from Twilight. I'm sorry, what were you expecting? If I would have dodged into you, you'd be out and I'd be on my last life against Procyon on his last life. You should know by now he doesn't stand a chance. I've won.
Rainbow didn't want a fair trade though; she wanted to be able to best Twilight without wasting lives, and while she had gotten a lucky move off against her at the beginning, that was frustratingly rare. Rainbow considered, for what must have been at least the tenth time today, trying to use magic against her friend. ...I can't; I don't even know how to draw the power out, let alone what to do with it.
Rainbow had been trying all week, but had been unable to draw out the power that had surprised even Luna. She could only feel it when flying fast, and she now spent most of her nights too tired to fly at all, let alone fast enough to get her emotions going. Twilight had read nearly every book in the library—again—searching for any information at all on how to train Rainbow, but she had found nothing.
Rainbow had tried talking to Luna about it after practice several times, but Luna remembered little from her childhood, or even the times when the Empire was young. It must be strange, to have several thousand years worth of memories all competing, trying to be remembered over all the others.
Again forcing her mind back into the present Rainbow ran back at Procyon. As she closed in she turned to the side, and began running a tight circle around the griffon, just out of his easy reach. Procyon tried to turn in place, to keep Rainbow in front of him, but Rainbow was shockingly fast even after everything she had done today. As she began to come around to his side, she dug her hooves in and dove in at him.
Procyon stepped back, and raised his claws to ward off her attack. Rather than dodge to a side as she usually did, Rainbow instead flipped over, and glided upside-down, aiming for his head. Procyon, having never been attacked in such a way before, reared up to stop her from gliding over him. Instead of even trying to clear his reach, Rainbow instead closed her wings and dropped to the ground. She landed somewhat heavily, but her forward momentum was immense and she skidded underneath Procyon, giving him a four hooved kick to the stomach as she passed under him. She skidded to a stop just a few feet passed him, but it didn't mater as he was already out.
Procyon dropped back onto his claws with a loud sigh. He must be getting pretty tried of losing, even with the odds stacked in his favor. Rainbow lay there for a moment, watching the griffon rub where she had kicked him. I shouldn't be so hard on him; he still has some broken ribs.
Suddenly Twilight began a teleport, winking out from where she was standing on the sidelines. Rainbow threw herself up, and backed up to Procyon, using him as makeshift cover. Twilight winked in to Rainbow's left, just out of easy reach. Rainbow, still with two lives decided to end this now, and lunged straight at Twilight, expecting a fair trade. Twilight, before even opening her eyes, winked out again.
Rainbow's mind exploded into thought. This had never happened before. She knew Twilight could teleport quickly; she had seen her do it before, but she never did while in a fight before.
Rainbow, while laying awake struggling to get to sleep, had often considered how best she could use teleportation when she eventually learned how. The biggest and most obvious advantage is rapidly closing the distance, or dodging an attack, but it could also be used as a distraction. Rainbow had often imagined herself doing exactly what Twilight had just done; using a short range teleportation to distract an opponent who expected it, only to use in again immediately. Rainbow's own plans were often very complex, involving multiple quick teleportations, to cover the teleports main weakness; it was easy to anticipate.
Rainbow doubted Twilight realized the full potential however, and was likely repositioning for an immediate counter attack, rather than starting a true teleport spam. The result was just as easy to anticipate, even if it had caught Rainbow Dash off guard.
Rainbow reared up, and flapped hard, pushing herself backwards over Procyon. Twilight winked in, standing directly in front of Procyon. If Rainbow had continued forward, then Twilight would have been directly on her left, ready to strike her. As it was, Rainbow came down almost directly behind Twilight, then lunged forward and wrapped her forelegs around her friends neck in a vicious, Pinkie Pie like hug.
"Gotcha!"
"Ugh! Rainbow, how do you do that!?" Twilight shouted, her words garbled as Rainbow squeezed the air out of her lungs.
"Even when you're trying to be unpredictable, you're actually rather predictable, Twi. That was a good try though." Rainbow Dash didn't mention that the encounter was mostly luck.
"You'll start to figure it out some day, Twi. You have plenty of potential." Rainbow released Twilight, moving around her close friend to press her muzzle into Procyon's face. "And you shouldn't feel bad; you're a great fighter, but I'm the best! It's not your fault you can't compete."
Procyon lowered his beak and glared back at Rainbow for a moment, before wrapping the talons of his left claw around her neck and lifting her forelegs off the ground. He was being surprisingly gentle considering how threatening the gesture should have been. "Remember, Rainbow Dash, all I need to do is get my claws around you, and it's over. Do you understand?"
Rainbow Dash warped her forelegs around his arm, using him to take the weight off her neck. "You have a wired way of flirting. How is your side feeling? Why don't you let me go and I'll show you a good time, huh? I can't promise you'll survive it though; I'm known to be a pretty tough lov—erk," Rainbow's taunting was cut off as Procyon squeezed more tightly around her throat, completely closing her airway.
Rainbow choked down the brief instinctual panic, and focused on glaring at Procyon. She hadn't meant a single word she had said: Procyon was reasonably handsome, by griffon standards, but Rainbow wasn't into the whole beaks and talons thing. That just sounds unnecessarily painful. I like my stallions soft, and warm, but thank you for offering, so if you would stop killing me that would be nice.
Rapidfire had flirted with Procyon a few times over the last few days, and while Rainbow Dash didn't know Rapidfire well enough to tell if it was intended as sarcasm or was genuine interest, it had angered Procyon to no end. That was all Rainbow was trying to do. Maybe I over did it slightly, she thought to herself, as her vision started to blur and she struggled to focus. Are you really going to make me kick you in the head? I swear to Celestia—
Procyon finally eased the pressure enough Rainbow could breath again, but unfortunately for him that also meant she could talk again. "Oh, boy, you might actually like it rougher than I do! There's this earth pony back in Ponyville who's basically made of rubber! You can do practically anything you want to her, and she'll just bounce right back: she'd be perfect for you.
"Oh, or maybe Applejack likes it rough; I don't really know. I've never asked her, but if she does she'd be better for you than I am. She's as tough as I am, but she can't fly, so she can't kick you half to death as easily as I can, although be careful with her on the ground: she kicks every bit as hard as I do. You never answered me; how is your side feeling?
"Oh, I don't know, what do you think Twilight?" She had to work pretty hard, but Rainbow was able to loosen Procyon's hold enough to twist sideways and look at Twilight. Twilight was wearing a wide eyed stare: she looked like she was witnessing a murder. Calm down Twilight, Rainbow thought to herself, I'll be fine. He's just a big angry puppy who's mad a little filly from Cloudsdale broke his ribs.
Rapidfire was wearing a grin that spanned her entire muzzle, and was working hard not to break into laughter. I should make a deal with her; that she gets to be Procyon's chew toy from now on. I'm sure she'd love it.
Rainbow shifted her gaze back to Procyon, and glared into his eyes. As she spoke, all of the false bravado from her earlier jeering evaporated, replaced with a cold fury. "I think we're done here."
Procyon hesitated for only a moment before releasing Rainbow. Whatever he was attempting to accomplish, whether he wanted to scare her or make her submit, it had obviously failed. Or was that not what he was trying to do? Was he just testing me? What is he looking for? And why couldn't he just ask!? Males...
"Well, I thought that was just lovely!" Rapidfire shouted, prancing up to Rainbow. "Maybe next time you can ask if he's... willing to share?"
"It doesn't mater, I'm not," Rainbow stated. "But it's fine, you can have him, Fire. Just ask him to keep his claws to himself from now on, and let him know if he tries something like that again he'll be getting more broken bones." Rainbow was usually quick to join in Rapidfire's mocking tone and goofy personality, but Procyon's actions had drawn out all of Rainbow's dread and reminded her just how far they had to go, and how little progress had truly been made.
Rapidfire opened her mouth to comment, but then snapped it shut again. Rainbow could clearly see the mental wheels turning in Rapidfire's mind. I guess all the comments she has are jokes. "It's ok, Fire, I have Twilight for my serious conversations."
"Ok, good, because I think you and Procyon have a bright future together! I mean did you see the way he was looking at you, Dash? It looked like he wanted to take a big bite right out of you!" Rapidfire was shouting and her voice easily carried across the field for everyone present to hear. For good or bad, the golden pegasi had no shame.
"I'm telling you, Fire, he's all yours," Rainbow said while moving back to Twilight. "Are you Ok Twi? You look like you saw a ghost."
Twilight was still wide eyed with her wings half spread, fluttering at her side. "I... why would he do that?"
"That's how griffons hug!" Rapidfire shouted, giving a violent nod. "Hmm... I wonder how they... you know?"
"Ask him some time," Rainbow cooed, "maybe he'll show you. Seriously, Twilight, are you ok? Don't worry about him, alright? If he tries something like that on you just blast him."
"I'm not worried about me! Rainbow, should I have done something to help?"
"Naw, I can handle myself," Rainbow said waving a hoof. "Although if you saw me turning blue I wouldn't mind you saving me."
"Rainbow, you're already blue." Twilight's tone carried a bit of gentle mocking, and her wings had stopped shaking.
"Well, darker blue... Twi, you know what I mean! Forget it, he won't try that again. Rapidfire, could you go talk to him, and make sure he..." Rainbow glanced around; Rapidfire had already left, cantering after Procyon. Well that takes care of that.
"So what now?" Twilight asked, moving up beside Rainbow. "We can spar again, but I feel the results will be predictable."
"Actually it's not. You're the only one here who's ever beat me, and the only one who can get points from me. Take pride, Twilight; second best is nothing to be ashamed of."
Twilight blushed, quite heavily. The red hue was bright enough to show clearly through her magenta fur. "I still don't think there is much to be gained."
"We have the time; we can work on my magic!"
"Ok. Have you been able to gain any conscious control yet? Until you do, there isn't a lot I can teach you. It's not something unicorns need to ever learn. Magic comes to use as easily as breathing. I don't know how to teach that."
"I know, but I've been thinking: the times I can feel it strongest are either when I'm flying hard, or when I'm scared. I've been trying to... I don't know how to say this; follow it? But I can't figure out how to drag it out. The only time I've ever been able to control it was when Luna was testing me."
"I don't think Luna would want to repeat that exercise anytime soon. Her hearing didn't completely come back until the next day."
"Yea, I know, but I think I can control myself, and I think I'll respond better to you, Twilight."
"Rainbow, I don't want you to see me like that, like..." Twilight trailed off, looking over to were Rapidfire and Procyon had begun another match against each-other. They were actually rather evenly matched. Rapidfire was clearly faster but the gap wasn't as massive as Rainbow's own advantage was, and Procyon was able to make up the gap with cunning and his advantage in reach.
"Twilight, I don't think you get what happened between me and Procyon. It's nothing, and besides I'd never be able to see you any other way that as you are. So common! I need your help." Rainbow started jabbing Twilight in the side. "I don't trust anyone else to do this for me, and I can't think of any other way."
"Your mind will adapt in time, Rainbow; you have to be patient."
"We have months at the most, Twi, and the more time I have to work this out the better. Let's go; I'll let you know if you've gone too far. Trust me." Rainbow began nudging Twilight with her snout.
