//------------------------------//
// A True, True Friend 
// Story: Canterlot's Newest Star 
// by BudCharles 
//------------------------------//

“And what’s seventy multiplied by five?” Miss Rosette asked the class.
 
“Ooh! Ooh!” Pupa called out up the back. “I know!”
 
“Yes Pupa?”
 
“Heh, this’ll be good” the tattooed colt snickered sarcastically to Scootaloo.
 
Scootaloo frowned uncomfortably and shifted her seat away slightly.
 
“Gee, what’s up with her today?” the colt mumbled to himself.
 
“T-Three hundred and fifty” Pupa finally answered, once he finished some strange method of multiplication using his leg holes.
 
“That’s right Pupa, well done!”
 
Pupa smiled proudly, while Scootaloo’s ‘friend’ stared at her indignantly. His thoughts were suddenly blasted out of his head by the bell.
 
“Lunchtime!” Pupa called out up the back of the class, jumping up and down, before bounding over to Scootaloo, toppling at least two desks on the way and causing a filly to squeal as he spilled the contents of her pencilcase.
 
Miss Rosette considered trying the ‘orderly fashion’ speech, but Pupa had already started the stampede – half the class was out the door.
 
“Scootaloo, can we hang out again, we never got t-” Pupa started.
 
A menacing look from the Pegasi sent him darting to hide under a desk.
 
“Unlikely,” a large Pegasus growled, “Scootaloo is our friend.”
 
“Yeah, he wouldn’t hang out with a dweeb like you, you’re –” the colt tried to add.
 
“Stop it!” Scootaloo interrupted, physically standing between the Pegasi and Pupa. “I talked to him the other day, and he’s way cooler than he looks. I say we should give him a chance.”
 
Pupa’s eyes brightened and his spiky ‘ears’ perked up slightly.
 
The colt rolled his eyes. “Fine, we’ll give him a chance, but only if he can prove himself.”
 
 
--✈--
 
 
“When you said prove himself, I didn’t know you meant this!” Scootaloo protested as she gazed up at the back wall of the schoolhouse.
 
The building was only three stories high, but it looked like the side of a castle, with a very unstable-looking rusted staircase zigzagging its way to the roof. At the very top was a tiny, closed window, about Pupa’s size.
 
The ground below the building was a slab of cement that looked about three millennia old. There were cracks all over it and stray rocks and thistles had turned it into what was basically a miniature Everfree Forest.
 
“Anypony who’s tough enough to be friends with the coolest ponies in the school, is tough enough to climb up to that window” one of the Pegasi argued, forcing a permanent marker into Pupa’s trembling hoof, “besides, he can just fly if he falls.”
 
“I-isn’t it against the rules to draw on school property?” Pupa tried to reason. “What if I get caught?”
 
“If you’re too wimpy to break a few rules, you’re too wimpy to be friends with us” another added.
 
“I’m scared, Scootaloo” Pupa whimpered.
 
“I’ll take his place!” Scootaloo declared, taking the marker from Pupa’s hoof, then gulping with fear almost instantly afterwards.
 
“Wait, no –” Pupa tried to plead.
 
“Is that allowed?” one of the Pegasi asked over the top of him.
 
“Quiet!” the tattooed one snapped. “Who cares? We get to see Rainbow Dash’s sister do something epic.”
 
Scootaloo took a deep breath and lifted her front hoof onto the first step.
 
It creaked a little, but stayed there.
 
She lifted a second hoof.
 
Then a third.
 
All four.
 
“Scootaloo! Scootaloo! Scootaloo!” the Pegasi started chanting.
 
Scootaloo tuned them out, and jumped up to the second step. It stayed stable.
 
Pupa covered his eyes as Scootaloo cautiously hopped her way up.
 
One story.
 
Two stories.
 
“HELP!”
 
“Scootaloo!” Pupa cried out, opening her eyes to see a step giving way below Scootaloo.
 
The filly grabbed onto the rail with one hoof, swaying back and forth with the breeze.
 
“Just fly!” the colt called out.
 
Scootaloo closed her eyes.
 
“This can’t be happening, this can’t be happening, this can’t be happening” she whispered to herself.
 
