The next day...
After eating breakfast and taking that letter he wrote to Blue the night before to the local post office on Fifth Street, Storm took off towards the weather factory on the edge of town, flying at speeds he didn't think he could achieve. Soaring above rows upon rows of gridlocked carriages on the streets below and between the fifteen-twenty story high buildings which made up the majority of downtown Vanhoover's grid-like streets, Storm's heart beat at a dangerously high rate as he tried his hardest to make it to the factory in the twenty minutes he had left until he was to start his three week-long training course. He had no clue as to what it involved, having never been through anything remotely similar back in Cloudsdale, but he tried to keep his cool about it. After all, while not nearly as well-built as his older brother Gust, Storm did consider himself to be a rather fit and healthy stallion in his own right, not to mention quite strong as well, so during the flight there, he tried to convince himself that he'd be able to pass it without any issue and hopefully start working at the factory soon enough. As he slowly but surely approached the factory, Storm came to the conclusion that the sooner he'd be able to complete his training, the sooner he'd become a fully-fledged weather pony in the most prestigious weather factory in Equestria, and the sooner that occurred, the sooner he would be able to get back to Cloudsdale to see Blue, even if it was only for a brief winter break. But yet, somehow that didn't help, and neither did Clear's rather ominous warning about the training from yesterday; instead of feeling better about it, his anxiety only grew as he had no idea what to expect from it at all. Having made it to the factory on the outskirts of town in the nick of time just before operations commenced for the day, Storm trotted from the edge of the cliff on which he landed into the weather factory a couple of hundred feet ahead of him, making it through crowds of weather mares and stallions who were about to start their shifts. Trotting through the revolving door which served as the entrance of the factory, he sat down in the vacant waiting lounge, his heart rate soaring as he glanced down at his watch.
"8:56 AM..." Storm mumbled as he shifted his gaze from the watch wrapped around his hoof, towards the television at the other end of the waiting lounge which was broadcasting the morning news report, as he desperately tried to take his mind off the upcoming course. For a moment, he managed to do so, that is, until she came in.
"Stormfire?" It was the same mare from yesterday, who sat with him at the table in the cafeteria. "Oh, there you are."
"Oh, hey...Lilli?" Storm got up out of his seat. "What are you doing here? Aren't you meant to be at the swimming pool or something?"
"I have a day off today." Lilli shrugged as she looked at the stallion sitting down before her. "My mom asked if I could go get you while she's discussing the training course with your... examiner."
"Cool." Storm said, his nervousness growing within him as he got up off the chair he sat on and followed her out of the waiting lounge and down a long corridor, walking through several departments involved in the production of weather, including the cloud manufacturing department and the department involved in planning the path and duration of thunderstorms.
"You seem nervous, what's wrong?" asked Lilli, noticing Storm shivering slightly right next to her.
"Nothing, nothing. I'm fine." Storm lied.
"You sure?"
"Well... not really." Storm confessed. "I just don't know whether this training will go as good as I hope it'll go. I mean, hey, your mom did say that it is pretty hard."
"I'm sure your results don't have to be perfect, Storm," Lilli explained. "Just try your best and I'm sure it'll go to plan."
"You certain?"
"Well, yeah," Lilli replied as they passed the door to the swimming pool, in which two or three weather ponies were training under the watchful eye of another lifeguard. "I had to go through something similar before I could become a lifeguard. They had someone supervise me while I swim and dive, and another guy would grade me based on my abilities."
"Really?" Storm raised an eyebrow.
"Did you have to go through something similar in Cloudsdale?" she raised an eyebrow.
"Nope, any training we received there was provided on the job." he explained.
"Oh, well here we don't do that," explained Lilli. "Here, my mom and her coworkers only choose the best of the best."
"Your mom's the manager here, right?"
"Nope, she's actually in charge of enrolling and training potential weather ponies." Lilli smiled before they entered the brightly-lit gym, a room comprised of several treadmills and a few exercise bikes right opposite of them, along with some heavy weights stacked in the far right corner and a large blue mat in the middle of the room. "Here he is, mom."
"Huh?" Storm glanced left to see Clear standing in the corner, with two stallions who were both discussing in the background.
"Morning, Stormfire." smiled Clear as she watched them approach her. "You proved yourself to us during the exam yesterday, so I'd like to welcome you to your training course, where we will assess your physical and psychological health and thus see if you're fit for the job. Are you ready?"
"Ready as I'll ever be, ma'am." Storm shuddered in uncertainty. "What happens if I fail it?"
