When the morning sun rose over the school, several of the students tried to cover their eyes. The junior year students were up and already heading to the breakfast hall. Gallus and Smolder about to get their trays, but Ocellus had to point out something. "I think you two should get the griffons and dragons," the changeling stated.
Gallus and Smolder both groaned as they walked back to the dorms. When Gallus got to Gale's, he could see that the white griffon wasn't staying in bed by choice. He was tossing and turning while his pillow was soaked with cold sweat. "Gale, are you okay?" Gallus asked. "Gale?"
The second he nudged him, Gale shot up and shoved Gallus back. "Don't do that," Gale demanded.
"What was that for?"
"I was a bad dream."
"Oh. Sorry. It's breakfast time." The white griffon groaned and headed towards the mess hall as the blue one went to get more griffons.
Smolder back into the mess hall with Peridot and Emerald, who was much calmer than she was from the day before. Though, the other students didn't want to get close to her. "What's with ever creature today?" the dragoness asked.
"You went a little crazy yesterday," her twin explained.
"But, I don't remember anything."
"Seriously?" Smolder asked while getting a tray.
"No. The last thing I remember is that kid throwing a trash can at me. After that, everything was black." Smolder took note of this as she got her eggs.
"Hey, Sandbar said you had a dream the other night," Smolder said. "What was it about?"
"Well..." The dragoness thought for a moment. "It's pretty blurry, but I do remember seeing a pony with a curly mane. Her mane looked scrolls, to be honest." With that bit of information, Smolder sat down with her friends she explained what Emerald told her.
"That sounds just like Trud," Ocellus said.
"Yeah, though I wish she was more specific of what she saw." Just then, two mares walked up to their table. Yona immediately noticed them.
"Shimmy Shake, Lighthoof," the yak cheered.
"It's great to see you again," Lighthoof said. "Why aren't we in the same class?"
"It's because the professors wanted us to help the freshmen adapt to this school," Ocellus replied. "But we should change schedules after the first week."
"Well, we're going to practice our cheerleading skills before the sign-ups start," Shimmy said.
"Yona doesn't have to try out again, will she?" Yona asked.
"Of course not. We'll be the ones who help teach."
"I'm sure we'll do a better job than Professor Dash did," Smolder snickered.
"I'm back," Gallus announced as he flew past the table to get his tray of food. Sandbar saw that Gale was right behind his friends, and he looked to be a little cranky. He thought he wasn't used to the school schedules yet as Gallus sat down.
Silverstream then noticed a sea-green colored hippogriff slowly walk towards the tray line, which he accidentally bumped into it. "Who's that?" Lighthoof asked.
"That's Kelpie," the hippogriff explained. "He... Doesn't look too good." He didn't. Kelpie nearly dropped his tray as he walked over to a table.
"I'm guessing he's not normally like this," Sandbar said.
"Not really."
"Should we ask him what's wrong?" Ocellus asked.
"I'm pretty sure he's just tired."
"That's what I'm curious about," Gallus commented. "I heard that Chancellor Neighsay is getting involved."
"That guy?" Smolder asked.
"It has to be pretty serious," Sandbar said.
"I also heard the professors are going to be taking note of all of the students," Gallus added. "I think we should do the same."
"Are you sure about that?" Ocellus asked.
"Until we know what we're dealing with, it's best to keep the different freshmen. It's the only idea I had to keep them all from beating up everything that moves."
"Yona make sure yak, changelings, and other creature not hurt anycreature," Yona said proudly.
During Rarity's class, Silverstream looked over to Kelpie to see he was struggling to keep his head up. "Hey, Kelpie," Silverstream whispered. "Are you okay?"
"Huh?" the hippogriff asked sounding drowsy. "Silver, don't talk to me. I couldn't sleep well last night."
"Bad dream?"
"Y... Yeah. How did you know?"
"The..."
"Class," Rarity cried grabbing the hippogriffs' attention. "I'm hoping we could ignore what happened to your fellow classmates. I'm afraid they won't thinking straight and I'm hoping you all would think about your actions. Like for example, the art of the dress." She displayed a nice looking dress she had made earlier. "Like art, it's best if you start with a sort of base. Like this." She showed a sketch of the same dress she had made.
