My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all related characters belong to Hasbro.
It was a warm morning as Celestia's sun shined down on Cloudsdale, the city in the skies over Equestria. The bright rays of the sun entered the home of the Captain of the Wonder Bolts herself, Spitfire. The yellow pegasus sighed deeply as she began to wake up, wanting to sleep a little while longer. Suddenly a loud crash quickly made her shoot out of her bed in fright. She sped downstairs and found a large hole in the cloud wall of her kitchen where her stove used to be. Standing next to the hole was a creature with the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a pony, a hippogriff. His pony half was the same shade of yellow as Spitfire's coat, and his tail and feathers were a golden brown. He also had a cutie mark which was a brown bow with three silver arrows over it. It was Spitfire's 16 year old son Hercules.
"Uh, happy Mothers Day?" The hippogriff said nervously as the yellow pegasus just stared at the hole in the wall.
"Hercules how did this happen?" Spitfire asked as she walked over to the hole and looked down to see her stove still falling and heading straight for a lake below.
"I was trying to make you breakfast, but I accidentally set the eggs on fire and panicked." Hercules said as he rubbed the back of his head with his right paw.
"So you threw the stove through the wall?" Spitfire asked in a tired, aggravated tone, wondering how it was possible to set eggs of all things on fire!
"No! I ran to get a wet towel, but when I ran back I accidentally knocked into it and then it went through the wall." Hercules said, rather embarrassed. Spitfire sighed and trotted over to the kitchen table. She sat down and rubbed her head with her hooves, trying to fight back the headache. The hippogriff poured her some coffee and brought it over to her.
"I'm sorry Mom. I swear I'll have everything fixed by the time you get back from practice!" Hercules declared.
"That's fine Hercules, I'll get a repairpony to come by later, just promise me you won't try to fix this? You're worse than I am when it comes to fixing things and that's saying something." The Captain of the Wonder Bolts said as she sipped her coffee.
After doing a little makeshift cloud arranging to make sure no one could enter the house through the hole while the two were gone, Spitfire and her son Hercules headed out. Spitfire had to go practice with her team, while Hercules needed to go buy a new stove.
"Be careful Hercules and please try not to crash into anything. I'm tired of having Mayor Hurricane sending me bills for everything you break." Spitfire said, her tone almost pleading. It was true, despite being the son of the best flyer in all of Equestria, possibly the world, Hercules was like a flying crash test dummy. That combined with his amazing strength and Hercules was an extremely dangerous flyer.
"I will Mom, you have nothing to worry about!" The hippogriff said confidently as he flew off into town, barely avoiding a cloud pillar, only to slam into a different one.
"I'm okay!" Hercules called from his rather embarrassing position. Spitfire sighed as she too took to the air.
Hercules managed to reach the market place safely, though he did crash into a couple of buildings and gave a poor flock of geese heart attacks. He walked through the cloud streets, feeling it safer to walk than fly given his track record. As he passed ponies on the street, they gave nervous smiles and quickly moved along. As the hippogriff made his way around a corner, a pony selling pots set his gaze on Hercules. With widened eyes the potter pony scrambled to gather his wares and close shop.
It wasn't because he was a hippogriff, though there were bullies who made fun of him for being one, it was because of his destructive nature. Everyone knew there wasn't anypony nicer than Hercules or as friendly, but considering a small accident on his part could lead to major disaster, no one wanted to get too close to him.
Hercules hung his head slightly in sadness. He knew why people were afraid of him, but it wasn't his fault he was really strong or accident prone! He tried to be careful as much as he could! But it was never enough for the ponies of Cloudsdale. Hercules neared the houswares store when he was suddenly hit in the head with a ball.
"OW!" The hippogriff exclaimed as he rubbed his head. He picked up the ball and looked over to his left to see three little pegasus colts.
"Hey Mister! Mind throwing our ball back?" One of the colts asked. Hercules smiled and threw the ball over, but forgot to mind his strength and the ball ended up speeding over the colts' heads and into a cloud pillar, taking out a good chunk of it. The pillar than began to topple over onto another pillar, which caused a domino effect that soon leveled the entire market place. Everypony turned to glare at Hercules who grabbed his tail and cowered a little.
"That freak isn't fit to live around normal ponies." One stallion grumbled to another to another who nodded in agreement. Suddenly a massive wind blew as a dark blue stallion with a light blue whirlwind cutie mark appeared in front of Hercules.
"I've had it with you boy! You're gonna have to pay this time, and I mean imprisonment this time!" The stallion barked out, causing Hercules to backpedal into a wall.
"Come on Mayor Hurricane, gimme one more chance!" The hippogriff practically begged, bringing his paws up in a pleading manner.
"And how many chances would that make it? The last chance I gave you after you nearly leveled City Hall was your last chance." Hurricane asked, scowling at Hercules.
"But that was an accident!" Hercules tried to argue, though the Mayor wasn't going to budge.
"Yes I know, they're all accidents aren't they? What about the time you wrecked the park trying to catch a bluejay? Or the time you broke the cloud machine and nearly caused the worst drought Equestria had ever seen?" The Mayor said in a no nonsense attitude. Hercules tried to argue, but couldn't and just hung his head in defeat. The Mayor sighed and thought for a moment. He knew Hercules didn't deserve to be locked up, but he had to do something or else all of Cloudsdale would end up a in ruins.
"I'll tell you what Hercules. I'm not going to have you arrested." Mayor Hurricane said, causing Hercules to look up at the pony with some hope.
"I'm going to put you on a quest of sorts, I think that's the right word for it." Hurricane said, causing the hippogriff take keen interest in what the Mayor was saying.
"If you can do 12 tasks worthy of recognition, I'll forget about all damages and even personally pay for the repairs of any future accidents you may have for the next 10 years. You'll have to leave Cloudsdale for this though." Hurricane finished as Hercules then shook the pony's hoof in agreement as he flew off to tell his mother
"WHAT?!" Spitfire yelled, tears in her eyes, as Hercules told her what had transpired in town.
"If you leave then I'll leave." Spitfire said, fully intending to do so. However, a golden brown wing wrapped around her. She looked to see Hercules standing there, sorrow evident on his face.
"You don't need to do that Mom." The hippogriff said trying to comfort his mother.
"He can't do this Hercules, it isn't right!" Spitfire insisted, her anger building at Mayor Hurricane.
"Come on Mom, it's not like I'm dying or anything. You can still see me and if things go good we won't get any bills for the next 10 years." Hercules said, trying to cheer his mother up if only a little. After a long silence, Spitfire gave her son a hug.
"I'll miss you. I knew you'd be moving out coming sooner or later, but I didn't think you'd practically be forced out of the house." The yellow pegasus said, her eyes brimming with tears. Suddenly she broke the embrace and flew off, only to return a few seconds later. She had a quiver full of arrows and a bow.
"It's gonna be rough out there and there are a lot of dangerous creatures, so I want you to be safe. I know you're an expert at using that thing, but be careful." Spitfire said, as Hercules fasted the quiver to his back and the bow around one of his wings. With one last hug and a goodbye, Hercules flew off, barely avoiding a flock of birds.
"Hmm, so it looks like my dear little half-brother is finally going off on his own. It's about time." A shadowed figure with burning red eyes said as he looked into a magical portal.
"I couldn't do anything while he was in Cloudsdale, what with Zeus being able to sense whatever happens in the skies, but now that he's grounded he will finally feel the wrath of war!"
