The Takeover

My grandparents house, 8 years ago

"Don't even speak like that!" My grandmother snapped at me. "You are going to college whether you like it or not."

"Do you know how much time I have put into this band?" I swiftly replied, my face turning red with anger. "I have put thousands of bits into equipment and each member has also done the same! I'm not going to college if this band takes off!"

She threw a dish into the kitchen sink, it shattering on impact. "Do you know how much money we have put back for your college fund? Are you not grateful for all that we have done for you?"

Oh, you're going to draw the ungrateful card. Okay. "How many times do I thank you for what you've done for me everyday? Clearly I don't kiss your ass enough. YOU are the one who said 'Whatever career you choose, make sure its one you want to do'. Okay then! I want this band more than anything else I have within my grasp. I have wanted to be on stage since the moment I first picked up a guitar and I will NOT let you take that from me just because you want me to go to college and live by the broken system the rest of this nation does."

She turned her head from me for a second. I know that hit deep. But the silence was soon broken when she spun around and yelled, "Don't you dare talk about the country you live in like that again! Need I remind you that this country is what your parents laid their lives down for? Are you grateful for anything at all?"

"Does anypony in this nation at all give a shit about anything those soldiers have done? My parents or not?" That stopped her. She looked down at the tiled kitchen floor. "Half of them live in poverty and have nothing to show for their sacrifice." My point was driven in like a hammer to a nail and that's when I took my leave. I hate it when we have these arguments. They may hurt her pretty badly, but seeing the way she is after every argument crushes me on the inside.

"I've got to go to work," I said in a more calm voice. "I'll see you later." I walked out the door and spread my wings and took to the sky.

I worked at a small, local restaurant that was about 10 minutes flight across Ponyville from my house. Serve customers during the day and rotate with the other ponies on stocking and washing dishes. It was a pretty easy job and the only thing that was really bad was the customers. The main things that grinds my wagon wheels with the customers is what they order. It was literally as if they just got hit in the head with a hoofball sized rock. Twice. Like when they order a hay salad...with no hay. I just smile and give the order to the cooks and let them sort it out.

I dug myself out of my own thoughts long enough to notice that it was getting pretty dark outside but it was only like 3 P.M. I guess I didn't read the weather calendar. The breeze ruffled my feathers and the wind cut through my mane like a knife through butter. I looked down at the town below me. There was Applejack, tending the apple cart and Pinkie Pie doing...well, I'm never really too sure about what she's doing. I also saw some fillies trying to do a wallflip and failing. I remember when I was into all that stuff. I was quite the daredevil but I was never stupid with it. Everything I did concerning stunts was well practiced. I could do a lot of cool things too but I had a trampoline accident that hurt my back pretty bad and it put an end to that.

I was jumping on a trampoline with some friends of mine, one of which was Cas, and we were all doing different stunts and what not. They told me I wasn't allowed to use my wings because it was cheating. What they didn't know is when it came down to stunts, I didn't need them. Anyway, I was mid-air, mid back flip when one of them shoved me. I flew over the net upside down and slammed into a nearby tree and descended down the rough bark, cutting up my back and wings and landed neck first on the ground. I mean, I'm almost totally fine with the occasional back aches, but I couldn't fly for a month after that and I still carry around a pretty big scar where the bark had carved a gash into my right wing. I feel like a walked out of that situation with the upper hand however, had I not been in the good physical shape I was in, I feel like that would have paralyzed me.

I could see my place of employment getting closer to me and it didn't look like it was very busy at the moment. I was really hoping for a slow day today anyway. A raindrop splashed on my muzzle and the water splashed up into my eyes. "Gah!" I yelped rubbing my eyes. Right as I opened them however...

SMACK!

I was plummeting to the ground with a deafening and constant ringing in my right ear and my vision was blurring. I tried to make an attempt to open my wings again but I was too out of it to recover. I slammed into the roof of a nearby building at an angle and rolled all the way up to the edge, my tail waving in the wind off the side of the building.

Did somepony just run into me? I made a vain attempt to get up but I just fell back over, my right side being shot up with a sharp pain. "Damn," I said, coughing, making my sides hurt even more. I tasted the unforgettable metallic taste of blood. Then I heard somepony land near me and I heard a hoof against gravel sound approaching me rapidly. "Sir! Sir, are you okay?!" the voice practically yelling at me. "Oh Celestia, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to." It was young mare, probably about my age. She rapped a hoof under my back to help me up, which I gladly accepted.

She kept asking the same thing over and over, "Are you okay?! I didn't mean to I was in a rush and I wasn't paying attention and-"

I cut her off, "I'm okay I promise." Her fast talking was hurting my noggin. I did a real quick check to see if any limbs were broken but after wiggling around my hooves and wings, I seemed to be fine beside a small pain under my right wing.

"Are you sure?" I heardd her say again.

"Hey don't worry about it-" Then I looked up at her and I must say, I have never seen a more beautiful mare in my entire 17 years of existence. I mean I could write a novel about her beauty but unless you saw her in person, you wouldn't believe me. She had a creamy white coat and a matte black and hot pink mane. Wow.

I saw that all of her belongings were strewn across the buildings' rooftop. A few notebooks, an XLR female to a quarter inch TRS cable that had come undone and a pretty expensive looking microphone had fallen out of her now torn backpack.

"I'm very sorry about running into you." She said frantically picking up the notebooks and putting it back in the bag. I headed over to the microphone and picked it up and went over to her with it which she quickly said, "Oh you don't have to do that, I ran into you, remember?"

