//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: Cloudsdale Academy // Story: Pulling Through // by Noponythere //------------------------------// Hi all! welcome to my second chapter for this series (first actual). Enjoy the story and please comment, like or favourite. ============================================================================== ============================================================================== Chapter 1: Cloudsdale Academy ============================================================================== Present time You wake up from your sleep and slowly crack your eyes open. You examine your surroundings quickly, a small bunk bed and your packed belongings in the luggage compartment above and opposite of you. The bright daylight shines through the crack in the curtains. Oh right, I’m on the train to Cloudsdale, Wait where’s Thunder- *ZzZzZzZz* Never mind, he's above me? A quick hop out of you bunk confirms your earlier suspicion. Thunder Hoof is sleeping in the bunk above you. As you look closely, he is sleeping in such an odd position you decide it is not worth waking him up. You go over and quickly draw the curtains. The refreshing sunlight fills the room illuminating all the cracks. You hear Thunder shuffle about behind you as he acclimatizes to the new light conditions. Don't give me any morning drama. Sheesh, Thunder is an interesting roommate, to say the least You think to yourself, might as well get used to this, were going to be roommates for the next 2 and a half years. This thought makes you think back to your school and your friends and family. You and your parents were not very emotional about you leaving for Cloudsdale, not to say they didn't care. Your parents could not be more proud their son was studying in the most Prestigious flight schools in Equestria. Your parents just don't do emotional drama... Looking at the clock in your room *07:50* You decide you still have an hour until the train stops and you need to fly up to Cloudsdale. The trip from your town had been a short uneventful trip. The town you came from is hardly on the map. It's not that’s it's small, it's just nothing happens there. You think of ways to pass the remaining time. Well... i guess i could just wait here and watch the scenery go by... *ZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZz* You hear a soft quite moan coming from behind and above you. You decide not to bother seeing what Thunder is up to. uhhh... everypony needs their beauty sleep I guess? *ZzZzZzZzZzZzZz* *GHnhhGNhgNHG* You hear some soft moaning coming from Thunder. You really do not want to think what Thunder is dreaming about in his deep sleep. You turn around and fly quietly to his bunk. In the mess of sheets and pillows, blood rushes to your head and cheeks. You're not the only one. You see Thunder's wings fully unfurled and pressed against the wall of the carriage.... as well as other parts *GAH* OK, I've seen TOO much!!! "Eep!" you decide not to spend another minute in his company and leave for the diner carriage. You decide to leave Thunder alone in the carriage. You reasoned; sometimes some pony’s gotta do what somepony needs to do... ========================================================================= 15 minutes later Diner Carriage ========================================================================= "Hey!!! Morning Flash" You easily recognise that voice and decide not to turn around. You quickly finish up your morning salad and greet your best friend. "Hey Thunder, you sleep well?" "Yeah, that bed was really comfortable" The turn's to the waitress and orders breakfast, at the same time stretching his wings. Comfortable!?!?! I bet it was.... You decide to poke some fun at your old time friend. Just to keep him on his toes, plus he deserves a bit of teasing. "Soo... manage to keep your sheets clean?" you say just slightly above a whisper. BURN!!! You see results immediately; he starts to blush heavily and stares at you with pointed daggers. Any other pony would probably have died from the resulting heart attack by now; anybody left alive would be crushed in the following pummelling. But, you know Thunder would never actually hurt anypony, though... why take the risk? You inch ever so slowly away from him hoping to change the subject. "What? It did look like you were enjoying yourself..." This causes Thunder to quickly change from anger to his usual shyness. He avoids eye contact with you but has recomposed himself. "Well, to answer your question" his voice now goes down to a barely audible whisper... "No." EWWWWWWWWW "That's just disgusting Thunder" You bury your face in your hooves, by now a few patrons in the carriage are listening in to both of you. They only heard your question and couldn't hear what Thunder replied with, but judging by your reaction, they understood the situation.... Thunder now starts to laugh as both of you make a quick exit back to your carriage. You leave a few bits on the counter as a tip and quickly hoof it to the door. You try not to imagine walking into a room greeted by this biological... hazard. "That room better be clean by the time we walk in" You notice Thunder eye you with the worst poker face you could imagine. "Uhh... I kind of put my sheets onto your bed, Lightning" You turn to Thunder with a look of horror on your face. "WHAT!!?!? "There wasn't any other place to put them; it was bad enough I had to wipe the walls." OHHH SWEET CELESTIA. Please shut him up, I don't even want to go in now. ============================================================================ Cloudsdale 09:00 ============================================================================ After departing from the train, both Thunder and yourself hastily fly towards the Academy. It