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The Play's The Thing

by HMXTaylorLee

Chapter 1: Act 1: Setting The Stage

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Sweetie Belle didn’t quite know when she started having feelings for her friend, Scootaloo. She had wracked her brain many times to try and find the exact moment, but couldn’t pin it. Although, the word “feelings” was a bit broad, now that she thought about it. In a way, she had feelings for Diamond Tiara too – exclusively negative, but feelings nonetheless.

The feelings she had for Scootaloo had always been the complete opposite – happy ones. From the moment that Scootaloo had kindly helped Sweetie Belle recover from the newly cutie-marked emblazoned Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon’s teasing.


“Sweetie Belle? More like…” Silver Spoon’s face screwed up, thinking of an insult to sling at the pure white unicorn backed against the wall of the school house.

“Sweetie Blank?” Diamond Tiara suggested, her cornflower blue eyes lighting up as she saw Sweetie Belle flinch as though she had just been whipped.

Their shrill laughs echoed across the school yard, drowning out a tiny sob.

“It’s not my fault...” Sweetie Belle whined.

The two Earth ponies carried on their mirthless conversation, paying no mind to the protests.

“Her flank is just so… blank!”

“I can barely remember when I was a blank flank, it was such a long time ago…”

“Just… leave me alone!” came another plea, falling upon deaf ears.

“And you’re sure she’s coming to your party?” Silver Spoon asked with a tone of disgust.

“My dad’s a client and friend with her big sister, so yeah, unfortunately.” Diamond Tiara shook her head with an exaggerated sadness.

“Well, she and that hick will make us look even more fabulous! How can a blank flank compare with these?” The two ponies pivoted to their sides, pressing their backsides against one another, revealing a duo of elaborate cutie marks along their flanks. A silver spoon for Silver Spoon, and a diamond tiara for Diamond Tiara – fitting, given their names.

“I don’t know,” Diamond Tiara pondered aloud, fixing her vivid blue eyes upon Sweetie Belle’s shimmering green ones. “What do you think, blank flank?”

Sweetie Belle lowered her head to the ground, pawing at the dirt along the school wall aimlessly. She didn't speak.

"Speechless, and who can blame her?" Diamond Tiara laughed falsely. She exchanged a hoof bump with the giggling Silver Spoon, and she and her cohort began to walk back to the playground where the rest of the students were undoubtedly waiting to be graced by their presence.

Sweetie Belle sat on her haunches, exhaling deeply with her eyes closed. Her imagination fired up from behind her eyelids, envisioning all sorts of images of her with various cutie marks. One was a half-full beaker, filled with a bright green liquid that matched her eyes. Definitely the mark of a great scientist. Another was a paint brush, leaving an s-shaped trail of paint in the same shade as before. Assuredly, a great artist! The next was a big, bold typewriter, with a multitude of indecipherable text on the page stemming from the device — undoubtedly that of a great writer! For a brief instant, she even saw herself with the same cutie mark as Mayor Mare. Imagine that — Sweetie Belle, the mayor of Ponyville!

In all of these images, she saw herself smiling broadly. A far cry from how she felt now.

"Don't let them get you down," she heard a voice say from in front of her. Sweetie Belle's eyes fluttered open to see an orange pegasus standing above her, large violet eyes looking at her warmly. Her mane was of a similar, yet slightly brighter hue. Though it seemed disheveled, Sweetie Belle couldn't help but notice the curious curl at the front that made the whole rough-and-tumble appearance seem deliberate. This pony smiled at her, and extended her hoof to Sweetie Belle.

"Name's Scootaloo," the pegasus offered. "What's yours?"

"...Sweetie Belle." Sweetie Belle answered with caution, wrapping her foreleg around Scootaloo's and lifting herself from her seated position.

"Well then, Sweetie Belle, looks like you've got yourself a new friend!" Scootaloo exclaimed with a bold confidence, seemingly not allowing Sweetie Belle a say in the matter. "After all..." She started, turning her body to the side, revealing a set of small feathered wings, and a noticeably blank flank. "Us 'blank flanks' need to stick together, right?"


“...Stick together...” Sweetie Belle smiled as she echoed the words softly to the open textbook in front of her. Yes, that meeting was certainly a strong way to make a first impression. That instance fostered those aforementioned feelings – this time, of gratitude, relief, and of course, friendship. So now, Sweetie Belle was cycling through her memories, trying to find where that friendship had blossomed into something more, at least as far as she was concerned.

