A senior oak chair, aged alongside the generations it had seen come and go, released a strident squeal from its elderly hinges. A tranquil breeze, a symbol of the dominating peace that conquered Ponyville for centuries, surged. The scent of the byproduct, belonging only to the family of unflagging bees who created it, accompanied by the intoxicating aroma of roses infiltrated Levi’s nostrils. The potent fragrance of colonies of flowers of all sorts of shapes, sizes, and colors threatened to seize the man under their spell with each breath he claimed, like sirens luring sailors to their untimely demise.
The slats within the borderline ancient seat dug into his rear like an army of shovels plunged into the dirt, only to be met with a cosmic bed of stone beneath the soil. The gusts of wind that rolled through the quaint, tranquil town with their nearly hypnotic balms in tow caressed Levi’s bare forearms. His jungly brown vellus hair danced with the tune of the zephyr.
Levi didn’t bother fighting the fruitless battle against the highly infectious smile reeling the corners of his mouth to the sky. The brunete’s grin clashed tooth and nail with the sun’s brilliant rays in a competition of sheer amiability. However, with one quick glance at the burning behemoth in comparison, the duel was written in the stars to be in the male’s favor.
Levi couldn’t help but get lost in the mesmerizing yet simultaneously soothing formation of Ponyville from the comfort of the library balcony. His view remained almost entirely unhindered, sans the railing keeping any and all from plummeting to the heavenly lot of sod below. The man’s emerald irises flicked from one flawlessly constructed building, its pure passion and unalderated craftsmanship made evident with every detail, to the other. With each elegant stroke of paint, colors both warmer than an evening campfire and cold as a glacier. The nails hammered deep within the base. He could almost smell the sweat swiped from the brows of unwavering workers as hours melted into days, the progress of the previous noon's work bleeding into the next. To anyone on the outside looking in, the tireless lengthy weeks of hefty effort and waging war on the urge to collapse in a heaving puddle seemed like madness.
But to them, nothing that a neighsayer alive could utter could shatter the deep-rooted love for the job. Or, at least what they considered to be, an art.
Levi’s globes never strayed far from the peaks of each and every humble abode that strived to forge the beloved conurbation. Silently admiring the mastery buried within the walls so many ponies strived indefatigably to mold from salt and sand was oddly refreshing. Levi enjoyed the moments in Ponyville where he could just..be there. Experience the moment for all of its worth. Graciously accept the sweeter-than-honey oxygen until his lungs met their full capacity. And, like icing embellishing an already flawless cake, there was a reason Levi killed the leisurely passing time upon the venerable balcony.
After Levi awoke that morning with a spring in his step, he had been informed by Twilight that the note idling peacefully upon the kitchen table was delivered by none other than Spitfire herself. The very same who threatened to split the air into a family of fragments each beat her wings produced, rushing the gravely injured man to Canterlot with never-before-seen power days prior. Or was it weeks? For the life of him, Levi couldn’t remember. With the harrowing reunion with Gary and rescuing Equestria from the irontight clutches of Nightmare Moon all hitting the male in the span of twenty-four hours, time lost its meaning. Events he assumed to have occurred not long ago felt like years had passed since. Whatever the case may be, a reconciliation was long overdue. A fact that Spitfire was clearly well aware of.
“The Golden Dashers are going against the Wonderbolts tomorrow!” Twilight’s jubilated squall bounced off the walls of his skulls, forcing him to relive the microscopic, yet still all the more present, sliver of dread. “And she gave us V.I.P tickets!”
‘Golden Dashers.’ Levi thought, ‘Wonder how good they're gonna do.’
In truth, the man seriously doubted they had a chance at winning. While it was a best-to-three tournament for the title of the best flying team in all of Equestria, their chances were slender at best. With the magnificent, reality-defying feat she put on display for all the world to see during their first interaction in consideration, whoever their captain was couldn’t hold a candle to her. Not to mention the lengthy, victory-ridden decades-long legacy the Wonderbolts held under their belt with oozing pride. Levi’s psyche flashed back to the fateful trip-turned-tour of Ponyville in the hours preceding the Summer Sun celebration. Where, much to no one’s surprise at all, had posters with each of the members bathing in their golden glory plastered on walls as far as the eye could see.
With the mountains of notoriety in their favor, combined with the unmatchable brawn the pegasi harbored, spelled certain doom for the Dashers. However, keeping in mind Levi had never heard nor seen of the much less notable crew since his arrival in Equestria, only time could tell their fate. Perhaps they were an undiscovered family of prodigies, ready and able to stomp Spitfire and co into the dirt while spitting shiny loogies on their names. But then again, looking back on the unrivaled might both Rainbow Dash and Spitfire showed, his vacillations never ceased there reign of supremacy.
Levi shifted his weight from the divine, unmatched comfort of the timber seat to the octogenarian logs the chair rested on. A shrill, sorrowful wail escaped the planks, a strident reminder of the generations that had come and gone since the birth of the mighty tree it resides in. The male’s brain felt as though it was ricocheting off the borders of his skull with each movement, despite how small or insignificant it was.
The early morning hours were still upon them. With Ponyville utterly and completely bathed head to toe in the mighty sun’s golden benediction, the drowsiness from Levi’s freshly awoken brain refused to subside. In fact, it had reached its apex. The fearsome star’s grace released him from its balmy clutches, the roof he oh so luckily had over his head becoming his savior in a split-second. Almost instantaneously, the harmonic symphony of prematurely risen families of birds vacated his ears. The tranquil opera of singing gusts of wind and whistling breezes tearing its listening pleasure right from beneath his feet. The intoxicating aroma of roses and honey, that threatened to submerge him under their irresistible spell, became nothing more than a fleeting memory. An indescribable but forever pleasurable echo that ran for the hills, forsaking his psyche indefinitely.
Without hesitation, assuming their positions in Levi’s groggy but more active than ever senses, was the normal landscape of sound that regularly occupied the household. Spike’s snoring blended into the otherwise dead silent library, as if a murder had taken place just moments preceding his arrival. Not a peep to be heard in the near future, exactly the way the lavender unicorn in the floor below preferred it.
Levi didn’t dare to move. His bones, once surging with life like a rushing angry river ready to tackle the day, plummeted into an abyss of motionlessness. Fear of a creak revolting against the absolute peace conquering the abode paralyzed the brunete. For a few seconds, he relished in it. He allowed the quietude to wash over his being. The perfect tranquility was akin to rolling flurries of nicotine infiltrating his form.
To the male, for all intents and purposes, his day thus far was nothing short of perfect. Losing track of time hugged by the sultry spring air, showered in the herculean star’s dexterity. While viewed as anything but grace to some and ferocious wrath raining down upon the earth to others. To Levi, it was a reminder of the sheer luck that blessed him for granting him with another day in Equestria. Another chance to prove he was beyond his past life of sins and transgressions. One that he planned to use for all of its worth.
And, to top it all off, he got front row seats for the gorgeous hush in Twilight’s library again. A favor from the heavens above in itself. However, like all things in life both precious and insidious, it had to arrive at its inevitable end.
One after the other, with the utmost ginger his bones could possibly muster, Levi’s soles met the billets uniting as one to configure the floor. Time became comparable to a river of magma leisurely crawling down a hill. Seconds bled into minutes. Hours threatened to rear its ugly head. All the while, the air encompassing every last inch of the mountainous tree torpified. Nothing dared to vanquish the quietude that spared not even a meager centimeter from its crusade. The only thing throughout the entire library that even ever-so-slightly resembled a commotion was the never ceasing snoring from the sapped dragon. The rhythmic rising and descending of the thin white sheet cloaking him under a veil of secrecy served as a pillar of relief for the man. A reminder that his trekking had, thankfully, reprieved the young reptile from joining the land of consciousness.
His nasally snoring, like the teeth of a saw dragged across a wooden trunk, never halted, even after the brunete’s soles greeted the old timber stairs. In stark contrast to the ligneous ground he traversed on just moments before, the steps were anything but lenient when it came to the pandemonium they would create. The very instant Levi’s weight became known, simultaneously spawning a slight warp within the wood, a dastardly tumult raided the air. Without a sliver of a doubt, Spike had been pierced by the relentless hook of day. An inescapable wrench was sure to follow. And, mere seconds after the wailing plank made its presence beyond noticed, the reptiloid joined his housemates at long last.
When the apex of the flight was behind him with the dawn of the escalier behind him, Spike emerged. Identical to the daybreak prior, at roughly the same hour, there he was. His statute surpassed the boundaries of “just being tired”. Spike looked utterly crushed by the revelation his residence inside the dimension of dreams was a memory. It was made all the more evident by the blight sacks of shadow dangling from beneath his wide jades that he lamented his awakening. Only amplified by the unintentional rudeness of it. The intense mourning of being devoured by the waves rolling amongst the cosmic ocean of sleep was evermore present in his close to inebriated globes.
