Culture Shock - Part 1
“Over one thousand years ago, our ruler of Equestria, Princess Celestia, united the armies of Earth, Unicorn, and Pegasus ponies, to form the E.U.P. Guards to ensure all denizens would be protected in times of war and peace. For the last four hundred years, the E.U.P. Guards has been running the Royal Guard Academy to ensure that those of all kinds who come in, leave as the best of what every regiment, company, and platoon should have: leaders.”
Everypony in attendance on the warm Sunday afternoon, listened as a stern, eloquent, and decorated white unicorn, delivered a speech at the podium in a grand chapel.
“Even as times have changed, more towns and cities, more relationships, and even change in rulers like with Princess Twilight Sparkle, what makes a good leader has remained the same. A good leader has the capacity and the will to rally ponies to a common purpose, and the character to inspire confidence. Their leadership is to be based on moral authority and on the truth.”
The speech kept everypony inside captivated as the Commandant spoke of the aims of his academy, most of whom were the parents, guardians, brothers, or sisters of young mares and stallions who lined up in an adjacent hallway. Even these new cadets could hear the speech even as the walls had an impact on its volume, and the chatter amongst them could drown it out.
“Make sure when you come up, you state your name, and which kind of pony you fall under, that way we can get signed in quicker” an Earth pony called out from behind his desk, an officer set with the task of handling the registration. He had the straightforward task of checking the names, marking them in and sending them to the correct one of four companies that each had been assigned to, as well as the correct platoon.
A bright yellow earth stallion approaches the desk, “Buckaneer, Earth” stated the stallion, and all the officer needed to do was scan the list of earth ponies to find the name.
“You’ve been signed in, you’re in McCarthy Company, 2nd Hoof. Make your way down left, get your uniform, make your way out to the west field” the officer confirmed, ticking the name off and pointing his right hoof down the entryway. Once the pony was on his way, the next one would come forward.
“Jet Wash, Pegasus.”
“You’re in Keating-Rogers, 2nd Wing.”
“Pruminant, Unicorn.”
“You’re in Fullerton, 1st Horn.”
“Gallus, um… Pegasus?”
The officer had finished marking the unicorn mare as registered when he looked up and saw Gallus, his train of thought derailed at the unexpected sight of the supposed pegasus pony in front of him. He could make out the wings on both sides of the light blue body with a cream underbelly, but where there should be a nose there was a bright amber beak, where there should be a mane, there were bright blue and yellow-tipped feathers. If he could look past his desk, he could have seen feline paws and eagle-like amber claws instead of hoofs.
“Uh… can you repeat your name for me?” asked the officer, his voice starting to tremble as he tried to regain his composure.
The blue feathered cadet returned a jaded glance, “Gallus, G-A-L-L-U-S” he responded, knowing it was a simple name to say but spelt it out slowly to ensure the officer caught all the words.
The pony officer pulled the pegasus list and hastily scanned through the list, hoping to make sense of the existence of the apparent cadet in front of him. Sure enough, as he scanned through the list of names, one seemed to confirm the cadet in from of him was meant to be there, written down as “Gallus (GRIFFON)”.
“That’s… great” the registration officer hesitantly confirmed. “You’re in Larson Company, 1st Wing, make your way down right… I MEAN down left, collect your uniform, head outside onto the west field” he directed in a staggered fashion, holding a nervous smile in the hopes of saving face.
A single eyebrow was raised up over Gallus’ blue eyes, unsure of why the earth pony’s shakiness. He was sure that the academy expected him like all the other cadets. “Thanks” he replied in a dry tone, as he made his way left, walking past the officer as he heard a loud exhale of relief.
He made his way to the fitting room, where there were several stacks of dark green coveralls, categorised by size, with a separate set labelled for pegasus ponies. Gallus picked up a medium-sized one and could feel the weight of the cotton fabric hanging from his talons.
He followed other ponies in putting the coveralls and felt relieved at how comfortable and flexible it felt, the weight of it felt reduced as it spread across his body and down both his arms and hind legs. There were even two holes in the back of the coveralls large enough to fit his wings through. The only fastening was done with a long strip of velcro on the front and a velcro strap around the hips, even ponies could fit them on despite the lack of fingers that Gallus possessed. The area also had bright yellow tags and markers on tables, the ponies writing their names on them, the griffon quickly grabbing one to write “GALLUS” on a tag and fitted it to his coveralls.
