//------------------------------// // Monday // Story: Equestria Girl. Wait, What's Equestria? // by Bysen //------------------------------// Dramatic Reading! The start of a new school year. Her start at a new school. You know, no big deal. It wasn’t like Twilight would really miss her old school over this new one, Cantalot High. She had friends sure, but they weren't really that close. They’d hang out if any of them specifically asked her, or she asked them for some reason, but they’d never just go see one another without any real purpose. Twilight did have one good friend at her old school, but he graduated last year so it didn’t make much difference. Her brother had gone straight into the army after finishing his education and was right into officer training. Shining Armour had his life plan already laid out in front of him and had even taken the first step. Or, first twenty-odd steps really. Twilight, on the other hand didn’t really know what she wanted to do. That being said, she’d taken her first five steps toward a lot of things. She didn’t have any particular plans but the fact that she was a certified genius gave her a lot of options. That was one of the main reasons she was starting at this new school. She had transferred at the beginning of her senior year. This was a very prestigious school and could much better accommodate for her special talents, though others would say it was more to accommodate for her ‘special needs’. Twilight had impulses to keep everything under to control and wasn't entirely up to snuff in social situations. She had mild 0.c-D, and was on the high-functioning spectrum of the autism scale. That was the clinical classification for it. She however just called it being a nerd. It didn’t really matter though. Twilight didn’t have to speak with anyone here if she didn’t want to. Of course she'd have to on some level but she could handle that easily enough. Twilight's plan was to simply adjust to this new school, find her place and stay out of everyone else’s way. It was the beginning of the year, so being the new girl here shouldn’t draw too much unwanted attention her way. She was wrong. Just walking down the halls, she couldn’t help but feel that everyone was looking at her. Twilight was constantly having moments of awkwardness where someone would look at her and she'd look back at them only to have the other person quickly turn away. It was even worse that when they didn't look away and they both just continued to stare at one another. It was eerie, to say the least. She even swore she heard her name a few times but it was probably her imagination. No one here would even know her name, how could they? Twilight just pushed those thoughts to the back of her mind as she walked down the halls, eventually finding her locker: block M, locker 6. She reached into a pocket in her skirt and pulled out the oddly ornate key. Whoever had had this locker last year had done some customisation to it. The key was standard, but the hilt of his was a red and orange sun and was actually kinda painful to hold and turn, the flares from the sun were quite sharp. After daintily opening the lock with a few fingers rather than the whole palm to avoid being stabbed by it, Twilight opened the door. It was empty as expected with the exception of a few photos on the inside of the door. They were of five girls and had pins and little red strings linking them to each other almost like a conspiracy theorist’s board. It was actually kinda creepy. Even creepier than the looks she’d been getting. The creepiest was the sixth picture that had half of it ripped off, but what was left of it made Twilight think a red X had been drawn through whoever had been in that photo. “Oh god... my locker belonged to a serial killer last year…” Twilight barely said aloud to herself before looking around to see if anyone had heard. A lot of people looked away as she turned to them but none of them had been close enough her hear her. “This is all kinds of messed up!” she said as she covered the inside of her locker from view and removed the strings from the pictures. The pictures themselves however appeared to be glued to the door. She tried to claw them off for a few seconds before quickly giving up. Instead she just sighed and decided to let it go. The locker was vacant and whoever owned it last was no longer here, so she had nothing to worry about. Calming herself with that thought she took off her backpack and unloaded her books into the locker. Today was just an orientation day and she wouldn’t need any of them until tomorrow. So for the rest of the day all she had to do was walk around, find where her classes where and head to the main assembly towards the end of the day. Twilight closed her locker, put the key in her pocket and poked her hand with it in the process… she’d also have to replace this stupid pointy key. First on her list of classrooms to find: English. Advanced English, focusing on literature and aesthetics. Remember: genius. It was the closest to her locker… maybe, she wasn’t quite sure about the layout of this map… “They’re not to scale. How