Limits of the Horizon

by Beware The Carpenter

14 - When Siblings Collide

After Sky Fire’s magnificently humiliating retreat, the laughter rumbled on for another two miles as Sky Blaze finished describing Sky Fire’s epic fail to seduce Pinkie’s triplets. That is, Spy Path and Star Streak laughed; for a moment Tungsten looked like he was going to go after Sky Fire, then he quietly withdrew into one of his Daring Do novels.

From the way his ears were pulled back, Sky Blaze guessed he was angry at her for humiliating their brother. Hopefully, this would make Tungsten think about all the people who’d been hurt by Sky Fire’s escapades. Besides; by the time he was visibly upset, Sky Blaze was already up to Sky Fire’s first escape attempt, and so she couldn’t stop then, could she?

After the anecdote, Sky Blaze and Spy Path kept talking, casually at first, but then more deeply after they reached Ponyville and were able to talk privately. Spy Path was visibly nervous and excited about a fifth of which was due to her never having been to Youtherd before, and the rest because later that night evening, she was going to see her older brother.

Spy Path didn’t elaborate, and Sky Blaze didn’t push; but a few years ago her parents had gotten divorced. Spy had moved to Manehatten to start a new life with her mom, while her brother stayed in Canterlot with their dad. Her parents still weren’t talking to each other, and Spy Path had made it curtly clear she had no desire of seeing her father. However, she deeply missed her brother, and the two had been keeping in touch by mail since the split.

Neither sibling wanted to appear to be taking the side of the parent they weren’t living with by either visiting Canterlot or Manehatten, so this year, they had both saved their money so they could to come to Youtherd and re-unite on ‘neutral territory’. Spy’s brother however, wasn’t going to be arriving until eight, leaving Spy Path the whole day in a town she didn’t know, so she tagged along with Sky Blaze to Sugarcube Corner.

By sheer luck, the two of them ran into some ponies Spy Path vaguely knew from Canterlot and briefly introduced to Sky Blaze before practically begging her to re-tell Sky Fire’s escapade with the triplets; and Sky Blaze was more than happy to oblige. Needless to say, several of Spy Path’s friends found the story incredulous, with one unicorn colt in particular insisting that what Sky Blaze described was scientifically impossible.

It was at that moment that the doors opened and who should come in but Sky Fire himself, following a filly that looked flattered by his attentions, and might be in danger of doing something she’d regret later unless Sky Blaze intervened. The unicorn proposed an experiment, Sky Blaze agreed, and one of Spy’s friends just happened to have a small custard tart in her lunchbox which she was willing to sacrifice for virtue, comedy and science. The moment the tart splattered on Sky Fire’s muzzle he freaked, shrieked, and jumped so high that his head crashed into the ceiling, before hurtling himself into the fountain outside; proving Sky Blaze’s story once and for all.

After lunch Sky Blaze took Spy Path to meet her netball team, which was meeting by the river for practice. Some of the team wouldn’t be arriving until later that weekend, but Spy made a decent enough fill in that if she’d still lived in Canterlot, Sky Blaze would have seriously considered training her as a backup in case Tempest Dive’s health got any worse. After practice, they’d caught the tail-end of a concert and had dinner in a quiet restaurant, giving Sky Blaze a chance to peruse the newspaper to see if there were any races worth winning.

It had been a fun day, but now it was over.

The sun was meandering toward the eastern horizon, Spy Path had gone to meet her brother, and Sky Blaze was on her way to bed. It was still early, but Sky Blaze enjoyed getting up before dawn; and having a few hours peace to meditate before sparring with Sky Fire and having breakfast.

The windows to Aunt Scootaloo’s house looked warm and inviting, but as she reached for the door, it was opened from the inside by Sky Fire who’d been on his way out; his eyes and mouth narrowing to slits when he saw her, “What, the hay, is wrong with you?”

Sky Blaze stepped back, failing to hide the slight smile that was edging around her lips as she noticed the frizzy edges to his mane, telling the story of about eleven showers, “Come on Fire, it was joke; besides, I didn’t throw that tart, or even think of it.”

“It’s not funny. You know I’m allergic!”

“It’s psychosomatic.”

“Psychosomatic? I had a rash down my neck for three hours!”

“You enjoyed eating custard before trying to seduce the triplets. One bad experience planted a ludicrous idea in your head which became a lie you’ve told yourself so many times that now you actually believe something benign is out to kill you. It’s just like how you’ve convinced yourself that any girl would have to be crazy not to want to sleep with you, and won’t mind if you lie to them to get what you want and then never speak to them again. If she does get upset, it must be her problem because she hasn’t adjusted yet to 'Canterlot Society'.”

Sky fire gave a sharp, angry sigh; “Don’t tell me you’re talking about Summer Tide again.”

“Yes Sky Fire, I am bringing up Summer Tide, and I’m going to keep bringing her up until you give her a real apology. Her family had just come from Oatlantis to Equestria as refugees; she didn’t know anyone here and didn’t know what kind of a colt you were. You pursued her for a week, took her virginity and have hardly spoken a word to her since.”

