PRPG2 Abridged
For all your inaccurate, misinterpreted and outright untruthful logging needs.
I wasn't there, so nothing of importance could possibly have occurred. ~swicked
- Some of the ponies went to a tower that was originally semaphore but is now used as an observatory. They went up in it, looked around, then left it, talking to a kid the entire time.
- They then went to the inn while the robot flirted with a brewing machine.
- Everyone met Akasha, milled about a bit, then a chariot all but fell from the sky on someone who needed to be saved by Emerald.
- We all got in the chariot that was actually a carriage that was actually a garbage truck and flew off.
- Then the wind attacked us and we fell from the sky but nobody important died.
- Then squirrels attacked us for no flipping reason. After Ivy hit them with themselves for a while, they ran away.
- Then we all went to bed.
- We all woke up, Ivy and Emerald talked about their graverobbing swag while Shadow hung around with a necrobreezyphiliac
- Ivy got all involved in trying to pickle a pony and we heard stories
- Nobody made breakfast. Instead, we left and got worms
- We all got wormed on real good while debating out of character whether or not an unconscious body counts as a player's property.
- After the worms got their head exploded or burned to death before exploding or whatever the other one did that probably also ended in an explosion, Ivy went back to graverobbing and got, like, a HUGE pearl.
- We walked down a road, met a yellow pony gathering "alms" for a disease we aren't certain she had, and then got to some ruins.
- We get to the "inn", which turns out to be some sort of wretched hive of scum and villainy.
- Sugar gets her pocket picked and everyone searches for the thief for hours to try and either gut him, rob him or pat him on the back.
Shopping!
Some with fewer threats of arson than others. - The stabby puts on a show. All in all, pretty much a waste of time.
- Four-armed monkey. What the heck.
- Goldpin, the most unfashionably blinged-out owner of the mall, shows up and throws swag at everyone.
- Sugar ate wood. A lot of wood. Poles and poles of it, straight down her hatch, with no sign of gag reflex. Talk about impressive!
- Sprocket showed how protective he is of his master by... well, standing around and watching her hulk smash stuff until multiple someones restrain her and he can cuff her front hooves, entirely incapacitating her, as his mod would repeatedly insist.
- Sugar, being a unicorn with TK, uh... disagreed.
- Lots of crying later, the PCs decided to stop pretending not to know Sugar in front of the big, well-armed thugs just in time to tell off a single post-peddling shopkeep. Our heroes!
- The tarponies attacked, with their ghost flames and doughy-eyed stares. Adorable and delicious, as Sugar would attest given she ate them all as soon as they inexplicably melted.
- Turns out they were a distraction so that the handy monkey (who was now on fire) could get his paws on Goldpin's upper-horn prince albert.
- After half the party ran, one returned, and an investigation started to figure out what the flip was going on between the love bug, the bug lover, the hot and handy monkey and... something else vaguely sexual about a red unicorn mare. Uhh... crap. Moving on!
- We found out approximately nothing after the camels admitted they were idiots and redirected us to a unicorn that simply lied through his teeth about pretty much everything he could think of.
- All while Emerald and the geek cuddled up nice and cozy in the little hole for two Emerald dug outside, Emerald's trusty new pet rock keeping watch while they "got to sleep".
- Ivy talks to Ivory about the golden upper horn rings summor. It goes over my head summor.
- She then fails at tail-lifting. She officially can't even.
- Sugar and Sprock are weirdoes. There, I said it. Freaking glow sticks and disco music. People aren’t sure whether to kill them or join them. Luckily, they only decide after the “rave” ends.
- Emerald sleeps with the geek. Akasha sleeps with Shadow. Ivy sleeps with a metaphorical rat. Discolor sleeps with a literal one.
- Emerald and the geek wake up and start out like a bat outta hell. The rest of the group does, too, but only after Ivy makes like her bedmate and scurries.
- The group meets up on the road. Ivy sees a bunch of bones and starts with the sex talks, really getting under Emerald's skin while trying to get under her tail.
- Emerald is so enamored by all of Ivy's attentions she agrees to give Ivy’s ring some serious TLC until it all shiny and glistening. You know, for research purposes.
- A fort, an obelisk and a bulletin board? It’s officially time to squeal on that guy that gave us all that gold. Yay!