As he exited the chapel, he was outside to get his first proper view of the Royal Guard Academy’s grand scale. On the left of the chapel was the wide main building that would act as both classrooms and accommodation. The building was large and white surrounded by an array of pointed arched windows with golden frames, with bright purple pillars on each corner and covered with a sanded golden roof. Spirals were etched all around the walls, pillars and roof.
It was obvious that the architecture was heavily influenced by its nearby city of Canterlot, of which the academy was adjacent to the mountain of which the city is located, with Canterlot Palace being visible from the side of the mountain's peak. Surrounding the building and chapel were vast open green fields and woodland, with ponies in grey metallic armour exercising in the distance.
Several ponies in green coveralls were standing around on the west side of the building, leading one to assume that must be the best field. As Gallus made his approach, he found the field had been separated into sections, and within each section, the ponies separated by what kind they are. Each section was signposted with the names Fullerton, Keating-Rogers, Larson, McCarthy, and Vogel.
Gallus could postulate that these were the companies, and he needed to be in the middle one, and one of the two groups of pegasus ponies must be his platoon. After a random guess, he approached the line of green coveralled ponies and decided to offer a calm first impression.
“Hey, my name’s Gallus” he introduced with lines across both sides of his beak curved upwards in a smile, stretching out one of his arms to offer his talons in a closed palm to shake. Unfortunately, the only ponies to notice didn’t give a warm response, if any at all. They looked back at Gallus dumbfounded, Gallus’ smile drooped down at the thought he either did the wrong thing or was in the wrong place. “Is this Larson 1st Wing?” he asked slowly, quickly moving his talons up and over his head to rub the back of his neck.
The pegasus closest to Gallus nodded and sounded in confirmation, giving Gallus a pause for relief, before stepping to the side to indicate that the griffon should stand in the line. As Gallus positioned himself, he could see a large crowd of ponies at the edge of the field, some waving across while some smiled and held back their tears. He thought it was a shame that his friends couldn’t be there to wave his way, nor were any other griffons insight. It would have bothered him if it wasn’t for the sound of two pegasus ponies whispering to each other further down the line.
“Is that a griffon?”
“I think so, the rumours must be true.”
“What rumours?”
“Princess Twilight’s School of Friendship held its first graduation ceremony a few months back, and other cadets have been saying one of the graduates was accepted into the academy, but no one knew who. Apparently, a griffon was one of those graduates.”
“You mean that griffon is gonna be training here at the academy? And he’s in our platoon?”
Gallus rolled his eyes. “No, I'm actually here so ponies could stare and whisper about me like a living statue” he answered sarcastically, speaking in a normal volume as he glared across the line. Two heads were caught with wide, startled eyes, shooting upright to be hidden by the line of other ponies. Before Gallus could try and find the two gossipers, a loud and forthright voice caught his feathered ears.
“Eyes forward cadets!” Gallus turned a pegasus stallion standing in front of the platoon lines. His coat was apple green, a lighter shade than the similar coloured green jacket he wore with a dark navy hat with hardened brims, his eyes sharp with hazel irises. “I’m Colour Sergeant Razorwing, your senior drill instructor, and this is Captain Westland,” he directed his hoof towards a similarly dressed creamy yellow pegasus mare that stood firmly between both platoons.
“We’ll be carrying out your E.U.P. Guard training and ensure you follow the regimen of this Academy. In time, you’ll get to meet other senior officers who will also help you in your training, but for now, if you lot want to make it through this year and leave as an officer, you do exactly what I tell you, and if I am to ask questions or give orders, you are to refer to me as Staff Sergeant. Do you understand?”
His questions were as sharp as his name, compelling the platoon to act. “Yes, Staff Sergeant!” the whole platoon responded in unison.
As Gallus went along with the group, all following Razorwing, into the main building. He already expected the place to be majestic and full of fancy colours and décor, being a prestigious institution, and he couldn’t help but notice every room had either antique spears, shields, and paintings of soldiers and battles, particularly the cafeteria and libraries could be mistaken for military museums. There were also other places he expected with it being a school, the classrooms, and the gym, no different in size and features to the ones found in Ponyville.
The last part of the tour required everyone to go up several flights of stairs, until at the very top where the word “LARSON” was written on the wall with doors on either side. Each door had a wing insignia on them, the only difference being the numbers printed on them, one and two.
These would be the platoon living quarters, a long corridor with doors on either side, poster boards, and a window that overlooked the fields. Each dorm had two beds, cupboards, and desks, with plain white walls.
