It was a cold and snowy day in Ponyville. Winter's thick blanket of snow covered everything, rendering the bright and colorful town into an icy white. Large snowbanks lined every walkway and thoroughfare, created either by hoof powered snowplows or single ponies with shovels, and both parties were also sprinkling salt to keep the ice at bay.

Despite all the hardships that that time of year brought with it, the townsfolk still maintained their cheerful expressions as they milled about the town square, visiting outdoor stalls and the stores that ringed the area. Every storefront had a Hearth's Warming theme ranging from simple candlelit dioramas of the three tribes in their window exhibits, to elaborate light designs with giant candy canes and miniature pine trees surrounding the entrances.

Winter's touch had also graced the grounds of the School of Friendship – or as the locals had started calling it – the S.O.F. Academy. The giant pond that served as part of the main entrance was frozen over, with gouges crisscrossing the area designated for students to try their hoof, talon, or claw at ice skating. Even the waterfalls had iced over, but in such a way that the water flowing behind was still visible.

Inside the building, behind the frosted glass windows, all the students were attending their last class of the day. Most would be happy to just be on their last hour, eager to be done so they could hang out with friends after hours, hit up the town, or to just take a needed nap. But today everyone was in a jovial uproar, for today was one of the days that everyone that went to school pined for.

Winter Break.

In the typing class, the clatter of typebars striking parchment was almost drowned out by the loudly chatting teens going on about how they would spend their two weeks of freedom. Most would be doing the usual of going home to their families and doing whatever they wanted to do for a change. They could play out in the snow until their limbs were numb, and then warm themselves up by the fire with a hot chocolate or apple cider, then stay up late watching movies or playing games. Some were even lucky enough to be heading someplace tropical.

Typing away at a much higher rate than his peers, Gallus hammered away at the keys, intending to take his speed record even further up the chart. With a soft chime, he reached up and smacked the carriage back to the right and continued without pause.

“You know,” the griffon said loudly over the din of the other machines. “This is the only boring class that I don't mind. But, I don't see why Twilight won't upgrade it to a computer class.” he didn't even bother to hide his annoyed tone. “Just think about it, why do we use these dusty old things when we could just type it into our systems at twice the speed. And if we mess up, it's an easy fix.”

Ocellus took a break from typing on her hoof model typewriter – the same as all the other hooved students – and leaned towards her griffon friend while rubbing her fetlock. “Well, this school did just open up not too long ago, so I guess they didn't have the funding. But I can't help but feel that Twilight and Applejack aren't big fans of computers. I heard them say things like remember those Flim Flam Brothers and their crazy computerized apple harvesting machine they sold to Granny. It didn't end well. Or I don't like the idea of machines doing all the work in learning. Don't get me wrong or anything, I love them, but there is a fine line between us and magic, and those rules should apply to machines as well.”

The changeling opened up her machine, pulling out her finished paper and replacing it with a fresh sheet from the box her and Gallus were sharing. As she fed the new one in and adjusted the alignment, she continued the discussion. “I believe Rarity was the one who suggested a class, along with Rainbow Dash.”

The disembodied head of Smolder popped up over the divider that separated the typing stations on their desk, an incredulous look on her face. “Really?! Professor Dash wanted a computer class?!”

“Yes,” Ocellus answered. “It had something to do with The Wonderbolts.”

Just then, Silverstream lifted off from her seat and began to do lazy circles just above their heads. “Ya, I saw it on the news a while back,” she informed them. “The Wonderbolts were installing computer mainframes at all their bases around Equestria for testing and training purposes.”

“You know,” Gallus started. “That makes perfect sense if you think about it. The Wonderbolts want to be the best, and if computers couldn't help them train to better, they wouldn't even bother with them. And Dash wants us to be the best that we can be too, right?”

“Yeah, but starting a computer class seems pretty eggheaded to me.”

The griffon felt a pang of disdain at that, which he let known. “Rainbow dash is not an egghead, Smolder. And neither is her computer class.”

The dragoness held her hands up in surrender. “Easy there, birdie. It's just a joke, nothing serious.” She felt like saying more, but a talon near her face stopped that.

“Sorry, can't talk now! My fav song is on the air!” With that, Gallus pulled his left headphone back over his ear and resumed his typing while bobbing his head to the beat.

Believing that he couldn't possibly hear over the music and the generally loud atmosphere, Smolder smirked and leaned towards Ocellus. “But isn't it eggheaded to learn how to program in BASIC and C?”

The little changeling tittered as the griffon suddenly stood up and brought his talons down onto the table. “Yeah! Well I...! Y-you...!”

