Bloom Filter

by ferret

Flight Lessons

Scootaloo would have helped more while Noi was doing all that recuperating, but Scootaloo had her hands way busy. Wings. Whatever. Way busy.

It was absolutely terrible of Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo loved her for it, but some pony casually mentioned to Rainbow Dash herself, that she should try to train Scootaloo at flying. When the fallout of telling that to Dash reached Scootaloo, she angrily confronted Apple Bloom, after momentarily escaping the excited Rainbow Dash. Scootaloo accused Apple Bloom of messing everything up, and Apple Bloom just looked at her evenly and said,

“If she weren’t the one doing it, you’d be all trying to make this big elaborate show for her, and totally panic when you have to perform. Remember the slalom 500 of ‘03?”

Scootaloo... remembered the Slalom 500 of ‘03.

“Just treat her like she ain’t anything special,” Apple Bloom advised Scootaloo. “She’s gonna see you flying at your worst, so you can just focus on getting better.”

Scootaloo wished Apple Bloom could understand how she felt about Rainbow Dash, but... Scootaloo wasn’t sure she understood it herself! Dash was so awesome and cool and... and Scootaloo wasn’t. But she wanted to, like... be like Dash, and be like, this super athlete that everyone admires. But Scootaloo couldn’t do that, so she just kinda... still tried? It was confusing.

What else was confusing was flying! There were so many books on it, all this crazy complicated physics about turbulence and ailerons and airfoils. Actually, Scootaloo could move her feathers individually, so they did make sort of good ailerons, at least they would in theory.

But otherwise, she didn’t understand half of what those books said, and was terrified that Rainbow Dash would get frustrated with her, and just call off the training. But Dash proved to be surprisingly resilient, and supportive. She didn’t treat failures like failures, but more like opportunities. Ways to learn more about how Scootaloo’s wings worked, and how they’d fly.

Scootaloo already knew a lot about her wings, from the preening she been practicing with her mom, to just experimenting with the complex motions they could undergo. Pegasus feathers really were magic, the way Scootaloo could move them without any apparant musculature at all. Twilight Sparkle said something about flexing the something something field, and it was all complicated sounding, but what it came down to in the end is magic.

Scootaloo thought the actual alien pony girl with wings could help her, but Twilight Sparkle didn’t even think Scootaloo could fly. She didn’t admit it, but her attitude around Scootaloo was one of apology and hesitance. She never guaranteed anything to Scootaloo, and always carefully phrased her sentences in terms of pegasi in general. It didn’t help that her advice that “You really gotta flap ‘em” just ended up with Scootaloo plunging nose first into the snow.

Twilight said Scootaloo didn’t have to worry about airfoils, since her wings would naturally project the same basic airfoil common to every pegasus. She said Scootaloo had to learn more gravymetric something something, and lots of stuff like that, but Twilight Sparkle really didn’t seem to have her heart into it. She just smiled sadly at Scootaloo, and assured her that there wasn’t anything wrong with her wings. Which was weird because Scootaloo never asked that in the first place. By the time she got tired of pestering Twilight for flying lessons, Scootaloo was starting to think that Twilight didn’t seem to believe she could fly.

And that didn’t make sense! Because Twilight totally believed pegasuses could fly, and Scootaloo was a pegasus, but Twilight just... didn’t have any confidence in her. Scootaloo just didn’t know what she was doing wrong, to make the purple girl feel that way. Was Scootaloo just a really terrible pegasus? Was it because she wasn’t born as one, and the real pony girl didn’t think she could do it?

Well, Scootaloo was determined to prove Twilight Sparkle wrong. Scootaloo had these wings, magic wings at that, and she was gonna get up in the air one way or another! She didn’t know if it was a pegasus... thing or whatever, but—and this is gonna sound totally sappy, but—Scootaloo felt like the sky was calling to her. Not calling like “Scootaloooo you really want to fly, Scootaloo! Wooo!” but calling like: Scootaloo sometimes had weird feelings of being sort of pulled upward, or she could sort of... see how easy it would be, just to... slip up into the air. It was sort of like how Sweetie felt things with her horn, or Apple Bloom could uh... it was hard to explain what she could do. But it was totally like that.

Nevertheless, it seemed like it was gonna take a while.

Apple Bloom was right about one thing, Rainbow Dash was the best trainer you could possibly have, even for something she was completely unqualified to train. She shouldn’t have been patient with Scootaloo, but she was. She should have been driven up the wall by Scootaloo, but she wasn’t. She was just... always there, and Scootaloo didn’t know what to feel. This amazing, untouchable star of Canterlot was genuinely excited about Scootaloo’s prospects of flying. Not just as some kind of curiosity, but it really struck a chord with her for some reason. The silly smile on Dash’s face when Scootaloo managed to hover, when she saw Scootaloo’s delight at catching the wind, Rainbow shared in that delight too. It made Scootaloo feel like she was... important, like she was helping. There was nothing she loved better than really giving Rainbow Dash a reason to smile, and for the first time in her life, Scootaloo could!

It was... too easy.

