-The Chronicles of Faint Darkness-

Quick Author’s note: I am deciding to put this first-person. It feels more natural to me, as I always catch myself putting ‘I’ instead of ‘He’. I also think I’m better at first-person stories. Let me know if I should change it back though...Enough ponies saying so, and I’ll do it. Otherwise, it’ll be first-pony from here on out.

~F.A.D.

“ATTEEEEENNN-SHUN! WAKE UP RECRUITS!” Spitfire was the first one to rise, unsurprisingly, and made sure that everypony else would be up. She had one month, princess Luna had said, to train these recruits into tip-top flying shape.

“Ugh...Dear Celestia, I can’t...My brain...Uhnnnn...” I tried my best to get up, but as I would say, ‘My brain no work yet!’. I decided on still getting up, but just...at a slower pace, than usual. I started to (literally) slide out of my bed until hmy face plunged into the floor. The pain from the fall jolted me upright, and I looked around the dorm room at his roommates. Frosty Winds was barely up, yet still more awake than me. The changeling, Moon Aegis, slid out of bed like I did, and landed on me, causing us both to fall.

“Come ON you lazy ponies! We DO NOT have time for these kinds of clumsy and slow movements!” Spitfire trotted over to me and Aegis, and lifted Aegis up and then lifted me up.

“Argh...Really? I can not even see the sun yet, miss Spitfire. Therefore, I have deduced that we have been awoken too early, and-” Aegis was immediately cut off, when Spitfire shot a glare that would make a full-grown manticore defecate himself. He shut his mouth, as I yawned and started to already leave the room.

“Look, guys and gals, if we don’t have time for this let’s...*yawn*...go get breakfast, and start our training, alright?”

“I agree with Faint, on this one, Spitfire. Let’s get this *yawn* show on the road.” Frosty followed me, and Spitfire followed, partially impressed by their ‘Get it done’ attitudes.

“Alright, recruits. Since you’re so ready to get this done, we’re gonna have a time limit. You all have one hour to get yourselves ready and prepared for today. One. Hour. See you all out on the training grounds!” With that, Spitfire took off, down the castle hallways. Frosty looked at me, I shrugged, and went towards the showers.

I might need a shower as well, Frosty thought. She smelled herself, and nodded. Yeah, definitely need a shower. She followed me, thinking he knew where I was going.

“Whoa, everypony just leaves the changeling behind...Racist...” Aegis laughed, and went towards the dining hall instead of the showers. After all, when his stomach rumbled, it caused a minor Equestriaquake. He smiled, feeling that the castle’s kitchen was about to be raided.

Meanwhile, I stepped into the showers. The way our dorm showers were set up was such a bad idea, in my mind. They were practically a long wall of showers. That was it. There was a tiny wall in-between the showers and the locker room behind, but no actual privacy in the showers themselves. I hoped I wouldn’t encounter either of the females in here.

I turned the water on, and began to wash myself, when I felt this weird feeling of being watched. Then, I looked to my right, and saw Frosty, also showering. She was looking at me, scowling.

“Listen up, ‘Faint’. I do not want to catch you EVER looking at me while I’m in here. do you understand?”

“Uh, I don’t think I had any intentions of doing that, but alright.”

“Good! that means, we can try to be friends.” She smiled, and I shook my head.

“Great, great...” I finished out my shower, with Frosty finishing right after. I shook my body like a wet dog, partially drying myself. I grinned, grabbed my towel, and began to finish the drying process when I felt a hoof poke my back. I turned, seeing a partially mad-looking Frost Winds.

“You...Just shook water, that touched your dirty body, onto me...” I nodded, and pulled my goofy grin out.

“Well, yeah. Just take a towel, and dry yourself off.” I used my towel to wipe a particular stream of water coming down from her hair off the side of her face. She jumped back, nearly punching me in the face as she did.

“Don’t. Touch. Me.” She grabbed her towel, and dried off as she left the showers. I figured it was time to show my stupidness, and see if I could get her to either be playful, or to smile. I threw my towel into what looked like a dirty towel hamper, or something of the like, and followed Frosty.

“Hey, Frosty!” I tried to keep myself from laughing, as I leaped into the air with my wings, and fell towards the confused and shocked Frosty. She had turned around, and barely looked up at me as I super-glomped her.