"So, basically you can't just throw a bunch of fabrics of colors together," Silverstream said.
"Exactly. I'm glad you've learned from what I taught you. Hopefully, you can help the others out. All you have to do is to draw a dress and you might be lucky enough to have it made." The hippogriffs took their notepads that were beside them and started sketching.
Meanwhile, Gallus and the griffons were warming up in Rainbow Dash's class, which took place in the field. "Should we really be starting gym class this early?" Gale asked.
"You get used to it after a while," Gallus replied as he finished stretching.
"Okay," Dash said while grabbing a ball. "Who's up first?" Gallus raised his tail and the professor had him fly up to the basket. A dark violet griffon flew up behind and pale yellow one stepped onto the field in front of him. Gale stepped in front of the pale yellow griffon and the two looked at each other eye to eye.
"Gale, you need any pointers?"
"I'm good," the white griffon replied.
Once Dash blew her whistle, the practice game started. Both sides went back and forth of knocking the ball towards the enemy goal. Gale tried his hardest to launch the ball into Gallus's goal, but the blue griff just kept blocking it. Gallus could see his anger was increasing. Then he remembered Gale saying his struggle to sleep. Thinking what happened to Trud and Emerald, Gallus squinted his eyes and miss the ball by a mile.
"Finally," Gale cheered while becoming airborne.
"What was that?" the yellow griffon asked.
"Sun was in my eyes," Gallus replied. This happened again three more times and Gallus's team wasn't happy with him. Before they got another round, the school bell rang, singling that it was time for the next class.
"Thanks, Gallus," several griffons said. They walked back inside with Gallus walking up to Gale.
"How are you feeling," the junior year griffon asked.
"Great," the freshman griffon said. "Thanks for letting me win."
"What were you dreaming of last night?"
"All I could hear was a voice telling me the pros and cons of griffons and hippogriffs."
"Honestly, they seem to be the same to me. The only difference is that they can change into seaponies."
"What ponies?"
"I'll explain on the way to our next class."
Back with the hippogriffs, Silverstream and Kelpie were showing each other their sketches. "Your's looks nice," Silverstream commented.
"Thanks," Kelpie yawned. "You know where I can get a good nap?"
"Not right now." Suddenly, they accidentally bumped into Gallus and Gale. "Ah, sorry."
"Does the seawater mess with your eyes?" Gale asked.
"Don't you start," Gallus ordered as he covered the griffon's beak.
"What did he say?" Kelpie asked.
"Let's just get to class early so you can have a nap," Silverstream said. She quickly dragged her fellow hippogriff away as the two griffons raced off in the opposite direction. Gallus and Silverstream both took a sigh of relief from what they just avoided.
Emerald and Trud were being treated like they had the plague. Smolder and Yona felt sorry for them and tried their best to cheer them up. "Yona and friends can make Yakyakistan pastry," Yona said. "Maybe we add gems for dragons."
"I don't think we want others to chip a tooth," Smolder said.
"Trud like having teeth," Trud said. "Plus, Trud can't cook."
"We'll try and figure out," Emerald said, "We're going to be late for class. I'm already in enough trouble as it is." The green dragoness raced off with Trud doing the same."
"We should go too," Smolder said to Yona. "You never know when someone's going to snap." Yona nodded before they walked off to their classes.
When Silverstream and Kelpie got to Fluttershy's class. "What was with that griffon?" Kelpie asked.
"He was probably just cranky from waking up early," Silverstream suggested. "Many of the hippogriffs are still tired." She wasn't wrong. Most of the other hippogriffs were rubbing their eyes to help stay awake."
"Alright everygriff," Fluttershy said, "I hope you're getting comfy at this school. I would like all of you to stay calm and quiet so we can all get along and learn." On her back, rested her pet rabbit, Angel Bunny. He hopped over towards Silverstream, who started scratching his ears. Angel tapped his foot.
"Is that good?" Kelpie asked.
"It's pretty good," Silverstream replied. "He's kind of a hard rabbit to please. You want to try?" She handed Angel over to him as gently started petting the bunny.
