Ask anyone on base, from the new Private to the Colonel, and they would all tell you Lieutenant Colonel Rainbow 'Bows' Dash and her squadron didn't shy away from combat missions, and more often than not, her squadron and ground crew would achieve flawless results. So if you asked them what went wrong that day, no one would be able to tell you. Rumours flew, of course, ranging from technological or mechanical failure on the craft in question, but that was disproved by the Chief Technician who oversaw the planes in question, Twilight 'Princess' Sparkle. Sure, Captain Sparkle flew too occasionally, but she was Chief Technician first. The most popular rumour, though, was that a special task force had been formed with the sole purpose of taking down Rainbow's squadron.
If you asked anyone on base, from the new Private to the Colonel, they would tell you it seemed like that task force had been successful. Otherwise, how else could you explain the star pilot who was currently missing, presumed dead? Twilight Sparkle had been fairly distraught on the flight home, and some part of Rainbow was surprised that the girl had landed safely. Most of them were still distraught, to be fair. After all, it had only been a few hours since... since it happened.
Her 2IC, shot down. They'd enlisted together, trained together, flown together.
Major Sunset 'Suns' Shimmer, MIA, shot down in friendly skies, presumed dead.
Rainbow couldn't bring herself to believe it, and had spent the last few hours alone in the company of the equally upset First Lieutenant Fluttershy 'Flutters' Breeze. Or more simply, her girlfriend. She could hardly imagine how Twilight felt, and dreaded to think how she would've felt if it had been Fluttershy. The news had been pestering the base for hours, almost as soon as their flight had touched down, which could only realistically mean someone in the base had leaked the news. As the most successful squadron the nation had, they were inspirations and known internationally. So, naturally, as soon as it was leaked that the flight had returned home one short, it was everywhere. Whoever had leaked the news, Rainbow intended to get them to the court martial. At least.
A knock sounded at the door, and Fluttershy gave Rainbow an apologetic look as she told the noisemaker to come in. Rainbow let out a light groan and shifted her head further into Fluttershy's lap.
"Lieutenant. Lieutenant Colonel. I've been looking for you."
Rainbow let out another, stronger groan before rolling over and giving a half-hearted salute.
"General Spitfire. Ma'am."
General Sophie 'Spitfire' Florentia sighed.
"Rainbow... what happened out there?"
Rainbow relaxed in the silence. Well, near silence. Mostly silence. It was hard, if not impossible, to find silence in the cockpit of a fighter jet, but whatever it was, Rainbow enjoyed it. Relished it. It was peaceful, if not for the looming danger that came from an escort flight. She glanced to her right, taking comfort in the tallies on Sunset's plane, who was leading the formation. Then Captain Jacques 'Applejack' Apple's, then First Lieutenant Rachel 'Rarity' Belle's, then Fluttershy's. She didn't need to look to know Twilight was behind her, and nestled into the middle of their arrowhead formation was Captain Diane 'Pinkie' Pie, the last member of the squadron, flying the cargo plane instead of her usual craft.
Rainbow shook herself out of her idleness as the radio crackled to life in her ear, Pinkie's voice sounding a tad more nervous than usual.
"Eight Hits west, Eighty-Nine degrees."
Rainbow's head whipped in the aforementioned direction, eyes narrowing through her helmet as she tried to spot the hits. Pinkie, in the cargo plane, had the most advanced radar of the flight, but it concerned Rainbow that the hits were headed their way. Pinkie's voice-
"Course adjusting. Eighty degrees, intercept."
Rainbow cursed internally. These were planes, and judging by the nerves in Pinkie's voice, which she assumed mostly came from Pinkie being in a cargo craft with no weapons, not friendly IDs. Sunset cut into the silence.
"Princess, get on to headquarters for backup. Bows, Flutters, Rarity, stay with Pinkie. Applejack, with me."
