//------------------------------// // "At the Gala" vs "The Unicorn Invasion of Dundee" // Story: Battle Station Bass Canon // by book_burner //------------------------------// Place: Made Sun Square Time: Two days after beating the pulp out of King Sombra A dull smog hung over the city of Manehattan, swathing it in gray.  The eye - which one could imagine being held up by a helpful turtle upon a cloud, except that clouds didn’t move without pegasi - swooped around the city and its five boroughs, as if seeking for something or someone.  It dove down towards the Made Sun Square Garden, where an immense crowd of ponies had arranged itself into a sort of line, and came to a stop a short distance from a tail. This was the tail of a mare who had yet to realize her destiny.  It was medium-length, in a single swooping wave, and ended in spikes.  It had the kind of striped blue-and-teal coloration otherwise normally associated with the more awesome varieties of toothpaste.  It belonged to one Vinyl Scratch, of Ponyville, who was standing in line to get tickets to the upcoming Sapphire Shores concert so she could take one Octavia Melody, also originally of Ponyville, on a first real date. The tail proceeded to swat the watchful eye away, its owner having decided she didn't like having a Breezy staring at her plot.  It was still the tail of a mare who had yet to realize her destiny. The line for tickets advanced by one pony, and Vinyl Scratch stepped forward to wait for another while to pay for tickets to a pop concert… of destiny. BATTLE STATION BASS CANNON Or: Vinyl Scratch vs the World of Popular Music Nopony has Remixed Yet Because friendship is pretty great, and for some reason that involves pastel magic talking equines around 1.25 meters tall. A narrated list of song links, for great justice. Place: Vinyl’s Time: Morning, early (very)         The sun had barely come up when Vinyl Scratch crept quietly back through the door into her walk-up in central Ponyville, smiling quietly to herself.  It was always surprising how many ponies didn’t realize how quiet Vinyl could be, for a DJ, but when it was a matter of sneaking concert tickets back up to show Octavia without waking anyone, she could do it.  Besides, getting up early meant she could sneak back into bed.         She crept from the equipment room, through the standing kitchen, and into the bedroom, and then tucked herself back into bed as noiselessly as she could.  Then, and this was the tricky part, she tried to silently levitate the tickets into the drawer in her nightstand-amp -- which was actually tough, since magic usually made some sound.  Then she wrapped her forelegs around Tavi’s gray barrel and nuzzled her neck.         Octavia yawned, opened her eyes, and…          “Kbeg?”  She shook her head a bit.  “Bed?  Whyuhmy in somepony’s bed?”  She started squirming, but there was no escape from the cuddle.  Bwahahaha.         (Vinyl never felt at all sure whether this kind of thing made her Chaotic Neutral or what.  “No escape” was an Evil line, but “cuddle” was definitely Good.  And you couldn’t really be in Dudist Beach without eventually catching on to the Chaotic alignment.)         “Because you were really stressed-out last night after practice,” said Vinyl Scratch, “And your Cutie Anxiety started playing up.”         “And then?” Octavia asked blearily.         “You were so wacked out about your destiny that I told you, hey, if you really get so panicky about playing cello for the Orchestra, you can always just go find that Starlight Glimmer chick the Six Girls were talking about and have her take your cutie mark away.  Bam, no more grand destiny to worry about.”         Octavia jolted to her hooves, her light purple eyes springing wide open.  Even blearily, it was a frightening proposition.         “I didn’t actually do it, did I!?”         “No, your anxiety just got even worse.”         “Good, because that would have been the single worst story ever of how I ended up sleeping with somepony.  But Vinyl, how could you never think about your place in the world?!”         Tavi had relaxed, but it was a depressed-relaxed, not a calm-relaxed.  Vinyl Scratch just kinda shrugged.         “I guess…  I mean, I know my place.  Everypony does.  You’ve got your town you come from, your friends, your cutie mark, what you do in life.  That’s your place.”         Octavia gave her that look, the you’re-being-so-dreadfully-Ponyville look.  She blanched a slightly lighter grey.         “I had more meant about our place in the universe, broadly, as ponies.  Lady Heartstrings…”         “Oh no.  But I thought you hated all that stuff she spouts!”  Everypony knew that stars were Princess Luna’s way of decorating the night, plain and simple.  Saying otherwise was like claiming that Princess Celestia didn’t pick what the sky looked like during the day.  The world just wouldn’t make sense that way.  Hay, why hadn’t Princess Luna just outright told the head of the Royal Night Orchestra to stop telling tales?  “You don’t think any of it’s actually true, is it?  Everypony knows the sky belongs to the alicorns, right?”         “Think about it, though!” Octavia was still stiff.  “If the sky belongs to the alicorns, who moved the sun, moon, and stars before the alicorns?”         “The unicorn nobility all-together, of course.  It’s right in the Hearth’s-Warming Eve pageants every year.”         “But then, who raised the sun and moon before the unicorn nobility?”         “That’s like asking, where did ponies come from?  We just don’t know.  Is Lyra really getting to you that much?”         “It’s just that she really seems to know these things.  She says the skies are a whole vast cosmos outside our world, that existed for long ages before there was ever such a thing as a pony.  She says the stars are other suns, with their own worlds spinning around them.  She says the Elder Race spread among them ages ago, that they were predators who dominated an infinity of worlds by claws, cunning, and woven plots.”  Octavia shivered.         Vinyl Scratch pulled Tavi close to stop her from hyperventilating.  It definitely wasn’t to stop herself from hyperventilating.  Oh no.  She’d been a brave girl ever since that one time in Unicorn Camp.         “You grow up thinking that a full-sized dragon is terrifying enough, and then a mare in a dress tells you the sky is full of dragons!”  Vinyl gulped.  “But hey, I’m - I’m sure Lyra’s just making this all up.  You know she’s just another Ponyville musician deep down.  She’s making it all up to seem deep for Canterlot ponies?  Right?  Right?”         But Tavi was still shaking.         “She keeps saying that we’re the only ponies anywhere, because only a weak, soft world like Equestria would ever give rise to creatures like us.  She says she’s making us in the Night Orchestra her ‘gods of a new world order’ by something she calls ‘harmony through hierarchy’.”         “The only ponies… i-in all the universe?  Weak and soft?” asked Vinyl Scratch.  Her face scrunched up into a grimace.  “That’s nothing!  Weak and soft is nothing, ponies have always been weak and soft, but we were weak and soft together, and that made us tough!”  She realized she was screaming and that her eyes had teared up.  “But Lyra is saying… that we’re all alone.”         “And that is how ponies die,” they intoned together, the words of the Draconomicon echoing in both their minds.  “For we are prey, who alone can only run.”         “Do you think we can pass this on to those Six Girls?” asked Vinyl Scratch nervously.  “Heroism against cosmic-scale stuff is kinda their thing.”         “Ummm… my dear… would this actually end well if we passed it on to them?  They’re the Elements of Harmony: the living avatars of Destiny in the world.”         “So you’re saying if we hoof it off to them…” started Vinyl Scratch.         “It’ll become - “         “A total disaster,” they finished together.         “Yeah, sure, friends for the friend gods, jewels for the jewel tree!” Vinyl Scratch rolled her eyes, “But they blew up half of Ponyville!  It’s gotten to the point where even Pinkie Pie isn’t throwing Sorry We Blew Up The Town Again Parties.  It’s like she doesn’t even notice anymore what her destiny does to other ponies around her!”         “Don’t forget that time Ms. Pie violently intruded upon my performance at the Grand Galloping Gala in Canterlot.  This would all get political,” Octavia groaned.  “The Royal Night Orchestra operates under the imprint and authority of Princess Luna.  Twilight Sparkle may be a princess herself, but it would be downright rude for her to step into Luna’s own domain and put her hoof down.  Even if the Lady Heartstrings does originally come from Ponyville.”         “Then I guess we’re dead and cosmically inferior and all that,” Vinyl sighed.  “Oh well.”  She brought up what she’d collected yesterday in her telekinesis.  “So we won’t be able to enjoy these?” Tavi looked at the tickets being levitated in front of her face.  Then she broke into a fit of squirming and giggling. Vinyl was lucky she’d practiced dancing while also working a turntable before: some unicorns would have had trouble levitating the tickets in place while also holding onto a struggling pony.         “You got tickets to the Sapphire Shores concert!  You got tickets!  To the Sapphire Shores concert!”         “Yeah, I did.”  Well at least that was working to cheer her up!         “You got tickets to the Sapphire Shores concert in Manehattan!” Was she really that surprised?         “Yeah!”         “You actually got me tickets to the Sapphire Shores concert in Manehattan this coming weekend!”         Ok, now it was time to just let go.         “Yeeeeeeeaaaah!” her voice rang out, pouring in just a tinge of electric guitar.  “And it’s two tickets, so we can go together!”         “Oh my sweet and lovely Muses, that’s WONDERFUL!  Vinyl Scratch, how did you know I’m secretly in love with pop music!?”         Oh.  Oh.  Ooooooh.  Well that did explain the Dig a Pony record Tavi had shoved into her saddlebag the other day.  And what was wrong with that, other than the fact that few other ponies liked that particular song?  Well, ok, ponies ignored that song because John Lemon had called it a piece of garbage, and too many ponies had no taste to get over what the artist told them and like what they like. Also, it probably hadn’t helped that the same band had held the famous Pinkie Pie of Ponyville for a short while, before creative differences tore them apart.         “Well, actually,” Vinyl Scratch admitted, “I didn’t know.  I always like to go to pop concerts so I can hear new things to sample, but I would have thought you’d be too classy, what with wanting to play in the Royal Canterlot Symphony.”         “I guess I could say pop is a guilty pleasure of mine, but really I oughtn’t feel guilty about it.  Sometimes a pop song can just wash away the complexities of one’s station and remind one of the simple joy that is life.”         “Wow, big words.”         “Oh just come here, you utter, utter DJ.”         But it was decided that they were going to the concert, and it was also their first kiss.         Which made it kinda a pity that Vinyl had kept her Get Rec’d on Record the whole time she’d been with Octavia.  Spying wasn’t very romantic if you weren’t into Close Bond 007 movies… Place: Canterbrigia Time: Meanwhile         It was a relatively ordinary dead-early morning in the Sexy Sax Pony, and Wells Wisher was thus the only actual sexy sax pony needed to run the entertainment.  The problem was, the Sexy Sax Pony had never seen as roaring a business as had sprung up with the advent of the War of the Wubs Music Contest: everypony in all of Manehattan with any musical aspiration at all, let alone a musical cutie-mark, had started using it as a place to relax and grab a half-decent cider without getting into a contest.  He was proud of that, even if it meant he worked tiring hours: Dudist Beach agents had spread word throughout the city’s Scene that their bar could be treated as a safe zone.         Of course, the citizens of Manehatten didn’t provide nearly as much information about the nobility as those of Canterlot had spilled in the One Nation Under Rock before it got taken-over.  Sweat, cider, and sweet, sweet intel had basically been what covered the floor there.          He just kept up his act, watching the clock slowly tick towards 08:00, sweet Celestia’s morning, when even the most vigilant of Dudist Beach’s officers could go the buck home.  He slid onto his side across the stage, raised a single back leg, panned a hoof over his face, and struck up his most recent composition on his saxophone.         Sisters, two stars that fell apart,         As they tumbled from the skyyyyyy,         Sun- and Moon-light, stirred jealousy and pride, as they both began to shiiiiine, And the ripple of all their struggles shook even their hearts, LUNA!  NIGHT-MARE MOON!  PRINCESS OF NIGHT!         The one exceptional thing about today’s dead-early morning was the number of well-dressed ponies still throwing back ciders at a time like this.  Maybe it was because of the Contest that they’d all dressed up nicely?  Or maybe some of them were just the normal banking clientele coming in to get thoroughly drunk before putting up with their jobs again all day -- Manehattan was like that.  Manehattan was also the shipping and shopping center for all of eastern Equestria, so it wasn’t like he could complain too much. With the guidance of the sun, The elder sister earned her place in the spotlight! While the younger’s ambition, To be loved hardened her tiiiiimes, ‘Till she refused to end the night. LUNA! LUNA! LUNA! LUNA! LUNA! Wait.  Was that a green unicorn over at that table in the back?  The one with the omelette?  They didn’t have a kitchen: how did she have an omelette?  And what the buck was she wearing? Time for morning is approaching and the air is cold and sets hearts to fear!         Wells Wisher wasn’t exactly a fashion buff, but he had spent time spying on the citizens of Canterlot and their affairs, which ended up being at least part of an education in fashion.  Mares normally wore dresses to accentuate the natural pastel colors of their coat and to draw the eye towards (or, in one known case, away from) whatever curves they had (or, in some cases, didn’t).  If they didn’t want to wear a particular look, they trusted in their coat to keep them warm, as the gods intended. They didn’t normally wear dresses designed to look like a manticore had a foal with a suit of armor and it ate them, especially not with those snarling, constricted eyes hiding their cutie marks.         He had to keep playing and hope she didn’t notice he’d noticed her. Feel the power flowing up into your hooves, And the courage coursing proudly through your veins! A saying he’d started to hear recently came to mind: to hide one’s cutie-mark is the way of the Life Fibers.  Was that what he was looking at? It's written in your stars, and etched into your soul! Bound by fate and harmony, LUUUUUUUUUUUUUNA! THWIP-THUNK Still alive.  He looked over his crest.  Horseapples.  The knife had just missed his face and lodged itself in the wood behind him.  He turned back to start fighting off the well-dressed ponies now trying to set fire to his bar. And found a hoof on his chest, with four grass-green eyes narrowed at him. “Good morning, Heartstrings,” he sneered. “Good morning, rebel,” she replied.  “What was that mongrel stuff you were playing just now about our Princess of the Night?” From the outside, an observer would have seen what looked like her casually shoving him a bit, except that he flew backwards, hit the wall, and mercifully lost consciousness as the rubble of his own bar collapsed in on him. “Find the scarf!” was the last thing he heard. Place: Made Sun Square Garden Time: THE CONCERT! (actually early afternoon)         Of course, nopony had ever said Vinyl Scratch was any good at standing in queues when it wasn’t for something really important, like tickets or her girlfriend.  This was why, in the back of her closet at home, she kept a stash of STAFF caps from every major concert hall in the land.  If she was headed somewhere, she just had to take the appropriate cap and make for the quick way in.         She and Tavi were now engaged in walking very casually, exactly like they had a right to be there, to the staff entrance to Made Sun Square Garden.  This required an effort to look casual and act natural, since everypony in Made Sun Square could totally see you walking through to the Garden.  Luckily, if you had the right STAFF clothing, nopony looked twice. They held their heads exactly low enough to look tired-out without looking depressed.  The ball caps were covered in carefully cultivated layers of closet dust, straight from Vinyl’s closet.  Tavi, surprisingly, had contributed the old band T-shirts. (And actually, hers was from a punk band and really suited her.  It had to be something about the tired-out look that went with her normal elegance to form the image of a consummate professional.  Oh hey, “consummate”, that was one of her words.  Vinyl had used to believe it was to do with food.) In short, they were the spitting image of grizzled, experienced concert-hall staff who’d played every show since the beginning of time and definitely, totally belonged inside through the service entrance, preferably raising a pair of free staff ciders to the Old Days and Where They’d Gone.         If anything was going to get them caught, it was the constant giggling and nuzzling and little kisses on the cheek.  Real staff members at concerts didn’t emit a sixth-level Sparkle Field out to ten hoofsteps’ distance in all directions, even after sneaking awkwardly out of an equipment closet where they’d been… buying some apples.         “You know, I’d actually expected that somepony would be on guard here during a music contest, maybe waiting to challenge Sapphire Shores for her Golden Record,” said Octavia as they approached the side door.  Well, it was a side door in so far as you could have side doors on a massive potted plant built in the middle of a city that was all grids and right angles. (Truth be told, it had been Princess Celestia’s gift to the Manehattan commoners lacking the gemstones and gilt of Canterlot or the country charm of the rural regions.)         She pulled the door open with a hoof, softly and inconspicuously.  There was nopony at the staff door.         Vinyl Scratch pulled her cap down over her eyes and slipped inside.  Tavi did likewise. It only took a minute inside Made Sun Square Garden before they understood why everypony had gone inside so quickly.  Tonight, the pegasus and unicorn staff had prepared the place with some absolutely BUYSOMESTRAWBERRIES amazing acoustics.         Sure, they’d both been there before.  Made Sun Square Garden was pretty literally a garden, being actually made of extrusions from the heavy Manehatten bedrock to form a terraced arena, with soil then used to smooth out the slopes, and a layer of grass and flowers planted on top of all of it (Readers from foreign planets or dimensions should be advised that when Equestrian ponies speak of “landscape architecture”, they mean it literally.).  The whole Garden was fed from above by a system of rotating micro-local weather managed by the Garden’s Weather Team. The result was a sports and performance arena where you were always comfortable, you could come with anything from a tent to just a blanket, and if you wanted something to eat, you just reached out and munched on stray flowers and clovers instead of trooping around to a snack bar. And today, just for Sapphire Shores, a team of unicorns had added a floating layer of acoustically reflective gemstone and stained glass, floating above and below the light clouding scheduled for Manehattan today.  Portraits of famous ponies, pastel logos, and (of course) rainbows danced across the grassy hills of Made Sun Square Garden, turning the entire concert hall into its own spectacle of softly colored afternoon sunlight.  Occasionally a cloud would interrupt the light while the gems and glass plates transitioned into a new pattern. “Bucking.  Amazing.”  Vinyl Scratch’s jaw had dropped open. “Seconded.  A work of true beauty,” added Octavia, hastily rolling up her own jaw from the floor. “So this is the kind of show you can put on when you’re Sapphire bucking Shores.” “As I have oft heard it said, ‘Ayyup’.” “We need to get to our seats,” said Vinyl Scratch, still staring upward. Luckily, Octavia had actually looked for them, and had promptly marched behind Vinyl Scratch to shove her dead-staring flank over leftward and up through the tiered fields of the arena.          Place: Their actual seats Time: Literally two minutes later         The opening act had started playing while they walked up the marble steps between tiers of lawn and reached their seats.  