"Ugh, fine!" Twilight flapped her wing to shoo Rainbow back. "But don't blame me if you blow this whole field away!"
"Actually, didn't you agree to take responsibility for me if I lose control?" Rainbow moved back, and sat down. If I'm going to be stuck here for awhile I may as well be comfortable. She also spread her wings, pushing them forward far enough to easily be in her field of view, so she could watch them. "Let's go."
"Ok, I'm going to leave your muzzle alone so you can talk, and I'll start off slowly." Twilight sat opisite of Rainbow, and took a moment to focus before her horn flared with a faint glow.
As the glow around Twilight's horn built to a small flickering flame, Rainbow felt a warm embrace flow around her. It was nothing like Luna's cold power had been; instead Twilight's telekinetic grip felt more like a gentle hug. Too gentle... It was a strange thing: to try and panic yourself, and it simply wasn't working.
To try and freak herself out more Rainbow began pushing against Twilight's grip, and found that if she put enough strength behind it she could still move pretty far. "Common, Twi, put more power into it."
Twilight looked at Rainbow for a moment, concern clouding her features, but she soon bowed her head and her horn flared bright. A wavering magenta glow began to spread across Rainbow's wings, and up her form. The glow traced around her face, but held her head in place. Rainbow could feel the heat from it pressed against her fur, but she couldn't feel the kinetic force itself unless she pushed against it.
Rainbow knew that at any moment she could ask Twilight to stop, and she would immediately. She was worried that this conscious knowledge might make it difficult to get herself scared, but almost immediately the fear of being trapped started to spread through her. Her legs started going cold, and as she tried to move them, to shake some heat back into them, Twilight's immovable force held them firmly in place.
Twilight had been kind enough to leave Rainbow's eyes alone too, so she was able to press them tightly shut, hopping the lack of sight would enhance the feeling. It did, massively. With her heart pounding in her ears, Rainbow snapped her eyes back open. Twilight still had her own eyes closed, with her head bowed forward, focusing to maintain the spell.
No, Rainbow, you need to do this. I'll be worth it in the end, and besides, you're perfectly safe. Rainbow forced her eyes closed again, and turned her thoughts inward. Her heart picked up it's wild pace again, as the rest of her body was taken over by a fierce chill. ...There it is. She didn't know the exact moment it happened, as it came so slowly, but as the cold fear closed in around her, her heart refused, instead slowly building into an intense heat.
As it had last time, the more panicked she became the more power flowed into her upper torso. Unlike last time she didn't try and bottle it up, but let it flow through her, slowly chasing the cold down her mid riff, then down her legs. It felt extremely strange; like insects not just crawling over her skin, but also underneath it, and even down her bones.
As the power built, Rainbow began trying to pull more out, from wherever it was hiding. Rainbow wasn't sure what to expect, but it felt truly terrible, like pulling a squirming parasite out of her heart. The revulsion at the thought caused her to pull away.
"No, Rainbow Dash, don't turn away; turn towards it and feel what it truly is."
Rainbow would have jumped at the unexpected sound of Luna's voice, whispered into her left ear, but Twilight's magic still held her firmly in place. She tried to open her eyes, but the gentle touch of magic held them closed. She could seen the midnight blue hue of Luna's magic through her eyelids, but the feeling was not the biting cold as Luna's magic had felt last week. It was not as warm as Twilight's touch, but it was far more bearable than it had been before.
"You need to look inside, and that is not something you seem to do naturally. Relax, and focus. Do not be afraid of what you will find."
It would be a lot easier to relax if I could see! Rainbow screamed internally. The brief flare of anger and fear caused another burst of power to blossom across her chest; the heat of it threatened to sear her coat. As she redirected the power into her wings, Rainbow tried to relax. She focused on how the power felt, and found it surprisingly easy to manipulate. She pushed it down her legs, to pool near her hooves before pulling it back into her torso, then shifted the majority of it into her wings. The heat felt good there, the heat spread through every feather.
Now, with most of the power out of her chest Rainbow turned her attention back to where the power was coming from. As she calmed her mind, the power was coming in just a slow trickle. She reached for it, trying to follow it back to it's source. There was nothing; as far as she could feel it was coming out of nowhere.
Again, she tugged at it, and again it felt like a worm was wriggling in her heart. She ignored the terrible sensation and continued pulling on the power, and while it took an immense amount of concentration she was able to collect up a large bubble of heat, that she quickly buried in her legs to make room for more. Where is the limit? I don't feel at all tired, and I'm strong as ever... Where is all of this coming from?
"Rainbow," Twilight whispered from her right side, "open your eyes."
Rainbow did as Twilight asked, and found Luna's magic touch was gone. As her eyes slid open her vision immediately shifted to her own wing, still spread out in front of her. Her wing was glowing in a dark sap green, very similar to the green streak in her mane. Unlike Twilight's magic aura, that usually flowed smoothly like water, Rainbow's was an untamed flame flailing wildly in the night air.
Rainbow stood, and craned her neck around to look down her flank and at her legs. The aura around her torso was dim, and flickered only slightly but the areas down her legs, where she had stashed the last surge of power, flared almost as brightly as her wings. She turned her thoughts inward, and pulled the power up from her legs into her torso, and watched as the aura followed the sensation.
"Twilight, I... Why did you let me go!"
"You didn't need the fear anymore," Twilight said, with a shrug. "That's incredible. Unicorns transition their power directly into their horns in preparation for casting. I never realized you could do the same thing with your entire body. How much control do you have?"
"I can move it around," Rainbow said as she pushed all of the power into her wings. Their aura burned brightly, to the extent it was difficult to look straight at, and the heat coming off of them was incredible, but bearable. "That's about it," Rainbow added, as she let it spread evenly through herself again. "I'll never spend a night too cold ever again!"
"How much focus does it take to hold it?"
"None; it seems happy enough just to sit where I leave it... Should it?"
"I have no idea!" Twilight shouted, a wide grin spread across her face. "This is something that no pony has seen in centuries, maybe even millennia! I think we should start off slowly, just in case. Can you dissipate the power without casting a spell if you need to?"
"I... lets see." Rainbow tried simply pushing the power out of her wingtip. It clung to her, like a little filly refusing to leave the nest, but with a quick flick of her wing Rainbow was able to send a small blob of shimmering green light flying across the field. It dissipated into the air before going to far, the heat being eaten away by the cold mountain air. "Yea."
"Ok, so now try to collect more of your power. If you can generate it quickly enough, without the emotional aides, then I think you're ready to start learning some basic spells."
Rainbow closed her eyes and reached inside again. It took a moment, but she was able to find the trickle of power, and began pulling on it. She had to strain her mind, and it still felt unnatural, painful even, but it came quickly enough.
"That's incredible!' Twilight repeated. "You're sure you don't have to focus to hold onto all that power? Well, then we can begin practicing immediately!"
As Twilight was shouting to herself, Luna moved up beside them. "Twilight, we must have a word before you go."
"Wait, where is everyone?" Rainbow asked, looking around. Luna and Twilight were the only others in eyesight.
"We've ended nearly an hour ago," Luna replied, coolly. "You were in quite the trance."
"How...? Ok, well, would you like me to go?"
"No, Rainbow, these words are for you to. Twilight Sparkle, I have no doubt that you will be excitedly pursuing this new talent that you and Rainbow Dash have discovered?"
"Of course, Luna, this is an incredible discovery! There are hundreds of unicorns that have had their horns broken or otherwise impaired that could—"
"No," Luna interrupted, "they could not. This technique carries with it extreme hazards. Rainbow Dash, and you will be able to mitigate these hazards with training, but a normal pony will only bring themselves pain, and possibly death by using this technique. Twilight, you may learn to use this technique yourself if you must, but do not share it with anypony, and do not use it outside of training if it can be avoided.
"You too Rainbow Dash. I don't want you walking around the castle setting things on fire. Only draw out what power you need in the immediate future. Powering up before a fight is a usable strategy, but do not hold onto any power for an extended period."
"Why?" Rainbow asked.
"Are there health effects?" Twilight added.
"Of sorts. It is difficult to say. It does not always effect each pony the same way, and to some the very knowledge of what could happen might be the cause. I will keep a close eye on you two, and let you know the moment a threat makes itself felt, but if you are careful that will not be necessary."
After she had finished, Luna continued to stare at Rainbow. It took a moment for her to realize why; she was still blanketed in writhing green flames. Rainbow stepped back from the other two ponies, pushed all of her power into her wings, then flared them up, forcing the power out. The rush was incredible; a fierce wind ripped at her fur as the massive release of heat pulled the green flame into the sky.
The massive swirling mass of green continued to rise, swirling in it's own small weather pattern, bathing the field in eerie green light. I've created my own weather before, pulling clouds around and twisting the wind to my will, but I've never done something like that before... this is insane.
"Happy?" Rainbow mumbled, her eyes still on the sky, watching the last of her swirling green flames eaten by the mountain air.
"Yes," Luna replied, in a gentle whisper. "Never be afraid of who you are, but be careful of what parts of you are given control that power." Before Rainbow or Twilight could say anything, Luna slipped into the air, and vanished into what was left of her night.
After the first week off pushing her students well beyond their limits Luna began to relax their pace, even giving them nights off to rest after the particularly brutal endurance challenges she began issuing them. She had asked them to take up hobbies on the nights off to practice their tactical sense, recommending several games of tactics they might try.
Twilight and Rainbow tried several. Rainbow preferred the card games, and while they had some very fun nights playing the various betting games with Procyon and Rapidfire, Twilight didn't enjoy them very much. The games had far more to do with bluffing the other players than it did with any kind of tactics, and while politely lying to your friends face may be fun, Twilight could not see how this could be considered a useful skill in wartime.
On one of their nights off, while Rapidfire and Procyon were busy doing something on their own, Twilight was finally able to convince Rainbow to play against her in another game of chess. They had tried once before, and after losing terribly Rainbow had been resistant to playing again.
Twilight had only played a little chess when she was young, usually against one of her parents, but since becoming Celestia's apprentice she had not thought to play in years. Despite Twilight being quite rusty, Rainbow, who had never played a game of chess in her life, had lost very quickly without putting up much of a fight. She had called it an 'egg head game' and refused to play again.
Since playing that first game in years Twilight had read up on the history of the game, and memorized most of the grandmasters and their more famous strategies, so it was not at all surprising that Rainbow lost her second game of chess even more quickly that she had her first. After beating her three more times, and with Rainbow showing no signs of improvement, Twilight explained the basics again, and gave Rainbow the collection of books she had read over the last few nights.
"Don't think of it as studying, think of it as a story of tactics and strategy," she had told Rainbow.
"Yea, whatever Twilight. You're just mad I'm so much faster than you," she responded caustically, but she had taken the books and began reading immediately.
Now, with some time to herself for the first time in what felt like years, Twilight moved out onto the balcony to think. She knew more about spells, and their interwoven complexities than any living pony—that she knew of—but there was always more to learn. I've spent my life learning how to craft spells, to take away magics unpredictability, and compress it into a simple weave. My life's work has been moving away from instinctual magic, but... I'm not always going to have enough time to think out a nice, pretty, well constructed spell. Maybe this technique Rainbow Dash invented will have it's uses.
