Chapters In a clearing, far away from the sights and sounds of Ponyville, a filly danced with abandon. Her purple mane trailed behind her as she effortlessly spun on her back hooves. She dropped down to four hooves, executing a graceful turn as she moved into her next leap. Her tale whipped around as she lifted her front legs and pushed up with all her might, launching herself up towards the sky.
As she jumped, a feeling of weightlessness came to her orange rudimentary wings fluttered instinctually. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine that she was flying, soaring in the sky. Then, as always, gravity exerted its harsh pull, and she fell down to the earth. As she landed, she spread out her front legs and bowed her head, though whether it was due to her now flightless state or just as an acknowledgement of the end of her dance it was difficult to tell. A single perfect tear trickled down from her eyes, tracing a silver line down her cheek.
Beside her, a scratchy record sounding out of a turntable slowly came to a halt, playing the last notes of Neightoven’s famous Für Elise. The record had been given to her by her mother, a few months ago, and could always make her feel calmer, more in control, despite the inevitable sadness the song always brought for her. She sighed as she thought about why she needed the calming feeling of her mother’s favorite song.
The orange pegasus whipped around in shock, quickly wiping off the tear with her hoof. Behind her stood her idol, Rainbow Dash, who was watching the little filly with a look of slight amusement on her face. A bright red blush rose up on her orange cheeks as she realized that her hero had probably seen the whole show. She looked down in embarrassment.
“Hey squirt, is something wrong? Your eyes look a little puffy,” the cyan mare said, this time without a trace of laughter in her voice. The filly continued to look down, refusing to meet Rainbow Dash’s eyes, desperately afraid of rejection.
“Scootaloo, if something happened, I’m here. You know that, right?” Scootaloo looked up, surprised by the mare’s unusually sympathetic voice. Normally, Equestria’s fastest flyer only spoke in loud confident tones. This was an altogether different side of her, one Scootaloo had never seen. “Right?” she asked again, holding out a hoof.
“Yeah,” the orange pony replied, although inside she was feeling conflicted. On one hoof, she didn’t want to seem weak in the eyes of her idol. On the other hoof, she really needed a shoulder to cry on. Finally, her need to release her feelings won, and she bumped her hoof against the proffered one.
“So what’s bothering you?” Rainbow Dash asked the filly in front of her. She walked over and sat down beside Scootaloo, pulling her down into a place where she could lay her head on the rainbow maned mare’s shoulder. Almost subconsciously, Scootaloo leaned into her hero, letting herself be held in a way that she hadn’t been held in almost six months, a way that she wouldn’t have let anyone else beside Rainbow Dash, her long time idol, hold her.
The pegasus filly, listening to the heartbeat of the mare that was holding her, began to speak. “I had a fight with Sweetie Bell today. She said that everything I wanted to do to try to get our cutie marks was dangerous, that she didn’t want to risk our lives anymore with all of my hare brained schemes. And she’s probably right, you know. My ideas can be kind of crazy at times. I mean, look what happened when we went zip lining! We ended up covered in tree sap and mud, but it could have been a lot worse. If those trees hadn’t caught us, we could’ve been seriously hurt. And who wants a talent in zip lining anyways? She’s right. I just mess everything up.”
“Don’t say that. Don’t ever say that.” Rainbow Dash hugged Scootaloo closer to her chest. “You had a bad idea or two, but you don’t mess everything up. And sure, you’ve gotten yourself in trouble a few times, but don’t stress it. Everyone makes stupid moves sometimes. Let me tell you, I’ve gotten in my fair share of trouble too, but do you see me calling myself a screw up? Do you?”
The orange filly gave her a shaky grin as she shook her head. Rainbow Dash tussled the filly’s purple mane. After a time, the mare asked, “So what happened next?”
Scootaloo’s grin abruptly faded. “Well, uh… then I told her that everything she wanted to do was useless and boring. I, uh, told her that cutiemarks in things like cleaning houses would be kind of lame.” The filly looked down again, ashamed of her actions. What would Rainbow Dash think of her, knowing she had said that to her best friend?
The sound of Rainbow Dash gently chuckling under her breath made Scootaloo’s head come up again. “You’re right, that would be a kind of lame cutiemark. Hey, don’t worry about the fight. The important thing is that you know you made a mistake, and that you apologize later. I’m willing to bet Sweetie Bell is feeling just as bad as you are.”
“Really?” The filly said, looking up with surprise in her eyes.
