In space, no-one can hear you neigh
CUTIE MARK CRUSADER PICTURES PRESENTS
ACTION PONY GOES TO
SPACE CAMP
Commercial towing vehicle 'The Neighstromo'
Crew: seven
Cargo: stable containing 20,000,000 tons of hay
Course: returning to Equestria
In the vacuum of space, amongst the stars and nebulae, a vast spaceship emerges; not a sleek, slender craft of the future, but a grimy, filthy factory drifting through the void. Inside, it is a maze of dingy corridors. Miles upon miles of pipes twist and turn through the bowels of the ship, leading to nowhere in particular. Lights flash. Steam vents from unseen openings in the walls. Numbers flash on computer monitors, and strange humming and whirring noises can be heard everywhere you trot.
Everywhere, that is, apart from the lowest levels of the ship.
“H-hello? Is anypony there? Hello?”
The earth pony’s hooves clank on the metal gangway, and it’s so cold down here that her breath mists in front of her face. She stops. The hair on the back of her neck prickles, and sweat drips down her brow as a chill travels up her spine.
She is not alone.
But, that’s impossible, surely! All the other crewmembers are still in stasis, and she's so far from civilization as to give new meaning to the phrase ‘middle of nowhere’, so it’s not as if she has to worry about space pirates forcing their way on-board. Yet she can’t shake the feeling that something’s not right, that she’s being watched.
“Don’t think like that,” the pony whispers to herself. “You’re all alone, and there ain’t nopony down here with ya. Stop being all scared over nothin’.”
The lights flicker. The shadows wrap themselves around her as she trots down the gangway. Her heart hammers against her chest, and she starts to sing under her breath in an attempt to calm herself.
“You... are... my lucky star... lucky, lucky, lucky...”
SNAP.
The pony freezes as the sound of a cable breaking in two fills the air, making her stomach lurch. And that’s when she sees it: rising from the shadows, a mass of tentacles, glowing green eyes and teeth. The pony’s eyes widen as she backs against the wall. She screams, and—
“No, it’s all wrong, cut, cut, cut!”
Scootaloo punctuated each ‘cut’ with a slap of her clapperboard, and Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle sighed as they stood there in the boutique. It was all they could do not to throttle their friend out of frustration.
“What did we do wrong this time?” asked Sweetie Belle. Scootaloo snorted as though it was obvious.
“It’s not awesome enough,” she explained. “It’s needs to be more awesome. And Sweetie, your costume, what were you thinking? Nopony’s gonna be scared by that.”
Sweetie Belle glanced down at her hooves, trying her best to hide the frown breaking out over her face. It was hard not to feel dejected. It had taken three days to put her costume together, three days of sewing together black bin bags to make the alien’s skin, and that wasn’t mentioning the countless hours spent fashioning tentacles out of papier-mâché. The antennae, however, were what she was most proud of. True, she hadn’t made them herself, but nevertheless she had had to search all over Ponyville to find ta set, knocking on ponies’ doors and visiting every shop, even ones she was almost certain wouldn’t even have them—Mr and Mrs Cake had been quite bemused by her request. But her perseverance had paid off when she had bumped into Pinkie Pie, and of course she had happened to have a spare set lying around. Sweetie could’ve kicked herself for not thinking to ask her sooner.
It had all been for nothing. Scootaloo walked around her, rubbing her chin and thinking to herself. “Your sister’s got loadsa crazy fabric and stuff upstairs, right? And she’s not back until later?”
Sweetie Belle shuffled her hooves. “Well, yeah, but—”
“Then that’s it! Has she got anything glittery? I think ya need to be all sparkly and stuff, yeah, that’d definitely be cooler.”
“Ah dunno, Scoots,” Apple Bloom said uneasily, noticing what Scootaloo, in her sudden burst of inspiration, didn’t: that Sweetie Belle looked distinctly uncomfortable with the idea of rummaging through Rarity’s fabrics. “Ah think she looks plenty scary already, if ya ask me.”
“And we can make you look cooler as well,” said Scootaloo, not listening to a word Apple Bloom was saying. “You can have a bandana and everything. Hay! Remember the talent show? Sweetie, d’you still have the costume you made for that? Apple Bloom could wear it, and it’d make her look like a proper space pony.”
