Adagio gets it. No one outside the Wonderbolts could understand, and yet Adagio does. Was the answer that simple all along? To find someone in another touring outfit? Or was Adagio special even compared to others like that, more on Spitfire’s wavelength than anyone else would be? And could she risk waiting to find out?
Steady on, girl, you’ve only known her for a few hours – that’s hardly a good basis to go reevaluating your life over. Especially when it’s a life you adore!
And it certainly was, Spitfire grinned, taking stock for a moment. She lay on an enormous, luxurious bed, arms crossed behind her head, the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen cuddled up against her and leaning on her shoulder. Bedside lamps illuminated the scene. Neither of them were wearing a thing, and the twisted bedsheets were mostly discarded, with only the lightest sheet covering their legs.
“For a minute there,” Spitfire teased, “I thought you might need an inhaler.”
Adagio caught Spitfire’s eyes with a coy glance. “Ah, well,” she said, sounding like a wise old wizard, “that’s because you take my breath away.”
Snorting, Spitfire couldn’t help grinning, too. Such a dignified way of presenting it, and completely at odds with the huge lungfuls of air Adagio had been gulping down a half hour before, when they were both spent. “Or maybe it’s because you don’t do enough cardio?”
Although it probably wasn’t entirely fair comparing a singer to a Wonderbolt in that respect. Cardio was literally part of Spitfire’s job.
“...It is very hot in here.” Adagio didn’t blush at the admission, but her cheeks were still a little flushed anyway from all the exertion.
“And that was with the air conditioning on full,” Spitfire grimaced. And in one of Canterlot’s finest hotels, where the air conditioning units were hardly cheap and powerless, they still hadn’t been enough. Against the skin of her shoulder, she could still feel the roots of Adagio’s hair damp with sweat. The joys of a heatwave. Although the heat inside after midnight had nothing on what she’d had to put up with during a daytime festival show a couple of days before, and that had been with more clothes on. “I did tell you to man up.”
The quiet musing which followed from Adagio was not at all what Spitfire expected, followed a moment later by Adagio asking, “Do you think I should shave my head?”
Spitfire squeaked. It was undignified, unbecoming of an adult, let alone a Wonderbolt, and certainly not their captain. But how else could anyone respond to that?
“Nice and cool on my scalp,” Adagio continued, closing her eyes with a contented sigh. “Would that be manly enough, do you think?”
But at the cost of joy itself! Countless priceless works of art across the world could be burned, and palace after palace ransacked, and it would all cost the world less beauty than Adagio losing her hair would.
All of which must have shown on Spitfire’s face, from the way Adagio waggled her eyebrows while watching her.
Spitfire felt the muscles in her limbs relaxing again with the confirmation that Adagio’s idea wasn’t serious – she’d been 80% sure it wasn’t, but with some subjects it was hard not to panic until completely certain. She hadn’t noticed how she’d tensed up until she was able to breathe again.
“...I’m pretty sure you shaving your head would be considered a war crime?”
And then the blush hit, and Spitfire was sure she must have turned the colour of a beetroot. The attachment the compliment showed was made doubly embarrassing by being to a girl she’d met only hours before, who she really should not have been that affected by. Even if that girl did have spectacularly good hair.
“A genocide against decency?” Adagio’s eyebrow quirked upwards, and a smile shone on her lips. “Now you’re actually making it sound tempting.”
The heat in Spitfire’s cheeks became something more natural as she laughed, shaking her head. I tried to discourage her, and instead led her to something she’d be proud to have as an epitaph. How did I even manage that?
Adagio planted a soft kiss on Spitfire’s collarbone, then looked back up at her. “So I don’t know how much more manly you want me to go. When I grew tired, I powered through it with strength of will alone.” Adagio lay with one arm draped over Spitfire’s waist, and now turned her attention to inspecting the manicured nails on the attached hand. She only glanced up again at Spitfire to add, “Isn’t that exactly what manning up entails?”
