Nestled cozily in the bottom of a long tube, Scootaloo could hear her own breathing reverberating off the tall walls; All the voices outside were muffled from where she was sitting, with the cannon she resided in pointing away from the roaring crowd. The white noise filled her ears, but even as she wiped a bead of sweat off her brow, she looked forward with a determined glare!

… and started feeling bored from within the stuffy barrel; she couldn’t help but sigh as she fanned herself half-uselessly with her hoof. “Uhhhggg… what’s taking so long?” She whined to herself, huffing momentarily before thinking screw it, holding onto the walls around her to slowly climb up the long pipe and dinging her helmet against the side occasionally… until she was about halfway out. “Wait, crap- can’t do that.” She remembered her instructions, causing her to slide back down the barrel dejectedly.

Trixie’s instructions for Scootaloo were, of course, very specific and detailed; and for the filly, they were too specific and detailed. “Uhhmmm… cannon, stay in…” she muttered silently to herself, hoping that spouting random words will help her remember the complicated plan necessary to pull this final stunt off. “Something, something, low pressure curve if I climb out before the fuse, uhhh…” Scootaloo wasn’t sure what that meant, but she definitely remembered getting told something along those lines sometime earlier; she wiped the sweat off her brow with a huff, continuing her train of thought- “Rings of fire… I fell into a burnin’ ring of fire- DANGIT! Now that’s gonna be stuck in my head all day!” Once again, she found herself trying to wipe the sweat off of her forehead.

“Uuugh… Something about a manticore, a box, and a buncha magic crap…” She muttered to herself, trying to make heads-or-tails of what the unicorn was trying to explain to her earlier- “Something something spell matrix, pocket dimensions, uhh…”

Conk!

Something lightweight was dropped onto her head, reverberating with a hollow sound when it hit her helmet; it was made of paper, and shaped like a bucket… an all-too familiar fast-food bucket from a Griffonian chicken chain, emblazoned proudly as KFC. “AW C’MON!” She yelled out the barrel of the cannon, barely able to read the note hastily written inside the empty chicken bucket that said ‘Wear this over your helmet, we got a brand deal!’ She was about to tear the paper bucket up when she noticed a tiny asterisk next to the hasty note, drawing attention to the text at the bottom which said- ‘Do it or you’re not getting paid- trust me, you don’t want to not get paid after this show.’ “Uuuughh… fine.” She grumbled, sliding the bucket over her helmet…

“What was I thinking about earlier?” She asked, once again wiping the sweat off her forehead. “The Matrix, and dimensions in my pocket, uhh…” Fed up with how much she was sweating, she decided that enough was enough. “I need some air, I can’t think in here!” She huffed, resolving to finally begin the descent up the barrel for some fresh oxyg-

BOOOOOM!

“AAAHHHHHH!” She was soaring over the crowd of cheering ponies like a bullet… because she pretty much was a bullet, being fired out of a comically large cannon; but despite this, the world around her seemed to be going in slow motion as she surveyed the scene in front of her. With the stage so far away with its closed curtain, she barely paid it any mind considering the three literal rings of fire in front of her; the cannon was angled in such a way that it would allow her to sail these hoops in a rising and falling parabolic arc.

She blasted through the first hoop in a spot that seemed much lower than dead center; with a singed spot at the end of her tail, she realized she didn’t have enough momentum to make it through the second hoop without crashing. Eyes shooting open, she only had a second to panic as her body straightened out, her wings flapping… differently than normal somehow. She spread them as wide as they would go, flapping them slower and more rhythmically than she normally would and was barely able to lift herself high enough to avoid the flaming ring. “YES!” She yelled, losing control of the flight immediately as she sailed through the last hoop with a look of elation on her face!

That is, until the stage's purple curtain opened, revealing a plain wooden box and a leashed manticore with its jaws wide open, standing atop a raised platform. Scootaloo barely heard Trixie yelling something about a manticore moonshot something or other as she clamped her eyes shut, covering them with her hooves as well.

CHOMP!
‘UUUUURP!’

“Manticores can burp?” Scootaloo spoke to herself, finding herself unable to move yet floating through space with the muffled sounds of the trepid crowd outside, unable to make out their words whilst distracted by her own thoughts… “Manticores have outer space inside their stomachs?” She heard the sound of a wooden crate bursting open from some unknown direction, unsure if she was facing up or down when she heard the sound of a chicken clucking through a pillowcase; but rather than feeling annoyed at the predictable joke, she felt ecstatic because of the simple fact- “HOLY CRAP, I FLEW! I WAS GONNA SLAM INTO THE HOOP, BUT I SAVED IT! YEAAAHEEAAAAA!” She yelled, unable to turn back to check whether or not a cutie mark might have appeared.

