Courageous

Chapters

Chapter 2: Like Research
Chapter 3: Grudge
Chapter 4: The Race
Chapter 5: Courage and Thought
Chapter 1: First Impressions
Chapter 6: No Fear

Chapter 2: Like Research

Courageous
Story 1
Chapter 2: Like Research
By: SleeplessScribe

After about an hour, the treats were all gone and general impressions-well, mine at least- of Rainbow’s brother had been formed. I, for one, thought he was going to be a fun addition to Ponyville during his visit, but there was still a lot about him I didn’t know.

When it finally seemed like there were no more questions for him, Nova let out a yawn. “Well, it was nice meeting you all, but if you don’t mind, I’d like to get some one on one time with my sis.”

Everyone nodded to him, giving their different responses all meaning the same thing. Once everyone was done, he smiled to all of us and poked his sister’s stomach. “Thanks again for having me! Catch you later!” With that, he was off, leaving his sister holding her stomach.

“Hey, you did that on purpose so you could get a head start!” Before Rainbow took off after him, she turned to us with a nervous giggle. “Thanks for being so nice, you guys, I know he can be a little too laid back sometimes. But trust me, get to know him better, and he can be a great friend! See you tomorrow!” Just like her brother, she was off, and as she flew we could hear a loud “Get back here!” echoing through the sky.

As soon as she was gone, Applejack shot Rarity a rather mean glare. “What was that all about, Rarity? Ya jump on the guy’s head, and then act like he killed your cat!”

The well-groomed pony scoffed at her friend, turning away. “He blatantly insulted me with no regard for tact or manners! Why should I be forced to put up with such a rude, uncouth ruffian?”

Pinkie began to pounce around the unicorn, seemingly oblivious to the argument going on. “I don’t see what the problem is, he’s funny! I like him!”

She let out a sigh, turning her attention to the hyperactive pony. Pinkie Pie, you like everypony.”

At Rarity’s words, she stopped bouncing for a moment, only to resume again after she had finished speaking. “Oh yeah, you’re right! I do like everypony!” Did that mare ever run out of energy?

Applejack took a step forward, a somewhat frightening look in her eyes. “He wasn’t insulting you, he was just being honest! If you would just pull your face away from the mirror for two seconds, you’d realize that!”

I’d had enough already. As I stepped between them, I alternated between facing Applejack and facing Rarity, pushing the two of them apart. “Girls, knock it off! Look, to be fair, Nova could’ve worded his opinion a little better, but that still doesn’t make your behavior any less right.”

Both mares lowered their ears, slinking back a bit. Applejack lowered her hat a bit, looking back at me. “I guess you have a point, Twi. He did kinda sound like he was being rude.”

Rarity began circling the ground with her hoof, keeping her head down. “And I suppose I could’ve at least talked to him and not just ignored him. It was rather unladylike of me, and I apologize.”

I shook my head, look over towards where Nova and Rainbow sped off. “It’s not me you need to apologize to. Granted, we don’t actually know much about him beyond what he’s told us, but I’m sure he’s not as bad as you’ve made him out to be. What do you think, Fluttershy?” I turned around to where the Pegasus had been sitting, but she was gone.

Upon further investigation, I spotted her trotting towards the exit of Sweet Apple Acres, so I said my good nights to the others and made my way to catch up with her. “Fluttershy, wait!”

She stopped as I called out to her, waiting until I caught up to resume walking. “Oh, yes, Twilight?”

“I was just wondering what you thought of Nova. Applejack and Pinkie seem to like him, but Rarity’s convinced he’s a jerk. What do you think?”

Fluttershy lowered her head a bit, stuttering as she spoke. “I don’t know. There’s no way to tell if he’s nice or not until we actually spend time with him.”

I gave her a nod; what she said was absolutely right. “I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

My sister knew I was never a fan of sleeping indoors unless it was raining out. Normally, I slept on the roof of our place in Cloudsdale, and the only exception tonight is that she decided to join me. Neither of us could really get to sleep, so we took turns kicking clouds that rolled by and keeping score.

I had three as opposed to her one, but the conversation was kind of distracting me, too. “So, what’d you think of your first day in Ponyville?”

Blowing a raspberry, I turned my head towards the sky and kicked another cloud. “Four. Not, much, sis. To be honest, I didn’t really get to see much, considering most of the day was spent talking to your friends in one place.”

Two came her way, and she got rid of both. “Three. I guess you have a point. How about I show you around tomorrow?”

Ever since the return of Princess Luna, the change in the night sky was obvious. It was much more vibrant, and the stars shined like lights on a race track. “Sounds great! Five.”

“Five! Ha, we’re even! So what’d you think of my friends?”

I let out a long, audible “mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm” at her question. One of my biggest hopes is that she wasn’t going to ask me that. “You want my honest answers?” After a nod from Rainbow, I sighed and told her what I thought. “Applejack is alright, and Pinkie Pie is awesome! But, is Rarity always like that? No offense, but she was kind of a rude… female dog.” Dad had brought the both of us up never to swear, and I always made an effort to find some alternative, even in an instance where I thought such a word was actually appropriate.

“Six. Well, to be honest, you could have been a little nicer. I mean, Rarity is a little conceded, but you were a little mean.”

Not even turning over on my side could keep me from kicking apart those three clouds with one hoof. “Eight. What was so mean about it?” I will openly admit this: I am not the smartest pony to come out of Cloudsdale. I know, shocking isn’t it? Acting, or in this case speaking, before thinking was a bad habit of mine.

My sister rolled her eyes at me, narrowly missed a cloud that rolled past her head. “Ah crap. Well, Nova, what you said wasn’t exactly rude, but you said it in a way that made it sound like you just didn’t care. Not to mention the face you were making; that didn’t help at all.”

“Huh, I never even thought of that. Do you think I should apologize tomorrow?”

She made up for her miss by hitting two at once. “Eight, we’re tied again. That wouldn’t be a bad idea, Rarity has a tendency to overreact, and she probably things you’re some kind of evil menace right now.”

I responded with a soft chuckle, throwing all four of my hooves in the air. “Boom, combo! Twelve!”

“What, no way! You never get that lucky.” She rolled her eyes again after seeing my grin, lying back again. “What do you think of Fluttershy?”

The more I thought of her, the more I realized something. “Isn’t she the one that others used to make fun of for her weak flying?” She gave me a nod, and I turned my head back to the sky. “It’s nice to see that she turned out alright, but I still regret not being around to help her like I was for you. Seeing ponies get bullied for any reason just really burns me up.”

“You don’t need to be sorry, it’s not your fault. Besides, I took care of ‘em for you.”

I chuckled again, patting her shoulder. “Atta girl.”

“So, what about Twilight? You didn’t mention her.”

That one took some thought. After a few minutes and two more, clouds, I finally thought of a decent answer. “I’m not really sure. Twilight’s the only one I couldn’t really read all that well, so all I know is what you told me. Though I’m sure she’s cooler than an egghead who stays in a library all day.”

It was her turn to laugh now. “Well, she’s really good with magic and knows a lot of neat tricks, but that’s the gist of it. She’s had times where’s she’s done some pretty awesome stuff, but all she really does in her spare time is sit in that tree and read books.”

Letting out a loud “pffffft”, I now had a new goal. My sister and I were always looking for different ways to compete against each other, and I just thought of the perfect way. “Tell you what, I’ll make you a bet. If I can prove Twilight is cooler than you think in a week, I win. If you’re not convinced, then you win. Loser has to go the rest of that day with their wings tied up!”

She jumped up, letting out a loud laugh. “You’re on! You’d have to spy on Twilight all day to catch her doing anything, and you can’t stay in one place for more than five minutes.”

That settled it. We both spit on our hooves and shook. “I can’t wait to see you freak at not being able fly.”

Rainbow grinned at me, giving me one of those friendly-but-not glares. “You can’t handle getting your wings wet, so I’m going to be rolling on the ground seeing you struggle with them tied up.”

* * *

I got Rainbow up early, much to her displeasure, so she could show me around the town. With our speed, we went around Ponyville three times in under ten minutes. We went around one more time and she had me name places to make sure I knew what was what, and the only two things I mixed up were the hardware store and the post office, mainly because I couldn’t see the signs.

As we touched down, my sister looked up at the sky and then back to me. “Well, since you got me up this early, I guess I’ll go ahead and clear out the clouds. Feel free to do whatever you want. Good luck with your spying!” She started laughing, and continued even after she was in the sky.

Rainbow told me Rarity lived in the upper floor of her boutique, so my only hope was that she was up at this hour. It wasn’t that early, but still early enough for most ponies not to consider still being in bed sleeping in. The fashion shop was a little out of the way, and definitely not somewhere I actually wanted to be seen going to, but giving Rarity an apology was only right, even if I didn’t like her that much.

I heard an audible “One moment!” as I knocked on the door, but the expression I was met with was a lot less cheerful than the vocal response just a second ago. “Oh, it’s you.”

Holding up both my front hooves, I tried to put on as nice of a face as I could. “Look, I realize that you and I didn’t really get along yesterday, and I’m sorry. We may not agree on certain things, but that doesn’t mean we should be angry at each other. I’ve come to extend an olive branch of sorts.”

Her angry glare began to ease into a more… accepting expression. “Very well, Nova. It must have taken quite a bit of pride swallowing to do this.”

“Oh believe me, it did. No offense, but I wouldn’t normally get within ten miles of a place like this.”

Rarity’s expression now changed to one similar to what I was giving her yesterday. “Ponyville isn’t even half a mile from here.”

I gave her a nervous chuckle, scratching the back of my head. “Right… so, no hard feelings?”

She smiled at me. Now that I looked at her, she actually was really pretty. “No hard feelings.” As soon as she saw me raise my hoof to my mouth, she slammed her own down on top of it. “Please, don’t. Applejack and Rainbow Dash both do that, and it’s absolutely disgusting.”

Rolling my eyes was too strong of a desire to resist, despite the fact that I just apologized for being rude. “Sorry, again.”

“It’s fine, just… don’t spit. I like to keep my personal space clean, and saliva is most definitely not clean. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a bit of work to do before noon rolls around. Good day, Nova.” The prissy pony didn’t even give me a chance to say “bye” as she closed the door on me.

Well, it wasn’t the smoothest apology ever, but it worked. Now my goal was to, for lack of a better word, spy on Twilight. The mere fact that my sister didn’t think there was much to that unicorn convinced me that she was either hiding something or was just more interesting than Rainbow realized. Besides, I didn’t really have anything better to do; Applejack worked on a farm, which was definitely not my kind of work, Pinkie Pie made sweets and acted silly all day, and while I wouldn’t have a problem with the latter, I really didn’t like cooking, my sister was busy busting clouds and doing whatever else she did around her-probably napping- and Fluttershy, well… all Rainbow actually told me was that she worked with small animals.

I made my way over to the massive tree the unicorn called home, and luckily for me, she had a balcony just perfect for landing on. It gave me a clear view into the upstairs, and an empty bed made it obvious she was already awake. In fact, as I heard the door below me close, I spotted the mare walking out with saddlebags and a checklist. Following her without being spotted wasn’t going to be easy, especially considering my body’s color scheme. Bright orange with a fiery mane and tail didn’t make for the best camouflage.

Fortunately, I was a Pegasus, and pegasi can not only fly, but can also stand and sit on clouds. After I found one big enough for me, I nestled myself onto it and began my slow pursuit. The unicorn hummed a little tune-a catchy one, I might add, sounded like an opening to a cartoon- as she walked along the road to the unlikeliest of places: the Everfree Forest.

I dropped my cloud immediately, hiding in the bushes. If Twilight was going in there, the trees would make a bird’s eye view useless. As she walked along, she stopped and looked at the plants at the forest’s edge, picking some and marking stuff off her list.

“Um, Nova?”

The sudden voice behind me, regardless of how soft it was, did make me jump a little, but my smile returned immediately as I saw the timid Pegasus behind me. “Oh, hi Fluttershy.”

