Game Night

by Sozmioi

Sardines

Sardines

A wild continuity appears!

---

Twilight Sparkle asked, confused, "Did princess Celestia really exclude you from a meeting she invited over two hundred other ponies to?"

Luna laughed. "She described it as 'nearly as tedious as the Grand Galloping Gala'." This statement drew several little gasps. "This year I am exempt as I did not take their promises last year; but as I will take them tomorrow, I fear that I will have to attend next year. But until then, I am a free pony!" This wasn't, strictly speaking, the Royal Canterlot Voice. She was just being loud.

We'd all had some drinks of Zebrican Quao to loosen things up. I wouldn't have touched it except Pinkie had calmly and seriously affirmed to me that it was all right. I'd never told her - or anyone here - that my family was none-or-way-too-much on alcohol, but, well, Pinkie. So she and I knew (I had experienced ample proof of Pinkie's reliability) that it wasn't alcoholic, and everypony else but Spike was getting drunk off of a convincing fake. Cheerilee had had an amount that would have been somewhat alarming if this were real.

That, in a way, was a good sign for me. We'd had a bit of a promising start, but then she'd come back to Ponyville, her true home. She hadn't written back to my letters, but she'd shown up to this little gathering. And now she seemed irritated, but not at me. So if she's trying to get sloshed, at least she cares, some way or another. And given how we parted, it's not plausible that she's really really mad at me. Still, there was something up, and not being able to ask her about it was awkward.

And so I praised Celestia in my heart when Spike coughed up a letter. He held it up for Twilight Sparkle to levitate; she opened it. "Re: Ponyville...." She looked up to me, even more confused. "It's for you, but I could answer this."

Luna asked me, "Does my sister frequently send you letters?"

"No, this is the first." I accepted the letter as Twilight went to a bookshelf. After reading the letter once, I groaned. Then I gave a dramatic reading: "Omar! What does the census say about its population level?" Lowering the letter, I answered, "Over niiine thouusand!"

The strange looks showed that I had hammed it up just enough. Twilight read, "Nine thousand and sixteen, to be precise. How did you know?"

"Princess Celestia spent a few days in my world, right? Well, she picked up a great deal of high culture from her adult hosts, and a great deal of low culture from their younger relatives and friends. And this is a reference to the latter. She has not up to this point indulged in shibboleth tennis with me. I imagine the tedium set her mind wandering. Likely she felt like there were over nine thousand nobles left."

Spike asked, "So... should I take down a reply?"

After a moment, I said, "Yes. Everyone, in order to give her a reply worthy of her question, I shall require your assistance!"

Pinkie was eager and got the materials faster than I would have expected (I hadn't seen her employ super-speed since we'd first met, so I'd forgotten). Upon hearing my plan, Luna was not at all hesitant to join in, which helped the others get over their reluctance.

And so, half an hour later, Princess Celestia received by postal dragon-fire a five by ten foot roll of baker's paper on which the ten of us had written, calligraphed, scrawled, sketched, painted, and stamped the text of her question and my answer (and in a few cases, the precise answer); this text was accompanied by a painting/charcoal sketch recreating the infamous scene with Celestia in the role of Nappa and myself as Vegeta (which really seemed backward, but she was the one who put their lines in our mouths). I had also thrown in a flying watermelon from the Demented Cartoon Movie, and a comparison of Trogdor to Discord.

This delivery interrupted her meeting rather more than a simple scroll would have, especially since we'd rolled it up in the short dimension instead of the long.

We never heard a complaint.

---

"Well, that was... fun!", declaimed Luna, who had drunk the majority of the now-empty bottle and seemed to be feeling it a little. "I will take full responsibility for her likeness if she is displeased."

Rarity said, "I shouldn't worry about that, dear - you did an excellent job!" She suddenly covered her mouth with a hoof. "Did I just call you 'dear'?"

As she blurted out, "I'm so sorry!", Luna said, "Yes; may I address you similarly?"

Rarity slowly closed her mouth. "Umm. Yes, you may, your highness."

A silence settled again, and this time we had no additional fake booze to fend off our fears any harder than they were already fended. Applejack began fidgeting. I decided that I was going to 'be' even drunker than I ought to have been. So, I stood up and made an announcement. "Today is a special day - it is Friday! Now, for the last two weeks, we've had a little game night. Still a little early to call it tradition, but anyway. Just because we're not in our usual locale doesn't mean that we can't play something!" I sat down harder than I needed to.

