A Scootaloo Story

by Golden Tassel

Chapter 15

"Scootaloo?" Rainbow Dash spoke softly as she opened the door to Scootaloo's room; she hadn't gotten an answer when she had knocked. The young filly was asleep on her bed with her head buried under a pillow. Rainbow Dash sat down on the corner of the bed and gently shook Scootaloo to wake her up.

Scootaloo groaned. She was sore all over now that the adrenaline from her fight with Applebloom had worn off. She pulled her head out from under her pillow and sat up. If not for her aching bruises, she might have believed the last few days to have been nothing but a bad dream.

"Hey, kiddo. How you feeling?"

Scootaloo held a hoof to her temple and flinched. "Sore."

"Yeah, that'll happen when you pick a fight with a farmpony." Rainbow Dash chuckled knowingly as she thought of one of her own scuffles with Applejack. She took a deep breath. "So I worked things out with Honeydew for you."

"She doesn't even want me here."

"That's not true."

"Yes it is. She hates me."

Rainbow Dash put her wing around Scootaloo. "She doesn't hate you. Honeydew has her own problems, and she just doesn't know how to help with yours."

"I'm grounded forever, aren't I?"

"Not forever, but Honeydew insisted that you need to learn there are consequences for your actions. Personally, I think you figured out that part already, but it's not really up to me. What I'm worried about is that you might not understand what you did wrong—it's like doing a new stunt; if you mess it up somehow, you'll know about it pretty fast, but if you don't know what went wrong, you'll keep getting hurt. You know what I mean?"

Scootaloo thought about that. She knew what Rainbow Dash was talking about—she'd fallen off her scooter dozens of times when trying something new. As she looked up at Rainbow Dash, she realized that even her idol must have crashed at least as many times for each of the complex and spectacular stunts that she now does flawlessly. "What did I do wrong?"

"Well, I don't know all the details, but the big one is the smoking. That stuff is poison joke, and it affects everypony differently. It can be really dangerous, and you could get hurt in ways nopony can predict."

"It made me feel so good, though."

"So good that you stopped caring about your friends? So good that you ran away and got in a fight with Applebloom?"

Scootaloo started to realize what went wrong. "Oh." She looked down at the floor, ready to accept that she deserved to be grounded. "So how long?"

"One week. That'll give you enough time to figure out the details of what went wrong so you can avoid it in the future." Rainbow Dash let that sink in for a few seconds before she finally gave Scootaloo the good news. "And you'll be free in time to practice for the junior stuntpony competition."

"But I couldn't earn the money for the registration fee."

"That's why I'll be sponsoring you, and I'll help you practice your routine." Rainbow Dash smiled as she watched Scootaloo's face light up. She tousled the little filly's mane. "I'll see you in a week."

Comments

[NotWhoYouThink]

Good story so far!

[Fluttershyisacutegal]

thus begin the final chapter