The Social Rejects Squad: Loose Ends

by Betty_Starlight

Chapter 2-5: 8-Ball

“Oh dear! I never completed the scene, did I?” Discord says before snapping the talons of his eagle claw together.

Suddenly, Cozy notices a black bandanna tied behind her neck and she also sees Chrysalis to her right now has a clear green plastic visor on her head, and a necklace with a pool salt hanging pendulum.

Cozy looks to Discord, “What are you doing?”

Discord raises his left eyebrow, “What do you mean Cozy? You two must defeat me in a game of billiards. If you win, I’ll leave you alone. But if I win, you’ll both be cast into the nameless void!”

“Okay golly dammit! No! Discord, stop!” Cozy says to the draconequus while stamping her left forehoof and Chrysalis stares at her wide-eyed. “I never agreed to this! In fact, we don’t even want you around!” she finishes before fluttering her wings.

Discord smiles and bends down to the little pegasus as he points with his lion paw, “You realize Cozy Glow, that I never asked you. I’m still giving you a choice however!” He says while flipping his lion paw in the air, “You can walk out that door right now and still be at my mercy. Or, you and the lovely Queen Chrysalis here can work together, as friends, to defeat me!” He levels his lion paw, “That’s my offer Cozy! What say you?”

Cozy smiles as her eyes widen with a thought, “Give me a minute to discuss this in the back with my associate please!” She looks to Chrysalis, “Chrysalis! Will you please take a step back and talk with me?”

Chrysalis looks over at Cozy with a confused look in her green eyes, “Uh, okay sure Cozy!”

Cozy sighs and starts trotting towards the back of the room, leaving a smiling Discord there. Cozy stops and turns back to face Chrysalis before whispering, “Okay, this is obviously a ploy to get us to become friends. He intends to have us working together in order to defeat him, thus learning the Magic of Friendship or whatever!”

Chrysalis smirks down at the filly, “Well, that much is obvious! The question is, what do we do now?”

Cozy stares beyond Chrysalis to see Discord there, still in his green and pink jersey and now looking at the wrist of his lion paw at the gold watch there before smiling back at the filly. Cozy narrows her eyes as she didn’t see that watch before and says, “I say, we play his game!”

“Are you insane, Cozy?”

Cozy looks back to the changeling, “Look Chrysalis! Follow my logic. Now, if we’re to believe that reformation is his ultimate aim here, then why not go ahead with his plan? You do wish to be reformed, don’t you?” Cozy says before staring into her green eyes deeply with cold calculating precision.

Chrysalis narrows her eyes at the pegasus and frowns, “Are you making me choose, here and now?”

Cozy smiles mischievously, “Call it a trial run if you like Chrysalis, but yeah, I think I am? Look! I meant what I said back there, okay?” Cozy looks seriously into her eyes, “I want to be your friend…” She tilts her head slightly to the left as she widens her eyes, “But you know, you’re gonna have to be my friend here too?”

Chrysalis scrunches her mouth and narrows her eyes, “You wish to reform me through friendship?”

Cozy corrects her neck, squints her right eye, and narrows her mouth, “You act like you’ve never had a friend before?”

Chrysalis starts and moves her neck back, “Well, I uh, that is to say…”

Cozy’s eyes widen, “Golly Chrysalis! You’ve lived for like, a really long time! And you mean to tell me during all that time, you never had a friend?” Cozy says before cutely tilting her head to the right while continuing to look deep into Chrysalis’s eyes with her own, wide-eyed auburn stare and smiling brightly, ear-to-ear.

Chrysalis grimaces and looks down harshly at the pegasus , “Baa! What is the point of this you treacherous brat?”

Cozy corrects her neck again and says firmly, “My point is, if we work together and 'play his game', then he’ll go away, and we can continue doing whatever it was that we were doing earlier!”

Chrysalis frowns, “Okay, I’ll agree to work with you, at least until that point!”

“Good!” Cozy scrunches her mouth and narrows her eyes undecidedly, “Now, should we break or have him do so?”

“I don’t think it really matters?” Chrysalis says, right before both pegasus and changeling here the balls clacking together.

