Rainbow Dash gains leadership of the Wonderbolts. She quickly discovers that whoever coined the term 'the joys of command' must have possessed a twisted sense of humor. Scootaloo arrives with a familiar, cocky attitude, not helping matters.
Captain Rainbow Dash of the Wonderbolts. Has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it? Certainly her dream job. Well, dreams and reality are two very different things.
Especially when our newly minted captain has to deal with an empty roster, budget cuts, the first non-pegasi cadets, and the pressure of finding out your best friend is now your boss, let alone a princess.
If that weren’t enough to make her quit, her three wing commanders might. Cloud Kicker is a sexual harassment lawsuit waiting to happen; Surprise makes no sense; and Lightning Dust is, well, Lightning Dust.
Meanwhile, Scootaloo arrives at the academy, ready and raring to prove she’s got what it takes to be an elite flyer. Pressure mounts as Scootaloo aims to make her hero proud.
She cradled the small piece of tin in her hoof. Funny, really. It was nothing more than a few pieces of metal and paint—it had probably cost five and a quarter bits to manufacture. But packed into the little pin was everything Rainbow Dash desired—everything she’d ever dreamt of.
Captain of the Wonderbolts.
When she had so brazenly barged into Spitfire’s office to complain about Lightning Dust’s recklessness all those years ago, Dash never figured she’d be sitting on the other side of the desk—well, not so soon, at least, and definitely not under these circumstances.
Captain of the Wonderbolts.
A lightning bolt set between open wings, brushed in gold. The insignia marked the dividing line between Wonderbolt First Class Rainbow Dash, the fastest flyer in Equestria, and a new title that was rapidly turning into a lead weight.
Captain of the Wonderbolts.
No one had seen Spitfire’s sudden resignation coming, least of all Rainbow Dash. It wasn’t how she’d imagined earning her promotion. It left a bad taste in her mouth.
Even so, that first day she’d fastened the last button of her new uniform, it had felt like a lover’s first caress. Thrilling. Sexy. But always lurking in the back of her mind, undermining, neighsaying, always bringing her down, was a little voice.
Fraud. You didn’t really earn this.
It was the same voice.
Her self-doubt.
The Best Young Flyer’s competition? It was there. Those first days at the academy? It was there. No matter what heights she achieved, she’d never truly left it behind.
She pinned the badge back onto its proper place: the right-breast pocket of her suit jacket. The crisp navy-blue uniform fit perfectly across her trim body; cut with all the precision of a perfect V-formation. The ponyester fabric flowed around the wing openings and up around her neck, with none of itchiness, none of the feeling of constriction she’d expected—a testament to Rarity’s excellent tailoring.
What a difference a week made, however. Now, the cuffs had begun to feel more like manacles, and her tie, a ten-ton yoke weighing down her neck.
Ha! Even the spacious office she’d inherited with its spectacular view overlooking the training field below now felt like a prison cell. The window didn’t need bars to make it so.
If it was any consolation, it did come with a beautiful new oak desk, finished to a glossy shine. Each time she ran a hoof over its smooth varnish, it felt to her like as sensuous as a dawnlit flight through Ponyville skies. On the flipside was the stacks and stacks of paperwork—about ten times that of even her worst days as Ponyville's Lead Weather Manager, by Rainbow's estimate—so large that any regular desk may well have snapped under the burden.
Rainbow Dash wondered, and not for the first time, if fate was playing a cruel joke on her. The term, “Be careful what you wish for,” echoed in her mind.
Just as they slipped, she slid her Hayviators back up her snout. The smoked glass obscured her eyes as they flicked over the newspaper clippings scattered haphazardly over the surface of her desk. They told the tale of her predicament quite succinctly.
‘Wonder-bolting! Budget Cut Has Famous Flyers Scrambling For An Exit’ screamed one headline, gargantuan block letters taking up half of the frontpage. Others followed in a similar vein, chronicling the departure of members of the Wonderbolt senior staff.
A three-point shot, and another ball of crumpled paper joined the mishmash of budget reports, editorials, and hatemail penned by fans of the former captain. All gathered into a pile at the bottom of the wastebasket parked several feet away in the furthest corner from her desk. Rainbow prefered a challenge.
The chair’s casters let out an irritable squeak as Rainbow slumped in her high backed executive’s chair. “Great. Just great.”
One week trying to stem the outflow of fellow officers and here she was: calling every Wonderbolt from across Equestria for a single meeting.
It left her drained. The faux-leather cradling her form was a comfort. Like most every other piece of furniture, it was brand new, an ancient tradition meant to give each leader a fresh start, free from any bad omens left by their predecessor.
Her gaze fell onto the cloud-couch parked by the door, and its current occupant, the first of her officers to show up. She appeared to be in middle of shifting a few out-of-place feathers in her right wing, and, in an impressive display of flexibility, all the while lounging on her back.
“Lightning Dust, you mind not grinding your grubby hooves into my new couch?”
Dust paused in her preening and smirked. “You mean like this?” Dash frowned as Dust ground her rear hooves into the fluffy cushions. “Oh yeah, this is real comfy.” She rolled onto her side and spread a large muscular wing open, going back to her task. Both the upholstery and floor quickly became speckled with little green fragments. Catching her superior’s glare, she returned the same signature cocksure grin she’d always sported. “Didn’t anypony tell you it’s impolite to stare, Dash?” she said, flexing her wing fully open. “Not that I blame you for being interested, of course.”
Rainbow Dash just rolled her eyes. Even now as Second Lieutenant Lightning Dust, the cocky stunt flier hadn’t changed much since they’d started at the Academy. Dust reminded Dash of an immature version of herself, with the same hotshot swagger that rubbed many of her squadmates the wrong way. Luckily, she had just enough raw talent to back up her attitude. At the very least a reprimand or twelve had tempered her former wingpony’s reckless streak…a tiny, tiny bit.
Their previously heated relationship had cooled into an almost friendly rivalry since what Rainbow Dash referred to as the ‘You feathering flank-face! You almost killed my friends!’ incident, or as Lightning Dust called it: the ‘Not my fault a feathering balloon flew into restricted airspace!’ thing. Dash had no doubt Dust resented being number two once again; she certainly gave her more attitude than usual the moment news of Rainbow’s promotion came out.
“No fair, Dusty. Dropping innuendo on Rainbow is my schtick.” Cloud Kicker slipped into the office with a flourish of violet plumage, stretching each wing open individually and spreading them wide like a peacock in mating season. Then again, every season was mating season for Kicker. “Heh, ‘in-your-end-o’,” she snickered. “Anyway, boss, I got—wow. New couch?”
During her time as Ponyville's weather manager, Rainbow had witnessed Cloud Kicker's uncanny ability to sculpt clouds into just the right shape. Now, she watched as her second lieutenant ran a practiced eye over the couch's luxurious cumulus cushioning… and its current occupant, caught in the act of preening a particularly difficult feather.
“Hey, Dust,” she said, brushing away a sharp green splinter of feather from the upholstery. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”
“That depends. Are you taking a vow of celibacy?” Dust dryly replied.
Kicker laughed off the absurd suggestion. “HA! Cute, but wrong. How ’bout we break in this new couch, you and me?” she said with a suggestive wiggle of her eyebrows. “Give it a hard test run.” Lightning Dust tried to scooch as far away as possible only to be too late. With a playful growl, Cloud Kicker pounced on her prey.
Pulling a hoof down her face, Rainbow Dash watched what were supposed to be her two senior wing commanders wrestle like foals. If only replacing them wasn’t so hard.
Looking over at her trophy case, she lingered over an early one from Junior Speedsters. It looked fairly heavy. Yeah, a swift blow to the back of their skulls and it’d all be over. Hiding the bodies among the clouds would be the hard part, but still… accidents happen.
The contest ended quickly with Lightning pinned down, straddled by Cloud Kicker at the waist.
“The winner, and still-reigning champion of the world! Ass Kicking Cloud Kicker!” she cheered, raising her hooves in victory. “And the crowd goes wild!” If she expected applause, she was in for a disappointment. “Never try to outwrestle a Kicker, Dusty. What you gonna do when ‘Cloudamania’ runs wild on you?”
Rainbow let out a long-suffering sigh and clapped her hooves. Yeah, Dust was a pain in the rear sometimes, and if Dash was still a cadet, she would totally be joining Kicker in the roughhousing. She was a different mare now, though. More mature. Tempered by experience. She expected more disciplined behavior from her officers.
“Alright, alright, CK, break it up.”
Cloud Kicker blew a raspberry at being foiled. She helped Lightning Dust back to her hooves, but not before playfully swatting Dust’s flank with her tail. “Anyway, I’ve got good and bad news, boss.”
“Alright. Give me the good news.”
“Your nameplate finally arrived!” Cloud Kicker said with a cheer, removing the slip of metal from one her uniform’s pockets and tossing it into Dash’s waiting hoof. “Nothing’s as official in the military as an etched nameplate on your door. Congrats, O Captain my Captain.”
Grinning for the first time today, Rainbow looked over the black lettering spelling out her name on the gold plate. “Captain Rainbow Miriam Dash…” she read.
Wait a minute.
“CLOUD KICKER!” she snapped.
“What?” Cloud Kicker shrugged her wings. “Hey, don’t blame me. Blame your parents.”
Lightning Dust rolled on the floor in uncontrollable laughter. “Your middle name’s Miriam?!” she wheezed, clutching her sides as she fought for breath. Cloud Kicker clamped her own lips together, doing a poor job of containing a chuckle.
Captain Rainbow Miriam Dash glared death at her subordinates. The effect appeared lost on the pair. One wore a sheepish grin while the other remained coughing on the floor from laughing too hard. “Cloud Kicker,” Dash growled out, her ears flat. “Only my folks call me Miriam! You know that!” Another shrug was all she received in return.
“What can I say, Dashie? If it’s on your birth certificate, it goes on your door.” She snorted. “If the Guard taught me one thing, it’s that the military takes legal names and titles very, very seriously. Besides, I think it’s cute.”
“Yeah, calm down, Miriam,” Lightning Dust sniggered from the ground. “Ha! Miriam!”
Rainbow just rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Like you’re one to talk, Britney.”
“Heh heh… Miriam.” Dust continued to giggle under her breath before clearing her throat. “We should probably get this meeting started.”
Rainbow gathered a stack of papers and patted them together. “Shouldn’t we wait for the others first?”
Two pairs of ears flattened as they shared a wary look.
“Heh... Yeah, that’s kinda the bad news,” said Cloud Kicker. “Which I’ll leave to good ol’ Dusty here.”
Lighting Dust protested as Kicker used a wing to push her forward. “Me? Why me? You tell her.”
“To hay with that!” responded Cloud Kicker. “Why should I do it?”
“She’s your friend!” Dust hissed back.
“Exactly.” Cloud nodded. “That’s why you should say it. Nothing to lose. She already hates you.”
“Hey! She doesn’t hate me, featherbrain! Well, not anymore.”
“Okay, a mild dislike then. I don’t see her mailing you any Hearth’s Warming cards.”
As the bickering escalated, Rainbow Dash gave the wood grain of her new desk a thorough inspection—with her face. She had to admit, Rarity sure knew how to pick furniture; real oak, miles above the cheap particle board Rainbow had suggested. Perhaps she’d invite the designer up to decorate the rest of the office. Aside from the furniture and her trophies, the space was still rather drab. It could certainly do with a touch of class and maybe a touch of color on the walls. Something other than gray, she considered as she watched the argument degenerate into petty insults.
“Okay, guys, I need you to chill, like, right now.”
“At least I didn’t piss off my entire class with my ‘Ooh, look at me, I’m such an ace’ attitude!” shouted Cloud Kicker while poking Lightning Dust in the chest. “Some of us know how to make friends.”
“Guys, seriously…” Rainbow repeated as she massaged her aching temples, growing more frustrated.
Lightning Dust scoffed. Wings flared, she barged forward until she and the blonde pegasus were snout to snout. “Oh, that’s real rich coming from you. I bet I’d have tons of friends too if I’d lift my tail for everything with four hooves and a pulse.”
“Sometimes less than four. I don’t discriminate.”
“You know what? I’m ordering you both to shut up!”
“Well that makes it all right then. Perhaps you should write a book. I can see it now: Relationship advice from the Flying Venereal Disease known as Cloud Kicker.”
“Okay, number one: I get tested on a regular basis. Number two: already writing it and with a much better title. And furthermore—”
“SHUT UP!” Rainbow slammed a hoof on her desk. She took a deep breath and yelled, “What. The. Buck?! Just tell me what the feathering feather is feathering going on! Where is everypony?!”
The pair looked at each other and shared a mutual shrug.
“We’re it, boss,” admitted Cloud Kicker.
Rainbow’s brows furrowed even deeper. “Tell me you’re not serious.”
“I’m not serious,” Cloud Kicker repeated to her captain’s teeth-grinding chagrin.
“...CK.”
Cloud Kicker shrugged.
Dash briefly considered throttling her. She was faster than Kicker; she’d just wrap her hooves around that soft, lavender neck, and squeeze. Dash knew Cloud Kicker had received extensive combat training with the guard before quitting to come to Ponyville, but she figured if she struck quick enough, it wouldn’t be a problem. Besides, saving the world counted as a get out of jail free card, right?
Fortunately, Lightning Dust confirmed the bad news before Dash could put her equicidal plan into action. “’Fraid the perv is right, Dash.” Cloud Kicker playfully stuck out her tongue, which both Dash and Dust ignored. “We’re all that’s left of the senior staff. Can’t really blame them for quitting,” Dust added with a shrug of her wings. “They didn’t wanna risk a hit to their pensions.”
A vein Rainbow had never felt before throbbed at the surface of her forehead.
“Whoa, Dash, you okay?” Cloud Kicker pointed towards the pulsating vessel. “Might want to get that checked out.”
Dash ignored her, still addressing Dust. “So everypony followed Spitfire out the door huh? What about Soarin? Rapidfire? C’mon, even Echo Fleetfoot? She’s not much older than us.”
“Err… let me see, umm…” Lightning Dust grabbed a personnel file from the inside her jacket pocket. “Soarin: early retirement—everypony knows he and Spitfire are an item so no surprises there; Rapidfire didn’t want to stay without his sister in charge, so another early retirement; and Fleetfoot’s got endorsements and modeling offers out the wazoo—ex-Wonderbolt, young, cute, and blind. She’ll end up making more money than any of us.”
Dust raised an eyebrow at the next sheet, showing it to Cloud Kicker. “Kicker, this your hoofwriting?”
Cloud Kicker looked and scratched her head, just as puzzled. “Not mine. I don’t dot my I’s with balloons.”
“Lemme see.” Rainbow Dash reached across and snagged the folder from Cloud Kicker’s outstretched foreleg. An odd command was written in a whimsical scrawl at the bottom of the page. “‘Look in the file cabinet, under the letter S’?” she read aloud.
They all turned as one towards the old, dented file cabinet sitting in the corner, one of the few items not replaced upon Rainbow’s takeover. It took on a sudden malevolence, like a long forgotten unmarked container lurking in the back of a fridge.
Noticing she was currently closest to the suddenly infernal cabinet, Dash joined the other mares, on the side of the desk furthest away from it.
“Well, you’ve always led from the front, Rainbow. You open it,” Cloud Kicker said, pushing her visibly reluctant superior towards the set of drawers.
“Will you chill?” Dash said, shrugging her off. “It’s just some old paperwork or something. But since you’re both so scared of the ohhh so terrifying filing cabinet, I guess it’s up to the Dash, as usual. You two chickens just watch my back in case I’m suddenly attacked by a bloodthirsty swarm of manila folders.”
Lightning Dust and Cloud Kicker might have bought her bluster had she not grabbed a trophy off a shelf.
Slowly, ever so slowly, she pulled open the drawer marked ‘S’, raised the trophy like a cudgel in her other hoof…
And…
“SURPRISE!”
“ARRGH!” Rainbow Dash leapt backwards, blinded by the explosion of confetti at point blank range. Carefully organized stack of documents went flying across the room and to the floor in a flurried mess as she hit the edge of her desk, her hip noting that oak was indeed a very hard wood, flipped over the top, and ended up overturning her chair, one squeaky wheel left spinning lazily in the air.
At some point, she had lost grip of the trophy, and it flew across the room. Its final destination: Cloud Kicker’s face.
Lightning Dust looked from her likely concussed wingmate over to the blonde, white-coated pegasus who was now struggling to extract her torso from the tight space.
Like anypony who had lived in Ponyville and wished to remain relatively sane, Cloud Kicker and Rainbow Dash had developed a certain quirk to the way their minds reacted to impossible events, and in particular, Pinkie Pie. That psychological fail-safe carefully shunted the question, "How did a pony that size get into the filing cabinet?" off to a nice safe deserted area to be properly disposed of later.