can you expect anyone to use a map that's not to scale!?” Twilight questioned as she walked past the library that was represented by a square the size of her thumbnail next to a pathway that by comparison should be approximately three miles long. The thought didn’t occur to her however to not walk while trying to read a map as she bumped into a younger pink-haired girl in a jacket that had to have cost in the four-digits. “Watch where you're go-” the girl said but paused as she looked up from her phone, which ironically she’d been looking at not paying much attention to see who’d bumped into her. “Oh, um… sorry about that Princess. Let’s get Sil!” she said as she grabbed her grey-haired friend and quickly ran off. Naturally this only left Twilight with more questions than answers. Like what kind of insult was ‘Princess’? And what’s ‘sil’ and why does she have to get one? And why the hell is everyone still staring at her?! This was seriously getting creepy! It was at the point that Twilight started looking for the hidden cameras… that would explain everything. But of course she couldn’t find any. They must be really well hidden is all! “Ok…” she muttered under her breath. “You’re just being paranoid. New school, you’re scared, and talking to yourself like this is completely normal.” Twilight took a deep breath and let out a sigh before just continuing on to find her first classroom. No one was staring at her, it was just her imagination. But as much as she kept telling herself that she was starting to freak out. Twilight started moving faster through the halls, not really knowing where she was going, and had probably passed her class already. Up ahead the hall split in two direction. To the right the hall was lined with students but to the left there weren't any. Naturally she took the left to get the hell away from these people. They were still staring at her! Twilight even noticed one girl do a double-take at her from the other side of the hall before she finally rounded the corner. It was a dead end. Just a few lockers on either side then a wall. Perfect! Even if she was boxed in, at least she wasn’t in the middle of the path having people constantly walking right next to her, staring right at her face. She leaned against one of the lockers, facing away from the flow. If they wouldn’t see her maybe they’d stop looking. Oh… who was she kidding, no one was looking at her. She could calm down and just… “Twilight Sparkle?” “Please just be someone from my old school…” Twilight scrunched her eyes closed and begged every god in existence. Trying to look calm she turned around to face… someone she didn’t know. A yellow girl with red and orange hair. “Um… hey. How are you?” she said, trying to act casual. “It is you! What are you doing back here?” The girl asked. The portal wouldn’t have opened again after it closed last time for two and a half years but it had only been a few months. This girl took a few steps more, holding a single book in her hand, but stopped as she noticed Twilight stepping backwards. “I just… wanted to get away from the crowd.” Twilight replied. Why did it matter to this chick if she was back here in this corner. Wait, maybe she meant back here as in the school… did she know Twilight from her last school after all? All of this hurt her brain and scared her totally shitless. Was it too late to transfer back to her old school? The girl took a few more steps forward, slowly though. Now, she was standing right next to Twilight and said quietly, seems it was obvious something wasn’t quite right “Really? But… how’d you op…” the red-head was cut off by yet ANOTHER person who apparently knew her here too. “Twilight!” came a male voice. A lighter yellow guy with blue hair pushed his way out of the crowd and into the alley. “Wow! I’d heard you were back but I had to see it for myself!” he said as he walked right up to her. Unlike when that other girl had approached her Twilight had nowhere further to back up. He just walked right up to Twilight and gave her a gentle peck on the lips. The next thing he would see would be the roof of the nurse's office as Twilight grabbed the book the strange girl had been holding and slammed him in the side of the head with it. He clunked against the locker before sliding down them. The girl was slack jawed at what she’d just seen but before the guy had even hit the floor, Twilight was gone. Everyone was looking at her and she wasn’t imagining it this time. Not that she had been before it turns out. She sprinted through the hallway trying to get away from those two who had pinned her into a corner and… and… oh god what were they about to do to her? Running through the halls tears started to from in her eyes as she thought about what could’ve just happened. Up ahead was her safe spot. Well safe-ish… she wouldn’t feel safe anywhere but the girl’s bathroom was as good as she would get. She bashed through the door and rushed to the second last stall, locking it behind her. Twilight pulled her feet up onto the seat and wrapped her arms around her legs and continued to cry. She’d just had her first kiss stolen.