How it feels to chew science gum
It was pretty much common knowledge that Ponyville was the center of weird in Equestria. It seemed like anything and everything was possible there. From parasprites crusading to bunnies invading, there was always something lively going on in that quaint little town. So, it came to nobody’s surprise when late one night at Twilight’s castle, small colored explosions were going off in the basement.
Sure, it got the attention of the occasional passerby and they stopped to stare, but overall, most ponies just shrugged it off as normal and continued on their day.
Just another day in Ponyville right?
Meanwhile inside the evil lair of the mad scientist Twilight Sparkle
“Mwahahahahahahaha! At last, I have done it!” Twilight cackled manically, rearing up on her hind legs as she held a mysterious object up to the light, the goggle lens covering her eyes flaring in the light “My ultimate creation has been realized! The power of science has prevailed once again!!”
The purple alicorn dropped down on all fours and placed her newly crafted creation onto the counter. There, laying innocently in front of her was a simple small jar filled with gum that said 5 Gum.
“That’s what you spent all week working on?!” Spike asked incredulously “I can buy that at the Ponyville market anytime I want! It’s a pack of gum for gosh sake!”
“This is far more than some mere pack of gum assistant scaly Draconis Maplefeist!” Mad scientist Twilight said, looking indignant “This will unlock heights not yet explored in pony kind!”
“…Still a pack of gum Twilight. I can’t believe you made me lose a week of sleep for this,” Spike grumbled, throwing his hands in the air in defeat “Can we go get some food now? I’m too tired to cook,”
“B-b-but science!” Twilight whimpered, her lower lip trembling. Spike rolled his eyes and snatched the goggles off of purple smart’s head.
“Come one, you can’t tell me that you’re not starving too,” he asked pointedly.
“Not really. I haven’t felt all that hungry the entire time we’ve been down here Spi-”
GRRRRROOOOOOWWWWWLLLLL!!!!
“AHHHHHH! Manticore!” Spike screamed, diving under the table “How did it get in here?!” the baby dragon curled up into a ball at the unexpected scary noise, fully expecting to be greeted by a fearsome beast at any moment. But as the seconds ticked by with nothing, he slowly opened his eyes. Confused, Spike crawled back outside. Only to find Twilight standing in the middle of the room in embarrassment.
“Uh, guess I was more hungry than I thought,” she giggled nervously, patting her stomach “Maybe we should go get some food. Like Hayburgers! Oh! They have a deal on a combo meal tonight. Get two burgers and get a drink and fries for free Squee!”
Twilight’s face lit up at the thought of going to her favorite fast food joint. Though she wouldn’t admit it out loud, she adored the burgers there. She secretly likes to order take out whenever she can and buy two or three burgers for herself with a large helping of fries and their famous dipping sauce. Hey! Mad pony scientists need to eat too!
Spike crawled out from underneath the table, his initial fear completely gone now “Great! Let’s go!” he cheered, dashing up the stairs towards the front door. Twilight rolled her eyes with a small smile. She levitated all of her lab apparel off of her and folded them neatly in a corner. Twilight trotted up the stairs and walked outside with Spike down the road towards Hayburgers an’ shakes.
“I’ll test out my newest creation when I get back. Now that the hard part of actually making it is over it’ll be smooth sailing from here. Nothing can go wrong now!” Twilight thought happily, looking forward to scarfing down three, maybe four burgers and washing them down with a nice big Hayshake.
Buuuuuut, the bright purple mare did not account for an unexpected visitor making her way to the castle while she was away. Almost immediately after the purple duo were out of sight, a certain prismatic mare could be seen rocketing towards the crystal castle, sporting a rainbow trail behind her.
Rainbow Dash burst through the door, flying up as she made her entrance before landing heavily on her hooves “Awwwww yeah! And that’s cool entrance number 378 for the totally awesome and amazing wonderbolt Rainbow Dash!” she threw out her chest and puffed herself up proudly, her nose in the air smugly “What did ya think?”
Silence. Silence so deafening that crickets could be heard.
Rainbow Dash cracked open an eye in confusion before looking around at the empty castle hall “Hellllloooooo? Twi? Spike? Are you guys here?” she called. More silence answered her question. Rainbow frowned “If this is a prank it’s not very original! Silent treatment ain’t funny!” she hollered. When no one answered her, Rainbow merely shrugged “Guess they really aren’t home. That’s a shame,” she said and began to saunter around the castle.
