Disaster Encounter
Gilda glided through the open air, occasionally banking slightly to avoid the rare oncoming cloud. Not that she didn’t already see each one coming from several miles ahead of her, she was just too lazy to alter her course much.
Her eyes honed in on a massive cluster of clouds far ahead of her, one all too familiar.
Cloudsdale.
She gulped as, for the second time in her life, she approached the interweaving network of cloud buildings and structures and ‘air ways’ that made up the beautiful city of the sky. She thought back to her very first time stepping foot on the clouds here, when she was just a small hatchling ready to experience her first day at junior flight camp.
Back then, it had been the first time she had ever been really anywhere outside of the Griffon Lands. The bright, vibrant colors of Equestria and all the cities within practically blinded her young eyes, which were more used to the duller tones of the village she was born and raised in. It didn’t feel like home, and at the time, it didn’t feel like she’d ever associate such a foreign mess of clouds and pegasi with home.
That feeling lasted all of a few minutes until she met the one pony who would go on to make Cloudsdale a second home to her, the same one who she would also fall out with years later for her own stupid ego then eventually reconcile with thanks to the same pink pony that caused her to fall out in the first place.
The same pony who she was now heading back to her second home to give personal congratulations for finally achieving her lifelong dream of becoming a Wonderbolt.
Gilda let a thin smile slip onto her beak. Hehe, you’ve really come a long way, Dash. She reached back for her saddlebag to make sure it was still snug on her back. In it was a small, rolled up poster of Rainbow Dash in her full Wonderbolts fit, that she was going to ask her to sign. It wasn’t really for her to own, but she knew damn well Rainbow would bounce in excitement being asked to sign anything. Confident that it was still there, she turned around and-
SMASH!
“Wha- ow!” Gilda shook her head and instinctively scowled. “Hey, watch where you’re… flying… oh.”
In front of her, also groggily shaking her head, was a very familiar yellow pegasus with an extremely recognizable fiery, orange mane. “Huh? Ugh, I picked the wrong moment to look behind me there, sorry about that. Uhm…” She peered closer at the nervous griffon. “Do I know you?”
Gilda froze, unsure how to properly greet the famous captain of the Wonderbolt herself, and threw an awkward salute. “M’am! Um, I… don’t think so?”
Spitfire rolled her eyes. “Please, no formalities out here while I’m off-duty, it’s just ‘Spitfire’ for now.” She inspected her a little closer, then perked up. “Wait, I remember you now!”
Gilda’s eyes widened and she backed up on instinct. “You do?” Please, please, please, please, Celestia, please tell me she wasn’t in Ponyville when I was there last time.
“Yeah! You were part of the same class of Junior Flight Camp as Rainbow Dash, right?”
Gilda blinked, and breathed a sigh of relief. “Oh, yep! I was!” She paused. “Wait, how do you even know that? Did Rainbow tell you?”
Spitfire laughed. “Surprisingly no, but I was on my last year when you and Rainbow were on your first. After the first time she performed that Sonic Rainboom, I remember keeping a bit of an eye on her, and I noticed her hanging out with a griffon that looks a lot like a younger you.”
Gilda rolled her eyes. “Yeah, that checks out.” She was about to zip past her to get to her destination, but stopped herself as the thought pierced her brain. No, Gilda, you’re not like that anymore, remember? She held out a claw. “My name’s Gilda.”
Spitfire bumped a hoof against her open claw, causing Gilda to cringe on the inside. “Ah, Gilda the griffon, huh? Neat, nice to meet you.”
Gilda retracted her forelimb and glanced around nervously. Gah, this was a whole lot easier when I would pretty much just ignore anypony else who tries to talk to me. But, Rainbow said in her letters that this whole friendship thing wouldn’t be easy.
Spitfire raised an eyebrow. “You alright there? Where are you headed, anyway? I almost never see any griffons this far out from the Griffon Lands, so it’s gotta be something important.”
The line of questioning quickly broke Gilda’s internal panicking. “Oh! Right, sorry. I heard a few days ago that Dash is a full-fledged Wonderbolt now, and I just wanted to pop by to, uh, congratulate her and all that.”
