# Faster

Неизв.

Good GOD, this took forever to get finished. FFN's editor was being a jerk. XD Well, anyway, have a fic about possibly the only het pairing I like in this series. That and FlutterMac, but that's not the point.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer- I do not own My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic.

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Soarin wakes up to the sound of hoof steps just outside his room. His desire to remain wrapped in the cocoon of blissful slumber makes him want to give the offending pony a piece of his mind; but then the sleepy haze clears long enough to tell him just who's outside. The pale blue stallion relaxes and rolls over in bed, considers going back to sleep, but figures it's probably a lost cause anyway.

One hoof gropes about for a moment before catching the edge of the alarm clock at his bedside, and he blearily turns the device toward him. The bright red digits burn fire into his eyes, searing "6:35" into his vision before the darkness eats that up too. If it were any other pony outside – one he did not know, one he did not spend almost every moment of his day with – he would wonder why the hay said pony bothered to rise this early.

But he knows this mare. Actually, knowing her is a gross understatement, a phrase that fails so completely to encompass his relationship with her that even he, the king of obliviousness, picks up on that.

And so Soarin knows why she bothered to get up. To make her way down the hall of the suite the two of them share, adjoined to the rooms of the other Wonderbolts who had accompanied them to this town. Probably to make herself a little morning coffee, to begin her day in a way only she can: with a surge of energy that spurs on the next, and the next, and the next.

The smell of coffee drifts through the air and pulls him back to the present: more than likely she's putting the beans in the blender, and – oh, there it goes. Soarin winces in spite of himself and tugs the pillow further over his ears to try and muffle the noise from the kitchen just down the hall. But no, it seems his body won't let him drift back into the blissful sleep from earlier. He can't explain why, but he has a feeling it has to do with her being up so early for just caffeine alone.

Maybe I want to talk to her alone or something? he wonders, and sighs moments later. No use worrying about that right now. After all, he's already awake; might as well get out of bed.

So he peels himself out of the cocoon of blankets, nearly tumbling to the ground in the process. As it is, he ends up with his hoof dangling over the bed's edge and his wings spread for balance. Wincing at the stiffness of his wings – gonna have to stretch 'em extra well today if I slept on them funny – he shakes his head, rubs his free hoof over his eyes to clear them of sleepiness. As fate would have it, his dangling hoof brushes against his Wonderbolts uniform on the floor; however, for some reason, he decides not to put it on to see her. It's still early; she's probably not wearing it either.

Still, he finds even that difficult to believe. Close as the Wonderbolts are – they've been more of a family to Soarin than his own, after all – unspoken boundaries do exist among them, and oddly, seeing each other bereft of their uniforms crosses one of those boundaries. Seeing her without her uniform on strikes an odd chord within Soarin and leaves a weird taste in the back of his mouth. It's a vulnerability that, surrounding her, feels unfamiliar to him.

In the end, he eschews the uniform and completes the journey begun with the hoof pointing toward the floor. Soarin reflects triumphantly on his ability to get out of bed this early as he trots out of the room, door creaking almost unnervingly loudly in the process.

He makes his way down the hall and sees her there. Oddly, the sight of her having chosen the same route regarding the uniform sends a thin wire of anxiety throughout his body, rather than relief at knowing he had made the decision she agreed with. Maybe because his idolizing her only stretches so far.

Even there, a boundary exists.

That thought fades quickly out of his mind much more quickly than his normal thoughts about her do as he watches her bustling about the kitchen. At this point the coffeemaker's prior dull roar has died down, and while he looks on, his fellow Wonderbolt places her front hooves on the counter in order to pour the finished product into a mug. In the suite's half-light, the mug gleams multicolored, and Soarin unconsciously moves forward, trying to get a glimpse of what it says.

Unfortunately, at that very moment, his balance chooses to destroy any pithy attempt at stealth and he stumbles with a surprised cry. She jolts at the noise, barely avoiding breaking the mug; as it is, it just makes an unnerving clatter against the countertop. She drops down to all fours again and whirls to face him with her wings outstretched in startled anger.

