The Road to Who We Are

by hamishwarfare

Chapter. 1 – Making Friends

Chapter. 1 – Making Friends

The wind was blustery, but the sky was crystal clear and as blue as could be. The air, while warm, held a nip that would strike when a pony wasn’t looking. Certainly fall was underway; the leaves were striking in their colours, but not yet willing to leave their trees.

The sound of childish laughter travelled with the nippy air; enticing a smile from anypony who heard the noise of children happily playing and having fun.

But if one were to listen a little harder, they would find that not all of what they heard was pleasant.

On the border of an industrial estate was a large stone building, boxy in shape with a large black iron fence surrounding the structure along with a grass covered courtyard. The yard itself held the odd piece of playground equipment – such as a worn and rusting round about, or a clearly questionable set of monkey bars – and using all this space and furniture were equally dishevelled children.

Young colts and fillies of the three tribes were running around and playing with each other; and while their smiles were bright, the eyes were not quite as shining. For these children were of the lost and forgotten. These children were orphans.

The grounds were, while maintained, in poor condition; the building itself was clearly old and refurbished into what it is today. Red bricks stained with decades of life made up the walls; with many large multi panelled windows placed in rows to break up the otherwise featureless wall. Several had single missing panes; a few were completely covered in wood.

The roof allowed the building to stand out a little; it was steeply peaked and slate grey, with small jutting out stone dormers and several large chimneystacks each containing a dozen pots.

Life at RC Orphanage was a tough life, but there were three square meals a day, and the building was large enough to allow shared bedrooms, rather than dormitory living. Individual items, on the other hoof, were a very rare commodity; and like anywhere were the children outnumber the adults by a significant margin, there is a bullying problem.

“HEY, GIVE THAT BACK!”

“Oh yeah? What you gonna do if I don’t? Huh?”

Following the edge of the red bricked building the grassy courtyard leads to a small outcrop of fruit trees. The children are not supposed to be playing around them; but the pegasi children enjoy the height, others like the shade, and of course, rule breakers like the seclusion.

A large earth pony colt can be found holding a book out of reach of a much younger looking unicorn filly. She attempts to jump for it a few time, but each time the bigger colt ensures her prize is just out of reach. Standing off to the side are another two earth ponies; both smaller than their ring leader, but sniggering and jeering at the distress of the young filly.

“Come on then, use your magic. Use that superior unicorn magic of yours. Cause there’s no way you’re reaching it and I sure ain’t giving it back.”

The purple furred filly scrunched her face in concentration, narrowing and focusing her eyes on the stolen object, but all she managed were a few sparks out of her horn.

The three colts around her just laughed at her all the harder upon seeing her attempt. “That the best you could do? Well I think this book’s doing you more harm than good. I best take it away from you.”

The filly tried at reach the book once again, and almost got a hold of it; but in retaliation the canary yellow colt pushed her to the ground with noticeable force.

The colt then exaggeratingly opened the book and flipped through the pages at random. “What even is this? There ain’t no pictures and the writings small. No wonder this thing was doing you no good.” He smiled evilly down at the floored unicorn, “I don’t think it’ll do me any good either.” Then without hesitation he dropped it, pages down, onto the damp grass from the rainstorm the previous night. “Oops.”

The dark mane’d filly reached out to the book, still hoping to save the piece of literature. Her hoof was within touching distance from her prize when the bully struck again, slamming his foot onto the book and narrowly missing the smaller hoof.

“HEY!” Before the yellow colt could start grinding the book into the ground a shout came from the corner of their home, causing all four of the ponies to look over.

The shout came from a pegasus filly, fur sky blue in colour with a long dishevelled rainbow mane. She spread her larger than average wings and launched herself toward the group, arriving within a fraction of a second.

“Why don’t you pick on someone your own size, huh?” the pegasus said as she came right up to the bully and stared at him, eye to eye.

