One month and a half. One month and a half and high school would be definitely over. It was hard to realize. Yet, the moment for sending applications to the various universities had come, and the lessons in classes now looked more like general reviewing than a chance to learn new things.
Within two weeks would happen exams for all the students from twelfth grade, and the other lasting weeks would be dedicated to get prepared for college.
The most serious ones already had started reviewing at least one week ago. Although colleges selected their students based on the marks and credits of their whole high school years, these end of cycle exams could call a lot of things into question. Those who, for example, didn’t have enough credits could aim for going to college anyway. As far as the others were concerned, the grade obtained at the exams could help getting additional scholarships or determine whether or not they could subscribe to some of the options.
This particular system often was criticized by some peers of the government, wanting to abolish it for years, at the profit of a way to do simpler and more classic, only taking credits into account. Also because it was about a ranking of the students according to their grades, which intensified the competition.
Indeed, each school published a list of the best students, based on the grades of this exam, which didn’t always reflect the reality of the past years.
Canterlot High School wasn’t any different, and each year, first ranks were taken over by students from the Guiding Class, giving in to a tough competition in order to reach the highest spots of the list. It was a golden occasion for outsiders to beat the big favorites.
Twilight knew she would be accepted at the Canterlot University, in Astrophysics. Despite everything that had happened lately, she had been able to keep up a good pace, and even gained back the infamous lost half-point of last year. She could have not worry at all, and be satisfied with her accomplishments.
However, she hadn’t yet received the agreement for her scholarship request. In order to stack all the odds in her favor, she knew the best thing to do was to be excellent at the exam, but also to get her spot on the firmament of the ranking. It was out of question for her to have Trixie, Thunderlane or Moondancer be valedictorian instead of her…
This was the reason why she had started to review with an unprecedented fervor, right after Rainbow Dash’s birthday party. Each seconds of her free time was spent reviewing her lessons, and she never parted from her precious flash cards. She also deprived herself of the afterschool outings with her friends, who knew what was at stakes for her in these exams.
Well… It depended when, in reality. Right now, they could hardly take seeing Twilight reading her History flash cards on board, a tray in her hand, in the waiting queue at the cafeteria.
Even the most hardworking students made the most of this time off to relax. They were reviewing while eating, yes, but not when still standing, and in good company.
It had to be said that among the girls, except Fluttershy and Sunset Shimmer, none of them had started their own reviewing. Applejack didn’t care at all about scholarships and rankings, and knew she had enough credits to be accepted at the Canterlot University in Business Management. Pinkie Pie could think of nothing but planning the Prom Ball and said if she wasn’t accepted at university, it wouldn’t bother her to keep on working at Sugarcube Corner (which always upset Twilight, in fact). As far as Rainbow Dash was concerned, she still was convinced she would get a scholarship thanks to sports, and if there was a field where being number one didn’t get her enthusiastic, it was studies.
“Couldn’t ya put this down for at least five minutes?” Applejack asked, since she was next to her in the queue. “Am pretty sure Equestria History will be the same until then.”
“No, I can’t. If I can’t get the first rank, I’ll be a shame for my parents!”
“And we always say Pinkie’s the one exaggerating things…” Rainbow Dash replied, rolling her eyes.
“It’s easy for you to say that, Rainbow! You’re almost certain you’ll get a merit scholarship in sports, no matter what’s your final grade.”
“You’ll get a merit scholarship in EVERYTHING, Twilight. You’re the best of all Canterlot.”
“Don’t you know exams could mess it all up? In my class, the others are feverishly reviewing.”
Obviously, no matter what the group would say, she would find an argument to contradict it. It was a pity she couldn’t relieve the pressure off for at least five minutes, especially as it did no good to her body, but stubborn as she was, it would be useless to upset her. The risk was to have her panic even more…
The young woman didn’t even look which dish she chose, so focused on her cards she scarcely said hello to anyone, and always almost bumped into one of her friends, if not to step on their feet.
