7 - The Beautiful Game Part 3 - I! AM! IRON MARE!!!
Silver Spoon sighed, in as dignified and quiet a manner as she was capable of mustering. She knew today would be tough. She was marrying a Wonderbolt, so getting used to sports-fervor was a necessity. Regardless of the age of the players in this case, she knew the allure of such things, and had expected her students to be gripped with the fever-pitch of a competition, just a touch too distracted to give her one-hundred percent of their attention.
What she hadn’t expected, was an entire class dressed, or in some cases painted, in the ‘team’ colors. Ann and her friends had inspired about half the class to come dressed in blue-and-red capes, jerseys, and paint, with a prominent ‘CMC’ emblazoned on little flags, while the other half appeared to be rooting for Flawless and her ‘Crystal Gems’ team with their green-and-blues.
Where did the tiny flags come from? She had no idea, but since Discord was still banned from the school, Silver Spoon suspected a certain pink party planning pony. Which was annoying, partially due to Pinkie being too… Pinkie to properly impress with the impropriety of pushing such platitudes and politics onto impressionable pupils.
Also partially, Silver Spoon had hired Pinkie to plan her wedding party, and didn’t feel like breaking that off over a silly foal’s game.
She also hadn’t expected every single eyeball in her classroom to be focused exclusively on the small clock they’d installed with a magical bell. There were only five minutes left in class, true, but they’d been staring like that all day.
“Alright, class,” she decided to trudge on with her last announcements, “I know you all want to go to your little game, but I still need to pass out these permission slips.”
As she walked through the rows of fervent Buckball fans, delivering the slips of paper to each student, she continued trying to explain one more time, just in case somecreature was actually listening to her.
“We’ll be visiting the Royal Canterlot Statue Garden, and while we have a couple of chaperons, we could always use a few more, so let your parents know…”
Please, she thought frantically, Don’t let Grogar be the only one who signed up…
Cheese, fidgeting as he always did at times like this, which admittedly was all the time, glanced away from the clock towards Ann, who seemed not to even notice the world around her. She simply sat, in a sort of calm, zen-like trance, a near-silent tune humming behind her lips.
It suits her, he thought.
“Hey, Ann,” he whispered after the teacher had gone by, “You alright?”
“Hm?” Ann turned, and gave her friend a soft, lazy smile, “What?”
“You’ve been weirdly chilled out for like, two days,” he said. Then, he smiled, “Not that that’s bad. Even at practice, you haven’t been anxious at all!”
Ann just nodded, slowly. “Yeah. Mom showed me something to help calm down.”
Cheese’s eyes flashed, “Oh? Anything I can use whenever my mom needs to calm down? Cuz, like… I could use a break once in a while…”
She giggled, “Ever heaw of ‘heavy metal’?”
“That’s silly,” he said, “Metal’s always heavy.”
“No,” Ann leaned over towards him, “it’s like… weally angwy music!”
One eyebrow raised. “How does angry music make you less angry?”
“I don’t know, but it works! Come ovew sometime, I’ll show ya.”
Ann paused. She heard something. Her ears twisted around like Moon’s, trying to track wherever the sounds were coming from, but she realized quickly that she needn’t bother.
The noise came from the entire class. Every foal, every colt and filly and nymph and chick and whatever else watched the clock countdown, inexorably towards twelve o’clock. And they were counting right alongside the little seconds-hand in a collective whisper.
“Ten… nine… eight…”
Silver Spoon sighed, again. She set the extra permission slips down and consigned herself to the end of class. And an extra-plus-size bottle of Sweet Apple Farms cider…
“… seven… six… five…”
Flawless met Ann’s gaze. Ann met Flawless’s. From across the classroom each dared the other to look away first. Though, when Flawless felt a second Ann tap her on the shoulder, she did lose eye contact for a brief second while she whirled about in surprise.
“… four… three…”
Mandible hoofbumped with Beauregard, the orange Changeling and blue unicorn locking eyes with Pearl and Cheese. Pearl snarled, and met their gaze. Cheese waved, and asked if they wanted to hang out afterward. Dib and Beau… considered it.
“…two… one…”
The clock struck noon. And nothing happened. There should have been a little bell-sound. That had been guaranteed by the manufacturer. A bell. Silver Spoon wondered why Cheerilee had trusted Trixie Lulamoon of all ponies with installing the thing, considering there was, for emphasis now, no bell.
Instead, there was a click that emanated throughout the room, followed by the sound of audio-feedback and static. Everycreature covered their ears and winced as the nails-on-a-chalkboard screech yowled from what should have been a simple, magical bell.
And then, a voice like static-cling sliding down a balloon animal said, “Are we ready? Is everypony here for the Big Game?”
Ann sighed and rubbed her forehead with her tail, “Oh, Dad…”
Instantly, with a pop, Discord himself, the Lord of Chaos had appeared at the front of the classroom. His sudden appearance drew all eyes to him, including the slightly embarrassed eyes of Ann, and the far more curious… even star-struck eyes of Flawless. Because standing beside the Draconequus appeared to be the Princess Twilight Sparkle, looking thoroughly put-out, in all her glory.
Silver Spoon, despite her familiarity with the royalty, sputtered at the sudden intrusion.
“P-Princess!? Discord? Wait… how… what!?”
Twilight leaned down to look the schoolteacher in the eye. She looked so apologetic that Silver Spoon started worrying.
“I’m so sorry about this,” the Princes said in the same tone as one might deliver an upsetting bit of medical news, “So… so sorry. But your school has been declared foreign soil, temporarily.”
Silver Spoon’s jaw hung loose. Then, with a drawn-out horror, she asked, “Why…?”
“Because Discord wants to attend the game,” the Sextarch of Ponykind sighed, “And this was the only loophole my lawyers could find to just let him have his way without raising taxes or having Bananas given the right to vote.”
“But…” Silver Spoon shook her head, “Why!?”
Discord slithered around the teacher’s shoulders, face fixed into a perpetual smirk.
“Because,” he drawled, “If you build it, they will come…”
As he raised a claw, talons ready to make the magic happen, Silver Spoon let out a single, solitary word of protest.
“WHY!?”
Where once stood Ponyville Schoolhouse, there was now nothing of the sort. A grand coliseum, wrought in oak and dolled up to resemble an Apple family barn writ large dominated the entire section of land right across the river from Ponyville. Red, blue, green, and purple flags and banners hung from apple-red walls, and the sounds of a clamoring audience filled the space.
For, quite suddenly, it would appear that all of Ponyville and some parts beyond had been teleported straight into that place. After a few moments of terror, or shock… they seemed to immediately warm up to the idea of a nice afternoon game.
Especially when they noticed the cheap food prices.
It really was a nice, warm day. And how often had weirder, more horrible things happened quite suddenly? At least, the older ponies could say with certainty, there wasn’t a power-mad centaur draining their magic away. Or a power-mad Changeling Queen draining their love away. Or a power-mad filly…
Point was, everypony agreed, it just felt like a perfect afternoon for a ballgame, and nocreature was really too upset at being teleported to one. Especially since that meant skipping lines and traffic!
In the stands, Grogar sat with the Princesses-Emeriti Celestia and Luna. For the first time in many, many years, he almost seemed happy, with a Buckball cap depicting Anarchy’s face atop his head and a veritable mountain of crackerjack boxes set out before him. He was so engrossed in his treats, in fact, that he hardly took note of the Princesses themselves.
“My bits are on the Crystal Gems,” Celestia took an enthusiastic bite out of a soft-pretzel and noisily chewed away.
“Sister, you cannot be serious,” Luna said as she tried to adjust the sunglasses and Little-Cheese hat on her own head, finding it quite difficult with the large, foam-hoof declaring the Cutie Mark Crusaders to be ‘Number 1’ covering her hoof.
Celestia tilted her head. “Oh?”
“In the first part,” Luna gave up trying to remove her memorabilia, and instead took a long drink of her soda, “we are currently living with little Ann in Fluttershy’s cottage. It would be rude to root against our hosts. Secondly…” she fixed her sister with a calculating ferocity, “I think Ann shall whip this Flawless most heinously.”
Grogar grunted through a muzzle-full of caramel-covered peanuts, “I always knew you were the wiser sister. I’ll take that action, Sun Princess.”
Celestia huffed, and raised her nose at the two neigh-sayers, “I happen to be a remarkably good judge of talent, judging by all the Princesses I’ve singled out and trained…”
“Is it two, or three, in one thousand years?” Grogar chuckled, “If I cared to, it would be a pittance to keep track of them.”
“Hm,” Luna mused, “I’m not sure if we should count Sunset Shimmer. She did reject the title.”
“Alicorn…” Celestia waved one hoof lackadaisically about her head, “… Princess… it’s the same thing, so I’d count her…”
“Excuse me?” another voice, much younger and higher than either Alicorn sister picked up from the row behind the three.
Celestia and Luna turned around, and in the seats directly behind them sat what appeared to be an older earth stallion with a greyscale mane, and a much younger pegasus mare with a purple coat and blue mane with a pink stripe. It was this younger mare who had spoken up, and from what the Royal Sisters could see, that had been a very unpopular decision.
“Wind Sprint!” the older stallion looked like his eyes were about to leave his skull, “You’re gonna get us sent to the moon!”
“Dad, chill,” she replied, her eyes never leaving the Alicorns sitting in front of her.
“May we help you?” Celestia asked, with as much sweetness as she could muster.
The young mare pointed a hoof at Celestia, “Yeah, you can tie up that crazy mane or lean to one side. Some of us want to see the game!”
Celestia wasn’t entirely sure she heard that correctly, “I… what?”
“They don’t have Daring Do books on the moon,” Wind Sprint’s (step)father stared into space, ironically in the metaphorical sense, “Though I suppose that means the bad ones will also not be there… oh, but the compendium…?”
“You heard me,” Wind Sprint frowned, then pointed at Luna, “At least she’s wearing a hat to keep that thing under control. How are you doing that anyway? And why would you cosplay as Princess Cadance?”
Grogar made a noise that was, if he were asked by a judge, emphatically not a laugh or guffaw. He merely inhaled a bit of caramel popcorn. While laughing. At Celestia’s expense. Grogar was, admittedly, bad with authority figures that weren’t his own.
Celestia frowned, “I’m not cosplaying, whatever that is. I am Celestia. Princess Celestia. Your former ruler? For over one-thousand years?”
Wind Sprint crossed her forelegs, “And, LARPer? What have you done for us lately?”
“… I wonder if Clear Sky will be able to handle the twins on her own…?”
Celestia turned to her sister, and said in a flat, unamused tone, “I’m going to get a hat. If Grogar does anything to my seat while I’m gone… I’ll send you both to the moon.”
Once the former Solar Diarch had made her sulking exit, Luna turned back around in her seat.
“So, Quibble? How are things? I missed you at the last convention.”
Quibble Pants folded himself into a fetal-position on his seat, whimpering, “And the next thousand…”
While the majority of the coliseum seats were perfectly practical and uniform in every way, solid wood-construction with soft-ish plastic pads set down for everycreatures’ relative comfort, just above the field of play itself sat a luxurious rainbow-silk-covered podium, where now sat the most important ponies in all of Equestria, whether they wanted to be there or not.
“Dag nabit!” Applejack growled in frustration, “I was jes’ about ta git back to work! The whole south field needs tendin’ today!”
