The Time Thief

by Reading4HalfMyLife

Loop 32

Had you asked Astral Plane before the loops if she wanted to go to school, she would have probably had said no, or just pulled one of those 'are you crazy' faces that kids seemed to enjoy using so much.

But now she felt stagnated.

She was starting to train in light leather armor for her duel with the Princesses, and was toying with the idea of asking Aunt Rarity for help in making new armor, but outside of that, she had no real goal. She would need to save up money for travelling, and she didn't have an allowance.

Her mother, unknowingly explained the solution.

"Your brain isn't getting enough stimuli" Starlight said to the filly. "It needs to learn new things. This is why you should pay more attention in school."

Later that night- for it was only Monday- Astral lay in bed and mulled that over. She had gotten out of school again by pretending to be sick, and she was still planning to get out of the next few classes by giving her parents the note.

But.

She was starting to miss school. Just a tad. It kind of felt like the end of the holidays, when you were bored and were more apathetic towards school.

But.

She didn't want to go back to school. That would mean seeing and talking to Apple Jam and Butterscotch, and she just, couldn't.

But.

She was slowly starting to grow more and more bored, and she was no idiot, she had seen the things that the characters in the Groundhog Day loops did when bored.

With a sigh, she turned over in her bed, and fell asleep. It was a problem or another day, or even another loop.

---

It turned out, it was not a problem for another loop, because the answer caught her eye when she was walking down the street. It was the town bulletin board.

She had looked at it before, but it mostly included things like lost and found flyers or babysitting offers. Now though, her eyes honed in on a brightly colored flyer reading: Germane Lessons! With an address underneath. She stared up at it, thoughtful, before, in a decisive move, taking the flyer down with her magic and following the address.

It led her to the home of one Billingual, a brown earth pony she had seen around town. He seemed surprised to see her.

"Astral" he greeted, opening his door to stare down at the filly. "What brings you to my humble abode?"

In response, she held up the flyer, and he smiled. "Did you know" he said, peering down at her "that you are the very first pony in all of Ponyville to express an interest in learning Germane?"

Not really. "Really?" Astral cocked her head, eyes wide. "Wow!"

The stallion chuckled. "I suppose our first lesson can be right now. Do you know any Germane?"

Astral shook her head bashfully, and the stallion chuckled again as he opened the door to let her in.

---

Two hours later, Astral left, head spinning, with a book called Germane for Beginners grasped in her magic.

Everything sounds angry in that language, she thought. Her brain was a little rusty from the lack of use, so she was struggling to get even the most basic ideas of the language.

Well, at least I'll have time to catch up.

Author's Note:

So, yes, I was sitting in science when they explained that when someone who was educated stops educating or doing anything productive, their mind starts to stagnate. Often times, they try to pick up new, physical things, but because the brain is not working the same way as before.

Then I realised Astral has been in the loops for a while- she was fifteen and a half, now she's sixteen and seven months. A good deal of that time has been avoiding school, so her mind would start to stagnate, and I am learning German, so I thought, why not, here looks like a good opening for fun times and shenanagins.

So, that will be something running in the background

Comments

[Twilight Connor]

Good luck with German. I've been trying Japanese for a while now, and gotten only a bit past pronunciation...

[Reading4HalfMyLife]

9200198
Ugh, it's terrible, so Astral is suffering with me.

[FridayPie]

9200230
That's like comparing Basic to assembler, Japanese being the latter