Unfortunately, the opening act was driving Octavia to pondering as she reached behind her mane; if she but had a glass it would be driving her to drink.  Ah, yes, there was her and Vinyl’s blanket for the grass at their ticketed spot.  And ah, yes, the opening act was indeed a punkish singalong called “‘Ere We Go!”, indeed by a Trottingham band called Da Dropkick Orkies. (It was utterly intolerable, because the band members were basically just shouting constantly into their microphones.  How did these ponies get to open for Sapphire Shores!?)         Octavia turned her marefriend’s face from the ceiling towards the stage and watched steadily for a moment, waiting for active consciousness to resume. “Vinyl, my dear,” she said, when Vinyl’s eyes started moving on their own again, “You understand ‘punk rock’.”  She helpfully made little quotes with her hooves to emphasize.  “Can you explain the point of this band to me?” Scratchy (nopony could ever know she was thinking of her as “Scratchy”) looked at her and tilted her head sideways with an eyebrow raised.  She looked delightfully like a bemused puppy.         “Da point?  Dey Da Orkies.  Dey all green, dey all from Trottingham, and dey all yell WAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!  What else is dere to gets?”         Octavia shook her head and rolled over, burying her face under both hooves and wishing she had wings to add.  For one thing, all the performers indeed had green coats.         “Forget I asked.”         At times like these, a pony could almost understand why the Lady Heartstrings hated nonclassical music so much.  Except jazz.  Jazz was a living wonder.         “Actually,” Scratchy was standing over her and winking, “It’s a dramatization of some ancient myths about Diamond Dogs.  Very cultural.”         Oh well.  Their song was finishing anyway, and they shuffled off the stage to the sound of one last WAAAAAAAAGH from the audience.  Octavia could hear her own thoughts again.         Octavia breathed more easily as Da Orkies’ janitorial staff, appropriately titled the Adept Custodians, shlepped their stuff off stage.         “Oh, right,” Vinyl Scratch remembered out loud, “We need to get these disguises off before somepony tries to enlist us in cleaning up!”  Vinyl rolled over and lifted the T-shirt and cap off herself with magic, then helped Octavia do the same.  The experience explained a lot for Octavia, namely why unicorns were so fond of clothes.  They had a perfectly easy time putting the things on and taking them off.         When she’d slipped her T-shirt up over her muzzle, she noticed Vinyl Scratch had put on her characteristic checked scarf.  Figured: she had to be ready to party, even at a pop concert.         And then Sapphire Shores trotted on, and she was the most beautiful thing in the arena.  They hadn’t expected that she would be.  In fact, they had mostly just expected somepony to walk onto the stage and announce that the show would start soon.         Yet, there she was, in her characteristically magnificent ruffled dress, which she had even improved from her usual.  It had three black crosses across its front, and the purple-on-violet hems had been exchanged for red-on-black, with the red threads glowing and shifting hypnotically.  Her emerald-on-red-and-black horseshoes clip-clopped across the stage, the only noise in all of Made Sun Square Garden.         This was what everyone had come to see.         “Hello, everypony!” crooned Sapphire Shores.  “How are you liking the show so far?”         The crowd roared as a single force of nature.         “WE LOVE YOU SAPPHIRE SHORES!”         Her smile was as broad as the day was long.  Considering that it was spring (these things always happened in Spring), this meant her smile had a ways to grow.         “Aaaaaaaaaaaah!” she sang in a do note, and turned her head this way and that to hear the echoes.  “What a magnificent occasion it is to be back in Manehattan’s own Made Sun Square Garden!  La la la la laaaaaa!”         It was magic. Sapphire Shores sang Serves Her Right, and it was as sassy as a filly who’d just inherited a million bits and had the world at her hooves.  For a magical few minutes, Manehattan outclassed Canterlot as everypony in Made Sun Square Garden knew what it was to be truly regal.  And hold it over those snooty aristocrats, of course. Nopony wanted to ever look away.  Everypony stared with eyes wide open. She sang Get Your Pony On, and it was like galloping through open meadows, wild and free.  She let the left side of the stadium sing along with her through the chorus, while the right side stomped their hooves to the beat.  The song lifted them all back into the primal steppes and plains of their ancient past, to the fresh flavor of wild grasses in spring, the pounding of the heart from successfully outrunning an enemy, and the original discovery of friendship when the herds learned their hooves could be weapons against the predator. And then she paused. “Before I begin my next song,” she crooned, “I just want to thank my generous donor Lyra Heartstrings for the gift of this lovely dress!” Everypony could see it, and watched as its bright, shifting red threads spun and wove themselves through the air until, when they settled, it was as if Sapphire Shores had changed shape.  