Rainbow Dash, sitting beside her, playfully checked out the cushy, throne-like seats they’d been provided. “Eh, you work too hard, sugarcube,” she grinned slyly at the use of the old Apple nickname, “And a little Buckball is good for you.”
“That’s playin’, Dash. Not watchin’.”
Dash smirked, “Maybe… but looks like Apple Bloom is selling some chocolate-apple-fritters at concessions.”
Applejack spun her head around… and then smiled broadly when she noted the food prices.
“… Alright, one game ain’t gonna bother the trees none…”
An explosion of confetti blew out over the podium at that moment. After so long, none of the ponies in the box even flinched as Pinkie Pie began her spree of whooping and hollering.
“Go Cheese! Go Pearl! Go Anarchy!” The eternally-pink mare paused in midair as she said this, and looked over towards Twilight, who took up the most central space and the nicest throne, “Is it weird that I’m one of Equestria’s leaders but I sound like I’m advocating mass hysteria and lawlessness?”
Rarity, admiring the seats they’d been given herself, merely replied, “How is that different from how you usually behave, darling?”
“Hee hee! Good point Rares! Down with the Mare! Down with the Mare! Let’s burn this heifer down!!!”
Twilight Sparkle just sighed at the insanity of it all. Then, she turned to her left and looked down at the only pony there she wouldn’t immediately call her friend.
“Prince Blueblood,” she said without any sort of enthusiasm whatsoever, “Glad you could join us.”
“I…” the Prince sat on a tiny, plastic chair not unlike one that might grace a foal’s tea party, and was almost as bewildered by that as he was at being somehow teleported all the way from Canterlot Palace to this Ponyville sports arena.
“I’m not… quite sure what just happened.”
“Discord,” Twilight sighed, “Discord happened. Apparently, Anarchy, Cheese, and Pearl are playing a foal’s Buckball game against some of their classmates, and that somehow warranted the entire population of Ponyville, and ourselves, to be dragged away from more important matters to satisfy his all-consuming ego.”
“Ah.” Blueblood’s face hadn’t changed in the slightest.
“I do hope you weren’t in the middle of anything too important?”
Blueblood worked his jaw for several seconds before answering, “I think we’ll be at war with Saddle Arabia and Griffonstone if this match lasts longer than an hour.”
Twilight didn’t bat an eye. “Oh… good…”
Another thought came suddenly to the Prince.
“Did… did you say Pearl…?”
“Pearl? Pearl!?”
The unicorn finally snapped out of her daze, and looked away from the towering coliseum towards her teammate, Cheese. They both were wearing sports-vests colored half blue and half red, with a single gold badge or shield emblazoned on the front, and alongside Ann and Flawless and her friends, they appeared to now be standing on a Buckball field, in a massive stadium of cheering fans.
“Ch-Cheese?” her voice shook, “Where are we?”
Cheese, still smiling, looked around briefly, and then took a deep draw of air into his lungs...
“Discord,” he said, almost quietly. Cheese then let out a long, exhaling breath.
Pearl narrowed her eyes at the pink-maned colt, “I… yes, that would appear to be the case. Thank you for snapping me out of that, by the way.”
“No problem,” Cheese nodded. Then, with a slight twitch to his eye and a frown forming in spite of his high spirits… he looked over his shoulder, saying, “Now… could you help me snap her out of it too?”
Ann sat at the edge of the outer ring. Her wings lay forgotten at her side, and her eyes darted to and fro with all the shaky, jumpy energy that sheer Panic could bring to her defense. Her mouth silently worded her thoughts as she raced through them.
Eyes, eyes, eyes, too many eyes, so many eyes, every-eye judging, judging, so many eyes, not a Buckball player, not good enough, not a pony, not a pony, don’t look, don’t look, don’t look, eyes, eyes, eyes…
She couldn’t really hear Pearl or Cheese telling her to ‘snap out of it’, nor could she feel them rock her back and forth with their hooves to get her attention. Ann couldn’t focus. She couldn’t see or hear anything. It was a world of eyeballs, and there were suddenly hundreds of them looking at her.
Along the edge of the playing field, somecreature… Discord, obviously, had carved a dugout just large enough to seat a single row of ponies and pony-sized creatures that wrapped its way around the field. They were extraordinarily nice seats, perfect for the front row. And among the creatures who currently took up a spot in that most-coveted place, a yellow pegasus and notable Draconequus started to worry.
“Oh dear,” Fluttershy reached up to her muzzle with her hooves, “She looks so nervous out there! Maybe this was a bad idea…”
Discord lay next to her, his serpentine form too long to sit in the space provided, with his head supported by his ‘hands’. “I was wondering why you of all ponies wanted to do this. It just doesn’t seem… you.”
Fluttershy looked down, her ears flat, “I thought… I thought maybe she’d take after you and… enjoy the spotlight. I’ve never seen her freeze like this.”
A paw settled atop her mane, drawing her eyes up to Discord’s own. The same eyes as Anarchy.
“There’s a difference between being a star,” he smirked, “and being a clown. I excel at the latter. And I wouldn’t wish that on Ann’s worst enemy.” There was a tenderness to Discord’s voice that hadn’t been there before, almost had no place being there.
And yet, Fluttershy could feel it… and it stung like a Flash Bee.
“I just didn’t want her to miss out on anything,” Fluttershy sighed, “I spent so much of my life being afraid of living. But she’s so scared now! It’s all my fault…”
“Possibly,” Discord nodded, “But then, we’re one-for-one on that score. And didn’t you tell me you would never have discovered your special talent if you hadn’t been pushed out of the nest?”
“… it was a cloud…”
Discord pressed a talon to her mouth, to forestall any more talk. “All I’m saying is that Ann needs to… shall we say… test her wings?”
Neither spoke in the relative silence that followed. Fluttershy smiled, faintly, and Discord drank in that smile he loved so much.
Then, there was a cough. Both turned, and saw a mare and stallion that seemed eerily familiar. The gold-coated mare with a ruby mane was Flawless’s mother, the blue stallion with the emerald-and-white mane her father.
Neither looked completely altogether at the moment.
Facet Glimmer tilted her head towards the center of the arena, one eye twitching. “Is… is this really happening?”
“We’re just curious on account of the whole… teleportation thing,” Prussian Blue waved his hoof about his head to indicate everything around him. Despite the green-and-blue face paint, which Discord had magically applied to him, Prussian certainly did not strike Discord as much of a sports fan so much as he was a pony who occasionally noted that sports existed.
Prussian did, however, take a long, calming sip of a soda pop in his lap. He then squinted, pointed a hoof out towards the field, and asked, “Is that Flawless?”
“Hey!” Flawless called out to the Crusaders, “Are we doing this, or what?”
She, Dib, and Beauregard stood just to one side of the Buckball inner circle. The boys were clearly overawed by the crowds, but Flawless’s coat shone with that crystal sheen her tribe were known for, glistening like she was a literal gem carved into the shape of a pony. She was eating up the attention.
Flawless Gem was in her element.
Which was more than could be said for Ann, who even now shivered in fear while sitting on her haunches, forelegs wrapped around her head in a desperate attempt to keep the eyes at bay. Even with Cheese and Pearl there, even with Shady, Moon, and Goldie up and out of the dugout seats to surround her, it looked like nothing was getting through.
Silver Spoon hated seeing that. She hadn’t much cared for this whole competition, seeing it as just an extension of all the problems she’d been dealing with between these foals who should have been friends. But now seeing it take an emotional toll on her students had put her off the idea entirely.
And that wasn’t even because she found herself dressed as a referee.
“Alright,” she said, eyeing her whistle dubiously, “That’s enough of that. I’m calling it…”
Flawless’s head snapped to her teacher with a glare to match any griffin, “WHAT!?”
Silver Spoon had dealt with that look before. Usually from parents, but the principle was the same. She was not intimidated.
“I’m not about to let Discord’s need for aggrandizement and your petty little rivalry cause any more emotional damage to one of my students, Flawless. You’ll just have…”
“One side!” the filly brushed past her teacher like she’d been doing it professionally. She began stalking towards the small mass of ponies and creatures huddled around the freak.
How dare she lose her nerve now?
The crowd clearly hadn’t figured out what was going on yet, as the din in the arena was almost impossible to hear over. But so close, Flawless could pick up most of what was being said. And the more she heard, the angrier the crystal pony became.
“…it’s gonna be alright Ann…”
“…come on, like you told me…”
“…you don’t have to do this…”
And the angrier she became, the more Flawless began to focus. How else to solve a problem? Focus. Focus, effort, and a game plan.
Guess it’s up to me… go for offense…
“Hey!” she shouted as she neared the Crusaders, “Blank Flanks!”
Five creatures turned to look where that had come from, followed by five frowns. Most were simply shocked to see Flawless so close.
Ann hadn’t even flinched, still watching the crowd with a vacant, wide-eyed expression.
“But…” Cheese frowned, “I already have my Cutie Mark…?”
Flawless saw the play, and intercepted.
“Sorry, Little Cheese,” she sneered, “I meant to say, ‘Blank Flanks, and Blank Brain!’”
Pearl Rose’s face turned about as pink as the swirl in her mane, and she advanced on Flawless with a howl in her wake, furious words on her lips. Flawless hardly paid her any attention.
Ann’s ear had flicked. Just a bit, but Flawless could tell when someone was listening.
Press the advantage.
She flicked her head in just such a way so that her braid whipped around to flick Pearl on the snout, and huffed, “Go tell it to the butler, Snob! Why are you even here, slumming it with these losers?”
Pearl came up, eyes wide, but whatever she’d been saying had died in her throat. There might have even been tears.
Bit strong, her gut warned, dial it back. Don’t get socked before she…
Ann was watching though… good…
“Don’t…” Ann started, slowly, cautiously. It was clear she was still thinking about the hundreds of ponies and creatures looking down at them, instead of the one pony she should have been watching.
Eye on the ball…
But as Flawless went in for the goal, a strangely quiet voice piped up. And despite how quiet it was, there was something in it that carried the sound over the other, deeply unhappy ponies before her.
“Um, Flawless? That’s not being nice,” Goldie sat up with her wings splayed out, cutting a much more imposing figure than the timid little thing had any right to be, “We’re… we’re all friends here, right?”
“Lay an egg, Goldie,” she shot back, more irritation at the interruption than a calculated strike.
Moon and Shady both stepped forward, bared fangs flashing for the former, and a flickering blue flame on the latter’s brow as the Kirin ignited. They said nothing, letting their presence speak volumes for their support for their friends.
Admirable, Flawless admitted, but not a part of the plan. And with Teacher closing in behind, the game clock is winding down. Time for the Hail Luna pass…
“Seriously Ann,” she leaned over to catch a glimpse of the Ponequus, who was now narrowing her ghastly yellow eyes towards Flawless perfectly, “Where did you pick up so many friends this stupid? These two didn’t even have comebacks!”
“Don’t talk about my fwiends like that…”
It wasn’t loud, like a shout. No, it was hardly above a whisper. But there was something about Ann’s voice that caused a chill to run down Flawless’s spine. No fear showed on her face, but for a moment she remembered just who she was antagonizing.
Open goal, push…
“I’m sorry,” she put a smirk she didn’t quite feel, “Did I huwt youw fwiends’ feewings?”
