• Published 2nd Apr 2013
  • 13,304 Views, 404 Comments

To Be Young and Stupid - Crowley



Apple Bloom enlists your help in gaining her Cutie Mark. Adorable hijinks ensue.

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Part 5

The wooden door opens with a quick, clean squeak, revealing the insides of the clubhouse. It’s as bad as you thought; truly, you had stepped into a nightmare of pink curtains and… and…

Wait. No, it’s just the curtains for the rough-hewn windows that are pink. Everything else is pretty much inconsequential. Look, the floor-boards are just a pale green and the walls are just a plain sandy colour, all of which is lit up by a couple of plain lamps hoisted towards the ceiling by a rope.

Two other ponies’ heads turn towards the door as it swings open. Apple Bloom’s partners-in-crime, Sweetie Belle, the dainty white unicorn, and Scootaloo, the rough-and-tumble pegasus of the group. Scootaloo’s short mane is obscured by her crash helmet as she holds her scooter. Sweetie Belle is busy making huge letters on a large piece of cardboard.

There’s not a single doll or tea-party set in sight.

“Hey, Apple Bloom!” the pegasus beams as the earth pony leads you inside, “We’ve just had this really cool idea! See, you and Sweetie Belle can charge other ponies to watch me pull off tricks on my scooter, then we’ll be able to draw a profit and improve the clubhouse! We might even get Cutie Marks in showmanship!”

Sweetie Belle, as if to punctuate Scootaloo’s idea, holds up her finished cardboard sign; the words “See Scootaloo the Splendid!” are scrawled in big, eye-catching letters.

“That’s a great idea!” the southern filly says before turning to you, “Could ya be a pal and help me set up a few ramps and such for Scootaloo? I’ll give you a real tour of the clubhouse later, I promise!”

You don’t agree, exactly, but nor do you refuse; you’re still trying to piece together why a group of little girls own a base-of-operations and are now attempting crazy ideas that you’d never even consider. Boy, were you wrong about them.

*******

“Just a little further… and… perfect!”

At Apple Bloom’s command, you drop another wooden ramp outside the clubhouse, aligning it perfectly with a few others that had been set up. To you, it looked a lot more like an accident waiting to happen rather than a carefully made arrangement for a show.

“Are you sure Scootaloo can handle this?” you ask, counting one potential risk after another in your head. The pegasus in question is practicing a few rounds on her scooter, weaving between the ramps rather than actually going up them. That’s probably the safest bet for now.

“Sure she can,” Apple Bloom waves it away, “It was her idea after all! Besides, she’s had a ton more falls than anypony else here! She’s a tough gal.”

“Really?”

“Of course she is!” Apple Bloom grins, “See that thorn bush with the purple clump of tail-hair in it? Scootaloo. See that tree with the tooth stickin’ out of it? Scootaloo…”

The stunt-filly in question interrupts; “I think you can stop pointing out every single time I’ve crashed, Apple Bloom…”

“…See that nearby fence with a hole the size of Scootaloo’s head in it-?”

“Cut it out!”

“I get the picture.” you put an end to the potential conflict between filly and filly before it arises, “When’s this scooter show actually starting?”

“As soon as the crowd arrives, of course!” Sweetie Belle pipes up. Her cheery, sunshine-filled face is then replaced by one hit by a stark epiphany; she was supposed to go into Ponyville and advertise the event, not sit around and watch it being set up.

“Uhh… pardon the delay?” she squeaks before darting off to do her special duty as a Cutie Mark Crusader Advertising Specialist. Hooray.

Scootaloo groans in exasperation, before flaring up her wings. “Whatever. I’ll be practising my awesome moves while we’re waiting, you two wanna watch?”

*******

As the late afternoon starts to slowly turn a sunset-orange, Sweetie Belle returns with a respectable audience. Mostly other kids from school that had been convinced to come out and play with her. Still, a crowd’s a crowd, and Scootaloo’s more than happy to shred up and down the makeshift ramps and jumps to the “ooh”s and “aah”s of the fellow young ponies.

When her final stunt - dropping down from the balcony of the Crusader clubhouse onto a ramp and gathering enough speed to launch herself cleanly through the branches of a tree - is landed without a hitch, the crowd make slowly disperses after the show.

The first ones to leave were Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon; they were only there in the first place so, in the event of Scootaloo badly crashing, they could churn out a smarmy insult or two. But since that wasn’t the case, they just decided to slink away. They’d have probably asked for their bits back, if they'd donated any in the first place.

“Ya know what,” Apple Bloom says as you’re helping her dismantle the ramps before dark. The other two members of her club had retired home due to curfew, but you agreed to help clear away the rest. “You’re a good kid. We’d have probably let you join the Cutie Mark Crusaders if you hadn’t already gotten yours.”

You dump the dismantled ramp by the clubhouse’s tree, where it promptly crumbles to pieces. How lucky was Scootaloo, again!? “Thanks,” you reply, “I enjoyed today more than I thought I would. It was… different.”

“Whaddya mean by that?” the filly gives you a strange look over her own pile of dismantled wood. Honestly, you weren’t sure how to respond to her in a way that wouldn’t seem insulting.

“Well, I thought that hanging out with girls would be more… I dunno…” you bite your lips at the prospect of finishing the sentence, “girly.”

“Girly?” she raises an un-flattered eyebrow, “Whatever gave you that idea? My pink bow? Sweetie Belle? The fact that you’ve never hung out with girls before?”

“All three of those, I guess. I just made the assumption. We’re cool now, right?”

“Don’t worry, I ain’t insulted. It’s just hard to accept being called girly when we’ve been up and down Ponyville bowlin‘, zip-linin‘, bungie-jumpin’, water skiin’ and Celestia-knows-what.”

She has a point. “I didn’t know that before, though,” you reply, “but I’d love to hang out and do more of…” you gesture around, pointing out the ramps that surround you both, “this sorta thing.”

“You really mean that? Even if you ain’t a Crusader?” inexplicably, she seems to perk up at the premise of you being around more often. A moment later, she catches herself. “I mean, uh, sure you can tag along with us. But only if you apologise!”

“For what?”

“For callin’ us girly.”

“But you’re all g-” You know what? It’s better not to rise up against Apple Bloom. The one thing you’ve learnt today is that she’s the single most stubborn filly you’ve ever had the misfortune to encounter.

You resign to just doing what she says for now. The sooner you get yourself home, the better. “Fine. I’m sorry for thinking you were all a bunch of frilly fillies, Apple Bloom.”

“Aaand?” she smirks.

“And the clubhouse isn‘t girly either. And it's very well-made.”

“Aaand?” Oh jeez, is she really doing this?

“And Scootaloo doing those tricks was pretty cool too.”

“Aaand?” her smile widens. You don’t want to play this game anymore. You have a train set and a warm bed calling you.

“And… I dunno, I’m looking forward to all the awesome things that I’ll do with you guys in the future?”

“Aaand?” You know what? Screw this.

“And that your butt’s so big it can pin down a colt the same age as you.”

“Aaa- wait, what!?” Bursting into laughter, you turn on your hooves and run, with Apple Bloom herself giving chase, “C’mere!”

Despite her eventually catching you and demonstrating her devastating butt-pinning powers on you against your will until you apologised, it was a pretty good Tuesday.