Rainbow Dash's duties as a full Wonderbolt have found her in an unexpected role: officiating an annual race across the San Palomino desert. After learning that the race has a Wonderbolt legacy behind it, she discovers there is one racer there who has the stated aim of breaking that tradition: Lightning Dust, her old expelled fellow cadet from Wonderbolt Academy. Determined to protect the Wonderbolt record, Rainbow Dash enters herself in the race with the specific goal of keeping her old rival from winning. But when a disaster causes the two to end up stranded in the middle of the desert with no food, water, or shelter, will they be able to work together long enough to get out?
Cover art is property of Hasbro and DHX Media.
Chapters (4)
Lightning Dust is one of my guilty pleasure characters.
This is going on my read it!
A hoof-sized fidget spinner...
Yeah, after Hipstershy, I could see the animators inflicting that on us.
An excellent Lightning Dust redemption fic. It feels earned, especially given her need for further work to get back in the Wonderbolts' good graces. The episodic tone is strong and enjoyable, though you shouldn't feel like that and Two Background Ponies are the only stories you're allowed to write. Also, you do get a little telly at times, spelling out things that would be better left to reader inference.
Still, thoroughly enjoyable from start to finish. Thank you for it.
I can actually see this as an Lightning Dust return episode, a little to long to fit but still great. I like the concept of this difficult desert marathon pegasi would race in and it makes for a good setting. I also love Lightning's motivation of wanting to be Number 1 or at the very least remembered, and Rainbow's words on how even those on top will eventually be forgotten someday, makes for good contrast. I will say that my gripe is that it's a bit too wordy, having a lot of extra detail that doesn't matter too much at the end.
But still you did a great job with this.
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Yeah, I agree. When I get time, I'm going to have to sit down and read it aloud to myself as if I was reading it to someone else. I try to avoid being wordy, but that's the only way that I'm ever able to make sure I catch unimportant lines of text.
Glad you enjoyed it regardless.
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I'm working back through it now, starting with the end and moving forward. I managed to take off about 1,000 words from that segment. Hopefully it reads better now.
Lightning Dust is one of my favorite characters.
I always hated the awful ending of Wonderbolt Academy where Lightning got a very raw deal.
They should have used the alternate ending instead.
Rainbow slowly reconciling with Lightning and helping her back into the academy was simply amazing.
Hopefully something like this story will happen soon in the show.
Dashie and Dusty should be friends and fly together as Wonderbolts.
Upvote and favorite.
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Well, darn it all, Lightning Dust is going to show up in Season Eight, Episode Twenty. This is already outdated.
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But it is still a much better story than we got there.
It remains among my favorites.
Oh, Rainbow...
Dammit, Rainbow. You're going to regret not paying more attention to that lecture...
....Yyyeah, fuck you, Lightning. You're still a pretty terrible pony.
And the fact that Spitfire probably wouldn't have kicked her out for her stunt says volumes about how terrible the Wonderbolts are, too. Why's Rainbow still want to be a part of them?
That was good. A shame the upcoming Lighting Dust episode can't possibly be as good as this.
Man, I can't overstate how much I enjoyed this. I'm a huge sucker for redemption stories, but all the Lightning Dust ones, while still enjoyable, felt unsatisfying in some way or form. This one absolutely hits the nail on the head, and I'm sad it took me so long to find it. Excellent job!
Great story! I really enjoyed it. You gave LD the redemption she needed.
Who won the race?
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If you're talking about the one at the end, I'll leave that up to the reader.
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Can lightning dust create lighting?
You get a thumbs up.
An oddball ghost happened across your fic and read it. Have a review!