“W-What are you doing so close to the Everfree Forest?”

I tilted my head, cocking an eyebrow. “I could ask you the same thing.”

She gave me a soft smile, opening her wings to reveal two ferrets underneath them. “The poor things were sick, so I brought them to my cottage to help them get better. Now that they are, I’m taking them back home.”

It took a little effort not to let out an “aww” at the sight. The ferrets themselves were cute, but Fluttershy was made even cuter by holding them like that. “So, what are you doing here?”

Turning back, I saw that Twilight was still examining plants. “I’ve got a bet with my sister going. I’m following Twilight around so I can get some proof that her life is more exciting than Rainbow says it is.”

The shy pony’s eyes widened a bit. “Oh, that sounds fun. But, isn’t that like, stalking?”

“Pffft, no! Fluttershy, this isn’t stalking. Stalking is creepy, this is… this is….” I had to think about this. Lifting a hoof to my chin, I had to really think about this. “Okay, it’s stalking, but not a creepy stalking. It’s like research, I’m trying to learn.”

Her smile returned; how could Rarity not see why I thought Fluttershy was better looking than her? “That makes sense. Oh! You’d better hurry, she’s going into the forest. Knowing her, she’s going to see Zecora.”

I raised my brow again. “Zecora? Is that like, some kind of horrific forest worm that steals little filly’s lunchboxes?”

Fluttershy shook her head quickly. “Oh no, she’s a zebra.”

Clapping my hooves together, I threw them in the air like I was the guy who discovered gravity. “Aha! A zebra!” I then lowered them, raising one to my chin again. “What’s a zebra? Oh, never mind, I don’t have time. See you later, Flutters!”

Flutters. I liked that nickname. It just sort of came out, but it sounded really good. Anywho, I managed to catch up to Twilight just as she entered into some creepy looking voodoo hut. Sneakily making my way up to it, I peeked into the window. My eyes widened as I saw Twilight talking to this… thing. She, he, it, whatever that thing was looked like a pony, but it was clad in gold rings and sported stripes all over its body. Man, Rarity would have a field day pointing out all the flaws in whatever this was.

I couldn’t actually hear what they were saying, but after talking for a bit, what I assumed to be the zebra handed Twilight a bag of… stuff. What? It was a dark brown bag, how was I supposed to know what was in it?

Anyway, I’m getting off track here. Twilight checked another item off her list, trotting out of the hut. She was still humming that catchy tune, but I wasn’t the only creature here who apparently liked the humming. As she walked by my clever hiding spot consisting of a bunch of bushes with tree branches on top, I saw two pairs of red eyes following her in the actual woods. Now I was more concerned about what was following her, as nothing good ever came out of this forest. In fact, why the heck was Twilight even here?

As she neared the edge of the woods, we all froze and took a whiff of the air, and boy, did it smell worse than my dad after a Wonderbolts show. I knew exactly what is was the minute that wooden claw poked out from the underbrush. “Twilight, look out!”

With no regard for subtlety, I jumped out and kicked one of the wolves right in the mouth to get their attention, causing it to let out a loud roar. “Twilight, run!”

The mare seemed not to care that there were two timber wolves that had been stalking her for the past five minutes. “Nova? What are you doing here?”

“I said run!” Okay, so apparently she was just too surprised at my sudden entrance to notice the wolves, because she took off immediately at the sight of them. Both of them tried to give chase, but I kept kicking them until they were angry enough at me to leave the unicorn alone.

I was way too fast for them to keep up with, so I had to stay slow if I wanted to lead them anywhere. That proved to be more difficult than initially planned, as slowing down gave them the chance to continuously bite at me, narrowly missing my hind legs. After a little bit, I spotted a low tree branch and grabbed hold of it. I continued to move forward until both wolves were in the right spot, then let go of it and had it slam them both in the face, shattering their bodies.

Twilight was standing at the edge of the forest when I touched down, just staring at me. “Woohoo! Twilight, did you see that? That was so awesome!”

Her blank stare turned into a glare as she started towards me. “That wasn’t ‘awesome’! Reckless is what it was, Nova, you could’ve gotten hurt!”

Rolling my eyes at her, I backed away some just to keep her from hitting me or something. “Well gee, what a wonderful way to say ‘Thanks for saving my life.’!”

The mare shook her head, taking a deep breath and extending her hoof as she did so. “Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful, but how do you think I would’ve felt if you got hurt trying to save me?”

I blew a raspberry, away from her, and patted her shoulder. “Pfft, I’m not afraid of some stupid timber wolves, I can handle myself.”

Twilight didn’t seem convinced at all, nudging my hoof off of her. “That wasn’t bravery, Nova, that was recklessness. Did you even know what you were going to do once you had their attention? No, even before that, what were you doing in the Everfree Forest anyway?”

That was a question I had really hoped wouldn’t come up. “Do you really want to know?” After a nod from the unicorn, I let out a sigh. “Alright, here it goes: Last night my sister asked what I thought of all of you, and you were the only one I couldn’t give a definite answer for. However, I told Rainbow that you had to be more than an egghead who stays in her library reading all day, and since we both love competition, I made a bet with her. If I could prove by the end of the week that your life is more interesting than she thinks, she has to tie her wings up for the whole day. If I lose, I’m the one that has to tie my wings up. So, in order to find out more about you, I started following you around.”

Her ears fell flat and her brow lowered. “You do realize that that story is so ridiculous that the only reason I believe it is because that’s definitely something Rainbow Dash would say, right?”

All I could do was give her a dopey nod. “Uh-huh.”

“Did it ever cross your mind to just come and talk to me instead of stalking me like some weirdo?”

“Well, at the time, it didn’t. But now that you say that, that seems like a much better option.”

The purple hoof met her forehead with sort of a “thunk” sound. “This is the same thing as this business with those timber wolves. Nova, you don’t think before you-“

“Help! Somepony, anypony, help!” After two days of quiet whispers, hearing the pretty Pegasus shout was incredibly strange. Fluttershy ran over to us, out of breath and panting.

Her timing couldn’t have been better, I was really not looking forward to listening to a lecture from Twilight. “Flutters! What’s wrong?”

She spoke between pants, pointing down the river that was nearby her cottage. “I was taking Rodney and Darlene back home, when I heard this loud, scary roar. Before I knew what had happened, Rodney had fallen into the river, and the current’s too strong for me to go get him.”

“Say no more!” I hadn’t gone too far away as I heard Twilight shout to me.

“Nova, wait!”

There was no time. I could see the little ferret in the water, squirming as he tried to swim back up. The girls were running along the bank as I flew, so I turned to them to let them know. “I see him, Fluttershy, don’t worry, I-“

Looking where I was going should’ve been my highest priority. Now I knew how those timber wolves felt as I the spot the branch had hit stung. I was dazed just enough to fall out of the air, landing in the water and becoming just as helpless as the ferret. Never a strong swimmer, I flailed around in the rushing water. My sister was right; I hated getting my wings wet, as it made them too heavy for takeoff, and I despised being unable to fly. Luckily, I did land right beside… Rodney, was it? Eh, it didn’t matter. What did matter was the fact that we were about to go over a waterfall, and the water was moving too fast for one of the girls to jump in.

“Oh man, this is bad, bad, bad!”

Author's Note

And here's where the comedy comes in. Nova is already feeling more like a character now since I'm giving him a definite personality, and as I continue to write, the adventure portion of the story WILL become obvious. However, I do hope you all have had a nice chuckle at Nova's ignorance and brashness... if that's a word.

Chapter 3: Grudge

Courageous
Story 1
Chapter 3: Grudge
By: SleeplessScribe

“Nova, you featherbrain!” I guess it was a good thing Twilight was here; just before I went over the edge, Twilight brought a bunch of rocks over my head and blocked off the waterfall. The impact hurt a bit, but at least I was alive. I managed to pull myself over to the riverbank, where both mares managed to pull me out.

The unicorn did not seem happy at all, and before Flutters could open her mouth, she stomped her hoof down. “Nova Dash! This is exactly the problem I was trying to tell you about. Your so-called ‘courage’ isn’t bravery at all! You’re being reckless, and as you can see, your thoughtlessness almost got you killed!”

After a few coughs, I looked up at her. “Hey, I’m alive, aren’t I? And that’s not all,” I opened my left wing, letting the little ferret return to the other Pegasus, “he is too.”

Fluttershy picked him up, twirling around with the ferret. “Oh, thank you Nova! I was so scared that I’d lost him, I don’t know how to thank you enough.”

Standing up, I shook myself off. “No need, Flutters, happy to help.” The timid mare flew off, leaving me alone with Twilight yet again.

She was still glaring at me, though she didn’t look as angry as before. “We need to talk.”

I plopped my flank down on the ground, preparing for a lecture. “Alright, get on with it.”

Twilight began to pace left and right in front of me, keeping her eyes focused on mine. “Look, I know you’re just trying to be nice, but I’m sure I’m not the only pony in Equestria that isn’t comfortable with being followed around. You don’t even have to; your sister isn’t necessarily wrong. While I do love spending time with my friends, most of my down time is spent reading and studying. Learning is my passion, and I just can’t learn enough.”

That wasn’t so bad. She began to trot away, but now that I was try, I lifted myself up and floated beside her. “I like learning, too. Rainbow was never much for education, but I found physics pretty interesting my last year at flight school.”

The unicorn cocked her brown at my, one corner of her mouth turned up in a doubtful smile. “You like physics? Alright then, prove it by reciting a principle to me.”

Chuckling was hard to resist as I cleared my throat. “The widely accepted explanation for flight uses the idea that faster moving air has less pressure. Because the top of a wing is curved, the air going over it has to move faster to meet with the air going underneath the wing, which reduces the pressure pushing down on the wing, creating lift. However, in this situation, there is no action or reaction. What’s really happening is that, because wings are angled slightly, the air going over top of them is bent downwards, and it is this action that receives the reaction of lift, pushing the wing up and allowing for flight.”

The deeper purple eyes were bigger than dinner plates, and her jaw looked like it was about to fall off with how far it had dropped. Now I had to laugh as I flew circles around her. “You should see the look on your face, Twilight! Look, being a racer is more than just athletic training. I had to do a lot of reading and learning to find out what did what and learn what I could do to achieve my maximum potential. For example,” I ascended a little higher, lowering my head and curling up all four of my legs so they were against my body, “this is how I position myself during the bulk of my races. The smaller I am, the less resistance I’m forced to work against, not only increasing my speed just through that, but it also keeps me from expending more energy on fighting against the wind resistance.”

She finally pulled herself together, shaking her head quickly as she watched me. “Wow, I’ve got to be honest, I would have never expected that to come out of somepony related to Rainbow Dash.”

Yet another laugh. “Yeah, most ponies tell me that. See, that’s how I manage to stay faster than my sister. Rainbow and I were both born fast, but I do everything I can to put the odds in my favor. Sis does the same thing, but her problem is that at this point, it’s habitual for me. Even if I’m not going anywhere fast I take on that position. Rainbow was too busy napping during classes to actually learn anything.”

Twilight gave me a happy nod, finally continuing on her way. However, I wasn’t done with her, so I landed and followed beside her. “Now it’s my turn to ask you some questions. First off, what were you doing in the Everfree Forest yourself? And second, what the heck was that thing you were talking to?”

She didn’t seem that upset at me, but she did look a little confused. “Rainbow never told you about Zecora? She’s a friend of ours, and I was collecting ingredients so she could make me a remedy. My little friend, Spike, is rather sick with a fever, so Zecora fixed up this medicine to help.”

I was about to let out an “ooooh”, but was interrupted by a multicolored blur zooming between us. My sister looked a little worried, and the tone of her voice only enforced this. “Nova, we have a problem. There’s these dark clouds up in the sky, and no matter how hard I kick, they just won’t go away!”

Drawing back a bit, I looked to Twilight. “You mind if I go see what this is about?”

The mare shook her head, continuing her trot. “Not at all. I’ll come see you when I’m finished, maybe I can help.”

