Amber came running out of the Everfree Forest, breathless and with sweat all over her white body and wings. No pony was around to see her, which she was relieved for as she headed into Ponyville. Her parents had grown tired of her not having a job for quite some time, and that she wasn't contributing to keep Equestria safe. So they had set her up with six different jobs in case she happened to get fired from one of them. It had made her happy that she got help with her job seeking. Her previous record of finding jobs hadn’t been good, but it did hurt her feelings a bit that they thought she would get fired from one or more jobs.
The first place for her work was at a bakery called Sugarcube Corner. The name sounded familiar to her, but she couldn't remember when she had been there before. With the help of a map her parents had given her, she managed to find the bakery after a few wrong turns.
The door to the bakery was open, with delicious smells and sounds of a pony’s giggling came from the inside. A purple unicorn she had never met before went out of the bakery. They passed each other without a word. She took a deep breath to get rid of thoughts of worry and went in. All sorts of cakes were standing all over the room on desks, and a pink coloured pony with a curvy raspberry mane stood behind the reception waiting for customers.
"I'm here for the job as a bakery assistant," Amber said going straight to the point in hope that she wouldn't say something embarrassing.
"Hi there, Amber," the earth pony answered happily. "We met at the party a while ago, and the party before that. We have met so many times, but it was so long since you came here. Why aren't you here more often?"
How does she know my name? Amber started backing away slowly with her focus set on the door out. With a blink she turned only to find a blue pegasus with a rainbow mane had entered the bakery and blocked the doorway. Her mouth opened in an attempt to form words of how sorry she was, but all that left was air.
"Silly me," the cashier said with a smile before starting to drag Amber by her right front hoof to the back of the bakery. "You're so eager to start you can't even talk. Well, here's your task for now, load these cakes into these boxes. When you're done with that, I can find something else for you to do." She shook Amber's front hoof hefty and then jumped back to where the blue pegasus was.
"Geez Pinkie," Amber could hear the pegasus saying. She could still feel the earth pony’s shake in her hoof. She slowly placed it down on the floor. Before she could react she saw that the hoof lost balance and brought her down on the floor. "That one is almost quieter than Fluttershy. Are you sure she's the right mare for this?"
The talking continued, but Amber had quickly lost her interest in the conversation and decided to ignore it. She didn't like the tone of the pegasus. But she wanted to show that she really could do this. There were ten cakes standing on a table, and they smelled newly baked. On the opposite side of the room a few brown boxes stood. The cakes were only standing on a very small plate that looked very hard to grasp, and she had to carefully bring them to the boxes. I can do this, I'll show them all, she thought and pushed the boxes all the way to the cakes.
“Are you having fun?” Pinkie asked as she entered the room. She slowly looked over the room before looking at Amber. “Oh, you haven’t even started yet. Remember to have fun when doing it. I always find it really fun.”
Amber couldn’t help but look into the pink pony’s eyes. They looked happy, as if it were an act. She quickly looked over the room where barely anything had changed since she stepped in. The moment was perfect for her to show Pinkie, and everypony else, that she actually could do something. Without hesitating, she grabbed down on the plate and carefully moved it over to one of the boxes. She tried to carefully place the cake into the box, but she lowered it in a bad angle which made the cake glide. Upon noticing it, she dropped the plate and threw herself under the cake in an effort to save it. The cake drowned her light cerise coloured mane in cream and strawberries, and she landed hard on the table with the cakes, breaking it in two and sending cakes flying. Pinkie tried to save some of the cakes, but it ended with both of them lying on the floor, covered in the remains of what had once been newly baked cakes.
“I like this game,” Pinkie said and used her tongue to remove the cake remains from her body. “Cleaning this mess up and baking new cakes will take some time. But we can make it even more fun.”
Amber tried to answer so that she could explain herself, but out of her mouth only air came and no sounds. “I’m sorry,” she managed to squeeze out in a lowly. “I’ll leave.” She held her head low as she walked out with a tear running down her cheek. Pinkie said something behind her, but she didn’t listen. She looked with disappointment at her cutie mark that had been sitting on her flank for years. It was said that a cutie mark was to represent a pony's talent in life, but she still couldn't figure out what her golden star with a green aurora crossing over it meant. Other than sleeping she had never really found something she enjoyed.