“It is!” That, and not moaning about it afterwards or making excuses. But I guess it was me who brought it up. Spitfire’s gaze wandered over the ceiling, content to focus on Adagio with her ears alone. The voice, after all, was just as gorgeous as the body, in its own way. Possibly even more so? Yeah, once you combined what Adagio said with how she said it and how it came out sounding…
“You don’t lead for as long as I have, with no route marked out for you and no one else on your side, without a bit of determination to back you up.” Nails apparently passing inspection, Adagio turned her hand up. “I imagine you can relate?”
Spitfire’s eyes flicked down again, finding Adagio’s looking up at her. “Oh, I get it,” she breathed, returning her attention to the ceiling.
All the changes Spitfire had made to the ‘Bolts since she’d been in charge... A total undoing of the way Wind Rider had run things, reversing a trend stretching back several captains before him. Risking everything they’d established as a reputation and a fanbase, staking everything on her belief that she could make the team into something much better…
‘Surefire,’ they’d called her, back when she’d had only her determination to carry the rest of them along with. That nickname had faded once the results started to come in.
And Soarin and Fleet, they’d been behind her the whole way. They’d believed in her, but they hadn’t quite understood the passion driving her. Not in the way that Adagio, who echoed Spitfire in both attitude and experiences, could. The eye-opening outcome of their talk in the club earlier of how lonely it was at the top was realising that it needn’t be.
She’d never won by being faster or better than others. She’d won by pushing herself harder than them, on the track and on the training ground. So yeah, she could relate.
Thinking of which, Spitfire’s eyes widened. “Sorry,” she cleared her throat, “I drifted off for a moment there.” Daydreaming about how great a girl was instead of actually spending time with her when she was right there!
Keeping herself pressed up against Spitfire’s side, Adagio rolled over onto her front, lifting herself up onto her elbows and cupping her chin. “Don’t apologise,”she said, voice low and effortlessly sensual, “I know you were thinking about me.”
Hoping her answer conveyed her curiosity and her amusement without confirming anything, Spitfire said, “How can you tell?”
Adagio smiled lazily, reaching out with one hand to trail her fingertips down Spitfire’s arm from shoulder to elbow, caressing the muscles through the skin as she went. “You’ve met me, so it’s a safe bet.”
Laughing while also rolling her eyes, Spitfire tried to ignore the little voice in her head saying she’d probably have been thinking about Adagio even if they hadn’t met, but had only made eye contact across the room in the club.
“I have definitely met you.”
Half way between a purr and a whisper, Adagio asked, “And how does that make you feel?”
The voice had the effect it was no doubt intended to, throwing up images of their bodies writhing together – some of which were memories, and others the product of Spitfire’s imagination under the influence of those words. But Adagio’s arrival had brought more than fantastic sex: there’d been the companionship of finding a kindred spirit, the reassurance that Spitfire wasn’t alone in what she was going through. But also the doubt, because Adagio seemed to handle everything so effortlessly, leaving Spitfire trailing behind.
“It’s hard to put into words.”
“So keep it simple.” Adagio’s answer was smooth and came without hesitation. “How would you characterise this whole night, in just one word?”
Out hunting for something pretty, and instead ending up with something beautiful? Who gave as good as she got, if not substantially better? And raised the possibility that Spitfire had been wrong in her beliefs about not finding anyone outside her immediate circle? Not to mention how Adagio specifying a single word to describe it brought to mind their conversation back in the club, with the signing on the skin, and walking out hand in hand through the front entrance for all to see!
“Unexpected. So unexpected.”
Adagio grinned, tossing her hair – as if it wasn’t mussed enough already. “To be expected is to be predictable, and to be predictable is to be boring.”
Fake scandal and horror filled Spitfire’s gasp at the thought of being mundane. And while it was hard to imagine that from Adagio, part of that must have been down to her keenness to avoid it.
“I agree,” Spitfire said. “Of all the surprises, though…” She rolled over onto her side, towards Adagio, shuffling down further into the bed so they were level with each other. “I’ve never had an equal outside the team before. I hadn’t dared to dream it possible.”
“An equal?” Adagio arched a delicately-sculpted eyebrow. “You flatter me.”
Put in those terms, Spitfire hadn’t ever really felt she’d had an equal inside the team before either. Many of the squad could do things she couldn’t, but she was the one leading them for a reason.
