Down to Earth

Rainbow Dash peered around the corner, her friends hurrying up the stairs behind her. “Is it safe?” asked Twilight Sparkle.

“Yeah, I think so. Hurry, before they catch up.” replied Rainbow Dash.

“All right. Make sure you barricade the door behind us to hold them off.” said Twilight.

“Aye-aye, Captain!” said Pinkie Pie, somehow pulling a hammer and nails from her, aptly named, hammerspace. She quickly got to work on nailing the door shut.

“Come on, we don’t have much time to get to Shining!” yelled Twilight, as the group of makeshift militia members continued down the long hallway.

“Does it seem… a bit too quiet in here to you?” asked Applejack, looking around apprehensively.

“Yeah, now that you mention it, it does.” replied Rainbow, cautiously peering back. A flash of blue and black going past one of the windows quickly caught her attention.

A thunk sounded from the door behind them. “Um, girls?” said Fluttershy, in a soft, quiet tone. “I think there’s—”

Without warning, the door collapsed into the hallway and a stream of mind-controlled royal guards began to chase the group of six mares. “Run!” shouted Rainbow. Everypony began to run away from the rapidly approaching group of guards at full gallop. They had almost all made it around the corner when a bolt of magic caught Twilight in the hoof, and she stumbled and fell. She put up a bubble shield, but it wasn’t going to hold for very long.

“Somepony, help!” she yelled, her voice muffled by the shield, making it sound like she was submerged in water. “I can’t keep this up much longer!” The group of guards had completely surrounded her and were casting bolts of magic at the spell to weaken it.

Rainbow Dash only hesitated for a fraction of a second before she sprang into action, running towards the guards at full speed. “Hey! All of you! C’mere!” she yelled, taunting the guards, who were confused for a moment.

“What in Tartarus are you doing, Rainbow?” said Applejack. “You’re gonna get yourself and Twilight hurt!”

What Applejack said only added to her fury. “Nopony hurts my family! Nopony hurts my friends! And NOPONY hurts my Twilight!” she screamed, bucking a guard in the face.

“This is for my father!” she said, as she hit another guard in the chest, catching him off-guard and sending him to the ground, winded. “This is for all the ponies in Ponyville you’ve hurt!” she yelled, sending another attack to a guard’s throat, leaving him on the ground, gasping for breath. “And THIS is for TWILIGHT!” she screamed, leaving her throat raw and her voice scratchy. She sent a final buck at another guard, sending him flying out a glass window. “Now come, and get me!” she yelled, covered in bruises and cuts from fighting.

Now here was the real fight. Guards swarmed around her, and it was clear (to her, at least) she only had two options. She could distract the guards and let Twilight escape, or she could flee like a coward and save herself. She had to choose between herself and Twilight. Almost instantly, her choice was made, and she sprinted towards another stained glass window. “I may not be able to save myself, but I’m taking as many of you with me as I can!”

“Rainbow, no! Please stop, I can handle them!”

She burst through the window, and the guards didn’t realize to stop until they had already followed her. She tried to extend her wings to glide to relative safety on the side of the mountain, but too late she realized a guard had cut one of her wings, making it agonizing to open it.

“Rainbow Dash!” yelled Twilight, looking down out of the remnants of the window. Rarity was beside her, and both their horns were aglow trying to catch her and stop her fall. “It’s no use! She’s falling too fast!” she said. In spite of that, their horns both glowed brighter, as they poured even more raw magic into the telekinesis spell.

Rainbow Dash was helpless to do anything but stare as the rest of her friends could do nothing to help her. “T...Twilight…” she says, her voice scratchy and inaudible over the wind. She repeated herself, trying to yell as loud as she could manage. “Twilight Sparkle, I… I lo—”

Rainbow bolted upright in her sleeping bag. “It’s just a dream, it’s just a dream…” she repeated to herself. “No reason to get worked up about it. Twilight’s probably still asleep. Actually, she’s probably still awake, reading something nerdy.” she said, rubbing her face with her hands. She was surprised when she felt something wet on her face. “Was… Was I crying?” She paused for a moment. “Naaah, Rainbow Dash, the best flier in all of Equestria, would never cry! Especially not over a silly dream, where she sacrifices herself for all her friends in a shortsighted attempt at protecting Twilight, and if she had stopped to think could probably have done something smarter—” she said, suddenly stopping. “Okay… maybe I was crying a little. So what? I’m not a crybaby or anything.” she said, walking into John’s house from his backyard.

When she saw her reflection in the mirror, her shoulders slumped. Her eyes had bags under them from a night of restless sleep, her face was wet with tears, and her rainbow hair was messy and sticking up everywhere.

John walked in and got himself a bowl of cereal. “Hey, you okay?” asked John.

“Yeah,” she croaks out, “just a bad dream.” She sniffled and poured herself a bowl of cereal and slumped down at the chair across from John. She picked up her spoon to begin eating, but didn’t eat. She just absentmindedly stirred her cereal, thinking.

