Another world? A nightmare? An illusion? Surely this can't be the reality that always was.
Rainbow Dash was accustomed to waking up in pain; being a Wonderbolt meant that at least some part of her was always sore. What she wasn't accustomed to was waking up in a cell in a world that's turned upside down.
In a place where everything seems wrong, she has to figure out just what she can trust. Is this a grand trick, or is this the world she's always known?
The command and a hearty shake roused the pony mentioned from a restless slumber. Magenta eyes cracked open, the world before her blurred by sleep and grogginess. She could make out vague shapes and colors, mostly a lot of grays with a big blob of orange and yellow right in front of her.
Besides her obscured vision, the sensations of intense pain shot through her body. It was mostly focused on her left wing and her head. As her brain woke up a little more, it was assaulted with more and more pain signals from her extremities. To add to it, she still couldn’t see. Where usually she could blink away this kind of fuzziness, now it wasn’t going away.
Other than that, she could tell she was on a cold stone floor. The rough cracks and edges digging into her skin. Dash tried to shift, but that only made her body protest more. It felt like she had flown a marathon or two in a hurricane with weights on her hooves.
“What did they do to you…?” The yellow and orange blob in front of her spoke again, now it’s voice filled with genuine worry. “Gods, he’s going to be angry.”
“Wait… Spitfire…?” Through all of the pain and weariness, the dots finally connected. The blob in front of her was none other than the Captain of the Wonderbolts. What was she doing here? Where was here? So many questions rattled around Rainbow’s head as more pieces fell into place.
“Right. Hang on.” Spitfire grumbled out as the sounds of hooves rummaging through a bag came to Rainbow’s ears. “You need these, I almost forgot.” Something slipped over the prone pegasus’ head, the familiar sense of flight goggles it felt like. As soon as they slid over her eyes, the world before her came into focus.
The light of the full moon was the only source of illumination, and it was just bright enough for Dash to make out some details. The room was made of rough hewn stone, old and cracked with vines and other plants clinging to the cracks. Across from her were what looked to be new iron bars that gleamed in the low light of the moon, the door in the middle busted off of its hinge.
Why did Spitifre think she needed goggles? Why had they wiped the blurriness of the world away? Sure, Dash wore flight goggles when she was… well… flying, but that was for safety reasons. It wasn’t like she needed them to see before or anything.
While that was all curious, it was the other pony in the cell that was the most surprising. Spitfire’s dark orange eyes were narrowed to slits as she looked over her shoulder, showing off her flaming orange mane shaved into a mohawk. Shining crystal armor the color of onyx adorned her body, hugging her form and bringing quite the contrast to her coat.
“What… what’re you wearing? What’s with your mane…?” The pain took a backseat for a moment to the burning curiosity now searing into her skull. She’d never seen that kind of armor before, and Spitfire was proud of her windswept look.
Orange eyes like two flames stared back Happy, eager and young “I can’t believe they actually accepted me” It wasn’t hard to believe at all.
Rainbow brought a hoof to her head and screwed her eyes shut as a memory washed over her. It left her head swimming and pounding like a jackhammer had been taken to it. It was a fragment of something that had pushed its way into her mind without any prompting. It wasn’t even something she recognized, it sure wasn’t something from her life.
“They really did a number on you.” Spitfire replied with a sigh before offering a hoof. Rainbow Dash gladly reached out and took it and was roughly pulled up to a standing position. Every single muscle in her body protested and she groaned out in pain, nearly falling down again. It was the Wonderbolt captain quickly propping her up that saved her from meeting the stone floor with her face. “We don’t have a lot of time before they find out we’re here, we need to get outside and get you home.”
“Where is here?” Rainbow croaked out, the question punctuated by a cough and yet another groan as her sore ribs complained. “I...I don’t even remember how I got here. I was…” She searched her memories for a moment, just trying to figure out what led her to this place. There was nothing, though. Anything she tried to recall that wasn’t just a general fact, like her friends or where she was from, refused to come to the forefront of her mind.
“Some old castle in the Everfree Forest. I’m not even sure how they found this place.” The Castle of the Two Sisters, at least that was the only castle Rainbow knew about in the Everfree. “I was hoping to fly out of here, but…” Spitfire’s eyes trailed to the left side of the injured pegasus. “...that’s not going to happen. So Plan B, get outside and warp out of here.”
Dash turned her head to get a clearer look at exactly why flying wasn’t an option. Her wing was hurting, but she was no stranger to flying through some pain. Late into the Wonderbolt show season, it was practically an inevitability.
Where once a cerulean blue wing sprouted from her back was now a bloody stump haphazardly bandaged. Breath caught in Dash’s throat as her heart thundered against her ribcage and her mind went fully blank. Not even Spitfire could stop her from falling back onto her haunches.
“M-my wing…” The words slipped out between gasps of air as pupils the size of pinpricks stared at the missing appendage. A blue hoof reached up to prod the covered stump to make sure it was real, the sharp pain let her know that it was. “Nononononono!”
“Rainbow Dash! Rainbow Dash please!” Spitfire shushed her and reached a hoof to cover the mouth of the panicking pony beside her. “I know it’s shocking, I know.” The usually cold steely gaze of the Captain gave way to something softer and warm. “I know, but we can’t stay here. If you want any chance of getting that fixed we need to get out of here now.”
“R-right.” The panic was pushed down and Rainbow summoned every last drop of bravery and courage she could manage. It wasn’t much in the face of her current condition and confusion, but it would have to be enough to escape this dungeon.
Her future as a Wonderbolt weighed heavily on her soul. The wings on her back meant more than the sun in the sky, they gave her life meaning. Everything she had ever accomplished came from determination and her raw talent for flying. Without that, who was she? Who would she be? For now she would have to put her trust in Spitfire to get out of here and fix this like she promised.
“Can you stand?” The question hung in the air for a moment as Rainbow pulled herself to her hooves. Her legs were shaky as the soreness took hold again, but she pushed through. With a mighty dollop of resolve and effort, she steadied herself and nodded to the armored Wonderbolt. “Good. The way out should be clear, but stay behind me just in case.”
Spitfire finally turned away and trotted out of the cell. Outside of the glimmer of the pale moonlight, her armor was practically invisible in the shadows of the dungeon. A helmet was picked up and placed over the head of the Wonderbolt, completely covering her mane and face and making her fade into the shadows even more. If Dash hadn’t known where to look, she wouldn’t even know that Spitfire was there.
To make sure she didn’t lose the camouflaged mare in the darkness, Rainbow quickly trotted out of the cell and behind her rescuer. Her ribs protested, as did her legs and lungs, but she used every last drop of strength she had to stay upright. She would’ve used the wall as a crutch but considering it was on her left side, she tossed that idea away. Standing and walking through the pain would have to do, at least until she could lean on her right side.
The mare in front of her started off down the hall, and Dash was close behind. Despite the crystal armor covering her hooves striking stone regularly, Spitfire made almost no noise. One would have to really focus to catch the soft clinking with each step that the practiced hooves took.
Each step was a labor, each corner they took was a herculean effort for Rainbow Dash. It was slow going, but at least it was going. Sometimes Spitfire would get entire hallway lengths ahead before realizing how bad Dash was lagging behind and waiting for her to catch up. Those moments seemed to bring out the nerves of the armored mare, her head swiveling around and checking every possible crack and shadow as she waited.
“Sorry…” Rainbow groaned as she caught up to the Captain again. Sweat was covering her face, matting her mane to her forehead. Ragged breaths escaped her lips and they never seemed to get rid of the winded feeling that plagued her body.
“It’s alright.” Spitfire grumbled as she stuck her head around the corner they were at. “I wasn’t expecting you to be this beat up, or else I would’ve been in something lighter so I could carry you.” Rainbow didn’t need to see the face of her comrade to know that she was grinding her teeth. “They’re gonna pay for this, trust me.” There was no room for even a shred of doubt in those words.
“Hey!” The shout pierced the quiet darkness from behind the pair. Two heads whipped around in time to find a pony in a dark blue tunic coming from the direction of Dash’s cell. “Stop right there, you’re not supposed to be out!” It was a stallion with a pale gray coat and black mane, a horn covered in a green aura poking through.
Rainbow’s bravado was as fast as she was, her chest already puffed out and her eyes narrowed into slits as she stared the stallion down. As his horn charged, time seemed to slow down. The fatigue that had been weighing her down vanished beneath a deluge of adrenaline and instinct. Her one good wing flared out and her teeth bared at the incoming assailant. Even injured and weakened, she wasn’t going down without a fight.
A pitch black helmet whipped past Rainbow’s head at a speed she marveled at, with Spitfire just milliseconds behind it. First the helmet hit the advancing unicorn in the muzzle, a spray of red and a sickening crunch echoing in the small space. Next two armored hooves impacted his form and took him right into the solid stone wall behind him. The whole assault lasted less than five seconds, with the Captain being the one who stood up afterwards without a drop of sweat being shed.
“Sweet Celestia, Spitfire. Did you really have to do that to him?” Rainbow was aghast at what she had just witnessed. Such violence wasn’t in Spitfire’s repertoire, not that Rainbow had ever seen at least.
“What did you just say?” Was the response that was fired back at her as the two met each other in the middle of the hall. “Look”—Spitfire donned her helmet again and pushed by Rainbow Dash—”we don’t have time to debate methods here. Even if we did, look at what they did to you. You don’t think they deserve this?” Attention was brought back to her missing wing, which still throbbed with pain. The surprised expression faded from Rainbow’s face, only to be replaced with a frown. “Yeah. Now everypony in the castle probably heard that, so we need to get going.”
Nothing else was said on the subject of violence. Whenever they got out of here and got somewhere safe, she would make sure to approach the topic again. For now, Spitfire was right. They needed to get moving.
The surge of adrenaline helped the speed of the duo, easily pushing Rainbow into her current top gear. Which, considering her condition, was about her normal walking speed when she wasn’t torn to shreds. They navigated the twisting corridors of the dungeon at a good pace, the light of the moon streaming through barred windows and lit their way.
It seemed like in no time at all, the two were at the base of a flight of stone stairs. At the top was a wooden door that looked brand new, and it was slightly cracked open. The best guess was that it was Spitfire who had left it so, and considering how nonchalantly the Captain traipsed up the stairs and peered through the crack it was a pretty good guess.
The doors burst inwards, a beam of turquoise light the cause as it barreled into the stairway and sent Spitfire tumbling backwards down the stone steps. The gleaming black armor coating her body smoked and sizzled as the excess energy from the magic blast seemed to take up residence in the crystalline facets.
“Oh c’mon!” Rainbow groaned in frustration as she helped her friend to her hooves, the once full helmet on her head now cracked and exposing one of her ears and mane. “What now?” Both sets of eyes looked up to the top of the stairs and at the silhouette standing where closed doors had once stood.
“Now?” The cool chuckle from the silhouetted pony sent a shiver down Rainbow’s spine and made every hair on her body stand on end. “Well now it looks like we have two prisoners instead of one.” When Dash’s eyes finally equalized with the light from the room above, the breath caught in her throat and her heart stopped completely.
“Starlight…?”
The pony that she knew as Starlight Glimmer moved down the stairs, a confident grin on her face and a fire in her eyes. Her tricolor purple and mint green mane was split into bangs on either side of her horn, the same style that she had with her cult in Our Town. It was like looking into a memory that you couldn’t forget no matter what.
“Oh good, you still remember me.” Starlight chuckled again as she kept moving towards the two. “I was worried you wouldn’t anymore, not after what happened.”
Rainbow Dash wasn’t sure what was going on. Nothing here made any sense. Starlight Glimmer was reformed! They were even friends! There was no reason for any of this to be happening! But none of that could stop the dots from connecting in her mind and her temper from flaring. Starlight and these other ponies, whatever had happened to them to make them this evil, had taken her wing and left her in a dungeon.
“What’s wrong with you, huh?!” Rainbow shouted as she took to her hooves and slammed one onto the stone below. “What’s gotten into you?” Her wing flared out once more as she stood between Starlight and Spitfire, not wanting to give a chance to the once-reformed villainess to hurt her friend again.
That little outburst was all the time that Spitfire needed to collect herself and act. The armored pegasus sidestepped from behind the maimed mare and launched herself right at the unicorn before them. Starlight didn’t even have enough time to charge her horn before she was sent backwards from the tackle. Powerful wings propelled the two into the open room beyond the busted doors, leaving Dash alone in the stairway.
“Rainbow Dash, get outside!” Spitfire hollered as she rolled across the floor with Starlight. Rainbow quickly ascended the stairs and watched as the unicorn let loose a few blasts of imprecise magic, only to be met with a solid armored hoof across the face. “I’ll meet you out there!”
Dash nodded as another jolt of pure adrenaline flooded her system, giving her just that extra boost needed to comply. As she started off towards the doors she saw a turquoise glow envelope both Spitfire and Starlight and raise them both into the air, only for the same aura to slam them both back into the ground with considerable force.
Between Rainbow Dash and the door to the Everfree Forest, were even more of those ponies in dark blue tunics. Mostly unicorns with a few earth ponies mixed in. They were all looking right at her.
There was a goal, and that was all the motivation Dash needed. Just like every other goal in her life, she would reach it and there was no stopping her. Obstacles: ponies bent on stopping her. Disadvantages: hurt and couldn’t fly.
It wasn’t a problem.
The competitor’s mindset took over and Rainbow galloped at the ponies in front of her. Where certain injuries limited her physical skill, she made up for with technique and practiced skill. Three earth ponies charged her first, which didn’t afford any of the unicorns a clear shot and afforded her a bit more safety from a distance.
As an earth pony mare approached her, Dash used her one working wing to propel her to the left at the last possible second. The mare soared past her and hit the stone floor with a loud thud. Rainbow left her hooves with a leap, landing atop a stallion’s head and pushing it down with enough force that his jaw met with the hard surface below.
The final earth pony, a stallion with a blue coat and a darker blue mane, finally got hooves on her and took the pegasus to the ground. Rainbow squirmed and struggled, but even with the best mindset in the world and all of the might she could manage, she was no match for a fully grown earth pony.
A continuous stream of Starlight’s magic solved the problem as it cut a swathe across the room, hitting the stallion in the chest and sending him off of the prone pegasus. The blast of energy cut across the room wildly, scattering the unicorns in front of the door as they hurried to cover.
Rainbow Dash looked behind her to see Spitfire with Starlight Glimmer in a headlock, the unicorn using one last desperate outpouring of energy to free herself. The Wonderbolt Captain’s helmet was completely gone now, sweat dappling her face and a long scratch trailing from an ear to her jaw and dripping blood onto her yellow coat. The gritted teeth, ferocious eyes and slowly twisting legs told Dash that Spitfire was getting ready to turn Starlight’s neck until it snapped. If it weren’t for the lances of energy that Starlight’s disciples began unleashing in the general direction of the two mares, it would’ve happened too.
The volley of energy was enough to make Spitfire relent and opt to just bring a hoof down onto the back of the unicorn’s head with enough force to knock her out cold. The unicorns and the Captain quickly switched positions in the room, the unicorns going to check on their felled leader and the Captain reuniting with the pony she came to rescue.
“We need to hurry before they regroup.” Spitfire commanded as she thundered past Rainbow, her hooves loudly striking the ground below as she headed towards the exit with the other pegasus right on her tail.
The Wonderbolt duo threw the doors open together and spilled out into the forest beyond. It was a reasonably cool summer’s night, a slight breeze moving the branches overhead and carrying the scent of coming rain in the near future. If not for what she had just been through, Rainbow Dash would call this an ideal night.
“Really wish these things worked indoors.” Spitfire reached into her armor as she spoke and pulled out a few glowing purple crystals. One of her wings draped over Dash’s back and pulled the maimed pony close to her. Before Rainbow could object to such an act or ask what was about to happen, the crystals were thrown to the ground and crushed underhoof. “Canterlot Castle.”
A blinding flash erupted around the two and consumed them. The scenery of a dark forest illuminated by the light of the moon gave way to marble white walls and carpets of red and purple in an instant. The world spun as Rainbow fell to her knees, her stomach revolting against what it had just been put through and her eyes screwed shut in protest. She had been teleported a few times by Twilight, but it was never as bad as that.
“Gods, I hate that.” Spitfire stumbled on her hooves but stayed upright nonetheless. “Your Majesty, I retrieved Rainbow Dash!” She yelled into the chamber before them, Dash thought it was the throne room from the brief flash she got before the world turned upside down and she was forced to close her eyes.
“Oh wonderful. Excellent job, Captain.” The voice that responded was decidedly not Princess Celestia, nor was it Princess Luna. No, she knew that voice from somewhere else. It was deep and foreboding.
Rainbow Dash opened her eyes, just long enough to catch the sight of King Sombra walking into the room before she passed out.
“I need a report. You know he doesn’t like to be kept waiting.” Once again, the rough and demanding voice of Spitfire was what roused Rainbow Dash from a deep slumber. The pain and exhaustion that had plagued her waking moments were now dulled, but the fog in her brain still remained and proved a challenge to fight through.
Light washed over her body, sunshine warming her coat and bleeding through her closed eyes to coax them open. She resisted as best she could, the allure of more rest was just too strong to ignore. However, she wasn’t opposed to just listening to the world around her.
A window nearby was cracked, the sounds of hustle and bustle mixed with singing birds came from beyond it. Hooves clicked against tile outside of the room she was in, indistinct murmurs carried along with them. Then there was the conversation happening in the same room she was in, between the recognizable voice of Spitfire and somepony else.
“We stitched her up the best we could. We did what we could with her wing, but…” There was a heavy sigh from the other voice, older and feminine. “Well, we did what we could. Besides that, she’s been sleeping peacefully with the help of some painkillers.”
“Until now.” Spitfire responded with a huff as the sound of hooves clicking across the floor filled the room. “Open your eyes, Rainbow Dash. I saw your ears moving, I know you’re awake.”
“Heh… yeah.” Rainbow chuckled dryly, only for it to be interrupted by an intense bout of coughing. Her eyes opened slowly and brought the sight of a blurred world to her. As she doubled over from the fit, a glass of water was brought to her lips and she was commanded to take a drink. Dash gladly complied and tilted her head back to gulp down the much needed drink. “Th-thanks.”
“How are you feeling, Rainbow Dash?” After the cup was sat back down to her right, something else was lifted up and placed on her muzzle. A pair of glasses, proper glasses and not flight goggles, brought the world into focus again.
“Why do you think I need glasses?” Rainbow frowned and shook the things off of her nose and onto the bed. Despite the world fading into shapes and colors again, she glared up at the Captain. “I’ve never worn glasses so knock it off.” To add to her point, Dash crossed her hooves in front of her chest and huffed.
“Alright well—” It was the doctor that spoke this time as she approached the bed. She shuffled some papers from what Rainbow could tell and scribbled something down and then presented the clipboard to Dash in her magic grip. “What does this say?”
Rainbow Dash picked up the clipboard in her hooves and squinted at it. No matter how narrow she got her eyes, the scribbles on the paper wouldn’t come into focus. Her tongue stuck out of the side of her mouth as she concentrated and brought the piece of paper closer and closer to her face until it was pressed right against her nose. That combined with the squint let her finally kinda sorta see what was written down.
“Three!” Rainbow Dash answered proudly as she handed the clipboard back to the doctor.
“Were there any noted head injuries?” Spitfire questioned the doctor, completely ignoring the fact that Rainbow was sitting right there and could hear her. “She was acting strange when I recovered her too.”
“None that we noticed,” The doctor responded.
Rainbow huffed and picked up the glasses from the bed and put them back on her nose. From the corner of her eye she could see the black frames and the blurry world just beyond them. However, the clear world within the borders of her glasses revealed only the worried look of the flame-maned pegasus beside her.
“Fine, something is wrong with my eyes!” Rainbow grumbled out as she turned away from the two other mares. “But as soon as they’re back to normal I’m breaking these dumb glasses.” However Spitfire knew that her eyes weren’t working right at the moment, it didn’t matter. She would just put up with the new hindrance until it passed.
The fog that had settled over her mind was bench pressed off by frustration and things started coming back in spades; Spitfire’s mane, the dungeon, Starlight Glimmer… her own wing… King Sombra. That caused Rainbow to sit up straight and whip her head around, unsure how much of it was a pain-fueled fever dream and how much danger she was in at the moment. Even the reality of the missing wing on her back fell away in the wake of Sombra’s possible presence.
“Hey, hey.” Spitfire rested one of her front hooves on the bed and the other on Rainbow’s back. Her usually gruff voice was quiet and warm, something that Dash had never heard before. “Calm down, it’s okay. You’re safe, you’re not in any danger anymore.”
That small gesture and the kind words achieved their goal and made Rainbow settle down a little. When they had arrived here, which she assumed was Canterlot based on all of the white marble everywhere and the cool mountain air flowing in from the window, she was exhausted and every nerve in her brain was fried from stress and exertion.
She had to have been seeing things.
“Yeah yeah, you’re right.” Rainbow took a few deep slow breaths to steady herself. There was one thing that could help her calm down even more, and she had to ask. “When are the girls getting here? They have to be worried about me.”
“The… girls…?” Spitfire cocked her head to the side, the spiky line of hair running down the middle of her head falling a little to the same side. “You mean Rarity?” She looked back to the doctor, who started flipping through the chart on the clipboard and murmuring to herself. “Who else?”
“What do you mean ‘who else’?” Dash rolled her eyes and scoffed at the other pegasus. “Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Applejack. You know, my friends?” The looks she received from the other ponies were that of confusion and worry. “What?”
“Rainbow Dash, what year is it?” The doctor broke the silence first, her voice quiet and prodding.
“1010, why?” The two mares staring intently at her made an uneasy feeling settle in the pit of her stomach. “H-how long was I in that dungeon?” It couldn’t have been that long, right? Certainly not years. Rainbow Dash couldn’t have blacked out for years. “Hey, answer me!” The bed-ridden speedster demanded.
“Less than a week.” Spitfire responded assuredly. “You got the year right, don’t worry.” The Captain bit her lip and turned her head to the side, just enough so Rainbow could see the long line of stitches running up the right side of her face from her jaw to the tip of her ear. “Wh-who is the ruler of Equestria, Rainbow Dash?”
“Rulers, you mean.” Rainbow corrected, that pit of unease threatening to consume her stomach with each word. “Princess Celestia, Princess Luna.” The abhorred gasp that came from the nurse did little to settle Dash’s increasing nerves. “Princess Cadance rules the Crystal Empire and Twilight helps out here in Equestria. Why?”
“So”—Spitfire’s shock faded quickly and was replaced with practiced poise—“you’re friends with one of the four rulers of Equestria?” The incredulity that flooded the words floored Rainbow and brought forth yet another scoff.
“Uh, duh?” Dash rolled her eyes and gave her Captain a light punch in the shoulder. “You know that, Spitfire. We’re in the Wonderbolts together, you know everything about me!” She thought about that statement for a minute. “Well, everything my Captain should know about me.”
“The… the Wonderbolts?” Spitfire responded quizzically as she was pulled away from the bed by the doctor. The conversation between the two mares was in hushed tones, and words like ‘torture’ and ‘fantasy’ were thrown around by the doctor. Things that made Rainbow Dash look for the closest exit that wasn't the door the two mares were standing by.
“Captain, Doctor Ray, I expected a report before my meeting was over. Not after.” The voice was the first thing she heard, that deep eloquent way of speaking that she knew too well. Finally he entered after a few seconds, cold steel vestments striking the floor below with a mix of power and grace. A coat of gray was complemented by a red cape covering his back and a cold steel collar that went from his chest up most of his neck. A smoky black mane billowed around his head, a plain horn the same color as his coat poking through right below a crown of gold and silver. Piercing emerald eyes scanned the room and fell right on Rainbow Dash.
“King Sombra, Your Majesty!” Weak knees and a churning stomach Her first time meeting him What did he want with her?
“AHH! KING SOMBRA!” Rainbow Dash shouted out as she scrambled out of bed and got between Spitfire and the corrupted unicorn in the doorway. The pain that swelled in her brain from the intrusive ‘memory’ didn’t abate her actions and instead only made her more determined. “Get behind me, I’ve dealt with him before!” He looked different than Rainbow remembered, and she was sure he was as good as gone after he destroyed the tree of harmony, but that didn’t matter now. She had to hold him off until Twilight and the others could get here.
“What has gotten into her?” Sombra spoke again, the hard edge in his voice dropping. The usurper king turned to the doctor as Spitfire moved in front of Dash and looked down at her disapprovingly. “Is she alright?”
“Sh-she’s just a little confused, Your Majesty,” The doctor, named Ray, answered as her knees shook. “I-if I can talk to you privately, I can brief you on some theories I have.” The clipboard that had been held aloft in her magic was now tucked between a curled up hoof and her chest as her eyes looked at anything other than the towering stallion before her.