Soarin laughs sheepishly, watching the spark of annoyance in her eyes simmer into calmness. "Uh. Morning, Spitfire."

She relaxes, tucking her wings close to her body again. As she does so, Soarin catches a glimpse of her cutie mark, half obscured by the shadows as it is. Fireballs, converging together on a lightning bolt. Not surprising, considering both her name and her reputation as the Wonderbolts' leader. How is it, he wonders, that I've known her for so long and yet I'm just finding out what her cutie mark is?

"Hey, Soarin," she greets. "Just making some early morning coffee."

"I know, I heard the blender going," he answers.

One amber eye narrows in amusement. "Sorry if I interrupted your beauty sleep. But some of us need energy to go on."

Soarin grins, amused in spite of himself. "Right, right…"

Spitfire turns and resumes her prior task of pouring coffee into her mug, stretching out her wings to get better balance. As she does so, she speaks through the grip her teeth have on the handle. "You want some too?"

"You know I don't like coffee that much," Soarin reminded her. The other Wonderbolts had laughed at him, that first time they had all sat down together and discussed things over breakfast and he had doused his cup of coffee with milk to dilute the bitterness.

Those ochre-colored wings stiffen for half a second. Just half a second. However, she recovers fairly well from her equivalent of being flustered. "That's right. Your sweet tooth and all."

"I do not have a sweet tooth!" he protests.

Soft chuckles from her direction are her only acknowledgment.

"I don't," he mumbles under his breath, significantly chastised.

"Sure," Spitfire laughs. Despite his prior indignation, the stallion can't contain a little smile.

He raises his head from where he had been glaring at the floor, peering up at Spitfire, only to straighten fully and blink wide, emerald eyes. "Um, Spitfire… You really don't have to –"

She waves it off, tugging a half-gallon of milk into visibility – where had she gotten that, he wonders fleetingly – and tipping its contents into the second mug he hadn't seen her retrieve. Keep Calm and Fly On, the mug reads, in stark black print on pink. Normally Soarin would cringe in embarrassment at its color, but right now all he can think is, Spitfire should be drinking out of that one. The slogan written across its surface fits her mindset more than his, after all.

"I'd feel bad chugging all this in front of you," Spitfire says, "so have some coffee, too." She wrinkles her nose in a show of distaste, but a good-natured smile plays on her lips to soften the sting. "If you can even call it that, after I put all that milk in it. Bitterness disguised by sweetness, I guess."

"Well, they do say you can tell a lot about a pony by the way they like their coffee," Soarin remarks.

Spitfire rolls her eyes. "No pony says that, Soarin."

Soarin's jaw drops. "Then Storm lied to me," he grumbles, ducking his head to hide his rapidly-heating cheeks. With his pale pelt and all, said blush would shine like a beacon to her.

"You should know better than to believe anything she says." At his ensuing pout, Spitfire laughs and gestures to the pink mug on the counter, from which tendrils of steam are slowly rising and curling out into the air. "Just take the coffee."

Soarin lifts his head and nods, trots forward to retrieve his cup. As he passes, he feels something brush ever so slightly against his flank, and flinches in surprise before he remembers just who exactly the only other pony in the room is.

Of course, recalling his companion's identity only confuses him even more. Because he has no clue for the life of him why Spitfire would purposefully – not accidentally; adult pegasi never unfurl their wings involuntarily, after all – brush her wing against him like that.

Bemused, he glances over. Spitfire's gaze lingers on him a moment longer before she seems to realize her action interrupted his path to his coffee and tucking her wing back to her side. However, she doesn't do the filly-like thing and look away, a blush on her cheeks. No, Spitfire keeps her eyes on him, chin raised almost in defiance of that stereotypical gesture and the lamplight framing her wild orange mane.

Yeah, I just did that, her stance tells him loud and clear. Which only mystifies Soarin even more, because he doesn't know why she would do such a vulnerable thing as touch her wings against his.