Ann stood up. “I said, don’t talk about them like that.”
“Or what?” Flawless tried to push as much venom into those two words as she could, knowing she had to lay the bait now.
“Or… or I’ll…” the Ponequus started walking, slowly up to Flawless, eyes narrowing as she closed the distance.
Flawless took a step forward as well, just to keep the momentum going.
Shoot for the goal!
“You wanna beat me?”
Ann almost hesitated. “Yes,” she growled.
“At Buckball?” Flawless’s nose was inches from her foe’s.
“Yes…”
“Right here?” a raised eyebrow, plus a renewed smirk offensive, “Right now? In front of a thousand eyes?”
“Wight hewe,” Ann almost snarled, eyes boring into Flawless’s from inches away, “Wight now!”
The others took a step back. The air was tense, like somecreature had played a low, low note on a large and powerful instrument, and that the air itself was vibrating with the tension. At any moment, reality could have snapped and nocreature would have noticed. The Ponequus and the Pony stood nose-to-nose, sharing a glare that could have started fires…
Point Match Set…
Flawless smiled, and in the genuine voice of a happy filly, cried, “Alright! Let’s play!” She turned swiftly, practically spinning on one hoof, and trotted merrily back to her teammates, leaving Ann somewhat floundering.
“I… what?” she blinked. “What just happened?”
Cheese, at her side instantly, laid a hoof on Ann’s shoulder. “I have no idea. Mom says fillies don’t make a lot of sense… and I guess she’d know…”
“That was… certainly a thing that happened,” Pearl concurred, lightly tapping her chin with a hoof, “Though I wonder. She changed her tune quickly there, like she’d gotten what she wanted…”
Moon shrugged with his wings, “Eh, who cares what Flawless thinks. You guys got this.”
Ann snorted. “Y-yeah… Yeah!” she said, then with more conviction, “We got this!”
Goldie pawed at the ground, “You sure? You’re not… upset about the ‘eyes’ thing?”
“Please,” Ann shook her head, a fire flaring in her heart as she said, “Wight now, the only thing I can think about is beating Flawless and hew pals!”
The teams finally faced off. Cheese and Flawless took their places in the inner ring, one lightly jittering with excitement, the other as still as glass. In between them stood their teacher, Miss Silver Spoon, sporting the black-and-white referee uniform and whistle, and giving Flawless a curious, knowing look as she began the final pregame ritual.
“Alright,” she said, her voice… somehow being transmitted through the speakers set up all over the coliseum, “While I don’t approve of all this pomp and circumstance, I suppose there’s no stopping this now. So, I want a good, clean game. No Griffon-Ball, and no Slap-Apple…”
Over at the podium, Rainbow Dash hoof-pumped and cheered when she heard her names for the Buckball variant rules read out.
“First to ten points is the winner, with a five-minute halftime at five points,” Silver Spoon finished. And then, she held out the ball on the end of her hoof. A noise went up from the crowd as she did so, a low sound like a vibration. It picked up in intensity until it was a rumble, and then a thunder.
And within seconds, the entire population of Ponyville was stamping their hooves in a riotous cacophony.
Ann leapt up, and began hovering with easy flaps of her wings. Dib, buzzing with a soft drone of his wings, noted how steady she floated there, almost like facing another Changeling, or… with those wings, a Batpony. He shook his head, and blinked away the fleeting feeling of panic.
Sure, Batponies ate insects. But that didn’t include Changelings… right?
Beauregard hefted his bucket, colored in the green and blue of his team… though when they decided that he wasn’t entirely sure of… in the aura of his magic, and spared a brief glance over to his opposite. Pearl matched his glance, her own team-colored bucket held aloft in her magical grip, and gave the colt a slight nod accompanied by a respectful glow from her horn.
He gave one back, and grinned. Maybe this would be fun after all.
“Good luck,” Cheese mouthed to Flawless, not being able to actually hear over the furious din of the crowd.
The crystal pony nodded.
And then, the ball was loose. It leapt up from Silver Spoon’s hoof into the air, silencing the crowd in an instant, all their breath held tight in their chests.
It came down, the crowd waiting to see if they could exhale again.
Cheese, powered by the irrepressible might of a sugar-high and his mother’s inherited sense of the bizarre, the strange, and the uncanny, was already leaping to meet it, his body seemingly uncoiling like a rubber spring being launched from a party cannon. His hindleg rocketed to the ball…
But Flawless was faster.
Her jab was calculated, and swift. It sent the ball clear over Cheese’s head, in a straight shot at the goal. Ann, startled at the sheer speed of the ball, lost precious inches in altitude as her wings briefly froze in place.
By the time she recovered, nanoseconds later, the ball had sunk into Beauregard’s bucket, and a point for the Crystal Gems was scored.
The crowd exploded.
“Oh no! Right off the hoof, we have a One-Oh game!” the echoing voice of Scootaloo belted out over the coliseum speakers, though whether anycreature could hear her was up for serious academic debate.
Not that she cared too much. Scootaloo was happy enough to hear herself talk. And sitting up in the hot-air balloon… albeit one with a huge ‘Discord’ face on the side… gave her what she considered the best seats in the whole house. She could see everything without needing to bend her neck around someone else, and she could pretend she was flying!
Too bad about the other announcer, however.
“Like, such violent aggression,” Tree Hugger bemoaned, “This ‘game’ is leading to the collapse of our society, ya know?”
“I…” Scootaloo crinkled her nose, “What?”
“It’s counterwaving the harmonious chill-vibes our young ones need to balance out their chakras(?)”
Scootaloo wasn’t sure if there was a question at the end of that statement… all she was sure of was that this seat was looking more and more like it absolutely wasn’t the best seat in the house.
Second round, things looked a little better.
In that anything better than tragically-awful would be considered ‘better’. Cheese was truly, completely shocked at how Flawless moved. He was a fairly light-limbed colt for his age, which only made him bouncier and wilder when combined with his bubbly personality and nascent Pie-sense. He’d never had a problem keeping up with anything. He wasn’t sure if that was something to do with all the cupcakes he ate, or that weird thing his mom brought up once in a while called The Ponk (always capitalized, always in italics).
Flawless was taller. She was skinnier. And Cheese wasn’t sure, but by the way she kicked, he would swear… so long as his Mom and her bar of soap weren’t present… that she was much stronger than he was. And it only took a second kick for him to realize how outclassed he was at this.
Said second kick sailed right past him, Cheese only getting the lightest graze on it with his hoof. And even that didn’t matter as Ann was taken off-guard by its speed. The game was twenty seconds old, and they were already down two points.
Yeah… Flawless was unstoppable. Cheese could see Pearl on the other side of the field clearly wracking her mind for a strategy that could pull them out of this mess, but as smart as he knew she was, it wouldn’t help if they got knocked into an unrecoverable deficit this fast.
Cheese glanced over his shoulder at Ann. She was still airborne, but it was clear in her face and in how she flapped around that she was shaken. All that confidence that… well, that Flawless had brute-forced into the Ponequus was vanishing as quickly as the crowds around Sugarcube Corner when Cheese had last tried to cook something on his own.
But Cheese didn’t need a fire brigade to show up this time. He needed to reignite a flame. Ann needed that… that…
“Ann!” he shouted, startling Silver Spoon for a moment as she was about to launch the ball again.
Ann gave him a confused look, mixed with the creeping shame that had been building for two brief rounds of Buckball as she let those point fly away.
Cheese grinned, hopefully in a way that would lift her spirit up.
“Angry Music!!!” he shouted again, and then spun back around to square off with a bemused opponent.
As the ball flew up again, Ann’s eyes widened.
As it came down, she smiled… no, she grinned…
Cheese got a hoof out in time, redirecting a Flawlessly struck ball to the side. It bounced once, then right into Dib’s own hooves. The Changeling sent it back, allowing Flawless to gracefully smack it over Cheese’s head and straight towards another easy goal.
Which was when a pink-and-black blur spun out in front of the ball. It disappeared into an instant-cyclone, and came whipping back out from the tip of Ann’s tail, a triumphant snarl on her face.
Fire in her eyes.
Flawless saw the fire.
She flinched.
The ball struck the field, and Flawless leapt for the intercept on the uptick. Cheese shot out a hoof, seemingly too slow to get under it… except that in the next instant, Flawless recognized what was happening.
Cheese kicked the ball down, rebounding on the hard field again, and sailing straight through Flawless’s legs, and under Dib, who couldn’t drop fast enough to stop it. The ball crashed into Pearl’s bucket, and a roar went up through the crowd.
A scoreboard across from the podium flashed: One-Two.
The Crusaders were on the board.
In the dugout, Discord wrapped up Fluttershy in his arms, the two spinning around in a laughter-whirlwind as Goldie, Moon, and Shady stomped their claws and hooves and cheered on. But their merriment could not be compared to the beaming smiles on Pearl and Cheese’s face as a spark of hope ignited within them.
Nor could it compare to Ann, who made absolutely sure that Flawless was looking at her when she let loose with a terrible cry that echoed with the Metal that filled her soul…
“I! AM! IRON MARE!!!”
“Not that I’m biased,” Scootaloo drawled slightly into the microphone, “but it is awesome to see the Cutie Mark Crusaders on the scoreboard!”
Tree Hugger nodded, and added, “Little Anny sure has a lot of her mother’s spirit in her, that’s for sure. It’s cool to see.”
“Don’t you think she’s counter-something the harmony of Pony society?”
“She, like, can be more than one thing at a time, mah dude.”
“… I’m a mare.”
“Like… you can be whatever you want to be, dude.”
Pearl Rose remembered one of her Papa’s lessons quite keenly as she tried to keep abreast of the developing situation on the field. Well, perhaps it was not, strictly speaking her Papa’s lesson so much as it was a lesson by a tutor hired by her Papa, but she began recalling it in detail now.
“Sun Zoo said,” she could hear the tutor’s voice in her mind as clear as it had been back then, “’Strike where your enemy is weak, and retreat where she is strong’.”
So, she thought as Flawless sent another hard shot across the center, Where are you weak?
Flawless was… well, she was flawless. A born athlete. While Pearl liked Cheese, his heart had never been in the game, and despite his pedigree…
Well, perfection is the enemy of good, they say. Cheese was good, great even. But he was up against a monster. He could keep up, but only just.
Pearl, on the other hoof, felt she was quite nearly paired with the Changeling Dib. He was light, quick, and speedy. The only openings she could find were whenever Ann or Cheese launched a low-shot past Flawless, it being a lot more difficult to lose altitude as quickly as it was to gain, but even then, it wasn’t by much.
Beauregard was a brute, she had to say, in terms of magic. Pearl noted with no small amount of pride that her magical control was quite advanced for her age, but his telekinetic grip was clearly stronger, if not far cruder. Pearl could match Dib’s movements with her magic, allowing her to get a good angle here or there. Beauregard seemed like he could either hold the bucket aloft or hurl it to the side, no chance to redirect or control his angles.
That just left Ann. And to Pearl, she was brilliant right now! She didn’t quite understand the physics behind it, but Ann’s wings gave her a range of motion and control similar to Dib, which put her in the position to outpace Beauregard’s clumsy attempts at keeping his bucket open. If Flawless wasn’t just that good, the Crusaders might be ahead by this point.
