A Week In The Life Of Wing Nut

Tuesday

Aerodrome wakes me abruptly with a nudge and a loud

"Get up, it's time to get over to the airfield." I groan, open my eyes, and blindly look around my living room. The bright sun shining into my face makes it impossible to see anything at the moment.

"There's no school today, I checked." I mumble back to her, barely awake.

"Get up." she orders me sternly as she heads over to my fridge and steals my food. I clumsily rise off the couch to challenge her, but I'm too tired to actually do anything about it. I watch in slight dissapointment as she takes my last few pieces of pizza over to my table and finishes them.

"I guess that's payback for eating your club yesterday." I say as she looks at me happily.

1. I'm awake now and I find another sandwich in the fridge. I eat the food, grab my saddlebag, and leave with Aerodrome to work. The sky is completely devoid of clouds and the sun is shining brightly down on Equestria.

"What a perfect day to learn this season's routine." I say to Aero happily.

"I agree. There's barely even any wind today." We glide lazily next to each other and talk about Celestia, flying, food, and other things for the rest of the flight to the field.

At 0945 we land on the strip and trot into the administration building. Aero retreats to her own office, while I make sure Vertigo, our team's manager is at the field. I knock on her office door and she grants me entry.

"Are you ready to begin the new season today?" she asks excitedly.

"Ready as ever. I hope we can memorize all of the maneuvers in the set before Friday."

"I can move the performance over to Saturday if you need me to."

"No, we can do it."

"Oh! that reminds me, Wing Nut, I've managed to find a train to the Crystal Empire for 80 fewer bits than before."

"That's great news." I say. "So what's the catch?"

"It leaves tonight at 1800."

"Oh. Does Aero know?"

"I'll tell her too."

"Fair Enough."

I walk over to her desk and sit down in the visitor's chair.

"Now, what did you need to see me about?" she asks me.

"Nothing, I just wanted to make sure you were here. Also that you were prepared to supervise us and help us with learning the tricks."

"Yeah, I'm always ready to help you guys out." She begins. "Especially when it's just you two and no other ponies to deal with. I know both of you well, so it's alot easier than having to learn what other ponies are like while simultaneously trying to train them."

"I know exactly what you mean. I'm glad we're all ready to go at noon." I reply.

"See you then." she says as I exit her office. I've already forgotten about the train tonight.

Next, I go to Aerodrome's office. She's sitting at her desk, reading over the flight plan we created yesterday. She glances at me for a second, and instantly returns to her reading.

"I guess you didn't feel like knocking?" she says to me.

"Nah. I don't need to knock. It's not like you have anything to hide from me that I haven't already seen or learned of."

"I guess that's true." she laughs.

"So how has your day been so far?" I ask.

"You've been with me since you woke up."

"That's true. In fact, YOU were thing that woke me up." I laugh.

"Oh, please." she retorts.

1. We are in the first stages of getting ready to fly. I clean and polish my goggles as I sit in Aero's office with her. She is currently standing in front of me, with her snout buried under her right wing. I can't help but notice that her right hind leg is bent and lifted slightly off the ground, as if she is focusing extremely hard on whatever she is doing.

"Whatcha doin'?" I ask her happily, causing her to pull her face out from under her wing.

"I have a feather here on the inside of my wing that won't straighten out, no matter what I try." She spread her wing to show indeed, a feather bent outwards and sticking out several inches. I place my goggles on my chair, approach slowly, and try to rub out the feather with my nose, but it just won't straighten.

"Weird." I say. "I don't think I've ever come across that problem before."

"I haven't either."

"Is the feather broken?"

"I don't think so."

"Hmmm." I finish, picking my goggles back up off of the chair. She sits down next to me in another visitor chair. I resume polising the final smudges off of my lenses as Aero watches me worriedly.

"I hope this doesn't become a problem." She says, continuing to preen herself even more. After about ten more minutes of trying to fix it, she finally gives up and continues getting ready.

At 1150 we are ready to begin practice. We are standing next to the landing strip alongside Vertigo, who is reading documents on a clipboard. Aero's goggles are all scratched up and I wonder why she doesn't replace them. A few more Pegasi fly in and land together, and then the sky is ours.

