To Sleepwalk Or Not To Sleepwalk
There weren’t many things better than a three-day weekend break. So when such a weekend came to the School of Friendship, everybody was quick to take advantage of it. Many used it to make a quick trip home and visit family, which was what Silverstream, Yona, and Ocellus all did. For Sandbar, he and his family made use of the three-day weekend to visit a family friend in the city of Applewood.
Meanwhile, their remaining two friends, Smolder and Gallus, stayed behind at the school to spend the long weekend there. For Smolder it was because the trip to the Dragon Lands would take too long to really make it worth her while—she’d get there just in time to have to head back. Gallus, meanwhile, totally could’ve traveled back to his native Griffonstone, he just had no reason to. To him, it was better to spend the weekend at the school even with only one of his friends to keep him company. So he did.
Sandbar had worried he’d be coming back to find the dragon and griffon bored out of their skulls, but when returning to the school late on the evening of the third day, accompanied by Silverstream who’d arrived at roughly the same time, he found the two waiting for them looking as happy and content as could be.
“Welcome back, you two knuckleheads!” Gallus greeted cheekily as they all met up in the darkened entry hall.
“Hey!” Silverstream greeted back, though at only a fraction of her usual exuberance, tired from her long journey. She yawned. “What are you guys still doing up? I would’ve thought you’d already be in bed by now.”
“Eh, we figured we’d wait for our roomies to show up,” Smolder said with a shrug, accepting a tired hug from the hippogriff while Gallus gave Sandbar a friendly noogie.
“I take it you two kept busy, then?” Sandbar asked as they then started for the student dorms. “Weren’t too bored without us?”
“Nah, we managed to put up with each other,” Gallus replied, exchanging a smirk with Smolder. “And you two? Had good trips?”
“Yup!” Silverstream said. “I had a great time catching up with family at Mount Aris.” She yawned again before adding, “But I’m burned out and ready to catch some Zs now.”
“Well, we better get you to bed before you start dozing off then,” Smolder teased, wrapping an arm around the tired hippogriff and led her off. She waved to Gallus and Sandbar as they parted ways in the dorm hallway. “See you two dudes in the morning, ‘kay?”
“Night Smolder and Silverstream,” Sandbar called as the girls vanished into their dorm room. He then turned to Gallus as they headed for theirs. “So really weren’t too lonely or bored without the rest of us, then?”
“Nah, Starlight, Sunburst, and Trixie were all still here, so if worse came to worse, we could always bug them,” Gallus said with a smirk. “Seriously though, we had fun anyway.”
“Was it a productive weekend, then?”
“Well…no, Smolder and I mostly just goofed off. But still, all told, it wasn’t too bad a weekend.”
“So just what sort of things did you two even do?”
Gallus hummed aloud as he made an exaggerated show of thinking about it…
“Marco!” Smolder called as she stumbled along the school hallways, blindfolded.
“Polo!” Gallus responded back from the other side of the hallway, watching the dragoness blindly blunder about with amusement.
“Marco!” Smolder called again as she bumped into a wall, pounded it in frustration then pushed away from it.
“Polo!” Gallus again replied as he circled behind her, staying out of reach.
“Marco!” Smolder called once more, spinning around to follow his voice only to immediately bump into a vase on a stand. “Oh slag!” she cursed as the podium tipped over and heard the vase smash to pieces while Gallus belly laughed behind her.
The rock music was loud enough that it made the whole student lounge rattle, but seeing they were the only students there, Gallus and Smolder couldn’t really bring themselves to care, especially as they were so lost in jamming along to the pounding music, both wildly strumming out on air guitars and prancing aimlessly about in half-formed dance moves not quite in time with the beat.
“This music is great!” Smolder shouted to Gallus.
“What?” Gallus shouted back, not quite hearing.
“Exactly!” Smolder shouted back and went right back to jamming out.
“So the students actually build these things in one day, all by themselves,” Gallus summarized as he and Smolder put on helmets, “and then they just drive something foals built?”
“Basically, yeah,” Smolder said as she sat in the driver’s seat with Gallus seated behind her. “At least, that’s what I gleaned from Sandbar’s explanation. He did talk about more technical stuff, but…”
“…but that was boring, so you tuned it out,” Gallus finished.
Smolder twisted around to smirk at him. “You know me so well. Anyway, you all set?”
“Yup,” Gallus patted the back of her seat, signaling to go ahead. “Go, go, derby racer!”
“All right!” Smolder pulled a lever to release the brakes on the spare applewood derby car they had “borrowed” from the Ponyville school house, before proceeding to drive it haphazardly down the hill in front of them at full speed.
“More tea, Mister Gallus?” Smolder asked in a faux accent, correctly hefting the dainty tea pot in her claws.
“Indubitably, Miss Smolder,” Gallus replied with a similar accent as he supped the last of the tea from his cup, pinky properly extended and being careful not to spill on the luxurious black tuxedo he wore with his top hat and monocle.
“And some sugar, perhaps?” Smolder added as she leaned over to pour more tea into Gallus’s proffered cup, careful not to crease the fabulous seafoam green dress she wore.
“With honey, please,” Gallus requested politely.
That done, they proceeded to sup their tea, enjoying the elegant flavor, before Gallus changed the subject:
“If you tell anyone that we did this, I will end you.”
Smolder smirked. “Likewise, feather butt.”
“En garde!” Gallus declared, holding his fencing blade out at the ready towards Smolder.
“Prêts!” Smolder declared back, holding her blade in a similar position.
“Allez!” Sunburst commanded from where he sat nearby, keeping score, and immediately the two fencers went at each other.
“Thrust!” Gallus declared, jabbing his blade at Smolder.
“Parry!” Smolder said as she blocked the attack.
“Retreat!”
“Feint!”
