The Pursuit of Pride

by The Real Steel

Chapter 3

The night passed uneventfully for rainbow Dash and soon the ever magnificent light of Celestia's sun shot through her windows. The sunlight illuminated the lazily sleeping sky blue mare who was currently sprawled out underneath her sheets, her limbs poking out from underneath them as she rested her head sideways against the pillow.

Soon a pair of blue eyelids peeled back to reveal the sleeping mare's rose colored cerise irises, highlighting her tiredness with their own personal droopiness before with a loud yawn Dash rose from her bed.

She made her way away from her rainbow colored bed and towards the shower, leaving her awesome rainbow colored bed behind her and stepping inside the shower. Turning on the hot faucet since she enjoyed hot showers more than cold ones she began to hear the soft pitter patter of water on tile echo through her bathroom.

As the comfortingly warm water ran through the cyan pegasus's mane and coat drenching them and laying them flat against her body she began to think of a very special day that came in a few months, letting out a little squeal of excitement, almost dropping her soap in the process.

Coming up in three months was a try out for the most prestigious team of pegasi the land of Equestria had ever known, namely, The Wonderbolts. It was Dash's dream to be a member of that team and her shot to try out was finally coming up, she could see it in her minds eye. The Wonderbolts, performing their well coordinated aerial missions in those awesome blue flightsuits with a certain rainbow maned pegasus mare flying right beside them.

As Dash washed and cleaned herself all over she swore that she would make it at the try outs. She needed to make it. This was her one shot or so she thought. The 'Bolts rarely held try outs and Dash wanted to impress them a lot.

Once she was finished and had turned the shower off she dried herself off and headed downstairs. Soon she found her pet Tank and gave him some food and water before heading to the kitchen and fixing herself a glass of orange juice. Applejack hated her for liking orange juice more than apple juice but Dash didn't care.

Soon she was flying through the air, enjoying the warm breeze of Ponyville in mid summer, her mane quickly drying out more from the wind as she flew over the town of Ponyville. She was busy just enjoying her day when suddenly she was stopped in her mid air tracks by the voice of a mare calling her name.

The sky blue pegasus looked down to see a dark yellow coated mare with slightly grey hair wearing glasses glaring at her and waving her down. With a sigh Dash descended towards the ground, landing soon in front of her and rolling her eyes.

“Yeah Mayor Mare, what do you need from me?”

Mayor mare fixed the arrogant pegasus with an angry glare and jammed her hoof up towards the sky which was filled with puffy white clouds

“Do you see that Miss Dash? Do you see all those clouds?”

“Yeah I see 'em, what about it? They're just clouds like any other.”

Mayor Mare bit her tongue to not lose her temper with the arrogant mare before explaining with a sig.

“Rainbow Dash, you are our weather patrol leader. Your only job around here is to keep the skies clear, why can't you do something so simple?”

“Hey! I can keep these skies clear, in fact I could clear them in ten seconds flat but my team is being lazy! Besides, I have been busy with my own stuff Mayor. If it is going to cause such a big hassle then I will deal with it, sheesh.”

With that Dash took off towards the sky and began using her speed to clear one cloud, then two, then three, then four and soon the whole sky was clear in record time before she flew back down and smirked at Mayor Mare, thinking her speed had once again saved her flank.

“I already know all about your speed Rainbow Dash and your ability to clear the skies so fast but do you realize that if you can't do your job I will have to fire you? This is your last warning Rainbow Dash, do not fail again or I will unfortunately have to find somepony who actually cares enough to do their job correctly.”

With that Mayor Mare turned and began walking towards town hall, leaving a wide mouthed and stammering Rainbow Dash in her wake. She was having problems processing what she had just heard, was she seriously being threatened with unemployment because she had been lazy? Dash didn't want to lose her job so she decided very easily that she had better start clearing the skies more frequently. Regretting her earlier actions Dash didn't even have a cloud to sulk on in the immediate vicinity.

Dash soon recovered from her shock induced stupor like state and took off for the skies that always seemed to welcome her with warmth and love. She needed to think for now and she had already cleared the skies for the day so she made her way over to her cloud home. She had nothing at all better to do with her day than to to spend it doing exactly what got her in this predicament. Being lazy.