In what time they've had alone together Twilight had tried to teach Rainbow Dash how to better control her magic, but Rainbow was unable to overcome a few major hurtles. Rainbow, so far, had no ability to control magic after it left her form, meaning she was unable to use a true telekinesis spell, which was the base most unicorn magic was built from.
Most magic was done by forming the spell in your mind, then casting it into existence and feeding the spell the energy it needed to function. Twilight's example to Rainbow had been, if you wanted a small light to illuminate an area, you would form the spell in your mind, construct it to have the basic dimensions you want, then cast it into being in the area you want it. After that, all you need to do is feed it power and the rest it controls itself.
Rainbow, instead of forming spells had simply controlled the power directly, and what's more she had done it in a way that should not have worked, and yet she had managed to create a levitating light—and set the corner of their bed on fire—only to lose control of it and scatter the light all around the room before cutting it off. Twilight had seen unicorns lose control of spells before, but that's not what Rainbow had done; she did not cast a spell at all, instead she called the energy forth then spewed it into the ball. With no spell to control it, the energy did what energy does; exploded outward and scattered around the room.
Now, as she stood on the balcony outside of their shared room in Canterlot Castle, Twilight tried to copy Rainbow Dash's instinctual use of raw magic. She started by focusing energy into her horn, exactly as she normally did to power a spell, only she held no spell in mind. Instead she mimicked what Rainbow had told her, and simply tried to draw the energy down into her head.
As the power seeped down from her forehead over her eyes, something amazing happened; the world exploded into color. Struggling down the moments panic Twilight calmed her mind. You're ok, you can still see... Rainbow didn't say anything about this!
The world around her looked much as it normally did, except for the bright, colorful flares that dominated her vision. The castle around her looked dark, it's white marble turning a muted grey, but there were stars of all colors and sizes glowing through it in every direction she looked. Twilight suddenly realized what it was; I'm seeing every living creature in the castle and city! What is happening?
She pushed the energy that blanketed her face down her neck, into her chest. As the energy faded from around her eyes the colors faded away as well. "That was... strange," Twilight mumbled as she pushed what had just happened into the back of her mind. There will be plenty of time to figure out what that was in due time, she thought as she braced herself to continue.
Being careful to avoid her eyes Twilight began siphoning more power from the base of her horn, and shuffling it around her face into her chest. Just as Rainbow said it would, as the power collected in one place Twilight could feel the heat building. She began to shuffle most of it into her wings, as Rainbow had recommended.
As the power built rapidly Twilight's wings began to glow in her familiar magenta aura. Twilight had seen it thousands of times as she cast spells, and often saw it wrapped around an object she was moving; she had even seen it wrapped around herself a few times before as she cast various spells on herself, but this was different. The magic was not flowing around her, it was coming from within her.
She moved to copy Rainbow, and pressed a glob of power to the tip of her wing, an forced it out. To her surprise, the moment the power left her wing her control over it vanished as well. The little magenta blob slowly floated away as it's heat drew it upward, to dissipate into the cold night.
Twilight took her time, slowly experimenting with the power. She tried to find a way to from a spell without using her horn, but she couldn't. If Rainbow can't form a spell, what she can do with just the raw power will be very limited... There must be a way.
Before she knew it Twilight had spent several hours standing on the balcony, but in the end she had nothing practical to show for it. Maybe next time.
⁂
Rainbow Dash had been far more productive with her time. After quickly giving up on trying to memorize various strategies she had switched to the more basic book that covered intermediary topics. Rainbow had originally though Twilight had simply memorized so many strategies to win that she could not stand a chance, but the more she read the more she began to realize some very key mistakes some of the grand masters were making, and she believed that she could beat even the best of them with her new found tactic.
The entire point of the game, was to capture the enemies lead piece; their king. There was no other objective, and no restrictions on tactics, and yet every single strategy revolved around capturing the king. It was obvious why, that's how you won the game so why wouldn't that be the main goal? Rainbow Dash could think of several reasons, and she wanted to test her theory.
But she forced herself to wait, and began to read through the boring strategy books to pass the time. It was painful for her to admit this, but Rainbow Dash was not perfect, and any weakness in the coming struggles could be fatal. I need to learn to be patient. Not every problem can be solved by kicking in their legs. It sucked, but it was true, and if she refused to learn somepony was going to end up getting hurt, all because she couldn't sit and wait for the right moment.
Rainbow was still struggling against herself when Twilight finally returned from the balcony, her wings still faintly glowing. "Hey," she mumbled, still lost in thought.
"Hey," Rainbow returned, hopping to her hooves. "Ok, Twilight, I'm winning this time!"
"Huh? Oh, ok." Twilight rushed over, the board and pieces rapidly flying through the air as she telekinetically assembled the board on the floor near were Rainbow was laying. "Your sure, Rainbow? I know you're a fast learner—when you want to—but you couldn't have gotten through even one of those books already. What makes you so confident?"
"You'll see," Rainbow said, a wicked grin across her muzzle. This is going to be good.
Twilight's opening move was simple, moving her king side knight forward. Rainbow knew, like all of Twilight's moves, it was a calculated move that would gain her an advantage that would not make itself felt for several more turns, and it would all be directed at boxing her king in.
All of the various strategies in the intermediate book Rainbow read were intended to attack multiple targets at once, in an effort to force the opponent to do what you want, and open lines of attack onto their own king, but Rainbow saw a different goal entirely.
As the game progressed and most of the pawns slaughtered each-other, Rainbow began to use some of the simpler strategies, first the concept of skewering an opponents piece, then beginning to use tactics such as the revealed threat, and moving to attack multiple pieces at once.
All of the tactics usually reserved for pinning down and removing the enemies king, Rainbow was instead applying to Twilight's individual pieces, hunting them down one by one. Rainbow had lost several pieces of her own, but in the end the numerical advantage she had built proved decisive, as Twilight began to run out of pieces. In the end, Rainbow had won simply because Twilight no longer had any pieces to defend herself.
"Wow, that was bloody," Twilight said as she finally lost the game.
"I know. Again?"
"Sure," Twilight said, resetting the board. "You move first this time."
Again, after a long bloody battle, Rainbow began to take the lead. All of Twilight's strategies focused on Rainbow's king were thwarted as Rainbow pressed her attack against Twilight's pieces. Rainbow spared nothing, but did everything she could to keep her own pieces safe. To try and save as many of her pawns as she could Rainbow would often use the larger pieces to try and take out as many of Twilight's own pawns as possible, then, marching her pawns forward to support her other pieces assured a favorable trade. This time Rainbow had nearly half of her major pieces left as she took the last of Twilight's.
"Ok, I think I've figured you out!" Twilight shouted, as she lost again. "You're trying to confuse my strategies by staying offensive! That wont work this time."
"That's not it Twilight, but if you're so sure lets go!"
This time Twilight played a defensive game, insuring that all of her pieces were in position to defend each-other and made it much more difficult for Rainbow to go on the offense, but still Twilight's main focus was on blocking in Rainbow's king, which made her predictable. Time and time again, Rainbow was able to see the attack coming, and position her own pieces to counter attack, not to box in Twilight's king, but to simply take as many pieces from her as she could, while minimizing her own losses.
Despite Twilight's best efforts her interconnected defense crumbled under Rainbow's dedicated attack, slowly falling, one by one until she again had nothing left. It had cost Rainbow nearly everything as well, but she still had enough to take Twilight's now undefended king.
"Darn it, Rainbow, what strategy are you using?"
Rainbow just smiled her favorite cocky smile.
"That was very impressive Rainbow Dash," Luna's voice called from the balcony.
Rainbow and Twilight both jumped at the unexpected voice, but they both smiled immediately after landing. Luna may have been driving them at a brutal pace, but she was still their friend. Even if she shot me with a lightning bolt during Nightmare Night, Rainbow thought to herself. It's ok, Luna; I strike my friends with lightning from time to time too. "Thanks Luna!"
"You may come in, Princess," Twilight called over her shoulder, as she reset the board yet again.
"Twilight Sparkle, may I play a few matches against Rainbow Dash, myself?" Luna asked, casually moving into the room.
"Sure, although you should probably tell Rainbow," Twilight said, moving aside.
"What?" Rainbow asked as Luna took her place opisite her.
"Starswirl invented this game shortly after the founding of the Empire," Twilight began, ignoring the fact she had just asked Luna to explain a moment before. "Luna and Celestia have been playing this game for thousands of years now! Most of the best chess masters have modeled their tactics off of Luna and Celestia's play. Neither of them has ever lost a match in ranked play, although they've never played against each other in public."
"We've lost plenty of matches, when playing against each other in private," Luna said, making the first move. "Not every match can end in a draw."
"I've always wondered why you refuse to play against each other in public; is that it?" Twilight asked, her eyes glued to the game unfolding before her. "You don't want anypony to see you as anything but undefeatable?"
"Partly," Luna cooed as she made her fourth move, pressing her queen up to take Rainbow's queen side bishop-pawn. "And that's checkmate."
Rainbow spend a moment staring at the board. Luna's queen was just one space diagonally across from her king, directly in front of her bishop. The only piece that could attack Luna's queen was her king itself, but Luna had positioned her own bishop to cover her queens attack on her second turn, meaning Rainbow could not use her king to take Luna's queen. With no other piece to take Luna's queen, and no space for her king to move, it really was game over. "On just the fourth move!"
"It's a very old opening strategy, Rainbow," Twilight lectured. "It's extremely rare that somepony falls for it, as the aggressive opening moves are so easy to spot, and the counters moves so easy to perform."
"Yea, well... rematch?"
"Of course," Luna whispered as she reset the few pieces that had moved during the short game. She then took the first move. "I and Celestia have played many matches against each other, to the extent that we know each others strategies as well as our own. I will use Celestia's style of play this match. I suspect it is the same strategy she will attempt in the coming war."
Twilight continued to stare at the board in wide eyed wonder, getting to see one of her idols play in person, but Rainbow hesitated. Is Luna trying to test her sisters war strategy with a game? If she wants a true test, I think Twilight would do better than me.
Rainbow focused on the match. Luna began with an interconnected defense, much like Twilight had done earlier, but unlike Twilight's Luna's was every bit as offensive as it was defensive. Luna began to secure a large section of the board, while also protecting each of her pieces with each other. It nearly stumped Rainbow for awhile, but she found the weakness.
Moving forward Rainbow managed to threaten a knight in the middle of Luna's formation, who was defending almost all of Luna's pieces. He was essentially the heart of her plan. Luna quickly moved him back, rather than letting Rainbow trade pieces for him.
Rainbow then moved up to threaten one of Luna's rooks, and again Luna pulled her rook back rather than letting him fall.
Her next move Rainbow managed to threaten two of Luna's pieces at once with her bishop, leaving Luna with a choice; lose an undefended rook, or lose a defended knight. Luna made obvious choice, saving her rook and leaving Rainbow with, at best, a bishop for knight trade.
Instead of taking it, Rainbow moved her rook up to threaten one of Luna's undefended bishops, again giving Luna a choice between and undefended, and a defended piece. This continued for several turns, with Rainbow building threats on Luna's pieces on both sides of the board, but was unable to gain a decisive advantage as every time Luna retreated a piece, she moved it to a position to cover Rainbows threats and even create a few of her own.
