For personal reasons, I will not be available on the usual closing date (the 21st) or the day after, so this month's contest will be extended by two days.

Here are the full rules.

Remember, there is no prize, as such, for this contest -- but if you win, you will be able to choose the prompt for the next contest. You'll also get a mention on the group's front page, and if you're really fortunate not only will I remember to put it in, but I'll even do so in English. If it ends up being in Romanian, Welsh or Māori, though, I'm afraid that's just too bad.

Prompt: "Birthday Magic" (selected by last month's winner, Impossible Numbers)
Rating: E or T
Word limit: 150
Closing date: Sunday 23rd September 2018, 11:59 pm UK time (world clock)

Please reply to this post with your entry. This makes it easier for me to keep track. Please do not leave feedback until after the closing date.

Entries are now open! Have fun!

6563767
I hate September. The month is like a doomsday clock to me as it continues to tick down to the end of the month. Once it hits the 30^th, we honor a day that I just completely dread...... my birthday.

*Sigh* but let's put that aside and focus on the prompt. What is it anyways?

...............................WHAT KIND OF SICK JOKE IS THIS?

The orange mare continues to frantically pace back and forth, "Okay, don't panic. We just need ta find somepony ta help us."

Her brother watches in concern while cradling a green foal.

"Starlight? Nuh-uh, she's fine at magic; but this is out of her field. Zecora? But she's outta town. A doctor? Naw, they can't stand us Apples." she covers her face in panic with the stetson hat she wears, "Oh poor Granny Smith, we'll get ya back to normal. Don't ya fret."

"Call me crazy, Applejack." spoke a red bowed filly, "but ah think Baby Smith likes this."

"How can ya say that? She was havin' a fine time as she was before. Sitin' in her chair, rockin' day after day, nothin' ta worry about. What makes ya think she wanted this?"

---

In the kitchen, a cake holding more than eighty blown-out candles, still waits to be eaten.

6565296

...............................WHAT KIND OF SICK JOKE IS THIS?

Because it's good to laugh.

Also, I may give this a go if I can think of anything. It's only 150 words, after all. That seems manageable enough.

6563767
Yer us be.......
This be a tricky one (or even a Trixie one)

“The great and powerful Trixie can do this!” Horn glowing ever brighter with magical energy, the teleportation spell forms. A sharp plop and the summoned item appears above the small table.

“Bravo…...Oh!” Trixie cries just before the smug look is wiped from her face. “Oh no! No, no, no….”

Sitting opposite her Starlight Glimmer feels the first touch of dread. ”What?”

“No bowl.” Trixie cringed as she attempts to convert her teleport spell into a solid energy shield, but the vortex bubble collapses taking the malformed shield spell with it.

Starlight looks up as an icy hoof traces its way along her spine. ”Oh No!”

A large amorphous yellow mass of warm liquid descends with velocity in to Starlight’s face and splatters all across the camp site.

Spitting out a small piece of soft fruit Starlight glares at her friend. “Really? Banana custard?"

“Happy Birthday Starlight.” Trixie grovels from under the table.

Just under a week to go -- remember, the deadline is the 23rd this month. Only two entries so far, so if you add yours you'll have a great chance of winning! (Or would, if this was a random draw, which even with me in charge is not quite the case.)

Darn it. I still wanna write something for this, but I'm struggling to think up any creative ideas...

6587354
I'm in the same boat; this prompt both intrigues and baffles me.

I really like what 6565296 did with it, though!

6563767
6587412

Ah, forget it. I'm ignoring the "magic" bit and going for the "birthday" bit. Besides, I can't win and it's my prompt, so I feel like bending whatever rules I want.

OK, here I go:

“There’s been some miscommunication,” said Professor Fossil apologetically. “We suspended access to the dig site –”

“My former home, Professor,” insisted Rockhoof.

“…to your home, sorry, yesterday. We must’ve received the incorr–”

“I have a geas! A warrior of the Mighty Helm, once placed under a geas, will yield against nothing.”

Sadly, Fossil knew this; she specialized in his time period. She hurried aside.

Rockhoof placed the cake on the earth, bowing his head. “The 1,038^th year since the birth of Swordbeater. Dutiful father. Proud blacksmith. A great friend.”

Fossil knew better than to interrupt. Now Rockhoof would follow the ancient ceremon–

“Thank you for your time,” he said.

Surprised, she coughed. “I’m sure we could spare you more?”