After a nod, I turned back to my sister. “Alright, what’s up?” She led me back over to the Everfree Forest, where a couple of black clouds stood out against the bright blue sky. “These are giving you trouble?”

My sister nodded, flying up to one and kicking it with both hind hooves, only to be bounced away. “See? No matter what I do, they just keep pushing me away.”

I rolled my eyes, flying up to the same one. “Stand back, sis, let me show you how it’s done.” Unfortunately, the only thing I showed was that something was wrong with this cloud. It was still soft and fluffy, but instead of breaking it apart, my hooves kind of just sunk into it before being pushed out, almost crashing my into my sister. “Okay, maybe not….”

She floated over to it again, poking it with her hoof. “Doesn’t look like there’s anything wrong with it. Something’s fishy, here.” Rainbow kicked it again to no avail. No matter what we did, the cloud just pushed us away from it. Eventually I tried coming down on it, but all that accomplished was me performing ten backflips and dizzying myself.

“I think we need a new approach.” We tried throwing things at it, blowing it with our wings, and even biting it, but absolutely nothing made this thing budge. “Okay, sis, something is wrong here.”

“Are you two having difficulties?” Twilight looked up at us, giggling to herself.

Both of us rolled our eyes, but my sister opened her mouth first. “No matter what we do, these clouds just won’t go away!”

The unicorn raised a hoof to her chin, pointing her horn at the cloud a few moments later. “Stand back, you two, I think I know a spell that can solve this issue!” I wish I had magic, sometimes.

With a loud boom, a purple beam burst forth from Twilight’s horn and right into the cloud. The cloud itself began to glow as well, but other than that, not much came about as a result. Well, not much until we heard another boom, and in the blink of an eye, I was on the ground with my rear left leg twitching.

Both mares made their way over to me, Twilight biting her lower lip. “Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry, Nova, are you alright?”

My words were kind of slurred, and I was really dizzy now, but I was alright other than that. “Nothing broken, does that count as alright?” To be honest, my stomach was a little upset, but that was probably because I had yet to eat lunch. They helped me onto my hooves, and we would have made our way back to Ponyville had the loud howl not frozen us. “Oh, please tell me that’s not what I think it is.”

Well, it wasn’t what I thought it was; it was much bigger, much uglier, and there was only one of them. The massive wolf let out another howl, swiping at us. Twilight turned back towards the town, but turned back around when she saw my sister and I rush at it. “Are you two crazy? Nova, what did I tell you earlier?”

I had learned my lesson about watching where I was going, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t talk. “What are we supposed to do, just lead this thing into Ponyville?” Twilight did have a point, though; rushing into this without a plan wasn’t a good idea. However, as soon as I thought of how bad an idea this was, a plan came to mind.

“Twilight, Rainbow, I have an idea!” Before either of them could say “what”, I began kicking the timber wolf’s face, making weird faces at it. “Come on, big guy! Come get me!” My taunting worked. The wolf directed its attention towards me. I took off, leading him into the same river I had fallen into earlier. “Stay with me, girls!” To make sure he was still on me, I gave the thing a few more kicks and moved away again. As we neared the waterfall, I needed a way to get this thing up on its hind legs, or better yet get it to lunge at me.

It was risky, but I flew in and gave a few more good hits, flying up as fast as I could. Like the idiot this beast was, it reared up on its hind legs, and I grabbed my sister as soon as it was. “Back of the head, now!” With all our strength, the both of us kicked it in the head. Twilight took the hint, too, when the monster began to lose its balance. Finally, she finished it by sending one of the boulders she had blocked the river with into the timber wolf’s head, and we all watched it plummet to the rocky bottom of the waterfall.

Pretty soon, the only thing left were a few soaked logs, and I clapped my hooves together as I turned to the girls. “Woo! Sis, let’s do that again, that was awesome!” My sister’s hoof met mine and we both began to laugh, and this time I was able to keep laughing, even after I saw Twilight’s face. She wasn’t laughing with us, but she definitely didn’t look angry with me like the last few times something like this happened.

After a sigh, she gave me a soft smile. “Well, at least you put some thought into what you were doing. I guess you’re not a total goofball after all.”

I gave her a shrug, floating in the air with my hooves behind my head. “I can be serious when the situation demands it.”

A loud “pfft” came from my sister and she elbowed my stomach lightly. “Quit faking, the only time you’re ever serious is in a race!”

It was time to be a typical big brother. With my foreleg around the mare’s neck, I pulled her to me and rubbed my hoof against the top of her head with a little force. “I’m sorry, say that again, sis? What was that about me being serious?”

Through my sister’s grunts and struggling, I heard Twilight call out to us as she resumed on her way back to the tree. “I’m going to go check up on Spike, I’ll see you two later!”

Had I not been teasing the heck out of Rainbow, I would’ve waved to her. “Later, Twi!”

Despite the wicked noogie she was receiving, my sister managed to turn her head up to look at me, grinning. “Well? You found anything?”

Rolling my eyes, I let her go and sighed. “I thought I did, but it turned out to be something you already knew about and forgot to tell me. She went to go see her zebra friend today, and I thought it was some kind of mutant! Thanks for including that little tidbit.”

Now it was her turn to roll her eyes. “Right, like I was supposed to know she was going to see Zecora today. I didn’t think you’d even care about meeting her, so I never mentioned her!” My fake suspicious squint clued her in that I was joking, and the smile returned to her face. “So, have you learned enough to at least tell me what you think?”

“She’s cool. If you ask me, she’s a lot cooler than you say she is, but I was always the one that actually passed my classes instead of sleeping through them.”

My sister gave another “pfft”, throwing her hooves in the air. “Classes, shmasses, all you need is skill!”

Ah, my sister was so blissfully unaware of how wrong she was. “Care to test that theory?” We both got up in each other’s faces, giving that competitive glare again.”

“You’re on.”

“First one to the end of Whitetail Wood wins.”

“One two three go!” She took off before I even realized what had happened, but it didn’t take me too long to catch up. Just as she normally did, Rainbow had all four of her legs outstretched, and while that might’ve helped her with drag, I always felt my position was the optimal for gaining speed. I had forgotten just how far away our destination was; Ponyville was in the center of Equestria, and Whitetail Wood was actually on the Western Coast, right above Las Pegasus. Our race remained pretty even, with one of us gaining a little bit of distance only to have the other gain just as much moments later. As we approached the forest, I noticed that a fair number of the trees were dead and withered despite it being mid-Spring. This distraction caused me to lose focus just long enough to slow down a bit, giving my sister the win as we passed over it.

“Ha! Look at that, Nova! Like I said, all it takes is skill.”

Grabbing her again, I resumed my playful roughhousing. “I got distracted, don’t get a big head! Oh, too late!” We both laughed at my comment before she pushed me away from her.

“Bro, you’re one to talk! I’ve seen the way you act after you win a big race.” She was right, but at least my opponents stayed focused.

After a few chuckles, we decided we needed to get going before somepony got worried and started looking for us. I kept insisting a rematch, but my sis was way too proud of her “victory” to risk losing in a race where I wouldn’t get distracted. I looked like we weren’t a moment too soon, either. As we looked down at Ponyville’s town square, all of Rainbow’s friends were there, chatting about something.

None of them looked very happy as we touched down, and my sister didn’t waste any time getting over to them to find out what was up. “Hey, hey, what’s all the commotion about? You all look like somepony just demolished Applejack’s barn.”

Well, I wouldn’t have gone that far. I mean, they all looked worried about something, but not something as serious as that. Apparently, I was wrong, though. Applejack turned to my sister and pointed in the direction of the farm. “Well, that might has well have been what happened! We were waiting on y’all so I could show you what’s wrong!”

Now that we were, indeed, all there, Applejack led us to Sweet Apple Acres, where all the dark, leafless trees were met with a gasp from everyone there save Rarity, who dramatically fainted onto a pillow she put beneath herself. “Y’all know it’s about time for the busiest apple harvest of the season to begin, and all these dead trees were perfectly healthy just a little while ago!”

Pinkie began bouncing around the trees, looking up at the barren branches. The hyperactive pony began to sniff at the roots, circling it like a dog tracking a rabbit. She then began to tap the trunk with both hooves, holding her ear to it as she did so.

Leaning over to her, I nudged Applejack while keeping my eyes on Pinkie Pie. “What exactly is she doing?”

It seemed ponies rolling their eyes was today’s recurring theme. “Just being Pinkie Pie. We’ve all learned by now that there’s no real point in trying to say anything. It’s just better to wait until she gives up.”

Well it only took about half an hour before Pinkie finally walked over to us with her head down. “I got nothing.”

Now it was my turn to try something. I slowly ascended, looking at all the girls. “Well, if these trees are in the way, let’s just pull them up so they’re not a bother anymore!” I rushed toward one of them, and had I been running instead, I would’ve come to a screeching halt.

“Nova.” It’s strange how somepony could stop me in my tracks just by saying my name. Twilight tapped her hoof against the ground, her brow lowered and her eyes half closed as she stared at me. “Think.” I slowly made my way back to the group as Twilight pulled a few pieces of bark off the dead trees. “I’ll take this back home and take a look at it. Maybe it’s just something natural, like a sickness. We don’t want to jump to any conclusions,” she then turned to me as she finished, “do we?”

My ears fell flat as I gave her a nervous grin. She didn’t give anypony a chance to speak, though. “I also sent a letter to Princess Celestia about those problem clouds, and she said she’d send some help over right away.”

She had to have planned that. As soon as Twilight closed her mouth, the loud roar as three of the legendary Wonderbolts passed over us, and one in particular caught my eye. With my focus still on her, I elbowed Rainbow. “Sis, do I see who I think I see?”

She let out a nervous chuckle, trying to pull me away. “What? I-I don’t know what you’re talking about, Nova! I didn’t see anypony. Say, how about we see what we can do to help Twilight, huh?”

My sister knew me well enough to know that if that Pegasus ever showed her face near me again, the last thing I wanted to do was avoid her. Applejack must’ve noticed my glare as well, given the fact that she was now nudging me. “Uh, Nova, everything alright? You look like just stole your win.”

I slowly turned to the farm pony, and she drew back a bit when she looked me in the eyes. “You have no idea.” I made my way towards the three pegasi, but I could still hear her say “What the hay does that mean?” as I did. Once I had approached them, I couldn’t help but snicker as I saw my former classmate struggling with the clouds just as I had. “Having trouble there, Spitfire?”

The captain of the Wonderbolts turned to me, sporting a rather happy expression given who had just addressed her. “Wait, is that you, Nova Dash?” Her fake joy was rather convincing as she flew over to me, holding her hoof out. “It’s been way too long, Nova, how are you? I heard that accident didn’t keep you from getting back on the track, but I’ve still been worried.”

Her eyes widened as I smacked her hoof down. “Don’t act all friendly with me. You know why I called you out!”

“I do?” The mare raised her brow at me, lifting her goggles. “If you didn’t come to say hello to an old friend, than I have no idea what you want.”

I closed the gap between her face and mine, and I’m sure if it were literally possible, she’d have a hole between her eyes from my glaring. “Don’t play dumb, Spitfire. I want a race, a rematch to make up for our last encounter.”

Spitfire’s mouth opened slightly, her brows angled upward. “Nova, we’re kind of busy right now. I don’t know what your problem is, but I don’t have time for any sort of race.”

“Fine! Tomorrow at noon. Be here, or be a coward, you hear me?”

Now she was starting to return my hostility, pushing against my head as she gritted her teeth. “Fine! But after I win, you have to tell me what’s gotten into you!”

“No problem, because when I win, you have to agree to have the race published in newspapers across Equestria!”

Her glare was now almost as menacing as mine. “Deal.”

Rarity finally picked herself up, shaking her head as she watched my brother. “Rainbow Dash, what on earth is your brother doing?”

Pinkie Pie was still bouncing, despite not being able to find anything with that tree. “Nova doesn’t look happy at all. He needs a big old slice of chocolate cake to turn that frown upside down!”

