Celestia's Grace

It was a beautiful day today, Celestia’s glorious sun was shining in the sky, birds were singing and the barracks were swarming with ponies getting ready for today’s training. Down on the first floor, hooves could be heard cantering and galloping around, ponies shouting to each other about various subjects on getting ready, “Where’s my helmet?!” “Hey man, have you seen my armor?!” While all this was going on, our main character of the story, Solaris, the white Unicorn was in his room all ready to go, waiting for the “go ahead” to head out to the training grounds. It’s been awhile, at least seven minutes he’s been standing there. He sat on his bed and took his helmet off, his dull orange mane flow about. He placed his forehooves onto his temples and started to rub them, it was his way of relaxing himself, he silently thought about options to take. "Do I show up to training late? Should I skip it and try to say I was sick?" he thought to himself

Suddenly his door bursts open, Solaris immediately scanned the room for any way take down the person busting down his door. His roommate popped his head in the room and shouted “Solaris, come on, you’re going to be late!” . Solaris raised up off of his bed, grabbed his helmet, adjusted it, and followed his roommate out of the door. They soon arrived at their destination, the training grounds. The grounds were a large rectangular area designated for training, there were weights to lift, workout gear and a large track that spanned about half of the grounds itself. The track was about half the size of the training grounds, it was covered by a large chain link fence to keep ponies inside, and keep others out. There was a large fence, about three times the height of any pony on the track, erected to prevent cheating by jumping over it. Most of the guards were already lined up in front of the commanding officer, blocking Solaris' view of him. Solaris joined them in the line. “Attention!” Him and the other guards in the line raised their hooves in salute at the command. The commander had a particularly gruff look about him, he had a scraggly voice that was burned into Solaris' mind from the countless days of training by his hooves. “Alright, fillies, what in the hell are you waiting for?! Get your sorry asses moving!” Everypony burst into full sprint to the race track across the field.

The ponies lined up at the starting line, waiting for the commander to give them the order to go "On with the race, get a move on!" the commander shouted, and the race was on. Solaris shot out from the starting line at full speed and into first place. Solaris kept his place well, sprinting ahead of the ponies, and looked back to see how fast they were going, and matched that speed so he didn't tire out. He focused at the task at hand, beating everypony else. Solaris began to grow tired, sweat started to dampen his mane, making it droop onto his face, and making the task that much harder. He started to slow down and others started to pass by him. He needed to catch up, he was starting to lose. By the grace of Celestia herself, I will win this race! Solaris burst into full sprint again, fighting his way back to first place. His breath started to become hoarse, he started to slow down again right after he got to first place and then a larger pony had started to catch up. He was a Pegasus that had a jet black mane and was catching up pretty quickly. "Havin' a hard time Solly?" the dark maned Pegasus bumped into him sending Solaris stumbling to the side and falling further behind the Pegasus. "Can't keep up?" Solaris knew what the pony was doing, so he ignored him. Seeing that the plan hadn't worked, the pony became infuriated, he slowed down to allow Solaris to catch up and stuck his hoof out and tripped him. Solaris fell forward unexpectedly and slammed face first into the dirt, after flipping over forwards and landing on his side, he sat up. He shook his head and stood up, and wiped his nose off with his left hoof, paying no attention to the wetness he felt, he shot back up and sprinted into the crowd of ponies fighting for first place. Solaris ducked and weaved his way through, bumping and pushing ponies out of the way, fighting his way to first place, where he came face to face with the same pony that had just tripped him. "Hey uh... I think you're bleeding a bit" Solaris ignored the comment and slammed his right hoof into the pony's right leg, generating an audible crack, causing him to fall over face first, and Solaris to sprint to the finish line.

And just like it started, it was over, Solaris over ran the finishing line and stumbled to a stop. The commander walked up to Solaris and looked down on the unicorn. Solaris was gasping for air, his lungs felt like they were on fire, the skin of his throat felt like it was peeling from the intense heat emanating from his lungs, he could hardly breathe and his heart was pumping a mile a minute. The commander stared at him, analyzed him, his eyes darting up and down Solaris' body. "Just, What was that I saw out there?!" Solaris looked up at him confused. "Don't you play stupid! I saw you trip Dusk!" Solaris' face turned red. Dusk, the pony that had tripped him earlier was limping back to the finish line, with the help of the two ponies in last place. "What is your major malfunction private?!" Solaris looked at the ponies staring at him, some were laughing and some looked sorry for him. "Seriously! What the fuck was that?!" the commander slapped him across the face. Solaris stood there stunned at what just happened, he look wide-eyed at his roommate who just shrugged at him. "I... I... uh.." he had trouble getting the words out of his mouth. "You what?!" the commander shouted at him, causing Solaris to cower and back up slowly.  "See me after training" the commander's eyes narrowed. Solaris knew he was in for it, he trotted back into the line, as he arrived all the eyes were on him, following his every move. He resumed position next to his roommate and stared forward just like nothing happened.

The rest of the training day went off without any incident, Dusk was sent to the infirmary to be treated for a broken right leg, and Solaris was on his way to the commander's office. He walked up to the door and knocked on it "Get your sorry ass in here!" he heard the commander shout from the other side of the door. Solaris slowly opened it, walked in, and closed it behind himself. "Sit down" the CO commanded, and Solaris sat down on a chair in front of the desk. The room was large, but nothing too out of the ordinary, there were filing cabinet to the left of the desk, and another, smaller desk to the side. The commander sat down at the desk and took his hat off and rested it on the desk next to his left hoof. "Okay..." he said as he rubbed his temples with his forehooves. "I saw what happened." he said, and Solaris stared at him blankly. "But I can't let you go unpunished for what you did Solaris." the commander put his hat back on. "The punishment would be so much less if you hadn't broken his leg." Solaris nodded and bowed his head. "But... in light of what happened and that you have no record. I can let you slide" Solaris looked up surprised. "But if you ever let me catch you doing shit like that again, your ass will be out of here so fast your Celestia damn head will spin right the fuck off!" and he pointed to the air. "Now get the hell out of here before I change my mind" Solaris nodded and quickly exited the room. As he closed the door behind him his roommate walked up. "I heard the captain yelling. How much trouble are you in?" he asked "I don't want to talk about it" Solaris replied. He branched off and continued the walk to his room by himself. Solaris arrived at his room and closed the door behind himself, and sat down on his bed. He took off his helmet and began rubbing his temples again, he looked down to his left hoof and saw a red streak on it. "Shit" he said to himself, as he looked at the rest of his leg, it was covered in blood where he wiped his face off, he knew he was bleeding but not that bad. Solaris walked up to the mirror and looked at the reflection of himself. Blood was dripping from his mouth, it was smeared all over his face from all the sweat and exertion. He walked back to his bed and layed down. He rolled over in his bed without pulling covers over and without taking his armor off, and drifted off to sleep.