Ultimate Equestria

by Leo Pachino

Chapter 010: Bar Room Dilemma

Pinkie fumbled with the five playing cards in her hooves as she sat at a small round table with three stallions sitting with her, each with cards facing away from each other.

To her left side was Cecil, a tall pegasus in a blue and white striped shirt and brown trench coat. To her right was Jarvis, a large and stout green Earth pony with an eyepatch and white iron shoulder armour on his left shoulder. Finally, across the table from the pink pony was Maurice, a small red unicorn with a black top hat and tuxedo.

“So…” The red unicorn said to his friends. “You all heard what happened between November and Ted?”

“Oh no, not November.” Cecil groaned, burying his face in the cards.

Maurice continued, “Ted thought it would be a good idea to give the mare a tap on her mark.”

“His classic opening move,” Jarvis commented.

“That was a week ago.” Maurice said. “And we haven’t seen him since.”

“That’s what he deserved. Had a long time coming to,” Cecil remarked.

“Really?” Maurice asked, lifting an ear. “I mean, yeah, Ted’s not the most moral stallion, but he still had class.”

Cecil rolled his eyes.

“What? It’s true.” Maurice said.

“Maurice does have a point,” Jarvis commented.

“Who asked you, Jarvis?” Cecil riposted.

“Don’t pick on Jarvis because he’s right.” Maurice replied with exploding pride.

“You know what, we can argue all night. For now, let’s entertain our new friend.” Cecil said.

“Gah, fine,” Maurice grumbled.

“Typical Cecil…” Jarvis muffled under his breath.

“Excuse me?” Cecil asked rather quickly.

“What? I said nothing.” Jarvis replied.

“So Pinks,” Maurice spoke to Pinkie. “You do the bets, you discard the cards you don’t want, draw new cards to replace them, and the pony with the best hoof in the end wins.”

“Got it,” She nodded.

“I’ll raise to ten bits.” Cecil said, pulling out nine bits from his pocket and tossing them in the center of the table with four other bits by the lit lantern.

“Call,” Maurice said.

He followed Cecil and added nine bits to the pot.

“Oh dear,” Jarvis said. “I only got eight on me.”

“Oh come on Jarvis,” Maurice berated him. “For the second time?”

“In two months.” Jarvis noted.

“We only go here once a month and stay a week.” Maurice immediately returned.

“Well I would’ve had more if somepony didn’t trick me into doing business near the Scorched Lands. Cecil.” The green stallion huffed, slowly turning to his pegasus pal.

“I didn’t trick you,” Cecil corrected him. “I just said it wasn’t very popular with pirates.”

“For good reason, there’s nothing there.”

“What were you even doing there for three weeks?” Maurice asked.

“You know,” Pinkie interrupted the argument, pulling out ten bits. “I can just give Jarvis one of mine.”

“Well-I-uh,” Maurice stammered, having planned an entire rant for Jarvis.

Finally, he said in defeat, “Fine, you’re too nice of a gal, and I’m too nice of a bloke. Let’s just do it.”

“Nice, my flank,” Jarvis muttered.

“You need to start taking responsibility for your own money Jarvis.” Cecil spoke.

“Funny, coming from you,” Jarvis slyly told.

“You guys seem to argue a lot,” Pinkie said “Are you all sure you’re friends?”

“Friends?” Maurice asked with a confused face as he discarded two his cards and drew two from the deck.

He explained to her, “We’re not exactly friends. We each run our own ships and loot alone and all,”

“Not really opposing rivals either,” Cecil added.

“We’re more…” Jarvis said as he switched a card.

He and the others thought for a moment.

“Rivals with benefits?” Cecil suggested. “I’m keeping my hoof.”

“Yeah-yeah,” Maurice nodded in agreement.

“I like that.” Jarvis said.

As the three stallions congratulated each other on their self-given titles, Pinkie looked at her five cards. In the warm light from the lantern in front of her, she saw that she had two Jacks, two sevens, and one eight. She discarded the eight and, to her delight, she drew a Jack.

