Session 44
Session 44.0 Ardashir
"Okay, so why are we here again?" Dash flew into the room with the Cutie Mark Map, where her friends already stood. "Another Cutie Mark problem?"
"No," Twilight picked up a thick book on the table as she spoke. "Big Brother's friends asked us to test another game." She showed it to them, made to be old and leathery-looking, with a crimson five-pointed star set within a circle on a black background.
"Oh dear," Fluttershy ducked and looked over the table. "It's not another horror game, is it?"
Twilight sighed as Rarity set a comforting hoof over Fluttershy's withers. "Yes, Fluttershy, so if you want to leave I'll understand. But given how you helped with Discord you might like this idea, it was made by my brother's friends working with some of the inmates of Tartarus."
"Huh?" Applejack examined the book very gingerly. "Yah sure that's a good idea?" She flipped through it, finding the setting section in red ink on white paper; the character section in red ink on black paper; and the third section completely blank black paper. "They didn't even finish this here book, this last section got nothin' in it."
"Oh, that!" Twilight took the book back and examined the introduction. "It's supposed to be that way. It's magic, the letters will appear in the dark." Twilight grinned as evilly as she could, which wasn't much. "It'll be spookier that way. So, girls, you in for a test drive or not?"
"I have some free time," Rarity sat herself at the table. "In the interests of helping Gizmo and the rest..."
"And we'll be helping somepony from Tartarus, too, and that's a good thing, right?" Pinkie Pie bounced over to her chair. She stopped and scratched her chin. "Say, Twilight? Just who DID help with this book?"
"It wasn't Tirek," Twilight read the dedication "'To the very dear ponies of Equestria, thank you for all the happy memories -- Hydia. May this innocent and totally harmless pastime amuse and enlighten you as you all participate in it.'"
The ponies froze. Six sets of worried eyes looked at each other.
"Um, Twilight," Rainbow Dash dropped down in her chair. She shifted uneasily. "Are we gonna regret this?"
Twilight rolled her eyes and began to dim the lights, closing the doors and windows. Darkness slowly deepened within the room.
"Girls, come on." She opened the tome before her, illuminated by the light of a single lantern. "It's only a book." Twilight began to read. "'Open your minds to the wisdom you are about to receive. Speak the words and set me free...'"
###
Deep within Tartarus, a short and hideous-looking witch began to cackle in the midst of the perfectly innocent tea party she was having with some sickeningly adorable bears, rabbits, and other woodland creatures.
"Heh-heh-heh! At least I'll be out of this dump, at any rate!"
(OOC: Let someone else write how hilariously this can fail. This is Hydia, after all; she never wins against the ponies.)
Session 44.1 MagicMan001 with Alex Warlorn
Vordul walked into the kitchen where his mother and sisters were sitting, Chrysalis was apparently reading a newspaper, which hide that she was magically writing with some underground anti-authority gamer producers that were producing yet another 'Your fully customizable changeling queen the destroys thinly veiled parodies of Shining Armor and Cadence and the Mane Six.' It helped unlike the invasion in Canterlot, the average ponies had not witnessed Chrysalis' latest attack (which had been the point), and Equestria had very poor mass media. Not that this is had helped the winter court be diplomatically recognized... yet. The Frost Giants had, technically.
Imago was eating insect and love concentrate cereal. And Pupa was... 'nursing' as changelings can. He was wearing a Neighke hoodie, thick black shades, purple beanie and heavy, jingling gold chain. He carried a huge boombox over his shoulder blasting music.
Vordul said, "S'up, homies!"
Imago said flat, "No."
"Mommy, I'm scared," quivered Pupa.
Chrysalis said flatly, not looking up from her paper. "Take that crap off before I hit you."
Session 44.2 Mtangalion and Ardashir with Alex Warlorn
(Continued with Session 43.5 Mtangalion and Ardashir / Session 43.6 Mtangalion and Ardashir )
(Continued with Session 43.5 Mtangalion and Ardashir
Session 43.6 Mtangalion and Ardashir )
Discord laughed. "Anatomy? How tediously limiting. Don't knock bipedalism 'til you've tried it." He snapped his fingers.
The next thing they knew, Celestia and Luna were a pair of voluptuous anthro alicorns.
Luna muttered, "this can't get any worse."
Just then some of the castle servant entered the room. "Did their Highnesses call for us? We -- "They saw what stood before them, on two legs. "AHHHH! Monsters! Monsters that ate the Princesses! CALL THE GUARDS!"
Celestia called, "No! No, my little ponies! Wait!" She ran after them to explain, and the panicked servants galloped away in panic.
Luna glared at the cackling Discord. "YOU!"
"What?" Discord said, wiping tears from his eyes as he rolled on the air. "I'm just expanding your horizons! BWA-HAHAHA!"
Luna's eyes turned red. "Then you can expand your own!"
"Ha! You think can transform me! Ha! In your dreams!" Discord realized what he just said. Oh dear.
"No! In my Night Guards'!" Luna zapped Discord asleep where he stood.
Discord appeared in the collective dreams of Luna's royal guards... now a incredibly shapely anthro dragonequus... on a darkened stage with a spot light... in an imaginary day-club full of Thestrals, who were all dreaming the same thing of somehow being anthro bat ponies, but due to the logic of dreams found nothing wrong with that. They whistled and gave cat call.
Discord snapped her fingers... only for the dancing poll to appear as a result.
"... Drat."
Session 44.3 Mtangalion
Princess Twilight Sparkle rushed into Canterlot Castle's throne room, yawning. "What's the trouble? The message said it was urgent."
The Night Guard escorting her bowed, seeming embarrassed. "Perhaps it's best if you see for yourself, highness."
Twilight nodded and started on the long trot through the hall, only to stop in her tracks, eyes wide.
Princess Luna was... some kind of anthropomorphic Alicorn mare? She had hands with fingers, but hooves where humans would have feet. She was large and... well-proportioned, too... very attractive by human standards, if those applied at all here. Her dress would have inspired Rarity right into a creative frenzy. Apparently, in spite of all of this, Luna had plopped an extra cushion down on her throne and carried right on with Night Court.
Filthy Rich, currently the only petitioner, waved a hoof-full of documents at Luna. "So, about this new overtime wage law..."
Something made an electronic chime, causing Luna to gasp. "One moment, my little pony!" The transformed Princess of the Night pulled out a human mobile phone, poking at the touch-sensitive screen with her fingertips. "YES! We finally have enough stamina for the next dungeon!" Eight-bit battle music played out of tiny speakers, mixed with cartoonish sounds of sword swipes and flying spells. "We summon Shiva! Have at thee, fiends!"
Filthy growled. "Again!? Forget this, I'm coming back in the morning."
Luna kept tapping the device, not even noticing when he left, stomping past Twilight on his way out. "This will only take a minute... or four or five. Ah, but we must venture into the daily dungeon as well to earn more holy orbs!"
Twilight took a deep breath, approaching the throne. "Okay, I think I see what the problem is."
Luna was surprised enough to look away from the phone briefly. "Truly, your powers of deduction astound us at times, young Twilight." She grinned eagerly. "Tell us, how can we send bits to the human world to buy gems, so that we may continue playing Last Fantasy Record Keeper without waiting for the stamina to refill?"
