Chapter 5: She's Trapping Him!
“Hold it steady, girls!” yelled Twilight from atop the living room table. “The giant shall be here soon, and this will be our one chance to defeat him! We’ve planned this for weeks, and the time has come to achieve freedom! Now begin our practice heave!”
At the door frame between the living room and bedroom stood two ponies on each side holding threads of yarn like a rope suspended at the opening. It was Pinkie Pie and Rarity on one side, and Rainbow Dash and Applejack on the other. Though, their practice of pulling the threads of yarn up didn’t go as well as Twilight had envisioned.
“What’s the status for our practice run, commander Fluttershy?” asked Twilight as she saw her friend crawling up onto the table, her hind legs wiggling wildly during the struggle to get up there.
“Phew, erhm… well, not that well. The recruits are a bit, wet behind the ears, Twilight. Pinkie Pie keeps falling over, Rarity is getting very easily distracted, and Applejack, well, she won’t stop chewing on her hat.”
Twilight sighed in deep frustration as she looked down on their disorganized group. Their trap to tip over the giant was never going to work if the four of them couldn’t even do something as simple as hold their strongest rope suspended for him to trip over.
“They’ve had several days to recover after the giant brought them here!” complained Twilight.
“Well, it took me over a week to learn things. I think they just need a bit more time, Twilight,” mumbled Fluttershy as she waddled her way over to Twilight.
The familiar sound of keys rattling in the distance triggered something within Twilight. They had journeyed all the way from the safety of their upstairs base to the dangers below. The giant was finally home to his keep, it was now or never if they were going to execute this brilliant plan of hers.
“Fluttershy, get your butt down there and get our troops in line. He is back! We can win this war once and for all. There will be no more casualties if we can pull this off!”
“But… there haven’t been any casualties so far, Twilight.”
“Are you trying to contradict me, soldier?” with intimidating steps, Twilight turned to go face to face with Fluttershy, staring her down in the best fashion she could.
“N-no, Twilight! I’ll get right down there!” squeaked and whimpered Fluttershy as she almost rolled off the table, onto the reclining chair and then onto the floor to do her best to wrangle in the disorganized group.
“Good. Yes, there it is. Come closer to us, every step you take is just one more step closer to your ultimate doom!” cackled Twilight, which to Richard merely sounded like tiny squeaks.
“I wonder what she’s so happy about?” pondered Richard out loud as he walked into the living room with several envelopes in his hand which he was taking to his bedroom.
Time was running out for them, and as much as Fluttershy tried to put the four ponies back on task, they proved themselves to be a task far greater than what she could handle.
“Oh dear, oh gosh. Please get up Pinkie. Here, take the rope, Rarity. That’s good!” squeaked Fluttershy before running over to Rainbow Dash and Applejack.
“Glad to see you’re still holding the rope, Rainbow Dash,” said Fluttershy before turning her attention to Applejack who still absentmindedly chewed on her hat, her big vacant eyes staring out at nothing particular. “Erhm, Applejack, would you mind it if you chewed on the rope instead?”
There came no response from Applejack, only more chewing of her hat which had gotten a lot worse for wear over the last couple of days. Fluttershy knew what had to be done, and without hesitation she grabbed the other end of the hat with her mouth and pulled it away from Applejack who wasn’t prepared for the tug.
“I’m really sorry, but I have to take it away for now, Applejack,” mumbled Fluttershy as she spat out the hat again and then picked up the rope. “But how about this nice and juice looking rope, hmm?”
No response, just an empty stare for the few moments she waited before gripping the rope with her mouth, chewing on it like she had done with the hat. “Well, I guess this is as good as it’s going to get, and not a moment too late.”
The moment Twilight had waited for had finally arrived, Richard was about to cross the border between the bed and living rooms, and there, high enough for his feet to get caught was their mighty rope of yarn, ready to bring the giant to his knees.
