The next day started off without a hitch. No one seemed to give any odd looks, not even any of the faculty. Perhaps their day off may have gone unnoticed after all.
Lemon Zest was getting her stuff out of her locker as she was about to head to class. She grabbed her books and closed her locker with her foot. However, the door didn’t quite catch on the latch and opened again. She tried again and got the same result.
“Come on stupid!” She turned around and really kicked the door this time.
BANG! Not only did she close the door, she managed to both dent the left side and bend the metal on the bottom. Lemon stared at her locker, thinking she may have just jammed the door.
“You’ve been working out lately Lemon?” She turned and saw Fleur de Lis and some of the other girls staring at her.
“Oh uh…yeah! You know me, gotta keep in shape for that summer bod, amirite!?” Lemon forced out a hearty laugh. Once they left, Lemon turned around and looked at her locker again. “Maybe I need to cut down on the protein…”
Sour Sweet was in her Modern History class, which was also her least favorite class. Who the hell cared about what war happened or who got involved in a nationwide scandal? Leave that stuff to someone like Sugarcoat who actually gave a damn.
While she was doodling when she was actually supposed to be taking notes, her eyes went around the room, trying to find something more interesting to pay attention to. She then eyed the teacher’s apple on the desk. No doubt it was probably a snack for between classes: giving a teacher an apple was both outdated and cheesy nowadays.
Sour then heard and felt her stomach rumble. Like most days, she overslept and had to skip breakfast to make it to school on time. The hunger, and the fact that she would have to eventually deal with her made her mood only worse. Still, for whatever reason, that apple looked really appealing right about now…
In almost a split second, the apple went from the teacher’s desk to her own. No, it didn’t teleport, it literally traveled the distance between the two points and needless to say this caused Sour to almost jump out of her seat.
The entire class was staring at her. “Miss Sweet, I understand you’re hungry but you could’ve asked me first,” the teacher said, trying to lighten the moment with humor. Did he not notice she was at least three feet from the desk?
Sour could only smile shyly as she sat back down and stared at the apple now in her possession. Already, she could hear the whispers.
“Did that apple just fly over to her?”
“She didn’t even move a muscle! Do you think she has psychic powers!?”
“Man, I wish I could do that with the remote…”
Sour was wondering the same thing. How long did she have this gift…if you could call it that?
Indigo was walking across the hallway to her next class. For whatever reason, she was feeling sort of restless, like she could do a few laps around the school. Well, she was practically the star athlete of the school. Her main sport however was soccer and as she found out at the Friendship Games it seemed she finally had a worthy opponent. What was her name again? Rainbow Crash?
As she was walking, she noticed that the floor had been waxed recently. Well, Crystal Prep has a reputation after all. She then noticed a girl carrying a large stack of papers walking in her direction. At the last second, she saw the girl’s shoes slip on the ground.
“Whoa!” She then reached out to catch her…and then stopped. At that moment, the poor girl should’ve fallen on her back and the stack of papers should have been all over the place.
But they weren’t.
In fact, the girl was still in the processing of falling…and it seemed as if everything around the two of them had stopped as well.
Well, not completely. It was hard to notice, but technically, everything was still in motion, just at a very slow pace. Indigo looked at herself. She was moving normally. “Okay…” She looked around. No one seemed to notice what was going on. She then looked at the girl and shrugged. “Might as well save her the trouble and embarrassment.” She went over and positioned the girl so she was standing straight and straightened out her pile of papers. She decided to look at one of them. “Oh…summer tryouts for soccer, forgot about that…” She put the paper back and stepped back, clapping her hands together. “Okay…I think that should do it…” She paused for a moment. “…Okay you can do the thing now…please…”
Suddenly time reverted to normal as the girl suddenly shuddered and looked around. “Gotta be careful with these floors, am I right?” Indigo said.
The girl looked over to her. “Oh…right. Yes, gotta be careful.” She walked off with a confused look on her face.