The colt blinked and took a step back, removing his foot from the defenceless paperback. “Buzz of and mind your own business, air head!”

“Hah, that’s rich coming from you; or are you too dumb to realise that I’m in your class, Custard Cream?”

The colt flinched at the mention of his name, but still held his ground. “And? What so good about that? Just cause you’re in the lowest class of the year with me, you think that’s worth bragging about? At least I’m not a ten year old blank flank, like you!”

The pegasus rolled her eyes at his attempt at a snipe back, “I’m eight, moron!”

This caused the opposite effect than the pegasus wanted, “HA! Your eight years old? Tell that to someone a bit more gullible. Everypony knows that Pegasuses are the shortest of the tribes; you gotta be eleven or twelve at least!”

She snorted back, “yeah? Guess what else everypony knows? Pegasi also have some of the meanest right hooks of all the tribes. We’re built for speed, so we’re nothing but muscle. You? You look like you’ve been sneaking into the kitchens every night for a year.”

That seemed to hit a nerve as the earth pony, Custard Cream, launched his left hoof aiming for his opponents face. The swing went wide over her head as the pegasus ducked down, before she used her own forehooves to push the earth pony away.

He rolled head over tail from the single strong shove before being stopped by the hooves of his fellow earth ponies.

When the hooves finished helping Custard Cream up he batted them away, before he faced his opponent once more. Now away from those piercing magenta eyes, he saw something strange in the chest fur of the pegasus. Between the blue strands was the sparkle of a red gem no larger than a single bit, buried and resting flush with her skin.

This is what clicked within the bullies mind; this is what told him who this pegasus was.

It must have been clear to everypony there when the bit dropped, “I see you actually do know who I am?”

“Yeah, I’ve heard of you, Rainbow. You and that other freak with a gem in her chest; going against your tribes and claiming to be sisters.”

Rainbow’s eyes flashed and her mouth pulled back into a snarl. “We are sisters.”

Custard Cream smirked, he found her weakness. “Oh yeah, the stories are all coming back to me now. The two freaks found near some Podunk town in the middle of nowhere. The crazy idiots who won’t be separated. The two stupid losers who would rather be together in this pit than be adopted.”

“Don’t call us that.”

“But then it’s no wonder, I mean really who would want two blank flank freaks and all the freaky stuff that happens around you two. Especially that fake sister of yours.”

“Don’t you dare!”

His smirk grew predatory. “Yeah, I heard she’s a real piece of work, a walking bomb. Always–”

“THAT’S IT!” Rainbow spread her large wings out and attempted to strike out at the bullies. Unfortunately she underestimated how wet the grass was and slipped, face planting into the dirt.

The three earth ponies laughed as they ran off, back around the building and out of sight. The enraged filly was about to fly after them when something stayed her hoof. She felt the present of an invisible hoof resting on her shoulder; it was familiar, comforting and help her calm down.

Rainbow took a deep breath in before slowly letting out both the breath and along with it, her anger.

“Are you ok?” Rainbow turned to face the smaller filly; she was still on the ground but had retrieved her book and was currently looking over it in distress.

She flinched and backed away a little however when she realised that she now had the undivided attention of the pegasus. Rainbow saw this and couldn’t help but feel a little sad at the reaction. “Hey, I’m not going to hurt you or anything.” She noticed the poor condition of the book. “Is it going to be ok?”

The purple filly looked again at her saviour and, while not completely reassured, felt like indeed she was not in any danger. “It’s not mine. I borrowed it from the library.” Her voice was soft and defeated, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. “I’m going to get banned for this.”

“Hey now, I’m sure it’s not that bad.” She caught a glimps of a few pages sticking out in such a way to clearly state they’ve been badly ripped; her reassuring smile faltered a bit at the sight, though it reset itself.

“Hey, I bet my sister could help you out.”

“Sniff, really?” A spark of hope filtered through the unicorns eyes as she looked up at the taller pegasus. “Does she have any spare bits I can use to fix this?”