Scootaloo stood there on the low roof over the Apple family’s porch. She hadn’t flown up there. Rainbow Dash had picked her up, and deposited the little orange pony at arm’s length, up there on the roof. Scootaloo wasn’t worried about falling. She’d used this spot before, and if anything, she was safer up here. Scootaloo could get a good glide in before having to deal with the ground, whereas from down on the ground she immediately had to worry about tripping up and tumbling. What she was concerned with wasn’t falling and hurting herself, but rather how to get altitude.

Because Rainbow Dash wanted altitude, and Scootaloo was gonna do everything in her power to deliver it to her. Rainbow Dash was gonna be so thrilled at this!

“Come on kid, give it a shot!” Rainbow shouted from a good distance down the driveway. She was aiming to catch Scootaloo, should Scootaloo come gliding down that way again. It was the kind of unreal situation that Scootaloo had started to get used to these days. Somehow, that brilliantly rainbow haired girl was bright eyed and attentive, instead of not even knowing Scootaloo existed. Somehow, here Scootaloo was, staring down at two orange cylinders, ending in thick orange nails that supported her weight, compressing down the snow on the roof. There were hoof-prints all over the roof of this awning, hoofprints made by Scootaloo herself walking around up here.

And that was mundane and ordinary, compared to what else she felt. While Scootaloo looked between those hooves to the ground below, knowing just how far it was before she landed, Scootaloo felt two strange limbs on either side of her body turn upward and spread out. She spread them out herself, moving them like arms, but not like arms. The cool air of the day drifted over her wings, each feather shifting in the slippery breeze, shining with a healthy orange sheen.

“Don’t be scared!” Dash called out again, “I know you can do it this time!”

They’d been playing with the football earlier, and Dash kept kicking it higher while Scootaloo would try to catch it. Try, and succeed! Scootaloo could leap into the air like an arrow to grab the thing in her hooves, before coming down with it in a gentle arc to the ground. And that was why Rainbow Dash thought that today, Scootaloo could fly.

“Okay here I go!” Scootaloo shouted in her weirdly high pitched voice, up there on that porch roof, speaking up before Rainbow could urge her on again, or worse, walk up to her with a disappointed look on her face. Scootaloo angled her wings experimentally, trying to feel the wind on them, the air that had to buoy her up, somehow. She could feel something, and she didn’t know if what she was feeling was right or wrong. But one way or another, Scootaloo was going to try.

She jumped off the roof, arm—legs stretched before her, as the air immediately gripped her wings, and Scootaloo was gliding. Gliding was something that was really easy. It was kind of like sliding, as if your wings were on oiled runners and you were sliding down an incline made out of air. It was easy to go too fast, if you tilted them down too far, but backwinging was also something that came naturally.

It came naturally, and usually ended up with Scootaloo landing nose first in the snow, so she didn’t want to do any backwinging this time. Instead, she glided towards Rainbow Dash at a gentle angle, and tried to imagine in advance the ball sailing up above her head. Scootaloo had to try to rise up somehow, from right here in mid-air, and grab it.

Right on schedule, Dash drop kicked the football, and it went sailing straight upward, shooting past Scootaloo’s head as high overhead as Rainbow could kick it. “I got it!” Scootaloo shouted unconfidently, trying to beat her wings or something to get up there. This was it. She either had to glide in descending circles until she landed, or... or something! Beating her wings made the air lurch under her, and Scootaloo called to... it or something? She looked up at the ball, like there was a hook pulling her up towards the thing, as it paused at the apex of its narrow arc.

Scootaloo missed the ball entirely, because she didn’t anticipate that it would start falling down again. Instead, she overshot, shooting above it and looking over her shoulder as it descended below her. Scootaloo didn’t have any vertigo. It was literally impossible to have vertigo, after the first time you spread your wings out and the air actually caught you. But she looked down and... and Scootaloo was so freaking high!

“You did it! You did it!” Rainbow Dash shouted from down there, jumping in place next to the discarded football while Scootaloo drifted further away from the ground. “Keep going, kid!”

Scootaloo didn’t spare a thought, and just... well, she didn’t just pump her wings, but she pumped them specifically when the air was there. It was hard to picture it, but Scootaloo could feel it. Like a really thin sort of water, like swimming in the lake. Scootaloo tilted her wings upward and beat them to push against the current that sucked around her nose, fighting to keep her altitude. At this rate, you could almost say she was flying!

Scootaloo gave a giddy whoop, just so excited that she might be doing it right. She was going so fast! Or the wind was lots stronger above the trees, and above the... farm house... jeez how did she get this high? How high she was caught Scootaloo off guard, and she immediately went into a tailspin, shouting out in alarm as the world spun around her. Scootaloo had to stop—! She couldn’t see! She backwinged frantically and stopped and—and plunged with a lurch in her stomach, then kicked her wings out, and

...was slide-gliding neutrally through the air again.

Scootaloo’s heart was hammering in her chest. She didn’t have any vertigo, but she sure as heck had dangergo! She didn’t want to be up here anymore. Maybe it would have disappointed Rainbow Dash, but Scootaloo was too frazzled to do anything besides glide in a slow circle, descending towards where the older girl waited her far below. Rainbow Dash was—if anything—the diametric opposite of disappointed, though.