The film reel playing in her mind blurred. They spent so much time together, in school and out of it, that it was impossible to find any one segment that tipped the balance. Now, Sweetie Belle was left to wonder two more questions: Why did she feel such a strange affection for another filly instead of a colt, and why Scootaloo? After all, as one of the Cutie Mark Crusaders, she spent as much time with Apple Bloom as she did with Scootaloo.

First things first – her “attraction” to fillies. Sweetie Belle was reluctant to use the word attraction. From what she had surmised, it wasn’t normal to have romantic feelings for the same gender as yourself. Sweetie Belle still wasn’t sure if she was “that” way, because she didn’t have feelings like that for anypony else – just Scootaloo.

So back to where she had just been in her mental outline – Why Scootaloo? The first thing that most ponies tended to notice about others was not the content of their character, but rather their physical appearance. Although Sweetie Belle hadn’t paid too much thought to it beforehoof, Scootaloo certainly didn’t fall short in that regard. Scootaloo was lithe and agile, and she never ceased to impress Sweetie Belle with how fit she was. While Sweetie Belle's sister, Rarity, would probably implore some divine intervention if she discovered that her sister had a crush on somepony who didn't meticulously brush their mane in the morning, Sweetie Belle wouldn't take Scootaloo and her wanton approach to mane styling any other way. Her determined eyes almost always had a confidence and spiritedness within them, the light inside them only faltered when Scootaloo focused on her small, and somewhat ineffectual, wings that kept her grounded. Sweetie Belle wouldn't say so to Scootaloo outright, lest the pegasus vehemently deny it, she thought the wings were utterly charming.

Physical traits aside, the content of a pony’s character was more important. The orange pegasus was brash at times, and certainly bursting with confidence and a can-do attitude. This had led to more than their fair share of sure fire schemes to get their cutie marks that had fallen not only short, but oftentimes off of a cliff or tree. Of course, the tough pegasus she was, she laughed it all off. Like her idol Rainbow Dash, Scootaloo was fiercely loyal to her fellow Crusaders. But underneath that wall of strength and stoicism, Scootaloo had proven to be a very sensitive pony. Her insecurities about what she deemed personal failings revealed a much softer and sweeter individual that Sweetie Belle had a burning curiosity to see more of.

It was here that Sweetie Belle found herself in a dilemma. Scootaloo had displayed a reluctance to reveal that core, and Sweetie Belle could surmise that on the off chance that if, IF, Scootaloo felt the same about her, she would never say it first. Naturally, Sweetie Belle had already considered that Scootaloo didn’t feel the same way – seemingly over a million times, but at some point, Sweetie Belle would have to tell Scootaloo how she felt. An uncomfortable conversation with her sister over a month ago taught her that she couldn’t simply harbor these feelings forever.


“Rarity?” Sweetie Belle asked timidly from the open door frame to her sister’s “inspiration room”, where the older unicorn was hunched over a sewing machine.

“Hmm?” her sister replied absentmindedly, focused on the dark green fabric sliding underneath the rapidly bouncing needle in front of her.

Sweetie Belle could tell that Rarity was pre-occupied, but she stayed the course.

“I had a question I wanted to ask you.”

“Oh, do go on…”

“What should I do if…”

“Mhm.”

“What should I do if I like somepony?”

The sewing machine made a loud whirring sound that choked as the fabric bunched up underneath the needle, bringing the stitching process to a screeching halt.

“What?” Rarity pushed the chair out from the table, spinning the rotating seat around to face her younger sister.

Sweetie Belle immediately regretted the decision to ask her sister, a bright red blush painting her white face, and making her bright green eyes stand out even more.

“I was just wondering what I should do if… I… like… somepony?” Sweetie Belle repeated, her voice fluctuating at the end to form a question. Not just because she wanted to know what to do, but because she suddenly felt as if she had tread on some incredibly thin ice, and that asking such a question with any sort of confidence or knowledge of what it meant was going to be cause her to fall through. Sweetie Belle tried to pass it off as though it was something she heard at school and that she didn’t know what it was she was asking.

“Oh, do go on, dear!” Rarity exclaimed, giggling madly. “Oh, this is so exciting! My dear Sweetie Belle has a crush on somepony!”

“N-no! I don’t!” Sweetie Belle’s protest fell flat in the wake of her sister’s frenzy.

“Who is he? Oh, I bet I know!”

“I don’t have a crush on anypony!”

“I bet it’s that Pipsqueak – he’s got the most charming accent—”

“No, really, I-I-I don’t have a crush!” Sweetie Belle stammered uneasily.

“Or maybe that Featherweight! He’s a bit thin, but he’s got such a winning smile—”

“Rarity…”

“Or that one that plays games all of the time, what’s his name?”

