Love of the Draw.

by Zoom zoom

In which Trixie makes a challenge

Ponyvile was in frenzy. Most of the town was scrambling for cards from all over the stores. Any that were not participating were also packing to leave for the weekend. So no matter what every pony was buying something for some purpose and that made the economy rise, so the Mayor had more money to use for her public services.

“Not even the end of registration and already we have enough to cover the costs of keeping everything running,” mused the Mayor.

“Of course,” said her guest, “Trixie knows what she’s doing. And she trusts that princess Luna knows what she is doing. She will be here tomorrow to begin hosting the tournament so Trixie can focus on winning.”

“Winning?”

“Do you doubt The Great and Powerful Trixie’s skills?”

“No,” said the Mayor simply, “I don’t even know how to play that game so it would be foolish for me to assume how good you are at it. But I do wonder how this event will get Luna back in everypony’s good graces.”

“Perhaps you as a non immortal leader don’t understand the concept of a very long game then,” said Trixie a little mad her friend was being insulted. “Luna wishes to make favor with the children of Equestria. That way less will be afraid of her as time passes instead of just trying to win over older ponies who went their entire life without even hearing about her as anything more than their nightmares.”

“Oh I know the tactic,” said the Mayor, “I just don’t think the princess is prepared for such interactions just yet after so long on the moon. It has only been two years after all, and she still has not altered her speech patterns since her last visit to Ponyville. Keep an eye out for her while you’re playing is what I will warn you Trixie. This will be the first big event she will be hosting without her sister in a long time and I’ll be too busy to assist her.”

“Busy with what?”

“You’ll see. For now I have to finish preparations so it will be all set for your little tournament.” And with that the Mayor left Trixie alone to ponder what to do next.

Later that afternoon, Trixie finished sorting out her deck. She had done a test drive of the previous one and lost due to putting in too many powerful cards. It appeared that her weakness was the inexperience in actually playing this card game. Even if she had the most famous powerful cards from the game thanks to her own skills, but it appeared if she wasn’t used to how to balance out this deck she would need to get her own abilities set.

“You,” Trixie called out the window to a pre-teen grey colt with flame colored hair, “Trixie wishes to use you for a practice match for the event. Get over here please.” The colt agreed with a shrug and brought his deck with him in little time.

Trixie showed him into her guest chamber the Mayor had set up for her. It wasn’t as big as the other rooms in the house, but my most standards it was better than the best motel in ponyville minus the room service so that was a plus. The two ponies sat on each side of a table by the door. Trixie set up all her materials, but the colt stared at her as he shuffled his cards with his magic.

“Uneasy about your own deck I see,” stated the colt as he placed his deck down. Before Trixie could answer he offered a hoof out, “I already agreed to help you out. After all that boasting it wouldn’t due to have co-host to be so weak as to lose in the first rounds of this thing.”

“Weak?” Trixie help back her urges to punch the colt and laid her own deck on the table in front of them. “I’ll show you weak child. The Great and Powerful Trixie will win a duel against you and then you will tell me how to improve this deck.”

The colt rolled his eyes, “Sure. The name is Cog by the way, nice to meet you.” Trixie shook the outstretched hoof and the Duel began.

“You go first,” said Trixie. Her horn glow with the power of the magic she radiated into the room.

“Very well,” replied the pre-teen. Despite how he shuffled his deck he still held his cards in his hooves unlike his opponent. “I’ll start with a set monster in the front row and two face down cards in my back row. I end my turn.”

The cards however suddenly glow as he said that.

“Okay, Trixie’s turn.” Said his opponent, “Trixie starts by playing Card of Consonance, so by discarding Trixie’s The White Stone of Legend Trixie gets to draw two cards. Then Trixie will summon Kaibaman and use his effect to summon one of Trixie’s strongest cards that comes to Trixie's hand by White Stone's effect: Blue Eyes White Dragon.”

