1 - Dangerous Individuals
Father stared at me coldly. Or maybe that was the frigid air around us; we were down in the Jägerwald, in the middle of winter. Dead trees poked at the sky above, and I fought to keep from shivering. Any sign of weakness would betray me; I fought to be strong, for once in my life.
“Why are we here?” Father’s question escaped in a breath of fog.
Because you dragged me here, would be the wrong thing to say. Instead, I looked around, trying to find a clue, something in the frigid terrain. There was nothing. It was cold. Wind blew in my eyes, and tears formed. “I... I don’t know.”
“No?” he smiled and took a step forward. Inside, I braced myself. “What is around us?”
I desperately looked around for an answer. What is it? I couldn’t find it. I was cold. “There’s nothing. Just us, and the forest.” I knew better than to lie.
“So there is nothing here for you to lose?”
The question was a trap. Still, I answered. I had to. “No... there is.”
Father smiled. “And what is that?”
I winced. Whatever I said, it would be taken from me. Be specific... I begged myself.
“Tsk... tsk...” I opened my eyes, and Father was shaking his head. “And here, our lesson was going so well. Up until your failure...” He let the word fall heavily. “Allow me to speak simply, then, so that you may understand: everything can be taken from you. And they will take everything from you...”
Lightning-fast, he grabbed me, we spun, and I landed chest-down in the sharp snow with Father on top of me, stretching out my left arm.
“N... no,” I stammered. It was futile.
“No, they won’t take everything from you, or no, you won’t let them?”
“I won’t let them!” I begged.
The world blurred in agony, but I knew he was grinning down at me. “Not if you let them see your weakness. That...”
His grip tightened.
“Will only end...”
Tighter.
“In pain.”
The wet snapping of my arm was drowned by shrill, loud ringing. My eyes shot open and reflexively, I threw out a punch. Instantly, the memory came back to life as pain burst up my arm.
“Scheisse!” I swore, shaking my hand. The pain faded after a few seconds, and I looked at the ruins of what used to be an alarm clock. With my slightly-less-maimed right hand, I scooped up the remains and threw them at the entrance of my cave. As they cleared the landing outside my cave, I shouted, “And rust in Hell!”
With that settled, I flexed my left fist a few times; it wasn’t broken, which was a small favor. My right hand was almost fully healed, but it was still a little tender from...
I pushed the thought out of my mind. I still felt bad for what I had done to Dash, but I’d have time to dwell on it during the hour-long flight to Farrington. Today was my first day of Farrington Guard training, and I didn’t want to be late. It had been three years since I crash-landed there, but for the first time, I actually had an obligation to that city.
Out on my landing, the sun wasn’t high enough in the sky for the day to be bright yet. I grumbled a few syllables, but I didn’t vocalize words; between the pain and the sound, my alarm clock had done a good job in waking me up. Once.
After a fish breakfast and a quick bath, I took off north for Farrington. The concept of running on a schedule wasn’t new to me, but it had been a few years since Junior Speedsters’. I guessed a schedule would be better than sitting around doing nothing all day; at least while I was in the middle of it, I really couldn’t complain. Part of me reveled in the simplicity of my mornings: first eat, then bathe, then go to the city.
Beneath me, the Jägerwald rushed past, and I wondered what the upcoming day might entail. Other than standing in a wall booth and walking around the city, I had no idea what Farrington guards did. Stop criminals? What were crimes in Equestria?
At that, I stopped mid-air, and my stomach dropped a few feet. What had I signed up for? Mentally, I slapped myself, but I didn’t need to. The full weight of my commitment hit me like a sack of bricks.
My first instinct was to turn and flee.
My Verbannungsprüfung only applied to griffin territories, but those were tiny compared to Equestria, let alone other countries. Heck, it’s not like anyone in Farrington knows where I live...
Suddenly and angrily, my logic returned. Coward, I scolded myself. The captain takes a chance on you, and you’re going to bail? I clenched my beak shut to stifle a yell; I was pathetic. Using that self-loathing as fuel, I forced myself onward to Farrington.
As I got closer to Farrington, my sense of dread grew. About fifty yards south of the gate, I hovered in place, looking for the a clock tower. I had heard it, several times in the city, but now I was on a schedule, I actually needed to know what time it was. I found it and read the hands: almost seven-fifty. I also saw that two of the guards along the top of the wall were taking interest in me, so I decided it would be a good time to land.
I walked the rest of the way to the arched gateway that the captain had told me to meet him at. Still uncertain about what the day would bring, I braced myself for the worst and sat down. Within a few minutes, I saw Captain Iron Bulwark turn a corner and start down the road toward me. When he saw me, he smiled and trotted faster.
The closer he got, the more and more nervous I became. Start small. Say “Good morning, sir,” I instructed myself.
The captain waved at me when he reached me. “Good morning, Cadet.”
“Sir morning!” I croaked. Damn!
At that, his smile broke into a burst of laughter. I fought to maintain eye contact and keep the embarrassment off my face. It was difficult to do when standing right in front of him; the captain was a good half-foot taller than I was without his black-maned helmet. He nodded at me and gave me a comforting smile. “I take it that you’re nervous for your first day?”
“I... yes.” It would’ve been dumb to lie at that point.
“Good,” he replied. “I have seen too many recruits who think that it’s acceptable to be more confident than they are competent.”
Well, at least there’s that, I consoled myself, and I felt a flicker of hope light in my chest.
“Anyway, we’ve got a long morning ahead of us, so if you don’t mind...” He turned and beckoned for me to follow him. “Let’s talk as we walk.”
