It had been the sunny afternoon of that day when he genuinely felt the feeling of helplessness.
The team had just gotten back from a round of their battle with the robots, each one of them taking a well-deserved break at their home base, leisurely occupying themselves with different hobbies or chats.
Well, except for a certain medic, of course.
Firebrand stood idly at the doorframe leading to the back exit, looking forth longingly at the sight in front of him; the goddess equivalent that is their very own team's scout, Ink Rose, who was practicing her baseball routine with her favorite bat. After his most recent talk with the Doc, it seemed to motivate him enough to actually find the mare during breaktime. The idea of taking action, however, was completely thrown out the window the second he laid eyes on her. Just listening to her light mumbles of 'hu-tah's and inhumanly adorable laugh whenever she'd victoriously strike the ball back at the wall, his eyes dilated out of pure admiration and his preciously shown dorky grin sneaking back up to his features. It was that time again in which all common sense left his body in a frozen-like trance, his thoughts being lost in nothing but how amazing she was. A feeling of... helplessness. All that was left to think of was how wonderful she was, how funny, how sweet, how enthusiastic, how energetic, the list could go on and on and on--
"Oh, heya Brand!"
Until they are interrupted of course.
"HaAAH! O-Oh, hello Ink." Brand had been so lost in his thoughts that he nearly forgot the purpose of finding her in the first place. He visibly flinched from Ink's sudden greeting, who in which responded with a laugh.
"My, my, silly Brandy. It was just a greeting, you scaredy-cat." The mare mused, momentarily pausing her game just to wink playfully at him. She then turned back as she continued, unaware of the inner struggle the poor medic was experiencing. "So, what's up?"
With that line, Brand's head turned into official emotional turmoil. He took a deep breath, the distant echoes of his last words with doc mocking him in his mind.
Wish me luck!"
And oh, was that what he really needed now.
"I... actually wanted to talk to you about something."
"Mm, alrighty,-" Ink Rose chirped, stopping her game completely and tossing her baseball to the side. She then walked on towards where Brand was, giving him all of her undivided attention."shoot."
"I-"
It was only then and there when Firebrand discovered the true difficulty there was to admitting actual, heartfelt feelings to someone. He hardly even began his first sentence when Ink's eyes locked intently to his, a lump forming down his throat uneasy to swallow. His heart sped faster than the ticking of sticky bombs (to which, he hated himself for making that analogy), the sides of his face and neck burning up quickly. It took all the willpower in the world to not set is face on fire (as much as his unicorn magic called desperately for it. Damn fire magic.).
Ink Rose tilted her head confusingly, pondering to why the sentence wasn't continued. "You... what?"
"I- well, this may sound strange to you, or maybe not I'm- I'm not sure it really depends on how you'll... take this information-..."
The sudden change of tone in her friend's voice was definite proof that something was up. She blinked slowly, trying to figure out whether she was just seeing things or if her friend's red coat turn a few shades darker than usual. "Uhm, Brand? Are you okay? Do we need to schedule something with Doc or--"
"Nonono no no no, we don't need to see doc! I'm alright!" Came the immediate response.
Seeing Dr. Wolf again was the last thing he wanted to do, especially after getting advice from the guy just minutes before all this happened. It would've turned out awkward. Like, Silver Quill levels of awkward. The idea of becoming an image of the gryphon in question sent a shiver down Brand's spine.
"Err..."
The unsure reaction from the latter seemed to snap him back to reality, Ink Rose unable to make out from anything that was going on. Fire Brand took a momentary second to recollect his thoughts, taking one deep breath as he repeated a simple phrase on his mind.
It's now or never.
Okay, it's actually more of a 'now or eventually with the consequences of being driven completely off-focus on the battlefield.'-kind of thing but hey, no pressure.
At least, that's what he considered as a simple phrase. Or maybe he was just taking these catch phrases too seriously.
