Violet Streak

Ponyville was kind of weird. Right after my first day of school, Mom came and picked me up. She told me that we were all going to go out to eat to celebrate the move, but once we got home we saw Dad talking with a pink mare who had way too much energy. As soon as we walked through the door she ran right over and started asking questions like, “What kind of cake do you like?” and “What’s better, pin the tale on the pony or musical chairs?”

I didn’t know what was going on, but she wouldn’t stop talking with Mom and bouncing in place. I took the opportunity to slip past her and join Dad in the living room. He told me that the mare – named Pinkie Pie – was the town greeter and she had plans for us that evening. I didn’t know the town had a greeter. I didn’t even know that town greeters were a thing. So our plan of going to a restaurant for dinner was canceled. Instead, we had a huge party with half the freaking town at our house! At least it felt like half the town.

Our house was pretty small so the party was set up outside. There were balloons and streamers all over the place. And somehow, they were able to make a small stage for a band to play on with a dance floor in front of it. A big ‘Welcome’ banner stood over a buffet table full of food, snacks and one big cake in the middle.

When it got dark, Pinkie planted a bunch of standing torches in the yard so everypony could keep dancing to the music and eating from the buffet. Most of the guests were grown-ups and were all quick to talk to each other and meet my parents. As fun as a party like this could be, I didn’t see any fillies or colts my age, so I just kind of stood off to the side and ate. That is, until Pinkie Pie pranced up to me, a familiar filly riding on her back.

“Whisper!” I called out, waving them closer.

She jumped off Pinkie and tackle-hugged me to the ground. I squirmed a little at the unexpected embrace, but it did make me smile. The hug ended right away and Whisper backed up to stand next to Pinkie.

“Welcome to Ponyville!” they both cheered.

“Uh, thanks.”

Pinkie picked me up for a hug of her own. “I am so super happy for you! Only a couple days in Ponyville and you’re already making friends!” She let me down and hopped away. It took a few seconds for me to balance on the ground; her grip was tight but, luckily, not bone crushing.

Note to self: Get used to random hugs in Ponyville.

I smiled and giggled a little at Whisper. Pinkie was right, I was making friends. None of my new friends even had cutie marks yet, which meant we all had something in common right away. Even with all the pouting I’d done over the last week about moving, my friends and the party actually made me feel alright about being here. For the first time, I started to think that maybe this place wasn’t so bad after all. Maybe I really could call Ponyville home. At least for now.

“Sorry we’re late,” Whisper said as she floated a cupcake down from the buffet table. “Gear just had to finish something he was working on and Mom said we couldn’t leave without him.”

“What was he working on?” I asked as we started walking.

“I don’t know, some drawing. He does that a lot.”

Note to self: Gear likes to draw.

“So, anyway,” she said with a mouth full of frosting, “how’re you liking Ponyville so far? It’s pretty great, right?”

I thought for a second and decided to be completely honest. “It’s no Cloudsdale, but I think it’s growing on me.” I wasn’t going to say that she, Gear, and Dusty were the reasons why.

“How much of the town have you seen so far?”

“Uh, not very much. Just my house and School. We’ve only been here a couple of days.”

“We should go exploring this weekend. There’s lots to do around here and I can show you all the best places to hang out.”

I smiled. “Yeah, sounds like fun.”

I spotted Gear in the distance and pointed him out. He was all by himself and looking around like he was looking for somepony. Whisper called out and waved him over.

“Where’d you go?” he asked Whisper. “I turned around and you were just gone.”

“I went to go find Violet.”

“You could’ve told me. I looked like an idiot, walking in circles all alone.”

“You always look like an idiot.”

Gear gave her a grumpy face as Whisper swallowed the last bite of her cupcake. They stared at each other for a minute, Gear still grumpy and Whisper looking innocent. This was the second time Whisper called him an idiot. I wondered why. He didn’t seem dumb to me and Whisper didn’t seem to mean any real harm when she said it. Maybe it was just some brother/sister thing that I wouldn’t understand. I never had a brother or a sister so I didn’t really know if it was normal or not.

“So, hey,” I said, trying to change the subject and avoid a fight or something. “Where’s Dusty? Isn’t he coming too?”

Luckily, my question caught their attention. They both slowly turned toward me and Gear started to look less grumpy.

“He couldn’t make it,” Gear said.

“Oh.”

“Yeah. If he were here, then the boys would be off doing whatever it is boys do and we could actually have some fun,” Whisper added, clearly trying to annoy her brother again.

That made me wonder how often the fillies in Ponyville hung out with the colts. I didn’t see hanging out with the boys as being a big deal. I had a few colt friends in Cloudsdale. They were cool. None of them were actual coltfriends. I wasn’t interested in boys that way yet. They were just friends who happened to be colts.

Gear held his head up and smirked. “Oh please, I’m loads of fun.”

“Oh yeah? Prove it.”

If I didn’t know any better, I’d have thought somepony was listening in on their conversation because right then the background music stopped and Pinkie called out with a microphone. She yelled out and told everypony that it was time to dance and then a beat started up. It was the perfect opportunity for Gear to ‘prove’ he was fun.

