Twilight's School of Friendship was an oddity among the other schools of Equestria.

Forgoing the usual strict curriculum laid out by an outdated ruleset that only accommodated equines, Twilight and the other element bearers chose to pursue a more organic style of teaching involving each one’s particular element and personal knowledge. The regular style of classroom had been reworked to not only give students more flexibility and freedom in their studies, but also to accommodate almost every sentient creature from all the surrounding kingdoms and more.

With these changes in place, not only were the students achieving higher test scores overall, but the attendance rate had increased almost threefold compared to the average. But as with all schools, there are some things that never change. For starters, the school still required a standard curriculum to run alongside the new one, and no matter how engaging they made the standard subjects, the pure boredom of being stuck in a classroom still applied.

In the furthest back row of desks, a group of six particular students of multiple races were doing everything in their power to stave off the dull monotony of the current lesson without getting into trouble. At the desk closest to the windows, a blue griffon decked out in blue sweatpants and a matching hoodie was alternating between staring at his watch and staring out into the courtyard. He would occasionally finger at the headphones draped around his neck.

The next desk over had a green pony resting his head on his hoof while staring absentmindedly at the blackboard as their teacher scribbled out diagrams with little bits of text dotting around them. He had black shorts and a sea green shirt with a graphic of sea turtles on the front.

The orange dragoness next to him wearing a purple shirt and black pants rested her head on the desk, counting each individual speck of dust on its cool surface. Directly in front of her was a hippogriff diligently taking notes for the rest of her friends to “study” later. Her attire consisted of a white shirt with a skirt and a seashell necklace.

Second to last was a changeling of a light blue coloration with red wings and translucent pink mane. She wore a light blue t-shirt and pants, and was trying to keep pace with her own note taking whille shaking of fits of drowsiness.

In the back corner of the room, a little bit removed from all the students so as to make room for a much bigger desk, a yak was drooling a river as she daydreamed about which food she would devour at lunch. She had on the traditional Yakyakistani quilted green dress.

The griffon by the window groaned and leaned over to his pony neighbor. “How much longer, man? If I get any bored-er I'm gonna lose my head.” He sighed and then added, “This sucks total ass... no offense.”

The donkey directly ahead of him shrugged while turning the page of his comics that were hidden inside a larger textbook. “None taken.”

“About ten more minutes, dude," the pony told the griffon.

Gallus rubbed his knuckles into his dry eyes, desperately trying to get some moisture back into them. "This sucks so much, Sandbar. I would be able to pass the time easier if I could listen to my jams, but teach can spot my headphones from across the room. His eyes are that good, and that's coming from a griffon!” He accentuated the point by pressing a finger into his temple.

The sound of a pony loudly clearing his throat at the front of the classroom caused Gallus to wince and drop his head down into his forelimbs. Knowing that the teacher was watching and listening, the griffon and his pals were forced to wait silently for the hands on the clock to line up vertically. Eventually, after what felt like an hour of impatient finger tapping, the noon bell rang out and the class eagerly gathered up their books and writing utensils and quickly shuffled out the doorway. They were all dimly aware of their teacher yelling after them about which section they were supposed to study, but that mostly fell on deaf ears.

“I gotta take care of something, I'll meet you guys at the cafeteria! See ya!”

Before anyone could question where she was going, Silverstream had taken to the skies and disappeared down the hall.

The then five friends collectively shrugged and followed the crowd of assorted creatures to the cafeteria, Gallus put his headphones on over his ears and plugged the latest and greatest mixtape into his cassette player. The music was his stress reliever, but he also wanted to hear what his friends had to say – so he set the volume to a quarter turn. Noting a distinct lack of conversation filtering through, he decided to break the ice.

“So... where exactly did Silverstream fly off to? There's pizza on the menu today, she loved that when she first tried it. She wouldn't miss pizza day for the world.”

Sandbar shrugged. “Dunno, but the others might. He glanced over his shoulder. “You girls know anything?”

Yona was the first to respond. "Yak heard her say something about the bookstore, right Ocellus?" she asked as her belly rumbled loudly.