With drowsiness anything but a distant echo in Levi’s brain, he couldn’t help but sympathize with the juvenile dragon.
Levi’s trotters relinquished the birth of the stairwell, allowing his marginally bone-tired frame to be drenched head to toe in the infectious excitement deluging the lower floor. Even being within a six inch radius of the pacing lilac unicorn, that single handedly claimed every inch of the level with her energy alone, the elation was a plague. Waves of jubilee radiating through the entirety of the home, having not even a hint of mercy in its ruthless warpath of infection. Spike, despite his borderline unconscious state, couldn’t battle the urge to smirk at Twilight’s animated presence. The corners of Levi’s mouth were easily hooked by the mountainous combers of exhilaration and reeled up without a second to spare. To say it was refreshing for the man to feel that level of excitement this early in the daybreak would be a criminal understatement.
The amethyst pony trekked briskly from one end of the library to the other. Her hooves leaving an imprint of her rapture inside the ancient wood permanently with each step she took. Her eyes, that surprised the brunete on its own with the unearthly size, seemingly multiplied in expanse. Dilated purple orbs conquered whatever shreds of white were left within her globes.
For someone who’s life practically revolved around books and literature like it was the only thing that kept her alive, being unexpectedly exultant for going to a sports game of all things was a shock. Twilight, the very same who lived and woke up everyday utterly surrounded by paper and hardbacks alike, was beside herself with happiness for a flying competition. Levi never thought he’d live to see the day.
The prospect of traveling far into the cavities of Equestria to the world-renowned, stunningly captivating cosmic bed of clouds known only as Cloudsdale. From what little was shown to him in one of the countless books embellishing the walls, the city enclosed by a limitless ocean of azure was reality-defying. Deep within the great big blue above their heads, far beyond the capabilities of the naked eye, was Cloudsdale.
A hustling and bustling metropolis forged solely from the fluffy, ivory masses that once decorated the airspace above. Rows upon rows of lofty skyscrapers adorned the otherworldly sheet of unpigmented puff. The magnificent, and most certainly breaking a law of reality, heights looked as though God’s hand reached from the abyss of albino to graze the heavens. Strips of colossal, mammoth rectangular office buildings defiled the otherwise flawless illustration of the municipality. A grim reminder that even the most joyful lands were not spared from the wrath of corporate greed. A fact only cemented further by the herculean structures that were like torture chambers for middle-aged wage-slaves than a place of work. Geysers of brilliant rainbow gushed like rivers one would expect to see within the mind of a child. Flowing beautifully from the colorless empire and plummeting to lands unknown beneath the buzzing province.
Hundreds upon hundreds of much smaller cloud platforms bespeckled the cyan ether encompassing the burgh. Resting peacefully upon them were boxy homes, compact restaurants and bars, and two very distinct factories. One, according to the lavender pony rapid-fire explanations, was the hub of creation for Equestria’s clouds. Rain. Snow. Hail. Regular ones for everyday viewing pleasure. If one could name it, it was born there. Courtesy of the unflagging pegasi who worked from when dawn broke exploded over the nation to when dusk reclaimed its throne at nightfall. The second, and plainly triple the size of the previous one, was the heart for all rainbow formation.
A trinity of towering smoke stacks protruded from the roof of the equally sized mill. Waving, multi-colored thick ropes of smoke erupted from the stone obelisks, a color identical to the magnificently alluring arches they forged inside the confines of the plant. Other than the inherent purpose it serves, not much else was known. According to Twilight, the recipe and exact methods of producing the prismatic bridges were shrouded in secrecy. Allegedly, the employees were to sign a lengthy contract upon their acceptance into the factory. As per the insignificant shreds of exposed information about the facility, if they were to ever out the formula by any means at all, they wouldn’t like what happens.
“Well, what would happen if they did?” Levi vividly remembered asking that morning.
“‘Immediate termination’ in their words, or they exiled them. It really depended on how much they spoke.” Twilight replied, splashing a mask of overwhelming shock upon the rightfully perplexed man’s features.
‘Exiled?’ Levi thought to himself, the word bouncing off the walls of his skull like a twisted game of pinball. ‘It can’t be that big of a deal, right?’
To the citizens and government officials of Cloudsdale, it very much was. As to what lies cloaked in a thick veil of mystery in the innards of the workshop the public may never know, but the piqued interest was still there nonetheless.
It really made him wonder what kind of hierarchy the metropolis used that warranted banishment as a viable consequence for a crime.
Tens of minutes passed. Pages flipped hastily, not wasting even a nanosecond of elucidating. All the while, Twilight’s motormouth showed no signs of ceasing in the near future. As far as Levi knew, the plum unicorn was in for the long haul. However, the male’s brain could only comprehend so many oceans of words and sentences before it began to tune out the elated pony’s speech subconsciously.
As paper was overturned and Twilight’s jaws divorced and reunited more times than he could count, his psyche was soon to drift off into distant lands. No longer was Levi’s mind impounded within the ligneous walls of the library. His brain meandered deep into the innards of Levi’s head, effectively summoning one of the copious amounts of overthinking spells that were no stranger to badgering when need be.
The Golden Dashers. Ever since the name of the Wonderbolts’ adversary had been relayed to him early at dawn, it refused to vacate his thoughts. There was something so…uncanny about it. Dreadful? Deja vu? All of the above? In truth, the male didn’t possess a scrap of a clue on what exactly the sensation could be. Every time the words replayed in the darkest corner of his pneuma, a ferocious kahuna of trepidation wasted no time in claiming his heart in its maw. Something somehow struck ripples of disquiet radiating through his being, latching onto his bones like starving mosquitoes dismissing Levi’s demands to depart.
The brunete’s unexpected and untimely combers of angst weren’t something to be taken likely. After all, those very same whirlpools of emotions that utterly devoured his core, for reasons he believed were meaningless worries, paved the way for a very real threat. It was the same internal uproar that preceded Nightmare Moon’s pronounced entrance. The identical intramural turmoil that arose seconds before crashing into the gloomy, fog-infested corridor. The very one conquered by Gary. A fact the male learned in the worst way possible. The list only continued. And his encounters with the ever-so-familiar rivers of fear surging through his veins weren’t limited to confrontations in Equestria.
More times than he could count back in Tuscaloosa, he could vividly discern the canals of fright overruling the blood inhabiting his arteries. Preceding clashes with junkies trying to raid his car for anything they could get their grimy, flea-ridden hands on. Just moments before a drug deal that would, in the span of a blink, decay to a worthless mound of ash.
The gush of anxiety wasn’t something Levi took lightly. Especially when it was for an event crowded with hundreds of thousands of people, with him and his friends merely a pinpoint among the lagoon of ponies. If what the man witnessed so far in Equestria was an indication of anything, predicting why he became consumed by the notorious lake of consternation was a next to impossible task. All he could do was hope. Sitting there, simultaneously under the onslaught of information unleashed upon him by the lilac unicorn, he prayed.
He mentally clasped his hands and directed his somewhat uneasy globes to the bright, buzzing heavens above. All he wanted was a peaceful outing. Was it really that much to ask for? A nice, cool spring day only made better by a free trip to the magnificent and stupefying metropolis of Cloudsdale. A chance to bear witness to, very possibly, Wonderbolts history in the making. The image his brain illustrated for him threatened to send his heart into a fluttering frenzy.
Sinking deep into the lush cushion in the best seats the stadium could offer to the trio of V.I.Ps. His form being delivered the riposte he desired on a silver platter. Trays of delicacies and fine wine provided to the trinity spectating the mortifying beatdown of the Golden Dashers through a thin layer of glass. An event that would add another notch to the Wonderbolts’ belt. Another victory to tally in the history books accompanied with a golden idol to shine their win for all the world to see.
There it was again. The creeks of dread. His blood vessels a victim of the merciless warpath of tyranny, its sights trained keenly on his unsuspecting being.
‘The Golden Dashers.’ Levi thought. Even when confined within the walls of his skull, the crew's title never failed to leave the tang of poison razing the male’s mouth. ‘Why can’t I stop thinking about them?’
It was a great inquiry. The abrupt torrents of fretfulness seemingly arrived without reason. Not even a hint of a basis for their entry. Levi’s mind, once an infinite terrain ruled by absolute peace and tranquility, was dashed by the group’s moniker. The Dashers were nothing but weeds erupting from the soil, ready and able to wreak havoc on the land governed by utter bliss.
The brunete desperately longed for a day devoid of turbulence. An afternoon where he could simply be Levi Cronell. Not the man in blue. Not Equestria’s sole protector. Not anyone’s savior. Just him. Nobody else. However, much to his crushing disappointment, the crushing trepidation for what was to come refused to die. Their presence was made loud and as clear as humanly possible. And the impact left on the male’s psyche didn’t bother to put forth any vein attempts to conceal itself.
