Harmony House

by Cookie_Girl


Chapter 1

In the city of Bayville, New York a group of people from all walks of life have gathered on the lawn of a large stately manor. Parents bringing their children to the summer boarding school program to see if they can be given a chance at a better future.

It is however no ordinary school, and they not ordinary students. This mansion in fact is the Harmony House, a safe haven for young mutants, and the students are all mutants.

Most of the parents here would prefer not to acknowledge their children's mutant nature at all, but the threat of sentinel robots and mutant hunters with the technology to detect anyone with the x-gene make living at home too dangerous for them. Some though wish to have nothing to do with their mutant child.

At the front gates a red pickup truck pulls to a stop. The passenger side door opens to reveal a tall athletic teenage girl in blue jeans, yellow boots, and a white t-shirt underneath a light brown leather aviator's jacket. Her skin is caucasian, but lightly tanned showing that she is used to an active outdoor life. Her hair is white and cut short except for the purple bangs that hang over her eyes. She wears a small amount of makeup, enough for decoration, yellow lipstick that matches her golden eyes that are surrounded by a light purple eyeshadow.

After closing the door, and grabbing her army camouflage duffle bag out of the truck bed she started to say goodbye to the driver, only to jump back as he spun the tires, and called her a freak as he drove away. Her eyes stung with tears that she refused to let flow as the only family that she had ever known drove away, and left her for good.

She slipped her head and one arm through the single strap in her bag, and put her hands in her jacket pockets before walking through the gates.

"Bye Dad." she said to nobody.

This girl's name is Gilda Griffin, and three months ago her mutant powers first emerged. Her father had locked her out of the house that first night because of what she had become. They tried to make it work, but his fear of mutants, and of what she did to the door grew stronger with each day. So when the Harmony House had opened its doors, and started taking in students he had made arrangements as soon as possible.

I just hope I have somewhere to go when summer is over. She thought.

Gilda was not foolish enough to think that her father would take her back in. Needing to think about something else she looked at the other students. Gilda was surprised at how many of them looked so normal. There were quite a few who looked perfectly normal, and she was positive that if they did not have the sentinels and the Friends of Humanity to worry about then they would not be here.

Others however, like the girl with plates of exoskeletal armor on her skin reminded her of why her father now hated her. She pulled her jacket tighter.

Finding a tree with a nice bit of shade she walked over and leaned against it, glad for a chance to just chill out. She watched the crowd, and hoped that nobody felt like talking. A few more students caught her attention when they showed off their abilities. She watched as an older girl who appeared to be part of the staff grabbed a blue skinned rainbow haired girl, and pulled her away for almost starting a fight.

"Owowowow." the blue skinned girl complained as the woman pulled her away by her ear. "Let go Spitfire! You're gonna yank my ear off!"

Spitfire was wearing a blue tracksuit with gold trim, and a winged lightning bolt insignia on the left breast. "That girl can shoot energy beams out of her eyes strong enough to punch through a brick wall." Spitfire pulled the younger girl over to a tree not too far from Gilda's, and finally let her go. "Why do you want her to shoot them at you?"

The blue skinned girl grinned at Spitfire. "So I can see how fast she is with them."

Spitfire facepalmbed which made the girl lose her grin. "Listen kid." Spitfire put a hand on the girl's shoulder, and gave her a look that was a combination of pride and disapproval. "You want to be one of the Wonderbolts. I'll train you, and give you a shot when I think you're ready. But it's gonna take more than just skill and style. You need to learn what I learned a long time ago."

Looking her in the eye Spitfire said. "Hotshoting hurts." With that she walked away, leaving the teenager with a slightly confused look on her face.

Then she caught sight of the white haired girl looking at her. "Hey! Name's Rainbow Dash."

Gilda cocked her head twice as she studied her. "Rainbow... Dash?"

Rainbow Dash chuckled. "I got super speed so that's where Dash comes from, and I leave a multicolored light trail behind me when I run, so... Rainbow Dash." she shrugged. "How about you?"

Gilda shifted nervously. "I uh... I got nothing." she looked away.

Rainbow laughed. "Nothing huh?" She then dashed over and put an arm around Gilda's shoulders. "If you had nothing you wouldn't be here. So what do you do?"

Gilda shrugged her off. "I don't want to talk about it!" she said aggressively.

"Okay okay, sorry!" Rainbow put her hands up defensively. They stood there awkwardly, and Rainbow Dash kicked at a patch of grass.
"You thirsty?" Rainbow asked, and pointed back at the mansion. "We got soda."

Gilda huffed, but gave in. "Any root beer?" she asked.

WHOOSH! The rainbow trail of light could be traced back to the mansion before it started to fade. Before it disappeared completely Rainbow Dash was back with two cans of root beer.

"Ice cold." she handed one to... "Hey what's your name anyway?"

