February 26, 2013
10:40 AM
Shedding Spare Droplets Zolingrad
An Encounter of Frightening Proportions
Spitfire was no stranger to the adrenaline rush. She couldn't be since her job description required her to pull off vertigo inducing stunts, sometimes even death defying if she was feeling really cocky and charged up. From a Slice Sling Drop to the Burning Vortex, Spitfire felt thrills that sometimes defied even her own expectations. What else could one expect from a Wonderbolt? They are made to fly against G-forces that would otherwise tear a normal pony apart.
Any pretense of this flew out the window as Spitfire groaned, wings twitching in pain as Applebloom stood there with apologies tumbling out of her maw faster than the wounded Wonderbolt could process them.
"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to-" She stopped when the Wonderbolt raised her hoof for silence.
"This is worse than the time Swift inhaled that bottle of helium... Ugh, did she HAVE to scare me like that? At least the squirt isn't a complete motor mouth." Spitfire thought, grunting as she got back to a sitting position, rubbing a hoof on her throbbing wings.
"Kid, just promise me not to do that again in the future and we'll get along just fine."
"Yes Ms. Spitfire," the filly mumbled, looking sheepishly at the ground in embarrassment. Spitfire sighed as she put up a small grin for the filly.
"Hey, buck up kiddo. It'll take a lot more than this to stop me." Spitfire said, thumping her chest. She raised her wings for emphasis, only to yelp as pain shot through her from wingtips to her spine. Applebloom ran up to her, alarmed by the sudden reaction.
"Owwwww. Actually, scratch that. This is going to ground me for a while..." Spitfire sighed, wincing as she got her first good look at her wings. Blood streaked throughout her fur and feathers, some of them knotted and twisted out of place.
What's worse, the tip of her wings felt numb, indicating that she had more than likely broke a few bones in the crash.
In short, Spitfire was stuck with two useless limbs that were little extra body weight.
"Is there anything that I could do to help?" Applebloom asked, a hopeful look in her eyes.
"No can do kid. There is a reason why wing repairs are so expensive and time consuming. This will probably take more than a few days to heal... Then again, I've seen worse." Spitfire said, rubbing her chin in deep thought. She remembered how some poor fool of a stallion thought he could weave himself through an obstacle course in record time, even though he had little to no experience with the track itself. Even when he was implored by both friends and instructors to think it through, the pegasus went forward. He paid for his recklessness by losing a wing when he accidentally severed it by ramming into a branch at high speed.
"Oh well... It can't be helped." She shrugged. Then she looked back to Applebloom.
"By the way, I don't think I have been properly introduced to you and your family yet, save for your sister Applejack."
"Oh, I''m Applebloom! Granny and my big brother Macintosh are in the kitchen cooking something up for you to make you feel better. And not just any something, they're cooking some good old fashion Apple fritters!" She salivated. "Mmmmh, they just have a warm feeling to them..."
"Are they?" Spitfire asked, raising an eyebrow. Then she mentally facehoofed. "How did I forget her name earilier? I'm not going senile am I? Nevermind." Still, perhaps she could pass the time with this young one... Though in all likelihood, she would probably end up like that obnoxious pink earth pony filly... Tiara something...
"Yup! Though Granny said that it's gonna be a while longer before we settle in for dinner. So she said I should check up on you to see how you were doing."
"That's... Very thoughtful of them. I never had anyone do that for me before, sadly enough. Well, save for the odd party or two with my squad."
"What? But yer a Wonderbolt! The way that Rainbow Dash keeps talking about you, I- I don't see how." Applebloom said, somewhat shocked by this new information.
"Kid, trust me when I say that the life of a celebrity like that of myself myself, isn't all that glamorous or all that it is cut out out to be. There are other things that we Bolts have to watch out for besides flying, ya know? I swear, sometimes I hardly know how I manage to get through with the stuff I put with sometime."
"Like dealing with File's temper... Or dealing with a horribly revealing tabloid and then worrying about his said temper... Or maintaining an act just to appease the Nobles, just because we have a reputation to keep... Or that time where he brutally mauled Soarin when he was caught eating pie on duty."
She shuddered as she thought back to her manager's anger problems, a unicorn who was known for his extreme temper, blowing up sporadically at the worst possible times. One moment he would be fine and dandy, the next he fights with the ferocity greater than an enraged manticore. Didn't help when he was one of the factors for the Wonderbolt even being out here in the first place.
She shook her head, thinking back to the events that brought her here with a shudder.
Applebloom looked up at her with concern, suddenly shuffling her hooves nervously.
"Um... Sorry if I brought up any bad memories Ms. Spitfire."
