//------------------------------//
// Chapter 9: Acceptance 
// Story: The Engineer’s Wings 
// by Keeper of time RD 
//------------------------------//

The rest of the battle went as well as a battle could thanks in no small part to the fact that once Dash and Scootaloo rejoined the fray, Spitfire took a defensive position behind the silver Mark 1, protecting it from any who dared make an attack run against the youthful pilot’s plane. More importantly, with the main guns of the enemy air ship damaged beyond function, it had to withdraw, and with the loss of its flack cannon support the remaining enemy airplanes soon found themselves needing to fall back as well.

While the enemy had suffered a major defeat, the Wonderbolts hadn’t gotten off scot-free. By the battle’s end they had lost four planes of their own, five if they counted Soarin’s. Truthfully it had been a minor miracle that all of the shot-down pilots had managed to only get injured escaping their doomed aircraft.

Once the fighting was over, Rainbow Dash gave the Cloudsdale the radio frequency that she and Scootaloo had been using, and they promptly used it to tell the filly to return to the landing bay.

Soon the last of the Wonderbolt’s planes had landed. And Spitfire wasted little time emerging from that last jet and flying her way over toward the silver Mark 1. As she approached a stern glare and a motion commanded the young pilot to come out.

Scootaloo came with her ears low and eyes to the floor. She wasn’t sure why, but everything about the elder pegasus’ stance said that she’d done something wrong.

“What were you doing out there?!” Spitfire demanded.

“I… I…” Scootaloo stuttered as her mind went into panic mode.

Sure, she’d been yelled at before. But ever since her dad died, she hadn’t been yelled at by a pony with authority over her. Yet this angry mare before her had the power to decide if she could complete her job or be sent away a failure with no choice but to apologize to Rarity for being unable to stay with Sweetie Belle until she brought her home.

“She saved my tail! That’s what!” Rapid Fire said, flying over and landing beside the filly.

“And mine,” Fleetfoot said boldly, also coming to the filly’s side.

“Me, too!”

“Ditto!”

Two more mares joined their fellow Wonderbolt pilots.

Seeing this, their captain took a step back, her look of anger replaced with one of confusion. Surely, her subordinates weren’t condoning having a civilian on the battlefield, and one that was a minor to boot.

“More importantly then all of that-” Rainbow Dash said confidently, her words parting the group allowing her to stand directly by Scootaloo’s side. “-I asked her to!”

First Spitfire blinked, then she raised an eyebrow. After a moment of seeming calm, she spoke with a slowly burning fury.

“You ASKED a civilian child to enter a battleground?! Do you have any idea who she is?!”

Despite the harsh tone of her captain’s voice, Rainbow Dash only looked back with convection. “She is Scootaloo! Daughter of Firestorm, the most amazing engineer and test pilot the Wonderbolts’ have ever had!” she answered.

Once again, Spitfire’s anger turned into surprise. “Then… You know… ” she muttered.

“Exactly who she is?” Dash finished the incomplete question. “Of course I do! Or have you already forgotten who was the rookie Wonderbolt you assigned to clean out his locker because he was too dead to do it himself?”

Spitfire’s eyes became pinpricks as she remembered exactly what Rainbow Dash was talking about.

“Let me tell you, every single picture in his locker had her in it!” Dash continued, draping a wing over the orange filly’s back. “Every. Single. One! So yeah, I know exactly who she is! I know exactly why she’s an orphan who has to fend for herself in this world!”

A look of seriousness and focus returned to Spitfire’s eyes, yet she only responded with the words, “Then why?”

The mare with the rainbow mane shook her head slightly. “Maybe you’ve been in the Wonderbolts so long that you’ve forgotten what it’s like to be a nopony, but I haven’t. I remember how hard it was to get hired when everypony would always ask, ‘why should I hire you instead of the Wonderbolts?’ And I was an adult! She NEEDS every chance she can get to prove herself! And I’m not going to ignore her skill just because of who she is!”

With the end of Rainbow Dash’s speech, she and Spitfire stared into each other’s eyes, both glaring stubbornly.