Taking time to stop in the library, Rainbow Dash flew up towards the top of one of the bookshelves. Lately she had gotten bored doing the same routine over and over again ever since she joined the wonderbolts; waking up, eating breakfast, doing morning drills and workouts with the other team members, rinse and repeat. She craved some entertainment. Something fun to take her mind off of her daily routine. And the entire series of Daring Do was the perfect remedy to that! Giggling, Rainbow Dash scooped up the entire series into her arms and began to fly back to the living room, ready to curl up in one of the comfy armchairs for a good few hours of reading and a good nap.
But as she made her way back down the hall, something caught her eye. Curious, she screeched to a halt and plopped down on the ground. There was a door ajar in front of her. Normally she wouldn’t care about some random door being open but this one led downstairs. Which was odd because she didn’t even know Twilight’s new castle had a downstairs. She thought it only had a ground floor and everything else was above on the upper floors. Clearly that wasn’t the case.
Intrigued, she dropped the books unceremoniously on the ground and made her way down the stairs. There were no lights or windows. Which should have been obvious considering she was heading underground. However, there seemed to be light at the end of the stairwell.
Poking her head though the door, Rainbow Dash was amazed to find herself in a laboratory. A brand new one that Twilight must have fitted into the castle after it had grown up from the ground. But that was not what caught her attention. What did catch her attention though, was the random jar of gum on the table.
Thinking nothing of it, Rainbow Dash scooped it up and headed back upstairs, looking forward to having something to munch on while she was reading. Rainbow exited the basement and kicked the door closed with her hind leg carelessly as she floated back over towards her pile of books with her new snack in tow.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
Rainbow Dash froze, her ears folding down as the clock in Twilight’s castle chimed.
“Oh no! It’s already noon?! Awwww, that means I have to go to the Wonderbolt show now. Oh well, so much for catching up on reading,” Rainbow Dash thought, leaving the books discarded on the floor as she floated up, still clutching the jar of gum which was going to be her in flight snack.
She popped a few into her mouth and stuffed the rest of the jar into her saddle bag which she had draped over her side.
Munch, munch, munch!
“Huh, so this is what it’s like to chew 5 gum,” Rainbow Dash commented as she rocketed outside and into the air.
She shot though the sky at a breakneck speed, waving down and greeting ponies down on the ground cheerfully as she blew past them. Leaving them bewildered as they were left in her cloud of dust.
Now beginning to gain altitude, Rainbow rose higher, passing the clouds and some other pegasi in her rainbow trailed wake. But something was strange about it this time. Instead of Rainbow Dash simply blowing past them like she normally does, the force she generated as she flew past the pegasi in the air was enough to send the careening off course! What was going on?
Unbeknownst to Dash, she was slowly getting bigger the more she chewed on her gum. Her body rumbled as it increased in size, sending small shivers through the mare. After leaving Ponyville, Rainbow Dash was already twenty feet tall. And only getting bigger.
Halfway to Cloudsdale and she was fifty feet tall. An extremely impressive size to say the least, but fate decided that while that was good, it could be better.
“Huh?” Rainbow Dash cocked her head in confusion as she finally made it to her destination. Now standing at a mighty 100 feet tall, she could only look on in bewilderment as Cloudsdale lay before her, now fun sized.
Perplexed, Dash leaned forward, bumping the front gate with her muzzle, as if to see if the tiny city before her was real. The gates broke clean off their hinges as the force from the giant mare pushed it down, clanging on the ground.
“Wha-what’s going on? Why’s everything so tiny? Did Discord shrink Cloudsdale to use it as a tennis ball again?” she wondered out loud, her massive voice spooking a few pegasi away from their perches.
Rainbow Dash blinked, slowly looking behind her and looking herself over. Realization crossing over her face “Ohhhhhhh…. I’m the one who’s big,” she muttered.
There was a pause.
“Waiiiiit a second. I’m the one who’s big!” Rainbow Dash repeated, a grin beginning to work its way over her massive face as she looked herself over with excitement. “Awwwww yeah! This is totally cool! I’m huuuuuge alright!” The prismatic mare giggled like a filly, doing a loop-de-loop in the air, disturbing the clouds in the area around her before landing with a crash on the ground of the floating city. Shuddering the pavement and the nearby buildings, causing some dust and dirt to be shaken from the roof of said buildings and loose rubble to be shaken free.
“How big am I anyway?” Rainbow Dash wondered to herself, sauntering not so quietly over to a nearby building and measuring herself.
“Hmmmm…” Rainbow leaned up against the structure, pressing her colossal body against it, unknowingly sending some cracks spiderwebbing up it “Let’s see here. This is a ten story tall building, so I’d say I’m about one hundred feet tall.”