“Riposte!”
“Touche!” Sunburst interrupted suddenly as the tip of Gallus’s blade tapped harmlessly on Smolder’s fencing jacket. “Another point to Gallus!”
“Darn it!” Smolder growled.
The constant tapping of the ping-pong ball slapping back and forth across the table filled the room as Gallus and Smolder aggressively pounded it every time it neared them, grunting from the exertion of their every swing.
Sat to one side watching them was Trixie, happily munching on a bag of popcorn.
Starlight stopped by to check on them. “How many games have they played now?” she asked.
“This is still the first one,” Trixie replied.
“Really? So what’s the score?”
“Still zero to zero.”
“What?” Starlight stared at her in surprise. “But they’ve been playing for hours now! And still neither of them have scored even one point?”
“Yup,” Trixie said as she munched on her popcorn, motioning to their students. “These two take ping-pong seriously.”
“I’m gonna get there first!” Smolder taunted as she and Gallus flew around the exterior of a school in a race.
“Heck no!” Gallus said, pumping his wings so to keep up. “Not on my watch!”
“Face it, you just can’t keep up with the powerhouse of a dragon like me,” Smolder smugly replied as she maintained a very narrow lead.
“Oh, we’ll see about that!” Gallus said, shooting her a determined look. “Because I can’t wait to make you eat those words, you—”
He was cut off with a sudden squawk as he, not watching where he was going, smacked into a flag post on the school’s roof.
“Ha-ha!” Smolder mocked, pointing a claw back at him while flying ahead.
…until she, also not watching where she was going, flew face-first into the school’s bell in its tower with a loud dong!
“…Oh, you know, the usual stuff,” Gallus finally replied with a dismissive wave of his talons.
Sandbar smirked. “I feel lucky to find the school still standing, then.”
“You know it!” Gallus replied with a proud grin.
Sandbar laughed as they stepped into their dorm room. “Gosh, I’m pretty tired too,” he said as he dumped his saddlebags on the floor. He yawned, stretching. “But I’m looking forward to getting back into the usual school routine tomorrow.”
“Weirdo,” Gallus teased as he flopped onto the bottom bunk.
“Aw, school’s not all that bad and you know it,” Sandbar remarked as he pulled out a nightshirt and wiggled into it.
“All right, all right,” Gallus relented, leaning back on his sheets. “I’ll admit it’ll be nice for things to get back to normal again…even if it is all lectures and homework and junk.”
“Oh, we know you wouldn’t still be here if you didn’t at least enjoy some of it,” Sandbar pointed out as he clambered onto the top bunk.
“Yeah, yeah,” Gallus said, rolling his eyes and waving his talons vaguely in the pony’s direction. “Night, Sandy.”
“Good night, Gallus,” Sandbar replied back as he snuggled into his covers. “See you in the morning.”
“Mm-hmm,” Gallus hummed as he threw on his covers and rolled over so to doze off.
Gallus slept well that night, so much so that he woke up before the alarm clock went off, feeling well-rested. Still, he almost hated to get up, as his bed felt snugger and warmer than usual, especially along his back. Debating whether or not to keep sleeping until the alarm went off, he rolled over so to face the other way…
…only to have his beak bump right into Smolder’s sleeping snout.
With a panicked gasp, Gallus leapt out of the bedcovers like he had been scalded, banging his head loudly on the underside of the bunk above him which made Sandbar snort and start to stir. Smolder’s in my bed, he thought anxiously as he backed into one corner of the mattress, staring at the asleep dragoness, Why is Smolder in my bed?!
“Mm…Gallus?” He heard Sandbar mumble above him, groggily waking up. “Is that you?”
“Sandbar!” Gallus hissed back in a croaky wheeze, terrified of waking Smolder, uncertain what would happen, “Help!”
“What? What’s up?” Sandbar asked, shuffling around. A moment later, his head leaned over so to peer down into Gallus’s bunk. His eyes widened at Smolder obliviously asleep on it and Gallus hunched in a clear panic in the far corner against the wall. “Uhhhh….”
“I know how it looks!” Gallus hissed. “But I swear, she wasn’t there when I went to sleep last night! I don’t know how she got here! I just woke up and there she was!”
Sandbar furrowed his brow, clearly confused. “Well…let’s not panic,” he advised, starting to climb down. “I’m sure there’s an explanation.”
“There better be!” Gallus wheezed, watching him.
Sandbar hummed thoughtfully, surveying the sleeping dragon before deciding to get it right from the dragon’s mouth. “Hey, Smolder,” he said, trying to shake her awake despite Gallus tensing up. “Wake up!” When Smolder didn’t react though, he gave her a rough shove, but this just caused her to flop over onto her face, not even stirring. She let out a rough snore. Sandbar scratched the top of his head. “She’s really asleep.”
“I almost want to just leave her like that then,” Gallus reasoned and, carefully stepping over her, clambered off the bed. “Let her wake up on her own and then ask her what the heck happened.”
Sandbar shrugged. “Okay, so do you just want to leave her in your bed?” Seeing Gallus visibly tense at the implications, he added, “Or do you want to try moving her back to her bed?”
“That last one, definitely,” Gallus chose without hesitation. He grabbed Smolder’s legs. “I’ll take this end, you take the other.”
Working together, they hefted her up and awkwardly shuffled out the door into the dorm hallway, carrying her between them. It wasn’t easy as Smolder remained deeply asleep and thereby limp and heavy. Grunting and hissing commands at each other though, they eventually arrived at Smolder and Silverstream’s room and started dragging her to the vacant bottom bunk.
They were only halfway there when Silverstream’s head popped out from the top bunk, brushing aside her nightcap’s tassel and staring down at them in confusion while they stared back up at her. “…morning?” she finally managed after a long beat.
