(Written by Scootareader)
Twilight Sparkle stared in steady determination at her pink friend frolicking ahead of her, a sultry pout adorning her features. Her purple eyes were cast across the park, attempting to make out what the excitable earth pony was doing, but she simply didn’t have good enough eyesight to be able to see what was going on. Her bandaged hooves lay on top of a park bench directly in front of her, uselessly grasping a pair of binoculars that she was unable to raise herself, a recent injury preventing her from performing some of the more basic tasks she needed.
At her side, a small purple dragon seemed to suddenly realize what she was trying to do. “Here, let me help ya.”
He ran around behind Twilight’s wheelchair, a further testament to her bodily harm, and gave several cranks of a lever, tightening two pulleys that were attached to her hooves and bringing the binoculars to bear in front of her eyes. She peered through them at the now visible Pinkie Pie. She stated as patiently as she could manage, “Okay, take this down... twitchy tail.”
Not even half a second after she said this, the small dragon bemusedly said, “Twitchy tail?” followed by a loud gasp and a hollered, “TWITCHY TAIL!” He released the lever holding Twilight’s hooves aloft, causing them to crash painfully down upon the bench.
Twilight winced in pain, then ignored it and turned irritatedly around to glare at her assistant. “Hush, Spike! We can’t let Pinkie Pie know we’re here, remember?”
Spike wasn’t paying attention anymore. “Something’s gonna fall, something’s gonna fall! Run for your lives!” He then sped off in a random direction, heedless of Twilight’s cool reasoning.
Twilight sighed exasperatedly. “Ugh, Spike... honestly. You’re overreacti—”
Her sentence was cut short by a small flower pot which landed directly on her head.
She attempted to regain her bearings and see what had happened, but her focus was once again jarred away from her by an anvil, once more directly atop her skull.
She was in an enormous amount of pain and unable to see straight in front of her, yet still conscious. If she could just figure out who the pony was that was dropping things on her—
She felt an enormous weight fall on top of her, and she blacked out.
Her unconscious body was rocked one final time by a piano dropped by the moving chariot above her, her already broken and weak body further pulverized. Modern medicine would cure her of her ailments over the next several days, but it didn’t stop her from feeling pain upon awaking.
When her eyes finally opened, Twilight gave a groan, followed by a mumbled, “Who... who did this?”
Spike, a worried look etched across his face, shrugged. “I dunno... I wasn’t looking at the sky.”
Pinkie Pie, obviously worried about her friend but heartened to see her awake and okay, happily stated, “Beats me!”
Twilight lay back on her bed in Ponyville Hospital. It seemed she wouldn’t find out who’d managed to accidentally drop four things in a row directly on top of her.
She had no idea who the pony was that she’d come into contact with.
Derpy took a deep breath as she limbered up her legs, preparing to exit her cottage. This was her big day. Rainbow Dash had agreed to let her try out for the Weather Team.
She’d been recruited to several odd jobs in the past; she had tried to prove herself during Winter Wrap-Up, but a mix-up between her and one of the other pegasi retrieving the southern birds had ended with the blame shifted upon her. Needless to say, that had greatly reduced her chances at getting a steady job as a weather pony. Her eyes didn’t help matters.
She’d become infamous with the Friendly Flyer Moving Company after the incident with the cargo chariot. She saw a flower pot begin to slide out, so she dove to try to catch it, but her daring rescue ended up launching her into the back of the van, the flower pot leaping into the air behind her and sailing downward to land with a crash below.
She scrambled to escape the shifting mass of suddenly treacherous household appliances and furniture, heedless of the things she was shoving around in her mad dash to get to safety. Unfortunately, she managed to further dislodge an anvil, a small cart of hay bales, and a piano. Several hundred bits-worth of damage plummeted to the earth at the behest of her clumsy hooves.
