Opening her eyes was being a bit of a nuisance to her at the current moment. With her back pressed against what she assumed to be an impressively comfy collection of padding and with an uncomfortably large blanket draped over her body like some kind of bathrobe, Octavia screwed up her gray face, scrunched up her nose, prayed that nopony was around to see the admittedly horrifyingly grotesque wrinkles on her muzzle, and raised her eyebrows so high into the sky she swore she would lose them in the cosmos forever. Her eyelids flew open, letting in the torrent of flooding rainwater that was the horrible sunlight peeking in through the curtains sitting idly in front of her current point of view.
She cringed instantly, a hoof swiftly flinging itself upward to cover her now open purple irises. Unintentionally thwacking herself in the forehead as she did so, Octavia sucked on her teeth and used her other available hoof to rub at the now growing lump forming next to where her horn would be if her parent's genes had intertwined in such an opposite way that their offspring—only one, more specifically her—would turn out as a Unicorn, with their bright magical auras and their gold jewel-encrusted glasses propped atop their delicate little noses. Not that she would've rather been a Unicorn, gracious no. She was, to be completely honest to everything that both beheld her and maintained her, immensely proud to be an Earth Pony. In fact, if she weren't, she was absolutely sure that she wouldn't be in the position she was currently in.
That brought up the question again.
Where was she?
She lowered the rather useful appendage, intent on letting it sink to the floor beneath her until she realized that it was simply content to rest on... something. She didn't realize what it was exactly, but inwardly noted that it was something incredibly soft. And kinda bouncy, now that she prodded her hoof against it. Blinking away the pretty little colors floating at the sides of her peripherals, Octavia shook her head and felt her left ear flop against her head, joining its cousin that currently found itself pressed against a... pillow?
Octavia stopped.
Her eyes widened as she sat up, the low creaking of bed springs echoing across the walls surrounding her. Frowning, she cocked an eyebrow toward the ceiling fan lazily spinning above her head and craned her neck to her right, eliciting a disgusting series of pops and cracks that would have certainly assured any outside viewer that the mare was dead on the spot. Her dark gray mane fell onto the pillow case as she examined it almost thoughtfully, with enough silence to rival any class during testing day. She glared at nothing. She always hated testing day. Returning back to her prior action, Octavia scrunched up her nose and gave the pillow a nice punch. The middle of the feathered accessory sank, dividing its figure into two neat halves until it slowly rose once again.
That was her pillow.
She shook her head again, this time facing the blanket that plagued her every living, sleeping night. With its soft black form that she inwardly despised and its artistically woven pattern that she'd once or twice hummed at, she was able to confirm yet another piece of her bed from back home. She threw the covers off her body, then swung around and lightly dropped to if she were correct—yep—her carpet in her room. Groaning to herself, Octavia looked out her window and shied away, the yellow light of the sun and the bright white clouds almost beckoning her to come outside for once and stop being such a little baby.
She closed the curtains without a word, only a small frown on her lips and a pair of now heavy bags nestled under her strugglingly wide eyes. Prodding her tongue against the inside of her cheek, she turned and prepared to make her bed—the usual start to her morning ritual before she went off to make her usual morning coffee. The welcomed smell of Equestria Black Coffee wafted into her imaginary nostrils with the bite of a cute dog and the bark of an oak tree. The blissful expression on her face shifted to one of dismissal. Perhaps she could pour something else into her Cigare Brûlé mug, with its past memories of horrid rehearsal days and fuddled double bass notes. Maybe Donut Joe's coffee? The ones she'd gotten at the shop the last time she'd been there, she immediately specified to herself. She hadn't had a good chance to dive into those bags of them since she'd bought them. When almost ninety-percent of your days was spent...
...she'd said this already. No reason to continue.
Octavia tossed the last corner of her bedsheet across her bed and smiled, a silent congratulatory celebration ringing way back in her mind somewhere with pats on her tired back and those cute little party things that rolled out when you blew into them. Gods she'd loved those things as a kid. Definitely better than testing day; that was for sure.
Her eyes became pinpricks, and her erect ears fell flat and snuggled against the sides of her head.
Coffee. Her bed.