At her words the card had a white glow and something appeared above it. It looked like the monster image had crawled right out of the card. Cog stared in wonder at it and Trixie smiled. “You didn’t think Trixie would organize such a game to take place all over town unless she could make it interesting to watch did you? Though this is just a sneak peek, Trixie doesn’t feel like she should need to bother using up so much of her precious energy to make it scale.”

“Oh you gotta teach me how do to that,” said the boy excited.

“Another time perhaps, now my Dragon attacks your set monster.”

“Fine,” said Cog, “It was Heavy Mech Support Platform.” The card suddenly burst into shards of light and reappeared in the graveyard zone face up. “Oh now that is just too cool.”

“Glad you enjoyed it. Trixie sets one card face down on her back row and ends her turn.”

“Wait,” said Cog suddenly remembering the duel, “first I activate my other trap: Stronghold the Moving Fortress. This trap becomes a monster on my field with 0 attack and 2000 defense, and then it’s my draw. So I summon Yellow Gadget, its effect brings Green Gadget to my hand. Then I activate my trap: Ultimate Offering. So I pay 500 life points to summon another monster. Green Gadget, this card’s effect is to bring Red Gadget to my hand. So I pay again to summon my Red Gadget to the field which puts another Yellow Gadget in my hand. Then I switch Stronghold to attack mode.”

“But why-“ Trixie began.

“As long as I have all three Gadgets, Stronghold has 3000 Attack Points instead of 0. So now I attack your Blue Eyes with my Stronghold which destroys them both. Then I attack you with each of my gadgets directly. With that I end my turn.”

“Darn. How could Trixie lose so many points so fast?”

“Probably cause you didn’t have a trap that could stop me. Mirror Force is fairly common these days and that would have gotten me stuck if you had that. Heck it’s even in the starter deck now.”

Trixie made a note about actually buying a deck before the stores ran out.

“Very well, now it is Trixie’s turn.” She pondered what to do for a moment before finally blinking and remembering to draw. “Silly of Trixie, oh thank Celestia, play my White Dragon Ritual spell and use my second Blue Eyes White Dragon as the cost. Then Trixie will sacrifice the Paladin of White Dragon that brings out to bring forth the final Blue-eyes in Trixies deck. Then Trixie plays Dragon’s Mirror, which lets Trixie remove all three Blue-eyes from the grave and field out of play to fuse them into Blue-eyes Ultimate Dragon.”

“Now, Ultimate Dragon attack his Red Gadget. And with that Trixie is done for now.”

“Wow good move,” complimented her opponent. You’re in no short supply of knowing how to play your cards well.”

“Of course,” said the blue unicorn smugly, “Trixie is nothing if not the best at knowing how to use what she has to her advantage. Why she had Twilight Sparkle crying in sheer joy at feeling the great powers of Trixie overtaking her.”

Cog just stayed silent as the realization of what she let slip hit her before just saying with a dead pan, “Did not need to know that thank you.”

“Whatever,” said Trixie blushing.

Cog drew. “I set this card face down and switch my gadgets to defense with one card in the spell/trap zone face down.”

“Very well, then Trixie’s Ultimate Dragon will attack your Green Gadget. And she ends her turn.”

“Alright, I didn’t want to do this but I summon my second Yellow Gadget and activate my trap: Torrential Tribute. This destroys all the monsters on the field when one is summoned. Then by paying 500 points I summon my Ancient Gear Soldier.”

“And when he attacks you can’t stop it with a trap until after he finishes. Then I play Ancient Gear Fist and equip it to my solider as a precaution so that if you do summon a monster that can destroy it, it goes away as well leaving you wide open again. Solider attacks your life points directly. And I end my turn.”

Trixie didn’t grimace this time. In fact she smiled. “Well there does come a time when a final trick has to be played.”

Cog was confused until Trixie flipped the face down card she had since the start of the Duel: Call of the Haunted. This allowed Trixie to bring back her Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon in attack mode. No words were spoken for a bit as Trixie did a little dance as she picked up her cards.