Something was bound to occur at the game. Whether good or bad. Meaningless or downright evil. A subtle spark to ignite a lengthy chain of events or an explosion blaring in his face. Striving to predict the event his mind somehow knew would materialize wasn’t possible by any stretch of the imagination.
The only option he clutched with an iron grip in his manuses was an aspiration. A hope that all of his discord laying waste to his previously pacific psyche was merely a ruse. A blanket of vexation smothering the man’s brain that ultimately harbored no real meaning whatsoever. All it was was a masquerade summoned by one of Levi’s copious amounts of overthinking spells. Hoping was the only option left in his hands.
Whether the Golden Dashers would prove to bear any insidious intentions to riddle Levi’s life with troubles was an answer only time fostered, and one it would not release easily. Patience was key. The only task the male had to his name was keeping the ravenous, rebellious emotional typhoon battering the walls of his skull at bay.
Pools of elation gathered and glittered within her violet optics, harboring no end in sight for as far as the eye could see. Her lips parted and greeted one another at a rapid-fire, almost unearthly speed that the male could hardly comprehend. His grasp on the mounds of words catapulted at him with blinding speeds slipped further with every letter he couldn’t fathom.
Her excitement, her sheer jubilee for the event that was right around the corner, was a priceless sight to the man. The much less serious side of the unicorn was a spectacle to behold, and a precious one at that. Even the mere prospect of shattering her pure and unadulterated joy into a family of shards by his radical, possibly over-the-top worries was a nightmare. All he wanted for the trio, himself included, was a pleasant outing with no concerns or anxieties for miles beyond the horizon. Considering the Nightmare Moon and Gary fiasco they had to endure the night prior, the rearmost outcome he desired was more heartache to ravage the threesome.
A sparkling beam overshadowed his features. His delight radiating from his pearly whites like a lighthouse with its sights trained on the amethyst unicorn ahead of him. Who, much to no one’s surprise, never ceased her onslaught of speech. Pages flipped perpetually. There rations of the spotlight being used to their entirety before a violet hoof briskly cast them into obscurity once again.
In spite of Levi’s overwhelming efforts and tireless attempts to smother the orb of dread within him, his futile endeavors were abortive. His grin was nothing more than a masquerade. A barricade of false exuberance. All of the brunete’s labor shouldered by an almighty hope that the oblivious unicorn remained blissfully unaware.
His trepidation did anything but halt. In fact, with each second that passed where the man refused to address its existence, it only snaked its tendrils around his heart more and more. The Golden Dashers. The name wasn’t familiar. He had never heard of a title anywhere near remotely similar in all of his years. No explanation was apparent as to why his core was ravaged by the unwavering unease. None of it made sense. Not even a remnant of clarity was discernible for as far as the eye could see. For all intents and purposes, Levi was alone. Forsaken deep beneath the waves of internal ferment to clash tooth and nail with his emotions.
Levi’s mind catapulted him into an unwelcome journey down the battered, winding trail known as memory lane. Vivid yet distasteful echoes of the dimension of pure and unadulterated nothingness emerged from the cavernous depths of his memory. The harrowing images displayed within the confines of the static ring suspended mid-air flickered before his eyes, like a broken TV sputtering colorless amalgamations.
The deathly clash inside the ring of fire against the equine-esque creature, that was more akin to a mockery of a pony more than the real deal. The grimace seconds leading to the borderline fatal battle with Gary inside the frigid corridor. The aftermath of…whatever beast unleashed its divine wrath upon Ponyville. The quaint town, or what remained of it, left a vile mark engraved into the wrinkled walls of Levi’s brain. After the shower of brimstone and merciless hail of hellfire, what little was spared from the massacre could only be considered a blazing wasteland. Charred husks of hollowed, vanquished buildings bespeckling a sea of smoking skeletons. The spectacle was utterly and absolutely dreadful to say the least.
Levi couldn’t predict evil. That was the main takeaway from the brunete’s foreboding recounting of the previous day’s events. Sinners hide among the saints, lying in wait within the tall grass of Equestria to sink their fangs into the innocents. It couldn’t get any more truthful than that. Predicting when danger would fall upon Ponyville, himself, or his friends was out of the question. All that he had to do was follow his gut in whatever direction it commanded him to march in. No matter how big or small the threat may seem. Despite the sheer level of absurdity it may present, or the insignificance of it.
Whatever the case may be, his intrusive anxieties would have to reside on the backburner indefinitely. The rapping upon the senior door of the library, that could only belong to a particular captain, meant one thing. The clarity he fancied would finally come to pass.
Humans and Cloudsdale weren’t friends. That was a sentiment that struck him like a freight train the very instant his foot left the sanctity of the hot-air balloon. The solid ground was no longer the save and grace he oh so dearly took for granted all his life. When the expertly painted azure cradle dangling below the mammoth gasbag finally greeted Cloudsdale’s terrain at long last, the threesome fit the definition of eager like a glove in every way imaginable.
However, the precise second Levi’s foot met the lush terrain of Cloudsdale, his heart plummeted alongside his freshly petrified being. To say Spitfire's brisk transformation from dear friend to savior wasn’t stupendous would be a criminal understatement. It took every fiber of strength within the male’s frame to resist sighing at the animated unicorn’s overlooking of the crucial spell. The magic needed for not only the brunete but the young, equally eager dragon to walk among the pegasi upon the lush terrain of clouds. In the end, every last bit of waiting and wrathful swarms of dread was beyond worth it.
A sight people would pay thousands to see was granted to him atop a silver platter. Any other emotion that previously occupied Levi’s form was cast into a thick lagoon of obscurity. Doomed to forever be exceeded by the flock of beaming thankfulness conquering the man at the flame-haired captain’s generosity. He was foolish to believe her kindness ended at her reality-defying rush to the hospital days prior.
As Levi would swiftly learn on his holycon uneventful trip to the world-renowned arena, the picture displayed to him by Twilight failed to seize each and every ounce of beauty Clousdale possessed. While the factories dotting the cosmic blanket of ultramarine cuddling the city snugly were a sight to behold, what lay within the confines of the ivory burgh was the true star of the show. The colossal, reality-defying towers that scraped the heavens robbed the entirety of the metropolis of the sun’s precious rays. Lengthy strips of small, unappreciated businesses relished in what little gleam that wasn’t utterly hogged by the mammoth obelisks protruding from the sea of ivory fluff.
Small talk circulating between the exalted trio tried in vain to override the borderline blaring pandemonium that none of them, especially Levi, bargained for nor expected. They couldn’t have guessed in a million years that a municipality harboring such a magnificent, tranquil exterior would be plagued with such bothersome commotions every second of every minute.
Some pegasi, who were immensely angrier and confrontational then the ones he had met thus far, thundered off in the distance. From what little Levi could dissect from their wrathful shower of words and hail of spiteful slang, their argument sparked into existence from one pony seizing the napping cloud of the other. From what the male could discern without needing a moment to ponder, hundreds, possibly even thousands, of impromptu beds lay sprinkled across the enormous sheet of cyan. As to why the duo of brutes never ceased their brigades of insults despite how ridiculous they appeared was nothing short of a mystery to him. The constant back and forth whistling of the air as the winged civilians dashed from one place to another raided Levi’s ears like a militia of Vikings. The strident whistle, that erupted each time another ironclad pegasus became a blur all around them, threatened to split his skull in two with every turbo trek. However, in spite of incessant, badgering auditorial discord of the fussing metropolis, the positives outweighed the negatives tenfold.
Since the wen resided practically adjacent to the heavens, the breezes and lengthy gusts of sugary-sweet wind arrived directly from the source. The almost non-stop zephyrs combed their long fingers through Levi’s locks. No scent dared to vanquish the perfect, unadulterated scent of the inodorous cat’s paw. In Ponyville, the air that radiated through the serene roads on a daily basis at no time came empty-handed. There was always an intoxicating fragrance of flowers nestled snugly in a field way over yonder like a souvenir from far away lands carried right to his doorstep. Or a hypnotizing aroma of freshly baked goods that sent his stomach into a rolling frenzy.
However, being nuzzled cozily in a cavity within the celestial sheet of cyanic, the gales possessed no such thing. Occupying the empty space where a heart-fluttering and irresistible aroma would lie was, what could only be described as, a hint of utter tranquility. In a way, it felt as though that currents that rode through the preoccupied streets of Ponyville were there only for the nasal pleasure they provided to the grateful civilians. It seemed, at least to the man, that the drafts that barreled through Cloudsdale were a gift dropped down from the promised land high above their heads. The puffs traveling up their nose rid his head of anything that even remotely resembled a negative thought. The very thing the man desperately needed at that moment.
Accompanying the discordant hissing of the soaring pegasi and the soothing song of the nomadic breeze was another sound. A much, much louder and immensely chaotic clamor belched their vile donnybrook as though they were attempting to harass the city of God overhead. The volleys of rumbling cheers and bombards of malicious jeers prophesied a very unpleasant aural experience for any and all who dared to enter. Aiming to decipher the carpet bombing that was the flood of heckles was equivalent to demanding a blind man to decrypt hieroglyphics. It couldn’t be done. And, if Levi was honest, there wasn’t really a need to. Their tone alone and the sheer, almost out-of-control level of their combined voices told the brunete all he needed to know.
