//------------------------------// // All aboard the hype train // Story: Prank War! // by Ashfur //------------------------------// Celestia wandered the halls of her castle, looking for her younger sibling and the rest of her closest friends. It had been hours since she had seen them last, and it was beginning to worry her as it was time for Luna to raise the moon and she hadn't yet. Deciding to take a moment, she stopped and turned to one of the bowing guardsmares. "Excuse me, Shimmer Shield. Have you seen Luna, Nick or Twilight anywhere? I fear I have lost track of them." The guard saluted, and replied. "Your majesty, I actually saw them enter the third floor conference room at the start of my shift seven hours ago. They have yet to emerge." Celestia looked at the door in question, one of the next she was planning to check. "...I see. Do you have any idea why they haven't come out yet? There isn't anything in there beyond a table and chairs." Shimmer Shield regretfully shook her head. "No, I can't say for sure. Although I keep hearing what sounds like rolling dice? Does that help at all?" "Yes, and I know what's going on. The new Ogres and Oubliettes expansion came out today. I can't believe I forgot!" Celestia bid farewell to the guard and entered the conference room. She gasped, the place was a mess. Character sheets were scattered all over the room, along with discarded pencil stubs and enough oddly shaped dice to make anypony slip on the floor. Only Twilight would need a 37-sided die, along with every other number of sides from 3 to 100, Celestia thought to herself. Nick, Twilight, and Luna were all laying amid rulebooks and half-painted figurines, each one in different levels of exhaustion. Twilight's eyes were bloodshot from reading her player guide and the new bestiary for the twelfth time. Luna seemed a little dizzy, trying and failing to paint the finer details onto a miniature pegasus assassin. Nick had put in a valiant effort, but lay passed out and drooling using Luna's side as a pillow and holding Spike as a rather jaded, unwilling stuffed animal replacement. Celestia caustiously strode into the room, narrowly avoiding stepping on a d4 and hurting her hooves, and addressed her friends. "I should have known you all would end up like this. Every time there's a new expansion, or whatever you call it, you three barely get any sleep for a whole week running a new campaign!" Twilight didn't even look up. "SSSSHHHH!" "And Luna, you needed to raise the moon an hour ago-" Luna's horn lit. In the span of three seconds the moon rocketed into the sky, placed in the wrong spot with the wrong moon phase and no fanfare in the slightest. The next instant, Celestia found herself teleported back out into the hallway with the door slamming shut behind her. She opened the door, irritated, and trotted back in. "That's it, I'm cutting you all off." Celestia grasped the three loosely in her magic, but almost immediately Twilight turned to her former mentor and literally growled, with bared teeth. Luna whipped her head around as well, and tossed the failed figurine at her sister, nailing her on the muzzle. Nick shuffled in his sleep, mumbling, and pulled Spike closer. Unfortunately, this caused Spike to release a blast of fire in surprise, which not only lit Twilight's tail ablaze, but also sent several dozen failed character sheets to Celestia. Which wouldn't have been a problem unless she dove forward to snuff out the flames on her former student's tail, which cause a huge surge of magic as papers appeared in front of her only to be sent again via the still-burning flames. That massive surge of magic caused a massive explosion of force, sending the group, their reading materials, all the miniatures and dice, and any hope of a peaceful evening flying out the window and into the cold moat below. Nick managed to wake, react, and surface first due to being built for swimming more than ponies were. "What in Tartarus happened? Where the heck am I?" "Noooo! My campaign notes and plotline!" Twilight wailed, having breached into the open air shortly after. "It's all ruined! The books are all RUINED!" "You are safe though, right Twilight?" Celestia sputtered out as she reached the pair. She had taken time to rescue Spike as well. "But, the books!" "WHO DARES PUT OUR MOON IN THE SKY WITHOUT PERMISSION?!" Roared the midnight blue alicorn as she gazed at the night sky. "You did, Luna. You, and Nick, and Twilight were so caught up in your new game that you were all in a sort of trance, and didn't notice." Luna blushed. "Oh. Here, allow us to fix that mistake." With a glow from her horn, the moon corrected itself, and the five friends clambered onto the shore. "Ugh... I guess our hype train derailed, huh Sparky?" Nick asked rhetorically. "I hope you all learned a valuable lesson about taking breaks and not letting a game consume your lives," remarked Celestia. "Of course!" The two ponies and humans replied. "Good, because I was worri-" "Until the next expansion, at least!" The sound of Celestia's immediate facehoof was loud enough to be heard from Ponyville.