//------------------------------//
// How I earned the name Skyla 
// Story: Rebellious Alicorn Teenager Shenanigans 
// by Masterweaver 
//------------------------------//

	Do you know how freakin' weird it is to be a fifteen-year-old blank flank? Yeah, now add the constant stress of being a princess on top of that, and the fact that you're named after that one time you nearly doomed your home country when you were less then a week old, and you might begin to see why I was so pissed on my fifteenth birthday.

It really didn't help that Pinkie had sent her weird sister to throw my party instead of coming herself like she usually did. I mean, Pinkie's one of those few ponies that has never been on my shitlist. Even when I actively try to get angry at her, she... like, totally diffused the whole thing with a well placed comment or a little confusion. I think she's secretly smarter than Aunt Twi or any of her scholars, but just thinks in this crazy sideways way. The point is, I like Pinkie. I like her throwing my birthday parties. And I know that I couldn't really blame her for having to deal with... whatever the latest emergency was. Something involving lava demons, I think.

But Pinkie's sisters... well, there's the quiet one, the loud one, and the weird one. The quiet one I'm kinda meh about--I don't hate her, or like her, she's kinda just there when she's there. I mean I'll try not to upset her or anything, because she can pull off this major sadface, but I'm not going to go out of my way to please her. And the loud one? Yeah, we yell at each other. Like a lot. But she gets me, you know? She lets me be something other than 'oh so perfect' Flurry Heart. I hate her, don't get me wrong, but... it's like that friendly sort of hate, you know, where you throw crystals at each other but the moment an actual dragon shows up you gang up on it? Yeah.

And then there's the WEIRD one. Maud. And I mean she's just so WEIRD. She EATS ROCKS. I mean they all do, but she does it REGULARLY. And she's like.... you look at a pony and you can tell if they're happy or sad and Maud doesn't DO that, you know? I have never seen a pony as grey as her. And I don't mean just her coat. You know, I'm actually not sure if she can go crystal? I mean Pinkie says she can, but I've never seen it. Maybe she becomes obsidian when the heart pulses or something. Nah, not obsidian... too fragile. Maybe she just becomes a literal rock.

So, she's weird and unemotional and here she was, on my fifteenth birthday, following Pinkie's checklist to the letter. Heck, she even said "Wheeeee" in that strange, flat tone of hers when she fired the party cannon. It was... weird. I mean, mentally I knew Pinkie couldn't be here, and mentally I knew that Pinkie trusted Maud to throw the party as best she could. But... Look, Pinkie Pie, her pinkness sort of suffuses the area, and the same is true with Maud's... greyness. It's just... mmmmnnnnrgh.

And that was on top of my lack of cutie mark, and having to memorize three books on Yak culture for a test the next week, and oh guess what dear old mumsy had assigned me extra guards cause of the lava demons which meant I was extra watched. And they weren't even some of dad's old partners, the kind of guards that I could joke around with. These were one-hundred-percent CRYSTAL PONES, stern law-abiding stallions who wouldn't even let me have an extra-large piece of cake because it was 'uncouth' and I was a 'princess--'

Sometimes I wish I'd been born an earth pony. They get the best deal.

Anyway, so I was basically having a really bad day. And as much as I wanted to enjoy the party, it was just... you know that feeling, where you think everypony's just going through the motions? Yeah. But at least I had a few friends at the party, cause, you know, friends.

Like Panther. Oh Celestia, Panther is THE BEST. See, he was actually conceived on the day of my crystalling, apparently I nearly zapped the head off his mom and she went from a mild-mannered maid to a 'screw it you only live once' pony in ten seconds flat. And that mindset was something that Panther took to heart. Gosh, I love Panther.

Platonically.

We're like brother and sister, kay?

Anyway, so during the middle of the party Panther notices I'm pretty down. So he walks up and he says "Yo, Zapper, you wanna ditch this whole shindig?"

And you know, that actually got me to thinking. Cause, you know, I'd been taught all my life that a princess has a 'responsibility' to appear at her own events and ensure that everyone was doing well, but looking out at the crowd I realized that I only knew, like, six or seven of them, and most of them were actually mom and dad's friends. And I was like 'wait, this isn't my birthday party, this is a party on my birthday!' And I really didn't like that.

So I said, "You know what, I do."

