Rainbows over the Flowers Chapter 1
In the empty blue skies, overlooking a large, densely-populated city, the sun loomed directly overhead; despite the lack of obstruction in the skies, it seemed that the sun chose grace, its energy seeming to gently rain down through the atmosphere.
Attuned with the serenely empty, quiet, still blue skies, the sun's light seemed to trickle down through the atmosphere, illuminating every stretch of the urban jungle indiscriminately - from the numerously condensed, cramp communities populating crammed, dilapidated buildings constructed with weak, brittle bricks that couldn't afford weather the gentlest storm; to the high-rise in the center of the city, surrounded by new roads, maintained homes, and clean structures.
Amongst the outskirts of the city's center, a woman made her way down the street, strolling slowly along. Her elbows flared out, bouncing gently, palms holding the back of her head. Her face tilted towards the sky, features suspended in idle thought, focusing her gaze directly into the sun as she walked.
From head to toe, tattoos of all kinds and colors decorated multiple regions of skin upon the woman; it felt as if the tattoos could be peeled right off the top of her skin, or dug into and scraped out - they were immensely saturated, creating an impossibly surreal vibrancy and depth; it would be impossible for anyone with healthy vision and a tattoo to assume such detail came from anything other than a recent touch-up.
Her uninked skin was a particularly pale, grayish light-blue, and no matter how the sun shined upon her being, it seemed as if her skin perpetually displayed a subtle, but noticeable luminescent hum.
A simple black tank top, cropped off just a couple inches above her belly-button, concealed her chest. The shirt extended up to her collarbone, completely concealing her cleavage; despite the lack of a bra, her shirt had no issues supporting her chest. From her hip down, just simple cargo pants resting upon plain sneakers.
Taking one look at her face, most would assume her to be in her late 20s or early 30s; thought subtle and hard to notice, stress and age-lines did tug at her eyes and other parts of her face - her eyes, still gazing directly into the powerful sun, were a deep, dull reddish-pink in color. Her face, although gruff and hardened, displayed an undeniable softness and inviting charm.
Although her full figure was hard to make out, it was clear that she was a strong, athletic person - she had clearly been training her body for quite some time; her muscles weren'tgigantic, but they were noticeably bigger than average, and absolutely shredded.
Lying atop her scalp, a naturally colored and uniform pattern of colored streaks: the wider streaks a dull orange, simply spanning back to front uniformly; the thinner streaks, a much more interesting light-scarlet, seemed to fork off a few inches before reaching the front of her head, the separated space filling with orange.
Consisting of several thin locs, she wore her hair in seven neat braids, uniformly bundled along the length of her head. Up until about the middle of her scalp, discreet elastic bands held her braids together; afterwards, lacking bindings, the hair seemed to fray out from the tightened braids, allowing it to flow out and cascade over her shoulders and back; her longest locs hung down to the middle of her spine, impressive for the relatively tall woman.
Although a treasure, most inhabitants of the city would argue that the most noticeable feature of the woman lied within the fancy, expensive accessories that she wore.
A silver chain looped her neck, linking together to support a decorated emblem: "WW", in a shiny gold backdrop, tastefully decorated and studded with diamonds. The emblem could only occupy a third of her palm, and yet, nearly every angle of light illuminated an envy-inducing sparkle.
Despite being in an urban setting with such an expensive piece of apparel, she strolled with a distinct lack of situational awareness - undoubtedly, people also walking the streets would immediately pin such a person as either oblivious or a careless tourist. Even so, with the lunch hour concluding, a vast majority of the streets were barren, and passerby seemed to pay the woman no mind at all.
Finally, after many minutes of idle strolling, the woman approached the end of the block hearing the familiar traffic density of another intersection approaching. She released her palms from behind her head, allowing her to lower her gazejustin time to see a red-skinned woman retreat from the street, cars beginning to inch beyond the service line.