"Its alright kid. But if you don't mind, I would like to make a change to a different topic, since we're probably going to be here for a while before the food get's here."
"Speak of the devil."
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Applejack descending from the 2nd floor with a basket filled with a first aid pack, a towel, extra gauze and an assortment of bottles that she quite frankly couldn't make out what they were designed for in the first place. On her back, there was a small blanket.
Setting the basket down, Applejack waved a hoof off, getting another piece of gauze out.
"Don't mind me none, I am just going to patch up your wings up with a splint so that they don't get any worse. I need you to stay still for this anyhow. Might as well learn a little about each other while I work. Just try not to snee-"
Spitfire then violently sneezed on Applejack. When Applejack just stood there for a moment, Spitfire became rather nervous. The last pony she knew to have sneeze on somepony while they had a cold, Soarin ended up with a black eye in addition to his already bad fever.
"... Sugarcube, it ain't polite to sneeze on a pony, ya hear?" Applejack finished after a long, awkward silence. What scared Spitfire was not how she reacted, but rather the lack of a reaction in the first place, with the apple farmer staring at her, thoroughly unamused.
"Ehehehe... Sorry?" Spitfire said nervously, suddenly feeling that she wanted to dig a hole deep underground and hide in it till the end of time. She looked at Winona, as if the pup would serve as a barrier, only to find the dog was snoozing quietly on the couch. Applejack only shrugged as she wiped her face with a towel.
"T'aint nothing to fret over Spitfire. Nothing worth getting riled up over. Applebloom, could you get another blanket set up for Spitfire to lay on? The wood floor ain't exactly going to do her any wonders for resting her body."
Applebloom snapped a salute, before rushing upstairs, leaving the two mares alone with each other. Wordlessly, Applejack began applying treatment to Spitfire's wounds, who winced slightly at the sting of the medical alcohol seeped into her cuts.
Spitfire paused, stroking her chin as she dwelled on an alternative topic of interest to converse on. She racked her head for something to talk about, until a light bulb went off in her head.
"... So, you are both the friend and rival that Rainbow Dash wouldn't stop yapping about, correct?" Applejack nodded with a grunt, wrapping a gash in Spitfire's left hind leg with several layers of bandages.
"Eeeyuup, ever since she came down here to Ponyville along with Fluttershy. Heh, she was so defensive about even me asking her name, with a rowdy temper to boot. We didn't exactly start off on the best hoof."
"So how did you become friends with her in the first place? Rainbow doesn't exactly strike me as the type who would make friends easily, especially since she wouldn't stop yapping off about how her farmer friend had the most powerful bucking legs in Equestria." Then after a moment she blushed profusely in embarrassment as she realized she made an innuendo.
"Uh, I don't mean that in a kinky way. No, I do not mean that in a kinky way." She finished, flustered. If her wings weren't tied down in a secured knot, she might have popped a wingie.
"Thank Celestia for small favors." She thought.
Applejack chuckled as she patted the Wonderbolt on the back.
"Don't you worry none about that... Well..." Applejack thought, tapping her chin for a moment. "It all started when we had an argument over who was the better athlete. I didn't mind her all that much till she claimed that she could probably buck my apple trees better than I could. Course, I couldn't let that challenge go unanswered. Poor Shy was so nervous and jittery that she thought we were going to kill each other. So we set up a competition of bucking twenty apple trees in a minute's time."
"So... How'd it go?"
"I managed to clear my set of trees in about forty three seconds. Rainbow on the other hoof was still stuck on her first tree after five minutes. She was so stubbornly insistent on, as I quote: "Bucking those doltbrained stupid apples.", that I had to pull her off. She told me that the trees were broken, that they were rigged."
"Oooooh... I hope she isn't bringing that attitude into the Wonderbolts. Can't have a glory hound with no sense of sportsmanship."
"Believe me, she is a lot more tame than she was when I first met her. Believe it or not, she accepted me as a friend on the spot after I treated her over to some cider. Claimed that I was good enough to be her rival, saying that all ponies like her needed a good nemesis. It only went further when ah helped her build up Shy's home. I swear, sometimes she worries a bit too much over that filly. I mean she stared down a cockatrice, made friends with a manticore, and even stared down a dragon." She chuckled.
Spitfire momentarily lost her balance as she flinched in shock.
"What!? She faced down...-" She stuttered, at a loss to describe her feelings to this new found knowledge, only for Applejack to nod in the affirmative.
"Yup. Rainbow Dash had to go in and tick it off by bucking him in the nose. Can't say he wasn't all that much happy about having an annoying rainbow colored pegasus smash his muzzle."
"... But how... Why didn't he just fry you then and there?"
"There is one thing that you don't wanna do to Shy, and that is making her angry."
