Pony Strikers Charged

by ZeroChill

The Gauntlet Has Been Set

The yellow flash felt like an eternity to everypony. It was an unusual feeling to be suspended in midair, as if the light was imbuing god-like energy throughout their bodies. It was a surreal feeling. Afterwards, the yellow flash became a white environment void of life. Then, the environment became a very dense fog, and each of them felt as if they were falling. As they passed through some of the thick fog, they were able to see crackles of lightning beneath them followed by a yellow landscape in the distance. Each and every pony realized that they actually were free falling quickly. Celestia, Luna, Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy and Derpy tried moving their wings. Unfortunately, they found that their wings were unresponsive.

“Wait, what’s the deal with my wings!? They can’t move!” Rainbow Dash complained. Realizing what this meant, she screamed to the top of her lungs. Fluttershy had her forehooves covering her eyes with apparent fear from passing through the bank of lightning. In response to see that wings were not working, Celestia, Luna, Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, Lyra and Vinyl Scratch tried to use their magic. Much to their displeasure, their horns shorted out immediately.

“Well Lulu, it seems as if everypony’s unicorn magic is unable to work as well. Should we panic?” Celestia suggested. Seeing this as a thrill, Luna smirked and positioned her body to a nosedive. She fell down faster than anypony else. As everypony else was screaming in fear of losing their life, a giant, metallic and gray airship came from the horizon, which everypony fell in. Surprisingly, nopony was injured by the fall, but crashing against the hard metal floor knocked the wind out of them. The gap that they fell into was closed by a dark-blue metallic roof.

When everypony got up, their eyes were met with an interior that is similar to a metallic factory. The room was dimly lit by sprayed wires with crackling electricity and there were hovering Television sets throughout the room. Each one was filled with a blue static. The atmosphere of the area emitted a cold feeling, sending shivers down every individual pony’s spine. Out of nowhere, Discord warped into the room with an array of fireworks exploding behind him.

“Does everypony here like the Stormship? We shall use this to travel across this universe.” The Television Sets lined up and had the static replaced with various lands that appeared as if they were devastated by the apocalypse. They were charred, frozen, and filthy. The technology within the lands appeared to be frayed and the atmosphere was unstable with constant lightning clouds, sandstorms and eruptions. Strangely enough, there were crowds of unusual creatures sitting at the stands of each ‘stadium’. The reactions of everypony were mixed, but Celestia was the most unsettled out of the ponies present. Her jaw was left open as she was absolutely speechless about the conditions of the universe. Twilight Sparkle was the first one to speak up.

“Discord, what happened here? I expected that this universe would have been more suitable for playing hoofball in. Instead, it seems as if the universe is devastated.” In those moments, Celestia regained her composure.

“These lands were devastated by the power of chaos. There is no doubt about it.” Twilight Sparkle looked up to Celestia with a worried look on her face.

“What do you mean about ‘chaos’ Princess Celestia?”

“These natural disasters are out of control. If you pay attention to this wasteland on this screen, the ground is frozen solid. Yet, at the same time it is affected by severe lightning storms. The lightning strikes at just about every minute. Do you see what is wrong here my pupil?” Twilight Sparkle paid attention to the screen and looked for any unnatural occurrences. She stared at the screen for a minute before the truth revealed itself.

“If the area is constantly being struck by lightning, then how does the ground remain frozen? It makes absolutely no sense!” Discord smiled as he saw that she had finally understood what this universe is about.

“And that is the beauty of chaos. These stadiums may be devastated beyond safety, but at the same time they are constantly regenerating themselves from the constant destruction. Do you see this Lava Pit stadium here?” Each of the ponies’ attention in the room shifted towards the screen with a volcanic atmosphere. Fire balls were splashing upon the charcoal floor of the stadium and scorched the field in a fiery inferno. The area was set on fire for a few seconds, and then the flames subsided. Braeburn looked towards Discord.