Sighing, she shoved both hands into her pockets, lazily, craning her neck to look up and across the street, studying the building:
The structure was absolutely enormous, several stories tall and taking up the entirety of the block. In the front courtyard, she could see several flagpoles, but only one in particular caught her interest - an orange flag, with a familiar white-ink Paisley design, tattered in the winds.
After a few short moments of studying the flag, she simply chuckled, shaking her head and closing her eyes. She opened them once again, her smile wide and prideful. Unlike before, there now seemed to be a clear direction and urgency behind the woman's heels as she kicked off into the street, not awaiting her right-of-way, gaze focused on a particular section of the building...
Now, each of her stride's were accompanied with an energetic bounce, triggering a unique phenomenon: her necklace seemed to bounce sluggishly, and her hair had an uncanny, floating feeling to it, bobbing side to side as she walked.
Despite the traffic barreling down both directions on the wide street, the woman hadn't picked up her pace any, maintaining the previous swag and swing of her step, her focus ensnared by the building; likewise, the other woman, still waiting on the opposite side tapped about on her phone, awaiting the barreling two-way traffic to come to a pause.
Though the red-skinned woman stood directly beside her path, neither woman seemed to acknowledge the other as she approached...
However just as the pale blue woman bounced past the red-skinned woman, she gasped, head flicking up from her phone, watching the passing cars for some moments, frantically looking about. After a few moments, she whipped her head all the way around, desperately searching the pale blue woman's direction, once again failing to find what she had hoped for.
Finally, she turned, shoulders sulking dejectedly and a defeated sigh escaping her lips as she continued the opposite way of the blue woman...
Unlike the red woman, the blue woman had already been far too absorbed with observing the scene of a class from a window of the school...
A boisterous class roared over the teacher who, in lieu of his inability to leash the little animals, simply sat in his chair, minimally concerned with actually educating the wild bunch. As far as he was concerned, he would require 3x the hazard pay before he'd chance reigning the class in. After all, he was getting old - no need to risk a disaster so close to the finish line...
"This class is a disaster in every sense of the word..." The teacher thought to himself, gazing upon the students in the room - several orange groups, some with blue, and a few red. However, as his gaze focused upon one particular student, he began to feel a particularly deep disdain, eyes squinting upon the cyan durag wrapped around her head.
Near the center of the class, leaning back coolly in a chair, a young girl bobbed her head, thoroughly enjoying the music blasting within her ears. Each bob started with a sure, powerful flick, making her locs flick and jump about in rhythm with her movement.
Though her hair was rainbow-gradiented, she bore an uncanny resemblance to the strolling woman otherwise - similar facial features, and essentially the same complexion, but with a brighter hue - a light-blue, grayish cerulean. She, too, wore a very similarly styled tank top, jet-black in color. Over the tank top she had a cyan-colored long-sleeved cyan denim jacket, cropped about half a foot longer than the tank top. She wore baggy sweats and simple sneakers.
Just like the pale blue woman's before, she, too, had a similarly-themed necklace. Due to the necklace having been placed beneath her shirt, it was hard to make out what anything other than the links looked like.
He frowned, observing the orange belongings scattered around the girl, before pinching the bridge of his nose - surely, the owners of the space she occupied were going to come and reclaim the area - he studied the room, finding several other locations the girl could occupy instead, his frown deepening.
Of course, he knew, she wouldn't be doing that even if it was suggested - she'd been harassed nearly every week of her time here, and on top of that, her non-affiliation coupled with rumors of her amongst the students meant that she'd never keep a companion very long.
Even theonefriend he knew that she had, a pink girl, wearily lurked around other groups in the room, not wishing to be as reckless as her outcast friend.
Now, here she sat, a cyan durag - a color never repped within the city before - hugging her temples. He knew she had a disdain for the other gangs, but to come into school with a color never repped before was a dangerous omen - a declaration...
Waiting for things to sufficiently escalate, he hovered his finger around the quick-dial button for security and the police...