“You don’t need to tell me what happened Sky Blaze; I was there.”

“You were there when you could use her; I was the one who found her sobbing in the bathroom. She still hasn’t gotten over what happened.”

“You make it sound like I raped her. She invited me up to her room, and with one purpose in mind.”

“You’d said you loved her.”

“I never said that. I said I thought I might be in love; she read more into the statement than I’d intended.”

“Do you even care how much you hurt her?”

“There have been plenty of times when I was with a girl, and thought that she had sub-vocally promised me something she hadn’t. When I found out that we weren’t on the same page I was disappointed, but didn’t act like she’d ruined my whole life. I moved on, and found someone else who would give me what I wanted. If Summer chooses to make herself miserable, every time things don’t go exactly the way she wants, she’s going to spend her whole life sulking.”

“If you’d just liste-”

“Summer and I spent one afternoon together, and both of us came away from it feeling disappointed. I’m willing to write the whole thing off as having been a bad idea, you think that the process should be repeated and somehow that will make everyone happy.”

“Summer doesn’t want you back; she just wants you to feel sorry and I want you to think twice before doing it to someone else.”

“I won’t apologize! I didn’t do anything wrong!”

“Is that what you’re going to say to the next Summer Tide, after you’ve gotten her pregnant?”

Sky Fire snorted, “If you’re so convinced that ponies should never date anyone they’re not serious about; when are you going to marry Armathirelok?”

Sky Blaze flushed, wings tensing behind her, “What happened between me and Amren was… totally different.”

“Not from his perspective. You started dating him, knowing from the start you didn’t want anything long-term. He asked to get a bit more serious, and you ran off. He tried contacting you, and you ignored him. He wasn’t just looking to bang and run either; didn’t he actually propose… like… several times?”

“That was different!”

“Not really; but if you’ve noticed, I haven’t brought it up since it happened because I know it makes you uncomfortable. I don’t go telling other people about it, I don’t make jokes about it; I don’t throw reminders of it back in your face every single chance I get. You’d think that would earn me some kind of consideration in return; but all I ever get from you now is you trying to punish me for making my own decisions instead of swallowing every morsel of the singularist, self-righteous crap that you try to force down everybody’s throats.”

“That’s not true.”

“You’re right. It’s Zecora’s singularist, self-righteous crap; but if you eat it long enough, eventually you start crapping it.”

“Valuing purity isn’t foolish. What’s wrong is you thinking that you can drag yourself and every filly you can catch through the mud, call Tungsten to jump in after you, and then somehow, everyone is going to walk away unhurt.”

Sky Fire kicked the earth; “I make my choices, Tungsten makes his, you make yours. If you want to wait till you're married before getting knocked up, that’s fine, but stop trying to insist that anyone who doesn’t is scum.” Sky Fire took a few steps like he was going to walk away, then turned back; “When you do finally decide to find your, ‘right one,’ take my advice and go with a pegasus. Getting down and dirty with an earth pony is fun and unicorns can do some pretty neat tricks with their magic, but nothing's sweeter than feeling the earth move while free falling at a hundred and sixty feet per second.”

He thought a moment then added, “If you do try that though; just be sure you can see the ground below where you’re playing. Last semester, I tried falling in pitch blackness with a filly I use to date; we hit concrete and she spent the next three months in hospital with four broken legs. I was alright since I was on top and she cushioned me, but I wouldn’t want to see you getting hurt.”

And he never said anything about this before now! He wrecked a filly’s life and didn’t even pause from carousing to so much as visiting her in the hospital?! “YOU… DID WHAT!”

Sky Fire hid a beaming smirk behind a scowl, “No; and if you understood me a tenth as well as you presume to, you would have known I was being sarcastic; but you just want to believe that everything about me is horrible so you can castigate me; thinking that I need to be changed.”

Sky Blaze choked on relief and belched out anger, “Custard.”

Sky Fire took a step back, his mane bristling; “Sky Blaze that’s not funny.”

“Sweet, sticky, warm, delicious custard.”

Sky Fire grit his teeth, “Night Glider; girl’s bathroom in the movie theater. We missed the ending of Daring Do and the Deep Children, but it was soooo worth it.”

“Custard pie, custard tarts, custard sauce.”

“Carrot Sauce, two bottles of wine to loosen her up and she let me spank her flank all night.”

“A bustard was flustered because his tree was full of mustard, so he sold the clustered structure and bought a keg of custard.”

“Tempest Dive wasn’t really sick those days she missed netball practice! She likes it rough and even better if I tie her down and then role-play on her ass.”

“Custard in your mane, custard on your coat, custard in the rain, custard down your throat!”

“Summer Tide… no, can’t think of anything nice to say about her. She was more like a pile of wet rags.”