The changeling piped up. "Yes. She was getting a new issue of that magazine, Pixels and Hardware. Isn't that right Smolder?"

"Ya, and it's Software and Hardware, not Pixels and Hardware," Smolder corrected them all as they entered the line that snaked its way out of the cafeteria doors. "Me and her have been reading that magazine for a while now, we got a subscription to it because it gives out free video games every month.”

"Yak never understands,” Yona said as she grabbed a lunch tray out of the stack. Why pay for a cheap magazine when you could just read it at the store and be on your way!”

Yona continued on down the line, piling her tray high with several slices of pizza, a few hayburgers, a huge salad, a mixture of canned sodas and juice boxes, and a bag of chips. Due to their larger size and higher metabolic needs, yak students needed triple the calories of a pony their age, so they were allowed much larger servings. The only other students who had truly specialized diets were the dragons, who required a small helping of assorted gemstones with their meals, in this case, they were baked into the toppings of the pizza.

The rest of the group was next, with Gallus grabbing a single slice, Sandbar opting for a veggie burger, and Ocellus got herself a salad, and they all got a drink of their choosing. At the end of the line, Smolder was handed her gem encrusted pizza slice by the lunchmare herself. With their selections in hand, the group crossed the room, managing to snag an unoccupied window table before they were all taken. After quickly deciding on who got to sit by the window, they all got situated to enjoy their one hour lunch break.

The tops of cans were popped and juices were poked as they engaged in their usual discussion of the morning's events – and future plans if it was a friday. After that died down, the conversation shifted to the one topic that almost constantly circulated around the table; their love for video games.

They were one of the very few things that they all had in common outside of school, with one game in particular their mainstay.

Spell Questing was the top-selling, story-driven open world game at the moment, with players and critics alike raving over not only the story and gameplay, but also all the hidden Bunny Day Eggs hidden around the gigantic world. For the next fifteen minutes or so, they talked about the latest quests they had taken and debated over which character attributes were best, with Ocellus going into great detail as to why the mage was the best class.

Far removed from their discussion, a random green pony grinned as he walked past the other entrance of the cafeteria with a tray that contained a cardboard box full of coleslaw, can of soda, and bag of chips. He made ready to pass through the door and be on his way, until...

WHOM!

The door was slammed open as a flying blur blasted through the opening without a care in the world, leaving the door to slowly close itself. The pony that had been struck found himself almost plastered onto the wall with a look of shock and horror on his face. As he slid down the wall and some nearby students snickered, only one thought was on his mind, which he voiced between gasps of pain.

"Oh no... My... Coleslaw."

“GUYS!”

The five immediately dropped their intense debate and looked out across the cafeteria, already knowing who they were looking at just by the screeching voice alone.

Silverstream hovered above them all with a huge smile on her face, a thick magazine clenched tightly in her claws.

“You're never going to believe what's going to happen this Hearth's Warming holiday break!!!”

In her excitement, Silverstream shot up to the ceiling and began doing loops. The little gang looked to one another to see who would be the volunteer to calm the hippogriff this time. Gallus hoped that Smolder or Ocellus would do the honor, but the double stare from the two forced him to sigh in defeat.

“...Fine.”

The griffon set down his half-finished drink and took off to catch his friend. She was all over the place and took Gallus several attempts before he could gently grab Silverstream and bring her back down to the table. Gallus settled back into his seat easily enough, but the excitable hippogriff was still breathing rapidly.

“Woah there, Silver!” Gallus exclaimed. “Take a deep breath, take it in slowly, dude.”

Once his friend's breathing had slowed to something close to normal, the griffon tried to get some information.

“Now, can you tell us what has gotten you so worked up?” he asked while brought his headphones back up.

“I... I need a drink.”

“Here,” Yona slid a soda across to Silverstream, and followed that up with a plate of pizza. “Yak brought extra, just for you.”

Silverstream took a huge bite of her pizza, savoring the delicious cheese before swallowing and opened up her cold soda. As she used her right hand to chug down the sweet nectar, her left was quickly flipping through the pages of her magazine. Once near the middle, she stopped flipping, slammed her empty can onto the table with a gasp, and pushed the magazine into the center for all to see. “Take a look at that!”