Though… really, her feathers had emanated with soft warmth, and his cutie mark tingles where her wing touched it even now.

He doesn't dare think any more on it, because another boundary lies there and he isn't sure if he wants to cross the fat, glow-in-the-dark line between friends-comrades-coworkers into something else. What that something may be, he doesn't know.

Right now, though, he knows he needs to get his drink before it cools.

He hastily grabs his mug and goes to sit at the nearby table. As he flops down in the chair, he laps up a bit of his coffee. Inundated with milk as it is, the bitterness carries a significantly gentler tang, and he closes his eyes and lets out a satisfied murmur.

"Good?" Spitfire asks, and he jerks up, sputtering, nearly coming away with coffee in his nostrils in his abruptness. He stares, wide-eyed, at the golden mare as she takes her seat next to him, giving him a confused look and cocking her head to the side. "Man, you're jumpy today," she laughs, though something he can't identify flits across her gaze as she speaks. Before he can gauge her emotions with a precision given to him by their years together, though, she takes a drink of her own. When she raises her head again, amusement has eclipsed any prior expression, and he wonders if he saw it at all. "Not used to being up this early, huh?"

Soarin shrugs. "You could say that."

Silence descends on them then, blanketing them as completely as the sheets Soarin had untangled himself from not half an hour before. Soarin focuses on his milk-coffee hybrid as thoroughly as possible, trying to avoid the thoughts that suddenly crowd in on him. It's a new sensation for him, contemplating anything with a fervor normally reserved for more studious ponies, and so just reflecting on that much heralds a headache the likes of which has never plagued him. Still, his mind chooses to push his comfort aside and encourage the questions jostling each other in his head to continue. The desire to know what he had seen in her eyes earlier lies at the forefront, closely followed by why he needed to come out here before dawn and partake in a drink he doesn't even like.

Of course, the answer to the latter is fairly obvious. You wanted to talk to her, remember?

But that had taken the form of a question too, when the notion had first coalesced in his mind.

For a guy who doesn't think too much, you're doing it an awful lot so early in the morning, a voice whose somewhat-raspy tone sounds suspiciously like Spitfire's remarks.

And like he would with Spitfire, Soarin hears his mental voice retort. Well, maybe I just do a lot of thinking when it comes to her!

Reflexive as the words are, they still bring him up short. Good thing that at that moment he's taking another drink of coffee, because his newfound expression would undoubtedly elicit some bemused query disguised as a barb from Spitfire, who, at the moment, is absorbed in her much more bitter coffee.

You can tell a lot about a pony by the way they take their coffee, he had said, and now Soarin knows it's only partly true. Yes, Spitfire has her bitter tendencies, but she's also strong, and fierce, and braver than he could ever be. Living up to her over the years proved a more difficult feat than he could have thought; yet he never found himself minding a bit of it. She's never made him mind it, only encouraging him, lifting him out of any negativity that dared surround him. Even during the practices for new routines when he ever botched anything, Spitfire always floats down to him, alone, a smile on her face and beatific words on her lips. C'mon, every pony makes mistakes. What matters is how you learn from 'em.

Maybe we can go even faster next time.

Keep Calm and Fly On.

"I was thinking we'd leave after the other Wonderbolts get up," Spitfire says suddenly, making him glance up at her. Hey – it was less abrupt this time, at least. Currently she sits in her chair, staring intently into her coffee, even though it's painfully obvious she addresses him and not it. "Well, after breakfast, anyway. We've gotta get to the next town on our tour as soon as possible."

Soarin blinks. "Oh, yeah." Mentally, he runs over the list of cities the Wonderbolts have already visited, eventually landing on their next destination. "Uh, Canterlot, right?" At Spitfire's ensuing nod, he continues, a little hesitantly due her lack of eye contact. "That should be fun. Best for last, I guess…"

He trails off then, as it suddenly hits him that business is the last thing he wants to discuss right now.

