Prologue - Kicked Out
“Aaaargh! They kicked me out! They kicked me out?! How could they?!”
The door to the quiet cottage swung open, and slammed shut in a matter of seconds. At the doorstep, stood a fuming teal pegasus, still wearing a familiar looking aerodynamic suit. It was only a matter of moments before she dropped her hastily packed belongings onto the ground, and attempted to remove the suit. Nearly tearing it, she tugged it over her head with some difficulty, and tossed it over a chair.
“They wanted to kick out me, the greatest flier in Equestria?!” She roared, knocking over a small night-stand in her rage. “All just because some stupid ponies flying a balloon near restricted territory! ...What the hay were they even doing here anyways? I thought Wonderbolt Academy was supposed to be pegasus only! What were the security guards doing?!”
The mare kicked a book across the room, and her eyes fell back on the suit she had just taken off a few moments ago. Clearly visible on the inside of the navy material, now that the suit was turned inside out, was the name ‘Lightning Dust’ carefully, and neatly embroidered into it. The seamstress was actually quite proud of being able to do that by herself when she did so, as she was pretty bad with her mouth when it came to small things like that. She’d never admit her pride of the simple accomplishment though, since it was embarrassing to admit being bad at something so simple. She had put a lot of time and care into putting her name on that suit, but now she just looked at it with pure disdain.
In a quick movement, the pegasus picked up the suit and gathered it into a ball, then chucked it as hard as she could into the wastebasket. She then sat down in the nearest, unturned chair and glared angrily at the wall opposite to her.
“...Stupid Wonderbolts...” She muttered bitterly. “...Just did what they asked... Got it done... Not my fault...”
The young pony fell silent, as the clock on the wall ticked on. She sat there for a while, her anger taking a long time to subside. By the time she was calm enough to get out of her seat, and not kick something across the room, Celestia had already lowered the sun a while ago, and the moon was already well across the sky. The mare looked over to a calendar that hung near the door that had been marked up with ink all over it. Lots of times and hours were written all over the dates, some of the dates had specific things written, like ‘Covering Nimbus’s Route, take his packages as well’ or ‘Mail from Ponyville arrives, make sure that wall-eyed pegasus didn’t mess up too badly’. Consistently marked throughout the calendar however, were little notes here and there that had the word ‘Training’ marked next to a time. In fact, almost every weekend that didn’t have anything related to covering somepony’s route, had ‘Training Day’ written on it.
However, what really stuck out on the calendar was a pretty conspicuous mark on yesterday’s date. It was circled furiously with red, and in big letters, it read ‘WONDERBOLT ACADEMY, FIRST DAY! ASK BOSS FOR DAYS OFF.”. After that, for about three weeks, there was absolutely nothing written on any of the dates, at all. Not a single drop of ink had touched any of them. Compared to the neat, orderly handwriting that the other notes were written in, this note was written in such a hasty fashion, that the only pony that could probably read it was the young mare herself.
The teal pegasus stared at that date for a while, before sighing sadly to herself. “...Well, I guess I should go to bed. ...There isn’t really any point for those days off anymore, so I’ll just go back to work tomorrow...”
She yawned, and slowly picked herself up, and dragged herself towards the stairs leading to her bedroom. After what had transpired earlier in the day, she really wanted to end it as soon as possible and forget about it. The moment the pony got into bed, and her head hit the pillow, her exhaustion finally reared its ugly head, and she immediately fell asleep.
***
“Mmph... No...” The mare mumbled in her sleep, tossing over in her bed. “That’s not... It wasn’t me, I-... No... No!”
With a shout, the mare suddenly sat up, breathing heavily and sweating. She sat there, trying to calm herself down after the nightmare she had just had.“I’m… I’m not a failure…” She mumbled to herself, wiping her eyes. However, it was a bit half-hearted, as if she were trying to convince herself rather than asserting herself. Looking up, she noticed a bit of dim light streaming from behind the curtains, signaling the rise of the sun on another day. The pegasus just sat there blankly, and then got up out of bed suddenly. She didn’t feel sleepy at all, and quickly packed a few things.
“…I’ve still got days off.” She thought to herself, stuffing various things in her saddlebags. A brush, flying goggles, pencil, paper and envelopes were included. “…Nopony knows that I even came home yet. …I’ll just keep my head down, and go travel. I can make up some stuff later.”
