//------------------------------// // Fantasy Hoofball // Story: Spark Notes // by Sharp Spark //------------------------------// The rain coming down on the field was a steady drizzle, not any kind of real downpour but just enough of a constant cold presence to seep through a pony’s coat, to dampen the wings of the pegasi and keep them off balance, to turn the once-pristine grass into a swampy mess of mud churned up by oversized hooves. The weather pegasi had really outdone themselves in making the day as miserable as possible. It was perfect for the Equestrian Hoofball Championship. Tight Spiral sat on a bench at the fifty yard line, his helmet clutched in his hooves as he ground his teeth. The Stalliongrad Stompers were up by three and were moving the ball down the field, their earth pony back pounding it into the line over and over again. They weren’t getting far. The D line was holding their own against the onslaught, but it was bleeding time off the clock and this deep in the fourth quarter they didn’t have much to spare. All Spiral could think about was that if he had been more effective earlier on, hit a few more passes, moved a little more under pressure, maybe he wouldn’t be stuck watching the championship slowly slide out of reach of his Fillydelphia Flash. But the Stompers had his number all game. Heck, they had been dominant all year. It was a classic matchup, one of what would probably go down as a historically great offense in the Flash versus what was definitely a historically great defense in the Stompers. And, as they say, defense wins championships. Then, a miracle happened. After two more runs with little progress, the Stompers tried something new. Their quarterback ducked back, taking advantage of the expectation of more of the same to try a quick slant to pick up the first down. Just as he threw, a flash of lightning and thunder rattled in the clouds above and he put a little more into the ball than he wanted. Their receiver beat his wings mightily to try and make up the extra distance but it missed his hooves by a sliver. ...And fell right into the waiting embrace of Quick Pick, who had kept his eyes on the quarterback and read the play perfectly. Spiral was up on his hooves yelling at the top of his lungs as Pick came trotting in, shedding his helmet. Pick flicked back his mane, one hoof thudding against Spiral’s with enough force that it would have bowled over a smaller pony. “I did my job,” he growled out. “It’s on you now. You gotta end it.” Tight Spiral looked up to the scoreboard, to see only a hoofful of seconds remaining. “That’s what I’m gonna do.” He jammed his helmet on, hooves pounding against the wet earth as he made his way to the huddle. His offense were waiting for him, their eyes sharp and expressions deadly serious. “We got one shot at this, boys and girls. You ready?” “Yeah!” they shouted back. “Then listen up. We’re tearing up the normal playbook. We don’t have the luxury of carving up these sons of mules piece by piece so we’re gonna do it fast. The knockout blow. And the one that’s gonna give it is… her.” His hoof shot out at the smallest pony in their huddle, their rookie receiver who had mostly served as a diversion all game. “Y-you sure?” she said. “Yeah. The secret weapon. Just like we’ve been working on in practice. You think you can do it?” The rookie had the attention of everypony in the huddle, ten sets of eyes boring holes into her. She took a deep breath. “With all due respect… Hell yeah, I can do it.” Spiral grinned, throwing his hoof forward. “Then let’s do this.” The rest of the team all put one hoof in and they let out a yell that shook the ground more than any thunder or lightning had all day. When they trotted up to the line, Stalliongrad was waiting. The ponies facing them might as well have been carved from the rock of a mountain. But Spiral knew from experience that they came on like a landslide. He could only hope his offensive line could withstand them for long enough. “Hike!” And then the ball was in his hooves. He trotted backwards, swaying upright on his back hooves in a motion that had taken a decade of practice. The ball felt slick against in his grasp, and his horn lit to steady it against his hoof. He didn’t know whether he was lucky or not that Stalliongrad had chosen not to blitz. They didn’t want to give him an easy throw, and had his receivers all locked up tight. But he waited, a calm fatalism settling over him like the chilling rain. His offensive line held on with an otherworldly tenacity against the larger and stronger Stomper tackles, and Spiral began to count the seconds, just