Harmony Consultant

by jqnexx

Non-canon Interlude: Gilda

Author's Note:

Not dead! I've been busy, and now my pre-reader is busy. I've got the next chapter awaiting pre-reading, and the chapter after that is 1/3 written. Stand by for the end of phase 1 and the beginning of phase 2: Escalation.

I still haven't gotten around to seeing Season 5. I should fix that soon.

These tower things were just too damn tall. That was really all Gilda could think about as she collapsed onto the grass. The floating island of Metafallica wasn’t technically attached to a tower, but it orbited around one way in the air and that counted as far as the griffon was concerned.

She knew shouldn’t have to come this far to find a shrink. Her father could afford a top-flight one back home, on the planet she normally came from. No need for any more weirdness. But it’d likely be a pony. She was sick of them. The ones who catered to griffons were normally pegasi, which… she didn’t want to think about. At all.

Her wings still burned from the stress of flying in an upward spiral for hours, but she took to the air. No way was she walking. Down below, odd monkey-dog-something creatures frolicked near a stream. She wasn’t sure if they were fugly or cute, but whatever they were she probably wasn’t allowed to snack on one. Humans could be a lot like ponies that way.

As she approached the city in the center of the floating island, she could see strange metal bird-things coming toward her. These must have been the “airships” the travel brochure mentioned. She’d have no dealings with them, a griffon was meant to fly under her own wingpower. The airships, however, seemed to want something to do with her.

One of them pulled alongside. It was almost entirely white and shaped vaguely like a cross between a boomerang and a seagull, with a glass bubble at the front for the pilot to sit in. She could see the pilot make a ‘follow me’ gesture with his hand (or hers, the pilot’s suit made it impossible for Gilda to tell). The airship lazily turned towards the mountain district and began to climb.

Gilda followed as best she could. The other airships had moved on after this one had left formation with them, which made Gilda suspicious. Normally an escort flight would have at least two griffons. The airship’s speed also was a little inconsistent. It was struggling to fly slowly enough to allow Gilda to keep up with it.

After ten minutes of climbing, Gilda tried to turn back towards the center. The pilot rolled the airship around and over her, putting the bubble canopy right in her face. Her mysterious escort pointed towards the peak of the mountain, and once again made the ‘follow me’ gesture.

The peak wasn’t all that great, at least in Gilda’s estimation. Still, for an island like this it was ok. It had a little snow at the top and was steep, and with that slope it looked like it could make for some killer low-level gliding.

The bubble opened. The pilot unbuckled themself from the seat and stood up on it. Then they flashed Gilda a thumbs up (Minotaurs had a similar gesture, so she recognized it) and pointed down the slope.

“The heck do you want already, Mr ‘I need a machine to fly for me’?” Gilda was getting sick of this.

The pilot pressed a few buttons on the control console, and the airship rolled over, dropping them.

Gilda seriously considered not catching the pilot. This dweeb deserves it for being so dumb with all this. But to heck with it, I’m not a bad gal. I won’t leave him hanging – unlike somepony.

As Gilda moved forward to grab the pilot, they suddenly spread their arms, revealing odd membranes connecting from the arms to the sides of their body. An additional membrane had snapped into position between their legs. Correcting her dive, Gilda realized that this hairless monkey was gliding. Whatever kind of wing-suit that was, it was giving the pilot the ability to almost-sorta fly.

Gilda turned her head up to check on the airship. It had flown off on its own and seemed to have fallen in behind another of its kind.

The pilot glided down the slope at a fairly decent speed. Gilda had flown faster (heck, trying to keep up with that airship was exhausting), but she’d rarely done anything so fast, so close to the ground. Hitting a cloud was one thing, hitting a rock was something else!

Up ahead was a set of stone pillars directly in their path. Gilda could pull up over them, trading speed for altitude even in a glide, but the pilot had only that glider-suit and she doubted they could do that.

Instead, the pilot rolled left, dodging the first pillar, then right, dodging the pillar to the left.