“…morning?” both boys echoed back in the same unsure tone. Smolder let out a snore.
They stared awkwardly at each other for a long moment.
“So…” Silverstream continued, still confused, “…any reason why you’re trying to abduct my roomie?”
“We’re not abducting her,” Sandbar explained calmly. “We’re putting her back.”
Silverstream raised a questioning eyebrow at them.
“She was in my bed, Sil!” Gallus hissed up at her. “I just woke up and there she was! And we sure as heck don’t know why!”
“Huh,” Silverstream remarked, tilting her head down at the sleeping dragoness. “Normally she doesn’t wander that far when she sleepwalks.”
Sandbar and Gallus exchanged looks. “She sleepwalks?” they repeated together.
“Mm-hmm!” Silverstream confirmed as she flapped off the top bunk. “Only on rare occasions though. She made me swear to secrecy when I found out.”
“Explains why we didn’t know about this,” Sandbar mumbled. “I’m guessing her climbing into other creatures’ beds is a first, then?”
“As far as I know,” Silverstream chirped innocently. “Usually, she stays in here, curling up on the floor or something.” She then giggled. “Once I found her asleep at the desk, ink smudged all over her, like she had gotten up to do homework in her sleep.”
“Very amusing,” Gallus grunted, Smolder’s weight starting to strain his muscles. “So then can we just leave her with you and you can sort this out?”
“Well, I can try,” Silverstream said, leading them over to Smolder’s bed and helping them flop her into it. “But usually she doesn’t remember sleepwalking at all, so I don’t know if I’ll know anything more than you two.”
“Well, maybe it was just a one-time fluke,” Sandbar suggested optimistically, “and this’ll be the end of it now that it’s over.”
Gallus unwound a little at that. “You’re probably right,” he agreed with a sigh. “No need to get so worked up over it.”
“Yeah, I’m sure she meant nothing by it, whatever her reasons were,” Silverstream assured. She glanced at Smolder’s sleeping form. “In fact, might as well not get her all worked up about this either. She gets really embarrassed when she realizes she sleepwalked during the night, and I think she might be extra embarrassed about this one.”
“Yeah, let’s do that,” Gallus agreed a little too quickly. “Let’s just pretend this never happened. It was only a dumb sleepwalking accident after all. No one else needs to know.”
Sandbar wasn’t so convinced. “Are you sure? That seems like it might be pushing our luck.”
“You want to be the one to explain to her that we found her asleep in another guy’s bed?” Gallus challenged.
Sandbar blushed, seeing his point. “No,” he admitted.
“Well then!” Silverstream said, clapping her talons together. “Since we’re all already up, we might as well start getting ready for classes!”
As Silverstream suspected, Smolder eventually woke up of her own volition about a half hour later with absolutely no memory of the event. She just got up and proceeded with her day like nothing had happened. It wasn’t quite so easy for the others though, who struggled to keep quiet. It was especially hard for Gallus, left with mixed feelings and spent the day trying to not look at Smolder in a weird light. He was pretty sure she noticed anyway, as she kept discreetly nudging him to spill the beans on whatever was bothering him.
However, Gallus never cracked and explained. And by the end of that day, having come to terms with the incident seeing no real harm was done, he started to resume focus on normal school life. He went to bed that night feeling confident he’d put it behind him.
Except the following morning he woke up feeling dread after noticing a warm large lump snuggled next to him in bed.
“Oh c’mon!” he exclaimed when he saw it was Smolder and again scrambled into the corner of his mattress, distancing himself from the sleeping dragoness.
“Huh? Wha?” Sandbar grunted above him. A moment later, his head was sticking over the edge of his bunk again. One look was all he needed. “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Gallus agreed with a frown. “Oh.”
Sandbar clambered down for a better look. He looked concerned. “Okay, one time could’ve been a fluke. But twice, in a row?”
“Then we better figure it out before she humiliates the both of us any further,” Gallus reasoned, clambering over the sleeping dragon to join him.
They both tried to wake Smolder, shaking her, talking to her, even shouting at her. Unfortunately, Smolder was apparently a very deep sleeper because she didn’t even stir. So, having no other options, they once again carried her back to her own room, alerting Silverstream of the situation.
“This is weird,” Silverstream remarked as they dumped Smolder into her bed. She scratched at her head. “There must be something she really likes about your bed, Gallus.”
“Maybe she likes the company,” Sandbar couldn’t help but quip.
Gallus shot him a look, not so amused. “Guys, this is serious,” he insisted. “Think about how it’ll make us all look if this gets around.” He gazed concerned at Smolder. “If she’s really doing this unintentionally then she doesn’t deserve that. It’s time we intervened for her own good.” He sighed and turned to Silverstream. “Sil, how do you usually get her to wake up?”
“Oh, well, I don’t,” the hippogriff admitted with sheepish shrug. “She usually just wakes up all by herself. Until then, she’s sorta…” she tapped her beak, looking for the right words, “…how do I want to say it?”
“…dead to the world?” Sandbar offered.
“All right fine, we wait until she wakes up on her own,” Gallus relented. “Then we sit her down and talk about this.”
That chance didn’t come until breakfast when Smolder found herself led into a secluded and empty corner of the school cafeteria. “Okay, you guys wanna tell me what this is about?” she asked as they sat down at an empty corner table. The other three looked at one another awkwardly, not wanting to be the first to broach the subject, which made Smolder grow concerned. “…guys? Is something wrong?”
Silverstream, seated next to her, leaned over to place a comforting set of talons on her shoulder. “Smolder, you know how you occasionally get up in the middle of the night and sleepwalk around?” she began.
Smolder groaned. “Oh great, I did that again last night?” she whined, dismayed at herself.
“…and the night before,” Sandbar unhelpfully added.
