//------------------------------// // Dancing Fire // Story: Lovie Dovie // by The Psychopath //------------------------------// " 'Asherk'?" Lovey repeated. "YYYYYYYYYYYYES!" the energetic dragoness shouted. She twirled around on one foot and bowed. "I am your fire instructor!" "...Okay?" "I like to say my name with exaggerating and sputtering. It's funny to me. " Asherk clapped her hands. "Alrighty then! Let's teach you how to breathe fire!" Asherk spread her wings and arms happily, but Lovey caught sight of something rather disturbing. "What happened to your wings?" the pink dragoness asked. Asherk's wings were torn to the bone. Only a few strands of skin remained, and most of it was coal black and burnt. "Hm? Oh. That. Happened when I first came here. Had a huge accident, and I lost my wings." Her smile started fading, then came back with a bang. She threw an arm and open hand forward and her other arm back and in the air, like she was presenting something on a show. "I discovered I could do something else with my fire, and it just takes some channeling!" She brought her arms to her sides, bent them, and casually twisted her torso left-to-right. She pushed her arms forward thrice each before another twist, and accompanied this by standing n her toes with one foot and twisting the leg. This went on for several seconds until jets of flame burst out of her wings, propelling herself into the air as though she were wearing a jetpack. She flew around, three very long ropes of fire waving off of both wings and letting loose bright embers and trails. Asherk flew up high, 'stalled', then dropped down in a steep plummet, stopping mere inches from the ground and righting herself up to lend on the ground. She threw her arm forward again towards Lovey and said 'Ta da!' to 'crown' her achievement. Lovey hesitantly clapped a few times. "That was impressive, but how did you even manage that?" Asherk shrugged. "I don't know. I lost my wings and wanted to be able to fly again. I hoped really hard, and there we go." She leaned to the side and tapped her head. "Well, not 'wished'. Turns out, my body creates fire all the time and lets it out through my skin." She flicked her hair. "I'm, like, one of the ultra-rare mutations, tcha!" she joked. "Please don't talk like that," Lovey sighed. "I hate that." Asherk shrugged. "If you don't want me to, I don't mind." She clapped her hands together once more. "Back to controlling the fire. Show me what ya got!" Lovey remained inert, looking around, embarrassed, and Asherk's smile became less prominent. "You have no control over your fire?!" she screamed. "That's a first..." she noted more calmly. "You really don't feel anything when you want to breathe fire?" "That's not entirely true." Lovey tapped her claws together in a consistent rhythm and pattern. "It only came out when I'm angry, and then again; I can't control. It just sort of...bubbles out." She shrugged. "Yeah. That's definitely not control. Very young dragons, generally newborns, do that, although it's not tied to anger," Asherk hummed. "Well, I guess it's time we try an assortment of way to get your flames flowing and spewing out of that angry mouth of yours!" she teased. The fiery dragon hopped back several steps to get into position for her dancing. She stretched a left leg forward, and rolled her arms once to the left, and repeated the motion in reverse with the right side. "Try dancing with me! It always gets my rhythm going!" She bobbed her head. "Fire is not controlled. It is directed, like this!" It started off as just a few sparks following Asherk's arms, then it gradually grew to sleeves of flame, then snakes of fire. Lovey shielded herself from the heat blasting off the coiling ropes of inferno. "You can keep it from flying off, too, but it takes work." She jumped in place, spreading her legs into a sumo stance, then slammed her arms together, producing a huge, expanding bubble of fire that engulfed Lovey and a huge portion of the garden section they were in. "No need to worry about the plants. They're specifically cultivated to be resistant to fire, so we can go crazy here!" The other teachers yelled at her for her actions, but Asherk just smiled widely at them in return. "You know, it's not entirely true that fire can't be controlled." "Really? I thought you were trying to follow some kind of philosophical charade by saying that," Lovey grumbled. "Nope. That's just how fire works." Asherk shrugged. "Now dance with me!" The fiery dragoness resumed her dance that she used to direct her flames, but Lovey was not jumping in. "What's the matter, Sourpuss? Got no rythm?" she sang. "Just let the music of nature flow through your body and soul!" The pink dragoness started grating her teeth, and her mouth started to sputter and spark with her pink fire. "I can see the flames, but I see no love!" "I don't do 'love'," Dovey repeated in mockery. "And I don't do dancing, especially when there's music at all!" Asherk stopped briefly to stretch her back, but resumed her dance, leaning backwards then pushing herself back forward with a bend. "That's because you're too high strung! Here. Let me help you get loose." Lovey's arm was grabbed and pulled, throwing her into a dizzying spin that allowed Asherk to grab her hand and force her into swinging her arm left and right while she recovered from the spin. After regaining her wits, Lovey ripped her arm out of the happy dragoness' grasp. "DON'T TOUCH ME!" Lovey shouted. She held her arm against her chest and stepped away. Asherk tilted sideways towards her and wagged her finger. "Ah! Someone's too embarrassed to dance in front of other people!" she teased. "You don't need to worry about that! The others dance, too!" She stopped dancing for a moment and pondered. "Well, not everyone." She waved her hand down. "But they're boring anyways." "I'll never dance anyways!" Lovey pouted. "I'll look for another teacher." Asherk cartwheel'd in front of the pink dragoness, blocking her. "Ah ah! I'm the only one available right now, and the others won't teach you even if you asked them really hard!" Lovey raised an eyebrow. "Oh really? And why not?" "Because we alllllllllll know each other here, and we decide on things for our newest members. They decided that I was the best teacher for yooooooooooooou," Asherk sang. Lovey's eyes twitched angrily. "Now time to dance!" Asherk stated when she grabbed her 'pupil's' hand again for another dance. Celestia was sitting on her small balcony, drinking some tea. She was too concerned about her message to know what tea she was drinking specifically, despite loving to know exactly what she was drinking, where it had come from, and so on and so forth. Behind her stood a butler, with mane combed back and black suit on. He had an air of professionalism in both face and posture, and awaited Celestia's beck and call. "Inklot," Celestia started. "have you heard anything about my message to the Lovie Dovies?" "I have not, Princess." Celestia started to worry. "He should have reached them by now and come back." "Additionally, I wanted to share this with you before, but you started drinking your tea to relax." He sighed. "I didn't think it appropriate to tell you." "Well, you can tell that I'm not relaxed." Celestia grumbled. "Additionally, you saying that has simply stressed me out even more." The stallion bowed his head. "I apologize, Princess." "So what IS the news?" "The messenger in question has not been seen or heard from since his departure from Ranchefort." "What?!" Celestia spoke in a whisper-startled voice. A group of large dragons were looking at a small note they had found in their lands, and were laughing at its contents. Its previous owner, however, was nowhere to be found. "Can you believe this?" a dragoness shouted through her laughter. "Yeah. They thought the lovie dovies would be helpful!" one dragon mocked. The dragoness called out to a dragon walking away. "Hey, is this true, though? The lovie dovies aren't just traitors to our way of life, but also to their own kind as well?" "You have the proof between your claws, don't you?" he replied. The group nodded to each other and flew away to who knew where. The dragon left behind looked at them for the corner of his eyes, his fists balled and his gaze angry. "Stupid dragons. Just as bad as the ponies," he hissed to himself. He kicked a pile of grass, better covering what it was hiding. "Everything's going well, though, wouldn't you say?"