“You know you can talk to me, right?  Keeping your emotions to yourself doesn’t help anyone in the long run,” said John.

“It’s nothing. Like I said, just a bad dream.” She paused for a moment, and ate a spoonful of cereal. The motion seemed forced and mechanical, like she was having a hard time keeping herself together and was trying to hide it.

“It’s not nothing. Please, Iridis—”

“I’m fine!” she retorted.

“No, you’re not!”

“Yes, I am!”

“Iridis, please, you need to talk about this.”

“No, I don’t. Now leave me alone,” she said, returning to her bowl of cereal.

John sighed. He paused and almost continues asking Iridis about her dream, before deciding against it. It would have to be dealt with later. But for now…

“Don’t you have some way of contacting your friends? A cell phone or something?” John blurted out.

“Huh? Uh… I don’t think so. We didn’t have that sort of stuff back home.”

“So were you Amish or something then?”

“Uh… no?”

“Hm. Then I guess you lived in a rural area?”

“... You… could say that, yes.”

“Which means no way to contact your friends.”

“Mhm.”

"Not at all? Not even mail?"

"Nope. I don't think mail could even reach there."

"Not even by plane? Where'd you live, some other dimension or something?" John said, laughing.

Rainbow suddenly looked startled. John looked at her and said, "Wait, are you serious?"

She managed to compose herself and looked at John, before bursting out laughing. " Oh man, I gotcha good, huh? No, of course not, that'd be nuts!"

John looked embarrassed. “I knew that! But still. There has to be SOME way to contact them, and I know you’re not telling me everything.”

“Well…” she began.

“Go on…” replied John, eager to get some information out of the secretive girl.

“No, it’s nothing. Nevermind.”

John looked disappointed. “Please?”

“No. I can’t tell you.”

“Can’t, or won’t?”

“Both. At least, not yet. Just… give me some time.” she replied, exasperated.

“But—” John began, before deciding against it. He resigned himself to asking more about it later and instead finishing his breakfast, as the day before it had been spilled all over him by a certain rainbow-haired girl.

Once again, Rainbow was passed out on John’s couch. After finishing her breakfast, she had apparently managed to drag herself into the living room before passing out. John mentally reminded himself to just let her sleep on the couch, as she seemed to be getting no sleep in the tent. Although it was weird to have a stranger sleeping in your house, the girl wasn’t a stranger, she was his friend… right?

He began to think about how much he actually knew about the girl. First, she was an athlete. A pretty good one, too, if her claims were true. Second, she lived in a rural area, unreachable by pretty much any form of travel. Third, she was hiding something, and John just had to figure it out; she was a puzzle, and puzzles needed to be solved.

Was Iridis even her real name? It sounded suspicious. It definitely wasn’t a common name. She didn’t even tell him her last name, (although, admittedly, he could not remember informing her of his own) and he didn’t know if she even had one.

John took another glance at the sleeping girl. He pretty much knew nothing about this girl who was sleeping in his house— wait, not like that! She was basically mooching off of him, paying nothing in return. He’d have to make her pay rent eventually, if she stayed.

Suddenly, her camera once again glowed. It was lying on the coffee table, and rapidly increasing in intensity. With yet another look at the sleeping girl, he decided that whatever was going on with her camera, he could handle himself. She obviously didn’t get a good night’s sleep, and needed the little rest she could get.

He picked up the camera and examined it carefully. It was a dual camcorder and camera, to be exact. He opened the LCD screen on the camera, and followed the instructions onscreen, which was to press “OK.”

Suddenly, audio burst forth out of the camcorder’s speakers. “Hey R—” A voice began speaking, but was cut off by a short burst of static. “I’m working on the camera, but there’s a l— of interfer— messing with the signal. I’m almost finished recal-ating it, just hold on.” The static cleared up, and John was clearly able to hear the sound of… something, hitting the floor repeatedly. Probably some kind of shoe. High heels, perhaps?

The screen showed your standard chemist’s lab. A bunch of chemicals, held neatly in test tubes, which were in turn held neatly by test tube holders. A bunsen burner was gently heating a vial of some bubbling purple chemical, and a beaker sat on the table with a glass stirring rod in it. Light was being bent by several crystals precariously held on the table, and being sent through some  strange device. He could do nothing but stare at the screen incredulously. Was this a communication device, and not even really a camera?

Suddenly, John sees a flash of purple. However, whatever that purple flash was had unfortunately gone out of the frame too fast, not allowing John to identify it.

“There. Can you hear me now, Rainbow?”

The girl on the couch stirred in her sleep. John quickly cupped his hand around the speaker to stop it from waking her. Who was Rainbow? Was that a nickname for Iridis? It certainly fit.

More clip-clopping drew his attention back to the screen. He almost couldn’t believe his eyes when a vial, filled with a purple liquid sloshing around inside of it and sealed with a cork, levitated across the screen.

“Rainbow? Are you… there?” said the voice, trailing off as she came into view of the camcorder. “Oh. Oh, no.”

The pair’s eyes met. “What… even…?”