“I can’t believe it! You actually did it, kid! You were flying!”

“...I was?” Scootaloo asked in confusion, once she’d landed safely in Rainbow Dash’s arms.

“How else would you get so high up in the air?” Rainbow asked incredulously. “You must have been a hundred feet up or something!”

“I guess that was flying?” Scootaloo said uncertainly. “I just saw the ball and swam uh, pulled, uh... wanted to get to it, so I dove um... up? I just got up there however.”

“There’s only one way up there,” Rainbow said confidently, jogging towards the farm house with Scootaloo perched up on her shoulders. “And that’s flying. Those little wings, kid? They really work! You went up just like a bird, and came swooping down like a... like a hawk!”

“Gosh,” Scootaloo said amazed, “It didn’t seem like anything special. You just... want to go up, so you sort of pull yourself up there. But I guess that is flying!”

Dash’s response was to spread her arms wide and go running around in circles, making Scootaloo laugh despite herself. Scootaloo was so happy she could impress someone so awesome as Rainbow Dash. She felt more on top of the world than she ever was in the air, riding around here on the shoulders of her idol, who was running around with her arms outspread, making airplane engine noises with her tongue. Scootaloo wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Indeed, that month of Scootaloo’s life was just full of good news and bad news. Good news because of Rainbow Dash, and also the flying maybe, but bad news because of... well...

Because of a little phone call, from Diamond Tiara.

“Scootaloo?” came Sweetie Belle’s voice, one Friday evening.

“Please kill me,” Scootaloo requested very reasonably, from her confident poise flopped face down on the couch, downstairs in the Apple’s living room.

“I don’t think Dinky would like that,” Sweetie’s voice persisted, slipping right into Scootaloo’s far too capable ears.

Scootaloo’s wings twitched. She wished this was something she could fly away from! She lifted her head, to look blearily red-eyed at the unicorn, Sweetie Belle standing neatly on fours, before Scootaloo and her couch that she’d claimed in her time of travail.

“I am so screwed,” Scootaloo groaned to a sympathetic but impatient looking Sweetie. “I can’t believe I forgot about him!”

“You’re not screwed,” Sweetie insisted, “And you’re not a terrible person!”

“I am a terrible p—hey!” Scootaloo shouted in sudden outrage, her pity parade neatly disrupted. She glared at Sweetie, then said, “I haven’t even checked my emails in—”

“Neither have I!” Sweetie said back with a frustrated snort. “You know how much trouble it is to compose a reply? We’ve all been avoiding... stuff!”

“And now he’s coming here?” Scootaloo exclaimed. “He’ll see me!”

Sweetie turned her head to the side, saying uncertainly, “Um, yes? It won’t be so bad. He already saw Apple Bloom, remember?”

“Yeah, but... I mean... I just don’t want to let him down,” Scootaloo said glumly. “Don’t want him to see just some dumb pony, instead of a girl.”

“He already knows you’re a pony,” Sweetie offered. “I think you’re just upset, cause you forgot.”

“I wish I didn’t forget... things,” Scootaloo said, rolling onto her back and gazing upwards. “I don’t know how other people do it. I just... I didn’t even think about him, not even once.”

“I don’t think people do, Scootaloo,” Sweetie told Scoots with a sigh. “It just sort of... happened that way. I didn’t even think about him, not even once. So did...didn’t Apple Bloom, and her family, and... anyone really. Dinky’s just really... easy to forget.”

“Well, you’re not all his girlfriend,” Scootaloo retorted sullenly. “What am I supposed to tell him? I can’t date you anymore, since I’m a pony, but that’s okay since I forgot about you anyway, so it’s no big loss?”

“Um... maybe something a bit more tactful,” Sweetie winced.

Scootaloo sighed. “All this time, I never even thought about him. I didn’t even know he was looking for me, until Diamond Tiara called!”

Sweetie grimaced at that, in a poor imitation of a comforting smile.

“Alright girls,” Apple Bloom reported, trotting up to the two of them. “Dinky’s all set to come over this weekend, and you can let him down nice and easy, Scootaloo. Don’t mean he cain’t be friends, and he can buzz off if he ain’t okay with it. Him and Diamond can play with us for th’afternoon, and we can introduce Diamond to Noi.”

“How am I supposed to let him down easy?” Scootaloo fretted anxiously. “I don’t know how dating works. He just asked me to the dance! What do I say to him?”

“Well, you could start by saying you’re sorry you forgot about him,” Apple Bloom offered flatly. “We all did, but he’s sorta your responsibillery, and he’ll want to hear it from you. Then, let him tell you he wants to break it up. Then if he won’t admit it, tell him that until you’ve got over this pony thing, he is gonna have to look elsewhere for a uh, girlfriend.”

“Hold on, I gotta take notes,” Scootaloo stated, half standing up before Apple Bloom jumped on the couch next to her saying,

“No! What? You’re gonna break up with him, by reading note cards?”

Scootaloo thought about that a moment. “Good point,” Scootaloo said, slumping down again. “So, apologize. Then... break it up? I forget, sorry.”

Sweetie sighed, and excused herself momentarily.