Lightning Dust, unfortunately, didn’t have the same fail-safe.
“Phew!” the newcomer cried, pulling her wings out with a pop and wiping the sweat from her brow. “Took you long enough. I’ve been waiting in there for, like, fore-ev-eerrrr! Wow, I haven’t seen a pony fall down and start foaming at the mouth like that since I wrecked Spitfire’s living room while riding a hippopotamus that one time… okay, two times. Soarin thought it was funny.”
With a groan, Rainbow hauled herself up back into her chair. She ignored her subordinate currently having a fit on the floor in favor of staring at her surprise guest feeling a terrible sense of dread.
Poofy blonde mane and tail, powder-white coat, random non-sequiturs. Dash’s eyes lingered on the trio of violet balloons on the mare’s flank.
Surprise. Why did it have to be Surprise? Dash mentally banged her head against an imaginary wall. There was a reason Spitfire had sent the Wonderbolts’ self-proclaimed party planner far far away, all the way across the continent to the western coast of Equestria, put in command of the Wonderbolt reserves. Dash hadn’t personally worked with Surprise much, but she knew of her reputation. She was too wild, too crazy, too unpredictable.
Like Pinkie Pie.
Had an annoying tendency to break out into song at any moment.
Like Pinkie Pie.
Now that she thought about it, Dash wasn’t sure how she’d missed the pattern. Suddenly, she was forced to lean back, her view overtaken by huge violet pupils.
Again, Rainbow found the lack of respect for personal space eerily familiar.
“So were you surprised?! Were ya were ya were ya?” The vibrating facsimile bounced up and down with each repetition. Rainbow opened her mouth, but was cut off as the pegasus backflipped off the desk to land flawlessly with what Dash swore was a sproing. “I really, really hope so. Surprise is my chief weapon… or is it fear?” she added at the end, rubbing her chin. “I always get those two mixed up.”
At Rainbow’s still-blank expression, one shared by the other pegasi in the room, Surprise smacked her noggin. “Silly me. I forgot to introduce myself,” she said with a blush of embarrassment. “How rude. I tell ya, if my wings weren’t bolted on, I’d forget where I’d left them. Thank Celestia I’ve got spares, am I right?” Her smile displayed all her teeth in all their smileriffic glory.
“Err…” Rainbow scratched her mane, still lightheaded.
“Sorry, sorry. Rambling again,” the white pony apologized, then stood up straight, wings flared, chest puffed out. “First Lieutenant Surprise Surprise Surprise, Head of the Wonderbolt Reserve Division reporting for duty, Captain.” Surprise finished with a picture-perfect salute, one that would make even the most stringent drill sergeant weep with joy. Rainbow Dash was about to say something, but was cut off as Surprise pulled a large scroll from her mane. The scroll unwound as she continued, “And acting Lead Drill Instructor, and acting Assistant Drill Instructor, and acting Head Stunt Coordinator, and acting Head Chef of the Cafeteria…” As she rambled on and on, the mound of paper rapidly rose up to her knees. “...And finally, acting Assistant to the Assistant Janitor. But you can just call me Surprise, ma’am. All my friends do.”
Rainbow stared in silence at the stock-still Surprise. Even Cloud Kicker appeared impressed by the lieutenant’s posture. It was textbook perfect; she would have seen enough at Westhoof to know.
“Nice to have you onboard, Pink—I mean Surprise,” Rainbow quickly corrected. Surprise still stood at attention like a marble statue. “Umm… at ease?”
“Oh, thank goodness.” A loud breath escaped from Surprise, and she resumed lightly bouncing. “Standing still is just tooorture!”
“…Right, so—” A thought. The reserves! Of course! Dash felt like smacking herself. The answer to her personnel problem was standing right in front of her. “Surprise,” she said said with her first smile of the day. “Just the mare I need. How fast can you round up the reserves for inspection?”
“Way ahead of you, Captain,” Surprise chirped. “All members of the reserve are present and ready for orders, ma'am.”
“Excellent! Let’s take look.” Dash spun in her chair to face the practice field. It was empty. “Surprise, why don’t I see anypony outside?”
“Because they all quit, duh! It’s just little old me. Not sure why you were looking outside.” She giggled. “Geez, Captain, I figured listing off all my new jobs would’ve tipped you off. Speaking of, any chance I can get a raise?”
“What?!” Dash shouted. “The entire reserve quit? Why?!”
“I dunno.” Surprise gave a small shrug of her wings. “A few of them did say something about not wanting to take orders from Princess Twilight’s pet parrot. I told them, ‘Rainbow Dash doesn’t even like crackers!’ They just looked at me like I was a few snowflakes short of a blizzard. Reserve HQ being empty is a huge problem though,” she added in more serious tone. “ The higher-ups might think we don’t need it anymore and reassign it to somepony else. I know I saw some Royal Guard eyeing up the place when I skedaddled.”
Dash buried her face in her hooves. “Wonderful. Anypony have any more good news?”
“Eh-heh…” Cloud Kicker had a crooked grin on her face. It didn’t fill Rainbow with confidence. “The thing is boss… Actually,” she shoved Lightning Dust forward. “Dust will tell you. Go ahead, Dusty.”
“What? No way! You tell her!”
"Ooh, ooh! Can I not tell her too?" Surprise asked, waving her hooves in the air.
“You don’t even know what we’re talking about!” Cloud Kicker yelled.
Surprise pouted and crossed her forelegs in a huff. “I know. I just didn’t wanna be left out of the conversation.”
“Just get to the point, Cloud Kicker!”
“Alright, alright. Cool your jets, Dash.” Cloud Kicker handed over a newspaper from her saddlebag. “Here. Read it and weep. Page two, second article down.”
They gave Dash a minute and watched. Her face contorted, scowling and turned redder the further along she read. The first line proved enough to get Dash fuming.
In an example of Princess Twilight’s new cronyism, noted associate Rainbow ‘Danger’ Dash of Ponyville was promoted to leader of Her Highness’s Wonderbolts. Some critics of Equestria’s newest ruler point out that the resignation of the Wonderbolts’ entire command was a direct result to Her Highness’s proposed budget restructuring. Many mark the coincidence that said resignations paved the way for the appointment of her close friend. Nepotism aside, this reporter wonders how effective Equestria’s top air defense team will be in a crisis now that it’s helmed by a pony some call an upjumped weather manager of a small rural village.
Rainbow launched out of her chair and began to pace around the room in mid-air. The rest of the squad prudently flattened against the walls.
“Upjumped small-town weather manager?! Why those little muckraking…”
She paused and, to Kicker’s surprise, exhaled in a slow controlled manner while running a hoof from her chest outwards. ‘Push the stress away and let it dissipate into the air.’ Twilight’s advice. It certainly was a much better short-term stress reliever than Dash’s first instinct: ‘Trackdown the feathering featherbrains and stomp them into a red paste.’
“Okay, so not everypony likes me in charge—”
Lightning Dust used a wing to cover a cough.
“—but Rainbow Dash has been doubted her whole life. But you know what the Dash does?”
“Curls up into a ball of self-loathing and doubt?” suggested Cloud Kicker.
“Gives a self-righteous and condescending lecture on friendship?” offered Lightning Dust.
“Binge on a dozen cupcakes then fly around the track really fast ’til the sugar rush wears off and you crash into the guys’ locker room, sign a sexual harassment warning, and then do it all over again, but with different flavor cupcakes?”
Dash sat in silence for moment before giving them all a flat look. “Why am I friends with you again?”
“Because I’m Lighting Dust, duh,” Dust answered with a cocky smirk, spreading her wings in what Dash guessed was an action pose. “Why settle for the rest when you’re friends with the best?”
Not to be outdone, Cloud Kicker turned to shake her flank in Dash’s direction, glancing back with a cheeky wink. “’Cause I’ve got a kickin’ backside? Yeah, I’ve seen you sneakin’ a peek. No need to deny it, Dashie,” she teased, flicking her tail.
“Wow, we’re friends already?” Surprise fluttered her wings in excitement. “We only just met, but I feel the same way! We should totally hang out. How about next Friday? No, wait. I’ve got balloon animal training that day. I’m this close to pulling off the flaming hoop trick.”
And the throbbing vein made another appearance. “No… I prove them wrong by being the most awesome pony at what I do.” Dash said, picking up her previous thought. She turned and motioned towards the gold pegasus statue which dominated the center of the practice field outside.
“From now on, whenever ponies think of the most legendary run the Wonderbolts ever had, they’re going to think of me: the most awe—”
“Yeah, geez, we get it, Dash,” interrupted Lightning Dust, rolling her eyes. “You’re the most awesome thing to ever awesome, yadda yadda. We’ve heard it a million times. Stop beating your chest; you’re gonna bruise it.”
Rainbow sat back down, kicking up her rear legs onto the desk. “You’re just jealous,” she said smugly, eliciting a snort from Lightning. “Thinking about it now, I’m obviously the best candidate for the job.”
“And don’t forget, the only candidate!” Surprise chimed, causing both Lightning Dust and Cloud Kicker to send her angry glares. She shrugged. “What? Was that supposed to be a secret?”
“Wait, what?” Rainbow narrowed her eyes at the trio of officers. “Guys, talk to me.” Cloud Kicker had a hoof over her face. Dust was staring really hard at the ceiling. Surprise… well… looked about the same as always, grinning from ear to ear.
“It’s just that…” mumbled Cloud Kicker, unconsciously rubbing behind her neck.
“Well…” Lightning continued.
“Being captain blows worse than finding oatmeal-raisin cookies hiding among a plate of perfectly good chocolate-chip cookies! I mean what sort of monster does that?! Am I right?” Surprise complained.
“That doesn’t make any sense!” Rainbow yelled at Surprise’s ridiculous statement, throwing up her hooves. She wasn’t sure which bit made less sense, but, for the sake of her sanity, questioned only the ‘no one wants to be captain’ part.
She pointed to each of them in turn. “Surprise, of the four of us, you’ve been in the Wonderbolts the longest. Just by experience you’re qualified for the job.” The white pegasus shrugged, letting out a small “meh.”
Rainbow then directed her hoof at the Cloud Kicker. “CK, you attended Westhoof. You’ve got practical military leadership training coming out your—”
Cloud Kicker perked up and grinned.
“—ears.”
The grin disappeared.
Finally, she turned to face the fourth pegasus in the room.
“And you, Lightning Dust. You’ve always tried to one-up me ever since we met.”
“True that.”
“Yet now, for some crazy reason, you never threw your hat in the ring. Why?”
Lighting Dust looked over to Cloud Kicker who shrugged and nodded.
“Being captain sucks,” she explained matter-of-factly.
Dash blinked. “What?”
“She’s right. It blows horseapples, Dash,” Cloud Kicker admitted. “Trust me. As a military brat, I know.”
“But-but being Captain of the Wonderbolts is supposed to be a dream job. Every kid dreams of joining the ’Bolts. The fame, the fans, everything! Becoming captain is like becoming the best Wonderbolt. Why wouldn’t you want the job?”
“Same reason my dad hated being a officer in the guard,” Cloud Kicker explained. “The higher up you are, the more paperwork gets sent your way. Then you’ve got the brass coming down from the top, plus worrying if somepony below you is going to screw up.”
“Yeah, and you've got to say no a lot,” added Surprise, hanging her head and allowing her tail to droop, “and that makes ponies sad. I joined the Wonderbolts to make ponies happy. Oh, and the parties!” Perking up, she pulled a noise-maker from her mane, thrusting it into Cloud Kicker's mouth. Wrapping the surprised pegasus in a tight hug, she squeezed, giggling as the party favor squawked. “Those are supertastical!”
“Let’s not forget the functions with snobby bigwigs you gotta attend. Total snorefests.” Lighting Dust stuck her tongue out. “No thanks. Plus, the Princesses are your bosses. You screw up, it’s a trip to the moon. Way too much pressure. Me, I’ll stick with the carefree life of the wing commander. Less responsibilities and more time to fly.”
Surprise and Cloud Kicker high hoofed her in agreement.
“More time for banging!”
“More time to party!”
“Tch, how much harder can it be than my old weather manager gig?” Rainbow waved dismissively. “I turned Ponyville’s team into a well oiled machine, didn’t I?”
Cloud Kicker shook her head. “Let me be serious for a moment.” A snort escaped Lightning Dust. “Have I ever lied to you, Dash?”
“Err…”
“Correction, have I ever lied to you about anything important?”
“Can’t say you have, CK.”
“Then believe me when I say this: the Wonderbolts are a huuuge leap from managing a small-town weather team, boss. Command, especially militarycommand, isn’t a lazy flight on a clear day. Expect heavy turbulence.” Leaning forward, Dash listened intently as all of Cloud Kicker’s usual humor was absent. “There are no breaks, no naptimes, and no pawning off responsibilities onto somepony else. The bit stops with you, Captain Dash. If, even for a split second, you don’t feel absolutely, one hundred and ten percent sure you’re up to the job, then you should resign right now.
“Think really carefully. It’s not just your reputation on the line here, Dash, but Princess Sparkle’s too. You’re behind that desk by her appointment; one of her first, in fact. You screw up and it’ll reflect really badly on her. If nobility smell blood in the water, they’ll be all over Twilight like a school of wild piranhas. Anything she touches from then on will be tainted by the failure of her first official appointment.
“You quit now and nopony will think any less of you. You stay, I’ll have your back just like always. I’m sure my two comrades here will too, right girls?” The other two officers nodded. “So what’s it going to be?”
For Rainbow Dash, it wasn’t even a question. “Twilight picked me to do a job and Rainbow Dash doesn’t let anypony down, especially not one of her best friends. I’m staying.”
“I never doubted you for a second, Dash,” said Cloud Kicker, nodding. “First order of business: how to address the huge holes currently in the senior staff.”
“Can’t we just promote some ponies?” Dash asked. “Who do we have on the standby list?”
Consulting a clipboard, Cloud Kicker listed off, “On standby we’ve got Cloudchaser, Raindrops, Bulk “Snowflake” Biceps, and Thunderlane, most of our graduating class.” She chewed the bottom of her lip and shook her head. “If we pull them, don’t expect any birthday presents from Blossomforth for a while.”
“Terrific,” Rainbow growled into her hooves before throwing them up in the air.
She had promoted Blossomforth to head weather manager before joining the Wonderbolts full time. From the times she visited, Blossomforth was doing a great job. Not as great as when Rainbow was in charge, of course, but she was getting there.
“Ugh, fine. We’ve no choice. Poach Ponyville’s weather team and draw up assignment recommendations. Maybe I can get Pinkie to bake Blossom a ‘Sorry for gutting your department’ cake or something.”
“You’re not the only one with problems.” Cloud Kicker tried to lighten the mood with a joke. “Take me for example. I’ve got to deal with the new cadets coming in.” A wistful sigh. “Imagine. Me, around all those tight, toned bodies. Everypony at the peak of fitness. Muscles taut after flying laps, outlined through those clingy, barely-there little uniforms. Beads of sweat glistening...”
“Umm… CK, you’re drooling on the carpet,” Lightning Dust told her.
“Sounds like your dream come true,” Rainbow Dash added, passing her a spare napkin.
“Pfft, I wish,” Cloud Kicker grumbled. “You know the military’s policy on fraternization. Subordinates are off-limits. I’m stuck window-shopping or risk getting court-martialed. Totally draconian if you ask me.” She groaned and put her head down. “Arrgh, this is gonna be torture.”
“I’d worry more about actually getting anypony to ogle first,” Lightning Dust said. “We’ve got a major recruitment problem right now.” The bad news kept piling up.
“How’s that even possible?” Rainbow asked. “The academy processes hundreds of applications every year. There’s never been a shortage. Everypony I grew up with would give their left wing just for a shot at joining the Wonderbolts.”
Dust pointed a hoof at the new captain. “Yeah, but they wanted to join Spitfire’s Wonderbolts. Not Rainbow Dash’s Wonderbolts. You’re an unknown quantity, Dash. The best flyers are waiting to see how you pan out. If you crash in a flaming pile of fail, they don’t want any of it to stick to them.”
“Unknown? Did somepony do a Sonic Rainboom or save the world while I was sleeping?”
“Those things, while great, Dash, only prove you’re an exceptional pony. Doesn’t mean you’ll make a exceptional leader. Spitfire proved she was both, and they idolize her for it. I know I signed up just for the chance to fly under her.”
Dash couldn’t disagree. Spitfire’s magnetism was certainly what had driven her to train hard every day. She remembered the magic of the first show she’d attended as a fledgling. Watching from on top of her father’s shoulders as the then-rookie Spitfire performed one blazing fast stunt after another. The flash, the power, the buzzing excitement the flame-haired pegasus had generated. It was at that moment that Dash knew without a doubt what she wanted to do with her life.
