Taking a Gander

by HackamoreHalter


3: Confessions and Comfort

In the time since its victory, the mighty Ursa had turned its attention back to the defenseless town, shattering homes and livelihoods like a snot-nosed brat bullying others by crushing their toys, completely unphased by the sudden onset of dreary rain. It was about to flatten a statue of Celestia when it paused in mid-stride, an odd look growing on its monstrous face. Its eyes screwed shut and its massive snout wrinkled. It took a massive breath of air, as if to roar its triumph once more, and then gave the second-most explosive sneeze Ducky had ever seen in her life.

From its nostrils came a dark snot-missile, rocketing to earth trailing a long line of clouds like the exhaust from an engine. The clouds did not stop after the Ursa sneezed, however, continuing to trail smoke from its nose as if it were some new species of fire-breathing dragon.

The creature seemed quite confused by now, bordering on worried. More clouds soon joined the first, streaming from between its teeth. Another crash of thunder split the skies, and the Ursa’s paws drew up to its tremendous belly, groaning as if it’d eaten too many sweets and was now cursed with a tummy ache. Each time it opened its mouth, waves of storm clouds would float free, tendrils of lightning passing between them. Another rumble of thunder, followed by an equally loud rubble from the Ursa’s upset stomach.

The creature had eaten a cloudstarter. A damaged, active cloudstarter that was currently hard at work performing its job of providing clouds, albeit slightly stormy clouds, for an entire region. In this case, the region just happened to be the contents of the Ursa’s guts. Though it would never go down in the history books, this day marked the passing of the worst case of indigestion the world would ever see.

Ducky couldn’t imagine that was very pleasant. Judging by the whining the great starry bear was emitting, she guessed that she was pretty close to the mark. With the pained expression of one suffering from food poisoning, and about to be violently ill from every orifice, the Ursa fell to all fours and tore into the forest with an ungainly haste to its stride. In mere minutes, it was gone, vanished back into the wilds as if it had never been. Hoofington, or at least what was left of it, was safe. Only a few smoke trails from small fires within the rubble broke the stillness of the village, flames that were fizzling out in her impromptu rainstorm. Well, several trails of smoke and one of storms; the site of the Ursa’s legendary sneeze. Storm clouds that had recently been trapped within the beast, she realized with a start. If they could escape...

With her breath caught in her throat, Ducky flew towards the storm trail, passing over the wreckage of the town proper. In her wake, the forlorn pitter-patter of rain faded and the cloudy skies above broke into rays of sunshine. All that remained in the sky was a brilliant yellow pegasus and a thin line of miniature, still-crackling thunderheads. They formed a line that led her to a small park near the center of town, a place for foals to play under the shade of the trees or for special someponies to stare into each others’ eyes from the benches on the edge of a dazzling little pond. With a squeal of joy, Ducky dove into the pond water with a respectable splash.

“Urgle, bah, ack!” Gander sputtered and coughed, his exhausted deadwood float interrupted by a golden mare who seemed to be doing her best to drown him. He’d thought himself lucky to land in the shallow pool after being so forcibly ejected from the beast’s body. If only he’d known the horror waiting for him, he would have stayed eaten. “Please to be, bleh, giving me a little rest, pony! You can kill me later!”

Ducky didn’t relent in her bone-breaking hug until she, too, was in danger of drowning in withers-deep water. She stepped back with the fiercest scowl she could manage. “Gander, you... you, you, you jerk!”

“Very eloquent,” the griffon muttered as he dragged himself onto dry land before collapsing with a wheeze. He rolled over onto his back, wings splayed at his sides. Above him, the thinning trail of storm clouds was beginning to fade, after having lost the source powering it. The thought of that source lodged into his enemy's intestines cheered him so that even the high-pitched whine of the mare didn't disturb Gander as much as he would have thought.

“What kind of a goof thinks up a plan that gets him eaten, for the love of puppies?!” Ducky climbed out of the water, shaking her long mane free of water. She never styled it anyways, the wind was good enough for that. Still upset, her gaze remained locked on the ground, so Gander watching her from the corner of his eye went unnoticed. She muttered quietly, “I really thought you were... Um, I mean, what kind of stupid plan gets you almost killed? And your legs look really hurt! Seriously, I ain't a doctor, but you should definitely not be puttin' weight on that.”