While the troika’s features twisted and contorted under the crushing pressure of the wave of bellows disgorged from somewhere, Spitfire’s owned not even a hint of anything that even slightly resembled discomfort. Poised amber irises lay concealed behind jet black lenses. Being held in place by lengthy silver arms that reached behind her head and made themselves at home in the crevasse dividing her ear from her temple. The scentless tempest washed over her relaxed frame just the same as the trio at her rear, allowing the collar of her captain's uniform to dance in the zephyr. To her, the jarring disharmony, that virtually laid waste to their skulls, was business as usual. To the triumvirate who struggled to keep their faces from scrunching like a crumpled plastic bag, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
The closer they got to the ruthless barrage of hullabaloo, the harsher the abominable blend of acclaims and mocks became. Spitfire’s ear twitched. A practically nanoscopic sign that the assault on their senses was finally getting to her, but an indication nonetheless. A thought that lingered in the depths of Levi’s mind was what the actual arena holding the much anticipated game was going to be like. His brain wasted no time in becoming a rampant, uncontrollable hub of tens of hundreds of possibilities as to what the mammoth stadium could possibly be. His fantasies ranged from far beyond the boundaries of reality to more grounded. They fluctuated from utterly wild illustrations of grandiose theaters bathed in grandeur from head to toe. The finest gems dug from the most cavernous bowels of Equestria, reeled from the earth by the finest carts money could buy, bedazzling its being. The jewels glittering in the soft blanket of the morning sunlight that completely enveloped it, transforming the ring into a glimmering idol of glory.
When the ashen asphalt path came to a conclusion, the sight before his eyes completely turned his impossibly high expectations to dust. When the mammoth building came into view, Levi’s irises were fully expecting to bear witness to something utterly different. He anticipated a colossal, magnificent building either identical or close to what his rife mind fabricated. What he received however was not only more reasonable than his fantasies by a landslide and a half, but more to his liking than he initially believed.
Perched on a cloud, a mere speck in the cosmic blanket of blue it rested in, was the grand stadium. If he was honest, there was nothing readily apparent about the arena that differentiated it from an coliseum plucked straight from the Roman empire. In the stead of the tan bricks forged from the rich, silky sand that blanketed ancient Rome was dull gray concrete. Cracks and divisions defiled the once flawless exterior of the enclosure. The only indicator that would signal it was in fact based in the modern era were the lofty golden flagpoles erected from the top. The immense pride it harbored practically resonated through Cloudsdale with each flap to the whistling wind.
Beyond the entrance, a long crimson carpet with deep, foreboding black borders on either side ran the full length of the entrance. The rug looked almost painted, as if it was one with the floor from the moment it dawned into existence. The walls were flawlessly cleaned and maintained stone-gray bricks, courtesy of the, what they could only assume to be, armies of janitors who furbished the place unwaveringly. The passageway was more narrow than Levi expected. However, the vast amount of vibrantly colored accolades and medals adorning the wall made the aisle all the more cramped. The rows upon rows of symbols of many victories in the decades, possibly even centuries, since the bowls birth tried and failed to rob him of his attention.
The striking resemblance to the dark, decrepit stronghold that once housed the Royal Sisters long ago sent a pulse of dread radiating through Levi’s being. The borderline identical tapestry, sans the nauseating crunch from decades of uncleanliness the former possessed. The dusky bricks lined with a seemingly unending display of conquest in the form of limitless awards and tributes. The blazing hues of the extensive banners dangling from the stygian walls like a dove soaring through a night sky practically screamed for attention in Levi’s peripherals. In spite of the dingy, overall woeful outward appearance, it was a stark and most certainly more appreciated contrast to the wretched castle. Having unending lines of prominent captains portraits and boastful recognitions was inherently superior to a murderer donning turquoise holding your friend at gunpoint. Or a shadowy alicorn roaring her dread-inducing cackle throughout the decaying halls.
On second thought, maybe more was evidently awful about the ill-omened fort than the grand stadium by leaps and bounds. However, only time could tell what the long-awaited game would hold.
Levi sank deep into the lush, heavenly chairs of the V.I.P suite. The bold golden behemoth nestled snugly in the boundless sheet of azure above rained its blessing upon the vast stade. Levi’s frame, almost always ready for anything ever since the harrowing encounter at the castle, melted into the warm open arms of the chair.
The room, reserved only for the fortunate few who were granted access, was everything Levi expected and desired for it to be. All he wanted was time to relax. Even a mere five minutes to let loose and live his life. Seize the crisp, odorless air of Cloudsdale into his pining lungs. Feel the luck of his survival pulsate through his form with each rhythmic pound against his ribs. Allow his taste buds to frolic in utter jubilee at the heavenly elixir dropped from the heavens on a golden platter for the V.I.Ps to indulge in.
It was the experience the man longed for ever since his return from Celestia’s castle the night prior. He desperately hungered for a day, hell, even an hour of pure uninterrupted relaxation. Not have to worry about undead bastards looming over his shoulder. Fearing that one day, the frigid metal of a pistol would dig into his nape and the male would be no more. If only he didn’t have to fret about perils that threatened to lay waste to Equestria, leaving survivors nothing more than a thing of the past. A remnant of a time long-lost.
Relief flocked to the male’s heart in droves and armies. No longer did the overbearing anxiety of brewing menace impale his heart with their swords of dread. He could, in the simplest way possible, exist. A fact that sent the corners of his lips lurching towards the heavens above.
A silky midnight-black carpet concealed the stone floor beneath. Lengthy smoke-grey stripes mustered the courage to defy the sable rug, reaching from one end of the matting to the other diagonally. To Levi’s left were three other seats, identical to the one the brunete resided in, each of them divided by a small stygian table. The walls possessed a sooty complexion, as though they were decorated top to bottom with the ashes of the deceased. Large silver plates adorned the crown of each of the bijou tops. Presented atop the trays, the liquid harbored within glimmering in the wrathful rays of the blazing mammoth star, were three lofty bottles.
If the way the royally-suited waiter rambled on and on about the jungly, disorienting mess of a history about the supposed “delectable” drink, one would assume it was only the finest alcohol. A concoction fermented only in the highest towers of God’s kingdom. Stewed in the largest pots forged from superb gems excavated from the earth. Instead, the only thing the trio received was a drawn-out babble and a triad of glasses filled to the utmost with subpar belly wash. Great.
However, Levi refused to allow a badgersome rant and a serving of inferior, sorry excuse for sherbet completely mar his outing. The true star of the show. The cream of the crop. The feature the quarters possessed that frankly saved the trio’s expedition lazed embedded deep in the concrete wall before them. A large, absolutely blemishless, broad window accorded their peepers access to the stupendous arena in its entirety. Thanks in large part to the dim, ill-light space they found themselves reposing in, the three’s sight of the grand hippodrome housing the uber-anticipated event was far from impaired.
An oddly smooth, behemoth disc of clouds idled in the bullseye of the grandiose dome, that seemed as if it could house a stade of its very own solely by itself. Protruding from the bald ivory playing field were yellow and black striped metal poles. Extensive, battered rings served as heads for the lofty totems jutting from the pigmentless ground, their paint beyond worn and beaten from their evidently weather-torn beings. The vibrant hues didn’t stand even a sliver of a chance against decades of merciless rainfall. The top-left corner of the alloy hoop was unfortunately a victim of the incessant, ruthless showers.
The varnish, once lively gold and the richest black imaginable, was nothing more than a figment of lost time. In its stead, rearing its ugly head for all to see, was the hideous pale innards of the ringlet. No longer were the unappealing ore, the skeleton of the obelisk, concealed beneath a veil of high-spirited hues. The years of war against the unpitying nights of wrathful storms and angry thunder exploding through the air left the augmented stanchions as a message to all.
If Levi was honest, the omphalos of the monumental amphitheater was anything but what the man expected. He anticipated the hub of the stade to resemble exactly the way the exterior portrayed it to be. A borderline ancient bowl where lion-hearted gladiators fought until their heart slammed against their ribs for the final time. He expected a vast pool of sand to inhabit the middle and metal, barred gates as old as time reel up by chains. All to reveal the fiery introduction of the valiant fighters, their veins transformed into canals of fiery adrenaline amplified by the skull-crushing roars of the exhilarated spectators.
While Levi received the furthest thing from that, the combers of excitement that sent shivers through the pegasi bearing witness to the game bathed his form. The energy alone pulsating through the crowd like a mushroom cloud was a sight to behold. His hopes were higher than the golden paradise above for what the close-nearing tournament had in store for the lot of them. If the buzzing vitality echoing throughout the stands was an indication of anything, it was sure to be a spectacle worth dying for.
