Dust & Rainbowsby I-A-MChapters1. Country Roads3. To A Place4. Where I Belong5. All My Memories2. Take Me Home1. Country Roads“Wake up, Rainbabe.” “No.” A quiet chuckle answers my flat reply as I curl up under the itchy sheets of the crappy motel bed we're sharing. It's hot, too hot, but then again we are on the Mother Road and, although it's not quite summer, it's close enough, and that means it's too damn hot. Lips press to my bare shoulder, and I shiver as they rise toward the base of my neck. A familiar hand brushes some of my sleep-tangled hair away so she can continue kissing and, finally, I sigh and roll over to catch her lips on mine. “Mmm, morning breath,” I grin, and Lightning Dust rolls her eyes. “Gross,” she gives me a light shove as she sits up. Or tries to, anyway. She gets about halfway up before I tackle her back down to bed, and she lets out a flailing noise of alarm as I pin her down, sling my legs over her, and straddle her waist. We both slept naked because frankly you have to in the heat of the Mojave desert, even just the part that Route 66 skirts, if you want to get any sleep. The heat sinks into the air and the dirt and the asphalt, it sinks into your skin and you sweat until you're soaked through and miserable. Well, except for us. I’m never miserable so long as I’m with her. “Really?” Lightning smirks up at me and I mirror the expression back as she reaches up and winds her fingers through my hair. I’d cut it short a few months after we’d returned. Returned. Capital ‘R’. My hair is a short, ragged, pixie bob now, which was a cut that I’d always wanted and always avoided in the past for a kind of stupid of reason. When I was a lot younger, maybe seven or eight, I’d asked my mom if I could get my hair cut short like that because it’d been the way that Gilda had worn her hair, and I was still going through that stage of wanting to be just like her, and my mom had shut me down hard with a flat ‘no’. Because it would make me look gay. Because that was completely unacceptable. What a bitch. “Really,” I lean down and kiss her neck, and she laughs as she pushes me playfully. “Come on, Rainbabe,” she laughs, and damn I love her laugh, “we’re way too sweaty for this.” “Thought ya liked it when I was sweaty,” I let a lecherous grin spread across my lips. “I mean, you sure spent enough time looking at me during our games, and I sweat like a workhorse.” A blush colors her cheeks as I bury my face against her neck and continue kissing. “Besides,” I continue quietly, “I like the way you smell.” “Ble~h,” Lightning groans, but she doesn’t pull away. “My head must still be fucked up because I don’t know if that’s super disgusting or insanely sexy.” “How about sexy?” Lightning raises an eyebrow. “How do you figure?” “Because I wanna have sex with you?” “Pervert,” but she still takes a hard grip on my hair and drags me down to kiss her again and again. “Love you, Dusty,” I whisper softly in the spaces between our lips, and I let my hands trail along her gorgeous, athletic body. Lightning Dust was more than my girlfriend, and had been since we’d come back. Her almost turquoise complexion is unblemished, despite the wounds we’d earned during the Battle of Canterlot two years ago. Her amber hair is almost the same, a little longer I think, but still soft and perpetually wind blown. And her eyes, those brilliant, topaz gems that are always smiling when she’s looking at me, no matter how many mistakes I make. “Always, Rainbabe,” she breathes back as she drags me closer to nip at my neck. “But, y’know, it might not be the best time f’this.” “Pfft, there’s never a bad time for this,” I reply as I return her little love bite, giving her a matching one on her shoulder. “Besides, it’s still dark out.” I nod towards the window where not even a peep of sunlight was creeping in through the slightly cracked drapes. “That’s sorta the problem.” “Why?” I look over, then narrow my eyes, then look at the clock and cuss. “Yeah,” Lightning laughs softly, “it’s past nine in the morning, hon.” “Stupid magic,” I sit up and glare at the wall for a while as I consider our options. “How many ya think?” Lightning chews on her lip for a few moments as she glances at the window, then at the door where the tetragrammatic ward she’d carved into it last night was still intact and unscorched as it would have been if something strong enough had tried to force entrance. I could see the calculations happening in her head, she was always the more analytical between the two of us, and definitely understood the nuts and bolts of magic better than I probably ever would. “Couple dozen?” “Tch, dammit,” I look down my sweaty, naked body and let out a plaintive whine that earns a magnificent roll of Lightning’s eyes. “But I’m all… ready!” “Yeah, babe, I can tell,” Lightning laughs, “but there’s like, a score and change of hellshades blackening about a kilometer of the fucking Mojave out there.” The name ‘Hellshades’ sounds bad, but really they were just supernatural ash and embers with a bad attitude. They’re nasty, sure enough, but only at night, and other than that they’re only really good as messengers and acting as the eyes and ears for whoever conjured them. “And?” “Oh my God, we are not going to have sex while surrounded by demons,” Lightning swatted my boob and I let out a squawk of pain as I rolled off of her. “Get your friggin’ pants on, Rainbabe, we’ve got work to do.” “Killjoy,” I mutter as I get up and fish around for my clothes, then look back up at her with more serious concern. “You sure you got enough juice in ya for this? After Las Pegasus, I mean?” “It’s been better than a week,” Lightning says as she sits up and pulls on her pants and trousers, which are baggy, military surplus fatigues. “I’m back to full, or close enough… you?” “I got a bigger wellspring than you, remember?” I smirk as I pull my shirt on and tug it down straight. “I’ve got juice and then some.” “Remember what the master said about pushing too close to your limit, though,” Lightning’s voice is stern as she laces up her boots. “You always do that thing where you go too hard, Rainbabe, you got lucky in Las Pegasus ‘cause we had backup, but out here-” “They’re shades, Dusty,” I wave my hand dismissively. “If I hit my limit and go dark side against some conjured mooks you might as well kick me outta the Hellions altogether.” “I still can’t believe that name stuck.” I cackle as I stretch my arms and legs, limbering up the way I used to before a soccer game back when the biggest problem I had to worry about was whether or not the other team’s back line had any oomph to them, and if the goalie knew his left foot from his right. Now I had bigger issues, like backalley sorcerers calling up living shadows to kill Lightning and I for bogarting the magical amulet he was trying to snatch up and corrupt. “Don’t knock it,” I stick out my tongue as I crack my neck. “We needed a name.” “Sunny and Zee didn’t have to agree to that one, though,” Lightning grumbles while she picks up the long length of thick, powerful chain links and starts wrapping them around my arms. “You sure you’re good for this, babe?” “I’m fine, Dusty,” I give her a level look as I pick up the other end of the chain and wrap it around my torso, securing it at the padlock that rests over my heart. “We got this… we always do.” Lightning wears a faint smile as she shakes her head, then wraps her arms around me and draws me close. I slip my hands around the back of her head and pull her in for a kiss. Not fast and passionate like I usually do, but slow and comfortable, our tongues twining together in a familiar dance as I taste her breath and relish the touch of her fingers as they play along my neck. “I love you, Rainbow Dash,” Lightning says softly. She only really says my name when she’s worried about me. “Let’s just be careful this time around. No redlining… please?” I roll my eyes, but nod. “Fine, I’ll keep it under the line.” “Thanks,” she leans her forehead against mine, and for a few moments we just stand there silently. A silence which is broken by a lonesome howl that someone more grounded in reality might mistake for the wind blowing across the desert. I grimace as I run my fingers along the carved runes on the chains, focusing my mind on the symbols. “Time to run again,” I mutter softly, and energy crackles along the chains and down my limbs. “To the edge and back… always back… always…” I grimace, nearly biting my tongue as the painful surges of electrical impulse bite into my limbs and muscles. Lines of pure light begin tracing themselves along my arms and legs, drawing designs like the branches of a great tree starting at my extremities and bleeding inward like living tattoos crawling along until they creep up my neck and cover my face in a mask of lambent energy. The Seal of Harmony, that’s what Zee called it anyway. All of us Hellions have one courtesy of one Sunset Shimmer, and it’s both the cost and the reminder that we bought our magic through darkness rather than light. Our time spent in Equestria had taught Lightning and I how to use the Seals despite us being asleep the whole time, which is one of the perks of having a master who works almost entirely through dreams. It had taken a while for us to remember everything we’d learned on the other side after coming back to our world, ironically it wasn’t unlike trying to recall the details of a dream, but we got it. As the Seal engages fully, I’m briefly hit with a feeling like someone stretching a thin film of plastic over my skin, and for a moment I can’t breathe. The first time it happened I had a panic attack, but after a year or so of practice I’d mostly gotten used to the sensation. “Ready?” I turn to Lightning whose body is glowing with its own set of vibrant yellow branch-and-leaf tattoos, and nod. “Why d’ya think they haven’t attacked yet?” I ask, and Lightning shrugs. “My guess?” She replies. “They’re waiting for a heavy hitter, and then come nightfall they’ll be on us.” “Why summon hellshades in broad daylight, then?” I gesture at the clock. “They’re only good as spies like this, nightime’s when they’re actually dangerous.” “Which is why they’re waiting, and they’re still dangerous,” Lightning said slowly, giving me a level look. “There’s enough of them to black out the skies, sure, but that’s no substitute for real night.” “I dunno, Dusty,” I rub the back of my neck as an itch runs down it. “This feels like a setup.” “Probably is,” she agrees with a dry chuckle. “But either we call their bluff, fight it out now, and maybe set off a trap, or we wait til night and get swarmed by an army of hellshades going at full chat, plus whatever bruiser they bring in.” “If we wait we might get a shot at the conjurer,” I point out, but Lightning shakes her head. “Not what we’re here for, Rainbabe,” she tucks her hand into her vest and draws out a small, hand-stitched leather bag. “Remember?” I sigh, but nod. “Yeah,” I say quietly. “I remember.” The Amulet of Inanna-Ishtar, that’s what Zee called it anyway, and if she’s right then it’s a piece of a goddess’s regalia that she wore when she descended into the underworld and then returned. Lightning presses the bag back into her vest and secures it. “We’re getting her back this time, Dash,” Lightning says with fire in her eyes. “We’re bringing back our friend.” I lean in and press my lips to hers again, slipping my hand down to her waist and pulling Lightning into my arms. She melts against me, kissing with enough desperation that you’d think we were going into our last battle. Who knows, maybe we are. Maybe this conjurer’s got some big bad juju waiting for us the moment we step out of our jerry-rigged ward and into the open. That’s why I’m kissing her though. If I go down in a fight I want kissing the girl I love to be the last thing I did. “Alright,” I say as we part, and I nuzzle her nose with mine. “Let’s go shoot magic missiles at the darkness.” “I hate you.” “Love you too, Dusty.” 3. To A PlaceNine’o’clock in the morning and it’s pitch black in the Mojave. If that doesn’t describe just how fucked up the world can get when magic is in the wrong hands I don’t know what will. Lightning Dust pushes open our hotel room door causing the tetragrammatic ward to crackle as its circuit is cut, and the magic flowing through it sieves out with a faint scent of air-freshener and ozone. I glance around through the dark, night-like desert, shivering a little at the unearthly cold. The sky is shrouded by something that looks like late evening, but I know is really just the dying embers from Hell’s furnace. Or something like Hell, anyway. One of the first things you learn about conjurers is where they conjure from. Now some conjurers work with mostly benign powers, pulling things like formless energy into our world from beyond the Wall. You can get pretty much any kind of power doing that, from electrical energy, to kinetic force, to pure fire and ice. Sometimes at the same time! But the less benign ones? Oof, those are a doozy. See, conjuring is a knack almost anyone can pick up and there’s a really good reason for that. There are always times when we’re desperate, there are always times when we’re alone and scared, and we just want someone, anyone, to be there for us. So we cry out. We cry into the darkness for help, and if a soul with enough magic in it does that? Well… occasionally something in that darkness will answer. “We’ve never fought this many at once, Rainbabe,” Lightning says, her voice wary. “Even in the middle of the Mojave morning, this is gonna be rough.” “We got this, Dusty,” I crack my neck to one side, then the other, “just watch my back and I’ll watch yours.” “So long as you don’t get distracted watching my butt,” she shoots back, and I smirk. “No promises.” We knock knuckles as the darkness starts to close in with a suffocating hostility. That’s the kind of thing that can really get under your skin if you’re not used to hellshades… the sense of being watched. The darkness out there is alive, after a fashion, and it’s watching me and Dusty, and it hates the fuck out of us because that is literally the only thing it’s capable of. Hellshades aren’t complicated creatures, they’re just petty hate and violent impulses, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t dangerous. Out of the darkness they begin to resolve, and I can’t help shuddering a little. The only thing that really, seriously skeeves me out about Hellshades is their shape. They’re like a walking silhouette of darkness cut from a cloth made of shadows, and when they manifest enough to really do damage they always look like something… not quite human. I wonder if they’re like ghosts, but if they are then I’m definitely sure I don’t want to know what they’re ghosts of. “Let’s snuff’em out,” I force a grin onto my face as I flex, and prismatic light crackles along my limbs. “Shock and awesome,” Lightning says with a wry chuckle. Her smile probably isn’t any more real than mine, but we put up the facade anyway. This isn’t a joke and we both know it… In the eight months since we started actively operating as members of the Hellions, we’d gone up against some real third-rate goombas and whoever this conjurer was? He was not one of them. “I count thirty-two, Rainbabe,” Lightning’s voice shook less than it might’ve. “Sixteen for each of us then,” I crashed my knuckles together and arcs of power spat between them. “No redlining, babe,” Lightning said more nervously. “You promised.” “Right, yeah, I know.” As we squared up, moving alongside one another, a voice shook the air and rattled the glass windows of the motel with shivering force. A sickly, tarry taste welled up in the back of my throat as it spoke, and I could tell Lightning wasn’t taking it any better than I was. THE AMULET… the voice came from everywhere and nowhere all at once. LEAVE IT ON THE GROUND AND LEAVE WITH YOUR LIVES. Lightning cusses sharply under her breath. “He’s puppeting them all at once,” she says, and feel a chill run down my spine. “That’s bad, right?” I ask weakly, and she just nods. “Right, thought so…” I turn back to the wall of shades and raise my voice. “Hey, uh, neat trick with the surround sound but we’re gonna take a soft pass on that offer. Any chance you just let up? That way we,” I gesture between Lightning and I, “don’t have to knuckle down and fuck up your roadies, here.” ONE FINAL CHANCE, the shades howled their master’s words in cacophonic shrieks. LEAVE THE AMULET. “This amulet is our chance at bringing our friend back from darkness, douchelord,” Lightning snarls as she takes a step forward. “You can have it over our dead bodies.” The world is a twisting murmur of shadows for a long moment, and I can feel every single one of the shades flowering down at us from the blackened skies. The tension lasts all the way up until the shades speak one last time, and they only say a single word. ACCEPTABLE. On that word, the wall collapses into a surge tide of darkness roaring towards us. I plant my feet, bracing the way I used to on track days, take a deep breath… …and I run. The air around me thunders as I barrel forward, a corona of prismatic electricity crackling around me as I ram into the solid wall of hellshades. I feel as much as hear them shriek in agony as I burn past their initial charge, but it doesn’t last. Their claws are like gripping anchors into my body, my skin is only protected from their sharp talons thanks to the veil of energy I’m projecting around my body that blunts kinetic impact, but that’ll deplete quickly if I don’t get free. Fortunately, I don’t have to bother. Lightning Dust is a one-woman phalanx, limbs of caged voltage peel out of her body as she catches up to me, new sets of arms fold out of her shoulders and from beneath her real limbs making her look like a Hindu goddess. Nothing can touch her. Every shade that attacks is intercepted by a clone that peels out of her body, bearing the shadow creature to the ground in a flurry of fists. She seizes me by the color with four hands, wrenches me free of the morass of shadows, and pitches me behind her. “Clear us a path!” Lightning shouts as she falls into a practiced martial stance. I nod, ground myself for a moment, take a deep breath, then bolt outwards again towards where the wall of shades is thinner. As soon as I move towards it, the hellshades try to compensate by swarming me. Hilarious. I’m too fast for these mooks to catch. Not quite fast enough to avoid a few knicks and cuts here and there, but nothing major and nothing I’ll even feel til the morning. Of course, if I’d been going at full speed they wouldn’t have even been able to lay that much of a hand on me, but the weight of the enchanted chains I was wearing prevented that. Zee and Sunny had both warned me that the faster I accelerated the more magic I would consume, and the faster I ate up magic the closer I got to dipping into the permanently tainted portions of my wellspring that were sealed away by Harmony. Lightning had the same issue of course but, unlike me, she had a hard throttle on her magic. Only so many clones could be controlled, and she generally managed with close-quarters combat using her clones to turn herself into a dervish of fists which was pretty energy efficient. Me though? There’s no throttle on the pain train. The shades move