Rainbow Dash giggled “And like, 20% cooler too. Heh, I wonder how this happened anyway. Maybe Discord is up to his usual tricks?” she wondered. It didn’t really matter at the end of the day; she was just happy about her new and improved height. Rainbow Dash just shrugged “Well, better head over to Wonderbolt practice. And this time, I’m heading there in style!”
Rainbow Dash laughed, enthralled at her new physical status and set out.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
All over the town, ponies poked their head out of windows as a gigantic shadow passed over them, shaking the ground as it passed. Structures rumbled, carts shook, and ponies bounced about as the 100 foot tall prismatic mare pranced through the streets. Rainbow Dash smirked, leaning down and peering through one of the windows of a nearby building “Heyyy down there little guys! Great morning to go out for a giant walk wouldn’t ya say!” she grinned. The ponies inside the building stood shell shocked as the gigantic Rainbow Dash laughed, her deep voice reverberating through the air as she sauntered away.
“Grrrrrrr!” Rainbow Dash growled playfully “Look out little dudes! Dashiezilla has come to town!”
Ponies fled from her humongous hooves as they stomped through the streets, though anyone who was paying attention could see quite clearly that Rainbow Dash, while having the time of her life now that she was gigantic, was still being mindful of her surroundings and making sure to step down if she was absolutely sure no ponies were below her. And with Rainbow Dash having so much fun, it wasn’t long before her infectious laughter caught onto other ponies. Soon they too had the laughing bug, and they as well played along with the giant mare’s games. Weaving in and out between her spire like cyan legs as they came crashing down on the ground with a mighty THOOM!
Rainbow Dash herself meanwhile would look around after taking her next step and find the next available opening where she could place her hooves. The ponies now looked so tiny to her! They looked adorable! Though, she would absolutely never say it out loud because she was wayyyyyy too cool for that of course.
Though, she will say that she did leave behind a bit of a mess. Scattered in bits and pieces behind her were some of the wispy remains of a few clouds buildings and structures that had fallen apart due to the sheer might of her strides when she passed by, with their insides like desks, chairs, and more scattered about in the streets.
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. This wouldn’t do! Cloud buildings falling apart on her watch? Absolutely not! As the former weather manager for Ponyville (and sometimes Cloudsdale), she was more than capable of restoring those buildings to their former glory. After all, she worked with clouds all the time. Have you seen the size of her Cloudominium? That thing could put Twilight’s egghead castle to shame. Puffing out her chest confidently, Rainbow Dash strutted over to the tiny buildings, ready to start her repairs. She almost felt like she was a filly again. Back when she was young, her parents would get her small model cities for her to play around in. She would race carts, practice weaving in and out of the buildings while she was flying, and occasionally, young Dashiezilla would make an appearance., stomping though the plastic figurines and buildings, laughing gleefully along the way. Fast forward a few years later and Rainbow Dash found herself in a similar position once again. Only now she was larger than life for real. And she got to use her size to be pretty helpfully.
Hey, what’s the point of being large and in charge if you don’t help out the little guy, right?
The tiny ponies on the ground watched as the 100 foot tall mare plop her rump down on the ground, shaking up the entire street as she did so, scooped up the discarded pieces of clouds on the ground and got to work. It was almost like watching an artist put together a sculpture. Given how big she was, Rainbow Dash had surprising dexterity and care when she worked with clouds. She carefully scooped up some of the discarded chairs, desks, and other furniture that had fallen down on the ground and placed them back inside their respective floors, albeit a bit lopsided with a few of them missing features like missing legs or supports due to her overwhelming strength accidently breaking them off.
Next, she took the discarded clouds and began to patch up the cloudy buildings. It almost looked like Rainbow Dash was working on a brick wall, and she was the giant mason in this case. Smoothing her colossal hooves over the building sides to flatten down the more lopsided parts before spreading in a new layer of clouds, mixed in with the fragments that had fallen off previously.
It was a long and tiring process, but if there was one thing Rainbow Dash knew how to do right, it was fix up a good cloud structure. Slowly but surely the buildings came into fruition, and even better than before! Now that Rainbow Dash had added an extra mini sculpture of herself on the top for the extra coolness factor of course!
Cheers rang out from the bug sized crowd as they applauded Rainbow Dash for her hard work. Rainbow Dash, as big as her ego now, drank it all up, puffing out her chest and pointed her muzzle into the air, beaming proudly.