Rainbow listened to the assenting voices with satisfaction, knowing full well the squadron treated Sunset as equal to Rainbow in rank, which, really, she was. She added her own into the mix before throwing a question.
"What are you planning, Suns?"
A sigh on the comms.
"First contact, hope they're friendly."
"Be careful, Suns."
"You got it Princess."
Rainbow watched as silence re-settled on the Comms, AJ and Sunset's craft banking off to meet the approaching planes. They might have been going for first contact, but she could at least see they were being careful about it, ascending even higher than the rest of the flight to keep both sets slightly safer. In the distance, eight specks appeared, and as Sunset approached them Rainbow could see the moment they started looking for her. She didn't know how she saw it, but she did. So she decided to do something.
"They're not friendly - Princess, get us our reinforcements, now! I'm going to help!"
She felt the jets engines begin screaming as she tore towards Sunset and Applejack, heard the surprise in the others' voices. Then, the specks pointed at Sunset and Applejack, and the fight started.
She was still racing towards them when the first volley fired, but Sunset was fast enough to roll over the shots before releasing a few of her own. Rainbow couldn't see Applejack, but from the corner of her eye she could see Rarity flying alongside her. That would make it 2 each, assuming... assuming Suns and AJ were fine until they got there.
AJ and Suns tuned back into the squadron's channel at the same time, but Applejack was already shouting.
"Suns - Left!"
Sunset offered no response but dipped her own craft, below the incoming volley before rising up above the other planes.
"HQ's scrambling. Ten to Twenty minutes."
"Too long. Keep 'em off Pinkie."
"Flutters, we need you!"
"Coming!"
"Bows - coming to you!"
Rainbow looked away from Sunset's craft to see a pair of fighters headed for her and rolled her own to the side, letting a volley loose as she did, before dipping. With a grim satisfaction, she noticed one of the two bank sharply as though to avoid being hit as much as possible, but they were far too close for them to avoid her shots entirely.
"They're goin for Pinkie!"
"I got-"
"-Suns! Behind!"
"Shit-"
"Princess, Runners-"
*-Seen-"
"-Rarity, left!"
"AJ! Three!"
"Fuck!"
That was what distracted Rainbow.
Pinkie, obviously, was out, which left them with six, but Twilight was guarding her, Flutters was still too far away, and they had the two runners that had rushed Rainbow to deal with. Which left four versus six. She'd been trailing one, which left three v five. Sunset still had one behind her, and Rarity had just banked off to deal with the one on her left. But that left Applejack alone against the other three. She could leave hers, yes, but they'd likely follow around and put two on Suns-
"Bows! Help her!"
"Suns! What-"
"Do it!"
Some part of Rainbow wanted to ignore Sunset, but Applejack needed help. She pulled sharply, up and right, coming up under two of the planes trailing Applejack. She must've gotten lucky, because her first, largely unaimed volley, resulted in a small explosion and one of the planes began dropping.
"Scratch one!"
"Flippin-"
Rainbow watched as Applejack rolled before pulling up in a loop that would have made Spitfire jealous. Because of Rainbow, the other two fighters were more occupied with avoiding rather than chasing, and soon she and Applejack were chasing them in opposite directions. It wouldn't be too hard to catch hers now, as soon as they came out of a-
"SUNSET!"
Rainbow felt her blood freeze over as Twilight screamed. Rarity called the second kill, but Rainbow's eyes were darting desperately over the sky, until- There.
Sunset was diving, hard, two behind her and now with Rainbow and Applejack's own targets circling to trap her in a crossfire.
"Suns look out!"
"SHIT-"
"Suns pull up-!"
"Suns-!"
"SUNSET-!"
Rainbow saw Sunset begin to level out, roll, and send Rainbow's mark spiralling, but it was ultimately too little, too late.