Session 44.4 Alex Warlorn and Mtangalion
"That is a... very nice dress Princess, er, Luna..."
"Thank ye Twilight, we made it ourselves."
"Truly, that knave Discord has a devilish imagination. Why are our teats up here, and why so large? One would think we were nursing twin foals! Perhaps if we magic yon dress into a suitable shape and put it on, stallions will once again look at our face when addressing us."
"But seriously, we could use thy help in this matter."
"... Uh, Luna, Sunset explained something to me about those games... after an... incident... she said that the makers of such games call ponies, humans, people, who pay large sums to their 'free to play' games, as 'whales.' "
"And?"
"And those games, Sunset explained, that they're designed to prey on every psychological trap the human brain has!"
"And how would she or thy know?"
Princess Twilight blushed. "I... might have some experience."
Session 44.5 Ardashir
"Um, by the way, Princess Luna?" Twilight hesitated to ask. "Just where is Princess Celestia?"
Luna rose, her new anatomy moving in a fashion that would have drawn the immediate interest of most males and some females. Luna looked down at herself and snorted.
"Bah! How do females with such a form even manage to move without drawing the eye of every stallion nearby?" She walked to a nearby door, leading off into one of the smaller chambers used by the Princesses when they desired some temporary privacy during their duties. "My sister is within, Twilight. She asked me to ask Discord whence the ideas for these bizarre forms came from. He did show us the 'World of Horsecraft' fan art." Luna opened the door onto a darkened chamber beyond. "My sister seemed oddly fascinated with what she saw."
"Okay." Twilight frowned and scratched her chin. "Wait, where is Discord now?"
Luna scowled in a fearsome fashion.
"He is currently indisposed."
###
In Discord's dream, the curvaceous draconequs, currently in an leather outfit, stood on a rooftop with a Thestral in a Bat-pony costume.
"So you'll leave your life of crime and join me in defending the honest ponies of Equestria, Cat-cord?" He said, sounding delighted as he held her hands.
"Anything if I can get out of this dream!" Discord groaned back. She tried to shapechange, to teleport, to change shape. All useless. "This romance stuff gives me a rash!"
###
Twilight slipped inside the room. Celestia sat against the far wall, looking at the one computer Sunset had sent her and Luna. She seemed frozen.
"See if you can aid my sister, Twilight," Luna closed the door. "I must see if Discord is yet ready to remove these hideous bodies he has cursed my sister and myself with." The sound of her hooves clopping on the floor came, fading as she left.
"Princess?" Twilight slowly approached. Celestia seemed frozen. Twilight shivered a bit at seeing her teacher in this unnatural form. If she'd found that 'fan art'... "Princess Celestia? I'm afraid the humans are a little randier than ponies, and when they get bored..."
She froze. Twilight could see the screen's image, and it bore the picture of the three leading figures of Crystalsoft. The human Chrysalis, Discord, and --
"Sombra," Celestia said, lightly touching the image on the screen. "Do you know the other me, as I once knew the other you?" She shook her head, and Twilight colored as other parts of the Princess' current form also shook. "I wonder what has become of that other me?"
###
Sunset got a knock at her door, and opened it to find Princesses Luna and Celestia standing there.
"WHAT! How did you come through the mirror portal without letting me know? Wait, why are you still equine? Or half-equine?" Sunset looked at their clothes So like those of Principals Celestia and Luna -- her blood froze. Hoping she was wrong, she hurried them into her hotel room. "Miss Celestia? Miss Luna? How did this happen?"
"Actually, Sunset Shimmer?" Princess Luna said. Sunset stared to hear the voice of Principal Luna.
"We hoped you could tell us," Principal Celestia said, ears pinned and sounding highly annoyed.
Session 44.6 Ardashir
"So, this just happened to both of you?" Sunset asked her principals. They were sitting at one of the tables in the con's tabletop-games room, one of the few places in the con Sunset figured would have both enough room and some privacy. She'd hurriedly set up a game of chess to fool anyone looking in.
Though she had to wonder how many fans would think the two anthropomorphic alicorns were anything but fans in very well-made costumes.
"We were grading papers and discussing the school budget," Luna rose and frowned, arms folded over her chest. She tossed her mane back from her face, looking annoyed as she accidentally hit her own horn. "Then there was a blast of light, a sound like mad laughter, we felt like we were being stretched like rubber, and the next thing we know?" Luna stood up, angrily stomped one hoof against the floor. She indicated first her sister and then herself. "We look like, like, something out of a cartoon!"
"You have no idea," Sunset said under her breath. As principal Celestia and Luna looked confused, she said, "Okay, but why did you come here?"
"We remembered some of the, ah, more unusual knowledge and skills you and your friends have displayed in the past," Celestia tapped her velvet nose. "This definitely counts as 'unusual'."
"So, any ideas?" Luna asked in a hopeful tone.
Sunset leaped to her feet. Face in her hands, she crossed the room from one end to the next. She turned and looked at the principals of Canterlot High. A pair of half-human alicorns looked back at her, their large eyes wide.
"So you don't know how this happened?" Both alicorns shook their heads no. Sudden cold fear trailed along Sunset's spine. "Wait, can either of you work magic?"
They looked at her in disbelief. "Please try," Sunset said, wondering how to explain it. "See if you can feel a sort of -- pulse, along your horns."
Celestia and Luna looked at each other, shrugged, and both furrowed their brows. Sunset held her breath as she felt a weak flow of mana from them both. It might be enough to control the fall of dice, but nor more than that.
"Well at least neither of you will be playing with any heavenly bodies," she sighed in relief.
"Talk about heavenly bodies!"
Sunset scowled out the door. Two male congoers were there, their eyes focused entirely on Celestia and Luna. Celestia covered her smile with one hand. Sunset hurried to the table and moved a rook.
"Uh, my rook to your queen, 'Princess Celestia'."
"Hey, bacon hair?" A male voice called behind her. "Can you, uh, move out of the way and let us see the real show?"
"Who are they even supposed to be, anyway?" His friend asked. The amused look on Celestia's face faded a bit when he added, "They're dressed like a pair of old schoolteachers."
Luna stood up, nearly bristling in her fury.
"We are the Princesses Luna and Celestia! Er, I mean, we're dressed like them!" She tilted her head back proudly, arching her long equine neck.
"Yeah, right," the complainer said. "You dress like my grandma."
Luna frowned at them and stomped over to close the door with a slam.
"That reminds me," Sunset sat back down in relief. "You came here? Looking like THAT?" Sunset shook her head and groaned. She definitely felt a headache coming on. "What if someone SAW you?"
"Several people saw us on the way in," Celestia said. For some reason Luna began to look more and more angry as her sister smiled. "We received quite a few compliments on the quality of our costumes." She looked a trifle superior as she said, "Well, I did. Luna, well..."
Confused, Sunset looked at Luna.
"They told me I was 'vamping it up too much'!" Luna put her hands on her hips. Her long tail lashed behind her as though she were swatting flies. "They said, 'Buddy, no one is going to take YOU seriously as a female!'"
Celestia fought down a giggle; Luna gave her sister a dirty look; and Sunset wondered how worse this day could possibly get.
Universe, she thought, that wasn't a dare.
