Looks Like I'm Gonna Have To Start Trying

by marmalado

I Did Not Fight a Child, But a Child Won Anyway

After the initial punch, things had been pretty easy from there. By the time Oprah was done with the Queen, her face, chitlin backing, and at least three of her legs looked next to unrecognizable. She had given up when Oprah had offered to shake her hoof, but needed a physical prompt to get into Tube 2, which really meant curling her up into a ball and throwing her hard enough to make a small dent in the plastic backing while also activating the tube to squishinate her and send her back up.

Finally, Oprah had beaten up something. It had taken forever, but she had done it. Though beating up a bug wasn't exactly a story she would want to tell the rookies. Maybe if she fibbed and said it was a bug whose size was on par with an average Ginormouse.

The thoughts made her tired. Not having a juice box handy was starting to take a toll on her. Reaching behind her back to get another one had proven to be a fruitless endeavor, which she blamed on whatever weird magic Discord had. If she didn't get one soon, she would start to go into withdrawal, and she wasn't ready to start obsessively cleaning the Bathroom with a toothbrush again.

Just as she was starting to shift into the REM stage of sleep, Tube 2 sent down its next contestant. Small, pink, with curly blue hair.

It didn't take a person with a below-average IQ to realize that O'Malley had sent down a literal child. Oprah knew that even before the filly stumbled out. The problem was that it was a child, and she had already dealt with Odd Todd. She didn't need a gender-bender species-bender with the same MO.

"Where am I?" The filly looked around in a fluster. "What is this place? How do I get out?!"

Oprah would have sought not to address her latest foe if basic human instinct didn't get in the way. "You're in Odd Squad. Precinct 13579. Can we get this over with already?"

The filly turned. "Get what over with?"

"The fight." Oprah pulled herself up. "You're here because my agent sent you down to fight me in what has become a very irritating stalling tactic."

"Oh." The filly's face expressed confusion for just a second before she put on an innocent smile. "Well, anyway, my name's Cozy Glow!"

"Oprah. And if you don't fight me within the next five minutes, I'm making my bed here and lying in it."

Cozy sat on her haunches and contemplated her hooves for a moment. "Uh...I mean...don't you think I'd be put at a disadvantage? You have...those...and I have hooves. Also, you're taller than me."

"Does it look like I care about advantages and disadvantages?"

"Look, I may be a villain, but I have standards, okay?"

Having argued with numerous clients and villains whose brains were slow in the development department taught Oprah that arguing was, in most cases, nothing but a waste of time and energy. Cozy wasn't any different, and so Oprah didn't see it fit to get into a verbal spat with her. "I can't exactly get down on all fours and battle you. I have pride and dignity. Don't you have...I don't know...magic powers or something?"

"No, but I did manage to steal nearly all of Equestria's magic!"

That made Oprah perk up, an idea forming in her mind. She swiveled her head as though something above the double-doors to the Trophy Room intrigued her, letting her eyes shift to Cozy to let her know she was interested. "Really? How so?"

"Wait." Cozy blinked twice. "You want to hear the story?"

"Sure. If Pegasi don't have any magic powers in your world, I want to see how you pulled it off. Enlighten me."

Like a parent who was finally willing to listen about their kid's day at school, Cozy's eyes gained a delightfully innocent shimmer. "Okay!"

Oprah was lucky that Cozy was one of those creatures who paced and moved about as she talked. It gave her ample time to reach into her hammerspace spine, take out the Bed-inator, and discreetly fire it at the other double-doors, all while Cozy's back was turned. The filly was so absorbed in her tale that she completely missed the action until the very end.

Which was when Oprah had already taken off her shoes, undone her bun, climbed into the bed, and pulled the sheets over her.

Cozy stared. "What..." Her expression twisted into rage. "What are you doing?! I'm telling the grand tale of how I nearly brought Equestria to its knees and you're treating it as some..." A proper motorboat engine impersonation. "...some stupid lullaby?!"

"A lullaby is a song. What you're doing is reading me a bedtime story."

Innocent as Oprah's words were, she couldn't deny that seeing Cozy struggle to comprehend what was happening was giving her quite the free comedy show. She hadn't seen that level of confusion from a child since she last shut down Otto when he asked how old she was. Poor thing had to be consoled by Olive for a week. Tragic, really, but he was far too young to know about her aging abilities.