To get to their table, however, she couldn’t do anything else then looking straight in front of her. She had barely took a few steps that, most to everyone’s surprise, she fell down, as sudden as a thunderbolt in the sky, her tray falling with her, and her dishes and drinks crushing against the floor in a roar.
Immediately, all her friends ran to her. It wasn’t a plain fall because she had tripped over, unable to see some danger in front of her… No. She had fainted in the middle of the crowded cafeteria!
----------------------------------
“Oh… Look, she opens her eyes…”
It took Twilight a few seconds to realize she was lying on a bed that wasn’t hers, then a few additional seconds to understand she still was at school, in the sickroom.
Her five friends were gathered around her, their faces tensed.
She never wanted to have them so worried. In reality, she had never suspected what happened to her would happen to her. Though there had been some forerunners, she had been so focused on her flash cards she had chosen to think it was her mind trying to trick her.
Obviously, it wasn’t.
She tried to sit, despite Fluttershy’s panicked pleads, telling her it probably was best for her to lie again for a few minutes. Where was her bag? And most importantly… where were her flash cards?
"I have to review…”
“Gee, easy now, Einstein! The nurse said ya couldn’t leave this bed ‘til she’ll tell ya to.”
“But I can’t allow myself to lie in bed! I have to review…”
“Don’t you think you should spare yourself a little?” Sunset Shimmer intervened, holding her hand. “I mean… You passed out, and according to the nurse, it’s because your body can’t tolerate so much fatigue anymore.”
This wasn’t a detail unknown to Twilight. She knew very well she had pushed her luck too far lately. The way of life she had adopted since she had started reviewing her lessons, panicked by the fact she hadn’t received any answers for her scholarship yet, it wasn’t a sound one, and even her parents warned her it wasn’t the right choice for her health.
Maybe she had put too much pressure on her own shoulders. After all, although the stakes weren’t quite the same for her, Sunset Shimmer also wanted to obtain a very good rank, and yet she could manage herself some time to breath.
She tightened her hand, glad she was by her side. Even if she was glad to have all of her friends by her side too, of course.
“I’m sorry I scared you, girls. It’s so distressing not to have this answer that I go to bed very late and I even neglect eating so I could make time.”
“And what are you going to do if you pass out on D-Day?” Pinkie Pie asked.
“It would be so… horrible”, Fluttershy added, almost crying.
Twilight wanted to comfort her, but she couldn’t get enough time to add anything else, since her curly-haired friend was already thrown in a speech.
“It’s important to eat well. Especially sugar. I eat a lot of sugar, that’s why I’m so smart.”
“In reality, there’s no real correlation between sugar intake and intellectual performances.”
“But there’s a link with anemia and a low energy”, Rainbow Dash clarified.
“Sure.”
Twilight looked down, like a little girl in the middle of a lecture. She was aware of how stupid her behavior had been, and how it hadn’t served her cause. There even wasn’t anything to debate about.
Her goal was so close, yet still so far, she would hate missing it at the eleventh hour because she wouldn’t have been attentive enough about each of the essential details, which also meant making sure she was at the best in everything, not only in her knowledge.
Thankfully, her friends were here to support her, and it was more than probable that, now they knew, they wouldn’t hesitate to put her on notice if she forced herself too much again.
“Well, I suppose you girls are right and I should spare myself a bit.”
“Very wise decision”, Sunset Shimmer said with a smile.
“Especially as I’m sure even if you don’t review anything, you’re going to beat the sh*t out of this ranking! You’re the best!”
“Since you’re probably the worst, I’m sure you’ll be at the very bottom”, a female voice from another bed snickered.
The six girls all turned their heads to the bed in question, and saw the separating curtain now opened and, lying with a bag of ice cubes against her cheek, there was Gilda, another twelfth grade student.
