• Published 3rd Jun 2014
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Piercing the Heavens - Calm Wind



Sequel to Flying Sky-High. A lot has happened, but now Rainbow Dash finally has a chance to fulfill her dream and become a Wonderbolt. As the process begins, will her relationship with Soarin be a blessing? Or will it be a curse?

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Chapter 36: Getting to Know Your Fellow Weirdos

MLP: FiM
Piercing the Heavens
By: Calm Wind

Chapter 36:


“Thirty minutes till lights-out!” Silver yelled out as he recruits began moving about in the barracks. “You’ll want to be in bed when they do! You won’t like me in the dark!” he continued as he made his way through the crowded room. The recruits seemed to move aside for him as he walked as if her were a higher being. That was probably the mindset he was going for. “Thirty minutes!” he yelled again before disappearing into his room on the far end of the wall and slamming the door behind him.

He never gave any orders, so the recruits proceeded casually as the scheduled bedtime drew near. It wasn’t that late. It was only 8:00 pm with lights out at 8:30. It didn’t matter what time it was though, all the recruits were ready to drop face first into their pillows. The wakeup call was at 6:30 am, giving them a good ten hours to get however much sleep they needed. However, after Fleetfoot’s little ‘expect the unexpected’ test, the recruits weren’t sure if they could actually believe any sleeping times given out.

In reality, Fleetfoot’s test had drilled something important into their heads: never be surprised, always be ready to get up and go. But it would be easier without the stiffness.

“Damn…” Dash took a few deep breaths as she sat on the edge of her bed and rotated her wings slowly. The ice bath helped, but she was definitely going to feel it in the morning. She reached for her footlocker and opened it, tipping the cover back until it rested against the wall. She reached in and pulled out her binder. She opened to the only piece of paper that was currently in it: the schedule.

It was set up like a calendar, with each box filled with whatever activities were planned for each day throughout the month. There was a clear pattern due to the color coding of each box, but Dash had yet to actually read the schedule. She was curious what sort of routine she would be following.

There were four colors in the boxes that always followed the same pattern: blue, red, white, and yellow. It didn’t line up with the weeks. Sometimes the pattern would overlap with the weekend. So by the looks of things, Dash was going to have to get used to the same four day schedule for at least a whole month. It was technically a month. She and the recruits had just finished day one of the first four day cycle. There were eight cycles of four days stretched over thirty-two days. The colors in each cycle stood for what was going on that day with a key at the top to help clarify.

Blue stood for strength and conditioning. They had done a lot of conditioning over the course of the first day. Not so much strength work aside from thousands of wing-ups and push-ups… and wing-push-ups, but Dash was sure there would be more strength work approaching.

Red stood for elements and combat. By elements Dash assumed they meant handling fire, water, and the like… but combat?! They were going to get combat training so soon? She wasn’t expecting that, but at the same time felt excited. She had fought alongside the Wonderbolts in the past, but she only had basic fighting knowledge. She could fly fast and throw punches, but she had no technique to match them. The Wonderbolts fought with incredible flight precision and control, executing maneuvers and special, unique abilities in the blink of an eye. The thought of being able to do the same was exhilarating.

Dash made a double take upon reading what the white boxes stood for. A free day? It didn’t say ‘day off.’ Dash recalled Soarin talking about days where they had nothing scheduled, but were expected to get some training in at their leisure. She wondered if that’s what ‘free day’ meant.

Then finally, the yellow boxes stood for… meetings and demonstrations. Dash groaned up reading the word ‘meetings.’ She could only avoid lectures for so long. She’d do it, but she was never good at sitting down and staying still for long periods of time. She WAS however intrigued by the ‘demonstrations’ portion. If that meant watching the elite Wonderbolts practice or use cool techniques, she’d be all for that.

After that, the boxes repeated. So it looked like their schedule would be two days of hard training followed by a day of rest/light training, and then a day of informational stuff; rinse and repeat. It seemed doable.

Dash blinked as she eyed the very end of the schedule. The thirty-third day on the schedule was not filled in. It was only marked by the Wonderbolt logo. Seeing it at the end of the schedule made Dash feel all tingly. She couldn’t believe how close she was. This was her last challenge to overcome before officially being considered a member of the Wonderbolts. She’d still be one if she was sent home, but to her… being selected to stay as part of the five pony recruit squad was the true entrance to becoming a Wonderbolt. She was the top pony all through the tryouts… she could do this.