"Fine!" Cozy reared back, then stomped both front hooves onto the floor before making a beeline for the hallway double-doors. "If you're not gonna get me out of here, then I'll find somepony who will!"

"I wouldn't try that if I were you." Oprah said with a yawn. "Both sets of doors are locked tight."

Cozy backed up. "Y-You're bluffing."

"If they weren't, I'd be sleeping in an actual bedroom, wouldn't you think?" Oprah turned onto her side. "Since I don't want to fight you, and you're clearly not willing to fight me nor are you capable of doing so, you're better off heading straight home."

"But I don't even know how to get back to Equestria from here!"

"Really think it over. I'm taking a nap. Who knows how many more weirdos O'Malley's gonna send."

A growl rattled in Cozy's throat as she began to trot around the room, looking for some means of escape.

It took her all of five seconds to spot the tunnel of holes shooting through the various rooms before the devilish grin formed on her maw.

---

"So as you can see here, the votes are largely tied. We have twenty votes for a bike, twenty votes for a trampoline, and one vote for a...potato."

"Potato!"

No one needed to look to know that Olaf was the one who had offered that suggestion.

"So does this mean we have to vote again?" Oscar lamented.

"If you had given us a set of options to vote for in the first place, this wouldn't have happened." Olive said.

Polly's mouth opened. Closed. Then opened again. "I..." A slight blush crept into her cheeks. "Y-yeah, you, uh...make a good point, Olive. I can't argue with that." She looked at Oscar. "But no, we don't have to vote again. All we need is to move the outlying vote to one of the two options."

Oren's face went a shade of white even clouds couldn't compare themselves to. Olive pinched the bridge of her nose with her two fingers. Oscar nervously looked at Olaf. O'Malley began to wonder if the automatic process he had put in place to stall Ms. O would hold up.

And Otto...wasn't here. He was still in the infirmary.

"Okay, I'll get this over with." Oscar heaved a mighty sigh. "Olaf, pick one. Either bike or trampoline."

"Potato."

"Not a valid option. Bike, or trampoline."

"...Potato."

"Oh for God's sake, I understand the songs of Hatsune Miku better than I understand you." Oscar shoved Olive forward. "Your turn."

"Wh- Hatsune Miku?" Olive's brow furrowed. "Since when do you listen to Hatsune Miku?"

"You'd be surprised at Otto's musical tastes beyond Soundcheck, heh."

Olive dropped the issue and focused her attention on Olaf, gripping his shoulders. "Olaf, you need to pick one. Either bike, or trampoli-"

"Hey!"

The angry shout put a halt on the frustration that lingered in the air. Heads turned to look at the approaching pink filly, wings fluttering as she opened her legs wide and put on an apologetic look. "Sorry about that. I just wanted to get your attention."

"Uh...that's okay." Olive tilted her head. "Who are you, exactly?"

"I'm Cozy Glow! I just came from...uh..." The filly pointed to the hallway behind her. "I dunno, but it was some blue room with four tubes."

O'Malley's eyes widened. "The Tube Lobby!" he murmured. "H-how's Ms. O? She's not escaping, is she?"

"Ms. O?" Cozy sat on the name for a moment, then it hit her. "Oh! Her! Uh, no, she's...sleeping. Pretty sure she can escape through that hole, though."

"What hole?"

"There's this hole that goes through a bunch of rooms and stops at a hallway. That's how I got here." Cozy shrugged. "Weird design choice, if you ask me, but-"

A high-pitched sound that was caught in between the stages of wheezing and screaming resounded through the bullpen.

Oscar's brow furrowed. "...O'Malley?"

"I HAVE TO PATCH UP THAT HOLE!"

Before anyone could respond, the young Tube Operator was speeding past Cozy and heading down the hallway.

"What's wrong with him?" Cozy asked.

"Well-"

Oscar made a mad grab for Olive's lips, stretching them away from her face like undercooked pizza dough. "Don't forget, we're talking to a villain."

"Well that's not very nice!" Cozy stuck her bottom lip out. "I'm not a villain. I'm just a filly who doesn't know where she is, that's all."

Oscar, realizing that Cozy had no knowledge of why she was sent to Headquarters, simply rolled his eyes.

"Would any one of you please help me get home?"

Olive muttered something unintelligible, though it was easy to tell from her narrowed eyes that it involved at least one curse word, if not more.

