Thunder and lightning clouds struck the ground around the mountain of Canterlot city, shrouding it in a cloak of noise and a torrent of rain. Meanwhile, Luna was sipping her favorite cup of coffee in the safety of the castle, in the middle of the day. She stayed up since Alicorns such as herself didn’t really need much sleep due to their universal connections to essence of life. Tia had the stars, mainly Equestria’s own sun, Cadence with her ties to love, and Luna had the moon and the dark matter of space itself. Still, she couldn't have felt more tired than she already was. The day was just being plain sad and depressing.
She stared out the window, which was filled with cloudy rain showers and pegasi flying about, moving the rain clouds into place. Luna, despite being a gamer, wanted to enjoy a relaxing walk in the royal gardens. It wasn’t happening today though. She sighed with resignation as she stared at the document she received today. Something about a hydra stomping through Ponyville. It deemed the resident, Rainbow Dash, to be arrested because a certain cyan pegasus was practicing a ‘Double Sonic Rainboom’ around its home. Or so the perpetrator claims.
Either way, the case was annoying. The Elements of Harmony were there to stop it from causing more destruction. The town was fixed, and the damage was paid for out of her sister’s own wallet. Yet, a certain somepony named Blueblood took this as an excuse to detain one of the ‘ruffians’, as he would call them, and have them locked up.
Luna promptly ripped the paper apart with the Luxury Royal Shredder as she fed the abomination of a document into the gaping maw of the machine. How wonderful.
Well that takes care of that, she cheerfully thought as she sipped some more coffee. Damn, I really wanted to go out today. I was going to go to the game shop after my walk, too. Fall of Cybertron came out a few days ago.
She swiveled her fake leather chair towards her computer and clicked on her Firemare shortcut. She went on her tumblr site to see the multitude of requests from her loyal fans; mainly those from colts, asking her to show off her flank.
Perverted assholes, she thought irritably. She then smugly smiles. Well, I suppose my flank is pretty wonderful. Still, I’m afraid I’ll have to decline their request.
She typed a quick response to one of the fan’s question and posed for a webcam picture to show what emotion she felt about answer the question. She then switched to YouTube where she owned a gaming channel filled with ‘Let’s Plays’ of Minecraft, Portal, and other games.
She had quickly rose to the top among the greats, Youtubers such as The SlyFox, Tobuckus, Hogscast, Uberhaxornova (Chaotic’s favorite, she would know), and most recently alongside with her, Belle Eve.
Luna remembers their first video together. It was a Portal 2 game, where she and Belle argued over who gets to distract the turrets and where to shoot the portal. Pretty fun. Before that, they first met at 2012 E3 convention (Equestria 3ntertainment) when Luna got lost in the crowd from Celestia.
She then went to the program Steam: a popular multi game platform designed by PIPe where several games from PC to console could be downloaded. In Luna’s opinion, it was very convenient as she could enjoy all her favorite games on one computer. Unfortunately, I.P.V wasn’t compatible with computers for some odd reason.
She logged on and browsed through Steam for any recent updates or game sales available to her. She sure did love its game sales. As she scrolled down the list, she found a notice post concerning a new co-op mode in ‘Equestrian Fortress 2’.
Wait, what?
She tapped the mouse button on the link to read more.
‘Pony vs. Machine lets you and five friends fight a lethal horde of robots on new maps, with the opportunity to upgrade abilities and weapons along the way. Go to http://www.equestrianfortress.com/pvm for more information.’
Luna’s wings suddenly had the urge to express joy by springing up into a stiff position. Luna’s mouth hung open as she stared into the single paragraph of words. Equestrian Fortress 2?
Co-Op? Robots? She was sold.
She brought out her iPony and quickly started to make a few calls. Chaotic meanwhile stepped into the room, still wearing the ridiculous maid outfit he was forced to wear a few days ago. His face was wrinkled with exhaustion, and embarrassment.
“Luna, I polished all your Lunar pots. Anything else?” he asked.
“Yeah, go fetch me a sandwich,” she said.
“Ugh! That isn’t cool to say,” he winced.
“Too bad. You snooze, you lose.”
Luna put on her headset and switched her mic on. She adjusted the ear paddings to make them easy on the ears, and lowers her chair height to give her the most comfortable seating position. She checked the lobby to see two players arrive: MagicofSparklez1 and Lovez4All.
“Hey Luna! Glad you could invite me,” Twilight thanked.
“Tis not a problem, Twilight Sparkle,” Luna assured.
“Hold on Twily, my game needs update. Should I accept it?” Cadance asked.
“Um, yes. It allows us to take in access to new weapons,” Twilight explained.
Luna’s headset beeped three more times, announcing the arrival of Lyra, Belle Eve, and Ditzy Doo.
“Hey Luna!” Ditzy said energetically.
“Hey Luna, what’s sup?” Belle Eve greeted.
“Oh. My. Gosh. Are you the real Luna?” Lyra energetically asked.
“Why, yes I am,” Luna said casually.
“OHMYGOSH! I’m playing with the actual princess!” Lyra girlishly squealed. “I played one of your music pieces before, it was amazing! You are an icon in music history!”