“Tell him until you got over this pony thing,” Apple Bloom repeated patiently to Scootaloo, “He’s gonna hafta look elsewhere. But give him a chance to say it first.”

“Okay, got it,” Scootaloo said concentrating.

“An’ if he gets upset at that,” Apple Bloom added, walking around in a circle on that cushion before sitting down, “Tell him what a good time you had at the dance with him.”

“The—uh, the dance kind of sucked though,” Scootaloo pointed out. “Not his fault, but I have more fun in class with him. Had.”

Apple Bloom looked off across the room, giving a coy little smile as she said, “Yeah, but if he thinks of the dance he’ll remember how he treated you right back then, so he won’t think he did nothing wrong.”

“He won’t... think...” Scootaloo repeated, scrawling on paper with a crayon she managed to get her mouth on somehow.

“What have you even done with him, besides go to the dance?” Sweetie Belle asked, while covertly sliding a box of crayons behind the couch with her hind leg. “Is he even your boyfriend at all?”

“Yes! No?” Scootaloo said, looking up in consternation. “I don’t know!” she threw her hooves into the air. “I never did this dating thing before. I was just winging it the whole time!”

The two stared at Scootaloo in amazement, until Sweetie Belle giggled, while Apple Bloom asked, “Did you not intend to make that pun?”

“What p—oh, ha ha,” Scootaloo said in disgust. “You know what I mean. I just have to... figure out what to say to him.”

“He seems like a nice, reliable boy,” Sweetie remarked, “Just tell him the truth. I’m sure he’ll understand.”

“Yeah,” Apple Bloom agreed comfortingly, “What could possibly go wrong with that?”

“I’m dooooomed,” Scootaloo moaned into the couch cushion.

---

So there Scootaloo stood. Sat, really. Sat there like a dog, with her front legs between her back legs, like was most comfortable to do now. There on her stupid pony butt, which should have been covered, now that she thought about it, but it was too late to do anything about that. All Scootaloo had on right now was her awesome black fire hoodie, and she could already hear the car pulling up outside.

“Wish I didn’t have to do this,” she mumbled to Apple Bloom, who sat there being a pony right beside Scootaloo.

“He’ll understand,” Apple Bloom assured her warmly, “Just don’t be afraid to talk to him about it.”

“Easy for you to say,” Scootaloo groaned. “I wish I could just fly away from all this. Actually...” she lifted an ear looking up at the ceiling. “I could literally fly away from all this!”

“Don’t even think about it,” Apple Bloom said disapprovingly. “You cain’t escape your problems on the ground just by flying above ‘em.”

“Well why not?” Scootaloo pouted. “It’s not like I could hear him get mad at me, if I was just a speck up there!”

“You’d have to come down eventually!” Apple Bloom retorted with a frown at her flustered, feathered friend.

“Why?” Scootaloo asked, maybe a bit of resentment fluttering in her chest.

“All the food is down here,” Apple Bloom explained simply.

“Oh.”

There was a clomping up the porch, and the thump of a hand gripping the door snapped Scootaloo back to attention. At least she didn’t have to deal with this and Rainbow Dash, and those two alien girls trying to pick apart her wings. Twilight had to come in the middle of the week to do her studying thing. Sunset couldn’t come along when she did that, as Sunset actually had classes to attend, but the two had declined to wait to visit until the weekend this time, on account of some friends coming over to play. Twilight didn’t want to disturb them, certainly.

And Rainbow Dash had been giving Scootaloo a much needed break the past couple of days. She was all too happy to leave well enough alone, after Applejack reminded Rainbow Dash about the unit test coming up on Monday. With the little project she and Dash had been working on, it was just exhausting Scootaloo to be practicing flying all the time. Rainbow Dash was awesome and amazing, but... a little overwhelming at times, when she wanted something from you.

So that left Scootaloo only having to deal with... this. The door swung open.

Applejack clomped in, sat down on the entryway bench and started removing her boots, and kicking the snow off of them, either disregarding or not seeing the two ponies waiting there. “C’mon in y’all,” she said to the others, whereupon a less nervous Diamond Tiara, and a very nervous Dinky ambled into the house. Apple Bloom looked nervous all of a sudden, which was understandable considering that she wasn’t usually entertaining boys coming over to her house. It was certainly the reason Sweetie Belle wasn’t running to introduce herselfy. So Scootaloo just helped Apple Bloom out preemptively, saying to the tall, round faced, lavender boy,

“We’re over here!”

Dinky turned and looked that way, and the boy’s golden eyes lit on them. He paused in taking off his shoes, as if not sure what to do about this, and responded in a light tenor, “Yes, I can see that...”

He shook his head fiercely then, saying, “Sorry—I don’t mean to stare.”

“Y-you shouldn’t be apologizing,” Scootaloo replied, trotting forward, “I’m the one who screwed up and forgot to tell you.”

Dinky’s incredulous gaze returned to her, making Scootaloo stop in her tracks, staring up at the big thing... the big boy anxiously.

“You really did forget about me?” he asked Scootaloo, who wanted to crawl right underneath the floorboards right now.