as he caught a flash of pink mane jitter around a defender thirty yards down the field. Tight Spiral’s eyes slid shut. He had made this throw a thousand times on the practice field and all the weather, the pressure of the situation, the shouting and noise of the field melted away. His hoof drew back and then shot forward again, as he gave one final bit of zip on the ball with his horn. His eyes cracked open, watching the trail of the ball as it arced into the low-hanging clouds. Off to the side, the timer on the scoreboard ticked over to zero. A timeless moment later the ball appeared again, falling from the sky like a meteor dead center of the endzone, right into the waiting hooves of Hail Mary, their rookie, the fastest receiver in the western conference. Spiral let out a breath as his fellow players began whooping and roaring. They swarmed downfield to lift Mary on their shoulders. She would be the heroine of the hour, and Spiral was fine with that. Instead, he turned to the stands, and his smile flitted away. Once upon a time not too long ago, this whole stadium would have been packed with mobs of ponies, split between those cheering uproariously and those mourning a crushing loss. But all would have admitted it was a game for the ages. Instead, today, three dozen fans at best sat scattered across the length and breadth of the huge metal risers. Quick Pick trotted over from the sidelines. “Didn’t doubt ya for a second. You still got a cannon for a foreleg, don’tcha?” “Mmm.” Pick followed his gaze. “Thinking about times past?” “Thinking about how I read in the papers recently that there’s more hoofball fans than ever before.” His eyes drifted to the billboards rising up at the top of the stadium, emblazoned with ads for Fantasy Hoofball. “You’d never guess from the looks of things at a real game.” “Time keeps on moving. Look on the bright side,” Pick nodded towards the stands. “There’s one fan of yours still out there.” Sure enough, there was one elderly mare going crazy over in the stands, chanting, “Spiral! Spiral! Spiral!” and screaming at the top of her lungs. All eight of a group painted in Stalliongrad colors were shooting dirty looks at her racket. Tight Spiral grimaced. “Yeah. That’s certainly reassuring. At least my mother still comes to the games.” --- Lyra rang the bell again. She shifted, mentally gauging the weight of her saddlebag as she tried to remember if she had forgotten anything. Comprehensive statistics from last season? Check. Detailed player profiles? Check. Annotated mock draft results? Check. Snacks? Lyra winced. The snacks. She was supposed to bring chips and salsa and she had forgotten. On the bright side it wasn’t anything important. Lyra considered whether it was still worth going back home to pick everything up, but then ruled against it. What if something terrible happened, like if she was kidnapped by changelings, or if she fell in a hole and broke her leg, or if her house caught on fire and she had to heroically save Bon Bon and ended up missing the first round of the draft? No, better to play it safe. Lyra gave up on the bell and knocked one hoof against the door. Minuette opened it a moment later, a strained smile on her face. “You’re early.” “Right,” Lyra said. “No, I mean, I clearly said that we’d start at 6:30PM and it’s currently 6:27. Please stop it.” Lyra groaned. “It’s close enough. Besides, I can see another pony in there.” “That’s Time Turner. He’s helping me set up and doesn’t count.” “I still think we should have ditched him after last season.” Lyra frowned. “We talked about this.” “Well…” Minuette shuffled her hooves. “I can’t just tell him he’s kicked out, you know?” “I can,” Lyra said firmly. “Last season he spent the whole time whining and snidely talking about how Equestrian hoofball isn’t really hoofball and in Trottingham blah blah blah.” “He’s family.” “I wouldn’t claim him,” Lyra groused. “But fine. If he’s helping I can too.” “Eating all the nachos before everypony else arrives isn’t helping.” “It’s helping me.” “Hey you two!” a voice called out. Berry Punch trotted across the front lawn, her saddlebags just as stuffed as Lyra’s were, but with a decidedly more clinky, bottley cargo. “Minuette won’t let us in,” Lyra said. “I will now,” Minuette said primly. “Because now it’s six-thirty.” Lyra rolled her eyes, and trotted in. She made a beeline for the living room, in order to claim prime sofa real estate. It took her several minutes to unpack her bags, making a neat stack of papers on the coffee table of her draft notes, though taking care to reserve room for the delectable potential of future nachos. By