2!] Chapter 27- Get Goin' Ya Dumb Bastards 2,712 words
[???] The Question1 words
[ARC II] Chapter 28- Caught Between the Clouds and a Hard Place8,267 words
[ARC II] Chapter 29- An Aspirin or Something3,570 words
An Eldritch Persuasion603 words
[ARC II] Chapter 30- He Set Us Up the Bomb2,619 words
[ARC II] Chapter 31- Spendthriftin'2,458 words
[ARC II] Chapter 32- Love and Its Pitfalls3,538 words

[ARC II] Chapter 18- The Bet

[Heads up note (HUN): While this was written while I was in a silly mood, I decided to make this officially canon. And yes, I do in fact LOVE (had to capitalize) volleyball. Carry on.]

"Hey Mono, I bet you can't beat Applejack, Aloe, Lotus, and Rainbow Dash at volleyball!"

"WHO SAID THAT?"

Mono heard only silence.

"WHICH ONE'A YOU EQUINE MOTHERFUCKERS SAID THAT SHIT?"

Scootaloo's purple mane and smug face appeared from behind a crate. "I did, and you've been cordially challenged by the Ponyville Schoolhouse. Just head on down this street until you see the crowd," she said. Hopping on her scooter, she speed away towards the schoolhouse with a light buzz.

A trail of dust flew up from the street, the small black and gray blur indicating Mono's extreme displeasure at having his volleyball skills challenged in public.

\\\\||||////

"Fillies and gentlecolts, it seems our last competitor is here!" Pinkie Pie announced. I quickly shot her a rancid glare. Before anyone knew it, I zipped onto her little stand and reached into her mane.

Finding what I needed, I pocketed the confetti and nodded once. I then made my way to the unoccupied area of sand, and threw my coat to the side. "NOW WHERE ARE- ahem. Now where are Applejack-ass, Adobo, Lettuce, and Rainbow Snatch?" I demanded of the crowd

My competitors glared at me from the other side of the court. A collective growl made me smile. "There they are. Alright, who am I playing with?"

A roll of laughter went through the crowd at my question, and Spike grabbed the mic dramatically. "Mono! You are to play the four of them on your own, using any special abilities you may have to win against your opponents."

I rubbed my chin thoughtfully. "I need sugar."

Pinkie Pie shoved a plate of cupcakes into my mittens in an instant, and I saluted her grandly. Within seconds, I was finished with a baker's dozen of baked goods, and the frosting must have been absolutely friggin' loaded, because I felt like electricity.

"Let's move."

A whistle blew, and Aloe served the ball.

\\\\||||////

The ball soared gracefully over the net, while Mono simply stood motionless. It reached within a foot of the sand, and with barely a movement, visibly anyway, Mono now occupied the spot and the ball was sent back over. Instead of striking it normally, he had sent it soaring dramatically into the air.

By reading the movement of the ball it was clear that Mono had not made it over the net, and the other team grinned. That was, however, until he appeared next to it in midair and spiked the ever-loving hell out of the ball.

"Ref! What was that?"

Time Turner shook his head. "Mono receives three extra hits on his side, making up for the lack of teammates."

"Thank you, Doctor Hooves!" Mono gave a grandiose bow. The stallion tensed up and his eye twitched.

"I am the eleventh doctor and I travel through time in my blue time-box…"

Two mares glanced at one another and jumped the twitching stallion. Immediately he started to jerk and fight against them.

"I HAVE TO SAVE ROSE! RIVER SOOOONG! RIVER SOOOOONG!" He was rapidly dragged away while Mono just blinked.

The human turned back to his contenders and waved downwards. "Eh, he'll be fine. New ref!" Applebloom pushed Carrot Top to the sidelines and threw a whistle around his neck.

"Got it!" she called.

Carrot Top blew the whistle and Mono threw the ball into the air.

"Mono has thrown the ball into the air, he's hitting it across, Lotus saves it by just a hair and- Mono's spiked it! I didn't even see him move, Pinkie did you see?"

"Noperooni!"

Mono shrugged. "I know, I'm cool."

Applejack grit her teeth and blew some sand out of her nose.

"Mono's serve," the ref stated. Mono tossed the object in the air and gave it a graceful hit. Applejack bounced the ball back into the air and Rainbow Dash spiked it towards Mono's field.

Mono instead zipped to the ball and volleyed it further into the air and followed it with a distance-skipping jump. A high-velocity spin later and the ball was sent into the mares' field, requiring very little effort on Mono's part.

"Mono: two, Ponyvillians: zero!"

Mono faced the aggravated fillies and pushed the inside of his cheek with his tongue while mimicking a quite vulgar motion with his gloved hand. The four of them went scarlet and he laughed sadistically.

