Lee awoke with a start. He'd had a fitful night of sleep and felt no better than he did when he tried to rest in the first place. Still chilled by the lieutenant's warning about remaining a blank flank, he couldn't set his mind at ease. Lieutenant Shining Storm, as the black pegasus was called, had successfully managed to make him fret even more about his current position. Rubbing his eyes, Lee slid half-heartedly out of bed and onto the floor where he waited for his companions to rise to the sound of the blaring trumpet outside.

After they attended a relatively silent breakfast, all of the new privates assembled where they had been told to do so many times before. The lieutenant from the night before strode past and reiterated what she had talked about the night before; that they would be assigned a sergeant who would train them, then they would be assigned when their cutie mark did—or didn't—appear. After that, it was all up to where they were placed. As Shining Storm finished her quick talk, she announced the sergeants assigned to each team. The ponies from group H stared at each other in confusion as they heard two names assigned to them. Sure enough, two stallions trotted up. One of them, in the lead, was a large, orange earth pony with burgundy hair. He had dark orange eyes and a scar underneath one of them, and he looked...unhappy. The other pony, significantly taller and leaner, was a pegasus pony with a coat of a pleasant shade of blue. He had spring green hair and pink eyes and appeared much friendlier than his stout companion.

"Hello," spoke the blue pegasus pony, "I'm Assistant Sergeant Vedette, and this is Sergeant Camouflet. We're assigned to your group—or, at least, I am. Officially. Sergeant Camouflet here is really in charge, but since I and another recruit were just promoted to sergeant and we're still learning the ropes, he's here to keep an eye on both of us. You'll be seeing more of me than him, though."

"Enough with the chatter, Vedette, your name would have been fine," Camouflet grumbled. The orange sergeant, standing as straight and as stiff as a plank of wood, finally addressed the blank flanks. "You, what are your names?"

"B-Boomer, sir."

"Prism Stone, sir."

"Merilee Argent Sun, sir," Lee said, instantly regretting the use of his full name. He looked down. "I-I mean, Lee, sir."

"Privates Boomer, Prism and Lee," said Sergeant Camouflet gruffly, either taking no notice of Lee's blunder or just ignoring it, "Let's see what you've got in you. Seargent Vedette, take these newbies out to test their abilities. I'm going to check in on the other assistant sergeant. I'll be there soon."

"Yes, sir!" Vedette confirmed. He waited until Camouflet left before cracking a smile. "Don't worry about him, he's just an old goat. I promise you'll not be seeing much of him. Come on, I'll show you to the testing grounds."

Vedette led the three ponies under his command to another clearing not too far away from their base camp. There, they toured all the areas they'd be practicing doing what Shining Storm described the other day. There was an area to make and test various kinds of weapons, an obstacle course, and a board full of tactics to study were just a few of the many things displayed. Over the next few weeks, Vedette and occasionally Camouflet would test Lee, Boomer and Prism in the different areas, having them try each what they deemed was a sufficient number of times. The only progress any of them made was Boomer, who seemed to (through learning) understand the ins and outs of grenades. Despite this, making them, testing them, and studying them seemed all for naught, as they provided him with no cutie mark to speak of.

As the days wore on, more and more ponies around the boot camp became depressed. Only a few of them had managed to find their cutie marks, and they had disappeared to fill their roles in the EDF. Taking his turn practicing patrol, Lee bumped right into Boomer one evening.

"Boomer? What are you doing out here? Shouldn't you be asleep?"

"No can do, Lee," Boomer said with a smile, "I'm working on something b-b-big. Just got this idea out of nowhere, like a spark in my h-head, and I don't know what's wrong with me, b-b-but it's like...it's like I've gotta do something about it!! B-be a pal and don't mention this to anypony?" Boomer gave a pleading smile and Lee rolled his eyes but smiled back.

"Yeah, yeah, all right. Go do your thing." He observed the materials hanging out of Boomer's stuffed saddlebags. They were clearly supplies from the grenade station. "...Hey Boomer, be safe, okay?"

