My Little Dynamite: Book One

by Fuzzyfurvert

Platform Seven

My Little Dynamite

By Fuzzyfurvert

“Spike, are you sure this is the right platform?”

Spike held the note they received earlier and re-read it before craning his head to look at the sign above the arch leading back to the Greater Canterlot Airship Station. “Um...looks like it. The note says we’re to meet the Princess here on platform seven when she arrives on the 4:15. According to the hourglass on the wall there, her ship should be pulling up in just a few minutes.”

Spike folded the tiny note and tucked it gingerly into one of the bags at his side and grinned at his boss. “Relax, Twilight! We’re just going to be looking after an Equestrian Princess. It’s not like we don’t have relevant experience with this sorta thing.”

Twilight scoffed. “Of course not. But Princess Mi Amore Cadenza is an old friend of mine, and I haven’t seen her in years.” Twilight’s eye twitched, her voice breaking and getting faster, as she continued. “She’s been abroad, touring the nations of our allies and doing Celestia knows what! What if she doesn’t recognize us? We’re both a lot taller now, Spike!”

Spike rolled his eyes, drumming his claws on the elevated platform’s floor. “Oh, I’m sure it couldn’t be that bad, Twilight. It’s not like we’ll be easy to miss.”

“No, Spike, I’m being serious. Celestia knows what Cadance has been up to, but it’s a state secret. I may be Princess Celestia’s top marked Battlemage, but she doesn’t share everything with me.” Twilight frowned, calming slightly. “Besides, I’ve been assigned as Princess Cadance’s personal guard and escort for the foreseeable future by royal decree. You don’t assign a Battlemage to that sort of detail unless you expect magical trouble—and a lot of it.”

Spike opened his mouth to retort when the sensitive frills along his spine and jaw flexed in response to the ambient level of magic in the area suddenly shot up. He raised his head, looking out into the blue sky, and a moment later a rift opened and the huge State Class airship, Excelsior, slipped into Canterlot air space. The vessel slowed to a crawl, retracting its antennae-like aether rods into the hull and began its short approach to the tower platform.

The zeppelin's enormous envelope blocked the sun as it pulled close, Twilight and Spike could hear the shouts of airponies as lines were secured and ballast adjusted. The ship, slung low under the envelope, creaked and groaned as the wood and steel that formed the hull adjusted to the warmer southern air of Canterlot. Ponies and dogs ready to disembark filled the deck of the gondola, their throats adding to the song of the airways.

Twilight fidgeted as the airship closed the gap with the station, shifting the position of the strap on her shoulder, her heavy spellbook and staff hanging from it. She tugged her long cloak tighter about herself to conceal her insignia from the approaching passengers. She couldn’t hide the fact that she was a noble-born spellcaster, but she could downplay her royal commission. Battlemages, though an elite force of specialized combat casters lead by Celestia herself, tended to be treated like an unstable bomb about to go off by the general public. This, all things considered, wasn’t an entirely undeserved reputation.

“Do you see her?” Twilight lifted herself up on her tiphooves and scanned the faces of the amassed ponies as the Excelsior made its final maneuver before docking. “I don’t see her. You don’t think she dyed her mane, do you?”

Spike chuckled quietly, but remained seated. The public reacted poorly enough to Battlemages without adding a living wall of scales and wings and green fire to the mix. “If she did, I’d still be able to smell her, Twilight. Princess Celestia made sure to give me a few of Princess Cadance’s old things to huff before we left.”

His nostrils flared and he took a deep breath when the wind changed and the zeppelin rocked slightly. Its gangplank was extended over the gap and connected to the tower platform moments later. “She’s in there. Just hold tight.”

Twilight continued to fidget under her heavy cloak. Princess Cadance - Cady - had been abroad for five years doing who knew what and all of a sudden she was returning. They had been thick as thieves back in school as fillies until she’d been sent away. Twilight wondered if she’d even recognize her old friend. Or if Cadance would recognize her and Spike.

Ponies and diamond dogs of all colors and stations passed before them as the Excelsior unloaded. Folks from the farthest flung corners of the Equestrian Alliance followed in a cacophonous parade of every language and smell imaginable. They gave Twilight Sparkle Spike a wide berth as they passed, entered the tower, and descended towards the customs and commons area. The passengers would find food and a place to rest from their travel there while waiting on the next departure or before moving into Canterlot proper.

As the throng started to thin, Spike turned his head, his strong senses picked up on a familiar scent. A tall pony in a hooded heavy cloak of its own approached them slowly, a small battered suitcase floating besides it. The pony stopped a few yards away from the two and paused dramatically to throw the hood of the cloak back.

