No... No, do something! Do something!
"DO SOMETHING, PLEASE!!" The scream resounded in the hallway of the home.
Martha, a middle-aged mare, burst from her room and galloped as quickly as she could to the door at the end of the hallway. Once at her destination, she knocked urgently on the wood. "Scootaloo? Are you okay in there?" There was no reply other than soft sobs and the occasional sniff. The brown Earth pony gingerly pushed open the door of the room, sticking her head inside. "Scoots?"
The first thing Martha noticed was a lump on the bed in the center of the room, with a shaking lump under its cover. The mare grew sympathetic as she slowly walked across the wooden floor and gently touched the lump under the blanket. "It's okay Scootaloo, Mom's here..."
"You're not my mother!" the lump shouted. Scoots then removed the covers from over her head, opening her bloodshot, swollen eyes wide and screamed, "My mom is dead! Just go away!" Regardless of the rude calls, Martha pulled the filly close to herself and rocked back and forth.
"Sh... I'm here, Scoots. I'm here..."
Tears fell from Scootaloo's eyes as she cried softly, "Rainbow Dash... I... need to see Rainbow Dash..."
Martha nodded, gently releasing Scootaloo and running for the house phone, dialing the numbers of a certain cyan pegasus as quickly as one hoof could.
***
Brrrrrrrring! Brrrrrrrring! In the dead of the night, the comfortable snoring pony sprawled out on her soft cloud bed was suddenly awakened by the harsh ring of her telephone. The pegasus jumped up, obviously startled. "Ah! Twenty-seven!"
But when aware of her surroundings--and realizing she was no longer in math class--Rainbow Dash reached for the phone receiver, picking it up and raising it to her ear. "H-hello?"
It was Martha, Scootaloo's foster mother. She needed Dash to come over.
"Come over? In the middle of the night? Sorry, Marth--"
Scootaloo had been crying in her room for quite some time and Martha couldn't calm her down. She had called for Rainbow; she wanted-- no, needed to tell her something.
"Wait, Scoots? Of course I'll come!"
Martha thanked Rainbow, and the phone was hung up. Dash headed out, in flight that was a bit unsteady from sleepiness, but she wasn't going to let her number one fan down.
Rainbow Dash arrived at the grounded home, and knocked. Surely enough, the mare she'd been talking to just minutes before answered. "Where's Scoots, Martha?"
Martha motioned for Dash to come inside. "She's in her room at the end of the hallway." Both ponies made their way to the filly.
Rainbow Dash opened the door. She was greeted with a quiet but angry, "Go away."
"Scoots, it's me."
Scootaloo lit up. "R-Rainbow Dash?"
"I'm here, Scootaloo." Dash wrapped her hooves around the filly and held her close. Martha smiled, knowing that Rainbow would have this handled, and closed the door slowly and silently. The blue Pegasus heard the orange one's soft cries, and whispered in her ear. "Sh... It's okay... Don't cry..."
"No..." Scootaloo pushed away. "No... It's not okay!" She proceeded to curl up into a ball, rocking to-and-fro and sobbing and mumbling. "He just stood there... He just stood there..."
Dash, despite Scootaloo's decline earlier, embraced the filly tight and rocked with her for what felt like hours. Eventually, the sun started to rise, and both ponies had fallen asleep, Scoots still in the safe hooves of Rainbow Dash.
***
Scootaloo awakened, but she found she could not open her eyes. They were too swollen from her relentless weeping. The poor filly, thinking she had gone blind, started to cry again, but no tears fell. Only small sounds came. The only image that she remembered was him. He was laughing. He knew what was going on, and yet...
He just stood there.
"Scoots?" the orange pegasus heard her friend's voice and once again tried to open her eyes, but once again to no avail.
"Rainbow Dash?"
Dashie nodded. "Yes, Scoots. I'm here. I've been here."
"I... can't see."
Rainbow turned Scootaloo's face toward herself and saw the dried yellow substance caked on the filly's eyes. "Here, Scoots. Let me take care of that." A rectangular box sat on the foal's nightstand. Taking a white tissue from it, the cyan Pegasus removed the crust. It hurt Scootaloo a little bit, and she whimpered a little, but when it was over, the filly could see once again, and the image burned on the inside of her eyelids faded, and the smile of her idol replaced it.
Scoots smiled sadly. "Th... Thank you." Rainbow then set her hoof on the young pony's shoulder.
"Scoots... I want to know..." Dash's face grew solemn. "What happened last night?"
Scootaloo's eyes once again grew wet. "It... It was a dream."
Rainbow was confused. A dream? That was what this was all about? But the pegasus maintained calmness. "What was it about?"
"W-well... there was me..."
"Yeah..."
"And some stallions..."
"Uh-huh..."
"And... a-and..." Scoots paused. "My..."
Dash leaned forward a bit. "Yes?"
"My... brother."
Brother?! Scoots had a sibling? Dash had had no idea. "You..." the mare paused, still taking in the new information. "You have a brother?"
