Scootaloo had always wondered how many fireworks could fit in her wagon.
The answer was twelve, if anypony were to ask, as long as she stacked them right. And that was counting room for the three of them. Two more than Apple Bloom could manage, and twelve more than Sweetie Belle wanted in the first place. But what did she know? Adding a pair of drapes and a roll of duct tape to the equation could only lead to one thing: cutie marks.
Foolproof. The only word for such an amazing idea. But Sweetie Belle had been full of nothing but doubtful questions since they started. Like, ‘are you sure this is safe?’ and ‘would our sisters think this is safe?’ and ‘this doesn’t seem very safe.’ That wasn’t even a question! The real questions that needed asking were ‘does that look like enough duct tape to you?’ and ‘do you think this hill is big enough?’
The hill certainly was, if Scootaloo had anything to say about it. They wouldn’t have picked it otherwise. A little ways out of town, it was perfect. It might have faced Ponyville, but that only meant the possibility of flying over the whole town for everypony to see. No way that couldn’t end up being awesome! Rainbow Dash would surely think so.
The runway they had painted down its face was hard to see with how finely it tapered into the distance. Scootaloo already felt like she was going a million miles an hour just looking at it.
“Are you really sure this is safe?” Sweetie Belle asked as she sat in the wagon, hooves around Apple Bloom’s barrel, warily eyeing the stack of fireworks over her shoulder.
“Rainbow Dash can go fast enough to make a sonic rainboom and she’s still okay,” Scootaloo said. She flashed a grin that would have sent a diamond dog running for the hills, but Sweetie Belle grimaced.
“That’s not really what I meant by—”
“Yeah, yeah, Scoot,” Apple Bloom cut in. “Just hurry up and light ‘em.”
“Psh. You’re just mad I could get more fireworks into the wagon than you could.” Scootaloo blew a raspberry at her.
Apple Bloom flustered. “I am not!”
“Are too!”
Apple Bloom glowered at her. “Just light ‘em already.” She pulled her goggles down over her eyes.
No need to tell her twice. “On it!” Scootaloo likewise snapped her goggles into position—“Ouch!”—and fished a match from its box. It flared to life at the flick of a hoof, and she reached behind them to light the intertwined fuses draping over the tail end of the wagon—a trick they had learned the last time.
The flame became a hiss, and Scootaloo retook her seat. Or tried to. With how much space the fireworks took up in the back end, she could hardly get one flank in. “Scoot over, Apple Bloom. You’re hogging all the room.”
“I am scooted over. You’re the one hoggin’.”
“Girls…” Sweetie Belle said, clinging tighter to Apple Bloom.
Scootaloo took hold of the wagon handle—the steering wheel of their one-way ticket to Cutie Mark City. She grinned in triumph. “Cutie Mark Crusader Wagon Racers are go! In three! Two! One!”
≈≈≈×≈≈≈
“I’m so glad you girls could help me move all my stuff into the castle,” Twilight said, she and her five friends walking toward her new home, each with bulging saddlebags.
“No problem, Twilight,” Rainbow Dash said, flying lazy circles around the group. “We’d never leave a friend hangin’.”
Applejack gave Twilight’s saddlebag a nudge. “What she said. You didn’t think we’d let a friend of ours lug all that stuff across town all day on her own, did you?” She hefted her own to emphasize the point.
Twilight smiled. “I have to say, it definitely helped speed things up.”
“Yea!” Pinkie Pie bounced alongside her. Luckily, Twilight had the sense to pack her bags with the non-fragiles. “Twenty-four hooves are better than four! Just like cupcakes!” A blur of hooves on a prolonged bounce. “But I wish that big, mean meanie pants Tirek didn’t blow up the library in the first place.” She frowned at nothing in particular.
“It’s okay, Pinkie.” Twilight smiled reassuringly. “I might have lost a lot of things in the library, but they were only things. And hey, I have a castle now.” She smiled up at the massive crystal tree, whose innumerable branches shimmered all colors of the rainbow in their skyward reach. “I mean, that’s a once-in-a-lifetime trade up. Can’t complain there, right?”
The others ‘mhmm’d.
“Really,” Twilight continued, “I’m willing to bet things will only get better from here on out.”
“You really think so?” Fluttershy asked from the rear of the group.
Twilight smiled at her. “I know so.” She couldn’t help spreading her wings with all the positive energy flowing through her.
“Well, if you know so, then what’s that sound?” Pinkie Pie asked.
They all turned to her. “What sound?”
“The one that sounds like three screaming fillies strapped to a wagon full of fireworks.”
The six looked up, and above them soared a little red missile straight at the castle. Time seemed to slow in the moments before impact as every pair of eyes saw in full the wide-eyed fillies soaring through the air. The castle exploded in a shower of colors and squeals of scattering firecrackers, its upper reaches billowing a cloud of smoke and massive chunks rocketing into the distant blue. Jaws dropped, none more than Twilight’s.
When all fell still, three wobbly little heads poked out from the rubble like little twigs growing from its stump, and five pairs of eyes glanced nervously between each other.
“You don’t think that tree has another castle-makin’ box we could use, do you?” Applejack asked.
Rainbow Dash shrugged, grimacing. “We should probably go check.” They stared at Twilight, who remained frozen in place, eye twitching.
“That... would be a good idea,” Rarity said. They backed away slowly and headed for the Everfree, before another kind of fireworks were sure to go off.
Author's Note
So this was an entry to the minific write off All In. Here's the original, if you'd like to see that version. (I personally prefer that version, but you guys know how min word counts go.) I finally decided to make it long enough to post, so here you guys go!
Special thanks to MaskedFerret for her input on the Fimfic revision.
Onward and Upward!
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