Chapter 1
–Gilded Wings-
He loved his job. It was the best thing he could have hoped for. This is all he could think of as he flew through the sky with the band of pegasi struggling to keep up with him. He made a sharp turn to the left and looked back once he leveled out just in time to see the others struggling to turn as well as he had just done. Of course they couldn’t do it; he was a higher rank than them after all.
He had been called in by the drill sergeant Iron Hooves to come show some of the new rookies how flying is really done. At first he had been reluctant, but he soon changed his mind when the princess herself thought it would be a good idea to show the rookies his skill.
He was part of the Canterlot Royal Guard, ranked as a major, and he was the expert on aerial maneuvers and even his cutie mark reflected his expertise since it was a wing that was slashing through the air.
He shouted back “Okay people, today we are going to go through some evasive maneuvers!” He made a quick dive at a 60 degree angle and then pulled up without any trouble. Again the other pegasi had trouble keeping up with his talent. Some of them were even colliding a bit with the others.
His name was Gilded Wings. He was one of the best flyers in the Royal Guard and he liked it that way. He got all the action in the air he could want, from fighting off threats to Canterlot, to having a friendly race with some of the other guards.
He flared his wings, stretching them as wide as he could and came to a stop in a short distance, then flapped them with his immense strength, turned around and flew towards the group of rookies behind him. They all panicked and flew out of their formation trying to avoid his charge. “You have to keep on your toes if you want to get ahead, so expect everything!” He shouted as he passed them by, only a few of them probably heard and understood him.
He let them take their time to regroup and looked around to examine his surroundings. While he was looking around the countryside he spotted a black unicorn with an unruly-looking grey mane sitting on a hill with some papers in his hooves. The unicorn stared up at him with wide eyes, wondering at his ability.
Deciding to impress the pony even more, he took a quick adjustment to his course and pointed himself right at the black stallion. The reaction was as expected; the pony suddenly jumped in surprise and started to get up and move, but Gilded was too close already. He was getting very close to him, so close as to see his cutie mark, a book with a musical note on one page, suddenly Gilded angled his wings upwards and sharply shot upwards, knocking the black pony over and sending his papers in a flurry into the air.
Gilded pulled out of his successful half loop and turned himself over, seeing the other pegasi group up behind him. He then shouted back, “Ok, time to do a loop!” And with that he angled his wings and started on his loop, the others following behind. He then pulled out of his loop and hovered to view them continuing theirs. He saw the black unicorn out of the corner of his eye and saw that the pony had resumed whatever he was doing before with the papers.
Gilded decided to ignore this fact and flew right towards the group intending to break them up. But when he was coming in they all split right in half and Gilded flew right by. He heard the others saying “Yeah!” and “We totally saw that coming!” He couldn’t help but smile: they had started to learn. He then twisted around and shot right back at one half of the group, while the pegasi were still celebrating. Gilded decided to mess with them. He used his expert fighting skills to grab one of them and spun around in tight circles. When he let go, the blue pegasus spun out of control towards the ground. The rest of the rookies just stood -- well, hovered -- in awe of Gilded’s feat. “Well don’t just sit there gawking! Go help him!” Gilded demanded. They all soon were on their way to help the spinning Pegasus. But there was something wrong; none of them could even catch up to the falling rookie. Gilded sighed, “Guess I have to save him myself” and shot down towards the falling blue blur.
“Heeeeeeelllllllpppppppp!!!!!!” the Pegasus screeched that was unable to stabilize himself. Ha, that was basic training, Gilded thought as he sped towards him. When he finally reached him he saw the ground approaching and quickly flared up his wings to come to a stop right before touching the ground. “You need to lay off the oats a bit!” Gilded strained, as he was not used to carrying such a load. After setting the pony down Gilded looked to the hovering pegasi around and said, “Now then, any questions?” They all raised their hooves.
how do you readers feel about this chapter? Editor: froopermoop
Chapter 2
-Globe Trotter-
He had always wanted to fly. He envied them, the pegasi, how they could fly free while he was stuck on the ground. He was forced to view them from afar, his closest analogue being to draw them. Of course, no-pony knew this, given his work often went unnoticed. Today he was looking for pegasi to add to his “secret” picture of Cloudsdale. (It was “secret” because no-pony cared enough to look at it, and by consequence, no-pony knew about it.)
He was sitting on a hillside near canterlot with his papers around him, waiting for some-pony to fly by long enough for him to draw them, so he could later redraw them onto the picture. A number of ponies flew by, but they were all oriented to keep flying so he never had a chance to get a good look at them.
This was the current life of the unicorn Globe Trotter.
After waiting for a bit he had decided to leave for the day, but as he got up he saw a white stallion pegasus with a red mane fly up into the air, a large group of other pegasi following suit.
He quickly took advantage of the situation and got settled back down so he was observing all of the pegasi. They all seemed to have a sort of hierarchy set up, so he decided on drawing the one who was up front and seemed to have the most skill.
Starting on the body base, he drew all the joints in an extended position, legs stretched out and wings likewise sprawled. As he started out on the outline of the body, the pony made a sharp left turn and he noticed the ponies behind him having trouble matching his agility. Now he knew he had chosen the right one to draw.
Trotter then began on the wings, which had 4 feathers on the outside and 3 inner feathers covering the area that the wings attached to the torso.
The pony then made a downward dive at around 60 degrees and pulled up -- with remarkable fluency, he noted.
He was having trouble with the cutie mark, but he figured he might get his chance soon enough. As he began on the legs, the pony fully stopped, turned around and shot for the other ponies and they all scattered in panic as he reached them.
Trotter chuckled, “Well, I guess he must be teaching them a thing or two.”
As he reached his apex, the pony slowed down and started looking around. Trotter wondered how the view must be up there… how the landscape could be easily drawn from such a high vantage point.
Then the pegasus looked directly at Trotter. “He must have noticed me looking at him.” thought Trotter. Suddenly the pony started flying directly towards him. “What is he doing!?” he thought. The pony was coming closer and closer, and soon enough he could see his cutie mark very clearly: he had just enough time to notice a marking of a wing on his flank. He made a quick mental note to draw it later, when right before the white stallion was about to collide with Trotter, he pulled up and made Trotter’s papers fly everywhere before knocking him onto the grass as well. “What the hay! Why did he do that?” thought Trotter while he was getting up and gathering his papers.
While he was gathering up the last of his papers the pony had done a loop and the others were quickly following suit. Then the same white pegasus stopped at his loop and started looking around and he looked at Trotter again. Trotter just decided to keep on drawing. He was working on the front legs now.
Then the pegasus turned and shot towards the other group of pegasi. Trotter was expecting them to scatter in panic but they split up neatly and they all seemed to be happy as far as he could tell. But then the white pegasus turned all the way around and flew towards one of the groups, “look out!” thought Trotter.
But it was too late; the white pegasus had grabbed one of the pegasi, a blue one, and spun him around. When he let go the pegasus started to spin out of control and was falling now. “Why are they not saving him?” thought Trotter. Almost as if hearing him, the ponies started to fly down and chase after the falling blue pegasus, then the white one which had stayed behind started to fly down and was soon out of view.
“Well I guess that’s it for today” Trotter said to himself. He looked at his paper; all he had drawn was a pony without back legs and a head. But it also didn’t have a cutie mark; Trotter quickly corrected this and drew a wing slashing through the air.
“Well, guess I’ll be back tomorrow”
So I was wondering if I should calle Globe Trotter just Trotter when refering to him in the text... what do you readers think?
