The Misadventures of Fanta Shock

by Feathers and Fanfics

Chapter 17: Fanta's Fright on Nightmare Night!

Nightmare night. One of ponykind's most celebrated holidays, full of sweets and spooks and, more often than not, a friendship problem.

Ponyville was busy. The mayor was wearing her rainbow wig, Fluttershy was hiding in her cottage, and Twilight and her chums were in the castle, bobbing for their own apples and swapping ghost stories.

The rest of Ponyville was gathered in the town centre. Every year, something new and fantastical was introduced to the Nightmare Night celebration. One year Granny Smith's scary maze took the biscuit, and another year it was the unforgettable participation of Princess Luna. This year, two rather unwelcome ponies had shown up to strut their stuff. Ponyville looked at the creamy-yellow stallions with suspicion. Flim and Flam were known for their con-jobs, fooling ponies into buying truly useless products, or using dirty tricks to beat out the competition. This year, however, they seemed more confident than ever. The crowd gathered around town hall, staring at the two unicorns and their spooky surprise, currently obscured from view under a sheet. The crowd was quietly murmuring, all except for a unicorn and a Pegasus, at the back of the throng.

Fanta Shock hated Nightmare Night. It was a holiday all about gathering candy and giving it to a statue, or sharing it amongst your friends, or giving it to kids. She strongly believed this to be a waste of perfectly good food, and besides, she hated sharing. And kids.

In short, she hated this holiday.

Feather, on the other hand, was the larger equivalent of a filly constantly on a sugar rush. She was solely responsible for Fanta being here, who had only agreed to come because she knew that Feather would direct all the younger ponies to her newly-rebuilt house for snacks if she didn't. For the occasion, the Pegasus had dressed as a sheep.

"Do we really need to be here?" Fanta growled.
"Yep! If you aren't feeling up to it, we can always go home and give out candy!"
Fanta growled again, and kept quiet.

The Flim Flam brothers tapped a microphone, to get the attention of their audience. "Welcome!" Said Flim.
"To our show!" Said Flam.
"We have a spooky scary device for all the ponies to enjoy!"
"It moves like lightning, sounds like a ghost, and is a truly terrifying toy!"
"It hides in the shadows, waiting to jump out at any moment!"
Flim tugged on the sheet, which came away to reveal their device. The audience gasped.
At first glance, it looked like a pony in armour. Closer inspection revealed that the pony was, in fact, a robot pony. It was steely grey, with no fur. Under the plates that made up the bodywork were visible wires and black textile joints. The mane was smooth and silky and long, a shining jet black colour. The eyes were blank, and the horn was slightly longer than most unicorns. In fact, everything was slightly larger. The legs seemed too tall, the muzzle too long, everything was slightly... Off. As if done on purpose. The worst part, however, was the teeth. The head had no fur, meaning the teeth were all fully visible, a twisted smile shining in the moonlight.

Fanta didn't like this. Even Feather seemed cautious. The rest of the crowd seemed subdued, or shocked. Flim's horn lit up, flicking some kind of internal mechanism to activate the creature. The eyes flicked on, blue dots in the eye sockets. Steam flowed from the nostrils, as it lifted its head to stare at the crowd with lifeless eyes. It slowly, deliberately leaned forward, the jaw lowering, as if to speak...
"Muahahaha." Its tinny voice rattled out, sounding silly and not at all scary. The crowd relaxed slightly, and the mayor took the stage. "And with that surprise out of the way, let Nightmare Night begin!"

The next few hours were much the same as any other Nightmare Night. Foals and ponies went around for candy, and the robot pony waddled around. Colts ran up to it, it would say "boo" in its pathetic voice, and they would squeal with delight and run away for a few minutes, before doing it all again.

Fanta watched the automaton as it played. It was just a huge toy, why did it bother her so? She couldn't ignore the itching feeling that it was... Wrong, somehow. She shrugged to herself, grabbed Feather and pulled her out of the wooden apple-bobbing tub, preventing her from drowning for the third time that evening.
"Look, if you drown, you can't eat candy!" She yelled at the sheepish Pegasus.

The robot pony stared at Fanta. It had no conscience, no thoughts of its own. A useful vessel in any amount of ways. It kept staring at Fanta, a line of programming peeking out of its core files, implementing itself and triggering a new set of commands. The robot's eyes flashed, the new program asserting itself. The sensors in the horn brushed over Fanta, silently confirming her identity. The eyes flicked to a bright red.

Then it crouched.

Feather was not listening to Fanta. Nightmare Nights were for fun, not being yelled at! So what if she drowned, there were at least three lifeguards in the town square!

Then she remembered that they weren't really lifeguards, and felt very silly.

Fanta grumped as Feather plastered her with "yes, I will be more sensible next time" and "of course, how silly of me". She knew the Pegasus wasn't listening. She toyed with the idea of locking Feather in a box next year, when something inside her head clicked, and she ducked.

Something large and silver sailed over her head, straight into the 'Nightmare Night kiss-the-mayor booth'.

Fortunately the booth was never popular, and the mayor was bobbing for apples elsewhere.

Fanta pulled Feather up, and both of them turned to face the next evil creature that needed a frying pan to the face. Fanta was not at all surprised when the robot rose from the rubble, and was already in the process of delivering a flying kick sandwich when it moved its head aside. Fanta made hard contact with the rubble of the ruined booth, breaking it up even further. She span around, angry that she had missed. The flying kick never missed. The robot stood, facing her. Both combatants were prepared to fight to the death.