Pinkie said, "Oooh! Another round of Super Double-Annihilation Team-Hunter?"

Rarity objected, "I told you, I'm never playing that again! And I don't care how many times you jump up and down. Or how long your hold your breath."

Twilight added, "You'd just fall unconscious and start breathing again."

Rainbow Dash added, "And we don't have enough ponies anyway."

Pinkie suggested, "Then, Hide-and-Seek!"

Rainbow Dash said, "No way. If you're hiding, no one ever finds you, even if we're all looking. If you're searching, you find us all right away." The other five native Ponyvillains (a much better term than Ponyvillian) nodded in agreement.

I leapt to my feet once more and showed a fist melodramatically. "I know a solution to this problem!"

Pinkie gasped. "Really? You mean I can actually play Hide-and-Seek again?"

"Yes! Kind of! Don't play Hide-and-Seek. Play Sardines!"

I turned around and caught each of them in the eye. "The rules of Sardines are simple. One person is the first 'sardine' and hides. Everyone else looks. When you find a sardine, you become one, also hiding. Game ends when everyone but one is a sardine. The sardines must all hide together, but they may move from place to place in one group."

Twilight reasoned, "So, Pinkie will find the hider right away, but can only hide as well as that hider can. Elegant."

Luna stood up next to me. "This reminds me of my childhood!"

Pinkie said, "Ooh, you played hide-and-seek?"

"We cowered together from the marauding terrors, and the stragglers would find us. Or not! This is a much happier time!"

She swung the door open and stepped outside. "Citizens of Ponyville!" We looked at each other in alarm - she had pulled out Nightmare Moon's two-register creepy voice. "I will be playing Sardines and you are all invited!"

She trotted back in and sat down. One of the pegasus guards who had pulled her chariot here stepped in after and whispered in her ear. After a moment the smile faltered. She replied, "How much?"

He whispered in her ear again.

"I will not make a habit of it."

He stepped out, and the two of them flew up to perch on clouds and keep overwatch.

Fluttershy suddenly loudly said, "Excuse me! Umm, aren't we kind of secret? I mean, the elements. Shouldn't we... not draw attention to ourselves?"

Luna was about to reply when the first curious townsponies showed up. She stepped outside to organize the game, and we began to follow.

Rarity halted in the doorway, eyeing my suit. "That attire doesn't appear suitable for a game like this, Omar."

I looked down. She was right. Since taking on my new job, I'd gotten rather used to being dressed way up all the time. I shrugged. "Well, what am I going to do?"

"Well, you could take it off."

Rainbow Dash shook her head. "No, he hasn't got a... you-know!"

I raised an eyebrow, but Cheerilee asked pointedly, "What is it you haven't got?"

"I don't know. What is it, Dash?"

"That flap thing that stallions keep their junk behind. He was just all hanging out."

Now Cheerilee was upset with me. "You opened yourself to Rainbow Dash?"

"No, I didn't open anything. There isn't anything to open, that's her point. I just thought if I was on the second floor that no one would walk in on me. So, I'm wearing clothing for this game, that's final."

Rarity joked, "I could lend you the dress you wore last time."

"No, thanks."

Luna declared from outside, "Omar! I must hear about this later!"

Facepalm. I'd left that detail out intentionally. But Cheerilee's eyes widened - she softly said, "And I thought she was loud because she was going deaf."

"I heard that too!"

Cheerilee called back, "I don't care!" That got some gasps from the others, but we could hear Luna's hearty laughter.

We slipped out just in time to see who was the first sardine - an orange pegasus. The two dozen of us waited, hushed, while she hid.

I heard one mare whisper to another, "I'm not sure how to feel about this."

"I know, right? I came when I heard, but now I kind of can't leave. We're not supposed to play with princesses."

"I think she's hiding in my house. I'll look there very carefully."

"Good idea. I'll check mine."

Of course Luna heard that, and gestured with her eyes for me to approach. She whispered to me, "This was a terrible idea."

"I could have told you that, but you didn't ask."

"I should have known too, but there's something in that Quao - nothing as tame as alcohol." That was alarming - did Pinkie lead me astray? "I must find how it is made. But, ah, why would you think this a bad idea? You opposed, even denied the 'difference'. Yet here it is, plain as night and day."

