//------------------------------// // Chapter Three: Health Class // Story: Heart of Light // by TheCrimsonDM //------------------------------// Heart of Light Chapter Three: Health Class Written by TheCrimsonDM The next day School was in session and Valiant couldn’t be more pleased with herself. Turned out there was a test scheduled for her health class that day and she had been prepared. Several other students were in dismay, including Scootaloo who had made several popular, although crude comments about the test. The teacher didn’t hear her, as usual. It sucked being next to Scootaloo, but what was Valiant supposed to do? Scootaloo leaned over to Valiant’s desk. “Hey, I need help. How does magic work again? It’s a unicorn’s horn right?” Valiant rolled her eyes. “Mana Lobe.” The mana lobe was connected directly to the horn, everypony had a mana lobe, though most couldn’t use it to create something out of raw energy like a unicorn. The horn directs and channels it. Yet that didn’t explain how Valiant could do magic, nor how ponies could do alchemy, but that was a question for another day. “The… oh, okay I see that on the answers. Weird name for a horn,” Scootaloo said. “Not as sexy either.” Valiant let loose a low growl, just audible to those around her while shooting a one eyed death glare at Scootaloo. Scootaloo hardly noticed as she rambled on, “Anyway, I only liked this class because I thought we were gonna get to the sexy stuff eventually, but the way this is going, nothing fun is gonna happen.” The teacher, a unicorn mare with dark gray fur and a graying brown mane walked over. “What’s this? Two students gabbing on like some griffon?” “Hey!” Scootaloo snapped. “Gabi’s a great griffon. Just because she’s loud doesn’t make her bad in anyway.” “And you,” the teacher said without seeming to notice Scootaloo's rebuttal. “I thought better from you, maybe that’s why your so quiet all the time? Secretly conversing with your friends behind my back.” Valiant wanted to argue but with everypony's eyes on her she felt smaller than usual. She shrunk back in her chair and attempted very hard to use an illusion spell to go invisible despite being an earth pony. It didn’t work. “You won’t even speak up for yourself when your in trouble eh? Well maybe detention will loosen those lips?” Painful flashes of old memories from the first time she could recall somepony saying that too her came in like arrows striking vital organs. Valiant closed her eye shut hard and forced them back down. For a brief moment if felt like her little world was going to collapse right there in the middle of the classroom. “Teacher she wasn’t talking,” Scootaloo said almost quietly. “I was bothering her, trying to get her to give me the answers. She’s like, smarter than me so I thought she’d have them. She was actually getting mad at me for bugging her.” The teacher spun around on Scootaloo. “What? What? What? You admit to cheating! Well that changes everything, I’m sorry Valiant Heart, I can see now that Scootaloo is the one in trouble. Scootaloo it’s detention for you, and I’ll be telling your foster parents.” Scootaloo leaned back in her chair and kicked her legs up. “Cool, sounds fun, teach.” The teacher moved back to the front of the classroom smugly satisfied with getting somepony in trouble. For a few minutes things were quiet, save for the occasional giggle or stray comment. Boy did Valiant ever miss having Miss Cheerlee as a teacher. “T-thank you,” Valiant whispered at Scootaloo. “No problem… wait, you can talk? I thought you were mute,” Scootaloo seamed genuinely shocked even having heard her speak just moments ago. Seemed like Rainbow Dash's influence was rubbing off. Valiant shook her head but didn’t speak another word. After five minutes the teacher rose from her seat and addressed the class once more. This time her horn lit up with a pale blue aura and an image appeared on the chalk bored behind her. “I’ll be collecting your tests in a minute,” the teacher said as the image of a mare and a stallion appeared behind her. “But now I would like to take a moment to discuss the next chapter we will be discussing. Sex.” Valiant’s eye widened as she stared at her teacher. What in the actual Tartarus is she talking about? “You will need to get permission from your parents to take the next several classes of course, if you don’t you can always do extra work in the library,” the teacher sounded less than enthralled about this. Scootaloo grinned. “Hoo Haa, hear that