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[elementofloyalty]

OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
Player Name: Dragon
Player Journal: dragonoflife
Age: 30+ :/
Contact: dragonoflife
Characters Played:

IN CHARACTER INFORMATION
Name: Rainbow Dash
Canon: MLP: FIM
OU/AU/OC: AU (history from Saudade, Trans9, Wishing Scales, and Witches Reign)
Canon Point: Post S3 + game memories
History: Canon

Besides her canon memories, Rainbow Dash has been sorely and sadly abused by the multiverse. Almost immediately after Discord's defeat, she fell into a Dive to the Heart, in which she was asked to choose to take on the form of her strength, and what power to give up. She chose Pegasus (Sword, Courage) for her strength, and gave up Unicorn (Staff, Magic). Having done so, she woke in the Darkness Between Worlds, gifted with the power to summon a coat that would protect her heart from that same Darkness. Though she drifted for a short while between worlds, she was quickly found by Mateus, a member of the Finders: an organization dedicated to locating people who are lost in the Darkness and returning them safely to Penrose.

Rainbow immediately attempted to join up with the Finders, eager to be a part of this organization -- in large part because she wanted to search through the Darkness Between Worlds for her friends. The thought of any of them drifting and alone out there was intolerable to her. Also, the Finders were a highly prestigious organization, which didn't hurt at all. Inducted into their number, Rainbow set off into the Darkness with her fellow inductees...

And the world promptly collapsed.

Rainbow woke up by being disgorged from a slime-filled pod on a living ship, which immediately informed her in no uncertain terms that her world had been destroyed and she had been rescued from the disaster, chosen to fight the world-consuming foes known as the Ohm and save all of reality. No problem, right? With her memories from the time spend in Penrose lost thanks to the Darkness, Rainbow found herself having to acclimate to humans and numerous other creatures once again. Fortunately, Applejack, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie were there to help ease the transition, and Rainbow settled into the routine with about exactly as much luck as you'd expected. Within days of arriving, Rainbow ended up snowboarding on a winter planet for shore leave, trapped in a force field with an Eldar she was forced to date, arranged for armor for Applejack, and made a friend out of a superpowered human named Punchy, who... punched things.

The last part was the worst part, because Punchy, in the course of duty, died. And for the first time, Rainbow Dash had to confront the fact that someone she really liked wasn't ever coming back. She didn't take it well, to say the least. She was furious and bitter, depressed and upset. She lingered on a bad, bitter mood for a while, even taking her feelings onto a mission she was assigned -- but was finally, at last, distracted by the rather alarming prospect of being transformed into a human by a powerful magical spell. Rainbow was upset... at least until she learned it wouldn't be permanent. Then she actually thought it was pretty cool. No one could claim that she'd come to a mature, rational understanding and acceptance of Punchy's death, but she'd been very thoroughly distracted from it.

What happened immediately after that, though? Rainbow would never know. (Because the game closed, and no one really explained that in IC terms, of course.) The Rainbow that awakened on Equestria remembered none of this; blissfully unaware of everything she'd been through, she went on various adventures such as learning to love reading, finding a pet, and performing the role of Commander Hurricane.

THEN TIME BROKE and Rainbow found herself sucked out of Equestria and into the realm of Termina, in the bustling city of Clock Town. To her horror, the transition had stripped away her speed and even her ability to move or stand on clouds, binding the former to her cutie mark like it was a power cell and the latter to a pair of shoes. Her sole compensation for this: a magical guitar, which allowed her to play a song that could communicate with others across distances. An upset Rainbow Dash found herself vulnerable to bees and mundane hazards, and barely able to win a duel with an elf. She also discovered, to her horror, that Rarity had been transformed into a human as well!

But her time in Termina didn't last long either; the same time distortions that brought her that ravaged the land, causing immense damage before ultimately banishing all those it had brought. Rather than safely back home, however, Rainbow found herself in a new world without a name, having forgotten her time in Termina but back to full shape as far as her natural ability went. She needed that ability, because here on this world, she was attacked. Hunted. Perceived as a monster by an increasingly fearful populace. Desperately, she made her way to the only safe place for a talking pony in the world: Balamb Garden, mercenary academy.

