In the life of a pegasus there are a limited amount of jobs they are expected to get into. These jobs involve being able to fly well, having an innate or good knowledge on how to control the weather and those that take up athletic ventures.
The types of jobs a pegasus could get were ridiculously limited because there were plenty of expectations set upon them, especially at a young age. Due to these expectations the pegasus education system was severely lacking for pegasus ponies that had special talents outside the common jobs that a pegasus could usually get.
Twilight personally thought Pegasus ponies were a bit flighty, but that didn’t mean they were dumb or poor of character. A pegasus who doesn’t fly very much is an oddity in the world of Equestria unless they are missing a wing or are incapable of flying possibly from having stronger genetics elsewhere even if they were born with wings.
It seemed like any pegasus that wanted a future on the ground or more importantly have a job outside of flying places and sports really had to get their schooling from some other place then Cloudsdale. Cloudsdale was home to a vast population of winged ponies and a minority of unicorns who enjoyed heights and sky diving way too much.
A pony known as Tress Ravel has been in the city of Canterlot for three weeks now, she had learned a lot since coming to the city that had both grand knowledge and incredible idiocy. She was sitting on a bench in the park just enjoying the sun as she read a book. The book in question was on advanced alchemy and chemistry.
From what she knew of Canterlot so far, unicorns were the main pony type concentration here. The horned nobles tended to treat earth ponies like her poorly; they tolerated the pegasi in a similar extent. At least not all unicorns believed themselves above others or happen to be stupidly full of their selves, but Tress had still met a lot of them when she got a tour of the city.
“Um… excuse me.” The voice was soft and very hard to hear.
Tress’s right ear twitched slightly, she thought she heard a pony speaking but it could have just been the wind.
“I’m sorry to bother you, but every pony around here seems so busy and um...” The pony that was trying to talk was having a hard time raising her voice and she stopped once she finally had the book reading pony’s attention. She watched as Tress slid a bookmark into her book and closed it.
“Yes, did you need something?” Tress really wanted to find some more friends other than the ones she already had; maybe this was an opportunity to have another one as this one wasn’t a unicorn with a tree shoved up their rear ends. The mare before her squeaked and hid behind her mane in a cute manner while trying to stammer out a question, one that Tress could hardly hear because she was so soft spoken. The mare before Tress was cute, adorable and beautiful; if her best friend were here she’d probably be fawning over her silky looking mane. “Can you please speak up? Well since you seem to be having trouble speaking, let me introduce myself. I’m Tress Ravel and you are?”
“Sorry, I’m…” The shy mare tried mumbling her name; she noticed the mare before her was starting to lose her patience. She just couldn’t help herself, she was so nervous meeting new ponies and even addressing this earth pony on her own was tough for her. She hasn’t had a friend for the last few years as her childhood filly friend had made friends with a griffon and that griffon was a very territorial one.
The shy mare thought it was notable that the bird lion was smitten with her oblivious friend and they disappeared out of her life with a mutual love for competitiveness. They had just gone different directions in life and she didn’t hold it against the slightly grouchy griffon or what was her best friend for being who they are. Maybe this was an opportunity for her to finally find another friend, as this pony was actually giving her the time of day and willing to listen to her petty problems.
The problems that the shy mare had were actually not quite as petty as she thought they were; she just didn’t make a big deal out of them, the ponies who did learn of her problems would probably be shocked to see she’s still as healthy and happy as she looks. She should have made a big deal of her problems and had all rights to do so, just because she was soft spoken didn’t mean she was tough to how the world treats her. She was like its doormat for everyone to wipe their hooves on.
“Well if I can’t have your name, then can you at least ask me the question you were going to ask?” Tress was starting to lose patience with the mare that had a wonderful pink mane and tail with a canary yellow coat. Despite her irritation she really wanted to hug this mare on the principle that she was adorable with her innocent blue eyes. Oh how far she had fallen from her halcyon days as a card carrying villain. She certainly wouldn’t change where she was currently in her life for anything though, as she was happier now with the family she was happy to be a guest of.
“Well I um… that is…” The pony trailed off mumbling to herself again.
Sighing to herself, Tress wondered how long it would take her patience to wear thin at this rate. If her patience didn’t wear thin, then this pony just might meet her best friend since she was preparing a picnic for three in the park. Technically her friend’s father was preparing an exceptionally large meal because her friend was such a lethally bad cook.
If what Tress’s friend was cooking didn’t come with a ridiculously specific set of directions she tended to innovate into dangerous territories, especially with alchemy and chemistry ingredients on hoof in the domicile. She once animated a simple mixed vegetables casserole; it took her friends’ entire family plus Tress herself twenty minutes to finally kill the darn thing by throwing it to the only being in the room that could eat it. Her friend’s father, mother and even her daughter can cook, but they each had problems cooking certain things which tended to end up with the same results as her best friends cooking. That wasn’t the only problem that family faced, but it did make eating a meal interesting when you had to wrestle it to the floor.
“You sound like you have a problem and it sounds like a big one given how much trouble you’re having communicating on a level that might possibly require the use of a megaphone. I think you might even need two.” As she stated her sarcastic remark, Tress rolled her eyes and with the barest twitch a portion of her mane moved away from her left eye of its own accord.
“Oh, well… sorry… time…” The cute pegasus even looked to have tears coming to her eyes as she looked ready to walk away. How could she have been so stupid to get her hopes up?
