//------------------------------//
// Interlude 1: Plucking The Strings 
// Story: Cyber Sam 
// by Golden Flare 
//------------------------------//


Canterlot City Mall - Instrument Store
Samuel's POV






I was waiting in the mall's instrument store for the girls so we could get Rainbow a new guitar, and while I was browsing, I found a relatively new violin on a shelf. I had some time to kill, so I picked it and the bow up to see if I still had it; I used to be quite the violinist before I was pulled here, some people even said I'd give Lindsey Sterling a run for her money...well, almost. But before I could play a note, I saw that the girls had arrived, only without Sunset Shimmer, guess she's either still rebuilding the school's front entrance or she's still wary of us.

"Rainbow Dash, I simply don't understand why you can't just play the guitar you have." Rarity says, only for Rainbow to open her guitar case and reveal that her old guitar is all busted up, making Rarity gasp, "Now I understand."

"How 'bout this one?" Pinkie rushed over with a purple tiger themed guitar.

"No." Rainbow declined.

"Lookie here!" Pinkie then held up a banjo.

"No..."

"Super groovy!" Pinkie showed her a tuba.

"NO, Pinkie."

"Well, whatcha lookin' fer?" Applejack asked her.

"That's the problem!" Rainbow began, "I need something that looks as awesome as I'm gonna make it sound!" she then gasped in awe as she laid her eyes on a red double-necked guitar with a lightning bolts and stars on it, it was almost like love at first sight...or something like that. Rainbow reached out to take it, but someone else had the same idea: Trixie Lulamoon, Canterlot High's resident braggart of a magician, grabbed the other neck, "Hands off my guitar, Trixie!" she ordered as she pulled it to her.

"I touched it first, Rainbow Dash!" Trixie argued, pulling it back.

"Sounds ta me like this is ah makin' fer ah nice, friendly competition." Applejack suggested.

"All right!" Rainbow fist-pumped, "Let's see who plays best!"

"A shred-off?" Trixie smirked.

"Shred ON!" Rainbow declared with determination.

Pinkie handed Rainbow a guitar as Trixie grabbed her own and they did their best to outplay each other, with Rainbow beginning to transform into her half-pegasus form, or as they call it "Pony-Up", and immediately beat Trixie in the shred-off in a blast of rainbow color, like a sonic boom. We all cheered for her as she admired her new transformation surfacing again.

"Check me out!" she said as Vinyl Scratch, the music store clerk, handed Rainbow the double-necked guitar, but she hesitated and looked at the one she was playing, which was now tricked out probably due to her residual magic, "Uhh...she can have it. I think this is the one that REALLY speaks to me." Rainbow decided, nuzzling against the instrument.

Trixie was shocked, but smirked, as she grabbed the double-necked guitar from Vinyl and loudly declared, "The Great and Powerful Trixie ALWAYS wins in the end!!" she then laughed loudly and triumphantly, until we walked past her.

"I doubt it." Rainbow said as she paid for her guitar.

"Hey, 'Braggy McBraggerson'," I nicknamed Trixie, "You might wanna check your 'prize'. Might be out of your price range, hehehe..."

Trixie did so, and saw the price tag was a whopping $12,000, which I SERIOUSLY doubt she can afford.

"Twelve-thousand dollars?!" Trixie shouted in shock and despair, before glaring at us and yelling, "You'll pay for this, Rainbow Dash!!"

Pinkie suddenly came back and said, "No, silly! If you want it, YOU have to pay for it!" she said, cheerfully oblivious as she winked at no one in particular.

As we made our way to our next destination, none of us noticed that my D-Watch chimed back in the store, trying to inform me of a new transformation that added itself into my ever-growing selection collection...