Rainbow immediately recognized three things: first, that she wasn't safe anywhere else; second, that if she enrolled she could train to actually pilot the freaking awesome airship; third, that being a mercenary would be pretty cool. She immediately signed up, only to be faced with the unfortunate and crushing reality of schoolwork.

In part because she had decided to give reading a chance, but mostly because she had an absolute bone-deep fear of failing, Rainbow threw herself into her studies with a conviction that had up till now been completely alien to her, when it came to education. In some cases, that produced results; in others, particularly classes that dealt with concepts completely foreign to Equestria, she struggled in bitter despair despite her best efforts. Her salvation came in the form of an extremely unlikely friend: Edward Elric, who took bitter affront at a talking pony who also so casually violated physics, but nonetheless begrudgingly helped her put concepts into terms she understood.

Pinkie Pie was there too, but both human and a graduate somehow. Rainbow was unable to find this weird, because it's Pinkie Pie.

Despite the fact that he was a jerk, racist against ponies, and completely unreluctant, Ed became Rainbow's best friend in Garden, after she discovered his alchemy powers and they ended up in a paint-balloon fight, then a field trip where they had to fight monsters. By the time Princess Luna returned as an Instructor in Garden, she had settled in comfortably to the routine, and was even able to help Twilight Sparkle when she in turn arrived to begin classes. (She never did get an adequate explanation about why humans wear clothes all the time, besides 'we just do', though.)

Behind the scenes, a skilled potion-maker from another world (Slughorn, if anyone's counting) had been concocting a draught that would help nonhuman people fit in better on missions and generally prevent them from being hunted as monsters -- a temporary humanization potion called Polymorphus. Rainbow began experimenting with this potion shortly after it was introduced, curious what being human was like. As before, she really enjoyed it so long as it wasn't permanent.

Rainbow suffered a major breakdown when she signed up for a charity date auction but no one bid on her. Convinced that she wasn't cool enough to date (even though she'd only done it for charity), she retreated to sulk in private. It took the combined efforts of her friends to talk her out of her funk and convince her that she shouldn't read anything into it, but they succeeded at last.

Not long after that, Daring Do -- yes, THE Daring Do, fictional pony hero and idol to our pegasus -- returned from a long mission to resume her Instructor duties at Garden. To say Rainbow was floored is an understatement, particularly when Daring took notice of her speed and skills.

Everything was not roses and sunshine, though; Garden came under attack, and in the confusion Rainbow was shot. The magic skills she had been learning kept her alive, but with a bullet lodged in her wing joint, she was unable to fly. Her hero: Ed Elric again, who dragged her out of danger and to the infirmary, though she was unable to get treatment due to the volume of more seriously injured. Refusing to leave her friends or less-capable cadets behind, Rainbow used the Polymorphus potion so she could go back out and fight, only for a misunderstanding to cause Ed to leave her to do his own thing when she thought he was coming to help. The blow to her self-esteem was hideous; it led to a screaming fit between the two, with a lot of emotion on each side and a lot of scabs picked off old wounds.

Bad as THAT was, things got much worse a couple of days later when Rainbow woke one morning as a completely different pony: a Rainbow Dash who had failed to perform the Sonic Rainboom in that first race all those years ago, and instead had gotten her cutie mark in painting. The change was not permanent, but Dash remembered everything perfectly, leaving her aware of how her entire life had hung on the balance of one moment.

A few weeks later, the cadets were all ordered into battle against monsters that were absolutely and literally unbeatable by them, as a demonstration of fighting against overwhelming odds, as well as trusting that the skills they had studied and the protection they had would keep them safe even if they fell in battle. Ed insisted on going out repeatedly, even when he was hurt, to try to protect weaker cadets; Rainbow tried to stop him. In the midst of their argument, Ed made a point that made Rainbow stop and take notice -- that the world should work in such a way that you gain equal to what you give, and that if you give, you should get back. And if the world didn't work that way, people should work to MAKE it work that way.

That lesson stuck with her. Rather than stop him, she went out to fight in his place, while he recovered.

Time Compression had no mercy, though; as it had done with others in the past, it now plunged her into a coma. For three days, while her body lay motionless, Rainbow experienced life back in Equestria -- the wedding of Cadance and Shining Armor, the Crystal Empire, everything up to Twilight's ascension as a princess, before she woke up once again. And if THAT hadn't been enough of a shock, a few choice words from Pinkie Pie made her realize what had been obvious for a very long time: her feelings for Ed were no longer platonic in the slightest.

