So Far...

“Hey Rainbow, I’m back!” I said excitedly as I walked into the cloud house. Rainbow wasn’t expecting me back this late, so obviously she was suspicious.

“It’s pretty late. Where the hay were you?”

“I was up in Canterlot for a bit. I found a job there.”

“Now what could you be doing in Canterlot that could-“

She stopped, her mouth hanging down to the cloud floor. She saw the Wonderbolts uniform in my hands.

“Would you mind explaining what you’re doing with THAT?” she interrogated.

“Not at all. I’m part of the Wonderbolts now.”

Rainbow knew what the uniform meant, but she still seemed to be flustered by my confirmation.

“So I have been training my flank off for years to join them, and you just sign up and you’re in? You can’t even freakin’ fly!” she interjected with obvious understandable jealousy.

“Oh well it’s a long story-“

“I have time. I am honestly curious as to how you managed to pull this off.”

“Alright well the day I left for town square, I met Soarin by the f-“

“Oh my gosh. You met Soarin?!?”

“Met him? We went to a bar together and talked a lot until he ejaculated all over the place.”

Dash gave me a very puzzled look. “Wh- what?”

“Long story. It was a prank we pulled on him while he was eating a pie. It’s a guy thing. So then he said I’d make a great Wonderbolt so he brought me to Canterlot and strapped some jetpack thing on me to let me fly but it of course malfunctioned and blew up and he got hurt but the medic was stupid so they fired him and I was put in his place.”

“Oh, so you’re the medic.”

“Yes. Pretty much.”

“So why do you have a flight suit… for a pony?”

“It’s a uniform thing. I’ll get Rarity to sew it to my size.”

She looked at the uniform with awe.

“Can I just see it for a bit?”

“I don’t see why not. It’s a male uniform though, as you can tell by the muzzle and the two tiered lightning bolt with wings over the cutie mark area.”

Rainbow hastily put the suit on, not used to the zipper that ran from head to legs, not the other way around as usual, so that in fast flight it doesn’t become unzipped. Rainbow looked awesome- tight blue suit with lightning bolts wrapping around her hooves and a large bolt from her neck down the middle of her body. The uniform around her muzzle wasn’t airtight, but it still fit quite well. She put on my goggles and started darting around the room, out a window, and lit up the sky in zigzags of rainbow. After a good 10 minutes of flying around her house, Rainbow flew back in. Her mane now looked like Spitfire’s from the air blowing against it, but it still remained the vivid rainbow, with cyan wings tucked to her body.

“You know… I think this achievement calls for a celebration…” she said, unzipping her uniform from her legs up, but stopping at her waist. “So Soarin…” she said with her best Spitfire voice imitation. “You can’t possibly fly all swollen down there…”

*

The next morning I woke up, again in Rainbow’s bed, me and my uniform covered in rainbow. Of course, Rainbow was all nice and tidy because the uniform took most of the rainbow, even though her hair was messed up and her wings were covered in spots with rainbow too. She was still sleeping, balled up with one of her wings partially covering her face, keeping most of the sun out of her eyes. I picked the uniform up off the ground and decided to get an early start (at 10 in the morning) by going to Rarity’s shop to get my uniform dry-cleaned and sewn to the proper dimensions. As I prepared to leave, I noticed a calendar on the wall had tomorrow’s date circled. It will be Rainbow’s 18th birthday.

Normally I would need Rainbow’s help to get down, but today there was a thick fog rolling in so I just belly-slid down, not only getting down but also efficiently washing myself off from the rainbow which stung a bit when it got in my nose. As I walked to Rarity’s shop I began thinking what to do for Rainbow’s birthday. I should probably get her a cake- unless someone else is already getting a cake and didn’t tell me.

“Sure thing, darling, I still have your dimensions; I should be able to fix this up no problem.” Rarity assured.

I headed for Sugarcube Corner down the block, maybe Mr. and Mrs. Cake would check their logs for any cakes for Rainbow. Fortunately, Mr. Cake was at the counter and I didn’t have to deal with Pinkie all alone. It’s not that I fear her; I’m just paranoid after reading Cupcakes. That shit was scary.

