Fog

by Door Belle

Calm

Scootaloo groaned and crawled from her bed into the dim light of a few scattered candles. One of the amenities Pinkie Pie didn't have in her cellar was comfortable bedding; the old mattresses at the Foster House weren't prime comfort themselves, but sharing a large cardboard box tipped sideways was no substitute. Every one of the filly’s bones was sore.

Diamond Tiara emerged from the box behind her, yawning. "Ugh, everything hurts," she whined. "I'd better be sleeping in a real bed tonight."

"It's no worse than sleeping on the floor." Scootaloo shook herself off and shrugged. Hopefully she didn't look as bad as she felt. "You're really spoiled, you know that?"

"Why yes, I do." Diamond grinned, perking up a little as she talked. "My daddy can afford the best of everything. I've slept on beds you could only dream of, under the warmest, heaviest comforters and quilts, on the softest—"

"I get it, already." Scootaloo rolled her eyes.

"Ahem. On the softest pillows, and roused by the gentlest alarm clocks from the finest lavender-scented sheets. Really, Scootaloo, your manners need a lot of work." Walking away only did so much when there was so little space, and Diamond had no trouble keeping up with the slow pace forced on her friend by the cellar's close quarters. Even with most of the others still sleeping, there was no escaping her voice. Not without going outside.

"Whatever."

"See what I mean?" Diamond turned away with a haughty toss of her mane.

Unfortunately, everything the pink filly had bragged about was true. Scootaloo had once joined her, Sweetie Belle, and Silver Spoon for a sleepover; even the guest beds had made for the most luxurious rest of Scootaloo’s life. If only Sweetie and Silver hadn’t kept her up for an extra hour with their whispering and giggling in the other bed.

At least, Scootaloo thought, she didn't need much time to walk off her poor sleep; she had crashed on the floor before. As one of the older fillies, and with the only crib already occupied, it had been her bed that Pa assigned to Star Dew when the colt was first brought into the Foster House. He had been so young then, and slept so much, that it was impossible to take turns as they did now. Mattresses weren't cheap, so Scootaloo had slept on the floor—and complained about it—for almost two years.

It was a few minutes before Pinkie woke, and soon the pink mare was busy rousing the rest of the foals, dragging herself from one to the next as they got up to remind them against using magic. She caught and spread a few of their contagious yawns, but there was otherwise no incident before she gathered everypony and declared it time for breakfast.

"And you get one, and you get one, and you get one," Pinkie said, her fake smile and the half-hearted pep in her voice never letting up. "Now I get one. Remember, pull the tab with your teeth—no magic! Dig in!"

Scootaloo stared down at the spoon and can of beans in front of her, then glanced over at Diamond Tiara, who was sneering at her canned corn.

"Oh no," Scootaloo whispered under her breath. "Diamond, don't..."

"And what is this supposed to be, Pinkie Pie?" Everypony but Pinkie gulped in unison, but otherwise remained silent. Nopony wanted to be subjected to one of the pink filly's tirades.

"Breakfast," Pinkie said. “You don't bring perishable food like muffins and cupcakes to a survival party, now do you?"

"What's perishable?" The voice belonged to one of the foals. Zippoorwhill, Scootaloo thought.

"It means it's been cooked or baked, instead of eaten where it grows like grass," another filly said.

“I guess I’ve heard dumber things, Longsocks, but you should still be ashamed of yourself.” Diamond Tiara groaned and rubbed her forehead. “Pinkie, everypony knows you need a diet—” somepony snickered, but nopony dared mention the hypocrisy “—but I hope you don’t expect us to eat raw vegetables and peanut butter for every meal down here.”

Pinkie opened her mouth, but hesitated when a few of the colts murmured agreement. She shut her mouth and looked down at her can, then back at Diamond, and sighed. “You shouldn’t say mean things about ponies.”

Pinkie and Diamond traded stares for almost a minute before the filly sighed and looked away. “Fine, I’m sorry I was mean to you, Pinkie Pie.”

“Good. I forgive you! But I’ll un-forgive you if I hear you being mean like that to anypony else.” Pinkie put on a half-hearted Stern Mommy Stare, but even that only lasted a moment. Scootaloo hadn’t known the mare even had one. “And I’ll do what I can for food, Pinkie promise. Now eat your corn.”

Diamond Tiara huffed. “That’s not a real Pinkie promise.”