Levi removed his arm from the cozy sanctity of his lap, coiling his fingers around the slender body of the elegant chalice. His lips unified with the brim of the outright stainless goblet, the ever-so-familiar sharp tang of cheap wine violating his formerly serene mouth. Nevertheless, in spite of the acidic punch that showed not even a sliver of mercy to his chops, the aftertaste was worth the wallop. Needless to say, the chipper host’s nearly unending assault of words didn’t lie.
The brunete returned the sylphlike vessel to its rightful platter, bringing his hand back home in the toasty hug atop his thighs. The denim warmed by the blazing beast of a star only made the manus’ embrace all the more restful.
Levi somehow managed to tear his globes from the hypnotizing view of the Cloudsdale horizon, briskly stealing a glance of his two companions seated beside him. It was a wholesome display to say the absolute least. Witnessing the soft, evidently more sensitive side of his friends felt like a show of emotion too precious to be seen by anyone excluding themselves.
Levi’s mind briefly flickered back to the distressing nightfall that truly sent the brunete down his path as the “Man in Blue”. The fateful, catastrophic, failed attempt at a Summer Sun Celebration. The look of raw, primal terror invading her otherwise peaceful plum optics. Her heart rate skyrocketed to unimaginable levels she never even considered were a feasible prospect. Her deep purple and raspberry streaked mane waving in the bitter castle air as she burned rubber to Levi’s side.
Comparing that petrified version of the lavender unicorn to the one practically becoming one with the leather recliner was like contrasting two entirely separate people. In a way, it was. However, Levi didn’t have to worry about that nigh on deathly night any longer. He could finally allow it to drift into the cavernous bowels of his mind, forever and always. Doomed to be consumed by the ravenous waves of obscurity. Where it rightfully belonged.
Without warning, the strident pandemonium of mechanical whining led a violent rampage through Levi’s ears. In spite of the distance from the source of the commotion, combined with the thickness of the glass, one would expect they would be spared from the uncharitable bedlam. However, Levi had been wrong before. And this was merely one of those times.
The robotic, stentorian whirring fortunately persisted for only a handful of seconds more. Levi’s belief that his hearing had suffered enough in the past few days to last him a generation was swiftly crushed. The earth-vanquishing boom that sent Gary back to hell. The explosion from the Elements as Nightmare greeted her defeat. The whizzing as Soarin’ sent him barreling upon his first entry into Ponyville. But, if the shrill computerized singing was an indication of anything, his auditory torment was far from concluded.
A duo of ample metal sheets, identical to garage doors sans the iconic ridges the latter possessed, rose from the ground. The alloy panel briskly divorced the floor, permitting the prodigious ocean of more than eager onlookers visual ingress to what lay within.
The chamber beyond the iron slab looked as if it hadn’t heard the word light in centuries. Impossibly thick darkness clung to the walls like starving mosquitoes. Viscous tendrils belonging to the murky shade wreathed the tenebrous silhouettes inhabiting the rooms. Attempting to discern the identities of the crews residing in the belly of the dusk stretched far past the point of impossible. If Levi was honest, the fact he could make out their vague shapes from the distance and density of the tenebrosity was itself a miracle. From what tiny miniscule details the male could make out from the lightless void, Levi distinguished the faint configuration of goggles fastened tightly over their domes.
The gargantuan lake of beholders were instantaneously lit ablaze the very instant the mystery pegasi’s hooves vacated the abyss of gloom. Simultaneously, two winged ponies released their trotter from the garroting tentacles of the internal twilight. Levi amazed himself once more at his newfound exemplary vision he didn’t even know he possessed.
From the left chasm of shadow emerged a hoof costumed in flashing, vibrant hue of yellow. A pigment that would cause the sun to turn green with envy. A mere inch above where their appendage ended rested a cyan lightning bolt from one side of their limb to the other. A Wonderbolt. Arguably the most recognizable color scheme he had beared witness to thus far in his Equestrian journey. After all, how could he forget the tint belonging to the pegasus who rescued him from an immensely perilous fate.
From the right lightless cavity, in stark contrast to their adversaries, the opposition to the Wonderbolts wasted no time in setting their grandiose entrance into motion. The co-captain of the Golden Dashers materialized from the ill-light lacuna. The raging pride she held for her comrades made itself known with each step she took. From the murk, with her deep blue and fuchsia striped mane whipping in the breeze like a flag in an unrelenting thunderstorm, was the second head the team possessed. And arguably the Dashers’ better half.
Cloud Rider. Her dark navy hair flowed down her muscular neck, one half of the indigo vanquished by a belt of rich salmon-pink. Her profound blue eyes were hidden behind a veil of silver-rimmed cobalt goggles secured snugly around her skull. Her expertly-tailored fliers suit stayed tried and true to the crew’s name in every way. Each inch of her ironclad frame, sans her flowing locks and tail, were sleeved with an exuberant shade of gold. A lengthy, sapphire flame coiled around her forelimbs, as though a viper bursted into bright azure flames and slithered up her protuberance.
The slender finger of fire spiraled up until it conjoined with a long tentacle of similarly colored flame, reaching from the rear of her head all the way to the dawn of her tailpiece. Instantaneously, the cosmic lagoon of spectators fulminated into a jubilated inferno.
That morning, during Twilight’s seemingly never ending rant about Cloudsdale and its extensive histories and legacies, one name jutted out from the hundreds of words he subconsciously tuned out. Years preceding Levi’s fateful arrival, after the original founder of the Dashers vacated the land of the living, two high-ranking members swooped in to take his place. Cloud Rider, the very same marching with her fellow allies to the playing field. And another, one the man had not made out or discerned from the line of Dashers yet, Silver Spears.
From what little the man picked up from her boundless explanation of the cadre, it seemed Cloud and Silver were polar opposites. The furthest thing from two sides of the same coin. Silver, according to the lavender unicorn, put winning as her top priority above all else. While Cloud on the other hand cared more about the well-being of her troupe than seizing victory. How the duo harbored even a sliver of chemistry given their clear-cut deviations was anyone's guess.
Levi welcomed the somewhat bitter zip of the low-grade wine with not-so-open arms as he gazed through the behemoth window. Spitfire stood as high and mighty as her jubilated nerves would allow. Her hooves remaining firmly planted into the chalky disc, a posture that would not live long.
“Dashers! Are you ready?” From a chocolate-brown wooden announcer's booth, nestled amply between the two endless rows of onlookers, a more-than eager pegasus’ voice declared. Combers of exhilaration drowned the cosmic lagoon of spectators without a moment to spare. Levi ogled through the stainless glass, his emeralds grazing over the blatantly nerve wracked flock of Golden Dashers.
A toned-down yet still shrill squeal of utter and unbridled joy catapulted from the lilac unicorn’s lungs, sending quakes of elation echoing through her frame. Only time could tell if Twilight’s strident display of joy would be warranted or the polar opposite.
The way Levi saw it, the Dashers were tepid, off-brand, generic cola locking horns with classic Coke. Grade-school tee-ball versus the New York Yankees. The odds were not in their favor. If anything, it seemed to the brunete that the omnipotent being watching over them set this event into motion all in an elaborate ruse to humiliate the Dashers. And, honestly, the male wouldn’t be even remotely surprised if that was the case.
The horde of over-the-top, nerve wracked jocks attempted in vain to fein the thinnest facade of menace while trying and failing to stare down their graphicly better adversaries. Their bones convulsed with the same crippling panic that rocked their steel-plated being. Cannonballs of sweat, leaving lengthy murky trails in their wake, held a derby down their feather-coated wings. Moisture virtually gushing from their foreheads threatened to turn their sharp features, cloaked behind a false veil of confidence, into a slip-n-slide.
Over his extensive stay in the, very rarely, beautiful city of Tuscaloosa, Levi had drifted in and out of his fair share of sports teams. Both harboring a momentous role that needed to be fulfilled and expertly played out, unless he desired the beatdown of his life in the locker room. Or, he possessed a small one. A position that, if he missed a few practices or games, it was no skin off anyone's back. With that stated, the brown-haired man had been a factor of numerous competitions, identical to the one he was witnessing, in the decades he spent in Alabama. Never, in all of his months upon months of exercise and hardship, had he ever experienced a level of disquiet even remotely similar to the Golden Dashers.
In fact, the more he thought about it, nothing about them seemed normal in the slightest. Their posture nearly collided with their fate several times. The skeleton keeping their daunting forms alive next to crumbled on multiple occasions. If their optics were visible there impossibly dark lenses, he was more than certain they would be pooled with stress as far as the eye could see. Truthfully, he probably had no idea the utter depth of the lagoons of alarm plaguing their globes.
“Golden Dashers, will the first racer take their place.” The thunderous declaration rocketed from the metallic, achromic speakers situated all around the ceaseless ocean of spectators.