“It’s, it’s just upstairs,” said Sweetie Belle, uncertainty creeping into the edges of her voice. Scootaloo beamed at her. Ever since her parents had brought her back a camcorder from a business trip to Manehatten the previous week, the pegasus’ mind was full of film, film, and more film; it was all she could think about, all she wanted to talk about, and her enthusiasm was contagious. Even Sweetie Belle, still hurt over the jibe about her costume, found herself smiling.
Scootaloo led the way upstairs. As they searched Rarity’s design room for the exactly the right fabric, they came up with a better way of doing the scene...
Exploratory vessel ‘Ponyetheus’
Crew: geologists with questionable credentials
Cargo: 20,000,000 tons of awesome
Course: to boldly go where no pony has been before
In the vacuum of space, amongst the stars and nebulae, a vast spaceship emerges; it’s super sleek and shiny, and it’s got lots of flashing lights on it. Inside, every surface gleams. There are computers everywhere, on each and every one of which is something interesting: profiles of space bandits waiting to be hunted down; maps of distant planets; pictures of aliens.
In the centre of it all sits captain Apple Bloom, surrounded by her crew of motley misfits (“Scootaloo, these are just manna... mannak... ah mean, these are just models of ponies! Ah don’t think anypony’s gonna buy this.”). Proudly, she surveys her crew, and then sits down in the captain’s chair.
“Captain’s log, stardate 43125.8,” she says. “The mysterious planet X is finally in sight, but there seems to be no sign of intelligent life anywhere. Perhaps if—”
Before she can say any more, that’s when the monster strikes. It is pony shaped, has a unicorn’s horn, and has a pink and purple mane... but that’s where the similarities end. It is covered in glittering tentacles, like the unholy union of an octopus and a disco ball. It wears sparkly eye-liner. It opens its mouth to reveal the terrible fangs.
“I’m going to get you, Apple Bloom,” says the alien. “Raaawrrr—”
“Cut, cut, a million times cut!”
This time, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle didn’t bother trying to hide their frustration. “What now?” snapped Apple Bloom. “What did ah do wrong?”
Exasperated, Scootaloo dragged a hoof down her forehead. “You were fine,” she said. “Sorta. Couldn’t ya say your lines like you actually meant ‘em? But sheesh, Sweetie Belle, what was that? That wasn’t even in the script!”
“... I was just having a bit of fun,” Sweetie explained sheepishly, rubbing the floor with a hoof. “That’s what this is, right? Fun?”
Scootaloo scowled. “There’s nothing fun about it. This is filmmaking. This is serious business!”
“That ain’t what ya said when ya got that there camera of yours last week,” said Apple Bloom, narrowing her eyes at the hateful object; Scootaloo shielded the lens as if trying to protect it from her friend’s glare. “You said ya wanted to make a film, and ya told us it was gonna be the most fun ever. Ya promised us! But if this is what it’s like, then ah don’t think ah want a cutie for filmmak—”
Before Apple Bloom could finish speaking, Scootaloo’s face lit up, and she flapped her wings in excitement, her anger vanishing so fast that it was almost alarming. “I’ve got it, I’ve got it!” she said, cutting off Apple Bloom. “I know how to make this film awesome!”
Apple Bloom huffed. She sat on her haunches, and crossed her forelegs.
“We’ve been going about it all wrong,” said Scootaloo, pacing in a circle. “Ponies just want explosions and chases, and we’ve gotta give ‘em what they want. We’ve gotta make this an action film. It’s gotta be the coolest thing ever! Apple Bloom, d’you know any good one-liners?”
Apple Bloom blinked. “One what-now?”
But Scootaloo’s mind was already tackling the next big problem. “Arg, this boutique, it doesn’t look spaceshippy enough. Sweetie, does your sis have any foil?”
“F-foil? What for?”
A devilish grin crept over Scootaloo’s face as she looked the confused Sweetie Belle in the eyes. “Oh, you’ll see. It’s gonna be amazing.”
