The Shy Driver

by Wiz Ahmad

Onwards to California

Author's Note:

Jesse gets an instant karma FAIL Fluttershy starts to realize how short her time span has become. And I mention the song whose title was used for a previous chapter. Enjoy, like, and comment! Thanks!

At last Fluttershy entered Phoenix. After legally parking the car in a small parking lot, she undid the racing harness and clumsily climbed out. She could hardly walk after sitting inside the Supra for so long. Stopping at a late-night McDonalds for a bathroom break, she then took a short walk down the long roads on the outskirts of the city, observing the other cars drive by and the tall leafy trees gently blow in the calm wind. After such a long drive, walking did feel very relaxing indeed.

However, just up the street, she noticed a group of men on bicycles. However, there was no Corvette, so she didn’t suspect anything really, and drew ever closer to the intersection.

But then she saw a familiar face behind his red and black helmet visor. The bruise above his left eye clearly showed that he had fallen badly – and thus had to be Jesse. She looked a little harder – and then Jesse noticed her.

Without even a single shout-out, he gunned the motor and headed straight for her, even though traffic was still speeding by and the light was clearly red. His men followed.

“Aaaaaaaaah!” Fluttershy gasped and ran, aiming for the trees behind her, hoping to gain a height advantage, but Jesse pulled out his gun and shot her wing, causing the tips of several feathers to snap, producing considerable pain. Fluttershy squealed in pain and fell to the ground.
Jesse and his gang dismounted their bikes, pulled off their helmets, and gathered around the helpless pony.

“I warned you,” Jesse hissed. “But you didn’t listen. Or perhaps you didn’t understand my clear words.”

Her head still spinning from the fall, Fluttershy stroked and shook her injured wing. “How did you all survive?”

Jesse sneered and kicked her hard in the stomach, knocking her backwards on her back. “Just a few bruises. You should be smart enough to know we’re not eggs.”

In the midst of her daze, Fluttershy noticed a few things around her. There were a few rocks lying about, and a length of black cord was hanging from one of the bikes closest to her, and it had a bottle of nitrous attached to it.

Fluttershy swallowed and sighed in pain and sadness. She didn’t want to hurt or severely maim these people, but their ruthlessness and cruel behavior left her no choice.

Acting fast, she punctured a hole in the hose line attached to the bottle of nitrous so it leaked, and yanked out a line of the cord all around to the other bikes. Then she pretended to be weak, lying down and moaning excessively.

“Look at this weakling girl,” Jesse scoffed, laughing along with his men. “She can drive a car but she can’t defeat us. Come on, let’s go claim our trophy.”

“Not today,” Fluttershy snapped, and struck two fragments of the rocks she had seen together. Sparks flew, the line ignited, and the bottle of nitrous oxide caught fire and blew up all the bikes, knocking Jesse and his men back with the blast, and also sending a wave of heat across Fluttershy’s back.

Acting fast like she had done with her bear friend back home in Equestria, Fluttershy attacked Jesse head-on, kicking and punching him until he was out cold. It took just a slap and a face kick for his men to pass out too.

With the men unconscious, Fluttershy called the police, and watched over the men until the sirens signaled the cops’ arrival.

“What on earth is this all about?” one of the cops asked.

Fluttershy shrank back, but soon opened up her mouth and told the whole story – how Jesse threatened her, the physical actions he did, and what she did to defend herself. It took some convincing, but the cops decided not to press charges against Fluttershy for her near-lethal bike blowup.

With Jesse and his meanies finally out of the way, Fluttershy could finally roam the streets in peace. As she travelled by day and entered cities by night, many stores were closed. So, she decided to go and spend some time sleeping with the animals in a nearby park. Although there were only chipmunks, blackbirds, pigeons, and squirrels around, it was enough for her to feel happy and relaxed during her night sleep.

After a good night’s sleep, Fluttershy woke up to a bright lovely morning, only to discover that her time was running out. It was Thursday, and she had to be at her destination before sundown.

“I…hope I won’t be too late,” she whispered worryingly to herself.

“Um, thanks for keeping me company, guys,” she quietly told the birds and squirrels, “but I really have to go. I mustn’t be late.”

Ensuring that her bladder was completely empty before leaving, Fluttershy raced back to the Supra, hopped in, started up the engine, and drove through Phoenix, filling the Supra up with more gas, picking up a few food refreshments on the way, and cleaning out the passenger seat.

Heading back onto westbound Interstate Highway 10, she turned the boost up to 25 PSI and went for it, increasing her speed. The revs climbed, and so did the speedometer needle.

“That’s 140, 160, and now 200 kilometers an hour!” she exclaimed with happiness, whizzing past the other cars and trucks as if they were standing still as statues. The loud exhaust of the turbocharged 2JZ straight-six cylinder engine roared as Fluttershy drove the Toyota Supra through the lanes of Arizona’s western highway at mind-blowing speed.

After a mile-and-a-half long 220 km/h run, Fluttershy slowed down and turned the head unit back on, this time checking her map information tables.

“Right, so I am roughly two hours from Quartzite, on the western border,” she thought, analyzing her time gaps. “That should give me approximately six hours to drive across California once I get across that border.”

However, when she switched back to the radio, all she got was a crazy whiz of electronically stitched notes, occasionally interrupted by cuts of voices. Switching to another station, she found a nice soft love song with a strong drum beat and atmospheric backing vocal effects. The singer described how he would feel content and close to his love as they made out, and also about annoying the neighbors in a place that was clean yet dirty at the same time – the bed. He also mentioned a notable line, stating that such a place was a paradise yet at the same time, it was a war zone.

Fluttershy quietly sang along, thinking back to the marriage of Shining Armor and Princess Cadence, and how Queen Chrysalis attacked, as well as the story that Carter told her about his break-up with his first girlfriend. How ironic and sad it was that love and intimacy was something so loved and enjoyed by many that they would fight each other for it and also break apart from each other due to it.

As the afternoon drew ever closer, Fluttershy finished eating up the last of her meal and approached the border crossing checkpoint.

This ought to be quick, I’ll be at the other side in no time, she thought.

However, the officers were even stricter then the ones back in New Mexico.

“Please don’t scratch the car!” Fluttershy begged them, as they opened up every nook and cranny of the Supra’s interior. They even looked underneath the car for any signs of foreign objects.

Fluttershy’s ID did appear to be pretty legitimate, and her driving license was fully approved, despite the points she received earlier in New Mexico for speeding. To earn a bit more respect from the officers, she cleaned out the small mess she had made from eating, and also threw away the packaging, placing the trash in a garbage bin and anything recyclable in a recycle bin.

Having gone through all the background checks, the Supra thoroughly investigated, and registration and insurance approved, Fluttershy finally started up the straight-six engine once more, and drove into the welcoming arms of California, the Golden State.