“Well it appears you just need to focus more on your deck basics if you didn’t know about Mirror Force,” Cog said simply. He had long since calculated he’d lose because of his own deck faults. “But outside that you should at least be able to handle yourself well in this tournament. Looks like I gotta get some better cards too. I will ask one question though.”

Trixie raised an eyebrow at the child. “And that would be?”

“Why didn’t you play call of the haunted when I was attacking with my gadgets? You could have stopped all my attacks and it makes even more sense since you had no way to summon that Ultimate Dragon till you got that ritual card.”

“Trixie simply wanted to pull her best move for last is all.”

“But,” Cog added, “If I had a way to destroy that card at all you would have lost. I take back what I said about you knowing how to use your cards. I think you need to practice more before this starts, but against different decks since I’m not about to let you know all of my cards if I’m going to make it to the finals.”

Trixie wasn’t angry with the boy as she would have been before. Instead she found it a good challenge. However the boy was right. She needed practice with this deck, lucky her she new two other colts that would still do anything she said with the right incentive.

Draw Blank let out a long breath. It was the middle of the night now and thanks to Applejack he was able to sleep with her and Applebloom in the caboose. After an evening of playing all kinds of games he had and laughing with the two he had gotten more than he bargained for his assistance.

Still he couldn’t sleep. Despite having likely the best bed he had in months something picked on the back of his head. That laughing he heard whenever he was near Applejack. It had not happened since he found the Chaos Greed card. That bothered him more than anything. He was looking at it harshly along with the rest of his learning deck. No other cards had appeared, it was still the game minimum of 40 cards to a deck with one of each of the three card types for his extra deck. He needed sleep so he set aside the cards.

The small snores of his roommates for the trip caught his attention to them. In the moonlight the sisters snuggled up with each other for warmth. Draw felt bad about this, the Apples had given him Applejack’s futon and blanket to use so the two had to share the remaining.

“Having family must be nice,” Draw thought. “No matter how low your life gets, someone will always have your back. I have to repay them for what they’ve done for me somehow. But I can’t do that until I have some capital and my own life isn’t so rocky. Sort of wish they were family, then I wouldn’t have this feeling I suppose.”

He watched them sleep a bit longer. It calmed him a bit and he was starting to fall back to sleep when a shadow past over Applejack’s face. Blinking back his sleep, Draw’s eyes darted to the outside. His ears perked up and he could hear it. Something or someone was crawling around on the top of the car. That much was obvious.

Draw got up to look out the window. As soon as he did a pair of claws grabbed his head. Luckily he was still mostly in the car so he bucked the side and called out for some help. The claws pulled and him and his skull until he finally gave in and was pulled to the roof of the car.

“Who is he?” asked one of the three figures on the roof. The other two had pinned him to the ground, each holding two limbs.

“He’s the one with the cards,” said one of them.

“Yes the rare and valuable cards,” said the last.

Finally looking up, Draw could see what he was dealing with. Three Diamond Dogs stared down at him. “You sure you got the right guy? I can barely afford tickets on this train. Why would I keep any rare cards if I needed to eat?”

A fourth dog came into view holding Draw’s saddle bags. His eyes widened. Everything draw owned, including his last two bits, was in that bag. His body went into auto-pilot at this trigger. Living his life barely in means meant he had been mugged a lot, until he taught himself how to get out of holds so he could run. Granted he couldn’t actually fight these dogs, but they were not expecting him to flip the two holding him off enough so they were hanging off the sides.

This distracted the other two long enough for him to buck the bags out of the dog’s hand and run for the end of the train as he grabbed his loot. He wasn’t exactly fit so it didn’t take long for even that to take its toll, but adrenaline was covering that for now as he opened the caboose’s door and rushed in, closing the door behind him. Applejack met his face and he turned to continue galloping. “What’s going on?”