“Rainbow Dash, get back in bed.” Spitfire leered down at the shorter pegasus and placed a yellow hoof right on Dash’s chest. “I know you’re not feeling okay right now, but just lay down. We’ll get you feeling right in no time.”
“No! Are you crazy?!” Rainbow pressed her chest right up against the hoof and puffed it out a bit. Her one good wing flared as she looked around her Captain and friend and glared at the monster who was still talking to Doctor Ray. “King Sombra is right there and you’re ignoring him! We should be kicking his butt back to whatever hole he crawled out of!”
“Alright, that’s enough!” Spitfire quickly overpowered the weakened pegasus and shoved her into the bed. “I’ve put up with it this long, but no more! I won’t have you threatening the King of Equestria right in front of me! You should know better, Rainbow Dash! I don’t care how messed up you are right now, you just don’t do that in front of me.”
Dash squirmed as her hooves were pinned to her sides and she was held to the bed. After a solid ten seconds of struggle, she relented and realized that she just wasn’t in the shape to fight back at the moment. Instead she leveled a heated glare at Spitfire’s head in an attempt to burn a hole through it with pure rage.
“He has you mind controlled with his creepy fear powers! He’s not the ruler of Equestria!” Rainbow had seen Sombra’s power in action before, but never this stealthily. Usually it came with green and purple eyes, but none were seen here. “Where are Princess Celestia and Luna?” She shouted around Spitfire and right at Sombra. “What did you do to them?!”
“Explain this. Now.” Sombra’s tone offered no more wiggle room for the doctor. He sneered, his fangs baring at the smaller mare as he began to visibly get angrier and angrier. “Now.” He demanded once more.
“I-It’s possible that she created some sort of fantasy world to cope with what she was put through.” Doctor Ray offered Sombra the chart she was holding, which he snatched in a flash of red magic. “H-her wing was sawed off, she had a few broken ribs that needed some strong spells to fix, and there’s evidence th-that…” Ray gulped as she looked at Rainbow Dash and then back to King Sombra. “...that they used some sort of spell on her, but we’re not sure what. Th-that amount of torture can make the mind do strange things.”
“Or…” Spitfire spoke as she loosened her grip on Rainbow just a little. “...they were brainwashing her with some fake reality that they made up so she would turn against the King.” That theory received a slight nod from the doctor and a small murmur of agreement. “We need to be careful, Your Majesty. There’s no telling what else she could believe.”
“Celestia, Luna.” Sombra strode towards the bed and knelt beside it so he was looking Rainbow Dash right in the eyes. “Dead names not spoken or honored for nearly one thousand years. Why do you think they still live, my dear?” Where she would’ve expected the tone of a victorious villain basking in his victory, Rainbow only heard genuine concern and curiosity. “Who told you such lies?”
“They’re not lies!” Rainbow Dash fired back, resisting the urge to spit right in the face of the unicorn less than a foot away. “I’ve lived in Equestria for my entire life and I know who the princesses are!” She couldn’t believe this! It had to be a painkiller-fueled nightmare or some sort of trick. It had to be.
“Did she mention any other names, Captain?” Sombra spoke without looking at Spitfire, instead keeping his emerald eyes connected with Rainbow’s. Her resolve and fire never faltered once in the face of such evil, and the small smile that she received in return only bolstered her will.
“She mentioned Princess Cadance as well and said that she was ruler of the Crystal Empire.” The smile that Sombra was forming disappeared in an instant to be replaced with a frown. “Then some names I didn’t recognize; Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Twilight Sparkle.” At the mention of Twilight, Rainbow could’ve sworn that she saw Sombra’s eye twitch. But it was too quick of an action to even confirm if it was real or not.
“Figure out who they are and bring me documentation on all of them. I want them scoured for any connection to the deviants who did this.” The order was answered with a nod and a crisp salute from Spitfire. “And Captain, bring me Rainbow Dash’s file as well. I want to help refresh her memory.”
Rainbow Dash had been moved from the hospital room she had woken up into a large room dominated by a long onyx table and multiple towering windows. The afternoon sun streamed in and reflected off of the crystalline table, bringing an almost ethereal atmosphere to the space.
She had been in the castle’s personal medical area, the King’s Hospital they called it. It was mostly for staff, as the doctors and nurses assured her that King Sombra himself never got sick or needed medical attention. Sounded like a bunch of nonsense, as even Twilight got sick from time to time.
Now here she was, alone with King Sombra. The unicorn king sat at one end of the table, right in front of one of the windows, while Rainbow Dash opted to sit all the way across from him. Magenta eyes full of fire and mistrust never once left the stallion as letting him out of her sight was a monumentally bad idea in her mind.
“How’s your wing, Rainbow Dash?” He had been prodding her with questions since Spitifre left them alone. All of them she had refused to answer and this one was no different. Her wing was missing, it wasn’t fine. Yeah it was better than it was the last time she was awake because it was at least bandaged and treated, but it wasn’t fine.
“I don’t know what you’re up to or how you did this, but we will stop you.” Dash reaffirmed with a growl. “You got a hold of the map and changed the past, probably. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter because Twilight will figure out how to fix this and we’ll kick your butt back to where you belong!”
“Rainbow Dash, please.” Sombra responded with a deep sigh. The stallion brought a hoof up to his face to rub the bridge of his nose as his magic undid the cape on his back and draped it across the back of his chair. “Can you be civil for a few minutes and just talk with me? I’m not… whatever you think I am. Whatever they put in your head are nothing but falsehoods, I assure you.”
“Maybe not time travel.” Rainbow completely ignored the plea from the stallion as she tried to figure out the game he was playing. “I bet you’re using your weird fear powers on me and all of this is some sort of trick!” She stood up and slammed her hooves onto the table, ignoring the pain that shot up both of her legs from the act. “I can break free, I know I can! You can’t hold me in here forever!”
“Oh for—” King Sombra stood up from his chair and strode across the length of the room in a few seconds. “I am not evil and I am not controlling you!” He stood right over Rainbow Dash now, looking down at her and baring his fangs in frustration. The mare shrunk down just a bit as he leaned in, causing the stallion to close his eyes and sigh once more. “I’m sorry.” Sombra’s tone softened and he looked down at the floor. “This situation has made me very frustrated since you went missing. I thought once you were returned things would be back to normal, but that seems to not be the case.”
“Yeah I’m not buying the whole ‘sad guy’ schtick, sorry.” Rainbow Dash crossed her hooves and kept her glare trained on him. “If this is real, and I mean a real big IF, then how did I go missing? What happened to me?”
There was a tiny part of Dash, deep deep down, that thought all of this might be real. It wasn’t a dream, that was for certain. She could read things and feel pain, so it couldn’t be a dream. That left a few possibilities; time travel nonsense, Sombra’s fear magic, or that this was one-hundred percent real and had always been.
The last option was impossible, so it had to be one of the first two.
A knock at the door drew both of the ponies from their respective thoughts. King Sombra’s horn flashed with red as the cape from the chair was teleported onto his back again. He stood up and straightened his posture as his eyes hardened once more and his throat cleared.
“Enter.”
“Sorry for the disturbance, Your Majesty.” A unicorn mare with a brilliant amber coat and a mane of crimson and yellow tied into a bun entered the room. She carried several manilla folders in a baby blue aura. “Captain Spitfire retrieved Rainbow Dash’s file and a few others you requested. There are a few more she is having slight trouble getting a hold of, but I will inform you when she has them.” The unicorn’s cyan eyes regarded Rainbow Dash with utter disdain as she glanced momentarily at the pegasus.
Cyan eyes crimson with rage “I know you’re using him. Nothing but a gold digging bird-brain.”
She never wanted this.
Rainbow doubled over as yet another flash shot through her head. It forced her eyes closed and she buried her head in her hooves. It was a migraine that lasted for only a few seconds, but it was enough to bring the usually tough pony to the brink of tears. When it passed and she brought her head up again, she found both Sombra and the mare staring at her.
“Sorry…” Rainbow muttered as she brought her wing up to fix the glasses on her muzzle that had become crooked. “Just some weird pain.” She shook her head and looked towards the mare with squinted eyes. “I know you.” Dash couldn’t shake that feeling that the mare was somepony she was familiar with, somepony on the fringes of her chaotic life. No name came to her, but the face was definitely there.
“Rainbow Dash, you know Sunset Shimmer.” Sombra nodded at the mare, who sat the stack of folders onto the table in front of them. “My personal assistant and the pony who helps keep the country running.” A chuckle escaped from Sombra’s lips as he smiled at Sunset.
“Oh, I’m just doing my duty. It’s my pleasure to help in any way I can, Your Majesty. You know that.” Sunset Shimmer’s smile looked genuine enough, but Dash couldn’t help but feel there was an air of fakery about it. Something about it looked like it could turn into a sneer at a moment’s notice. “Now, about your schedule for the rest of the day.” Sunset levitated a clipboard in front of herself and began to read it off. “The weather council from Cloudsdale is still waiting on—”
“Cancel my meetings for the day, Sunset.” Sombra interrupted his secretary with a raised hoof. “I’m afraid this is much more important and requires all of my attention for the time being. Apologize to them all and reschedule.”
“Of course, Your Majesty.” The reply was calm, but Rainbow could see Sunset Shimmer biting her lip and holding back more than a few words. “I’m sure we can fit them all in some other day.” There was an inaudible addition to that sentence that not even Dash could pick up despite being right next to the mare, but it surely was biting and sarcastic. “I’ll… leave you two alone. There are guards outside in case you need them.”
There was a curt nod from King Sombra as his assistant left the room, the heavy wooden door closing behind her. A heavy silence fell between the two ponies left alone, one that Rainbow Dash was more than happy to have. She didn’t want to talk with the villain before her or indulge this charade.
One of the folders was slid towards Rainbow Dash, her name stamped on the front in red ink. She placed a hoof on it and pulled it closer, her eyes darting over to Sombra before she flipped it open. Resting right inside was a typed document with a black and white picture of herself attached.
Rainbow read over the document again and again, just absorbing all of the information it contained. There were bits and pieces that were enough like her own life, but so much of it was wrong. Fluttershy going missing? Joining the Royal Guard? Legally blind? It was like looking into a very warped mirror.
“I believe you mentioned Fluttershy earlier.” Dash had been so engrossed in her own ‘past’ that she hadn’t noticed Sombra move behind her so he could read over her shoulder. “A fillyhood friend who went tragically missing, her file is included but it is quite short. Fell during some competition and was never found nor her body recovered, you’ve told me about her on a few occasions.”
“No, we went down there and found her! I remember it.” Rainbow Dash’s jaw clenched as she just kept scanning the document over and over and over again. None of this could be real, but it all felt so vaguely familiar that it was hard to discount any of it. “I went down into Whitetail Woods with the search party and found her myself, I remember.”
“As for the others…” Sombra’s magic levitated two more folders in front of Rainbow Dash and they opened. One had Twilight’s name on the front and Applejack’s on the other. “Twilight Sparkle is a well known tragedy here in Canterlot. Poor thing suffered an internal magic cascade while taking her exam for my school. Her parents perished with her and her brother was the only surviving family member.”
Rainbow Dash snatched Twilight’s file out of the air and straightened her glasses before reading. All of what Sombra said was right here in black and white, everything that the government knew about her and what exactly happened. That’s not how it happened, though. It wasn’t! Twilight survived and just turned her parents into plants, nopony died!
Right?
“As for Applejack, she’s a member of the Apple Family out of Ponyville.” Sombra brought the folder forward and read it aloud. “Mother Pear Butter, father Bright Macintosh, two siblings and a grandmother all living together. They have sold their cider at my Celebrated Crystal Carnival for the last decade, which you have become quite enamored with.” He chuckled and flipped the page, showing off several photos of the family together. This included Applejack’s parents, much older, and with the Applejack and Big Mac rainbow knew.
“No, her parents are dead. They died when—” Rainbow started to push back but another stab of pain in her brain put a stop to her words and drew a whimper from the mare.
“Hope y’all enjoy it, Your Majesty.”
Warm delicious amber liquid. Drink after drink after drink.
She could drown in it and die happy.
She saw it all as clear as day in the little flash, Applejack standing by her whole family as she passed a mug right to Rainbow. Bright lights behind them and gleeful sounds surrounding them. It was clear as day and backed up everything in the file and what King Sombra had said.
The heart in Rainbow’s chest thundered against her ribcage like it wanted to get out. Sweat poured down her face and her one good wing twitched erratically against her side. None of this was real, it couldn’t be real. This wasn’t how things were! Fluttershy was okay! Applejack didn’t have parents, but she was happy! Twilight Sparkle wasn’t dead! She remembered them all so clearly and vividly that it couldn’t be fake! This was fake and she knew it, not the life that she remembered every detail of!
“Rainbow Dash, are you alright?” The files were sat down and an armored hoof rested on her shoulder tenderly. That was all it took to finally break the panicked mare. The pegasus threw the hoof off of her and jumped up from her chair, then she took off.
Her body, despite being better than it was in the dungeon, was still sore and raw. It protested when she slammed the massive wooden door open and screamed as she began sprinting through the halls of the castle. There were indistinct shouts from behind her, she both ignored and couldn’t even comprehend all of them. Her mind was too busy racing with the knowledge it had just been given.
This was a lie! All of it! She had to get out of here and find some way out of this nightmare world!
Rainbow Dash had been inside of Canterlot Castle only a few times in her life, she had even stayed the night once or twice. However, that didn’t prepare her for the backrooms she now found herself in. Never before had she been this deep in the bowels of the castle, or maybe it had changed from what she knew in her memories.
No matter how lost she may have felt, she kept running. She ran past all of the ponies that walked through the halls. She ran by every door that was slightly ajar, her eyes always straightforward and not diverting. She wove her way through the traffic of the afternoon at the top speed that her hooves allowed.
The sound of pounding hooves came from behind her, no doubt Sombra and his guards. They were all mostly big bulky stallions, and even at fifty percent she was faster than they could ever be at one-hundred. The nimble pegasus made the run through the halls of the castle seem effortless in comparison to the clattering of armor against marble that was constantly behind her.
Rainbow skidded around a corner, her hooves sliding on the slick surface below them until friction finally stopped them. In front of her was a u-shaped staircase that was free of any ponies. Dash sprang up and cleared the first set of steps, her knees nearly buckling as she landed. No time was wasted as she spun on her rear hooves and launched herself down the second set of steps as well, not wasting any time to gather herself or to let her legs truly absorb the impact.
As the polychromatic pegasus made her way through the halls, she began to recognize certain landmarks along her way. This was the ground floor of the castle, the giant double doors that lead to the throne room were unmistakable even in this strange world: an engraving of Canterlot mountain with the sun rising behind it.
Rainbow’s internal compass kicked in with that big hint of where exactly she was and she made a sharp right turn at the door. Usually the throne room had a lot of guards, so best to avoid it for now. Instead, her best bet would be to use the hallway that ran parallel to the long empty chamber. Assistants and ponies all made space as they saw the mare barreling her way down the passage.
There was a side entrance down the hall a bit, it was the same one that they had used for Shining Armor and Cadance’s wedding for all of the bridesmaids. Just as she approached the door, a guard opened it at the perfect time that allowed her to slip through.
To say that being outside again was refreshing would be the understatement of the very weird last twenty-four hours or so. A cool breeze wafted through the mountaintop city, tickling Dash’s feathers and swirling her multicolored mane about her head. For a moment, it washed the panic away.
That was until she saw the giant twenty foot tall statue of King Sombra in the courtyard before her. It depicted the unicorn on his hind legs, his front hooves resting on the hilt of a sword that was dug into the ground. A plaque at the base read ‘Qualis Rex, Talis Grex’, a language that Rainbow Dash didn’t even recognize let alone understand but it was safe to assume it was only bad.
It was only a few seconds that she allowed herself to stop, but it was all she could afford. A few deep breaths later and she set off once again towards the city of Canterlot proper. She had to get out of the city and get to Ponyville. It was her best bet, maybe even find the Elements of Harmony. If this was some sort of altered timeline, then they could set it all right.
The panicked pegasus raced through the palace grounds, the chorus of dozens upon dozens of guards mobilizing coming from all around her. The large open space that dominated most of the palace grounds had not changed save for the statue, and letting her gain speed on a flat empty space was the last thing anypony who was trying to catch her wanted.
The gate that led into the city was wide open and allowed Dash her first look at the world beyond the castle. It was not the Canterlot that she knew. The city in her memories was full of white and golds, greenery and parks abundant with winding roads that were paved over trails from hundreds and hundreds of years ago.
This was not the case now.
The sprawl that laid before Rainbow was completely different. A solitary road stretched out from the entrance to the palace and went on in a straight line for as far as the eye could see. It seemed like every five-hundred feet or so another smaller road split off on either side of the main thoroughfare. From where she stood it looked more like Manehattan than Canterlot, divided into even parcels with buildings made out of alternated white marble and dark crystal.
It didn’t matter how different it looked, she still needed to get out. She still needed to get away from the castle and Sombra and all of the lies he kept trying to tell her. Rainbow sprinted down the main street at top speed, her head on a swivel as she looked for directions towards the train station.
Right
A memory prodded her again, this one not headache-inducing for once. The pegasus took a hard right down the next street, one dominated by throngs of ponies in guard armor. All of them gave her looks of concern and worry as she continued her race through the changed city.
Overhead the sky was quickly changing from a sunny late-summer day to overcast. Pegasi above flitted to and fro as they moved heavy gray storm clouds into position. No sooner than her head told her to take a left did she start to feel droplets of rain hit her head.
As she ran, the rather uniform housing began to feel familiar. Not familiar in the sense that she had been in this exact place before, but familiar like she had seen stuff like it before. It reminded her of the housing provided to Wonderbolts during training camps, just cookie-cutter cheap structures whose occupants could be changed out whenever it was needed.
This had to be some sort of shortcut to the train station, it just had to be. There was no other reason to run through such a heavily militarized area other than a quicker way to her destination. As she weaved through blocks and blocks of cookie cutter houses, all occupied by guards, she couldn’t help but acknowledge that pit reopening in her gut as she got deeper and deeper into the urban maze.
Stop.
Rainbow Dash did as the little voice in her head told her and skidded to a halt. The sky above was dumping water onto the city consistently now, drenching the one-winged pegasus quite thoroughly. The mane plastered to her face was moved to the side to let her get a better look at what exactly she was stopping for.
It was a house, much like every other house she had passed, a box made out some sort of dark colored crystal. A door was placed in the dead middle of the box, with a window on either side. A mailbox sat right in front of the mare with a name stenciled on its side.
‘R. Dash’
“What?” She asked herself, eyes squinting behind the glasses on her muzzle. The heart in her chest stopped it’s rapid thumping for a moment to instead pull her towards the front door. Something deep down was calling this home, but that wasn’t right. This wasn’t the grand cloud house she had built for herself far above the simple homes of Ponyville, this wasn’t where her heart was supposed to lead.
Trepidation slowed her hooves as she walked down the sidewalk towards the door. A hoof reached out to the doorknob, shaking ever so slightly in the deluge of rain. Breath caught in her throat and her body seized up as she turned the knob, causing the door to slowly open inwards.
The interior was dimly lit by whatever light could make it through the thick and heavy clouds above. It looked to be made of the same crystalline structure as the exterior, save for the short brown carpet that coated the floors. The sight did nothing to bring Dash’s breath back, but it did spur her forwards. It was like instinct drawing her in.
The entryway had a room off to it’s immediate right, a kitchen complete with all the basic necessities. There was even a black kettle placed neatly on the front burner of the stove and waiting to be used. A few dishes poked above the rim of the sink, already washed just not put away yet.
Across from the kitchen entrance was a small end table placed against the wall, various trinkets and knick-knacks strewn about it; some loose bits, a pack of gum, a badge of some sort, and a comb. It wasn’t the things on the table that interested her, it was the picture hanging on the wall above it.
A simple black frame housed a color photo of herself. She sat at an angle, looking to the right of the camera with a stern look on her face behind the black-framed glasses. She donned a black uniform with ostentatious gold buttons running up the front, even going slightly up her neck. A hat with a horseshoe, a pair of wings, and a horn insignia rested in one of her hooves and the words ‘Pvt. Dash’ were on a nametag on her chest. A small golden plaque at the bottom of the frame read ‘Graduation 998. Rainbow Dash’.
Dash stared at the picture for an eternity. She looked into the eyes of the mare, challenging the fake Rainbow Dash in the picture to come out and face her. The pony in the frame never moved, much to the chagrin of the real Rainbow.
“I’m not you!” Rainbow shouted at the picture before slamming her hoof right into the glass. Glass shattered around the impact and fell to the table below helplessly, as did tears from Dash’s eyes. “I don’t know you! I’m me! I’m a Wonderbolt and an Element of Harmony and ALL OF MY FRIENDS ARE ALIVE!” She grabbed the picture in her hooves and threw it as hard as she could into the kitchen behind her, panting and shaking as she glared at the broken frame.
“This isn’t my home.” Rainbow reasserted to herself with a mumble. “I don’t live here. I live in Ponyville. I was a weather pony out of flight school… not some guard.” The need to reassert all of that information was growing stronger and stronger the more she stood in the house that didn’t belong to her. “I’m a Wonderbolt. I save the world with my friends. I don’t live in Canterlot. I’m not this Rainbow Dash.” The conviction in her voice began to waver as she repeated the information to herself.
Weary hooves carried the mare deeper into the house. Nothing stood out about the living room, just a simple setup with a couch, a coffee table, and a radio in the corner. Her wing stretched out and brushed the back of the couch, coming back with a thick layer of dust now clinging to her feathers.
The sparse decorations and silence brought a sense of desolation to the space. Unused and lonely, like she spent so little time here. Did this Rainbow Dash really live such an isolated life? Was she so alone that she only went between the kitchen and her bedroom?
Another day of work Exhausted, sore, drained. Dark house again, like it always was Did she even have the energy to eat?
Another round of debilitating pain that came with the flash of memory brought Dash to her knees. The wave of despair that she felt before had only tripled in such a short amount of time. The tears that had been falling before only increased in frequency as she covered her eyes with her hooves.
“You’re being transferred to Canterlot. Ceremonial Division.” Betrayal. Hurt. Agony. Pride dented and tossed aside. “There will be no arguments, Specialist Dash.”
Another flash replaced the loneliness with shame. Context alluded these small snippets, but they brought the full force of the associated feelings with them nonetheless. Dash’s magenta eyes screwed shut as she tapped the temples of her head with her hooves, trying to push the memories away herself.
“The Royal Guard, Dashie?” Was it so hard to believe? Dad was supposed to be her biggest fan. “I’m behind you, but reconsider. I don’t think it’s for you.
“It’s degenerative, I’m afraid.” A big word to use on a filly. “Glasses will help, and some magic therapy will slow it down.” She didn’t want to wear glasses like some egghead!
Scraped knees and the taste of cloud “C’mon nerd, get up!” Glasses were tossed away, leaving the world blurry. “What’s the matter, can’t see without your big dumb glasses?”
They kept coming, a deluge of memories that wouldn’t stop and threatened to drown her. All powerful and pinning Rainbow to the floor from a mix of pain and intense emotional weight. Her mouth opened repeatedly, her lips forming the word ‘stop’ but no sound coming out. She laid on the floor and whimpered as she was assaulted by thoughts and feelings that weren’t hers.
“Fluttershy? Fluttershy!?” How many hours in the forest? Too many. Too many hours in the mud. Boot camp was brutal, and left her sore. It would pay off one day. Her first paycheck from the government. More money than even her parents made. Maybe this would make them proud of her. She was proud, too proud. Chest puffed out and wings flared as she received her promotion. This would show that stupid Sergeant. “Get up, Private.” She spat out the bitter mud and stood. “Why did they think sending a filly with glasses was a good idea?” Anger and a stubborn resolve welled up.
They were all blending together now in a maelstrom of emotions. She couldn’t even tell one apart from another as they washed over her and brought wave after wave of pain. Dash’s brain pushed back against every single one and the emotions that came with them, but her heart embraced them as hers. It was like her body was fighting itself to accept what it already knew, and it was tearing Rainbow apart at the seams.
“Rainbow Dash?” A voice finally not from her head prodded her softly. It gave her brain to focus on something else and it latched onto it instantly. “Rainbow Dash, are you okay?” It was Spitfire again, because of course it was. “Hey, look at me.”
Rainbow was lifted up into a sitting position by the Captain, who was also on her haunches. There was no more passion or fire in her amber eyes, instead they were softened with worry and fear. Dash did her best to wipe her face with her hooves, at least trying to look respectful for the pony she served beside.
