The two of us stared in awkward silence; Spitfire rearranged her carefully placed morning coffee. I watched as she reached out, turning it slightly, but not daring to take a sip. The room was dark, lit by only a single candlestick hanging above the table from which I was seated. The table’s filthy wood showed that history had clearly had its way with it. The walls were damp with an incomplete red paint job; the room overall smelled fowl. Spitfire leaned in, finally done considering her coffee’s potential. She smiled at me having noticed my interest in the room’s interior design,

    “Now, Scootaloo, I want you to tell me everything. Everything that you can remember; do you understand?”

    I nodded, not sure where to begin. She placed her hooves on the table,

    “Good, then I expect quite an interesting story.”

    I nervously opened my mouth; I had never told anypony my story, not even Rainbow Dash,

    “I was an unknowing orphan in my youth, always behind in everything,” I began, “The other pegasi picked on me for my flightless disability, but I knew that someday my wings would sprout. Unfortunately, that is not what’s happened…”

    “Oh?” Said she, her hooves crossed with interest, “Was that not you earlier?”

    I shook my head, “No, that was me; I made a mistake.”

    “Come on, Scootaloo! We’re going to be late!”

    I looked up, watching the blue and yellow filly sprint down the hall. I was ashamed she had to see me like this. I sat in a room filled with rows of beds, each with a trunk placed underneath them; there were seven windows.

    “Scootaloo,” said she, plopping herself on a bed beside me, “you’re going to be late and I’m going to get the blame for it, come on!”

    I nodded, looking down in shame, “I-I can’t, HopeCry, I’m… under the bus.”

    She tilted her head, “Huh? What are you talking about?”

    I didn’t want to say it, but I knew there was no way out of it. She had already gotten me out of trouble on several occasions; I didn’t want her to take the blame like she had so many times before.

    “Listen, ‘Loo,” HopeCry whispered, “I understand if you got in trouble again. It’s alright! I’ll get you out of it.”

    She winked and skipped away, leaving me with another pound of everlasting guilt.

    ”So you were a troublemaker?”

    I shook my head, “No, not at all. I-It was just a one-time thing.”

    Spitfire gave a single chuckle, “Sure.”

    I blushed.

    HopeCry spoke, of course, of the assembly, a group meeting that had been highly anticipated by many of the children there. The event was so important, that everyone’s schedule revolved around it; it was the Day of Release. I knew I wouldn’t be making the ceremony anytime soon, so I gave up hope. Every day felt like nothing, a simple passing of the time, but this assembly was much, much different.

    ”And what made it different?” Asked Spitfire, picking up the coffee, “Why weren’t you involved with the ceremony?”

    Each category of the orphanage had a monitor who would watch over the children day by day and report their status to the Head. All the children in the morning were escorted to the lunch rooms, everyone but me. No, instead, I was set aside for what they classified as “bad behavior”. I had no idea what they were talking about, but I played along, trying my best to apologize for whatever I may have done.

    “I know I was up late last night, but please! Forgive me!” I begged, clinging onto the leg of my attendant, who only pushed me aside like the worthless pegasi I was,

    “You know what you’ve done. Don’t you dare try to hide it! Come on, pick up your hooves!”

    I was terrified and placed upon a bed to watch each student make a funny face as they walked by. Everypony but HopeCry tormented me. She was the only pony who cared for who I was, instead of what I could do. She was the only one to stay behind and comfort me. She tried her best to stay just a bit longer but was quickly pushed away by the attendants. The monitor that put me aside approached me,

    “Come on, we can’t have ponies like you hanging around forever.”

    Puzzled, I followed her to a remote staircase that nopony dared go near. The bunch of ponies I was paired with were the explorational type, always going out of their way to see as much of the orphanage as possible before they left, but out of all the places they dared go, it was this staircase they avoided. The lot of them told stories of gore and betrayal; many of them were ludicrous and unbelievable, but one, in particular, seemed to hold merit.

    ”And this story was?”