Session 44.7 Ardashir
While Twilight and the teratogenicly transformed princesses sought a solution to their problem, her friends -- well, friend Starlight Glimmer and rival Trixie, were checking out a Canterlot toy store seeing if there were any new games they could buy for the upcoming Hearth's Warming.
"And so that the Great and Powerful Trixie can find another way to humiliate Twilight Sparkle," Trixie boasted as they looked at the various offerings on display. They were currently surrounded by dolls and stuffed animals.
"Will you ever get over that, Trixie?" Starlight asked as she looked at the selection on display. Everything from the finest magically enhanced, hoof-made fancy dolls of Celestia, Luna, and Cadence to simple plush figures of various mythic and fictional characters and a whole array of animals. Starlight pointed at one gemstone inlaid porcelain doll of Celestia with a price tag that would have supported her for months. "Look at that! What parent would dare to let their foal play with that, even if they could afford it?"
"Nopony buys it for them to play with," Trixie said with a sniff. "They buy it and lock it in a glass case to impress everypony with how much they love their foals." She flicked her tail off at a pile of plush ponies. "Those are better if you want your foal to actually - have fun -- What!"
Trixie and Starlight stared at what they saw. Six plushies made to resemble six ponies they knew well, very well. Trixie worked her mouth until she spat out, "Twilight Sparkle and her friends are now toys for foals?"
"Spike showed me that cereal with the 'Elements of Harmony marshmallows'," Starlight said, sounding amused. "But I didn't think they had toys made of them!" She picked one up that looked like Rainbow Dash. "I bet Dash and Pinkie Pie would be delighted."
"But, but Trixie helped save Equestria too!" The blue showpony indignantly stamped her hoof. Her horn glowed as she began tossing through the pile of plush. "Where is HER toy?"
Starlight rolled her eyes.
"Trixie, must you be so insecure? You don't see me complaining about it."
"I'm your number one fan!"
Starlight and Trixie both blinked and looked at the Rainbow Dash toy. She squeezed it lightly again and it said, "Let's do a Sonic Rainboom together!"
"It should be bragging about itself to sound like Dash," Trixie muttered as she bent to read a sign. "Ah, so they use magic to record a few phrases which the doll says when it's squeezed?" A smile began to cross her face. She picked up the small gem used to record the speaker. "And you can create your own list of remarks for the doll here at the store?"
Trixie headed off for the cashier, a Twilight Sparkle doll in tow.
"Trixie," Starlight said, "what are you up to?"
"Why, just getting a little surprise ready for Trixie's good friend Twilight Sparkle, of course!" Trixie paid her bits over and headed for the recording booth. "If she does not allow the friend who saved her life, the Great and Powerful Trixie, to amuse foals, then Trixie will have to find her own way to amuse ponies."
She vanished into the booth with an exaggeratedly evil laugh.
Session 44.8 Ardashir
"I was hoping to wait and show this to Twilight first," Trixie said to the rest of the Mane Six, as they looked up at the small stage she'd erected in the Cutie Map room. She was obviously eager, almost skipping as she moved across the stage. She had a small table beside her, and several somethings lay under it covered by a cloth. "But since she is so busy in Canterlot..."
###
"Hold still, Princess Luna," Twilight said. Half a dozen grimoires from the Princess' own library floated around her. Reading from one titled Perilous Polymorphs For Ponies To Perpetrate, she frowned as she tried to read the very archaic script. "I'm sure I've got it! This time."
Luna, currently in the form of a Diamond Dog that still possessed the, ahem, 'enhanced attributes' of Luna's anthropomorphic form, snarled in anger.
"Luna wants know how Twilight Sparkle ever beat her in first place!" Her ears and tail drooped, leaving Luna looking appropriately hangdog. "Not to mention, get better vocabulary back! Best for Horsecraft game too; only Diamond Wolves as PC race so far!"
###
"Trixie will be generous and display the results of her little gift-buying expedition to Twilight's sidekicks!" The showpony smiled, looking downright smug.
The ponies before her didn't take it as well.
"Sidekicks?!?" Dash and Applejack both yelled at once. "Th' hay we're 'sidekicks'! Twilight would never say that."
"Ahem! I really have to agree with them, Trixie," Rarity said, giving the other mare a glare. "Twilight never treats us like we were just flunkies!" Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy both nodded as she said, "We're all equals, even with Twilight's alicorn-dom, and..."
"Ta-da!" Trixie whipped the cloth off, and six ponies blinked at what they saw.
"Oh! Oh, my!" Fluttershy fluttered over to look at the six soft plush figures on the table. "Are those - us?"
"Wait, is that me?" Dash flapped over and picked 'herself' up. She failed to notice the smile on Trixie's face. "This is awesome! Hey, ya think we can get figurines made of us for Oubliettes & Ogres so we don't have to try and make some ourselves?"
"Aww!" Pinkie Pie cuddled the plush of herself. "I want to get two of these for Pound and Pumpkin."
As she squeezed it, the plush 'spoke'. "Hi! I'm Pinkie Pie! Let's have a party so we can become friends!"
Pinkie squeed with joy and hugged it even tighter. It spoke again. "I'm one of Twilight Sparkle's friends! I helped her beat Nightmare Moon!"
"This seems nice." Rarity warily picked 'hers' up and squeezed it. It began to speak. "Greetings, dear! Let's create a lovely dress..." Rarity began to smile, a smile which went frosty when it said, "And not upstage other ponies again."
"Wha-aa-at?" Rarty's shriek filled the room. She frowned at the toy. "That was only once! Maybe twice!" Dash's laughter filled the room. Rarity glared at her. "I'm glad you find this amusing, Rainbow Dash!"
"Aw, come on," Dash said as she lazily flew around the room, amusement bubbling in her voice. "It's only a toy." She squeezed hers and it said, "I'm Rainbow Dash, and I'm awesome! Not to mention reckless!"
"Huh, they got me there."
"I also nearly destroyed Ponyville twice! Thank gosh for high-powered connections!" Dash stared. She tried again. "I'm Twilight Sparkle's number-one sidekick!" Squeeze. "Never ask why ponies call me 'Rainbow Crash'!"
"Huh? Hey, wait a minute!" Dash bristled and began examining the plush closely. "Who's a sidekick? Rainbow Crash? Yeesh, who made these things?"
"An' why is this the first time we ever heard o' them?" Applejack checked her plush as well. Her face darkened as it said, "Ah'm a silly pony!"
The remaining Element Bearers gathered around Trixie. She smiled and squeezed the Twilight Sparkle plush: "I'm a pretty pony princess! But it took Trixie to save Equestria!" Squeeze. "Trixie is the best! She deserves her own toy!"
"Ah began ta suspect who made them say this," Applejack frowned as Trixie tried and failed to look innocent before she cracked up laughing.
"You can change what they say," Trixie said, before she rolled on the floor laughing. "But why would you want to?"
Session 44.9 Kendell2
"Okay, so we've got PLENTY of disspell disguise potions, right?" Sunset asked, after their party dealt with yet ANOTHER changeling infiltrator trying to trick them. It was quite nerve racking to keep have enemies offer to join their party, only to stab them in the back. Especially when most players were pretty nice about it (with some exceptions). They'd lost their fair number of quests BECAUSE of that.
Sci-Twi nodded. "Yes."
