Routine Day
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
The singing of Equestria’s anthem could be heard in the distance, at Gallus’ best guess it was coming from the window as he and Scythe stretched their wings and got their room ready. It was the start of a routine day at the E.U.P. Royal Guard Academy, and the first order of the day was to muster outside the dorm with the other cadets in their platoon in time for room inspections.
Their beds had to be straightened, drawers and shelves arranged, and every part of the uniform had to be laid out on the bed from head to paws in exact placements, it would be tedious had the attention to detail not become second nature to them. The two checked on each other’s areas just to be sure nothing was out of place, Scythe moving the gloves to be more parallel, while Gallus picked out stray feathers hiding underneath the bedsheets.
By the time they stood to attention outside their door, they were sure that everything was neat and orderly. There was always one slight issue, despite inspections always being carried out by both Westland and Razorwing, it was always the latter that inspected their rooms. Westland never picked a specific room on each inspection, but Razorwing without fail would walk between Gallus and Scythe into their room with an austere look on his face.
Once inside, Gallus silently fumed and began counting under his breath. One, two, three, four, five… “Psst! What’s the current record?” Lightning Dust whispered over to Nicknames with a sly smirk on her face.
“I think the longest was forty-five seconds, right?”
Nicknames looked over to Scythe and Gallus for confirmation, but the former held his breath and fixed his sights in front, whilst the latter held a jaded gaze as he continued to count in his head. Twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two… Gallus could hear Razorwing slowly open cupboards and draws, looking inside, making light hoof steps around the room.
Forty-three, forty-four, forty-five... Not a word had come out of the dorm room, so Gallus furrowed his brow. He glanced at Scythe, but the pegasus was too frozen to explain anything, his eyes slowly shifted back to the front, seeing if the other cadets were aware of what they were hearing. Or rather, what they’re not.
Fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight, fifty-nine… Suddenly, at the corner of his field of view, Gallus caught a glimpse of Razorwing walking out of the dorm room. His body tensed as the staff sergeant stopped between Scythe and himself, worried with confusion as to why there was no bellowing or even a “Griffon! The curtains aren’t fully drawn!” in a sharp voice.
As Westland emerged from Lightning Dust and Pound Sterling’s room, having finished her inspection, Razorwing turned his head towards her and then gave a subtle nod. It felt almost as if a miracle had occurred, Razorwing had completed an entire minute-long room inspection without any comment, criticism, or quip towards Gallus.
Then Razorwing sharply turned his head towards Nicknames, “Officer Cadet Nick, I believe the record now stands at seventy-six seconds by my count” he said, causing the large cyan pegasus to pale.
“And griffon,” Razorwing followed, turning to the tense blue griffon. “You can count in your head. When we do our inspections, keep your beak shut.”
Gallus gulped and nodded, as he figured it wasn’t a complete miracle.
The cadets had a full breakfast at the mess hall, which ultimately was a good decision as they needed all the energy they could get. The morning’s training session was an obstacle course.
It wasn’t as restrictive or intense as Winstone’s Trial however, instead it was a long field where cadets had to run on an oval track around sixteen hundred metres in length, with hills, valleys, lakes, and rings. The main rule of the course this time was that you could fly over or through any obstacle, but whenever it was flat, you could only run.
The task of running, then jumping to fly, to landing to run again over and over was gruelling. The pegasus and griffon cadets could count themselves lucky, as earth ponies and unicorns would endure the same course on just their hooves alone but their wings used the same energy as running would. This was made worse by all the cadets requiring wearing their full body armour, as such carrying their bodyweight in metal as a bonus.
Eager flyers like Lightning Dust and Gallus who started flying over every obstacle in their path, struggled early as their wings were too tired to fly high enough to go through the rings without resting, nor could Gallus climb if he wanted. The cadets more experienced with the cross country had the better strategy of only flying when the obstacle made it necessary, giving their wings a much longer break to be ready to reach the tall heights.
Once every cadet had finished the course, it was back to doing drills with what little energy they could regain. Razorwing argued that doing the marches and face turns was to ensure that even after so much physical pressure, soldiers and officers could keep their minds ready for precise actions and reactions. The cadets on the other hand, just suspected that this was just the Staff Sergeant making the drills harder on purpose.
After a strenuous session, Gallus didn’t have time to freshen himself or take off his armour before he was ordered to meet Captain Westland in her office. Not that the studious pegasus was bothered by the appearance of the blue griffon she called in, as long as he stood to attention and gave a salute.