Smolder dropped her head into the palms of her claws, groaning again. “All right, what dumb thing did I go and do now?” she asked, bracing herself.
But again, none of the three wanted to be the one to enlighten her, and if anything, their collective embarrassment only grew. It did little to reassure Smolder.
“…guys?” she asked cautiously, starting to dread the worst.
But even that didn’t prepare her for the reality. “You went and climbed into my bed,” Gallus finally blurted out. “Twice. While I was still in it.”
Smolder pulled back, confused and stunned. “Wait…what?”
“Yeah, that was pretty much our reaction too,” Silverstream said with a nod.
Smolder’s jaw went up and down several times trying to respond. “But…then why have I woken up in my bed both times?”
“Because we were nice and put you back so to spare you the embarrassment,” Gallus replied simply.
“Actually, the first time we thought it was just a fluke and not worth making a big deal out of,” Sandbar elaborated. “The second time we just couldn’t wake you up so to talk to you about it until now.”
Smolder was still processing it all. “So…you’re saying that in the dead of night, I get up, go down the hall, climb into Gallus’s bed, and sleep there the rest of the night,” she recapped. When the others nodded sheepishly, she looked incredulously to Gallus. “Then, why hasn’t any of you stopped me from getting that far? Why haven’t you even noticed me trying until you all wake up in the morning? Especially you, Gallus?”
Gallus blanked out, having not considered it before. Sandbar and Silverstream curiously looked his way for an answer didn’t help. “Uhhh…”
“You mean to tell me that you really don’t notice another creature climbing into bed with you until too late?” Smolder snapped.
“Well…Gallus is a bit of a deep sleeper himself,” Sandbar reasoned.
“Look, let’s not get off topic,” Gallus interjected and looked at Smolder seriously. “The problem here is that this is a problem at all. And I’m pretty sure you don’t want it continuing any more than we do, so we need your help figuring out how to fix it.”
“Well…I don’t know why I’m doing it!” Smolder protested, flustered and embarrassed. “I don’t even remember doing it! Heck, I didn’t even know until you guys told me!” She sighed. “Look, if I knew of a way to stop myself from sleepwalking, I definitely would’ve already been doing it way before now.”
An awkward moment of silence fell as they all pondered the dilemma.
“What if we just…blocked her way?” Silvestream offered. “The doors to our dorms do have locks, after all. Maybe we should just lock them before we go to bed tonight, see if that helps.”
“That might work since they lock from the inside,” Sandbar said. “So even if Smolder gets past the lock on her door…”
“…she’s not likely to get past our door, because she can’t unlock it from the outside,” Gallus finished, catching on.
“That’s assuming I can even unlock doors while sleepwalking,” Smolder said and averted her eyes, still embarrassed. “I’m…told that I don’t have the best coordination in that state…honestly, it’s surprising I even get as far as your guys’ room.” She sighed, rubbing the bridge of her snout. “But locking the doors is a good idea and will probably work. I hope. So let’s try that.”
The rest of the day progressed fairly normally. As there wasn’t really much more to say about the uncomfortable subject, they didn’t really talk about it more. But Smolder still felt bad about it, especially for Gallus, and that she couldn’t even remember it certainly didn’t help. As such, she felt obligated to make it up to him somehow, spending most of the day trying. Gallus kept brushing her off, assuring it wasn’t necessary. But Smolder still helped him with little things where she could and he’d permit her to. Eventually he relented and allowed her to continue, so long as it stayed within reason, commenting that it seemed “oddly endearing” of her.
The day ended with Smolder still feeling pretty bad about the whole thing though, and as she laid in bed that evening, she wondered just what it was that was making her do this. She had a few theories, of course, but nothing definite. Most didn’t seem savory to contemplate with consideration of the attached implications, building bridges to potentially bigger problems she wasn’t sure she was prepared to deal with yet, even regardless of how “savory” they did or did not seem to her. What she really didn’t get was why Gallus specifically? Climbing into someone else’s bed during the night was one thing, but why seek a specific one?
But as night fell and her tired body egged her closer to sleep, she told herself to stop fretting. She couldn’t think of a logical explanation, so in her head she concluded there wasn’t one. Either way, tonight she could be assured that precautions were taken to prevent it—Gallus and Sandbar had locked their dorm door, and she and Silverstream had locked theirs. Smolder remained confident she couldn’t unlock either in her sleep, so really, that should be the end of it.
And of course, even if all else fails, she still had Silverstream keeping an ear out for her. “You do have my back on this, right, Sil?” Smolder thought to ask after some minutes of lying in bed, pondering this.
“Snnerrrx, fishy, fishy, fishy, fishy,” came Silverstream’s response from the top bunk, jumbled in something of a half-snore, half-mumble.
All right, maybe Silverstream wouldn’t be that reliable. But Smolder still dozed off feeling assured that this still wouldn’t be happening again.
The next morning, Gallus awoke to find Smolder in his bed again. Worse still, unlike the past two times where she was just curled up somewhere beside him, the dragoness had instead draped herself over top of him, wrapping her limbs loosely around him in a sort of sleepy hug.
Gallus had very mixed feelings as he lay there, afraid to move. On one side, Smolder was surprisingly warm and cozy, like a big and heavy, but scaly, blanket. In any other situation, he’d hate to disturb this arrangement. But on the other side…this wasn’t any other situation. Even though he knew she was a heavy sleeper and probably wouldn’t wake even if he threw her off, he dared not do anything to disturb her for several moments, trying to decide how to proceed. Eventually though, he accepted that he was just going to have to slip out himself, even if it did disturb Smolder. So, moving carefully, he tried to wiggle free.
Only for Smolder to tighten her grip on him before he could, keeping him in place.
