Scootaloo Will Fly!

by MyHobby


Gimme About Ten Years

On a green hill in Ponyville’s park, Scootaloo spread her wings. She looked at them with her lips pressed together. She tilted the tips and watched the feathers wave in the cool breeze.

They were longer, just a bit. They were wider, too. They felt heavy when she folded them against her back, but when extended, they almost seemed to carry their own weight.

Not to mention they were purple. Not the same purple as her mane, either. They were lighter, like Twilight Sparkle’s coat. They were different. They were strange. They were new.

It had been a long summer, but they had finally found a donor: A mare from Los Pegasus who had lived in pain for quite some time. When her body finally failed, when her last minutes were upon her, she signed over her wings to a newly-founded wing-donor program with a smile. Her blood type matched Scootaloo’s and her body structure was roughly the same, so arrangements were made to ship them to Ponyville.

(1): It did not escape the doctors that such a spell would revolutionize surgery overnight. Several unicorn mages, including Twilight Sparkle, approached Discord for the secret to the process. He taught them what he could using his own chaos magic. Even now, former students from Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns work to unravel the secrets of the spell, and how to cast it using safer magic methods.

They had arrived earlier that day. Scootaloo went to Ponyville General, where Discord made the switch (1). They had asked to keep her wings to study the fairy string deformations. She figured that was fine. She wasn’t going to need them.

At the bottom of the hill, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle waved. Discord sat behind them, holding a bag of popcorn. He popped a kernel into his mouth and gave her a thumbs-up. Scootaloo gave them a slight, nervous smile.

She shuffled her hooves in the long grass. A wingtip touched her shoulder. She turned to press her nose against Rumble’s. He backed away to give Rainbow Dash room to land beside them. Rainbow raised an eyebrow, and Scootaloo gave her a nod.

Rainbow Dash spread her wings and made one slow, precise flap. Scootaloo mirrored her feather for feather, but she didn’t put any magic into it. They stood face-to-face, practicing flap after flap, growing quicker with each pass. Rainbow held her wings straight out and took a deep breath in.

Scootaloo sucked in air and jumped. Her first flap knocked her sideways. She continued to hold her breath as her wings flapped haphazardly, sending her in a zigzagging path towards the ground. Rumble’s strong forelegs wrapped around her middle, halting her downward spiral. Breath wheezed out of her mouth.

She glared at Rumble, who just shrugged with a smug smile. She flapped her wings at a steady pace and pried his hooves off of her. Once she got her rhythm down, she chanced a look at the ground.

She was ten meters up, maybe more. And she was staying. She wasn’t falling back to earth. She wasn’t standing on a cloud. She was hovering.

Rainbow Dash whistled from up above. She waited on a cumulous cloud a bit further up. Scootaloo flapped harder, but started to wobble again. Rumble steadied her with a hoof.

He backed away, brought his wings up, and thrust down with a burst of invisible magic. He shot upward.

Scootaloo stuck her tongue out of the side of her mouth. She brought her wings up and, before she could start falling, brought them down through the air. She zipped upward, bursting through the bottom of the cloud and getting stuck halfway through the next.

Apple Bloom’s laughter drifted up first, followed by Rainbow Dash’s and Rumble’s. Scootaloo tried to wriggle backwards out of the cloud, but only succeeded in bunching her wings around her head. She settled for tearing the cloud apart with an unladylike snort of laughter.

She flopped beside Rainbow Dash, who held a hoof to her mouth to hide a huge smile. Scootaloo stood, brushed herself off, and ignored the continued suppressed giggles.

Rainbow Dash fell off the side of the cloud, catching the wind and soaring over to another cloud carefully positioned a short distance away. She waved Scootaloo over.

Scootaloo took a running leap. She spread her wings in an attempt to glide to the next cloud. Halfway across, it became obvious she was losing too much altitude. She flapped her wings in shaky, stuttering beats, which knocked herself off-balance again.

