//------------------------------// // Chapter Ten: Laughter Ex Machina // Story: Vinyl and Octavia Engage in Roleplay // by DoctorSpectrum //------------------------------// “So I suppose we should roll for initiative then?” asked Octavia. She wasn’t sure whether she was looking forwards to this combat or not – it could be quite fun, as combat was always a nice way to break up some of the monotony of a session, but she had doubts about Natural Twenty fixing his game to be more fun for her and Vinyl, especially in light of how the combat had been last session. And besides, there were much faster and easier ways to get loot than through combat, which she would much rather be doing.   “Unless you have a way to stop the pirates, or at least delay them immediately, then you will certainly have to,” said Natural Twenty.   Octavia frowned as she looked through her character sheet. This would be so much easier if we had acquired more loot by now! Oh, if I had my time-freezing bracelets from that one campaign back in university…   “Can I fly Octavia out?” Vinyl asked, also looking through her character sheet. She didn’t seem to realise that she was holding it upside down.   “That depends,” said Natural Twenty. “Are you planning to fly her to another part of the ship, or are you planning to fly her to someplace else – such as land, for instance?”   “I want to go to a bar,” said Vinyl, grinning at Natural Twenty.   “…Yeeessss,” he said slowly, “but what do you want to do within the roleplay?”   “Uuuhhh…” Vinyl said, frowning as she looked at the game board. Natural Twenty had set up enemy figurines on the board as he had announced the presence of the pirates. From the looks of the board, Vinyl and Octavia were not in a good position.   “You know, you totally weren’t meant to escape the crate when you did,” he pointed out, beaming. “I was hoping that you two would escape at night when they were all asleep, or when they docked at the nearest island and half of them went out exploring.”   We could have had the pirates explore the island, find whatever treasure or loot there is, and then steal it from the cargo hold, thought Octavia to herself, staring blankly at the table in thought. Confound it! Why didn’t we wait longer? See, this is why I need the time-freezing bracelets – there was that one time when we were stuck inside that volcano, so Double Bass used an arcana check to modify the magic of them so that we could turn back time instead, thus-   “Um, Octavia?” asked Natural Twenty, interrupting her inner monologue. “Are you still with us?”   “Are there any time-freezing bracelets nearby?” Octavia asked, still staring blankly at the table.   “What?...Oh, those things,” said Natural Twenty. “I remember those. They were super-silly.”   “Do we see any lying around?” Octavia asked.   Natural Twenty grimaced. “Maybe I’ll throw them in the campaign later, but for now you’re stuck without them,” he said. “Anyway, are you two fighting the pirates or not?”   “What do you say, Vinyl?” Octavia turned to her lover, who was grinning at the board. “Do you have any plans? Are you going to fly me somewhere else?”   “Nah, there are no decent bars around here,” Vinyl replied. “Well, there’s that one good one, but the bartender there hates us, remember?”   “…No, I meant what do you want to do with me in the roleplay,” said Octavia, rolling her eyes.   “Oh. Oh, I want to have sex with you!” said Vinyl, her grin broadening.   Octavia frowned. “You seem to have sex on the brain quite a lot recently.” In response, Vinyl shrugged.   “Sex is fun, alright? Can you blame me for wanting some?”   “Then why won’t you just hurry up and do it with me rather than being all talk, no action?” Octavia muttered under her breath.   “Sorry? Didn’t quite catch that.”   “I said that I’d rather we don’t have to fight these pirates,” said Octavia, smiling warmly at Vinyl. “Now, are you going to fly me away, or shall we stay and fight? We have spent far too long on this decision.”   “I dunno if I can, y’know, carry you all the way to land or whatever,” said Vinyl, flipping through her character sheet once more as she spoke. “I mean, I – hey, what’s this? Element of Laughter?”   In unison, both Octavia and Natural Twenty bit their lips. “That- that is…” began Octavia.   “It’s an…interesting…mechanism,” said Natural Twenty. “Let’s just say that there’s a reason both Octavia and I just bit our lips in fear.”   “Honestly, Vinyl, I would not recommend using the Element of Laughter,” said Octavia. “It’s just as likely to hinder us as it is to hurt us.”   “Sweet!” said Vinyl happily. “I’m using it!” There was a moment of silence.   “We both tell you not to use it…and you decide to use it?” questioned Octavia.   “Yeah, cos like, I can tell that you two are doing a reverse psychology-type thing on me!” said Vinyl. “I’ve got you both figured out!”   “I can understand why you would believe Natural Twenty to be tricking you,” said Octavia, “but why wouldn’t you listen to me? I’m on your side!” She looked away from Vinyl. “At least, until you start trying to keep all the loot, like they always do…”   “Don’t suppose I could convince you to reconsider this action?” asked Natural Twenty, a hopeful look in his eye.   Vinyl smiled. “Pass me a… a…” She looked at her character sheet. “A d100?!” She looked at Natural Twenty’s saddlebag. “How in the hay do you fit something that big in your bag?!” she asked.   “I didn’t actually bring a d100 today, Vinyl,” said Natural Twenty, silently deciding that it was easier than explaining what a d100 was to the drunken unicorn, “so you can just roll two d10s.” He levitated them across the table to her. “The red one will be the tens value, the blue the ones value.”   “Right! Let’s see what happens!” Vinyl said happily.   Octavia grimaced, recalling some incidents that had happened with the Element of Laughter in past sessions. In simplest terms, the player using it would roll a d100. The DM would have a table of effects, each corresponding to a number between one and one hundred. Whatever number the player rolled would activate that effect.   The thing that made the Element of Laughter so deadly was that the effects could be anything – one time, one of Octavia’s roleplaying friends had accidentally resurrected a major villain of the campaign with it. Another time, everypony in the party had suddenly grown gills and needed to breathe water for the rest of the session. Although Octavia knew that Natural Twenty purposely put more positive effects in his table of effects than negative ones, there were still many, many, many opportunities for this to go wrong.   Octavia was broken out of her reminiscence by the sound of the two d10s clattering onto the coffee table. She swallowed. “What did you roll?”   “Twenty-seven,” said Vinyl, looking at the dice. She turned to Natural Twenty. “What does that do?”   Relatively speaking, that’s not too high a roll, thought Octavia, biting her lip once more without realising it. Would Natural Twenty make lower rolls have worse effects in his effects table?   “Let’s see…” said Natural Twenty, flipping through a few pages of his, “twenty-seven, twenty-seven… here we are!” Both Vinyl and Octavia leaned forwards in anticipation. Natural Twenty cleared his throat before continuing. “A white-coloured aura surrounds Vinyl’s horn. Some of the pirates look a little wary, but for the most part they still look prepared to rush and attack you. Vinyl feels the magical energy pulsing through her horn for a few seconds, before it disappears and bursts out from her in a fifty-metre radius. For a few moments, everypony is blinded!”   Octavia realised that she was holding her breath, and released it. “What happens?” she asked.   “Vinyl, you look around the deck to see…no pirates,” said Natural Twenty dramatically.   “I’m awesome,” said Vinyl, turning to Octavia and grinning.   “And what do I see?” asked Octavia eagerly.   “You see…wood,” said Natural Twenty simply. Octavia gave him a look. “Wooden planks of the deck, to be precise.” He lazily rolled a die. “You can also smell a fly nearby.”   Octavia slowly raised an eyebrow. “Natural…what’s happened to me?”   “Why don’t you ask Vinyl?” he asked, grinning.   “Is Octavia sexier than before?” Vinyl asked Natural Twenty.   “Octavia? Why, what in Equestria are you talking about?” he replied, still grinning. “She’s nowhere to be seen. Instead, where she was is a small lizard, trying to make sense of its surroundings.”   “WHAT?!”   “You can also look to the deck and see that where there was a hoard of bloodthirsty pirates before, there is now a group of lizards, similar-looking to the one beside you.” Natural Twenty’s grin grew larger. “You rolled nicely on that one.”   “So…everypony within the blast was turned into a lizard?” Octavia asked through gritted teeth.   “No, not everypony,” said Natural Twenty in a matter-of-fact way. “Vinyl wasn’t affected by the magical spell – it’s not as though she rolled a twenty-eight or anything.” He leaned in her general direction. “Again, nice roll.”   “I am cool with this,” said Vinyl, leaning back in her chair and putting her hooves behind her head.   “But…I…I…” Octavia said, trying to think of some way out of the situation. “This does wear off, doesn’t it? Vinyl can just wait for it to wear off me, yes?”   “Of course,” said Natural Twenty. “Naturally, you don’t know when it does, and depending upon how it affects everypony’s physiology, the spell may wear off on the pirates beforehoof.”   Octavia grimaced. “I flick my tongue out passive-aggressively,” she said bitterly.   “Are there any clothes around here?” Vinyl asked unexpectedly. Natural Twenty paused for a moment before waving a hoof.   “Sure, there’s a crate of clothing supplies for the pirates right next to Octavia.”   “I’ll take a shirt from it, yeah? Then I’ll totally put Octavia into the front pocket,” Vinyl said.   “Any objections, Octavia?” asked Natural Twenty.   “…I flick my tongue out passive-aggressively,” Octavia repeated.   “Excellent!” said Natural Twenty. “What are the plans, Vinyl?”   The unicorn thought for a moment, before muttering to herself under her breath. “If I…we had those balloons…but then if the pirates turn back…”   “Well?”   “Got it!” Vinyl said happily. She turned to Octavia. “Octavia, we are totally taking this ship back to Canterlot!”   “Let me guess – to find a bar?” Octavia asked. Vinyl shook her head.   “Not in the slightest, Octavia! I figure we take over this ship…”   “Yes…”   “…attach all the balloons to it…”   “…Yes?”   “…and we fly it to Canterlot, transform it into a warship, and use it to take down Celestia!” Vinyl grinned broadly. “What do you say?”