Beats of Life

by NightsongWrites

Chapter 10- From the Mouths of Fillies

Sweetie Belle sighed heavily as she trotted down the path to Sweet Apple Acres, head bowed in deep thought. It had been a rough week for the teenage mare. With the return of Rainbow Dash from slavery, Scootaloo had been practically inseparable from her idol. Which definitely not a bad thing! Her ears flattened in shame at the thought. Of course it wasn’t a bad thing. Rainbow Dash had practically been her marefriend’s big sister for years, coaching and watching over her. Heck, her supposed “death” had sent Scootaloo into a depression that had taken Sweetie Belle a… lot of work to drag her out of. Work and love.

A smile tugged at the corners of her muzzle. Love. Three months ago, Sweetie Belle wouldn’t have given love a second thought. School was far too important, and working on her singing voice… Rarity thought she should work at it, and if Rarity thought it was a good idea (and it didn’t involve fashion), weeeelll… But when Scootaloo had started to drop into depression, the feelings had started to hit. Every glance at her orange friend, just to see hopeless eyes; every meeting that didn’t start because Scootaloo didn’t show up… Sweetie closed her eyes at the last memory as it clawed its way forward.

A thunderstorm, one of the powerful ones scheduled by the Weather Team to water the entire town in one night. Rushing to Scootaloo’s house, only to find the door ajar, her parents off on a vacation. Scootaloo’s room empty of all our her clothes, and her scooter. Following her scooter tracks hadn’t been hard, due to all the mud, but Sweetie Belle wasn’t an athlete like her friends. By the time she had followed the tracks to their terminus, Sweetie Belle had been panting heavily, practically dead on her hooves. Till she had seen Scootaloo.

In the dark and the rain, Scootaloo had slammed hard into a jutting tree root, flinging her and her scooter over the side of the path and down a rocky hill, leaving her bloodied and sporting a broken leg. Getting her home had taken a miracle of its own: her levitation magic spiking just enough to drag Scootaloo back up the hill, then carting her home on her back. At the time, Sweetie Belle was fairly certain it was rage that was giving her the strength. After that night, Sweetie Belle knew the true reason: it had been love.

It had been love that let them get home. Been love that had given Sweetie Belle the strength to confront Scootaloo about her actions. It had been love that had uncovered their feelings for each other: just a simple kiss, a small, tiny thing… that had started something beautiful. And now… just maybe she was-

Sweetie’s ears suddenly perked. Floating along the apple-scented breeze of the Acres was… music. Piano, if Sweetie trusted her ears- which she did, more than anything or anypony. Hesitating a few, thoughtful moments, the little unicorn turned off the path, ears twitching in time with each dulcet note. Whoever was playing was skilled, but… hesitant. The tone was almost scared of being heard, and Sweetie Belle blushed as she found herself wanting the tempo to pick up, to give some beat and vibrancy to the calm air.

To Sweetie Belle’s surprise, the sound was coming from Fiddlestick’s cabin. Her expression brightened considerably. Had Applebloom’s cousin stopped by for another visit? The last time she had stopped by, she and Sweetie Belle had hit it off quite well, with the violin-playing pony giving the filly a few pointers on music, all the while describing her trips around the whole of Equestria. But… she hadn’t known that Fiddlesticks played the piano too. Glancing around, the filly spotted the open window along the left wall and smiled widely, darting over to peek in eagerly and discover the source of the music. It… definitely wasn’t Fiddlesticks.
A small white unicorn, larger than Sweetie Belle but definitely smaller than Rarity, was seated in front of a large keyboard… thingy, covered in flashing lights and dials that rested just above the more traditional ebony and ivory keys. Dainty hooves gingerly worked over the controls, and from Sweetie’s angle, she could see the nervous, pensive look on the mare’s face, sweat sticking to her bright, neon blue mane. She hunched over after a moment, and the notes began to play again; at this range, Sweetie Belle could tell what was wrong: the player was far too nervous. She was letting her nerves get the best of her, playing too formally and not letting the music… take her.

Interrupting the mare would definitely be rude, Sweetie realized, biting her lip slightly, But not helping her would be tantamount to music… evil.