“Okay ponies, ground rules” called Razorwing, “This corridor, the washroom, your dorms, your uniforms, and your equipment are your responsibility. Starting tomorrow, you need to make sure they’re all clean, tidy, and orderly by the end of the day, so Captain Westland and I can carry out inspections the following morning.”
This was followed by the stuff that wasn’t allowed, “There is a list of stuff not allowed in the dorms like makeup and alcohol, be sure to dispose of them before the end of tonight. Nopony from any other platoon or company can come in without authority from their platoon command. If you have anything to ask, my own room is at the end of the corridor. Otherwise, get unpacking, you all got an early start tomorrow.”
As ponies started going into dorm rooms, Gallus did the same. Each bed had kit bags containing cutlery, a water bottle, toiletries, and survival equipment. While the other ponies had gotten bags of other things to put into their rooms, Gallus only brought one thing.
A photo, a group photo that was taken of him and his friends at the graduation ceremony, all wearing gowns and carrying their diplomas, bunched up and smiling. He cracked a smile as he looked at it and stuck it up onto the wall. “Welp, I’m here now,” he thought, knowing that he won’t be able to see them for a few months.
He reassured himself that he can handle it, he’ll just need to keep in touch. Plus, if he can make friends here, the time away won’t be so bad. His reminder of the way other ponies were standoffish and murmured amongst themselves didn’t seem to help, groaning as he could hear muffled sounds of over and over through the walls.
"You see we have a griffon in our platoon?"
"I thought griffons had their own army."
"Do you think he's friendly?"
He wasn’t surprised that being the only griffon he’d stand out, but he remembered going through that experience fine back in Ponyville. Was it really that odd to find griffons in other places too? There had to be somepony who didn’t think the sight of a griffon was weird or intimidating.
“Oh uh… hey… I think you’re my roommate?”
The sound of a mumbled voice emerged from the dorm room’s entrance, Gallus turned to look and was greeted with the sight of bright amber pegasus pony, mane and tail of a reddish-brown colour, one of his forehooves bent and raised as if paused from stepping further. He glanced at the pony’s name tag on his coverall, it read “Rosewood”.
The pony’s nervous expression didn’t give Gallus much hope, “Can’t imagine why else I’d be here,” he sardonically answered whilst rolling his eyes, “name’s Gallus.”
The amber pony reacted with a sigh of relief. “Cool, I’m Scythe, welcome to the Academy” he followed, stepping forward and offering an outstretched hoof. In turn, Gallus slowly grabbed the end of the hoof with his talons and shook it with a firm grip, finally someone had the decency to introduce themselves, although he furrowed a brow whilst staring at the nametag, unsure why it had a different name in the first place. Scythe was quick to notice, "Oh yeah, Rosewood's a... family name." he explained, his voice trailed as he used his shaken hoof to adjust the nametag.
“So, this must be my bed then?” he then asked, his voice jumping up a gear, but Gallus didn’t have much time to answer as the pony quickly dragged a bag in from outside and started unpacking himself. He managed to take things out of the kit bag and place them in specific parts of the cupboard, even checking to make sure all the bits were aligned and oriented in place.
For Gallus, this pony was interesting, he clearly gave the impression of a neat freak. Gallus was particularly lazy when it came to taking care of the dorm room he and Sandbar shared, always leaving things on the floor and in a mess, he preferred the sea-green pony’s chilled vibe about things like that. Still, the griffon couldn't complain about the first welcoming pony he encountered so early on in his time.
“So, what part of Equestria are you from?” asked Gallus, politely urging him to start a conversation.
“Uh… Cloudsdale,” Scythe replied, as he began digging through one of his other bags. “What about you?”
That answer explained the slightly more welcoming attitude towards Gallus, Cloudsdale was a large pegasus civilization that travelled around Equestria in the sky. Gallus knew that the ponies from there were usually friendly towards griffons from the few that he knew in Griffonstone. “I’ve been living in Ponyville for the last few years,” he answered, “recently graduated from Princess Twilight’s School of Friendship, just in case you heard any rumours about me.”
Scythe cracked a smile in response, "Hmm, I think I heard about that one” he remarked, as he took out books from his bag and placed them on his desk. “But I wouldn’t worry about that, there are other rumours you’ve got to worry about.”
The intrigued griffon raised an eyebrow, Scythe nodded and continued. “Hope you’re ready for the first four weeks, my brother graduated from here a few years ago, always teased me about how rough they are. Especially bad if you’re not an early bir-I MEAN riser!” he quickly panicked and corrected himself, nervously grinning.