- Tonight on PRPG: the eternal quest for booty!
Be what you want 'cause a hero is free! You are a hero!
Yar har fiddle dee dee, being a hero is alright with me! Go to the leader and demand your fee, you are a hero!
- We join our PCs as they prepare to make like medic's typical sleeping companion and rat out Goldring. Goldpin? Gold something to Golden Mittens. The fort commander is, as one might expect, skeptical about these folks plotting to sell out her golden brosef.
- Mechapony does not offer anyone cookies. The stabby is less than enthused, so toymare begins eating furniture.
- Ol’ mitty is nonplussed, so Ivy moves right in with explaining everything while dragonshy stands about looking adorable.
- Oh my gosh, is she adorable. Ay. Dor. Ah. Bull.
- The A-Team goes to religious studies to learn about violent demonic possession on a morbidly obese mechapony and its effects on superstitious stabby by proxy.
- The crazy stabby "helps" Ivy take a stallion's spear somewhere other than between her legs.
- Ivy is now cripplemare, but holy hell, is she stoic about it. Toymare cries buckets of crocodile tears to make up for it.
- Cripplemare learns about the elements and junk while stabby hangs with mittens.
- Puzzle box. Completely immune to magic. Except scrying, sort-of.
- Emerald talks about getting her dildo possessed by a demon. Or something. I kinda stopped listening.
- ...and that was it. The wrap up, everyone slept everywhere, and we go.
- The medic's rodent alarm clock wakes her up and the rest follow suit. Honestly, her name should just be Ratmare.
- Everyone proceeds to do nothing until nearly ready to leave, at which point they notice the stabby has no interest in cavorting around with the unholy, so the stabby adds "dragon rider" to her resume.
Over the river and through the wood to Princess's keep we go...
- Attacked by BANDITOS. Also known as muggers-with-a-better-name.
- Fired and teamkilled, glassed (and given a rather bloody hickie by miss medic), fired again, I dunno, and escaped.
- The medic tries to save the banditos. Emerald shows off the more "scorched earth" side of her policies.
'Cause yeah, she's pretty much a pain in the neck no matter who you are. Bah dum pish.
- Medic, being a medic, takes it on the chin. At least, after her jaw drops. Honestly, who could have figured psychopaths were psychopathic?
- Stabby collects a bunch of weapons to play with, but Ivy insists that she shares. Unfortunately for her, the stabby complies, and despite the fact that the stabby continues to cause more harm to the team than anyone else so far, no one even begins to suspect she might be a plant for... uh... whoever the villain in this game is.
Cripplemare becomes Crippled Cripplemare: Revengeance and away we go again...
- We get to the "Old Fairgrounds" and the first thing we see is a funeral. I think this is Bryce's attempt at a "visual" pun (something like the only fair fit for the old being their funeral, I figure). I refuse to give him the satisfaction.
- The royals' outlawing a fair to prevent rioting seems to be encouraging rioting. Bryce is on fire, tonight.
- Into the inn, still no cantina music. Cripplemare starts drinking when Mr. Shiny Hero Guy comes in.
- The conversation basically just circles the toilet bowl until he leaves, in no small part due to a butt-kissing stabby.
- Cripplemare gets upgraded to "Gimpymare".
- Gimpymare talks to medic about the morality of coldblooded murder of criminals vs. still-coldblooded-but-legally-justified execution and how they are totally different, ending in the medic whispering sweet nothings into her ear sans more bloody hickies.
- Most everyone beds down for the night. Gimpymare sneaks into the stabby's bed while Emerald wets hers from a karmic nightmare. Poor, sweet little murderer...
P.S. Realistically, this session could be abridged as "We arrive in town, see a funeral, talk with locals, Discolor whines about how moral she is and sleep.", but I already did the session-in-a-sentence bit.
- We wake to find our heroes in typical fashion. The medic with a cock in her face, Gimpymare curled up around an unconscious and unwilling bedmate, Emerald as alone and unloved as the day she was born, and the stabby and dragon shacked up all nice and cozy together. You know, Hinds might have a point about shipping those two, but don't tell him I said so. I mean, uh... darn it.
- Gimpymare appears to be dreaming about sleeping with her mother or something and tries to pull the stabby closer to, in Bryce's words, blindly grope her. Better luck next time?