Feather rolled her eyes at the needless drama, and chucked the tub full of water over the robot, expecting it to fizz and fall over, so that she could have her candy already.

It didn't fizz. It didn't fall over.
And she didn't have any candy.

"Feather, get everypony away. I'll handle this." Fanta yelled, as she stared down the evil machine. It gazed at her with those emotionless red eyes. She sprung, her movements a blur as her hind hooves swung up, ready to deliver a freshly made roundhouse double kick to the robot's face.

Her hooves connected, but it was like hitting a solid steel wall. She yelped in surprise as the resultant force flung her backwards, onto her back. With a smooth hop, she was back on her feet, just in time to register and avoid the steel hoof driving towards her head. The next few seconds seemed like years, with kick after kick being delivered, both opponents dodging attack after attack. Ponies had gathered to watch the deadly contest, silently observing with bated breath. Both fighters got in some solid hits, and it wasn't long until a visible injury was made. A graze on Fanta's cheek, made by the vicious horn of her attacker. She took a backwards jump to give herself some space, panting heavily, as the seemingly unharmed robot stared at her, devoid of all emotion. She may have only taken a scrap on the cheek, but her body ached from the metal machine's attacks.
"You're a tough little scrapheap, ain'tcha..." Fanta gasped. "Mind if I ask why you're doing this? Why me?"
The automotan spoke, this time without moving its lips. "Fanta Shock is the target. Must destroy."
She winced as the voice grated in her ears. Her mind raced, searching for any way to end this battle. She needed more time. "Who sent you? Was it the Flim Flam brothers?"
"Unknown."
"Helpful." She muttered. Water didn't hurt it. She couldn't damage it. How about using it against itself? What do robots run on? Gears, wires. Not helpful. Electric, yes, but water wasn't effective. Heat? No, it would've overheated in the fight. What about the computer? Errr, terminals, chips, logic circuits, binary-

Logic circuits.
She grinned. She had an idea so crazy, it actually might work.
"Feather, I need as many of those throwing spiders as you can find at Ponyville fountain asap! Tin Mare, you're with me! Catch me if you can!" She took off running, ponies breaking formation to let her through. The robot crouched, then shot forward, travelling much faster than anypony had ever run before. Feather was already in the sky, heading for the area of town that housed Nightmare Night's fun area, grinning to herself. "Tin Mare.. Good one, Fanta."

Fanta ran. She ran faster than she had ever run before, because she knew that her pursuer didn't tire and could probably make Rainbow Dash look bad in a hoof race. She ducked as the automaton dived at her again, those hard hooves sailing millimetres over her skull. She quickly turned down an alleyway on her right, a shortcut to the fountain.

Feather grabbed the basket of toy spiders, and started flying towards the fountain. She longingly gazed at Apple-bobbing tubs below her, but she shook her head and flew on.

Beat robot now. Get candy later.

The robot skidded to a halt. Fanta stood in front of the fountain, a tired smirk on her face. Tin Mare lowered itself, preparing to charge.
"Now, Feather!" A basket of toy spiders dropped in front of Fanta.
The atmosphere tensed. Fanta looked up.
"I MEANT THROW THEM AT THE ROBOT, YOU FEATHER-BRAINED NITWIT!!" She yelled angrily, shaking her hoof at the pegasus. Grumbling, she picked up a spider. "If you want something done, do it yourself. Hey, buncha bolts! Two plus two is five!"
The robot tilted its head. "No." It grated. "Two plus two is-" the toy spider flew through the air, skewering itself on the creature's horn. With a beep of surprise, Tin Mare waved frantically, its sensors blocked by a squeaky, fuzzy spider.
Fanta grinned. "Hey, iron flanks! Why was six scared of seven?!"
The robot stopped moving to calculate this. "Impossible. Numbers do not have fears."
"Wrong! Six was scared of seven because seven ate nine!"
".... That does not compu-"
CLANG!!

The robot twitched. It clicked a few times, its voice burbled, and it fell to the ground, the electronic life gone from its body. Smoke billowed from its nostrils, and sparks flew from under the frying pan buried deep, deep inside the monster's mechanical skull.

Fanta grinned, panting as she nursed her wounds. "Guess your logic circuits couldn't handle so much rubbish, eh? Heheheh..." Feather helped her up.
"How did you beat it, Fanta? It was invincible!"
"Computers and stuff use logic circuits, Feather. All I had to do was do something illogical."

".... That's really dumb, Fanta."

"Hey, it worked!"

Flim and Flam sighed. They hated Ponyville. They always ended up in trouble, this time they'd even gotten themselves arrested.
"Why'd you do it?" Fanta growled.
"We didn't know!" Flim began.
"We bought the toy off a hooded stallion, who said it was designed to scare ponies. He didn't say anything about hurting ponies!" Flam finished.
"Don't you two know not to talk to strangers? Maybe you'll learn your lesson this time."
She slammed the cell door behind her.

And subtly stole the key, later dropping it in Ponyville lake.

Comments

[Patronum2000]

I do have to say it's nice sneaking in a homosexual relation ship like that in the last chapter, showing how normal it is without taking away from the actions.

[Feathers and Fanfics]

7688009 thanks for the heads-up!

[Feathers and Fanfics]

7688043 I'm glad you liked it