Equestria: The Fallen Utopia

As time went on, I grew into a strong colt. Rainbow Dash treated me as her own, caring for me. She brought me to the Ponyville School building and I went to school there. I hid my wings, though, because I was worried what everypony else would think. The biggest problem in school though was Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon. On the first day, they walked up to me.

"So," Diamond Tiara snidely said. "You're the new kid?" I slowly nodded.

"Where's your Cutie Mark?" Silver Spoon asked. "Or do you even have one?" My eyes narrowed. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon gasped.

"He doesn't have a Cutie Mark," Diamond Tiara said. She and Diamond Tiara giggled and walked away.

"Good luck fitting in," Silver Spoon called back. Diamond Tiara joined her in crying out, "Blank Flank!" Those days without a mark were dark ones. But I did find my special talent at the end of the school year.

At the end of the day, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon were picking on another young filly with no Cutie Mark. Remembering what they said to me, I walked over and confronted the two.

"What do you think you're doing?" I asked. "How does it make you feel to pick on someone weaker than you? Or do you just think you're better than everypony else?" Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon backed up as I walked closer. "How do you sleep at night, knowing that you hurt other ponies feelings on purpose?" I continued. "I know how I'd feel. Awful." Unknown to me, my flank had lit up, and everypony was staring. I had backed Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon against the school building. "How would you feel if somepony made you feel bad about no Cutie Mark?" I wondered. "Maybe we can find out." At that, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon ran off, away from the school. I turned around and saw everypony staring.

"What?" I asked. Applebloom pointed at my flank. I looked down and saw it. My Cutie Mark. It was a short sword with a silver shield behind it, representing my talent as a defender of the weak. The class went from shocked to awed, as they crowded around me to get a look at my Cutie Mark. I wasn't a show off, so I just stood there, letting the class see. Rainbow Dash came and picked me up shortly after. She flew me back to her house and I showed her my mark. She was impressed. Since I was out of school, Rainbow Dash began teaching me what she knew on flying. Rainbow would have me jump off the edge of clouds and I would try to recover in the air. Rainbow Dash made sure I never hit the ground if I couldn’t recover fast enough. As I grew stronger, Rainbow Dash would test my flight speed with the anemometer that she borrowed from Twilight. I learned much from Rainbow Dash and even a little bit from the Wonderbolts, the greatest team of fliers in Equestria. Rainbow Dash had introduced me to them and asked if they could teach me some more advanced things about flying. They agreed. Spitfire taught me where the core components of my wings were and how to maximize them, Soarin showed me how to lift off with power off of any foundation, and Fleetfoot taught me basic aerodynamics to maximize flight speed. I learned fast and soon became a magnificent flier.

When my flight test was two days away, Rainbow Dash brought me to a field. I recognized the place. We had come here often to practice flying.

“What are we doing here?” I asked her. “Shouldn’t I be preparing for the flight test?”

“We’re here for a test of my own,” Dash said. “A pop quiz actually. You ready?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I responded. Rainbow Dash proceeded to ask me each component of the flight test, and I answered quickly and accurately.

“What is the first part of the flight test?” Dash asked.

“Weather Clearing.” I answered.

“Part 2?”

“Agility.”

“Part 3?”

“Recovery.”

“Summarize for me.”

“Clear, Fly, Fall, Complete.”

“Good, good,” Rainbow Dash said. “I taught you well. I want to try one more thing.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“I want to test you with a synchronized Sonic Rainboom, since you've learned so much,” Dash answered. I was speechless.

“Wait, what?” I could not have heard that correctly. “You’ve got to be shitting me. Tell me you’re shitting me.”

“No,” Rainbow said. “I’m not shitting you. We are going to do a Sonic Rainboom together.”

“All right,” I said. I had seen Rainbow Dash do the Sonic Rainboom lots of times before. I had studied her technique in takeoff and fall, but I couldn’t believe I was about to do one myself.

Rainbow Dash and I planted our hooves on the ground and waited for the perfect moment to take off. After a few moments, a strong gust of wind blew past. We opened up our wings in perfect sync, crouched low, and bolted upward. Rainbow Dash and I flapped as hard as we could, trying to gain enough altitude. When we had breached the cloudline, we snapped our wings shut and let ourselves fall. We aligned ourselves perpendicular to the ground and let terminal velocity do the rest. After a few seconds, I noticed the Mach cone forming around us. We were nearly there. I tightened up my form, slightly lurching ahead of Rainbow dash. She tightened up as well and caught up. The mach cone narrowed. As I closed my eyes, we suddenly blasted toward the ground. We made a U-Turn to avoid the ground and looked behind us. The resulting sonic boom blasted across Equestria, a rainbow colored blast with a bright, golden glow. We slowly landed and watched the spectacle of color.

“I never thought I’d actually do it,” I said quietly.

“But you did!” Rainbow Dash cried. “You are so awesome!” She lightly slugged me in the shoulder. We watched the Rainboom until it dissipated. I then had a nagging thought.

“That Rainboom wasn’t done by just you,” I said. “We did it together. You could tell from its golden glow. That’s definitely going to draw attention from Princess Twilight.”

“Nah,” Rainbow denied. “That egghead won’t notice shit. She’s too busy with her muzzle buried in her books.” I gave Rainbow Dash the sly brow look. I knew she read the Daring Do series of books quite often.

“I don’t know,” I worried. “I’ve known Twilight to be awfully suspicious about these things.” I flew off towards Dash's home. Rainbow Dash followed me. I flew inside the mansion and sat on a chair in the kitchen. Rainbow sat down next to me.

“What is it?” she asked. I was thinking hard.

“Rainbow,” I said. “What if I fail the flight test? What happens to me then? I’ve heard stories about failees that disappear and are never seen or heard from again. I don’t want to fail.”

“You won’t,” Dash assured. “I’ve taught you everything I know. There’s no way you can fail. You’ll pass with flying colors, literally.”

“Thanks, Rainbow Dash,” I said. I left the kitchen and flew up to my room. I sat down on my bed and looked out the window. I had a clear view of Ponyville and could even see the weather factories of Cloudsdale in the distance. Rainbows spewed from a vent in the roof, lighting up Equestria with color. I sighed. I looked around the room. It had every picture I had ever drawn as a colt of me and Rainbow on the walls. I looked through the photos. One of them specifically caught my eye. It was a photo I had taken of me and rainbow Dash when I had flown for the first time. I had my hooves in the air and was cheering for myself. Rainbow Dash was next to me, grinning wide. Cloudsdale was in the background with a rainbow coming out of the top. Everything in the picture described victory. I thought of that picture as I fell asleep, thinking about how much Rainbow Dash had done for me.