“Thank you for your patience, Miss Rainweaver. I know you must be very anxious, but I wanted to double check everything before I gave you any false information.”
“It’s fine,” the yellow pegasus said quietly. “I just want to know what’s going on.”
“I see.” The doctor paused for a moment. “Will your mate be joining us, or...?”
“No, he has to work today...the thunderstorm tomorrow.”
“Of course.” He sighed. “Well, normally with news of this nature, I prefer to tell both parents at once, to better prepare them for the...unique challenges associated, but--”
“What news? What challenges?”
Another heavy sigh. “I’m sorry, Miss Rainweaver, but I’m afraid the tests have confirmed our worst fears. Scootaloo will never fly.”
Rainweaver’s eyes widened in horror. “N...never?”
“No, I’m afraid not. She has an extraordinarily rare genetic defect; in essence, she has the wings of a pegasus without the proper body structure. The wings work fine, but because she has solid bones, rather than hollow ones, they lack the power to lift her off the ground, at least for any meaningful length of time.”
“But how...how is this possible?”
“As I said, it’s very rare...and it requires a certain pairing to manifest.”
A pause. “Meaning?”
A second, longer pause. “Scootaloo’s condition is unique to children of pegasi and earth pony parents.”
“But...” Rainweaver gasped shallowly. “No...”
“Yes, Miss Rainweaver, I’m afraid so. Scootaloo is not...can not be Mr. Cloudseeker’s daughter.”
“There must be some mistake!” she said frantically. “This isn’t possible!”
The doctor shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
~~~
“Scootaloo!”
Scootaloo didn’t respond to the summons. She kept her head buried under her pillow and pretended to still be asleep.
“Scootaloo, it’s time to get up!”
The second, more urgent call went just as unheeded as the first. The orange pegasus hadn’t actually been asleep for several minutes, the vague nightmare having torn slumber from her rather rudely, leaving her breathless and wide awake, but she was nonetheless loath the leave the warmth and comfort of her bed.
The door to her bedroom rattled with an impatient knock. “Scootaloo, I said get up! You can’t be late to your first day of work.”
Scootaloo rolled her eyes behind her eyelids. Right, like you have any place to tell me not to be late. To her thorough irritation, she heard her bedroom door rattle and swing open, and her tormentor clopped into the room with an annoyed sigh. “Scootaloo, come on. Don’t do this to me...to yourself...today. You’ve got to make a good impression. Derpy pulled a lot of strings to get you hired, and it would really hurt her feelings if you didn’t take it seriously.”
“Whatever, Dash.” Scootaloo finally spoke, knowing this simple phrase would incense the other mare. She grinned silently as she heard Rainbow’s irritated grumble, indicating her apathy had had the desired effect. However, unlike most days, the cyan pegasus didn’t just turn on her hoof and stomp angrily out of the room, ranting about how Scootaloo was throwing her life away and wasting her talents. Instead, Rainbow came over to the bed and grabbed the comforter, pulling it rudely off. Scootaloo curled up even tighter under the sheet, holding it tightly.
“Come on, Scoots, you don’t have time to be such a...a teenager today.” Scootaloo could practically hear Rainbow swallowing the much more vitriolic word she had wanted to say. “This is serious, okay? Please just get up.”
Scootaloo sighed loudly as she threw the sheets back and sat up, dramatically rubbing her eyes with her hooves and stretching her broad, powerful wings. “Fine, I’m up already. Happy?” She glowered at the cyan mare, who simply shook her head.
“No, you’ve still got to get ready and get out of here. You’ve got to be at work in half an hour, and it’s going to take you ten minutes to get there as it is.”
“No it won’t!” Scootaloo said defiantly. “I can get to the post office in like three minutes. Less, if I fly.”
“Good,” Rainbow said, still not smiling. “Then you’ll be seven minutes early. Now come on, you’ve still got to shower and eat and--”
“I know, I know!” Scootaloo interrupted her. “I’m not a filly, you know.”
Rainbow snorted. “Sometimes I wonder.”