“Awwwww yeah! That’s right little guys! Check it out! Now it’s all totally Dashiefied! Wayyy cooler than that boring design from before!” Rainbow Dash boasted, completely unaware that because she had made the sculpture of herself on the roof of the building, only she could see it due to her height. To everyone else, the building still looked completely fine. Which is why they didn’t say anything as they bade the gargantuan mare good-bye as she stomped away, heading over towards the Wonderbolt stadium for practice.
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Spitfire tapped her hoof impatiently, constantly looking at her watch every few minutes as the irritating seconds hand ticked by “Urgh! Where is she? Dash was supposed to be here 30 minutes ago!” she said with exasperation, looking around at the assembled Wonderbolts
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Standing on her left was Soarin. Soarin has his face buried in a slice of apple pie that he had bought from the huge red stallion that sells apples on the weekends, Big Macintosh. As a regular customer, Big Mac had given him a pie on the house. An apple pie that Soarin was gleefully eating up.
Standing on her right was Fleetfoot. The smaller blue mare just seemed bored out of her mind. She had a late night practicing different maneuvers, running up as late as two in the morning, and when she had gone to bed, it was pretty late. Now, standing there with not much sleep and boredom eating away at her, Spitfire could see her eyes beginning to droop as the poor mare struggled to stay awake. She really needed some excitement and fast!
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Spitfire growled in frustration, closing her pocket watch and throwing it into her bag. She was getting sick of hearing that darn thing tick the entire time. “Alright Wonderbolts, listen up!” she said authoritatively “Since Dash isn’t here yet I guess we’ll just have to start practice right now and then catch her up to speed when she gets here.” Soarin and Fleetfoot nodded, taking off into the sky and circling some of the floating rings that had been left in the middle of the field, getting their muscles warmed up as they darted in and out of the rings.
Spitfire silently watched them, groaning to herself as she rolled her shoulders and flexed her wings. She’d have to give Rainbow Dash a stern lecture on the importance of punctuality when she got here, something she wasn’t looking forward to doing, but hey, it had to be done. But as she spread her wings and got ready to fly up and join the other two, Soarin and Fleetfoot both gasped, their eyes focused on something behind her as a huge shadow fell over the entire stadium.
“Heyyyyyy everyone! Guess who’s bigger and better than ever?!” a loud and very familiar raspy voice blasted out from behind Spitfire.
Spitfire rolled her eyes, turning around to give Rainbow Dash an earful over being late, but the second she turned around and laid her eyes on her, the clipboard Spitfire was holding clattered to the ground and her jaw dropped. The captain of the Wonderbolts was busy mimicking a goldfish as she beheld the arrival of their newest member.
Rainbow Dash was peering over the top of the stadium. But that wasn’t the impressive part. What was impressive was the fact that she was somehow, someway, towering at over 100 feet tall! Rainbow Dash tossed her comically tiny bag down on a nearby bench before hoisting herself over the stadium wall. The entire stadium groaned under her weight but somehow didn’t break, much to the relief of the other three Wonderbolts present. The ground trembled as Rainbow Dash sauntered over with a cocky smile on her face.
All three Wonderbolts stood there in stunned silence as they suddenly felt really small, a stark contrast to their usually larger than life status they normally have amongst the common ponies. They stood before the titanic mare, no bigger than her hoof as Rainbow Dash posed proudly in front of them.
“Awwwww yeah! How do I look now guys!” she boomed proudly, her voice rumbling the air itself.
“Rookie? How’d this happen to you?” Spitfire asked incredulously, taking off her sunglasses dramatically.
Rainbow Dash shrugged her street sized shoulders as she stood at attention to her pint sized commander “I don’t really know ma’am,” she admitted sheepishly “I just ate some gum I got at my friend Twilight’s place, and while I was on my way here I just found myself this big. Not that I’m complaining, hehehehehe.”
Spitfire stared at her “Well, that’s great and all (I guess) but now I’m not sure how you’re supposed to train with us and compete with all the rest of the Wonderbolts rookie,” she said, “I mean you’re way to darn big!”
Rainbow Dash’s eyes widened “Wait, no! Are you sure? There has to be something we can do!” she pleaded, the energetic mare not wanting to miss out on the chance to practice with her fillyhood heroes.
Soarin and Fleetfoot glanced at each other in contemplation while this conversation was going on between their newest member and their captain. An idea had sparked up between them, maybe a way to include this newly enlarged version of Rainbow Dash in their activities and training regiments and at the same time, still put on a good show. It was worth a shot.
Fleetfoot cleared her throat “Ahem. Permission to speak freely captain?” she asked.
“Granted!” Spitfire hollered in her usual military voice “What’s the matter Fleetfoot?” she asked.