Dash looked up from the schedule as she heard a rustling sound from the corner of the room. Actually, the noise had been constant the whole time she had been looking at her schedule.

She glanced behind her, over her shoulder into the far left corner of the barracks. She spotted Matteo shuffling about his bed. His pillows and sheet were on the floor and he moved while holding a corner of the bedspread in his beak. It apparently had come undone and Matteo was trying to fix it, but the more he pulled and tugged to try and straighten it out, the more the spread slipped off the mattress.

“Rgh…” he grunted in frustration, dropping the corner he had in his beak and moving around to try and fix the bit on the other side that had come undone. He tried to anchor the bedspread down with a talon as he pulled on it, but the instant he gave it a yank the spread slipped out from beneath his talon. The elastic edge snapped up and struck him in the neck. He glared at it and tried again… this time pulling harder in his frustration. The spread snapped back again, but this time so hard that it was yanked from his beak. The spread came completely loose and fired off of his mattress, balling up as it flew through the air.

Matteo’s eyes widened as the bedspread, turned projectile flew through two bottom bunks before shooting towards Squall, who was reclined in his bed, and crashed softly into his face. Squall flinched hard as he was suddenly faced by the bedspread, flailing his hooves for a second before yanking it off and looking around with an extremely sharp glare attached to his face.

Art by: MyLittleXyo

Matteo came around the bunks and approached calmly. Squall locked his eyes on Matteo and snarled.

“What the hell was that for?!” Squall snapped at him.

“Accident,” Matteo said calmly.

“Bullshit!” Squall hissed while bundling up the bedspread into the tightest ball he could and chucking it at Matteo’s face. Matteo reached up a talon and easily snatched it out of the air before shaking his head.

“No. It was an accident,” Matteo clarified without losing any composure. He turned away from Squall. “Sorry,” he added simply before heading back towards his bed in the corner. Squall just blinked and rolled his eyes.

“Whatever…” he said to himself before reclining again.

Dash was doing her best not to lose it. From watching big, strong Matteo trying to make a bed, to Squall getting an unpleasant smack to the face with a piece of cloth that smelled like griffon, to Matteo’s ridiculous composure taking on the broody douche mood of Squall… it was quite the comedy show.

Her eyes fell back on Matteo as he tossed the balled up bed spread onto his bare mattress and released a long sigh. Dash snickered as she got up and trotted over to Matteo’s corner. She approached and moved up alongside him, noticing his eyes locked on the mess that was his bed. Dash chuckled as he glanced at her.

“Gilda makes the bed at home I take it?” she asked sarcastically with a smug grin. Matteo looked back at the bed in pieces, took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and exhaled.

“Yes,” he admitted straight out. “I’m not the most… skilled housekeeper…” his voice almost sounded ashamed. Dash almost found it humorous. She hopped up on the bed and began pushing the bedspread apart.

“Okay, not being able to make your bed won’t bring shame to your family name big fella. Come on, grab this end,” Dash offered to help as she tipped her head down and pushed one edge towards him with her nose.

Matteo obeyed and grabbed the free end of the spread as Dash pulled the other towards and over the other side. Together they managed to get the elastic band cleanly around both bottom corners of the bed before repeating the process with the top. They tucked the bedspread around the head of the mattress and Dash nodded contentedly.

“Easy!” Dash blurted out. She blinked and glanced at Matteo, who was slightly glaring at her. “Uh… I mean, with two doing it!” Dash corrected with a weak smile. Matteo let one amused snort escape his nose.

“Thank you,” he said before he reached for his pillows and sheet on the floor. Dash smiled and nodded as she came around in front of Matteo’s bed. She was about to head back to her bunk, but she stopped before she could make it completely past his bed. She turned and leaned on his mattress as he fluffed his pillows.

“So…” she casually began. “Had a good first day?” Casual conversation. It’s not like she had anything better to do. Matteo glanced at her again before returning to his pillow.

“It was fine,” he put plainly. “More conditioning than I’m used to, but the wing-ups were nothing.”

“You don’t say…” Dash said sarcastically while stretching and folding her stiff wings while eying Matteo’s massive wings. “You never even flinched whenever Silver came up to you. Gotta admit, I’m pretty impressed,” Dash droned on randomly. Matteo shook his head.