"Well..." Clear let out a sigh. "It's rare that somepony fails in this course, but when they do it's usually because we've graded them below 75% or if they have cheated."
"I understand completely, ma'am." Storm's heart rate picked up once again, followed by a chill traveling down his spinal column as he tried to envision himself returning home to Cloudsdale, and being shunned instead of being greeted and welcomed home by his family members, especially High Wind. "Sure...I guess."
"Hi, Stormfire." said one of the two ponies, a silver-colored Pegasus stallion with a navy mane. "My name is Arctic Ice, and I am a flight coach here at the Vanhoover Weather Factory. So, before we start off, tell me some things about you; what your age is, where you come from, how long you worked in weather, etc."
"Well, I just graduated high school literally only a few days back, so I am 18. I am from Cloudsdale, and I worked part-time at the weather factory there since I was 16, I believe."
"Okay," replied Arctic Ice, taking down some notes about Storm on his clipboard. "Any of your friends or family members working at the factory in Cloudsdale?"
"My mom, my dad and my marefriend."
"Alright. Anyone else?"
"No sir."
"Well, you do realize that once we begin there isn't any backing out, right?"
"I do." Storm nodded.
"Okay. Can I check your height and weight, please?" he asked, motioning for Storm to step on a scale, which displayed his weight as being 165 pounds, which was about average for a Pegasus pony of his size. After stepping off the scales, he was measured by Arctic Blast's assistant as being around 4'5, which made him pretty tall compared to other Pegasus stallions he knew.
"Alright, your height is exactly 4'5, while your weight is 165.41 pounds," explained Arctic. "You're taller than most other Pegasi I know, you know that?"
"Yep, that's what everypony tells me." Storm replied.
"So, what we're going to do here is start off by just seeing how well you fly." explained the cardiologist.
"Sounds easy enough." Storm shrugged.
"Follow me, please." Arctic grinned, before leading them out of the gym through the open emergency exit into the large park which dramatically overlooked the city's airport around three, maybe four miles in the distance, surrounded by large tracts of middle-class housing which in a way was similar to what Cloudsdale's suburbs were like, namely the one he lived in, North Cloudsdale, despite the different styles of architecture. It was a beautiful day in Vanhoover; one which wasn't particularly warm, but was good enough for flying or for any other physical activity, the clouds which covered most of the sky only an hour ago having faded away to reveal a wonderfully mid-blue July sky, and the morning smog, which was also known to shroud the city's suburbs during mid-summer was nowhere to be seen. On top of that, the temperature, which increased deeper into the city, seemed to be somewhere in the mid-seventies in this part of town, perhaps 76 or 77.
"This is where our weather Pegasi have their flight skills assessed, Stormfire." explained Clear, watching as he stared off into the distance.
"The view from up here is amazing, isn't it?" Lilli smiled at him.
"It sure is." Storm grinned at her. "And it's colder than in the city here, too."
"I agree," Clear replied. "Perfect weather for flying, eh?"
"Definitely." Storm nodded.
"Are you ready?" Lilli asked, also being embraced by the colder air.
"Yeah, I sure am." Storm smiled. "I love flying."
"Well then," Arctic came over to them. "What you'll be doing right now is flying around the perimeter of the park in the given time. Sounds easy, right? Well, not entirely. We have a few obstacles set up along the way, which will make this part of the examination slightly more challenging."
"Oh."
"And to ensure you aren't cheating, we need another Pegasus pony to fly with you. Unfortunately, I can't do that, but I'll be watching you from here," he explained, before turning towards Lilli. "Would you like to volunteer, ma'am?"
"Yeah, definitely." she smiled, before turning to look at Clear, who gave her an approving smile and nod.
"Alright Storm, are you ready?"
Storm responded with a nod, before outstretching his wings to their full size. After having his wingspan measured by Arctic's assistant, he was ready to start, with Lilli standing right behind him and observing his every move, her angel-white wings also being outstretched.
"Okay Storm, you have ten minutes to fly around the perimeter of the park," explained Arctic, before taking out a stopwatch from the pocket of his jacket and setting it up. "Lilli here will monitor your flying and tell me if you are cheating, and if we find out you were, then you're out of here."
"Don't worry." Storm gulped. "I won't cheat."
"Good." smiled Arctic. "The purpose of this test is to see how good your reaction times are, as well as to get an idea of how well you fly."
"I've done an obstacle course before in gym class." Storm remarked as a gust of wind blew through his mane.