“Bottom line: with Spitfire gone, our usual pool of recruits has gone from overflowing to dry as a bone.” Dust finished with a defeated shake of her head.
“Oh that reminds me.” Surprise rummaged around her yellow cotton-candy-soft mane before presenting Dash with a brown parcel. “The captain—not you, Captain, the old captain—wanted me deliver this to you. I don’t know what it is. Oooh, maybe it’s candy!” she said hopefully. “Please let it be candy! Can I have some if it’s candy?”
Ignoring Surprise, Rainbow Dash took a letter opener to the package and laid out the contents: a letter, a bottle of brandy, one dog-eared copy of How to Swear like a Sailor in Ten Easy Lessons and finally, what Dash found most intriguing, a trio of snapshots.
Snapshots of Spitfire and the other ex-Wonderbolts.
At the beach.
In swimsuits.
Posed in what some would call a rather provocative manner. Each was signed, “Betcha wish you were here!”
“Yoink! I’ll just take those.” Cloud Kicker snatched the pictures and tucked two away in her shirt pocket. The third was… well, extra special so she hid it in her mane for, what Dash could only assume was quick access later. “You know… Umm… I think I need to take these to my room for…” She circled a hoof searchingly, “…safe keeping. Yup, wouldn’t want these to get lost.”
Lighting Dust craned her neck to see what could make the usually unflustered Cloud Kicker sweat all of a sudden. She let out a loud wolf whistle.
Glancing back over her shoulder with a flirty wink, back arched to the camera, was Spitfire in a sheer black one-piece. The already smoldering image was made even hotter when one noticed that she was being treated to suntan oil rubdown by a gleaming Soarin. The buff stallion’s wet and matted coat glistened in the sun, clearly just returned from a swim in the ocean. It was enough to give any pony, mare or stallion, a massive nosebleed.
Rainbow motioned Cloud Kicker to stay. She knew her old flight camp buddy too well. If Cloud Kicker was allowed to leave now, she wouldn’t be seen for the rest of the day. Dash chose not to ask, and frankly didn’t want to know, what Cloud Kicker would be getting up to later. Ignorance was bliss in this case.
Taking the cue from her teammate, Lightning Dust helped herself to the brandy. After all, it was free booze. “Not bad,” she commented after taking a swig. She offered the open bottle to Cloud Kicker, whose wings were unfurled all over the sofa.
“Indirect kisses, Dusty?” she chuckled, grabbing the bottle. “You shouldn’t have. Mmm… I’ve wanted to get a taste of you for a while.”
Eyes rolling, Dust made a gagging noise.
Glad to be left out of Cloud Kicker’s shenanigans for once, Rainbow Dash opened the letter.
Congratulations on your promotion, newbie. Just letting you know there’s no hard feelings about you getting my job. As a gift, because I’m just generous like that, I’ve included two items that helped me survive command. Use them well.
Word of advice, kid. The Wonderbolts are yours now. Since its founding, each leader has left his or her own mark. I know I was your role model; heck, it’s flattering to no end. I rub it in Soarin’s face every chance I get. But—and this is huge—don’t try to copy me. Be your own mare. Show Equestria what the Wonderbolts are capable of under the first pony to do the Sonic Rainboom in forever.
I’d ask you to do me proud, but I already know you will.
-Spitfire
P.S.
I put your name forward, so don’t blame Princess Twilight. Consider it payback for that itching powder cloud prank you pulled at graduation.
P.P.S.
Read the book cover to cover. Trust me, you’ll need it.
P.P.P.S.
Included is a special present for Cloud Kicker. Try to keep them clean.
Right. If Spitfire believed in her, Dash vowed not to let her down. When she was done, flyers from all over Equestria would be kicking down her door.
It’s not like she’d be alone. Rainbow looked at the three faces across from her: the playful yet dependable smile of an old friend and colleague, the confident smirk of a rival, and a oddly blithe grin of Surprise.
Rainbow Dash chuckled to herself. If anypony would’ve told her younger self she’d someday understand what a word like ‘blithe’ meant, let alone well enough to use it in correct context, she’d have laughed her tail off. Heck, if Twilight found out, she’d probably use her Princess powers to declare a national holiday.
Straightening up, the new captain issued her first orders with a sweep of a hoof.
“Cloud Kicker, I want a list of possible promotions on my desk first thing in the morning.”
“You got it, boss.” Cloud Kicker saluted.
“Lightning Dust.” Dust nodded. “Find us some cadets. Winners of recent major racing events, skilled weather ponies, stunt flyers, anypony.” Rainbow Dash leaned forward with the beginnings of a feral grin forming. “Leave no cloud unturned, and I mean none of them. If you think a candidate is Wonderbolt material then I don't care where you find them. Keep a special eye out for any guard recruits who wash out for discipline reasons or even if they look like they may want an alternative career flying instead of impersonating statues all day.”
Lightning Dust gave a sloppy salute. “Consider it done.”
“Surprise, you—where’d you get that cloudcake?!”
“Wha? This?” Crumbs sprayed from Surprise's mouth, decorating Dash’s blue fur with tiny specks of vanilla frosting.
Rainbow looked on, expressionless, at the fluffy white layer cake. A specialty exclusive to Cloudsdale, the special mix of leaveners meant one risked the cake floating away unless it was tethered a specially designed weighted cake stand. While this property was thankfully lost to each piece when cut, the taste was lighter than any other type of cake known to ponykind.
The words ‘Congratulations Ranblow Dish!’ were written in multicolored frosting on the one now hovering over a small side table.
“You want a piece?” Surprise bounced over with up a large chunk of misspelled name balanced on her wing. Unfortunately, the trophy from earlier made itself known, catching the edge of one her forehooves. “Oopsie!”
Splut!
Good thing the shade of frosting matched Dash’s coat. Bits of moist sponge cake slid down her face as she drummed her hooves. Her so called ‘friends’ collapsed on the floor laughing while Surprise hopped over.
“I’m sooo sorry!” she said. “I’ll have you cleaned up in a jiffy!” Before Dash could blink her vision turned pink, moist, and a bit sticky. The others stared in fascination. Lightning Dust couldn’t figure out how anypony could fit such a ridiculously long tongue in their mouth, while based on the lecherous leer painted on her face, Cloud Kicker had a much different thought.
“I really, really like where this is going.”
“Mmm… sweet and spicy!” said Surprise as soon as she finished ‘cleaning,’
Fortunately for Surprise's continued survival, years of dealing with ‘Pinkie baths’, a phrase coined by Applejack, had worn her down. She found getting upset pointless and simply settled for begrudging acceptance. She took a hopelessly outmatched tissue to her drool covered fur.
“Surprise, you’re close friends with all the Wonderbolts who took off, right?” the spittle-covered captain asked her springy subordinate.
“Absolutely-positutely! They don’t call me ‘The Party in the Sky’ for nothing!” Her blonde curls bounced as she nodded vigorously. “My aftershow parties were the best.
“Everypony loved them, except for the one time with the tuba, the bottle of vodka, and the flock of skylarks. I may have been a bit tipsy when I planned that one. It all worked out in the end though. Still,” she huffed, “Fleetfoot totally didn’t need to yell at me. Her eyebrows grew back. And then there was that other time at the Manehatten zoo—”
The party pony’s rambling continued for another minute until, at a nod from Dash, Cloud Kicker stuffed a hoof in her mouth.
“That’s great, Surprise. And exactly why you’re the best pony to convince them to come back,” Dash spoke quickly then nodded for Cloud Kicker to remove her hoof, who, apparently enjoying the wet sensation, did so with reluctance.
“Roger roger, dodger dodger, Dashie!” Surprise cranked out a salute. “But first, you know what this calls for?”
“…A party?” Dash guessed, rolling a hoof in the air while resting a check against the her other.
“Wow! How’d you guess?” Her eyes narrowed, Surprise leaned forward and smooshed Dash’s cheeks together. “Are you psychic?” She circled her hooves against the sides of her head. “Quick! What am I thinking right now?”
“...Cupcakes?”
Surprise gasped with such force, she inhaled Rainbow’s mane. On the off chance she’d missed some frosting the first time, Surprise chewed the chromatic strands idly for a moment. To her disappointment, it did not taste sweet at all.
Again, years of built up tolerance allowed Dash to calmly wait for the slobbering ordeal to end. Like the Iron Pony herself, Dash’s mane was tough and had survived far greater disasters. She had been struck by lightning, set on fire, shaved in various degrees by both Pinkie Pie in an ill-conceived plan to use hair as an ingredient and Scootaloo in an ill-conceived plan to create an enchanted wig granting… Awesomenessity. Her mane had even survived being styled by Rarity on at least three occasions and a terrifying trip to the spa that had involved curlers.
Not finding any sweetness, Surprise flew in reverse. She reared up, criss-crossing her forelegs like a shield. “She’s scanning me! Get out of my head!”
The others watched, not sure what to make of Surprise as she rolled around on the floor, clutching the sides of her noggin.
“Hey, Dash.” Cloud Kicker waggled her eyebrows. “Can you guess what I’m thinking?”
Without missing a beat, Dash listed off in a deadpan manner, “Surprise. Her tongue. Me, drinking ’til all the brain cells storing that image die, or I black out. Whichever comes first.”
“Wow, either you can read minds or I’ve become really predictable.” Cloud Kicker lifted a hoof to her chin. “Maybe I need to get some new material.”
Lightning Dust snorted. “Does it involve you stopping with the dirty jokes and double entendres? Maybe come up with something with actual class. Or can we just expect more butt jokes?”
Cloud Kicker gasped, looking offended at the very notion. “I think we both know the answer to that question. And since when do you know that brain cells store memories, Dash?”
“Meh.” Rainbow gave her wings a slight shrug. “Kinda picked it up through osmosis hanging out with Twilight all these years. And yes, the fact that I know what osmosis means scares me too.”
Cloud Kicker shrugged. “Better late than never. Some of us actually stayed awake during Basic Weather Management.” She turned to Surprise who was still rolling around, yelling about mind invasion. “You up for some drinking, Surprise?”
“Drinking? I love drinking!” Surprise exploded, previous mental invasion apparently forgotten, bounding to her hooves. She pulled her fellow wing commanders from across the room into an impossible hug. “The only thing I love more is partying. And partying involves drinking. Unless it’s a children’s party, then no booze, only punch. I don’t mean to brag, but I do make the best fruit punch in all of Equestria!“
“I don’t know about that. Bet Pinkie Pie could give you a run for your money.”
Surprise quirked an eyebrow as she squinted at Cloud Kicker. “Pink earth pony?”
Nod.
“The Element of Giggliness?”
“More like Element of Jigglyness. Am I right, Dash? Up high!” The captain remained unamused. Left hanging, Cloud Kicker muttered, “Spoilsport,” lowering her hoof. “Yeah, that’s Pinkie all right.”
“Nope, never heard of her,” said Surprise. She turned and hopped out the door. “C’mon, I know a great place downtown. I’ll race you there.”
Lighting Dust grunted as she stretched her wings. “Alright, but Cloud Kicker gets a head start. No way I’m flying with her on my six. I swear she hangs back on purpose.”
“Sometimes it’s good to slow down and enjoy the sights, Dusty.”
“Well, enjoy them all you like, cuz you’ll be fighting for second place,” Dash bragged. She was halfway out of her chair before Surprise surprised her by gently pushing her back down.
“Nope nope.” Surprise shook her head. “No partying for you, Captain. You’ve got to sign and stamp these maintenance orders by tomorrow.” A large stack of papers were pulled out of her mane then plopped on Rainbow’s desk. “And here’s a brand spanking new ink pad for your hoofstamp. Enjoy! Let’s party, girls!”
A white blur marked the trio’s departure, leaving Dash with only a half-eaten cake and a near-empty bottle of brandy for company.
Rainbow Miriam Dash, Captain of the Wonderbolts glanced from her newly minted captain’s pin to the mountain of paperwork laid on her desk and, not for the first time, wondered—no, knew—she’d been tricked.
Chapter 2: Cadet Scootaloo Reporting For Duty Part One
Chapter 2: Cadet Scootaloo Reporting For Duty Part One
Manehattan 45 Bridleway, Apartment #121 aka Cutie Mark Crusader Clubhouse MK. II
Scootaloo tossed her saddlebags onto the secondhand couch, one of the few pieces of furniture in the run-down, one-bedroom apartment.
Letting out a tired yawn, she flexed and rotated her stiff joints, loosening her tight wings in a flutter. Another day at Speedy Wing Couriers was complete, but left her wings feeling like lead weights.
Much like the rest of her, the young flyer’s wings had grown large to match her body. No longer a little chicken, Scootaloo had sprouted up to become the tallest Crusader. Applebloom had switched to affectionately calling her a ‘giraffe’ on account of how long in the neck she’d gotten.
Throwing aside the soiled grey uniform, Scootaloo couldn’t wait to jump in the shower and rinse off the layers of sweat and grime she’d picked up from flying from one end of the industrial city to the other. Even the lighting bolt crossed tire that made up her cutie mark looked like it had been driven through the mud.
Not the first time it had been soiled. She’d earned, what she termed ‘the most radical cutie mark since Rainbow Dash’s’ during a part time stint at Ponyville’s postal office one summer.
A bad strain of the feather flu had knocked out half the delivery ponies. Everypony else saw it as bad luck. Scootaloo saw it as a challenge. The speedster had hitched a wagon loaded with half the day’s mail to her trusty scooter and burnt a trail clear across town. In a thunderstorm. Every piece delivered to the correct address. All in under an hour.
She’d been fired immediately for misappropriating equipment without consent, but who cared? Cutie mark earned, and it was ever so sweet.
Made sense she’d fall into a similar job in Manehattan. It was a cruddy job in many respects: the hours were long and her bosses were jerks, but as one of the quicker couriers in the company—the fastest in her opinion—she got some of the most lucrative assignments, so the money was great.
Or great for Ponyville, at least. Scootaloo sniffed, looking at the bits of paint peeling off the walls as she walked across the worn carpet. She winced as her hoof touched a stiff dried-on stain, not even wanting to guess what it had been.
It took all three Crusaders working to afford living in Manehattan. She loved the girls, and had fond memories of sleepovers when they were fillies, but three adult mares sharing one princess-size mattress got real old, real fast.
After a long luxurious shower, Scootaloo raided the kitchen. Following a nutritious snack of sliced apples covered in peanut butter, washed down by a protein shake, Scootaloo crashed onto the couch with a loud belch. Her eyes wandered over nothing in particular. She felt like vegetating.
This being a weekday, Sweetie Belle would be back from her shift at the jazz club soon enough and she could hear Applebloom’s snores coming from the bedroom. She was probably exhausted after a full day of classes at the Manehattan School for Architecture, plus a shift at the construction site.
The earth pony’s drive always amazed Scootaloo. She didn’t think she could manage studying and working at the same time. Of the three Crusaders, Apple Bloom turned out to be only one destined for higher education. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle had followed their fellow crusader to Manehatten for their own reasons; Sweetie Belle to start her singing career.
If she was honest with herself, Scootaloo had only come along to not be left behind. She felt a little jealous of her friends. They at least pursued real careers, while she was stuck in a dead end job.
With nothing better to do, Scootaloo took to sorting the day’s mail. Electric bill, water bill... To her frustration the water bill had gone up.
Again.
Feathering utilities. What a bunch of robbers. This was the third rate increase this year.
The girls would have to switch to shorter showers if they wanted to stay in budget. Just great. One of the few luxuries Scootaloo actually enjoyed, gone. There was nothing like a nice hot shower to relax tight muscles after a long day. Sweetie, especially, was going to just ‘love’ the news she couldn’t take bubble baths anymore.
Oh well, back to the mail. ‘You may have already won a million bits’, Musicians Monthly for Sweetie, a letter from the Wonderbolts, another bill…
Eyes widening, in her scramble, Scootaloo scattered the other suddenly inconsequential pieces of mail to the four corners of the room. Her hooves shook as she beheld envelope. Stamped with the Wonderbolts’ insignia, in her mind at least, it contained the single most important, life-changing piece of paper she’d ever received.
“Hey, Scoots! What you got there?”
Startled, the young pegasus squeaked in surprise. The letter was thrown into the air to be caught in a green aura. Scootaloo hadn’t even heard Sweetie Belle enter.
“Geez, Sweetie! You scared the horsefeathers outta me,” heaved Scootaloo.