the time she was done, several of the others had drifted in. Magnum showed up first, his booming laugh making his presence known long before he ambled in from the kitchen. Lyra had always liked him. Underneath the fatherly exterior and silly straw hat, he was a whiz at hoofball fundamentals, having played out a short stint at quarterback himself before a back injury had sidelined him. Caramel arrived next, nervously slinking in to hover around one corner of the room. Lyra took one look at him and wrote him off. He was the newbie in their league, and Lyra doubted he knew much of anything about the game. Then came Pinkie Pie, more or less suddenly materializing in a fit of giggles from behind an easy chair. None of them even really knew how she had found out about the league. She had simply shown up at their first draft, explaining that given the presence of at least three balloons and more than four ponies it constituted a party and she had to be there. She had proven to be completely uninterested in the rules of hoofball and totally unconventional in her roster management, but infuriatingly successful despite everything else. That left one more… “Thunderlane,” Lyra spat out. “Lyra,” he said, grinning a stupid grin with his stupid face. “A pleasure as always. Ready for another crushing defeat?” He still hadn’t let up about beating her in the championship match last season. But this time things were going to be different. Lyra forced down the rising bile and gave him her sweetest smile. “Oh, I don’t know. We’ll just have to see how things go.” Thunderlane trotted over to a seat where he could keep an eye on Lyra. “We shall.” Thankfully, Minuette and Time Turner eased the tension by bringing in a few plates piled high with nachos and okra poppers and fried zucchini zingers and several other unhealthy things that Lyra couldn’t name but could most certainly eat. That was the good thing about Minuette. Dependability. She had even assumed that Lyra would forget the chips and salsa and had pre-bought some herself, which was a little insulting but admittedly justified. And Minuette could be eminently trusted to pay all the league fees on time to the proper authorities, which was important because Lyra didn’t think she could live without fantasy hoofball, and most of the other leagues in town wouldn’t let her join out of fear that she would crush them underneath the weight of her brilliant and glorious knowledge. At least that’s what she assumed, anyways. The last league to blacklist her hadn’t been very specific, other than some nonsense about Lyra not paying enough bits which was silly because she was clearly going to win the season and thus not need to. It was just saving everypony time and effort to have everyone else cover her dues from the beginning. Of course in this league, even Lyra had to admit that winning wasn’t a certainty, and had grudgingly parted ways with the surprisingly steep entry fee in order to placate Minuette. Minuette, who was presently clearing her throat in order to catch Lyra’s attention. Lyra shook her head, sitting up straight and relinquishing her grip on a nacho plate. “Draft order has been randomly determined,” Minuette said. She pulled a sheet off of the posterboard set up in a place of honor in the living room. Lyra felt her stomach drop as she saw her name at the very top. “As always, it’s a snake draft, no trading of picks, and any pick challenged by another player must be ratified by a simple majority of the league.” Lyra’s mind raced. She hadn’t expected the first pick. That was a lot of sudden pressure – and it meant she wouldn’t pick again until sixteenth, so if she didn’t get value out of the first round, she would be really sunk. “Having problems deciding, Lyra?” Thunderlane smirked. She glanced up to see that his name was second, right next to hers. “Would you like some advice from someone who knows how to win?” “Sure,” Lyra said, as she frantically flipped through her stack of papers. “But I think Magnum usually keeps things close to his chest.” That got a booming guffaw out of Magnum, and an annoyed glare out of Thunderlane. “We’re all here. Are you ready to start, Lyra?” Minuette asked. Lyra took a deep breath and let her notes drop. “Yes. I take Princess Celestia for the position of quarterback.” That raised some eyebrows around the room. Not that going for a quarterback early was surprising – they really formed the core of your team – or that Celestia was that much of a reach. She would be gone in the first round, definitely by pick sixteen. But commonly accepted knowledge was that alicorns were underperforming at the