*BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!*
The deafening sound of an alarm startled Prisma from her sleep. Moaning, she groggily slapped the alarm, turning it off before shaking her head to wake up. Today was a free day, which meant that the Ghosts could spend their time training and keeping their skills as sharp as possible or properly planning their next missions instead of doing it on the fly. They didn't get many days like this, since they were almost always out in the field, so they never wasted any free days. Prisma decided last night that she would focus on hoof to hoof combat, and she could really do with some help from Speed, since Quickdraw was most likely going to be occupied with his own special training - which was far too harsh for the others.
Bringing herself back to reality, she glanced at the clock. It read 6 AM, which was enough time for her to get ready and grab some breakfast, but also meant that she only had about three hours of sleep. She would definitely need to grab a coffee before training today.
Meanwhile, Quickdraw was already up and making his way to the canteen. Being the commander, he was used to sleeping less than 2 hours most nights - it came with the job. He grabbed a plate of oatmeal and eggs, and a cup of espresso, and sat down on a nearby table. Some of the guards that were stationed in the HQ were present, talking amongst themselves and also eating breakfast. Only some would come and talk to Quickdraw - he never looked like the most welcoming pony, so most were intimidated by him and his prowess, though they would never admit it. However, those that actually spoke to him knew that he was actually very polite. He was just very serious most of, if not all the time. Switch was the only pony who had ever seen the side of Quickdraw that actually showed emotion, and even he hadn't seen that side for a few years since they first became ghosts, barring last night.
"Boss! How are you?" Prisma called out as she sat down across the table from Quickdraw. She waited as Quickdraw slowly looked up from his plate, admittedly taking a while to fully wake up this morning.
"I'm alright, little drowsy this morning. How are you? You're up early today," he answered.
"Couldn't get much sleep last night, as usual. I've been dealing with insomnia the past few months to be perfectly honest with you."
Quickdraw narrowed his eyes, a subtle sign of concern for his fellow squadmate. "You could go to the infirmary, they might be able to give you some sleeping pills to help you out. Can't have you passing out from sleep deprivation in the field and letting us get killed."
Prisma snorted, "Is that your way of showing that you care?"
With a sigh, Quickdraw admitted, "Yes, it is. It's hard enough to see one of my closest friends in a state like that, not to mention it's hard enough to do our job with one member down, let alone two. By the way, that's about as much care as you will ever get from me, in case you were wondering. I already showed you too much just now as it is."
Prisma nodded, amused by Quickdraw's attitude, and the two ate in silence for a few minutes. Eventually, Quickdraw spoke up again. "What are you planning on doing today? We only have today until we're deployed."
"Well, I was gonna practice my aim, but I think I really need to work on my hoof to hoof combat skills. You know, in case I get into that sort of situation, cause I kind of suck at it right now. Plus, my aims good enough as it is," the mare answered. Quickdraw's ears perked up at the mention of hoof to hoof.
"You want me to help train you today? I was going to train on my own, but I reckon I could help you out. Beware, it isn't going to be pretty."
The grey mare was admittedly very surprised that Quickdraw would actually be willing to help personally. Usually, he would just give them instructions on what to do if they needed any, and get on with his own training schedule, although the prospect of his training not being 'pretty' did scare her a little. After giving it some thought, she answered,
"Sure! I could definitely use your help! I was gonna train with Speed, maybe he'll want to work with us aswell?"
Quickdraw scoffed, "That's assuming he will even wake up before we finish."
"Heard you two talking shit about me, hows about you say it to my face huh?" Speed suddenly appeared behind Quickdraw, whispering into his ear and causing him to lean away in disgust.
"How do you do that? It's like you literally appear out of nowhere and know everything thats going on!" Prisma questioned the blue stallion. She was indeed quite curious, he just seemed so different than everypony else.
"Wouldn't you like to know? I'm afraid that's a secret. Come tell me it if you ever break the rules of reality, heeheehee!"