Gallus so wanted to make a great comeback, but his beak just wouldn't cooperate. Rather than risk losing anymore face by trying to stutter out something witty, he conceded defeat and sunk back down into the seat with crossed arms and a derisive snort. “Whatever.”

Yona had been silent for the most part, focusing all her will unto the machine before her. Her hooves came down slowly and methodically onto each key, but each time she so much as thought about picking up the pace, the whole desk would shake like an earthquake. Luckily, her slow and steady pace had paid off, because she had just a few more pages to go before the session ended. Still, she couldn't help herself.

“Smolder one, Gallus zero, and Yona always number one.”

The rest burst into laughter as the griffon flushed red in embarrassment. Smolder laughed the hardest – of course – and was also the last to simmer down into chuckles. “Oh wow,” she chuckled. “It's a good thing for you that Sandbar took a sick day to go wait in line at the game shop. He woulda had a field day here. Oh well...”

Smolder dropped down out of view behind the divider and fell back into her desk chair. The others soon joined her, eager to blow away the last few minutes of the day by finishing their assignments so they wouldn't have any distractions over the break.

Five minutes later, and the sounds of typing had faded to just a few machines still going. Everyone else had finished their work and were waiting anxiously with their bags for the bell to ring. Ocellus was the first to straighten out her stack of notes and staple them together, with Gallus coming in an uncharacteristic second. Ember and Silverstream tied for third, and Yona was the last to finish up. Then the bell rang and everyone made their way to the door in an excited mob, tossing their work onto the teachers desk as they passed.

Once out in the hall, the five made their way to the dorms with the griffon jogging ahead of his companions. “Well girls, I gotta go get my bits and my winter hoodie. We'll all meet back in the courtyard, yeah?”

“Yep,” Silverstream chirped. She then had to shout because the griffon had turned down an adjoining hallway. “Don't take too long now!”

“I won't!” came the muffled reply from around the corner.

As soon as Gallus was sure that the hallway he had taken was truly deserted, he maxed out the volume on his player and began to walk in step with the beat. He had also started humming the tune, but as the second chorus began to sing so did he. “It feels so good on the dance floor, clap your hands! Move in time, clap your hands! Something new! A fire's burning in my heart, want to be with you. Feeling something new-”

Just as he was really getting into the groove, a large mass moving at a decent speed slammed into his back and sent him down to the floor. With a drawn out huff, Gallus got onto his knees and rubbed the back of his head while looking around to find the headphones that had flown off. He found them – or rather heard them – still playing behind him, but when he looked over his shoulder and saw just who had knocked him over they became the least of his worries.

“Ah damn!”

He quickly got back on his paws and ran over to Headmare Twilight, who was also trying to scramble to her feet with limited results. “Are you okay Miss Twilight?! Here, let me help you.”

With their combined efforts, Twilight was on her hooves and she hastily picked up her dropped belongings with magic. “Yeah, I'm fine. No, late! I gotta get to the station or I'll miss my train to Canterlot!”

She looked at her watch. “Oh no! I won't make it in time by just flying!”

As Twilight's horn powered up, Gallus reached for his tape player but spotted a silver plastic card under it that wasn't his. He snapped it up and made to give it to the headmare, but she disappeared in a blinding flash that left him reeling. After a second of shaking the stars out of his eyes, he grimaced through his rapidly building migraine. “Every time. Why does she have to teleport every fucking time.”

Knowing that it was pointless to try to give the card up to nothing but empty air, he held it up to his eyes to see what it actually was. And it didn't take a genius to figure out what the string of numbers on the front of it meant.

“It's her credit card. Ooh, it’s a platinum!”

The good in Gallus demanded that he take a few seconds out of his day to swing by Starlight's office and pass the problem off to her, but the griffon in him wanted to hold onto the card for use later – which made perfect sense seeing as Starlight was most likely out of her office at that point anyway. With a wicked grin, he pulled out his wallet and slid the platinum in next to his red debit card. “I believe I'll be holding onto you until after winter break.”

With the little distraction out of the way, he swiped the dirt off of his headphones and got them back onto his ears – ready to continue his dance to the dorm rooms.

The dorms given out to the students certainly weren't the biggest in the world, but they were a good fit for most – including him. They were each furnished with a decent sized bed, a small writing desk next to the window, and an attached bathroom with a shower. It was the students choice of how their dorms were to be decorated, and Gallus had set his up just like his room back home. Various posters of popular bands, musicians, and video games lined the walls, some new and others faded from time. The oldest ones were hand-me-downs from Gilda, and the others were collected personally from magazines and the like.

