Saturday 9:15 pm.
The mustached spit champion, Spear stood on the sidewalk as he stared at the home of the Apple family. He glared intensely at the house despite the wind and rain.
“Soon” he muttered to himself. A bright flash of lightning lit up the sky, followed by an enormous
boom of thunder. Spear quickly began to walk away as he muttered to himself “Oh what the heck am I doing in the rain, this isn't cool it's just irresponsible”
Sunday 12:23 pm.
Wake up, get out of bed, eat something breakfasty, go to work, come home, eat something dinner-ish and sleep. That was Aria's usual routine most days of the week, unless she had a day off, on which she replaced work with the task of trying to avoid interaction with her fellow sirens as much as possible. The simple solution would most likely be to go outside and walk around the city; but Aria's general disgust for the world around her only left her feeling more frustrated the see saw of it.
Perhaps frustration would be a better sum of her routine. Constant frustration over the situation Adagio's leadership had left them in, frustration over being stuck in some world devoid of opportunities for someone who was practically an extra terrestrial, frustration over having to suffer through everyday knowing that everyday would be just like the last one... frustrating.
So why on the one day when something was actually different would she choose to sleep in.
Aria slept with her covers over her head, trying to drown out the sound of Sonata and Adagio's television show, an obnoxiously loud game show involving contestants going through a series of obstacles with the goal to get to the end with out messing up, contrary to the audiences hopes that they fail miserably on every single one. Needless to say the two enjoyed it for entirely different reasons.
Aria grumbled at the sound of loud footsteps approaching the bed room door, quickly followed by an even louder knock.
“Aria, what time were you supposed to meet those girls toady?” Adagio asked in a less than pleasant tone.
Aria groaned and mumbled out a response that would not have been understood even if someone was sitting right beside her.
“Was that a response or a growl?” Adagio asked, losing what little patience she had.
Aria peaked her head out from the covers and looked at the digital clock next on the night stand.
“About a half hour ago” Aria replied. She covered her ears as she waited for the inevitable screech from a furious Adagio. Several seconds went by but their was no such reaction. Aria peeked over the covers and saw that the door remained remained closed. A small smile came to Aria's face as she closed her eyes and prepared to drift back off to sleep.
“Adagio don't!” Sonata suddenly pleaded from the other room.
Aria's eyes shot open as she heard someone enter. Before she could react, she suddenly felt the covers being torn off of her, followed by a splash of ice cold water. The previous warm cozy feeling only made the sudden wet and cold more unbearable. Aria looked up to see Adagio standing next to the bed with a bucket in her hand.
“Get up... now” Adagio said, emphasizing the words to an intimidating extent.
Aria clenched her hands into fists as she resisted the enormous urge to punch Adagio right in her little she-devil face; but the act would do nothing but make living with Adagio more miserable. Her comfort gone, her personal space invaded, and her dignity dealt another blow, Aria slowly got up off the bed. She stood up and began to move towards the siren's dresser, only to be stopped by Adagio.
“I'm up, okay. I just need to get some dry clothes” said Aria.
Adagio smiled and said “It's hot and sunny outside, you'll dry off before you get to the school”
“Like you're going to stop me” Aria said as she glared at Adagio.
Sonata peaked her head through the doorway “Come on girls, don't fight” she pleaded.
“We're not fighting, Aria's just being difficult” Adagio said to Sonata before directing her attention back to Aria “Let me put it this way, you either go right now and dry off before you get there, or I'll make it rain on the rest of your clothes”
“Ugh... Fine, whatever, have fun being a psycho” Aria said as she quickly made her way to the door.
“And don't think you're coming back here in a half hour or something. I don't want you back until you've learned something about those girls. That should take up the entire day for someone as anti-social as you”
Aria flung the door open then hurriedly walked down the hall, hoping to get away before Adagio could take another emotional jab at her.
