//------------------------------//
// Second Round 
// Story: Heroes for Friendship 
// by King-Mac-13 
//------------------------------//

Grimoire looked down to his clipboard. “Alright next team is Team 4: Fluttershy, Flash, Adagio, and Vinyl. So, who’ll be first up to the plate?”

After no one moved, Vinyl stood up and walked silently to the platform. When she stood there, the symbol appeared above her head and started to spin. When it stopped, the symbol above her head looked like an 8-bit skull of some kind. Her attire changed like the last group. When it was done, she stood with a sort-of cybernetic style. Her white cyber body was accented by glowing blue and a long braid to one side of her head.

“You’ve been given the kit of the master hacker known only as Sombra; specifically, the Cyberspace variant. You specialize in messing with the enemy and taking away their abilities with your skills. All the while, you break down their HP with your SMG.”

Vinyl examined her equipment. After a while, she smiled and stepped to the side.

Grimoire looked back to his clipboard. “Next!”

After a look from Sonata, Adagio leaned back a bit and sighed. She stood up and walked toward the platform. “Let’s get this over with.” She stood with arms crossed. The symbol started to spin above her. When it stopped, the symbol above her head resembled a dragon. Her attire became a sleek cybernetic chaise. Her face was covered by a similarly sleek mask. Her hair was pulled back into a pony tail, hanging out the bottom of her helmet.

“You’ve been given the kit of the cybernetic ninja Genji Shimada. You specialize in damaging the enemy and escaping conflict. You are a hit and run hero. As a result, you have little health. Keep this in mind as you fight.”

When she stepped away, Flash stepped up to the platform. When his symbol stopped spinning, it landed on a symbol akin to a pair of wings with a halo above them. He smiled, “Guessing I’m the healer.” His attire changed to become like a set of white and gold, winged body armor. He held up a staff in his hand.

“You’ve been given the kit of Angela Ziegler, commonly referred to as Mercy. Your job is to keep your team alive, even if you have to bring them back from the dead. You also possess a plasma pistol in the event that you need to defend yourself.”

Flash gave an impressed whistle, “Nice.”

Grimoire turned to find Fluttershy hesitating to step onto the platform. “Is something wrong?”

Fluttershy took a few deep breathes before looking back to the platform. “No. I can do this.” She stepped onto the platform and watched as her symbol appeared and started to spin. She recoiled for a moment when a strange, elongated skull appeared as her symbol. “W-w-what’s that one?” Her attire shifted to a long white coat with metal accenting. Her face was covered by a skull mask and her gauntlet’s fingertips were coated in red. “W-w-what is all this?!”

Grimoire was trying to hold back his laughter. “You’ve been given… the kit of… Gabriel Reyes. Commonly referred to as Reaper. Specifically, the Wight variant. You… You’re a close-range combatant using your Hellfire shotguns.”

“Eep! I-I-I… don’t think I can…”

“Sorry. Too late for that.”

“What?”

The doors closed on the group and they were sent off to their mission. When the doors reopened, they stood before a tower that extended into the sky. To many, it made them feel small and insignificant… In the group, only one felt this.

Welcome to Lijiang Tower.

Flash looked up the tower before them, “Wow…” After a moment to take in the area, he took a deep breath and turned to the group. “Okay, we should try to find somewhere safe in the first round. That way we can better defend ourselves later.”

Fluttershy was having difficulties adjusting to her situation and didn’t really hear what was said. She could feel her muscles tightening against her will. Her hands gripping a pair of shotguns and her fingers wrapped instinctively around the triggers. It took all her mental fortitude to move her fingers away.

During this, Flash had noticed Fluttershy’s plight and wanted to make sure she was alright. “Hey, Fluttershy. Are you…” Before he could finish, he placed his hand on her shoulder to console her only to have his hand pass through her.

When he tried to get Fluttershy’s attention, she was focused elsewhere and was shocked by the contact. She jumped slightly as her body turned into a vapor, her eyes glowing a bright, neon blue beneath her mask. This only made her situation worse, however. Her heartrate was sky rocketing as her body started to return to a physical form. When she was solid again, she brought her hand over her heart and she took deep breaths to try to calm herself.

Flashed moved around to face her and placed his hand on her shoulders. “Fluttershy… It’s okay. None of this is actually real.” He tried to put on a calming face and help her down. “When we leave, everything will be normal again. It’s just a game.”