"Don't be shy," Fluttershy said. "Once you get to know Angel, he can be friendly." Some other small critter came out from behind Fluttershy's desk. The scampered over to the hippogriffs, each griff started petting one of the critters. "I thought that a good lesson we'd learn today would be exploring each creature's habitat."
She then showed off a tree figurine along with a figurine of a bird and squirrel. As she showed how the two creatures lived, Kelpie had a hard time keeping his eyes open. Once he closed them for five seconds a set of dark red eyes glared at him. This shocked him away, which startled the little critters. They started running around in fright, which grabbed the teacher's attention.
"Oh, my... Please calm down." She rushed around trying to catch the critters. The hippogriffs tried to help out, but due their lack of experience with smaller animals, they kept struggling. It took a good ten minutes to get all of the animals under control. Fluttershy did her best to finish the lesson as fast as she could. Just as she got to the end, the bell rang. The mare sighed. "Class dismissed."
The hippogriffs left with Silverstream and Kelpie walking side by side. "Why did you scream?" the pink hippogriff asked.
"I thought I saw something," Kelpie replied.
"With your eyes closed?"
"I thought it was something in my dream." Silverstream started to get worried.
When they got to the mess hall, they got behind Gale, who was starting to get impatient. "Come on," the griffon groaned, "Just put some stuff on your plate and get going!"
"I'm sorry," the changeling in front of him apologized, "I can't decide."
"Don't you just eat love?"
"Well, we share it, but yes."
"Then you can that." With that, Gale shoved the changing out of line.
"Hey, that wasn't appropriate," Kelpie said.
"She was taking forever," Gale stated as he got some water.
"You could've helped her."
"She can have some love."
"Well, she didn't get a drop from you."
"Okay, how about we all try and calm down," Silverstream suggested. She looked over to her friends, signaling that she needed help.
"You know, there's something about hippogriffs," Gale said. "Gallus told me you changed all of yourselves into seaponies just to hide from a king. It tells me that you're all cowards."
"If you knew who the Storm King was you'd change your mind," Kelpie replied.
"You had soldiers. Couldn't you just attack him?"
"We were outnumbered. Besides, the plan worked. Our kingdom isn't in shambles."
Gale started flushing up. "Take. That. Back."
"Alright," Gallus said, "Let's sit you two down." As he was about to help move them apart, Kelpie slapped his talon away.
"Make me," Kelpie said. The hippogriff and griffon glared daggers at each other.
"You know, if you can be a seapony, I'm sure you're used to getting wet," Gale scoffed. Without warning, he sprayed his water bottle at Kelpie. The hippogriff tackled him to the ground as the fight broke out.
"Crud," Gallus groaned. He and his friends were about to break things up but Kelpie made a break for it.
"Get back here!" Gale demanded. He gave chase, as did the third-year students. When they got to the middle of the school, where the bridges and moats were at, Kelpie was nowhere to be seen.
"Where'd hippogriff go?" Yona asked. She got her answer when similar colored seapony jumped out of the water and took Gale down with him.
"Found him," Smolder said. Silverstream and Ocellus turned into seaponies to dive down and stop them. The griffon couldn't breathe as Kelpie smashed his head against the ground. The seaponies separated them and resurfaced to change back into their normal forms.
"Let go of me," Kelpie ordered.
"What's going on here?" Sunburst asked.
"Gale and Kelpie are out of control," Sandbar explained. Sunburst looked at the two creatures and levitated them towarsd him.
The griffon woke up to see the vice principal in front of him. "Huh? What?" Gale asked. "Why am I soaking wet?" The griffon didn't get an answer as Sunburst took him to Starlight office. The six friends looked at each other feeling very worried.
The six got back to the table. "This has to stop," Ocellus said.
"We tried," Silverstream said.
"I got to use the restroom for three minutes and that happens," Gallus said.
"Gallus, this is serious," Sandbar stated, sounding annoyed.
"I know it is. But if we can't stop it when they have the dream, how are we suppose to stop them."
"Princess Luna?" Yona suggested.
"She's retired," Ocellus said.
"Besides," Gallus said, "By the time we get a letter to her, this school will be closed by then."