She turned her head to the left. Her collection of musical posters, the door to her living room, and her hat drawer waited patiently for her interaction with their beings. Now to the right. She found her polished double bass, her bespoke bow, and her stand filled with folders upon folders of music, their figures practically beaming in the sunlight. Lifting a hoof up, she stared in silence at her boring, gray carpet.
Oh Gods she was home.
No no no wait what?
Octavia fell to her haunches, her two front hooves beginning to dance wildly across her entire body like shadows from a candlelight. Maybe if she hit herself hard enough she'd wake up, this had to be a dream, there was no presently possible way in the whole wide world of Equestria that could even come close to explaining where she currently sat, inside her humble abode with her double bass and her music and her lovely selection of hats, and oh Gods her oven she had to check that at some point there was no possible way it was still–
"Octavia."
Octavia sat up, forelegs flailing as she let out a short yelp.
L shrank back wordlessly, her neck retracting her head as far away as was possible from the griffon's position in front of Octavia. A huge frown was plastered on her gold beak, her brown eyes showing signs of either genuine, urine-drizzling fear or simple unpreparedness in trying to—presumably—wake up the dumb little gray mare easily smaller than her and with no real combat experience aside from immature fighting words and silent, string-tuning retribution, so as to wake her up and get her ready to begin the trek toward Tall Tale. L, slowly regaining her composure that she most certainly hadn't actually lost in the first place, chuckled to herself and scratched at her exposed neck with a talon. Octavia cringed, mostly due to the sunlight currently massacring her sight from behind its curtain of snow white clouds. Gods, what time was it?
The mare leaned over to her right, finding the other three griffons sitting around a blazing campfire. A dirtied silver pot, its lid spoiled with remnants of old food and spoiled dreams, hung by its handle from a long stick hovering over the flame. A pair of Y-shaped branches were stuck into the ground as support, like a wingmare helping you get in with that one colt on the hoofball team. She had to get free food at the cafe somehow. T, the only one tending to said cooking pot, was also the only one who showed no real reaction toward Octavia's admittedly embarrassing rousing, though that was most likely due to the fact that if no one looked after it, it would simply burn. Meanwhile, W gave her a crooked smile and a quiet nod from his seat on the grass, Candidate in his claws.
Valkyrie took the time to be a jackass, and laughed as loudly as she possibly could.
Good morning to you too, dodo.
Octavia rubbed the back of her neck mindlessly, a neutral look on her face as she realized where she actually was.
With bugs buzzing in her ears, tall grass pricking at her legs, and the smell of campfire food wafting into the air with the strength of the Wonderbolts' locker room, Octavia recalled the rocky cliffside, the slow descent into vast greenery, and the almost six-mile hike that led to where she now woke up from a long, nice sleep accompanied by a long, nice dream. A dream that she wished she could go back to, for Celestia's sake did they have to get up this early? Mind her, her usual wake-up time for practice or a rehearsal was around seven o' clock—a sharp seven o' clock at that—but it most certainly wasn't anywhere near six right now!
The five of them sat inside a small clearing—gosh, the griffons seemed to love those—with bountiful oak trees circling them in a sloppy ellipse. A few clouds drifted in the blue sky, wispy and incomplete as if Celestia had torn up little cotton balls from her medicine cabinet and flung them into her beloved azure realm. To the right, Octavia could still see the tops of the cursed Smokey Mountains in all their snow-capped horror. And to her left, if her craning her neck was to be rewarded enough, the faintest sight of Tall Tale's skyscrapers could be seen, trying their hardest to be noticed by the gray mare who was now trying really hard to not do so. She was probably hallucinating. There was no way she would escape that damned cave.
She frowned.
She'd been dreaming about coffee as well, earlier. Her stomach growled, and the bitter taste of the leftover powder found its way onto her tongue. Gods she missed coffee...
"You want some coffee?"
Shut up.
Octavia's eyes lit up. Like a hawk, she looked back over to L and gasped at the mug in her claws. How had she not noticed that before?
Steam rose from inside the godly white cup. Octavia swore she felt a bead of sweat roll down her forehead.
Breathlessly, she asked, "Are you certain?"
L simply nodded.
Madly grasping at the mug, Octavia threw her head back and began to chug it in light of the morning sun.