//------------------------------// // Chapter 4: CMC Friend-Makers // Story: End of the Crusades // by TimeBomb0 //------------------------------// Sweetie Belle fidgeted on her hooves. She shouldn’t be this nervous, she told herself. After all, what was so different? She was in the same room that her classes took place at, with most of the same schoolmates (which unfortunately included Diamond Tiara), and even the same teacher. The only difference was that instead of a few rows of desks, there were now a line of risers in the center of the room. It wasn’t like she hadn’t just sung her heart out in a public contest the night before, either. If anything, she should be eager to be able to show everyone why she deserved her new cutie mark. She had already told them all about it at the beginning of class. Some of them had even seen her mark-winning performance last night. Despite her attempts to quiet it, the worrying feeling deep in her stomach, the one that had plagued her all of last week, still persisted. “You okay, Sweetie?” “Huh?” Sweetie came out of her trance and looked up to find Cheerilee standing over her with a smile. She felt a light blush coming on. “Oh, I’m okay. Uh, were you saying something?” Cheerilee resisted the urge to giggle and kept her motherly stare. “No, Sweetie. Just looking out for my students. Are you sure you’re fine?” The butterflies in Sweetie’s belly flapped a little harder at her teacher’s question, but she found the strength to overpower them. “Um, well,” Sweetie started, looking from Cheerilee to the risers and back, “I’m a little worried.” “Worried?” Sweetie took a breath. “I’ve never been in a choir before. I don’t even know the first thing about singing in a group.” “Well, it’s okay if you’re a little nervous,” said Cheerilee, “but I just know you’ll have fun here, and I’m sure everyone in the choir will do their best to make you feel welcome. And speaking of everyone…” Cheerilee turned to the risers and cleared her throat loudly enough for everyone to hear. The fillies and colts stopped their conversations and all climbed onto the risers in what Sweetie assumed to be their normal spots. “Good afternoon, my little ponies,” said Cheerilee. “Thank you all for signing up for the Ponyville Elementary Choir this year. Singing is a most wonderful talent that can not only brighten the hearts of everypony who listens, but provide a great way for a pony to express her feelings right from the heart. “With your hard work and talented voices, I know we’ll touch the hearts of everyone in Ponyville more than ever before.” From her position, Sweetie Belle could see Diamond Tiara making a gagging expression as Cheerilee gave her speech. Whether her teacher caught it or not, Sweetie couldn’t tell any difference in the way she spoke. “With this, I would like to welcome a new member to our choir.” Cheerilee nodded her head at Sweetie, making the entire class look at her. “I’m sure I don’t have to remind everypony of Sweetie Belle finding out about her wonderful singing voice last night.” Sweetie felt a blush coming on her cheeks and looked away with a shy smile. “Sweetie told me she would love to join our choir and show Ponyville more of her special talent,” said Cheerilee. Once more, Diamond Tiara made a visible gagging motion that went ignored. “Oh, can she show us her singing voice?” asked Dinky from the front row. Sweetie Belle gasped. There were the butterflies in her stomach again. “Yeah, some of us haven’t heard her sing yet!” said Rumble from the back. “Hmm… I suppose a demonstration couldn’t hurt. What do you think, Sweetie?” Cheerilee asked as she looked back to Sweetie at her side. What Cheerilee saw made her look concerned. Sweetie frowned and stared straight ahead, her breathing just a bit louder than normal. “Are you okay, Sweetie?” asked Cheerilee. As if coming out of a trance, Sweetie blinked and looked up. “Huh? Oh, I, uh, guess I could sing a little.” She drew a circle in the ground with her hoof. “Are you sure? You don’t have to demonstrate if you don’t want to,” said Cheerilee. “Oh, give me a break!” interrupted Diamond Tiara. “She sang just fine at the contest last night. It’s not like she’s forgotten how to sing since then.” “Diamond!” Cheerilee snapped, her smile turning into a disapproving glare in a flash. Diamond Tiara fell silent. She looked away in shame and annoyance. Not even she could resist a stern voice from a grown-up. “If Sweetie doesn’t want to sing, that’s her choice.” “I’ll do it.” Cheerilee’s glare disappeared as quickly as it appeared. “You will?” Sweetie Belle looked up to her teacher with a nervous smile. “I’ll be fine. I mean, I’m not trying to win a contest for my friends or anything. I’m just singing for a few ponies.” She glanced over to the choir and gulped. “A few ponies that I go to school with and have known for a really long time, and happen to be part of a choir I wanna join.” Cheerilee looked at Sweetie with concern and sighed. “If you feel like