Applejack and Rainbow Dash got busy, this time the ball being their serve as a kind gesture from Mono. Aloe served the ball, which then went to her sister, which was flung into the air and smacked backwards by Dash to AJ, who caught the violently-spinning deathball and flung it clear over the net.

"Mono's gonna have a tough time matching that power!"

A quick smirk from Mono and suddenly several flickering copies of him appeared on the field. One flickering image tapped the ball over his head to the back of the court. The next copy pushed the ball higher than before. Yet another vibrating afterimage sent it straight up.

"He's moving fast enough to create clones of himself! He's found the mirror poo-." Pinkie was cut off by Spike's fist entering her mouth. "Shush you," he said.

Just then, the sand rocketed up and a single human chibi spiked the ball with deadly speed, distorting the shape of the sphere into a violently spinning oval. This time, the impact drove sand apart and the ball corkscrewed completely into the ground. Mono fell back to earth and grinned.

"That fast enough for ya, Tootaloo?"

"Woah! He just. Made. Afterimages! How'd you do that? Are you Kid Flash, or are you Speedy Gonzales?" Pinkie Pie continued to shout to Mono excitedly, and in response he simply shrugged.

Rainbow Dash snarled at the smug expression on the human's face, daring him to pull another stunt. Aloe and Lotus gathered the other two into a small group huddle, leaving the human to roll his eyes and yawn obnoxiously.

"Done yet? I'm kinda getting bored. I mean, you're just so slow," he taunted with a toothy grin.

Scootaloo burst above the crowd furiously with her wings beating quickly. "WHAT?" She was pulled back down by her tail, leaving Mono with an amused chuckle.

Shortly afterward, the group joined hooves and separated.

"Your serve," Mono gestured with a single hand, his mittens allowing pseudo-fingers to appear. "Do whatever you want, ladies. Ref, give them no penalties."

Aloe served the ball, straight into the air. Lotus bumped it with her muzzle, and Applejack gave a mighty spin while standing on her hind hooves. Bringing her fore hooves together, she devastated the object of the game with a space-distorting hit, sending the ball straight into the cloudy sky.

Mono deadpanned. "Great job. You ruined the game for everybody." He began clapping sarcastically, congratulating their stupidity. Then the ball crashed at his feet, sending a wave of sand into his face.

Rainbow Dash dive-bombed from the heavens, a huge grin on her muzzle. She began cackling at the Sand Man that Mono had become. Mono shook off the offending powdered crystals and glared at the four mares.

"Well played, ladies. Your serve again," he remarked calmly, having regained his nerve. He kicked the ball to them and watched the quartet expectantly.

Using the same play, Applejack sent the ball through the clouds. Mono kept his eyes on the three mares on the ground instead.

"So. We have four and a half seconds before Rainbow Dash hits the ball and it arrives here. Remember to keep your eyes on the ball." A small, white speck appeared from above. "Because you are not gonna want to miss this," he whispered.

Just as the volleyball reached him, his fists came together and the ball became a wildly spinning oval against his arms. With a great heave, it was sent into the skies, much as the mares had done.

The ball made its way back down, nearing Mono's side of the court rapidly. "Do not lose your composure, do not break your stance, stretch out your awareness, and do not let your guard down for even a second," he remarked calmly.

He burst into an even greater number of afterimages of himself, his speed outpacing the visual receptors in the ponies' brains. They saw him jumping in the air near the net and sliding across the sand in the back. Waving to the right and preparing for the ball to the left. Yet another trio did a jig to distract them.

The ball fell to Mono's side of the court and was whisked away by an afterimage, which was then sent to another at the front, wherein all the copies abruptly disappeared as one.

"Where'd he-" Spike began.

BABOOM

The sonic explosion rattled the residents of Ponyville and shook windows, sending severals pets into howls and screeches. The ball spun away merrily in the center of a cloud of dust, leaving Mono's opponents dumbfounded.

Dead center on the Ponyvillians' side of the court was a conical crater with a white sphere losing centripetal force. The manes of the four mares were in disarray, the sheer force of the impact driving the wind about them.

Silence reigned over the crowd and the two announcers.

Mono stepped onto the mares' side of the court, where they all stood stock still. Reaching into both of his pockets, the human pulled out the confetti.

\\\\||||////

I threw the confetti over the four losers' heads and deadpanned immediately. As the confetti rained down I brought my hands into the air and motioned them grandly.

"You lose," I said, turning around to walk away.

And so I let them stand, motionless, in a glittery, showy, shower of stupid.

\\\\||||////

"And that Miss Cheerilee, is why we need him on our side," Sweetie Belle gestured to Mono. The school teacher watched the small alien walk away slowly, her mind struggling to comprehend the event that just took place.

"I knew he was fast but… wow." Miss Cheerilee raised a hoof to Sweetie's and bumped it. "You win."

Author's Note:

Inspired by the Panty and Stocking series.

ARC II THEME

1,294 views

127

Previous Chapters Next