//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: Games Chaos Plays // Story: Lost in the City of Lights // by ShobieShy //------------------------------// “Rise and shine, Casey!” are the words that awake me as I feel a large amount of water being dumped on me. My eyes shoot open and I roll off of my bed in surprise. I look up to see a floating bucket and a smiling Discord. I lay face down on the floor and groan. “Literally why the fuck did you do that, Discord?” I ask in irritation, voice muffled by the floor. The draconequus ignores my irritation and snaps the bucket away as well as the water in my bed and clothes, drying both. “It’s morning, and I didn’t want you to sleep in too much.” He says. I look up to the window and see nothing but blackness and the demonic cousin of Aurora Borealis. “Wha- oh right…” I sit up and face the draconequus. “I assume this place doesn’t have morning?” “Please, day and night cycles are so boring!” Discord says, waving his claw. I sigh, then chuckle a bit. “Alright, well, I don’t have anything to do today. So, why’d you wake me up?” “On the contrary, Casey!” Discord says. He snaps his paw and we both teleport to the living room. “I’ve got plans for us today!” Confused, I look up to him. “Why would you of all people have plans?” “Who says the Spirit of Chaos can’t have plans?” Discord asks, feigning offence. I look up at him and cross my arms. “Literally the title?” I ask rhetorically. “Seriously, what’s up?” “Well, uh,” Discord starts, “Fluttershy told me the best way to make friends was to, uh...” He shifts around a bit. “Do things together?” he finishes with an unsure smile. I take a moment to think. “Uh, alright I guess.” I say. “I’m in. What’s the plan?” “Bowling!” He shouts excitedly. “Bowling?” I ask, surprised at the seemingly normal activity. “Regular bowling?” He scoffs. “Of course not regular bowling. We’re going to play Chaos Bowling! It’s an invention of mine that I like to play with Fluttershy sometimes when she comes over for our tea parties.” Okay, if I’m being honest, that really does sound like fun. I nod in understanding. “Alright, I’m interested. How does it work?” Discord’s smile grows. “Oh wonderful!” he exclaims, clapping his paw and claw together. “So it works like this,” He snaps his claw and, after a quick flash of light that temporarily blinded me, we were standing on a small-ish, grassy floating island outside his house. The oval shaped island is about fifty feet long and twenty feet wide and has what I immediately recognized as a bowling lane starting at the center and extending to the end of the island. It has the arrows and everything. I notice a shimmering red ring hovering slightly above my eye level about another thirty feet past the end of the lane. Inside the ring there are ten bowling pins, but they appear to be shifting, moving, and bending. In the space between the pins and the edge of the island, there are pink clouds spinning around, creating a large kind of cylinder leading to the pins. Every now and then one of the clouds would cross from one side of the cylinder to the other. Overall, it’s very neat looking, but leaves me confused. “Alright, rule number one,” Discord starts as glasses appear on his face and a chalkboard appears next to him. I wait for a few seconds before his glasses and the chalkboard explode. “There are no rules!” I chuckle slightly. “Makes sense. So how do we play?” Discord smiles then whistles. Then from the ground beside the lane, a tube pops up angled towards us. The tube starts making noise before a blue object flies out of it and flies towards Discord. He catches it and points to the tube. “Here comes yours.” I turn back to the tube and see a red object fly out of it and towards me. “Oh shit!” I exclaim and catch the object with both hands and my chest. It feels like it has a good amount of weight to it, but after the impact, I notice it feels lighter. I take a look at it and saw that it’s some kind of cross between a regular bowling ball and a paper airplane. It had the same marble-like design as a regular bowling ball, but it looked like it ate a paper airplane. I hold it up with one hand and it started to float upwards slowly, as if it’s completely weightless. I look up and notice that Discord’s was the same way, just blue instead of red. Discord steps up the the start of the bowling lane and looks at me. “Now, to play, all you have to do is throw your Bowlane at the pins, avoid the obstacles, and hit as many pins as possible. Like so,” He holds up