singing for us, then go right ahead. You can stop anytime you’d like.” Sweetie nodded, never taking her eyes off the choir. There they were, looking right at her with eyes wide in anticipation and one pair in a glare. The butterflies in her belly gave another flap, making it that much harder for the song to come out of her mouth. She looked back and forth between the filles and colts, desperately trying to remember any of the techniques from the book that saved her skin the night before. “Come on, Sweetie, you can do it!” said Dinky. “R-right.” Sweetie gave another gulp. Looking at her classmates wasn’t doing her any favors. She needed to make them disappear, and there was only way to do that. Letting out one last sigh, Sweetie shut her eyes and imagined herself to be anywhere than where she actually was. She was no longer in the classroom. With no effort at all, the first place she went to in her head was outside with her fellow Crusaders. Memories both young and old took the three of them to an endless number of crusades. They were racing downhill in bobsleds during the last Winter one moment, and enjoying a nice picnic in the Summer the next. It didn’t matter what they did in her mind; she was okay with whatever… “…will be, will be.” The visions in Sweetie’s head disappeared at once. Had she just sung the entire piece? She tried to remember anything about the last couple minutes, but all that came to her were the memories of crusades past. The sound of her cheering schoolmates kept her from thinking any further. Sweetie opened her eyes to the smiles, stomps, and cheers of almost everypony in the choir. “That was wonderful singing, Sweetie. I know you’ll fit perfectly in our choir.” said Cheerilee, still standing at Sweetie’s side. She lifted a hoof and pointed it to a space between two of the choir students. “Here, let’s put you between Archer and Twist for now and see how you do there.” Obliging their teacher, the students spread themselves apart, allowing space for Sweetie to climb up to her spot. “T-thanks, everyone.” Sweetie blushed as she climbed up the steps. Now at her designated spot, Sweetie Belle turned around. She looked at the classroom from her new height. Something felt different, she thought to herself. She couldn’t have been more than a couple feet off the ground, but it was more than enough for the schoolroom to feel a little strange. “Okay, everypony,” called Cheerilee, who now almost stood at eye-level with Sweetie. “It’s time to get started on our singing. Since we have a new member and it’s been a while since our first meeting, I’ll go ahead and pass out a new set of warm-up songs.” Cheerilee walked back to her desk and pulled out a stack of songbooks. She turned her backside to the choir as she went to work balancing them on her barrel. “That was a great job, Thweetie.” “Huh?” Sweetie perked up and looked over to Twist. No one else could have spoken with a lisp like that. “Oh, thank you.” She smiled. “Yeah, I don’t think any of us thought you could sing so well,” said Archer. “Neither did I,” said Sweetie. “This choir’s gonna thound great now that you’re here,” said Twist. “In fact, this might be the best theason of choir ever!” Sweetie’s blush could only grow deeper. She thought of how silly it was to still feel embarrassed about her talent to the ponies who would easily accept it. Sweetie opened her mouth to reply, but Cheerilee’s voice beat her. “Here we are, everypony. Take a songbook and pass it down the row until everyone has one.” The choir smiled and did as they were told. As they passed the books out, Sweetie’s thoughts drifted to her friends. She could only hope that they were having as much success as she was right now. ********************************** “Hey, Scootaloo?” said a muffled voice. “Yes?” replied another muffled voice. “You wanna know somethin’?” “Yes?” “I don’t think our cutie marks are gonna have anythin’ to do with trampoline gymnastics.” With a groan, Scootaloo adjusted her forelegs and pushed her muddy face off the ground. She glanced over to the yellow mess of limbs lying flat on the dirt just a few feet from a bright pink trampoline. “I hate to say it, but I think you’re right.” Apple Bloom soon parted company with the ground and sat up. She paused to spit out a clump of dirt and grimace at the taste. “I guess on the bright side, we didn’t actually cause any damage to Pinkie’s trampoline,” said Apple Bloom as she walked to the bright pink bouncing contraption. “Not t’ mention we didn’t spend any bits on this crusade or wreck anythin’ either. I can’t even remember the last time that happened.” To this, Scootaloo frowned a little more. “That just means we’re not trying hard enough.” Apple Bloom moved to one of the trampoline’s legs and started taking the contraption down. “Well, we still got plenty of ideas and money left to try. We can’t let ourselves get bummed out just yet.” Upon mention of the ideas, Scootaloo’s face relaxed a little. “Yeah, but… I guess I thought