//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1 - A Mission to Remember 
// Story: The Gift for the Pegasus:  A CMC Mission 
// by G4PONYTales 
//------------------------------//

“Look out!” Shouted Sweetie Belle.
“Cutie Mark Crusader block transporters coming through!” Scootaloo chimed. The Cutie Mark Crusaders continued laughing as they rode the sliding cinder block down the hill to meet a certain pegasus, who was without a cutie mark and in need of help.
Chipcutter, abruptly glanced up from the dinosaur he was sculpting out of his lunch. He gasped in awe at the a giant cinder block hurtling down the hill, and before he had a chance to jump and get out of the way… the cinder block stopped a foot away from him.
All three crusaders, ready to start their mission, jumped off to greet him.
“So, you said you needed our help?” asked Scootaloo, grinning with pride.
Chipcutter blushed at the entrance, much to the three ponies’ joy. “Y-yes, that’s right.  You’re the Cutie Mark Crusaders, aren’t you?”
“That we are”, said Sweetie Belle brightly. Applebloom then said, “how ‘bout we sit and chat fer a bit?”

In an engaging conversation, Chipcutter learned about the CMC’s while the CMC’s learned more about Chipcutter. The problem solving minds that made them crusaders helping other ponies subconsciously connected, as always, to solve a problem.
“So, ya said yur inta sculpting, right? So ain’t that yur cutie mark?”
Chipcutter rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “Well, I’ve been into sculpting for a while… but I still don’t have any cutie mark.”
“But your sculptures are amazing! You definitely have talent; a sense of awesomeness.” Scootaloo put emphasis on the adjective in accordance with her pegasus role model; the most awesome pony she knew.
“You… you guys really think so?” Asked Chipcutter, eagerness rising in his voice. With the eagerness came some more blushing from a compliment he’d never heard before; then again, he did keep the majority of his sculpting to himself.
Sweetie Belle decided to share her unicorn sister’s story; being telekinetically dragged by her horn lead her to a rock filled with diamonds. It wasn’t until then that she knew her true passion, and talent, and gained her cutie mark in the process. “My sister was lead by her subconscious to a rock full of diamonds; one which would solve her true desire. But she needed to find it. And you may be the same way; you just need to do something to discover yourself.” With that remark, Sweetie Belle telekinetically handed him a hammer, and a mask. “Sculpt this giant rock.  Just… try.”
Chipcutter took a deep breath, put on his mask, took his hammer, and started sculpting in high speed - not without jumping into the air first.
To Scootaloo, it all happened in slow motion. And it was the part about him flying that drew her attention. The spreading of the wings, followed by the agility and skills of a pegasus sculpting a tall, tall rock of ever-changing form…

“Scootaloo… Scootaloo, wake up,” a voice shouted. Scootaloo suddenly bolted up from her sleeping position. “Huh? Yeah, I’m awake! I’m awake!” She said frantically. She was in the Crusader Clubhouse along with Applebloom and Sweetie Belle; both looking at her like she had fainted. “Uh, Scootaloo, are you alright?” Asked Sweetie Belle.
“Uh, everything’s fine,” Scootaloo said as she blushed, sheepishly rubbing the back of her head.
“Yer sure about that?” Applebloom asked, still wanting clarification, “I mean, you’ve been falling asleep during our mission wrap ups lately. What’s wrong?”
“Wrong? Nothings wrong. It’s nothing, really,” The pegasus spoke quickly and profusely, searching for something - anything - in her brain to divert attention from herself. Her small, pathetic self.  But there was nothing. Nothing.
“Well, if you’re tired then, why don’t you just go home?” Sweetie Belle suggested.
“Really? Um- are you sure you don’t need my help settling down our mission?” Scootaloo asked her friends.
“We’ll be fine,” Applebloom said.
It’s just as well they don’t want my help. Ignoring the sub-conscious thought, Scootaloo wanted to protest but decided not to, just in case this embarrassing thing were to happen again. “Sure,” she said as she got up and went out of the door.

But Scootaloo didn’t go home. She couldn’t go; not just yet. Instead, she needed to reassess her dream. The dream had been of a recent mission helping a pegasus, Chipcutter, to find his special talent: Sculpting.
But the dream had put focus into more than just that; Scootaloo’s subconscious mind had brought up Chipcutter’s wings; how he completed the task of discovering his cutie mark with awesome, skillful flying.
Scootaloo glanced at her own wings, which could do little but help her ride her scooter. She already had her cutie mark; has had it for a couple of years now. But she still couldn’t fly.
Maybe Scootaloo’s dream had been trying to tell her something about herself that she, like Chipcutter and Rarity, was meant to do but needed to try in order to achieve it...

And with that dream in mind, she would try doing it. Scootaloo stood on a tree stump, in some close proximity of the clubhouse. She glanced at the window where she could make out Applebloom and Sweetie Belle, lost in their mission wrap-up. They didn’t seem to notice what Scootaloo was doing, or trying to do, and maybe they would get to see it when it really happened.
The small-winged pegasus stood on a treestump, then glanced at a butterfly flying by. Her eyes followed it, observing the with bright, big, glamourous wings; the way they beat swiftly through the air, with so much speed and agility...
You can do it, Scootaloo! It was that voice, that inner voice which Scootaloo often relied on for moral guidance; that voice which propelled her. It told her, like many times, that she could do it.
The young pegasus spread her wings, and leapt into the air; her wings, as always, breathing frantically to keep up.
I’m doing it! I’m in the air! My wings; they’re working; if I keep up like this-
Scootaloo opened her eyes shortly before falling from half a foot in the air.

Lying on the ground, in a position she was quite familiar with, the adolescent pegasus stared dreary-eyed at the grass. In another painful attempt, she got up, and beat her wings. Without the help of a jump, they beat uselessly; weakly.
Why can’t I do it? Why, why, why, why?
She got up. Stood on the tree stump. Took a deep breath. And tried again.
I can- no, no I can’t…
My attempts are getting longer, so maybe if I try thirty times as hard… Ooff!

Exhausted, a sore-winged pegasus lay down staring at the clouds. In her imagination they taunted her; she would never be able to fly to cloudsdale, would never be able to control the weather or blow away a cloud…
Scootaloo grew weary at her thoughts, wondering why they existed; she started to questions herself for it, practically beating herself up for such self-pitying thoughts. Why now, all of a sudden, after so many years of accepting the truth?
But could she ever accept the truth?