How My Daughter Saved Equestria

We took Diamond inside the sprawling building, and quickly found that the only thing we could find was the principal’s office. The headmaster, Chancellor Neighsay himself, smiled at Twilight and grasped her in an embrace. I smiled, happy to see that the old EEA administrator had seemingly let the past go and had wrapped himself around the finger of friendship and care. He was no longer the bigoted pony he once was, for I noticed that there was a rather large foreign exchange program there. “We invite students of all species to come here and learn,” he explained, “after Princess Twilight taught me to value every life, pony or not, I completely changed my ways.”

“That’s wonderful to hear, Principal Neighsay,” Twilight said.

“I am sorry I locked up your school back in Ponyville all those years ago,” he admitted sheepishly.

My bride smiled. “That has long since been forgiven. Now, where can we find Ms. Cheerilee’s room?”

“Ah, Cheerilee. A fine teacher, and an excellent…er…pony.”

We both noticed the blush that tugged at his cheeks, and shared a knowing smile. It seemed our old Chancellor turned Principal had something of a budding love for the dark pink teacher. I didn’t blame him for it. Cheerilee was a very pretty pony, who had a kind heart and a wonderful personality. Of course, I was biased towards Twilight, but even I had the common sense to realize just how many ponies our teacher friend had touched.

Diamond looked at him inquisitively. “Principal Neighsay?”

“Yes, my dear?”

“Why are your cheeks red?”

“OKAY!” Twilight said as a blush appeared on her face, “time for us to be going! Now, where did you say the room was?”

“Down the hall, third door on the right,” Neighsay said, pointing away with his hoof.

We thanked him and went on down the corridor, passing mountains of lockers on both sides. It reminded me of the days when I was in high school, and the locker doors would creak open and clang shut. The students were obviously bigger fans of the latter, because that meant that the day was done and they could finally return home and slack off on their homework. I’ll admit, I was one of these avid procrastinators. I felt like I had many more important things to accomplish, such as reaching the next level on some first-person shooter.

When we reached the room, we found Cheerilee outside greeting her new students. Every one of the foals had a different reaction to meeting her. Some had known her for a while, because they had attended preschool and their own forms of kindergarten there. Others, like Diamond, were brand new to the school and were shivering with fright. One by one, Cheerilee would bend down and allow the student to give her a hug in an attempt to comfort them and assure them that everything would be fine.

When she saw us, she bowed in deep respect. “Your Majesties, welcome to my humble classroom.”

We bowed in return, but then Twilight threw her hooves around Cheerilee and the two old friends laughed. “It’s so great to see you, Cheerilee! It’s been much too long!”

“Indeed it has, Princess,” Cheerilee responded.

“We were so thrilled to hear that you moved here last year. Now we know Diamond will have a wonderful education!”

“Well, I’ll certainly do my best,” she said before looking at me, “and you’re Prince Stony Tail, AKA Jeff in the human world. I don’t believe we’ve officially met.”

I smiled at her. “No, I don’t believe so. But it’s wonderful to finally be able to meet another one of my wife’s friends from Ponyville.”

I noticed right away just why many of Cheerilee’s former students referred to her as “The Foal’s Friend.” Her warm smile and bright spirit lit up the hallway, and I was immediately comfortable leaving Diamond Sparkle in her care. I never told Twilight, but I had my own fits of nervousness regarding our daughter’s first experience in school, and I had silently pleaded with some unknown force to make her teacher somepony excellent. It seemed we had found that excellence, and I silently berated myself for not trusting Twilight more. After all, she had made a choice with our daughter’s best interests in mind.

Cheerilee lit up when she saw Diamond. “Oh, my goodness! This must be Princess Diamond! Hello, there!”

Diamond peeked out from behind Twilight’s front leg and slowly crept up to Cheerilee. She was having the same shivers as some of the others, so Cheerilee bent down. “Why don’t you give me a hug? That way we can start off on the right hoof.”

“A hug?” Diamond asked.

When Cheerilee nodded and smiled, our little grey filly stepped a little closer and tentatively put a hoof around her teacher’s neck. She seemed to become more comfortable with the idea and quickly wrapped the other hoof around Cheerilee. She pressed into her, almost like she did with Twilight or I whenever she was scared. When she broke off and backed away into our shadows, she offered a small smile. “I…like you…Ms. Cheerilee.”

“Aw…I like you too, Princess. Now, why don’t you come on in to the room and get your things settled?”
Diamond’s small smile didn’t grow, but it remained and she nervously followed Cheerilee into the room. We did as well, and found that the room had been decorated flawlessly. Ponies in the first grade would have found it to be paradise. There were myriads of animal related educational posters on the walls, and a large picture of Ponyville dominated the sheetrock next to the window. Cheerilee’s desk had pictures of all of her old friends on it, and one of the biggest chalkboards we’d ever seen loomed large behind her as she took her seat.