wasn't hard to miss; it was only one of the largest grounds in all of Cloudsdale. You've never seen so many other pegasi in such a big city before. Both of you take some time to enjoy the scenes Cloudsdale has to offer. The breathtaking scenery and architecture astounds you, knowing most pegasi don't have much of a taste for culture, besides classical pegasi culture. Passing a quiet cafe though the streets you notice a young couple outside, passionately making out at their table. Even from this distance you can clearly hear the audible moans of love as they kiss in a warm embrace. You take little notice to this as you've seen this scene many times back in your town. Although the passing glance did get catch Thunder Hoof's attention. He quickly catches up to you with a genuine look of question on his face. You almost guess what he wants to ask you. But you decide to let him speak first. "Hey... umm.... Lightning? Uhhhh-" "Yeah Thunder?" you slow you pace down to allow him to talk comfortably "Do you think you'll find that special somepony in Cloudsdale?" You aren’t taken by surprise by his question. He already knows your stance of relationships when it came to mares back in your old school. "Well I would know if I find that special somepony when I meet her Thunder" you reply quite bluntly. Thinking back to the past, it had never been very hard to hook up with a mare in school. You did get quite a few offers and countless of desperate fillies asking you out during the prom but you knew none of them really liked you for who you are. Granted, good looks and fitness does help you find somepony You decide to return the question to Thunder; he also shares the same situation you're in. In Fact both of you never took anypony on a date or at prom. Both of you would almost always be together. You weren’t gay, and Thunder certainly wasn't You learnt that after uncovering his collection of porn magazines and DVDs under his bed one day. Nopony saw it that way either. But both of you never really did pay particular attention to mares at school. "Soo... how about you Thunder? You wish you had a special somepony" Thunder keeps his cool appearance and continues at your pace “I don't really know Lightning, but I don't know if there's anypony out there for a person like me" What he was saying was partly true; Thunder was not exactly the outgoing kind of pony. He preferred to keep his emotions and thoughts to those close to him. Though... with his build, you imagine it difficult for anypony to resist that hunk of a stallion. You notice that you're quickly approaching your destination. Looking up from where you were, the main building itself was as large as city hall. The ornate feature of the building clearly shows the amount of money parents, sponsors and the government had pumped into this Academy. Both of you enter the administrative office and the receptionist quickly directs you to the student transfer department. Both of you wait patiently outside the office while the admissions officer is on his way. You notice his name written on the frosted glass of his office door. *Solar Chaser* Well... I guess it's because he's looking for stars? You laugh quietly to yourself as the seconds tick by, you were never much of a comedian but even this was quit good to you. Shortly you are quickly greeted by a medium sized yellow Pegasus who look liked he just graduated from school. "Good morning gentlecolts" he greets you with a loud but gentle welcome. He quickly introduces himself and leads us into his office. "I’m sure you two are just as excited about joining our Academy as I am of having such brilliant students such as yourselves" He quickly goes over both of our records and explains more about our scholarship. You remember what coach speed wing said 3 month prior to this. "In fact I want to see you on the Junior National League Team in a year's time" "I’m guessing both of you are tired from your trip to get here" both of you reply only with a silent nod. "well I’ll show you to your dorm rooms and by lunch I’ll arrange for somepony to give you two a tour around the school" You and Thunder take that as your signal to get up and follow Solar Chaser. ================================================================================ Dorm room 22-2B 09:45 ================================================================================= You look up at the dorm both you and Thunder Hoof would be staying in. Given the amount of money someponies parents are forking out, the dorm itself is quite well kept, low density and best of all, spacious. Heading down the corridor you notice the intervals between room doors, suggesting the rooms themselves are large. With a small set of keys Solar chaser opens room number 22 and leads you into your room. You quickly notice your space is about as large as a good sized apartment. "This is your commons area, you have a small kitchen, the living room, and dining space all fully furnished. You quickly notice many of the items and furniture as brand new, this was high quality products too. "HEY!! Lightning, they stocked the fridge!!" you look at Thunder pillaging the fridge and checking every other item stocked in the commons area. Sheesh, next thing you know, Thunder's getting a wingboner over a new room Turning back to him, your eyes sadly confirm what your brain just told yourself. You decide not to pursue that line of thought and follow Solar Chaser into your room. "Here you have your own bedroom, once again fully furnished and complete with en suite bathroom. There’s a small balcony at the window, and you get a great view of the grounds from here." Solar chaser continues to show many of the features in your room. At a quick glance you notice the rooms here all get a queen sized double bed. You