“Pardon me sir, but is it really safe to play hoofball in these conditions? Some ponies can get really hurt like that.” He asked worriedly. Discord placed a supporting arm around Braeburn’s neck.

“You shouldn’t worry over a slight challenge in hoofball. I’ll make sure that none of you ponies get hurt.” He stated in an unnerving way. As Vinyl Scratch heard more of the stadium gimmicks and power of chaos infesting the land, she couldn’t keep her grin under control.

“Now this is just awesome! I knew that this universe would be awesome, but I didn’t think it’d be filled with such awesome stuff! I want to play now!” Discord looked towards the white unicorn with the electric blue mane and sunglasses. Seeing her enthusiasm caused him to smile.

“Well Scratch, since you are so eager to play this game, perhaps I should just cut to the chase and explain how I’ll set this up. Does everypony here agree?” Each pony in the room looked at each other with varying degrees of either excitement or uneasiness. Eventually, all of them nodded in agreement. “Good. Now first of all, each of you will be your own captain.” Each of the ponies in the room gasped. Luna stepped forward slightly to talk to Discord.

“If what you are saying is correct, then each one of us gets a team.” Discord nodded in confirmation. “Then, how does one pony become a team?”

“I’m glad you asked Luna.” Discord opened up his griffon talons, and a gray remote with a large red button appeared in his hand. As he pressed the button, electricity shot from the ceiling and into a gap in the ground. The gap lit up in a light blue color. Then, metallic particles came up from the glowing gap and began to attach to each other. As the materialization was completed, a round, metallic object appeared before everypony. It looked like Discord’s hoofball. Then, different plates on the ball began to split apart from each other. Eventually, the “ball” morphed into a torso with five gaps in the points of a star. Metallic, slender limbs shot out from four gaps from the ball. From the remaining gap at the top, a flat screen erupted out of the body. On the screen, a pixelated face with a yellow background appeared. It took its first steps forward. It spoke in an electronic voice.

“Greetings everypony. My name is M0-4N unit ‘Star’ model 3-6. You can feel free to call me Star.” Star moved the limbs on its side upwards, which ended in five smaller limbs. It clenched its sub limbs closed, as if it was testing their mobility. Seeing it do this, Lyra’s eyes opened wide-open before she squealed in delight. She ran up to Star quickly.

“FINGERS! YOU HAVE FINGERS! I want you to tell me everything about how they work and what their purpose is!” Lyra stated with so much energy that Pinkie Pie grew a bit jealous. Star backed up a bit before Bonbon grabbed Lyra’s mane with her mouth and pulled her back.

“I’m sorry about my friend. She has this obsession with these imaginary creatures known as humans. I hope she didn’t traumatize you.” Bonbon apologetically stated.

“No problem at all. In fact, humans do exist in this universe.” Star happily said as close to how happy a robot can be.

“…Whaaaaat?” Bonbon stated in disbelief.

“Aha! See? Humans do exist Bonbon!” Lyra said as proudly as possible. Bonbon gave an unamused expression.

“Yes, humans and human subspecies do exist in this universe. In fact, let me answer the princess’s question first.” Star walked over to Luna. Seeing how unnaturally the robot walked caused Fluttershy to whimper in fear. He slowly put his thumb and middle finger together and moved them in a way where they snapped. The metal floor near him opened up to form a rectangle in the ground, and a neon blue shelf with fifteen silver, metallic gauntlets with indented ridges and screens rose up from the hole. “I want you to wear one of these gauntlets please.” Luna complied and put her forehoof into one of the gauntlets. When she put it in deep enough, the black screen flashed a light blue color and snapped itself onto the forehoof, startling her. The gauntlet flashed a brilliant white, which caused all the ponies in the room to cover their eyes with their hooves.