—

CHOMP!
‘UUUUURP!’

The crowd gasped in utter terror whilst Trixie held onto her hat to jump onto the stage, with streamers of odd-colored magic blasting from her horn like a shotgun firing a swarm of bees. They danced and raced around each other as they split off into groups to fully saturate the wooden crate in faint pink magic that caused the box to literally jump into the air, slamming down with enough force to give anyone nearby a short case of tinnitus as the lid popped off, and the walls all fell outwords like a door off its hinges. “THE GREAT AND POWERFUL TRIXIE PRESENTS-” She yelled, pointing a hoof at the orange-painted chicken that wore an ensemble that was meant to mimic Scootaloo’s helmet and cape and even a small KFC bucket all shrunken down to chicken-size. “THE FLYING CHICKEN, EVERYPONY!”

The crowd looked at the little creature in utter disbelief, waiting for the stuntfilly to give her grand-standing speech… or even just to affirm that she was okay as she looked around with confusion on her face. She pecked the wooden stage and proudly exclaimed- “Bok!”

“YEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!”
“WOOOOOOOOO!”
THUDUDUDUDUDUDU-

The crowd erupted into an utter cacophony of incomprehensible hootin’, hollerin’, and stompin’ their hooves as the fillynodded off the stage and flapped her wings into the cheering masses to crowdsurf away… all the while Trixie looked on in mild jealousy. “They’ve never crowdsurfed Trixie away before…”

—

Scootaloo sighed, literally staring out into space. “Can you let me out of this manticore now?” She blurted out, only getting a muffled chuckle in response.

“You’re not inside the manticore, you’re inside a suspended animation pocket dimension while Trixie counts our earnings.” she explained to the filly plainly, underlined by the clinking of valuable bits. “While the pocket dimension is technically within her mouth, it’d be entirely wrong to say you were eaten by the manticore.” She mused, causing Scootaloo to huff.

“I don’t know what most of that means, but what does that have to do with me?” She asked, starting to feel an itch on her flank. “Can’t I just have a check that I can cash or something?” She could only hear Trixie scoffing.

“If I go to a bank, they might start questioning my finances, and Trixie does not need that.” She heard the mare muse to herself along with the clinking of bits. “The KFC manager is paying me in coupons for that exact reason.” Of course, that made the filly raise another eyebrow.

“Do they even have any pony food on their menu? I’ve never actually been there.” Mainly because she promised herself years ago that she wouldn’t wanna be caught dead within that place. “I’ve tried their mashed potatoes and gravy- it tasted like styrofoam with wallpaper paste.” Trixie actually giggled, and sounded sincere about it.

“They don’t actually serve chicken in Equestria- it’s all tofu based, and the manager was a griffon who swore by the taste of their fried tofu bucket.” Scootaloo’s stomach grumbled, reminding her that she skipped lunch and… hopefully not dinner yet; worst case scenario, she had a downstairs freezer chock-full of ill-gotten ice cream at home. “I’ll throw in a couple coupons for you, as a bonus.” The filly rolled her eyes at the mares smug tone.

“None of that explained why I have to stay in here, though.” She whined, only receiving silence in response… unless… “It’s Diamond Tiara, isn’t it?” She asked, causing the magician to chuckle.

“She’s really upset at you, which is why she paid me a decent chunk of bits to keep you occupied for a while.” It sounded like Trixie shrugged just then- “And because of your 50% cut, I need all the bits I can save up.” Scootaloo sighed.

—

Clink, Clink, Clink, Clink!

The saddlebags full of bits weighed heavily at the small filly’s sides, filled with the crushing weight of gold coins… so she didn’t feel that upset about it. “Who knew the show’d be such a hit?” She spoke to herself as she made the trek across the town with the marvelous purple-orange gradients of the sun-setting sky and grinning whilst taking shortcuts through the shaded alleyways. She barely paid attention to the dirty-red bricks that rose to the sky on either side of her, and definitely didn’t stop to question why two dumpsters would be placed across from each other as she walked right into the chokepoint.

“Ah!”
Click!

She jumped and drew her pocketknife out of her bag just as Silver Spoon made herself known by hopping into her path wearing a dress that covered most of her body and a frilly white wide-brim hat atop her head. Scootaloo pointed the plastic-gripped county fair stiletto knife at the bully with a huff and said- “Back off- these bits are mine, fair and square.” She grinned, slashing her knife in the air uselessly for dramatic effect while Silver just giggled. “Do you know how many times I’ve pictured this exact scenario in the shower? I’m like, an expert when it comes to dealing with muggings in alleyways!” But all that bravado fell when she heard a chuckle from behind her.