Sweetie Belle giggled. “Sorry, but you were kinda zoned out. What’s got you so distracted? Usually you come home and pass out on the couch.” Scootaloo pointed to the letter by way of answering. The unicorn’s eyes grew large when she got a closer look. “The Wonderbolts?” It came out as a whisper then grew into a cry. “The Wonderbolts, Scoots!” She wrapped her friend in a hug, hopping up and down in joy. “You made it into the Wonderbolts!”
A raised orange hoof halted her celebration. “That’s a ways off, Sweetie. The letter’s just from the academy. I haven’t even opened it yet.”
“Well what are you waiting for?” Sweetie asked in growing impatience. The pegasus rolled her eyes. Sweetie acted like her future hung in the balance.
“Well somepony interrupted me.”
“Open it then.”
Scootaloo held a hoof up for patience. “I want to open it carefully. Savor the moment, you know? I don’t want any rips on the envelope when I get it framed.”
“Hmm… Nah.” Before her friend could react, Sweetie ripped open the envelope with her magic. “Let’s see here.” She kept the angry pegasus at bay with a light repulsion spell while reading aloud.
“Dear Scootaloo: Thank you for your application to Wonderbolt Academy. Blah, blah… the application process is rigorous… Wow, they sure like to draw things out.” She skipped to the important part. “Here we go.” She cleared her throat and continued, “We are happy to inform you that we are prepared to accept you—”
Scootaloo jumped into the air and freaked out, screaming,“Yes! Yes!” pumping her hooves while spinning wildly around the room. She was in! She was bucking in. A lifetime of work paying—
“—as our new waterpony.”
Scootaloo blinked. “Wait, what?” Her mind froze, and lost any remaining control over her wings, sending her crashing to the floor in a confused pile. Peals of laughter burst from Sweetie Belle as she hopped away. “No way it says that! Gimme!”
Holding the letter just out of reach with her magic, A giggling Sweetie Belle led the wannabe Wonderbolt on a merry chase around the living room. Scootaloo growled with every missed pounced, the unicorn weaving the piece paper erratically as she ran. Finally. Sweetie made the mistake of trying to leap over the couch, on which Scootaloo had been heaped only moments before. Her hind leg caught on the backrest, earning her a face-full of cushions.
Not missing the opportunity, Scootaloo dived bombed her prone friend and flipped her over. “Revenge!” she shouted, then commenced the tickle torture, rubbing her feathers up and down the white unicorn’s now vulnerable cutie marks. She gave Sweetie’s music-note-embossed hearts no mercy, the tickling making her victim squeal. “Say uncle.”
“Uncle! Uncle!” Sweetie cried, causing her torturer to roll off. “No fair, using your wings, you featherhead. I almost peed myself,” she panted out, catching her breath as Scootaloo retrieved the discarded letter.
“Well, that’s what you get for messing with the fastest pegasus in Manehattan,” Scootaloo bragged, puffing up her chest.
“Maybe the biggest ego in Manhattan,” said Sweetie Belle, earning a playful punch. “Ow, not so hard.” She rubbed her shoulder with a pout only for Scootaloo to shake her head.
“That wasn’t hard. You need to start working out more,” she said, giving Sweetie’s soft flank a poke. “Got to get some muscles on you like me,” she added, flexing the muscles around her open wings for emphasis.
The petite unicorn turned up her nose and affected a prim and prissy huff which would’ve made her sister proud. “I’m a singer. As such, I need to stay slim, soft, and sexy.” She got up to give a twirl and finished with a sultry wink. Scootaloo giggled as Sweetie Belle spoke, sounding more and more like her prim elder sister. “I’ll leave the muscles to uncouth ruffians such as yourself, if you please. Now fetch me some refreshment, waterpony. I am positively parched.”
“Oh, ha ha.” Scootaloo flapped to the kitchenette, returning with a full glass which became enveloped in Sweetie’s green aura. “Okay, so you had me going for, like, a second,” she admitted as Sweetie sipped.
“Yeah, well, I needed to pay you back for dumping rainbow dye in my shampoo last month.” Sweetie gave her pink and purple toned mane a loving toss. “Nopony messes with my hair and gets away with it.”
“I told you it was an accident. I wanted to try the rainbow look. I just got the bottles mixed up, is all.”
The unicorn raised a well-groomed eyebrow. “And the glue on the toilet?”
“That was me trying to fix the crack in the seat,” Scootaloo admitted sheepishly while scratching the back of her neck. “But I swear, if I’d known we’d end up having to shave your butt, I would have waited for Apple Bloom to fix it.”
“What’s all the ruckus?”
Stopping their argument for a minute, the pair watched Apple Bloom stumble into the living room. Still dressed in her apple-dotted pajamas, she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes before letting out a wide-mouthed yawn. “Some of us are tryin’ ta sleep, ya know.”
There would be no more sleep, however; Sweetie emitting a high pitched squeal put paid to the notion of going back to bed.
The others protected their ears, lest they go deaf. They’d seen the amateur singer shatter crystal champagne flutes once, such was her pitch. Needless to say, her elder sister had been less than thrilled by the loss of her very expensive glassware. Words had been exchanged, some of the sort normally found on the back of dumpsters. Words the Crusaders never expected to spew forth from the mouth of a prim and proper lady such as Rarity.
“Lan’ sakes! What’s got Sweetie more excited than jackrabbit on a—”
“Oh nothing,” interrupted Scootaloo, cutting off another Apple family countryism before it got rolling. She buffed a hoof against her chest. “Just got accepted into Wonderbolt Academy. No biggie.”
She was instantly tackled to the ground. The orange pegasus gasped for air as the much stronger earth pony wrapped her hooves around her midsection in a crushing hug. It got worse when Sweetie Belle jumped onto the pony pile.
“Girls, can’t breathe.”
“Oops, sorry there. Sometimes Ah forget mah own strength.”
“Yeah, sorry. Anyway, we just have to celebrate!” Sweetie Belle cheered. “Let’s go to the new wine bar that opened across town.”
“Nah, this ain’t time for yer frou-frou wines and the like.“ Apple Bloom waved her off. “This calls for real drinkin’. Ah got just the thing.” Apple Bloom soon returned from the bedroom with a box of bottles. Scootaloo’s eyes brightened on sight of the label.
“Is this Sweet Apple Acres hard cider?” Sweetie Belle asked, cradling a bottle like it contained the rarest ambrosia.
The earth pony nodded. “Eeyup. Mah sister’s own special recipe. Ah’ve been savin’ it for a special occasion. Ah’d say y’all joinin’ the Wonderbolts sure ‘nuff qualifies.”
“Well, I’m not a Wonderbolt yet,” Scootaloo said with hint of modesty. She used a wing to twist open the cap of the bottle offered to her by Apple Bloom before taking a draft, while Sweetie used magic to open hers, and the earth pony only needed the strength of her bare hoof.
“Phff… Like ya won’t make it. That’s silly talk. Didn’t ya hear? Rainbow Dash is in charge now. No way ya can fail with her there.”
“I wouldn’t count on Dash giving me any special treatment, guys. Remember when she taught me to fly that one summer?”
Just recalling ‘Coach Dash’ made Scootaloo’s wings shudder. During training, Dash had been like a whole other pony. Gone was her supportive honorary sister. In her stead, a loud, foul mouthed monster demanding one more wingup, one more lap around the park, always one more of everything.
“She was brutal. Muscles I didn’t even know I had still get sore just thinking about it.”
“She warned ya ‘fore ya started. She wasn’t gonna let ya quit.”
“I don’t know,” said Sweetie Belle, taking another sip of cider. “Sometimes I thought Rainbow’s training methods were a bit unorthodox. Didn’t she chase you around a track with poo on a stick one time?”
Scootaloo shivered at the memory. “Yeah that was...” she reclined on the couch, “pretty gross. One morning she ordered me to do one hundred jumping jacks under two minutes. If I failed she said she was gonna shave my mane, and if I gave up I’d lose my tail too. I thought she was joking till she showed me the clippers. I never thought I’d ever hate Rainbow Dash.”
“Can’t argue with the results,” said Apple Bloom. “She got ya in the air just like she promised.”
“Yeah, and she treated you to ice cream every Friday.” The unicorn popped open another bottle and lay on her stomach. Scootaloo rolled over to face her friends.
“That was the weird part. It was like...” she searched for the correct word, “...like there were two Rainbows and they didn’t know each other. When we weren’t training, she acted like she wasn’t putting me through Tartarus. Never talked about it. Just did sister stuff.”
“I wouldn’t count out special treatment just yet, guys,” Sweetie chimed in, holding up the letter. “Looks like Dash left a note for you, Scoots.”
Dear Scootaloo
Hey Squirt,
Bet you’re super stoked right now. Wish I could have been there, just to see your face when you read the letter. I remember when I got mine. I tried to play it all cool, you know, for the girls and stuff. I got a reputation to maintain.
Between you and me, (and probably Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. Hi girls!) I was flipping out. At least you’re getting one week’s notice (I’m crossing my hooves the postal service delivers this on time). Me, I got a whole twenty-four hours. Good thing Cloudsdale is only a short flight from Ponyville.
Anyway, I know you and the girls will want to celebrate so I’ll wrap this up. I can’t wait to see your smooth moves, kid. I’m not going to lie, this is going to be the toughest challenge of your life, but I know you’ve got the right stuff.
You learnt under the wing of the Best Flyer in Equestria, after all.
Can’t wait to see you try to break my academy records.
Can’t wait to watch you break my academy records.
Anyway, got other letters to send out so I’ll wrap this up.
Drink a cider for me.
Yours truly,
Love
Meh, screw it
Love (Show this to no one on pain of plucking)
Captain
Your Honorary Big Sis Rainbow Dash
Putting down the letter, Scootaloo knew that for the next few days sleep would be near impossible. Wonderbolt Academy was going to be the most exciting experience of her life. Ever.
Chapter 3: Cadet Scootaloo Reporting For Duty Part Two
Chapter 3: Cadet Scootaloo Reporting For Duty Part Two
Health Office Wonderbolt Academy, Cloudsdale
Dressed in her newly issued cadet flightsuit, Scootaloo sat impatiently in the waiting room.
Despite what she had told Sweetie Belle about not expecting special treatment, Scootaloo had to admit that a part of her was a little disappointed Dash hadn’t met her at the gates. Worse, she’d been sent straight to the health office after her papers had been processed. How was she supposed to know her vaccinations were a month out of date?
Scootaloo hated hospitals, and this place shared the same clinical antiseptic smell she’d come to associate with broken limbs and sunny days stuck indoors. Even the reading material was the same dry trash—all health and lifestyle magazines. Scootaloo was pretty sure she didn’t need to learn a ‘new timesaving recipe for hay omelets’ or ‘one-hundred and one ways to knit a sweater for your hubby’. Her thoughts were rudely interrupted by a high pitched squeal of delight.
“Scootaloo!” She only had a split second to look up before being glomped onto by a yellow blob.
“Alula… Can’t breathe… Too tight,” Scootaloo wheezed. She drew in a deep breath as Alula loosened up.
Pushing the hug monster off, Scootaloo smoothed her mane back into place, rubbing her now sore neck. Talk about a blast from the past. She hadn’t seen Alula since graduation.
“I swear, you’re just as touchy-feely as your sister sometimes.”
Seriously, if Alula’s talent hadn’t been in track and field, Scootaloo swore her cutie mark would be a silhouette of a pony being hugged to death. Even back when they’d attended Cheerilee’s class, Alula had a reputation as a hug ninja. One minute you’d be minding your own business, the next, a cuddle assault out of nowhere.
Nopony was safe from the soft yet incredibly firm embrace of those creamy yellow hooves; not even a filly as feared as Diamond Tiara. Scootaloo remembered the obnoxious filly’s shrieks with a smile.
“Hey, don’t lump me in with Cloud Kicker,” Alula said, sounding a little embarrassed. “Sis is just… Umm… overly affectionate sometimes.”
Scootaloo chuckled and shook her head. Looked like Alula hadn’t changed much in personality or physically. The purple-maned pegasus had always been on the short side, but possessed the slim, athletic build of a track star.
“Anyway, it’s great to see you, Scoots. I don’t think we’ve talked since you, Apple Bloom, and Sweetie Belle left Ponyville. Alula frowned. “You could have written, you know!”
“Yeah, well, we all got a little busy, I guess.” Scootaloo patted her on the shoulder. “Still, it’s nice to see a familiar face around here. Hey, idea! We should totally team up. It’ll be just like our time on track.”
“Yeah, until I made captain and you quit.”
“Whoa, hold on.” Scootaloo held up her forehooves defensively. “You know that’s not why I quit. Track just wasn’t extreme enough for me that’s all. Not enough of a challenge, you know?”
Alula let out a deep sigh. “I told you a dozen times; we weren’t going to light the hurdles on fire. I don’t even want to talk about your exploding shot put idea. I don’t know how you got Apple Bloom to make one, but there was no way I was letting it on the field.”
“And that’s why track didn’t meet my daily requirement of awesome. Fire and explosions up the level of awesome by a factor of ten. Undisputed fact.”
“Uh huh… And the possibility of getting maimed is totally cool because Rainbow Dash said so, I bet?” Alula guessed, arching an eyebrow.
“Exactly! If it’s not dangerous, it’s not worth doing.” Her watertight case made, Scootaloo draped a foreleg around Alula’s shoulders. “We should still team up though. Imagine the two of us. The pride of Ponyville versus the best flyers Equestria has to offer. Aww yeah, they don’t stand a chance. They should just make us Wonderbolts right now.”
Alula giggled. “Actually, not just the two of us.”
The girliest scream Scootaloo had ever heard escaped from the inside the doctor’s office. She hadn’t heard a scream that high pitched since she and Apple Bloom had hidden a spider in Silver Spoon’s desk. Good times.
Both mares watched a light-grey cadet stumble out. Tears ran down his cheeks as he rubbed the patch bandage covering his right shoulder.
“Celestia below that smarts so bad!”
“Rumble?” Scootaloo simply stared as he looked up. As with Alula, some years had passed since Scootaloo had last seen Rumble. Aside from getting taller and gaining some muscle, the colt hadn’t changed much. Rumble’s swept back black mane and round filly-like face remained just as she remembered. Both features had made the shy colt very popular with the girls back when he was captain of the Ponyville’s hoofball team. She’d never seen him cry though.
Alula rolled her eyes. “Oh, suck it up, Rumble. Don’t be such a baby. It’s just a little needle.”
“A little needle?!” he cried, still sniffling. Scootaloo took a good look at his shoulder. That bandage did look pretty big for one needle. “Try five! Nopony told me I was going to get five shots at the same time!” His whining only earned him another eyeroll from Alula while a bead of sweat ran down Scootaloo’s neck.
Not that she was scared. No way. She was Scootaloo, the only filly badass enough to be hoofpicked by great Rainbow Dash to be her sister. Fear? Scootaloo didn’t even know how to spell the word let alone what it meant. In no way was she shivering or filled with the sudden urge to hightail it out the nearest window. Nope, not at all.
“Phff, it’s only a jet injector.” Alula waved a hoof dismissively. “They’re used all over the military. You don’t see me crying. It’s just a little prick.”
“Don’t listen to her, Scoots,” warned Rumble. “She’s used to it. Her entire family’s in the guard. They’re trained to handle pain better than us normal ponies.”
“Hey! I’m normal. I’m just not a wuss, like someponies I could name,” Alula said, pointing towards Rumble. He let out a snort of annoyance. “But I won’t because I’m so nice.”
“NEXT!”
Scootaloo gulped. Both Rumble and Alula wished her luck before leaving.
She stepped into the doctor’s office and the saw the multi-needled injector resting in its cradle. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the monstrosity as the doctor rubbed her shoulder with a swab of alcohol.
“Now hold still. You’ll feel a small pinch.”
— Wonderbolt Academy, Cloudsdale Airstrip
Rubbing the large white bandage on her shoulder, Scootaloo grumbled under her breath. “‘A little prick’, she said. Stupid shot. Stupid Alula.”
“I told you not to believe her,” Rumble said from her left. “My brother has a saying: never trust a mare who doesn’t cry when she breaks her leg.”
“Hello, I’m standing right here, ya know,” Alula called from the right. All three Ponyvillians stood on the main airstrip, watching the other cadets gather into a straight line. “It was just one time, and I only fell off a swing. No big deal.”
That wasn’t how Scootaloo remembered it. “Wait, didn’t Diamond Tiara push you so hard that the swing went over the top bar? I remember now, you fell and one of your front legs snapped. Eww… The bone was poking out of the skin and everything.” She turned little green. “So gross. Everypony was totally freaking out.”
“Meh, it hurt worse when they reset the bone.” Alula grinned. “They tied me down and gave me a bit to bite down on and everything. It was super hardcore,” she finished, sounding way too pleased with herself.