Rainbow finally made her move, instigating a massive blood bath. At the end of it the board was mostly cleared, and now, with Luna's pieces too few to cover each other effectively Rainbow was finally able threaten multiple undefended pieces at once, and began to take pieces for no loss of her own. In just a minute Luna was out of pieces, and Rainbow cornered her king with her sole remaining rook and her own king.
"Whoa..." Twilight mumbled from the side of the board. "Rainbow, you did it!"
"She has. Take pride, Rainbow Dash. It cost you almost everything, but you have bested Celestia's best tactics and strategies. If you would give me one more game, I would like to see how my own strategies hold up."
Rainbow made the first move this time, playing every bit as aggressive as she had before. Luna's new strategy was also much more aggressive, rather than the deeply layered defense that had marked Celestia's strategy Luna's pieces offered each other no support, which made it much easier for Rainbow to threaten them. At one point Rainbow moved up a bishop, in place to attack one of Luna's rooks and one of her knights, neither of which were covered.
Luna now had to chose which to save, leaving the other to be lost for no cost to Rainbow. To Rainbow's shock she did neither, rather than wasting a move and still losing a piece she attacked with her other rook, spearing Rainbow's knight and rook.
Rainbow thought they might be beginning another game of setting threats against each other, but after Rainbow moved another piece up to threaten another of Luna's, Luna instead took Rainbow's knight, leaving her rook open to Rainbow's rook.
After taking Luna's rook with hers, Luna, still with two of her pieces under threat, moved her queen up, although she was not yet threatening anything with it.
Rainbow took Luna's remaining rook with her bishop, but Luna ignored it, instead continuing to press forward. The game continued for several more turns, with Rainbow building a larger advantage over Luna, taking one of her bishops and most of her pawns.
Luna suddenly moved her queen all the way up, diagonally across from Rainbow's king. "Checkmate," she called out smoothly.
Rainbow looked the board over twice. How did I not see that? Her knight has been there, in position to cover her queens attack for nearly half the game! I guess I was too busy taking everything from Luna's back row.
"It cost you a lot, but you did it Luna!" Twilight chanted from the side.
"It did cost much, yes. You would do well to remember what the objective is, Rainbow Dash. All of the soldiers in the world will do you no good if you lose your king."
"Hey, be fair!" Rainbow shouted. "I've never played before today, and I beat you once!"
"Yes, you have, but would you have attacked with such reckless abandon if you were commanding your friends and family?" Luna's words were gentle, but she spoke with great weight.
"What? Luna, this is just a game."
"It will not always be so simple. Rainbow Dash, do you realized what you've done?"
"Killed all of my friends and family to beat you in a game of chess?" Rainbow didn't want to be mean, but she couldn't stop the biting sarcasm from seeping into her voice.
"That is what it seems," Luna replied, with a smile. "But more importantly, it looks like you have reached the same conclusion the Reiter Ponies have. Up to this point, wars have always been fought over objectives. Against the tyranny of a king, to expand your territory, sometimes even to annexe an entire empire. Maybe small wars will be started for moeny, or even petty glory, but they are always about the objective. If you have nothing to fight for, why fight?"
"Well, the Reiter Ponies do want territory, right?" Twilight asked. "They just want the Crystal Empire, to appease Sombra?"
"We don't know," Luna stated bluntly. "We don't even know how closely they are allied with Sombra. He may have instigated their attack, but he did not personally take part. He would make a powerful addition, as he has such a high power density, but he stayed out of it, or was not allowed to. We also don't know if they want the Crystal Empire for themselves, or for Sombra, or maybe something else entirely."
"And we're going to war with them, even though we don't know what they want?" Twilight wore a deeply concerned look.
"They have attacked us, in force, without warning or provocation. Your brother and sister in law nearly died, Twilight." Luna pushed herself to her hooves and gave Twilight and Rainbow a quick bow. "I have put off my duties long enough. I bid you both a fair night. As always, if you have need of me the guard will know were to find me."
"Ok, take care Luna," Twilight said with a smile, as she moved to take her position opisite from Rainbow back.
"Yea, have a fun night," Rainbow said, giving Luna the best smile she could manage as her mind was busy chasing thoughts.
As Luna turned to leave Twilight gave Rainbow a meaningful look, but Rainbow was unable to tell what it was meant to mean.
Just a moment after Luna gracefully leapt from the balcony Rainbow blurted out an irritated, "what?"
"Do you think this is right?" Twilight asked, leaning forward, wincing. "You know, to go to war to... you know."
"Kill," Rainbow stated bluntly. She had been thinking the same thing all week. Luna's training was starting to shift from endurance and getting her students into the right mindset, into strength training and close combat tactics. Rainbow had escaped mostly unharmed but Twilight had picked up some good bruises, some of them from Rainbow's strikes. It was only a matter of time before Luna started teaching them the best ways to take a ponies life.
"Yea..." Twilight trailed off, looking at the floor.
"Don't worry, Twilight, we're going to be fine."
"That's not what I'm worried about. Is this right, to invade their nation?"
"We can't ignore what they've done!" Rainbow shouted. "We can't just let them get away with this. They've murdered most of our guard!"
"So we're going to kill most of their soldiers?" Twilight asked, cocking her head sideways.
"No! We don't need to kill anypony; all we're going to do is march into their capital and make their leader answer for what they've done. If they try and fight us, we'll defend ourselves. Besides Twilight, this isn't our choice. I don't actually know what Celestia and Luna are planing, but I trust them, just like I trust you. They wont ask us to kill anypony unless we need to."
Twilight blushed quite a bit at that; just enough Rainbow could easily see it against her dark magenta coat. Rainbow was glad she wasn't easily embarrassed; her much lighter coat would do nothing to hide it if she ever blushed.
"Thank you, Rainbow. I hope I'm worthy of your trust," Twilight managed as the color faded, "but that's still not what I mean. I don't think I can do it. What good is a soldier that can't fight?"
"These are not our friends, Twilight; they've killed hundreds already, and they need to be stopped. We'll do everything we can to prevent needing to kill any of them, but we can't ignore their crimes, and we cant put half a nation in prison. Luna and Celestia will only ask us to do what is absolutely necessary, and nothing more."
"Ok, Rainbow, I trust you too. Common, lets play another game, but please, try and be more careful with your pieces."
"Yea, sure Twilight."
Rainbow Dash was not careful with her pieces; she still considered killing off an many pieces on both sides and simplifying the game her best bet at beating Twilight, and besides, in chess you only captured the enemy pieces and held them for ransom. No one dies in chess.
Luna had called last nights training early, and told her students to get to sleep as early as they could. "We will be training in the day tomorrow, very early in the morning. I want you all here before the sun rises. We will be doing something very special."
Neither Twilight nor Rainbow had managed much, as they had their sleep schedule turned around so drastically, and barely managed to make it back to Luna that morning. Twilight had managed just four hours of sleep. Not too bad; I've aced tests on less. By the looks of it Rainbow had managed far less; her landing was as sloppy as Twilight's.
"Are you ok?" Twilight whispered to Rainbow as the students gathered around Luna.
"Huh? Yea, I'm... Yea..." Rainbow muttered mostly to herself.
"That's a hard no," Rapidfire called, moving over to Rainbow. "Seriously, Dash, you're a real light weight."
"I'm not... drunk," Rainbow muttered to the ground, rubbing her eyes with a foreleg.
"Sure you're not," Rapidfire said, with a truly excessive dose of sarcasm as she jabbed Rainbow in the side with her muzzle.
"She'll wake up when we start flying," Procyon said in a dry voice. "That always raises her spirits."
Twilight suspected as much, but she didn't know why Procyon would know that; they had only met two weeks ago.
"We are going to do something very exiting today," Luna said to her students, with a wide smile across her large snout. "Do not consider this a true test; you can not fail today, but I would like to know how well coordinated you will be in a more proper battle situation. Most of the time I suspect you will be fighting against terrible odds, but only simple soldiers. Sometimes though, you will find yourself face to face with the best our enemies can throw at you. Today we will be simulating that very situation.
"Come; we are going to fly to your battle ground." Luna spread her large wings, and smoothly slid into the air.
Twilight was worried she might bump into someone as they all flew in such close formation, to stay near enough to Luna to hear, but as she climbed into the sky Rainbow took up position on her immediate left. Even in her sleep deprived state Rainbow was able to hold precise formation with Twilight, even as Twilight wondered side to side as she struggled to keep up with Luna's rapid pace. Rapidfire took a position on her right, staying a bit further away but still held formation with Twilight, allowing her to concentrate on flying and not worrying about flying into anyone.
As it turned out, they didn't need to stay very close to Luna, as she transitioned into her royal Canterlot voice.
"Celestia and I have perfected a training aid that I feel it is time to fully utilize. It is a very simple substance in theory, but it's application is something I am personally very proud of. Celestia likes to call it Paralzyme, but I prefer Occisus Pingere."
"Huh? Death Paint?" the dark grey pegasi, Thunderlane, called out. He was the only pony here besides Rainbow and Twilight that was from Ponyville, although Twilight didn't know him at all. Rainbow knew him a bit, but not very well either. Twilight didn't know why, or how, he knew old Equittish, but unfortunately he was only partially right.
"Actually," Twilight began, shifting into her lecture voice, "death in old Equit is mortium. Occisus is an verb, not an adjective or noun. It basically means, to cut down or, to slay. You are right; pingere is old Equittish for paint, so it's sort of... a knockdown paint?"
"Very good, Twilight, Thunderlane," Luna's voice boomed over them.
"Why call it paraslime then?" Rapidfire asked.
"Paralzyme," Twilight corrected immediately. "I believe it's a compound of paralyze and enzyme? If so does this mean you've finally completed Clover The Clever's prison lock?"
"No," Luna stated. "If we had completed Clover The Clever's work, we would have used her name for the potion. While it is heavily based on her work, it was made in a completely different intent. Clever's potion was intended to disable a unicorns magic for as long as is needed. Our paint is instead a skin contact short term paralytic, intended only for the purpose of creating more realistic training. Maybe in a few years we can use it in law enforcement as well, but for now it is in very limited supply and requires an outside power to function."
"What is the outside power source?" Procyon asked.
"Me," Luna answered.
"What does it do?" Rapidfire asked. "Oh, let me guess!... Knocks ponies down?"
"Yes, by paralyzing them. The most important aspect of it though; it is fast acting but also easily treated, allowing those disabled to return to the battle quickly afterward. I also have great control over the specific effects. The paint itself is nothing more than a marker; the real effects come from a spell I will cast on you all, and maintain. All the paint does is locally trip the spell, activating it's effects. The spell itself can be almost any; extreme pain, weakness, or total paralysis. We will be using the later."
They continued on in silence for a few moments. This is incredible, but not actually as forward thinking as Luna makes it out to be. Using a physical object to trigger a preexisting spell is a concept that has been around for thousands of years, as is the basic paralysis spell. I guess having the spell trip only locally is a pretty big achievement, and making the spell's efficient enough to cast and maintain on over twenty individuals would be a challenge, but it's something I could probably work out in a few days. Why wouldn't they bring me in on this?