All three of us take off together, flying side by side, with Aerodrome on my right. We fly straight up as soon as we leave the ground, Vertigo is lazily and inaccurately following us, as she is only here to help us memorize the routine.

"Finish the loop" she says to us, and we obey. We messily fly around the loop, then level out a few meters above the ground.

"Delta into pass" she yells, and we both fly away from the other, her going left, and me going right. Continuing the bank, we turn around and begin heading straight for each other.

"Pass into hammerheads!" she calls. "And a hug!" We pass each other, gliding up into a stall as we go. I can see Aero mirroring my flight path a few meters away. After a second of hangtime, and as we slowly drift closer, we tuck in our wings and begin to fall back down to the ground. Aero and I grab each other and embrace as we fall, out go the wings, and then we let go and level out in opposite directions before we hit the ground.

"Nice!" Vertigo calls to us. "Now come here!"

Aero and I fly back over to Vertigo, who is hovering over where we split during the delta. She turns the clipboard in her hooves to face us and begins to speak.

"This is something new I am trying. I have a checklist for the different parts of this flight plan. Once I believe you deserve a perfect score on a maneuver, I will check the box." She states.

"Did we have to use experimental methods NOW, when we have less than a week to memorize an entire show?" Aerodrome reacts as I look at the list indifferently.

"This should help speed things up." Vertigo answers. "I think this will work well. Why would I have incorporated it if I didn't think it would work?"

"Fine, but if we aren't ready for the Crystal Festival airshow, or whatever it's called on Friday, I'm going to blame you." Aero finishes.

"What's our next move?" I interject, breaking the spontaneous hostility.

"Next, we are doing..." Vertigo looks at the clipboard. "Seperate immelmann's to face each other, then form a column over the crowd, Wing Nut in back. After that, we begin the solo section. Aero will go first. To signal a finish, she will fly straight at you. Wing Nut, enter how you please, and to signal a finish, fly up and wait for a brohoof from Aero. Once you've gotten it, get in a line, and return to me.

"Let's start from the hug." I say.

"I'll stay close on your solo, to get that brohoof done with as little idle time as possible." Aero replies.

Aerodrome and I fly up to the area we hugged, grab each other, and drop back down into the routine. We break off and soar up towards where the audience would be. Aero drifts slowly into the way of my flight path, and I join up behind her. We fly past, and far behind the "stands" and once we're far enough to be out of sight, we about face and fly low right above the backs of our nonexistent audience. As we pass over the audience reference point, I break off and fly vertically into the air above the stands, up far enough to be out of Aero's way. Aero remains flying straight over the imaginary stands. She begins a series of flips, rolls, twirls, and even some aerial ballet, before finishing with a high speed pass.

I notice her flying towards me, and I turn to face her as well. She passes me and then it's my turn. Unlike her, I begin with a high speed flyby. Because that's just how I roll. I turn around and when I'm passing over the audience, I glide slightly up, tuck in my wings, and lean into a backflip. They always seem to like that. I perform a bunch of other sexy maneuvers, then corkscrew vertically for Aero. She flies at me, bumps my hoof, and I accelerate as fast as I can towards her in the direction she passed me in. We then stop and fly back towards Vertigo.

"That was great, ponies." She says to us.

"Yeah it was!" I agree as Aero looks over at me.

"Do you know what you are doing next?" She asks us with a smile.

"We have a long series of extremely difficult maneuvers that Aero and I came up with yesterday, correct?"

"Yup. Once in formation, you fly out in front of the audience and you do corkscrews around a central point in between you. Then you surf on Aero's back for-"

"Woah, woah, woah." Aerodrome interrupts. "What? I never agreed to have that in the routine." After a brief pause, she looks at me angrily.

"I may have added that one this morning when I was getting my goggles out of my office." I say. "Just do it. Please?"

"Fine." she agrees.

"Anyway," Vertigo continues, "After you've surfed around for a little bit, you two are going to recite a few lines. You are going to instantly deteriorate the maneuver quality and pretend to lose track of what you are doing. Then, you meet in front of the audience. Aero will yell: "I thought we were diving next!" Then Wing Nut, you yell: "This performance's quality just took a dive!" Then after a brief pause, you guys will dash straight up and fall opposite ways to form an 'M' shape. Got that?" Both Aero and I nod excitedly.