Spitfire glances up then, only to blink when she sees the confusion on the stallion's countenance. "You okay?" she asks.

Soarin hastens to abate her concern, but inwardly he claps one hoof to his forehead. At least he knew he wanted to talk to her. Unconsciously, his eyes trail down to her flank, which, half-obscured by the table top as it is, still allows him a glimpse of the lightning bolt where the two flames meet jagging down.

"How did you get your cutie mark?" he blurts out before he can stop himself.

Oh, great job, you basically just gave away that you were staring at it. He braces himself for an indignant rebuke from her.

However, she defies his expectations and just eyes him oddly. "That's why you were looking at me funny?"

"Sure." Soarin laughs nervously, not even knowing why.

Clearly she picks up on his anxiety too – and why is his heart pounding? Stop it, heart – for she takes a slow, careful drink of her coffee, watching him bemusedly through her lashes as she does so. Even from this somewhat limited vantage point, though, he sees that same emotion cross her face again and darken her eyes. And this time, he's enough in tune with said emotion himself to identify it.

Really, he only stops himself from doing anything more than widening his eyes in shock with all his self-control. Because he can't understand for the life of him why Spitfire should feel nervous around him.

But then in an inversion of before, she surfaces from her drink, and similarity to before returns when he sees her face carefully wiped clean of anything other than neutrality. For some reason, Soarin finds himself straining none too subtly to catch a hint of that anxiety, that idea that maybe she cares as much about his opinion as he does hers. Yet while memories flicker through her consciousness, Spitfire either doesn't notice Soarin leaning forward randomly or doesn't care.

"Guess I was maybe fairly early in filly school?" The golden mare shrugs, and a hint of pride sneaks into her smile at her next words. "I was one of the first in my class to get it."

Of course. Soarin isn't surprised.

"Anyway," she continues, taking a drink of coffee before resuming, "I remember we were on a field trip for school, at the Canterlot gardens. My teacher kept going on and on about the history of the place or whatever," she waves a hoof dismissively, "but I just thought all the statues were pretty cool. Especially that one of…" She frowns, nostalgia-dimmed amber eyes narrowing in thought. "You know your lore, right? Who's the guy that's a mixture of a bunch of creatures? Caused chaos hundreds of years ago?"

Soarin tilts his head to the side; he could never claim the moniker of history buff, but the tales of this particular figure always sent a shudder through his body, as remembering the name does now. "Discord, you mean?"

"Yeah, him." Completely unruffled by the same apprehension Soarin feels, Spitfire nods. "Anyway, yeah, those were pretty sweet. So my class moves on, to a higher point at the cliffs. To get a better view of the city below, I guess.

"Of course, wouldn't you know someone trips." She sighs, though her lips remain quirked upward as she sips more coffee. Fleetingly, Soarin realizes his own milk-coffee hybrid sits in front of him, and hurriedly follows her lead.

When they both look up again, Spitfire's still grinning, apparently triumphant beyond all self-control at what she's about to say next. "I didn't even think about it, you know? I don't think my wings were even fully grown yet." She chuckles, a hint of self-deprecation worming its way into the sound. "I don't know how I thought I could fly down and carry something almost twice my size, let alone up twenty feet of cliff."

"Twice your…?" Soarin blinks, confused. "I thought you said you were in filly school."

Spitfire does something very strange then: she hesitates, stares down at her coffee, apparently finding images of the past in its opaque depths. "I was tiny as a filly, okay?" she mutters grudgingly. Quickly, she adds, "That's not the point. The point is that I flew down and managed to save this colt that had slipped and fallen down the cliff."

"Colt?" Soarin repeats. A noxious tendril of something he's never experienced edges into his belly then, making the milky coffee settling there churn. Hay – he would almost call it jealousy, if he didn't know any better.