"And we've all got the chat box ready to ask them trick questions a bot wouldn't know?" Sunset asked (unknown to Sunset, Sombra had forbid Chrysalis from having her 'elites' make it IMPOSSIBLE to guess they're a changeling for game play purposes).
"Got that check list right here," the puppy Spike said, holding it up.
"Alright, let's go!"
This particular quest involved raiding a dungeon to capture a powerful Changeling Alchemist as part of a LARGER quest line to track down and defeat the leader of the Changelings. They'd already gotten through a few bosses. This one was thankfully not nearly as brutal as the Reign of Chaos expansion, or maybe it was and they'd gotten USED to the difficulty level. They'd discovered some lore on the Changelings and the Crystal King, but weren't nearly to the end.
There was also apparently a big side quest in the dungeon that would impact things later in the game (some people saying it was needed to access a bonus boss, others that it was to unlock a True Final Boss, others that it was just lore), but given the difficulty, they weren't going to go out of their way to find it, only if they ran into it (they could always come back later at a higher level).
Given their luck, Pinkie Pie ran into it while chasing one of the Changeling infiltrators they'd managed to expose (they'd STILL managed to nearly get trapped by those again).
It wasn't what any of them expected.
It was a simple hermit's shack in the far side of the dungeon.
"...So...shall we?" Rarity asked.
"...We're here, might as well..." Sunset acknowledged.
The group's party approached, revealing a new cutscene.
A cloaked figure emerged from the house and jumped, looking at them. "...Oh...you...you're the heroes trying to stop the Crystal King, correct?" she asked, the humane seven answered yes. "...I see...please come in...I may have some information you want to hear."
The group, against their better judgment, followed the NPC in where she took off her cloak to reveal a grayish heliotrope unicorn with a sparkling crystal coat, her mane light blue. "I am Radiant Hope...the last Crystal Pony...I'm sure you've heard of my people..."
The NPC paused, seeming to give a conflicted pause. "...King Sombra...the Crystal King...I know what he's done and plans to do...but everypony has a story...I CAN'T try to stop you from leaving...but if you'll listen, I may be able to point you in the direction of a greater evil..."
"True final boss?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Or bonus boss...Let's listen..." Sci-Twi said. "...I'm a sucker for lore..."
The group answered yes. A cinematic cutscene began to play.
"Very well...Long ago, the Crystal Empire was ruled by Princess Amore and protected by the magical Crystal Heart...and I was but an orphan there...and one day, a young grey colt joined me...we were both kind of outcasts..."
The cutscene depicted the young Radiant and a young dark gray colt playing games, made from the smoke of the fire burning in the shack.
"...He was my best friend, and we did everything together...almost everything...he was always sick the day of our greatest celebration, the Crystal Fair...And one year, he nearly died until I was able to save him..."
The smoke imagery depicted a sick colt in bed...who began to crack apart until young Radiant healed him.
"...Soon, we saw visions in the Crystal Heart...I saw myself as a Princess...he saw himself as something else...something awful..."
Smoke forms rose off of the two colts, Radiant's forming an Alicorn while the colt's formed a monstrous shape.
"...And he eventually ran off into the frozen north...and came back as something awful..."
The colt's visage turned into the form of the Crystal King, rampaging across the Empire.
"...Sombra came back believing a monster was his destiny...but I don't believe in destiny..." Radiant explained, giving a determined look. "When the Empire and Sombra vanished...I found a way to extend my life until their return so I could defy that horrible fate..."
The mare looked at the screen, the smoke rising into another shape. "Sombra's true nature is one of the Umbrum...a race of monsters born from smoke and shadow who Queen Amore sealed underneath the Empire with the Crystal Heart in a place known as the Shadow Prison. The strongest and leader of them, Rabia, sent her son to infiltrate the Empire to free her and the other Umbrum."
The smoke took on the twisted forms of vaguely equine abominations, the largest raising up and laughing.
"At this very moment, Sombra's forces seek to unearth the Umbrum and free them to once more be a blight upon the land...Heroes...I ask you to show Sombra that fate can change and what his mother MADE him to be is not all he is..."
The cutscene ended and the NPC Radiant stood up. "...Thank you for listening...I'll heal you all and let you be on your way..."
The group stared at the screen in shock.
"...Drama bomb..." Pinkie Pie said.
---
"Hehe...thanks for including me," the human Radiant Hope said, giving her husband a kiss as they watched the animatic Sombra had made for her.
"No problem, Radiant," the human Sombra replied, giving her a kiss back.
OOC: Note: this Radiant Hope is based on her HUMAN counterpart, who is Sombra's wife and fully aware of what the human Rabia was like. So naturally her game counterpart has different motivations.
Basically, they found the quest line that unlocks a bonus/true final boss dungeon for Rabia Sombra mentioned in an earlier entry.
Session 44.10 Ardashir
"Okay, is everyone ready?" Sunset looked around at her friends, currently ponied up and standing in a circle around their still-transformed principals. Celestia nodded. Luna just tapped one foot, er, hoof impatiently. Just beyond the closed doors they could hear the crowds of CrystalCon, talking about the latest new quests.
"Please hurry, Sunset!" Luna's belly rumbled loudly and she winced. "I think I'm getting hungry for oats."
"I still say we oughta take some pictures," Dash ignored the pinned ears and snorts from Celestia and Luna. She held up her smartphone. "Just so I can stick them on the Internet and have everyone wondering how we made those costumes."
On the phone, pixelated ponies showed, standing before one of the Changeing fortresses for the new campaign.
"What?" Sunset stared in disbelief before she tried to take the phone from Dash. "You were fiddling with the game while I was telling you how we have to do this properly the first time?"
"Yeesh, what?" Dash stepped back from her, holding the phone behind her back. "So I may have missed a few minor points. Hey, I've been trying to get some dirt on these new quests since this morning."
"I'm so glad that restoring us to our proper forms means this much to you, young and still liable to being flunked lady," Celestia's voice was chilly. Dash gulped.
Applejack removed the phone from her hand and set it on the table.
"Amusing as it might be ta put pictures of our ponified principals online, Ah'd say we'd be smarter not ta press our luck."
"I agree," Luna snapped the words out. She gave a single flap of her wings, the feathers rustling as she displayed her irritation. "Or does a certain student athlete want to repeat another year of school?" Dash hurriedly shook her head 'no'.
Sunset nodded and counted off with the fingers of one hand. "One, two, three..."
She and her friends rose into the air, the magic surging through them and seeming almost to react in anger at whatever magic had altered Celestia and Luna. 'Then again', Sunset thought, 'it IS Discord's magic'.
The magic of the Elements gathered, joined, reached out like a living rainbow to cover the two anthropomorphic alicorns before them, and faded to leave their familiar and quite human teachers behind. Sunset saw a small bit of magic seem to vanish out under the door. "Hopefully THAT won't case any trouble.'
"It worked!" Pinkie Pie cheered. She and her friends high-fived each other in victory.
"That was interesting," Celestia examined her reflection in a mirror set against the wall, "but it is NOT an experience I want to repeat!"
"Nor me!" Luna reached around and then checked her forehead. "No horn, no wings, no tail! Thank you, girls!" She embraced Sunset and then the others.
"And you were worried about me not paying attention," Dash smugly set her hands on her hips. "Hah! I didn't even NEED ta listen ta get it right."
Everyone froze as screams suddenly echoed from beyond the windows on the far side of the room, the ones that overlooked the hotel pool.