“I... kinda... yeah...” Scootaloo admitted miserably, “It’s not you, it’s me,” she corrected hastily. “I just forgot like an idiot, and it’s nothing you did wrong.”

“You did forget, though,” Dinky reasserted carefully.

Scootaloo’s lack of answer besides blushing must have been answer enough, because he gave a relieved sigh and said, “Oh, thank goodness.”

Wait, what?

“Hey!” Diamond Tiara protested loudly, while struggling with unlacing her last boot. “Just because I said, doesn’t mean that I’m really gonna just—”

“Oh, no I didn’t mean it like that!” Dinky yelped enigmatically to Diamond Tiara. “I just thought she was gonna be upset, or scared of telling me, or something. You really don’t have to, if you don’t want to.”

“I... um... like...” Diamond murmured in a conflicted tone. Scootaloo didn’t know what was going on, but somehow this Dinky dude had rendered Diamond Tiara speechless.

“You aren’t upset,” Dinky asked Scootaloo directly, “Are you? I’d hate to think I deserved it somehow.”

“No, it’s cool,” Scootaloo said, standing up, “You didn’t do anything. I’m just such a featherbrain sometimes.” She lifted a wing and added, “Heh... literally...”

“Wow, you really have wings, too,” Dinky said, leaning forward to look more closely.

“Yeah, and they really work!” Scootaloo chirped, fluttering them to lift herself in the air briefly, before thumping down on her hooves again. “Uh, not much clearance in here,” she said embarassedly.

“No problem,” Dinky said easily. “Not like you can hover or anything.”

“Actually, Twilight said I could, or that pegasi could do that,” Scootaloo said. “She didn’t know the details about it, but weather teams had to get really good at it so they could position the clouds just right.”

Dinky gave Scootaloo an open mouthed stare. “Weather... teams?” Dinky remarked, as surprised as he ever got.

“Boy, have you missed a lot!” Scootaloo declared, feeling pretty astonished herself, with just how much her... new friend who happened to be a boy didn’t know. “Buut I’ve only flied like... a week so far, so I haven’t been able to mess with the clouds yet. All I know is how to drag myself up there and try not to stall out.”

“It’s still a pretty big accomplishment,” he admitted. “No, like huge, I mean. Those wings shouldn’t even hold you up!”

Scootaloo looked at one of the tiny things at her side, saying, “Yeah, but Twilight said they’re normal size, and it’s just pegasus magic that gets it to work.” One of the feathers was a bit crooked, so she bit on it and pulled it straight, and then fiddled with it to get it to fold under the other one... and then blushed, turning back to face Dinky. Diamond had since been quietly led off by Apple Bloom, leaving Scootaloo and the boy relatively alone in the entryway there.

“Y-you’re just talking to me like you always do,” Scootaloo told Dinky, guiltily holding her wings tight against her, “Like I was a normal person. Most people are more uh... thrown by this whole... pony thing.”

Dinky moved his shoulders in a shrugging motion, saying, “Diamond mostly filled me in, and I already saw Apple Bloom. Why would I see you as any different? You still look exactly like yourself, just... pony!”

Scootaloo had to smile at that. “You’re a real cool dude, you know that Dinky?” she said relievedly.

“I um, guess so,” Dinky barely acknowledged, blushing himself.

“Well, I guess we got that outta the way,” Scootaloo declared, more confidently. She lifted a hoof and turned on her heels, to point herself straight to the other room. “How about you come meet my other friends?”

“Well I already met ‘em,” Dinky admitted, “Though, I’m curious what Sweetie Belle looks like as a pony.”

“Oh, right, at the dance...” Scootaloo said feeling uneasy about that whole... thing.

After a pause, Dinky asked, “So, just to be sure, we’re not um, dating anymore, are we?”

“What? No,” Scootaloo said waving a hoof at him dismissively, “O-of course not. That’d be totally weird, since I’m a pony now, and not a... uh... human.”

“I’d be happy to date you if I was a pony,” Dinky offered, “I mean... I would, except... I mean, there’s nothing wrong with you. Anyone would be happy to you know, date you.”

“Yeah, yeah I know, horse parts, and—” Scootaloo was interrupted by Dinky saying in a very guilty tone,

“No, it’s... not... just that.”

He looked at Scootaloo, looking a bit lost honestly, as Dinky confessed to her, “I was sort of hoping you would be okay with... I was just thinking about ...dating Diamond Tiara.”

Scootaloo reeled back at that. “Diamond Tiara?!” Scootaloo asked, surprise and aversion curling her lip, “Why would you want me to date Diamond Tiara?!”

The lavender boy stared at her blankly. Realization seemed to dawn in his eyes.

“No!” he protested, “I meant me dating Diamond Tiara.” Oh. Ohhh. Oh. Oh? ...oh.

“I guess?” Scootaloo asked uneasily, moving a bit sideways to Dinky. “You want ...tips or something?”

“No, I wanted... I mean we are or... were boyfriend and girlfriend, right?” Dinky asked, doing some weird thing with his hands.

“Oh, right,” Scootaloo said mutedly, “I forgot about—I mean I just wasn’t thinking about that. I mean, are we boyfriend and girlfriend? I didn’t ask you out to the dance, so what is it?”