“Come on,” I said with a smile. “Let’s go dance!”

The three of us ran over to the dance floor. A white unicorn with sunglasses and headphones had replaced the other band up on stage. I had no idea why she needed sunglasses at night. I don’t know what her instrument would be called – if you could even call it an instrument – but sounds came out of these two giant speakers as she moved her hooves around a big table. Ponyville really was full of weird ponies. But they were good-weird.

The dancefloor was so crammed with ponies that some had to dance on the grass next to it. Luckily, since my friends and I were smaller than everypony else, we could squeeze in easily. Although, it might have been easy to get separated if we didn’t keep an eye on each other. We worked our way to the center of the floor just as the beat really started to pick up.

I didn’t really know how to dance, but I didn’t need to. I just tried to copy what everypony else did and bobbed my head to the music and kicked my hooves one at a time. Before long, I was skipping in circles and then ducking and weaving around other ponies. I wasn’t really following the music very well, but at least I was able to keep my head bobbing in time.

Gear was even worse than me. His eyes were closed and he had big smile on his face. He kept rearing up on his hind legs and kicking his front legs. Each time he landed, he would shake his head and tail back and forth. Now and then he’d open his eyes, look serious and start stomping around in small circles. It was enough to make me giggle, but at least his stomping was mostly in time with the rhythm.

Whisper actually looked like she knew what she was doing. She would lift her left foreleg and right back leg for a couple of beats, then hop and switch to her right foreleg and left hind leg, all while slightly bobbing her head to the rhythm. When the music changed, her dancing changed with it and she started swaying from side to side and stomping one hoof at a time with every other beat. Her timing was perfect.

Even though each song sounded pretty much the same to me, I knew we had been through a few. I got really into it and started using my wings to lift me up just off the floor and I kicked my hooves from side to side. Before I knew it, I was floating up above the crowd and I closed my eyes to feel the beat better. I quickly flew from side to side, swaying with the music. When the sound changed, I kicked my hooves one at a time, trying to imitate Whisper, and slowly spiraled around. Then I flew in tight circles as if I were galloping in the air. Finally, I opened my eyes, flew up and did a backflip into a big loop. That’s when I saw the crowd watching me and cheering.

“Woo hoo! Yeah! Give it up for the filly with the moves!” the mare playing the music shouted.

I gulped before smiling awkwardly at everypony. That was kind of embarrassing. I spotted my friends still in the middle of the dancefloor and flew down to them. I hadn’t even noticed until I landed that my wings felt just a little sore. I may have pushed myself a little too hard.

“That was awesome! You were like…” Whisper said, trying to imitate my movement in the air.

“Uh, heh, thanks. I think I’ve had enough dancing for one night,” I said with heavy breath.

I started walking away from the dance floor. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t scared of the attention or anything, I just knew that I really couldn’t dance, especially in the air. If a crowd was going to cheer for me, I wanted it to be for something awesome, not my over-excited kicking and head bobbing. I giggled a bit when I saw Whisper following me and literally dragging her brother along with magic. She had a big smile on her face too. Gear didn’t even bother resisting. My friends were ridiculous. I loved it.

“So what do you want to do now?” she asked.

I thought for a minute before I came up with something. “Hey, you guys wanna see my new room?”

“Okay,” Whisper said, keeping her smile.

“Sure,” Gear said, finally able to stand and walk on his own again.

The music was quieter inside but not gone. We were the only ponies in the house and there was still some unboxing to do. But even though there were a couple of boxes, there was still enough space in my room for the three of us. I was still moving things around, but my bed, toybox and dresser were each set where I wanted them. Other than that, I had already taken all the important things out and put them in my room. My Wonderbolts poster, my Wonderbolts bedsheets and pillowcase, my Rainbow Dash doll – which sat on my pillow – and my family picture were all where they belonged. The rest could wait.

“So this is my room. Make yourself at home.”

“Huh,” Gear said as he looked around. “It’s not as girly as I thought it would be.”

“What, did you think everything would be pink? That’s not really my style.” I immediately realized and regretted that I might have just accidentally insulted my new pink friend by saying I didn’t like the color. “I mean, pink is fine and all, but green is actually my favorite color.”

Luckily, Whisper didn’t seem to notice anything wrong with what I said. She was too busy looking at the Rainbow Dash doll on my pillow. She stood on her back legs, her front hooves hanging over the side of my bed.

“Whoa,” she said quietly. “She looks so cool! Can I play with her?”

“Uh…” It wasn’t that I didn’t want her playing with it, I just didn’t want something to happen to my most treasured possession. But Whisper’s smile practically begged me to let her have a closer look. “I guess so. Just be careful, she’s really important to me.”

Whisper climbed onto my bed. “Don’t worry, I will be.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Gear said. “She has, like, a bajillion stuffed animals at home.”

“I don’t have that many.”

Gear smirked. “Yeah, you kinda do.”

“Do not!” Whisper started to get a little angry. I guess it was Gear’s turn to tease her.

“Dad had to build new shelves on the walls just to hold them all.”

