The Tempest tales

“Knock knock… knock knock…. princess?" the waitress knocked on Fizzlepop's door.
"Knock knock .... princess? Time to wake up, you have to go to school today. "
Fizzlepop suddenly opened her eyes, looked at the watch and saw that it marked 7 in the morning.
"Damn, I fell asleep late yesterday."
"Yes, I'm awake, I'll be there soon." Fizzlepop replied as she got out of bed and stretched quickly.
"Certainly princess, I'm going to get the wagon prepared." the waitress answered.
Fizzlepop went to the bathroom and did the usual routine: contact lenses, teeth, mane.
She was about to leave the room when she stopped.
"Maybe it's better that I put something on, I don't want it to happen like in the library."
She turned and went to the wardrobe, initially she had decided on a cloak but it was too obvious, she could use a suit, but it would have been ridiculous to go to school, she looked around for a few seconds until she found what she needed.
She had a gray sweatshirt between her hooves large enough to make it difficult to see whether or not she had wings, it had a hood that could have hide the horn, was long enough to cover her front legs to the knee, yet left the rest of her body uncovered starting from the hips, so the hips without cutie marks would remain visible, but she was used to it, and the scars on the leg that had grabbed the ursa.
"Better than nothing."
Fizzlepop took her backpack and put them on her back and then left her room to go to the dining room.

When she arrived her parents were already seated and were drinking tea, on her plates there were slices of bread and strawberry jam.
"Good morning Fizzlepop." said her father.
"Good morning dad, good morning mom" she greeted both parents and sat down after putting down the bag.
"You're going back to school today, aren't you happy?" her mother asked.
Fizzlepop wasn't in the mood to see her classmates again, she would have preferred to live the summer holidays forever, she had gotten used to being completely alone.
"Yeah" she said, lying like the night before.
"Why do you use the sweater?" she asked again.
"I was cold" she tried to come up with an excuse, her father obviously had not fallen for it.
Brisk put the cup down and looked into her eyes.
"Fizzlepop, you put on it to cover your wounds right?" he said softly so as not to be heard by the waiters.
Fizzlepop looked down and nodded.
"I understand, just try to bear if something happen like two days ago."
"Yes Dad, I'll do my best," Fizzlepop replied, she actually didn't know if she could do as she said, she still didn't feel strong enough, and she feared she never would be.

Fizzlepop ate quickly then she prepared to leave, she put the hood on her head and the saddlebags on her back.
When she went out the front door she saw that in front of her there was the royal carriage that she used to go to school, attached to it were two stallions.
Fizzlepop had always been against using that carriage, she would have preferred a simpler one so as not to attract attention.
She sighed and climbed aboard.
"Good morning, you can leave." she said to the two ponies in front of the wagon.
"Good morning height, let's leave immediately." answered the stallion on the right.
As they said they started walking, then they went to a trot and then to a gallop.
Although they moved at high speed, the carriage trembled little, thanks to the special suspensions she had designed a few years earlier, the idea was to use oil-infused suspensions with magic that allowed them to automatically adjust and make them more or less elastic depending on the terrain they were on.
She remembered how proud her father was of her when she presented him the idea.
In fact, Fizzlepop had created many useful inventions that combined technology and magic: lenses that did not fog up, shoes for walking on clouds temporarily, clothes with a built-in deodorant function, automatic lamps and other things that were now used throughout the world.
These memories of it gave her a bitter taste in her mouth.

"We have arrived princess."
Fizzlepop was awakened by her thoughts, she turned her gaze to the right and saw that she was in front of the school.
"Here I am finally." She took a deep breath, "Brace yourself Fizzlepop, you can do it."
Fizzlepop put together all the determination she had and got off the wagon.
"Thanks, you can go back to the palace." she thanked the guards who had brought her.
She began to walk towards the entrance of the school, in front of her there was the gate to the courtyard and above it was written "High school for future leaders".

Reference image for "School for Future Leaders", imagine the name written above the gate.
The images serve only as a reference point for the current scene, adapt them to the story.

When she went through the gate she noticed that there were no other ponies outside the school. "Great, I was late on the first day."
Fizzlepop walked quickly to the school and then walked to her class, when she was in front of the door she paused for a moment.
All the determination had disappeared as she was walking, now she was afraid, afraid of inquiring looks, afraid of whispers, and afraid of facing her "friends".
"Come on! I can't escape right now! "
Fizzlepop slowly lowered the handle and pushed the door, the whole class was in front of her, the teacher was sitting at the desk while she was making roll call, the pupils all sitting at the desks chatting to each other, in the back there they were Glitter Drops and Spring Rain; the only free counter was the one in the corner near the two of them.