Spitfire, much like Rainbow Dash herself, was soaking wet. Her mane was slicked back to stay out of her eyes and she was dripping water onto the carpet below. The rapidly rising and falling of her chest let Dash know that if the rain didn’t have her drenched, then sweat would. How long had she been flying around and looking for Rainbow?
“I just want it to stop. I want it to make sense.” Rainbow blurted out as her head fell to look at the floor. This was just something she needed to say to somepony, anypony. “None of this makes sense, none of it feels real. I-I don’t even know if I’m real anymore.”
Heaps of moments that she didn’t think belonged to her had chipped away at the stubborn notion that this whole world was some sort of trick. If it was an illusion, it was one of impossible quality. There was no way to manufacture everything that she felt with the flashes of the past, and it left her feeling like she didn’t belong rather than the memories.
“You’re real.” Spitfire responded curly and assuredly. A yellow hoof reached out and rested on Rainbow’s cheek, wiping away a tear. “See? I can touch you. You’re real, and you belong here.” The older mare’s other hoof took one of Rainbow’s hooves and placed it against her unarmored chest. “I’m real too, just focus on my heartbeat.”
Rainbow took a few deep breaths and closed her eyes, focusing on her hoof pressed against the other mare’s ribcage. The rhythmic beating of her heart was easy to feel from the prolonged vigorous activity and flying, and probably the worry that drove her.
“Who am I?” The question asked by Spitfire was so simple that it almost seemed to be a trap.
“You’re Spitfire?”
“No, who am I to you? You know this, Dashie.”
That was the first time that Spitfire had addressed her by something other than her full name. The fact that it was such a personal nickname to boot only knocked the wind out of her lungs. Nopony but her parents and Pinkie ever called her ‘Dashie’.
“Dashie, this is Spitfire.” A filly, older than her. She looked like fire given form. “Her mom is… away. She’s going to stay with us for a bit.”
Along with the expected flare of pain, came a drizzle of warmth and familiarity to douse it. For the first time since she awakened in that hell of a dungeon beneath the decrepit castle, she looked at Spitfire as more than just somepony she admired and worked with.
“The King wants to speak to her, Captain.” Spitfire and Rainbow Dash had walked all the way back to the palace together in the pouring rain. The former kept a wing over the latter, shielding the maimed mare from the showers overhead. Now they stood at the gates to the palace, their entry barred by a stunningly baby blue unicorn mare with cold eyes the same color as the clouds overhead.
“I figured as much, but I’ll have to ask that you tell His Majesty that it can wait until tomorrow, Galea.” Spitfire, even though she wasn’t in uniform, seemed to slip into her role easily. As the unicorn, Galea, opened her mouth to speak again she was cut off by a raised hoof from Spitfire. “I asked him to let me handle this personally outside of my duties as Captain of the Guard, which he approved. I’m exercising that right further and I will report to him when it’s completed.”
“Very well, Captain.” Galea answered through semi-clenched teeth. “I will inform His Majesty of your decision. Should he oppose where can you be found? Your apartment or—” Once again, the unicorn was silenced with a hoof.
“My apartment, yes. I ask that he holds off, though.” Rainbow Dash looked between both mares, the cool composure that commanded respect radiating from Spitfire was wholly juxtaposed by the coiled and stiff rigidness that Galea put forth. “Trust me, he’ll understand.”
Spitfire ushered Rainbow Dash through the gate and past Galea. Dash couldn’t help but stick as close to Spitfire as she possibly could, her side pressed right up against the slightly larger pegasus. Despite all of her doubts about the world as it seemed, there was now something to latch onto.
Even in the life she remembered, not the one that was slowly coming to the surface, Spitfire was a stabilizing force. The Wonderbolt was somepony she had always looked up to, somepony who had achieved everything that she had wanted. The work ethic and drive that Dash had seen everyday of flight school when she was young from Spitfire was something she took to heart.
Now in this life, with so much doubt cast on the world around her, there was somepony truly familiar. The flashes of memory she had received back in the house illuminated more about the current Captain of the Royal Guard. In both lives Spitfire was something of a rock, in this one somepony she considered a sister even though they shared no familial relation.
The constant presence and feeling of another pony was reassuring that this wasn’t fake, it wasn’t some sort of trick or illusion. It was most definitely real, and the pony beside her wasn’t malicious. Sombra still wasn’t to be trusted, as this had to be some sort of time travel nonsense or something. There was no way he was innocent in changing everything around. Spitfire could be trusted though, she was sure of it and she was going to cling to it for all it was worth.
“Who was that?” Rainbow Dash decided that it was best to stop thinking about all of the differences, and focus on what was in front of her. Knowing about this world could only help her figure out where things went wrong in the long run.
“Galea, my second in command.” The door into the palace was opened for them by two identical guards. “She’s… well, she’s good at her job.” The bite in Spitfire’s words told Dash that there was more to say, but not in public. The wing that had been over Dash’s head was withdrawn and shaken out, water droplets spraying over the tile floor below. “We need to get you dry and change those bandages on your wing.”
“Yeah, right.” Dash mumbled and nodded. Dragging the conversation back to her, and more specifically her wing, brought her mood down once more. She looked back at the stump, the bandages surrounded it damp and slumping near to the point of falling off. “I hate this.”
“It’ll be okay, Rainbow Dash.” With other ponies around it seemed like Spitfire’s use of ‘Dashie’ dried up, which was more than okay with Rainbow. “We’ve measured you for a prosthetic when you were out, and it’ll be done soon enough. It will take some time to get used to it, but I know you’ll get right back into form.”
“Yeah…”
The rest of the walk through the castle was held in silence. Gazes of all types lingered on them, the cripple and the Captain. For some unknown reason, more than a few of those gazes were more nasty than others and all of those were focused solely on Rainbow Dash. Now usually all eyes on her was something she could handle, but this was something much different.
The glared daggers in her sides spurred Rainbow Dash on, pushing her and Spitfire's walk into a hasty trot. They followed much the same path that Dash took when she left the castle and headed right back up the stairs she bolted down earlier. Instead of taking a left turn at the top of the stairs, they swung right. It was a short walk from there with just two more turns in the labyrinthian inner workings of the castle until they were in front of a door with two crossed spears engraved into it.
The door was pushed open and Spitfire stepped in with a light, relaxed sigh. The scent of lilac and gooseberries mingled in the bright interior of the apartment and spilled out into the hall just enough for Dash to catch a whiff. A deep purple carpet coated the floor inside, complemented by the white walls with their gold trim. Alternating candles and bouquets of flowers dotted the walls, bringing a very fancy and polished look to the space. Rainbow Dash honestly couldn’t believe that Spitfire lived here, surely this was all done by the castle staff and not the Captain herself.
“Honey, I’m home! I brought Dash along, hope you don’t mind,” Spitfire called out as she stepped into the apartment properly, motioning Rainbow in as well. “She won’t mind, trust me. You two bicker, but I know she enjoys your company.” The small primer was nice, but that didn’t answer the question of who ‘she’ was. It was surprising enough that Spitfire was married, but the added information didn’t help quell that surprise.
“Oh she’s finally up and around? I am so happy to hear that, darling!” The melodic tone, the inflection of somepony who spent too much time around the Canterlot elite. It wasn’t just familiar, it was a voice that Rainbow Dash heard almost every day of her life.
A pearlescent white mare rounded the corner, presumably from the living room. A slender white horn poked through the royal purple mane on her head, which was pulled up into a tight bun. Sparkling sapphire eyes gleamed with excitement and then momentary worry as they caught sight of Dash.
“R-rarity?”
“We met in Canterlot at a coffee shop.” She just didn’t seem like Spitfire’s type. “I know she seems too fancy for me, but…” Rainbow would trust Spitfire for now.
“Yes?” The unicorn responded with her head tilted to the side. “Darling, are you alright? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” As Rarity approached Rainbow, she was intercepted by Spitfire, who placed a hoof on her apparent wife’s shoulder. “Are you sure she should be walking around, Spitfire? She looks positively ghastly, and you’re both soaking wet and dripping all over my carpet!”
“Dash is having some memory problems, Rare.” Spitfire spoke softly enough, just trying to keep it between herself and Rarity. Even through the raging pain that shot through her skull, Rainbow still picked up on every word. “She had a bit of a panic attack and ran to her house. I just need to help her readjust, y’know? Get her back up to speed. You don’t mind if she stays with us for a bit, do you?”
“Oh, of course not.” Rarity responded with a smile before pecking the taller pegasus on the lips. “She’s welcome to stay as long as she needs to. I cannot even begin to imagine the things the poor dear had to go through with those brutes.” Spitfire went in for a hug, but was quickly rebuffed by a well manicured hoof. “Ah ah ah. You take Rainbow and dry off first. You are not using me as a towel.”
“Right, sorry.” Spitfire chuckled and cleared her throat. “Mind getting us some towels? We can wait in the kitchen and dry off there so we don’t get the carpet any more wet than it already is.” That made Rainbow look down at the rather damp patch right under her hooves, which caused her to take a big step to her right so she was in the kitchen and on tile.
“Splendid idea.” Rarity smiled as her blue aura encased Spitfire and lifted the mare off of the ground before moving her into the kitchen. “I’ll be right back, you two.” With that, Rarity ventured off deeper into the apartment, humming as she went.
A bevy of questions rose to the surface of Rainbow’s mind. There was the obvious one of ‘why Rarity?’ and ‘when did they get married?’ and things of that variety. Never in the life that she considered her real one had she ever thought of Rarity as one for a life of domesticity. That wasn’t the thing that was truly gnawing away at her, though.
“How long have I been gone? Like, how long was I in that dungeon?” It had been a question that had slowly been bubbling its way up to the surface the longer she had been awake. Nopony had told her the exact length of time she had been captured for, and it was beginning to worry her. “Like a week tops, right?”
“Dashie—” That already didn’t bode well and reopened that all too familiar pit in Rainbow’s stomach. “—You went missing while you were training. You were practicing your rainboom out towards Ponyville and you just disappeared.” Shame crept in on the edge of Spitfire’s voice, and her eyes fell to focus on her hooves. “I-we searched everywhere we could think of. We had guards roaming the countryside thinking you got hurt or worse…” Spitfire sighed and raised her head again to meet Rainbow Dash’s eyes. “Three months. You were gone for three months.”
“Three months?!” Dash couldn’t help the volume of her voice as it rose to a near roar. “I-I can’t remember any of it…” She had assumed it was only a week or so, maybe a little over. Months? “I-what…?”
“We looked for you everywhere. I looked for you everywhere.” Spitfire’s voice cracked and the wings on her back shifted uncomfortably. “At first we thought maybe you went to see your mom or… or maybe even back to Cloudsdale, but no. You went out to fly one day and just didn’t come home. It wasn’t until one of my ponies in Ponyville reported some strange stuff happening down there that we even thought to check that old castle.” Spitfire paused to clear her throat and look Dash in the eyes with a small smile. “But you’re okay. You’re back now.”
“Yeah…” Rainbow could only nod and return the smile even though it felt more than a little fake. “I guess I am.”
“Here you go, you two.” Two towels were unceremoniously dropped on the heads of the two mares. “Now clean up, I need you two out of my kitchen so I can cook dinner.” Rarity’s pushy haughty tone at least hadn’t changed from what she remembered to now, so at least some things stayed familiar.
The duo went about drying themselves off in silence, Dash needing to remove her glasses and set them aside before getting to her mane and face. When she got around to her wings, she had to be a bit more careful than normal. More than once she brushed against the still raw stump that protruded from her back and winced in pain.
“So you two met at a coffee shop or something?” The memory was pretty clear on that point, but Rainbow Dash wanted to hear it from the pony’s mouth. The thought that, of all ponies, Spitfire and Rarity had managed to get together was baffling. As she put her glasses back on her face, she had to blink away those last few lingering moments of blurriness.
“At first, yeah, our orders got mixed up.” Spitfire spoke as she took Dash’s towel from her. “Gimme a sec, Dash.” The flaming pegasus disappeared for a few moments and came back without the towels but with Rarity. “We talked for a bit afterwards, but I didn’t really think anything would come of it. Just a passing conversation with a cute mare.”
“Cute? Oh you do me a disservice, darling.” A very dangerous grin crossed Rarity’s face, which drew a light blush and a nervous chuckle from the mare beside her. The horn atop the unicorn’s head lit up as several pans were removed from the cupboards and placed on the counters.
“Sorry, a beautiful mare.” As Rarity turned her back, Spitfire rolled her eyes playfully at Dash. “But yeah, it was a whole two-ships-passing-in-the-night thing. I didn’t expect to really crash into this"— Spitfire bumped her flank against Rarity’s with a grin —"particular ship ever again.”
“Oh yes, and what a crash it was.” Rarity spoke as she went about preparing dinner, pulling things from the fridge and cupboards as she went. Dash was having a hard time focusing on what exactly it was she was making, some kind of beans it looked like, she was far too invested and interested in the strange pair’s story. “It was at The Carnival about five years ago. I was on the ferris wheel when it broke down, and thanks to some rather bad upkeep, the car I was in started to come loose.”
“I was working security. I was going through a review for promotion and my name was up for Captain. I don’t think I’ve ever been that stressed before, but I was trying to have a good time.” Spitfire hopped up on the counter to sit, far enough away from Rarity that she wouldn’t interfere with dinner being made. Rainbow was happy enough to just lean against the wall, even though her muscles protested being made to stand up any longer. “I heard her scream and everything in my head just kind of fell away. I acted and got to her car right as it started to fall.”
“My knight in shining armor.” Rarity interjected with a dreamy sigh.
“From there, it was just… chemistry.” The goofy grin on Spitfire’s face as she recounted hers and Rarity’s relationship was more than a little infectious. “We dated for about two years and we’ve been married for three years now.”
“You look fine, Spitfire.” Rainbow was sure of that much Spitfire in dress uniform, sweating. “What if she doesn’t say ‘I do’?”
Whatever had been said between the two had been lost to the blinding pain that flashed through Rainbow’s head. She had played it off well enough and just closed her eyes for a moment to ride it out. Luckily neither member of the married couple seemed to notice.
“We weren’t together in your… ‘memories’, were we?” The question from the other pegasus slammed into Dash’s gut at full force. She hadn’t expected that question, she hadn’t even expected Spitfire to indulge the other set of memories that dominated her head.
“I’m afraid I seem to be missing some context.” Rarity took a moment from her work to turn on her hooves. “Would somepony mind filling me in?” Rainbow Dash could only look away from the pony she had considered to be one of her closest friends. It was hard to broach this subject seeing how happy they were together.
“Dashie”— Spitfire started off by using that nickname again —”seems to have… created a fantasy world while she was captured. My best guess is it was some sort of defense mechanism to cope with what she was going through.” Dash bit back every venomous comment that fought its way to the tip of her tongue. It was a struggle that was noticed by Spitfire this time. “Not that I can blame her.” The other pegasus added on with haste. “I think I was some kind of athlete? A ‘Wonderbolt’ or something?”
“Yeah.” Rainbow wasn’t happy with how nonchalantly her supposed long-time friend approached the subject of the memories she had, and she made sure that her tone reflected that. “Kind of like the ceremonial division, I guess. The Wonderbolts did shows and races and helped defend Equestria.” Wonderful moments in that blue and yellow uniform relaxed the muscles in Rainbow’s body. Memories of flight, exertion and glory all rang throughout her mind. “You were the leader, and somepony I looked up to. A hero. I always wanted to join, and eventually I did.”
“Always looking up to your ‘big sister’, hmm?” Rarity smiled and turned back to the meal she was making on the stove. “I cannot fault you at all, darling. It does sound like quite the world.” The former element of harmony paused for a moment before asking the next question. “Was I there, if I may be so bold to ask?”
“Uh, yeah. You were one of my best friends.” The answer caused Rarity to giddily trot and place and make a happy little squeal that drew questioning looks from the pegasi. “We lived in Ponyville and stuff.” For now the parts about saving the world would be left out, the doubt that this was all some kind of ploy by somepony was still there. This was all real, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t something nefarious going on. Keeping cards close to her chest just seemed like the best idea for now.
“And in this, did you have a special somepony?” Rarity prodded gently, but it was prodding nonetheless. She was looking for a particular answer, and judging by how Spitfire leaned in, she wasn’t the only one.
“Not… really.” A blush crept up Dash’s cheeks, but it was quickly quelled and forced back down. “There was this one pony, a mare, we were really close friends but—” A bitter sigh escaped from her throat. “—I guess what we were to each other was always kinda up in the air, I don’t know. I guess we were both just too stubborn to ever take that next step.”
“Very interesting.” Rarity hummed as the giddy grin faded. “You will have to tell us more about this some other time, Rainbow Dash. It sounds like something you need to get off of your chest.”
“Yeah I guess.” The weight of the world finally came crashing down on Rainbow Dash. Her friends, every single one of them and the relationships she had… they were all dust in the wind. It was a possibility, no matter how weak she saw it, that they never happened at all. A fog settled over her mind that seemed to exacerbate all of the aches and pains she had. “Hey, I think I’m going to just go to bed. I just need some sleep.”
Maybe she would get to see her friends again in her dreams.
“Rainbow Dash, wake up! They’re talking about you!” Once more, Rainbow was roused from a restless sleep by somepony deciding to be loud around her. With a groan, she pushed herself up and blinked a few times, trying to clear the sleep from her eyes before she remembered just why that wouldn’t work. She squinted just enough to make out the white and purple blob that stood in the doorway to the guest room she had been given to sleep in.
“What? Who?” Dash reached out with her wing to where she had put her glasses the night before. Once her feathers had found purchase, they quickly picked them up and she set them on her muzzle. “What time is it…?”
“Oh about seven in the morning.” Rarity answered nonchalantly before using her magic to pull the covers off of the sleepy pegasus. “Now come along, King Sombra and Spitfire are speaking about you!” That was certainly enough to give her a jolt, one that spurred her to her hooves and made her stagger towards the door.
“Alright alright, I’m coming.” Dash leaned against the doorframe for a moment and yawned, her stomach adding in a hungry growl on top of it. Right, she still hadn’t eaten anything since...well, since she really didn’t know when. Maybe going to bed without eating was a bad idea after all.
So she staggered down the hallway towards the living room, the sound of ceremonial music coming from the radio that sat in the corner. Rarity was sitting on the couch, a newspaper beside her and an empty bowl on the coffee table in front of her. A box of cereal was held in the light blue aura as it filled the bowl slowly.
“So why are they talking about me?” Rainbow sat beside Rarity on the couch and let out yet another yawn. Early morning sunshine streamed through pulled back drapes and filled the room with much needed light. It was a pretty apartment, Dash had to concede that. Not that she expected anything less from Rarity.
“Your little galavant through Canterlot yesterday was quite the shock for some ponies.” Rarity spoke with the same level of haughty assuredness that Dash had always known her to, it was like nothing had changed. “Nopony knew you were alive, much less rescued. So the news spread like wildfire and now it needs to be addressed.”
“Yeah, fair.” Giving Spitfire more work sent a twinge of guilt through the pegasus. “When are they actually supposed to start talking?” Listening to the waiting music wasn’t exactly the best way to wake up a tired and hungry mare.
“Oh any moment now, darling.” Rainbow hadn’t been paying attention, but at some point Rarity had filled the bowl with milk as well. “Now here, breakfast for you. Spitfire got it for you before she went to work, she insisted it was your favorite.”
“Uh, thanks.” Dash scooped up the bowl in a hoof and used her good wing to grab a spoon that had been sitting beside it. The contents of the bowl were what looked to be chocolate chip cookies, but in miniature. She could already see the milk around the little bits turning chocolate slowly. “I thought they stopped making this stuff when I was a filly…” She muttered to herself before taking a big bite.
“And now a statement from His Majesty King Sombra, Crystal Emperor, Sole Regent of Equestria and her Territories, Pony of the People.” A tinny voice sounded from the radio, drawing the attention of both the mares.
“Full of himself, isn’t he?” Dash’s remark earned a smack on her shoulder from Rarity. “Ow! It was a joke, chill.” The pegasus grumbled and rolled her shoulder. So ponies, or at least Rarity, were touchy about him.
“Hello everypony.” The baritone timbre of King Sombra’s voice seeped out of the speakers of the radio. “Wonderful to see you all here today, and with such good news.” Chuckles came from the press that most likely surrounded the unicorn king as they took their notes. “I will not waste your time or mine any longer, though. Specialist Rainbow Dash has been found and rescued, she is currently relaxing and is recovering.” Cameras audibly clicked and flashbulbs went off as ponies documented the moment, murmurs rising from the crowd. “It was none other than the brave Captain Spitfire who carried out the daring mission. As such, it would be inappropriate for me to explain the complexities of the situation so I will turn this over to the good Captain.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty.” Spitfire’s voice came from among the shuffle as the sound of Sombra’s steel vestments rattled and hit the stone floor as he moved away from the microphone. “I want to set a few boundaries before I get started: I will not be giving information of where Rainbow Dash was being kept. That’s classified and revealing what we know will only show our hoof to the ponies who did this.” There was a pause as the reporters chattered eagerly. “Yes, you.”
“Cloud Cover, Cloudsdale At Seven. So you can confirm that it was ponies who did this? There was some speculation that it might have been Changelings given recent activity at the border with the Hive.”
“Yes, and I can confirm that it was The Cult of Dusk and Dawn.” Shocked murmurs and gasps ran through the crowd. “It’s safe to say that their motivation for ponynapping such a public face of the Royal Guard was to deter ponies from enlisting and to demoralize our troops. However, we have recovered Rainbow Dash and shown that we will stop at nothing to save anypony threatened by these terrorists.”
Rainbow Dash had to admit, Spitfire was good in front of a microphone. Her voice was always level and calm, but there was a certain stern quality about it that commanded respect. That wasn’t even just here, either. The Wonderbolt Captain that still sat in her memories was the same way. Authoritative and stalwart, a rock that ponies admired and respected.
“Air Waves, Canterlot News Network. Were any ponies captured during the operation that can give more information about The Cult?”
“No.” The microphone picked up a small sigh from Spitfire. “I went on this mission alone, as it was too dangerous to risk multiple ponies. However, we have a pony of interest that you were given a photograph of: Starlight Glimmer. She’s long been thought of as a key member of The Cult, but now we have confirmation of that fact. I’m asking ponies all across Equestria: if you have any information that could lead to the arrest of Starlight Glimmer or any members of The Cult of Dusk and Dawn, please contact your local Royal Guard post. You will be rewarded if your information bears fruit. We must show these ponies that we will not live in fear of them, but we will live in peace in spite of them.”
“Oh she’s good.” Rainbow muttered to herself as she sat her bowl of cereal down on the table. There was a certain art to playing to a crowd, Dash was intimately familiar with it. Knowing your audience, knowing how they would react to certain things and using their own expectations and emotions against them. All mandatory tools in any entertainer’s toolkit, and all were being deployed perfectly by Spitfire.
“Clear Picture, Fillydelphia Enquirer. What exactly is Specialist Dash’s condition? Reports from ponies who saw her yesterday described her as ‘gaunt, panicked, and missing a wing.’ Any comments?”
“I am not at liberty to discuss Specialist Dash’s condition at the moment.” Even from sound alone, Rainbow could tell that Spitfire was looking down at the podium instead of at the crowd. “She had an episode of panic after waking up yesterday that resulted in her escaping from the castle. She was found and brought back safely and is currently here and recovering.” Spitfire’s tone softened as she spoke the next words. “What she has been through can be described only as ‘traumatic’. While I know she’s a pony that many ponies around Equestria love and admire, we ask that you give her time to heal and adjust to a normal life again. She will be back in the public eye eventually, but it may be awhile.” There was a pause. “Thank you all for your time and I thank His Majesty King Sombra for giving me this opportunity. Long live the King and long live Equestria.”
“Well, that was quite something.” Rarity turned the radio down considerably as she turned towards Dash. “How are you feeling, darling? Well, I hope.” That was a very complicated question whose answer she wasn’t even sure of herself.
“Honestly? Like I need a shower.” Dash opted to go for something more surface level rather than get too deep into it. The improvised shower that the downpour had given her yesterday was nice, but it couldn’t compare to the real thing. “Do you mind if I…?”
“Oh yes, of course!” Rarity exclaimed as she stood up with a smile. “Our house is your house for now, darling. Anything you need, just ask!” Rainbow stood as well and was enveloped by a warm hug from the other mare. “I am glad you are safe, Rainbow Dash. I know you and I may not talk much, but you are family. You’re very important to Spitfire, and therefore important to myself as well.”
“Thanks Rarity.” There was no hesitancy in Dash’s reciprocation of the action. The hug from Spitfire yesterday had been nice, but this felt like home. She wrapped her hooves around the fashionista she thought she knew and squeezed, closing her eyes and enjoying the moment. “It means a lot, really. Thanks.” The two parted with a small smile between them, and Rainbow went back down the hall and into the bathroom.