True enough, his body had seen better days. He was battered, bruised, and beaten. The high-speed kicks and the final less-than-graceful landing had left his bones feeling shattered, if they were not already broken. But for Gander, the pain was less of a shock than a sudden realization that struck him. She really cared. She’d met him hours ago, and she cared more about his life than... well, anyone that he knew of. These ponies, it was simply ridiculous. The word escaped him without conscious thought. “Merci.”

His breath hitched in his throat as he became acutely aware of the depths of his transgression. Where had that even come from? That was a word rarely used by any griffon, good or bad. He set the blame squarely on his near-death experience and tried desperately to purge the thought from his mind. Thankfully for the continued wellbeing of his honor, fortuned smiled upon him in the guise of a translation error.

“Yeah, beg for mercy all you want, I’m never lettin’ you forget this whole mess," Ducky scoffed in reply. "You hear me, mister tough griffon? I mean, really, I didn't think you were serious with that whole, 'griffon must hunt the stars' bit. I know you folks gotta do what you gotta do, but is tryin' your level best to get yourself killed really got to be part of it? Where's that fit in, ya featherbrain?”

"It was a, urgh..." Gander grunted as he tried to move his wings. With simple walking looking more and more out of the question, the air was his only escape. His muscles disagreed with this decision, turning to gelatin or perhaps gelatin that was on fire, and keeping him firmly seated on the ground. He covered up his hiss of pain by focusing entirely on talking. "...It was a, how would you say, a matter of honor. The beast interrupted something very important."

"Ohmygosh, your mother!" The mare gasped, levitating several feet into the air with her eyes going wide in shock. "Did you find her? Is she okay? She got away safe, right?!"

"I... found her, yes," Gander allowed with some hesitation. Though that instinctive caution he'd known all his life urged silence, for the life of him the griffon could think of no reason not to continue. To open up, even a little. He shook it off. "The beast is gone, and now I can return."

Another attempt to take flight left him gritting his teeth together to bite back a howl of pain. He hadn't hurt this badly since his last birthday party. The griffon take on piñatas were a little more aggressive than the equine version. Regardless, he was going nowhere on his own. Ducky looked at him in concern, "Are you okay? Can you fly?"

"If my wings were torn from my back and fed to me in a broth, still I could fly." It was a traditional reply, and he felt rather proud of it, but it simply wasn't enough. The disproving look on Ducky's face broke through the remainder of his resistance. He'd already come this far, he decided with a mental sigh. Why stop here?

"But... perhaps not now. I think, maybe, I feel like a walk." This was it. His face scrunched up as he forced himself to keep talking. It was almost more painful than his injuries. "Do you remember, pony, what I said about griffon ways?"

Even these words, empty and innocent though they were, left a bitter taste in his mouth, but it was enough to get the idea across. A smile appeared on Ducky's face, one that grew rapidly until she realized it was there and made a futile attempt to hide it. For any of her other faults, at least she caught on quickly.

"A griffon never relies on nopony, and never asks for help! I was just goin' for a walk, too! Over... uh... that... way?" She gestured with a wing in a wide circle, stopping when Gander let out as subtle of a cough as he could manage. She seemed to be enjoying this, the heartless wretch. "But it's raining, and I just, uh, dried my hair. I'd hate for it to get wet again. "

"I do not understand, it is not ra-" Ducky was gone in a flash, and seconds later a torrential downpour fell squarely on the griffon's unamused head. With an arrival just as sudden as her departure, the yellow mare was back, all smiles and sunshine. Minus the sunshine. Gander gave her a level stare that was slightly hidden beneath the wet, drooping feathers of his crest. “Was this really necessary, pony?”

“Hey, you still had some Ursa snot on you, give me a break.” She cleared her voice to get back into character. Her lower lip quivered, ears drooping like a lost puppy, and the final relentless attack: teary, sapphire blue eyes that grew so huge and soul-rending that Gander felt his heart seize. “If only somepo- uh, griffon could shelter me from the storm?”

Gander and a hundred generations of proud griffon spirits in the afterlife collectively slapped a clawed hand to their face. Still, he raised his long, tapered wing and the golden mare slipped underneath, supporting him from the side. Together, they took slow steps forward, ever mindful of the limping gait of the griffon. It was almost pleasant, until she spoke once more. “Whoa, you’re a heavy one.”

“It’s muscle,” the griffon hissed.

“Yeah, fat muscle I bet,” she snickered, only to quickly sober up and speak softly. “Anyhow, you remember what I said about pony ways, right Gander? A friend don’t ever need to ask.”