“I suppose...” Dinky frowned, pinching his brow, “If it doesn’t bother you at all that me and Diamond Tiara are dating, then we’re not boyfriend and girlfriend. So that means if it does bother you, even if you don’t want to say it, then we are. Or, were. So does it bother you? It’s okay if it does, just... I just wanna know.”

Scootaloo looked down, actually thinking about it for once. She sure didn’t feel any... magic girlfriend urges rising up in her, but she did have some misgivings. “You’re kinda young, I guess?” she attempted, giving Dinky another wary look.

“Yeah, I know, and we’ll be careful,” Dinky said reassuringly to Scootaloo. “But I mean you, how does it make you feel?”

Scootaloo swished her tail, honestly not sure how to answer that. “I feel... kind of weird about it?” she suggested, “I mean, Diamond Tiara? Really? You really think she is someone you’d wanna date?”

“I...” Dinky gulped, “I really do.”

“She’s so... crazy though!” Scootaloo exclaimed with difficulty. “Most boys won’t even come within 10 feet of that. You saw her at the dance.”

“I think she’s fascinating!” Dinky reiterated excitedly, “And incredible, and—and she just really needs someone, you know? Plus she likes me and I don’t have to impress her, or anything; I can just be myself.”

“You know that she likes you?” Scootaloo asked, wondering how much of his dating thing was one sided.

“That’s what she said,” Dinky answered mildly.

“Seriously?” Scootaloo raised an eyebrow, making Dinky cringe at the unfamiliarity of his situation.

“...yes?” Dinky eked out.

“So, why are you not boy and girlfriend?” Scootaloo declared with a stomp. “If you like her, and she likes you, and you can deal with... her, then why even ask me oh because I was your girlfriend, right.”

Scootaloo just toed the floor, trying not to blush any more than she already had.

Dinky didn’t answer, since Scootaloo answered her own question. She was seriously thinking about just stuffing her hoof in her mouth, and ending this whole talking out loud thing once and for all.

“Yeah, you can date her,” Scootaloo conceded mutedly, despite her embarassment at the thought. “I guess you two could be cute together. I-if you’re ready for it. But just... don’t just do it just because you think she’s pretty. If you find out what she’s really like, and you can’t handle it... you could really hurt Diamond Tiara.”

So Dinky said to Scootaloo what he said to Diamond Tiara, about relative prettiness and what it meant to a boy. Ommitting the embarassing part about Scootaloo, of course. And Scootaloo was weirded out for a while, by that serious conversation they’d had, but Dinky was still Dinky, and after they rejoined with the others, things started to lighten up right away. Noi seemed to take a liking to him, though it was sort of weird the way she referred to him as a “cute kid” through her pronunciation problems.

Pretty much every pony took a liking to him, when it came time to be brushed and there was another set of hands to do it with. He didn’t come over very... often, after that day. He was more than willing to be helpful, but perhaps the pony thing was throwing him more than he would admit, and Dinky ended up more of a close friend to Diamond, to the rest of them by satellite. There was that little boost from meeting her at the dance, but if any of them figured it, Dinky would be the first friend Diamond Tiara made all on her own.

---

“Just... gotta... take a break...” Scootaloo gasped some days later, sort of starting to think that maybe she would have had it any other way with Rainbow Dash. She could swear her wings sizzled, when she flopped down on her back and the feathers hit the snow. They sure felt hot enough to sizzle. Rainbow Dash had been coming over every day after school this second week, utterly relentless, always with a bright eyed excited smile. She didn’t have any ulterior motives to doing this for Scootaloo, only the pure joy at seeing Scootaloo really flying, and Scootaloo couldn’t ever say no to that!

Well, that and their special project. But Scootaloo was in on that, so it didn’t count as taking advantage of her.

Rainbow Dash was making Scootaloo start to feel like Apple Bloom though, with how that Noi girl... lady latched onto Apple Bloom like glue at first. At least Rainbow Dash had to be at school most of the time, but... Scootaloo couldn’t believe she was looking forward to not spending time with Rainbow Dash!

“I think you almost reached the clouds!” Rainbow Dash told her excitedly. “You were so high up, it was incredible! Go on, do it again!”

“I’m taking a break!” Scootaloo called out, her voice muffled in the snow there from the pony shaped indentation that was the only sign of her existence. Rainbow Dash crouched over Scootaloo, and in a surprisingly sympathetic tone said,

“You can take a break whenever you want, but good grief kid. You’ve been going non-stop this whole week!”

That, and practicing when Dash wasn’t around.

“I wish I had half the stamina you did!” Dash told Scootaloo in honest approval.

“Yeah... stamina... right...” Scootaloo agreed pleadingly, still trying to catch her breath. “Man,” she said in false bravado, standing up on her shaky hooves, and brushing off her body, “My wings feel like they’re gonna fall off! I think it’s time for a snac—”

“Fall off?!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed getting up in Scootaloo’s face in sudden bug eyed horror. “Your wings wouldn’t fall off, would they? Are you injured? Oh no, you’re hurt? Why didn’t you say anything? I don’t want your wings to fall off! Oh no, and you just started flying too! Of course you’d need to start slow! Are they okay, please tell me they’re—”

“I’m fine!” Scootaloo stated firmly, pulling her wing tip out of Rainbow Dash’s worriedly inquisitive fingers, and pushing away Rainbow Dash’s cheek until the sky blue girl gave Scootaloo some space. “My wings are fine,” Scootaloo clarified, “I’m just a little...” her ears went down.