Stupid mark, she thought and looked over the map for her next destination. It was a small cottage on the outskirts of town near the Everfree Forest. She lifted her wings and flapped with them for a few seconds while running, believing that maybe her mark had something to do with flying. It then hit her that she couldn't fly. Instead of training like the other pegasi had done, she had been busy sleeping. She blamed herself for it, but even now she could feel the comfy sheets and the sweet madras she had slept on when she was younger.
Around the cottage lots of animals were either running around or flying. Birds were singing and bunnies were eating carrots. A yellow pegasus stood at the side of the cottage feeding a few squirrels, and a bunny tapped his foot due to impatience.
Amber went up to the pegasus trying to look confident, but her walking revealed that she was scared and uncomfortable. While she liked animals to a certain extent she didn't enjoy having them around while trying to work. Animals easily made her lose her concentration and make her forget what she was doing, or what she was going to say. She wondered what she was getting herself into. The yellow pegasus noticed her, and she seemed really uncomfortable and perhaps even a little scared. Amber wondered if she looked the same as she felt the same. But she was determined to show everypony wrong.
A colourful butterfly flew by her nose when she opened her mouth to speak. It made her confused for a second, and she lost her thoughts on what to say. The other pegasus looked too shy to be the one to start talking. So they both stood there for a really long time just looking at each other, neither one willing to be the first one to speak.
Amber was the first one to lose her patience, she said a few words of goodbye, but they were so low that it was impossible to hear them, and she left. The yellow pegasi only looked at her, wondering why she had even come.
Second job failed before starting. Amber cursed herself as she left the cottage to head back into town. Small tears were running down her cheeks, and she wondered if maybe she should have made the Everfree Forest her home. She usually hid there, away from the rest of the ponies. It wasn't because they were mean to her, but she feared what they might say if they saw her fail. The forest itself wasn't so scary, and as long as the animals hid from her it was all fine and sometimes even comfortable in there.
The next job she was about to go to was a pegasus only job, but she didn’t go there with high hopes. She arrived at a road where the job was to be undertaken in the close proximity to an apple farm that she recognised. It was where a lot of the town’s food was coming from, and one could always rely on the nice ponies that ran the farm.
"She's finally here," a voice said from above her. She recognised the voice and when she looked up she saw the blue pegasus from the bakery sitting on a cloud. "I told Pinkie that you weren't cut for bakery, this is where you belong."
Amber didn't feel all too comfortable in the situation, but she decided she would at least try her best and not care what the others thought of her. "This is where I belong," she managed to squeak out of her voice in a really low and shy tone. The sound of multiple hoof steps coming from the road drowned out her own words, but the pegasus seemed to have heard.
"That’s the spirit," the blue pegasus responded. "Come up here and let’s get this cloud clearing started."
"I can't fly," Amber mumbled out in shame as she managed to figure out why the job was pegasus only, you needed to be capable of flying.
“It’s easy,” the pegasus replied and took flight. “Use your wings, and you’ll see that it’s easy.”
Amber nodded slightly before starting to flap her wings hard. The wind under them felt nice, but she was flapping in such a speed that was making her tired. With a quick look down she saw her hooves still attached to the ground. Panting she gave up on the task.
“I can’t help you if you don’t have the will,” the pegasus said. “If you change your mind, come seek me up. I’m sure I can teach you how to properly use those wings.” With a flash she was gone in the distance together with the cloud.
Amber stood still where she had been left crying a small bit and wondering if she could ever find something she was good at. Stupid mark taking up space on my flank. She cursed her cutie mark even more as she made another attempt to fly. Her hooves still refused to leave the ground, no matter how hard she flapped her wings. In her attempt to fly she had forgotten all about the hoof steps and a horde of sheep led by a brown dog with white spots, knocked her off the road. She landed hard on a rock. She could feel how her stretched out wings broke underneath her.
"Ah'm so sorry," she heard an orange earth pony with a cutie mark consisting of three red apples say. The pony was standing over her with a concerned look in her sap green eyes. "Apple Bloom, get the sheep to their hedge and prepare the first aid kit! Ah'm so sorry."