They look behind them to see Discord, bent over the pool table while his legs float ominously a foot over the ground and his lion paw holds the end of a pool cue while his eagle talon guides it. He says, “I sunk the green four ball and so I’m solids!” before looking down his cue to see the green 4 ball. He shoots and the cue ball clacks against it, causing it to fall into the side pocket on his right. Discord smiles while floating over to the right side of the table with his pool cue. Cozy suddenly notices the stick has a peculiar bluish black color. He leans down as Cozy sees the slightly bluer midnight black front of the cue about 18 inches back from the front nub, that contrasts with the dark black of the rest of the pole.

Cozy gulps as Discord shoots the cue ball into the solid blue 5 ball to go into the same pocket as the first. He then moves to the other side and shoots the cue ball towards the solid red 3, when it connects, and the red ball goes just to the left of the hole, and stops abruptly.

Discord stares at the pony and changeling on his left from that side of the table, “Oh poo! I got two! Your turn!”

Chrysalis smirks and says, “I shall go first!” before haughtily and defiantly trotting toward the left side of the room where the pool cues are racked neatly on vertical peg holders. She turns her head to the right to bite down on one before trotting back to the table.

She collects the pool cue in her forehooves after leaning over the table and carefully positions herself. She aims down the cue and strikes the cue ball, causing it to go forward with unexpected velocity and strike the red striped 15 ball near the left far corner at an angle and knock it into the hole.

She then puts the cue back in her mouth and trots over to the other side of the table where she once again, positions herself over the table, with the back of the cue on her right forehoof while her left guides it. She aims down the cue and strikes the cue ball, causing it to fly forward at the blue striped 11 ball, striking it to the left of center and causing it to fly at an angle into the other side pocket. She smiles at Discord and says, “I believe that means, we’re tied, yes?”

Discord frowns at her, “Oh sure! Let’s just get this over with!”

Chrysalis sees the cue ball a few inches to her left and scootches her body across the table to get there before looking around and carefully aiming down her cue. She strikes the cue ball once more and it flies at the purple striped 12 ball near the other corner pocket and hits it, slightly to the left of center once more, causing it to fly towards the hole on the right. She frowns and says, “Okay, I missed that shot!”

Just then, the door in the back of the room opens and the filly and changeling witness a second draconequus of similar configuration to Discord floating through the door as he says in Discord’s familiar sly voice, “Sorry, I was tied up! Is this the reformation pool game?”

Cozy sees he’s wearing shades over his eyes, a red beanie, and a big gold chain necklace with a white A-shirt over his diverse frame. He floats over to the cue rack, grabs a cue of his own that suddenly turns a black color with a shimmering magic that slides from the tip to the back. He floats over to the right side of the table and lines up his shot while looking over his shades with his mismatched yellow and red eyes and holding the cue stick back with his lion paw.

He strikes the cue ball and sends it screaming towards the solid green 5 ball, quickly striking it, and sending it into the side pocket. He then floats off towards the end of the table at his left and the cue ball as he lines up another shot while holding the stick with his lion paw once more. He hits the cue ball again, causing it to fly with velocity towards the solid orange 3 ball and strikes it, causing it to fly towards the corner pocket's left side and hit the median there, bouncing back and hitting the blue striped 19 ball in the area to knock it slightly further from the hole and the cue ball flies in the back to Discord’s right.

Cozy looks up and says, “My turn?” before sighing and taking off to fly to the cue rack. She floats in front before seeing an unusually small cue on her right and snatching that with her forehooves. She then floats around the table, carefully assessing it before finally flying over to the left side where Discord was a moment ago and aiming down the sight of her cue, now perched on her left forehoof, at the cue ball.

She hits the cue ball, and it flies forward without quite as much velocity as the last few times, yet it strikes the pink striped 13 ball and sends it into the other corner pocket all the same. She says, “Golly!” before flittering over to the other side with her wings while keeping the pool cue in her forehooves. She once again aims down the sight of her cue while flapping her wings as she attempts to line up her shot and strikes the cue ball to send it flying towards the green striped 11 ball near the far side pocket. It strikes the 11 ball at an angle and causes it to fly just to the left of the hole. She looks up and says, “Well, I got one more point anyway!”

“Yes! Yes! Very good little Cozy!” the jersey Discord says while rolling his eyes and floating to the other side of the table, with the cue loaded into his lion paw once more. He moves his hat up with his eagle talon and aims down the cue with the larger pupil of his right eye as he lines up the shot and strikes the cue ball once more, to send it hurtling towards the solid yellow 9 ball near the other side pocket. It strikes the yellow ball, sending it flying to the hole, only to bounce back once it reaches it! Discord’s eyes widen as he says, “Okay, that’s not fair!”

