//------------------------------//
// At the Academy 
// Story: Not Every Bad Plan Is Bad 
// by Jhoira 
//------------------------------//

Minuette grinned happily to herself as she sat in the dim office of the Wonderbolts commanding officer. She didn't really care about Spitfire's rank too much, but it was nice that her future marefriend was successful. Minuette giggled to herself as she knew she was getting ahead of herself. But it was fun to get ahead of herself! She'd done it many times, both figuratively and literally. Though she wasn't supposed to do it literally anymore. When Twilight found out about Minuette's fun with time magic she was a bit more than just a bit miffed. 

Spitfire smiled as she walked behind her desk, now that she was on her home turf, as it were. She had her hooves back under her now, back in her own domain, where she was top dog. Straightening up behind her desk she looked at Minuette. "Well, I do think we should get this entire situation worked out. What exactly the plan is. Since you seem insistent on trying to make this more we'll need to set out some regulations."

Minuette smoked a little wider and hopped forward. Setting herself in front of the desk like she was a Wonderbolt herself. "Oooooh, commander Spitfire. I like it." Batting her eyelashes Minuette destroyed any resemblance to a Wonderbolt she'd had.

Spitfire rolled her eyes but couldn't hide her slight smile. "You're really gung ho."

Minuette grinned and went back to wandering around the office examining its contents. "Well, I can't help it! You just looked so unhappy..."

Spitfire wrinkled her nose. "I did not..."

"True, but that version makes me sound better!" Spitfire let out a bark of laughter as Minuette then turned and smiled gently at Spitfire. "But you did look a bit... Lonely."

Spitfire waved a hoof dismissively. "I was... Concentrating on my thoughts." Spitfire disliked the way the conversation was going so she tried to redirect it. "But it's very kind of you to care about a stranger like that." She turned to motion to a side door. "We have a little less than an hour but if you wanted to get fixed up or anything my private bathroom is through there." She turned back onto to find Minuette has walked over and say right next to her. Their faces only inches apart. "Gah! Minuette!?" 

Minuette wasn't grinning like she usually was, and had a serious look. "I'm not one of your subordinates."

Spitfire blinked, shaking her head gently. Had she somehow offended Minuette...? "I... It was just an offer/information, Minuette. It wasn't an order."

Minuette giggled gently and shook her head. Spitfire was still confused, but glad that Minuette had gone back to her happier self. "I wasn't talking about the bathroom silly!" But even so, Minuette did avail herself of the offer. She wanted to more tidy up but. Spitfire had had to carry her up to the academy after all.





The two made quite the pair, Spitfire in her dress uniform and Minuette in her pretty blue dress. A bit overdone in Spitfire's opinion, but not by very much, much to her relief. She'd nearly had a heart attack at some of the dresses Minuette had been considering for the evening. Though like she'd suspected they were betting some sidelong glances. Of course, no one was saying anything openly but... Spitfires musing were interrupted by Minuette. "They're all jealous."

Spitfire grinned as she looked about. She had to give it to Minuette, a few of them did look jealous. And, thankfully, there seemed to be fewer who were giving them the sidelong glance as she'd thought there would be. Spitfire straightened up a bit, not having realized she'd been hunching down slightly. "Oh? Because you're so pretty, I assume?"

Minuette nodded, grinning widely. "Yep! You have the second prettiest marefriend here!"

Spitfire let out a small chuckle at that. She didn't even feel the urge to correct that they weren't actually marefriends. Even under Minuette's version, this was a test run. But being the second prettiest was an amusing turn of expectations so Spitfire couldn't help but ask. "And who has the prettiest one? Rainbow Dash?" Though come to think of it she's not seen rainbow Dash yet...

"I do."

Spitfire's brain took a moment to switch its attention back to Minuette, then another to process the statement. Spitfire has enough control to not allow herself to laugh out loud but it was a closer thing than she'd have liked to admit. And she wasn't able to stop her smile from growing a bit wider than was proper for her to walk around with. "Very clever, Minuette."

Minuette, for her part, smiled widely and leaned in. "See?"

Spitfire frowned, shooking her head. "See? See what? You don't expect me to believe you actually think I'm the prettiest do you?"

Minuette giggles and shook her head. "Oh no. Though you are definitely top ten. I meant nothing went wrong just now!"

Spitfire was still lost but she didn't think it was important. Minuette was very pretty, but Spitfire was finding out she was equally odd. Not that that was an issue, most ponies had their own odd foibles. She pointed over towards the refreshments to change the subject. "Want something to drink? Or a snack?"

Minuette nodded eagerly as they trotted over to the table, looking out at the crowd. She knew a hoof full of ponies here, but had to nudge Spitfire for help on one of them. "Who's that? The one with the bow." 

Spitfire glanced in the direction just to make sure but she was fairly certain she knew who it was. Wasn't many full-grown ponies that wore bows. "That's Flitter, Cloud Chaser's sister."

Minuette nodded, pointing at the very similarly colored pegasus in the same group and Spitfire nodded. "They're almost twins."

