//------------------------------// // The Only Chapter // Story: Your Middle Name is What? // by LeeLovesMLP //------------------------------// Scootaloo let out a loud sigh, kicking up her feet onto the consul of Rainbow Dash's car. "Daaash," she whined a little. "I thought that we were gonna to the skate park before we went anywhere else!" Rainbow Dash laughed a little bit, parking the car before leaning over to ruffle her honorary-sister's hair. "Sorry, Scoots." The athletic girl chuckled before unbuckling and opening the door. "But they screwed up my license. It should only be a minute." Dash seemed to punctuate her sentence by slamming her door, causing Scootaloo to make another noise of complaint before following Rainbow out of the car. "But Dash, it's the DMV! They're gonna take forever!" She huffed, crossing her arms as she walked. "The skate park's gonna be closed by the time they finish! And I really wanna try my new scooter today!" The younger girl turned her pitiful purple eyes to Rainbow Dash, trying her best to convince her to forget about the license. "Please?" She pleaded, batting her eyes for emphasis. "You're gonna run into the door, Squirt." Scootaloo planted her feet on the ground, managing to stop herself before she collided with the building, and once more turned to her big sister in a final attempt to get back in the car. Rainbow Dash merely smirked and held open the door for her. "Okay..." Scootaloo sighed slowly, trying to calm herself down. If Rainbow Dash said that it wouldn't take that long... Then it wouldn't. Right? "Seriously, Scoots, it won't even be that much time! Look. No line." The blue-skinned girl waved her hand at the single person standing there. "We'll be in and out." Almost as soon as the words left Rainbow's mouth, the person ahead of them stepped up to the station to be helped, leaving the two girls as the only ones on line. Dash smirked down at Scootaloo, placing a hand on her hip. "Told ya." The younger girl sighed again, leaning up against the wall. Dash needed to get this done. All she had to do was be patient. And not think about her scooter. ~~~ A half hour later, Scootaloo had been reduced to picking at her nails as she waited for the guy in front of them to just hurry up. She was only in middle school, but even she knew that it shouldn't take that long to renew a license plate! And, with a glance out the window, the girl could only confirm that, if they took much longer, she wouldn't be able to make it to the park. "Dash." She whispered, feeling like that was all she could do in the quiet room. "Come on... Pretty please?" She begged, clasping her hands together. For a second, Dash looked like she was considering it, and Scootaloo was about ready to start cheering with joy. Of course, though, the guy in front of them chose that very second to finally finish and step away from the counter, letting out a hurried "Thank you!" to the man behind the counter before scurrying away. While she was giving him the death stare, Scootaloo noticed an hourglass symbol pinned to his jacket. How ironic. "Next." The man behind the counter called out, beckoning them forward. Dash winked at Scootaloo in triumph before stepping forward. The DMV worker (whom Scootaloo was not a fan of right now) gave Rainbow a flirtatious grin, adjusting his bun. "Well, hello there, Rainbows. And how, may I ask, should I give you the absolute pleasure of being serviced by yours truly?" Dash blinked at him, clearly unamused. "Can it, Zephyr." She growled, reaching into her wallet and slamming her license onto the table. "You botched my driver's license. Again." The employee - Zephyr - feigned innocence, reaching for the small card. "My, oh my, Dashie, did you really go through all the trouble of messing up your own license just to spend some time with moi?" He chuckled, clearly amused, and brought the card behind the counter to look at it closer. "Really, Rainbows, all you had to do was ask Flutter-Butter." The rainbow-haired girl gritted her teeth in frustration, clearly trying to keep it together for Scootaloo. "Listen, buddy. My sister and I have somewhere to be, so print. Me. A. New. One." She growled, her hands forming and releasing fists. "You listed that I didn't have a middle name." Scootaloo huffed, rolling her eyes, only to be silenced by a hard stare from Rainbow Dash, who was clearly starting to get fed up with her. However, the sharp look that Dash had given her couldn't stop Scootaloo's thoughts; This is why she'd been waiting for half an hour? A middle name? Zephyr made a small tut-tut noise, playing with the license. "Oh goodness, Rainbows, I'm so sorry." He then reached into a file, pulling out a document and handing it to Dash. "Fill that out, Sugar-Pop, and this Breeze'll start preparing another special card for ya." He playfully winked at the blue-skinned girl before dissapearing into the back room. Rainbow Dash sighed loudly, cocking a hip and leaning over the paper. "Sorry, Scoots." She apologized as she began scribbling with the pen attached to the desk. "This'll only be a minute." Scootaloo groaned, slumping up against the wall. "You said that when we got here!" "That was Zephyr's fault." "Humph." "Watch it, kiddo." Rainbow Dash warned, glancing up from the paper. "I know this is taking longer than you'd like, but if you keep that up, we're going straight home after this." At this, the middle schooler's expression took on one of pure horror, and she quickly mashed her lips together, trying to silently will her big sister to finish the document so that they could finally move their tails and get to the