“Real Pinkie promises use magic. I don’t want to lose the game.” Pinkie winked, but without her old energy, it was just a slow, twitching half of a blink. Scootaloo’s skin crawled, and even Diamond Tiara swallowed audibly. “I mean it, though. I promise. Now, everypony, pull the tops of your cans off just like Auntie Pinkie. Teeth only, no magic!”

Once her skin was still, Scootaloo tucked into her beans like almost everypony else. She would go without hot meals for a week if it meant Pinkie never did that thing with her eyes again.

Nopony spoke up once breakfast got under way in earnest, and as she ate, Scootaloo saw Pinkie give up on trying to feed some of the others. A few minutes later, and with just one or two spoonfuls to go, the filly’s insides reminded her that she had just eaten beans.

“Uh oh.” Scootaloo gulped and stood up. Pinkie was doing something with Rumble’s brother on the table, and fortunately, nopony else was trying to get her attention at that moment. Scootaloo picked her way over across the crowded floor.

“Pinkie.” She kept her voice low and lifted her head, glancing over the edge of the table. Rumble’s brother—she really had to get his name—lay there half-changed, and with all his crying and fighting, he clearly had a problem with Pinkie’s attempts to get a fresh diaper on him. Scootaloo’s stomach turned. Thank goodness she’d never had to do that for Star Dew.

“Ye’, ‘Cootaloo?” Pinkie said, her teeth clenched around part of one of the diapers. She didn’t look up.

“What are we supposed to do for toilets?”

Pinkie set the diaper down. “The latrine is past the boxes at the new end of the escape tunnel." Then she gave the grey colt an encouraging nuzzle. "Come on, Crackle. Please? For Auntie Pink—”

That was when the little colt cut loose in Pinkie’s face and started crying again. Scootaloo decided not to stick around, but as she made her way towards where the escape tunnel had collapsed she could have sworn she heard Pinkie sniffling.

Party games took up most of the remainder of the morning, and Scootaloo found herself alone again. Even tooling around on her scooter at the pathetic speeds adults wanted would have been more fun than another round of the Gossip Game, Sleeping Lions, or Pin the Tail on the Pony; without the scooter or even the space to gallop around while buzzing her wings and making woosh noises, the orange filly was idle. As she pawed at the earthen floor aimlessly, rearranging and erasing patterns in the dust and imagining resemblances to bat ponies, her ears flicked and caught the sound of somepony retching at the latrine.

Weird, Scootaloo thought. Beans usually gave ponies trouble at the other end.

It was a few minutes later that Diamond Tiara laid down with a tired grunt next to Scootaloo. The pink filly looked a touch pale. Or perhaps it was the light?

“Having fun playing with dirt?” Diamond’s tone was weary rather than sharp, and she had to pause and swallow. Scootaloo raised an eyebrow as the filly went on. “It figures; if you can’t fly you might as well quit pretending those wings make you so much better.”

Scootaloo’s raised brow fell flat again. “What, are you fat between the ears now too? That was awful, D.T.”

“Whatever.” Diamond rolled her eyes. “You still managed to find something even more boring than those baby games. Good—Good job.”

“Lame.” Scootaloo slipped into a softer tone. “Was that you barfing? Are you okay?”

“I’ll be fine when we get out of this hole.”

“Whatever you say.” Scootaloo sighed and turned back to her imaginary patterns in the floor. If Diamond Tiara was hiding something, the truth would come out sooner or later. It always did, especially now that they were friends. “I thought we’d be out of here by now.”

“I guess everypony’s busy. But Daddy wouldn’t just leave me down here—” Diamond’s voice started to crack, but she recovered quickly “—so maybe he just doesn’t know where I am.”

“Yeah, and Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom wouldn’t abandon me. I’m sure they’re looking for me right now.” Or so Scootaloo hoped. Maybe they would be too busy around Sweet Apple Acres and the Carousel Boutique, or maybe grown-ups were busy being dumb ponies who didn’t let fillies do things that adults might call dangerous. But Pinkie had said it wasn’t safe to go outside at all. If even she hadn’t left yet…

Scootaloo swallowed a knot. Everything was fine.

Author's Note:

I'm not happy with how long that took to write. Sorry!

Comments

[FloydienSlip]

Curiouser and curiouser...

[ThatClosetBrony]

Huh, the take you did on DT and Scootaloo, with them being frenemies, is interesting. Definitely something fresh compared to the show.

[KvAT]

Holy shit, you really write the bunker despair greatly.