Spitfire nods, shrugs dismissively enough to dispel at least some of the almost-maybe-envy rippling through his body. "Boulder was his name. Big hulking brute who thought he was better than everypony else." Sighing, she takes another sip. "Wonder what he's doing now…"

"Guess you set him right," Soarin comments, not sure why he needs to interject so quickly. To avoid the awkward silence that would have likely ensued as she reminisced? Maybe.

To assuage the envy deep inside him at this past he was never a part of? Most likely.

She looks up at him, with a smug, so-very-Spitfire gleam in her eyes. "Yeah, I did, didn't I?"

The stallion's eyes flick back down to her cutie mark. He can imagine what came next: her class clamoring around her, congratulating her and regarding her in awe at what had just transpired; Boulder growling in embarrassment, looking away and hating how a filly half his size had had to save him; her eyes growing wide as she took in the newly acquired attribute on her flank.

"So why fireballs?" he asks in spite of himself.

Spitfire tilts her head, making the lamplight engulfing her mane in a vibrant glow shift. "You're just full of questions this morning. I'd think you wouldn't be fully awake." She smirks at his annoyed expression, but explains nonetheless. "Apparently I was flying so fast on the way down that some stray branches along the side of the cliff caught on fire. Saw them burning on the way back up and everything. It freaked me out at first, but later, when I was thinking about it, I thought I was just going really fast." She smiles to herself, taking another sip. "Maybe that was when I first started thinking about becoming a Wonderbolt."

Her tale leaves a twinge of distinctive awe in his heart, one that's even stronger after knowing how impressive she was even as a filly.

"Overly interested, aren't we?" Spitfire drawls, pushing her apparently-empty mug aside to regard him with a quirked eyebrow.

"Well excuse me for being curious," Soarin grumbles under his breath.

An instant later, his indignation turns to surprise at the pressure of something on his hoof. Dumbly, he follows the path of his foreleg – the one resting on the table – upward, to the ochre hoof mingling with his own light blue one. Only now that he knows the identity of the object – and who, exactly, that object belongs to – do tingles trace from the source of the contact up to his body and make him shiver in spite of the warmth of the spiraling tendrils.

"Sorry," Spitfire says, sounding genuine, which would strike Soarin as odd if her touch hadn't mentally incapacitated him. It's just a touch, what's wrong with me? "I just didn't expect you to be this interested."

Soarin manages to pull his scattered thoughts together long enough to offer a reply. "I, uh, no, don't be sorry. It's just…" He hesitates, then suddenly wants to buck himself in the face for doing that; he's known her so long, he should be comfortable with talking to her frankly like this, lack of opportunity to do so and tingly feelings aside.

"We've always got our uniforms on, and those cover up our cutie marks," he confesses. Considers, briefly, pointing out the oddity of her choosing to omit her uniform this morning, but decides not to in light of just how early it is.

Spitfire's eyes dart to a point further below, and it takes Soarin a humiliatingly long moment to notice she's taking in his cutie mark as well. Compared to hers, it's relatively plain: just a cloud, set off by dark lines behind it to signify it speeding forward.

"The story of mine's not as interesting as yours," he says quickly, before she can ask. And really, it's not. Completing a trick back at flight school had heralded the appearance of the cloud on his flank.

It's humiliating, that it took him that long to shed his former status as an aimless "blank flank." Especially when at that stage in life, she had already tried out for the Wonderbolts more than once.

But Spitfire's shaking her head, withdrawing her hoof with a grin. "I told you my story," she says teasingly. The way she ends it almost sounds like a question, suggesting she will not let him refuse.

Soarin shakes his head. "Really, it's not that interesting," he says, heart pounding. "It just, uh, took me a really long time to get it, is all."

Spitfire cocks her head to the side. "How long are we talking here?"

He winces. Clearly, she won't let up in her continuous attempts to push the truth out of him anytime soon. Glancing down, he sees the all-but-forgotten mug of milky coffee and, grateful for the chance at a distraction, ducks his head down to attend to it. It's cold and tastes sour on his lips, but he forces himself to spend a few moments on it.

