The next hour went about as expected. Introductions were made between the coach, four counselors, and seventeen campers. The ground rules were laid out, and consequences for breaking said rules. It all went by at a drag, and still was much too fast for Fluttershy, who sat in line dreading the inevitable. She felt herself try to sink into the clouds beneath her when Head Coach Perfect Spiral, an immensely built mare who - in Fluttershy’s personal opinion - was way too high strung to be teaching children the delicate art of flight, blew her whistle at an ear-shredding pitch and volume.
“Now, all you little fillies and colts, line up behind Counselor Hooves-” A grey mare sporting a blonde mane, camp jersey, and unfocused eyes waved a hoof and gave the crowd a goofy smirk “-as I call your name! once that’s done we’re going to march calmly to the stadium and test your abilities one by one. Then we’ll begin putting you all in squads under a counselor. Now, then…Cloud Kicker! Blossomforth!” Coach Spiral’s gruff voice continued on for some time, calling up each camper one by one. The order seemed completely random, at least certainly not organized by name, as Fluttershy was placed near the end of the line, between -who else?- Golden Feather in front of her, and a cyan filly with an unruly mane streaked with every color of the rainbow, whose name was ironic even by pony standards.
The unfamiliar filly sauntered up behind Fluttershy, strutting as though she expected to own the place by simple merit of her own attitude. Fluttershy tried to ignore her, hoping that her shrubbery impression might do her a bit more good this time.
“Hey, name’s Rainbow Dash, what’s yours?”
So much for blending in Fluttershy thought dryly. Perhaps trying to blend as a plant in a city made of clouds was a plan that needed revising…either way, there was nothing left but be polite and hope to make peace early. “I-I’m Fluttershy“ Well, easier said than done…bravo Flutters This was going to be a good day for her sarcastic side, Fluttershy could tell.
“Umm, sorry? Didn’t quite catch that” Rainbow prompted.
“I said, I’m Fluttershy…” Truly a Herculean effort at communication, maybe next time try to drop the entire sentence?
“One more time? I think I almost heard you on that one.” The blue filly’s patience was clearly beginning to wane.
Fluttershy cleared her throat agitatedly, and tried again. Once more, with feeling perhaps? “Sorry, I’m Fluttershy”
“There we go, see? Nice to meetcha Fluttershy. Say, you look a bit older than the rest of these chumps, what are you, like a returning champ or something? Well prepare to have all your old records thrashed, 'cause I'm the fastest flier to ever grace this camp!” The younger filly struck a pose, both sleek and proud...
Definitely too full of herself to take anything out on others...and she's kinda funny. Returning champ? Hah! Fluttershy was taken slightly aback at her brash nature, but something about this pony said that she'd be a loyal friend, something Fluttershy was in desperately short supply of. Best to head off that competitive nature now, yes? “N-no, this is my first year here too, and I'm definitely not a champ at anything.” Except tripping over my own hooves, maybe... but Fluttershy kept that last bit to herself. They'd all get front row seats to that spectacle soon enough, in any case.
While the two fillies had been talking (or stuttering, in some pony's case), the rest of the line had filled out. Behind Rainbow Dash, a pair of colts were doing...whatever it is colts do...rather energetically. Somehow it involved quite a bit of making each other sound like idiots. Fluttershy foresaw those two being an issue when she finally had to attempt anything resembling coordination. For now, however, they simply laughed boisterously to themselves while the line of campers was finished and ushered into the stadium.
Inside the stadium walls, the campers gasped at the sight before them. The stadium floor had been mostly cleared away, leaving nothing but stray wisps of cloud between the campers and the ground so far below. The stadium itself was full of obstacles, platforms set in staircases, and rings arranged in interweaving courses indicated by colored ribbons tied to them.
None of that was important to Fluttershy, who was still stuck staring all the way to the ground.
Coach Spiral started calling names down the list, and each young flier would take off, following a simple course of rings. The blue course was the only track set entirely over solid cloud cover, and as such was dubbed the 'beginner' course. Not all were entirely successful, but most made their way through the course with varying scales of ease. Once they were done, either by finishing the track or by touching the cloud floor, the camper was assigned to a counselor and sent to stand with their group.
After the third or fourth success, Fluttershy's nerves kicked into overdrive. It wasn't until Golden Feather was gearing up to start that Rainbow finally noticed Fluttershy was shaking like a leaf on Tornado Day.
“Hey Flutter, you okay?” Fluttershy shook her head.
“What's up? Nervous?” A quick nod.
“Pfft, why? This track is like, kid's stuff!”
The only response was a nearly inaudible squeak, barely heard over the cheering gang of fillies who must have been Golden's friends. Ugh, more of this... Rainbow thought. Can we please be past this phase now? Instead of a verbal prompt, she simply gave an expectant stare, and waited.
“I can't fly.”
Still hard to hear, but much better than trying to get her name...maybe this filly is warming up to me. “See? I'm not that scary!”
The actual message of the reply took a few moments to register, however... “...Wait, WHAT!?”
Rainbow's outburst earned a silencing glare from her new-found friend. To the surprise of both of them, it worked. She continued in a much more secretive volume; “What do you mean, you can't fly? You have wings, right?” The quaking pony next to her nodded. “Hay yeah you do, and anything with wings can fly, right?” Her volume began to find its way back to normal full-excitement levels.
Fluttershy's voice started to come back to her as well, encouraged despite her attempts to argue. “I-I've heard stories about birds who can't fly that live on the ground”
“Pfft, as if!” The blue filly scoffed. “Haven't you heard about all the crazy stuff that lives on the ground? Bears and wolves and lions and stuff that'll eat a pony up in one gulp? And that's a pony! No way a bird that couldn't fly would be able to live on the ground! So there's no such thing, which means you can fly, 'cause everything with wings can fly!”