After packing everything she thought she needed, she quickly galloped down the stairs, and out the door. Without hesitation, she took off like a flash, the door to her house slamming behind her. The pony didn’t notice the little paper that was attached to the door fall off, and flutter to the ground…
Hey there, sorry I’m out. I finally got into Wonderbolt Academy after all my practice! I’m not going to be back for a while, so if you need to find me, just send me a letter! I’m sure one of my colleagues will get it to me at the academy.
-Lightning Dust
Chapter 1 – Brushed Off
Lightning Dust’s stomach growled and she immediately stopped flying, just realizing how hungry she was becoming. She had left the house in such a rush, that she skipped breakfast. The sun was already high up in the sky, and the teal pegasus wasn’t willing to skip two meals when she was planning to fly for many hours without pause.
Landing on a cloud with a soft ‘pomf’, sending little clouds of… clouds in different directions, she took off her bag and took out some carrots she had grabbed. While she was munching on some lunch, she also pulled out a map, and begun to look it over.
The map was pretty detailed, as it was drawn for any avid fliers who wanted to be able to go anywhere in the world. Lightning hadn’t really planned on where she wanted to go, and really just flew in one direction, while brooding.
“Hrm, let’s see…” The teal pegasus thought to herself, as she played around with the carrot leaf in her mouth. “If the sun is there… And I’ve been flying this fast… I should be somewhere near… Accithera. …Wow, I’m already out of Equestria? That must be a new record somewhere…”
Lighting had only been flying about half as fast as she possibly could. But that was still much faster than any normal pony. Plus, her practicing had gotten her to the point where flying long distances at very high speeds wasn’t that much of a challenge either. All of it was preparation for Wonderbolt Academy… which was now out of her grasp.
“…Well, since I’m here, I might as well go to Australeo. Always wanted to go there, heard they’ve got one of the top flight camps in all the world.” Lightning put away the map, and picked up her saddlebags. Spitting out the leaf, she looked to the sky, when a thought came to mind.
“Hrm… If I go at the same pace, It’ll be dark by the time I get there…” She mumbled to herself, and scratched her head. “…Won’t be much time to do anything, or even find somewhere to sleep…”
“…Buuut, if I go really fast, I could make it there in just an hour…” She thought, her eyes widening at the idea. An impish smile began to form on her face. “…Hehe, Let’s see if I can do it in less time.”
Confident, the pegasus stretched out, and popped her neck to loosen up. She then stretched out her wings, and extended them to their full span. Pawing at the ground, her eyes narrowed as she put the flight goggles on.
“Alright, here we go…” Lightning muttered to herself, as she strung a stopwatch around her neck. “Three… Two… One…”
*Click*
With a powerful kick, the mare rocketed into the sky, the cloud she was resting on obliterated into mist. At blistering speeds, the daring pegasus hurtled to her destination, blasting any cloud in her path.
***
Like Lightning had said, within the next hour she could already see the coast of Australeo, and picked up her pace. She hurtled past the beach, and soon she was on her way to her first planed stop. The capital city of Clawdney.
“Hehe, right on time.” The pegasus mare thought confidently, her destination getting closer and closer.
Suddenly, what looked like a gryphon doing mail delivery came out from behind a cloud, unaware of the missile hurtling straight toward him. Lightning saw the gryphon, and tried to slow down, to no avail.
“…Oh crabapples, I’m going to fast! Gonna crash!”
And in the next moment, Lightning collided straight into the gryphon with a loud squawk, and the two went hurtling toward the city below…
***
With a thud, the tangle of bird-beast and pony bounced and skidded down one of the few dust paths that curled around the metropolis’s outskirts. After a bit of struggling, the two separated, both looking a bit haphazard after the collision.
“Hey! Watch what you’re doing dweeb!” The gryphon growled angrily, pushing herself onto her paws. “…Aw, look! You moron, you made me drop the letters I gotta deliver! They’re everywhere now!”
