“Hey, Scootaloo wake up,” Rainbow Dash said from the bottom of the bed, “Scootaloo! Get up. Come on, did you forget? Today is the first day of autumn break, and the day I promised to teach you to fly.”
Scootaloo snapped awake, jumping up with excitement. She couldn’t wait, this is one of the things she was most looking forward to.
“Well it’s good to see you excited about it,” said Rainbow with a smile, “come to the kitchen, don’t want to try flying with an empty stomach, you need to have nothing distracting you and hunger is a distraction.”
They went down into the kitchen and had a meal of fruit and pastries before heading out the door. Scootaloo jumped onto Rainbow Dash’s back and they took off towards the park, they wanted a nice big open place to practice. When they landed, Scootaloo jumped down onto the grass and stretched out her wings.
“Alright let’s get started, what should we do first?” she asked Rainbow.
“You’ve already started doing the first thing, stretching, you gotta keep yourself nice and limber.” Rainbow replied.
They started their stretches, first stretching their legs and then their wings for about five minutes. Scootaloo was already getting impatient, with every new stretch her frown grew.
“When are we going to get to the flying already?!” Scootaloo yelled, her impatients getting the better of her.
“Before we can get off the ground we gotta go over the basic wing movement, don’t be in such a rush.”
Rainbow started to slowly move her wings, up and down with a slight forward to back movement. Scootaloo, not paying attention to what Rainbow Dash was doing, started to beat her wings as fast as she could, a light hum coming from them.
“Woah, you’re not a humming bird, you have to move your wings slowly, softly, more fluidly, see how I’m doing it?” she continued her slow, almost circular motion with her wings.
“But my wings are so small, it’s hard for me.” Scootaloo said exasperatedly.
“There’s nothing wrong with your wings, every Pegasus’s wings are proportionate to their body, like you are small, your wings are small just as I’m bigger, I have bigger wings.” Rainbow explained
“Then what about him?” Scootaloo asked as a large muscled white Pegasus flew by, “He’s huge but he has tiny wings.”
“He’s… different, nopony can explain how or why he’s like that, he’s the exception to the rule I guess.” Rainbow said contemplating the pony, “anyways, it’s not your wings you just need to get a feel for the motion, start slowly and let yourself get used to it.”
Scootaloo sighed and started to move her wings like Rainbow Dash was, she immediately felt the difference as to how the wind moved around them. She smiled at up at Rainbow and slowly got used to the motion.
“Good, you gotta keep your motion fluid, and when you feel you’re ready, try putting a little more power into it.” Rainbow said encouragingly.
Scootaloo tensed up a little and her wings started beating faster again. “No, not faster, put power into it, don’t tense up, you need to be limber and fluid.”
She slowed her wings down again and got into the rhythm of the slow semicircular motion again. This time she beat her wings down a little harder and she could feel her weight lessen on her hooves, she looked expectantly at her sister. Rainbow gave her a smile and said, “Yeah, like that, keep doing that when you feel ready and you’ll be flying in no time.”
“Rainbow Dash is that you?” a voice called from behind them, “It is, you teaching that filly to fly eh, is it some sort of charity thing or what?” Rainbow and Scootaloo turned, it was Soarin of the Wonderbolts.
“Soarin?!” said Rainbow Dash astonished, “What are you doing here?”
“I was on my way to an important event in Cloudsdale and I saw you here teaching her to fly.” he said and pointed to Scootaloo, “You still haven’t answered my question.”
“I’m teaching her because she’s my sister,” seeing the confused look on his face she continued, “it was fairly recent.”
She explained what had happened to him. “Harsh,” he said giving Scootaloo a sad look, “still, it’s good to see that you’re happy at least.”
Scootaloo was waiting for Rainbow to turn her attention back to their flying lesson but she just kept talking to Soarin.
“So hey, I was just thinking, I don’t have a date today, would you like to join me?” Soarin asked moving a little closer to Rainbow.
“Uh, right now?” she asked.
“Well it is a lunch event so, yeah if we left right now we’d get there on time.”
Scootaloo cleared her throat, she really wanted to get back to their lesson.
“I have to stay here with my sister, teaching her to fly and all that.” said Rainbow nervously.
“Right, I’m sorry. Your sister… slipped my mind, I didn’t mean to drag you away from her, I just…” he trailed off, he couldn’t think of an excuse and he felt embarrassed asking her to just abandon her sister there for a date.
Rainbow Dash turned back to Scootaloo and continued their lesson and Soarin took off towards Cloudsdale alone. Rainbow looked up and watched him for a second, ‘a date with a Wonderbolt,’ she thought to herself, ‘if only…’ She shook her head, her sister wasn’t a burden, and it wasn’t bad having her around, she enjoyed the time she spent with Scootaloo, she couldn’t believe she would even think of her as something holding her back.
Scootaloo saw the look of longing as she saw Rainbow watching Soarin fly away, ‘had she done something wrong?’ she wondered. She couldn’t help but feeling guilty for the sad look on her big sister’s face just then.
“Hey, let’s head back home for lunch, I’m getting kind of hungry.” said Rainbow Dash.
Scootaloo nodded and she hopped onto her sister’s back again. Rainbow took off and as she did, she felt something was wrong with Scootaloo. “Hey, are you ok?” she asked concerned.
“If it’s about Soarin, it’s okay,” Rainbow said reassuringly, “you know I wouldn’t just abandon you right?”
Scootaloo nodded. “Good, and don’t you ever think otherwise, we’re sisters and sisters look out for each other.” Rainbow Dash said strongly.
Scootaloo smiled and hugged Rainbow, even after they landed she was still hugging her, she didn’t want to let go of her sister.