since Sweetie got her cutie mark out of nowhere, we would get ours really fast, too.” “Well, that could still happen,” said Apple Bloom while she folded the trampoline. “I mean, I thought I had totally run out o’ ideas just a few days ago, but now I got a whole backpack full of ‘em and plenty of money to pay for most of ‘em.” Scootaloo sighed; what else could she do when faced with the truth? “Alright, but we really gotta push ourselves for these next crusades. Sweetie didn’t earn her cutie mark by going easy on her practicing, so we can’t do the same either. So what’s next?” Though her forehooves were holding a portion of the trampoline above her head, Apple Bloom froze in her tracks. “Uh, next?” she said while looking with an arched brow over at her friend. “Yeah, what’s the plan now? Are we gonna try some base-jumping? Breakdancing? Bookkeeping? No wait, scratch that last one, Twilight won’t let us do anything but check out books anymore.” Apple Bloom felt like shaking her head, though she couldn’t exactly say why. “I think the best thing t’ do would be t’ call it a day.” Were someone to stand near Scootaloo, they would have sworn they could feel something intangible deflating next to them. “Seriously?” spoke Scootaloo. “But we still got so much stuff to try.” “I know we do.” Apple Bloom pushed the trampoline over. “But I’m a mite worn out from all the jumpin’, and it’s gonna be dark soon anyway.” Scootaloo looked up and noticed the orange and violet sky for the first time. “Darn.” She frowned. Apple Bloom folded the last of the trampoline and smiled to herself. “There. Now all we need is t’ bring this back to Pinkie. I just hope she ain’t too hard to find today.” “I’m not!” Out of the trampoline box popped Pinkie Pie’s grinning head. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both jumped back in surprise. “Pinkie!?” they cried out. “Well, I’m usually not all that hard to find,” continued Pinkie as she climbed out of the box. “Unless it’s a game of hide and seek. I’m a champ at hide and seek, second only to Fluttershy of course!” Apple Bloom and Scootaloo exchanged looks, a move that went unnoticed by Pinkie. Scootaloo turned to the pink mare and asked “So what are you doing here?” Pinkie Pie opened her eyes. “Oh, right! I need my trampoline back. Turns out some of the frogs at the swamp have been getting into the main town.” “But what does your trampoline have t’ do with that?” asked Apple Bloom. “Why wouldn’t my trampoline have something to do with this?” Pinkie Pie adopted a serious look. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo opened their mouths as if to speak, but were unable to find any words between the two of them. Pinkie Pie grabbed hold of her trampoline and tossed it into the air. The folded contraption fell perfectly into the box, pulling the lid closed as it went past. “No time to talk. I’ve got some frogs to relocate. Bye girls, see you at the party!” In a flash, Pinkie was gone, box and all. The only evidence of her being there was the puff of dust kicked up in her wake. A few seconds of silence passed before the two fillies spoke again. “What was that all about?” asked Scootaloo. “Knowin’ Pinkie, it could be anythin’,” replied Apple Bloom. “No kidding.” Scootaloo turned to her friend and lifted a hoof to the side. “And what was that party she was talking about?” Apple Bloom shrugged. “I don’t know. Pinkie just about has a new party goin’ on every other day. Could just be fer Gummy gettin’ a new tooth or somethin’ like that.” “If that’s the case, then she might not want to keep Gummy as a pet for much longer.” Scootaloo shuddered as a scary image of a grown Gummy entered her mind. She shook it out of her head. “So same time tomorrow, I guess?” “Yep.” Apple Bloom smiled. “Gotta make the most o’ what time we have left before Winter Set-Up.” Scootaloo matched her smile with a grin. “Definitely. Tomorrow, we give it our all. We’re getting our cutie marks before Winter Set-Up no matter what!” ********************************** “…And that’s what we did after school yesterday.” Sweetie Belle looked at Scootaloo in quiet admiration. Her head was leaned over on her desk so she could see both of her friends as they recounted the story. Despite the rest of the class chatting all around her, she could hear their every word loud and clear. “Wow,” said Sweetie, “that sounded like fun. Well, the jumping part did. Are you any sore from all the landings?” Scootaloo scoffed. “Nah, we’re both fine. I brushed that stuff off easy.” To this, Sweetie raised an eyebrow. “Really? Not even a little bit?” “Of course.” Scootaloo lifted her head in pride. “I don’t even know the meaning of the word paAAIEEE!” Her smug grin instantly changed to a contorted face of pain when Scootaloo felt a poke to her rather sore left leg. “Doesn’t hurt, huh?” asked a grinning Apple Bloom as she withdrew a hoof. Scootaloo rubbed her sore limb. “Except for there,” she mumbled. Sweetie giggled to herself. She could always