Chrysalis smiles with her stick in her mouth as she trots to the other side and says through her teeth, “Of course it is Discord! That’s what happens when you use too much force in your shots!”

Cozy’s eyes widen as she looks to the big black changeling 10 feet to her left as she thinks.

Chrysalis leans over the table once more with her cue locked by her left forehoof as she aims down it to line up her shot. She hits the cue ball, and it careens into the nearby orange striped 14 ball at an angle, causing it to fly with just the right amount of velocity into the corner pocket! She smiles and says, “Okay, that’s four for us!” before putting the cue back in her mouth and trotting over to the left and repositioning herself on the table once more, with the cue loaded in her right forehoof while the left guides it. She aims to the cue ball and smiles before striking it, to send it into the red striped 19 ball, that goes near a the side pocket. She frowns and says, “Well, we’re still ahead of you!” She then puts the cue in her mouth, goes back to her hooves beside the table, and motions with her right forehoof to Cozy towards the back of the room before beginning to trot that way.

Cozy sees this signal and frowns before turning left and trotting behind Chrysalis towards the other end of the room.

Chrysalis turns, lowers her neck to gently put the cue down on the floor before raising her head to the filly and lightly whispering, “I’m better at curved shots than you!”

“Well golly gee Chrysalis! I barely ever played pool before!” An annoyed Cozy whispers back frantically.

Chrysalis frowns, “No, you didn’t let me finish twerp! (Cozy frowns) You seem to do okay in straight shots. You should do your level best to stick to those sorts of shots and let me take care of anything trickier!”

“Golly Chrysalis! You sound like you have some experience playing pool?”

“Cozy, I never told you or anybody else this, but I liked to sneak off into the pony pool halls from the west of Equestria where I’m from, when I was still a pupa. They never let me go outside, but tricking them was easy enough when you’re a shapeshifter and then it’s just a matter of traveling to the nearby town, where we regularly fed for love!”

Cozy frowns, “You know, that’s probably why Discord chose this game right?”

Chrysalis leans forward and frantically states, “No doubt! He must have some reason for picking a sport he knows I have some experience at. But why?”

Cozy frowns and says, “I don’t think it really matters? Okay Chrysalis! I’ll stick to your plan and try to shoot straight!” before smiling up at the changeling.

Chrysalis frowns, “Why are you smiling Cozy?”

“Because you’re my friend and I like spending time with you!”

“Ugh!” Chrysalis says before rolling her eyes and bending her neck back down to collect her cue with her mouth and then she turns to trot back to the table where the two Discords, one in a basketball jersey to the right in front of the table and the other in a wife-beater on the left behind the table awaiting her. She stops suddenly and turns back to the pegasus behind her. Cozy looks up at her and frowns. She leans down and puts down her cue again before raising her neck once more and taking a few steps back towards the pegasus, “Cozy… It occurs to me that I might not get another chance to say this…”

Cozy’s auburn eyes widen and mouth narrows once more as she timidly looks up at the changeling, “W-what do you mean Chrysalis?”

Chrysalis inhales sharply through her nose and examines this peculiar pink filly before her. She sees she has neatly arranged bluish white curls over a smiling freckled and dimpled face. So warm and inviting. She knew that once upon a time, this cuteness and gentleness was but a façade, but now she could tell it had substance. She lowly and calmly says, “Cozy Glow, you said you wished to be my friend… Is that true?”

Cozy starts and says with wide eyes as she leans forward slightly, “Well golly gee Chrysalis! Of course, I wanna be your friend!”

Chrysalis can’t help but crack a slight smile on the right side of her face as she then calmly whispers back, “Alright Cozy. I accept your friendship!”

Suddenly, streaks of white lightening begin to circle out of Chrysalis’s body as it levitates from the floor. Cozy darts to the back as Chrysalis’s eyes glow white with magical energy. Her body slowly becomes brighter and brighter as she stays suspended in the air in front of an aghast pegasus filly, when suddenly, she glows brighter than the sun, causing Cozy to close her eyes with her right forehoof in front of her face to shield it.

She lowers her hoof and witnesses a very different changeling, now slowly floating to the ground before her. Chrysalis now has a mauve head with a single curved horn about 10 inches in length jutting out of her forehead, but curved upward towards the ceiling. At the neck, her color changes to a more vibrant purple with slightly lighter purple hooves and clear pink insectoid wings at the side of her body.