Personality: Almost immediately, Rainbow Dash makes a pony think "arrogant". She gives off an air of total confidence in her abilities and herself, asserting that she's the best and coolest pony as if it should be so obvious she shouldn't even need to say it. She's also eager to prove that she's the best, to the point of hypercompetetiveness; she'll make challenges readily and never back down from one, and is always on the lookout for an opportunity to show off her skills, especially by racing.

The darker half of this confidence is her absolute dread and terror of failure, or looking foolish. In friendly physical competitions with Applejack, she resorted to using her wings to gain an advantage over the earth pony, then later stooped to some fairly dubious and underhanded tactics to beat her. Despite her legitimate skill at flying, when she found her confidence undermined prior to the Best Young Flyer competition, she managed to freak out to the point of collapsing in a corner and quivering in a state of utter breakdown. Everyday slipups don't bother her much, because she's used to them and even she knows she's not perfect, but when it comes to failing to be awesome, she doesn't know how to handle that because she so rarely fails in that respect. In Witches Reign, she collapsed at one point because she believed no one thought she was cool enough to date, even though at the time she had no interest in dating whatsoever and had only signed up because it was for charity.

Her public image is incredibly important to her. A self-described athlete, she furiously refuses to try things that go against that image, and despite having an 'egghead' for a friend, she's expressed some unfortunately anti-intellectual sentiments on more than one occasion. Her attitude has relaxed markedly, however, since she discovered that she had a great love of reading, though it took a fair amount of self-reconciliation to accept this side of her. She has, however, reconciled education and study with her image thanks to a year of necessary classwork. When finally confronted with something she HAD to study in order to master, she chose to study rather than to let others get past her.

Rainbow Dash is also impishly playful and mischievous; she had a love of pranks, but only ones in good fun. She won't pull a prank on someone who will get hurt by it (like Fluttershy), although she has relaxed her standards remarkably when it comes to pranking people who can't take a joke because they're too uptight, as opposed to too sensitive.

In many respects she's one of the laziest ponies around; she's frequently caught napping, and at one point it's implied that she rarely does her job of clearing the sky in a timely fashion. She was also kicked out of flight school at some point. This laziness seems to come from how she can succeed with barely any effort; she's been an amazing flyer since her youngest years, can clear the sky in ten seconds flat, and generally has no reason to exert herself. She's impatient and easily bored as well, so her general disdain for things she HAS to do is understandable. When it comes to her real dreams, like joining the Wonderbolts, Rainbow Dash puts an astonishing amount of practice and effort into her flying, routines, and maneuvers. She practiced her performance for the Best Young Flyer competition relentlessly, despite never being able to perform the Sonic Rainboom in her sessions, and even without a specific goal is constantly working on new ways to impress and awe. In all of her game environments, she's found a goal to pursue and given it her all -- becoming a Finder, regaining her strength, or graduating from Balamb Garden.

Unlike most ponies, Rainbow Dash tends to be blunt and sometimes outright rude. She generally calls a spade a spade, for example pointing out to Rarity that she really is a laughingstock while her other friends are trying to cheer her up, or constantly complaining about Fluttershy's subdued cheering. Despite her impatience and irritation, though, she's never considered leaving her friends behind. Her Element of Harmony is Loyalty, and when the chips are down, she'll defend what's important to her without a second of hesitation. On some level she seems to understand that she needs friends who are stronger and more stable than she is, though she'd never admit it. She DOES admit, quietly and in private, that she hates being alone; beneath all that bluster, she's just a lonely girl who wants attention.

Strangely, her time dealing with people (or one specific person) who are even more stubborn than she is has mellowed her noticeably from canon. Confronted with someone like this, she is calmer and more empathetic than normal, trying to seek understanding or compromise. She is also a lot more understanding towards anyone she sees a little of herself in, such as Scootaloo, or Fionna the Human. Her time in the Wonderbolt Academy has made her much more sensitive of the responsibilities of leadership and her duty to pass on her skills and knowledge to those in need.

NOTHING can surprise her any more. Upset, depress, cheer, or invigorate, sure, but she's had so many weird things happen to her that she just can't think of anything as impossible any more.