like they’re caught in thick sludge as I careen around them. I spin and spiral, kicking off from the ground with every motion, almost flying as I rip through the air, my legs threshing through the shadows like blades. I land on my hands, spinning and rolling in place, cutting through the shades as they throw themselves mindlessly into my light-shrouded legs before finally pulling back as their master reins them in, stopping them from shredding themselves on me. Kipping up with a push, I handspring to my feet, land with a hard skid backward, brace, and push off again. The shadows come at me like a scythe this time, their bodies folding together into a mass of dark magic and hate, but I drop to my knees, sliding beneath the attack and skidding forward before rolling in and lashing out with my legs again. My legs have always been and will always be my best weapon, they’re pistons of magically enhanced skin and muscle, and my heels hammer into the center mass of the shadows, collapsing it like cheap metal siding as I blow through two more of the shades I follow the force of the blow with a push, accelerating to throw myself forward into the air and spin like a bladed wheel. From the air I see Lightning, fighting like an army is at her back because in a way there is one. Hellshades are simple creatures, tactically speaking. They fight like jackals or coyotes, like starving, desperate wolves, circling their prey, snapping in only to draw back as they try to open a blind spot for a fellow to take the legs of their target out from under them and bear to the ground where the pack can finally bury them in tooth and claw. Except Lightning doesn’t have a blind spot. I watch as a shade dives at, right at the hollow of her back where anyone else would be vulnerable. An arm made of lightning folds out of her real left arm, bending backward and lashing out to catch the hellshade by its throat. Two more arms follow, each one grabbing one of the shades clawed limbs, and with a mighty heave they wrench the thing apart, its airy shriek echoing as it’s banished back to its home. Lightning never even had to look at the thing. Her fists were barreling out, one-two-one-two, her knuckles cracking ephemeral jaws and shattering limbs. Each blow carried the force of three behind it as she layered her clones fists over hers. One-two-three shots in a single punch, all within a heartbeat of one another. Her feet are planted solidly on the ground as she bobs and weaves. Five clones, six bodies, all occupying the same space. The Hellion who earned the title Kali of Boxing in the black-magic underworld rampaged through the conjured army, introducing shadowy flesh to Queensbury rules in the most visceral fashion possible while following my trail of light and destruction. We trained night and day for months to get this good, and that’s literal. During the day we sparred and fought, training with Adagio’s sister, Aria as she pounded the basics of multiple fighting styles into us. During the night we Dreamed, practicing routine after routine in the space beyond the Walls of Sleep. My feet barely touched the ground as I spun, kicked, rolled, and lashed out, my Capoeira turning the air around me into a meatgrinder for the shades. Complicated style or no, when you move ten times faster than anyone else and learn from a hyperkine, you don’t need much in the way of realtime to master a physical skill set. And then I was out. I spun and kicked, landing two heavy blows on a mass of shadow and striking it into the cold earth of the desert, and like a set of drapes being ripped from a window, suddenly sunlight is streaming in. “Dusty, c’mon!” I shout as I turn, spinning and kicking at every approaching shade as they try to close the breach I’d opened up in their sorcerous darkness. They were weaker here though, and the closer Lightning got to the opening the weaker the shades became until finally, we both managed to stumble out, panting and gasping from the dome of darkness that was covering a square kilometer of the Mojave around the motel we’d been sleeping. “Crap, guess we’re hoofing it the rest of the way,” I spit on the ground and hold out an arm to Lightning as the dome of shadows starts to roil and shift, moving in a way that makes me think of an enormous, lumbering tortoise. Lightning takes my hand and grips hard. “Let’s get some distance, Rainbabe,” Lightning says as she steps closer, wraps her arms around my neck, and hugs me tight. “Now run!” I don’t need her to tell me twice. I turn my back on the shadows, take another deep breath, and bolt. If that conjurer wants the amulet he’ll have to catch me first and, to this day, there’s only one person who’s ever really caught me, and she was resting in my arms. 4. Where I Belong ~One Year Ago~ “S’been a rough year, mates,” Zee starts. Her breathing is still labored as she reclines back in the front passenger seat of her E-Type. “We’ve managed,” Sunny says as she muscles the car through traffic. “Still no power steering, huh?” Lightning remarks from the seat next to mine, and a chorus of dry chuckles answers her. Zee scoffs and gestures blithely with her cane. “Told our lass I ain’t ruinin’ a classic, an’ I’m ‘oldin’ to it.” I shake my head and turn to watch the city of Canterlot pass us by. We’re heading north towards the docks, I know that much, but I have no idea where we’re supposed to be ending up. “So… you gonna tell us what’s going on with you, Zee?” I ask as I turn back to her. Zee frowns, then shrugs and toys with the gnarled knot that makes up the top of her cane. I notice now that it’s not just ornate, it’s actually covered in symbols like the ones tattooed across her unscarred skin. “Arabus all but killed me,” Zee says finally. “M’nerves are shot, muscles too… heart’s barely functional, but I got medication f’that.” “Even then, she’d be dead without magic,” Sunny added grimly, and Lightning and I both blanch. “Just the act of beating tears up her heart, so I have to be around to lay healing spells on her now and again before it gets too bad.” “Seriously?” I turn and stare at Zee who nods. “Aye, tha’s as it is, luv,” Zee admits with a bitter sigh. “Ain’t much left’a me now, but I got this tidy lass t’thank f’keepin’ me outta hospital.” “She should still be in the hospital,” Sunny said the words with a kind of bitter tightness that suggested this wasn’t the first time she’d mentioned it. “Not yet,” Zee says with the same rote tone, “not til our lass is awake.” Our Lass. Zee’s love, and one of my best friends, is this world’s version of Twilight Sparkle. Brilliant, mad, and powerful, among a variety of other things, she was also a good person, deep down. She had rescued Sunny from her abusive mother, fought to defend us, and strove to find a place where we all belonged. And Storm King had used her. Manipulated her. He had poisoned her with dark magic and left her shattered after draining it from her before the Elements of Harmony had apparently defeated him. “So she’s still…” Lightning trails off, but Sunny and Zee both nod. “The Seal of Harmony is keeping her alive, but only just,” Sunny says. “The Bell of Tambelon was a real nightmare of an artifact though, as it turns out.” “The what?” I lean forward on my elbows. “You mean that little brass bell she always wore?” “It was Grogar’s Bell, mates,” Zee clarifies. “We pulled together some research courtesy’a Gilda’s witch n’that lot beyond the gate, aye? That thing weren’t just a bell.” “It was a focus,” Sunny’s knuckles tightened so hard on the wheel that the leather creaked and her knuckles turned white. “A vortex that channeled the sum total power of a dead kingdom, Grogar’s kingdom… a necropolis that was filled with dark magic.” “Shit,” I lean back and let out a slow breath. “What was it doing to her?” “Killin’er,” Zee’s reply is subdued. “But not natural-like, aye? It was turnin’er into a monster, a demon-thing like Grogar… s’why she was changin’ like she was.” “Son of a bitch,” Lightning swears, and I reach out to take her hand as she clenches her teeth. “And I’ll bet he knew exactly what was going on.” “Aye, I’ll ‘appen tha’s true,” Zee agrees. “Pops took us all for a ride mates… can’t tell ye ‘ow sorry I am I brought ye all inta this shite.” “Not your fault, Zee.” I say the same words at the same time as Sunny Flare, and we share a surprised glance that warms a little after a moment. “If anything you’ve been worse off than any of us,” Lightning offers weakly. “I mean, think about it… you were raised by that psychopath, you’ve had him whispering in your ear since you were a kid.” “She’s right,” Sunny says softly as we turn onto one of the warehouse roads, and she reaches out to put a hand on Zee’s and to my surprise their fingers lace together. “You’re too hard on yourself, Zee… this wasn’t your fault, okay? Twilight wasn’t your fault.” “Mayhap I’ll buy that when I see’er awake,” Zee says quietly. We park in front of a large warehouse. There’s a set of fencing around it that looks relatively new, along with a slew of ‘No Trespassing’ signs. Beyond the fences is an open, barren lot of cold concrete, and the warehouse itself looks like it’s halfway to falling in on itself. Every single door and window is plastered with boards nailed to the jams and tape with bold letters stating ‘Condemned’ on it, and it certainly looks condemned. Hell, the place looks friggin’ haunted. “Where are we?” I ask as I step from the car. “Place I bought off’a that orange-haired lass with the fins,” Zee groaned softly as she stood from the vehicle. Sunny was at her side seconds later, giving her a hand up as Zee braced her weight against her cane. “Adagio,” I muttered, shaking my head. The eldest sister of the Dazzlings, a trio of Sirens from Equestria who, once upon a time, had threatened Canterlot with their magic, were now some of Sunset’s staunchest allies. Adagio herself was, mind-blowingly, one of the six Elements of Harmony. “Aye, tha’s it,” Zee nods as she hobbles towards the gate with Sunny Flare in tow. “This place’s got all manner’a defenses they’d built up back when they were trainin’ t’kick us in the nuts.” Zee chuckles wanly at that, then heaves her shoulders in an exaggerated shrug. “Now? It’s a safe place f’our lass, and there’s loads’a magic sunk into the stone by now.” “Helps with working other magic,” Sunny supplies helpfully. “Guess it’s probably not dangerous if you’re keeping Twi’ here, huh?” Lightning asks with a weak chuckle, and Sunny gives her an arid smile. “Yeah, thought not.” “Still,” I cut in, “you’re keeping her in a collapsing warehouse?” “Eh…” Zee makes a vague gesture, then nods for me to follow her. Sunny Flare pulls the gate open a few feet, enough to permit us entrance, and I go in with Lightning on my heels. As Sunny follows us, she closes the gate and I hear a faint snap of energy from the metal. “The hell?” Lightning says as she and I both turn at the noise. “That an electric fence?” “Enchanted, actually,” Sunny says with a smile. I still can’t get over how much she’s changed from the simpering shrieking zealot that clung to Twilight’s every word. “That noise was the warding circle re-engaging.” “Nice,” Lightning smirks. “You’ve gotta teach me how to do that.” “It’s extremely precise magic,” Sunny warns quietly, but I just shake my head at that. “Don’t sweat that, Sunny,” I wave away her concerns with a laugh. “Lightning isn’t like me, she’s actually smart.” “C’mon babe, don’t-” Lightning starts, but I silence her with a look. “I’m kind of an idiot, Dusty,” I say grimly. “I try but the fact is… I kinda fuck up a lot.” “Ain’t more’n me,” Zee cackles, slapping her hand across my back, and I can’t help but smile. “Now c’mon… let’s go see our lass, aye?” I nod and follow, trailing behind Zee with Lightning and Sunny taking up the rear. At first, I can’t even tell where it is that Zee is heading to because none of the doors seem to be open, I start to wonder if maybe one of them is just made up to appear locked when Zee whole form just… ripples. It’s only for a moment, but it’s like she passes through a soap bubble, there’s a slight distortion in the air around her. I grit my teeth and keep walking, determined to follow her, and sure enough I pass through some kind of barrier, and for a moment it feels like someone is stretching super-thin saran wrap across my whole body, and then there’s a sensation of something snapping and it passes. And a gasp leaves my lips. The warehouse isn’t falling apart, it’s standing tall and almost polished. The walls are whole and intact, the doors are barred and reinforced with steel, and the windows are caged in metal. Curling, graffitied symbols in strange curvilinear designs done in a riot of colors across the walls gleam and crackle with magic, and the air is thick with a scent like spice and incense. “What the fuck,” Lightning’s mumbles as she steps through the barrier beside me and stares up at the warehouse. “Well we ain’t been sittin’ ‘round with our thumbs up our arses all year, y’know,” Zee says with a certain smugness as Sunny steps through alongside us, a small smile of her own on her face. “No shit,” I shake my head, smiling weakly as Zee gestures for us to keep moving. Sunny moves past us to one of the doors and fits a key to the lock, turns it, and that odd crackle I’d hear from the gate sounds off again. It occurs to me that, for as heavy-duty as the place looks on the outside, the magic reinforcing it must have turned this place into the equivalent of Fort Knox. And it was all for the sake of protecting a single soul. The inside of the warehouse is wide open, lacking interior walls and with the roof kept intact by the reinforced columns of concrete. All along the edges of the warehouse it was like someone had taken the contents of different rooms and buildings and just stitched them together. There’s a large, king-sized bed pressed against the far wall sitting on multiple rugs, along with a dining table nearby, and several bookshelves arranged around it. The whole ensemble could have been transplanted out of someone’s master bedroom. Where the rugs terminated further along the exterior wall there was the beginning of what looked like a laboratory, with tables covered in beakers, bottles, and other chemical paraphernalia. Past that are more rugs, chairs, tables, and shelves, giving the look of a sitting room or a study, and beyond that ‘room’ was a kitchen. But the center of the warehouse is what kept my attention. The whole middle of the massive building has been given over to a single purpose. The cold concrete floor is scribed with the most intricate interlocking set of lines I’d ever seen, and I didn’t have to be a genius to recognise a magic circle when I saw one. This one had to be at least a hundred feet across. Candles burn at equidistant points along its edge and at points inside of it as well, and at the dead center of the circle was a queen-size bed with an IV beside it, and a single occupant. “Damn,” Lightning takes the word out of my mouth and says it with a whisper of awe and pain. “Aw man,” I feel a sliver of pain settle in my chest as I stare at the thin figure, barely breathing, on the bed. “Twi’...” I look down at the circle, then up to Sunny who just nods, answering my silent question, and I cross the circle and move to the bedside. Twilight Sparkle, the mad mage of Canterlot, and my friend. If she weren’t breathing, I might think she were dead. Her face is ghostly-pale, and she’s thin as a rail. Her hair is pooled around her in a ragged halo, and every inch of her skin that I can see is covered with lines like the curving branches of a tree. “What is it?” I ask softly as Lightning moves beside me and takes my hand. “Those tattoos.” “That’s the Seal of Harmony,” Sunny replies as she moves to the other side of the bed. “It’s the only thing keeping Twilight from succumbing to the poison of Tambelon’s magic, a dam against a tide of darkness.” “How do we fix it?” Lightning asks, a tight anger to her voice that reflects itself in her grip on my hand. “How do we bring her back?” “Tha’s the sixty-billion double-dollar question, luvs,” Zee says bitterly. “There’s nowt we ain’t tried as we are, but tha’s not all there is to it.” “What do you mean?” I look up with a raised eyebrow. “She means,” Sunny cuts in, “that we may have exhausted what she and I can do, but there are other sources of power in this world that might have the answer.” “Then why-?!” I cut myself off, realising even before I ask the question what the answer will be. Why wouldn’t they do it? More like how would they do it. Zee is all but dying, and Sunny is the only thing keeping her alive. Zee could barely walk without help, and Sunny probably acted as her caregiver as much as her friend. Even if the answer to Twilight’s dilemma was as simple as going to fetch something it would be an undertaking to manage it. I let out a slow breath, turned to Lightning, and she gave me a small smile before nodding. “Right,” I say quietly, and grip Lightning’s hand back. Lightning Dust leans up and brushes her lips over my cheek, loops her arm into mine, and with a small grin, we both look up to Sunny and Zee. “So,” I start, “what can we do?” 5. All My MemoriesThe shadows stay on our tail for better than a week. We keep ahead of them, but barely. The hot sun of the Mojave keeps them at bay during the day, and my speed gives us a considerable lead on them, but Lightning and I both know that’s only going to last for as long as we’re on the Mother Road. That and I can’t keep running forever. The metaphorical ‘engine’ that runs my magic is a pretty damn efficient one, but I need to sleep eventually. Unfortunately, between running all day and only catching a few hours of downtime at night, by the end of the week I’m running on fumes. “C’mon, Rainbabe, just a little further,” Lightning says. We’re close to the official end of the route and about six days from Canterlot on foot assuming I could find time to recharge, but therein lay the rub. “Can’t… stop…” I gasp as Lightning Dust pulls me into an alley. We’d passed into the limits of Yokelahoma City fifteen minutes ago, now we're downtown and my whole body is starting to go numb. Worse, it’s closing in on the evening and once night falls fully the Hellshades will be right on our asses again just like they have been all week. “Not your choice, Rainbabe,” Lightning says. “You’re on the edge of redlining, and that’s not an option.” “We… we can’t…” My vision doubles as I collapse back against the wall of the alley and slide down it until I’m sitting on the ground. “They’re right… on our heels…” I’m heaving every word out between dragging air into my abused lungs. I want to keep running. I have to keep running, but my body is at its limit. The tattoos crawling across my sweat-stained skin like ivy are an ugly bruise-purple, and I know if I try to push further they’ll dive into angry scarlet. Damn it. “Let’s go babe,” Lightning gets herself under me, pulls one of my arms over her shoulder, and starts dragging me out to the sidewalk. The sun is setting, and the city streetlights are only just now beginning to flicker on one by one. Even through my haze of exhaustion I'm straining to listen for the sound of the Hellshades approach. It’s subtle, just an aura of faint whispers. Imagine suddenly being in a large room full of people where everyone is keeping their conversations to a polite volume, except you’ll hear it coming from the walls and the air and the sky above. “Where are we going?” I gulp in another drink of air and look up at Lightning who’s scanning the skyline of the city. She doesn’t answer for several minutes, and by now I’m smart and patient enough not to repeat myself. I know she heard me, and the only reason she hasn’t answered is because she’s coming up with a plan. That’s how we work. She plans and I execute. Lightning is my shot-caller, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. “The Mareiott.” Lightning looks over at me with a renewed grin. “We’re going to the Mareiott.” “Isn’t the vacation supposed t’be after we finish the mission?” I ask with a laugh. “Shut up,” Lightning pulls me closer so she can support me with one arm while pulling out her phone and dialing with the other. “We need a place that’s well lit.” “Isn’t that everywhere?” I look around the city. We're downtown, so all the businesses are restaurants and bars catering the city's substantial nightlife. “Why the Mareiott?” Lightning doesn’t answer. She’s holding the phone up to her ear, and it only rings once before I hear Sunny Flare’s muffled voice answer on the other line. //Dusty? Are you okay?