They were flying away from Canterlot to the north east, deeper into the remote northern spine of the Unicorn Range. Canterlot was originally built as a castle with an internal town, intended to guard Equestria's northern boarder. The only way to travel from north to south through the Unicorn range would either be to go through the large valley to the west that Cloudsdale usually hovered over, or to travel through the mountain pass that Canterlot guarded. Once Canterlot had become the capital of the Empire, a new fort was built further down the pass, deep in the heights of the range, to guard the now much more important Canterlot from the north.
After the Crystal Empire joined with Equestira, and Canterlot suddenly became the center of the Empire, the north fort was abandoned. Years of disuse and the cooling climate had permanently frozen most of the pass, forcing all road traffic to the northern Crystal Lands to travel through Cloudsdale's valley instead. Any traffic travelling to the east towards Manehattan would now travel along the southern perimeter of the Unicorn Range, rather than risking going over or through the massive mountains.
There was no practical reason to come up here anymore. At least we won't be interrupted by anything... as long as there are no avalanches.
As they approached the old fort, Twilight had to steady herself; they fort was huge! Twilight had never seen even a drawing of it before, as archeologists had supposedly picked it clean millennia ago, and only a handful of ponies even knew it existed at all. It's walls stretched at least five stories high, and was as wide as Canterlot itself was.
As they crested the wall and began to descend into it Twilight made another major discovery, it was at least ten stories to the central courtyard. The outside of the lower five stories must be underneath the snow! The courtyard itself was at least three thousand feet across, and then the ring of buildings was at least another 800 feet.
The courtyard itself contained almost nothing but a bunch of random snow drifts, and at least twelve other ponies. None were in uniform, but Twilight could clearly recognize Spitfire and Soarin in the lead. No, not twelve; there are sixteen of them! Twilight thought, as they came in for a landing on the loose snow.
"Wow, Luna, are you serious?" Rapidfire blurted out, coming in on Twilight's right, her heavy hooves sinking into the snow.
"I am," Luna cooed to her students, as she moved forward towards the Wonderbolts assembled in the middle of the courtyard, her light steps leaving almost no impression on the snow.
"Are those all veterans?" Procyon asked, gouging a deep track in the snow as he pulled himself along. "That's Spitfire and Soarin in the lead; we may be in trouble."
"No," Rainbow quickly answered, hovering above them all. "Do you see the pegasi on the back left, with the amber and orange mane? That's Lighting Dust; she was in the same class as me two years ago, before I... left."
"Is she the one that—" Twilight began to ask.
"Nearly killed you and the rest of our friends? Yea, that was her," Rainbow's answer interrupted.
"How much do you know about the rest?" Procyon asked, craning his head to look up at her hovering above.
Twilight didn't need to look; she could feel the cool breeze from Rainbow's wings on her back. Instead she looked the collection of Wonderbolts over, trying to remember the names a the few she recognized. Just the famous few, she finally admitted to herself.
"Spitfire's full squad is here," Rainbow said from above, "Spitfire herself, Soarin, Fleetfoot and Blaze. The second squad, the one on the right, is Fire Streak's. It's him, Lighting Streak, High Winds and Silver Lining. I don't recognize most of the other two squads; I think they're all recent recruits. That's Cloudchaser with Lighting Dust, and Cloud Chaser is in the other squad."
"My brother. He was accepted just last year," Thunderlane said, sounding uninterested.
"Yea..." Rainbow mumbled. "Twilight, is that Candy Floss?"
"It is," Twilight answered, spotting the bright maned pegasi from Ponyville. "I didn't know she even wanted to be a Wonderbolt!?"
"We might not actually have it so bad," Rainbow began, "if half of them have only been flying a year or two. That's Cloud Kicker too. I guess half of Ponyville's weather team made it in."
"You ponies and your clouds," Procyon taunted. "I think we'll do well enough."
"We'll win!" Rainbow shouted, and hurried ahead to land beside Luna.
"You heard her!" Rapidfire barked; "let's do this!"
Twilight followed as the others rushed ahead, but she couldn't shake the dread that fighting out numbered against a well trained squadron was a bad idea.
"Hello, everypony, and every griffon," Luna began. "Thank you for making it out here on such short notice; I'm glad Celestia could spare her Wonderbolt squadron for today's war-game."
"Thank you, Luna," Spitfire responded, with a curt bow. "It was no issue, but we are only half of the Wonderbolts squadron. As Celestia rebuilds the Royal Air Force she thought it would be wise to expand the Wonderbolts squadron, so we've begun calling in some of our reservists to double our active size."
"A wise step," Luna said in a cool tone. "We will need to expand rapidly if we hope to take our objective, and Celestia is wise to not underestimate the power of the skies.
"Today I wish to test my own growing squadron, and to see how my techniques compare in a practical test to those traditional tactics taught by my sister." Luna then explained to the Wonderbolts the basic premiss of the paralzyme compound, repeating everything she had told her students earlier.
"Each of you have a trough filled with paralzyme near your flag, which is located in a small enclave on either side of this courtyard. This is a simple objective competition; whichever side manages to gain control of both flags, and return them to their base will be victorious.
"You will be able to compete as long as you are physically able, with one exception; if any of you are disabled in the air, and I am forced to intervene to rescue you, you will be considered out of the competition. You can take a beating on the ground, but it takes very little to lose control of your wings while in flight, and even a short term loss of control can be fatal when flying at high speed. If you cannot protect your wings, stay on the ground.
"Now, move to your base, and prepare."
"So Luna, what are you hoping is going to come of this," Twilight asked, as the group moved back from the Wonderbolts with Luna in tow.
"To see how close we already are, and where I will need to focus our future training. We are running out of time, and I want to make the most of what we have left. I'm also curious how well the Wonderbolts strategies will function against an unconventional enemy."
"What do you mean?" Rainbow asked.
"You will see. Rainbow Dash is in charge."
"...I am?" Rainbow asked, sinking to the snow.
"You are. I will now cast my spell." Luna bowed her head, her horn glowing a deep blue. None of the other students reacted, but Twilight could feel a powerful spell settle in around her. It was eerie; she could feel an immense energy contained within the spell, but there was no other immediate effect or sensation.
Twilight glanced over all of the other students, paying particular attention to Rainbow; none of them could feel it, not even Rainbow. I'll need to train her better, or she'll still be helpless against a powerful caster, Twilight thought to herself, again feeling dread rise in her stomach.
"I will now cast this spells counterpart on the Wonderbolts. Prepare yourselves." With her spell complete, Luna turned and pushed herself into the air, flying towards the Wonderbolts assembled on the other side of the courtyard.
Twilight sifted her focus back to the powerful hex pressing in around her, and began to consider how the spell worked. Does it really use this Paralzyme as a catalyst or an enzyme to begin the spell, as Clover the Clever theorized, or is it just a simple marker to trip it? If so I might be able to manually trip the spell with my magic... although I think that may be considered cheating.
As they moved to the trough to wet their hooves in the sapphire blue paint, a few of the pegasi, including Rainbow, also wet the tips of their wings. "That's clever," Twilight commented, moving to copy them. Since her wings were larger than most pegasi, even the stallions, it would give her a major advantage in reach.
Procyon not only coated his talons, he also smeared the paint down the entire leading edge of his thick wings. Procyon had often used his wings as battering rams, using his thick wing bones in a way that would shatter the wings of a pegasus; that would be sure to catch the the pony exclusive Wonderbolts off guard. He also dunked his beak, giving him a clown-like blue mask.
As Rapidfire looked up she managed to hold a straight face for only a moment, before dissolving into uncontrolled laughter. "Procy—on, what are? Are you really? That is fantastic! You're going to really kill out there!"
"What's so funny Pony?" Procyon growled. "Griffons are built and bred for combat, with more powerful weapons built into our bodies than most ponies can carry."
"Yea? You've clearly never seen how much I can carry," Rapidfire said with a wide smile, pressing her muzzle into Procyon's face.
"Be careful, or you may trip Luna's spell," Procyon warned, wiping some of the pain from his beak across Rapidfire's forehead. "Oops."
"We can't trip the spell Luna placed on us with this paint, otherwise we already would have," Twilight explained. "It doesn't look like the paint itself is anything special. The spell must have the detection built into it, which I suspect is tripped by the pigment in the paint; that's the only difference between ours and theirs."
"Cool," Rapidfire mumbled, spreading the paint Procyon had smeared on her more evenly across her forehead. "That's a great idea. Everypony always calls me bull headed."
As they moved away from the trough Twilight was expecting them to leave a trail of paint with each step, but it had already mostly dried in just a few moments. Strange... Will the interaction between the paint and the spell Luna cast on the Wonderbolts turn it back to liquid? Clever, Luna, but this is not what Clover had in mind.
"So what's the plan?" Rapidfire asked no one in particular.
"We can either focus on defense, or focus on offense," Rainbow began. "We can play defense either by setting ambushes, or by concentrating everything in the flag room. Either way we'd be giving them time to prepare and organize, which I don't think we can afford. If we play offense we can either press straight for the objective, and hope we can make it through before they do, or we can play... meaner..."
"I'm cool with mean," Rapidfire said, jumping into a low hover.
"I see your point, Rainbow Dash," Procyon said solemnly. "They've trained for years to work as a team; we have not."
"You guys have a bit, while playing against me, but you're not very good at it." Rainbow lowered her eyes to the snow, spending a moment in thought.
Twilight felt she had a good guess what Rainbow was going to say, so she spoke up to say it herself. "You want us to play a game of attrition, to take the numerical advantage away from them?"
"Sort of. Luna was right, we're not actually fighting sixteen against twelve; we're twelve independent ponies and griffons fighting against just eight elements of two. I remember what it was like training as a wing-pony under Lighting Dust; you have to follow them everywhere, never thinking for yourself; only reacting. They can't split down any lower than groups of two, and they are not used to fighting alone. If we can split them, or take out their leaders, we will have a much easier time.
"Also, we will never be able to match their organization, so we might as well not even try. No complex plans, all we're going to focus on is interrupting theirs. Chaos. We'll leave four of us on permanent defense, with the other eight focused on disabling as many of them as possible. Once we get enough of them out, we take their flag and it's over."
"Are you sure, Rainbow?" Twilight had to ask. "There's no way to do this without a long drawn out fight? I think, if we—"
"Twilight, this isn't chess," Rainbow bluntly stated. "We don't move one at a time and there's no time to think once it starts. We don't know how to fight as a group yet; they do. If we let them fight as a team we're going to lose. The only advantage we have is that we can be in twelve places at once, while they can only be in eight.
"We break their formation, and take them out. We can't even think about going for the flag until we have the way mostly cleared, or have them all distracted."
Luna had finished with the Wonderbolts by now, and had flown up to take a position on the high wall surrounding the courtyard. When she spoke, her Royal Canterlot Voice boomed off the high walls. "Begin."
"I'll play defense," Procyon said, moving backward towards their flag room.
"So will I," Thunderlane said in his empty voice.
The rest of Luna's students scattered randomly.
Twilight performed a simple teleport, coming out on top of the surrounding wall, opisite Luna. Rainbow had exploded into a pure vertical climb, and was just reaching the same height.