Growing more alarmed, Gallus again wasn’t sure how to react to this, but he knew it wasn’t good. “Sandbar,” he hissed out, trying to get the attention of his roommate, “Help! Sandbar!”
It took a couple tries, but finally he heard the pony stir. “Gallus?” he mumbled as he woke up. “Is that you?”
“Yes!” Gallus kept hissing. “Help!”
“Oh.” Sandbar made a groan as he guessed what had happened. “Oh no.” A moment later, his head was hanging down to investigate. His eyebrows went up at the sight awaiting him. “Well…that’s a new one.”
“Stop gawking and help me out!” Gallus hissed. He couldn’t quite shoot him a glare from his position, not with Smolder lying atop of him. “She won’t let me wiggle free!”
“All right, just a second,” Sandbar assured and climbed down before stopping to survey the situation again. He looked a little amused. “It looks sort of cozy, honestly. Cute, even.”
Gallus blushed unbidden. “Sandbar,” he whined pitifully.
“All right, all right, lemme see what I can do.”
He grabbed Smolder by the tail and tried to pull her off the griffon. Smolder seemed to sense it though and only gripped tighter, tight enough that when Sandbar pulled her, Gallus got dragged along too. Sandbar hummed thoughtfully to that, then climbed onto the edge of the bed to try grabbing her around the middle. The result was no different though, Smolder tightening her grip even further and now entirely wrapping her arms tightly around Gallus’s belly, like he was some full-sized plushie she was giving a squeeze.
Gallus let out a noise that was part whimper, part groan, but he had an idea. “All right, lemme try something,” he said, motioning Sandbar to back up.
With a couple grunts, he then managed to roll over onto his back, pinning Smolder under him and exposing where her arms and legs interlinked. This allowed Sandbar to pry them apart long enough for Gallus to slink free, though it took a couple of tries because if Sandbar loosened his hold for even a second, Smolder’s limbs would snap back in place and pin Gallus down again. And she still managed to snag him around the hips once more while he was clambering off the bed, making him stumble.
“How did she even get in here in the first place?” Gallus demanded as he finally struggled free, leaving her snoozing in his bed. “I thought we locked the door!”
Sandbar glanced over at said door, saw it was ajar, and went to investigate. A few twists of the now notably looser doorknob quickly provided the answer. “Looks like she managed to break the lock,” he deduced with a wince.
“Really?” Gallus asked frustrated, then snorted as he moved to see too. “Well, so much for her not operating locks while sleepwalk—OOF!” he was suddenly jerked to a halt, twisting around to see Smolder had snagged the end of his tail in her grip. Shooting her an annoyed look, he pried it free again. “All right, that’s it,” he growled as he marched for the door. “We’re waking her up.”
“But…how?” Sandbar asked, having not forgotten all of their failed past attempts.
“Oh, I’ve got an idea for that,” Gallus assured as he went out the door.
A few minutes later, he came back with a big bucket full of cold water.
“Uh…” Sandbar hesitated, watching him take it to the bed.
“These sheets are due for changing anyway,” Gallus justified before dumping the whole bucket over Smolder’s head.
It worked. With a spluttering gasp and a jolt, she woke almost immediately, coughing and spitting water out of her mouth and nose. Annoyed, she wiped water from her eyes and saw Sandbar and Gallus standing there. “What the heck, guys?” she snapped at them, incredulous. “What are you two doing in my room?”
“Oh, I wish this was your room, Smolder,” Gallus assured wearily.
Smolder paused and glanced around, noticing it really wasn’t hers. Realization hitting her, her anger immediately vanished and she shrank inward on herself in dismay. “Oh no…oh no, no, no, no—Gallus, I’m sorry!”
“I know, I know,” Gallus replied with a heavy sigh, sympathizing. “But clearly, we’re going to have to up our game on this.”
Once Gallus had put fresh sheets on his bed, they met up again at breakfast to reassess the situation. At her own insistence, Smolder sat alone on one side of the table while the others sat together on the other. As she was visibly reeling with a whole storm of conflicting emotions far more than normal for her, they looked at her with concern.
“This sucks,” she finally blurted out. “This has been going on nearly all week now and we still haven’t beaten it.”
“There has to be a reason for it, though,” Sandbar remarked. “I mean, there’s clearly a pattern to it.”
“Uh, Smolder?” Silverstream gently asked from where she sat on the end. “Have you maybe thought this is because you’re…well…” not wanting to say it in front of the boys, she tried to sign it out by jabbing her head in Gallus’s direction.
Gallus glanced at her, confused, but Smolder understood what she was trying to say. The same thought had occurred to her before, but she’d dismissed it then as unlikely. Now it was back in full force, but the implications intimidated her especially as she didn’t think Gallus would be on board with it. “Part of me hopes not,” she admitted. The other part…she wasn’t going to let have a say in it.
“Well, whatever is going on, how do we stop it?” Gallus said, concerned. “Like I said before, we can’t let this keep happening. It’s awkward enough between the four of us, so imagine if others started finding out about it too.”
Smolder blushed and let her head thump on the table with a dismayed groan in unspoken agreement.
“Well…what exactly didn’t work last night and why?” Sandbar asked, trying to collect the facts they did know.
“Well…clearly I couldn’t keep an ear out for Smolder escaping after all,” Silverstream admitted apologetically. “I just slept right through it. So that’s no good.” She then motioned to Smolder. “And then Smolder got past both locked doors anyway. She broke open your guys’, and she simply unlocked ours.”
“Basically then, locks alone aren’t going to cut it,” Gallus surmised.
Silverstream nodded. “Though it couldn’t hurt to keep trying anyway, just in case.” She tapped her beak thoughtfully. “I have a spare lock I’m not using that I could put on our door, making it so Smolder would have to get through two locks to open it…but I dunno if it’d help.”