// Sunny’s tone is one of immediate worry. Unlike Zee, she’s kind of a worrywart in general, although I guess that’s probably to do with Zee’s condition. “Could be better, Flares, we’re in a bind.” Lightning gives her the low down on the Hellshades and the conjurer, what little we know of him, including the Spark’s Notes regarding my week-long marathon. “Anyway, now we’re in Yokelahoma City and Dashie is the next best thing to redlining,” Lightning finishes, and I hear Sunny make a sharp noise of disapproval. “I have a plan, but we need to get the penthouse at the Courtyard Mareiott, can you and Zee swing that?” There’s a brief pause, then Sunny chuckles quietly over the phone. //Ah, I get it… yeah, we can do it, and if it’s occupied Zee can always hack their servers and make a few changes to the reservation logs. Just start heading over, it’ll be ready under your name in a minute or two.// “Thanks, Sunny,” Lightning says, and gets a wordless hum by way of response before the line goes dead. “Penthouse, huh? Snazzy.” I give Lightning my best grin, wiggling eyebrows included, and earn a flick across my nose in reply. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Rainbabe,” Lightning grumbles as she settles me more comfortably against her as she starts walking. “We need to call a cab, we have to get to the hotel before nightfall.” “I can run us there,” I say firmly. “I can do that much without redlining.” “You’re already bruising, Dash.” Lightning’s reply is tight and strained. She’s not angry, I know what angry sounds like. She’s just scared. “We can’t-!” “-can’t afford to wait for a fuckin’ cab!” I cut her off. “I know my limits, Dusty, I can get us to the Mareiott, okay? Just show me a map, and I’ll get us there!” She wants to argue with me, but she also knows I’m right. Whatever Lightning’s plan is, it relies on us having as much time as possible to execute it, and calling a cab, waiting on it, and then having to deal with the ride itself through downtown evening traffic meant we’d be an hour poorer on time at best. Or, I could run, and we’d be there in five minutes. “Fine!” Lightning snaps as she pulls out her phone and opens up the maps app, punches in the Mareiott hotel address and shows me the directions. I stare at it hard for a moment, tracing the line in my mind, occasionally looking up to orient myself before looking back down at the little blue line that weaves through the city. After a moment, I’m sure I know how to get there. Taking a deep breath, I pull in more magic, and my body crackles with hyperkinetic energy. Strength floods my shaking limbs, and the tremors still themselves immediately as I stand up from where I’d been leaning against Lightning Dust, breathe out, then in again, and turn back to Dusty with a grin. “Ready?” I open my arms, and Lightning steps into my embrace. I pull her close and as I do she buries her face against my neck and hugs me tight. “Be careful, baby,” she whispers. “Please don’t push it.” “I know.” I cradle her gently as I breathe in her calming scent. “I won’t… just hold on tight.” “Always.” I nod, then dig my heels into the cement sidewalk, trace the blue line to the Mareiott from where we’re standing one last time in my mind- -and then I run. A sheathe of sparkling kinetic energy snaps into place around me as I explode into motion. I keep myself subsonic this time. I’m already setting off car alarms every other step, and if I break the sound barrier I’ll blow out every window in a kilometer radius. Plus, there are people here… even when the majority of the blowback from my wake is contained by my magic it’s not a fun experience to get bodily tossed around by a speedster. Right now, I barely have enough throughput to get us to the Mareiott safely with nowhere near the extra power to reduce collateral damage. I have to be very careful. Lightning is right to be worried. As confident as I made myself sound when I’d told her I could get us to the hotel, I’m not actually one hundred percent sure on that. The angry bruising tattoos of the Seal are pulsing deeper and deeper in color with every passing second. They’re an active track on my magical expenditure and once they hit red I’d be tapping into the most powerful magic in my body. Dark magic. It would be like flooding my internal engine with nitrous. I would go from barely standing to being on top of the world. I would be faster than any other being alive. And I’d be marinating in the same power that corrupted Twilight and Zee. I’d been forced to redline briefly back in Las Pegasus to get the amulet before another sorcerer, a speedster like me, got their hands one it. The result had been a crazy high that had required Tempest, Summer, and Lightning’s combined effort to pin me down and knock me out of it. Here it’s just Lightning, and if I redline now… If I hurt her… I bite down on my lip and put a lid on those thoughts as I throttle my magic again, slowing us a little but keeping my expenditure to a more efficient clip. If I ever hurt Lightning Dust because I lost control, I think it would really kill me. As it is, we make it all the way to the hotel before the splitting pain of the Seal straining to contain the press of my power draw sends me stumbling. Lightning tumbles out of my arms with a yelp of alarm as my legs go out from under me and I hit the cement hard. The remains of the kinetic sheathe keep me from peeling half my face off, but it still hurts like a bitch before I finally come to a stop on my back. “Rainbow?!” Lightning cries out as she staggers to her feet and runs to my side. I can barely breathe. I sure as hell can’t stand. Electric pain arcs down my arms and legs. Spasms roll through me as the tattoos of the Seal flash between deep, bloody purple, and a dangerous red. I’m right on the line, not over it, but it would only take a stray breeze to push me the rest of the way. “Rainbow, stay with me, baby!” Lightning kneels and pulls my head onto her lap. “Come on! Don’t go over the line! I can’t do this without you!” It’s so close. I can taste it. The power… the pure, unbridled speed. For a moment, I can feel it again. That unleashed power I briefly held two years ago during the Battle of Canterlot. It’s right at my fingertips, and if I reach just a little bit further I’ll have it in my grasp again. Speed that can take me from one side of the world to the other in the span of heartbeats. I could move so fast that nothing could ever touch me again, nothing could hurt me, nothing could even see me. I would be a goddess; everywhere and nowhere all at once, and all I have to do is- “RAINBOW!” Lightning’s voice jerks me back from the edge, and I gasp for air. I can’t run from her, I can’t hurt her, and I can’t… I can’t be with her if I let myself get addicted to that power again. That, more than anything, pulls me back from the red line. “I’m here!” I gasp the words out, and Lightning sobs with relief. “Thank God,” Lightning cries as she pulls me up into her arms and hugs me tight. “Can, uhm… can you stand, babe? ‘Cause we gotta move.” “Y-Yeah, just gimme a sec,” I wheeze before forcing myself to sit up. My vision doubles and then swims, briefly filling me with vertigo before I manage to tamp down on it and get my head on straight again. My legs manage to feel like lead and rubber at the same time as I stand, but Lightning gets herself under me again and we make our way towards the Mareiott lobby with time to spare. We get more than a few weird looks from the hotel patrons and staff as we stagger into the hotel. I look like ten miles of bad road, and Lightning isn’t much better. “Can I help you, ladies?” The concierge looks us up and down like we're scum that got tracked onto the hotel carpets on the heel of someone a lot richer. He’s a tall, spare man in a nice suit with a receding grey-green hairline and a sallow complexion. His nose is the sort that looks like it was made to be looked down over, and I have to bite back a snarky remark about it. I remind myself that we need them to not kick us out of here. “Reservation for two in the Penthouse under the name Dust, Lightning,” Lightning says wearily, and the concierge looks over at the young woman manning the front desk. They share incredulous stares but she goes to work looking for the reservation anyway, and a moment later her eyebrows shoot up past her generous bangs. “It’s… here,” she glances up at the concierge who looks equally surprised. “Can uhm… if I could just have your ID’s to confirm?” The woman holds out a hand, and we both dig out our wallets and pass our ID’s over. Mine is just an ID card while Lightning’s is an actual driver’s license. I don’t have one because, well… why would I? I can outrun a Formula One racer at full chat without breaking a sweat. Besides, I hate driving. It gives me anxiety. “Everything is in order,” the woman says, sounding as surprised as the concierge looks. “Full service, too… and, oh wow…” She gestures violently for the Concierge in a ‘get over here’ motion who moves to her side, and they both read over something. Their demeanors both change instantly, and suddenly the concierge is all smiles and respect. “I’m so sorry for the confusion,” he says with a bright grin. “Please, follow me!” I look over at Lightning with a raised eyebrow, and she just chuckles. “My guess?” She says. “Zee probably left them a pretty substantial tip.” “Ah…” I nod. That sounded like Zee. One thing we’d learned from having a benefactor as wealthy as Grizelda Grimfeather bankrolling us is that an alarming number of people are happy to look the other way regarding even the weirdest shit if you just shove enough hundred-dollar bills over their eyes. That actually ended up explaining a lot about why our world is so fucked up. The concierge walks us over to the elevators, punches in the penthouse suite, and swipes a card which he hands over to us once he’s done. He wrinkles his overlong nose as Lightning takes the keycard from him, but says nothing, probably because the scent of money chases out the stink of sweat pretty effectively. The elevator chimes and opens to a large, and lushly appointed room. The furniture is top-class and definitely looks spendier than anything I’ve ever rested my duff on as the concierge leads us out. We move into the room with as much grace as two exhausted women can manage, and I take a deep breath. This place even smells expensive. “Room service was ordered ahead of you, ladies, and will be up directly,” he says cheerily, all of the vitriol in his voice was gone since he’d seen the depth of Zee’s pocketbook. “If you have any other needs, please don’t hesitate to ring the front desk.” “Thanks, Jeeves, we’ll do that,” Lightning replies. If he took offense to the moniker, he was professional, or greedy, enough to not show it. He swept a small bow and returned to the elevator as Lightning dragged me towards the bathroom. “You gonna tell me why we’re here, Dusty?” I ask as the elevator door closes. “Light,” is her only answer. I collapse onto the toilet seat and shed my seal-chains as she runs a hot shower. The shower alone is as big as my bedroom back at my dad’s place, and the bathroom itself is probably the size of our living room. If I were less tired I would probably be staring at the gold fittings and the polished marble, but as it is I can barely keep my eyes open. “If we’re lucky, we’ll get a few hours of sleep before the shit hits the fan.” Lightning sweeps her hand under the water a few times before nodding and turning to me. “You need sleep, Rainbabe.” “Still haven’t explained,” I say groggily. “Light against the shades, I get that, but they’ll short out the mains like they always do. City infrastructure is dogshit.” “Right,” Lightning agrees. “Except high-class places like the Mareiott have back generators that kick in if the mains go out, and those backups have backups for things like the kitchen freezers and the really expensive suites.” “Like the penthouse,” I say, my eyes widening as I start to laugh. Like I said, Lightning is the smart one. Lightning Dust carefully strips my sweat-stained clothing off of me, then lifts me into the shower. I let her guide me mostly because I’m not entirely sure my legs are going to support me if I try to do it on my own. If it were anyone but Lightning Dust, I’d probably be putting up more of an argument, but Dusty has seen me at a lot lower than this. She’s probably the only one I trust to take care of me when I’m this weak. I’m barely in the shower when the front bell rings. “That’ll be room service.” Lightning stands and dries off her arms where the shower had splashed. “Just relax, babe, and try not to fall over and drown.” “If I go out like that I’ll deserve it,” I mutter. I lean back into the flow of hot water, relishing the way it sluices the sweat off of me. At one point I glance down and see the water running a deep, dirty brown as it swirls into the drain. I must have dragged a quarter of the Mojave into the lobby with us. Hm… maybe Jeeves had a point when he looked at us. We must have looked like a couple of vagrants. “Got some food, Rainbabe.” Lightning hip-checks the door open and drags in the entire serving cart. It’s piled high with carbs, meat, fruit, and three pitchers of ice water that make my mouth go dry just looking at. Up to now we’d been living off of gas station food in between crashing at the shittiest types of roadside motels for what little rest our pursuers would give us, and my stomach has decided that enough is enough. The smell of steak and potatoes hits me like a Mack truck and my stomach lets out a deafening rumble. Lightning Dust laughs as she slips in beside me, pulling her clothes off as she does, and starts helping me wash. My limbs have gotten a little feeling into them by now and between the two of us and brand new loofah we manage to get me feeling at least human-adjacent again, rather than like day-old roadkill. “Here, Zee did us another solid,” Lightning says as she helps me out of the shower and passes me a towel. She kneels down as I dry myself off, and pulls a bag out with some sports company logo on it I don’t recognise, probably something local, and pulls out two full sets of clean clothes, one in my size, and one in Lightning’s. God bless that crippled Braytish lesbian. Once I’m dry I pull on the form-fitting sports top and shorts, and Lightning starts to do the same, but something makes her jerk to a stop as I finish tugging the top straight. “No fucking way.” Lightning says, and I turn to her. “What?” Lightning Dust sighs heavily as she holds up the sports top she was gifted with the back of it facing her and glares at it for a moment before flipping it around so I can see it too. I can’t help it. I start laughing. The back of her shirt, and mine, has the image of a skull split in half by a lightning bolt, and just below that is the word ‘HELLIONS’ written in a sharp font like the letters had been scarred into the shirt with a carving knife. “We’re like the lamest motorcycle gang,” Lightning grumbles as she pulls the shirt on. “Aw c’mon! It’s awesome!” I stand and look at my back in the mirror. “That is rad as fuck!” “You are such a loser.” Lightning laughs but she stands as she does, pulls me close, and kisses me. There’s a subtle curve to her lips that I like. Now, I’m not what you’d call experienced. Actually, Lightning is the only person, girl or otherwise, I’ve ever kissed. That said, I know what I like, and I can say without a shadow of a doubt that I like the way Lightning Dust kisses. “We’re gonna make it out of this, Dusty,” I say quietly as we part. “And we’re getting Twi’ back this time.” Lightning sighs as she rests her head against my shoulder. “That’s what we thought last time,” She replies with a hard touch to her voice, “and all did was piss off a Prench Warlock by stopping that fake anti-curse bullshit he was peddling.” “Yeah, but punching him in his stupid face when we found out felt pretty good,” I say. She laughs again. It’s the little things like that that keep me above water. What we did- what I did- hurt so many people, and nearly hurt orders of magnitude more, that I can’t think too hard about it or I’ll start drowning in guilt. Instead I focus on what I can do to make it right. Part of that is making her laugh. I tell myself that so long as I can make Lightning laugh, I can live with myself. So long as I can help, and try to make up for some of the damage I’d caused under Storm King, I can keep on going. “We’ll make it work this time, Dusty,” I say again, running my hands over her soft, windblown hair. “And if it doesn’t, we’ll try again, and again, and again, until all of us are together again, okay?” “Yeah,” she nods, “okay.” “Now let’s get to that grub, because I smell steak,” I turn to the platters of food and start grabbing, and I can feel Lightning’s eyes on me the same way I can hear her laughter. “Just don’t stuff yourself, I need you awake in a few hours, not in a food coma,” Lightning calls as she walks out of the bathroom. “I’m gonna go sketch up a ward on the door.” “Hang a sock on it too, wouldja!?” I reply through a mouthful of mashed potatoes. “Babe, no,” she yells from the living room. I chuckle as I take a bite of juicy steak, chew, and swallow, washing it down with ice water. My magic takes a ton of energy out of me, and not all of it comes from my wellspring. What I do is a cousin to hyperkinetic fighting, which means that the acceleration also burns a load more calories. Not one-for-one, obviously, otherwise I’d burn myself up, most of the extra power comes out of my magic, but the rest? Yup, good old fashioned meat and potatoes. One of our Master’s first and simplest lessons when it came to taking full control of our magic back while we were dreaming in Equestria was this: ‘Don’t. Skip. Meals.’ With that in mind, I swallowed the last few bites of my steak before making up a plate to take out to Lightning. I filled it mostly with finger food, things she could pick at while she sketched the design. She would need to eat a full meal too, but at this point she needed everything she could get. “Hey,” I say as I step out of the bathroom, dragging the serving cart behind me, “here, you should eat a little while you work.” I hold the tray I’d filled with fruits, olives, and salmon nigiri up to Lightning as she drew the chalk along the wall and door. She’s going slow to make sure the matches up all the lines, but her free hand grabs one of the nigiri and stuffs it, whole, into her mouth. “Fanks babe,” she mumbles around the mouthful of fish and rice, then swallows, and pulls back as she finishes a section. “I oughta finish this first though.” “Not unless you want me to rat you out to the master for skipping meals,” I say with a grin, and Lightning winces, but smiles back. “Ugh, fine…” she takes a few pieces of fruit. “That dude was harsh.” “You know what he’d say to that?” I laugh as I take another bite of potatoes. “Doi,” Lightning pops a grape into her mouth, bites down, swallows, then, in her best impression of Master Sombra, says: “I am a King, not a dude.” Author's Note Yes, my unfinished garbage fire 'King & Shy' is canon to Featherfall. Maybe I'll finish it one day, maybe not. But the idea of Fluttershy and Sombra still kicking around in the shadows of Equestria amuses me to no end. 2. Take Me Home ~One Year Ago~ Sunlight streams into my eyes, and I clench them shut hard as pain lances into my brain. “Ow, wha-!” I lick my lips, my tongue feels thick and cottony, and my head is pounding with a drumbeat tattoo that slowly fades into a background thrum of dull fog. Everything smells… familiar. I rub at my eyes with the heels of my palms, trying to dig the pain out, and slowly I feel the weird sensitivity start to fade. Just as I start to breathe normally again, a quiet cursing beside me tells me I’m not alone. “Dusty?” I force one eye open and see Lightning Dust mirroring what I’d just done, rubbing at her eyes and swearing. “Yeah, I’m here, what…” she blinks furiously for a few seconds, the squints and looks around. “Where-?” “Welcome back, ladies.” That voice. My breath catches in my chest like I’d just swallowed a fish hook, and slowly I raise my head to look forward, straining to see past the dazzling sunlight. Wheels… and a chair… and… “Sunset?” Shit. She looks different. Taller maybe? A little older? The hunched posture is gone from her shoulders that she’d had for so long after she’d lost her ability to walk in the accident, and now she looks… “Don’t try to do too much yet,” she has that cocky smirk on that she’s always worn so well, one that a small part of me was afraid I’d destroyed. “You technically haven’t used your eyes in about a year.” Her words take a moment to settle in my gut. A year? “A year?!” Lightning says what I’m thinking, and I can see her turquoise complexion pale as she stares at the wheelchair-bound redhead in disbelief. “One year, two weeks, and four days,” Sunset says solemnly. “Not a bad recovery time to be honest, all things considered.” The memories came back in a rush. Zee. Twilight… no, Midnight Sparkle. The battle in front of the school, and then everything going black as Midnight crushed our wills beneath her own, and then the strangest feeling of displacement. I remembered the fight, though, and all the people I hurt, all the damage I inflicted on the city with my reckless speed, and I remember… “You did this! You made me do this! Why couldn’t you just back down?! WHY?!” I… I remember… “You’ve gone too far, Twilight!” “Rainbow, Lightning, breathe!” Sunset’s voice was a distant thing, so far away I can barely hear it. All I can hear is her voice in my ears… in my head! “DO IT!” “Oh fuck,” I grip my head as my whole world tilts and spins. I had tried to kill Sunset Shimmer. I remember Zee pulling me into the sky as Lightning Dust blinded the new Elements of Harmony with an army of clones. I remember Zee throwing me into the air and then angling myself down, wrapping myself in my accelerating magic, and then… …and then hammering through their defense to give Midnight her first shot… …and Zee her final one. I crumple onto the warm concrete and spill my guts, literally, vomiting out what little is in my stomach and dry-heaving the rest of the way through the spasms. Lightning is there a second later, heaving and coughing around a mouthful of bile and mucus. “Well that coulda gone better.” The voice came from behind me, as a hand gripped my collar and hoisted me back up to sitting. “Not surprising, though,” Sunset’s voice replies softly. “Rainbow? I’m gonna need you and Lightning to take a few deep breaths, savvy? Just breathe and try not to think too hard for a bit, you’re readjusting to being awake and it’s gonna be rough.” “W-What…” I start to speak, then spit as I taste the remains in my mouth, then wipe my lips with my sleeve and try again. “What happened? The Battle… Storm… Twilight and Zee?” I force myself to look up at the girl who, once, had been my friend. The girl who I had betrayed, and then sided against with a gang lord, and then, if my memories were to be believed, tried to kill. Sunset did look a little older, but she did say that a full year and change had passed. Seconds later she was joined by another figure stepping into my vision, this one even more familiar. “Gil…” Tall, broad, hawk-nosed, and fierce. Gilda Grimfeather was, if anything, even more imposing now than she had been back at the battle. Her frame was fuller and stronger, her face had lost some of the lean and narrow angles and settled into a more mature beauty. And, as always, that short, snow-white hair of hers hung loose and ragged over predator eyes of gold and flint. “Welcome back, dumbass,” Gilda’s voice was sharp, but not exactly unkind, just… cold. She looks me up and down before turning back to Sunset. “Hey, Sunshine, I thought you said them goin’ over there was gonna fix’em?” “I said it would fix the mental scarring from the slave-spell,” Sunset’s replies uneasily. “This… well, I’m pretty sure that was just a good old fashioned panic attack.” Panic? I’ve never had panic attacks in my life. “Huh, yeah, guess that tracks,” Gilda sighs and turns back to me, shaking her head. “I wanna say I feel sorry for ya, Dashie, but…” “I know,” I say, my voice hoarse and raw. “I wouldn’t feel sorry for me either.” “She was being controlled, Gil,” Sunset cut in, but Gilda just shook her head. “Not the whole time she wasn’t,” Gilda shot back without turning away from me. “Ain’t that right, Rainbutt? You coulda backed out before you got too deep, savvy? But you didn’t! Shit, you finally go ride-or-die and the hill you planted your fuckin’ flag on was that one?!” I lower my head. I can’t argue, I can’t say a damn thing because Gilda is right. I knew it was going pear-shaped, I’d seen it happening, slowly but surely. I’d known Storm King was bad news from the moment I met him but I’d chosen to ignore my gut instincts and just… “Gilda, c’mon,” Sunset says softly. “You’re being too harsh… they just got back.” Gilda curses quietly under her breath and turns her back on me, stalking away clenching and unclenching her hands. Her attempts at keeping calm last all of about five seconds before- “What the fuck, Sunflower!?” Gilda turns on her heel and jabs a finger in mine and Lightning’s direction. “They tried t’kill you! Not me, not the rest of us… YOU!” “GILDA!” Sunset’s raised voice cuts sharply through her girlfriend’s tirade, shocking Gilda silent as Sunset turned on her chair’s axis to meet that golden gaze evenly. “Take five and cool off.” I can hear the clockwork clicking of Gilda’s false arm, the sound of her limb tensing and flexing beneath plates of magical metal. Even Storm King hadn’t been able to figure how they had replaced her arm so quickly, or even what it was made of, but I knew enough to wager it had come from the other side of the portal. “I’ll be fine, Gil,” Sunset’s voice was soft again as she rolled forward, reached out, and took Gilda’s hand. Her real one. “I love you, Gilda Grimfeather, but let me handle this, okay?” Another soft curse issues from Gilda, but she nods, then takes a knee in front of Sunset. For a moment I have this crazy image of a knight kneeling in front of a princess, and I realise it’s because of the look in Gilda’s eyes. Absolute devotion. Total loyalty. And pure love. Gilda takes Sunset’s hand and pulls it in so she can press her lips to amber knuckles, then nods, puts her forehead against Sunset’s hand, then gets up and stalks away. “Kinda makes sense how we lost now,” Lightning finally speaks up, and I look over at her in surprise, and she grimaces. “Sorry, didn’t mean for that to sound like… I mean, I’m glad we lost, like, that’s obviously a positive, but I get it now.” “How do you mean?” Sunset looks curious as she turns on her axis again to look at us again. “The Elements?” “Nah,” Lightning shakes her head, then looks thoughtful for a moment before amending, “okay, yeah, but like… more than that, I get why the Elements worked, because that shit you got with Gilda?” She nods towards the retreating figure of Sunset’s girlfriend. “That’s some real goddamn magic, right there.” “The magic of friendship’s a helluva thing,” Sunset says wryly, and Lightning lets out a wan little chuckle before frowning and sitting back against the stone steps we’ve been squatting on. I frown, then turn my head and look back behind us for the first time. Sure enough, the statue of the Wondercolt is towering above us in all its rearing glory. The pedestal is polished, and everything is exactly the way I remember it from, apparently, a year ago. Except for… “What the hell happened to the school?” It’s bigger than I remember. A lot bigger. All the damage that had been done to it during the battle in front of it was repaired, all the broken windows and the shattered masonry were replaced. There were whole extra wings built alongside it now, and the walls had supporting pillars, balconies, and open bay windows to let in the streaming sunlight. The place looked more like a temple than a school. “You missed a lot, Dash,” Sunset says, gesturing around us. “A year’s worth, because of what happened.” I hang my head, guilt welling up inside my gut as I grimace. “And it wasn’t just you,” Sunset continues, “you dragged-” “Woah, hold up!” Lightning gets shakily to her feet and moves between Sunset and I, fixing the former with an angry glare. “Look, we fucked up, I own that, alright? But don’t talk about me like I didn’t make the same fuckin’ mistake, okay? Dash didn’t ‘drag’ me anywhere! I made that decision myself, got it Wheels?” Sunset and I both sit back in surprise at Lightning’s sudden outburst, and I’m about to say something when she wobbles dangerously on her feet. In an instant I’m at her side, my arm around her waist as I pull her arm over my shoulders and prop her up long enough to pull her back to the steps of the pedestal and lower her down to sit next to me. The whole time, Sunset just watches us, her cyan eyes sharp and critical as Lightning’s head lolls weakly against my shoulder, and her hand slips into mine. “Not your fault, Rainbabe,” Lightning mutters dazedly. “I ain’t some fucking damsel dragged along in your wake, alright? I chased you into hell on my own two feet.” “You’re right, I’m sorry,” Sunset says quietly. “You shouldn’t’ve had t’chase me there, Dusty,” I say, my throat tight with shame and anger. “It was still my fault.” “I don’t care,” Lightning replies in a low, even tone as she raises her head to look me in the eyes. “I’ve been in love with you for four fucking years, Rainbow Dash… so where you go? I go.” Sunset sighs and leans back in her chair, eyeing the both of us critically. “Ride or die, huh?” Sunset says, then sighs again. “Whatever, anyway I’m here because Twilight, Princess Twilight that is, alerted me that your treatment was finished…” she looked at me first, “your dad knows your coming home, he’s been worried,” then she turns to Lightning, “same with your grandmother, and don’t worry, me and the girls have been looking after her.” I see weight fall from Lightning’s shoulders at Sunset’s words. “Thanks…” Lightning wipes at her eyes, and her palms come away damp. “I was really worried I’d… fuck, thanks Sunset.” “Don’t mention it.” “Now what?” I ask, looking around. “Can’t exactly pick up where I left off, right?” “Yes and no,” Sunset replies, then gestures behind her. “You’re not just looking at Canterlot High… you’re looking at something brand new.” I stand, shaky and weak, and Lightning stands with me. “On the surface, it’s still the high school,” Sunset explains. “But beneath that, it’s become something else… Bastion Academy is what we call it, the first Arcane Academy in the world.” “Hot damn,” Lightning stares at the school with new eyes. “So when you said ‘yes and no’,” I began carefully, “you were saying…” “Yeah, you probably still have your magic,” Sunset sounds less than thrilled at the prospect and I don’t blame her. “You should spend some time here… maybe learn a few things.” “Doesn’t sound like a bad idea,” Lightning says, looking back at me with a careful smile. “Whadya think, Rainbabe?” “I… I dunno,” I admit slowly, then turn back to Sunset with a frown. “Would you trust me with magic training?” “No,” Sunset says flatly, and Lightning and I both wince. “But that’s personal… objectively, I’m pretty sure you’ve learned your lesson, but personally?” Sunset sighs again and leans back in her chair. “Shit, personally I don’t know if I’ll ever trust you again, Rainbow Dash.” The wind goes out of me at her words, but I don’t try to refute them. “You made a lot of bad calls,” Sunset says in a tight voice, “you dragged a lot of good people into danger, almost got Score killed… all because of your reckless pride.” “If it’s so bad why are you even bothering giving her a chance?!” Lightning snaps. “Why even try?!” “Because I told you,” Sunset snarls the words out, “it’s personal, it’s not logical, and it’s not fair!” Then she deflated a little. “And because she hasn’t done anything I’m not guilty of too.” Silence fills the sunny afternoon as I stare at Sunset in surprise, and whatever it was that Lightning had intended to say was apparently stalling out on her tongue. “I’ve had a year to get some perspective, okay?” Sunset says as she fiddles with the divided-sun emblem at her throat. “I think the reason I was so harsh with you back then was because I could see you making every single mistake I’d made.” “Pretty sure I did worse, actually,” I admit. “Pretty sure you did too,” Sunset agrees. “Because unlike me, you took other people down with you,” I nod, and Lightning takes my hand and squeezes. “I don’t trust you, Dash, because I don’t want you to hurt the people I love… again.” “Fair enough,” I say softly. “But you have a place at Bastion if you want it,” Sunset replies, “and you do still have friends.” I raise an eyebrow. “Speaking of which…” Sunset trails off as she pulls out her phone and glances down at it, then grimaces and shakes her head. “I’m taking off, she and I still don’t have much nice to say to one another.” “She?” I ask, standing back up as Sunset pulled on her gloves and took a grip on her wheels. “Sunset what’re you talking about?” “You’ll see,” Sunset says, then starts to turn away. Before she leaves, she looks over her shoulder and meets my eyes. In them, I can see sorrow, regret, guilt… all things that are probably neatly mirrored in mine. Once upon a time, we’d been friends, and in a short span of time I’d managed to destroy all of that progress. “Welcome home, Rainbow Dash,” Sunset says quietly before turning away and setting off after Gilda. “You okay, Dash?” Lightning is at my side, her hand finding mine again, and I turn to pull her close and bury my face against her shoulder. She holds me, rubbing my back and I hug her tight and shudder, waves of emotion rolling over me. We’re still standing there when the sound of a loud, old motor pulls up at the drop-off roundabout of the school. A door, heavy and creaky with age, opens, then slams shut, and a familiarly accented voice cuts through the air. “Aye up, Dash, Dust.” The voice is harsh, cocksure, and thickly Braytish. I jerk back from Lightning and step back from her, and she does the same, both of us looking up at the same time towards the street where a welcome sight is moving towards us. Grizelda Grimfeather smiles at us, her expression pulled to the side by the burn scars covering the left half of her body and turning the grin into something like a sneer. Her right hand grips the handle of an ornate cane that she’s leaning heavily on, but her other arm is wide open. “C’mon then, mates,” Zee crows, “giz uz a hug!” I laugh, I can’t help it. I run to her and wrap her in my arms, and Lightning is there a moment later, and we engulf Zee in a tight hug. Zee shifts her weight, leaning against us as she wraps her arms around the both us and hugs us back just as hard. “Mates,” Zee’s voice is choked with happy tears, “S’damn good t’see ye again, luvs… damn good.” All three of us laugh and cry at the same time, leaning against one another. I think a big part of me was afraid that I had lost Zee and Twilight too, that they had gone somewhere I couldn’t chase them down. “Y’look good, Zee,” I croak, and Zee just laughs raspily. “Tha’s a bloody lie, innit?” She pulls back with a dry smile. “BUt you? Aye, both’a ye are lookin’ damn good, mates.” “Definitely felt better though,” Lightning adds as she steps back, and Zee goes back to leaning on her cane. “What happened to you?” “Rough landin’,” Zee’s smile gets even more arid. “Them bastard gauntlets tore m’body apart, aye? But I ain’t dead yet, luvs, not for a good long while.” As she says it though, I watch a small trickle of blood leak from the corner of her mouth, and suddenly Zee was overcome with a fit of coughing and hacking. Tiny splatters of crimson dust the concrete beneath her, but before I react, another figure moves between us. One in a long robe tied tight around a thin frame with a veil of pale grey draped over her face. Her hands go around Zee, one at her back, and another at her chest over her heart. “Hey what’re you-?” I start, but she ignores me, and words spill from her lips. The words aren’t any language I know, but as she speaks a faint light surrounds her hands that’s almost the same color as her veil. Pale grey. And Zee’s coughing fit subsides. Slowly but surely, she begins to relax as the robed figure takes out a cloth, licks it, and begins cleaning away the rust-red stains around her mouth and on her hand. “Soz, mates,” Zee rasps, “ain’t as hale as I used t’be.” “Shit,” Lightning swore softly, “what the hell was that?” The robed figure turns to us then, and pulls the hood down, and shoulder-length locks of mulberry spill out around her still-veiled face. I finally recognise her, despite not being able to fully see her features. “Sunny Flare,” I mutter, “that’s you, isn’t it?” “It is,” her voice is a lot more subdued than I remember. She always sounded a lot more unhinged, back then… back when she was always dogging after Twilight. “Welcome back, Rainbow Dash, Lightning Dust, you’ve missed a lot this last year.” “She’s right, mates,” Zee says solemnly, then nods back to her E-type, its engine still rumbling contentedly by the roundabout. “Get in… we’ll fill ye in on the way.” “The way where?” I ask as we start towards the car. “To Twilight,” Sunny says softly.
