“Rainbow Dash!” The cry roused the sleepy sky-blue pegasus. Running a hoof through her prismatic mane she groaned. The weather schedule had called for some early morning adjustments today, so Dash had done her job, and retreated to one of her more secluded clouds to take a nap, to make up for the early morning. In fact there where only two ponies that even knew this was one of her napping spots, and one of them was named ‘Rainbow Dash’ so that didn’t leave a long list of suspects as to who had awoken her.

Pulling the cloud apart just enough to poke her head through, Dash asked, “What is it, squirt?”

“Twilight’s looking for you,” the orange pegasus filly, with the purple mane, below said in response.

With a slight roll of her rose red eyes Rainbow Dash pulled the cloud apart a little more, allowing herself to slip through the hole altogether. Just because Twilight was a friend didn’t automatically mean a summons from her was important enough to bother her at her ‘don’t bother me’ napping location. Opening her wings she came out of her free fall and flew above Scootaloo, once the filly turned her scooter around, the two pegasi headed back into town.

Rounding a corner the two came in line of sight of the giant tree that also happened to be a library. The first thing to catch their eyes was the pink earth pony sitting by the door. Alarmingly enough the mare’s usually fluffy mess of a mane was almost perfectly straight. However, the moment Pinkie Pie saw the two pegasi heading her way, she hopped to her hooves and her mane fluffed right back up. Even though Pinkie’s display of sadness had faded quickly, Rainbow Dash knew whatever was going on definitely had to be important enough to bother her over.

“Uh, Scoots, What’s wrong?” Dash asked of only pony in earshot, as they picked up their pace toward the library a bit.

“I-I don’t know,” Scootaloo’s voice trembled a little, proving that she too had seen the momentary lapse in Pinkie Pie’s perpetual happiness. “All I know is Applejack barged into the clubhouse and told us all to drop what we were doing to help look for you. And whoever found you first was to send you to Twilight at the library.”

Nodding to the filly, Rainbow Dash pumped her wings harder, surging ahead. As the pegasus neared the library Pinkie Pie whipped her tail over the door handle and yanked the door open, allowing Dash to speed in with all due haste, followed a few seconds latter by Scootaloo.

Inside Rainbow Dash flared her wings hard, and even had to do a loop-de-loop overhead to finish dispersing the rest of her momentum without crashing into anything. Coming to a hover, Dash took note of who was in the room, and found some individuals she hadn’t expected.

First there was the equally newly arrived Scootaloo sliding to a stop, after a sudden turn to avoid those that had been here all along. Next and as expected was the purple unicorn with a darker purple mane, Twilight Sparkle. One of the unexpected guests in the library was Zecora, a zebra who was laying in what seemed to be a hastily conjured bed, looking rather ill. The other unexpected pony in the room was none other then Princess Celestia.

First Rainbow Dash nodded respectfully to the ruler of Equestria, then a cough made her back away from the ailing zebra in the bed. “You need not flee, zebra’s doom can only afflict me,” Zecora said, punctuated by another cough.

“Zebra’s doom?” Dash couldn’t help but ask.

Launching into lecture mode Twilight answered, “It’s a disease that only affects zebras. It’s not very contagious, but it’s highly dangerous. If left untreated it’s always fatal after ten days.”

Landing solemnly on the floor between Twilight and Scootaloo, Rainbow Dash raised a confused eyebrow and asked, “Okay… So Zecora’s sick. But why come looking for me? I’m not a doctor. What can I do about it?”

“To put it simply, half of the ingredients for the cure can’t be found in Equestria. I wrote letters to everypony known to keep gardens with exotic plants and such. But… I’m not holding out hope that we’ll be able to make the cure here at all. So I… we need you to go to the one place where the cure is commonly made. The zebra lands,” Twilight answered.

Smiling boldly, Rainbow Dashed raised a hoof to her head in a salute and said, “Consider it done.” Then her smile turned a little sheepish as she added, “Just one question. Where are the zebra lands?”