“Officer Cadet Gallus, at ease” she politely acknowledged his presence, Gallus felt his aching muscles begin to relax. As the captain stood behind her desk with her head resting on her forehooves, her eyes followed Gallus’ arm as it slowly returned to his side. “Hope your talons aren’t too sore, on your first day you said the drills weren’t built for them.”
Despite all his aches and pains, it only occurred to him that he couldn’t feel anything in his bright amber claws. With his arms remaining at his side, he slowly clenched and extended his talons, and had a hint of relief when he could feel the couch of the pointed tips and light muscles. “Not at all, Captain,” he answered, remembering how sore his talons were at the start of drills.
Westland returned a smile. “Good, if that ever changes, you should know where the infirmary is by now,” she advised, before going to her drawers to look for Gallus’ file. “A good officer must always have good judgement when it comes to their health, and I don’t want to see my cadets with injuries unchecked.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Westland then began to read through her file on Gallus’ progress, commenting on them aloud as she went. Although Gallus tried his best to listen, his mind drifted as he caught sight of a group of earth ponies outside a window. Three of them were outside, one with a ball wrapped around his hoof, the griffon could only guess they were about to play a game of sorts.
It’d been months since Gallus tried out for Buckball, and he hadn’t touched the sport since. Even hearing Nicknames talk about his training left him feeling sour, being excluded entirely because of a jerk coach and even bigger jerk of a unicorn. Even if he did get in, it wouldn’t have been as fun without his friends at the School of Friendship cheering him on. Even that had its sore reminder…
“… to have a good chance, you can start by paying attention.” Gallus jumped back into focus, the fur on his neck puffed out in a panic as he saw the captain with a surly glare and a dark aura surrounding her like a tiny storm were to emerge. Westland could only continue in a more frustrated voice. “I’ll be brief then, Canterlot Palace Royal Guards expect the best in leadership and best in character, you’ve got the potential for both so focus and work on your studies, understood?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Anything I need to know before I let you go to your next class?”
Knowing he screwed up, all Gallus wanted to do was fly out of there and get out of his heavy uniform before he’d get metaphorically struck by a lightning bolt. He just had to say no ma’am, there is nothing you need to know. Nothing is bothering me at all. “…except for my mail.”
“Your mail?”
His heart stopped, Gallus got his inner thoughts and outer voice mixed up. “I haven’t received any mail for a while… like… since the start of term?” His voice started to trail off, and his head sunk lower, as he tried to explain. Captain Westland was rather calm during the exchange, but her sharp stare made it difficult for Gallus to weave his way out.
Her eyes narrowed, “I see… You’ve left it a bit late to bring it up, haven’t you?” she asked in her lowered voice, scribbling down on the paper within her files.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Well, go see the mailroom and see if they can resolve your mail issue, preferably before I next see you. Understood?” Gallus had no words this time, his head was already low enough to realise he was in trouble, only raised enough to indicate that he nodded. “Now disappear.”
As instructed, Gallus hurriedly made his way out. The last thing he wanted to do now was to let his captain know he was late for class.
“Who can remind us of the Code of Honour that all guards must follow, Earth Pony, Unicorn, and Pegasus alike?” A beige earth pony asks an auditorium full of earth pony and pegasus cadets, several of whom raise their hooves. Sitting three rows from the front, Gallus also had his arm raised. The lecturer scanned the auditorium, looking for whom to pick to answer.
His head suddenly stopped when Gallus was at the centre of his field of view. “Oh right, griffons too…” he added, before turning his head in the opposite direction and pointing at an earth pony on the far side of the front row. He didn’t turn back, for if he did, he would have seen a perplexed griffon who only intended to answer the question.
“Soldiers never lie, cheat, or steal, sir.”
“Correct.”
The lecture was on command, leadership, and management, going over morals and ethics. All the cadets in the room should have known the Code of Honour, given that they had to know it for the entrance exams, but this lecturer wanted to be sure the cadets knew it was more than just a single sentence.
“When you are in command of a platoon of your own, you must follow it and not tolerate its violation yourself. And why? It’s trust. Every one of you has reasons to be here, one of which I would imagine is to protect Equestria and everything it stands for. Even peace needs to be protected. However, it is Equestria that decides whether the guard can protect them, and they won’t decide that we can if they cannot trust us. Follow the Code of Honour, and you can’t do wrong. That’ll be all, class dismissed, be sure to leave ordinarily.”
