It was obviously a trap.
Twilight scratched her nose and stared at the small marble figure of a guard, pushed forward from its protective phalanx on her opponent’s left flank, right onto a diagonal of Twilight's princess.
She checked again, three moves ahead, then four, for any recapture, pin, or fork. Nothing. The move would split her major pieces between the left and right halves of the board. Could that weakness be worth a guard sacrifice?
But it wasn’t even a weakness! Her princess was still on the back rank; moving it would only strengthen her position. She'd been considering the move even before her opponent put the guard there. So what was her opponent up to?
Wobbly Wisher had said, “I don’t believe in psychology. I believe in good moves.” Taking the guard was the best move.
But evidential reasoning required considering that her opponent thought moving the guard had been a good move. Ergo, there was something Twilight still wasn’t seeing, because she thought it was an awful move.
But her opponent knew Twilight would think it was an awful move, one so bad that it was obviously a trap. So avoiding the “trap” might be the trap! It was a psychological trick to let Twilight let her move the guard through a protected square.
But she also knew that Twilight knew that she knew Twilight knew that it looked like an awful move. So...
Twilight shook her head, scratched her nose again, and started over. If she ignored the guard, she'd avoid the trap--if it were a trap--and still have the initiative, probably a game-winning—
BUZZZZ!
“AAUGH!” Twilight glared at the chess clock beside the board, then slumped her shoulders and let her head drop.
“I WIN AGAIN!” Rainbow Dash shouted, jumping up from the table. She froze in mid hoof-pump and looked at Twilight. “The buzzer means I win, right?”
Twilight sighed. “Yes, Rainbow. The buzzer means you win.”
Dash pumped her hoof. “Yesss! I win, I win, I win, I WIN!”
Twilight frowned and began setting up the pieces again. “One. More. Game,” she said through her teeth, without looking up.
“Naw,” Rainbow said, waving one wing dismissively at the board. “This game’s too easy.”
5741656 It's probably just the universe conspiring against you again.
Rainbow wins by being stupid. Seems like Rainbow alright...
Rainbow was playing the mind game -- something that works very well against Twi.
Yeah, I could see that happening, alright!
Poor Twi! All she needs now is to convince Dash to read an actual chess playing guide, then it's all over.
Alas, the flaw of every chess player who overestimates their opponent.
Y'know, done in the visual medium, this would make for a perfect episode opener.
5741990
It was a babylon 5 quote that google has failed me in tracking down for you.
Something similar was said by Lord Byron -- that was all I got from trying to track it down.
I envy Dash here. I'm terrible at chess, but apparently not so terrible that I can't make better players question how many levels of deception I'm operating on when the answer is "zero."
Brilliant.
*face slowly morphs from serenely neutral to horrified to pissed to drunk pissed to "my face is melting because I'm that pissed"*
WHAT THE DICK?! Oh my god... oh my lord... oh my... oh my...
*takes a lengthy swig of water*
I swear, there has been no deeper travesty in the universe than Rainbow Dash beating Twilight at chess. Of all the horrible things I've seen you write about, Bad Horse, this tops the list of dastardly. I guess it can be argued that Twilight caused her own defeat, but in the annals of history it will go down that RD kicked Twilight's ass in perhaps one of the most humiliating defeats to have ever been achieved ever.
Btw, I'm kidding. It's hilarious. Isn't fun how we overestimate things, making a huge deal out of it, only to face utter and complete screwage?
Also, don't know how this is relevant and if I should be disturbed, but the ad I got for this chapter is one of vaporizers.
i.imgur.com/2GtmEIM.jpg
5742460
I'm rather fascinated to see how you practiced you are in the art of deception in Magic, Foamy.
Ha! And that was legit. I laughed out loud at that final line. Nicely done!
My two most memorable chess games:
The other guy moved a piece, I moved a piece, and he moved a piece to checkmate me. And the other time, my brother and I ended up with nothing left but our kings and spent what felt like two hours chasing each other around the board and giggling hysterically.
I'm really bad at chess...
Mike
5741914
Over-thinking things and getting caught in thought loops is a particular weakness of Twilight's, as we've seen. It doesn't just apply to Chess. Though I at least expected her opponent to be someone she'd have reason to have inflated ideas of the competence of, so the joke ending took me by surprise.
Oh lord. Twilight...
5741699
What, again already? Geez, give it a rest, will you? It's been not two weeks since the garbage truck and the escalator.
hehe.
I'm not sure if I should put this comment on the story or the blog post. I don't want to give away the ending after all. I'll move it if you ask.
This story is an all too rare treat. Thank you for making my day. I expected Pinkie Pie instead, though your choice was more interesting
Also, if you haven't heard of it, there is a story in "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" about Zhuge Liang and the "Empty Fort Strategy" which may interest you.
5761155 Ah! I was more thinking of a more horrific scenario, throwing everything back to the stone (grazing?) age.
So I just got through reading all of these (or all the ones I hadn't already read). A few are misses on the hit-or-miss scale, as to be expected of a collection of short stories that seem to be 70% experiments, but many of them are quite chilling.
5816183 Which ones would you call hits / misses?
5816701
Hits: Happy Thoughts, *Game of Immortals*, Sombra's Curse, *The Ones who walk away from Equestria*, Changeling Dream, Twenty-one, *Special*, The Quiet One, Celerity, Fraud, It's a Trap!
(I put stars on the very, very best ones. Sadly out of those three only Special strikes me as a concept that could be expanded into a full story without losing some of its punch.)
Misses: Shipping Costs, No Regrets.