Incensed, Scootaloo racked her brain for a suitable retort, but Rainbow immediately turned back around and left the room, shutting the door behind her with slightly more force than was necessary. The orange pegasus contented herself with angry thoughts as she kicked the covers aside and stalked into her bathroom, turning on the shower and stepping in. As far as she knew, Scootaloo was the only pony her age who had their own wing of their house. To be fair, it wasn’t too much of an issue for a pegasus to add on to a cloud home, and Rainbow was unusually adept at cloud sculpting. Still, it was a mark of pride. Plus, it meant she didn’t have to deal with her babysitter any more than was necessary.
Once upon a time, Scootaloo had idolized Rainbow Dash. To her, the cyan pegasus had been the perfect role model, flawless in every way. She was fast, strong, brave, smart, and so cool that none of her geeky friends could have compared. Then she’d invited Scootaloo to come and live with her--a dream come true at the time--and all that had changed. Gone was the constant aura of awesomeness, the endless energy and confidence. Behind closed doors, Rainbow had proven to be just like any other pony. She tired out at the end of the day, she lost her temper at foalish things, she was forgetful and flawed, and most of all, she wasn’t always cool.
Sometimes, Scootaloo had discovered, Rainbow Dash could be as geeky as any of her friends. She took her job very seriously, despite her constant tardiness and dismissive comments. She kept close tabs on the latest in weather technology and theory, even though she didn’t really like reading, and often visited the library to pick up books on meteorology and climatology. Somehow, Scootaloo had always assumed that Rainbow had simply come by her weather-warping skills naturally, and discovering that the pegasus actually had to study fairly hard to keep her skills properly honed had been a nasty surprise.
She also wasn’t always brave. Scootaloo hadn’t initially noticed when she’d moved in, but as time went on, the orange filly had started to realize that Rainbow Dash wasn’t always as sure of herself as she pretended to be. She often worried about her flying skills, wondering if she was as sharp as she could be, as fast as she could be, and whether she would ever be skilled enough to join the Wonderbolts. She had applied every year for as long as Scootaloo had known her, and every year, she had been denied for one reason or another. Usually, it was as simple as there not being an opening. Sometimes, tryouts would coincide with a more important obligation, and Rainbow would have to miss the trials. Most of the time, though, Rainbow would simply trip up on the tryout. The cyan pegasus was prone to bouts of self-doubt, and performing in front of judges sapped her confidence. As a result, she would perform poorly, and once again be turned away. She would always come home from these tryouts with tear tracks on her cheeks and a thick voice, trying and failing to hide the bitter disappointment from her young charge. Scootaloo had made it something of a ritual to comfort her surrogate big sister every time she’d come home from these trips, meeting her at the door with a hopeful smile, then immediately transitioning to a sympathetic hug when she surmised that Rainbow had, once against, failed to make the cut. As she grew older, the ritual had steadily lost its luster as Scootaloo became more and more disappointed that her idol couldn’t perform under pressure. Eventually, she had stopped meeting Rainbow at the door altogether, unwilling to weather the stress of supporting the older mare, especially since it was essentially her own fault.
And so Scootaloo had slowly lost her admiration for the pegasus, and had simply settled into seeing her more as a nosy babysitter than an idol. Even though Scootaloo had her own room, the rest of the house was definitely Rainbow’s, and the tired mantra of “As long as you live in my house, you’ll follow my rules!” had become almost a weekly announcement in the cloudhome. Scootaloo certainly couldn’t disagree, but she could retort with the threat of leaving. “I did fine on my own before, and I can do it again!” Truthfully, living on her own again was the last thing Scootaloo wanted to do, but it seemed that Rainbow wanted it even less than she did, so claiming she was about to run away did occasionally get her to back down. Otherwise, the two pegasuses mostly lived in a tense stalemate that had existed since Scootaloo had gotten her cutie mark, and seemed unlikely to relax anytime soon.
Her cutie mark. Scootaloo glanced down at the mark, sharply defined in the wet fur on her flank. Scootaloo had always hoped, however foalishly, that when she got her cutie mark, it would turn out to be something related to flying. Even if she was physically unable to fly under her own power, there were plenty of other ways to take to the sky: Twilight Sparkle had her balloon, hang gliding was a popular pastime among other earthbound ponies, and Pinkie Pie even had that bizarre flying contraption. Unfortunately, the winged black tire on her flank that had appeared shortly after she had won a race against Rainbow Dash--the other pegasus in the air, Scootaloo on her scooter on the ground--had put all those lofty dreams to rest. She had realized that even though she couldn’t fly, she could still move just as fast as anypony on the ground, so long as she had her scooter and her magnificent, powerful wings.
