A Prodigy and A Bat

by Darkstrike

Rating: everyone
Tags: Slice of Life
Length: 992

Flight Writer has little left to learn, and learning other ponies' is a task that he refuses to undertake. White Night longs for another pony to provide her company. The two find their answers in each other, but answers also come with danger.

Flight Writer has little left to learn. The books that he can obtain with his hooves are limited-little believe he can understand them, much less read them-and school provides not even a scrap of unknown subjects to study. Flight could surely learn about other ponies; a subject he fears more than flying.
White Night, a bat pony isolated in the Everfree has little respite when the only voice to break the deafening silence is her own. The yearning for another pony has grown strong in her heart, and she would willingly accept anypony who could give her her fill in socialization. The day this happens is ill to happen however, as the prejudice against her kind is uncompromising.
The two ponies acknowledge what they want, but the dangers that come along are great. The question their minds possess: Can they bear the danger?

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2016-11-18 07:40:01 UTC

Chapter 1

Flight Writer heard nothing. The outside world was lost to him as his eyes gazed upon the paper that gave knowledge to any who wished to obtain it. Thoughts stemmed from the words he read, and hypothesizes formed, begging for the testing needed to create theories, and from there, facts. Observation and inference is necessary too. The scientific method is required. Fight's voice echoed in his skull, filing the comment into the library that held his knowledge: his mind.

The only goal he cared about in life was expanding that library. The only way to meet that goal was to read. Flight had, for the most part, been doing this for as long as he could remember. 7 years, 248 days... He listed the equivalents of each time, only stopping at seconds. Nano-seconds weren't a concept of time he had found yet.

He sighed lightly. Flight knew it was hard enough already to learn anything new at his age. Adults held little faith in his intelligence, constantly "dumbing" down their vocabulary. He did have a sneaking suspicion that the grown-ups -who every little filly and colt thought to have the wisdom that age brought along with many other intellectual gifts- had little knowledge. Or at least their choice of words. Flight saw this as quite the shocking epidemic. The fact that so few, young and old, possessed little knowledge of a higher vocabulary; it saddened him to think that little had as high of a mind as his.

"Flight Writer," the stern voice rang out around his ears, "please pay attention. I'm sure you'll learn much more from em than a simple book."

The voice was enough to bring him out of his trance-like state. He looked up at the teacher, dreading the impending lecture that was soon to come. Even if it was a short one, it would be none the less embarrassing. The fact that the chastisement was announced publicly to the class made it all the worse too.

"Please put the book away and pay attention." Flight promptly put the book into his saddle bag, and looked back up at him, now ready to listen. "There we go," he grinned, even if the expression had little humor, "much better, am I correct?"

"Y-yes Mr. Etiquette..." He stuttered the reply out.

Mr. Etiquette's grin flashed away, "Now then, where were we? Ah yes, as you can see here..."

Flight was more than happy enough to escape the classroom after a dreadful time spent learning absolutely nothing. While many of the other little fillies and colts had learned a great deal of basic multiplication, he had learned nothing of value. I know all of this already, and he expects me to at least listen to him! He huffed, quite appalled at the concept of such basic tasks. Here he was, learning the math that everypony knew at the most basic and mundane level; Flight could calculate to the tenth place of a decimal, yet he had to tolerate such unhelpful review. The only compensation for the mind-muddling time was that Etiquette had not expressed his opinion of Flight's habit of reading in class.

Albeit, it was an opinion that had been told for the whole class to hear too many times to count. Flight was prepared to rant aimlessly in his mind about this topic when a high-pitched giggle interrupted his train of thought.

"What do you find funny about my failures right now Spell?" He narrowed his eyes, waiting for her response.

Spell giggled once more, then said, "Oh, just the fact you never learn your lesson with him." She rolled the light green spots that were her eyes, the color moving about as she did the expression that Flight had been so accustomed to with her.

"Oh shut up," Flight grunted. "He should learn that I have other subjects to pursue than his basic multiplication that has such terrible teaching methods."

"I doubt your precious reading had anything to do with what we learn. You always read something I can't understand." At these words, the text Flight had been reading came into his mind. He had memorized these words quite well; main concepts of an entire biology book were vital for anything comprehensive to be gained.

"Well, I doubt you can understand anything I read when you look through my mind," he shot the retort back at her, satisfied with the flinch Spell received for such grating comments.

"You wanna play that game, don't you?" She glared at him, horn flaring to life in its green aura.

"No," Flight finally spoke out loud, abandoning the telepathy based communication with her, "In fact, I will never play this game, because even if I can read your thoughts I cannot predict your magic." He did however play his own game in the form of tapping her light orange horn. The simple nudge was more than enough to make the light flash away. He grinned lightly and with a fake loving voice said, "Besides dear sister, a fight would not be pleasant for either of us, would it?"

Spell stopped walking, looking at him with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes, "Of course beloved brother," She too used the mocking tone he had used, but it was quickly dropped with her next line: "but I doubt Mom or Dad would want us to fight right on their doorstep."

He blinked, looking at the door they stood in front of. Their jesting had led them home the whole way -without Flight realizing it the whole time.

"Agreed," he stopped along with her, waiting for her to open the door(the knob was too high for him, Spell's magic could easily turn it) as he tapped his hoof, "either way, I doubt my lack of strength would prevail over your magic."

"Only smart thing you've said all day." She grinned, her horn flaring to life as her magic opened the door.