Minor Turbulence

Minor Turbulence Part 2: Waking in a Dream

Chapter: 1 The Letter

By: Midway Bridge

Something was off when I woke up.  I didn't know what it was at first.  I rolled over in my bed.  Ah mystery solved, I was in a bed.  Since I didn't remember how I got there either I was kidnapped against my will and drugged (improbable), was moved in my sleep by law enforcement (likely), or passed out after blowing all of my money on alcohol (wouldn't have been the first time).  I had a horrible headache which indicated a hangover so that wasn't good.  I felt around for my coffee can.  I felt around for it in the bed.  My anxiety grew the longer I couldn't find it, but I calmed when I felt its cool rim.  I pulled it out and shook the coffee can.  There was a satisfying clinking sound of a few bits still in there.  Good, that gets rid of option three.

I looked around the room.  It was vacant save for a single pony sitting in a wooden armchair.  The pony startled me; he was wearing some sort of gas mask over his face along with a skin-tight jumpsuit of some sort.  Or was it a her?  Probably was a he, though was nearly impossible to tell with the mask covering the curves of face and the jumpsuit covering all but the wings and the hoofs which he (presumably) was busy filing.

Since there weren’t any officers in the room, I started to lean towards the kidnapped and drugged option a little more now.  When you wake up and see a gasmask wearing pony you'd think so too.

The pony had a green coat and wings folded to his sides; the jumpsuit jacket was made of thick black leather that was edged with red and yellow.  On the shoulder was a single golden lightning bolt emblazoned in a ring of red.  The gasmask was unlike anything that I had ever seen.  The two filters on the sides glowed softly with a light blue hue and the lenses of the eyes reflected the same color, creating an ominous blank stare.  Combine that with the deep respiration of the mask and I was official, freaked out.

"Who the hay are you supposed to be?" I asked nervously.

The pony looked up then just shrugged and continued to file his hooves.  I shuffled nervously in the bed.

The door opened and a different pegasus walked in, she was stood tall and proud, she wore the same uniform but without the gasmask-like thing.  Her hair was long and blond, not like the electric yellow I had, but lighter and with a touch of a few blue streaks running down it.  She had a light build like most pegasai, but even through the jacket it was easy to see that she had a toned physique as the result of hard work.  Her eyes were a nice light cyan that matched her dyed mane.  Her lips were pursed in a frown like she just heard bad news.  Perhaps she did, and was here as a result.  After all, I was usually followed by bad news wherever I went.

The pony in the chair said something to her but it was muffled by the mask making it hard to understand.  The gasmask wearing pony got up and left without another word.  Not to mention my killer headache didn't help my hearing either.  I needed my mourning coffee… if there's one thing I'll miss about my job it'll be the espresso maker.

"Right, question time," she stated like she was assuring herself of what to say.  She approached to bed and pulled up a chair. "So what’s you're name?"

No point in hiding it.  "Turbulence."

"Alright then Turbulence, what the hay were you doing in the middle of a storm napping?" She wasn't yelling, but I could tell she was trying to scold me like a child.

"I was tired so I took a snooze is that a crime?" I was pretty sure it wasn't but I'm not to well versed when it came to the bureaucratic nightmare we call politics.

"Beds too good for you?"

"Don't have a bed to sleep in." She faltered a bit upon hearing that.  There was a flash of uncertainty across her face but she recovered before speaking again.

"So you just took a snooze in a class 3 storm?"

"A class three storm, huh…" I wracked my brain to remember that stupid meteorology class I was forced to take.  I drew a blank.  Right, play dumb.  "Didn't seem like one when I got there, it was just a few storm clouds and some gusty winds."

"Are you daft?  The weather stations were calling the storm for a week now ever since the system blew out of the Everfree forest.  Don't you read the papers?"

"Can't say I do." I hadn't had the time to sit and read a paper for a very long time.  Not to mention to actually afford one.  All those extra bits could add up to something important like rent for a week.

"Guess you don't get out much then."

I'm outside more often than you.  I freakin live outside.

"Excuse me for interrupting your 'question time,' " I said in a mocking tone while drawing air quotes.  She glared daggers at me but I shrugged it off.  "But who's shooting the questions and what was the deal with the other guy?"

"Who Pilot?" she asked gesturing to the door.

"Sure," I clarified.  How was I supposed to know who Pilot was?

“Don’t worry about him.  He’s a real sweetheart when you get to know him.”

“That’s one hell of a creepy gas mask though…”

"It's not a gasmask exactly, but you don't really need to understand that." There was that frustrated parental tone again.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You see Turbulence," she put an unnecessary stress on my name as if it were to intimidate me or something, "at the Emergency Weather Bureau, we have technology even the Wonderbolts aren't authorized to use.  I don't want to bore you with the details."