    A colt, who invented the iron bar story, said that once every year, a filly is selected to leave the group during the Day of Release. That filly would then be judged by their behavior throughout the year. If they were good, they weren’t touched, but if they were considered “unfit”, they would be killed on the spot, taken out to the garbage the following morning.

    ”You said this story held merit, how so?”

    I remember doing a bit more investigation and by everything I’d seen, he was right. Every year a pony was set aside and never seen again; an unreasonably large amount of garbage was taken out the next day. Everything he said seemed true and all the fillies knew it. It was because of his story that all the children tried their best to stay out of trouble. Before then, who knows? A lot of speculation circled around that colt. Many said that he was the founder’s son or even the result of Equestria’s natural evil. Either way, this colt claimed to be there since the beginning and nopony was willing to argue with him.

    ”You mentioned the ‘iron bar story’. How does that go?” Asked Spitfire, placing down the coffee once more, still refusing to take a sip.

    The Iron Bar Story was the first one I’d ever heard. It was about a filly who was fed up with the system and tried to leave by climbing the iron bars that surrounded the orphanage. Unfortunately, while she climbed the gate, she was caught and fell behind a line of bushes that bordered the inside of the exterior walls; her body was penetrated by a row of spikes hidden within the greenery.

    ”Bit unbelievable, don’t you think?”

    “Not at all,” said I, slightly offended that she should think my youth was gullible, “It was very believable to the mind of a child.”

    SpitFire waved her hoof, leaning back in the chair, “You went upstairs?”

    I nodded.

    The staircase was nothing more than a simple wooden ladder that led to a remote part of the building, a place I had never seen before. It looked like an old attic; I asked for an explanation but was immediately rejected. Apparently, the orphanage was a conglomerate of two or three houses; this attic, unlike the rest, was off limits. The place, from top to bottom, was made from wood slats and empty with the exception of a small wooden chair and a full-sized mirror draped in a white cloth. There, the monitor pointed toward the stool and unveiled the reflective mirror which was held in a gold-plated frame featuring an old mural of several dancing ponies. I sat down, unsure of what would happen next; the monitor loomed behind me. She pointed at the mirror and spoke very close to my ear, “What is it you see?”

    I shuttered, “M-myself?”

    She shook her head with disgust and aggressively pushed the wooden chair closer to the mirror.

    “Do you know what I see?” She asked, violently pressing my face against the mirror, “I see, a disabled, useless, troublemaking, filly without a pony in this world who would ever care for her. Can you see that?”

    I shook my head with forced, frightened agreement; she knew I was lying, but chose to put me down anyway. The chair fell back with a loud crash; she moved to the back of the room and prepared something I could not see.

    “Scawthon, was it not?”

    “Scootaloo,” I blurted out, holding my mouth immediately afterward. She glared at me from the back of the room,

    “What does it matter? You’d be leaving anyway.”

    A single shard of hope jumped from within me before realizing that if I were really leaving, I would be with the other fillies who took place in the ceremony.

    ”So she said you’d be leaving? Did your local tales ring any bells during that time?”

    I nodded, “Very much so, but I dared not say anything after I blurted my name. I knew what would happen if I disobeyed.”

    The monitor stood behind me and placed her hooves on my shoulders; I still remember how cold they were,

    “Have you ever seen this place?” She asked, circling around me; I shook my head,

    “The fillies don’t dare to even speak of it.”

    I braced, but she didn’t make a move, instead, she smiled and walked behind me, “Good, I’m glad my lies made their way to your litter.”

    I was shocked and unsure how to react, “Had everything I learned just been a lie?” I asked myself, focusing on the mirror rather than the attendant.

    “Were all the stories a lie?” I questioned, hoping that she’d be merciful enough to give me an answer. She smiled menacingly,

    “Why, of course not! It takes time to fabricate a lie! There’s always truth in a lie.”

    I shivered, “What is going to happen to me? Are the rumors about this room true?”

