Get ready to hate Diamond Tiara more than you already do.

---

Chapter Seventeen – A Little Bit of Venting

"Glass, do you know why I want to speak with you?" Ms. Cheerilee asked as soon as the Crusaders had left the school.

Though the cuts on his cheek had long sinced knitted themselves closed, Glass felt them twitch in agitation to the question.

"I have a vague idea," he murmured. The magenta mare gestured to a nearby desk.

"Please, have a seat," she said. Glass complied, seeing no other option. As he did so, Cheerilee looked at him, a mixture of curiosity and concern washing over her face. "Okay, now what really happened to your face?"

Glass's cuts tingled in remembrance. "I told you," he replied. "I ran into a brick wall."

Cheerilee raised her eyebrow, not fooled at all. "That's not what it looks like."

Glass bit the inside of his cheek. "Well, that's what happened," he said firmly.

His teacher narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing Glass as he lied.

"Uh huh," she said slowly. "Well I'm afraid I don't believe you Glass. And do you know why?"

"Why?"

"Because I've never known a brick wall to cut up somepony's face like that." Cheerilee said bluntly.

A cold sweat broke out on the back of Glass's neck. He tried desperately to keep an emotionless face. Forcing a small grin he said, "They were very sharp bricks."

"Glass, why won't you tell me the truth?" Cheerilee asked, not even acknowledging his answer. "I promise you all I want to do is help."

He looked away, reserve faltering slightly. "It's not something you can help me with."

"Try me," his teacher responded warmly.

Glass gave his teacher a glance. Her eyes looked sincere and her concern genuine, but would that be enough?

"I… uh…"

The simple answer was no. No, it would not be. It didn't matter if Cheerilee wanted to help; the truth of the matter was she couldn't. Nopony could. Glass had learned that lesson the hard way.

"I'm going to go outside now," Glass said hastily. He took off like a bullet towards the front door.

"Glass?" Cheerilee exclaimed in shock. She moved to go after him, but was far too slow. Glass was outside in seconds. He hopped down the steps to the school house, and then quickly ran around the wall and ensconced himself between it and the steps. Cheerilee's hoofsteps were heard a second later.

"Glass wait," she called out. Then his teacher paused and looked around. To her, it appeared that the young white colt had vanished. "Uh… Glass?" she said, looking around. He didn't respond, and held his breath, careful to make any noise. "Where did that colt get to?" Cheerilee murmured to herself. She slowly descended the steps and walked out into the school yard.

Seeing that her back was to him, Glass took off. He darted around the schoolhouse and to the playground with silent speed. Cheerilee did even notice him.

Once he made it to the other side he leaned against the wall and took a shaky breath.

"Too close," he whispered. He inhaled and exhaled a few more times, trying to calm down. He had almost told Ms. Cheerilee everything, and that would have been a disaster.

Glass had tried twice before to get some outside help regarding his father. It never ended well. Whenever somepony might be on to the misdeeds of Onyx, the bastard would just force his whole family to uproot and find a new location. Then the abuse would continue, often worse than before. Glass couldn't do that again; he had friends now… he had Scootaloo now. He didn't want to be forced to leave them.

The young colt stayed plastered to the wall, festering with these thoughts in his mind. His resolve steeled as he did, and Glass assured himself that he wouldn't tell the truth about his father to anypony else. It was just too risky.

His anger also rose as he thought on. He was sick of living in fear of what his father would do to him or his mother. The knowledge that he was powerless to do anything about it left him with the need to vent.

"Leave me alone!" A frightened voice yelled.

Glass's eyes jolted in the direction of the cry. At the edge of the playground he spied three fillies. One purple, one gray, and one pink. His eyes narrowed as Glass saw his chance to vent his frustrations. He began running.

---

"Hey there, Dinky," Diamond Tiara said smugly. The purple unicorn filly froze with sudden fear, her bubble wand sliding out of her hoof and clattering to the ground. She didn't respond.

"Why are you out here by yourself? Oh wait, I remember now. You don't have any friends."

Dinky's lip quivered. "W-what do you want from me?"

"I just want to talk to you, assuming you're smart enough to handle a simple conversation that is," Diamond smirked. She was on a roll now.

"What do you mean?" Dinky asked.

Silver Spoon giggled. "Wow, she really is dumb."