I let out a sigh as all my friends met me with both worried and slightly upset expressions. This was another situation I didn’t think I’d need to bring up, just like how I didn’t think I’d need to tell Nova about Zecora, but after a deep breath, I tried to remember as much of the story as I could. “Nova doesn’t like Spitfire too much anymore.”

Twilight tilted her head at me. “Anymore?”

After another sigh, I sat myself down and told them everything I remembered. “Nova and Spitfire were in flight school together since Nova first entered, so they’ve been friends for a long time.”

The prissy unicorn piped up, interrupting me and leaving me with an unamused, straight face. “Wait, that would make her only a year or two older than you, would it not?”

I gave her a nod, turning back to the Wonderbolts struggling with those clouds. “Yes, she now holds the record for the youngest Wonderbolt Captain since the group was established. See, the thing is… my brother believes that title should’ve belonged to him.”

“Yes, it should have.” My brother touched down in the middle of the circle we had now formed, looking up as the three pegasi made their exit. “Spitfire and I had been friends since our days in the Cloudsdale Academy for Advanced Flyers. We were the best of friends, always trying to outdo each other with friendly competition, and that continued on to our entrance into the EAAR. She and I climbed our way through the minor and major circuits and go to the pro league together, but once we were there, she tore our friendship to shreds.”

Twilight held her hoof up, stopping him in his tracks. “Wait. Nova, if you went to the academy, why didn’t Rainbow Dash?”

I leaned back with my hooves behind my head, floating a little ways off the ground. “Too many rules. All that school would’ve done was hold me back.”

Our favorite farm mare looked over at Nova again, cocking a brow. “How exactly did she ‘tear your friendship to shreds?’”

Now it was his turn to sit down. “It was almost two years ago when Spitfire and I completed our first season in the professional racing league. It wasn’t that uncommon for a racer with exceptional skill to be accepted into the Wonderbolts if they took enough interest, and with their captain retiring that year, they decided that the pony with the most points in the poll and the most cup wins of that season would receive the honor of assuming leadership of the group.”

That part he never told me. “Whoa, whoa, whoa! You’re saying that they decided who would lead the Wonderbolts based on this one race?”

The expression I was met with caused me to put on a sheepish grin, backing away as he continued. “It was the Haytona 500, sis. Only the best of the best of the best earn enough merit to participate in the last race of the season. Both Spitfire and I were tied in the poll, and we both had the same number of cup wins that season. Throughout the entirety of the race, we battled for first place, occasionally being passed only to take the position back. Finally, at the fifth from final lap, I guess she had had enough of me and pushed me just enough to send me into the wall, effectively taking me out of the race! That brought me down to fifth place in the poll, and it was my first, and still my only, DNF in my entire career! When I ran into the wall, the resulting crash broke my wing and my leg, and it took a good month for the bones to completely heal. Don’t you see? Spitfire basically cheated to get to where she is now!”

All jaws were dropped but mine. Taking a hold of my brother, I tugged on him to get his attention. “Nova, I’ve met Spitfire before. I know I was there when that crash happened, and I saw her nudge you, but how do you know she was trying to wreck you?”

They all nodded in agreement, and Twilight set her hoof on Nova’s shoulder. “I’ve been scolding you quite a bit on jumping to conclusions and acting without thinking, Nova. Don’t you think you should’ve at least talked to her before challenging her to a race for vengeance?”

He threw his hooves into the air, shaking his head. “No, no! Twilight, I never said anything about vengeance! Pardon my language, but yet, I’m pissed off beyond belief, but I want this rematch because one of two things will come out of it: if Spitfire wins, I’ll know she did it fairly this time, and if I win, I’ll know I’m still the faster Pegasus. Besides, I know she cheated, and I’m not going to give up until I force her to play fair!”

I lowered my head, still looking at him as he began to fly off. “So you’re really going through with this?”

“I have to, sis. If I don’t, I’ll never be able to see Spitfire the way I used to, as a friend. I’ll still see her as a cheater, but at least I’ll know she can play fair when she wants to.”

Chapter 4: The Race

Courageous
Story 1
Chapter 4: The Race
By: SleeplessScribe

With nothing left to do but wait for Twilight to finish doing… whatever she was doing, all the girls went their separate ways to continue their own work. My brother, however, immediately began gathering clouds so he could shape the track for tomorrow’s race. Of course, I helped, but my goal was still trying to talk him out of it.

“Nova, what’s gotten into you? You even told me yourself that you’d gotten over this issue.” Packing clouds isn’t as easy of a job as it sounds, and Nova had to finish stuffing together a few before he could respond.

“You know, sis, I thought I was too. I was even happy for you when you wrote to me about getting into the Wonderbolt Academy. It’s just… seeing Spitfire in that costume, knowing what she did to gain the privilege to wear it, it just makes me so mad. Look, I know you look up to her, and that’s one reason I’m going through with this. All I want is one race so I can either prove to myself that I’m better than she is or that she can at least win a race cleanly.”

As of now, the cloud walls of the makeshift track stretched from Twilight’s balcony to just a little ways away from Cloudsdale, but a typical professional-grade race track was about twice this size. “You know, there’s no guarantee you would have won, even if she hadn’t bumped you, and what makes you think she did it on purpose? You said it yourself; you and she used to be best friends, and why would she do something like that to her best friend?”

He let out a low sigh, kicking one of the clouds into the wall. “I don’t know! Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t, but until I hear a better story, I’m sticking to my own.”

“Come on, Nova. Isn’t there anything I can say or do to convince you not to do this?”

My brother slowly shook his head, not even bothering to look at me as he responded. “No.”

The rest of our work continued in silence. By the time we were finished, the track started at Twilight’s balcony, stretched up to Cloudsdale, turned right and over the mountain Canterlot was built into, then looped back to Ponyville. It was very late, and as the last cloud was stuffed into the makeshift wall, both of us were yawning. As we made our way back home, Nova drifted beside me, patting my back.

“Rainbow… I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.”

I closed my eyes for a moment, debating on whether or not to hold myself back. “I’m gonna be honest, here, you did. You embarrassed me a lot. Did you see my friends’ faces when you came back? Not only that, but Spitfire too! You know I pretty much idolize her, and yet you still let your own anger get in the way of that. Honestly, I’m surprised I’m still able to talk to you!”

My sister’s words cut pretty deep. However, I’m no longer afraid to admit that I was still a complete hardhead, and no matter what, I was going to win that race. Rainbow decided to sleep indoors tonight, and I didn’t blame her; after what she said, I was starting to feel like a real jerk. When morning finally came, it felt like I hadn’t gotten but maybe three hours of sleep.

I decided it was probably for the best to avoid my sister and her friends, at least until the end of the race. Then, maybe they’d at least give me a chance to apologize for being such a… butt. Despite how much I was dwelling on how brash I had been, it was hard to focus on anything with an empty stomach. From what I remembered during my sister’s tour of the town, there was a little restaurant not too far from where I currently was, and lucky for me, it was open.

What wasn’t so lucky was the fact that just a few tables over from me, my new favorite unicorn had seated herself, and the first thing she did was turn to me. Honestly, it felt kind of ridiculous that she had this kind of power over me, but the authority she projected was also something to be respected as she held her hoof out to me, then pointed to the seat across from her. “You. Here. Now.”

After gulping down a lump in my throat, I made my way to her. I sat down, but for the life of me, I couldn’t look her in the eyes. “We need to talk. Rainbow Dash has made it quite clear that we can’t change your mind. So, because you’re going to go through with this, I want you to at least do something for me. Do something for all of us.”

My response was interrupted by the waiter, but we both made our orders as quickly as possible so we could continue. “What is it?”

She closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. “Don’t think about why you actually challenged Spitfire. If you go into this race just looking to take her down, nothing good is going to come out of it. Treat this like you would any other race, and when it’s all over, don’t treat her like the bad guy. You don’t know all the details, so instead of rushing headlong into everything you do, for once, take my advice and think. There may have been more to that situation than you realize, and you just assumed that she crashed you on purpose.”

I let out a long sigh, finally managing to actually look up at my friend. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks Twilight, looks like I have a leash to grab me when I get out of line now.”

Twilight giggled a little at my joke. “If you think I’m bad, you should see Fluttershy when she gets to scolding.”

Rolling my eyes, a chuckle of my own let itself out. “Fluttershy? Twilight, unless there was a little animal in danger, she couldn’t raise her voice to save her life.”

A sly grin formed on the unicorn’s face as our sandwiches arrived. “Did you know she saved Ponyville from a dragon? Did you know that, by herself, she reformed an evil draconequus bent on chaos and destruction? Would you believe me if I told you she was the deciding factor when Ponyville was chosen to bring water up to Cloudsdale this year?”

Again, she started to giggle at my wide-eyed, open-mouthed face. The two of us spent almost all morning talking in between bites of our meals, and while what I learned was probably already stuff my sister already knew or wouldn’t care about, I found it pretty interesting. My conversation sealed the deal; one day I absolutely had to prove to Rainbow that knowledge can be helpful even to ponies as athletic as she and I.

Before we knew it, it was almost time for lunch, and we were still in the same place we had been since breakfast. “Twilight, I have to thank you again. I’m feeling a whole lot better than I did yesterday, and I feel like I can go into this race doing as you asked, now.”

She raised her hoof into the air, looking past me and into the sky. “Well, we’re about to find out.”

It was obvious it was still her, but Spitfire looked completely different with her mane down and without her costume. Her eyes shifted between Twilight and I before finally resting on me. “We gonna do this or what? I don’t have all day, sorry to say.”

Rising from my seat, I held my hoof out to her. “Spitfire, I want to apologize before we even start. I don’t want to hear anything about anything until the race is over, but I have something I need to ask afterward.”

The Wonderbolt looked down at my hoof for a moment before slowly shaking it, though she still wasn’t smiling. “You know, that hurt me yesterday. I see a foalhood friend for the first time in two years, and what does he do? Gets an attitude with me for no good reason. You’d better have an explanation ready.”

“Save it for after the race. I tell you all about what my problem is after you’re finished eating my dust.” I gave her a smug grin, and after a moment, she finally responded with one of her own.

“I hope you still like me as much as you used to, because all you’re going to be seeing is my rear end!” After a moment of awkward stares from both Twilight and I, she cleared her throat. “Um… that came out wrong. Where do we start?” I led her towards Twilight’s library and up onto the balcony, where a bunch of the townsfolk, including my sister and her friends, were gathered underneath to watch.

I pointed up towards Cloudsdale, tracing the path of the “track” with my hoof. “We’re doing three laps along these clouds. First one back here at the end of the third lap wins, and try to keep it clean.”

Spitfire drew back, her mouth agape as if I had just insulted her mother. “Excuse me? I would never dream of cheating!”

I rolled my eyes as I took my starting position. “Right, whatever.” She did the same, and my sister herself was on a cloud in the middle of the track with a flag. After a nod from both of us, she swung it down, and we were off.

Spitfire used the same tricks I did with body positioning, so there was no margin whatsoever for error. While Cloudsdale wasn’t that far of a horizontal distance from Ponyville, one had to go considerably higher up to get to the actual city. The Wonderbolt managed to stay ahead of me for a good part of the section that went through our home, but by the time we were turning to fly over the mountain, we were even.

“Gotta admit, Spits, the view back there isn’t bad, but I’d much rather be up here!”

“Quit doing that, you’re leaving me with nothing but dirty jokes to make!”

It was all I could do to keep from laughing as we passed over the mountain. Twilight was right, since I wasn’t dwelling on the accident that ruined me, I was remembering how much fun racing against this mare had been. As we made the return trip back to the library for the first lap, I began to pull ahead, but since Spits was on the inside, she managed to even it out again on the turn. The second lap was the same as the first; Spitfire was always better at pure ascension than I was, so going up to Cloudsdale allowed her to pull again, but I caught up again once we went through the city.

