Fire and Ice Don't Mix

When Rainbow woke up, she realized that she was leaning on something warm and soft. Another thing she noticed was that the heat was bearable now and that her massive headache had thankfully been reduced to a dull throb in the back of her head. Ugh my head she carefully propped herself up on her elbows and looked around, they were still in the dungeon. She sighed, this is *so** not my day*.

"Hey, glad to see you're awake." a voice behind her said making her whip her head around she thought she heard a protesting snap from her neck. She muttered some unintelligible words under her breath. A light chuckle reached her ears and that's when she recognized the voice belonging to Soarin.

"How much did I miss?" Soarin tapped his chin as if thinking really hard about something, which he was, nothing in particular really just the fact that some weird pony, supposedly the chief of this ancient tribe(how he got into a position that important, is beyond Soarin) knows who they are and that they have these totally crazy (but cool no pun intended) powers that somehow have been triggered and now he doesn't know what is going to happen to them. Well, no point in sugar-coating anything. They're already pretty deep into the situation already. Soarin let out a well earned sigh.

"Well, you see...we apparently have these really awesome, but totally freaky powers that we're somehow gonna learn to control and that guy has something really suspicious going on and I don't like it." He gave an over exaggerated smile, with all his teeth showing that would have made Pinkie Pie proud. Rainbow just nodded slowly unsure what to make of this situation. It's not everyday that you would get told something like this.

"Ooookay....so now what?" Rainbow jumped at the unexpected sound of the door opening. It felt like déjà vu to Dash. A figure entered the dungeon, flanked by two other ponies. Rainbow remembered him uh what was his name? It was Night somethingNightwalker....nah that's not it......oh that's right! Nightstalker, that makes much more sense she let out a small smile at remembering this pony`s name. Sure it may be a pretty small feat, but anything to get her mind off of their 'situation'.

"Ah, so she finally woke up, wonderful!" Nightstalker announced a little too happy for Rainbow's taste.

"What do you want now?" Soarin spoke up, annoyance clearly abundant in his tone. Nightstalker scowled, but as quick as a blink, his scowl morphed into a smile. If Rainbow didn't like him before she certainly hated his guts now. This guy reminded her in a twisted way of Pinkamena. Rainbow shuddered at the memory of Pinkie talking to a bucket of turnips. Nightstalker spoke up, this time his voice took on a serious note, defiant of the smile still glued to his face.

"Now, it`s time for your training of course." Nightstalker stepped to right to reveal the doorway that he had been blocking. He motioned with his hoof to follow him. It didn't look like Dash had much choice in the matter so she followed albeit wearily, just in case tried to do something funny. Soarin followed as well, with his eyebrow raised, skeptical of what was to come.

Soarin didn't know what was coming but he had his doubts that this training Nightwalker was talking about wasn't as advanced and sophisticated as the training they had to undergo at the Wonderbolts Training Facility. Boy was Nightwalker going to prove him wrong. The hallway they were walking down didn't prove to be anything special, mainly because the lack of light that was allowed through the place. Soarin began to ponder this as they continued down the dank and musty passageway.

"So......Mr. uh Nightwalker does your um tribe live down here?" Soarin cringed at how stupid and unsure he sounded. But perked up again when he actually got an answer.

"Yes and no. We spend the majority of our time underground due to....some issues. Some of us decide to stay above, but that is none of your concern right now." Nightwalker made sure he stressed the last little part of his sentence, which did nothing except take Soarin's suspicions a level higher. He leaned into Rainbow to whisper in her ear.

"Something is definitely not right with this guy." Rainbow took a moment as if to study Nightwalker. Then whispered back.

"Yeah I know, it's almost as if they're hiding something from us." Soarin nodded his agreement. Best to play along until he and Dash could get more information on these ponies. They passed a small window barely the size of a plate, it appeared to be the only source of light for a while, which would have been bad, but astonishingly it was good in this case. The beams of light illuminated the hallway they had been walking down. The reveal of this wasn't inviting, disembodied pony legs lined the stone walls and Soarin even thought he spotted a head. The pony legs appeared to be covered in armor causing the light to glint off them. Soarin let out a barely audible gulp. He glanced at Rainbow Dash just in time to see her eye twitch. Another few minutes of walking brought them to their- or more precisely, Nightwalker's- destination. A huge wooden door appeared on the right of the hallway. Nightwalker cocked his head to the two ponies who had -unknowingly to Soain- followed them, he made them out to be guards of some type.Makes sense...I think. The two guards grunted in response and moved to open the door. Nightwalker nodded his approval and strode into the room like he owned the place, which ironically he did. What Soarin saw made his eye twitch and his jaw to smack the floor. In contrast to the dark setting they had come to know of this dreary place, this room was filled with windows. The floor had polished tiles that would have put the Canterlot Castle's ballroom to shame. Velvet drapes framed all the twelve humongous windows(he counted). The walls were painted a creamy color that actually made the place rather inviting. The room itself was easily the size of the Wonderbolts HQ with plenty of room to spare. A sweet scent played around the air, it was actually oddly familiar to Soarin. He sniffed and concentrated for a second. Needless to say the answer hit him a second later.It smells like... PIE!! Soarin's pupils grew as his mouth started to water and his face sculpted out a genuine smile. A nudge at his side cruelly ended his pie fantasy. He looked over to see that it was Dash who had snapped him out of it, not that he needed it of course.

"Yes Dash?" she shot him a mildly irratated look complete with a raised eyebrow. She tilted her head forward at Nightwalker. "Oh right heh."  Soarin then turned his attention to the unicorn in front of them, who was wearing a smile that actually looked more like a sneer if anything.

"Welcome to the top state of the art training facility, where you will begin your training as my personal protégés." Rainbow and Soarin glanced at each other then returned their gazes back at Nightwalker.

"So.....are we supposed to be honored or something?" Soarin asked with mock innocence. Nightwalker pressed his lips tightly together and let out a long breath through his nose.

"One could only hope." Nightwalker replied sarcastically. "You could stand to show some manners, it wasn't easy to not kill you the minute I saw you." Nightwalker narrowed his eyes for a brief moment .

"Gee thanks, I feel touched.'' Soarin shot back with a roll of his eyes while Nightwalker seethed. Soarin had to hold back a chuckle as Nightwalker regained his composure.

"Now, we begin."