Fluttershy was closest, and she reached them first. "Oh dear! Uh, everyone, I think you should see this."
'I will not like what I am about to see', Sunset told herself as she reached the window and looked down on what the faded Chaos Magic had wrought.
She didn't either.
Down in the pool a monstrous creature like a three-headed siren splashed and roared as congoers fled -- to a distance, where they began taking photos with their smart phones.
"Best promotion ever!" One yelled.
"This isn't a promotion, you nerd!" The purple siren head yelled at him.
"Hey, girls!" The blue head yelled. "Now we don't have to worry about losing each other ever again!"
"Shut-up, Sonata!"
"Make me, you big jerk!"
As the blue and purple heads snapped at each other, the yellow-orange one glared up at Sunset. She shrieked just one thing: "Fix this! We can't go around looking like King Ghidorah!"
"Okay, Adagio, we will!" Sunset yelled down to her. She and the others headed for the door. On the way, she collared Dash. "And this time get it right, okay?"
Session 44.11 Mtangalion
(Thanks to Kendell2 for the name 'Midnight Heart')
Windy Whisper yawned profusely. The gray thestral slouched in one of the Cutie Map Table's thrones... Twilight's ironically. "I can't believe this ridiculous game actually rated a second edition, and I'm stuck beta-testing it."
Rarity grinned slyly. "I can't believe you're still insisting that Dusklight isn’t your cup of tea, darling. You haven't missed a session yet."
Windy rolled her eyes. "You know those corporate types. Gotta have the 'batpony' perspective. At least I have apples." She pulled a ripe juicy one out of a bag and sank her fangs into it, savoring the sweet juices unapologetically.
Rarity, Cheerilee, Spike, and Big Mac had all seen her ravishing a piece of fruit plenty of times, but Rainbow Dash was looking distinctly uncomfortable while trying to act like she was totally cool with it. Eh, points for trying. "So Rainbow, you got roped into this too? I am so sorry..."
"Now, Miss Whisper," rumbled Big Mac. "Be nice."
Windy found herself blushing quite a bit. She was starting to fear that she'd come to these sessions just to hear Big Mac's voice...
Even if she wasn't secretly “Midnight Heart,” the author of the Dusklight novels, who had to sign off on every edition of the official Dusklight roleplaying game.
Windy sighed.
Miss Cheerilee glared at her mildly before nodding. The war for Big Mac's affection was far from settled, after all. "If Rainbow has broadened her reading material to include supernatural romance, then we should congratulate her! We’re hardly in a position to judge, after all."
"Maybe she's just into it for the cool monster fights," said Spike, giving Rarity a dreamy smile.
Rainbow fidgeted. "Actually, it kinda is something like that! I came up with a new concept for the game, and Princess Luna actually thought it was a good idea." She opened the game box and pulled out a small deck of gray-bordered cards. "So, the second edition of the Dusklight game is gonna have..." She grinned and fanned the cards dramatically. "Monster hunters!"
Spike scratched his head fins. "Huh. So, like, Crystal and Straight Edge will be sneaking around, trying to have their romantic get-togethers without Inspector Hoofsing catching them?"
Cheerilee giggled. "Or Jasper and Daring Do will be madly in love, tragically torn between different worlds..."
Rainbow grinned. "Maybe!"
"Nuh uh, you can't do that!" said Spike. "Daring Do and Dusklight are clearly separate story universes."
"Oh yeah?" retorted Rainbow. "I have a whole stack of Daring Do/Dusklight crossover fanfic that says otherwise!"
"Well, that doesn't prove anything!"
"It doesn't not prove anything!"
Rarity blinked, then gasped loudly. "Darlings! I've just had the most extraordinary thought!"
The others blinked at her, letting the argument trail off.
"Nopony knows who Midnight Heart is... there aren't even official photographs... and she's created an extraordinary and beloved fantasy universe that everypony *believes* is fictional... just like A. K. Yearling." Rarity was practically shivering with excitement. "What if, darlings... what if Midnight Heart is also a biographer... and the world of Dusklight... is real!" She practically squealed the last bit.
Windy wanted to bang her head on the table. "And... she's officially gone over the fangirl event horizon."
"Well, why couldn't nightponies, kirin, and wolfponies be real?" demanded Rarity. "We never would have thought that pandas could be real, or that griffons as big as this castle could be real."
Rainbow winced. "You gotta admit, nightponies are mostly just sparkly knockoff changelings who suck magic instead of love. I'm sure Empress Blackrose would have mentioned something if there was *another* secret changeling court."
"They could just be extremely well hidden! But wolfponies, now..." Rarity grinned. "They could be hiding in plain sight. What if... Diamond Wolves and those impossible reality-bending costumes of theirs are just a cover story... and they were the wolfponies all along!?"
Spike covered his mouth, trying not to laugh. "Oh boy, you're lucky Alisa didn't hear that! She'd probably bite you and say, 'Tell Alisa when Mistress starts growing wolf fur.'"
"Are you kidding?" said Cheerilee. "She'd get all 'maybe we are, maybe we're not!' and troll Rarity even harder."
Rarity thumped her hooves on the table. "I beg your pardon! Alisa is a good friend of mine, not some common troll. She’s just having a little time out in the frozen north at the moment."
Big Mac sighed.
Rarity hmphed. "Well, there's one way to settle the issue of whether Dusklight is fictional or not. I must track down the real Midnight Heart!" She leveled a hoof at Windy Whisper. "And you're going to help me!"
Windy nearly choked on her apple. "Wha... Why me!?"
"Because Princess Luna owns the company that publishes Dusklight, of course. I need a contact in the Night Court." Rarity beamed. "Useful leads... a place to begin investigating! Besides, aren't you the least bit curious about who Midnight Heart really is?"
"No," said Windy. Apple's own truth, there. "Sorry, Rarity, but no. There's no way I'm getting involved in some crazy hunt for creatures who don't exist. Absolutely not. Forget it!"
--- A few hours later...
Windy Whisper trotted out of the castle, stretching after a long and oddly satisfying game session. “Well, goodnight for you, morning for me. See you next time!” She spread her wings to take off.
Rarity blinked. “Wait!” She held a hoof out. “You’re truly not going to help?”
Windy tilted her head quizzically. “Were you expecting some kind of Pinkie Pie thing where I’d say yes after I just got done saying no, and nopony would remember how you talked me into it?”
Rarity blushed. “Well, Pinkie does live here, darling. That sort of thing happens more often than not.”
Windy trotted closer and brushed Rarity’s shoulders with her wings. “Rarity… take it from a thestral, somepony who’s a real daughter of the night, not a make-believe one. That fantastic crazy supernatural romance world… you’re chasing after something that doesn’t exist. Our lives are pretty magical already! I mean, we’re ponies! Be happy with that.”
Rarity watched Windy fly away, then grinned. “If you think I’ll give up that easily, darling, you’ve never seen me at three in the morning with a commission due the next day!”
Session 44.12 Alex Warlorn
"I swear it's like this castle has a sadistic sense of humor," one of the Winter changelings to another. "If I wanted to live inside something that takes pleasure in others' misery my egg would've stayed insider Her Majesty's abdomen!"