“Well, that's another problem solved by cold water” Adagio said as she returned to the couch. She noticed Sonata shooting her an annoyed glare “What? If I didn't get her out there we could be missing out on vital information”
Sonata rolled her eyes, having given up on arguing with Adagio's reasoning a long time ago.
Aria cursed under her breath as she slowly walked towards the school. She wondered why she was actually doing what Adagio had told her when she could have easily just gone anywhere else until enough time passed for the others to buy that she'd actually done as instructed. Maybe it had just become a force of habit to follow Adagio's orders, either that or the fact that she knew that she would be as welcome anywhere else as she would be with those girls.
She looked up from the sidewalk and saw the ever irritating Canterlot High gleaming in the sun light. Every time she saw that building she was thrust back into the memory of being brought down by seven girls and a giant astral projection of a unicorn shooting rainbows. Such an absurd end to their near return to glory was too much of an injustice. Too much of a stupid, ridiculous, unfair end to an already unlucky series of events.
In the distance, Aria saw the two girls out by the schools track and field. The rainbow haired girl was currently performing various tricks with a soccer ball, and the farm girl was... spitting. Aria groaned as she walked towards the two girls.
Rainbow's attention was taken away from her tricks as she saw Aria out of the corner of her eye, breaking her concentration long enough for the airborne soccer ball to striker her forehead embarrassingly.
“Hey, Applejack” Rainbow called.
Applejack quickly turned, messing up her spit in the process, causing it to misfire, leaving a strand of saliva hanging from her slips. Applejack brushed the spit away with the back of her hand, then walked toward Rainbow.
Aria approached the girls and stopped with more than enough distance between her and them.
The three girls awkwardly waited for someone to speak.
After nearly a minute of silence, Rainbow finally filled the void
“So... Aria, that's your name, right?” Rainbow asked in a sad attempt to make conversation.
Aria nodded in response.
“Does that stand for something?... or is it just a horse world thing?” Rainbow asked.
“It's a music thing, like a solo song or something” Aria replied “And seeing as how every person or pony I've ever encountered has a weirdly fitting name, I'm going to assume you are, Rainbow... something... possibly just Rainbow” Aria said to the rainbow haired girl before turning her attention to Applejack “And you're... farm... hay...apples... Applejack”
“We haven't really met before, right?” Applejack asked.
“No; what, are you saying I was right?” said Aria.
“Yeah, usually the completely random correct answers are Pinkie's thing” Applejack replied.
“I don't know who you're taking about” said Aria.
“Oh, yeah, I guess this the first time we've actually had a real conversation” said Applejack.
The three girls all nodded, concurring with the statement. Once again the three girls fell into an awkward silence. Applejack and Rainbow awkwardly smiled as Aria's expression remained blank.
“So...” Rainbow uttered out “Do ya want to kick the ball around?”
Aria did not reply, she simply continued to stare at the two girls, slowly shifting her gaze from one to the other.
Rainbow and Applejack's awkwardness soon turned to concern as the siren's blank stare turned to an annoyed grimace. Without warning, Aria let out an aggravated huff before turning away from the girls and storming toward the bleachers.
The two girls looked at the siren, perplexed at the sudden action.
“I'll take that as a no” Rainbow said before walking back to the field to resume her soccer practice.
Applejack remained on the track, looking back and forth between Rainbow and Aria, trying to decide whether to convince Rainbow to try again, or to talk to Aria by herself; but before she could decide, she heard a familiar sound approaching. She turned in the direction of the sound and an angry glare appeared on her face as she saw the strange student from before ascending the bleachers.
Spear's boots clonked against the wooden bleachers as he stepped up to the top row. He then turned and looked out over the field. A few tense moments passed before he sat down, looming over Applejack like a hunter waiting for it's prey to make a move.
Applejack continued to stare the stranger down, keeping the tense showdown for going over half a minute.
As if he had somehow triumphed, Spear smiled and kicked his feet up onto the seat then stretched out as he laid down and stared up at the sky.
