-=≡Fourth Play, Timid Wings≡=-
Rainbow Dash looked proudly out at her friend. “Fluttershy, show them how it’s done.”
“Meep,” the cowering pegasus meeped.
Fluttershy stepped forward awkwardly. Her face was kept lowered, away from the gaze of the other ponies. It wasn’t so bad. Her heart was only beating at a light rock n’ roll instead of death metal, and her wings weren’t locked up either. Flying in front of an audience still wasn’t something she was keen to do, however.
A pair of giggling voices caused Fluttershy to recoil away from the source. It wasn’t loud, but the noise cut through all other sounds, cutting directly into Fluttershy’s mind. From behind her pink mane, she peeked out at two pegasi, chatting with each other.
Both of them were a pale shade of purple, nearly the same shade, in fact. One had teal-colored mane with a pink bow holding it in place. The other had a shorter, white mane that swept upwards.
When they noticed Fluttershy was spying on them, the one with the bow said, “Sorry, Fluttershy. Cloudchaser was just telling something funny about a news story she read. Good luck!”
“Good luck,” the one called Cloudchaser called out.
Both of them waved encouragingly.
Fluttershy took a deep breath. Just getting through this was her top priority. The chances of her making the team were slim to none anyway. As long as she tried her best, Rainbow Dash certainly couldn’t complain. One step at a time, she walked to the starting line. From the corner of her eye, she caught on to two bright expressions. Pinkie and Rarity had moved to the front, and both of them wore blinding smiles.
Spike came over to strap on the sandbag. The timid pegasus’s legs buckled under the weight, and she let out a gasp when the strap was pulled taut.
“Ready?” Spike asked. His claw was poised over the stopwatch’s start button.
Fluttershy nodded once.
“Go!”
Unlike everypony else, who rocketed off the start line, Fluttershy flew forward at a modest pace. It wasn’t from lack of trying, however. Her wings were flapping as hard as they could, but the weight on her back was just too much.
When she arrived at the first challenge, Fluttershy pushed forward. Instead of shifting slightly to the side and cutting across it at a slight angle, like all the others, she slammed into the heavy obstacle head on. All she accomplished was getting the wind knocked out of her. Fluttershy’s legs wrapped around the hanging weight tightly as it swung forwards. On the return trip, Fluttershy was tossed onto the ground.
“Come on, Fluttershy, try again!” Rainbow Dash called out.
Fluttershy made a minor whine as she staggered onto her hooves again. She bit her lip to keep from crying out of embarrassment. Mumblings from the audience drifted to her ears, but they were too far away to understand. Taking a peek back, nopony looked like they wanted to laugh. Instead, they were all waiting patiently.
Slowly, she rose back into the air again. The force of Fluttershy’s wings rippled through the grass around her as she readied for the next attempt. When she flew forward, everypony’s eyes widened. The chattering gave way to total silence. There were only the sounds of wings beating through the sky.
Unlike the other’s who forced their way through, Fluttershy almost gracefully fit through the gaps by curving her body. Charging in directly was a bad idea, and her strength wasn’t enough move the obstacles. This was the only way she could think of to get through. Like the wind, the timid pegasus made her way through with minimal disturbance.
It was felt like a refreshing splash of air when the sun finally shined through the obstruction. Her wings extended out in jubilation at finally being free. Long, pink hair swept through the air. Her friends were enthusiastically cheering from the sidelines. Pinkie let out a shrill whistle.
“Ready for the second part, Fluttershy?” Twilight asked from behind the cannon.
Feeling more confident from the cheers, Fluttershy nodded. But the loud bang from the first blast caused her to drop downward and the ball to sail overhead. When she returned to position, there was a forced smile on her face.
“I’m really ready this time, Twilight,” she called out in a breathy tone.
For the next two shots, Fluttershy did surprisingly well. Both of them hit their target, and the last one was even a bullseye much to the joy of the audience. They were fluffy shots, though, ones that arced into the air and landed softly as the ball pleased.
The timid pegasus landed facing away from everyone else. Her chest heaved from the pressure of performing in front of others. That hadn’t gone all that bad, though, right? She made it through to the end at least.
Spike ran over to Twilight with his notes on times and abilities. He leaned close, using the clipboard to cover his mouth. “Uh, Fluttershy does realize that the point of a bouncer is to bounce things away forcefully and not slide in between them, right?”
“Oh hush, Spike,” Twilight said.
Rarity and Pinkie Pie were cheering loudly, especially the pink pony, who was standing on hind legs only to wave her forelegs.
“Woohoo! Go, Fluttershy!” Pinkie wooped.
Rarity nodded in agreement. “That was most excellent flying, darling.”
Fluttershy looked away from the two of them with her cheeks burning bright. Not even her pink mane could hide that. “Thank you.”
The rest of the pegasi took their turns under the keen observation of Rainbow Dash, Twilight and Spike. By the end, the team secretary had several sheets full of notes already recorded, and that was just for the bouncer position.
“Alright!” Rainbow Dash said as she landed in front of the others. “It’s time for-” Originally, she had wanted to call out the mover candidates, but a quick scan of the crowd revealed that Applejack still hadn’t arrived. Just what was that farm pony doing? Rainbow was really starting to get worried now, but as the captain, she couldn’t let it show on her face.
“Time for the snatchers!” she called out.
“Ooh, I guess it’s my turn to demonstrate the obstacle course.” Twilight Sparkle, the vice-captain of the yet unnamed Ponyville Wonderball team, stepped up to the starting line of the snatcher course. The glint of magic surrounded her horn.