“Ah, hello Arthur, I’ve been hearing a lot about you lately! Did you really join the Wonderbolts?”

“Word spreads fast… considering I just joined last night…”

“Ah, well what can I do for you?”

“Are there any orders in place for Rainbow Dash’s birthday tomorrow?”

“Hmm… surprisingly not. I have one for the birthday of a nice mare named Ms. Hooves for tomorrow, but that’s the only one.”

“Alright, then I’d like to place an order for a cake… hmm… lemon cake with cyan icing and rainbow sprinkles!”

“Would you like the sprinkles to be rainbow-flavored?”

“Heck no!”

“Alright, it should be ready for pickup tomorrow morning.”

I decided to head back to Rainbow’s place. I had until 12 before I should board a train to Canterlot. It’s a 20 minute trip, meaning I should have plenty of time for the meeting at 12:45 should an unexpected event occur, which is usually the case. Then I thought- maybe I should make her a present. She seemed really interested in planes; maybe I can make her a model plane.

I headed to the blacksmith near town square. He allowed me to barrow his tools and sold me some scrap iron for 5 bits. I bought an electric toothbrush earlier from a store and disassembled it to try to make the prop spin. I hammered out a sheet of metal flat and rolled it into a cylinder, welding the seam shut so it became a fuselage. I also welded some nubs on to it- I guess they were wings. Finally I attached the propeller to the shaft of the toothbrush. I didn’t want to test it out of fear that it will spontaneously combust, so I kept it intact for the sake of showing up with something.

I did my best climbing back up the fog, and came back inside. Rainbow was already making breakfast. As usual, Eggo waffles. Eggs and bacon would sound good, but unfortunately in this universe it’s inconsiderate to eat eggs or meat.

“Hi Rainbow” I said.

“Hey! Fun time we had last night… Want some waffles?”

“You sure wake up late. It’s almost noon.”

“Well we were up until 1 in the morning. I need my beauty sleep.”

I felt like making a comment about Rarity, but I knew what she meant. She just likes sleeping in. I ate my waffles and slid down again, this time the fog was much thinner by now and I kept bouncing over pockets and stumbling upon craters. Rainbow did me a favor and flew me down to the ground.

“So if you’re joining the Wonderbolts, does that mean now we can’t be together?”

“Nonsense! We just have to make you a Wonderbolt too. That shouldn’t be too hard.”

“Yeah and my birthday is tomorrow!”

“Yep and I have a present ready for you!”

“Oh my gosh what is it?”

“I’m not going to-“

“No wait don’t tell me. I want it to be a surprise!” she said with a huge smile on her eager face. She thinks it will be a good present; that kind of scares me.

Right about then I decide to head to the train station. As always, I just miss the train arriving at 11:58 and have to wait for the next one at 12:17; that cuts me down to just a few minutes to spare. The 20 minute long train ride to Canterlot was relatively uneventful. A few bumps, some pony begging for money because he says he is super poor just to have his wife call him on a phone he was hiding and bust his act.

I hastily ran into the compound with the hangars, no one bothered to check for ID; they knew who I am. I walked into the middlemost hangar as I was instructed and saw all the Wonderbolts sitting by a projector and a screen. I saw Soarin who seemed hypnotized by the blank screen and the projector’s fan whirring. I sat next to him.

“Oh hi!” Soarin said.

“So how did things go last night?”

“Oh well spitfire bucked me in the nuts for taking that picture of her, I probably deserved that, and then for some reason as I lay on the floor crying and covering my nuts she dropped a copy of ‘Sports Equestriated’ in front of me with a hot picture of her all wet on the cover and said ‘I look better on this anyway’, winked, and walked away.”

“Damn. Sounds like she likes you.”

“Meh. We have our ups and downs” Spitfire replied behind us, startling us a little. “Let’s face it. You’ve caught me doing worse, and I’ve caught you doing worse.”

“Heh, sounds like everyone’s got the dirt on everyone.” I said sheepishly.