“Alright, my little ponies!” She said in the customary greeting that many teachers gave foals, “time to begin! But first, I’ve asked Prince Stony Tail and Princess Twilight to share a few words.”

The students all gasped and their eyes grew wide. For a lot of them, this must have been their first time seeing royalty up close and I could tell that they felt extremely excited. It was even a surprise to our own Diamond, who perked up and smiled when she heard our names called.

“Thank you, Ms. Cheerilee,” Twilight began, “and hello fillies and colts! This little surprise was arranged a few days ago, when Cheerilee sent a message to the castle asking us to come and speak with you. As many of you know, I was once a student in this very school.” The concept that Twilight was once their size and their age seemed to blow their minds, and they all began whispering about it. “Please,” Cheerilee said, “let the princess finish.”

“Thank you,” Twilight said again, “anyway, this school was very good to me. It taught me the values of hard work and being a good student. But there was one thing it didn’t teach me: the magic of friendship. I had to learn that on my own when I was older. It was my own fault, as I was obsessed with books and knowledge, but I don’t want you to trip over the same hurdles. Fall in love with knowledge, yes, but also fall in love with friendship.”

“My dear Twilight is right,” I said when she finished, “when I first fell into Equestria from the human world, I didn’t have any friends. Now, thanks to Twilight’s stern, yet gentle lectures and teachings, I have lots of them. Please, don’t let the opportunity to make a new friend slip through your hooves. There are lots of other foals in this school, just begging to be met. Study hard, work hard, and try hard to make friends. Even if you have just one, it’s much better than being by yourself. You’ll find that life throws a lot of bad stuff in your path, but having a good friend there to help you through it makes it worthwhile.”

I turned and noticed Twilight’s eyes glistening with tears. She bent over and nuzzled me a bit, silently confirming everything I had just said. I gladly returned the nuzzle and kissed her softly on the cheek. Some of the fillies in the class were taken with our soft romance, while some of the colts made faces at it. Then there was the big colt in the back. “Twilight and Stony, sittin’ in a tree-“

“HARD HEAD!” Cheerilee suddenly roared, “that’s enough, young colt! Get up here and apologize to Their Majesties right now! Move!”

I jumped a bit. I had no idea Cheerilee could get that angry. She had seemed like such a sweet pony when we met her only a few moments before. “Twily?” I whispered as the colt began trundling his way towards the front.

“Yeah?”

“I didn’t know Cheerilee could roar like that.”

“She’s a kind soul and a wonderful teacher, but there are some lines that shouldn’t be crossed.”

We each gave the young one a stern look as he stopped and sat at our hooves. “I’m sorry, Your Highnesses,” he said with a completely unsubtle sarcasm, “I don’t know what came over me.”

Twilight bent down and stared into his eyes. “Listen, young colt. We came here to say a few words about friendship, but you seem to be missing the point. I believe you’d rather bully and tease the other foals and ponies than try and make friends.”

“Friendship is stupid,” Hard Head said with contempt, “I’d much rather play with my Action Pony figures!”

Twilight’s look softened, and I could tell she had him cornered even though he didn’t realize it. “But wouldn’t you like somepony else to do that with?”

Hard Head’s look went from angry and contemptuous to shocked and scared in an instant. It was almost like Twilight had dug into his mind with a hoof and flipped some switch that needed to be turned on. The lights of care seemingly began burning in his mind for the first time ever, and he looked back up at my bride. “Well…er…I guess…”

“Of course you would!” Twilight said with kindness, “and I bet you that there’s somepony out there who’d love to extend the hoof of friendship to you.”

Hard Head turned around and looked, silently begging his classmates to help him. But nopony raised their hoof in eagerness. In fact, they all began turning away or shuffling in their seats. It became very apparent that Hard Head had done a lot more to hurt than help, and the students were repaying him in kind. I could almost hear Twilight’s heart breaking. She loved friendship just as much as myself and Equestria, and when ponies turned away from each other, it tore her very soul open.

Then, suddenly, a grey hoof shot up and we both looked to the source. We beamed with pride when we saw that it was Diamond. She silently got up from her seat and trotted to the front of the room. “It’s all okay,” she told the young colt, whose head and tail drooped, “I’ll be your friend.”

“You…will? Even after I made fun of your Mommy and Daddy?”

“Of course! Mommy says that friendships must look past the kind of inconsiderate taunting you committed.”

“Huh?” The colt asked. It was obvious that his vocabulary wasn’t quite on Diamond’s level.

“That means friends have to stick together through anything, and I promise I’ll stick by you.”

I swear, Hard Head was nearly in tears. He grasped our daughter in a hug, much to the other foals’ collective surprise. We both realized that the poor colt must never have felt what it was like to have a true friend, and it was touching to see our daughter pass on what we had tried so diligently to teach her.

“I think she’s ready for this,” Twilight whispered in my ear.

“Indeed, she is, darling. Indeed, she is.”