We always joked about how the two of us filled in each other’s gaps, and it was kind of true; the Wonderbolt was better with ascension, but going down helped me to accelerate a lot faster than her. I also had the inside of the lane this time, so I widened the gap a bit more as we turned to begin the third and final lap. This time around, Spitfire’s ascension only managed to bring her muzzle up to my neck, and it stayed that way through the city in the clouds and all the way to the mountain. Spitfire managed to get the inside again, so the turn from the mountain to Twilight’s evened us out, but now it was all downhill.

Before I knew it, the line of clouds above the balcony was broken, and both of us landed, panting and out of breath. My sister flew over to us as fast as she could, her hooves on her cheeks and her lips pursed like she was making a kissy face. “I take it back, I’m glad you went through with it. That was so awesome!”

I had to speak in between pants, looking up at her from my current sitting position. “Who won?”

The quiet Pegasus approached us, trying to push the words out. “You, um, tied.”

“We tied?” It was kind of funny hearing us shout at the same time; this was the first time in our history together that we never had an actual winner after a race. Turning to her with a grin, I nudged her shoulder. “Well, at least you raced fair this time.”

Spitfire jumped up, giving me a sort off irritated-but-not-angry glare. “Yeah, what was that about? You know I would never cheat at a race!”

Now I was on my hooves, giving her the same agitated gaze. “Which is why you pushed me into the wall to win our first Haytona 500, isn’t it?”

The mare backed away some, her eyes wide. She raised a hoof to her chest, lowering her head a little as she looked back at me. “Nova… I didn’t do that to take you out.”

Rolling my eyes again, I scoffed at her response. “Really? What other reason could you possibly have for dragging my numbers down so far and putting me in a cast for a month?”

Her surprised expression faded as she sighed, replaced by a more mellow look. “If I hadn’t done anything, you probably would’ve crashed head-first into the wall and snapped your neck!” She saw my open my mouth, but pressed her hoof against it. “Do you remember Stormcloud? That Pegasus that apparently had some kind of vendetta against us? He was there too, and he wasn’t very happy. Stormcloud started near the back, and it took him most of the race to get up close to us. I caught him pushing other racers around left and right, knocking them into each other and kicking them, and then he headed straight for you. Nova, I didn’t nudge you, he tried to push both of us into the wall, and I was just trying to move you out of the way. I’m sorry that my trying to help caused you to crash, I truly am, but it would have been much worse had Stormcloud gotten a hold of you. I hate to say it, but if you had been paying more attention to what was going on around you, you would have seen him coming too.”

I fell to my knees after she was finished, my head hanging. At this point, I couldn’t speak now. Luckily, she wasn’t actually done. “Not only that, but even if you didn’t crash, there was no guarantee you were going to win, anyway. Let me see if I understand: You have been holding a grudge against your best friend for the past two years because you thought she purposely made you wreck and kept you from becoming captain of the Wonderbolts?” After a slow nod from me, she shook her head. “I hate to say this, Nova, but with an attitude like that, you could never join our lowest of ranks. You’ve always had an issue with jumping to conclusions and acting without thinking, and you never even bothered to ask me what actually happened! Had I not been so busy, I would’ve come to see you, but after not hearing from you in so long, even after my schedule emptied up some, I just thought you didn’t want to see me.”

Even looking at her was impossible right now, looking anywhere but down was impossible. All of my sister’s friends were now gathered, watching me experience more shame in a few minutes than I’ve felt in all my life. “I’m sorry, Spitfire. Please, please tell me you can forgive me?”

She set her hoof on my shoulder, softly patting it. “We’ve been together since we were young. Of course I can forgive you.” After a sigh, she turned her back to me. “Unfortunately, because of this, I’m afraid come next racing season, you will be barred from acceptance regardless of how well you do.”

Jumping up, my eyes widened and my jaw dropped; I guess that was today’s facial trend. “I- You- Say what?”

The mare slowly shook her head as she spread her wings. “I’m sorry, Nova, but even if, as a friend, I see you once again as the colt I used to love, as leader of the Wonderbolts, I can’t allow a pony so cocky to join, nor a pony that speaks and acts before they think. When you can learn to fix those two issues, then we’ll start paying attention to your racing performance again.” With that, she flew off, leaving my once again with my ears flat and my head down.

As I began to wallow in self-pity, I realized two things. One: that would give me a similarity to Rarity, and two: she just said something that I was just now picking up on. “Wait… did she say ‘love’?” Letting out a loud groan, I fell on my back with my hooves on my forehead. “What is that mare trying to do to my head?”

Apparently Applejack and Rarity had other things to attend to, as only my sister, Fluttershy, and Twilight were still there when I picked myself up. The unicorn’s hoof pressed lightly against my shoulder as she looked at me. “This may not be the best time, but do you finally see what I’ve been trying to tell you? Your recklessness and rashness have resulted in a big consequence.”

“Yes, Twilight, I get it. So what do I do now?”

All three of them gave me a shrug. “Well, I’ve seen you starting to change already, but this isn’t something we can actually help you with.”

I rubbed my chin for a moment before turning to the pegasi. “Hey, sis, would you and Fluttershy mind breaking up the track for me? I know I was the one who wanted it, but there’s something I need to do as soon as possible.”

They both gave me nods and made their way to the clouds. All things considered, I probably shouldn’t have asked Flutters because of her weak flying, but I had enough faith in my sister to keep anything bad from happening to her.

Twilight tilted her head at me. “What exactly is it that you need to do?”

With a smile on my face I turned to her. “I need to check through your library, if you don’t mind.”

Chapter 5: Courage and Thought

Courageous
Story 1
Chapter 5: Courage and Thought
By: SleeplessScribe

Geeze, Twilight had a lot of books! I mean, she did live in a library, but still. I perused all her titles, starting in the “W” section, pulling out anything I thought might help. The unicorn herself watched me curiously, examining the books I was talking out. “Nova, what exactly are you looking for in here?

“Anything on weather anomalies. I figure there’s gotta be something about those clouds in here somewhere.” I heard her clap, a smile on her face.

The unicorn walked over to me, skimming over all the books I had picked out. “Wow, that’s quite a lot. Are you sure you can read all of them?”

I turned to her, giving her a sly grin. “I was hoping you wouldn’t mind helping me.”

She responded to my grin with a giggle, taking half the books from the stack. “Not at all, Nova. Shoot, I’ll have these books read in no time, I’m quite the speed reader.”

Picking up one of the books while she wasn’t looking, I flipped to the very end and looked at it. “Nope, nothing helpful in this one.”

“Wait, you, how did you do that?”

I couldn’t help but laugh at her confused face. Being inside the library was kind of unnerving, considering one wrong move with my wings could throw down all the books off a shelf, so I decided it was best to stay on the ground for now. “By flipping to the last page!”

Twilight playfully hit me in the shoulder, flipping through one of the books. “Alright, let’s quit goofing around. You know, Nova, this idea was actually pretty good thinking. I mean, even if we don’t find out something about those odd clouds, specifically, there may still be information in here that might help.”

After a nod, I returned to the front of the book I currently had. “Twilight, when I first pulled that stupid stunt with the timber wolves, you told me there was a difference between courage and recklessness. I have to ask, is it actually possible to be brave without being heedless?”

She thought for a moment, turning to me when she was ready to speak. “Of course, it is. I’ll also tell you about something else: fear. Fear an emotion caused by the belief that something or someone is dangerous or harmful. If someone were to ask me, I’d tell them that the difference between being courageous and being rash is how you handle that feeling. When you’re reckless, you act without thinking or caring about the danger or harm. Courage and caution go together; you acknowledge the danger, but you don’t let it stop you, so you act with regard to that danger. Does that make sense?”

Some of what she was saying went over my head, but I think I got the point. “Basically the fact that I’ve been doing stuff with no regard for my own safety is what makes me reckless.”

“Exactly.”

I let out a sigh before actually starting to read. “I’ll try and remember that from now on.”

“Please do. I don’t know you well enough yet for you to end up in the hospital or something.” Twilight was surprising me with her multitasking. When I looked over to her, she was already six pages in.

Unfortunately, I’m a male, and according to ninety percent of females in Equestria, we can’t multitask, so I found myself unable to focus on reading as I talked with the unicorn. “Oh? And what’s what supposed to mean?” I would say that anyone looking at me would say my grin was either really stupid or really smug.

I actually don’t think she realized what she said as her cheeks turned pink. “What, what did I say? I didn’t say anything. Just telling you to remember to start thinking about your own safety, even when you’re doing something brave or dangerous.”

My grin remained as I teasingly poked my head between hers and the book from above. “There was also that part about ‘not knowing me well enough yet for me to end up in the hospital or something’?” Twilight was becoming my sister in terms how much fun she was to tease, and the face she made in reaction to me repeatedly raising my brows just made her more adorkable. Yes, that’s a word. I said so.

“I was just saying that we’re friends, but I don’t know that much about you, still. All I really know is that you’re an athlete with more intelligence than his sister.”

Rolling my eyes, I gave her another grin with lowered eyelids. “You know what can fix that, right? A couple dates.”

The unicorn backed away, her face bright red at my words, leaving me to fall on the floor, laughing. “Excuse me?”

“I’m just playing with you, Twilight! You’re way fun to mess with, no offense.”

After a sigh, she returned to her book with a smile. “None taken. Just… take it easy, I thought you were serious for a minute.”

Now I was starting to think she wanted me to make these jokes. I came up close to her face sporting the same expression I had earlier, and said “How do you know I wasn’t?” However, her new expression wiped the look off of my face, bringing a nervous grin out of me. “Right, sorry. You know, Twilight, I will say this seriously: you’re a lot cooler than I expected you to be.”

She continued flipping the pages as she giggled. “I’m not sure if I should be offended or flattered. Anyway, we’re not getting anywhere distracting each other like this.”

I returned to the book I had barely even starting, giving her a “pfft”. “Twilight, you’ve been doing most of the talking while reading, don’t talk to me about distractions!” After another laugh from her, I began my own reading. Had it been anyone other than Twilight, I would’ve been slightly ashamed at the fact that I had only finished two books in an hour as opposed to her five, and honestly, the only thing I was really learning about was weather itself, no strange occurrences or anomalies yet.

No Pegasus should have to admit this, but I honestly didn’t know a whole lot about clouds, rain, and the like; all I knew was how to move clouds. After a while, Twilight was starting to take books from my stack, and eventually when I reached for another one, they were gone. I fell on the floor, looking up at the studious mare. “Gah, how long have we been at this?”

Twilight closed the last of the books I had pulled out and looked down at me. “Three and a half hours.”

“Really? It doesn’t feel like that long. Did you find anything?”

Unfortunately, the mare shook her head. “Nothing specifically about these black clouds we’ve been seeing. Most of the material I read through was about how certain weather is created and how it works.” She looked through the window, and despite being on the floor, I could see through it as well. I guess the sight of my sister made her think of it when she asked me, “Say, Nova, I know racing season must be over now, but if you haven’t been able to visit your sister in such a long time, what’s changed to give you time to do it now?”

It was really a stupid reason, and I had looked into getting that rule changed, but in the end my efforts were shot down by the owners of the EAAR. “All professional league racers are required to spend a minimum of four years in their special training camp. I found it totally dumb that they made us do that, but their claim was that ‘not only does it give our racers a specialized training regimen to follow, but it also promotes sportsmanlike conduct by supporting interaction between racers.’ Sometimes I wonder if the heads of the association are even thinking about the stuff they do.”

I really didn’t want the subject to stay on my absence, so I thought of something more relevant to the current situation. “Twilight, about the clouds. Obviously, these things aren’t normal, but if they’re still actual clouds, than they’re basically a whole bunch of condensed water droplets, right?”

“Well, yes, that’s assuming they are indeed just very strange clouds.”

“Alright, so if that’s the case, wouldn’t it be possible to either cause those droplets to evaporate again, or, if need be, saturate them so much that it causes them to precipitate?”