A large and resounding sigh of relief rushed through the auditorium as ponies stood up and prepared to leave. Although pegasus ponies could use their wings to fly over the seats, the abundance of them made the risk of crashing too high to pull it off in one go, so most followed the earth ponies down the row they sat in and down the stairs.
One of the few flyers willing to fly their way down was Gallus, he knew that there was a short amount of time to travel between classes, but long enough that he could sort out the issue he brought up with Westland earlier. As he landed at the bottom of the auditorium, he briskly walked up to the lecturer.”
“Excuse me, sir,” he called to get his attention. “You wouldn’t happen to know where the mail office is?”
“Sure, you take a left out the front door and you’ll find it around the corner.” The lecturer didn’t bother to look up at his notes to see Gallus, merely extending and curving his forehoof to visualize his directions.
Not that it seemed to matter to Gallus, he knew where to go so he could do what he planned to do, have a word with those mail couriers. Gallus flew over the cadets walking down the corridors and the stairs, going outside through the main doors and towards the left side of the building.
The department had their tiny building that was attached to the rear side of the much larger academy building, coloured in the same bright white walls and purple roofing that Canterlot enjoyed the theming of. There were two doors, one at the front near the corner where the two buildings meet, and a larger one on the side for large boxes and bags of letters to be delivered through.
The front door had “MAIL DEPARTMENT” printed in gold serif text, with a list of times underneath it. Fortunately for Gallus, he was there at a time when it was open, so he felt there would be no problem going in.
At least, until he tried turning the doorknob, there was a rattle but no budge. The building was locked. Gallus furrowed his brow, he checked the times, and it was supposed to be open, and there weren’t any other signs to indicate otherwise.
He knocked on the door, but there was no answer, so he tried to peer inside through the glass door, but the building was so dark it was hard to make. The only other window had textured glass, obscuring all detail inside. It was likely done this way to avoid anyone like Gallus from peeking into that side of the office for security.
“Maybe the mail pony working there went out early for lunch?” Gallus thought, having checked the time, and it was close to lunch. He sighed and made his way back to his next class; he couldn’t imagine that office being closed for the entire day.
It was the afternoon, and time for the clubs. Scythe had gone out to the woodlands for Cross country, Lightning Dust to the Aerial Athletics team at the track, Pound Sterling to the firing range for Archery, Nicknames went to the gymnasium for Buckball, as did Gallus for Mountaineering. As much as they wished these clubs weren’t mandatory, they had the relief that they weren’t in one of the clubs that took place in the morning.
Nicknames made his way into the court, leaving Gallus to go down a corridor to the room at the end covered wall to wall with coloured boulders. The griffon couldn’t place an arm inside the room without getting a jubilant welcome. “GALLUS! MON OISEAU BLEU!” called out the Prench earth pony Fountain Blue.
For the sake of politeness, Gallus had to give a short wave and a nervous smile, whilst other ponies turned their heads towards him. Even Whipper, the other lead of the club, rolled his eyes at his friend’s jovial welcome of their griffon climber. Thankfully, Gallus’ saving grace came in the form of a bright yellow unicorn stallion.
“Hey, Gallus! Wanna pair up?” It was Cliffhanger, the sole unicorn member of the club. He was already strapped into his harness and had an additional harness levitating by him to courteously pass over to Gallus.
Although he had come accustomed to being disliked or ignored by most unicorns, Gallus felt refreshed knowing that there was one unicorn who was comfortable approaching and being nice to him for a change. That is despite Gallus only really remembering Cliffhanger for one certain incident in the Griffon’s Mountain trail over the holidays.
“Sure, you can climb first, I’ll catch you” Gallus answered facetiously with a smirk, to which Cliffhanger chuckled in response.
Once strapped on his harness, Gallus and Cliffhanger went up to the open wall. The two clipped themselves up to the rope, Cliffhanger doubly so for safety, and the climbing began. It always intrigued Gallus how ponies made it possible to climb with just hooves. Back in Griffonstone, he had heard of goats that could scale mountains, something about their wide hooves with spongy toe tips, but ponies’ hooves weren’t designed like that.
He flapped his wings to fly in place, following Cliffhanger as he effortlessly placed his hind hooves on the lower boulders while hooking his hind hooves to the higher ones to pull himself up, all the while Gallus pulled on his end of the rope holding the unicorn in the air. As much as he joked about it earlier, Gallus didn’t want his climbing buddy to fall.