Once again, Spike was there to take down notes on how the participants were doing. For this run only, Rainbow Dash was ponying the cannon.
Slightly up ahead and to the left was a paints targeted. This time, the goal was to prevent the ball shot from the cannon from hitting the target. Moving on from there was several stacks of crates of varying heights. The top of the crate totem poles were painted different colors, and a ball was placed in the middle of it all. Using magic, the candidates had to touch the ball to the color called out by the test administrators. Finally, they had to move a metal hoop through a winding and curving metal pole. Every time the hoop touched the pole would be a point deduction. This was designed to test magical strength and control with telekinesis.
“Ready.” Spike called out. “Set. Start!”
Twilight didn’t move, though. She crouched low with horn pointed forward. A look of intense concentration burned in her eyes. Though she hadn’t moved yet, sweat rolled across her face. Everything other than the cannon was tuned out.
Seconds passed without anything happening, and then a deafening boom. Immediately, Twilight wrapped her magic around the fired ball, not an easy task due to the speed and force. Narrowing her eyes even more, the alicorn’s horn became bright enough to shine through a foggy night. The ball swerved to the side, avoiding the target completely.
Over the next four shots, she got even better. The last ball fired by the cannon was not only stopped, but caught within her magical powers.
With a pleased smile, Twilight moved onto the next part of the course, accuracy and speed. Before she got fully situated, the instructions were already flying.
“Red! Blue! Orange!” Rainbow Dash called out in rapid succession. “Red! Yellow! Purple! White!”
Twilight followed all the instructions perfectly using magic to touch a ball to the proper stack of crates. The ball gracefully curved through the air in fluid motions. Suddenly, she stopped with the ball hovering near her head and turned towards Rainbow. “There is no white.”
“Oh, right,” Rainbow muttered. “I think they’ve seen enough, onto the next part.”
Passing the hoop through the winding pole was no problem. Twilight finished it quickly and with zero mistakes.
Spike rushed over waving his evaluation sheet. “That was great, Twilight. You set the bar pretty high.”
“Well, it’s not like they need to beat me.” Twilight glanced away with a chuckle.
“Awesome,” Rainbow said at the end. “Everypony got that? Okay, first up is..."
Most of the unicorns did pretty bad on the obstacle course. They either couldn’t manipulate a speeding ball with magic or didn’t have fast enough of a control. Many times, they turned their heads before the ball reached its destination, leaving them to move it blind.
A unicorn mare with a soft green fur that almost felt minty fresh did rather well. At least Rainbow Dash was impressed with her speed. Out of all the trials thus far, she had the fastest time, albeit with some mistakes. Not any more than average, however.
Finally, Rainbow Dash called out, “Rarity!”
“Rarity,” Spike repeated, but with a lot more dreaminess to his voice. He almost floated over on pure affections. “Good luck.”
“I shan’t need it,” Rarity said, “but thank you, Spike. Now then, Rainbow, let’s get started.”
With grace and poise, the white unicorn made her way through the obstacle course. Having so much previous practice with being a goalkeeper, five out of five balls were fully stopped and caught. From there, she had no problem doing the reactive exercise. With head held high, Rarity made it look easy.
Strutting forward, Rarity cleared the precision portion of the test without losing a step. The air around her almost shimmered with magical energy from her elegance. The metal ring was gently placed back onto the starting position once she finished. Flipping her hair, she ended with a smile and a pose.
“Woohoo!” a cheering came from the side. “Go, Rarity!” Sweetie Belle was hopping up and down, somehow appearing above the crowds. She was actually standing on Fluttershy’s head to get a better vantage point. Her small hooves waves in a blur through the air.
Spike had been captivated the entire time. Even when doing sports, Rarity was amazing. “The highest score,” he sighed. “And I’m not just saying that.” The notes were held up to prove his point. “You really did score higher than Twilight.”
“Oh.” Rarity batted her eyelashes towards her alicorn friend. “Is that so?”
“Well,” Twilight said, “you did catch more balls than I did. And we had near the same time in the other tests. Nice work, Rarity.”
“Thank you, darling.”
Rainbow Dash also slipped over and whispered, “Just by comparing you to the previous unicorns, I can already tell you’re getting onto the team.”
“And our deal?” Rarity asked.
“You got it. I’ll wear whatever you want during interviews.”
“Most excellent.”
It didn’t take long for the remainder of the unicorns to finish their trials with nopony really standing out. Twilight organized up the notes and then stacked them together with the pegasi information. Finally, it was time for the movers. Or was it?
Rainbow Dash walked around nervously, occasionally looking at the earth pony group. There was still no sign of a cowboy hat sticking above the rest. The Cutie Mark Crusaders were still only at two-thirds strength as well.
“We need to continue,” Twilight said after a few minutes. “Everyone’s getting restless.” The droning coming from the participants steadily grew louder.
“Okay,” the team captain sighed. “Start handing out the information forms to them.” Of course this could have been done earlier, while they were conducting the previous trials even. But she wanted to stall as long as she could. It no longer seemed possible.
It only took a few minutes before ponies were clamoring to have their forms collected. One at a time, Rainbow Dash collected them when Twilight could have easily gathered the lot all at once.
“Okay,” Rainbow said without a hint of trepidation. It just wouldn’t do at all if the team captain was seen to be worried. “Let’s get started with the mover trials!”
“Hold on just one minute there!” a voice yelled out from the back of the group. It was powerful and rang out clearly through the chatter.