But the chance to stall falls sadly flat: when he looks up again, Spitfire still watches him expectantly, amber eyes fixed steadily on his face. "Soarin…" The name coils outward from her lips in an almost admonishing manner, yet he can detect genuine curiosity there as well.

Maybe that's why he finally relents and just tells her, just lets himself agree to the part of him that insists she will never judge him based on just how long it took him to realize his true call in life.

"I didn't get it till flight school, okay?" he mumbles. Spitfire leans forward, looks about to ask him to repeat himself, then her mind catches up to her action and she draws back, eyes wide. That loyal part of him falters, and he squeezes his own eyes shut, afraid of the condemnation he would find in the amber fires he's come to know so well. Why did I ever think just saying it was a good idea…

"Sorry I don't have an awesome story like you," he apologizes, a little bitterly. "All I did was a bunch of complicated things in the air and when I touched down again, my cutie mark had appeared." Ironically, he doesn't even remember all the maneuvers he had performed that day. Odd, since as a Wonderbolt he must know many more ways to perform. He turns his face away, noting the purple and green shapes that dance across the inside of his eyelids. For some reason, they make him think of Spitfire, flying about and telling him to go faster and dragging Boulder up out of the abyss.

The fact is that I'm just not amazing, like you.

He doesn't realize the words have escaped him until he hears Spitfire sigh. Just like that, his eyes fly open and he jerks his head back to her. The shock on her face fades, replaced by a kind of weary sympathy.

Maybe that's the moment he notices her hoof wound against his again.

"Soarin," she says, more gently than he would have thought her capable. Then again, she's already defied his expectations so many times in this morning alone. "It doesn't matter who you were then or how long it took you to get your cutie mark. It doesn't matter if you're not the pony you thought you would be. What matters is who you are now."

Soarin dares to look down at their adjoined hooves on the table. He's never noticed the smattering of tiny, nigh invisible freckles along Spitfire's foreleg before.

Then again, they had never exchanged stories of their cutie marks before now. They had never seen each other without their uniforms before now.

All because he had to join her for her morning cup of coffee.

"And who am I now?" he asks, quietly. His heart pounds, as if to inform him he's almost-maybe-terrified of the answer. Like he needed that confirmation.

He doesn't even know why this is happening, though – why his chest feels ready to burst with anxiety, why he feels she'll judge him harshly. She would never do that, he thinks, she…

And then she speaks, and he catches a glimpse of her wings shivering, as if she were restraining any other visceral reaction from her body at getting these words out in the open.

"You're Soarin," she answers, just as quietly as he. It's clear that an invisible fog has descended over them, a ceiling to mute their volume; to clog their voices with its vapor, strong enough to muffle even her normally-boisterous cadence, and act as another unspoken boundary. Ironic – even as one boundary vanishes, another goes up.

"You're Soarin," Spitfire repeats, wings trembling against her back, another silhouette of gold outlined by the lamplight. "You're a Wonderbolt, and a darned good one at that. You're my right-wing stallion, and the best friend I've ever known." Distinctive tremors mark her words as she continues, and they work their way down her voice and into her body, giving the hoof over his a decided shiver before that, too, is repressed.

Startled – and concerned – Soarin leans forward, trying very hard to ignore the way the tingles in his body flare anew at the shift of movement. Instead, he focuses on gauging her emotions. The coffee making its way through her system brings a glimmer to her eyes, the same light that always marks her when she trots out to see the other Wonderbolts gathered, ready and raring to go.

Here, though, their fellow Wonderbolts have yet to awaken. Here, it's just Soarin and Spitfire, subordinate and leader, defined loser and amazing idol, but above all, stallion and mare.

And now that he gets a closer look at that glow to her gaze, Soarin can see the almost-maybe-hesitation-nervousness there. Directed at him.

Maybe that's the moment it hits him: the reason why he felt compelled to follow her and participate in her early morning coffee ritual, even though by normal standards only the sunlight streaming through his window would wake him. Why he feels the need to impress her. Why he draws so much encouragement from hearing her encourage him, from hearing those words c'mon Soarin, we can do this a little faster, fly a little better, perfect this move, the crowd won't even know what hit 'em after we hit the scene.