The chaotic mess that was his bed and floor were of no concern as he navigated his way into the room. He unshouldered his heavy duffel bag and dropped it unceremoniously onto the messy bed, and then set about undressing. His clothing for the day came off, first the blue hoodie, then the matching pants – which were kicked off into the pile of dirty laundry in the corner. Down to nothing but his black boxers, the griffon sauntered over to the desk that held his pride and joy.

Two monstrous rectangular boxes of a beige coloration with black inlays in the front of each were positioned as far to the right edge of the desk as possible. The bottom box had a row of toggle switches running across its face and Graphic Max 8000 was emblazoned in the lower right corner.

To the left of the stack was something that resembled the screen of an arcade machine, but instead of being in a console with a sole joystick and a few large buttons to keep it company, this was located in an enclosure made of beige plastic with an attached keyboard comprised of well over fifty individual black keycaps with gray keycaps for the ones with important functions.

With a muted thunk, Gallus flipped the main power switch and the machine whirred to life with a positive beep. He then powered on the monitor which crackled into action with the added displeasure of causing the fur on his wrist to stand on end, but the benefits far outweighed that. After a few more seconds to warm up the monitor, he reached back to the box and flipped several more of the switches, a staccato clicking adding to the already impressive sound. With all the necessary stitches flipped and their accompanying diodes lit up red, a few strings of text appeared on the screen.

Searching for boot record from floppy... done.

Starting SK-DOS 7.1

HIMEM is testing extended memory... done.

Knowing that he was now in business, Gallus pulled the chair out and sat down before the screen. With practiced ease, he rested his talons on the keyboard and quickly inputted a series of commands that would bring him closer to the goal. The final command he typed was DOORS, and a strike of the enter key brought the computer to a black screen. It hung for a few seconds, then the screen flashed to an image of a door with inlays of red, blue, yellow, and green opening outward.

The screen went to a background showcasing a pixelated aquarium, and a small, spinning hourglass made its home directly in the center. Once that went away, he grasped the mouse in his talons and dragged the cursor over to the stack of icons and selected the one at the bottom that was a giant letter E titled Equestria Online. It opened up to display a prompt for a username and password which Gallus entered in.

As the computer processed, he took the opportunity to get out of his seat and head over to the closet that contained all his clean clothes. He pulled out a black sweater, long cargo pants, a pair of tube socks, clawless gloves, and a hooded black jacket. With his selection completed, he placed the pile of clothes onto the bed and grabbed the pants. As he slid them up his legs, he heard the computer tell him something he had heard countless times before.

“Welcome! You've got mail!”

With pants zipped up and socks on his paws, he got back in the seat and navigated to the inbox. Once, in, he filtered through the newly accumulated mail for anything important. “Junk, junk, junk, and more junk. No, I don't want to make my cock bigger with pills. Ah! Telegram from Griffonstone.”

His smile grew more and more as he read through it.

Dear Gallus,

Hope you've been eating well and are having fun at school. We do miss you here in Griffonstone, but we know that school has been doing great things for you. Since your grades have been so good as of late, we have decided to give you a small bonus to your allowance, for the holidays. We also got you a present that you'll absolutely love, and it should hopefully get to your box in a day or two. We all hope you like it.

P.S. Remember to brush your teeth!

He grumbled slightly at that last bit. Once a week was more than enough for anybody, or it was in his mind at least. He was more concerned with the mystery gift – not so much the gift itself – but the delivery. Gabby was a great carrier, but her efficiency was mostly rendered useless by the poorly maintained system that employed her. Gallus knew that griffon post was iffy at best within the country, and him being overseas would add a whole new level to that problem. It’ll come when it comes, I guess. May as well just focus on what’s now.

He went the final few emails looking for anything else of importance, but with them being nothing but useless ads, he powered down the system and finished dressing. He then reached under the bed and pulled out a pair of black leather pawboots and slipped his paws into them. His talons made quick work of the laces, and he was set. With bag back in hand, he walked out of his dorm and locked the door behind himself.

Meanwhile, out in the snowy courtyard, the rest of the gang had picked the area with the least amount of wind possible to await their friend. The cold air temperature wasn't so bad for equines – provided they had dressed accordingly – but the windchill was enough to send anybody packing. Well, most anybody.

Yona giggled heartily as she swept her arms and legs through the fluffy snow, glad to once again be in her element. “Yes! Yak loves winter!”

While the yak was more than fine laying in the snow in nothing but her dress, the others had at least dressed the part, with Silverstream wearing a puffy down purple jacket with long black pants and black calf-length boots.

