Author's Notes:

Added on 18 May 2016

Formerly Come One. Come Some.

Rainbow Dash rubs some crust from her eyes when the elevator doors lazily slide open with a ding. She smacks her lips and runs her tongue around her mouth to lick up the last of her breakfast crumbs, and she checks to make sure her uniform is crisp as she walks into the hallway. If the hallway wasn’t polished then Rainbow Dash would feel like she was walking in a tomb, but its clean and brightly lit with the walls being bare, save for a single, gold stripe running down its length and a sign that prohibits flying. As she walks down the hallway, she smiles nervously at other ponies that give her odd glances and tries to tune them out when they whisper behind her back.

After going through the tedious checkpoints that check, double check, and triple check her identity and papers, Rainbow Dash finally makes it to the lobby of Research and Development. She sees ponies in uniforms conversing among themselves about their daily activities, but it seems that once one notices her presence, everyone notices her. The crowd stops talking and stares at her, and she takes a deep breath and walks in, flashing a cool smile. She uses her cool charm to greet a couple of mares drinking soda and they move to another table clear across the room.

“Oh boy,” mumbles Rainbow Dash as a couple more ponies scoot away from her when she nears them.

When she reaches the door on the other side, it opens up towards her and a familiar charcoal stallion pegasus walks out with a basic uniform on. He’s talking to someone behind him, so his head is turned away and he ends up bumping into Rainbow Dash. They stumble away from each other and shake the stars out of their eyes before looking at one another. It takes the stallion a couple of seconds longer than Rainbow Dash to regain himself, but when he does, his ears droop and his eyes widen at the sight of her agitated state.

“Watch where you’re going!” snaps Rainbow Dash.

“Sorry!” blurts Thunderlane as he backpedals.

Rainbow Dash scoffs and bullies her way past Thunderlane, and once she is in the hallway and the door slams shut behind her, she stops dead in her tracks and glares at the last pony she wanted to see, hear or imagine. From the looks of it, Soarin is also dreading fate’s cruel joke of having them run into each other.

Rainbow Dash snorts out hot air and storms past him, making sure he sees the murderous scowl on her face.

“Rainbow, can we talk?” asks Soarin suddenly.

Rainbow Dash swears and fights every urge to rip him a new one. The only way she can do it, though, is to pick up her pace and keep her mouth shut, which she does, but it doesn’t stop Soarin from galloping after her. He repeats his question and Rainbow Dash now thinks the best way to escape is to fly. However, it seems that as soon as she spreads her wings, a military police officer appears out of nowhere and clears her throat obnoxiously while pointing at the sign prohibiting flying.

Rainbow Dash lets out an annoyed, explosive sigh as she folds her wings and slows to a trot when Soarin appears next to her. She knows there is no escaping Soarin since she’s not allowed to fly, and the last thing she needs is to get dinged after barely getting out of jail. Especially when she’s on an unofficial top secret mission from the Captain of the Royal Guard.

“Rainbow, can we talk?” says Soarin.

“Yes, we can talk! But make it quick. I have work to do,” says Rainbow Dash.

“Well, you’ve been avoiding me ever since you got back and I just wanted to talk.”

Rainbow Dash rolls her eyes. “Yeah, I got that after the umpeenth time you said it.”

Rainbow Dash comes to a stop when she bumps into Soarin’s hoof. She rolls her eyes and turns to him, and he leads her to a secluded part of the hallway after some effort to convince her to do so. Once there, he closes the door and makes sure no one else is around before he turns to Rainbow Dash, pawing the ground nervously. Rainbow Dash scowls and taps her hoof impatiently, and when Soarin’s awkward silence passes the ten second mark she heads towards the door, but he holds out his hoof pleading her to wait.

“You better hurry up, my patience with you is shot to shit,” says Rainbow Dash with a sneer.

Soarin opens and closes his mouth a couple of time before he is finally able to form a sentence. “I want to apologize.”

