Shuttle pones #1

Three days post T-50 incident. VTOL hangar.
"Sergei! Have you seen where I placed those pictures of Sasha and I?" Lightning asked as he was running about the hangar.
"Calm down, sure they're somewhere." Sergei said rather annoyed with having to deal with Lightning's slightly hyperactive shit, then again, it's like having a little brother and sister. Much like Brezhnev said, "Welcome him as a brother."
"Lightning, found them. Sergei hid them again." Sasha said as she came down from the rafters with the pictures.
"Sergei, could you please stop this?" Lightning asked
"Da, is just teasings. I try." Sergei said his English skill still not as great as they could be, but Sasha's vastly improved due to Lightning.
"Sergei, I'm not liking teasings either. Please stop." Sasha said as she started to place the pictures around again.
"Da, I will put effort into it." Sergei said very defeated.
"Thank you Sergei, I owe you." Lightning said catching Sergei off guard.
"You what?" Sergei asked.
"Owe you a favor for at least slowing the teasings." Lightning said as he was rather comfortable with the Russians now. Hell, most of the NATO and Russian ponies started to get along better after they all beat on a common enemy. They all had Anon to thank for cracking a few skulls and telling everyone to get along with Thunderbolt and Morgan standing behind him.
"We're going out Sergei." Lightning said as he was waved away by Sergei who has unfortunately taken to drinking heavily to cope with Lightning and Sasha's late night shenanigans, allowing him to sleep, but always end up hung over. At least Sergei wasn't an aggressive drunk, just more of quieter than normal.
"Sergei, stop drinking, I'll replace all vodka with water again." Sasha said after Lightning left.
"You were one who did that? I thought Anon did." Sergei said rather surprised by it.
"He told me to the first time, you keep drinking like that I'll do it myself." Sasha said before leaving.
Sergei got off the couch and was rather hungry, so it was off to the local watering hole for a bite to eat. Sergei walks past your shop as you're swearing at a Cessna 150 for nearly taking your hand off with her prop. She destroyed the wrench and ruined her prop, but that was something that made Sergei grateful he did not have a prop, though he saw nothing wrong with them.
"Deadful things those little planes are aren't they?" an unfamiliar voice said to Sergei.
"Who are you and what are you doing at my base?" Sergei asked as an Mi-8 pony was hovering next to him.
"Ludmila, I'm an Mi-8." She said as he looked up at her.
"Helicopter pony? Interesting. How do I know you exist, and not just a drunken hallucination?" Sergei asked as she descended enough for him to feel the down wash from her rotor.
"Guess you do exist. Wind never blows down." Sergei said as she touched down next to him.
"And you're a drunken plane." Ludmila said as Sergei laughed.
"Drunk yes, plane half correct." Sergei said as it was his turn to hover.
"Oh you're one of the Yak VTOL planes." Ludmila said as Sergei hovered rather wobbly over to the bar.
"Da, VTOL, in between you and plane. Rather like my niche, though I don't carry much of anything." Sergei said as he opened the door for her
"This airstrip its such a wonderful place. Everyone who lives here gets along so well. It's almost like one of those pony cities." Ludmila said as Sergei laughed again
"It's quiet because we have had our share of trouble lately. Give it time it will be like every other base. Are you moving here?" Sergei asked in case he needed to drop his wisdom on the helicopter pony.
"No, visiting, heard there was a really good mechanic here. Why?" Ludmila asked
"There is one pony you don't want to upset, because if she does not kill you, her father will." Sergei said as he looked around for Morgan
"There is a pony named Morgan, she is nice when she's calm, but anger her and not even Celestia herself can save you from her wrath." Sergei said as KC nodded in agreement.
"Damned good thing everyone here at least gets along with Anon, kept her from blowing Phantom into bits a couple of times. Ahm just damned happy she got rid of that T-50. I like the girl regardless, she's really sweet, but she does have a dark side. She, Anon and Thunderbolt are real good at keepin that on a leash." KC said upon hearing the name Morgan.
"I'll bet ya it's Morgan that's keepin all the freaks away from this place. Allows me to focus on my aerobatics." Blue said actually thankful for how scary Morgan can be.
"Ah, one base queen." Ludmila said as KC laughed,
"She ain't the queen. Thunderbolt'd be the queen and Anon the king of this airstrip. Think every now an again he refers to this strip as Avalon's Shadow. Ah don't understand that man sometimes." KC said more in a rather happy manner.
"Da, KC, he's good. Good at what he does too. All of us very happy to have him." Brezhnev said as Sergei and the Mi-8 got the bar saying nothing but good things, and admitting there are faults in the leadership around Avalon's shadow.
"So you all aren't afraid of them?" Ludmila asks.
"Of course not, Anon is a friend of mine Ludmila. In fact he's a friend with most everyone who lives here. There are a few ponies he does just put up with." Sergei said as KC passed him a drink and something to chase it with.
"You know my rules Sergei, ya can come sauced, but Ah'm not lettin ya get worse than ya are." KC said as Sergei nods and starts with the chaser first.

