//------------------------------// // Scootaloo // Story: Red Flag Valentine // by Meteor_Mirage //------------------------------// Naturally, the next day brought Morning Glory right back to the Carousel Boutique for more coaching. Due to the happenings of last time, he was instead situated in the kitchen of the half business, half home as he drank some half decent tea. Across from him sat Sweetie Belle, thoroughly enjoying her own tea, and to his right sat the newcomer of Scootaloo, forgoing the tea entirely in favor of a soda. Morning had just gotten done with telling the girls what had happened with Cardinal, though they’d obviously heard through word of mouth, various newspaper articles, or the few folk songs that had been written since the previous day. News travels fast when there’s no real news to travel. The three sat there, digesting the story over their drinks for quite a few minutes before someone finally spoke up. “So, what’re we supposed to be doing here?” Scootaloo asked as she set her finished soda down on the table. She leaned back in her chair, letting out a sigh. “I dunno if I’m gonna be the biggest help. Romance isn’t really my thing.” Morning just gave her a shrug as he tried to hide behind his teacup. Sweetie Belle, however, briefly lit her horn to move Scootaloo’s empty can onto the coaster that was there for a specific reason. As she did this, she looked to Scootaloo as if nothing was happening. “Well, you know Cardinal more than I do, and obviously my idea didn’t work.” Ignoring Sweetie Belle for a moment, Scootaloo looked over to Morning Glory. “So he just, like, ate the flowers right outta your hoof?” Blushing at the sudden attention, the pale blue colt nodded gently as he shrunk in his sear. “I mean, it was really just the one flower but,” he then dipped his head just a bit, “Yeah, I guess.” Nodding satisfiedly, Scootaloo then turned to Sweetie Belle. “And why not just get Apple bloom? She’d be way more useful here.” Sweetie Belle just shook her head. “She’s too close to Cardinal. And you know exactly why we can’t let her in on this.” She took a moment to take a small drink of her tea, then looked back to Scootaloo. “You’re our plan B, so do you have an idea to help this sweet gay boy,” she briefly gestured to Morning Glory, “Get his gay on with a colt of indeterminate sexuality?” At that, Scootaloo took a moment to focus on thinking. It had been quite some time since she’d last done it, so she was forced to really try. She shut her eyes tight, resting her elbows on the table while pressing her hooves together in front of her face. She sat like that for quite a few moments while Sweetie Belle and Morning Glory watched on. And, as it continued, shared a look at Scootaloo’s expense. “I’ve got it!” Scootaloo exclaimed suddenly as she lurched back in her chair with a massive grin on her face. “Morning could just race him! Cardinal loves to race!”And then she just sat back with a huge smile, like she’d found the perfect answer. There was quite a pause as both ponies waited for her to continue and maybe make a bit more sense. Of course, she paused with them so that they could compliment her on her awesome idea. This just made a long pause that was awkward for all. The pause was broken by Sweetie Belle clearing her throat, then following that up with gesturing to the colt across from her. “Look at this colt,” she reached across the table at the blue colt, grabbing his hoof and pulling it back with her gently. She then gestured across the lithe foreleg that was now displayed along the table. “Look at this leg. Do you really think this could keep up with Cardinal? It can’t even keep up with me.” As Morning Glory stole his hoof back with a blush, Scootaloo just shrugged. “What? You asked for my idea and I gave it to you. Now it’s not good enough?” She crossed her hooves with a slight frown, flopping right back in her chair. Sheepishly raising his hoof, the girly colt fought to cut in. While this was supposed to be a thing for him, he couldn’t seem to get a word in. But finally it was his time. “I… don’t think I’m going to be the best at running. Maybe.” He couldn’t help but give a tiny shrug, then tapped his hooves together nervously. “But I could try, I guess?” He sank back into his chair as he just reserved himself to doing whatever it takes to get a boyfriend. “Alright fine!” Scootaloo said with a huff, yet again rolling her eyes with a loud, drawn out sigh before standing up from her seat. “I’ve got another plan, but I’ve gotta go grab something from someone.” She turned to look at Morning. “Wanna tag along, or just stick around here?” The colt briefly looked down at his tea cup, noting that it was empty and that it would be awkward to request a refill, then he looked back up