As the flash dimmed down, Luna was equipped with a midnight blue uniform: her torso was covered with a thick, metallic armor. There were holes in the armor that allowed her wings full mobility. A larger form of her Cutie Mark was plastered on the breastplate of her armor. Her long legs were shielded with slim, dark blue shin guards. Her hooves were covered in metallic cleats that looked like the gauntlet on her hoof. The transformation startled her. As she looked around, she saw that each pony in the room stared in awe. Rarity excitedly went up to Princess Luna with a gleam in her eyes.

“Princess Luna, that armor looks positively gorgeous! It hugs your body so well, and it also makes you look just as dangerous as you are beautiful!” Luna blushed at the comment given to her by Rarity. “Do you feel any different?”

“Well we, er, I do feel like I can take on anything. But, this doesn’t explain how we are going to play with one pony per team.” Star looked towards the newly-armored Luna and approached her.

“You see that screen on your gauntlet?” Luna lifted the hoof with the gauntlet to her face, and she saw that it was active. On the top of the screen, there was a sprite of her head. Below it were three darkened squares and a brighter square that has the face crocodile with a midnight blue mask on it. “Try tapping one of those squares on the screen and see what happens.” A stylus shot out of a port on the gauntlet. She smiled before she grabbed it using her magic and tapped a vacant square. What appeared were several different sprites of creatures that were alien to her. She slid the stylus, which rotated through the different creatures within the selection. She smiled as she found a sprite of an unusual pink creature with a large-open snout and a red bow that read ‘Power’ underneath it in bright, blue letters.

“Thy strength appeases us Birdo! We shall choose thee!” She double tapped it twice, filling the vacant square with the creature. Instead of being pink, the creature’s sprite had a midnight blue skin with a dark purple bow. The gauntlet fired a beam out of a lens to the side of it and materialized the Birdo from her gauntlet. Like the sprite in Luna’s gauntlet, Birdo took the appearance of a bipedal, midnight blue dinosaur with a large space for a mouth. The Birdo was equipped with a thick torso and a set of armored shorts that contained an opening for the spiky tail of its wearer. The Birdo twirled and made strange noises, eliciting a few curious stares towards its direction. Celestia looked towards Star, who had a smile on his screen.

“So that creature my sister summoned will be used as a pony’s teammate?” She curiously asked.

“That is correct. With this technology, any pony can be their own team. It is the reason why it is possible to have large tourneys with a low amount of players. In addition, the gauntlet grants amazing soccer skills, but the skill distribution shall be based off of what the pony believes is most important. Luna, please tap the sprite representing you on the gauntlet.” Luna gingerly tapped her icon, revealing “Offensive” as her status. “As an Offensive player, your passing and shooting are your superior skills, but your movement and defensive skills are pathetic. The sidekick you picked, Birdo, is a Power player. That means that her shooting and defensive skills are amazing, but her movement and passing skills leave more to be desired.” Luna pondered on her current situation.

“Despite having great power on our side, we can’t move well throughout the field. This means that we need some fleet-footed characters to balance out our slow ones.” Luna browsed through the creatures in the gauntlet when a white skull sprite that looked like it belonged to a turtle caught her eye. It had “Defensive” as its status. She tapped the status, revealing the distribution of the points. She was pleased to see that the creature had movement and defense as its superior skills despite the lack of any shooting or passing points. She double tapped the Dry Bones icon, which filled the vacant square in the middle. The gauntlet fired another beam right next to the space near the Birdo, which materialized a bipedal skeleton of a turtle. Its head was painted with a midnight blue color, and it wore a heavily battered shirt with bright yellow shorts. It came equipped with cleats that were a mix of midnight blue and bright yellow colors. It seemed to look around before its eye sockets locked with Luna. It tried to go over to her, but its bones separated from each other. Celestia giggled at how clumsy the Dry Bones was.

“Oh Lulu, is a skeleton really the best idea you can come up with for a partner? This will be an easy win for me.” Luna became irritated with her sister’s words.

“Oh haha Tia, very funny. Just wait until we meet each other on the field. Then, you’ll see that we will beat you!” Celestia smiled her sister’s slight frustration. Star walked over to her.

