//------------------------------// // Thursday // Story: A Week In The Life // by Comet Burst //------------------------------// Life isn't fair. Plain and simple. Bad things always strike when you're unprepared, whether what you are doing involves relaxing, working, minding your own business or even saving a friend from a horde of stallions while simultaneously preparing to pry him for information as well. At least, Rainbow Blitz thought so. It had been less than twenty four hours since he had blown up AJ's barn and sent the town into a mad panic, all because of Butterscotch hugging him the wrong way. The townsponies and especially AJ were less than lenient to the prismatic pony, ignoring where the clear blame lay and dumping all their frustration on him. I mean, heck, they didn't even bother looking for the pony responsible for yesterday's RainNuke, they just all used Rainbow Blitz as a scapegoat and forced two months of community service onto him, not to mention that he also had to help rebuild AJ's barn without any compensation. AJ had told him he was lucky he was getting any help at all. "Welcome back, my friends, to the show that never ends! We're so glad you could attend! Come inside, come inside!" "No, no, a thousand times no!" "Aww, come on!" "We are NOT singing that at the talent show!" "But it's a really good song!" "It's only good to you because you made it up, you condenselosophogus!" "That's not even a real word!" "How would you know?!" Butterscotch sighed heavily as he sat under an apple tree on a hill overlooking the construction site. Not being muscular or having any particularly useful skill was often a blessing, but it was also a curse. As the Element of Kindness, he did feel partially responsible for the fiasco yesterday, but was not taken seriously by anypony despite his protests. So instead of just walking away, he nearly begged to help in some way. AJ was reluctant to allow Butterscotch to help on the construction of the new barn, so he instead asked him to watch over the three colts while the other ponies were busy. Applebutter, Silver Bells and Skater Roo had a talent show coming up and had formed themselves into a club called the Coolie Mark Commodores, a clandestine group of colts without a special talent bent on finding one come Eris or high water, or let Solaris's royal hindquarters squish them into the sun. That was their motto. No joke. As of now, Silver Bells was arguing with Skater Roo about the song they should sing. Several had been submitted, but almost all had been rejected. "For those about to rock!" Silver Bells shouted at the top of his lungs. "NO!" Applebutter and Skater Roo shouted back. "There's a filly whose sure, all that glitters is gold and she's buying a stairway to--" Skater Roo started. "Seriously?! Nopony wants to listen to that!" Silver Bells shouted. "Slowly stroke me!" Applebutter shouted while playing the piano. "I'd prefer not to go to jail after the talent show..." Skater Roo mumbled. "There's a little black spot on the sun today!" Silver Bells sang in the wrong octave, causing Applebutter to hurl. "We need to pick a song!" Applebutter shouted over them, causing Butterscotch to roll his eyes. It was a long and arduous road to dealing with colts. Butterscotch was actually pretty happy he didn't have one of his own. It wasn't that he didn't want one eventually, but he was mostly sure that, if he did, the colt might be mistaken as a filly like he was. Some less than fond memories popped into his head as the butter colored pegasus thought. He remembered some pretty dumb ponies, which ironically were fillies, teasing him about how dainty and weak he was. It was thanks to Rainbow Blitz that they stopped since he was pretty intimidating as a colt. After performing his first Sonic Rainblast, Blitz had become the most hunky colt at the school with his blinding speed and awesome looking coolie mark while Butterscotch was a little more than embarrassed that his were three pink butterflies. Still, Blitz instantly befriended and stuck up for him against the various bullies over the years, earning Butterscotch's friendship and trust when many ponies couldn't understand why. As typical of any friends, though, their friendship tended to be strained at points, but the two never seemed to have a permanent falling out. As Butterscotch thought about it, he closed his eyes, smiled and started to nod his head happily, completely unaware of the three colts in the room. They each stared at him, wide eyed and dumbstruck. Applebutter eventually looked back at the piano and started to mumble. "I was just kidding when I sang that..." he mouthed, staring at the keys. That evening was probably one of the most interesting that Ponyville had ever experienced. At the community theater, a cranberry colored stallion stood behind the drawn red curtain, closely examining a clipboard. Behind him stood three colts, each garbed in dark cloaks. They each fidgeted nervously, glancing back and forth, hoping that nopony was there to ruin the surprise. They had little time to rehearse their act, but they felt it was good enough to earn first place in the talent competition. Their teacher, however, didn't even bother to wonder why his students were dressed as cultists. He was instead focused on how the schedule was working. The show was going to be an hour long and six colts and fillies had entered, meaning they had about ten minutes each to perform. Several of them, including the illustriously spoiled Diamond Crown, would try to hog the spotlight as much as they could, so he had to be prepared with the trapdoor. On the other side of the curtain, a crowd of ponies had gathered to watch the young ones. Their various shapes, sizes and colors made it a dizzying sight to anyone who could not handle rapid flashes of colors, like Butterscotch. Our favorite yellow pegasus stood near the back of the seating area, dangerously close to a trash can. His cheeks were green as he repressed his dinner, trying his best to stare at the curtain. That's when his luck got the best of him again. "Howdy there, Scotch!" came a familiar southern twang. The pegasus turned