“Someone who understands.” Spitfire slipped an arm around Adagio’s waist, pulling their hips together in a comforting closeness. “Who really knows what it’s like. That’s not something I believed I’d find.”
Without saying anything, Adagio raised a hand to Spitfire’s cheek, cupping it and gazing into her eyes. Spitfire felt her heart leap in answer. After a moment, she blushed and had to look away. “I’m not proposing marriage or anything,” she tried to laugh it off. “Just that you’ve opened up possibilities I didn’t realise I had.”
What began as a smirk on Adagio’s lips to accompany her raising eyebrows at the mention of weddings ended as more of an honest smile as Spitfire finished.
None of the others she’d met at nights in the club would have believed their eyes, seeing her here like this. Spitfire could hardly believe it herself. “I’d got so used to being on the prowl,” she shook her head. “I never thought I’d get caught.”
Adagio pursed her lips, leaning back and studying Spitfire with an intrigued look. “I can understand not thinking you’d find the right person, but it sounds more like you were purposefully avoiding it?” Adagio brought a hand to her chin, peering at her, and Spitfire felt goosebumps breaking out on her scalp at being analysed like a puzzle to be solved. “You and I don’t do fear of failure,” Adagio said, before correcting it to, “We don’t let it rule us, anyway. So I can’t believe that would hold you back from something you want.”
There’s a difference between worrying something won’t work out and being so certain of it that it’s not worth the effort of trying, but…
“It’s a weird thing, being an athlete,” Spitfire said. Adagio settled in next to her again, running her fingertips down Spitfire’s side in long, caressing motions. “Even the best athlete in the world will have to retire half way through their life. I won’t be breaking any records at 40.” And that deadline seems so much closer than it did, once upon a time. “So I’m very aware, always, that my time doing what I love is limited.” She felt her pragmatic smile become a grimace. “And I don’t want to waste any of the time I’ve got, or compromise it with divided loyalties.”
A withering noise of disgust accompanied Adagio’s flat, knowing eye roll, which reminded Spitfire she wasn’t the only one in a field with an age limit for success. And at least in her own industry those restrictions came from biology, rather than higher-ups being uninterested in anything other than youth.
Spitfire shrugged where she lay, unable to offer Adagio any consolation beyond sharing the same frustration. “So I figured relationships could wait til after.”
“Ah,” Adagio said, nodding wisely like a wizard again, and undermining it all with the twinkle in her eyes. “So you’re gonna start dating at 45?”
However silly it sounds, it’s better than the alternative. Here’s to hoping I age well. “You gotta give the best years of your life to something. And spending them on my passion feels like the right thing to do. The best investment.” Spitfire frowned. It sounded hollow, put like that. “This is why I get up in the morning; it’s what I want to focus my efforts on.”
Maybe from further away Spitfire would have missed it, but up that close she could see, deep in Adagio’s eyes, something she could only describe as wonder. It was surrounded by the same flirty engagement and more serious understanding as usual, but it definitely lurked there underneath it all. Adagio’s voice was low when she replied. “Most people would call that selfish, but I’d call it driven.”
Yeah, that was it. It had sounded hollow in Spitfire’s head because that was how most people might have thought of it. They didn’t have that fire behind them, so they looked down on prioritising it. Despite so long of doing it her own way, the standard attitudes and prejudices of a society of people who weren’t like her still filtered through. But even knowing that, it was hard to shake their hold on her sometimes.
“I don’t know. Because you’re right, a lot of people would call that selfish. And say that you’re a better person if you dedicate your life to others.”
“Eurgh, good people.” Adagio turned up her nose, and the fingertips on Spitfire’s side paused. “Don’t be like them. You’re better than that.”
Grinning, Spitfire gave a reassuring squeeze with her hand on Adagio’s hip. “It just feels like I wouldn’t really be me if I gave up striving to win with everything I have. That’s who I am.”
Adagio leaned in closer to Spitfire, their bodies pressed warmly together from chest to thigh – warmth that was by no means unwelcome, despite the heat of the night. Adagio pulled her mass of curls out behind her and laid her head on the pillow, with her nose less than an inch from Spitfire’s.