After a while, Fluttershy was starting to calm down. She still felt weird about her abilities and the weaponry, but she was no longer panicking. Baby steps… Though, baby steps didn’t help when they were shot at. A group of robots had found them and started shooting.

Flash turned and drew his plasma pistol, unloading into the enemies. Vinyl tried to shoot them with her gun, but they were far enough away that her accuracy was terrible. Adagio tried to use her sword but it was locked down. She angrily swung her fist and launched a trio of shuriken into the robots. Fluttershy… was having difficulties. She wanted to help, but when she fired the shot gun… the noise and kickback from the blast caused her to drop her weapon. She was shaken, but didn’t want to give up. She fired her other shotgun, but dropped this one all the same. She shrunk away as one of the robots got close to her.

“G… GET AWAY!” She pulled another pair of shotguns out of her cloak and unloaded into her robotic attacker. Eight shots later (four each) she stood over the wreckage of the robot, breathing heavily. She dropped her guns again before materializing another pair from her coat.

The team was stunned by the display. Sort of… they were still trying to focus on staying alive, so it didn’t really last very long. But it was there, and it shocked them to their cores.

Vinyl dodged an attack using her teleportation device and hacked one of the robots, stopping it from moving. When she noticed exactly what her ability did, she tried to get the attention of the others to let them know. Unfortunately, the robot started to move before anyone else saw it, so she had to shoot it and deal with the rest later.

After a while, the coast was clear, and the robots stopped coming.

Round 1: Complete.

Flash let out a quick chuckle and smiled, “Nice. One down.”

Round 2: Protect the two control points. Capture of one of the points results in failure.

“Well that hardly seems fair.” Adagio spoke for the first time since getting her kit. Her voice was given a robotic reverb, making her sound like a combination of organic and artificial.

You are granted three minutes to prepare.

“Well then, never mind.”

Flash clapped his hands to get the group’s attention. “Alright. To defend two points at the same time, we’ll need to split into teams of two. Vinyl, you’re able to hack opponents and medical packs. You can act as a pseudo-support class. And Fluttershy, I noticed during the first round that you can heal yourself when you hit your opponent. The two of you will form the first team and head to the point on the eastern side of the tower. That leaves Adagio and I to deal with the western point. Does that sound alright to everyone?”

Vinyl nodded with a smile, recognizing that Flash had the best plan for the situation.

Fluttershy nodded nervously, “I think that sounds okay.”

Adagio just stood there with her arms crossed. She wasn’t a fan of Flash’s attempt to take charge of the group. After all, the position of leadership is where she belonged. However, she couldn’t fault his logic, either. Adagio knew if she spoke up now, it would be clear she was just trying to take charge for the sake of it. She had to build up to a position of power. “Fine…”

Flash gave a quick nod, “Alright then. Let’s move.”

\/

As Vinyl and Fluttershy arrived at the eastern point, they were met with a few robots. Not too many, mind, but enough that they both had to deal with the threat to defend the point. Vinyl would hack the enemy bots and Fluttershy, would attack with her shotguns. After a while, Fluttershy was getting used to the guns in her hands and her actions became less shaky and nervous. Of course, there still some difficulties. The phasing in and out of existence still felt weird and she learned she could use it to teleport, though it also left her vulnerable. Vinyl adapted to her abilities much faster and made use of everything she had to control the enemy units. Together, the two were able to accomplish their objective and push the robotic forces back for the moment.

Off to the west, Adagio and Flash were having… difficulties of their own. Adagio used every opportunity to get under Flash’s skin, whether intentional or not. She would charge forward, take out a bunch of robots, then return to demand he heal her wounds. It was starting to get grating for Flash. He would try to say something only for her to rush off ahead and force him to follow and keep her alive. He was on his last nerve after only two minutes passed and she forced them away from the defense point, which he had to quickly return to and deal with the intrusion only to get yelled at for leaving Adagio without a healer. In a lull during the fighting, Adagio was going on a rant about Flash having to do his job. Flash kept his composure for as long as he could. He simply sat there as Adagio went on a minute on long rant about how a healer should act like a healer. He could tell it wasn’t really about him being the team healer. Time as the oldest of his brothers helped train him to recognize when rants weren’t really about the subject of the rant.

Adagio’s rant eventually turned into an angry tirade about being stuck in the human world. Her and her fellow Dazzlings being from Equestria has become common knowledge among the Canterlot High students after Twilight ripped open portals, pulling away the curtain that the other world existed.