“Gallus, mind if I ask” Cliffhanger decided to speak up halfway up the wall, his voice carrying a light groan and heavy breath as he pulled his body up higher along the wall. “You chose your regiments, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Were your choices for mountain ones?”
There was a pause. “No. Why?” answered Gallus, his eyebrows flattened.
“Nothing.” There was another groan as he pulled himself to the next boulder. “Just thought you might have talked about it with Captain Whipper and Major Fountain Blue.”
“I haven’t, not much point since I don’t like…” Gallus' voice trailed off, he was getting reminded of his feelings towards climbing.
“No, no, I get it.” It was fortunate that Cliffhanger was understanding, given how he was the only one in the club who knew. “Have you noticed how differently they act though?” Gallus took his sights off Cliffhanger and turned his head to look down to find the two staff ponies.
The two certainly had different approaches to instructing. Fountain Blue was as lively and encouraging as ever, he would talk as if both the climber and belayer were listening, giving them pointers to get even higher. Whipper was direct and to the point, he mostly stood silent looking upwards towards the climber above, while staying close to the belayer on the ground, only commenting if one of the two was doing something wrong.
“Kinda…”
“Just a few days ago, I asked them about the Chevaux Alpins, cause that’s my top choice.” Cliffhanger explained as Gallus continued to look on at the two earth ponies. “Fountain Blue was all Go for it, you’ll do great, you get to climb wiz ze best!” Even with most of his energy focused on holding himself up, the unicorn could somehow pull off a nasally exaggerated Prench accent.
“Whipper though, he was kind of the opposite. You’ll have to work on your Prench, you’ll be far away from your home, be sure it’s what you want to do.” This imitation though was more of a gruff voice,
Gallus gave a light chuckle, “Yep, that sounds like them…”
“I still want to do it; I like the thrill and challenge of hanging on from high up.” He asserted, followed by a jesting remark. “If I was born with wings like a Pegasus, I probably wouldn’t be doing this.”
“Or a griffon.” Inserted Gallus.
“True. Come to think of it, sometimes I wish I had your talons so I could easily grab onto things.” he followed up, groaning harder than he did before. Gallus turned back to Cliffhanger, the unicorn had his right forehoof stretched as far up and outward towards a red boulder he couldn’t reach. He was gritting his teeth, pushing up as far as he could on the two boulders he was standing on, his eyes fixed upwards so that he wasn’t seeing any other way to progress further.
In fairness, Gallus couldn’t see either, his eyes were focused on Cliffhanger’s rope and how it dangled loosely beneath him. They widened as he realised with anxiety that he was distracted for so long, he forgot to belay and had to rapidly pull on his end of the rope to the point where the unicorn’s end of the rope extended back up again.
“Uh” in a nervous panic, Gallus suddenly spotted a blue boulder partially obscured by Cliffhanger’s thigh. “Put your right hind hoof on the boulder by your knee” Gallus advised hastily.
Cliffhanger paused, took a moment to catch his breath, and then looked down. Sure enough, there was a blue boulder by his knee. He stepped onto the boulder and pushed upwards, now he could finally hook his forehoof onto the red one.: “Got it!”
With a sigh of relief, Gallus could keep the conversation going, just if he kept his eyes on Cliffhanger. “So, you’re not worried about the other things Whipper said, like being far away from home?” he asked.
“Nah, being far away from home is part of the job,” acknowledged Cliffhanger with a mild shrug. “Besides, Whipper must have been far away from home to be in the Chevaux Alpins, not to mention the language barrier, but he got through it.”
He made a point; Gallus remembered hearing Whipper talk about him and Fountain Blue being in that mountain regiment during the mountain trials in Griffonstone. Yet, Whipper sounded more like a pony closer to Ponyville than to the Prench regions, perhaps he had to move to a completely different part of Equestria to be where he is, he wouldn’t be the first.
“Not to mention, you’re far away from home to be here, and you’re doing well, right?” added Cliffhanger, although through his personal experience, he had his doubts.
“I guess…”
“So yeah, I’m gonna go for it.” Cliffhanger seemed determined more than ever. “Thanks, you’re a good listener.”
As Cliffhanger made the last few metres up, Gallus stopped what he was doing. After he heard the unicorn’s gratitude, there was a moment where Gallus expected something snide or patronising, something about him being a griffon. But there was nothing, it was a realisation that maybe Gallus could have made one more friend, it caused him to smile for the first time all day.
“You’re welcome.”