“You’re darn right we do” Spitfire said, slamming down in front of me with her hoof a picture of me and Rainbow from last night.

“Do you guys spy heavily on each other all the time?” I asked with deep concern.

“Actually…” Spitfire contested. “I intercepted this from the paparazzi. You really have to be careful what you do out there now that you’re a bona fide Wonderbolt.”

“So Soarin, you also intercepted that picture from paparazzi?”

“No. I just think…” Soarin started saying, but died down to a whisper. “Spitfire turns me on.”

I checked behind me to see if Spitfire was listening in but by now she was at the front preparing to present something. She started up the projector and showed a map of where they will go on their next 3 day tour, what moves they will perform, and where they will greet fans and sign photos. Since I’m the rookie I have fan mail duty. I give a standardized reply to every address we receive mail from and if there are any items, usually pictures to sign, I put them to the side for later use for I don’t know what.

“Hey” Spitfire said in her usual nice voice. “You realize if you’re a Wonderbolt it will be pretty much impossible to have an outside relationship.”

“So you’re saying I should give up on Rainbow?”

“Heck no. Remind her we are having tryouts in the Cloudsdale Cloudessium next month. Last year we turned her down because she was 17 so this year is the year!”

Since Soarin’s hangar was pretty much empty, I was assigned to a side of it. I had a section with a nice big bed... almost too big... but then again this is a bed for celebrities. And their lesser-known medic. I thought about how great it would be when Rainbow was a Wonderbolt too. We would pretty much be inseparable... unless one of us lost our jobs or something. Very rarely do I think of a positive hypothetical situation; I don’t know why, I guess I just hate to bring my hopes up.

*

The next day I woke up to the sound of an obnoxiously loud horn. It was still 5 in the morning. Luna’s shift hasn’t even ended yet. I slowly got up and went to see if Soarin was up this early too. He also had just gotten up, but seemed a lot more energetic.

“So how was your first night, rookie?”

“It hasn’t ended yet and you’re asking me now?”

Soarin laughed at my joke, even though I was being serious. “Don’t worry it gets easier as you get used to it.”

I went outside and saw every Wonderbolt all dressed and ready filing into a row. Spitfire passed in front of the row, counting heads, and led everypony in a stretching exercise. They did some stretches and then began flying 3 kilometers in a line over the track around the compound. After the Wonderbolts finished their daily exercises, me excluded because I can’t fly, everypony want to the hangar where the meeting was held for breakfast. It was still the crack of dawn and the sky a navy blue hue. I followed the Wonderbolts into the hangar where tables were positioned filled with waffles, pancakes, orange juice, muffins, bagels, oats, and all sorts of other non-meat breakfast items. I sat down and saw Spitfire digging into a muffin, Fleetfoot drinking juice, on of course Soarin burying his face into a pie, munching loudly. I don’t even know where he got the pie; there were no pies on the table. And then I saw what looked like a tin vessel filled with omelet. Since I hadn’t had one in such a long time, I gave myself a piece. Soarin snickered.

“Ou mow, Arfur, at omwet if weely gwof.”

Unable to discern what he was trying to say, I ate a piece. It didn’t taste like omelet at all, as a matter of fact it had a sulfury taste. I cringed. Soarin swallowed.

“I was trying to say, the omelet is gross. It’s made of powdered eggs.”

Essentially pissed, I had a blueberry muffin. It was a really good muffin, so I felt better. After breakfast I decided I needed to talk to Soarin, since he was becoming like a best friend to me. I knocked on the door to his room.

“AAAH! No Spitfire! Don’t come in!”

He didn’t even shut the door properly, so my knocking opened it. I saw his room was a bit of a mess, his uniform lay wrinkled on the floor, and he was shoving a magazine, mostly unsuccessfully, into the crevice between his bed frame and the mattress. He turned and saw it was me.

“Oh just you.” He said, relieved, pulling the “Sports Equestriated” magazine out of its cramped location. “What’s up?”

“I want to talk to you about relationships...”

“Ugh, don’t you have a mom-“ he stopped and quickly corrected himself. “I mean, of course. I don’t know much about women but I’ll tell you what I know...”