I stood up and walked alongside him, even though I didn’t know exactly where we were headed.
“I won’t mince words, cadet,” he started. “Being a guard is hard work. And as a griffin, you will face an additional set of hardships during your time with us. Most of the other guards, at least, will only judge you by your own merits and deeds, but still: I can’t order the ones who won’t to stop feeling centuries’ worth of animosity.”
Great. I rolled my eyes. The captain was too wrapped up in his speech to notice.
“I don’t tell you this to excuse anyone’s actions to you; just as fair warning. That being said...” We turned and headed up the stairs to the Guard’s headquarters. On the landing in front of the door, he stopped and continued, “I expect you to deal with your peers both gracefully and tactfully. If you reciprocate their aggression, you’ll only serve to enforce their prejudices. On a personal note, you seem to do an adequate job of that already, or at least, I haven’t had any real complaints about you during the past few years.”
I wondered if that had anything to do with how little time I spent in Farrington; after a few months at the start of my exile, I had probably only spent a week’s worth of time in the city “during the past few years.”
Captain Bulwark opened the door for me, and I passed into the Guard’s headquarters. I looked around while I waited for the captain to catch up with me; the room was pretty much the same as it had been last week: empty, despite the benches on the wall and desk that stood in front of the back wall.
When he caught up to me, we started walking, and the captain continued, “At any rate, I should tell you: regardless of any preconceived notions of a guard’s duty, your main role as a Farrington guard will be to maintain order, not to stop crimes.”
I blurted out, “What’s the difference?”
We stopped, and Captain Bulwark turned to me with a small frown. “I suppose now is as good a time as any to bring this up: when with a superior officer, you will be required to hold a certain level of respect. You will address us as ‘sir’ or ‘ma’am,’ and you will wait until we are finished speaking to ask any relevant questions. Understood?”
His reprimand drained any confidence I might have been feeling. Then, for a split second, his attitude reminded me of my older brother. Gerard was also a pretentious bore that demanded everyone respect him.
Of course, I used to throw his cock-sure attitude back in his face at every available opportunity. Then he’d call me a “contemptible bitch,” I’d call him a “pretentious blowhard,” then he’d jump at me and we’d try to kill one another before Father intervened and beat both of us...
Ah, family...
As soon as I remembered Gerard, I noted several key differences between him and the captain. For starters, Captain Bulwark actually regarded me a certain level of dignity, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized why I should respect him: he had earned a position of authority, unlike my brother’s dubious honor of being one of the few males in my tribe.
“Yes,” I finally answered. As soon as I said it, I realized that what I had just been scolded for, so I added, “Sir.”
I caught a glimpse of pride from the captain before he started walking again. My pride returned a little, and I kept up with him as he continued speaking. “To answer your question, it’s a distinction that some ponies in this city don’t make at all. The criminals, at least, see the two as one and the same. But to stop a crime means that order has been lost. Restoring that balance is the role of the Guard that makes the headlines, but ultimately, it should only be a side effect of your true goal.”
We reached the door on the right-hand side of the back wall; once again, Captain Bulwark held it open for me. I entered into a stone hallway that smelled strongly of damp earth. It was still dark in there; between the weak morning sun and the windows on the left wall being tiny, not a lot of light got through. Across from the windows, the wall on the right had four doors set into it.
We walked deeper into the hallway, and the captain finished his point: “Unlike restoring order, maintaining order is difficult to observe. That is because order is the natural state of life in Farrington. What that means is that the most important part of your duties is to be a pillar of the community in such a way that you prevent crime.”
At the last door in the hallway, Captain Bulwark pulled a ring of keys off one of the belts that kept his armor on. As he unlocked the door, he continued, “Of course, your presence will intimidate others at first. It’s an unfortunate irony, but at first, you will probably cause more disturbances than you prevent.”
The captain paused while he opened the door. The room was full of racks that held weapons, armor, and other supplies: the armory of the Farrington Guard. We crossed the threshold and stayed on the left-hand side of the room, and I took the captain’s continued silence as an invitation to speak. “So... why have me as a guard?” I quickly added, “Sir?”
“Why indeed,” he mused aloud. He turned to me, and I had a hard time reading his expression. “Because I believe that in the end, things will work out for the better. Too many of Farrington’s citizens still live in fear of a griffin attack, even though it has been centuries since the last conflict that took place on Equestrian soil. Am I correct to assume that your ex-tribe has no intentions of such an assault in the future?” he asked.
It felt weird to have a pony talk to me about the Sharfkral, but I put those thoughts away. It wasn’t like I could talk to any griffins about my banishment, so I shook my head. “Sir... we took a huge loss of territory just so we could be left alone.” With a shrug, I finished, “No one really cares about ponies, unless you count passive bigotry.”
“Duly noted,” Captain Bulwark answered. “But anyway, if the ponies of Farrington actually get to see a griffin, instead of hearing horror stories, then I think that minds might be opened. I won’t be so naïve as to think I can end all hostilities, but perhaps I can marginally reduce the amount of hatred our races feel toward one another.”
I thought about it for a moment; in theory, the captain’s logic was sound, but in reality, I doubted that any Equestrian peace offering to the Sharfkral would be met with any sort of sincerity. Hell, I thought, thinking back to the pegasus wings nailed to the wall in my family’s cave, Father would literally kill the messenger.
“It’s a noble goal, sir,” I replied. “But I don’t think my tribe’s going to change its mind any time soon.”
Captain Bulwark shrugged. “Be that as it may, your actions in Farrington will come under the utmost level of scrutiny. I have faith in you...” His tone hardened. “But if you fail in your duties as a guard, those failures will be addressed—in the Farrington courts, if need be.”