We begin at the brohoof. I hover in the air in the area I ended the solo in, and she flies in and slaps my hoof. I take off after her and we fly side by side back around towards the audience. Then, I land on her back, fold my wings, and begin surfing. She rocks back and forth in the air like a pendulum, forcing me to keep my balance until we reach the audience, then she banks around to the right as I jump off of her back. She starts climbing quickly as I fly back out in front of the stands. She turns, flies back to me, and yells her line.

"I thought we were supposed to take a dive next!"

"This performance's quality just took a dive!" I yell back. Pause. Then we shoot up simultaneously into the air. We are flying belly to belly, watching each other as we ascend, slow down, and begin to fall back down. We fly away from each other, slowly increasing the speed at which we approach the ground in two seperate arc shapes.

"NOW HALF OUTSIDE LOOPS UPWARDS AND PASS EACH OTHER!" I hear Vertigo scream. I begin an outside loop a few meters above the ground, flying down towards the sky. I can see Aero mirrorring me from across the aerial stage when I look down. Then suddenly, Vertigo yells something. But I didn't hear what it was she said, because I was distracted by the sudden sensation of my head crashing into something, and a pain shooting up my back.

I wake up in the dirt, surrounded by scattered cardboard boxes and blank printer paper. A red unicorn with a brown mane is staring down at me with a concerned and apologetic look, and I can see Aerodrome and Vertigo flying towards me hurriedly from behind her.

"What the buck did I hit this time?" I tiredly ask the mare.

"I was making a paper delivery, and I wasn't paying attention to where I was bringing this cart." She explained. "And I walked right into your way. I'm so sorry."

"Another 2000 sheets of paper?"

"Yeah, for a 'Wing-Nut'." She says. I see Aerodrome land behind her followed by Vertigo.

"UGH, THIS HAS TO STOP." I mumble loudly. Suddenly, a burst of pain goes off in my head, making me cringe.

"Wing Nut, are you okay?!" Vertigo yells to me, as the unicorn flushes and realises that I was the pony that was to recieve the paper.

"I think I'm fine." I say. "I've been in worse."

"Like that time that little colt threw a rock that hit you in the head, and then you crashed into that pile of rocks?" Aerodrome asks enthusiastically.

"Exactly."

Vertigo looks at the two of us dumbly.

"Didn't you spend a week in the hospital that time?" she asks as the red pony backs away slowly. "How could you be so casual?"

"Well, I'm fine now aren't I?" I answer.

"At the moment? No!"

"yes I am. shut up."

1320, and I'm in the break room eating food that was left unattended for too long, and watching the TV. The three of us decided it would be best for me to not fly for the rest of the day. At 1325 Aero walks in.

"Aren't you supposed to be in the infirmary?" She questions me.

"I was hungry, so I left." I answer. "Now I'm here." She pauses for a moment before agreeing.

"Ok."

She sits down next to me happily, yet without a word. We watch TV in silence for a minute, before she begins to talk.

"I wish you would be more careful. For a few moments there, I thought you might have been dead. The way you didn't make any attempt to make your landing any softer. You just tumbled."

"I think I was unconscious for a couple seconds right after the collision." I say peacefully. "Hey, did you know that paper cart I hit was another delivery for me, that some idiot had ordered and sent my way deliberately to annoy me. Again."

"I don't care about the paper!" she says to me sternly. "Are you really okay?"

"Well, I have a terrible headache, and my back and neck hurt from taking the full brunt of a crash, but other than that I'm fine... For the most part."

"Maybe you should go home until the train leaves tonight?" Aero suggests.

"Nah. I'd rather stay here."

"At least come with me to my office."

"Okay."

1330 and I've eaten plenty of break room food and followed Aero to her office. She is watching me thoughtfully while I sit in a chair and look at a painting of The two of us performing at an airshow in Fillydelphia. It was presented to us by a fan and I let Aero keep it for herself, because she really liked it. I really like it too.She breaks the silence.

