Fire & Rain
When the film was over, Spitfire and Rainbow Dash exited the cinema together, each quoting lines and laughing. Spitfire noticed that Rainbow seemed to be walking a bit closer to her than she had been earlier. It was a small gesture, but it signaled to the Wonderbolt that Rainbow was feeling more comfortable with the idea of a relationship.
‘Don’t get ahead of yourself, Spitfire.’
“That was the best movie ever!” Rainbow beamed, her excitement and energy nearly contagious. “Thanks for buying the tickets.”
“Well, let’s see now, I got to see an awesome movie, got some free snacks, and had an awesome mare to spend some time with; I call that a hay of a deal!” Spitfire winked.
“Yeah, I’m kinda awesome,” Rainbow smirked. “But you’re pretty good too.” She retorted, playfully nudging Spitfire in the ribs.
“Ooo, somepony thinks she’s a hotshot,” Spitfire challenged, her playful tone and noticeable grin not doing much to cover the fun she was having.
Rainbow made a show of polishing her hoof against her chest in the most disinterested way she could manage. “Well, I’ve only saved Equestria a couple times; done a few Rainbooms. Nothin’ real big.” She winked to Spitfire.
“Too bad my wing is messed up,” Spitfire countered with a playful nudge. “Otherwise I might have to embarrass you in front of everypony.”
“Oh, it is so on!” Rainbow grinned, her competitive nature forcing its way to the surface. Spitfire couldn’t contain the laughter any longer, and pulled Rainbow into a sidelong hug with one foreleg.
“Okay then, how ‘bout a race.”
“R-really?” Rainbow perked up, almost giddy at the idea of racing her idol.
“Really,” Spitfire nodded. “And when I win, everypony will get to see just how cute you look when you’re embarrassed.” She winked again.
“I don’t do cute!” Rainbow protested as her face turned beet red.
“Somepony forgot her floaties,” Spitfire teased in singsong.
“I—wait…What?” Rainbow stared in befuddlement.
“Floaties... You know? Swimming in Denial?” Spitfire explained.
Rainbow simply blinked. “That is the weirdest line ever.”
“Never mind,” Spitfire groaned, resisting the urge to smack herself in the face. “So, Dash, what should we do next?”
Rainbow took a moment to look to where the sun was in the sky, quickly gauging how much daylight was left. “Well, before it gets too late, I should find a hotel to stay in. You wouldn’t happen to know of any affordable places nearby would you?”
Spitfire thought for a moment. She was used to having her booking hoofed to her by Arcus or a member of the support staff. That said, she still took personal trips from time to time, though her budget was probably far more flexible than the salary a weather manager could afford.
“Well,” She started slowly, “I know that anything along Mane Street is good quality, and they usually have pretty good prices too from what I remember.”
Rainbow nodded, her wings instinctively spreading before she remembered Spitfire’s injury. She blushed and grinned apologetically. “Sorry. I’m not used to walking everywhere.”
Spitfire shrugged nonchalantly. “Meh, neither am I. Ah well, that’s life; no sense crying about it now,” Spitfire smiled. She couldn’t blame Rainbow for wanting to fly; it was simply the nature of a pegasus to be in the skies. Setting those thoughts aside for the time being, she took a step ahead of Rainbow and motioned for the weather mare to follow. “Shall we?”
“Right behind you,” Rainbow answered.
Spitfire gasped melodramatically, pressing a hoof to her chest and feigning outrage. “Why, Rainbow, such a perverse filly!”
“Oh please, your plot isn’t that hot.”
“So you have been looking,” she winked.
Rainbow’s face turned crimson again. “No! I-Ju…you….wh—” She pressed her hoof to her face and groaned. “I crashed right into that one.”
Spitfire patted Rainbow’s withers gently. “Don’t worry; if anypony asks, just tell them it was an unscheduled snack stop.”