At least that answered as to who I was talking with, or rather who she represented.  "Why has the Emergency Weather Bureau taken an interest in a simpleton like me?"

"You practically had 100,000 volts flowing through you when we found you," she said, "We'd like to know why you aren't fried to crisp."

"Don't we all?"

"You mean you don't know?" she asked, she raised her eyebrows in disbelief.

"All I can tell you really is that when I was young I was struck by lightning and this appeared."  I took off the covers to show her my cutie mark.  "Hurt like hell then but, ever since lightning never bothered me that much."

"That's very interesting… tell me more, anything really would do."

"Isn't much more to tell.  I passed out when it happened don't remember a thing." That was only partially true, but she didn't need to know the rest of that story.  The lead up, getting saved, and the whole 2 and a half month recovery thing wasn’t something she needed to know.

"I see." She stood up again.  She walked over to the door.  "You might want to wash up and look presentable."

"Hey wait!  You never answered my question!"

"Which one?" she tried to recall but got nothing.

"What's your name?"

"Gale," she answered bluntly before she quietly shut the door behind herself.  What a charmer she was.  I’m glad that I never have to see

I got up out of the bed, a task that proved to take more effort than anticipated.  She asked me to look presentable; all I had to do was look in the mirror to see why.

A bad mane day was something that sometimes happened for a pony who slept in bed.    Now imagine me after sleeping in a storm cloud.  There is a noticeable difference.  Today was no exception.  My electric yellow mane was a complete mess shooting out in sporadic directions.   After wrestling with it for a better part of 5 minutes, I looked, by my standards, 'presentable.'

I noticed a small letter on the desk next to the bed with my name addressed on it.  It was a dreary dark grey and had the golden lightning bolt motif of the Emergency Weather Bureau.  I assumed it was for me to read.  I opened it quickly curious to see the contents.

"Dear Turbulence,

Your presence is requested at the Emergency Weather Bureau on November 18th for an audience with Captain Rook.  Arrive no later than 3:00 pm.  If the date is inconvenient please send a written response ahead of time.

Director Rain,

Head of EWB"

What a strange letter to receive.   The calendar on the wall showed that today’s date was the 17th, so I had the whole day to decide if I even wanted to go.  I wondered why they would possibly want to see me again until I realized I probably had to retell the entire story from the beginning to her superiors so they got it on record or something.  I freaking hate the government.

When I walked outside Gale was standing idle by the door waiting for me.  The gas masked pony dubbed 'Pilot' was nowhere to be seen.  I supposed he had better things to do than foal sit me.

"Good, you're ready."

"What the hell is this?" I lifted up the envelope.

"A letter."

No shit.  "Why do you need to leave a letter for me?"

"Pilot left it for you.  Its contents are for you only."

"Come on, why does the bureau need to see me?  We already talked."

"That's for the captain and you to discuss," she said.  She seemed to be enjoying my frustration.  "Seeing that you’re alive and well, I’ll be off.  You've haven't been checked out already but you can leave.  Or stay if you wish."

She walked out and around the corner of the hallway narrowly avoiding the medical staff rushing a new patient into a different room.  I watched her as she exited the building and took off for the skies.

--=====--

November 18th

I took her advice on staying in the hospital for the night.  I should have injured myself more often since sleeping outside during the winter is just brutal.  The Emergency Weather Bureau wasn’t too hard to find, it was a gigantic grey monolithic structure that was just a few blocks down from the famed Cloudsdale Weather Factory.  I hadn’t given the building much thought beforehand it was always in the background and out of the way of my daily life.  But now I climbed the many stairs that led to the buildings foundation.

The building itself was comprised of solid earthly materials that somehow managed to stay above the clouds (magical enchantment perhaps?).  There were columns above the stairs that resembled classical pegasus architecture, but otherwise it was in complete stark contrast to the surrounding city.  Above the large wooden doors was the same lightning bolt in a red ring that I had been seeing a lot of as of late.

The door creaked loudly as I entered.  The interior of the building was incredibly large.  I the first floor of the building was primarily comprised of the lobby which I now walked through.  All of the walls, pillars, even the floor was  made up of finely polished black marble.  It was dimly lit by spherical electrical lanterns and tall glass windows on either side of the room which cast strange reflective lights off of the gleaming marble.   On the floor was a giant depiction the circled lightning bolt but there were words etched into the red ring in black letters.

“In the darkest of nights filled with the brightest of lights we come, protect, and serve till the clear sun rises again.”