"Why? From what I saw of her, she seems scared of her own shadow. How could such a shy pony like her best a dragon?" Spitfire asked, puzzled.
"That's because you haven't seen Fluttershy's Stare."
"The Stare?"
"To put it bluntly, there is nopony I ever heard of ever besting Shy when she's angry. Heck, she even made some Diamond Dogs rebuild a destroyed school house by just asking nicely. As far as I know, they haven't troubled them since. Or anypony else for that matter actually."
Spitfire was a bit skeptical at first, but the unusually grave expression on the farmer's face told her that if she were ever to meet face to face with this "Fluttershy", it would probably be in her best interest to remain cordial with both her and her friends.
"Wow..." Spitfire whistled. "Guess that means I have to be careful around her. Must be one of "those" quiet types, eh?"
"You said it. Shy may be one of the nicest sweethearts that you'll probably ever lay eyes on, but for the love of Luna... Ugh...."
"So.... What can you tell me about yourself? We kinda got sidetracked."
"Well, there really ain't all that much too me to be honest. Just a plain old farmer here in Ponyville."
"That's not true sis! There ain't anypony to have bested you in a rodeo yet, except for that time in Dodge Junction."
"Wait, she's in a rodeo?" Spitfire thought, eyes widening. "Wait, when did she... Nevermind."
"Applebloom, really, it ain't nothing much to fret over." Applejack said in a stern voice.
"But you are one of the top ponies in the Dodge's Horn Gallop!"
Spitfire blinked, did she hear that right?
"Wait, could you run that by me again? I thought you said she was in the Dodge's Horn Gallop."
"That's because she is!" The filly said with a grin. "Only the bestpony ever to hit the rodeo."
"Aww shucks Applebloom, t'aint anything special." Applejack said bashfully, kicking a hoof.
It was fortunate for the Wonderbolt that they were currently looking in another direction, or else they would have noticed the slacked jaw expression that Spitfire had on her face. The Wonderbolt had indeed heard and processed the information, but she was still having trouble even believing her own ears.
"She's in THE Dodge's Horn Gallop!?" Spitfire just stared in shock, the two ponies oblivious to the Wonderbolt's gaze.
"But you've been champion for the past eight rodeos Applejack! Unless you claim that you ain't the 'La Grande, heir to none other than our pa, none other than "The Grande" himself!"
Spitfire blinked, then looked to where Applebloom had pointed, a section of the room Spitfire didn't notice previously. Surely she didn't mean "them". Sure, the similarities were there, but...
"Could she... Nah. You're just getting worked up over a little something Spitfire. She can't possibly being talking about...." Her thoughts trailed off as she got her first good look of the area. Her eyes shot wide open.
What she saw made her gasp, jaw nearly dropping off its hinges.
"The Grand Finale... Oh my Celestia! That's! That is the..." She trailed off in a whisper, still unable to believe her eyes.
Standing proud before her were several trophies, commemorating the champion of the competition.
But these weren't just any trophies... These were only awarded to only the best rodeo ponies ever to live in Equestria. One stood out. And it was one of a kind that Spitfire thought that up until this point, she would have even dared hope to even see personally. Mainly due to the winner's name being kept anonymous for legal reasons.
Plastered on a black sliver polish with a ruby affixed to the center was simply "The Big Apple. Winner of Year 1000 Finale Rodeo: Applejack".
Spitfire felt as if she was rammed with a runaway train, only to end up landing in a field of gold. Spitfire became woozy as she stared back at Applejack. It suddenly became a lot harder for her to keep steady on her legs. So her rump hit the floor. She began to feel faint as an inner fanfilly long thought lost popped into existence. Her inner passion was rekindled, her flame burning brightly once more.
"By Luna's socks... It's actually her... I am ACTUALLY in the presence of the Finale Champion." She squeed in a quiet but powerful way. Her sudden spike in euphoria caused her to grin a smile that was only possessed by the most devoted (Possibly even mad) of fans. Spitfire herself was given this treatment from fans far and wide, what with being a Captain of the Wonderbolts. The irony of this fact did not fly over her as she felt her cheeks warm up in a slight blush.
Meanwhile, Applejack was still talking with Applebloom when she noticed Spitfire starring at her with an unnerving grin.
"Uh, you alright there Spitfire?"
When she didn't respond, the far was beginning to feel increasingly uncomfortable. Perhaps the pegasus hit her head a wee bit too hard?
Applebloom stopped talking as she too noticed the glazed look in Spitfire's eyes.
Walking up to her, she tapped the paralyzed Wonderbolt, snapping her out of her trance.