Despite thinking she was used to it by now, Spitfire felt her breath catch all over again at just how beautiful Adagio was up that close. “My life is a reflection of who I am,” she finished, almost mumbling the words with how distracted she was in that moment.
“And you’re selling out your principles if you compromise that,” Adagio said, raising a hand out. The way she’d ran her fingertips down Spitfire’s skin, making only the lightest contact, had felt great when it had been on her side. But on her face, it was all she could do not to close her eyes and bask in it.
“Right,” Spitfire said, breathing out and feeling some of her muscles relaxing at Adagio’s touch, like they’d turn into jelly and she’d sink into the bed. “If I let a relationship hold me back, let it get in the way of how much I devote to my passion, then I think I’d come to resent it.” She focused on Adagio’s eyes, using them like beacons to keep her anchored in the conversation. “And I’d always wonder what I could have been, if I’d given it my all.”
“I know what you mean.” Adagio spoke more softly, halfway between a whisper and her usual resonance. “I’d rather regret doing something than not doing it. At least that way you know.”
Feeling the corners of her lips rising up of their own accord, Spitfire made no reply and let that speak as her agreement. Adagio’s fingers made their way from the upturned side of Spitfire’s face, down her jawline, and came to rest on her neck, idly ghosting over the skin below her larynx. The tingling sensation might have given Spitfire a shudder if she’d been paying attention to it, rather than fixated on Adagio’s eyes.
Then Adagio chuckled, with a rueful widening of her eyes, adding, “Of course, if you stick with that, and choose team relationships over romantic ones, what will happen once you retire from the team?”
The question, which might otherwise have left ice in her chest, instead gave her a warm feeling, since she already knew the answer. “I joined up at the same time as my two closest friends. It would be nice if the captaincy went to one of them when I retired, but realistically we’ll all be equally past our primes by that point, so I think it’s more likely we’d all retire together.” They’d already talked among the themselves about how the three of them would probably be the scourge of an old peoples’ home together someday. “And I’ll miss Misty Fly, High Winds, Surprise and all the other younger ‘Bolts, but as long as I have Soarin and Fleet, everything’ll be fine.”
The same fondness shone from Adagio, even when she said, “If they’re anything like my two sisters, then the last remaining challenge is to be able to stand each other for that long.”
Spitfire snorted. Definitely some truth there.
Adagio continued, “And by 50, you’ll have already been dating for five years, so you might have some company from other sources too.” As she said it, Spitfire felt the hand on her neck drift lower, fingers tracing patterns across the top of her chest. She tried to copy the gesture, with her fingers on the small of Adagio’s back, but her own movements felt clumsy by comparison.
“I might, yeah,” she laughed, drinking in how Adagio almost glowed with amusement. “So I just have to hold out until then.”
“Chasing off those commitment demons.” Adagio slid one leg between Spitfire’s, the skin feeling almost creamy with how smooth it was against her own.
Prompted by that new closeness, Spitfire expanded the area her hands worked with on Adagio’s back, now dragging those fingers the whole way down her spine. The way the arm enveloped Adagio, too, gave the impression of wrapping them tighter together. I could stay here forever...
“More like playing boomerang with them, really,” she said, “with how they always come back after a while.”
After taking what appeared to be a moment to reflect on that, Adagio tilted her head. “And if they win someday, before you’re ready to stop living for yourself?” Her hands danced their way lower, gliding around the contours of Spitfire’s chest.
Sighing happily at the touch, Spitfire said, “I’ll just have to make sure they don’t.”
“Mmm, yes you will,” Adagio agreed, her voice lowering to a mischievous whisper. “You see one coming, you shoot to kill.”
“Only thing for it.” She tensed her muscles and set her jaw, making a show of being determined to fight. “Bang bang, off they pop!”
Those muscles dissolved an instant later when Adagio raised her knee higher, nudging Spitfire’s legs further apart in the nicest of ways and entwining their bodies. It seemed almost too obvious to notice, but that physical closeness brought with it the feeling of a deep bond on a more emotional level.
“For now, though…”