“Y’know, for a pony named Frosty Winds, you sure are pretty warm!” I laughed, and she threw me off of her. I got up, dazed, and looked straight at her. She was practically giving me a Death Stare, as I gave her my best puppy-dog eyes impression. Then she started to laugh.

“Luna damn you, Faint. You might be annoying, but I think I like you.”

“Yay! Now, to breakfast!” I smiled as I flew under her, picking her up on my back as we went down to breakfast. I dropped her down as we entered the dining hall, both of us smiling.

“Whoa! Next time, ask before you do something like that!”

“Yeah yeah, whatever. I smell pancakes!” I trotted over, watching as Spitfire and Aegis chit-chatted about Luna knows what. I took a seat, and looked over the feast of a breakfast we had in front of us. I felt myself start to drool, and wiped my muzzle.

“Heh...Aegis? Can you pass me the pancake platter, the syrup, and...”

~20 Minutes of Pigging Out in an Eating Contest~

“Aegis...You cannot defeat me...I am the black hole of food consumption...” I groaned, and patted my overstuffed belly. I looked at Aegis, who was equally stuffed. He looked at me, then we both looked to the table, where the final pancake laid. I started to reach my hoof out, at the same time as Aegis. I was about to grab it, but a certain pegasus named Frosty Winds shot past my hoof, and ate the pancake.

“Ha, I win.” Aegis and I looked at her, then at each other.

“This not over, changeling!”

“No, I do not believe it is, pegasus!”

“Alright Recruits, time to get to training!” Spitfire motions for us to follow her outside, and we did. The training grounds were different today. They were set up in an obstacle-course form. We also saw some of the other squads on the field. Each one had three members and a mentor. Some of the other flying teachers were random pegasi from cloudsdale as far as I could tell, and some of them seemed like professional trainers. Most of the other squads had also been here longer than us. There were at least 30 something groups on the field, all prepping for the course, it seemed like.

“Recruits! Today, we’re having an obstacle course training session. This will show us, the mentors, how you interact with other groups, and with situations you have not actually been training for. There will be two for each subject: Flying, Marksmanship, Close Quarters Combat, Stealth, and an Intelligence-heavy subject. there will be one at the beginning and end of each subject. Each subject will take exactly one month. This is our first one.” Spitfire turned, and pointed at a bell-shaped object, miles away it seemed. It was on a very small cloud, very high up.

“Your goal is to reach that bell, as a team, and ring it. All three of you must be present when the bell is rung, so work together. You cannot simply fly to the bell, either. You must complete each leg of the course. There is a part where you will have to clear a certain part of the sky, fly through the cloud building without wrecking anything, and finally, fly through a storm cloud to the end bell. We will have Pegasi monitoring the course at all times, watching who fails at certain parts. Any questions?” All three of us shook our heads, and watched as the sky darkened. We also found the gigantic cloud building she was talking about. It was like a cloud-base, probably filled with small corridors. Lastly, we looked at the gigantic, black storm cloud that was rolling into place, blocking the bell from our view.

“Alright guys...We can do this, right? It’s just a bunch of other stupid pegasi, and we can easily beat them. We got this!” I found myself trying to sound like a coach giving a pep-talk, but I could tell it wasn’t working. Especially when we looked closer at the other squads. There were pegasi of all ages, sizes, and colors. There was one especially big Pegasi I was worried about. He was a very light sky blue, and looked camouflaged against the sky. His wings were gigantic, as was his mane. It was stuck in a permanent position like streaks. they were a dull blue. I was fascinated at how different he looked than most pegasi.

“Faint! Get ready! We have five seconds to get ready to take off!” Frosty woke me from my daze, and I got prepared.

“...Three...Two!....One!...Go!” I don’t know who announced it, but I didn’t care. As soon as the word ‘Go!’ was said, everypony was off. I flew straight for out apparently designated point in the sky that we had to clear, of which Frosty had led us to. We got started by kicking and punching the clouds, but by the time we finished, nearly everypony else had already moved on. We pushed ourselves to go faster as we entered the cloud base. On the inside, we found out, it was a maze. We also found out that Aegis is a GREAT maze navigator. By the time we got outside, and started towards the stormcloud, only two teams were ahead of us.

