Rumble sat quietly in the back of the classroom, staring silently at the collection of book that were made available in the small bookcase. Mostly story books for young foals, as to be expected of an Elementary School, but Rumble had already read most of them, so none really stuck out to him that well. He let out a depressed sigh, and sat down at one of the empty desks in the room.
He thought about how suddenly his brother had come home one day, and told him that the two of them would be moving to Ponyville, and that he would have to be enrolled in a new school all of a sudden. Despite all of Rumble’s protests, and threats to run away, here he was, sitting in the empty classroom at Ponyville Elementary School, while his brother worked through his enrolment with the pony that will soon be his new teacher: Miss Cheerilee.
“Stupid Thunderlane,” he muttered to himself. “Making decisions without even asking me… Who cares if I’m still just a kid? Don’t my thoughts matter at all?”
“But Rumble, we’ve been to Ponyville before, and you said you liked it, right?”
“I said it wasn’t a bad place to go for holidays, but I don’t want to move there!”
“What about all the friends you made there?”
“What friends?! I never even got to speak to anypony last time we went there!”
“Well, now you have another chance.”
“But I don’t wanna move! I like it here! Why are you always trying to boss me around?!”
“That’s enough! We’re moving, it can’t be helped! End of discussion!”
“SHUT UP! Stop pretending like your our dad, because you’re not!”
Rumble cringed at the memory of that fight with his brother, just three days ago. Afterwards, he refused to leave his room except for lunch and dinner, no matter how much his brother threatened to break down the door, or to get Cloudchaser to drag him out… In the end, he reluctantly left the room this morning, but refused to speak to, or even make eye contact with his brother.
It was even worse when he met Cheerilee, his new teacher. She greeted him with a big, warm smile, and he simply turned his head and muttered “hello”. She offered to give him a tour of the school, and he simply said “whatever”, in the coldest tone he could muster. Thunderlane, having enough of his bad attitude, told Rumble to stay in the classroom until he and Cheerilee were done.
Rumble wasn’t too happy with his brother ordering him around – yet again – but if it meant not having to listen to him for a little bit, he was all for it. In fact, he even offered to simply go ‘home’, making air quotes with his wings to show that he didn’t really consider it his home, but Thunderlane warned him that if he left the schoolhouse unsupervised, he would be going to bed without dinner tonight.
So now, here Rumble was, moping about in an empty classroom, listening to the clock tick as he waited for his brother to return, and confirm that he was now stuck here, in this unfamiliar town, attending an unfamiliar school, with ponies he didn’t know, and that he had no say in the whole matter… Today blew. And tomorrow was going to be even worse, he just knew it.
Rumble woke up early the following morning. Sleeping in a new bed, in a new home, knowing that the next day he would be forced to spend time with ponies he didn’t know, instead of his friends back in Cloudsdale, didn’t help the troubled colt find any rest during the night, and it showed in his red, baggy eyes that he couldn’t have got more than about an hour’s sleep.
Rumble let out a loud yawn as he walked through the streets of Ponyville alongside his big brother, who he was still not talking to for as long as he lived, on his way to his new school. He passed by several fillies and colts on the way, also being led by older ponies who he figured were their parents or guardians. He also passed by an arguing couple on the way there. A grey Pegasus mare and a brown Earth Pony stallion, who were apparently arguing about the stallion hanging out with so many other mares.
‘Great, just what I need right now,’ Rumble thought to himself as the raised voices made his headache even worse.
“Hey, are you okay, Berry Pinch?” Curious, Rumble turned his attention to a group of three fillies walking in front of him. The middle one, a pink-coated filly with two-toned purple hair, had stopped and was now breathing heavily.
“I’m fine,” she said to her two friends, who looked concerned for her. “I just… forgot something at home. I’ll be right back.” Before her friends could protest, the filly ran off down an alleyway, in the direction that the grey Pegasus from earlier had just gone.
When he finally got to school, Thunderlane wished him a good day. Rumble ignored him, and simply went into the schoolhouse, despite the fact that everypony else was still playing outside. He found his way to his classroom, which was as empty as it was yesterday. He took a seat over in the corner, at the back of the class, and just slung his bag down onto the floor. Then, he sat down at his desk, and slumped his head down onto his forehooves as he let out a dreary sigh.
He heard the door open, but didn’t lift his head up. So somepony else felt like coming in early? Maybe he wasn’t the only one with troubles… Or maybe it was just the teacher.
“Um…” Nope, definitely a filly’s voice. “Excuse me.” And she was calling out to somepony. Unless somepony had snuck into the room whilst Rumble wasn’t looking, he assumed that she was addressing him.
He slowly lifted his head up, to see that same filly from earlier standing before him, looking much better than she did earlier. “Are you Rumble?” she asked, to which the colt simply nodded. “Miss Cheerilee asked if I could show you around the school, since you didn’t get a proper tour yesterday.” Rumble groaned and lay his head back down.
“I’m fine,” he said. “I’m too tired to walk around right now…”
“Oh, uh, okay,” the filly said, and Rumble could hear her backing up a bit… and her breathing starting to increase. He lifted his head up slightly, so that he could see what was going on. She was now sitting down at another empty table, breathing in-and-out very quickly.
“Are you okay?” he asked out of concern for the filly, and was surprised to see her react so… energetically. She practically jumped up in her seat, spun around so that she was facing him, and began waving her hooves dramatically with a huge smile on her face.