Dash flopped backwards on her bed, she was still processing all the implications of the short conversation. She was being threatened with joblessness if she didn't start doing her job more frequently. She began to wonder what her future would hold if she got fired from the only job she had ever known since she arrived in Ponyville after leaving Cloudsdale and the day slowly began to work its way from early morning to noon in the town that bustled around without the sky blue mare to take part in it.

At that exact moment as Rainbow Dash was wondering what was going to happen to her future Scootaloo was back in detention once more being told what her future held if she kept up her current course of action.

Reform was towering over the teenage mare, staring down into her eyes with his own, shaking his head in disappointment as his stern, experienced voice spoke out to her

“Scootaloo, if you do not pay attention to me and Cheerilee as well as the rest of your teachers then you are going to have an unnecessarily hard life. You are effectively wasting your life by acting like a delinquent.”

As had become her standard response to the teachers who tried to run her life Scootaloo scoffed at him and chuckled, sticking her tongue out at him and smirking before mocking him. She spoke in a very arrogant manner to the teacher, making her voice as annoying as she possibly could on purpose.

“Ha, when are you silly teachers gonna learn? Scootaloo makes her own future, not you! I am going to be great just like Rainbow dash one day and neither you or Cheerilee will be able to stop me from soaring through the sky and making my dreams come true. And all your stupid book smarts and schooling isn't gonna help me be a world class flier so shove off.”

Reform opened his mouth to speak but gave up for the day, he already had a headache from Scootaloo and the arguing they had done since early this morning. All the other mares and colts were laughing their heads off at his failure to tame the free spirited and wild Scootaloo.

“Alright class, so the Great Equestrian Migration..............”

Scootaloo rolled her eyes as she droned him out, doing what had become a habit when she was in detention. She was staring out the window, surprised by the lack of the regular rainbow trail that flew through Ponyville belonging to her mentor and idol Rainbow Dash. This concerned Scootaloo far more than whatever it is that reform was talking about and she decided she would go see Dash after school was out.

After about 4 more hours and 3 more bickering sessions with Reform the school bell finally rung to signify the end of the school day and as she hopped out of her chair to leave the detention classroom Scoots was stopped by reform. She sighed and walked over to his desk, tapping her hoof impatiently, wondering what he wanted as she sighed towards her.

“Scootaloo I ma going to have to tell your parents about your behavior and hope they can make it through that thick skull of yours. I hope you don't let your bright future go to waste Scootaloo but I have done all that I can to try to help you, now it is in other ponies hooves.”

Scootaloo was inwardly not looking forward to talking to her parents about this, she knew that it would be harder to dismiss her folks than the teachers. Outwardly however she showed all that she had inherited from Dash and kept her cool, scoffing at Reform and laughing.

“Yeah okay, whatever teach. Am I free to go now or are you going to keep me here against my will?”

“No Scootaloo, you may go. And I hope you think on what I have said.”

Without another word Scootaloo left the school and a smile crossed her previously defiant face as she flew towards where she and Rainbow normally trained.

Dash had spent a good portion of the day sulking and talking to herself about what had happened early in the morning, silently kicking herself for letting it get this bad before she decided around midday that she would head to the field to train.

With her sky blue wings flapping Dash soon arrived at the training grounds with no thoughts of Scootaloo in her mind and no desire to fly, she simply hovered in mid air lost in her own thoughts.

Dash began to think of other things she could do if she got fired from her weather patrol job, she had no other job experience though. She had left Cloudsdale right out of flight school and came to Ponyville, wanting to escape her parents who wanted to make her something she wasn't. So the independent and free Rainbow Dash bolted out of Cloudsdale and rose to fame in Ponyville, becoming a hero and an icon as well as the best young flier in Equestria.

Still though, for all of her accolades and her pronouncements of awesomeness this job was all Dash could do without needing instruction which would ruin her rep and it was the only thing giving her enough bits to stay afloat. She simply couldn't afford to be laid off from her weather patrol duty and with that being at the forefront of her thoughts she began to go down a dark and dangerous mental path which she was pulled from when she heard the sound of approaching wings.

The source of the disturbance became known shortly as the orange coated, teenage apprentice of Rainbow Dash soon came to their training grounds and over to her mentor, smiling wide at seeing her before she noticed that Dash didn't seem herself and her face became a mask of concern.

“Rainbow Dash? Are you alright? You look a little down in the dumps.”