“Really. Trust me, I’ve been in enough fights with my friends to know. So let me guess, what happened next was that the fight escalated, with Applebloom trying to moderate, and the next thing you knew you were both storming out of the clubhouse in tears?”
“Uh, yeah, how’d you know?” The orange pegasus looked up at the pony holding her with a mixture of confusion and wonderment in her eyes.
“Like I said, I’ve been through a lot of fights with my best friends. You can’t be close to somepony without having a few big fights. It’s just something that happens. Like I said, the really important thing is to apologize for what happened, and recognize you’re part in the fight, which you already seem to have done.” She grinned down at the filly in her arms, who looked up with another shaky smile.
“That still doesn’t explain this,” Rainbow Dash said, gesturing with her hoof at the turntable, and the layer of grass beside it that had been scratched by her leaps and twirls. Scootaloo could feel another blush rising in her cheeks, but decided to forge ahead nonetheless.
“Um, it calms me down. I don’t know why, but there’s something that’s really soothing about it.” By this time, her cheeks were on fire. She’d never really told anyone else about how much she enjoyed dancing, and it had always been a private thing, something to share between her and her mother.
“I can understand that. My parents actually made me take dance classes, back before I discovered my love of flying. It’s nice, in a slow way.” Rainbow Dash paused, looking in the distance with a faint smile on her face. She could remember what it’d been like, how the dancing had been soothing, relaxing, almost as relaxing as flying. As she thought of how nice it had been, her expression turned contemplative. Maybe she should try dancing again. She had really enjoyed it, after all.
“You- you don’t think it’s silly?” Scootaloo said, not processing the mare’s words. She’d been afraid of rejection, too afraid to tell anyone. After all, what would they think if they knew that the tomboyish filly liked something as girly as ballet dancing? But maybe, if Rainbow Dash liked it, it couldn’t be so bad, right?
“Silly? Of course not. Maybe a bit girly,” she said. At this, Scootaloo’s spirits fell. “But hey, you are a girl. We’ve got a right to like things like that. Plenty of colts do it too, you know.” The filly’s eyes opened wide. She hadn’t known.
Suddenly, Rainbow Dash looked up, as if sensing something was wrong. Seeing the location of the sun, her eyes widened. She started to stand up, turning to the filly beside her.
“Hey, Scoots, I’ve gotta fly. There’s a major storm scheduled for Ponyville and I need to go and organize its formation. Hey, if you’re open later today, and your parents are okay with it, I could take you back to my place, maybe teach you a few dance moves?” The leader of Ponyville’s weather squad turned to look at her companion. Scootaloo started in surprise, then looked at the mare with a mixture of shock and awe.
“Really? You’d let me come into your house?” she asked incredulously.
“Sure. Why don’t you come over around seven or so? My shift should be done by then.” The pegasus stood up in earnest, stretching herself out in preparation for flight.
“Yeah! I’ll be there. Definitely,” Scootaloo said, her face unusually solemn.
“Well, see you then. Bye!” With this the rainbow maned pegasus shot up into the sky, leaving a faint rainbow colored trail behind her. Scootaloo watched until the mare was nothing but a speck in the sky, and then until she was gone from view entirely. The filly continued to stare at the spot in the sky where she had last seen the mare for a few minutes, before shaking off her reverie and walking over to the place she had left her turntable and saddlebags. Pulling a record sleeve from her right saddlebag, she carefully slid the vinyl record into the sleeve and delicately replaced it, putting it back among the other records she kept in the bag. Turning to the turntable, she slid a glass cover over it and delicately placed it in her right bag, pulling the straps shut on the two bags and cinching them shut to protect them from the elements.
The orange pegasus turned, pausing for a moment to look up one last time to where she had last seen Rainbow Dash, then began the long trek home, thinking of ways to pass the time before she could go over to the cyan mare’s house.
A yellow filly with a red mane, complete with a bow almost as big as her head, sat slouching in the center of Carousel Boutique. On a rack next to her, several dresses were hanging, complete and ready to be shipped off to Canterlot. Behind her, three mirrors stood facing a raised platform, ready if anyone wanted to see how a dress or a saddle looked on them. On her other side, a stage was cloaked, hidden from the view of the world by red curtains that were draped everywhere in the lower room of the building. In another part of the room, a red dress lay uncompleted on a white manikin, the stitching done, the fabric half covered in brilliant rubies. The dress was part of a new monochromatic scheme of dresses that the proprietor of the boutique, Rarity, was in the process of creating.