realise Thunder had noticed your face when you saw the bed. You prepare for the inevitable... Don't say it.... "Hey lightning, I noticed you were checking out your bed" You're going to say it... A huge grin quickly spreads between both his ears, he quickly gets Solar chaser in between both of you. Why do I even put up with you... "Don’t get any ideas now lightning, we all know you make a lot of nois-" You quickly charge towards him. But he quickly runs out the door into the commons area "I'LL KILL YOU THUNDER!!!!!" You quietly hear Solar Chaser chuckle from behind and quickly add in "Oh don't worry you two" both of you momentarily pause to listen to Solar Chaser. You think to yourself, this must be important. "The bedrooms come with complete soundproofing, nopony even right outside the door could hear a thing from inside. That goes the same for your bathrooms." with that he burst into a fit of laughter and starts to move to leave your dorm. You return to your futile attempts to injure Thunder. "Oh a final thing about dorm rules-" you both again pause and pay attention to Solar, "Colt's and Fillies in their own dorms by 11PM" With that Solar leaves your dorm and Thunder breaks into another fit of laughter. You decide to stop trying to pummel Thunder and decide to blow off steam in your shower. You remember, your punches don't really actually hurt a person like him anyway. Thunder decides to lie back on the sofa and watch some CSI:Canterlot on his new favourite TV. You return to your room, LOCK the door and head for a long warm shower... Well I guess somepony's gonna have to blow off steam sometime... =============================================================================== 11:30 ....After some fun time in the shower.... Author's note: NO he did not spend over an hour in the shower ^_^ =============================================================================== You pop out of your bedroom, you notice Thunder Hoof shovelling mountains of popcorn into his mouth while watching the season Finale on CSI. Ever since that show first released months ago, it's become a national hit. Fans were so desperate for a season 3, they broke into the production studio, hoping to get a glance at the latest season. The company recently announced only 13 episodes would be made for the next season. "Hey uhh... Thunder?" *Munch Munch* "SHHHSHSH this is the best bit" his eyes stay glued to the screen. This is the scene where the investigator says *we need to talk* and the pony hoofs it out the backdoor. how is that exciting, they always run.... *Munch Munch* okay.... *Munch Munch* "I’m just going to head out for a while, I’ll be back by 12" "K" *Munch Munch* You decide to explore the surrounding area around your dorm. You quickly realise that the grounds are quite deserted at this time of day. The absence of half the student body suggests there in their lessons or on a lunch break. The Academy ran lessons more like lectures, not all the student's would be in a lesson at 1 set time. As a result, you often had many free periods during the day, though students require a pass to leave campus. You take to the sky briskly, using only a fraction of your wingpower to quickly ascend to the optimum hovering altitude. I wonder how good the ponies here are at Wingball, or at flying at least... "LOOK OUT!!!" WHA-? "What?" you quickly turn around, nothing would hit you that quickly you reckoned. But clearly you never see it coming, it smashes into you at full speed and hurtles you towards the earth below. You are quickly falling out of the sky, with something else grappling on to your rear hooves. Taking into practice everything you learned about recovering from a midair collision you quickly try to slow down your descent, furiously flapping your wings and trying to get into a glide pattern. You try and use your wings to the fullest capabilities. It wasn’t enough. Whatever had hit you was adding to your weight and further reducing your aerodynamics. You land in a small grassy field about 1 Kilometre from your dorm. You quickly try to pick yourself up but realise whatever had grabbed onto you had landed on top of your chest, besides the pain of the fall, this thing was just as heavy as a pony. After regaining your senses, you realise this thing was in fact a pony, a bright cyan, rainbow maned pegasi. You blush slightly as she quickly regains consciousness. "Umm could you get off me" she stares at you and quickly looks down to where she is lying. "HEY! Get off me freak!" She badly tries to hide her now bright red, rosy cheeks. You quickly get a glance at her eyes. Looking at her face you notice she has a pair of dark, almost wine coloured magenta eyes that seemed to compliment her coat. You now felt slightly aroused as you wings begin to unfurl. come on wings!! NOT NOW!!! You try and take your mind of it and attempt to make conversation. "Looks like you failed a textbook manoeuvre miss-" She quickly shuts your mouth with a hoof, smacking you in the cheek in the process. Ahh.. The rough type, no wait... stop thinking that "WHAT?!?!" she gets of your chest and stands up FINALLY, thank you... "Look here rookie, you couldn't even manage to recover from a low speed collision, and anypony could have done that" WHAT!?!? She’s clearly the pony to blame. "Low speed! you couldn't even see where you were going, plus, weren’t you pulling me down, another failure on your part" She quickly hides he face again, she's clearly upset over what happened, even if she knows she was wrong. You quickly try and apologize, you always felt a sense of guilt when you made another pony feel bad, even if it wasn't your fault, and your dad always taught you to be a gentlecolt. Damn you, righteous feeling of obligation. "Look, I guess we both made some mistakes and