Sunny bounced in place, shaking her orange jersey. She rolled out her neck one more time and looked over at Pipp. “You ready?”
Pipp flapped her wings, which poked through the orange jersey that should have fit her sister. “Ready or not,” she said.
Sunny glanced at Onyx. “How about you?”
Onyx pushed her orange beret back. “Clear skies, grass cut; I’m here to kick some butt,” she affirmed.
Sunny cracked a smile. “Alright. Let’s do this.”
The opening ceremony was about to begin. With a triumphant fanfare, Queen Haven descended to the temporary podium, flanked by Thunder and Zoom, with Hitch in a striped referee sweater behind her. On one side stood Team Orange (Sunny, Pipp, and Onyx) and on the other, Team Purple (Posey, Fifi, and Izzy).
“Welcome, my little ponies,” she began. “I will admit, the thought of holding this game when Princess Zephyrina is being held captive against her will did alarm me. But I realized, we cannot be held captive by fear. This game is meant to celebrate the differences between us, and so this game must go on.” She hesitated. “That said, Sunny, are you quite certain there’s no new information?”
Sunny looked up and flinched. “Um, nothing I’m willing to share,” she said hesitantly, sliding her saddlebag behind her with a rear leg.
Haven’s eyes narrowed. She looked at Thunder and gestured with a wing, and Thunder flew down. Sunny reluctantly relinquished the book, and he flew it up to Haven.
She pulled out her reading glasses. “What we know about Cozy Glow,” she read aloud. Her brow furrowed. “Had a severe misunderstanding of friendship, was never able to make any of her own? Overcompensated for her looks with deliberately cutesy manestyles?” She peered in closer. “She wet the bed until she was 13?”
Sunny chuckled nervously over the crowd’s laughter. “Our current theory is she’s lashing out because she was such a loser in her time.”
Haven sniffed. “Well, that’s enough of that,” she said firmly, shutting the book. “Hitch! Play ball!”
“Yes, ma’am!” He blew his whistle, calling the players to the field.
Pipp let out a pained grunt as she blocked Posey’s shot with her body. For a friendly game, Posey was really going all out.
This forced her to step up her game, and she was dripping in sweat. She tried not to think about how her Pippsqueaks would react seeing her like th-
“I got her sweat on me! I’m never washing my mane again!”
Ok, maybe she didn’t hate it.
After the logo, Dazzle Feather and Skye Silver came into view.
Skye began. “The biggest story this week is, of course, Princess Zipp’s disappearance.”
“We all saw that livestream,” Dazzle said.
“I’m still sleeping with a nightlight,” Skye said. “But in an effort to show unity, the buckball game went on as scheduled.”
“And the Most Valuable Pony? Our very own Pipp Petals.”
The screen showed a montage of Pipp playing defense. Ball after ball bounced off her body.
“Pipp Pipp Hooray indeed,” Sky said.
“She played so well, especially with her sister being taken over by that scummy Cozy Glow. That’s gotta be hard mentally.”
“Have you seen Sage Wisdom’s streaming numbers? Talk about a mass exodus. All that are left are the bots.”
“She’s just not cool anymore.”
With a frustrated roar, the phone was smashed against the ground.
In the dark of the night, a pony going at maximum sneaky slipped through the hallways. She ducked behind a column as a guard passed by, hovered cleanly overhead as a second patrol passed, and darted down the corridor.
She quickly found her target and pressed a hoof against the scanner, and the door opened with a soft hiss.
Carefully, she crept up on the pony in bed. “Guess who? You really should have updated the biometric scans,” she said coolly.
The pony in bed sat up… and lit her horn. “And you should really pay more attention to your surroundings,” Izzy said.
The lights turned on, revealing her friends. “Smile, Cozy,” Pipp said, holding her phone up. “You’re caught in 4k.”
“Aw, you guys are such good friends,” Cozy said, clasping her hooves together. “Was it hard staying awake for me?”
Izzy glanced over at the empty coffee cups on the floor. “No,” she lied.
“And now what? You bring me down and get Zipp back? What’s your plan for that? Wait, wait, don’t tell me. ‘Work together’.”
“Yeah, something like that,” Sunny said.
While Cozy had been talking, the potted plants that had been strategically placed started to glow.
But Cozy Glow had other plans.
While Sunny was focusing on the plant, she dove down, tackling her. In one move, she took off the necklace and jammed it over her head.
Zipp collapsed.
Sunny’s eyes rolled back in her head, and a second later, she stood up, and nonchalantly kicked Zipp off. She rolled her neck out.
And her eyes opened, now darkened to a familiar scarlet.
“How?” Hitch protested.
Cozy-in-Sunny cocked her head, as if dumbfounded. “I just…” She held up the amulet, then dropped it. “You really know nothing. Ruling over you is going to be too easy.” She looked down at herself. “Ugh. Earth pony,” she said disgustedly. “Hold, please.” She closed her eyes, and her ethereal horn and wings exploded into existence. “That’s more like it.”
“Sunny can’t do that,” Izzy said.
“Of course she can’t,” Cozy spat. “You’re all idiots, remember? You’re no match for me.”
“We might not be,” Pipp conceded, “but I think they are.”
Guards burst into the room.
But Cozy-as-Sunny had no desire to come quietly. She started with a rabbit kick behind her, taking out one. As two others swooped in, she vanished her wings, letting herself fall, only to twist in the air, summon them back, and ram into another, taking out two at once.
“She’s outflying them all,” Pipp realized, horrified.
More guards arrived. Cozy smirked and flapped her wings, creating a mass of glitter to disorient and slow them down. Izzy tried clearing it, but Cozy blasted the ceiling, caving it in and trapping her.
Hitch threw an orange in the ground and sprouted a tree, but Cozy was ready. With a burst of magic, she sliced through.
“If you say Sunny can’t do that, I’m castrating you.”
Hitch gulped.
Her voice turned syrupy sweet. “Hey, could you get the door for me, pretty please?” She kicked out with her hind legs, sending him flying with a strength that seemed almost magical in nature. He crashed through the door.
She gave the trapped guards a mocking salute. “Toodles,” she said, and took off.
“No! We’re right back where we started!” Pipp wailed.
A movement behind her made her jump.
“No, we’re not,” Zipp said angrily, having recovered enough to fly. She shook the curls out of her mane and tore out the bow, spread her wings, and took off.
Cozy looked behind her and laughed. “Let’s try spinning, that’s a good trick!” She bored her way through the clouds, gathering lightning that sparked around her. With a casual toss of her head, she unleashed it, clearly expecting to disorient or disable Zipp while leaving herself unharmed.
But Cozy remembered too late that while she could control clouds with magic, it was the innate pegasus magic that protected her against lightning.
Innate pegasus magic that Sunny Starscout the earth pony didn’t have.
So while Zipp did get the shock of her life, so did she, and the two ponies fell to the ground.
Earth pony stamina recovered first. Cozy pushed herself up and neared the downed Zipp. “You…” she panted as her horn glowed and picked up a rock, “are more trouble than you’re worth. And now-”
Clang!
Pipp hovered behind her, holding a frying pan. She quickly snatched the amulet off Sunny’s neck and kicked it aside, then turned to the camera she still held. “Check it out, ponies. Friendship can overcome anything, and we will never let anything or anypony drive us apart. Pipp, Pipp, hooray!” She tapped the screen. “Alright, is that it? Stream ended? Ok. Good.”
And then she collapsed.