count on her friends to put a smile on her face. “Anyway,” spoke Scootaloo once the pain in her limb had subsided, “we’re gonna try some more crusades after school.” Scootaloo pumped a hoof. “We’re not stopping until we’ve both found our special talent!” “Cutie marks or bust!” added Apple Bloom. Sweetie giggled again. “Okay, just try not to bust anything. I only gave you fifty bits.” “We’ll try not to,” said Apple Bloom. “I think our next few crusades shouldn’t cost too much. We’re tryin’ out kite-flyin’ and card-playin’ next. We’d have t’ try to break somethin’ that way.” At the mention of the crusades, Sweetie Belle’s smile faded. She felt another odd feeling deep within her stomach. It wasn’t the same as the feelings she had before her big night on the stage. Those felt like her heart was going to explode from fright and nervousness. This time, her belly felt a little hollow, but not because she was hungry. Rarity’s breakfasts eliminated any chance of that being the answer. It was as if there was something missing from her, something she wanted back but knew she couldn’t have. “I wish I could come along with you for those,” said Sweetie. “They sound like fun.” “Well, why can’t you?” asked Scootaloo. “It’s the choir. We’re having our first concert in a few weeks, and we really need to work hard if we’re gonna learn all the songs by then. That means rehearsals are gonna go pretty late.” “Aw, don’t worry about it, Sweetie. Scootaloo an’ I can handle ourselves,” said Apple Bloom. Were she not separated by another desk and its purple-maned occupant, Apple Bloom would have laid a shoulder over Sweetie in comfort. All she could do from her seat was add “You just worry about doin’ great in the choir, an’ we’ll make sure to come see all yer concerts.” Sweetie Belle responded with another soft smile. “Thanks, girls. I can’t wait to see you two at our first concert and my cuteceñera.” Scootaloo and Apple Bloom lifted their eyes in surprise. “You’re gonna have a cuteceñera? Since when?” asked Scootaloo. “Since Pinkie Pie came to the Boutique and told me I was gonna have one,” said Sweetie with a straight face. Scootaloo looked baffled. “Pinkie Pie? But how did…” her voice trailed off as the memory of Pinkie’s sudden appearance last night flashed in Scootaloo’s mind. She instead closed with, “Oh, right. She likes to do that.” “Yeah, sorry I forgot to tell you about it yesterday,” said Sweetie. “I was going to, but the whole class got excited about my cutie mark and then Cheerilee asked if I wanted to join the choir. I had so much stuff to think about, it just slipped my mind.” “I hear that,” said Scootaloo. “I know I’d have a hard time remembering things if I were in your horseshoes.” Apple Bloom nodded behind her friend while she dug through her backpack. “So when is yer cuteceñera?” she asked. “It’s this Sunday evening from five to about eight. It’ll be at my parent’s house. Rarity doesn’t want it at her Boutique, and Pinkie told me the Cakes are re-doing the inside of Sugarcube Corner that weekend.” Sweetie rubbed her head. “At least, I think that’s what I got. Pinkie was talking pretty fast because she had another one of her senses. Something about her needing her trampoline, I think.” “5 PM. Sunday night. Sweetie’s house,” mumbled Apple Bloom through a pencil as she wrote down the details on the corner of one of her crusade blueprints. “Got it,” she declared after spitting out the pencil. “We’ll be there fer sure.” “Definitely.” Scootaloo grinned. “Alright everypony, it’s time for class!” Proving her namesake once more, Cheerilee’s voice soon brought the entire schoolroom to silence. The young fillies and colts all turned their attention to their teacher, their eyes wide and minds ready for anything. “If you haven’t heard by now, today marks the first official day of Fall this year. Now can anyone tell me what that means?” A small number of hooves raised in the air, some of which were adorned with cries of “Oh, pick me!” “Hmm, let’s see,” said Cheerilee as her eyes scanned the class. “Twist?” “Doeth it mean the Running of the Leaves will start thoon?” spoke the glasses-wearing filly with braces. “Yes, it does,” said Cheerilee with a smile, “but it also means something else. Do you know what it is, Pipsqueak?” “It’s gonna get colder and Luna will make the nights longer, right?” asked Pipsqueak. “That’s right.” Cheerilee walked over to a chalkboard on wheels. The side visible to the children was completely blank. “However, it also means something important for the class today.” “Does it mean more homework?” came Snails’ drawl from the back row. His comment caused a look of panic in some of the class, especially his friend Snips. The corner of Cheerilee’s mouth tried to curl further upwards, but she held it down. “No, Snails… well yes, it does, but it means something more important than that.” All eyes focused on Cheerilee as she spun the easel around. The chalkboard on the flip side contained an outline of the classroom, with