Suddenly, the girl's skin shivered - a familiar sense of déjà vu jolted within her body from head to toe - her shoulders jumped reactively to the intense, short-lived, invasive feeling; immediately she balanced the leaning chair, paused her music, and whipped around to face the window. She watched intently, facial features paused in confusion, trying to confirm the feeling she had.
Several moments passed. Nothing. The girl scratched her head, assuming that perhaps it was just her body having a strange moment... Just as she pushed off the chair to lean on it once more...
SLAM!*
A hand gripped the back of the chair, aggressively forcing it back down onto the ground, immediately startling the girl student once more. Alongside her, the entire class jumped, forcing all attention upon Rainbow Dash's position.
Brows immediately sagging into a glare, she turned, meeting eyes with a boy who glared back just as meanly as she did. "Too early for this shit hoe... Fuck out my seat, Rainbow Dash, we dusted yo' ass this week already..." he threatened, his hand still gripping the back of the chair.
However, upon recognizing the boy, Rainbow Dash's frown quickly replaced itself with a wide smirk, standing from the seat, facing the boy and staring up directly into his eyes. He was slightly more muscular than your average build, a bit taller than Rainbow Dash, and with pale orange skin, and red hair.
"Yourseat?" Rainbow Dash chuckled, shoulders bouncing with amusement, her pearly whites glistening.
"You deaf, bitch?" Lotus retorted, becoming impatient with her. "On Death Lotus, you better get the fuck up out here..." He continued, pointing to the classroom's door.
"Ain't deaf, but maybe Iamblind..." She began, consoling herself and gesturing to the chair. "Show me where they wrote 'Daddy's Boy' on here?" she taunted, chuckling again.
Lotus' eyes squinted on the girl, fists tigtening. Suddenly, he swung, which Rainbow Dash anticipated, quickly kneeling over and pushing her palms into his lurched-forward chest, throwing him over her back and flat onto the ground.
For a small moment, he writhed on the ground, reaching for his back to soothe it as he rolled about, eliciting loud, hearty laughter from Rainbow Dash, who clapped her hands, pointing at him and gleefully watching all the members of the crowd spectate them.
The civilian students looked on, features of concern and aversion to Rainbow Dash upon their faces - to them, it was like watching a drunken daredevil teeter across a tightrope connecting two canyons...
Then, Rainbow Dash's laughs slightly faltered, looking at a particular student's worried gaze - suddenly, Rainbow Dash heard a loud shuffle, flicking around to see Lotus shooting off for her, already in a running stride- one of his hands seemed to be behind his side, and the other, a reaching arm, fingers grabbing forward.
In a singular moment, Rainbow Dash knew that if his closest arm wasn't attempting to make a meaningful impact, he likely had a deadly weapon in the other. Her eyes lasered into life, immediately zoning in, her adrenaline on fire.
By the time Lotus entered a 3-foot radius of Rainbow Dash, she'd already envisioned her counter - as Lotus finally closed the distance, and she saw him begin to slink his other arm from around his side, she ducked his grabbing hand with a crouch, purposely swinging herself to his left side.
In that moment, ducking into the dangerous weapon, Lotus immediately put all of his force into the stab, planting his feet as hard as he could, his arm swinging forward, muscles flexing into life.
Rainbow Dash smiled, planting her own feet into the ground, pushing off to the left, getting just enough distance to have the blade only graze her jacket; in the same move, she wrapped her right hand around his wrist, pulling his arm behind and twisting.
Klang!*
As soon as the blade dropped, Rainbow Dash lifted her leg, planting it directly upon Lotus' butt.
pnt, dcchh!*
"Unnf!" Lotus grunted in pain, sliding across the floor and knocking two desks over as Rainbow Dash let her foot go. Quickly, she crouched, picking up the blade - a fancy, multi-colored butterfly knife, with longer than average blades.