position. Commonly accepted knowledge was wrong, though. Lyra had the statistics to prove it. “I’ll take Princess Twilight Sparkle for the position of quarterback,” Thunderlane said. He nodded at Lyra and she frowned. He must have seen the research too, or else was just following after her. It had taken Lyra a lot of waffling to come down on Celestia over Twilight. It was an age and wisdom over pure talent kind of thing, and Lyra had eventually landed on superior strategy as better than raw potential. Berry Punch must have figured that she got a steal at claiming Tirek with the third pick. At least she popped open a bottle of wine in celebration, but Tirek was seriously overvalued and Berry celebrated everything that way. Caramel followed up by taking somepony named Tight Spiral. Lyra had to desperately search her player profiles, worried that she had overlooked some key prospect. She finally came across his name in the list of a scouting report on the Equestrian Hoofball League – Lyra had penciled him in as a potential very-late round backup – and breathed a sigh of relief. She glanced over to Minuette and they shared a look. Caramel really was new to this whole thing. The rest of the round went more as expected, except for the never-expected Pinkie who took Discord… as a tight end. It wasn’t a bad position for him, given his general flexibility, but most good analysts projected him as a top QB, and Lyra didn’t know who Pinkie was going to claim for her real quarterback. Well, it wasn’t Lyra’s problem at least. Magnum took a more obscure Qirin queen on the turnaround, and then immediately moved into claiming King Sombra at running back. It was a pretty smart call, as the sneaky royal made up for his smaller size with some pass-catching finesse and an uncanny ability to find holes. Lyra had him pretty highly ranked herself, given the dearth of strong options at RB. The second round was much more scattered. The first Element went to Minuette at pick 12, taking Rainbow Dash as an obvious choice for wide receiver. Even with only average ball skills her speed kept her as a deadly threat. Applejack followed to Berry Punch at 14, but taking a linebacker that early was foolish, even given the mare’s pass rush. Unfortunately, Thunderlane scooped Lyra with pick fifteen, stealing Soarin’ only inches from her hooves. Lyra grimaced. He was by far the most athletic Wonderbolt candidate for wide receiver, and she had been counting on being able to take him at the bottom of the second round. “Spitfire at wide receiver,” Lyra said through gritted teeth. She didn’t like having to double down on smarts and strategy versus physical talent, but she didn’t have much choice. Celestia and Spitfire would make for a strong QB-WR1 duo, able to gameplan for any eventuality and easily adjust on the fly. At least on offense. If she really was going to seal the deal on a hyper-tactical team she needed a leader for her defense. She needed a pony who could read the entire opposing offense at a glance, with enough knowledge of the game and innate instinct to dynamically make a difference in constantly adjusting to be in the right place at the right time, all in the fraction of a second that modern hoofball required. Which meant a big reach, just because it was too much of a risk to wait all the way until the bottom of the fourth round. “And for my next pick,” Lyra said. “I take Rarity, at safety.” That got some murmuring out of the rest, but Magnum ran one hoof across his moustache, nodding slightly in her direction. Caramel barked out a laugh. “Wait. You’re not serious, are you?” “Why wouldn’t I be?” “Rarity the dressmaker? Has the fancy carousel shop thing in town? You want her to play hoofball?” Now a few other ponies around the room were smiling too, but the sharklike grins were more in Caramel’s direction. Lyra stayed quiet. He’d figure things out soon enough on his own. Most of the big names went fast after that point. The Wonderbolts were quickly stripped of all their marquee stars. Pinkie picked herself, and then picked a copy of herself as cloned by whichever magical gizmo had done it a couple of years ago, which only barely passed a challenge vote. And then only with the caveat that her team could field a maximum of two pink earth ponies. Everypony agreed that the thought of facing a team of Discord and ten rampaging Pinkies was far too dangerous to be allowed. Shining Armor went to Magnum, a key tactical leader who could contribute on both sides of the ball. Berry Punch snapped up Iron Will at RB, disappointing Lyra who had really hoped he would fall to her. It particularly chafed