"...Riiight," Prisma answered skeptically before Quickdraw cleared his throat,
"So I'm assuming you heard everything, so are you in or not?"
"In on what?"
Quickdraw smirked, proving Prisma's thoughts wrong, "See? He doesn't know everythi-"
"-Oh, I don't know about your training with Prisma later today? Sure, I'm in." Speed interrupted with a sly grin, countering Quickdraw and therefore re-proving Prisma's thoughts right, causing her jaw to slightly drop with shock.
"You are something else entirely, kid, we are lucky to have you on the squad, whether we like it or not," Quickdraw muttered the last part.
"You, uhh, you not gonna have breakfast then?" Prisma piped up, only to be scared out of her fur as Speed disappeared and reappeared next to her, slamming his plate on the table (somehow not breaking it) and making an excruciatingly loud CLANG that drew the attention of everypony else in the canteen but Quickdraw, who was completely unfazed.
"No, breakfast is for pussies," Speed said sarcastically before devouring his food like a rabid animal. Prisma decided to follow Quickdraw's lead and ignore him, instead focusing on her own food. She smiled inwardly, thinking about how Quickdraw always seemed to set an example for his squad to follow, even in situations where it wasn't needed, like right now.
Prisma fell onto haunches, panting and sweating profusely.
"You're not tired already are you?" Quickdraw asked as he landed in front of her, not affected at all by the ten minute sparring session they just had together. Prisma was putting everything she had into it and couldn't land a single hit on Quickdraw, who wasn't even trying. She couldn't get her head around how he was so good at everything. Looking to the side, she noticed that Speed was still lying on his back and panting as well, even though he finished sparring with Quickdraw twenty minutes ago. And Prisma thought Speed was good with his hooves. Quickdraw was a machine.
"Come on, let's work on your technique some more. Speed, you too, get over here!" Quickdraw shouted. In the blink of an eye, Speed was in front of him saluting, looking like he fully recovered; a complete contrast to a moment ago. Prisma, however, took almost two full minutes just to stand up straight. It certainly didn't help her that Quickdraw got the two going as soon as she was up.
"Alright, let's work on your defense. Block all of my punches," as soon as he spoke, Quickdraw sent a flurry of punches at both Prisma and Speed at the same time. While Speed was doing well, Prisma kept getting hit. Thank Celestia he's not punching hard, she thought as she began ducking and weaving instead to avoid getting pummeled any further. Repeated blows to the face and body started to hurt her, even if they weren't very strong.
Quickdraw noticed that Prisma wasn't exactly blocking his punches, so he started to push forward, backing her and Speed up against the wall so neither could escape. Soon, both were backed up against a wall, forced to block and parry instead of dodging. Quickdraw was really pushing their abilities beyond their limit. This was what he wanted - they had to know that their enemies are relentless and will not stop until they were dead or unconscious.
"Slow down, I can't keep up!" Prisma started to panic as she started to lose her breath, fearing that Quickdraw was actually going to seriously hurt her. This only made Quickdraw attack faster. At this point, even Speed was faltering, and was hit in the muzzle by a right hook, sending him careening to the left, down for the count. This caused Prisma to lose her concentration completely; it wasn't long until she shared the same fate, but with an uppercut that sent her upwards, hitting the wall at an awkward angle and falling onto the floor, dazed both from the uppercut and overexertion.
Speed looked up and grimaced as he saw Prisma hitting the ground. Sweet Celestia, Quickdraw is evil! He's pushing it a bit too far though. he thought. Quickdraw suddenly turned to face him and answered his thought.
"Yeah, I'm pushing it too far. I'm going hard on you. You both need to know how relentless the enemy is. In hoof to hoof combat, your opponent will not stop until you are knocked out, or worse. This goes for all combat types aswell. The most important part of combat is self defense. You must be able to defend both yourself, and other ponies that cannot defend themselves, if you are to win a fight. Understand?"