Where a tall, lanky Earth Pony had stood, there was now a lithe, sleek Earth Pony covered in fabric, with adorable little bones running up and down her costume and a cutely enormous pair of pairs of heart-shaped speakers strapped to her sides. The red and black threads were now pulsing ever so glamorously in bold, sexy crosses across Sapphire’s chest and barrel. “Here we go, everypony!  The Symphony Regalia and I will be playing our first grand hit!  Let’s make this… the best debut ever!” “Aaaaaaah!  At the gala!” Sapphire Shores’ voice rang out. “At the gala!” everypony sang back together. At the gala! rang all of Made Sun Square Garden. “At the gala, in the garden, I’m going to see them all!  All the creatures, I’ll befriend them at the galaaa!” sang Sapphire Shores. At the gala! echoed everypony together. There was a mare bobbing her head next to Vinyl Scratch, with a dark gray mane on a lighter gray coat.  She seemed nice, but wasn’t anywhere near as important or pretty as Sapphire Shores.  Even if she did have a pink bow-tie on.  What was her name, again, anyway? “All the birdies, and the critters,” Sapphire Shores trilled on, “They will love me big and small!  We’ll become good friends forever, right here at the galaaaa!” At the gala! everypony repeated. Why was Vinyl’s neck on fire?  Sapphire Shores was singing, so Vinyl Scratch’s neck definitely shouldn’t be on fire.  Was her neck on fire?  It was definitely on fire.  Would it be ok to look away from Sapphire to check on her neck?  She’d have to. She looked away from the most beautiful sights and sounds in the world… and the scarf around her neck was pulsing with the same red lines as in Sapphire Shore’s dress.  Except that around her neck, they didn’t look bold and sexy, nor beautiful, nor pretty.  They just looked… clear.  Sobering.  Like coffee with just the right amount of vodka in it. She felt like a lovely dream had fled.  If she looked away from her scarf, would it come back?  Lovely dream of what?  Sapphire Shores was the most glamorous, most sonorous, all-around best pony, and she was right there. "All our dreams / will come true / right here at the gala!” At the gala! Wait.  That would imply Octavia wasn’t the all-around best pony. That was the dream.  Glamor magic in Sapphire Shores’ singing, making her think that Sapphire was the best pony instead of Octavia being the best pony. Vinyl concentrated on her scarf burning at her throat, tried not to listen and looked over at Octavia.  But there was no Octavia: there was just a gray mare staring and cheering and singing along in helpless adoration. “At the gala! I will sell them: all my appletastic treats!” she crowed. Gods above!  There were stories about Sirens that could do this to ponies, but Vinyl had never thought they were real.  Or, for that matter, that Sapphire Shores was one of them. “TAVI!” she screamed in her marefriend’s face, waving her hoof.  “IT’S SIREN MAGIC!  SAPPHIRE SHORES IS A SIREN!” “Hungry ponies, they will buy them!  Caramel apples, apple sweets!” Octavia was bobbing her head to the beat. “Give us sa - she can just - mples!  We will buy them - eat me up!  Gimme some - then!” sang Octavia stiltedly.  Her face was twitching and spasming with the effort of speaking independently of the song, and even then it was only glamor-influence. “And I’ll earn a lot of money, for the Apple familyyyyyy!” rang the voice of Sapphire Shores. Buck that and buck it hard.  It was still taking effort to move, but the more she concentrated on the burning threads at her neck, the more clearly she could think.  And the more she concentrated on the image burned into her memory of Octavia’s face spasming, the louder her hoofsteps thudded as she walked down towards the center stage. She readied her Get Rec’d, swung the headphones in blaster-mode over her crest and shoulder, and max’d the volume.  Tavi had said Shores had a Golden Record.  Beating the BUYSOMEPEACHES out of her would be totally legal.  Contest rules. If Sapphire Shores could play music that tapped into the primal experiences of history, two could play at that game. All our dreams and our hopes From now, until hereafter. All that we've been wishing for Will happen at the Galaaaaa. At the Gala! Vinyl flared her  into action as she marched down the stands towards the open field.  Sapphire Shores hadn’t taken notice yet: she’d hopefully be able to get in a solid hit before she did. “THE PROPHECY IS WRITTEN,” she recited from the ancient scriptures.  “DUNDEE WILL FALL.” Snare drums snared, and she resonated her hoofsteps with them -- it hurt a little, but she could take it.  The trumpets trumpeted, and she hummed along.  A few ponies around her started to awaken from their trance, and feeling her beat instead of Sapphire’s, they came in as the choir. The tune swelled and built.  The chorus lilted.  This was her challenge to Sapphire Shores, for the sake of Made Sun Square Garden and Manehattan beyond. Vinyl broke into a canter…   “THE UNICORN INVASION OF DUNDEE!” … and threw her shoulders into the blast to push through the recoil.  A canonball of blue-white bass energy arced down towards the stage.  