Admiral Biscuit

The fight ranged all over Ponyville.

It had started innocently enough. Rainbow Dash had stopped by Sugarcube Corner for a quick afternoon pick-me-up. She’d been up all morning training, and missed the weather supervisor from Cloudsdale issuing a change in the cloud order. Flitter had finally found her, napping on a tree branch in Sweet Apple Acres.

She’d responded to the crisis well: “Oh, ponyfeathers!”

She shot off the limb like a rocket, straight to the meteorological office. Paging through charts and schedules—never her strong suit—she’d finally wrangled enough pegasi by stripping one shift entirely, and calling in a couple of favors. Then she’d zoomed around the sky with all the rest of her team, swapping out rain clouds for shade clouds, and returning the old clouds back into receiving just before the Cloudsdale pegasi arrived to pick them up. Naturally, they hadn’t been impressed with her tale of heroism.

Her afternoon well and truly wrecked, and her flanks coated with sweat, she took a quick dip in the reservoir to clean herself off before heading into town for a bit of sugary goodness.

Pinkie listened to her tale, and nodded in all the right places, before bringing over a tray of cupcakes. As the town clock struck six, Pinkie took one of the cupcakes off the tray, lifted it triumphantly in the air, and smushed it against Rainbow’s muzzle, slowly and deliberately.

Before Dash could even react, Pinkie was gone, leaving nothing behind but a slowly swinging door and the faint smell of peppermint.

Rainbow licked the frosting off her nose and crouched down, her tail flicking in agitation. “I’ll get you, Pinkie,” she muttered.

She leapt off the floor, blazing through the door Pinkie had so recently vacated.

Her flight was brought up short by a wet impact to her side. She’d been ambushed by a hoof-thrown mud pie.

Shaking the slime off her coat, Rainbow took to air to seek her elusive pink quarry. In fairly short order, she spied her nemesis, happily pronking through Ponyville proper.

Rainbow took an aerial shortcut to the market, zooming down to Roma’s stall. “Hey, you got any overripe tomatoes?”

Roma gave her a quizzical look, but promptly hoofed over a small bag of plump tomatoes.

Rainbow shot back up in the air, her ammunition draped from one hoof. Before too long, she spotted her prey, cluelessly rummaging around in a tree.

Rainbow weighed her options. She could lob one tomato at Pinkie, or drop the whole bag at once. Really, it was no choice. Expertly judging for windage, Rainbow upended the bag, watching with smug satisfaction as the missiles fell toward their target.

Pinkie’s tail twitched, but it was too late—there were too many tomatoes for her to dodge them all. With a satisfying splat, the tomatoes burst all over her coat and mane.

Rainbow jumped on a convenient cloud to watch the proceedings as Pinkie glanced around her, hoof still stuck in the tree. She glared up, her icy eyes locking on Rainbow, and expertly winged a pineapple at the pegasus. It hit the center of the cloud, passed through, and smacked Rainbow right in the belly.

“Why you—” Rainbow made a grab at the pineapple but missed—her perch was disintegrating. “I’ll get you, Pinks!”

“Can’t catch me,” she taunted, and blew a raspberry.

She took off, Rainbow in hot pursuit. Normally, it would have been no contest, but the baker knew all the shortcuts through town, and took perverse pleasure at traversing every covered alley, culvert, and storm drain in town.

The pair finally wound up at the pond. Pinkie—now sporting a diving mask and snorkel—dove right in, and Rainbow lanced into the water behind her, hot on her hooves.

They splashed around for a while, washing their coats, before swimming to shore and drying themselves off. Pinkie and Rainbow bumped hooves, and the two of them went their separate ways.

Of course, it didn’t end there. Rainbow was too competitive to let it end that easily. But she was tired, and she knew that the pair couldn’t afford to wreck Ponyville in a full-scale fruit fight.

So, at precisely six o’clock the next evening, Rainbow Dash stood by the front door of Sugarcube Corner, a water pistol filled with ink in her hoof. She was going to settle this like the settler ponies did in those westerns that Twilight had recommended and which she totally didn’t read.

She got Pinkie right in the brisket as she walked out the door. What Rainbow had failed to anticipate was that Pinkie was also packing heat, or that the mare, among her other talents, had earned the title “Quick Draw Pinkamena.”

The retaliation was swift. Pinkie, naturally, had filled her water pistol with bright pink ink.

Rainbow looked down at her soaked fur in annoyance before looking at the maniac face of her friend. The duo stayed that way for what seemed like an eternity, magenta eyes staring in blue eyes. Then they both darted to opposite sides of the building.

Games like these have their own sets of rules, and both parties would play fair, even without having discussed the rules beforehand. Neither combatant could go where the other could not get her, there would be no back shots, no innocent bystanders were to be inked, and no quarter was to be given.

Rainbow made the first move, trying to flank Pinkie. The earth pony had anticipated the move, and had somehow scaled the wall. When Rainbow shouted and jumped around the corner, she found no foe, only a stream of ink headed in her direction. She lept back just in time, narrowly avoiding a shot between the eyes. Before she could bring her weapon to bear, Pinkie had flipped back up onto the roof.

Rainbow flattened herself against the building, pondering her options. She’d be an easy target in the air, especially since she didn’t know exactly where Pinkie was. Instead, she fired a shot up at the roof to keep the baker pinned and galloped across the street, sliding to cover inside an alleyway.

She watched in satisfaction as Pinkie Pie looked around in the air for her before dropping off the roof of the building into a small clump of bushes.

Rainbow took two shots, missing with both, before Pinkie located her. Her third shot nearly scored, but Pinkie ducked under it and rolled, returning fire mid-tumble.

Rainbow darted down the alleyway and towards the fountain. She splashed into the center, the sheets of water obscuring her—she hoped.

It seemed to be working. Pinkie bolted out of the alley and glanced around for her erstwhile foe. As she moved closer and closer, Rainbow grinned, the barrel of her gun unwavering. As soon as the pink pony was within easy range, she fired.

She’d made one miscalculation—squirt guns don’t fire through fountains, and her triumphant shout served only to warn Pinkie of her location. But the cover worked both ways: Pinkie’s shots also didn’t penetrate the columns of water.

The two began an epic game of cat-and-mouse. Rainbow couldn’t leave the fountain, and Pinkie couldn’t shoot through it. Each tried to squirt the other, and each failed. Finally, Rainbow’s gun gave off a half-squirt, and she knew the game was up. She could still bluff, though. Pinkie took a few more shots, which Rainbow easily evaded. The pegasus watched closely, biding her time until nothing but a weak spray came from Pinkie Pie’s gun.

Rainbow launched herself out of the fountain, rolling in the water until she was up against the edge of the pool. Pinkie didn’t give an inch, just stared over the marble parapet at Dash.

“Game’s over,” Rainbow said triumphantly, her gun pointed at Pinkie’s chest. “I’ve got you dead to rights.” She pulled the trigger, her grin fading as only a few drops of ink dribbled out of the barrel.

“Yes,” Pinkie hissed. “but mine isn’t empty.” With a malicious grin, she pulled the trigger.

Author's Notes:

Prompt: Yes, but mine isn’t empty.

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