Which was only punctuated again, as another ball fell into Beauregard’s bucket, grazing the tip of Ann’s wing as it went in. Three-and-one was not an ideal place to be.
It was time for a plan.
While Miss Silver Spoon prepared for the next toss, Pearl shouted to her teammates.
“Cheese! Gumdrops!”
That drew a raised eyebrow… or whatever chitinous substitute Dib’s kind had for eyebrows, from the Changeling. No matter, the sprightly pink-maned earth pony saluted with a determined gleam in his eye, assuring her he knew what was needed.
Ann winked, acknowledging the plan, and then set herself into a determined scowl.
The ball careened past Cheese, who hadn’t even tried to go for it at the toss-up. He seemed totally absorbed in checking his hooves and polishing them on his chest. Flawless gave him a curious look, suspicion slowly trickling in.
Ann caught the ball with her whole wing, like she’d done at practice, and spun herself around in the air like a gyrocopter blade, instantly becoming a whirlwind of Ponequus color before heaving the ball back from whence it came. It practically sizzled as it rebounded off the field by an impassive Cheese’s haunch and sailed past a startled Flawless and a confused Dib.
The ‘pegasus’ couldn’t score like that without the Slap-Apple rules. But Ann wasn’t looking to score.
The ball bounced off Pearl’s bucket as she spun it about and slapped it back towards center. Flawless, expecting a ‘foul’ call for the ball leaving field, still nearly got a hoof out in time to intercept. Nearly. Almost. Not quite.
Cheese had leapt back into action, giving the ball a straight buck with his hindlegs that sent it off at yet another angle. Dib had zipped to one side to block Pearl’s bucket, only to see at the last instant that the ball went off in the other direction, sinking neatly into the bucket held far away from where Pearl stood, a triumphant smile on her lips.
The crowd rumbled in appreciation for the play. Three-two, Crystal Gems. But not for long.
“That…” Rainbow Dash’s jaw started to hurt hanging down as it was, “That… was… AWESOME!!!”
Applejack slapped her knee as she laughed, “Hoo WEE! That sure were somethin’!”
“Did you see that pass!?” Dash was up and out of her seat, wings flapping madly in her excitement, “I knew that filly had what it takes!”
Applejack smirked, and cast a look up at her partner, “I thought you didn’t much care for her?”
Dash landed besides Applejack and wrapped one hoof around her shoulders, “Nah! She’s fine. And she plays Buckball, so what’s not to like?”
“Eeyup,” Applejack chuckled, “Heck, all of them could probably have whupped us if’n we played ‘em at their age.”
Rainbow Dash shook her head, “Yeah, story of our lives, right? You basically invented the game, and we keep bumping into Pies and Shys who could trounce us at it.”
That got a true laugh out of the Apple matriarch, snorting and near-cackling in her seat. But soon, she had herself back under control, and the two simply held onto one another as they watched the next round begin.
“I want one,” Dash whispered.
Applejack snorted again, “I ain’t lettin’ Discord touch either of us jes’ to have a foal, Dash. No-how. No-way.”
“Aw, c’mon!” the Wonderbolt captain nudged her in the side, “Zap Apple would be the coolest Farmer-slash-Wonderbolt who ever lived!”
“Dashie, I…” Applejack raised an eyebrow, “Zap Apple?”
“Yeah…”
“… You named it?”
It was adorable, in Applejack’s opinion, to see a bright red blush on her cyan pegasus’ face. But before another word could pass between them, the sound of a ball clattering against wood echoed through the stadium.
Four-two, Crystal Gems.
There wasn’t a whole lot for Cheese to really do, at the moment. The game was largely running by itself at this point, and he’d already accepted that he just couldn’t compete at Flawless’s level enough to be more than a speedbump in her path. So, while he surrendered his body over to that strange, ineffable force his Mom called his Pie Sense… and once tearfully wondered aloud where he could hear it that it might ‘be The Ponk’… Cheese’s mind was preoccupied with other things.
This is stupid, we should be friends with Flawless! Why can’t Ann and Pearl see that? It’s like Mom says about that Sun Zoo guy; winning a hundred battles isn’t excellent, making friends without fighting is.
The ball grazed his left ear just enough to leave a burn. He noted it, and filed that away for later consideration.
Wow, Flawless isn’t playing around, which is a silly statement since all we’re doing is playing a game. Then again, Mom and Dad keep telling me that games are the most important part about parties, since they bring everycreature together with an activity, which I guess Buckball is, but still… oh hey! They’ve got smoothies in the concession stand! I wonder if I can get one at half-time…?
His Pie Sense, that ultra-instinct, guided Cheese’s hindleg around in a solid roundhouse kick that redirected another ball passed by Ann. He idly watched it sail away while his mind continued thinking about more interesting things.
Boy… Ann’s getting pretty good at this. She’s pretty great, all things considered. She’s pretty great at playing, pretty great at eating ice cream and shakes and cupcakes, pretty… uh, um, pretty good at… pretty.
Friends can be pretty, right…?
…
Wait, is the crowd cheering? Did we score?
“Little Cheese with a righteous kick and the goal! And the score is Four-Three, with the Crusaders coming back with a vengeance!! Like, can these little dudes do it? Can they do it!? I THINK THEY CAN!!!”
“… Tree Hugger?” Scootaloo nudged her co-announcer, gently, like she might if she were trying to get an angry Manticore’s attention, “Um… you okay?”
The older pony idly played with one of her long, red-grey locks. She didn’t look over to the younger pegasus.
“I… might have to do some chakra realigning later…”
The next round started with a vengeance. When the ball came down from the toss-up, Flawless and Cheese were both ready to meet it with a hard hindkick. The ball pinched between them, firing back into the air, starting a free-for-all between both teams’ ‘pegasi’ players.
Ann and Dib met in the air, all four hooves meeting at the ball simultaneously. The crowd watched, mouths agape as the two children swatted and clawed at the leather Buckball, neither able to wrestle it away from the other.
The Changeling gave his wings an extra hard buzz, coming up just high enough to get more of his weight down on the ball, and finally broke the struggle with a hard head-butt to spike the ball…
Directly into Ann’s long, pink-and-black tail, which hung below her. She gave him a smirk and a wink, and then flicked the ball back down towards her side of the field with a bit of a forward spin on it. The ball hit the field behind Cheese, but the spin carried it from there over to the little colt, who sent it on its way with a backflip and a kick.
Dib, too high up to intercept, watched helplessly as the score became Four-Four.
“Hm,” Rarity hummed.
“Hm?” Princess Twilight, one eye on the game and one on a stack of paperwork she’d teleported in, hummed back in question.
Rarity shook her head lightly, “Oh, nothing dear. I was just… thinking.”
“Uh huh,” Twilight looked over the next form in front of her, quickly signing off on a spending bill meant to fund Equestria through Nightmare Night, before giving her friend all of her attention, “Thinking about what?”
Rarity said nothing, but Twilight had gotten good at this sort of thing, and just needed to follow where her friend’s eyes were pointing.
“Pearl Rose?” she asked.
Rarity shrugged, “It’s a bit odd to see… well, one of Blueblood’s own kicking up dirt with commoners, you know. Playing Buckball.”
Her eyes drifted over to said Prince Blueblood. He stood stock-still, forehooves up on the podium railing, and had done so since the game started. If he moved now, Rarity thought, she’d be surprised to not hear a bone or muscle pop out of place.
“We all have our little surprises,” Twilight smiled, one eye drifting back towards a form for ordering new dragon-scaled armor for the guard… the dragons in the guard needing armor of a different fit, naturally, “And I’d think you of all ponies would appreciate how far the apple might fall from the tree.”
Applejack swiveled her head halfway around at the mention of her namesake, but something Rainbow Dash said to the farmpony kept her out of the conversation.
“You’re not wrong, darling,” Rarity said, eyes still on the Prince, “But you have to admit, some trees are more… egregious than others.”
“She takes after her mother, thankfully,” Blueblood said without turning back, in the same tone of voice one might use to comment on the weather.
Rarity’s irises narrowed to pinpricks, and one hoof covered her swiftly reddening face. “Oh my… I beg your pardon for my boorish language just then…”
“Yes, yes,” he waved an idle hoof in her general direction, “Understood. Think nothing of it.”
The Princess and her friend shared a brief, confused glance before Rarity hopped off her throne and walked over to the usually tempestuous Prince. Which suited Twilight just fine, as more forms apparated before her in dragonflame, including a final notice on which statues would be on presentation in the Royal Canterlot Statue Garden this season, and she happily went about checking them off… though with one eye still on the situation at hoof.
“I truly am sorry, Your Highness,” Rarity slipped easily into the most customer-appeasing tone of voice she could, “It was impossibly rude of me to comment like that. I let my… my past experiences cloud my better judgement. I humbly…”
Whatever Rarity planned to say, it was instantly forgotten as a Buckball slapped against the railing of the podium, filling the space with a loud, metallic ring. Despite not being able to hear for several seconds, she could tell by Applejack’s gesticulations that the first ‘foul ball’ of the game had finally happened, and by Ann’s distant beet-red face that she’d put a little too much spin into her last pass.
Rarity shook herself, and once she was certain that her hearing had returned, she attempted to continue.
“Er… what I was trying to say was…”
Blueblood cocked his head slightly towards the stammering mare, and perhaps for the first time in minutes broke his gaze away from the field. “Miss Rarity, it’s quite alright.”
“I-Is it?” she smiled, chagrined.
“Not really,” he shrugged, “You were indeed quite rude. And insulting a member of the Peerage? It’d be a scandal for anypony else.”
Blueblood turned back towards the game, leaving Rarity to sputter silently. But between her eye twitching, and her tongue catching on a dozen different scathing comebacks, she’d given him time to think.
“You weren’t necessarily wrong, however…” he finally said, eyes locked to the game and a smile upon his lips, carefully concealed by his mustache. “Merely… uncouth.”
While Rarity stood, watching Blueblood with a far more critical eye than she’d ever given him before, he pouted and sighed. “She needs to take the initiative.”
“Pardon?”
“My Pearl,” the Prince nodded towards his daughter, and Rarity pulled herself up to the podium railing besides him, “She’s letting that Changeling colt, er, nymph… whatever, run her ragged. She needs to start pushing, instead of reacting.”
Rarity glanced out at the game. They’d been going at it for a solid minute-and-a-half since the foul ball, seemingly an eternity in game-time. The players were starting to show signs that the game was wearing on them, and normally Rarity would be sweating in sympathy with the poor dears…
Except that the crowd had fallen nearly silent. Nearly. Chatter was almost nonexistent, but a slowly building clatter of hooves began to shake the stadium. Rarity could see Pinkie leaping back and forth through the aisles all the way across the sea of ponies… she even thought Pinkie was in more than one spot at a time… driving the audience with her typical exuberance. Stoking the sports-fan-fire in every heart.
The chorus of hooves was the safest way the crowd could release their excitement. If they cheered right now, the whole of Ponyville would go hoarse in an afternoon.
Pinkie would have giggled incessantly at that, Rarity noted.
The energy was incredible. Rarity would never admit to it, being a unicorn of high class and style… but it felt like watching that last game of Hoofball her father played, back when he was a young, powerful stallion, and she was the proudest filly to watch her father play the sport he loved.