"What am I going to do?" Twilight asked herself. Her mind exploded into thought, but unfortunately they all tripped over each-other and she was left there, without a plan, watching as the Wonderbolts began to act.
One flight of four began to flank around each side, Lighting Dust leading one, Cloud Chaser leading the other. Fire Streak's flight remained stationary, fanning out in the entrance to their flag room. Spitfire was in a hard climb, slightly outrunning Blaze as she struggled to keep up with her flight leader. It looked like Spitfire was trying to head off Rainbow's climb, but it didn't look like she was going to make it; Rainbow had a clean advantage in a climb.
Soarin, with Fleetfoot in tow, climbed slowly into the sky, scanning the courtyard for something. After a few moments he began to raise his search to the sky, then along the walls surrounding him. As his gaze slid to Twilight, instead of continuing on his eyes locked onto her. He immediately began powering himself straight at her.
Oh no, what do I do, what-do-I-do, whatdoIdo! she screamed at her mind, as Soarin closed in.
Twilight caught herself as she began to look for a hiding spot, and forced herself to calmly watch him approach. "Don't be silly," she scolded herself, "if I can stay out of Rainbow's reach, I'll be fine."
Her heart didn't listen, and began to thunder in her chest, and she couldn't stop her muscles from tightening.
As Soarin was still a few seconds from reaching her, Twilight teleported away, aiming for the opisite side of the wall. Opps, I forgot Luna was there! Reaching out with her senses Twilight could feel were Luna was sitting, right were she was originally going to come out. Using what strength she could summon as she traveled through the ether, Twilight bent the angle she was teleporting, coming out sitting beside Luna rather than on top of her.
"Umm, hi."
"Twilight Sparkle," Luna said with a smile, but she did not take her eyes off of the courtyard.
It only took Soarin a moment to realize what happened, and a moment longer to find Twilight again, and he began closing in again. How long until he realizes, as Rainbow did, that trying to close on me is wasted effort?
"Is there any out of bounds?" Twilight asked Luna while she had the opportunity.
"No; fly back to Canterlot if you wish, but the objective is below."
"Right," Twilight mumbled as she turned and dove off the backside of the wall. After a moment of hovering there she teleported up, as high into the sky as she dared.
Coming out Twilight had to struggle hard to hold herself in the extremely thin air, high above the battle ground. I wonder how long until he'll give up? Twilight thought, as she looked around, trying to find Rainbow Dash or Spitfire. Were are they?
On a whim Twilight looked up. "What in Equestria?" All three of them were well above her, at least five thousand feet above her. Twilight herself was at least five thousand feet above the ruins, which themselves were at about fifteen thousand feet elevation. That puts them at twenty five thousand feet...
Rainbow was still above Spitfire, and Blaze was still struggling hard, and ultimately failing, to keep up with Spitfire.
There's not a lot I can do to help up there, Twilight thought to herself as she struggled to breathe were she was. At least she's taken Spitfire out of the battle, and Blaze too.
Looking back down, she spotted Soarin again coming after her, struggling up at a steep angle. I'll do my best, but all I really need to do is keep the two of them busy; that will leave the other ten of us just down two. I hope they do ok.
⁂
Rapidfire was sick of trying to catch Rainbow Dash all the time. She had done a good job of hiding it, keeping her rising fury hidden beneath her camaraderie and bravado. Rainbow Dash was frustrating as hell to fight, but she was a nice enough kid and didn't deserve to be hated, so Rapidfire had turned her anger on Procyon.
Procyon had dealt with it remarkably well, ignoring her almost completely, with the exception of just a few outbursts. I probably shouldn't have wound him up so tight though; Rainbow nearly had to pay for it... focus!
As the match began Rapidfire had rushed straight down the middle, intending to cut loose and have some fun, but half of the Wonderbolts had flanked around the sides, four had charged off into the sky, leaving just four in the entryway. Rapidfire seriously considered charging into the lead pony, a stallion with a light orange mane with a silver stripe down the middle, but decided against it. If you want to waste four of you sitting in the doorway, fine, go for it.
Throwing herself into a hard turn, Rapidfire powered herself around the left side of the courtyard back around behind the Wonderbolt flight that had started around just a few moments earlier. The courtyard was large enough that even at full speed it would take nearly twenty seconds to cross through the middle. Since the courtyard was a near perfect three thousand foot diameter circle, that would give it over a nine thousand foot circumference.
It would take me nearly a minute to lap this place, Rapidfire thought as she pushed herself to catch up to the Wonderbolts who had started to flank around the left side. Luna's other students had already broken up their flight, scattering the elements in various directions.
As Rapidfire pressed in she spotted the flight leader; the pegasi with the striped yellow and orange mane Rainbow had pointed out earlier. What was it, Lighting Dust? Rainbow Dash didn't sound very happy about seeing you here. This one's for you Dashie.
As she charged in, Lighting Dust turned towards her, landing in the snow in a low crouch. Her wing-pony, a stallion with a light blue mane spiked back, turned to cover her back, taking his eyes off Rapidfire.
Really? Rapidfire though, shocked at how easy they were making this for her. I guess you've never fought a pegasi who's built like an earth pony before. Speed is your only ally, and you've given her up!
As Rapidfire closed in, at full speed, Lighting Dust tried to raise her fore-hooves to ward off the attack. Rapidfire swatted them down with her own hooves, before turning to drive her right shoulder into Lighting's own shoulder. None of the Paralzyme was exchanged, and neither of Luna's spells were tripped, but the impact shook Rapidfire to her core, sending a lance of pain from her shoulder across her entire side. She transferred almost all of her forward momentum to Lighting Dust bringing herself to a near stop. It was painful, but she'd be fine.
Lighting Dust was not as lucky; the impact sent her tumbling, flying backward into her wing-pony and knocking him on his side as she continued passed. Rapidfire lunged forward to tag out the stallion, before remembering this was not the simple game they had been playing over the last few weeks.
Let's see how this works, she thought, driving her hoof into the stallions shoulder. It didn't look like much had happened at first; he recoiled as one usually did when struck, but as he tried to rise his foreleg crumpled beneath him.
Rapidfire lunged forward again, striking his opisite leg midway up. This caused the stallion to fall onto his face, before trying to right himself by furiously flapping his wings.
"Oh, no you don't!" Rapidfire shouted, jumping on top of him, whipping her fore-hooves across the base of his wings. They fell to his sides, motionless. "Haha, this is fantastic!"
"Is it?" an obviously pained mare said from Rapidfire's right, before striking her hard across the right shoulder.
Reeling back from the blow, Rapidfire took to the air for a short hop away, turning to face her attacker. Lightning Dust was barely able to stay on her hooves, her left foreleg hanging limply at her side as she used her wings to keep her front off the ground.
As Rapidfire landed she crumpled uncontrollably to her right, frantically flapping to keep herself upright. What the hay? Her right foreleg was completely unresponsive, and completely numb. It went so fast I didn't even feel it go numb; that is weird!
Lighting Dust's leg, however, was clearly not numb; Rapidfire had dislocated it when she rammed her.
"Hey, let me get that for you!" Rapidfire shouted, pushing herself into the air off her hind-legs. You have no right foreleg, you have no right foreleg, you have no right foreleg, Rapidfire changed to herself as she flew at Lighting Dust. It was impossible to tell without looking, as she could feel nothing at all.
As she approached Lighting Dust tried to fly sideways around the attack, but unfortuatly she hadn't thought it through and moved to Rapidfire's left, exposing the side with the dislocated leg. Reaching out as she passed Rapidfire brushed her still functional left fore-hoof down the length of Lighting Dust's side, making contact not only with her dislocated shoulder, but also her left wing-root and hip.
She continued passed, electing to slow into a hover rather than attempt a three-legged-landing, and turned in the air to admire her work. With both her left legs and left wing numbed, Lightning Dust had fallen on her side and was unable to right herself.
"That's two!" Rapidfire shouted.
She was too busy feeling proud of herself to hear Cloudchaser fly up behind her, and tag both of her wings at their root.
Suddenly, without any control over her wings, Rapidfire flopped directly into the snow.
"That's one," Cloudchaser cooed into her ear before moving on.
⁂
Twilight had spent a good few minutes wasting Soarin and Fleetfoot's time teleporting around five thousand feet above the mountain, but she was starting to see a pattern emerging. They were both getting board and losing focus, spending more time looking up at Rainbow, Spitfire and Blaze than they were watching Twilight.
As Soarin moved in towards her again, Twilight teleported out, then immediately back in, only slightly to the side. Soarin, who had again turned his eyes up at his leader jolted backwards. Perfect, Twilight thought, teleporting again, this time coming out right behind him.
As she lunged forward to hit him in the back, Soarin folded his wings and dropped like a rock.
As Soarin fell away Twilight found herself tumbling forward.
Without making a sound Fleetfoot struck her from behind, sending Twilight into a tight forward spin.
"Whaaah!" Twilight exclaimed as the world blurred around her. She teleported away, coming out a few hundred feet away.
She found herself having a very difficult time keeping her balance to hover level. It took her a moment to realize she couldn't feel her lower half. "Oh no... Umm..."
"Are you ok?" Soarin asked, slowly moving forward.
"Yea... I never realized how much I use my legs to balance." Twilight had to struggle a bit, but she could still fly well enough. It's not like I was going to beat anyone with my flying anyway, her mind added.
"Soarin, hey!" A voice echoed up from below. "We need some help down here!"
Twilight didn't recognize the voice, but Soarin clearly did. He spent a moment looking at the ponies still struggling with each other below. "Go and help them," he said suddenly, pressing himself into a steep climb.
"What? Me?" Fleetfoot asked, starting up after him.
"Who will cover you?" Fleetfoot asked, slowing her own climb.
"I will!" he responded.
Fleetfoot hesitated, hovering in the air for a moment before looking at Twilight. "What about her?" she shouted after Soarin, but he had already climbed too high to hear.
"Well, it looks like you're on your own," Twilight cooed as she moved forward. It looked like Fleetfoot was beginning to panic. This is exactly what Rainbow was talking about, Twilight realized. How do I take advantage of it though?
Fleetfoot suddenly broke into a steep dive, angling towards the center of the courtyard, where the last few Wonderbolts were facing off with Luna's remaining students.
Twilight followed, easing into her own gentle dive.
⁂
Rainbow had expected something like this to happen; going after Spitfire was exactly what she herself had planned to do, so it wasn't that much of a surprise to have Spitfire coming after her. She had tried using several of her best tricks to catch Spitfire off guard, but Spitfire had already done all of them herself. Ah hay, she invented half of these herself! There was only one trick Rainbow could do that Spitfire couldn't, and a Sonic Rainboom would do nothing to help in a close range fight. At least I know I can always run away...
There was something else Spitfire had that Rainbow didn't; she could turn unbelievably tightly, enduring massive acceleration's that would knock most ponies unconscious if it didn't outright rip their wings off. Rainbow could easily extend away, and turn to attack Spitfire head on, but as she approached and tried to circle around behind her, Spitfire would pull an incredibly tight turn and be attacking Rainbow from the side before she had even completed half of her own turn. Rainbow would then abandon the turn and extend away before Spitfire could catch her, but Rainbow could never catch Spitfire off guard; every time she tried to turn in Spitfire would be right there, ready to get her.
