Gilda comes to Ponyville and meets Gallus. Drama happens.
Gilda came to Ponyville to visit Rainbow Dash only to find she's out of town for a few days. Deciding to wait around town for her she does her best to avoid any of Rainbow Dash's friends and meets Gallus. Despite the chapter names, this is not a shipfic. Mild spoiler: Despite how chapter 2 ends and all of chapter 3, this is not a shipfic
New Chapter every Sunday! [hopefully] New Chapter every second Sunday! [check the published dates, I managed to post weekly for quite a long time] Hiatus for April while I work on my April Fools quadrilogy.
This was originally a 'just write something' project to start writing again and as such the first few chapters are a bit all over the place and a little slow before I figured out what the plot was. And as such, Trigger Warnings! Out of date Headcanon, Midsentence Author's Notes, and jumping Forward/Backwards/Sideways abruptly where I didn't think it was worth writing.
You know, going to someone’s home town to visit works a lot better when they’re actually there and not off somewhere for three weeks. “Ponies love surprises she said. Show up unannounced she said…” Gilda mocked Gabby’s words as she flew down from the cloud house where she’d found the note on the door. Who leaves a note on their own door? Well it worked telling her where Rainbow Dash was… or at least where she wasn’t.
She had to either cut her losses and leave or wait around in Ponyville hoping it was towards the end of those three weeks. The former means she’d wasted her time coming here. The latter means she’d risk running into Pinkie Pie or Fluttershy. Or one of those other… three? Four? However many other friends of Rainbow’s she’d met but didn’t remember. Gabby had also mentioned some kids, one of them was Rainbow Dash’s ‘sister’ but Gilda had no idea where to start looking and didn’t really want to either.
Besides it being the new centerpiece of the town that last time she’d visited barely had a two story building, Gilda did know one of Rainbow’s other friends by name. Sorta. The Princess of Magic. Or... Friendship? There was a pretty big difference there in her mind but everygryth she’d asked seemed to think it was one of those. Twilight ssssomething starting with ‘S’. If any pony knew when Rainbow was getting back it’d probably be her.
Gilda landed just in front of the castle-tree-rock-thing. Her brown rear fur matched the ground around the building that clashed with the grass covering everywhere else in the technicolor town. Taking a few steps up the steps, she bawled her yellow talons and knocked on the door that likewise matched colours. Roughly, at least. The purple of the walls was a close match to her feather tips and eyeliner on her otherwise white feathers on her upper body. Not that it was actual eyeliner but ponies always assumed it was make up and not just natural colouring.
After a few seconds without an answer, she knocked again. Usually a second knock is harder and louder but Gilda had gone full bore with the first couple of rapps. Third and fourth knocks came before about a minute passed without an answer. Resigning to be obedient, she instead pressed the doorbell she’d been avoiding. “You’ve reached the Castle of the Twilight Sparkle: Princess of Friendship-”
“Well that answers that at least.” Gilda muttered and rolled her eyes at the words.
“Unfortunately, I or anyone else within the castle am unavailable at the moment. If it is between monday and friday in the hours of 7am and 5pm I am likely at the School of Friendship, seen to your right. If it is outside of those times then I may be out on royal business and may be some time. If it is between the hours of 10pm and 5am, please come back during daylight hours. Unless you’re Princess Luna. If this is an urgent matter, please hold down the button to contact me. Penalties for misusing this function outside of an urgent matter can be up to and including a fine of…”
The sound drowned out with distance as Gilda had flown off after being pointed towards the adjacent building. Not that she was heading to it. She just couldn’t be faffed listening to a recorded message. It was between monday and friday in the hours of 7am and 5pm so she could find Twilight there but finding somepony to find somepony seemed like more hassle than it was worth. Plus is she remembered Granpa Gruff’s ramblings right, all of Rainbow Dash’s friends where teachers or something at that school. Which meant if she was going to look around Ponyville with the least chance of running into any of them, now was the time.
Something something
That school she’d heard about must’ve gotten out. As Gilda left the shop young ponies had flooded the streets. Oddly enough though, barely any of them gave her more than a glance. Unlike most of the adult ponies around here that would stare at her when they thought she wasn't looking. This worked to her advantage as if they ignored her, she’d ignore them. Taking a seat at one of the provided tables, Gilda opened her meal. Hay by itself was the blandest food she’d ever eaten but if she could say one thing that ponies and gryphons had in common it was turning basic food into a real meal. At least, she had it in common with them… and she knew there was a gryphon chef famous amonst ponies so… close enough.
She unwrapped her food and prepared to take a peck. But before she could get to that “Beggin’ yer pardon. You wouldn’t happen ta be Gilda now wouldja?” a light twangy voice came from just to the side of Gilda. There was definitely some sort of accent to the voice but Gilda couldn’t place any pony’s accent for the life of her. Turning her head, Gilda saw the little pony that had asked her if she was herself.
While the description Gabby had given her was just ‘A young earthbound, pegasus and unicorn’, they were the only three young ponies in this town that would know her. Well, Gabby’s description was probably more… descript, but that was all that Gilda remembered of it at the least. “Yeah. You’re those ‘Cutie Mark Ca-somethings?”
“Cutie Mark Crusaders!” Applebloom answered with pride. “I’m Applebloom, this is Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. We’re friends with Gabby and she told us all about you.”
“And Rainbow Dash mentioned you a few times too.” Scootaloo followed.
“And Rarity… Rarity…..” Sweetie Belle began and stumbled. “I got nothing. But it’s nice you meet you irregardless.”
Unbeknownst to Gilda her thought of ‘That’s not a word’ was mirrored by Scootaloo. “Right. So… Apple Belle, Sweetie something and… I already forgot.” she said, motioning to them in the order introduced.
“Uh… not quite.” Scootaloo replied.
“I’m kidding Scootaloo.” Gilda replied in a deadpan tone as she finally took the first peck of her hayoli and hay speghetthay [I regret writing that]. Mouth still full “Gabby talked about you too. Excessantly.”
“Well it’s nice ta finally meet you.” Applebloom extended a hoof to shake. A motion that had always confused Gilda a little since they didn’t have talons like gryphons used when they shook claws. She had seen them ‘bro hoof’ as those two Beavis and Flankhead colts from flight school had called it. Probably not the only ‘bro hoofing’ those two did. Though, they probably thought something similar about her and Rainbow Dash.
Gilda put her claw out and with and open palm high-foured the hoof. A move she knew always through ponies for a loop the first time she did it. “Uh-huh… you too Apple Belle.” she said with a slight smirk before swallowing her mouth full.
“No she’s Applebloom. I’m Sweetie B-wait… I thought you said you were kidding and knew our names!?” the filly squealed. Gilda just groaned and turned back to her meal. Kids where a headache. Pony kids where even worse. And that she was at the age she was expected to have some? No.
“Well… it’s been great. Really…” taking another peck at her meal. “But I only came here to see Rainbow and she’s not here…“ swallow. “So neither am I after I finish this.” and ate another beakfull. While mostly true, Gilda knew exactly what would happen next. At least, if Gabby was right about Scootaloo being Rainbow Dash’s ‘sister’. Two days. That’s the longest she’d wait for Rainbow or she’d head back to Gryphonstone.
“Understandable.” replied Scootaloo and began to walk away.
The End.
“Now hold on Scootaloo.” Applebloom reached out and grabbed her friend by the tail, pulling her back into the conversation. “Doesn’t Rainbow Dash finish her tour some tahm this week?”
“Oh, right. Yeah, the Wonderbolt’s tour ends in three days.”
‘Ugh… fine. I’ll wait THREE days.’ Gilda thought to herself. It wasn’t much of a stretch from two days after all.
“But she probably won’t be back for four.”
‘Why does the universe keep doing this to me? Fine. FOUR days…’
“Gotta fly all the way back from her last stop in Guta River.”
‘Screw you universe!’ Gilda thought to herself as her outward expression reflected her silent anger. Guta River was not only in the Gryphon Kingdom but pretty close to Gryphonstone on top of that. She’d flown all the way here when she could've just went like three hours north. That whole two days limit wasn’t arbitrary after all, it was how long it would take to fly back home from here.
“Right… that Wonderbolt tour. Was thinking of going. Then I didn’t.” Gilda said, just pushing the scowl from here face beforeclaw. “Doubt I would’ve seen her in the crowd anyw-wait. Oh I swear to the Idol of Boreas if she’s gone to Gryphonstone to see me at the same time I came to Ponyville to see her…”
Scootaloo noticed something. Something that she had had the honour of telling Rainbow Dash’s parents… and then remembering how well that had turned out. And knowing how tenuous Dash’s relationship with Gilda was, probably shouldn't be offhoofedly mentioned. “Of course you would’ve seen her from the crowd. Why else would you go to a Wonderbolts show unless you wanted to see her up there with the other Wonderbolts?” much like Sweetie Belle just did.
“I’m sorry, I must’ve misheard you… did you just say Rainbow Dash is a Wonberbolt!?” Gilda practically screamed!
“Um… yes?” Sweetie Belle answered, cringing away from the towering gryphon.
“Huh… never thought she’d actually do it.” Gilda said with an odd combination of mostly surprise mixed with a small amount of both jealousy and pride. Although there was a touch of anger in there too. They hadn’t seen each other in X years. Hell, she’d seen Twilight Sporkle more recently than Rainbow Dash. Even if they had been on bad terms with each other, surely she would’ve mentioned she was in the Wonderbolts if she had been at the time. She better not have been.
“Heeyy....” Scootaloo interjected. “You’re not upset that say, someone other than Rainbow Dash was the one to tell you. Right?”
Rainbow Dash had been cool and Fluttershy had been an extreme case but she’d forgotten that ponies can get upset over the littlest things. “What? Who would be upset about that?” Gilda replied, breaking away from her thoughts on when Rainbow had become a Wonderbolt.
There was something so foreign to Gilda about caring so much about others. Sure, she cared, just not to the same extent where every little thing had to be treaded on like a full nest. Yet that about them, though she didn’t like to admit it, had helped Gilda out more times than she could count. And that she’d grown up around ponies had rubbed off on her more than she consciously knew. She didn’t really like gryphons either.
Although, as far as she could tell, neither did any of the other gryphons and she could just be over thinking that. Not to mention putting it that way, she didn’t really dislike ponies anymore than she disliked gryphons.
“Really? How could you not think she’d become a Wonderbolt?!” Scootaloo chimed in. “You were there when she did a sonic rainboom right?”
“It’s a figure of speech kid.” Gilda deadpanned.
“Right… I knew that.”
“Sure you did…” Gilda mused, thinking about how this young pony kinda reminded her of Rainbow Dash she’d known as a kid. “Hey, you know Rainbow Dash right? She’s like, your ‘sister’ or something. Does she still keep that spare key under her door mat?”
“Door mat? No, it’s in her mailbo-oops…” definitely reminded her of Rainbow Dash. It almost made Gilda worry about the students Rainbow was teaching.
“Well then…” Gilda began before finishing the last of her lunch. “I’m going to be staying there for the next few days. Think she’ll mind? Don’t answer that, don’t care.”
“Can gryphons even stay in cloud houses?” Applebloom asked.
“Yeah. I thought you had a gryphon at that school of yours. What is Rainbow even teach you anyway?” and then the idea that Rainbow Dash was a teacher hit her. Those poor, poor students.
“We don’t go the School of Friendship.” all three of them said in unison but each with a different inflection. Scootaloo dejected, Sweetie Bloom gleefully and yellow one matter-of-factly. All followed by “Jynx, you owe me a soda.”
Applebloom took the lead with “Ugh… well as ah were saying, we don’t go ta the Twilight’s school. But we do know all the students that do. And you must be talkin’ ‘bout Gallus.”
“Did he fall through the clouds that time when Cozy Glow did the thing with magic?” asked Sweetie Belle.
“No, he was one of the one who caught all the others” Scootaloo answered. “And so did Rainbow Dash. I still think we should be in that school instead of just tutors. I could’ve helped save them too!”
Sweetie Belle, seemingly more oblivious than usual spoke up with “No you wouldn’t have.”
“Ugh!... I so would’ve. I mean, I can glide fine once I caught one of them!”
“What? No, I meant because we’d be in a lower year than them. Not because of…”
“Wait… you can’t fly?” Gilda said, almost shocked.
“She said it, not me.” Sweetie Belle quickly said, trying to direct this off of herself.
“I’ve seen new hatcheds that can fly. How did Rainbow Dash take you as a ‘sister’?”
“Guess, she’s just a better pony than you. Hmmph… I can see why she doesn’t talk about you much.” Scootaloo turned and left. “Let’s go girl. We have a tutoring appointment with Candied Mexican.”
The other two turned to follow. Sweetie Belle took a moment to look back and say "Well uhh, it was nice meeting you. Goodb-... bye.”
Well… she couldn’t say she didn’t deserve that. Of course Gilda couldn’t help but feel a bit mad too. She hadn’t meant to say it as an insult, it just kinda came out that way. She’d been genuinely curious about a pegasus who wouldn’t fly, yet alone being taken under the wing of a great flier like Rainbow. Gilda and some other ponies had joked about Fluttershy not being able to fly but really she just wasn’t good at it was all.
And speaking of Fluttershy, there she was over there… leaving!
Gilda awoke the next morning on a couch in Rainbow Dash’s house. Pfft, more like mansion. Compared to most every other house in ponyville it was extravagant. Compared to her own house it was a palace. And that's saying a lot for a town with an actual palace in it. Even if they called the crystal tree thing a ‘castle’.
The debate of whether to take something from Rainbow’s kitchen raised itself again as Gilda stretched awake and felt her stomach asking for breakfast. She’d landed on not taking any of Rainbow’s food last night but that just made the decision this morning even harder. Crashing at her friend’s pla… her ‘friend’s’ place without asking was one thing but taking something from her could lead to a whole other can of worms. Damn it… now she was just even hungrier for a can of worms.
There hadn’t actually been a key in the mailbox or under the doormat. Or a mailbox or doormat at all. But it’s a cloud house.
As she flew through the instantly reforming wall Gilda set her sight on the town below, it was certainly bigger than the last time she’d visited. It had gone from a small town just outside of the capitol to a tourist destination more popular than cantalot itself. Which, while meaning more ponies to deal with, also meant there was actually something to do here this time. And a lack of chance of running into any of Rainbow Dash’s pony friends, especially Pinkie Pie or Fluttershy changed this from four day slug just waiting to a four day slug doing stuff at least.
There’s a…
(this next part is a song that’s tune in my mind is kinda a mix between the Ursola song from little mermaid and Prince Ali from Aladdin]
Shop that sells picture of Rainbow Dash And all of those other six mares But that’s not getting any of my cash So much stuff that I couldn’t care… less!
Next door to the store that’s a big bustling mall It’s got everything I could need But it’s selling rainbow wigs with goggles attached So gotty my eyes gonna bleed
Everything here, all that I’m near gives me a sneer Get away from stores gonna relax A trip to the spa, it’s not very far Sign reading “Even loved by Rainbow Dash”
I just wanna have fun and I wanna forget Everything I’ve been through here before Can’t go to the pool can’t go to the school And definitely not that cake store!
Sweet. This one looks good. I’ll check out the rock museum! It’s not what I thought, not the cool kinda rock Wanted lead zeppelin not lead-potassium
What is there to do in a town so entrenched in somepony you wanna forget? Every storefront is an affront to my past, my future and my present. But down around town that the townfolk live away from the tourist trap crap There’s a small little store selling quills and sofas that’s just as small town as it gets!
I thought there was lots to do in this town Should’ve slept in why’d I come down? Three more days I’ll just be looking around In ponyville it’s all rainbow dash and her crowd A single thing without her it just can’t be found!...
I don’t want a wig and I don’t want that pic I don’t want a life size replica nor a minifig I don’t want any of the crap that they’re throwing around Why would anyone want a rainbow dash crown?
A cane a cake a cart a kite The kite’s kinda cool but the colour’s not right A washcloth a watch broach a wind sock a rainbow c… oh my god.
(music stops) "Is that real?"
(long pause before the music starts up again)
I just wanna wait in peace without unease and uncomfortable memories Can you believe there’s not a single piece, park, parchment, parcel or pursemint without her stitch?
Rainbow Dash is in everything. Everyway, everywhere, everytime Not a thing in Ponyville can be done without her somehow being tied
I don’t understand why everypony’s a fan The reason this gryphon can’t find Why try to run instead of join in the fun? This is not the fun I had in mind.
Gryphons and ponies have so much alike yet everything that’s in between Is different enough to make tensions rough So I’d rather just sit here and eat.
It was the same place she’d eaten yesterday and despite it feeling like she’d been wondering around ponyville’s tourist sites for at least eight hours it had been something more like three. Of Course saying she hadn’t slept in was a relative term meaning she’d ONLY slept until about midday. So much like yesterday, and Gilda realised this as she saw those three fillies coming towards her again, she’d ended up here around the time school finished for the day.
“Wol’ heya Gilda.” the yellow one said. She didn’t stop though.
“Hey.” came from Scootaloo and a wave of hoof from Sweetie Bloom. Neither of them stopped either.
“You three again… hey.” Gilda offered, being very, obviously, polite. For a gryphon.
She still had questions about Scootaloo being flightless and somehow being taken under the wing of, pun intended… wait was that even really a pun? Under the wing off Rainbow Dash. But no, a completely relevant question was somehow inappropriate. That’s what Gilda had liked about Rainbow. She was one of the few ponies who was just as brash as any gryphon. Being told you suck wasn’t an insult if it was true. It was a motivation to get better.
Maybe she could’ve been a bit better with how she phrased it at times but nothing she’d ever told anypony was untrue. Back in flight school, ponies picked on Fluttershy. Gilda didn’t. She said Fluttershy can barely fly. Rainbow had once called her out on that and Gilda had just said “What? It’s true. Guess that’s why she’s at flight school.”
And not that Gilda would ever say it, at least today, she’d had a deal of respect for Fluttershy at the time. The filly clearly hated it but was still trying. That was, until she dropped out. Irony of course that somehow Rainbow was the one who got the reputation for dropping out. Those two idiot colts who couldn’t understand graduating early from proven achievement where the cause of that. There loss though. They probably would’ve gotten some tail-feather from Gilda if they hadn’t run their mouth.
Odd thought. A gryphon having sex with a pony. Gilda couldn’t say that the idea was unappealing to her but as she’d gotten more mature, and probably from no longer seeing nothing but ponies for a year, her sense of attraction had shifted away from ponies and back to gryphons. Even pegasus where slightly off putting with their… shape, being just… wrong. She wasn’t exactly sure what was off putting, just that it was. She couldn’t even remember what she’d used to find attractive about Rainbow Dash.
Their head covered in hair. Their legs ending in hooves. Their small wings. Some… MOST, not even having wings. Their tail also covered in hair. Not that gryphon’s didn’t have hairy tails but in a… different way. And their colour. Instead of the basier brown, grey, black and sometimes even white, ponies where every colour from green to yellow, to orange, to red, to pink to purple to… blue.
“Oh hey it’s you… I haven’t seen you around in ages.” Gilda said aloud without really thinking.
The young blue cock had been walking along the road, hadn’t even noticed another gryphon sitting on a table eating a loaded heigh fries. Still didn’t notice her even after being talked to. It’s not like she’d called his name or anything to specifically grab his attention. What did grab his attention though was the CMC just out of sight from where Gilda was sitting shifting their eyes rapidly back and forth between him and Gilda.
Then, even though he hadn’t really been paying attention, what had been called to him clicked in his head that it was about him. He looked at Gilda, back at the CMC and then back at Gilda again. ‘Okay… this now I guess.thought to himself. “Do I know you?” he asked flatly.
“No.”
The End.
“But you tend to notice a blue gryphon. Guess you don’t tend to notice them being gone too. Hadn’t really thought about it much but I haven’t seen you in what, X months now.” added Gilda before taking another bite of… whatever thing she was eating was.
“Uh huh…” the blue boy said dismissively. “And is there any particular reason Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo and Applebloom are hiding from you around that corner?” he asked, pointing towards the red bow sticking out from where Applebloom was peeking around the corner.
