Chapter Eight

Twilight Sparkle

I hear an alarm go off.

"Five more minutes." I mutter, rolling over in my bed.

However, my bed feels less comfortable, somehow, and my sheets are thinner.

I open one eye, and see row after row of books.

I leap to my hooves and squeal. I'm in Erudite training! I'm an Erudite Initiate!

"Keep it down!" Holly Dash, one of my many roommates, tosses a pillow at me. I deflect it with my horn and send it flying under my bunk.

"Do you have to wake us up at six am, Twi?" asks Night Shade.

"We're not all early risers." complains Twinkleshine, Night Shade's cousin.

"Don't you guys want to study before classes begin?" I ask curiously.

"NO!" all five mares shout.

I do a quick head-count. There are Night Shade and Twinkleshine, who are also Erudite-born initiates, Holly Dash and Sugarberry the Amity transfers, and Sea Swirl the Candor transfer. I note that we're all unicorns, and inform my roommates that 92% of the Erudite population are unicorns. I am responded with another pillow, this time from Twinkleshine.

I sigh and pull a book out from one of the shelves, titled A History of Factions.

Time to study.

Three hours later, classes begin.

My roommates have finally gotten into the spirit of things, and they're giddy with excitement. I try to keep it all down, but I let out a few squeals every now and again.

"Settle down, class!" calls our teacher.

"Cheerilee?" I ask. "You're teaching us?"

Cheerilee nods. "I teach the initiates every year. You'll remember that I send in a substitute every training month?"

I nod, slightly ashamed that I haven't figured it out before.

"But before we begin," Cheerilee says, "We're going to have a little introduction by Jeanine."

"Jeanine?" a male pegasus mutters to his friend. "She's coming?"

I sit up a little straighter, suddenly wishing that I wasn't in the front row.

At that point, Jeanine enters. She is tall, with a pale yellow mane and the palest blue pelt. She has a cutie mark of a pencil on paper, to represent her high IQ. She glances between us, as if sizing us up for future Erudites.

"Good morning, initiates." she says.

"Good morning, Jeanine." we say in unison. And no, we have never practiced that.

"Today you are going to begin your learning to be Erudites." she says. "I presume that almost all of you got Erudite in the test?"

We all nod, though I hesitate. Well, I got 33⅓% Erudite. I think. Does that count?

"I noticed," Jeanine informs us, using her horn to scratch something out on the chalkboard in front of us, "that, of the twenty initiates in this class, eleven are Erudite-born, four are Abnegation-born, three are Amity-born, and two are of Candor birth."

After writing this out on the board, Jeanine turns to us and gives us a glare. She then turns her attention at me. "You." she calls.

"Me?" I ask, startled.

"Yes," she rolls her eyes slightly, "Can you tell me what the percentage of each faction is in our class?"

I take a few deep breaths to steady myself, and then I respond. "Well, obviously, there's a 0% Dauntless."

Jeanine scratches that out on the board.

I continue. "Then, since twenty times five is one-hundred, we simply have to multiply the other numbers by five. So there's 55% Erudite, 20% Abnegation, 15% Amity and 10% Candor."

Jeanine nods. "Very good." She erases the words and then writes 90ºC. She looks around. "Can anyone tell me what this temperature would be in Fahrenheit?"

Lots of ponies raise their hooves, including me. She picks on me. "Yes, Miss…"

"Twilight Sparkle, ma'am." I respond. "First, you have to do is multiple ninety by the fraction nine-fifths, or 1.8. Right now, we can multiply it by nine-fifths."

Jeanine writes this on the board:

90 9

– X –

1 5

"Then you can cancel out the five," I add, "and turn the ninety into eighteen. Then it's simply multiplying eighteen by nine, which is one-hundred sixty-two."

Jeanine notes this on the board. "Is that all?"

"No. You then have to add thirty-two. That makes one-hundred ninety-four."

Jeanine writes 194ºF on the board. "And, Miss Sparkle, is that more or less than the average body temperature?"

"Definitely more." I say.

Jeanine nods. "And can you tell me, Miss Sparkle, about the rulers in the time of the princesses?"

I feel a little worried. "The time of the Princesses…" I mutter. Who were the princesses who ruled? "Um... Luna and... Celestia, is it?"

Jeanine nods. I sigh with relief.

"Very good, Miss Sparkle. If the rest of the class is as good as this, we'll have a lot of new Erudites this year."

The Erudite-borns have been taking notes. The other classmates take the cue and start copying their neighbors' notes.

"Please remember," Jeanine tells us, "that in two weeks, you will be given an intelligence test. Those whose intelligence is below the minimum score will become Factionless."

I shudder. Factionless.

"Continue with your class, Miss Cheerilee." Jeanine nods to our teacher, then walks out of the room.

Cheerilee begins to teach, as my thoughts wander towards the test. Will being Divergent lower my score?

"And now," Cheerilee says, "The Square of Opposition…"