"I don't know how I could forget, but that's a pretty expensive microphone. Wouldn't want it getting fried, whether you ran into me or not." I replied. Being the musician that I am, I knew if that microphone stayed out in the gentle rain it would eventually mess up. She held the backpack open which I gently placed the microphone in. Then I walked over to the cable and started to rap it up into a neat circle and came back and put it into the bag.

I looked up at her again and her horn was alight and next thing I know, a piece of tissue paper was rubbing me on the muzzle at the left edge of my mouth. "Gah, what are you doing?" I said surprised, quickly pulling away. I didn't want to come across as being mad at her, I mean it was an accident and I'm not out-of-order so...

"Sorry, sir," she said again. "You had a little bit of blood on your lip, so I was wiping it off. Just didn't think you wanted to fly around with it on you."

"Well, thank you." I said with a slight smile. She still looked really sad and the rain adding to her already messed up mane didn't help.

"Look, don't get sad about running into me. I promise it wasn't a big deal and I'm fine. Shit happens alright, that's life."

She looked up at me. "That still doesn't make me feel better about it."

I sighed. Sometimes cheering a pony up is out of your hooves. "Don't let is weigh you down. I'm fine." I dusted off the back of my right foreleg.

She shook her head back and forth at lightning speed and her mane returned to normal. "Well, I'm late for my singing lessons and I really have to go."

Singing lessons?

She opened up her wings and was about to jump to get a start off the ground when I said, "Wait!" Her wings folded back and she turned around. Now that I had her attention I continued, "So, you're just going to run into me, knock a few marbles loose, and leave without at least giving me your name?"

She kinda smiled at that. "My name's Nova."

"Nova," I repeated, letting the name roll of my tongue. "I like that." I did what I aimed to achieve seeing the slightest amount of red appear on her white cheeks.

That's when I turned tail to look the direction I would be heading. "Nice running into you, Nova," I said with a smile sliding up the side of my face. Celestia, I am such a smart ass. I opened my wings and took off.

Damn, I thought to myself as I was flying away from the scene. She was gorgeous. I wonder if I'll be able to focus my mind on work today after seeing her.

That's when it dawned on me that today was Monday.

Damn, I'm going to have to do dishes tonight.

Later that night, half an hour before closing

"Damn!" I exclaimed after spraying myself with water while using the power washer to rinse off a spoon.

"Now there is no need for all that cussin," I heard Steve call from the kitchen.

"Shut up, Steve, no one asked you!" I called back jokingly.

Luckily, that was my last dish for now. I looked behind me and saw my co-worker taking an order and then through the order window, I saw Steve working on a different order. Then I looked out the window to see how many customers had accumulated while I had my head in the sink doing the dishes. To my surprise there was only two, but one of them I noticed, was none other than Nova, her backpack sitting on top of the table next to her. Steve put up an order into the order window and called to the front, "hay salad for the lot, that completes that order." Belle, my co-worker, was walking over to the window when I told her, "I've got it." I quickly put the salad inside the bag and went through the kitchen and out the back door, Steve asking, "where are you going?"

"I'll be back in just a minute." I replied closing the door behind me. I spread my wings and flew casually over the building and landing in front of the awning, I landed and walked over to Nova's table.

"Ah, we meet again." I said casually. I walked over to the table and sat down across from her setting the bagged salad on the table and slid it over to her.

"Oh, hey!" She said with a smile. "Its you from earlier when I...ran into-"

I interrupted her, "Yeah yeah, I know. I'm the pony who got knock out by a girl." I waited for her reaction. Her eyes went wide and she started to say something before I interrupted her again. "Would you stop stressing about that?" I asked with a pause before continuing, "If you seriously hurt me I wouldn't have come to work today. Believe me, it wasn't that bad."

She kinda just stared at the table a little bit, just like last time.

"I wanna get to know you," I told her gently. "You seem like the type of pony I want to know." Really, we need a singer for our band and if she is any good, I might have found one. Surely she isn't doing stand up or something with that microphone.

She looked up at me in the eyes and said, "Well, when you get a minute, let's talk."

I looked inside the normally tinted windows of the restaurant and saw that all of my colleagues were sitting around talking and I looked back around to the lot, where I saw nopony at all. Obviously the other pony who was here had got his food and left. Then I turned to Nova and told her, "I think I have a minute."

And talk we did. We talked about random things from home-life to work force. All the while neither of us not noticing the passing of time. Then we came around to the matter of hobbies. She told me that she liked to sing in her free time. It was one of her favorite pass-times. For my little piece of the world this was some breaking news.

"Really?" I asked enthusiastically. "Me and my friends have a band we are trying to get started. What kind of music do you listen to?"

She replied, "I listen to almost anything. Music is the voice of the soul I like to believe."

A personality to match the looks and a voice that is soothing to the ears.

"Well if that's the case, then why don't swing by my place and check out our setup." Then I thought about it. "Actually, why don't you try out?"

"I don't really sing in front of other people." she replied sadly. "It makes me nervous."

Oh no.

"Why? You don't mind talking to other people do you?" I asked.

"No..."

"You said that music is the voice of the soul right?"

"Yes..."

"Then by singing, are you not just talking through your soul?"

That earned a moment of silence. "I guess so."

I grabbed a napkin and wrote my address on it. "Then I guess I'll be seeing you there?"

She sighed. "I guess so."

"Then it's a date! What time would be good for you? I need to know so the other members can come." Oh man I was so excited. If Nova is as good at singing as I'm hoping she is, then we have a new singer. "How does Wednesday sound?"

"Whoa now," she said with a sarcastic smile. "I didn't say anything about a date. Especially if I don't even know your name."

Now she was catching on to the mood. If giving her my name was what would seal the deal then so be it. "My name is Khan."

"Alright Khan," she said while getting up and putting her backpack on her back. "I'll see you then."