After years of trying, Scootaloo finally discovers her special talent.
It's the worst thing that ever happened to her. She'll have to leave Rainbow Dash and all her friends behind as she's forced to go off and learn about her new talent... and then it gets worse.

The sequel, Choices Legacy, is now available.

As always, I adore getting comments about the story; the more specific and prolific the better -- negative comments included. Your comments help make my future stories better.
Featured on Equestria Daily.

Many thanks to my team. I couldn't have done it without them.
Pre-readers:
MailboxBomber
Kyaksa
tosety
IceBeerG

Dialog Consultants:
Jacob Ellinger
kidmurkury
markey58

Editors:
IRpony

Proofreaders:
OkemosBrony
Unimpressive Vagaries

Artwork:
Scootaloo Vector by MoongazePonies
Background and cutie mark by author
In-Chapter art by author

Remember the time Ponyville was invaded by Parasprites? Or the time Cerberus, the demonic three-headed dog guardian of Tartarus, Equestria's underworld, wandered away and ended up in Ponyville?

What I'm trying to say is, it's an odd sort of town. Anything can happen.

This is the story of how a million star spiders came to live with Twilight Sparkle. It wasn't even the weirdest thing to happen to her that month.

Ponyville, man. Crazy place.

Edit: Now a reading, apparently!

As the head of Manehattan's premier fashion company, Rarefaction Fashions, Rarity has it all: style, wealth, influence. She's the talk of the town, darling of the paparazzi, and icon to fillies and colts all over Equestria.

But when Twilight Sparkle drops by to catch up, an ancient magic spell from the Saddle Arabian Book of the Dead, intended to guide kings and queens on their way to the afterlife, goes awry. Once the city's favorite daughter, Rarity wakes up to discover there is no record of her existence. And not only that, but in this strange new crime-ridden Manehattan, police checkpoints cordon off the streets and anypony not possessing the proper ID is punished by indefinite detention.

But she presses on, searching for somepony who remembers her. Because if she can't find anypony, then who will remember her? She spent years leaving her hoofprints on Manehattan with the simple power of generosity, as a way to be loved and admired. But now she's anonymous and alone in a nightmarish, distorted mirage, a twisted and decaying vision of the city as it was never meant to be. And slowly but surely, it's leaving its mark on Rarity and all the other lost souls unlucky enough to live on its mean streets.

Written for the Equestria Daily Writer's Training Grounds #002 (hence the strict 7,000 wordcount). Inspired (rather obviously) by Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said.

One nasty miser. Three ghosts. What the Dickens is this? Why, it's a wholly gratuitous Christmas Carol parody, released just in time for Christmas according to the Julian Calendar! Contains footnotes, pointless asides, and a highly disappointing third act!

A while after the events of "Rarity takes Manehattan," the other five have also gotten their keys (I know you know that spool of rainbow thread is a key) and opened the box. There didn't seem to be anything inside. They can't figure out what's up with that until a week later, when they start developing superpowers. That's when things get kind of strange.

Written for the EqD Writer's Training Ground #002. Comments are encouraged, because I want to know what people think and I don't expect many people to read this and thus be available to provide thoughts.

Rarity becomes part of a social game. But who knows the rules?

Under assault by the plunderseeds, the Tree of Harmony remembers the first morning of the world, and her delight in discovering life, laughter, love and serenity.

A dying Applejack is kept company by Twilight, but they receive a visitor who offers them an alternative they had yet to consider...

Written expressly for Equestria Daily's inaugural Writer's Training Grounds. Apologies in advance for the clipped, frenetic pacing of the story, but there was a hard limit of 1,500 words, and when you're as wordy as I am, that's very difficult to obey!

Now with an awesome audio adaptation by the talented Scribbler!

Cover art shamelessly swiped from Carnifex; modified version by Scribbler.

The Writers' Training Grounds, a fine event hosted by Equestria Daily for beginning writers. Ever since early Season 4 of MLP:FIM, a weekly prompt has been posted that I more or less follow. That prompt has guided most of the chapters within this story. Some chapters have continuity, some don't, some have giant monsters or metaphysical travel. One thing is for sure, everything here is bonkers.

Gather around, humans and ponyfolk alike, for I am a bard, and I give you the weekly tales of the Compilation! A greater range in lack of organization than the Canterbury stories! Higher variance on continuity than the Grimm fairytales! More or less desperate than a retelling of the Arabian Nights! Contains at least one more vampire than the Twilight Saga, which brings it to a grand total of at least one! This is a Compilation of Miscellaneous Typed Scribblings of A Random Guy!

Watch in amazement as a writer races time to meet a midnight deadline on Thursday (used to be Tuesday)! Let your imagination run from its leash and ruin your neighbors’ petunias! Be thrilled, or thrillingly disappointed, as you read through semi to completely disjointed works of fanfiction! Use this as a scale of a bard’s improvement, from Chapter #1 all the way to Chapter #?

Quality is a figment of your imagination! So criticize however you want. The best criticisms of the week will receive the honor of having an OC randomly pop up in a random story of my choosing. Not kidding there. Right a good review and partake in the chaos that is technically my mind!

Well in the future, Ponyville is still remembered. The ruins are right there for anypony who wants to see them, after all. And sure, there's a lot about Ponyville that's been forgotten. Its name, for example. But Fluttershy's transformation to batpony and back is still remembered. And so are the other consequences of Twilight's spells.
This is the story of how Ponyville ended.

This was written for the Writer's Training Grounds #001 on Equestria Daily. I suspect that's only barely good enough of a reason to overcome my aversion to sharing my writing, so please try not to be too harsh in your (hopefully constructive) criticism. I'm skittish.