With a few victorious knocks on the roof, Cliffhanger had finally reached the top of the wall. “Okay, time to abseil. Ready?” asked Cliffhanger, turning back to his trusted climbing partner. Gallus nodded, holding the rope firmly to lower his friend down. Suddenly, today was a good day to be climbing.
The mountaineering club had dismissed for the day, Gallus hummed a tune to himself as he left the gym. Outside the sky was a dark grey and rain poured heavily onto the ground, a dreary sight for the ponies doing their afternoon drills, and yet Gallus’ face was glowing from today’s club.
Best of all, he had only one thing left to do, he still needed to talk to the couriers at the post office. Sure, his fur and feathers were getting wet, and it was late in the afternoon, but he remembered the opening times and it was still technically open.
He flew over to the front door of the office and placed his talons on the handle. Much to his disappointment, there was a rattle, but the door wouldn't open. “For real?” he exclaimed, his eyebrows knitted in annoyance that for the second time, the office was shut with no signage explaining why.
If the weather outside was dryer, Gallus could have waited for several more minutes, but his mood was starting to dampen. He made his way back to the main building, took cover from the rain, vigorously shook off the excess water from his blue fur coat, and made his way back to his dorm.
At the top, some of the pegasus cadets in his platoon had arrived before him, taking time to either clean their rooms or freshen up their uniforms. By the time Gallus arrived, there was roughly an hour or so before the last activity of the day and dinner, an hour set for personal study. However, Gallus just wanted to recharge his batteries while he could.
Before he could rest easy in his dorm room, he was greeted by a familiar amber pegasus pony. “Oh, hey Gallus. How was the climbing?” said his trusted roommate, brushing his fur with a towel draped around his neck.
“Hey Scythe, pretty good actually,” Gallus replied with an upbeat tone and friendly face, at least to try and regain the positivity he had moments prior. “How was the cross country?”
Scythe sighed and turned to the window, observing the splatter of water droplets trickling down from the rain outside. “It was wet…” he said in a soft dour voice, Gallus figured the pony had to run in the damp mud and needed to clean himself up afterwards. “I’m lucky I could have a shower before I go out…”
“You’re going?” questioned Gallus as he tilted his head, there was a whole hour where ponies could hang around in their room, so where was Scythe heading off to.
“Yeah, to see Major Babel?”
“Oh right, Yakyaki lessons,” said Gallus, lifting his head in realisation, he had been doing private tutoring on languages with Major Babel in his office for months. Gallus should have recalled it sooner. “Have fun, I’ll hold the fort.”
Scythe chuckled at the joke. “Daraa uulzii!” He told Gallus before making his way past and out the door.
“What?”
“Oh! Uh… see you later.”
Scythe disappeared, making his way down the corridor, and Gallus closed the door. Finally for the first time since before he woke up, Gallus had some peace, with only the sound of the rainfall tapping on the window as added ambience.
He grabbed one of his textbooks on pony history, he needed to get some revision done. He started to read through a chapter titled “Celestial Destiny” on the outward expansion of Equestria, it listed various years where tribes of ponies wished to make a new life and were granted bits and resources to help create settlements under the blessing of Princess Celestia.
Most of it was accelerated after ponies acquired a vast amount of land from various creatures, although the book left out which creatures specifically. Gallus tried to think about which, he seemed to recall Grandpa Gruff once saying King Grover sold land to ponies, but the specifics were muddled in his head.
He struggled to get his mind off the mail office being shut all day, it didn’t make sense. If anywhere could explain why Gallus wasn’t receiving his letters, it’d be them. They must have been making mistakes, couldn’t be anypony else. It’s not like what Yona was accusing his platoon of, they wouldn’t be stopping him from catching up on his friends like Ponyville… unless…
“No,” Gallus thought, violently shaking his head and jumping off his bed. That’d be ridiculous, none of them had any reason to sabotage his friendships. Lightning Dust wouldn’t risk it if the Royal Guard Academy was her last chance at doing the kind of flying she loved, nor would Pound Sterling considering her financially limited upbringing.
Nicknames would probably do it for a week at most as a joke, but not a joke stretched for several months. Besides, the only way any of his platoon to get a hold of Gallus’ letters would be to get into his room. That would leave Captain Westland, Staff Sergeant Razorwing, and Scythe Magnus.
Sure, Gallus wasn’t too bothered by Scythe’s secret heritage, but would that still make him trustworthy? “Yes, yes it would” Gallus affirmed himself, he had his parts of his life he’d rather keep to himself, and Scythe trusted him, Gallus should do the same. Not to mention, out of all the ponies who didn’t want to get caught, it’d be him.