“Do you really think we want your… pittance? Picture day’s tomorrow, and you’re the reason they had to cut my fur.” she stated with a growl, wearing a pink three-piece suit with a white felt hat which covered up what was left of her mane from the tree-sap removal, and Scootaloo even noticed a few bald-patches on DT’s cheek. “That knife of yours looks cheap and lame.” Her arch-enemy said as she reached into her suits pocket and pulled out a closed balisong with curved gold grips and held together with platinum pins; Scootaloo’s eyes shot open and she began to sweat a little, paying no mind to the silver filly behind her.

Diamond Tiara undid the latch and began skillfully flipping it around and swapping between her hooves as the rhythmic clacking noise they made drew attention to the sharp, curved blade and tossing it in the air before catching it with her right hoof, fully deployed and locked open. “Crap, that knife is better than mine…” Scootaloo muttered, closing the blade of her stiletto and tossing it back into her pocket, raising her hooves in the air and closing her eyes. “Fine, just… make it quick. Do what you gotta do.” She said, hoping that they would take the bait… and unable to resist sneaking a peak, her plan fell apart immediately as she saw Diamond Tiara cutting a feather-stuffed pillow open. “Hang on, I won that bet!” She yelled defiantly, only to receive a glare from DT. “During the Manticore Moon Dive or whatever that trick was called, I managed to raise my altitude all on my own!” She whined as the wind picked up, causing DT’s hat to fly off- but before the filly could catch it, she witnessed just how much of her mane they had to cut off before the hat was pressed back onto her scalp.

“Didn’t see it-” Diamond grumbled through grit teeth just as Scootaloo heard the sound of a paint-can lid being opened, along with an obviously piney smell. “Didn’t happen.” She heard the footsteps as Silver approached her from behind with the can and a paintbrush, and blurted out-

“Let me take the bag off first. I don’t want any tree-sap on my loot.” She said, casually removing the backpack and accepting her fate… but she wasn’t the least bit upset about it.

—

‘I flew today! All by myself, under my own wingpower!’ She’d go on to write in her diary later that night, wearing a hoodie to keep warm because of all the patches of fur that got shaved off. ‘Not only did I make a bunch of cash and KFC coupons working with Trixie on her show, DT and SS both got sapped-and-feathered… by accident, but it was in front of a decent amount of ponies regardless.’ She tapped the pen into her chin and thought of what else to write- ‘Despite the fact that I got the same feather treatment and DT made sure to take plenty of photos to laugh at with the class… but I should be thankful that if I showed up tomorrow wearing nothing but sap and feathers, I probably wouldn’t have to get it taken anyway.’ She giggled to herself, idly stroking her mane with a hoof- ‘Either way, they’ll be showing up to picture day tomorrow with a lot less mane than they woke up with this morning… but you wanna know the kicker?’

Scootaloo giggled to herself with a massive grin on her face. “It’s like what Cheerilee told us- No wearing hats on picture dayyyy!” She sing-songed to herself aloud from the sheer irony of the situation; rather than being upset, she could only laugh at the fact that her bullies would be- “Wait a minute.” She came to the cold realization when she started idly stroking her mane… or what was left of it, and remembering the massive bald spot that went from above her eyebrows to nearly her scalp in such a manner that not even a comb-over could fix. It’s too late to buy a wig, and she doubted the wig store would be open on a sunday and especially not enough time to do it before heading to the photography studio and beating the inevitable line of students that would build up from the picky stallion who owns the place and making sure everypony looks good before sending them off… “My Sunday will be completely gone if I show up too late to beat everypony else… probably why Cheerilee opted to have the photo-op all day tomorrow.” After a grumbling sigh that caused her to lower her head… she gave herself a chuckle.

“Screw it- I flew today, and I couldn’t be happier.” She resolved, finishing up her journal entry and shutting the diary. “I hope Rainbow had her contacts in!” She squee’d to herself, having a relieving feeling that told her things could’ve been way, way worse. “Aaaaand… it’s bedtime!” She exclaimed, yanking the chain that turned her bedroom light off and hopped into bed.

Fin.

Author's Note

The guy who commissioned this story also commissioned this accompanying piece-

I hope you've enjoyed reading this fic! I had a blast writing it myself :p

Your likes and comments are greatly appreciated, and as of posting this chapter, I'm still taking commissions! Again, thank you all sooo much for the support- it means a lot to me :3