"Hello, sorry for the delay." Fizzlepop said shyly, she hoped no one would notice her but in vain.
All the ponies fell silent and looked at her, Fizzlepop was frozen in place in silence.
"Good morning princess, we haven't seen you for a long time, you can go sit down." the professor said flatly.
Fizzlepop moved to the vacant desk, she had her head slightly lowered and kept her gaze below the line of the eyes, she could already hear the inquiring glances and whispers of the students.
"I thought she was dead."
"Why did they promote it?"
“Did you see the scars on the leg? Who knows what he's hiding under the sweatshirt. "
Fizzlepop could already feel the pain creep into her soul.
"Hold on."
When she got to her desk she took the bags off her back and put them on the hook, then she quickly sat down, pulled out the book and kept her head down.

Half an hour had passed since the lesson began, the teacher was explaining on the blackboard the equations of tangents to a curve, although it was a very difficult topic, Fizzlepop was not paying attention, it was something she had already studied on her own.
However, the other pupils were also not very interested, their attention was on something else: the return of the princess.
From that fateful night no one saw her until today, according to many she was dead but it had not been officially said, according to others she had been injured so badly as to make her a vegetable.
Some had tried to ask Smooky Jaster but he lied saying that he had saved the life of the princess and killed the Ursa, obviously no one believed it.
They tried to ask Ebony Rose but she knew next to nothing as she ran away first for help.
Glitter Drops and Spring Rain didn't answer any questions and were reluctant to talk about it.
The only ones who knew what had happened and the current situation of the princesses had been sworn to say absolutely nothing, the penalty would have been the accusation of treason.
Seeing her this morning after a long time had come as a surprise to many, especially because she wore a sweatshirt when it was still hot outside, and because of her visible scars.
The pupils had far-fetched many theories, some of which were close to the truth, while others were far-fetched, like someone saying the princess was a cyborg, or that she was a ghost or a zombie.

“Driiiinggg” the bell rang, marking the end of the lesson.
All the pupils got up and began to leave the class, at the next hour they had a chemistry laboratory.
Fizzlepop, Glitter and Spring came out last.
As Fizzlepop passed near the other two she thought she saw Glitter open her mouth but then she closed it immediately and looked down.
Through the corridors you could see the scarred alicorn walking through the crowd, every now and then someone stopped to look at her, others accelerated their pace or tried to pass her as far as possible, behind her were the two green and blue unicorns talking among them in a low voice.

When she got to the laboratory he saw that almost everyone was wearing a lab coat.
"Damn, I can't put the smock over the sweatshirt." Fizzlepop did not want to reveal what was under the hood, so she did the only thing that came to her mind: she went to one of the less visible positions and hoped that the professor would not notice.
Unfortunately, in the post in front of her they were Spring and Glitter, they could practically look into her eyes, however no one looked up at her.

Counter model of the chemistry laboratory, on one side there is Fizzlepop while on the other Spring and Glitter.
The images serve only as a reference point to imagine the current scene, adapt them to the story.

During the lesson you could only hear the professor's voice, he was very stern and did not want to hear enyone when he spoke.
"You can start." he said after explaining the procedure for the laboratory experience.
Immediately the pupils moved and began to take test tubes and flasks as they talked.
Fizzlepop, had remained silent, both because she had no group mates, and because she was concentrating on the experiment, chemistry was a subject she liked very much.
"Fizzlepop?"
She was being careful not to spill too much.
"Fizzlepop?"
She was just missing a drop.
"Fizzlepop?" said Spring Rain out loud.
Fizzlepop accidentally squeezed the pipette she had in her mouth and sprayed all the contents into the beaker: the experiment was ruined.
"What do you want?!" she screamed aloud as she raised her head, sparks came out of her horn but could not be seen under the hood, it seemed that there was a light that illuminated her face in a mournful way and made the scar on her eye stand out, she had learned to endure frequent headaches.
"Sorry we bothered you, we just wanted to ask you to pass that flask behind you."
Spring and Glitter had their ears down and looked scared.
Fizzlepop looked behind her and saw the flask on the counter, then turned around again.
"Take it by yourself." she spat harshly as she lowered her head again and started the experiment all over again.

"Driiiinggg" the bell rang and as before the pupils cleared the laboratory quickly, even Glitter Drops and Spring Rain went out with the others.
The next hour went in a similar way to the first, Fizzlepop had sat on the sidelines with her head down, the chatter of the students had faded and they paid more attention.