She is a three-dimensional creature. As an exceptional flyer, and thanks to pony-physics, which allow her to hover in midair effortlessly, Rainbow Dash is completely unbounded by any fetters of gravity. She's as likely to be found hovering a few feet up as standing, and moves into and out of the air with as little thought as a person taking a step to one side.

Rainbow cannot handle death well. She views it as a a lie and a betrayal, a broken promise. Cool people don't leave their friends hanging like that, so clearly people who die LIED about being cool. She doesn't recognize grief in this feeling, because admitting to grief would be admitting that someone who didn't value her friendship enough to not DIE on her had power over her. She has yet to come to any sort of acceptance with Punchy's death, and is not likely to any time soon.

Having fallen for a guy, now, Rainbow is absolutely horrified and disgusted with herself and wants nothing more than the entire world to not knowm ever. She's as subtle as she ever is, of course, so this is a fairly doomed hope for her, but she absolutely refuses to acknowledge it except to her closest and most trustworthy friends (i.e. Applejack). She'll happily support OTHERS in their romantic endeavors, of course; they're not up to her standards of coolness, after all.

Strengths:

Flight: Inherent to being a pegasus pony. Rainbow Dash's wings allow her to effortlessly hover in midair or fly in any direction.

Speed/Agility: In many respects she functions like a speedster superhero (e.g. the Flash). She is capable of immediately accelerating to a speed fast enough to leave (rainbow-colored) flames directly beneath her, as well as decelerating instantly. Even at very high speeds, she is capable of making sharp ninety-degree turns in rapid succession. By flying in a circle, she can raise enough wind to generate a tornado. This is pure physiology on her part -- half practice and training, half natural talent and gifts.

Strength/Durability: Although a pegasus pony, Rainbow Dash is able to compete on an equal footing with Applejack, who is not only an earth pony, the strongest and most enduring type of pony, but exceptional even for an earth pony.

Sonic Rainboom: At top speed, Rainbow Dash can shatter the sound barrier to produce a Sonic Rainboom: which is a massive boom that also results in a circle of rainbow light expanding outwards from the spot where the shock wave originates, while a rainbow trails in her wake. This ability is not unique to Rainbow Dash, but so rare is the pony that can do it that it is the stuff of legend and myth. She first performed the feat as a pre-adolescent filly; now, after regaining her confidence in her ability to do it, and with the greater speed and strength of her adult years, she can pull it off after just a couple of seconds of acceleration. Straight up.

Sonic Rainnuke: When descending from a modest height at top speed, Rainbow Dash is capable of slamming into a target with enough force that the impact creates a mushroom cloud and a Rainboom-style circle of expanding light.

Cloud/Weather Manipulation: All pegasus ponies are capable of manipulating clouds. They can disperse them with a swift kick, or for more fine control, can push them around quite precisely. By jumping on or kicking the cloud, they can cause it to rain, thunder, snow, hail, etc.

Karate: Rainbow is a black belt in karate, and has further refined her technique and studied during her time in Witches Reign.

Protective Coat (Saudade-gained): A bracelet on one hoof allows Rainbow to summon a long black coat. The coat protects a person from corruption in the Darkness Between Worlds.

Magical Guitar (Wishing Scales-gained): Like an electric guitar, but it runs off magic instead of electricity. Rainbow can play the Herald's Aria on it, which allows her to communicate magically with a person regardless of distance.

Blaster Edge (Witches Reign-gained): A bracelet with a launcher attached, the Blaster Edge fires a wicked projectile at a foe, which then returns to the launcher to be fired again.

Junction (Witches Reign-gained): Her training at Balamb Garden and the provided device allows Rainbow to form a bond with an energy creature called a Guardian Force. Rainbow has one of these (Ifrit). The GF has two purposes: it protects her from being killed by guardian her life energy, and it gives her access to some special abilities, such as Summoning it to attack foes, or using...

Paramagic (Witches Reign-gained): Thanks to her Junctioned GF and training, Rainbow can draw out the magic energy of others, storing that magic energy within her. She has access only to a small, specific list of spells (healing, elemental attack, and status manipulation). So for example, if she Drew magic out of Twilight Sparkle, she might get a Float spell. Rainbow can cast these spells directly, or Junction stored magic to augment her strength and endurance.

