Trouble Shoes looked back at his flank, then set his sights on the trio of hoops in front of him.

“Just leave me be, cutie mark!” he proclaimed as he charged forward, the rodeo clowns on the left and right splitting the scene. The clown in the middle, however, sat there frozen in fear.

A look of determination played across Trouble Shoe’s face as he set his sights on the hoop. “I aim to clear that there—”

Trouble Shoes slowed his roll as he noticed that the rodeo had disappeared from around him. In fact, everything had disappeared from around him, leaving him surrounded by what appeared to be a black canvas pocked with stars.

“...hoop.” Trouble Shoes stopped, then kicked the ground. “Stupid cutie mark!” he said, grunting afterwards. “You done got me lost.”

“Hold up, pardner. You are not lost, You are exactly where you need to be!”

“Huh?” Trouble Shoes said as he looked around for the voice, laying his eyes on what appeared to be Princess Luna. Except he didn’t know no Princess Luna that would wear a black ten-gallon hat and matching black boots with spurs. He snorted.

“You here to make fun of me because of my cutie mark? Figures.” Trouble Shoes turned away and started to walk into the nothing.

“Now see here, young buck—”

Trouble Shoes whipped his head around and faced Luna with a glower. “An’ stop talking like that. That’s cultural appropriation. We don’t take kindly to that around these here parts.”

Luna pursed her lips, then cleared her throat. “My apologies. My intention was not to offend. It was merely to make you more comfortable.”

Trouble Shoes planted his rump. “Comfortable for what? To get poked fun at and laughed at fer the rest of my life?” He felt the faux suede of Luna’s boot touch his shoulder.

Luna chuckled. “Not at all, my… my, you are a large fellow, aren’t you?”

Trouble Shoes squeezed his eyes shut. “Now you gotta make fun of my size, too?”

Luna shook her head. “Not at all, Trouble Shoes. It’s just that my subjects are usually… smaller in stature than I.” Luna chuckled. “It is just as well, for I believe you will make a fine addition to the fold.”

“What fold?”

Luna lifted her boot-clad hoof off of Trouble Shoes’ shoulder. “Into the fold of those who have fully realized their destiny.”

“What destiny?” Trouble Shoes asked as he turned his head to face Luna’s grinnin’ mug.

“Please rise, Trouble Shoes.” Trouble Shoes did as told. Luna cleared her throat again. “For your achievements in finally realizing your destiny as a rodeo clown, you are to be granted a gift few ponies will ever achieve in their lives. You are to become an Alicorn Princess.”

Trouble Shoes reared at that. He weren’t no filly, and he informed th’ Princess as such.

“I ain’t no filly,” he said.

Luna scoffed. “First of all, I believe you mean mare. The ascension process grants you Princesshood. It does not alter your age.”

“Well, that’s good, at least.” Trouble shoes looked down. “But it’s just my luck that I’d become a mare right when I—”

“Secondly, ascension does not alter your gender.”

Trouble Shoes raised an eyebrow. “Then why I gotta be a princess?”

“It is a,” Luna said as she held a booted hoof up to her mouth and coughed, “a bureaucratic matter. All of the paperwork is written to ascend to Princesshood, and unless you would like to wait two years to become an alicorn, a Princess you must become.”

Trouble Shoes grunted. “Hm. Alright.”

“Safe travels, Princess Trouble Shoes,” Luna said as her horn glowed.

Applejack was flabbergasted. That rodeo clown had plum disappeared! She glared at the Cutie Mark Crusaders, who shook their heads and shrugged. She swore that if they had anything to do with this, she was gonna—

Just then she saw a light descend from the sky and touch the rodeo ring, revealing… Trouble Shoes! The crowd pulled out their torches and pitchforks, then quickly put them away and gasped in fear as Trouble Shoes unfurled a set of massive wings. Upon further inspection, there was the tiniest bit of a horn poking through his hat. She glared at the Cutie Mark Crusaders again, whose jaws were dropped in shock.

“Oh, Celestia, we helped Trouble Shoes become an alicorn!” Apple Bloom said. “Quick, check your flanks!” The three fillies hurriedly checked their flanks, then groaned.

“At this rate, we’ll never get our cutie marks!” Scootaloo whined.

“You knew that was Trouble Shoes?” Applejack said, a glint of rage in her eyes.

Apple Bloom shivered. “Y-yeah! We figured—”

“That’s enough!” Applejack said. “The three of you are—”

“Trouble Shoes, you’re under arrest!” Sheriff Silverstar said, jumping out of the crowd with his deputies.

One of the deputies looked at him. “Sheriff, I don’t think Appleoosa’s jail can hold an alicorn.”

“It’s okay,” Trouble Shoes said as he hung his head low and walked towards the sheriff, “I’ll serve my—”

Princess Trouble Shoes stepped on a ball and slipped, launching him into the air and eliciting a roar of laughter from the crowd. Instead of falling to the ground, though, it launched him straight into the air, where he caught a patch of solid air and hung there for a moment.

“Just my luck,” Trouble Shoes said. “At least everyone’s having a good time.”

And judging by the raucous crowing emerging from the crowd, Applejack decided that they were indeed having a hay of a time. It seemed that Trouble Shoes, Princess of Rodeo Clowning was doing what he was destined to do, and it was all thanks to Apple Bloom and her friends.

Applejack leaned in to Apple Bloom. “What you just done there is a good thing.”

Apple Bloom beamed at her sister’s approval.

“But you’re still cleaning up the rodeo pit fer runnin’ off like that.”

“Aw, come on!” Apple Bloom said.

“Quit yer bellyachin’, it builds character.”