names for each student on the seats and Cheerilee’s desk at the top. “It’s time for our new seating chart for the quarter!” said Cheerilee. A chorus of groans and disappointed sighs broke out amongst the class. The moans could be heard loudest in the general area of the Cutie Mark Crusaders and around Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon. “Now, now, everypony, I know you’re disappointed, but a new seat is just what we all need for the new season. Think of it as an opportunity to talk to some of your other fellow classmates and make some new friends,” Cheerilee spoke, her expression unwavering. She lifted a hoof and pointed it at the board. “Now then, we’ll start with the row closest to the door. In the first seat, we have…” While Cheerilee ran down the new seating chart, Scootaloo looked back and forth between her friends with a worried look. “Oh no, a new seating chart? How are we gonna discuss our plans now?” “Maybe it won’t be too bad,” said Apple Bloom, her expression a hopeful one. “Who knows, we might end up pretty close together fer this season, too.” ********************************** “…Or we might end up completely separated.” Apple Bloom’s smile had faded to a depressed frown. She slumped on her hoof as she looked from the back of the class. In the front and left-most seat sat Scootaloo, while Sweetie was moved to the right and middle of the class. Thankfully, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon were not close by to any of them, but it did little to comfort her. Apple Bloom let out a sigh. She tried to comfort herself with the fact that she could always talk to them during lunch and recess in addition to anytime outside class. Still, she knew she was going to miss whiling away the minutes of free time with her friends, and she had a feeling the others would miss it, too. They all may as well have all been on a chain of remote islands hundreds of miles away from each other. Meanwhile, Scootaloo sat with her head slouched into her hoof. Her frown carried a look of both boredom and disappointment. She was never too keen on sitting in a desk and listening to someone talk about boring stuff all day long (something her “C” average grades reflected). Why learn about unimportant things like the founding of Canterlot when she could be outside doing everything she could to get her cutie mark, after all? But with nopony next to her that she could discuss these things with, Scootaloo was certain the hours she spent in class were going to crawl by slower than Tank on a road covered in glue. One row back and across the room from her sat Sweetie Belle, though she didn’t feel very sweet at the moment. She carried the same frown as her friends while she stared at the curves and grooves in the wood that made up her desk. The differences between the markings on her new desk and the old one only further drove home the sad truth. The knot in the corner was now off to the center. The cut marks on the edges were gone. Her friends were not to her sides anymore. And there certainly never used to be a note on her desk before. Sweetie Belle blinked and shook her head out of her trance. There it was: a folded note with her name on it in someone else’s writing. She quickly looked up and checked her surroundings. Cheerilee had her back turned to the class while she wrote some math problems on the board. The rest of the ponies she saw were either looking at Cheerilee or writing the problems down. Taking the risk of being caught and scolded, Sweetie grabbed the note and quietly opened it. The mouth-writing was rough, but the message’s content was enough to make Sweetie stare at the message in disbelief. Sweetee, pleaz sit at are table for lunch to-day. –Truffle They wanted her to join them at their lunch table? Sweetie knew exactly what table Truffle Shuffle sat at. It had most of the choir members there, like Dinky, Archer, Rumble, Featherweight, and Twist. It wasn’t hard to remember who all sat at that table, either. In her head, Sweetie could see them now, all laughing at jokes and talking about the cool stuff going on. That’s what they always did when she, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo walked by to their own table to do much of the same thing as them, just on a smaller scale. