“Anon? Hey, Anon. You ok?” Ugh, you could hear Scootaloo’s voice. But you couldn’t remember what happened after Scrappy challenged you. Did you get knocked out? Did you knock him out? And why did your eyes hurt?
“Ugh, Scoots? Ngh… what happened?” You opened your eyes to a blur of colors. You could see you were under a blanket marked with rainbow lightning bolts, and you could feel a pillow under your head. “D-did I win? Or lose? Erm…”
Your vision began to clear, and you could see Scootaloo looking rather unsure as she looks behind herself. It seemed Scrappy, as well, was knocked out due to… something. “Oh um, well, it was a tie actually.”
A tie? “Wha? How did that happen? I remember accepting his challenge but… Nothing right after that. Also...” You licked at your muzzle, tasting the bitter taste of something soapy and lemony “Why do I taste lemony fresh?”
Scootaloo put on a false looking smile as her voice jittered a tad “Oh um, you headbutted him and you both got knocked out. As for the smell, erm…” She shrugged “Wouldn’t know. Maybe you’re just tired or something” Huh, it was like something much worse happened and she didn’t want to let you in on it. Weird, especially since you don’t get knocked out by headbutts so easily. But then again, you were feeling rather woozy today. First that weird filly, and now getting knocked out by a headbutt. C’mon, Anon, you can do better than that!
“Yeah, maybe. I have been feeling really off, ngh. Can’t believe it was a double K.O. though.” You leaned upwards and gave your head a rub. Huh, you didn’t feel any kind of head pain. “Anyway, ugh… Can you wake him up and ask him yourself to tell me the info on Chrysalis, it’s really important that I find out.”
“Well, actually, Scrappy did tell me everything he knew about it.” Scootaloo said, as her sudden timid nature began to subside.
“What?! Then why did I have to fight him?!” You bellow
“I mean, he has been wanting to challenge you again for a really long time, Anon, especially after you finished your training. I didn’t wanna tell him no.” Scootaloo explained.
Of course, the little bugger must have been begging for a fight for awhile, ever since your training started most likely. “Right… Ok then, so, what’s the news then?”
“Well, there’s good news. And there’s some bad news. In that order” Scootaloo said
Huh… He knew enough to have both kinds? This oughta be interesting. “So what's the good news then?”
“Well, Scrappy says Chrysalis actually… well… saved us.” Scootaloo said, her voice not as cheerful as it should be given such news.
But you? Hah! You knew it! Or you felt it anyway, despite your previous fears. “Hah! I KNEW IT! Told you! Chrysalis may still be evil, but she’s still my friend. Plus, she must be learning something if she saved the both of us out of the blue and… wait” How did she save the both of you? From the glow of the statue, it looked like she blew it up herself. “How did she save us exactly?”
“Well, that’s the thing, she tried to save us. Scrappy says if you could notice her aura, then she was using a lot of magic on the statue. And the reason why she was using magic on the statue was because the gears were mangling each other at that point. Chrysalis tried to stop it altogether, but couldn’t hold it for long.” Scootaloo explained.
So the sounds of the gears, before the aura, that was the entire platform falling apart. Well then, the bad news didn’t sound too bad, and didn’t hold a candle to the good news. “Well, the bad part is behind us. Good to know we don’t have to worry about her now, now if only I could find her…”
“Erm, Anon, wait. That statue blowing up wasn't the bad news, I didn’t even say what it is yet. Actually…” Her ears began to fold and droop as she prepared her next words “You’re probably not gonna like this next part.”
Relax, Anon, you already know she tried to save you. Good enough to make whatever bad news you were about to hear to be pretty insignificant. “What is it?”
“Well, the reason Scrappy said she tried to save us in the first place was because he knows how she is. And so, he said there were actually two possibilities why she tried. The first was because you’re her best friend, and the other… erm… She um... “
“C’mon, Scoots, out with it. What other possibility could there be?!” Like, what else could it be?!
Scootaloo sighed, and looked at you with intense worry “The other possibility is that she wants to destroy you personally. Scrappy says she might want to get her revenge for what happened to the other changelings, personal revenge, as in she won’t let anything happen to you until she can destroy you herself.”
Shit, how could you forget that possibility? But, it can’t be that, right? She was stupid pissed when she ran off, but she was still your friend, right?
...Right?
Scootaloo could see you mentally trying to rationalize the news, and it was something she hated. She hated seeing you still try to hold onto such a friendship. She knew even when you verbally say you were over it, that you still clinged to it for reasons even she couldn’t understand. “Anon, I’m worried about you. If she wants to destroy you then we can’t keep this to ourselves. We have to tell somepony, she’s too dangerous.”