Gilda leant back in her seat and twisted her head. “We’ve been made!”
“Abort! Abort!”
“Wait… why does that matter… and you're already gone. Fine… wait up your guys!”
Both the boy and Gilda watched for a moment before returning to face each other. “Eh, beats me.” answered the gryphon as she took another bite. “You know them from the friendship school?”
“Yeah, sor-” he started but was interrupted.
“Wait. Her name is ‘Applebloom’?”
“Yeah…?”
“And that other one’s name is ‘Sweetie Bloom’? That’s weird.”
“It’s Sweetie Belle.”
“Well that’s even weirder.”
“Eh… pony names.”
“I know… right?” she laughed. “Gilda.”
“Gallus.” he replied and stepped forward. He took a seat opposite her and sat while asking “So what’s a gryphon like yourself doing in Ponyville?”
“I was visiting a friend but turns out they’re off in the gryphon kingdom… what are the odds?”
“Well, it happened so… 100%.”
She stared at time with a bemused look. He wasn’t wrong. He just wasn’t right. “That the kind of stuff they teach at that school? I mean I figure you go to that school. I know somegryphon does and a blue one would fit right in with…” Gilda trailed off making a claw gesture at the everything around them.
“Well, that and other things. ‘The Magic of Friendship’...” he mocked. Although he had experienced it first hand and created a castle… ‘castle’ with it. “Learnt some really cool flying moves. And… wait. You don’t actually care do you?” he finished deadpan.
“Yes and no. Mostly no.” Gilda chuckled out. That he’d managed to pick up on it at all set him apart from the rest of these ponies around here. She had a pretty good idea who the flying teacher was. She’d rather hear about it from Rainbow herself though.
“So how do you know the CMC? Those three fillies that are obviously in that trench coat over there.”
“We’ve been made… again! Hoof it!”
Gilda couldn’t see the result as she didn’t even bother turning to look at the three but she could hear the ripping of fabric, the crashing of some boxes and the screams of ‘My cabbages!’ from the owner of whatever they’re tripped and crashed into.
“I know one of their sisters.”
“Really? Couldn’t see you having much in common with Miss Rarity. And you didn’t even know Applebloom’s name… or Sweetie Belle’s for that matter… so I doubt it’s Miss Applejack either.”
“‘Miss’ Rarity? ‘Miss’ Applejack?” mocked Gilda.
“Hey, don’t blame me that Principle Twilight’s a stickler for school manors. Besides, which one of them? Neither mentioned knowing a gryphon. And believe me, they would’ve brought it up.” Gallus took a breath, fluffed his neck feather and fluttered his eye lashes. “Oh yes, I am quite familiar with gryphons from my travels as a world renowned fashionista. As I am with all things that I have no idea what I’m talking about on.” he then stiffened his neck, dropped his jaw and put a paper plate on his head for a hat. “Well darned if ah aint got a story to tell you what not ‘bout the time me and a gryphon, of all folk, made a delivery through the forest of feathered fearsome fear!...”
Gilda merely stared blankly for a moment. “I’m sure those impressions are totally spot on on… but I have no idea who either of those ponies are.”
“You don’t know the ‘heroes of equestria’?”
“Well have SOME idea who they are… but… you know what I mean. I’m talking about Rainbow Dash, Scootaloo’s sister… figure… thing.”
“Oh, that. Yeah, that makes a lot more sense.”
“Does it?” Gilda came with so much mockery in her tone <some clever analogy>. “She can’t even fly. And Rainbow’s all about flying. Literally ALL about flying. How could she take someone who can’t even fly as her… ‘sister’?”
“Well… that’s probably exactly why.” Gallus returned with so much condensation that that last analogy did the opposite of whatever I said it did. It’s not like Gilda didn’t understand empathy. She did. And really, it was that simple.
“Huh…”
“Miss Rainbow Dash just… I don’t know. Cares for her I guess. I know, strange concept for a gryphon huh?”
“No. I get it.”
“You do? You didn’t five seconds ago.”
“Well I do now.” she said with force.
“Ok, ok… sheesh. Why are the hot ones always so uppity?...” he mocked
That was a shift she hadn’t expected. “I’m going to stop you right there. I’m old enough to be your mom.” she could tell by the smirk on his face he was about to say something stupid to follow it up. “And I swear if you say ‘That’s the best part’ I’m going to end you.”
He hadn’t planned on saying that. All though Gallus certainly wished he had thought of it. Not that he’d even meant what he’d said in a flirty way. And what he blurted out next, certainly didn’t help either. “You’re only old enough to be my mom if you had me at my age.”
There was a long pause from Gilda. Long enough for Gallus to worry before “I know what you think you were trying to say but all you really said is I’m twice your age.”
There was no smooth talking out of this now. Abort. Abort! “Yeah, well, whatever. There’s plenty of hot hens at our school.” And that probably would’ve done it too. If he hadn’t followed immediately with “Well… as hot as non-gryphons can be.”
Three thoughts ran through Gilda’s head at those words. 1: ‘Either I wasn’t weird for finding ponies hot when I was his age. That or they both of us are.’. 2: ‘He totally has the hots for Rainbow Dash doesn’t he?’. And 3: ‘I should not have this conversation with someone his age…’.
But then a fourth thought popped into her head. One that she vocalised less intentionally than she wanted. “‘Non-gryphons’? Not ‘ponies’. I heard there was like a few non-ponies there. So which one?”
“What? No I was just being non-non-inclusive.” he instantly replied. “Although… come to think of it, all the non-ponies, well, besides me, are girls.”
“So what are they? And on a scale of 1 to 8?” Gilda asked and said, holding up first 1 talon, then all 8 on her forepaws.
He had changed the topic at least. Whether for better or worse… or if he had even really changed topics at all, just who the topic was about. It’s not like he had anything to hide. All he friends where just that, friends. Worse case scenario he rated their looks low in a conversation they’d never know about. “Well, there’s Smolder. I didn’t even know she was a she for at least a month so I’d go with… a 4.”
“And she’s…?”
“Oh. Smolder’s a dragon. She’s pretty gryphon-like with her attitude. So if I had to choose, I’d just choose a gryphon. No looks barrier.”
“Wait… she doesn’t look great. But you still gave her a 4?”
“Yeah? Isn’t 4, like, average or something?”
“Below average.”
“No.” Gallus said as he held up his right forepaw with all four talons out and his left balled. “It’s like right in the middle.” and he was right. If you included zero. Which neither of them where.
“Whatever. So she’s average looking.”
“Well, not exactly.” gallus corrected. “Looks she’s probably a 3. Maybe 2.” he got a raised eyebrow from Gilda. “But she’s like, ‘gryphony’. So that’s a 5 there. And that’s an average of 4-I don’t know. I haven’t exactly spent much time thinking through which of my friends is the hottest. I like all of them. Even… no homo, Sandbar.”
“‘No homo’?” Gilda said with a smirk. Then added with a condescending voice “Thought you said they were all girls?”
“No. I said all the non-ponies where girls. Sandbar’s like part of our crew and a pony and a colt.” Gallus paused for a moment. “And if you say ‘That’s the best part’ I’m-”
Gilda cut him off mid-sentence once more. This time though she sounded almost excited. “A hippogryph?!”
“Yeah.” gallus answered flatley. “A hippogryph.”
“So her mom or dad the gryphon?”
“Wot?”
“Which one’s the pony and which one’s the gryphon. Or don’t you know.” Gilda said with genuine curiosity. Something that caught Gallus completely off guard.
“I… don’t think that’s how hippogryphs work.”
“‘Course it is. Or haven’t you learnt about the birds and the lions yet?”
With a bemused expression and a tone of sarcasm Gallus answered back. “I’m pretty sure this whole conversion is not so subtly talking about which of my classmates I’d like to bang so yeah, I have an idea what sex is. And if you think that ponies and gryphons having a kid together makes a hippogryph then I think you’re the one with no idea what sex is.”
Two possibilities rang through Gilda’s head. 1: her school counselor at flight school had been full of it and she’d found another thing that a teacher and the book she was reading from had told her as 100% fact and she'd believe for the majority of her life was BS. Like glass was a liquid. Or that you can’t divide by 0. Or option 2: she was right and he was the one who had no idea. She chose to believe the latter.
“Trust me. As a hen growing up around ponies who fed me the same line of ‘It’s not like you can get pregnant.’ you gotta find this stuff out.”
“I mean… there’s a whole country of them. And they’re like half fish. Or that might just be magic. But there’s no way an entire race is just half gryphons.”
“Well, then you sure she’s a hippogryph? Ponies and gryphons make hippogryphs. Ponies and buffalo make deer. And ponies and dragons make chimeras. No idea what gryphons and anything other than ponies make but when you only have pony books, they tend to focus on themselves.”
“Wait. You think ponies and… whatever a buffalo is, make deers. Those long legged mice with antlers?”
“Not those type of deers. The book just called them that because the look like… them… oh. I get it now.”
“So the book said that a pony and gryphon’s chick is just called hippogryphs because they look like hippogryphs... but aren’t?” he asked, trying to hold a laugh at the idea. But almost as soon as he had said it out loud... “Yeah. I could see that.” the idea actually kinda made sense to him. “Also what’s a buffalo? What would that even look like to make a ‘deer’ with a pony?”
“I don’t know.” she said dismissively. She was probably right but there was still the chance that she’d made an idiot of herself there. It certainly felt like. “The hippogryph.” Gilda stated, intending for Gallus to continue.
Gallus paused for a moment. “Well… she’s kinda beautiful. But also really off-putting. Like, I’m thinking of a gryphon when I look at her and well, yeah. She looks like she’s half pony and it’s all kinds of bizarre. So… a 4.”
“Again?”
“Yeah, again. I mean… if they asked me out I wouldn’t say no. But I don’t think I’d ask them out… you know?”
“Ehh… not really.” she did. “But who else?”
“Yona. She’s a yak. She’s… nice. Kinda clumsy. Talks in third-grypho… third-‘yak’? I don’t know. I don’t really like her. I mean I like her but… I’d give her a 2. Like a high 2. Nearly a 3. Not quite though. And besides. I think Sandbar likes her anyway.”
“So how about Sandbar?”
“0.”
“Cold.”
“Straight.”
“Doubt.”
“Bbbhhh, shhh… whatever. Last there’s Ocellus. She’s a changeling. Oh, and changelings have… changed. They’re like fluro colours now and less jagged. And well… I’d say… 7?”
“7?!” Gilda spat out in surprise. “That sounds pretty high to me.”
“Well, I mean, she’s a changeling. So hotness can be an 8. It’s usually only a… 6 though. That’s still high isn’t it.” he said as he looked off in the direction of the school.
“Wow… you really just realising right now you like her aren’t you?” she’d said it in a mocking tone but despite that, she had been genuine about it. She’d just naturally came off as being a bitch is all.
“No… maybe… yes?” he turned back to her, eyes slightly wide, almost worried looking but more to do with realisation. “Yeah… I think so. She’s smart. I think someone called her ‘a-dork-able’. That’s pretty spot on.” he chuckled at that and a smile came to his face, replacing his concerned look from before. “Shy but brave. Surprisingly good flier. I can always depend on her when I’m behind on my homework. Never lets me just copy though, so that’s a negative I guess. Jokes… pranks…”
“Ask her out or I lose what little respect I have for you.” Gilda stated, snapping Gallus out of his contemplation.
He turned to her and all of that faded fast. “Oh, yeah, I’m totally going to do that because some random hen I met dared me to. Dang it! I don’t want this… this’ll just make everything complicated. I just want to go to school and hang out with friends. Not some of the pony’novela stuff Miss Rarity’s always going on about…”
“Hey, she can be anything right? At least you found a blue bird.” again, she didn’t mean to sound like a bitch when actually trying to help. She just couldn’t help it herself.
“I don’t care about that!” spat Gallus. He paused. Changing once more from annoyed to sombre he said “And honestly, when you look at me do you even think I’m attractive? Don’t answer that.” she wasn’t going to. “I’m weird. I’m not as bad as Silver Stream but I don’t want a blue gryphon, it’s weird. Now a grey gryphon, that’s my thing.”
“What, like blueish black grey?”
“No. Like… uh… Natalya.”
“Who? And what kind of name for a gryphon is ‘Natalya’?”
“Forget it. Ugh… now I have to worry about that whole changelings laying eggs in you thing is true.”
“Could just be she’s tricked you into thinking you love her. That’s what changelings do isn’t it?”
“No. She wouldn’t do that. That’s like saying us gryphons only care about bits.”
“That’s not exactly wrong though.” Gilda emphasized by pulling a bit out of seemingly nowhere and flipping it between the knuckles of her claw.
“Maybe for you.” he answered back, took out a coin of his own and flipped it over his shoulder into the tip jar. It was an incredible shot to say the least.
It impressed Gilda, but “You regret it already don’t you.”
“That was my lunch money for tomorrow…” he moped.
It got a laugh from Gilda. “See, you’re going against your instinct just to defend her from ‘some random hen’. No denying it bud.”
“Dang it… I… dang it!” and with that he took off. Looking back at it, Gilda could see how she’d upset him.
“Do you… have a tab for him?” she turned and asked the pony behind the counter. The mare just shook her head and magicked over a bill for both of their food. “Dang it.”
He rounded the corner and immediately stopped. Leaving wasn’t about going somewhere so much as making a point. What that point was Gallus didn’t exactly know. But he made it. What he found around the corner was enough to make him want to leave again. “Sooo... how’d it go?” Sweetie Belle asked. She, Scootaloo and Applebloom where predictably still hanging around.
“How much of that did you hear?” Gallus immediately asked.
“Nuffin’. That’s why we asked.”
“Are you SURE?”
“Yeah… pretty sure. Why?” Scootaloo returned.
“Nothing. Forget about it. But on a completely unrelated note, do you know where…” Gallus hesitated. If he just asked where Ocellus was they’d figure it out. “... Sandbar, Ocleous, Yona, Smolder and Silver Stream are?”
“Uh… not really. I’d’ve thought if onepo-body would know it would be you.” answered Sweetie Belle. “And is that really unrelated?”
“Yes. And you’re right… she-they’re probably at… gotta go. Seeyas.”
“He was acting weird right?” Scootaloo asked.
“I bet Gilda knows what’s what.” Applebloom followed.
“Great… so can we just talk to her now?” Sweetie Belle continued.
“Hmm...”
“No.”
“Of course not…”
Meanwhile, back with blue bird boi
This time of day Ocellus would be one of three places. The school: studying. The school: reading. Or the school: just hanging out. Some way to spend a friday afternoon. But, while not his idea of a great time, he could picture her doing any of those three and being perfectly content with it. Slight smile, relaxed posture, glazed eyes… a-dork-able.
It wasn’t even a minute before he arrived at the school. Library was his first destination and surprise to no one, she was there. So was Smolder. The orange dragette was sitting on a table, one leg dangling off the side and the other with her foot on the table and a hand supporting her as she pointed towards something that Ocellus was flying up to.
They hadn’t seen him yet. How he was going to do this, he hadn’t figured out yet. Seperate them, talk to them both, wait for one to leave… he had no idea which. That wasn’t helped by Yona rounding a corner and yelling in her usual volume of voice. “Yona can’t find book on bipeds. What biped even mean?” Smolder said something in response but from Gallu’s distance he couldn’t make out what. She did make a doubled hand gesture over herself. Then pointing her thumb over her shoulder to her wings and shrugged.
“Uhh… great. Next thing you know Silver Stream will show up as well he said as around the opposite corner no one came. “Huh… I was kinda expecting that to happen…” then Silver Stream continued to not be in this story [yet]. “Haaa…” Gallas sighed as he walked in. “Hey guys. What’s happening?”
“Hey Gallus.”: called Smolder. “Ocellus think there’s something called a ‘Big Foot’ in the forest.”
“I’ve seen it. Twice. On my way to the Treehouse of Harmony I-”
“We’re calling it that now?” Smolder asked but was ignored.
“-saw it standing by a tree. Its fur mixed in with the tree really well but I could sense it. I think it’s looking for a mate. But, they’re rare creatures. So finding one even by another must be quite difficult.”
“Yona not know what Big Foot look like. Tell Yona.”
Author’s note: I didn’t want to spend another paragraph of just talking describing it so this minus the pants. Also I haven’t actually seen Gravity Falls [but it’s on my to watch list] I just know of this design.
“Oh, Ocellus mean Yeti. Yak have Yeti in Yaklands.”
“Sounds more like a Yowie to me.” Silver Stream added.
“Uh… Chupa-thingy?” Gallus jokingly contributed.
There was a slight pause from Ocellus after she heard Gallus’ answer. She stared at him for a few seconds more before saying “Well, maybe it’s all three.” Ocellus answered. “We just have different names for it in our different homes.” and she continued to stare at him.
‘Changelings can sense love…’ Gallus thought to himself. ‘Oh Gryph she already knows!’ and even in his silent thought, his dilated eyes portrayed his expression. Well, for a second at least. ‘Wait… does that just make it easier then?’
“Are you alright Gallus?” asked Ocellus.
She had to ask… which means she didn’t know. Or maybe she was being polite, like how ponies aren’t meant to look at each others junk just flopping around everywhere. Gryph he was glad all the non ponies had cloacas… or long, shaggy, all-covering yak hair. “Uh, yeah. I just… gotta go find a book.”
He left and headed down the aisle. For some reason ponies arranged books in alphabetical order rather than duodecimal. Not that Gallus understood the duodecimal system anyway. He walked into the aisle enough that he was out of sight. If Ocellus could sense it from him, she’d probably follow. At least that’s what every teen drama he’d ever seen told him. Not that he watched those of course!
She didn’t. Instead he just grabbed a book off the shelf and stood just by the end of the aisle, peeking around the corner. “Yona not scared of big hairy monster.” she yelled in her best library voice. A brief moment passed and, obviously egged on by Smolder, continued with “Yona is not big hairy monster. Yona just big and hairy. Not monster part.”
Blah blah blah
“I’ll keep reading up on Big Foot here.” Ocellus called out as the author couldn’t think of what to right that wasn’t Gallus angsting a ton which seems out of character so instead just skipped to when Yona and Smolder left.
Gallus paced. “Ok… the others left. Now it can be just you and her. Not that being alone had stopped Sandbar from asking Yona to the Pony Cotillion. But that’s different. Sandbar has bigger balls. You’ve seen them… no homo. Just swinging all over the place. No homo. Ok… just go out there, sit next to her and read… then ask Ocellus if she'd like to go out somewhere.”
“Sure, where to?” Ocellus asked as he was about to turn the corner, only for her to do so first.
“AHHH!” he squealed in a rather high pitch and jumped at her appearance. “I uh… I mean… you didn’t hear that did you?”
“Everyone heard you. My ears are still ringing” she chuckled. Which meant she hadn’t heard what he was asking about. “I’m done for today. So where do you want to go?”
“Uh… just… somewhere. You checking out that book?” Gallus asked, pointing towards the book she was holding under a foreleg.
“Yeah, I found it while putting back the book on bipeds. It’s called ‘You Know What They Say About People With Big Feet’. Although I’m not sure if it's fiction or not. Either way I’m sure it’ll be a good read late at night. What about you, I know I’m a faster reader than you but did you finished your book yet?” she said, motioning to the book on the reading top.
“Oh, no. I… hadn’t even started.” he hadn’t even remembered he had put a book there. Well it had worked to make it look like he’d been back here all this time for a reason. Although, if he hadn’t read it, why was he down the aisle for so long? “It’s… for my homework. You know how I late I start that stuff.”
“Oh, what class? I could probably use it too then.”
It was just a random book. He didn’t even know the title. “N-no. It’s for the class we don’t share.”
“There’s a class we don’t share?”
“Home-ec!” he blurted. And it wasn’t even a lie. He took that class with Sandbar and Smolder but Yona, Silver Stream and Ocellus weren't. He knew Silver Stream had flight lessons at that time instead but he wasn’t sure what either Yona or Ocellus had then instead. “What do you have instead of that anyway?”
