"Rainbow Dash is the coolest pony ever!" Scootaloo ranted. Sweetie Bell and Applebloom looked up in boredom.
"We know how great she is." Sweetie Bell said with a roll of her eyes. "You've only told us, like, a million times."
"Yeah, Scootaloo, although it's great to have a role-model, ya' shouldn't always be chattin' about them like they're the best thing in the world." Applebloom said, patting the orange pegasus on the back.
Scootaloo wrenched away. "But she IS the best thing in the world!" the pegasus argued. "She can do a sonic rainboom! Can anyone else YOU know do that?"
Sweetie Bell sighed in frustration. "With how great you make her sound, you'd think she could at least teach you to fly."
"Yeah, Scootaloo." Applebloom began incredulously. "Why can't she do that?"
"Um..." Scootaloo's mind raced for an answer. "I... she... she HAS taught me to fly!"
Sweetie Bell's eyes lit up. "She has? Why didn't you tell us?" the white unicorn asked in wonder.
Applebloom looked at her doubtfully. "Yeah, why didn't ya' tell us?"
"It was... going to be a surprise." Scootaloo replied, a feeling of relief washing over her now that her hero was safe from blasphemy.
"Show us."
Scootaloo tensed as she turned to answer the yellow earth pony's challenge. "Um... show you...?"
"Yeah." Applebloom said as she crossed her forelegs. "I mean... unless you can't do it."
"I can too do it!" Scootaloo lied. She looked at her wings; they had grown a lot in the past few weeks; maybe if she got a running start....
"Okay, here goes." Scootaloo said as she crouched down. She licked her lips and began fluttering her wings; they felt strong and ready.
Maybe I can do it! she thought as she jumped into the air. She hovered for a few seconds before crashing down again.
"Is that what Rainbow taught ya'?" Applebloom asked bluntly.
"Yes! I mean... no...." Scootaloo said as she rubbed her wing.
"You were lyin', then."
"I... I...." Scootaloo could feel tears beginning to swell in her eyes. Before risking any more of her pride, she stood up and galloped off, blocking out the sounds of her friend's apology.
--
An hour later, Scootaloo sat sniffling in a shady cloud pile up at Cloudsdale. She, along with other non-flying pegasi, could get a ride up or down whenever they wanted in a hot air balloon, and that was what she had done as soon as possible. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying, and her whole body shook with caged-up sobs.
"I'll never be as good as you...." she whispered in a hoarse, watery voice. Oh, more than anything, she wanted to be as cool as Rainbow Dash. She wanted her string, fast wings and her amazing, rainbow lightning bolt cutie mark. She wanted to be just like her.
Suddenly, she had an idea. She sat up, rubbed her eyes, and smiled. If there was anyone who could make her as cool as Rainbow Dash, it would have to be the cyan pegasus herself.
--
Rainbow Dash rubbed her eyes and turned over on her cloud, but the knocking on her door continued. She groaned and lifted her head. "Come in." she mumbled. A second later, a flash of orange whizzed in and bumped into her cloud.
"Hiya, Dash!" Scootaloo said excitedly as she rested her front hooves on the cloud. "Whatcha' doing?"
"Um... napping." Rainbow replied, patting the cloud she was on.
"Oh." Scootaloo said with disappointment. "I wanted you to teach me something."
"Teach you what? I'm not teacher." the cyan pegasus replied with a yawn.
"I wanted you to teach me how to be cooler!" Scootaloo said with a grin. "See, I tried to fly today, except then I couldn't, and everyone laughed, so I want you to teach me to be cooler."
"Oh." Dash replied, sitting up. "I guess I could teach you that, but I'm still kinda tired."
Scootaloo looked around, and Rainbow noticed with a pang how messy her house was. I really should clean up, she thought.
"How about I do some cleaning up," Scootaloo began, as if she had read Dash's mind, "and you can sleep. Then you can teach me when you wake up."
"Okay. Sure. Sounds great." Rainbow replied sleepily as she laid her head on her pillow.
--
Rainbow Dash woke up groggily and yawned. As her chest expanded to draw in air, she felt something wrapped around her tightly- so tightly, in fact, that she could breathe only slightly. Instinctually, her breathing began to quicken as she wriggled to free herself. Then she felt that her legs were tied together under the cloud with some sort of rope- the front and back two legs tied together, and then the pairs roped together.
"Oh, Dash! You're awake no!" Scootaloo's cheery voice came from the kitchen.
Dash let out a relieved laugh. "Oh, hey, Scoot! Do you know why I'm tied up?"
"Of course I do." the orange filly's muffled voice said. Scootaloo appeared in the doorway, carrying what seemed to be big shears- the kind that one would cut down a small tree with.
"Um- okay, Scoot, why don't you untie me, then I'll, uh, help you to fly-," Rainbow Dash nervously began.
"You are helping me, Dash." Scootaloo said with a wide grin as she put down the shears. "I'm going to be as cool as you now."
"Scootaloo, this isn't funny." the cyan pegasus said as seriously as she could, which was hard, seeing how the combination of an adrenaline rush and lack of air was making her panicked and dizzy.
"No, it isn't." Scootaloo agreed. "It wasn't supposed to be." The orange pegasus stood at Rainbow Dash's side, just out of the cyan pegasus' field of vision. She could hear the shears opening and closing, and then felt something cold at the base of her wing.
"SCOOTALOO, NO!" Rainbow Dash screamed as she fluttered her wings helplessly.
"Now Dash, stop or you'll make me miss." Scootaloo scolded. "We wouldn't want your pretty little wings to get damaged, would we?"