The group all stood up in their seats and leaned in to see what the fuss was about. As Gallus, Sandbar, Yona, and Smolder took in the pages in open-mouthed silence, Ocellus decided to read the text out loud.

“The makers of the tabletop RPG Ogres & Oubliettes, and the smash hit video game series Spell Questing, have made their first foray into the world of online gaming with Spell Questing Online: Battle of the Shadows!”

Gallus was the first to regain their speech. “Holy shit, dudes!” he exclaimed. “Look at the pics on this game, it looks so awesome!”

With a delicate teal hoof, Ocellus pulled the magazine towards herself and scowered the fine print.

“Is it... oh please let... Yes! It's multi-platform!" she cheered, knowing that she would still be able to play with the group on her system.

The changeling hoofed the magazine over to Yona, who slowly picked it up.

"Wow, I get to destroy anyone that gets in the way of the yaks and yaks will be the most powerful faction in the world!" The yak finished her statement by shoving her mouth directly into her salad bowl and loudly consuming the contents.

As the rest of the group talked more on the game, Sandbar munched on the crust of his pizza, deep in thought. Hearth's Warming was in a few days, and that meant winter break. In any other situation, the pony would have eagerly awaited such a time, but with the release of the next game in his all time favorite series coinciding, he was torn. His friends would most likely be going back to their own homes for the break, and that meant no gaming with the gang until after break, which just wouldn't do!

Then the plan came to him. It was a long shot, but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? “Hey guys, I’ve been thinking. Remember last hearth’s warming when we all got stuck here?”

Smolder huffed. “How could anyone forget that Your point being…?”

“Well, since it worked out in the end so well, maybe-”

“We could do it again!”

Silverstream’s loud screech caused the other five to cover their ears, both because of the volume, and what was suggested.

“You mean, not go back to our homes… again?” Ocellus asked timidly?

Smolder wasn’t nearly as shy with her response. “You seriously want to go through that a second time?!”

Sandbar looked around for any kind of support, hoping to at least find some with Gallus, which didn’t happen.

“Hey now, don’t look at me like that. I have a legal guardian now, which means I can’t just hang out here all the time anymore.”

Without anybody to vouch for him, the pony did his best to state his case. “I mean, this game is online, right? But all our homes are so far from each other that it’ll be almost impossible to play with the lag. Plus there is a computer store right in town, so we can all pick up our copies on launch day!”

“Well, we do have have internet back at Mount Aris – ridiculously slow internet – so that’s not really an issue. But I would have to mail order the game, which could take weeks! I’m in!”

Gallus drummed his claws on the table. “Internet is flaky at best in Griffonstone, and I know the place I live at doesn’t have connectivity. We don’t have a dedicated computer store so… I’m in. Depending on my guardian, of course.”

“Yak doesn’t want to miss another Snilldar Fest, but yak also wants to join friends on the fields of battle! Let’s do this guys!” she smiled, all done with her meal now, as was everybody else.

“What about you, Ocellus? Are you in?”

“I-I would have to contact my broodmates first and make sure I’m not needed for anything. If I can’t stay fully, I should at least be able to stay long enough to get my preordered copy.”

"Well if that the case guys, we better call our parents or whatever and tell them that we are doing this," Gallus said to them all as he got up and finished off his soda. "How long until our next class, and also, what is it?" He looked to Ocellus.

"About fifteen minutes, and its math class, ugh..." she groaned alongside her friends as they all got up and headed for the exit.

Meanwhile, outside one of the doors of the cafeteria, the green pony from earlier was leaning up against the wall and eating what remained of his coleslaw right out of the box. He was just going in for another bite when the door flew open once again smacked him in the face. The gang of six either walked or flew out the exit, completely oblivious to him, and his coleslaw covered face.

Author's Notes:

I see gallus owning a cassette player if the show was more on what their life was like then building up a great story. I love it that way still.

but in the show, I can't help but see them in a world with mix tech like the Regular Show