Cozy opted to ignore this. "Pretty please? I just wanna go home!" Her eyes began welling up with tears. "I-I wanna see my mommy and daddy!"

"All right, fine! Jeez. Just stop whining." Oren stepped forward. "Come on. I'll take you back home. Let's go, before O'Malley does something stupid and wakes Ms. O up. As he always does."

As he passed by Olive, he only uttered the words "you're welcome", which didn't help her mood. What also didn't help was that he was too far away to literally wipe the stupid smirk off of his ugly face.

With the filly gone, Oscar let go of her lips, and she was able to speak. That is, once she reassembled them on her face.

"Oscar, I don't usually say this...but what the heck."

"You were gonna tell Cozy Glow about our entire plan! Are you crazy?"

"Are you projecting or are you asking a legitimate question?"

"She's a villain, Olive. You were partnered with Odd Todd. You should know how dangerous child villains are."

"And yet the executives keep throwing them at us."

"...What?"

"Forget it. You wouldn't understand."

Needless to say, Oscar knew what would be on his mind for the rest of the week.

"Anyway, let's get back to it." Olive turned to Olaf. "Olaf, you can pick either bike or trampoline for Ms. O's gift. No potatoes."

"Tram-potato-line?"

"No."

"Potato bike?"

"No."

"Tram-potato-line-bike?"

"Oh yeah, this is hell."

---

When Oren and Cozy got to the hole that the latter had described, O'Malley had only barely started patching it up. A few wooden boards were sitting next to him, with two attached on the top and bottom of the hole with school-grade glue.

"You've gotta be kidding me."

"Hey!" O'Malley pointed a screwdriver at Oren. "You're lucky I have some Maintenance knowledge under my belt. So don't complain."

"I'm not-" Oren gave an irritated sigh. "Well, yes, that, but also, how many rooms does that hole go through?!"

O'Malley paused and looked. "I'd say about ten."

"And they all look tame...for the most part. Hopefully there are no pancakes." Oren glanced at Cozy. "Let's go."

Due to having the benefit of wings and the ability to fly with them, Cozy reached the Tube Lobby at a faster rate than Oren did. Oren wasn't exactly the most athletic agent of Precinct 13579, and it was lucky for him that most of the rooms he went through were either empty or required a specific trigger to activate. Except for one, which played the opening theme to some show called Neighborhood Wars he had never heard of.

Finally, when he got to the Tube Lobby, he looked at his surroundings. It looked a bit gruesome. He could swear he saw blood...there was a chrysalis on the ceiling...oh yes, and Ms. O was snoring away in her bed. He scoffed, because a boss falling asleep on the job was beneath him. If he were a Director, he certainly wouldn't take naps at work, that was for sure.

"Hey!" Cozy yelled, snapping him out of his reverie. "You're supposed to get me back home, remember?"

"Oh! Yeah, right, right." Oren made his way to the control desk, eyeing the buttons with unease. He had no idea how to operate the tubes, a haunting realization he had made in that moment. All he had to go off of was watching the hands of the tube operators that sent him up the tubes.

"Hurry up!"

"I'm trying, okay?! I don't know how to operate these things!" Oren snapped, before his eyes warily shifted to Ms. O. She moved ever slightly, but otherwise continued to snore as though nothing had happened.

With a sigh, Oren pressed the upper-left button, which raised the structure above it upwards. Said structure was a pillar with a sphere attached to its top, so in his eyes, he was on the right track.

It wasn't the buttons that swayed him, though, so much as it was the computer at the head of it all. That took luck and a lot of blind tapping. When the tube finally got activated, he sighed in relief.

"Golly, I'm gonna miss you. It was fun watching you struggle."

That was the straw that broke the camel's back for Oren, as he took Cozy, hurled her as hard as he could, and sent her up the tube without another word.

His eye twitched as he looked at his boss. Still asleep. That was all he needed to know. He started booking it back through the rooms, taking the time to punch a few walls in the process. O'Malley was slow in the building department, after all. There was a reason why he became a tube operator.

Author's Note:

Yet another concept for the idea bin. I don't regret a single thing.

...Except Oprah punching the Swiss cheese bug. Let's be honest, bug would put up more of a fight than that. But this is a crackfic and you shouldn't go to Crane Brothers levels of analysis with mine.