“That is so wrong…”
Spitfire led Rainbow through the bustling Manehattan streets with the confidence granted by frequent travel experience. She was grateful that she was both in Manehattan and out of uniform. In Cloudsdale, every Wonderbolt was a celebrity, and every pegasus knew what they looked like without the uniforms thanks to a very talented, and intrusive, group of paparazzi photographers that seemed to make camp outside of the team’s headquarters.
In Manehattan, there were a few ponies in the media circles that knew the team out of uniform, but the market for the photos was almost nonexistent. Earth ponies and unicorns enjoyed watching the team perform like every other pony, but beyond that they cared very little about the private lives of celebrity pegasi.
It was this indifference that made Manehattan a popular vacation spot for Spitfire and the rest of her team. Without their uniforms and the familiar windswept look to their manes, they blended in very easily with the rest of the city. Some of the team even preferred to spend the off-season living in the earth pony city. She knew at least half the team leased apartments year round for that express purpose. Spitfire could certainly understand why.
If she were in Cloudsdale, the press would have been swarming her the instant she set hoof out of the hospital. She didn’t even want to think about attempting a legitimate date there; the fake dates with Soarin resulted in hours of being stalked by paparazzi ponies. The mere thought of showing up with a mare for a date in Cloudsdale was enough to make Spitfire feel queasy.
She snuck a glance at Rainbow as they walked; the younger mare’s attention was currently distracted by the Manehattan architecture. How would she handle that sort of spotlight? Was it fair to ask her to endure that if this one night turned out to be only the first of many? Spitfire fought back a sigh. She didn’t know what might happen, and she absolutely hated not knowing.
When they rounded the next corner, Spitfire spotted a familiar red unicorn trotting casually in their direction, his eyes focused on a notepad. Spitfire’s eyes went wide.
“Oh buck my life.” She uttered. Without thinking, she hooked a foreleg around Rainbow and pulled the oblivious mare back. The comedy of Rainbow’s very surprised yelp was lost on her as she dragged the weather manager into the nearest shop.
“What the hay, Spitfire?” Rainbow groused, a look of bewilderment spreading over her face when she noticed the mare in question crouched low, only her eyes peering out of the storefront’s bay window.
“Sorry, sorry. We gotta lay low for a minute.” She whispered, moving up slightly to get a better view.
“Uh … what are you doing?” Rainbow asked.
“Hiding from him.”
“Who is ‘him’? Are we talking a pony, or some weird two legged thing with crab claw arms instead of hooves?” Rainbow smirked.
Spitfire stared at her in bewilderment before shaking the image free of her mind. “Unicorn…a unicorn named Red Top. He runs the Manehattan Enquirer.”
“I’m guessing that’s a bad thing?” Rainbow surmised with a raised eyebrow.
“It’s a gossip paper. They find a piece of news, they write up whatever story they think will sell to fit with it, and they don’t have any sense of shame. There was a DJ not too long ago they did a cover on, not sure if or how she recovered from that. It was… bad,” Spitfire explained.
“Okay, so, uh…why don’t you just tell him to buck off?” Rainbow asked, the simplicity of the question giving Spitfire a chuckle.
“I wish it was that simple.” She gasped and ducked down a bit. “There he is.”
“Yeah, there are several unicorns on the street,” Rainbow noted flatly. “Which one is he?”
“Look for the reddish-orange one with a notepad,” Spitfire replied.
Rainbow spotted him quickly enough, a tall unicorn stallion that had the majority of his attention focussed on the notebook levitating in front of his face. Saddlebags obscured the mark on his flank. As he made his way past the storefront window, Spitfire pressed flat against the wall, doing her best impression of a chameleon, which wasn’t a particularly good one.