Her inquisitive eyes thus opened, Rarity said, “Perhaps always pushing is a mistake? One might dictate the pace of a dance…”
“Or a Gala,” Blueblood offered.
“Or a Gala,” Rarity smiled slightly at that, “But in an act more… confrontational, let’s say, to remain reactive might instead be…”
Pearl, having spent the match being chased around the outer edge of play by a single-minded Dib, suddenly juked left as her bucket leapt right, catching the Changeling out of play. She had to send the ball back with a hard kick, it having gone left as well, but for the next several seconds Dib did not zero in so closely to the unicorn.
“… strategy,” Rarity finished with a grin.
Blueblood said nothing, at first. He took a deep breath, and held it for a moment before he responded, “Indeed. I wish I’d paid attention to… strategy when I was younger. I’m not completely oblivious to your ire with me,” he turned an eye back to Rarity, and for the first time she could see something beyond a pompous brat standing proud of nothing in the halls of a gala.
“But if I had figured that out a little earlier…” his voice trailed off. The Prince visibly sagged for a moment, but it was only a passing shadow. He rose back up, eyes returned to his Princess.
“I don’t care if it’s a ‘peasant game’, Rarity,” he whispered, “If Pearl Rose is to play it, if she’s to be a,” he spat the next words, “Buckball Player… then she will be the best! She’s a Blueblood! As long as she follows her heart, I couldn’t be prouder…”
Pearl juked. Dib dived… only to see Pearl and her bucket together, with a Buckball clattering on home.
Five-Four, Crusaders. At the half.
As Gems and Crusaders made for the dugouts rimming the arena, where juice, snacks, water, and friends and family awaited, there was a notable flash of white, magical light that filled the center of the field. The audience, already pushing, shoving, and borderline riotous to reach the restrooms, barely paused to take notice.
But that didn’t mean that nopony missed the resulting sight.
“I don’t believe it!” Scootaloo’s voice blared over the sound-system, “Ponyville! We got a real treat for your halftime game today!”
“Aright!” Tree Hugger seemed to agree, “It looks like we have the Royal Yakyakistani Cheer Squad. They’re like, so in-tune with their inner-selves. We can all learn something from their example.”
“And it looks like they’re being led by none other than the one…” Scootaloo’s voice got low, “… the only… Ponyville’s best singing-voice! Sweetie Belle!!!”
Sweetie Belle indeed stood at the head of thirty yaks, all dressed in Ponyville’s colors, and her in a corresponding marching outfit, complete with a hat and baton held in her magical aura.
She… did not seem amused.
“I’m not doing this,” she said simply, dropping her baton and swiftly making her way for the concessions before Pinkie devastated the local food supply… again.
The yaks, clearly not expecting this, shared confused looks.
Until one decided to speak up.
“If Pony not lead Yaks in Cheer… then Yaks lead Yaks… in SMASHING!!!”
The dull roar of thirty yaks leaping up and down in non-synchronized stamping provided a strange sort of calming ambience for Ann as she, Cheese, and Pearl greedily sucked down water bottles hoofed out to them by their friends. Cheese poured half his bottle out onto his own head, while the other two drank like they’d been led to water.
“You guys are amazing out there!” Goldie squealed, “I never realized how much fun a non-Griffon-Ball match could be!”
“What’s diffewent about Gwiffon-Ball?” Ann asked before she knocked a whole bottle of ice-cold water back.
“It’s also called ‘Full-Contact’ Buckball,” Shady rolled his eyes. “Dragons like Griffon-Style, but they also play Hoard, which drags games out for weeks…”
“Isn’t that just Keep-away?” Cheese asked, his mane sucking up water like a sponge.
“Full-contact keep-away,” Discord grinned, drifting above the foals as a Discord-colored cloud and quietly raining CMC flags, jerseys, and pins on anycreature not on the team, “where points are scored by concussions and a lack of Buckballs found per day. I personally find it a fascinating variant. But then again, I’m also a fascinating variant…” he cackled and drifted in the wind.
“Focus, ladies!” Pearl Rose crushed her water bottle in a magical grip, “We’ve got Flawless on the ropes! Now all we need is to finish her off for good!”
Everycreature paused at that, and there was a swift and silent exchange of looks around the dugout. Finally, it was Cheese who, by unanimous decision, stepped forward.
“Uh, Pearl? Maybe you’re taking this a little too personally?”
She scoffed, “I don’t know what you mean! After the way she treated you all so abominably? How can you not take it personally?”
“Yeah,” Moon said slowly, like he was trying to think through his next words before saying them, “But you’re playing a game, not fighting a war.”
“I don’t see the difference,” Pearl lifted her head slightly, “You can apply Sun Zoo’s philosophy to lots of things!”
“I don’t know who this Sun Zoo is,” Fluttershy said, looking down at the zealous filly, “But I imagine even he’d say that having fun while playing a game is more important than beating somecreature else. Isn’t that right, Discord?”
The Draconequus, caught mid raspberry aimed at an equally mugging Pinkie Pie, twisted around in midair at the mention of his name. “Huh? What?”
Fluttershy, voice slightly strained, responded with, “I said, winning the game is less important than having fun. It isn’t good to want to play just to beat somepony else.”
“Hm,” Discord frowned and scratched at his brow, “No, you’ve lost me.”
“Flawless is always being mean to us,” Ann pouted, “So why can’t we wub her smug snout in this just once?”
Her mom hummed, and looked away. Fluttershy looked out over the crowd, noting her friends sitting on the podium. Applejack and Dash seemed stuck in a private conversation, Rarity and Blueblood were casually watching Pearl, Pinkie had trucked in a small hill of confections, popcorn, and soda. And Twilight…
Twilight looked up from some paperwork (a proposed law to ban the importation of certain hallucinogenic-sugar pills from Perytonia) and gave Fluttershy an encouraging smile, the sort she gave when she knew one of her friends just needed a moment of encouragement and confidence.
Surprisingly, it worked. Fluttershy turned a steely gaze back on her daughter. “Ann,” she said, her eyes and her voice’s resolve making it plain she cared very deeply as to what the Ponequus said in reply to this, “Does acting like a bully make you happy?”
Ann worked her jaw for but a moment. Even in the heat of the game, on top of a wave of adrenaline and excitement over finally pulling one over on that smug, rude, grumpy, jerk-faced crystal pony… she’d had enough of feeling angry and ashamed for one week.
“No…” she said, then looked away, “I just wish it did, sometimes…”
Pearl sighed, “I… I suppose that’s true. I just wanted so badly to make Flawless eat the things she said earlier about us. About Moon, Cheese, Shady, and Goldie.”
She looked about the throngs of ponies readying themselves for the second half of the game, and then back down to her hooves. “I suppose this was my mistake as well.”
“Mistakes are always forgivable,” Cheese said, eyes closed and voice in a measured tempo, “If one has the courage to admit them.”
“That…” Pearl couldn’t quite manage to say more. None of the other creatures could seem to come up with anything either.
Cheese giggled, “That was Spruce Neigh, not Sun Zoo, so I’m not sure if it counts. We’re still quoting other creatures, right? Ooh! How about, ‘Cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education’? Or, ‘The power to destroy an entire planet is insignificant next to the power of the…’?”
A lion’s paw slapped over Cheese’s muzzle.
“Kid,” Discord sighed, “The Ponk is strong with you. But we’ve got two meta-narrative characters in this story already, and I’ll be barbequed…”
Fluttershy gasped.
“… if my Ann isn’t the third one, so quit it.”
Cheese just giggled again.
“Come on,” Ann brightened up, “We can still have fun with this game, and beat Flawless! We just have to… not obsess ovew it.”
“Good,” Shady laughed, “Glad that’s sorted. Uh, right?”
A floating stopwatch had appeared above the leaping Yaks, displaying a dwindling amount of time. All knew what it meant. Half time was coming to an end, and in mere seconds the field would be retaken and the game would recommence. The stadium began to rumble with the rhythmic pounding of hooves as the crowd counted down the final minute.
“Pearl’s quick, and she’s clever,” Flawless placed a hoof on Dib’s withers, “Just use your emotion senses. If you feel she’s trying to be tricky, go with your gut, alright Dib?”
The Changeling smiled a broken smile, his confidence only slowly returning under his friend’s cocky grin. “I’ll try. I will!”
“B-but,” Beauregard spared a glance over towards the other team, already marching back towards the field, “I swear I can hear her… I think she’s playing music in her head, and I can hear it in mine! And it’s so… angry…”
A green hoof touched the shivering unicorn’s chin, and brought his eyes back down to Flawless’s own… where an emerald fire seemed to burn.
“Beau? She’s a creature wrought from the stuff of starlight and madness… there’s not a lot you can do about that.”
Beauregard cringed, a puppy-whimper escaping his throat. But the smaller crystal earth pony didn’t flinch, didn’t waver. Her eyes bore into his own… and that fire started to feel warm…
“But!” she said, that self-assured smile back on her face, “Ann’s still getting used to flying, and as much control as she’s got, she can’t do speed. Just try to out-run her, and move your bucket faster! I know you can do it. How long did it take us to teach you to grab things with magic?”
“A… a long time?”
She stamped a hoof, kicking up a small dustcloud, “And are you gonna throw away all my hours of hard work helping you?”
The blue unicorn felt his cheeks burn, and he straightened noticeably, “N-no! Never!”
“Yeah!” Dib snarled, “We’re gonna win! We’ve worked too hard for this not to!”
“Alright,” Flawless took a breath, and started towards the Yaks, “Together…”
With the ringing of the giant stopwatch, the Yaks disappeared in a flash of light and the sound of rattling dice. All chatter, all distractions within the arena vanished with them, replaced by the stamping of thousands of hooves and the silent, focused energy of four ponies, a Ponequus, and a Changeling staring each other down over a few lines of chalk.
Silver Spoon shivered. The pounding of hooves was almost magical with how it could affect an entire stadium like this, but it was the eyes that arrested her attention. She knew the looks her students were throwing at each other. She’d had to break up a few playground fights before, after all.
But… oh, she hated just letting things like this out of her hooves. If it helped though…?
Enough thinking. Silver Spoon tossed the ball up into the air.
And so… The War began.
Minutes passed. The crowd alternated between rapt silence, thunderous applause, and cries of shock and awe. The ball lurched across the field like it had a life of its own, an animating energy that caused it to fly hither and thither at shocking speed.
And, if indeed a Buckball could have a life of its own, this one was having a terrible time of it, as every second was taken up by hooves, tails, and muzzles kicking the ever-loving huff out of it.
The score tied, Five-Five, with a low kick from Flawless, aided by a rebound from Dib.
And then, within seconds, Pearl pulled off another trick-play, juking away from Dib’s space and snatching another point out of the air. Six-Five.
More time passed. The crowd grew nervous. Fast goals made an exciting game. Slow goals, over a measured time and not the result of fouling? Even more exciting! Of course, slow goals weren’t so interesting for one pink party planning pony pseudo-princess, so she began roaming during the second half.
Six-Six, off a tail-whip from Flawless. Cheese and Ann had gotten a touch on the ball, but it had too much power to stop.
Six-Seven, Dib caught Pearl out of place, and a quick rebound to Flawless put the Crystal Gems up one.