having Thunderlane right before her, as he clearly relished the thought of stealing her picks away. Lyra noticed that he kept staring in her direction and got a devious idea. As he was pondering his pick at thirty-one, she neatly stacked her player profiles, leaving one on the top as she nonchalantly reached over to grab some nachos. Thunderlane craned his head slightly, thinking she couldn’t see. “I’ll take Daring Do, at wide receiver,” he proclaimed, voice dripping with satisfaction. “Oh dear,” Lyra said. “That’s unfortunate.” “Sorry Lyra,” he said. “You win some, you lose some. Or rather, I win some, and you lose some.” “Hm? I wasn’t talking about my next pick. I mean it’s quite unfortunate for you. I suppose you didn’t read the press release from A.K. Yearling that the next Daring Do book is delayed, due to Daring having broken her wing in the Temple of the Titanic Tapir. Oh, but I will be taking Ahuizotl as my next pick, at tight end please. And for thirty-three I’ll take Gisele the Griffon, who had an excellent showing at the recent Equestrian Games relay.” She could practically see the steam rising off Thunderlane’s face as several of the other players joined in to rib him about his pick. “I do think it’s your pick again!” Lyra happily chirped. They went from there to some of the more obscure Equestrian athletes, and then into even stranger pastures. After round five or six things always did tend to get a bit more eclectic. Magnum took a hydra for his defense, and Minuette grabbed a phoenix to complement Dash at WR – she would have one heck of a speedster one-two punch there. Caramel even made either a particularly lucky or clever move in grabbing a manticore for defensive tackle. A few of the more notable dragons went off the board, and Lyra filled in with a herd of buffalo for her offensive line and a pair of changelings at cornerback – she normally preferred the speed and power of a timberwolf there, but given her strategy so far she decided to stick with a team that could communicate well and play smart. Pinkie kept up the weird choices, finding some brilliance in between the insanity – one of her offensive linesponies was apparently her sister’s pet rock, and for a cornerback she took ‘that eagle from the one time with the river that was like swoooop and awwwwk! you know?’ which no, Lyra did not know. But she claimed Starswirl the Bearded at QB in round seven, which led to a heated argument around legality. It was eventually allowed, followed by an immediate run on historical figures. Lyra passed up the opportunity to grab Commander Hurricane, instead choosing to take a chimera as her running back. Her research hadn’t covered history and there was just too much of an unknown factor in play. Plus, Thunderlane had preemptively grabbed a windigo for his defense. Though Lyra hoped she wouldn’t regret the decision. Caramel, apparently emboldened by Pinkie’s unorthodox picks, made a claim for a-parasprite-and-five-barrels-of-apples as his defensive line. It narrowly passed as well, but Time Turner turned around and took Fluttershy-the-one-time-she-was-a-vampire. At that point they were off to the races. As everyone more or less solidified their starting lineups, that meant getting backups, where it usually paid to take a risk on something strange. And where the challenges and voting on legality began to get heated. Fantasy hoofball was in its way a game of politics, with a lot of unspoken quid-pro-quo going on as people tried to simultaneously downplay their egregious attempts to shatter balance while preventing anyone else from eking out more than marginal victories. Pinkie always voted yes on everything. Thunderlane and Time Turner almost always voted no. But the rest took some finessing. Often that meant starting big and working your way down. There was no way anypony would agree on letting Magnum take an ursa major and he knew that – the dang thing wouldn’t fit on the field. But after the argument, his claim of an ursa minor went by without so much as a comment. Similarly, Time Turner made a case for a whole swarm of quarray eels but only wound up with one. It was somewhere around round fifteen when things started to trail off into an exhausted, contemplative peculiarity. After passing Minuette’s request for ‘like two hundred breezies’ and firmly denying Caramel’s pick of ‘the cutie mark crusaders, at the position of they have to play for the opposing team’, Berry Punch looked forlornly at an empty bottle and claimed ‘that feeling of existential despair when you realize you’re out of red wine and will have to make do with white for the rest of the