1. Country Roads“Wake up, Rainbabe.” “No.” A quiet chuckle answers my flat reply as I curl up under the itchy sheets of the crappy motel bed we're sharing. It's hot, too hot, but then again we are on the Mother Road and, although it's not quite summer, it's close enough, and that means it's too damn hot. Lips press to my bare shoulder, and I shiver as they rise toward the base of my neck. A familiar hand brushes some of my sleep-tangled hair away so she can continue kissing and, finally, I sigh and roll over to catch her lips on mine. “Mmm, morning breath,” I grin, and Lightning Dust rolls her eyes. “Gross,” she gives me a light shove as she sits up. Or tries to, anyway. She gets about halfway up before I tackle her back down to bed, and she lets out a flailing noise of alarm as I pin her down, sling my legs over her, and straddle her waist. We both slept naked because frankly you have to in the heat of the Mojave desert, even just the part that Route 66 skirts, if you want to get any sleep. The heat sinks into the air and the dirt and the asphalt, it sinks into your skin and you sweat until you're soaked through and miserable. Well, except for us. I’m never miserable so long as I’m with her. “Really?” Lightning smirks up at me and I mirror the expression back as she reaches up and winds her fingers through my hair. I’d cut it short a few months after we’d returned. Returned. Capital ‘R’. My hair is a short, ragged, pixie bob now, which was a cut that I’d always wanted and always avoided in the past for a kind of stupid of reason. When I was a lot younger, maybe seven or eight, I’d asked my mom if I could get my hair cut short like that because it’d been the way that Gilda had worn her hair, and I was still going through that stage of wanting to be just like her, and my mom had shut me down hard with a flat ‘no’. Because it would make me look gay. Because that was completely unacceptable. What a bitch. “Really,” I lean down and kiss her neck, and she laughs as she pushes me playfully. “Come on, Rainbabe,” she laughs, and damn I love her laugh, “we’re way too sweaty for this.” “Thought ya liked it when I was sweaty,” I let a lecherous grin spread across my lips. “I mean, you sure spent enough time looking at me during our games, and I sweat like a workhorse.” A blush colors her cheeks as I bury my face against her neck and continue kissing. “Besides,” I continue quietly, “I like the way you smell.” “Ble~h,” Lightning groans, but she doesn’t pull away. “My head must still be fucked up because I don’t know if that’s super disgusting or insanely sexy.” “How about sexy?” Lightning raises an eyebrow. “How do you figure?” “Because I wanna have sex with you?” “Pervert,” but she still takes a hard grip on my hair and drags me down to kiss her again and again. “Love you, Dusty,” I whisper softly in the spaces between our lips, and I let my hands trail along her gorgeous, athletic body. Lightning Dust was more than my girlfriend, and had been since we’d come back. Her almost turquoise complexion is unblemished, despite the wounds we’d earned during the Battle of Canterlot two years ago. Her amber hair is almost the same, a little longer I think, but still soft and perpetually wind blown. And her eyes, those brilliant, topaz gems that are always smiling when she’s looking at me, no matter how many mistakes I make. “Always, Rainbabe,” she breathes back as she drags me closer to nip at my neck. “But, y’know, it might not be the best time f’this.” “Pfft, there’s never a bad time for this,” I reply as I return her little love bite, giving her a matching one on her shoulder. “Besides, it’s still dark out.” I nod towards the window where not even a peep of sunlight was creeping in through the slightly cracked drapes. “That’s sorta the problem.” “Why?” I look over, then narrow my eyes, then look at the clock and cuss. “Yeah,” Lightning laughs softly, “it’s past nine in the morning, hon.” “Stupid magic,” I sit up and glare at the wall for a while as I consider our options. “How many ya think?” Lightning chews on her lip for a few moments as she glances at the window, then at the door where the tetragrammatic ward she’d carved into it last night was still intact and unscorched as it would have been if something strong enough had tried to force entrance. I could see the calculations happening in her head, she was always the more analytical between the two of us, and definitely understood the nuts and bolts of magic better than I probably ever would. “Couple dozen?” “Tch, dammit,” I look down my sweaty, naked body and let out a plaintive whine that earns a magnificent roll of Lightning’s eyes. “But I’m all… ready!” “Yeah, babe, I can tell,” Lightning laughs, “but there’s like, a score and change of hellshades blackening about a kilometer of the fucking Mojave out there.” The name ‘Hellshades’ sounds bad, but really they were just supernatural ash and embers with a bad attitude. They’re nasty, sure enough, but only at night, and other than that they’re only really good as messengers and acting as the eyes and ears for whoever conjured them. “And?” “Oh my God, we are not going to have sex while surrounded by demons,” Lightning swatted my boob and I let out a squawk of pain as I rolled off of her. “Get your friggin’ pants on, Rainbabe, we’ve got work to do.” “Killjoy,” I mutter as I get up and fish around for my clothes, then look back up at her with more serious concern. “You sure you got enough juice in ya for this? After Las Pegasus, I mean?” “It’s been better than a week,” Lightning says as she sits up and pulls on her pants and trousers, which are baggy, military surplus fatigues. “I’m back to full, or close enough… you?” “I got a bigger wellspring than you, remember?” I smirk as I pull my shirt on and tug it down straight. “I’ve got juice and then some.” “Remember what the master said about pushing too close to your limit, though,” Lightning’s voice is stern as she laces up her boots. “You always do that thing where you go too hard, Rainbabe, you got lucky in Las Pegasus ‘cause we had backup, but out here-” “They’re shades, Dusty,” I wave my hand dismissively. “If I hit my limit and go dark side against some conjured mooks you might as well kick me outta the Hellions altogether.” “I still can’t believe that name stuck.” I cackle as I stretch my arms and legs, limbering up the way I used to before a soccer game back when the biggest problem I had to worry about was whether or not the other team’s back line had any oomph to them, and if the goalie knew his left foot from his right. Now I had bigger issues, like backalley sorcerers calling up living shadows to kill Lightning and I for bogarting the magical amulet he was trying to snatch up and corrupt. “Don’t knock it,” I stick out my tongue as I crack my neck. “We needed a name.” “Sunny and Zee didn’t have to agree to that one, though,” Lightning grumbles while she picks up the long length of thick, powerful chain links and starts wrapping them around my arms. “You sure you’re good for this, babe?” “I’m fine, Dusty,” I give her a level look as I pick up the other end of the chain and wrap it around my torso, securing it at the padlock that rests over my heart. “We got this… we always do.” Lightning wears a faint smile as she shakes her head, then wraps her arms around me and draws me close. I slip my hands around the back of her head and pull her in for a kiss. Not fast and passionate like I usually do, but slow and comfortable, our tongues twining together in a familiar dance as I taste her breath and relish the touch of her fingers as they play along my neck. “I love you, Rainbow Dash,” Lightning says softly. She only really says my name when she’s worried about me. “Let’s just be careful this time around. No redlining… please?” I roll my eyes, but nod. “Fine, I’ll keep it under the line.” “Thanks,” she leans her forehead against mine, and for a few moments we just stand there silently. A silence which is broken by a lonesome howl that someone more grounded in reality might mistake for the wind blowing across the desert. I grimace as I run my fingers along the carved runes on the chains, focusing my mind on the symbols. “Time to run again,” I mutter softly, and energy crackles along the chains and down my limbs. “To the edge and back… always back… always…” I grimace, nearly biting my tongue as the painful surges of electrical impulse bite into my limbs and muscles. Lines of pure light begin tracing themselves along my arms and legs, drawing designs like the branches of a great tree starting at my extremities and bleeding inward like living tattoos crawling along until they creep up my neck and cover my face in a mask of lambent energy. The Seal of Harmony, that’s what Zee called it anyway. All of us Hellions have one courtesy of one Sunset Shimmer, and it’s both the cost and the reminder that we bought our magic through darkness rather than light. Our time spent in Equestria had taught Lightning and I how to use the Seals despite us being asleep the whole time, which is one of the perks of having a master who works almost entirely through dreams. It had taken a while for us to remember everything we’d learned on the other side after coming back to our world, ironically it wasn’t unlike trying to recall the details of a dream, but we got it. As the Seal engages fully, I’m briefly hit with a feeling like someone stretching a thin film of plastic over my skin, and for a moment I can’t breathe. The first time it happened I had a panic attack, but after a year or so of practice I’d mostly gotten used to the sensation. “Ready?” I turn to Lightning whose body is glowing with its own set of vibrant yellow branch-and-leaf tattoos, and nod. “Why d’ya think they haven’t attacked yet?” I ask, and Lightning shrugs. “My guess?” She replies. “They’re waiting for a heavy hitter, and then come nightfall they’ll be on us.” “Why summon hellshades in broad daylight, then?” I gesture at the clock. “They’re only good as spies like this, nightime’s when they’re actually dangerous.” “Which is why they’re waiting, and they’re still dangerous,” Lightning said slowly, giving me a level look. “There’s enough of them to black out the skies, sure, but that’s no substitute for real night.” “I dunno, Dusty,” I rub the back of my neck as an itch runs down it. “This feels like a setup.” “Probably is,” she agrees with a dry chuckle. “But either we call their bluff, fight it out now, and maybe set off a trap, or we wait til night and get swarmed by an army of hellshades going at full chat, plus whatever bruiser they bring in.” “If we wait we might get a shot at the conjurer,” I point out, but Lightning shakes her head. “Not what we’re here for, Rainbabe,” she tucks her hand into her vest and draws out a small, hand-stitched leather bag. “Remember?” I sigh, but nod. “Yeah,” I say quietly. “I remember.” The Amulet of Inanna-Ishtar, that’s what Zee called it anyway, and if she’s right then it’s a piece of a goddess’s regalia that she wore when she descended into the underworld and then returned. Lightning presses the bag back into her vest and secures it. “We’re getting her back this time, Dash,” Lightning says with fire in her eyes. “We’re bringing back our friend.” I lean in and press my lips to hers again, slipping my hand down to her waist and pulling Lightning into my arms. She melts against me, kissing with enough desperation that you’d think we were going into our last battle. Who knows, maybe we are. Maybe this conjurer’s got some big bad juju waiting for us the moment we step out of our jerry-rigged ward and into the open. That’s why I’m kissing her though. If I go down in a fight I want kissing the girl I love to be the last thing I did. “Alright,” I say as we part, and I nuzzle her nose with mine. “Let’s go shoot magic missiles at the darkness.” “I hate you.” “Love you too, Dusty.”
3. To A PlaceNine’o’clock in the morning and it’s pitch black in the Mojave. If that doesn’t describe just how fucked up the world can get when magic is in the wrong hands I don’t know what will. Lightning Dust pushes open our hotel room door causing the tetragrammatic ward to crackle as its circuit is cut, and the magic flowing through it sieves out with a faint scent of air-freshener and ozone. I glance around through the dark, night-like desert, shivering a little at the unearthly cold. The sky is shrouded by something that looks like late evening, but I know is really just the dying embers from Hell’s furnace. Or something like Hell, anyway. One of the first things you learn about conjurers is where they conjure from. Now some conjurers work with mostly benign powers, pulling things like formless energy into our world from beyond the Wall. You can get pretty much any kind of power doing that, from electrical energy, to kinetic force, to pure fire and ice. Sometimes at the same time! But the less benign ones? Oof, those are a doozy. See, conjuring is a knack almost anyone can pick up and there’s a really good reason for that. There are always times when we’re desperate, there are always times when we’re alone and scared, and we just want someone, anyone, to be there for us. So we cry out. We cry into the darkness for help, and if a soul with enough magic in it does that? Well… occasionally something in that darkness will answer. “We’ve never fought this many at once, Rainbabe,” Lightning says, her voice wary. “Even in the middle of the Mojave morning, this is gonna be rough.” “We got this, Dusty,” I crack my neck to one side, then the other, “just watch my back and I’ll watch yours.” “So long as you don’t get distracted watching my butt,” she shoots back, and I smirk. “No promises.” We knock knuckles as the darkness starts to close in with a suffocating hostility. That’s the kind of thing that can really get under your skin if you’re not used to hellshades… the sense of being watched. The darkness out there is alive, after a fashion, and it’s watching me and Dusty, and it hates the fuck out of us because that is literally the only thing it’s capable of. Hellshades aren’t complicated creatures, they’re just petty hate and violent impulses, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t dangerous. Out of the darkness they begin to resolve, and I can’t help shuddering a little. The only thing that really, seriously skeeves me out about Hellshades is their shape. They’re like a walking silhouette of darkness cut from a cloth made of shadows, and when they manifest enough to really do damage they always look like something… not quite human. I wonder if they’re like ghosts, but if they are then I’m definitely sure I don’t want to know what they’re ghosts of. “Let’s snuff’em out,” I force a grin onto my face as I flex, and prismatic light crackles along my limbs. “Shock and awesome,” Lightning says with a wry chuckle. Her smile probably isn’t any more real than mine, but we put up the facade anyway. This isn’t a joke and we both know it… In the eight months since we started actively operating as members of the Hellions, we’d gone up against some real third-rate goombas and whoever this conjurer was? He was not one of them. “I count thirty-two, Rainbabe,” Lightning’s voice shook less than it might’ve. “Sixteen for each of us then,” I crashed my knuckles together and arcs of power spat between them. “No redlining, babe,” Lightning said more nervously. “You promised.” “Right, yeah, I know.” As we squared up, moving alongside one another, a voice shook the air and rattled the glass windows of the motel with shivering force. A sickly, tarry taste welled up in the back of my throat as it spoke, and I could tell Lightning wasn’t taking it any better than I was. THE AMULET… the voice came from everywhere and nowhere all at once. LEAVE IT ON THE GROUND AND LEAVE WITH YOUR LIVES. Lightning cusses sharply under her breath. “He’s puppeting them all at once,” she says, and feel a chill run down my spine. “That’s bad, right?” I ask weakly, and she just nods. “Right, thought so…” I turn back to the wall of shades and raise my voice. “Hey, uh, neat trick with the surround sound but we’re gonna take a soft pass on that offer. Any chance you just let up? That way we,” I gesture between Lightning and I, “don’t have to knuckle down and fuck up your roadies, here.” ONE FINAL CHANCE, the shades howled their master’s words in cacophonic shrieks. LEAVE THE AMULET. “This amulet is our chance at bringing our friend back from darkness, douchelord,” Lightning snarls as she takes a step forward. “You can have it over our dead bodies.” The world is a twisting murmur of shadows for a long moment, and I can feel every single one of the shades flowering down at us from the blackened skies. The tension lasts all the way up until the shades speak one last time, and they only say a single word. ACCEPTABLE. On that word, the wall collapses into a surge tide of darkness roaring towards us. I plant my feet, bracing the way I used to on track days, take a deep breath… …and I run. The air around me thunders as I barrel forward, a corona of prismatic electricity crackling around me as I ram into the solid wall of hellshades. I feel as much as hear them shriek in agony as I burn past their initial charge, but it doesn’t last. Their claws are like gripping anchors into my body, my skin is only protected from their sharp talons thanks to the veil of energy I’m projecting around my body that blunts kinetic impact, but that’ll deplete quickly if I don’t get free. Fortunately, I don’t have to bother. Lightning Dust is a one-woman phalanx, limbs of caged voltage peel out of her body as she catches up to me, new sets of arms fold out of her shoulders and from beneath her real limbs making her look like a Hindu goddess. Nothing can touch her. Every shade that attacks is intercepted by a clone that peels out of her body, bearing the shadow creature to the ground in a flurry of fists. She seizes me by the color with four hands, wrenches me free of the morass of shadows, and pitches me behind her. “Clear us a path!” Lightning shouts as she falls into a practiced martial stance. I nod, ground myself for a moment, take a deep breath, then bolt outwards again towards where the wall of shades is thinner. As soon as I move towards it, the hellshades try to compensate by swarming me. Hilarious. I’m too fast for these mooks to catch. Not quite fast enough to avoid a few knicks and cuts here and there, but nothing major and nothing I’ll even feel til the morning. Of course, if I’d been going at full speed they wouldn’t have even been able to lay that much of a hand on me, but the weight of the enchanted chains I was wearing prevented that. Zee and Sunny had both warned me that the faster I accelerated the more magic I would consume, and the faster I ate up magic the closer I got to dipping into the permanently tainted portions of my wellspring that were sealed away by Harmony. Lightning had the same issue of course but, unlike me, she had a hard throttle on her magic. Only so many clones could be controlled, and she generally managed with close-quarters combat using her clones to turn herself into a dervish of fists which was pretty energy efficient. Me though? There’s no throttle on the pain train. The shades move like they’re caught in thick sludge as I careen around