"How did you...? I mean, understood sir!" Speed answered as he got to his hooves, facing his tutor and saluting. Prisma regained her consciousness soon after and joined Speed by his side, saluting Quickdraw.
"Good. Now that you've got a taste of how hard the enemy can push you and how stressful being defenseless can be, let's work on how to block and counter an attack"
The rest of the training session went smoothly, and ended with three rounds of sparring between Speed and Prisma. Quickdraw noted that for Prisma's confidence (or lack thereof) in her ability, she was performing exceptionally, now that she knew how to properly defend herself. She could keep up with Speed, and even managed to stun him with a counter attack during the last round. What Prisma didn't know, however, was that Speed was taking it easy on Prisma - he didn't want her to feel inadequate compared to the rest of the Ghosts.
While Prisma and Quickdraw went to wash up and rest, Speed decided to give Switch another visit. He still had some time before Quickdraw said to meet them for a briefing of tomorrow's mission anyway. Before heading down to the infirmary, however, he thought it might be a good idea to bring Switch some food from the canteen. After all, the chefs were serving Spaghetti, which was Switch's favourite.
After grabbing a serving, Speed took a daisy sandwich for himself and devoured it on his way to the infirmary.
Switch was, for the first time, behaving himself in the infirmary, much to the relief of the nurses. He was too busy thinking about what Quickdraw said yesterday to do anything else anyway.
"...Please, I don't want to see someone so close being hospitalized so much. One of these days you won't be so lucky. I don't want to have to bury you, bro..."
These words echoed continuously in his mind. Switch would never admit this, but it struck him like a wrecking ball and clung to him. He hadn't seen Quickdraw express genuine worry for anypony since before Speed joined the team. Since his older brother, Live Wire, died in his hooves, he thought. Was it possible that Quickdraw thought of Switch as somepony as close to him as his own brother? Switch had always known Quickdraw to not 'give a shit' about anypony after all.
Too stuck inside his head, he didn't notice a familiar small blue pony slowly inching their muzzle closer and closer to his ear.
"YOUR PIZZA'S HERE! THAT'LL BE FIFTEEN BITS!" Speed bellowed down his ear before slapping a bowl of spaghetti on his chest.
When Switch's ears stopped ringing, he shouted back, "SPEED! One of these days I'm gonna make sure you never use your goddamn voice again!" he then looked down to see what was sitting on top of him. "AND THIS ISN'T EVEN PIZZA- ooh, spaghetti, yes!"
The sight of his favourite food instantly calmed Switch down and started munching on his food, looking as happy and innocent as a foal. Speed snickered as he watched him.
Switch finished his bowl almost instantly, letting out a loud belch and sighing in contentment. Remembering that it was in fact Speed who brought his food to him, Switch turned to face him and asked him how he was doing and how his day went. Speed answered by explaining how training went with Quickdraw and Prisma.
"-And, get this, he looked me right in the eye and answered my thoughts as if I said it out loud! I swear that stallion is part god or something!" Speed finished his recount.
"Yeah, he's basically supernatural," Switch commented, "I've known him pretty much my entire life, he always seemed to have some sort of superpowers."
"Yeah man, Quickdraw's insane, you're lucky you've known him for so long."
"He's the boss for a reason," Switch added.
Speed looked up at the clock, reading 6:55 PM. Realising that the briefing was in five minutes, he cursed, turning to Switch.
"Shit, I just remembered I got a briefing with the squad in five. Gotta bounce!" He shot towards the door-
"oh, Wait!"
Speed turned back to Switch.
"Thanks... you know, for seeing me, a-and talking to me. Celestia knows how boring being a vegetable is all the time." he joked.
"No problem, I had plenty of time to kill and nothing else to do, don't sweat it bro. I know how bored I'd be if I was you!"
Speed left the 'vegetable' alone to dwell on Quickdraw's concern once again. If Quickdraw really felt that way, then Switch really needed to change his ways.