at Scootaloo with a small shrug. “I guess I could join you and get a feel for what you’re gonna make me do.” With that said, he ever so gently stood up, shooting an apologetic grin to Sweetie Belle. She just accepted it with a shrug. At least she could focus on other things for a while. Like the other pairings she had to set up. After they embarked, all Morning could do was follow closely behind Scootaloo as she raced through the streets of Ponyville. She walked much faster than he normally ran, but he fought very hard to keep up with the racing pony. It was only a few minutes of running, though it felt like hours to the soft blue colt, before Scootaloo suddenly stopped in front of him, causing him to bump into her as he seems to do at least once every day. After softly bouncing off of the similarly lithe mare and brushing himself off, Morning Glory noticed the reason why Scootaloo had stopped in the first place. In front of the both of them stood a moderately tall, light grey colt. Due to the speed of the filly approaching him, he had already taken a defensive stance in preparation to be knocked into. This just left him frozen in front of the now stationary Scootaloo, staring at her warily with his purple eyes. “Rumble! Just the colt I wanted to see.” Taking advantage of the stationary colt, Scootaloo moved to sidle up against him and wrap a hoof around his neck. Truly a feat for her. “Y’see, our friend over here has a bit of a problem,” she gestured over to Morning Glory, who was trying his hardest to not keel over and die from embarrassment, “Sooooo, I was wondering if I could get those tickets back.” Rumble rolled his eyes, letting out a soft sigh, He looked to Morning and basically ignored the filly who was still hanging off of him for a moment. “So, is this a Cardinal sort of thing?” All Morning Glory could do was nod bashfully and fiddle his hooves about just a bit. He didn’t really trust himself to talk due to all the embarrassment, and he didn’t really know Rumble all that well. Thankfully the nod was all Rumble seemed to need. He reached into his dimensional pocket and pulled out a set of two tickets that were in mostly pristine condition. Immediately he hoofed them over to Morning with a soft grin. “I was gonna give ‘em back anyway. Pip can’t exactly make it.” He flexed his wings gently in response to his statement, confusing Morning Glory immensely. And yet he still accepted the tickets warmly and without a fight. He gave them a small look over and decided that if Cardinal was a fan of the Wonderbolts, and he sure as heck was, then Morning would have to be a fan as well. Or at least try and fake it hard enough. He gave a shy grin to both Rumble and Scootaloo. “Thank you. I’m not sure how I can repay you, Scootaloo. I probably have some money saved up but…” He gave the tiniest of shrugs before regarding Rumble fully. “And I hope you can find some other thing to do for your, uh, thing.” He then gave another, much more nervous shrug. Removing herself from around Rumble, Scootaloo gestured kindly at Morning. “No need to repay me. Us Junior Recruits get free tickets to, like, study the formations or something.” She took that moment to strike a strong pose with her wings flared out as she stood as tall as she could. “I mean, when you’re the second best flyer in the business, and training with the best, you don’t really need to study.” It took a moment, but Rumble’s eyes lit up with realization after Scootaloo finished patting herself on the back. He turned to her with a questioning look on his face. “Wait, free? You said a hundred bits!” He glowered down at the filly, causing her to instantly retreat. “Oh, did I say free? I meant, uh,” she looked to Morning Glory for assistance, but found that the colt had instead already taken a few steps back. Knowing that he wouldn’t exactly be any help, she tried a different tactic. “So how’s about you go find Cardinal and I can go and take care of this?” She ended her question with a soft point at Rumble. Morning didn’t need to be told twice. He trotted a few more steps back before turning around and rushing off. He then spun around to run back in the direction of the arguing pair. Not because he wanted to keep his friend and sort of acquaintance from fighting, but because he really needed to go that way to take a shortcut. He yelped out a “Sorry!” as he passed, but they didn’t exactly seem to notice. It didn’t take long for Morning Glory to get where he was going. After cutting through the argument, then Ponyville’s ‘Granny Smith Memorial’ park, he found himself all the town’s very neglected racetrack. Only used by teenagers or Pegasai who just wanted to show off. Being both of these, Cardinal zoomed past Morning quickly, bring a large gust of wind along