Loyal Wing's Story

Name: Loyal Wing A.K.A Loyals
Age: 28
Race: Equestrian Pegasus
Home Country: Equestria
Residences: Ponyville Garrison. Townhouse on Trips and Trots #2 (Ponyville)
Occupation: Equestrian Special Operations, Third Twilight Guard squad “Lion’s Roar.”
Official Affiliations: Equestrian Royal Military, Equestrian Royal Guard.
Unofficial Affiliations: Ponyvillilian Hoofball League, Equestrian Special Operations.
Titles: Hero of Lion’s Gate, Detachment Commander (Lion’s Roar), Twelfth Blade of Equestria, Royal Knight of Equestria, Claddagh, Uncle Featherhead.
Special Talent: Forged Bonds; Making, protecting, and strengthening bonds with others. Manifests magically as Finest Hour.
Cutie Mark: A Claddagh
Notable Physical Markings: A green mane and tail fringed with white.
Notable Magic: Finest Hour.
Colors: Stark white coat, green mane with white tips, steel blue eyes
Standard equipment: A glaive of some sort (recently acquired an alchemically forged starmetal glaive, has about twelve or so at home) Lion’s Roar’s heirloom black steel armor (Twilight Guard pattern,) purple tinted flight goggles.
Family: Rosewood (Mother, alive) Updraft (father, deceased)
Relationships: Currently dating Princess Twilight Sparkle. Close friends with his Squadmates Dive Bomb, Iron Sides, Freelance, and Misty Spring. Friends with Sallet and his daughter Sterling Silver. Keeps in contact with his ex-fillyfriend Silver Lining. Tangentially serves Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, and Princess Cadence. Knows multiple soldiers and guards, still having a minor rivalry with Shining Armor and various others from Camp Dandelion. May or may not know a few oddballs from his line of work.

Biography: Born in the cloudcity of Trots on the day his father perished fighting a storm threatening the entire city. Loyal Wing grew up an athletic, if headstrong, colt. While not particularly interested in school, he managed well enough to keep his mother, Rosewood, happy. As he grew up, stories of his father’s heroics encouraged him to further hone his athletic abilities, wanting to live up to his dad’s legacy. Over time this grew into an ego (the size of Cloudsdale) that made him keep pushing himself, to prove he was the best around. This persisted, despite an incident as a young colt where he nearly fell to his death cloudhopping that resulted in a lingering fear of heights. He was even trained by the sheriff of Trots, one Sheriff Cloud Ranger, in martial arts with his father’s glaive. When he discovered his Cutie Mark his mother and the other ponies of Trots gathered enough Bits to send him to the Canterlot Guard Academy to be trained as a knight. They believed the Claddagh on his flank, a symbol representing loyalty, devotion, and a to be a sign of a brighter future than the small city could offer. Once in Canterlot he grew accustomed to the ground, where the fear of the floor opening up beneath him vanished, and quickly took to the Academy’s teachings. Martial arts, combat flight drills, tactical training, whatever they could throw at him. He rose to the top of his class, even earning acting professor Commander Supercell’s approval, and a recommendation by Royal Guard Captain Night Light himself. Needless to say, he was more surprised than anyone when he was plucked out of the prestigious academy to train at Camp Dandelion, a mostly unheard of boot camp lead by an earth pony stallion named Lion’s Roar. It was not what he expected. The training was absolutely brutal, weeding out over half of the members. But, through it all, the prodigy with an ego streak grew into a soldier. It was during this time that Lion’s Roar broke him down and showed him really what he was, causing him to rediscover the loyalty his cutie mark represented. He became almost a father figure to Loyal Wing and the rest of the trainees, and so when it came time to graduate and return to their respective branches, the goodbyes were said with tears. Then the war with the south started, and Loyal Wing was dispatched to the Dream Valley military base to assist in protecting the border, along with Dive Bomb, Iron Sides, Freelance, and Lion’s roar himself. It was during this time he met Sallet, an earth pony armourer serving among the support corps at the base. One heated argument and a sparring match later, the two had started to respect each other. Over time they would become friends, and Sallet would introduce Loyal Wing to earth pony alchemy and alchemical smithing, while also upkeeping and occasionally improving the squad’s equipment. Eventually Loyal Wing and his squad came up against a war band sieging a small border town during a routine patrol. There they fought Tal Rassa the Machinator and his small army. During the fight most of the squad was disabled, and it was only with Lion’s Roar sacrificing himself to defend them that they managed to prevail. Loyal Wing was promoted to squad leader, and would lead them well throughout the war and beyond. Eventually the squad itself would grow into a special operations squad, working directly under Princess Celestia, taking the name Lion’s Pride in honor of their lost mentor. Eventually he would crash land within Sweet Apple Acres, meeting Applejack. Through her he met Twilight Sparkle, and would befriend both. At some point Twilight Sparkle would ascend as an Alicorn, and become Princess of Friendship. Lion’s Pride would be assigned as part of her royal guard thanks to the massive amount of chaos that happens in Ponyville, and the squad came to live there. One evening Loyal Wing dug up the courage to invite Princess Twilight Sparkle on a date, and the rest is history.

