I Dreamt to Fly

by MrDynasty

25: The Final Course.

It was the day of the League finals, where Scootaloo and two other contestants were going to battle it out in the final race. “Chin up, Squirt! You have nothing to worry about!” Rainbow Dash said, standing in-front of Scootaloo and pulling her head up with her hoof.

Scootaloo looked away and smiled nervously. “I-I know, Dash. I just hope you won’t be mad or upset with me if I don’t win,” she said, looking back over to Rainbow Dash again.

Rainbow Dash shook her head quickly. “No way in a million years would I be mad or upset with you! You’ve already impressed everypony, including me! I’ve told you this so many times, Squirt, so trust me when I say that I won’t be disappointed if you don’t win,” she said, gaining a confident smile.

Scootaloo stretched her wings and smiled as well. “Thanks, Dash. Sorry you have to keep repeating it to me; I’m just so paranoid about it,” she said, looking back over to her and giving off a nervous laugh.

Rainbow Dash put her hoof on Scootaloo’s chin and started moving her head from side to side. “Hey, as long as it’ll stop you from getting paranoid, I’ll say it a million times over,” she said, continuing to move Scootaloo’s head around with her hoof.

Scootaloo was a bit confused as to why her head was being moved from side to side. “…What are you doing?” She asked curiously, lifting up one of her front legs in an attempt to get Rainbow’s hoof away. Rainbow Dash suddenly licked her hoof and rubbed Scootaloo’s cheek vigorously.

“I’m just making sure you look your best in-front of the Wonderbolts, wouldn’t want you looking like you haven’t showered,” she said with a soft smile, eventually pulling her hoof away from Scootaloo’s cheek.

Scootaloo rolled her eyes in response. “But I haven’t showered!” She stated with a small pout. “I won’t even be near the Wonderbolts technically. Maybe Spitfire, but that’s about it,” she said, rubbing the cheek that Rainbow Dash had unpleasantly “cleaned”.

Rainbow Dash nodded as she sat down. “Yeah, but I wouldn’t want her thinking I was a bad caretaker or whatever; wouldn’t bode well for my reputation,” she said, raising one of her hooves while giving off a nervous grin.

Scootaloo sighed as she sat down as well, her tail flumping onto the ground like a small pillow. “That just made things a bit harder to stomach. Didn’t know I was representing you,” she said, suddenly gaining a small frown.

Rainbow Dash laughed nervously and shook her head in response. “No, no, no! You’re not representing me; some ponies would just assume I didn’t care for you if you arrived all dirty or whatever. But you look fine, I’m just being ever so slightly paranoid,” she said as her nervous grin continued to spread across her face.

“Its fine, but I suppose I’ll go and take a shower then, just in case,” Scootaloo said, standing up and trotting towards the shower room. When she got far enough away from Rainbow Dash, she began to mutter to herself. “No sweat, Scootaloo. Noooooo sweat at all…”

When Scootaloo arrived, she couldn’t tell if the crowd sitting around the course was larger than the crowd at the previous course, but they were certainly louder, that she could tell. She trotted over to the other two contestants, one of them being Rumble. Scootaloo gave a small poke to his shoulder. “Glad to see you made it here too, I would have felt lonely if no one I knew was here in the finals with me,” she said, giving him a warm smile.

Rumble smiled back and nodded. “I bet it would have, and I’m happy to see that you got through too. You just came out of nowhere!” He said, raising one of his legs excitedly

Scootaloo tilted her head slightly, not knowing what he meant. “Came out of nowhere? What do you mean by that?” She asked curiously.

Rumble put his hoof to his chin as he tried to think of a comparison he could make to explain it, but he couldn’t think of any at the moment. “…Well, I can’t think of an example. What I mean is that no one really knew who you were or how good you were at flying, then all of a sudden you just kick the flanks of nearly every other contestant! I don’t think anypony was expecting that,” he said, grinning to her.

Scootaloo laughed nervously in response and rubbed her cheek. “Y-yeah, I think I just got lucky. I was also usually around the back end when it comes to my position in the courses, I just so happen to keep barely passing despite my inexperience...” She said, looking over to him with a crooked smile. “…Anyway, good luck I suppose, I’m sure we’ll all need it.”

Rumble nodded to her before he began to trot around the starting area, not saying anything else in the meantime. If Spitfire was coming over, she was surely taking her time. The crowd was still cheering quite loudly; no doubt the ponies on the ground under these clouds would have been able to hear it.

Scootaloo took the time she had before Spitfire arrived to survey the course, hoping to figure out what to do before she even started. Oddly enough, there wasn’t anything to actually figure out. No obstacles, nothing to weave around or enter, just a medium sized course that connected back to itself. The course wasn’t a circle, or an oval. It was very inconsistently shaped, having multiple different turns that made it harder to traverse through, but not too much harder by the looks of it. The shape of the course was shown by a surplus of large hoops that were placed to keep the contestants going in the right direction. It was also making sure they wouldn’t cheat by short-cutting. Frankly, it was just your bog standard lap based course with no clutter whatsoever. Although, it seemed like anypony was able to overtake at any time during the course, meaning it was probably going to be quite the competitive race.