By now, reams of paperwork lay forgotten by Twilight’s seat. The Alicorn watched the game with the same single-minded attention as the rest of her subjects. Applejack and Rainbow’s hushed argument was forgotten, half-finished, as both ponies raised themselves up on the podium railing to get a better view, while Rarity and Blueblood maintained a sort of meditative focus on the field of play.
Seven-Seven, Ann lobbed an overhoof pass that only Cheese’s incredible, bouncy jumps could reach for the score.
Pinkie Pie lay twelve hayburgers along her tongue, covered the mess with whipped cream, and then rolled the entire monstrosity into her mouth. She vaguely wondered how the game was going while she hefted a cheese-covered soft pretzel the size of her head into optimal scarfing position.
Beauregard watched Ann with intensity as the next round began. As he ran back and forth, trying to get Flawless an angle to score, he never let his eyes wander far from the source of his increasing panic, the Ponequus whose… angry music seemed to bleed out from her head into his. He listened, a captive audience to the pounding of drums and the roar of some sort of magical instruments he couldn’t name.
Finally, the music became too much to bear, too loud and too powerful to hear over itself. Beauregard’s mind reared back, and frantically searched for a counter. He couldn’t let Ann dictate the pace of the game. He couldn’t let Flawless down. He wouldn’t!
“Baaaah!” Beauregard finally seemed to snap, shouting out a drum beat of his own upwards at Ann, “Bada bum bum! Badadada gah gah badadabump!!!”
Anything that could stop the music, anything!
Her own concentration disrupted, Ann looked down at the colt. She quietly, bemusedly took in his wild, wall-eyed gaze, the froth on his lips, and the way his hooves seemed to tap out a beat only Beauregard could hear… but was different from the one he was sputtering at her.
It took a long second before she could fully form the words to express what she was feeling looking at this display. “What the flying feathew…?”
Whap!
The ball rang off her head, bouncing up as she chittered in surprise and spun about, grabbing at her mane.
The crowd gasped. Silence held for an instant as the Buckball drifted up… and then came down into Beauregard’s waiting bucket.
Seven-Eight. Own Goal.
“Oh no!” Ann’s hooves flew up to her face, covering up the humiliated blush that burned her face a beet-red.
Discord swiftly covered Fluttershy’s eyes with his tail, both wincing with a shared, “Oh no…”
“Like… oh nooo…” Tree Hugger’s low, vicariously-embarrassed voice went out over the speakers.
“Oh yeah!!!” Pinkie cheered, finally getting Apple Bloom to give in and deep-fry an apple-fritter.
“An own-goal!” Scootaloo’s rising voice matched the sudden swell of the crowd’s cheers and jeers, “I can’t believe it! I don’t believe it! The Crusaders are in trouble now…!”
Ann merely drifted above the field, wings flapping, but no other movement visible. Her eyes swept the crowds, the dugouts, the podium. How could she…? Letting everypony down…?
Down in the center, Cheese’s eyes narrowed in a pained expression as he watched her. He could feel a tightening in his chest as he realized how his friend was probably…
“Hey!” a hoof jabbed his shoulder, bringing Cheese suddenly back around to Flawless, who had to shout for him to hear her over the crowd even this close, “You need to help her!”
He didn’t hesitate, except to give his opposite number a quick nod. Cheese waved his hooves and began jumping up and down. His frantic movements went unnoticed by the crowds, so consumed by the scandal, the incredulity of that last play.
But Ann’s eyes twitched. They caught sight of Cheese, and managed to drag the rest of her face back towards the field. Meeting that look of fear and sorrow, Cheese felt a giddy, silly feeling deep, deep down in his gut. Like a little pink bubblegum-balloon swelling up and catching a Pink wind…
“It’s okay,” he said, letting The Ponk guide him, “It’s gonna be okay…”
The crowds roared, but it didn’t matter. Ann only heard his voice. Only saw his lips mouth those words. For a single moment, Anarchy was in a silent world with only Cheese. Only ever Cheese.
She blinked, and a new look came over her. Ann looked to Silver Spoon, and gave her a savage nod. Her teacher took the hint, quickly blew her whistle, and launched the ball once again.
It was Eight-Eight only a minute later, after Cheese tail-whipped a curveball past Flawless and Dib. The crowd was as animated as ever, regardless of which team they’d decided to root for, and chanting crowd songs could be heard battling it out in pockets as their excitement built.
A rousing rendition of Seven Neigh-tion Army belted out from somewhere behind the podium, the words lost as most of the ‘singers’ were content to ‘oh’ and ‘woah’ their way through it, while a tight pack of attendees most likely from Dib’s extended family challenged them with We Are the Changelings, and a few scattered pockets tried to get Equestria, The Land I Love started, though it was hard going without a super-pop idol to lead them.
And somewhere, Pinkie’s very own We Will Ponk You could somehow be heard above all of them.
And then all fell silent, for the score was suddenly Eight-Nine, after Beauregard redirected a pass from Dib back to Flawless with the flat of his bucket. The Crusaders were blindsided by their own play!
Prussian Blue and Facet Glimmer had spent the entirety of the game sitting quietly in the dugout seats with Fluttershy and Discord, not saying a single word or doing a single thing outside of quietly sipping at their drinks and hitting the restroom to wash off the face-paint Discord had liberally applied to Prussian at game’s start.
But as the game fell into its final stretch, when even the Princess of Equestria was standing at attention to see the conclusion, the two ponies found they had a few moments to themselves.
“So…” Facet coughed into a hoof awkwardly, “I guess this means… Flawless and that Anny pony are still…?”
Prussian’s face barely moved as he said, “Honey? The Spirit of Chaos has enabled our daughter to play his in a magically created arena before a crowd of thousands, all so that they can work out their foalish rivalry in the most public way possible, and probably let said Spirit have a giggle at everycreature’s expense. I think they’re not quite friends, dear.”
Facet glanced up at the clouds overhead, where a smattering of pegasi had created their own seating arrangements high above the crowds and even the announcer-balloon. “I suppose this means we should be… encouraging Flawless’s interest in sports?”
“I think this means we should be ready to flee the country,” Prussian sighed and took a bite of the candy bar held in his hooves. Then, through a full mouth, he added, “But yes. I think she’d appreciate that. Maybe we can fund a little league in… Perytonia?”
“The climate’s terrible,” Facet’s eye watched a foul ball streak away into the crowd, whereupon the impact sent ponies scattering, “Though the gem economy’s strong. It’s that or moving up to the Caribou.”
“I don’t do well with cold; you know that.”
Facet smirked, “Well… I guess we’re rooting for Ann, then?”
Both crystal ponies met one another’s gaze. And for a moment, there might have been a real debate between them on that issue...
But then Prussian shrugged, “Being rich is overrated. COME ON FLAWLESS! YOU GOT THIS BABY!!!”
“You know,” said Wind Sprint, eyeing the unconscious Celestia, “For an immortal Sun Goddess, you have a real glass jaw.”
“She was never one for direct confrontation,” Luna nodded, recalling… basically every fight they’d ever been in, “And apparently playing Buckball was never going to be her forte.”
Quibble Pants just shook his head, “I can’t believe that little filly could kick so hard! I mean, how does she have the muscle mass to produce that kind of kinetic energy?”
Grogar’s terrible laughter caused one of his discarded crackerjack boxes to blacken and burn.
“Inconsequential as it may seem, that is Little Cheese, a colt. More importantly, he is possessed of his mother, Pinkie Pie’s, abhorrent and unnatural theurgy. Reality howls in terror at their approach! Had I their power in my youth, Equestria should still be held under my dreadful dominion.”
Wind Sprint frowned, “And who are you?”
Before Grogar, the Nec-ram-ancer, could speak further, Luna held up a hoof for attention.
“Does this really matter? For once I don’t have somepony singing those infernal sports-songs in my ear. I’d like to enjoy the final moments of this game in peace, if that isn’t too much to ask?”
Her words were prophetic. Mere moments later, Cheese made up for his foul. With a high kick, a low dodge, and a bit of luck… the game was Nine and Nine.
Sudden Death.
“This is it Ladies and Gentlecolts! The endgame! The final play of the game! It’s time for legends to be born and heroes to die!! Let’s make some noise!!!”
“Tree Hugger, you really need to chill…”
“Like, we can chill when we’re dead, Scoots…”
“…”
The ball dropped.
Cheese whipped his mane around, snagging the ball and sending it flying back towards Ann with a twist of his head, barely avoiding Flawless’s hoof as it took a few strands clean off.
Well, he thought, there goes my cool pompadour look.
Ann’s wing snapped up the ball, and with a full-body whirl she sent it back ten-fold. Her eyes locked onto Flawless’s as the crystal pony launched a second kick at the approaching ball. With Cheese a second behind, she had no trouble knocking the ball back towards Beauregard’s bucket.
Ann was quicker, and with a flick of her tail she rocketed the ball away. The low angle gave Cheese a chance to redirect this one up and away from Flawless, right for Pearl’s racing bucket.
Dib was on top of it, spiking the ball back down.
The ball kept going. Around and around the field, it simply ricocheted from one side to the other as Ponequus, Changeling, and ponies juggled the hard leather lump back and forth. Ann could feel the ball as it moved, its strange orbit becoming a chaotic mayhem pinball, the wild and uncontrolled variables vibrating with the same rhythm of her heart.
This was her element. This was everycreature’s element. This wasn’t about who was better anymore, this was about who would make the first mistake now. Their skills were matched, their effort the same.
It was all down to dice, the random ebb and flow of quantum mechanics and probabilities.
Ann couldn’t be happier. Win or lose… she existed in a system of controlled Chaos now. She was in love with it, the fate of the game riding on a coinflip.
Dad was right! This is BEAUTIFUL!
She could see it, as well. The one random variable that would decide it all. The dice of destiny. The coin eternal.
It was Cheese. It was always Cheese. He was about to collapse. His breathing was harder than Flawless’s. His flanks heaved with effort while she was merely winded. Her eyes were like steel, while spittle dripped from his muzzle with every play. That near-miss right at the round’s start had shook him, and Ann could see it. She could see the way the numbers ran together in rivers and streams and railroads and catapults… chaos, amirite?
And she saw it all in an instant, a mote of time caught between heartbeats, between when she caught the ball in the crook of her tail, and when she’d already thrown it back to him.
Cheese reached out with his whole body, his hind leg perfectly placed for a roundhouse. He swung about, letting his momentum carry the colt completely around in a furious arc. Ann watched him in achingly slow-motion, willing him to do it. Dib was out of place, and Cheese was closer than Flawless. One kick. That’s all it would take. Victory was within sight…
But… his one grounded hoof slipped… no. His back-hoof simply couldn’t take the weight and the speed and the power anymore. Cheese fell. He fell, hard.
“Cheese!”
Ann dove, wings at her side with such force that she could feel the wind pop as she broke through it.
Cheese hit the dirt, kicking up dust as he landed. The dust was too slow to interfere, however, as Flawless’s own momentum carried her through to the ball, and with a solid kick of her own she sent it sailing.
It drifted right past Ann’s right side, so slow she could have reached out and touched it with a hoof.
Could. She could have. But that didn’t matter anymore. The game didn’t matter anymore.
It never mattered.
Time returned to normal as Ann flared her wings out, stopping dead in her tracks right above Cheese. She dropped down, and quickly touched his side.