 Personality: At face value, Loyal Wing is pretty well represented by his name: He’s incredibly loyal, and he’s a pegasus. His determination is on par with most sedimentary rocks, and he gives everything he’s got in everything he does. If one gets to know him though, they’ll find a lot more. The first thing you’ll find is that he’s actually not unintelligent, and in fact does give most things a good amount of thought. A lifetime of martial and tactical training has made him an extraordinarily quick thinker, even for a pegasus. He’s no genius, but he’s certainly not dumb muscle. He tends to approach situations on a case by case basis, instead of applying blanket judgements on things. So while he may seem unnaturally interested in some things, it is with good reason. While a more than a bit egotistical, he can generally back up his boasts. His defining feature is his loyalty to his friends however, as shown by the symbol on his flanks. He highly respects his squadmates, and is willing to push himself far beyond his limitations in order to protect them, even if sometimes they don’t really need his help. His generally cordial demeanor breaks when his friends are in trouble, insulted, or you just challenge him to something. His self confidence is perhaps a bit too high, but it does mean that insults directed at him barely get a chuckle in response. Just don’t insult his friends, or you’ll have a very angry pegasus tackling you. If you couldn’t tell, he’s a bit of a hot head when his buttons get pushed, and it is REALLY easy to push those buttons if you say the wrong thing. He legitimately believes he’s the best at what he does, and while he doesn’t like being proven wrong, being overcome just fuels his drive to improve even more. While this may sound bad, he’s usually a decently friendly pony. He’s respectful of most, until they give him a reason not to respect them, and while he can be a bit annoying to be around sometimes you’re not going to have a dull moment. He approaches everything with 100%, so if somepony can let go of their seriousness for a little while they’ll probably enjoy themselves around him. Though you’ll have to be careful, if you go too slow or bore him, he’ll start daydreaming and completely zone out on you. And once you’ve befriended him, the difference is like night and day. It’s not easy, as he’s actually kind of shy, hiding behind the mask of politeness to cope with social anxiety. This isn’t helped by a poor memory for names and a good memory for faces, meaning often times he can’t remember the pony’s name despite recognizing them. While he treats most ponies with at least a baseline respect, he treats friends incredibly well. He cherishes them, believing that true friends are rare and valuable enough to deserve whatever it takes to keep them. While this means it is possible to take advantage of him, his other friends take care of him well enough to keep him out of trouble. And he’s willing to do anything, ANYTHING, for his friends. A good example is his ability to put aside his fear of heights for them, completely ignoring what is usually a crippling phobia. Just be careful, getting him to shut up once you actually get him talking is difficult, he’s a bit of a chatterbox. Proud, more intelligent than he lets on, enthusiastic, a bit of a hothead, and unwaveringly loyal. He takes each day as it comes, but don’t get between him and his friends if you don’t want to tick off the sleeping bear. If you do, you’d better give it all you’ve got if you want to stand a chance.
   Interests: Earth pony alchemy, of which he’s at an apprentice level and pursues with a single minded interest that’s rare for him. Flight, which he is quite proud of his skills at, and can rarely resist a challenge to. Hoofball, which is serious business. Daydreaming, which he does a LOT, usually when you think he’s listening to you if you’ve bored him. Naps, because how else can somepony keep up that kind of enthusiasm otherwise? Any kind of challenge, whether he wins or loses they’re always something he can barely resist. Camping and hiking, exploring the massive world underneath the clouds. Twilight Sparkle, because Purple Smart.
   Quotes: “Huh. Maybe I’m a lion. What do you think?” -Tal Rassa’s last moments.
“With all due respect Princess, you and I both know he wouldn’t accept a promotion, dead or alive.” -At the burial of Lion’s Roar within the Canterlot Military Graveyard.
“Come on, I know you’ll love it. Trust me Twilight.” -On the way to the Canterlot Central Garden with Princess Twilight Sparkle.
“No, no… I’m okay. Come on, one more time.” -Just prior to collapsing after 17 hours of training to beat Pinkie Pie in a race. He lost, again, by the way. AJ sold tickets, and popcorn.
  Habits: You can usually find him taking walks through forests and such during fall, or curled up at home next to a fire with a book and some cider. You can also find him complaining about the heat whenever it gets around 80 degrees and up, but when it snows he is the first to make a snow angel. when he does get out of bed the first thing he gets is a cup of coffee and a fresh jelly donut, and that puts a smile on his face...just don’t talk to him until he gets them or you’ll be sorry.

 Likes: Cold weather (YAY SNOW!!), jelly donuts with coffee, sunsets in the evening, comic books (secretly reads love stories), listening to any kind of music, walking through the forest, alchemy, helping others, playing hoofball, flying low and fast  
 Dislikes: MORNINGS, hot weather, lectures (so boring), morning P.T., high altitudes, being told he was wrong, some of Misty Spring’s jokes, cleaning his house (he calls it a organized disaster)