Chapter 18 – Race to the End

Rainbow kept up the pace, flipping and dodging around other ships just to keep from getting her engine fried. Breeze keeping up his barrage of bolts in order to save the racer from any onslaughts of attacks. The further they got into the pack, the more bolts they found flying around everywhere, "This is getting nuts!" Rainbow called out as she once again raced past another aggressive racer.

"I'm running low on bolt charge, gonna need to let her rest soon." Breeze told her.

"Ponyfeathers." she grumbled to herself and gunned it again. The distance she gained caused her to bypass several of the others.

"She's coming up to 18th place!" Pinkie called out, and suddenly watched as something slammed into the Rainbow Trail from the side, "Ooh, now she's in 20th." she continued.

"What the hay?" Rainbow asked as she regained some kind of composure with her.

"I'm not losing this time." she heard from inside the other machine. Breeze quickly turned and began shooting as the other started shooting as well, somehow Breeze won out, and the last of his bolts slammed right into the hull of the other ship. The ship dispersed the charge across it, only a single thruster shutting down causing the ship to slow down and fall behind.

"Whew." Rainbow Dash exhaled in relief, and again pushed the throttle forward, "Where did that guy even come from?"

Suddenly, the two of them found themselves covered in a shadow. Breeze looked up to see a giant triangle-shaped ship, a long-pointed nose coming off from its front and long pointed wings at each side. It just barely fit through the rings. "What the…?" Rainbow called out, and could quickly see the shock guns start charging.

Breeze squeezed the triggers on his guns, only to have them fizz at him instead, "Uh, Dashie…" he said to her, and could only watch as the barrels of the much larger ship started glowing again. Rainbow could easily imagine whatever it was inside the ship grinning, like a sick hunter playing with its prey.

The two of them were jarred when something came crashing into them from the side, a familiar diamond-shaped ship that fired back as the much larger ship tried to take out the two racers, only to be thwarted as the other ship stopped a great majority of their bolts and absorbed the last few. "You ok Skittle Head?" Syls asked over the coms.

"Syls?" Rainbow asked as the two of them fell behind a bit.

"Tris?" Breeze asked.

"Whew, that was close!" the Dryskian gunner asked.

"What in Bacromus is going on?" Syls asked, "You were moving like the Haloo was after you!"

"The what?" Rainbow asked.

"Some guy named Boar shot is with a Linear Arc Cannon shot, toasted our shields." Breeze said.

"How could you tell?" Tris asked.

"My bro has dealt with those things before on the Genesis Ark, he recognized it for us." the stallion said in response.

"We should report him!" the taller Dryskian said.

"He's got it too well hidden." Rainbow Dash said, "We'll have to be clever about it."

"Well, either way, sounds like you could use our help." Syls said with a cocky attitude.

Rainbow quickly let her worry fade, "I'd really appreciate that." she said, quickly catching Syls off guard, "And I promise, when our guns are recharged, we'll help return the favor."

"Um…" Syls said as she let the humility sink in, "Alright then, let's do this!"

"Thanks, Syls." Rainbow said quietly and listened as the two gunners began talking.

"That was some pretty good shooting, can't believe you were able to stop all of those bolts." he said to her.

"Not all of them." Tris said as she looked down at her console.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Thanks to that we've got maybe two hits on our shields left, this is going to get hairy if we move forward." she said.

"So, what do you want to do?" Rainbow asked.

"We're going to have to swallow our pride and just stay in our spots." Syls said as she looked around, "I mean, 9th and 10th place isn't bad right?"

"Wait…" Rainbow asked as she looked around, "Where is everypony? And when did we get so far ahead?"

"You can thank Oversized for that." the two different ships heard from over the coms. Applejack appeared on the screen, "He's been takin down almost everypony he comes across, and in the back, our resident cheater is tearin through the rest, more than half of the competition has been eliminated."

"So many never given the chance because of one cheater." Breeze said.

"Hey?" Rainbow asked, "Where's the end of the track?" When they all looked forward, they saw what Rainbow saw, there was no end to the track just yet.

"That's weird, usually a giant ring pops up from the ground to signify the end of the track." Syls commented.