“What’s taking you so long?”
 
“I CAN’T FLY, ALRIGHT!”
 
Scootaloo nearly lost her grip, dropping the marker as she switched hooves.
 
“You lied to us!” the colt called out.
 
“If it makes you feel better,” Pupa offered, “I lied about having friends!”
 
 “I had to! I wanted to be cool! I wanted somepony to like me!” Scootaloo called back, missing Pupa’s comment entirely.
 
“Well you’re not cool, you’re mega uncool! I bet Rainbow Dash is ashamed of you!” the colt called back.
 
Tears began to fill Scootaloo’s eyes. “That’s not true. Rainbow Dash thinks I’m the coolest! Sh-she said so!”
 
“Whatever! We’re outta here! You two losers play tea party or whatever you like to do!”
 
Scootaloo held on to the rail with both hooves, as tightly as she could, and cried.
 
What if they were right? What if Rainbow Dash was just pretending to like her? What if she was totally lame?
 
Her hooves began slipping.
 
She closed her eyes tighter. This was it. Nopony was going to save her.
 
She felt a cold, hard hoof tap her gently on the back – and heard a faint buzzing sound behind her.
 
Scootaloo smiled. No pony was going to save her.
 
“Pupa!”
 
She let go of the rail and threw her arms around her friend.
 
Suddenly, they both began falling.
 
“You’re too heavy!” Pupa gasped.
 
“Let go! Let go! I’m not worth –”
 
Scootaloo was interrupted by a bright green flash, before finding herself riding… Rainbow Dash?
 
“Rainbow Dash!” Scootaloo called out. “How’d you know we needed you?”
 
“Nah, still Pupa”, ‘Rainbow Dash’s raspy voice answered, “changeling, remember?”
 
Scootaloo’s ears perked up with excitement. “Whoa! That’s so cool! Who else can you be?”
 
Pupa transformed into a purple alicorn, and pretended to spin out of control. “Twilight Sparkle, for a start.”
 
Scootaloo giggled hysterically.
 
Another green flash, and Scootaloo found herself riding a small dragon.
 
“That’s so cool!”
 
“Rawr,” Pupa replied, gaining more giggles from Scootaloo.
 
The young changeling smiled, flashing back to his own form as the two of them safely touched down.
 
Scootaloo hugged Pupa a second time, almost tight enough to squish him out of his exoskeleton. “Thanks.”
 
“Let go” Pupa gasped.
 
“Woops, too tight?” Scootaloo giggles as she released Pupa.
 
“No, you just gave me way too much love at once, now I don’t feel too good.”
 
“Oh right, that. Woops.”
 
“It’s okay,” Pupa giggled, his eyes reaching maximum levels of sparkle, “it was the best love I’ve tasted in ages!”
 
Scootaloo found herself clutching her chest a second time.
 
Pupa raced to Scootaloo’s side. “Are you okay, did I do something?”
 
“No no, it’s just, I was up high for too long… or something” Scootaloo answered, breathing a sigh of relief as her heart slowed to its normal pace.
 
“Okay.”
 
“Hey, uh… about yesterday,” Scootaloo started, “I’m really sorry. I shouldn’t have left you like that. It was actually uncool.”
 
Pupa gave him a puzzled expression. “I don’t remember you doing anything wrong.”
 
“Well, I said I was gonna hang out with you… and then I didn’t. That was a really low thing to do.”
 
“So you’re sorry for not doing something?”
 
“I guess you could put it that way.”
 
“You ponies are weird!” Pupa giggled.
 
“Says mister bird vomit” Scootaloo giggled back.
 
“Hey, you just gave me ‘bird vomit’ a few minutes ago.”
 
Scootaloo’s face went a little pale. “Eww.”
 
“So… you still wanna show me your scooter?”
 
“Do I ever!”
 
Pupa’s eyes lit up as Scootaloo lifted her front hoof.
 
“Remember our hoofshake?”
 
Pupa nodded and tapped Scootaloo’s hoof, then the other, then both.
 
Then… the end of lunch bell sounded.
 
Scootaloo sighed. “I’ll show you tomorrow. Actually tomorrow.”
 
Pupa nodded. “See you then!”