My fear from earlier came right back to my stomach. Being a guard was a serious, real thing; if I screwed up badly enough, I could end up in prison.
“So then, Cadet Gilda,” the captain asked, “what will you do? Do you still want to go through with this, or do you want to quit while you still can?”
“That’s a loaded question, sir,” I countered. I didn’t like being led on like that.
“Touché.” He nodded at me. “But still: if you aren’t serious about seeing this through all the way, to the end... it would save everyone’s time if you left now, and no one would judge you for it.”
“How long is it before I can’t ‘quit while I still can?’” I asked, making air quotes with the fingers on my right hand. “I mean... I’m not going out there alone today, am I, sir?”
The captain laughed, and I had to hide the aggravation from my face. “I apologize if I’ve misled you, cadet, but no. All Farrington guards go through a training period where they learn the proper procedures of being a guard.” After a moment’s pause, he added, “As for a point of no return... you’re free to leave the Guard at any time, depending on the manner in which you do so. Generally, though, there are no ill consequences if you leave before taking your oath; for you, that would mean Saturday.”
Six days? I wondered. I had less than a week to make what could be the most important decision of my life, and so far, the only thing I knew about being a guard was that I had to call my bosses “sir” and that everything was harder for me because I was a griffin. “No offense, sir, but I dunno what I’m getting into. I won’t flake out over anything stupid, but I can’t make a promise about something I don’t know.”
Captain Bulwark looked at me as if I had just said something profound. “That’s... wise,” he admitted in an impressed tone. He shook his head lightly and changed the subject. “Well, then, let’s get you suited up.”
“What?” I blurted out. For the first time, I noticed we were standing right by a rack that held several suits of armor.
“The armor,” he said, rapping his hoof against his own breastplate, “is a traditional part of being a guard. That’s why we’re here, cadet. You’ll have to wear the armor during your training shifts, and on all of your permanent shifts—if you make it that far.”
He turned to the rack and started clinking through all the suits, one after another. For my part, I just stood there, stunned. I hadn’t thought about wearing armor, let alone armor meant for ponies. There was no way it was going to fit me properly. With a small shrug, I resigned, Might as well do it right.
“Ah-ha! Found it!” The captain pulled a suit off the rack and pointed to a rounded indent in the shoulder seam. “Wing holes!” he boasted, like it was the coolest thing ever. He held out the armor in one hoof and asked, “Do you want help your first time, or do you want to figure it out yourself?”
“I’ll get it,” I answered. I wasn’t sure how I felt about the armor—wing holes or no—but looking at it, it would be incredibly awkward for two individuals to try to get it on.
I took the armor from the captain and almost dropped it; it was incredibly heavy. Once I got over that, I undid the four buckles and put on the back part. It dug into my neck and squeezed my shoulder blades together, but at least the bases of my wings fit into the provided holes.
Slowly and surely, I brought the smaller front half of the armor up to my chest. It fit, or what counted as fitting. Then, I started the buckling. Fastening the back two straps made the armor tight; when I started on the front two, I immediately felt that my armor wasn’t going to be anything short of “painful.”
When I got the final buckle done, I looked up at the captain. He held out a helmet. The first time I tried it putting it on, one of the big feathers on my forehead got pushed down into my eye. The second time, I smoothed my head feathers to the left before putting the helmet on. I lost all of my peripheral vision, but at least my ear sockets weren’t covered by the helmet; if they were, I’d be partially blind and deaf..
I looked back at the captain again; this time, he gave me an approving nod. “It’s not as tight as it needs to be, but you definitely look like a Farrington guard. How does it feel?”
Not tight enough? Compared to what? “Like I’m being crushed, sir,” I answered, unconcerned with the strain that was in my voice.
He answered with an apologetic glance. “Eventually, I’ll look into getting something better-fitting. For now, it’s the best we can do. Just be thankful the Officers’ armor is more open than Sergeants’ or higher; I don’t think a fake tail would suit you.” I glanced at him, trying to figure out what he was talking about; then, I saw how the back of his armor covered his whole butt area, whereas mine stopped at the joints of my back legs.
Different armors aside, the captain said, “One more thing before we head out to the lobby, can you go—”
“Iron, are you insane? What the hell is this beast doing wearing guard’s armor?”
The livid voice came from the doorway of the armory. In order to see who it was, I had to turn all the way around, in short, heavy, clanking steps.
The captain cried out, “Lieutenant Starfall, good morning!” It sounded cheery and fake.
When I could finally see the doorway, there was a dark-blue pegasus standing in it. He was wearing silver armor, except the edges were all trimmed with gold. The main thing I noticed was his look of raw, burning hatred that focused directly on me. Then, turning to the captain, he brushed something off of his forehead and spat back, “Good morning, sir. Do you mind telling me what is going on with this... thing?” He gestured at me like he were trying to flick something gross off the end of his hoof.
My first instinct was to tackle the smug asshole. Then, I remembered the armor, and my job, and the captain’s words about “setting an example for my race.” Since I was crippled, outranked, and had to be honorable, the only thing I could do was seethe silently.
Captain Bulwark’s voice flecked with anger. “Starfall, that’s completely uncalled for. She’s one of your subordinate guards.”
Somehow, the lieutenant’s face got even more hateful as he turned to me, then glared back at the captain.
“No.”
I slowly turned my head so I could look between the captain and... the lieutenant; I wasn’t sure if he was my lieutenant. Silence fell hard on the room, and I felt exactly like I did the times that one of my other siblings had gotten in trouble.