    This time, she said nothing and returned downstairs, leaving me alone in the attic. I dared not stand; I knew what would happen if I did. I began to cry silently in the darkness, praying that somepony were to come and rescue me.

    ”Did it come true? What happened to the monitor?”

    “Yes,” I sobbed, “somepony did come.”

    SpitFire sat up in her chair, “Who was it?”

    I sighed, wiping the left side of my face, “HopeCry…”

    HopeCry discovered the room while the mare was absent; she was speechless.

    “Scootaloo? What’s going on?” HopeCry asked, leaning down before me, wiping the tears from my face, “What happened here?”

    I couldn’t answer her, in a way, I was ashamed of whatever it was I did to deserve this. I tried to look my best in front of her. She looked at my burning red face,

    “Scootaloo? Did she- hit you?”

    I nodded “no”, but she knew the truth. She sighed and managed to pry me from the chair; I collapsed in front of her. I didn’t want to leave now that I learned what really happened here. Everything that pony had said was true, I was a mistake.

    “Don’t think like that!” Said she, pulling me up from the ground as best she could, “We can still do this! You can’t give up hope!”

    She saw the tears in my eyes and began to cry herself, but I did not weep for her. I wept for the monitor standing behind her, holding a large sword-like object; it was part of the orphanage’s crest. I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. HopeCry looked at my dazed expression and tried to understand as best as she could. She turned around a mistake that I regret to this day. I watched as the small sword dove deep into her neck, reaching her heart of gold within seconds. I cried aloud as she fell to the floor, expressionless, but worst of all, immobile. I stared in distraught horror as the crimson wood floors grew even more so; I screamed, she was the only friend I ever had. The monster towered over me with a beaming blade in her hoof. I backed into the mirror and said my prayers once more, looking into my petrified reflection. Everything paused as the figure raised her hoof and slowly brought it down again. Half of me wanted to stay while the other wanted to dart out of the room. I cried and jumped to the left, the small sword piercing the wood, scratching the mirror with an ear-deafening screech.

    ”So she killed your friend and attacked you next?”

    “Yeah,” I said, head hanging with all the shame I had just consumed, “she did.”

    SpitFire gave a minuscule chuckle, “Well it looks like you made it out okay.”

    I nodded, “But at what cost?”

    Lying on the floor, I leaned against the chair, which had toppled over. She looked back at me with glowing eyes. A desire to kill was found legible in every part of her body,    

    “Come here, Scoots. Don’t worry, you’ll go swiftly, just as your friend did mind you.”

    I glanced at HopeCry’s limp body lying on the floor beside her, the droplets of her blood seeping downstairs was clearly audible. She picked up the mirror and raised it above her head. My eyes widened as I jumped aside as fast as I could; she hurled it. Splinters from the wood launched themselves into my sides as a single, seven-inch piece of glass delved deep within my right hind leg. I screeched like a bird, hitting my head against the floor repeatedly until the pain could go away in the slightest.

    “Scoots, my dear, you’ve got a lot of lovely pegasi looking for you. Now do be a dear and let me hoof you into the–how should I say?–golden ponies.”

    I cried as loud as I could, hoping that anypony from the downstairs could hear and help me. The monitor laughed hysterically,

    “Oh? You think you’re going to be heard? How cute! We’ve been doing this for generations, do you really think somepony is going to hear you now?”

    I eyeballed my dead friend hoping that I could prove a point, but instead, she just chuckled,

    “Who? Her? She’s just another failure like you; she never would’ve been able to do anything.”

    I coughed teaspoon’s worth of blood, “What about the other ponies? What are you going to do with them?”

     She gave me a demonic grin, speaking with a darkly brooding laugh, “We have some friends in Cloudsdale that we’ve made an agreement with. They say weather ponies are always under stress hunting down new fillies for their… experiment.”

    ”Ah, yes, I think I’ve heard of that unit. They’re a rather large facility on the edge of town. Very prosperous, I hear. I have yet to visit.”