“Well, Soarin and I have been talking, and we’ve been thinking that it might be best if we include Rainbow Dash as part of the performance,” she said, flashing a grin up at the enlarged mare, one that was happily returned.
Spitfire raised an eyebrow “Oh? And how do you think we should go about doing this?” she asked “Dash here is far too big to participate with any of our normal drills and performances. And we have a performance coming up pretty soon. So how do you and Soarin suggest we go about this?”
Soarin approached the group and spoke up “Well, I was thinking we could change around how we do the next performance. This time, why not have Rainbow Dash here as the singular obstacle that we all have to dodge and evade?” he asked “It seems like it’s doable. And since Rainbow Dash isn’t like a still dummy or a regular hoop we have to dodge or go through, we could have a ton of variety of tricks and stunts we can do. Even some on the fly.”
Spitfire looked unsure “I don’t know, changing things this late might not be the best idea…” she said with a note of worry in her voice.
“I have a suggestion. Why not have me act as a giant monster you guys have to stop?” Rainbow Dash asked “That’d be like, totally awesome! And I’m sure all the spectators would want to see some huge monster action!”
Fleetfoot grinned “That would work,” she said.
“I agree. We could implement all of our ideas together. Rainbow Dash can act like a giant monster like from those old Kaiju films I used to watch as a colt, we can go through all of our old maneuvers like Spitfire wanted us to do, but this time we can focus the stunts around Rainbow Dash’s body, and we can even invent a few moves for Rainbow Dash to use on the fly. Everyone wins here!” Soarin exclaimed excitedly “We can even try to boost some popularity among the fans and do a preformence where we defeat the ‘big scary monster.’ If Dash is fine with doing it.”
“Ooo! Yes!” Rainbow Dash pranced in place excitedly, causing the ground to tremble.
Everyone looked at Spitfire excitedly, eagerly awaiting her approval. Spitfire looked at each one of their enthusiastic faces before finally letting out a heavy sigh “Alright, we can try out your ideas for the next performance,” she said, finally giving in.
The field shook from the loud and happy cheers that erupted in the center of it, where the colossal Rainbow Dash, accompanied by Soarin and Fleetfoot were all celebrating their victory. Their happiness was so infectious that even the ever stoic and serious Spitfire cracked a smile.
“Alright everyone! Yes, yes, I’m happy we can include Rainbow Dash as well. But if this is going to work, we’re gonna need to start practicing ASAP! Take your positions!” She commanded, her air of military leadership starting to creep back into her voice as it was time to get back to business.
“Yes Ma’am!” echoed the chorus from the three of them. Soaring and Fleetfoot flew over to their starting positions at the other end of the field. With Rainbow Dash on the other hand, it wasn’t as graceful.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Every seat in the stadium shook as she sauntered over to her starting position. Her shadow washing over the tiny cast like a wave in the ocean, splashing down on them and just as quickly passing on. Soarin and Fleetfoot inched to the side as Rainbow Dash’s hoof came down a little too close to comfort as she took her starting position next to them. Her humongous status completely dwarfing the two of them.
Soarin and Fleetfoot took to the air once more and beckoned Rainbow Dash to lower her head. Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow but nevertheless complied. Soarin and Fleetfoot relayed instructions to the giant mare on her role during all of this and what she’ll be doing during practice. Once she had gotten the message and understood what she was supposed to do, Soarin and Fleetfoot resumed their positions previously and stood at attention, along with Rainbow Dash.
“Alright! Let’s begin!” Spitfire announced, blowing her whistle.
All at once, all three of the Wonderbolts took to the air. The wind generated from Rainbow Dash was especially strong considering how large she was.
“Raaaar!” Rainbow Dash vocalized, taking swipes at the pint sized ponies buzzing around her, much like a cat trying to catch a bird “Better run puny Wonderbolts! The evil Dashiezilla will catch you all!”
The two tiny Wonderbolts weaved in and out of her outstretched limbs as Rainbow Dash flailed about, stirring up clouds of dust and throwing loose items about the field, including her bag. Fleetfoot going high and Soarin going low, disappearing behind Rainbow Dash.
“Stand fast evildoer!” Fleetfoot called out dramatically, delivering a corkscrew dive into Rainbow Dash’s snout and bouncing off “We will defeat you yet!”
Rainbow Dash pretended to act winded as the dive from Fleetfoot made contact. She crashed to the ground with an audible BOOM, shaking everything on its hinges and groaned “Argh! Curse you Wonderbolts! You may have won this round, but Dashiezilla will be back!” She giggled.
Tweeeeeet!
