Griffonstone has seen better days. Rainbow Dash wants to do what she can to help her hometown, but what can one griffon do in the face of centuries of turmoil? Especially when everyone writes off her off as a joke...
But when she feels a mysterious pull to an old mineshaft, everything changes... Suddenly, the fate of all of Griffonstone rests in her talons.
A story in the Noodleverse series, a species swap AU shared by myself and Pasu-Chan. This is the first story in the Harmony's Chosen arc, making it the best place to start!
Also available as an audiobook by Nailah!
Many thanks go out to proofreaders: Pasu-Chan, Eddie Grammar, bats, ArchAngelsWings, Krixwell, and Hoofclid.
Special thanks to thedarkprep for figuring out how to improve the ending.
Cover art by Pasu-Chan.
I don't want to get into a fight with Fluttershy over the distinction between sticks and branches, especially after she was gracious enough to specify that she would only use fallen branches. But I would say that it reads a little better as...
rocks, leaves, and a few fallen branches
(Or maybe 'SOME fallen branches' to make up for the lack of branchless sticks)
There is just something inescapably whimsical about levitating leaves. In fact I would go as far as to say it is the most whimsical thing ever. Fight me.
Oh yeah, the story. So I among my favourite things to read in mlp fanfics are, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash being friends, origin stories, and new Krickis fics. So I'm absolutely biased, but this was great.
12 year old Rainbow Dash with her shaky, yet super arrogant logic, not trusting friendship, stealing food she can't eat, is fun and a good stating point. I notice Gilda is a tagged character so I'm hoping that they can team up and spread the magic of friendship (unlike the actual show where they said they would, but never did).
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lol you are right about the sticks/branches distinction. That's a relic of editing the chapter, in which I had originally written logs instead of branches, and it was pointed out to me by a more nature-savvy reader that logs aren't actually used to start fires in the wild (when camping in editors experience; she's into camping and has started fires from found materials whereas I have not). So I replaced logs with branches and didn't take note of the surrounding context
And as usual, you flatter me too much. I'm very happy you enjoyed this, and hope you will enjoy the rest in due time!
👀
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Gilda trying to set up a coup?
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Not exactly a coup when no one's in charge, but she's certainly trying to do something here!
On the upside, that'd at least be quicker than starving to death.
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Indeed it would be. Count your blessings, Rainbow Dash!
That was a typo.
11423228
lol Rainbow pulling a Grunkle Stan but with the goal of teaching kindness would be amusing
This story is really quite something. i feel flattered to be able to give it an audio. i adore the characterization of Rainbow especially, keeping her her, but giving her a more unique character.
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Thank you so much, both for the compliment and for the reading! I'm glad you enjoy Rainbow, she's fun to work with.
This chapter was amazing, the vivid details from the city of Griffonstone, to the characterization of both Rainbow and Gilda is absolutely top notch. I am truly enjoying this gem of a story and am looking forward to more. Keep being awesome.
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Thank you so much! I'm really glad it all came through well
Bah gawd, Igneous is a BEAST
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Haha yeah he is, dude is not someone to mess with for sure!
And this matters to you because...?
No seriously, Rainbow. Just a little while ago you were saying you didn't want the leadership spot, and while you didn't know what it was at the time, you didn't particularly want the idol either. You can't claim Gilda went and tricked you when you practically shoved it into her talons before she could explain anything and refused to let her get a word in edgewise out of your own ignorance and not Gilda's. I mean, if Gilda hadn't attempted at all to explain what it was you had there and instead pretended she knew nothing of its significance from the start, then I'd be right there with you. But she did. And you actively stopped her from doing so. So don't pretend there's not an element of "well, I tried, but if that's how you want it" here on Gilda's part.
Further, at the same time as all the rest of this, you told Gilda you wouldn't stop her from trying to put herself up as leader of Griffonstone, you just wanted to be left out of it. And she's still doing exactly that. In fact, from her perspective, you'd effectively given her the okay to do all of this by consciously passing up the chance yourself. Just because you didn't stop to think she might actually succeed won't change that, nor that you'd shot yourself in your own foot ignoring Gilda's very clear attempts to convey that the thing you had was, in fact, extremely important, doesn't mean you don't at least share some of the blame for this yourself.
Really, other than claiming the credit for herself--and even that's not really the worst case of of that I've ever seen--Gilda's not really done anything wrong here (at least...not yet), not when Rainbow, out of her own ignorance and not Gilda's, was the one who shoved it into her talons and refused to let her explain what it was. And she'll use that fact against you when you try and protest it, Rainbow. In short, you kinda brought this on yourself.
I get Rainbow feels a little cheated, but not only was that more her own fault than Gilda's, she also doesn't really have that much of an argument to stand on to undo it because of it. Hence, of course, the plan to steal it back, but that's probably only going to dig her even deeper into the hole she's found herself in. In fact, I suspect the real issue here is that Gilda's appearing to succeed at something Rainbow's been trying to do herself for years without success...and she's both a bit miffed about that as well a tad jealous...which really isn't in line with the kindness she wants to be spreading around, so perhaps the real morale of all this is that she has more to learn on the subject after all? Eh, we'll see.