“I’ll return again for the others. Besides, the dead should not impose too much on the living.”

She smiled warmly. “Please stay. As archaeology professor, I’ll be the judge of that…”

6589841
Good stuff, man. I might have to take a "buck it" approach to half the prompt myself to make this happen.

Well, just over two hours left, if anyone else wants to slip in under the bar!

6563767
Last minute, as usual. And 150 words.

It’s the Imperfections that Make Us Interesting

“Is this her first lamb?” Fluttershy calmly said to Applejack, feeling the sheep’s belly.

“Yes!”

“Probably a narrow birth canal. We’ll go to Dr. Fauna’s—”

“She’s out on a call!”

Fluttershy’s eyes widened. “Th-this is more serious than I can…”

“She could die!”

Fluttershy set her jaw and nodded. “Twilight, you’ll need to teleport the lamb out.”

Twilight gaped. “I can’t teleport something I can’t see!”

“You have to.”

“W-where to aim, and… well, teleportation magic does grab all of something if you get part of it, but—” Twilight gasped “—the umbilical cord! They’re connected! It wouldn’t work, I’d have to guess where to cut—”

“I trust you,” Applejack said.

Fluttershy’s hoof traced an oval. “Inside here.”

Breath held, Twilight felt the magic cling, envelop, expand, oddly long one direction, stop!

A perfect lamb blinked at her—well, Twilight had missed its left ear point.

Applejack grinned. “We’ll name her Tippy.”

6563767
I’m definitely only taking bits and pieces of the prompt here, but better some horsewords than no horsewords, right?

Twenty minutes past closing time, Pony Joe set down the mug he’d been polishing and walked to the cafe’s door, seeing silent streetlights. He sighed, then flipped the sign to closed.

The half-hour since his last customer had left gave him plenty of time to sweep the floors, wash the dishes, and bag the day’s leftovers—save for the heart-shaped eclair sitting alone in the counter’s soft light.

He sighed as his gaze lingered over its delicate layers of chocolate, pastry, and cream.  It’d become a habit to make one in case his favorite customer stopped in. And it’d make too much mess to join the bag he’d drop by the shelter on his way home.

Joe was gathering his hat and coat when the bell above the door rang.  His heart leapt as a sleek black figure came sauntering in.

“Lover,” Queen Chrysalis purred. “Any news about the city’s defenses?”

6 entries at the finish! For a moment there, I thought we were in trouble. Phew!

And indeed, we're done for this month! As IN says, a round half-dozen as the whistle blew. Thank you to all who entered!

As usual, I'll now take a couple of days to decide on a winner. Feedback is now open!

6565296
I'm unclear on what's happening. My best guess is that some magical mishap has reverted Granny Smith to being a baby (and she might have done this to herself), but it's possible they've got a new baby in the house at the same time Granny Smith is having a serious medical problem. Given the prompt, I'll assume you're going for the former. I don't get the line about doctors not liking the Apples either. That's not something I can say I recognize from canon, and it's just begging to be justified. Needs some editing work, too.

In a story this short, we obviously don't get a lot of time to develop the characters, but you have a good voice for Applejack going. If you meant what I think you meant, this was cute.

6575061
I see someone is trying to curry favor with Loganberry. Similar to the last one, there are some editing issues, but it's all pretty clear. I'm not foggy on how any of the plot goes, and StarTrix is always a pleasant thing to read. It's simple, too, so I don't have much to say about it.

6589841
An ineligible story! INTERLOPER!!!!!!!!!!

The setting and character and tone are all good here, but it seems a little uneven on the plot. Like how Fossil is at first reluctant to give Rockhoof access, but moments later encourages him to stay. And it's not like she couldn't see what he was going to do. He's standing there with a cake, after all, and as she says, she knows the ritual. So I'm not really following her mental process. Rockhoof's, sure, but hers is the one the story focuses on to make its point. It wouldn't take much of a tweak to handle that, since there isn't some monumental event going on here, just a low-stakes moment of one character gaining a new appreciation for another, and it is a nice feel-good thing.

6594129
There's a neat story about an unexpected friendship here, but I am left a little confused about a couple of things. For one, wouldn't the sphinx have challenged her as soon as she entered? Kind of a "who goes there?" thing? The card seemed unnecessary at first, though I guess it's a birthday card and the riddle is a present? The mention of Cheerilee makes me think this is a filly, which would then excuse how the riddle could have many answers—basically, anything intangible between two people. My first thought was a grudge. But if this is a filly, that's awful far for her to go on her own, or if her parents brought her, that's an awfully dangerous undertaking for them to allow. So there's a little barrier to entry about how she could even get into this situation, but once I'm there, it's really cute.

