A Chance of Grey - Chapter 1 - A spider and dark wings - by RandomGreymane

My first memories were of a spider. I was a tiny foal, barely birthed but shakily taking my first steps in the world.

We were gathered at my grandmare’s house, as we often were, which still amazes me to this day as my grandmare’s house was pretty small. It was meant to be a temporary house while grandpa slowly built the main house. (Grandpa passed away the year before I was born. From all the stories I’m both happy and sad that I never met him.)

Grandma’s kitchen was no bigger than twice that of a garden shed. The “dining room” was the about two thirds of that size and set off at right angles to it.

In the center, right-hoof, was a small laminated kitchen table with a flat steel edge running around the outside. The pattern, I recall, was this sharp white with speckles in it that varied from coal black to slight grey in color. It was kind of like as if someone had bleached a robin’s egg and used the shell to fill in the top of the table.

Around it my aunts and uncles sat, their voices only partially decipherable to my young ears. Each of them sipping the drink of their choice, mostly coffee, and re-hashing the family gossip with vigor.

In the farthest left-hoof corner was an old icebox. (Refrigerators existed by then, and my grandmare had one, but she kept the old wooden icebox because it made good storage. And grandma was always keen on not throwing things away if there was another purpose for them.)

As I wobbled past the front of the lower doors, and rested a hoof on them to steady myself, an enormous spider came skittering out into the light right in front of me.

I was shocked. I stood there staring intently at the spider. Partly fascinated but more than a little afraid. I remember that it looked so large to me at the time, especially the eyes, as large as the hoof of a full grown stallion.

One of my uncles, Uncle Hairy, noticed me staring. “What are you waiting for colt? Step on it!”

Without opening my mouth I slowly shook my head. I didn’t have the words to express myself so I just stood there. I didn’t want to get bit, or get spider all over my hoof.

Uncle Hairy looked me over and expressed himself with an irritated snort. “Salvia what kind of colt are you raising here?”

His tone was so harsh that I started to cry and immediately ran into the nearby living room to get away from him.

“Oh leave him alone Hairy!” my mother exclaimed in exasperation “He’s still very young!”

“He’s a dullard is what he is.” Hairy replied with a snort.

“Oh hush!” my mother scolded.

A moment later she entered the living room and picked me up to comfort me. Slowly the emotions of the moment subsided and I stopped crying. Mom always made things better back then.

From that point on though I had a healthy fear of Uncle Harry and avoided him whenever possible. (I still do.)

My mother was a certified nurse’s aide back then and worked at a nearby hospital in Coltcago. She worked long hours and her and my father didn’t get along. In truth I know that the issue was me - I wasn’t expected. I saw a photo years later of my parents getting married in the courthouse - she was at least 6 month pregnant with me when the photo was taken.

Not to say that my father wasn’t a good stallion. He did his best, always, to provide for our family. That meant he worked long hours. He was a unicorn and was one of the first ponies to maintain the new automated spell clusters that kept track of the bits that flowed back and forth between what passed for modern businesses back then.

One year they had a fight and my mother left him. She took me to grandma’s and we lived with her in the tiny house for a full year before moving back in with my father.

Living with grandma was a striking change to say the least. I wasn’t old enough to start school yet so I spent my days in the tiny house and on the surrounding ten acres.

This was absolutely fantastic to me and far different than my previous few years in the big city.

My grandmare delighted in showing me around her 10 acres of farm. There were no animals except the one dog, but she showed me just about every inch of that property. (If she didn’t, my Uncle Jimmy did. I never realized how odd his name sounds. Jimmy.)

One day she took my hoof and led me out of the house. There was a large apple tree there that shaded the entire front yard. She had a bucket in her hooves that had something in it that I couldn’t see.

We stopped just past the tree and waited while she scanned the nearby treetops of the small orchard across the other side of the driveway.

Without a word she nodded her head sharply. There was a rustle in one of the trees, the pear tree I think, and a large bird took flight.

It was jet black and it’s wings were ENORMOUS. I remember being surprised when it landed in front of us and was taller than my grandmare when she was sitting, and twice my size. He was shiny, and black, and every bit the largest raven I’d ever seen.