baby? It’s finally time for the sex class, with Scootaloo.” Valiant screamed internally. This was not something she wanted to have happen, nor did she know how to bring this up with her parents. It wasn’t like she didn’t understand how sex worked, or why it happened. She just didn’t approve of it, or like it, or think it was valuable at all. Despite Trixie’s obsession with it, when it came to Maud of course. It was gross, disgusting, and mean. Valiant readied herself for what was likely to be the most maddening conversation ever when she got home. Most students would be going home to ask for permission to go to the classes. Valiant would be begging to be left out. *** The treehouse was quiet as ever while Twilight reorganized one of her personal libraries. At this stage in her life she had multiple libraries. Of course she shared her wealth with those she trusted, and even donated more than enough books to the Golden Gale Library just outside of town. So she felt she had earned her collection. There was a quiet rapping at her front door, but before Twilight could go to get it the door swung open and an old friend walked through. The peach colored mare wore a dark gray cloak with it’s hood drawn over her face, yet her exposed muzzle offered a warm smile. The mare shut the door behind her and threw back her hood to reveal her fiery mane. “Sunset, how are you doing?” Twilight asked as she walked over to embrace one of her oldest friends. “I’m doing great, more enemies defeated, too many kids in the family, the usual,” Sunset replied. “And you?” “I’m preparing for the disaster that’s going to be Rarity’s thirtieth birthday.” Twilight groaned. “I love her, I really do, but even she knows that at some point she’s going to freak out and start crying. We just have to accept it and help her through this time I guess.” “Sounds rough, too bad that I’m not that close to this version of Rarity.” Sunset’s eyes took on an sad look as if she was looking at an old memory. “I’m not really that close to any of your friends here. Trixie aside of course.” “Speaking of that, me and Valiant wanted to speak to you about something. Though she should have been here by now,” Twilight frowned. “I wonder what’s keeping her?” “Probably friends, she’s a teenager after all.” Twilight bit her lower lip. “I hope so.” “What did you need to speak to me about?” Twilight moved over to a desk and pulled out some of the work she had been doing. “Take a look at this.” She passed over a folder concerning all the information she could gather on the six guardians, the guardian hearts, and the Seekers.” Sunset took a few minutes to read through it. Luckily that’s about the same time as a second knock appeared at her door. Twilight went over to the door, it was left ajar, yet nopony was in sight. She couldn’t see anypony outside. She opened the door slowly, her chest tightening with a familiar sense of dread. There was a splash as Twilight's world was temporarily swallowed by a bucket of water. Twilight shook her head, mane soaking wet from the prank. Off in the distance Twilight spotted a pink filly galloping away, lavender and red stripped mane flowing in the breeze. “I have got to talk to her mother about this at some point.” “Won’t matter,” Valiant’s tiny voice stated from Twilight’s side. Twilight nearly jumped at the sudden appearance of the little teenager. “What? How? When?” Valiant poked her head inside and upon seeing Sunset her body grew tense. She pulled out her whiteboard and wrote a quick message on it for Twilight. “She’s here already?” “Yes,” Twilight said with a slight nod. She walked back inside, leading the way for Valiant. “Sunset, our guest has arrived. Have you finished looking over my report?” Sunset set the folder down and let out a sigh. “You’re going to need to find the Seekers Archive aren’t you?” Twilight nodded. “I’m afraid it might be our only choice at this point.” Sunset sat down and leaned her back against the bookshelf. “Okay, I can tell you what my mentor told me when he first introduced me into the Seekers. There were three major clues left behind with specific members of the guild. Don’t get me wrong there were many, many other clues, but most of them are lies or red harings. Only three of us had any real information.” “Do you?” “I have a clue; Past the tall shadow’s tail you will find knowledge.” Twilight blinked. “That’s… useless.” “it is by itself. There are two other clues you need to figure out the location of the Archive.” Valiant