Cool.

There wasn’t a single soul in the room other than a single secretary quietly typing a paper up.  She sat behind a dark wooded desk.  I briskly walked up to her; my hoofsteps clopped loudly and echoed throughout the room with each step.

I cleared my throat to get her attention.

“Do you have an appointment?” she asked without looking up.  She shifted her glasses a bit, but remained focused on the task at hand.

“I’m Turbulence and I got this letter-“

“Use the elevator on the left, floor 10” she said not waiting to hear what else I had to say.

“Okay then.” I had no idea what an elevator was, so I assumed it was the big fancy golden plated door to the left of the desk.

The doors slid open without a sound when I approached.  I jumped back when I saw somepony else coming out.  They jumped back too.  Wait… it was just my reflection.  Now I felt stupid.  Inside was just a tiny mirrored room.

“Um… is this-"

“Just go in and press 10,” she sighed in exasperation.  Obviously she got this kind of confusion a lot.

I walked into the small room there was a row of buttons on the side ranging from 2-15 and a few letters like L and B.  I pushed the button numbered ten and the door slid close.  Then I felt something strange.  I didn’t know what at first but then I knew.  The room was moving.   Sweet Celestia the room was moving!  I started to quietly panic in the confined room.  Lights were flashing and the lurching movements of the room made me feel queasy.  Soon the doors opened.  And I teetered out of the confounded elevator right into something or rather somepony.

That pony of course was Gale.

“First elevator ride I assume?” she said with a smirk pushing me off of her and wiping her jacket clean.

I nodded and tried to regain my balance.  Of all of the ponies I could crash into it had to be her…

“The captain said you’d be here.  Follow me.”

The floor was carpeted red with golden trim on the sides there were other ponies in the room, all were wearing uniformed garb.  Some were like Gale’s and others were blue and had different symbols.  They all talked amongst themselves as we passed by.  This floor was different than the first. The walls were a bleach white.

“Step lightly,” she said.  She was already a few paces ahead of me.  We stopped towards the end of the hallway.

"When you meet the captain speak quickly and to the point.” She brushed off my coat in a few places and fixed my mane. “Address him as sir or Captain, never as simply Rook.  And for the love of all things good don't stare."

"Stare at what?"

"You'll see for yourself." she said "Good luck."  She shoved me into a different direction and gestured to the room with a big golden plank marked ROOK in large letters.

--=====--

I walked into the room.  There was a single pegasus sitting behind the desk hovering over a game of chess.  From what I could tell none of the pieces had yet to move.  He was a dark blue coated Pegasus and unlike all of the other ponies I saw in my brief visit he didn’t wear any sort of uniform, but he had a black one with golden stripes hung up with care on a rack next to the desk.  His eyes were a dark blue also staring intently at the board in front of him.

"Sit down." He motioned to the chair across from him.  I sat.  The glass chess set lay between us almost challenging us to play a game.  His pieces were opaque and frosted white while the ones on my side were a translucent and bent the light through them like tiny lenses.

"Are you a player?"

"Not really, no." Did I really look like a chess player to him?

"There’s a certain kind of tranquility in chess that many fail to appreciate.  It teaches us many things like humility, patience, and tenacity.  The game itself is mathematically perfect, which is why it is still popular today.  When played correctly and each piece supports each other, the player is victorious.  To do this the player must plan ahead many turns in advance."  The stallion slid a pawn two spaces forward on the board.  "As you know, my name is Captain Rook, leader of Emergency Weather Response Team 403."

"Yes, sir." I responded as I was instructed to do so.

"There's an opening on my team that I want to see filled.  I think you’re the stallion for the job, but like the game of chess I must plan ahead.  Are you truly ready for a job like this?"

"With all due respect sir, I had no idea I was to be interviewed for a job"

"Spare me the sir's and whatnot, I was through with that since I was discharged from the Royal Guard." He shifted around in his seat a bit.  It was then when I caught a slight glimpse of what Gale said not to stare at.  His right wing.  It was completely messed up and bent out of shape, twisted in directions that the bones shouldn’t have a reason to go to.

"Military doesn’t like liabilities.” He sighed folding his damaged wing away. “Isn’t that right Stormy?"

"You know my real name?" The note had addressed me as Turbulence and I had been referred as such by everypony for years now.  Just hearing it aloud felt odd.

"I know all about you."

"You don't know anything about me."