Finally, Captain Bulwark spoke, “We’ll discuss this later.”
Lieutenant Starfall nodded. “Later indeed. And you...” He turned to me, and his face twitched a little while he picked his words out. “Stay out of my way,” he spat. Then, quickly and suddenly as he had shown up, he was gone.
I heard a sigh from my right, and the captain looked disappointed. “That could have gone better,” he said to me.
“It could have gone worse,” I mumbled absently, remembering how my armor had kept me from attacking him on impulse. I didn’t like being judged for what I was, but at the same time, it was something I was used to by now.
Something hit my back, right below my wing joints; instantly, I was flat—or as flat as the armor would allow; I couldn’t really bend my hind legs. Looking up and behind me, Captain Bulwark had wide eyes, but he pulled back his hoof from his congratulatory pat on my back. Smooth... I chided myself as I stood back up. At least you kept your tail down.
“Er... sorry,” he apologized, putting his hoof down. “But that’s the type of attitude you need to have about this sort of thing.” I nodded slightly, and he gestured over to a shelf on the back wall of the armory. “Grab a belt, and a baton, and... I’ll take you around for your first patrol.”
I walked over to the shelf where a dozen or so belts hung off hooks along the bottom. For belts, they were pretty plain; the important thing, I guessed, was that they each had several pouches and a length of thin rope hanging from them. I grabbed one, and there was a lip on my armor for it, so I got it in place easily enough.
Sitting on top of the shelf was a pile of six-inch metal tubes—batons. Each of them had a small, spherical tip on one end; on the other, fIatter end, they were branded with some strange lettering and the number thirty-seven. When I picked one up, the rounded tip was only about an inch away from my fist. What the hell is this for? Throwing?
The captain appeared on my left and picked up a tube of his own. “We got these because they’re less intimidating than the full-length truncheons. But...” He took a step backward, flicked the tube down, and it telescoped out to a much more useful length. “They pack about the same amount of punch. There’s more training that goes along with these, but most of it is focused on when to use them. I’m going to assume you can figure out which end to bludgeon criminals with?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Excellent,” he replied. “Then put it on your belt so we can get started with your patrol.”
* * *
Two hours later, I was starting to realize that the morning’s short, boring conversation with the captain was going to be the highlight of my day.
For starters, I wasn’t used to walking so much, let alone while wearing metal skin that was far too tight. Walking in Farrington was already crappy; I always had to bend my fingers back to avoid losing a talon in the cracks between the cobblestones. On top of that, both of my hands were recently injured: my right had a tender scab from early last week, and my left was still sore from punching a clock.
Additionally, I didn’t have the lung capacity to walk as fast as the captain wanted me to. I kept complaining, mentally, that griffins were better-suited for quick bursts of lethal energy, not endurance. Between hunts, most of our time was quiet and still. We weren’t lazy or anything, it was just that there was a clear relationship between energy and food: the more you exerted yourself, the more you needed to kill.
Ironically, I didn’t really care that everyone was staring harder than usual. That was because I was distracted by the pains of walking, and how I felt like I was being slowly chewed by a giant metal monster. No matter what I did, I was uncomfortable. I tried to take long, slow strides, but bits of skin, fur, and feathers kept getting caught in the seams between the plates. I tried taking shorter, faster steps, but that only succeeded in wearing me out quicker.
So, when Captain Bulwark slowed to a stop outside of a small restaurant around ten-thirty, it came as nothing short of a relief. “I suppose now is as good a time as any to go over ‘break policy.’ There’s no real set rules or limits for taking breaks, because you’ve got to complete a certain quota of circuits per hour...” he trailed off into a quiz.
I parroted his words from earlier. “It varies based on patrol, but this patrol’s quota is two per hour.”
He smiled and continued, “And since running for an entire circuit goes against protocol, we don’t really have to regulate if and when a pair of guards decides to take a short break.”
With a nod, I glanced at the restaurant we were apparently taking a break at. I knew it was a restaurant because of the wooden sign that hung above the door, but other than that, it looked like all the other businesses in the city: stone with small windows. The ponies’ houses in the Residential District were a little more decorative—they were wooden and painted whatever colors the owners wanted.
I looked back to the captain, and he was giving me an odd look. “So, then, ah...” he paused. “Do you need to go inside?”
“Need, sir?” I raised an eyebrow.
“That’s where the restrooms are,” he answered.
“Oh!” I realized what he was asking. “No. No.” Thankfully, it was true; I wasn’t looking forward to figuring out those ranges of motion that my armor would and wouldn’t allow.
“Well, then,” the captain looked at the restaurant’s door. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be brief.”
He stepped inside the restaurant, and again, I noted how his armor covered a lot more than mine did. With a shrug, I figured maybe I didn’t have it so bad in that regard. Anyway, I tried pushing that whole train of thought out of my mind, but the longer I stood there, alone, the more and more disturbing it got to think about what the captain was doing in there.
Then, from behind me, I heard a heavily-accented voice. “Well, well, well... what’ve we got ‘ere?”
The morning’s patrol had given me some practice, so I could turn around somewhat fluidly. When I did, I saw a sapphire-blue stallion with a bright red mane that bordered on “garish.” I didn’t catch his cutie mark, which was something I had to work on as a guard, but I did remember my manners. “Hi.”
He smiled, but the friendly gesture just made me feel a sense of dread for some reason. “‘Ello there, Officer...”
“I, uh, I’m not an officer yet,” I corrected him. Then I forced myself to stick out my hand. “But it’s Gilda.”
