With loud, booming salvos, the armada of Ledomaritan zeppelins fired at the hill of earth sloping east from the walls of Blue Nova. There were three large warships in the center, flanked by a dozen miniature aircraft, and the largest cannons were repeatedly and mercilessly pummeling the suspiciously misshapen earth from afar.
On the deck of the centermost ship, Enforcer Evans stood, squinting into the flying waves of debris. A setting sun spilled golden beams through the scattered dust as deeper and deeper craters were carved out of the ground.
“We've been going at this for nearly forty-five minutes!” another enforcer shouted above the blaring cannons. “How long are we going to be at it?!”
“Until we expose the hidden chamber built underneath!”
“And what if there's nothing to be found?!”
“This is Prime Enforcer Shell's order, not mine.” Evans icily stared over at his cohort. “Would you be the first to break his command?”
The stallion said nothing.
“Keep firing!” Evans shouted, facing forward again.
Not long after, a pair of stallions galloped up from the ship's lower decks. “Sir! Sir, we've detected movement!”
Evans spun about, his mouth pursed. “From within the area of fire?”
A stallion nodded and exclaimed, “Something's opening up! Like a structure of some sorts!”
Evans exchanged glances with the soldier next to him. He waved wildly to the enforcers nearby. “Cease fire! Cease fire!”
Several officers amplified the command, shouting the order across the deck. Stallions with flags and flares passed the signal along to the flanking battlecruisers. After continuous rounds of cacophonous thunder, the noise and shelling finally stopped. Everypony craned their necks from where they were station, gawking at the sight below.
Through the clearing dust, a rustic brown interior of multi-layered metal appeared. The sunlight edged over the crest of the two massively opening doors, pouring into the grand hollow with the grace of melting ice.
“I don't get it...” An enforcer murmured into Evans' ringing ears. “Why open the doors? Why now?”
“Hopefully, they are wanting to surrender to an immediate inspection,” Evans said calmly. “Otherwise, they would be subject to... immediate... t-termination...” The enforcer's brow furrowed.
Something was shifting through the mouth of the immense hangar. Several thick shapes rose out of the ashen dark like dragon heads. A worried murmur washed over the ship from every confused enforcer in attendance.
Evans fidgeted nervously. He hissed towards a subordinate. “Give me those binoculars!” Levitating the item in question to his brow, he stared out towards the sundered hilltop. As the site came into focus, he saw one zeppelin emerging... followed by two... then four and eight and sixteen and thirty-two...
“Sir, what is it?”
Evans opened his mouth, lingered, then ultimately sputtered, “Transports. Transports are... uhm... exiting the interior.”
The enforcers exchanged glances, then trotted closer to the commander. “How many, sir?”
Evans gulped and lowered the binoculars. “Well over a hundred...”
Several jaws dropped.
“They... they're civilians?”
“I cannot tell! They... they bear no flags!”
“They can't all be civilians!”
“Was it not Prime Enforcer Shell's command that no subjects be allowed to escape the target zone?”
“Yes... but...”
“We have to inspect them!”
“With what?!” Evans growled. He and the other stallions shared collectively blank stares. They looked back at their paltry escort, numbering no more than twelve ships. Then, with pensive breaths, they gazed back as eighty... one hundred... one hundred and twenty zeppelins slowly drifted out of the hangar's mouth.
Far away, beyond the dense cloud of hovering airships, within the bowels of Nightshade's once-concealed chamber, a pair of ponies stood within in a lofty control chamber above the humongous interior doorframe. They locked the doors in place and gave Rainbow Dash a signal. She saluted back, then hovered down, hooking each Nightshade employee under a separate forelimb. Then, holding her breath, she fired her thrusters, flying the three of them towards one of several airships towards the rear of the unmoored fleet.
As the pegasus flew, she and the employees glanced on either side of them. One by one, the leftover zeppelins were being detached from their docking stations. As the ships drifted off, guided by an accelerating autopilot, a pony or two jumped off of each, landing on the metal bridges of the hangar and running towards the rear of the interior. They saluted Rainbow Dash in mid gallop and made for a few airships that were remaining stationary. There, the workers and engineers combined to form the skeleton crews of over two dozen airships. They communicated with each other via soundstones and dramatic hoof signals.