to the entrance to see his good friend and fellow Element of Harmony, AJ, grinning at him, along with his bright red sister. "What'cha doin' all the way up here?" AJ asked with a smile, "Not gunna be color sick again, are ya?" Butterscotch turned away and started to blush past his green cheeks when a loud 'thwack!' echoed into the room, followed by a whine of pain. He looked back to see AJ rubbing the back of his head while Red Gala glared daggers into him. "What was that for?" AJ whined, "I was just bein' honest!" Another 'thwack!' echoed around the room as AJ whined again. "There's a difference 'tween bein' honest and a jerk, AJ," Red Gala growled to him, "Tha's somethin' you and Blitz need ta learn." AJ grumbled under his breath at her, but kept his silence. Gala continued to glare at him before Butterscotch gave an uncharacteristic groan before leaning over the trash can. The mare's face instantly softened as she extended a hoof to him. "Ya okay, Buttah-Scotch?" she asked worriedly. The timid pegasus squeaked as he vigorously shook his head. His silly pink mane flopped about before he turned around and sat on his haunches, trying to steady his spinning head. "Carrots," he moaned pathetically, "Why is it always carrots?" As he sat there, a pile of pathetic willpower, he felt a soft hoof touch his cheek. Butterscotch instantly looked up to see Red Gala's smile less than twelve inches from his face. What happened after that has been omitted at Butterscotch's request... but I can tell you that his wings never stood up like that before. After the most embarrassing, most inappropriate and most hilarious wingboner ever, the lights dimmed as the talent show started. The rumble of the crowd quieted to a hush as the cranberry schoolteacher stepped out from behind the curtain. "Fillies and gentlecolts!" Cherry Lee shouted proudly to the crowd, "It gives me great pleasure to see you all here tonight! We have a great show planned for you, so we would like to kick things off with..." Cherry Lee closed his eyes, wishing he didn't have to say the actual name. "... the Coolie Mark Commodores!" The teacher trotted off to the side as the curtains opened, revealing three small figures draped in all black. The creepy sound of silence filled the air as they did nothing, making some in the crowd uneasy. AJ smiled wryly at the scene before saying, "Isn't that the club Applebutter made up?" Without warning, one of the colts let out a huge scream, tossing off his cloak to reveal the most obnoxious costume ever. Silver Bells was decked out from head to hoof in a sparkling green leotard covered with bright pink slashes, his mane was in a mohawk of disturbingly long spikes and his eyes had pink starbursts around them. Behind him, the other two shed their cloaks as well. Applebutter wore an almost all black outfit with a matching black bandanna instead of his trademark red one. The sleeves around his hooves had a fire pattern rising up from the bottoms and his bandanna had little dragon skulls peppered all over it. Skater Roo, however, wore a dark purple unitard with sky blue and hot pink stripes all over it. His mane was styled similar to Silver Bells, but it was swept back like hedgehog spikes. I swear, every single set of eyes in the crowd were as wide as dinner plates. "Ah think that rotten apple is coming back ta haunt me," AJ whispered over to Gala. "KICK IT!" Silver Bells screamed as Applebutter pulled a boombox out of nowhere. Once his hoof made contact with the Play button, an eerie and obnoxiously loud song started to fill the air. Several ponies too close to the stage had to cover their ears, but that didn't deter the young colts onstage. They each thrashed around to the song, looking a little like they were dancing, before Silver Bells started singing. "Load up on corn, bring your friends! It's fun to lose and to pretend He's so darn bored and self concerned Oh no, I know he heard me." Applebutter and Skater Roo started to chant as Silver Bells finished. "Hello, hello, hello, how do? Hello, hello, hello, how do? Hello, hello, hello, how do? Hello, hello, hello!" At this point, many in the crowd were trying to shield their ears from the piercing noise, but they were unsuccessful for the most part because all three of the colts started shouting together. "With the night out, it's more dangerous! Here we are now, CMC-er's! And we don't know what we're yelling! But here we are now, the Commodores!" Butterscotch, who was already pretty horrified from his gigantic wingboner, felt the taste of carrots in his mouth as he spun to the trash can. Applebutter sighed impatiently as he pushed a broom to sweep up the mess. While he had the time of his young life, he and his friends apparently destroyed the entire stage. Props from other random things were strewn about the place, many in pieces. He looked over to see Silver Bells trying to pull a lyre out from the speaker on the boombox while Skater Roo stacked cardboard trees in a pile on the side of the stage. While the three colts had thought they had given the best performance ever, it was obvious they had lost the talent show. According to their teacher, they had come in eighth place on the ballots. It seemed a little odd to Applebutter that they did that bad, especially since there were only six entrants in the talent show including themselves, but he wasn't very good at what his brother called 'dem fancy mathamaticks', so he didn't argue the results. Outside, Butterscotch stood uncomfortably close to Red Gala, and by uncomfortably close, I mean beside her. The two were waiting for Applebutter to come out of the theater, but it didn't seem like that was happening any time soon. "So, uh," Butterscotch started lamely, "That was, er, quite the... uh, show..." Red Gala nodded her head. "Eeyup." Butterscotch rubbed the back of his head before trying to speak again. "Um, you know, I was thinking," he started slowly, causing Red Gala to turn to him, "If, if you don't w-want to come over... tomorrow, you don't, uh, have to." Gala just smiled at him and turned to face the theater. "Ah gave ya my word, Buttah-Scotch. I'll be there tamarrah."