In the wake of the accident, Derpy escaped unscathed, but the company had to pay for damages, and her pay was the first thing it was taken out of—all of it. Needless to say, Friendly Flyer, the head of the company, wasn’t happy to hear about the loss of profit and appeared more than willing to cut out the problem employee.
Word circulated around Ponyville like wildfire. One of the most serious downsides of living in such a small town is that everypony knew you; if you were to be involved in a scandalous incident with the mayor, the police-ponies would come knocking before you agreed with a hoofshake. This gossip system effectively squelched all repeat crimes and increased kinship among the townsfolk, but if you were on the wrong side of the gossip... you’d have a better job surviving in the Gates of Tartarus.
Derpy thought several times of moving away and starting over, but... this was Dinky’s home. She’d found friends and happiness. She wasn’t privy to her mother’s plight, nor did Derpy ever want her to. Such a little filly’s mind wasn’t ready for complex issues like joblessness.
So, she did about the only thing that her cutie mark had allotted her: She let her worries pop away into the ether and pasted a silly grin on her face that would put Dinky at ease. After all, Derpy had a little filly of her own and a home... well, maybe not the second thing for much longer. She knew of several ponies to ask that would let the two of them board for a little while if need be.
Her mind seemed caught on something for a few moments. She let her ponderings meander once more over what she’d just thought and realized the source of all her problems. What kind of special talent is bubbles, anyway?
Give her a bubble stick and she can blow any shape. Give her a hard time and she’ll smile it away. Give her anything that could serve as a job and get bits on the table... and she has no talent at all.
She shook the dark thoughts from her mind and pushed open the door of the cottage. Dinky was at school right now, unaware that her mommy would be trying out for this job; Derpy had learned her lesson the first time she had come home fruitless and her filly had cried for hours. It was best to tell only the good news.
It was a relatively uneventful journey to the center of town; Rainbow Dash was apparently setting up for some sort of ceremony and needed a few extra hooves that weren’t preoccupied with standard duties. Derpy flared her wings briefly, getting a little lift to better view the sky where she anticipated Rainbow Dash to be patrolling.
Relatively quickly, she found the cyan pegasus darting to and fro, monitoring several other pegasi that were helping with the day’s festivities. Derpy beelined for her target, focusing on her goal.
It was at that moment that her eyes crossed.
She cursed herself for trying to look too hard, crashing into the unsuspecting daredevil and sending her fluttering slowly to the ground. Derpy, the worse for wear, was unable to maintain any sense of control, sprawling out on the ground and giggling abashedly. “Uh... sorry about that.”
Rainbow Dash picked herself up, a brief glimmer of irritation glinting in her eyes as she looked at her offender. It disappeared just as quickly and a comrade’s smile quickly rewrote itself onto her features. “Oh, uh... no problem. We all make mistakes.” She dusted one of her legs off distractedly. “Just try not to make any more today, all right? This is gonna be a pretty big ceremony. Everything needs to look perfect... as it can be.” She glanced toward the top of the town hall briefly.
Derpy nodded profusely, cutting a comical salute that she mistook for serious. “Yes sir, ma’am sir! What should I do first?”
“Oh, uh...” came Rainbow Dash’s hesitant reply. There were several moments of silence as she looked around, trying to find something with a high fault tolerance. Finally, her eyes focused on the clear blue sky. “How about monitoring the weather? Can’t have a very good ceremony if there’s clouds looming all over it.”
Derpy looked upward, her brow etched with a high degree of skepticism. “But there are no clouds.”
“Yes, well... not yet. But you know how weather patterns can shift. Just make sure that there aren’t any clouds around, okay?”
Derpy was satisfied with this answer, her bobbing head a testament as such. She knew she was being given light duty and that it would require no actual work, but if she could impress Rainbow Dash, she wouldn’t lose her house, Dinky could keep being blissfully happy like always, and the future would be brighter for everypony. Besides, she couldn’t refuse to work.