    She finally backed me into a corner and raised the sword once more, shouting in anger as every obstacle failed to do her bidding.

    “What have I done to deserve this?” I cried, “What about HopeCry? Why would you kill her?”

    She raised the dagger and gave it one more swing before answering, “What does it matter? You’re all scum with irresponsible parents! We can’t take care of you lot forever! Besides, every death is covered… forever!”

    I rolled up into a ball as best as I could, feeling lost and hopeless all while being trapped in that desolate corner. She raised the knife high above her head for one final blow; I closed my eyes in fear. This was my end; I knew it to be true. Nothing could save me now. The ponies I knew all my life had no knowledge of friendship, HopeCry’s life was indefinitely taken and I had no way of escape. A large shadow draped over me as the corrupted mare stood holding my fate. I shivered in fear, but something was off. I opened my frightened eyes and looked behind my ultimate death to see a pony standing behind her. The pony was a bright blue color and had deeply sorrowed red eyes with the blackest of all scleras. She nodded to me, unaffected by my situation, and looked down at my hind hooves. A ring of blood and glass surrounded me, no, protected me. I wanted to say something, but again, I couldn’t. I blinked, finding the pony gone from existence and the monitor flat on the floor, a large piece of glass surfacing from her forehead. The trail of glass was broken and new fears emerged.

    ”So you killed the monitor?”

    I shook my head, “No, not at all. I don’t know what happened. I saw this bright blue pony and then everything was fine.”

    SpitFire began to show more interest in the story, “Well, now we know what happened to the orphanage.”

    I stared at her in dazed confusion, “What do you mean? What happened to the orphanage?”

    She smiled and leaned back as she did before, “The orphanage shut down around seventeen dates ago under the case of suspected murder. Don’t worry about it; at least you can say you’ve lived something down.”

    She laughed and pressed me to continue my story; I wasn’t sure if I wanted to.

    I ran away from the orphanage as fast as I could, jumping from the high windows and trying my best to climb over the fence. Apparently, the spiked fence thing was in fact, a lie that was made up to keep fillies from escaping during the night. Out from the dark streets, I watched a small carriage take at least seven of the children out to Cloudsdale.

    “If only they knew what they had in store,” I’d say to myself, running deep into the streets. Word gets around very fast there, and I soon became the talk of all Ponyville. Everyday I would hear different stories about myself; everypony kept a watch out and each one wanted to put me in my place. Some said they’d kill me on the spot while others wanted to turn me in for the presumed murder of two ponies.

    ”They accused you of two?” Asked SpitFire, still carefully watching her unsipped coffee. I sighed and looked down,

    “Yes, they accused me of two. I tried to explain myself, but they didn’t want to hear it. I had nowhere to run.”

    “Seems reasonable,” said she, “You are quite a target,”

    I blushed.

    “So,” she said, sitting up in her chair, “You were left out on the streets for, what I can imagine, quite a while. What happened next?”

    I discovered Rainbow Dash a date later. I was walking along one of the back alleyways facing the edge of town when I happen to spot her flying by performing a series of tricks I found astonishing. In a way, I envied everything about her. She was colorful, bold, and from what I saw, she had more talent than an entire army could muster. Using the shadows, I followed her until it became dark and the buildings looked more like giants than humble domains.

    ”You knew Rainbow Dash?”

    I nodded, “She’s like a sister to me.”

    Spitfire’s smirk melted into thin air, “Is that so?” Said the yellow mare, a grim tone could be heard in her voice. A cool chill ran down my spine as pre-existing sweat poured down my face.

    “So what did you do next? How’d you get so close to Dash?”

    I looked at her with suspicion; I took a deep breath,

“I can’t say that yet; I’m not there.”

Spitfire crossed her arms, “Fair enough; continue.”

I soon met a pony by the name of SweetieBelle wandering near the parameter of the Everfree Forest, which was dangerously close to where I was then staying. I tried to hide from her, but all my efforts were meaningless; she had seen me before I could make a move.