them. I spin and spiral, kicking off from the ground with every motion, almost flying as I rip through the air, my legs threshing through the shadows like blades. I land on my hands, spinning and rolling in place, cutting through the shades as they throw themselves mindlessly into my light-shrouded legs before finally pulling back as their master reins them in, stopping them from shredding themselves on me. Kipping up with a push, I handspring to my feet, land with a hard skid backward, brace, and push off again. The shadows come at me like a scythe this time, their bodies folding together into a mass of dark magic and hate, but I drop to my knees, sliding beneath the attack and skidding forward before rolling in and lashing out with my legs again. My legs have always been and will always be my best weapon, they’re pistons of magically enhanced skin and muscle, and my heels hammer into the center mass of the shadows, collapsing it like cheap metal siding as I blow through two more of the shades I follow the force of the blow with a push, accelerating to throw myself forward into the air and spin like a bladed wheel. From the air I see Lightning, fighting like an army is at her back because in a way there is one. Hellshades are simple creatures, tactically speaking. They fight like jackals or coyotes, like starving, desperate wolves, circling their prey, snapping in only to draw back as they try to open a blind spot for a fellow to take the legs of their target out from under them and bear to the ground where the pack can finally bury them in tooth and claw. Except Lightning doesn’t have a blind spot. I watch as a shade dives at, right at the hollow of her back where anyone else would be vulnerable. An arm made of lightning folds out of her real left arm, bending backward and lashing out to catch the hellshade by its throat. Two more arms follow, each one grabbing one of the shades clawed limbs, and with a mighty heave they wrench the thing apart, its airy shriek echoing as it’s banished back to its home. Lightning never even had to look at the thing. Her fists were barreling out, one-two-one-two, her knuckles cracking ephemeral jaws and shattering limbs. Each blow carried the force of three behind it as she layered her clones fists over hers. One-two-three shots in a single punch, all within a heartbeat of one another. Her feet are planted solidly on the ground as she bobs and weaves. Five clones, six bodies, all occupying the same space. The Hellion who earned the title Kali of Boxing in the black-magic underworld rampaged through the conjured army, introducing shadowy flesh to Queensbury rules in the most visceral fashion possible while following my trail of light and destruction. We trained night and day for months to get this good, and that’s literal. During the day we sparred and fought, training with Adagio’s sister, Aria as she pounded the basics of multiple fighting styles into us. During the night we Dreamed, practicing routine after routine in the space beyond the Walls of Sleep. My feet barely touched the ground as I spun, kicked, rolled, and lashed out, my Capoeira turning the air around me into a meatgrinder for the shades. Complicated style or no, when you move ten times faster than anyone else and learn from a hyperkine, you don’t need much in the way of realtime to master a physical skill set. And then I was out. I spun and kicked, landing two heavy blows on a mass of shadow and striking it into the cold earth of the desert, and like a set of drapes being ripped from a window, suddenly sunlight is streaming in. “Dusty, c’mon!” I shout as I turn, spinning and kicking at every approaching shade as they try to close the breach I’d opened up in their sorcerous darkness. They were weaker here though, and the closer Lightning got to the opening the weaker the shades became until finally, we both managed to stumble out, panting and gasping from the dome of darkness that was covering a square kilometer of the Mojave around the motel we’d been sleeping. “Crap, guess we’re hoofing it the rest of the way,” I spit on the ground and hold out an arm to Lightning as the dome of shadows starts to roil and shift, moving in a way that makes me think of an enormous, lumbering tortoise. Lightning takes my hand and grips hard. “Let’s get some distance, Rainbabe,” Lightning says as she steps closer, wraps her arms around my neck, and hugs me tight. “Now run!” I don’t need her to tell me twice. I turn my back on the shadows, take another deep breath, and bolt. If that conjurer wants the amulet he’ll have to catch me first and, to this day, there’s only one person who’s ever really caught me, and she was resting in my arms.
4. Where I Belong ~One Year Ago~ “S’been a rough year, mates,” Zee starts. Her breathing is still labored as she reclines back in the front passenger seat of her E-Type. “We’ve managed,” Sunny says as she muscles the car through traffic. “Still no power steering, huh?” Lightning remarks from the seat next to mine, and a chorus of dry chuckles answers her. Zee scoffs and gestures blithely with her cane. “Told our lass I ain’t ruinin’ a classic, an’ I’m ‘oldin’ to it.” I shake my head and turn to watch the city of Canterlot pass us by. We’re heading north towards the docks, I know that much, but I have no idea where we’re supposed to be ending up. “So… you gonna tell us what’s going on with you, Zee?” I ask as I turn back to her. Zee frowns, then shrugs and toys with the gnarled knot that makes up the top of her cane. I notice now that it’s not just ornate, it’s actually covered in symbols like the ones tattooed across her unscarred skin. “Arabus all but killed me,” Zee says finally. “M’nerves are shot, muscles too… heart’s barely functional, but I got medication f’that.” “Even then, she’d be dead without magic,” Sunny added grimly, and Lightning and I both blanch. “Just the act of beating tears up her heart, so I have to be around to lay healing spells on her now and again before it gets too bad.” “Seriously?” I turn and stare at Zee who nods. “Aye, tha’s as it is, luv,” Zee admits with a bitter sigh. “Ain’t much left’a me now, but I got this tidy lass t’thank f’keepin’ me outta hospital.” “She should still be in the hospital,” Sunny said the words with a kind of bitter tightness that suggested this wasn’t the first time she’d mentioned it. “Not yet,” Zee says with the same rote tone, “not til our lass is awake.” Our Lass. Zee’s love, and one of my best friends, is this world’s version of Twilight Sparkle. Brilliant, mad, and powerful, among a variety of other things, she was also a good person, deep down. She had rescued Sunny from her abusive mother, fought to defend us, and strove to find a place where we all belonged. And Storm King had used her. Manipulated her. He had poisoned her with dark magic and left her shattered after draining it from her before the Elements of Harmony had apparently defeated him. “So she’s still…” Lightning trails off, but Sunny and Zee both nod. “The Seal of Harmony is keeping her alive, but only just,” Sunny says. “The Bell of Tambelon was a real nightmare of an artifact though, as it turns out.” “The what?” I lean forward on my elbows. “You mean that little brass bell she always wore?” “It was Grogar’s Bell, mates,” Zee clarifies. “We pulled together some research courtesy’a Gilda’s witch n’that lot beyond the gate, aye? That thing weren’t just a bell.” “It was a focus,” Sunny’s knuckles tightened so hard on the wheel that the leather creaked and her knuckles turned white. “A vortex that channeled the sum total power of a dead kingdom, Grogar’s kingdom… a necropolis that was filled with dark magic.” “Shit,” I lean back and let out a slow breath. “What was it doing to her?” “Killin’er,” Zee’s reply is subdued. “But not natural-like, aye? It was turnin’er into a monster, a demon-thing like Grogar… s’why she was changin’ like she was.” “Son of a bitch,” Lightning swears, and I reach out to take her hand as she clenches her teeth. “And I’ll bet he knew exactly what was going on.” “Aye, I’ll ‘appen tha’s true,” Zee agrees. “Pops took us all for a ride mates… can’t tell ye ‘ow sorry I am I brought ye all inta this shite.” “Not your fault, Zee.” I say the same words at the same time as Sunny Flare, and we share a surprised glance that warms a little after a moment. “If anything you’ve been worse off than any of us,” Lightning offers weakly. “I mean, think about it… you were raised by that psychopath, you’ve had him whispering in your ear since you were a kid.” “She’s right,” Sunny says softly as we turn onto one of the warehouse roads, and she reaches out to put a hand on Zee’s and to my surprise their fingers lace together. “You’re too hard on yourself, Zee… this wasn’t your fault, okay? Twilight wasn’t your fault.” “Mayhap I’ll buy that when I see’er awake,” Zee says quietly. We park in front of a large warehouse. There’s a set of fencing around it that looks relatively new, along with a slew of ‘No Trespassing’ signs. Beyond the fences is an open, barren lot of cold concrete, and the warehouse itself looks like it’s halfway to falling in on itself. Every single door and window is plastered with boards nailed to the jams and tape with bold letters stating ‘Condemned’ on it, and it certainly looks condemned. Hell, the place looks friggin’ haunted. “Where are we?” I ask as I step from the car. “Place I bought off’a that orange-haired lass with the fins,” Zee groaned softly as she stood from the vehicle. Sunny was at her side seconds later, giving her a hand up as Zee braced her weight against her cane. “Adagio,” I muttered, shaking my head. The eldest sister of the Dazzlings, a trio of Sirens from Equestria who, once upon a time, had threatened Canterlot with their magic, were now some of Sunset’s staunchest allies. Adagio herself was, mind-blowingly, one of the six Elements of Harmony. “Aye, tha’s it,” Zee nods as she hobbles towards the gate with Sunny Flare in tow. “This place’s got all manner’a defenses they’d built up back when they were trainin’ t’kick us in the nuts.” Zee chuckles wanly at that, then heaves her shoulders in an exaggerated shrug. “Now? It’s a safe place f’our lass, and there’s loads’a magic sunk into the stone by now.” “Helps with working other magic,” Sunny supplies helpfully. “Guess it’s probably not dangerous if you’re keeping Twi’ here, huh?” Lightning asks with a weak chuckle, and Sunny gives her an arid smile. “Yeah, thought not.” “Still,” I cut in, “you’re keeping her in a collapsing warehouse?” “Eh…” Zee makes a vague gesture, then nods for me to follow her. Sunny Flare pulls the gate open a few feet, enough to permit us entrance, and I go in with Lightning on my heels. As Sunny follows us, she closes the gate and I hear a faint snap of energy from the metal. “The hell?” Lightning says as she and I both turn at the noise. “That an electric fence?” “Enchanted, actually,” Sunny says with a smile. I still can’t get over how much she’s changed from the simpering shrieking zealot that clung to Twilight’s every word. “That noise was the warding circle re-engaging.” “Nice,” Lightning smirks. “You’ve gotta teach me how to do that.” “It’s extremely precise magic,” Sunny warns quietly, but I just shake my head at that. “Don’t sweat that, Sunny,” I wave away her concerns with a laugh. “Lightning isn’t like me, she’s actually smart.” “C’mon babe, don’t-” Lightning starts, but I silence her with a look. “I’m kind of an idiot, Dusty,” I say grimly. “I try but the fact is… I kinda fuck up a lot.” “Ain’t more’n me,” Zee cackles, slapping her hand across my back, and I can’t help but smile. “Now c’mon… let’s go see our lass, aye?” I nod and follow, trailing behind Zee with Lightning and Sunny taking up the rear. At first, I can’t even tell where it is that Zee is heading to because none of the doors seem to be open, I start to wonder if maybe one of them is just made up to appear locked when Zee whole form just… ripples. It’s only for a moment, but it’s like she passes through a soap bubble, there’s a slight distortion in the air around her. I grit my teeth and keep walking, determined to follow her, and sure enough I pass through some kind of barrier, and for a moment it feels like someone is stretching super-thin saran wrap across my whole body, and then there’s a sensation of something snapping and it passes. And a gasp leaves my lips. The warehouse isn’t falling apart, it’s standing tall and almost polished. The walls are whole and intact, the doors are barred and reinforced with steel, and the windows are caged in metal. Curling, graffitied symbols in strange curvilinear designs done in a riot of colors across the walls gleam and crackle with magic, and the air is thick with a scent like spice and incense. “What the fuck,” Lightning’s mumbles as she steps through the barrier beside me and stares up at the warehouse. “Well we ain’t been sittin’ ‘round with our thumbs up our arses all year, y’know,” Zee says with a certain smugness as Sunny steps through alongside us, a small smile of her own on her face. “No shit,” I shake my head, smiling weakly as Zee gestures for us to keep moving. Sunny moves past us to one of the doors and fits a key to the lock, turns it, and that odd crackle I’d hear from the gate sounds off again. It occurs to me that, for as heavy-duty as the place looks on the outside, the magic reinforcing it must have turned this place into the equivalent of Fort Knox. And it was all for the sake of protecting a single soul. The inside of the warehouse is wide open, lacking interior walls and with the roof kept intact by the reinforced columns of concrete. All along the edges of the warehouse it was like someone had taken the contents of different rooms and buildings and just stitched them together. There’s a large, king-sized bed pressed against the far wall sitting on multiple rugs, along with a dining table nearby, and several bookshelves arranged around it. The whole ensemble could have been transplanted out of someone’s master bedroom. Where the rugs terminated further along the exterior wall there was the beginning of what looked like a laboratory, with tables covered in beakers, bottles, and other chemical paraphernalia. Past that are more rugs, chairs, tables, and shelves, giving the look of a sitting room or a study, and beyond that ‘room’ was a kitchen. But the center of the warehouse is what kept my attention. The whole middle of the massive building has been given over to a single purpose. The cold concrete floor is scribed with the most intricate interlocking set of lines I’d ever seen, and I didn’t have to be a genius to recognise a magic circle when I saw one. This one had to be at least a hundred feet across. Candles burn at equidistant points along its edge and at points inside of it as well, and at the dead center of the circle was a queen-size bed with an IV beside it, and a single occupant. “Damn,” Lightning takes the word out of my mouth and says it with a whisper of awe and pain. “Aw man,” I feel a sliver of pain settle in my chest as I stare at the thin figure, barely breathing, on the bed. “Twi’...” I look down at the circle, then up to Sunny who just nods, answering my silent question, and I cross the circle and move to the bedside. Twilight Sparkle, the mad mage of Canterlot, and my friend. If she weren’t breathing, I might think she were dead. Her face is ghostly-pale, and she’s thin as a rail. Her hair is pooled around her in a ragged halo, and every inch of her skin that I can see is covered with lines like the curving branches of a tree. “What is it?” I ask softly as Lightning moves beside me and takes my hand. “Those tattoos.” “That’s the Seal of Harmony,” Sunny replies as she moves to the other side of the bed. “It’s the only thing keeping Twilight from succumbing to the poison of Tambelon’s magic, a dam against a tide of darkness.” “How do we fix it?” Lightning asks, a tight anger to her voice that reflects itself in her grip on my hand. “How do we bring her back?” “Tha’s the sixty-billion double-dollar question, luvs,” Zee says bitterly. “There’s nowt we ain’t tried as we are, but tha’s not all there is to it.” “What do you mean?” I look up with a raised eyebrow. “She means,” Sunny cuts in, “that we may have exhausted what she and I can do, but there are other sources of power in this world that might have the answer.” “Then why-?!” I cut myself off, realising even before I ask the question what the answer will be. Why wouldn’t they do it? More like how would they do it. Zee is all but dying, and Sunny is the only thing keeping her alive. Zee could barely walk without help, and Sunny probably acted as her caregiver as much as her friend. Even if the answer to Twilight’s dilemma was as simple as going to fetch something it would be an undertaking to manage it. I let out a slow breath, turned to Lightning, and she gave me a small smile before nodding. “Right,” I say quietly, and grip Lightning’s hand back. Lightning Dust leans up and brushes her lips over my cheek, loops her arm into mine, and with a small grin, we both look up to Sunny and Zee. “So,” I start, “what can we do?”