night’. They just let her have that one. Lyra could feel the moment come for her most harebrained idea of all. She took a deep breath. “I’d like to take Principal Celestia for quarterback.” Minuette looked up from where she was sprawled out on the floor under the draft board. “You already got Celestia, remember? First round.” “No, Principal Celestia. See, Twilight was telling me about this mirror world where there are these creatures called…” Half the room groaned in unison, drowning her out. “Whatever,” Minuette muttered. “Next is… is. We’re done?” Sure enough, the board was full up. Lyra glanced over her team, putting it together in her head. Not bad. Not bad at all. Of course, the real test was yet to come. She carefully went through her notes, collating the player profiles into the league’s teams, noting the potential strengths and weaknesses of each team, who she would be best able to target for future trades a few weeks in the season, who she would want in return considering the fit for her own team. She was halfway through sketching out a comprehensive plan in case of injuries to each of her most important players when she realized Minuette was shouting loudly in her ear. “Lyra!” Minuette shouted again. Lyra blinked. Everyone else had gone home. “Sorry, I kinda zoned out there, huh?” “You could say that. Berry braided your mane while you were busy writing… whatever it is you were writing.” Lyra flipped her head to the side. Huh. She had. “Need any help cleaning up?” “You mean, do I need anyone rooting through my fridge for leftovers to take home?” Lyra’s stomach grumbled. “Maybe.” Minuette sighed. “No. Magnum, Berry, and Caramel just left though. I think they’re headed to The Salt Lick for drinks. You could probably catch them if you hurry.” Lyra got to her hooves, packing away her papers back into her saddlebags. “No thanks. Where’d Time Turner get off to?” “Decided to turn in early.” Lyra nodded. “Good. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a game to get to.” “The season doesn’t kick off until next week,” Minuette said. “Sometimes I think you’re a little too into this. Unless… Lyra, did you pay extra for a preseason game?” “Of course not!” Lyra said. “I made a wager, in which the loser will have to pay extra for a preseason game.” “With who?” Minuette blinked. “Oh Celestia, with Turner, didn’t you?” “What? He’s doing perfectly fine with his fancy-shmancy clock shop. He can afford chipping in towards a good cause.” “Lyra!” “Now if you’ll excuse me,” Lyra said, grinning. “I need to go home and go straight to bed. I have a game to get to!” --- Princess Celestia flipped through the letters at her desk. She had lowered the sun about an hour ago, but as is always the case, Princesses rarely have the time and luxury to sleep. She flipped through her mail by candlelight, glancing across the addresses for anything that needed to be immediately dealt with. One caught her eye, and she paused out of curiosity more than anything else. “Equestrian Hoofball League Player’s Union,” she read out loud. “Tight Spiral, Representative.” Her horn lit up and a several pages slipped out of the envelope, followed by a crumpled set of thicker sheets signed front and back with names. The hoofwriting on the letter was careful and professional. She had to skip to the third paragraph to get past all the formal introduction business and down to the point of the letter and, apparently, petition. “Dramatic decrease in interest in game,” she muttered. “Crisis for livelihood of athletes… Severe depression resulting from cutie-mark-driven dysphoria. Oh my.” She flipped to the second page, frowning slightly as she scanned through the letter. The next few sheets were submitted as evidence, some kind of official forms for league registration for Hoofball Fantasy Fantasy Hoofball Corporation Inc. Celestia stopped, her brow creasing as she glanced at a sample team and noticed the names it listed. “Wait. How would they even play this... game?” Then she took another look at the corporate logo on the entry form and let out a very audible groan. Celestia stood up and stretched, her back popping, before making her way out of her chambers and down the long hallway to the chambers at the other end of the palace. She pushed the door open. “I think we need to have a talk,” Celestia said sternly. Luna looked up from the pile of bits she was curled up on, almost bumping her head on the ceiling. Even her shifting sent a mini-avalanche of coins skittering down the pile. “Sister!” Luna said, voice booming. “Why didst thou not tell us sooner of the wonders of this thing you call ‘capitalism’?”