//------------------------------//
// My Teacher 
// Story: Her Watching Eye 
// by InkHeartBrony 
//------------------------------//

I managed to hide the lock of pink hair underneath the gray. Hoping it would stay there. I left for school early after eating a morning muffin, and found my way to the school house.

The only things indicating it was the school house, was the sign above the door that had a picture of a pencil.

Next door was the library. Above the door, a red book.

If I looked past it, I saw what looked to be a never ending line of identical buildings. Behind me, was the same, facing inward.

I knocked on the school house door, looking around to see if any pony was out this early. The door creaked opened, and Teacher looked out warily. She sighed upon seeing me, and her slight smile widened into a familiar grin.

She gestured for me to come in, and I did. She closed the door, and continued to grin unnaturally.

"You don't have to smile like that to me." I said.

Teacher smiled slightly, dropping the fake grin. "What did you need to speak with me about?"

I tugged at my hair a bit, until the tiny lock of pink came loose. The moment Teacher saw it, she gasped.

"No no no!" she said nervously, running to her desk and frantically opening drawers.

"Teacher! I am unique!" I said proudly.

"That is bad. Very very bad." she stopped at one drawer, pulling out a strange can, dropping it back in, and pulling out a different one.

"If the guards see you like that, you could get hurt!"

"You are worried for me?"

"Of course I am! As much as I wish I just let your hair go back to-" she began to choke on her words again, starting a coughing fit. She grabbed her bottle with her hoof and took a drink. "I wish I could let your hair not be gray, and be the color it should be- I cannot."

"A-are you saying my hair isn't gray? I was not born gray!?"

She gulped, and took out a bottle in her hoof, one with a strange spout on the top. She shook it, and approached me.

"Stay still." she said, as she grabbed onto the pink hair, and sprayed it with something wet from the can.

"What is that?"

"See?" Teacher said, smiling nervously. "All better!" she showed me the once pink hair.

Now gray.

"Teacher." I frowned. "I was not supposed to be Gray?"

Teacher paled. Her white face, somehow going even lighter.

"No." she sighed. "I wish I could tell you." she said quietly.

"Is my name Pink?" I asked. "Was I to be Pink instead?"

She turned away, her ears flopping down. 

"Teacher..." I reached out a hoof.

"Who am I?"

She did not look at me, she turned her back, and said nothing.

She knows who I am supposed to be. She knows who I am. Why is it that we had such a connection the day I met her?

"Who am I?" I asked again.

"I cannot tell you."

"You are older than us all, you know so much, but you are unable to speak about what is important."

"I am not allowed to speak." she said. "I want to tell you, but they have prevented me from speaking about certain things." her eyes teared up, and she began to sob. "I know your name, but I cannot say it." she choked on every word. "You are not Gray. You were never supposed to be." she sobbed even harder. "If you want to know the truth, not only about yourself, but about Mother, you need to figure it out on your own. I want to tell you. I want to tell you everything."

"Teacher... is Mother bad?"

She stared at me, her teary purple eyes blinking. She opened her mouth, but all that came out were croaks, she clutched at her throat, but no words came.

They have done something to Teacher.

They have hurt Teacher. Why would Mother hurt Teacher? Shouldn't Mother love us no matter what, shouldn't she care about her children? 

She forced Teacher to not say something about her. She forced Teacher into silence, specifically her, because she knows too much.

"Teacher, how do you know so much? You know so much about the past, you were there for it. You were a part of that past. You had wings too, but they were taken."

She nodded.

I reached forward, and pulled her into a hug. We both needed it.

"Gray. Since I cannot speak, I need you to know something..."

"What?"

"Keep asking questions. Do not stop, do research on everything, I may be able to confirm thoughts you have. Read every book Mother has written, look for clues, signs, anything... it's what I do."

"You want to stop Mother." I said, staring at her.

"I vowed to."





We will not be equal. We will not always be happy, but we can freely weep without being arrested. Although I have been told Mother is great, all my life. 

I have been out of the children's home for four years. I was then introduced to Teacher Purple my first day out. She explained to me our society, how it works, and that I arrived from the children home with my fellow classmates. 

She told me of Mother. Her great wisdom, her power, the equality, the joy, and the love everyone shared.

It was a lie... I should've known, but it sounded like a dream come true.

A world without sadness. A world without grief, pain, hatred, war... was impossible.

Those feelings of sadness are there. You can do nothing to throw them out completely, but only push them aside.

I realize now that that is what Mother is doing. She covers our sadness with bandages, but it does not take away the pain.

That only hides it under layers of fake happiness. We are forced to hide our feelings, keep on that stupid grin. 

Teacher came talking to me on her own, after school almost everyday, she would tell me of things we didn't learn in school. Wonderful things I loved to hear. She told me not to tell the other children, she told me never to speak of this to anyone else.

I would learn about the past, more than I could ever know. She told me about herself. She was 'unique'.

But I wonder why she came to me. She knows things about me I didn't know.