skate park. Without having to deal with Scootaloo, Rainbow was able to quickly polish off the document, slamming the pen back down and shoving it to the other side of the counter. "Zephyr!" She shouted. "I'm done! So print it off so I can get out!" Zephyr sashayed back inside, casually tossing the old card into the trash. "Calm your clouds, Rainbows, I'm back." He mused, taking a seat before retrieving the paper. The man gave it a quick once-over before shaking his head a bit. "Dashie, Dashie." He chuckled. "And you're saying I'm the reason your license was all out of sorts." He dramatically slid the paper back over to her. "I need your middle name, Rainbows." The teenager looked clearly confused. "I gave it to you." She responded, picking up the page and double-checking. Meanwhile, Zephyr shook his head, looking down to inspect his nails. "You gave me the initial, Hun. I can't accept just the letter D." At this point, Scootaloo felt ready to rip her hair out. "Holy Faust!" She exclaimed, slamming her hands on the table. "Dash's middle name is Danger. That's what the D stands for. Now print the license so we can go!" Rainbow Dash blushed furiously, too caught up in fixing her document to pay attention to Scootaloo's outburst, and scrawled something onto the application, awkwardly blocking it from Scootaloo's sight for several moments before she finally clicked the pen closed. "There. Done. Print it." She sputtered, thrusting the page back at Zephyr. He took one glance at the page, smirking at it almost evilly before facing the computer to type. "I'm sorry... Scootaloo, right?" He glanced at her knowingly. "You see, Honey Bunches of Oats, you're wrong about Dashie's middle name; or, at least, her real one." Scootaloo's eyebrows furrowed in confusion, looking up at Zephyr with more curiosity than hatred. "But..." She glanced over at Dash, who seemed like she was practically eroding away. "She said her middle name was Danger!" "It's a figure of speech, Scoots." The older girl muttered. Before Scootaloo could even begin to ask what Dash's real middle name was, Zephyr printed off the card and passed it to Rainbow with a cheeky grin. "Sign on the line, miss Rainbow-" "NO." "Dahlia-" "Zephyr!" "Dash." He finished, chuckling evilly before sitting back to watch Scootaloo's reaction. Scootaloo stared at her big sister in a new light, her purple eyes blinking in confusion. "Dash?" She asked, tilting her head to the side a bit. "How come you never told me?" Rainbow Dash groaned, letting her head fall to the counter. "It was unimportant..." The purple-haired girl threw her arms up into the air, very clearly surprised. "But it is important! I already told the rest of the CMC about your wicked awesome middle name! How are they gonna react when I tell them that you're named after..." She trailed off in confusion, furrowing her eyebrows as she thought. "Uh... Dash? What's a Dahlia?" Dash muttered something incoherent in response. "What?" "I said it's a flower." The blue-skinned girl mumbled into her arm, refusing to look up and show off her shame. Scootaloo blinked, trying to properly process this information... and failed. Her hero, the coolest girl in Canterlot high school, with a name and reputation centered around speed and awesome... was named after a flower?! Zephyr stared in amusement at Scootaloo's bewildered face and Rainbow's clear show of defeat; he'd clearly won this round. Pulling the new card out of the laminator, he set it down on the counter and slid it over to the girl with a smirk. "That's gonna be thirty bucks, Dashie." He chuckled smartly, holding out a hand for the pay. Dash lifted her head up to glare at him through her bangs, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a wad of cash. "Screw off." She growled, snatching the card away from him and practically stomping out the door, dragging Scootaloo behind her and leaving a triumphant-looking Zephyr Breeze leaning against the counter. ~~~ Closed. Just as Scootaloo had known it would be. The pair of them stood there for a good long while, just staring at the chained gate in silence. Eventually, Dash let out a heavy sigh, slumping back onto the hood of her car. "I'm sorry, Scoots..." She sighed, glancing over at her little sister. "I let you down." The middle-schooler looked to Dash, then at the gate, and then back at the older girl once more. After a second, she wrapped up her mental debate and walked closer to Rainbow, hopping up to sit on the hood with her. "It's okay." She assured her, looking up at the sunset sky of orange and purple. "There's always tomorrow, right?" Rainbow Dash's own magenta eyes turned to the sky, and she visibly relaxed a bit. "True." She admitted with a tiny shrug. "But still, I promised that we'd go today." "Things happen." Scootaloo pointed out. "You needed to get it fixed.. Otherwise you might not be able to drive me at all." Dash paused for a minute, looking over to her sister. After sitting in silence for a few minutes, contemplating, she finally spoke up. "You know, Squirt... I'm proud of you." Scootaloo's head practically whirled around at lightning speed to meet Rainbow's eyes, which were shimmering with pride. Before the younger girl could even ask why, however, her sister had outstretched an arm and pulled her into a side-hug without warning. Happily, Scootaloo snuggled into Dash's shoulder, closing her eyes to relax. "I'll bring you back tomorrow, okay?" "MmmHmm..." Scootaloo hummed briefly, not really bothering to word an actual response. "Hey... Dash?" "Yeah?" "I'm still gonna tell everyone that you're named after a flower." "Scootaloo!"