"There may not be a 'difference' but there are power differences. When you come to Ponyville and say you're playing a game and that everyone can come, well, many will feel like they have to. The reverse is not so."

Luna pouted. "That much we agree on. And I misused that power. Stupid. Hmm."

"What?"

"Can I make it work? If the game ends up worthy of a princess..."

"Is it time yet?" asked one of the less-enthusiastic mares.

Luna focused and her horn began glowing. A large number of mirror walls rose from the ground roughly three body-lengths apart, laying a loose labyrinth over the town. "Anypony you see walking through these walls is not playing and can only see faint outlines." Our inspection of these walls was cut short as mists swirled around, gathering a dense fog over the town in just five seconds. And to finish, a dozen fake 'sardines' appeared around us. "These are decoys. If you come within a head's length of one, it will vanish from your sight, but others may see it." The decoys ran off into the labyrinth. "If ever any of you give up or become afraid, say my name three times so that I may remove these illusions from you."

Everyone suddenly had a new take on the situation, including the two hesitant mares I'd overheard.

At Luna's "Go!", the crowd began moving at varying paces. Luna herself ran off nearly as quickly as Pinkie and Rainbow Dash. Twilight Sparkle barely moved, examining the mirror walls in detail. Some of us didn't move at all.

"Luna Luna... ow." - "Give it a try! How often is something like this going to come up?" If those two are in, I guess it was a success.

Once most of the others were gone, Fluttershy finally said, "Luna Luna Luna." and took a deep breath, visibly relaxing. "I don't think this is for me. See you tomorrow?", she said apologetically, and flew off towards home.

After a minute, only Cheerilee and I were left. We both 'Luna'ed out of the game and proceeded to have an incredibly awkward conversation (btw, she had figured out that she wasn't really exactly drunk, but also that she wasn't exactly herself). Some of the least awkward moments:

- "Most dating is a reductio ad absurdum proof that the couple is not meant for each other."

- "That's like saying 'I love you iff a billion and seven is prime.'"

- "That would be like saying 'I love you iff two billion and seven is prime.'"

- "The experiment was a success: total failure!"

- "For all X in that set: does X appeal to you?"

- "Anyway, I hope we agree that XOR is not the right operation to use here."

- "So steepest descent doesn't lead to immorality, but ideal projection does? That seems backward." (ideal projection is what ponies call Newton's method)

When things get tough, we fall back on our roots: in our case, it was math humor. And it worked, kind of. We had no idea whether we could actually go interspecies, but we were going to give it a shot and not be offended if the other couldn't take it. And we were going to take it slow. Not the least because of the Quao.

As we spoke, we idly watched the game proceed without interference from the mirror walls and fog. It was funny to see the mass of sardines huddle quietly with the searchers passing right next to them with only a faint outline between them.

What was especially interesting was how the sardines seemed really afraid at the hoofbeats passing nearby. I'd never gotten that into the game. It seemed ideally suited to pony psychology. Their shivers led to Luna spreading her wings over the shivering ponies, comforting them. That actually got us to say 'awwww' at the same time, totally interrupting our conversation.

We also saw some confused townsponies ask the mass of sardines what was going on. Once, Twilight Sparkle came across the rear end of a stallion who was standing through a wall talking with the sardines. Of course, by the time she made it to where they had been, they'd moved on.

Eventually, Luna discreetly began removing mirror walls to make it easier to get around, and shortly everypony (and Spike) was a sardine.

The maze disappeared altogether and we started afresh. For round 2, the two starting sardines were Rainbow Dash and Applejack because it seemed that, setting aside Pinkie (who couldn't be the starting sardine), they had made the first discovery simultaneously. To elaborate matters, it was decided that they would hide separately, and whichever of them had fewer sardines in their group at the end (or when the groups met) was the winner in their private contest.

Several new townsponies joined, and only one left. He thanked Luna for the game and apologized that he was going to have to get up early; she replied that the invitation was not one which required a detailed explanation to decline. I understand where she was going with that, but it didn't quite come across well.

Anyway, this time, Cheerilee and I stayed in; we dropped the conversation, but stuck together as we searched. Now our silence was comfortable - so comfortable that it took effort to remember that anypony not playing could see us clearly. At least, as long as we were in the square. Cheerilee found a decoy Rainbow Dash on our way off to the side, and I another. Once we were behind Sugarcube Corner, we had a bit more privacy, though we were well aware that it was deceptive - there were more walls out here.