- The stabby chills her behind after all of Gimpymare's attentions in a dangerous, ancient magical artifact. Seemingly deciding it would make a better bonnet than bum cover, she promptly gives herself brain damage, leading to people suddenly caring whether or not she's rhyming. Huh.
- In possibly the worst decision of her life, and that's saying something, the stabby gives Gimpymare daterape perfume. The absolutely and completely 100% straight mare who does not think about other mares sexually in the least immediately uses it to attempt to bed the first two npc mares she sees, surprising no one, real or imagined, save Owen.
- Everyone boards the GM train for two days solid, trotting on day and night through... farms again. Incredibly detailed farms. Lines upon lines of what crops, what Gimpymare knows of farming practices (which her mod didn't even ask to roll for, agriculture horse or no), and the "rays of vegetation" that "splay outward". We are told our heroes are in awe of their spender. Just... calm down, Bryce. Deep breaths.
- We hit New Canterlot and we finally learn what Gimpymare ISN'T attracted to... stone carvings of little girls.
- Now at the palace, everyone gets in the line to entertain the prince, except the stabby, who opts to play with herself.
- The prince is friendly, amicable and polite... so yeah. Now we know the face of our enemy.
- Our heroes get a room (well, hopefully more than one) and bed down for the night.
*looks at the log above* ...looks like I might need to work on this “abridging” thing a bit. Oh well.
- We're given a presidential suite and immediately proceed to wreck the place.
- Medic passes out on a bed before she can make it out to the roof, the poor dear.
- Gimpymare begins filling everything she can find with dirt to grow a quick batch of home-grown, high-quality "herbs". For science.
- Following Gimpymare's lead, stabby smokes a bowl. Turns out to be an even worse idea than it sounds.
- Bitchy literally screams that everyone "better be quiet" before immediately engaging Gimpymare in conversation about all her likes and dislikes. The flirt.
- Gimpymare breaks in and kissuscitates the stabby, who promptly attempts to stab her a third time.
- Bitchy don't know how to say stabby. Cheers on what appears, to her, to be Gimpymare taking advantage of an unconscious mare. Yeah, we're goin' with "bitchy", here.
- After Gimpymare finally stops responding to bitchy, turning instead to her plants, so bitchy stops gabbing and goes back to her room. Time skip to morning.
Deadmare's Ol' Stiffy's The Carrion Kid's father comes calling with a single stoic indian tear to give the dragon another quest seed.
- Stabby sneaks out and no one sees her, inside or outside. A cry of triumph can be heard of CB points well-spent.
Bitchy uses an umbrella indoors and is not struck by lightning. My childhood lied to me
- Everyone (except the stabby) gets told, via very nice letters, to, and I quote, "Fuck off." Some even get a bribe!
- The party openly contemplates treason via breaking into the princess's bedroom. Just to see if she is okay, of course, though I suspect Ivy might have vastly different reasons to recommend this course of action. They eventually realize this would require knowing what window, if any, is the princess'. Ah, the best laid/laying plans...
- The stabby finally shows up again, all fed and shiny, and SCENE!
I'm bored, so let's change up the style for a round, eh?
- Doctor: Good news, gimpy! We can fix your leg. The only catch is you have to watch Ye Olde Porno while you do so.
- Gimpymare: I can live with that.
*one minute later*
- Gimpymare: Screw this, I saw better pornos at my first birthday party. Stabby! Bitchy! Get in here!
Z&B: Yo.
- Gimpymare: Can you do anything about this thing? All these puppets do is grind. Literally. They're smoking like Z in a hospital.
- Stabby: ...*puff*
Emerald: OH MY GOSH YOU GUYS, LOOK, I FINALLY FIGURED OUT THE CODE TO THAT ENCRYPTED NOTE WE'VE BEEN SO WORRIED ABOUT FOR WEEKS DAYS ON END!
- Everyone else: The what now?
- Emerald: Yes, yes, thank you. I feel your love and admiration. No, wait, that's enough. Get off of me.
- Bitchy: But I smelt blood...
- Emerald: ...ahem. Yes, well... excuse me, then. *rushes to the bathroom*
Timeskip, now entering: Home of Deadmare Dad
- Deadmare Dad: Conspiracy! Conspiracy! Intreeeeeeaaaaage!
- Wimpyponies: Agreed!
