Princess and School of Friendship Headmare Twilight Sparkle felt a mix of stirring emotions within herself as she glanced down at her attendance book. It was mostly filled with green check marks, with a few red X's peppered over the page as students called in sick or had other matters to attend to. But what made her heartache were the three outliers on the page; Ocellus had missed almost every other day in the past two weeks, but seemed to be improving over the last three days; Sandbar had seventeen red X marks in a row as he approached his third week without setting foot in the school; and lastly, what was the epicenter of everycreature's hurting, Gallus; a long red line traveled across his entire row on both pages that were open, signifying that the griffon had dropped out. Within two days, he had his few belongings packed up, and he boarded the next train west out of Ponyville.

There was a gentle knock on the door of Twilight's office, pulling her out of her thoughts. She looked up from the attendance book to the doors.

"Come in." She replied somberly. The handle turned, the door slowly swung open, and her sister-in-law Princess Cadance poked her head in.

"Hey, Twilight. How are you holding up?" The Princess of Love asked, stepping into the office and softly closing the door.

Twilight let out a quiet sigh, looking down at the attendance record again.

"Admittedly, a little better now that you're here. Thank you so much for making the time, Cadance." Twilight answered as her sister-in-law took a seat on the other side of the desk.

"It's going to be far from pleasant, but seeing how I sort of had a hoof in getting them together, I feel some sort of responsibility. What happened?" Cadance asked, her voice full of concern.

"It's all happened so fast, I'm not even sure what the catalyst was. The first hint that I got was when Lieutenant Colonel Berrytwist had the semi-annual physical evaluations for Ponyville's E.U.P. The attending physician believed Gallus had clinical depression. Just when Fizzlepop recommended treatment... He quit. The Ponyville E.U.P. has largely remained a volunteer outfit, so it wasn't exactly complicated, but, still... It's been years since I've seen her that angry. She's since told me that she won't allow him to return to the guard if he ever decides to come back."

Fizzlepop's exact words had been far less cordial. And louder.

'If that's the bed the featherbrain wants to make, then he can fucking sleep in it!'

The Lieutenant Colonel's anger was understandable; she had invested considerable effort into building Gallus into a capable soldier with aspirations to go to the Canterlot E.U.P. She had recently returned from a one-week trip to Griffonstone, so that she could learn how to better hone Gallus' strengths and abilities.

"How's Sandbar?" Cadance asked softly.

Twilight swallowed, and gently tapped at the beginning of the row of continuous red X's on the attendance record.

"He hasn't been in school since Gallus took off. His parents have assured me he's eating, but beyond that... I don't know. He hasn't wanted to see anyone, and I've decided to respect that, for now, but it's gotten to the point where I wanted to call in an expert." Twilight told her, motioning across the desk to Cadance.

"Love is, tragically, a double-edged sword, Twilight. Falling in love is one of the most wonderful feelings one can ever experience... And falling out of love, especially unwillingly, is one of the most painful experiences in a pony's life."

"From what little I've heard, Gallus gave him next to no explanation... Just that he had been unhappy for some time. Didn't even say goodbye. Sandbar just returned to his bedroom, where the two of them had been living for the past year, and all of his belongings were gone. The rest of his close friends have taken this pretty hard, Ocellus especially. The three of them were, well, polyamorous."

Cadance nodded in understanding.

"It's a completely legitimate relationship choice, Twilight. But of course everycreature involved has to be careful, and communication has to be open and honest. Because when it's not..." Her sister-in-law trailed off.

"Like when somecreature pretends that everything is fine when under the surface things aren't?" Twilight finished, her soft tone inflected with disdain. She saw Cadance raise an eyebrow.

"Sorry, Cadance. Honesty. It's one of this school's core tenets. If something was wrong, he should have told us. His teachers. His doctor. His significant others. And because he didn't, there are quite a lot of creatures close to him that are confused and hurting right now." The headmare said.

"I'm not judging, Twilight, and I do appreciate the insight. It'll help things going forward. Gallus has clearly made a conscious choice, and because of that, I think the best choice of ours right now is to not worry about him. Like you said, there are other creatures right here that are hurting because of his choices. They should be our priority. Sandbar and Ocellus."

Twilight nodded in agreement.

"Ocellus has been staying at the dormitory, and she's made a concentrated effort to keep attending classes, and she's been trying her best, but there have been days where she can't. I've spoken with Thorax, and he's told me that bursts of incoming negative emotions can make a changeling physically ill. When you combine that with her own emotions that she must be dealing with right now... I'm amazed she's doing any better than Sandbar right now. Thorax has told me to send for him immediately if she feels she needs to talk, or return home."

"So, Sandbar then?" Cadance asked. Twilight nodded.

"I think he needs the most guidance right now. If we can get him back to school, great. I don't want to hope for too much, but if we can get him and Ocellus to talk things through together, I think that would the best we can hope for. But we really should take things one step at a time."

Cadance agreed.

"I'll go and talk with his parents, and see if I can speak with him."

Author's Note

Finally got the first part of this written up this evening after having it on my mind forseveral days. Just as a warning for readers going forward:

If you're hoping to hold out for Gallus' point of view, I'll just say it there won't be one. I am using a lot of very recent IRL experiences to write this (and so far it's been cathartic as f), and that is a point of view I cannot even fathom, let alone put into sensible words. This story is about the creatures that those decisions left behind.

As always, thank you for reading.