"Gilda." she said, and popped the tab on her can with one hand. "Gilda Griffin."

"Hey, that's actually a cool name." Rainbow opened her own can. "You probably don't even need a codename."

"Good, I just want to be left alone, and I definitely don't want to be some kind of superhero."

Rainbow Dash just shrugged. "That's cool, I think enough of the students here want to be one that a single girl that doesn't won't make a difference."

"Cool." Gilda nodded and sipped her root beer. "So who are the Wonderbolts?"

Rainbow Dash grinned. "They're our own hero team. They're the coolest, and I'm going to be one of them!"

Gilda rolled her eyes. "Well good luck with that hero girl. So what do they do?"

"You mean what do they do as heroes, or what are their powers?"

"Both I guess."

"Well as heroes they mostly just protect the school, and the city." Rainbow Dash explained. "The headmistresses aren't interested in sending their students out after villains and stuff. As far as they're concerned we're just getting trained to control our abilities, and protect ourselves."

Rainbow Dash looked over the crowd, trying to spot the members of the Wonderbolts. She pointed at a blonde woman in a tracksuit like Spitfire's. "That's Surprise. She's a teleported, but unlike most people that can teleport she can pop up out of anywhere even if she can't see the place she's going to." A confused look crossed Rainbow's face. "Also she doesn't have to be small enough to fit inside something in order to teleport inside it."

"What, like she can teleport inside of a shoebox?" Gilda laughed at the idea.

"Yes, yes she can." Rainbow Dash deadpanned.

Gilda couldn't think of what to say about that.

Rainbow Dash continued. "That's Soarin." she pointed him out. "He forms an energy field around his body that makes him almost as light as air, and he can even shape it into wings so that instead of just floating he can actually control his flight, and it doubles as a force field."

"So he can fly, and he's bulletproof." Gilda summed up the information. "I'm guessing Spitfire has fire breath or something?"

Rainbow Dash scratched her head in thought. "Yeah, it's not really fire though. I forget most of the egghead stuff, but basically she exhales a form of plasma."

Gilda's deadpan expression was the signal for Rainbow Dash to continue. "Uh, okay well lightning is a form of plasma, and is hot enough to melt sand into glass in the blink of an eye. Spitfire can make her flames as hot as fresh lava from a volcano."

Gilda gave a complimentary curse at that. Rainbow Dash continued. "She's also an olympic level athlete, and she saved my life, and she is just plain awesome!"

"She saved your life?"

Rainbow Dash smiled, not grinned just smiled, and looked at Spitfire in awe. "Yeah. It was a couple of years ago, and I had just gotten my powers. I could only make short jumps of speed at first, and it was so cool that I just wouldn't stop doing it. Something across the room that my mom needed? I dashed over and got it for her.

I got pretty lucky and grew up in a town that was mostly okay with mutants. Oh, sure there were a few people that were superstitious or whatever, but mostly they didn't care. But I still should have been more careful."


A young girl, her skin black not blue, her short hair like a rainbow ran down the street. Again and again she dashed forward in short bursts of speed, but she could not go fast enough to escape her pursuer. Her attacker could not quite get a fix on her, but it was not giving her an opportunity to get off the street to safety.

Suddenly the ground beneath her feet exploded as she dodged an energy blast, and the force knocked her off her feet. She groaned in pain as she felt her injured leg.

THOOM!

She froze as the sound of her doom approached.

THOOM!

She looked back with her eyes wide from fear.

THOOM!

The giant killer stopped before her. In a completely monotone electronic voice the monster said "Mutant apprehended. Directive..." the sentinel raised its arm with the blaster in its palm pointed at the girl. "Terminate."

The girl shut her eyes, and tried to think of something other than dieing in the street. She felt an intense heat wash over her, but it did not hurt. Opening her eyes she found that the robot's arm had been blown off and melted nearly to slag.

The sentinel turned its gaze to where the blaze had come from. Spitfire was standing not ten feet away, dressed in the blue and gold uniform of her team. "Halt mutant." commanded the sentinel as it raised its other arm. Spitfire's response was to quickly take a deep breath, and exhale it in a torrent of flames that welded, and then melted the machine into an immobile half formed skeletal frame.


Gilda pictured the scene in her head. She then shook her head, and raised her can of root beer for a toast. "Wow. To Spitfire."

"To Spitfire." Rainbow Dash copied her.

They both drank their sodas. "To Spitfire." a third voice spoke up behind them. They both did a spit take, and choked on their drinks. "Hahahahaha! You should see the looks on your faces!"

As the voice broke out into another fit of laughter Rainbow Dash looked back to confirm who it was. "Surprise!" the speedster yelled at the older girl. "You're gonna give someone a heart attack!"