The first thing Rainbow Dash did when she entered the small space and closed the door was to look in the mirror. She didn’t recognize the mare that stared back at her. Even if she ignored the glasses that still looked out of place, she still looked like somepony else.
Her mane was long and shaggy, much more so than her usual messy look she loved, as it was now hanging all around her head. Her ears were nearly completely covered up by it and the neat trail that went down the back of her neck now spread out everywhere. It wasn’t just the mane either. Like the reporter on the radio had said, she looked gaunt. Her eyes looked sunken and she could see her cheekbones through her fur and skin. Three months in a dungeon hadn’t been kind to her at all.
“I will get better.” She told the mare in the mirror with startling confidence. “This is not who I am.” Unlike a similar message directed to the picture hanging on the wall of the house yesterday, this one was not meant to mean that she was a separate pony from the one she was looking at.
After affixing a shower cap to her stump of a wing and promising to apologize to Rarity afterwards, Rainbow showered. She didn’t sit in there for long, nor did she indulge herself in the act. It was quick as all showers should be. The image of the mare in the mirror was seared into her mind and she wanted to work on getting her body right as soon as possible.
That desire was once again stonewalled when she exited the bathroom by none other than Spitfire. The pegasus stood at the end of the hallway in her full black crystal armor, sans the helmet that had been destroyed by Starlight. Her mane was fully styled into that tall flaming mohawk that she had in the castle and a sympathetic look on her face.
“King Sombra wants to speak to you, Dash. I was sent to come get you.” Rainbow’s determination was quickly crushed beneath the weight of that statement. “I know you probably don’t want to and I’m sorry, but they’re orders.” Spitfire stepped aside so Dash could step out into the living room.
“What does he want to talk to me about?” Rainbow raised an eyebrow as she walked down the hall. Spitfire hit the nail on the head, she really didn’t want to talk to Sombra. It still felt wrong to even think of him in Canterlot and even more wrong to think of him as ruling Equestria.
“I think he just wants to help you readjust, Dash.” Spitfire sighed and placed a hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder as she drew close. “I know he was some sort of villain in your...your dreams, whatever you want to call them, but that’s not real.” Spitfire looked Rainbow right in the eyes and spoke slowly. “This is real, right here and right now. King Sombra is the rightful king of Equestria and he wants to speak to you. He’s no monster, he’s no villain. Please, just speak to him. You don’t have to like him, just afford him a little respect.” Spitfire’s voice lowered and she practically whispered to Rainbow. “Do it for me, Dashie.”
“Fine.” Dash acquiesced to the request meekly. She couldn’t find the courage or will to deny Spitfire no matter how hard she tried. “It’s still...weird, y’know?” In her heart, she knew that Sombra wasn’t a good guy, she knew he was a monster. “You’ll be there, right?”
“Yeah, I’ll be there with you.” Spitfire smiled and squeezed Rainbow’s shoulder. “Now c’mon, best not to keep him waiting.”
--------
Rainbow Dash and Spitfire stood at the doors to the throne room, the engraving of Canterlot Mountain looming high above the two pegasi. Rainbow’s hooves shuffled nervously, knowing just what was on the other side made her heart thunder in her chest. She wasn’t ready for this, but she had to do it.
The doors opened with the help of Spitfire, exposing Rainbow to the throne room for the first time. Rainbow remembered it as a long room, the white marble floor was split by a red carpet that ran the length of it. Massive stained glass windows detailing the heroic exploits of Princess Celestia and Luna, and the Elements of Harmony lined the far side. This throne room was much the same, except the carpet was now deep purple and the white marble columns had been replaced by the deep purple, almost black, crystals that Sombra was known for.
She also didn’t recognize any of the scenes depicted on the stained glass windows anymore.
“Captain Spitfire, Rainbow Dash.” Sombra was standing in front of one of the windows, silhouetted by the sun streaming through the colored glass. The shadowy unicorn turned around and smiled at the two mares.
“Your Majesty.” Spitfire bowed and nodded towards Sombra, then nudged Rainbow Dash to follow suit.
“Your Majesty.” Rainbow would say the title, but she wouldn’t bow. Instead she opted to simply nod. It was bad enough that she had to give him any modicum of respect, but not even Spitfire would get her to bow to him.
“I understand from Spitfire’s reports that you’ve forgotten many things.” Sombra spoke calmly as he strode across the room to the mares. “I want to apologize for that and I want to offer my own help in refreshing you on the history of this great country.” Sombra stopped right in front of Dash and looked her over, his bright green eyes burning into her. “First, tell me what you think I am and what Equestria is. Do not fret, I won’t be angry. I need to know.”
“Gladly.” Rainbow shot back the moment Sombra closed his mouth. “You took over the Crystal Empire in some sort of coup and enslaved the crystal ponies. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna helped banish you, but you took the Empire with you. You came back one thousand years later and you were beaten again.” There was more of course, but much like what she had done with Rarity and Spitfire, she withheld some details. Saying that she was instrumental in killing Sombra wouldn’t do any good, no way.
“Fascinating.” Sombra responded with a chuckle and turned around. “Come with me, please.” Rainbow obliged the request, mainly because Spitfire nudged her to do so. They followed Sombra over to the opposite wall, to the first of many stained glass windows. It depicted the Crystal palace with Sombra on its balcony. “There was no coup. The Crystal Empire was a strange relic in the age in which it existed: when the previous ruler died it was up to a group of trusted ponies to select their predecessor from a pool of candidates. I was one of them, and I won the election fair and square, over even the ambassador to Equestria who was one of Celestia’s closest friends.” There was a venomous chuckle from the unicorn as he continued. “I was accused of rigging the election, accused of killing the previous Queen all because their little friend did not get her way.”
Rainbow was humoring this, but she didn’t believe a word. Painting Celestia and Luna as foals throwing a fit because their friend didn’t win? No, that wasn’t who they were. Maybe Luna on a really bad day, but Celestia? Patient and matronly Celestia? There was just no way.
“I rebuffed every accusation. I pushed back as they threatened to take the Crystal Empire from me by force.” Sombra growled as his hoof seemed to dig into the marble below it. “I could not stand up to the combined might of the sun and the moon, I knew it. So I turned to magic I scarcely understood. A relic that sat far beneath the earth, promising power if one could survive their fears. If one were to succumb to the challenge, they would be driven mad.”
“So it drove you mad.” Rainbow Dash concluded with a nod and her eyes narrowed. “You banished them instead and took over Equestria, right?” She could see it in her mind’s eye, history gone wrong where the bad guy won. It made her stomach churn.
“I did not succumb, I overcame.” Sombra turned back to Rainbow, his cloak billowing as he spun. “What the relic showed me was the world you described: a world where I went mad, enslaved my own ponies and fell to the shadows that crept into my mind. I saw it all, and it told me that it was unchanging, written in the stars that it must happen. I rejected it.” Rainbow stepped back, the words hitting her like a runaway train. He had seen it too? “When I was told I would lose, I won. When I was commanded to be cruel, I turned kind. When the universe said I was to be conquered, I became the conqueror!” Sombra roared out victoriously as he hastily moved to the next window. “When the sun and the moon came to my doorstep, I struck them down where they stood because I was told they were eternal!”
Dash’s eyes trailed up the pane of multicolored glass. Sombra stood with a spear made of crystal in his magical grasp, the crumpled forms of Celestia and Luna at his hooves. Her blood ran cold as it hit her. They weren’t banished, they were dead. One thousand years dead.
“They were foals given that which they did not earn.” Sombra sneered at the depictions of the alicorns and shook his head. “Power, respect. All just...given to them. Can you believe that? Control over all of the ponies of the world, a kingdom, a castle. Destiny decreed them gods and the world went along with it. Raised them up on a pedestal so high that they forgot what the ground looked like.” Sombra turned to Rainbow Dash once more, the fire in his eyes rising higher as he spoke. “After I killed destiny and conquered fate, I saw that the immutable truths written in the stars are nothing more than oppressive lies meant to keep the ponies deemed unworthy in their place. I took what I was told I could never have. I surpassed the mere trappings of what I was meant to be.”
“But...they’re alicorns.” Rainbow couldn’t get it out of her mind, it was like telling somepony that they could breathe water or that you didn’t need wings to fly. It was wrong on so many levels, some she couldn’t even come to grips with. “They controlled the sun and moon! They can’t die!”
“They were given control of the sun and the moon. Did you think that they did not move by themselves? Ponies interfered and used magic to make the world fit them, but once control was relinquished, the natural order was restored.” Sombra puffed out his chest as he spoke, looking up at his fallen foes with pride. “As for immortality: they couldn’t die of natural causes. No age or hunger or thirst would kill them, but wounds could and did. Their bodies do not rot, they have stayed the same since the day life left them. Truly remarkable in that sense, but mortal nonetheless.”
“They weren’t bad ponies!” Rainbow furrowed her brow and stamped her hoof on the floor. “I know they weren’t! They didn’t deserve to be killed!” Her blood was boiling, her eye was twitching and her wing flared out in frustration. “I don’t care if you thought they were coming to get you, talking things out is always an option! I bet you didn’t even let them do that!”
“Those two were not interested in discussion. If you do not believe me, do you want to hear about them from someone else who was there?”
Who else could have possibly known Celestia and Luna at the time that would still be alive?
“I told you, I don’t have any idea who he’s talking about.” Spitfire whispered to Rainbow Dash as they strode down the hall side by side. King Sombra was walking ahead of both of them, leading them to his personal quarters to introduce Dash to somepony. “I’ve never even been in his quarters. It’s protected by wards and charms he put there himself, so nopony can get in unless he wants them to.”
“Really? No idea at all?” Rainbow Dash found it hard to believe that the Captain of the Royal Guard didn’t know about something in the castle. Who were all of the immortals she could think of? Tirek, Discord, Scorpan, that slime thing that Discord knew. Cadance was a possibility maybe? Dash didn’t exactly know how old Celestia’s niece was but Sombra knew who she was, so she had to either be alive or was at some point.
“No. Now just show some patience, please.” Spitfire grumbled back at the other pegasus, her head never turning to actually address Rainbow. With a sigh and a roll of her eyes, Dash obliged the request.
“Your Majesty, can I talk to you for a moment?” The yellow and red unicorn from the meeting room, Sunset Shimmer, popped into existence in a flash of light right beside King Sombra. “The Saddle Arabian Ambassador has sent a request that your visit to Saddle Arabia be moved up a few weeks to right before the Carnival.”
“Absolutely not.” Sombra shook his head and extended a hoof to push Sunset’s clipboard into her chest. “One thousand years since the first Crystal Carnival, I will not miss it due to Saddle Arabian impatience. Tell him the original date stays or the visit is cancelled.” Sombra started off again, Sunset right beside him and the two pegasi trailing behind. “I am not entertaining the little prince’s constant rescheduling any longer.”
“Of course, Your Majesty. Consider it done.” The unicorn scribbled something down on the paper she held before speaking again. “On the note of the Crystal Carnival: Specialist Rainbow Dash was meant to kick off the festivities with a Sonic Rainboom. Considering that is now an impossibility, we need to find something else to-”
“-I can still do it!” Rainbow shouted out. Her one good wing fluttered against her side as she bounded between the two unicorns. “I-I mean, if I get a prosthetic soon… Your Majesty. I can still do it.”
“With all due respect, Specialist. No, you cannot.” Sunset scoffed at Rainbow, her horn lighting up with a red glow and pushing the pegasus back. “It takes ponies months to adjust to a prosthetic limb, let alone a pegasus with a fake wing. I doubt you’ll ever be as fast as you were.”
“You don’t know me.” Dash growled out as she narrowed her gaze. The familiar competitive fire lit itself deep in her belly and swelled poured out of her eyes. “I’ll get used to that wing in like a day and I’ll be just as fast!” Rainbow’s glare was matched by Sunset as the two mares nearly started to butt heads.
“Expedite Rainbow Dash’s wing.” Sombra raised his voice to break the two mares staring contest up. “I want it done as fast as possible. Prepare a contingency just in case she is not ready, the biggest magic fireworks you can find.” A black armored hoof pushed between Rainbow and Sunset, gradually moving them apart. Then he looked at Rainbow Dash, a slight grin creeping across his face. “Consider this a challenge: get back into form before the Carnival.”
“I can do that.” Rainbow Dash nodded and then shot another look at Sunset Shimmer before returning to Spitfire’s side. “I’ll show her…” She grumbled under her breath, her chest puffing out a little more.
“Very well.” Sunset huffed and disappeared in another flash of red magic.
The rest of the walk to the King’s chambers was uneventful and slow. Sombra’s walking speed was leisurely and winding. Several staff members came up to speak to him, all about things that were much less interesting than what Sunset Shimmer had to say. It was about thirty minutes of meandering, each minute seeming longer than the last, before they reached the pitch black crystal door that led to King Sombra’s quarters.
Rainbow Dash wasn’t much for magic. It never interested her, and as a pegasus it didn’t really make much sense nor could she do anything with it. Even without a horn or much of a sense for what magic was, Dash could feel the magic radiating from the door in front of her. It made the fur all over her body stand on end and made the glasses vibrate on her face.
“Captain Spitfire, I ask that you stay out here while I speak with Rainbow Dash privately.” King Sombra didn’t look at Spitfire as he directed her, instead his horn was encompassed with a glow and the door split down the middle and swung open.
“Your Majesty, I have to object. I trust Rainbow Dash but she’s still...easily confused. I don’t want her lashing out at you if she has another episode.” Each word Spitfire let loose sunk yet another dagger into Dash’s heart. Sure, this was still a lot to take in but she wasn’t going to attack King Sombra. She wasn’t suicidal.
“Do you not think me capable of handling one injured pegasus, Captain?” Sombra spoke coolly as he turned around to face Spitifre. Where most ponies might wilt at the sight of King Sombra rounding on them, but the guard captain stood her ground.
“Of course not, Your Majesty. It’s my duty to ensure your safety against all threats. I just want to make sure you don’t have to defend yourself if the need arises.” Spitfire didn’t even look like she was breathing as she looked up at the towering stallion. Sombra’s emerald eyes looked over his captain and then he took a step back.
“I understand, but you don’t need to worry. You may stand out here and wait. I will not renew my wards so you can enter if you need to.” Sombra placed a hoof on Spitfire’s shoulder. “Only if I call you, though. Am I understood?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Spitfire snapped a crisp salute and moved to stand beside the door. She stared ahead, her posture ramrod straight and her demeanor unflinching now. Even though they hadn’t entered the room yet, it already felt like Rainbow was alone with the usurper king.
King Sombra silently turned and walked into his room, and Rainbow followed. The door closed behind her with a meaty thud, signalling now that they were truly alone. The confidence that Sunset’s attitude has brought to a new high was now fading into the background. In all of her years had she never been alone with one of their foes, usually this was Twilight’s forte.
The room before her was expansive, at least twice as big as Spitifre and Rarity’s whole apartment. Suits of armor, both crystal and steel, were along the walls. A greatsword, the blade still coated with old blood, was on the wall and enclosed in a glass case. There were no windows in the space either, instead it was lit by candle-filled sconces.A massive bed dominated the far side of the room, covers of rich dark satin flowing over the mattress. It looked like a room...well, fit for a king.
Instead of talking to her in here, Sombra made his way towards a door in the corner and beckoned Dash to follow. Beyond that door was his personal study. Bookshelves lined the walls from the floor up to the ceiling, and only afforded enough room for a high-backed chair with a small table beside it in front of a roaring fireplace.
“Do you know what I found when I first entered Canterlot?” Before Dash could fully enter the room and look around, Sombra had stopped her at the threshold. He didn’t give her a moment to respond before he answered his own question. “Celestia’s room, replete with all of the things she sought to hide from the world.” In the throne room his voice had been bombastic and victorious, but now it was quiet and somber. Hot breath smelling slightly of charcoal washed over Rainbow with each word. “Every problem Equestria had faced that she had solved and earned so much admiration for: all half measures. All things she knew would come back to haunt the ponies of Equestria in the future, all things she knew somepony else would fix for her.”
Images of Tirek, Discord, Nightmare Moon and even Sombra himself were all conjured in Rainbow Dash’s mind. All things that Celestia and Luna had dealt with long ago that the Elements of Harmony had to save the world from once again. It was always sort of weird how Celestia never helped them fix those things considering they were usually her messes in the first place.
“I read about what she had done with Equestria’s foes and woes, about how she saw great saviors in the future that would be required by fate to conquer them once more.” Sombra continued with a disgusted scoff. “So I dealt with them. I sealed Tartarus up with my own magic and surrounded it with a fort, protected by my best guards. I found the deepest roots of those plunderseeds in the Everfree Forest and burned them to a crisp. When that beast of chaos was still made of stone, I lopped off his head and threw his body through that cursed mirror they kept hidden in the basement, then had it melted down to make a new sword.” Sombra finally stepped back and looked off into the study. “Where they had been content with waiting for trouble to arise, I wanted to be a proactive leader to keep Equestria safe.”
Another headache shot through Dash’s skull as all of the information sank in. Discord was gone? Tirek had never been freed? No chaos or strife had ever befallen the ponies of Equestria like she had seen? It was unbelievable. That familiar sense of panic began to rise in her chest as more and more of what she thought she knew crumbled around her.
“I wanted to speak to you privately about this because I saw many things. I saw Celestia and Luna banish the Crystal Empire and myself to the edges of time, only to return one thousand years on because they refused what needed to be done. I saw the dragon and the alicorn put me down once more, but not finish the job.” Dash’s blood started to turn to ice in her veins as he spoke. Whatever had shown him his fears had shown him everything. Everything. “I saw you and your friends finally do it, put me down like the mad dog I was. I saw you finally do what had to be done. You’ve seen it too, haven’t you?”
“Y-yeah…?” Rainbow gulped, her throat about as dry as any desert in the world. Surely he had brought her in here to kill her as some act of revenge. Surely he was angry that now she had seen what he could do and wanted to silence her from exposing him.
“Good.” Sombra nodded with a slight smile, the look in his eye more than a little unhinged. “I don’t know how those cultists did it, but they’ve shown you what should be in an attempt to turn you against me. I have no doubt about that. “
“You’re not...mad…?” Rainbow took a few deep breaths as no anger was evident in his voice. It calmed her enough, but not entirely. “I kinda figured you would want...I don’t know, revenge?”
“Nonsense. Those events never happened, simply the dreams of fate.” Sombra waved his hoof at Rainbow dismissively. “I want to encourage you to think about that world critically. Think about what your life was like, what challenges you faced compared to the real world. I want you to see that fate robbed you of hard work, of the satisfaction of overcoming adversity in that world. When the universe decrees you are important, when it says you must be great, it steals both choice and the thrill of overcoming resistance from you until your part is done.” Sombra closed his eyes and bit his tongue, stopping himself from talking further. “I will let you marinate on that without further prognostication from me, Rainbow Dash. Now, I want you to meet an acquaintance of mine.”
“Oh are you finally done talking, Smoky?” A snarky voice came from inside the room, one she knew and despised all too well. “Well, let’s see this mare whose time you’ve been wasting, come on!”
“No…” Rainbow said beneath her breath as she rushed into the room and turned around, looking for the familiar serpentine menace that the voice belonged to. “Alright Discord, where are you?”
“Up here, my dear.” Rainbow spun around to face the fireplace and looked up. Sure enough, right above the fireplace on the wall was Discord. Well, his head was up there at the very least. Mounted on a wooden plaque, cut off less than a six inches below his head at the neck, was Discord’s head. “I see you know my voice and you’ve guessed my name. How intriguing.” Everything else seemed to be in order, those mismatched red pupils in yellowed eyes, the two different horns and that single fang dipping out from a chaotic grin.
“Alright, what’s your game?” Rainbow glowered up at the draconequus ferociously. “No way you’re just stuck like that. This is a trick, right? A joke?” She knew Discord well enough to know that this is something he would do to gain the upper hand in a meeting.
“Oh trust me, I wish.” Discord responded with a sigh, his ears turning down. “What you see is what you get now. It turns out when your body is chucked into another dimension, there’s not much you can do. When I was first released from my stone prison, believe you me, I was as shocked as you are.”
“Silence.” Sombra moved to stand between Rainbow and the prize on his mantle. “Discord, we are here because you knew Celestia and Luna. Rainbow Dash does not believe in my characterization of them. She believes them to be unassailable as rulers.”
“Those two?!” If Discord had a chest, it would’ve been heaving with laughter. “They’re goody two-horseshoes, but perfect?” The decapitated draconequus shook his head. “Oh dear no. Luna was always too angsty for her own good and Celestia was always focused on ‘doing the right thing’. At any cost.”
“Yeah, okay. Sorry if I don’t take his word as law.” A twinge of sympathy pinged Rainbow’s heart as she thought more about Discord. He was an annoying troublemaker, but did he deserve this? The answer was...complicated. He had hurt a lot of ponies when he first came back, and it seemed like this at least prevented that. In the other world, that world of should be, was his redemption enough to wipe away the pain he caused?
“I understand, but take what he said with what you were shown. Does it line up?” Sombra rested a hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder and spoke calmly. “Think on it more, and you will see everything I said to be true.” He lifted his dark hoof from the sky blue fur it sat upon. “Beyond that, I invite you to dinner tonight with myself as a ‘welcome home’ feast.”
“Oooh, take me along. It’s been a good long while since I’ve been out of this wretched room.” Both ponies shot a look at Discord simultaneously. “Oh I see how it is. Come in here and wake me up from my nap just to ask me one question and leave and then not take me to dinner.”
“Yeah, I’ll be there I guess.” Rainbow Dash completely ignored Discord and spoke to Sombra instead. He couldn’t cause chaos, but at least his spirits didn’t seem dampened by that at all. Maybe she would come visit him in the future if Sombra allowed it to see how much he knew about what both she and Sombra saw.
“Doesn’t it feel good to be outside, darling?” Rarity looked up from one of the gems she had in her magical grip and flashed a smile at Rainbow Dash. A pair of bright red horn rimmed glasses sat on her muzzle, highlighting just how blue her eyes were as she stared at the mare across from her.
“Yeah, if you can call this ‘outside’.”Dash huffed as she turned towards the window beside her and briefly pulled the drawn curtains to the side. Sunlight streamed through the darkened interior of the private carriage the two were riding in for that brief moment before being suffocated once more by the blackout curtains. “Why can’t you tell me where we’re going again?”
“Because that’s the nature of a surprise, Rainbow Dash.” Rarity gently chided her friend and went back to studying the brilliant ruby she had brought along. “You should be thankful that I could even get Spitfire to agree to this at all. Especially after she and the King said they wanted you kept under wraps until you recovered.”
“Yeah, you’re right.” Dash admitted with a deep sigh. She readjusted in her seat, her one intact wing and the stub twitching anxiously. “Thanks for this…I guess I’m just a little impatient.” She chuckled a bit and rubbed the back of her neck with a hoof.
“You’re quite welcome, darling.” Rarity replied with the same warm smile she had started the conversation with. “I think you’ll quite like this surprise, though. It will definitely be worth a little patience.”
Rainbow Dash nodded and fell into silence, her head resting against the blacked out window. She could see the city pass them by as the carriage rattled down the street, see the eyes of ponies on the sidewalks staring at them as they went by through the gap in the curtains, no doubt the Royal Guard sigils that adorned the onyx carriage making them curious as to the occupants and the destination. Just like her, they would have to wait and see just where the carriage would end up.
“Hey Rarity.” Dash decided to draw her attention away from the gawking crowd outside and instead focus on the other pony inside. The unicorn once again looked up from the ruby she had been studying. “What’re you going to do with that gem? Use it in a dress?”
“A dress?”
“Yeah, y’know, a fancy dress to wear to a party or something.” The look she received from Rarity was nothing short of total confusion. The mare’s head was tilted to the side and she had one eyebrow cocked. “What?”
“Darling, what do you think I do?”
“Umm…” Dash suddenly had the feeling that she was incredibly wrong about something once again. It was a sensation that was all too common as of late and one she was beginning to loathe with every fiber of her being. “You make clothes, right? Dresses and stuff.”
The laugh that erupted from Rarity was a blow to Dash’s pride. “Not since I was a filly, darling! My goodness, I haven’t thought about designing clothes in…” Rarity mumbled some number beneath her breath. “...years!” There was a beat as the other mare looked at Rainbow Dash and saw the hurt behind her ears. “Oh dear, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh like that.” Rarity scrambled for an apology, her words fast and breathless. “I wasn’t laughing at you, just at the thought of it all. I’m sorry.”