his ball-plane, which I now know he calls a ‘Bowlane’, and closes one eye to aim it. He even comically sticks his tongue out in concentration. He then begins running down the lane rearing back the limb with the Bowlane in preparation to throw it. He gets about six feet away from the edge before throwing. The thing sails right through the center of the cylinder of pink clouds. But right before it’s about to hit the pins, a cloud drifts from the outside in an attempt to cross. The Bowlane collides with the edge of the cloud and flies off course, just barely scraping the edge of the ring. Discord stomps the ground. “Ponyfeathers!” He turns and walks back over to the start of the lane, his arms crossed in frustration. He whistles again and a blue Bowlane shoots out of the tube. And with a determined look, he catches it and aims quickly before running again and throwing it. It flies straight down the center of the cylinder, taking the same path it took before. The Bowlane makes it halfway down before one of the pink clouds darkens to a nice purple and fires a bolt of lightning, making Discord’s Bowlane explode into shrapnel. Discord looks on in horror as his Bowlane explodes. His face then turns red and stomps the ground again, making the whole island shake slightly. “What the BUCK?! HOW?!” After he calms down, he walks back over to where I was standing. While my mind was telling me to not say anything, the larger part of me decided to do just that. “‘Like so’, huh?” I ask with a smirk on my face. He flashes me a fiery glare before sighing and calming down. “Well let’s see you do better.” He says with an arrogant smirk. He snaps and a giant score sheet along with an equally giant marker appear and hover to the left of the lane. The marker floats over and jots down his score under his name. He then gestures for me to take my turn. “Go on, show me how it’s done.” “Alright, alright.” I say, approaching the lane. I hold the Bowlane as best I can, but it’s really awkward to hold. I eventually settle on holding it from the bottom with both hands and my thumbs reaching towards the back of it. I hold it in front of my face, looking over it with one eye to aim it. Satisfied, I begin running down the lane. I throw the Bowlane with both hands straight down the cylinder, well, mostly straight. It’s veering to the top left a bit. I stand there expecting the same thing that happened to Discord to happen to me, only for it to not happen. Instead it actually hits one of the outer pins, causing it to explode violently into smaller pins that hit the other pins, causing them to explode at well. Soon I was left with three pins left in the circle. Unfortunately they were all spread apart. But I still hit the pins on my first try, which made me happy considering Discord’s first try wasn’t as fortunate. I walk over to the start of the lane, turn to Discord and give him an arrogant smirk. “Was that better?” I ask in feign confusion. Discord just narrows his eyes before flashing me an evil smirk. “So that’s how it’s gonna be? Well, Casey, you’re on.” He maintains his grin as he uses his claw to whistle, sending my Bowlane at me. I catch it with ease this time. Still smiling, I look up at Discord. “Let the game begin, old man.” Feeling as determined as ever, I raise my Bowlane to take my aim. I glance over to Discord and notice that he’s looking between the five remaining pins, me, and the score sheet. He’s biting his nails, making the pieces fly to the sides comically. I smile at his nervousness. This game is mine I think. My current score is one-hundred-ninety-eight, while his is two-hundred-two. So, while I’m losing right now, if I hit all five of the remaining pins, I win. About halfway through, we were tied, so we decided to make things a bit more interesting. We made a bet that, in hindsight, was probably very stupid of me, but it’s made this game incredibly fun. We bet that whoever loses, would owe the winner a favor that they could cash in at any time. I realize that making such a loose deal with the literal Spirit of Chaos is basically like making a deal with the devil, but I’m feeling cocky. I look back, continue aiming, begin running, and throw. I stand there, watching the red Bowlane sail through the air, heading straight towards the group of five pins as they hover around, warping as if they were stuck inside a funhouse mirror. Just as my hopes start to solidify into certainty, I notice one of the pink clouds fade to purple. The purple lightning strikes my Bowlane, shattering