Everyone froze as the sound of Spitfire’s whistle echoed across the field “Alright! Good job everyone!” she called out to the others “That was pretty good Dash! All we gotta do is add a few more tricks to this performance and we should be gravy for the big show. Do you have any questions Fleetfoot and Soarin?”
Fleetfoot blinked and looked around “Where’s Soarin?” she asked in confusion.
Spitfire blinked “He was just here! What, did he fly off to go grab another pie or something?” she grumbled “Wouldn’t be the first time he went to goof off.”
Rainbow Dash was about to answer when she suddenly got very red in the face and slowly turned to look behind her. All eyes turned in her direction as the giant mare slowly looked back at them “What’s up with you rookie?” Spitfire asked.
“Uh, I, Ummm…I think I figured out where Soarin went,” Rainbow Dash said meekly, the bashful and embarrassed attitude a stark contrast to the boisterous show she had put on earlier. Spitfire raised an eyebrow as a silent command to go on with Dash’s explanation. Without another word Rainbow Dash got back up and slowly turned around.
And there stuck in between the fibers of her tail was the now tangled and hanging upside down Soarin.
“Uh, little help here? I think I’m about to lose my lunch,” he grinned weakly.
Well, Soarin got his help alright. But not before the cacophony of laughter erupted in the stadium at the poor stallion’s predicament.
Elsewhere in Cloudsdale
Sunny Skys trotted briskly though the ever expansive cloud facility. What was the cloud facility you ask? Well, it’s only what’s keeping the entire city of Cloudsdale floating up in the sky. Sunny Skys looked at a few readings on a nearby console, taking note of them and writing it down on her clipboard.
“Ah yes, perfectly balanced. As all things should be,” She thought pleasantly. As long as the magic, clouds, and wind meters were all in perfect synchronicity then everything was running smoothly.
“How goes things tech?” she asked one of the many ponies monitoring different readings.
“All good ma’am,” the tech replied in an easy going manner “All scans from Cloudsdale have come back as normal,” he said while grabbing a sandwich and kicking his hooves up “It’s all smooth sailing for the rest of the day.”
Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!
The tech’s eyes went wide as the unexpected noise began to wail over the console “Wait, wait, wait! That’s not right!” he said in a panic, sending his sandwich flying and spattering against the wall. Tomatoes, lettuce, and daisies flew everywhere as he hastily scrambled back into position “The readings are going out of synch? That’s not possible!” he cried, pulling on levers and pushing buttons, trying desperately to get things back in order.
“What’s going on Tech? What’s happening?!” Sunny Skys asked in a panic, fear beginning to grasp onto her heart as she felt her stomach lurch at the noise.
“The magic, clouds, and wind meters are not perfectly balanced as all things should be!” the Tech yelled in a panic. Sunny opened her mouth to inquire what he meant, but before the Tech could continue, the entire building, no, the entire city began to shake.
The Tech looked at her with fear in his eyes “If the meters aren’t balanced then Cloudsdale won’t be supported! WE’RE ABOUT TO FALL!” he shouted as he and about a dozen other employees working here scrambled around trying desperately to restore order. But as Sunny Skys looked outside she could see other clouds and sky rushing by accompanied by the howling of wind.
It was too late. Cloudsdale was falling.
All over the city panic began to erupt as chaos and anarchy spread. Ponies were trying desperately to keep their homes in one piece and keep them from falling apart. Some of them were trying to nail them down onto the ground while some of the more like minded ones were attaching some of their homes to clouds and trying to make makeshift air rafts and sail away with them.
Some pegasi were floating off the ground as the high speeds of the city falling began to pick up. In their brief moment of panic, they had seemingly forgotten that they could fly. Though the same couldn’t be said for some of the tourists there who actually didn’t posses a pair of wings.
A few good Samaritans were trying to catch some of the other falling creatures who didn’t have wings; pegasi, griffons, and even some dragons were doing what they could to help, but if things didn’t change, and fast, things were going to go south very quickly.
“Woah! What’s going on?!” Rainbow Dash asked with alarm as the entire ground started shaking “This isn’t me I swear!” she cried.
“Look!” Fleetfoot exclaimed, pointing upwards “We’re falling! Cloudsdale is falling from the sky!”
“We are?!” Spitfire cried “How the heck did that happen?” she asked, shaking her head in disbelief as she watched the sky rush by all around them. All over small and loose equipment began to slowly rise into the air because of how fast the city was falling down to the ground. Cracks began to form in some of the structures made of harder substances like cloudcrete and along the pavement.
Seeing this, Rainbow Dash immediately sprang into action, spreading her wings as fast as she could “Who cares how this happened? What matters is putting a stop to this right now!” she said sternly, determination glinting in her eyes.
