Laughing. That’s the most vivid thing Scootaloo remembered from that day and it always filled her dreams. This one was no different. Almost every dream was the same for her. Minor differences like the length of the knife, or the wideness of her wounds. But the only thing that never changed at all was the laughing. Never. It had started like all the others, she found herself in her bed getting up to get a drink of water. She trotted down the stairs to the kitchen and found a glass in the cupboard, the type of glass had changed like always. She started the faucet and let the glass fill up. She hears a yell from her dad and she trots to the bottom of the steps.

“Ya dad?” She asks meekly.

Annoyance in his voice as he started to trot down the stairs towards her, “What are ya doing up this late? We’ve talked about this. If I’m asleep you don’t make a peep.”

“I’m sorry, I just wanted a glass of water,” Scootaloo says cowering as her dad approached.

“I told ya there would be consequences if ya did this again Scootaloo,” He says revealing the long serrated knife, “This may seem a bit harsh but next time, next time it’ll be twice as bad. Ya mum know that all too well. Why can’t you get that through your head? Do you like the pain?”

Scootaloo’s eyes wouldn’t leave the knife. She knew what this meant and she just wanted to run down the street yelling. But she knows that she wouldn’t even make it out the front door. Plus, they live on the outskirts of Ponyville. No one would hear her. She tore her eyes away from the knife as her dad walked closer. She started to back into the kitchen and then spun and took off. Just as she had expected she only made it to the sink. She reached for something, anything at all with an outstretched hoof and only found her overflowing glass. She pulled it to the ground with her and t smashed off the floor, further angering her dad.

“What the fuck! You stupid bitch of a foal!” He grabbed her by the mane and smashed her head to the tile floor. He repeated that until she stopped struggling.

He let her go and then studied her as if thinking, what can I do to make her pay for this? Obviously he was still tired so he decided to start small. He quickly dragged the knife across her flank. She gasped and started whimpering. He repeated the action on her other side, causing the same reaction. Her caring father then brought the knife up to her wing and started studying it.

“Where is it? I know it’s here somewhere?” He said playing with her wing. He smiled as he found the tendon and shoved the knife through it, “You never would have flown anyway.”

She starts crying and screaming and he withdraws the knife. He starts laughing as if he has had the best idea in his whole lifetime. It’s the same laugh. Always the same. He brings the knife to her mouth and whispers, “After this, you’ll always be happy.”

Scootaloo screams as he puts the knife in her mouth and starts cutting the smile into her face. “Shhhhhh if you scream you’ll tear your smile,” She quiets to a whimper, tears streaming down her face.

The orange, and now red, pegasus starts squirming as her so called dad starts working on the other side of her face. She starts trying to slither out of his grip, making the cuts more jagged. The filly reaches out for anything to help get out of his cold unforgiving grip. Her hoof meets a broken piece of glass, and out of pure primal instinct she grabs it and thrusts it upward. The knife tears out of her face leaving a ragged tear in the top of her newly formed smile. She opens her violet eyes when she feels wet liquid soak her hoof and drip into her face. The clear weapon of her father's undoing glinted in the light. His body tumbled onto her and she let out a scream that would have woke up the gryphons.

Scootaloo wakes up with a start, sweat covering her from head to hoof. Rainbow Dash barges in through the door, “Scoots! You okay?”

“Scoots” nods and gets out of bed, walking into the bathroom and vomiting into the toilet. She stays there for a few minutes until Dash comes in to check on her. "Care to tell me what that was all about? Was it about this again?" She said motioning with one hoof to Scootaloo's face. Flushing the toilet she stands up and looks at herself in the mirror, her mane disheveled and that grin. That everlasting grin was staring back at her like always.

"What do you think? You and I both know it wasn't the one about rainbows again," Scootaloo says walking from the bedroom and sitting back down on the guest bed, "That leaves two options, a nightmare I've never had before, or the one about the scars. Which one do you think it was?"

Dash snorts, "Ya, I can feel the sarcasm in the air. Care to tell me what actually happened? You leave me guessing everyday as to what did that to you. Was it a timber wolf?"

"A timber wolf would have been nothing compared to what really happened. But Dash, I really don't feel comfortable talking about this with you. You'd think of me different. No one would ever want to be associated with me again because we all know the truth would get out somehow and than we'd have to learn some stupid friendship lesson. Dear, Princess Celestia. I'd rather die than go through that again."

The cyan pegasus sat there, contemplating whether to push more or drop the subject. Eventually she sighed in defeat, "Ok Scoots. Maybe sometime in the future you'll open up to me, but until then if you want you can sleep in my bed with me. Just for the night."

The adoring fan readily accepted this offer and trotted behind Dash into her fluffy cloud room. They both ducked under the blankets and Rainbow dragged the tiny orange foal in with her wing. They stayed like this for the rest of the night.

Author's Note

Hope this gets better responses than the original. I wont be taking the other one down either because I want it to be a constant reminder of my progress.