Scootaloo squinted at her friend like she was crazy. Sure, she’d experienced her share of injuries—mostly her or Dash’s fault—but never anything more serious than a broken wing that one time she’d jumped off her parent’s balcony. Dash had carried her to the hospital at what had felt like the speed of sound.
Scootaloo recalled laying in the wheeled cot as Rainbow raged at her nonstop for over an hour about the utter reckless stupidity of flying unsupervised. Dash had gone so far as to threaten to have Twilight cast a tracer spell on Scootaloo so she would know where the filly was at all times.
Scootaloo had always considered it kinda hypocritical. Especially since she’d only been imitating Dash in the first place. Though, now that she thought about it, Rainbow Dash had toned down her own level of risk-taking after Scootaloo had been discharged from the hospital.
Rumble’s whispers pulled Scootaloo out of her thoughts. “Hey, check it out. Are you guys seeing what I’m seeing?” He pointed down the runway.
Following the direction of his hoof, they spied an ash-grey mare with a long violet mane taking a spot at the end of the line. Scootaloo didn’t see a problem. The pegasus looked about the same as all the other cadets. “Am I missing something?”
“Look closer. Check out her wings,” Alula explained. Scootaloo’s gave the cadet’s wings another onceover. What stopped her, her eyes widening, were a pair of leathery, purple wings tucked at the mare’s sides.
Scootaloo let out a whistle. “Wow, batpony, huh? Don’t see too many of those around. Not even in Manehattan.”
“Actually, they’re technically called thestrals,” murmured Rumble. “Batpony is just slang. We should probably stay away from her. Batponies freak me out,” he whispered with a shudder.
Scootaloo raised an eyebrow. Rumble’s attitude surprised her, quite frankly. He was the last pony she expected to harbor tribalist feelings of any sort.
“Aww, is Rumble-Wumble scared of the little batpony? Alula teased with a devious little grin. “‘Fraid she’ll sneak into your room one night and suck your blood?” She chuckled and stepped closer to the colt. “I bet your blood tastes delicious, Rumble. Sweet and innocent. Yes, I can just imagine it. You, tucked nice and cozy in your bed, fast asleep.”
Rumble scurried behind Scootaloo’s taller frame as Alula kept advancing. “Slowly a shadow creeps closer. Closer... then… Chomp! Rumble’s drained faster than a chocolate milkshake at Sugarcube Corner on Free Shake Day!”
“Stop it, Alula,” Scootaloo said. “You’re scaring him. Not cool.”
“N-no she’s not. I’m fine. Haha…” Rumble said from his hiding place behind the orange pegasus. Alula continued to giggle.
Taking pity on him, Scootaloo turned to pat Rumble on shoulder. “Don’t listen to her, Rumble. Alula just likes messing you.”
“Yes I do,” Alula said cheerfully.
“And besides, I’m pretty sure those fangs are for eating fruit. Remember the fruit bats back at Sweet Apple Acres? They had fangs too.”
“Bet they didn’t have talons,” said Alula, directing both their attentions to the opposite side of the field. They watched a griffon coast in for a smooth landing.
Living in Manehattan, one of Equestria's most cosmopolitan cities, Scootaloo had the opportunity to meet quite a few griffons. They were all positively puny compared to the specimen stepping into line with the other cadets.
The griffon’s wingspan dwarfed any of the pegasi on the field and the decision to dye the tips a vibrant shade of pink also helped make her (It was definitely a “her”, Scootaloo noted, as most male griffons wouldn't go anywhere near that color) stand out from the other griffons Scootaloo had encountered.
“So majestic…” Rumble whispered. Alula picked up on his glazed look immediately and pounced.
“Careful there, loverboy. Her beak looks pretty sharp. You might cut your face going in for a kiss.”
“It’d be totally worth it,” Scootaloo heard him mutter.
She shook her head and smiled at the dreamy look on his face. Good luck to him. If Rumble wanted to be distracted chasing griffon tail, it just meant less competition for her. Not that she wasn’t a shoe-in for a spot on the team already.
Come to think of it, batpony and griffon aside, she hadn’t seen any flyers who looked like much of challenge so far. Most of the cadets were mingling with each other with the single visible exception of a barrel chested stallion who, Scootaloo was pretty sure, hadn’t uttered a single hello since arriving. He stood ramrod straight, staring into the distance like a statue.
Noticing where Scootaloo was looking, “Royal guard transfer, if I had to bet. Yup, definitely the right build,” Alula said. “See the huge the muscles around his legs and barrel? Comes from wearing heavy plate armor all day. He’ll be pretty strong, but don’t count on him winning any races.”
Scootaloo and Rumble nodded in agreement. The stallion looked ripped straight from a Royal guard recruitment poster—pristine alabaster coat and a razor-straight, blonde haircut kept short and tapered.
“Atten-shun! Captain on the field! Line up for roll call!” Lightning Dust announced as she and Cloud Kicker landed. “Move move move!”
The recruits scrambled into something resembling a straight line. Scootaloo struggled to remain stoic as her inner fanfilly jumped up and down as Rainbow Dash glided in. The Captain of the Wonderbolts didn’t even kick up a speck of dust on touchdown; her flying was just that polished.
Dressed in crisp officer’s blues complemented by a pair of thick aviator sunglasses, Rainbow Dash looked every bit an officer and a gentlemare. Exuding a no-nonsense air of command, she marched down the ranks, sizing up each cadet one by one. Rumble became her first victim, the poor colt almost sunk to the ground underneath her terrifying glare. Scootaloo keep her eyes front as Dash walked by.
“The Princesses aren’t here to take care of you anymore,” the Captain barked. “While you’re here at Wonderbolt Academy, I’m your mom, your dad, and your goddess. My name is Captain Rainbow Dash. You’ll address me as Captain or ma’am. Some of you have probably heard of me. Maybe I signed an autograph or posed for a snapshot with you after a show.
“Well, my advice is to chuck those memories right off the feathering cliff! From now on you’re no longer fans. You’re balls of clay Celestia placed in my hooves to mold and shape as I see fit. When I say fly, you fly. When I say eat, you eat. When I say take a dump, I don’t care if you're standing in front of your damn mother, you take a Celestia damned dump! Do I make myself clear?!”
“Yes, ma’am!”
“Now I’ll bet the first thing you thought when you read that acceptance letter was, ‘Hey, they must think I’m pretty hot stuff. I’m ready to be a Wonderbolt right now’. Are you ready to be Wonderbolts, cadets?”
“Ma’am, yes, ma’am!”
Rainbow Dash removed her sunglasses and stopped to look up and down the line then turned to her her subordinate. “What do you think, Lieutenant Dust? See anypony you think will make it?”
“No, ma’am, not a one.” Dust replied sternly. “We must’ve done something to piss off one of the princesses real bad to be saddled with this sorry flock.”
“What about you, Cloud Kicker?”
Cloud Kicker shook her head. “We may as well send ’em all home, Captain. Nothing but a bunch of no-talent wannabes if you ask me.”
Dash turned back to her recruits with sneer. “You hear that? Two Wonderbolts, the best of the best, ponies I’d trust with my life, don’t believe any of you have what it takes. Are they right?”
“No, ma’am!” they all shouted back.
“You really think you’ve got what it takes to be Wonderbolts?”
“Ma’am, yes, ma’am!”
“Heh, we’ll see.”
And so it went. Scootaloo had seen enough military movies to catch onto the whole drill sergeant act Dash was putting on. Still, she copied Alula’s example. Her friend seemed to know how to properly stand at attention. With her family’s military background, Scootaloo guessed Alula had proper posture drilled into her since she could first stand on four legs.
After Dash wound down, she ordered Cloud Kicker to start rollcall.
“Alula.”
“Yes, ma’am!”
“Rumble.”
“H-here!”
“Scootaloo.”
“Present!”
“Straight Arrow.”
“PRESENT AND READY FOR DUTY, MA’AM!” The former Royal guard bellowed with such force, Cloud Kicker’s mane practically blew off her head.
After tapping her ears, she continued. “Genevieve Pinfeather.”
“Je suis là... I mean, present!” The griffon’s crystalline Prench accent was at complete odds with her size.
“Sweet Dreams.”
Nopony answered.
“Cadet Sweet Dreams,” Cloud Kicker repeated. Still getting no response, she frowned.
Along with the other cadets, Scootaloo leaned forward and watched all three officers march towards the single batpony in attendance.
Who was fast asleep.
Scowling, Rainbow Dash poked the snoring pony in the chest. When that didn’t get a response she slowly lifted the cadet’s ear, moved close and yelled, “WAKE UP!”
“Wahaha!” Startled out of her doze, Sweet Dreams’s wings flared out and she fell over.
“Enjoying your nap, Cadet?” Dash growled. Sweet Dreams shook her head rapidly. “What’s your name, Cadet?”
“S-Sweet Dreams, ma’am.”
“Not anymore, it’s not. Lighting Dust, is it nap time around here?”
“Only if we’re suddenly back in preschool, Captain.”
“How about you, Cloud Kicker? Is it nap time?”
“I’m not even tired, ma’am.”
Dash bore down on the poor batpony who sat quaking on the ground. “Guess what, Cadet? You’re the first of our merry band to earn a nickname. Congratulations, from now on, you’re Nap Time.” Her frown deepened. “Did ya just yawn while I was talking to you, Cadet?”
Sweet Dreams clamped her mouth shut. “S-sorry, ma’am. Not used to staying awake during the day, ma’am.”
“Get up, Cadet!” Dash snarled, narrowing her eyes. “On your hooves!” The shaky thestral moved to comply, but the Captain unexpectedly raised a hoof to stop her. “Ya know what? Since you’re down there already, wingups. NOW! Don’t stop till I’m tired!”
“Man, laying it on a bit thick there, aren’t you, Dash?”
Silence.
Scootaloo looked around, trying to spot who’d be dumb enough to speak out of turn. It took her a second to notice that Rumble and Alula had sidestepped away, just enough time for her view to be filled by a pair of vivid cerise eyes.
Blazing. Angry. Doom-filled eyes.
“You got something to add to the discussion, Cadet Scootaloo?” Dash asked in a low, stern tone which promised hours of kitchen duty if she got the wrong answer.
Scootaloo’s eyes darted back and forth, looking for support. Alula remained a statue while Rumble stared off in the opposite direction, apparently admiring a cloud drifting by.
“Looks like we’ve got an ace over here, ladies and gentlecolts.” Dash got right into Scootaloo’s personal space. “I bet you think you’re the best flyer in the academy, don’t you? You know what? I’d bet good money you’re the worst flyer here. Ponyfeathers, I doubt you’ll even make it past the first day. What do you say to that, Cadet?”
She was so close, Scootaloo could smell her breath—minty fresh with a hint of… wait, brandy?
Dash barking in her face should have put Scootaloo off, and for a moment it did. Rainbow’s own story about her first day at the academy flashed to the forefront of her mind. With it came a sudden surge of cockiness, and Scootaloo said the first thing to pop into her head.
“Try me, ma’am.”
Rainbow replaced her sunglasses. “What’s that?” she asked, low enough to come out as a threat. Staring into the tinted glass, Scootaloo examined her reflection. She’d watched Dash wear the same cocky expression enough times to hopefully pull off a decent impression—confidence edged with an unsaid challenge.
“Let me show you what I’ve got, ma’am.”
From behind those lenses, Scootaloo felt Dash staring her down. She kept her cool though and didn’t look away. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lightning Dust raise an eyebrow, undoubtedly feeling a sense of déjà vu.
“So you want a chance to prove yourself, huh?” said Rainbow.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Oh really?” Rainbow put on a menacing grin. “Cloud Kicker, fetch the buckets!”
Following orders, Cloud Kicker quickly returned with a stack of empty buckets. She lined them up, one by one, along the landing strip. Scootaloo tried to keep cool as the other cadets muttered about what the buckets could be for.
She hadn’t expected Dash to break off script. The grim smile on her captain's face didn’t help matters. Goading her may not have been one of Scootaloo’s best ideas.
“All right, newbies, I want five hundred laps!” A collective groan came from the cadets, an especially pathetic one from Sweet Dreams.
“That wasn’t a request! Get up in the air. NOW!” A shrill blow from Dash’s whistle punctuated the command.
Five hundred laps, one hundred jumping jacks, fifty wind sprints, and Celestia knows how many wingups—she’d lost count after the first hundred—later found Scootaloo buried face-first in a bucket, puking her guts out.
The acrid stench of her own vomit invaded her nostrils without mercy. Based on the equally miserable retching noises coming from her neighbors, Rumble and Alula weren’t in better shape.
As the exercise progressed, each cadet had dropped out of the sky and paid tribute of that morning’s breakfast to the silent pantheon of buckets. The only one spared revisiting a meal was the griffon. Genevieve was last to finally burn out. Even still, she landed in surprisingly graceful manner, then simply passed out.
Stomach emptied, Scootaloo collapsed onto her back while her wings gave a brief twitch of exhaustion. A body, the shade of cyan blue, blocked her view of the sky. She’d developed a sudden hatred for that color.
“Laying down on the first day, Squirt? Tsk, tsk.” Scootaloo searched for even a hint of sympathy in Dash’s eyes only to come up empty. So much for sisterly love. “Can’t say I’m impressed, Scoots. On my first day I was out there breaking records, not puking up breakfast. Let this be a lesson. Here, I take backsass from nopony, even you. Remember that. Next time I won’t go so easy on you, Cadet Scootaloo.”
As Rainbow Dash march away, Scootaloo came to a sudden epiphany. This must be what recruits the world over felt towards their drill instructors. Pure unadulterated hatred laced with a perverse and almost self destructive desire for their respect. Scootaloo groaned as she rolled back onto her hooves, ignoring her stomach’s violent protests at getting up so fast.
Dash wasn’t impressed? She wanted records broken? Well fine! Scootaloo would show her ‘big sis’ she hadn’t been idle since they’d last trained together. Flying through Manehatten alleyways at high speed while dodging dumpsters and fire escapes had taught Scootaloo a few tricks, ones bound to impress even a seasoned flyer like Rainbow Dash.
“Tomorrow, Dash. Tomorrow, I’ll show you what I’ve got.”
“INCOMING!”
Scootaloo barely had time to dive out of the way as a noisy cloud wagon suddenly came in for a landing from out of nowhere. Despite the ridiculous speed of its approach, the wagon miraculously remained intact as it bounced to a stop.
The white, blond pegasus pulling it flipped out of her harness with ease and smacked a large button. The wagon's cover unfolded to reveal a carnival music box lined with all sorts of trumpet horns, cymbals and bass drums, colorful flags, and a lot of fun little gizmos and doo-dads that whizzed, bobbed, and popped to the beat.
“Welcome welcome welcome,
it’s your first day here.
Welcome welcome welcome,
follow me in a great cheer!
Welcome welcome welcome,
Hip hip hurray, repeat after me.
Welcome welcome welcome,
to the Wonderbolt Aca-de-my~!”
Stunned silence reigned...for about two seconds.
“Wait for it…”
A ding signaled from a side compartment. A miniature oven opened up and shot a freshly baked cloud cupcake in front of each pony while a steady stream of confetti erupted from the organ pipes.
“Yippee! I didn't mix them up this time!”
Scootaloo’s stomach churned as she looked from cake laying at her hooves then back to the bucket filled with the remains of her breakfast.
Her stomach chose the bucket. As she heaved, Scootaloo heard the mare’s muffled complaints.
“Nopony’s eating my cakes…!”
—
Chapter 4: Pancakes and Politics With a Side of Haybacon
Chapter 4: Pancakes and Politics With a Side of Haybacon
Canterlot Castle, Canterlot
“This is so boring! Seriously, why’d you force me to tag along with you guys?”
Her head hurt. Nothing like starting the morning with a throbbing headache. Rainbow Dash heaved a tired sigh for what was, by her count, the third time in the last five minutes.
Sure, Dust had a point. They had arrived for Rainbow’s meeting a couple of hours earlier than strictly necessary, but that was the way of things.
Canterlot ran on its own clock. If you were on time, you were late. If you were early, you were on time. Somedays, Rainbow really missed the sleepy pace of good old Ponyville.
She wished Lightning Dust would just let the issue go already.
“I mean, I missed breakfast—the most important meal of the day.” A pinion from Lightning’s left wing folded down as she listed each item. “I’m pretty sure our illustrious captain can take care of things by herself.” A yawn escaped as they marched down the hallway, and she picked up her pace to keep her position on Rainbow’s left.
“Because a captain’s got to keep up appearances,” Cloud Kicker explained from their captain’s right flank. “You ever see branch heads without a swarm of adjuncts?” She waved towards the crowd of functionaries milling about their business as the trio cut a path. “I don’t think so. We don’t want our Rainbow looking like a chump, do we? Still, it’s not fair you won’t let us stick around and meet the Princess, Dash. What’s the big deal?” she asked, flapping once to get in front of her captain, forehooves crossed and wearing a mockery of a sulky frown.