5. All My MemoriesThe shadows stay on our tail for better than a week. We keep ahead of them, but barely. The hot sun of the Mojave keeps them at bay during the day, and my speed gives us a considerable lead on them, but Lightning and I both know that’s only going to last for as long as we’re on the Mother Road. That and I can’t keep running forever. The metaphorical ‘engine’ that runs my magic is a pretty damn efficient one, but I need to sleep eventually. Unfortunately, between running all day and only catching a few hours of downtime at night, by the end of the week I’m running on fumes. “C’mon, Rainbabe, just a little further,” Lightning says. We’re close to the official end of the route and about six days from Canterlot on foot assuming I could find time to recharge, but therein lay the rub. “Can’t… stop…” I gasp as Lightning Dust pulls me into an alley. We’d passed into the limits of Yokelahoma City fifteen minutes ago, now we're downtown and my whole body is starting to go numb. Worse, it’s closing in on the evening and once night falls fully the Hellshades will be right on our asses again just like they have been all week. “Not your choice, Rainbabe,” Lightning says. “You’re on the edge of redlining, and that’s not an option.” “We… we can’t…” My vision doubles as I collapse back against the wall of the alley and slide down it until I’m sitting on the ground. “They’re right… on our heels…” I’m heaving every word out between dragging air into my abused lungs. I want to keep running. I have to keep running, but my body is at its limit. The tattoos crawling across my sweat-stained skin like ivy are an ugly bruise-purple, and I know if I try to push further they’ll dive into angry scarlet. Damn it. “Let’s go babe,” Lightning gets herself under me, pulls one of my arms over her shoulder, and starts dragging me out to the sidewalk. The sun is setting, and the city streetlights are only just now beginning to flicker on one by one. Even through my haze of exhaustion I'm straining to listen for the sound of the Hellshades approach. It’s subtle, just an aura of faint whispers. Imagine suddenly being in a large room full of people where everyone is keeping their conversations to a polite volume, except you’ll hear it coming from the walls and the air and the sky above. “Where are we going?” I gulp in another drink of air and look up at Lightning who’s scanning the skyline of the city. She doesn’t answer for several minutes, and by now I’m smart and patient enough not to repeat myself. I know she heard me, and the only reason she hasn’t answered is because she’s coming up with a plan. That’s how we work. She plans and I execute. Lightning is my shot-caller, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. “The Mareiott.” Lightning looks over at me with a renewed grin. “We’re going to the Mareiott.” “Isn’t the vacation supposed t’be after we finish the mission?” I ask with a laugh. “Shut up,” Lightning pulls me closer so she can support me with one arm while pulling out her phone and dialing with the other. “We need a place that’s well lit.” “Isn’t that everywhere?” I look around the city. We're downtown, so all the businesses are restaurants and bars catering the city's substantial nightlife. “Why the Mareiott?” Lightning doesn’t answer. She’s holding the phone up to her ear, and it only rings once before I hear Sunny Flare’s muffled voice answer on the other line. //Dusty? Are you okay?// Sunny’s tone is one of immediate worry. Unlike Zee, she’s kind of a worrywart in general, although I guess that’s probably to do with Zee’s condition. “Could be better, Flares, we’re in a bind.” Lightning gives her the low down on the Hellshades and the conjurer, what little we know of him, including the Spark’s Notes regarding my week-long marathon. “Anyway, now we’re in Yokelahoma City and Dashie is the next best thing to redlining,” Lightning finishes, and I hear Sunny make a sharp noise of disapproval. “I have a plan, but we need to get the penthouse at the Courtyard Mareiott, can you and Zee swing that?” There’s a brief pause, then Sunny chuckles quietly over the phone. //Ah, I get it… yeah, we can do it, and if it’s occupied Zee can always hack their servers and make a few changes to the reservation logs. Just start heading over, it’ll be ready under your name in a minute or two.// “Thanks, Sunny,” Lightning says, and gets a wordless hum by way of response before the line goes dead. “Penthouse, huh? Snazzy.” I give Lightning my best grin, wiggling eyebrows included, and earn a flick across my nose in reply. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Rainbabe,” Lightning grumbles as she settles me more comfortably against her as she starts walking. “We need to call a cab, we have to get to the hotel before nightfall.” “I can run us there,” I say firmly. “I can do that much without redlining.” “You’re already bruising, Dash.” Lightning’s reply is tight and strained. She’s not angry, I know what angry sounds like. She’s just scared. “We can’t-!” “-can’t afford to wait for a fuckin’ cab!” I cut her off. “I know my limits, Dusty, I can get us to the Mareiott, okay? Just show me a map, and I’ll get us there!” She wants to argue with me, but she also knows I’m right. Whatever Lightning’s plan is, it relies on us having as much time as possible to execute it, and calling a cab, waiting on it, and then having to deal with the ride itself through downtown evening traffic meant we’d be an hour poorer on time at best. Or, I could run, and we’d be there in five minutes. “Fine!” Lightning snaps as she pulls out her phone and opens up the maps app, punches in the Mareiott hotel address and shows me the directions. I stare at it hard for a moment, tracing the line in my mind, occasionally looking up to orient myself before looking back down at the little blue line that weaves through the city. After a moment, I’m sure I know how to get there. Taking a deep breath, I pull in more magic, and my body crackles with hyperkinetic energy. Strength floods my shaking limbs, and the tremors still themselves immediately as I stand up from where I’d been leaning against Lightning Dust, breathe out, then in again, and turn back to Dusty with a grin. “Ready?” I open my arms, and Lightning steps into my embrace. I pull her close and as I do she buries her face against my neck and hugs me tight. “Be careful, baby,” she whispers. “Please don’t push it.” “I know.” I cradle her gently as I breathe in her calming scent. “I won’t… just hold on tight.” “Always.” I nod, then dig my heels into the cement sidewalk, trace the blue line to the Mareiott from where we’re standing one last time in my mind- -and then I run. A sheathe of sparkling kinetic energy snaps into place around me as I explode into motion. I keep myself subsonic this time. I’m already setting off car alarms every other step, and if I break the sound barrier I’ll blow out every window in a kilometer radius. Plus, there are people here… even when the majority of the blowback from my wake is contained by my magic it’s not a fun experience to get bodily tossed around by a speedster. Right now, I barely have enough throughput to get us to the Mareiott safely with nowhere near the extra power to reduce collateral damage. I have to be very careful. Lightning is right to be worried. As confident as I made myself sound when I’d told her I could get us to the hotel, I’m not actually one hundred percent sure on that. The angry bruising tattoos of the Seal are pulsing deeper and deeper in color with every passing second. They’re an active track on my magical expenditure and once they hit red I’d be tapping into the most powerful magic in my body. Dark magic. It would be like flooding my internal engine with nitrous. I would go from barely standing to being on top of the world. I would be faster than any other being alive. And I’d be marinating in the same power that corrupted Twilight and Zee. I’d been forced to redline briefly back in Las Pegasus to get the amulet before another sorcerer, a speedster like me, got their hands one it. The result had been a crazy high that had required Tempest, Summer, and Lightning’s combined effort to pin me down and knock me out of it. Here it’s just Lightning, and if I redline now… If I hurt her… I bite down on my lip and put a lid on those thoughts as I throttle my magic again, slowing us a little but keeping my expenditure to a more efficient clip. If I ever hurt Lightning Dust because I lost control, I think it would really kill me. As it is, we make it all the way to the hotel before the splitting pain of the Seal straining to contain the press of my power draw sends me stumbling. Lightning tumbles out of my arms with a yelp of alarm as my legs go out from under me and I hit the cement hard. The remains of the kinetic sheathe keep me from peeling half my face off, but it still hurts like a bitch before I finally come to a stop on my back. “Rainbow?!” Lightning cries out as she staggers to her feet and runs to my side. I can barely breathe. I sure as hell can’t stand. Electric pain arcs down my arms and legs. Spasms roll through me as the tattoos of the Seal flash between deep, bloody purple, and a dangerous red. I’m right on the line, not over it, but it would only take a stray breeze to push me the rest of the way. “Rainbow, stay with me, baby!” Lightning kneels and pulls my head onto her lap. “Come on! Don’t go over the line! I can’t do this without you!” It’s so close. I can taste it. The power… the pure, unbridled speed. For a moment, I can feel it again. That unleashed power I briefly held two years ago during the Battle of Canterlot. It’s right at my fingertips, and if I reach just a little bit further I’ll have it in my grasp again. Speed that can take me from one side of the world to the other in the span of heartbeats. I could move so fast that nothing could ever touch me again, nothing could hurt me, nothing could even see me. I would be a goddess; everywhere and nowhere all at once, and all I have to do is- “RAINBOW!” Lightning’s voice jerks me back from the edge, and I gasp for air. I can’t run from her, I can’t hurt her, and I can’t… I can’t be with her if I let myself get addicted to that power again. That, more than anything, pulls me back from the red line. “I’m here!” I gasp the words out, and Lightning sobs with relief. “Thank God,” Lightning cries as she pulls me up into her arms and hugs me tight. “Can, uhm… can you stand, babe? ‘Cause we gotta move.” “Y-Yeah, just gimme a sec,” I wheeze before forcing myself to sit up. My vision doubles and then swims, briefly filling me with vertigo before I manage to tamp down on it and get my head on straight again. My legs manage to feel like lead and rubber at the same time as I stand, but Lightning gets herself under me again and we make our way towards the Mareiott lobby with time to spare. We get more than a few weird looks from the hotel patrons and staff as we stagger into the hotel. I look like ten miles of bad road, and Lightning isn’t much better. “Can I help you, ladies?” The concierge looks us up and down like we're scum that got tracked onto the hotel carpets on the heel of someone a lot richer. He’s a tall, spare man in a nice suit with a receding grey-green hairline and a sallow complexion. His nose is the sort that looks like it was made to be looked down over, and I have to bite back a snarky remark about it. I remind myself that we need them to not kick us out of here. “Reservation for two in the Penthouse under the name Dust, Lightning,” Lightning says wearily, and the concierge looks over at the young woman manning the front desk. They share incredulous stares but she goes to work looking for the reservation anyway, and a moment later her eyebrows shoot up past her generous bangs. “It’s… here,” she glances up at the concierge who looks equally surprised. “Can uhm… if I could just have your ID’s to confirm?” The woman holds out a hand, and we both dig out our wallets and pass our ID’s over. Mine is just an ID card while Lightning’s is an actual driver’s license. I don’t have one because, well… why would I? I can outrun a Formula One racer at full chat without breaking a sweat. Besides, I hate driving. It gives me anxiety. “Everything is in order,” the woman says, sounding as surprised as the concierge looks. “Full service, too… and, oh wow…” She gestures violently for the Concierge in a ‘get over here’ motion who moves to her side, and they both read over something. Their demeanors both change instantly, and suddenly the concierge is all smiles and respect. “I’m so sorry for the confusion,” he says with a bright grin. “Please, follow me!” I look over at Lightning with a raised eyebrow, and she just chuckles. “My guess?” She says. “Zee probably left them a pretty substantial tip.” “Ah…” I nod. That sounded like Zee. One thing we’d learned from having a benefactor as wealthy as Grizelda Grimfeather bankrolling us is that an alarming number of people are happy to look the other way regarding even the weirdest shit if you just shove enough hundred-dollar bills over their eyes. That actually ended up explaining a lot about why our world is so fucked up. The concierge walks us over to the elevators, punches in the penthouse suite, and swipes a card which he hands over to us once he’s done. He wrinkles his overlong nose as Lightning takes the keycard from him, but says nothing, probably because the scent of money chases out the stink of sweat pretty effectively. The elevator chimes and opens to a large, and lushly appointed room. The furniture is top-class and definitely looks spendier than anything I’ve ever rested my duff on as the concierge leads us out. We move into the room with as much grace as two exhausted women can manage, and I take a deep breath. This place even smells expensive. “Room service was ordered ahead of you, ladies, and will be up directly,” he says cheerily, all of the vitriol in his voice was gone since he’d seen the depth of Zee’s pocketbook. “If you have any other needs, please don’t hesitate to ring the front desk.” “Thanks, Jeeves, we’ll do that,” Lightning replies. If he took offense to the moniker, he was professional, or greedy, enough to not show it. He swept a small bow and returned to the elevator as Lightning dragged me towards the bathroom. “You gonna tell me why we’re here, Dusty?” I ask as the elevator door closes. “Light,” is her only answer. I collapse onto the toilet seat and shed my seal-chains as she runs a hot shower. The shower alone is as big as my bedroom back at my dad’s place, and the bathroom itself is probably the size of our living room. If I were less tired I would probably be staring at the gold fittings and the polished marble, but as it is I can barely keep my eyes open. “If we’re lucky, we’ll get a few hours of sleep before the shit hits the fan.” Lightning sweeps her hand under the water a few times before nodding and turning to me. “You need sleep, Rainbabe.” “Still haven’t explained,” I say groggily. “Light against the shades, I get that, but they’ll short out the mains like they always do. City infrastructure is dogshit.” “Right,” Lightning agrees. “Except high-class places like the Mareiott have back generators that kick in if the mains go out, and those backups have backups for things like the kitchen freezers and the really expensive suites.” “Like the penthouse,” I say, my eyes widening as I start to laugh. Like I said, Lightning is the smart one. Lightning Dust carefully strips my sweat-stained clothing off of me, then lifts me into the shower. I let her guide me mostly because I’m not entirely sure my legs are going to support me if I try to do it on my own. If it were anyone but Lightning Dust, I’d probably be putting up more of an argument, but Dusty has seen me at a lot lower than this. She’s probably the only one I trust to take care of me when I’m this weak. I’m barely in the shower when the front bell rings. “That’ll be room service.” Lightning stands and dries off her arms where the shower had splashed. “Just relax, babe, and try not to fall over and drown.” “If I go out like that I’ll deserve it,” I mutter. I lean back into the flow of hot water, relishing the way it sluices the sweat off of me. At one point I glance down and see the water running a deep, dirty brown as it swirls into the drain. I must have dragged a quarter of the Mojave into the lobby with us. Hm… maybe Jeeves had a point when he looked at us. We must have looked like a couple of vagrants. “Got some food, Rainbabe.” Lightning hip-checks the door open and drags in the entire serving cart. It’s piled high with carbs, meat, fruit, and three pitchers of ice water that make my mouth go dry just looking at. Up to now we’d been living off of gas station food in between crashing at the shittiest types of roadside motels for what little rest our pursuers would give us, and my stomach has decided that enough is enough. The smell of steak and potatoes hits me like a Mack truck and my stomach lets out a deafening rumble. Lightning Dust laughs as she slips in beside me, pulling her clothes off as she does, and starts helping me wash. My limbs have gotten a little feeling into them by now and between the two of us and brand new loofah we manage to get me feeling at least human-adjacent again, rather than like day-old roadkill. “Here, Zee did us another solid,” Lightning says as she helps me out of the shower and passes me a towel. She kneels down as I dry myself off, and pulls a bag out with some sports company logo on it I don’t recognise, probably something local, and pulls out two full sets of clean clothes, one in my size, and one in Lightning’s. God bless that crippled Braytish lesbian. Once I’m dry I pull on the form-fitting sports top and shorts, and Lightning starts to do the same, but something makes her jerk to a stop as I finish tugging the top straight. “No fucking way.” Lightning says, and I turn to her. “What?” Lightning Dust sighs heavily as she holds up the sports top she was gifted with the back of it facing her and glares at it for a moment before flipping it around so I can see it too. I can’t help it. I start laughing. The back of her shirt, and mine, has the image of a skull split in half by a lightning bolt, and just below that is the word ‘HELLIONS’ written in a sharp font like the letters had been scarred into the shirt with a carving knife. “We’re like the lamest motorcycle gang,” Lightning grumbles as she pulls the shirt on. “Aw c’mon! It’s awesome!” I stand and look at my back in the mirror. “That is rad as fuck!” “You are such a loser.” Lightning laughs but she stands as she does, pulls me close, and kisses me. There’s a subtle curve to her lips that I like. Now, I’m not what you’d call experienced. Actually, Lightning is the only person, girl or otherwise, I’ve ever kissed. That said, I know what I like, and I can say without a shadow of a doubt that I like the way Lightning Dust kisses. “We’re gonna make it out of this, Dusty,” I say quietly as we part. “And we’re getting Twi’ back this time.” Lightning sighs as she rests her head against my shoulder. “That’s what we thought last time,” She replies with a hard touch to her voice, “and all did was piss off a Prench Warlock by stopping that fake anti-curse bullshit he was peddling.” “Yeah, but punching him in his stupid face when we found out felt pretty good,” I say. She laughs again. It’s the little things like that that keep me above water. What we did- what I did- hurt so many people, and nearly hurt orders of magnitude more, that I can’t think too hard about it or I’ll start drowning in guilt. Instead I focus on what I can do to make it right. Part of that is making her laugh. I tell myself that so long as I can make Lightning laugh, I can live with myself. So long as I can help, and try to make up for some of the damage I’d caused under Storm King, I can keep on going. “We’ll make it work this time, Dusty,” I say again, running my hands over her soft, windblown hair. “And if it doesn’t, we’ll try again, and again, and again, until all of us are together again, okay?” “Yeah,” she nods, “okay.” “Now let’s get to that grub, because I smell steak,” I turn to the platters of food and start grabbing, and I can feel Lightning’s eyes on me the same way I can hear her laughter. “Just don’t stuff yourself, I need you awake in a few hours, not in a food coma,” Lightning calls as she walks out of the bathroom. “I’m gonna go sketch up a ward on the door.” “Hang a sock on it too, wouldja!?” I reply through a mouthful of mashed potatoes. “Babe, no,” she yells from the living room. I chuckle as I take a bite of juicy steak, chew, and swallow, washing it down with ice water. My magic takes a ton of energy out of me, and not all of it comes from my wellspring. What I do is a cousin to hyperkinetic fighting, which means that the acceleration also burns a load more calories. Not one-for-one, obviously, otherwise I’d burn myself up, most of the extra power comes out of my magic, but the rest? Yup, good old fashioned meat and potatoes. One of our Master’s first and simplest lessons when it came to taking full control of our magic back while we were dreaming in Equestria was this: ‘Don’t. Skip. Meals.’ With that in mind, I swallowed the last few bites of my steak before making up a plate to take out to Lightning. I filled it mostly with finger food, things she could pick at while she sketched the design. She would need to eat a full meal too, but at this point she needed everything she could get. “Hey,” I say as I step out of the bathroom, dragging the serving cart behind me, “here, you should eat a little while you work.” I hold the tray I’d filled with fruits, olives, and salmon nigiri up to Lightning as she drew the chalk along the wall and door. She’s going slow to make sure the matches up all the lines, but her free hand grabs one of the nigiri and stuffs it, whole, into her mouth. “Fanks babe,” she mumbles around the mouthful of fish and rice, then swallows, and pulls back as she finishes a section. “I oughta finish this first though.” “Not unless you want me to rat you out to the master for skipping meals,” I say with a grin, and Lightning winces, but smiles back. “Ugh, fine…” she takes a few pieces of fruit. “That dude was harsh.” “You know what he’d say to that?” I laugh as I take another bite of potatoes. “Doi,” Lightning pops a grape into her mouth, bites down, swallows, then, in her best impression of Master Sombra, says: “I am a King, not a dude.” Author's Note Yes, my unfinished garbage fire 'King & Shy' is canon to Featherfall. Maybe I'll finish it one day, maybe not. But the idea of Fluttershy and Sombra still kicking around in the shadows of Equestria amuses me to no end.