“Rainbow!” Before the pegasus could respond the voice of her sister came from behind her. Running towards the two was another unicorn, lavender furred with a mane the colour of night and a single pink stripe going through it.

It took no time for her to reach the pegasus and the two nuzzled each other in greeting. The unicorn was the same height as the pegasus and her build was very similar, only being slightly less athletically developed than her apparent sister. But apart from a deep purple gem embedded within her own chest, there was nothing else that said these two ponies were sisters.

“Hey Twilight, I noticed Custard Cream picking on this filly so I came to help. But the damage was done and her books been damaged. Think you can fix it?”

The filly unicorn on the floor was confused at seeing the closeness of the two; but her eyes were fixed on the other unicorn. Her horn was a lot longer than was normal, already reaching the length of an adults horn, despite being about half their height.

“I think so. I’ve managed to get a hang of the Mend spell Miss Kind Heart has been showing me.” Her violet eyes moved to the filly on the ground, “May I see your book, please?”

Those eyes were full of kindness and had an aura of wanting to help, it was all but impossible for the youngest filly to do anything else but show this Twilight unicorn the damaged book.

“Hmm, some water damage and a few ripped pages; though not completely torn out.” The kind smile turned into one of confidence, “Yeah I can fix this; if you could hold it still.” Her eyes narrowed and her tongue stuck out in concentration as she focused.

There was a moment of silence were nothing happened; and it stretched to almost uncomfortable levels, before Twilights horn glowed in a Raspberry coloured magical aura. The magic enveloped the book and with slow deliberation the hanging pages pulled themselves back into the book, before the darkened wet stains began to fade. It took a few minutes, but eventually the precious treasure was as good as new.

With the spell complete the bigger unicorn stumbled back a pace or two as she let out a tired sigh. The pegasus called Rainbow was by her side in a moment, a wing over her back and helping to support her sister.

“I knew you could help.”

“Heh, I’m glad I could. Rainbow, I felt you getting angry; is everything alright?”

“Just that bozo getting under my skin a little; nothing I couldn’t–”

“THANK YOU!” Their conversation was stopped by a small pale purple missile slamming into the two. “THANKYOU, THANKYOU, THANKYOU!”

“Heh, sounds like she enjoys books almost as much as you do.”

Twilight smirked at the pegasus, “Na it sounds like you when someone gives you a Daring Do novel.” She looked down at the younger filly “You’re very welcome. What’s your name anyway, I don’t think I’ve seem you around before?”

The smaller unicorn stepped back a pace or two and it was here that Twilight was able to get a full look at the filly. Her coat was a shade or two lighter in colour than her own, as well as the main colour in her mane. What separated the two, besides the height difference, was that instead of a pink stripe the other unicorn had a teal stripe in her mane. “My name is Starlight Glimmer. I’m seven years old and yeah, I’ve only recently arrived here since my last orphanage closed down.”

“Well my name is Twilight and this is my sister Rainbow. It’s nice to meet you Starlight Glimmer.”

“Umm…” Starlight started fidgeting with her forehooves, clearly fighting between being polite and asking a question.

“Ha, she’s like you when wanting to know something and can’t bring herself to ask.” Rainbow said as she lightly shouldered the standing unicorn. “Well go ahead, lets here the questions you’ve got. Let’s see if there are any we’ve not heard before.”

Twilight wilted slightly at Rainbows brashness, but couldn’t bring herself to disagree.

Starlight still looked a little nervous about asking, but the curiosity clearly got the better of her. “Are you two really eight years old?”

The two blinked in unison before Rainbow let out a small snigger, “not surprising. But wasn’t the first question I was expecting.”

Twilight rolled her eyes, “Yeah we’re both eight. According to nurse Kind Heart, when we were brought here she gave us a full check-up, including a spell to determine our age since we were too young to know.”