showed her whiteboard. “Where do we find the other clues?” Sunset grinned. “You’re growing into quite the curious kitty.” Valiant smiled in reply. “As for the other two clues,” Sunset rubbed at her forehead. “There’s this issue where one of them is being held by a kind, old, and insane mare. You might recognize her yourself, Twilight. Inkpots was once one of us and one of the highest ranking members of the guild. As for the last one, it can only be found with the last of the True Seekers. As in one of the founding members.” “What do you mean?” Twilight asked. “I mean you’ll have to get into Bookmark’s tomb and find the clue yourself.” Sunset shivered at the thought. “I don’t envy your quest, Twilight. As one of the Guardian Hearts myself, I should be more interested in what you’ll find. Sadly I am not. I just want to get on with my life and make things as good as I can for me and the sirens, and our nine kids.” “I don't envy your life either,” Twilight laughed thinking about the amount of kids. A small pain shot through her heart at the same time, but she pushed it away. “Well this is all I could really ask of you anyway, thanks for the information.” Valiant flashed her whiteboard again. “Thank you.” Sunset smiled widely at them. “Don’t mention it. I’ll make you a map of where you can find either of these two ponies. Just be careful, lots of ponies have undertaken this quest, and failed. There are even some ponies that have dedicated their lives to making sure that these ponies failed. They may not care about your noble intentions.” Twilight shook her head, she couldn’t allow this to deter her. Not now. “I’ll be fine. Besides I got Valiant heart with me.” Valiant offered another grin. Sunset gave them a nervous smile. “I’ll trust you two.” *** When Valiant finally returned home she was excited about the prospect of finding the Seekers Archive. So excited in fact that she very nearly missed the fact that Sweetie Belle was sitting in her room, waiting for her. For a moment Valiant simply stood there, staring blankly at her friend. Sweetie Belle was examining the collection of cat plushies. “These are… nice.” Valiant walked in and shut the door with a rear hoof. “Hi.” Sweetie Belle offered her a small smile. “I heard from Scootaloo that you’re going to be having a fun time in health class.” “No,” Valiant said with a stern stance. Her earlier joy was quickly dissipating. “It won’t be fun.” “I know… I used to listen in on the adults conversations, well more or less I was really good at listening in on Rarity’s. I didn’t used to understand what had happened to you, or why you’re living with Maud and Trixie. I do now.” There was nervousness in Sweetie's voice as if she was walking on broken glass and trying not to get cut. “I won’t take it.” “The class? I guess I can’t blame you, and I mean you already know about all that stuff anyway. How babies are made and everything.” Sweetie Belle shuffled her hooves. “I used to think it was really cool that you were willing to listen in on Rarity’s conversations about sex with me. It was like a secret we could share, like we were two secret agents gathering intel on the enemy. Our enemy being adulthood.” “Yeah,” Valiant shrugged. It had been boring to listen to all of Rarity’s private stories, yet that wasn’t the part she liked about hanging out with Sweetie Belle. “I liked sneaking around with you.” “Applebloom graduated early, so she already took the class ages ago.” Sweetie looked down at her hooves. “I think she knows about your foalhood as well, after all Applejack is her older sister and your family. She might come by to visit you.” Valiant walked over to her bed and laid down. “Whatever.” Sweetie Belle simply stood there, silent as could be for a few minutes. The silence was deafening, though Valiant wasn’t going to be the first one to break it. Luckily she didn’t have too. There were other ponies kind enough to do so. There was a knocking at the bedroom door, and only a moment after did the door open up. Maud was standing there. “Are you okay?” Sweetie Belle began walking to the door’s exit. “You two have plenty to talk about, I’m just, uh, going to let you do that. See you later.” Once she was gone Maud entered the room and shut the door again. “You didn’t say hello when you came in. Are you okay?” “No.” “What’s wrong?” Valiant rolled over and looked up into her mother’s eyes. This was going to be a painfully awkward conversation, at best. “I have to talk to you about a class at school.”