“All right, are you ready, AB?” shouted Scootaloo, cupping a hoof over her mouth as she shouted down at her two friends. “I’m itchin’ to do this.”
Apple Bloom brought down the hammer on a wide nail, driving it the final few centimeters into the rickety wood ramp. Spitting the hammer out, she looked up at Scootaloo and nodded. “Yep, s’ready as it’s ever gon’ be… I think.” She gave the ramp an exploratory kick. It shook a bit, but didn’t fall. “I’unno, but it seems steady enough. You probably won’t die horribly, but I ain’t makin’ any guarantees. AJ always said to never make promises ya can’t keep.”
“Yeah, whatever, as long as it holds for at least one jump, I’m calling it a success,” said Scootaloo, waving her hoof dismissively. “All I need to do is break the Ponyville jump record once, and then my name will go down in history as the greatest jumper to ever live.”
“I mean…” Apple Bloom scratched the back of her head with a screwdriver. “If ya’ll wanna call it ‘history’, then whatever, but really you’re just gettin’ your name scratched into the inside of the tube at the playground.”
Scootaloo puffed out her chest proudly. “That’s good enough for me!”
Apple Bloom shrugged. “Whatever you say, Scoots.”
“All right, Sweets,” said Scootaloo, turning her gaze to the napping filly in the adirondack chair. “You ready to start the countdown?”
Stirring from her nap, Sweetie Belle yawned. “Sure, whatever.”
“Sweet…” Scootaloo tightened the straps on her helmet, pulled her goggles down, and then gave a confident smirk. “Let’s wreck this sh—”
Before Scootaloo could finish, the ramp completely caved in on itself in a spectacularly flashy crash that left the squished between two planks of wood, with nails impaling her on every side. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle stood in silence for a moment, then glanced at each other.
Sweetie Belle sighed, rolling out of the chair and stretching out her hooves. “Welp, I guess we better go get her, huh?”
“Guess so,” replied Apple Bloom.
The fillies turned away, leaving Scootaloo’s limp body amidst the pile of rubble. As they walked down the street, towards the edge of town, Apple Bloom frowned. “Hey, do you ever think about how little we care that Scootaloo dies a bunch? I mean, don’t it seem kinda weird? Did we just get used to it at some point? Is it something we should get used to? No matter how you look at, our friend’s still dyin’, so maybe we should care more.”
Sweetie Belle stopped, putting her hoof on Apple Bloom’s shoulder. “Apple Bloom, there are a lot of things in this world that don’t make sense, and Scootaloo’s apparent immortality is one of those things. You can’t read too much into this stuff, y’know? You’ll drive yourself crazy thinking about it. Scootaloo dies a bunch, and that’s that. If you start assigning meaning to it… you’re gonna have a bad time.”
“I guess,” said Apple Bloom, kicking at the dirt. “Still though, maybe we should do more to help her?”
“Help her how?” shot back Sweetie, raising her eyebrow. “What do you think you could do to help Scootaloo? Clearly the universe wants her dead, but something else wants her alive, so she’s stuck in an endless loop… or something. I really have no idea. Either way, what does it matter?”
“It does matter, doesn’t it?” said Apple Bloom, unsure of the answer herself.
“Look, until Scootaloo says that she wants help trying to solve this mess—if that’s even possible—there’s no point in trying figure it out, so don’t bother.” Sweetie Belle took her hooves off Apple Bloom’s shoulder and started walking again. “For now, all we can do is keep on living our lives as normally as we can. Scootaloo seems content enough as it is, so there’s no need to go changing the status quo.”
“So, what? We jus’ leave things how they are? We go on lettin’ Scootaloo die over and over again?”
Sweetie Belle shrugged. “Yep.”
Pursing her lips, Apple Bloom hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Well, all righty then. In that case, let’s go get Scoota—”
“Whoo hoo hoo!” cried a familiar voice, interrupting Apple Bloom. The house next to them exploded into a shower of splinters as a massive three-headed dog burst through it, with Scootaloo riding on its back. She was holding on to its collar with one hoof, and waving the other in the air wildly. “Whoa ho ho there, Cerby. Don’t kill my friends too, heh.” Scootaloo fluttered her wings and hopped off the giant dog, landing next to Sweetie and AB. “Sup guys, Cerberus here decided to give me a ride back this time so I wouldn’t have to walk. It’s a heck of a long way to Tartarus, y’know?”
“We know,” said Sweetie Belle, chuckling. “It’s not like we’ve never picked you up.”
Suddenly, a second familiar voice appeared. “Cerberus? He’s supposed to be guarding the gates of Tartarus! This must be the disaster!”
“Is that Twilight?” asked Apple Bloom.
“Sounds like it,” replied Sweetie Belle.
“The only disaster here is that I didn’t get my goodbye kiss from Cerberus,” said Scootaloo sadly. She watched as Twilight led the massive dog away from the town and back towards Tartarus. “I really love that guy. Nicest dog you’ll ever meet.” She paused a moment. “Three heads are a bit off putting, I’ll admit. Cool guy though.”
“Hey, Scootaloo,” said Sweetie Belle. Scootaloo turned around, and Sweetie smiled. “You know we love you, right?”
Laughing, Scootaloo wrapped her hooves around Sweetie and AB, pulling them into a tight hug. “‘Course I know that. I love you guys, too.”