“I have flight lessons with Miss Rainbow Dash. So does Silver Stream. I’m a bit surprised you’re not in that class too.” Ocellus paused in thought. It wasn’t like every pegasus was in that class so why would every/the only gryphon be? “Anywho, let’s go check out our books. Then let’s head to… um… somewhere to read?” she knew Gallus didn’t really like to just hang out and read but she didn’t really have any ideas for this late in the evening without heading out for dinner yet.
“Yeah. Sure.”
“Really?”
“Y-yeah. Why? Is it not normal to want to hang out with a friend?”
“Hmm… I guess not. But I thought you normally wouldn’t. And you feel a bit…. ‘off’ today.”
“What? Na, I’m fine.” he said with a smile that betrayed him. And he knew it too. He wasn’t sure if Ocellus was the type to pry deeper into it though. When the paused became awkwardly long, which was pretty much instantly, he dropped it and added “Well, let’s go then.” and her turned and headed for the front desk. Ocellus followed.
He arrived first to the empty desk. Ocelosu joined by his side a few seconds later, waited another few seconds before ringing the bell. “One moment!” called <horse book pun name> before she came out from the back office where he had been diligently pretending to work. “Ocellus. Another day, another book?”
“Yes indeed HBPN” and handed her her book.
“Ohh… not a bad choice. Very… descriptive.” the mare whose age put her squarely in the stereotypical demographic for Fifty Shade of Heigh readers. “Scan and… boop. Here you go.” she hoofed the book back to Ocellus. “And yours?” she reached out and took Gallus’ book. She looked at it and her face dropped. She looked up and it at him who wasn’t paying attention and instead ‘subtly’ looking at Ocellus who was re-re-re-reading the back blurb, with a slight hint of confusion on her face. Mostly at the word ‘people’.
She scanned the book and gingerly handed it back to Gallus. He turned to her to take it and noticed her look. The faint smile, the eyes shifting from him to Ocellus and back. “Thanks…” he said with a hint of confusion of his own now.
“Oh, don’t mention it. To anyone. Nice choice of books by the way.” she said, pointedly at Gallus more than Ocellus. “Well, have fun you too.”
“Oh, we will.” Ocellus replied as she began to walk off, Gallus quickly beside her. “So Gallus, want to go to my room? Or maybe yours.”
A surprised and mildly entertained snort came from back at the counter. Ocellus didn’t pay notice but Gallus looked back. “Be safe you too.” and she winked at him. What was going on? She couldn’t know…? if anygryph would know he was crushing on Ocellus it would be Ocellus. He hadn’t done anything to give it away around HBPN so how could she have figured it out? Was he really more outwardly apparent about it than he thought. While he noticed a few things he was being goofy about, there were only a few of them, otherwise he was playing it pretty cool.
“What’s your book about anyway? Cooking, sowing, um… etiquiet? I don’t know what home-ec is beyond those first two. So…?”
“Uh… it’s…” and as Gallus looked at the book he had just booked out, he understood how, or why, HBPN had figured out what he had been thinking about. “Interspecies Offspring."
“Huh… I felt like sex-ed would be part of social studies, not home-ec. But I suppose this is a bit more advanced than simple reproduction mechanics.” Ocellus said to Gallus, completely oblivious to the look of sheer panic not only on his face but cartoonishly radiating from him in visible stink lines. “If you need any help with it just ask. I learnt all about that in the hive. Back when we were… well, you know. Succubi. Are-are you alright? You look… cartoonishly panicked.”
Shaking his head, which as everyone knows, dispels stink lines, Gallus collected his spaghetti [for the moment] and managed a quickly thought answer. “Uh… yeah, actually, do you know what a buffalo is? Somegryph I know said buffalo and ponies make deers and there are so many things weird about what I just said.” he said calmly while screaming internally.
“Oh, well Yona’s a buffalo. Well she’s a yak, obviously. But they’re pretty much the same species, just different cultures. Don’t tell her I said this, but I think the little deerling from her and Sandbar will be adorable!” she said with a squeal. That’s when something clicked in her. A common misconception about changelings is that they can sense love. While not wrong, it’s not entirely accurate either. It’s not so much that they can sense it so much as the can ‘intake’ it and they know that they’re doing so.
Thing is, since Thorax had yeeted Queen Chrysalis out of the hive and switched over to giving love instead of taking it, they’d sort of lost that ability. At least passively. As the thought crossed her mind, she switched back for a moment, taking love instead of giving it [no bow chicka bow wow]. And oh boy was there love coming from Gallus. And despite the very sexual nature of what had given it away, her thinking of what a gryphon and a changeling make, there was practically no lust in that love.
As good as taking this in felt, Ocellus quickly switched back and said “Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry!” she almost hugged him but thought better of it. She then went to put a hoof… feeler? What the hell do changelings have?, on his shoulder but awkwardly stopped short of doing that either. “I-I didn’t mean to do that to you… I…”
“Uh… do what? Exactly.” Gallus just asked.
“Make you fall in love with me-” Gallus’ face fell at those words. She knew. Gig is up. Confess? Deny? Run? Kiss? Hug? Prolonged awkward silence? Let more than 0.1 of a second pass as the brain throws seventeen unvocalized but concepted thoughts at you within that short amount of time. “-too.” and that last word both confused him and really changed the context of what she was saying for a third time.
The prolonged awkward silence was his go to it seemed out of those options as both of them just looked at one another for a solid few seconds. Gallus finally broke it with “Y-yeah. I just realised I- wait, ‘too’?” he asked.
“Well… the thing is. You see. Changelings have changed… but not entirely.” she said, trying to both explain and not seem like she’d done it intentionally. “Like yaks and buffalos. Our cultures are different, but we’re still the same.” bringing it back to that earlier conversation. That despite writing it almost an hour ago was probably only like 10-20 seconds ago story wise.
“You’re not the same? Then why are you like…” Gallus waved a claw up and down her body. “This then?”
“Well, we are shapeshifters. And you’re not mad?”
“Should I be?”
“Well, the other colts where.”
“Other colts? So, other ponies at this school like… like you?” Gallus asked dejectedly.
“They did… but. I kinda tricked them into loving me. I put off a pheromone that’s slightly addictive to male ponies. So, when they’re around me they feel ‘sated’ and when they’re not they feel ‘empty’. Thorax gave Principle Twilight a heads up about this and had Sandbar drink an… ‘antidote’ for it since we hang out so often.”
“Wait… so you knew you could do this to me and didn’t give me an antidote too?” and that’s where the anger came in. At least it sounded like it to Ocellus who cringed back at the accusation even though none had been intentionally made.
“I’m sorry! I didn’t think it could affect gryphons. It must be really weak on you but still having some small effect if it took this long.” Ocellus would be crying at this point if she had tear ducts. “I should’ve guessed it might affect more than just male ponies after those fillies asked me out too.”
“Nice.”
Ocellus blushed. “Well, you should probably speak with Principal Twilight. She’ll have some of the antidote on hoof. You… won’t be the first pon-grypho-” Ocellus stopped for a moment in though. “Actually you will be the first gryphon I’ve sent to her about this…” she smiled to herself at the correction. Something that even though he knew why now, Gallus still found a-dork-able. She recollected herself and finished with “But you get what I mean right?”
“Yeah. I get it. Don’t feel so bad about this. You can’t help it so it’s not your fault. I’m sorry too.” he said putting a claw on her shoulder as she faced away from him. “I’m glad I’m not in love with you. No offense. When I first realised it I didn’t want to be. Because it could ruin our friendship.”
“Aww… that’s weirdly sweet.”
“Right… well, I’ll just be going now. To speak with Principle Twilight. Bye.” he said as he realised where he was and quickly left.
“Ok, goodbye.” Ocelosu called back. “Huh… I didn’t even realise we’d been walking that entire conversation and ended up in my room, sitting on my bed with the door closed.” if only someone had described such actions in text. “Oh bother. He left his book here too.”
Chapter
“You’ve reached the Office of the Principle Twilight Sparkle.” the automated message begin as Gallus knocked on the door. “Unfortunately, I am unavailable at the moment. If it is between Monday and Friday, within the hours of 7am and 5pm then I may be out on royal business and may be some time. If this is an urgent matter, please hold down the button to contact me. Penalties for misusing this function outside of an urgent matter can be up to and including a fine of…”
Gallus held the button down.
*POP*
“What’s the emergency?!” Twilight asked, popping into existence and bowling over Gallus in the process. Her wet mane slipping out of the towel wrapped around it and the rest of her dripping water onto the floor.
Gallus, composing himself, answered her borderline twilighting toned question. “Uh… Ocellus sent me…”
“Uh-huh.” she answered with the expectation of continuation.
It was only met with silence for a few more moments though. “About the… antidote.”
“Oh right, the antidote…” she trailed. “The antidote for Ocellus. The antidote chosen specifically to cure Ocellus. Ocellus’ antidote. That antidote?”
“No. The one for me, to stop her… her love-bug stuff on me.”
“Oh thank Celestia. I thought since you would only press the button in an emergency and you were talking about an antidote I thought she’d been poisoned but you said it like I knew and I didn’t so I panicked and tried to stay calm but pretended I knew what you were talking about so that you wouldn’t panic but you still pressed the button so it is an emergency! What’s the emergency?!” she asked, again.
“Ugh… I’m in love with Ocellus but she told me it was just a changeling thing tricking my brain into it and that you had an antidote for it.”
“Oh right, the antidote. The antidote for-”
“Please stop.” Gallus said face palming. “Do you have it or not? Please don’t tell me she lied to save face.”
“Right. Sorry. Yes. I do.” Twilight assured him. Which actually hurt more than he thought it would. Mostly because he didn't think it would hurt at all. Whether the feeling where real or not they were real to him damn it. And losing them just felt bad. “But I’ve never heard of it affecting anything other than a pony of the opposite gender.” she said, putting a hoof under her chin and turning her head upwards to think.
“And that means…?”
“It means… this could be a great new case study. Would you mind if I made a report out of this? ‘Changeling Pherodiction [pheromone addiction] and the effect it has on gryphons with prolonged exposure’. I could keep your name anonymous.”
“Oh, I wonder which gryphon at this school it could be. Totally not the ONLY gryphon whose friends with the ONLY changeling…” Gallus mocked.
“R-right....” Twilight admitted and magicked away the quill and parchment she'd magicked in just before. “I can give you the antidote. But I’m not sure it’ll have the same effect it’ll have on ponies. And come to think of it, it may not even be safe for a gryphon to take. So no. I can’t give you the antidote.”
“So I’m boned…”
“No, not at all. I’ll just have to consult with either Zecora or Thorax first.” Twilight replied as she rounded her desk and pulled out a pulled out the same quill and parchment she’d zapped away before. But in addition she zapped in Spike.
“Wha- what happened?” the little purple dragon [I’m giving descriptions not detailed enough for people who don’t know who spike are but unnecessary for people who do] said as he popped into existence in front of Twilight. “Wait… you’re here? I’ve been waiting to have a shower for half an hour and you’re not even in there?!”
“Spike, take a letter.” and she passed him the quill and parchment.
"Spike, take a letter…"
Dear King Thorax, it’s me, ya boi, Spike the Brave. Twilight’s asked me to send you this message. Apparently Ocellus’s drug-stink can affect gryphons. Any idea if the cure will work and if it’s safe for a gryphon to take? Wait, didn’t you tell me the stuff was just water and that being aware of the drug-stink was enough to stop its effect? Or did you just tell me that. Oh no… am I in love with you for real? Oh this is heavy man. We need to talk about this in person [in pony but spike wouldn’t say that and even more so not so with thorax]. Oh, and Twilight is asking you to come here anyway. Love Spike.
“No wait!” Spike yelled as he tried to grab at the magic smoke from the burnt letter he’d just sent. “Oh… that was bad, uh… typo. Yeah. Typo. Nothing else.”
“I’m sure he won’t mind.” Twilight reassured him. Turning back to Gallus and completely ignoring that side story, Twilight added “Luckily, Thorax is the closest out of all the foreign students’ patrons. He should be here by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. Until then, my only recommendation would be to avoid her for the time being. But just remember not to be rude about it. I’m sure she feels bad about this and treating her like a…” the old saying of ‘treating her like a changeling’ seemed inappropriate now. “Friend she still is to you.” she finished slightly incoherently.
Gallus just sighed. He figured that’s what Twilight would say. Still hurt though. All of this did. Even if the writing didn’t reflect it much. He just didn’t really know how to express it all. Both Gallus and the writer. Is this fourth wall breaking too much? Too bad, this whole thing is just a writing exercise more than a serious project anyway.
His room was pretty close to hers and she would probably come visit later thinking he’d taken the antidote. So Gallus would have to go somewhere and come back later before going to sleep. He could go talk with Gilda again… na. Why? Just because she was a gryphon. Maybe Starlight was a better idea. She was the school counsellor after all. “Right… so should I be back here tomorrow at midday?”
Twilight answered with “Perhaps a bit later than that. That’s just when Thorax should arrive by. It’ll probably take a bit longer than that. If it was a simply ‘yes the antidote will work’ we would’ve gotten a response already so it may be some time. Maybe later in the afternoon. Say, 3pm?”
“Sure. See you then Teach’.” and he stepped out of the office. He then checked she hadn’t followed him, and by the sound of annoyed dragon noises coming from the door, he figured she had something else to deal with first. He then immediately knocked on the door next to Twilight’s.
“Come in!” called Starlight through the door. He entered and closed it behind himself. “Oh, Gallus… what a surprise!” she was a surprisingly bad liar at times given her history.
“How do you know already?” he asked. From past experiences both here and in the principal's office, the walls weren't thin or anything.
“Well, I suppose I can tell you. The Cutie Mark Crusaders where just in here before and they told me all about what happened.”
“How do they know already?”
“Some old marefriend of Rainbow Dash told them that you told her.”
Somewhere, somehow, Gilda could sense the spaghetti falling out of Gallus’ metaphorical pockets. Or she would in the future because timeline wise, this takes place simultaneously to the previous chapters. Either way, as Gilda paid for both of their meals she took a moment to figure out what she was going to do for the rest of the day. Let alone the next three. And speaking of three…
Scootaloo rounded a corner and aksed “What did you say to Gallus that made him so upset?”
“GRYST!!! Where do you come from?” shouted Gilda in shock.
“Well, I guess that’s one way to ask her… not exactly subtle though.” Sweetie Belle coming around after.
“Well it beats tryin’a ‘bring it up herself through driving conversation that way’.” followed, both verbally and physically around the corner, the third one whos name Gilda had forgotten already… again.
Sweetie Belle returned with “But that’s what you’re meant to do when asking somepony something so you seem interested in what they’re talking about and so you don't look impolite by doing… that!”
“I don’t really care about being polite. She’s not.” Scootaloo said harshly. “He was just as annoyed as I was after talking with you.”
“I wouldn’t say annoyed is the right word…” Gilda mocked, casually raising a claw and facing the open palm [what’s a bird claw palm called?] to the sky for emphasis.
“Then what WOULD you say, hmm?” Scootaloo asked again.
And it was a good question. What she would say is ‘I made him realise something really obvious’. But what she should say however was “None of your business, that’s what.”
“What kind of answer is that?”
“The one I gave you.” It wasn’t any of their concern. Well, besides being concerned about their friend. So it kinda was. But she had a feeling that Gullas wouldn’t want anyone to know about his crush on Oculus… or whatever her name was, at least not until he’d figured out the whole thing for himself.
Incredulous conversation
“Alright! Alright…” Gilda shouted, interrupted Scootaloo vaguely speciesist rant. “I told him I’m pretty sure Rainbow Dash had a thing for my when we went to school together so it wasn’t weird at all that Sandbar liked him and that that pony has to make the first move if he really does want you. Because if you’re wrong, you just come off looking gay.” While most of what she’d just said was utter bullshit, the last part was from personal experience.
For something she’d come up with on the fly [same with the author], she’d worded it almost perfectly. Saying that Gallus had noticed it about Sandbar meant that they would bug him about it and not Gallus. Of course this could horribly backfire if it turned out Sandbar did have a thing for him… but what were the odds of that? Given her experience with the universe jerking her around, probably high. Wait, Gallus had said Sandbar liked Yoda right? Ok. She was safe on that front.
“Rainbow Dash was the one who had a thing for you?” Scootaloo said in an accusatory tone. As if what she’d heard was the other way around.
“Really? That’s what you took away from that?” Gilda scoffed. “You know… I’m actually starting to see why Rainbow would take you has a ‘sister’.” she said with air-quotes. “You’re clearly as smart as she is.”
Gilda eventually left the restaurant. She did so when the wait staff wasn’t looking and only paid for her own meal. She’d leave that for Gallus to deal with later. She didn’t live here so it wasn’t her problem. Ofcourse leaving meant Gallus wouldn’t be able to find her if he came back looking. But it also meant those three fillies couldn’t find her after that prank she pulled on them inevitably got revealed as just that and they stormed back to confront her. And while seeing the face of the victim of a prank was the best part, she already knew they had fallen for it and was happy enough for her.
The rest of the afternoon, not that there was much left of it, was spent walking around the town. While most of the stuff that wasn’t just a grocery or local farmer's stall was focused on tourist trap crap selling something called ‘mane 6 merch’ and ‘pony swag’ she did find a few stores that didn’t. Gilda wasn’t entirely sure who the mane 6 where but did know it was Rainbow’s friends. Uhh… Rainbow, Fluttershy, Ponk, Twilit Sporkle… Apple and… Trixie? She wasn’t sure about that last one but with how much advertisement there was about her around town she had to be one of them. Why else would there be so much stuff mentioning her? [the joke is trixie put it all up herself]
One of the few stores that wasn’t about them for sure was this place that seemed out of place in a small farm town. The Carousel Boutique. Gilda didn’t exactly have too much of an interest in high fashion and often thought the makers of said fashion had to be high themselves. But 'not much' was still leagues above how much Rainbow opposed it. She could remember the school dance and how much of a fight Rainbow had with her parents about wearing that dress.
Gilda was about to enter the shop when a thought occurred to her. She’d pretty much exhausted the list of things to do in this pondunk town and if she went here now, this late in the evening when she’d have to leave soon anyway that would just be a waste of a thing to do. So the Gilda x Rarity section can wait and I know that seemed like set up for it to happen now but doing this felt organic. It’ll happen, your just getting a little blue balled for now is all if Gilda x Rarity is your thing. And I know the x is usually used in shipping terms but I’m just using it as a general story setting phrase.
With a flap of her wings Gilda took off into the sky, just narrowly missing the door to The Carousel Boutique opening and Fluttershy walking out. “Goodbye Rarity. I’ll see you tomorrow so we can finish the photoshoot.” followed by the door closing and the sound of a single middle aged mare opening a tub of icecream and uncorking tonight's bottle of wine.
The scene was the inside of Rainbow Dash’s cloud house with the front door just slightly off of centre frame. Gilda popped through the floor. Cloud. House. Landing softly aloftly on her feet she took just a few steps and flipped onto the couch heavily. Yet softly. Soft as a cloud one might say. One might be extremely proteinous for saying it but one still might.
Something about the sudden jolt of landing and the new angel *Buurrrrpp* “Ugh… that’s better…” she said before stretching out. “Two more days to fill. What am I going to do?...” she wondered aloud. A wave of tiredness [autocorrect changed that to exhaustion. I know what I meant!] hit her. Today had been a lot of flying around, even if the only written part had been a short conversation. “I could sleep an entire day. But only one. Sure. I’ll do that tomorrow.”
And she shut her eyes.
She almost immediately opened her eyes as the sun decided that from a hundred billion kilometres away… or maybe like three in this universe, it was going to perfectly come through the window and blast her in the eyes. Even closed it made the inside of her eyelids glow red. Thing was, for it to come through that window it had to be “Morning? What the fluff?! Did reality just glitch on me? I don’t feel reste- actually I do. Wow… that’s freaky.”
It had been about six when she’d closed her eyes and the sun said it was about six now too.