She raised her hoof to her chin, tapping it as she spoke. “Well, in order to do either of those, you’d need an incredible amount of heat. Clouds form when water evaporates into vapor and rises. As it gets higher, that vapor condenses again into a cloud. Eventually more droplets will be added into the cloud until the cloud can’t hold any more, and that’s what happens to make it rain. At least, when nature runs its course. It’s obviously quite different when pegasi control the weather.”

As she talked, I found it so odd how two ponies can give birth to a pony that found stuff like this so interesting, and then another one after him that only found interest in naps and trying to be faster than her brother. “So based on the assumption that these clouds are actually clouds, it might be possible to get rid of them by either heating up the air around them enough to cause the condensed water to become vapor again, or evaporate enough water to have them saturate the clouds, correct? Do you know any kind of spells that could generate that much heat?”

The hoof remained on her chin, her brow now furrowed. “I could try one, but environmental changing spells are rather difficult, so I wouldn’t be able to keep it up for long.”

“I think I may have another idea.”

Taking apart those clouds took a lot longer than I thought it would. However, after almost four hours, we were finally done. We made our way to Twilight’s to let my brother know we were done, but as we did, everything suddenly got dark. “What the hay? Hey, it’s supposed to be sunny for the rest of the day, what’s going on?”

Fluttershy nudged my shoulder, pointing at the sky. “Um, Rainbow Dash, Nova’s moving clouds.”

As I looked to where she was pointing, I saw my brother packing in clouds in front of the sun, eventually spreading them out once the entire thing was covered. Flying up to him, I would have managed to knock him on the head had he not ducked. “Nova, what are you doing? Today was supposed to be completely sunny!”

He seemed not to care about my obvious displeasure. “Sorry, sis, but I need to do this, and you need to help. Twilight and I have an idea for getting rid of these problem clouds, but in order to pull it off, we need to shield everypony until we spread the word for them all to stay indoors.”

I shook my head quickly, raising my brow at him. “What are you talking about? What exactly are you planning?”

Without a word, he grabbed me and pulled my back down to the ground with him. “That doesn’t matter right now, let’s just go around and spread the word, alright? The sooner everypony is inside, the sooner we can get rid of these problems.”

That’s exactly what we did. Basically, Fluttershy and I helped Nova inform all the citizens in Ponyville to stay indoors without any idea why we were even doing it. I don’t say this often, but my brother can be a real pain sometimes. “So, why exactly are we doing this?”

He opened his mouth, but before he could get anything out, Twilight ran up to us, already getting a sentence out before she even stopped moving. “I just got a letter back. Everything’s ready to go, but it can’t stay this way for very long. Is everyone under a roof?”

My brother gave a kind of goofy salute. “Yes ma’am!”

All I heard from the unicorn was “We” before a loud roar echoed through the entire town. Immediately, Nova took off towards it, leaving us with no choice but to follow if we didn’t want him doing something crazy. Once again, we all found ourselves at the edge of the Everfree Forest, where a mass of those black clouds had now come together, forming some kind of monster.

Its wings were spread out, wider than any Pegasus wingspan I’ve ever seen. Its four legs sported freakish claws on each foot, and at the head was a huge beak and two beady red eyes. Whatever this thing was, it wasn’t friendly, and it wasn’t happy.

Fluttershy was already cowering, curled up behind my brother. “What in Equestria is that thing?”

Both Nova and I looked up at the sky, but I guess he noticed it before me. “Well, whatever it is, it’s made of those clouds that have been giving us trouble. Which means, if we can get rid of this thing, that might just solve the whole problem.”

Nova made a move towards it, but he found himself trapped in a magic grasp and being pulled backwards. Twilight said, “Wait, all of you! Look, something is inside of that thing!”

After squinting my eyes, I saw it too. I couldn’t make it out very well, but the silhouette basically resembled a smaller version of the shape the smog had now taken. “Do you think it’s trapped in there, or do you think it is this thing?”

The unicorn shook her head, biting her lower lip a little. “I’m not sure. I’ve never seen anything like this before, so I couldn’t tell you. Nova, what do you- Nova?”

He wasn’t there. Of course, while Twilight was distracted, he had decided to start messing with the monster. It was swiping at him as he flew circles around it, managing to stay out of reach. “Rainbow, Fluttershy, get up to the clouds blocking the sun and get ready for my signal! Twilight, is it going to move on its own, or is she watching?”

She looked up at the clouds Fluttershy and I were now holding for a moment, turning back to Nova. “She said she’d be watching for when those very clouds move!”

“Alright, good. Now you get under something, Twi!” My brother flew up a bit higher, looking down. When he saw that this thing was following him, he sped up, heading right for us. He kept having to swerve to the side to avoid getting struck with those claws, but once Twilight was under a bench and he was right in front of the “sun shield”, he shouted out “Now!” and quickly dove under the beast.

Fluttershy and I pulled apart the clouds as fast as we could, and the sun was huge. It was closer than I had ever seen it before, and it was beaming right down on the cloud monster. Well, it would have been if there were still any of those black clouds left. However, my eyes widened and I rushed towards what was left of it as the sun returned to its normal position in the sky, catching her before she hit the ground.

Her body was covered in cuts and bruises, and there were spots on her body where her fur was missing that had clearly been burned prior to the sun exposure. Despite this, I could still easily recognize her, and I think Nova could to as all three of them walked over to me. He kneeled down, moving the feathers out her face. “Sis… isn’t this your old friend Gilda?”

Chapter 1: First Impressions

Courageous
Story 1
Chapter 1: First Impressions
By: SleeplessScribe

Ah, mornings in Ponyville were always so lovely. Well, unless the Pegasus ponies scheduled rain for that day, but even then it was in the afternoons for the most part. Spike was still asleep from a long night of staying up to help me study, and I thought he deserved a little rest for his hard work. I had some errands to run outside of the library, so I decided the best use of this amazing morning was to take care of them.

As always, I prepared a checklist for myself, with the first item of which to be checking my checklist. “Hm, let’s see, restock on quills, pick up my new ‘101 Ways to Cross Reference Data Printing’, pick up those sweets for Rainbow Dash’s surprise, and double check my check list! Check!” With a delighted smile, I checked off the box for checking off my checklist. I couldn’t help but think back to two days ago when Rainbow gathered us all together. She was rather excited about something, and gave us each something to bring to a picnic today. Picnics, first off, weren’t really something Rainbow Dash would be one to organize, and second, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything not Wonderbolt related get her so excited.

Regardless of her reasons, I made my way to the parchment store to pick up my quills, and of course, after I had gotten as many as I wanted, I checked the box off my list. The next stop was the post office to pick a book I had just ordered. Of course, the library had a copy of it, but I wanted to get my own copy for personal use. After all, you never know when somepony will come in needed to know how to cross reference their data from multiple research experiments! Once the book was in my saddlebag and its corresponding spot on my list was checked off, it was off to Sugarcube Corner.

It was getting pretty close to ten o’ clock now, and ponies were actually out on the streets now. I have to admit, despite how I felt when I first moved here, I was very glad that Princess Celestia had me move to Ponyville. It was always so nice, and for the most part, peaceful. There was the occasional sleeping dragon and rampant draconequus attack, but for the most part, peaceful.

Zoom!

Allow me to add the occasional Rainbow Dash waking up at a decent time and flying around at top speed, knocking ponies down and causing them do drop their bags to the list of issues Ponyville had every now and again.

Except, this wasn’t Rainbow Dash. Slowly, a bright orange Pegasus sporting a red and yellow mane slowly returned to me. His light green eyes widened as he rushed over, helping me up and picking up my book for me. “Aw no, did I do that? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to. Are you hurt at all?”

Well, at least he apologized. Picking up my quills, I turned to him and took the book back. “Oh, it’s fine. Just... watch where you’re going next time.”

With closed eyes, he gave me a wide grin. “I’ll remember that.” The colt’s grin faded as he began to look around. “Say, would you mind helping me? I don’t remember anything since the last time I was here; would you happen to know if Sweet Apple Acres is where it used to be?”

Pointing a hoof in the general direction, I gave him a nod. “It’s not too far down that path, just—"

“Okay, thank you!” Before I could even finish my sentence, he took off.

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. He knocked me over, asked me directions, and didn’t even bother to tell me his name. Who exactly was that Pegasus? As curious as I was, I didn’t have time to follow him and ask. I had yet to get those treats from Sugarcube Corner, and that little accident now put me behind schedule. Well, I’m sure nopony else would mind if I was late, but I still didn’t want to be, regardless.

Mr. and Mrs. Cake already had the cookies and cupcakes ready for me as I came in. Mr. Cake was boxing it up as I entered, but I didn’t see Mrs. Cake anywhere. “Hello, Twilight! How’s your morning been?”

Giving him a small chuckle, I set the bits down on the counter for him. “Um… I think ‘random’ would be the best way to describe it.”

He gave me a concerned look as I picked up the box. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

All I could do was shrug, honestly. “Neither one, really. This reckless Pegasus knocked me over, asked me for directions, and just took off.”

“Well that wasn’t very nice!”

I shook my head quickly at him, somewhat anxious to leave. “Oh no, he did help me up and apologize. He just seemed like he was in a hurry for… something. Well, anyway, thank you for the treats! I’d love to talk more, but I’ve got somewhere to be myself, take care!”

The baker waved at me as I trotted out the door. “Have a good day, Twilight!”

It was almost time for everyone to meet up. The spot Rainbow Dash had chosen was in a flat plain near Sweet Apple Acres, and if I wanted to get there on time, I had to really leg it! It’s a good thing I read so many books on running in preparation for the Running of the Leaves.

Lucky for me, there were no more clumsy Pegasi flying around, so the trip to Applejack’s farm went uninterrupted. The picnic spot was just a short distance from the edge of the orchard, and as I approached it, I saw that both Applejack and Rainbow Dash were already there. However, the third pony that was with took me by complete surprise. As I saw the colt from this morning, part of me began to feel as if I should’ve known he’d be here.

Applejack spotted me as I made my way over to them, waving at me with a smile. “Howdy, Twilight! Glad to see you could make it!”

I set the box down on the blanket that the three were sitting around, trying to keep my eyes off the colt. “Good morning Applejack, Rainbow Dash.” As I trailed off, I wanted to hit myself as I realize that set myself up to say hello to him to without even know his name. However, a light orange hoof was extended to me, and as I looked at the Pegasus, he was smiling.

“Nova Dash. Sorry I didn’t really introduce myself earlier, I was kind of in a rush.”

After a short hoof shake, I was already feeling a bit less awkward around him. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, I’m Twilight Sparkle.” It took me a moment, but after I processed his words, I stared at him with wide eyes. “Wait a second, Dash?”

Rainbow nodded and poked her head between us. “Surprise! Twilight, meet my brother, Nova.”

I shook my head quickly, unsure of how to react to this. “Since when do you have a brother?”

All three of them started laughing, but Applejack managed to finish first. “I didn’t believe it when she first told me, either, but after watching the two of them fly around for a little bit, there ain’t no way these two can’t be related somehow!”

Both Pegasi gave me wide grins, but all I could do was raise a brow. “If you’ve had a brother this whole time, why haven’t you said anything?”

Nova then turned to his sister with his jaw dropped. “What? Sis, you never mentioned me?”

Rainbow let out a nervous giggle, rubbing the back of her head as she moved away from her sibling a bit. Her eyes darted from side to side, eventually focusing on me. “Well, the same reason you never talked about yours! Why say something when nopony asks you about it?”

As Nova and I both said it, I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or be a little spooked. “Oh, that’s a good point.” When we finished, the both of us stared at each other for a moment. “That was weird. We did it again!” After a lengthy pause, Nova jumped up and made a noise that sounded like a cross between a dying duck and a flugelhorn.

“Combo breaker!”

Now it was time for all of us to laugh. Between breaths, Rainbow looked at her brother and set a hoof on his shoulder. “Bro, you are so goofy!”

With a proud smile on his face and a hoof on his chest, he responded with a purposefully deep voice. “I try my best.”