“Maybe we should put it on our door instead,” Gallus reasoned, “Seeing we don’t have a working one anymore.”
Smolder ducked her head in shame at that.
“I talked to Headmare Starlight about that,” Sandbar piped in. “I managed to tell her our door lock got broken without telling her precisely how. She bought it and she’ll have it fixed before tonight, but I doubt she still will if it gets broken again.”
“I don’t know if I trust locks alone to stop me at this point,” Smolder mumbled, anxiously rubbing at her temples.
“Maybe we should bring Ocellus in on this,” Silverstream suggested cautiously. “I mean, she’s smart, maybe she’ll think of something we’ve overlooked.”
“Worth a try,” Sandbar said with a shrug. He glanced at Smolder. “Unless there’re any objections.”
But Smolder shook her head. “I’m just about willing to try anything at this point,” she said.
They heard the school bell toll, alerting that classes would start soon, and quickly got up to go. “Right, we’ll regroup and finish our plans later,” Gallus said. “Let’s hope Sil’s right and Ocellus can help.”
Of course, getting Ocellus up to speed took a bit of explanation, but once she had been given the proper context, she was happy to try and come up with ideas. Her eventual suggestion was something very changeling—a special type of membrane made from changeling gel and a weave of magic that then stretched over the side of Smolder’s bunk. It could safely detach and roll up for storage when it wasn’t in use, but otherwise, once securely in place, it formed a sticky barrier that most anything could get stuck on, and Ocellus felt Smolder should be no exception. She even happily made this greenish barrier herself and helped set it up. It looked sort of unsightly, but it seemed promising, especially when combined with the locked doors they agreed to try again tonight.
Smolder’s mind was on other things though, as like yesterday, she found herself following Gallus around, looking for ways to try and make up for all of this and still feeling she owed him. However, Gallus quickly took notice and intervened, politely telling her she didn’t need to and to not worry about it. So, needing something else to preoccupy her from this ongoing problem, she went to the school library to read through everything she could find on mental discipline, wondering if there was a way she could force her subconscious to behave. Once she felt she understood enough to try it, she went back to her room and spent the rest of the evening meditating and trying to train her subconscious to behave and not sleepwalk. By the time she went to bed that evening, she felt rather excited to the point that she tossed and turned a bit before getting to sleep, feeling confident that she’d beaten it this time.
The first thing Gallus became aware of as he slowly woke up the following morning was the faint smell of ash and bubblegum. It seemed welcoming and familiar and his nostrils happy to receive it, so his still-awaking mind worked to determine where he had smelled it before, curious of the answer…until he remembered that Smolder liked to use bubblegum-scented shampoo and that like most dragons she tended to have a faint ashy smell surrounding her at all times. Eyelids flinging open, he found his beak was tucked neatly in the crook of Smolder’s neck, curled up asleep in front of him and snuggled close. Very close. Even worse, Gallus had at some point wrapped himself around her in his sleep, only worsening how it all looked. If it wasn’t for Smolder facing the wrong way, they’d be basically spooning.
Gallus’s first instinct was to quickly pull away, but found he already had something flat against his back and something dangling right over his head. Glancing upwards, he realized they were fancy gowns of all sorts. Looking behind him, the something flat proved to be a large cardboard box. It was labelled “definitely NOT girly tea sets,” but hearing how the contents musically clinked together whenever he bumped it, he knew better than to believe it.
Peering down towards his feet next, he realized he wasn’t even in his bed this time and was instead lying halfway out of an open dorm closet. In fact this wasn’t even his room, but Smolder and Silverstream’s—judging from how his blanket was wrapped and tangled around him, Smolder must have literally dragged him out of bed and down the hall to get here. Several questions of why sprang to mind, but Gallus decided to prioritize getting out of this compromising position before anyone saw them.
But Silverstream’s head leaned into view before he could do that. “Morning!” she greeted, a little too chipper. “This is a new one, isn’t it?”
Gallus stared at her for a second, trying to work out how to explain this. Then, conceding that he couldn’t, he changed the subject. “So I take it Ocellus’s barrier and the extra lock did squat, huh?”
“Looks like it,” Silverstream said and looked over to Smolder’s bunk bed, where the green membrane had been ripped to shreds. “I think Ocellus forgot to consider dragon claws. And as for the lock, well…” she stepped to one side and swung the door fully open so Gallus could see. Where there had been the doorknob was now a black and scorched doorknob-shaped hole.
Gallus’s eyebrows went up as he understood. “She used her firebreath to melt the lock?”
“Yeah, explains why I remember smelling smoke during the night.”
“You smelled smoke, suggesting a fire…and yet you kept right on sleeping.”
“Well, at the time, I was dreaming I was swimming through Seaquestria and just thought it was what was on fire, but that was silly, because how could it be on fire when it’s literally underwater, so…”
Silverstream’s tale was interrupted when Smolder suddenly stirred and pushed herself partway up. She blinked blearily at Gallus still next to her for a moment before going bug-eyed and throwing herself against the frame of the closet door. “Oh rocks, Gallus!” she exclaimed. Her eyes darted around taking in their surroundings in a panic. “This is my hoard. YOU’RE IN MY HOARD.”
Gallus went confused. “Your…hoard?”
“Seems you dragged him in here last night,” Silverstream elaborated, also taken aback.
For a moment Smolder looked like she would either have a seizure or die of chronic embarrassment. “But that means—OUT! Everybody out!” She started pushing them both out of the room. “Out, out, out, out! It’s…you see…I gotta…NEED ALONE TIME! Right now! No disturbing!” She then slammed the door shut after them, or at least tried, seeing the damaged door wouldn’t properly latch at the moment.
They stood there in surprise for a moment. “…Well!” Silverstream finally declared, putting her talons on her hips.
Gallus, meanwhile, was frowning. “What did she mean by hoard?” he asked.