“This...” my grandmare said as she pointed a hoof in the raven’s direction “...is Night Wind. He visits from time to time.”

The raven bent his head to one side so his right eye was clearly focused on me. “He doesn’t speak.” my grandmare continued “Or at least he hasn’t since I’ve known him.”

My grandmare put the bucket on the ground and reached into it to toss something to the raven. I was too mesmerized by the sheen of the black feathers to notice or remember what it was. Night Wind immediately attacked the offering and swallowed it whole. She repeated this action a few times then stopped.

“You can touch him if you want.” she whispered softly to me. “Just don’t look directly in his eyes or he’ll peck yours out.”

I was trembling. I could reach out to this wonderful thing in front of me? Really? I moved slowly forward and when I got close enough I brushed my hoof down the side of one wing, careful to look at the wing itself and not Night Wind’s eyes.

The bird regarded me with a look of intense observation. I knew that if I made the wrong move I would be pecked and pecked hard. But, oddly, I wasn’t afraid.

Gathering what remained of my courage, I moved right up to Night Wind and carefully put my forelegs around him and gently hugged him. I may have imagined it but I think he leaned into me a little bit. (My memories aren’t what they used to be.) I remember he smelled like clean air. Like nothing of the earth had ever laid a hoof on those ink-black wings. He smelled like winter snow, and summer breezes, and all those times the air moved without any visible source and brought a freshness with it.

After a time, I released Night Wind and backed away to stand next to my grandmare. With little fanfare, and a noise that sounded suspiciously like derision, Night Wind spread his gigantic wings and launched himself into the sky.

I watched him disappear over the treetops and slowly became aware of my grandmare grinning at me. “Like him?”

I nodded mutely.

“We’ll see him next year.” she said as she raised her head to follow the dwindling black speck.

And, as with many things, grandma was right. Night Wind visited us the next year. And the next. And the next. Then one year...he didn’t appear.

I was crushed. I’d come to expect that quiet moment of peace filled with shiny blackness. That moment when I felt...connected.

And now it was gone.

In one moment my world was amiss. Like having the proverbial rug pulled out from under you or missing that last step on the stairs before you hit the floor unexpectedly.

I miss him still.

But life, as it does, moves on. Eventually my parents reconciled and we moved back to the city to live in an apartment in one of the internal neighborhoods that my parents deemed suitable for the entire family.

I was in preschool at the time and I remember not doing well. I wanted to do nothing but play and I couldn’t understand why nobody else wanted to do so as well.

After several notes from my teachers about my activities, my mother scheduled an appointment for us to visit a special doctor. I didn’t know at the time but it was a developmental specialist.

I remember entering the office and a nurse taking me aside and having me try different things. I distinctly remember the old-style “square peg, round hole” test. I happily was playing as I attempted to force a block where it wouldn’t fit in the frame.

After a time, my mother entered the room and we both sat down next to the doctor I’d seen her go off with when we came in. I’ll never forget his first words:

“Your colt is not a genius.” he said after he had reviewed the paperwork the nurse had written up.

“Well...okay...” my mother replied. “What are his prospects?”

“He will be good for nothing more than pushing a broom.” the doctor continued.

I can’t remember all of what happened next. She had such a mixed look on her face during the walk home. Looking back, it was a mixture alternating between both sadness and anger.

After that things changed a little. My mother read to me a lot and had me do a lot of little things that felt a lot like school. Eventually I moved from kindergarten to the formal Celestial school across the street.

I remember the teachers of the Celestial Sisterhood being extremely strict. More than once I got my hooves smacked with a ruler for not paying attention. I did horrible in classes and was behind all the time. In time I made friends that lasted with me the entire time we lived in the city. Mostly other ponies who had similar problems with school that I did.

In case you’ve never been to a big city like Coltcago, the buildings aren’t usually built with peaked roofs like in smaller towns and villages. They are flat with gutters on the sides that collect the water and guide it into the storm sewers.