- Deadmare Dad: Myyyyyystery. Conundrum? Enigma!
- Wimpyponies: Here here!
- Deadmare Dad: And so, now that I've explained everything, would you mind risking your life for all those hypothetical riches I'm just now bringing up that may or may not exist?
- Everyone: Heck, why not.
- Changling: Dun dun DUNNN!!!!
- Everyone: FOR THE LOVE OF CRAP, EMERALD, DON'T KILL IT!
Changling: *hypersonic squish*
- Emerald: "Ooops."
- Everyone: WHAT THE CRAP.
- Dragon: Burn the evidence! Burn the room!! BURN IT ALL DOWN!!! BAHAHAHAHAA!
And so our brave heroes fled the scene of the crime.
- Ahem.
The brave PCs ran away. Bravely ran away! When the law reared its ugly head they bravely turned their tails and fled! Yes, the brave PCs turned about and gallantly they hoofed it out. Bravest of the braaaaaave, PRPG! 2!
- As I think we all know, nothing works up a hunger like arson, so our heroes briefly consider crashing a feast gimpymare knows about, right up until the resident dragonian changeling expert notes that the buggy hivemind will likely aim to kill them in the resultant calorie coma.
- While the party ponders this fact, they discover that someone is trying to find them via magics. Being the very polite criminal she is, Emerald (along with half the party) happily sits down in a quiet, isolated alley to allow their assassins to catch up to them. Such a well-mannered murderer!
- Finishing up tracing the skryer and interrogating one of medic's boyfriends on his intentions, Emerald proceeds to squash one bug twice and trap the other. "Trap" deriving from the latin root for "allow to get away". The other PCs do stuff too, but... yeah. Emerald squashes the bugs.
Gimpymare: "Hey, would you mind taking us to that creepy abandoned tower out in the middle of the lake?" Scooby Sailor: "Ruh-uh, nope, no ray!" Gimpymare: "Would you do it for an Ivysnack?" *lifts her tail* Scooby Sailor: "Ruhhhh... roh kay!" Scooby Dooby Doo, ruttin' with you, creepy scumbag don't give me crabs!
- Stupid tower builders made it resist teleportation, preventing entry without wings. It's like they forgot what the master race is...
- Puzzle, journal, adventure!
ITS (In This Session): Owen has about a dozen aneurisms over where people are relative to each other.
Bitchy coughs and sputters about how much she hates water, despite later jumping in twice and turning out to not need to breathe. Honestly surprised I missed that little detail, but you pick up a lot of small, pedantic little inaccuracies when you review stuff. I mean, why else would they call it hinds-sight? *gets thrown from the stage*
- Gimpymare gets a water-breathing potion and nearly drowns herself digging through some rubble. Stabby does roughly the same, but gets a shiny. Finally Emerald, henceforth known as OP, rips out the tower's innards. We play with a water portal, and then leave because I don't think we honestly could remember why we were there in the first place. Pretty surprised that doesn't happen more often, actually.
- After sneaking up on, spying, and finally approaching a group of young, supple, impressionable youths, gimpymare breaks out the date rape drugs. To use of their parents, I mean.
- What a time for the DM to try and push a "rape has consequences" message, huh? We end on our heroes trying to stop a mare from becoming a literal cliffhanger in a metaphorical one.
- Royally righteous Raja really rocks at rhyming!
- Bitchy seems genuinely confused what children are (other than that they aren't blueberries). OP explains they are barely worth sparing the lives of, while the children themselves mostly just describe each other as "unpalatable to dragons". Eventually, though, everyone unites around a common interest in pyromania.
- Dragon's mod has stabby look over a steep ledge and no one suggests offing her. My opinion of my fellow PRPG2 members has risen.
Cripplemare mark 2 gets the down-low on her low-down rapist. As medic evacs her to camp, Gimpymare argues that it's not gay if they come on you first. Err... come on to you first. Yeah.
- What follows is a very real and heartfelt discussion on the importance getting consent from adults capable of giving it before having relations with them. Despite apologizing, I'm pretty sure it all goes right over gimpy's head. OP's, probably, too... but morality's the water to her oil. She's above it.
- Winston likes saying "dam". How very infantile. Tut tut.