Gilda clutched a hand to her chest. "She nearly did now." she said, and then she thought to herself. Easy Gilda. Stay calm. Don't let it happen again.

"Oh my gosh! You didn't have a heart attack did you!?" Surprise teleported away in a flash of golden sparkles, and reappeared in the same way with a defibrillator charged and aimed at Gilda's chest. "Clear!" She yelled.

"No! Wait I was-" Gilda backed away from the woman, but found herself several yards away when she finished her sentence. "kidding?"

Rainbow Dash patted her on the back. "You're welcome for the save, but don't worry her pranks are harmless." she told Gilda. "Usually."

"What?"

"Nothing! We're going to go look for some more of my friends Surprise." Rainbow grabbed Gilda's arm and pulled her in the direction of the crowd.

"Okay, you two go that way, and I'll go check on things for the surprise party." Surprise called after them and waved happily. Then she clapped her hands to her cheeks, and her eyes widened in alarm. "Oh no! You're not supposed to know about that! Just pretend you didn't hear me!" she yelled, and teleported away again. Rainbow Dash and Gilda just continued walking toward the crowd.

From a bush next to the tree that Gilda had been leaning against there came a noise like a cork being popped. Then from out of the bush stood a teenage girl that could simply be described in one word. Pink.

"Well she's...eccentric." Gilda said as she let Rainbow Dash lead her away.

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. "Yeah, eccentric is the word we use to describe her." she said sarcastically.

Gilda looked around at the many different people to get her brain working properly again. As they we're about to walk by the first group of people she noticed that one of them, a frail pale skinned girl with light pink hair, had a pair of large pink and yellow butterfly wings sprouting from her back.

Gilda pulled her arms up to tighten her jacket protectively around her. Because Rainbow Dash still had one of Gilda's arms held in her's this sudden movement resulted in the two of them being pulled close into each other's personal space. Intimately close.

"... What are you doing?" Rainbow Dash asked with a sideways look at Gilda.

Gilda blinked twice and hesitated while a blush spread across her cheeks. "... I...uh..."

"Oh my. We aren't interrupting something private are we?"

Rainbow Dash and Gilda both looked to see the butterfly winged girl along with two other girls. One in an orange shirt, blue jeans, and a brown leather Stetson hat with her yellow hair held back in a ponytail. The other girl was dressed in sandals with two inch heels, and an ivory white dress with her purple hair done up in an elegant swirl. It had been the first girl with the wings that had spoken. She wore a light yellow blouse with pink butterfly and flower print that was cut low in the back to allow for her wings, slim blue pants, and pink slip on shoes.

Before Rainbow Dash could decide if she should facepalm, or make some deadpan or sarcastic comment she was knocked a few yards to the side when Gilda rapidly waved her arms back and forth in panic.

"What!? No! There's nothing going on!" Gilda shouted.

The others ignored her and went to check on their friend, though the country girl did give her a glare.

"Oh my goodness!" said the butterfly girl as she knelt down next to her. "Are you okay Rainbow Dash?"

"Dash!" Gilda rushed over to where Rainbow was laying face down in the grass. "Is she hurt? Should I do something?"

"I think you've done enough." the country girl said, and she grabbed Gilda's left shoulder with her right hand and pulled her back.

Gilda swung her left arm back to try and knock the other girl's arm away. Normally since her powers activated anything Gilda hit, on purpose or by accident, got sent across the room. Hitting this girl's arm was like hitting a tree for a normal human. They stood there for a minute and glared at each other.

"Really now girls." the well dressed girl scolded both of them. "It was an accident Applejack, and you know it. Now both of you apologize."

They both mumbled apologies to each other, and looked ashamed of themselves.

Rainbow Dash groaned and pushed herself up to her knees. She then spat out the mouthful of grass that she got from her fall. "Bleh! Grass tastes terrible." she advised everyone.

"She's fine." said the butterfly girl.

"I've taken harder hits than that just by tripping when I run." Rainbow Dash reminded them. She stood up and did a few stretches to limber up making several joints pop.

"Ahem."

Rainbow Dash looked to find the fancy girl gesturing between herself, the butterfly girl, Applejack, and Gilda. "Stop waving your hand around like that and introduce yourself Rarity. It's kinda rude." Rainbow Dash told her.

Rarity facepalmed, and then began taking to Gilda. "Since Rainbow Dash appears to have once again misplaced her manners..."

"Hey!"

"...allow me to do the introductions." she did a small girlie bow, and introduced herself. "The name I have chosen to go by after discovering my abilities is Rarity. I have the power to transform my body into different minerals, my favorites being gemstones."

Rarity then waved a hand in the butterfly girl's direction causing her to squeak and pull her pink hair down in front of her face. "Our timid friend here is called Fluttershy. A play on words because of her butterfly wings, and her shy nature. Say hello darling."