“Twily!” Princess Mi Amore Cadenza smiled, her eyes lit with happiness. “I was told to expect a guard, but you and Spike? This is awesome!”

Cadance laughed rushing forward, and scooped up a startled Twilight in her wings and magic grip and pulled her into a tight hug. “I haven’t seen you in forever, Twily!”

“I-I’m um...happy to see you too, Princess.” Twilight gasped as she was lifted and spun around by her charge. “I am on duty, Princess Cadance! Please, I’m here to protect you.”

Cadance giggled setting Twilight down to stand on her own hooves but kept her wings draped over the smaller unicorn’s back. “I feel safer already, my hero.”

She smiled when Twilight blushed and then turned, looking up at Spike as the drake rose on all fours to tower above them both. “I am, of course, happy to see you too, Spike. My, but you’ve grown a lot since I last saw you!”

“It has been a while, Princess. Whenever you and the Battlemage here are ready, we do have clearance to fly back to the castle. The Royal Sisters are expecting us.”

“Battlemage?” Cadance looked back at Twilight, who was somehow blushing harder than before. “I can’t believe it! You actually kept your promise to me!”

The Princess grinned and then leaned in closer to Twilight. “I suppose that means I have to keep my end, huh?”Twilight started to shake her head when Cadance closed the remaining distance and placed the softest kiss she could ever remember experiencing on her lips. “I’m happy to be home and in good hooves, my little dynamite.”

Twilight briefly considered melting right there on the zeppelin platform. No, that would be a silly idea. The sheer amount of heat required would actually char me to a crisp rather than melt my body into a puddle. So, then why does Cadance’s kiss make me feel like I already melted?

The pink alicorn continued to smile at Twilight, her muzzle only a few inches away. Cadance’s lavender eyes sparkled, giggling at her guardian’s embarrassed expense. “Heh...Twily? Equus to Twily?”

Spike snorted and lowered his head down to the level of the two mares. “Don’t worry about her, Princess, this happens every now and then. Let me load up your bag while we wait for Twilight to zone back in.”

Spike plucked Cadance’s travel case with a graceful claw and slipped it into the same bag at his side. “You didn’t pack much, Princess. I brought my big pack saddle just in case but now I hardly need it, and I feel dumb.”

“Don’t feel that way, Spike,” Cadance blushed and shrugged, “I was called back suddenly, so I only brought the essentials. Maybe I’ll eventually get my things from the Minotauran Collective sent here, but I’m not going to hold my breath.”

At the mention of the Collective, Twilight snapped out of her fugue, her brows narrowing. “Minotauran? You were there? I heard they closed their borders? How did you get out?”

Cadance grinned and bounced a few steps back from Twilight. She stuck out her tongue briefly and shook her head. “I’ll tell you that one later, Twily. Right now, don’t we have other things to do? Auntie Celestia is waiting for me, remember?”

“Oh.” Twilight frowned in disappointment. “Oh! Sorry, Princess! We can take Spike back to the castle. I mean we can use Spike. I mean, uh, we can ride Spike! He can fly! Yes, that!”

Cadance giggled and put a hoof on Twilight’s muzzle to silence the stammering Battlemage. “Still the same old Twily, even after all these years. How did you ever make it as a Battlemage?” Cadance pressed in harder when Twilight tried to open her mouth again. “Tell me later. Let’s just get moving, okay?”

Twilight nodded, and Spike chuckled as he lowered himself down onto the platform, his saddle barely big enough for the two ponies. Cadance smiled, taking her hoof off Twilight, and slipped it into the stirrup. “I call front!”

The Battlemage blinked, her own hoof coming up to feel at where the Princess had touched her twice now. She nodded mutely again, watching Cadance mount up, and followed the pink alicorn. Twilight’s body moved on auto-pilot while her mind spun in circles. Everything was moving so fast, and it almost felt like she was lost in the chaos of the outside world again without guidence. Why could nothing be simple like her time training under Princess Celestia to harness the elements?

Twilight let herself drop onto the saddle behind the Princess and nudged Spike gently with a hoof. The huge purple drake, easily twice the height of any mortal pony and several times the length, spread his wings. The shadow he cast covered the whole of the platform from the station arches all the way to the moored Excelsior. The few remaining stragglers and airponies called out in surprise as Spike took two quick steps off the edge, falling from the tower, and hurled himself and his passengers at the ground below.