"Perfect gift, bitch boy." Rainbow Dash joked, skillfully flicking the blade around with one hand, other on her hip, awaiting Lotus to rise. He angrily shoved the tables away from himself, sitting back against one before scrambling to his feet, teeth grit in fury.
His chest and back heaved with rage; he glanced back between the other members in orange around the room, before facing Rainbow Dash once more.
His shoulders simply rised, and fell, body frozen with anger, deciding what he'd do next. Ceasing the moment of silence, Rainbow Dash tugged at her cyan durag, her locs dropping to her shoulders. She shook the durag around for the entire room to see.
"Every one of you pussies wearing orange better remember this color." She began, scanning the room, shaking the durag toward the other students in orange that refused to step in for Lotus.
"Tell ya' block. Tell ya' big bros. Warn ya' lil bros. Tell da' lil' fam y'all got in the patrol unit. Tell dem' lil' politicians y'all buyin' out..." Rainbow Dash rambled, feeling that her point had now gotten across.
"Tell 'em I'm coming foreverything. Your drugs, your money, your power, your status..." She continued, still scanning each face in the room. "... Yourlife." Rainbow Dash emphasized, purposefully weighting the delivery with a pause.
"RainBooms, nigga. That's who's runnin' yo' ass down every time you see this color,YURD?!" Rainbow Dash barked, before facing Lotus once more.
"You can't be serious..." Lotus chuckled to himself, deeply amused that the girl thought she had any chance with a new gang in a city with established entities.
"Youcan't be serious..." Rainbow Dash immediaetly retorted, tying the durag back around her head. "What's it been, like damn near 11 years and you still can't touch me on these ones?" She began, her tone cocky and arrogant.
"But somehow, you be in the tren-" Rainbow Dash began, shrugging and closing her eyes.
CRK-BOOM!*
Immediately, Lotus' eyes burst with fury, becoming wide, his hand shooting for the inside of his sweater and quickdrawing his gun, releasing a round towards Rainbow Dash.
All members of the room jumped, heads turning towards Lotus, who now held a gun, barrel steaming. Rainbow Dash, quickly regaining her composure, placed a knuckle on her hip, shooting a disapproving frown toward Lotus.
Of course, Rainbow Dash thought -that'swhy they hadn't bothered backing him up; they wouldn't bother stepping in for a man that could just shoot her. Shooting in the school was an unspoken taboo, but if anyone could get away with it, it would be the Death Lotus, and most especially, Lotus Rich.
She clicked her tongue, closing her eyes and shaking her head. "Nice aim.So you're gonna shoot me for kickin' ya sorry ass?" She asked rhetorically, unimpressed. Her grip around the buttefly blade she looted tightened immensely, feeling her nerves become tight. Lotus, in turn, laughed this time, seeing how quickly Rainbow Dash's amusement dissipated.
"You always got sum'n smart to say... That's really what you want your last words to be...?" Lotus trailed on ominiously, his finger curling around the trigger once more.
"You better not miss the next one..." She added, taking one step forward, blade pointed towards Lotus. He chuckled.
"Ain't had to tell me twice. Last time you disrespect me like that…", the boy agreed, his fingers beginning to squeeze…
Unbeknownst to the two within conflict, a figure in a jet-black hoodie scrambled through the room, shoving through the crowd, rushing toward the boy in Orange, moments away from taking his second shot...
Author's Note (henceforth referred to as "A/N")
This is the second rewrite of a story originally known as "The Thug Life Chose Me", a My Little Pony fanfiction I've been passionate about since my teen years. This rewrite has been storyboarded, and as such, should be much more organized and fun to read through.
I will be uploading the story here, updated once every Friday until it is caught up to the current progress of the upload on FiMFiction.
Should you ever have any questions about the lingo / vocabulary in this story, don't hesitate to ask! It's always my pleasure to educate those who genuinely want to learn more about my beautiful dialect!