I smirked. “We have this. We may not get first, but we have this!” My squad and I entered the cloud. It was very linear, and we had an idea of which way to go. That when I heard Frosty scream.

“Frosty! Where are you!” Aegis and I stopped, and looked around. I saw Frosty falling, clutching her left wing. I dove towards her, hoping that Aegis was following. Frosty was falling at a really high speed, almost faster than I could catch up. I extended my hoof as I pushed myself to fly faster than I ever had before. The wind was screaming in my ears, nearly popping them, as my mane and tail whipped around. My eyelids struggled to stay open. I could feel my body starting to feel like it was being constricted. Next thing I knew, my ears had popped and started to bleed, but I still heard the explosion that happened behind me.

This speed was faster and better than anything I had ever known before. I caught Frosty, and started to carry her to the finish line. When we landed I felt Aegis pat me on the back as he rung the bell. I smiled, and we both carried a drowsy Frosty back to the ground where we were met with a jaw-dropped Spitfire.

“C-Congratulations, recruits...You may have finished second to last, but that was an amazing performance, nonetheless. F-Faint...I want to speak with you privately, after you and Aegis get Miss Frosty to the infirmary.”

Aegis and I nodded, and he put Frosty on my back as we started to trot to the infirmary, wherever it was.

“Dude...That was. Just. Hot damn, that was awesome! Do you even know what you pulled off back there?! That was a SONIC RAINBOOM! Without the ‘Rainboom’ part. It was just a black and grey streak, but still!”

“Yeah, thanks. You did pretty awesome out there as well.”

“Pfft, what I did was nothing. Don’t forget, you also saved Frosty’s life.”

“Yeah, well, I can’t let friends go down, ya know?”

“Yeah.” We trotted the rest of the way in silence, with Frosty occasionally stirring on my back. When we finally got her to the infirmary room, she told us what happened.

“Well...I saw a flash of yellow, and suddenly my wing hurt like hell, and the next thing I know, I’m falling because I can’t fly. I also blacked out, when I was falling.”

“Oh. Well, thanks to Faint here, you’re okay. He pulled off the most awesome Sonic-Rainboom explosion type thing ever!”

“Ah. Well Faint, thanks. I appreciate you not letting me fall to my death.”

“No problem! That’s what friends are for. Now, you gotta stay here for the night, but the doc says you’ll be fine tomorrow. Meanwhile, I have to go talk to Spitfire. See you guys later.”

“Bye!”

“See ya.” I left, heading for the dorm room. I figured that’s where Spitfire would be. Funny enough, when I got there, she was waiting. She wasn’t looking at me first, though. She was staring out the window, contemplating something, until I cleared my throat.

“*Ahem* You wanted to talk to me, ma’am?”

“Yes, recruit. Take a seat.” I sat down on my cot as she said. “What you did out there today recruit, was very rare. I’ve only seen one other pony pull off a move like that in my life. Her name is Rainbow Dash. You’ve proven yourself, so far, to be very much so like her recruit. What I’m trying to say, recruit, is that you have potential, and a lot of it. I believe in you, recruit. Princess Luna, from what I’ve heard, only takes in one squad each year, after the training has finished, and she gives them a certain assignment.”

“Wow...”

“Yeah, recruit. There are thirty-three squads this year in total. There are very low odds of our squad making it, but I believe that this certain squad will. Especially, not that I am officially making you the Squad Leader. Do you accept this responsibility, recruit?”

“Ma’am...Yes ma’am! I accept the position of Squad Leader for our squad, squad number thirty two!” I got up and saluted Spitfire, who saluted in return, with a smile. She hoofed me a small pin, that showed a Moon, and within it, a Triangle with a bar under it horizontally.

“Great job, squad leader. You and your squad will receive your uniforms tomorrow. These are the uniforms that will resemble the ones that I believe you will get when you beat all the other squads out here. Yours will be the one with the same insignia as the pin’s, on the hat and jacket. Now go get your squad, return here, and get some rest. You go get the uniforms at seven thirty am. Dismissed.”

I nodded, and lowered my salute as I left the room. I put my pin on my cot as a did so as well. So far, training was that hard. I hoped it wouldn’t change much from this, as I went to gather the rest of my squad, gleefully humming the my little pony theme song all the while.