Spitfire smiled warmly. “Well isn’t that sweet?” Her eyes shifted towards Gilda’s open saddlebag, where the rolled up poster laid. She smirked. “Soo what’s this?”
Gilda flinched as Spitfire zipped by her, snagged the poster, and returned hovering at her spot before she could even process. “Wha- hey!” But she had already unrolled the poster.
“Ohh? You a fan of hers now?” Spitfire rolled the poster back up and tossed it back to Gilda, who furiously snatched it back out of the air. “She’d definitely love to hear that.”
Gilda fumed. “That’s not what that’s for! I just wanted to have something to remember her by.” She pointed a clawed finger at her and narrowed her eyes. “And don’t go taking my stuff.”
Spitfire put her hooves up defensively. “Hey, I wasn’t taking anything.” A mischievous grin plastered onto her muzzle and she narrowed her eyes. “Hehe, and even if I was, would you even be fast enough to stop me?”
Gilda blinked. After spending so many years being friends with Rainbow Dash, she could immediately tell that the comment was made in jest. However, after also spending so many years being friends with Rainbow Dash, the first thought in her mind was to also take it as a serious challenge. She narrowed her eyes back.
“Oh yeah? Why don’t ya put your wings where your mouth is.” She pointed at a lone cloud off in the distance. “Last one to that cloud and back is a gnarly dragon egg.”
Spitfire froze, opening her mouth to possibly clarify that it was a joke, but eventually just laughed. “Yeah, you’re definitely Dash’s friend. Race is on.”
It wasn’t even close.
Gilda panted as she flapped the remaining distance to their starting point, where Spitfire hovered with the smuggest expression in all of Equestria. “Who’s the gnarly dragon egg now?”
Gilda stuck out her tongue. “Alright, I really didn’t think you could turn so sharply like that. Fine. You win.” Stubbornly, she puffed out her chest. “But what we griffons might lack in speed, we totally make up for in strength!”
Spitfire’s eyes practically glowed, as if she’d been handed a chocolate cake dipped in gold. “Is. That. So?”
Gilda pointed back up to the cloud they had previously raced to. “Three claw wrestles. Best of three. If I win, I get two free tickets to the next ten Wonderbolts shows! You’re the captain, you can make that happen, can’t you?”
“You mean a hoof wrestle?” Spitfire rolled her eyes and laughed. “If that’s for you and Dash, you know she gets a complementary plus one every time she’s in an event now, right? Since she’s part of the team?” She shook her head and chuckled sinisterly. “But alright anyways, I can totally make that happen. And if I win, after your outing with Dash, you’re buying both of us beers at any one of Cloudsdale’s taverns of my choosing.”
Gilda checked her bag briefly to make sure she had enough bits on her. “Ha! That’s it?!” Gilda took off towards the cloud, laughing as she turned around to face Spitfire. “Prepare to cough up those tickets then, dweeb!”
Spitfire quickly caught up, looking no less smug than before. “You sure about that?” She leaned in closer. “I’ll have you know, I’ve hoof wrestled each of the griffons on your nation’s Equestria Games team and won. Last chance to back out now!”
Gilda looked at Spitfire’s comparatively thinner forelegs, then back to her larger, muscular forelimbs, and laughed. “Oh yeah? Bet.”
Gilda sat on her chair, wrapping up her little reminisce. She gazed at the foal in front of her, eating pizza cheerfully while seated on the lap of her marefriend. She turned her gaze around the house at the many framed photos lining the walls of her and her marefriend flying or posing together, and eventually, some with their precious Blackbird G. Starfighter flying alongside them. She sighed sleepily.
“Y’know, sometimes I wonder what the fuck I’d be doing with my life if I hadn’t lost both of those damn hoof wrestles to you.”
Spitfire’s eyes widened and she leveled a death glare at her. “Gilda, WHAT DID I LITERALLY JUST SAY ABOUT SWEARING IN FRONT OF THE KID?”