Cloud Rider, the only one out of her lackluster blob of goons that seemed to possess even a measly shred of fortitude, sauntered through her subpar mob. The boundless strips of royal blue cushioned seats only now presented their division for all the world to see. It was clear as day which side inhabited which militia of fiery, undying zealots, ready to shout from the rooftops in support until they drew their last breath.
The left, the Wonderbolts barmy army, swore a solemn vow of silence when the Dashers’ deity emerged into view of the public eye. Met with blistering scowls by some, and nothing but the most divine gazes and eyeballing by others.
“On your marks!”
Cloud settled her hooves deep into the ivory plate completely devoid of every last remnant of color. The sharp, immortal longing for victory within her peepers nearly pierced the glass shrouding her irises.
“Get set!”
The triad shifted in their seats.
Cloud’s brows furrowed.
Her sights were acutely locked onto the gold metallic hoop before her.
Conquest against easily the utmost skilled band of fliers in all of Equestria was nothing short of a next to impossible task. She knew that more than anyone. However, the raging lion forged from an immortal longing for triumph refused to die. In the toasty palms of success or the bitter clutches of defeat, Cloud would not back down. Only when her dead body hits the floor would she ever even consider the possibility.
That promise, the oath she earnestly affirmed to follow regardless of the prices of the path she took, would test her here and now. Even in the face of an abashing, downright dreadful loss that would stain the Golden Dashers’ broad legacy for as long as it remained standing, she didn’t care.
This was the moment she proved herself. Right here. Right now. And she couldn’t be more composed.
“Go!”
A booming crack tore through the air.
The pegasus’ muscles kicked into high gear.
Her hooves exploded from the ground.
Cloud’s wings knew the mission.
And so did she.
A serene gale invited itself into the nostrils of the man in blue. The placid zephyr danced to the beat of its own drum as it traveled through the hushed ether of the Wonderbolts Academy. The tranquil, soothing gust trekked down the boundless canals conquering the airspace, leaving a faint whistle resonating throughout the polytechnic. A short-lived yet still discernible legacy left behind, fading into the oxygen he bore the fortune of breathing. Disappearing into the morning atmosphere as though it was never even there. A ghost vanishing into the night.
Levi liquified into one of the man lush navy blue cushioned seats in Spitfire’s office. The hub of all decisions pertaining to the greater-good of the team, both downright lifesaving and utterly dreadful. The prospect of granting his being the respite it oh-so desperately needed in the self same room where so many ponies had their dreams vanquished. Their chances at victory and fame robbed from beneath their hooves. The stem of the flourishing, lively tree that was the academy. Where with one foul crimson stamp, a pegasus’ burning aspirations for reverence would be destroyed. In a matter of merely milliseconds, years and decades of yearning would be for naught. The countless hours they transformed to ashes spent in the gym. The nigh-uncountable days turned to cinders of boundless studying, praying with whatever mental fortitude stood high and mighty within their skulls they would pass. Every last bit of it with a sole, raging ambition in mind. An undying determination.
Not only would they survive the grueling and sometimes outright cruel bodybuilding required for an extended stay, but thrive. Become one of the best. A king of all kings. The shining stallion on the cover of Equestria Daily. Have their name be roared for miles when there time to put their skills on display for all the world to see in the core of a stadium.
It would be the holy grail a regular pony couldn’t even fathom. It sounded easy on paper. Exercise. Study. Endure. Then, you’re home free. Until that fateful day when they’re called into the very headquarters Levi reposed in without a measly sliver of a care in the world. When they find themself under the stern, expertly-honed amber gaze of the flame-haired captain, their blood ran cold. Veins converted into neverending canals of ice. Arteries metamorphosed to frosty wastelands. Where their confidence once lived now resided a barren fallout zone. The valiance they formerly possessed to look Spitfire in her razor-sharp, unforgiving irises without crumbling to dust died with their goals.
One fell swoop. A scarlet blotch of ink defiling the achromatic paper where all of their information lied. The fatal dread that must’ve swarmed their nucleus like a colony of vengeful hornets. “Pack your bags,” He could almost hear the fierce headmaster speak, “You’re going home.”
Truthfully, Levi didn’t have anything remotely close to a clue as to what long-winded, verbose scenarios his brain fabricated under the wrathful force of boredom. In fact, all he pined for in the cozy confines of Spitfire’s, what he perceived to be, happy place was rest. For the limitless darkness to establish supremacy in his psyche. The lengthy inky tendrils of sleep to coil around his frame. Grant the maws of the cavernous depths of slumber permission to swallow him whole.
Attempting to garner an ideal position for the utmost possible ceasing of consciousness was a challenge to say the least. Constant shifting. Incessant scraping of the legs grating against the flaxen flooring, threatening to vandalize its flawless complexion. The perpetual arching and contorting of his poor defenseless spine to try and will a congenial stance into existence. He tried, in every sense of the phrase, all he could think of. Fingers clasped behind his head. Hands idling in his lap. His feet crossed versus folded. His strives evinced unavailing.
Seconds melted into minutes. The aggregate of countless futile efforts showed without a shadow of a doubt that the peace and quiet he so miserably lusted for was stationed far beyond the horizon. Each rhythmic tick of the clock situated above his head, while simply a component of the miniscule background noise that faded into obscurity for anyone else, struck a starkly-different emotion deep in the man. The click that rang from the chronometer and ricocheted off the vibrant indigo walls was a smack to the male’s face. As though the omnipotent being watching over him from the heavens above strictly forbade entry into the land of dreams to mock the brunete. In truth, it seemed more tortuous than that. A punishment for his sins would be a more fitting label.
At least that’s what Levi wanted to be the case. The man was correct to some degree. Something was indeed looming over them and simultaneously more-than-guilty of the sleep robbing it committed. A malevolent being. The life it bore the misfortune of living insidious and riddled with blasphemies.
It was a bony and evil beast. One that went by only one word.
Worry.
An intense, drastic, never-before-seen level of anxiety that plagued every last nook and cranny of the otherwise tranquil bower. The odorless threads of Cloudsdale wind, who brewed the courage to even fantasize about entering, sealed their fate the very instant their form greeted the perturbing air. Whatever otherworldly entity that personified the precise emotion utterly claiming Spitfire’s frame adopted the doublet into its grasp. And resistance was futile.
It all started long before the rock-solid pair of friends touched base back at the flying institute, when the scorching feud’s finale came and went. Rainbow Dash accompanied the blaze-haired captain as she sauntered along the titanic panorama of clouds, with one destination imprisoned in her mind’s sights.
A diner. More specifically, the mother of all restaurants in Cloudsdale. It was, in every sense or definition of the word, the best. It had dawned greatly preceding the birth of any of the people briskly trekking to the eatery in the present. In fact, prior to the accouchement of most if not all of the pegasi residing in the buzzing city on that very day. Spitfire’s grandparents had told her wonders about the allegedly divine venue.
Sanguine reviews from all walks of life. Heavenly food dropped down to the table from the golden paradise above solely for their indulging pleasure. Drinks, both for the heaviest of drunkards and lightest of drinkers, were nothing short of seraphic.
It was the whole shabang. A perfect terminus for a downright flawless day. Just the mere prospect of Levi blessing his body with the cherubic respite it so-desperately needed after an energy-burning outing nearly made the brunete’s mouth water.
Minutes of strolling beneath the wrathful eye of the blazing behemoth sitting in his throne above their heads passed. A weariness blossomed in their feet and hooves respectively. Heads transformed into mindless, bone-tired goldfish wandering aimlessly in a glass tank. Their port of call, which was advertised to be “a wing flap away” by the world-renowned headmaster, seemed miles beyond the horizon.
Right as fatigue began its rapid-fire consumption of the man’s physique like a starving disease, the yellow and tan striped structure materialized into view at long last. Finally, following the couplet hour long venture from Ponyville to the vast city of Cloudsdale, Levi made it. Repose, a way to appease his roaring gut, and quenching to his desert of a throat were bundled into a lone all-in-one package. Levi’s build threatened to melt into a puddle of black and blue at the thought of dissolving into the lush leather of the luxurious benches. To feel his taste buds thank him on its hands and knees, palms firmly pressed together and all, at the stunning cuisine he would be provided. Hopefully free of charge.
It was a flawless recipe for an equally mint trip. However, when the strident ring of a bell hanging over the front door invaded the assembly's ears, their odyssey was devoid of normalcy from there on out.
When the mostly stainless glass bordered with a dying aurate-painted metal briefly divorced its frame, a brace of well-dressed pegasi eventuated.
One was instantly, albeit effortlessly, recognized by the sapped male as the very same contender he was silently rooting for during the Dashers’ entire…whatever that was. A circus act was a more fitting title.