The bird pun wasn't missed by Gallus though, griffons weren't fans of them, though he appreciated Scythe's shaky attempt to save himself. “Nah, it can’t be that bad” he responded dismissively as he rested his paws and feline behind on his bed. “This place already kind of reminds me of the School of Friendship, what with the living quarters, cafeteria, library, gym. This is just another boarding school, except instead of learning about friendship it’s about being an officer, right?”
Scythe, on the other hand, didn’t seem to agree, his head tilted, and eyebrows lowered, unconvinced of how Gallus sure was of himself. “Well… don’t say I didn’t warn you” he uttered under his breath, as he continued to unpack the rest of his things.
Gallus was sound asleep when he could have felt being shaken, the motions worked wonders to bring him out of his dreams and into the waking world. He attempted to open his creased eyes, to much his regret as the lamp above shone right into his focal lenses, his vision so blurry he could barely make out the hazy silhouette of Scythe having woken him up.
The griffon groaned as he lifted the top half of his body upright, desperate to know what time it was, but as he opened his beak to ask, the booming forthright voice of Razorwing drove its way inside the room through the door.
“Wakey Wakey! Finish making your beds, fill up and take your water bottles, you have five minutes to line up outside the corridor for the morning parade!”
As quick as the call rang through his ears, the fuzzy figure of Scythe made a brisk exit through the door, leaving a tired Gallus alone in the dorm room. His first course of action was to open the curtains to get in natural light, hoping that the morning light from outside would invigorate him. With talons on the fabrics, he parsed them to see the sky was… dawn. As the low-light aided focus to Gallus’ vision, the mystified and groggy griffon wanted to know more than ever why he was woken up this early.
He slowly turned back to the inside of the room; his blurs having diminished enough to at least focus on Razorwing’s orders in what little time he had. The griffon was stunned to notice how immaculate Scythe’s bed was, the sheet both straight and tightly tucked with the creaseless pillow as if the bed was never slept in.
He got to work on his own bed, tucking the sheet under the duvet on one side, and flattening out the pillow in the hopes it looked presentable. While he couldn’t tell if there were any creases or curves on the bed, he felt it was good enough for the state he was in. As soon as he grabbed the water bottle from his cupboard, a curious sound could be heard emerging from the corridors. As he used the tap to fill his water bottle as full as it could go, he groaned in realisation as to what it was, ponies singing in unison.
Equestria, the land I love,
A land of harmony
Our flag does wave from high above,
For ponykind to see
Equestria, a land of friends,
Where ponykind do roam
They say true friendship never ends,
Equestria, my home
It was Equestria’s national anthem, a song meant to fill ponies with pride as it goes on about friendship. In all the years Gallus lived with ponies, he never understood their incessant desire to sing out song after song as if they spent their day to day lives in a stage musical. On the other hand, he grew up amongst griffons in a society that banned singing for aeons, which made just about as much sense. If there was one thing Gallus would understand the need for griffons to share pride, it would be singing a national anthem.
The urge to hurry up caused Gallus to begrudgingly approach his way out and towards the two lines of ponies harmonizing the words of the anthem, only slightly relieved to find he wasn’t the last one to join in standing with them, a few more faces with sagged eyes, drooping faces, and wilted feathers making their arrival.
Unfortunately, the dark green sergeant standing between the parallel lines didn’t look pleased, even describing his feelings that way felt more like a compliment. “Alright cadets, listen here and listen good!” he barked once the singing stopped, as he proceeded to march down the line. “This is the first morning and not all of you were here on time. From now on, if you aren’t in line five minutes before the anthem starts, you’re late!” Having reached the other end of the line, he made a perfect half-turn in one swift motion, stamping his hoofs to a stop. “If a soldier in Princess Twilight’s parade was late, do you think she would be pleased?”
“No, staff sergeant” the tired members of the platoon answered, some remaining half-asleep, to Razorwing’s dissatisfaction.
“I said, do you think she would be pleased!?”
“No, staff sergeant!” the platoon repeated louder.
“That means this morning, we’re off to a bad start. This is your first and final warning! Understood?”
“Yes, staff sergeant!”
“Alright, now drink up, and then hold your bottles over your head so I can see they are empty.”
As if on command, ponies left and right of Gallus proceeded to lift their water bottles over their heads and chugged the contents down, their pegasus wings wrapped firmly around the bottles for support. He felt compelled to do the same, using his talons to hold the water bottle up, each gulp of water felt less and less refreshing as it started to dawn on him how much the bottle could contain.