“Hold up! What are you gonna do?” Soarin asked frantically, still covered in a few stray strands of red, yellow, and orange after being rescued from Rainbow Dash’s tail.
“I’m going to fly down to the bottom of Cloudsdale and catch it! That way I can stop the city from falling, or at least slow it down,” Rainbow Dash said with resolve.
“There’s no way! Do you see how big the city is compared to you?” Soarin said “You’d need to be, like, 50 times bigger to even slow this down.”
Rainbow Dash nodded “Alright then! Soarin, grab the gum! It’s in my bag over there and give it to me as soon as you can. I’m going to fly down there and try to make some progress and slow down the city!” she said. And before Soarin could protest, Rainbow had already taken to the air, blasting strong currents all around her and buffering the others as she flew around to the other side of the city and down towards the bottom of it.
“Bring it on city!” Rainbow Dash challenged as she saw Cloudsdale descend closer and closer to her “I got this! I got…” She trailed off as the shadow of the city fell over her “Heh, wow, it sure looks a lot bigger now, doesn’t it?” Rainbow Dash said to herself nervously.
She patted herself on the cheeks to psych herself up “Alright, this is no time to freak out! It’s hero time!” Rainbow hollered and rocked up to intercept the falling city.
CRASH!
“UUUURRRRGHHHH!” Rainbow Dash grunted as she caught the bottom of Cloudsdale over her head with her hooves and began frantically flapping her massive wings in a vain attempt to slow down the falling city “Come on stupid city! Stop falling!!” she yelled.
“Rainbow! Here!” a voice called out to her amidst the panic, chaos, and confusion.
Squinting, Rainbow Dash looked over to her right and saw Soarin. Soarin holding a bunch of very familiar looking tasty treats in his hooves. He quickly flew over to Rainbow Dash’s face. No words were needed as she quickly opened her mouth, feeling the extremely tiny pieces of gum on her tongue as she quickly swallowed them.
“Come on! Come on! Hurry!” Rainbow cried, casting a quick look down at the ground and seeing how quickly it was approaching.
As if to answer her frantic pleads, Rainbow Dash began to feel a warm sensation beginning to spread across her body. She blinked, no longer panicking, or freaking out anymore because suddenly, the city of Cloudsdale didn’t feel very heavy anymore. In fact, she could barely feel it at all anymore.
Meanwhile down in the city, it was a completely different experience for those who were still in a panic. Ponies all over Cloudsdale froze in shock and surprise as the falling sensation they were experience and witnessing was slowly coming to a grinding halt. The somewhat featherbrained ones nailing their houses down to the clouds so it wouldn’t get knocked away when impact struck slowly stopped hammering away as they realized the wind wasn’t whistling away as much anymore.
Those who were putting their houses and belongings on emergency cloud rafts paused as well, once it became clear that the song of chaos and anarchy was no longer being sung throughout the city. They paused, confused. The city had stopped falling? But how was that possible? It’s not like something was big enough to catch it. Well, what happened next was definitely a spectacle all who lived in the city would remember for as long as they lived.
All the creatures in the city crouched down instinctively as everything around them rumbled. They watched with disbelief as far away, towards the east side of Cloudsdale, a gargantuan blue wing began to lift into the air, shaking the very air as it did and casting a shadow of immense proportions over the city. But the sight wasn’t over yet. As the ponies looked towards the west side of the city and saw an equally colossal wing, bigger than the city itself, begin to lift into the air. Both appendages filled with power and might with each one of their subtle twitches, sending cascades of wind down and buffering those below.
The air rumbled as Rainbow Dash lifted her colossal head, almost in slow motion to the tiny ponies of Cloudsdale as they beheld their savior.
“Uhhhhh hey everypony! Looks like you’re all safe now!” Rainbow Dash announced happily, waving down to the stone sized city sitting on her back. For a second there was silence. Then, all at once, the city of Cloudsdale erupted into tiny high pitched cheers. All of the ponies celebrating their gigantic hero. Rainbow Dash could swear she could even see her parents down there in the crowd. All of them hugging everypony they could get their hooves on and saying “That’s our girl! She’s the best at everything!”
Rainbow Dash grinned, standing up to full height and throwing out a salute, practically shaking with giddiness “Awwwww yeah! The totally awesome Wonderbolt extraordinaire Rainbow Dash just saved the day again! Hold your applause everypony!” she exclaimed proudly but couldn’t help but smile even more as the cheers practically grew louder.