“You others are in for it now,” Jarvis proclaimed with a grin. “I once won one of the crown jewels from the King of Camelu using these skills, so there’d be no way that you’ll beat my hoof.”

“Says the stallion that only brought eight bits,” Cecil commented with a smile, causing Maurice to snicker.

“For reasons caused by somepony,” Jarvis replied, ready to continue the previous argument.

“Whatever, I just trumped you all.” Cecil declared.

Dramatically, Cecil placed his cards onto the table.

“Three of a Kind,” he gloated.

“Drat,” Maurice groaned as he placed his down. “Two pairs,”

“Ha!”

“Pity,” Jarvis responded as he slowly set his hoof down. “I got a full house.”

“What?!” Cecil exclaimed.

“Ha!” Maurice shouted back for irony.

“That’s funny,” Pinkie said, displaying her cards. “Full house for me as well,”

“She’s got Jacks to sevens, you got tens to sevens, Jarvis!” Maurice announced.

“So does that mean I win?” Pinkie asked, slightly confused.

Jarvis quickly lied, “No-”

“Yes!” Cecil interrupted in the nick of time.

“Hooray!” Pinkie loudly cheered as she took the forty bits.

“Alright, Jarvis,” Maurice said amidst the cloaked pony’s celebration. “No more games for you.”

“Oh come on,” the stout Earth pony cried. “We’re rivals with benefits. Maybe I can have a free-be this time.”

“Here’s an idea,” Cecil suggested. “How about you bet that shoulder armour and we’ll each bet five bits? Sounds equal,”

“No-no-no, I got a better idea,” Maurice piped in, joining in on the joke. “How about you steal some bits from Grivs while he’s chugging on his cider?”

The trio of pirates, followed by Pinkie, looked over to the backmost corner of the large dining chamber to see a giant grey unicorn, with muscles bulging from his sleek black jacket, drinking a cup of cider.

On the table in the booth where the titan was seated at alone was a large pile of golden coins and a few gemstones. Maurice and Cecil immediately laughed.

“I’ll do it.” Jarvis calmly replied, causing his rivals to choke on their laughter in shock.

“Are you nuts?” Cecil whispered. “Grivs is three times bigger than you. Not to mention that he escaped prison four times after committing mass murder each time.”

“I’m not scared of him. I’m going.”

“Don’t!” Maurice yelled out in a whisper as his friend exited the table.

Jarvis slowly walked towards the hulking giant, showing no fear. Whether this was true bravery or just sheer idiocy, his friends couldn’t tell.

“He is so dead.” Cecil solemnly groaned before immediately snapping at Maurice. “And it’s all your fault!”

“My fault? You were the one getting all jokey when he ran out.” Maurice retorted.

“I wasn’t the one who suggested he’d walk up to death.” Cecil retorted back.

“At least it isn’t Korsan.”

“What does that mean? It’s like comparing a shark with a Kraken. Both are certain death no matter how you look at it.”

“Wait,” Pinkie interrupted, seeing as this was her chance to transition to the topic of Korsan. “You stallions know of Korsan?”

“Do we know of him?” Maurice said with a look of surprise. “Everypony and their mother here knows Captain Korsan. He visits this place every week. Honestly, who hasn’t seen his giant floating ship he owns, with the black flags with the little red gear symbol and all ‘that?”

“Speaking of him,” Cecil said, having mostly already forgotten of Jarvis’ departure. “Isn’t it odd that he wasn’t here last time?”

“He said he was doing some venture in Equestria, that place is fairly well militarized.” Maurice told him.

“So was Cervidas, yet he showed off some pretty nice booty when he came back at his usual time.”

“I guess, must be the memories or something.”

“Probably,” Cecil agreed.

“It’s just,” Pinkie said. “I haven’t really heard all that much talk of him around here, and I’ve heard he’s a famous character.”