It was Cloud Rider. The mare’s bone-white skin was no longer swathed beneath the sun-yellow and azure outfit he associated with her until that moment. Her deep sapphires were no longer betrayed by her veil of cerulean-tinted goggles that hid the sight-to-behold from the world. Her navy and pink striped mane was better resting peacefully against her neck than whipping wildly in the wind as calories converted to fleeting memories. A cyan inscribed polo shirt sleeved her ironclad chassis, the team’s logo sewed with pride into where the right front pocket would normally reside.
A pegasus in a spear formation, reducing the sound barrier to an echo of a lost time while the winged pony burned rubber through the air. The ultramarine cobras of flame gliding across the individual's structure, a carbon-copy of Cloud’s own uniform Levi had beared witness to the hour prior.
Her coat retained a thin, borderline unnoticeable blanket of sweat from her rigorous yet vain strive at triumph. The sun’s irate shafts of flaxen radiance gained a fresh mocking undertone as they brought a sheet of glimmer upon the co-captain’s flesh. While stunning to some, with the context in mind, it obtained a sickening inkling.
The companion situated at her side however was an entirely different story, while simultaneously being the culprit behind Spitfire’s overwhelming fret. It was the leader of the sorry-excuse for a ragtag gang. The one who assisted in the founding of the team years ago. The self same who garnered mass amounts of both hatred and support from the general population of Cloudsdale.
Silver Spears.
Arguably the most infamous flying organization founding father in the history of the metropolis.
She had stone-grey skin with a mane almost identical to melted steel flowing over her cervix. Her eyes were pools of molten bronze, most certainly hiding something beneath its surface. The collar on her achromatic button-down fitted snugly over her muscular being was divided. Granting their eyes access to the argent whistle dangling from a slender scarlet necklace.
The air around swallowing the two jarring parties shifted like tectonic plates. Life all around them halted. The background noise of the whistling of Cloudsdale’s gales and the joyous harmonizing of birds ceased. In every way, the sudden and unwelcome encounter slayed the world in all directions with one fell swoop. A singular cleave of a blade, and Equestria died.
Gazing into her chestnut optics, seeing the microscopic pinpoint of something other than the overbearing hospitality, felt odd to say the least. He couldn’t put his finger on it despite his best efforts. However, what he could decipher from the marine of inconspicuous emotions was the uncanny stir in the atmosphere. A disturbance. An unmistakable symbol of Levi’s unnatural, somewhat eerie, ability to detect inherent danger, either apparent or not, kicking into high-gear.
The congruent sensation he received as he traversed through the ashen fog in the castle. The dread and unease kindling in the pit of his gut seconds foregoing the dastardly headlights laying waste to his vision.
While yes his potential to forewarn threats has worked before, and there was certainly no reason for its effectiveness for Silver to be up for debate, Levi had his doubts. On one hand, the unusual and still unexplained combers of trepidation that completely consumed the man in blue that morning would ultimately have an answer. That being it had something to do with the Dashers’ chief before him.
On the other hand, Levi could’ve easily fallen victim to another one of his copious amounts of overthinking spells. That perhaps he was allowing his internal discord to manifest into an unwarranted disquietude towards the sooty pegasus.
Shaking her hoof, surveying every last drop of emotion that dared that inhabited each individual centimeter of her copper-colored globes, it wasn’t all peaches and cream. Behind the treacherous masquerade she reinforced to the absolute utmost, a pinpoint of something in her cavernous lakes of rust resisted her endeavors at censorship. As her jaws separated and reunited more times than Levi could keep up with, her rambling having no end in sight for miles, it gave him all the more breathing space to analyze the speckle. The sinister dot. A dabble for whatever evil transgression she had planned.
It wasn’t her hasty, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it introduction to Levi that metamorphosed Spitfire into a confident and unbreakable pillar, to a nervous train-wreck of a pony. He didn’t know what foul, ungodly kahuna overcame Silver’s irises, but whatever it was, it struck the fear of god in the Wonderbolts captain.
Even a half hour in the wake of the ordeal, Spitfire’s body once tough as nails body language became a distant memory. Now, trying and failing to relax in her midnight blue swivel chair, a meager task as small as scrawling her name across a document didn’t come without a mountain of disquieting mannerisms.
An attenuate layer of sweat dawned on her brow. Colonies of cannonballs of hidrosis commenced a derby down her forehead. Her teeth clenched, an effort to keep her quivering jaw at bay. One that, unlike anything else she did to halt her jittery movements, proved successful. A hoof ran through her mane every few seconds, only adding to the ever-growing collection of moisture accumulating on her scalp. If somebody were to waltz into the room, it wouldn’t surprise Levi a bit if they mistook Spitfire for a marathon runner who just crossed the finish line.
Abruptly, vanquishing the silence in its entirety, a low deep groan escaped Spitfire’s lungs. Her pen clattered against the mostly blank sheet of paper on her chocolate-brown leviathan of a desk. In truth, if the barely any lines filled in whatsoever were an indication of anything, it didn’t seem like she would be using it anytime soon.
The short-lived clunk. That momentary pandemonium. Despite the barely noticeable length of the commotion, it was enough to knock the roaring silence of its mighty bedazzled throne. The ignition for Levi’s dissection of the situation. The trail of gas lit ablaze.
It was time to get to the bottom of whatever was irking Spitfire to such a degree. If Levi was honest, it was long overdue.
Levi stood, his weary knees and bone-tired joints immediately sparking a rebellion. Loudly demanding the sanctuary of the chair be returned to them, a reality that would forever remain a fantasy.
Levi meandered his way across the yellow lightning bolt-patterned rug to the treen behemoth somehow called a desk. A safe haven for the pegasus when times got rough and the road grew jagged. However, gone was the sensation of home that overtook her each time she bore the fortune of sitting in it. All it was now was a chamber of restlessness. An inescapable prison consternation that not only was absent of an escape, but devoid of a fragment of ruth. Much to Spitfire’s divided emotional landscape of relief and overwhelming agitation, Levi saw the shackles that bound her. And his mouth was the key.
“Spitfire?”
A low, misgiving hum broke through the irontight barricade of her sealed lips. The air struggling to climb the walls of her throat.
“You know you can talk to me about anything, right?”
Despite the silence, Levi knew as clear as day she realized the male was speaking the cold hard truth. After all, one doesn’t simply bail someone out of a painful fate without developing a layer of trust. Small or big, it didn’t matter. All that did was that it was there, ready and able to be used. A privilege he hoped Spitfire would seize and utilize to rid her chest of the harrowing mountains crushing it.
Hush reigned supreme in the room. Absolute, unfiltered quietude claimed its rightful seat on its mesmerizing throne. Every last shred, remnant, and scrap of sound for miles beyond the borders of the training establishment fell dead like poisoned birds. The only thing that remained of a regular functioning world were the slender streaks of golden radiance impinging through the crevasses in the blinds.
If he was honest, the brunete wanted anything but having to coax her into relieving herself of her grievances. Not only for pegasus’ own well-being, but for her fliers. Her fliers. Not anyone else's responsibility. Hers. So if Spitfire chooses to keep her feelings under lock and key, combined with personal suffering from her acute worry, her team would bear the brunt alongside their leader.
“Spitfire,”
Levi’s arm unfurled, allowing a supportive yet still gentle palm to cascade down upon the uber-tense pony’s shoulder. The rough textile of her captain uniform’s jacket felt like the flesh of a rhino unifying with his hand. The chafed material barely grazed the surface when it came to amputating her nucleus from the inflicted injustices.
The brown-haired man’s advances were only met with a stiff, sharp sigh, as though only a splinter of her internal turmoil managed to breach the prison behind her ribs. The lucky handful that were graciously granted the opportunity of emancipation.
“Come on, talk to me.”
Spitfire sensed a handful of corpses impact the ground inside of her, belonging to the worries that once plagued her core. She relished in the comfort of Levi’s tranquil tone ending the existence of her harsh anxieties with one solitary cleave. Spitfire didn’t bother shielding herself from Levi’s infectious plague of a smile. Spitfire was alert to the fact that declaring war on the urge to mirror their smiles was worthless. Their conflict ended exactly as she expected.
All the curled corners of her mouth indicated was how weak and frail her facade of merriness truly was. Her grin was akin to a nigh-invisible sheet of paper trying and failing to block a burning, blazing, raging orb from the view of the outside world. It was impossible to say the least. A fact only cemented further by Levi’s clear-cut puncturing of her brittle masquerade.
As much as her body pleaded with her to rid her chest of the mountains crushing it and give in to the man’s soft emeralds. Surrender to the might of his liquifying beam. Allow the chambers of her heart to be devoid at long last of the overwhelming, borderline fatal dread hijacking her being. She desperately pined for it. The sensation of freedom and intramural tranquility. The very same she profoundly took for granted in the perfunctory block of time preceding Silver’s fateful saunter through the diner door. The ear-piercing ring from the small golden bell swaying from the peak of the entry now stabbed her core like a sword of raw, searing apprehension. Unsparingly slapping the air from her desolate lungs. Even the mere mention of the uber-revered restaurant she previously loved and held on the highest pedestal within the bounds of reality sent her heart into a panicked frenzy.