"You're exaggerating," the other changeling stepping through a door, that due to a 'freak' gust of wind suddenly slammed his head between the door and the gloomy stone doorframe several times. The settling of the castle stones almost sounded like a dark belly laugh.
"Not one word!"
Meanwhile, "But mommy! I had to go to the little nymph's room really bad, and my bed room door wouldn't open!"
Chrysalis rolled her eyes. "Your 'bedroom' has three walls, just fly out and cycle back next time." Chrysalis stopped in front of the door that was 'stuck'. Chrysalis charged her horn... the door instantly 'came loose.' "And after I blasted a few doors off their hinges, they stopped 'getting stuck' around me."
"But... but would the castle... be doing stuff?"
"This castle was once built by trolls eons ago back when they were an actual threat and a player on the board and not the bigger, stronger, and somehow even more stupid than diamond dogs annoyance they are today. It's saturated with dark magic. The stones practically 'sing' me to sleep though my magic sense each night."
"Is it safe to live here?"
"Oh trust me my defective spawn, it hates Equestrian ponies even more than we do!"
"Shouldn't that be poisonous to us then?"
"Well, its hate isn't directed at us. And we hate Equestrian ponies too... so it likes us."
"Is this why you've been winning all our games of hide and seek?"
"My dearest failure of egg laying, those who don't cheat simply lack imaginations."
Session 44.13 Alex Warlorn
It was time again for Princess Twilight Sparkle to beta test yet another anineigh style mecha battle table top game from her BBBFF and his high school buddies Twilight herself had gamed with a filly (not that she'd let some know that of course).
To keep the insanity down to a minimum, Twilight had chosen Pinkie Pie, who she knew who try every crazy combination that nopony else would think of, and Gilda, who would try to mixmax her way to creating an invincible death machine.
Story conventions like a main character piloting an expendable grunt mecha could survive multiple shots where the rest would explode from being so much as poked with beam saber in the toe, existed as explicit game play mechanics. So dramatic tension, heroic or villainous reveals that hadn't existed before weren't only possible, but part of the game (within limits of course, which was why this was being beta tested).
Twilight Sparkle could appreciate how some tropes in some books she'd read, even in the same genre, could have explosive unbalancing of the game or story if mixed together. On the other hand, her DMing time with the Cutie Mark Crusaders and Button Mash had taught her not to ignore player input. The game wasn't was flexible as as Teenagers from Outerspace (Twilight REALLY wanted to continue that game, leaving it with the party split up and wandering about, made it feel incomplete somehow, but the size of the group had proven problematic). For one, character could actually DIE here, for good! There was tricks for 'miraculously surviving' and 'revealed to have lived after all' but they required a VERY LARGE amount of drama point.
There was an optional rule for making drama point unlimited to the player, but in exchange the DM got just as many to use for themselves that the player used. But Twilight worried this might discourage creativity, though she admitted it would help curb abuse.
"Okay Pinkie Pie, Gilda your mechas have been completed, your training is complete. Your prototypes don't have time for field testing, so you will be sent out into battle right off the assembly line. You arrived at your respective set pieces to find the other, and recognize each other's mecha as bearing the symbols of a faction in opposition to yours."
"Twilight!" Pinkie cheered. "I divert power from weapons and do the Dance of Smiles, which should trigger my energy weapons negation field, no lasers or beam swords should work within the field."
"I get angry over her stupid dance."
"... That's it?"
"Yeah."
"Oh. Okay Gildy! Then I release one of my confetti packs, negating all missiles, and creating pretty sparkling lights, and make sure they spell out a message of not seeking hostilities!"
Pinkie Pie had been reading. Oh dear. "Alright."
"I get angry over her stupid confetti, and I get even angrier than that over her cowardly message!"
"You sure Gilda?" Twilight thought Gilda was overselling it a little.
"Yep. Those idiots had 'quick temper' under 'flaw', so I took that and got extra perks! Ha ha!"
'That says a lot about griffin culture,' Twilight thought.
"I wave at Gilda through the cockpit."
"I get super mad over her stupid waving and not taking this battler seriously! And her cowardly refusing to fight! And I get even more angry that she could make so angry! And that makes me even angrier! And the adrenaline coursing through me REALLY makes mad! I'm gonna trash her stupid robot!"
"Well... good luck," Twilight said, "She's negated energy beams and projectiles, and her mecha has a lot invested in mobility and evasion, your mecha is pretty clunky in comparison."
"Not right now it isn't!" Gilda grinned in a way that would have made her ancient pony eating pre-history feral ancestors proud. Gilda displayed her character sheet. "I took Rage Power Up, the more angry I get the more Badflank stat bonuses I get, and since my mecha can already punch the head off hers to the moon, I'm putting them in speed and accuracy."
"Well, impressive, but-"
"AND! I also took Power Up Rage too! The more Badflank I get, the more angry I am!"
Twilight's eyes widened. "You've created an endless feedback loop."
"Exactly! Normally it would take a while to build it up. But since Pink there wasted that time with her silly stuff, I've had plenty of time to power up, and get more mad from
powering up and get more mad and power up from that! So say Goodbye to your mech Pinkie!" Gilda wrote down an absurdly high bonus on her character sheet from her Badflank pool.
Pinkie Pie's smile never left her face. She didn't so much as twitch. With Pinkie Pie, that could mean anything, from being off in her own world to not being worried. Gilda however felt confident enough and wasn't about to be shaken by Pinkie Pie's 'poker face.' She rolled.
"I use Parody Slip." Pinkie Pie said.
"Say what now?" Gilda blinked.
"Ahem: Parody Slip: Once per day, a pilot of your choice's Badflank Bonuses become penalties for one action of your choice WHEN the action is made and the results have yet to be determined."
Gilda's eyes widened. Gilda looked down at the dice. Then at Pinkie Pie. Then book looked at Princess Twilight. A minute later, Twilight had flipped through the back of the beta version of the game and had found what she was looking for.
"... Okay Gilda... your mecha clumsy slips on a banana truck, the force of your misaimed attack and boast sends your mecha into orbit... where you are land face first on the moon to a loud gong sound that somehow is heard back on Equus. However your mecha didn't have upgrades for space travel, so you're kinda stuck there. Sorry."
"Wow Gilda! You really mooned me!" Pinkie Pie giggled.
-
"Should we stop her?" Spike asked seeing Gilda trying to get her claws on Pinkie Pie, making ancient Griffinstone vows of vengeance on Pinkie's bloodline.
"She'll calm down in a minute... I hope."
Session 44.14 Alex Warlorn
"Wow!" Princess Twilight Sparkle said, sitting in front of a game of Grand Theft Chariot that Button Mash's mother wouldn't let him play but had been saved from the mysterious katana she kept under her bed. "This is like the video game, 'Naughty!' Where you go around taking extra splices of cake before everyone else had one!" She giggled in a rather un-Twilight like way and fluttered her wings. "These wings are funny, I can fly like Star Catcher! I mean Celestia! HEHEH!"
"That past life nonsense again?" Starlight asked rolling her eyes.
"It's not nonsense." Pinkie Pie said hugging Minty/Twilight.
"Seriously Starlight, don't do this, I ended up with a British accent when I called it baloney," Spike warned.
"It's all mental suggestion and trickery, Trixie even showed me how this sort of thing is done. I won't fall for such an obvious scam. Come on Pinkie Pie, revert me to a past life!"
