//------------------------------//
// Chapter 3: Magical Misery Detour 
// Story: The Strange Case of Dinky Hooves' Cutie Mark Curiosity 
// by Fluttercheer 
//------------------------------//

	The sun was still in the sky, but already shimmering with an orange glow and on its way to sink beneath the horizon, as Dinky and the Crusaders arrived at the Hooves household.
The bundle of energy she was, Dinky did not waste time and happily bounced through the entrance door into the foyer of the house. “I'm home, Mom!” There was a drive for attention in her voice, but not an unpleasant one. Behind her, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle entered the house with smiles on their lips.
A rustling could be heard, coming from the kitchen to the right, then hoofsteps. In the doorframe of the kitchen, Derpy appeared. She looked at Dinky through her crossed eyes, wearing a smile as well. For a short moment, her glance fell on Dinky's companions, then she looked back at her filly. “Did they agree to help you, Dinky?”
She set herself into motion and approached her. A small drop of muffin batter slid down from her cheek and landed with a splosh on the floor. Derpy didn't pay any attention as she stepped right into it, leaving small pieces of batter like a trail behind her.
At her daughter's side, she touched her cheek, then gently scratched her chin. Dinky lifted her head and closed her eyes, enjoying the warm gesture.
“They did!” she answered as her mother had retreated her hoof, cheerishly. “We're going to start right now!”
Derpy turned towards the Crusaders, who confirmed Dinky's words with nods.
“I hope you can really help her.....” A shadow was on her face suddenly and her eyes expressed some grief. “Dinky is trying to get her cutie mark for so long already, but nothing ever worked..... We already started thinking that she is unable to get one.” There was a portentous tone in Derpy's voice.
Dinky dropped her ears and looked to the ground, her eyes now full of grief, too.
“Don't worry, we are the Cutie Mark Crusaders! We're goin' ta get Dinky a cutie mark, it's our special talent!” Apple Bloom reassured the worried mother and her daughter.
“Yeah, everypony can get a cutie mark! Just look at how long it took us to get ours!” Scootaloo assisted her friend with more encouraging words. She looked behind on her flank.
The positive reinforcement by Apple Bloom and Scootaloo wiped the sadness and the grief away and both mother and daughter returned to wearing smiles, Dinky's ears perking up again.
“You're right,” Derpy said. “Who else if not you could help my little Dinky?” Her voice still had a sad tone, but some confidence was ringing in it as well now.
Derpy turned back at Dinky. She placed a hoof on her head. “Don't try it for too long, Dinky. Dinner is almost ready.” Another piece of batter hit the floor, this time dropping off her mane, indicating that “almost” was relative.
Scootaloo held a hoof at her mouth, stiffling a giggle. A stern expression in her face, Sweetie Belle poked into her side with a leg.
Dinky nodded. “Mhm.” Then she reached out to her mom and gave her a tight hug, not caring about batter getting smeared on her face as well now. “I promise, mom, we're doing it real quick and then we can talk about my new cutie mark once we're finished!”
The cheerful conviction in Dinky's voice cast another sad expression on Derpy's face. But she suppressed the sigh that was building up in her throat and gave her daughter a firm squeeze.
The two of them let go of each other and Derpy ruffled through Dinky's mane. “Take care, Dinky.” Then the young mother turned around and trotted back to the kitchen, leaving more splotches on the floor of the foyer. Dinky added some, too, as she wiped some batter off her own face.
“So,” Apple Bloom called for Dinky's attention, “where is that shootin' range ya talked about? The sun's almost down, we better hurry if we want ta still try it out today!”
To their right, Derpy froze in her movement. She stood still for a moment, but then continued her way to the kitchen, slower than before. She did not look back at them.
Dinky acknowledged Apple Bloom's question and turned around to a short corridor at the right side of the stairs. She pointed at it. “It's out there in the backyard!”
Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle followed her hoof and squinted their eyes. The corridor was dark, and they couldn't tell if the lights were just out or if there weren't any, but in the shadows, they could see the faint silhouette of a door.
“Let's go then!” Apple Bloom said.
Together, the three of them moved towards the door, but before they could reach it, Dinky rushed past them and blocked their path. Stretching out a hoof, she pushed Apple Bloom back a little. The three Crusaders could see that her face looked frantic in the light of the illumination spell she had cast to see in the darkness. The impression only lasted for a moment.