“Rarity?”

“Well, whoever he is, he’s certainly cute enough. And that hat!”

“RARITY!”

Rarity snapped out of her bizarre seizure to look at her sister, who didn’t look embarrassed like she had before. Instead, she looked cross.

“What is it, Sweetie Belle?”

“I – I don’t have a silly crush on some colt, alright? I just want to know what I should do if I ever did. In the future. Not now.” Sweetie Belle added for emphasis.

Rarity raised her eyebrow at the filly, studying her for the slightest hint of a fidget or other tell that might suggest she was having the fabric pulled over her eyes. Sweetie Belle was used to this, and was grateful for including the addition of “some colt” that made her statement mostly true.

Though her observations evidently hadn’t indicated that Sweetie Belle was being untruthful, Rarity still seemed wary.

"Well..." She said uncertainly, the tone of voice still showing some reluctance. "If ever you do find yourselves with feelings like that..."

Sweetie Belle inched closer to her, eager to drink whatever advice Rarity spilled forth.

"Let them know," she finished.

"Really? Just like that?" Sweetie Belle asked with confusion as she stumbled backwards.

"Easier said than done, darling, believe me." Rarity whipped her head back, emphasizing the words 'believe me' with exasperation. "But I can hardly think of anything worse than living with feelings of uncertainty like that. Even if they don't feel the same way, at least you'll know for sure."

"What if they say no? Won't that be weird?" the filly asked with a panicky tone of voice.

"Of course it will!" Rarity exclaimed. "Especially at first. But it's much less, how did you put it, 'weird'? Yes, it's much less weird, and much less painful in the long term than nursing a powerful and unremarked affection for somepony."

Sweetie Belle was growing more frantic, this advice spurring her on. "But how do you tell somepony that you 'like' them?"

Rarity laughed, and shook her hoof at her younger sister. "Now that... that is the thing, is it not? That all depends on you and the pony you're telling. Despite the impressive amount of books on the subject, there's no one right way to say it. Not — not that I'm an expert on those kinds of books!" The unicorn laughed unusually loudly, Sweetie Belle's raised eyebrow not dissuaded.

"Hahaha... well... Anything else you wanted to know?" Rarity asked curiously, making a note of her sister's reaction. "I have to finish this design for Princess Twilight before Spike comes to pick it up later. He's such a gem, he is!"

"...No..." Sweetie Belle sighed again, not feeling any more confident about her situation. If telling somepony that you liked them were easy, she wouldn't have asked for help in the first place. The advice seemed redundant.

"Well, then I suppose I will get back to — BUTTON MASH! It's Button Mash isn't it?" Rarity shouted, recovering from her pivot back to the machine with an impressive twirl that found her mere inches away from her sister's muzzle.

"I-I don't have a crush on anypony!" Sweetie's eyes darted back and forth nervously as she backed out into the upstairs hall.

"Aha! I knew it!" Rarity exclaimed with gusto. "I can always tell when you're fibbing, my dear Sweetie Belle!"

As Rarity's excited giggles and utterances sounded from down the hall, Sweetie Belle entered the guest room where she slept with only one thought on her mind.

I should have said "colt"


The shrill cry of the school bell roused Sweetie Belle from her daydreaming, and she found herself staring at the same textbook page she had during the start of the period. Had she really been that lost in thought for so long? Before Sweetie Belle could contemplate just how much her crush on Scootaloo was beginning to affect her basic ability to read, the shuffling of chairs and desks was interrupted by the school teacher's call for attention.

"Everypony, everypony!" Cheerilee yelled above the din. "Please, settle down. I have a very exciting announcement I need to make before you are all released for the day." The students groaned collectively, and slowly ambled back into their seats.

"First, I have a question," she stated. "By a show of hooves, how many of you have you have different races of ponies as parents? For example, your mommy is an earth pony, and your daddy is a pegasus?"

Several hooves raised into the air.

"Wonderful! Now, as I'm sure you all remember from last quarter, having different races of ponies as very special someponies was something that was once frowned upon in the very early days of Equestria. Until Princess Celestia and Princess Luna decreed otherwise, it was against the customs and traditions of the early settlers of Equestria to love somepony that was a different type of pony than yourself. Can anypony tell me the name of the holiday celebrating the passing the law allowing interracial marriage?"

Nopony raised their hoof. The classmates exchanged nervous glances and whispers.

