//------------------------------//
// Your world exists only to burn 
// Story: The Equestrian Card Wars of 2013 
// by Daedalus Aegle 
//------------------------------//

	"So, um, I play Pacifism on your dragon. If that's okay with you, I mean."

Rainbow Dash was lying flat on her stomach on the floor of Fluttershy's cottage, her eyes drooping with boredom and disbelief in the face of her friend's green-white deck. They had been playing for two hours, and had yet to get through one game. She turned to look at the notepad paper where their life totals were recorded in two columns. Rainbow Dash's column had one number: 20. Fluttershy's column reached almost down to the bottom of the paper, every number but the last having been crossed out with pencil. That last number read: 149.

"And then, um, I cast Angel's Mercy and get seven life." She picked up her pencil and crossed out the 149, and wrote 156 beneath it.

"Fluttershy..." Dash said with a growl. "Are you going to actually attack me, like, ever?"

Fluttershy bit her lip nervously. "But... I don't want to hurt anypony."

Rainbow Dash sighed. "Nevermind."

"It's your turn again now," Fluttershy said.

Rainbow dash drew a card from her deck. Her all-red, super-aggressive deck filled with hard-hitting flying creatures and powerful fire spells. She looked at the card. It was a Mountain. She put it into play alongside the fourteen others, that were not doing her any good since she had long since used up all the cards in her hand.

She looked down at the cards laid out before her. Her fleet of vicious fire-breathing reptilian killers, who had ravaged their way across Domineighria, Whinnystrad, Mareodin and Ravnicolt, had apparently met their match in the form of one of Fluttershy's tea parties. Dash had no less than seven mighty elder dragons in play, each capable of destroying whole armies on their own. Each of the red cards had a white card lying on top of it. Two of them were enchanted with Pacifism (enchanted creature can't attack or block), two with Faith's Fetters, (enchanted creature can't attack, block or use special abilities), and three with Recumbent Bliss (enchanted creature can't attack or block, and Recumbent Bliss's owner gets 1 life at the start of her turn).

"I can't do anything," Rainbow Dash said mechanically, for the fifth turn in a row. "Your turn."

"Oh, okay, let me see, I get three life from Recumbent Bliss..." Fluttershy began counting up the various cards she had in play that gave her more life at the start of every turn. Rainbow Dash tuned her out. It wouldn't be quite so annoying if it didn't take her so long every single turn. Turned out math wasn't Fluttershy's strongest point.

"And then two from Ajani's Mantra, so that's fourteen." She crossed out the 156 and wrote 170 beneath it. "Okay, so my turn starts, and then I play Solarian Infusion for seven, and I use both green and white mana so I get fourteen life." She crossed out the 170 and wrote 184.

"Are you going to attack me?" Dash asked impatiently.

"Oh, um, not this time..." Fluttershy said, her voice shrinking. "You can have your turn now."

Dash drew a card, and smiled. Finally something she could use. She flipped six of her Mountain-cards on their side. "I play a Volcanic Dragon. It attacks you! Four damage." Great, she thought. Now I just need to do that another... her mind froze. Math wasn't her strong side either. ...lots of times.

"I play Fog. It, uh, prevents all combat damage this turn."

Dash banged her head against the floor. "...Your turn." She focused on the pain in her forehead to drown out the sound of Fluttershy's calculating.

"So that's fourteen again, so now I'm at 198. And, um, I play another Pacifism on your dragon."

The cottage filled with the rhythmic pounding of Dash's forehead on the floor.