In the middle of our laughing fits, we heard a loud gasp as Pinkie Pie bounced up to us, followed by two white hooves that suddenly latched onto Nova’s head. “What the hay?”

Rarity’s eyes were sparkling as she messed with Nova’s mane. “Good heavens, darling, what on earth do you do to make your hair seem so natural? Look at this, your roots are yellow, but each individual strand fades into red as you go up! This is simply marvelous!”

The Pegasus obviously did not appreciate such an intrusion of personal space, and he made this clear through his grunts and audible throat clearing. As Rarity got off of him, a nervous grin on her face, Nova looked over to his sister. “It is natural! Why are you freaking out at a two tone mane, but not my sister’s that’s, like, six different colors?”

Rarity closed her eyes as she spoke. “Well yes I— hold on a moment. Did you say sister?”

Rainbow Dash once again stepped in, pushing the fashionista further away from her brother. “Rarity, I’d like you to meet my brother, Nova Dash.”

While Rarity seemed quite thrilled to meet him, the half-closed eyes and straight mouth told me Nova wasn’t nearly as excited. “Just who is this chick?”

In typical Rarity fashion, she lifted her head and placed a hoof to her chest. “I, my dear, am Rarity, owner of Carousel Boutique and the most beautiful pony in Equestria!”

The colt seemed thoroughly unimpressed, fixing the mess Rarity had made of his spiky mane. “Pfft, I’ve seen prettier.”

I was sure every pony here except Rarity wanted to bust out laughing, but the well-groomed unicorn’s reaction discouraged any sort of positive response. Her eyes widened as she stared at him, her teeth bared and gritted. “Excuse me? And who could you possibly know that is more gorgeous, more fabulous, more absolutely stunning than moi?”

It took him no time at all to respond, and his voice was still flat and unfazed by Rarity’s disbelief and anger. “Fleur de Lis.”

“You know Fleur de Lis?” Always one with a flair for the dramatic, Rarity raised a hoof to her forehead and pretended to collapse onto the picnic blanket, allowing Pinkie to hop over to her and hold her hoof out to the Dash brother.

“Hiya! My name is Pinkie Pie! Nice to meet you, Nova!”

He chuckled as he smiled at her. “Finally another sane pony! Nice to meet you too, Pink—“ As soon as his hoof touched hers, he began shaking as a loud buzzing was heard. Pinkie brought her hoof back, revealing that she had been wearing a hoof buzzer.

Rainbow shot a mean glare at her friend, obviously not happy about the prank. “Pinkie!”

“What?”

Before Rainbow could respond again, Nova picked himself up and began to laugh. Grabbing Pinkie’s other hoof, he shook it with a delighted grin. “I like this one already, sis! You got me good with that one.”

Everyone, except Rarity, started laughing again. Nova seemed nice enough, and Rarity’s current disposition towards him couldn’t really be put into the equation, seeing as how she thought it was a crime against the world not to think of her as anything less than gorgeous. Speaking of Rarity, she finally managed to get up, keeping her attention focused on our new friend.

“Very well, then, Nova. I suppose I can settle for all of Ponyville instead.”

He patted her head teasingly, still keeping his smile. “That’s more fitting, but honestly, I think she’s prettier.”

All heads turned in the direction his hoof was now pointing, causing our timid friend to squeak and freeze in place. Rarity didn’t seem too upset by his response, though she was hardly pleased by it. “I suppose that’s acceptable as well. Fluttershy isn’t that bad looking of a mare either. I mean, she was a model.” With her head still raised and her eyes closed, she made her way to the other end of the blanket.

Nova’s smile returned as he looked to the startled pony. “Is that her name?” Slowly, he ascended into the air, landing in front of Fluttershy and hold out his hoof. “Hi there, Fluttershy, my name’s Nova Dash.”

As I watched her shy away from him, I was brought back to my first day in Ponyville. It took her spotting Spike and thinking he was adorable for her to work up the courage to even speak loudly enough to be heard. Nova tilted his head, moving toward her a little. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Still she backed away, causing Nova to do the same. Fluttershy moved her mane just enough to watch him return to his sister’s side before she slowly made her way over to the opposite side of the blanket from him.

After everypony had gathered, I took it upon myself to do a little evaluation. It doesn’t take long for ponies to draw conclusions and decide if they like or dislike somepony else, and based on my friends’ behaviors, I could tell who was going to act how towards him.

Rarity was obvious, she avoided even looking at him as often as she could, and Rainbow was also obvious. I mean, she is his sister. Applejack gave me a little more trouble; she seemed like she didn’t mind him, but she could still go one way or another, and Pinkie Pie obviously liked him. Even if she didn’t like everyone she met, it was still obvious by her jokes and laughter that the two would get along well. Fluttershy, however, wasn’t giving me any clues at all. The kind mare sort of kept to herself for the majority of the time. She would occasionally take some food and look at Nova, but for the most part she just sat there and listened.

A lot, and I mean a lot of questions were brought up, and a lot of times Nova couldn’t even finish answering one before another was asked, but all was silent when Fluttershy finally spoke up.

“So… why haven’t you come to visit before?”

Eyes darted from Fluttershy to Nova repeatedly, but he didn’t really seem all that unnerved by the question. With a simple shrug, he began his response. “Do you want the long version, or the short?” After four voices responded with “long”, the Pegasus cleared his throat. “Alright then, grab some snacks.”

He waited politely for everyone to get ready for what I assumed to be a rather time-consuming story. “I entered into Junior Speedsters Flight Camp a year before my sister. In that year, I gained a strong passion for racing. When my sis finally did enroll, I balanced speed training and keeping the jerks off of her back, but eventually that came to an end. My love of speed and racing was solidified at my graduation when were put through an obstacle course. Not only did I finish first, but I broke the school record of 20 seconds by completing it in 14! In addition, after I left everyone in the dust and crossed the finish line, this baby appeared.”

Nova paused for a moment, showing us the fiery lightning bolt stamped onto his flank. It was very similar to his sister’s, with the key differences being the fireball in place of the cloud, and the colors. “Once I saw this, I knew competing on the race track was my destiny. If that wasn’t enough to tell me I was born to race, I was also offered a scholarship to enter into Cloudsdale's Academy for Advanced Flyers, the training camp for the Equestrian Association of Airborne Racing! Of course I accepted, and I trained night and day so I could gain entrance to the minor circuit of the actual association. Once I was in, it only took a few years, some hard work, and a lot of wins for me to climb the ladder into my current spot in the professional circuit. One day, I am going to get enough sponsorships and cup wins to earn that much desired acceptance into the Wonderbolts!”

“Wait just a second!” Rainbow jumped up, floating in the air and glaring at her brother. “You never told me you wanted to be a Wonderbolt!”

He gave her a simple shrug, looking at her through one open eye. “Honestly, while it would be totally awesome to join that group, I’m happy where I’m at right now. Anyway, the reason I haven’t been around is because between racing in the lower leagues and continuous training, I just ended up getting distracted every time I thought about coming to see my favorite sister.”

She rolled her eyes, touching down again and playfully hitting his shoulder. “I’m your only sister.”

As they resumed their teasing banter, and Pinkie randomly joined in throwing fake, goofy insults at the both of them, I noticed Fluttershy watching him intently and nudged her. “Fluttershy, is everything alright?”

The shy pony gave me a nod, turning to me. “It’s just… strange. Like looking at male Rainbow Dash. Except a lot sillier.”

Fluttershy made a good point. While Rainbow Dash definitely had a sense of humor, Nova seemed a lot goofier than his sister. That could only mean two things: that he was either going to be a lot of fun to be around, or he was going to be an incredible bother, and I found myself desperately hoping for the former. Nova seemed nice, and it would be so great to have another pony to learn lessons of friendship from.

This was going to be interesting, to say the least.

Author's Note

And there you have it. Don't start jumping to conclusions, this is ALMOST a completely different Nova. I'm going to be doing as much as I can to make this the best, and FINAL, version of Nova's story I will ever write, so I really hope you enjoy.

Chapter 6: No Fear

Courageous
Story 1
Chapter 6: No Fear
By: SleeplessScribe

I felt like I had been hit over the head with a boulder. My head was throbbing, my whole body was weak, and everything everywhere was sore. Everything from my sight to my memory was a blur, keeping me from recognizing any of the faces that met me as I finally came to.

“Gilda, hey, you alright?” I could at least recognize gender, and this was a male. My vision wasn’t completely screwed, so I could make out blurred shapes. I was surrounded, and apparently on my back. There wasn’t enough detail to actually figure out where I was, but judging by the fact that I wasn’t dead, it was at least somewhere friendly. I had bright colors on all sides, and as my vision slowly adjusted, I realized it was all those ponies from my last visit with Dash. After I figured that out, I found myself wondering if this really was a better alternative than what I just came out of.

Looking around at all the ponies, there was only one thing I could respond with. “I’d be a whole lot better if I wasn’t in the custody of the Dweeb Patrol.”

I thought it was a decent comeback, until the bright orange one from a long time ago stepped up right next to my head. “Really, Gilda? Is that how you not only greet your best friend’s big brother, but also thank us for possibly saving your life?”

My eyes widened, and I would have jumped up had my current condition allowed for it. “Nova? Wait, what, how are you here? Well… at least there’s still one cool pony around here.”

The Pegasus rolled his eyes at me. “Alright, drop the ‘cool’ act. You were inside this giant cloud monster, and we need to find out why.”

Shaking my head quickly, the mere mention of that… thing brought back a few memories. Some events were still foggy, but I could recall most of what had happened up until I lost consciousness. “It was my father, he put me in that thing. I knew he wanted to punish me, but he’s been different lately. He’s been even more rude, cruel, and just plain terrible than normal, and I’m not the only griffin he’s made into these monsters. There are even more, and I’m sure more are being made as we speak.”

I let out a loud cough. That little speech had left me breathless, forcing me to pant a bit as my chest rose and sank.

It was odd that none of them looked angry, and even more strange was the fact that we were inside. I couldn’t tell exactly where, but I did know I was in a bed, and the entire place was made out of wood, so it had to be a decent ways away from their lame town. As soon as I was done talking, the nerdiest looking of them all stepped up beside Nova. I don’t think I’ll ever understand why Dash decided to hang out with losers like this. She said, “Gilda, please, do you remember where he is right now? If what you say is true, he could have an army of those things marching on Ponyville right now!”

I got that she was worried, but did she really need to shout like that? My head was already pounding, and her volume didn’t help. Lucky for her, there was no way I could forget the settlement I was born in. “Deep in the Everfree Forest, there are some old ruins. Go all the way through that, and the village will be right at the edge of the forest on the other side.”

The unicorn gave a nod as she began to trot away. “Girls… and Nova, get yourselves ready. I’m going to send a letter to the princess to let her know about this. There’s no doubt in my mind she’ll want to act.”

She didn’t actually get very far, seeing as she was now in the arms, or legs, of the elder Dash. “We don’t have that kind of time, Twi! We could go through there ourselves, right now, and just let the princess know when the trouble’s been dealt with. Let me ask you something: what is the difference between A: Send Celestia a warning, having her send guards to check out the scene, determining whether or not the situation actually demands action, and then receiving orders to go take care of it, and B) going there now, taking care of this ourselves, and letting her know everything’s okay? Answer: four hours!”

The blonde dweeb was the next to speak up. “I’m with Nova on this one. Who knows what could happen by the time we-“

“Twilight!” Another male voice came from below us, and before I knew it, that weird, scaly thing was running up the steps. Despite how little I cared about these dorky ponies, that creature piqued my curiosity. He started waving around a scroll, handing it to the unicorn that was talking earlier. “It’s from Princess Celestia!”

Anybody that could read that fast was even lamer than a regular nerd. “She’s already seen what’s happening. The Princess believes the Elements of Harmony will be necessary, so let’s go get them now!”

All of them took off, save for Nova, who froze in front of me with a smug grin on his face. “Don’t go anywhere, now.” With that, he was off.

“Oh, ha ha, very funny.”