Besides, even if he did do it, where would Scythe hide the letters? He couldn’t just throw them away, there aren’t many places where you could throw out unopened envelopes. Scythe could hide it behind the wardrobe, Gallus figured it wouldn’t hurt just to check, it’s a dark and small area that neither of the commanders would look in during inspections.
It’s not like hiding stuff back there was completely out there, Gallus remembered he used to hide that old antique plaque that Grandpa Gruff sent him, he looked behind the wardrobe and found it to be empty, not even letters. He checked the drawers and found clothing, but no letters. He checked the drawers of Scythe’s desk, and that’s when he stopped. Inside was Grandpa Gruff’s plaque.
He had forgotten about lending it to Scythe, the pegasus must have kept it in his desk to translate it like he agreed to do back in Hearth’s Warming. He looked at the plaque and saw the large, towering griffon and at the right angle, it appeared to stare back at him with a stern judging glare, guilting Gallus for sneaking around Scythe’s things.
Perhaps there was something about Grandpa Gruff saying to “never forget”. To get it out of his mind, Gallus returned to his textbook, to read further on the ponies' outward expansion. From shore to shore, ponies brought civilization to the savage lands, expanding out from City of Everfree., The ponies would settle in places from the northwest of Vanhoover, to the south of Appleloosa and east of Manehatten, simple settlements growing into bright shining cities of today thanks to the creativity of all three tribes.
One paragraph stood out when Gallus read through the story of Celestial Destiny: “Newly established settlements weren’t safe for years after their foundation, Dodge City and Appleloosa set up teams of Earth pony “Rangers” to ward off angry herds of Buffalo from running through the streets. Word would eventually reach the E.U.P. Guard who united, recruited, and trained the teams into the newly founded Southern Hoof Ranger Battalion to protect the civilians from the stampeding herds.”
Gallus scoffed, reading how some ponies were protecting their own from angry Buffalos, and getting rewarded for it. But that begged the question of why were those Buffalos angry in the first place? I mean, ponies didn’t live their first, did any of them check that the land they stood on was bought? He couldn’t blame the buffalos if ponies were to describe them as savages. It gave Gallus something to think about, something other than his letters.
Major Babel had an intense way of teaching languages, to him it wasn’t about just knowing how to say a certain phrase or sentence, there were also certain nuances of Yak culture that must be translated over as well.
Some Scythe picked up on quickly, Yaks don’t have words to distinguish a hut from a house, just as they don’t have words for the most ranks that pony military has, and pronouns are less common as Yaks are more direct about whom they are speaking about.
Along with learning how to speak and write Yakyaki, was how to translate not just consecutively but simultaneously. Major Babel taught Scythe how to write fast notes and wait for the optimal moment to interpret what was being spoken. Even with guidance, it was considerably challenging but useful. The Major said he’d hardly teach these skills because they were impractical in a class environment, so Scythe felt gratified that he got to try them out.
When the lesson was over, Scythe simpered but was mentally exhausted as he walked slowly back to the dorms. He’d like to go back to his bed and rest for a while, but time had other plans. As he finally got to his platoon’s corridor, cadets were departing from their bedrooms and making their way out, it was time for dinner.
Although amongst the crowd walking towards him, bunched up and impassable that Scythe had to flap his wings to go over them, he couldn’t see Gallus. He was halfway through the crowd when one of the cadets stopped him. “Yo! Mumbles!” called out Nicknames, causing Scythe’s teeth to grit, “It’s time for food, where are you going?”
“I’m just… looking for… Gallus…”
“What’s that Mumbles? I can’t hear you!” Scythe’s forehead creased as he stared back at Nickname’s dumbfounded face, he knew Nicknames could hear him, he tried to speak that time, and the corridor was mostly silent despite the congregation. “Whatever, if you see Bluebird, tell him to come down, nopony’s seen him for the last hour.” Without skipping a beat, Nicknames sprinted off to join the other cadets.
That left Scythe finally on his own to breathe, finally reaching his bedroom door. Turns out Gallus wasn’t that hard to find, the griffon was lying on his bed, his face covered by a textbook. One of his arms was hanging off the side of the bed, Scythe chuckled at the scene, relieved that he wasn’t the only one that was exhausted.
“Hey Gallus, I’m back” he declared in a raised voice, causing Gallus’ arm to jolt and his body returned to life. “Everypony else is heading to the mess hall, are you coming?”