“If not for that annoying little princess, we’d run this miserable world! Damn that princess Twilight Sparkle…”

“No wonder you lost.” Flash spoke just above a whisper, but still loud enough for the former siren to hear.

She turned to Flash with a glare. “What?”

“It’s clear you heard me.”

“Let’s make sure. Humor me.”

“I said ‘no wonder you lost.’ After all, you can’t keep track of your opponents. Sunset was the factor that pushed the Rainbooms over the edge to beat you. Not to mention that fact that you don’t understand teamwork.”

“Is that right?” Adagio glared toward him, insulted by his words. It’s not necessarily about what he said. Rather it’s from the fact that he said anything at all. Adagio was not accustomed to having others talk back to her so openly. Even without her powers, she held an aura of command and a demand for others to fall in line. Of course, she knew others would talk about her behind her back. Trying to stop that would be a fruitless effort. This, however, was new. She had caught others in similar, lone volume statements only to have them retract when confronted.

“Damn right it is. It’s honestly surprising you got as far as you did when you had your powers.”

Now Adagio was insulted by his specific words. “Oh?! Then pray tell! How exactly do I not understand teamwork? How were we just lucky when we had our powers?! We could have brought this place to its knees! We had only a single failure! We were able to sew chaos among you humans for years before that failure! We had to work as a team to…”

“Did you?!”

Adagio stopped her questions. She was taken aback by Flash’s tone. She knew his reputation as mister nice guy and how he never got angry. Thus, his yelling was a surprise.

“I want you to think long and hard about how you worked that magic. Was it really as a team or were Sonata and Aria just told to follow your lead and fall in line?!”

“Wait. How do you…?”

“Know their names? Because they recognize they lost and tried to move forward after it. I knew about Sonata and Rainbow Dash’s friendship before this because I saw their interactions in the school. Aria actually made friends with one of my bandmates and has actually helped critique our sound, allowing us to improve! They’ve made more of an impact on this school than you did!”

Now Adagio was pissed, “That’s it! You can just…!”

“No! You had your chance! You’re just trying to rush ahead, making everyone have to try to keep up with you!”

“So, that’s where the outburst came from. You’re just tired and can’t keep going at this pace.” Her tone was mocking. She wanted to hit what nerves remain, ready to tear him down again. “Besides, Sonata, Aria, and I had to work together to activate our powers. I’d say I understand teamwork.”

“Oh? Do tell. When did Sonata get the chance to make a suggestion? Did you know that Aria is actually a good drummer? If you three had actually worked together, rather than forcing them to step in line behind you, you’d have been unstoppable. But no. You rushed ahead and made them try to pick up the slack! You wouldn’t know teamwork if it shot you between the eyes!”

Adagio had enough. What he said may have been true, but she didn’t care about that. She was going to make him suffer for talking to her like that. Her hand reached for her wakizashi, ready to make him hurt. She was caught off guard a moment later at the realization that he appeared to have the same idea.

A plasma pistol was aimed squarely at her chest. As he pulled the trigger, Adagio’s preparation for an attack became a reflection, sending the bolt back at it’s firer. Flash moved a foot to the side, turning his body, and dodging the bolt to hit a nearby, damaged robot slowly approaching them.

Western Point: Locked Down!

Flash’s face shifted as he replaced his pistol with his staff. “There, see? Teamwork.” There was no spite. No anger. Nothing. There was no hint of the aggravation from only a moment ago.

Saying Adagio was confused would have been quite the understatement. “Wait! What?!”

“We should get back to the others. Sounds like they still need help.”

“Hold it! What the hell just happened?”

“I saw a robot limping around and wanted to eliminate it. However, your running around earlier made me pretty mad, so I decided to use it to make a point instead.”

“You tried to shoot me!”

“Did I?”

“I’d think so!”

He chuckled before turning to her with a smile on his face. “Did you know that your deflect ability has an 8 second cool down time?”

“What?”

“After using your deflect, you can’t use it again for 8 seconds. I knew you had your ability ready and that you’d be able to send it back at me.”

“I… What?” Adagio eventually got her act back together. “I get it. Mr. Goody-Two-Shoes is one of those borderline obsessive gamers, right? That’s why you took charge earlier.”