“Great job rookie!” came the high pitched voice of Spitfire as she and the rest of the wonderbolt flew up to her face to congratulate her. Rainbow Dash had to hold in a snicker, they were tinier than flies to her now!
“That was awesome Rainbow!” Fleetfoot squeaked up at her, grinning from ear to ear “How did you know eating all that gum would make you big enough to lift up the city?” she asked.
“I didn’t!” Rainbow Dash giggled, her voice was like thunder to the little ponies, shaking them up as her deep voice boomed though the air “All I knew was I had to get Soarin to give me as much as he could, so I’d hopefully be big enough to lift up the entire city!”
“Well, you certainly made the right call!” Soarin called up to her with a grin “Thank goodness this was as big as you got. For all we could have known you could have been playing ping pong with Canterlot mountain with how huge you could have gotten!”
Rainbow Dash laughed, a tremendous noise that reverberated through the air and shook the city on her back “You’re right about that alright!” she boomed. The populace of Cloudsdale looked up towards the sky darkened again, as they saw the towering expanse of Rainbow Dash’s feathers lowering themselves down towards the city. Rainbow carefully plucked Cloudsdale off her back like it was nothing more than a stone and set it down off to the side next to Ponyville.
“Well,” She yawned “I’d say that’s enough hero work for the day. I’d say I’ve earned myself a nice long nap!” she giggled. Spitfire looked like she wanted to protest, after all, they had only just started training for the day, but a bemused grin and shake of the head from Soarin convinced her otherwise. She sighed and relented “Alright then Rookie, go ahead and take the rest of the day off. But I expect to see you working twice as hard tomorrow. Ya got that?” she asked.
“Yes ma’am!” Rainbow Dash threw up a lazy salute as she sauntered over to her napping destination. A nice and cozy looking spot near the Everfree forest. That’ll keep the monsters away from the town in the meantime. Rainbow let out a colossal yawn, her humongous mouth blasting out warm air that buffered the treetops of the forest and blowing away a few nearby monsters like hydras and manticores back further into the forest as she curled up contently, ready to settle down for a good nap.
Or at least that was the plan, if a small grey speck hadn’t caught her attention.
Rainbow Dash blinked, lifting her head up a bit more as she wordlessly watched the grey speck flutter down towards her cutie mark. Once there, the tiny grey speck simply settled down on the cloud part of Rainbow’s cutie mark as if to nap there as well.
“Hey! I’m not a hotel ya know! Get your own cloud!” Rainbow remarked indignantly giving her rear a little shake, hoping to remove the new addition to her fur. Said pony looked around confused at the sudden voice ringing out around her before settling her eyes on the colossus behind her. Revealing the newcomer to be Derpy.
“Oh, hi Rainbow!” Derpy said cheerfully, waving her hoof up at the giant mare “What are you doing here?”
“wha-me? What am I doing here? You’re the one on my cutie mark!” Dash spluttered out.
Derpy blinked in confusion, before looking down again at where she was at “Oh, you’re right! This isn’t a cloud. Sorry Rainbow.” Derpy squeed and lazily drifted upwards “I thought this was a nice comfy cloud. I was going to take a break here and nap after my shift was done at work,” she said.
Rainbow gently shook her rear again to further discourage the tiny grey mail mare from any attempts of napping on her “Yeah well, I ain’t a hotel and neither is my cutie mark. If ya wanna go lie down, then there’s some clouds over on the east side of Ponyville you can nap on. Trust me, they’re amazing!” she said, “Take it from a napping expert,”
“Okie doki!” Derpy replied pleasantly, wobblily flying into the air and drifting off into the direction Rainbow Dash specified.
As Rainbow watched the teeny tiny mare disappear over the horizon, she let out an exhausted sigh “Phew! Glad that’s over with. Now then, I think it’s time for a good power nap myself. A fitting reward for a cool and awesome hero like myself! Looks like’s all’s well that ends well!” she said.
“Ahem!” Came a voice. A very familiar voice.
Rainbow’s eyes went wide as she slowly turned around and looked down.
Standing by her hoof was Twilight and Spike. And boy, they did not look happy.
“Care to tell me what’s going on here?!” Twilight demanded, gesturing her hoof to all of her giant friends standing in front of her.
Rainbow squeed “Uhhhh…I can explain?” she tried weakly. Only to be met with a roll of the eyes from Twilight and a very exasperated sigh.
Hero to zero in less than a minute and now in big trouble. That had to have been a new record
Author's Note
This was a fun story I wrote as part of my end of a trade with Tsitra360. Here is the picture he made for me, now posted on my Twitter: https://x.com/BottleH20/status/1795573543109095726