Scootaloo became angry. "I hate him. I hate him with all I've got."
Now, usually, when a filly says "hate", she means she just doesn't like something for a little bit of time, like if one of her friends told a cold in their class that she liked him, or something along those meager lines. But when Scoots had breathed the word, it was genuine. Dash could tell. Something had happened for this to happen. Something bad. More than bad.
"Why, Scoots? Why do you hate him?"
"He.." Scootaloo's voice was overcome by emotion. "He... just stood there..."
Rainbow Dash shook her head, not quite understanding. "You keep saying that, Scootaloo. What does it mean?"
Scootaloo took a deep breath. Should she tell Rainbow Dash? Could she trust her?
...Yes. Of course Scootaloo could trust her. Rainbow Dash was the most trustworthy pony the filly knew. Rainbow Dash was like her big sister. No, she was her big sister. Scoots had silently accepted that. So, the foal started to tell her story.
As she did, the images played in her mind of the most scarring memory of her life.
***
"Hey, Scoots," the tall stallion said in a mock-loving voice. The filly backed up until she hit the grimy brick wall of the alley. "You wanna play a game?"
Scootaloo wouldn't be fooled. She saw the knife strapped in the stallion's belt. And Scoots wasn't stupid, even though she was only seven. "No!" she cried. "I don't wanna play a game with you!"
Then three more stallions appeared, each laughing darkly and grouping with the first. Lastly, a stallion Scootaloo was familiar with stepped out of the shadows. "Hi, sis."
"What..." Scootaloo was perplexed. "What are you doing?"
The first colt took the knife from his belt with his teeth. "We want to play with you, Scootaloo. But, we were having a hard time deciding what game to play. So we decided to let you choose."
"What?! No! I don't want to play!" The foal turned to her brother, who wasn't exactly smiling, but he didn't look against what his friends were implying. "Do something, bro!"
He did nothing.
The first stallion then lit up. "Oh! I know!" He took another step forward, the light of the moon glistening off of the weapon between his yellowed teeth. "How about we give you a cutie mark?" His companions all laughed, except for Scootaloo's brother, who was still emotionless.
The filly tried to run away, but was grabbed by two of the other colts, who held her in place with her fore-hooves. She screamed to her brother, "Do something! Don't let them do this! Please!"
No reply from the colt, who only shifted on his hooves a little.
The knife was slowly brought closer to the filly's bare orange flank. But just as it was about to hit her flesh, she jerked her body, and the sharp blade instead cut deep into her left wing, and Scootaloo was certain it had breached the bone of the wing. The limb hung over, attached only by perhaps one tendon. Blood started to flow. Scoots shrieked in agonizing pain.
Scootaloo's brother finally started to step forward, but stopped and backed up again. Scoots kept screaming, and the three stallions that had proposed this sick game trotted away, shouting, "Let's get out of here, quick!"
Only Scootaloo's brother remained. The filly stopped screaming and simply fell to the ground, falling unconscious from shock. And he just stood there. He stood there, doing nothing. But finally, he exited the alley in a full gallop.
Scoots was left there alone for a couple hours until two adult ponies found her and put her in their carriage, taking her to the hospital as fast as they could. But all Scoots paid attention to as she drifted off into unsettled sleep was how her brother didn't even care to stop his friends. Even for his own sister.
Now there was no pony left to care for Scoots. She was all alone.
***
"Scoots..." Rainbow swiped a tear from her eye. "I... I had no idea."
Scootaloo sighed. "Of course you didn't. I didn't tell any pony the whole thing. Not even the doctors."
"That's awful!" Rainbow Dash proclaimed. "Your brother should have done something! You're his sister!"
"But... there's more." Scoots added, with obvious reluctance. "I was rushed to the hospital, and... they amputated my wing." The filly started to cry again. "They replaced it with a prosthetic. But they said that my fake wing couldn't sustain flight. Rainbow..." Scootaloo buried her face in her hooves and sobbed. "I'm... I'm never going to fly!"
Dash hung her head. But then she raised it and boldly said, "You're wrong, Scootaloo."
Scoots raised her head. "W-what?"
The cyan pegasus jumped off the bed, landing gracefully on the floor. "You're going to fly, Scootaloo. The doctors will find a way. They have to!"
"And what if they don't?" Scootaloo crossed her fore-legs. Dash wrapped her own fore-leg around the filly.
"Then we'll find a way." The mare "booped" the filly's nose. "Together."
The two ponies embraced.
From that day on, Scootaloo was happier, with less pressure on her. Sure, there were moments when she still remembered her inability, but at least she had told some pony she trusted, so it wasn't just on her chest alone. Dashie supported her all the way.
Scoots always did wonder what had happened to her brother. Perhaps if her showed up again, she would forgive him. Maybe she'd forget all he didn't do.
Or maybe the stallion that passed her by on the streets of Ponyville everyday would finally gather the courage to tell her how sorry he truly was.