The red-maned stallion looked at my hand, then shook it. “It’s nice to meet you, not-yet-Officer Griffin.” I hid my annoyance as we broke out of the handshake; then, we just stared at each other for a few moments. “But where are my manners? I’m...” He tapped his hoof to his chest. “I’m the reason you’ve got a job right now, love.” He started walking in a circle around me, and I turned to keep my eye on him. “‘Course, when one o’ my associates told me that Bulwark’s got his own pet griffin, I thought he was having a laugh at first. But no, your captain, ‘e seems to think I’m something other than a legitimate business stallion... apparently enough to sic a Northerner on me.”
The more he spoke, the less I liked this guy. “Uh... what?” I didn’t know whether I was questioning his condescending tone or his crazy accusations.
He scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Open your pretty li’l eyes, love. No one hires someone for free, ‘specially not a guard. Your captain’s been harassing me for years, trying to catch me in the middle o’ something I’m not even remotely a part of. Now, ‘ere you are.” He widened his eyes and swept a hoof off into the distance. “A griffin! Captain Bullwark’s latest and greatest tool for puttin’ the screws to the citizenry.”
Behind me, the door to the restaurant flew open and a voice commanded, “Get away from her. Now.”
The red-maned stallion looked back behind me. “Well, well, well... speak of the Devil, eh?”
Captain Bulwark walked up beside me and continued, “You are now obstructing Guard operations. Leave. Now.”
“All right, all right.” The crazy guy waved a dismissive hoof. “I was on my way, anyway.” He turned and began walking away. Then, he looked back at me. “If you’re looking to be part o’ something tha’ respects you instead of just makin’ you a faceless tool, come up to the Artisan District later.” He kept walking after that, then he turned onto another street, and he was gone.
When I looked at the captain, he had his hoof on the hilt of his sword. He saw me looking, so he put his hoof down and muttered something about “half his assets.”
“Assets, sir?” I asked.
The captain shook his head. “Nothing of consequence, I suppose.”
He was still glaring off into the distance, after our weird visitor, so I asked, “Who was that?”
My question shook him out of his thoughts, and he grinned, slightly. “That, cadet, was a very dangerous individual.” I looked at the captain waiting for more of an explanation, and he looked back at me. “What did you two talk about?”
I shrugged. “Something about how you’re only hiring me because I’m a griffin so you can ‘put the screws to’ citizens.”
“And you didn’t believe him?” the captain sounded torn between relief and confusion.
I looked back at him. “The fun thing about getting talked down to by someone? Makes it really hard to take them seriously when they say they can help you. At least you’re real with me.” The captain raised an expectant eyebrow, so I concluded, “Sir.”
He nodded slightly. “I’d apologize for requiring formalities, but the chain of command is critical for the Guard to function.” He gestured off to the direction that the strange stallion had gone off in. “But anyway, we’ve got a patrol to continue.”
We both started walking, the captain continued his lecture about the chain of command, but that only made me think back to that morning, when the pegasus lieutenant had straight-up disobeyed the captain’s orders. He seemed to have something against me, too...
Captain Bulwark wrapped up his point and asked, “Any questions, cadet?”
For the first time that morning, I had one. “So, captain... am I going to meet any other dangerous individuals today?”
* * *
After lunch, Captain Bulwark took me back to the Guard’s headquarters to wait for Sergeant Justice, my sergeant and supervisor for the rest of the day.
The desk in the lobby was empty, except this time, there was a cute little sign that read, “Out to Lunch, Leave a Memo for Memo.” I glared at what I suspected was a pun, even though I didn’t get it.
Instead of dwelling on it, I went over to the right-hand side of the lobby to wait for Sergeant Justice. I wished I could sit on one of the low-lying benches, but mostly, I was glad to have a moment to collect my thoughts and take a break from walking.
My first impression of being a guard was that it was easy to learn, hard to do. The most I had to think about anything was going to be memorizing laws and Guard regulations for dealing with situations, but really, it was a lot of “act according to the situation.”
The hardest part for me, at least, was going to be the personal parts of the job: routine, reliability, and politeness. I hated having to be nice to assholes; it was one of the least-fair things that the captain had taught me about that morning. He had confidence in my self-restraint, or he said as much, which made me think it was doable. Similarly, I’d have to get another alarm clock before going home for the evening, but that was about all I needed to do to stick to a rigid schedule.
But routine—every day, being a guard for eight hours... it was physically taxing. I hated how exhausted it made me. My armor was heavy, unwieldy, and tight. Captain Bulwark assured me that once it was more certain that I was going to stick around with the Guard they’d work on getting something custom-forged for me. That just made it seem like I was stuck between a rock and another rock, and then they were tied around me with a strong length of chain...
Around two, the front door of the citadel opened, and an older, purple mare took one step, met my gaze, and called out, “Oh, very funny, Iron.” Her voice rang with a strange accent, and as she walked over to me she started muttering incoherently; the only word I caught was the end, when she breathed, “prick.”
Once in front of me, the pony—by her silver armor, I guessed she was my sergeant—looked me over from head to talon. Even though she was sizing me up, it felt refreshing to be eye-level with someone after being loomed over by Captain Bulwark all morning. Finally, my sergeant spoke up: “Griffin, huh?”
“Yep,” I answered.
She nodded, then shrugged, seeming to come to terms with the fact that she wasn’t getting a new pony underling. “The captain says you’re good, so that’s good by me. You ready to go, Hilda?”
I needed to correct her, but first, protocol. “Yes, ma’am,” I said, raising my hand as close to my head as I could for a salute. It couldn’t reach, so I just sort of held it out in the air in front of me.