Ocellus was the most heavily clothed, with a huge light blue hooded parka that hung down to her knees keeping out the cold, with a pair of matching insulative ski pants and boots. But even with the hood of the covering her face with only her eyes and nose exposed, she still shivered strongly. “It's s-so cold,” she complained, her voice muffled by the pink fringe around the hood. “H-how do you handle it, Yona?”

The yak snorted. “Thick yak fur keeps Yona warm in harshest of winds – just like back home. Yaks are best at everything!” With that, Yona got out of her imprint and proceeded to dive headfirst into a nearby snowbank and throw snow all over the place.

“What about you, Silver?”

Silverstream held out her tongue, catching a falling snowflake on the tip. She brought it back in, noted that tasted of snowberries, and turned to Ocellus. “I'm kinda used to it. Seawater can get pretty chilly, especially when you go deep. Still wondering why you get so cold, though.”

“I believe it’s because us changelings live in a relatively warm location. I mean, It still does get cold at night in the badlands, but the hive is geothermally heated.” Another bout of shivering wracked her body. “I-I wish I had a hot water bag.”

The crunching of snow drew their attention to Smolder who was jogging toward them, clad in her winter gear of a blaze orange hoodie, blue sweatpants and a pair of purple snow boots. “Sorry that took so long,” the dragon said once she was close enough to not have to yell. “I just could not find my other boot.”

She then looked at the nearby snowbank – and the yak that was rolling around in it – and put her claws on her hips. “What did I miss? Apart from Yona being Yona.”

Silverstream smiled. “We were just talking about how Yona can handle winter with barely anything on while Ocellus freezes no matter how much she bundles up.”

“Well then, we should get this over with soon, and that means waiting on... nevermind then.”

The three watched as Gallus flew out the entrance and came in for a decent landing by them. “So guys, ready to go buy Spell Questing Online?”

“You know it!” the three shouted as the started running in the direction of town.

Gallus then looked over towards Yona, who was still in the snowbank. “Come on, let's get going.”

Yona didn't respond, to engrossed in her play to notice anything else. Knowing that words alone couldn't dissuade a yak once they set their minds to something, the griffon scooped up a clawful of snow and packed it down into a small ball. This should end the fun... for a second at least.

The tossed snowball hit its mark, and it did have the intended effect of getting Yona's attention. Unfortunately, it had struck her right in the face, and an evil smile grew on her features as she swiped it away. Gallus laughed initially, but that turned into him backing away slowly as he saw the snowball that she was rapidly creating. Beads of sweat started to form on his brow when he saw that the finished product was bigger than his head, and that even Yona seemed to be struggling to lift it.

Once she had hefted her snowboulder above her right shoulder, she chuckled. “Nobody snowballs Yona and gets away with it!” she yelled in glee as she hurled the ball directly at his face.

The ball of white filled Gallus's vision, and it was only thanks to natural feline reflexes that he was able to duck down in time for it to fly overhead with a loud whoosh. He spun in place and tracked the snowboulder as it rocketed off in an arcing trajectory towards town. His senses piqued once again, and he took to his wings to avoid another projectile that flew harmlessly under.

He hovered above the courtyard and looked down at Yona who was furiously throwing snowballs, which were easily dodged.

“Get down here you crazy bird!”

The griffon laughed. “Not likely! Besides, this will get you to the store faster! Woah!”

As he hovered backwards while beckoning the yak towards him with his talons, Gallus's thoughts turned to the fact that he would have to land eventually, and he would really be in for it then.

In the ponyville market, a green pony with a gray vest and knitted cap was carrying several grocery bags worth of green cabbage; large carrots, glass jars of mayonnaise and sour cream, onions, bottles of white vinegar and dry mustard, with packets of salt and pepper. He sang a small tune as he trotted down the street. “Going to make some coleslaw, going to make some coleslaw. Gonna put it in my bell...”

He trailed off and came to a stop when he heard a peculiar sound coming from the sky. He looked up and squinted, trying to spot whatever it was against the gray clouds. The last thing he saw before everything went black was a mass of snow exploding in his face, knocking him onto his back with all the various glass bottles and jars flying out of their bags and shattering into one gigantic mess atop him. After a moment of hesitation, several ponies rushed over to the incapacitated pony to render aid.

Author's Notes:

Boy, this is the most I ever write for one chapter I wanted to be good so everyone can make great fics about them and also give it up to the editor that made it better too

Also, the song Gallus was singing too its name is "It Feels Good" here's the video to that song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFKidUHOx6k