“Infamous you mean.” Maurice corrected her. “The reason we don’t talk about him is because the bloke that works in the kitchen doesn’t want us to, it makes him uncomfortable and could cause him to say something wrong when Korsan comes around. That abomination of a stallion’s a psycho when he and the poor fella even look at each other.”

“His service might not be that well in good tastes.” Cecil added, “But the old stallion and his daughter work with what they can to keep us gathered here. It’s our only true home apart from our boats, so we try to keep Nitin stress free while we deal with Korsan’s weekly visits.”

“His daughter?” Pinkie asked, glancing back towards the bar maiden.

“Yep, November and Nitin share the same Gale blood, blood that Korsan’s so thirsty for.” Maurice said.

“Why’s that? They’re just workers of the bar.” Pinkie said.

“You see,” Cecil explained. “Their relationship with Korsan runs a bit deeper.”

“Cecil,” Maurice mutters to his blue pal. “Shut up. We don’t want more mouths to keep shut. Could be an agent of his, you never know.”

“Pipe down. Do you see a horn on her head? No.” Cecil told Maurice. “By what we’ve seen from Korsan plenty of times, we can trust her.”

“Your funeral mate…”

“Now, Pinkie, it all started-”

However, just before Cecil could begin, a girlish scream roared from the back corner of the room. Everypony inside looked over to see what’s going on, stopping their conversation and games. Enwrapped in a crimson aura and hovering above the wooden floor floated Jarvis. The giant grey stallion, Grivs, stood behind him, angrily huffing and puffing.

“Jarvis!” Maurice exclaimed.

“We forgot about him!” Cecil exclaimed.

“No pony touches my booty.” The gruff giant breathed as he held the green pony in his magic grip. “I’m going to enjoy breaking every bone in yer wee body.”

“Please don’t, have mercy!” Jarvis squealed as he felt his spine being pulled from the inside. “It was Maurice’s idea!”

“No!” The small red pony exclaimed. “It’s all Cecil’s fault!”

“No it wasn’t!” Cecil frantically said with sweat dripping from his shivering face.

“It don’t matter to me,” the grey stallion growled. “I’ll just break each of yous, the runt, the loud-mouth, and the baby, all at once!”

“Wait,” Maurice asked. “Which one am I?”

“Doesn’t matter when I’m finished. You three have caused more than enough trouble in my life.” Grivs declared.

Grivs’s sharp horn glowed brightly as Cecil and Maurice were quickly enveloped in their own red auras and lifted into the air.

“Jarvis, Cecil, this maybe our final moments together as rivals with benefits. Before we die to Grivs, I have one thing to say.” Maurice told his companions.

“I have something to confess as well.” Cecil replied.

“Me to,” Jarvis said.

“Okay, all together…” Cecil said.

The three stallions then shouted at once, “I cheated during our first game! …What?!”

“Wait!” Pinkie cried out, running towards the hulking giant. “Don’t hurt them!”

“And why shouldn’t I?” Grivs roared at her, releasing a small cloud of foul breath at her.

“In all honesty, I am the one responsible. I won what was going to be Jarvis’ win, causing him to run out of bits to bet with.” She confessed.

“Pinkie!” Twilight screamed out as she and the others galloped towards their friend. “Are you insane?”

“What is this?” Grivs growled. “Some game to find out which one of yous to break the most?”

“Grivs Dinklesworth!” November yelled at him, exiting the serving bar and slowly approached him.

With a menacing scowl on her face, fear washed through everypony as they looked at her, not even daring to giggle at Grivs’s last name.

The small bar maid sternly told the hulking giant, “My father and I will not tolerate you causing indiscriminate slaughter in here. Now you put those stallions down and deal with them when you’re out at sea or else.”

“…” Grivs was silent, frozen in fear.

“Do I make myself clear to you?”

“Yes ma’am.”

Slowly, Grivs set down the trio and returned to his seat, never taking his shrunken eyes off of the bar maiden’s glare.