- I try to follow what happens next in the chat and the log. So yeah, Misty fell off a concrete wall near a cave, so we explore that, and there's stuff in it. A powerhouse with... tentacles? The flume horror, for which stabby makes a cure for cysts at some point and collects as much as she can of the goop from the walls that's apparently super-duper valuable (sweet, did me a serious solid there, Raja), and there's teleporting and flame throwing and okay I'm just skimming the rest.
- Blah blah control room servos lights exciters shut off this toggle that derp de derp. Looks like OP does pretty much everything. Guess it was another puzzle with a master race solution, but hey, aren't they all?
Someone threw an element of harmony into a turbine, apparently, and the rock outs gimpymare as the destroyer of worlds.
- Chase scene! Ish! Gimpymare is talked down pretty much immediately. Getting back to old habits, gimpy promptly deflects her concerns and insecurities with talk of sex, which actually turns out slightly worse than usual when Bitchy gives her a sucking neck wound. Or is it a neck wound sucking? *shrug*
- Not to be outdone, stabby puts a hole in medic's chest.
- As thanks for the anti-cyst potion from earlier and in recognition for her becoming a bearer of an element of harmony, one of the future saviors of the world, OP apparently leaves stabby to (hopefully) die if/when vampony wakes up.
- Stabby takes the opportunity to shove a few anti-demon potions down bitchy's throat, which produces the exact opposite effect by turning her into a fat twilight vampire.
- Schrödinger's pony wakes up. And didn't. She's burned by the sun. And not. She will be missed.
- Ripped necks and sternum gouges are far less serious than I thought.
- At this point I can say with relative confidence everyone knows more about what medic's deal is than me.
- Bryce describes forests, hills, villages, hamlets... no farms. I guess we're all going to starve, now.
- Gimpy expresses almost as much interest in delving into a city's plumbing as she does a pony's. We are all a little more disturbed of her. Only a little, though, given the mare in question.
Bryce tries to convince CD that there are people that wouldn't fuck Gimpy if only under penalty of losing their jobs. "So, fellas, when do we get to my... sexecution?"
- Dragon mail. OP, the serial murderer, is not only wanted for an arson she didn't commit, but for killing the arsonist that isn't dead! We are all suitably offended by the injustice of it all.
Stabby shows gimpy her massive magical rutabaga. Gimpy is quite impressed and asks for some of its seed to plant in her fertile garden. If not, Gimpy says she'll... go through stabby's poop for it. Hey, you know what this is? Not my fetish!
- Stabby gets to turn the unrepentant mass murderer OP into a pretty pink pony. This is just lovely.
- All this plant stuff... I don't get it. Bryce isn't a botanist, he's a doctor! Those aren't even similar... or ARE they?
- Stabby finds a mushroom that "has a pink stripe on its annulus and a crimson volva." Just... yeah.
- The town's shady-guy makes his entrance and rapid exit when he realizes he's not going to be getting any dragon poontah. Go, look it up. I can wait.
- A freaking copper points us toward a "reputable inn" (20 bits it's just her brother's or something) and stop.
- Fun times at the inn of repute. It turns out to not be as much of a scam as it sounded.
- Enter Gabby, the poshest plumed prep-pleb.
- Ignorant to intensely intimate implorations and insistent innuendo, Gabby's innocuousity intrigues.
- Lace attempts to break up another marriage, this time WITHOUT an ulterior motive. Well, outside of disliking the name the mare's parents gave her. Breaking the norm, medic actually does something about the morally reprehensible behavior she just witnessed. Namely, paperwork.
- Stabby shoves her jewel into dragon's box while OP watches and all are highly disturbed by the experience.
- Off to the tower we go, then in, then up.
- Horological Gremlins. Squish squish squish. Also, while stabby can't point threateningly for crap, she remains the dragon-snuggling world champion.
- We save a bunch of pigs, one of whose name is just a play on a word that means pig-like. I mean, talk about hammy...
- Lacee gets all schemee with another trenchee. Then steals her clothes after stealing the lifes's work of the pigs. Because Generosity.
Gabby tells a short story about beating up being beat up by midgets.
Right off the bat, medic meets a DM self-insert leather fetishist that immediately gets her out of her clothes before lustfully filling all of her armor's holes. Honestly, Bryce, I thought this was a family game! What is WRONG with you?!