“That’s what she calls that stash of stuff she keeps in the closet,” Silverstream explained with a shrug.
Gallus tapped his chin for a moment. “So…is she seeing me as like…some sort of possession for her hoard or something then? Or is it more…” he suddenly stopped as it started to click together, “…Oh.”
Smolder spent the rest of the day hiding in her room, refusing to allow many visitors or even explain why. It was clear she was feeling very on edge, almost panicked. But since she was her roomie and needed access to the room too, Silverstream was permitted entry, and going cautiously, she attempted to coax Smolder into explaining what was up. Eventually Smolder caved and told all, but made Silverstream not just promise but Pinkie Promise not to tell anyone else, leaving her obligated to respect that wish. She was still able to present a few details, namely that Smolder wanted time to “process” things and that it was indeed a “dragon thing,” but couldn’t elaborate more than that because of her promise.
It was enough for Gallus to get the idea, though.
Fortunately, Silverstream finally lured Smolder to come out of their room, on the pretense that the repair pony needed to come inside so to fix their doorknob. So leaving Silverstream to handle that, Smolder relocated to the student lounge, which was where Gallus ultimately found her early that evening. She was sulking on the lounge’s big couch, looking tense, uneasy, and overall miserable—a very far cry from her more usual cool, confident, and smug attitude. Gallus empathized with her, hating to see her in such a rare, but clear, distressed state. So, taking in a breath, he loudly cleared his throat to alert her that he was standing in the doorway.
The couch faced away from the door, so Smolder had to spin around to see him, her eyes bulging when she did. “Gallus!” she shouted in a panic and pressed herself into one end of the couch in an attempt to try and distance herself from him.
“Hey, hey, it’s okay!” Gallus quickly assured, holding out his talons in a placating manner. Once he saw she wasn’t going to flee, he gently stepped towards the couch, his gaze soft. “I’m not here to cause any trouble, and I promise I’m not mad. We’re friends, after all. It’s going to take more than all of this to change that.”
“It’s not you I’m worried about though,” Smolder mumbled guiltily, nervous as she watched him approach.
Gallus made a small smirk. “Don’t trust yourself at the moment, huh?” He opened his wings and flapped gently over the back of the couch, seating himself at the other end so to respect Smolder’s desire for some distance. He sighed, turning more serious. “I can’t say I blame you, given everything that’s happened. This whole sleepwalking mess is starting to rattle you, isn’t it?”
Smolder, looking oddly small and fragile curled up in a ball like she was, first averted her eyes then slowly nodding her head in confirmation.
Gallus took another deep breath. “You wanna tell me now what it’s all about then?” he asked. Seeing her tense, he gave her a knowing gaze. “Because you’ve figured it out, haven’t you? Why this is all happening?”
Smolder squeezed her eyes shut, clearly fighting with several conflicting emotions at once. “I’m sorry, Gallus,” she mumbled, ashamed. “I didn’t want or mean to put all this on you. Not like this. This was all sort of…” she trailed off. “…I wasn’t even sure of it myself until this morning. If I had, I…Gallus, I swear to you, I would’ve stopped this somehow. I will not force this on you if you don’t want it.”
“At the moment, Smolder, I just want to understand what’s really going on.” When she didn’t immediately replied, he prompted, “There’s more to it than just the sleepwalking, isn’t there?” Smolder shrank in on herself a little more. “It has something to do with you dragging me into that hoard of yours last night, right?” He leaned closer, trying to look Smolder in the eyes. “Is that bad or something? I do remember Spike talking about how he’d once got really greedy and started hoarding everything he could lay claw on and grew…”
“No, no, that was a totally different thing,” Smolder assured, her tone slipping back into her normal manner of talking a bit as explaining distracted her briefly from her issues. “That happened because Spike didn’t restrain his greed—the hoard was just incidental.” She uncurled her body a little as she went on, Gallus patiently listening. “See, all dragons have a hoard of some sort. It’s normal. It’s…it’s how we keep all of our prized possessions safe and close. Like how ponies or griffons might store heirlooms or whatever in a box. Hoards are just the dragon version of that. It’s…instinctual, even. Putting our things in a hoard is a sign that those things are…important to us.”
Gallus snickered. “I guess that explains why your hoard is all just ballroom gowns and tea sets, then,” he quipped. When Smolder, annoyed, lunged across the couch to slug him on the shoulder, he laughed. “Now that’s more like the Smolder I know,” he said, giving her a pleased grin. When that made her pause, he nudged her back, more gently. “C’mon, scale butt, just let it out already. This isn’t like you, and…” Gallus paused, awkwardly rubbing the back of his head for admitting this, but admit it he did. “…and you’re starting to worry me, honestly. I just want to help. So are you going to let me?”
Smolder sighed, seating herself down beside him and staring at the floor. She didn’t talk for a long moment but Gallus didn’t rush her. “There was this dragoness I used to hang out with,” she started explaining abruptly, “a little older than I am. When we met, I had just molted, gotten my wings, and really going solo out into the world for the first time, and…and she sort of helped walk me through the basics of it.”
Gallus didn’t see how this related to things but he didn’t question it. “Was she a friend or something?”
“More like…an ally,” Smolder said. “We looked out for each other, at least.” She shook her head. “The reason I’m telling you all this though is because…a few years back, she met this drake, and they started hanging out. I had taken him to be just, y’know, one of the guys at first, but then she drags him off to the cave where she keeps her hoard, saying she wanted him a part of it, and…” she sheepishly rubbed her arms. “…well, to keep it short…they just had their second clutch of eggs this past dragon hatching season.”
“Ah,” Gallus said, nodding his head as he caught on. “So this adding someone to a hoard thing is basically a dragon’s way of…declaring their interest in someone.”