“Quite simply,” said the green stallion, “thieves. Grab Applebloom, we have to get to the train security.” Applejack nodded and the two rushed back to the main part of the car to pick up Applebloom.

Unfortunately these dogs were smarter than they looked. Two of them had chased Draw behind, but the other two had broken back into the train, one holding down Applebloom by the neck while the other was searching for more valuables. Applejack rushed her sister’s capture and bucked his teeth in while Draw galloped ahead to open the next compartment door so they could get through. That’s where he met yet another Diamond Dog, one so large his was able to pin Draw with one of his massive paws.

The other three dogs, the fourth one still holding his maw from Applejack’s powerful buck, wrestled with the two mares. Applejack was strong, but with three of them and trying to protect Applebloom she was taken down in due time.

“What happened to him?” asked the largest dog.

“Pony kicked me,” replied the fractured jawed dog. Only it came out more like “Aaarrreaa.”

“You’re welcome,” said Applejack with a grin.

After some struggling Draw was met with the light of candles and scent of wax as the room was lit up to the best it could be. The Apple sisters were in front of him with the four dogs with knives to their throats. The largest dog got off him so he could turn to look at Draw. “Get your deck out pony. We will take your cards after winning.”

Draw looked at him confused, “can’t you just take my deck and leave? Heck with this set up even if I wanted to fight you I couldn’t.”

“What pony said is true,” replied the large dog. “Grumble, would have done so if not ordered by master to duel you up there.” He pointed to the roof.

“You gotta be kidding,” said Draw getting his bearings again. “Even if I agreed to this moronic idea, our cards would just fly off. What idiot would challenge anyone to duel on a moving train’s hood?”

The large dog snapped his fingers and the blades came closer to the Apple sisters’ necks. Applebloom let out a cry as the blade nearly brushed her skin.

“Stop,” called out the stallion, “I never said I didn’t agree to this. If you let them go I agree to do this duel.”

“Better yet,” said Grumble, “We release small pony. If you win duel then muscle pony is free to go and we leave. You lose and we get your deck and muscle pony stays ours to use for labor.”

Draw didn’t have many options, “agreed then. Now release Applebloom.” They did as he said and pushed Applebloom away from her sister as she tried to run up to her.

“Follow,” they told Draw Blank as they backed up holding Applejack.

Applebloom looked worried, but Draw Blank patted her head. “Get the security. I’ll keep them busy with this game. Then no matter what happens you grab Applejack and I’ll run for it when they show.” The filly understood and nodded as she rushed out to the front of the train.

Draw Blank came out to the roof of the caboose with is deck. It was his real deck since he couldn’t risk losing too soon. After making sure the dogs were all in his view and aimed for the rest of the train, which seemed odd they would listen to him he sat down. “So how exactly to you plan on us doing this without our cards flying off?”

In response, Grumble stood and used himself as a wall to block the winds from most directions. As he did so he dropped a black orb he kept in his vest pocket. It grew with magical energy as he tossed it between him and Draw.

One of the other dogs, came to meet him with his own deck. Under the glow of the black orb's aura the cards stuck as if there was no wind. “Tornic will duel you for your cards.”

“Whatever,” Draw said trying to act as calm as he could with one of his newest friends having a knife at her throat. He placed his own deck down. Slowly releasing it to his amazement there was no wind so long as he was in the black aura's field.

“DUEL”

“I go first,” said the dog picking his five cards. He drew and looked at his hand with a malicious grin. “I summon Mad Dog of Darkness in Attack Mode.”

The monster card seemed to leap out of the card again but it was as big as Tornic. Applejack’s eyes darted from the monster to the Diamond dog. “What the heck is going on? How can the card come to life like that?”

“It doesn’t,” replied Draw Blank simply holding his five cards to the ground along with his deck to keep them from blowing in the wind. Then when he noticed there was no wind around the cards he released them and looked at his friend. “This is fairly common in my circle. Unicorn fans love using illusion magic to make it look real. I don’t know how but I’m guessing this dog’s little orb is what is doing this and keeping my cards from being blown in the wind.”