Worse, Spitfire was not getting angry. She was calm, diligently pressing any opening Rainbow offered, but never over extending and not wasting energy trying to chase her. Rainbow Dash herself was getting very frustrated, and began to consider less conventional means of attack.
"Spitfire!" Soarin's voice echoed up from below.
"What?" Spitfire shouted back, without taking her eyes off Rainbow.
"We've lost too many down here; they need backup."
"Copy," she shouted, folding her wings to her side as she entered a hard dive.
Blaze, who was struggling along at a bit lower altitude, immediately followed.
Rainbow pressed into her own dive, and began to consider what to do. I can catch them, no pony can out run me, even in a dive... but Spitfire will just turn into me again; how do I get around that? As she continued to build speed the air pressure squeezed around her, pressing her wings hard against her side. I bet I can get her to lock up, if she's dumb enough to follow... which she isn't.
As she closed in from behind, Spitfire did exactly as she expected and pulled into an extremely hard turn; one that Rainbow could never follow without ripping her wings off.
Soarin and Blaze turned in their own directions, also pushing themselves into turns Rainbow couldn't follow at this speed without hurting herself. Rather than even try Rainbow simply dove past them. She was getting close to the sonic barrier now; far faster than any pony but her could reach; unfortunately there wasn't much she could do at this speed.
She flared her wings forward, shifting her center of lift enough to begin a hard pull out. I think that's part of why no other pony has done a Sonic Rainboom; they don't know how to pull out without killing themselves. After pulling into level flight, Rainbow began pulling back into another hard climb, angling towards the three descending Wonderbolts. What happened to Fleetfoot?
Rainbow considered pressing another attack, but Spitfire was at the perfect speed to pull into any attack she tried. Instead she simply flew passed, climbing above them again.
"Both of you, help the others!" Spitfire shouted as Rainbow passed, before pulling an incredibly hard reversal to begin climbing after her.
"Yes ma'am!" Soarin shouted, staying in his steep dive.
Rainbow continued to push herself up, building altitude almost as quickly as she had given it up. After about twenty seconds she was well ahead of Spitfire, who had begun to climb in a tight spiral, unable to power herself straight against gravity as Rainbow was.
"This... is it..." Rainbow mumbled to herself, between ragged gasps. This is were my advantage over Spitfire is, she continued in her mind. Rainbow herself was beginning to run out of strength, her wings struggling to get purchase against the thin air. It's like trying to run up a frozen ramp.
Finally reaching her limit, Rainbow transitioned into level flight, and began to power herself to higher speeds. As Spitfire leveled out behind her, Rainbow began a loose high speed turn, circling around Spitfire's side.
Spitfire tried to not only follow, but to turn inside Rainbow as she had at lower altitude's, but her wings were unable to find enough air to support the tight turn, leaving her to skid wide.
Rainbow turned as tightly as she could, straining her wings to close around the circle behind Spitfire.
As she closed, Spitfire played one last ditch maneuver, spinning her body around in mid air even as her momentum carried her backward, and tried to slow into a hover to face Rainbow's charge. It didn't work; as she strained to hold level Spitfire instead began to descend as Rainbow closed.
Giving up, Spitfire suddenly closed her wings and allowed herself to fall.
Unable to adjust her course down in time Rainbow shot by over her head, before rolling inverted and diving after her.
Damn it; that was my chance! Furious at missing the opportunity Rainbow dove after Spitfire, rapidly building as much speed as she could. I need to get her before we reach thicker air!
As she closed in, right before catching her, Spitfire flared her wings wide and pulled up at an impossibly steep angle. Rainbow flared her own wings as wide as they would go, and strained against the centrifugal force as hard as she could. The pain in her wings was immense, threatening to tear away.
It wasn't enough; Spitfire easily pulled up out of Rainbow's view.
Rainbow closed her wings again, falling back into her dive. Haaay... Glancing over her shoulder she saw Spitfire diving hard on her tail. Does she really think she can catch me? Rainbow thought, watching her idol struggle to follow her.
A sudden thought dawned on Rainbow. This is going to be very mean, but catch me if you can.
Rainbow purposefully slowed her dive, allowing Spitfire to close in. Glancing over her shoulder again, sure enough Spitfire was closing. As Spitfire moved almost within hooves reach, Rainbow picked up the pace again, just enough to goad Spitfire on.
Spitfire flapped harder, pushing herself to speed's she had never reached before.
I really hope this doesn't get her killed.
As they continued to build speed, the force of the air crushing in on them built to truly incredible levels, pining their wings in place. Rainbow pushed on a little further, before forcing her wings forward and beginning her pull out.
She had only pulled up about five degrees when Spitfire carried on passed her, completely unable to pull out of the dive as the air pressure locked her wings in place. Gotcha.
Rainbow pressed back into her dive, and closed in behind Spitfire. They were still a good ways away from the sonic barrier; at this speed they'd have about ten seconds before they reached the mountains still eight thousand feet below. Ten seconds to tap out, and save, my idol! Perfect!
As she reached Spitfire, Rainbow wrapped her forelegs around Spitfire's midriff, and began another pullout, after taking a moment to drag the tips of her wings, still coated in paralzyme, across Spitfire's own wings. She took her time with the pullout, being careful not to put too much pressure on Spitfire's stomach. She managed to get them into level about two thousand feet above the mountain.
"I really hope you've had fun today," Spitfire said over her shoulder, sounding surprisingly composed all things considered, "because you've earned it with that one!"
"Thanks Spitfire!"
"But I'm afraid this is it for you too!"
Before Spitfire could try anything, as that last statement made clear she was going to, Rainbow simply dropped her.
Letting out a little squeal Spitfire dropped, tumbling slightly as she fell.
"Don't worry, Luna will catch you!" Rainbow called after her, before powering herself into a steep dive, quickly out running and passing Spitfire on her way down. Soarin is next.
⁂
Procyon had spent the last few minutes sitting near their flag room, watching as eight Wonderbolts had brawled with eight of Luna's other Students. Rainbow's original plan to have four of them stay to guard the flag was apparently abandoned, as just Procyon and Thunderlane remained, but it seemed to be working well enough.
There were just a handful left now, on both sides. As the four Wonderbolts held in reserve, guarding their own flag, moved to join the fight Procyon decided it was time for him to move in too.
"Let's go," he barked at Thunderlane, as he shoved himself into flight.
Thunderlane said nothing, but he followed immediately, moving slightly to the right as the two of them pressed into the middle. The battle was closer to their side of the courtyard, meaning they would have a moment before the four Wonderbolts closing from the opisite side arrived.
Procyon singled out the little pegasi mare who had taken out Rapidfire. Cloudsomthing. She was circling with the other griffon that had been training alongside them these passed weeks. I should have gotten to know her, I know that, but... she reminds me of everything I've left behind, and with good reason. There would be time later, he decided, as he timed his approach so he'd be behind Cloudsomething as he arrived.
Cloudchaser heard him coming, and tried to turn to face him, but the griffoness took the opportunity to press in, forcing the pony backwards.
As Procyon arrived he grabbed the ponies rear-legs and pulled her down from her low hover, before reaching up to bring his talons down her back. He was very careful that his talons didn't actually bite into her skin, but it was enough to cut thin lines into her fur and the paralzyme disabled the muscles along her back and wings.
Letting the pegasi fall to the snow, Procyon turned his attention to the sole remaining Wonderbolt, save the four that were still rushing to join them.
"Brother!" the Wonderbolt shouted with a wicked grin.
What?
"Brother," Thunderlane mumbled in a dry tone.
Oh, "I'll leave you two alone then," Procyon said, turning towards the approaching flight of four.
The griffoness, without a word, moved to flank around the right side.
Another of Luna's students, a slightly larger than average mare with a dark azure-grey coat and silver and light blue stripped mane, was galloping in from the left, but her right wing hung limp at her side.
Procyon began to climb above the approaching Wonderbolts, waiting for them to get involved with the griffoness and mare before diving on them. He took a quick glance at Thunderlane and his brother behind him; Thunderlane had already paralyzed his brother's wing and was quickly pressing in. With just a bit of luck this will be a fair fight soon, Procyon thought, turning back.
The lead Wonderbolt, Fire Streak, turned hard to the side, aiming for the griffoness who was still trying to flank around. His wing-pony followed close behind, but the second element continued to charge ahead, ignoring Procyon and the grounded mare, heading straight for Thunderlane.
The griffon can hold her own, Procyon though, as he began to maneuver to dive on the two Wonderbolts passing below him. He waited for them to pass underneath him, then dropped behind them, rapidly picking up speed in the steep dive. The lead pegasi continued straight for Thunderlane, oblivious to Procyon's rapid approach, but his wing-pony, who's sole job was to keep his tail clear, did notice; she pulled up steeply, and turned to fend off Procyon.
Procyon simply pulled up slightly, and sailed clear over the wing-ponies head, before diving steeply at the element leader. He flared his wings wide to slow down not only so he would have more time to aim, but also so he wouldn't break the ponies back. Crashing down with immense force in a way only a griffon could, Procyon drove the pony chest first into the snow, skidding to a stop perched on his back.
After carefully paralyzing both his wings and forelegs, Procyon pushed off into the air, turning to face the wing-pony as she rapidly approached.
She lead with her forelegs, aiming to dive them trough Procyon's chest. Procyon reached forward and caught both of her forelegs as she screamed in, pulling them to her sides. Her chest slammed into him and her momentum pushed him backwards, but he had her now.
To her credit, she didn't hesitate for a moment, leaning back and lashing out with her hind-legs, connecting with Procyon's abdomen. He felt a brief flicker of pain before all feeling from his lower half vanished.
In response Procyon threw her up, then pulled her forelegs down, whipping her rear into the air and exposing her back. He then leaned forward and pecked the base of her left wing, before dropping her. She took one flap with her right wing, which sent her into a tumble, before spiraling to the snow below.
Taking a quick look around Procyon discovered that the griffoness had been overwhelmed by the two Wonderbolts, who were now turning their attention to the ground bound mare, hounding her from the air.
Procyon began to build speed, but without his lower half responding he was having a very difficult time balancing.
Thunderlane flew passed him, coming in behind the two Wonderbolts quickly.
"Soarin, hey! We need some help down here!" the lead pony shouted at the sky.
Aah, I had forgotten, Procyon though, looking to the sky. Rainbow will be ok still, and I doubt they could catch Twilight either. We could still be out numbered.
Procyon dragged his eyes back to the two Wonderbolts, who were being driven back by Thunderlane. This took the dark azure mare out of the fight, but it also protected her. She doesn't need to be protected, Procyon thought, as he climbed above them, intending to push them to the ground.
As he neared the peak of his climb, and began to dive, he took one more quick look at the sky. One of the Wonderbolts was diving on him, fast.
Without thinking Procyon turned to face the attack, hovering in place. As the Wonderbolt approached she turned away at the last moment, staying just out of reach as she arced around Procyon, forcing him to turn in place to track her. Rainbow has done this to me before; I can't fight like this.