“You're right!” Fluttershy hopped up, suddenly emboldened by borrowed courage. “I can fly!
“You will fly!”
“I WILL fly!”
“You can do it!”
Coach Spiral called Fluttershy's name.
“I CAN DO IT!!!” And with that, Fluttershy took off at record speeds!
...Or she would have, had she not forgotten to lift her front hooves off the ground. Instead, she was left to skid forward several hooflengths on her face. Once again Fluttershy: well done. You've outdone yourself spectacularly in a shining example of grace and ineptitude. Fluttershy's sarcasm was truly having a field day today, and who could blame it? The silver lining here was that even at face value, clouds really are just water, and so despite being fatally embarrassed, she was unharmed.
“Okay, okay, pick yourself up and try again” Coach's voice lost some of its edge at this point. It may have been to soften the edge that the campers' laughter had taken.
And Fluttershy did try again, really, but with her Rainbow-instilled confidence now shattered, she barely made it to a hover less than a hoof off the ground. Much too low to even reach the first ring of the course.
And there they were, the two colts from earlier, laughing to each other and pointing at her. Not that she was more than two pony's lengths away from them, but they didn't even bother trying to keep her from hearing them immediately come up with a nickname to suit the moment. 'Klutzershy'. An oddly detached part of her mind was mildly impressed that they'd come up with something that eloquent on the fly. Golden Feather's gang of friends quickly tried to take up the chant of 'Fluttershy, Fluttershy, Fluttershy can't hardly fly!', only to be silenced by Golden herself, plus a few counselors for added weight. Still, in less than thirty seconds, the entire camp was armed to the teeth with enough figurative ammo to tease Fluttershy to Tartaurus and back, and she knew she could never risk trying to fight back.
"Alright, everypony, that's enough!" Coach Spiral picked her voice back up to Drill Sergeant level, attempting to rein in the situation. "Fluttershy, you'll be with Counselor Hooves." The camper in question nodded morosely and made her way over to where the grey mare from earlier was standing with a blonde maned, lavender coated filly Fluttershy had never met, but was immediately sure had not taken part in the...'festivities' a few moments previous.
As soon as Fluttershy had made her way safely to her post, the Coach called the next flier. "Rainbow Dash, you're up next!"
The exuberant filly immediately stopped her glaring at the two colts next to her, tensed in preparation to pounce, and took off. Where Fluttershy's takeoff had failed in every way, Rainbow's execution was nearly flawless. She zoomed, banked, dipped and swerved through each and every ring as if she'd been doing it all her life. More impressive still was her speed. She zipped through the course like an arrow with a mind of its own, clearing the last ring in a matter of seconds.
Her technique for breaking, though, needed some work. Still hurtling at top speed, Rainbow quickly lost control of her direction and careened straight down into the cloud floor. All that could be seen of Rainbow was her rear end sticking out of the ground, and the sight left the whole camp in giggles. As the nearest counselor went to help the tiny speedster right herself, Coach Spiral once again restored peace with a quick bark.
As soon as her head was free, Rainbow quickly shook herself free of any cloud wisps and looked around nonchalantly. “I meant to do that.” she stated as calmly as possible.
“Sure you did, Rainbow Crash.” the tan colt, who was next in line, taunted. “I'll bet you just love eating cloud, it's the perfect snack for a loser like you!” His friend added, quick to not be left behind.
Rainbow was in their faces in a flash. “Say that again, chickenhead, I dare you!”
“I said that's Enough!” The coach's voice came thundering across the square, stopping all three in their tracks. “I will not tolerate bullying in this camp. Ever! Do I make myself absolutely clear?” Every colt and filly in the area, and at least one of the counselors, nodded their heads fearfully. “Good. Rainbow, you'll also be working with Counselor Hooves. Hoops, you're up.”
As the tall, tan, and annoying colt began his run, Rainbow stalked over to where Fluttershy was sitting, and plopped herself gracelessly next to the yellow filly to watch the colt in contemptuous silence. She felt a small bit of satisfaction when he finished his lap a half second slower than she had, and when his cohort proved even slower, she was mollified enough to shoot Fluttershy a quick grin. Her cocky attitude quickly turned apologetic when she realized that Fluttershy was staring at her somewhat coldly.
“I told you I can't fly...” she muttered resentfully.
“But I-” Rainbow's rebuttal was quickly cut off.
“Of course you can fly, silly, you just need a bit of help.” Both fillies turned around, startled at having been snuck up on by their assigned counselor.
“Oh, sorry, didn't mean to scare you two.” she grinned sheepishly. “Here, let's start with proper introductions first, right? I'm Counselor Hooves. Seriously, though, call me Derpy; being a counselor is intimidating enough without it being shouted at me from all sides.”
“Rainbow Dash! But you knew that already.” The cocky grin returned at full force.
“Fluttershy.” Still subdued, but audible at least.
“I'm Cloud Kicker.” The lavender filly spoke up at last, with only the slightest trace of nervousness.
“It's nice to meet you all. Now, before we get into things for real, I'm going to give you all a warning.” Derpy was suddenly serious, or as serious as she could be with one eye boring into them while the other seemed to be extracting the secrets of the universe from the mountain below them. “There will be no bullying on my watch.” She gave Fluttershy a pointed half-stare, which the filly was quick to shy away from fearfully. “That includes beating yourself up over silly mistakes. Nopony is a perfect flier when they first start out, and everypony screws up sometimes. Even the Wonderbolts run into stuff, so don't you kids start kicking yourselves when you're down, okay?” By the end of her speech, the older filly -Fluttershy had realized that she was only a few years older than the rest of the camp- was back to her goofy smile, and her three charges were beginning to relax.
All three nodded in quick agreement. “Alrighty, then! Let's get started!”