Gilda followed the maneuver, although it was a bit scary. Holy crap, who is this guy.

Up ahead was another landscape obstacle, a loop of stone with a small hole in the center. The pilot made some minor course corrections and shot through.

Gilda knew as she approached that the hole was narrower than her maximum wingspan. Ohhhhhhh craaaaaaaaaaap. She made a quick flap up to give her some momentum and tucked her wings to her sides. She had just barely cleared it when she reopened them. Oh thank heavens thank you.

The land fell away in front of them as they crossed over the edge of a horseshoe-shaped cliff. To their left and right waterfalls plummeted. The pilot banked and dove between the streams of water to their right. Gilda considered following, but maneuvered around the streams of water to the left instead. She could see the pilot’s head turned to watch her. Hah! I’m not so bad at this!

They continued for a few more minutes until one last cliff loomed up ahead: the edge of the floating island itself.

Gilda expected the pilot to stop somehow, but they kept going towards the edge. Crud, I’m gonna have to catch this lamebrain after all that?

As the pilot sailed over the edge, they grabbed at an item on their back and began unfolding it in midair. Gilda watched, confused, as the pilot unfolded an odd lozenge-shaped board and stood on it.

A blast of blue light pulsed from the bottom rear of the board, and it suddenly shot up. Gilda watched the pilot’s knees flex to keep balance, as the board began to angle itself up.

Ok the board’s nearly vertical. How the heck are his shoes gripping that? Probably some bullshit magic.

The pilot came in for a landing in a clearing near the edge of the floating island.

As the adrenaline faded, Gilda’s thoughts caught up with her again. “Okay, that was pretty wicked, no lie, but you probably made me late for my appointment.”

“No, I don’t think so.” The pilot’s feminine voice surprised Gilda, she had thought that airships were a ‘guy’ thing for humans. She took off her helmet, letting loose a surprising amount of purple hair. “I’m Cocona. Nice to meet you.” She held out her hand.

Gilda looked at it. “What do you mean, you don’t think so?”

Cocona smiled. “Lady Luca contacted me about your case. She read over your situation and your profile, and felt that Dive Therapy wouldn’t necessarily be best for you.”

Gilda blinked, taken aback. “Then why’d she say to come here, then?”

Cocona’s smile became sly. “Think about it for a second. How do you feel?”

“Uh, pretty confused.”

“And before that?”

“You mean all that flying we just did? That was nuts. You’ve got no wings and you’ve got no fear of death either! It was the most radical thing I’ve done in forever.”

Cocona nodded, and extended her hand further towards Gilda. “Want to do some more crazy stuff?”

Gilda gave the best approximation of a smile she could, using her eyes and forehead rather than her beak. “Heck yeah.”

“Flying under your own power like that seems so cool. That’s why I had that suit made. I wanted to fly with my own body as much as possible. But I can’t really accelerate at all, which is why I still use the v-board mostly.”

“That’s the, uh, board thing? It’s like a little mini-airship?”

“Yeah! I know you’ve got the ability to fly on your own, but you look a little tired. Why don’t I show you how to use one? I’ve got a spare stashed here.”

Gilda’s eyes narrowed. “You seem like you’re really prepared for this.”

Cocona nodded. “Yeah, like I said, Lady Luca contacted me. She thought you were a decent enough person, you just needed some friends you don’t have any baggage with while you settle your feelings. So she asked me to give it a shot since I had the most in common with you.”

“So you’re being friends with me because you’re ordered to?”

“Nah. I read your file. You’ve matured a lot more than you know, and I figured it’d be cool to train with somebody from another planet.”

That brought back the confused stare. “Train?”

Cocona’s smile would make a shark feel inadequate. “Yeah, they’re doing some big ‘V-board All-Stars vs Wonderbolts’ cross-world exhibition thing.”

“Oh my goddess. We gotta kick their butts!”

Cocona’s smile returned to its normal, warm state. “C’mon. Let’s get going.”