"Shh," Sandbar cried. "You want the others to hear?"
"I'm just saying, if you can find a way to stop the source, I'm all ears." The group didn't say anything as they ate until the bell rang. Ocellus thought about everything that the rogue students described. Then she thought what if a changeling lost its temper.
When it was time for Rarity's class, Ocellus made sure that all of the changelings were acting normally. Aside from Moss, the changelings were quite nervous about their next lesson and the current events at school. "Moss, did you sleep well last night?" Ocellus asked.
"Like a log," Moss replied. "Why'd you ask?"
"Just wondering."
"Listen up," Rarity said. She now had the changelings' attention. "I thought we tried and do something a little fun to help us all calm down. So, I thought we'd make wind chimes." She showed a set of wind chimes she made. The chimes had a nice light blue coloring and some diamonds around the top.
"That looks beautiful," a changeling commented.
"Thank you." The unicorn levitated some materials into the middle of the classroom. "Grab the parts you need and when you're all ready, I'll show you what you need to do." The class did as the teacher told them and when every creature was ready, the lesson started. "Now, a mistake I sometimes make is form over function. We'll decorate these later, just make sure that your chimes work before they look nice."
Ocellus and the other changelings did what they were told. After a while, they all had a set of homemade wind chimes. "Wow," Ocellus gasped. "This turned out better than I thought."
"What do we do with these?" Moss asked.
"You just hang them in your room," Rarity said. Then the bell rang. "You may go now."
The changelings walked down the hall most of them walked to their rooms to hang up their chimes, while others left theirs in the classroom. Yona saw Ocellus taking her windchime to their room. "What Ocellus doing?" the yak asked.
"Hang up my new wind chime," the changeling replied. "We just made them in Professor Rarity's class." She managed to hang it on the window seal and blew some air on it. The chimes clinked together and making their harmonic melody.
"Yona like chime noises."
"Thanks. I think I might paint it later." The left the room to get to their next classes.
After school was finished, the six met up in the lounge to talk about a plan. "You guys think of anything?" Sandbar asked.
"Welp, the only thing I can think of was a dream catcher," Silverstream said.
"Don't you still have the one I gave you?" Ocellus asked.
"It... Broke when I took it home. Turns out it wasn't waterproof."
"Can't you make another one?" Gallus asked.
"I could try," Ocellus replied, "But I don't know I can find the part to make the hoop."
"Plus, I think we'll more than one dream catcher to keep all of the students safe," Sandbar added.
"Ugh, this is never easy," Smolder groaned.
"Guys, don't the nightmares making creatures act like not themselves sound familiar?" Silverstream asked as she started shivering.
"Silver, stay calm," Sandbar said.
"It can't be him." Gallus said not wanting to name who "him" was. "We hit him with a friendship beam, remember?"
"Then what's causing this?" Smolder asked.
"I don't know."
"Yona starting to get a headache," the yak groaned.
"Guys, I've been thinking about something," Ocellus said. "We saw what happens when a yak, seapony, griffon, and a dragon lost their temper. What would happen to a changeling?"
Her friends shuttered. "I don't want to see what happens," Sandbar said.
"It's only a matter of time until that happens," Gallus said. "We need to figure out how to stop whatever's causing this."
"Maybe there's something in the library about this," Ocellus said.
"It's worth a try," Silverstream said. They all headed towards the library and looked for something in the books to see what could help them.
Hours had passed and the six creatures couldn't find anything. "Welp, here are four hours of my life I'm never getting back," Smolder sighed.
"Smolder, we need to fix this," Sandbar stated.
"I know, but we found nothing. And look, it's getting late."
"Smolder right," Yona said. "Plus, yak getting sleepy."
"We can't go to sleep," Silverstream cried. "What if we get angry and lose control."
"If that happens," Gallus said, "We'll make sure to stop one another."
"Got it," Smolder said. The six walked back to their room. Yona lied down on her bed and Ocellus landed on the top bunk.
"What if Sandbar gets angry," Yona said.
"He doesn't have a lot of abilities that could deal damage," Ocellus said. "We won't have to really hurt him."
"Ocellus sure?"