“Right,” Smolder averted her eyes, blushing. “…so I guess I don’t need to explain what’s significant about me basically doing that with…you, sleepwalking or not.” She eyed Gallus warily, fearing his response, but other than falling quiet and adopting a faraway look, his non-reaction was almost disappointing. “You’re…taking that better than I thought you would.”
“To be honest, Smolder?” Gallus said, giving her a sheepish grin. “I had…already started to suspect earlier in the week.” He shrugged at her surprise. “It was the only thing that explained this whole sleepwalk-into-my-bed thing that also made sense to me.” He sighed, averting his gaze. “I wasn’t positive though, so…I kept quiet. And I thought, if that was the case…you would’ve made it clear way before now.” He gave her a teasing grin. “You’re not exactly the subtle type, after all.”
Smolder played with the tip of her tail for a moment. “The thing is…I’m only just figuring this out myself. ’Cuz I think…I think I’ve been in denial about it.” She shrugged. “I guess I had just always figured it’d be another dragon so much that I never really considered it could be a non-dragon…so I guess whenever my thoughts drifted to…well, you…I just shrugged it off because you’re a griffon. But it was still there, niggling in the back of my head…until we hung out together the whole of that three-day weekend and…I think let myself start getting attached.” She winced, kicking her feet. “And I guess the rest of me finally got tired of waiting for me to take the hint…hence the sleepwalking and all that.” She sighed, looking Gallus in the eye with a look of concern. “That’s…why I’ve been hiding all day today. Not only did this all catch me off guard, I worried these dumb…hoarding instincts…were trying to force it to happen, and…and I figured you wouldn’t roll with that…and I definitely don’t want to make you.” She studied his face. “…are you mad?”
Gallus thought about it for a second then shrugged. “Honestly, I’m more flattered than anything.” He laughed. “You dragons always seemed to me like you’d have pretty high standards, so for any dragon to show interest in a jerk like me…”
“But you’re not,” Smolder interrupted, grabbing him by the shoulder without thinking. “You act like you don’t care and all that, but in reality…Gallus, you’re a good guy…a really good guy.” She tapped the center of his chest with one claw. “Under that hard shell you’ve built up around you beats a good heart. You hide it, but every now and then, that shell cracks enough for the rest of us to see the real you.” She sighed, then let herself thump her head into the griffon’s chest, who was taken aback by the uncharacteristic show of affection. “Like right now. Despite all this crap I’m putting you in, you’re still looking out for me like…” she squeezed her eyes shut and pulled him into a hug, voice dropping almost to a whisper, “…like the concerned friend you are…like you care…because you do.” She made a shuddering inhale, as if suddenly freeing herself from a heavy weight. “That’s what I love about you. It’s not your looks, or species, or any of that stuff on the outside…it’s what’s on the inside.”
For a long moment, Gallus just sat there numbly, arms held askance uncertainly. But then he gently let his talons settle on Smolder’s back. Gingerly at first, then with more confidence. Finally, he returned the dragoness’s hug in earnest and held it there for a long moment, the two simply savoring the moment. “Aw, Smolder,” he said, not quite managing to hold back a sniffle, “You know just what to say.”
Smolder smirked to herself. “It was a lucky guess, honestly.”
Gallus chuckled. “You know…I could say the same things about you.”
Smolder’s grin turned more warm and genuine. “…I know.” At the moment though, she couldn’t care, just wanting to savor this heart-to-heart.
But then Gallus pulled away, holding her in front of him. “You’re still right about one thing though. This whole…sleepwalk-into-beds thing you’ve been doing? That really isn’t how I want this.” When Smolder’s head started to sink crestfallen though, he slipped a talon under her chin to lift it again. “So…let’s just not do this that way, hmm?”
Smolder perked up, surprised yet hopeful. “…you really want to?”
Gallus averted his gaze. “Admittedly…I haven’t really been looking for a relationship, much less with any of you guys. I had…just always seen you as my friends…never really stopped to think any of you could be more than that.” He gave her a warm grin. “But…if you really think we can make it work…then sure, I’m willing to give it a shot.” He laughed as Smolder’s face lit up and grabbed him in a hug again, this time with a bit more force to her squeeze. “Besides…we still haven’t figured out how to stop you from sleepwalking into my bed every night.”
“I dunno,” Smolder said, noting how she was feeling not just happy but also at peace with herself more than she had all week, “something tells me that’s not going to be a problem anymore.”
Gallus grinned knowingly, stroking her spines. “Maybe you’re right.”
So, not worrying about it, they both sat there on the couch instead, snuggling together and stayed like that for some hours.
When Sandbar awoke in the morning, he realized that everything seemed to be quiet and all was well for the first time all week. But when he climbed down from the top bunk, he was almost unsurprised to see Gallus’s bed still had an extra occupant it like before, the dragoness snuggled up against his side with Gallus’s arm draped over her. Both looked quite content, so much so he almost hated to disturb them, but he still felt obligated to.
“Hey,” he said, reaching over to shake the griffon awake, “Gallus, wake up.”
Gallus snorted then blearily looked up at him. “…what?” he asked sleepily, stretching a little.
“Smolder’s sleepwalked into your bed again,” Sandbar said, nodding his head at the sleeping dragon.
“Oh that.” Gallus gave Sandbar a knowing grin. “She wasn’t sleepwalking this time.”
Sandbar’s eyebrows went up. “Oh,” he said, understanding as he grinned too, “Oh, I see.” He pulled away, satisfied there wasn’t a problem. “Then I’ll stop disturbing you and butt out. Unless you wanted me to wake you up.”
Gallus considered it for a second but then shook his head. “Nah,” he said, snuggling back up to Smolder. “We’ve had a pretty eventful week and it’s a Saturday. I think we’ll sleep in.”