"C'mon!" Apple Bloom had arrived early that day, bouncing around him in his blanket of safety. "Ya had enough just 'livin''. It's time to learn some thin's. Ya listened to Applejack just fine, like that, but another mare."
He poked his head out from his blanket. "Another mare?" He climbed free, confusion on his face. "What other mare?" He suddenly smiled. "Is it you?"
"Ah'm still a filly!" She colored softly. "Not a mare just yet, um... but thanks..."
"Who do you mean?" He grabbed the brush in the room in his mouth and got to grooming himself for the day. "Have I met them?"
"Nope!" she declared perhaps a bit overly cheerfully. "But ah think ah mentioned her before? Miss Cheerilee's all of our teacher." She waved in a wide circle. "You'll be in our class, learnin' with us."
Dry blinked as he set the brush back down. "Will there be others there, or just us four?"
"Lots of others." Apple Bloom waved that idea away. "A whole class of 'em. Foals like me." She pointed at herself. "But way less good at the adventurin' thin'. Most of 'em would just hightail it out of there if somethin' scary showed up."
"They sound smart." It took a moment for Dry to realize what he said. "Not that you are dumb! You are very brave, which is... Um."
She brought down a hoof on his head with a low clop of connection. "Ya doof. Are ya ready?"
"Wait, right now?!" He bristled even as he shook himself out. "Right now?!"
"Right now. Ya ain't got much else to do, do ya?"
Dry went to fetch his camera. Er, well, it was Fluttershy's camera, but it was his responsibility until he returned it! With it dangling around his neck, he turned back to Apple Bloom. "Is it safe there?"
"At school?" When he nodded, she burst into giggles. "Only real 'threat' we usually run inta is maybe wantin' to fall asleep if it's a borin' lesson. Besides, we'll be there! Scoots and Sweetie! Um, not Scoots, right this second." She rubbed her cheek. "She still feels bad after that fight. Let's visit her after school today."
"I would like that." Dry started for the door. "She fought very bravely. The least we can do is wish her well."
"Yeah!" Apple Bloom burst free of the club house just ahead of Dry, half-bouncing down the steps. "Can't wait to show ya off." She looked over her shoulder. "Hope yer ready to make friends!"
"No," admitted Dry plainly. "But I will try my best." He descended the stairs without hopping, but broke into a bouncing pronk to keep up with Apple Bloom once he was on the ground. He looked like a deer in ways, and his jostling gait was a reminder that perhaps he had some in him.
A fact not missed by Apple Bloom. "Since when did ya run like that? Kinda like Pinkie Pie."
Dry remembered the energetic pink earth pony. "Does she?" That brought up new ideas. "Has she been to Everglow?"
"Yep." Apple Bloom pointed ahead. "There's the school house." She hurried ahead, prompting Dry to speed up to match.
Other foals were present in abundance. "Who's that?" asked a filly with a tiara. "He..." She licked over her lips. "He's from that place, isn't he?"
Apple bloom quirked an ear at the other filly. "Hey, Diamond. If you mean Everglow, yep, he's from there."
"And he's following you." Diamond circled Apple Bloom to get a better look at Dry, coming in close. "Looks like a pony, but an odd one. What kind of pony are you?"
"Ghost tribe," reported Dry proudly. "You've been there?"
"Not by choice, but we were." She waved another pony over, Silver Spoon soon at her side. "He's from Everglow." Diamond pointed at Dry accusingly.
"Like, wow." Silver inclined her head left and right. "I didn't know we had an exchange program with there. I woulda signed up!"
Diamond applied a hoof to her own face. "You are not serious!"
"Why not?" She stuck her tongue out at Diamond. "It'd be nice to visit a Luminace library again."
Dry's eyes widened faintly. "You know of Luminace?"
That got Silver's attention and bright smile. "I am a priest of hers'. And in her name, I welcome you." She dipped her head at Dry. "May we be friends."
"May we be friends," echoed Dry with less certainty. "I know of Princess Luminace, but I am not a worshipper. Nice to meet you! I'm Dry Whisper." He thrust out a hoof at Silver, looking more happy about their meeting than confused.
With a firm clop of met hooves, the two were officially introduced. "Silver Spoon," she noted. "And that's Diamond Tiara." She leaned against her tiara'd friend. "We've both been there. It was tough, but we made it."
"Is she also a priest?" Dry looked at Diamond curiously. She had a very different... energy?
"As if." Diamond waved that away. "They call it a 'Mesmerist'." She tapped the side of her head. "One good look from me and I can get in a pony's head."
Dry shied back at that. "I feel... It's not fair. Everyone else my age already has a profession. I don't have any magic." He suddenly tapped the camera still dangling from him. "I have this, but it's not me, just something I am borrowing."
A bell suddenly rang overhead. "Class!" chimed Sweetie Belle as she rushed past.
Apple Bloom nodded, nudging Dry along. "That goes fer us too."
Inside was the largest pony in the room, a smiling mare. "Alright, class. Everypony..." She trailed off, noticing Dry coming in. "I see we have a new face?" That pony was not like her other little ponies. Long of limb and with a strangely angular body, was that even a pony? They were next to Apple Bloom, a likely source. "Apple Bloom, will you introduce us to your guest?"
