Chapter 87 – The True Form of Justice

Back in the race, Mirikka and Rainbow each swerved along the track, each glaring daggers into each other as they tried to overtake the other, dodging the blasts that would have hit them as they trusted their gunners to hit their target. Rainbow suddenly moved away, taking a turn wide as she entered into the gate, and once again fell from the path to enter another of the gates. "Too easy!" she said, even though Mirikka had followed her move.

"Where are those snipers?" the Sunik girl asked harshly, "I swear if they aren't in position, I'll have their tails for Insubordination!" She watched as Rainbow quickly turned around, and flapped her wings at her, a stream of fire erupting from the center of the wings just as they barely touched the sides of her ship, and almost as if she had practiced thousands of times, turned back to point forward. "Cocky brat!" she growled and once again pressed her comms, "WHERE ARE THOSE SNIPERS?" she asked.

Up on some nearby cliffs, a Sunik knelt down with his hands on the back of his head, a long-barreled rifle laying next to him as he looked to the dirt beneath his knees. Behind him, with a strange-looking gun in his hands, stood a casually dressed Dryskian man in a blue button-up shirt and brown slacks. He had grey fur and faded blue ears, age showing through the fur on his face, and a walky-talky in his other hand, "Ok team." he said, "Is that all of them? Over." he never took his eyes off of the Sunik assassin.

"Roger." the radio in his hand said back to him, "All snipers have been apprehended and are awaiting transport of authority. Over."

The Sunik at gunpoint sighed in defeat, "Good work team." the Dryskian said, "Keep your eyes on them until the guards arrive. Over."

"Roger that, Over and Out." he heard from the other end, and placed his radio back on his belt.

"Stay right there, buddy." he said, his only response was a glare from his captor and a sneer of disapproval.

"This is bad." one of the male Suniks in Mirikka's garage said, "Lady Kiane is gone and I can't get ahold of either team. The Tower team has gone silent and the last transmission we got from our snipers was cut off."

"Did…" another male Sunik asked, "…Did they all get arrested?"

"Impossible." a female Sunik said, she sounded like she was in charge, "The guards didn't even know we were out there, plus we still have the Chameleos in place of Lady Kessel. There's no way we could…"

"Mrs. Prisskk! Mrs. Prisskk!" a Sunik shouted as she ran up to the female in charge, "The guards just showed up, they have our garage surrounded, and the news!"

"WHAT?" Mrs. Prisskk called out as she looked to the garage door. There outside, stood several of the armored guards; some Treeopon, some Dryskian, and others either Sunik or Hylop, it seemed as if the entire army that resided in the Tower had surrounded them, "Contact "Mirikka, tell her the entire operation failed."

"Emergency!" Mirikka heard over her coms as the picture of a green and tan male Sunik appeared, "We're surrounded by guards, and we can't get ahold of the sniper team, "I think both fronts have failed. I repeat all teams have fallen! We're…"

Suddenly a large Treeopon guard appeared behind him, grabbing him by the shoulder, "That's enough of that!" the brute said, "You're all under arrest! Mirikka of {snort} the Sunik Empire, the moment you stop, you {snort} will be placed under arrest for tampering with the official outcome of the Terranuilian race, blackmail {snort} of several officials, attempted murder of a race official, the kidnaping of {snort} two race officials, conspiring to illegally replace an official representative, and the murder of Terranuilian gunner Krisskkil of {snort} Tusk's team!" with that, the armored Treeopon leaned forward, she could almost see the grin under his helmet, "Good luck." these words he placed with a touch of dark sarcasm, a hope that she is knocked out of the race entirely just as her coms went dark.

Her face fell, her eyes widened, and she felt alone. Everything she had worked for was falling apart around her, "BUSTED!" Rainbow Dash called out, snapping the Sunik's attention back to the pony.

"You…" the Sunik racer growled as her anger rose, "This is all YOUR FAULT!" Her racing became erratic as she tried to press herself into the Rainbow Trail Mk.3. "A Lesser creature should know their place, but your creatures, all you do is mess things up! You've been a curse to me since we met!"

She dashed across the track, Rainbow slowing down just in time so that Mirikka's racer passed by and slammed into the wall. Rainbow then moved to the other side, and dashed forward, "That's because we aren't lesser creatures!" she called out, and placed just a little bit of magic into her machine, "WE'RE PONIES!" The colors that erupted from her boosters pushed her forward at a faster speed, only slightly faster, but it was faster nonetheless.

"Holy Moly!" Pilit called out, "The power output just jumped! And yet, it's still perfectly stable!"

"Atta girl Rainbow!" Applejack called out.

