Nocturnals

Rainbow headed straight for the castle. It was protected by a transparent, light blue shield. It was only supposed to keep the weather out though, so she just flew right through it.

The moment she passed it, the sudden change in wind conditions (or more accurately, the sudden lack of any wind at all) threw her off course. She took a sharp dive to the left. The wonderbolts had prepared her for situations like this, but their training was about suddenly appearing strong winds, not for it to just disappear. But she recovered quickly enough and only lost a little bit of height and speed.

The reconstruction had started shortly after the night Celestia learned about Shaded and had been going on throughout the entire winter, with only a short break over Hearth’s Warming Eve. Lunar Guards—most of them wearing the dark red robes of scholars or the light bronze armour of battlemages—constantly walked out of the castle, carrying rubble out with their magic, walking over the newly built, wide stone bridge that had replaced the old one Rainbow had proven her loyalty at years ago, and exchanged it with fresh stones piled up on waggons on the plain in front of the castle.

Shadowbolts helped the mages. They told them which stones were in which waggon, how much rubble they could pile on them without overloading them, and they managed the safety aspects of the cargo. They had set up a camp consisting of seven tents arranged around a crystal pedestal that was as high as Rainbow herself.

Never thought I'd see the ‘best flyers in the Everfree forest’ working as couriers, Rainbow thought. Then she noticed a group of three Shadowbolts, two stallions on the sides and a mare in the middle, standing a little bit away from the rest. The middle one was waving at her with a hoof.

Rainbow landed in front of the group, and now she recognized them. It was the exact same ponies who had wanted her to betray her friends. The mare of the group greeted her, “Good day, Rainbow Dash. I'm glad that you could make it.”

“Yeah, hello. So what do you want this time—” her eyes narrowed from her trying to remember something“—what's your name?”

The mare tilted her head, then chuckled nervously. “Oh, I never properly introduced myself, did I?” She extended a wing and said, “The name's Shadow Surprise, and I'm the captain of the Everfree Shadowbolts, the greatest aerial team in this forest.“

Rainbow Dash hesitated for a moment before shaking her wing. “Rainbow Dash, proud member of the Wonderbolts, the best aerial team in all if Equestria.” She smirked at the last part.

“We know. You made quite the name for yourself. Wonderbolt light blue really suits you. But you have to admit that,” she grinned, “your Shadowbolt costume isn't too bad, either.”

“You know that—”

“That you dress up as one of us for Nightmare Night? Yes. I have to admit that it's a really good costume, considering you only saw us for one minute. But that's not why we are here today.”

“Yeah, you want to challenge me to a race, right?” Rainbow asked, thankful to change the topic.

“Correct. If you feel up to the challenge, that is.”

“Of course I am,” Rainbow said with a cocky smile.

“Great. Follow me, I’ll explain the details at the start.”

Shadow Surprise lead Rainbow to the camp. Surprise told Dash to wait at the statue while she got something from her tent. Rainbow looked closer at the pillar. It appeared to be made from the same material as the crystal heart.

Surprise returned and gave Rainbow a hoofstrap with a little circular disk on it. “It will tell you the way,” Surprise explained while Rainbow fitted the band on her left hoof. She showed Rainbow a similar band in her own hoof. “See the circle with the three dots on the disk?”

“Yeah.”

“They show you were to go. The outer dots will get closer together the closer you come to the next control point, the middle one shows you the direction. The race goes over five control points. Flying above the trees or crashing leads to disqualification. Any questions?”

“No. Let’s do this.”

Rainbow and Surprise stood at the starting line between two tents, facing away from the castle.

“Ready,” the Lunar Scholar they had asked to be their starter said. Rainbow and Surprise bent their hooves. Rainbow glanced at the disk. The first section was going to be straight over the plain in front of them.

“Set.”

Both Pegasi opened their wings and brought them forward, ready to fly away.

“Go!”

Rainbow Dash shot forward. She looked at the trees outside the shield. When she approached the end of the shield, she tilted a little bit to the right. Now affected by the winds again, the tilt caused her to fly straight again. A quick glance behind her told her that she lead the race by a good margin.

The dots grew closer, her lead longer. If she doesn’t hurry up, I’ll get bored.

Soon she noticed that the first controlpoint was a tree at the edge of the plain. Somepony had placed a red crystal on it, that turned green once she passed it. The next control point lied somewhere in the forest,

Rainbow lost a lot of speed from avoiding the trees. If she could have flown over it, like she normally did, it would have been no problem, but she had agreed to the rules. Another, red dot appeared on her disk.

Surprise was closing in.

Rainbow began avoiding the trees narrower, but didn’t dare to go as close as possible. Normally, she could risk catching her wing in a tree branch, but because of the second rule, she didn’t want it to be considered crashing.

Surprise didn’t seem to have that problem. She seemed to fly through branches as if they weren’t there at all.

The second control point came closer, as did the end of the dense vegetation. Rainbow put everything she had into the race, but Surprise still managed to take the lead.

They left the forest. A gorge lied in front of her. Rainbow flew over it while Surprise descended into the gorge.

Why she did that became clear once Rainbow reached the next checkpoint.

Or thought she would. She flew past the point on the disk, but instead of changing to the next one, it just pointed her back. Dammit, the next point is down in the creek!