Rainbow studied the stallion curiously. He seemed like a normal enough unicorn to her, but she wasn’t exactly a celebrity. The only one of the Elements of Harmony who ever got any level of celebrity treatment was Twilight, and that was more due to her status as Princess Celestia’s protégé than anything else. Red Top seemed to notice her staring, his gaze shifting from his notepad to her. Rainbow nodded politely, a gesture that Red Top politely returned. He never broke from his trot as he disappeared down the street in the throng of Manehattan ponies.
“Well,” Rainbow started. “Looks like he’s gone now.”
“Phew, that’s a relief,” Spitfire replied, flopping against the floor.
“Are you two planning on buying something, or are you just gonna play hide and seek?” asked an older mare from behind them. The question startled both pegasi into finally noticing that the shop they had spontaneously chosen to hide in was, in fact, a bridal shop. With a quick apology, both mares made a beeline for the exit and trotted quickly down the street. Spitfire was the first to break the awkward silence between them.
“We shall never speak of this,” Spitfire insisted. “Never.”
Rainbow smirked, sensing an opportunity for precious vengeance. “Gee Spitfire, not even one full date and you’re already trying to plan our wedding,” she chided playfully. Spitfire nearly tripped at the implication, barely managing to catch herself in a more or less dignified manner.
“Marriage? Me?” Spitfire guffawed. “As if I could be tied down so easily!”
“Tied down, huh?” Rainbow mused, sending Spitfire into cold horror as she realized the implications of what she had just said. She slowly looked over to Rainbow, who was doing her very best to keep her smirk reigned in.
“Kinky,” Rainbow said, her voice intonating Hedley LaMane from the film they had just seen together.
“And now it’s my turn to take a sudden snack stop,” Spitfire groaned. Rainbow patted her on the back and smiled.
“Don’t worry, Spitfire, you’re still cool,” Rainbow said with a bright grin. Spitfire chuckled, silently thanking any and every god, demon, and spirit that her brother had not been present for that exchange.
“Come on, Dash, let’s find you a hotel and then get some dinner,” she said cheerily.
“Sounds good,” Rainbow replied, giving Spitfire a playful salute.
Together, they trotted through the bustling city until they found a cluster of hotels along the Mane Street strip for Rainbow to peruse. Spitfire found yet another surprise in the younger mare as she proved to be very money conscious. She went to each hotel and spent several minutes talking with the ponies behind the counters about long-term renting rates, incentives, and any business discounts they offered before she settled on one of the few hotels that offered pegasus cloud beds in the upper rooms. Once she had filled out the papers and received a key, the two exited the building to find themselves being lightly rained upon.
“Oh you have got to be kidding me!” Rainbow glared angrily up at the skies. “It took those ponies all day to set this up?!”
“Maybe they had to build the clouds themselves,” Spitfire snickered.
“Oh I am gonna kick their flanks so hard tomorrow that they’ll feel it next month,” Rainbow said through gritted teeth.
Spitfire couldn’t help but smile. “You take a lot of pride in your work.”
Rainbow nodded slightly, her magenta eyes keenly studying the overcast sky. “There’s no point in doing something unless you intend to give it all you’ve got.”
‘Ha ha, give it all—No, no! Shut Up brain!’ Spitfire cursed her own dirty mind. She nodded, leaving the easy innuendo joke alone for once.
“I can understand that,” Spitfire said. “I expect everypony on the team to hold absolutely nothing back for a show. We live to fly, so why not act like it?”
Rainbow nodded, seemingly more focused on the cloud cover than Spitfire’s comment. Any normal mare might have been irritated by the seeming indifference, but Spitfire wasn’t just any pony. She knew that look, the look of a mare that was fiercely proud of her work and took it very seriously. The Wonderbolt saw that same look in the mirror every time she was preparing for a show. She had seen it in her parent’s faces when she and Rapid were little, and it was in Arcus’ face every time she saw him.
Spitfire couldn’t be irritated with a pony like that. She respected that kind of attitude far too much to be annoyed by it. That said, she still wasn’t a weather pony, nor did she plan to become one.