“No no, it’s okay.” Dash shrugged it off and pushed all of the pain off of the surface. It wasn’t okay, but she would deal with those feelings on her own time. “I guess that was just more cobwebs.” More memories of that other world, the world that should be. “So what do you do, then? You don’t just stay in that apartment all day, right?”
“Well of course not.” Rarity lightly scoffed at the idea of being a stay-at-home mare and held the ruby aloft for Dash to get a good look at. “I help source all of the crystals and gems that Equestria needs for its military. Ever since I was a filly I had a knack for finding great deposits of beautiful and useful gems.” Blue tendrils of magic penetrated the ruby, causing the entire thing to illuminate the interior of the carriage in a purple light. “My parents moved to Canterlot when I was a teenager to put me to work for the Royal Crystaller. Since then, well it’s all history now, but I rose through the ranks. I still help with finding large deposits, but I am usually more busy with personal projects for King Sombra.”
“So…you find rocks and stuff and give them to him?”
“Don’t make it sound so droll, Rainbow Dash. They are more than just rocks.” Rarity pulled her magic from the ruby and sat it beside her. “His enchanters and enchantresses tell me what they need, and I find the perfect ‘rock’ for the occasion.”
“What do they use them for?”
“Oh weapons and armor mostly, though I have worked on one of his private train cars before. That was quite fun.” Dash didn’t have any recollection of the other Equestria having such an extensive need for those things. Maybe it was because of Sombra’s Crystal Empire heritage? “I was some sort of seamstress in these…dreams of yours?”
“Something like that…” Dash muttered in response. “You had your own place in Ponyville, but you had shops in Manehattan and Canterlot too. You were probably the most talented pony in the world when it came to fashion.”
“That sounds quite lovely, but I can’t imagine spending all of my time making clothes.” Rarity shook her head, the tight bun of purple hair atop it barely moving with the motion. “Function over fashion, that’s what is important. Creating things that are useful for the Empire and the King is my true calling.” There wasn’t another word uttered before the carriage jolted to a halt and a knock came from one of the drivers up front. “Oh good, we’re here! One moment while I check to make sure everything is ready, darling.”
Rarity was out of the door and had it closed before Dash could even catch a glimpse of the scenery outside. She heard the mare’s hooves against concrete along with the sound of metal armor scraping against the ground. So guards were meeting them here at the very least.
“You can come on out, Rainbow Dash.” Rarity’s melodic tone came from beyond and the door swung open, flooding the interior with pure sunshine.
Dash exited the carriage, blinking a few times to let her eyes readjust to the afternoon sun. They were on a street somewhere in a more commercial section of the city. The two mares were flanked by a small squad of five royal guards, all adorned in the crystalline armor they wore. It looked like that beyond them, this entire side of the street was clear of any other ponies.
Before them was a building with its front door propped open, the light sound of music from a radio pouring out onto the street from within. The sign above the entrance read ‘Barber Shop’ and nothing else. It was the same drab gray box like the stores next to it, nothing special at all.
“You took me to get a manecut?” Dash questioned her friend.
“Well…last night Spitfire and I were talking and she was telling me about a saying you have. ‘Look good, fly good’?” A sheepish smile spread across Rarity’s face as she spoke. “Now that the King has asked you to attend a dinner, I figured a little sprucing up was in order and it would make you feel better and get you ready to fly once more.”
Rainbow Dash nodded and let her head hang for a moment. She could feel tears welling up in her eyes and threatening to spill out. It wasn’t just because of the sentiment either, she appreciated her friend in both of the worlds she occupied caring enough about her to do something like this, but the familiar stabbing pain in the back of her mind was adding to it.
“Do you have to wear the shades, Dash?”
Accusatory, even embarrassed from Spitfire.
“Look good, feel good. Feel good, fly good.”
A motto to live by.
The pain was getting easier to withstand without collapsing now, but that didn’t make it any less painful. With customary speed, she recovered and nodded at her friend. She quickly, and covertly as she could, wiped her eyes and threw on another smile.
“Thanks Rarity, I guess I could do with a cut.” To punctuate her point, she shook her head, causing her mess of a mane to whip around her face. “Flying with all of this won’t be very fun.”
“I can only imagine.” Rarity agreed. “Shall we get inside and get this done?”
With a nod, the two mares made their way inside. The interior was in stark contrast to the exterior; vibrant and full of unique life that the cookie cutter construction lacked. The red and white tile floor was polished to a mirror shine, the walls were decorated with pictures of the ponies in military uniforms with their manes freshly cut, including Spitfire with her mohawk right above the register.
“Ahh, you’re who they closed my shop down for.” An old stallion whose knees seemed to buckle with every step approached the pair. His coat was fully gray and baby blue eyes were magnified by a massive pair of glasses on his face. A horn poked through a stubborn jet black mane that was slicked back with enough gel to gag a horse. “Oh me oh my. Look at that mop, soldier. That’s not regulation is it?”
“Do…I know you?” Rainbow Dash took a step back as the geriatric stallion pushed his face within an inch of her own. Her ears pinned back as he studied her for a few moments then pulled away.
“You should!” He pointed a shaky hoof at the wall where a picture of Rainbow Dash sat. Her mane was shorter than usual in that picture, but recognizable enough as still her style. “That was your first. Been your barber for years, just like all of you featherheads in the guard.” The stallion waited for a moment for her to recognize him. “Oh right, the guards said something about some memory problems. Finally rattled that big empty head of yours a little too much, huh?”
“Uhh…yeah, I guess..” Dash shrugged. “Sorry, but I don’t really remember who you are.”
“Well that’s a shame.” The stallion grunted as he made his way to one of the chairs in front of a mirror. “My name’s Clipper, most ponies just call me The Barber.” Clipper patted the chair and waved to Dash. “C’mon sit down.”
Dash made her way over the chair and hopped up in it. The seat was old and worn, countless hindquarters having flattened whatever cushion had once existed in it to the point of nothingness. The old thing ratcheted up until Dash could see herself in the mirror in front and Clipper behind her.
“Now the rule is you pick a cut during your first time and you get the same thing every time you come back.” Clipper rattled out as his magic grabbed a pair of electric clippers and some scissors from the small shelf in front of her. “Problem is, you don’t know me anymore so that doesn’t feel too fair. So let’s start over…what kinda cut do you want, Rainbow Dash?” As he spoke he draped one of those capes made out of thin but slippery plastic over her body to stop hair from falling onto her.
Dash looked at the mare in the mirror, the sunken tired eyes behind the glasses and the long wild mane that fell over her head in technicolor waves. She studied that mare, but she couldn’t find anything she recognized as her. In her head there were these two competing images of Rainbow Dash. One of them was a proud soldier who fought through adversity every day of her life to get where she was, and the other was a carefree but fiery mare with enough natural talent to beat anyone or anything but lacking the real work ethic to perfect it into anything. One was a sword that hacked through the dense thicket of excuses and obstacles while the other was a dull cudgel who relied purely on talent. Which one was she? Was she either? Both?
Rainbow focused on the mare in front of her, one that had experienced both of these realities. Who knew both of them to be true and false at the same time. A nexus of contradictory experiences converging in one space. No, she wasn’t either of them. She was something new, and she needed to make that known to the world.
“Shave it all off.” Rainbow Dash told Clipper. Her words were weighted with confidence as she was completely sure of herself at this moment. Clipper cocked his head to the side and looked down at her. Before he could ask that question, that dastardly question meant to put doubt into her mind. Before he could ask ‘are you sure?’, she nodded. “Yeah, I am.”
“Shaved it is.” Clipper said as he started up the razor in his grip. The buzzing filled her ears and his magic pushed her head forward so she was looking down to the floor. She felt the cold metal teeth of the machine touch her neck and push upwards as it started to cut down her mane at the base. From the corner of her eyes she could see bright polychromatic chunks of hair fall to the floor below. She could feel the weight of those other versions of her fall away as it was all slowly chipped away. The past was dropped onto the floor, meant only to be swept away and tossed into the garbage. None of that mattered anymore. It wasn’t who she was then, in either world, it was who she was now. She was that nexus of contradictory experiences, and she was going to make this Rainbow Dash something to be proud of because of it.
“When did you get that scar, Rainbow Dash?” Rarity’s voice cut through the noise of the razor, causing it to cut out. Clipper was about halfway done with her mane, having just started cutting it from the front now.
“What scar?” Dash didn’t have a memory from either side of any kind of hit to her head that would’ve left a scar. She raised a hoof and ran it across the shaved and exposed back of her head and felt an indent at the base of her skull that shouldn’t be there. “Can I get a mirror or something?”
She was wordlessly spun around so her back was facing the mirror on the wall. A small hoofheld mirror was brought up in front of her so she could see the back of her own head. Sure enough, right at the base of her skull was an ugly indented scar, like a lightning bolt turned sideways and slapped across the back of her head.
“Looks old.” Clipper commented. Dash would take his word for it as the old stallion probably had seen his fair share of old wounds. “Looks like something you’d see on a body in a grave, though. You’re lucky to have survived that.”
“I don’t think Spitfire ever mentioned you having such a bad accident but we can ask when we get back.” Rarity bit her lip as she craned her head to look in the mirror to get a good look at the scar. “It does look quite bad though…”
“Yeah, let’s just finish up here first.” The scar, and the thought of what caused it, would stay put in the back of her mind until then.
It wasn’t long until Clipper was done with his job. He did a few passes over her head a few times to make sure it was all level. Once he was done, he nodded and pulled the cape off of her and gave it a shake. “Well?” He asked expectantly.
Rainbow Dash looked in the mirror again. She looked at the mare in those fierce magenta eyes and studied her. She looked lighter now, like a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders. Rainbow patterned stubble dotted her head where her mane once was, leaving her to look like a completely different mare than she had ever seen before.
Just what she wanted.
Dash looked to the floor to see the piles of rainbow mane gathered around her seat. To see it all there gathered up and ready to be swept away was a mix of relieving and anxiety inducing. She could feel her chest tighten a little as the enormity of what she had done started to kick in. In all of her lives she had only one style for her mane…but that was the point, right?
“C-can I step outside?” She turned to look at the two ponies behind her. “Sorry, I just need some fresh air right now.” She couldn’t have a breakdown here in front of them, she just couldn’t. She needed to be alone so she could process this.
“Yeah, out back.” Clipper pointed towards a door in the back of the shop. “There’s a little alley out there, good for some alone time.” Before, when they had entered, he had been a little gruff and harsh but now his voice was soft and warm, like a grandparent who knew just what to say.
Rainbow Dash stood up and bolted out of the back door into the warm air beyond. The door slammed behind her and she took deep breaths and closed her eyes. The air was warm and wet back here and it smelled lightly of garbage and standing water. It wasn’t fresh air like she wanted, but it was just enough to bring her back around to reality.
She ran her hoof across her head, the prickly little hairs tickling the appendage as it went. She was rid of all of that mane now, completely and it felt…good. Tears began to fall from her eyes onto the moist concrete below, disrupting the little puddle at her hooves. Her slow and calm breaths didn’t quicken as the tears fell, but they were joined by small sobs and whimpers as she wept.
Her heart broke as she mourned the lives that were, the ones that were sacrificed and left behind for this new one she was given. This was a fresh start. Other ponies still knew her and remembered who she was before, but she didn’t. Not really. That pony they thought they knew was gone now, and only she remained. These were the only tears that would be shed for that Rainbow Dash and the one from that world of should be.
“Oh my Celestia…” A voice came from somewhere else in the alley, light and bubbly. It yanked Dash from her mourning and back into the present moment. She wiped her eyes with a wing and widened her stance as she looked around, ready to fight whoever it was. “Dashie…?”
A pink pony came from behind a small pile of boxes in the corner of the small alley, her mane and coat, both equally pink, matted from a long while without a proper washing. Her bright blue eyes filled with a wild and manic energy that sent a shiver up Dash’s spine.
“Pinkie Pie…?” The name was effortless to say and it fit the pony perfectly.
“Y-you know me…?” The bubbly warmth was sapped from the pony’s voice and was replaced with a cold realization. “You…you remember me?” Pinkie’s eyes, her pupils the size of pinpricks in the darkened alley, advanced towards Rainbow Dash. “How? We’ve never met here. No…no…not here. There. There! You’ve been there! Or seen it! That’s it, right?!” Her voice went from cold to excited to demanding in the span of just a few seconds.
“There? You mean…” No, it was impossible. It had to be, right? Pinkie had always been…weird when it came to knowing things she shouldn’t know or even acknowledging things that don’t exist. She always had that seventh sense, her Pinkie Sense being the sixth, that seemed to connect her to some weirdness. “The other world. The one where we’re friends with Twilight, Rarity, Applejack and Fluttershy. You’ve seen it?”
“SEEN IT?!” Pinkie went from a few feet to a few inches away in the blink of an eye. Her nose pressed right against Rainbow Dash’s, her hot breath that reeked of garbage washing over the one-winged mare. “I’m STILL seeing it! I see it every time I close my eyes!” Pinkie closed her eyes. “Oh HI Twilight! Yeah I have seen Rainbow Dash, she’s right here! Rainbow Dash! Rainbow DaaaaaSSSSH!” Pinkie let out a laugh that morphed into a deep and painful sob as she opened her eyes.
“How?” It was the only word on Rainbow’s tongue as she opened her mouth.
“How? You tell ME how, silly!” Pinkie stepped forward even more until she had Rainbow Dash pinned against the door, a solid earth pony hoof pressing Dash’s one good wing to the door.. “Tell me! Please?”
“I-I don’t know. They’re like memories.” Rainbow sputtered out as she tried to wiggle from the grip of the crazed party pony. “I woke up here with them. I-I don’t know.”
“Are you…are you FROM there?!” Pinkie asked. In an instant, her mane deflated like a sad balloon and rested against the sides of her face like a stiff board. Her overall color palette darkened as her eyes shifted from an eccentric bright blue to ice. “How did you get here? How do I get there?” Rainbow had no answers to give even if she was given the opportunity. “TELL ME!”
There was a banging on the door behind her and cries from both Rarity and Clipper as they tried to push the door open to no avail. Rainbow Dash tried her best to help by slipping away from the mare in front of her, but with the same luck. She was still weak from her months in that dungeon, and even in a state of obvious homelessness Pinkie was stronger than her.
“TELL ME!” Pinkie demanded again, this time her hooves going to the base of Rainbow’s neck. That excitement at being known had completely faded, only being replaced by pure rage. “You don’t understand! I need to go there! I need to! It’s so cold here! It’s so…so…lonely here…I NEED that. I NEED them!”
Those strong earth pony hooves, the hooves that belonged to a seasoned rock farmer, pressed down on Dash’s throat. Dash’s hooves slapped at Pinkie’s as the former’s eyes went wide. Slowly she was being lifted from her hooves against the rough metal door behind her by her throat, Pinkie’s maniacal gaze transfixed upon her.
“WHY AREN’T YOU TELLING ME?!” Pinkie screamed in her face. “You want to keep me here! Just like everypony else! You want to keep me away from there!”
“P-Pinkie…” It was going to be the last word before she lost consciousness, she knew it.
A bolt of magic impacted Pinkie’s side and sent her colliding into the wall beside the two. Rainbow fell onto the cold wet ground in a heap as her chest heaved and she sucked in the gross moist air around her. Two guards were on Pinkie Pie in an instant, their magic pinning her hooves to the ground as one more and Rarity came to help Dash up.
“My goodness, are you okay?” Rarity asked as she looked Rainbow Dash over. “I can’t believe you were attacked by that ruffian. I understand this is not the best part of town, but a homeless scoundrel attacking random ponies? This is ridiculous.”
A sound of metal against flesh drew Dash’s attention to one of the guards kicking Pinkie square in the ribs. She felt an anger brew up deep down in the pit of her stomach, even despite what had just occurred.
“H-hey! Back off of her! She’s…she’s sick, okay?” Rainbow Dash got to her hooves and glared at the guards. “She didn’t mean to hurt me, I know she didn’t. She needs help, not you beating on her.” One of the guards turned to look at her finally and told the other to cut it out.
Rainbow felt no anger towards the pink pony on the ground, because if it weren’t for Rarity and Spitfire that might be her right now.
“Hey you look good, Dash. I can get behind the shaved head look.” Spitfire placed a hoof on her adopted-sister’s shoulder and smiled. “Decided to change it up a bit, I respect that a lot.” She was in her full Captain armor, a wiry stallion with a notepad followed behind her.
“Yeah, y’know, it’s a new me. I wanted to start fresh.” After that altercation in the alley, it felt good to be next to Spitfire again. The two married mares were going to be her one lifeline and tether to this world. If Dash was going to build a new and better life out of what was already here, she was going to use what was already available. It helped that she still felt great fondness for both of these mares in both worlds, so she was close to them no matter what.
“Darling, did you know anything about this scar Rainbow Dash has on the back of her head?” Rarity interjected, stepping forward and tilting Dash’s head to the side to show the scar. “I don’t seem to recall any stories about it.”
“Scar?” Spitfire stepped to the side to get a better look. Her hooves went up and removed the glassy black helmet from her head and she squinted at the scar. “That’s…new. She didn’t have that before. Does it hurt?”
“No, not really.” Dash put a hoof to the back of her head to feel that scar. “When I get those memory flashes my head hurts but I don’t know if that’s why.”
“The memory loss!” Spitfire smacked her own head with a hoof. “That explains it. A head wound like that would lead to some memory loss, it would have to.” She shook her head and laughed as the realization hit her. “I guess the doctors didn’t catch that but I’m glad we did now.”
“Yeah, I guess.” That answer didn’t feel right. Clipper had said it looked like a mortal wound, but here she was. She would accept it for now considering she wasn’t dead…but that would be on her mind for the foreseeable future now.
“We’ll get it looked at by a doctor tomorrow, hmm?” Rarity smiled and patted Dash’s head. “If it’s not bothering you too much it can wait until after tonight’s dinner.” Rarity’s singsong voice kicked in as she practically pirouetted around Dash and Spitfire.
“Right, the dinner.” She had forgotten about her appointment with the King. It was still the last thing she wanted to do, spend more time with that psychopath who called himself the ruler of Equestria.
Her thoughts of the stallion were complicated. He had seen the things she had, all of it. He knew what she knew all too well, and in that respect he was the only one who truly understood her. Still, he killed Princess Celestia and Luna. It seemed like he did the same to Cadance at some point. Then of course, he invaded and took over Equestria. Both parts of her mind, both sets of memories, were at odds. One saw him as a villain and the other a noble and benevolent ruler.
That’s who he was to them, soon she would find out who he was to her.
“I’m not wearing a dress.” Rainbow Dash stated defiantly to the two mares around her. “Actually I’m not going to wear anything. No way.” That elicited a giggle from Spitfire and a scoff from her wife.
“It’s a meeting with the King, darling. You can’t just go naked!” Rarity protested and produced a tape measure from…somewhere and stretched it out against one of Rainbow Dash’s legs. “I’m sure I can find something in one of the wardrobes in the castle that will be suitable. One of the royal tailors can even hem it if need be.”
“I’m not wearing a dress!”
“What about her dress uniform?” Spitfire put a hoof on her wife’s back and gently pulled her away from Rainbow Dash. “We had that brought up from her place, right?”
“Oh!” Rarity dropped her tape measure and stood up straight. “Yes, yes we did. It’s in our closet, I think. I can go up and get that pressed and ready right away!” There wasn’t even time to say goodbye before the lone unicorn of the group was galloping off towards the apartments.
“I hope I can at least blend into the crowd or something.” Rainbow muttered with a sigh.
“What crowd? It’s a private dinner with just you and the King.”
“What?” Dash’s blood ran cold as the words sank in. She had assumed it was some sort of big dinner where Spitfire and Rarity would be in attendance. She needed at least one of them there for support. She couldn’t be alone with him again.
“Yeah, he asked you to dinner. Not anypony else.” Spitfire put a wing over Rainbow’s back and began to walk, gently prodding her friend along with the appendage. “It’ll be okay. Just like earlier I’ll be right outside, and you can just yell if you need me. It’ll be fine.”
King Sombra knew that in her current state, Rainbow Dash was no threat. Earlier he had shown that he was not afraid of her and that he held no ill will towards her. So why did the thought of being alone with him open such a deep pit in her gut? Was it the ingrained reverence of the King? She always had butterflies when meeting with Princess Celestia, but she never remembered the sheer terror she felt with the idea of meeting with Sombra.
Even more curious, the terror didn’t actually manifest when she was alone with him. It was only the thought of the act and not the act itself, the exception being when she first woke up in the hospital bed and her fight or flight instinct kicked in. The disconnect between her head panicking and her body remaining calm when presented with the same situation was another oddity to figure out in time.
The walk to Spitfire and Rarity’s apartment was quick and relatively unobstructed compared to Dash’s other walks through the castle halls. Well, there was no random Sunset Shimmer interruption this time is what that meant. The short trip didn’t give Dash any time to stew in her nerves or anxiety about her upcoming meal, which was both a blessing and a curse. Being constantly twitchy and nervous was bad, but she also needed to prepare. What if this time he tried something? What if last time in his chambers was just so she would have her guard down the next time he got her alone?
As soon as they stepped through the door she was prompted to take yet another shower on top of the one she had taken in the morning to get any lingering fuzz from her manecut and the stink of the alley off of her. So she did just that, the warm water doing enough to wash away her anxiety until she was clean once more.
Once she stepped out of the shower and dried herself off enough, she put on her glasses and looked in the mirror. Earlier in the day, before her first shower, she did something similar and she hadn’t recognized the mare in the mirror. Now, the same gaunt and tired mare still looked right back at her, but it was different this time. Before her body was covered with stuff she had never wanted nor put there. The missing wing, the tangled mane, the glasses…but now there was just that one changed thing, the shaved mane. It was so little but it made such a big difference. She could ignore the other parts, all the other imperfections that drew her ire, and she could just focus on that one thing she changed. It almost induced a sense of euphoria that now she had even a modicum of control over how she looked, of her body in this world. She was sure after she ate more, got into shape, it would be even better. Maybe one day she would even be comfortable in her own body again.
She just had to get there.
Rainbow Dash finally emerged from the bathroom after a few more minutes of alone time. The only sounds coming from the abode were a song coming from the radio and Rarity’s humming accompanying it. When Dash entered the main room, she saw the unicorn standing in front of an ironing board with a black uniform laid flat across it. The buttons, instead of being brass, were made of bright blue sapphires. There was a cap resting on the back of the sofa as well, similarly black with blue stitching front and center in the shape of a jagged sunburst.
“It might be a little loose due to your…slim figure, darling.” Rarity hummed and pulled her iron away from the dark fabric. “Taking it in isn’t really an option today and I’m sure you’ll fill in eventually.” Her baby blue aura levitated the garment in the air and held it up to Rainbow’s torso.”I really do wish they would move away from the sapphires for the buttons for the ceremonial division. I think some nice rubies would work much much better…but then again, black and red? A little…evil, don’t you think?”
Despite Rarity’s insistence that she had no taste for fashion, she spoke like she did. There was still that little spark deep down that had survived all of these years, that had survived the crushing weight this world seemed to have on her desire to create.
“I think I would like navy blue instead of black.” Rainbow spoke as she looked down at the uniform. Even the black alone looked a bit too evil for her taste. The navy blue that Spitfire wore in that other world was more flattering and looked more professional in her opinion.
“Oh…hmmm.” Rarity pondered that suggestion a bit. “With gold or brass buttons, yes.” Rarity agreed before shaking her head and casting the thoughts aside. “Well we are not the designers of such things, now are we? Now please try it on, I can help with the buttons if you need it.” Rarity pulled the black jacket away and replaced it with a white collared shirt and a blue tie that were pressed to perfection.
Rainbow Dash did as she was told and put on the white dress shirt first, throwing it over her back and slipping her hooves into the sleeves. Even before it was buttoned she could tell that Rarity was right in it being a bit oversized at the moment. Everything was loose and hung around her body and just closing the shirt up wasn’t going to help much. Rarity helped confirm that by buttoning up her shirt for her and also helped with the tie. Both things she would’ve done by herself with her wings in the past.
Collar tight around the neck.
Tie squeezing and suffocating.
Would she ever get used to dress uniforms?
Probably not.
Dash brought a hoof up to that gash on the back of her head that pulsed with a new flash of pain. She shrugged it off, something that was becoming easier and easier to do as the memories kept coming.
That memory didn’t match the current reality at all. Where once the shirt and tie had squeezed her neck like a python constricting its prey, it was now hanging around her with enough space left between the fur and the fabric that a hoof might be able to slip in. Rainbow Dash grimaced and choked back some tears as she looked down at her loose fitting outfit.