Spitfire nodded as Minuette went around poking her for more information on the guests. Spitfire knew almost all of who each guest came with but knew their exact relationship ship only a little more than half the time. Eventually, Spitfire had to ask. "Why are you asking all this?"

Minuette gave a most mischievous grin. "Well since you said that this is a probationary relationship I'm scoping out other options."

Spitfire chuckled and shook her head. While that might have been somewhat true she seriously doubted that was the main reason Minuette was asking. "Care to give me the truth?"

Minuette motioned around them to the crowd. "Well, you didn't seem to mind when any of your subordinates were in relationships..." Spitfire groaned as she realized Minuette was scheming to get her way... "And I was also just curious." Spitfire gave Minuette a long sideways glance before deciding that was probably also the truth.

Spitfire smiled slightly. "Ok, trickster. You've made your point." Minuette beamed but Spitfire raised a hoof. "I'm not saying I've agreed. You've just made a point that I shouldn't dismiss the idea out of hoof. Though like I said I kind of already had a plan..."

"Yeah, but you didn't like me because I wasn't old enough for your austere majesty." Minuette managed to make it sound even more Sarcastic as she gave a small fake bow.

Spitfire smirked and would have responded save for a small commotion at the door. Spitfire nodded towards it as Minuette perked up at the sight. "I'm guessing that's Rainbow Dash. She has some exotic marefriend. Cloud Chaser said it was some kind of unicorn."

As they walked over Rainbow Dash was standing proudly with a strange creature at her side. Scales down it's back, an antler instead of a horn, and a tail with only a ruff of hair at its end instead of being all hair. An exotic looking pony no doubt. That alone would have accounted for the crowd around the two, but it did very much help that the exotic pony was quite fetching, in a strange "she has scales" kind of way.

Minuette, like most the others, crowded around after the surprise wore off. While most barraged the two with questions Minuette was polite enough just to stare and try and get a good view of the new creature. Spitfire smiled absently as she watched the happy, bouncy, mare try to get what she wanted, but did so in a well-behaved way, unlike some of the others who were peppering the two with questions. Sadly she couldn't yell at the group for it since about half of them weren't actually Wonderbolts or support staff, but their guests.

It was a few minutes but Minuette found her way back to Spitfire, smiling and Spitfire tilted her head in question. "You get a good look?"

Minuette nodded, smiling. "Mhmm! I'd have wanted to ask her some questions too but there were too many people pestering her already." 

Spitfire smiled a little wider, inclining her head to Minuette, which just caused Minuette to tilt her own head in question. "Oh, I'm just... Uh... Glad you thought better than to add onto the poor things stress tonight."

Minuette snorted, a tiny bit indignant, but mostly just amused. "You know just because I like to be happy doesn't mean I'm an uncultured boor!" She grinned a bit at Spitfire, any the bite in her words washed away by that same happy demeanor.

"Well she couldn't have answered any of your questions anyway, she's mute." Minuette's eyes widened as Spitfire dropped that nugget of information. 

"Oooooh! Do I get to barrage you with questions then?" Though Minuette grinned, Spitfire had to disappoint the pony, shaking her head.

"No, I only know that, she's from a faraway forest, and her name is Autumn Blaze." Spitfire almost watched Minuette deflate in front of her eyes, and couldn't stop herself from grinning. "You know I'm sure after everything's calmed down Rainbow Dash would be happy to talk to you."

Minuette bounced up and down, grinning. "Ooooh! So I get to barrage... Er... Ask her a reasonable amount of questions?"

Spitfire chuckled but nodded. "Certainly, but if you'll excuse me I need to go pull her out of that mess she's in right now." Spitfire pushed her way through the crowd and with vague statements about forms, and other requirements pulled both Rainbow Dash and her new marefriend out of the frenzy and off to a safer area of the banquet.

Minuette trailed after them, posing, making sure she was as pretty as possible, waiting to be introduced, once Spitfire was done rescuing the two poor things. But that never ended up happening.  After Spitfire got Rainbow Dash nestled in with Cloud Chaser and Flitter, Spitfire returned to Minuette. While most would have placed the two with Soarin, Fleetfoot or some of the other more senior members for strength of rank, Spitfire knew better. Flitter had the strange ability to absolutely exude an amount of "unwelcome" that Spitfire could only aspire to. Not even Spitfire willingly stayed in a conversation that Flitter wanted her out of.

Spitfire and Minuette spent most of the banquet simply making small talk. Mostly it was Minuette making small talk with Spitfire simply listening, and maybe looking a little intimidating. Though that was mainly for show, you couldn't be the commander and not give off at least a little bit of intimidation in your dress uniforms. They even returned to Rainbow Dash eventually and Minuette got to ask some of her questions, but Spitfire only introduced her as Minuette, nothing special.

As the night ended they both returned to Spitfire's office to change back, and go home. But Minuette had something to address first. "Well, before we go I think we have something to talk about?"

Spitfire chuckled a little and nodded. "Oh, of course, your "let's be a couple" argument I believe." Spitfire herself hadn't made up her own mind yet.

Minuette shook her head. "We do need to talk about that, but first there's something more important for us to talk about!" She smiled, bowing her head to Spitfire. "I'm sorry."