“Not really. I grew up the oldest of four brothers and as a part of a set of triplets. I grew up having to be observant and that I would need to know how best to get a point across.” He smirked at her and turned to walk off toward the Eastern Point.

Adagio stood a moment before catching up with him. “Wait, so all of that before was just trying to get me to understand the ‘power of friendship’ stuff?” She emphasized with a mocking tone.

“Nope. Everything I said was real. You’ve certainly been frustrating so far. Not to mention that you tried to take over the world by brainwashing all of us… However, I feel it’s possible that even you can turn things around and act like, at minimum, a functioning human being.”

“And to do that, you got me mad to make me try to kill you?”

“Lesson 4: when properly channeled, anger gets stuff done.”

She was taken aback by his use of the word ‘shit.’ She’d heard he couldn’t hurt a fly and never cursed, unlike many in high schools… “Lesson 4?”

“Yep. According to my dad, anyway.”

They kept walking for a while in silence after that and Adagio couldn’t stand it. “What are the other 3 lessons?”

“Pardon?”

“You mentioned other lessons according to your dad. What are the others?”

Flash smiled as he spoke. “Lesson 1: Humanity is inherently incapable of doing everything and must work together to thrive. Lesson 2: Don’t be a jerk. Lesson 3: Always have an ambition, it’ll keep you moving forward. There are other rules, obviously, but those are the first three. If you want, I can get you a written version.”

“Out of curiosity, how many lessons are there?”

“Depends on how you choose to live… It’s weird. Really, though, it all boils down to two big rules. The first is treat others with basic human decency until they give you a reason not to.”

“And the second?” As they spoke, Adagio had slowly moved to be behind Flash. She was still pissed at him for using her to make his point. What’s more, she wanted to be done with this stupid game. She could kill two birds with one stone right now. End the annoying nuisance, let the timer run, and she’d be gone. She slowly and silently readied her shuriken for a swift strike.

“Keep improving, be it mind or body.” Flash stopped a moment and stood in silence.

Adagio halted as well, remaining behind him. She wanted to get this over with, ready to strike and she almost got her chance.

However, he turned around to face her. “Well?”

Adagio quickly hid her weapons, “Well, what?”

“I believe you were about to stab me in the back.”

“What? No, I wasn’t!” A half-lie. Figuratively speaking, that’s exactly what she planned. In a literal sense, she planned to shoot him in the back… sort of.

“Good to hear. I knew you were more the type to look them in the eye. So, go ahead.” He made an x mark over his heart. “Get it over with.”

“What? Why are you…”

“Don’t try to lie to me. I know a lot about you thanks to Aria’s friendship with my bandmate. I know you’re the vindictive type. So, go ahead. Hit me.”

She primed her blades again and raised her arm to end him, but she stalled. Why? Why would she stall now? Why not end the stupid game like she planned? What was stopping her? Something felt off, something in the corner of her eye… She finally got her nerves back and sent the blades flying, only to have them fly passed Flash and into a roaming robot.

Flash turned and smiled. “Nice shot.”

Adagio, however, was confused. The blades were too precise in the robot to be a mistaken miss. She had aimed at Flash, hadn’t she?

“Come on. Let’s keep moving.”

As they walked, Adagio was left to her own thoughts. She couldn’t make sense of what just happened. However, she didn’t really have the time to think about it.

They soon arrived at the eastern point. The point was overrun by bots when they arrived. They saw Vinyl, currently invisible to her enemies, running through them to reach their center. She jumped, became visible, and unleashed a powerful EMP, shutting down the robot attackers. After that, they saw Fluttershy jump down from a balcony.

She spun around, shooting around herself and decimating the robotic presence shouting, “Die! Die!! DIE!!!”

Flash and Adagio were frozen in shock at what they had witnessed. The first to gather themselves was Flash, “Huh… Would you look at that. Teamwork.”

Adagio still couldn’t believe what she had seen the past few minutes, and that would leave her with things to think about.

\/

Round 5: commencing…

The team had made their way to the last round before they technically won the game. They just needed to beat one last mission.

Standby for details… A large energy spike was detected nearby. Investigate the situation.

With their mission set, they made for the site. Adagio took the forward position, defeating more than a few robots, but never strayed too far from the group should something happen. They eventually arrived and found a large device in the center of the area.

“The heck is that thing?” Adagio destroyed another robot as she asked.

Scanning…

“Guess we’ll find out.” Flash said as he healed Vinyl’s injuries.

