Perfect Rose didn’t know what she was feeling.
It had been a little while since she’d gotten home from school, she wasn’t really sure how long exactly, and she’d just been staring at a blank wall for most of that time. Walls make time go funny; she’d learnt that in the past… weird amount of time.
It wasn’t helped by the horrible and entirely alien sensation that was the deep pit that had formed in her stomach, an odd mix of queasy and sad that her young mind wasn’t really able to process. She wasn’t really sure why. Blueblood was a meanie, she knew that much. He had said bad things, but she was home now, and her mum and dad would make everything better with love, hugs and cookies.
…So why weren’t things better? They were always meant to make things better!
This didn’t make sense. It was weird. It was stupid. She hated it. HATED it!
She didn’t want to feel like this.
She sniffed sadly, listening to the silence of the bedroom around her. Part of her wanted to call for Time Catcher, but she couldn’t quite manage it. Instead, she elected to turn around and throw herself onto her bed, scrunching her face up into her pillow and letting out a heart-wrenching wail that, had it not been muffled by the said pillow, could have been heard for miles around. The sheer confusion and myriad of unknown feelings swirling inside the almost four-year-old’s mind were unleashed in that wail, the silence being banished by her cries of anguish and hurt.
This wasn’t a mere tantrum, a bout of tears brought on by something as small as a scraped knee. Her parents could attest to witnessing moments of both those points. No, this was a moment of pure sadness no one of such a young age should ever have to experience, and no parent should ever have to witness.
But her parents weren’t there at that moment. She didn’t know where they were. She hadn’t asked. She hadn’t thought to, given the state she had been in during the trip home.
But now she wanted them. She just wanted her mummy and daddy.
Fluffy sat silently nearby.
“No, Fluffy! Shut up!” she gave her pained protest. “It’s stupid and bad and wrong and graaah.”
She curled up further, the movement dislodging her covers and causing the manticore doll to tip over.
“…Sorry, Fluffy. I love you…”
She reached out one of her wings and pulled the manticore closer, snuggling up to her faithful companion and burying her face in its chest. The manticore toy, as always, was willing to put up with Perfect Rose as she cried all the tears she had to give.
And those tears flowed for a while longer, though they did slowly begin to taper off, intermittent with the occasional hiccup and cough brought about by her hysterics. But after a time silence fell over Rose’s bedroom once more. But in its own way, the silence was its own curse. As an eerie calm returned to the young griffon, her mind once again started to go over previous events in some attempt to comprehend why they happened.
Perfect Rose sniffed. “I just wanted to be friends…”
Blueblood snorted. “Friends? You griffons are getting brave. I know all about you people! Mother says you belong in the dirt. That you were weaselled into that ‘family’ of yours without earning it! And I think a non-pony being here is completely insane!”
She just didn’t understand… She had seen the looks. They were weird. Her parents said so! She knew she was ‘adopted’, that her parents were different from other parents. That they brought her home from a place called an ‘orphanage’, rather than… Where did babies come from? She didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. She was different, she knew that.
But Princess Cadenza was too! And she was nice and pretty and smart! So that was stupid. Why would weird people be mean for dumb reasons?
“There is a lot of talk around Canterlot. You know how the other nobles are,” she started to explain. “With the new generation soon to begin school, there has been gossip about our dear Perfect Rose. Some may not feel… comfortable with her being in the same schools the nobility send their young ones to.”
Her birthday… She’d forgotten…
“So what? We send her to an obscure school somewhere at the rear end of Canterlot as if we’re ashamed for her to be seen in public!?” Ebony asked indignantly, their respective parents starting to shoot them looks of concern. “No, Cash. I won’t do it!”
“Who is hiding anything!? There’s plenty of good schools in the lower districts!”
“Not to them! And if we start treating Perfect Rose differently, then how can we expect the rest of the nobility to learn?”
Differently? She was different, but how different? Why didn’t other ponies like her very much?
…Other ponies.