A purple glow surrounded Twilight’s horn, and a scroll came floating off one of the library shelves enveloped in a similar glow. It unfurled revealing a world map. Pointing to the continent everyone in the room knew was Equestria, the unicorn explained, “As you see, if you cross the ocean heading east or east northeast you’ll run into the griffin kingdoms. However, this continent south of the griffin kingdoms is where the lands the zebras call home are.” Sliding her hoof across the map she continued, “You’ll need to fly east southeast. Also the north part of this continent is mostly desert and the towns and cities along the north and west edges are mostly colonies for the griffin kingdoms or Saddlearabia-”

Watching Twilight’s hoof slide across the map even further, effectively doubling the distance of the trip, Rainbow Dash’s ears fall limp as the knowledge in her head was mixing with the words she was hearing.

Her friend’s displeasure unnoticed, Twilight continued, “-So you’ll need keep flying past the desert to the savannas where the zebra lands are.”

Frowning, Dash spoke up, “Twilight. There’s just one kinda big problem with your plan. Last I checked the record for the fastest ocean crossing by a lone pegasus is five days. So even if I smash the record, and I’m sure I will, you’re still looking at eight, maybe seven days of flight time just going one way! I may not be a genius pony like you Twi, but I’m fairly sure that seven plus seven is more then ten. And that’s assuming I can find that cure thing instantly.”

“I know Rainbow. But while we were waiting for you to come, Celestia and I came up with a way that might just speed your trip there. Leave some space in your saddlebags, but gather whatever food and water you think you’ll need for the return trip and meet us at the mountaintop east of town in one hour,” Twilight replied.

“Mountaintop east of town got it… Isn’t east of town part of the Canterlot mountain range? Which peak am I meeting you on?” Dash asked.

“The one that will have two princesses and your friend on it,” Celestia answered with a soft smile, and a bit of a laugh.

* * * * * * *

Two regal alicorns and a unicorn standing on a snowcapped peak did in fact stand out well enough that finding the trio of ponies had been easy, although the white of Celestia’s coat and wings blended into the snowcap rather easily. On the other hoof Celestia’s mane and tail stood out rather well, and flowed as if blowing in an unfelt breeze like some kind of weird, faded rainbow. Being named after them Rainbow Dash had seen enough rainbows to know that, unlike Celestia’s mane, true rainbows never had pink in them.

Compared to her elder sister, the princess of the night stood out quite easily against the snow with her midnight blue coat and wings, and her mane and tail were like a vision of the stars of the night sky, flowing in the same unfelt breeze as her sister’s.

Bowing her head slightly as she landed before them, Rainbow Dash said, “I’m here, what now?”

Twilight Sparkle stepped forward and the glow of her horn brought forth two scrolls from her saddlebag. “Here’s the world map I showed you earlier, you know just in case.” Waving one of the scrolls she added, “And this one is the translations I had Zecora make, to help you communicate with any zebras that don’t speak our language.”

Showing Dash the contents of the scroll Twilight explained, “The first part is a greeting, announcing yourself as a traveler from Equestria. The second is a request for the medicine that we need for Zecora. The third and fourth parts are a more formal introduction and request that you should use when talking to a zebra tribal chief.”

Looking down on the scroll Rainbow Dash found the scroll had eight paragraphs. Alternating between equestrian text and gibberish she couldn’t understand, save for her own name and the word ‘Equestria’.

Stepping forward Celestia said, “Rainbow Dash, you should also know that Equestria has no formal diplomatic relations with the zebras.” A small ornate box floated into view, held by the golden glow of the princess of the sun’s magic. “I know diplomacy isn’t really your thing, but given your part in easing the tensions between the frontier ponies and the buffalo I’d like you to act as Equestria’s representative while you are on this mission. Give this gift to whatever zebra tribe gives you the medicine. And while Zecora tells me that you shouldn’t have any trouble getting the medicine, just in case she’s wrong, feel free to use the box and gems inside to barter for it if you need to. Just make sure that you only give the letter inside it to the zebra chief of the tribe that you get the medicine from.”