Vinyl raced to get away before Shores could see where the shot had come from.  Until she could get in close this would be a shoot-and-run fight. At the Gala, all the royals, They will meet fair Rarity! They will see I'm just as regal at the Galaaaaaa! And Sapphire Shores’ high note casually dissolved that canonball.  Vinyl could see the BUYSOMEAPPLES smug smile on her face as she casually dashed to the other side of the stage and continued her song. DAKKA! Pain lanced through her left wither as tissues that weren’t supposed to separate, did.  She fell and rolled through on her side (a sharp coldness pressed further into her bleeding flesh), which at least meant the next shot missed her.  Problem was, it hit some poor red Earth Pony stallion.  She noticed that up on a sheet of stained glass, floating across the ceiling, there was a flash of green and grey.  What had hit her?  She pulled it out telekinetically.  It was a finely carved emerald, tiny and shaped almost like a fat bottle without a cap. “Bullets?” she whispered.  But firearms were illegal!  And who was shooting at her?  Bystanders to a song-duel were BUYSOMEPEACHES illegal to use in the War of the Wubs. Vinyl Scratch winked a basic shield spell into existence around her and used a basic healing spell to weave her wither back together.  Every unicorn could do that, which was why she hadn’t expected to get shot with actual bullets.  Everypony knew you didn’t bring guns to a spell-fight, let alone a Royal Music Contest song-duel. She just had to keep singing. “They came with the first light of dawn, setting their sights on Dundee,” she warbled weakly.  “Led by the sorcerer Zargothrax, slaying all ponies he seeeeees!”  This time she had her ears turned to the sides and heard the bullets coming, dodging onto her front hoof before flipping over some ponies.  She was almost in the frontmost section now. “They ride to war, once noble beasts, corrupted by wizard spell.  The unicorns used to be good.  Now they are forced to serve Heeeeeell!”  Her voice was clearer now, stronger. I will find him, my prince charming, And how gallant he will be! He will treat me like a lady To-night at the Galaaaaaaaa! “That isn’t enough, Sapphire!” thought Vinyl Scratch, as she fired the bass cannon at the stage again.  The more she could keep Shores and her apparent sniper moving, the further down Vinyl could reach.  Her scarf was still burning, which meant Sapphire had dodged the blast and was still singing. “Down from the mountains, and across the river Tay, an army of undead unicorns are riding into the fraaaay!” Vinyl bellowed, and leaped over the fence keeping the audience out of the stage pit. “Fireballs and lightning are raining from the sky!” she bellowed across Made Sun Square Garden.  A Bass Wave shook the stage as she nailed her landing. “Chaos and bloodshed while all the ponies die!”  She had to sing louder!  Ponies were starting to wake up! “In this epic battle begins the final war!”  Vinyl Scratch dodged to the left again and circled the stage, trying to reach the stairs.   A rain of bullets bounced off her shield, shoving her away from the stairs.  BUYSOMEAPPLES.  But she could turn this to her advantage. She dove under the stage and readied her bass cannon for the last line of the chorus. “Tragedy will strike this day!  Prepare thee for!” she cried, and braced herself.  Ready… aim… “THE UNICORN INVASION OF DUNDEE!” Vinyl Scratch jumped up onto the stage, where Sapphire Shores was actually out of breath.  Her scarf was no longer burning, and the other ponies were waking up.  She wasn’t even getting splinters in her mane from where she blew a hole in the stage. Tzing -- her performing shades landed cleanly on her face after being launched into the air when she’d jumped.  Vinyl smirked in that one way she knew everypony else found infuriatingly smug.  Now then. “The townsponies had little ho -” This is what we've been waiting for, To have the best night ever. “ - pe.  They were not ready for war.  Fireballs make everypony die -” she stomped a hoof and felt the stage shake underneath her, “ - and buildings collapse to the floor!” Each of us will live our dreams, Tonight at the Gala. Sapphire Shores hadn’t even stopped singing for a second.  She was just doing it at Vinyl now. “The beautiful princess was raped, and taken to prison with cry!” At the Gala! “Angus McFife swears a mighty oath: I WILL MAKE ZARGOTHRAX DIIIIIIEE!" Bullets bounced off her shield as wubs, riffs, and chorus-song echoed through Made Sun Square.  She couldn’t keep this up forever, but she could make it to the end of the song.  Probably.  If Shores didn’t knock her out first. The wall of sound hit her again. I’ve been dreamin', I've been waitin' To fly with those great ponies-- Sapphire Shores slipped right to the side of Vinyl’s desperate punch. The Wonderbolts, their daring tricks: Spinning 'round and having kicks. Perform for crowds of thousands, They'll shower us with diamonds! More wubs!  She needed more wubs! “The forces of darkness, are invading proud Dundee!  There must find a hero, to save its destiny!” She punched and bucked at Sapphire, but nothing ever connected.  All she managed to do was waste Bass Wave energy on blows that just hit the stage. Then she saw Sapphire Shores trip over one.  