Dash rolled her eyes. “Because a captain’s got to keep up appearances.”
“C’mon. I won’t even talk. You won’t hear a single double entendre, I swear.”
“Yeah,” Lightning added. “You dragged us all the way here. Least you could do is let me get an autograph.”
Cloud Kicker tapped her chin. “Didn’t you almost get Her Highness killed once?”
“Meh.” Lightning Dust shrugged. “She didn’t have a crown back then. What’s your point?”
Rainbow just let out a sigh, pinching the bridge of her nose.
I really can’t deal with the Wonder Twins today, she thought.
Over the last week, affairs had not progressed the way she’d wanted, chipping away at what little patience she’d started with. First, the pegasi from Ponville’s weather team remained stuck in processing, so she was still short-staffed. No amount of angry letters fired from her desk seemed to move the bureaucracy to work any faster.
Maybe calling them all, ‘The end spawn of four pints of lager and defective contraceptive’ had been a bit overtop. I really need to learn to proofread letters before mailing them.
In any case, hopefully Twilight could make all her paperwork problems disappear with the stroke of her quill. Then there was the all-powerful House of Stable Lords’ subcommittee on military affairs which held her purse strings.
Where I’ll have to get on my knees and beg like a dog. “I hate politics.”
“Too late for regrets now, boss.” Cloud Kicker poked at the badge on her captain’s chest. The ghost of a rather smug grin tugged at the corners of her lips as Rainbow snorted. “I did warn you, new brass starts at the bottom of the totem pole. You’re gonna have to fight beak and claw for every last bit.”
“I’m not a griffon, CK.”
“Better learn to fight like one quick. The Guard, the Navy, all of them will tear you apart if you don’t. We may be brothers in arms, all singing kumbaya when the enemy’s at the gates, but in peacetime…” She stopped to chuckle. “In peacetime we’re all starved dogs fighting over scraps.”
“And that’s why I need this meeting to go well. Twilight can make all our money and personnel problem disappear with a stroke of a pen.” Rainbow looked at each of them with a frown. “And that’s why I’m not risking any shenanigans from you two.”
Cloud gasped loudly. “Shenanigans? Us? I’m offended and hurt. Hurt and offended.” Rainbow Dash sighed as she pinched the bridge of her nose. She’d been doing that a lot lately. Cloud Kicker turned up her nose, hamming it up. “Why, I bet Dusty here is just as devastated by your lack of faith in your trusty subordinates. Right, Dust?”
Her wingmate looked up from reading a bodybuilding magazine. “Sorry, wasn’t listening.” Lighting swept a hoof towards the rows and rows of shelves. “So, why are we in a library, anyhow? Kinda odd for a princess to have her digs in a library, don’t ya think?” She sidestepped a cart overburdened with books. The page called out a brief apology before disappearing among the stacks. “You’d figure royalty got their own private digs or something.”
As they weaved around scurrying patrons, Rainbow chuckled. “That’s a long complicated story, Dust.” One Rainbow happened to enjoy retelling.
It was point of fact: Twilight Sparkle loved books. On a few occasions, Rainbow Dash even accused Twilight of having an unhealthy relationship with books. Especially the complete twenty-seven volume set of trashy romance novels by Bodice Ripper complete with autograph that Twilight still believed none of her friends knew about. The ones inside the triple warded chest stashed under her bed.
No, the issue began during a party where somepony gifted her with a book. Again, not an obvious problem. Equestria’s newest princesses turning into squealing, giggly mess in the middle of a ball attended by the Canterlot Elite and most of the media over said book—a rare first edition spellbook by some egghead unicorn Dash couldn’t remember the name of—however, sent tongues wagging.
Twilight, of course remained oblivious to the chatter; until one day, the Griffon ambassador arrived for trade talks and, per tradition, he bore gifts for each princess. A bejeweled Fabergé griffon egg for Princess Celestia. A delicate silver circlet for Princess Luna. For Princess Twilight, 1001 Questions You Had About Griffons But Were Afraid To Ask Unabridged Edition.
This trend continued. From diplomats to everyday petitioners, they all brought her some manner of written material as tribute. Later, publishers got into the act, sending her first editions in hopes of garnering a ringing endorsement from the newly nicknamed, “Princess of Books.”
Soon her castle in Ponyville became the envy of bibliophiles the land over. Books, scrolls, tomes, pamphlets, even a few wood carvings steadily filled every nook and cranny.
And the funniest part? Twilight couldn’t refuse. Decorum and her own love of books forbade it. As Celestia had once explained after Twilight complained about the growing mountain of dry paper turning her once spacious bedroom into Equestria’s greatest fire hazard: Twilight Sparkle’s polite refusal of a gift meant nothing to the average pony. Princess Twilight Sparkle’s refusal, however, could ruin a pony’s life and reputation.
Applejack, ever practical, had helpfully offered to take any unwanted volumes to fuel her furnace in winter.
“...Twilight wasn’t allowed back at Sweet Apple Acres until Applejack’s tail grew back.” Rainbow smiled at the memory. She’d kept a few snapshots of the farmer, strictly for posterity of course and not at all to bust AJ’s chops at every opportunity. “Eventually, she just threw up her hooves and moved here, into the palace library.”
“Well, as interesting as that story was,” Lightning Dust said with yawn. “I think we should head down to the cafeteria. I’m starved.”
“You’re in luck,” said Cloud Kicker as they turned around. “They serve some of the best waffles around.”
Watching the pair walk away, Dash called after them, “And keep out of trouble!” There came back two flippant salutes.
“Jawohl, mein Kapitän!”
“Sí, mi capitán!”
Dash shook her head as she watched them disappear around a corner.
Taking a moment to straighten her uniform, Rainbow about-faced and marched towards Twilight’s office with her back straight and head lifted high.
Until she met the other pair of flyers that made her want to tear her mane out in patches every time they crossed paths.
"Halt!" announced the first diminutive thestral, his membranous wings outstretched and his somewhat smallish form outfitted in the fabulous pink and gold of Twilight's Library Guard that no self-respecting Royal Guard could have been forced into at spearpoint. Peanut was holding said spearpoint across the chamber door in the stiffest formal stance possible, despite Rainbow's many, many encounters with himself and his brother during previous trips.
"State your name and business!" announced the other, a perfect mirror image of his twin with exactly the same attitude and formality that was driving Rainbow crazy.
A hoof massaged her temples. It didn’t help. “Peanut, you know who I am. Do we really have to go through this every time?”
The guard opened his mouth in a vague ‘O’, somewhere between surprise and mild offense at the very notion. “But, Captain. Being a herald for Her Highness is my job, sorta thing.”
“I thought we was guards, Peanut?” the other batpony asked of his twin.
“Right you are, Brittle.” Peanut nodded to his brother. “And part of being a guard is announcing visitors to Her Highness’s chamber as loudly as possible in the traditional fashion of the Night Guard, passed down through the ages ever since—”
“Look!” she snapped, puffing up in annoyance. “I really don’t have time for this, guys. Just let me in.”
“But-but.” They appeared to get upset. “It’s so boorring, sorta thing.” Peanut whined.
“Nothing ever happens ‘round here,” Brittle added. “Best we got was last week when some daft pony spilt their latte on the encyclopedias. The Head Librarian almost turned the poor lad into a shish kebab.”
“Yeah, can you just let us have this one thing, Captain? I herald therefore I am. It’s what we do. It’s tradition, sort of thing,” Peanut begged. “Pleeeese?”
It took a moment but she gave in to the inevitable with a groan. “Fine. Go ahead.”
“Yay!” Peanut stood up straight and cleared his throat. Brittle opened the doors as his twin bellowed, “ANNOUNCING CAPTAIN RAINBOW DASH OF THE WONDERBOLTS. BEARER OF THE ELEMENT OF LOYALTY. REVIVER OF THE SONIC RAINBOOM. TWO TIME—”
The rest was cut off by the door being slammed shut.
The Princess was seated behind her desk, talking to a stallion in a chef’s jacket. “Ah, Rainbow, you’re here early,” Twilight said. “Please take a seat. Can I interest you in a midmorning snack?Oh wait. First let me introduce you to my new personal chef, Sous-vide.”
“A new one? What happened to whatshisname?”
“Gastrique?” Twilight shrugged. “Quit last month. Fourth one this year. I can’t imagine why.”
“Yes, Your Highness.” The chef spoke in a heavy Prench accent. “It is indeed the mystery of our time why graduates of Equestria’s finest culinary institutes, trained in cuisine from all over the world, would leave your service. Now, let’s go over your order: one daisy sandwich.”
“Toasted.”
“Yes.” A muscle clenched in his jaw. “At precisely five hundred and five degrees Kelvin for thirty seconds per side before being bisected along the longitudinal axis into two isosceles triangles of equal dimension. Would you possibly wish for anything to drink with your sandwich?”
“And an apple juice from Sweet Apple Acres, in juicebox. Don’t want to risk any spills”
“And a Sweet Apple Acres juicebox. How very daring. Your Highness, I could not help but notice that you ordered precisely the same items yesterday. And the day before that. And the day before that.”
“Exactly!” Twilight beamed. “I’m so easy to please. I don’t get why ponies keep leaving.”
“Quite the mystery, Your Highness,” he muttered under his breath. “Quite the mystery indeed.” The chef turned his attention to the other pony in the room with a raised eyebrow and hint of a smile. “And pour vous, Capitain? Something other than a daisy sandwich, perhaps?”
“Hmm,” she said, rubbing her chin. “Well, I did miss breakfast.”
“Then allow me to prepare something. How about a lovely breakfast souffle? A light seasonal fruit salad, perhaps? Ah!” he exclaimed, eyes filled full of hope. “An athlete such as yourself requires a protein-rich meal, no? May I suggest Eggs Florentine, drizzled with hollandaise? Freshly prepared, of course.”
“Hmm…” She thought for a moment. “Yeah, I could go for some eggs. But none of that frufru stuff. Do me a triple fried egg sandwich. Oh, and with chili sauce and chutney,” she added.
“I beg your pardon?” All hope in Sous-vide’s eyes vanished, replaced by an irregular twitch.
“Look, it's easy. Just fry four eggs, put them between three pieces of bread—”
“Yes, you imbecile! I know how to make a blinking—” He swallowed, regaining some composure and the fancy accent he’d inexplicably lost during his outburst. “My apologies, mon Capitan. Is there a particular variety of chilli sauce you wish upon your refreshment?”
“Umm… the red stuff? And don’t skimp. If I don’t feel like I’m having a baby, you haven’t used enough.”
The chef looked like he was about to say something, but then bit down hard on his lower lip. “Very good. And what type of bread does one prefer?”
She stared at him blankly. “There’s more than one?”
He again paused before taking another deep breath. “I see. Very well. I shall return shortly with your… food.”
“So,” Twilight began after the chef departed. “Tell me, is being Captain of the Wonderbolts a dream come true?”
“As if,” Dash snorted. “Try a nightmare.” She stood up and began to pace, occasionally throwing out a hoof as all her frustrations spilled out. “I’m buried under paperwork. I went to bed hating myself because I had to chew out Scootaloo in front of the entire class. Cloudchaser came by with the replacements from Ponyville Weather, and none of them can legally wear the uniform. All their forms are still in limbo, and no one in Administration will give me a straight answer on what the hold up is. And worse, my budget’s still the smallest in Wonderbolt history.
“Cloud Kicker says just because I’m the new girl they think they can jerk me around. It’s just… It’s just nothing’s working out the way I expected, ya know?” She stopped and turned to Twilight with a deep frown on her face then let out a breath. “Sorry. Just really needed to vent.”
Twilight waved a dainty hoof dismissively. “It’s fine. Tell you what. I’ll apply a little princess pressure to expedite all that nasty paperwork. Actually, what you need is a secretary, and I know the perfect candidate. She's a little obsessive about neatness, but I'm sure you two will get along just fine.”
That got a raised eyebrow from Rainbow. “Um... You're telling me she's a neat freak? That's like Fluttershy calling somepony shy or Rarity calling them overdressed.”
Twilight returned a flat look. “Do you want her or not?”
“Yes, yes!” Rainbow backpedalled, waving her hooves. “I’ll take her, I’ll take her.”
Soon enough, the chef returned with their orders, placing each sandwich in front their owner. “Your food, mesdemoiselles.”
“Sweet! Thanks!” Tossing aside the parsley garnish, Rainbow wasted no time in diving into her sandwich with table manners more akin to a pack of starving weasels than a pony.
“Sacre bleu!”
“I’d stay back, if were you,” Twilight warned the chef as sizable chunks of egg and chili sauce flew in every direction. “Unless you want to lose a leg.” She took a bite of her own sandwich, chewing at more sedate pace as they watched the overstuffed sandwich rapidly vanish down Rainbow’s gullet. “My, she must really like it. She never licked the plate clean back in Ponyville.”
Finished, Dash tossed the now empty plate onto the desk and let out a loud belch. “Ahh,” she sighed, rubbing her stomach. “That hit the spot.”
Twilight giggled at her chef’s goggled-eyed expression and dismissed him with a promise to have the dishes sent down later before raising an eyebrow at the pegasus. “Four eggs, really? That hardly sounds healthy.”
“It’s no biggie. I’ll burn it off in no time. Got to fuel the engine, you know,” she said, patting her own trim midsection. “How about you? Looks like royal life agrees with you.”
Twilight smoothed out her dress, but it didn’t help hide the slight bulge. Her cheeks reddened. “I may have gained a few pounds.”
“Princess of the Purple Pudge!” Rainbow Dash snarked. Said princess returned a flat look. “Or how about Princess Eggplant… err… butt?”
“Do you want me to turn youinto an eggplant?”
Rainbow giggled while waving her hooves. “Oh c’mon, Twilight. I’m just kidding around. Trust me, I’ve seen worse. Stop by the academy. A few laps, some pushups, and we’ll have you back in shape in no time. Anyways, back at ya. How’s life as The Princess of Books?”
“You know the old saying: ‘heavy is the the head that wears the crown.’ Well, I’ve developed a throbbing headache,” Twilight gestured to the mess of papers spread over her desk, the number and height of which, Rainbow admitted, made her own desk look organized. The glow of magic began to reconcile the chaos. “Sometimes I wonder if the only reason Celestia promoted me was to pawn off her workload. She galivants off to preside over weddings and kiss babies while I’m stuck reviewing laws and dealing with nobles sniffing at my heels. One day I’m going to lose it and turn one of them into a cockroach. Who knows; that might be an improvement.”
Rainbow offered a shrug. “Tried asking Princess Luna for help?”
“Ha!" Twilight sniffed. “Believe me, I’ve tried. ‘Such drudgery be the responsibility of the day, young Twilight. Thou hast our sympathies, but we must sleep if we are to be sufficiently rested to protect Our ponies lest they fall prey to the many terrors lurking in the darkness. Both real and of their own wild imaginations! Neigh, in our time, my sister and I would put such accursed parchment to the flame and any noble foolish enough to displease us to the sword. That be our advice to thee!’” A derisive snort escaped her nostrils. “Fighting monsters. Phah! Princess of the Night my purple plot! More like Princess of the Night-club, if you believe the tabloids.”
Twilight reached inside a drawer and withdrew a bottle of bourbon marked ‘From Trixie, TG&P’ with an expensive label and a matching shot glass. “Want some?”
“It’s bit early in the day, dontcha think?”
“A Princess’s privileged prerogative, my pegasus praetor.” Twilight laughed then measured out precisely one-point-five fluid ounces, as marked on her graduated shot glass, before quaffing it in a single swallow. A satisfied ‘ahh’ followed as the alcohol ran down her throat. “Now,” she said, capping and returning the bottle to its hiding place, “we have two hours to prepare for the meeting with Blueblood’s budget committee.”
Rainbow waved a hoof. “I’ve got this, Twi. A bit of my winning charm, a few words from you on how important the Wonderbolts are for Equestria’s security, and boom! Budget restored.”
“My word, isn’t she confident?” Rainbow heard a voice say from behind.
“Ah, Miss Bookish Delight,” Twilight greeted the Head Librarian. The pink earth pony wore a green turtleneck and her purple mane was done up in a matronly bun. “Thank you for coming. How are you?”
“Just wonderful, Princess. Patrons have become so gentle with the books since you took up residence,” Miss Bookish Delight cheerfully replied. “So much so that I no longer need to bring out The Stick With Sharp Pointy Bits On The End.”
“Don’t you mean a spear?” asked Rainbow, eye drawn to the short spear strapped to the librarian's side.