Rather than continue the lopsided high speed fight Procyon simply closed his wings, and dropped towards the two Wonderbolts below. Thunderlane can deal with her, if she tires to follow me.
Again aiming for the wing leader, Procyon dropped on him, slamming into him with enough force to send them both into a tumble. He didn't manage to tag any part of the Wonderbolt as they both fell to the snow below, both in their own uncontrolled spin. As Procyon struggled to right himself both of his arms and his wings went limp, and he collapsed on his side.
The Wonderbolts wing-pony had followed him down, and taken him out from behind. He couldn't help but smile though as the dark azure mare managed to tag out the Wonderbolt he had driven into the ground. That's two and an assist; I could have done far worse.
⁂
Oh no, who do we have left? Twilight thought as she descended. It looks like it's just me and Thunderlane now... Oh, and the other pony on the ground, but it doesn't look like she can fly. We're still against Fleetfoot and I think that's High Winds still up. We need to get them quickly.
Thunderlane and Fleetfoot were circling each other; both were extremely fast. High Winds was climbing toward them from below, ignoring the ground bound mare below. I can help Thunderlane with Fleetfoot, or I can stop High Winds... can I take her alone? Can Thunderlane take Fleetfoot alone? Oh... I just don't know.
Rainbow had been clear; keep them from being able to work as a team, but Twilight didn't know if she could take her alone. I'll help Thunderlane, she decided, closing her wings to dive as quickly as possible.
As she approached Fleetfoot turned to intercept her, giving Thunderlane her side. Right before the two collided Twilight teleported away, coming out on her right side. Thunderlane pressed in from her left.
Fleetfoot turned to lunge at Twilight, hitting her on the left shoulder, numbing her left foreleg. As Twilight tried to fly backwards to open the distance, Fleetfoot tried to follow, but Thunderlane tackled her from behind. Thank you, Twilight thought, as she teleported away now that her distraction had played it's part.
Coming out just a hundred feet away, she took a moment to look herself over. She couldn't feel anything below her midsection, and her left foreleg was now out of action. Both of her wings were fine, but it was extremely difficult to keep her balance with just one leg.
Fleetfoot was falling down, completely unable to stop herself. Twilight was about to reach out to catch her with magic, when she suddenly took on a blue aura. Oh, thank you Luna; I forgot you were here. Who else is left?
High Winds was climbing after Thunderlane, but Thunderlane had already turned to face her, and was circling down from above.
Twilight's eyes fell on the dark azure pegasi stuck on the ground. Twilight teleported down to land near her. As she came out of the teleport she only felt one hoof touch the snow; the rest of her crumpled to the ground without any sensation.
"Oh, are you ok?" the azure mare shouted.
"Yea, I can still fly... a little. Go get their flag." Twilight struggled into a low hover.
"Huh? Oh!" and with that, the mare galloped off.
How big is this place? About three thousand feet across? We're nearly half way there already, so it'll be a be nearly five thousand feet for her to make it there and back. That will take her well over a minute if she can run at full speed, but she has a disabled wing to look after and is running on deep snow... Maybe I should try flying it the distance, or we switch out Thunderlane?
But no, Thunderlane is committed and she's already going for it now.
Twilight started to teleport towards Thunderlane, to help as much as she could, but she noticed Blaze and Soarin both in a hard dive, coming down quickly. Oh no, oh no, umm... Twilight could think of nothing to do that she wouldn't consider cheating, so she decided to only bend the rules a little bit.
She teleported up in front of Blaze and Soarin. Soarin simply dodged to the side, continuing passed her, but Blaze attempted to tackle her. Blaze only slowed slightly from her dive before slamming into Twilight, nearly knocking the wind out of her. The spike of pain traveled through all of her body that she could still feel, before the pain in her wings vanished as Blaze reached around her to tag them both.
Twilight reached her one responding foreleg around Blaze, held her tightly, and pulled her with her as she teleported.
They came out with most of their velocity intact, slamming them both into the snow. Twilight felt a spike a pain across what little of her body she could feel, and did her best to rise with her one working leg. She ended up on her side, unable to really move.
Blaze was sprawled on her side, but otherwise unharmed and moved to rise, before the dark azure mare tacked her from the side, tagging out her wings and legs in quick succession while the Wonderbolt was still dazed.
"Thanks, Twilight! That's two for me now!" the mare shouted, preparing to dash on.
"No problem," Twilight croaked, "umm?"
"Night Glider!" the mare shouted, as she continued towards the Wonderbolts flag. "We can talk later!" she added over her shoulder.
So, I've assisted with two, and distracted several for awhile... I could have done worse.
Thunderlane was still brawling with High Winds, neither making any progress. Both were playing it safe, knowing that this could be what decides the battle.
Soarin suddenly dropped in from above, Thunderlane barely managing to dodge his high speed pass.
High Winds took the opportunity to rush him, closing in a straight attack.
Thunderlane suddenly closed his wings, and dropped below the attack before catching himself, and furiously flapping, drove himself back up into High Winds midsection. As she crumpled around him, she managed to strike both of his wings, but he wrapped his forelegs around her and dragged her down with him, getting both of her own wings before Luna caught the two of them.
Soarin, now the sole Wonderbolt, looked around, and quickly spotted Night Glider, just now leaving the Wonderbolt base with their flag.
He immediately dove towards her, closing the distance far faster than a ground bound pony could ever hope to run.
⁂
Rainbow dove in at an incredible speed; still not to the sonic barrier but far closer than any other pegasus would dare. She hadn't been fast enough to save Thunderlane, but she was more than fast enough to catch Soarin before he caught their last mare.
Rainbow took a moment to fly passed Luna, to let her know Spitfire was coming in for an uncontrolled landing, before turning to dive after Soarin.
To think I once idolized that slow stallion! Rainbow thought to herself. In truth, she still did, just as every sane pegasi mare did, but her small time with the Wonderbolts had done a lot to give her a bit more of a realistic view on their capabilities. Soarin was about to turn her realistic view on it's head.
As she closed in, right before she reached him, Soarin threw himself into an impossibly sharp turn, even more tightly than Spitfire had managed. Rainbow tried to throw herself to the side, to at least tag him as she flew by, but he managed to get entirely out of her reach. Not only had he managed a turn that would have pulled Rainbow's feathers out, he was grinning across his entire snout as he did it. Every one of Rainbow's sense told her he should be howling in pain after a turn like that, but he was laughing at her!
"I'm sorry, Dash, but this is going to be a lot rougher than our last dance!"
"You can't catch me, Soarin," Rainbow shouted back, her mind racing to come up with a trick to beat him. I can do this.
Rainbow cut back in, trying once again to attack Soarin, this time from above. As she approached he tucked into a tight downward loop, drawing them both into a dive, and to higher speeds.
Rainbow dove, directly down on top of him. Right before she caught him, Soarin pulled another sharp turn, cutting to the side too quickly for Rainbow to follow. As Rainbow shot passed, she pulled up sharply to avoid the ground. Soarin twisted back around, diving to try and catch her but Rainbow effortlessly sped away at ground level, before beginning to climb above him as she circled back around.
Rainbow tried making diving passes several more times, but each time Soarin simply turned in and Rainbow shot passed, before extending away and climbing again.
Enough of this! Rainbow moved in again, and as he had before Soarin dove to build speed, but rather than diving on top of him Rainbow simply followed, matching speeds with him, following slightly above and behind. As Soarin reached the bottom of his dive, he again threw himself into a hard turn. Rainbow still couldn't match the turn, so she didn't even try, instead pulling into a slow turn to try and stay above him.
As Soarin slowed, he tried to turn back into Rainbow and climb to catch her. Without much effort Rainbow was able to stay just above Soarin as they climbed, until he slowed into a hover. Rainbow dropped into her own hover and turned to face Soarin, still slightly above him.
This is it, Rainbow thought. Without hesitation, she lunged forward, using all of her strength as well as the altitude she still held over Soarin to close. Soarin was slower than she was, and was at a clear disadvantage; his only advantage over her lay at higher speeds, but it would take him too long to reach those speeds now, even if he tried to dive.
But Soarin had one other major advantage over Rainbow; he was a good, well trained soldier, and on top of his training he had been in many air-brawls with other pegasi over the years, giving him a level of practical experience not even Spitfire had.
As Rainbow dove, Soarin leaned back and closed his wings, letting himself fall, then, as Rainbow was about to make contact, Soarin flapped his wings, rotating backwards even further, dropping his head down towards the ground and away from her attack as he lashed out with his hind-legs, catching Rainbow square in the stomach.
The pain evaporated almost immediately, as her lower half was paralyzed, but her eyes still blurred and the air was forced from her lungs. Half blind, Rainbow slammed into Soarin's chest. Soarin immediately wrapped his forelegs around her, squeezing what little breath she had manage back out and grabbing the base of her wings.
Her left foreleg ended up pinned between herself and Soarin, but she managed to pull her right foreleg free, and reached around Soarin to tag his left wing. Rainbow's eyes managed to focus just in time to see Soarin's cocky grin shift to shock as they began to fall.
Rainbow closed her eyes and pressed her face into the white fur of Soarin's chest as they tumbled, waiting for Luna to catch them. As the world slowly stopped spinning, she again opened her eyes, to be greeted with the midnight blue glow of Luna's magic, gently setting them down in the snow.
Rainbow tried to push herself up, but Soarin held her tightly against his chest. "I think I've earned a little snuggle..."
"You?" Rainbow asked, legitimately confused. "What about me? I've taken down two Wonderbolts today!"
"Ok, ok," Soarin began, "fine... You can snuggle with me then... I'm sure Spitfire won't mind."
"Why would Spitfire mind?" Rainbow asked, struggling onto her side with just her front half responding. "Wait... you don't mean..?"
"Whatever," Rainbow mumbled as she lay her head on Soarin's chest. I didn't realize I had competition... Ugh, forget about it; I have enough to worry about.
Night Glider was nearing their base, with the Wonderbolts flag in her mouth. Now that she was the only pony left that wasn't disabled or disqualified Luna's students had practically already won.
Spitfire, with her wings hanging limp at her sides, was marching towards Rainbow and Soarin. Sure enough she was wearing a angry expression, but Rainbow couldn't tell if it meant get off my stallion or I'm beating you next time. Maybe it was a little of both.
"Train hard, Rainbow Dash; you're not going to trick me that easily again!" Spitfire shouted as she neared the two cuddling ponies.
I guess she doesn't care about Soarin then, Rainbow concluded, closing her eyes.
"At attention, soldier!" Spitfire barked at Soarin as she came up beside them.
"Can't boss," Soarin said, shrugging his shoulders. "Besides, this civilian managed to get herself hurt, and needs looking after."
"I'm not a civilian anymore," Rainbow mumbled into Soarin's fur, "and I don't need looking after."That might carry more weight if I wasn't taking a nap on top of him right now, Rainbow thought to herself. It's cold, and he's warm.
Rainbow's eyes were still closed, but she could clearly hear Spitfires sigh, then the sound of snow crunching as she walked away.
Two Wonderbolts, Rainbow thought to herself, her chest swelling with pride. I managed to take down two Wonderbolts! Yes, one was with a one-off trick, and the other cost me everything, but I took down the two lead Wonderbolts!