Luna blushed a little at the compliment. “Oh, it was nothing my dear. I just like to play the harp every now and then.”
“You created the harp, paving the way for all chordophones!” Lyra said enthusiastically.
“A chordo-what now?” Luna asked.
“You know, string instruments?” she said.
“Oh, that. Well I don’t mean to brag about it, but I suppose I did do a little something-something,” Luna said.
“Ugh, are we gonna play or what princess?” Belle Eve complained.
“Oh, of course, what map do you girls want to play?” she asked.
“Oh! Oh! Can we do the one in the forest with all the buildings?” Ditzy asked.
“Does everypony agree?” Luna said.
She receives a lot of check marks from her teammates, telling her that they would like to.
“Alright then, Ponyworks it is!” Luna chose the designated map and started the match.
The group spawned in a branch of a company building. To Luna, it looked to be the lounge area where employees could relax and eat at lunch time. She confirms this when she spots a coffee maker in the corner.
“Muffins!”
Ditzy, in her engineer uniform, dashes over to the coffee maker and repetitively hits the virtual pastry to simulate her desire to eat it. She makes a noise that sounded somewhere around the lines of ‘Om nom nom’.
“Derpy, no! That muffin is not for you!” Belle Eve insisted.
Belle Eve sports the soldier class as she tries to push Ditzy away from the fake food. However, the grey pegasus’ assertion proved to be a match against Belle’s strength. Twilight donned the demolition pony, with Cadence and Lyra in the medic and the heavy class respectively. Luna herself preferred to use the sniper class.
“Come on girls, we don’t have that much time.” Luna went over to the double doors that she assumed to lead outside. “I could hear the timer clicking already. Let’s set up camp.”
The group spreads themselves throughout the map to cover the even grounds. Cadence and Lyra, the two being the most appropriate pair, set out together to cover the wide main street and the two lanes that lead to the bomb’s target. Ditzy, Twilight, and Belle went to the front lines in hopes to diminish the robo-ponies’ numbers. Luna chose to go solo and camp out in a high setting, where she could view both the left and right lanes. From here, she could easily pick off any stragglers that the front lines have missed.
The announcer started the countdown as each of them took their positions.
5
4
3
2
1
Up from her tower, Luna could see in the distance the blue robot containment mobile base that serves as the spawner for the robo-ponies. A steel horde of clanking robots burst out of its bay doors to meet the opposition. One of them held the enormous bomb on its scrawny back.
“SCOUTS!” Twilight shot off a couple of grenades.
With a satisfying explosion, the group that surrounds the bomb carrier explodes in a mess of nuts and bolts. Luna picked off the robo-ponies that attempted to reach the bomb. With the aid of Ditzy’s mechanized turret and Belle’s explosive rockets, the first group is easily annihilated. Luna didn’t pause though as there was an announcement for an end of the wave. Her predictions came true as she spotted another group of robots rushing towards the bomb.
Twilight shot off a couple more grenades while Ditzy rushed towards the group of soldier robots. The robots launched a couple of their own rockets at the derpy pegasus, but her turret intercepted them in the air, causing the missiles to explode in their owner’s faces. Ditzy took out the rest of them with a couple kicks and hammers. Belle Eve just laid behind the turret line, spamming rockets at the base of the cliff where the robots were jumping from.
“This is too easy,” Belle Eve said. “Do you think that the robots ran out of scrap metal to build more?”
“I doubt that,” Luna said gravely.
From what her teammates couldn’t see, she scouted the next wave of enemies, with a giant soldier robot in their wake.
“Super Soldier!” Luna yelled.
The front lines screamed as the giant robot lands in front of them, picking up the bomb and strolled along, leaving the trio at the mercy of emotionless hunks of metals.
“What in Equestria are you girls doing!? Kill that thing already!” Luna said.
“As you can see here princess, we’re kinda busy with our own problems!” Twilight said, slicing a robot next to her.
“Lyra, we can’t get to the bomb guy! You and Luna will have to take it out with headshots!” Belle Eve blasts a robot off its feet.
“Awww yeah! Time for the mint power horse to slap some bitches!” The minty unicorn revs up her minigun.
Cadance just sighs as she uber charges Lyra for the robots. Luna wasted no time as she continuously sniped the super carrier with a line of bullets. Inch by inch, the super robot’s health goes down at the same pace as its walking speed. Lyra unleashed her own hail of bullets as she attempted to bring down the walking behemoth.
“Damn, it’s just not working!” Lyra shouted. “Derpy! Can you do me a favor!?”
“Yeah?” Ditzy said, bashing a robot behind Twilight.
“This guy has muffins! Tackle him!” she said.
“Muffins? MUFFINS!”
Luna watched in amazement as Ditzy rushes at the robot with impossible speeds, knocking the giant down to the ground, killing it instantly. The wave ends with a blaring alarm.
“Oh my gosh Ditzy, how did you get there so fast?” Luna asked.
“I sprinted,” Ditzy said.
“… But there is no sprint in the game,” Luna cautiously said.
