Rainbow Dash impatiently waited for night to fall. She knew what she needed to do, and she had all the confidence that her plan would work. Now all she had to do was wait for it to get dark.

Rarity seemed similarly restless. The seamstress had spent the past hour weaving blades of grass together into a mat a few inches square. Occasionally, she’d prop it up with her magic and drop little stones into the middle to see if the mat could hold them. More often than not, the grass would come apart, and she’d have to start all over again. Still, it’d only take a few minutes for her to weave another mat before ruining it again.

The sun went down and once more the island fell into darkness, but even then, Rainbow and Rarity didn’t leave the mountain. Instead, Rainbow just stared at the moon while Rarity sighed and fussed with their supplies behind them. Eventually, she stepped out of the darkness and moved closer to Rainbow’s side. “When are we going to go down?” she asked.

“Soon,” Rainbow assured her.

Rarity raised an eyebrow and glanced at all the supplies they’d gathered over the course off the day. “How soon is soon? I’m already feeling tired from simply dreading having to carry all this wood down the mountain. We should’ve left it where we found it and picked it up on the way.”

“We can’t risk the minotaurs finding any of this stuff,” Rainbow said. “It’s at least safe up here.”

“It won’t be worth it when we trip and fall while carrying all this stuff in the darkness.”

“We’ll just take our time,” Rainbow said. “We just have to wait for the right time.”

“And when is the right time?” Rarity skeptically asked.

Rainbow turned her eyes down to the village. “When they pack it in for the night. We don’t want them being awake when we pull this off.”

“And just what stunt are we pulling off?” Rarity asked. “I’m not going to go in on this thing blind.”

After a moment to think, Rainbow shrugged. “We’re gonna start a fire in their village,” she said. “That’ll get them all out and we can go raid the chief’s hut for the medallion thingy.”

Rarity blinked. “Excuse me, what?” She blinked again. “We’re going to become arsonists just to raid the village?!”

“We need to get them out of the way!” Rainbow exclaimed. “A distraction’s our best way of doing that!”

“Not by burning down the whole village!”

“It’ll only be one hut, Rarity!” Rainbow exclaimed. “They’ll all show up and put out the fire before it spreads! That’ll give us enough time to get in and out!”

“I can’t believe you’d stoop to such barbarism just to get a medallion!”

“Oh, so you’ve got a better idea?” Rainbow spat back, bristling. “Let’s hear it! I’m all ears!”

Rarity opened her mouth but nothing came out. Fuming, she crossed her forelegs. “No, but there has to be a better way.”

Rainbow rubbed a hoof against her temple. “Rarity, I’m trying to get us out of here and back home. We don’t have time to play around at this! Every day we stay here is another day we’re risking our lives! We need to get on with this and get back home, Rares. This is the best way.”

Sighing, Rarity touched her hooves together. “I… I’m just worried,” Rarity said. “Somebody could get hurt from this. I don’t want to come back to Equestria a murderer.”

“If we don’t do anything, we won’t get back to Equestria at all,” Rainbow insisted. Her wingtip traced Rarity’s jawline until she directed blue eyes toward her own. “Listen, I don’t want to hurt anypony—anyminotaur, either. But we might have to before we’re through with this, okay?” Shaking her head, she took her wing away from Rarity’s face. “If it comes down to it, I’m choosing us over them, Rares. I’m not gonna let some dumb minotaurs stand between us and getting home.”

It wasn’t really an answer Rarity was happy with; that much, Rainbow could tell. If anything, Rarity’s lowered head and furrowed brow were only signs of how torn she was. “Well… let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that, then,” she said.

“Yeah.” Rainbow glanced at the moon and grumbled. “Celestia, how much longer is this gonna take?”

“We can’t force the night to go any faster,” Rarity said. “We just have to wait.”

“I guess.”

Rarity lied down on her back to stare at the stars, and Rainbow joined her. A little cloud cover obscured their views of the heavens, but it was thin enough to let them see most of the stars. It was a beautiful sight; it reminded Rainbow of her filly days in Cloudsdale.

“So we’re going to start a fire,” Rarity thought aloud. Rainbow’s ears perked in her direction, and she glanced aside to see the unicorn deep in thought. “Any more specifics to that? Or are we just winging it?”

“I’ve got a few ideas,” Rainbow said. “I want to start the fire in a hut on the edge of the village as far away from the chief’s hut as possible. Maybe a storehouse or something for their canoes and crap, not one with minotaurs sleeping in it.”

“I’m glad to hear that, at least,” Rarity said. “And then we sneak into the chief’s hut while all the minotaurs are distracted?”

“That’s the idea,” Rainbow said. “While they’re all distracted out there, we go in and out. Easy peasy!”

Rarity raised an eyebrow. “You know that because you said that, it’s going to be much more complicated than we’re planning on.”

“It’ll be fine,” Rainbow insisted. “The beauty of the plan is its simplicity! We can adjust it on the fly if need be, but the basics get us in and out in no time at all! Ten seconds flat!”

“I doubt it’ll take ten seconds, darling, but sure.” Rarity stroked a few strands of her bangs back out of her eyes. “I’m not exactly sure about this, but it’s the best we have, I suppose.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow said. “Don’t worry, Rares, we’ll pull through this. Just trust me.”

“I don’t know how many times you’ve said that today,” Rarity said. “I feel like you’re trying to convince yourself just as much as you are me.”

Rainbow waved her hoof. “No way, Rares. We got this. We aren’t gonna let a bunch of stupid minotaurs stop us.”

“I certainly hope so…”

“We’ll be fine. We’ll just be careful and everything will work out fine.” Sitting up, Rainbow looked at the bundles of fuel sitting in the ruined building behind them. “Speaking of which, we should probably get moving. We gotta get this stuff all the way down the mountain and into position, and that’ll probably take us an hour or two just to move it. Hopefully by then all the minotaurs are asleep.”

Rarity groaned and rolled over. “If we have to,” she said. “Hopefully you’re right. Otherwise we’ll have to sit in the brush and wait, and I’d rather not repeat last night.”

“Eh, it’s not so bad, Rares,” Rainbow said, standing up and trailing her wing along Rarity’s side. “More time for us…”

“Mmmm…” Rarity’s ears perked as she stood up after Rainbow. “That’s certainly nothing to complain about, now is it?”