“You mean you want to apologize about how you left me in a prison cell when I needed you the most?” Soarin looks down to hide the shame in his eyes and Rainbow Dash shakes her head while looking away from his ugly mug to hide the tears building up in her eyes. “And to think I actually believed you when you said you enjoyed being around me.”

Soarin is barely able to look at Rainbow Dash, and when she looks at him he flinches and makes a small gulp. His eyes are also shining from the small bit of tears that formed, and Rainbow Dash almost accepts his apology right then and there, but his betrayal is too great to be let off with simple misty eyes.

“I did have fun with you. I did enjoy being around you,” Soarin says quietly, “but I... this is all I know. The Wonderbolts, Air Guard, this uniform... and when you did what you did I panicked.”

“Oh bullshit.”

“You don’t know, Rainbow. You don’t know what it’s like. You don’t know how much... you just don’t understand.”

“I don’t understand?” says Rainbow Dash furiously, tears now rolling down her cheeks and voice cracking. “No, I do understand! You cared more about your career than me! You abandoned me when I needed you the most! My friend nearly died and I was arrested because I saved her! And what do you do? You leave! You left me when I was in a prison cell!”

Soarin makes no attempt to counter Rainbow Dash, and now he can’t even look her in the eye. Rainbow Dash watches Soarin, though, hoping he will say something that will give her a reason to scream at him or punch him in the nose. But he remains silent. Rainbow Dash grits her teeth and stomps on the floor after the silence becomes unbearable for her.

“Aren’t you going to say anything?” says Rainbow Dash.

Soarin reluctantly looks at Rainbow Dash, gulping back whatever tears haven’t trailed down his cheeks. “I know I hurt you, and I haven’t forgiven myself for it, and I know my apologies won’t work. But know that I am, and will always be, sorry for what I have done to you, and I hope you’ll forgive me someday.”

Rainbow Dash scoffs and shoves Soarin away while stomping past him, being sure to whip his face with her tail along the way. She slams the door on her way out and marches down the hallway without looking back.

It has been nearly a full shift after Rainbow Dash had her unpleasant encounter with Soarin, and she now walks through the complex, completely ignoring all pleasantries and evading every guard around. For one pair of guards she sneaks around she hears them talk about Shining Armor being wanted for the murder of Quill Pen. It is the big news of the day and has been broadcast from every outlet imaginable.

Rainbow Dash personally thinks the situation stinks of set-up and also wonders how she will be able to tell Shining Armor of her findings, or, more importantly, if Brisk Wind and Major Fuller knew he had someone on the inside. Someone like her. As those thoughts become more dominate, the thoughts of how much of an ass Soarin is moves to the back burner and she becomes more nervous to the point where she gets the jitters just by looking at her shadow.

After spending an indefinite time snooping around and evading the guards Rainbow Dash comes across the place she wants to be. Major Fuller’s office.

She looks around to make sure that no one is around, and when she sees that the coast is clear she pushes aside the urge to leave and approaches the door. When Rainbow Dash checks the door she finds it to be unlocked. She stares at the door suspiciously and waits for any signs of someone on the other side before doing one last look around and pushing it open. She cringes when the door hinges squeak and she slides inside while carefully closing the door. After it clicks shut she gets to work.

Rainbow Dash wasn’t sure what to expect when she got into Major Fuller’s office. She was sure it would be clean, which it is, and she was sure it would have medals along the wall, which it does, but she was not expecting to see so many low ranking medals. One in particular is a blue ribbon with the number five imprinted on it next to a glass case holding a polished bolt action rifle. Inside the case with the rifle is a series of spent bullet casings, each one with a dated tag, and next to the case is a square formation of pictures.