Ditzy nervously fidgeted a little. “Um, well-”
“Doesn’t matter,” Belle Eve heads over to the upgrade station. “We already won. Now for me, I’m gonna get some hype ‘grades.”
Luna, already at the station, picks out a nice rifle that she knew could pierce through multiple targets. She also improves her Jarate to slow her enemies for easy headshots. Finished, she makes way to her camping spot. The round had started yet again as she shifted in her seat to get more comfy. As she did though, Luna’s character fell to the ground in a pool of blood.
“What the BUCK?!” Luna shouted.
The kill camera traveled across the map to reveal the figure of a sniper robot.
“Oh horse apples,” Luna muttered. “Girls! We have a sniper on the map.”
“Oh snap, Luna where is he?” Belle asked.
“Rooftop, second building behind you on your left,” she said.
“Okay, Twilight. Plant some bombs here so I can bounce off them when they explode. I don’t want to waste time shooting a rocket at the ground when I could get sniped in the air.”
“Okay!” Twilight said. She planted a couple a sticky grenades at the base of a wall where Belle Eve indicated.
“Okay, on my mark,” Belle said. She ran towards the grenades and leaped above them. “MARK!”
Twilight immediately pressed the detonator and Belle took off into the air, looking around the rooftops for the sniper. Her target was confirmed as she spotted him… until the sniper quickly killed Belle while she was in mid air.
“Damn it! I had him too,” she pouted as she respawned.
Luna meanwhile spawned back in the office lounge. She went up the tower steps again and aimed her scope over the robot. She took the shot, but entirely missed when her target moved. Luna anticipated the robot’s shot and ducked behind a wall, narrowly dodging what would have been a definite kill shot. She came out of her protection to aim again. This time, the sniper was missing.
“Shit, he’s gone. Lyra can you see him?” Luna said.
“Can’t really, I’m down here.” Lyra looks around. She then spots the sniper jumping between the roof tops in front of her, and on its back was…
“Guys! It has the bomb!” she said.
“WHAT?!” The others all shouted in unison.
“Oh no, that must be the reason why there were no robots spawning,” Twilight said.
Lyra and Cadence attempted to shoot down the sniper bot, but with no such luck, the robot sniped the both of them in succession.
“Shit,” they both said.
They had to give the robot respect though. It pulled off some pretty awesome kill shots.
Luna, however wasn’t going to let some pansy, fake sniper pass her. With all of her reflexive timing behind her hooves, she moves the crosshairs over the head of the bomb carrier. She cracks the bullet shot, and the robo-pony goes down, crashing into a pile of boxes. The girls cheered as the robot goes down, but Luna listened intently for a bull horn or a siren. No such sound came to her ears.
“Girls, we have a problem,” she warned.
“What is it Luna?” Cadence asked.
“The wave didn’t end.”
The group suddenly stepped into silence. Ditzy broke it.
“But Luna! If the wave didn’t end, then where are the robots?” she asked.
Luna looked towards the looming fortress that spawned all the robots. She looked at the bay doors to see something large heading their way.
“Girls, get to the front lines now. This is bad. Very bad.” Luna started shooting at the menace.
“What is it? What do you see?” Twilight asked.
Luna waited for a dramatic pause. Then she yelled at the top of her lungs.
“TAAAANK!”
There was a silent pause for a quick moment, and then the whole group screamed in frenzy as they dashed towards the forest area, attempting to cut it off. The rolling tank wouldn’t seem like it could be affected by sniper rounds, but already Luna had quickly shot 20% of its health bar. It didn’t seem to be slowing down, however as it burst through the wooden wall that serves as an entrance. Ditzy landed onto the tank from a nearby roof with a hammer in hoof. She spamed her mouse button in hopes of bringing it down. Twilight released her round of grenades at the beast.
“Derpy! That isn’t going to work quick enough! You might as well drop the hammer and use your butt instead!” Twilight said.
“How on earth does that work?” Ditzy retorted.
“I don’t know! Just do something!” Twilight yelled back.
“I am!”
“Oh my Faust guys, just shoot the damn tank already!” Belle Eve said, developing a headache.
In the end, despite the entire team’s effort, the tank plowed through all their defenses and imploded the stupidly designed self destruct button in a nuclear explosion. Luna groaned as the base exploded in a fiery death. Luna took a few deep breaths at their loss. She stretched her hooves and then went to the upgrade station to pick something new.
“Ok girls, let’s try that again,” she said, confident that they can beat the game.
Her bedroom door opened as Chaotic came back, magically floating with the requested sandwich. Luna looked at the insides of it, only to find daisies and spiced mustard. It was her favorite snack, but since she lost she needed something else to make her feel better. Teasing her favorite scribe might do the trick.
“I don’t want this, go make me a different sandwich,” she announced, pushing the plate away.
“What?! Then what kind of sandwich do you want?!” Chaotic said.
“I don’t know. Surprise me.”
Chaotic looked at Luna in disbelief, then he stomped his hooves in frustration as he picked up the plate and stormed out the room. Luna smiled a little, feeling a little satisfied… but she also felt kinda bad for doing that to him. She’d make it up to him somehow. But now, the game needed her attention.