Skybound
Higher.
Higher.
The green-and-brown of the ground below became a vague blur, a world left behind. The wind howled in her ears.
Higher!
The howling dulled as she crossed into the whiteness above, the sound smothered by the thickness of the clouds: water vapour held in suspension for Earth Ponies and Unicorns, but the gateway to a special place for Pegasi. She angled her wings, the blue tips dragging against the thick of the nimbus, her cyan coat becoming heavy with moisture. Her heart surged as her body did, until it beat in her neck contracted by the effort, matching the cadence of her wings double-time, triple-time.
Just a little more!
She closed her eyes and let her wings work for her. Powerful muscles bulged and contracted with each flap, sending her surging upward, mocking gravity with the ease with which they carried her higher and higher still.
Tinted goggles over her eyes, a victorious grin on her face, she contracted her body for one final push, and shot upward like a loosened arrow.
Puffs of cloudstuff trailed behind her as she breached through the sea of the sky. Her wings slowed down. Her heart went back inside her chest to beat a victory march. Her goal achieved, she allowed herself a moment of respite.
Her wings went still.
She floated, held between the rolling clouds below and the infinite above. The Sun warmed her, unfiltered, and shimmered on the waves below in gleams of yellow-white.
She took a deep breath of the thin air of the sky. Shivers coursed through her body as the smell of ozone filled her lungs and reminded her of where she was.
Where every Pegasus belonged.
Her true home.
Gravity caught up to her at last, and she felt herself tilting downard until the clouds and the infinite switched places above and below her. She fell faster, faster, faster. Her wings shivered with trepidation but she firmly kept them pressed against her body.
Not now. Just a little more…
The pool of sunlight came rushing to her, and just before she breached through the clouds again, her wings unfurled and caught the wind.
With a pull against her core like she was pulled by an invisible rope, she soared back up in a great arch, momentarily dipping under the waves before breaching back again with a burst of mist.
Her heart raced with adrenaline and the joy of freedom. The Sunlight wrapped around her like a tantalizing embrace, daring her to go up, up, higher, always higher. She breathed out, knowing that dizzying thought was insane. The clouds met the tip of her hooves as she allowed herself to lose altitude and trace snaking gouges in the sheep-like floor hidden above all.
The sky stretched around her to meet the horizon before being lost in the blurry distance. Here and there, the odd peak of a mountain timidly pierced the white sea like so many islets, offering a resting place for tired Pegasi exploring the immensity of the sky.
She angled herself with a smirk until her wingtips disappeared under the surface of the clouds, changing her course to come straight at one of the peaks. She swerved with a great drag and gritted her teeth, fighting against the weight pulling her down and away from the peak. Tiny readjustments happened all over her body. Her wings straightened and changed angle, the tips spreading lightly to better fight against the pull, her hooves extended to spread her weight, her ears went flat against her skull to shut off the wind pressure, and she swung around the rocky mass like a pendulum before shooting back on track with a victory shout.
Her flight was meandering at first. She used the momentum she’d gained to propel herself forward and let the wind currents play in her feathers and decide where she’d go. They pulled her left and right in a sinuous line and rocked her body where they met and clashed, fighting to see which one would win in guiding the Pegasus.
Ultimately, a current pulling her towards the south won, and her finely-honed senses felt her body lightly turn off-course to follow the stream. She let go, allowing herself to be brought along the wind’s path without resistance, and let her wings wide-open to glide atop the gentle current.
She blew a strand of rainbow-coloured hair out of her face. Her mane and tail billowed in the invisible waves rolling around her in the sea of freedom that only existed above the ground. There, she could let go and let herself float endlessly, and let whatever was watching over her take her wherever they wanted.
All she had to do was keep her wings straight.
Relax.
Breathe in.
And—
She flipped in a barrel roll and broke away from the current with a dizzying acceleration as her wings flapped shut against her body with a dull fwomp, the air gathering under them having been violently expelled.
Let herself be guided? She was Rainbow bucking Dash! Euphoria exploded inside her as she wrestled back control over her movement with the winds and easily won with a burst of speed.