Super wicked cool action ship ‘THE MILLENNIUM AWESOME’
Crew: CAPTAIN T.J McROUNDKICK
Cargo: PUPPIES AND GUNS AND CANDY
Course: SPACE CAMP
In the vacuum of space, amongst the stars and nebulae, a vast spaceship emerges; and it’s being pursued by THE EVIL SPACE EMPIRE, OH NO! A thousand battle cruisers, each as big as a mountain but faster than the speed of light chase after it, and they’re all firing lasers and missiles and, and these really big guns as well, and T.J McRoundkick’s ship is swopping in and out of an asteroid belt, vrooom!
“Scootaloo, how are ya even gonna film all this?”
“Oh hush, Apple Bloom. We’re Cutie Mark Crusader filmmakers, we’ll think of something. Now help me put up this foil so we can get this scene done once and for all.”
T.J McRoundkick sits in the pilot’s seat, struggling to keep control of the spaceship. Suddenly, one of the Evil Empire’s evil spaceships zooms ahead of her, and starts firing right at the cockpit! McRoundkick puffs on her cigar. So that’s the way they wanna play, huh?
“Eat lasers,” she says, and then she blasts the ship into oblivion, boom! Flying right through the explosion, she laughs, but then disaster! A piece of debris smacks against the engine, sending her hurtling towards the surface of a desolate planetoid.
CRASH.
The dust clears. T.J McRoundkick gets up, sighing as she looks around her ruined craft. By her hooves, she spots the cigar, so she picks it up and takes another drag. “Talk about a fixer upper,” she mutters to herself.
This ain’t no time for talk, though: any second now the Empire’s goons will be forcing their way inside, which means she has no choice but to prepare for what could very well be her last stand... but if she’s gonna die today, then she’s gonna go out in a blaze of glory. T.J McRoundkick spits out the cigar, clambers through the wreck of the Millennium Awesome, and once she reaches the armoury, she kicks the door off its hinges (“don’t hit it too hard,” wailed Sweetie Belle. “Rarity’ll kill me!”). Staring back at her are ALL THE GUNS: big ones, small ones, some which fire missiles, others which shot lasers, and yet more still specially designed to take out space unicorns and space pegasi. “Say hello to mama,” says McRoundkick as she picks out the biggest, meanest looking weapon she can.
And that’s when the door behind her blasts opens, and in come the alien onto the spaceship. Cool as ice, T.J McRoundkick turns to face it. “Didn’t yer mother ever teach ya to knock?” she says.
Then she fires her gun, and—
“Scootaloo, what are you doing?!”
Scootaloo paid no attention to Sweetie Belle. Instead, in an effort to make Apple Bloom’s gun—or to more exact, Rarity’s tail straightener—seem more powerful and explosive, she kicked over a rack of clothes, and watched satisfied as the dresses scattered all over the floor in a big mess. But her satisfaction was short-lived. The rack clattered against Rarity’s work desk, knocking over the heavy mirror which had been resting atop of it; this, in turn, smashed against a mannequin that just so happened to be on wheels; and the three fillies could only watch in horror as the model pony rolled across the floor, right into a stack of shelves which wobbled ominously before falling over, sending balls of wool unravelling, and sent expensive sheets of fabric flying through the air, and sprinkled hundreds of threads and pins and needles over the floor, along with little jewels, shiny buttons, and countless beads. And all this was to mention nothing of the foil Scootaloo has insisted on covering all the surfaces with to make the room look more like a spaceship.
There was a moment of awful silence. With a trembling hoof, Scootaloo switched off the camcorder. “Oops,” she said, flatly.
‘Oops’ was right. Just then, Rarity arrived, and opened the door to her design room. She took one look at it, her eyes widening as she saw the foil, the clothes on the floor, the smashed mirror, the damaged mannequin, the overturned shelves, the wool, the sheets, the threads, needles, pins, jewels, buttons and beads. She opened her mouth as if to say something.
And then she fainted.
It was the worst telling off Scootaloo had ever received in her life, and made worse by the fact that she knew that not only was she in the wrong, but she was so far and so deep in the wrong that she couldn’t even fool herself into thinking somepony else could share the blame with her. This was her mistake and hers alone. She had refused to leave Carousel Boutique until she had convinced Rarity not to get mad at her sister; though of course, there had been nothing to stop her own parents from getting made at her.