“Well…that was all weird,” Indigo thought. Of course, she wasn’t necessarily freaked out by it. Not Indigo Zap. She then grinned all of a sudden. “I could have some fun with this…”
Sugarcoat was currently in the library reading a book that she would eventually be doing a report on. Or she would be if the couple at the table next to her weren’t talking so loud. Oddly enough, they weren’t that close by and yet it was like they were sitting mere inches from her.
Finally losing her patience, she calmly closed her book and glared at the two students. “Excuse me, people are trying to concentrate here.”
The two students looked at her in surprise and went back to what they were supposed to be doing in complete silence. Sugarcoat returned to her reading but the peace wouldn’t last long. She then heard music blaring out and she then looked where it was coming from.
There was a male student sitting at a table near the front wearing headphones. He was probably listening to an MP3 player. It sounded like rock music. Sugarcoat looked around and no one else was looking in his direction. How did they not hear this?
She felt a little self-conscious getting up and telling the student off but…then again if he was listening to headphones that loud with those headphones, he was going to be deaf before he hits twenty-five. The least she could do was help keep his hearing.
She walked over and tapped the student on the shoulder. He looked up and pulled down his headphones. “I can hear your music across the room. If you keep playing it that high you’re going to go deaf.” She meant well, really.
The student stared at her. “Really? Wow…must be good speakers then…but I barely have the music at half volume and you can hear it?”
Sugarcoat paused. He was telling the truth but…
“You must have good hearing then. I’ll turn it down then if it bothers you so much.” He did just that and went back to his work.
Sugarcoat awkwardly went back to her seat. Since when did her hearing get that good? She certainly didn’t listen to loud music but to be able to pick up on things like that-
Suddenly, the scent hit her. Did she smell cinnamon buns? Was it coming from the cafeteria? But that was downstairs!
Sugarcoat shook her head. Maybe she ought to go to the Nurse’s Office, just to be safe…
Sunny Flare had just left class and was walking down the hallway when she passed Dean Cadance’s office. She paused and looked at the door. Unlike Principal Cinch, Cadance was much more approachable and always had her door open for everyone. She was witness to all that happened at the Friendship Games but even if she did approach her, what could Cadance do?
She certainly wouldn’t mention the little side-trip they took yesterday but…it couldn’t hurt to express her concerns about her other peers.
She then went to the door and knocked on it gently. “Come in!” a gentle voice responded. Sunny opened the door and went inside. She instantly spotted the dean organizing her bookshelves in the back.
“Oh, Sunny, what can I do for you?” Cadance asked. “I apologize, I’m in the process of rearranging the office.”
“Is this a bad time?” Sunny asked.
“Not at all! Please, take a seat.” Cadance went back over to her desk and sat down. “Something I can do for you?”
“Well…it’s kind of hard to explain…” Sunny started.
“Oh? Well, I’ll try to follow along as best I can,” Cadance replied.
Sunny then explained her concerns over the past month, about how the students who all of a sudden have warmed up to each other. “Well, I’ve noticed that too but I can’t see how that’s a bad thing,” Cadance commented.
“Well no but isn’t it odd?” Sunny asked. “Crystal Prep has for the longest time had a rather hostile environment.”
“That is true…but I certainly welcome the change, although I guess I could say Principal Cinch has echoed your concerns as well.”
“Really?” Now that was a surprise.
“Well…I admit she tends to want things her way, even if that may be perceived as an iron fist and I know it’s because of reputation as she says but I don’t see how more active engagement between students is bad for the school.”
Sunny sighed. “I guess you’re right…”
“Sunny…is there something else bothering you?” It was strange to hear her first name spoken like this. To any other faculty members it was always “Miss Flare”. But Cadance was dedicated to know all her students, new and old alike and a first name basis was a way to close the gap.
“Is it that obvious?” Sunny asked with a wry smile.
