Blunder
This Morning
“I hate you!” Cozy Glow screamed as she rushed past the new maid. “I hate you, I hate you, I HATE YOU! I HOPE YOU DIE!”
Cozy barely even saw the maid, whatever her name was. She was still standing and hadn’t dropped dead, so it didn’t matter. What mattered was what she had done.
Daddy’s chess set sat upon a small table in his study. Not on the floor. Its pieces were all neatly organized into their starting positions, instead of exactly where they were supposed to be. The game was gone. The game she’d protected and waited three years to finish was gone.
Just like…
Cozy’s vision was blurred from tears and red from rage. She pulled the chess board down onto the floor, scattering the pieces as she did. Not that it mattered since they weren’t right.
“M-Miss Cozy,” somepony said as Cozy gathered up the pieces and started looking for the right ones. The maid came into view, it must have been her. “Miss Cozy, I’m sorry, I don’t know how – ”
“SHUT UP!” Cozy screamed. Her hooves trembled. She found the white king and set it down. It was in e1. She knew it was in e1. And one of the black rooks was in e3. She’d never forget that, not for a second. It had been at the front of her mind for years.
The maid sat down in front of Cozy. “Miss Cozy, I didn’t – ”
“I SAID SHUT UP!” Cozy tuned out any further platitudes. She held both white rooks in her hooves. Where had they been…one was at a1, it had never moved, but the other one…
“What’s all the ruckus?” Uncle Fork’s voice called.
Black bishop at…at b5, right? It had been her queen’s bishop, hadn’t it been?
“I don’t – I don’t know, Mister Fork,” the maid said. “I came in and – ”
Cozy put the bishop down and immediately knew it was wrong. She moved it to c5 and knew that was worse.
“Oh, no,” Uncle Fork interrupted. “Oh no, Cozy – your game…”
She’d lost her other bishop, right?
Cozy whirled on Uncle Fork and the maid. “FIRE HER!” Cozy screamed. “She ruined the game! SHE RUINED IT! FIRE HER!”
The maid had tears of her own in her eyes. Good. Uncle Fork had a serious expression on his own face as he looked her up and down. “I’m sorry, Indigo,” he said…
Cozy had already turned away, looking back to the board. White knight…d2? Or still back at a1? The other white knight had been eliminated, right?
Black pawns, she’d barely moved her pawns, except the ones at d7 and e7, those were gone. She was…
Wait, the black king. Where had the black king been? Her own king? Why couldn’t she remember?!
Cozy let out a long, primal scream as she swept her hooves across the board, scattering pieces everywhere. Her wings were spread wide. Her whole body was shaking. Nightmare Moon hadn’t taken the game. Discord hadn’t taken the game. The Plundervines had never even come close. The last game she played with Daddy, it was…
…it was…
…gone…
She felt a wing close around her. She screamed again, turning and bucking and hitting Uncle Fork in the ribs. He let out a gasp of air as he fell away. The maid was no longer in the room.
“She ruined it!” Cozy screamed, falling to her stomach and pounding her hooves in the ground. “She ruined EVERYTHING!”
“Cozy – ”
“N-now…now if – when, WHEN Daddy gets back, he’s…he’s not gonna be able to play…”
“Cozy…”
“He’s gonna be so mad, he’s been looking forward to finishing the game for years and years and years…”
“Cozy! Cozy, it’s alright! I have the game right here!”
Cozy froze. She rubbed her eyes, wiping away tears, looking to Uncle Fork. He’d risen up, and was holding up a neatly folded sheet of paper. As Cozy watched, he unfolded it, revealing its contents:
Black: Rook e3 and a8, King g1, Knight c6, Bishop a5, Pawns a7, b7, c7, f7, g7, h7
White: Rook a1 and h1, King e1, Knight d2, Bishop d5, Pawns a2, b2, c3, f4, g2, h3
Cozy let out a sound somewhere between a cry and a shout. The next thing she knew, she had snatched the paper from Uncle Fork’s hooves and gone back to the game board, laying out the pieces. Uncle Fork was next to her, and helped her lay everything out.
And it was right. Cozy knew, knew down to her very soul, that it was right. Everything was exactly where it was supposed to be, her Daddy’s game had been restored…
“I had a feeling this might happens someday,” Uncle Fork said, holding up the paper, “so I’ve been holding on to this, just in case. I know how much – ”
Cozy didn’t let him finish. She threw herself forward, wrapping her forelegs around him as she hugged him as tight as she could. “Thank you!” She cried. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, Uncle Fork!”
He chuckled, and rubbed a hoof atop her mane. It kind of messed up her curls and she hated when her curls were messed up…but she didn’t feel any hate towards Uncle Fork right now. He was her best uncle in the whole world. Also her only uncle, but that didn’t matter. If Cozy had a million uncles, Uncle Fork would still be the best.
“Now then,” Uncle Fork said, pushing Cozy away from him a little. He put the piece of paper into her hooves. “Why don’t you hold onto that?”
“Uh-huh!” Cozy agreed, clutching the piece of paper tightly to her chest. She was going to make so many copies. Spread them all over the house, at least one in every room, plus she’d have some at school, and at her Daddy’s businesses, and…
“You look like you could use some cheering up,” Uncle Fork continued. “How about we go out for ice cream?”
Cozy’s wings flared at that. “Yes please!”
“Alright then. Go and get ready, dry your eyes, and then we’ll go out.”