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo… of course! As much as she considered the idea, Sweetie couldn’t just leave her two best friends like that. She’d have to explain that to Truffle before lunch. With a sigh, Sweetie, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo all turned their attention back to Cheerilee and waited for the lunch bell’s ringing to unite them once more. ********************************** “…So we’ll start with the kite-boarding tomorrow, then we’ll give tree-trimming a try.” “I dunno. I think we should try kite-boardin’ on Thursday and do frisbee-golf tomorrow. That way, we’re not too tired for tree-trimmin’.” “But if we do that, we’ll have kite-boarding and rocket-building for Thursday, and there’s no way we’ll have enough time for both of those.” “Then you should both try the first plan,” piped in Sweetie from across the table. “Maybe if we tried rocket-building and tree-trimming tomorrow, we can do frisbee-golf and kite-boarding on Thursday,” continued Scootaloo, her head still fixed on the mess of plans on the table. “Then if we make any mistakes, we’ll definitely have some trees to trim.” “But then we’ll be dead tired from all the runnin’ around we’d have to do on Thursday,” said Apple Bloom. She pulls another piece of paper from out of the pile. “Here, maybe we could try a night talent like star-gazin’ tomorrow and leave frisbee-golf fer the weekend.” “Now there’s a plan. You both can do that,” said Sweetie. “But we can’t do a night talent together. At least, not on a school night,” said Scootaloo. “We don’t need to do some talents together,” said Apple Bloom. “That way, we can still try findin’ our cutie marks even when we have to go home for the night.” “Separate attempts at cutie marks?” Scootaloo glanced to the side and rested her head on hoof. “Yeah, that could work. We could get even more crusades in before Winter if we do that.” “Oh, there you go,” said a smiling Sweetie. “Sounds like you have everything all worked out, so maybe now we can talk about–” “Wait a second,” interrupted Scootaloo. “If we’re gonna start doing these separate crusades, we need to figure out what days we should do them, too.” Apple Bloom nodded. “Yer right. Here, lemme dig them outta my bags and we can go over them, too.” While Apple Bloom ducked underneath the table to do just that, Sweetie looked off to the side and frowned. “…Something else,” she muttered under her breath. Such had been their gathering at the lunch table since the crusaders had sat down. It was a nice enough day for the class to enjoy its lunch outside, which meant they could sit together at their favorite table under the shade of an old oak tree. Tried as she might, Sweetie couldn’t get a word in between Apple Bloom and Scootaloo’s planning. They had even eaten their lunch while they laid out the groundwork for upcoming crusades. It wasn’t that Sweetie wanted to keep them from working out the best way to earn their cutie marks, far from it. As they had talked about their plans, however, Sweetie could feel an empty feeling growing deep within her again. It made even less sense to feel empty now that she had just had lunch, but as her friends continued to bring up the things they were going to do after class, Sweetie finally realized what the emptiness meant, and it made her feel worse than before. She didn’t have to go on crusades anymore. No more crazy shenanigans with her friends. No more spending countless hours coming up with plans to earn her cutie mark. No more cheering each other up after a failed crusade and enjoying milkshakes while they looked forward to tomorrow’s chance of bringing them success. She no longer needed to do any of these things. Her friends were right next to her, but while they spoke of future crusades, Sweetie felt like they were worlds apart. “Hey, Sweetie Belle!” Sweetie perked up and looked around her. There were only four tables outside. The voice that called to her definitely didn’t come from her friends. It didn’t come from the table that housed Snips and Snails. It definitely didn’t come from Diamond and Silver’s table. That just left one table, the one table detailed in Sweetie’s note, to be exact. “Come sit with us, Sweetie.” Dinky waved to her from the far side of the table. “We all wanna talk to you.” Sweetie looked back and forth between her friends and the table of choir students calling her over. On one hoof, she had a whole new table of ponies wanting to talk to her, maybe even get to know her. Then again, she couldn’t just up and walk away from the fillies that had stuck with her for so many adventures. They were her friends, even if she had the chance to make a new group of friends in the choir, or if her friends were talking about things that no longer pertained to her, or had ignored her suggestions like she wasn’t there… “Um, girls?” asked Sweetie as he turned around to face them. Their eyes remained glued to the plans in front of them. “But Friday night’s supposed to be cold, so we can’t do star-gazing. Let’s do photography then,” said Scootaloo. “We can’t do photography on Friday. We’d have t’ borrow a camera from Featherweight, and he’ll be outta town until Sunday morning,” replied Apple Bloom. “Hey, listen,” said Sweetie, “Dinky wants to talk to me at her table about a couple things, so I’m gonna head over there, okay?” “Yeah, sure, go for it.” Scootaloo waved a hoof at Sweetie. “But the problem with photography at night is…” Sweetie didn’t bother to listen to the rest of the conversation. She gathered up the rest of her lunch in her bag, stood up, and turned around. She looked back one last time at her friends, then walked off to her seat at the choir table.