It was a unique pain she had never experienced before, looking at clothes you knew in your heart of hearts you belonged in that just didn’t fit. Her body was rejecting the uniform like a transplant gone severely wrong. It was almost causing her physical pain to look down at the shirt and tie, and she didn’t even want to think what the jacket would do to her. If she looked in a mirror now, she knew she would break. It would be like looking at a pretender, a mare who just didn’t belong in the body she had ended up in.
She would put up with all of this for now. She would swallow her pain and her pride for just tonight and then tomorrow—no, tonight—after this dinner she would start getting her body right. In turn that would help get her head right as well. She just needed to channel that fire and desire.
First she just had to make it through dinner.
—-
“You look good, Dash.” Spitfire waited outside of the dining hall, still clad in her armor. “Maybe a bit loose, but it’s okay. He’ll understand.” Spitfire’s wings came out and straightened the tie around Dash’s neck. “Remember: I’ll be right out here in case anything goes wrong. Either call me or just excuse yourself.”
“Yeah, thanks.” Rainbow nodded and looked towards the door, an aged and darkened wood monolith with two purple handles made of crystal. She knew what was waiting behind them, who was waiting. “Any advice?” She wanted to make it out of this unscathed as much as she possibly could.
“Just go with the flow.” Spitfire said with a smile. “I know he’s intimidating, and doubly so for you because of what you saw, but he’s an easy pony to talk to and he seems to like you. Don’t think too hard, just talk.”
“Yeah, right.” Dash mumbled and shifted uncomfortably. “Don’t think who I’m talking to when it’s him.”
“Like I said, I know.” Spitfire responded with a sigh, a bit of frustration entering her voice. “I get it, but just try to be cordial. You seemed to at least manage that earlier in his room.” The guard captain stepped back from her lifelong friend and then placed a hoof on one of the door’s handles. “Good luck.”
The door opened and Rainbow Dash crept inside. The dining hall was the same one she had seen in her memories from that other world: dominated by a long white table, tall slim windows at the other end covered with dark purple drapes. The table was already filled with all kinds of steaming hot food that filled the room with wonderful scents that made Dash’s mouth water.
Other than the table and the food, the room was empty. There was no King Sombra in here, not that she could see. So she crept further into the room, her head on a swivel. It seemed pretty rude to her to invite somepony to dinner and then to make them wait.
Dash made her way down the table, to where the only two chairs in the room were. They sat across from each other at the far side of the table with empty plates sitting in front of them. She wasn’t sure if there was etiquette pertaining to which one she should sit at. In her experience, royalty usually sat at the head of the table but that didn’t seem to be an option here. So she just hopped up in the chair on the side she was on and waited.
It was maybe a minute before she heard something metal overhead open with a meaty ‘thunk’. Her head whipped around to see some kind of vent in the corner of the room now open and a black smoke came billowing out. Dash stood from her chair in an instant, her one wing flared, as she prepared to flee. The first guess she had was ‘fire’ and she was ready to bolt if that was the case.
Instead the smoke coalesced at the head of the table, thickening and becoming darker until it formed one solid shape, that shape being the one of the King. His eyes were the first thing to truly become solid, the emerald green irises locking onto Dash as soon as they were able. The rest of his body soon solidified, leaving King Sombra without his usual vestments.
“Oh, I see I’m a bit underdressed.” He remarked as he made his way to the seat across from his guest. “You didn’t have to dress up for me, Rainbow Dash.” His voice was as thick and smooth like the smoke he came into the room as.
“Sorry, Your Majesty.” Rainbow took the cap from her head and put it on the table. “Spitfire and Rarity kinda pushed me to wear something. I just went along with it…” She knew it was stupid to dress up for this thing, she knew it was pointless.
“Of course they did.” Sombra chuckled and rolled his eyes. “Please, you look like you’re going to a funeral. If you’re feeling uncomfortable you’re free to take it off.” He said this all with a slight smile, two fangs poking out from his mouth as he stared at her.
There was no need to say that twice. There wasn’t any smooth way to undo the buttons on either the shirt or jacket. So she just slid them off over her head instead. She had enough wiggle room in the ill-fitting uniform to do so. She let the clothes hit the ground and pushed them under her chair with a hoof.
“Goodness.” Sombra sighed deeply. “I’m glad I invited you to dinner, you could use a good meal.” He gestured at the table between them. “Fresh caught fish from the river below Canterlot, freshly baked bread and mashed potatoes from our kitchen, the most delicious baked soybeans in all of Canterlot. Protein and carbohydrates, just what you need.”
“Did you invite me to dinner just to fatten me up?” Dash raised an eyebrow, but she wouldn’t reject the offerings before her. She gathered up her plate and heaped food upon it, anything she could get a hold of. She wasn’t ever really a picky eater and whatever reservations she had before had now evaporated.
“I would not be telling the full truth if I said ‘no’.” Sombra shrugged and levitated a piece of fish onto his plate. “I wanted to help you recover the most that I could while also enjoying our company.”
As soon as her plate was full and set down back at her place at the table, Rainbow Dash dug in. She had eaten in the morning, sure, but she didn’t feel this hungry then. No, her appetite was more voracious than it had ever been before. She wasn’t even tasting the food as she consumed it, she just knew she needed to eat. Not just because her stomach demanded food, but because she needed to get strong and healthy again. Neither of them spoke until Rainbow Dash had completed her first plate, leaving all but scraps in its wake. She let out a hefty and satisfied sigh as she slumped back in her chair.
“I’ll go back for seconds in a bit…” She mumbled. “I haven’t eaten that much that fast in…forever.”
“Well I’m glad you enjoyed yourself.” Sombra chuckled lightly and put his silver utensils down onto the table. “Would you mind a little conversation between plates?” The King pushed the plate away from him and rested his fore legs in front of him.
“Uh, I guess not?”
“Good. Good.” The shadowy stallion across the way closed his eyes and seemed to center himself before speaking again. “I guess I should comment on your mane? Not a look I expected from you, but it looks quite good. Better than what you came home with.”
“Thanks.” Dash nodded. “I just felt like I needed to reinvent myself after everything that happened.”
“I can only imagine. I was shown all of that where my path diverged. I cannot even begin to think what I would be like if I was shown that now instead of then.” Sombra shook his head and then looked up at the ceiling. “Then to add memory loss on top of it? No, I might go mad. The fact that you are still standing is a testament to your mental fortitude.”
“It’s not easy…” Dash muttered. “I still feel like that other world I saw is my life and this is some…fantasy. Everything here looks real but it feels so fake.” She picked up a silver goblet that sat by her plate and sniffed at the contents, warm cider. She greedily gulped down the amber liquid, the taste reminding her of a home she could only remember now. “Like this—” She said as she sat the goblet back down. “—cider. It feels so real, it tastes like heaven but all I can think of is what it was like there.”
There was that paradox that raged inside of her. When she looked at Sombra, she could only see the villain she had vanquished with her friends twice over. When she talked with him, though, when she got into the flow and she didn’t focus on his appearance but just his company, it all felt so natural and comfortable. She didn’t understand it at all.
“Mmm.” Sombra nodded. “I’ve heard you have these memory flashes, but other than that you don’t remember anything?”
“No. General feelings, I guess. Anything concrete just comes and then goes.”
“The first time I ever saw you, Rainbow Dash, I was attending a practice that the guard was holding in Cloudsdale.” Sombra started on a seemingly unrelated note, a fond smile forming on his face. “Your commander at the time wanted to show you off, his fastest pony, and told you to perform your famous ‘sonic rainboom.’” He leveled his gaze at her again, his features soft. “You were so much different than the others, so ready to prove yourself to all comers. Then there’s that trail of yours, brilliant and full of color…I was entranced. When you began to fly upwards I said to my assistant ‘I want her for the ceremonial division.’ but when I saw your rainboom, I knew I needed you here in Canterlot.”
“You’re the one who got me transferred?” She still knew that memory, she relived it when she went to her house the other day. It stung. It still wounded her pride even through her amnesia.
“A transfer was planned before I came along.” He looked down at the table and furrowed his brow. “Headstrong, stubborn, prideful and had difficulty following orders. You believed in yourself far too much and trusted others far too little. An outright promotion was never in the cards for you, Rainbow Dash. They were going to ship you off to some far corner of the world, guarding Tartarus or sitting in some musty seafort.” He shook his head. “I couldn’t let brilliance be locked away, the world needed to see it.”
“Did you ever tell me any of this or did you just let me think I was demoted for nothing?” She felt that familiar fire rise up in her belly, the one that kept her competitive and faster than anypony else. “Were you just pulling my strings?”
“Of course not!” Sombra stood up from his chair with haste and moved over to Dash’s side of the table and stood beside her. “After you were transferred I extended an invitation to the castle for a dinner such as this, except it was at one of the rooftop gardens.” The King kneeled and rested a hoof on Dash’s leg. His touch was soft and delicate, much unlike what one would expect of a King. “I explained how such a fantastically colorful pegasus such as yourself couldn’t be sent away into the darkness, no. You deserved to be here, in the gilded city amongst the jewels and parades. I asked you to lead my grandest celebrations, be the centerpiece to my crowning achievement…and of course keep me company, my beloved.”
King Sombra leaned in and planted a kiss on Rainbow Dash’s cheek.
Rainbow Dash slammed the dining hall door as she left, her face bright red with a mix of embarrassment and pure rage. She saw Spitfire talking but couldn’t hear her over the blood rushing furiously in her ears. She stomped off, the captain of the guard right on her heels, headed nowhere in particular.
What had just happened was stuck somewhere between unacceptable and unbelievable. Never before had something so patently outrageous happened to her, not something in that vein at least. Being kissed by another pony? What would Applejack think?
Applejack…
They had met before here, when Rainbow Dash had bought cider from her at some event. Was there anymore to it? In that other world she had seen they were more, so much more. Applejack had been her first kiss…and her first love. Even if that wasn’t this world or life, she couldn’t ignore those feelings. She didn’t even know what she felt here or what she was supposed to feel.
A clumsy tongue pushed past her lips
Fumbling hooves touched her sides
First kiss and a little more Hopefully the next one wouldn’t be with Soarin
She stopped when the memory assaulted her at the prompting question of her feelings. It seemed her first kiss was with a colt here, which meant she didn’t have the same gender preference she did in the other world. She slammed a hoof against the tile beneath her, the sound barely registering above the thoughts roiling in her brain.
“None of this makes sense.” She growled as she started walking again, this time in the direction of Spitfire’s apartment. “What am I here? What am I even doing here?” She was asking these questions to herself, knowing that the answers were as far away as those memories.
“RAINBOW DASH!” The shout made all of the ponies, including the pony it was directed at, stop in place. Spitfire landed beside the maimed pegasus, her own face as red and flustered as Dash’s. “Will you stop and talk to me? What happened?” Her voice lowered enough so only the two of them could hear it. “You cannot just run out of dinner with the King like that.”
“He kissed me!” Rainbow Dash hissed out at her friend. She pressed her nose right against Spitfire’s and glared at me. “That bastard kissed me, okay? What else do you want me to do? Stay in there?!”
“What?” Spitfire blinked and looked through Rainbow Dash, completely frozen.
Dash spun around and started to walk again, hoping to find out what was going on through determined introspection.There had to be something in what she already knew and what she had been told by him that revealed more.
She was brought here by him because he liked the way she looked, he liked her fire. She had lived in Canterlot for sometime but her apartment looked abandoned even beyond her absence, then she hadn't really talked with Rarity at all really…so where did she spend her time? Here in the castle? With him?
Then that memory popped up again, the one she had when she first met Sunset Shimmer. ‘I know you’re using him.’ Was ‘him’ Sombra? Sunset seemed to hate her for some reason, and that would make sense. If the King’s personal assistant felt like Rainbow Dash was trying to obstruct his duties or distract him, then yeah the hate would make sense.
With Spitfire now off of her trail, she wandered the halls with only one thing running through her head: she had to find Sunset Shimmer. Her hooves took her to the main hall, then the throne room and finally to the offices near the hospital room where she had woken up a few days ago. In all of that time, the sun had set and the moon had risen.
The royal offices held her prize, standing in front of an open door and talking to a guard. Both mares locked eyes as Rainbow Dash made a beeline straight for her. Dash grabbed the unicorn’s foreleg and dragged her into the open door directly behind her and then closed the door behind them.
“Rainbow Dash, what is this all about?” Sunset demanded with a huff, her cyan eyes burning with the same crimson that ran through her mane.
“What am I?” Rainbow Dash shot back, finally letting go of the other mare’s leg. “What do I do here in the castle?”
“Besides eat up the valuable time of the King?”
“Can you drop whatever you have against me for like two seconds and just answer me?” Dash did her best to soften her own glare and lighten the tone of her voice. “Okay, I just…I need to know why you hate me. What am I to the ponies in this castle? Because right now I’m angry and confused and…and I just need some honesty.”
“You really don’t remember, do you?” Sunset raised an eyebrow and stepped back, scoffing a little. “This isn’t an act at all.”
“You thought this was an act?” Dash looked around the room, the only thing being with them a barren table with half a dozen chairs around it. She went over to one and sat in it, leaning back to the point that it threatened to tip over backwards. “No, no it’s not. I didn’t just make up that my memory disappeared. I’m not doing this for sympathy.” Dash put her face in her hooves and growled a bit. “Something weird just happened and I just want an answer that nopony but you and Sombra can give me and…and right now you’re the one I want to talk to.”
“Color me shocked.”
“Yeah, you and me both. So please, Sunset, if you can just help me understand what’s happening.” Rainbow Dash looked around the room again, just to make sure that nopony else was around and that the door was indeed shut. “King Sombra said some stuff and kissed me and I need to make sense of it.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time.” Sunset mumbled in response.
“Yeah that, I need less of that. Please.”
“Okay.” Sunset threw up her hooves and joined Rainbow Dash in a chair across from her. “Sure. You’re his…consort. That’s a polite way of saying it. You two spend too much time together, you spend too much time here in the castle with him, and you do nothing but distract him.”
“I’m his…marefriend…?”
“No, don’t be stupid.” Sunset rolled her eyes and scoffed at the notion. “Kings don’t have ‘marefriends’, and if they did it wouldn’t be some commoner. You’re somepony who got too close, and if I had to wager it’s the reason why you were captured by those fiends.”
Rainbow Dash was still caught up in the whole ‘marefriend’ thing that it being the reason she was in this mess didn’t even register. She looked up at the ceiling, staring at the tiles and just not thinking about anything else.
“Personally—” Sunset continued. “—I always thought you were using him to advance your career and the gifts that came with being so close to him.”
“Yeah.” Dash mumbled and stood from her chair. “Thanks Sunset.” She ignored the protests from the King’s assistant and walked out of the door, shutting it behind her. “This is…ridiculous…” She kept muttering that to herself over and over as she moved through the halls, her hooves bringing her to the doorstep of Spitfire and Rarity’s apartment.
She had shrugged off Spitfire earlier, but now she needed her two lifelines to bring her back down to earth and sift through these new revelations. Her hoof raised of its own accord and knocked on the door. It was only a few seconds before both of the married mares inside answered.
“Oh thank Equestria, you didn’t leave the castle.” Spitfire sighed in relief and leaned on the doorframe. She was without her helmet and the armor that usually adorned her legs but still wore her onyx breastplate. “I was getting ready to go looking for you again, where have you been?”
“Just…wandering.” Rainbow Dash pushed past them both and went straight for the couch, slumping into the well-worn cushions.
“Now, darling…” Rarity spoke first as both she and Spitfire joined Rainbow on the couch, one on either side of her. “...are you sure what you told Spitfire actually happened? I mean it can be custom with some of those nobility to kiss both cheeks as a greeting or a farewell.”
“When someone like him calls you ‘my beloved’ and then kisses your cheek, yeah I’m pretty sure.” The admission from Dash earned a gasp from Rarity and a little grunt of surprise from Spitfire. “Then I went and talked to Sunset Shimmer afterwards and…and she called me his ‘consort’.”
“What?” Spitfire pulled on Rainbow’s shoulder so the two were facing. “Consort? Like..like…”
“You two didn’t know?”
“Darling, you barely talked to us.” Rarity spoke while Spitfire was still gathering her thoughts. “These past few days have been the most we’ve seen of you in almost a year. Despite living in Canterlot, you’ve rarely visited at all. We only knew what you were up to thanks to Spitfire’s job. We had no idea what was going on in your personal life.”
“I thought you were just ignoring me when I went to your place to check up on you…not…I didn’t think…” Spitfire blinked and nodded a bit, a tear forming at the corner of her eye.
“Sorry.” Dash sighed and leaned on Spitfire’s side. “I just learned about it today, myself. I...I would’ve told you.” She bit her tongue and recognized she would have to take some responsibility for the actions, even if she didn’t remember taking them. “I should’ve told you.”
“What else did he tell you?” Spitfire was now laser-focused on knowing the things she had been blind to. The tone of her voice offered no quarter or debate, she needed to know.
“That he was the one who got me transferred to the ceremonial division because he liked how I looked and…then he invited me to dinner and I guess took a liking to me even more. He asked me to be his and I accepted.” Saying it all out loud didn’t make it any more believable than when it had first happened. “I don’t remember any of this…I don’t even remember liking stallions. In my memories I had a marefriend and didn’t even like stallions so, yeah, this is a bit of a shock to me too.”
“I can’t believe it.” The mares beside her said in unison.
“Yeah, well, rainbow mane didn’t help me hide it…the jokes pretty much wrote themselves for bullies when I was a teenager.” Dash muttered and ran a hoof through her shortened mane. “Sunset thought I was using Sombra for status, but if nopony even knew…”
“Let me sort some of this out…” Spitfire closed her eyes and brought a hoof to the bridge of her muzzle. “Rainbow Dash, you don’t have a preference. You’ve had marefriends before, coltfriends. I’ve never seen it matter to you.”
“It’s true, you brought a unicorn mare to our wedding as your plus one.” Rarity added on. “I guess the important question to answer is what you want to do with this information now?” She continued and placed a hoof on Rainbow’s back. “No matter what anypony thinks of this, including Spitfire and myself, it doesn’t matter. What matters is how you want to handle this. If you choose to…pursue this avenue, then we will be behind you. If you want to forge your own path, then so be it.”
“Mhm.” Spitfire nodded and leaned her head against Dash’s. “I’m a little—well I’m more than a little shocked—but this is the first time in a very long while that we’ve been this close and talked this much. At least since the wedding. I’ve seen you during Hearthswarming with the family since then, but we didn’t really talk. I’m not going to push you away now.” Spitfire took a deep breath and wrapped a warm wing around the smaller pegasus. “Whatever you want, whatever you decide, I’ll be here for you. Even if it means being the King’s…close personal friend.”
“I don’t know what I want.” Dash admitted with a deep long sigh as she closed her eyes and relaxed against Spitfire. “I feel like I barely know who I am.” At the very least, it seemed like her habit of avoiding her family had stuck in both worlds. So that facet of her being remained true no matter what.
“Then it’s time for you to find out for yourself.” Spitfire ran her hoof over Dash’s head slowly. “Think of this as an opportunity, right? Just like you’re doing with Rare and I, you can have second chances. Maybe we can even go see Mom and Dad sometime soon.”
“Yeah, I never really talked to them, did I?”
“Nope. You always said they suffocated you. Once you moved out of their place it was just visiting on the holidays.” Spitfire spoke with some sympathy regarding the situation and gave Dash a pat on the side. “They always coddled you after your eyes went bad and from some of your drunken ramblings, you’ve always resented them more than a little for it. I can’t even imagine how they would react to you now…”
“Do they even know I’m okay?”
“I sent a letter as soon as I got back to Canterlot with you. I told them you were alive and safe now and that it was best for them to stay in Ponyville, just best to let you heal in peace.” Spitfire hummed for a moment. “Relative peace, I mean…considering recent events.”
It was a weird change. In her memories from the other world her parents endlessly cheered her on no matter the danger or challenge. They celebrated her every accomplishment to an inane degree. So they were a lot more protective here, a lot more unwilling to let her attempt to succeed. That would be a difficult change to confront when the time came.
“Just be yourself, darling. Don’t let what others think weigh you down now. You can be the pony you want to be, free of preconceptions.” Rarity leaned on Rainbow Dash too, creating a ponypile on the overwhelmed mare.
Rainbow Dash was lucky to have friends like this. She wasn’t going to take them for granted again, not this time around. She would use the lessons from that other life to make this one better.
Rainbow Dash’s hooves beat against barren earth, clouds of dust kicking up in her wake. The sun beat down overhead and beads of sweat dripped down her body as tired and tight muscles kept her body moving. She had been running laps in the courtyard where the guards trained for an hour now, stopping every so often for a long drink of cold water before getting back to it.
Her last few days had been much of the same: eating massive breakfasts that she and Rarity prepared, running and exercising for most of the day, and avoiding King Sombra and Sunset Shimmer as best as she could. It wasn’t much, but it was what she needed.
The act of working out like this was refreshing, something that she hadn’t done on the ground in what felt like forever. She spent most of her days in the sky, practicing tricks and maneuvers. There was something refreshing about running though, about hooves in dirt. The physicality of it all.
Dash came to a stop at the finish line of the makeshift track, where a table with several jugs of water had been set up for her. Spitfire had it set up after the first day so Dash could stay outside instead of going inside every time she needed a break. She trotted over to the table and sat on her haunches as she pulled one of the jugs down.
She was feeling better and better with each day, stronger too. She was burning as many calories as she consumed each day, already turning her skinny and frail form more wiry and tough. Dash was shorter than most other pegasi, leading to any excess weight she put on more noticeable than others. For now she would be thankful for a more lean physique.
She chugged the cool water down until half of the jug was empty and let out a happy sigh when she pulled it from her lips. She set it down and looked up to the sky, bringing her wing up to block out the sun so she could see without being blinded.
It was a beautiful, if a little hot, day. A few clouds dotted the sky, being moved to wherever they needed to be for the upcoming weather schedule by diligent and hardworking pegasi. A group of guards flew in formation over the castle and in between the clouds, their crystalline armor gleaming in the midday sun. The sounds of the city reached over the castle walls, the sound of socializing ponies going about their days.
It felt like a perfect day.
“Rainbow Dash!” A voice, one she immediately recognized as belonging to Sunset Shimmer, called her name shattered the perfect moment and drew her head back down to the ground. A group of ponies were crossing the courtyard from the castle, chief among them being Spitfire and Sunset Shimmer. Dash stood up and put the jug on the table and waited for them to approach.
“Getting enough exercise in, Dash?” Spitfire beamed as she spoke. She admired the work ethic, the relentless pursuit of betterment, and she was happy to see her adoptive sister in that pursuit.
“I could always do more.” Dash admitted with a matching smile.
“Well we might be able to help with that.” Sunset interjected as she took an elongated box from one of the armored stallions behind her. “It was finished this morning.” The case came to rest on the table with the water as it was relinquished from Sunset’s magical grip. The latches on the case were clicked open by the same magic and it opened to reveal the contents.
Inside was a metal facsimile of a wing crafted of gold and silver. At the point where each of the feathers, sharpened like knives, met the main structure rested a sapphire. Then one last sapphire sat at the base of the thing. The whole thing glimmered and shone in the sun overhead, catching the light no matter the angle.
“Rare just finished fitting the gems this morning.” Spitfire spoke quietly but wasn’t able to keep the smile from her voice. “I’ve never seen the armory make something so fast, especially a prosthetic like this.”
Dash lifted the wing from the case with her hooves. Being metal, she expected it to be heavy. It wasn’t though, it was light and felt almost like a stiff breeze might carry it away. She wished it looked a little less ostentatious, but as long as it worked she wouldn’t complain too much.
“Be gentle with it!” A stallion surged forward and took the wing from Dash’s hooves with a golden aura of magic. “This is delicate hardware! You can’t just toss it around in your hooves.” He was a unicorn, an amber horn poking out of a ragged vermillion mane confirmed that much. Energetic cyan eyes studied the mechanical wing from behind a pair of round spectacles that looked eerily similar to Rainbow Dash’s own. To match his mane, a scraggly beard hung from his chin. “We’ll help you set it in and make sure it works, then we’ll be on our way. If you need any maintenance, just come see me.”
“And you are…?” Rainbow Dash recognized the stallion vaguely, but she couldn’t pin a name down. She had definitely seen him before.
“Oh right, your memory problems.” The stallion muttered and pushed his glasses up on his muzzle. “Sunburst, I’m His Majesty’s court mage and-”
“-my brother.” Sunset Shimmer finished.
“Now stand still.” Sunburst adjusted his glasses again as he moved the metal wing to Rainbow’s side. “You’ll feel a little tingle-well, maybe a shock-as it connects.” He took his time lining up the prosthetic before sliding it over the stump.