The wind wanted her to go south? Tough luck. She wanted to go downward? She would go downward.
The thick clouds surrounded her once more as her body pierced them with a clap. Maybe there was a mountain hidden inside. Maybe an airship, or a random bird that would crash into her wing and send her tumbling down. But there never was. Nothing would ever dare come between her and her flight. She would have grinned if she wasn’t sure it would rip the skin of her face right off.
Faster.
Faster.
The cloud burst open around her, revealing the yellowed plains of southern Equestria. A desert stretched to her left, a small city was on her right. In front of her, the land thickened into a jungle several hundred miles farther.
Her wings angled themselves with barely a thought on her part. As the ground came to meet her, her angle smoothed down, and tall grass tickled her hooves just as she went back up again.
She let her momentum slow down again. The moment between the speeds was what made the experience so special for her. Caught between the finely-controlled plummets and the powerful surges upward was a delicate split-second where everything held still, where up and down had no meaning anymore.
In that thin slice of time, everything was revealed. She could see the details in the roiling clouds with utmost precision, every play of the light in their folds and bulges. The howling in her ears stopped, and the sounds of the planet beating under her, and the swishings of the sky came to her like a gentle melody, a harmony of life. Even her mane and the fur of her coat hung frozen in the air, and if she closed her eyes, she could imagine being in an infinite pool, floating between the surface and the seafloor.
Shivers of excitement ran up her spine as she felt the cool caress of the air lifting her fur and brush against her skin, rise her mane above her head. Just a few seconds more...
Gravity caught up to her and wrapped itself around her, dragging the Pegasus down through the sky once more. This time, Rainbow Dash knew where she was going, and let the pull of the ground shoot her north, back to the place that was her home on the ground.
The surface of the clouds puffed and misted around her as she let herself be pulled under before breaching back over and over, flipping and swerving, and leaving a trail of her presence behind her as she flapped her wings faster, faster, faster.
She didn’t go as fast as she would during a dive, and didn’t go as fast as she would during a normal flight, period. But the rush of wind against her face was no less exhilarating, and the song of the wind was just as sweet to her ears tipped with frost from her trip into the chill of the clouds.
Her heart dipped as she did, tilting downward to exit the cover of clouds. Eventually, it always came to an end, didn’t it? She couldn’t fly forever, and resting was of unfortunate importance to a Pegasus. She’d always stretch that bitter ending as much as she could, meander a bit over a forest or two, only losing altitude when her destination was in sight.
And so, the descent to the ground was a lazy glide over the Everfree Forest. She smiled at the gnarled canopy below and angled her wings to let the winds guide her toward Ponyville. The glide slowed down, and the rush of the air against her lessened to a disappointing nothing. Soon, her aching muscles went back to work, flapping the rest of the short distance to a clear patch of grass next to the town.
There was no duller or disappointing sound than the landing thud of hooves against the ground. Even then, she couldn’t ignore the burn in her back muscles from the extra load she’d been carrying and the buzzing sensation in her wings, telling her she needed the ground rest whether she liked it or not.
“Terminus!” she called, undoing a strap under her belly and kneeling down. “Everypony down!”
Four little thuds sounded in rapid succession as Scootaloo stumbled off her back and graciously fell to the ground. The makeshift harness fell down around Rainbow Dash and she shook herself free of the lingering pressure on her sides.
“That. Was. Amazing!” Scootaloo’s eyes were alight with joy. “I don’t know what to say!”
Rainbow Dash did a dismissive gesture with a hoof. “Don’t mention it, squirt. Just… don’t go telling your aunts I brought you with me, deal?”
“Deal!”
The filly grinned and extended a hoof that was promptly bumped by Rainbow Dash’s own.
“So… now what do you want to do?”
“Ice cream?”
Rainbow Dash licked her lips. “Ice cream it is.”
One of the wings that had carried them so far up in the sky draped itself over Scootaloo’s back as the duo walked back to their earthbound home.