“Master gave it to us,” said Tornic simply, “especially for facing you.”

“I’m flattered,” said Draw trying to keep up the calm demeanor with a smirk. It twitched a little too much and his eyes kept darting back to Applejack to make sure she was safe. “Are you done with your turn?”

“Not yet,” said the dog. “I set two cards face down and end my turn.”

“Fine then,” replied Draw doing his namesake. “I set one monster in defense mode and one card face down in my back row, your turn.”

The dog drew his card and laughed. “I play the spell card: Cold Wave. This makes it so neither of us can play nor set spell cards or traps until my next turn. So I don’t have to worry about pony playing trap on me. Now, my Mad Dog attacks his face down monster.”

“You must be fairly new to this,” said Draw darting his eyes back to the game. “Effect monsters can be used as traps if used right. The monster you attacked is my Penguin Solider.”

“And when he is flipped, such as when you attacked him and sent him to the graveyard zone, I get to send up to two monsters on your side of the field back to your hand. So since you only have one I think he can go back to your hand. Plus since my knight was in defense mode I didn’t take any damage from your attack. All in all a good move for me.”

Tornic Growled. “I will summon my Mad Dog of Darkness back in Attack Mode again.”

“Then my turn,” Draw replied. “I set another monster in defense mode and end my turn.”

“Is Tornic’s cards so good pony can only defend?” The question was a decent one, but one Draw rose on purpose. He had to make this game take as long as possible. He could have taken out that monster easily on his turn, but he couldn’t be sure the beast had a way to come back yet.

The Dog’s wide grin grew more so with his next card. “I play the spell: Big Bang Shot. This is a Spell that equips to my Mad Dog. Raising his attack by 400 points to 2300 and giving him a powerful effect. Unlike last time, even if your monster is in defense mode the difference between that and my monster’s attack comes out of your life points. Then I summon Guard Dog in Attack mode.”

“And now my Mad Dog of Darkness, destroy his defense monster!”

“I have a trap,” Draw called out. “Mirror Force, this trap reflex your attack to destroy both of your dogs.”

“Not so fast,” said Tornic with a grin, “I have one of my own. I chain my Seven Tools of the Bandit. By playing 1000 life points I negate and destroy your Mirror Force.”

“Crap.”

“Indeed, it appears Pony needs refresher, now Mad Dog of Darkness finishes his attack.”

The set monster was destroyed. Draw wasn’t sure how to react, “the monster you killed was my Witch of the Black Forest. This card lets me bring any card I want with 1500 or less defense to my hand. And I choose my Goblin Attack Force.”

“A lot of good it does pony right now. Mad Dog still does 1100 points in damage to you.”

The dog’s tail smacked into Draw Blank, usually this was just symbolical for effect, so one could imagine the shock when he felt like he was punched in the face. Draw Blank was pushed back by the shock until the back of his head hit the ladder on the back of the caboose. “What the-“

“And next,” Tornic continued, “Guard Dog attacks you directly.” The beast pounced on Draw and bit into his shoulder. White hot pain shot through his limb as it did. “Then I end my turn.”

Drawn Blank struggled to balance himself again. His limb wasn’t bleeding but it still stung as if he had been bitten and red dots where teeth marks would have been. He couldn’t stand on it but it could still hold his cards. “What the heck was that?”

“Oh, forgot.” This time it came from Grumble. “Master said this orb will make you both feel the attacks. And the loser will have their soul drained into orb or something.”

“Seriously,” said Draw in disbelief, “it’s a filly’s card game. Who takes it this far?”

“Our master does,” said the Diamond Dog with the knife to Applejack’s throat. A small trickle of red ran down the knife. Applejack winced in pain. “And I suggest you do as well or you’re going to lose both yourself and your friend here.”