"Look over there!" Applebloom points over to a pony walking rather slower than the ones around him.
This pony's walk, however, is not the thing that stands out to the Cutie Mark Crusaders. What they notice that he's a blank flank, but not just that. He's much older than the age of the CMC, in fact, probably older than the mane six. Which only makes it more of a questionable thing when they see that he's likely had better days than this one.
"What's up with him?" Scootaloo asks. "Do either of you know who he is?"
"I sure don't." Applebloom responds. "Maybe he's from out of town or something."
"Well if he's from out of town, I saw we give him a warm welcome to Ponyville." Suggests Sweetie Belle. "Come on!"
They follow the pony, not finding any difficulty in catching up with him.
"Howdy!" Greets Applebloom. "We couldn't help but... uh..."
He just keeps walking, but does slow his pace for a split second as though he was half listening to them. Applebloom repeats herself again, but this time gets an answer out of him.
"Hey." This pony's voice actually doesn't sound anywhere near as sad as the CMC expected. In fact, he sounds quite content.
"We're curious, why haven't you gotten your cutie mark yet?" Applebloom asks curiously, only to find the other pony slowly walking away again. "H-hello?"
The CMC follow this new pony they just came across, keeping a distance at first before they don't mind him seeing their pursuit. He doesn't even look at them, as though he already knows the extent and details of their intentions. They soon decide enough is enough and approach him, a little bit unsatisfied with the fact that he has no cutie mark on his flank.
"This one seems just as stubborn." Comments Sweetie Belle. "But I'm sure we can turn this one around too."
It isn't long before the other pony halts in his tracks, but in such a stoic fashion that the CMC expect him to say something when they walk up to him. But all he does is turn around and stare at them.
"Excuse me, sir." Applebloom introduces herself after noticing very few other ponies around. "Mah name is Applebloom, and I couldn't help but notice that... you uh... have a blank flank."
The other pony nods. "That is correct."
"And... you're grown up too." Adds Scootaloo. "Why don't you have a cutie mark?"
"Because I don't want to have one."
All three of the CMC look at eachother with anticipating faces, trying to get one of the other two to say something first in the light of what had already happened with Rumble. Applebloom decides to go first.
"Alright, well... you see, we happen to be the Cutie Mark Crusaders. And our job is to go around and make sure everypony in town gets their cutie marks so they're not left behind everypony else." Applebloom explains and takes a small step closer. "We want to help you."
"I'm sorry, but I'm not interested. I'd rather not have only one purpose that says who I am, I'd rather just have anything I want whenever I want."
"Well today's your lucky day!" Scootaloo starts off. "Because we just ran into another pony earlier this week who said the exact same thing. And guess what? We changed his mind with this one easy-"
"Scootaloo, please! We can't just jump right into it." Applebloom interrupts before turning to the other pony. "But that's the beauty of having a cutie mark! You get to automatically be good at one thing through passion in what you do and then you can do other things without it taking away from your main thing."
He shakes his head.
"I have no interest in having a main skill. I only have interest in being able to do anything I possibly can the best way equally. I don't want any strengths or weaknesses."
"But... isn't that boring?" Questions Scootaloo.
"I don't think it is. I just want to find success in everything I do. And for none of them to define who I truly am."
"Then how will you know what you're meant to do?"
"I don't want to be 'meant' to do anything." He frowns. "Look, I'm not telling you how to live your life. Please understand that I don't want someone else trying to change how I see mine. It was nice meeting you."
"But this is an important step in finding your purpose in life! You start doing what you're best at." Sweetie Belle tells the other pony as he turns away from her. "Do you have some really talented pony you look up to? You don't have to be just like the ponies you look up to."
"There are none. I only want to be like me."
The CMC nod their heads.
"Okay... okay." Applebloom begins, taking a deep breath. "So who do you want to be? What do you like to do? What's your favorite activity?"
"Whatever I feel like doing at the time. I don't want to only be one type of pony. I want to be everything."
"Everything?" Sweetie furrows her brow. "What is that supposed to mean?"
"I want to be able to excel at absolutely everything I want to. I know that sounds extremely unrealistic, even impossible, but that's why I said it's only something I want."
"Yeah, well... I'm pretty sure it's never gonna be something you'll actually have. Not trying to discourage you, but that's literally impossible."
"I like it better than me being a one trick pony."
Applebloom facehoofs and lets out an frustrated grunt.
"But you won't be! Look, this is the exact same thing we just told somepony else and this is pretty much what they said." Scootaloo point out. "You can trust us, you don't have to only do the thing that matches your cutie mark. I don't think anypony does that. Come on, you can come with us! We'll help you find what you're meant to do."
"Doesn't matter to me. I understand that you believe you know what's best for me, but again, I'm not interested. I don't want to get a cutie mark. I don't want my purpose to be set in stone like that."