Twilight rocked with the motion, plenty of practice with Spike’s flight capabilities tempering her surprised gasp to a simple tightening of her grip on the saddle and Cadance. His form was built for speed, not power, and he needed momentum to take flight. In Canterlot city limits there was precious little open ground for the task, but there were more than enough tall buildings and cliffs available to perform a drop from. It was so common place to her now that she didn’t even chuckle at the yelps and startled screams it caused the ponies and dogs on the street below to make.

Twilight, herself was ready for the drop. Making the drop with Cadance, however, was a different story. The Princess whooped loudly as they went over the edge, her hooves in the air instead of holding onto the saddle. Twilight knew she couldn’t lose the Princess within the first ten minutes of starting her official detail, so she wrapped one arm tightly around Cadance’s waist and her other hooked under the saddle horn. She held them both tight, Spike flapping his wings once, and turned the dive into a shallow climb. The street and stunned street goers shrank below them as they climbed back above roof level of most of the buildings. With Cadance’s warm body pressed against her, Twilight was sure she could feel her heart in her throat.

When the sky opened up above the rooftops, Cadance turned back to look at Twilight. “It’s very auspicious, isn’t it? Us—meeting again on today of all days.”

Twilight shook the strands of Cadance’s mane out of her face and leaned closer so she wouldn’t have to shout over the wind. “What do you mean, Princess?”

“It’s our anniversary.” Cadance arched an eyebrow. “Or did you forget? Five years ago, we made a promise to each other, Twily. We promised to take care of each other and never let the other come to harm.”

“That’s why I became a Battlemage. I had to become strong and skilled.” Twilight knew she didn’t have to hold Cadance now that they were leveling off, but she just couldn’t seem to get her hooves to obey her. “I remember that day like it was yesterday, but you disappeared without so much as a ‘goodbye!’ Princess Celestia has barely kept me up to date on whether you were alive at times! I’ve had no idea what situations you were thrown into, only a few educated guesses,so I was surprised to get this assignment, to say the least.”

“Fate just seems to have a way to make things work out, doesn’t it?” Cadance made no move to get out of Twilight’s grip and leaned back into the mare. “It’s almost nostalgic, isn’t it? Though, on that day, if I recall right, it was Spike that was riding on your back, not the other way around.”

“A lot has changed since then, Princess.”

Cadance nodded, more to herself than anything else, letting Twilight continue to hold her tightly, as Spike banked wide around the taller buildings nearer to the city’s center. Pegasi and other winged dragons flew to and from these skyscraping behemoths like bees from enormous beehives. Several zeppelins circled the buildings closely, in holding formations, as goods were either loaded or unloaded. Below them, the Canterlot streets were just as busy, if not more so, with all the powered carriages that popped and whistled along. Vendors of all varieties hawked their wares to the passersby that trotted or drove through the major thoroughfares.

The castle, on the far end of the city, sat above it all on the pastoral mountainside that was kept clear of Canterlot’s advancing waves of steel and stone. Its dome golden and almost blindingly bright under the sun and Princess Celestia’s long rule. Cream-white and midnight-blue colored pennant flags flew from every spire and parapet, displaying the combined symbols of the Royal Sisters. The main gate was shut with mounds of flowers piled against it like a snow drift.

Cadance sighed and closed her eyes, letting the sounds and smells of the greatest pony city on Equus wash over her. “And yet the more things stay the same, hmm?”

Comments

[Ughlee]

FINALLY A STORY WHERE TWILIGHT ACTUALLY SHOWS HER RAW ABILITIES AS A BADASS. Plus there's no dark tag. We need more stories with this concept. Already liked.

[Enderpony22]

Not sure how I feel about Twadence. Must study further.

[LightningStorm987]

Hmmmmm......first chapter finished. So far you have captured my attention. Not only have you introduced Twilight as a battlemage, but a fully grown Spike as well!? Awesome!! I have always enjoyed a good fantasy novel, most of them dealing with dragons, warriors and mages alike. With this premise alone your story has captured me. I enjoyed this first chapter very much and look forward to reading the rest. Small correction. Nothing big, has nothing to do with the story. Just a small grammatical hiccup> Shesmiled when Twilight blushed and then turned, looking up at Spike as the drake rose on all fours to tower above them both. Where is da space? Why you no have space!? WHY!!?? (cough cough) excuse me, lost myself for a moment. Carry on!

[Victus454]

I like this, it's awesome! For a breif moment I kind wished it was Shinning Amour instead of Twlight and then I realized screw that this is epic. Alternate universe rock.