The room was silent but for a soft scratching sound as Applebloom swung her hooves on the hardwood floor. The filly was bored, as bored as she’d been since before she had formed the Cutie Mark Crusaders, when she had spent her afternoons alone. She turned to look around the room disinterestedly. She had already examined the room, looking at the various dresses on display, the ruby coated dress that was clearly a work in progress, and had even tried to interest herself in the overall architecture, which would be interesting to her, had she not been to the building many times before and had many previous attempts to examine the architecture. The filly sighed.
It had all started when Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, her two best friends and fellow crusaders, had gotten into a massive fight, with Sweetie Belle arguing that she was tired of almost dying whenever Scootaloo wanted to go out crusading, and Scootaloo saying that she was sick of trying the unicorn always trying to get lame marks. The earth pony had tried to mediate, but the argument had quickly been blown out of proportions, leading to the two ponies storming out of the clubhouse in anger, leaving the red maned filly behind, hoof still outstretched in an attempt to soothe the tempers of her friends.
Afterwards, the filly had tried to find Scootaloo in an attempt to heal the wounds caused by the recent fight, but she’d been unable to find the pegasus, despite looking in all her friend’s favorite haunts and asking around town if anyone knew where the orange pony was. She’d avoided Scootaloo’s actual home, though; for one thing, the purple maned filly hated the place, and for another, Apple Bloom had heard enough tales about the house, and in particular, Scootaloo’s dad, to know better then to go over there.
When she’d been unable to find Scootaloo, the filly had decided to go to the Carousel Boutique to find Sweetie Belle. She’d wanted to find Scootaloo first only because she knew that the pegasus was much more sensitive than her unicorn friend, and because while Sweetie Belle had Rarity, Scootaloo had no one to cry to.
At the boutique, she’d been startled to find her sister, Applejack, deep in a conversation with her friend Rarity. From what she heard through the door, before she came in and brought all conversation to a halt, it seemed like Applejack was telling Rarity about somepony she had a crush on, and was looking for love advice from the unicorn fashionista.
The yellow filly had been disheartened to learn that Sweetie Belle wasn’t at the boutique, but decided to stick around in case her friend returned from wherever she had run off to. She’d moved off into the main floor of the building, shutting the door between her and the kitchen where her sister had been talking with her unicorn friend. As she had closed the door, she heard them start up the conversation again, in a much quieter tone.
Now, however, she was beginning to regret her decision to wait for Sweetie Belle to return to the shop, as she was growing increasingly bored, and she still hadn’t thought of a way to repair the crusader’s friendship. Suddenly, she was struck with a flash of inspiration.
Applebloom had heard tales from her sister of how Rarity had made dresses for her friends as a labor of love. She thought that, maybe, if she made a Crusader uniform for her friends, they might forget about their argument and get back to going on adventures and having fun, like they were supposed to be doing. Also, the uniforms would be a good way to pass the time until her friend came back.
Tentatively, so as to not let Rarity or Applejack know what she was doing, the filly slowly made her way up the stairs to Rarity’s workroom, where she kept her fabric and sewing machine. The filly tiptoed up the stairs, being careful not to make any noise as she slipped inside the room.
As the pony silently shut the door behind her, she gave a quiet sigh of happiness. Applebloom had always enjoyed working with fabrics and paint; there was something intrinsically pleasing about creating something so that other ponies could use and enjoy it. She didn’t get the opportunity to work on such projects often, but when she did, like the time she took it on herself to fix up the Cutie Mark Crusader clubhouse and give it a new paint job, she always dove into the project with tenacity and enthusiasm.
Her eyes sought out the bolts of fabric neatly arranged on the shelves, the sewing machine set to the side, and the three smaller manikins that Rarity had yet to fill up. Looking around, she could also see Rarity’s current project, a half completed sapphire blue dress that was slowly taking shape around another manikin that she’d set out in the center of the room. The filly gave the in progress dress a quick glance before turning back to the task at hand. She wanted to create a unique uniform for each girl that would be tailored to fit her lifestyle, and, at the same time, be similar enough that it could be used to identify the three fillies as Crusaders. Her tongue stuck out slightly as she furrowed her brow in thought; then she got to work, pulling various rolls of fabric off the shelf and laying them out, cutting out of them the shapes she wanted.