"That is where you are wrong." He opened up a file on his desk.  "Stormy Weather, named after the big storm that occurred during the second week of May.  Approximately 19 years old.  Due to a lack of birth records his date of birth is unknown so he celebrates his birthday on the day he arrived at the orphanage instead on May 14th.  Was a bit of a troublemaker in the orphanage, received numerous detentions for pranks and whatnot.  Picked on by a bully and also reportedly crashed the first time you took flight.  You never were adopted due to a label put on your file that marked you as disturbed."

I didn't know even know that.

"When you were 12 you went to Cloudsdale summer flight camp.  Having no prior knowledge of flight you had trouble arriving there in the first place.  To get there you rented a chariot that cost about $100 but they charged you only $10 out of the kindness of their hearts.  Due to your inexperience as a flyer you were quickly labeled as different from the rest.  Your closest thing you have to a friend was Ditzy Doo who was known as 'Derpy' due to an eye impairment that caused her eyes to cross.  You didn't consider her a friend due to your bitterness and rough upbringing, but never the less she tried her best to make you feel welcome and loved, even if unappreciated."

"Hey I appreciated what she did-"

"By pulling pranks on her and teasing her? Sure," he snorted, "that’s how I would treat somepony who shows me kindness." His voice was layered thickly with sarcasm.

He continued, "In summer flight camp you had a run in with Rainbow Dash, she was the top flyer in the class but she came to you out of pity to help you, but like everyone else you meet, you shut her out."

That was a private conversation that I didn't tell a soul about.

"A pony coined the nickname 'Turbulence' and it stuck with you ever since.  During the final test you had a strange occurrence involving a near black out during a downwards spiral to the surface.  Luckily you almost regained control before impact and suffered minimal damage.  You finished nearly last in the test due to your off course flying."

"That night back on you flew outside on your own to fly home to the orphanage.  It was here when you were struck by lightning and caused you to black out.  You would have died if someone hadn't saved your life."

"Do you have records on who it was?" I asked hopefully.  This could answer at least one of my questions from that night.

"Upon interview he didn't want to disclose his name."  He said stiffly.  Obviously he wanted to know that too so he could complete that file of his.

"Upon waking up you discovered your cutie mark; a black cloud with lightning bolts shooting out of it.  When you came back from flight camp, you changed a bit and four years later your "parental figure" Ms. Sunshine left having gone having moved to Baltimare to start a new life.  From here your grades plummeted marking you as the lowest in your class.  You remained in the orphanage until 18 where you decided to try to go to college.  Instead of your first choice, you vouched for three years to Anappless for a military career where you were given a scholarship due to your predicament.  After 1 semester you were kicked out before graduating because of disorderly conduct.  You re-applied again under a different alias but were denied entry and were practically court marshaled for falsifying a military document."

I was told that misunderstanding was to be kept off record.

"In the end you got a job as a weather approver in the Cloudsdale weather factory.  You had ins and outs of apartments since couldn't afford rent and food  while having occasional underage binge drink, so you lived, illegally I might add, on wayward clouds outside of the city.  You made $10,150 this year but you requested that you only were paid $9,999 to be exempt from federal taxes.  A few days ago you were fired from said job and made your way into a storm cloud to spend the night where you wound up getting rescued by our team.  Which leads us to the present day." He closed the file and slid it into the bottom drawer of his desk.

"How do you know all of this?" Damn creeper must have been stalking me for practically my whole life.

"I make it my job to know more about my recruits than they do.  You'd be surprised how much the government keeps on record."

I had a sinking feeling that he pulled a few strings to have all of this information.  He also most likely took some illegal routes to acquire it.

"Tell me, are you going to leave the life that you came from behind you?  We don't have the luxury of dealing with practical jokes or any sort of crap.  You work for me, don't complain and maintain the peace.  I get you paid money, enough so you'll want to learn how to do your federal taxes.  I've made my opening move so now I ask you, what's yours?"

I gave it a moment to think.  I didn't really have any options at this point. I didn't have enough cash to make it through the next month.  I recently got fired from my job and one just happens to fall into my lap? Some would call it fate, but I know better. Fate hates me.

"What's the catch?"

"No catch.  Unless you count dealing with dangerous weather a catch, but given your history it's more of a perk."

This guy knew me too well.  Literally.

"I'll take the job…"  I moved a single clear pawn to the center of the board challenging his, "…but only for the money."

"An interesting move, but I didn't expect anything more or less from you."

"When do I start?"

"Right now.  Welcome to Team 403."

~----------~

Disclaimer: I am not Laruen Faust incognito, and henceforth I do not own MLP: Friendship is Magic. I make no claim for Hasbro’s characters or world. I am just a humble fan fiction writer, nothing more.  Please leave your questions, comments, and constructive criticism in the comments below so I can better myself as a writer and enhance your experience as a reader.