Chapter 3

Ironheart was excited for his next class, which was band rehearsal. He knew they wouldn’t be rehearsing today, so he thought he’d take the time to power nap so he wasn’t too tired for the rest of his classes. He was afraid that there’d be lessons in all of his advanced courses and he wanted to make sure he was on task.

‘Besides,’ he thought whilst walking to the band room, ‘we’ll be doing pep band rehearsals until Hoofball Season’s over anyway; so I won’t be playing an instrument since I’ll be in the game itself. Though there is that one underclassman that just plain sucked last year...' “Ugh!”  He said with a facehoof, ‘I hope I don’t have to tutor him or anything until I’m done with Hoofball. He knows music, but he’s sooooo quiet and can’t play very well…’ he finished in his head.

Ironheart reached the band room with a few minutes to spare before the bell, so he entered the Director’s office. They’d known each other since Ironheart’s first year, which also happened to be his teacher’s first year as well. It wasn’t uncommon for Ironheart to pay him a visit often. In fact, he would have gone into his office that morning, but everything was dark and the doors were locked, leaving Ironheart to assume that he just arrived late as it was the first day.

“Hey Mr. Keystrike!” he said trotting through the door. “You weren’t in here before the day began. Hey, where are you?” he asked, not noticing that the office was empty.

He heard a faint voice reply, “Good morning, Ironheart.” The voice suddenly grew louder, “I’m in the back room!” it said.

Ironheart started towards the door in the back of the office, leading to a storage room filled with shelves of music organized into folders and envelopes as well as instrument accessories and miscellaneous items relating to band and chorus. It had that old, musty paper smell to it, so Ironheart was kind of wary to go in there as he always ended up gagging after 5 minutes inside. But Mr. Keystrike had met him halfway, and appeared right outside the doorway. The white Unicorn stepped out into the office with a stack of music levitated in front of him, obscuring his face.

“Here, let me get those,” Ironheart insisted, placing his back underneath the stack of papers. “Okay, drop them.” He said. Mr. Keystrike released the magic and the papers were balanced on Ironheart’s back as he waited for his instructor to move so he could follow.

“Where are these going?” He asked. It was obviously pep band music, as they were half the size of a normal sheet of paper, with titles such as “Give it Up” and “Crunch Time.”

“Take those straight into the band room and put them on my podium,” Mr. Keystrike ordered. So Ironheart quickly, yet cautiously made his way back to the band room and skillfully tossed the whole stack from off his back onto the podium without any papers falling off. The bell still hadn’t rung, but students were piling into the rehearsal room, so Ironheart followed suit. He first made sure both of his instrument cases were still there, and was delighted to see this trumpet and French horn cases sitting in the exact spot he left them in before vacation. He was relaxing in his seat when the bell rang; which for some odd reason forced two wires to connect in his brain and a thought occurred to him:

‘If Mr. K had me bring those papers in, then we must be rehearsing today!’

“UGHHH!” he groaned out loud, attracting the attention of everypony in the room. His eyes darted back and forth at the various faces that stared. Only a few ponies that played last year did not return, beside last year’s graduates. There were also a number of new faces he did not recognize. However, he knew the rest of his band mates from last year, and quickly tried to recall the main traits for each in his head, at the same pretending like his groan went unnoticed.

Behind him at the back of the room was the percussion section, and his best friend Stix. Stix was an Earth Pony with an orange coat, a short yet slightly curled black mane, and a rather odd Cutie Mark. It was an image of a bat hitting a snare drum on the head, which correlated to his impressive ability with both percussion and baseball.  Stix and Ironheartwere best friends since their first year at Mulewaukee High, and were arguably the best musicians attending during their final year. Though they rarely spent time together outside of school, during class they were as thick as thieves, sharing interests in a variety of things from music, to jokes, to games, and to books. They even had a secret hoofshake that they recited every day, sometimes more than once. Ironheart was lucky to have such a loyal friend, he trusted Stix very much. Stix never made fun of Ironheart’s lack of a cutie mark, either. He merely inquired about it at one point, Ironheart responded with silence, and Stix never brought it up since.

In the front row sat Ironheart’s other good friend, Reid. Reid was a dark brown unicorn that played the clarinet. He was also infamous for being the class clown. His cutie mark was a regular heptagon. When he was asked about it, Reid replied with “I though heptagons were awesome at the time, so I made myself have it as a talent.” Nopony ever attempted to delve further for an explanation after that statement, so the true story is still unknown. What’s sure though, is that Reid will always be there if you need a laugh.

Ironheart, Stix, and Reid were all good friends with each other; while not spending too much time together, they enjoyed every moment they spent together laughing, joking, talking, and playing music.

“Alright, students,” Mr. Keystrike said. Most of the class did not react and continued to talk.

“Ok, everybody,” he repeated, waiting patiently for the room to quiet down. His efforts were proving to be futile.

“SHUT UP, EVERYPONY!” Ironheart shouted. Nobody listened to him either, and the room was still loud. Mr. K simply waited until silence overcame the class. Then he started talking.

“To those of you who’ve been here before, welcome back,” he began, “And to those whom this is your first time in this room, welcome.” He then proceeded to pass out the papers, via magic, which Ironheart placed on the podium earlier. They weren’t music sheets, however. They were just syllabi for the year, like what Mr. Addams handed out earlier. ’The music must’ve just been what was on top,’ Ironheart concluded, with a sigh of relief.

“We will not begin rehearsal until tomorrow, class. Today I will just be spelling out the plans for the year. We will have several performances this year, including Hoofball pep band, our Hea… ing Eve conc… winter pep ban… ing Concert… uation…”

Ironheart fell asleep…