“This wasn’t the first time I’ve had one of higher rank yell in my face,” Matteo explained as he tried to drape the sheet evenly over his bed. After three failed attempts he just tossed it on. “Before I was rejected from the Sky Wings we had recruitment camps, sometimes I had three or four instructors in my face at a time. Remaining composed and steadfast in the face of all challenges is the most important trait of a griffon warrior…” he glanced towards Silver’s room. “Instructor Silver has more presence and willpower than any I’ve ever encountered… but he doesn’t quite match the force of three or four griffons. Also, Silver’s yelling is a bit more… on the clever and humorous side. All I ever heard from griffon instructors were plain, bare-faced insults,” he turned to Dash and shrugged. “It was bad at first, but they did it so often I got used to it very quickly.”

“No wonder you’re so stone-faced,” Dash chuckled as Matteo opened his foot locker and rummaged through his belongings.

“I take pride in that, you know…” he said as he closed his locker and looked around.

“Sounds like the Wonderbolts mixed with the Canterlot Royal Guard…” Dash mumbled to herself. “Guess we don’t need to worry about you at all,” she joked as she looked back to him. Her interest piqued as Matteo suddenly reached his neck as high up as it could go and fixed his eyes on something. Dash followed where he was looking, but she was too low to the ground.

“I’ll be fine,” Matteo pointed. “I’d be more worried about him.”

“Huh?” Dash, curious, extended her wings and gently lifted off until she was at head level with Matteo. She flattened her ears and brow as she looked across the top bunk in front of them and to the next.

Twister was sitting on the bed, hunched over with his back legs tucked into his chest. His expression was completely blank, his eyes were both open very wide, his ears were drooping down, and his mane had lost all of its static and was flat against his head and neck. He had wrapped his tail around his body, pulled it up to his face, and was resting his head against it while stroking it very slowly.

Dash stared for a moment, but then shrugged as she turned back to Matteo.

“He’s just being weird… as usual,” she said rotating a hoof up by her ear. Matteo shook his head.

“He’s been like that all day. I know instructor Silver intimidated him… but I thought he’d be back to his usual antics by now,” Matteo said with an actual hint of concern in his voice. Dash looked between Matteo and Twister a few times. Matteo showed no interest in going over to say something. She didn’t blame him. While Matteo showed concern for a wingmate, he wasn’t very fond of Twister. You wouldn’t be either if Twister had a reality bending chase with Surprise around your body.

So Dash took a moment and broke away from Matteo. She hovered over to Twister, not quite sure what to say. She went with a casual approach and rested her arms on the side of his bed while hovering the rest of her body in place off the edge.

“Hey Twister, what’s—” she instantly paused as his head twitched twice to the left then thrice to the right. He turned his head sharply towards her. Blinked one eye, then the other, lowered his head between his tucked legs and did two forward rolls on the mattress, but remained perfectly in place. Dash slowly backed up as he completed the motions and went right back to where he stared, stroking his tail. “—up…” Dash finished while carefully moving back into place.

“Nothing is up. There is only down. Downdowndowndowndowndowndowndowndowndown…” he became progressively quieter until his mouth was moving, but the word ‘down’ vanished.

“Uh… I know you’re usually a little loopy… but are you okay?” Dash asked. Twister’s pupils moved in opposite directions away from one another.

“The FISH was DELISH and it made quite a DISH,” Twister replied as a creepy expression made its way onto his mouth. It looked like he was trying to make his usual disturbing grin, but something was preventing his mouth from cooperating, so his mouth twitched and lurched as he failed to move it properly.

“I’ll take that as a yes…” Dash backed away fast this time and quickly made her way back over to Matteo. Matteo blinked and lifted an eyebrow as Dash rapidly approached him again. “Okay…” she said while staring blankly at him. “Maybe there’s something… a little more wrong with him than usual,” Dash glanced back to see Twister rocking back and forth on his plot and sucking on one of his hooves.

“You call that a little?” Matteo furrowed his brow, slightly disturbed.

“You wanna try talking to him?” Dash shrugged while pointing towards Twister. Matteo glanced at Dash, then back to Twister who was now on his head and slowly spinning in a circle.

“Not particularly, no,” he said while very subtly shaking his head.