The young girl was known of the gang, though Sunset Shimmer and Fluttershy never met her until today. She was at Middle Canterlot with the first part of the group. In ninth grade, she even befriended with Rainbow Dash, before she turned to Applejack instead. Gilda never really forgave her what she considered like treason and never hesitated to display her scorn about her – for example by letting derogatory messages on the girls’ toilet’s doors.
It had to be said that with her punkish look, and her peppery character, more often convicted at Principal Celestia’s office than she was in class, it even was a small miracle she hadn’t doubled her grades because of her lack of work. She wasn’t a teenage girl known to be benevolent to others, and she was noticeable by nothing more than how often she was expelled, and how disrespectful she was with adults, and people in general.
“Are you sure it won’t be you instead at the very bottom of this ranking? Only with my credits in sports, I’m smashing you!”
“But there’s no sports evaluation at the end of the cycle exams. How are you going to do it, you little bird-brained?”
Indeed, the only absent evaluation were sports, despite how important physical education was in the Equestrian educational system. The students’ knowledge was the only thing that mattered in this case. It didn’t scare Rainbow Dash, who felt self-confident enough… until then.
Though she thought she wasn’t bird-brained, she knew very well she hadn’t been exactly hard-working this year, not much than during the previous years. Only when her father lectured her hard about her grades in scientific matters had she made an effort. If she had obtained enough credits, it was narrowly and especially thanks to her excellent grades in sports – it helped that Mr. Caballeron hadn’t stayed.
However, if there was someone hardly in a position to remind her of her lack of discipline, it was Gilda. She wasn’t in her class, but Vinyl Scratch was, and once told her the teenage girl almost always came to class without notebooks or pencils, or even without a bag. Which probably didn’t help her to take notes.
“And you think you are going to pass? Don’t make me laugh!”
“I don’t think so, I know so! Because I have my own personal method.”
Gilda leaned over and took a phone out of her apparently empty bag. It was put inside a white leather case with which it was impossible to know whether or not the phone was here.
“In front of the teachers, I make sure they can see me putting this case into my bag, but in reality, my phone is hidden in my uniform skirt’s pocket. I never fail at any test because I look at the answers on Internet and no one notices anything!”
So, this was why she never doubled any of her grades? Very clever. And very stupid as well. Didn’t she know that if caught in the act, she would be forbidden to exams for five whole years, and that all the exams she would have been to until then, including her driving license, would be considered void?
She could boast as much as she wanted. It was an unfaithful way to win. Alright, Rainbow Dash liked to bend the rules a bit when she was in a bad position, but always when the stakes weren’t highly important, like a video game, a board game or a friendly race. During exams of sports evaluations, she tried to be as fair-play as possible – though she tended to be a little bit individualist.
She didn’t need any gadgets, anyway. She was much better than Gilda. Period.
“You know what? Let’s make a bet!”
“What kind of bet?”
“Like, if I get a better grade than you at this exam, and without cheating, you’ll have to climb on a table at the cafeteria and tell everyone I am your master.”
Behind her, the girls tried to dissuade her of doing such a crazy thing, but she chose not to listen to them. Rainbow Dash knew it was a bit stupid, childish, even, but she couldn’t stand this first-class dunce dared insinuating she had no common sense while she did nothing but cheating all this time!
“Fine. It means if I get a better grade than you thanks to my little trick, you’ll be the one who should call me master.”
“You got yourself a deal!” she hurled, stretching her hand towards her brand new rival.
With a strange smirk, Gilda held her hand, and shook it, thus finalizing the deal between them.
If, at first, just like the rest of the gang, Twilight thought the idea was a disaster and a very bad reason for plunging into the bliss of learning, once thought through, she saw in this decision the perfect way to review while relieving the pressure off like suggested. It was obvious she was the best choice to help Rainbow Dash winning her bet. It meant that by making her review, she would review at the same time, without putting her health in danger the way she did.
In reality, this stupid bet was a stroke of genius!