- One Past Life reversion later-
"HIIIII BON BON! Let's have cookies later with everyone!" Starlight said her head out the window, waving at the ex-monster hunter. She was also walking on her back legs well enough to make Lyra jealous. And somehow she holding things with her hooves without her horn magic.
"Wow!" Buttons said looking at her from the outside with the other Equalist cultists, ponies. "She has a sparkle of hope in her eyes. I haven't seen that since she vowed to free ponies from the tyranny of cutie marks."
Starlight happily skipped to her desk, and worked through a storm of the homework Twilight had given her that had been building up, including the extra credit on how to handle two friends who didn't want to be friends with each other.
Starlight turned to the little purple dragon. "Hey Spike, you got any Clevland Brays? I could use some dancer-cize!" She asked as she put on some leg warmers.
"That sounds like fun!" Twilight/Minty said fluttering over to her. Within minutes they were playing 'Prance Prance Revolution', wearing leg warmers, head bands, and form fitting exercise outfits, dancing on their rear legs (Twilight/Minty with some help from Starlight).
= Starship - We Built This City =
Pinkie Pie dressed up and joined in. For reasons he could not comprehend, Spike found himself joining in a matching outfit.
"Pinkie Pie, snap them out of it!"
"... Later. This song rocks!"
"We build this city... we built this city..."
Session 44.15 Ardashir
"Big Mac, why is Applejack breakin' stuff all over the farm an' making a pig outta herself on th' apples?"
"She said somethin' about proving how Pinkie Pie's 'past life regress-whatever' was all hokum and she was gonna prove it."
Big Mac and Apple Bloom both watched as Applejack, now hatless but wearing a bow on her tail, tried to carry a bucket of apples across the farmyard -- only to slip in a mud puddle and send both apples and herself flying into the pigpen.
The pigs just rolled their eyes.
"Applejack," asked Granny Smith staring at the sight. "Whaddaya got ta say fer yourself?"
"Heh! Ah'm a silly pony!"
Session 44.16 Mtangalion
Gilda peered down at the snowy streets from her second story window, scowling. "Huh. It's like griffons conquered Canterlot, and then they got super-lame." Everygriffon she saw was dressed in old-timey clothes, and even she was wearing a purple coat with ruffles and lace, and a little pair of spectacles. "What kind of enchanted comic is this, anyway?"
A group of griffons padded across the street, squawking cheerful carols horribly out of tune, real claws-on-chalkboard stuff. Another griffon kept leering at passers-by and ringing a little bell incessantly, until the other griffons donated their bits to make him go away. "Obviously, it's Hearth's Warming season. I get that... but I've been here five minutes already and I haven't been attacked by templars or anything." She leaned out the window and shouted, "Hey, is there a narrator in the house? Can I get some action going here?!"
Eerie mists began to swirl in Gilda's room, cheering her up immensely. "That's more like it! Where's my ghost-fighting kit?"
The mists formed into a floating spirit that strongly resembled Grampa Gruff. "Snowfall Frost!"
Gilda blinked. "Who?"
The spirit of Hearth's Warming Past twitched his shaggy eyebrows. "That's you, genius. Ahem-hem! Snowfall Frost, you've become a bitter griffon who doesn't like Hearth's Warming one bit! Why don't I tell you all about how you got this way? In the spirit of the holidays, I won't even charge ya!"
"Do we have to?" groused Gilda, rolling her eyes. "I hate it when games make you watch a bunch of story crap for twenty minutes before you get to do anything."
"Ungrateful!" Grampa Gruff shook a clawed fist at her. "You'll take your flashback and like it!"
The comic book's pages turned, switching the scene to an even older-timey classroom, where a fledgling Gilda was struggling to... levitate a piece of chalk? With magic!? ... while a black vulture-like griffon supervised her, scowling.
A very young Gabby stood just inside the doorway, talons clasped hopefully. "Please, Snowfall, won't you come to our Hearth's Warming party?" Her eyes got big and watery. "We miss playing with you!"
The black griffon sneered at her. "If you ever want to have real power, you must choose to forget frivolous distractions and study!" A fireball exploded into existence, hovering over his outstretched claws.
Little Snowfall's eyes lit up. "Gee, let me think. Some lame party, or magical powers... Gimme the power, duh!"
The enchanted pages flipped back to the present. "Wait, wait wait..." said Gilda. "In this comic, I'm a wizard!?"
Spirit Gruff would have face-planted, if he wasn't floating. "Is that all you got out of that?!"
Gilda grinned devilishly. “Are you kidding? Do you know how bucking rare griffon wizards are?” She waved glowing claws, and a whole stack of books floated off their shelves, assembling themselves into a book fort. “Hah!” She spun and glared at a snowglobe, poofing it into an apple, then a live flopping fish, and then a pile of golden bits and jewels after that. “Yesss!”
Gilda flapped over to the big spellbook that stood conveniently open, next to a bubbling cauldron. “Let’s see what else I can do…” Her beak fell open so hard, she nearly lost her spectacles. “A spell to erase Hearth’s Warming from existence?! I can do that?!”
“Be warned!” said Grampa Griff ominously. “If you continue on this dark course…”
“I mean, how does that even work?” mused Gilda, totally ignoring him as she paced around the room. “Does it warp time and space and literally erase the day? Maybe it erases everyone’s memories and makes them forget there’s a thing like Hearth’s Warming. Either way, if the comic’s own logic says I can pull a stunt like that…” Her voice started to change and distort, magically louder and deeper. “What CAN’T I do? Mwahahaha!”
Outside, carollers and shoppers stopped in their tracks, glancing around. A nearby townhouse was groaning and shifting on its foundation. Sounds of cracking stone and snapping wood planks came from the windows, as if it was being demolished from the inside-out. Then the whole structure blew up, roof flying off and walls falling away, as Gilda tossed her head and shook her wings out, standing up three stories tall. The roar she let loose at her new size was just icing on the Hearth’s Warming cake
Gilda flicked her claws casually, beaming down at all the petrified little griffons in the streets. “Heh, never gets old.”
A shiny swirl of magic distracted Gilda before she could decide what to do next. Another ghost appeared… this time it was Greta, scarf and all.
“Snowfall Frost!” Greta declared. “I am the Spirit of…” She realized that she was addressing Gilda’s left front foot. “Oh, excuse me!” She flew upwards, hovering in front of Gilda’s beak. “I am the Spirit of Hearth’s Warming Present. While you scheme to put an end to Hearth’s Warming, so little understanding the spirit of…” She trailed off, blinking.
Gilda grinned broadly back at her.
Greta pulled a sheaf of paper from somewhere and started flipping through the pages. “We’ve gone really off script, haven’t we?”
Gilda shifted a paw and lazily crushed a newsstand beneath her toes. “Heh, maybe...”
Greta laughed nervously. “You know, others are not so fortunate as you this holiday season, Snowfall Frost!”
“You got that right!”
The spirit glared at her. “Come, let me show you how your faithful clerk Snowdash is spending her Hearth’s Warming.”
Gilda tapped her chin with a claw. “Oh, no need for the magical guided tour! I can see her house from here.”
Greta smile grew forced, twitching mildly. “Is… is that so?”