Blah blah blah skip something about sleeping for 12 hours made her too rested to sleep the whole day skip
She’d decided to steal breakfast from Rainbow. But when Gilda looked in the cupboard she only found doritos and mountain dew. Fiery doritos and red alert that is. The casuals stuff. With that she did a light hop and fell through the floor. He wings caught her and she glided down to the average flying height over the town. Her practical joke from yesterday backfired on her. The only place Gilda knew too get something to eat at and she’d semi-skipped the bill.
Blah blah blah
“Would you happen to be Gallus?” Someone said as they approached her. Naturally this irritated her. It was like asking if a mare was named Steve. That was a cock’s name. Didn’t help that she [and Rainbow Dash] got called tomcolts throughout their time in Flight School. She turned around to see… what the tart was that thing?!
It was roughly pony shaped, taller than her, green and had antlers and bug wings. Her brief confusing gave way to “Do I LOOK like a Gallus?” she growled. The thing backed up slightly and did a very pony gesture of raising one bent… hoof? Up to its chest. Why did it have a single wing for a tail… ‘what even are you?’ She thought “What even are you?”
“I’m awfully sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. My name is Thorax. Uh, King, Thorax. I’m a changeling. I’m sorry to have bothered you. I’ll just be off now. Good day.” he turned and began to leave.
“What? You’re not a changeling. They’re… not…” she motioned at all of the him. A thought caught her mind. A changeling asking for Gallus. “I know Gallus. Why are you after him? That Oculus hen, uh…. Mare. Ladybug? Her. She in some sorta forbidden love thing with him?”
“Well. Yes actually. I take it you know about his… ‘attraction’ to her?” he looked around and hesitantly said, trying to keep private matters private. “Though, it’s Ocellus.”
“Yeah. Chick seemed head over paws for her. Don’t tell me it’s just some kinda changeling trick. Because if it is… called it!” she said, leaning back into her seat. She hadn’t even realised her food had arrived and was already on the table. It totally hadn’t been spit in by an annoyed waiter who didn’t understand that gryphons didn’t understand the concept of tipping beyond the minimum payment for a servous. Like countries that don’t just pay a bare minimum minimum wage.
Thorax sighed heavily. “It is.” he admitted. Gilda let out a chuckle at first but then immediately got hit in the feels by how much that would have to suck for Gallus. “But… it shouldn’t be. It shouldn’t be affec- I shouldn’t be telling you this. Not without Gallus consent. I should be getting to the school grounds to speak with Twilight.”
‘A changeling wanting consent. There’s a first.’ Gilda thought to herself. “It’s cool. I’m Gallus’ uh… liaisons. Like you are for… O...celery.” she lied, though rather convincingly. She knew enough about Granpa Gruff having to come here every few months for some chick, that she now knew to be Gallus, guardian.
“No you’re not.”
“Worth a shot.”
“How do you know Gallus anyway?”
“I thought you had to get to the school to speak with Twilight.”
“You’re very confusing with whether you want this conversation to end or keep going.”
Gilda shrugged. “Eh. I’m just going with the flow. I met him yesterday. Never spoke to him before that. Didn’t even realise I hadn’t seen him in Gryphonstone lately until then. He came up to me, hit on me a little, and I made him realise he had the hots for the changeling. Also, rumor is Sandbar has the hots for him. But I didn’t tell you that.”
“Yes you di- oh, right.” he started and stopped. Thorax then sighed once more. “I’m putting off talking to Twilight because I don’t know the answer to her question. I should, but I just don’t.”
“Well… neither does she.” Gilda replied. “What’s the question anyway?”
“Do you know what changelings and gryphons produce when they breed?”
Gilda thought about it and let out a descending whistle. “Well if I had to guess… *description of this picture*”
“No, that wasn’t the question I don’t know the answer to. I know that answer to that… and trust me, it’s not… that.” he flinched at the thought. “It’s something… feral and… sad. Deformed creatures that would be called… well, ‘creatures’.” that answered Gilda’s question about it being some forbidden love thing. “What Twilight asked was ‘Can changeling pheraddiction affect gryphons?’ and I don’t know. It shouldn’t. Changelings evolved alone side ponies so we’re only really meant to breed with them.”
Something came to Gilda’s mind. Well, something other than that it should be ‘Changelings evolved alone side ponies parasitically’. If a gryphon and a pony made a hippogryph, then what did a hippogryph and a gryphon make? Maybe a ‘gryphon’ that still had some leftover traits from the pony. “Like being blue…”
She had no idea who his parents where. Granted her parents had pawned her off to flight school and when she got back she was old enough to be on her own. So not being around your parents as a gryphon wasn’t uncommon. She wasn’t even sure if Granpa Gruff was actually her granpa. Or if her and Gabby where related at all. Good thing gryphons, like horses [irl look it up] were resistant to inbreeding or gryphonstone would look like… oh. Oh dear.
Meanwhile, last night. [yes, I know, that’s the joke]
Gallus didn’t know what he’d expected going back to the restaurant he’d met Gilda at would do. But them saying he needed to pay for his food was actually completely expected in retrospect. He had a few bit on him [don’t ask were] but that was pretty much it. “Great… now I can’t afford to do anything either…” he muttered, looking at the single bit, paperclip and a piece of string he had left in his claw.
He assumed Ocellus would think he’s ‘cured’ and come talk to him. She was sweet that way. Damn it! He had to be somewhere else tonight, and tomorrow morning until this was all dealt with. Now that he was down on cash that limited the options. Yona, Silverstream and Smolder had all been at the school earlier today and would probably still be there. That left Sandbar. Where he was though Gallus had no idea. Running into him would be as unlikely as running into Gilda aga-and there he is right there.
“Hey man!” called Gallus. Sandbar was standing on his hind legs, forelegs leaning on the glass window of the store front. “Whatcha looking at?”
“Oh. Hey man.” the colt said hopping down from the display. “Would it unfair to the shopkeeper if I just got a quill from you instead? I mean, it’s half his business afterall.”
“I’m not giving you a feather.” Gallus deadpanned. “Why do you even want one. Aren’t they more of a unicorn… or claw, type of thing?”
“I don’t know. Just thought it’d be cooler than a pencil.”
“It wouldn’t. Trust me. Dead feathers taste awful.”
“They’re not distasteful, they’re classy…!” he said smoothly.
“If you say so…” Gallus mocked.
“Hey… you alright?” the question came out of nowhere Gallus thought. “You look a little… off. Everything doing good with you?” He did feel a little… ‘off’. But he didn’t think he was showing it. Guess some grythons just couldn’t hide things as well as they thought they could. That or some ponies could just tell a lot better than others. Or both.
“Yeah. I’m good… just some school stuff.” he said calmly enough that Sandbar’s response caught him off guard more than him asking in the first place.
“It doesn’t sound like you're good. It sounds like you’re the opposite of good. Ungood.”
“You mean bad?...”
“Yeah. That. You know you can tell me anything right? I got your back no matter what.” Sandbar emphasised by placing a hoof on Gallus’ shoulders. Not quite the back but close enough.
“Yeah. Yeah I know.” Gallus offered, dropping any false appearances he’d been putting up. “How could you even tell anyway?”
“How could I not? You’re voice is all shaky, you’re looking down and shifting around. It’s like… every tell you could imagine, you’re doing.” all of this was news to Gallus. He’d had no idea he’d been doing any of that. Like no one had been describing it. But it wasn’t lazy writing [although this part certainly is] so much as being from the perspective of the person not knowing they were doing anything at all. Which in turn, is good writing!...
“Dang it…” he muttered at the realisation before telling Sandbar “It really is just… an issue with school.” technically true but with many qualifiers. “It’ll be solved by monday. I… I’d rather wait until it’s over to tell you about it.”
“If you say so.” Sandbar mocked with the same phrase Gallus had. "But uh… what are you doing now?” he said as he ran ahead of Gallus and started walking backwards in front of him.
Gallus sighed. “Nothing really.” he knew Sandbar was going to anyway so he figured he’d ask rather than just be imposed upon. Wait… was it still being imposed on if he only asked out of courtesy? “You wanna hang out?”
“Well. I was gonna spend some time with Yona but I’m sure she’d understand. After all, you know what they say: colts before malts!” he laughed and stepped in beside Gallus as they walked to wherever. Gallus didn’t get what was so funny about that or even understand what it meant. But it cheered him up a little all the same.
Meanwhile, a few hours later back in Yona’s room.
Happy birthday to Yona. Happy birthday to Yona… Happy birthday overlooked middle child. Happy birthday to… Yona……
“Well I suppose that would explain it.” Thorax told the gryphon he’d just met in the context of telling her private information about both his charge and another young student she had nearly zero connection with at all. “If Gallus had some pony ancestry it could cause her pheradiction to affect him, albeit slower than usual. Though, I’m not sure that’s the case. Afterall, hippogryphs, or at least the kind we’re talking about, are sterile.”
“Are they?” questioned Gilda. She’d read the book years ago but even then she hadn’t really ‘read’ the book so much as skimmed it. “Doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Sonic Rainboom was thought impossible until Rainbow Dash did it… like seven times now.” she sounded almost too gleeful in those words. It wasn’t like she really missed Rainbow Dash and was extremely disappointed she wasn’t here right now or anything. B-baka…
“Well, I suppose. After all, anything is possible if it happens.” he said in thought, looking towards the castle and the school just above the roofline. “But I can’t just assume that’s why. If it’s not then the cure won’t work on him. And as far as I know, there's no way to find out such a thing.”
“You could just ask his sires. Even if he doesn’t know his grandparents, they should. And if either of them are more ponylike still, then there’s your answer. Pretty simple really.” she offered.
“Yes. That’ll work perfectly.” Thorax pranced a little at his words. This got an eye from Gilda, and a few others watching. He may be a common-ish sight around ponyville at this point but that didn’t make him any less of an oddity when he did show up. “Thank you for the advice… uh…?”
She didn’t offer a name. She instead waited for him to ask it.
“I’m sorry… I don’t think I got your name.” he said with an awkward smile. “All I know is that, well, that it’s not ‘Gallus’. Hehe…”
“It’s Gilda. And thank me by not dropping it around any of Rainbow Dash’s friend. I don’t want to run into any of them until I have to.” she said, with a slight look over her shoulder to the direct she thought, but wasn’t quite sure, Fluttershy was hiding from her at.
Then for good measure, the other direction that she knew those three fillies where hiding from her at. She knew they were there for sure as the side of their manes was just barely poking around the corner. And from the way it was, they’d have to be standing on top of one another. Seriously, what was with ponies and avoiding any sort of confrontation like the plaque.
“Right. Of course. Well, thank you Gilda. I’ll be sure to… not, mention you.” the big green bug-deer stammered. He took a step back “I hope to see you again some time. Good bye.” and he took off into the air. Doing so with much more speed than Gilda expected from something so bulky and thin-winged.
Gallus woke up early. Which was doubly annoying since he’d stayed up late last night, making sure he wouldn’t get back before Ocellus had surely already gone to sleep. He had slept like a log though. Not much could stop him from doing so. Even emotional turmoil. What did make it a bit harder though was Sandbar pulling him into a spooning position at about 3am. And considering he’d done that from the couch on the other side of the [small] room made it even more impressive.
Of course early was a relative term. On a school day, 9am is late. On a saturday, it’s VERY early. Getting out of his bed, he wiped the sleep drool from his face and walked over to the chair Sandbar had gone to sleep on, now up-ended and laying on top of Sandbar instead. Flipping it on him had been the only way to keep him from moving around so much. Gallus remembered pretty much everything instantly, no forgetting, even for just a moment as he woke up. His weird dreams about him huffing Ocellus’ farts really confused him. And the phrase ‘love-stink’ wouldn’t leave his mind.
Just glad the Tree[house] of Harmony hadn’t decided that last night was the night it’d link their dreams again.
He opened the window and jumped out. He did that more often than using the door. Twilight on the other hoof didn’t know that and so if he had used it, he wouldn’t seen the note attached to it saying ‘Please attend the Headmare’s office at your earliest convenience. Principle Twilight. Dictated, not written.’. Instead he flew out of the school ground entirely. Just a few more hours until he could go and have this all be over and dealt with.
What he was going to do for those few more hours… eh, he’d figure it out. It’s not like there wasn’t a lack of things to do in this town.
A manic expression of harmony’s might. A tree that’s a castle appeared overnight. A school taunt by six who when’s powers unite… A rainbow explodes crushing all darkness in sight!
Gallus woke up early. Which was doubly annoying since he’d stayed up late last night, making sure he wouldn’t get back before Ocellus had surely already gone to sleep. He had slept like a log though. Not much could stop him from doing so. Even emotional turmoil. What did make it a bit harder though was Sandbar pulling him into a spooning position at about 3am. And considering he’d done that from the couch on the other side of the [small] room made it even more impressive.
Of course early was a relative term. On a school day, 9am is late. On a saturday, it’s VERY early. Getting out of his bed, he wiped the sleep drool from his face and he walked over to the chair Sandbar had gone to sleep on, now up-ended and laying on top of him instead. It had been the only way to keep him from moving around so much. He remembered pretty much everything instantly, no forgetting, even for just a moment as he woke up. His weird dreams about him huffing Ocellus’ farts really confused him. And the phrase ‘love-stink’ wouldn’t leave his mind.
Just glad the Tree[house] of Harmony hadn’t decided that last night was the night it’d link their dreams again. That aside, he didn’t know what he was going to do today. He usually spent the weekends with his friends and while that was still possible, he wanted to avoid her at least until he’d been told if the cure would work or not and Twilight had said that wouldn’t be until later this afternoon. Back peddling on that would be bad writing.
*poof*
A letter appeared before him in a cloud of sparkling green dust/smoke. Obviously from Spike. Which raised the question: can Smolder do that too? Can all dragons? He grabbed the note with his talons and read.
Gallus, Please come to the Headmare’s office at your earliest convenience. Principle Twilight Sparkle. Dictated not written.
Gallus wondered if Twilight had said that last part or Spike was just being passive-aggressive. Both were equally likely. Nevertheless he crunched the letter up and through it over his shoulder, roughly towards the bin. It missed but it was in the right area so as far as he was concerned it wasn’t a mess so long as he picked it all up when taking the bin out. Which he hadn’t done for almost a fortnight now but that’s not the point.
He opened the window and jumped out. His wings caught him and as he flapped a few times, he took off into the air. Twilight’s office was just over there and took him a matter of seconds to get to. She did however have something against students entering it through her window which made it a bit longer of a journey to get to, having to go inside the building and arrive at the door to her office that way.
The door was open and inside he could see her sitting behind her desk and Thorax sitting in a seat just a bit too small for him in front of it. “Ah, Gallus. Please.” Twilight said and beckoned. She followed up with a motion towards the door. Gallus closed it behind him as he entered and quickly hopped onto a chair. Now, he’d thought he’d done so all smooth and cool-like but after last night he wasn’t sure if he’d pulled it off as he thought he had. “Thanks you for coming. It seems that I was wrong in assuming Thorax would reply immediately if it was as simple as taking the antidote. As it turns out, he doesn’t have a message spell to respond with. I kind of just assumed he did and, well…”
“Gallus. It’s good to meet you.”
“Uh… we’ve met.”
“Oh, well, only ‘officially’. But, as a friend of Ocellus, I’d like to properly meet you.”
“K…?” Gallus put out a claw for him to shake. Thorax took it and shook it. “So… does that mean I can just take the antidote and it’ll make this go away?”
“Y-yes. It should. Probably. At the very least, I can assure you it’s safe for a gryphon to take. As Twilight was concerned about.” he wasn’t sure it would work and was sure it was safe because what it was was just water. Knowing that you where under the effect was usually enough to dispel it. Although, this had come up when he was first in talks to enroll Ocellus here so the batch Twilight had was water that had been sitting in a vial for over a year.
“Should?”
“Well, it’s not guaranteed effective. But it’s rarely not. And, well, this whole situation has brought up some questions that quite frankly, even as the new King of the Changelings, I don’t know the answer to. Both myself, and… femur? [wtf is his brother’s name?] had no idea it could affect anything other than a pony. Nor a femal-” he stopped.
Twilight had told him about the two fillies who had been sent to her by Ocellus. But that was her business to be kept private and had nothing to do with Gallus’. Also, according to Twilight’s conclusion, the two cheerleaders hadn’t been affected by the pheradiction at all. Luckily, Ocellus had just been too innocent/naive to realise why they had wanted a Changeling to join them in their room that night.
“Forgive me for asking, but… do you by any chance happen to have a pony in your ancestry?”
“What?”
“I mean, is one of your parents, or grandparents a pony?”
“No, I know what you mean. But… what do you mean? I’m a gryphon!” he said a bit louder than necessary. Gallus wasn’t sure why but it felt like an accusation. Or maybe it was because “I don’t know. I’m an orphan.”
“Oh. I uh… should I know what that means?” he leant over and half-whispered to Twilight. Gallus face-<palm but with a claw/talon word>ed.
“Well. You see…” Twilight began, doing her best to try and defuse the situation. She knew his parents weren't in the picture and that’s why Granpa Gruff was his guardian. And since Hearth’s Warming she’d also known Gallus didn’t exactly like his home life. “It means th-”
“It means that I don’t have parents.”
There was a long pause. Oddly, not awkward though. But what broke it made it so. “How is that possible?” asked Thorax. Gallus’ thought that had to be the dumbest question he’d ever heard. And Yona had asked him some doozies. From a cultural angel though he began to understand. Literally every Changeling knew their mother was Quinn Chrysalis. And that Thorax and Ocelosu where technically siblings.
“No dude… I HAVE parents. They’re just gone. Or dead. Or… something like that.” he said with a mix of explaining and annoyance at having to explain that. It wasn’t until after he’d said it that he started to feel, well… shitty was the best way to describe it. Not sad, just, ‘ugh’ feeling. And that was reflected by his tone as he added. “I don’t know who they were or if they were blue. Or why I am. I just… am.”
Twilight, trying to break the tension once more, which for some reason she hadn’t thought there would be at all, cut in with “You see Gallus, though the possibility hadn’t occurred to me, Thorax is asking because when a pony and a gryphon reproduce with one another, with either being the male or female they produce an offspring known as a hippogryph. Though, not the same type as Silver Stream. They’re called tha-”
“Called that because they look like hippogryphs, yeah yeah I know that. I don’t look enough like a hippogryph to be one.” he said as if he’d known that for more than a single day. And it hadn’t even been quite that long yet.
“That is true. But is it possible that perhaps only one of your parents was a hippogryph and the other a gryphon? That could explain there being nearly no difference between you and any other gryphon besides the colour of your feathers.”
“I thought they couldn’t have a chick?”
“Also true. Usually. But though improbable, not impossible.”
Gallus had never questioned his parentage before. He’d just assumed they where two deadbeats who couldn’t handle raising a blue chick or they where dead. Granpa Gruff had, when asked, told him ‘They found you crawling around and nobody would claim you so everygryphon just decided that I was the one who had to take care of you. Now shut up and eat your grule you little ingrate.’
“If it’s improbable not impossible, isn’t it also possible that I’m just a gryphon who got affected by Ocellus'… “ he paused as his mind told him ‘don’t say love-stick don’t say love stink don’t say love stink’. “Romance… smell…” he cocked his head slightly and wondered if that was better or worse. “What even made you come up with that idea?” he said, suddenly realising how defencive he was being. If it was an addiction to whatever Ocellus’ thing was, maybe he was just coming off of it and strung out.
“Well, I ran into another gryphon on the way here. We had a little chat to help me think things through and-”
“Damn it Gilda. First Ocellus, now this… I swear if she’s right again-” and the words ‘Finish that threat, I dare you’ came to mind. And you know what? He was going to finish that threat. “I have to go talk to somegryphon.” and he stood, took off and flew out the window. Not quite as fast as the sentence made it sound but still with a modicum of speed. Evenough that Twilight’s words were ignored entirely.
She asked aloud but not particularly directed at Thorax “Did he say ‘Gilda’? I need to contact Rainbow Dash.”
Gilda x Gallus 2: for a story based around these two it took long enough to get them back together...