“Hold on, I’m not angry at you.” Though Tress wasn’t about to say she was incredibly annoyed as she stowed her book away in her saddle bag, this pony was so ridiculously meek it was kind of funny. At least her voice was nice, when you could hear it that is. “Now tell me what’s wrong?”
“Don’t want to bother you anymore then I already have…” The pegasus started to walk away quickly until a purple unicorn turned the corner of the pathway that she was walking towards. A very large bush had blocked both of them from seeing each other and they ended up colliding.
The unicorn suddenly being spooked let loose a blast of magic point blank at the poor pegasus as they fell to the ground. The giant picnic basket that the unicorn had been carrying in her magic went sailing upwards and it would have spilled its content, if it were not for a quick flying tiny glowing orb. The orb circled around the basket quickly and it slowly floated to the ground without spilling its contents.
Tress sighed; nothing was ever quiet for long with her best friend around. She sighed happily at the thought of having a true friend with a wonderful family that took her in even knowing where she came from and her origins. They said it wasn’t the strangest thing to ever happen to them and they shrugged off her innate weirdness almost immediately. She looked to the pegasus and saw that her mane and tail had been altered into a randomly angular mess, it kind of reminded her of the mess that was Filli-seconds mane only more triangular in nature. That poor mare was only trying to ask for help and then she gets blasted by her friend, she chuckled dryly in amusement.
If there was one lesson in life that Tress had inexorably learned the first week of being here, it was that you never spook, startle, surprise or attack Twilight Sparkle. The unicorns reprisals to sudden shocks were starting to become a tad legendary in Canterlot. An aggressive gang of hoodlums had spooked her so badly once that they were all immediately trapped in an airtight barrier. Those guys were lucky that the celestial guard unicorns managed to bring the entrapping barrier down in time. They might have asphyxiated otherwise and it took five unicorns ten constant minutes of hitting it with powerful spells to bring it down.
Twilight’s response to the pegasus was far more tame and comical looking, she was beginning to see why Twilight had that still growing collection of Mane Fancy magazines. Tress knew Twilight didn’t like fighting and was horrified at the barrier spell she had cast on those thugs, she was just panicking too much after casting it to even concentrate on its removal. She had learned so much about her friend in the last three weeks and even enjoyed befriending her daughter Barb; however there was nothing here for her in Canterlot except Twilight and her family. Even if Twilight Sparkle was her friends real name, she’d still continued to call her Radiance as she was rather radiant about life and learning things.
It took Tress a bit of time to adjust to the sudden changes in her life, not having a mane that could grow on command or do things to her will made her feel like she was missing three limbs. She still had some control over her mane and tail, but not nearly as much as she wanted and she still felt like she was missing a large piece of herself when she did manage to move it. All the once upon a time Mane-iac could currently do was limited earth pony magic and not at the outright super power levels either.
“Oh my goodness I’m so sorry, here let me fix your mane.” With a flash of her horn, Twilight made the shy ones mane and tail go back to the way they were before the head on collision.
“Oh no, it’s my fault that I wasn’t looking where I was going. Thank you very much.” The mare said shyly and she was about to make a run for it.
Only she stopped as she spied a certain tiny creature breathing heavily that was sitting on top of the basket, it caught her eye and from Tress’s position it looked like some kind of odd switch was immediately flipped.
“Oh my goodness, are you a breezy!” The mare was squatting down to eye level with a confused gray coated black haired pixie pony. “I’ve always wanted to meet one of you, my name is Fluttershy. I’ve heard that your species was rare, what are you doing here in Canterlot little one?”
“Oh great, Smart is the one to actually get a name from her. She could hardly even say a few words to me.” Tress groaned out loud as her temper flared slightly, Fluttershy looked towards her with a sheepish little smile.
“Yeah, Smart has a way of getting things done even when she’s supposedly just me. Tress, were you okay by yourself exploring the park?” Twilight lifted the basket again as Smart was relaying to the saddened Fluttershy that she wasn’t a breezy, but a pretty good facsimile of what one would look like. Tress relayed Fluttershy’s actions to Twilight and that it had been very peaceful until she came along.
“Hey mom, are you okay? You’re not going to fire off anymore magic around wildly are you?” Barb poked her head around the bush, Fluttershy once again perked up.
“Oh my goodness a baby dragon… well you look like a dragon, but you also resemble a pony. Um… you are a dragon right?” Fluttershy was beginning to get out of her shell more.
“Fluttershy was it? How about you join us for a picnic so you can learn more about how wonderful my daughter is, we’ve got plenty of food and you certainly look hungry.” Twilight noticed that Fluttershy looked slightly malnourished, but she wasn’t all skin and bones. Her heart went out to this sweet sounding pony.
“No, I wouldn’t want to impose…” Fluttershy’s stomach grumbled as loud as a grizzly bears would and her tune changed quickly once again, with a slightly more pale realization of something important from the look that crossed her face. “But if you insist.”
“Take as much as you need. Just help us set it up and clean up afterwards. Maybe tell us a little about yourself, you wouldn't believe the problems we have with making friends here in Canterlot.” Smiling to herself, Twilight new that her last gallon of currently chilled honeyed cider was about to be emptied. It would be for a good cause, just to find out why there’s an almost starving teenage pegasus running around one of Canterlot’s parks.