"Perfect, then you'll have no problem with this at all."
"'You'll have no problem with this at all', my flank." Storm muttered under his breath as he flew around the admittedly large park, which from the air seemed to cover at least two square miles, stretching down the slope of the hill on which several sections of the weather factory, including the gym, and the cloud-manufacturing chamber were built. He had just flown through the first obstacle that was laid out for him with Lilli following his every move like a hawk, the obstacle in question being a hollow pipe-like structure made of meticulously-sculpted water ice which twisted round in a zigzag pattern. He had flown through obstacle courses before, but so far, this was on a whole new level, with Storm narrowly avoiding any collisions with the wall of the highly convoluted tube all while maintaining a constant airspeed, and as he headed towards the next obstacle at least a few hundred feet up ahead, he could only imagine what challenge it could pose for him. All the while, Lilli was observing his every move like a living surveillance camera, and following him to his next obstacle, the outline of which they could both make out as being similar to the loop of a roller coaster, reminding Storm of that one time when he went with High Wind and Gust to the county fair in Ponyville, where ponies of all ages from several different parts of the province came to check out and ride the roller coaster, as well as other rides. As she watched him fly between two birch trees which blocked him access to the loop, which was at least two hundred and fifty feet tall, before zooming up it without thinking twice, she had to admit, his flight skills were rather impressive, especially considering the fact that he didn't learn the art of flying until fairly recently. That, and his wings did seem fairly muscular... Wait, what?! her heart almost skipped a beat and her cheeks lit up a rose red as she flew after the stallion in front of her. She wasn't in love with him, she couldn't be. After all, she had only just met the stallion, and for her, 'love at first sight' was something that only belonged in fairy tales or bad romance movies. Flabbergasted and too embarrassed of herself to continue, she began to have thoughts of turning back and just leaving Storm be, but she had to monitor him for any signs of cheating, for example, flying out of the loop. Storm didn't seem like the kind of guy who'd cheat his way out of everything, but she came to the conclusion that it was probably as a precautionary measure she had to do so. Plus, he did seem like a fairly likable stallion who despite being the new guy on the team, was good with the higher ranks, namely her mother, who constantly asked him about himself and where he came from, and as they completed the loop, with Storm flying several feet in front of her, she came to the conclusion that leaving him on his own would be mean.
"That was impressive." she smiled at the stallion in front of her, hoping inside that he'd turn back at least for a second and flash a smile of his own.
"Thanks." he replied. "I honestly didn't think I had it in me, especially after that tube thing."
"That's difficult, I know." she replied. "Even the weather ponies who work here hate it. Sometimes we call it the garden hose, because when we were planning this obstacle course, one of the designs that came in looked like a tied-up hosepipe."
"Really?" Storm gasped.
"Yep." she nodded. "But it turned out that the designer had accidentally eaten an ounce of poison joke before starting work, and as a result, his design was rejected."
"What the hay?" Storm almost burst out laughing. "You can't be serious, right?"
"It's true." Lilli chuckled herself. "He said he brought it at the grocery store thinking it was lettuce... The effects of poison joke only wear off after about a day and can include hallucinations. You think touching it without wearing any protection is bad, wait till you ingest the stuff."
"I wouldn't want to try." Storm shuddered at the thought of himself experiencing the classical symptoms of poison joke-itis or whatever it was called, before glancing down towards the railroad to see the late morning freight train pull into the airport station at least half a mile in the distance.
"Me neither to be honest." she let out a hearty chuckle, before glancing to the left and noticing the next obstacle in the course, an array of small thunderheads, all of which were brightly illuminated by lightning bolts which surged through each cloud. "You ready?"
"Me? I'm always ready." Storm responded smugly, although a part of him wasn't sure how to proceed. Having flown through several storms in the past while working at Cloudsdale without getting struck by lightning, Storm knew the basics of flying in adverse weather conditions, but something about these clouds was unlike any thunderstorm he flew through before. Was it the massive bursts of lightning which surged from one cloud to another in the space of a second? Was it the fact that these clouds were so small, or was it that they may be magical projections only designed to put a pony off flying through them? Storm did not know the answer, having never participated in a training course like this before, and yet, despite this, his fear soon gave way, and he wanted to give it a go.
"Ever done something like this before back in Cloudsdale?" asked Lilli, catching up to Storm who hovered in mid-air, kept from falling the two hundred feet to ground level by the constant fluttering of his wings.
"Nope." Storm shook his head. "But I still want to give this a shot."