"Why not? Everypony wants to have some purpose that represents what they're meant to do in life."
"Well I'm not crazy about that. I want to make sure there are no loose ends in the range of my abilities. I want the only thing that represents me is perfection, and there is no picture for that because it's relative. Forget everything else."
"Okay, well we can't force you to do it. But if you don't mind, would you like to hear about the last pony who didn't want a cutie mark?"
"I... I just don't care, okay?"
"Well you've been making almost no sense since we followed you here." Sweetie Belle tells him. "And it's really worrying to us."
"Probably, yeah. But I'm not bothered by it. I'm not asking or expecting you to understand. You did come to me about all this."
The CMC exchange another set of concerned glances.
"The thing is, we're worried that you're going to do what the last pony did." Applebloom finally brings up after a pause.
"What did he do?"
"He tried to turn all of the other fillies in our camp against having a cutie mark too. Said that it limits you to doing only one thing, or some other nonsense. Was basically trying to boss everypony else around because of what he thought. When in the end, he just wanted to be just like his brother and thought he'd get a cutie mark that would push him away from that."
"So he did it the wrong way, then."
"I... guess so?" Agrees Scootaloo. "Wait, what?"
"If you must know, I don't believe what he believes. At least not in the same way. I want to never have a cutie mark not to avoid having the wrong set purpose, but to avoid having any at all."
"I know we've already asked this, but why?" Applebloom repeats what was said before. "If anything, I'm just curious at this point."
"I really do want to excel at anything I want. Anything and any time, I don't want anyone's help or encouragement. I don't want a stamp on my flank telling me one of the things that does define me. I don't want to be defined by anything other than myself. Unlike the other pony, I'm already old enough to truly stick to the decisions I make for myself, and I don't have anyone in life whom I want to be just like." He goes on, but his words gradually begin to fall on inattentive ears. "I'm not a genius, I know. In fact, I'm not very smart at all. But I still know what I truly want for myself. And I refuse to let some life calling to alter that."
"Something tells me you're not telling us everything." Applebloom squints at him, watching him stand in place like a statue.
"That's true. But I don't wanna explain myself. It's not like I need other ponies to understand. It doesn't benefit me, so I don't bother."
"Well we'd like to understand." Scootaloo forces herself to still be somewhat interested. "We'd love to hear you out and see if we can help."
"The main idea is that I want to be good at everything, and be able to just stop doing something all together when I stop needing it. I don't want to be driven by passion, only raw skill. And I want to do it all on my own without anyone helping me."
"Why do you feel that way? "Asks Sweetie Belle. "Don't you have friends?"
"Not anymore, at least. But it's no big deal, really. I can handle it."
"Well come with us and we'll introduce you to some cool ponies you can make new friends with. We're not gonna judge you." Says Applebloom with a cute smile. "You'll probably not going to want to be perfect so badly if you have more ponies by your side."
"I'm not asking for sympathy, I just want to be left to live as I am and be happy."
"But you're not happy at all!" Sweetie tells him. "You think you're getting closer to being yourself by avoiding a purpose in life, but you're just making yourself suffer more. It's okay to not be perfect."
"I know it's okay. But I don't care about that. I don't make my choices in life based on what's okay or what's not okay. I follow what I truly want. And what I truly want is either perfection or nothing at all." He still holds onto what he's been saying before.
A cloud passes in front of the sun, casting a shadow over the ponies in the field. Scootaloo tries to think up something else to say to him, but he just stares down to the ground with a crestfallen expression. He looks so distant, so uninterested in taking in the suggestions of ponies trying to give him advice.
"So are you saying you just don't care? You don't want to have a purpose in life?" Asks Applebloom. "Even though it actually could help you get better at something?"
The blank flank keeps his gaze on the swaying grass below.
"Do you remember back in April?" He recalls with a slight tilt of his head. "Back when Trixie and Starlight were in the kitchen together? And Trixie couldn't find it within herself to be able to turn something into a teacup?"
"What are you talking about?" Applebloom begins to back away between her friends.
"That part where she started turning everything into a teacup was right up my alley to write about. It was the perfect depiction of how I would be once I found something I wanted to be good at. With it not being the only thing."
Applebloom and Scootaloo exchange awkward glances as a gust of wind passes by. They are met with a brief silence from the grown blank flank before them before he continues.
"I could have written thousands of words for that. It would have been such an experience for me, because I could reflect who I was on the inside when writing something about that part!"
He imagines himself playing the role of Trixie to an extent. Referring to himself in third person and sifting around through the world around him for another thing to be perfect at after finding one thing. He discovers something he wants to do but doesn't quite know how to do it for a while until he finally somehow pulls through by some asinine miracle; drawing. It was a fictional talent for him personally, but he still loved to dream about being able to do it.