You sat there, silently, pondering. You couldn’t really tell anyone else, not even Discord. The only person you felt comfortable telling was Bonbon, and this was due to two reasons. Her skills, and the fact that in the show she really has done next to nothing when it comes to saving the world, which meant in the end, she wouldn’t get in your way. Still though, if Scootaloo was going to be worried so much about it, perhaps looking at Bonbon’s skills in a more optimistic light might be needed, if only because it could come to a surprise at how good she actually is at her job. Hell, if there happens to be some sort of final showdown, maybe she’d have the means of subduing Chrysalis without you even having to be there. All this, of course, if Scrappy’s second possibility turns out to be true, as she could have still just saved you due to friendship. “You’re right, Scoots. Thats why I’m gonna tell Bonbon about it. If anything, she should be able to help me out.”
“Anon! You can’t just… Oh wait” Scootaloo’s ear twitched as her face made an expression of pure confusion “You’re actually going to tell somepony?”
You nod “Yeah, I mean it’s dangerous not to, right?” It really wasn’t, as another thing you had was the horn, something she had no chance against anyway.
“Yeah… Ok, I guess that's alright. You’re not messing with me? You are going to tell her, right?” Scootaloo questioned
You nod again as you wave your hoof at her “Yeah, yeah, you have my word and my promise. But I’m gonna do that after a few errands. I gotta see the changelings today, and then Twilight.”
“The changelings?” Scootaloo was once again confused “Why? I thought you found them creepy.”
You shrug “I just wanna make sure everything is on the up and up, especially now that we know Chrysalis is skulking about. Better safe than sorry, right?”
“Yeah, that’s actually pretty true. I mean, Thorax seems nice, but we really don’t know what goes on over at that hive.” Scootaloo said as she rubbed her chin. Scootaloo, while she loved and trusted Scrappy like a little brother, still had trust issues with the rest of the changelings. It made sense, given that there still had to be some tension deep down within her after being attacked by them so long ago.
“Exactly.” You nod
“Ok, but what about Twilight then? Why see her? Unless you’re gonna tell her about Chrysalis too, which I kinda think you should, just in case” Scootaloo asked
“That's sort of a last resort kind of thing, Scoots. I just wanna see her about… Well… Don’t laugh.” Oh god, she’s gonna laugh. “I want to ask if I could work as a professor at her school.”
“You mean, teaching others about friendship stuff? I don’t think that’s funny, that’s actually kind of cool.” Scootaloo said, looking at you with an uplifting smile
“Seriously? You think it’s cool?” Woah, you expected her to laugh at you.
She nods “Yeah. I mean, you’re a kid like us, but you’ve managed to do so much in terms of friendship. Sure, you didn’t reform Chrysalis, but you reformed really scary ponies like Starlight and Tempest. I mean Rainbow Dash could have done it too, but you managed to do it before her, or even Twilight even. You have this knack that other ponies don’t have. So yeah, I think you could do it. Heck, I even got a cool title for you. You could be a professor of ‘Alternative Friendship Techniques’. Pretty cool, right? Just came up with it now!”
Wow, that was really encouraging of her, it made you feel like you could actually do it. “Yeah, that’s actually a pretty darn cool title. I think I’ll use it, thanks Scoots.”
“No problem, Anon. Though, if you do this, I’m gonna miss you. I mean, you know, at school.” She said with a soft frown
Wha? “You and the girls aren’t going to Twilight’s school?”
Scootaloo shook her head “Never got an invite, so nope. I guess she thinks we’re already good at friendship or something. I dunno, I guess. I don’t even know how that school is going to work. But if it's about teaching friendship, then you’d be perfect for teaching alternative techniques and stuff.”
Ok, why does she keep mentioning “alternative” techniques? It was kind of irking you. “Why do you keep saying that? Are you saying I can’t teach any normal friendship stuff?”
Scootaloo hesitates at first. But she does indeed nod with a slight grimace. “Erm… I mean, ummm… You kind of do ‘not so friendly’ kinds of things sometimes, Anon. I’m not knocking you or anything like that, but you know how Twilight is. That’s why I said ‘alternative’. Because one, you really are good at reforming bad guys, and two, its nothing like anypony else has ever seen, which makes it 'alternative'. See what I mean now?”
Huh… Well, while you still felt you were good at friendship all around, but you couldn’t deny that dealing with especially bad guys seemed to be mostly your strong suit. “I think I do, and… Thanks, Scoots. It’s good to know I at least have your support.” You tell her with a smile as you put on your horn.
“No problem, Anon, we’re a team, remember? We gotta get each others backs and support each other too. So, you going to the hive already?” She asks as she steps back, and opens up a cooler at the side of the podium.
You nod “Yeah, gotta get it done as soon as possible, you know?”
“Yeah, especially with what we know now. Here!” She takes an apple juice box from the cooler and tosses it towards you “In case you get thirsty, because… you could get thirsty.” She said, as her smile suddenly became awkward. What did she mean by that? You did feel rather parched, now that you thought about it, as if you had expelled a ton of liquid. But even then, it was odd to see her acting weird. But whatever, she was probably just worried.
“I will, thanks, Scoots, seeya soon” You wink at her as you catch the box, and then disappear in a flash of light.
“I really, really hope he knows what he’s doing.” Scootaloo remarks before tending to Scrappy, worried about your mental state and health.