Shining Armour is terrible at archery
Today Shining Armor had a day spared to do some archery with some of his guardsmen friends, they were to do it in the courtyard at mid-day, he had invited three unicorns on their days off
Everything was set up at the courtyard, the target set up in the middle for the participants to hit, made a little larger for Shining's sake, he was a terrible archer, so bad his shots would probably hit Ponyville before they hit a target in Canterlot.
Shining was there an hour before the guards playing with him even arrived. A not-so useful thing that was stuck in his head was that Cadence had told him that was that one of the three major Canterlot elite were around. As as strong as Shining was, he never would have the confidence to even look them in the eyes, especially Wall. Wall was scary, and the only elite that you couldn't see any color in. His armor was black, and covered his whole body, Sometimes you wish you could see what the mysterious pony was under that thick steel armor. although, sometimes he would wear chainmail, for when he didn't want to carry that chunky armor around.
"Hello Captain!" The first unicorn exclaimed with an excited look in his eyes
"Hello, are you ready for some archery?" Shining asked returning the smile
The unicorns all nodded and grabbed their bows at the same time, then the second unicorn said "Captain, why don't you take the first shot?"
Shining smiled and drew his bow, he attempted to stop the front of the bow from vibrating, he released and it flew over the wall, hopefully not hitting anyone. These were arrows used by proper archers in the royal guard, and are made to jam in the thick skin of gryphons. Shining tried not to imagine what it would do to a pony.
The first unicorn drew his bow, and hit the target dead in the center, some unicorns were very talented in archery, Shining liked to believe that this was one of them.
The second unicorn hit the target one color away from the center, the third hitting near the outskirts of the target, but still scored.
The next round had begun, the unicorns all gathered round for the captains first shot, and giggled like colts. Shining focused as hard as he could, he managed to stop the bow vibrating, and made sure the arrow was completely still, but after he released the arrow, he realized he had no idea where he was aiming, and this could lead to some serious consequences.
The arrow gild down in a perfect straight line across the courtyard, straight towards the flank of a ghostly figure, wearing black chainmail so finely woven, you could not even catch a peek of the color the wearer even was.
It was Wall...
Shining panicked, he saw the arrow had pierced straight through the armor, and deep into Wall's flank he shut his eyes tight and leaned down to avoid eye contact, but he could not refuse himself to look upwards.
Wall turned to shining slowly, he could feel his life coming to an end as Wall's eyes stared into his soul
"SHINING... ARMOR" Wall kept his gaze fixed on Shining sounding very annoyed, he felt as if he was going to suffocate to death, before Wall even finished him off
"YOU ARE... THE WORST ARCHER... IN EQUESTRIA"
While Shining was Wall turned to his flank, grabbed the arrow with his mouth and yanked it out, there was no expression, no pain... this was one of Canterlot's major elites, who has sustained years of mind-destroying training. He turned to Shining and spat the arrow out, blood dripped out of the hole the arrow had made, and the arrow was painted a fine color of red
Then for some reason, for some magical reason, Wall became a nicer, less aggressive pony in two seconds
"Listen, stop thinking that the vibrating bow is such a bad thing, it means that you've stretched it as far as you can, put most of your focus into the aim and positioning of the arrow" Wall said in his new aura of helpfulness
The unicorns behind Shining were shaking, and one of them had run off, Wall approached Shining, and stood behind him and roughly, straightened his aim
"Release!" Wall exclaimed, Shining's arrow hit the target dead in the center.
Wall nodded at Shining, and walked away.
"Maybe... Maybe we can trust Wall" Princess Luna announced to Celestia from the castle, looking over the courtyard
"Yes, maybe we can" Celestia replied.