“I remember, pony,” Gander grunted. He almost fell face-first into the mud in surprise as she swatted him on the rump with her tail, a motion accompanied by the sound of a whip crack. He had clearly underestimated the force these things were capable of.

“Friends remember each other’s names,” she tsked at him in reproach. He briefly considered feeding the mare her own tail. It was only when she threatened to unleash the horrifying puppy dog eyes again that he relented.

“...fine. Seafire, then.”

“Oh, hay, no. Friends, Gander! Friends bein’ the important word, there. My friends call me Ducky, and that sure as sugar better include you.” Now it was her turn to grumble under her breath. “Most ponies make friends by sharin’ similar tastes in books, or wearin’ the same color hat or somethin’.”

She snorted, laying the sarcasm on as thick as she could pile it. “Here, I go starin’ down an Ursa to make your acquaintance, and we ain’t even to nicknames yet?”

“Why this other name? What is wrong with Seafire?” Gander asked as they followed the path out of the park. He seemed curious, and the mare bet talking probably kept his mind off the hurting his legs were no doubt feeling, so she was inclined to speak up.

“Well, you ever hear of Firefly?" They passed by a planter along the edge of a window looking out onto the road that still had some daisies in it. Ducky plucked one as they stumbled by, figuring that the owner would probably replant seeing as how the house the planter was attached to only had that one wall still standing. She continued through a mouthful of daisy, "Bigwig general from way back, helped found somethin’ called the Wonderbolts?”

Gander gave her his best incredulous stare, and not only for her lack of manners. “Griffons respect strength of flight. Your Wonderbolts are faster even than our fastest griffons. All know of them and wish one day to defeat them.”

“Yeeeeah, Firefly’s, like, my great, great, great, a couple more greats, great grandma. Or somethin’ like that.” She waved it off as if it were nothing. “Don’t mean much to me, but it’s a family tradition I guess to put a ‘fire’ in the name of any mares. Seafire came from the color of my eyes. I couldn’t tell ya how they named my cousin Spitfire.”

Once more, Gander came close to ending up on the ground. “You are kin to the Wonderbolts leader?”

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” she grumbled. “A whole family of athletes, and me with my fat rump. You know, I got my cutie mark for playing in the rain? Not racin’ or fightin’ beasties or whatever. Nothin' fiery about me.”

True enough, the mark on her flanks was a collection of raindrops in the shape of a long-necked sea creature, perhaps a serpent or a dragon. He hadn’t even noticed it before. Brands of any type were hardly a griffon tradition.

“How I got my nickname's another story, but, yeah, I was never much fond of the name Seafire. Always getting compared to Spits. Got tiresome, you know?” she sighed, only for her trademark pearly whites to return with a vengeance. “But I get all the free t-shirts I want! You lookin’ for an autograph?”

“You are insufferable,” Gander noted with clinical dispassion. Her tail snapped again, simply reminding him of its presence. He groaned, equally from injuries to his body and his dignity, and added, “...Ducky.”

“Well, yeah, but that’s the best kind of sufferable!” She laughed with an infectious glee, her mood as bright as her coat. It didn’t hold long, and her giggle died down as she noticed a darkening to Gander’s already somber aura. She wasn’t exactly expecting the stoic griffon to join in with a chuckle, but she didn’t think he’d get even duller than before. “Hey, you doing okay?”

“We have arrived,” he said simply. Ducky took a long look around, as her attention thus far had been occupied keeping the heavier griffon upright. They had almost left the city behind, far beyond the markets and houses. Ahead of them were vibrant green hills that had the look of a manicured lawn, perhaps even a golf course, but littered with signs of destruction from the Ursa's rampage. She could see a few sections of a gothic wrought iron fence that were still standing, though most of the intricate black metal had been flattened into the ground. Everywhere were piles of stone rubble, some smaller than she was but others that might have been rooms made entirely of polished white stone or marble. Here and there a monument had been left standing, some in simple geometric shapes while others were more artistically carved into ponies or pillars with a sun at the peak.

“Gander,” the mare said, her voice low and solemn, “this is a graveyard.”

The griffon didn’t respond, except to raise his wing from her back and limp forward, each step a noticeable strain. He walked until he stood at the edge of one of the many slight depressions in the ground, a convex crater that vaguely resembled a paw. A footprint. At its center was a crushed slab of granite, a crack through its entirety that formed the pattern of a spider’s web. The name was legible, if only just.