“Gilda!” Gallus yelled as he increased his speed towards her. He’d thought the odds of finding her at the same place as yesterday to be pretty low but he didn’t exactly have any better idea of where else to look. That and he hadn’t had breakfast yet either. She was about to leave so it was only lucky timing and plot convenience that let him catch her there in the first place.
Why he was putting so much stock into what ‘some random hen’ had come up with came down to her being right about the first thing. Even being right about her tricking him into loving her, even if Ocellus hadn’t done so on purpose. “Sup dweeb.” Gilda replied as he got closer. “Take it the changeling’s daddy came and chased you off huh?” she said with a smirk.
“What the tart did you say to him? And why the tart are you talking about me to some… some… dopplebanger?!” he yelled. Just two years ago [or three or four, not sure how long it’s been] that term would’ve been completely fine with everyone who’d just heard him. Now it was the pony’s N word, nag, but for changelings. ‘Course Gilda didn’t know that and honestly most ponies still didn’t care. Gallus knew though. “I mean… uh… darn it.” he cursed at himself to himself.
“Wow, ok, ok… calm your crotch-tits.” she said while making a forward and backward ‘slow down’ motion with one of her foreclaws. “He came up to me and just started talking. Forgive me for not being rude and telling him to shut up and shove off like I wanted to.” Gallus fully landed at this point and stepped up close to her.
He didn’t say anything. He just death stared her. She didn’t back down from it though. Not at first. A solid ten seconds passed before she flinched and her eyes darted away from his for a moment. She’d lost that match. He loosened up barely a second after that so it was clear he knew that he'd won too.
“Hey, I gotta give you credit though. Clearly you told her. So I guess you didn’t lose my respect after all.”
“Are you my mother?”
“Wot.”
“You talked about how your old enough to be my mom, about having a chick with a pony and now, turns out I might be part pony. So… are you? Coming to Ponyville with some excuse about meeting up with Miss Rainbow Dash even though she’s not even here but really coming to check on your wayward son?!”
Gilda just stood there, eyes wide and beak slightly agape.
He walked past her and sat in the seat Gilda had just gotten up from. “I’m just messing with you. How did you come up with the idea that I’m part pony?” he asked, still mildly chuckling as he sat.
Gilda, still a little shocked didn’t exactly know how to react to that little prank he’d pulled on her and just shrugged, muffling a “I’un’no.”.
She regained most of her composure and had to admit, that was a good prank. If she had caught on fast enough she probably would’ve said 'yes' just to mess with him in turn. Or was that too mean? Eh… “Think it’s actually possible? I might be part pony?” he asked as she walked up to the table she’d just gotten up from. There was only a single seat at it so she couldn’t sit down herself.
“Dunno. Got a better explanation?”
“Yeah, uh… I'll have a breakfast gryscone and a medium Dr.Poop please.” Gallus said to the waiter.
“Wait, you’re getting something? I was just about to leave!” Gilda groaned. She should still leave just to prove a point. “To go!” she called to the waiter. Whether she heard or not and then acknowledged it or not, the two of them would have to wait to find out.
Gallus, leaning on the table, answered her. “Well I’m either a one in a million son of a hippogryph. Or I’m a one in a million gryphon affected by changeling’s… phera-whatever...” he twirled his claw to emphasise the ‘whatever’ part. “Oh! And you were right. It… it was a changeling trick.” he admitted, voice downtuned.
“Wait… really?” that surprised her. “I thought I was just joking. What a bitch move.”
“What? No! It’s not her fault… she didn’t mean to.” he started, defending the girl. But by the end of it, it was barely even half hearted. “She was surprised by it too.”
“Right… if she tricked you, how exactly is that NOT her fault?” Gilda walked over to another table with two mares at it and grabbed a chair from their table without asking. The cream and mint mares watching and eating popcorn didn’t object at all. She placed it at the table directly across from Gallus, back facing inwards and sat on it cool-teacher style.
*explanation*
“That was incredibly clear and concise and doesn’t warrant going over it another time as we both now know what happened.” Gilda said stiffly as if her words where completely out of character.
There was a third option however. Neither of those one in a million things where right and his feelings for her were genuine. But Gilda didn’t think pointing that out to him would make him feel any better. And at this point, she didn’t think that was what was on the forefront of his mind. He clearly thought he was acting cool but he was a horrible actor. Wait… was she any better then?
Gallus didn’t seem upset, which is what Gilda thought he’d be around this whole thing but she couldn’t quite place what it was she was seeing from him. He corner eyed almost every pony who walked by. It was when a blue pegasus [not Rainbow Dash] flew by that he followed her hard with his eyes. The mare probably noticed too and put an extra bit of flap into her soar that emphasised what she assumed he was looking at her for. It really made that pegasus' day and made her feel good about herself.
“Wait… you really think you’re part pony?”
He answered with "That’s like the third thing you’ve started with ‘wait’ in a row.”
“Ok… guess not then.”
“Wai-damn it…” Gallus began, cutting himself off. “Wait. No, you’re right.”
“As always.”
“Yeah, will I wish you weren’t for once.” he muttered. “Granpa Gruff. He’s your grandpa right?”
“Um… probably?”
“Well, he’s my guardian for this school. And he’s the closest thing I have to a father. Even if he pawned me off to this place at the first chance.”
“Flight school for me. Join the club.” she joked in agreement before realising what he’d just said. He thought they were family. She tried to stop from saying anything more. “Listen dweeb, I-” but he just talked right over her.
“He’s gotta know something about who my parents are right?” he said, going in a different direction than she’d thought. “I’ve never really, properly, asked him before so I’ve only gotten ‘They found me crawling around town.’ but he’s gotta know who had an egg around then or who died… or if there was some pony or hippogryph around 11 moons beforeclaw.”
It was weird. Gilda had never heard someone’s voice like that before. Both excited and downtrodden at the same time. It certainly pulled on a few heart strings she didn't know were so out of tune. Or maybe that was her hope that he had thought of her as family. Nahg, who would want that? It’s not like she liked him or anything. B-baka!
“Anyway…” Gallus interrupted her thoughts. “I have a favour to ask.” she didn’t reply verbally, only raising an eyebrow slightly in a ‘go on’ manor. “Could… you… help me found out?”
“W-why do you want my help? You can talk to Granpa Gruff on your own.”
“I can. But I’d rather not if I don’t have to. When I do, I’d like to have a friend there me to help me out. That's what friends do.” Gilda looked at him for a long moment after he said it. He in turn didn’t break eye contact. But unlike before, this didn’t feel like a competition.
But if it was, he lost as Gilda answered. “Pfft… we’re not friends.”
“Dude… we met each other yesterday. Like, not even a full day ago. And you want me to go off on some wild adventure with you… because we’re friends all of a sudden?!” the gryphon said with obvious mockery. “Sure, why not? Name’s Gallus. You’re… Sandbar, right?” he said, breaking show canon for the sake of story flow.
“Dude! This is gonna be awesome!” Sandbar replied as he threw an arm over Gallus’ shoulder and pulled him in. He then waved his other hoof in front of them in an arc. “Where to dude?”
“Dude, let’s get the others and nearly destroy the school before it even open dude.”
“Dude!”
Dude…”
“Dude dude dude”
dUDE dood dudE”
Dude dUdE DuDe
“du-”
“STOP!!! Yona not think they say ‘dude’ that much.” Yona yelled, interrupting Silverstream’s recapping.
“My point is, they’ve always been close. And Gallus looked super upset with his ‘I’m sooo cool and not obviously upset at all’ look he was putting on when I saw them last night.” Silverstream did a flip and spin in the air, turning from having been flying backwards facing Yona to flying forwards along side her. “Besides, did he even know you had something special planned for him last night. Your ‘snu-snu’ thing, whatever that is.”
Yona blushed lightly and attempted to hide it behind her braids. Luckily, Silverstream was facing away from her now and wouldn’t see. “No. Yona not tell Sandbar. But why Silverstreram taking Yona to Sandbar’s room? Yona can make it by yakself.”
“Because that’s what friends do…” she said with a chuckle. “Also, because I’ve got nothing else to do today.” it wasn't too far to the colt’s dorm rooms but they did have some time to fill in and Silverstream was not one to walk in quiet. “You know, Gallus is kinda cute when he’s sad. Too bad he’s not like that all the time. Not that I want him to be sad or anything.” she dismissed herself with a wave of a claw. “Girl talk: who do you think is cute?”
“Uhh… we’re heading to Sandbar’s room, remember?”
“Oh! Right. Of course… you and him are a thing now.”
“What ‘thing’ are we?” the yak asked, giving Silverstream a sideways glance.
Silverstream, turned her head fully and answered “You two are dating aren’t you?”
“What ‘dating’? Like a calendar?” Yona had a tendency to not know ponish phrases but surely she knew that one. Maybe yaks called it something like ‘courting’ or even... ‘mating’.
“Oh you sweet summer child…” Silverstream said with cheer.
“Yona winter child. All yak winter child.”
“Ok.” Silverstream said flatly, ending this line of discussion knowing it was going nowhere. Besides, they’d arrived. Yona knocked on his door. Then knocked again. Then knocked it down… again. “Well I bet he’s awake now.” Silverstream followed Yona into the room. “Or… maybe not.” she followed up with. He wasn’t in there and the room was surprisingly tidy.
Turning around and bending over, Yona hooked one of her horns under the door and lifted it off the floor. The letter she’d slipped under it last night wasn’t there so he must’ve seen it. Though, maybe just telling somepony to be somewhere without checking if they had anything else planned first wasn’t exactly the best way to guarantee them coming when you asked.
Peeking her head out the door, along with Silverstream who put a nervous smile on her face before slowly pulling back into the room, Yona saw a number of other ponies head sticking out their own doors to see what the noise was. A few of them saw Yona and just rolled their eyes before going back to what they were doing. Some watched on and some began to leave the immediate area in quite a hurry.
“Who know where Sandbar is?!” she called to all who remained. About half of the onlookers pointed a hoof towards a room three doors down and on the other side of the hall. Gallus’ room. She began to bolt towards the door when about two or three steps [trots?] in she stopped. “Thank you.” she said politely and then immediately began towards the door once more. She knocked on the door. Hard.
Well she would’ve if Sandbar hadn’t opened the door at that exact moment. He’d been woken up by something loud followed by some muffled yelling coming from outside. He almost took a hoof to the face but realistically, that happening is impractical. I mean the logistics of not noticing and the one opening the door immediately walking to be close enough to where the door was to be hit just wasn’t a realistic scenario.
“Oh h-” he began before he got cut off.
“Where was Sandbar last night?”
“Uhh… well, I ran into Gallus and… I’m actually not sure why, but I just had to be around him last night.” Sandbar said as he stepped back into the room. He winced a bit as if he just hurt himself [physically] a little. “There was just something about the way he looked. I couldn’t help but want to be with him.”
Silverstream, under her breathe, muttered “Mood.” then chuckled just a tiny bit.
“That’s fine. Yona not upset at all.”
“Really? You’re not upset?” he asked incredulously.
“Yes. Yona just said that. Yona not upset at all.” Sandbar looked to Silverstream who just shrugged. Neither of them could tell if Yona was being passive aggressive or completely sincere. While she pretty much always seemed to wear her emotions on her coat, everything about the words ‘not unset at all’ set off red flags. Though Yona couldn’t actually see the colour red which also kinda muddled the metaphor.
“Well… I’ll make it up to you anyway!” he declared. “Why don’t I take both of yo-ough!” a sudden pain in the flank stabbed into him as he turned on the spot. “Ahh...!” he let out and took a few steps with a limb. “I must’ve slept wrong last night. Not that I did much sleeping with Gallus i-hhmmm…” he groin-wheezed cutting off his sentence.
“Are you hurt? Yona help!” Yona Yona’d as she hurriedly stepped over to him.
Even though they were in Gallus’ room, this was much more what they were expecting from Sandbar. Or really, from any messy boy’s room. Unmade bed, flipped over chair with cushions all around it. Table with three open books on it and a few scraps of paper in the bin which where the oddity as those few in the bin where well outnumber by those all around it. And a bag of half finished doritos [which Silverstream totally didn’t snatch 1 or 7 of]. And to top it off a saucy, borderline lewd, poster of some gryphon athlete hanging just slightly crooked on the wall. [it’s Natalia. Remember her? Continuity!]
“Gallus’ room is so much tidier than Yona room.”
“Wot?” Silverstream replied.
“Yona say 'Gallus’ room is so much tidier than Yona room'.”
“Thanks for the help Yona, but I’m fine.” Sandbar stood back upright and winced just a little. “Ugh… I’m gonna be walking crooked for days after last night.” and either Silverstream had a dirty mind or Sandbar was doing that on purpose. Yona was of course completely oblivious to any possible, intended or not, double meanings. “But it was worth it to make Gallus feel good. Huh… my jaw’s a little saw too.”
Silverstream saw the open window and flew out of it in a hurry. “I’m sorry, I’ve got something to do!” and she flew out and up, out of earshot and began to crack up laughing. She knew it was all just a misunderstanding on her part but the idea that Sandbar was cheating on Yona with Gallus was hilarious to her. Or it was until she phrased it like that. “Oh.” she stopped laughing immediately. “Well that’s not funny at all.”
She flew back down and into the window just as the door closed. From the other side she could hear “Yona could of swore Silverstream said she had nothing to do today.” with a tone she thought either sounded let down that another creature had ditched her after she thought they would be hanging out, or it was just muffled by the door.
A similar sounding “Don’t sweat it. Now we can spend the whole day together… until about 2. I gotta be at…” and it trailed off with distance before I had to figure out how that sentence ended. Pulling back from the door, she looked around. Silverstream knew it was rude to snoop around her friend's room but…
The first thing she looked at was the chair flipped over on the ground. A thought crossed her mind and dispite knowing how stupid it was, she followed through with it and tried sitting on the bottom of the chair. Oddly enough, the wooden strauts where not comfortable. After discovering that, she flipped it back rightsideup and placed the cushions back on it.
Second, she went over to his desk and had a look at all the papers. There was a textbook, a notebook and a scrap piece of paper as well as a letter from Principle Twilight. The one from this morning. Weird that she called it the headmare’s office but herself principle. Of course, not having a date on it, Silverstream didn’t assume he was from today and instead from one of the many other times he’d been called to her room for one thing or another.
Thirdly, and lastly, she lightly jumped onto his bed. “Oh wow… this is soooofffffft…!” she said aloud as she wriggled a bit and rolled onto her side. About to get off she noticed the poster. “That’s such an awkward pose.” which in her mind translated to ‘I’m gonna do that!’. From her side on the bed, she sat up and, with anything that might be displayed facing the wall, strut the pose.
Hind legs tall yet spread, tail lifted, wings flared and her torso flat against the pillow and bed. Her eyes almost even matching the direction as in the poster from her looking directly at it from where she… stood/lay. And as the ridiculousness of the pose set in she held back a laugh, letting out a little… whatever-the-word-for-laughing-through-your-nose-is as the smile on her face went face down into the pillow.
It then immediately came back up from it, smile gone, replaced with a grimace. “Ugh!” she groaned. “Why is it… moist?!” as she chucked the pillow onto the corner of the bed and flapped her wings, alofting [not a word, but I’m using it anyway] her from the mattress.
She looked over the rest of the bed for anything similar. Ideas of what it could be ran through her head. And probably because she had not been subconsciously, just not wanting to truly admit it, she had been doing all this to search for any sign that her earlier thought of Sandbar’s promiscuity was correct, all the rational ones didn’t seem to click.
Drooling on his pillow in his sleep? No, who does that...? Biting down on the pillow. Obviously. Or maybe it was… “Eww! And it was on my face!” as her mind uncontrollably went over all the positions two ponies and a pillow could be in to cause a splash zone there. “No. Sandbar wouldn’t do that to Yona. And Gallus wouldn’t let him! And… and even I don’t believe it myself.” she pouted.
She needed someone else to tell all this to and then have them tell her she was just being crazy. But who? Obviously Sandbar, Yona and Gallus where out of the question. Yona probably doesn’t even know what cheating meant and the boys would both deny it even though it was true. If! Even IF it was true. Smolder and Ocellus probably shouldn’t get dragged into this either.
“Hhhuuu… if only there was somepony at this school whose job it was to listen to students' problems. To council them. Or give them guidance. If only…” Silverstream sighed as she headed towards the window and jumped. “Oh. Right…” she said, catching herself with her wings moments before hitting the ground.
Some onlookers would attribute such feats normally to Pinkie Pie and her physics defying antics and comedic look of basically just coming to a complete stop milimetres before hitting the ground but it was much more of a Rainbow Dash move with how much skill such a flying maneuver took.
Of course with her concern of Sandbar having an affair, she didn’t even pay notice to Smolder’s notice of her leaving Gallus’ room hastily and moderately discretely compared to the front door so early in the morning.” Heh…” the dragon chuckled. “Lovebirds.” but that was drama for another time/side story.
Normally, this is roughly the point where I would usually end the chapter but that would mean that this side story would have to be multiple chapters. So this is just going to be a long one and whether it actually has any affect on the main plot or not, we’ll find out when Gallus and Gilda get back from Gryphistan.
Despite Starlight's office being nearly twice as far as the filly’s dorm was from the colt’s dorms, she made it in nearly a third the time that that had taken her. Flying was ofcourse faster but also Yona was slow. Being Saturday Starlight wasn’t in her office but she had that spell active at all times, even if Trixie disapproved. When Silverstream knocked on the door…
‘You’ve reached the office of the Guidance Counselor Starlight Glimmer. Unfortunately, I or anyone else within the faculty, am unavailable at the moment. If it is between... do I really have to read it verbatim? … … Yeah, I don’t really care about uniformity. I’m trying to get away from that kinda thing, remember? … … Why didn’t you stop recording then? … … Ugh… fine. Look, if it’s urgent, continue knocking and I’ll be there as soon as I reasonably can. Wait, what’s this about a fine? They’re students, they don’t have any mo-’
The audio cut off. Whether that was because Silverstream had started knocking and it overwrit the spell’s first function for its second, or they’d finally stopped the recording at that point. As Silverstream did so the door opened and she clocked Starlight in the face. Guess the logistics aligned this time. “Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry!” she said, covering her lower face with her claws then sheepishly reach out with one, pulled it back quickly, with a small second outreach and another pullback in the middle of it before repeating to slowly reach out fully this time.
“Ough!...” the mare groaned. “I-it’s alright. Come in.” she added, lowering her own hoof from her lower face and politely pulling away from Silverstreams claw coming to touch her by stepping back and ushering the student inside. She seemed jumpy. “So… this is actually urgant I take it.” trying to lighten the mood.
“I certainly hope it’s not.” answered Silverstream. She sat down on a chair and waited for Starlight to take her seat on the other side of the desk. Which she did so moderately faster than usual. “Ok. Sooo… hypothetically, if I knew a couple, no couple in particular, who were dating and that one of them may be cheating on the other with a friend of both of theirs who also is noone in particular, but also may want to keep that secret for reasons other than the cheating part should I tell the cheated on one about it without being sure, invade the other ones privacy [even more] and find out for sure before telling or not dig further and never know if its true or not and be a constant state of guilt knowing that I could’ve known more but didn’t do either of those things and so it’s not my fault that I didn’t tell if he does come out, no I didn’t mean ‘come out’ come out, I meant if it does all come out in the end and that I knew but didn’t do anything because I didn’t want to dig further and get more involved than I already am without anyone even knowing that I’m SUFFERING!”
“Wow… o...k.” Starlight said after getting blasted with words. She’d gotten parts of it and thought she might have an idea about who she was talking about. “Could you, go over that one more time. But instead, this time, try going a bit slower. Taking a moment to make individual sentences and… not just spit it all out in 10 seconds flat.” Starlight didn’t know why but she felt an odd cringe on those last words.
“I’m sorry. I’m just…”
“It’s alright. I understand something like this can be… stressful. That’s what I’m here for. To help you get through any social, emotional or even ethical problems you may have here at the school.” she said, all the while magicking a kettle and cups, pouring herself and Silverstream some tea. The filled cup floated over to Silverstream who took it, blew on it and then sipped. “Now, take your time and…” she motioned to go on.