The hour was over and the politics teacher had finished giving homework..
Fizzlepop took from her backpack a bag with dried banana flakes inside, they were her favorite snack.
"Fizzlepop?" called Glitter Drops.
"What do you want?" she replied coldly.
"Spring Rain and I wanted to talk to you, in private."
Fizzlepop saw that there were still some ponies in the classroom, she left the classroom without even checking that they were following her, she went to the back of the school where there was usually no one.
When they arrived Fizzlepop sat down and began to eat dried bananas, Glitter and Spring looked at each other until the green unicorn decided to start the discussion.
"We wanted to know how you are." she asked softly.
"Well, certainly not thanks to you." she replied contemptuously as she chewed and looked away.
"Listen, Spring Rain and I wanted to apologize for what happened that night, we were scared and didn't know what to do." Fizzlepop stopped chewing and turned her head towards them, she had a look of anger.
"You weren't afraid, you were selfish, you abandoned me, you turned your back on me!" she yelled in their face as her horn began to sizzle, "I would never do that to you, that's not how friends behave."
"Sorry Fizzlepop, but really what could we have done ?!" Spring said, raising her voice.
“I don't care what you could have done, but what you didn't do! I've always trusted you, I've always thought you loved me, but apparently I was a fool to think so. You are like everyone else, you only approached to have the favor of the royal family. " she explained as her heart began to beat madly.
"It is not true! We are your friends, we didn't do it on purpose. " she tried to say.
"Hahahaha" Fizzlepop laughed coldly "yet you didn't even look back when I called you, you ignored my screams to the last, all to save your skin." she blamed the two.
Spring Rain took a step forward, of the three she had always been the most irascible.
“What should we have done? Should we have been killed with you ?! Did you want us to shield you? We are not your personal guards! " she answered her in the same tone.
Fizzlepop felt the murderous instinct rising from the depths; she raised her head and straightened her body, at this moment she was towering over both of them, her gaze expressed fury, from under the hood you could see bright flashes.
“Do you know what happened? What did that Ursa do to me while you ran away? " Spring looked at her hind legs.
“They are just a couple of scars! I don't understand why you get so angry. "
"I'll show you!" Fizzlepop said, looked into her eyes and lowered the hood revealing the broken horn and the scar on her eye.
"Oh my, this is awful!" Glitter Drops said without thinking, Fizzlepop glared at her and stepped back with her ears down.
"I didn't know, I'm sorry." Spring Rain tried to justify herself.
"Your apologies are of no use to me, they won't give me back my horn and wings, so you can go fuck yourself." she turned to leave.
"Hey, why are you talking to us like this, we're trying to apologize, you're the selfish one!" yelled Spring Rain, Fizzlepop didn't listen to her and went back to class.
For the rest of the day they didn't talk or look.

"Driiinggg" the bell that marked the end of the last lesson had rang.
The other ponies were eager to get home and therefore hurried out of the school.
Fizzlepop went out last, when she crossed the entrance gates for the second time that day, the same carriage was waiting for her.
She climbed aboard and the stallions began to move quickly.
When she finally got home she quickly got out of the wagon and went inside, as it was half past one she went to the dining room.

She was surprised when she opened the door, her parents were still sitting at the table.
"Hi mom, dad, why did you wait for me?" she asked as she sat down.
"We wanted to know how your return to school went."said her mother.
Fizzlepop didn't answer immediately, even she didn't know what to say.
"It went pretty well." she tried to lie.
Brisk had understood by now when her daughter lied, she had a tendency to move her left ear.
"Are you sure?" he asked her again giving her a dirty look.
Fizzlepop sighed.
"No, it didn't go well, I was late, everyone was looking at me and talking behind my back." she said quickly after looking down at her plate, today there was rice with artichokes and asparagus.
"But I did as you told me, I tried to ignore them, even if it still hurt." she added.
"You did well, Fizzy, you will see that over time they will stop." her mother reassured her.
"There is something else though." Brisk said.
"Well, I also talked to Spring Rain and Glitter Drops, or rather, I had a fight."
"It must have been hard to meet them again, especially after that night." Cherry said.
“Yeah, I don't think I want to go to school anymore, I don't enjoy anymore, I feel oppressed and always out of place, I wish I could just study on my own. I am already ahead with my studies so it would be enough for me to take the final exams. " Fizzlepop suggested.

Brisk and Cherry looked at each other disconsolately.
"I understand your reasons, but as we have already told you it would be a shame, since that school has existed all the nobles and royals have studied there, and then maybe it's a bit early to decide, it's only the first day." her father told her.
“Why can't I be like you and mom? You've studied in the library and yet you are king and queen, ”Fizzlepop pouted.
"Fizzlepop, it's been centuries since your mother and I were your age, times have changed and so have laws and traditions, the Iponia elite expects wealthy ponies to rule them, it would be strange for them that the future queen did not go to school for future leaders. " explained her father.
"It's such a stupid thing, I'm way ahead of my teammates, I've always worked hard, but now it's all gone along with my horn and wings." Fizzlepop paused. "When I am queen the first thing I will do is cancel these useless rules." she finished saying.

For the rest of the meal they said nothing more.
"I think I'll go take a nap and then stay in the library," Fizzlepop announced after a yawn.
"Of course, sleep well." his mother said warmly.
Fizzlepop went to her room, took off her contact lenses and crawled under the covers; in a few minutes she fell asleep.