My sergeant grimaced at the whole display. “No, no, no. I don’t care what the captain says, don’t ‘ma’am’ me all the time.” She looked at my hand. “And what the hell is that? A griffin salute?”
“I can’t reach my head,” I said flatly.
Apparently not taking my word for it, she grabbed my arm with a bright-purple hoof and rotated my shoulder joint a few times. I was amused enough to let her, but finally, she let me go and shook her head. “Iron’s on a comedy spree today, Hilda. I’ll be right back.”
She rushed through the door on the right side of the room, and two things went through my head:
First, I needed to get her calling me by my actual name. True, Father named me “Gilda,” but it was a hell of a lot better than “Hilda.”
Secondly, I wondered if she’d keep calling the captain by his first name to his face. For everything that I learned about the chain of command today, everything seemed to fall apart in practice.
A few moments later, she returned, carrying some straps in one hoof. She gave them to me and said, “Iron seems to have forgotten his own days as a private. Put these on.”
The straps looked like miniature belts, and I was confused for a moment; then it clicked. Four straps on my armor, four straps in my hand. I unbuckled my armor, then worked on putting the strap lengtheners on. When I finished, my armor was still uncomfortable, but it was loose enough where I could move—and breathe—again.
After a quick test of “sitting,” I stood up and nodded at my sergeant. “Thanks, m...uh, dude?”
She frowned with one eyebrow. “Try again, Cadet Hilda.”
“Thanks, Sergeant Justice,” I tried. It’s now or never. “But my name’s Gilda. With a ‘G.’”
That just made her roll her eyes. “Tell you what, ‘Gilda with a G,’ I’ll call you Gilda if you call me Sherry.”
“Works for me, Sherry,” I said.
She smiled and stuck a hoof out; I shook it.
“Anyway, Gilda, talk is boring. Let’s go outside, look for ass that needs kicking, and you can teach me how to patrol.”
The rest of my afternoon was almost a complete reversal of the morning. Where Captain Bulwark was all about rules, regulations, and stiffness, Sherry was laid back and fluid—but she was careful about keeping me in line, just like the captain had been.
True to her word, for the whole afternoon, Sherry played coy and let me explain to her everything that we were doing, and why we were doing it. I had to draw on a lot of my knowledge from that morning, but somehow, she seemed to ask just the right questions so that I could answer almost everything.
By the time clock tower chimed five times, I had definitely gained a respect for my sergeant. We walked back to the Guard’s headquarters, which she told me was called a “Citadel.” When we got there, she turned to me and said, “Looks like you survived your first day, huh?”
“Yeah,” I said. The whole Guard thing still seemed daunting, but I felt as if I had learned a lot that first day. I also felt that, given enough time, I could actually function as a city guard. That thought caused the hint of a smile to form at the edges of my beak.
Sherry responded by baring her teeth at me and squinting one eye. Before I could ask her what she was doing, she mused, “Heh. You smile weird.”
That killed it.
Instantly, she shot me an apologetic look and patted my shoulder. “Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try, though.”
I raised an appreciative eyebrow and grinned. “So, uh, what do I do now?”
“Dunno,” she answered. “Whatever griffins do for fun.”
The dismissal was clear to me, so I bowed my head a little. “See you tomorrow.”
“Night, Gilda,” she responded. Then, her eyes shot open. “Oh! Don’t take off too quick; Iron’s got some stuff for you at the south gate.”
With that, I left her for the evening. I didn’t go south right away, though; I needed to get a replacement clock. I turned and headed to the small shop that I had bought my first clock at, eight days ago; hopefully, they’d have another one in stock just like it.
By four-thirty, I should’ve been done with my lieutenant’s duties and on my way home. My schedule was screwed up this week; I was usually the night lieutenant. Since two guards were still hospitalized—and another was out with the flu, damn him—I had offered to take over the day lieutenant’s shift to make things easier.
It should have given me more time to spend at home with my children. However, since Iron had apparently gone completely insane in the last week, I had to go visit him on the south end of the city before I could go home for the evening. He was a smart stallion, but if I let him stew, it would be harder for him to see reason.
So, after leaving my armor in the Citadel, I went to go visit him at his station. As expected, he wasn’t happy to see me. When I saw his frown, I realized the feeling was mutual, and I asked, “Just what the hell was that about earlier?”
“You. Tell. Me.” He bit off each word.
I shook my head. “Don’t even act like you’ve got a hoof to stand on here.” I pointed at him. “When you gave me the paperwork for a new guard, nowhere did it say, ‘This guard is a mindless killing machine from the filthy half-breed cesspool to the north.’” I pointed a hoof on it. “There’s even a line for it, Iron. ‘Risk factors.’ And you wasted it on ‘possibly violent father?’”
Iron blinked a few times. “Okay. Here’s where we’ll begin.” He put both of his gold-armored hooves on the counter inside his room. “Call her ‘half-breed’ again, and I will dock your pay for a week.”
That caught me off-guard; Iron rarely threatened guards with their pay. As annoyed as I was at him throwing his weight around, he was captain, and I had a family to provide for. “Okay,” I agreed.
“Secondly, if you defy me like that in front of a subordinate again...” He grit his teeth. “Don’t make things difficult for me, Star.”
“You’re the one—”
“No, you disobeyed—”
I slammed both of my hooves on top of his. “Griffin, Iron. After what they did to Comet, what part of putting her under me sounded like a good idea? Or are you trying to get me to resign?”
We glared at each other for a few moments before Iron broke the silence. “Get out of my face, and let’s continue this conversation like adults.”