“‘Swan... Song,’” Ducky read from its shattered face, craning her neck to see. As she read, her throat went dry. There was only one explanation. “‘Beloved wife and... mother.' Oh. Um... oh."

She'd thought the griffon's crazy antics to be a plot born of overconfidence. She'd thought him to be seeking personal glory, to be picking a fight or trying to make a name for himself by bagging some stupid trophy to take home. Her ears fell flat as she realized the truth. The Ursa had crushed what might well have been Gander's one lasting connection to his lost mother. He'd nearly gotten himself killed protecting the memory of family he claimed not to even care for.

If that wasn't love, she wasn't sure what was.

There was more to the grave, but she couldn't quite make out the words through the damage. The script was different, thin and whispy with looping curls and exacting linework. The text was as much art as written words, but try as she might she couldn't make sense of them. "'No.. Noose... News....’”

“‘Nous jouions au soleil à la pluie à la mer,’” Gander spoke, words that were brusque but beautiful, lithe but loud. Even without the meaning behind them understood, the rhythm, the harmony of the words were clear as day. He brushed dust reverently from the tomb with an outstretched wing. “‘A n’avoir qu’un regard qu’un ciel et qu’une mer.’”

He sank to his haunches, finishing the epitaph with a sigh. “‘Les nôtres.’”

The pegasus mare joined him at his side, quietly slipping underneath his wing again in support. It was just a slightly different type of support than she had offered before. “What does it mean?”

“‘We played in the sun, in the rain, in the sea,’” Gander translated. If he objected to her presence, he certainly didn’t show it. “‘Having only one look, one sky, and one sea. Ours.’"

He looked up, staring at nothing in particular. The words resonated with him in a way he couldn't quite explain, not even to himself. "It is the end of a poem of our people. A tale of lovers who are faced with a world of monsters, of hatred. So they lock themselves away from the outside, to be free. To be together.”

Ducky was hesitant to speak up, as if she might break something delicate by doing so. “Your folks, they really loved each other, then, huh?”

“It seems that it was so.” Gander's voice sounded distant, as if he was only partly there and the rest of him was far away. Ducky could read it on his face that he was learning this for the first time. It was a melancholic thought.

“Makes sense now that you had to beat the snot out of that Ursa. Literally, hehe. Uh, ahem. Yeah, I’d have done the same, griffon or not." Ducky gave a little self-righteous growl at the thought. "If some fat-rumped teddy bear stepped on my mom, I'd have kicked him right in the nu- ...uh, in the n-northern stars.” She trailed off with an embarrassed pause, scratching idly at the ground for a moment in silence. “When, uh, when did she...?”

“When I was born.” Dusky visibly winced at his answer. She’d figured something along those lines, but just hearing it hurt. She wasn't fooled for a second by the clinical, dispassionate way he'd spoken, as if he were talking about the weather. This was the type of wound that ran deep and left a scar.

“I'm, uh, real sorry to hear that. Hayseeds, that just ain't right. You never even got a chance to know her.”

Gander shook his head slowly. “My father, he returned to the griffon kingdom with me. I was raised among them, as a griffon. Never could I compete with my kin. Never did I have the strength. For all of my years, I have tried to match them and always I have failed.

“Now, it is my... how to you say, de passage à l’âge... a rite for being, ah, grown and finding one’s place. A griffon must go to his elders, and be given a task. He does this thing, he wins the favor of his elders, and he takes his place as one grown.” Gander continued speaking. There was no point to doing so. He was telling this mare, this pony, secrets about himself and his people. Practically his entire life’s story. He didn’t understand why. Nor could he comprehend how it could possibly be helping the way it was. All he was doing was talking, and it felt as if a weight was being freed from his wings. All he could do now was keep talking so long as Ducky, so long as his friend, kept listening.

“I went to my father to find his favor. He gave me this task. He told me it was not his favor I need to seek, but the favor of my pony mother.” Gander scoffed. “I thought it to be the finest insult I had ever received. All of my life has been much mocking and cursing for my... ah, self. My pony weakness. Ponies are soft. Griffons are strong. All griffons knew this.”

The griffon glanced at Ducky as he said this, a question in his eyes. She gave an encouraging nod without speaking to continue. She was listening, not doling out judgment. “To be given a task to find the favor of ponies, and a dead one at that, I thought this was my father telling me at last that never would I be a griffon. For all of my trying, never would I be one of them. I was not strong enough. An insult sixteen years in the making.”