“Cheese!” she thought she said. It was hard to hear. There was a thunderstorm exploding around the arena. Funny how the weather teams hadn’t warned about that.
He was breathing, though lightly and irregularly. She could feel a groan rumble in Cheese’s chest. If he had the breath to groan…
Ann flipped him over onto his back, and tried to check his breathing. She could feel it on her face. He… he was alright? It was so loud, how could she even hear herself think? Thinking about the thunder was all she could do as Ann turned to look up. But instead of grey clouds and lightning, it was a mostly clear day.
The crowd was simply exploding. The entire arena shook with their stamping and emotional cries. Scootaloo was yelling something through the speakers, but Ann couldn’t hear what she was saying over the braying throngs.
Flawless stood over her, eyes twinkling as she stared off towards where Beauregard had been stationed and where her goal had ended the game. But after a moment, the crystal pony shook her head and looked down.
Ann growled as the other filly knelt next to Cheese, but it hitched in her throat as Flawless’s foreleg wrapped around Cheese’s, and Ann found herself pulling him back up onto his haunches alongside Flawless.
“Are…” Flawless panted, “Are you okay?”
Cheese nodded, only slightly out of it. “Yeah… I think I’m okay. Kinda slipped there, though... at the end.”
He turned his head slightly, “Thanks Ann. I…”
Cheese stopped. Talking was a little more difficult when a pair of batwings completely enveloped him in a hug, especially one as tight as this was.
“I’m sowwy, Cheese,” Ann whispered.
“Oh?” the colt pulled himself out of the hug slowly, “What for?”
The Ponequus turned her head to look up at the scoreboard.
Ten-Nine. Crystal Gems.
“I think I just lost us the game…”
Cheese cocked his head to the side, enough to get an eyeful of the score. “Yeah?” he said, “But did you have fun losing?”
Ann’s mouth moved, but words didn’t come out. She looked up at Flawless, who met her gaze with a completely neutral expression. Well, not completely, completely neutral. But for the life of her, Ann couldn’t tell what else was in that expression. Not just yet.
“I…” Ann’s eyebrows raised themselves up, as she surprisingly found her answer, “I think I did.”
Cheese sighed, and closed his eyes. “Good. You’ve taken your first steps into a much larger world.”
Beauregard, Dib, and Pearl finally reached their teammates. The unicorn colt was practically dancing as he approached, and Dib smiled so hard that Ann thought his exoskeleton was about to crack.
Pearl, it had to be said, approached with far more trepidation. Her eyes glistened, just a bit, but her poise was never in doubt. She carried herself proudly as she came upon Flawless, and gave a little bow of her head.
“Well, Flawless Gem,” she said in as formal a voice as she could manage, “It seems I must congratulate you on your victory. Bragging rights are yours, naturally. We shall… we shall try to stay out of your way, henceforth.”
“What?” Flawless gave the unicorn a quizzical look.
“You win,” Pearl’s voice very nearly cracked as she said this, “You’ve proven you are… better than us. We shall not contest it. You… you played very well today.”
The crystal pony’s face scrunched up at this, and she seemed to think for a moment before responding. “I… I guess. But you three are at least second best. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“But…” Ann frowned, “we lost.”
Flawless scoffed. “You lost to me, which was never in doubt. I’m awesome! I mean…” she flinched at her own words, “… I mean, you weren’t bad. In fact… this was a lot of fun.”
She looked back towards Pearl, “Would… would you guys be up to do this again sometime? Buckball, I mean. Not…” she waved her hoof about at the stadium.
Cheese grinned stupidly, his eyes flashing back and forth between Ann and Pearl. A low squee threatened to escape his lips as he beamed.
Ann looked to Pearl, waiting to hear what she said.
Pearl took several long, long seconds to consider her response.
“Would… would that mean we were friends?”
“No!” Flawless almost snarled… then kicked at the ground with one hoof, “I mean… I guess it wouldn’t be too bad. You guys are really good and… I don’t get to play enough around here. So, if it really matters…”
She paused as a leathery wing fell over her withers. Flawless half-turned, and nearly flinched away as she came nearly eye-to-eye with those… eyes.
“I can live with that,” Ann said, a soft smile on her face, “As long as Peawl can.”
Cheese’s mane began to inflate with the squee he was holding back.
Pearl stared at Ann for only a moment. Then, she huffed in a very dignified manner, and said, “Of course I can. So long as you, Flawless,” she pointed with one hoof, her eyes flashing in challenge, “aren’t too upset next time when we kick your flank!”
“Oh really!?” Flawless’s predatory grin caused even Beauregard to take a step back. Her eyes flashed in answer, “Then I guess we are friends!”
“I guess we are!”
“Good, beating friends at Buckball is so much more fun!”
“I concur!”
Cheese’s squee, had anycreature noticed it, would have been one for the ages. But, just as the colt was nearing the end of his ability to hold himself back, a curious thing happened. Light, brilliant and white, filled the center of the field.
Ann blinked and looked away. The light wasn’t blinding, per say… but there was something wrong with it, to her eyes. All throughout the game, she’d been looking at a complex web of chaos and randomness, something beautiful. Now… now the light that bloomed around her was something different.
It had the stench of order upon it… Destiny.
But within moments, it was gone. As if it had never been.
Dib shook the light from his eyes first. “Well… that was weird.”
“Y-yeah,” said Beauregard, sounding a little shook-up, “It was almost like… FLAWLESS!!!”
“What!?” her ears perked straight up, and a touch of panic settled into her voice.
Dib saw it as well. “Your flank!”
Flawless scowled, “Why are you two looking at my…?” Her voice caught in her throat. The crystal pony’s eyes widened even as her irises shrank to near-dots.
Her flank was blank no more. Instead of a featureless green, Flawless now bore the image of a Buckball and two gemstones engulfed in streaking flames like comets in flight.
“I… I got my…” her whole face contorted as a smile threatened to completely overtake her. But before she could say anything more, another voice came from behind.
“Hey Pearl!” Cheese gasped, “You too!”
By now, everycreature was staring, and the approaching parents, friends, and Miss Silver Spoon quickly joined in the impromptu display of gob-smacked faces.
Pearl’s face was identical to Flawless’s. For on her flank was now the image of a Buckball wrapped up in the stem of a red rose.
The two fillies looked at their flanks, then one another. And with glistening, gleaming eyes and beaming faces they cried out together: “WE GOT OUR CUTIE MARKS!!!”
Instantly, the sound of cannons roared over the arena, and a rain of pink confetti filled the air. Balloons, secreted under every seat, began to fly out over the crowd. A banquet table, freshly furnished with cupcakes, muffins, and no small amount of ballpark fare hurtled out from the Princess’s podium to land just next to the doubly-startled colts and fillies, and the grand scoreboard dropped its display to reveal a new sign, which read:
Congratulations! Happy Cute-ceañera for Flawless Gem and Pearl Rose!
Cheese could only shake his head. “She overdid it again…”
The party planner pony herself drifted down to the field, suspended by a bright pink umbrella held in her tail. As she landed, she stuck it back into her mane, smiled, and approached the still-shocked fillies.
“Nah! I hardly had to dip into my personal supply to get this all set up! Although, the fireworks haven’t gone off yet, so… oops.”
Pinkie winced as she looked up. High above the stadium, the Discord balloon drifted by, flaming rocket-tails blasting out of its sides as it listed more and more towards and out-and-out nose dive.
Scootaloo’s voice came out over the speakers again, “Ladies and Gentlecolts, it was an honor serving with you.”
But, just as the first strands of the violin-quartet piece, Nearer Celestia To Thee, began to play, Discord sighed and snapped the whole affair away, leaving Tree Hugger and Scootaloo standing at his side, nary a balloon to be seen in the skies.
“Okay,” Tree Hugger took a breath, “Like, that was a bit too exciting for me.”
Scootaloo rolled her eyes at this, and then held out a hoof towards Discord. “Thanks, Honorary Crusader! That was a lot of fun.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he waved her down, hiding a smirk, “Don’t mention it. Really, don’t mention it.”
“Pearl Rose.” The voice of her Papa caused the princess to spin in place and throw out a little salute not unlike the ones the guards would give.
“Yes, Papa?” she looked up at the immaculate white stallion as he approached, alongside the entirety of the Council of Friendship not already present on the field.
Blueblood sniffed. “I see you have a Cutie Mark. A… Buckball… Cutie Mark.”
She winced at the way he said ‘Buckball’, like it was a muddy patch in the road, or a servant with a crooked collar, or a salad with one too few tomatoes in it, or the sun when it just so happens to be in a position to irritate his eyes…
Pearl Rose was suddenly struck with the sensation that she should, perhaps, question her Papa’s stance on things once in a while…
“Yes, Papa… are…?” she gulped, “Are you upset?”
Blueblood’s mustache and beard twitched noticeably. “Upset?” he closed his eyes, sighed, and said, “Terribly so.”
Well… that was not ideal, Pearl thought. But she was still a Blueblood. She kept her mouth closed, and tried to keep her breathing under control. Couldn’t let Papa see her cry. Not here, and not now…
“Had I known beforehoof,” the Prince’s horn suddenly glowed with magical light, and Pearl could feel herself being lifted up into the air, “I would have gotten you some real trainers and equipment.”
Blueblood pulled Pearl to him, and wrapped his forelegs around her in a close hug. She responded in kind, eyes glistening with starlight, and a smile on her face, at least when she wasn’t kissing her Papa on his nose.
Amongst the creatures who stared at the display with a warm feeling filling their hearts, Flawless had only a moment before she felt two pairs of forelegs wrap around her barrel. She looked up at both of her parents, who beamed down upon her with as bright and shining smiles as she’d ever seen from them.
“We’re so proud of you, kid,” Prussian nuzzled her braided mane, a single tear sliding down his face.
Facet rubbed her cheek against Flawless’s, a shared smile between mother and daughter as she said, “My little girl’s growing up! Now… how do you feel about humidity?”
Flawless frowned, a clear ‘What?’ on her lips before another voice interrupted her.
“I told you both before,” Twilight sighed, “I was never going to banish anypony just because their child didn’t get along with one of my friend’s children! Why does everycreature think I’m a monster!?”
“Ponies are naturally skittish by nature and have wildly active imaginations so they tend to form conspiracy theories and horror stories prompted by the least of their anxieties?”
Everyone in the field, minus Pinkie, turned to stare in wonder at Little Cheese.
“Ahem,” Discord coughed just loud enough to grab the little colt’s attention, then with two talons gave him a universal ‘I’m watching you’ signal by pointing at his glaring eyes.
“Oh,” Cheese blushed, “And Mom likes telling scary stories to foals about you.”
“PINKIE!?”
“What?” the pony in question frowned, “You can’t blame me! What about that time you became evil?”
The Princess shook her head, “WHAT!? Pinkie, when did I ever ‘become evil’?”
“That time you mind-controlled us!” Pinkie waved her hoof about, now annoyed at having to explain herself, “Or that time you stole our Cutie Marks!”
“… Pinkie? That was Starlight Glimmer.”
Pinkie paused, a perplexed expression puzzling her features as she pondered her previous position.
“Oh… sorry,” she blushed and grinned sheepishly, “I mixed you two up a lot before you got your growth spurt. Sorry!”