2. Take Me Home ~One Year Ago~ Sunlight streams into my eyes, and I clench them shut hard as pain lances into my brain. “Ow, wha-!” I lick my lips, my tongue feels thick and cottony, and my head is pounding with a drumbeat tattoo that slowly fades into a background thrum of dull fog. Everything smells… familiar. I rub at my eyes with the heels of my palms, trying to dig the pain out, and slowly I feel the weird sensitivity start to fade. Just as I start to breathe normally again, a quiet cursing beside me tells me I’m not alone. “Dusty?” I force one eye open and see Lightning Dust mirroring what I’d just done, rubbing at her eyes and swearing. “Yeah, I’m here, what…” she blinks furiously for a few seconds, the squints and looks around. “Where-?” “Welcome back, ladies.” That voice. My breath catches in my chest like I’d just swallowed a fish hook, and slowly I raise my head to look forward, straining to see past the dazzling sunlight. Wheels… and a chair… and… “Sunset?” Shit. She looks different. Taller maybe? A little older? The hunched posture is gone from her shoulders that she’d had for so long after she’d lost her ability to walk in the accident, and now she looks… “Don’t try to do too much yet,” she has that cocky smirk on that she’s always worn so well, one that a small part of me was afraid I’d destroyed. “You technically haven’t used your eyes in about a year.” Her words take a moment to settle in my gut. A year? “A year?!” Lightning says what I’m thinking, and I can see her turquoise complexion pale as she stares at the wheelchair-bound redhead in disbelief. “One year, two weeks, and four days,” Sunset says solemnly. “Not a bad recovery time to be honest, all things considered.” The memories came back in a rush. Zee. Twilight… no, Midnight Sparkle. The battle in front of the school, and then everything going black as Midnight crushed our wills beneath her own, and then the strangest feeling of displacement. I remembered the fight, though, and all the people I hurt, all the damage I inflicted on the city with my reckless speed, and I remember… “You did this! You made me do this! Why couldn’t you just back down?! WHY?!” I… I remember… “You’ve gone too far, Twilight!” “Rainbow, Lightning, breathe!” Sunset’s voice was a distant thing, so far away I can barely hear it. All I can hear is her voice in my ears… in my head! “DO IT!” “Oh fuck,” I grip my head as my whole world tilts and spins. I had tried to kill Sunset Shimmer. I remember Zee pulling me into the sky as Lightning Dust blinded the new Elements of Harmony with an army of clones. I remember Zee throwing me into the air and then angling myself down, wrapping myself in my accelerating magic, and then… …and then hammering through their defense to give Midnight her first shot… …and Zee her final one. I crumple onto the warm concrete and spill my guts, literally, vomiting out what little is in my stomach and dry-heaving the rest of the way through the spasms. Lightning is there a second later, heaving and coughing around a mouthful of bile and mucus. “Well that coulda gone better.” The voice came from behind me, as a hand gripped my collar and hoisted me back up to sitting. “Not surprising, though,” Sunset’s voice replies softly. “Rainbow? I’m gonna need you and Lightning to take a few deep breaths, savvy? Just breathe and try not to think too hard for a bit, you’re readjusting to being awake and it’s gonna be rough.” “W-What…” I start to speak, then spit as I taste the remains in my mouth, then wipe my lips with my sleeve and try again. “What happened? The Battle… Storm… Twilight and Zee?” I force myself to look up at the girl who, once, had been my friend. The girl who I had betrayed, and then sided against with a gang lord, and then, if my memories were to be believed, tried to kill. Sunset did look a little older, but she did say that a full year and change had passed. Seconds later she was joined by another figure stepping into my vision, this one even more familiar. “Gil…” Tall, broad, hawk-nosed, and fierce. Gilda Grimfeather was, if anything, even more imposing now than she had been back at the battle. Her frame was fuller and stronger, her face had lost some of the lean and narrow angles and settled into a more mature beauty. And, as always, that short, snow-white hair of hers hung loose and ragged over predator eyes of gold and flint. “Welcome back, dumbass,” Gilda’s voice was sharp, but not exactly unkind, just… cold. She looks me up and down before turning back to Sunset. “Hey, Sunshine, I thought you said them goin’ over there was gonna fix’em?” “I said it would fix the mental scarring from the slave-spell,” Sunset’s replies uneasily. “This… well, I’m pretty sure that was just a good old fashioned panic attack.” Panic? I’ve never had panic attacks in my life. “Huh, yeah, guess that tracks,” Gilda sighs and turns back to me, shaking her head. “I wanna say I feel sorry for ya, Dashie, but…” “I know,” I say, my voice hoarse and raw. “I wouldn’t feel sorry for me either.” “She was being controlled, Gil,” Sunset cut in, but Gilda just shook her head. “Not the whole time she wasn’t,” Gilda shot back without turning away from me. “Ain’t that right, Rainbutt? You coulda backed out before you got too deep, savvy? But you didn’t! Shit, you finally go ride-or-die and the hill you planted your fuckin’ flag on was that one?!” I lower my head. I can’t argue, I can’t say a damn thing because Gilda is right. I knew it was going pear-shaped, I’d seen it happening, slowly but surely. I’d known Storm King was bad news from the moment I met him but I’d chosen to ignore my gut instincts and just… “Gilda, c’mon,” Sunset says softly. “You’re being too harsh… they just got back.” Gilda curses quietly under her breath and turns her back on me, stalking away clenching and unclenching her hands. Her attempts at keeping calm last all of about five seconds before- “What the fuck, Sunflower!?” Gilda turns on her heel and jabs a finger in mine and Lightning’s direction. “They tried t’kill you! Not me, not the rest of us… YOU!” “GILDA!” Sunset’s raised voice cuts sharply through her girlfriend’s tirade, shocking Gilda silent as Sunset turned on her chair’s axis to meet that golden gaze evenly. “Take five and cool off.” I can hear the clockwork clicking of Gilda’s false arm, the sound of her limb tensing and flexing beneath plates of magical metal. Even Storm King hadn’t been able to figure how they had replaced her arm so quickly, or even what it was made of, but I knew enough to wager it had come from the other side of the portal. “I’ll be fine, Gil,” Sunset’s voice was soft again as she rolled forward, reached out, and took Gilda’s hand. Her real one. “I love you, Gilda Grimfeather, but let me handle this, okay?” Another soft curse issues from Gilda, but she nods, then takes a knee in front of Sunset. For a moment I have this crazy image of a knight kneeling in front of a princess, and I realise it’s because of the look in Gilda’s eyes. Absolute devotion. Total loyalty. And pure love. Gilda takes Sunset’s hand and pulls it in so she can press her lips to amber knuckles, then nods, puts her forehead against Sunset’s hand, then gets up and stalks away. “Kinda makes sense how we lost now,” Lightning finally speaks up, and I look over at her in surprise, and she grimaces. “Sorry, didn’t mean for that to sound like… I mean, I’m glad we lost, like, that’s obviously a positive, but I get it now.” “How do you mean?” Sunset looks curious as she turns on her axis again to look at us again. “The Elements?” “Nah,” Lightning shakes her head, then looks thoughtful for a moment before amending, “okay, yeah, but like… more than that, I get why the Elements worked, because that shit you got with Gilda?” She nods towards the retreating figure of Sunset’s girlfriend. “That’s some real goddamn magic, right there.” “The magic of friendship’s a helluva thing,” Sunset says wryly, and Lightning lets out a wan little chuckle before frowning and sitting back against the stone steps we’ve been squatting on. I frown, then turn my head and look back behind us for the first time. Sure enough, the statue of the Wondercolt is towering above us in all its rearing glory. The pedestal is polished, and everything is exactly the way I remember it from, apparently, a year ago. Except for… “What the hell happened to the school?” It’s bigger than I remember. A lot bigger. All the damage that had been done to it during the battle in front of it was repaired, all the broken windows and the shattered masonry were replaced. There were whole extra wings built alongside it now, and the walls had supporting pillars, balconies, and open bay windows to let in the streaming sunlight. The place looked more like a temple than a school. “You missed a lot, Dash,” Sunset says, gesturing around us. “A year’s worth, because of what happened.” I hang my head, guilt welling up inside my gut as I grimace. “And it wasn’t just you,” Sunset continues, “you dragged-” “Woah, hold up!” Lightning gets shakily to her feet and moves between Sunset and I, fixing the former with an angry glare. “Look, we fucked up, I own that, alright? But don’t talk about me like I didn’t make the same fuckin’ mistake, okay? Dash didn’t ‘drag’ me anywhere! I made that decision myself, got it Wheels?” Sunset and I both sit back in surprise at Lightning’s sudden outburst, and I’m about to say something when she wobbles dangerously on her feet. In an instant I’m at her side, my arm around her waist as I pull her arm over my shoulders and prop her up long enough to pull her back to the steps of the pedestal and lower her down to sit next to me. The whole time, Sunset just watches us, her cyan eyes sharp and critical as Lightning’s head lolls weakly against my shoulder, and her hand slips into mine. “Not your fault, Rainbabe,” Lightning mutters dazedly. “I ain’t some fucking damsel dragged along in your wake, alright? I chased you into hell on my own two feet.” “You’re right, I’m sorry,” Sunset says quietly. “You shouldn’t’ve had t’chase me there, Dusty,” I say, my throat tight with shame and anger. “It was still my fault.” “I don’t care,” Lightning replies in a low, even tone as she raises her head to look me in the eyes. “I’ve been in love with you for four fucking years, Rainbow Dash… so where you go? I go.” Sunset sighs and leans back in her chair, eyeing the both of us critically. “Ride or die, huh?” Sunset says, then sighs again. “Whatever, anyway I’m here because Twilight, Princess Twilight that is, alerted me that your treatment was finished…” she looked at me first, “your dad knows your coming home, he’s been worried,” then she turns to Lightning, “same with your grandmother, and don’t worry, me and the girls have been looking after her.” I see weight fall from Lightning’s shoulders at Sunset’s words. “Thanks…” Lightning wipes at her eyes, and her palms come away damp. “I was really worried I’d… fuck, thanks Sunset.” “Don’t mention it.” “Now what?” I ask, looking around. “Can’t exactly pick up where I left off, right?” “Yes and no,” Sunset replies, then gestures behind her. “You’re not just looking at Canterlot High… you’re looking at something brand new.” I stand, shaky and weak, and Lightning stands with me. “On the surface, it’s still the high school,” Sunset explains. “But beneath that, it’s become something else… Bastion Academy is what we call it, the first Arcane Academy in the world.” “Hot damn,” Lightning stares at the school with new eyes. “So when you said ‘yes and no’,” I began carefully, “you were saying…” “Yeah, you probably still have your magic,” Sunset sounds less than thrilled at the prospect and I don’t blame her. “You should spend some time here… maybe learn a few things.” “Doesn’t sound like a bad idea,” Lightning says, looking back at me with a careful smile. “Whadya think, Rainbabe?” “I… I dunno,” I admit slowly, then turn back to Sunset with a frown. “Would you trust me with magic training?” “No,” Sunset says flatly, and Lightning and I both wince. “But that’s personal… objectively, I’m pretty sure you’ve learned your lesson, but personally?” Sunset sighs again and leans back in her chair. “Shit, personally I don’t know if I’ll ever trust you again, Rainbow Dash.” The wind goes out of me at her words, but I don’t try to refute them. “You made a lot of bad calls,” Sunset says in a tight voice, “you dragged a lot of good people into danger, almost got Score killed… all because of your reckless pride.” “If it’s so bad why are you even bothering giving her a chance?!” Lightning snaps. “Why even try?!” “Because I told you,” Sunset snarls the words out, “it’s personal, it’s not logical, and it’s not fair!” Then she deflated a little. “And because she hasn’t done anything I’m not guilty of too.” Silence fills the sunny afternoon as I stare at Sunset in surprise, and whatever it was that Lightning had intended to say was apparently stalling out on her tongue. “I’ve had a year to get some perspective, okay?” Sunset says as she fiddles with the divided-sun emblem at her throat. “I think the reason I was so harsh with you back then was because I could see you making every single mistake I’d made.” “Pretty sure I did worse, actually,” I admit. “Pretty sure you did too,” Sunset agrees. “Because unlike me, you took other people down with you,” I nod, and Lightning takes my hand and squeezes. “I don’t trust you, Dash, because I don’t want you to hurt the people I love… again.” “Fair enough,” I say softly. “But you have a place at Bastion if you want it,” Sunset replies, “and you do still have friends.” I raise an eyebrow. “Speaking of which…” Sunset trails off as she pulls out her phone and glances down at it, then grimaces and shakes her head. “I’m taking off, she and I still don’t have much nice to say to one another.” “She?” I ask, standing back up as Sunset pulled on her gloves and took a grip on her wheels. “Sunset what’re you talking about?” “You’ll see,” Sunset says, then starts to turn away. Before she leaves, she looks over her shoulder and meets my eyes. In them, I can see sorrow, regret, guilt… all things that are probably neatly mirrored in mine. Once upon a time, we’d been friends, and in a short span of time I’d managed to destroy all of that progress. “Welcome home, Rainbow Dash,” Sunset says quietly before turning away and setting off after Gilda. “You okay, Dash?” Lightning is at my side, her hand finding mine again, and I turn to pull her close and bury my face against her shoulder. She holds me, rubbing my back and I hug her tight and shudder, waves of emotion rolling over me. We’re still standing there when the sound of a loud, old motor pulls up at the drop-off roundabout of the school. A door, heavy and creaky with age, opens, then slams shut, and a familiarly accented voice cuts through the air. “Aye up, Dash, Dust.” The voice is harsh, cocksure, and thickly Braytish. I jerk back from Lightning and step back from her, and she does the same, both of us looking up at the same time towards the street where a welcome sight is moving towards us. Grizelda Grimfeather smiles at us, her expression pulled to the side by the burn scars covering the left half of her body and turning the grin into something like a sneer. Her right hand grips the handle of an ornate cane that she’s leaning heavily on, but her other arm is wide open. “C’mon then, mates,” Zee crows, “giz uz a hug!” I laugh, I can’t help it. I run to her and wrap her in my arms, and Lightning is there a moment later, and we engulf Zee in a tight hug. Zee shifts her weight, leaning against us as she wraps her arms around the both us and hugs us back just as hard. “Mates,” Zee’s voice is choked with happy tears, “S’damn good t’see ye again, luvs… damn good.” All three of us laugh and cry at the same time, leaning against one another. I think a big part of me was afraid that I had lost Zee and Twilight too, that they had gone somewhere I couldn’t chase them down. “Y’look good, Zee,” I croak, and Zee just laughs raspily. “Tha’s a bloody lie, innit?” She pulls back with a dry smile. “BUt you? Aye, both’a ye are lookin’ damn good, mates.” “Definitely felt better though,” Lightning adds as she steps back, and Zee goes back to leaning on her cane. “What happened to you?” “Rough landin’,” Zee’s smile gets even more arid. “Them bastard gauntlets tore m’body apart, aye? But I ain’t dead yet, luvs, not for a good long while.” As she says it though, I watch a small trickle of blood leak from the corner of her mouth, and suddenly Zee was overcome with a fit of coughing and hacking. Tiny splatters of crimson dust the concrete beneath her, but before I react, another figure moves between us. One in a long robe tied tight around a thin frame with a veil of pale grey draped over her face. Her hands go around Zee, one at her back, and another at her chest over her heart. “Hey what’re you-?” I start, but she ignores me, and words spill from her lips. The words aren’t any language I know, but as she speaks a faint light surrounds her hands that’s almost the same color as her veil. Pale grey. And Zee’s coughing fit subsides. Slowly but surely, she begins to relax as the robed figure takes out a cloth, licks it, and begins cleaning away the rust-red stains around her mouth and on her hand. “Soz, mates,” Zee rasps, “ain’t as hale as I used t’be.” “Shit,” Lightning swore softly, “what the hell was that?” The robed figure turns to us then, and pulls the hood down, and shoulder-length locks of mulberry spill out around her still-veiled face. I finally recognise her, despite not being able to fully see her features. “Sunny Flare,” I mutter, “that’s you, isn’t it?” “It is,” her voice is a lot more subdued than I remember. She always sounded a lot more unhinged, back then… back when she was always dogging after Twilight. “Welcome back, Rainbow Dash, Lightning Dust, you’ve missed a lot this last year.” “She’s right, mates,” Zee says solemnly, then nods back to her E-type, its engine still rumbling contentedly by the roundabout. “Get in… we’ll fill ye in on the way.” “The way where?” I ask as we start towards the car. “To Twilight,” Sunny says softly.