The faint, melodic humming of her magic stopped suddenly and it became black around them. Dinky's horn flashed up again two times for very short moments, then the spell fizzled out completely. Sighing, Dinky reached for a light switch to her left. As the corridor was illuminated again, this time by the magicity the house was equipped with, her face appeared calm again, mostly.
“Not yet,” Dinky said. “You can't go to the backyard yet.”
Puzzled, the three other fillies looked at her. “Why not?” Sweetie Belle asked.
“I-I still need to prepare the shooting range!” Dinky shot back an answer.
“Preparin'? Why? Ya said ya doing this often with ya sister. Why it ain't ready yet?” Apple Bloom narrowed her eyes sceptically.
Some beads of sweat began to trickle down Dinky's forehead, but she tried to ignore them. “B-Because it's a mess right now! Sparkler and I really destroyed it yesterday when we were practicing! I just need to clean it up first and put up new targets!”
“Uh-huh,” Apple Bloom said, plainly. An eyebrow of hers was raised now.
“Is anything wrong?” Scootaloo asked worried, noticing the sudden nervousness of the young unicorn.
“N-No!” Dinky answered hastily. “I really just need to clean it up! It will just be a moment, wait here until I'm done!” With that, she turned and rushed outside, leaving the Crusaders in the corridor, alone and confused.

As the door had fallen shut behind her, Dinky darted over to the left side of the house. A few empty paint buckets stood there, left from the last time the house needed a repaint. Three long planks laid in the grass in front of the buckets and Dinky was grabbing one of them. She pulled it away from the house and over to the fence, where she let it drop again. She went back to the paint buckets, took them and arranged them on the plank.
Dinky furrowed her brow, scrutinizing the arrangement, then shook her head. She turned around at the spot and galloped to the other side of the backyard, where she snuck around the corner of the house, aiming for the trash containers.....

Meanwhile, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle waited patiently inside the house. A look through the window confirmed them that it was slowly, but steady, becoming evening. Soon, it would be too gloomy outside to shoot spells at targets. They sighed collectively. This was only their first mission as the cutie mark counselors they had become now, but it was exhausting already. Another sigh leaving their throats, they leaned their heads against the wall behind them.
While they sat there, waiting for Dinky to return, they suddenly heard hoofsteps above their heads. Looking up, they followed them with their eyes across the ceiling until the steps suddenly stopped, then began to descend on the staircase a moment later.
Sparkler's content face took on a surprised expression as she noticed the three fillies sitting in the lit-up corridor that led towards the backyard door. They answered her look with tired expressions.
“What are you three doing here?” she asked them. “Has Dinky invited you over?” She knew the three fillies in front of her, especially after the parade that went through the streets a few days ago and the massive cute-ceanera Pinkie Pie had thrown for them, both events that nopony in Ponyville would forget that quickly. They had never been as guests in their house, though.
“Not exactly,” Apple Bloom answered the question of the purple unicorn mare that approached them now, rubbing the back of her head. “It's more like we got hired. Dinky asked us for help ta get her cutie mark, she's our first client.”
“Mhm,” Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle nodded confirmingly, slightly grunting in annoyance. They were getting impatient.
“Sounds like a good idea,” Sparkler said. “My little sister is waiting for her cutie mark for a long time already.” Her words were similar to Derpy's words before and like her, Sparkler's face showed grief for a moment, but she was better at hiding it than her mother. She looked around, appearing confused now. “But where is my sister? Why are you not together?”
The fillies closed their eyes and did their third collective sigh. Then Apple Bloom explained.
“Dinky is in the backyard. She told us how the two of ya shoot ya magic at targets and that she is really good at it, so we figured this could be her special talent and came here ta practice it with her. But now she left us alone, saying she needs ta fix up the shooting range first.”
Sparkler's face cleared up, then darkened, then got adorned by a rather stern expression as a realization came over her, all in quick succession. Without saying another word to the fillies, she turned left and trotted past them, approaching the door. She opened it with her magic and went outside. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle exchanged concerned glances, then they got up and followed Sparkler.
