Griffons and The Art of Hurrying Up To Wait

by Metemponychosis

Introduction

Hi! I’m Geordi. I’m a griffon, as you may have guessed by my original name that starts with a G… Anyways, I was born in a little town called Whitelake, some miles off of Griffonstone towards the greener pastures filled with cows and cow dung that is Greenleaf. Whitelake was sort of the purgatory between smelly country hell and smelly urban hell, but it was a nice enough city when you got used to it, small, friendly and out of the way.

I made beautiful scarves there, and I knew they were beautiful because even if our city was hot as if the sun had taken offense, cute griffon ladies came from Griffonstone to buy them!

And that was before Princess Celestia once stopped by my humble little shop and bought one when she visited. I don’t mean to brag, but, after that, Princess Luna visited too, and so did that big supermodel from Canterlot.

Little ol’ me was good at making pretty and artsy scarves and it would be false humbleness to say otherwise.

Well, I made them because I liked making scarves. I liked the art… Selecting the right fabric, tinting, finishing it. It paid for my bills, yes, but that was secondary. I was lucky enough to be born in a place where one could spend their entire lives surviving on the universal basic income and live off my hobby, if I was prepared make a few sacrifices.

It was nice enough, until then the economy went to the shitter.

Turned out some northerner dickhead decided that he should be king of the griffons, and the northerners agreed. Some noble bird called Gilad ‘The Lion’, for fuck’s sake… He was the governor for the northern griffonian territory, the Snow Mountains Hold, and I never saw the guy, but he messed up my life good!

Yeah, sure! Fuck our lives because you have the blue blood! Not even considering he threatened to split Griffonia from the Equestrian Confederation, the unified commonwealth of interdependent nations that made up our world under the wise guidance of Princess Celestia; making him king meant upturning the entire democratic process which endured for centuries since King Grover died.

The only thing I asked was WHY?!

Make no mistake, the griffon chancellor was a corrupt prick and everybody and their moms knew. But the government investigated itself and came to the conclusion that it had done nothing wrong. It took months before some pokehead in Canterlot blinked twice and went “Wait! That’s illegal!”

Shit hit the fan hard, but the powers that be always had to investigate the problem rather fixing it, and so griffons were stuck with a corrupt jerk nobody liked, and since news were actually meant to make you depressed so that you would buy more newspapers, they flooded the stands with news of more and more scandals and schemes every day. I didn’t know what worried me more: that they might be making those up to sell, or that they might be true!

Griffons took to public demonstrations of discontent that invariably turned the population against the local militias of the cities and if shit hadn’t hit the fan already, it did so again. Meanwhile, nobody did anything about the racist, xenophobic, isolationist pricks that wanted to put their governor as the new ruler of the griffon nation.

“At least he’s not Gail!” The angry political experts cried from their tables in the shitty bars, in between large gulps of beer.

Of course, the griffon representatives in the Hall of Friendship, Canterlot, started seeking a solution by angrily shouting at each other like five-years-old children and ‘The Mare’ went “Hur-dur… Griffons are entitled to choose their own leadership. Duuuuh…”

I hope she strangled herself on that stupid scarf.

Well, then, fine. Brilliant. Whatever. That was why the basic income was good. I could survive until that mess blew over, even if nobody cared for my scarves anymore.

Then the enlightened griffon Chancellor, the dumbass in charge aforementioned Gail Silkfeathers put his greasy paw on his beak and hummed to himself after eating another donut bought with the money he had stolen from the public coffers. “Ya, know? I don’t like the idea that they’re getting me out of my office. We actually need money to fight a war. No, not my money! Griffonia’s money! What is that? We don’t have any? Puh-lease!”

Public security? Gonna fight a war, bitch!

Public health? Take some vitamins, bud!

Public Schools? Why do poor griffons need education, anyways?

Public lighting? Pffff… That is why the sun and the moon are up there!

Homeless shelters? What homeless? I don’t see any!

Basic income? Caw caw caw caw! Just turned it all to muskets.

War economy, mobilizing the Griffonian Standing Army and propaganda. All that cost money. Lots and lots of shinny golden coins with Celestia’s dumb face on them the jerks that depended on him remaining were happy to give him.

To make things worse, that cunt in Mount Aris taxed to the high heavens everything that went to Griffonia because she didn’t like neither the Chancellor nor the jerk up in the north. Also, it didn’t help that the northerners shunned the hippogriffs and spoke… Let’s say ‘bad things’ about them at every chance.

To understand that it is important to understand the geography of the region. And also, how little forethought our leaders had in the past. Hippogriffia was the entryway for almost everything that came from the whole world except for Saddle Arabia and other griffonian cities. The large cargo ships needed the hefty infrastructure in Beachhome and that was a coastal city in the strait Griffonia shared with the hippogriffian nation. The Strait of Dove.

The thing was that they had to go through hippogriffian waters because in the south was a giant magical storm that sunk everything that got too close (no wonder the hippogriffs worshipped that thing), and to the north was the Frozen North. Yeah… It’s a little-known thing: the Frozen North is the whole north. All the way from the Crystal Empire to the northern lands of Griffonia and full of cold monsters that they said could chill your blood with a stare. And that was an important little detail.

That whole thing worked nicely with Her Royal Highness Princess Celestia (Hail Her Radiant Self) making sure that no one abused the whole thing.

But once Queen Novo decided that fuck the griffons, big food companies started buying all the poultry and fish coming from Beachhome and other griffon coastal towns because the northerners started hoarding all the game meat they used to sell. The fish coming from Mount Aris? So expensive you’d think the damn things were raised on Princess Skystar’s bath water!

So, not only griffons were out of education, homes, public services and healthcare, they were also running out of food and money to buy what food remained! Not to mention that the saddle arabians were scared mindless of the big bad griffon up in the north. Some stupid legend… I don’t know. The important thing was they shut every direct contact with anything that vaguely resembled a griffon.

And then, when things were about to derail out of control the ponies were busy with some dumb shit the two younger princesses worked up and the world abandoned Griffonia like it was a ticking time-bomb about to blow. Which it fucking was because everyone had abandoned it to its own fate!

Not surprisingly, nobody had money to waste on pretty scarves anymore. Bills went as high as Luna’s stars, and I had no means of income. I lost my home. Then I lost the paper box I was living in because the jerks in the local militia needed some poor bastard to lash out on. I didn’t even get angry at them, the situation being what it was.

Then, one day, while I sulked under the rain, came the recruiter with the nice green uniform and black cap.

“Hey, come fight for your country, citizen!”

“You mean, fight to save the Chancellor’s ass or to unfuck Griffonia?”

“Yes!” He said with a huge grin.

“Nah.” I closed the invisible flap of my invisible box.

“But we have food! Beds! Showers! All the stuff we stole from you and pretty ladies love a griffon in uniform! Eh? Eh?”

And that is how I joined the glorious Griffonian Standing Army!

Comments

[Heavy Weapons Guy]

Now that you mention it, it does seem like a lot of griffon names do start with G… I wonder if there’s a reason behind that- also looks like it’s civil war time

[fechlin]

Holy shit this is fantastic.

[Metemponychosis]

10910417
I believe that all canon griffons characters from the cartoon have names starting with G.
Of course I came up with a stupid reason, but that isn't on this story. It will come up eventually on PoP.

[Metemponychosis]

10910758
I'm glad you like it!