"It's nice to meet you." she barely squeaked.

Rarity was about to tell Fluttershy to speak up, but she was interrupted by Gilda. "It's nice to meet you too."

"... You could hear her?" Rarity asked.

"No, I just...guessed." That earned her another glare from Applejack.

Rarity just shrugged and continued. "Well anyway Fluttershy here can obviously fly thanks to her lovely wings, and she is able to empathically communicate with animals."

"That's kinda cool." Gilda tried to get a look at Fluttershy's face, but failed because of the wall of pink hair that was being firmly held in place. What little bit of a pale cheek Gilda could see was flushed red so she figured that being singled out from the crowd must be an embarrassing situation for her. Gilda could relate to that now thanks to her mutation.

"And of course you've already met Applejack." Rarity paused as she thought about how to phrase her description of her friend's power. "I'm so sorry Applejack, but I still can't find a tactful way to say it."

"Not a problem Rarity." Applejack told her, and then to Gilda she simply said "I got horse legs."

Rarity facepalmed again.

"Horse legs?" Gilda asked.

Applejack reached down and pulled up the right leg of her jeans to reveal that the toe of what Gilda had thought was a boot was actually a grey hoof.

"Strong nuff to kick through a solid concrete wall, can run at a top speed of forty miles an hour on pure muscle power, and can carry eight hundred pounds with out breaking sweat." Applejack said proudly, and then she stood back up straight and looked Gilda dead in the eye. "And if ya call me cowgirl I'll buck ya right through a concrete wall."

"Don't worry I won't." she told Applejack. Then she smirked. "But I might make fun of you for that name."

"It's a family nickname." Applejack grumbled. "My real name's Jackie, and my family name is Appleseed. So because I liked a certain cereal growing up..." Applejack trailed off as the rest was obvious.

"Appleseed?" Gilda asked. "Like the legend?"

"Legend nothing!" Applejack said loudly. "He is our direct ancestor!"

Gilda held up her hands defensively. "Okay okay, don't bite my head off...cereal girl."

Applejack hung her head and huffed in annoyance. "Dang it." She looked at Gilda and deadpanned. "I hate you."

The others all laughed or giggled.

"So I guess you couldn't think of a name for having horse legs." Gilda teased.

"Well someone tried calling me cowgirl a few too many times when we first met." Applejack glared at Rainbow Dash who was trying to look innocent.

Everyone looked at Rainbow Dash.

"Oh, come on! You showed up wearing a cowboy hat and had hooves!" she exclaimed. "I thought you wanted to be called that."

"Epic fail dude." Gilda confirmed.

"It would seem that you are about to be introduced to another of our friends dear." said Rarity as she spotted another girl approaching them.

The girl approaching them was black with purple hair with a single pink highlight running from her bangs to the end of her perfectly straight shoulder length hair. She was dressed pretty plainly in a simple blouse and skirt combo with matching shoes and knee high striped socks. All of it in the same shades of purple and pink as her hair. She was carrying an impressive number of books for someone her size. The stack started in her hands at waist level, and continued on up to block half of her face from view.

"Hello girls." she greeted them from behind a book on string theory.

Gilda's first impression of her was nerdy goth.

"Got enough books there princess perfect?" Rainbow Dash asked with a grin.

"Very funny Rainbow." she rolled her eyes. "So are you all going to listen to the headmistress' welcoming speech to the new arrivals?"

"Well that would be the fashionable thing to do." Rarity suggested.

"Ain't got nuthin else to do." Applejack admitted with a shrug.

"I guess I'll go to." said Rainbow Dash.

"I don't think I'll go." Fluttershy said. "If you don't mind that is. It's just that with so many people that I've never met before, and I really don't like crowds. So I think I'll just stay inside with my animals." she told them. "If that's ok with all of you."

"That's perfectly fine Fluttershy." the girl assured her. She then saw Gilda. "Oh, hello. I'm sorry for not noticing you."

Gilda raised an eyebrow. "That's ok, your hands are full."

"Hehe, yes they are." she looked to Rainbow Dash. "Um, Dash would you mind?"

"Your room or the library?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"My room please."

Rainbow Dash set to work. Zooming back and forth between the group of friends and the mansion she carried at least two books at a time. In ten seconds flat the books were all gone.

"Thanks." the girl said and held her hand out to Gilda. "I'm Twilight Sparkle."

"...like those vampire movies?" Gilda asked.

"NO!" Twilight shouted. Everyone laughed except for Gilda and Twilight. Twilight groaned and slapped a hand to her face. "I hate those movies...and the books."

"So what's your power?" Gilda asked to change the subject.

"Past experience has led me to believe that it's easier to demonstrate than to explain, but that can wait till later." Twilight told her, and then waved for everyone to follow her. "Come on, Celestia is about to give her speech."