Rumble pushed her up from beneath, carrying her the last couple of meters. She gripped the side of the cloud and used Rumble’s head as a stepstool. She blew a raspberry and pranced to the other side. He grinned and raised the cloud for her return trip.

She practiced gliding for a half an hour, after which she performed basic wingups. Her original wings had been thoroughly exercised, these had not. She finished up by fine-toning her hover until she could maintain altitude, go up, and go down, all without going splat.

She touched down on the hill and slumped to her knees. She breathed heavily, her smile never leaving her face. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle gathered her up in a group hug, and the three friends laughed loud and long.

Discord rolled around on Scootaloo’s scooter, popping wheelies and popcorn simultaneously. She cleared her throat. He stopped, gave her a sheepish grin, and kicked the scooter towards her. She spun it around and stopped it beneath her rear-right hoof.

Apple Bloom secured the new, improved Scootsmobile wagon to the scooter while Scootaloo fastened her helmet’s buckle. Bloom gave her a wink as she and Sweetie climbed aboard.

Scootaloo spread her wings, and she was off. Sweetie squealed first with fright and then with laughter as they picked up speed. Rainbow Dash and Rumble followed overhead, while Discord kept the pace with an outlandishly-light jog.

She slowed to a safer speed once they reached downtown. Friends and acquaintances called out salutations as they passed. Quite a few gave Scootaloo a double-take when they noticed the color of her wings. Scootaloo just returned the gesture with a toothy smile.

She parked the wagon next to Sugarcube Corner. She was still pulling off her helmet when she was tackled with tiny hooves and peppered with questions. Pound, Pumpkin, and Patty Cake all wanted to know where the wings had come from, what she’d done with the old ones, and whether she was gonna be a Wonderbolt now. Rice Cake cooed from his seat on Pumpkin’s back.

Scootaloo took a peek at her big sister. “Maybe. Gimme about ten years and we’ll see.”

Sugarcube Corner was bustling. Muffins and cupcakes jumped off the shelves. Ice cream and root beer flowed. Pinkie Pie was a blur of motion taking down orders and delivering baked goods. Carrot Cake threw ingredients together in a skilled melee, while Cup manned the cash register like a dragon gathering its hoard.

Most tables were built for two or three, so the group of friends pushed two together. Pinkie gave a crushing hug to Rainbow Dash and Discord, and followed up with smaller—though no less warm—hugs for everypony else. She took their orders as they gave them, even though she already knew their favorites. She left with a whoosh of air.

Her note fluttered down abandoned, a red “rejected” stamped on one side. Scootaloo guffawed when she realized Pinkie was printing cake orders on the back of bills from the City Council meeting.

They parted ways a while later, though Rumble refused to leave without a goodbye kiss. Not that Scootaloo was complaining. Apple Bloom hitched up the Scootsmobile to her back and returned it to Sweet Apple Acres. Sweetie Belle retired early to practice. Rumble wobbled his way home, his heart light. Discord vanished into thin air, leaving enough bits behind to pay for the treat.

Rainbow Dash gave Scootaloo a hug. She held it for a long moment. When she broke it off, she kept her face turned away, mumbled a goodbye, and flew towards her cloudhouse. Scootaloo touched her shoulder to find it damp. She gave Rainbow a lopsided smile and climbed onto her scooter.

It was a quick scoot to Quills and Sofas, as usual. Her parents were waiting just inside the door. They also had questions. Had she flown? Had it been as amazing as she’d imagined? Was she going to fly again soon? Was Rainbow Dash a good teacher?

The answer to all of them was a resounding “yes!”

They sat together on the softest couch in the showroom, one that for some odd reason or another never seemed to sell. Scootaloo regaled Davenport and Roseluck with her stories of derring-do, of her near misses and triumphant victories. Accomplished with a little help from Rumble and Rainbow, of course. In the end, she wrapped her wings around her parents, drawing them together in a snuggle.

Scootaloo closed her eyes and grinned the cheesiest grin of her entire life.

“Yeah, I can fly.”