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Returned From Sabbatical · FiM Minific ·
Organised by RogerDodger
Word limit 400–750
Show rules for this event
EXCLUSIVE: Where Are the Rainbooms Now?
It’d been two years since the legendary Rainbooms graduated from Canterlot High. But stories of their greatness still echoed through the high school halls.

CHS desperately missed their heroes. That’s why I — Scribble Dee, Editor-in-Chief of the Canterlot High Sentinel — decided to track them down and answer our school’s most pressing question: Where are the Rainbooms now?




I started by reaching out to each of the Rainbooms for comment… excluding Fluttershy, who was spending a year abroad at an isolated butterfly sanctuary in Neighpal.

An anti-spam filter on Twilight’s email bounced my message back to me. Rarity sent me a link to her Instagram.

But that left four Rainbooms. I decided to start with the girl who emailed back within an hour: Rainbow Dash.




When I entered the diner for my interview with Rainbow, I found her trying to impress a waitress by showing off how many tater tots she could fit in her mouth at once. When I sat down across from her, she jumped, tried to swallow all the tots, spent ten seconds choking, then calmed down and shot me a grin.

“What do you wanna know?” she said, eyes watering.

Over the next two hours, Rainbow regaled me with tales of the Rainbooms’ incredible exploits. She laughed recounting the time she single-handedly saved the Earth from aliens with just a guitar solo; she cried remembering the time she leapt in front of a bullet to save Fluttershy’s life. When I asked to see the “wicked” scar it left, she said she couldn’t hear me over the tears.

Who knew that being the frontwoman of a high school garage band could be so awesome?

Before I left, Rainbow slipped me her phone number. “Lemme know if you need any more cool facts,” she said, pulling out a cigarette.

“You smoke?” I asked.

“Of course,” she said, sticking the unlit cigarette between her lips, butt-side first.




When I met Pinkie Pie outside her college dorm and explained the article, she was ecstatic.

“Aww, people still talk about us?” Pinkie said, blushing. “That’s so sweeeeeet~!”

I held up my tape recorder. “Were you expecting this sort of legacy?”

“Nope. I just liked hanging out with my friends! I didn’t care about the music that much.” Pinkie took a quick look around, then leaned in close and whispered, “I wasn’t even playing half the time! And no one ever noticed!”




“Yeah, I pretty much wrote every single one of our songs,” Rainbow said at the start of our second interview. She nodded to herself, then smirked and asked, “Hey, did I tell you about the time I saved Twilight from getting shot?”

“I thought you saved Fluttershy?”

Rainbow blinked. “Oh, right.” She sat silent for a moment, then asked, “Can we start over?”




“Lemme tell you,” Applejack said, leaning against a tree, “there ain’t nobody more discriminated against than bassists. I carried that band, and what do I get? Less attention than a patch of rotten moss.”

I frowned. “That’s gotta be rough.”

“It was!” Applejack sighed, but then she gave me a big smile. “That’s why I’m in a ska band now! The music stinks, but they can’t play a lick if I’m not there!”




A bit after midnight, I got a text from Rainbow Dash: “U wanna hear my mixtape 🔥🔥”




“I really do miss it,” Sunset said when I visited the coffee shop she worked at. “I mean, who wouldn’t? Hanging out with great friends, meeting fans, getting to make great art? It’s the life most people only dream of.”

She leaned on the counter and chuckled. “Us girls still talk, sure, but it’s not the same. The time you spend with your friends — you gotta cherish it. Because one day, all you’ll have are the memories.”

Tears welled in my eyes. “That’s so true!”

“Yeah,” Sunset murmured. Then her face sharpened into a glare. “Now are you gonna order something? You’re holding up the line.”

I glanced at the crowd of customers gathering behind me, then squeaked, “I’ll have a muffin?”




Once I finished my interviews, I ran back to CHS and wrote up my article. It went out, all 1000 words, in that week’s issue of the Sentinel.

And guess what? We managed to give out four copies! That’s a new record! I knew that CHS missed their heroes!

Only problem: Rainbow Dash won’t stop texting me. Can anyone help me block her number?
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#1 · 2
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Nicely written!

The small scenes and the dialogue only form give the fic quite a lot of dynamism. There’s hardly a word lost, and no time to get bored. Generally speaking, I like the fics which exaggerates the traits of the characters (or even twist them completely). The story here is camped in a good way, because it underlines the funny bits about the characters while not going all the way down to pure, unsubtle caricature. The bit about Applejack is probably the weakest, because I don’t really grasp how this relates to her character (though it might be my misremembering the show). It’s funny, but not gross.

Overall, quite a pleasant read.
#2 · 3
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I think I must have said this about a dozen times over the years, but normally I'm not a fan of cutting up a minific into many little scenes. But I really do think that this does make great use of its format to succinctly and quickly deliver its jokes. It's great that you don't waste any unneeded time and words with scene transitions or extraneous connective tissue. This is a sleek read that manages to fit in many more jokes than you'd think a minific can hold.

(*car salesman slaps roof of car*)

Now, this is the part of the review that I honestly did not look forward to writing. Because there's no way I can make it sound the slightest bit objective when I say that the jokes here felt more on the amusing side of the spectrum rather than laugh-out-loud funny. Maybe it's just because I've been reading ponyfics for more than ten years now, but a lot of the comedic beats and character deconstructions (especially Rainbow's) do feel familiar in a way that takes the edge off of the humor.

That's really the absolute worst I can say about this piece, though. In pretty much any other aspect I can think of, you've done a solid job I think, and I'm probably going to rate this one highly as a result.

Thank you for entering!
#3 · 1
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Alright I think I found my comedy winner for the round. I was wondering after Rainbow's first section how you'd fit in so many interviews of that length, but the chopped up scenes and lengths felt great. Every beat hit exactly how it should, and everyone felt believably in character for a post-high school setting.

I thought it'd be hard to beat Scribble's email being immediately bounced by Twilight's filter, but AJ being in a Ska band and Dash being attention starved are hard contenders.

Funny and punchy with one extra joke to send us off. I give it five out of five unsmoked backwards cigarettes.
#4 · 2
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Wow, the journalist wrote the journalism story. What a surprise.

Last year, I wrote a Writeoff-esque minific with this OC, Scribble Dee. When I came up with the idea of visiting the Rainbooms a few years after they'd broken up, I know that I had to bring her back.

Originally, Rarity and Twilight were gonna have their own scenes... but in planning, I quickly realized that I'd have to cut some of the Rainbooms out to make this fit the wordcount. And since I couldn't think of anything fun for them to do, they got axed.

I'm glad that people liked the fast pace. I'd love to post this on FiMFiction without adding anything, but they need 1000 words, so... I'll find something to add.

Thanks to everyone for reading and reviewing!