Rainbow didn't pay any attention. She felt the coldness on her wing receding, and a feeling of hope rushed through her veins; only a millisecond later, she heard a rusty, scratching sound and felt an immense pain in her wing. She screamed as the scratching sound began again, and she noticed it as the sound of the opening and closing shears, cutting through her skin, then flesh, and ultimately chewing away at her bone.
"I guess these aren't sharp enough." Scootaloo said regretfully. "Hold on and I'll get something better. And don't bother trying to fly away; the cloud your on is tied down."
Rainbow's mind was blurred with pain, but she could hear Scootaloo rummaging around in her house. After what seemed like centuries, the filly returned, dragging what Dash could just make out through her blurry vision to be a small table and a clamp.
"Good news, Dash!" Scootaloo's disturbingly happy voice exclaimed. "I found a table and a clamp! This will help a lot." Dash watched numbly out of the corner of her eyes as the filly pushed the table over next to the cyan pegasus' injured wing.
"Good, it's level to your wing." Scootaloo chirped. Dash gritted her teeth against the pain as the filly outstretched her wing and laid it on the table, leaving a bit of room between the table and Rainbow's body, so that the exposed bong was over the ground. Then she slid the clamp onto the table so that it trapped Dash's sing on the surface and began twisting the wheel on it until it was holding the pegasus' wing tight.
Rainbow blurrily wondered what this was going to do, when Scootaloo climbed onto the table. Dash's eyes grew wide in horror as Scootaloo crouched down, wiggled a little, and jumped into the air.
"NO-," Rainbow began before the filly came crashing down onto the exposed bone in her wing. There was a sickening crack, and Rainbow screamed again.
"Look, Dash, it's your wing!" Scootaloo said cheerily. Rainbow looked numbly up and almost threw up when she saw the filly holding up a cyan wing.
"It's a little bloody," the orange pegasus pointed out the obvious, "but I'll clean it off. Hold on."
Dash sunk into a state of half-consciousness for a few minutes before she heard Scootaloo coming back. When she did, she was carrying a needled and thick, black thread along with the wing.
"You've been screaming too much." Scootaloo reprimanded, dropping the wing and approaching Dash. "Someone might hear you."
Rainbow made the connection, but she was in too much pain to resist. Scootaloo took her place near Dash's head and threaded the needle carefully and precisely. Then, with a slow, careful stroke, she pierced Dash's lower lip with the needle and pulled it through to the end; then she did it again on her top lip, and continued th pattern all across her mouth. The cyan pegasus could feel little beads of blood forming at every stitch, but the pain in her wing- or, rather where her wing used to be- drowned out any other hurt.
"There." giggled Scootaloo. "Now no one will here you! We can't have anyone finding us out, can we?"
Rainbow Dash was lucky; her other wing came off fairly easily, without use of the table. Somehow the loss of her other wing made Dash feel better; maybe because now the pain was even on both sides.
"I always admired your wings." Scootaloo said after she had washed the other wing off. "I always wanted mine to be as strong as yours. You always told me to wait... but I'm sick of waiting. So I decided... if I can't have wings like yours, I'll just have your wings!"
Dash watched numbly as Scootaloo threaded the needle and pierced her own tiny wing with it; then she lined up the cyan wing to it and started to attach the two with messy, uneven stitches. Blood began to pour out of Rainbow's dismembered wings, but if Scootaloo noticed, she didn't care. She finished, then did the other wing, finally holding up her new wings to look at her handiwork.
"Do you like them, Dash?" the orange pegasus asked. "I do. They look so much prettier on me, don't you think?"
Dash looked at her pleadingly, wanted to be let free- even if she had to live a life without wings, it would be better than no life, right?
Scootaloo met her pleading gaze with no recognition for a few seconds. Then a small, disturbing smile grew on her face. "You want to be let go? Already?" she asked. "But we're not done! You still have to help me earn my cutie mark."
Dash's mind went blank. She knew what this meant, but she simply had no strength to care anymore. Scootaloo held up a knife, walked over to Dash's side, and began to trace around the lightning bolt on Dash's side with it. Rainbow winced at the pain, but didn't try to move; maybe of she behaved well, this... this monster would let her go free.
"Aw, aren't you having fun anymore?" Scootaloo asked as she shredded the flesh around Rainbow's cutie mark. "I thought you always had fun with me."
"Or maybe you always though I was a nuisance." the filly continued as she peeled the cutie mark from Rainbow's flank. "That was it, wasn't it? The annoying pegasus filly who can't fly. You didn't like me, did you?"
Scootaloo started on the other cutie mark, digging into it with sharp, jagged movements. "But I can make it up to you."
Tears welled in Dash's eyes as the orange filly ripped the cutie mark from her flank.
"I'll show you so much fun.
"You like to fly, right?
"Then let's fly together."
The orange pegasus untied the cloud from the floor and pushed it over to the window. Rainbow Dash looked to the ground miles below and her breath stopped.
Scootaloo began to untie the ropes. "One more sonic rainboom, Dash. One more... for your biggest fan."
Rainbow Dash felt herself shoved from the cloud, and down she fell.
--
Scootaloo watched Dash fall until she was out of sight. With a smile, she went back into the dark house and picked up the needles and thread. She whistled as she began to sew the cutie marks unto her flank.
I'm special now, she thought as she merrily worked.
I have a cutie mark like everyone else-
Scootaloo stopped mid-stitch. She wasn't special. She just had her cutie mark and some bigger wings- just like every other pegasus. Who says she couldn't have more than one cutie mark?
After she finished her sewing, she found a pair of saddlebags and stuffed her supplies in them. With a smile, she looked out the window.
Well, I always have been envious of Twilight's magic....