"It's only a hunch. I still don't know what we're dealing with." Filling up with fear, the changeling and yak went to sleep, hoping for a better day tomorrow.
Ocellus slowly woke up and found that Yona wasn't in her bedroom. "Hung, she must've gotten up early," the changeling said to herself. She got up and walked outside to see inside going into the hall, she was in a field. It didn't look like any place she'd ever seen before. "Okay, something's not right."
Just then, something rushed past her. She looked around, but nothing was there. She then got smacked on the back of the head and fell to the ground. Before Ocellus could stand up, someone stomped onto her back. She looked up and saw a yak standing on her.
"Get off me, please." The yak didn't listen, it just kept stomping. Then the changeling got picked up by a griffon before she was tossed across the air. Ocellus tried using her wing and even tried changing shape, but she couldn't. Just then a dragon flew towards her before slashing her with its claws.
The changeling fell into a pool of water below where she then got rammed into by a seapony. Ocellus was launched out of the water before she landed on the ground. The second she stood up, a pony started throwing garbage at her. As Ocellus tried blocking the trash, she could hear deranged giggling.
"Wow, you're a lot tougher than you look," said a sweet yet nasty voice.
"Who's there?" Ocellus asked. A silhouette of an alicorn landed in front of her. "Princess Luna?" The changeling got smacked in the face.
"Try again."
"Who... Are... You?" Ocellus was starting to feel weak. She could see the alicorn grinning, though it didn't last long as they heard the chimes of a wind chime. The alicorn groaned in pain as the world shook.
Ocellus jolted awake and screamed. She could see Yona was out of bed and stomping on the floor. "Ocellus awake," Yona cheered.
"What..." Before Ocellus could finish she and Yona heard some groans. They looked to the front of the bed to see translucent pink filly with a curly blue mane. She opened her eyes and saw that the changeling and yak could see her. When she gasped she vanished. Ocellus and Yona couldn't believe what they just saw.
"Cozy Glow?!" Sandbar gasped.
"That's impossible," Smolder exclaimed. "She was turned into a statue."
"Yona knows what she saw," Yona said standing her ground.
"I don't know how," Ocellus said, "But she was actually there."
"But why was she visible?" Silverstream asked.
"I think I have an answer for that," Gallus said. "In one of the books, I found I read that wind chimes were made to help keep evil spirits away. Unfortunately, the book was mainly about arts and crafts."
"So, not much about ghosts."
"Nope."
"At least we know who's doing this," Sandbar said.
"Wait a minute," Ocellus said, "How come Cozy didn't bother you?"
"One of the changelings gave me a set of wind chimes," Sandbar replied.
"Us too," Smolder and Silverstream said.
"So, you're all protected," Ocellus said. "That's a relief. I can't believe she almost got me."
"But hang on," Gallus said. "How many of the changelings had wind chimes?" They all grumble coming from the tray area and found it was coming from Moss.
"Uh oh," they sighed.
"He's going to go off at any second," Gallus said.
"We can try and keep him calm," Ocellus said.
"It's only a matter of time."
"We couldn't find anything in the library," Smolder said. "How are we suppose to fix this?"
"I hope there's a way," Sandbar said. "I don't know if the school's going to last much longer."
"I'm going to try and talk to him," Ocellus said. She walked off to hopefully keep the changeling under control. "Moss, are you doing?"
"I slept terribly," Moss replied. "Don't talk to me."
"If you need help calm down..."
"Don't talk to me!" Ocellus gulped as she walked back to her table.
"Yep, he's a lost cause," Gallus said. "I suggest we prepare ourselves for an inevitable fight."
"I can work with that," Smolder said.
"Guys, you know we can't do that," Sandbar said.
"I don't think he's going to give us a choice."
Even with Moss's anger, Ocellus did her best to keep him calm. Still, it was far from easy. Moss would say things under his breath which were far from appropriate and he started making violent jesters towards others. And this was all during their first class.
When they got out into the hall, Moss didn't stop grumbling. Sandbar saw Ocellus and ran up to her. "Has he cracked yet?" the colt asked.
"I think I'm making progress," Ocellus said. By her tone, it sounded like denial.
"Ocellus, you know Gallus has a point. You can only keep him down for so long."
