The Nightmare Relief Plan

__--Operation: Nightmare Relief Plan--__

Location: 34408XP, Turquoise Sea

Date: 20 December 1037, 1:35 PM

"It fired..." Scootaloo didn't know who said that, but even General Dash over in the Vanhoover could not deny that that ear-piercing sound and blinding flash had just happened.

A veritable whirlwind of voices consumed Scootaloo's comms over the next several seconds.

General Dash's voice was the loudest. "Somepony get me intel! I want to know what the payload of that railgun is now!"

"Um, let me call somepony- er, somegriff from Mount Aris..." said Sapphire Light.

"Uh... did he say he was targeting Manehatten?" gulped Aurora, "I, um, live there."

"Shortwing damaged the railgun as it fired! It might have missed its target!" said Iris.

The clearest voice of all, surprisingly, was Perfect Shot's. "WHAT HAPPENED?!"

"Our aim was disrupted, Captain!"

"LOAD THE NEXT SHELL!"

"See, General! He faked his surrender!" exclaimed Rumble.

"...All aircraft, destroy the Equinox." While Scootaloo could not see Rainbow Dash in person, she knew that it must have been eating at her to know that she was wrong.

"Wilco, General." Scootaloo responded first.

"Wilco," said Blastoff.

"Alright," said Iris.

"With pleasure!" said Rumble.

Just then, several new aircraft launched from the Equinox. Scootaloo and her squadron began to engage them in earnest, all the while listening to the insane ramblings of Perfect Shot as his submarine became increasingly riddled with holes.

"Aim for the base of the railgun!" commanded Scootaloo.

The submarine's CDO spoke up, "Sir! The railgun is damaged! We can't raise the elevation of the barrel!"

Perfect Shot was silent for a moment. "...Clipped wings in the sky is a sign of an ill omen..."

"Captain?!"

"ALL SLOW AHEAD! FLOOD THE AFT TRIM TANKS!"

"But sir, the boat will sink aft first!"

"AND THAT WILL GIVE THE GUN THE ELEVATION IT NEEDS!" Perfect Shot descended into unhinged laughter.

"By Celestia, he's lost it..." said Rumble with utter shock in his voice.

Scootaloo glanced at her ammo count. Only six bullets left. Better make them count. She turned toward the Equinox again, only to hear the missile warning from her radar again. She quickly pressed the emergency countermeasures button, but nothing happened. She pressed it again. And again. Still, nothing happend. Must have been damaged when the sub was shooting at me. She groaned in frustration. "I gotta break off, missiles are on me. Keep focusing on the railgun! It's more important than their aircraft!"

All the while, Perfect Shot continued to ramble into her ears. "Don't you see, Shortwing? Our Goddess will be saved at the cost of a mere ten million lives!"

"You liar! You just wanna kill innocent ponies!" shouted Iris.

"Railgun supercapacitor is recharging," the Equinox's CDO relayed.

"Shortwing," General Dash began, her voice more serious than it had ever been before, "Scoots. I was wrong, I'm sorry. But now: Don't hesitate. They quit being soldiers the moment they faked their surrender."

Scootaloo tried to pull to the right to evade the missile, but her damaged wings seemed to hinder her ability to turn. The beeping grew ever faster and louder, so she resorted to simply accelerating to try and outrun it. Wings don't fail me now...

Through the corner of her eye, she saw muzzle flashes from a destroyer's guns. She hoped that one of them could finish off the Equinox, especially since her aircraft was functionally out of ammo.

"Um, General?" asked Sapphire.

"What is it, Ms. Light?"

"I just got off the phone with Mount Aris. They said that it is, um, very likely that the railgun's payload is nuclear in nature."

"Well isn't that just great?!" General Dash spat, "Do we at least know where that shot is going to land?"

"Um, not yet."

"If I stop responding in, oh, let's say ten minutes, then it blew up Manehatten." Aurora chuckled, though her voice was full of fear. "Though if I am going to die, then please sink his ship before the nuke hits me. I want to outlive him."

Scootaloo sped up her aircraft as fast as it could go, and thankfully, that was enough. The beeping ceased as the missile behind her dropped into the ocean. Unfortunately, more pieces of her already-damaged wings were torn off by the wind.

"Indulge me, then! What makes you and I any different?!" Perfect Shot laughed once more, "You want to kill the two hundred ponies on this boat to save your goddess. I want to kill ten million to save mine. How is that any diferent?!"

Rumble cheered as he landed a barrage of shots onto the Equinox. "Let's give him an answer he can take to the bottom of the ocean!"

"Captain, we're taking on water! We won't be able to maintain the gun's elevation for much longer!" exclaimed the CDO.

"How long until it's ready?!" demanded Perfect Shot.

"Railgun supercapacitor at 55%! Roughly sixty seconds, sir!"

Scootaloo managed to turn her aircraft around without it falling to pieces. She accelerated toward the Equinox, all the while more pieces of her plane were falling off as she sped up.

"Don't you see?! DON'T YOU SEE?! Landing a clean shot on a difficult target to bring forth divine salvation - that is what makes it elegant! That is true beauty!"

"Somepony destroy that railgun! We can't allow it to fire again!" yelled General Dash.

"Railgun supercapacitor at 75%!"

Come on... somepony... Scootaloo looked over the scene before her. The railgun was beginning to glow again, but her comrades were busy being harrassed by the remaining enemy aircraft. The destroyer that was shooting at the Equinox had just received a torpedo delivery and was in the process of sinking. The other three were laying fire into the sub, but then something new happened: magical bubble shields began to manifest in the air between the Equinox and the destroyers. Of course it has that too...

Her heart sunk as she realized she was the only pony currently able to shoot at the Equinox's railgun.

And she only had six bullets left.

Still, she accelerated. She'd have to make those bullets coun-

Wait. Scootaloo tapped her radio on. "Hey, anypony who knows the answer to this: can kinetic force set off depth charges?"

"I think so," answered Aurora, "Why do you ask?"

Scootaloo opted to not answer her. Instead, she eyed a gap in the bubble shields and aimed straight for it.

Even now, Perfect Shot kept talking. "Alas, you don't see, Shortwing! Of course you wouldn't!"

"Cadet, what are you planning?!" asked General Dash.

Scootaloo continued to speed up. The Equinox wasn't far now.

"Shortwing, answer me! What are you planning?" asked General Dash again with genuine worry.

Scootaloo held her breath as she threaded the needle through the bubble shields. She had to keep accelerating to maximize potential damage.

"Scoots! Stop now, please!" pleaded not General Dash of the Equestrian Airforce, but Rainbow Dash, her lifelong friend and mentor.

"Railgun at full charge!"

Perfect Shot laughed once last time. "Commence firing!"

Just reconnaissance. Nothing crazy. Scootaloo closed her eyes. "Sorry, Rainbow Dash."

"Scootaloo! No!"