Starlight’s eyes were wide, “But you’re both so much bigger than me and I’m seven.”

At this the two shrugged their shoulders. “Dunno. We’ve always been big for our age.” Rainbow chimed in.

“Miss Kind Heart is too busy to look deeply into it, since she’s the only nurse here. We’re healthy and that’s all that matters to the rest of the caretakers.”

Starlight frowned in thought before her eyes landed on the other odd thing about the two. “Do you think it has anything to do with those gems in your chests?”

“Dunno again. We’ve always had these here, as long as we can remember. They can’t remove them and no spell Kind Heart has tried can even see them.”

The three fillies talked back and forth in the shade of the trees before the inevitable clang of a bell caused them to pause.

“Well, that’s play time over with for now; we better get inside.” Starlight said as she started to walk towards the corner.

“Hey Starlight, Uhh...” Rainbow hesitated and looked her sister, who nodded encouragingly. “Would you like to be friends?”

Starlight looked back at the two. “I dunno. I mean you both seem really nice; but won’t we get in trouble if we, yunno.”

Rainbow’s ears flattened as she heard the uncertainty in the fillies voice. “Its ok if you don’t wanna be friends with me. But can you at least be friends with Twilight?”

The pain was as clear as day to the youngest filly. The longing and sacrifice was just as obvious. It sparked something within young Starlight, an air of defiance to societies norms.

“Yes, I would like to be both of your friends.” The smile that radiated from Twilight was bright and the complete opposite to Rainbow’s look of shock and gobsmack.

“See Rainbow, sometimes you just gotta trust ponies. But anyway, we really better get inside; we’re already going to be late.”

The three friends ran off, the two larger ones keeping the pace set with their newest friend. The main doors were within reach and Rainbow glanced back to make sure Starlight was still there, when she noticed something that caused her to freeze in place.

“NO FAIR!”

Twilight and Starlight both skidded to a stop and watched with confusion as Rainbow pointed out what was wrong. “Starlight’s a year younger than us, but she’s got her Cutie Mark! Twi, how come we still don’t have ours?!”

Twilights head whipped around and her eyes froze at the sight of her new friends flank. Sure enough the image of a single purple star with a wavy teal trail escaping out of the top greeted her vision. Disbelief was quickly replaced by shock, before finally settling on a frown. One that was identical to the one found on the pegasi’s face.

Starlight giggled at her new friends antics, before dashing off ahead of them; not wanting to receive a detention. She giggled again as she caught joint grumblings on the wind as the slackers quickly caught up. For as large and intimidating as the two first appeared, they really were just a couple of fillies just like her.

---

“So how did you get your Cutie Mark, Starlight?”

It was after dinner time and the three new friends were working together as a part of the clean up crew; they were too young to be trusted cleaning dishes, but they were helping clean the tables of any stains from the meals of the day.

Starlight paused in her attempts to remove a particularly stubborn yellow stain to look over to her new friend Rainbow; her face a little hesitant. “My Cutie Mark? W-well it wasn’t quite as amazing as most everypony else’s stories.”

“Why? Was it something boring, or simple?” Twilight asked as she used her magic to manipulate a brush around the table Starlight was cleaning.

Starlight shook her head, “no not boring; almost the opposite actually.” While she said those words, her tone of voice told the two other fillies that it was also a bit of a sad story as well. “You see at my last orphanage, before it was closed down, I had a friend who got his Cutie Mark really early by reading books on magic theory. I was happy for him, and jealous, but then he started helping me try and find my Cutie Mark as well.” A small sad smile worked its way into Starlight’s face as she fell into memories from not too long ago. Before we got very far though, he managed to get adopted thanks to having his Cutie Mark at such a young age. So I tried even harder, reading all the time since we had so much in common; but nothing was working.”

Two warm bodies appeared on either side of her as she continued to stare at the recently cleaned tiles. “If it’s too sad, you don’t have to tell us.” Twilight’s soft voice said by her shoulder; but Starlight shook her head.