“Tired,” Scootaloo mumbled.

“Sorry, what was that?” Rainbow Dash said, cupping a hand around her round, human ear. Was she joking around? Oh, oops.

“I’m tired, okay?” Scootaloo said a little louder, finally fessing up, a clenching feeling in her chest as she did... huh. Scootaloo’s chest was behind her now, okay weird.

“I’ve been fly—flying, yeah,” Scootaloo said uncertainly standing there before Rainbow Dash in the packed snow, “Pretty much all that I can. And I just... I just don’t want to disappoint you.

“I–I love being up in the sky,” Scootaloo half lied, “But, I mean—I just don’t want to let you down, Rainbow Dash. You come here every day and you get so excited when I get up into the air. I wanna do that for you, see you feel that way. You... you smile at me, like really smile, and I just can’t let you down. It doesn’t matter if I get a little tired, if I can do that for someone like you!”

“For me? Nononono,” Dash said in harsh correction, shaking her index finger for some reason. Dash crouched down to the snowy ground where Scootaloo was standing. “You need to do this for you,” she emphasized, putting a finger on Scootaloo’s snout. “All this... flying stuff,” Dash smiled, standing up straight again and looking into the sky. “You could make me happy if you just got ten feet off the ground. I’m happy for you that you can get all the way up into the sky, but I mean...” her smile faltered a bit and she said, “It’s not like I can be up there with you. When you’re up there in the sky, the only one around is yourself, so you gotta do it for yourself.”

“Well, if it’s just me, I... I just...

“...want my scooter back,” Scootaloo blurted out unhappily. She knew what words were fighting its way out of her chest, but it was just too hard to hold them inside. There was just no better way to put it. Scootaloo wanted to... be tall again, and not have this gigantic tail following her around, and she didn’t want to be dressing up in doll clothes, because that’s practically what they were. She wanted to be human, not some kind of animal, or some kind of... thing that flies in the sky and has to save her shed feathers, in case they might be magic. Because humans could do so much more than some stupid little pony. They could do one thing more than some stupid little pony, that’s for sure. They could ride scooters.

“My old scooter is even taller than I am now!” she complained, trying to save face by being outraged about it. “It’s like twice as big as the one in my dreams. I can’t ride on it anymore and I... I kind of really liked that thing. It was sorta my thing, you know?”

“You’re moving on to bigger and better things, squirt,” Rainbow told her confidently. “You don’t have to roll around on the ground. Just fly anywhere you wanna go!”

“But I don’t have anywhere to go! I don’t even care about where I’m going! I just want to be...” Scootaloo whipped her tail, “Look, never mind. Let’s just try this one more time. I really wanna get this right.”

Dash’s worry broke into an excited anticipation. “Can you imagine the look on her face?” Rainbow told her with an eager smile. “It’s gonna be legendary!”

“Heh heh, yeah...” Scootaloo said up to her, but she just couldn’t rouse that kind of enthusiasm, with the mood she had been sinking into this afternoon.

Rainbow seemed to pick up on that, and her smile softened as she said, “You know, I think that scooter was holding you back. Now you got no limits! I know it’s new, and way weird. But sometimes things just gotta change. It’s all part of growing up.”

“Yeah, getting too small for your scooter, growing wings and a tail, getting feet instead of hands, all just a normal part of growing up,” Scootaloo said mildly, inspecting a hoof.

Dash raised an eyebrow at that. “You know,” Scootaloo urged, lightly bumping Dash in the shin with that foreleg, “You got all the stages of life: baby, kid, pony, teenager, adult!”

“Hah, you are a riot, kid!” Dash declared with a silly smile. She rubbed Scootaloo’s hair with a hand, making Scootaloo blush from how much Dash had to bend over to do it.

“Now,” Dash said, lifting Scootaloo bodily up, to let her flutter up onto the porch roof. “Just one more time. This time it’s gotta be totally radical! Then we’ll be ready. And then, I dunno, if you really want it, maybe we can do something about that scooter of yours.”

“Really?!” Scootaloo said excitedly, sticking her head over the edge of the roof.

“I have no idea!” Dash called back up to her with a smarmy grin. “Why don’t you ask that big brother of Apple Bloom’s? He’s in metal shop, isn’t he? I just kick a ball around!”

“You do way more than that, Rainbow Dash!” Scootaloo said with a fond smile right back.

“Aww, you’re too kind,” Rainbow said with a cute little, if brief, bashful blush, “But compliments won’t get you up in the air. Now let’s see you put up a good holler!”