She was a griffon. She wasn’t like other ponies. She couldn’t make things float, even when she tried really really hard and got sad that she couldn’t. Her friends could! But she never managed it. Even with Fluffy helping her. Which was stupid, because Fluffy should be able to make everything work.
And there was the wings, feathers, beak, lack of hooves…
“My Dad says you’re bad!” Ice Shard then said to Perfect Rose. “That you shouldn’t be here.”
Perfect Rose shrunk back. “Huh? Why?”
“That’s stupid!” Bright defended his friend.
“He says she’s a freak and that she’s not supposed to be anywhere near us, that she’s useless!” the colt pressed further. “You should come with us. You might get in trouble being with the freak!”
She thought Ice Shard was just being a stupid meanie butt head. But… was she a freak? Was she really so different that… Was she a monster? A bad thing that made everypony else scared of her?
But she didn’t want to be bad! She just wanted to be a good filly…
A good… filly…
Was she a filly? She was a griffon. But what did that actually mean? Her head hurt thinking about it.
Was she not a filly?
And did that mean…
“…I’m… Aren’t I a pony…?”
“Gyah,” Ebony Rose spat out as she pushed her way through the front door, allowing Cash Counter to follow her in before slamming it shut behind her. She then pressed her back up against it, slumping to the floor with an expression of pure defeat on her face.
“…So…” Cash said awkwardly. “Want some tea? I can-”
“No! I don’t want some tea!” she retorted. “I want to… Gah. Forget it.”
Her husband sighed, sliding over to join her in sitting by the doorway. “Yeah, I know. Murder, arson, jaywalking… Somewhere in-between?”
“To put it mildly.”
“The nobility…” he muttered spitefully. “Perhaps moving to Ponyville isn’t the worst idea. The ponies there are actually worth being called ‘ponies’.”
“We could bunk with Rich. Or with the Apples. I’m sure Buttercup and Bright Mac wouldn’t mind.”
“Applejack and Big Mac would love having Perfect Rose running around with them.”
“With the new foal? Buttercup’s pregnant, remember that piece of news?” Ebony reminded him. “Filly or colt, what do you think?”
“Depends, which name do you like better? Apple Surprise or Apple Bloom?”
“Either. But Apple Bloom sounds cute,” she replied. “Huh… It would be quite the household. Think Granny Smith would protest?”
“Probably.”
“Maybe we’d better hold off then.”
“Most likely.”
Silence fell between them, the couple just sat by the door affectionately and comfortingly holding hooves. They were content to let their fury towards Social Grace and her son bleed away as they slowly breathed in and out, calming themselves before doing anything else.
And then they noticed Time Catcher at the end of the hall, the unicorn butler taking that as a sign to approach.
“Sir. Madame. Welcome home. I would ask if you had any luck, but your demeanour gives me my answer.”
“She’s a self-important idiot, Time Catcher,” Cash answered him. “Ugh. How’s… How’s our daughter?”
Time Catcher paused a moment. “I’m afraid the young madame has yet to come out of her room. I wish I knew what to say, but I think that’s a job more suited for her parents. You should go and see her, she needs you.”
“It’s bad, then?” Ebony asked in a quiet voice, her mane falling to obscure her tired eyes.
“No child as young as she should have to experience the social prejudices of our society in such gross detail,” the butler responded sternly. “I fear she is facing some harsh realities she isn’t yet equipped to process or understand. I fear for her wellbeing.”
“Well… duty calls, then,” Cash noted, standing up and offering a hoof to his wife. “Forget those… beasts. She’s all that matters right now.”
“Yes. I know,” Ebony replied, accepting a hoof up and standing beside her husband. “Come on. I need to see my baby…”
Time Catcher watched on solemnly as the two parents ascended the staircase, his eyes serious and full of worry. He shook his head as they fell out of sight, wishing them the best before returning to his work throughout the household.
Ebony and Cash, meanwhile, quietly approached Perfect Rose’s bedroom with their ears perked up and listening for any sounds within. What they got was… silence. Nothing. And so, each nervous as to what they might find, they slowly opened the door and revealed the room beyond.