Twilight stared. And stared. And then, she sighed, shook her head, and simply whispered, “It’s Pinkie, it’s Pinkie, don’t think about it,” to herself.
Within minutes, the Cute-ceañera was in full swing. The crowds had given a small cheer or two at the occasion, but most simply wished to get on their way and head back out to finish their interrupted schedules. Princess Twilight had to teleport back to Canterlot, apologizing for missing the fun, but explained that there was a war or two to avoid. She took Blueblood and Pinkie with her, they being the heads of the Foreign Office.
Pearl and Flawless were the toast of the town, it had to be said. Their friends gathered around to congratulate them, and their families and neighbors celebrated the momentous occasion as only ponies could; muffins, cake, confetti, and mariachi aplenty.
Only Ann stood alone, off to one side of the party, seemingly content to watch. She watched her Dad talking with Flawless’s folks about importing edible gems, or really talking at them while they tried to understand what was going on, exactly. She watched her Grampa regale Shady, Goldie, and Moon with stories from when he ruled the world. She watched Cheese and Luna draw mustaches onto Aunt Tia’s face while Silver Spoon chatted with Applejack and Rainbow about… something that involved no small amount of shouting and pointing back at Discord.
And she watched Flawless and Pearl talking animatedly with each other over Buckball strategies, appointments for practice they could run together, and even other things less consequential such as birthdays, favorite treats, and preferred music.
All of this was fine, of course. Pearl was still her friend, naturally. Nothing would change that… right?
Ann found herself staring back at her flank. A simple, yellow field.
As she stood there, contemplating… she heard her mother’s hoofsteps approach.
“Ann? Is everything alright?” the tender concern in Fluttershy’s voice danced along Ann’s skin, as though she’d reached out her wings for a hug already.
“Yeah,” Ann said slowly, “Evewything’s fine. Just… thinking.”
Fluttershy’s eyes widened almost imperceptibly… and then lit up with the soft smile on her lips.
“Are you worried about getting your Cutie Mark?”
Ann’s wings ruffled. “…’little,” she muttered.
“Hm,” her mother nodded, “I understand.”
“Do you?” Ann sighed, “Did you evew wowwy you wewen’t a weal pony?”
Fluttershy flinched, “Uh… maybe we should talk with your father about that lisp…”
“I’m sewious!” Ann stamped a hoof.
“I know you are,” Fluttershy placated, reaching out a wing to the filly. Ann didn’t need much prompting, letting her mother pull her close.
Fluttershy continued, “You don’t quite know what you’re supposed to do. You feel like you have a place to be, but you don’t know where it is, or if you’re already there. Right?”
Ann nodded, but said nothing, looking up into her mother’s eyes questioningly.
“We all feel that,” she continued, “It’s natural. But you can’t force Cutie Marks. They’re… oh, how did Twilight say it?”
Fluttershy tapped her chin a few times in thought, then smiled and said, “It’s destiny. It will happen in its own time.”
“Bleaugh,” Ann stuck out her tongue, which lifted up a wooden ‘No Thank You’ sign, “Destiny is dumb.”
Her mother just chuckled at the outburst, but covered her mouth with a hoof all the same, “Oh, even Dis… your father doesn’t hate destiny anymore.”
“Weally?”
Fluttershy nodded, “Of course! He told me once that there’s always a little Chaos in things, even ones as orderly as destiny. The… infinite variables, I think he calls it?”
“Mom!” Ann tapped her hooves excitedly, “I saw those! I could see the vawiables!”
A pop, and a brief flash of light just above them, announced Discord’s return to his most favorite ponies in the world.
“Really!?” he leaned down from his perch in the air and pressed his face deep into Ann’s pink and black mane, “You could see Chaos!?”
Ann giggled, “Dad, that tickles!”
The Draconequus slipped out of her ear like a snake, crowing, “Oh! Happy day! Happy fraptious day! Caloo callay!”
Hearing that, Fluttershy frowned, “W-what?”
“It’s a reference,” said Discord, without prompting appearing behind her dressed in a tall tophat with a playing card sticking out of the brim, “I trust I’m still allowed to do those?”
“Is that one of those fourth wall things?” she raised a curious brow.
He sighed, “Yes, dear. Yes, it was. But enough about walls, fourth or otherwise.”
With a quick snap of his fingers, party hats popped into existence atop both Ann and Fluttershy’s heads. A plate of black cake also popped into being just in front of Ann’s face, hovering just close enough for the cake, in a Prench accent, to politely offer Ann a bite.
“Mmmm,” she hummed with delight, “Sauerkraut and burning rubber! Thanks Dad!”
Discord chuckled, then pointed back towards the others. “If you want to thank the chef, I understand Cheese caused irreparable harm to an oven to get that one just right for you.”
She nuzzled her mother one more time, and then with the plate of ‘cake’ held firmly in her wing, Ann trotted back to her friends, letting the whole issue of Cutie Marks and winning and everything else fade away until all she thought about was the beautiful chaos all around her, and the friends that made up so much of it.
Long into the night, work at Canterlot Palace was still going on. So many members of the high court and the Princess’s inner circle had vanished around lunchtime that the whole government had simply ground to a halt. But once that had been sorted out… everypony realized how bad a government shutdown could screw with their work schedules.
Crow Bar, a black and white pimento earth pony, and his gold-maned unicorn partner Iron Knee worked alongside a hoof-full of servants in a massive storage facility located deep in the crystal-vaulted caverns beneath the palace to finish off the day’s duties before bedtime. They had orders to relocate some of the materials down here, and it had already been a long, rough day.
“Seriously,” said Bar through gritted teeth as he pried away at wooden crate near twice his height on hind-legs with his signature, namesake tool, “If yer gonna have a surprise Buckball game, and ya gotta kidnap half of Canterlot to attend, why not just schedule it!?”
Knee rolled her eyes. “It’s like this Discord fella never met the Princess!”
The crate’s side finally came loose, Bar quickly dropping his instrument to lower it slowly to the ground with his head, “I mean… who does he think he is?”
“Pfft,” Knee shrugged, “Some chimera of some sort. I heard he used to be a criminal or something.”
“Huh, weird. Then again…” Bar dropped the crate-side and began checking on the contents, “I guess Friendship and all that…”
Knee nodded, “Hm, yeah. Good point.” She tossed a look over her shoulder, making sure nopony was listening in.
“Uh… hey, Bar? You, uh… you feelin like grabbing some cider after work or… SWEET SUN AND MOON WHAT IS THAT!?!”
The startled unicorn fell flat on her haunches, eyes locked to the snarling beast that stood in front of her. Bar quickly rounded the monster, giving his friend and coworker a concerned look that slowly morphed into a trolling grin.
“Knee? Did… did the statue scare you?”
“I wasn’t scared… I was just… startled…”
“Which is another word for being…”
Iron Knee was back up, an unamused expression settled onto her features. An expression that could curdle milk at a glance, and one that Bar had learned to walk away from slowly. Which he did now, though not without an idiotic grin on his face.
I can’t believe I like this idiot, she thought.
“What even is this?” she looked over the monstrous-looking art piece… and shivered.
Bar looked over the clipboard dangling from his neck. “Lemme see… The Elements of Disharmony… huh. I think I heard of this one.”
Knee’s eyes widened in legitimate shock. “You know something about art?”
“I am a multifac-ee-ted individual,” Bar grinned. “And… art is pushing it. It’s no Chippcutter, that’s for shure.”
The two ponies looked over the whole sculpture. A cringing centaur, a frightened foal, and a snarling changeling queen caught in a leaping charge. From the stamp on the top of the box, it’d been down here a while, and had spent time in the Starlight Vault.
Huh, Knee tilted her head in thought, wasn’t that the new Restricted wing in the Palace Library?
“And…” Iron Knee frowned, “This thing is supposed to go to the Royal Canterlot Statue Garden?”
Crow Bar shrugged, “Can’t account fer tastes. But we got orders,” he proferred a signed document from his clipboard.
Well, it looked official. Had the Royal Seal, signature, and everything. The checkmark looked a little off… but then, nopony could really question Princess Twilight. It wasn’t like she even could be distracted, right?
“I guess the Princess thought this thing would be a good reminder of what Harmony protects us from.”
“Alright, alright,” Knee rolled her eyes, “Help me heave it out of here and we can go on our date… I mean… get drinks!”
No! Too close! Abort! Abort!
Bar watched the mare slap her head into a nearby crystal with a hard whap. She grumbled a bit, but didn’t look like she was gonna actually help him any time soon, so he rolled his own eyes and started for the hideous statue.
I can’t believe I like this gal.
This wasn't supposed to be so long. How did I accidentally write this much? What happened to me? Where did I go wrong!? 
Ah well. I doubt anything bad will happen to Ann from here on in. Yup. Smooth sailing from here on in. What could possibly go wrong...? It's not like Twilight was distracted while signing those forms earlier, right?
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Well, there were certainly a lot of character moments in this one. I'm not even sure where to go! You packed a lot in there for sure.
You say Cadence when you mean Celestia.
Hah, an Obi-Wan reference.
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No. She did mean Cadance. Everyone knows who the Love Princess is.
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Oh........ okay, I guess.
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The joke is, Wind Sprint was a filly back when Twilight took over and Celestia retired, and I’ve always felt like ponies were very forgetful in the show, so it seems natural she’d think this was a Cadance cosplay. Though in her case, she’s probably just trolling.
This chapter was so GREAT! I can’t believe how many threads were wrapped up and started at once. I’m loving all of these characters and I can’t wait to see what they do next!
Also, think there can be a little world building between this and Trixie’s story? Maybe a minor role for Celeste or perhaps someone is reading the Daring Do Tambelon book? Something like that?
The Metal is strong with this one
Well what ELSE are you gonna name a rainbow-maned member of the apple family?
Just like Snails said "Think about nothing at all"
Her son must be so proud of her right now :p
Man, ain't that the truth
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That is a neat idea! I'll have a think about that next time I'm working on this story. But... Trixie needs some love too.
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It’s like.... you have a UNIVERSE here. Use it. Maybe RD and AJ’s parenting exploits can be it’s own solo story, I don’t know! There’s so many ideas!
Ugh, it’s not easy finding time to give such a meaty chapter the attention it deserves....
Well, that ended about as well as it could have!
Guess we have a new Rainbow Dash on our hooves.
So, Twilight wouldn’t have approved of putting the Legion of Doom out in the garden if she hadn’t been caught up in the game? The real question is, how did that request even get submitted? I suppose the bureaucracy just wanted to clear some indoor space and nopony but Twilight would have recognized it for what it was?
I like these guys, they
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They indeed. They indeed.
Letting bananas vote, that's bananas!
Found this story and am racing my way through it. I haven't seen any next-gen stories in a while, and its great to read one that incorporates the entire show.
Technically... Twilight kind of did mind-control them in Lesson Zero. And she also took their cutie marks in Magical Mystery Cure. So props to Pinkie!
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i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/000/909/991/48c.jpg
XD She's probably going to feel bad because if they do get released it will also be her fault. You did say those villains would come back so yeah.
Heh, what you did.
Seriously, I hate sports, all sports, but enjoyed this greatly.
I thought she punched Celestia
You'll be so busy screaming the lyrics that you'll forget about your anger, of course!
....just me?