"Then go for it." Lilli gave him an encouraging, and decidedly cute smile. "Avoid the lightning bolts, because contrary to what most new weather ponies believe, these aren't projections or anything like that, they're real bolts. I'll be right behind you in every step of the way."
"Thanks." Storm returned the smile, before his brain switched into full gear. "How am I gonna do this? And more importantly, how long do we have left?"
"Four or five minutes, I'd say," Lilli replied. "Here, let me give you a tip. A lightning bolt forms every two seconds and jumps between two clouds. For example, you may have a bolt erupting out of the cloud on the right and surging into the cloud on the left. Two seconds later, another bolt would erupt from the left cloud and surge into the cloud on the right."
"Who told you all this?"
"My dad, he was the flight coach at the local high school, before he enlisted in the Royal Guard," Lilli explained. "What does your dad do?"
"My dad, well, he's involved in the transfer of weather ponies between Cloudsdale and other weather factories."
"So, he's the one that sent you here?"
"Yeah, you could say that, even though I didn't consent to him sending me here."
'Why did he do that, if I may ask?"
'I don't know..." Storm let out a sigh. "I guess I was just too much of a pain in the flank for him to handle."
"Don't say that." Lilli rested her hoof on his shoulder which immediately seemed to raise his spirits. "I'm sure he regrets his decision and misses you."
"I won't be so sure, but it's a nice thought." Storm sighed. "Thanks for raising my hopes up of getting back home, Lilli... but I'm not sure I'll be welcome there."
"You really miss it, do you?" Lilli sighed as they both stared eastwards past the group of miniature thunder clouds towards the mountain range in the distance.
"Yeah..." replied Storm. "I met so many great ponies there."
"Well, if you want, I can help you get settled in Vanhoover." Lilli proposed. "On top of that, I can help you meet a lot of good ponies here."
"Thanks for the offer, but I'll pass." Storm replied. "I don't want to keep you from anything."
"It's no trouble at all." Lilli smiled. "I mean, we are friends, aren't we?"
"You think?"
"Of course." she smiled. "If you're nice to me, I'll be nice to you. Now let's finish off this obstacle course together."
"Won't that be cheating?"
"Not if I fly alongside you. It's not like I'm gonna be guiding you through the course; if anything, I might just give you a small helping hoof if you need it."
"Well, alright." Storm smiled at the mare. "You ready?"
"Yep. Remember what I told you about the lightning bolts?"
"They aren't random; they just jump between two clouds every two seconds."
"Bingo. Now, come on!" Lilli smiled, before she took the lead, Storm charging through the air after her as both of them begun to fly through the storm, narrowly dodging the lightning bolts as they surged from one cloud to the next. He had to admit that while dodging lightning bolts was never his strong suit, sometimes ending up with second-degree burns on his body as a result of flying through lightning storms before, this was a piece of cake, contrary to what he believed before trying it out himself. It was like what his mother had always said when he was a colt; "If you put your mind to it, you can achieve anything.", and so far, her words seemed to be ringing true. After flying out of the storm clouds, they passed the two final obstacles, including a set of pillars between which they had to fly, and a small lake of water in which they had to dip their hoof and keep it in for as long as possible without losing control of their flying.
"That was amazing." Storm smiled as they came into land in front of Clear and the cardiologist tasked with measuring Storm's time. "Well done."
"Thanks." she returned the smile before Clear walked up to them two.
"Great work, Storm." Clear smiled.
"Thanks, ma'am." Storm replied. "I honestly didn't think I'd be able to do this course."
"Well, you just did." Clear shrugged. "Arctic, can you tell us Storm's time?"
"8 minutes, 23.3 seconds," Arctic replied. "By no means is this our best time, but you did well. Congratulations."
"Thank you, sir." Storm grinned, before turning towards his new friend. "And thanks for giving me some much-needed motivation, Lilli."
"Aw, it's no problem at all." Lilli shrugged. "You flew so well, Storm..."
"Thanks." Storm smiled at the mare, who blushed in response. "You did really well too. Arctic?"
"Yeah?" Arctic gazed up from the clipboard on which he had written Storm's results from both the aerial obstacle course and the heart rate test.
"What am I doing now?" Storm asked.
"Well, I'd suggest you go home, Stormfire," replied Arctic. "You did great today. Be back here tomorrow for the next part of your training, alright?"
"Alright."
And with that having been said, Storm headed back into the gym, wondering how the next three weeks would work out for him.