It was quite clear that I was the only one who didn’t understand what was going on. All the girls were rushing to the library, and I was just dragging behind, hoping that they’d tell me. As soon as we entered the library, Twilight led us into another room I had yet to see, opening a display case. Inside were five shiny, gold necklaces with even shinier gems inside, and a head crown thingy. At the time that all this was happening, I didn’t realize it was actually a crown, but even now that I do, the “head crown thingy” will always be its official name.

As Twilight put a necklace on each mare, I noticed that the gem inside resembled their cutie marks as well, and even the head crown thingy was similar to Twilight’s. “Alright, girls, let’s go!”

I hoped they didn’t think I was going to stay out of this, because if they did they were in for a rude awakening. My sister was the only one of the six flying, leaving me enough room to just cruise by them. “I know you all didn’t forget about me, right?”

Twilight opened her mouth, but Rainbow was never bad at talking fast. “Sorry, bro, but this is kind of a job just for us. I hate to say it, but you won’t be much help.”

These girls could move fast when they wanted to. We were already entering the forest when my sis was finished. “So? Rainbow, when was the last I listened to you when you told me I couldn’t do something?”

She couldn’t even respond. The mare let out a long, drawn out “mmm”, but nothing more.

Ideas started flowing through my head as we made our way. Watching them just run through the forest like they were made me wonder if they had already been this way, as they seemed to know every turn to take and not one of the six wandered off. Finally, I had a plan figured out. “Hey Twilight, if more of these monsters are being made, do you think this guy is using the griffins from Gilda’s village to do it?”

I’m sure if she wasn’t running, she would’ve rubbed her chin like she normally does. “That’s not a bad hypothesis. Why do you ask?”

“Well, we’ve learned that we can’t just bust the clouds and that your magic doesn’t work on them, right? We obviously can’t ask the princess to move the sun again, but what if you all focused your efforts on trying to free the griffins?”

“That could work, and it’s at least worth trying to- look out!”

Too late. It was like a repeat of the river accident except without the ferret… or the river. I hadn’t noticed my sister rising up to fly over the ancient arch, and now it was going to have a permanent print of my face on it. “Alright… that hurt.”

Twilight was the only one that actually came over, but at least all of the mares stopped and turned around. We were off again once I was back on my hooves, and before I knew it we stood before the massive wood posts that made up the walls of the griffin settlement. I wish I had had a stopwatch with me; it didn’t feel like it took us any time at all to get here.

However, the question now was how to get in. There was a huge gate, but something told me a simple knock and a polite hello wouldn’t grant us entry. The studious unicorn turned to my sister, but I was already poking my head up above the posts before she could say anything. Well, at least before she could say something to Rainbow. “What can you see, Nova?”

More than I would have liked to. The village consisted of grass huts that were lined up along the inside of the wall, one longhouse on the left and right each, and a large altar in the middle. At that altar stood a griffin larger than any I had ever seen, with wings as black as night, a head of dull grey feathers, and fur that was darker brown than the trees at Applejack’s farm. Standing around the altar were more of those monsters, and more, normal-looking griffins sat before the big guy.

I honestly did not want to see what he was doing to them, so instead I turned to the inside of the gate, slowly and quietly making my way towards it. The remarks from the girls were audible even through the wall, but they were extremely muffled.

“And just what are you doing in the domain of Krieger, pony?” Now the girls were shouting for me, as the big griffin was not only looking at me, but was already behind me before I could even open the gate. “You trespass on my land, and as the chief of this village, I punish trespassers with death.”

Despite how freakishly big and scary this dude looked, I honestly wasn’t frightened or intimidated. Giving him a grin, I leaned against the bar that kept the gate locked, wing situated underneath it. “What did you say? Sir, I’ll have you know I am not trespassing, I’m from child services, and I’ve received a report from your daughter that you’ve been very abusive!”

His cocked brow and crooked beak made me want to laugh; I was honestly expecting this guy to get angry, but the reaction he gave was priceless. “Excuse me?”

Rolling my eyes, I slowly began to lift my wing, taking the bar with it. “Oh, wait, that’s wrong, I’m the guy that can stop your evil plan without even touching you!”

I had no idea the nostrils on a beak could flare, nor that they could puff out smoke. “You dare to challenge me, fool? That cocky attitude of yours will be your undoing!”

He raised one of his claws to strike me, but I was already in the air, and the gate was open, allowing my friends to get in and almost trample the chief. Once he saw what had happened, he let out an angry roar that I just stuck my tongue out to. “Rise, my beasts, and kill them all!”

After that incident with the arch, I had definitely learned my lesson about paying attention to what’s around me, so I didn’t really want to risk looking down at the girls to see how they were doing, seeing as how I now had a giant chicken nugget chasing me. The griffin charged at me, but I eased to the left and watched as he went right passed me. “Smooth move, knucklehead!”

Once again, he roared and charged after me, but I was way too fast for him. I made my way towards the trees that pressed up against the sides of the wall, coming to a halt when I was right in front of one. My speed created a decent gap between the two of us, which gave me time to look down and see that my idea had worked; Twilight and Rarity were using their magic to pull griffins out of their cloud traps while Pinkie, Rainbow, and Flutters grouped them all together so Applejack could tie them up with a lasso. As each one was freed, the cloud monsters disappeared, but there was no more time to watch.

I flew up quickly, and moments later heard a loud clunk. Mr. Big and Bad turned to me again with a furious glare, and that was when I learned that griffins actually had teeth. With my tongue out, I blew a raspberry at him. “You’re too slow!”

History continued to repeat itself, though this time I touched down and took off again, leaving him with a mouthful of dirt as he pulled his head out of the ground. After spitting it all out and turning to me, he was met with the amazing, breathtaking view of my rear end before I started breakdancing in midair. “Come on, step it up!”

When I first was peeking over the wall, I had failed to notice the red flags that were flying at each corner of the settlement, and as Krieger met my altitude again, I pulled one off its pole and waved it. “Toro! Toro! Uh… griffo! Griffo!”

He was panting a little bit now, but that didn’t stop him from shouting and roaring like a maniac. “I’m going to rip you apart!”

Well, if by “rip you apart” he meant slam himself right into the flagpole, he carried out his threat pretty well. At this point, his head was covered in lumps, and the skin had even broken in some places; I could see a little blood in certain spots. I waited for him high above the altar, and this time, instead of immediately charging at me, he took a few seconds for his breathing to return to normal.

“This game of tag is boring.” I wanted to say more, but I had to finish the last steps of my plan, and distracting myself with taunting more than I needed to wasn’t part of it. Instead of leading him into something this time, I flew in continuous circles, and, like an idiot, he followed me. Stunts like this were foal’s play for me seeing as how one of the first practical lessons at the academy tackled dizziness. The big guy, however, was not so fortunate. After a decent bit of time leading him around, he slowed down until he was at a full stop and fell to the ground, too dizzy to move.

I landed beside him with a smug grin on my face. “Told you I’d beat you without even touching you. Alright, girls, he’s all yours.”

They all nodded and stood in a straight line before Krieger, and their Elements began to glow. The ground shook with their power as Twilight’s horn, as well as her eyes, shined brightly. Within moments, the other five were blasting beams out of their necklaces and into Twilight’s head crown thingy, and out of her horn came a bright, powerful rainbow that struck the massive griffin and… set him on fire.

My jaw almost dropped as I saw him become quite literally a fried chicken, but I was able to keep my mouth closed when I saw that the dark body was a shell itself, and after it had burned up, a smaller, but still decently large griffin was left on the ground, still breathing, but obviously too weak to move. That’s not all, either; the smoke that had risen from the flames was moving. It looked like it was moving towards Canterlot, but it disappeared before it got there.

Raising my hoof to my lips, I let out a loud whistle and clapped my hooves together afterwards. “That. Was. So. Awesome! Did you see that? Out of nowhere, you all just went Supermane on this guy!”

In the midst of my excitement, I felt many a hoof patting my back and two lavender forelegs around my shoulders. “Nova, that was amazing!”

My sister chimed in, seizing the chance to rub my head for once. “Yeah! You took on that big turkey all on your own!”

I could only assume that all six of them were going to throw their two cents in, and now it was the timid pegasus’ turn to speak. “That was very brave of you. Woo hoo.” Okay, I have to admit, the way she whispered that “woo hoo” was utterly adorable.

Up next was Little Miss Prissy, and hearing something good about me come out of her mouth was like hearing my sister deny a race. “Fluttershy is absolutely right, my dear. Well done, Nova Dash, well done!”

In typical Pinkie fashion, the bouncy mare was jumping around all of us, not to mention speaking faster than I could fly. “Great googly moogly, Nova you were all bam boom boopity bop and then all whammo boom boom and then all reeow pow! That looked like so much fun!”

Oddly, Applejack seemed the least impressed out of the bunch, though she still sounded like she was decently surprised. “I don’t think I’ve seen anypony move like that since my last rodeo!”

At this point, I’m pretty sure my face was about as red as the ends of my mane. “Ah, stop it, you all. I was just having fun, really. I needed to keep the big oaf from messing with you all while you freed the others, and what better way to keep someone’s attention than making them mad?”

They all started laughing, and before long I was laughing with them. Who’d have imagined that such a serious situation would end in all of us like this?

* * *

When we finally got back to Ponyville, the sun was starting to go down. After all the Elements were returned to Twilight, everypony went their separate way to take care of things they needed to finish, and although my sister went back home for some r and r, I decided to stay with Twilight.

I was still completely hyped from what happened, and it took Twilight using her magic to hold me down for me to finally get under control. “Phew, thanks Twi. I was starting to go Pinkie Pie for a second. I told you that you would somehow become my leash.”

She let out a giggle as she walked up to her door. “Not a problem, but I am curious; why did you decide to walk home with me?”

“Well we did kind of leave a huge mess in your library.”

The mare rolled her eyes at me, the smile still on her face as she opened the door. As we entered, I saw that the entire place was spotless. “This is what happens when you have an amazing assistant like Spike helping you out.

“Speak of the dragon, and the dragon shall appear!” Indeed he did. I had never actually seen Spike before, so the sight of the little dragon jumping out of the door to what I have dubbed “The Element Room” was a bit of a surprise. “And he comes bearing another letter from the princess.”

Twilight returned the Elements to their proper locations and then took the letter, reading it aloud.

“My faithful student

I have received word of your recent success, and would like to extend my congratulation. I realize that it is rather late, but I would like to ask that, if he is still with you, you have your friend Nova Dash come to Canterlot Castle. While you and all of your friends have earned much praise, my sister and I have something we would like to discuss with him specifically. I will also be sending you a gift very soon, so look forward to it.

Sincerely, Princess Celestia”

I stared at the letter with a raised brow. “Um, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not. Do you think I’m in trouble?”

She playfully nudged my shoulder, shaking her head. “I highly doubt it. I’d be excited if I were you! Then again, I’d probably be halfway out the door already if I were you.”

After a light chuckle, I did as she said and made my way to the exit. I froze before I opened it, though, and turned back to the unicorn. “Before I forget, I have something to ask you: do you think you know me well enough yet?” This time, I was kinda half serious half joking, and all genuinely curious.

It took a few moments for her to finally form a legitimate sentence to respond with. “Honestly, I don’t think so. You’ve got me curious about you now, and I should pretend to be angry at you for that.”

With that, she gave me the perfect opportunity to mess with her head just before leaving. “Well, I’ll try and keep my schedule open enough for a date or two, how about that?”

My plan was to speak, look at her face for a moment, and then leave with a smug grin. What happened was me leaving with a face about as pink as Pinkie’s tail after hearing her response. “I’ll think about it, Nova, I’ll think about it.”

Either she was being completely serious, or she was a really good actress and was now patting herself on the back for turning the tables on me. Actually, both was also a possibility. Regardless, I had to calm myself before I entered the castle, so I did a few tricks on my way there. I was nowhere near the acrobat my sister was, but no matter what anyone says, I was, am, and always will be faster.

To be continued...

Author's Note

And this here is your bridge immediately to the seventh fic.