“Why did you do this?” shouted her father. “What possessed you?”
Scootaloo didn’t have an answer, for in truth, there wasn’t one. She had allowed herself to get carried away and this was the result: sitting on the sofa in the living room, head bowed low, and the sinking feeling in her belly refusing to cease, as though she was falling into a bottomless void. Her nostrils were clogged. Her mane was messy. Has she been allowed to, she would’ve gladly curled up into a ball at the bottom of her bed, in the dark, with her bedroom door locked forever and the curtains drawn. This was the worst she had ever felt.
Until her parents took her camera away, that is. “You can have this back,” said her mom, “when you’ve learnt to behave.”
Scootaloo’s tears redoubled as Mom grabbed the camera out of her hooves and locked it away in a cupboard. Afterwards, she was sent to bed early without supper, in order to think about what she had done.
And think she did. The memory of pushing over the rack played over and over in her mind, the image of the clothes so vivid that she almost felt she could reach out and touch them, feel the silky smooth fabric that she had ruined. But really, it wasn’t about the clothes. Rarity would recover, and a year from now the fashionista would laugh the incident off, dismissing it as the accident that it was. Thinking about it like this didn’t make Scootaloo feel better, and it didn’t make what she had done right—on the other hoof, she knew it was the truth.
No, what terrified her was that she had ripped the bond between her and her friends. She trotted up and down her bedroom, flapped her wings, rubbed her eyes as though there was something stuck in them, and Sweetie Belle’s voice cried out in her head, I was just having a bit of fun. That’s what this is, right? And then Apple Bloom joined in, asking what she had done wrong this time, and why were they taking this so seriously? A week ago, Scootaloo would’ve agreed with her. What had happened? What had changed?
“I just wanted to make a good film, that’s all” she whispered to herself, starting out the window. The sun was setting. The sky was blood red, and full of oranges and yellows; it was like it was on fire...
Scootaloo gulped. “But that’s no excuse to treat them the way I did. This was s’posed to be fun.”
With a heavy heart, she drew the curtains, remorse eating away at her... and she made up her mind. Grounded though she was, she wasn’t going to let that stop her: she was going to sneak out, and she was going to apologize to Sweetie and Rarity, and she wasn’t going to leave until they knew how sorry she truly was. After that, she would find Apple Bloom and repeat the whole process all over again, and even if her friends didn’t forgive her, it wouldn’t matter. At least she would’ve tried to put things right. At least she would’ve tried to repair the damage she’d caused.
As she opened her window, hot tears forming in her eyes, there was a knock on her bedroom door, much too soft to be her mother or her father. Scootaloo frowned at the door. What was this?
The door opened. Her jaw dropped.
There stood Sweetie and Apple Bloom in the corridor, and Scootaloo gaped at them, dumbstruck, so surprised that it took a second or two to resister that they were... smiling? True, their smiles were weak, but the important thing was that she wasn’t imagining them. Apple Bloom cleared her throat.
“Um, your parents let us in. They say ya grounded, but... well... mah sis’, she got me this tape recorder for doing so well at school, and... and we were just wondering if—”
“Cutie Mark Crusader radio presenters?” Sweetie Belle chimed in. She still had the ghost of eye-liner on her face. “It wouldn’t be the same without you. Please Scoots? It’s coming in the post tomorrow, and your parents said that so long as you’re back before sundown, it’s alright with them.”
Scootaloo gawped at her friends. “But I was really mean to you two. Aren’t you mad at me?”
“Course, silly,” said Apple Bloom with a laugh. “But we’re yer friends, ain’t we? Friends forgive each other. Besides, we know ya well enough to know how sorry you must be feeling right now.”
The tears which had been forming in Scootaloo’s eyes started to fall, but they weren’t from sadness. Dashing over to the door, she threw her hooves around her dear friends, and never wanted to let go. She loved them. She loved them so much, and didn’t ever want to do anything to hurt them ever again.
“Adventures of T.J McRoundkick, the radio serial?” Scootaloo said once they had all let go of each other. The other two smirked at her.
“And her sidekicks Alien Filly and Space Pegasus?” said Sweetie Belle. Scootaloo grinned back at her.
“You know it. Man, this is gonna be so awesome.”