it, as well as my hopes, into thousands of pieces. I just stand there, mouth agape, as I get showered with the Bowlane shrapnel. “Oh fuck… What have I gotten myself into...” I ask silently. I hear Discord celebrating behind me. “YES! I won!” he shouts as he dances in place. “Discord, Lord of Chaos, and champion of Chaos Bowling!” Confetti bursts out from the ground, making it rain various colors across the island. I regain my composure and walk over to the still dancing draconequus. I sigh, ready to get this over with. “Alright, what’s the favor?” Discord looks down at me. “Well, I don’t have to redeem my favor right now, do I?” he asks with a smile. “Well, no… I just thought I’d ask to try to get this over with as quickly as possible.” I answer honestly. “Oh don’t worry, Casey.” He pats my head condescendingly with his paw. “I’ll make sure my favor won’t harm your mortal self.” I give a deadpan expression as he pats my head. “Gee, thanks...” Discord tilts my head up with his talon. “Oh come on, don’t be like that. Let’s go back inside and get some food.” He snaps and again I wince at the light as we’re teleported inside. As I regain my sight, I hear Discord gasp. “Oooh! I have a better idea! Let’s go out for lunch!” I ponder for a second before answering. “Sounds gucci to me,” I say, “Got any place in mind?” Discord taps his chin in thought. “Well, I was going to suggest Sugarcube Corner, but now that I think about it, we’ve got a whole new city to explore!” He pops a brochure into his paw, opens it and begins looking it over. I notice on the front it read ‘Manehattan: A Visitor’s Guide’. “Well, what looks good?” I ask. “Nothing, but that’s to be expected from ponies.” he says as he tosses the brochure behind him. It lands in a trash can that appears right under it before disappearing. “Let’s just walk around and find something. Well, you’ll walk, I’ll just fly. Walking is so overrated.” “Sounds good to me.” I say, “I’m ready whenever you are.” Discord nods and heads towards his front door, throwing it open to reveal a Manehattan sidewalk. I follow behind him as he steps out. As I look around, I notice nearly everypony was looking at us, some with fright, likely at the fact they they’re looking at Discord, while others wore curious expressions. True to his word, he floats up a few feet and lays on his stomach mid air, looking at me. “Lead the way, Casey.” “Alright. I don’t exactly know this city, like, at all. So don’t blame me if we don’t find something immediately.” I say as a disclaimer. “Oh no worries, Casey, I’m sure we’ll find something in this city.” he says, floating up beside me as we begin making our way down the sidewalk. “Are we there yet?” Discord whines as he floats next to me on his back, wearing a sleeping mask. I sigh. “One, I don’t know where we’re going. And two, we’ve only been walking for ten minutes.” “What?!” Discord exclaims, startling a few ponies around us. “It feels like it’s been ten hours!” I look at him with a raised eyebrow. “You don’t wait often, do you?” “Waiting is for ponies who can’t do literally anything!” He says, “I knew I should’ve just made lunch myself. I could really go for a plate of steel and grease nachos, maybe add some iron shavings, no, aluminum shavings...” I just shake my head and continue walking, looking around for a restaurant that catches my attention. Then I see it. A restaurant with a name so punny, I can’t not stop for it. Filli’s. It had a red silhouette of a filly as its logo. It was literally Chilli’s. “There.” I start, pointing at Filli’s. “Found a place.” Discord looks in the direction I’m pointing, squinting his eyes. “There? It doesn’t exactly look high class… Remember Casey, we can go anywhere.” “It reminds me of home.” I answer, not looking away from Filli’s. Discord looks at me confused. “My house?” “No.” “Twilight’s castle?” “No.” “Well now you’ve lost me.” he says, crossing his arms. I turn and look at him in his yellow eyes as he gives me a confused look. “Earth.” I say simply before returning my gaze to the restaurant. “My home.” His eyes widen slightly in realization and he unfolds his arms. “Oh...” We both stay silent for a few seconds until Discord becomes bored and snaps his claw, lifting me up with his magic. “Well, that’s enough moping for now. Let’s go on in and eat, shall we?” I give a sigh then a small smile. “Alright... By the way, I can still walk.” “Yes, yes, of course.” he says, waving his claw, dismissing his magical hold. I land on my feet and we walk through the front door.