Rainbow Dash lightly placed the two ponies with her atop a miniature airship's deck. They nodded with thankful expressions before rushing to detach the vessel from their respective mooring clamps. Soon, at the rear of the massive surge of exiting vehicles, a second squadron formed, and each of these—unlike the bulk at the front—were actually manned by ponies of various crew complements. While Rainbow Dash observed the group as a whole, she twirled about on her suit's thrusters and faced the majestically hovering sight of the Noble Jury towards the roof of the hangar.
“Okay, guys... that should be most of them!” Rainbow Dash said. “Nopony's fired yet, so that should give everyone space to make an exit.”
”This isn't going to work...” Imre's voice droned.
Rainbow frowned at the sound stone. “Girl, for the last time—”
”Will you let me finish?” Imre barked. ”Unless we get some of these ships to fly into the enemy's faces, they're still going to blow every one of us out of the skies.”
”None of us can fly, Miss Dash,” Clark's voice said. “And as much as we'd like to soar our way into the thick of things and give the fleet a little push, as t'were...”
“No, I get it,” Rainbow said with a nod. “Floydien's 'beloved' has huge flanks. You all would be sitting ducks!”
”Snkkkt—Floydien heard that, vomit boomer! You apologize this instance or—”
”Scrkkk—Rainbow, it's Pilate. I hate to ask any more from you than what's already been requested...”
“Look, Pilate, we're in this together. Well, most of us, at least.” She fidgeted as she glanced down at the squadron of civilian vessels piloted by the Nightshade group. “I'll give everypony the cover that they need! Wait for my signal, okay?”
”Whatever you do, Rainbow, don't fly too close to that armada. You're just as fragile as the rest of us, you know...”
“Zebra, please. Don't insult me.” Smirking, Rainbow Dash lowered the soundstone and twirled to face the Nightshade employees. “All right!” she shouted above the sound of her own thrusters. “Here's what is going to happen! I'm going to fly out there and accelerate a bunch of the airborne ships so that they catch the armada's attention!” She gestured out the huge yawning doors and into the sunlight. “Trust me, I know a thing or two about Ledomaritan enforcers! Sooner than you think, they'll start firing, and the air's gonna be full of flak and fire and stuff! It's gonna be dangerous flying, so I want your best pilots at the helm of each ship! We're not out of the woods yet!”
She held a separate shard up in her hoof.
“I'm listening in on the same frequency as your sound stones! You need to keep to the rear and let the rest of the ships absorb the damage! But if any of you get hit, or if you find yourselves in a pinch, then give me a shout! Trust me! I'm pretty darn fast! I'll get you out of any jam that might happen! But once you fly off, you're on your own! Get out of this city, this province, this state—whatever! Just get out of view of the enforcers! Then, once the heat's died down, return to Blue Nova! Return to your families! So long as they don't see your faces in these ships, they don't know that you're involved!”
With collective breaths of relief and steely determination, the many mares and stallions nodded in one accord.
“Alright! Wait for my signal! Best of luck to each and every one of you! You're helping us as much as we're helping you!”
With a salute, Rainbow Dash flew up and past the Noble Jury. She gave the cockpit a wave, and an elk inside nodded back, his antlers sparkling through the glass windshield. A zebra and a unicorn backtrotted as Floydien leaned forward, channeling energy into the control consoles of the majestic vessel. The skystone above the craft flashed a brighter crimson. With rivuleting waves of mana, the ship hovered away from the docking clamps, filling the bowels of Nightshade's hideout with a high-pitched rumble.
Rainbow Dash accelerated her thrusters, rocketing herself out of the mouth of the hangar like a lone missile. She gritted her teeth against the biting wind, twirling left and right around the bodies of multiple, multiple airships. Once she was closer towards the front of the densely drifting cloud of ships, she touched down on one airship, trotted into its cockpit, and shoved the instrument throttles forward. With a steady hum, the ship puttered faster, accelerating towards the Ledomaritan armada. As this happened, Rainbow Dash immediately jumped ship and flew to the next closest dirigible. She landed, throttled it forward, and hopped to the next one without wasting anytime.
In swift order, Rainbow Dash forced no less than twenty airships to accelerate at full-speed. They cruised like metal mountains towards the center three warships of the military blockade.
On board the lead ship, Evans started to tremble. Bulbs of sweat ran down his temple as he looked across the line of advancing ships.
“Sir, they're...” An officer looked nervously towards him. “They're accelerating towards us... and fast...”
“They're coming at ramming speed!” another enforcer exclaimed. “They're not stopping!”
“Give me the amplification stone,” Evans said, motioning with his hoof.
