* Epilogue *
A familiar cottage. A weekly visit. A cheerful greeting.
“Come in, Rainbow Dash!”
“Heya, Fluttershy!”
The day was another long, hot, summery affair, though there was at least a cooling breeze to provide some comfort, and a few scattered clouds in the sky provided slow-moving patches of shade here and there.
Dash sauntered into the cottage and subconsciously looked over to the dining table, noting that Fluttershy had already set out the two Battleclouds boards. Seeing them lanced her with a strange, odd pang of disappointment. Fluttershy must have noticed something because her happy smile fell a little. “Is something wrong?” she asked.
“Nah... it’s just, I thought we should probably play something different today...” said Dash, weakly. Memories of the previous week were still strong, and with this being the game that had triggered a whole day of futile shenanigans, she’d rather lost her appetite for it in the short term, not to mention for actually wanting to beat Fluttershy at it.
“But I thought you understood? I don’t mind if...”
“Yeah, I do, I get it,” said Dash. “But it still feels wrong for me, y’know? I just feel like we need a different game. At least this week.” She really didn’t feel like a whole afternoon of relentless victories against Fluttershy today. Why wasn’t there a game they could play that Fluttershy would have an even chance of winning at? Or even drawing at? Tieing a game would be better than...
Oh.
Oh. It was so obvious!
Dash’s face lit up into a wide grin and she reached out and wrapped her leg around Fluttershy’s forehoof, speaking excitedly. “Come with me!” She raced, Fluttershy in tow, to the windows at the rear of the house. Pushing them open, they leaped through into the rear garden, finding themselves on the warm, soft grass.
Scanning around, Dash quickly found a patch of bare, dusty earth and a short, sharp stick which she took in her mouth. While Fluttershy watched, Dash drew a pair of parallel lines in the dirt, and then two more, perpendicular to the first pair and trisecting them into thirds, creating an open-sided three-by-three grid.
Fluttershy looked up, confused. “Noughts and crosses?”
“Exactly!” cried Dash. “Trust me, there’s no way you’re gonna lose today. In fact, you might even win, because if there’s one thing I learned last week... it’s that I am terrible at this game!” She grinned. “So, you wanna be X’s, or O’s?”
Fluttershy looked up and smiled warmly. “O’s, please.”
“Okay then,” said Dash, passing Fluttershy the stick. “You go first.”
—End—