"Uh oh." Tris said, "If this goes on too long, we won't make it."

Syls nodded in agreement, "We weren't expecting a drawn-out race. Usually the qualifying rounds are over by now."

"Didn't you fuel up?" Breeze asked.

"We did, but we were a bit reckless. Our shield isn't going to recharge for a while and our bolts are nearly depleted for now." she said in response.

"You mean we just ran out of charge rescuing them." Tris admitted.

Syls growled a bit, "So what do we do?"

Suddenly Breeze heard a beep on his console, "We trade-off." he said, and gripped his controls, "Thanks to the time Rainbow and you two earned us, I'm at about 75% charge, We just need to wait and stay in the game until my charge is up, then plan it so that you're at 100 by the time I'm empty and trade-off like that. Utilize all of our skills until we find the finish line."

"So, it's a plan?" R.D. asked in confidence.

"Not the worst one I've heard, but hey, if it'll keep us all in the game, I'm up for it." Syls said as she smiled.

"Me too! This will be intense, but I have faith in our little squad." Tris said and looked down at her console, the bolt charge rising to 3%.

"Then let's go, we gotta all make it to the end of the track. Together, nothing will stop us, not even the big guy." Rainbow said, and they all grinned at her confidence, "Let's do this."

The moment those words left her mouth, the two racers pushed their racers harder, moving past a few more competitors along the way. Flips and tricks that dodged around bolts and some even causing those bolts to strike another competitor before they rocketed past to the next one. Eventually, they got to the lead ship, the giant ship that encompassed them the last time, and only with one smaller ship behind them, "Ready?" Rainbow asked both gunners.

"What's your charge?" Breeze asked.

"56%." Tris said with a bit of excitement.

"Good, I should be able to buy you some time." he said and quickly turned to shoot at the barrier of the much larger ship. They saw the guns turn to them, and then separated, allowing the bolts to sail past them, and into the smaller ship behind them. The engine shut down quickly from the barrage of shots, and the two of them pushed their engines at full boar, sailing past the much larger ship with Breeze keeping the bolts that were going to hit either one of them from connecting. Suddenly Rainbow and Syls pulled back on their throttle and moved to the center of the track. The larger ship slammed into one of the pillars that had made up the next ring, the barrier on the large ship flickering a bit before coming back on.

"Did you see that?" Tris asked, and was rewarded with Rainbow Dash's excitement.

"I see the finish line!" the pegasus said getting the others to see the large ring coming from the ground. It looked every bit like the ring that formed the starting line.

"Gun it, you two. We'll keep you steady!" Breeze said.

Tris focused a bit, her charge not quite past the mark she would have wanted, but it seemed to be an emergency. The two pilots pushed their ships to the max, a straight line that blurred the sides of reality as they raced to the end, the gunners stopping the bolts from enemy ships from behind as they pulled away, the two of them focusing on the rear as they pushed their own skills to the max, and listened to the call of their pilots as each of them reached for the end. Then when they crossed the ring, a light shined around them, and a gong nose sounded, followed by the cry that they had heard when the race began. The light that had welcomed them, also kept any stray bolts from passing the finish line.

"I WON!" Syls shouted, "I can't believe we made it!"

"What do you mean you won?" Rainbow asked, "We crossed at the same time!"

"Check your console feed!" Tris said, and Rainbow looked down to see a picture of the two of them, but even though their jets were even, the Rainbow Trail was a smaller ship. The nose of the Silver Blitz just slightly poking out in front of her own as the two of them crossed the finish line.

"What?" Rainbow asked, and let it sink in, "Aw." she groaned, and pulled forward to get to somewhere safe as the much larger ship sailed through the gate, and almost slammed into the two of them. The four of them watched as the larger ship sailed passed by, the intention clearly there as it finally started to come to a stop. It turned to them and loomed as it came close. Breeze could easily feel the malice coming from the ship itself as it so gently scooted on by.

Rainbow Dash could only gulp in intimidation as the ship slowly made its way to the garages.

"What was that?" Syls asked, and looked to Rainbow Dash.

"It's going to be a long and strange story." the mare said in response.