“We’ll see how he is in the morning,” Dash bit her lower lip and rubbed the back of her head. “If he’s still… more abnormal than usual, I’ll let somepony know…”

“FIFTEEN MINUTES!!!!” Silver suddenly yelled from his room before slamming his door again.

“Ah, I gotta wash up still,” Dash said to nopony as she glanced at Matteo. He was still looking uncomfortably towards Twister. Dash slipped away casually and went for her toothbrush in her footlocker. She grabbed her towel from a bar above it before heading towards the bathroom. She stopped as she passed Thunderlane’s bunk.

Thunderlane was lying flat on the bed, face down in his pillow, arms and legs sprawled out and hanging over the edges, wings included. He was releasing quiet groans of discomfort that were muffled by his pillow. Dash snorted once and shook her head while holding in a chuckle. Day one and Thunderlane was already half dead. This was going to be a hell of an experience for him.

Dash entered the bathroom and trotted up to the first of the four sinks that lined the wall to the right of the door. She turned on the faucet and let the water get moderately warm before reaching her hooves in and splashing some against her face. She rubbed her face a few times, stopped, and put one of her ears up.

She thought she heard something… it sounded like a scraping noise, but there were so many other things going on right outside she just ignored it. She grabbed her towel and wiped her face clean before grabbing her tooth brush.

As soon as she shut off the water, the scraping noise sounded out again, but this time it was directly behind her. She turned around just in time to see Little Star pushing a small plastic stool along the floor with her head. The tiny mare nudged it towards the sink beside Dash and hopped up, placing her toothbrush and towel on the counter. Dash blinked and kept her eyes on Little Star as she went on the tips of her back hooves and just barely reached the faucet handles to turn on the water.

She sighed as the water began flowing in her sink and stole a quick glance at Dash. Dash quickly looked forward and quickly tried to put toothpaste on her brush, but because she rushed, the toothpaste missed and landed on her hoof.

“Smooth,” Little Star chuckled as Dash gulped. Dash wasn’t quite sure how to approach anything regarding Little Star. Dash’s eyes told her: ‘filly,’ but Dash’s brain told her: ‘thirty years old.’ It was a strange situation indeed and she found herself at a loss. Her brain was so incredibly stuck on what to do that Dash didn’t realize she was staring directly at Little Star, toothbrush tucked into the back of her mouth, and toothpaste slowly foaming up to the point where it dribbled down her lip.

Star looked up at Dash and flattened her ears back.

“Something on my face, honey?” she asked Dash. The low mature tone coming out of the filly body still kind of freaked Dash out. Dash realized what she was doing and almost swallowed all of the toothpaste. She yanked the brush out of her mouth and instantly spat into the sink before shaking her head and reapplying toothpaste to the brush.

“S…sorry…” Dash said nervously while starting her brushing over. Star shrugged and started cleaning up as well.

Dash finished brushing her teeth and rinsed her mouth out, glancing over at Star again. Forget it, this was just getting awkward. Dash had been curious so she went for it.

“Look um…” Dash slammed her mouth shut tight as star looked up at her.

“Yrsh?” Star said with her toothbrush lodged in her mouth. Dash took a moment to think. Was there any way to put this without sounding like she was prying?

“Um… well… uh…” Dash stumbled over her words. Star spat out her tooth paste and tipped her head slightly.

“You want to know how I’m so small?” Star finished for her. Dash’s ears flopped down. Star easily figured it out. Dash hoped she hadn’t annoyed her.

“I… sorry, forget about it…” Dash turned back and started gathering up her stuff.

“No, no, no…” Star chuckled as she rinsed out her mouth. “Look,” she smiled at Dash as they both gathered up their things. “Like I said before, I get this all the time,” she gave Dash a warm smile as they began walking out of the bathroom.

“I was just worried you were… sensitive about it,” Dash admitted while walking alongside the tiny mare. Star shook her head.

“I got over it a long time ago. It’s part of my life, so why let it get to me? I still do things any other ponies do, just from down here,” she joked with a little hop.

“Eh, just for the record…” Dash said with slight embarrassment, “I’m not looking at you like something is wrong, I’m sure it’s just a family thing or something…” she quickly made clear. Star actually started giggling.

“It’s funny actually,” she smiled brightly. “I get THAT more than I get questions about why I’m so short.”

