Scootaloo had spent the past few months travelling around the world, trying to break the record for the highest skydive survived without a parachute. First, she'd jumped off the dome surrounding the Crystal Empire... but a gust of wind had immediately smacked her into the side. She'd slid down the rest of the way. Next, she'd planned to jump off the highest point of the Peaks of Peril... but she'd received a singed letter of complaint from someone called Rain Shine. Her third choice was somewhere far more local: the colosseum in Cloudsdale. This was going to be her biggest stunt yet, and she was determined to get it right this time!
"Are you crazy?" Sweetie Belle nagged her in their clubhouse. "Apple Bloom and I can't afford to pay for your funeral!"
"I'll be fine!" Scootaloo insisted with a wave of her hoof. "I've skydived countless times before, and I'm still in one piece!"
A few hours later, she "borrowed" Twilight's hot air balloon and headed to Cloudsdale. When she entered the colosseum, its seats were packed with pegasi waving orange and magenta banners. Rainbow Dash wasn't one of them; she was in Ponyville right now.
"GO SCOOTALOO!" they shouted in unison.
Stood at the edge of the large hole in the floor, Scootaloo peered down. Ponyville looked like a tiny speck so far below, but she was certain they were cheering her on, too! Her heart raced with so much excitement that she could feel it in her eardrums. She braced herself, took a deep breath, and then jumped.
Skydiving was simply exhilarating! She felt a surge of adrenaline as the freezing wind rushed past her, drowning out the sound of her pounding heartbeat. This must be how the Wonderbolts felt!
As the fields surrounding Ponyville became closer and closer, her excitement turned into panic. She wasn't slowing down at all! She spread her legs out and frantically buzzed her wings. That would at least create enough air resistance to slow her down, right?
...Right?
SPLAT!
Now, she was standing alone in an empty, flat, black expanse of nothing. It wasn't in total darkness, because she could see her hooves in her peripheral vision as clear as day. Odd. She'd always thought the afterlife would be more... interesting than this. Had nopony else died today?
"HELLO?" she yelled. Even though there were no walls in sight, her voice echoed as if she'd fallen down a well.
"Hello!" a cheerful voice sang. The suddenness would've scared the life out of Scootaloo if she, y'know, had a life to be scared out of.
A pastel pink shape, twice Scootaloo's height, materialised in front of her. It was an indistinct blur at first, but soon took the form of a pink hippogriff she vaguely recognised... holding a scythe that looked sharp enough to cut down every tree in Sweet Apple Acres without getting blunt.
"AH!" Scootaloo gasped, startled. "You're Terramar's sister, right? What is this place, and what're you doing here?"
The hippogriff chuckled, and took a deep breath. "My name is Silverstream. I've seen you around Ponyville, but I didn't know you knew Terramar! What's your name again?" She said this so quickly that Scootaloo was stunned into silence for a few seconds.
"Uh... and my name's Scootaloo." She held out a forehoof. "Nice to meet you?"
"Anyway, Scootaloo, I'm here to take you on your one-way, all-expenses-paid trip to the afterlife!" Silverstream proudly held up her scythe and tapped it. "You see, it turns out that the Grim Reaper can't keep up with all the deaths in the world, so he asked the Tree of Harmony for help, and then the tree contacted me and my friends in a shared dream asking if we'd like to be part-time reapers, and we all said yes! So Grimmy gave us these magic scythes, and now we can travel to and from the void between life and death! But only when somecreature in the vicinity has died, of course."
"Sure..." Scootaloo didn't have a clue what half of that meant. "Uh... Hey! Do you think you could bring me back to life? Please? There are so many things I wanted to do!" She gave Silverstream her best puppy-dog eyes, perfect for begging Rainbow Dash to take her to Wonderbolts shows.
Silverstream wagged a talon disapprovingly. "Nu-uh. Rules are rules! Well, that, and I've already paid for your funeral and the company doesn't do refunds."
"Wait, WHAT?" Scootaloo gasped, her voice squeaking like Sweetie Belle's used to.
Silverstream nodded. "Being a member of the royal family has its upsides."
"Well... I'm surprised you'd get involved, seeing as we barely know each other and all," Scootaloo replied. I'm sure Sweetie Belle is glad, she thought.
"Nonsense! Any friend of Terramar's is a friend of mine!" exclaimed Silverstream. "Speaking of which, he's invited! We couldn't get your parents, though. They're busy wrangling dropbears—"
"Okay, I get the picture," Scootaloo interrupted. "Can you just get on with this already?"
"I'm glad you asked!" exclaimed Silverstream, as if she were completely oblivious to Scootaloo's frustration. "Ooh, this is my favourite part!" She swung her scythe downwards, and a cluster of pale blue, glowing lines appeared and gradually spread out.
"Oooh! Do I get to see my parents one last time?" Scootaloo asked, her wings fluttering.
"Of course not!" Silverstream exclaimed nonchalantly. "It's even better than that!" She held her talons close to her face and squeed with delight as the glow grew brighter. Scootaloo turned towards it and saw... a staircase. Granted, it was made of pure light and seemed to reach upwards infinitely, but it was a staircase nevertheless. "Isn't it incredible?"
"...Oh," was all she could say. She never thought her own death would be disappointing. Still, she hesitantly stepped onto the first stair.
"Time to get going!" Silverstream shouted. Scootaloo looked behind herself one last time to see that she was waving. "Remember, don't be sad! Your life may have been short, but you've changed so many others for the better. Oh, and don't forget to say hi to the Four Horses of the Apocalypse for me!"
With that, Scootaloo turned to face forwards, her pace steadily speeding into a trot as she set her sights on what lay beyond...