"Break left Dash!!"
"Break right Soarin!!"
"Dive! Dive Fleetfoot!!"
"Let's give it the finishing touch Wonderbolts!!"
In the air above the floating training facility and compound that housed the strong pegasi of Equestria's elite aerial performance team, the famous Wonderbolts, flew the pegasi that made up Wonderbolt Squadron No. 1. Fleetfoot, Soarin, the second in command, new member Rainbow Dash, and of course the Squadron Leader, the intrepid and skilled Spitfire. All four pegasi were good friends and fast fliers.
Spitfire had the most acrobatic flying experience tucked under her wings, and therefore was the leader of the Squadron. Wonderbolt policy dictated that a Squadron Leader has to have at least six seasons of experience before they could reach the position and Spitfire had certainly surpassed that requirement. Her second in command, Soarin, had five seasons of experience and was near to completing his sixth, and would therefore be qualified for the position of Squadron Leader. The somewhat shy and pie-loving stunt flyer was more focused on performing his job well than he was on his position. Fleetfoot had three seasons of experience and was thoroughly in love with her job. She had gained quite the reputation as a solo performer as well as a welcome face among the squadron performances. And of course there was the new face that had appeared in the squad. Rainbow Dash was the perfect candidate for the Wonderbolts. She a tough mare, not one to suffer fools. She could be a jokester but was serious when it came to her job. These skills had been honed over her first season of experience with the squadron and now they were being put to good use. Especially her speed, for a mare who could pull off the legendary Sonic Rainboom three times in her life was definitely one worthy of a position with the fastest pegasi in the land.
The squadron finished up the aerial maneuvers and came gliding to a halt down on the runway of the training field. The smoky contrails that the fliers left behind in their wake faded out after they stopped.
"Great job everypony." Spitfire smiled as she walked up to the other three. "That will definitely be a sight to see at the show in Manehatten this summer season."
"Yeah it will!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed with a face of confidence. "Its gonna be totally awesome!!"
"As long as we keep our formations and timing right, it can't fail to impress." Soarin chimed in with a smile.
"Right on brother." Fleetfoot answered. All of the squadron chuckled in response.
"Alright everypony." Spitfire said. "Let's get on back to the barracks."
Not a second had passed before Rainbow Dash flared her wings and assumed a takeoff stance with a sly grin on her face.
"Race ya!" She said, before launching into the sky with a trail of rainbow following her. The other wonderbolts looked at each other an grinned as well before shooting off after her.
Soon, they were flying alongside the rainbow maned pegasus as she flapped her wings with every ounce of energy she could muster in an attempt to gain speed over her fellow Wonderbolts. Fleetfoot, Soarin and Spitfire however were not your average pegasi and only flapped their wings in a similar manner to Rainbow Dash, keeping almost even with her. The pegasi watched each other in order to gauge their airspeeds and to keep level with their competitors. They were so focused on maintaining their speed with each other that they didn't notice the strange green cloud suddenly form directly in their path.
At that moment, Spitfire remembered to look ahead for any obstructions as she knew that the direction they were heading was towards a low mountain range that they would have to climb to avoid. It was therefore to her surprise that she now saw the strange green cloud in her path. The ghastly green formation was like nothing she had seen weather wise before. She knew that the local weather teams were supposed to make the day mostly clear today and she knew they had never made anything like that before. She therefore called out the order that she thought would prevent them from entering the strange cloud.
"SQUADRON BREAK!"
Fleetfoot, Soarin, and Rainbow Dash, after hearing their leader's order, looked to their front and saw the cloud. Heading the order and the danger in front of them, Rainbow Dash and Soarin broke left while Spitfire and Fleetfoot broke left. However, the cloud was too wide and they found themselves suddenly engulfed by the green mists. Realizing that they could become separated in the cloud, Spitfire called out another order.
"CLOSE FORMATION!!"
Soon, she began to see the silhouettes of Soarin and Rainbow Dash come back into view as the formation closed up and began to slow down.
"What's the buck is going on Spits?!?!" Soarin called out.
"I don't know Soarin!!" Spitfire called back. "The weather ponies weren't scheduled to create anything like this today!!"
"What's that up ahead!?!?" Fleetfoot called out suddenly.
Spitfire looked ahead and was surprised to see a large ball of light flashing in their path. The light was coming closer and closer and closer. Spitfire had no idea what the light was, but whatever it was, she knew they didn't want to go through it.
"SQUADRON BREAK!!" She called.
Immediately the four ponies began back-flapping in an attempt to stop themselves from reaching the light, but their velocity was too great and the rate of speed they were going at would have required a mile to stop in mid air, a mile that they did not have. This was made apparent as suddenly the four pegasi made contact with the light and disappeared into it with a sudden flash. After the flash dissipated, the cloud was sucked into the ball of light and disappeared without a trace, along with the four Wonderbolts.