"What did you say?" Moss asked.
"Uh oh. Moss, it's not..."
The changeling stomped closer to the colt. "You think we're going to steal your love?"
"Nothing like that."
"Well, you didn't do anything to help me?"
"What?"
"In fact, you helped beet me up."
"What are you talking about?"
"I think I know," Ocellus shivered. "Moss, just calm..."
"Stay out of this," the changeling ordered. He shoved Ocellus back, knocking her off her feet.
"I think you should listen to her," Sandbar said trying not to panic.
"You know, she was right about you," Moss said.
"She? Oh, she."
"I've had enough of you judging us."
"Do you even hear yourself?" Moss didn't listen and just turned into a minotaur and then tossed the colt across the hall. He flew and screamed down the hall until he was caught by Sunburst's magic.
"What happened?" the vice-principal asked.
"Moss is out of control." On cue, the changeling-minotaur ran down the hall. He tried punching Sandbar, but Sunburst blocked the punches with a forcefield. The stallion tried to stun Moss with a spell, but the changeling turned into a maulwurf, which made the spell a minor annoyance.
Quickly, Sunburst teleported himself and Sandbar away to the school moats. Silverstream and the other hippogriffs were there going for a swim. "Silver, good to see you," Sandbar said quickly, "Hide me!"
"Why?" the hippogriff asked.
"Where are you?!" Moss cried out in anger.
"Another one?"
"Yep," Sandbar replied sheepishly. The hippogriff and colt walked over to the water where Silverstream's pearl piece turned them both into seaponies. They hid under the bridge as Sunburst teleported away to get help. The maulwurf stomped towards the moat, breaking parts of the walls. This slowed him down and gave the seaponies enough time to hide. Ocellus flew up to look moss in the eye.
"Moss, you need to stop," Ocellus begged.
"Not until I get that pony," the maulwurf said.
"He didn't do anything wrong."
"It's not just him."
"Listen, I know what you're talking about. That alicorn you saw was lying to you." The maulwurf raised his claw and Ocellus turned into a dragon to brace herself. She was launched across the area and smashed into the wall. She fell to the ground and changed back to her normal form. Moss started tearing up the bridges before a torrent of fire nearly hit him.
"Who did that?"
"Yo, down here," Smolder said. She now had Moss's attention. "You know, the yaks said that they're best, but I think dragons are better."
"At what?"
"Competition. Let's see if you're faster than me." With that, the dragoness took to the sky.
"Get back here!" Moss turned into a griffon and chased her down.
"Where did they go?" Sandbar asked.
"Guys, get over here and help me with Ocellus," Gallus said.
"Where's Smolder going?" Silverstream asked. She and Sandbar jumped out of the water and returned to their normal forms.
"Smolder buying time," Yona said as she placed the first-aid kit down.
And she was. Smolder and Moss flew around in the sky at high speeds. "What's the matter?" Smolder scoffed, "Can't keep up?" Moss gritted his teeth and turned into a bird the dragoness knew too well. The changeling was now a roc, a big one at that. Smolder felt that the plan was backfiring and dove towards the ground.
"Stay still!" Moss ordered. He chased her to the ground and was gaining. Just before he could catch up, he stopped. Smolder looked back and saw the roc turned back into a changeling and he was brought to the ground and Smolder found he was being held by Sunburst, Starlight, and Chancellor Neighsay.
"Unbelievably," Starlight sighed.
"You took the words right out of my mouth," Neighsay agreed. Moss tried changing his form again, but he just stuck as a changeling.
"Smolder, are you okay?" Silverstream asked as she and her friends ran up to the dragoness.
Neighsay looked towards Ocellus, who had a few bandages on her. "We told you not to run off," Rainbow Dash said. She ran up along with the rest of the teachers.
"I really hate to do this," Neighsay sighed.
"Chancellor," Starlight begged, "We just..."
"I'm sorry, but look at your students over there." He pointed to Ocellus, who seemed to be in pain by just standing. "It pains me to say this. I'm glad your friend changed my mind about this school, but it must be shut down." Starlight hung her head in defeat. The professors did the same as the students looked at each other feeling more worried than ever.