"There's nothing to do. We are supposed to be practicing right now, but we can't."

"I would rather be practicing as well, but if I'm not going to seek medical care, the least I can do is avoid flying for the rest of today. What really sucks is that we're going to be sleeping on a TRAIN tonight. What a way to begin the healing process."

"I don't like it either Wing, but We can't fly all that way, and we got the tickets cheaper than they were before. I'll help you out tonight if you need me too. You deserve a good night's sleep after that crash."

"You make things so much easier for me, Aerodrome."

"Vertigo found the tickets."

"But Vertigo never talks to me about the downsides of what she does for us, nor tailors anything to me based on my personal well being."

"That is true." Aero concludes. "I am pretty nice."

"This trip should be pretty good, though. Even if we are going to be sleeping on a train tonight."

I get out of the chair and walk over to Aero's window, Which unlike mine, on the other side of the building, has a great view of Manehattan. I can see dozens of little colorful ponies flying around in the sky, and hundreds walking around on the sidewalks in the distance.

"Maybe we should pack for the trip." She suggests suddenly, breaking the momentary silence. "You know, because we leave today."

"That's a good idea. I'll get my saddlebag ready th-" I pause as another burst of pain shoots through my head. Aero is looking at me strangely. "It's just my head." I tell her.

"That's not good, Wing. You should get that checked out."

"I'm fine."

"Please?" she asks, giving me huge puppy dog eyes.

"I'll return to the on-site medics and let them look at it." I say with a sigh. "But I don't think there's anything wrong with me."

"Good."

1. I've returned to the medics, who said I was okay and sent me off with some headache medicine, and I've also packed my saddlebags up with my flight stuff.

"Did you pack what we need for the trip?" Aero asks me the very moment I enter her office.

"They said I'm fine, thanks for asking." I say sarcastically. "But yes. And before you begin reading down a checklist of things I need, I have the feather paint, my goggles, a copy of the flight plan, a map, 200 bits, and a cold turkey sub.

"Good. I have 150 bits, my goggles, and an extra pillow."

"An extra pillow?"

"Yes. For extra softness."

"Ok then." Just then, a knock comes from Aero's door. Aero calls to the knocker, and Vertigo enters the room.

"Good. I went by Wing Nut's office, but nopony was there." she announces. "I'm here to make sure you ponies are ready for the train ride. It's a long one."

"We were just talking about that." Aerodrome answers. "Both of us are ready to go."

"I'm am ready to go." I say dumbly as I let one eye drift away in some random direction.

"Is he okay?" Vertigo asks Aero. "Please don't tell me that the crash broke him."

"I don't know." Aerodrome replies concernedly. "He can't remember what the medic ponies said." Vertigo gives me a concerned and scared look as she leaves the room. As soon as the door closes, Aero and I crack up laughing.

"Nice quick thinking."

"You too."

1800 and we're on the train, which has been moving for about five minutes.

"This train is taking the most back-flank route possible." I declare as I read the rail map. "We're taking the North route through the Foal Mountains, then we're stopping at Canterlot for an hour, then we're going almost straight West underneath Cloudsdale towards the Unicorn Mountain Range, back Northeast through Galloping Gorge, and then up to the Crystal Empire. Luckily, Equestria is relatively small, or we probably wouldn't even make it there by Friday."

"No one said the Friendship Express was direct." Aero replies.

"At least not on the one route we need it to take." I say.

"I still can't believe that you lied to me about having a brain injury." Vertigo complains.

"We didn't tell you I had a brain injury." I say.

"Yeah, I said that he forgot what the medics had told him." Aero Agrees.

"Whatever."

"Oh, don't be like that, Vertigo. It's all in good fun."

"Good fun?" She sounds angry now.

"I was the one that got hurt."

"Stop it, ponies." Aero interrupts. "We should all just get along with each other and drink some alcohol in the food car." She adds with a wink.

"Sounds good to me." I say.

"I'd rather get some sleep." Vertigo says as she gets up to go to the sleeping car. "I'll see you later." We watch her leave in silence as an angry, sad aura lingers in the cabin. More silence.

"Ok. let's go!" I say quickly.