“Oh no, dear. Only guards are cleared to carry spears. This is The Stick With Sharp Pointy Bits On The End. Completely different. For instance, a spear only has one sharp pointy bit on the end.”
"I see. Wait a sec, there’s dried blood on the tip!”
“Do you have any overdue books from our friendly little library?” Her cheerful smile didn’t waver. Rainbow shifted in her seat and shook her head, trying not to think of the pile of books that were likely still gathering dust under her bed back in Ponyville. “Then you needn’t worry.” She pushed her thick-rimmed glasses up her snout as she made her way towards the desk, flanked on either side Peanut and Brittle.
“Hey!” Rainbow turned to address the two thestral guards. “How come you guys didn’t announce her? What happened to I herald therefore I am?”
“The Head Librarian don’t likes it when we shout,” explained Brittle.
“What he said, sorta thing,” Peanut said, concurring with his twin.
“Don’t mind Miss Bookish Delight,” Twilight leaned forward and whispered to Rainbow Dash. “She’s a touch eccentric. I blame the absinthe.” She turned to the librarian. “Were you able to retrieve the book I requested for Captain Dash?”
“Of course, Your Highness,” Miss Delight said, sliding a thick hardcover in front of Rainbow.
“Saying A Lot While Saying Nothing: The Art of Sounding Intelligent, by Balderdash Silvertongue.” Rainbow read the title with a perplexed expression. “Twi, do you think I’m dumb? I can talk just fine!”
“I didn’t call you dumb, Rainbow,” Twilight said defensively. “It’s just that, in politics, what you say isn’t nearly as important as how intelligent you sound while presenting your argument.”
“Her Highness is correct, Captain,” added Miss Delight. “Balderdash Silvertongue’s work is required reading among the ruling class, and has been for centuries.”
“So according to this, I need to string together as many big words as I can, even if they mean absolute garbage?” Rainbow said, sounding irritated as she flipped through the pages. “What’s the point of that?”
“To obfuscate,” Twilight said.
“To make one sound cleverer than one’s rivals,” the Head Librarian added.
“It’s so ingrained in political life that it became a verb named after him: BSing.” Twilight leaned forward with steepled hooves. “Rainbow, you’ve got to learn to BS, and BS as hard as you can at the committee hearing.”
Looking from the book to Twilight’s serious expression and the grinning librarian standing over her shoulder, Rainbow figured she was stuck. With a groan, she flipped to page one.
Hopefully, Cloud Kicker and Lightning Dust appreciated how lucky they were.
They’re probably having relaxing breakfast right now.
Canterlot Castle Barracks, Cafeteria
Cloud Kicker ducked behind the cafeteria table, narrowly missing the barrage of waffles that pounded overhead. Unfortunately, Lightning Dust had never really participated in a Royal Guard Food Fight before, and lacked that special fraction of a second worth of experience that, in this case, meant catching the followup salvo of sticky pancakes right in the face. Landing behind the table next to Cloud Kicker in a sticky splat, she grimaced in pain.
“They've taken over the main serving line. We'll never root them out of there unless we can somehow make our way over to the waffle iron and make some replacement ammunition—” Cloud Kicker gave her cheek a quick lick. Lightning recoiled, wiping away the wet spot as fast as possible. “CK, why?!” she cried.
“What? It’s my favorite brand of syrup. That stuff’s expensive, you know.” Cloud Kicker grabbed an apple from the fruit bar that had tipped over and scattered breakfast items all over the nearby floor. “Anyway, it’s all your fault we’re in this mess.” She popped out of cover long enough to fling it at an advancing guard, the fruit impacting his face in a juicy explosion of pulp and seeds. “I don't think they appreciated what you called that one guard's mother.”
“How was I supposed to know she worked the grill here?!” shouted Lightning in return. She held up a serving tray to block a sudden onslaught of baked beans that splattered against the metal with a sharp clang.
“But a drill sergeant's mom? Of everypony here, really?” Cloud Kicker commented as they dove behind a hot buffet line, narrowly avoiding an incoming storm of granola. With walnuts.
“Look, can we continue this chat after we’ve found some better cover, please?” asked Lightning Dust. “They’ve got hash browns! Hash browns! Those suckers sting like—” A ball of piping hot glop sailed overhead. “Wonderful! Now they’ve built an oatmeal catapult!” She peeked around a corner of the table. “And they’re loading it with maple and brown sugar flavor. I hate oatmeal with maple and brown sugar! Damn heathens, you only need raisins and a touch of cinnamon!” she shouted at them.
“Talk about a sticky situation,” quipped Cloud Kicker with a smile.
Dust groaned and shook her head. “Really? You had to use that line? Couldn’t come up with anything better?” She peeked over the table again. The front entrance was blocked by the oat-a-pault. They’re only hope was to brave a deadly gauntlet of fruit salad stations which lined the only clear route to the cafeteria’s secondary exit.
Soldiers were maneuvering to flank their position. Dust wished they could just fly out of there, but they’d be shot down by a banana barrage faster than Cloud Kicker could make a dirty joke involving bananas. Those soldiers were damn snipers with those potassium rich missiles of doom.
She suddenly regretted passing up that one self-defense course in college. At the time, she’d thought the instructor was a nutter for claiming fresh fruit was a lethal weapon. “When you're walking home tonight and some great homicidal maniac comes after YOU with a bunch of loganberries, don't come cryin' to me!" she remembered him shouting. Showed what she knew.
“Charging for the door is utter suicide,” Cloud Kicker told her. “Those slices of kiwi look razor-sharp! Kiwi!” she spat in disgust. “What kind of monsters ruins a perfectly good fruit salad with kiwi? Is there no decency in this world? Anyway, I calculate our chances of making it out at about one in ten.”
Lighting Dust returned a feral grin. “Never tell me the odds,” she said, getting into a running position. She might have to be carried out on a tray, but at least she wasn't doing paperwork like Dash.
Canterlot Castle Military Budget Committee Hearing
“Again, Captain. Please tell this committee why it should restore funding of your little acrobatic troupe. Especially now that its most prominent members have chosen retirement?”
In Rainbow’s expert opinion, Prince Blueblood possessed one of the most punchable faces in all of Equestria. Protocol prevented her from saying so out loud, however, and she fought to keep her poker face as he looked down at her, all smug and comfortable from one of the row of plush faux-leather armchairs set behind the committee's bench. She was stuck behind a tiny wooden table.
Dash knew it was all on purpose. Everything in the chamber was designed to make the subject feel small, at the mercy of her betters. Wood paneling surrounded her on all sides. The dark shade of the stain and the lack of windows lent the space a claustrophobic air.
Her wings twitched.
Or it’s just my inner pegasus talking, she supposed as she shifted in her chair. It too was on the small side, constructed out of hard, unyielding oak, with no cushioning whatsoever. The narrow armrests forced her wings against her sides, and it was killing her.
Not that she would give them the satisfaction of showing it.
The expressions of the committee members ranged from bored to smug satisfaction. Not that the small fish mattered. This was Blueblood’s theatre. She was in a dogfight in his airspace armed only with a stack of note cards helpfully provided by Twilight.
At least she wasn’t flying without a wingpony. Twilight nodded from her raised throne which occupied one corner of the chamber. It was tradition for one to always be available just in case a princess decided to attend a hearing.
Twilight raised a hoof an inch off her armrest. It was a tiny gesture, but to those who knew court politics, enough to convey her support.
Dash glanced at her notecards one last time and cleared her throat. “During The Era of the Lonely Sun, and…” She trailed off. Staring back at her was card after card of high-priced, gourmet word salad. What had Twilight been thinking? Based on how many syllables stringing them together, some of these words were worth at least ten-bits each. Something about dark times, blah, blah. Ponies longing for a symbol of hope. Something about Commander Firefly, etceteria.
“Screw it!” The notes cards went flying over one shoulder. “Look, I’ll admit we’re in a bit of a… let’s say, ‘a downturn’ right now, but I promise you, if you give me a chance, then I can bring us back to, heck, beyond our previous glory!” Her voice rose as stood up from her chair. “Ever since our founding, the Wonderbolts have strived to remain a beacon of excellence. But we can’t fulfill our mission if you clip our wings!” She looked each of committee member in the eye before making eye contact with Twilight who nodded. “Just cut our bindings and let us fly free. Thank you.”
She returned to her seat as Twilight graced her with a smile, and she figured she’d done a decent job.
A slow clap echoed through the chamber.
“A fine performance, Captain.” Prince Blueblood wore a smile so oily, Dash half expected it to slide off and stain the carpet. “It appears our Princess Twilight is an excellent tutor. She has trained you well. Perhaps for your next trick you will roll over on command.” Sycophantic chuckles emanated from his allies to be interrupted by a sharp rebuke by the princess in the room.
“I find your comments rude and uncalled for, Blueblood!” Twilight said from her throne, frowning deeply.
“My apologies, Princess,” Blueblood replied, in a tone which lacked anything close to sincerity. “In any case, I fail to see why the funding cuts should be rescinded.” The smirk on his lips grew wider. “Funding cuts, I might remind everyone, you, Your Highness, proposed in the first place. How very odd that you would push to see them rescinded after your chosen candidate was put in charge.”
Twilight put paid to what she thought of that notion with a loud, overblown scoff. “You should look to your own dealings before accusing any pony of nepotism, Blueblood. Considering how you have a major stake in most of the companies on the receiving end of government contracts. How is the Navy’s new dreadnaught coming along, by the way? Rumor has it they are planning on naming it the The Pride of Blueblood. That must be nice.”
“As nice as the twenty percent apple subsidy you snuck into the last session’s agriculture bill. Must be nice for that farmer friend of yours.” Twilight blanched. “All immaterial to the subject at hoof,” Blueblood casually dismissed with a wave of his foreleg. “The question becomes, does Equestria require the Wonderbolts any longer? In fact, we could save several hundred thousand bits by disbanding them altogether.”
“Over my dead body, you will!” Dash yelled, jumping up. “And there’s no way we spend that much!”
“Kindly rein in your dog, Princess. The carpet is very expensive. And as you’ve noted—In your rather unrefined manner, Captain—the Wonderbolts were meant as a beacon during Equestria’s time with only one princess to guide it. However, now that we appear to be living in an age where alicorns seem to be popping up like mayflies, you and your troupe are no longer necessary.
Twilight rose from her throne to her friend’s defense. “Everypony here knows that the Wonderbolts play a critical role in Equestrian life. Supervision of hurricane duty, combating severe weather events. And not to mention the support they offer Equestria’s air defense.”
Blueblood let a contemptuous yawn. “One: Cloudsdale Weather Management is more than capable of filling any void left over by their absence. Second: the Wonderbolts haven’t seen combat action since Tirek. Where they failed. Not to mention the changeling invasion. Where, again, they failed. The dragon rampage in Ponyville was just the icing on the cake. Face it. The Wonderbolts have been reduced to the level of circus performers. The Royal Guard can protect our airspace and take any assets the Wonderbolts leave behind,” he said, smiling down as Rainbow held her scowl in check through gritted teeth.
“You have barely enough cadets to fill out your academy. Even after you’ve broken tradition by allowing in—Ugh.” He gagged on the next word as if he had taken a sip of wine gone sour. “Minorities.”
“There’s nothing wrong with griffons or batponies!” Dash exclaimed in the face of the growing murmurs from the rest of the committee.
Blueblood raised an eyebrow. “So you’re in agreement with Princess Twilight’s radical We Are All Equestrian’s Act?”
“Granting equal rights to nonponies is not a radical proposal!” Twilight snapped. “They do just as much for Equestria as everypony else.”
“Hardly.” The Prince rolled his eyes. “Bad enough since Princess Luna’s return, thestrals have begun migrating back to Equestria. At least they are vaguely equine. But you would put us on the same level as griffons or donkeys. Why should we allow them citizenship?”
“They pay taxes like everypony else and deserve not to be exploited,” Twilight argued back. “In fact, they pay more per capita than ponies and should to be allowed to vote and have a say.”
Blueblood gave a harrumph. “Of course they should pay taxes. Nonponies benefit the most from our social programs—”
“A proven fallacy!”
“—These minorities suckle at Equestria’s teat, but when it needs defending, do you see any rushing to join our brave mares and stallions defending the nation? No!”
“Only citizens can join the military. You know that, Blueblood.”
That he smirked, and Twilight didn’t immediately turn him into a cactus irritated Dash to no end. Blasted etiquette.
“It’s too great a security risk to allow noncitizens to enlist. Who knows where their true loyalties would lie.”
“I think we’ll be addressing that paradox soon enough, Blueblood,” Twilight countered with a hint of smugness. “As you stated, both a thestral and a griffon are among the latest batch of Wonderbolt cadets.”
“Yes, yes. Everypony here is well aware of your discovery of that clever little loophole,” Blueblood admitted with a sniff.
Where the rest of the military was restricted to Equestrian citizens, whoever had drafted the Wonderbolt charter had gotten sloppy and used the word ‘residents’ instead of ‘citizens’ when specifying qualifications for membership. Twilight had promptly rammed a saw into that loophole and cut a hole big enough to fit two new 'Bolts through.
Honestly, Dash had never knew about the restriction until now, so hadn’t blinked twice when Genevieve and Sweet Dreams had shown up as last minute additions to the roster. She should have suspected Twilight’s hoof. She wasn’t sure if she enjoyed being a guinea pig in one of Twilight Sparkle’s social experiments, but Rainbow was damned if she was going to let Blueblood get another lick in.
Dash felt the debate leaving her out and interjected, “Yeah, what species they were born into doesn’t matter. If they’ve got wings, then I’ll have them doing stunts that’ll blow your mind.”
“Oh, so you think you can make them equal to all the pegasi who came before?” Blueblood asked to which Dash buffed her chest.
“I don’t think so. I know so. And they won’t just be equal. They’ll be miles better!”
“Whether you think or not is debatable.” Blueblood rubbed his chin in thought before saying, “Very well. I propose a challenge.”
“Bring it on! Captain Dash never backs down from a challenge.” She ignored the panicked waving coming from Twilight’s direction.
“In eight weeks time,” Blueblood said, “a trade delegation is scheduled to depart for Saddle Arabia to work out terms over the exchange of Equestrian weather management services for Saddle Arabian textiles and spices. Their current government is quite hidebound and is skeptical as to the merits of such an agreement. Maybe a suitably spectacular display by Equestria’s premier ‘weather’ team would impress them enough to agree to our terms. Succeed, and we’ll restore full funding and assets to the Wonderbolts. I’ll even throw my support behind Princess Twilight’s silly little proposal.”
“Challenge accepted! I’ll have my senior officers prepped in no time.”
“Actually,” Blueblood interrupted her premature congratulations. “I think a show by your cadets and your cadets alone would be truer test of your leadership skills, wouldn’t you say, Captain?”
Dash kept her face neutral as inside her head she did a quick calculation. With raw cadets, eight weeks was cutting it close. Too close. But what choice did she really have? You know what? I got this. No problem. Because you know who you are? “I’m Rainbow Dash!”
Coughs.
“Umm, yes. We are aware of your name, Captain,” said Blueblood sounding as perplexed as his fellows. “And I take by your bright-eyed confidence that you accept my terms.” Dash nodded. “Excellent! Then I believe we are finished for the day, ladies and gentlecolts. Meeting adjourned. Oh, and one last thing,” he added just as everyone made to leave. “Are you certain you can prepare a suitable show with a griffon who barely speaks Equestrian and a batpony who failed to break out of her specie’s nocturnal cycle? But, I’m sure you’re up to task. You’re the legendary Rainbow Dash, after all.”
Perplexed by his parting comment, after the room emptied, Dash met a fidgeting Twilight pacing around one of the many marble columns framing the hallway outside. The alicorn’s guards stood off to one side, glaring at anypony who might encroach on their sovereign's personal fret-zone. The little dome of silence she’d cast helped too.
Rainbow had a bad feeling about this. “Twilight, what the hay was Blueblood talking about in there?”
By now, Twilight was hopping from one leg to the other. “Dash, what were the names of those two cadets again?” She smacked her face against the barrier repeatedly when Dash named them off. “Those aren’t the cadets I put forward, Dash.”
“What?”
“Somepony must have switched the files!” Twilight said in rising panic. “First off, I greenlit a stallion and a… and a…” Twilight appeared so flustered the proper term wasn’t coming.
“A tercel?” Rainbow supplied.
“Right! Exactly! A tercel! Not a mare and a hen. Which, now that I think about it, doesn’t make sense. How can a griffon lay eggs when their rear-half is a lion? I need to go look this up right now!”
“Twilight!” Rainbow snapped. “Focus!”