Rainbow suddenly slowed down before turning around and quickly firing off the cannon mounted on the front of her ship and shattering the rest of Mirikka's shield, before igniting her left side boosters to circle around the oncoming ship and end up behind Mirikka, Breeze instantly turned his guns to her, and pelting the jets on the back of the ship with every bolt he had left in reserve. It was enough all of Mirikka's engines faltered, sputtered, and then stopped. "NO!" she called out as for the last time Rainbow Dash passed her by, "NO!" she called out as she watched the small ship pass through one of the gates, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" she screamed as her ship landed on the dirt, scraping up the bottom of her ship.

"YES!" Breeze called out, lifting his hooves into the air for a cheer.

"WOOHOO!" Pinkie shouted in triumph.

"YEEHAW!" Applejack echoed. The others each cheered in their own way as Rainbow Dash, clearly in the lead, rocketed through the course. Breeze, once the charge came back to his guns, began shooting all targets he could find. The race was a blur after that, Rainbow barely remembered even crossing the finishing gate. The only clear memory was during the announcement.

"WOW!" the announcer shouted, "WHAT A RACE! I never thought I'd get so excited! Even I'm impressed with today, and I've been doing this for thirteen Cycles!" Once again Rainbow Dash could almost hear the cheering from everyone in their houses as they let out a roar of excitement. "Now onto the scores, remember this race is point based, not speed-oriented like the prelims, so onto the scores!" A few seconds later the announcer once again sounded, "Let's start with our resident hero and their new Mk.3 racer. Gotta hand it to them, they've been through a lot since they got here, but was it all worth it? Let's find out!"

The seconds that passed by held tension for everyone, "Looks like Rainbow Dash started out and finished strong, with a total of 56 points earned from just the red targets alone, I'd say that's an impressive streak. Then if you add the 40 points from the blue targets to bring her total up to 96 points. That's a new record!"

Rainbow smirked, turned to her rear, and said, "Nice shooting."

Breeze simply rubbed the back of his head in embarrassment.

"But that's not all folks!" the announcer said, catching everyone's attention, "Remember, her team was also able to knock out Mirikka completely from the tournament!" This caused everyone to cheer, "And because of that, she earned a whopping 25 points for knocking out an opponent, bringing her final total up to 116 points. Sadly, she was not able to discover the elusive purple target, but she did arrive in first place in speed, earning her at least ten points for that feat alone, her total is now 126 points well done Rainbow Dash!"

Once again, the crowd erupted in cheering, "Coming up close behind her and her gunner, the Meltackian team has earned 45 points from red targets but 50 points from the blue targets. They were also able to take down one of the teams from Hyl's final four, earning them 25 points as well, but because they came in second in speed, they only get 5 points for their finish, making their total 125 points. Oof just barely, but still only enough to come in behind Rainbow Dash, better luck next time." The announcer once again fell silent for a second, "Behind them, was the Dryskian team from Bacromus' final four, 32 points for red targets and 45 for blue, but to our surprise, they were able to find the elusive purple target, so that means that they leave the track 87 points!" Once again, the announcer stopped for a second, "And let's not forget our returning competitors, the Hok-Sai team of Tri-Tiner and friends, earning their usual point total of 80 points this Cycle. But Sselekk's team seems to be the upset here, as they've amassed a total of 93 points, congratulations."

"Looks like you beat me." Syls said as she contacted the larger Sunik.

"I do lead the army, remember?" he asked, "Of course, I would have some really good gunners."

"And Kklesstic upsets the entire race by pulling in 100 points on his own." the announcer shouted.

"WHAT?" Sselekk asked as he turned to the strange pitted Sunik ship that hovered there.

The picture of a tall and lanky Sunik suddenly came up on the screen, his scales were pale green, and it looked as if he hadn't showered, his white lab coat was wrinkled while the neon grey tuft of hair on his head tossed every which way and the overly thick glasses on his face balanced perfectly on his nose, "Well, well." he said, "I've miss calculated a bit, but I do say, you are quite the specimen, little one." Rainbow Dash cringed at him, he looked as if he were looking at a question. inquisitively searching for an answer, "I wonder," he said, "How durable is your mind?"

Suddenly Twilight came on screen, "Excuse me?" she asked, "You can't just hack into some pony's private channel!"

"But I just did little one." he said, and stopped, "Oh I see. A horn and wings, does that make you more or less powerful? Or maybe the same, just spread out between multiple points?"

"I'm not answering that." she said flatly, "You're just trying to throw us into a political battle with each other."

"Hm." he hummed in thought, "So you're not as stupid as I thought you'd be. Perhaps we can talk business?"

"Business with you?" she asked, "Why would I want to do business with you?"