“I’m almost done, and this parts a bit cooler. So anyway I was in the park trying really really hard to learn magic when I blew up.” That was not what the two ponies beside her were expecting to hear.

“Blew up? But you’re here talking to us right now and I can’t see anything wrong with you at all.”

“My magic blew up, Rainbow; the ponies that helped me said it was a magic surge.” She shuddered, “I can still feel the surge of power, the taste of magic; it was brilliant, very scary but brilliant.

“Thankfully the guard and medics got to me quickly and saved me; and it was when I was being checked over that I saw I had my Cutie Mark. Giggle, I think I almost gave the medic looking after me a heart attack, I squealed so loud in surprise!” That got a laugh from her two friends beside her, and it help Starlight get past her earlier melancholy. “So yeah, that’s my Cutie Mark story.”

“That was cool; I just wish blowing up worked for us as well.” whatever Starlight was expecting to hear from her friend Rainbow, talking about blowing up was not what she was expecting.

“What do you mean blowing up isn’t working?”

Twilight gave Rainbow a sharp glare, causing Rainbow to flinch before returning it with apologetic eyes. Starlight noticed the byplay and was about to apologise, but Twilight shook her head, slowly. “You told us your story; I think its fair we tell you something about us.

“You see, its not just our size that’s weird about us; we’re also strong magically. Nurse Kind Heart thinks its thanks to our powerful magic cores that’s making us grow so big; but, when we get very upset or really excited we also blow up.”

“Yeah,” came Rainbow’s sombre agreement. “I don’t get it too bad, cause I’m a pegasus; I just have to not get too worked up with my emotions. But Twi here, she’s a unicorn like you; I bet you can imagine how often she’s missed judged her output of magic, or it spikes, and causes a problem.” Starlight shivered at the thought; while she hadn’t mentioned it in her tale, the area of the park she lost control in had clear scorch marks from where her magic arced. The epicentre even had a dip in it where grass and dirt used to be.

“Director Race Control has been very good to us; getting us help with controlling our emotions, and getting extra magic lessons for Twilight. But sometimes no matter how much we try, we slip up; but when that does happen we’ve been taught just what to do and we get to the kiln as fast as possible.”

“The kiln?” this was a part of the building Starfire had no recollection of; and she had just had a tour of the place a day or two ago.

It was Twilight who took up their talk; her voice was more upbeat, but the ghost of shame and worry could still heard if you listened carefully. “The RC Orphanage used to be an old pottery factory; it was abandoned for some time before Director Race Control changed it into an orphanage. Its why the north wing is off limits as well as some rooms here and there; they’re not being used and so are blocked off.

“Me and Rainbow share a room not far away from the closed off north wing, away from everypony else who sleep down in the south wing; because that’s where the big industrial kiln is. Like everypony else we’re not allowed to go there whenever we want; but whenever we feel ourselves beginning to, blow up, we head for the kiln.”

Starlight’s eyes widened with realisation and before Twilight could go on to tell her why, Starlight filled in the gap herself. “Oh I get it. A kiln is like a giant insulated oven; so you two go in there just before you lose control and once you’re in there you can calm down without causing too much damage.”

Twilight beamed, “exactly right!”

Rainbow, however, let out a moan, “Aww man, another egghead! How is it I get surrounded by ponies who’ll be happy to spend all day in the library!”

Twilight burst out laughing; the boulder of tension on her shoulders evaporating with each gulp of air. Starlight, however, was a little put off at the comment; until she noticed that Rainbow was giggling along with her sister. What little annoyance Starlight had at the comment disappeared when she too started to join in with the laughter.

Her new friends were certainly weird, and perhaps even a little dangerous to be around if their story is true. But then she found herself smiling more today than she had done since Sunburst got adopted.

It was good to have friends again.

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[Catpaw616]

“What even is this? There ain’t no pictures and the writings small.

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