With a flap of my wings, I pushed off the windowsill, stood up, and raised my front arms in surrender. Then I put them on the ground and folded my wings back in. “Fine. Sorry about doing it in front of the new recruit. But no, it really wouldn’t have worked.”
Iron raised an eyebrow. “Still?”
The question had some weight to it, but I couldn’t forgive griffins for what they had done to my wife. And I knew it would only cause problems if I tried to be the lieutenant who oversaw the one griffin in the Guard. So I answered with a nod. “Still.”
He sighed, then shrugged. “Maybe it was a lapse of judgement on my part, then.” He rolled the shrug into a stretch, and he stifled a yawn. “You know this means I’m going to have to juggle sergeants around. And I’m going to have to work late hours to get caught up on my captain’s duties.”
I shrugged apologetically, then asked, “Why’d you have to hire a griffin, of all things?”
Iron closed his eyes and he looked... sad. “Because she needed it. And a few individuals in this city need her... if not personally, then by presence.” His eyes flashed open and he stated, “They’re not all savages, Star.”
“Yes they are,” I corrected him. But we’d had this conversation before, so I changed the subject. “So, how’d she do for her first day, anyway?”
“Splendidly,” he returned, flatly. “Her armor doesn’t fit, she struggles with the boundaries of ‘appropriate behavior,’ and she met Red Hooves.”
I was tired of standing in front of Iron’s station, so I walked around to the side, turned, and stood up, propping my back on the wall. I crossed my front legs to match the posture, which was more comfortable than it looked. And it let me keep my hoof near my knife’s sheath. “No shit,” I chuckled. “How’d that turn out?”
“He offered her a job, but wisely walked away before things escalated.”
I suppressed a chuckle. “Iron, I’m afraid to go hoof-to-hoof with that animal. And, like Comet always nags, I spend too much time with ‘that darn thing.’” I tapped my knife with a hoof. “And I saw how stuffed into my old armor your cadet was; I doubt she’d be any help.”
Iron didn’t say anything; instead, he just grunted agreement. There wasn’t much to say, really; Iron was an orphan, and when he was sergeant, he had looked up to his lieutenant like a father. When Red Hooves killed Lieutenant Spade... well, everyone took that one personally.
Of course, there was no proof of that; just like he got the judge to say, the only eyewitness report could’ve applied to either Red Hooves or his sister.
We stood there, silently but amicably, for a good few minutes. Then, Iron greeted, “Good evening, Gilda.” Mentally, I sighed; couldn’t she leave a pair of friends alone? Then Iron continued, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone look so hateful while holding so cute a clock.”
At that, I fell onto my front hooves to take a look at what he was talking about. Sure enough, the griffin was holding a cutesy alarm clock that featured a rabbit that rang the bells. And sure enough, her immediate response was brutality: “Rabbits are food, not blacksmiths.”
I scoffed, and she looked at me; I wondered if she recognized me without the armor. I pointed at her and turned to Iron. “And that is why you’re nuts, Iron.”
She glared at me and Iron ignored me, turning to her. “So, how was Sherry?”
“Informative,” the griffin said with an indifferent shrug. I saw what Iron meant about “acceptable behavior,” but I didn’t say anything. She wasn’t my responsibility.
Iron leaned out of his booth and cracked a grin. “Extension belts...” Then, his eyes widened and he apologized, “I apologize, cadet; I should have remembered my smaller days.”
I hoofed at the dirt below me; normally, that would’ve been an excellent setup to a joke about how I was three-quarters of an inch taller than Iron. It didn’t feel right with the griffin there. Nothing did.
She shrugged again. “It sucked, but it didn’t let anything else distract me.”
“Then at least something good came out of it,” Iron agreed. Then he held out a trio of scrolls to give to the griffin; Farrington Guard’s standard rules, regulations, and policies. “These may be a bit drier than Sherry’s lessons, but they’ve got the same information in them for you to review over nights. Just... be gentle with them.”
There it was: Iron’s hypocrisy over my prejudices. I scoffed. “Like that animal’s not going to shred them in its claws.”
Iron was about to say something, but the griffin interrupted him with, “I’ll be careful, sir.” She turned to me with a glare, looked over her shoulder at the city, and then turned back at me.
Then, Iron’s pet griffin spat in my eye.
“Gah!” I was more frustrated than angry. By the time my knife was out of its sheath, she was twenty feet away and in the air; even with her armor, we’d probably be over Sharptallon Lake before I caught her. It wouldn’t be worth it to fight blind.
Behind me, Iron burst out laughing. It started as a few escaped chuckles, but then it rolled into an uncontrollable fit, and he was in tears by the end, when he finally regained enough control to offer me a towel.
I glared at him for a moment before I sheathed my knife and took the towel. As I wiped off my face, I suppressed a gag; her spit stank. After my eye was clear, my vision was still blurry. Better not be permanent, I seethed.
On my right, Iron was grinning like an idiot, so I balled the towel up and threw it in at him. It hit him in the mouth, effectively shutting him up.
“How do they even spit?” I asked. “They don’t have lips.”
“Accurately,” he answered, overjoyed. I glared at him, and he continued, “I’m not thrilled that she did that, but come on... everything else aside, you know at least know as well as Maxie does that she’s sensitive about her gender.”
Despite myself, I chuckled; I had forgotten about Iron’s sister’s mishap in the post office two weeks ago. Still... “So, what are you going to do about that?”
He looked at me with a strained grin. “Two off-duty guards, outside the city limits? Star...” He shook his head, still smiling. “I’m going to remember that image, over and over, every hour of overtime I work this week because of you.”