Moreover, why he always draws himself up and puffs his chest out in pride at hearing her use we.

Were Soarin a less straightforward stallion, he would probably experience trepidation now, at putting a label on his emotions. But, really, said label explains Spitfire's behavior as well: automatically going to prepare him coffee as well, and knowing just how he likes it; brushing her wing against him for seemingly no reason at all; the hesitation that had flitted, soft and gentle and fleeting as a butterfly's wings, across her countenance during this morning's encounter.

And because Soarin is a straightforward stallion, he opens his mouth and speaks, suddenly possessed with the desire to confirm his newfound epiphany. At least, before his common sense, scarce as it seems, can buck him in the face and tell him to stop.

"Just your best friend?" he queries, and it feels like the world's riding on those four words. Even though the question had flowed forth so casually, he immediately finds himself listening with bated breath for her reply, heart pitter-pattering like rabbit's feet in his chest, aided by both the anxiety of the moment and the caffeine running through his veins.

Spitfire laughs, a little self-deprecatingly, and guilt assails him at his identity as the cause of that conflict in her. Guilt, tinged with hope. Which of course amplifies the former even more, but he pushes that aside.

"You know the answer to that," she hedges.

Soarin frowns, pulls back slightly. Feels the hope inside him flicker, just a bit, like a candle in a breeze. Actually, in her case a more fitting description would be a hurricane. "No, I don't, otherwise I wouldn't have a – mmph!"

Stupidly, he thinks of Spitfire's analogy about how he prefers his coffee. Bitterness, disguised as sweetness. And yes, he can detect a very small hint of that bitterness on her lips – but above all an overwhelmingly sweet flavor prevails, maybe because it's her, Spitfire, sweet and warm and alive and real. Her hoof twitches nervously against his chin, which she had grabbed to tug him forward. Once she feels him relax into her hold, though, she calms as well.

Something brushes against his cheekbone, and he almost jolts in shock before it hits him that her eyelashes must have touched him as her eyes fluttered shut. And – what is that, a blush he can feel radiating against his face?

His mouth curls up into a smile against hers, and stretched across the table as he is, he still manages to lift his hoof – the one she had just touched – and press it over her cheek. By now the tingles are racing over his body, working overtime to compensate for his screaming heart and warmth passing through him.

Eventually, though, the desire for air proves too much – he has yet to master the technique of couples in romance movies of holding his breath long enough for a proper kiss, it seems – and he draws back with an audible gasp, opening his eyes. They must carry a glazed, darker hue than normal, because Spitfire follows him back, pushing her forehead against his. A playful smirk that must have formed just before he pulled away stretches across her lips. "That good, huh?" she purrs, the very image of coy self-confidence.

"Uh…" Soarin splutters.

"That's a yes." Spitfire lets out a soft puff of laughter, closing her eyes again and angling her head down slightly. Despite her show of arrogance, Soarin can detect the still-there tremble in her forehead against his. He pulls his wings close to his body again – they had flared out in surprise when she had grabbed his face and stiffened when she had smashed her lips against his – and sighs, bliss the likes of which a good night's sleep had never given filling him.

Somehow he wants to find a way to say all the words just now emerging from the haze of happiness and shock in his mind. Above all, though, the confession her mouth had effectively stifled rises to the back of his throat and begins to percolate at the tip of his tongue. Rather than relieve himself of its burden, though, he chooses to remain silent. Even he knows speaking would effectively ruin this moment between them.

Besides, he knows her well enough already to understand.

On the table, beneath their outstretched bodies, the coffee mugs sit, forgotten.


Do the ponies in this show even drink coffee? I DON'T EVEN KNOW. Let's just pretend for the sake of this fic that they do. I can definitely see Spitfire doing it, for sure.

Anyway, review please!