Three volleys tore into Sunset's craft from varying angles, and the nose dipped again as gravity started to take over. The plane began rolling, and some part of Rainbow's brain was praying it wasn't due to Sunset's body being slumped on the joystick. She heard Twilight let out another scream, and watched as another hostile fighter erupted into a ball of flame. But her attention didn't - couldn't - leave Sunset's sinking craft.
Spitfire was sat at Fluttershy's desk, head in hands, and Rainbow and Fluttershy themselves were in fresh rounds of tears.
"Jesus, Rainbow, I'm sorry..."
"I- It's not like y- you coulda done an- anything anywa- way."
Spitfire shook her head sadly.
"I shoulda put more flyers out with you. I knew I should've, but... I didn't think you'd face a task force hunting for you in our airspace..."
Fluttershy nodded for Rainbow, running a hand through the prismatic colours.
"When will they get to the crash?"
Spitfire hesitated at Fluttershy's question before nodding slowly.
"They already have. The eject system emergency fired, and there was no body at the crash. But outside of that?"
Rainbow and Fluttershy shared a look. There was a chance. Slim as it might be, there was a chance.
"I'm going back to command. If I hear anything, you'll be first to know."
Spitfire left the room, and Rainbow wasted no time in cuddling back into Fluttershy, who smiled lightly in response.
"Rain-"
"Less talking. More snuggling."
The girl nodded and shifted on her bed, pulling Rainbow further in so they both fit in the warm spot in the centre. The silence worked wonders for Rainbow, who, for the first time in longer than she'd like to admit, she submitted fully to Fluttershy's will, cuddling in close and not even attempting to resist any of her moves. She trusted Fluttershy completely, knew she knew exactly what Rainbow needed. And she did. So it was, that a few hours later Rainbow found herself waking up against Fluttershy's chest, lips tired from kisses that had stilled her overactive brain, arms numbly wrapped around the other girl who held her close, held her tight. She sighed contentedly and rubbed her head against Fluttershy, who giggled lightly and resumed stroking Rainbow's hair.
"Welcome back, sleepyhead."
"Mmmm."
"Rainbow?"
"mmmMM?"
"They found her, Rainbow."
She was up on her arms like a gunshot, eyes wide as she raised herself off of Fluttershy's body. The girl nodded, and Rainbow was running out the door, Fluttershy undoubtedly not far behind her. It was a lengthy drive to the hospital, but getting there, she was met by the other girls, all smiling, Twilight with dried tears on her face. Rainbow said nothing, simply pulling in the Captain for a hug with a relieved sigh.
"How is she?"
"Broken, bruised and damaged in about every way you could possibly think of."
Twilight nodded into her shoulder.
"But she's alive. She'll live."
"Oh thank god..."
She felt the others close around her for a group hug. Sunset was still painfully missing, but she'd be back with them. She was okay. Rainbow let out a sigh and closed her eyes, enjoying the warmth from her friends.
Author's Note
[Authors note copied from AO3]
oh man this is short. so I don't really know why I wrote this to be honest. I guess I just kind of mixed the War AU from FIM with EQG, but I'd be lying if I said this story wasn't at least partially (cough, mostly, cough) inspired by one of the ZAP APPLES fics by the amazingly awesome Flower_Heart10, so please please please make sure you go read at least some of those. Practical heaven for Appledash shippers, I tell you.
Oh uh also, like Bar and the Bands Side A, I'd be willing to advance upon this world if people are interested.
Otherwise, don't expect Dying Rays Fluttershy and Rainbow's chapter to take too long now? However this assumes that the new idea that fell into my lap as I finished this fic doesn't steal all of my attention. You may be lucky, you may not be. Even if it does, the new idea is a Dying Rays prequel, so Where The Sun Goes will still be developed regardless.
Anyway as always, I hope you all have a great rest of your day and night, please go to sleep, I love you all GOODNIGHT <3
Edit: Its been like a day. The new idea has taken over. Expect chapter 1 soon, then maybe the writers bug will let me go back to Dying Rays.