I sighed and shook my head. Then I walked back to my usual spot of wall and stood up on it again. Iron had a point, I had to admit—he did, technically, hire a guard, and I, technically, was making his bad choice harder on him.
And it was a bad choice.
Despite his “racial ambassador” angle he was trying to pull, I knew exactly how everything would end up. She’d try living like a civilized being, but then the stresses of living in an intelligent community would overwhelm her, she’d snap, and then she’d be a danger to Iron’s beloved city.
I put my hoof on my knife’s hilt, taking a small comfort in the fact that I’d be there to stop her, when the time came.
I couldn’t put it into thoughts, how much I hated that entire disgusting race. For all I cared, they could go die in a fire, and from what I heard, they were in the process of doing that anyway. So why? I pulled the knife out and looked at the blade, near the hilt; it had a small engraving of an “S” and a “C” surrounded by a heart. Why Comet?
“Bit for your thoughts?” Iron asked.
I swallowed hard, then asked, “Think she knows who did it?”
“Starfall...” came a warning voice.
I slammed a hoof against the side of his station. “I mean, what could Comet possibly have done to deserve...” Like every time I thought about it, the image of Comet flying for her life, then losing, then... I tried to put it out of my mind. I couldn’t.
“What would it change if she did know the individual who attacked your wife?” Iron’s voice sounded oddly close, so I turned to my right; his head was craned around the corner of his booth.
I wanted to ask how he was standing like that, but his question was more important. I thought about it, then admitted, “I... I don’t know. I just want some damn answers.”
Iron raised an eyebrow. “Then ask her. Or stop using your questions as a shield for your prejudices.”
I sighed; Iron was still angry about what had happened that morning. I didn’t want to keep fighting. “Again, I’m sorry about breaking the chain of command in front of your cadet. Will you forgive me if I start treating the griffin with respect?”
“No,” Iron said, shaking his head. “I’ll forgive you because you’re my friend, even though you’re a friend who says and does stupid things when angry. I want you to come to terms with Comet, Gilda, and all the other griffins in your own way, not just for my sake.”
I nodded back to him. “I’ll work on that, then.”
“Good,” he said, and he retracted himself back into the guard station. “That is an incredibly uncomfortable way to stand, for the record.”
I raised my head and stared up to the sky. “Yeah, were you mounting your desk in there or something?”
“Hey! She is a classy piece of oak; don’t talk about her like that!” Iron shot back with mock choler. I smiled at his joke, but I was more glad that he made it in the first place.
The clock tower struck six off in the distance, and I looked back at Iron. “Anyway, Comet’s expecting me. What time do you get off your shift?”
He shrugged. “Probably closer to seven.”
“You and Maxie should come over for dinner tonight; Comet’s pot stickers are amazing.”
An odd expression came over his face. “Maxie’s in Stalliongrad tonight, and vice-versa...” I hid a laugh in a quiet cough, but Iron continued, “But, yes, I’ll take you up on that offer.”
“See you after your shift, kid,” I said with a smile as I left. Iron was only few months over a year younger than I was, but we both liked my joke about it.
I considered flying around the city, because I lived near the north gate, but that evening, I wanted to take the long route home. Today had been a long day, and I wanted to sort everything out before I settled down for the night. As I walked up the main drag of Farrington, my mind flowed with thoughts of the Guard, the griffin, and Comet.
My trip home was quiet and peaceful, but in my heart, I knew it was the high humidity before a great summer’s storm.
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It seems this chapter is mostly unchanged from when I last read it, except for the insertion of that one bastard, Red Hooves. Good, just like how I remember.
Also, you mentioned punching a clock, but that scene wasn't in the updated version. Did I miss something?
Wouldn't Sherry say "Cadet"?
Incomplete sentence. Think you're missing the word "on" the counter.
"animal" is a little vague, here, considering the character. He talking about Red Hooves or Gilda? I'm guessing Red Hooves.
Oh? No longer are we being vague? Or is this just a thought from Starfall's point of view? (a case of unreliable narrator)
Whoa whoa whoa, reading this chapter, I saw no mention of "racial ambassador" mentioned. At least, not between Iron and Starfall. At least, I did not recognize it.
Burn. But this soon? Unless you're changing the tone or sense with which we see Maxie, this line seems inappropriate this early in the story, where new readers would not know what you're talking about. This line seems more like a line meant for old readers.
Oh, with this introduction of Red Hooves... well... if he is who I think he is (don't remember his name from the original), then boy will that be satisfying.
1956931
Fixed, fixed, important to establish their equality in Starfall's mind, his assumption, that's Starfall putting a name to it, and... yes.
Thank you for that.
Weird question, what kind of accent does Red Hooves have? I'm imagining him with a thick Irish accent right now.
I'd suggest that when you switch the point of view to a new character, you put their name in bold above the text. This chapter got really confusing when it suddenly switched from Gilda to the lieutenant whose name escapes me. The horizontal line helps, but it's not really enough on its own.
Love it, also I love how you are changing the perspectives back and forth between the characters. very nice. Although sometimes confusing, but overall I love what it does for the story to get their different perspectives. <3
Very well written too, but there are typos, it happens, nothing to be ashamed of.
The perspective shifts are so random and unmarked I get totally lost trying to figure out who is talking.
But a really good story so far.
I kinda lost who talks when. This NEEDS fixing. First it's Gilda's point, but then, without ANY warning it SWITCHES, and I wonder how Guilda, the GRIFFIN, PAWED the ground, or something simular!