Weaknesses: Rainbow's flying still, and probably always will, suffer when she stops paying attention to where she's going. She still routinely slams into things when she isn't paying attention.

Despite having the ability to use paramagic, as noted above, she's actually bad at both drawing magic out of others, and casting it. Her spells have barely any kick to them.

She puts appearances first, often over substance, even after she should have learned not to do so. She still has a lot of pride and arrogance.

Although emotionally maturer than canon, she is still incredibly bad at handling deep and serious emotions like grief or love.


Pony/Animal Type: Pegasus.
Cutie Mark: A cloud with a lightning-shaped rainbow descending.
Pony Picture: She looks like Rainbow Dash.

SAMPLES
First Person:

Okay, ponies, listen up! The name's Rainbow Dash, I'm Ponyville's weatherpony, and that means I need a roll call from all you pegasi out there! There's a lot of responsibilities you have that you need to be aware of, so listen up! First of all: DO NOT CHANGE THE WEATHER. We are on a schedule here, people. A one-cloud rainstorm, fine. Deciding you want a sunny day when we've got downpour slated, not fine.

Second: Do not harass the flying tortoise. I'm serious. You do not want to mess with that little guy, he'll end you. Oh yeah, that goes for all you OTHER ponies too, if he's near the ground.

Third of all, do not just make homes on clouds. Napping is fine, that's practically what they're there for, but they're not homes. Use a sensible house like a normal pony. If you need help constructing a cloud home, I'm sure Twilight has plenty of books in the library that she'd be happy to loan you.

Fourth, if you think you're fast, you're not, and I'm taking all challengers to prove it. [Rainbow winks broadly at the scroll.]

Oh yeah, and uh, if anypony shows up named...

...Nah. Never mind.

Third Person:

The skies over Ponyville were blue, save for several clusters of clouds that Rainbow had quite deliberately left behind when she'd snuck out earlier this morning to clear them out and set the weather. Beyond that, it was a gorgeous day.

She'd also set up a sign that told people where to stand to watch the demonstration. Directing them to the middle of Ponyville was unusual, because all these buildings made it a tricky prospect, but she'd counted for them when she worked this up.

As the sun reached its zenith and the hour of noon comes upon them, there was no sign of the demonstration though. From behind the town hall, Rainbow had been watching the crowd gather with excited glee. She gave it a minute to build suspense, then took off--

The first the audience saw of her was a rainbow streak slashing through the skies above them like a comet, air roaring as it raced over her body and through the feathers of her wings. Rainbow dropped into a plunge, diving down to the street below and ahead of the audience area at a speed that surely was going to flatten her on the pavement -- but it didn't. She pulled out of the dive at the last second and into the Super-Speed Strut, racing along the ground with a casual smile as if she was just out for a stroll in the park. Only her beating wings and the thunder of air betrayed the effort she was putting out as she rocketed straight through the crowd, then blasted back into the air with such force that the ground actually craters slightly beneath where she lifted off.

Into the sky again, and this time headed for the largest of the clouds, which she raced around with rainbow contrail behind, quick hoofwork and air pressure sculpting and shaping it until it resembled a fearsome dragon, jaws dropped and wings spread, ready to pounce. Rainbow ducked behind it and whacked it with her forehooves, sending it shooting at the other cluster of clouds she'd left behind. Then she raced past it, whirling around the second cloud until it resembled a pony, legs thrust back in the middle of a powerful kick -- and a second later, the dragon-cloud slammed face-first into those raised rear hooves and dissipated.

She drew herself up proudly, savoring the moment, then descended again, weaving and turning just to show off her casual moves. Give the audience a breather, let them build up some anticipation, because compared to what's coming, most of them can only imagine...

Again, Rainbow pulled out of her dive, this time swooping over the cloud, forelegs extended and wings laboring as she raced off down the street, accelerating with all her might as she reaches the edge of town. Just over the fields on the outskirts, she pulled up sharply, then pours on the speed as she rocketed towards the sky--

With an immense rumbling boom, brilliant, shining waves of rainbow light burst out from her, rolling over Ponyville in a glorious display of color. In its wake, the pony flew a great arc over the town in no time at all. It might be high noon, and a near-cloudless sky on a beautiful day, but Ponyville now had a shining, glittering rainbow arching through the skies above it.