Shit! Device is nuclear! Repeat! DEVICE IS NUCLEAR!

“What?!”

Defuse the device immediately!

“Vinyl!”

Vinyl quickly moved next to the device and started to hack into the core to defuse the bomb. As she did, the others made sure she stayed safe. The robots were starting to decrease in numbers. However, to compensate, their robotic soldiers started to come in equipped with grenade launchers. The group did what they could to fight back without Vinyl’s help. They took sustained damage throughout the fight. Flash had to use his revival ability and ultimate to keep them all alive during it all. They repelled the robotic threat and were able to breath calmly.

One robot, however, was broken, but not defeated. It aimed its launcher and fired two shots. The first was aimed squarely at the healer, Flash Sentry. Before it could hit, before any of them could react, Adagio had jumped between them and deflected the grenade back, ending the robot.

Adagio returned to her usual posture, a bit surprised by her actions. “Teamwork… huh?”

The second shot’s timer could be heard going off. When it ended, all they saw was a bright white light.

\/

All four tumbled out of the simulator as the doors opened.

“What happened?” Flash asked as he stood.

“Well…” Grimoire rewound the events on screen to show the second grenade wedging behind the device, setting it off when it exploded. “The device was compromised and detonated. The city was decimated, and all four operatives were killed in the explosion. Mission failed.”

“Crap…” Flash hung his head a bit hearing that. Taking in a deep breath, he sighed. “This was fun, but I need to go. I’ll see you guys around.” He waved and left the tent.

Adagio followed him to the exit, “I didn’t plan to stick around either. If we win, give my prize to Sonata.”

Sonata was confused for a bit given what she just heard. “Adagio?”

Adagio left the tent to find Flash making his way to the school building. She followed him and tapped his shoulder. “I have something I have to ask you.”

Flash took out his phone as he spoke, “No you don’t.”

“Pardon?”

“You have something to ask Flash. Here’s the reveal: I’m not Flash.”

Adagio raised an eyebrow. “Seriously? You expect me to believe that?”

“Remember the triplet remark? My name is Grey Hat, the middle triplet. Flash has had a lot on his plate the past couple of days but didn’t want to say no to the invite given the reasoning. He wanted to help, and I had nothing better to do. So, I took his place for the game. Even had to shave my goatee for that…”

“Your brother means that much to you?”

“Well, no shit. That’s family. Also,” he sighed, “that false outburst thing from before is something he would do to get a point across. He could get Bastian and I to do whatever he asks of us… Now, is there a reason you’re following me around? The truth is revealed. You can go now.”

“I still have questions.”

“Seems more like a thing for that Grimoire guy, doesn’t it?”

“I want to know how no one noticed you weren’t Flash and how you knew so much about us.”

“No one noticed because I know my brother very well. As for the other part…” He looked at this phone, “… Adagio Dazzle. No known criminal record. No established home region. Not much information until recent events of a Canterlot High Battle of the Bands. You live six blocks from here with your former band members Sonata Dusk and Aria Blaze.”

“Okay… And why do you know that? You a stalker?”

“No. You leave a lot of information on your phone. I simply grabbed it from there.”

“You’re a hacker?”

“A damn good one, too. Now, I need to find Flash so I can go home…” He opened the doors to the auditorium and looked around, simultaneously dialing something on his phone.

Honey, what ‘cha waiting for? Welcome to my candy store~

“There he is.” Grey made his way to a sleeping Flash, slouched to be invisible from the entrance.

“That sounded familiar…” Adagio tried to remember the tune. It was somewhere in the back of her mind, but couldn’t place it in that moment.

Flash yawned as he stood back up, addressing his brother, “How was the game?”

“Interesting,” Grey adjusted his hair to a style more his own and handed Flash his signature jacket. “By the way, acting like you got us a fan girl.”

Flash drowsily looked to the subject in question. “Adagio Dazzle, right?”

“Yes. It’s… Oh! Now I remember! Candy Store!”

“Pardon?”

“Your ringtone.”

“Oh, that. I didn’t think anyone else at this school knew that song.”

Grey rolled his eyes. He knew how this went. Flash could discuss performance for a long time and the new face seemed to be in a similar boat. After about ten minutes of discussing performances and music, Grey decided to sit back and listen to music instead of their conversation. Grey sat back in a nearby chair, put in his ear buds, and let the time fly.