For at least thirty seconds, the four ponies couldn't see anything but white. White was all that filled their vision as they felt the sensations of being tumbled and tossed about in a storm, only their was no rain or thunder or winds to be felt or heard. Then, almost as suddenly as it appeared, the white in their vision gave way to a strangely calm cloudy blue sky.
Rainbow Dash felt like her eyes were spinning around in her head. She had finally stopped and was now hovering in the air, but it took a moment before her senses unscrambled themselves and she was able to get a fix on where she was. Looking around, she saw that the formation that she and the others had been in before was now broken as she was now alone in the sky. However, she soon was able to spot the yellow and orange form a Spitfire floating about 40 yards away from her and she began to make her way over to her. As she approached she began to see both Soarin and Fleetfoot making their way to Spitfire as well and soon all four pegasi were gathered in the sky.
"What in Equestria was that?!" Fleetfoot exclaimed. "More importantly, where in Equestria are we!? I got a look at the ground expecting to see the mountain range a few moments ago and all I saw was farms."
Rainbow Dash was confused by this. The nearest farm was of course her friend Applejack's and that was miles away from where the Wonderbolt Base was. She didn't have much time to think about this though because then Spitfire spoke up.
"Let's drop down and get a look around. Try to get our bearings." She said with a calm voice and she began to descend. Soon, the other three members of the squadron followed her down.
In less than a minute, they were down to about 1,000 feet and had a good view of the land beneath them. Like Fleetfoot had said earlier, the landscape had completely changed. Their were large yellow fields that were lined with trees and bushes by the looks of it. Every so often there was a section of trees that stood out among the farm fields. Instead of any steep mountains like they had been expecting, the land rolled with large hills and flat expanses like the landscapes around the city of Trottingham.
Rainbow Dash looked around for anything that could be a useful landmark. Then as she looked to her right, she saw what looked to be buildings of some sort off in the distance. Though they weren't familiar to her, it was better than nothing.
"Hey Spitfire." She said. When Spitfire glanced in her direction Rainbow Dash pointed towards the buildings. "I think there are some structures over there."
Spitfire looked in the direction that Rainbow Dash was pointing and indeed saw a group of buildings. Her first instinct was that it was a town of some sort and immediately decided on a course of action.
"Well spotted Dash." She said. "Lets make our way over there. It might be a town and if it is a town we can ask for help to get back to base. Follow me."
With that she began to fly over towards the buildings with the rest of her squadron following close behind her.
As the group flew towards the buildings, they began to notice for the first time that the weather had turned colder. This was strange as it was summer in Equestria and the weather ponies were scheduled for a warm and sunny day. But wherever they were, the message had not been received. Luckily for the Wonderbolts, their flight suits were magically charmed to adapt to whatever weather they were subjected to. However, they group was still slightly chilled by the cold air. The time of day also appeared to be different as it now seemed to be early morning rather than late afternoon.
"I hope that wherever we a headed towards has some hot coffee on hoof." Soarin spoke up. "Even with this suit I'm freezing."
All the other squadron members murmured in agreement. They were starting to wonder if they were even in Equestria anymore at all. The landscape was unfamiliar, the season seemed to have mysteriously changed from summer to winter. And to top it all off so far they had yet to see any signs of ponies. Not a single indication of pony life. The group was starting to get nervous.
As they neared to structures that Dash had seen, they began to make out what they were exactly. The furthest structures from them were a spaced out group of large black and grey rectangular structures that resembled the factory warehouses in the industrial centers of Equestria. They stood on the edge of a large field that seemed to stretch over two miles wide. Bordering the field was a road with interspaced circles dotting the exterior edges. in the middle of the field, what appeared to the ponies to be two long runways crossed the field and formed a perfect 90 degree angle. Another runway crossed over the other two and formed a little triangle in the middle of the field. What perplexed the four pegasi the most was that there appeared to be creatures and what appeared to be vehicles moving about on the field and moving alongside the runway that they were approaching.
"Where are we?" Fleetfoot piped up with the question on everypony's mind. "This doesn't look like any of our bases."
Before any of them could answer, a low droning noise began to reach their ears. The noise continued to get louder, and louder, and louder, and louder, until the ponies realized that the noise was coming from behind them. Turning their heads around, the found themselves staring at the strangest machine they had ever seen in their lives. The machine was black, with long wings sporting spinning propellers like the ones that were on some of the flying machines back in Equestria only they were spinning much faster. It had a class nose and a long black body which ended with another set of wings that had vertical fins on the ends. What was most startling was that the roaring machine was heading straight towards them.
"SQUADRON BREAK!!" Spitfire shouted as once again the group of four split off into pairs to avoid the oncoming craft. As the craft roared by, Rainbow Dash was able to make out a set of letters on her right side. DX followed by a blue circle that was bordered yellow and had a red circle bordered white in the middle, followed by the letter V. The front of the craft had a line of cylinder shaped symbols with fins that were pointing down. Rainbow Dash was able to count at least ten of them. As the craft roared on, a single wheel dropped down from each of it's wings as it approached the runway. The four ponies regrouped, and for a moment were too stunned to speak.