Starlight wasn’t sure if that whole ‘knew a couple’ thing was about the seemingly obvious choice of Sandbar and Yona who everypony knew about or if it was a ‘asking for a friend’ moment and that Silverstream was dating somepony. Or somecreature. Or, not to assume baseless/mildly racist/mildly birdcist gossip going around the school was true, someGallus. But if what she’d heard yesterday and Gallus’ demeanor when she told him he’d heard was true, though it was the first she’d heard of it, that would explain the emphasis on ‘come out’ she thought she’d heard somewhere in that monster of a paragraph long sentences that this sentence was beginning to start to mimic and at this point was just kinda doing it intentionally by running on far longer that it rightfully should have by any rational means screw flanders screw flander screw flanders.
“Well, I have this friend. Two of them really. And they’re dating.”
“Yona and Sandbar? Or...”
“Uh… I’d rather not say.” Silverstream said. Then immediately backtracked “Oh, why hide it. Yes. It’s Sandbar… he’s… maybe, I’m not sure.” she paused. “Is it even any of my business?”
“It really all depends on if you feel like it is. Do you?”
“Well if I knew that I wouldn’t be here would I?”
“Fair point.” Starlight gave. “Alright, in my opinion, no, it’s not. And you shouldn’t tell Yona. At least if you don’t know for sure. Until then you have no responsibility to tell her. Not that I'm saying you should go looking for proof either. But if you find out he is cheating on her, that’s not on you either. He’s the one who did it. Not you. Unless you actively help them, you’re not responsible for anypony else’s actions.” she stopped and looked directly into Silverstream’s eyes after that to make sure she took in what she’d just said. “I do have one question. Is it Gallus?”
“How did you- I mean… pfft. Wot? No. no… noooo… yes. But how did you know?”
“I heard from the Cu- from somepony yesterday that Sandbar may have a crush on Gallus and that Gallus may be aware of it but is waiting for him to make the first move. I just can’t figure out why he’d ask Yona to the catilian if he liked Gallus. I completely dismissed the rumor because of that until I ran into Gallus yesterday he… I shouldn’t say more and have already said too much.” she said with a nervous smile.
“Well maybe Sandbar’s gay.”
“Well, yeah, obviously if he likes Gallus. IF.”
“I mean and wants to hide that so he covered up by starting something up with Yona.”
“Wait, ponies still cover up that they’re gay?” Starlight said in her blissfully peaceful life without struggle...
“Well, yeah, obviously. At least… hippogryphs do. Oh! Maybe ponies don’t [they do] but gryphons do and Sandbar’s covering for Gallus.”
“That seems like a bit of a stretch.”
“Got any more likely… word-that-means-things-that-could-be then?”
“Scenario. And yes. It could all simply just be a big misunderstanding and you should trust your friends to do the right thing.”
“Yeah… but when are things ever simple around here?” she asked with genuine annoyances at her own truth. “And just when I was starting to think Gallsu was cute too…”
“What?”
“Wot?”
“I thought I h-”
“I’m going to tell Yona. kthxbye.”
“That’s the opposite of what I said but sure… whatever.” Starlight sighed and levitated a flask up, pouring some of it into her cup and took a long sip of her tea. She then refilled the cup from the flask and repeated.
Gilda x Gallus 3: I think we'll have to change this naming convention soon
“Dude… we met each other yesterday. Like, not even a full day ago. And you want me to go off on some wild adventure with you… because we’re friends all of a sudden?!” the gryphon said with obvious mockery. “Not a chance!” Gilda laughed. Gallus just sat there bemused, taking it.
“Wow… thanks a lot.” he said flatly.
“Do you even know what you’re asking? You know what… waiter. Waiter!” she called.
“How can I help this morning?”
“What’s your name?”
“Savoir Fare, miss.”
“Cool story. Listen. We met two days ago. I got… uh… this ring, that I gotta take to the dragonlands and destroy it in the fires of Mt. Moon. Could you help me? Afterall, that’s what friends do.” she finished with a smirk. Though a bit more extreme it was still a comparable request of basically a complete stranger.
“I’m afraid I can’t help you with THAT this morning.” he said without dropping his toity professional waiter routine. “You’d have to wait until 2 when I finish my shift. After that I’m free until Tuesdays and so long as I’m able to make it back by then, then I would be happy to accompany you.”
“P-wha-tcha… you heard us talking didn’t you?!”
“Ok, you got me. I did. But that does sound like a good weekend to me.”
“You’re not getting a tip.” she stood up. But before leaving she turned to Gallus and started “Look!...” before stopping. She closed her eyes and let out a huff. Trying to not sound angry, she continued. “Look. When I head back home after this awful vacation is over, I’ll help you. But I’m not leaving early, especially after waiting two days already, just for you. So, either wait a few days or do it yourself. See ya in Gryphonstone Gallus.”
She took off before he could reply. Savoir Fare however managed to get out “But you already tipped with your meal from earlier.”
Gilda flew at a nominal speed. She wasn’t going slow enough that Gallus could catch her if he wanted to or fast enough to make sure he couldn’t. She was simply leaving. She’d expected some drama coming here and that’s why she’d planned, and succeeded at, avoiding Rainbow Dash’s friends, knowing there was probably going to be enough awkward talking between the two of them as it was. And yet she’d somehow found herself in this.
Not too far off, Gilda stopped, landed and began to walk along the road. She’d already filled in an hour for breakfast but that still left the rest of the day. Maybe a catnap at noonish but it was still too early for that. The only place she had any idea about was that clothing store she’d almost visited yesterday. Other than that there were a ton of touristy things to do. Some of which would normally have gotten her attention if they didn’t involve that main six friends of Rainbow’s. Was it six? Five? Seven? Who knows?
She could only say she had three friends. And that was counting Rainbow Dash which while they had left on… good enough terms a few years ago Gilda really had no idea where she stood with her. And definitely didn’t plan on telling her she’d been staying at her house the last few days. Of course… Gilda hadn’t counted Gallus in those three. She came to a stop "Should I?" she muttered aloud.
“Please don’t.”
She snapped out of her thoughts. Gilda knew that voice. Swivelling her head more like an owl than an eagle, she looked around. She couldn’t find her until, craning her neck forward, more like a crane than an eagle, she looked around a cart she was standing next to. “Fluttershy.” she said stiffly.
It wasn’t so much a word as an ‘eep’ sound that came from the pegasus. Gilda thought her luck had finally run out but nothing that had happened here so far had been particularly lucky to begin with. Up until this point that was. Luckily, Fluttershy flew away. And at a decent speed at that. Gilda could easily match it of course, but from what she remembered of Fluttershy's flying ability, it was impressive.
Now, there was something about what just happened that confused Gilda. Not that she’d run away, that was honestly one of the three things she’d expected to happen if they did run into each other. The other two being making small talk of ‘Oh, nice to see you again Gilda’ but with seven layers of fear on it, or the two of them standing there awkwardly saying nothing. No, what confused Gilda was that she had conflicting feelings about the mare.
On the one claw she thought Fluttershy an absolute cowimp [coward/wimp] for running away like that. On the other claw she had clearly learnt how to fly properly, if not well even since flight school. And she was oddly… proud, of her old… friend. ‘Yeah, but she’s not anymore though is she?’ Gilda thought to herself. And even back then, she was probably more like what Rainbow Dash is now to her.
Meanwhile, somewhere else.
No, nvm, back to Gilda.
Gilda continued on for some time, hoping to spot something else she could do on the way to that store. Also she wasn't entirely sure she was even heading in the right direction so looking around helped on that front too. It had been maybe five minutes before she noticed it. The end of an excessively long [and totally real] pink tail poking out from the corner of a building. Fluttershy was following her.
“Oh for Gryst sake…” under her breath as she rolled her eyes. And once she was aware of it, she was completely aware of it for another sometime. Seeing a yellow feather tip or ear and pink mane poking out from a bush or over a barrel. That confusion she had from before was resolved. The pegasus didn’t have the balls to confront her and just trasped around, hiding from what wasn’t even really a problem. At least not a problem from Gilda’s point of view. Seriously, what did Fluttershy think she would do? Yell at her? Yeah… probably. But really, that’s about it.
She could either call her out on it or go into the store she’d finally found. And as Gilda chose the latter, not a single moment did it occur to her that by doing so she also didn’t have the balls to confront her and hid from what wasn’t even really a problem. She entered the building and the doorbell rang. It was accompanied by…
‘Welcome to the Carousel Boutique. I, Rarity, Shall be with you in just a moment. If I do not attend to you within a suitable amount of time please ring the bell on the counter, as seen on the left. In the meantime, please browse my wares or have some tea and cookies waiting for you on the table. And of course, once again, Welcome to the Carousel Boutique! Loitering is strictly prohibited, any and all theft will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, the Carousel Boutique is not responsible for any damage to your purchases due to Ponyville related mishaps involving Rarity or any of the former Elements of Harmony in the event of another world ending threat, without the purchase of Helements of Armoury insurance which is subject to approval and denial at retailers discretion. Terms and Conditions may apply.'
The audio in a way seemed familiar to her but having only heard it once before when she first went to the castle, Gilda couldn’t place it or make that connection. Only the readers could and even then this line was written to make sure that they got the joke.
Gallus returned to his room. He couldn’t blame Gilda for not cutting her holiday short just to help him. Still didn’t stop him from wishing she had. Realistically, waiting a few days for her to come with wouldn’t change anything about what he would or could find out but if he didn’t leave before then he was sure to run into Ocellus and knowing her, she’d ask a simple question. And when he answered 'no' she’d ask a not so simple question. And then another and another. All the while he was still in love with her... kinda-sorta-maybe.
When he got there he didn’t really think much of the chair he’d left Sandbar under being righted, figuring he’d flipped it before leaving. He grabbed a small saddle bag and put a few snacks in it. It was a two day trip after all and a bag of chips seemed enough. Which meant the extra pretzels where an extravagance. In all Gallus didn’t pack much. Just the food, a few bits and a rubber band and paper clip incase of emergency.
He’d spent a decent amount of time, nearly an hour, but it was still early enough in the morning and if he left now, he could probably knock it down to get there before midnight if he powered through it a little. He’d then sleep in his own bed back home, which thinking about it was nowhere near as comfortable as the one he had here. Arguable he felt more at home here than back in Gryphonstone. A thought about being more comfortable around ponies came to mind but it wasn’t quite right. The ones he felt most comfortable around only one of them was a pony. Though, they still weren't gryphons either.
Gallus; packed, went to his door and opened it only to nearly get punched in the face by Silverstream. “Wow, that’s like the third time today…” she said with a lack of chuckle he’d expect from something like that from her. “Only the second miss though. Mind if I come in for a moment?”
“Uh, actually, I was just about to head out.”
“W’where you going? [that was not a ‘w-where’, that was an abbreviated ‘well where’] I could tag along.”
“Yippy.” she replied as more of an acknowledgement than in excitement like how the word's normally used. Either Gallus was off more than he thought and somehow affecting others or how he saw others, or Silverstream had something on her chest too. The two of them took off, flying at a slow pace, roughly matching the speed of the ponies around them walking. School rules for indoors. “So what where you and Sandbar talking about last night?” she asked as they got outside and sped up to a regular flying speed.
“Oh… you know. Guy stuff.”
“I bet.”
“What was that?”
“I said ‘So what where you and Sandbar talking about last night?’.”
“No, after that.”
“Well… after that I said… ‘I said ‘So what where you and Sandbar talking about last night?’.’.”
“Zhhh… nevermind. Yeah. Guy stuff. Hoofball, O'n'O, hens… parties! Uh… school work.” he tried to quickly recovered from letting the actual truth slip. Of course it was all technically true. They’d spoken about all those things briefly at least. Some more than others is all.
“Hens? Something wrong between him and Yona?” she replied. Even with his ‘masterful’ recovery, most of his friends wouldn’t have picked up on that part. Unfortunately for him, hippogryphs, though often using the term ‘girls’ on occasion used ‘hens’ too.
“No! No, it’s definitely not about Yona.” Gallsu answered, trying not to worry her friend that something might be bad between their friend’s relationship. Of course it had the opposite effect and only made her suspicions escalate. Their relationship talk didn’t involve Yona at all and just the two cocks. A phrase that hippogryphs also used on occasion.
“Oh, don’t tell me there’s someone you like? Who is it?” she asked with her usual enthusiasm but still something wasn’t 'usual' about it. Maybe a lack of excitement. Gallus, not having any reason to suspect anything was different in her, instead assumed it was with him. After all, he was sure he had been acting cool and calm, his usual aloof self and yet two ponies so far had picked up on it within seconds of talking.
Which made him realise that if he said anything more, she’d surely pick up on it too. “No… it’s…” but then again, why hide it? “It is. But for their sake, I’d rather not say who.” he said, trying to look stern. He mostly succeeded but there was a tiny bit of sad little puppy mixed in with it still. Only a tiny bit.
“Ok… I understand.” ‘SANDBAR IS CLOSITED!!!’ “Ooo, what’s in the bag?”
He thought for a moment before answering. The direction they were heading, she’d realise sooner or later they were heading out of Ponyville. “It’s a travelbag.” he answered. He waited not quite long enough for her to ask a follow up question, but just long enough, though unintentionally, to start talking again just a fraction of a second before she did. “I’m heading back home for a bit.”
“Home? You mean Gryphon...stock?” she tried to remember where he lived outside of the school.
“Yeah.” he didn’t correct her, and kinda got a laugh out of it. “You know how I said I liked some… one.” he tried to not say ‘somecreature’ like he did for them because that would really narrow it down. Of course she thought he was doing that but with ‘somepony’. “Well, something happened between us yesterday and it made me ask a few questions about myself. And I shouldn’t be around that… ‘person’.” a rarely used phrase by any race. “At least not until I figure this out about myself.”
“Ok… I understand.” ‘THEY”RE BOTH CLOSITED!!!’ “Gallus.” she put a claw on his shoulder, pulled him to a stop. She looked him straight in the eyes and said “I just want you to know that no matter what you are, none of us would think any differently of you.” and suddenly all her usual unusualness was back. Gallus thought it must’ve been her positive words making him feel better and lifting whatever sad veil was hanging over him long enough to see her normally again.
“Even if I was a hippogryph?”
“Even if you were a hippogryph.” she assured, having absolutely no idea what that actually meant.
“Thanks. It helps.”
“That’s what friends do.”
“Heh, yeah.” he laughed oddly getting pleasure out of words that had been so soul crushing last time he’d used them hismelf. “As much as I’d love [poor choice of words] some company all the way to Gryphonsto-stock, I think we should part ways about here. I should probably head there by myself.”
Silverstream made a confused look as he said it. He had after all just asked for help and then said he’d solo it. But that wasn’t what she scrunched her face over. An instant after she did so, she shifted over to the side a bit and narrowed her eyes, looking past Gallus into the distance. “Is that a...nother gryphon?”
Gallus turned and looked off to see in the distance Gilda hovering in place. A long off, echoey shout came from her direction. She was far enough away that what little of her mouth movement they could see didn’t sync up as they heard “Sup dweeb. Don’t ask why but I'm coming with you!”
Whereas Silverstream wore a confused look, Gallus’ was equal parts confused and annoyed. He took off towards her fast. “Do you know h-ey wait up!” Silverstream asked/called out as he left her. He had a few second start on her before she started up too yet she managed to catch up, and could’ve easily passed him before he made it the noticeable distance to her.
Gallus flared his wings and flapped a few times [Silverstream only flapped once] to bring himself to a stop in front of her. After all that, she was coming with him now? “Why?” he asked. Her answer was predictable....
“Don’t pay that recording any mind. I’ll be with you in just a moment!” a voice called from somewhere out of sight. A few seconds later a white unicorn mare came out from a door, a brief glimpse into the back room Gilda saw some fabric rolls and a pinned up mannequin. “Hello-oh, hello! I don’t get many gryphons in my boutique. I’m Rarity. How may I be off assistance? Are you after something specific or just browsing?” she said, accelerating from a walk to a saunter when she saw who had come in.
Gilda [the author mentioned by name, making sure you knew this wasn’t another misdirect of whose who. Wait… I said Gilda in the last paragraph already… whatever] said “Neither. I’m just looking.”
“Y-yes. Quite.” Rarity offered in turn, mildly stunned by the answer.
“Welp… I think I came to the wrong place. Nothing here’s my style. Shouldn’t have expected ponies to have the same tastes.”
“Oh, I assure you darling, I have something for every taste. What you see on open display is just a sampling. I have muchmuchmuch more than just these.” she said, hating herself just a little for dismissing what she considered her best works, which is why she had them so proudly displayed. “Now tell me, what is your taste precisely? I’m sure I’ll have something but we must narrow down what that something is exactly first.”
“Well, uh… it’s… punk.”
“What was that?”
“I said punk!” she raised her voice but not quite shouting. Punk was cool. But it was twice as tryhard which made it twice as uncool.
“Oh-hoh, don’t worry.” she reassured. “Punk, goth, 70s. They may have a reputation for who they’re associated with but you cannot deny that the styles themselves are magnifique! Why, I myself have been known to rock a jacket and fro from time to time.”
“Really…?” Gilda asked mockingjay as she looked the prissy looking pony up and down.
“Yes. Really.” Rarity replied with a smirk as she quickly turned and jolted behind a counter. She scrummaged through a few albums on it’s shelves before pulling out one, flipping to a particular page. “See for yourself then.”
Gilda went over and took a look at the photo. She then looked up at the pony. “That could be anyone in that helmet.”
*picture of Daft Punk Rarity to subvert expectations of Punk Rarity from that one episode but I can only find an EG version of it*
“Well I am that anyone and regardless of who it is under there, I made that outfit. So, would you like to see what I have in line with this style?”
“Yeah. Sure.”
“Wonderful! I won’t be a moment Miss…”
“Gilda.”
The name sounded familiar to Rarity. She couldn’t place it though. Normally a simple ‘Have we met before?’ would come up in small talk but surely if she’d met this gryphon before she’d remember her. As far as Rarity could recall she’d met three… no four. Gallus, Gabby [that drake stealing hussy], the one Rainbow Dash knew and that one from the train with the cake. Oh, and Natalya, that lovely athlete from the Equestria Games. She could say she knew more dragons than gryphons. Or would that be specist?
She dipped into the back and barely a moment later [thanks to the time dilation spells Starlight had put on that room] she came back out carrying an array of wares to wear. “Now, unfortunately, most of my clientele are of course ponies. And as such the only pieces I currently have available in your size and form are those designed for pegasus stallions.”
“And what are you implying?” Gilda asked, bending her neck forward and her head to the side zeroing in with one of her eyes.
“N-nothing at all! Just that your frame is larger than that of a pony. Rest assured I wasn’t saying anything about your femininity or-”
“Relax. Gryst… ponies can’t seem to take a joke.” Gilda bemoaned. She knew that of course. But it never stopped her from making comments like that. Maybe she did it hoping to find a pony who’d throw one right back at her. Like Rainbow Dash did. Not that Rainbow did last time they’d met. Gilda was more pony like than she’d like to admit and Rainbow was more gryphonlike than any pony she’d met [and liked].
But was that even a good thing? Despite liking gryphons as a whole, she knew most of them where absolute arse hats. Herself included. Although, Gilda was glad what had started to make her ‘pony-like’ hadn’t affected her as much as Gabby who basically wasn’t even a gryphon in terms of attitude. Gilda would probably be an aunt soon if she guessed right about Gabby and her extra long delivery runs.
Wonder who she was hooking up with? But right now Gilda had something completely unrelated to her sister’s love life. “Rarity wasn’t it?” she said to the nervously smiling mare. “Show me what you got.”
Rarity paused a moment before recovering, mildly scolding herself for thinking ‘No wonder Rainbow’s no longer friends with the one she knew if they’re all like this. No no, don’t generalise like that.’ “Of course. I have three that I think you’d like.” levitating three jackets, one with matching pants and another with matching brace guards. “Feel free to try them on.”