1200 hrs. Your shop.
"Morgan, why do I keep getting letters from Sunbutt?" You ask as she and Thunderbolt bring you lunch.
"Oh you know, that trip I took with the group that was summoned?"
"Yea?"
"I may or may not have gotten a little angry. But on the bright side I did make a friend." Morgan said as you hit your head with a clip board
"Why did I expect anything else?" You say as you're stopped from hitting your head.
"I don't know dad, it's just they're so easy to scare, and all the other ponies try to get them to react, and I did." Morgan said giving you her explanation of it.
"And your friend?" You ask.
"Princess Luna. She thought my ability to scare her sister's guards was rather funny." Morgan says as you roll your eyes and eat your lunch during your break.
"Have you gotten anything from Luna?" Morgan asked.
You have to think for a second, before you nod.
"Yes, she says hello. I write back when I get a letter, if they take the time to write me I may as well write back. Such a dying form back home. Everything was electronic, it's kinda nice to get back to pen and paper." You say as the formalities you were taught as a kid finally have use.
Morgan and Thunderbolt both laugh at you, and you join in.

1230 hrs. Raptor's
"Thanks for staying with me YF-23." Raptor said as YF-23 came out of Lightning's old room.
"You do know my name is Nora right?" she asked as Raptor flushed with embarrassment.
"Sorry, it's just I've been full of myself ever since my YF days."
"No fucking kidding, you made your own brother run away." Nora said
"Well, it was something I had to learn the hard way." Raptor said as she was still upset about making him run out.
"Well, don't be such a little bitch about it. If I was still pissed about the YF days I would have killed you by now instead of being your friend Raptor. You still talk to that moron Sidney?" Nora asked as she was stretched out on the couch.
"Eh, not really, cutting him out was a good thing for me. Then again, he did cry when I told him to get out of my life. Kinda feel sorry for him." Raptor said
"Fuck that idiot, should've learned a long ass time ago that you two would never have worked out." Nora said as Raptor hid her face.
"Y...yea, he and I, it never did really work out." Raptor said as Nora noticed the stuttering.
"What's the matter with you Raptor?" Nora asked as she looked at Raptor who was fidgeting a little.
"N.Nothing! I'm alright. R really, I I'm ok." Raptor said as she blushed for reasons beyond her comprehension.
"Riight, sure you are. Hey since you're up do you mind getting me a drink?" Nora asked as she closed her eyes.
"Sure." Raptor said almost relieved to have a single word to say.

1300hrs. just outside Edge of Space.
Sergei and Ludmila are walking around the airstrip.
"Sergei, why is the strip called Avalon's Shadow?"
"That's a question for Anon, he named it that, we normally just call it the Airstrip. Come let's see if he's busy." Sergei said as he and Ludmila walk to your shop.
"It's still such a wonderful place, despite there aren't very many hotels for us here." Ludmila said as they walked.
"The hotels are more for ponies that need the rest before continuing on their way, it's not how we tend to make money. We make money by either moving cargo if we can or run aerial escorts. Or the occasional fire mission. The fighters love the escorts, the ground attacks like the fire missions, everyone else who doesn't carry weapons does passenger duty. We may not like riders, but it make us money." Sergei said as they walked.
"Oh, so you all do have a way to make money." Ludmila said
"Yea, Anon, our mechanic charges us a decent price for his work, but he has to so he can get us the parts to keep us flying. He tends not to make money off of us, but the visitors get charged full prices, we get a discount depending on the work done." Sergei said as he knocked on your Shop's door.
"Sergei if that's you, you're late. You were supposed to be here after my lunch." You say as you open the doors to find him and the Mi-8 pony.
"Oh, you must be Ludmila, the Mi-8 on the list Come along you two, Sergei's appointment won't take me long." You say inviting the two of them in.
"Anon, why you call Airstrip Avalon's Shadow?" Sergei asked as the two of them stood in your doorway.
"Well, that's a long story, see the dam over there?" you say pointing to it
"Da." Ludmila said
"That's Avalon Dam. Remember that it's there. Come there's a story to be told" You say as you motion for them to come into the shop.
"As I've been told, long ago there used to be a earth pony city called Avalon, they had a great city, and the dam they built supplied them with all the water they needed regardless of the rainfall. Avalon was a trade center, ponies came from all over to see what the other parts of the world had. It was a city of such untold beauty, it rivaled the structures of the pegasai, who built their homes in the clouds. The jealous Pegasai then brought all the rain clouds they could find and brought them upstream of the Avalon river. It rained for days flooding Avalon and creating the massive reservoir on the other side of the dam. But you didn't come for the story of Avalon, you came to know why I call this place Avalon's Shadow. Well, that's easy, we sit in the shadow of Avalon dam. We sit in Avalon's Shadow, litereally, once a year the sun shines directly onto the dam at sunset casting it's shadow on us. That and it's closest mythical place." You say explaining your reason for calling the base what you do