With a shriek of frustration, Sky Blaze lunged towards Sky Fire; her sharpened hooves barred toward his infuriating, smug face. He only had a split second to react, but that was enough to take a defensive stance, parry her first hit, and counter with a kick of his own. Sky Blaze caught his blow, and twisted his arm into a wrist-lock to try and spin him into the ground, but his wing-strike at her fetlock broke her hold.

Sky Blaze pulled back, and they squared off for a moment without moving before simultaneously unbuckling their saddlebags and lunging towards each other. Sky Fire swung an overhead strike with his left wing, while bracing to kick her when she ducked. Sky Blaze swung to the right, and shot out her wing to grapple his from beneath. He dropped his to meet hers and they met head-on filling the air with a sharp ‘crack’ which drowned out the noise of their saddlebags hitting the ground.

Sky Blaze was fast, fearless, agile and with lightning fast reflexes; Sky Fire was exactly the same. They had fought each other almost every day since they were three, through summer to winter and back again, they met each other every morning before school for training, cumulating in a sparring match, as they tested, taught and learned from each other, goading each other to be better. They had fought each other nearly every day since they were three; but this was the first time in their lives when they had ever truly fought each other.

Sky Fire leapt into the air to avoid Sky Blaze’s forward lunge, so she angled her dive into the dirt, caught herself with her forehooves and then launched herself vertically into the air, spinning her hind hooves wildly; looking for her brother. Sky Fire avoided her flurry and landed a blow on her gut.

Sky Blaze regained her fortitude then swooped towards Sky Fire who flew above and tried to kick the top of her head. Sky Blaze flew on a course to make herself an ideal target, and when his hoof came down, she swiveled horizontally, and caught one of his fore-hooves with both of hers. Their opposing momentum’s canceled each other out, and they both flipped, Sky Fire spinning upside-down, while Sky Blaze turned right-side up, twisting her brother’s hoof so she could crash him into the earth.

It almost worked.

Sky Fire made a feint with his wings, and then maneuvered an unexpected twist that channeled both of them into the brickwork of Scootaloo’s house, and they fell separately to the ground. Both on their hooves again within seconds, and then charged again though it was clear Sky Fire was favoring one arm. Sky Blaze spun her wing around to smack it from behind the knee, but he saw her coming and lifted both arms, rearing onto his hind legs and letting off with a wide roundhouse kick.

Sky Blaze grinned when she saw her chance, knowing that he was trying to beat her with a move she had always been a bit better at then him. She spun onto one hoof and, using her wings to augment her speed, angled her kick towards his fa – CRACK!

Something like an iron mallet struck Sky Blaze’s jaw. An indefinite amount of seconds passed and she found herself lying face down in the dirt, her head throbbing with pain. A muffled groan was echoing through the air and it took her a moment to realize that it was her. After several moments of agony she managed to look up, her clearing vision showing Sky Fire lying a few feet away in a similar position. He saw her at the same moment she saw him and they both shot up, both managing to hide the throbbing pain, but this time neither of them moved to attack.

“I think that was sufficient to replace our sparring session tomorrow morning.” Said Sky Fire casually, rubbing his hoof up and down his jaw to make sure it was still there.

“Agreed.”

“You know what,” said Sky Fire spitting out a small glob of blood, “That was a good enough fight, it could be enough to replace all our sparring sessions for Youtherd.”

“Fine.” Concurred Sky Blaze, “We just won’t talk to each other for the rest of the holidays.”

“Fine.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Sky Blaze woke earlier than usual with a slight headache. She tried to get back to sleep, but the din of the party outside continued to swell into a discordant babble of hoots and hollers. After a few moments she’d had enough; and sat up to close the window, but didn’t open her eyes so it would be easier to get back to sleep.

The first thing she noticed was that far too much heat and light was falling on her face then there should be. Sky Blaze had an impeccable sense of time, the feeling in her bones told her that it was about two in the morning, three at the latest and yet it was warm enough to have been midday… and she smelled smoke.

Sky Blaze opened her eyes.

In front of her she could see the moon sailing majestically through the early morning air, the stars huddling together reading the story of earth over each other’s shoulders and the blazing rooftops of a dozen houses. Sky Blaze dashed to the window, wondering what flaming idiot had let a bonfire get so out of control, and then inhaled the unmistakable scent of fresh blood and burning flesh.

The shouts beneath her morphed into cries of terror and pain; as the streets came alive with the flickering shapes of ponies running from shaggy figures two or three times their size, bellowing war-cries she didn’t recognize. Sky Blaze had only a moment to take this in, then ducked when someone lobbed a flaming torch through her window.

Chapter Fifteen >>> Tomorrow When The War Began

Author's Note:

This chapter was especially difficult to write in a way that (I hope) conveys two flawed characters both giving arguments you can half-agree with.

Let me know what you think.

Comments

[the other sans]

If you want to wait till your married
and then roll-play on her ass

1. You're.
2. Role.

Hmm... Both flawed yet... I side with Sky Fire more than anything. Chivalry is dead with Blaze. And I'm finally back to reading this