“Considering how griffons have such good eyes. Plus, I’m really, really, REALLY big.” She flexed and dug her claws into the street, dislodging chunks of cobblestone. “Huh, so that’s Dash as a griffon. Neat…” She frowned sharply. “Huh? No Hearth’s Warning dinner or presents? Don’t I… I mean, doesn’t Snowfall Frost pay her better than that?”
Greta recovered some of her composure. “No, Snowfall Frost, for you have been a hard griffon with a heart of stone, and…”
“Hey, don’t you go guilting me for the backstory,” snapped Gilda. She pondered some more, making people and objects bounce all up and down the street by tapping her foot. “Well, no problem! Why should they be down and out when I have all these magical powers?”
Gilda snapped her talons, and instantly across town, Snowdash’s table groaned beneath the weight of a seven course holiday dinner. “Yeah, that’s the stuff.” Another snap, and Snowdash’s brother, Little Pip, threw away his crutches and danced around their house. “In fact,” she shouted, “here’s some Hearth’s Warming Cheer for everygriffon, on me!” Delicious dinners and shiny wrapped presents started appearing all over Canterlot, and there was even a ghostly plate of griffon scones just for Greta.
Soon, the carollers were singing her praises, and griffons were crowding the streets to come thank her. Gilda soaked up the adoration like a dragon drunk on greed and grew even bigger, smashing into the buildings on either side. By a happy coincidence, they were both condemned former law firms, so nogriffon minded this very much.
But then, the third and final spirit materialized, none other than Princess Luna, pulling off the griffon look very well, Gilda thought. “We are the Spirit of Hearth’s Warming Yet to Come! Behold, the terrible future that will come to pass if you do not… change your ways?” The other two spirits appeared next to her, waving script pages, and a small argument broke out.
Gilda coughed thunderously. “Yeah, about that. So, uh… I HAVE changed my ways, and I’m totally down with Hearth’s Warming now! Astra bless us every one and all that!” She grinned and gave the spirits a double thumb-claws up, and a giant “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED” banner unfurled behind her in a flash of magic.
Once those pesky spirits were finally out of the way, Gilda stood tall, overshadowing several city blocks just by spreading her wings. “Let’s go find some more towns I can conquer… I mean, win over with Hearth’s Warming cheer!”
--
“Seriously, Twilight?” asked Rainbow Dash. “You let Gilda go into an enchanted comic book by herself?” She started snickering.
Princess Twilight frowned. “Well, it’s the first one I’ve written on my own, and I needed someone to beta test, and you were all busy… why, what’s wrong with Gilda testing it?”
The enchanted comic book in question started magically pulsing as Gilda’s voice echoed from it. “Hey, Princess, don’t mind me, but I’m adding fifteen or twenty more chapters. I need more time to take over the North Pole so I can rule Hearth's Warming forever. Heck, let’s make it a graphic novel series…”
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Yeah, she can pull off an insane grin, but not an outright evil one.
You know Hydia, Lord Frieza, a guy who's capable of making a planet go ka-boom with a flick once tried to escape Hell. It worked, briefly, but, he ended up making the same mistake he did last time, and you know where that got him? Obliterated by the guy he hated the most and back in Hell. Ya wanna go through that?
It helps if you have two limbs with which you can manipulate things without magic.
Luna, honey, you're a several thousand year old Princess, and in some continuities, a deity, and in some, you literally know Fate. So tell me then, why oh WHY would you tempt fate like that? You KNOW what's going to happen.
I can't tell if she's screwing with him or not.
That's a no then.
Human anatomy works differently to equine anatomy is all I'll say on the matter.
That's usually why I try to stick to endless running games, a good time waster, no need to sink cash into it, and it's fun to just play for a couple of runs then switch to something else.
Ah...
GOOD choice of words.
Not even going to dignify that.
You shouldn't have said that.
Ouch.
Universe: Too bad.
I don't doubt it.
Oh dear...
Trixie's doing methinks.
Heh.
Trixie's doing. This is the exact sort of petty revenge she'd go for.
Surprise, surprise...
Oh, you. From the Sombra arc in the comics.
That was probably the best of the Fiendship is Magic comics. I just wish Discord had gotten one.
No kidding.
Yeah, you should have expected that.
I don't doubt that it will.
And there it is.
And how many are actually decent or sound like they could fit in canon?
And 3, 2, 1...
Huh, subversion of the usual trope. Nice.
Interesting mentality.
It's more fun that way.
You're planning something.
I see...
Called it.
And there's the punchline.
Booo! That was terrible!
Whatever helps you sleep at night.
Your funeral.
Even the pigs aren't impressed.
OK, that's a funny line.
Gilda's having fun screwing with the script.
That the script won't last long.
7797945
They WERE! But Hasbro deep-sixed that one. So they had to come up with another fast, thus why the Sirens' is so low quality.
7797982
That explains it, because considering how, for lack of a better term, half assed it was, it had to have been made in a rush, I have no doubt that the writing team could have come up with a better story given more time.
7797982
7797987
Though having a clear backstory would have ruined his Jokeresque Multiple Choice Past, nevermind how non-canon the comics supposedly are.
7798032
I suppose, I'm just curious to see what the writers would have come up with.
I feel like you should give a side story in the Crystalsoft saga of Radiant and Chrysalis playing tennis. Then a little twist of fate where Chrysalis inadvertently introduced Radiant to Sombra. You know a little parallel from what happens in game to what had happened in real life. Though that's just my random babbling. It would explain why Chrysalis had tried to seduce Sombra before hand. I forget which section it was in but it has happened before.
Another fun chapter, this one has really great Gilda writing.
Anytime Luna casts powerful magic in haste, it tends to end poorly. My guess is this will end with her entire personal guard being more loyal to Discord than her out of their huge crushes, or maybe just trying to ship Discord with their boss.
I wonder if a young Principal Celestia and Sombra dated?
Of course she's angry, she's got 6 enhanced attributes!
Classic quote, would also have accepted "Ah sell apples and apple accessories."
C'mon Rarity, when you put it like that the answer seems pretty obvious.
There has to be some ulterior motive from the gaming buddies, but I can't figure out what it is.
So cute!
This was definitely the highlight of the chapter for me.
Or at least another chapter or two!
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Thanks!
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Thanks for the feedback. :)
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Nope. Discord is stuck being forced to fit what THEY consider to be their fantasy mare.
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If you want to write that, I'll post it.
7799247 Sure. I don't know how good it would be but I'll write something out for later. Might take me a while. Not long but by next week I should have something. I'm working on my own story as well. Had a break through on that but work killed my spark by draining my soul.
Awwwww!!!
Now he can taste Rarity's beauty as well!...... don't you dare take that out of context.
Why is it that the biggest fan favorite references from G1 are all from one-shot songs? Not that i'm complaining. shoo be doo.
Rainbow and fanfic go together as well as Vogons and poetry.
And every paradox detector in existence exploded
Its like LittleKuriboh's kneecap-wrench. If you think to hard about it, YOU'RE NEXT
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This did manage to some funny parts didn't it?
7802062 doesn't it always? But here more than usual
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HEH! Thanks for the comment.
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GOOD QUESTION!
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Ah. Then I wouldn't be surprised if next time Discord visits the castle at night, he's announced as "the dreamy and oh-so-sweet Lord of Chaos!"
It says a lot that none of this seems out of place...
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