“Oh…” Dash was relieved, but still felt a little awkward.

“Anyway…” Star cleared her throat. “When I was very young, my parents were vigilantes that fought against magical foes in secret to keep them from disturbing the peace of Equestria…” she went on. Dash’s eyes widened considerably as Star continued. “One day when I was a filly, our enemies made a bold attack on our home. My parents fought them off, but not before a curse was placed upon me… keeping me in the shape of a young filly… forever…” she trailed off while holding her head high.

“What…?” Dash blinked as they exited the bathroom. Star burst out laughing and the two stopped after a few steps back into the barracks among the rest of the ponies.

“I’m kidding,” Star chuckled while waving a hoof towards Dash. “Honestly, I’m just this short. Long lost family trait I guess,” she shrugged. Dash stared blankly at her before a small grin curled onto her lips and she began chuckling herself.

Dash just got completely punked. She literally bought the story until Star told her it was made up. Dash had a feeling she was going to get along with Star just fine.

As the two stood there in front of the bathrooms and shared a good laugh, Squall emerged from the stallion bathroom and came to a brief halt. Dash and Star were in his path. He waited for all of half a second before walking forward and roughly pushing past both of them.

“What the…?” Dash grunted as she was shoved aside. Star was knocked completely over on her plot. Dash glared at him as he moved by. She was losing her patience with him fast. “Hey! What the hell is your—”

“Really, REALLY?!” Star cut off Dash. Dash shut her mouth as Star shot up from the ground, absolutely fuming. She lifted off and zipped up beside Squall. “You could’ve said EXCUSE ME, you know!”

“Whatever…” Squall replied as he kept walking.

“Oh no buster! How about you say sorry?!” she poked him in the cheek. He quickly moved his face away and scoffed.

“Whatever…” he repeated, and kept walking.

“WELL?!” Star flew a circle around him using her small wing flutter technique. He growled and swiped a hoof up at her. She darted to the side to avoid it. “Say it!” she demanded. He gritted his teeth and swiped at her again. She once again zipped out of the way arm right back into his face.

“WHATEVER!!!!!” he barked at her. The two were butting heads… which was actually amusing because Squall was a pretty big stallion, and she was so tiny.

“HEY!” Silver’s voice suddenly poured into the barracks.

Absolutely EVERYTHING stopped as all the ponies turned to him.

“You two!” Silver directed at Star and Squall. “Angry sex is prohibited!” he yelled before looking at the rest of them. “Lights out in exactly thirty seconds! If you aren’t in bed in—” before he could even finish, all the recruits had scrambled and were in their beds. He stopped, blinked and shrugged. “God damn, I’m proud of you idiots…” he said quietly before stepping out a little. “GET SLEEP! You’ll need it every night. If you get out of bed for any reason besides using the bathroom… don’t turn around, it will be less painful from behind.” The collective shudder almost made the whole room shake. Silver turned back around and reached for a light switch installed next to his door. “GOODNIGHT!” he threw the lights off and went back into his room. Slamming the door of course.

Well, it was one day in the books… and quite a few more to go. Dash had a lot on her mind, but she was so tired, she just wanted to sleep. Easy enough.

A recruit across from her bunk sneezed.

Two seconds later the P.A. came to life.

I hear you existing…” Silver’s voice slurred through the speakers creepily. Dash’s eyes opened very wide, slowly.

Okay, maybe sleeping would be a little hard with Silver and Celestia knows what kind of antics he was capable of…

--- To Be Continued ---

Author's Note:

Yeah, a bit short... but the reason for that? i got 2K words into the next scene and realized it had been a long week. So i cut this off at the end of the scene in favor of getting yous another chapter, of probably the same length out either tomorrow or sunday.

So yeah, my work hours are slowing down my updates... but i have too much planned out for this story. Updates WILL remain constant and i WILL finish this story... and then move onto others. Don't worry about me stopping cause it ain't gonna happen.

Little Star is a jokester! Squall's an ass! Thunderlane thinks he's dead! Twister is messed up... even more! Matteo can't make a bed to save his life! SILVER CAN HEAR YOU EXISTING!

anyway, like i said, expect chapter 37 either tomorrow or sunday... cause it's already halfway done. ;)

I hope you enjoyed! Thanks for reading!

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