6594276
*cough*loser*cough*

6594285
Hmm. Not sure whether Pony Joe is a changeling here or a traitor. And if the latter, whether he knows what he's doing or is in her thrall. That has a fairly big impact on how I'm supposed to interpret things. Still, this thing exudes atmosphere, and that's the quickest way to get me to enjoy a story. The setting and tone are well done here.

6594591
Thank you sir!

I'm fine with leaving room for reader interpretation, but in this case I think it came out being more vague than I'd hoped. My personal vote is unwitting traitor under her thrall.

Fun fact: this started out yesterday as a first stab at a minific for the current Writeoff, written to this prompt. My subsequent submission may or may not have unfolded along different lines. But I came back to this today and figured I could whittle it down into 150 words of something.

6594591

I'm unclear on what's happening. My best guess is that some magical mishap has reverted Granny Smith to being a baby (and she might have done this to herself), but it's possible they've got a new baby in the house at the same time Granny Smith is having a serious medical problem. Given the prompt, I'll assume you're going for the former.

You're correct. I was implying that it was Granny's birthday with the cake and eighty or so candles. I had Applejack state Smith's daily life to get across how boring it must be in her old age, which would explain why she would want to be young again as I set up a twist on the old basic birthday tradition, 'Make a wish and blow out the candles'.

I don't get the line about doctors not liking the Apples either.

That was just a joke I put in that's based of the old phrase, 'An apple a day, keeps the doctor away.' Since they eat apples almost everyday, you could be lead to believe that they don't see doctors very much. And if they don't see doctors, then that means one less patient and a shortcoming in profit.

Thank you for the review.

6594713
I wouldn't say that it killed suspension of disbelief for me. This actually does sound like the kind of thing they'd plausibly do in the show. We did have the CMCs running off to the big city in "For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils," so there's precedent in kids acting incredibly recklessly with no consequences. And this is a very interesting talent for the filly to have. I guess it's not just a random "I don't know when your birthday is, so we'll call it today" thing? She deciphered an ancient text saying when the sphinx was born?

6565296 6575061 6589841 6594129 6594276 6594285

All right, results time. I have to admit that Somerset Cider's custardy entry made me chuckle, though I'm not sure how standalone it really is for those not familiar with the whole custard thing. This month, though, my pick is CoffeeMinion's story -- I really liked both its atmosphere and the twist. Maybe the title gives away just a little too much, but it's still a satisfying scene (at least to me, and I'm the one writing this!) and so CoffeeMinion is the winner this time.

So, CoffeeMinion, please think up a prompt for October's FF150 and post it here. Assuming I approve it (and I've never vetoed a prompt so far!) it'll go up on the 1st of next month in the normal way.

Thank you, everyone who entered -- and indeed everyone who didn't. Maybe some of you will feel like giving it a shot next time! You're all welcome to continue with feedback if you wish.

6596627
If it made you chuckle then I am happy, knowing that you have had a bit of a tough time lately.
Honestly? I was struggling to come up with any thing for this prompt.

6596794

Yes, I think that narrowness of the prompt was something I should've foreseen. "Birthdays" alone would have been a more open-ended improvement. I'll bear that in mind if ever I get a chance at prompt-duty again.

Also, congratulations 6594603 for being this month's winner! I'll be ready to tackle your prompt come October, rest assured of that much.

Wait... I WON?!

Thank you 6596627! (And 6597026!) I don't know what to say... this sort of thing never happens to me!

How about a prompt of "Dead or Alive"? I realize it's the name of a leading bikini fighting game series, but it could also be a bit open-ended, and a bit Halloween-y.

6597790
Sounds good to me! I'll edit the group front page, and as usual the next contest thread will go up on the 1st. If I remember, which is a 50/50 shot at best.

I won the popular vote, yet lost the election....

Dead or Alive, huh? Yeah, I'm questioning that too.

6600059
Things I could see it inspiring:

• Westerns
• Fanservice
• Medical comedy
• The undead
• Bon Jovi

6600587
DO IT FILLY

6600643
That sounds amazing

I totally ship Bone Jovi x Skeleanor