She heard the fluttering of a pegasus’ wings fly down to the side, making her look around to see if it was Spitfire. Upon noticing that it was indeed Spitfire, Scootaloo trotted over to the other two contestants and waited for the briefing they would usually get before the course started.

Spitfire trotted over to them and raised her leg. “Congrats on making it to the finals you three, it’s definitely something to be proud of,” she said with a smile. “Anyway, there isn’t a lot I need to say about this course. There are three laps, and that’s about it. Whoever comes in first place wins the League, so I wish all three of you the best of luck in winning; you’d all be great Junior Wonderbolts material though! Thank you all for participating either way; you may line up now,” she said as she trotted away and over to some of the other Wonderbolts.

Each of the three fillies went over to the starting line and waited for their cue to start. Scootaloo was beginning to feel a little stressed as she couldn’t stop thinking about how her family and friends would react if she lost, would they be disappointed? Would they be ashamed? It was still a worrying thought, even though she knew they’d all most likely be fine with it.

The crowd went silent as the same stallion from the previous course was given a microphone again, presumably to start the race. “Three laps! Winner becomes the next member of the Junior Wonderbolts. You may start in 5, 4…” He said, counting down. Scootaloo quickly pushed all of her paranoia aside and tried to focus on the race ahead. “…2… 1… GO!” He yelled loudly into the microphone.

With enough speed to wipe the dust off of an entire house, all three of the contestants blasted into the start of the final course. There was no determined place at the start as every single filly was relatively close by to one another. They were continuously trying to overtake each other already, despite having just barely entered the course. When the overtaking had eventually settled, Scootaloo ended up in last place. It wasn’t that worrying to her, as she still had plenty of opportunities to get ahead of the competition.

Scootaloo wondered when she should be trying to overtake, since she didn’t want to stray too far from the rest of the contestants while they were ahead. She knew that the end of the course was going to be hotly contested if they all managed to get close to each other, meaning it might have been wise to try and get as far ahead of them as possible

Scootaloo began to increase her speed, hoping to get into second place with relative ease. The pony ahead of her wasn’t having any of it; increasing their speed as well to try and counter her. Scootaloo pulled back, not wanting to expel too much of her pent up energy so early on.

The filly in second place decided to keep their speed up as they quickly dashed under the filly in first place and flew up in-front of them, switching their places. Scootaloo was trying to stick to the inside of the course, hoping to gain a small edge over her competition as she turned the corners slightly faster than they did. Her window to try and get in first place was quickly getting thinner by the second, so she was going to have to make a move sooner rather than later.

Suddenly they had all passed the first lap, with Scootaloo having never moved positions since she started. She decided to give overtaking another try as she quickly and confidently flew ahead of the filly in second place, barely giving the other pony time to counter it. Only after passing them did she realize that it was Rumble, meaning they were now in last place instead of her.

The crowd continued to cheer as the only available spot in the Junior Wonderbolts was being aggressively contested for. Rainbow Dash remained confident in Scootaloo’s abilities, while Twilight seemed a little more sceptical. “You sure she has what it takes to win?” Twilight said, looking over to Rainbow Dash curiously.

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Well duh! Of course she has what it takes! She starts out slow and careful and seems to make up for it near the end. But winning doesn’t matter either way, at least not to me!” She said ignorantly, raising one of her front legs.

Twilight grinned and shook her head. “Okay, both you and I know that that isn’t anywhere close to the truth, Rainbow Dash. No one hates losing more than you do,” she said, making Rainbow Dash sigh in response.

“I can be a bit of a tight-wad sometimes, but not all the time! I can accept losing… it just takes like a week of cider and self-loathing to get over it,” Rainbow Dash said, crossing her front legs as she pouted.

Twilight rolled her eyes. “I rest my case, I suppose. Still, I hope you won’t get like that if she doesn’t win,” Twilight said, raising one of her front hooves and looking over to her.

Rainbow Dash put her hooves back on the ground. “No way! I’m more worried about what it would do to her, not me. I wouldn’t want her getting de-motivated, or disheartened,” she said, rubbing her neck slightly.

Twilight nodded, looking back over to the course. “I’m sure she won’t, she doesn’t seem like the type of pony that would just mope around,” she said, beginning to pay attention to the race again. “Oh hey, they’re nearing the end of the second lap and Scootaloo is still in second place!” She said excitedly.