Applebloom picked up the shapes she had cut out from the fabric. Setting them aside, she cut off the excess fabric, then rolled the fabric back up and returned it to the shelves where she had gotten them originally. Turning back to the shapes she had laid out, the yellow filly began to work on the dresses in earnest.
For Scootaloo, the young dressmaker decided to create something lightweight that wouldn’t smother her outgoing friend, yet at the same time, hard duty enough to withstand the rough and tumble lifestyle the pegasus lived. In the end she settled for a single layer of orange felt with a purple trim at the bottom to weigh it down and prevent it from flying up in her face when she performed stunts on her scooter. The dress would cover her whole back, with holes for her wings on either side. On the flank, where most ponies had their cutie marks, the dress had been embroidered with a small patch of purple cloth in a shield shape. In the middle of the shield stood the emblem of the Crusaders, a rearing filly with a cloak blowing behind her, stitched in golden thread.
For Sweetie Belle, the filly used a silver fabric with a silky look and feel. Sweetie Belle didn’t do nearly as many stunts as Scootaloo, and she would appreciate the dress more then the orange pegasus would have. The back was layered with a light purple trim, matching the highlights in the unicorn’s hair as the fabric folded down the hind legs of the manikin. Like Scootaloo’s dress, she sewed on two purple shields embroidered with the ensign of their club.
Finally, the yellow filly got to work on her own dress. She pulled out the yellow cotton fabric that she’d cut out earlier, and quickly got to work, creating a simple, understated dress with a red border, designed for hard work. Like the other two dresses, she put the badge of the three filly’s club where a cutie mark normally lay.
In front of her, on the three manikins she was using, stood three completed dresses, each made to fit a different style, but with an underlying similarity clearly evident between the three. The farm filly stepped back in satisfaction.
Behind her, the pony heard the door to the room slam open, and jumped around in shock. Rarity was standing in the empty doorway, eye’s wide with shock at the audacity of the young filly. Slowly, though, the mare’s brain began to process what had happened, and as her shock left her, rage began to set in.
“Uh oh,” Applebloom said to herself, and then braced herself for the coming storm.
A white unicorn galloped down a forested path, tears blurring her vision. Behind her, a purple and pink mane streamed away from her body, blown back by her speed. The filly wasn’t running towards anyplace, but rather from somewhere, and somepony. She saw the trees around her begin to blur as more tears gathered in her eyes. Finally, she began to slow, exhaustion taking its toll on the young pony. Her run trailed off into a desolate walk, and she was breathing hard from exertion and emotions. Her breath hitched in her throat as she thought about why she was running, and she started to cry in earnest, opening the floodgate on her tears.
The reason Sweetie Belle was crying was her best friend, Scootaloo. When the pegasus had suggested another one of her crazy schemes, Sweetie Belle, tired of getting covered in tree sap every time she tried to earn her cutie mark, had offered an alternative, helping to clean up Carousel Boutique, a place known for its lack of tree sap. Scootaloo in turn told her that her suggestion was lame, and that BASE jumping would make for a much better Cutie Mark than house cleaning. From there, the argument had escalated, despite Applebloom’s attempts, until the two fillies exited their clubhouse and stormed off in opposite directions, leaving their earth pony friend behind. Sweetie Belle had waited until the building was out of her sight before she broke into a gallop and let loose the tears that had built up.
The unicorn was, in part, angry with her friend. Angry at how she always wanted to do dangerous things, angry at how she had immediately shot down Sweetie Belle’s idea, angry at how she had continued the argument for so long. But mainly, Sweetie Belle was angry at herself. She was a practical filly, and she had known, when she went against Scootaloo’s idea, that an argument would ensue. She knew how the pegasus would react, how she always reacted. She’d known that it would be painful for Applebloom, that her friend would try to stop them, and yet she had still gone ahead. Couldn’t she get covered in tree sap once in a while, for friendship? She sat down, tears streaming down her face, and slammed her hoof against the ground, angrily, before burying her head in her front hooves and crying her anger out.
After a while, her tears slowed down to a trickle, and she sat quietly aside from the occasional sniffle, her emotions spent. She stared at the twin puddles beneath her that had formed from her tears, too emotionally tired to do anything else. As she watched, another tear fell from her eyes to the ground, making ripples in the puddle.
“Sweetie Belle? Are you okay?” The soft voice, coming from behind her, scarcely registered with the young pony. Hoofsteps sounded behind the filly as the owner of the voice trotted up next to her. A yellow pegasus with a pink mane came into the unicorn’s vision.