A fellow enforcer levitated the shard in question towards him.
Evans spoke into the glowing rock, broadcasting his voice loudly through the air. “Attention, civilians vessels! Halt your advance at once and prepare to be boarded!” Evans winced, even as the words came boldly out of his mouth. ”This area is off limits to non-military flight, and every unauthorized ship from this hangar is under official investigation. Stop or you will be fired upon!”
The ships did not halt. As a matter of fact, twice as many were accelerating than just seconds before. A tiny prismatic figure was darting between the ships in the middle, but Evans was too encumbered by the moment to notice.
“Sir, they're... uh... they're not stopping...”
Evans stammered and spat, ”This is your last warning! Stop your advance, or by the power invested in m-me by the Council of Ledo, you will b-be fired... upon...”
The ships came faster and faster. The air whistled from their sharp ascent, tickling the ears of the frightened enforcers upon the battlecruisers' decks.
“Enforcer Evans...?”
Evans gnashed his teeth and threw the shard down. He murmured aside to his fellow officers. “Open fire...”
“On wh-which ones, sir?”
Evans spastically shout. “All of them!”
The enforcers blinked at each other. They looked down the deck.
The gunners glanced back. Then, almost flinching as one, they spun the turrets about, loaded their shells, and fired.
The air filled with thunderous crashes once again as the cannons unleashed their fury on the front line of airships. Several of them shattered, and several more exploded.
Rainbow Dash found herself having to kick away from an exploding zeppelin underneath her. “Whoah! Haaaa-ha ha ha ha!” She smirked devilishly as she twirled about on roaring thrusters and rocketed towards another line of slowly drifting ships. She shouted into both soundstones. “Come on in, boys and girls! The water's fine!”
As she accelerated against the flow of airships, the air behind her filled with fire and shrapnel.
The first round of shelling ended, and as the battlecruisers reloaded, the unmanned civilian ships continued hurtling towards the armada on a suicide path. Their numbers were barely whittled down, and soon they were flocking over the vessels on all sides.
“Pull us back...” Evans murmured at first. He spun about and shouted at the top of his lungs. “Hard to stern! Get us out of their path!”
Bells rang and stallions ran—panicked—from station to station as the massive ships tried swinging out of the way. The smaller escort vessels drifted in, albeit in awkward and ill-timed clusters. They tried intercepting the speeding ships, but were largely unsuccessful. Several of the airships brushed up against the battlercuiser's hulls, scraping at the metal surfaces and knocking several soldiers off their hooves. The air filled with noise and panic, and in the midst of it all, the armada stupidly fired a second salvo, sending even more waves of burning metal flying into the air and adding to the chaos.
And whoever said Rainbow Dash had no sense of tatics?
Zebra, please.
Dropship Rush!
I'm suddenly curious whether this is a viable technique in an RTS.
Guess Evans and Shell forgot the one key rule of winning any war, DO NOT DRIVE YOUR ENEMY INTO DESPERATION.
This is a good example of why, they begin to act erratically, unpredictably, and suicidally. And and all mistakes on your part will only amplify their chances of survival bu magnitudes.
RD knows that a good offense is the best defense.
And we all know that a good battering ram is the best offense.
I'm fairly sure this chapter makes no sense physics-wise. I mean, Dash's thrusters can only move her so fast, and all the ships outweigh that by an order of magnitude at least.
Oh well.
Shell is not going to be happy with those guys, even if those zeppelins were unmanned.
On a completely random note, 2 Fast 2 Furious was a good movie, but clearly lacking compared to the rest.
Love Dashie enjoying herself in the explosions.
3048537 Supreme Commander 1, load up a bunch of tech 1 soldiers onto some dropships and fly them in,the soldiers will shoot from the dropships as they fly over enemies before being shot down and dealing decent damage to anything underneath them when they crash.
Dubbed Ghetto Gunships.
So yeah, It's viable.
3048666
I know about the ghetto gunships. What I was referring to is when a whole bunch of ships that can't attack and that you can't see the inside of rush your base. None of them are attacking besides crowding the skies of your base, and your actual target is buried within. Like cannon fodder.
3048681 Oh, Dunno.
3048648
RD isn't pushing the zeppelins, she's boarding them, going to their control rooms, and increasing the throttle to speed them up.
Next chapter, Nancy Jane runs!
3048745
I'm sorry. I do occasionally skim these, particularly when I see something that seems to not make sense.
