If anyone had told me back in my old life that I’d be studying martial arts for anything other than self-defense, I’d have likely thought they were trying to sell me something. I had vastly preferred swimming or biking as my mode of exercise and had no interest competing.

Now I was sitting around with Rainbow and Scootaloo, waiting for one of Rainbow’s friends to teach me some of the styles Deer favored so I could enter martial arts tournaments for profit. Truly life is full of unanticipated surprises, both for good and for ill. I do believe this was a surprise for good.

“So when about is she going to get here?” I asked the prismatic Pegasus.

“She should’ve been here ten minutes ago, but if she had showed up on time it might be the first sign of the end times,” Rainbow snarked, “I’ve never known Summer Flame to be less than fifteen minutes late.”

“Summer lives at her own pace,” Scoots nodded in agreement, “‘A martial artist is never late or early. They arrive exactly when they mean to.’”

“Sounds like an interesting gal,” I chuckled as I stuck my hands in my pockets.

“Interesting is one word for her. I can’t think of too many others who would pick up and move at nothing more than the prospect of a new student,” Rainbow shook her head while wearing a fond smile.

“Wait, what?” I was surprised to hear that.

“Yeah, as soon as I told her about you she got a funny look on her face and declared she was moving to Ponyville. No idea what that was about, but Summer’s gonna Summer,” Rainbow shrugged as she fluffed her wings.

“Maybe there was a scroll from her ancestors portending my arrival,” I snarked, fully believing I was being facetious.

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Rainbow remarked and upon my incredulous look she reminded me of a key fact, “Dude, this is a world of Magic, remember? Prophecies and shit aren’t the most uncommon thing, even if half of them are self-fulfilling, a quarter of them are bullshit in the first place, and the last quarter of them are only strong guidelines.”

“Duly noted,” I said, scrunching my face as I adjusted my worldview. It was odd to me how I had been here almost a full month and some of the realities of this world still wasn’t common sense to me. Maybe I was expecting myself to adapt too quickly?

“Oh! Here she comes!” Scootaloo pointed across the clearing, her underdeveloped wings buzzing excitedly. I looked and sure enough a young woman was approaching us. Her coat was a blue a few shades darker than Rainbow and her hair was rich auburn and a lot thicker and bushier than the average Pony’s. Her attire was very plain, just a black sports bra up top and gray sweat pants down bottom. The thing that really drew my attention was the almost branch like horn on her head. She was a Kirin.

“Hey Summer!” Rainbow called out, waving her arm in greeting.

“Yo, RD,” Summer greeted casually, “Hey small fry,” She affectionately messed with Scoot’s hair.

“Summer!” Scootaloo playfully complained while ‘fixing’ her hair. Summer then turned to me and sized me up.

“So, this is the Ranma you’ve told me about?” Summer asked of Rainbow. For my part I was standing still, slightly nervous under the scrutiny.

“That’s her,” Rainbow confirmed, “I did tell you her scrawny looks weren’t everything.”

“Scrawny?! If I’m scrawny then what does that make you, Rainbow?” I playfully teased.

“Delightfully well proportioned, unlike some top-heavy girls I know,” Rainbow shot back with a challenging grin. Suddenly Rainbow found herself in a headlock courtesy of Summer, “Betrayal!”

“Us ‘top-heavy girls’ gotta stick together,” Summer smirked as she proceeded to noogie Rainbow.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Let me go!” Rainbow piteously moaned as her escape attempts were thwarted by the Kirin’s superior positioning.

“Say Auntie!” Summer commanded.

“Auntie, auntie, you win!” Rainbow tapped out and Summer let her go.

“So, now that Rainbow’s ego has been put back in its proper place, let me properly introduce myself. I’m Summer Flame, Kirin and third degree black belt in The Way of the Bramble. Rainbow’s given me some heads up on your situation, but there’s no substitute for firsthand experience,” Summer grinned as she got into a loose fighting stance I didn’t recognize. Her feet were flat to the ground but her legs weren’t far enough apart for a horse stance. Of course, saying I didn’t recognize it wasn’t saying a whole lot, given my limited knowledge of martial arts.

“Name’s Ranma Saotome, please to meet you,” I replied. My first inclination was to go into a stable horse stance, but my instincts started to disagree with that plan of action and I found myself in a stance with my legs much closer together with most of my weight on the balls of my feet. I could tell Summer noticed this hesitation by the way her eyebrow arched, but she said nothing.

“Alright you two, on your mark…get set...GO!” Rainbow shouted.

Summer was instantly on the offensive, throwing a fairly even mix of kicks and punches to probe my defense. I was only barely able to keep up and let in more than a few of her attacks. A large part of my trouble came from that fact that my mind was telling me to zig and my body was telling me to zag.

Summer then tried to knock me off my feet with a leg sweep. I jumped over the attempt and decided to make a few offensive kicks of my own. This proved to be a mistake as Summer grabbed my right leg and threw me. I managed to recover in midair and land on my feet, but wasn’t given much of a chance to breathe.

Summer came at me with a different stance, this one a lot lower to the ground in almost a wrestler’s fashion. I, who had only ever sparred with my fellow judo and karate students, had no idea how I was supposed to approach this. I tried to kick at her head, but she powered through and grabbed me around my midsection.

I tried to stay grounded, to not let her bowl me over, but between her surprising strength and my inexperience, she lifted me off the ground and brought me down hard. A few moments later, she had me soundly pinned.

“I think that’s it,” Rainbow announced and Summer freed me from her pin. She then helped me back on my feet.

“So, I guess what Rainbow said is true. Trained in a ground based striking style but you’ve got another set of muscle memory ratting around in you,” Summer appraised.

“Yeah, that’s an accurate summation,” I sighed, “I just don’t know what to do. I was only ever a green belt, so I don’t have the experience needed to take advantage of this muscle memory and even if I did a part of me honestly feels I’d be cheating.”

“Well, lucky for you I have a few ideas,” Summer assured me as she clapped me on the shoulder, “We’re going to be seeing a lot of each other in the future.”

“There are worse fates,” I snarked with a small smirk on my face.

“Rainbow didn’t say you were such a sweet talker,” She laughed, “We’ll see if you still feel that way in a couple of months.”

Uh...It's still February?

To be honest this month has been just a complete disaster from start to finish and I barely had any time to write this. From internet outages to my youngest sibling coming home sick while conveniently forgetting we still have a minor little thing called Corona going about. His test results come back today and I'm worried.

Hopefully I get the next chapter out before the very last day of March, but I make no promises. And to think I wanted to have the first chapter of Standing United out tomorrow! Life waits for no man, I guess.