The mare was definitely familiar to the filly, but a name was unplaceable, just floating off in the ether of her mind, out of reach of her mental feelers. Sweetie Belle, used to spotting injuries among her friends, was quick to notice the signs of recent hurts: bruises along her flanks and sides, a large purple knot just behind one ear and, the one that made Sweetie Belle wince the most, the fading signs of a massive dark bruise around her horn, creeping past the line of her mane. Whatever accident the mare had been in had to have been terrible, and very painful. She had heard Princess Sparkle talk about a thing called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and that sometimes it made ponies act in strange ways, very much unlike themselves. Indeed, it was what Sweetie thought Scootaloo had gone through after bribing Cloudkicker to bring her up to Rainbow Dash’s torn-up house.

“C-come on, Vinyl,” the mare suddenly muttered, and it was all Sweetie Belle could do to keep from crying out in startlement, “Y-you can do this. Tavi’ll like it… c-come on, you’ve done this before…”

Again, her hooves began to work across the keys, and Sweetie Belle winced in sympathy at a flurry of inaccurate notes. She wasn’t sure why she started singing- it was quite possible that the sudden realization that she wasn’t alone would send the traumatized Vinyl into a panic, to stunned to continue along with the strange unicorn filly perched up on a windowsill. But it just felt… right. The piano faltered for a few beats as Sweetie began, her voice clear and pure as she began to sing about hope and love, a small smile spreading across her lips. It wasn’t a song she had sung before, but one that came to her heart as she went, one that captured her in the swirl and majesty of the music. And then… the piano joined… and the harmony was complete. For both musicians, and Sweetie asked Vinyl Scratch this many weeks later, the feeling was utterly euphoric and perfect, just what she had been missing.
****************

Wielding weapons was never Scootaloo’s strong suit, and not just because of her smaller size than most hopefuls for the Aurora Guard. Her stubby wings simply did not have the wing-strength to balance a pike or glaive, and she had no magic like unicorns to wield the Aurora Guard swords. So, like Scootaloo had always done, she improvised. As she buzzed down the road on her scooter to the Training Fields, the pegasus filly double-checked her custom made horseshoes: designed by Applebloom, they fit over her hooves and were secured around her knee by leather straps. Straightening her hooves was the trigger for a pair of sharp blades to slide free, long enough to count as daggers, and able to be punched forward or sliced. Applebloom had found the project rather morbid, but for Scootaloo, it had been perfect.

Usually the Training Fields were rather empty, as the Ponyville Aurora Guard tended to be either unicorns or pegasi, who practiced in Twilight’s library and the clouds, respectively. But as Scootaloo scanned the Fields, she spotted a grey mare standing among the Group Attack Station, which had four pony constructs coming at the trainee from four different directions. The mare standing on her hind legs without a hint of pain or strain, already an impressive feat, and balanced a spear with her hooves. That… was different. Scootaloo skidded her scooter to a stop on an overlook, eyes widening as the attack began.

The constructs were created by Princess Sparkle herself; made of pure mana, they looked like purple, blank featureless versions of the creatures the trainee wished to face, and moved exactly as they could in “real life.” Oddly, this mare had decided to face unarmed pony opponents, instead of the usual minotaur or griffon opponents that alot of Guards preferred to train against. Two pegasi and two unicorn constructs shimmered lightly as they activated, and launched themselves at the unarmored mare.

“Holy buck.”

The unicorns’ horn lit with a bright purple at roughly the same time as each other, and their pegasi counterparts dived pummel the spear-wielding pony, only to slam into empty air. With a grunt the mare, using her own neck as a balance, had spun her body and the spear like a top, launching it towards the left unicorn like a dervish’s blade. The sharp metal tip of the spear deftly slammed into the unicorn’s horn, shattering the illusion with the “disabling” attack. In the same movement, she leaped off one hoof, rolling over the back of the attacking “pegasus” just in time for the other unicorn’s stun beam to strike it full in the face. Landing with no small bit of grace, the mare twisted and swung her forelegs forward, using the momentum to bring her body off the ground and side-kick the remaining unicorn directly in the horn, shattering it as she landed back on all fours. The last pegasus had recovered from its diving miss, cork-screwing through the air to launch itself at the mare.

To this day, few ponies believe Scootaloo when she says that a mare, unarmored, turned and bucked the construct clear across the Training Fields, taking out a hundred year old oak tree in the process.
“Holy… buck.”

Author's Note:

Just a little slice of life on this one, but Vinyl is making friends! Yay!

Comments

[Kenshinryuu]

I like Scootaloo's sai shoes, very cool. I loved Sweetie singing to Vinyl's music, that will help her heel.

[Lightoller]

“Holy… buck.”

Indeed.

[Doctor Elite]

Good as always!

[Muzzle_luvr]

Good chapter. And a bad ass Tavi!