My friends and I regularly would use a nearby mulberry tree to make our way onto a ladder that led to one of the roofs. And since all the roofs were close together...well you get the idea.

I remember one time we were on a roof that overlooked a street with shops and people walking back and forth on it. We were hanging our heads over the sides of a low block wall on the front of the building. The space behind the wall was littered with the leftovers of some long-gone gang of construction ponies. A brick here, an iron spike there, that sort of thing.

I picked up and iron spike to look at it.

“Drop it over the side!” one of my friends said. (In retrospect Tank wasn’t the brightest of ponies. His ego far outweighed the thin and wiry stature of his frame.) “Drop it! I dare you!”

“Umm...” I was undecided. I mean I knew enough that I could hurt somepony. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“C’mon! I double dare you!” Tank exclaimed, jumping up and down now. “Take a chance Chance!”

Okay, yeah, my parents named me Chance. It was the most popular pony name for years until recently. I’ve never been comfortable with the name really...where was I.

Tank was still waiting on my answer, hopping from one set of hooves to the other. “C’monnnnn!” he whined.

I don’t know what happened next really. I think Tank sat the steel bar on top of the edge of the building and when I turned I knocked it off. Or I might have purposefully knocked it off. To this day I’m not sure. Regardless it fell to the ground on the sidewalk with a loud clang! The ponies on the sidewalk looked up at us and one of them started yelling. “You could have hurt somepony badly!” the stallion said angrily. “You all just wait there while I call the guards!” he continued.

We of course weren’t going to wait for that to happen. We turned and galloped across multiple rooftops until we were far away.

I can laugh about the experience now but in hindsight it was the first time I really realized that my actions had serious consequences for others. It was the first time I realized that something I did could seriously hurt someone.

That didn’t sit too heavy on my mind though at that age of course. I was too focused on having fun and trying to understand the ponies and world around me.

About the middle of my third year at school we moved out to a suburb named Nailtown. It was kind of a mixed blessing because my sister and I got our own rooms finally but it meant I lost all my friends and had to make new ones.

I don’t make friends easily, nor let them go...

On top of all this my parents continued to fight a considerable amount. It wasn’t like an argument each night, maybe every other night. Still bad but not bad enough to be unlivable. (Though more than once I thought about running away.)

I did even more poorly in school than I’d done before. Each time I failed my mother told me it was okay but my father got angry. If you’ve ever heard the expression ‘Child of the crop’ you know how he reacted often. I learned really quickly not to make him angry.

There’s so much that happened when we lived here it’s hard to fit it all into a framework. This is true of my life all over. It’s all so...disjointed. Like everything is happening at once and I have to take myself and puff myself up to not be affected by it all. Kind of like how you have to turn up the light to burn away the fog. It gets more difficult to brighten that light as I get older.

The friends I made were good ones for the most part. A few were fair-weather but not the core group.

During school I was put into extra classes to deal with a lisp I’d developed but for the most part I did just as badly as I had done previously in school. I tried, I really did, but no matter what I couldn’t grasp the things I needed.

To top it all off, I had developed a hairless patch on the top of my head. The bullies started calling me “Hole In One”.

During one of the teasing sessions I just stood there unable to rebut any of their insults. Suddenly a filly about my age came up and shooed them all away.

“Don’t worry!” she said after they left. “I am missing hair too!” She pulled a knit cap off her head to reveal large empty spots as if she’d been shaved wrong. “Call me Patch.” she said cheerily.

I don’t know what it was about her but I immediately trusted her. Despite the insults and innuendo she and I started hanging out. One day I heard she was sick so I went to her house with some cookies for a gift.

She was in her bedroom. As I entered I was so surprised at how white it was. Like everything had been bleached and the only color left was the bright lack of it.

She explained that she was very sick but that I shouldn’t worry. We played games and talked and just existed as if the world outside was so much empty. In time she was tired so I went home.

Over the course of the next few months we met in that room and one day she explained to me that she might have to go away. It was a tough concept for me. But I think I understood because I was in love with her. Truly in love. I don’t think I’ve ever felt the same way with anyone else in Equestria.