“If you’ve been around students as long as I have, you pick up a thing or two,” Cadance grinned.
“Well…I guess I’m trying to wrap my head around what happened last month…”
“Oh…yes I can imagine,” Cadance said. “Actually, you’re the first to come to me about it. I was surprised none of the other students had but…I guess it wasn’t as traumatic an event to some.”
“Maybe it’s a slight bit of guilt…”
“Ah…I see…you feel guilty about what happened to Twilight and you think she might hold a grudge?”
“N-No it’s not-!” Suddenly there was another knock on the door.
“Excuse me,” Cadance said as she got up and went to the door. As she opened it, Sunny heard her say, “Oh my!”
Sunny looked over and to her surprise saw her friends in the doorway. “Sunny, what are you doing here?” Indigo asked.
“I was just speaking to Dean Cadance…what are you guys doing here?”
It was Sour that responded. “Um…did anything weird happen with you this morning by chance?”
“What? No, why?”
She didn’t respond and Cadance looked curious. “I think maybe you should all take turns explaining what happened.”
The other four girls took turns explaining their stories and neither Sunny nor Cadance could believe what they were hearing. “This…sounds crazy you know that?” Sunny said.
“You think we’re making this up?” Lemon snapped.
“Well I don’t know Lemon, yours sounds kind of normal to me,” Indigo commented.
“Seriously!? You saw my locker, that’s not normal! That’s like battering ram strength right there!”
Sour sighed and looked around the room. “Dean Cadance, can I borrow that stress ball?”
“Oh, sure.”
Sour didn’t walk over to it. Instead the ball left the desk and went right into Sour’s hand. “Is this crazy?” she asked as she squeezed it a few times.
“Well that’s…definitely not normal,” Cadance said. “Er…this just started today?”
“Yep. Not gonna lie though, mine’s kinda cool actually,” Indigo said.
“Wait a minute. Sugarcoat, I thought you always had good hearing?” Sunny asked.
“Yeah, but not good enough where I can hear stuff traveling through the air ducts or smell something fifty feet away.” She then took off her glasses. “I can even see without my glasses…”
“Okay, so she’s turned into Spider-Man,” Indigo commented.
“I feel like I’m not getting the complete picture here…” Cadance said. “I’m no psychiatrist or specialist on…whatever this is but… it sounds like you’re going through a similar process as the girls from Canterlot High.”
“Ugh…wonderful…” Sour said in disgust.
“Well, I haven’t experienced anything yet,” Sunny said. “So maybe it’s like a disease…”
“Oh thanks Sunny…” Indigo glared at her.
“I can’t say…but what I can say is this: it’s best if neither Principal Cinch nor the student body gets news of this.” No one disagreed with that. “Also…has anything else weird taken place recently?”
“Actually…” Sunny then told Cadance about what happened in the woods with the manticore.
Cadance was shaking her head. “Normally I’d think you’re all crazy but considering what I’ve seen I can’t deny it. I got a call from Twilight just today about what happened at Camp Everfree so the story makes sense. Something is definitely going on.
“But for now, let’s just pretend nothing has happened. I’ll make some calls, see if I hear anything else. I guess you could say Twilight and her friends have become experts in this sort of field.” She then looked at the clock. “I don’t mean to kick you girls out but I have a meeting to go to in twenty minutes so we’ll have to save this for another day.”
After they left the school, Sunny was getting looks from everyone. “So…nothing happened with you?” Indigo asked.
“That’s what I said.”
“Oh…well maybe something will happen it just…takes a while right?”
“Why should I care?” Sunny suddenly turned on her. “You think I want some weird magical power?”
“I don’t think you can call it “magical”,” Lemon commented.
Sunny huffed. “I don’t care and honestly if nothing happens, so much the better. I have to get home now.” She then walked off towards her house without another word.
The rest of the girls glanced at one another. “Sheesh, what crawled up her skirt?” Sour asked.