There was indeed a shock as the base of the metal wing connected with her flesh. Every hair on her body stood on end as a surge of what she assumed was magic pushed through the nerves of her body all the way up to her brain. It was like catching a second wind she didn’t know she needed. The new wing on her back now stood straight and its metal wings flared out, the jewels glowing with power.
“Please try to lay your wing flat against your back.” Sunburst asked, his eyes traveling up and down the appendage. “Don’t think too hard about it, just like you would with your other wing.”
Dash did as she was asked and tucked the wing against her side. She looked back and forth between the new wing and the real one, unable to tell the difference when it came to the dimensions alone. It was almost a perfect replica, save for the whole ‘being made of metal’ thing. She raised both of her wings and curled the feathers, amazed at the flexibility of the silver and gold-plated limb. Magic was truly a marvelous thing, she had to admit.
“Get used to it for a day or two. Move it around, let your body get acclimated to the magic. Pegasi aren’t used to such direct sources of power connected to their bodies, so just relax. You don’t want your body to reject it.” Sunburst’s voice was full of calm consideration, but there was an underlying urgency in those words. “It’ll probably be a few days, maybe a week, before you can attempt to fly.”
“No way.” Dash rotated the new wing and continued to flex it. She could feel the breeze move over it and saw the metallic feathers react as if they were natural. It felt normal, not like some sort of prosthetic.
Rainbow Dash’s hooves beat against barren earth, clouds of dust kicking up in her wake. Her wings spread out and rushing wind rustled the primaries, both real and fake, as she closed her eyes for a moment and focused on the sensation. It felt like a lifetime since she had shifted into a headspace for flight, but it was like a perfectly tailored suit. It just felt right.
She had a couple of hundred feet of runway ahead of her, wind was coming right at her so takeoff might be a bit of a challenge. Good, she needed one. Her wings beat once. She still expected the new one to fall off of her side due to the weight, but truly she couldn’t tell the difference. They beat again and again and again until she achieved lift.
Hooves left the ground and the tyranny of the earth was left behind. As her eyes opened again, she was greeted with a sight she wasn’t sure she would ever see again. The only thing in front of her was the blue of the sky and the freedom of flight. Her heart soared on new wings and a wave of euphoria washed over her soul like a tsunami.
The now-complete pegasus did nothing but fly around the courtyard where she had been practicing previously. She ignored everything but the sensation of flight, the sense of freedom she had reacquired. She wasn’t quite up with the clouds yet, she knew she was far too tired to go that high at the moment. For now she would be content with staying about fifty feet off of the ground. Greater heights would come soon enough.
“How’s it feel?” Spitfire, who shed her armor, had taken off and risen to the same altitude in a few seconds. Both mares stopped and hovered in place to talk.
“Better than you could ever imagine.” Rainbow Dash couldn’t keep the smile from her face as she spoke. “It’s a bit stiff, but I think that’s just how it’s going to feel. I’m worried about more technical stuff though, I’m not really sure how much control I have over it.”
“One thing at a time, Dash.” Spitfire chuckled. “You’re still not up to full strength yet. Maybe just focus on the basics before you try to do any corkscrews or barrel rolls. “
“Please.” Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes playfully at the captain. “I could outfly you even at fifty percent strength!
“You couldn’t beat me in a race on a good day at one-hundred percent!” Spitfire fired back and gave Dash’s shoulder a light punch. “All of your fancy flying can’t beat pure speed, and I don’t think you can hit that fifth ‘Rainboom’ gear right now.”
Dash was about ninety-nine percent sure she was faster than Spitfire. In the Wonderbolts that was tenths of a second of difference, but it mattered. In a straightaway, Dash would bet on herself over Spitfire one-hundred times out of one-hundred. In something a bit more complicated, an obstacle course or even a track with more curves or changes in elevation, Spitfire would have the upper hoof. There was no denying who was faster, though. Only one pony in all of the world had the speed necessary to create a Sonic Rainboom and it wasn’t Spitfire.
“Wanna bet?”
“Dashie, you’re in no shape to r-”
“You scared?”
“No, I’m not scared of racing somepony who spent three months starving and wasting away and just started to fly again five minutes ago.”
“Then what do you have to lose?”
“You’re really going to make me do this?” Spitfire let out a deep sigh. “Alright, just don’t act like I didn’t warn you.” The unarmored captain rolled her neck and stretched out her limbs. “Let’s start at one end of the courtyard and go to the other end. That’s…” She eyeballed the distance and hummed for a moment. “...a thousand feet? Give or take a hundred.”
“Sounds good to me.”
The two made their way to one end of the courtyard and landed. Dash rotated her wings and stretched, getting as loose as possible before the race could start. Her long bout of exercising beforehand had already left her sore and ready to call it a day, but now this was a matter of pride. She would take a sore body over a wounded pride any day.
“Ready…” Spitfire spoke as she dug her hooves into the hardened soil. Rainbow Dash joined her, assuming a stance like her body was a coiled spring ready to be shot from a cannon.
“Set…” Rainbow Dash said next as they both flared their wings out.
“Go!” They yelled in unison.
They disappeared in a wingbeat, leaving only a cloud of dust behind. Rainbow’s body screamed at the stress she was putting it through, the exertion tearing at the muscles in her back. In the first few seconds she was neck and neck with Spitfire, and the shocked expression from the other mare showed just how unexpected that was.
The effort was grueling, it was like nothing she had ever experienced before. She had flown while exhausted, yes, but it was never like this. Before she always had this ability to push to one-hundred percent even if she was nowhere close to it. She felt her wingbeats start to syncopate and she started to fall behind Spitfire in the standings.
They had stayed side by side until they had about one hundred yards ago and Dash’s strained body finally faltered. She didn’t just slow down, the unused muscles associated with flight seized up and she dropped like a rock. If she had not been only ten or so feet off of the ground, the fall would’ve been severely dangerous. Instead she just tumbled ass over teakettle across the ground, her body picking up dust and dirt. She came to a stop, finally, about ninety feet from the declared finish line.
It was only when her body finally came to a complete stop that her mind caught up. New scrapes and bruises had already sprouted up from her tumble across the terrain and the ache and exhaustion caught up to her. Her eyes closed and she let out a long and low groan that resonated with the dirt and pebbles around her.
“Is the wing okay?” Sunburst was the first one by her side and had her artificial wing raised and was inspecting it closely. “Oh thank the stars, it’s fine. The charms held up, good.”
“I’m fine too, thanks.” Dash yanked her wing away from the stallion and tucked it against her side. She stood, her legs protesting the action wholeheartedly, and winced. “I’m gonna feel this in the morning…”
“I’ve…never seen you fly that fast before.” Spitfire, who hadn’t even broken a sweat from their race, landed by Rainbow Dash’s side. She steadied the exhausted and sore pegasus with a hoof and shook her head. “But I told you so, I knew you weren’t ready.”
“Gotta test your limits, it’s the only way to overcome them.” Rainbow retorted as she stretched out her muscles to alleviate some of the burning pain that consumed them. “And I told you that I could outfly you at fifty percent. I’m just not even at fifty percent yet.”
“If that’s the case then you’ve been holding back for your entire life.” The answer was muttered with a hefty dollop of annoyance added on top. “I should throw you in an ice bath for this, you probably need it anyways.”
“I would kill for an ice bath and a nice deep massage.” Rainbow Dash replied with a longing sigh. “I missed this, though. The burn. The pain. It means it was a good workout.”
“You’re crazy.” Spitfire laughed as both mares trotted back towards the castle. “It’s like you’ve never met a wall you weren’t glad to bash your head against.”
“I’ll stop when a wall finally wins.”
—-
“I miss you.” A metal locket turned over in Rainbow Dash’s hooves. It was something that had been at her home in the city. Rarity had gone and packed up some of her stuff to bring here while she recovered, this locket being one of them. It was a simple thing made of gold with no markings on its outside that could fit in the frog of her hoof.
Inside was a treasure so precious she could barely stand to open it. There was no force on the planet, not even her own sadness, that could stop her from opening it again. There was just a picture inside, a picture of two fillies. One had a wild rainbow mane and a bright smile, the other had a long pink mane she hid behind.
She had half expected the locket to feature three butterflies engraved on its surface, but that would’ve been impossible. Here, in this world, Fluttershy never got her cutie mark. She never had the chance.
“It’s my fault.”
The rainboom scared her.
Sent her falling.
It was a weight on her soul.
The one weight that would add no strength over time.
It was so hard to keep composure when the weight of two worlds were pressing down on her heart. Even alone in Spitfire and Rarity’s guest room, her room now, she felt the need to keep herself together.
“I miss all of you.” She thought about the other mares that made up her friend circle. What would they do if they were here? Alone and isolated they would be in the same position she was, but what if they were all here? How would they deal with this? Their six heads together were better than any one of them alone.
Here it was just Rainbow Dash, though. Rarity was here too, but it wasn’t the same. There were no Elements of Harmony. No grand friendship. It was just herself and a game of two truths and a lie with reality
“No, no lies. Just the two truths.” She reminded herself. This world was real, but so was the other one in her memories. Sombra had even said it and confirmed it. He had seen it too. If it had actually happened or was happening somewhere else, in some different world, was another question. That was the grand design of fate, though. This world was the one that was not meant to be but was happening all the same, so both were true and she carried them both with her.
Her body had already given out once today from strain, how long before her mind would follow from all of this?
Rainbow Dash flew above the castle and looked out towards the horizon. Beyond the streets of Canterlot, at least from up here, everything looked normal. She could see Ponyville and Cloudsdale in the distance, looking the same as she left them…well, minus Twilight’s castle and the friendship school. Those, like so many other things, didn’t have the chance to exist yet.
Doing her best not to dwell on her dual homes, she rolled backwards and went into a dive. She had spent not just her morning, but her entire afternoon up here. She was training her stamina bit by bit, getting stronger and stronger. Even just a day after she failed to finish the race against Spitfire she felt more confident with her wings. It was like walking, or breathing. It was something that came so naturally to her that all she needed was time.
She pulled up far before she met the ground and flew just above the rooftops of the guard barracks. The tips of her hooves clattered along the shingles as she slalomed along the top of the building, really just flying for the sake of it. She wasn’t building up her speed or doing any fancy training. She was sticking with the basics until her flight muscles were back at full strength and she could make certain that she wouldn’t collapse mid-flight.
She had not really spent much time inside of the castle since King Sombra’s little admission. Even today she had eaten breakfast and left immediately to fly. She didn’t even go out through the main doors, she opened one of the windows in the apartment and threw herself out of it.
Anything to make sure she wouldn’t run into Sombra or Sunset Shimmer.
The urge to fly outside the confines of the castle walls and out into Equestria proper, to just explore, was so great. Rainbow Dash had promised Spitfire that she would stay close and stay safe for now, but that didn’t diminish how much she wanted to leave. She wanted to see Cloudsdale and Ponyville and see the ponies who lived there to see how they differed from her memories.
“How’s it handling?!” A shout came from the ground from Sunburst. She had seen him come out of the castle in the periphery of her vision but hadn’t paid him any mind until he called out. Dash spiraled towards the ground and landed beside the mage, tucking her wings against her sides as she did so.
“It’s good.” She nodded and looked at the metal wing before giving it a shake. “I was having trouble with tight turns yesterday but I think that was me.” The metal wing extended and rotated around as its sharp metal feathers spread out. “It’s better now, I just had to adjust.”
“Yes…” Sunburst’s horn lit up and he steadied the wing in his magical grasp as he studied it. “Good integrity on the crystals, they’re holding the spells well. No scuffing so the protection wards have held up too…Rarity does know her gems, I’ll give her that.” Sunburst muttered. “Do you mind if I take it off of you for a few hours? I just want to do some fine tuning on a few things.”
“I do need to eat dinner soon.” A growling stomach reinforced the need for a meal as soon as possible. “Can you get it back to me in like an hour and a half?”
“Yeah, I think so.” Sunburst nodded as his magic slipped into the cracks of the metal appendage and popped it free from Rainbow’s side. “I’ll have it delivered to Spitfire’s apartment when I’m done.” The stallion began to walk away but stopped in his tracks and turned back to Dash. “Oh yes, I believe Sunset was looking for you too. Something urgent, I’m not sure.” He chuckled nervously and rubbed the back of his neck. “I kind of tuned her out, sorry.”
“Can’t blame you.” Rainbow Dash shrugged. “Guess I’ll look for her and then go get dinner.” The two ponies went their separate ways, Sunburst likely off to a dingy room full of books and spells and Rainbow off to find Sunset Shimmer.
Her first inclination was to take to the skies and fly towards Sunset’s office to take a peek through the window, then she remembered that she was down to one wing again. With a grumble she headed into the castle proper and started to meander through the halls towards the administrative wing.
“Oh Rainbow Dash! I’m so glad I ran into you, darling!” Rainbow spun on her hooves to face Rarity who was rapidly approaching her from down a hall. The married mare was walking as fast as she could without breaking into a gallop, probably just out of respect for the castle itself.
“Hey Rarity, what’s up?”
“I wanted to catch you be—what happened to your wing?” Rarity leaned her head to the side to look at the nub of Rainbow’s missing wing. “You didn’t break it already, did you? We worked very hard on that, you know.”
“I didn’t break it!” Rainbow defended herself and scoffed. “Sunburst said he wanted to tweak some things, he’ll have it back to me after dinner. Chill.” Rainbow rolled her eyes at Rarity and let out a sigh.
“Right. Apologies for jumping to conclusions then.” Rarity cleared her throat and straightened her posture. “I actually came to find you to talk about dinner. Spitfire is taking me out tonight for a date night, so I’m afraid that you are quite on your own when it comes to food.”
“Ah…” Rainbow’s disappointment swelled in her stomach and then settled like a rock that dragged her shoulders closer to the floor. She wanted to talk about flying with Spitfire tonight, about a stricter training regiment and maybe even training with the squad she had in this world.
“I’m really sorry, darling.” Rarity reached out and placed a hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder. “It’s just been…months since we’ve been able to do something like this with each other. When you were missing she wasn’t really in the mood for date nights and such.”
“No no, it’s cool. I understand.” Rainbow nodded and took a deep breath before standing up straight. “It’s going to be my first night alone since I got back, but that’s probably important for me. I think.” She put the best brave face she could for her friend. “I’ll probably just go to the castle kitchen and see if they have anything and then go bug Sunburst after I talk to Sunset.”
“A good idea.” Suddenly Rainbow was pulled into a warm embrace by the other mare. “We’ll see you later tonight or tomorrow morning, okay? Be safe, have a good night.”
It took a few moments before Dash could react, she just wanted to melt into the hug. She wanted to take in that familiar perfume that Rarity wore and squeeze her tight, but she had to control herself here. “Yeah. You guys have fun. You deserve it.”
They spoke for a minute or two more, just talking about how Dash was adjusting to the wing and to make sure that she wasn’t pushing herself. Then Rarity went off to get ready for the night out with her wife, leaving Dash to her own devices.
“Right, Sunset first I guess.”
Even though it was well past time for the work day to be over, Rainbow started by heading to Sunset’s office. It was up two flights of stairs and hidden in the depths of the Administration wing. One would think that somepony as important as the King’s personal assistant would be closer to the throne room or even next to the King’s bedroom. Not a whole floor or more removed from either and on the opposite side of the castle.
Sure enough, the door was slightly ajar and light spilled from the interior of the room out into the hall. There was a light muttering coming from inside, like Sunset was talking to herself. Rainbow knocked on the door and opened it before she got a response back.
The office inside was filled to the brim with stacks of boxes, all pushed to the walls to give room to walk around in. Her desk had stacks of papers and sticky notes all around it. To the pony who set it all up it might make sense, but to Rainbow it looked like a cluttered mess.
“Ah, Rainbow Dash.” Sunset sat down the paper she had been reading and looked straight at Rainbow. “Nice of Sunburst to finally do as requested. Please, sit.” A chair was pulled from somewhere in the room and put in front of the desk.
“Alright…” Rainbow did as she was requested and sat. “What’s this all about?”
“The King has requested your presence.” There was a bitterness in her voice that seemed to be present every time she spoke about Rainbow and the King in the same sentence. “While I knew his intentions previously, I’m afraid I can’t comment on them this time. He’s been in the lower depths of the castle over the last few days, in places where nopony is allowed but him.” Sunset shuffled some papers and looked down at her desk.
“What’s this about?” Sussing out Sunset’s motivations had been hard to say the least. It was obvious that she was jealous of Rainbow Dash for her relationship with Sombra. Did she want to be that close with him? Or was there something more?
“Never in my entire life or in the lives of the five personal assistants before me who served him, did he ever bring somepony close to him.” Sunset looked right in Rainbow’s eyes and took a deep breath. “There are things that nopony alive could fathom that he knows about. Can you imagine all of that knowledge he holds? How much somepony could learn from him?”
“So you are jealous.” Rainbow did her best to hold back the grin that was building but she let it slip just a little.
“Yeah well…” Sunset grumbled and huffed before looking back up at Rainbow Dash. “I’ve spent my life studying and learning everything I could relating to Equestria, its history and King Sombra. To be so close and to still feel like you know nothing is…infuriating.”
“Let me ask again—” Rainbow Dash cleared her throat. She was glad to have a little glimpse into Sunset’s state of mind and why the mare was so adversarial towards her, but none of it explained why she was telling this to Dash now. “—what is this about?”
“He’s going to show you something.” Sunset pulled a folder from beneath her desk and sat it in front of her. “There’s always been rumors of what’s down there, we’ve all heard them: Celestia and Luna’s horns, Cadenza herself still alive, some old relics called the Elements of Harmony. Nopony knows, though.” Sunset tapped her hoof against her desk nervously. “I want you to tell me what’s down there.”
“Yeah, sure.” All Rainbow needed to hear was the possibility of the Elements. Sombra knew who she was, what she was. He knew her connection to them, surely he wouldn’t be foolish enough to bring her close to them. Maybe if she could just interact with her element, it could set some things right. Maybe it would boot her back to the world she knew instead of this one. On the off chance it was something else, there was no harm in getting Sunset on her side.
“I’m…surprised you agreed so quickly, but I won’t complain.” Sunset stood from her desk and motioned towards the door. “I’m supposed to escort you to the King now. We’ve kept him waiting for long enough.”
The two walked in silence through the castle. Sunset Shimmer’s walls went back up as soon as they left her office, once again adopting the stone-faced and focused demeanor she always assumed in the halls. They made their way to the throne room on the first floor and went to the back of the cavernous room where a door stood flanked by two guards. The guards held up their hooves to Sunset and waved Rainbow Dash through.
Through the door was a staircase that seemed to go down forever in front of her into an inky black abyss. The door closed behind her with a heavy thud and she stared into the depths ahead of her. It wasn’t completely dark, as the steps themselves glowed ever so slightly so she could always see them. She extended one of her rear legs and pushed on the door, only to find that it had somehow disappeared behind her.
“Great. Magic staircase.” Rainbow Dash grumbled and started her way down. She supposed that was one way to keep ponies that somehow managed to get through the guards from getting out with whatever they found.
For five minutes she plodded down the stairs, never seeing anything in front of her other than the never ending stairs and an infinite blackness. She stopped in place and thought for a moment. Surely she should’ve hit the bottom by now. Sure the castle was on top of a mountain, but there was no way a single staircase with no landings or turns went all the way to the bottom.
“Lost?” A raspy baritone whispered right into her ear.
“AH!” Rainbow Dash jumped out of her skin and flared her one wing as she spun around on the stairs to find out who that was. There was nothing behind her but darkness, not even the stairs going up were visible anymore.
The darkness coalesced into a solid form in an instant, King Sombra soon stood before her with black smoke wafting off of his body like steam. He grinned down at the mare with his fangs poking from behind his lips and a knowing look in his piercing emerald eyes.
“Can you not?!” Rainbow instinctively punched his shoulder with a hoof and huffed. What she had done flashed through her mind and she looked at the King in earnest regret. “Uh…sorry. I didn’t mean to…hit you.”
“It didn’t hurt so you’re fine.” Sombra stepped around Rainbow Dash and looked down the staircase. “My question stands: are you lost?”
“Well there’s no end to these stairs, so yeah. A little.” She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. “Let me guess, they’re magic or something.”
“Or something.” Sombra concluded. “The door closes and it seals you in a singular point, infinitely repeating until you figure it out.”
“Okay so you’re just going to magic us out, right?” Rainbow Dash knew he could turn into smoke, but could he teleport like Twilight could? He was old enough that it seemed like something he should know how to do.
“Magic doesn’t work down here.” Sombra tapped his hoof against the stairs. “Specially constructed to nullify such things. I can still change my form as I please because that’s not magic, that’s just how I am. No magic down here, no flying, no cheating. The answer is practical, if esoteric.” Sombra stepped forward, but skipped a step. “Every other step and we’ll be onto the next room.”
“Really? The trick is just taking two steps at a time?” Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes and looked down at the crystalline floor. The steps themselves were narrow, barely big enough for her hoof to fit on. That coupled with the dim light of the stairwell discouraged taking two at a time. “Sure, why not.”
They both started down the steps, skipping every other one as their eyes were fixed on their hooves. It didn’t take long for the two ponies to come to a rest on a landing, presumably at the bottom now. The whole trip, after implementing Sombra’s solution, had taken less than a minute.
“See?” King Sombra rested a hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder and shot her a smile that fully bared his teeth.
A shiver shot up Rainbow’s back and she felt a blush creeping up her neck to her cheeks. Her wing twitched against her side and threatened to flare out, but she fought all of those urges. She forced those treacherous feelings down and just gave him a small nod.
Before them now was a door, the same composition as the one that had been at the top of the staircase. The King opened it and held it open for Rainbow Dash to enter first. On the other side was a room that was made of the same exact material as the stairs, an opaque slightly glowing crystal. It was nothing more than a box with only the door she walked through in it. It lost even that as Sombra walked through and the door disappeared as it shut.
“Let me guess, there’s another trick to this?” Rainbow Dash walked around the room and looked at the walls. “Like the door is just invisible in the exact same place where we came in?” She approached one of the walls, the one on the complete opposite side of the room from Sombra, and tapped on it with her hoof.
“Not quite.” He took up a spot in the middle of the room and beckoned Dash to join him. “Please, come here.” She slowly approached the stallion, still wary of him and his intentions here. This looked a little too much like a jail cell, one he might try to trap her in. When she stood in front of him he gave her a warm smile and looked her straight in the eyes. “Do you trust me, Rainbow Dash? Please, answer honestly.”
“No.” Rainbow Dash didn’t even need to think twice about that answer.
“Well I need you to.” Sombra replied. “Not forever, just for now. In these moments where it’s just you and I down here alone…I need you to trust me, Rainbow Dash. Please.” His voice had lost its edge that it usually retained when around others and was now flowing into her ears like warm honey.
Rainbow Dash sighed and nodded reluctantly.
“Close your eyes, please.”
She bit her lip and took a deep breath before closing her eyes. Her ears twitched and turned towards where Sombra was. He shifted, his metal adornments scraping against the crystals beneath them both. A hoof came up and rested against her cheek, the metal cool against her warm fur.
“Imagine this room in your mind’s eye.” Sombra spoke softly. “Four walls, a floor and a ceiling. The whole thing is made of crystals that glow just enough to give the room form.” He paused. “Do you see it?”
She nodded.
“Imagine the space in front of you, beyond me. See the wall.” Sombra moved to her side and her ears rotated to follow. “Picture a door in the wall right in front of you. Once you have it, walk towards the door.”
Rainbow Dash did as she was told and pictured a door in the wall in front of her. She pictured the same one that had been at either end of the staircase. The picture of the altered room was now in her mind and she held it there. She moved across the room in as straight of a line as she could imagine and reached out when she was close to the edge. Her hoof, instead of hitting the flat wall, landed on a wooden door instead. She fumbled around for the doorknob and gave it a turn and a pull. Once it opened, so did her eyes.
Just like that, an opened doorway was in front of her. She stepped through it hastily and Sombra was right behind her as she did so. Now they were both in an elongated hallway at which yet another door sat at the far end.
“Okay.” Rainbow Dash finally let out the breath she didn’t realize she had been holding in with a sigh. “What’s this room, then? Infinite hallway where we can’t touch the ground or something?”
“Hmm…” Sombra closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment. “No. We got lucky. This one is just a hallway.” Then he began walking. “The rooms change. Always three puzzles with different solutions and different room layouts. I believe this time we just got a lucky draw on room three. I’ll have to do some tweaking to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”
“So…” The only sound was their hooves against the floor as they made their way down the hall. “...what’s exactly down here? Sunset said nopony really knows so it must be important, right?”
“An understatement.” He mumbled somberly. “It’s the most important thing in the world, Rainbow Dash. A shackle of fate I’ve not been strong enough to cast aside yet. It’s something you need to see to understand and hopefully trust me again. Only myself and one other pony know what it is…you will be the third pony ever to know.” They both stopped before the final door. “I only ask that you let me explain and think before you react. That’s my one condition.”