Then one day I showed up at the house and stood there on the wide flagstone. Her parents were stacking moving boxes on the front porch. The conversation still sits with me.

“Is Patch here?” I asked.

“No she’s not Chance.” her mother replied.

My mouth was not sure what to say next. I looked at the boxes. “...did she die?” I asked quietly. “Because she told me once that she might.”

Both of them suddenly had tears welling up in their eyes and for several long moments they didn’t speak. Grandma taught me to be patient sometimes so I said nothing.

Finally, Patch’s father spoke, “We are moving to Prance so she can get better treatment.”.

To this day I’m not sure if those words were lies or the truth. They felt false.

“Tell her I miss her.” I told them, my eyes welling up. “Tell her I love her.”

It was at that point her parents broke down and openly cried. I couldn’t confront this so I ran. I galloped most of the way home and sat in my room and cried.

This memory has stayed with me for all my life. And to this day I still think about her from time to time. I don’t even recall her real name, her cutie mark, or much else about her. The truly sad part is I never knew what happened to her. I never took the time to go find out and I don’t think I’ll ever do so. I think...I think I still love her. Insane and foolish of me, I know. But there it is.

Without Patch around the bullying intensified. I endured it because there was really nothing else I could do. I cried so much that it only increased the insults with “Crybaby!” and other similar things. I found some relief by hiding away.

The house that my parents purchased had a crawl space underneath it. It was to all appearances a basement that had been made of poured concrete but then filled back in with very tiny gravel. A grown pony couldn’t stand up in it. I couldn’t even fully stand up in it, but it was secluded, had plenty of room, and above all it was quiet.

It was perfect.

I can’t tell you how many times I hid down there. The opening in the floor was in my room so I could hide down there whenever I wanted.

So many times I hid down there with a bean bag and a lantern and read fantasy books. It was my escape, my release. It allowed me to recover from being forced to be around all the other ponies that insisted that I was the ‘weird’ one. It was blissfully silent of noise It was the one place I was able to just lose myself in my thoughts or a book.

I read so many stories back then. Stories of rockets! Stories of knights! Stories of magick! And not the everyday kind of magick that unicorns use but the spectacular kind that moved mountains and brought the stars to my hooves.

In time I mentally and emotionally balanced a little bit and was able to spend more time outside of the “pit” as my family called it. (My sister hid down there with me as well from time to time but she was more an extrovert than I will ever be so it wasn’t often.)

Then something happened. The school I was attending got in a system of automated spell clusters of the same type my father worked on.

My father had already introduced me to them by taking me to his workshop once or twice. I was always mesmerized by how the spells he crafted created things that worked, things that moved, things that produced one number from the ones given it. I hated math but I loved this!

This was actually my second introduction to these clusters. When we were still living in Coltcago, after my parents got back together, my father brought one of the sub-clusters home to do some work on it. It wasn’t much, all bland and frankly a little ugly. But he taught me how to do some things with it. And I enjoyed every bit of it. It made sense. It was organized. It wasn’t like all the strange and fluctuating things I had to deal with where ponies were concerned. But he had to give it back when we moved out of the city. I didn’t see another cluster until I entered the middle grades.

I was hooked to say the least. Every spare moment I spent involved with those systems. The teachers tried to use it to motivate me at my other classes but often I ignored them until I couldn’t. I worked at bringing up my grades because I finally had something that I could wholly understand! I couldn’t let them take that away from me.

So I worked harder. I brought my grades up. I didn’t make any more friends than I already had, but I suddenly fit into the structure around me. People knew where I stood finally. They understood. They still teased me and insulted me and excluded me. But they accepted me.

And of course it had to all fall through. My parents decided to move from Nailville to another suburb further out called Lattice Lake.

When I found out we were moving I begged and pleaded that we find some solution so could at least finish out my 3rd year at the upper grades. I tried and tried to find a solution but time and time again the answer came up with a harsh bleakness. “I’m sorry but you can’t finish school if you don’t live in the area.”

I was crushed. I would be starting all over again. I would be losing all my friends again. And that’s exactly what happened.

It was pure hell of a different order...