//------------------------------//
// Friendless 
// Story: Flight of the Valkyries 
// by Prisoner 24601 
//------------------------------//

	Sweetie Belle was walking down Equestria Avenue in Ponyville, looking for Scootaloo. She was late again for finding a talent. Even though they were devastated that they could no longer work together, the CMC were still a social group. At least, that was what Sweetie believed. Obviously, Scootaloo had been held up somewhere.
As if on cue, Scootaloo dashed out of an industrial workshop. She joined Sweetie on the street, who immediately asked, "What in Equestria were you doing in there?"
Scootaloo replied, catching her breath, "Turning in some blueprints. I figure I could get my Cutie Mark in inventing."
"What makes you think that?" Asked Sweetie, an obvious undertone of doubt in her voice.
"Well, I invented plenty of stuff! Like the Treehouse. Yeah, I designed that." She said cokily.
"Hm." Sweetie said, pushing the conversation aside, "Have you seen Apple Bloom anywhere?"
"No, but isn't today another one of her Zecora apprentacing days?"
"Oh, yeah." Sweetie remembered, then catching the glimpse of a yellow filly with a big red bow on her head and an enormous smile charging towards them said, "Oh, here she comes!"
"GIRLS! GIRLS!" She screamed. She screeched to a halt in front of Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. Each of them had their eyes glued to Apple Bloom's flank, for there, lay a picture of a flower in full bloom. "Isn't it great?" Apple Bloom asked, obvious to her they were staring at it. "Zecora said I got it 'cuz I got a real knack for plants." The other two couldn't say a word. Here, standing in front of them, was Apple Bloom; with a Cutie Mark!
"Wow, Apple Bloom!" Scootaloo was the first to speak up. She suddenly got annoyed, "Is it real this time?"
Apple Bloom was offended. Here she was, exited out of her mind because she just got her freaking Cutie Mark, and the first thing Scootaloo asks is 'Is it real?'. "Of course it's real!" She snapped back, "Why wouldn't it be?"
"All I'm saying is that last time you 'got' a Cute mark," She was angry with Apple Bloom now, "It turned out to be fake and cause us a lot of heartbreak."
Apple Bloom was angry back, "Well, excuse me if I got desperate once, but this time it's different!"
"Oh, suuurrreee it is." Scootaloo mocked, "And I'm a chicken."
Sweetie Belle had had nearly enough. She couldn't stand by while her two only friends tore each other apart.
"you are a chicken." Apple Bloom detested, "And this time it is different. Why would I lie to you about this, Scootaloo? We're friends."
"You tell me why. And we are not friends. Not anymore." With this, Scootaloo turned her back on Sweetie and Apple Bloom, and walked back down the street, tears in her eyes. But she couldn't let them see.
Apple Bloom wanted to apologize, but she was too stubborn. "You bet we ain't." She said, and walked back towards the way she came. Sweetie was left alone in the street. She didn't know which of her friends to go comfort. Both were saddened beyond help. Sweetie Belle was torn. Which did she chose? Apple Bloom, practically her cousin, or Scootaloo, the poor orphan? She chose Scootaloo. She seemed like she needed more comforting.
She raced up behind Scoots. "Hey, Scootaloo," he said, trying not to get her even more upset.
"Go away." She replied.


*****


It had been a week since Scootaloo and Apple Bloom had their big fight, and still neither wanted to admit they were wrong. Sweetie was still in the middle of it. But Scootaloo had cheered up. Now, she and Sweetie Belle were sitting in the park, talking about their latest attempts at getting their Cutie Marks.
"Well, the inventing idea was a bust. They rejected my blueprints for a flying machine." Scootaloo said.
"Did you remember to draw it on blueprint paper?" Quarried Sweeite.
Scootaloo shoved her face into the ground.
"Well, I haven't been doing too well, either. My fasion career was a 'bust', as Rarity put it." Sweetie consulated.
"Well, have you thought that you should do something other than fasion?"
"Well, I have thought about singing. I'm pretty good at that. Wanna hear something?"
"Sure. What is it?"
"It's a poem I read in a really old book. Here goes." She cleared her throat, and in a symphonic voice, started singing:



"Oh,
Rise through the sky,
On beautiful amber wings.
Light the sky on fire,
With the jealousy you bring.

Rise through the sky,
Let your will shine through,
And they'll come to accept you,
As long as you stay true.

For you, my filly,
Are different from the rest.
You can rise through the ranks,
And prove that you are best.

Rise through the sky,
They know not who you are,
But I know clear,
A Valkyrie, you are.
Ooooohhhhh.
Ooohh."


Scootaloo was speechless. She was frozen. She didn't know where, or when, but she had heard that song. That rhyme. "Hey, Sweetie," She began, without looking up from the ground.
Before she could finish, a stallion came galloping in front of Sweetie Belle. "Excuse me, miss."
"Yeah?" replied Sweetie Belle unsurely. This was a peculiar fellow. She forgot all about what Scootaloo was trying to say.
"My name is Armstrong. Edwin Armstrong, and I'm looking for the source of that be-a-utiful singing! Do you know where exactly I can find the singer?"
"Yeah." She said again, in a sort of matter-of-fact way. "That was me."
Edwin laughed. "You mean to tell me that you: a selfless little filly like yourself, are the voice behind that magnificent tune?"
"Yes. Yes I do." She said, trying to portray herself as somepony who had control of themself.
"Well, then, missy, you could just be the next big thing of FM radio. You see, I have a vision." He came next to Sweetie, put his left hoof around her neck, and pointed his right across the sky, "I have a vision of ponies tuning in to FM radio regularly. A set time every day, to hear you, my little filly of wonders, singing. You'll be famous!" he returned to his original place standing in front of her. "You in?" he asked.
Sweetie was amazed! Right here, standing in front of her, was a stallion with the means to give her what she'd been dreaming about for months: a Cutie Mark! "Yeah!" she spurted out, with yet another crack in her voice.
"Great!" replied Armstrong, "I'll see you at the radio station first thing tomorrow morning. Here's my card." He finished, giving Sweetie a card, and trotting away.
"This is awesome!" exclaimed the white filly, "This is my chance, Scootaloo! My chance to become a big shot and finally earn my Cutie Mark!"
"Great" Scootaloo faked a smile.


*****


Sure enough, Sweetie had visited Edwin Armstrong at his studio first thing the next morning. And she continued doing so for weeks. Until one day... One fateful day... She returned to Scootaloo with great news.
"SCOOTALOO!" Sweetie shouted as she charged her way through the trees towards the treehouse. There was a sign there that had been for weeks: a shillouette of Apple Bloom with a huge red slash through it. SHe climbed the physically impossible to exist steps and entered the humble club hideout. "You're not going to belive this!"
"What?" she exitedly asked. She was hoping Sweetie had goten her first paycheck.
Armstrong had been ging on about how he couldn't pay Sweetie every week because of financial trouble, and he always promised double the next week. Sweetie had devoted that money to either fixing up the current one, or making a completely new clubhouse. Scootaloo figured that with the money Armstrong had been promising, it would total up to at least a quarter of a million, plenty of money to buy a new clubhouse.
But no. There was no paycheck. There was no money. There was only two things.
Two painful little notes.
Smack dab in the middle of Sweetie Belle's flank.
"You see!" Sweetie shouted in exitement, turning so Scootaloo could see her new Cutie Mark better. "I got my Cutie Mark in singing!"
"That's great." Said Scootaloo. This time, she couldn't fake a smile. She couldn't do anything.
She just walked out.

Out of the treehouse.

Out of Ponyville

Over to the red cliffs.