“Princess, you should put on the next gauntlet. Let’s see if you have what it takes to out-do your sister.” Celestia complied with Star’s request as she walked over to the shelf and placed her forehoof inside a gauntlet. She closed her eyes so that she wouldn’t be surprised by the sudden transformation like Luna had been. As she opened her eyes, she found herself with a body-tight torso suit that extended down to her forelegs. She also found herself to be wearing a golden yellow breastplate. In addition, her golden shoes were traded off for silver cleats that are similar to her gauntlet and an image of her Cutie Mark was on her breastplate, just like with Luna’s armor. To complete her ensemble, she was wearing a golden helmet with a small opening that allowed her aurora mane to flow out freely and a large space at the front that fit her snout and horn.

“This gear feels like a bit much. I know that the gear is needed to survive these absurd conditions, but this power is amazing! Is it really necessary?” She stated in awe. Luna looked towards the direction of her sister once before she snorted.

“Tis a slight equip. I am sure that I can destroy you in the Hoofball Pitch even with that.” Celestia looked at Luna with burning eyes.

“Is that so Lulu? Let’s not forget who the older sister around here is. Let’s also not forget who defeated the other for control of Equestria one thousand years ago. Let’s also remember who mistook the salt order for sugar and ruined every bakery in Canterlot for three days!” Luna clenched her teeth as she was seething in anger.

“Thou promised that thee wouldn’t mention that situation again codpiece! Salt and sugar look very similar in bags nowadays!”

“Awww, are you angry that mother liked me more than she liked you Lulu?” Celestia teased. Luna stomped her right forehoof around on the ground before she approached Star with a murderous look.

“Bring us to the closest Hoofball field at once!!!” She screamed using the Canterlot voice. With a motion of its hand, Star brought up a light blue holographic screen that had a map of the universe. He clicked on a location simply known as ‘The Vice’. There was a sudden shift in movement as the stormship changed direction. Twilight looked towards Star with a worried expression.

“Star, what is wrong with the princesses? They seem much more violent than what they should be.”

“Do not worry Twilight. That is an effect the gauntlet has. Because it gains its power through absorbing the chaos in this universe, it can cause the wearer to be significantly more aggressive in their personality. This makes matches much more exciting as a result, and the personality shift is only present while wearing the gauntlet.”

“Well, it’s a relief that the effect isn’t permanent. Though, I’d like to hold off on wearing my gauntlet until after the princesses have played each other.” Most of the other ponies mumbled in agreement. Discord looked towards the direction of Celestia and Luna with a grin present on his face.

“Alright then, you should pick your teammates now.” Luna quickly tapped on the final vacant box on the screen and found a spherical ghost creature with fangs known as Boo. She saw that it was a “Playmaker”-type character and saw that it has strong movement and passing, but poor shooting and defensive skills. She double tapped it, filling the vacant square with its sprite. As it did, her gauntlet shot one beam towards the direction of the Birdo and the Dry Bones. The Boo spawned from the beam while it was equipped with a midnight blue helmet and nothing else. The Boo floated casually above the surface.

Using her magic to hold the stylus from her gauntlet, Celestia tapped the first vacant square and found the sprite of a humanoid red and white mushroom known as Toad. She checked its status to see that it was a “Playmaker” character, which she double tapped to fill the first vacant square. Her gauntlet shot a beam out towards the opposite direction. From the beam came Toad, who was equipped with a golden helmet that fit the circumference of its head, a golden yellow shirt with the insignia of the sun on it and tight, yellow shorts. Wasting no time, she tapped another vacant box and she picked the first sprite shown. The sprite was an orange-brown bipedal mole creature with a “Power” status. Celestia’s gauntlet fired another beam near the Toad, which materialized the mole creature known only as Monty Mole. The Monty Mole wore a golden-yellow helmet and a metallic breastplate colored gold. It had claws so powerful that it was able to tear through the steel beneath it, leaving behind a dirt pile for a point of entrance. It jumped from the hole and landed on the floor in front of it. There were several noises of awe resonating from the ponies, but Celestia didn’t feel impressed.