She gave several beats of her wings, raising her above her brightly colored fellow pegasus and becoming swallowed up in the vast expanse of sky that she was to patrol. Sure enough, there was nothing to do.
She flew around in what felt like circles, staying alert for any cloud that dare approach the town hall. There was, of course, nothing. Nothing that she could see, except the clouds over the Everfree Forest.
Suddenly, she had a glimmer of an idea.
As things stood, she wasn’t going to have a way to prove herself. Rainbow Dash would say something like, “Hey, great job keeping the sky clear, I’ll let you know next time I need help,” then never tell her. They always did it to spare the feelings of the grey pegasus, and it always bothered her to know that this was how other ponies treated her.
But not today.
She flew hurriedly to the edge of the Everfree Forest, where a large storm was threatening to brew, and grabbed a dark, foreboding raincloud. If Rainbow Dash could see her busting this beast apart, she was sure to hire Derpy full-time and get her some work!
As she neared the town hall, a large grin adorned her features. This was probably the best idea she’d had in a long time; she could finally see a light at the end of the tunnel.
A glance at the festivities told her that Rainbow Dash was putting the finishing touches on the ceremony that was about to happen. The cyan pegasus glanced upward, saw Derpy with a dark rain cloud, and a look of concern flickered once more across her face. “Uh... you sure you got that handled?”
“Yup! I’m gonna bust this one away!”
“Just... be careful. We don’t want anything else broken.”
She smiled and nodded once more. She leapt and began beating down upon the raincloud with her hooves, causing it to buckle and release a torrent of rain.
Her face screwed up in irritation as she began to jump harder onto the cloud, attempting to break through the dense, roiling mass and dissipate it.
Still not quite hard enough. As she impacted the cloud, a lightning bolt flashed out from within the folds of the dark shape and arced directly over Rainbow Dash’s head, eliciting a surprised “Huh?” from her.
The concern was evident in Rainbow’s voice. “Now, careful, Derpy.” She flew up to where Derpy was still trying to kick the cloud apart, lightning spilling out of it and striking random areas on the ground. “You don’t wanna do more damage than you’ve already done.”
The two of them focused on the town hall just as the roof collapsed in. Her mouth opened in protest, but she cut herself off.
She knew that she wasn’t to blame for the current state of disrepair town hall was in. Mayor Mare had known about the weakened supports for months; it had been reported as soon as her secretary reported creaking during a rainfall and an investigation team had observed the rotted wood.
The only thing that Derpy was to blame was for wanting to nap up there, landing atop the roof, and the entire thing falling apart in a sudden spectacular display of destruction—with Derpy stuck within the wreckage. She’d miraculously escaped unharmed, but the town hall was now broken and would cost a lot more for repairs than if the mayor had been punctual about such things.
She decided to let it go in a heartbeat... to be bubbly, just as her cutie mark dictated she should be. She continued trying to break the cloud apart, telling her skeptical boss, “I just don’t know what went wrong!”
At that moment, one of her hooves made purchase and passed into the cloud ever so slightly. The built-up static in the cloud found an easier means of escape... directly into Derpy’s body.
She wobbled uneasily, several hundred volts of shock having just wracked her body. The carefree pegasus, in an attempt to put Rainbow Dash at ease, smiled the happiest smile she could manage.
Rainbow Dash didn’t seem too happy with her performance so far. “Yeah... it’s a mystery,” she replied sarcastically.
Derpy quickly noticed that Rainbow was putting the finishing touches on the banner for the ceremony. She rushed over to compliment the pony on her good work, backing away to see all of it. “Nice work, Rainbow Dash!”
As unlucky as Derpy was, it just so happened that there was an unsecured wooden beam directly behind her, which she managed to bump into with just enough force as to send it toppling over.
Rainbow Dash noticed the falling beam, darting below it to try to stop its fall and prevent any further damage, but the large support was simply too heavy, and it crashed through the hollow wooden deck and into a vast storage area located directly beneath.