“So, uh, mind telling me what you’re lookin’ for?” she asked.
There was a momentary pause before Rainbow seemed to realize Spitfire was talking to her. “Huh? Oh, sorry.” She pointed her hoof up to the sky, drawing Spitfire’s attention to a line of slowly moving clouds. “See the movement there, where the clouds are drifting west?”
Spitfire squinted for a moment, her eyes scanning the cloud cover until she spotted the movement Dash was talking about. “Yeah?”
“Those are the trade winds. Whoever’s the interim manager up there keeps placing them too high. It’s not that big of a problem for water distribution, but it is making the cloud pushers work way too hard just to keep the rain in the city.” She sighed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be getting annoyed about this.”
“Hey,” Spitfire put her hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder. “There is no shame in taking pride in your work.”
Something about that comment made Rainbow flinch visibly. Spitfire noticed the movement and the look that flashed over Rainbow’s face. Something clearly was bothering the younger mare, though exactly what was a mystery. Spitfire held her tongue; whatever it was, she would it leave alone until Rainbow was ready to talk about it; assuming she ever did feel like opening up about it.
“I guess,” Rainbow answered softly.
“Come on,” Spitfire patted her back. “Let’s get some dinner. My treat.”
“I can pay my share,” Rainbow protested.
“Consider it a belated ‘thanks for saving my life’ dinner,” Spitfire winked.
“Fine...” Rainbow smirked slightly. “But I get to pay for the next one.”
“Oooh, I suppose,” Spitfire replied playfully. The implicit promise of a second date with Rainbow Dash was definitely not an unpleasant prospect.
Spitfire led them to a fancier place she knew on upper Mane Street, simply called Club White. The casually furnished establishment had a large bar area with many small round tables set in front of a small performance stage. Booths lined most of the walls that were adorned with countless photos of performers and celebrities that had either played at the club, or had given it their patronage.
To the surprise of both mares, the performer for the evening was a griffon. He was sitting comfortably on a bar stool with an acoustic guitar strapped over his shoulder. The instrument was only playable by griffons, their talons giving them the dexterity necessary to play complicated arpeggios and patterns that even prodigal unicorn musicians had difficulty in replicating. Beside the stage was a tip jar half-full of bits, and beside him was a box of records available for sale.
“He’s pretty good,” Rainbow commented as they were shown to a table.
“Yeah he is,” Spitfire agreed, impressed. Both mares opened their menus; Spitfire casually read through the options.
Rainbow gasped. “S-Spitfire, I-I can’t ask you to pay these prices!” She stared, almost horrified at the Wonderbolt.
Spitfire smiled calmly, her hoof reaching out and resting on Dash’s. “Rainbow, this is my treat. Order anything you like.”
Rainbow’s ears folded back timidly. “I-I just don’t wanna be a moocher.”
“Don’t worry, Dash. Just relax and have some fun.” She reassured her date. Rainbow blushed and nodded lightly.
She ordered a comparatively cheap entrée and a glass of water, while Spitfire ordered herself something slightly more expensive and a lavish cocktail. The griffon started a song that both mares found entrancing as their food was delivered .
“That’s a really pretty song,” Spitfire commented absently.
“Yeah, it really is,” Rainbow agreed.
Oh, I've seen fire and I've seen rain.
I've seen sunny days that I thought would never end.
I've seen lonely times when I could not find a friend,
but I always thought that I'd see you baby,
one more time again.
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"Their" song perhaps? Name of the story certainly hints at something like that...
I might be completely wrong, but, still...
At the same time, I was hoping for this to update, and whoop dee doo, it does, and I became happy
i wonder when they will kiss
1567844
"HEY! YOU TWO SHOULD KISS!"
Excellent chapter. Keep it up. Also, I love the song you mentioned at the end there. Used to listen to it all the time.
