> On One Wing > by TheOtherSideOfFluttershy > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Chapter One > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- It wasn't that Spitfire disliked stallions and their slightly obnoxious behavior. It was simply that she hadn't found the right stallion to get in a relationship with. She did have coltfriends before, and she knew relationships required effort and love from both sides. And Spitfire just never felt the kind of love needed to have a good relationship. So it was very common to see Spitfire turn down stallions for the sake of her heart, but she always did it politely. She would simply state that she didn't feel the same way, and it would be better if they didn't try at all. She always suggested being friends, but usually the stallions ditched the idea as soon as they found another lovely mare for themselves. Spitfire was quite fine with that. She also knew that she was right. The stallion only wanted her for her looks and never really cared for her personality. Every once in a while, she would see a mare, broken hearted from their ex-coltfriend who had found out that her personality was terrible, and ditched her for it. Not all stallions she had turned down were this way. Some were good friends of hers, and loved her for her looks AND personality. They were only friends though, and not the Apple to Spitfire's eye. She remembered one friend, Rainbow Dash, a female, who wanted a relationship with Spitfire. Spitfire was surprised, and quickly turned her down. Rainbow Dash was crushed, but not to the point where they couldn't be friends. Everything was fine with Spitfire's love life. Perfectly fine. Spitfire woke to her usual weekday alarm at five in the morning. Spitfire was possibly the only pony, besides Queen Pinkie Pie, who was a morning pony. Climbing out of bed, Spitfire checked the date and headed to groom herself up. After getting herself ready and eating a breakfast consisting of two muffins and some coffee, Spitfire headed outside to do her morning warm ups. She lived in a cloud house in between Ponyville and Cloudsdale, as did several other ponies. Below her little neighborhood was a track field that pegasi used to train their wings and increase their strength. Spitfire flew down to the track, landing next to one of the bleachers. There was no pony else there at the time, making her early start worth it. Spitfire began her training with a warm up consisting of pushups, curl ups, and wing pull ups. She proudly claimed the Ponyville wing pull up record, and planned to keep that title. After getting her heartbeat up, Spitfire began her workout. She flew at a slow pace before accelerating to a medium one. After five minutes of that, she gave herself some speed and pushed herself closer and closer to the limits, only slowing down when out of breath. By that time, other early morning starters, such as Raindrops and Rainbow Dash, began coming in. Once Cloudchaser and Flitter showed up at their usual seven o'clock, Spitfire begun her cool down workout. She set herself next to Rainbow Dash, who was determined to beat Spitfire's pull up record. "Hey Dash. Still trying to beat me at my own game?" Rainbow Dash was straining herself to speak. "Nngh..... Who ever.... huff...... said it was your..... eff...... game?" Spitfire smirked. "Alrighty then. Just don't hurt yourself, okay? Queen Pinkie wouldn't want one of her best friends injured for her visit." Rainbow gave a what seemed to be a chuckle before jumping down from the bar and letting Spitfire do her wing ups. Rainbow began her push ups right beside Spitfire. "You know, you and Pinkie would make a cute couple." "Huff.... Say what? She barely... eff .... knows me! Besides, you know I prefer to be straight." "I'm just saying. Give me the word and I bet I could set you two up." Spitfire rolled her eyes. Every now and then, Rainbow Dash would try to get her to go on a date with one of her friends, who all happened to be royalty (except Applejack). Spitfire had never really taken interest, though, and didn't expect Rainbow's friends to either. "No thanks, Dash. I'm too busy right now." "You always say that. You need to take a break from training and get interested." "Likely." Rainbow Dash groaned at Spitfire's reply. "Tell you what. You go out on a date with one of my friends and I'll stop bothering you about it." Spitfire thought about it. She didn't want to go on a date, but she really disliked Rainbow Dash bothering her. Pulling off, Spitfire landed next to Rainbow Dash. "Fine, but only so I can workout without being bothered about your friends." Rainbow Dash smirked up to her. "Alrighty then. I'll mail you a letter with all the details about the date." "I would hardly call it a date." Rainbow just stuck her tongue out at her. Spitfire took off into the skies, hoping that Rainbow Dash would forget (like she normally does) and that she wasn't late to work. As Spitfire flew into the Weather Study and Management building, she was greeted by her boss, Ditzy Doo. She was a bit clumsy, but good at her job nonetheless. She was a boss every employee wanted, a boss that brought muffins for everypony and promoted a happy working environment. She stood waiting for Spitfire next to Spitfire's office, holding a couple papers in hand. "Good morning, Ditzy. Sorry I'm late." "Don't worry, you're only ten minutes late. Now if you were twenty, then we'd have a problem!" Ditzy