“Are you okay, Sweetie?” she asked again. The filly turned her head slightly to look at the mare beside her.
“Hi, Fluttershy. I’m fine,” she replied in a despondent voice. The unicorn had gone into a state of apathy after crying, and was feeling strangely detached to the world.
“Um… I hate to intrude, but it’s kind of cold out. Do you want to come back with me to my house? It’s just down the road.” The mare gestured with her mouth. Only a few hundred yards away Sweetie Belle could see Fluttershy’s cottage. She blinked, surprised that it was so close, and that she hadn’t even noticed it when running. On the other hand, she’d had other things on her mind. She turned towards Fluttershy with a wavering smile.
“Thanks. I was feeling kind of chilly.” The unicorn looked up at the mare, who gestured with her wing. Sweetie Belle stood up slowly, limbs somewhat numb, and started following Fluttershy back to her grass thatched house. Neither talked as they walked, settling into a companionable silence. Eventually, the two reached the house, and Fluttershy opened the door to let her companion in.
Sweetie Belle followed her inside, uncertain. Fluttershy led the filly over to the large chair that she’d placed in front of the stairs.
“Here, make yourself comfortable. I’ll make some tea… I mean, if you want some that is,” the mare finished shyly.
“I’d love some,” the unicorn said to her companion, regaining some of her usual enthusiasm. Fluttershy smiled, glad that the filly was becoming more like herself. The pegasus quickly busied herself with making the tea as Sweetie Belle slowly stopped shivering. When the tea was done, the mare brought it over to her young guest, pouring out two cups of the steaming liquid. Giving one of the cups to her unicorn companion, Fluttershy sat down on a second chair facing the first and set the tea pot on the table between them.
After a few minutes of quietly sipping tea, Sweetie Belle began to squirm, feeling kind of awkward about the lack of conversation now that she wasn’t feeling so bad. She’d been expecting the pegasus to ask why she’d been crying, but the mare seemed content to just sit and quietly sip tea. The tea itself had had wonderful effects on the filly, soothing her emotions and warming her up, but now the lack of talk was beginning to get to her.
“So, Fluttershy, what have you been doing recently?” the filly asked her host, in an attempt to break the silence that had fallen over the house. The mare looked up, blinking as she came out of her peaceful reverie.
“Um, not much, I guess. I’ve been caring for a little bird that broke his wing,” she responded, “But it healed and he was able to get back to his family today. I was actually thinking about cleaning my house this afternoon.” Sweetie Belle looked around the room. It wasn’t terrible, but it was clear that the cost of taking care of animals was a messy house. She turned back towards Fluttershy.
“Do you want any help?” she asked the mare, in part because she wanted to ease her host’s burden and in part because working would be a good way to distract her mind from painful thoughts.
“That would be great! I mean, if you don’t mind, that is…” the shy pegasus replied.
“I’d love to,” Sweetie Belle told her, setting down her empty tea cup. “Where should I start?”
“I was thinking we could begin with sweeping the floor,” the mare directed, “and maybe afterwards we could dust off these bookshelves and the table.” Following her companion’s lead, Fluttershy set her tea cup back on the table and opened a door beside her leading into the bathroom. From inside she grabbed a broom and a dustpan. Grabbing the broom in her mouth, she began to sweep up the dust on the ground, leaving the dustpan for Sweetie Belle.
The filly’s horn glowed blue for a second, magic encircling the dustpan and lifting it a few inches, before the magic flickered and the pan fell back to the ground. Grimacing, the filly reached down and picked up the cleaning instrument with her mouth.
For a while the two simply worked, the mare sweeping as the young unicorn held the pan in place, periodically dumping the dust into Fluttershy’s trash bin. When they finished sweeping most of the room, the ponies moved on to dusting, Fluttershy with her wings, Sweetie Belle with her tail. As they were working, the yellow pegasus mare began to hum a soft song, almost subconsciously.
Sweetie Belle looked up from sweeping her tail along a shelf and opened her mouth, joining in to create a perfect harmony between the two ponies. As they sang, a family of mice came out of a tiny whole in the wall to listen. The birds who had taken residence in Fluttershy’s birdhouse poked their heads out and looked at the two singers. Even Angel came downstairs from where he’d been napping to listen to the beautiful song.
As the two reached the end of the melody, a smattering of applause rang out from the assembled audience of animals, who then dispersed back to what they had been doing before the two ponies had started their song.