Ones I didn't enjoy very much but they aren't actually bad: Mare of the Rings, The Pony Side, Worth It. Also I didn't even read The Pony because the poetry turned me off, yes I am an uncultured boor.
Most of the other ones were good but not standouts in my book.
6355891 ... it never occurred to me you could read it that way. Thanks for the heads-up. I wonder how many people thought that?
6358365 My intention (and, I think, LeGuin's intention) was that they're walking away because they don't want to be part of it anymore. They don't want it on their conscience. Though I muffed that a bit, and also hinted some were walking away because they didn't want their foals to be the one. That was a mistake.
Yes! Rainbow beating Twilight at chess.
Can't get more bizzar, twisted, or weird than that! Definite TZ matterial!
& that final comment by Rainbow
They should have that in a canon episode!
Great set of stories, Bad Horse. Definitely TZ matterial for most all of them, and I think I enjoyed a better percentage of these than the Twilight Zone show. Good job! Thoroughly enjoyable!
I came across this set of stories because I had been coming across several stories that have a nice touch of the macrabe and weird that the old TZ series was known for.
Lost and Never Found, Heirlooms, and The Misty Mansion just to name a few.
I'm not sure how getting stories put into groups works here, if the authors have to ask to submit, if readers have to make recommendations, if group owners put out invites, or what happens? You might want to consider inviting them into the TZ group.
And thanks for the stories.
6359299 Thanks! Usually, you read the group's home page and then its forum to find its rules. You always have to join a group to add a story to it. Sometimes only the moderator can add a story. Sometimes you're not allowed to add your own story.
You mean this? Looks like you already added it.
I'll add more stories to it over time, so click the "Tracking" icon above the title if you want a notification when I do. It should look like an old-fashioned bookmark.
6359571
Yeah, that's the group site, but there wasn't any info on how to submit stories to it.
I was initially confused by what you said, until I guessed that you thought I added this collection to it. After reading those stories I mentioned in my last post, I started looking around in case someone had already made a TZ group (I thought, if no one had yet, why not me? ). I did a search for groups labeled "Twilight Zone" and actually found 3, but two were empty. That's how I found your story, it was already there.
In fact, just this moment, I looked at the group membership and saw you're not in there. So either the group creator or one of the moderators must have put it in. How freaking cool is that?
Heck, I'm still just figuring my way around the FimFiction site. They've got some pretty cool features floating about this place
Thanks, I've already got you faved, so I'm looking forward to more.
6360156
It works like this:
You can favorite a story. That just adds it to your list of favorites. I don't think it notifies you of new chapters.
You can track a story. That notifies you if new chapters come out.
You can follow (or watch) a person. That notifies you if they write something new, but not if they add new chapters to an existing story.
6360512 Yes, the Faves and the Tracking has been letting me know I've got unread chapters. My list of "Read Later"s doesn't, though. However, I can sort by "Last Updated" for all three & get anything that's been added to.
6358945
I'm just happy someone found amusement from that, despite whatever age it might have. Always happy to help springboard someone's jokes into something more absurd and funnier than my own, eh?
6361511
That's differerent. Tracking also sends you a notification instantly when someone releases a new chapter to a tracked story. They're indicated by the red number on the bell in the upper-left corner of the screen.
6364158 Okay. Understood now. Except the only notifications I get by the bell at the top of the page are for replies to my comments, when someone puts me on watchlist and such, or when they Fave/Track my stories.
Maybe because I'm not set up to be emailed that updates are happening here or at other sites I'm signed up to? If I did, such notifications would outnumber the spam I get every day. It's more convenient and efficient to pop into the sites I vistit once or twice a day to see what's new--although I know some sites is best to visit once a week or so.
6362855 Yeah, that was an awesome setu up. Seems rather sad that it hung out there for so long---OMG---I'm starting to think like Pinkie!
6364829 Have you Tracked anything that's had chapters added since you tracked it?
Not everything on fimfiction works all the time, but everything works most of the time.
6371789 I've got stories sitting in my Tracking list for months, if not a full year, by now and dozens of them have been updated. But like I explained, I've never gotten a notification by the "bell" for any story in my Tracking list.
For example, I've got "You Won't Go Home Again..." by tehphillzor which was just updated Aug 24 & "All These Years (Set in Stone)" by eLLen updated Aug 25, but never a "bell" notification received.
The "bell" has only notified me about replies in story threads (like this one that let me know about you replying to me, to which I'm answering), when someone put my stories into their Faves, and sometimes their Tracking or Read It Laters lists, or when they started watching/following me.
The only times I've ever known a story was updated, for Faves & Tracking, I get the red unread chapters number incrementing in the popup menu when hovering the mouse over the Library. From there, I usually check all three lists by opening separate browser tabs and sort them each by "last updated".
I guess I do need to figure a way to sort my Faves. Their numbers are getting ridiculously large now in that single pile. Perhaps I don't use the Library in the way it was intended. Those I put in Read Later, I do so because their descriptions sound intriguing, or I read a few chapters and like where it's going. Those, I put in Tracking, I already decided I like it a lot. Those I put in Fave, I love!
6371789 Heh! I just discovered something.
One of the options available for each of the lists is you can go and edit them. In each of those fields, there're choices for selecting email notifications as well as update notifications.
In all three of mine, email is disabled while tracking notifications were enabled on both Faves & Tracking. I just enabled the Read It Later's list--I bet that when someone updates one of those, I'll see numbers pop up on the Library menu
edit-->Yipe! All that took was a page refresh--I've got 6114 unread chapters in my Read It Later list!
But it's cool! I also found how to make those additional Library lists
5742910
Does the most recent presidential election result qualify for that?