I thought my life would change with Rumble. I really did. With my idol living her dream, I decided that it was time to make a dream or two for myself. They all involved him. And because of him, those dreams were shattered. That jerk of a Stallion. He told me he liked me, he was so sweet. I wasn't one for romance, but he wooed me all the same. Rumble, that jerk! I thought I loved him, but now I hate him.
I came to the top of a hill overlooking Ponyville in the hopes that nopony would see me. Such humiliation needed solitude to heal. That was common knowledge to every pony; Stallion or Mare. Heartbreak required time alone to heal. And I was alone, I would always be alone. I would have friends, family, but I would still be alone. Always, always alone.
"Well, well. Lookie who we have here?" a voice pierced the silence. My eyes widened in horror. No, anypony but them?! Of all the horrid, despicable ponies in the world, the two ponies behind me were the worst of the worst. I knew there were two because wherever one was, the other was never far behind. "If it isn't the loser who can't keep a guy?" the same voice said. I didn't turn to look at them. They hadn't earned the right for me to face them. I couldn't even consider them equal to me. However broken it was, I still had a heart. Those two, didn't.
"It's sad, really; even after you finally learned how to fly, it wasn't enough for him, was it?" the second voice said. This must have been so entertaining for them. The second one rarely spoke beyond echoing her friend's words. It took me a moment to register what she'd said, and it hurt like nothing else. Because I'd been thinking the same thing. What's more, I'd been thinking that it was because I couldn't fly before that he went out with me in the first place. Which made me question why. Was it pitty? A feeling of superiority? Or was it merely the fact that he enjoyed dating those who lived vicariously through him?; those who were born to do the things he could do, but for whatever reason couldn't do them?
I kept my voice from breaking, but I couldn't stop the tears any more than I could stop my body from shuddering. If I had to choose between the two, I would have chosen to stop the latter. If they'd heard me cry, their verbal torture would have ended much sooner, but my resistance egged them on. And having seen my body convulse gave them a second wind.
"I wonder if he even liked you to begin with? Perhaps he lost a bet to his friends and dating you was the punishment." the first voice said, her mirth barely hidden in the words. Both tittered with absolute delight at having known they'd broken through me. I felt cold, my legs like jelly. I wanted to just give up on pride and scream into the air, regardless of their presence. But more than that, I wanted to take a step forward. It would be so easy. Just escape them by stepping off the ledge. Only instead of spreading my wings to fly, I just fall. It was high enough, the ground was hard enough, my bones were frail enough. And I could angle myself just right to escape the injuries.
As I thought it over, I saw myself begin to move. My hoof lifted up from the ground and I could see it inching forward. How tempting it was to just let it happen; I wanted to let it. What was left for me? Rumble had been the only pony who'd ever expressed any interest in me as a mare, everypony else either wanted to be my friend or a passing acquaintance. I was sick of friends, or rather, I was sick of the friends I had. They'd all moved on and simply kept in touch. As for the original Cutie Mark Crusaders, the argument over Rumble had broken us apart. A stupid argument over who he liked. As far as I was concerned now, they could have him. There's nothing left for me in this world.
It was at the moment I decided to give up that something caused me to stop. I felt a chill run down my spine into my hooves. Something invisible had grabbed me by the heart. Or was it by the soul? It glued me to the edge, preventing me from taking that final step. I felt as though whatever had stopped me may very well have been one final chance at any kind of life.
"W-who are you?!" I heard one of the girls demand of an unknown party that had seen fit to intrude on this unintended suicide. I was compelled to turn around. Who I saw made my blood run cold.
It had been five years since anypony had seen him. That pony had disappeared off the face of Equestria, and nopony realised until it was too late. Him, the pony whom Princess Luna searched for herself. She'd scoured the entirety of Ponyville and even searched the depths of the Everfree Forest. Him, the little colt that nopony could be mad at, at least not for long. Him, Pipsqueak; the young colt who wanted desperately to be a Pirate. He was standing right before all of us, and I was the only one who recognised him. But something was very wrong about him. What I felt promised a new life, what I saw promised just the opposite. His eyes were like that of a Gryphons, and as he looked at me, they held a power the likes of which I'd never experienced before.
"I'm not all that surprised to discover that you two don't recognize me. You never really payed any attention to the things beyond your own noses." Pipsqueak said, closing the distance between himself and the two mares who had nearly coaxed me over the edge. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon! How I hated them. Their voices tortured me, but their faces brought about a rage the likes I'd never known. Those two had tormented me and my friends throughout school.
"How dare you! Who do you think you're talking to?" Diamond Tiara demanded.
"You tell me. Who do you think I am talking to?" he asked, getting into the fairy floss coloured mare's face. She drew back, only to get a little distance between them, but Pipsqueak simply leaned forward and kept the same length apart throughout.
"You're speaking to two of the richest mares in all of Ponyville, in this side of Equestria!" Silver Spoon burst out, clearly infuriated by this Stallion's lack of respect.
Pipsqueak was known to Ponyville as a cheerful colt. And his laugh had always been cute in a manner, much like his voice. Even I found it to be as such. But what I heard was manic, evil, nothing like the Pipsqueak I knew. It surprised me, and ever so slightly frightened me. His laugh now was like a Stallion who had spent several years in an asylum. There was no rhyme or rhythm to each burst of mirth. In a way, it sounded more natural than any other laugh, filled with unadulterated glee. He knew something we did not.
