Chapter 55 – The End of the Beginning

Once again, Rainbow Dash stood at the garage door, waiting for it to open, 'I was sure I'd see that shaman girl yesterday, but somehow, she didn't show.' the blue pegasus thought to herself, 'I wonder why?'

"Thinking about the race today?" she heard the grey-furred unicorn say as he walked up beside her.

"I was actually thinking of yesterday." she admitted to him.

"What part?" he asked as the smile fell into a concerned frown.

"It's something that didn't happen actually." she said, "Do you think that shaman girl…uh…what's her name?"

"Cya-O-Ur." he reiterated.

"Right. Do you think Cya-O-Ur knows where our garage even is?" she asked.

"Well, I don't think so." he said with unsure confidence, "You see, the shaman of the Talu can only see the future in spurts, and not totally clear ones either. And from what Lau has told me, she's gone and misused her power, so it might stop working for her the right way."

Rainbow Dash hummed in thought, but wasn't given much time to think as the door started opening, "There's no way to tell until we see her again." he finished, "And honestly, I hope it's a long-time till."

Rainbow smiled, she knew he cared, cared more than any pony she knew. The death he had seen, the lives he had taken, and even the regrets, all weighed on him. He still smiled, no matter how miserable he felt that day, he always smiled. It was the one thing she felt kept him going at times, the fact that he could smile through so much tragedy. She turned her eyes to him, then back to the sun as it shined through the door, and took a deep cleansing breath. She had been there to share the weight with him. When she could get him to talk about his past, he would feel better, and his smile would brighten. They were a pair, a team. And she believed you never leave your team behind, take them with you to the finish line. "Ready to win this race?" she asked.

He grinned, that same grin he always gave her when he was excited for some kind of prank or excitement, "More than ever." he said, "Final four, here we come!"

She simply smiled, and with a single flap of her wings, lifted up to enter the cockpit. He followed soon after, disappearing and reappearing at the top before flipping into the hatch that led to his gunner seat. With the door to their garage opened all the way, they took off. Rainbow didn't want to go slow, she simply opened her throttle to half, and let the ship fly through the doors. She turned her head to see where to go, and with a grin, silently found her friends next to her. Honor, with a visible grin, and Syls with an even more confident grin than she had ever seen, "You look different somehow." the Dryskian said, "Did you do something with your hair?"

"Not her hair." Tris said, "It's her aura."

"Even her mental state has changed. Like there is a focus we've never experienced before." Chivalry said.

"A lot happened in a short time." Rainbow admitted, "But we're going to get through it, and right now, the final four awaits!"

"But what could have sparked such a drastic change?" Honor asked, "It's not the race, both of you have a weight that seems to have been lifted from you."

"We'll have to tell you later. Right now, I say we see who's faster." Breeze said and confidently grinned.

"Race you to the starting line!" Rainbow followed up and pushed her ship even faster as the other two just grinned in delight, and raced on.

"You're on Skittle Head!" Syls said as she tried to catch up to the little blue ship.

"Such children." Honor said.

"Oh, shut up. You want to race them and you know it." his sister scolded. With a grin, he pushed his ship faster, attempting to make up for the lost distance. 'Rainbow Dash, you and your friends have a special talent to turn even your enemies into your friends.' she thought, 'I envy you. To have changed even our outlook so much in such a short time. I thank you.'

The three raced on, each overtaking the other at times, pushing their racers and skills until they found the starting line, a large, almost impossibly tall cliff with seven small entrances.

"What the…" Rainbow asked as they neared it.

"The Labyrinth?" they heard Tusks ask from the coms.

"Oh, my Egas." Syls said, "Nopony has been in the Labyrinth since the first Terranuilian Race!"

"Why did the officials choose this all of a sudden?" Breeze asked.

"You ponies don't know very much about this planet, do you?" Honor asked, "During the Terranuilian Race, it's like the planet comes alive. The race tracks are chosen by the planet itself."

"I have so many questions…" Twilight said mostly to herself as her surprise dominated her expression.

"And the answers have been lost to time." Pilit said as she hung her head in shame.

"How do we know which opening is ours?" Breeze asked.

"I…" Syls said, and realized, "…don't know."

"This track hasn't been used in hundreds…maybe even thousands of CYCLES!" Pilit said over the coms. The three racers came near the walls, just behind the other racers. While the pilots kept their eyes on the space in front of them, the gunners looked up. Each spying the symbols above the opening doors.

"Are they lined up by garage number?" Rainbow asked.

"Can't be, if so then Sselkk would be parked in the fourth slot, not the second." Syls said.

"I think it has something to do with those symbols over the doors." Tris said, getting everyone to look at what she was saying. Above the doors, carved into a bronze circular plate were symbols, each one different in design. One looked to Rainbow like it was supposed to be in the shape of one of Rarity's diamonds on her cutie mark, another looked as if it were a demon's mask, as well as others, like the one above the Suniks was that of a lizard she could easily find in Equestria, then another that looked like a fork and one that looked like an angry eye. There was another she just couldn't figure out, but another that was seven lines that merged into a point near the top before spreading out towards the bottom in a curved shape with the point starting on the right.

"That kind of looks like a rainbow?" Breeze asked.

"Maybe if you count the actual lines as the individual colors." Twilight said in response.

"Does that mean that the scary-looking face thing is for Honor?" Syls asked.

"Why would mine be the mask?" the Meltackian asked. Just then, Rainbow pulled into the spot with the rainbow symbol, and it shined with a dinging noise accompanying it.

"Oh, that's how we know." Tris said and waited until Syls pulled into the spot with the mask. Nothing happened. "I guess the mask is yours." she said and heard Honor grumble as the two ships changed places, and heard the same noise as when Rainbow Dash had pulled into her spot. "I wonder why the diamond is our spot?" Tris asked.

"Probably because of the diamond shape of your racer." Breeze said, "Just like the war mask is for the warrior design of the Honor Guard."

"I suppose." Honor said, "But how did the ancestors know that we would be participating in the race that would feature the Labyrinth with our particular racers?" His answer was never received. Instead, the doors began opening at that moment, causing each of the racers to focus on the track ahead. Each pilot started revving their engines, waiting until the starting sound. When it did sound, the racers jutted forward, disappearing through the openings before each door slid shut behind them, and the symbols on the bronze plates vanished as the glow faded.

"Maps, maps, where are the maps?" Twilight asked herself as she searched through the files they had uncovered.

"I don't think there is a map of the Labyrinth!" Pilit said as she too hurriedly searched for anything that would tell them what to expect.

"And I thought you said that Bacromus didn't have magic?" Pinkie asked.

"What?" Writch asked, "What do you mean?"

"If Bacromus doesn't have magic then why did the symbols above the doors just disappear?" the pink pony asked.

Everyone, pony and alien stopped what they were doing, and glanced at the symbol plates above the doors, "But…" Pilit said in confusion, "…what's going on?"