"I mean," Diamond answered. "That you're stupid. It even says it all over your face." To clarify, Diamond crossed her eyes to imitate Dinky's disability.

The unicorn sniffled. "Why are you so mean to me?"

"I'm just telling the truth," the pink bully justified. "What's so mean about that?" Tears bloomed in Dinky's eyes.

"Oh look, Diamond, I think she's about to cry!" Silver Spoon said joyfully.

"Oh don't worry Dinky," Diamond Tiara said in a tone that was almost comforting. "It's not your fault. After all, everypony knows you inherited your stupidity from that brain-dead mother of yours."

"No…" Dinky whispered, the tears piling up behind her eyes.

"I mean," Diamond said with a chuckle. "She's so stupid, she doesn't even know who your father is."

"Shut up!" Dinky cried, her tears falling now. "Leave me alone!" The purple filly charged Diamond in a desperate and blind attempt to chase her off. Diamond scoffed at the effort, and – with the help of Silver Spoon – pushed Dinky back.

The filly stumbled before she finally landed on the dirt plot first. Dinky could do nothing at this point but cry. Tears and drivel began running down her face in copious amounts as she sobbed uncontrollably. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon laughed.

"Stop it!" Somepony said. The two bullies turned to be greeted by an angry looking Obsidian Glass.

"Uh… h-hi," Diamond stumbled out.

"What the heck is wrong with you two?" Glass shouted. "How could you stoop so low?"

"Hey, we're just having a little fun," Silver Spoon said.

"Really," Glass angrily retorted. "Is she having fun?" He indicated Dinky, still crying on the ground. Neither Diamond nor Silver Spoon gave an answer.

"You two should be ashamed of yourselves. What possible excuse are your twisted minds using to justify this?"

No response.

"Yeah that's what I thought," Glass spat out. "You two make me sick."

Diamond looked like she had been punched in the gut. "Glass I-"

"You know I thought you were just annoying," he cut her off. "You didn't seem that bad honestly. Of course I was wrong. You're just a bully, and I hate bullies."

"I… I didn't…" Diamond Tiara swallowed.

"Get out of here," Glass seethed. When neither filly moved, he shouted. "NOW!"

They bolted out of the way, running back towards the playground. Dinky was still a sniveling wreck, but the sight of seeing her tormentors flee gave her some joy.

"Are you okay?" Glass asked, offering a hoof. Dinky gratefully accepted it and Glass pulled her up.

"No," she sniffled.

"Look, I don't know what they said to you, but they're wrong," he told Dinky.

"Thanks," she said, wiping her eyes. "I just wish I knew why they always pick on me."

"It's not worth your time to find out," Glass assured her. Dinky offered a half-hearted half-smile.

She retrieved her dropped toys slowly.

"Your name's Dinky, right?" Glass asked. The filly's crossed eyes looked at Glass.

"Yeah… why?" she asked.

"Well, I was wondering if you'd like to hang out with me and my friends," he said.

Dinky opened her mouth in surprise, having never thought anypony would ask her that. She pondered the offer silently. Glass was patient with her, but wondered why she hadn't already jumped at the opportunity.

"Okay," she finally said.

Glass smiled. "Awesome. Follow me, they should be around here somewhere."

---

Hey guys, I sincerely hope you haven't forgotten about me or this story. Sorry for the four month wait, and such a short chapter in general, I owe you all an explanation for this.

In short... Shattered Glass is essentially on hiatus.

Before you gather the torches and pitchforks, let me explain. On hiatus does not mean cancelled. That's the last thing I will ever do to any of my stories. I know people really like this fic, so I'm going to do my best to pump out chapters. During this hiatus, my hope is to write several chapters at once and then release them around the same time. Hopefully waiting several months for several chapters will be better than waiting several months for one chapter. But why exactly did it take me four months during summer vacation to write one chapter? many things actually.

Shattered Glass has never been my primary concern. I'm not going to lie, I have always focused more on Frostburn, and now even that story's on hiatus. The truth is, I get lots of ideas to write about, and they tend to take hold of my inspiration until I write them. Another reason is fimfiction, the official pony fanfiction website. I'm over there now way more often and I mainly write stories for there now.

Unless you are on fimfiction as well, this may be the last you hear from me for a while. I'll still pop in every few days to read or PM people or whatevs. Thank you very much for reading my nonsense.

In Bronyhood,

Fire Gazer the Alchemist