I’m sorry for not avoiding you" You put your forehoof onto her shoulder trying to get her to look at you Did that even make sense She starts to look back up towards you, you can't help but stare into her dark magenta eyes. There wasn't anypony else you ever knew or saw who had such deep colour and emotion in their eyes. You decide to avoid eye contact again, in an attempt to keep your wings down. "Well I’m sorry too, I guess I was being to awesome up there." So much for honour.... Now that she mentions it... she was travelling quite fast. You couldn't even dodge her coming towards you. No other pony you saw could travel that fast that no otherpony had time to react. You take this as an opportunity to get acquainted with her, after all, you did need to know how fast ponies here are. "Say, you were actually quite fast up there" you manage a sincere smile, she immediately perks up and jumps into a pose. "Hell yeah! The name's Rainbow Dash, fastest flier in Equestria, nopony can go faster than me!" you can't help but challenge her title. You yourself had won many awards in speed and manoeuvrability. "Actually, I’m quite fast myself, the name's Lightning Strike, and I bet I could beat you in a race" She quickly jumps into a start position. Happy to respond to a challenge "Oh Yeah well, how about we race to that building over there, I gotta be somewhere anyway" you both line up neck and neck. "Ready?" she calls out "on Go" Both of you stand poised to take off. You stand in a braced, standing position to get a good head start while Rainbow Dash appears to be lower down in more of a pounce position. You can’t help but get slightly excited at this sight of this Damn you Rainbow Dash and damn you Teenage hormones... "Ready" Ok, don't go too easy but put some effort into this, she might not be too bad "Set" She certainly has speed, I’ll give her that, but has she got the endurance Hehe,.... endurance. *imaginary facehoof* "Go" She quickly jumps up and takes off just as she calls out go. You stand there bewildered, you're surprised no otherpony has every left you in a trail of dust... DAFUQ!??! You set off, hoping to catch up on some lost ground, you push your wings to give you the boost you need. Surely enough you manage to close in on her and are now only slightly behind. You can't help to feel slightly embarrassed to have been left behind at the start of a race. "Heh, not bad for a rookie..." she turns to you and gives a cheeky smile. "Cheat" you quickly blow a raspberry and take off in front, using your extra wing power. You close in on the finish line, you look to your sides and see nopony there. Wow, she had me on a run, but I got it in the bag *ZOOM* "BOOM! Did it in ten seconds flat!" she starts to shake her hooves in the air, as if she just won an award. She then turns back to you, a smug on her face. "Nice try rookie, nopony's beaten me yet" HOT DAMN she's good.... I guess I do have competition. "If it makes you feel any better rookie, you’ve come closest to me ye-" She turns around only to see you staring at her flank. You realise how compromising this scene looks and quickly avert your eyes. The last thing you want to be caught doing now is eyeing somepony's ass. "Wait!! I know how this looks like but hear me out!" You quickly try to cover your face with your forehooves. You somehow predicted the inevitable Shit... oh god... *SMACK" You feel a hoof what you across the head. You were only trying to see what her Cutie mark looks is. Coincidentally, it's quite similar to yours. A rainbow coloured bolt coming from a cloud. Besides the shape of the cloud, the facing of the cutie mark and of course the colour of the bolt, yours is almost identical. "Pervert..." She tries to avoid eye contact but doesn't shift away. "I was just looking at your cutie mark...." you feel a lump forming on your head. I’m going to need to cover that up... "Sure..." She meets your eyes in a gaze and seems unimpressed by your explanation. I deserved that.. Kinda "Anyway I’m late for my thing, Solar Chaser is going to kill me if I’m late" She now starts to look quite annoyed. Obviously she doesn't quite like work, nor has the best relationship with staff. "What were you supposed to do? Where are you meant to be" you try and help her out seeing as you owe her that much. "I’m supposed to meet two stupid new transfer students and give them a tour of the Academy. Damn, I hate meeting new students, they always think their better than me, or try to hit on me..." Shit....uhhh "Hey..Ahh Rainbow Dash?" "Yeah, rookie?" "What dorm are they in?" She unraffles a piece of paper from behind her wings. "Says here, ohh... uhhhh. There in Dorm 22-2B" she folds the paper back up and gestures for you to follow her "Come on, these students are staying in like, the best dorms, you wanna follow me?" she tries to think about why she wants me to follow AWW man, she's gonna hate me.... "Uhh, I could use some help guiding them, plus their probably some nerd pony who can’t even fly anyway" That last remark stings you. You feel bad for keeping people in the dark. What do I do...!?!? "Rainbow Dash?" "What? Aren't you coming?" "I’m the new student in Dorm 22-2B Real subtle......... " I-" ====================================================================== ====================================================================== Next Chapter: You and Thunder get to know some new people at school. some sweet charaters and some quite unsavoury ====================================================================== ====================================================================== finished the first chapter. Hope you enjoyed it. Support likes and comments are greatly appreciated. Any constructive criticism welcome. Any recomendations to the story is also welcome.