Chrysalis looks down at the pegasus with her solid sky-blue eyes and smiles.

“Golly! What just happened?”

Chrysalis can only stammer out in wide-eyed shock, “I accepted your friendship into my heart Cozy! True friendship! And uh, I guess this is me now?”

“Wow Chrysalis!” Cozy says while staring back at Chrysalis with enormous brown eyes and a big smile on her face.

Chrysalis says, “Of course! But there is something I must do now!” Before turning around and bending down to pick up her cue and trotting back to the left side of the table as the basketball jersey Discord backs away to the back left to make room for her. She leans over the table with the pool cue in her forehooves once more and aims down the stick to fire the cue ball at the striped yellow 13 ball… Which promptly sinks into the side pocket… She then trots over to the other side and positions herself once more and smiles as she again, shoots the cue ball with her stick to sink the blue striped 15 ball into the other side pocket… She continues this process and sinks the mauve striped 16 ball before the purple striped 18 ball and even more!

Cozy can only stand there and watch in wide-eyed amazement at how well this changeling can suddenly play pool now that she’s reformed! She soon notices that all the striped balls are gone and only the 8-ball remains right in the center of the table. A difficult shot for sure, but not impossible. When Cozy then hears a familiar scream coming from outside the hall.

“AAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!!” said the voice before she heard a loud BAM noise coming from the door. SNAP! CRUNCH! BOOM! Went the wood outside on the door.

Cozy looks back at the door and yells, “Little Snack!”

She hears the faint sound of the voice from outside, “Cozy! I found you! And I’m getting you out of there! Hang on!”

“Little Snack! Stop trying to break down the door and listen to me!” Cozy screams at the door.

There's a brief pause for a few seconds before Little can be heard screaming, “Um, okay! What do you wanna say Cozy?”

“Listen! We need uh, five minutes! Just give me and Chrysalis, five minutes in here! She still needs to sink the 8-ball!”

Cozy here’s something unidentifiable from the outside before Little Snack’s familiar voice yells back, “Alright Cozy! Five minutes! Uh, how many seconds is that?”

“Oh golly!” Cozy whispers under her breath while her eyes close and she softly giggles to herself. She opens her eyes to the door again and yells, “Three hundred Little Snack! Five minutes is three hundred seconds! You need to count to three hundred before breaking down the door!”

“Um, okay Cozy! Count to three hundred, and then bust in there! Gotcha!”

Cozy then shakes her head before looking back to the table at Chrysalis, “Chrysalis! You got five minutes! Sink the 8-ball already!”

The Discord wearing the green and pink jersey with the grey ballcap shakes his head and says, “I don’t need to be here for this!” before snapping his eagle talon and disappearing in a puff of smoke.

The other Discord in the A-shirt with shades looks to the area his comrade once occupied before saying, “And neither do I!” and then snaps his lion paw and disappears himself.

Chrysalis smiles, and strikes the cue ball with her stick, sending it flying forth with much speed and striking the 8-ball. The 8-ball flies to the far corner pocket on the left, only to hit the edge just to the left of the hole and bounce to the other side before rolling back towards Chrysalis and stopping in the middle of the table! She sees this and looks at Cozy before both filly and changeling start to giggle uncontrollably!

Just then, Cozy and Chrysalis hear that same voice give out a mighty war yell, “AAAAAAHHHH!!!!!” before seeing the front door of the pool hall break open in three places down the center as an orange ball with green streaks at the edges, rolls inside and smacks right into the table with Cozy on the other side and (the new) Chrysalis on her left! Little Snack’s body is doubled over as her back is on the table with her long green tail skyward and her head on the ground with two pigtails flat on the floor. She quickly rolls back to her hooves on the right and corrects herself to look over at the new changeling on her right near the corner of the table and says, “Okay! I know that’s Cozy Glow on the other side of the table! Oh uh, you okay Cozy?” as she looks in the direction of the pegasus filly.

Cozy looks back and says, “Yeah, I’m fine Little Snack!”

“Okay, good!” Little Snack says before nodding. She turns her green eyes back towards the corner pocket while her pigtails sway the other way and looks up at the changeling before asking, “Uh, who are you?”

The changeling smiles and says, “Call me, Crystal Heart!”