Rubbing her head, Lightning was about to retort until she noticed that the grumpy gryphon was already trying to pick up the scattered envelopes, muttering about how she was already slightly behind, and now definitely wouldn’t be able to make delivery in time. Almost guiltily, the pegasus frowned at what she had just done. The delivery pony knew how it felt to drop all the letters she had to deliver, which always seemed to happen whenever that clumsy grey-pony came from Ponyville. She never seemed to watch where she was going. At least she was willing to apologize, and help try to fix her mistake afterwards.
“…Hey, Sorry.” Lighting said sheepishly, while starting to pick up some of the letters. “All my fault, wasn’t looking where I was going… Here, let me help.”
The gryphon gave Lightning a suspicious look, but when she noticed that she was actually trying her best to pick up as much as she could, she fell silent.
“…Hey no, it was partly mine.” The delivery gryphon spoke up, much to the teal pony’s surprise. “I was a bit in a rush, so I wasn’t paying attention. Could’ve easily gotten out of the way in time if I wasn’t so focused on finishing the job on time.”
“Ah no, mine entirely. Shouldn’t have been flying so fast.” Lighting said, handing her the letters she had picked up. “…Hey, how ‘bout I help you out with your delivery? We can call it even-stevens that way.”
“Ha ha, what? What can you help about delivering mail?” The gryphon said, doubtfully. “You don’t even look like a local, so I doubt you’d be able to deliver any of them no matter how long you had!”
“Hey, I work in the post office back in Equestria!” Lightning protested, almost a bit insulted at the challenge. “Give me a map, and half of what you gotta deliver, and I bet I could deliver them faster than you could!”
The gryphon raised an eyebrow at the challenge, and the started laughing. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a pile of letters, along with a folded up piece of paper.
“Here, this is a map of my route. I already memorized it, but I still keep it on me anyways. I gotta get these all delivered in the next hour, so meet back at the post office here.” She explained, while pointing at a red dot on the map. “First one there owes the other a mug of cider!”
“Uh, okay-” Lighting nodded, while placing the parcels in her saddlebags. “Wha- Hey wait, I said we’d be even stevens! Why are we betting on it?”
“Haha, that’s because the race is enough to be even for me!” The gryphon grinned. “Anyways, threetwoone go!”
Rocketing off without a chance for Lightning to react, the gryphon was off, already starting to do her deliveries.
“Hey, that’s cheating!” Lighting roared, looking almost gleeful, and sped off to do what had just been assigned for her.
***
Not long later, the two speedsters arrived at the post office at the exact same time. Lightning had done a pretty good job, but got lost once or twice after misreading the map. It turned out the whole ‘not know the local area’ was actually a big disadvantage for the young mare, as she had to focus more on where the deliveries where, rather than on speed. By the time she was back, she was just panting slightly.
However, the gryphon was panting extraordinarily heavily. She was having a bit of trouble talking, her throat was too dry, so that the two temporarily forgot about who won for a moment while Lightning galloped in to get her a cup of water.
After quickly gulping the cool liquid down, along with a few more cups of it, she seemed to recover.
“…Aaaah.” The gryphon let out a satisfied sigh. “How’re you not tired?”
“Well, I got lost, so I had to take it easy a little bit…” Lightning said guilty, not happy with her performance. Very frustrated with herself, the young mare was disappointed that she wasn’t able to push herself with a simple race like this. She made a vow to learn the streets a little better, so she could have a better performance next time a challenge like this came around.
The gryphoness gave Lightning an incredulous look. “You… You were taking it easy?! Do you train?!”
“Yeah, quite a lot!” Perking up quickly from that question, Lightning puffed her chest out with pride. “Anytime I got free time, I’d practice my flying and try to go faster than any pony before!”
The mail-gryphon stared at the teal pegasus long enough to make her feel a little self-conscious, and embarrassed about saying something so corny. But Lightning did at least feel that was true, she always tried to push herself more than anypony she knew. She certainly was the fastest, until she went to Academy…
As Lightning was pushing the thought of Wonderbolt Academy out of her mind, the gryphon burst out laughing. “Pfft, haha! Wow, really? Man, I remember when I used to be so devoted to flying like you. ...I wonder, would I be that fast and fit if I continued…?”
Mumbling the last part a little unsure of herself, the gryphoness shook her head. “Ah, not important. You’re a tourist right? Do you need a place to crash?”
