Gilda leaned against the wall next to her school desk. Her family had just moved to Cloudsdale, so having only recently transferred in she knew no one, and nobody talked to her. As a griffon, she was too proud to approach others, so she spent her breaks alone, other pegasi chatting around her. But that was fine. Cloudsdale was a place that valued personal prowess and flight skills like no other in Equestria. Once the ponies had seen just how good a flyer Gilda was, they'd beg to be her friend.
The first flight training hadn't gone as well as Gilda had expected. She had still placed in the middle field, hitting most of her marks, but the young griffon was used to being amongst the top. She didn't quite know why, but suspected it might have something to do with the far greater altitude of Cloudsdale compared to the griffon city she came from. Breathing felt different here, too.
Once she figured out why exactly moving had made her a worse flyer and fixed it, she'd show all those ponies and they would finally treat her with the respect she deserved.
For now Gilda just leaned against the wall and watched. There were the aces. The ones who scored highest in the flight training, standing together. They were close, looking down on all those who didn't manage to be amongst the best, but also guarded against each other. The number one spot was a prized one, and rivalry was fierce. This was were Gilda belonged, where she should be. Well, she had only arrived very recently: she'd have to show the ponies that a griffon deserved every ounce of respect they demanded.
Then there were several groups of the middle field. Each of them clustered together, trying to appear in conversation with each other, trying not to look like they were watching the aces for how they should behave. For now Gilda was stuck with that middle field, but very soon she would ascend to stand amongst the aces, to be one of those who determined the tune rather than danced to it. But of course that was what everyone in the middle field dreamed of.
And then there were the losers. Laughing loud and smiling big, wanting to draw attention away from the fact they couldn't even get a middling score in flight tests. They would never make it to the aces, and most of them had already given up hope, no longer fighting. With a bit of effort, Gilda might be able to feel pity for them.
There was one pony who sat alone. Blue coat, garishly colourful mane and tail. Rainbow Dash. Gilda didn't quite know what to make of her. She had met the pony before, years ago in flight camp, but when she saw her again this morning in school the blue pegasus looked away and acted as if she didn't know her. Gilda wanted to know what was up, but took the hint and had decided to figure it out later.
Dash had placed pretty well in the flight test – not amongst the aces, but top of the middle field – but noone around seemed to want to talk with her. Maybe Dash was involved in a feud with someone powerful, and the other ponies didn't want to get associated with her for that reason. Slighting a powerful griffon could lead to grudges that often lasted a lifetime. Maybe Dash wanted to protect Gilda from being attacked by association … but Dash had stood up for Gilda at flight camp, and the young griffon was quite willing to return the favour.
The door to the classroom slammed against the wall, startling Gilda from her thoughts, and her homeroom teacher Steel Greyfeather strode into the room.
“Class has started, get to your seats everyone!” Mr. Greyfeather announced, angry annoyance tingeing his tone.
The students moved to their desks with deliberate slowness.
Nobody respected Mr. Greyfeather. After all he was just homeroom teacher. Everyone knew that all the good teachers were flight teachers. What else really mattered? What was the point of getting an A in Equestrian History if you couldn't crank out at least a 9 on the anenometer?
Mr. Greyfeather knew this as well. He probably had never placed higher than middle field in any flight test. His years were passing by, and slowly age was creeping up on him. His chance for greatness was long gone.
When the students had finally reached their desks, Mr. Greyfeather began with the class proper: “As you all know we have our flight show coming up in two weeks. To make sure that everything goes well I want to allocate tasks for the show today already. That gives you fourteen days to make sure everything is done. I will be checking on your progress in a week.”
A couple of muted groans of annoyance were ignored by their teacher.
The ageing pegasus consulted the list he had before him, then asked: “Ok, anypony willing to organize the buffet for the flight show next Saturday?”
Seeing nobody raise their arm, Gilda chose to extend her claw. If she did well on this, she'd earn the others' respect and be assigned more prestigious tasks.
“Nopony?” Mr. Greyfeather asked again.
Gilda slightly waved her claw from left to right.
The teacher took off his glasses and let out a heavy sigh. “Look. I know nopony wants to take care of this, but it needs to get done, so somepony better raise their hoof because everypony is going to stay here until anypony shows up who is willing to organize the buffet.”
Oh.
Gilda slowly lowered her claw.
Briefly glancing back at her, the solitaire blue-coated pony raised her hoof.
Mr. Greyfeather's eyebrow shot up: “Rainbow Dash? Fine, you take care of it. Then, about the decorations …”
“No, Mr. Greyfeather. Gilda …” Rainbow Dash started, but was interrupted by her teacher.
“I don't want to discuss this any more, Dash. We have enough to cover as is. So who is willing to …”
Once more, the rainbow-haired pegasus tried to speak: “But Gilda …”
Mr. Greyfeather's hooves slammed down onto the desk, startling all students. “Damnit, Dash! Don't interrupt me! If I say be quiet then you better be quiet – we've heard enough from you as it is. Now don't you say another word or you'll spend the rest of class outside!”
