Winning Spirit

Indigo Zap fought off the mild throbbing in her forehead as she surveyed Crystal Prep's sports fields. The basketball team was situated behind the school, and she could see the tennis and racquetball courts close to the bleachers. Meanwhile, the soccer field lay to the west of the campus, with a volleyball net stretched across it and the school track circling it. If she squinted her eyes, she could just make out the starting line, all the way on the other side of the campus from her current location.

The good thing about having so many fields was that it allowed Crystal Prep to excel at as many sports as possible—particularly against the other schools in and around Canterlot. The bad thing about having so many fields was that it also meant a whole lot of students to keep track of during practice hours.

Which in turn meant that, on any given day after school, if Indigo didn't have practice herself, she was having the absolute worst time.

Indigo let her mind wander, allowed herself to daydream of playing games with the other students. If only Twilight Sparkle hadn't transferred away from CPA before finishing her cloning advancements. Indigo would totally split herself into quintuplets and set herself loose on every field at once, instead of being stuck pushing a supply cart around between them—to say nothing of suffering from neck strain as she looked around to make sure there were no problems.

Sure, these were tasks which Principal Cadance said only Indigo could optimally perform—but she was having serious doubts. She huffed, once again weighing her options as she considered finally telling Cadance to find someone else. After all, her own practice was suffering for this—and besides, three months of field duty had yielded nothing but uninteresting, un-awesome, uneventful boredom.

As if to punctuate her mental griping, Indigo heard a scream at that very moment.

Her body snapped into motion, and she grinned, both on instinct.

Finally, some action.

With a squeal, she was off.

Leaving her cart behind, Indigo tore across the complex. She slapped away racquetballs with her bare hands, and intercepted a basketball pass by the shirts, tossing it to the skins with a wink and smile.

With zero loss of speed, she ran onto the main field, weaving between the volleyball players, making sure nobody's game was interrupted. Finally, as a coup de grace, just before reaching the other side of the field, she jumped as high as she could and blocked a goal shot with her forehead, causing simultaneous cheers and cries from the players.

Indigo landed, shook off the soccer ball-induced dizziness, and powered through until she reached a dark-skinned girl with short-cut white hair wearing a Crystal Prep-branded t-shirt and shorts. The girl was sitting in the middle of the track nursing a skinned knee.

"Whoa! Looks like you took a nasty spill, there." Indigo took out some healing cream, sanitary gauze, and bandages from the pocket of her own shorts, and knelt. "Come on, let's take care of that."

The girl winced as the cream met the cut, but she relaxed as the pain subsided, and Indigo cleaned and bandaged the wound. "Hey, thanks," she said.

"Meh, don't thank me," Indigo said. "The longer you stay there on the ground, the longer you block the other runners."

"O-oh, right! Sorry about that."

Indigo rolled her eyes. "Yeesh, don't apologize either. This stuff happens to everyone." She fastened the bandage, and stood back up. What's your name, anyway?"

"Night Glider," she said, taking Indigo's hand, and standing up herself.

"Huh. Interesting name." Indigo looked towards the sun, then back to Night Glider, and chuckled. "Maybe you're a couple hours early to practice?"

Night Glider chuckled back. "Betting you're not wrong? Didn't stop CPA from scouting me to transfer here, though, and I wasn't about to say no—" She froze, her eyes widening. "Oh. Oh my God."

"What? What is it?" Indigo said. "Did I lose my goggles again?" She felt around her head, grasping her headgear, and sighed in relief. "Okay, good. Hate when I do that."

"You're..." Night Glider gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "You're Indigo Zap! Star of, like, everything here, but especially track! Oh my gosh, oh my gosh!" She bounced in place.

Realizing what was going on, Indigo put on a wide smile. Having fans never ceased to be fun. "Yep, yep, yep." Indigo exhaled in satisfaction. "That's me. No applause, please." Her voice turned earnest. "Actually, maybe you should pack it in early today. Come back tomorrow fresh. Like I said, everyone trips sometimes."

"No way." Night Glider shook her head. "I can totally keep going."

Indigo tilted her head. "You sure? Don't want you getting hurt. Crystals are best when they're in top shape."

"Not to worry." Night Glider patted her bandaged knee. "It was just a skin scrape. Thanks to you, it doesn't hurt anymore—and besides, there's no way I'll catch up to you if I 'pack it in' after one fall." She took on a dreaming, motivated gaze. "Just seeing you here, every day, drives me to push as hard as I can. I want to be at my best for Crystal Prep and for you. So, you'd better be out here every day—I want you here to see me gliding!"

Indigo relished the warm feeling in her chest as Night Glider took off. She was pretty fast. Not as fast as Indigo, but given time and practice...

"We'll see," Indigo said to herself.