“Now, are there any more problems that I need to take care of?” November asked, looking at the others.

“No, November.” The four stallions immediately replied in unison.

“Good.”

With the problem now taken care of, the mare turned around and headed back to her station.

“You cheated at our first game?” The rivals-with-benefits asked each other.

“Whoa,” Spike gasped, shocked at what November just did.

“Whoa is right there, mate.” Maurice replied.

“How did she do that?” Pinkie asked.

Cecil promptly answered, “She and her father are a force to be reckoned with around here. They are two of the only retirees of his crew.”

“You mean-”

Before Pinkie could finish her question, a loud knocking rattled from the door, sounding like metal bashing against weak wood.

“Him?”

The door then violently swung open. The caped bipedal appeared on the other side, showing a fearsome smile.

“Yes. Captain Korsan.” Maurice whispered.

“Hello everypony.” The captain chuckled, walking towards the serving bar.

Silence remained throughout as he drew closer and closer to November, back at her position. In the right corner of his single eye, he saw the large group of cloaked heroes alongside the rivals with benefits and Grivs, all staring at him.

“What’s going on over there?” He asked in a mischievous, yet curious tone. “Some sort of ninja cult? Though I’m more shocked to see Maurice and his friends standing next to Grivs of all ponies. By the way, how’s to going, Grivs? Healed well after our last encounter?”

Grivs released a very audible gulp from his throat.

He clutched it with a hoof, silently responding, “Yes, Captain Korsan.”

“Good.” Korsan replied before turning to November. “November Gale, how has things been? How has your father been?”

“We’ve been fine.” November said with a disgusted look on her face. “You’re late.”

“I’m sorry. I had a run-in with a few pests, which serves as a great transition for this... Chopin!” Korsan said.

Immediately, a tall and fairly stout pale stallion, wearing a beret and black and white shirt, walked into the bar. He had a pile of ten papers in his black magic. Quickly, the mime-like pony silently trotted over to a bulletin board at the left side of the room and stuck each paper onto the wall with a small dagger for each.

Twilight and her team look at the papers and saw that they had their faces printed on them.

“Ten bounties? Are three of those fillies and one of them a dragon?” November asked.

“A baby dragon, and yes. Attention patrons, I have set up a ten million bit bounty for the capture of all ten of these ponies. Each pony had a varying set of value, so if you can’t catch all of them, you can just catch the more valuable ones. The pegasi and earth ponies are 750,000 bits each, the unicorn filly and dragon are a million bits each, the alicorn is one and a half million bits, and the older white unicorn is four million bits. I want them all alive.”

“Even the older white wench?” A mare customer seated at a booth asked.

“Especially her,” Korsan declared. “I shall return in fourteen days, expecting my bounty then. You may want to search near the Central Ley Line.”

“Which are you more insane about? The ten million bit total bounty or thinking we’d risk our hides going anywhere near there?” The same mare asked.

“Are you saying that my reward is too expensive?” Korsan asked, already knowing the answer.

“No!”

“Just what I thought. Now I must be off doing a little expedition of sorts. Oh! I almost forgot,”

Quickly, Korsan reached into his cape and pulled out a small crossbow-like weapon. He aimed it towards one of the dart boards on the other side of the tavern and fired it, launching a small green metal bolt, glowing with green anti-magic, out of the barrel. It struck the bullseye and pierced the wall behind it, creating a loud striking sound that caused the onlookers to wince.

“This custom multi-fire crossbow has specially modified anti-magic iron rod projectiles keenly designed for alicorns and evasive targets. It’s a prototype weapon I’ve been working on, just thought I’d like to share it with you all.” Korsan said, twirling the weapon around his metal fingers.

“Impressive,” November replied in a deadpan tone. “Now go do whatever it is you wanted to do. Your sights already seem to be on another mare, so there’s no reason for you to be bothering me.”