"Of course. How could I forget?" I half expected him to claim that they were in fact wrong about being the wealthiest mares this side of Equestria, but he seemed to find joy in the fact instead. "In that case, I shouldn't have to worry about leaving you with nothing." he said. I witnessed something so rare, so inconceivable that I almost wondered if I'd imagined it. But I knew I didn't. I hoped against hope that I didn't. I saw Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon flinch. They suddenly understood Pipsqueak's intent. And I understood where he had been the past five years.
It baffles me how I never noticed the trademark Pirate sword, the bandanna under that wide brimmed hat, or the long coat around his back. All classic indicators of Pirate Captains. Pipsqueak was a Pirate, and he was on the hunt for treasure.
I tried to contain my glee at the sight before me. Pipsqueak had drawn his sword on Diamond Tiara and had used it to steal the tiara on her head away from her. Now, she was acting like a filly in a game of 'Piggy in the middle'. Only the rules were rather different. She tried to fight him for her tiara, but Pipsqueak was too quick to dodge and Diamond was too slow to throw a punch. She believed she'd gained the upper hoof when Silver Spoon went to help her, but Pipsqueak managed to dodge both as though he'd been seamlessly doing it from the beginning. Focusing on him, I saw that he was practically dancing around the mares. Further inspection made me realize he was dancing towards me.
Before I knew it, He'd grabbed me by the barrel and we were pressed against each other, standing on our hind legs. I couldn't help but blush as this pony, once smaller than I loomed over me with a cocky grin and mesmerizing eyes. "Let's fly, Scootaloo." he said. His voice washed over me like a cool breeze and I found myself taking flight before I knew it. I barely noticed Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon screaming at us to return with Diamond's Tiara. My mind was too busy trying to make sense of what had happened. One minute, I was ready to kill myself, to let everything just disappear, or rather move on without me. The next, I'm carrying a Pirate through the sky with stolen booty. I found the whole thing to be thrilling. It was like an eternal game of 'Keepings Off', mixed with 'Finder's Keepers'. My heart skipped a beat as the adrenaline took over and I shot towards town, hoping to find somewhere we could escape together and hide out.
"The old treehouse." he said, as if reading my mind. I grinned, having wanted to go there for a while, but being unable to given that it was on Applebloom's property. But I'd already broken the law now. Tresspassing was by far an inferior crime in comparison. It only took me a minute to get there. It might have taken Rainbow Dash a few seconds, but I wasn't her. We landed on the balcony of the treehouse. It hadn't been maintained in three years, around about the time the three of us broke apart. Still, it could hold our weight. I led Pipsqueak inside and closed the door behind him. Paranoia began to kick in as I did my best to cover the windows with the curtains and drapes that had fallen over in storms.
"Relax, Scootaloo. We weren't followed. Trust me." Pipsqueak said, removing his hat and letting it rest on a wooden box. I saw his red bandanna and the Ascot around his neck. He almost looked like an older Pipsqueak's head transplanted onto a Pirate's body. He even had a cute little goatee growing on the end of his chin. He looked nothing like Rumble, but in my opinion, that was a good thing.
"It's been a while, Pipsqueak." I addressed him, trying to sound somewhere between Neutral and Happy. His gentle smile turned into a smirk as he lifted his head and looked down at me.
"Five years, I'd say. And I go by Silver, now."
"Silver?"
"For my silver tounge. I can be very persuasive." I wondered if it didn't have anything to do so much with his silver tongue as it did his strange eyes. They seemed to have a power over ponies, even when the recipient wasn't looking in his direction, so long as he had his sights on them they were his. I knew those eyes were what stopped me from walking off the edge of the cliff.
"You're a Pirate." I said, more than asked.
"I am." he answered anyway, a cheeky grin now on his face; as though being a Pirate weren't something to be discouraged, but rather something to laugh about. "I seem to have missed so much. Tell me, Scootaloo; why were you going to kill yourself?" his entire demeanour changed and I felt as though those eyes I saw were all around me, judging me as though if they didn't like my answer, they'd... do something.
I hesitated. Why did he want to know? Even when he was here, we were little more than casual friends. If anything, he was closer to Applebloom than to me. But something about the way he looked at me made me want to tell him. I couldn't place it. It was like he was controlling my mind, making me want to indulge him. "I..." I began, hesitating again. He simply blinked, waiting for me to continue. "I got into a fight with Applebloom and Sweetie Belle three years ago. We broke up over an argument about who Rumble liked more. A week later, he chose me. I was so happy. A flightless Pegasus could have a life, maybe a foal. I could be a part of a functioning family, and my disability wouldn't do anything to impede that. But today, after three years of dating, Rumble broke up with me. He tried to do it quick and fast, like ripping off a band-aid, but as is sometimes the case, he got stuck half way and it hurt so much..." Tears began to fill my eyes as I replayed the still fresh memory in my head.
"...I wanted to die! My hopes and dreams were in that relationship and he took it all away from me. I hated him and it hurt like nothing else. Then, when I went to try and mend my broken heart, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon showed up and their abuse was too much. I couldn't take it anymore. I'd have decked them instead, if it weren't for the fact that they'd said the same things I'd been thinking. I wanted the pain to stop, Pip! I wanted to forget and be forgotten."
I broke down in front of him. My heart had been the first thing to go, and now, in the safety of a familiar place with a long lost friend, I felt I could fall with my heart. The feeling of those judging eyes dissipated and all I felt was his presence, watching me. I cried for a minute before he placed a hoof on my shoulder and settled himself down beside me. His body was so warm. I'd felt so cold after Rumble had broken up with me, and here was Pipsqueak; Silver. A Stallion, a Pony, a friend.