Dash frowned as she felt the weight of the box as it was added to her saddlebags, but said nothing to protest the wish of the princess. “Okay, I know what to do once I get there and all. But nopony has bothered to tell me how I’m getting there with enough time to even have a chance of getting back here in time.”

Once more Twilight Sparkle spoke, “Well, you see there is a simple speed amplification spell. Normally it wouldn’t last long enough to get you that far away. But with a little digging I realized it might be possible to create a feedback loop if it was combined with the magic that comes off your sonic rainboom. However, in order to properly magnify the effects of the spell’s arcane matrix-”

A sky-blue hoof cut off Twilight’s lecture. “Short version please,” Dash asked, in a semi-annoyed tone.

Luna, princess of the night chuckled, and then took a stab at answering for the flustered unicorn. “We shall cast the spell. It shall take the form a ring, and you shall need to perform the sonic rainboom just before passing through the ring of magic.”

“Yes, and Rainbow, it’s essential that the rainboom be as close to the spell we’re casting as possible, but also it needs to go off before you pass through the speed spell. And once the spell takes effect don’t slow down for anything until you reach the zebra lands… or at least get as close as you can before the spell burns out on its own. But if you slow down too much you’ll bake the feedback loop and the spell will brake earlier then it has to. And don’t worry about getting tired, as long as the spell is active, your body should be able to draw energy from the spell itself, so go all out flying on your way there,” Twilight added.

“I like the sound of that,” Dash said through a reserved smile. After double checking her saddlebags she nodded and announced, “I ready. Fire it up any time.”

The three ponies on the mountaintop donned protective ear ware and nodded, as Rainbow Dash flew up into the sky. Once she had enough room to do her part Dash turned around to face the peak below, and saw a ring a magic high above the three magic users, shimmering with three colors of magic. The golden glow of the solar princess’ magic, the blue light of the lunar princess’ magic, and the purple light of Twilight’s magic, all woven together into a seamless ring of light.

“Really Twilight? Even at sonic-rainboom speeds I could make it through a ring half that size blindfolded,” Rainbow grumbled to the wind, before going into a dive.

A thin veil of water vapor appeared, trailing off of Rainbow Dash’s front hooves as the air pressure on her body smashed the air together and held her back. The layer of water vapor took the form of a half sphere as lightning began crackling around the pegasus, the building air resistance refusing to let her accelerate further. Get out of my way! Dash thought, and with that mental command the magics protecting her from the rigors of high speed flight collapsed from a sphere into a cone. Speeding up she pulled out of her dive, aiming for the space in the middle of the ring of magic and feathering the line between subsonic and supersonic flight.

Gauging her speed and the closing distance between herself and the magic ring Rainbow Dash counted down in her mind. When she reached ‘one’ she pushed her wings for all they were worth, and the wall of resistance before her shattered. The air behind her exploded with a prismatic ring of light erupting from the center of a radiant white flare. She had executed the sonic rainboom only a few feet before the ring born of unicorn magic and shot through it like the super-sonic missile she’d become.

The moment Rainbow Dash had passed through the ring it began following her as it collapsed into her body. It took a second for the magics to make their way into her, but once they had she surged ahead with speed the likes of which even the daredevil pegasus had never dreamed.

The air around her exploded again. A shining flare of prismatic light that dwarfed the light of the first sonic rainboom, burned like a mini second sun. From that miniature prismatic star three rainbow shockwaves erupted, spreading out through the sky. Rainbow Dash shot out of the light heading east southeast, the rainbow light coming off of her forming a rainbow only long enough to tear itself apart into a prismatic aurora in her wake. Leaving the world’s first hypersonic rainboom far behind her, she shot off, over the horizon in the blink of an eye.

Author's Note

Up front let me say that this didn't turn out as well as I'd have liked, but having run out of ideas to revise it anymore here's the best I could come up with. That said I hope you enjoy the story anyway.