Derpy flew down immediately to do what she could. Surely Rainbow Dash didn’t blame her for what just happened. It could have happened just as easily to anypony. She bowed her head into the large empty space and called out, “You okay, Rainbow Dash? Anything I can do to help?”
Rainbow Dash flew out of the hole abruptly, rapidly saying, “No! Nothing! In the name of Celestia, just sit there and do nothing!”
This... wasn’t going well. Derpy knew better than to try and make things right anymore. This was already a failed prospect. Rainbow Dash would never let her join the weather team now.
She immediately decided to sit down on her flank atop the wooden planks.
And, as luck would have it, the wood was weakened by having a large support beam crash through it, and the small amount of force supplied by Derpy’s flank was enough to cause the wood to crack and splinter, collapsing below the grey pegasus. In an act of surprise and desperation, she reached out for something to grab... and happened to get Rainbow Dash.
The two pegasi plummeted to the bottom of the storage area, tumbling onto the dirty floor and untangling themselves. Derpy, trying as always to make light of the situation, comically said, “Oops... my bad.”
From the bottom of the hole, they could hear another pony talking somewhere. Rainbow Dash rose to the first hole that had been created by the falling beam, and Derpy took the one she’d just created. The two of them watched the proceedings that were going on.
“… and, I want to thank Applejack in advance for generously offering up her prize money to fix town hall!”
Derpy saw the corruption in a heartbeat. Rather than displace the funds she would need to fix the building herself, the mayor was going to pocket money from a farmer who needed the winnings to instead fund the repairs of a building that she herself should have fixed previously, before it became such a problem.
But... bubbles. She simply let the dark thoughts pop away and instead decided to help cheer for Applejack. “Yay Applejack, woo!”
As she cheered, she raised her hooves, realizing a moment too late that there was nothing holding her to the deck anymore. She crashed once more onto the hard dirt floor.
She simply lay there for a few moments, catching snippets of the speech being given above by Applejack, hearing the love and adoration of the cheers. Rainbow Dash quickly forgot about her fellow pony lying in the hole, being far more interested in what was happening outside. The simple farm-pony was the center of attention right now, not her.
Nopony remembered Derpy. Nopony noticed Derpy. She was just as well to be lying down at the bottom of a hole, where she couldn’t break things or make up excuses.
Suddenly, she let the darkness disappear as she gave a few good flaps of her wings, getting her hooves under her, then rising steadily out of the hole once more and into the light of day. She left a solitary tear to dry in the dirt down there, keeping with it all the sadness and despair that she’d felt only a few moments before.
After all, she couldn’t let Dinky see her unhappy... or anypony. She had to be strong or be swallowed up in this world, and she wasn’t about to let things get away from her now.
That night, Derpy dreamed.
She saw herself flying effortlessly above a fresh, strongly built town hall. A single offending cloud drifted lazily over it before the vigilant mare blasted through it and left nothing but a trail of vapor to sprinkle the ground below. She was a weather pony, and a great one at that. Even Rainbow Dash herself was proud.
She looked down and saw ponies cheering. They were excited to see the fearless pegasus keeping their town safe from darkness. They were lined up in front of the town hall, waiting for her to give a speech.
She went slowly downward, alighting behind the podium and standing proudly. The crowd let out a chorus of cheers, followed by a chant that gripped the entire assembly. Over, and over, they shouted her name, “Derpy, Derpy, Derpy....”
She basked in their cheer, not even needing words to express her happiness. They all knew how much she loved their acceptance. She was finally good at something, and they loved her in return. This was the life she wanted to live.
This was also the life she’d only ever dreamed of having.
Luna’s night continued, soldiering its way through on the road to dawn. Through it all, Derpy’s mind wrapped her in its warm embrace, leeching away the sadness and emptiness she felt in her waking moments. With her dreams to keep her company, perhaps tomorrow wouldn’t be so terrible after all.