She longed for that relief. To not experience the harrowing aftermath of a seemingly meaningless gaze and hoof shake. To others, they would practically collapse and succumb to the glut of elation of being in a ten-foot radius of a celebrity. To her however, it was an entirely different story. With her reputation riddled with sin, transgressions, crimes, the whole lot, Silver Spears was the last pony you would want grazing your presence. The rearmost option on any and all lists. If anything, it seemed to the sun-yellow pegasus that Silver had this planned out the precise moment she was informed of their upcoming feud. Infect Spitfie’s aura. Strike her with the king of all blistering glares that threatened to slay the captain where she stood. Leave. Simple yet effective. A fleshed out, flawlessly executed hit-and-run on her psyche. It was as though she smited the Wonderbolts headmaster with the sole purpose of afflicting her with the most amount of emotional discomfort and turmoil. Perhaps she enjoyed the nearly lethal angst that gnawed their souls at her impending arrival. An advent that was sure to bring a horde of disastrous consequences in tow, leaving nothing but anguish and ruination in their path.
Then, when their hapless victim was razed to dust, they left. Fading into the darkness from which they had come. A ghost melting into the tenebrosity of the night. Or, in Silver’s case, the devil retreating back into the hellfire it called home. Yeah, that was a more fitting label.
“Captain?” Abruptly, robbing the attention of the duo, a familiar voice emerged from the impenetrable silence of the academy. A little too familiar for Levi’s liking.
“C-Come in.” The words tripped and shambled from the prison behind her sealed-tight lips like a herd of heavy-footed elephants. In fact, speaking at all in the utmost hushed room felt…wrong in an unusual way. As if they were violating the soundless chamber with anything that seemed remotely similar to a sound. However, if the brunete thought that was bad, then he was anything but prepared for the badgersome trio of knocks upon the navy blue door. If the noiselessness wasn’t vanquished already, then it certainly was now.
The silver knob twisted. The old hinges groaned in annoyance as the steel panel divorced its frame. Inhabiting the indigo entry, basking in his own glory that he believed he harbored, was none other than Soarin’. The identical one who sent him barreling into a wall at speeds Levi never even considered were possibly under the laws of reality without a care in the world. No wonder he was a Wonderbolt.
“What is it, Soarin’?”
“The new batch of newbies are here. Thought I’d let you know.”
Spitfire’s domino of fraudulent confidence toppled.
“Here? Now?”
“Yeah, Cap.” Soarin’ responded. “Are you alright? You seem kinda-”
“I’m fine,” Spitfire sharply severed his words in two without a hint of hesitation. “I’ll meet you there.”
With a short-lived nod and a twirl of his ironclad physique, Soarin’ was gone. Vanishing into the ill-light hall from where he materialized from in the first place like a leaf in the wind. In absentia before Levi was permitted the chance to fully recognize his existence.
Spitfire’s haunches deserted the sanctity of her lush cobalt swivel chair, the wheels ceasing there rasping mere centimeters before colliding with the midnight blue wall behind it. Hooves transforming from clacking against the tan floor to muffled by the aurate carpet was foreign to the man’s ears. A sound that once upon a time was a standard noise that simply dissolved into the background noise of everywhere he went. A vital organ of the complex, thriving body known as the unnoticed ambience. However now, it seemed unnatural in an immensely odd way, as though Spitfire shouldn’t be walking.
That, at least to Levi’s very possibly overthinking brain, that Spitfire would be better off by leaps and bounds if she opted to remain in the deathly-silent chambers. Not to cure the brunete of his inescapable loneliness, but for her own good. Nine times out of ten, Levi trusted his gut more than anything alive or dead that ever walked the earth. The sensation that ravaged it. The begging-to-be-recognized merciless whirlpool that dawned in the fathomless bowls of his stomach each time the prickle of forthcoming danger stung his nostrils. And in the meager handful of days he’d been in Equestria, the internal uproar hadn’t failed him yet. Even in the years and decades preceding his fateful plummet into the world of ponies, the inner commotion was his own personal guardian angel.
From the instant his memories were capable of being remembered to now, it was practically his right-hand man. His bodyguard. His ride-or-die. The one thing, sans Alan, he could rely on the most in any world at any time. It didn’t matter whether his being was stationed in Tuscaloosa or a vast, boundless land ruled by a unicorn with wings, it would never stop being at his side when he needed it the most.
With that being said, and with the tingling in his belly amplifying as the seconds ticked by, Spitfire vacating the safety of her office was nothing short of a terrible idea. Not a thing with a functioning brain roaming the terrain of Cloudsdale would even dare to think about infiltrating the heart of the Wonderbolts academy. The moment her physique travels beyond the confines of the team’s hub, the story takes a drastic slope. If Levi’s roaring solar plexus at the sight of the strolling Spitfire was an indication of anything, anywhere outside the confines of her boudoir at any time spelled fated doom. A looming threat that no one could predict and most certainly couldn’t anticipate.
The specifics of what danger laid in wait deep in the dusky corridors of the institute were a blur. All that mattered was the major blaring takeaway from Levi’s forecast of precariousness. Something was coming for Spitfire. He had not even a shred of a clue as to who or what, but he was more-than-aware that it was rapidly approaching. Second by second, minute by minute, all they could do was buy time before its ineliminable arrival. The training establishment was its terminus. It was fate, perhaps destiny.
It couldn’t be altered, changed, or halted in any way shape or form. It was bound to happen. And his flame-haired friend forsaking the sanctuary of the Wonderbolts H.Q was merely pushing a marble down a lengthy, catastrophic, dreadful hill. The only thing that awaited the captain on the horizon let she continue down her path was anguish and misery.
A future Levi utterly abhorred. One he was going to stop dead in its tracks. Right here. Right now.
“Spitfire!” His companion’s name catapulted from his lungs as he whipped his physique around, his tense and tight-with-worry frame facing his oppo.
The headmaster’s movements ceased. Her head craned. Amber greeted emerald. His globes were pooled with alarm. A stark and graphic contrast from the deep yellow irises he gazed into with fret and panic. With the incessant clicking of trotters on flooring, a blanket of unfeasibly-thick quietude enveloped the pair once more. In a way, a vastly uncanny one, it was as if the duo had swapped bodies, dragging their personalities in tow.
Instead of Spitfire being the one nearly driven mad with anxiety, Levi assumed there stead. And the pegasus he looked down upon with nothing but concern seemed a lot calmer than she should be. Pinpoints of the suppressed dread that previously hijacked every inch of her being remained, the masses smothered by the untrue facade of fortitude.
“Yeah?” Her tone wasn’t spared from the suppression of the fabricated disguise of resilience. It sounded like the exact reverse opposite of the pony before him: Normal everyday Spitfire.
The more he peered into the cavernous depths of her optics and the longer his build sojourned in place, the louder a revelation screamed in his skull. Mayhap, contrary to Levi’s hysteria-ridden brain, Spitfire was capable of withstanding the storm in the foreseeable future. Maybe she possessed the brawn necessary to prevail over whatever threat made the downright foolish decision to harm the leader of the Wonderbolts.
Perhaps another one of his dastardly, wretched overthinking spells had reared its ugly head once more. Or a real risk to Spitfire’s lied ahead. In any case, intramural doubts began to surface that the imaginary or not peril harbored the muscle to take down the heart and soul of the Wonderbolts.
“It’s…nevermind.” The dismissal tottered from his lips.
“You don’t have to stay here, Levi. You can take a tour of the place if you want.”
‘A tour?’ Levi thought, the prospect of clearing his mind after such an unease-infested experience resonated through his head like the mighty golden bells of heaven. ‘Sounds nice.’
“I’ll do that,” The brunete replied, “Thank you.”
“No problem. Just try not to get lost, I don’t wanna come searching for you.”
A chuckle mostly rid the air of the emotional opacity.
“I’ll try. No promises.”
After a mutual sharing of a sweet, sentimental grin, Spitfire departed. Abandoning Levi in the boundless landscape of notions in his psyche. The man in blue sauntered out of the refuge of the office. As his shoes unified with the black and grey tiled floor of the hallway, regrets began to seep through the cracks of the almost perfect barricade he forged in his brain.
Was letting Spitfire go a bad idea? That was the sole inquiry that plagued the limitless landscape of his cerebrum. Were his intense perturbs really based in reality? Was her welfare something he truly needed to lose sleep over?
Levi’s rigid and vibrantly-clothed being became engulfed more and more by the tenebrosity with each step further he took into the maws of the shadow. His dark denim jeans became one with the gloom encompassing the passageway. And, just as quickly as the man in blue entered the absence of light, he vanished within it. Leaving behind only a husk of the meaningless trepidation.
‘Meaningless,’ The word echoed off the walls of Levi’s cranium, ‘Gosh, I hope so.’