The blue-coated pony looked from her teacher to Gilda, then back at her teacher again who was glaring at her with fire in his eyes. A few tears were running from her eyes and her bottom lip was quivering. She drew a trembling breath which almost sounded like a hiccup, swallowed, then spoke again: “Gilda …”
“OUT! NOW!” The grey-coated pegasus screamed. “If you keep disobeying me, I'll have you expelled! And you better believe that I'll do it, too.”
Rainbow Dash held the teacher's stare for several seconds, then rushed out of the room crying.
“So, about the decorations. Who'll take care of …”
Gilda got up. She might be incurring Mr. Greyfeather's wrath, but if she didn't support Rainbow Dash now, no-one would ever respect her. A griffon who didn't stand by its flight mates flew forever alone.
As Gilda silently walked out of the room, the teacher shot her a brief glance, but beyond that did not acknowledge her existence at all.
Closing the door behind her, she found Rainbow Dash fluttering in the air next to the classroom cloud. This was part of the punishment of being sent from class: there was deliberately no place to stand on the classroom cloud, so you had to fly for as long as the class took. With an inward sigh Gilda fluttered next to the pegasus, her wing muscles already aching from exertion because of the training she had this morning.
“Hey.” Gilda offered half-heartedly.
“Hey.” The response was equally enthusiastic.
After a few seconds of uncomfortable silence, Rainbow Dash stated: “You know … this actually is just muscle training for flying. I should get kicked out of class more often. It's not like you learn anything useful in there anyways.”
Gilda let out a humourless laugh: “If that isn't the truth.”
“And next time,” the pegasus continued, “we'll just fly them all to the ground during flight training. They'll just have to stare at the speed trails we leave behind.”
While that pretty certainly wasn't going to happen, the griffon girl appreciated the energy and aggressiveness of her newly regained wing mate: “I like the idea.”
With a couple more jokes and some boasting Rainbow Dash managed to break the ice, and before long Gilda was having more fun out here than she had anticipated having all day. Time flew by, and Gilda was surprised when the door was thrown open and Mr. Greyfeather fluttered out. The older man took off without so much as a glance or a word towards his students. A bit behind him other pupils started to mill out of the classroom.
“Hey everyone, look! Boom-Boom has found a friend!” one of the aces commented sneeringly.
All the other pegasi within earshot started to laugh as loud as they could, and Rainbow Dash looked like she would start to cry again.
“Boom-Boom?” Gilda asked carefully, wondering just what the hell she had gotten herself into.
Dash snivelled briefly, then looked at Gilda with defiance in her eyes: “A few years ago I managed to create a sonic rainboom during a race. The shockwave travelled up to Canterlot. Course they came to figure out who did it, and I told them, but they didn't believe me. They told me to do it again … but I couldn't. I don't know why, but I've actually been a worse flyer ever since I created the rainboom. So now they mock me and call me a liar, even though it was really all true!”
“I believe you.” Gilda replied. She absolutely did not believe her. But she was already an outcast for being a griffon and now marked as 'the boom-boom friend'. No clique would accept her while the aces pushed her down, and Gilda sure has hell was not going to suck up to people who slighted her just for the faint hope of being allowed a place at the end of the table.
“I knew you were a good friend!” Rainbow Dash beamed with joy.
Gilda didn't know how to respond to that.
“Oh, I also have another good friend that I need to introduce you to!”, the pegasus continued eagerly. “She's really nice, and great at making tea.”
'A loser.' Gilda translated in her head. She'd do her very utmost to not be seen with that other friend of Dash's: her social status was ruined enough as it was.
“Her name is Fluttershy, and the two of us will move out of Cloudsdale as soon as we can. Hey, why don't you come with us? I want to find a good place to train so I get accepted to the Wonderbolts.”
The Wonderbolts? Equestria's most elite airborne intervention unit? An impossible dream for a pegasus who couldn't even place top of her class. But Rainbow Dash's optimism was … somehow inspiring. Being next to the self-confident pegasus Gilda herself felt like if she tried hard enough, she could do anything. Folly, of course, but she felt better hanging out with Rainbow Dash than she ever had amongst her griffon kind.
“Sure. I'll move out with you. Nothing really keeping me here anyways.” That was quite the truth. The only thing here were her parents, and Gilda had never gotten along well with them to begin with. If she moved out they'd probably just be happy that the utility expenses were going down.
So why not? Two years from now, when she would become of age, Gilda would move out with Rainbow Dash, see what the world held in store for her. But for now she had another two years of school hell in Cloudsdale to go through.
Gilda stretched her claws, not really listening to Rainbow Dash going on about how great this was and how everything would be working out perfectly. If the ponies didn't want to play nice they would just have to learn that whoever crossed a griffon, bled.