“I meant about Wonderbolt relationships.”

“Umm, well see I’m kind of treading on this ice too. You can have sex with other Wonderbolts technically, there’s no rule against that, but you can’t let it destroy your professionalism or waste time so what me and Spitfire do is-“

“No no no I meant how strained will my relationship be with anypony not part of the Wonderbolts?”

“Oh, that’s even tougher. If we’re on tour they can see you from the stands but they can’t come to the VIP area where we are so it might be tough. Why, is it about Rainbow?”

“Kinda. Today’s her birthday.”

“Oh, and tonight we fly for the show in Fillydelphia. Well I think you two have plenty of time. We’ll only be gone for 3 days, it’s not like some of our 2 week tours happening later in the year. I think by then Rainbow will have joined us. I mean, have you seen her? If we’ve heard about her, she’s pretty much a shoe-in.”

With that, I left to go back to Ponyville, where I would have to tell Rainbow on her birthday I have to go on tour for a few days. It doesn’t sound too bad… only a few days away.

*

I arrived at the blacksmith shop to pick up my plane, all wrapped up in some nice wrapping paper, and my cake from the shop, for which I emptied the rest of my bits. Pinkie had told me the party will be in Applejack’s barn as usual because it is roomy and can be emptied quickly.

I arrived to a room full of excited faces, notably Rainbow, who has just pinned the tail on a drawn pony on the barn wall. I set the cake on the table and was met with a barrage of hugs and questions. It turns out Rainbow likes lemon cake, so it wasn’t a complete disaster, after which we gave her presents. Rarity gave her one first.

“Oh boy, I wonder what this is!” She said, eagerly tearing apart the wrapping. It was a sweater. Her face slumped.

“Now mine!” cheered Pinkie. With some hesitation, Rainbow tore apart the gift wrapping.

“What is it?” she asked, holding up an absorbent piece of cloth.

“Why it’s a towel silly, and it’s ever so useful! A towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, washcloth, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet-weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitchhiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitchhiker might accidentally have "lost". What the strag will think is that anypony who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is, is clearly a pony to be reckoned with.”

“Thanks Pinkie...” Rainbow said sheepishly, determining that the present would have more value had that speech not been made.

Rainbow also got a tome on the history of spackle from Twilight, a bushel of apples from Applejack, and a minigun from Fluttershy, complete with 400,000 bits worth of ammo. Now it was my turn. I handed her my plane, it looked like a Sopwith Camel that was blown up and reassembled by 9 year olds with dementia.

“I uh, how does it work?” Rainbow asked.

“You push this button under this nub here.”

By now the propeller had long fallen off, and what remained was a fuselage with little nubby wings and a bulky empennage. Rainbow turned on the toothbrush motor inside and the whole thing started vibrating. The drive shaft didn’t turn, so even of the prop was still there it wouldn’t turn anyway.

“Oh.. hehe.” Rainbow’s face grew pink.

“Is that what Ah think it is?” asked Applejack.

“If you are thinking it’s a failed attempt at an airplane then you-“

“IT’S A VIBRATOR!” cheered Pinkie, bouncing around the room. “That’s one of the most thoughtful things you could have given her since you won’t be here a while because you’re going to be gone with the Wonderbolts like you said earlier but told me not to tell anyone YAAAAY!”

“Rainbow, It was supposed to be an airplane.”

“Oh, well that’s ok, at least it’s not a sweater.”

“Hey!” interjected Rarity

“To be honest, I don’t think much can compare to Fluttershy’s gift” she said, revving up the minigun.

She tucked the airplane away into a bag with the rest of her presents, except for the sweater. At least she likes it enough to keep it.

“Oh darling, I almost forgot” Rarity said, tossing me a redesigned Wonderbolts uniform.

I put it on and surprisingly, it fit pretty well. In fact, without any other clothes on it might even fit just right. Rainbow flew up to me and hugged me.

“By the way tryouts are in a few weeks. Then you will be a true Wonderbolt and not some lame medic.” I said reassuringly.

With that, our lips met again.