Gotta love these unconventional tactics. This is just one reason why RD is Awesomeness Incarnate. Long live the UENR and remember to ZADUBADABU!!
Huh, for a second there, I thought Evans was just going to let the ships pass, unwilling to attack potential civilians. For the sake of balance, the Ledomaritan army really needs an ethical representative, a voice of moral reason (the closest thing so far is Josho... yeah...), so they're not all villainous boogey-men (boogey-ponies?). And Evans seems like the likely candidate, plucked from obscurity, as he was, by Shell's deathly hoof. Or, I thought. Eh, there's still time, if that's the route the story will take.
But anyway, surprisingly good plan on Dash's parts. Maybe there'll be no innocent fatalities, after all.
Dash knows a thing or two about harnessing chaos.
3049716
You know the thing about chaos is...
It's... fair...
Dashie has a plan?
And it's actually WORKING?
You had my curiosity, but now you have my attention.
Safety in numbers. Herd together and let your mingling forms confuse the attacker - Pilate ought to know. Maybe they should've painted stripes on the airships before departure.
3048485 Das racist.
3049716 ginoraidy.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/tumblr_lx4or62fjn1qmyyan.png
Fly Nancy, fly!
Remember when this tale was one of solitary flight and solid description?
Things have changed a lot since then
3050013Soon. I think Saturday at the latest, hopefully.
So... Many... Shipsplosions...
3048756
Maybe it'll be about Shell escaping the sewers and pursuing the group. Call it Dick and Jane
Two stupid plans at once, both born out of Rainbow Dash's awesomeness and both working most efficaciously at the moment.
So Roarke, the only one presently trying to make plans through an intelligent outlook, is the only one presently in a rather dire situation. OK then.
You have a rather disquieting habit of cutting things off on a positive or negative note in the middle of an event, before belting out quite the opposite in the next chapter pertaining to the aforementioned event. I sincerely hope this is not going to be the case, as I rather enjoy a stupid plan on occasion. It would be nice for these guys to catch a break for once.
3050806 It's three words too, so it works XD
3048648
Wait, do you think RD is pushing the ships. I am assuming you do because that would be the only reason why you would mention mass. Nonono, rainbow is altering the auto pilot of each of these ships.
IIIIIt's Dashie's First Get-Backing Adventure!
And so the technique works! But is the Noble Jury going to sneak out amidst the chaos, or what? We'll find out soon enough...These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
P.S. That's all for today. Tune in tomorrow for act three!
That's alot of airships.
So this was an amazing chapter. I could just picture the herd of airships bearing down on the enforcers, and Evans' "Oh crap" face. I really wish I could draw, because that scene would definitely be a fun one to do (especially if a little Dash doing loop-de-loops in the background were added).
Rainbow's little pep-up speech was a nice touch. I miss her taking charge and kicking ass like in the early days, but now with even more self-confidence and consideration for her compatriots. Lets just hope she can live up to her word and no one gets seriously hurt. (Except for Shell. He can bite the big one any time now). Although when(if?) he finally dies, I probably won't believe it, anyway. He must have Horcruxes kicking about or something, because no one other than Rainbow has survived that many ridiculous near-death experiences.
Well, off to the next chappie!
"Target the reavers... target everybody... SOMEBODY FIRE!!!"
4.bp.blogspot.com/_D_Z-D2tzi14/S8TRIo4br3I/AAAAAAAACv4/Zh7_GcMlRKo/s1600/ALOT.png 3083505
Haha! It worked!
-Spirit
I cant be the only one who saw this scene while reading it.
This plan is actually working nicely.
Haha, way to go, Dash! Your "stupid" plan worked stupendously!
Finished A Momentary Lapse of Reason and started in on The Delicate Sound of Thunder!
If its stupid and it works, it ain't stupid. Rainbow's plans in a nutshell.
Shoot them! Shoot them all!
As long as they dont get the equivalent of a manifest for Nightshade industries... and missing persons list from the incident to cross-reference... i dont see that not happening in real life. Ah.. but they're safe from identification right?
8913198
This is a black site. They're trying to keep everything secret as they can. At least until they remember that that one guy they know was a moron and left several duty rosters out for anyone to find. We all know that ONE guy who you can count on to screw something up. But at least they'll know who to blame later on...and beyond that, I doubt they'll be searching nationwide for these stallions and mares with the same fervor as they have RD and crew. Hopefully the escaping folks will remember to run and to keep running as soon as they can get the chance. >.>
Good stuff this chapter, and the story!