---

“Oh boy, this is gonna be so awesome!” Scootaloo hollered eagerly and deliberately, once she was atop the highest peak of the Apple family’s two story farm house. There was no more sign of Rainbow Dash, and no more practice to be done. This was it. There was a long, sheer drop from here, all the way down the side of the house, down to the hard packed frozen dirt where the truck was parked, along with Rarity’s car, and a completely horrified

~ / o Twilight Sparkle. o \ ~

“Scootaloo, no!!” Twilight cried out to the foolish little filly swaying precariously, so very, very high off the ground. “You’re going to get yourself killed!”

How could this have happened? She had warned the filly, didn’t she? Was she not clear enough? Did Scootaloo just have a death wish? Oh no, what if she was suicidal because she couldn’t be human again? Why was it so hard to just tell her that she would never fly?!

Twilight Sparkle found herself outside alone, without knowing of anyone nearby, except one little orange pegasus who was just about to break her neck, once she jumped off the top of that farm house. Rainbow Dash was nowhere to be seen, and she was supposed to be keeping an eye on Scootaloo! Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were off doing something with the pigs, and Rarity was in the middle of a carefully heated bath! When Twilight heard Scootaloo cheering about something, she didn’t expect to walk outside and see this!

“Oh, hey Twilight!” Scootaloo shouted with a distant smile down to her. Twilight’s mind was racing. She couldn’t get up the stairs at a fast enough rate to catch Scootaloo on the roof, if she tried something foolish, but perhaps Twilight could predict heuristically where another family member might be in a more advantageous—

“Don’t worry, Twilight!” Scootaloo laughed heedlessly. “I got it figured out! See, I made bigger wings! Now I can totally fly!”

“Are those cardboard?!” Twilight shrieked, her fingers like claws halfway to outright climbing up the wall to get at the little pegasus. The odd looking flaps Scootaloo had attached to her back somehow, they did not look structurally sound in the least.

“Don’t worry, Twilight! I really did figure it out!” Scootaloo told her all too confidently. “I’ve been crashing into the ground every time when I try to fly, because I haven’t been jumping from high enough! From here, I’ll be flying for sure!”

“You don’t know that!” Twilight shouted, “That’s ridiculously dangerous!”

“What are you, my mom?” came Scootaloo’s derisive sneer, “Just watch this!”

“No! No I am not watching this! This is not happening! You are just going to calm down, and come right down from there and—”

“Okay, if you insist!” Scootaloo shouted back. And then

She jumped.

That horrible, reckless, stupid, sweet innocent little filly just—just threw her life away! She took a running start and cleared the roof by a good three body lengths, her tiny little wings spreading underneath the large cardboard squares. Now Twilight had to catch her! There was literally no one else around! Why was there no one else around?!

“Scootaloo!” Twilight shouted, “Hang on!” For a moment it looked like against all odds, Scootaloo was going to make it. She could glide or slowly descend or... or something. But then Twilight’s gut sunk even further as the cardboard wings just smoothly slipped right off of Scootaloo and blew away.

“Oh no!” Scootaloo exclaimed in terror, doing the absolute worst thing and looking back at her own wings. She stalled out and plummeted from the air like a stone, a terrified scream escaping the child’s breast as her wings betrayed her and she couldn’t do anything but fall. Twilight ran away from the farm house, arms outstretched. She didn’t know if it would be safe to catch Scootaloo at those velocities! Scootaloo was in a nose dive! She was rocketing for the ground far too fast for Twilight to even catch up! Twilight couldn’t understand it. How did things just suddenly go so wrong!

Scootaloo and Twilight were both shrieking, and Twilight barely had enough time to stumble forward, arms outstretched drunkenly. She had to catch her, before the pegasus would strike the earth and maybe never get up again! She’d never make it in time!

“Aaaaaah!” screamed Scootaloo

“Aaaaaah!” screamed Twilight.

“AAAAAA—oh hey, Rainbow Dash!” said Scootaloo, after backwinging suddenly, straining her wings to turn her dive into an upward loop.

There, Scootaloo just... floated at about head height, flapping her wings lightly to stay circling in the air, as if she were a butterfly, or a bit of dryer lint. She... she was flying, right next to Rainbow Dash, who was suddenly standing there facing Twilight Sparkle, and pointing a... camera at her?

Author's Note:

I don’t know if this works, with the readers all knowing what’s going on. But, suck it Twilight!

Comments

[Chrome Masquerade]

Oh, the look on Twilight's face must be glorious!!

[Wellwater]

Ahaha wow. Incoming twisplosion?

[Trump-12]

Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash = massive trolls.

[PiMan]

I think it works. We're laughing like Dash is laughing, rather than screaming like Twilight is screaming.

[ferret]

7114888 What I wouldn't give for those soon to be taken photographs!
7115235 I'll try to avoid describing the spluttering spittle in gross detail.
7115629 How many people could take "I can fly" and turn it into "let's prank the alien?"
7115856 Good, thanks. I definitely wanted Scootaloo's flying to be a much smaller reveal than it was for Twilight.

[RemareShadows]

trololololololol

[Reese]

"into the air like an arrow,y to grab the thing in her"
Something appears to have gone wrong there.

"from her confident poise"
"pose"?

"when it came time to be brush and there"
"brushed"?

[ferret]

8285755

arrow,y

Curse you emacs, and your ambiguous state machine!

"pose"?

Nope, that was definitely poise this time.
Thank you!