"Anypony? It was just last quarter!" Cheerilee exclaimed with a tone of mock anger. "I'm not entirely surprised. It's hard to remember sometimes that something as basic and important as love could attempt to be stifled with a law. The holiday is called 'The Night of Harmony's Flowers', and we celebrate it every year on June 12th."

The nervous whispers grew louder — the mutterings that June 12th was only next week, and that was after summer vacation had started were frequently among the messages passed.

"Now, I know what everypony is thinking!" Cheerilee spoke again, louder than the dissonance from her students. "You're thinking 'Why should we care about something during summer that isn't sleeping in or playing the day away'? Well, I'm very excited to announce that, after a conversation with the playwright Mrs. Loving herself, that Ponyville Elementary will be putting on the next performance of her historical re-enactment 'Harmony's Flowers!'"

There were a few errant claps around the room, but the air was mostly thick with a tentative silence.

Cheerilee didn't look dismayed at all, however. Rather, she looked unsurprised, as though the less than stellar reaction was anticipated.

"I'm certain that spending the first precious days of summer setting up and rehearsing a play is not something that everypony here is ecstatic about, so I have created what I consider a fairly creative incentive," she hinted. "I'm sure that none of you are too thrilled about the 10 page essay detailing your summer vacations either, no? Remembering and documenting an entire summers worth of late night sleepovers, trips to the beach, and carefree gallivanting seems pretty time consuming, doesn't it?"

Mumbles of agreement sounded throughout the room, some of the more boisterous students making their objections more widely known with exaggerated groans.

"So instead... anypony who participates in Ponyville Elementary's production of 'Harmony's Flowers' will not have to do the essay. They will be free to spend the entire two and a half months after the play merrymaking to their heart's content, secure in the knowledge that not a single minute will need to be spent poring over a paper. How does that sound?"

The entire classroom exploded into a frenzy of excited cheering. Their quiet disturbed, a nest of birds in one of the schoolyard's trees flew off in a startled hurry.

"Then it sounds like we have a show in the works! We can go over the specifics tomorrow, but first, every great play needs at the helm a spirited director. Someone to ensure that the written work of Mrs. Loving is honored. Now, who here among you would like to take the task of directing the tale of the pivotal romance of Star Bright the unicorn and Drift Monsoon the pegasus?"

Sweetie Belle's mind went blank for a moment. Somewhere, deep in her subconscious, gears churned within. A love story between a pegasus and a unicorn? That sounded familiar enough, and it was certainly something she could relate to effectively. That tiny voice in her heard that made the connection was strong enough to command her front leg to lift itself above her ears.

"Sweetie Belle!" Cheerilee cried out, drawing every single stare of Sweetie Belle's peers towards her. She felt her face grow red, but she didn't lower her hoof. "You're sure you want to direct this play so soon after your last one?"

The unicorn vaguely recalled her first attempt at directing, writing, and starring in a play. Were it not for her sister's costumes, it would have been a colossal train wreck. Sweetie Belle was not altogether encouraged by this previous failure, but the little voice in her head that directed her foreleg to raise also was not relenting.

Her mouth had gone dry, so she simply nodded.

"Excellent!" Her teacher's voice rang over the excited chatter of her peers. "Sweetie Belle, I'll need to speak with you. Everypony else, have a great afternoon, and I'll see you tomorrow!" The shuffling chairs and desks from earlier resumed their dance, and Sweetie Belle's classmates slowly filtered out of the classroom. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both lingered for a moment.

"This is going to be so awesome! No lame essay to write!"

"Yeah, and our friend's gonna be directin' a play!"

"A boring romantic play, blech!" Scootaloo gagged dramatically.

"Don't pay her no mind, Sweetie Belle," Apple Bloom spoke. "We'll meet you at the clubhouse when you're done with Miss Cheerilee, so we can start plannin' what we're gonna do in the play!"

Sweetie Belle nodded once more, her mouth still as dry as the San Palomino desert. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo exchanged a curious glance between themselves at their friends' markedly less excited reaction.

"Alrighty then... see ya soon!"

With that, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both scurried out into the hallway, leaving Sweetie Belle alone with her teacher. Sweetie Belle slowly clambered out of her desk and made her way to the desk closest to Cheerilee, who was busy straightening a thick stack of papers that were no doubt the script to the play.

What had she gotten herself into?

Author's Notes:

An idea that came about while working on my other story. Readers of that one will notice that the very holiday mentioned as the centerpiece here was featured in Scootaloo & The Cabinet of Seers.

I'm aiming to keep this relatively shorter and sweeter, but I have a feeling that my inability to streamline anything is going to interfere with that...

Next Chapter: Act 2: Playing The Part Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 26 Minutes
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