I sat down on a bag, then when it grunted, I realized it was a bag of Applejack. "Oh, hi. Sorry 'bout that."

"Ssh."

Cheerilee whispered, "Nice hiding place. I still can't see you."

I added, "At least Pinkie went for Dash. Not that she counts."

Cheerilee found another sack and slid in, and I sat on a box; she crawled onto my lap (she may be a pony, but she is a little pony - maybe 60 kilos, to my 70), and Applejack shuffled onto my feet.

A mare walked right by us and didn't see us. Cheerilee shivered on my lap most endearingly.

A minute later, a stallion came the other direction. And then Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, that same stallion, and Rarity came back the other way. Pinkie winked at us and kept walking.

Once they were gone, Applejack whispered, "A tie. Blasted ties. At least we stayed hidden even from them."

At that, Luna landed right in front of us. She leaned close to Applejack and whispered. "Thou'rt noisy as a mule."

With her present, we could no longer hide quite as effectively. Close, though - Luna seemed to sink into the shadows deeply, though not so deeply that I suspected magic.

The next few minutes were quiet, then all at once we got three new sardines - one couple walked by us and only noticed Luna as they began to turn. A few moments later another showed up and said, "I heard you from around the corner. If we went to the square's labyrinth, hearing wouldn't be worth as much."

That seemed cogent, so we headed in. We shortly ran into Rainbow Dash's group. And again we were tied - seven and seven plus Pinkie. Rainbow Dash whined loudly, giving away our position.

Luna took the lead, guiding us away, and we only picked up one more before slipping into a crack between two walls, then another, and into a small space. I was crammed between Cheerilee on one side and Rarity on the other. Once we were settled in, Luna gave Rainbow Dash a stern look and held a hoof to her lips. The intensity of her expression actually got my heart rate up a bit; Rainbow Dash practically wilted, but she did so silently.

We could hear a pony right on the other side of that wall. And she was coming for us, coming around towards the entryway. It was as if it was a terrible thing for us to be found. Cheerilee shivered against me harder than before. With the ambiance, I wasn't too much steadier, but I put an arm around her. Luna again spread her wings, and the breathing calmed.

The tension felt absurd as a perfectly ordinary mare made her way into the circle.

And this repeated over and over until we were overflowing the space. I never expected it to be so tense - and it never had been, with humans. But packed in among herding-animal people, it was.

When we ran out of space, we had to move. Then we ended up stretched out across the labyrinth on the way back to the starting point at the library, hoping that nopony would think to check there. As it turned out, Twilight Sparkle was sitting on the steps, reading a book about mazes.

She looked up. "Hello! Did you know that... oh. Never mind."

This larger space was not so well-suited to frightened huddling, and the atmosphere broke.

By this point, I expect that Luna had begun taking down some walls outside of the sight of the players; she was certainly thinning the mist. Ponies began finding us faster and faster. And so we all ended up back where we started.

After one last pony came in, Luna announced - reasonably quietly, I was impressed - "And that is everyone. Thank you all for coming; I hope you enjoyed yourselves?"

There was a generally-satisfied rumble.

"I am very glad to hear that."

And then a stallion asked, "Excuse me, princess?"

"Yes?"

"Who was Nightmare Moon? Was she really you?"

A pause. Outside of Ponyville, this was essentially common knowledge; she was a little surprised to hear the question at all. However, only the ponies of Ponyville had seen in her monstrous guise.

"A spirit of evil infected me at a time I was specially vulnerable, and I transformed into what you saw at the celebration. With some outside help I expelled the spirit, and later on we destroyed it." Warmly, thankfully, she added, "It will not happen again."

This was by far the most calm and assured she had been when issuing that particular claim. In a way, I finally got her that hug she needed. Maybe even literally.

As for the rest of the weekend? Well,
A) this IS mainly about game night, and
B) we took it slow.
(what, you thought I was going to say 'mind your own business' after everything else I've told you?)

Comments

[nothingtoseehere]

Nice chapter. The Cheerilee addition was kind of abrupt, though not necessarily in a bad way. I always welcome the addition of my waifu.

[Sozmioi]

3742180

I'm sure her absence was just as inexplicable for all three of you out there who read the story this follows.

I'll drop a hint in chapter 1 so it doesn't come out of nowhere.