"Hey, Miss Spitfire! Ya alright?" Snapping out of her trance, she realized that she had the attention of both mares and flustered. Twice now, she was glad that her wings were tied up at the moment.
"Uh, yeah... Sorry about that. I kinda spaced there for a moment. Must be the cold, don't mind me." She cuffed the back of her head with a hoof, chuckling nervously. When Applejack's gaze who bore in on the pegasus failed to relent, she thought her heart might burst by the rapid beat it was making. And she wasn't even flying! Applejack then came right up next to her, staring at her with an intensity that would probably have melted the whole of Canterlot if the stare were weaponized.
"Sugercube, I can tell when a pony is lying to me, and right now you couldn't be anymore obvious if somepony slapped a liar poster on you. Come on, what's the matter?"
"I-, um..." Spitfire stuttered, at a loss for thought, withering under the farmer's gaze as her confidence rapidly sapped to nothing.
"Oh colt... I am so screwed." Spitfire thought, feeling more nervous than at any time in her career as a Wonderbolt.
"SOUPS ON, EVERYPONY!" Flinching, the family saw that Granny Smith and Big Macintosh had came in with several plates of some of what Spitfire thought looked like the most appetizing apple products she ever laid eyes on. Considering that the food she ate on a regular basic amounted to what other more refined ponies might call carnival fare, it shouldn't be surprising that Spitfire puckered her lips in hunger.
"Easy there, don't try and eat it all at once. Applebloom, could you help me with getting the other plates?" Hesitantly, she looked at Spitfire for a moment more, before disappearing inside the kitchen. Spitfire was left alone with Applejack.
She gulped.
"Well, ain't you going to tell me why you were starring at me like that? The only pony I have seen grin like that is Rainbow Dash, especially when you are around."
"I, uh actually..." She trailed off, trying to think up an excuse. She was running out of time. Oh Celestia, what would she think if-...
"Say again?"
She was trapped. And out of desperation...
"Iamactuallyyourbiggestfanofyourrodeos!" Spitfire bluttered, only to slam a hoof right over her muzzle.
"Come again partner?"
Spitfire stood there with lips sealed, shuffling her hooves around awkwardly.
"I believe I know what might be Miss Spitfire's problem AJ. I am surprised you didn't notice yet."
At some point during the conversation, Big Macintosh had entered the room, standing their silently while the conversation continued.
"Big Mac, just what in the hay do you possibly think might be her problem? You think the fever might be making her act oddly?"
"Nope. But take a closer look at her."
"Aright, alright! Don't get your nickers in a bunch. I don't see what is so importan-...." She trailed off as she finally noticed that Spitfire's wings were rigid, with an intense blush on her cheeks. Applejack put two and two together.
One: Spitfire was wearing a grin that would give even Rainbow Dash a run for her money.
Two: She was starring at both the trophies and then at her.
Then it clicked. And when it did, Applejack felt the blood drain from her face as the realization hit her.
"Oh sweet Celestia... You mean..." She trailed off, unable to finish her sentence. She looked at the floor as her brain struggled to process this new information. Memories of times past began to resurface. Memories she had thought she had completely buried. Though she didn't show it, there was conflict brewing inside the stetson wearing farmer.
At this point, Spitfire had finally mustered up the courage to get up and approach Applejack. She was wearing a grin of admiration that she only saw Rainbow Dash give to Spitfire during the Best Fliers Competition. But yet ironically, here was Rainbow's idol giving her that same look. And quite frankly, it rather horrified the farmer.
"Um, Applejack? I have a confession to make..." She muttered, almost back to a Fluttershy whisper.
"Just spit it out Spitfire..."
"Alright." She took a deep breath before steeling her resolve.
"I am actually your biggest fan." Her words hid a barely restrained glee. But she might have well shouted in Royal Canterlot.
A solid ten seconds passed. For a moment, nothing was said between the two.
Then Spitfire flinched the apple farmer hit the floor with a thud.
Applejack, the mare of whose famous unshakeable resolve, the sane pony in her close of group friends when they refereed to her for wisdom, fainted for the first time in her life. Unlike her friend Rarity, she had no couch to fall on. So instead, she hit the ground with an audible thump.
After a moment, Granny Smith came walking in, food being dragged in by wagon table.
"Alright everypony, whose up for some good tasting apple fritters, hay fries and.... Oh dear."
Wordlessly, she shared a glance with the elder grandson of the family. She didn't even need to ask, for her facial expression told Big Macintosh all he needed to know. Sparring a pitying glance to the soon to be probably doomed Wonderbolt, he pointed to the lone pegasus, then the trophies.
Granny Smith eyed Spitfire, then the trophies, then back again. Then she pointed an accusing hoof at Spitfire.
"You."
Her smile was completely gone.