Her eyes were locked on the screen, filled with determination. Finally, she tapped the last vacant square and saw the sprite of a yellow turtle head. She double tapped it after seeing that it was a “Balanced” character. As the blue beam fired from her gauntlet, a smile started to creep on Celestia’s face. The beam spawned a bipedal turtle with a golden-armored shell with the insignia of the sun on it. It was wearing bright yellow shorts and bright yellow cleats. Star walked up to the turtle creature and examined it.

“Interesting choice Princess. The Koopa has average Shooting, Passing, Movement and Defensive skills, but he should be a reliable character on your team.” Celestia browsed through the gauntlet’s screen one more time to check what status she was. She was pleased to find out that she was a “Balanced” player. She also saw that she had a crocodile sprite on her screen with a gold-yellow mask. As she did this, the airship began to shake. “Ah, we’re here!” Star looked towards the two princesses, both of whom had murderous expressions on their faces directed towards each other. Each of their teammates also looked at the other team with a similar ferocity.

“Just tell us the rules, and we’ll be ready to play. This is what you want after all, isn’t it Lulu?” Celestia said with a hint of scorn.

“Please do so Star. I want Tia to pay for thinking she is better than me. The both of us know which one of us is better!” Celestia brought her face closer to Luna’s face.

“Yes Lulu, the better pony is me. More ponies like me more than you for bringing out the sun each day.” She stated proudly. Luna gasped and then brought her face closer to Celestia’s face.

“Tia, the only thing you bring to those ponies is that fat ass for all the stallions to fantasize about!” Each of the ponies in the room gasped at how rude Luna’s words were. Both sisters put their faces towards each other and began snarling. Star appeared adamant about the situation.

“Very well, I shall explain the rules. In this universe, you can hit anyone on the field whenever you want, however you want. A team can have up to three items at a time, and items are obtained through charged shots to the other team’s goal or by having a teammate without the ball being tackled into. Your sidekicks are capable of skill shots, which are unique shots designed to make getting goals easier. As for the wearers of the gauntlets, they are capable of the almighty Mega Strike, which can score a maximum of six goals in one shot.” As Star said this, a giant screen descended from the ceiling, which revealed a green, cragged soccer field surrounded by stadium stands filled with roaring alien creatures. “Since we have arrived, the two of you can position yourselves at either the home or away teleporters over there.” It pointed towards two electric blue tiles at the center of the room, each of which were lit up with dim lights.

“I’ll take the away teleporter. Lulu knows that she needs all the support from the home audience “Celestia said haughtily.

“If that’s how you want to do this, then we’ll be sure to not show you mercy on the playing field Tia!” The two sisters turned away from each other as they approached the teleporters.

“Well then Celly, Lulu, I hope the two of you have fun!” Discord said while waving with his talon tips. Both princesses vanished through an electrical impulse shooting upward from the tile. “I’ll bring us down to the stands to watch our rulers of Equestria play a fun little game of hoofball!” Discord snapped his talons, warping all other thirteen ponies onboard down to the stands in The Vice.

Author's Note:

Sorry to have kept some of you waiting, but here's the second chapter. So, Luna and Celestia are going to be playing the first game of hoofball in the next chapter. I'm going to need a proofreader for future chapters though.

Comments

[chaos2012]

Yes! Monty mole was my favorite assist character!

[ZeroChill]

3368493
Monty Mole was also one of my favorite assists characters. He requires a bit of skill in the Power terms, but he's still a Power character.

[ZeroChill]

Chapter 3 shall very likely come tomorrow. Be prepared for the first explosive match.

[Dirty Bit]

I freaking HATE Monty Moles and Birdos

Personally, I prefer a team of two Boos and a Dry Bone for good measure

I'm curious to see both princesses' mega strikes