"Sure thin'!" She kept right on nudging Dry to the front of the class to face them. The rest had taken their various seats. "Hey everypony! This here's Dry. He's a pony, jus' not from 'round here. He's from Everglow." Eyes widened across the class. Tales had been spread of that dangerous world. "Don't worry none, he's just a foal, like us. He's here to learn, also like us." She turned towards the teacher. "Speakin' ah that, can he? He's real polite."
"Well, hello Dry." The teacher nodded at him. "I'm Miss Cheerilee, the teacher here." She pointed to an empty seat. "And if you want to join us, take a seat and we'll begin." She realized just as she finished saying it. "Do you have a notebook, or a pencil?"
Dry shook his head quickly. "I'm Dry Whisper," he offered in way of a full name. "I have this." He tapped at his camera.
"A photographer, are you?" Cheerilee was smiling at the eager little colt. "That's lovely, but hard to use to take notes during class." She ducked her head down and came back up from behind her desk with a notebook and a pencil together. "You can have this."
Dry's eyes shined as he grabbed both in his mouth, much as Cheerilee had done. "The ponies of this town are so generous. Thank you!"
"If you don't mind my asking." Cheerilee inclined her head faintly. "Are you an earth pony?" He surely had no wings nor any horn.
"Ghost pony," corrected Dry, to the alarmed gasps of several foals. "Not that kinda ghost!" he quickly got out, coloring. "We live in a ghostly place. We're not ghosts."
Cheerilee reached out, resting her hoof on Dry's nose without falling through it. "This colt is alive," she declared with all seriousness, calming the class. "Have a seat. Now, today we're going to cover--" She slapped a black board, making it spin around to reveal a pony with a hard hat. "Manufacturing. A lot of the things you value--" She moved the pointer to various drawings of the goodies modern living allowed. "--came from ponies working very hard to make it happen. Ponyville is not home to much in the way of manufacturing, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't have some idea how these things come about."
Dry saw other ponies were taking notes. Some of them were looking distracted and bored. He had nothing to be bored of! It was all amazing and new. He folded open the notebook and began scribbling down what Cheerilee was saying, word for word, as quickly as he could. Efficient note-taking was not a skill he had yet learned.
"Yes, Dry?" He had raised a hoof, and she saw it. "You have a question?"
"If I may." Dry brought his hooves together. "If they make these things so far away, how do they get here? Do they carry them here? Is it teleported?"
Cheerilee smiled gently. The new student was asking a valid question. He was listening. "While both of those are, technically, options, both have their issues." She looked to Apple Bloom suddenly. "Apple Bloom could tell you tales of how their family struggles to deliver things to places not even halfway across Equestria. We live in a big world." She spread her hooves out wide. "So we needed other solutions. You've all seen the train, have you not?"
Most ponies nodded quickly. But Dry did not, and Cheerilee was watching him, so saw that. "You haven't? The trains are very fast, though they can only move along their tracks. It takes considerable effort to put them down, the tracks." She turned the blackboard back to its blank side and got to drawing some tracks quickly. "But once they're there, goods, and ponies, can easily travel back and forth quickly. It's thanks to these that we, all the way over here in Ponyville, can enjoy nice things made in Manehattan or Baltimare." She pointed at the Ponyville dot and way across at the Baltimare dot. "If they had to walk here, we'd be waiting a very long time."
Snips inclined his head at the new student. "You never saw a train? For real?" He had found a student inferior to him in knowledge at something, a rare treat.
Diamond raised a hoof suddenly. "There's a train network on Everglow, the Thunder Rail. It does the same thing, but with more magic and less steam or pony power."
Cheerilee nodded at Diamond. "I have never been, so I will have to take your word for it. It's not surprising, in the end. Whatever the world--" She turned the board back to the one with the manufacturing ponies. "We have goods, and we have ponies that want those goods, and they're not always next door. When that happens, solutions to get them from A--" She tapped the manufacturing ponies. "--to B" She tapped the smiling pony getting the goods. "--have to be made."
The foals flowed from the building, lunch break had been declared. Some ponies ran off to play, but most were sitting about wherever was comfortable for them, nibbling at their food.
Diamond found Dry just as he was leaving the building. "Hey."
"Hello." He inclined his head at her. "Are you a duchess, or the child of a noble?"
Diamond's ears twitched atop her head. "Huh, you're not entirely off. Good eye." She leaned in. "And you probably don't have lunch." His flinch was enough to confirm that. "Which is why I came over." She turned away. "C'mon. My butler's right over there." She pointed the way. "And he brings way more than I'll ever eat in a day, so..."
"It's true," chimed Silver. "He never knows what Diamond's in the mood for, so he plays it, like, safe."
Diamond snorted at that. "That makes me sound like the problem. This gets the new kid fed." She waved at her butler with a grin. "He's joining us for lunch."
"As you wish, ma'am." Randolph did not question the odd-looking pony. He served all three of them and ensured they were all filled and hydrated.