"Okay, I'll give it to you straight, Ink;" He breathed out, trying to calm down the butterflies that resided in his stomach. "I like you."
The scout found herself laughing at her friend's statement, as if it were nothing out of the ordinary. Ink would even consider herself surprised with how hard it's been for Firebrand to tell her. "What's so wrong then? I like you too Brand! You're such a great friend, and you crack the funniest of jokes at times--"
"A-Actually I meant that I like-like you. More than a friend kind of way." He quickly restated, a nervous smile on his face.
What came next was a round of silence between the two team members.
And then came the regrets.
A lot of them.
Firebrand tried his best to keep up his simply-nervous smile act, though with little success. Every passing moment has made it clearer and clearer of how much he has been internally screaming into the void the whole time. He was pretty sure that the butterflies in his stomach have mutated into monster-sized ostriches at this point, and his face was already a blazing hot darker red shade. So much for his self-image. Ink Rose's face, on the other hand, has been hindered unreadable. It was unclear of how she felt about all this; confused, shocked, disappointed, the medic was too overwhelmed to process anything that came to sight.
This didn't stop him from apologizing though.
"Oh dear Celestia, I am so sorry you had to hear that. I know this has all been so confusing for you--"
Wait a minute.
Is Rose... suppressing a chuckle, right in front of him?
Ink suddenly bursted out into a full-out round of hysterical laughter, her figure hunching over as she tried to control her breathing control. The medic could only blink unknowingly as he cautiously watched his friend completely loose her chill in the most unexpected way possible.
"Brand. I know." Finally came her proper response, smiling sweetly to the flustered stallion.
Firebrand groaned frustratingly at himself in defeat, burying his face in his hooves. "See? I never should've done that in the first pla--"
He snapped his head back up from out of the blue, his eyes widening in shock. "--wait what?"
"I knew you had a crush on me, silly. It's been obvious for quite a while now. I am an analyst after all." She continued, looking straight towards him as she raised a hoof up and used her mouth to mimic the sound of a finger snap as if she ever had fingers.
The blonde could only stare back into his long-time friend's eyes in pure disbelief, realization hitting hard and hardly merciful.
"Wha-- I mean, wait what? But why didn't you just--?"
"Oh, I couldn't just simply tell you like that. It would take the fun out of it." Ink chided, then paused for a moment to wink more evidently now, a shimmering glint of mischievousness in her eyes. "Besides, who knew that the level-minded medic could become such a lovable dork when it comes to these things?"
His jaw dropped, allowing only the faint, high pitched gurgling of voice to pierce the air between them. Part of him wanted to smack the living sense out of the mare for not telling him sooner, the other wanting to glomp her as much as possible, now that he has a valid reason to. He was still grateful either way.
"Oh, and... I like-like you too." Ink mused, mimicking what he had said earlier with her own deep red hue on her cheeks. The most of what she could do was share in his flushed up embarrassment after everything he's probably gone through. "I'm surprised you haven't found out yet until now. Even Dr. Wolf knew about it, funny right?"
Firebrand's response could only be described with incoherent sputters of processing thoughts, unable to fully make out words from what the mare of his dreams has just admitted to him. He was, however, eventually able to speak more or less normally again, rubbing his neck as a surge of indescribable happiness and joy dawned upon him in the end.
"So, um, are you free next Saturday afternoon? Maybe a simple munch out and video game marathon?"
"A munch-out and video game marathon seems perfect. It's a date then!"
The feeling of content finally came about to the red stallion, a heartwarming grin shamelessly glowing across his features as a sign of how much he's been able to accomplish today. And to imagine that he owned it all to--
Two and two clicked in his head in sudden realization.
"Wait a minute, if Dr. Wolf knew about all this ever since before... then, you set this all up with him a while ago! That talk was all planned you little--!"
But he wasn't able to continue his point onwards, for he was then silenced by a pair of delicate lips pressing onto his.
Oh, he's definitely helpless.