“Hey! Who are you?” She called out over the hills, waving a hoof letting me know of her whereabouts. I was timid, not having an innocent conversation with a pony since I left the orphanage; I said nothing, but instead, stared into her bright green eyes. She called again,

“Excuse me? Hello? Can you speak?”

At that point, she had started running toward me, but I didn’t move. There was something about this pony that drew me to her; it was something that I felt was missing all my life. I gathered my courage and opened my mouth, saying the words I hadn’t in months,

“Hello, I’m Scootaloo.”

I remember watching as the little white pony gasped, shaking my hoof and throwing her head back,

“Oh! I’m SweetieBelle! I’m new here, but I think we’ll get along just fine!”

She smiled a warm one, giving me a playful hug and trotting off. I called out to her,

“Wait!” Said I, “Do you… want to hang out or something?”

SweetieBelle stopped to think a moment, then declaring,

“I think that’d be a great idea! I’ll tell you what,” she proposed, walking toward me with a suspicious smile, looking up and down to see what I was capable of, “if you come with me to Sugar Cube Corner tomorrow afternoon, I’ll cover for you and let you live near my house, deal?”

I was about to nod, but then realized, “How’d you-?”

She smiled, giggling like the fillies we both were, “Don’t think I haven’t noticed your unruly smell, Scootaloo. My sister’s all about that kind of thing, cleanliness and other practices of hygiene.”

She stopped to look back at Ponyvile, she sighed, “I must go, but don’t forget! Noon at Sugar Cube Corner! I’ll see you there!”

”That’s how you met SweetieBelle, huh?” Smiled Spitfire, still not amused by my consistent chronological storytelling order. I nodded, staring at the still untouched coffee. I began to wonder if it was there merely for intimidation.

“So when does Rainbow Dash fall into this story?” She bluntly asked, not bothering to coat it in comfort.

“Why does she want to know more about Rainbow Dash? Doesn’t she work with her?” I asked myself, rubbing my hooves against the red wood table.

SweetieBelle was waiting outside the bakery. Looking left and right, she waved toward me to hurry up, daring not to speak a word.

“What’s the deal?” I asked, looking down the streets in a similar, suspicious manner. She smiled and pointed toward the back door of the bakery; it led to the kitchen.

“We’re going to prank somepony special today.”

I nodded my head in confusion, “Huh?” I whispered, watching her slowly push through the door and roll to the floor. She signaled me to follow; I had no choice.

“So who are we pranking?”

Pranking was almost as popular as the Equestrian Games back at my orphanage. Every morning, a pony would walk downstairs covered head to hoof in whatever substance the other fillies could get their hooves on. I tried not to participate in it, but because of my absence in their activities, I became the prime subject for all their torturous pranks, therefore, I had no choice. SweetieBelle moved ahead, crawling as fast as she could, slipping under the table and hiding beneath its draping cloth, giggling; she signaled me to follow. I began to hear whispers from outside the sweet shop; I panicked, sliding under the table as fast as I could, hoping nopony heard my thundering hooves. SweetieBelle rolled her eyes and placed a hoof on my muzzle, trying her best to calm me down. Hooves of all different colors walked in front of me; I looked at SweetieBelle, hoping for an answer to all this unexplained secretivity, but she smiled and said not a word. She knew who she was looking for.

A large, bustling collection of ponies wandered throughout the bakery; we had been hiding for an hour and my hooves began to throb. SweetieBelle placed her hoof on my back, firmly pressing it down to prevent me from moving.

“Shh,” she whispered, pointing at a pony from behind the tablecloth, “There she is.”

SweetieBelle pulled my mane as I tried to look at whom she was pointing to; I only caught a glimpse of watered-pink colored pony’s spotted dress.

“Wow; that is an AMAZING cutie mark!”

    I glanced toward SweeiteBelle; she nodded, “Wait for it; that’s her sidekick.”

