We sat around the table eating breakfast. An omelet. Everything was understandably quiet after my freak out. I wish that didn’t happen. I need to work on getting a handle on things like that.

Thankfully Spitfire decided to diffuse the situation, “So I’ve never been on a space cruise before. What are they like?”

“I’ve been on one once,” Cat said, “They’re almost like normal cruises other than the fact you can’t go out on deck and enjoy the sea air so to speak. Unless you wanna get a space suit and step out an airlock and even then there’s no air to breathe. But there is an open area with a large glass dome over it that gives the illusion of openness.”

“Cool. Do most cruise ships have pools?”

“I’d hope they would or else they’d lose a lot of business. But cruise ships for the most part of small cities of several thousand people. In the middle is generally the city part with casinos, restaurants, shops, gyms, all sorts of things to do. Some even have small biomes on the lower decks with things like forests or a larger pool; depending on the destination and what you want to experience. Speaking of which I’m off to buy the tickets. Jett can I have the-”

I held up the card as she stood up from the table. Cat grabbed it and headed over to the coffee table, leaving me and Spitfire alone.

“LISTEN I-” we both began.

“YOU FIRST.”

“NO YOU FIRST.”

“STOP IT.”

“YOU STOP IT.”

Spitfire started laughing. I smiled. Comedy always was the best medicine. I laughed along with her.

Finally she managed to calm down enough to breath, “About earlier. I’m not gonna hold anything against you at all. If you don’t want to talk about it that’s fine too.”

“Thanks. Sorry ‘bout that. I… I didn’t exactly have a good night.”

“I didn’t keep you up all night did I?” she asked worried.

“No,” I said, “But is the wing thing normal?”

“What wing thing?”

“Well I was lying there staring at the ceiling when I got a face full of feathers. It kinda flopped onto my head.”

Spitfire blushed, “That’s not supposed to happen. They normally stay put in the night.”

“Well you were sleeping on your stomach. Ever try sleeping on your back?”

“No. Too uncomfortable for any Pegasus. Sides and front. Sleeping on your back can give you wing cramps when you wake up in the morning.”

“Ah.”

“But if you sleep on a cloud bed you can sleep however you want. They’re pretty comfortable.”

“Can’t really sleep on clouds here. You’ll fall right through.”

“Oh. So we’re going on a cruise?”

“Yup. Still can’t believe I got Cat to go along with that. If there’s one trait that we share it’s being stubborn.”

“I heard that!” Cat yelled.

“I don’t care!” I yelled back.

We finished eating and cleaned up. Cat had bought the tickets for the cruise. Meaning we would be heading home in style.

“Can I have my card back?” I asked.

“No. I don’t trust you with that money.”

“But it’s registered to me.”

“So change the registry.”

“Nope.”

A small object clunked me in the head, “Fine. Here you go.”

I snatched the card out of the air, “So you booked it?”

“Yes. We leave tomorrow.”

“Cool,” Spitfire said, “So what’re we gonna do until then?”

“I don’t know about you two,” Cat said hefting a bag onto her shoulder, “but I’m going out. My helmet’s faceplate cracked when I kissed the pavement and I need it fixed. I trust you can handle yourselves considering where you both landed?”

“Yeah we’re fine,” Spits said.

“Good. And Jett.”

“Yes?” I responded.

“Try not to do anything stupid.”

I scowled at her, “Why I never! I’m pretty sure I’m fine.”

“Sure. Just don’t leave this hotel. I’ll be back in a few hours. Bye.”

“BYE,” we both said. Cat stepped out of the room and into the hotel hallway.

“So what do you wanna do?” Spits asked.

“Hmm. Don’t know. Probably just gonna hang out.”

“Ugh, I was hoping we could do something fun.”

“Oh come on. You never like to take things slow do you?”

“Um, I’m a Wonderbolt? Speed and agility are part of my personality.”

“Well not all of us are Wonderbolts. I’ll tell you what. We can go get into trouble later. For now I want to catch up on some world events.”

“Well while you’re being boring I’ll be sleeping.”

“Try not to smack me with a wing this time.”

“Oh shut up,” she blushed and punched me in the shoulder.