Rainbow Dash looks over her shoulder to make sure no one is coming in before she gets a closer look at them. One is a picture of Major Fuller with a group of ponies celebrating their college graduation. He is wrapping his hoof around Quill Pen’s neck, wearing a party hat, and overall looking bored. Another one is a wedding picture labeled “Fuller-Aural Wedding”. Fuller is wearing his military uniform with Lock and Brisk Wind in the positions of best stallion and mare, and he actually looks happy. The third picture is of him and Shining Armor at the Gala with Prince Blueblood. Shining Armor looks bored while Major Fuller and Prince Blueblood seem to be having a good time talking to each other. The fourth and final picture has Fuller shaking hooves with Braeburn at some kind of outdoor event, judging from the rows of tables stacked with food and banners in the background. Rainbow Dash is surprised by what she’s seeing, but doesn’t give it too much time since she has more snooping to do.

She walks towards a bookcase and scans the copies of books and small paintings. The paintings are nothing spectacular. Just birds and other forest animals in various poses. Rainbow Dash also finds books on ornithology and mythology. However, one book catches her attention. It has a red spine and gold lettering that spells: Shining Path. She carefully pulls it out and flips the book open to see what she could find. One thing she finds is that it has the University of Stalliongrad seal on it, but she thinks nothing of it and flips to a random page and starts reading. She loses track of time almost immediately as she reads the confusing, yet admittedly interesting, book about social and economic philosophy, and right as she was about to finish the chapter a very unsettling voice speaks right into her ear.

“I presume you’re enjoying the book,” says Major Fuller.

Rainbow Dash jumps with a surprised yelp, dropping the book and puffing out her feathers. She then scrambles back as Fuller casually returns his book back to its original place.

“Do you enjoy reading philosophy?” says Fuller. “Or are you more into espionage?”

“I’m actually more of an adventure girl,” says Rainbow Dash carefully as she moves towards the door without taking her eyes off of the unicorn, but her heart sinks when she sees that it is closed and locked.

“I see.” Fuller walks in front of Rainbow Dash, forcing her to back up until her backside bumps into the bookshelf, and he keeps his eye on her as he points towards the rifle in the casing. “That is a Shire and Waler rifle. Developed by the Shire and Waler Defense Company, this model pioneered the rifles and provided the foundation for modern ballistic weapon developments. Adventurers and sharpshooters love it for its durability, range and accuracy.”

“That's nice,” says Rainbow Dash slowly.

Fuller’s horn glows and the rifle floats towards him, and the entire time he does not take his eyes off of Rainbow Dash. She watches him carefully, tensing her body and ruffling her feathers as she waits for him to show any signs of wanting to physically harm her.

“This particular rifle got me fifth place in the Annual Appleoosa Shooting Bananza,” says Fuller.

“Wow, you sure wear that medal proudly,” says Rainbow Dash, sliding along the wall, away from the Major when he turns the gun towards her.

She breathes a mental sigh of relief when he points the barrel to the floor and opens up the chamber to peer inside it. He then snaps the chamber shut and glances up at Rainbow Dash, still keeping the barrel pointed at the ground.

“It helps me put into perspective on how skilled I have become with such a weapon. You know Braeburn Apple, correct?” says Fuller.

“I guess I do, but not that well,” says Rainbow Dash.

“He was at Annual Appleoosa Shooting Bananza and won first place in every category, and when I asked him how he did it, he told me that he is accurate with his weapons because he follows a simple rule: ‘Aim small. Miss small’.” Major Fuller steps forward, eyes narrowing on Rainbow Dash and his rifle going back to its stand. “He also said that second chances are gifts that need to be held to the highest of standards. You are back, Airmare Dash, and while I do not approve of it, it is not my decision to make. Just know that you are on thin ice as it is, and that if I catch you where you do not belong again, I will end you. Dismissed.”

Major Fuller’s horn glows and the door swings open, and Rainbow Dash wastes no time in leaving. She walks out of the room with a brisk pace without saying a word, and when Major Fuller closes his door, she releases a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. Then she leans against the wall and sits on her haunches while rubbing her eyes with her shaking hooves.

When she recollects herself a few seconds later, she trots down the hall, mumbling: “Man, what a creep.”