Then he carries out the action and spills out a sketch onto a blank piece of paper that doesn't look like it was done by a four-year-old holding the pencil with their two front hooves. A sketch that he can change on his own, and erase parts of at his own will and replace with whatever he sees fit.
"Well did you? Did you write about it?" Asks Applebloom.
"No. I didn't. It was too late."
"What do you mean too late?"
"By the time I actually got around to seeing that scene, it had already been out for over three or four days. It was too late for me to be in that early bird spotlight. And it was the perfect thing for me to put out there, the perfect topic for me to spill a little bit of my soul out onto paper about."
He can see it now. He finally learns how to draw well and effortlessly. The making of the teacup... so to speak. He starts doing it over and over again after being utterly amazed by his new ability. Hopelessly impressed by his raw ability that he never thought he'd have. And it was all his.
"That really shouldn't matter, though." Says Scootaloo. "Being one of the first ones to do something isn't always the most important thing."
"It is to me. And it doesn't matter whether I'm writing something or otherwise. I always want to amaze everyone, and not in just one thing. I want to show that there's more to me than what makes the average pony an average pony. I want to show that I have boundless ambitions that are matched by what I do." The pony explains. "I just love that feeling. That feeling you get when you make everyone's jaw drop after you do something so incredible they've never seen before. That's what I wanted to do back in April, with Trixie and the teacup."
"Hold on..." Applebloom starts up again, looking extremely confused at this point. "Why are you talking about Trixie all of a sudden? Do you know her?"
"It was that moment when I could really relate. When it showed how I picture myself when I finally leave my own boundaries and do what I could never do before. I wanted to be early so badly, but it was already too late when I found out about it."
"I feel like we're getting off track here." Scootaloo finally conveys as another gust of wind hits and a storm cloud comes rolling in. "Is this still about you not wanting a cutie mark?"
"It certainly is." He answers. "Because Trixie suddenly started trying something she wasn't used to. And she finally did it, and then she couldn't stop doing it. I could have written at least 10,000 words on that in like a day."
"Okay, so it seems like you want to be a writer." Sweetie Belle says to the pony.
"No, I don't want to be a writer. In fact that, perfectly sums up how I feel about the cutie mark thing. I want to be that pony who excels in writing along with anything else, but I don't want to be a writer."
"But that's impossible!" Sweetie throws her front hooves forward. "I mean... how do you think you're going to pull this off?"
"There's a lot more I could have said, but I really don't have the time to say it all. I would have been able to if the situation back in April was the one now. I would have had so much more to go on. Guess it's too late for that now, huh?"
"What are you talking about? Like, okay, so you don't want to be a writer. That's fine. But what's all this about Trixie and teacups all of a sudden?"
"It's an... analogy or something. I don't know the word for it. Like I said, I'm not very smart." The blank flank sighs and turns away again. "But it's also something I really wanted to write a ton of stuff about but didn't because I didn't find out about it until it was too late to impress everypony!"
"You don't have to impress everyone every time you do something, though. Just be yourself."
"I'm afraid that's not enough." He replies. "Not even close." The stallion walks away in the direction of the open fields.
"Well... okay, I guess. Really hate to just leave it at this, but it's your choice." Concludes Sweetie Belle.
"Are you sure you don't want our help? We'll reach out to you if you're struggling. Blank flanks are the ones we're meant to help."
"This may sound a little cynical to you, but I am not interesting in getting help from anyone. I don't need or want anyone. I just want to do anything. On my own." He continues to walk away the the Cutie Mark Crusaders. "I'm sorry, but this is the way I want it to be. I swear."
Now the CMC are completely lost in whatever message this pony is trying to get across. It's a good thing he didn't expect them to understand.
"What in the hay is up with that pony?" Applebloom asks with a weirded out expression.
"Maybe he used to be a lot like Rumble in a few ways, but it's too late to help him now." Scootaloo watches him disappear over a hill. "I dunno, that might be it. At least that's what he's making it seem like."
"How on earth did he go this long without getting a cutie mark in the first place?"
"Who knows." Applebloom sighs. "Anyway, who cares? He's not trying to control anypony else. At least I hope he's not. Maybe we should keep an eye on him in case he changed his mind." She thinks for a second. "In fact, do you think he knows the mane six?"
"Don't think so. But whatever." Scootaloo estimates in her head.
The other two shrug, soon walking back to the treehouse together to go do something else.
Author's Note
I know this seems very disorganized and poorly structured story-wise, but that's a given when it's based on an episode I didn't really care about as well as me typing 3,000 words about it in approximately two and a half hours. I tried my best, but I still don't feel like it was enough. Oh well, I just hope it at least wasn't a trainwreck.