“Yeah, I’m starving…” Gallus gravelly replied, picking up and throwing the textbook off his face and throwing it down to the side of the bed. As the griffon rolled himself back onto the floor, Scythe smiled and started to turn away from the door. “Oh, wait, remember that plaque I lent you? Did you figure out what it said?”
After a pause where Scythe looked at the ceiling to think, his muddled head suddenly clicked. “Oh yeah, I wrote it down.” Scythe quickly turned back into the bedroom and approached his desk, he pulled out one of the drawers and picked up the plaque with his hooves.
He revealed to Gallus that the plaque had a new addition to it, a folded sheet of paper held to the wooden back by a piece of tape. During the holidays, he borrowed an antique book on Grandpa Patton’s bookshelf on Griffish texts and spent a whole evening translating the glyphs on the plaque.
Gallus held the plaque and unfurled the paper and read what was inside. “Be filled with pride. Soar through the sky. Leave no Griffon behind.” Scythe was beaming as Gallus read it out, it might have been a short and simple sentence, but it was an accomplishment to write it out to something understandable to ponies.
In contrast, Gallus was irritated, and his claws clenched hard on the plaque. All that effort and the outcome was some generic griffon motto about pride, flying, and being together. It felt like Grandpa Gruff wanted to remind Gallus of what he is and what he should be doing. It was only when he looked up at Scythe’s glowing face that he was reminded of the effort that was put into helping him get this information.
“Thanks.”
He then placed the plaque gently on the surface of his desk, and two made their way out of the dorms. After a long day of classes, physical exercises, and frustration, it was the end of just another routine day at the E.U.P. Royal Guard Academy.
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Yeah something is fishy about this whole situation about the mail if somebody's trying to sabotage his friendship
I have a feeling the mail ponies are purposely locking Gallus out when they see him coming....
Mail theft is a serious crime
11190208
Or they've been ordered to by a certain Unicorn stallion who has not friendly to Gallus from day one.
11190222
I would agree 100%.
And if this is the case, I suspect the Provost of the Academy is about to find himself on the wrong side of the law.
11190242
I hope it's true. I would love to see him get what's coming for him after doing what he's done so far to Gallus.
11190246
So would I. Heck, I'd love to see Twilight march into his office with a pair of Guards and arrest the him.
But still a win, I think.
I really haven't been able to get a good bead on Razorwing. I'm getting the impression he doesn't so much resent Gallus's presence, but he does still seem to single out Gallus and hold him to a higher standard, yet I'm not sure it's with deliberate, or even conscious ill-intent. Heck, for all I know, it might be his way of assisting, so to speak, by pushing Gallus to not just meet the expected bar but rise above it.
Or it could really be he's just signaling out Gallus because he's the one griffon in the group.
But the fact I can't definitively say one way or the other about him is...well, I hesitate to say a "plus," but it does help to give Razorwing the benefit of the doubt, so that even if it IS the latter, I could still see him rising past it himself. I dunno, I guess we'll find out in due time.
Well, I can think of at least two that aren't being good soldiers then...but we'll not get into that right now.
Another win for the day! Not quite two for two, but still a plus nonetheless.
It nearly got repossessed by the griffons some centuries later because Equestria basically misplaced their receipt for the sale...but that's neither here nor there.
It just dawned on me--Manifest Destiny. You're referencing Manifest Destiny here. Dang, that's not very flattering for the Equestrians then, because Manifest Destiny was really just a glorified excuse to practice imperialism--by force, if necessary--and over the years I've found it to not actually have been a very praiseworthy ideal, so the thought Equestria went through a similar phase...
No. Manifest Destiny-like ideals typically didn't bother with such "trivial" details if it meant an inconvenience towards furthering their nation's unrestricted expansion.
Huh. Kinda rhymes. Which is mildly interesting, considering this is the Ponish (English) translation of it, not as it's written in its original Griffon, so I'd assume it'd have to be a coincidence.
In any case, Gruff's intended message to Gallus behind it seems clear--don't forget about land and creatures you're part of/grew up as. And I get Gruff's intent behind it, totally, but...I can also see why it might rub Gallus the wrong way, seeing there are things about that he'd rather put behind him.
But I suspect Gruff means it on a deeper level than that anyway...again, time will tell.
11190242
I made a comment some chapters back that the route that guy's taking is only going to get him fired from his job, so I guess he really just wants to loose it that badly.
You know that's actually kind of cool I really like that something refreshing after gallus has been having
11190248
Agreed!
11190255
Oh yes, at the very least he'll lose his job.