"You got it!" Boomer trotted off back to their tent and Lee shook his head.

"I sure hope he knows what he's doing..."

The very next night, during the limited free time in which the recruits had to relax, Boomer ran excitedly to Lee, hopping around as though he'd burst from the boundless energy within him. "Lee, Lee! Lee, I did it! Come on, gather up e-everypony in the camp and tell them to sit right in the middle of the clearing!!" He scurried off without explaining what it was about, and so Lee told Prism, and in turn they together told the populous of the camp to meet in the middle. The sky was dark and cloudless, and at first Lee wondered if Boomer hadn't wanted everypony to join him in stargazing. However, the sergeants and Lieutenant Shining Storm, also present, all seemed to be anticipating something.

Suddenly, from behind them, there was an odd noise and a grand boom as a bright light rose up into the sky and exploded.

"F-fireworks," gasped Prism. Before she could get another word out of her mouth, two more in hues of green and red burst forth into the night. Lee looked over to their leaders, but the sergeants and Shining Storm seemed to be enjoying themselves. The black pegasus' eyes seemed to glimmer and sparkle in the light of the fireworks, and Lee couldn't help but smile. There was something about the way she held herself, something about the way she looked...it was as breathtaking as the light show above them.

There weren't many fireworks that followed, but the "ooohs" and "aaaahs" that poured from the ponies watching showed that the number hadn't mattered at all. All it took was a few good blasts of color and sound to excite and stir up the ponies. Their morale was back, at least for the moment.

Lee and Prism rushed to find Boomer, who was cleaning up the setup of his homemade fireworks nearby. "Boomer, that was amazing," Prism exclaimed as she hovered in the air above him.

"B-b-b-b-BOOM!" Boomer said with a laugh, throwing his hooves into the air.

"How ever did you do that? ...And won't the sergeants and the lieutenant be upset with you?" Prism asked. Boomer shook his head and smiled.

"Nah, they approved it. As soon as I talked to Sergeant Vedette, h-he vouched for me in front of the Lieutenant and told h-her that e-e-everypony could use a little show to b-b-boost their spirits. One of the unicorns ponies h-here cast a spell over the area so we didn't alert or scare anypony else."

"Then why the sneaking around earlier?" Lee asked.

"Haha, you don't seriously e-expect me to have told them I could do this if I h-hadn't already worked it out for myself. It just felt...right. B-b-better than grenades. Better...better than anything." He said the last sentence with a relaxed sigh, devoid of stuttering.

"Oh!" Prism Stone covered her mouth and then pointed to Boomer. "Boomer, your flank! You...you've got a cutie mark!!"

"W-what?" Boomer checked his flank, stammering not out of habit but out of surprise. "No way! I did, I did! Check it out!" Boomer stepped closer and showed off his new cutie mark to his friends. Three little fireworks decorated his once blank flank, and he glowed with pride. "I...I did it! My special talent...fireworks! H-how cool!!" Lee smiled and gave Boomer a hoof-bump.

"I'm so happy for you, Boomer," he spoke, before giving him a quick hug. "And I'm even more happy that you don't have to stay here."

Boomer's smile faded a bit. "Oh..."

"Oh, Boomer, don't feel so bad! Lee and I will get our cutie marks in no time, you'll see! And just you wait, we'll all get ones related to normal things, and we'll go back home, and we'll write to each other and meet up, and, and..." Prism had tears forming in her eyes as she listed off the things they still had to do together.

"Don't worry, Boomer. Prism and I will be just fine. ...The train's not coming for a while, though. Come on, let's go back to the tent and celebrate how awesome you are."

That sentence from Lee was all it took to cheer Boomer back up again. Hooves around his friends, Boomer trotted back to camp with them to enjoy the rest of the night.

Author's Note

I'm going to try to update more often now that I've got the whole story mapped out. Hopefully the chapters don't get any shorter than this |D;;

As always, thanks for reading!!