But then, if she truly does, who am I supposed to be?

Somehow recently, something changed about her. She could go on and on about the books we read, about anything she wanted to say... but then she stopped, and now her words are limited, just as I was catching on to who I may be, just a hint, a lock of hair, could reveal it all. She could've told me my name.

My real name. But no, Mother hid it in silence.

There is something going on here. Why does Mother keep us quiet? Why do we worship her so, when all she brings is pain and heartache.

Teacher knows something. She wants to put an end to Mother's reign. Of course... I do too.

But it's hard to go against something you've been told is good all your life.

Teacher wants to tell me things. She wants to tell me who I really am. I can see it in her eyes when she looks at me, now as she's looking through the bookshelf.

She glances at me, I can see the worry in her eyes. I can see the feelings, the feeling that she is trapped with no way out.

I have never been in Teachers home. It is different from my home. It is messy, there are papers and books strewn about the room. By the window, I see a strange large cone shaped object on a stand with glass on the front, where it seems to point out the window.

Beside that, their is a cork board. Covers with pictures, papers, arrows, and question marks.

I stand up from the chair, and approach the board.

I see multiple pictures of the same 6 ponies. I see what I can assume are the 'mane 6' from the book. Attached to the white mare, Rarity, I think, is a red string, leading over to a picture of a very similar looking mare, with the same color hair, but missing the curl. Her eyes, the same color as her hair. On her head, is stitches. The mare is wearing a brown cloak, and has it pulled over her head, she looks worried in the picture, and her head is turned, looking to the left.

Under the picture is an address. 

E 5268

I look to the left of the board, and see a picture of Mother, holding the Staff of Sameness. A red string connected to it, is directed towards a paper with a picture of a blue mare with big red hair. Above it says, 

I'm pretty sure Meadow Brook only had 8 magical items, not 9 Then surrounding, are pictures of 8 items.

A string connected to Mother, leads to another picture of her of her face grinning, next to another random pony grinning the same way.

Their are words surrounding Mother's face.

Purple coat. Striped mane, different colors, brighter saturation, eyes don't match mane, can pick up heavier objects, has a unicorn horn.

UNEQUAL

"Found it!" I heard behind me. I turned around, and approached Teacher curiously. What is it exactly, that she was looking for?

Teacher placed carefully, a large brown book on the table. I sat down in the chair, and she sat in the one across from me. She pushed the book towards me, and I read the title.

The Fall of Friendship

"Similar to 'When The Sun Dies', this focuses on the creation of our society, it focuses more on the defeat of-"

She began to cough again. She could not say whatever she was going to say. She was not allowed.

"Defeat of what?" I asked.

She opened the front of the book, dust flying up into the air, she placed her hoof on the page, and I looked at the words directly under.

'-Twilight Sparkle."

"The defeat of Twilight Sparkle..." I said. "But, we already learned this in When The Sun Dies!"

"No." she said, "This goes more in detail. Written from a first hoof experience, this book was banned because it spoke too much of the truth." Teacher grinned, and looked into my eyes, "It has almost everything I know."

"But then..." I looked at it, "how did you obtain it?"

She smiled. "I just kept it. I bought it the moment it was published."

I gulped, staring at the book, reading the cover again.

"Why is it called The Fall of Friendship?"

"Because, Gray," she whispered, leaning close, "That's exactly what this society is. That's exactly what happened when Mother- Starlight Glimmer- rose to power. She built this world, because she was afraid of losing ponies. She didn't want their unique personalities and gifts to distract them from her. She doesn't truly care about us... she only desires to be loved- but she does not return the favor."

I looked into her bright purple eyes, which sparkled in the light. I looked down at the book, taking in a deep breath, and opening it.





Hours passed of me reading, talking, and asking questions. Trying to understand the full picture Teacher was trying to tell me.

"-she opened her eyes, only to see they were locked inside. Their cutiemarks gone, replaced by equal signs."

"-she couldn't believe what she was seeing, their inevitable doom, and their was nothing she could do about it."

"It was hopeless. Just hopeless. Princess Twilight Sparkle would never see her friends again, but she had to try."

"-she was reduced now to nothing but Purple. Her wings and horn torn from her body, her fur bleached like every pony else. Her mane and hair dyed the same as her purple eyes. She was cursed, cursed to know the truth-"

"-She was cursed to know the truth. But she could not speak it. Her friends minds were broken and lost in the midst of millions, yet Twilight was here all along. Having memory of all events before, but no way to find her friends, no way to tell any pony the truth and make them believe it. That was her punishment for trying to help ponies and save countless lives."

I paused, and began to read the lines out loud, slowly, clinging onto every word.

"Princess Twilight Sparkle is nothing more now than a teacher. A teacher who speaks lies to children forced out off her tongue. Princess Twilight Sparkle is reduced to nothing more but a pony by the title of-"

I stopped.

I couldn't read it. It couldn't be true. It couldn't be real. 

I slowly choked out the words, and looked up at my teacher as I did.

"-Teacher Purple."