Dash gave her most reassuring smile to her young friend, nay, her sister and puffed her chest out in pride before jamming a hoof at it and proudly speaking to her.

“Ha! Are you kidding me Scoots? Rainbow Dash, down in the dumps? Never! I am feeling just fine today squirt, so you ready to begin training?”

Scootaloo entertained the thought that Dash wasn't telling her the truth for a second but since she had no reason to doubt her mentor she eagerly shook her head, happy to once again be training with Dash.

“Yeah Rainbow Dash! Let's do it!”

With a wide smile on her face and a boatload of eagerness Scootaloo waited to be told by Dash what she would be training on today and Dash decided to give her something simple that would leave her to her thoughts. She told Scootaloo to practice increasing her max speed and that she would be watching to which the orange teen gave a salute and took off like an orange and purple coated bullet.

As Dash watched Scoots push her body to the absolute limit desperately trying to increase her speed she once more returned to her thoughts. She was still watching Scootaloo and calling out the occasional compliment but for the most part she was looking as if were from a great distance away, her minds eye being elsewhere.

After about an hour of flying Scootaloo had reached her limit and made her way over to Dash who seemed lost in thought, her mind was elsewhere but that didn't stop her from giving Scootaloo some very impressed and deserved praise.

“Now that was some impressive flying Scoots, keep that up and you may be as good as me one day. I think that is enough training for today, you seem to have reached your limit. Lets get you home alright?”

“Okay Rainbow Dash!”

And so they left the site of their daily training, master and apprentice, heading towards the house that belonged to Scootaloo's parents. As they drew closer Dash got the distinct feeling something was wrong though. Smoke was rising from the area and she bolted ahead of Scootaloo to investigate and what she saw made Dash's heart leap into her throat, blocking her tears. She had an absolutely mortified look on her face and her body didn't move from it's position in the air.

Scootaloo soon caught up with her and fixed her with a questioning look noticing the stare and the terror on her face.

“Rainbow Dash? What's...........wro-”

The word froze in Scootaloo's mouth as she saw exactly what was wrong, her house was one fire and she couldn't see her parents. With tears in her eyes Scootaloo bolted towards the house, going to head right in. Dash quickly followed after her and tried to hold her back as the flames licked at the world outside, eager to consume any ponies foolish enough to get too close.

With some difficulty Dash managed to bring the teen back with her to the crowd and Scootaloo began making inquiries as to whether or not anypony had seen her parents come out, they all shook their heads that they had not. Apparently there had been a gas leakage in the house and it had caught fire with her parents inside.

Dash and Scootaloo hugged as they both watched the flames eat the house from the inside out until the fire ponies arrived to put it out and Dash took Scootaloo home with her. She knew that she of all ponies would need to be there for the young mare who stayed uncharacteristically silent through the entire trip to Dash's cloud home.

When they had arrived Dash took Scootaloo into the home and closed the door, she immediately began bawling as they arrived and Dash took a seat on her couch, bringing Scootaloo with her. They began talking with each other with dash trying her best to comfort Scootaloo.

“Why Rainbow. Why mom and dad? Why now? What did they ever do to deserve this?”

Dash had to force a lump down her throat as she hugged the young teen close.

“I don't know why Scoots but I do know that your parents didn't deserve what they got. I am sure they are ina much better place now, enjoying t=each others company forever and they will be watching over you forever from now on kiddo.”

*After her words had time to sink in Scootaloo dried her eyes and nodded resolutely to Rainbow dash, hugging the older mare tight as she spoke.

“I hope you are right Rainbow Dash, I hope you're right.”

With that statement said Scoot felt the stress and shock of the day finally get to her and fell asleep on the couch. Her eyes closed as tears rolled down her cheeks, her hooves around Dash and the older mare allowing it and hugging the mare she saw like a little sister close until sleep took her as well.

Scootaloo woke up with nightmares more than few times, only screaming the first time and only briefly until she realized that Rainbow Dash had her and she was safe. Dash for her part kept a constant vigil over Scootaloo, never breaking the hug that night and desperately wishing she could do something for her. Soon though after about the fifth time Scootaloo woke them both up they both fell into a fitful sleep that they would stay in till the next day.

Comments

[Rarity Belle]

1786344 You are welcome darling. And I shall do both yes.