Applejack let out a huff, aggravated that the stare down was mere amusement for the odd student. She slowly turned back to the track. She suddenly reared herself back, then flung her entire body forward, letting out a magnificent watery projectile. The wad of spit flew through the air and landed an undeniably impressive distance away.
Applejack placed her hands on her hips as she smiled, pleased with her performance. She then looked over to Spear who had not even bothered to acknowledge her spit.
Without warning, Spear casually spat upwards. The airborne saliva ascended to heights never before seen by ground originated spit, and descended just as quickly. To Applejack's amazement and the non-concern of everyone else, the spit landed perfectly on top of Applejack's previous spit. Spear's aim was uncanny, his mastery of the spitting art unimaginable, and the smug grin hiding under his mustache was the sugar coated cherry on top of a sundae of boastfulness.
But Applejack knew that this was not just boastfulness, it was a statement plain as a brick wall. Her spitting skills were no where near that of Spear's. Had it been one of her friends she may have just shrugged it off, bit her lip and forgotten about the whole thing only to bring it up during a therapy session if she ever went nuts. But this was not a friendly spit competition, it wasn't even fair, she was so incredibly outclassed that she stood know chance at her current level. It was one thing to have her spit champion title taken away by some random student, but it was a much worse feeling for her skills to be swept aside as though she was the champion of novices.
The farm girl took in a series of long deep breaths as she attempted to calm herself. Her pulse began to slow and the tenseness of her muscles lessened, she could feel herself slipping back to a calm state. But her heart skipped a beat when she felt something like a raindrop strike the top of her hat. She knew what had struck her, but force of habit forced her to reach up on top of her hat. She lowered her hand and saw the moisture of saliva on the tips of her fingers... Spear had just spat on her.
She glowered at Spear who laid whistling as though he had done nothing.
Applejack chuckled as she lost control of her senses for a moment. In an moment of blind rage, she quickly, inelegantly spat a lengthy wad of saliva up towards Spear, landing short by an embarrassingly large distance... but not necessarily missing a target.
Aria did not know what was coming as she sat scratching dirty words into the bleachers with her pocket knife. She instantly stopped as she felt the wad of saliva strike her eye. A disgusted look came to Aria's face as her mind processed the situation. She looked up at Applejack who had not quite taken in the situation herself, still glaring like a mad woman.
“You... spat on me” Aria said in a quietly angry tone.
Applejack began to shake herself out of her own rage and started to stammer “Uh... wha... I what?”
“YOU SPAT ON ME!!!!” Aria screamed before leaping off the bleachers and charging towards Applejack.
The loud scream caught Rainbow's attention and she quickly picked up her ball and ran towards her friend.
Rainbow's speed matched against Aria's lack thereof allowed Rainbow to meet Aria before she reached Applejack. Rainbow grabbed Aria around her waist and held her back as Aria struggled against her, flailing her arms at Applejack in a vain attempt to strike her. As she realized her swings were meaningless, she began to spit at Applejack, missing more shots than she landed.
Applejack simply stood there, taking the spits, making no attempt to defend herself. She knew full well it was herself to blame for her inappropriate behavior.
“Settle down!” Rainbow yelled.
After Aria ran out of curse words and saliva to throw at Applejack, she finally ceased her aggression and was released by Rainbow.
“Yeesh, you girls need to knock it off with this spit nonsense, it's making it way too hard to concentrate on my practice” said Rainbow.
“Practice?” Aria asked in a mocking tone “You mean practice for this” Aria quickly grabbed the soccer ball away from Rainbow then threw it to the ground. She reared her left leg back and kicked the ball as hard as she could toward the fields goal post.
A loud ping sound rang out as the ball struck the post and ricocheted right back at Aria, striking her in the face with tremendous impact. Aria's arms dropped to her side and her expression turned blank as her face slowly began to turn red either from embarrassment or just from the impact.
“Uh... you okay?” Applejack asked.
Aria's world went black and she limply fell backwards into unconsciousness.
“She's not okay” said Rainbow.