He let out a long breath, a sigh that was equal parts weariness, acceptance, and relief. The mare at his side was quiet, but judging from the crinkle in her brow and the thoughtful stare, it was a moment of contemplation rather than an awkward silence for lack of anything to say.

“Huh. I see it way different than that,” the sunny pegasus finally chimed in, scratching at her unruly orange hair.

"How do you mean?"

"Well, first off, and I dunno this might just be me, but tryin' at somethin' for sixteen years, fallin' and gettin' back up again?" She shrugged. "Seems crazy strong to me. Most folks I bet would just give up. Kinda attitude like that can drain oceans with a bucket, know what I mean?"

The griffon snorted in amusement, but Ducky wasn't near done yet. “Plus, seein' as how he went and married one, your dad must've had a pretty good opinion of us pony types. Might've figured you could use one, too." She added a little too quickly with a stammer, that rosy tint finding its way back to her face, "U-uh, a good opinion, that is. Not a wife. Ehehe, um, s-so anyway! I bet he sent you off this way to get a little learnin'. You know, maybe get a second opinion on that whole 'ponies are wrong' thing you got goin' on.”

“...Perhaps, but-” Gander started, but Ducky waved him to silence.

“Ain’t finished yet. I’m thinkin’ he was also tellin’ you somethin’ else. Cause if he said you don’t got to earn his respect, well... then don’t that mean you already got it? Don't have to work for somethin' you already won, right?”

“I.... That is a... thought. But what of his task?” Gander tapped the broken gravestone with a charcoal-colored claw. “To win the favor of a pony long dead?”

“You’re kiddin’ me, right?” Her eyes rolling at her friend's confusion, Ducky blew a raspberry and threw one forelimb around the griffon’s neck. “Didn’t I already tell you about pony ways?

“Your mom might never have metcha, and maybe you never got to meet her, but I'd bet my wings on one thing;” The normally ditzy mare was as serious as he’d ever seen her. The passion of her conviction flowed into her words. There was not the slightest hint of doubt or deceit. It was as if she were speaking of a universal truth, and her next words only magnified that feeling. “She. Loved. You.

"She’d never, ever, ever think you were a mistake, or weak, or any other insulty stuff some griffony types might.” Ducky added with a dismissive wave. “Her favor or whatever it was you needed to earn, you won it the minute she first learned of you, and you still got it now. She’d have loved you unconditionally, Gander, and I can tell you that straight.

“Cause that,” she brought a hoof to her heart, nodding with finality, “is the pony way.”

With that, she slipped from his side, floating up with slow beats of her wings to the edge of the mound of dirt that made up the crater around him. “I’m gonna leave you two alone for a while now. Figure you probably need a few minutes. Just holler whenever you want to, uh, I dunno, go walkin’ some more. Maybe grab a bite to eat. I’m starvin’!”

She disappeared from his sight, and then Gander was alone. Well, not exactly alone. He ran a claw over the granite marker and its etched words. His mind was in a bit of a daze, a jumble of new thoughts whirling through like a tempest. What the pegasus had said made a dizzying amount of sense, but not in any way he was raised to understand. Why had his father really sent him here? To prove something to himself? To learn something of himself?

He did know one thing. It was the griffon way to honor one’s ancestors, and he was a griffon at heart. Here was an ancestor, regardless of form. He lowered his head to the resting place of the pony that brought him into this world, and spoke with a solemn grace.

“Honored mother, I have come here to the pony lands, and....” he began, only to hesitate. What was he supposed to say? Something to show respect, naturally. How did one respect a pony? Pony ways were strange. Abnormal. A complete change from everything he had ever known.

But not wrong. It had been a single day, and already he had learned that much. What else was there to learn? Of himself, of the equines and their ways, of friendship? An easily recognizable tail was sticking out of a nearby bush, its fiery orange completely giving away the position of the mare attached to it, who was trying very hard not to be caught eavesdropping.

Crazy ponies.

“And... I think,” he began again, patting the gravestone fondly, “I might stay a while longer.”

Perhaps it was not what a good griffon might do, but Gander was not a good griffon. Not quite. Nor was he a pony. Maybe, just maybe, he could be a bit of both. Maybe he could be himself.

That thought suited Gander just fine, and for the first time in his life, he felt... happy.