“Yeah, well… so what? It’s a better hobby than your drawings.”

Their argument didn’t really seem like it would turn into an actual fight, especially since Whisper was laying on her back up on my bed holding up Rainbow Dash. But I still wanted to avoid a fight anyway. I started going through one of my boxes until I found a ball we could play with. I flew up into the air and interrupted them. “Who wants to play ball?” Both of them stopped talking and looked at me.

Gear smiled. “Yeah, sure.”

I tossed him the ball and we just started passing it back and forth. After a minute, Whisper set Rainbow Dash aside and started playing pass with us. There’s something really fun about throwing a ball around, I don’t know what.

“So… Who is she?” Whisper asked as she passed me the ball.

“Who’s who?” I asked back, tossing the ball to Gear.

“Your doll. You’ve got all this stuff with her picture on it. Who is she?”

I caught the ball again and held it. Slowly, I floated down to the floor, sat across from Gear and stared up at Whisper. Was she kidding? I couldn’t believe she didn’t know who Rainbow Dash was. The Wonderbolts are super famous. Everypony knows them.

“That’s Rainbow Dash. She’s only the best Wonderbolt ever!”

“Huh,” Whisper said. “Who are the Wonderbolts?”

“How do you not know the Wonderbolts?” Gear asked. “They are literally the best flyers in all of Equestria.”

“I don’t know… I just never heard of them before.”

“You like the Wonderbolts too?” I asked Gear excitedly. It would be so awesome to meet other fans. Maybe there would even be a fanclub. Or we could make a fanclub.

“Well I’m not exactly a fan or anything, but Dusty likes to talk about them sometimes.”

“Oh.” That was a little disappointing. But if Dusty was a fan then maybe we’d have something to talk about the next time I saw him.

“So you must really like them then, huh?” Whisper asked as we started tossing the ball around again.

“They’re the best! I wanna be just like Rainbow Dash when I grow up. You know… when I get my cutie mark.”

“You wanna be a Wonderbolt? Are you really good at flying?” Gear asked.

“Yeah. Well… kinda,” I said a little quietly, staring down at my bed. “I mean, I’ve been able to fly since I was little. Doing tricks and stuff is pretty hard though…” That was the truth. As much as I admired the Wonderbolts and their flying, I really wasn’t Wonderbolts material. The last time I tried doing a trick it didn’t work out so well. I didn’t want to sound down or anything so I perked back up and continued. “But it’s okay if my special talent isn’t amazing flying. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’ll be awesome. What do you guys think your cutie marks will be?”

“If I knew that I’d already have mine,” Gear said.

“Good point,” I said, passing the ball to Whisper. She held the ball for a moment before passing it over to Gear. There was something on Whisper’s face in that moment that I hadn’t seen before. It was quick; if I had blinked I would have missed it. A frown. That was the first time I’d seen anything other than a smile on my normally ball-of-happy friend. I really didn’t know what to say. Something was obviously wrong, but I wasn’t really sure how to help other ponies when they felt bad. Luckily, I didn’t have to because she spoke up almost right away.

“I’m not sure I even want a cutie mark.”

“What?” I asked. “Why not? Everypony wants their cutie mark. It’s, like, the thing we’re supposed to do right now.”

“I know. It’s just… Remember Sapphire?”

I felt my mane, a few bits of sand were still stuck in there. “How could I forget…”

“Well, she used to be my best friend. We even started learning magic together just six months ago.”

“Seriously?”

Whisper nodded in response.

“What happened?”

“She got her cutie mark and started being a big jerk.” Whisper looked kind of angry. But there was also a bit of sadness there. “I wasn’t there when it happened. I think it was three or four months ago. Her parents took her to Manehatten for a week-long vacation and when she got back she had her cutie mark. She wouldn’t even tell me what her mark meant or how she got it; she just kept acting all stuck-up and snooty. And then she started picking on all the others who didn’t have their cutie marks and even telling some who did that her’s was better. It was like she’d become a completely different pony! If that’s what getting your cutie mark does, then I don’t want any of it.”

She threw the ball at me pretty hard. I managed to catch it without being knocked over. I knew what it was like to lose friends – I had just moved away from my Cloudsdale friends, after all – but I never lost a friend because they started being too mean before. I couldn’t even imagine what it must have been like to have somepony go from best friend to worst enemy. I had to try to cheer her up.

“Well that’s not going to happen to any of us. Right, Gear?”

“Yeah. That was just Sapphire. A cutie mark wouldn’t change any of us.”

Whisper smiled. She hopped off my bed, walked in front of me, pulled Gear over with her magic, and hugged us both. I hugged both of them back. Gear was just waiting for it to be over.

It wasn’t long after that that the party ended and my friends had to go home. It had been a long day and I was pretty tired, but something kept me awake longer than I should have been up. I couldn’t stop thinking about what happened between Whisper and Sapphire. If getting her cutie mark really turned Sapphire into a jerk, I wondered what would happen when I got mine. I know I said I wouldn’t change, and I never thought that I would before, but now I wasn’t so sure. What would getting my cutie mark really mean?