In celebration, Apple Bloom, who had gotten her crossed hammer-and-screwdriver cutie mark a few weeks earlier, had built her a new scooter, much sturdier, larger, and faster. It had a place for Scootaloo to rest her flanks on so she didn’t have to stand the whole time, and it sat on large rubber tires that allowed her to lean into curves for better maneuverability. Apple Bloom had called it a Scootazoom. Scoot had simply called it perfect. Its maiden ride had been with the three Crusaders sitting on it, all around Ponyville, just like old times. It was much faster than her old scooter, and seemed to better fit the much louder, deeper sound that her wings now made as they violently beat the air, propelling the vehicle forward. Of course, it was also much heavier, which only served to further strengthen the pegasus’ already powerful wings. Unfortunately, nothing seemed to make any headway towards allowing her to fly.
A sudden rapping at the bathroom door shook her out of her reverie. “Time’s up, Scoot! You’ve gotta get going, or you’ll be late, no matter how fast you are!”
“I’m coming!” Scootaloo shouted back, furiously slamming the water off. She quickly dried off and stomped out of the bathroom. Rainbow had already returned to the living room, and was standing there tapping an impatient hoof when the orange filly came in.
“Finally!” the mare said. “Now come on, it’s already half past seven, and you’re supposed to be there at eight.” Scootaloo sighed theatrically as Rainbow fussed around her, patting away flyaway hairs in her mane and stuffing a hay-and-buttercup sandwich under her wing. “That’s your breakfast, and I asked Derpy to take you out to lunch, so don’t forget!”
“I won’t,” Scootaloo groaned, rolling her eyes. Rainbow didn’t react as she pushed her towards the front door.
“Work hard, stay safe, behave,” she added emphatically.
“I will, I will.” Scootaloo pushed open the front door and stepped out into the frigid early morning air.
“I lo--uh...I’ll see you tonight, Scoot!” Rainbow called after her, stuttering over the second word. Scootaloo groaned again. It was so embarrassing; she wasn’t a filly anymore, but Rainbow still said it sometimes. She’d started a couple months after Scootaloo had first moved in. It sounded awkward at first, but after a while, it had become ritual. When she dropped Scootaloo off at school, she would say, “I love you, Scoot!” Scootaloo would always beam and respond, “I love you too, Dash!” When she was younger, it had meant the world to her, but as she’d grown up, she’d slowly grown tired of the exchange. It was juvenile, she decided. Even if it was true, it wasn’t the kind of thing they had to say every day, was it? Besides, it was embarrassing. None of her friends’ parents said ‘I love you’ every time they left the house, and Rainbow wasn’t even her mother. She’d managed to convince Rainbow to knock it off, but every so often, the blue pegasus would forget and slip up. It wasn’t a big deal, but it still irked her a little bit.
Even so, she shrugged it off. “See ya, Dash,” she said, and the door closed behind her. She took a deep breath of the crisp, high-altitude air. She spread her wings and smiled as the wind whipped through the stiff feathers, imagining herself soaring effortlessly through the sky, flapping her wings, feeling the wind rushing by her ears...unpowered gliding was a pale imitation of true flight, she knew. It was the best alternative she had, but it was almost too close to enjoy. Every so often, as she sailed silently down through the air, she would catch a particularly strong updraft, and she would ride it to its apex, relishing the feeling of gaining altitude at will. But then the draft would lose strength, and she’d return to slowly, inexorably gliding back to earth. It was a bittersweet exchange, but she longed for it all the same. In fact, she realized, it had been some weeks since she’d glided down off the cloudhome’s porch. The filly glanced back at the closed front door. Rainbow Dash would be furious if she wasted time flying around when she had to be somewhere. The orange pegasus grinned wickedly. Perfect.
Taking the sandwich from under her wing and stuffing it whole into her mouth, she took two strong steps towards the edge of the cloud, snapped her wings to their full span and leaped into the abyss.