Surprisingly, there was at least one pony in the platoon who had a less comforting time drinking their water. A light cyan pegasus on the very end of the line started swaying side to side, each breath lasting longer and longer, unable to stay up straight, his face starting to fade to a white shade of green. Suddenly, his eyes shot wide open and started to hold one of his hooves to his face. Razorwing caught notice of this and slowly approached the nauseous pegasus face to face, the anxious pony’s cheeks starting to balloon up as he pressed his hoof tighter around his mouth.
“Either you swallow that up or go, cadet,” slowly growled the sergeant, “Not a single mess in my corridor, understood?”
The nauseated pegasus didn’t make time to nod his head, he darted down the corridor and swerved right into the washroom. For the next minute, every pony and griffon stood by uncomfortably as the sound of splashing and groaning echoed through the corridor. Gallus peeked through the door and finally spotted a clock to tell the time with, although it was six in the morning, the sounds started making him reconsider breakfast.
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You’ve been signed in, you’re in McCarthy Company, 2nd Hoof. Make your way down left, get your uniform, make your way out to the west field” the officer confirmed, ticking the name off and pointing his right hoof down the entryway. Once the pony was on his way, the next one would come forward.
“Jet Wash, Pegasus.”
“You’re in Keating-Rogers, 2nd Wing.”
“Pruminant, Unicorn.”
“You’re in Fullerton, 1st Horn.”
I do love how you name of the group after the the writers of the show very clever
Once again I do love how you reference the names of the writers who worked on the show and I'm assuming the highest rank of all time is Faust if I'm correct
Ok so this is the beginning of Gallus's first day of training to be one of the Royal Guards and something tells me this is going to be a very long months or even a year for him but it looks like there is some ponies still gave him a well welcoming here at least 😅 so I wonder how this will go I guess we'll find out next time
10716338
Thanks. It was based on how Sandhurst name their companies after famous British battles, thought it'd be a nice nod to do something similar. I'd imagine Faust would be a regiment name actually. :P
I mean, it does make sense. His skill set as a griffon would probably fall closest to that of the pegasi than any of the other tribes, given his ability to fly and otherwise have to engage in more melee combat.
It's still inadvertently speciest, of course, but it's admittedly to be expected with the first non-pony in their ranks (discounting any changelings that may have snuck into the ranks--knowing Chrysalis, I'm certain that probably happened at least once at some point, so to gather intelligence and other devious things).
"That's G as in golf, A as in alpha, L as in lima, L as in lima again..."
Ha-ha, I see what you did there.
Especially the "early bird" one, as I somehow doubt there are that many griffons that are morning creatures--certainly not Gallus, at least.
Actually, I'm torn on deciding on whether or not she'd even notice, or instead needlessly go completely Twily-nanas over it, reading entirely too much about it.
If it was Celestia, though, I could say with almost one hundred percent certainty that she wouldn't care and probably wouldn't even notice, more pleased by the overall gesture of the parade rather than how orderly it was carried out.
Anyway...welcome to day one of military life, Gallus. Rest assured--the nightmare's only just starting.
well, the first inspection (and its aftermath) will cure that little problem ... not to mention the 'early bird' bit ...
10716738
My impression is that even if Twilight wouldn't notice, officers and soldiers would make sure they don't screw up for the sake of their own status and reputation, officers especially. Besides, if she would, no guard wants to find out. :P
Do people have difficulty drinking water in the morning? I wouldn't know. I used to guzzle a quart every morning just to tamp down the immense amount of acid my stomach over-produced.
I'm like The Fly! (And he looks like it too!) Heyyyyyy... my mind-voice is being mean to me!
Why drink water? Why MUST they drink that much water on waking?
10903467
It's to keep up their fluids, what with the amount of exercise they do outside.
Sooo... I see a few comments wondering why the guards have to drink all their water. Personally I got the distinct impression this was to check if any pony had switched out their water for alcohol and that one unlucky dude got caught. Don’t know if that was the writer’s intention, but I got a pretty good laugh out of that!
I'm loving it so far but it would be nice to have some mentions of like the nightgaurds and stuff
Ahhhh, the NCO in me feels elated reading about mornings like this.
During basic I was one of the lucky ones, I had the uncanny ability to wake up before the wake up call.
The poem "The 'Eathen" & other poems by Kipling would warn Gallus what he's getting in to. But no, he's special. He gets to learn The Hard Way