"What the buck was that thing?!?!" Soarin at last exclaimed.
"I don't know." Spitfire said. She looked behind her and saw that the craft was not alone. She could see more black shapes off in the distance coming towards the field. "But I think we had better get out of the air. Down to the field now."
She then turned and flew down to where the strange craft was now rolling to a stop on the road along the field.
After the ponies finally touched down onto the ground, they finally got a good look at the creatures they had seen from the air. For Fleetfoot, Soarin, and Spitfire, they had no idea what these strange bipedal creatures were. But Rainbow Dash, who had heard descriptions from her good friend Twilight Sparkle after her trip through the Crystal Mirror, did.
"What are they?" Fleetfoot asked as they watched from a distance.
"They're humans!" Rainbow Dash answered.
"Humans? Like the ones your friend Twilight saw?" Spitfire asked.
"Yeah." Rainbow stared at the humans, who were clad in what appeared to be blued uniforms, though a few who were climbing out of the craft were wearing a collection of straps and what appeared to be yellow vests and leather hats. "They don't look anything like Twilight described though."
"Alright." Spitfire spoke. "We are going to go and talk to them." The rest of her squadron looked at her questioningly. "I know that this might be dangerous, but right now they are the only creatures that could possibly tell us where we are right now. So come on."
With that she started walking towards the group of humans, with her squadron trailing behind.
Flying Lieutenant Allen Morton was going crazy. At least he thought he was. Maybe all of the raids were finally beginning to wear on him. The 22 year old former student from London certainly thought so after what he thought he saw up in the air as they were coming in for landing just 15 minutes ago. For as they had approached the runway, he thought that he had seen what appeared to be four flying horses! Flying horses! They had been flying right in front of his Lanc as it approached the runway and had split off just as he thought he was about to hit them. After he had touched down, he soon began to think that he had been hallucinating, as the only flying horse he had ever heard of was from Greek Mythology and he was certain it didn't exist anywhere accept in ancient texts. As he began to unstrap himself from his seat, he was tapped on the shoulder by his flight engineer, Roy Macduff.
"You alright there skipper?" Macduff said with concern. Allen didn't respond for a few moments, not knowing how to explain what he had just seen.
"Mac, you might think I'm crazy if I tell you."
Macduff chuckled in response. "If you are anything, crazy ain't it. Tell me."
Allen sighed in resignation as he braced for the response. "As we were coming in back there, I honestly thought I saw a group of ..... flying horses."
Macduff's playful expression suddenly changed to one of confusion. "Come again skipper?" He said leaning in.
"Did you say you saw flying horses?" A voice came up from below them. The two men looked down and saw the bombardier, flight sergeant James Tillin looking up at them.
"Yes I think I did." Allen replied.
"I think I saw them to." Tillin said with a bewildered look in his eyes. "Right in front of the nose they were. Thought I saw them clear as day."
"Are you sure you two didn't just see a few birds?" Macduff interjected. "I mean I find it hard to fathom that...."
"Skipper!"
The three men turned back to face down back towards the exit hatch. They could see another one of their fellow crew mates, Warrant Officer James Harris, the mid-gunner poking his head in the door. He had gotten off with the other crew members, Sergeant George Jensen the rear seat gunner, Sergeant John Appleton the radio operator and Sergeant Daniel Black the navigator.
"What is it Harris old boy?" Allen called down to the man.
"You better come out here sir." Harris called back. "There something the boys think you ought to see sir."
Allen, Macduff and Tillin looked at each other, before they began to crawl out of the cockpit, climbed over the main spar, and made their way to the door. Stepping out, they found the rest of the crew waiting, staring at something that the other three could not see. Members of the ground crew were also standing with the bomber crew staring at whatever it was that they were staring at. Allen pushed his way through the group to see what it was and suddenly stood as still as a statue when he did. Standing before him, were four small winged horses. They reached his stomach in height and he was about 5 foot 10. One was blue and seemed to hold the rainbow in it's tail and mane. Another was bright yellow and had a mane and tail like orange fire. Another was a lighter blue than the rainbow maned one, but had a dark blue mane and tail. The last one was an arctic blue color with a windswept white mane and tail. For a few moments, the creatures stared at them and the boys stared back, not sure what to say. Then, the yellow horse stepped forward and did something that was the last thing the young pilot from London expected.
"Hello. Can you help us?"
Author's Note
Here is another new story! Of all the world war stories that I have seen here, I have only seen a few that deal with the air war in the Second World War and few from the British perspective.
I have always had great respect for the brave young men who flew the night missions over Germany. Almost half didn't survive. This is a bit of a small tribute to the men who flew the Lancs over Hitler's Europe.
Hope you all like it. And don't worry, my other stories will be getting updates soon. I just have been very busy at the moment and will be busy for a little bit longer. Just hang in there.
Again I hope you all enjoy!