Cozy nodded, putting the paper into her mouth and galloping off. She skipped the stairs entirely, wings beating steadily as she went up to her room and its bathroom, rushing inside. Uncle Fork hadn’t been lying, Cozy saw when she saw herself in the mirror. Her eyes were rimmed with red, and her feathers were all out of place. Her coat, too, her coat was all mussed up from when she’d thrown herself on the floor. She set about cleaning herself up immediately, not wanting to call a maid.
Once finished, she looked to the piece of paper, holding it out at forelegs’ length. Uncle Fork had really come through today. Sure, he just wanted Daddy’s money and Cozy was the best way to get it…but could Cozy really blame him? And even if it was true, that didn’t mean that Uncle Fork didn’t still care about her. He’d let her keep believing in the tooth flutter pony, after all.
And he’d made sure to save a piece of paper with her’s and Daddy’s game on it. Who knew how many years he’d been saving this?
Well…not very many. The paper was still crisp and unblemished. It folded neatly, like it had only ever been folded once or twice before.
Cozy frowned.
And it was a good thing he’d had it right on him, instead of in a desk or drawer or something. He carried it on him at all times, it seemed, just in case…
…and yet, it was in perfect condition. Like he’d only just made it.
Cozy’s head tilted to the side.
Perfectly folded paper. Which he’d just happened to have on him. The first time, the only time, anypony had ever put away the chess game when they weren’t supposed to. All of Cozy’s butlers and maids knew that they weren’t supposed to do that. They were all told how important the game was to her.
And Uncle Fork had just so happened to have the paper on him.
Cozy pulled the paper close to her snout, and breathed in.
It even still smelled new.
“Cozy?” Uncle Fork asked. He’d come into her room, and was looking into the bathroom. “Cozy? Are you ready to go?”
Cozy looked at Uncle Fork. And she put on her sweetest smile. The one she’d been practicing for ages. The one that got her friends and made everypony around her just tell her how she was cute as a button and want to do anything for her.
“Yup!” She said. “I sure am, Uncle Fork!”
They went out for ice cream. Cozy got a big sundae with cherries and chocolate fudge and cookie crumbs and whipped cream. Then they went to the park, where Cozy was going to play some of the old ponies who came to the park to play chess. She knew them all really well, it was one of her favorite things to do, and they often had sweets for her too. So she got a snack and she got to play her favorite game. Some of the old ponies were even really good and sometimes they beat her. But they always gave her extra candy when that happened so it wasn’t so bad.
They were definitely going to beat her a bunch today, because Cozy’s mind would be elsewhere. She was planning.
Her Uncle Fork had crossed a line. It was one thing to want all of Daddy’s money because he was too lazy and stupid to make his own. That was normal, it was normal to want what you didn’t have.
It was one thing to be all nice and stuff to Cozy and spoil her just because Cozy would get all of Daddy’s money if he didn’t come back by the time Cozy was an adult. That was just a reasonable way to get Cozy to share Daddy’s money. It was give and take. A transaction. It was fine.
But Uncle Fork had tried to worm his way into Cozy’s heart. He had taken something away from Cozy, something more important than anything, but covered it up. Then he gave it back to her and expected her to not figure it out. Like she was stupid. Like she was a child. Like she was a puppet dancing on his strings.
He was going to pay. Cozy was going to make Uncle Fork pay, was going to do to him the same thing that he had done to her. She was already planning how. It would take a long time to come to fruition, but when it did…
And then Discord and Tirek arrived in Fillydelphia.
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I want that bastard to suffer. I am not joking on this. I know it won't happen, but by god I want him in pain before the end of this.
Also, you made me feel a smidgen of pity for Cozy Glow. Impressive, most impressive. [/Vader]
Huh, I thought Fork was genuenly getting better, but it seems he wasn't unless the maid made a genuine mistake and he just never had to get the paper before. Either way, Cozy's paranoia of him does seem justified.
I'm actually puzzled about that last question. With how much Cozy plays chess and how much she's obsessing over that game, shouldn't she have it burned permanently into memory?
He might never realize it, but getting drained by Tirek was the luckiest break to ever happen to him.
Oh wow. That is ... yeah.
That explains so much.
It’s a shame Cozy never considered the idea that the reference sheet can just be written recently due to say, a new employee like the one that just happened to be responsible for this mess.
For all of her smarts, she herself never wrote a reference sheet on her own.
The tragedy was that her uncle never betrayed her at all. I checked the first chapter and all of the chess positions were correct.
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Not strictly betrayal, but something arguably worse. Making himself look like the savior, while having ordered the attack he stopped.
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Her thought process is actually that he copied the correct positions that morning, then told the maid to clean it up, to incite the very situation that transpired.
Not saying you're wrong, just that, she could be right.
Quite the sense of doom hanging over this one, since we know how quickly it's going to go sour...
I now wonder if she's right.
Beware a true sociopath. Something that seems like a little thing to you can be a great mountain to them, and they shall react with the weight of that mountain.
Still a jerk move by Fork.
You would think Cozy Glow is smart enough to write the game on paper by herself.
10882195
She is still a kid, with the experiences and maturity of a kid even if with a much higher intelligence. Some things don’t occur to her simply because she hasn’t ever considered it because it’s never happened to her before.
Topping the list of Things I Never Thought I'd Say About Cozy Glow: This poor kid. D: Monsters aren't born, they're made.
I love how she completely understands her uncle's motives, too.
This story is amazing, loving it.