chuckled. "I was waiting for you to come in so I could explain the new task I have for you." "Alright. What is it?" Ditzy adjusted her reading glasses and scanned the paper. "There have been a few mistakes caused by that one pegasus, you know the one recently fired, and they need some help fixing them. There are too many cumulonimbus clouds for the summer season and not enough cumulus clouds. Somepony came up with the idea of sending the extra cumulonimbus clouds over to the Everfree, but since it is under Queen Pinkie's name, we have to fill out tons of paperwork about safety, the amount of clouds, and where we plan to send them. I have Cloud Kicker on safety, Cloudchaser on location, and you on how many clouds extra we have. I know you worked with the pony responsible a little on the numbers, so you might have a good idea of how many extra we have. If you have any problems, just tell me or Soarin." Ditzy handed Spitfire the papers before turning around. Spitfire examined the papers while she trotted into her personal office. Her office mate, Sunny Skies, had always been bad at math, but she must have screwed up badly to be fired. Spitfire placed the paperwork next to her computer, silently cursing Sunny Skies for the extra work. "Oh, sorry to interrupt you again but I got you two muffins to make up for the extra work!" Ditzy had came back with two chocolate chip, perfectly cooked muffins and placed them on Spitfire's desk. Chocolate muffins were her favorite. Ditzy knew that. She knew everpony's favorite muffin, and always gave out extra with extra work. Chocolate muffin in her mouth, Spitfire began the long and tedious paperwork. The paperwork was obviously done by Head of Counsol Twilight Sparkle. The mare was a brilliant alicorn, Spitfire knew that, but worried about every single detail. Nothing about how many clouds there are was made simple. She wanted to know the process to how the overproduction of the clouds came to be, including all ponies that were involved. This meant that Spitfire would have to dig through Sunny's files and find other notes from co-workers about the clouds she was in charge of. Spitfire didn't enjoy going to all of the higher staff and talking to them about it, especially a particular unicorn. "Lyra, do you have the notes Sunny Sky gave you about the previous season's number of cumulus clouds?" "Where would my notes be?" "I just asked you that." "I know. I'm asking you where they would be." "What? You placed the notes somewhere, probably in a file or something." "File? I don't do files." Spitfire facehooved. "Sweet Pinkie, Lyra you just made my job twice as hard as it should be." "How's that?" "I need you to search through all your papers and find the notes that Sunny gave you." "When?" "Now. I need those notes to finish out the form so we can deposit the extra cumulonimbus clouds over the Everfree." "You need my notes just to do that?" "It's complicated. So can you please look for them?" "Sure. If I find them, I'll place them on your desk." "If?" "What? I may not find them!" How in the name of Pinkie AND Twilight does Bon Bon stand her? "Please do. See you around." Spitfire made her way back to her desk, then screamed into her Frustration Pillow. "Are you alright Spitfire?" Spitfire wheeled around to see the filly Applebloom behind her. She had some boxes that contained some paper from Sunny's old desk. "I'm fine, just a little frustrated. What are you doing here Applebloom?" "Ah'm doing volunteer work for school. Ah'm just helping out around her for today." "Neat. Thanks for helping." Applebloom gave a 'No problem' and the two ponies went back to work. Spitfire had to wait on Lyra to finish up her one project, so she decided to start organizing her other projects. She only worked full on with Spring, and half on with Summer, so all the other projects were little ones. They weren't tedious like the one she was dealing with now. As she was organizing, Lyra came by. "Hey Spitfire! I found the notes you came by asking for earlier." "Great! I'll just add them to my pile here." "You have a pile of Sunny's notes? Why?" "It's for the form, you weren't the only one with some notes from her. You know why she got fired, right?" "She got fired?" "Yes. She did." Spitfire wasn't surprised. "She gave us an over abundance and shortage. Ditzy fired her because the mistake is not her first, but it is her largest." "Oh okay then. I'll see you at lunch! That is, if you're going." "What do you mean?" "It's been lunch break for thirty minutes. You might not be going." "Really?" She checked the time. Sure enough, Lyra was right for once. "I guess I'll just come with you to lunch, if that's where you're going." Lyra lighted up. "Awesome! I'd loved to hang with you! Let's go!" Spitfire followed the green unicorn to the elevator, and watched as Lyra pressed the button until the elevator door opened up. As soon as the doors closed, Lyra started talking. "So you have a special somepony?" "No, I'm not interested in anypony. But Rainbow Dash is hooking me up with one of her friends." "Really? Wow, you must be lucky." "Not really." The two got of the elevator and got their food. Lyra got a salad, and Spitfire got a daffodil sandwich with some apples on the side. After paying, she followed Lyra over to a table and sat down. Lyra immediately began talking. "So you want to hear about Bon Bon and me?" Spitfire had a feeling she was going to regret her decision