with him. This blew the heck out of Morning’s long white mane and made him look gorgeous. It also blew the tickets he was still grasping gently between his lips. He let out a startled gasp as they left his poorly handled grasp, and he tried his hardest to reach for it, but, being an Earth Pony, he couldn’t exactly do much about it. But Cardinal obviously could, what with his wings and all. Hearing the soft gasp of his buddy with his sensitive Pegasus ears, he looked to see what the problem was and, in doing so, he noticed the fluttering of tickets to his right. Mixed with Morning’s saddening reaction and useless attempts to get them from the ground, he realized they were most likely pretty dang important. Gliding down with expert precision, he caught the tickets in his mouth while doing a sick flip. He then lazily flapped on down to greet his buddy with a very big grin. “What’s up, dude?” He attempted to say past the items in his mouth, so it came out mostly muffled. Realizing this, he spat the Wonderbolt tickets out into his hoof, only slightly covered in saliva, along with his mouth guard, very covered in saliva. He offered said hoof over to Morning. “Right, here ya go.” Making sure to not go anywhere near the mouth guard, Morning graciously stole away the tickets, though he made sure to grab them by the non-wet bits. Even still, he considered placing them back in his mouth for just a moment. It’s basically the same thing as kissing, right? Of course, he didn’t. That would be weird. Instead he just stood staring at Cardinal, unable to form actual words due to being, like, three steps away from scoring a date. As such, it was up to Cardinal to save the day. After depositing the mouth guard, he wiped off his hoof, then gestured the tickets his friend was still clutching. “So, those tickets are yours?” He paused to let Morning respond, which he did with a small shrug transitioned into a shy nod, causing Cardinal to grin. “Sweet! What’re they for? Like, a ballet or something?” Morning Glory suddenly became eerily aware that he would have to actually produce a word or two explaining himself. He fought with his tongue for a few moments before finally whimpering out a words. “It’s, uh, just two Wonderbolts tickets.” Seeing Cardinal perk up slightly at the mention of the flight team, along with the added glint in his eye, gave Morning all the courage he needed to follow through. Sort of. He still stumbled about in getting his words out. “I was sort of thinking… I mean, you’ve kind of… I’ve heard you talking about how much you like talking about the Wonderbolts, so I just sort of got these for you.” With an absolutely massive blush all the way uo to his ears, he offered the tickets in his hoof right back to his friend. After taking a moment to process what the blue colt had just told him, Cardinal gave a beaming grin to both Morning Glory and the tickets. It took him a moment to grab them back, but when he did he let out a soft squeal. He couldn’t help but read the information over and over again, but getting too excited to even process the words he was reading. But once he finally did it, his grin got even grinnier and his eyes lit up like either fireworks or shooting stars. “Holy heck, these are for the Cloudsdale show tonight! How’d you even get these?” He brought the tickets up to the sun to fully confirm they were legitimate, watching the wings of the logo begin to flap. Not knowing about the prevalence of Unicorns enchanting fake tickets for profit, Cardinal was absolutely ecstatic about this. The rush of happy was simply too much for the colt. Therefore, he was forced to spread it. And he was going to start with the pony in front of him. Disregarding any sort of personal space issues, Cardinal immediately wrapped his hooves around the back of Morning’s neck, bringing the smaller colt in for both a severely deep and a severely awkward hug. He even started to nuzzle his friend gently. “Thankyouthankyouthankyou~!” Despite the heinous disrespect of his personal bubble, Morning couldn’t find himself disliking this treatment at all. His entire body might have lit up with a huge, deep red blush, but he couldn’t complain at all. He even found himself wrapping a hoof gently around Cardinal, testing his boundaries a bit. Of course, that moment was the one where Cardinal decided to pull back, ensuring that the boundaries couldn’t be tested properly, The light grey colt gave one more beaming grin at Morning, then extending his wings and giving them a test flap. “I’ve gotta go tell Scootie the good news!” He took off with a speed and intensity that nearly knocked the smaller colt over. The last thing the dazed colt heard after the rush of wind was: “Thanks bud! I’ll tell ya how it went after school tomorrow!”