She lay them out on the counter. The first was a black pleather buckle-up jacket with three ring studs on each shoulder, a long collar designed to not be folded down and an odd-sized pair of bracers. One just the size of a band with a sting stud link and the other about three times longer with a pattern of a crescent moon that Gilda didn’t recognise as being Luna’s Cutie Mark.
The second of the three was a brown, wool lined pleather zip-up jacket that at first glance looked ridiculous. The main body of the jacket looked normal enough with two zippered pockets on the lower half and the very bottom being trimmed with the inner wool showing on the outside. Things got a bit weird at the shoulders though where the same wool lining from the bottom was on a nearly as large neckline. The zipper continued through that though into the collar that again was long but not meant to be folded down. However unlike the last collar that was meant to be flared out this one had belt buckles over the zip and looked as if it would go all the way up her neck and possible even a bit over the face ending in some more wool trimming. The arms [forelegs] too had a smaller belk around the wrists [ankles?].
It was clearly meant to be a winter jacket and while it certainly fit the model for ‘rebelling from the norm’, Gilda wasn’t entirely sure she’d call it ‘Punk’ so much as ‘JRPG’. A term she’d learnt from the nerd Glenda. The first nearly fell into that category too but made her realise that if the second jacket had been black, it probably would've been punk.
The third jacket was black… possibly real leather, with 6 belt buckles running up the center. The buckles themselves where black too but the clasp was a stark contrast of white as where the two link studs on the lower pockets and all down the arms. It had a shirt collar with a ridged design running along the edge that when folded over matched the design on the lower part of the collar. The matching backs, luckily, didn’t have such a flashy belt buckle over the fly but a similar, subtler belt did it well. The studs ran down the legs too and made a pattern that without the other leg would look odd and random so that when walking it almost seemed to move.
Rarity flipped over the second jacket, which unlike most jacked for pegasi that just had two holes for the wings [and for the tail in the case of the pants] this one instead had another length of wool-lined material shorter than her own wings but roughly the length a pony’s would be until it was all feather [just over half the total wing length], with some smaller, more delicate belts straps hold it in place.
Gilda looked at the three of them for a while. The second one certainly screamed ‘high’ fashion to her. The third more emo or goth than punk. And the first, too generic punk. She lifted one of them up and looked down the neck hole. “Yeah. Way too small.” she dismissed. Although she had actually done so to try and be polite about thinking they were all shit.
“Oh, well, they won’t fit perfectly of course but I can make the adjustments faster than you’d think.” though for Rarity it would be approximately 60 times longer than Gilda would wait here in realspace. “If you’d try on the veste doublée en laine [wool lined jacket] and allow me to take a few measurements I’ll be able to make the necessary changes to it and either of the other two. What do you say?” she asked, levitating the second jacked towards Gilda. “I know it’s not quite ‘punk’ but I think it would look good on you all the same.”
Gilda grabbed it roughly. Intentionally so. If it couldn’t hand a little stress now then there was no way she’d get much use out of it before it was wrecked. “Alright, I’ll give it a go.” Gilda said as she began unbuckling the neck. A phrase she thought she’d never have to use. Once she was done she ran the zipper down the centre and unlinked it at the bottom. She was about to put an arm [claw/foreleg?] through the sleeve when she thought “How much is this going to cost anyway? I’m not exactly rolling in bits.”
“Well most of my clients tell me it’s more than they hoped but less than they expected.” she answered as she covered her mouth, turned her head and did a little lady-like chuckle.
“That’s not an answer.”
“Quite true. I apologise. This piece will cost ฿259. A bargain I assure you.”
Gilda made a ‘not bad’ face. Rarity had been right. More than she’d hoped but less than she’d expected. Her claw came out of the sleeve a bit more than was intended for the type of jacked this was. it was very comfortable but would definitely be too warm for this time of year. She threw the body of the jacket over her back and shifted for a moment before her wings came through the holes. They fit, but it was a bit tight.
“One moment while I go and grab my measuring tape. You just finish donning the veste doublée en laine while I’m looking.” she said with an odd shift in here gave. Not that Gilda noticed while she put her claw threw the other sleeve.
The piece of winter clothing on, she reached up for her wings and lined the cover up with them. She expected this part to come nowhere close to fitting. Ponies had much shorter wings than gryphons. At least on average. She’d seen one pony at flight school with wings nearly the size of her whole body. And also a vague memory of seeing a unicorn levitating herself up there just before Rainbow Dash’s sonic rainboom.
Gilda reached for the two sides of the jacket’s bottom and brought them together before relinking the zip. Careful when she got up to her transition of fur to feather she ran it all the way up until she got to her neck. While the belted collar went on further, the thickness of her neck stopped it there. Still, it was done up enough she could move around and get a good feel for it.
Taking a few steps and feeling how it moved she started to think she might get this thing after all instead of just [semi intentionally] wasting the tailor’s time. She may have to cut back on expensive meals but she’d saved a fair bit of bits by staying at Rainbow’s place instead of an inn.
She moved over towards a mirror and looked at herself. It was just off matching her fur and feather colours but was roughly the shade half way between the two complimenting it well. The jacket itself looked absolutely ridiculous but it somehow worked. She raised the collar up and turned to the side to simulate it being buckled. It went right up to her chin but not enough for her to touch it unless she was looking down. It was meant to cover the face a bit to keep it warm but this was probably a good feature of it being too small.
As she was examining herself in the mirror one of the wing strips fell down. They were too small for her to properly belt them up but that was a realisation. “How the hell am I meant to do up a belt up there?” she said aloud and turned to where she thought Rarity would be back to by now. She was still in the back however, looking for a tape measure. And on that note, how would she even make adjustments to a pleather jacket?
Having been in it for nearly a minute now, Gilda started to feel warm. Not uncomfortably so, but it would be in another minute or two. Sure it was warmer inside the building than outside but she couldn’t just wear this jacket around. She unzipped the top down to the bridge of her feathers and flapped it a bit to get some air through it, hoping that doing so would make it more wearable in general. A few moments passed and her lower fur continued to warm up. Zipping it down further and unlinking it she cooled but having the jacket open like this changed the look drastically.
Rarity still wasn’t back yet. “Hey, you lost back there? The jackets getting hot so if you’re gonna take some measurements do it fast!” she called out.
“Coming!” Rarity called back, returning with a tape over her neck and a new pair of red rimmed glasses. “Awfully sorry, something unexpected came up.” as she pranced back in. Coming over to Gilda say asked “If I may?” levitating the measuring tape towards the gryphon.
“Go for it.”
“Wonderful.” she ran the tape down Gilda’s forelegs, then around the neck, then as she got to the wings “Say, you wouldn’t happen to be an old friend of Rainbow Dash’s would you?” despite having taken three measurements by this time this was only a few seconds after starting. She was fast and skilled at doing so and wasted no time knowing what needed measuring and what could be a problem. And her question was included as something that needed measuring and could be a problem.
Nevertheless Rarity waited for an answer as she continued her measurements, completing them before Gilda could even answer. “Yeah. We used to be. Don’t go thinking I can get you her autograph or somehing stupid like that though. I haven’t seen her in years. Tartaras, I came to this shop t-”
“Boutique.” Rarity corrected.
“-o go… boutique, whatever. I only came here because every other shop seems to be obsessed with her and her friends. Didn’t think a place like this would have anything to do with her. But here you are, fangirling over her…”
“Oh no no no no, you’ve got me all wrong.” Rarity said stepping back and grabbing a quill and paper and scratching down some notes. “I’m, actually a close friend of hers.” and her tone carried a strong sense of nervousness.
“Of course you are…” Gilda sighed. Coming here to avoid her friends and instead stumbling right into one of them. She began to take off the jacket taking her first claw out of the sleeve and through the jacket over herself to take the other out. Rarity took the garment in her magic hold, ran the measuring tape alone a few spots and wrote down a few more notes.
“Now, if you’ll give me just a few moments I can make the necessary alterations.” she then waited for an affirmative response but got none. She didn’t get a negative either and so with an awkward smile she turned and headed back into the rear room. A few seconds passed and she called back once more. “Gilda, I have a confession to make.”
“Oh sweet hatchling Shirdal…” Gilda cursed, taking the lord’s son’s name in vain.
“When I asked if your where the gryphon that Rainbow Dash knew…” she said, coming back out into the storefro-… boutiquefront. “I was really asking if you were the old friend of somepony else.” following behind Rarity was…
“H-hello Gilda.” Fluttershy said. “It’s nice to see you again.”
“Is it?!” Gilda stepped forward as she nearly yelled. “Is it really?”
“I-I mean… I haven’t seen you in quite some time. And I thou-” Fluttershy began.
“Strange. Because I seem to recall running into you about twenty minutes ago.” she said, stepping closer until she was less than a pony’s length away from the pegasus. “You didn’t seem so happy to see me then.”
Rarity stepped in between the two. “Please. There’s no need to raise our voices.” she said with neutral words but looking at Gilda. She turned to Fluttershy, placed a hoof on her chest and gave her friend a reassuring smile. “Now, I believe You had something you wanted to say, Fluttershy?”
Fluttershy nodded and broke eye contact with Rarity to make it instead with Gilda. She then immediately broke that too to make it with the floor. “Well?...” Gilda asked. It was something to Fluttershy that Gilda was at least willing to let her talk. Looking away from the floor and briefly to Rarity first she finally reconnected with Gilda’s gaze.
“I just thought that… it’s good to see you again, um, despite how… I um, may have acted when I uh, ran into you. N-not like how I ran into you last time. But um-” Gilda growled at the memory from a number of years ago now when she’d last visited. How Fluttershy had ran right into her, flank first. Fluttershy let out another sound that could only be described as ‘eep!’.
Gilda returned to Fluttershy. Shivering, hiding behind her mane to no avail, their eyes locked once more. Though Fluttershy’s where down to pin pricks. Gilda kept her eyes locked to and stared [little did she know…] at the mare in front of her. Rarity shifted uneasily, not sure if she should say anything. She was unable to help her friend at that moment but luckily, as the next moment came, Fluttershy began to calm.
Still shakey, she had at least stopped being so literally. “My last day at flight school, you yelled and said awful, awful things… but you’d never been mean to me before then. Well, maybe a little. But nowhere near as much as those other foals. And no more than to Rainbow Dash. We never spent any time together ourselves but when we were both with Rainbow Dash you never seemed to mind me being there. Gilda… are we… where we ever… friends?”
Normally Gilda would consider this a win as as soon as Fluttershy had finished, she hung her head and looked away breaking their gaze. But whatever Gilda had expected, this had taken her aback. It even tugged on a few strings that she managed to quickly cut most of. But with genuine kindness in her voice she said “Fluttershy…” and reached a claw out and gently placed it under Fluttershy’s chin, lifting it to face her. When Fluttershy, doe-eyed looked back at her she added. “I never liked you.”.
“O-oh…”
“But I respected you.” Gilda added, pulling back and turning to leave. “You HATED being there. But you where there trying to make yourself a better flying. And I thought that was so cool. And then you left. To live on the ground. To give up.” and though she tried to hide it, the reason she’d turned away, she wasn’t crying, but her eyes watered just a little. Blinking it back in and knowing/hoping that was all of it, she turned back towards them. “You followed me here, had a ton of chances to come up to me and say anything. Instead you skulk around, not even very well, and come in through some backdoor, chat up the shopkeeper and get her to take your side doing what you should’ve done by yourself because you needed someone else's help to say ‘Hi’. That… THAT is why I don’t respect you anymore.”
Gilda was huffing. It had all turned to anger. She didn’t notice herself but flame was coming out of the sides of her beak and the occasional small gaught bursting forth. It wasn’t too common but gryphons [canonically] breathed fire when they got mad and she was barely keeping this entire building from burning down in her rage.
Fluttershy, for her part, was not doing what Gilda had expected her to be doing. Cowering, hiding, even running away. Instead she just looked shocked. As Gilda panted and the flames began to subside Fluttershy said “That’s not true at all!”
Gilda’s scowl held as she raised an eyebrow in bewilderment at such a blatant, laughable lie. “Really? Then why didn’t I see you come through that door?!” she motioned to the front door she herself had entered.
“Oh, no, that part’s true…” Fluttershy retreated her head as she said it. She came right back with “But what you said about leaving flight school. That’s… that’s not how it happened.” she said with confidence clear in both tone and posture. And if Gilda didn’t know better, she’d have believed her.
“Is that what you tell yourself?” Gilda scoffed.
“Yes. It is. Because it’s true.” she stood there. Holding her ground and keeping eyes locked. Gilda wasn’t sure if the pegasus remembered that about her but if she did, Gilda had to win now and held eye contact without blinking. Fluttershy blinked. But she didn’t look away. It wasn’t until Gilda narrowed her own eyes that Fluttershy’s mannerisms shifted back to their usual as she physically shifted backwards too. “Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to try and stare you down. I just… I just, want you to know…”
“You don’t think you quit?” Gilda asked. Fluttershy, looking away now, shook her head 'no'. Gilda heavily, audibly exhaled through her nostrils. She continued to stare at Fluttershy, even if she wasn’t returning the look. And while that would usually be a win to her, it somehow didn’t feel like one right now. She moved her gaze to Rarity, who without moving her head, shifted her eyes from Fluttershy to Gilda.
A sheepish smile cracked Rarity’s face. “Well then, now that that’s out of the way. Why don’t we see if that jacket fits. Fluttershy, would you assist me in the back room?” she said as the jacket alit in blue magick. “That is of course, if you’d still like the jacket?” she asked very posingly, practically a statement more than a question.
“I… guess…” Gilda replied.
“Wonderful. It won’t take a minute.” as she ushered her friend back behind the counter and into the workshop. Gilda didn’t know this but in the hyperbolic time chamber of her studio Fluttershy took a solid five minutes of calming before she could help with anything. That was only five seconds outside however. Gilda, for her part, did realise that’s likely what was happening, just not how long it was actually taking. And that asking if she still wanted the jacket was Rarity's way of keeping her here in the meantime.
Eventually, though not long, more than a minute, Fluttershy came out by herself with the jacket. “It’s ready.” she said, moving it from her back to the counter just beside Gilda. The gryphon stared at the pegasus for a moment. The exact moment Fluttershy’s eyes caught her’s was the moment she turned to look at the jacket instead.
“Gotta admit. You’re fast.” Gilda said, reaching out a claw to grab the jacket. It didn’t look like it had been added too but was clearly differently sized. Without anymore words she put a claw through a sleeve and it went perfectly down to the ankle/wrist. She then threw it over her back and shifted her wings until they went through their holes. The wing covers seemed they where the right length now too.
“W-would you like some help with those?”
Gilda paused. She’d said it herself earlier. How the hell was she meant to do up the belt on her wings without someone else to help her? Would she like help? No. Did she need help? Unfortunately, yes. “Sure. If you want to.” she extended a wing out horizontally to where Fluttershy could reach it. Although it was still a small bit above her from their size difference. With an elegance that Gilda didn’t expect from Fluttershy, she gentle began flapping her wings and took a perfectly level flight to reach it. “Subtle…”
“Oh. Was it that obvious I knew you’d need help with this?”
“The hovering. Don’t pretend like you’re not putting effort into it.” Gilda remarked as Fluttershy finished up the buckle to the exact right tightness. Gilda turned to face the pegasus.
“Oh, well I’m… is it meant to be hard?” Fluttershy accidently bragged as she came to a landing. Hovering at a stable level wasn’t hard, but it wasn’t easy either. And from what Gilda knew of Fluttershy, albeit from Xteen years ago, easy was hard for her. Medium like this would be extreme on that scale.
“Forget it.” Gilda offered her other wing to Fluttershy and clasped the zip at the bottom of the jacket together before zipping it up. Fluttershy took flight again and did it up while Gilda reached the collar with her zip. She looked over her shoulder at Fluttershy and waited for her to finish before walking over to the mirror the second she was done. She saw Fluttershy fly softly to just behind her and land in the mirror before looking to herself in it.
Again, the jacket should look absolutely ridiculous [and it still kinda did] but somehow it suited her well. The collar was zipped but the belts weren't done up and with the zip seemed redundant. Guess they could be used to tighten the folds so that they could be loose over the face or right up against it for warmth. Flapping her wings, she found she had much more of a range of motion in the jacket than she’d thought she would’ve.
“Do you like it? I helped Rarity make this one.”
Fluttershy had asked just an instant before Gilda was about to ask ‘How much was it again?’ and almost didn’t want to ask it now. But even if it wasn’t practical for right now, it would be good come winter. Not to mention it was an amazing jacket and cheaper than she’d thought. Though more than she’d ho- damn it. “You made it?”
“Oh yes. I’ve helped Rarity with a number of her designs. As a seamstress, a helpful eye or even a model.” she accidentally bragged once more. “This one was certainly the former and I’m quite proud of it. And I have good news too.”
“And what’s that?” Gilda asked, turning her head from looking at Fluttershy in the mirror behind her to facing her, at least with one eye.
“It’s a gift.”
“As in free?”
“Yes.”
“And you can just… GIVE this to me?”
“Of course. That’s what friends do.”
“I’ma stop you right there.” Gilda turned even further, from side eyeing Fluttershy to being right in front of her and invading her personal [ponysonal?] space. “I told you before, we’re not friends. I don’t like you. And no jacket will change that. Got it dweeb? We. Are not. Friends!” her voice just a fraction below what would be considered shouting. She wanted to make this clear.
“I… I…” Fluttershy began.
“Why do you care so much? Even back in flight school, did you even think I was your friend then?”
“No, but I-”
“Then why are you trying so damn hard? It’s embarrassing, really.”
“I… was talking about Rarity. She let me choose what to do with the jacket… because that’s what friend’s do.”
“Oh.” yeah… one of them was certainly embarrassed now.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t think you’d be offended by it being just given away. I know how gryphon can be when it comes to bits.” slightly racist… but not un true. “I should’ve known that getting something you think is valuable for free could be bad too.”
“No. No… it’s fine.” Gilda replied, though she turned to looking back at the mirror as she did. Partly because she didn’t want Fluttershy to take back the offer of a free jacket, but mostly because she genuinely felt bad. She wasn’t totally unfamiliar with the concept of kindness and generosity, having started her friendship with Greta after giving her a free muffin. And thinking of those two concepts she felt as if there was somehow a link between them and these two ponies… na.
Gilda stood looking at herself in the mirror, eyes locked on herself but not really inspecting anything. Just staying put to avoid possibly locking eyes with Fluttershy. If she did… she’d probably look away first right now. A long moment passed in silence until Fluttershy walked up beside her and turned slightly to face Gilda. “I think it looks good on you.”
It was nowhere near as long as the last silence had been but there was another brief yet noticeable pause between Fluttershy, and Gilda’s “Thanks.” as she turned her head to meet Fluttershy’s gaze. Luckily for Gilda, as she turned back and broke the stare, Fluttershy did so too. “You didn’t need that unicorn’s help you know.”
“What do you mean?”
“Sneaking around and having to have someone with you just to say ‘hi’. Super lame.”
“I know… at least, I know that now. But… it was something I thought would be hard for me. And I thought that maybe, having a friend there with me when I did would make it easier. And, even if I didn’t need it in the end, it did help. That’s what friends do. They help whether you need it or not.”
Gilda didn’t hear the last few words after that one particular line. The first time she’d heard it she’d been amused. The second time angered. But this third time… “Oh funk…”
“Excuse me?”
“N-nothing. I just… I gotta go.” she turned and headed for the door. The jacket she was wearing was still free right? Hope so because she was leaving in it. She grabbed the door handle and pulled. The bell rang and she stepped out. But before she left “Fluttershy.” she called back. “It was… nice seeing you again.” before she stepped out and the door slowly closed behind her.
With a few flaps that barely felt like they had anything at all strapped to them, Gilda took off. She knew/hoped he hadn’t left yet and flew out of Ponyville. Not too far, but far enough that she could watch all ponies flying around it for any that where coming out of it and heading east. Not that Gallus was a pony. That’s just all she could see at the moment. He was Fluttershy at this moment. Which was a weird analogy. But I’m sure you get the comparison.