    I waited a bit longer and listened harder, hearing the voice of who I assumed would be the victim.

    “Nice try, blank flank!”

    The whole room murmured about the unfortunate guest. I sat idly, looking over to SweetieBelle,

    “We gotta do something! We can’t just let her be humiliated in front of all these ponies! After all, we don’t have our marks either!”

    SweetieBelle looked down but did not move. Instead, she nodded her head in disagreement. I wouldn’t have any of it.

    “Do you have a problem with blank flanks?”

    SweetieBelle tried to stop me, tugging on my hoof for just a moment before standing up too.

    “What are you doing?” She silently whispered; I ignored her as the room gasped.

    “If you won’t do it for me, then at least do it for her,” I glanced at the blushing red pony with her head hanging low. SweetieBelle sighed, finally realizing that this was a better solution.

    “I said; do you have a problem with blank flanks?”

    ”And the humiliated pony? Who was she?”

    I looked down, “That was Applebloom; we all became friends soon after.”

    “So would you say you were glad you did that ‘prank’?”

    I thought for a moment, nothing would’ve turned out the way it had if I hadn’t taken her offer. I nodded my head,

    “I suppose so. SweetieBelle was the last friend who ever came to see me. Everypony kind of forgot me when I was left alone. I-I”

    I began to sob, pressing my forehead on the table for better support. Spitfire did nothing to stop it; she smiled,

    “Don’t worry about it. I never had any friends, at least, any that lived.”

    Something snapped, “What do you mean?”

    She leaned back in her chair, throwing her arms behind her, “It’s nothing; I was a very lonely pegasus. My dad was always busy trying to ‘save the world’, but… I rarely see him. In a way I hoped he’d come visit, but; seeing how he’s always in Canterlot, it’s not going to happen anytime soon. Either way, this is about you; why don’t you tell me how you left the atmosphere as a flightless pegasus?”

    I was sick of my condition. Every doctor in Ponyvile had turned a blind eye on my disability; they simply stated I was “special” and that I was merely a “mistake”. Even to this day, I believe Rainbow felt the same way. She would always check on me day and night with hopes that I couldn’t try to jump off the cloud as an attempt to fly. We argued a lot about it; I didn’t think it was fair and she thought she was just taking precautions. I remember explaining to her that I was not some kind of pet that needed to be changed daily, but her opinions differed. Her view was that she was simply looking out for me and that it was best she’d overlook everything I did. To her, I was but a vegetable.

    ”You mean chicken, right?”

    I blankly stared at her, “What?”

    Spitfire tried her best not to smile, “Oh, you know, you’re supposed to watch over chickens day and night to make sure they are eating in healthy amounts and such. Right?”

    “I-I”

    Spitfire clapped her hooves and another uniformed pegasus walked into the room. She whispered into his ear just loud enough for me to hear,

    “Could you figure out what the recommended daily food intake for a single, white, purebred chicken is?”

    The pegasi stared directly at me, then back to her. She nodded and waved her hoof, the pegasi smiled and whispered,

    “It will be my pleasure.”

    I had no idea what was going on, but I had a feeling it had to do with something I said. I took no notice and continued my story.

    Eventually, Rainbow was called to the Pegasi Army, you ponies, to fulfill a special endeavor of some sort. She had already been on business trips to the Army before, so I had every confidence she’d be back within a few weeks, but; I was wrong. Those weeks turned into a month, which, soon after, turned into a whole date. I was alone, living in a house with her mementos scattered throughout. Each trophy reminded me of all her great successes, giving me room to remember my devastating failures. I pondered everything while I was alone. I relived and replicated the day and night before she left. I redid everything she had done before she took off. I could feel myself go insane with the guilt of a lost sister creeping up on me, and there was nothing I could do. It wasn’t before long that I began to question what was real and what wasn’t. I tried to look at the world differently, and, in turn, it only gave me more pain. I looked in the mirror that morning knowing that I was dreaming, knowing that I was invincible, yet, I still fell.