“I’ll…I’ll do my best.” Dash resolved. “I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try.”
“That’s all any of us can do.”
The door opened and led into what looked like one of the apartments up above. It was the same layout as Rarity and Spitfire’s at the very least. A small kitchenette was to the right as soon as they walked in and a small entryway opened up into a living space replete with a couch and a radio propped up on a table.
“He must be busy…or napping.” King Sombra mused as he walked into the abode and looked down the hall where the bedrooms would be. “I have arrived for another inspection!” He shouted down the hallway.
There was the sound of a creature scrambling some behind one of the doors and soon one of them flew open and a stallion careened down the hall. He was tall and meant to be burly, but his sterling white coat seemed to almost cling to his skin. There was still mostly muscle underneath that fur, but he was very lean as opposed to bulky. A two tone blue mane was on top of his head, almost the same length as Dash’s own. A horn protruded from his forehead and glowed pink as the stallion shut a door behind him.
“King Sombra, Your Majesty.” The stallion bowed before the regent. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t expecting you…or…” He looked at Rainbow Dash. “...company.”
“Shining Armor?” Rainbow Dash couldn’t believe the pony in front of her was the Captain of the Royal Guard from the other world. He looked so…small. So frail. The Shining Armor she knew was a magical powerhouse that could hold off an army even when he was mind-controlled, this one didn’t even look like he could fight her off.
“Yes?” Shining replied. “I’m sorry, have we met?”
“I told her about you on our way down.” Sombra smartly interjected himself in the conversation. “Shining Armor, this is Rainbow Dash. She’s here to join me for the inspection.” Shining Armor looked at Rainbow Dash critically and then gave an almost imperceptible shrug. “Is everything in order?”
“Yes, Your Highness. I was actually just attending to it when you arrived. Dinner time, you know.” Shining Armor moved down the hall towards the door he had come out of. “Sh—” The stallion caught himself and took a deep breath. “—it…has been fine. As always.” There was a profoundly deep pain in his voice that Rainbow couldn’t place. It was almost like a kicked puppy.
“Good. Please, to your quarters.” Sombra motioned Shining away. “I need to be alone with Rainbow Dash for a moment.” He waited until the unicorn had entered another room down the hall and turned back to his pegasus companion. “Understand that what I have done down here is not because I wanted to. These are not acts of malice. Everything I have done is a necessity for the stability of Equestria, I need you to understand that.”
He opened the door.
There should’ve been a simple bedroom behind it, but there wasn’t. Instead there was a massive cavernous and dimly lit room that had been carved out of the mountain itself. Purple crystals jutted from every surface and reflected the world around them, amplifying what little light there was by a few torches spread across the room. At the far end she could see a bed against the wall and something in the bed connected to the wall by a chain.
“Hello?” A small shaking voice called out. “Y-you’re not Shiny…or Him.” The creature in the bed stood, it’s full height easily double that of Rainbow’s. A metal ring was fastened around its barrel to keep the twitching wings that sprouted from its back from moving at all. A long sharp horn also sprouted from its head and had a glistening piece of metal at its base. “Who are you?”
The creature, the alicorn, stepped forward. She was about halfway across the room when the chain that connected her to the wall became taut and kept her from moving forward any further. Alicorns were always lanky creatures, but this one was different. She was mostly bone, no muscle or fat to be seen on her body.
“I-I don’t get a lot of visitors.” The alicorn continued. “My name’s Twilight Sparkle, what’s yours?”
The only sound to break the deafening silence in the cave deep beneath Canterlot was hooves against stone as Rainbow Dash crept closer to the pony across from her. Dash’s eyes kept locked on this version of her friend while Twilight kept her own fixed on the ground. One had so much to say, and the other had been beaten into silence over such a long period of time.
Twilight Sparkle was about the same height as Celestia from that other world. Her legs were thin and spindly, her mane long and unkempt, and her coat pale and dull. Rainbow Dash reached out with a hoof, which caused the alicorn to recoil reflexively.
“Hey…” Dash whispered. “It-it’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you.” Her hoof touched the alicorn’s cheek and she could feel Twilight press against it. Her fur felt coarse and rough, she could feel the grit from the rocks and dirt in the cave deeply embedded into her coat. “I’m Rainbow Dash. I’m not here to hurt you.”
The mix of emotions that roiled deep down in her soul were still getting sorted out in her head. She wanted to cry. She wanted to pull Twilight into the deepest tightest hug she could manage and never let go. She wanted to scream and rage at the two stallions who put and kept her friend here. It was so difficult to push it all down and keep going.
“You’re the first new pony I’ve met in a really really long time.” Twilight mumbled. “Like forever.” The fully grown alicorn’s hooves tapped against the floor. “I like your name. It’s pretty.”
“Thanks.” Rainbow nodded and cleared her throat as she continued to push down all of her feelings. “H-how long have you been down here, Twilight?”
“A long time…” Twilight reached out with her own hoof and poked Rainbow Dash’s chest carefully. “...ever since I got my cutie mark. I’m not sure how long that is, I lost track after a year I think.” Twilight put her hoof on Rainbow’s head and ran it across her shaved head and let out a giggle at the sensation. “I really like your mane. I knew it would feel funny.”
“Why do you think you’re down here?”
“Oh…” Twilight suddenly drew her hoof back and withdrew into herself. “...because I’m like this.” She nodded at her wings and up at her horn. “I’m not supposed to be like this. It’s dangerous. I’m supposed to stay down here to keep everypony safe.”
“A poor victim of fate.” A somber baritone invaded the conversation and split the two mares apart. Twilight’s eyes went wide and she scrambled away towards the bed against the wall. Any pity or sadness that Dash had evaporated in the face of burning rage that erupted in her heart as she turned towards Sombra.
“Fate?!” She roared as he approached. “You did this to her! Not fate! Not some…concept or something! You!” She could feel her face heat up as she stepped up to the King and puffed out her chest.
“I reacted.” Sombra stated cooly. “I was presented with a situation and I acted as I had to.”
“Maybe don’t imprison her for twenty years!” Rainbow yelled at him. “Keeping her all the way down here, away from everything! Do you even give her anything to read?” She looked back at Twilight, who was now just a lump under her covers. “She needs something to read…” She mumbled.
“It was this or the same end as Cadenza.” Sombra’s voice fell to a whisper. “I could not kill a child, no matter the circumstance. I could not let her live up there, either.” He looked past Dash and sneered at the lump on the bed. “Alicorns…ponies just flock to them, hold them up on pedestals. They’ll do anything to put them into power, even kill.” He motioned at Twilight. “Can you imagine ponies putting their own lives in danger for her?”
“Yeah. I can.” Rainbow shot back. “I have. I still would.”
“Not for her you wouldn’t.” Sombra replied. “For the Twilight from the world-that-should-be, yes. Not this one. She ascended when she was but a foal. Imagine if she was left to her own devices up there. Imagine if ponies worshiped her, committed violence in her name. Not for her actions, no, but just because she was given wings. She hasn’t earned anything.”
“She’s still a pony.” Rainbow could feel tears start to form in the corners of her eyes. “I don’t care what other ponies would do, I care about her as an actual living breathing pony. Is this how a pony should live?”
“It’s better than her death.”
“Those aren’t the only two options!” Rainbow Dash screamed. “It isn’t death or imprisonment! Or is this just who you are? You’re just destined to put ponies in chains, huh?” She shook her head in disgust and turned away from him.
“No, that’s not who I am. Those were the only two options I had, the only ones I saw in that moment. I’ve regretted every moment she’s spent down here.” Sombra reached out and put a hoof on Dash’s shoulder. “I am heartbroken that this had to happen.”
“But you’re not sorry you did it.” Rainbow scoffed in disgust. “And then you have the gall to make her own brother spend his life guarding her down here? Really?”
“He volunteered.” Sombra growled out. One of his eyes began to twitch as he took a deep breath before speaking again. “She’s his family, and therefore he sees her as his responsibility. If you want to talk to him about it, then be my guest.”
“I don’t want to talk to him.” Rainbow turned around and muttered. “I barely wanted to talk to you before this…now…?” She shook her head.
“That’s why I brought you down here.” Sombra kept his voice low so only Dash could hear him. “I came down here to check on her a few weeks ago and the guilt finally got to me. She needs somepony who doesn’t…resent her in some way. That’s not me nor anypony in my castle.”
“Shining Armor is right out there.”
“She ascended when she got her cutie mark during an exam and the resulting blast not only wiped out an entire wing of the castle, but also their parents and countless others.” Sombra straightened his posture. “Shining Armor watches over her because he sees it as his duty, to keep her safe from others and others safe from her.” Sombra retrieved a medallion from his cloak and placed it on the ground. “Spend time with her if you want, if not I understand. You can return to the surface anytime you wish with that trinket, one way only. To get back down you have to go through the rooms again.” He pulled a second, identical medallion out, tapped it three times with a hoof and disappeared in a flash of light.
“Gah, I can’t believe him!” Rainbow Dash threw her head back in frustration and let out a series of sounds that approximated several unladylike words. When she felt she had gotten most of her feelings out, she took a deep breath and centered herself.
“Y-you know the King?” Twilight raised her voice for the first time since Sombra came in.
“I don’t even know.” Rainbow trudged over to Twilight’s bed and flopped on it, her head hitting her alternate-friend’s bony flank. “I don’t know a lot of things, it seems.” She sighed again.
“Are you trapped down here with me now?” Twilight asked, her hoof once again running over Rainbow’s mane with a little smile. “Did you do something wrong too?”
“Hey.” Rainbow sat up and looked at the alicorn with a fire in her eyes. “You didn’t do anything wrong, alright? I don’t know if anypony has told you this before, but this isn’t your fault.” She shook her head. “No, none of this is. You didn’t do anything, it’s everypony else that wronged you.”
“I don’t know about that…”
“Some things you don’t have to know, you just have to trust that it’s true.” It was weird for Rainbow Dash to feel like the wise sage with all of the friendship knowledge, but it wasn’t unwelcome. She was used to teaching by now, just not used to teaching Twilight.
“What happened to your wing?” Twilight asked, yanking the conversation down a more personal path.
“Some…bad ponies got a hold of me.” Rainbow wasn’t sure if Twilight knew anything about the world above, but she would guess next to nothing. How much did she know about the world when she was eight? Nothing much, so Twilight staying at that level for twenty years… “They hurt me, a lot. They kept me down in a dungeon like this for a couple of months.”
“Oh…I kinda know what that’s like.”
“Yeah, you do.”
Rainbow looked at Twilight, really studied her for the first time. Her mane was as long as Luna or Celestia’s, but it didn’t flow with the same ethereal magic. Despite the situation as a whole, there was a spark in her bright violet eyes that made Rainbow Dash want to smile. Even with everything going on, with her whole life lived in this cave, there was still a hint of that pure Twilight essence deep down.
“Do you like stories?” Dash asked. She received an eager nod in response. “Yeah, kinda figured. Wanna hear one?” Again she got a quick and enthusiastic nod. Rainbow Dash sat up straight and put her back against the wall. “Once-”
“Wait wait! Let me get comfortable!” Twilight came fully out from under her blanket and tucked her legs under her body like a cat would. “Okay, I’m ready.”
“Once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria, there were two sisters who ruled over the land and spread harmony to all of the little ponies.” Rainbow Dash was trying to get the wording to the old story right, but an approximation would be good enough. “The older sister raised the sun that all of the ponies played and lived under. The younger sister raised the moon at night and kept the dreams of all of the ponies safe.”
“I don’t think I’ve heard this one before…” Twilight’s eyes went wide with excitement and she let out a shrill noise of excitement. “What were their names?”
“Uh…their names don’t matter for now. They’re not the main characters, really.”
“Then why start with them?”
“It’s, y’know, like a backstory. It’s important to set the scene.” Rainbow Dash explained in exasperation. “Can I continue?” Twilight muttered a quick apology and nodded. “So the two sisters. Everything was happy for a long time, but the little sister eventually got jealous. She didn’t think it was fair that all of the ponies froliced and played underneath her sister’s day and slept through her beautiful night. She let that jealousy take her over and became a pony overwhelmed by her own dark heart! She became Nightmare Moon! The sisters had a big epic battle but the older sister used these old magical artifacts called The Elements of Harmony and sealed her own sister in the moon itself.”
“Hmm…” Twilight’s head swiveled and looked at the door that led to her brother’s apartment.
“It was…the hardest thing the older sister had to do. She watched over her little sister every night when she raised the moon so all of her little ponies could sleep. It hurt her…so much to look up at the moon every night.” Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and closed her eyes. “But she knew her little sister would be back. In one thousand years, the stars would aid in her escape.”
“Do you think she did the right thing, the older sister?” Twilight couldn’t push down the pain in her voice no matter how hard she tried. “There wasn’t any other way?”
“I don’t know.” Rainbow admitted. “I know she didn’t do it because she hated her sister, though. She did it because she loved the ponies of Equestria and she knew her sister was…not in a good place.”
“Is she still up in the moon?”
“No, that was over a thousand years ago.” Rainbow looked at her friend and smiled. “It took a group of brave and amazing ponies to save her.”
“Are those the main characters?”
“Yeah, but it starts with just one. This little purple unicorn-”
“-like me!” Twilight chimed in excitedly as her hooves tapped against the bed.
“Yeah, just like you.”
“Um…Rainbow Dash?” Twilight looked down at the bed where her once tapping hooves were now playing with the sheets. “Do…do you think you could run your hoof through my mane?” The alicorn’s face turned bright red as she asked the simple little question. “My-my parents used to do that when they were telling me stories…”
“Uh…” Rainbow was taken aback by the question, but she did give a little nod. Twilight scooched a little closer and rested her head on the pegasus’ leg. Dash reached out and began to slowly stroke through the long ratty mane of the alicorn. “The purple pony lived in Canterlot for most of her life, and she was the smartest pony around. She knew everything in any book you could imagine. She could recite facts and figures with ease. But, she had no friends. She spent her days in a castle, where the older sister taught her the ways of magic. Then one day, the older sister sent her student out to a little town to make some friends. Little did the student know that she was sent there on the same day, one thousand years later, when the younger sister would return.”
Once more, Rainbow Dash was interrupted by Twilight. However it wasn’t by a question, it was by a light snore. It had been just a few minutes of Rainbow Dash telling her story and Twilight was already passed out. She waited a few minutes before getting up and picking up the medallion from the middle of the room. She looked back at her friend one last time before tapping the little amulet and disappearing.
Rainbow Dash reappeared in a blinding flash of light amid the room connected to Sombra’s bedchambers.The dying embers of a fire sputtered and fumed in the fireplace against the wall and an open book lay on one of the chairs. She sighed and shook her head, the rage deep down in her heart still burning like the coals in the fireplace.
“Oh hello again, Rainbow Dash.” The voice made the mare nearly jump out of her skin as it broke the silence of the study. “I can’t say I’m used to new faces just popping in whenever.” It was Discord, his head still hanging above the mantle, lit from below by the dying light. In the moment, she could see the scion of chaos as a monster still. That was until she remembered he was nothing but a disembodied head. “Oh are you breaking in? Looking to steal some trinkets or find some dirt on His Majesty?”
“No…” Rainbow Dash didn’t have it in her to argue or rail against the bodiless god. She didn’t feel like she had a lot left in her at all at the moment. “I..uh…I came from the dungeon. I saw…a friend. Or maybe somepony who should be my friend? I don’t know.”
“Ah, The Problem.”
“What?”
“That’s what he calls her, at least after he visits her.” Discord’s voice lowered and he furrowed his brow to mock Sombra’s countenance. “What am I to do with this infinite Problem? Oh woe is me, woe is me.” The beheaded God rolled his eyes. “He gets lost in his own feelings more than anypony I’ve ever met. Anyway, that filly down there in his magic dungeon is the one problem he cannot solve, because any solution is worse than the problem itself if you believe his rhetoric.”
“Yeah, he gave me his little spiel down there.” Rainbow grumbled. “‘I’m heartbroken that it had to be done.’ Yeah right.” Rainbow Dash flopped in the chair before the fireplace. “Why didn’t he just kill her? He’s afraid ‘Fate’ will just materialize a new alicorn from out of nowhere to usurp him? Who? Cadance is…gone-” she couldn’t bring herself to say dead, not quite yet. “-so it’s not like Flurry Heart has a way to exist. So…what?”
“That’s the scary part, isn’t it?” Discord’s mouth erupted into a crazed grin, sharp teeth lining his crooked mouth. “What next? When the last hope of the universe’s plan to set things right goes away, what will it do? Cornered animals are quite dangerous, you know. When you remove the last possible winning card from the deck, what will your opponent do? Maybe they’ll give up quietly and walk away…or perhaps they’ll flip the table and ruin everything.” Discord let out a cackle that made Dash’s blood run cold. “When you know everything, the unknown is so infinitely terrifying it’s better to just play for a stalemate.”
“What, you think the entire universe would just end if he killed Twilight?”
“It’s certainly a possibility, isn’t it?”
“And if he lets her out, he loses. At least, if he’s right that ponies would just flock to her.” That would be preferable to just keeping her down there or the world ending though, surely he sees that. He’s played the strings of fate like an expert fiddler for one thousand years, he could figure a way to come out the other side unscathed if he let Twilight go, right? “Wait…why do I care what happens to him?” Rainbow shook her head. “I need to work on getting Twilight out, Sombra be damned.”
“Oh, just announcing our plans while in the same room as someone who lives in Sombra’s quarters, are we?” Rainbow cringed when she realized that Discord could hear that part. What could she say to get him to keep quiet? “Oh, don’t worry about bribing me.” He responded, as if reading her mind. “After all, if you’re successful it will be the most chaotic thing to happen to this dull place since Sombra took over. If I was capable of taking sides, it would certainly be yours where I would fall.”
“Great, noted.” There was no comfort in needing to trust Discord, but she would have to for now. She gave the once threatening creature a nod as she walked towards the door that led to Sombra’s bedchamber.
She just needed to get through this room and hope he wasn’t in there and if he was that he was sleeping soundly. The door to the bedchambers opened slowly, groaning with every inch moved. Dash stuck her head through and blinked as her eyes adjusted to the darkness beyond.
The dying light from the fireplace spilled from the doorway, pushing the darkness back bit by bit. It was just enough that Dash could see shapes and shadows of the room and could successfully navigate her way to the exit.
However, as she looked around the room, her eyes fell upon the greatsword affixed to the wall. It was still stained in the blood of Celestia and Luna, the blade forever tainted by a dark red sheen. A thought crossed her mind…one that half of her treacherous brain rejected entirely. She could lift that massive blade probably and then bring it down on the sleeping King not twenty feet away. Then she could get Twilight out of the dungeon and set the world right.
Her hooves wouldn’t move towards the blade, though. No matter how much she willed them to. Something beyond her own malice towards the monarch stayed her hooves from violence, something she still couldn’t explain. He had killed the princesses! He had killed Cadance! He had imprisoned Twilight for her entire life! He deserved nothing more than a swift death himself!
But when she looked towards his bed and saw the covers rising and falling with every breath, she heard the soft grumble of his snores. Her heart fluttered. It was an infuriating fact that for some reason, she liked him. It was some vestige from before she woke up in that castle, some leftover emotion from when she was considered his consort.
With a deep and frustrated sigh Rainbow Dash trudged through the darkened room towards the exit. She gave one last look back at the sword and the figure in the bed, shook her head, and opened the door to leave.
She had expected to be accosted by guards waiting outside of the King’s bedchambers, but there were no sentries in place. Either Sombra had sent them away for her sake or he trusted the wards he had on his room a little too much. She was free to wander to her heart’s content, but her heart was set on just going home. Was sleep in the cards after what she had learned? Who was to say.
Her hooves carried her to Rarity and Spitfire’s apartment, where she sleepily pushed open the door. She had expected to be met with a darkened interior, instead the living room light was on and a soft song played over the radio.
“Rainbow Dash?” Spitfire’s voice came from inside, but with no Rarity to accompany it. The yellow head of the mare popped around the corner. “Oh thank goodness. I was worried about you, y’know!”
“Sorry…” Rainbow mumbled. “I got caught up with…an old friend.” It still hurt to think about the imprisoned pony in the dungeon, about her friend. “I couldn’t really tell anypony to send a message.
“Ahh, an ‘old friend’, huh? Some time with the King?” There was a playfulness to the question, but Rainbow was having none of that.
“No! That monster isn’t my friend.” She spat back at Spitfire as she rounded the corner to the living room and flopped on the couch beside her friend. “After today he’ll never be my friend, either.” Spitfire hurriedly gathered up a bunch of papers that were scattered around the coffee table and stuffed them into a folder that she then put face down. “I don’t even think I can tell you what I saw. It’s probably classified or something.”
“Half of my job is classified.” Spitfire said with a grin. “Try me, and if I’m not supposed to know then at least I’m good at keeping secrets. We’ll keep it between us.”
“Okay…I won’t get in trouble for telling you, right?”
“Nah, just try not to tell everypony and we should be fine.”
“You remember Twilight Sparkle?” Rainbow started with a deep breath.
“The filly that destroyed half of the castle and died? Sure. You said she was one of your friends in that…other world.” Spitfire was still dismissive of that other world, which Rainbow Dash now knew to be 100 percent true. “I mean, I read her file. That’s about all I know about her.”
“She’s alive.” Rainbow stated bluntly as she looked down at her hooves. “That magical explosion didn’t kill her, she ascended. She became an alicorn.” Spitfire’s brow furrowed at that word ‘alicorn’. It was certainly a four letter word around here. “Sombra’s kept her locked up in a magic dungeon since then, since she was a filly. He showed me and I talked to her…and…” Tears welled up in Dash’s eyes as she felt herself unable to continue. She let the emotional load finally shatter her walls as she collapsed on the couch and sobbed. “She-she’s not supposed to be there.”
“Rainbow Dash, she’s an alicorn. She’s dangerous.”
“She’s still basically a filly, Spitfire! She wants to be told bedtime stories and wants her mane brushed as she’s falling asleep! She’s not a danger to anypony! Sweet Celestia, you’re almost as bad as him.” Rainbow Dash threw her hooves up. “It’s completely awful what he’s done to her!”
“He should’ve just killed her, so this is a better alternative for her at least.” Spitfire looked towards the ground, as if she could see through it to the threat that she now knew was deep below their hooves.
“Those aren’t the only two options!” Dash yelled for the second time that night. “Whatever. I should’ve known this is how you would react. Forget I said anything.”
“I will.” Spitfire responded curtly. “You’ve always had a soft spot for ponies that need help, but I didn’t think it would lead to alcorn sympathizing. So I’ll forget it, as long as you don’t bring It up again.” There was a heavy silence between the two mares, both of them quietly resenting the opinion of the other. “Anyway…we’re going to Ponyville in the morning. Rarity and I talked it out and we figured it’d be a good idea to get you to see Mom and Dad again.”
“Just tomorrow? Out of nowhere?”
“It’s a bit sudden, but we think getting out of Canterlot for a day or two would be good for you. Plus, Mom and Dad deserve to see you and know you’re okay.”
“I mean, okay, I guess.” It wasn’t that she didn’t want to see her or parents. She was curious what they were like here. It was just awfully sudden. “When are we leaving in the morning? I was hoping to get some more flying in tomorrow.”
“Early.” Spitfire retrieved the folder that she had been perusing before Rainbow had come in and opened it. The front read ‘CLASSIFIED’ in big red letters. “Busy busy day.” She mumbled.
“Alright…” The conversation was weird and stressful to begin with, but the ending only left it even more so. “Goodnight…?”
“Yeah, goodnight.”
Rainbow trudged to her room and shut the door behind her. The metallic facsimile of a wing she needed to function was laying on her pillow. She picked it up and gave it a quick study, nothing had been changed outwardly but who knew what Sunburst had done to the spells affixed to it. She sat it on top of the dresser and flopped into bed.
Sleep came faster than she expected. Almost as soon as she closed her eyes she found herself drifting off and then she began to dream.
Rainbow Dash found herself in familiar skies high above the Everfree Forest. She had flown here a million times, the unpredictability of the weather made it more of a challenge. It was another thing to go up against, something else to make her better in the long run. She had been diving in and out of clouds and skimming the tops of the dangerous trees below for hours without incident.
The peaceful flight was shattered when a lance of energy erupted from the canopy below and passed within an inch of Rainbow’s wing. She fled. She flew as fast as she could, heading towards Ponyville itself to tell the local guards.
A massive pillar of magic erupted from the forest as she got to the edge where wilderness met orchard. It formed a massive maw that swallowed her whole.