“Sorry. Right. Second, I would never recommend anyone who couldn’t speak basic Equestrian.” She growled in frustration. “Blueblood knew the whole time. We’ve been outmaneuvered!”
Now it became Rainbow’s turn to bang her head against the wall. “All right, look. I’ll let Genevieve and Sweet Dreams go. We’ll switch them out. Simple.”
Eyes widened. “You can’t do that, Rainbow!” Twilight exclaimed, grabbing Dash by the shoulders and shaking her.
“I can’t have flyers in the sky who are half asleep or can’t communicate with their teammates, Twilight. They’d be a hazard to eveypony else up there.”
“But you can’t!” Twilight pleaded. “If word gets out that the first minority Wonderbolt cadets in history were kicked out of the academy, it would set The We Are All Equestrians Act back years! It’ll be seen as a failure! My failure! Blueblood and his cronies will make sure the press roasts me on a spit!”
The signs of a typical Twilight breakdown were all there. She collapsed to the floor in a curled up in a babbling ball of pent up neuroticism. “I’ll be a laughing stock. Princess Celestia will be forced to revoke my princesshood just to save the reputation of the Crown! What if they have to amputate my wings?!“
Dash had just about enough. “Twi, get ahold of yourself!” She pulled her up by the armpits and grabbed the alicorn firmly by the shoulders, looking her square in the eye. “Fine. I won’t drop them from the roster. I’ll think of something. But you need to come clean with me right now. You know, normally I wouldn’t wipe my butt with anything that comes out of Blueblood’s mouth...”
“I’m sensing a ‘but’ coming,” Twilight said. “You’re wondering if I maneuvered you into position?”
“Well yeah. Kinda.” A cold feeling grew in the pit of Rainbow’s stomach when her friend looked downcast at the floor, not answering right away.
After a second, Twilight looked up again. “What was I supposed to do, huh?” Her voice grew heated. “Spitfire wouldn’t cooperate with me. Too bound by tradition. ‘The Wonderbolts have been pegasi for the past several thousand years,’ she said. ‘No way, no how is that changing on my watch,’ she told me.”
Rainbow blinked. “So those pension changes…”
Twilight held up a hoof. “Well, I couldn’t just fire her, could I? How would that look? Equestria’s newest princess just barging in and throwing her weight around, dismissing ponies who didn’t agree with her? The press would have a field day. So, maybe I created an environment a touch more conducive to her resigning. I didn’t think for a moment that they’d all follow her.”
“So it’s true?” Rainbow snarled. Her wings unfurled to their full impressive span as she advanced on the alicorn. “The only reason I got this job is because you needed a pawn?!”
“Of course not!” Twilight shot back, her own wings mirroring the pegasus, both mares circling each other. “You’re a knight at least.” Her quip didn’t lessen the scowl pointed at her. “Besides, we both know it was only a matter of time until you wore that pin.” She twirled a hoof in the air. “I simply accelerated the process by a few years, nothing more.”
“It’s not nothing! I wanted to earn it! You knew that, Twilight. Not have it giftwrapped like some sort of cheap birthday present. You’re hoofing out favors for your friends just like those shady newspapers said. Favors we didn’t even ask for. That apple whatever Blueblood was talking about. What’s the deal with that? If AJ finds out, she’ll flip her lid. Heck, you’ll be lucky if she doesn’t stomp up here just to buck some sense into you. We both know this is the sort of back scratching that really burns her bushel.”
“So?” Twilight spat. “The currency of politics is influence, Rainbow Dash. And let me tell you, I’ve done favors for far, far less deserving ponies. Going to all their little parties. Dancing for their amusement. A wink and a nod here. A whispered promise there. All in hopes that maybe, just maybe, when I propose a new law or program it won’t be sucked into the black hole of some committee never to be heard about again!”
Rainbow stood with mouth agape as the rant continued to grow more and more unhinged, punctuated by bouts of heavy breathing by the alicorn. More than a few purple feathers floated to the floor, breaking up the uniform white of the tiles as Twilight paced in circles around the pegasus.
“Oh yes! They respect Princess Celestia. They respect the dickens out of her! Princess Luna scares the ponyfeathers out of the nobility. They don’t dare mess with a princess who can plumb all your deepest, darkest secrets while you’re asleep. And Cadence is the undisputed empress of her own city-state, and the Princess of Love. Everypony loves love!
“But Princess Twilight Sparkle? Nope! She’s not immortal! She’s the Princess of Books! Send her another first edition. That’ll shut her up. Besides, she’s just the princess of the tiny backwoods hamlet of Ponyville. A jumped up little unicorn who lives in a magic crystal tree-castle-thing and still not important enough to get a feathering taxi in Manehatten!” She rounded on Rainbow. “So pardon me if I don’t feel just awful for using what little influence I’m granted by the worthless piece of gilded tin resting on my noggin to cast my friends a few pearls before the swine get them all!
“You girls saved the day too. Where’s your crown? Where’s your reward? So I ask you, is it wrong to slip in an apple subsidy, or a line item to open another nature preserve into next year’s budget? Or imply that giving a certain designer a prominent place in your upcoming fashion show might be considered a favor to the Crown? Tell me, is it?!”
She waited a moment, and when she was sure Twilight was done, Rainbow marched forward and slapped the princess across the cheek.
“Ow!” Twilight whined, rubbing the spot. “Rainbow Dash!”
“Sorry, Twilight, but you were going a bit crazy there.”
“All right, maybe I deserved that.”
“Oi!”
Both mares turned to see Peanut and Brittle rush over.
“The Cap’n just slugged the Princess!” said Peanut as they skidded to a stop.
Brittle looked excited for some action and lowered himself to attack position. “You want we should take her in, Your Highness?”
“No no. It’s fine.” Twilight said, waving them away.
Both guards looked crestfallen. “You sure?” asked Peanut. “Pretty serious crime hitting a princess. Treasonous, sort of thing. We could have her flogged.”
“Absolutely not!”
“You're quite sure?” he wheedled. “Not even a light flogging? Been a long time since we had one o’ thoses.”
Twilight stared at the guard incredulously. “There hasn’t been a legal flogging in hundreds of years!”
“Like I said, been a long time, sorta thing,” Peanut reiterated.
Twilight and Rainbow both sighed and shared a look, small smiles forming on their lips. They both commanded crazy ponies.
Cloud Kicker sneezed. “Dust, are your ears burning?”
Lightning Dust peeked out of the broom closet and checked the hallway in both directions before giving the coast is clear. “Shut up and run, CK!”
Rainbow left Twilight’s office with a lot on her mind. The grimace parked on her face guaranteed everypony gave her a wide berth. All she needed was a mini storm cloud trailing her around to complete the look.
Eight weeks.
Eight weeks! How was she going to whip everypony into shape that fast, and deal with Twilight’s projects at the sametime. She didn’t have anything against the batpony and griffon personally. She just didn’t appreciate her Wonderbolts being used as a petri dish for one of Twilight’s social experiments.
Rainbow Dash stopped and let out a heavy sigh. After glancing around to make sure nopony was nearby, she rested her forehead against the surface of the closest wall. The granite felt cool even on this, a warm spring day. The truth was, despite what she’d told Twilight, despite the strong front, that little nagging voice in the back of her mind had reawoken with a vengeance.
Told you so.
She slapped herself.
Fraud.
She loathed that voice.
Told you, you didn’t earn it.
Why did self-doubt have to sound so smug, so gleeful at being right? But what choice did she have? She couldn’t quit. Twilight was right. It wasn’t all about Rainbow Dash. Whatever she did now was going to affect a lot of ponies.
No! Dash bounced lightly on her hooves and threw a few punches at her shadow to get her blood flowing. She needed to get it together and think. And Rainbow did her best thinking when moving.
Fact: she had two flyers with serious issues. A problem, but it meant she still had four cadets free of any issues. Alula and Rumble were solid flyers from what she remembered, and Scootaloo was her ace in the hole. She knew with absolute certainty Scootaloo could master even the most difficult stunts Dash threw her way.
Rainbow was so wrapped up in her thought that she rounded a corner only to collide with a wall.
Which was odd. She didn’t recall this particular hallway ending in a dead-end. She was even more surprised when a giant hoof, woolly and unshorn, manhandled her back to her feet, and the same wall spoke in a voice perfectly suited to a hard chunk of gravel.
“You should watch your step, Comrade Captain.”
It took Dash a moment to blink away the stars and give the...mare?—she was pretty sure the earth pony looming over her was a mare. Hugemongous was the word Twilight would've used. Rainbow Dash lacked Twilight's vast stockpile of ten-bit words, however, so her first thought was simply: “Holy moly, you’re a freakin' gianorumous pony!”
Titling her neck upwards, Dash was confronted by a mare—she’d settled for her best guess—about two ponies high and three wide, wrapped in a heavy olive-green military jacket trimmed in red.
Dash’s second thought was if earth pony had ice in her veins. She couldn’t think of any other reason why, while it was smack dab in the middle of spring, there wasn’t a single bead of sweat visible under her peaked cap. And obviously she’d been spending far too much time around Cloud Kicker because her third thought was ‘look at the size of those shoes.’
A draft pony she guessed, judging by sout frame and pillar-like legs, one of the many subtypes of earth ponies—once again, a nugget from one of Twilight’s trivia nights bubbled to the surface. The closest frame of reference which came to mind was Bulk Bicep’s mom, but judging by the glacial glare directed her way, she wasn’t about to be invited home for fresh baked cookies, not unless those cookies had rusty nails in place of chocolate chips.
From the thick accent, Dash pegged her as hailing from Stalliongrad, an industrial city located in the northwest part of Equestria. A cold, grey, depressing place lived in by cold, grey, depressing ponies who endured the bleak winters with equally bleak attitudes.
A place with such a depressing reputation, works by its authors were among the few pieces of literature Twilight actually recommended ponies against reading. Pinkie Pie had made the mistake of checking one out once.
Her hair had remained straight for an entire week and that was after reading a comedy.
“Captain Iron Curtain, I presume,” Dash said, finally recognizing the new head of the Royal Guard. She kept her voice cool.
“My son, Comrade Captain,” Iron Curtain rumbled. And, in Rainbow’s mind, ‘rumbled’ was the only word that fit. ‘Talk’ had taken one listen and run away to hide under the bed. “My son, Straight Arrow. We discuss, yes?”
Dash raised an eyebrow. She hadn’t given the Guard transfer much thought. His record, from what she remembered, was solid. Come to think of it, she had a hard time believing Iron Curtain was his mother. The stallion had a sleek muscular body to him, sharing more in common with a ballet dancer rather than the heavily muscled behemoth standing in front of her. “I didn’t know he was yours.” Her eyes narrowed. “If you’re here asking for special treatment, then forget get it. Straight Arrow has to pass my standards the same as every cadet.”
The Guard captain’s head tilted to one side, giving Dash a better view of a wicked scar which ran down the left side of her face and over one eye. She released a deep-throated laugh. “You misunderstand, Comrade Captain,” she said. “No special treatment. I want you to kick him out.”
“Err… Say what now?”
A massive hoof easily the size of a bowling ball came to encompass Rainbow’s shoulder, the long hairs of her fetlocks enveloping it completely.
“Simple, Captain. Straight Arrow, his father was Royal Guard. Like his father before him, and his father before that.” The earth pony released a heavy snort. Rainbow flinched as a burst of sour scented vapor hit her nostrils. “My son belongs with us, Comrade Captain. Not your Wonderbolts. We are soldiers, not performers. You will delivery him, da?”
Rainbow coughed. “No chance, Captain.” She finally succeeded in wiggling out from under the other captain’s hoof. “For whatever reason, Straight Arrow signed up to be a Wonderbolt. If he wants to leave on his own, that’s fine. But I’m not gonna to drop him for some sort of family tradition. No matter who his mom is.”
Iron Curtain’s expression hardened into a deep scowl, but Rainbow meet it with a fierce glare of her own, standing her ground while her mind could not help but think about the Royal Guard’s deep chest, which, she guessed, was fully capable of snapping her lighter frame in half like a dry twig on a hot day.
Not expected was another hearty laugh followed by a loud slap to her withers, which sent Dash careening head first to the floor. “You have fire, Comrade Captain. Ho ho, this is good. You shall need it, yes?” Once again, Dash found herself roughly grabbed by the nape of her neck and roughly hauled upright. “I make you deal, yes? You give me back my son, and I give my word not to take your reserve base. Is good deal, yes?” Rainbow suddenly found herself snout to snout with the much larger mare, legs dangling off the floor. Up-close, the distinct scents of snow, soot, and vodka became pronounced, along with how outclassed she truly was. Iron Curtain outweighed Dash three times over. All of it solid muscle. “If not, then I promise you this, Comrade Captain. My vas pokhoronim. We will bury you.”
With that, Rainbow found herself unceremoniously dropped on the hard marble tile as she watched the other captain disappear around the corner.
After rubbing her sore bottom, Dash had returned to Twilight’s office and pumped the Princess for as much information on the new captain as possible.
According to Twilight, the invasion of Canterlot by the changelings had shaken up many in the nobility, and they’d placed the blame squarely on Shining Armor’s leadership, calling the Royal Guard a soft and coddled institution.
Enter Iron Curtain. Her leadership was as harsh and cold as the city from which she hailed. A new, more brutal training regime was introduced. Recruits were sent to march in the Appaloosan desert alongside the buffalo, and pull sleds laden with boulders along the frigid outskirts of the Crystal Empire.
Rumor was that the increased emphasis on close combat—both barehoofed and armed—had seen a marked jump in the number visits to the infirmary. Anypony who didn’t measure up was summarily dismissed. Iron Curtain did not suffer the weak and had reputation a for crushing any officials foolish enough to get in her way.
Rainbow sighed. Things were getting more and more complicated. She longed for the days when her biggest worry was bucking clouds. Clouds were so much simpler.
The air in the Royal Garden was tinged with honeysuckle and pleasant birdsong. Neither did anything to lift her mood as she completed another circuit around a fountain sculpted to look like the Royal Pony Sisters. Patience was something she’d learned over the years, but hints of her younger, more impatient self still surfaced sometimes.
She checked her watch for what must have been the sixth time since she’d arrived. She’d been waiting at the agreed meeting spot for hours. Okay, it was more like ten minutes, but it felt like hours. Bottom line: they were late. With everything that had happened today, the last thing Rainbow was in the mood for was wasting time waiting for Tweedledee and Tweedledum.
Just as she was going to give up and takeoff solo, her ears perked at the crunch of gravel and the familiar sounds of an argument. ‘Way to watch my back! Do you know how hard it is to get granola out this mane? I thought us flyers were supposed to stick together.’ ‘I took a danish to the face for you! Besides, I think I still have strawberry seeds in my unmentionables.’ ‘I for one stand behind my uniform.’ ‘Yeah, when you’re not actively disgracing it! And you still smell like blueberries.’ ‘That sucks. I can’t stand blueberries.’
As her subordinates rounded a tall hedge, Dash marched up to them intent on chewing them out. “What took you guys so…” She stalled. Both pegasi appeared as if they’d returned from a warzone. A tasty, tasty warzone set somewhere in the nomare's land between East Breakfasta and West Brunchia. With a side of haybacon.
“What the hay happened to you guys? CK, why is there syrup in your mane?”
“No prob, you can lick it off,” said Cloud Kicker.
“And are those scrambled eggs all over your jacket, Dust?”
“Can we go?” Lightning Dust hastily scrubbed at the stain while glancing around. “We need to leave, like right now.”
“Yeah, I'm with LD,” Cloud Kicker concurred as they grabbed their leader, one under each forearm.
Rainbow twisted away as they tried to drag her off. “Whoa, hold up. You two are agreeing on something? Something doesn’t smell right here.”
Cloud Kicker kept shooting fugitive glances back down the path. “Well, it certainly has nothing to do with the spontaneous and totally, totally accidental fight which occurred in the cafeteria between a couple of brain-dead guards and some other innocent ponies. Who, and let me emphasize this, were definitely not us.”
“Who, if I might add, were totally winning the fight until they had to leave,” Dust added. “So can we go now?”
“Sure, I guess—” Rainbow’s ears perked up. All heads turned back down the path. “Do you guys hear yelling?” Her lieutenants looked at each other and nodded. They were already dots in the sky by the time Rainbow turned back around, so she found herself alone when a company of a thoroughly pissed off guards covered in bits of fresh fruit surrounded her, all brandishing rather pointy spears towards her chest.
At their lead appeared to be a red-faced sergeant, an entire pancake breakfast decorating his uniform and a kiwi impaled on his horn.
Pinching the bridge of her nose, Rainbow Dash sighed for the umpteenth time today and said the first thing to pop into her head.
“Did you know you’ve got a kiwi stuck on your horn?”