The staredown ended when Spitfire turned to Scootaloo instead and said, “For the record, when I give general orders, I only expect Wonderbolts to follow them. If I want you to launch I’ll specifically call for you to launch, Courier Seven. Got it?”

“Yes ma’am,” the filly managed to mutter, trying not to sound like a child apologizing to a teacher, and failing miserably.

Then Spitfire turned and stared walking away. And as she went, she looked over her shoulder, and added, “Dash! Seeing as you’re so keen on building her up, I’ll let you sign off on the endorsement.”

“Endorsement?” both Dash and Scoots asked.

As she walked away the captain casually said, “Last I checked, five shoot-downs officially makes you an ace combat pilot. And she’s shot down more than that in our presence, so somepony should add that to her logbook.”


* * * * * * *


It took only a moment for Scootaloo to fetch her logbook from the cargo space of her plane.

When Rainbow Dash joined the filly atop the silver Mark 1, she had brought her own logbook. Dash then flipped open both logbooks to the endorsement section, and began to copy, word for word, the entry that had noted herself as a combat ace. Until she got near the end anyway, using her own Wonderbolt identification number instead.

“Hey, Rainbow Dash!” an orange stallion with a yellow and red mane called out.

“Oh, hey Firestorm! What’s up?”

Had she forgotten something again? The rookie couldn’t help but wonder as the senior Wonderbolt approached.

“I was hoping to ask you a favor,” he said.

With a bold grin the young mare answered, “Oh? what kinda favor?”

“Well, I brought my daughter to our air show yesterday, and she really liked the performance you put on. And I’m planning on getting her a logbook for her birthday, so I thought I could make it really special if you would sign it for her.”

Her grin only grew at the request.

“Tell ya what, Spitfire has me flying some boring patrol today. And I wouldn’t mind somepony to talk to while I was out there. So why don’t you come with me, and I’ll sign that book when we get back?”

“Deal.”

…I never did sign that logbook…

“Rainbow Dash? Are you alright?” Scootaloo asked, curious as to why the blue pegasus was impersonating a statue all of a sudden.

Shaken from her thoughts, Dash finished adding her signature to the endorsement and pulled her head back. But not before a single tear fell before she could look away.

“I’m fine. Just remembering the day Spitfire signed off on me becoming an ace. That’s all,” she lied.

“I bet that was a good day,” Scootaloo said, with a smile creeping onto her face. “Hey, Rainbow Dash, can I tell you a secret?”

Rainbow Dash answered still looking away. “Sure thing, squirt. Your secrets are safe with me!”

“I always wanted your autograph. But I never thought I’d get it for something important like this! This is so cool!”

“Yeah, I am kinda cool! But you earned it, never forget that.” As she answered, Dash got up. “Look I gotta go… do stuff. I’ll catch ya later,” she added, never looking back.

Only after Rainbow Dash had left did Scootaloo look down at her logbook and notice where a teardrop had fallen near the endorsement that now heralded her as an ace combat pilot.


* * * * * * *


For the Wonderbolts, much of the rest of the day was spent repairing the C.S. Cloudsdale, the gash having rendered the cloud ship unable to move until said repairs could be made.

For Scootaloo, she’d spent most of that time doing what repairs she could to her plane. And much to her surprise, she found Crescent, the equipment manager, intentionally ‘misplacing’ a few sheets of metal already cut to the shape of the more badly damaged panels of her plane. “Like I’m not going to fix every aircraft that fought for us,” he told her when she asked why he’d left them lying on the wing of her plane.

Furthermore, the rest of the maintenance crew also seemed to adopt this unspoken agreement that, as far as they were concerned, they were going to look after the Mark 1 just as if it was an actual Wonderbolt plane. So by day’s end, every hole had been patched, every dent fixed, and even every damaged wire and cable replaced.

Dinner in the mess hall also brought a noticeable change in the atmosphere. The table where the trio of fillies and Rainbow Dash were was no longer shunned or teased. If anything, some of the Wonderbolts made their way over to it to give a subtle sign of respect, be it a nod or a quick salute, all of these leaving the three youngsters feeling far more welcome then their first day aboard. Enough so that none of them noticed Spitfire going out of her way to avoid their table.