Amber only barely felt that she was getting picked up by the earth pony she recognised as Applejack. She had met her many times when she had bought food, but now all she cared about was her wings. They were hurting and making her dizzy in the process. She tried to speak, but feared that only moans would come out. So she kept her mouth shut with her teeth almost breaking each other under the pressure she was putting on them.
Applejack ran incredibly fast for a pony carrying another pony, and Amber was soon inside the Sweet Apple Acres house. There she had her wings being taking care of by Applejack and her sister.
"They ain’t broken, but y’all should probably still see a doctor," Applejack said in a certain accent as she finished bandaging Amber's wings so that they were stuck to her body. "Mah apologies." Applejack offered an apple pie as a way to say sorry to the white pegasus, who still were at a loss of words.
"Thank you," was all she managed to squirm out. Her wings didn't hurt so much anymore, but she didn't feel all too safe in talking. She remembered that the Sweet Apple Acres was her fourth place to work on and decided it might be worth going for it. "Um, about, a, job."
"Ah can't have y’all working after this," Applejack answered seeming to understand what was going on.
After eating the delicious apple pie, Amber felt she hadn't much more to do at the farm. So she waved goodbye to Applejack and her sister, too afraid to actually say it out loud, and she went on her way. Her next stop was a boutique, and she hoped that there would be a calm job there where she truly could show that she was capable of doing something. She was getting tired of being rejected and a part of her thought that her cutie mark meant that her special talent was failing, one way or another.
The boutique was glimmering with colours and multiple voices were coming from inside through the open door. Amber hesitated for a second but then forced herself inside where a white unicorn was showing off a lot of dresses to other ponies. All of them were dressed in so many colours that it made her eyes hurt.
"Um, hello?" she asked, but no pony seemed to have heard it. The tour went on from mannequin to dress, and the white unicorn even went on to show off hats and other accessories. Amber grew tired of waiting and even tried gently knocking on one of the other ponies, but she didn't notice her at all. So she left the boutique mostly disappointed in herself.
It didn't take her long to reach her last stop, the town’s library. The door with a candle grease light carving on it was closed, but she forced herself to knock. It was shortly opened by the purple unicorn she had passed by at the bakery.
"Ah, you're finally here," the unicorn said letting Amber inside. "My name is Twilight Sparkle. My assistant is out of town, so I need you to help me with various tasks."
Amber looked around the room that was full of books of different sizes, lying on the floor. The floor under a small desk with a parchment lying on top of it even had some large ink stains. "Amber." It was all she managed get herself to say, and it made Twilight look at her strangely. But it wasn't her face the unicorn was looking at, but her flank. It creeped her out. The door was closed, and she wondered if anypony would notice if she made a run for it.
"Your cutie mark is really special," Twilight said inspecting it very closely. "How does it come that a pegasus has a cutie mark representing magic?"
The words confused Amber for a second, and she wondered if that really could be what her cutie mark meant. But she wasn't happy about it as she had no use of magic at all. She took a lot of time thinking before she finally answered with all the words carefully thought out. "I got it when I slept.”
"Interesting," Twilight replied and levitated a book to her. "There's nothing in any book describing anything similar to this."
"I'm the only pegasus in my family of unicorns," Amber said after thinking out the words carefully to avoid anything awkward slipping out. Her words were true, in a line of unicorns she was the only pegasus for hundreds of years. It made her stand out from the rest of her family, but the only difference it really included was not getting to go to magic kindergarten like her sisters.
"Maybe you caught something from those," Twilight responded and placed the book back in the bookcase. She started walking around the room in a way that looked like she was thinking. "Maybe they tried to make you a unicorn. No, that doesn't make sense. You know what, forget the assistant job. If it’s fine by you I would like to take some time studying you."
Amber nodded happily in agreement.
"Great!" Twilight said with excitement glowing in her eyes. "Come back tomorrow, and I'll have a few things prepared. Oh, this is going to the history books." She levitated a lot of books to her and started reading them. She looked really eager to get started.
Amber waved farewell and took her leave. She didn't get the job she was intended to get but another much better, and she would finally get to know what her cutie mark meant. She had finally managed to prove to those who doubted her that she could do something, she was special in some way and that knowledge made her really happy. She attempted to fly up into the air in a fit of happiness only to crash land into the dirty ground. With her wings tied up it was impossible for her to even start trying to fly.