So she waited there. Hovering about, though not the delicate steady hover Fluttershy had done before. A rough, open air hover that dropped about half a metre and then rose again between the flaps of the wing. She waited for quite a while too. Long enough to think she may have already missed him and she’d have to make a choice of going back into town to look for him or start flying to Gryphonstone to try and catch up with him.
Taking another look around, she finally saw the pair of blue wings flapping in her direction that she’d been waiting for. “Oh you have gotta be shitting me.” she muttered. With incredible speed and a near instant stop, she was suddenly face to face with…
Gilda blinked. Other than that, her face was completely motionless. In a combination of disableif, annoyance and surprised. Or more commonly known by gryphons who actually had a handle on their emotions as shock. For starters Gilda wasn’t expecting Rainbow Dash for another day at the least and realistically another after that, maybe more.
“Nice jacket.” Rainbow said after a silent moment passed. She still didn’t get anything from her. “I heard you where in Ponyville, so I double timed it back home. Glad I ran into you out here, looked like you were about to leave. Imagine. Coming all the way here and not catching up with each other.” she laughed and made a dismissive hoof motion at the idea.
“Yeah… imagine.” Gilda finally answered. She was about to leave… but you knew that. She’d already made that choice, choosing to help Gallus. That wasn’t the right word. He didn’t need help, he wanted it. Support Gallus. She’d chosen to support Gallus over staying here and waiting to see Rainbow Dash. So her being here shouldn’t change that at all. Shouldn’t...
Something about Gilda’s tone confused Rainbow. Like she didn’t want to. Sure they weren't that close anymore but last time they’d met they’d at least made up enough to part on good terms. And so for the second time today, Gilda heard the question. “Gilda, are we friends?”
The answer this time was a lot simpler. “Duh.”
Well to her it was. “Uhh… is that ‘Duh, of course’ or ‘Duh, of course not’?”
“What, do you want a hug or something for an answer?” she said, mockingly opening her arms. “Yeah, we’re friends. I guess [b-baka].” whether she misread it or just didn’t care, Rainbow Dash hugged her. Gilda froze. Even falling a little before she started flapping her wings again. Arms still open, she closed one giving her friend a half hug. She’d heard some anecdotes about how good a hug felt. They over sold it. Sure, it was nice, but… that’s about it.
Dash pulled away from Gilda and quickly looked about to see if anypony saw that. There wasn’t anypony for miles. A few dots in the distance over towards Ponyville but nopony out here. “I don’t know how long you’ve been here but… you don’t have to leave just yet do you?” for as cool as Rainbow Dash tried to sound, it came off sounding pretty desperate. Probably because it was. But for how desperate she actually was, she’d sounded relatively cool.
Gilda had half a mind to mock it. She hadn’t been that desperate to see Rainbow Dash herself after all. This time. Last time she came here though… that was a different story. One that nearly matched Rainbow’s now. She’d really missed Rainbow back then and if Rainbow was feeling that way now Gilda couldn’t mock that. But she did have to knock it back.
“A few days. And yeah. I gotta go pretty soon.”
“Oh. Ok. Well, how about we hang out until then huh?”
Gilda sighed. “Listen Rainbow Dash. I’m gonna be straight with you.” and despite the phrasing, Rainbow Dash didn’t even chuckled, feeling that Gilda was being serious. “I gotta go. And you showing up right as I’m about to is making it way harder. So… could you just like… get lost?”
Rainbow turned. “Ye-yeah. Sure. I understand.”
“Damn it. Don’t take it that way!” Gilda said, reaching out to turn Rainbow back around. Which was good for Rainbow too since she’d come from outside of Ponyville and had turned away from it to leave. Gilda, knowing how emotional ponies tended to get, even Rainbow Dash, expected to see tears. It oddly hurt her when she didn’t see any. “I just mean that I have to do something and talking with you is making hard to go and do it.”
“Yeah, I said I understand.”
“That was the worst fib I’ve ever seen…” Gilda rolled her eyes at the obvious attempt to save face.
“So you really gotta go huh?” Dash asked, still seemingly oblivious to how much a question like that was exactly why Gilda wanted her to leave. “Well, uh, just remember. If you ever stop by again, you’re always welcome at my place.” Gilda let out a tiny wheeze of a laugh at that as she pictured Rainbow’s face at the realistion she’d already taken full advantage of that fact.
She quickly played it off though, returning the sentiment. “My place too if you’re in Gryphonstone.” Rainbow Dash let out a similar tiny wheeze of a laugh. Gilda didn’t catch it either.
“Well… see ya.” Rainbow said but didn’t immediately leave, instead lingering for just a moment longer than you would after saying goodbye. But as it passed the norm for how long, she left before it went into an awkward way, much like this sentence went.
She passed Gilda who turned to watch her leave but didn’t do so at top speed, hoping for a “Wait!...” Gilda called out to her. Even at sub top speed, Dash was still able to get a decent distance between them in such a short amount of time. Far enough that Gilda had to shout it. Dash stopped and Gilda flew up to her this time. “Could you do me a solid?”
“Sure!” Rainbow exclaimed excitedly. She seemed far more eager than she should be.
Whatever it was she was expecting Gilda to ask of her, it wasn’t this. “Could you return this jacket to Rarity?” she asked as she began undoing the neck buckles.
“Really? It looks good on you.”
“Yeah… but it’s too hot. I can’t fly all the way home in it.”
“Oh. Well, yeah, sure. I can do that for you.”
Subconsciously Dash had been maintaining level with Gilda in flight. Gilda had been slowly lowering. They touched the ground as Gilda unclasped the zip and threw the jacket over her back, only for it to get stuck on her wings that where still done up. Damn it. It really was well made. She couldn't even feel those where still there. “Argh… could you…?”
Gilda couldn't see it happen from under the jacket stuck over her but pretty soon it was undone and finally off of her. She pulled it off and just saw Rainbow landing once more in front of her with a poorly hidden smile, trying not to laugh at the blunder before her. Well two can play that game.
Gilda took the jacket and folded it. Surprisingly neatly. “Here.” she said, clawing it to Rainbow who took it. “Try get a full refund too. Don’t settle for anything less than the ฿259 I paid for it. And… use it as a holiday fund to come visit me.” 'Hehehehe… that’ll get her to push the topic. Wait… Rainbow Dash still likes prank right? Yeah… yeah of course she does. Welp… already hedged the bet anyway'.
“Yeah, I figured Rarity made it. But… you might be interested to know that Fluttershy probably had a hoof in it too. I can tell her style. I don’t know why but she loves being wrapped up in straps.”
Gilda just stared. She wasn’t sure if Rainbow was joking or if she was completely oblivious to what she’d just implied. Gilda hoped the former. “Yeah, I know.” Gilda pasued. “Thinking about it, could you… do me another favour?”
“Yyyyeah?” she asked, wondering what kind of favour it would be after making a sex joke about Fluttershy of all things.
“Tell Fluttershy… that maybe, we are friends.”
Rainbow Dash really had to find out what the tartaras had happened while she was out of town. That could wait though. “Uhh… is that ‘we, me and you’ or ‘we, you and Fluttershy’?”
Gilda face clawed… left it there for a moment before pulling it back slightly to rub the bridge of her beak with two claws. “Me and Fluttershy.” she groaned.
“Yeah, I’ll tell her for you.” she said. “Is theerrrrre... anything else? Before I go?”
“Na, that’s it.”
“Arlight [not a typo]. Well, See ya. Again.”
“Yeah. Later dweeb.” Gilda put her claw out.
Rainbow raised her hoof and bumped it. “Ha… look who's talking.”
*PFFFffffff….*
And Rainbow Dash took off. Gilda was pretty sure Rainbow Dash was getting out of there before she showed any tears. But totally not because Gilda was heading towards that herself. She had gotten the last word in with her so Rainbow Dash had won that little exchange. And Gilda was fine with losing that one. Although the idea that everything was a competition to her may be the reason she doesn’t have a lot of friends. Na!
Still, the whole reason she’d come to Ponyville had just left. And by her doing too. Just so she could help some possibly mutated, possibly gryphon/pony hybrid she’d met two days ago figure out which one of those two he was.
“I don’t care what you said, I want to know why?!”
“Gryphonal reasons.”
“Gryphonal re… what kind of bullcarp is that?”
“Gryst… can’t a hen change her mind? Do you want my help or not?”
“I… y-yeah.”
“Good. Now shut up and tell me who this is. I thought you said you were the only gryphon in Po-oh my lord. What the…?” Gilda blanched looking at Silverstream. It clicked to her pretty fast that this was her and why Gallus had said she just looked… ‘off’ somehow. “You weren’t kidding when you said she was ugly huh?”
“Wot.” Silverstream stated.
“I never said that!” Gallus quickly interjected.
Gilda continued to look at her, nearly in awe. “It’s… uncanny. Like looking at a gryphon but not.” it certainly looked like the halfway point between a gryphon and a pony and yet still completely different to what she’d actually imagined. And with this new image to compare to, the idea that Gallus was actually part pony seemed far more unlikely. Of course there was one weird thing that Gallus had said about her. “She’s a 4?”
“What are you talking about?” Silverstream asked, spinning her head from being turned all the way right to all the way left as Gilda circled around her to keep eyes on the earthier gryphon. The skyier coloured gryphon stared slightly wide eyed at the two of them. He began to speak but was completely cut off by Gilda.
“He told me that you’re just wrong somehow. I didn’t get it… but I do now.” she said, finally having fully circled the hippogryph and gotten a good look at her. “It’s like you’re a gryphon with all the wrong proportions and it’s kinda terrifying to look at… but I can’t look away. Like a train wreck.” she said with absolutely no regard for how insulting something like that was.
“Oh…” Silverstream followed. “I totally get what you mean. Gallus freaked me out for a while too. And the ponies were also super weird at first. But you get used to it. Honestly the strangest part is getting used to it and then going home and seeing half the hippogryphs as the weird ones until you adjust again. Freaky!”
“Gilda.” she said, putting out a claw. “You’re… Goldenshower right?”
“Uhh… no. Silverstream.” she answered with a face clearly trying to hide a very bizarre combination of emotions after being called that before grabbing Gilda’s claw and shaking it. As she did grab it though, Gilda balled it up into a fist as if to bump. Silverstream, feeling like an idiot released and quickly balled her claw and went to bump. Only for her fist to smash into an open palm of a hi-four.
The snickering from Gilda made it clear she’d just been played. “Eh, close enough. Same thing really.” Gilda replied and lowered her arm.
“It’s really not. Do… do you know what that means?”
“What what means?”
“Don’t worry about!” she said just below a shouting volume to forcibly change the subject. “So how do you know Gallus?”
“Uh… we go way back. Yeah. All the way back to yesterday. Suddenly we’re best friends and he asked me to go on a journey of self discovery with him.”
“Well, that is what friend d-”
“DO NOT finish that sen-”
“Sandwiches!” Gallus screamed as he held one between them. They both looked at him confused. Especially since Silverstream was pretty sure he’d only packed a pack of chips to eat. His eyes darted from one to the other in the silence. “Please stop talking about me.”
“Aww… feeling blue?” Gilda mocked.
Gallus just glared annoyed for a moment before coming back with “I think I’m starting to hate you.”
“Tss, you know you love it.” dismissed with a wave of the claw.
“No. I really don’t.” Gallus said in one of those calm tones that somehow carried more passive aggression then yelling ever could. “This whole thing started over how I look different and I don’t need the both of you talking about how weird I look.”
“What? No…” Silverstream piped up “Well, yeah I was but… I didn’t mean in a bad way. I like the way you look!” she said, realising what that may sound like [and a little bit was like] only after she’d said it. Gallus, for his part, caught it too but was more thinking about the immediate jab Gilda was sure to take at that as his eyes shifted back and forth between the two hens.
“Heh… well if things don’t work out with you-know-who I think you got a rebound waiting.”
“No!” Gallus shouted. “I. Don’t. Want that!” his arm flown above his head in exasperation. “The main reason I didn’t want it with…” he had been yelling at Gilda but calmed himself slightly as he looked as Silverstream. Lowering his voice. “With... you-know-who...” Gilda was at least keeping it quiet for him. “I didn’t want it to make our friendship weird. And nothing against you Silverstream but same goes for you.”
Though keeping Ocellus’ name out of it, he had narrowed it down to his friends. “Is that the only reason?” Silverstream asked.
“Well… maybe. After we talked about it, it just left me with questions. You know… the questions about myself we talked about earlier. All of… the this-whole-thing is why I’m going.” he said, sheepishly. He then hardened and motioned his eyes towards Gilda with actually looking at her. “Why I’m bringing her is a mystery. And I mean it. I really have no idea why she’s coming with me.”
“Is she your sister?”
Gallus snorted, Gilda answered. “No!”.
“Technically… I think she’s my niece.”
“Wot.” Gilda said this time.
“Yeah… Granpa Gruff’s your granps right? Well he kinda adopted me so I’m his son. So I’m your… mother or father’s brother and that make me your uncle.”
“That’s not how tha-”
“That’s totally how it works!” Gallus interrupted. The anger in Gilda’s eyes… he’d won this round by miles. “Silverstream?” he said, asking for confirmation.
“Makes sense to me.” she said with a shrug.
Gilda just hovered there. She was either seething or trying to figure out if he was right… neither of them could tell which. “Well at least you don’t think I’m your mom anymore.” she said under her breath. “This is all fun and games but I’ve been waiting for you here for long enough already. Can we just get going already?”
“You two are heading for the Gryphon Kingdom.”
“Not really a kingdom without a king… but yeah.” Gilda answered. “She’s not coming too is she?”
“Um… are you?” Gallus asked.
“Do you want me to?”
“Maybe.”
“No.” Gilda deadpanned.
Gallus heavily sighed. “I guess not.” he said and turned away from her a bit facing towards the east. “I’ll see you in a few days… maybe a week. Two at most. Can’t miss that much school.” he paused. “Probably can’t miss this much school actually. Oh well. I’m sure Principle Twilight will understand.”
“You better hope she does.”
“What’s she gonna do? Expel the only gryphon at the school?”
“Yeah…” Silverstream answered truthfully knowing that Twilight was so not racist that’s she’d do something that could be seen as racist to prove she's not by treating students equally regardless of species. Wait… I meant speciest. w/e.
“W… well don’t say that!” as he started worrying he might get expelled for this. Silverstream just put a claw to her mouth and laughed. She was just kidding… kinda. Gallus got the joke and chuckled a bit too before “Well… see ya.” she rushed in and hugged him. It shocked him for a brief second before he gingerly returned it… “Y-you too.” why did he say that?
She released him. “Goodbye. Say hi to Gabby for me.”
“Will do.” he said turned towards Gilda who had started flying off already, only to stop about 50 metres away after noticing that they were STILL talking! Gallus took the hint and caught up with her.
“How does she know Gabby.” she said as he kept pace with Gilda, flying away and out of ear shot of Silverstream.
“Oh, she’s here like every other day. She’s dating Spike.”
“I have no idea who that is… but niiccccceee…”
“I’m not sure if Spike is older or younger than me…”
“Where are you going!” Twilight forcibly asked as she poof’d into existence in front of Gallus. Gallus ran right into her. They both spun end over end in mid air for a moment, gravity ignoring them for comic effect.
“What that… how did you?...”
“Know you were leaving? Well I have this tracking spell on you.”
“You have a tracking spell on him?” Gilda asked, getting Twilight’s attention for the first time.
“Oh, Gilda, I presume?”
“You know what they say about those who assume. It makes an ass of u and me.”
“I said presume, no assume.”
“J-... whatever! Why do you have a tracking spell on him? Do you have one on all your students or just the gryphon?!”
“What? No! I don’t just have it on him because he’s a gryphon. I have a tracking spell on all of my students…” she paused ever so slightly “that are connected to the Tree of Harmony.
“So you have one on all the non ponies?” Gallus smugly asked.
“Yes.” Twilight answered to his correct assertion. “Wait. No. Well yes, but I also have one on Sandbar!” Gallus snickered. He’d made Principle Twilight make a fool of herself and dismissed Gilda’s accusation. Twilight caught that and realised both of those things too. She took a deep breath. And let it go. “Gallus. I just want to know why you’re leaving Ponyville? And auxiliary to that, why is Gilda going with you?”
“Why does that matter?” Gilda asked. “Can’t-”
“Let me handle this.” Gallus stopped her. He cleared his throat and “Gilda’s abducted me and need you to save m-no, just kidding.” And Twilight’s horn de-lit after it immediately lit just before. “I’m going home for the weekend. Gilda, who is also heading that way has offered to keep me safe on the way.”
“I… somehow doubt that.” looking between both him and Gilda. “Nevertheless, I can’t allow it without written approval from Granpa Gruff.”
“You’re absolutely right.” Gallus admitted.
“Thank you.” she said smugly with her eyes closed. She opened them and asked “Wait… why did you agree so easily?”
“I guess I’ve got no choice but to go all the way to Gryphonstone and get his approval. Well I’ll just go do that. Bye.” and he flew past her. Not at a fast pace, just enough to prove a point.
Twilight stayed in place for a moment calculating what he’d said. He wasn’t technically wrong. He just wasn’t right. She turned to catch up to him only to have Gilda place a claw on her shoulder and pull Twilight back to face the gryphon “You really gonna stop a kid from going home after what he’s just been through.” wait, did Gilda know that Twilight knew? I just checked and *explanation* between two paragraphs is close enough for me!
“Oh, that’s what this is about.”
“Yeah. Now go away.” Gilda said, not wanting more conflict/drama today. She flew past Twilight and caught up to Gallus. ‘I’m not usually a praying gryphon… but please don’t let her follow us…’ she thought to herself, or rather, to Faust [or rather, to Bysen]. Her prayers were answered.
A few moments after she’d caught up to Gallus the two of them increased from a polite we’re leaving but not in a hurry speed to actual leaving speed. And shortly after that they heard a teleportation *pop* and seeing as she didn’t appear in front of them again, she had obviously taken the hint.
Gilda however was still looking around, almost nervously. “What, you think she’d going to appear out of nowhere again?” Gallus joked.
“No. But Pinkie Pie might.” she said with mild distain.
“O...k…” Gallus raised an eyebrow. “I’m not saying that’s unlike her to pop out of a cloud somehow… but why exactly?”
“It’s six right? Rainbow Dash is in some group of six. Well, I’ve run into four of her friends now [and Rainbow Dash herself] so the only one left is her.”
“Really, you’ve run into all of my teachers?”
“Yeah. Fluttershy. Rarity. Trixie. And now Twilight.
“Yep… that’s them alright…”
“Only leaves Pinkie Pie. And it feels like… she’s right behind me!” she screamed and spun around pointing at… nothing but a few clouds drifting by in the sky. “Huh… must’ve been my imagination.”
It was about eight hours ago that it started. Gallus had said he thinks he might hate her. He wasn’t lying. Sure, Gilda was doing nice things but in an absolutely dickish way. He was genuinely confused by her actions and constant flip flopping on them. If he hadn’t met some… ‘unique’ characters in his time in Ponyville he would’ve wondered if she was mentally stable.
After traveling since just before midday they’d made it to about three fifths the way there [which by the map puts them in them middle of the ocean so let’s assume the long way is the usual way people go is up north along the land bridge. Let’s also say that Dash is fast and secure enough to cross the ocean and that’s how she got back so soon]. Even though gryphons [and pegasus and other flying races] can go into a semi-conscious state that allows them to sleep while flying long distances, their body still needs rest. And as it got dark, the two landed and found a nice platou on a cliffside to spend the night on. There was even some rope there for some reason. So if they needed any rope they could checkoff that from the list.
This was originally my bullet point notes but I’m lazy
Seriously, I hate you awww… but I think we’re friends now Wtf? Can’t a girl have a change of heart? Requires a heart Ouch. hey as far as gryphons go I’m pretty good Yeah gryphons suck. Kinda hope I am part pony so I can stay in equestria What then? Probably become a guard or something. I know enough royalty to get a spot as a royal guard Gotta love nepotism I mean… I was gonna actually work for it but… yeah that’ll certainly help. Just like it did shining armour Who? d/w we’re friends. This chapter was pointless