But she wasn’t going to give up. The honour of the Wonderbolts was at stake! So she turned around, dived into the creek and into the cave at the end. She flew as fast as possible, almost reaching sonic rainboom speed, and the red dot representing Surprise got closer. I can still make it. I can still make. I just can’t…

Rainbow’s scream as her left wing clipped a rock echoed through the cave. She crashed into the ground, grinding to a halt. She dragged herself into a sitting position and checked her wing. It was loosely hanging down. She tried to move it, but was unable to. Brocken. Well, that’s it, then. She had lost. Luckily, her hooves had escaped the crash with a few scratches, so she started walking towards the next checkpoint. With every step, she felt like knives where stabbing into her wing, but she had to get there if she wanted find the way back.

Surprise was almost out of the cave. Only one more stretch and she had successfully defended the Shadowbolts title. Then she noticed that the blue dot on her disk representing Rainbow Dash started to blink. She shot out of the cave and flew straight upwards, let herself fall back and used the momentum of gravity to shoot back into the cave.

A few minutes later, Surprise found Rainbow. She landed beside her opponent and looked at the wing. Without asking what happened, she took a pill out of a pocket and gave it Rainbow. “Take that, it will help with the pain.”

She took the pill and just as Surprise said, the pain got better. She could now walk without aching in pain at every step. “Thanks. I should be able to make it back now.”

"Alright, Stripes, but I’ll still stick with you until we get back to the castle.

“Stripes?” Rainbow asked, confused.

“Yeah, you really impressed me. Most ponies don’t provide that much of a challenge for me, so I thought you deserved a nickname.”

“But why ‘Stripes’?” Rainbow had stopped and looked at Surprise.

“Well, your mane is rainbow stripes,” Surprise said matter of factly.

“I know, but why focus on that. I lost and crashed.”

“So what? Happens to the best. What’s your nickname with the Wonderbolts?”

“Crash,” Rainbow said reluctantly.

Surprise looked at her, doubt in her eyes.

“I’m serious.”

“Wow. Would you mind if I called you Stripes instead?” Surprise asked.

“Not at all,” Rainbow replied, “Now, let’s get out of here.”

When they arrived back at the camp, Surprise offered to bring Rainbow to the nearest hospital, and Rainbow gladly took it.

After changing out of her uniform to avoid a panic in Ponyville, Surprise told Rainbow to lay down on a stretcher. Or what she called a pram. To Rainbow, it looked more like a bed. “Are you sure that’s the right one?”

Surprise nodded.

“But it has no wheels.”

“Just lie down.”

Rainbow did, and as soon as she lied comfortably and was secured with straps, the stretcher started to hover as if a unicorn was carrying it with magic. Surprise climbed in the harness and took off, pulling it behind her. “How…”, Rainbow mumbled.

“Special crystals,” Surprise said, “It’s much easier that way. We use the same in the waggons for the stones.”

Rainbow was impressed. She knew that stones could have some unique powers, but she never considered that they could also substitute simple unicorn magic. She rested her head on her hooves. Not really surprising. The Crystal Heart protects the Crystal Empire, the Alicorn Amulet can give a unicorn incredible power. And of course there were the Elements. I bet a hovering… Her head shot up again. “Hey, could you give me a few of those crystals?”

“Why? Can’t you live a few days without flying?” Surprise asked sarcastically.

“It’s not for me, it’s for my little sister. She can’t fly, but is awesome on her scooter. And with them, she maybe can’t fly, but she would be a lot closer. Maybe the closest she will ever get.”

Surprise was silent for a few moments. Then she said, “That should be doable, yes. But I can’t just give them away. You will have to introduce me to your little sis first. I’ll be stationed at the castle for a while, so just come by when you have time.”

“Yeah, once my wing is fixed, I’ll…”

“You’ll… what, Stripes?”

Rainbow didn’t answer. Surprise looked over her shoulder and saw her lying there motionlessly with her eyes closed. The broken wing had started to change colour, the wet feathers turning purple.

“What do you mean, 'you made a mistake'?!” Applejack shouted at Doctor Horse, “Three days ago, you told Dash that it's just a simple thing and let her go with a cast, and now she's in there, fighting for her life, because y'all made a mistake!”

“I'm terribly sorry for what happened to her, but I need you to make a decision. Her wing got necrotic. We may be able to save some of it, but that would involve a lot of risk. The safest thing would be to amputate it, but either way, we can’t wake her up to ask her what to do right now..”

Applejack turned away, looking through the window of the operating theater. The surgeons did their best to keep Dash alive, but it was clear even to her that she wouldn't make it much longer. Applejack took a deep breath, and turned back to Doctor Horse.

Three weeks later, Rainbow was allowed to leave the hospital in Cloudsdale. It was a clinic specialized in wing injuries, so she was transferred there after the Ponyville doctors realized that they couldn't help her.

“Remember, take it easy for a while. We don’t know how much the wing can take,” the wonderbolt doctor told her. Again. Rainbow had heard that the entire time throughout the recovery and was sick of it. It was of course nice of him to bring her to the front door himself instead of just having a nurse do it, but Rainbow couldn’t shake off the suspicion that he was more interested in the success of his experimental ‘therapy’ and not in her personally.

“Yes, Doctor, I know. No races, no rainbooms, no flying in bad weather,” she recounted.

“And don’t forget to write down your impressions,” he said, scoldingly waving his hoof, “If this is a success, it will help a lot of pegasi.”

“I won’t forget it.” Rainbow eyed the door. She had already flown a little bit during the therapy, but she longed for the sensation of flying freely.

The doctor wished her luck, they shook hooves, and Rainbow left the hospital.

She walked to the edge of the cloud the hospital was on and looked down. It was still hovering over Ponyville, so it would only be a short flight, but she sure was to enjoy every moment of it. Rainbow opened her wings and, finally, flew again. Her left wing still felt weird in comparison to before, but at least she could fly.

And there were worse fates than having a metal wing.