The places hadn’t changed in the middle of Twilight and Rainbow Dash’s conversation, meaning Scootaloo was still in second place and Rumble was still in third. They were quickly approaching the end of the second lap, about to start the third and final lap. Scootaloo was still thinking up her plan of action. When should she try and overtake the filly in first place? Would now be a good time? Or would it only make it harder in the long run? She figured that it would be best to try now, as she didn’t want to end up with no energy to overtake at the last second.

With a sudden burst of speed, Scootaloo pushed ahead of the filly in first place, barely taking their spot just prior to passing the second lap. They passed the second lap mere seconds later, meaning that Scootaloo had went from last place to first place in just one lap. The crowd began to cheer immensely, getting very excited from there being a new filly in the lead.

Now being in first place, Scootaloo was starting to feel stressed, worried that her position would be stolen from her when she least expected it. She didn’t want to fail now, she was so close! The race was one lap away from being over, meaning that the fillies had to give it all they got if they wanted to win. It wasn’t long before Scootaloo’s place was being contested by the filly behind her, prompting Scootaloo to swerve in front of them whenever they attempted to get past.

After being denied first place numerous times, the filly began to get agitated, leading them to smacking Scootaloo’s tail with their hoof. While it was quite a minor thing, it still managed to distract Scootaloo for a split second. However, she was quick enough to swerve back in-front of the filly behind her, yet again denying them the chance to overtake.

Realizing their strategy of trying to swiftly overtake wasn’t going to work, the filly flew to the side of Scootaloo, hoping to simply out-speed her in the final stretches of the race. Scootaloo was determined to win, not wanting to give the other filly any chances to squeeze into first place. She sped up even more, almost pushing her wings to their speed limit.

Scootaloo’s concentration was interrupted as she felt her shoulder get shoved. She looked over to the other filly, realizing that they were almost resorting to pushing to try and win. She simply ignored it and pressed forward, continuing to out-speed the other filly despite the shove.

Almost immediately after she regained her concentration, she was shoved by the other filly again. She could feel her head beginning to heat up in frustration, unsure if she should start shoving them back in retaliation. Despite her frustration, she decided to keep her cool and focus on the course.

All of the stress she had previously had been replaced with determination as the finish line came in full view. Suddenly the determination had turned into anger as she felt her shoulder get shoved one more time, prompting her to react. “STOP IT!” She yelled, quickly shoving the filly back with enough force to nearly knock them off course.

The other filly instantly came back over and pushed her, making Scootaloo push them back. Many gasps had come from the spectators as a fight had broken out mid-course, with both Scootaloo and the other contestant shoving each other back and forth as they continued to fly towards the finish line. Eventually Scootaloo stopped, realizing she was wasting precious time.

She shot towards the finish line again; ignoring anything the other contestant was trying to do to deter her. She didn’t know how far away she was from the contestant that was shoving her, but she didn’t let that concern her right now. Her vision was locked dead ahead towards the finish line as she was pushing her wings to their limit, her speed increasing to its near maximum.

In a split second, she crossed the finish line. Excitement rushed through her body to the point of not being able to hold it in, suddenly shouting in glee as she began to slow down. “YES! I DID IT!” She yelled, coming to a stop and lowering herself down to the ground shortly after. She had never felt so exhilarated in her life, her heart beating so fast she was seeing stars.

She sat down to regain her energy, trying to slow her breathing back down again. She wanted to stand up and jump around, but she just didn’t have the energy for it. The crowd was going wild, and it was like music to her ears.

She had a wide grin plastered over her face as Spitfire came over to her, presumably to tell her the results. “Congratulations, Scootaloo, but I’m afraid you came in second place.”

Suddenly Scootaloo’s heart sunk into the bottom of her chest, her expression changed to that of surprise, and her whole body began to feel light. Spitfire hesitated on telling her who won. “…I’m sorry to tell you, but Rumble won,” she said, leaning to the side and pointing over towards Rumble who looked to have been celebrating with his family. “They passed you while you and the other filly were fighting,” Spitfire said.

There was a small pause in Scootaloo, and it felt like an eternity had passed in that pause. When she came back to reality, she began to cry, putting both her front hooves up to her face and covering it so Spitfire couldn’t see it. She had never felt more disappointed and embarrassed than she had ever felt in her life. She was so convinced she won, so confident with herself, only for it to be taken away because of some stupid fight that wasn’t even technically her fault. A mix of frustration and sadness was enveloping her body. Why was she so stupid to engage with the other contestant like she did? Why didn’t she just continue to ignore it like she should have done? She felt like a complete idiot.

It was hitting her in waves as she didn’t fully realize she had lost until now. Rainbow Dash was going to be so incredibly disappointed in her, especially after the fight she just had that cost her the win. Scootaloo couldn’t stop herself from crying and hiccuping in her hooves as she covered her face. She didn’t want to see anyone right now; she just wanted to be left alone.

She was a complete failure.

Author's Note:

Not over yet. (Also this chapter is long overdo)