The curtains were open, Celestia’s sunlight flowing into the room and making it look, overall, far cheerier than it had any right to be given the circumstances. But on the whole, everything appeared undisturbed. Toys were scattered where they’d been left that morning before school, her books remained in their bookshelves ready for future bedtime stories… The only difference, and a soul-crushing one for the two ponies, was the sight of Perfect Rose’s bed. Or, rather, the sight of what lay atop of that bed…
Perfect Rose herself, curled up on scattered and uncomfortably scrunched up bedsheets with Fluffy predictably held close. They almost thought she’d fallen asleep if it weren’t for the fact that her eyes were open and staring blankly into the void.
They entered, silently closing the door behind them as they approached the bed.
“Perfect Rose…?” Ebony called out gently.
The griffon gave a sharp gasp at the intrusion, shooting up with her favoured doll in her claws as her eyes latched onto the two ponies who approached and sat on the side of her bed. She remained there for a good few seconds, simply staring at them like she couldn’t believe her eyes.
Then her lower beak began to quiver, her eyes welling up as she lunged at her parents as they caught her with open hooves and both hugged her tight. Her wailing renewed, the child crying away all she had left to give. They, on their part, were happy to sit and wait for their daughter to get her grief out of her system. Minutes passed them by, the child’s cries becoming their world as the terrible noise assaulted their ears. And yet, eventually, they once again began to die off…
But what she said next broke their hearts worse than any errant tear ever could.
“Mummy… Daddy… Why am I different?”
They immediately froze; both the question and the sheer void in her tone throwing them completely through a loop.
And, this time, they found themselves at a complete loss as to how they should respond.
“Am I… am I a monster?”
“What? No!” Ebony refuted. “Never ever think something so horrible! You are the sweetest little filly this side of Equestria. Don’t let them ever make you think otherwise, okay?”
“But… I’m not a filly…” she realised sadly.
“W-what do you mean?”
“Am I… Am I pony…?”
Ebony’s mouth gaped like a fish, her eyes moving pleadingly over to Cash Counter for help.
“…No, you’re not a pony,” Perfect Rose’s father finally admitted. “You know you’re a griffon. You’ve always been a griffon. Griffons… they are not ponies.”
“But…” Perfect Rose held them a little tighter. “Is that why I can’t make things floaty?”
“You know not all ponies can make things float either,” Cash pointed out. “Your teacher has taught you that much.”
Earth ponies and pegasi…
But she wasn’t either of them.
“What is a griffon?” she then asked. “Why aren’t I a pony?”
“Griffons are… half eagle and half lion,” Ebony explained. “Most live in a faraway place across the sea. Another country, with their own cities and their own families. But some live in Equestria too, like you.”
“They brought you to us, and when we saw you, we realised you were the most beautiful little filly to ever exist,” her father then stated, nuzzling the top of her head. “It doesn’t matter that you aren’t a pony. Not in the slightest.”
“Can I… meet them?”
“Maybe one day.”
“What are they like?”
“They’re… like every other creature. People of all kinds.”
“But everypony is scared of me…” she muttered sadly. “Even when I just want to be friends and play.”
“Perfect Rose, listen to me,” Ebony addressed sternly. “There is nothing wrong with you. You didn’t do anything bad, okay?”
“Some other ponies are just naughty and don’t understand,” Cash Counter further explained. “You are perfect the way you are, we promise. I mean, the Princess, your friends… even Fluffy says so!”
That finally got a smile out of her. “Yup! Fluffy is a smarty pants!”
“Yes. Very smart,” her mother agreed. “And she is telling you to ignore the mean ponies, alright? We all love you so, so much. My special little girl…”
They hugged her tight, a loving family embraced that, despite it all, told Perfect Rose that she was safe. Here, with them, in this room, nothing could hurt her. She was protected, secure and, most importantly, loved. Loved more than anything by two ponies who meant the world to her, and she to them.
Here and now, Perfect Rose felt safe.