***

“Scientists are saying that there has been an increase in geyser activity in Yellowstone National Park. There have also been signs that the water level in Yellowstone Lake has decreased. What this has to do with the caldera beneath the park has yet to be determined. In other news…”

Well, all caught up now. Aggressive activity between Mercury/Venus and Earth/Mars has increased. The Everything from Jupiter out has wanted to stay out of it and has been promoting peace. A picture of a teenager plastering a sign with Fluttershy on it and the caption, “Violence will not save us,” to a bus stop shelter had caught the eyes of attention of the system. And of course Fox news was there to criticize it.

Spitfire woke up, “Are we gonna do something now?”

I shut the TV off, “What do you want to do?”

“Well this hotel is pretty high up and-”

“No.”

“Oh come on! You didn’t even know what I was going to ask!”

“It probably had something to do with us getting on the roof of the building and us doing some sort of crazy stunt.”

“Well you were right about the roof part. But the doing some crazy stunt you’re wrong,” Spits said.

“Really?” I said, “What did you have in mind?”

“Just a sightseeing opportunity. I was thinking we could ‘get into trouble’ and get on the roof and see the view.”

“Just the view?”

“Just the view.”

I got up from the couch, “Alright.”

“You’re in?”

“I’m in. Got nothing better to do and it’s not like Cat will let us leave this hotel.”

“Cool!”

We walked out of the room and into the hallway. No one was out and about in the hallways fortunately. We found a stairway and walked up to the top floor.

“Where do you think the roof would be?” Spits asked.

“Up?” I responded. Me being a typical smartass.

Punch to the shoulder, “You know what I mean.”

We walked down various hallways. Most of the doors led to suites and other rooms, mostly maintenance. We finally found a door labeled, ‘Roof level,’ and stood in front of it.

“Think this is i-” I began before Spitfire punched me in the shoulder again.

“Stop it.”

“Ow. Ok,” I laughed.

I walked up to the door. It had an old generation II pad lock over the door latch. This place must not get updated often. The lock was simple enough for me to pick.

“You have a bobby pin, paper clip, hair pin or something?” I asked.

“I have this,” Spits said holding up a small hair pin, “Got it from the hotel room.”

“Cool,” I took it and snapped it in two. I shoved the two pieces in to the lock and began feeling around to find the correct position for the tumblers. It took a few minutes but soon we had a successful pick.

The lock hit the floor with a thud. I picked it up and pocketed it and opened up the door. A small stair case led up onto the roof level. We stepped up onto the top of the roof. The building had a large rounded off roof that had technical stuff and various antennas cluttered about.

We walked out onto the roof deck and found the edge of the roof.

“Whoa,” Spitfire said, “I thought the view would be nice up here but this is totally unexpected.”

“Yeah…”

The view was absolutely amazing. The city was laid out before us. The towering buildings and spires stood like monoliths; monuments of humanity’s genius. A maglev train shot down one of the tracks before continuing into one of the tall sky scrapers. Several flying cars zipped by. All this was contained inside a giant geodesic dome. Beyond the dome was the Earth, rising in the background. It was an amazing, picturesque scene.

I loved views like this. The wonders of the cosmos lay out before me. It made me feel powerful yet so small all at the same time.

I stared out, “Beautiful…”

***

“Beautiful…”

The word echoed through Spitfire’s mind. What did it mean to someone like Jett? He seemed like the philosophical type. He was able to stare at something, like the stars, that Spitfire took for granted and paint them in a different light. And here he was again using that word. But what did it mean to him? The view was amazing to say the least.

But Spitfire was confused. He had complimented her on her beauty, even if it was a bit unintentional but then later became terrified of her before returning to normal. Clearly something was not right with him. This wasn’t something like when Twilight’s OCD kicked in; this seemed deeper and more psychological than anything.

His sister refused to talk about it. She asked him if he wanted to talk but didn’t exactly pursue the subject. It didn’t exactly seem like something he was too fond of talking about. She didn’t blame him. She didn’t know what had caused a reaction like that but it had to have been understandably traumatic. But he was her friend wasn’t he? Maybe in time he would open up to her. Maybe…

***

We returned to the room after carefully replacing the lock. We opened up the door to the suite to find Cat sitting in the living room, reading a magazine.

“Ah,” she looked up, “I see you two are back.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said, “So you get the helmet fixed?”

Cat held up her skydiving helmet. The gold faceplate was without a crack or knick.

“So where have you two been?” she asked.

“We just roamed about. Enjoying all the nice things the hotel has to offer,” I said.

“Did you do anything stupid? Actually, don’t answer that.”

“Alright I won’t.”