In any case, I suspect this isn't going to go as smoothly as Gilda envisioned it, so that'll probably be Rainbow's chance to set the record straight. Not that she should really need the idol at all to get Gilda's position herself anyway--who is declared king or queen shouldn't be whoever's holding the shiny object, it should be who's best for the job as the most effective leader.
The irony here is that Rainbow isn't quite telling the whole story here either--she's just telling the one she wants griffons to know, just like Gilda is. If they knew the whole tale of how Rainbow had pretty much voluntarily given up the idol, even when Gilda tried to explain to her just what it was she had, this would probably be going differently.
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Well, you're certainly not wrong. It's almost like Gilda as the antagonist is maybe not really what this story is about
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I thought you might say that.
Oh rainbow you hothead
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She is not the smartest lmao
Ehhh....do they, though? The more I think about this, the more I think Rainbow's overlooking (deliberately or otherwise) a rather important detail in all of this, and she's going to live to regret it.
Admittedly, that does sound like a typical Rainbow Dash kind of plan.
You didn't even try!
Personally, I am predicting all of the regrets.
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Without saying two much, there are two chapters left, so we'll see Rainbow's response very soon
Aside from that, thanks for reading and commenting. I'm not at a place where I'll get discouraged if I don't get comments, but there haven't been a ton of commenters on this one, and I appreciate you commenting on most every chapter
Griffon Pinkie is cute.
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Isn't she though
You repeated the first couple of paragraphs at the beginning. Just letting you know.
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Huh, wonder how that happened. Thanks for letting me know, I'll go fix it!
Many cute picture heck.
Glad to see she figured out that feeling <3
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Gotta learn how to be the element of loyalty sometime lol
Wow, it's actually kinda impressive how much Rainbow messed up.
Well, I don't know, that last part still remains to be seen. Part of how Gilda handles this particular situation moving forward should help determine that.
Yeeeeaaaaaah...about that...
See, this is why you should've talked with her before going and trying to steal anything.
Yeah, I wondered that too. It'd probably solve at least a few of Gilda's problems doing so. She probably wouldn't have helped her friendship with Rainbow any in the process, but...if she's really that determined to be that strong leader, then...she can't really have that standing in the way of resolving her problems.
Well, no, she didn't even try to do that, really, not until Rainbow was already going to her, which was silly because, like the idol, Gilda knew exactly where Rainbow was. If she really wanted to talk with her about it, then why delay doing so for as long as she did?
Basically, I think mistakes were made all around here.
Eh, so long as they learn from them, though.
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It really is, she done goofed big this time
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I'm gonna level with you and say that the reason Gilda didn't go to Rainbow's house to speak with her is quite simply because I, for whatever reason, did not think to have her do that. I dunno that I would've had her do that, but I would've at last given a reason why she didn't. Maybe say she was on her way there and ran into Rainbow along the way, or that she had gone there and was coming back from the Rainbow-less house when she saw RD. Idk, but lmao I'm the dumb one here
Awesome 🤩
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Glad you're enjoying it! Almost at the end now
Awesome😊
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Thank you, glad you liked the story!
Very nice. Sad they had to get kicked out I'm sure they will be welcomed back after they save the world ya?
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I imagine they will be yeah, hard to keep up a ban when the people become heroes lol
This story was definitely interesting, and I like the premise of the conflict, but I feel like things were done in a way that makes everything overly straightforward and drawn out, so it was hard for me to really connect with it.
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That's fair, thank you for giving it a chance all the same
Aw, it's already over? Welp, at least I don't have to wait for the sequel.
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Yeah not a terribly long fic this time. The sequel is a little longer at least. Glad you enjoyed the ride enough to want more!
I'm not good at giving indepth feedback on something even if I'd like to, so I'll keep it short.
I really enjoyed reading this story! It was a lot of fun to read through this alternate take on things, and I'm real hopeful to see more stories made for this AU!
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Always good to see this AU getting some love!
Thank you! I've very glad you enjoyed the story, and since I saw you favorited it, I assume you enjoyed or are enjoying the next story as well
You know, it's funny. Gilda tried to tell Rainbow what that thing was -- twice. Rainbow just didn't want a history lesson, though...
And then later-
And earlier, she had also said that she didn't care about Gilda's bid for queen hood, just as long as she got left out of it. Seems like Gilda's just... honoring that request, really.
Now, Gilda's version of the story is certainly... creatively interpreted, but she's definitely not the only party here twisting the truth for her own benefit.
11597744
This is very true! We'll get more between these two later, but the key thing here is that this is a pre-canon Rainbow who has not learned many lessons yet. I'll let Gilda explain her side when she gets to it haha
Hmm, making big assumptions here. If I were feeling uncharitable, I might say that Rainbow's just mad that she wasn't the one improving things -- but, while I do think that there's a bit of that, the larger part of it is more likely to be that she's letting her grudge cloud her view of things. She's mad, so she's leaning towards the worst possible ways to interpret things because that makes it easier to stay mad. Can't say I haven't been there.
Oh ho?
Swallowing one's pride is never easy. For Rainbow, it's an especially onerous task.
And would you look at that -- might it be that the problem was that Rainbow was trying to work through the wrong Element?
A lovely story! I enjoyed this a lot.