1567844>>1568284
They will kiss when they've earned it, and not a minute before
1568293
Thank you kindly, and high-five for Fire & Rain
I love it when songs I listen to my Ipod all the time make it into stories. It makes me feel like the things I listen to are actually popular.
I'm certainly enjoying this story, it has a nice calm feeling, with a hit of some difficult moments to come in the future.
Looking forward to what will happen in later chapters
1568312 Will it be a nervous peck from Rainbow Dash, I'm feeling that would work really well
1568437
Thanks very much, the next chapter should be Wednesday or Thursday. And don't worry, I'm very serious about making characters earn their relationships.
1568662
High five brother, this is the music I was raised on (literally, my dad was in a band for a long time)
1568804
are actually already written, we're just marching forward now.
Glad you like it, and we're going places. Some later...events
1569454
Only one way to find out
If I could think of one thing this story needs its MORE THUMBS
This is great! I look forward to more
*clicks refresh*
Sees no new chapter
*clicks refresh*
Sees no new chapter
*clicks refresh*
Sees no new chapter.......
*click* no*click* no*click* no*click* no.....
*click click clickclick click clickclick click clickclick click clickclick click click*
...you get the idea
1573191
I've been doing the same thing.
1573191 1583694
Soon, very soon.
1585111
Yay!!!
1586059
You know what the funny thing is? I was just looking at the story statistics and going "why the heck is there a youtube referral?"
I'll get back to you when I've recovered from the mind = blown
Oh, the next chapter will be sent for editing before I go to bed
Words failing
iambrony.jsmart.web.id/mlp/gif/25442__safe_animated_discord_fanfic_computer_now-kiss_discorderlyconduct_typing.gif
1568284 *is laughing* Amen to that^^ but I guess its a bit too soon for that. Its their first date after all^^
I was wondering where the name for this fic came from... now I know^^ Its a nice song and I think it fits the fic pretty good^^ cant wait to see what happens next^^
Am I the only one that caught the Power Puff Girls reference?
I must say I am extremely impressed with this fic so far, and I'm loving the references.
Keep it up!
damnit i feel like sucha n ass for having this great story just sitting to be read later.
Spitfire patted Rainbow’s withers gently. “Don’t worry; if anypony asks, just tell them it was an unscheduled snack stop.”
Lost it at that point
Can I use the "only griffons can play guitars" thing in one of my stories?
I was gonna have someone break it.
Fire and Rain by James Taylor. Now thats a favorite of mine. That song really does this story justice, cudos to you for including it!
Took me a full game of minesweeper on medium difficultly to realize what was meant. 46 seconds if you're curious.
Got my ass kicked out of class for laughing so damn hard at that. And then that Powerpuff Girls reference was great as well. Then there is that song. Excellent choice in every way. Was that the inspiration for the name? Onward into this amazing madness!
~SolidFire
I found a typo.
There is an 'about' missing at the beginning of that sentence.
OMG, Power Puff Girls references too. I love this story so much.
static3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130613201960/powerpuff/images/4/4c/SpeedDemon1.gif
3118212 Are you sure it wasn't 69 seconds?
3502407 Not necessarily. The about is more formal but not absolutely needed. Especially if you consider this is them talking. Often times during normal speech patterns (DEPENDING ON WHAT PART OF THE WORLD YOU'RE FROM) some words just get dropped. For example, Are we talking cake or pie could roughly translate the same meaning when spoken as Are we talking about cake or pie If you look at it this way as it being spoken word versus written text it makes sense.
That reminded me of this song. Now with 100% more My Little Pony!
That James Taylor song was just perfect for this.
nothingishere.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/gooddayforpie.jpg
Don’t worry, Spitty: he might still read about it in the Enquirer, knowing the habits of papparazos and how they might combine with the abilities of unicorns...
Yeah, Mare Do Well was a bunch of dick moves bundled up in a bag.
Water, water went everywhere. I hope you're proud author, I hope you're proud of that glorious comedy of yours.
Sounds like a good song to me