Each step boomed as he came closer and closer to the rope, it was now or never for Twilight, and she wasn’t going to let the chance pass. “NOW! HOLD IT UP!” she screamed at the top of her lungs.
The rope neither rose or lowered more than it already was. The ponies holding it up weren’t very capable and at least, to Twilight’s comfort, they had it up just enough for Richard’s right foot to slip under it. Though, when push came to shove, it all fell apart. His foot did get tagged by their yarn rope, but as he pulled the foot up, all four ponies were dragged along for the small duration before the strings of yarn simply snapped, leaving Richard slightly confused.
“Huh, what was that?” asked Richard out loud as he felt a slight tug on his foot. Looking back only revealed two bits of yarn as the ponies were still hidden behind the wall, lying on their sides in the living room.
“That’s strange. I don’t remember yarn being here…” mumbled Richard. “I guess the little ponies must have found it and played with it, wait, these strings of yarn has been threaded together…”
“Dammit, dammit, dammit! How could this brilliant plan have failed?! We should have won the war right now. I checked the math on the rope, it was perfect for this trap.” Snarled and squeaked Twilight. “The ponies… It must have been the ponies’ fault! Yes, everything was perfect. It must have failed because they weren’t trying hard enough. I guess there needs to be a lot more training before these idiots are ready for another attack on the giants.”
“Twilight! What are we going to do now. The plan’s failed, and what is the giant going to do to us if he finds out what we did?” whimpered Fluttershy from the floor, trying her best to herd their four soldiers towards the stairs for a tactical retreat.
“He won’t find out, commander. The giants are far too dumb to notice our schemes. We’ll simply head back to base and come up with an even more brilliant plan. I’m certain our next one will work!”
From the doorframe Richard watch the absurd sight of six small ponies waddling away in a hurry towards the stairs.
“What in the world is going on here? How did all of you get out of the guest room? What were they even trying to do down here. This is really strange…”
Curious and confused, Richard picked up the six miniature ponies, holding them firmly in his arms as he carried them upstairs while they wiggled and nibbled through their transportation. Upstairs he was met with the sight of the guestroom door standing ajar, though nothing indicating how it had opened up.
“Hhmm, maybe I left it open before I went outside… Perhaps I should set up something to keep an eye on all of you. Whatever, time for all you to go back to miniature Equestria,” chuckled Richard while placing each one of them down into the box as carefully as he could. “Now could you please stay here for a little while longer? I have to do some studying and homework. But, I’ll totally be back in a few hours to have fun with you girls.”
Twilight watched in horror as the giant hand gently stroked Applejack who had once again returned to eating her own hat. Disgust filled Twilight’s heart as she could see, even through the vacancy of her expression that Applejack actually enjoyed the attention she got from the giant. Though, she could remember her time before intelligence, and those petting sessions were something else.
“This will be our last defeat, evil giant!” With him gone, Twilight went about to check up on her troops. “I’m disappointed in all of you, especially you, Fluttershy.”
“But, I did the best I could, Twilight,” whimpered Fluttershy while helping Pinkie back up on her hooves as she had once more tipped over.
“Well, it obviously wasn’t good enough.” Twilight sighed frustrated. “I’m sorry, Fluttershy. It wasn’t your fault. I’m just a bit, frustrated. I want us to get out of this horrible place and back to Equestria as soon as possible, but I guess we have to take some more time to help our friends regain their senses and memories before we can even think about another plan.”
“It’s okay, Twilight. I know your heart is in the right place. Why don’t you help me with Applejack. We gotta be able to do something so she’ll stop chewing on stuff all the time, it’s bad for her teeth,” said Fluttershy in her usual calm and sweet manner, walking towards Applejack after having helped Pinkie.
“I’ll help, I’ll help,” mumbled Twilight. “I guess we won’t be making any new plans or much progress for the next week. But, once our friends have recovered fully, we’re going back to the drawing board, and we won’t stop until we’ve come up with the perfect plan to stop the giants once and for all!”