It was time to test his wings.

He wasn't exactly sure what to do. Did he just... feel the wings, or something? Bruce pushed as hard as he could from where he thought his wing were, to no avail. Maybe he just needed to think about flying. He braced himself, and thought as hard as he could. Thinking, however, brought back memories of his final fight...

Batman landed softly on the ground behind the thug, using the wings of his cape to glide to the ground noiselessly. He wrapped his arm around the mouth of the criminal, stifling his screams and rendering him unconscious at the same time. Batman lay him down softly against the ground, making no sound at all. He stood up, assessing his surroundings. The stone gargoyles attached to the sides of the walls were both stable and high enough for him to grapple onto and not be noticed.

Batman pointed his fist at the gargoyle, and then clenched his fist. A grappling hook shot out and pulled him upwards. He swung around the stone beast and landed on it's back expertly. He surveyed the enemies... They were obviously all untrained guards, as they both walked with confidence around the warehouse, walking simple patterns. Too predictable. The first enemy was right across the room from him... He glided off of the statue and flew towards him, leg outstretched. He smiled with satisfaction as his foot made contact with his face. The thug was kicked against the wall, knocked unconscious. Batman turned with a smile when he heard sharp footsteps cross the corner of the wall. As the thug rounded the corner, Batman grabbed him with his hand on the criminal's mouth and punched him in the face. He dragged the body into the shadows...

Bruce snapped out of his reverie.

"Focus, Bruce, focus!"

He braced himself against the ground once more. With surprise, he found that he could feel his wings. He could feel them move up and down, and a feel of weightlessness overtook him.

He was flying.

Bruce never felt so happy before. In fact, he hadn't felt happy at all since he took of the mantle of Batman, but now- now he felt like he could do anything. He floated upwards and swooped down sharply, pulling back up before he landed on the ground. This was like how he could glide with the wings attached to his arms as a human, but this was legitimate. After about an hour, however, he was spent. Bruce landed softly on the grass. An hour was a decent amount of time up in the air, at least for someone who had never flown before. He lay down, and watched other ponies walk around the park, seemingly carefree, for about another thirty minutes before he felt he could fly once more. While resting, he had applied physics to try to find how to make flying easier. Bruce stood up, braced himself against the ground once more, and flapped his wings. Time to test out his theory.

He floated upwards, and at a decent height, he flew forwards as fast as he could, then curled up his wings until they were flat on his back. He shot towards the ground like a bullet while moving forward at the same time, then outstretched his wings to glide over the ground and back up into the air. By the time he finished the maneuver, he had crossed over about half of Ponyville. He smiled to himself. Maybe he had a chance in this race after all. However, he had no place to sleep, and no money to rent a room if there was a local inn. Bruce decided to sleep under a tree. Although it was no Wayne Manor, it was still a comfortable place to sleep.

Bruce woke up early on the day of the race, making sure that he could still feel his wings. He practiced his invented maneuver. Finally, as Bruce was resting, Rainbow Dash flew by, spotted him, and glided softly back onto solid ground.

"Heya, Darknight." She said as she approached, waving. "Hope you're ready to lose." Bruce smiled, imagining her look when she lost.

"I wouldn't count on it." Bruce replied. Rainbow Dash gulped.

She flew up and beckoned for Bruce to follow her. He flew up as well and followed as she guided him to a gathering of clouds high in the sky. She landed softly onto the clouds with a soft poof. Bruce raised an eyebrow, but cautiously landed onto the cloud. Surprisingly, the cloud didn't give way, but instead held his weight.  Rainbow walked to the edge of the cloud. She pointed towards other small clouds with flags planted into them.

"See those?" She motioned, waving her hoof. "We fly past those as fast as we can, and then shoot down towards the ground." She shrugged. "It's a simple and foolproof way to show off your speed!"

The clouds went pretty far. At least they were all in a straight line.

"Got it?" She asked. Bruce nodded, and trotted over to the edge of the cloud with her. Rainbow Dash smiled confidently

"On your marks..." Rainbow called. "Get set... Go!" Both Rainbow Dash and Bruce took off at the same time. She flew fast easily with pure speed. Bruce tried to follow, but found that she was a few seconds faster then him. He smiled. Time to test the new technique. He put on an extra burst of speed, and swooped down towards the ground. Pulling upwards, he saw that he had gained a few feet in front of Rainbow. She had a look of surprise on her face, replaced by grim determination. She sped forwards. By the time they reached the end of the clouds, they were right beside each other. They flew straight downwards. At the last few seconds, Bruce lay his wings flat against his back, falling harder. The earth came rushing up before him and he opened his wings. He landed on all fours, creating a huge cloud of dust. Rainbow Dash landed beside him, coughing as she waved away the dust. When the dust cleared, they found they were standing in a crater, with Bruce in the center, completely unharmed. Bruce grinned as her jaw dropped.

"That...was..." She started. Bruce prepared himself against her probable cursing. "SO AWESOME!" She started hopping up and down, squishing her face as Bruce watched in amazement. ""How did you do that what was that you looked like a bullet teach me teach me teach me!" She blurted out quickly. Bruce was happy. This place was admittedly pretty cool, and he felt himself relax from the pain he felt at the thought of leaving Gotham behind. For once, he gave a real smile as Rainbow Dash continued to praise his invented technique. Next Chapter: Manticore Estimated time remaining: 11 Minutes