But he's also the head of a military academy, and has committed a crime against one of his cadets. In a real life military he'd be on a course for a court marshal, then likely a stripping of rank and pension before a dishonorable discharge.
Well it looks like things are pretty good so far Gallus and the other Cadets are preparing for their daily activities but he was called by one of his Sergeant's to talk about how has he been doing and he's been wondering about the the mail carrier and it's been really bugging him for a long time because he knows that he's been sending his letters to his friends but they said they never received them or he never received from his friends again there is something going on and it doesn't help that the mail office is closed you want to call it suspicious but anyway he went to his climbing activities and he meet one of the cadets name cliffhanger and it turns out he was a pretty cool guy and he's been wondering about the other two ponies the ones who was in charge of the climbing Expedition I mean yeah they are acting a little suspicious but I don't know a little bit too soon but after that he went to the mail office and once again it's so close I wonder what is up this is getting really suspicious but anyway he decided to rest up for the day until dinner is coming and Scythe translated the language of the Griffins even though Gallus care less about it he showed appreciation that he did it for him but still there is something going on with the mail office and it's somebody trying to sabotage his friendship with his friends I guess we'll find out next time because it's driving me insane right now
11190208
11190222
11190212
Yeah it's driving me insane who could have done it just to sabotage his relationship with his friends
11190280
We all know who it is, but it can't confirmed until the next chapter comes out. Or the one after that. We will just have to wait and see.
this chapter was ok
neat to see some of the behind-the-scenes stuff with Scythe's lessons
but the A-plot of the mail office business, that has the irritating reek of The Conspiracy(tm) about it
mother of fucking christ, there's a reason the show had only two episodes with Neighsay, and that reason is that bigot characters are fucking irritating in interest-destroying ways
and you've gone and given us a whole-ass cabal of such characters as our main antagonists
11190249
I was quite pleased with this being brought up, I contributed a bit to the whole bringing civilization to the land thing. Really this shouldn't be much of a surprise, after all, Equestria was formed after the three tribes hating each other nearly doomed their race. When you can't hate on each other, you just have to go find someone else to hate, no?
11190212
Only if it is mail theft. Keep in mind that if'n this were the US, as far as I know, once delivered to a facility's mail room (think college, large corporation, etc), it stops being mail as it's been delivered to the recipient (think care off <facility>). For outbound, I'm not sure what the rules would be, but much of the same rules are in place. So this is just general theft at best assuming you can prove that it was intentionally not delivered, or that it was destroyed.
someone / pony is messing with the male.
Gallus still has a ways to go to under just what Grandpa Gruff is trying to tell him.
a grate chapter for a amazing story.
11190911
You're probably right, but I guess I just liked to think that was one area Equestria had managed to stay mostly above, considering they have such a reputation even with outsiders for being particularly friendly with all.
11190938
I'd almost say to keep that typo, as I find the implications rather amusing.
11191084
Personally I like the more realistic direction of ponies having to learn to be friends with everyone, I mean in a way it explains why Twilight is the first Princess of Friendship, ponies have arrived at the end of a long journey.
11191131
No, I agree, I just also think you could've conveyed that same point without going into unsavory directions like Manifest Destiny and all that--just because they're already naturally friendly doesn't mean there isn't still plenty more to learn about it along the way.
But honestly, though, I don't know why it stands out so much to me to begin with, because I do have to admit, were it me writing it...I'd probably toy going the same direction too, if just for stressing the point.
11191133
I think because it's so glossed over. Consider the original Hearth's Warming story, everybody became friends and lived happily ever after. Seems too easy, too simple, too clean, the truth is rarely so clean, and we all know it.
11191084
what makes you think that is a typo?
11191208
11191133
So what Javarod said about his contributions is correct, but to answer anyone asking, yes the Manifest Destiny reference was intentional when I wrote it. What actually inspired me was a comic from QueenCold's Dragon Lands headcanon, where (former) Dragon Lord Torch explains his disdain for ponies:
Considering how in official maps Equestria is seen as much larger than other countries, non-ponies have had issues with ponies using their land without permission or compromise, and ponies seeming to travel to other nations freely because a magical entity told them to solve a problem (there are too many examples) then yeah, the parallels are there. Even if ponies kept their best hoof forward, I feel that non-ponies don't exactly feel that ponies on a whole are as friendly as ponies think they do, otherwise, ponies would have been more inclusive before Twilight came along.
Loooved this chapter!
Can't wait for more!