And Panther gets this big grin on his rhodonite face. "Give me ten minutes, then tell your guards to take you to the nearest working bathroom." And he walks off and out the door.

So I sort of do the princess party thing after that, you know, talking to people, trying to dance, getting some punch, and all the while I keep an eye on the clock. And I thought I was being subtle, but apparently I wasn't? Whatever. Anyway, after a while I sort of apologize and walk up to my guards and I'm like 'Guys, I need to go to the bathroom, just real quick, kay?'

And they're like 'Very well, let us escort you' and I'm all 'sure it's your job guys' and so we start walking down the hall, except the closest bathroom is out of order (cause Panther backed up the toilets) and then the next closest, and the next one, and the guards are getting a little suspicious so I say 'maybe there's some sort of plumbing problem, but there's got to be at least one bathroom that works, right?' and just like that we come to the only bathroom on the floor that isn't out of order.

Guess what? This bathroom has a window.

Guess what else? None of my guards have wings.

Guess what I do next? No, go on, guess, REALLY.

So I'm gliding out of the castle, and I see Panther wave at me and enter this alleyway, so I glide down to him and I say "Wow, you backed up twelve bathrooms just for me?"

"Only the finest shit for you my dear."

And we crack up laughing. No, what he really did, see, was drop actual bricks in the bowls. Like actual construction bricks, you know? Don't know where he got them, don't actually care.

Anyway, so then he's like "Why don't we go to a real party? You'd have to disguise yourself, obviously, but I can deal with that." And he pulls out this coat dye and dunks it on me, and then he sticks these gold streamers over my highlights and I'm sputtering and he's laughing his tail off--really, it is kind of funny looking back on it but I was thinking 'oh sweet Celestia I look so guady I'm gonna kill him'.

But he calms me down enough that I'm willing to follow him downtown, to this place called, get this, the Shatterpoint. I know, right? It's a club, and when I walk in the noise is just amazing. And Panther even knows the bouncer, he's like 'Uncle Stonewall!' and the bouncer frowns at him, but Panther has reservations so he gets us both in, and wow.

Okay, so, there's this dance floor, and this bar, and the whole... shindig, you know? Now, I just wanted to have some fun, okay, so I did some dancing, and then I ordered some cocktails, and the bartender is like 'wait are you old enough for this' and for ONCE I'm glad for my princess lessons because I start rattling off all these details on booze and he's like 'okay, you must be a regular, but you just look so young,' and I roll with it and say it's my natural charm.

Yeah, I got shitface drunk. What, you expected something different?

Anyway, so I get back on the dancefloor and I'm just singing along with the music and, you know, my voice is freaking AMAZING. Don't let anypony tell you different. These pipes shattered the crystal heart on day three, and I've only learned to use them even better. I just get into singing and dancing so much that the DJ waves her hooves like 'Holy shit, you're awesome' and I'm like "Bet I'm more awesome than you" and she's points at me like 'Yeah? Think you can DJ this club?'

And Panther laughs and he's goading me on and I say "Yeah, I think I can!"

So like the drunken idiot I was I take the stage behind the turntables and the DJ's off to the side silently laughing her tail off. Cause, seriously, here's this untrained teenage drunk, trying to take on one of the most important clubs in Equestria. But I just grin and start grinding out this seriously righteous beat, and sing along with it, and the crowd goes nuts. And the DJ nods along like 'Hey, that's not actually bad,' and I get it in my head to do a little lightshow with the song and the crowd goes even MORE wild and everyone's enjoying themselves...

...right up until the pegasus guards fly in and tell them that the entire club is hovering twenty feet off the ground.

Yeeeeeah, sometimes I don't have the best control of my magic.

Lucky enough I was able to set it down mostly in one piece, and the guards sort of dragged me back to the palace--but the whole club is following along, singing my praises, and part of the chant, right, is "best singer in the sky, la la!" and I'm like, "Thank you! Thank you!" And then when we get to the palace Panther screams "Princess Sky-Lala is in the house!" and the crowd just takes it and runs with it and the last thing I hear as I'm escorted in is this huge chant of "SKY-LA! SKY-LA! SKY-LA!"

And then I turn around and I see Maud, and mumsy, and daddikins, and they're all frowning at me.

And I'm still kinda drunk, so I stick up my hoof and say "BEST FIFTEENTH EVER!"

So that's how I got the name Skyla.