“Huh? W-well, I was gonna go stay in a hotel…”
“Nah, don’t stay in one of those stuffy places. Why don’t you stay over at my place, free of charge? I like you, so it wouldn’t be a bother.” The gryphon said, while putting a claw on the pony’s shoulder. “…The name’s Gilda, what’s yours?”
“…Lightning Dust.” The pegasus responded, smiling. She liked this girl’s spunk. “Hey, why not? It’d make it easier for me at least.”
“Great! Anyways, I think I’m off my shift now…” Gilda thought aloud, while looking at the clock for verification. Nodding, she then started to steer Lightning towards the door. “Come on, Let’s go get some cider. …Looks like it was a tie, so I guess we both owe each other a drink!”
Though unsatisfied about the outcome of the race, and the fact that she didn’t win, Lightning laughed at how Gilda saw how the outcome meant. No matter what, it’d look like they’d go for drinks. Normally the mare would dispute the victory, but… Well there was something about the gryphon’s manner that stopped her.
“Sure, I’m okay with that. So long as you know a good place.”
“Are you kidding? I know the best places in the city!” Gilda said, mock insulted.
Again, Lightning laughed.
Chapter 2 – Getting Up
For the next few days, Lightning followed a routine. At sunrise, Lightning got up early to do some flight training. The pegasus always did that every morning ever since she had gotten out of flight school, rain or shine. She was really devoted to her dream of becoming the best flier in Equestria. But after being kicked out… Lightning wasn’t sure why she continued, but she did anyways. Despite the bad feelings associated with why she was training, the teal pony still was able to find some comfort in the routine.
During the day, she usually liked to watch the gryphons that were milling about in Clawdney. To Lightning, it was interesting to see how similar the gryphons lived in comparison to the ponies back home. In fact, even the weather was controlled in the exact same way. The only difference she found was the way they dealt with thunder. After eavesdropping on a conversation between a married couple, she found that for whatever reason the storm clouds here aren’t made to produce any sort of noise. So instead, some gryphons are assigned to make the thunder by roaring. The weather-gryphon’s voice was almost inaudible while complaining about how badly they were stocked on throat lozenges.
In the afternoon and night after Gilda got off work, Lightning was dragged around to see the sights of Clawdney. Whether it’d be a cider house, or a club, the two always found something fun to do. The night life of the sprawling city reminded the mare quite a lot of Manehattan’s night life, from when she last visited there. Bright lights, gryphons letting loose, and the smell of food wafting out of restaurant doors as ovens and fryers were being fired up. It was almost enough to get Lightning to relax and forget her problems, and just completely let loose and have fun. Almost.
No matter how hard Lightning tried to forget the memory of being kicked out of the Academy, it always lingered on the edge of her mind. Every time she went to bed, she woke up later in the middle of the night from the same nightmare. It was an old one that she used to have, a silly one at that too. Being forced to go back to flight school because she messed up badly at something, which was terrible because she was one of the worst fliers there back when she was attending. Lightning was made fun of for it, it wasn’t a pleasant memory. But the ones she was having were a little different this time. Those old nightmares always ended with her flying away. Going into a part of the yard that she used to practice on her own to get better, and fly high up where the teasing couldn’t reach her. But when she went there now, she saw two familiar faces.
Her parents.
The Dusts are a respectable family from Canterlot, like most of the ponies that lived there. And they were as snooty too, without exception. Lightning hadn’t seen her mom and dad in years, since their last meeting had ended without kind words.
Like most parents, Mr. and Mrs. Dust wanted Lightning to follow in their footsteps. As the owners of a chariot company, an industry that had started to thrive ever since the famous Fancypants took fancy to traveling the world. Left and right, the highest class of ponies started buying chariots and hiring drivers to transport them to whatever destination desired quickly, and comfortably. They wanted their daughter to succeed them in their business, after she finished school.
However, Lightning had other things in mind. She’d always been the type of girl that liked to be outside, the sun shining overhead as she enjoyed the fresh air. The filly loved to fly, even though she wasn’t the quickest of pegasi. And like most aspiring fliers, she wanted to join the Wonderbolts; something of which her parents didn’t approve of. The Dust family was a very traditional family, wanting Lightning to be a prim and proper lady, not some tomboyish urchin infected with the ‘Wonderbug’ they called it. They tried to squeeze that out of the teal filly in any way possible, and hoped to get her back under control by teaching her the proper lessons of ladyship.