“Y-Yes! Of c-course I am!” she responded, and Rumble could see that she was sweating heavily. “I-I just have a s-slight fever, t-that’s all…”
Rumble nodded, but didn’t believe her… Especially not when her eyes fluttered shut, and she fell forwards out of her chair. Rumble quickly got up and ran to the filly’s aid. He felt her temperature, and found that was burning up!
“You are not alright!” he said, rising to his hooves. “Stay here! I’m going to go find a teacher!” And with that, he ran out of the classroom, and straight to the teacher’s lounge… Or, as straight as he could, without any knowledge of the schoolhouse save for the location of the classroom. He eventually found what he was looking for, though, and Cheerilee hurried along with him to the classroom.
What they found, though, was a perfectly empty classroom, with no sight of the sick filly anywhere. They ran to the nurse’s office, to see if somepony else had taken her there, but the nurse said that nopony had stopped by today. Cheerilee panicked at the idea of one of her students going missing, whilst she was apparently unwell.
Went they went back to the classroom during first period, Cheerilee’s original plan was to cancel her lesson, giving the students some time to study on their own, whilst she rushed over to the filly’s house to see if she had gone home. However, to their surprise, the filly, ‘Berry Pinch’, was waiting for them in the classroom, along with all of the other students, looking quite healthy and cheerful.
Rumble had no idea what was going on, but he felt relieved that the filly seemed to be okay now… Until he passed by her seat, and she started breathing heavily again. He looked at her in disbelief, and she looked back at him, with a look of confusion and fear.
The rest of the day, Rumble never let the filly out of his sight. Whilst she wasn’t as bad as she was before classes started, she was still breathing much more heavily than she should have been, and every now and then, she glanced over at Rumble with that same look of fear in her eyes. As if he was the cause of her current condition.
During lunch, he tried to speak to her, but the moment her got close to her, she immediately ran off, using the excuse that she needed to use the restroom. Rumble was left standing all on his, completely bewildered by the strange filly. He was pulled aside by a blue Earth Pony filly, with a dark-blue mane, and a bow and arrow shaped Cutie Mark.
“Hey, you weren’t picking on Berry Pinch, were you?” she asked sternly.
“N-No!” Rumble answered quickly. “I was just concerned, since she doesn’t look like she’s feeling well today. That’s all.”
The other filly smiled and sighed softly. “You’re new here, so you wouldn’t know, but Berry Pinch hasn’t been healthy recently. It started sometime last week. Her mother says it’s nothing to worry about, but she gets high fevers every now and then, and is often short of breath.”
“Is that really nothing to worry about?” Rumble asked the blue filly.
“Well, it comes and goes… There are times where she’s healthy, you wouldn’t even know she has health problems. But her mother assured everypony that there’s nothing to worry about, and there’s really no reason to doubt that.”
Rumble nodded in response, but still wasn’t entirely convinced. That filly fainted earlier, or at the very least, collapsed onto the floor, and he’s supposed to believe that that’s normal? That there’s no cause for alarm? And also… ‘Why does she keep giving me that strange look?’
School seemed to drag on forever that day, but it was finally over, and Rumble was more than eager to get back to his new home and just sleep the rest of the day away. Thankfully, his brother was still at his new job, so he would get to walk home in peace and quiet.
On the way, he noticed the grey Pegasus and brown Earth Pony that were arguing earlier… now sharing a smoothie together on a park bench, the Pegasus leaning on the Earth Pony and nuzzling him affectionately.
‘Huh… Guess they worked things out… Well, good for them.
Rumble’s attention was immediately drawn away from them when he saw something in the corner of his eye, and quickly turned around to see Berry Pinch whizzing past him, and wandering into an alleyway. The way she was walking looked like Cloudchaser after a Saturday night out, and she had even bumped into a wall as she was walking, but didn’t seem to notice at all.
Worried, and very curious, Rumble followed the pink filly into the alleyway, making sure to stay a good distance behind her so that he wouldn’t get caught by her. She stumbled and staggered her way through the alleyway, taking a few twists and turns, and eventually found her way back into the streets. Rumble continued following her for a while, noticing that, every now and then, she would stop and look around, as if she wasn’t sure where she was going. Also, her horn was glowing a bright green colour. Was she using a spell of some kind? Why?
Eventually, Berry Pinch started to pick up the pace, and was soon running instead of simply walking. Rumble followed suit, but he wasn’t as good an athlete as his brother, and as a result he had lost track of the filly. Deciding to give up the chase, Rumble took a look around him… and found himself lost in a field of apple trees. He realised that this must have been the town’s famed apple orchard, and sighed as he tried to navigate his way through all of the trees, to find some kind of path that would lead him back to town.
“Whooooa, nelly…” he heard to his right, prompting the young colt to turn and see a flash of green further down the orchard. Cautiously, Rumble made his way towards the light, making sure to take cover behind the various trees around him as he did so. He eventually found his way to the source of the light, and gasped at what he saw.
Before him, Berry Pinch and stood in front of an orange Earth Pony mare with a blonde mane, and a beam of green energy was shooting out of the filly’s horn, and towards the Earth Pony’s head. The filly’s eyes were closed, and her frown was slowly turning into a smile, and it seemed her breathing was starting to stabilise.
Rumble took a step back, horrified at what he was seeing…
CRACK!
“Shoot!” Rumble shouted as he felt a twig snapping beneath his back right hoof, and when he noticed Berry Pinch’s eyes slowly open and look towards him, he did the only thing he could think of doing at this point: he turned on the spot, and began running, as quickly as possible.