It wasn’t a large trip.  She righted herself immediately.  But it was a trip. -- Wonderbolts will see me right here at -- Vinyl channeled all the vibration of an army of undead unicorns into her Bass Waves. Glory! She reared up to strike the stage with her front hooves. Would prevail! This day! She struck, and the stage collapsed under Sapphire Shores.  The crowds of ponies all around Made Sun Square Garden blinked in the afternoon sunlight, freed from the siren spell. “Fireballs and lightning are raining from the sky!  Chaos and bloodshed while all the ponies die!  In this epic battle begins the final war!  Tragedy will strike this day, prepare thee for --” She jumped into the hole where Sapphire was just rising to her hooves again, right foreleg pulled back and charged with Bass. “THE UNICORN INVASION OF DUNDEE!” Sapphire’s head made a horrible crunching sound. “Flower metal?  Really?” she whispered, with blood running from her mouth. Then her dress tore, its red glow faded, and something… left her. Vinyl didn’t feel any burning around her neck anymore.  She’d won.  But everything had gone straight to Tartarus. The world spun around her, her limbs turned to jelly, and flowed thoughts her notright eyesclosed rest. Safetavi?  About Safetavi what!?  Nowrest. In front of thousands of ponies, Vinyl Scratch thumped to the uncovered earth. Place: Canterlot Castle, basement Time: Sunset         “So… then,” whispered the Lady Lyra Heartstrings through clenched teeth, clip-clip-clipping a hoof to the floor.         “So then,” said some pointlessly professional Canterlot mook in a suit.  He couldn’t keep still on his rump, constantly looking this way and that.  It was as if he thought she really was just going to feed him to her Ts’an Nu.         Of course not.  He’d have to fail her twice more to warrant that.  Or carry a secret she couldn’t allow to get out.  Or have made some attempt at incentivizing her like the nobility occasionally tried.  She was a reasonable Lady, after all, even if of new title.         “The scarf had not been found by Dudist Beach after all,” she continued.  The sunset was beautiful tonight, even if it drove the cream in her dress to orange.         “Yes ma’am.”         “Instead, it somehow slipped between our hooves.”  Clip-clip-clip.         “Yes, ma’am.”         “And ended up in a thrift shop in Canterlot, of all places.  Canterlot, the Royal City within whose fabulous boundaries Destiny itself forbids poverty, and in which there should be no such things as thrift shops.”         “Yes, ma’am.”  Clip-clip-clip.         “Whence it was found by that most obnoxious of all Royal Music Contestants, Vinyl ‘DJ PON-3’ Scratch.  Who then proceeded to, worst of all, wear it during Sapphire Shores’ concert.”         “Correct.”         “Who not only survived against, but in fact defeated, Sapphire Shores and her Siren Shift?”         “Again, correct.”  Clip-clip-clop.         The Lady Heartstrings sighed audibly and lowered her eyes to the floor.  It actually would have been a kind of relief to just feed him to Ts’an Nu and be done with it, but she could only hire so many muscleponies cheaply before the flow of bits from her coffers into those of the mob would show up in the Diarchy’s famously well-checked financial ledgers.         At least she still had Sapphire.  The mare had been strong, strong enough that she was almost uninjured beyond what the Shift had soaked up before dying.  That was all right.  There would be another Life Fiber dress.  She would see to it.         “Go find out if that thrift shop is still there, would you?”         The mook of a stallion cantered out as fast as his legs could carry him from a sitting start.         At the very least, no common pony on the streets knows of us yet, whispered Ts’an Nu in her mind, as sweet and reasonable as ever.         Yet, my love, she replied.  Yet.          Place: OUCH Time: OUCH         Vinyl Scratch woke up in a great deal of pain for the second time in… what had it been, a week and a half now?  Argh.  And these bandages were scratchy all over.  And slings!  Why was she in slings!?         Oh, bandages.  And a bed under her. Place: Hospital Time: Oh gods why         “You’re awake,” said a voice to her left.  Who was that again?         “It’s me, Wells Wisher,” said Wells Wisher.         “And how the buck did we get here, eh?” asked Vinyl, still unable to shift her body so the bandages wouldn’t itch and bite.         “You halfway killed yourself fighting Sapphire Shores to a standstill.  I got attacked by Lady Heartstrings.”  She couldn’t even turn to look at Wells Wisher, so she just nodded a little.         “Where is here, eh?”         “Beth Alicorn Hospital.  It’s not like they moved us halfway across Equestria or something while we were near-critical.” Place: Beth Alicorn Hospital, Manehattan Time: To get even         “We’re gonna bucking get Heartstrings for this, aren’t we?”         “Yeah.” “She BUYSOMEPEACHES ruined my date,” deadpanned Vinyl Scratch, remembering everything. “She BUYSOMEBERRIES ruined my sexy sax bar,” deadpanned Wells Wisher, shuddering as he remembered the last bits. “This means war,” they said together.