So the day Mr. and Mrs. Dust learnt that their little girl secretly signed up for flight school, they kicked her out the door and disowned her on the spot. It was the last sign to them that she was a hopeless case, so they just gave up on her. No matter how much she pounded and cried, they wouldn’t let her back home. Lightning had to stay with her grandmother, who passed away not long after the young mare had graduated flight school.
So seeing her parents always shocked Lightning. And it was even more surprising to see them looking so proud of her, in the very place that was the reason for disowning the mare.
But every time the teal pegasus tried to approach, they always stayed the same distance away. No matter how hard the pony tried to reach them, no matter how fast she was flying, she could never reach those open arms.
Lightning always woke up after that, tears in her eyes. And she’d just lie in bed, staring at the ceiling until sunrise, tempted to go back to sleep by how tired she was, but afraid she’d fail again in getting that hug from her mom and dad. But she was even more scared at what would happen if she actually did get that hug, and what she would have to face when she wakes up afterwards, and they not being there.
Because of the nightmares, the mare lost a lot of sleep. It was starting to wear on her a bit, her energy not as high as usual and her endurance while training fell quite a bit much to her frustration.
“…So whaddaya wanna do Dust?” Gilda asked as usual after work, acting chipper as usual. “Crash the clubs again? Get some drinks? Or… Pull a prank on somebody?”
The gryphon’s beak broke into a mischievous grin at the last suggestion. But that faded immediately at Lighting’s response. Instead of her usual modest response at her being okay with anything, she gave a rather unenthusiastic shrug. Gilda quickly looked the mare up and down, and noticed she looked haggard.
“Yo Lightning, what’s up? You look like what came out of the rear end of a manticore.” The gryphoness said bluntly, but concerned nonetheless.
“Huh?”
Lightning looked a bit confused for a little bit, but then realized slowly what Gilda was talking about. The mare had looked in the mirror early this morning, and she realized that she did in fact did look like crap. Bags under her eyes, mane not as kempt as it could be, and her feathers weren’t preened properly either. Her coat wasn’t as sleek and shiny as it used to be, looking quite grungy.
“Oh crabapples, Gilda noticed.” Lightning’s thoughts raced in panic. “I don’t want her to worry … What do I do? Uh… um…”
“Oh, it’s nothing.” She lied, instinctively trying to cover up her appearance before she came to a conscious decision. “I’m fine, don’t worry about it.”
“You sure? You kinda look like a wreck…” Gilda frowned, looking very doubtful. “Hey maybe we should take it a bit easy today, I mean-”
“I’m fine.” Lightning said flatly. “…Look, I can prove it to you. I’ll race you back home, and I can prove to you that I can beat you as well as any other day.”
Usually, Gilda would’ve gladly risen up to the challenge, earnestly willing to try and beat the speedy pony after so many losses. However, much to Lightning’s surprise, she almost looked a bit reluctant.
“Well, I’m not sure… You sure you don’t want to just-” She started, looking a bit uncertain, eyeing the teal pegasus carefully.
“Come on, don’t be chicken!” Lightning said, almost aggressively. “Won’t be hard, so let’s just hurry up!”
Gilda looked shocked, and her eyes narrowed. But she still had that same frown from before, and fell silent. After quick deliberation, she finally said “…Fine, but only if you take it easy on me. I’m a bit tired from work.”
Something seemed to snap inside Lightning, and she glared at her gryphoness friend. Just that request for the mare to take it easy made her mad for some reason, and she didn’t know why.
“Tch, there’s no way that’ll happen. Go hard or go home…” She growled, clicking her tongue. “I’ll get there before you even start. …threetwoonego!”
She shouted quickly, and then bolted off before Gilda could even react. Lightning even ignored Gilda’s call of protest, and was just blitzing on straight down the road. But her usual agility was gone from her body, she had a few near misses with various gryphons and ponies walking about. Until finally, her ballistic flight ended when suddenly a large black and yellow object came right into her flight path, and she collided straight into the side of it. The mare went flying from the collision, her unconscious form being flung through the air, in a graceful arc like a sack of apples, hitting the dusty road with a loud ‘WHUMP’.