“Oh, talking with you is always a delight to me.” Korsan teased.

“Imagining you crashing your ship in a joyride is always a delight to me.” November retorted.

Korsan grunted in annoyance. Before he left though, the brown pegasus fired another bolt towards the dartboard. This time, the bolt hit the first bolt on the bullseye dead-on, causing the first to peel in two like a banana.

“Adieu.”

Korsan and Chopin silently walked out of the bar and closed the door on their way out. After a moment of silence, the usual activity resumed throughout the chamber. Ponies waited a moment for Korsan to leave before storming out of the tavern and beginning their bounty hunt.

“Aww,” Rainbow Dash groaned as she looked at her picture. “They got my nose wrong.”

“That’s not what’s important,” Twilight said as she and the others viewed the papers. “What’s important is that we’re all now wanted for a massive amount of money at Thieves’ Hold, the pirate center of the entire world. If we don’t either get as far away from here as possible or find some way to remove these bounties, somepony will find out and we’ll be in huge trouble.”

“What about the Diamond Eye?” Applejack asked.

“That might have to wait. Disappear for now, go back to the ship. I’ll stay behind to see what I can do.” Twilight commanded.

Quickly, the five other mares and Spike left the bar and hurried down the ramp. Luckily, Korsan’s airship was already out of sight.

“Hey, Pinks’ friend,” Maurice called out to Twilight. “Where’s your buddy off to? We’ve only played one game.”

“She had something to take care of.” Twilight said.

“Is she going after the bounty?” He asked.

“Not sure, we’re deciding.”

“I see. See yous later, I guess.”

As Maurice turned his attention back to his fellow rivals, Twilight sighed with relief.

She thought to herself, Good, he and his buddies are oblivious at the moment. Now, how to get rid of these bounties? I can’t just remove them off the spot, they’ll notice and I’ll be busted as well as my friends. We can’t make that much of a speedy escape with our ship in ruins. What to do-

Twilight’s train of thought is abruptly cut off as a cyan aura surrounded her and launched her over and behind the serving bar. The purple alicorn’s now exposed face was met with the bar maiden’s. November had a notably distressed expression.

“November?!” Twilight exclaimed.

“Shhh, I not going to put yous up,” She immediately whispered. “I figured it was you and your crew being put up to bounty. That pet dragon was a dead giveaway. Luckily, I think only I was able to get a close enough look.”

“What are you doing?” Twilight asked.

“What does it look like? I’ve saving you and all of your friends’ hides. By the way, did you actually bring three fillies with you to Thieves’ Hold?”

“Sort of, it’s a long story. But the real question is why are you doing this?”

“I know what he’s going to do to each of you if he gets his claws on you. Korsan’s a lunatic. He’ll show no mercy to even the foals. I’m not going to let him do that. Your best bet is to get out of here now. Save yourselves.” November warned.

“Thanks for the advice, but we can’t leave, especially now.” Twilight told her.

“What?!” November silently exclaimed.

“We have to stop Korsan and get our artifact back to Equestria from his clutches. And seeing as how he’s been bothering you all, scaring even Grivs senseless, we have to help you.”

“That’s very kind, but with those bounties on your heads, you won’t be able to do much.”

“Can we get rid of them?”

“No, if Korsan found out we removed them without some form of payment, he’ll be furious, blow up the place even. And paying off the bounty is utterly impossible. Ten million bits total, how would you be able to do that in only two weeks?”

“My friends and I could work for you.”

“With what money earned? We can barely afford repairs and no pony will buy our more expensive items because they’re just as bad as everything else around here. You saw how your friend reacted to the cider. By the way, she still needs to pay.”

“Hm… How many drinks of cider would we need to sell in order to reach ten million bits?”

“Two-hundred thousand at least to pay it off, but where are you going to get enough resources to make that much cider? We don’t exactly have the best import sources. And what about selling them afterwards?”

“…I have an idea.” Twilight said with a smirk.

Author's Note:

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