In the backyard, Sparkled spotted Dinky immediately. The younger unicorn was still busy with preparing an impromptu shooting range. Sparkler trotted over to her until she was close. “Dinks? What are you doing?”
Dinky twitched, immediately knowing that she was caught. She put down the empty glass bottle that she was holding in her hooves and hesitantly turned her head around to her big sister, eyeing her. The expression in her face was an assortment of regret, sadness, guilt and even a bit of fear. On shaky legs, she turned around completely, inch by inch, the grass blades getting shoved aside by her hooves. She looked at the ground for a moment and pawed it, then back at her sister. “I'm sorry, Sparks.....” she whispered quietly.
Sparkler sighed, then she closed the last distance between them. She tipped Dinky's horn with a hoof. “Were you talking about that shooting range stuff again, sis?”
“Mhm,” Dinky nodded, not saying more. A few tears appeared in the corner of her eyes.
Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle had arrived at the scene as well by now. Dinky looked over to them, the regret in her eyes deepening. “I'm sorry.”
“Uh, what's happening?” Apple Bloom asked the filly, utterly confused now. The expression in her friends' faces showed they felt the same.
“I lied to you.” Dinky cast her eyes on the ground, a depressed look in them. “I can't shoot at targets with my magic. I just made it up when you asked me what I'm good at already, because there is nothing I'm really good at.” Her eyes began to well up more. “I'm just a talentless waste of space.....” Dinky sat down and closed her eyes, then started whimpering quietly, tears running over her face now.
“What? But.....” Scootaloo began, bewildered. “B-But you used magic! You helped us lifting up the plank with a levitation spell!”
“Yeah, and you used a light spell in the dark corridor!” Sweetie Belle added.
“And ya hammered in nails with ya magic! What's wrong, Dinky?” Apple Bloom completed the trifecta of confusion.
The young unicorn didn't answer. Sparkler sat down at Dinky's side and put a hoof across her back. She pulled her closer. Head resting on her big sister's chest now, Dinky continued crying.
Sparkler looked at the Crusaders gravely. “Dinky hasn't completely mastered magic yet. She can sometimes cast a spell, but her magic is only slowly developing. She's not there yet.”
Scootaloo dropped her ears and the concern in her eyes increased. “And that's everything?” she asked.
“Yes!” Sparkler replied, a little harshly. Scootaloo did a step back. “My sister has very big problems with figuring out what her special talent is and it does not make her feel good.”
“I-I'm sorry.....” Scootaloo lowered her head a little. “I just wanted..... I thought there is.....” She sighed. “Nevermind. Just forget it.”
A portion of regret appeared in Sparkler's eyes now. “I know you want to help my sister and I appreciate it. I'm sorry if I sounded rude, but it's not an easy situation for any of us.”
“It's fine,” Scootaloo assured her. “I shouldn't have asked this either.”
Now Apple Bloom took the floor. “We all understand how it feels ta not know what ya supposed ta do, Dinky. And we would never let a pony in need of a cutie mark hang.”
Scootaloo nodded in agreement. “Yeah, we aren't mad because you lied to us. We're still helping you and we will get you this cutie mark!” She slammed a hoof into the ground as a sign of determination. “You can count on us, Dinky!”
“Yeah!” Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle agreed with their friend's words.
At Sparkler's chest, Dinky sniffed. She opened her eyes and leaned away from her big sister a bit, the tears in her eyes making it hard to see the three fillies in front of her. She wiped with a hoof over her eyes, then retreated from Sparkler and got up on wonky hooves.
“Thanks.....” she whispered. “You are my only hope.” She wiped the rest of the tears out of her eyes and attempted a smile. It barely worked.
“Don't worry!” Apple Bloom spoke up again. “Whatever it takes, we're going ta continue until there is a mark on that flank of yours!” She pointed a hoof at Dinky's bare flank.
Dinky looked at Apple Bloom and gasped, her eyes suddenly showing fear, but it only lasted for a moment. Finally forcing herself to a smile, she trotted over to the three Crusaders.
“What should we do?” she asked. “How should we try and get me a cutie mark?”
It was apparent in their faces that this was something they hadn't figured out yet, though, Sweetie Belle's face suddenly lit up like a lightning bulb.
“I think I have an idea.....” she said.