- Stabby tells a story about how hot dragons are to equines or something. Explains a lot, really.
- Finally, our host arriv.... or nope. Holy crap, this is one heck of a morning constitutional. What, did he fall in? A habit like that might explain all the pigs.
- As Winston put it, "STABBY BOARDS AIRSHIP, FORCES WAY INTO HELM, RUINS EVERYTHING"
- Medic nearly gets lynched, so Gimpy tries to lynch stabby, too. For equality's sake.
The Tower of Paragon Peel. Serene, elegant, dignified. Sitting on the shore of the lake of New Equestria it serves as a center for trade and the seat of governance for the region. It plays host to a variety of species, people in positions of power and authority, and commands a degree of respect from all who stay there, great and small alike. With none of this even remotely in mind the bitchiest vampire this side of ghastly gorge rams her way through the door and into the throats of everyone she can reach, her utterance of "MOVE OVER, FUCKERS, I'M COMING IN!" echoing throughout the tower and into the annals of history. In a matter of minutes the silver-tongued psychopath perfectly employs the door-in-the-face technique, backing off her initial offer of offing a few guards post-majordomo-maiming in favor of sizable donation in blood and servitude from two inexplicably selfless PCs, namely the self-centered one and the super self-centered one. I'll let you decide which is which.
- Cue convenient narcolepsy, the sleeping sickness sensation that's gripping the nation... err... sessions.
- Seeking an untainted voice of reason, medic runs off to rouse and rile the resident unstable monster-hating, ally-maiming psychostabby, who nearly stabs her in the typical fashion, all while the future bearers of harmony get busy tearing into the police in defense of a cruel, manipulative monster (and her vampire mistress). After arriving on the scene medic gets to chewing on a few necks of her own, before being promptly "disappeared" in one hit by OP while the stabby blazes up... with the booze going up with her. Barely making it out alive as she suffers from a recently heavily-drained blood supply, the lingering effects of a full dose of batpony venom and heavy smoke inhalation, OP barely manages to levitate a swimming pool's worth of water in order to combat the fire as the rest of the troop organize their own efforts to take on the inferno.
End scene as PCs and players alike collectively wishing the last few hours hadn’t just happened... with only a couple exceptions.
- After all, I do love a good blaze...
- Oh, and people have taken to calling stabby "Stabby Stripes". Retroactively changing all instances of "zebra" to "stabby"... now.
2014-12-17 23º Session and 2014-12-22 24º Session
- Spying, scrying, crying, lying, dying.
- Gimpy, confident that Stabby set the fire but unwilling to admit personal involvement, opts to come off like she's just racist. Which she's totally not, by the way. No way. Nor into mares, for that matter.
After clearing out the cellar's stock of corpses and corpse paraphernalia, the death threats resume, now in the presence of the police, Bryce just tossing the negative (and potentially time-consuming) consequences of darn near everything we do out the window like an antique grandfather clock.
Leaving the scene of more arson, Gimpy proceeds to intentionally piss off the owner of the first place they come to. As revenge, she breaks into said owner's home to steal their jewelry and lie to their child. In response, she sleeps with their guests, breaks into more of their home and raids their liquor, too. Good going, Gimpy! That was as heroic as it was justified! Way to show them what for!
- Anyway, in comes Fuchsia in an emotional scene I all but missed. Guessing they were, like... lovers or something. That or sisters. Both? At least half the players in this game would probably prefer both, so we'll go with both.
- Stabby wanders off, clearly guilt-stricken and not at all bored, and talks Gimpy into instigating the aforementioned second break-in. Narrowly avoiding drunken rape while Gimpy confuses her for Gimpy's mother (lots of implied incest this session...), she gets back to the others just in time to miss everything. (Not that it's the first time...)
- Aforementioned everything happens, announcing the grand celebration of Stabby offing the vamp, right in front of the vamp's grieving best friend. Which was a lot more tasteful than it sounds, I'm sure.
- Then in comes the plot, right on the plot's... plot. The master ninjas, having failed at assassination, opt for negotiation. It goes about as well as...
- ...actually, let's see. No fire. No corpses littering the ground. The authorities aren't on the way...
- ...I'd say that was one of our best negotiations yet! Sad it failed without any kind of compromise or resolution and with the changelings still intending to kill us.
- Anyway, don't use the elements, they'll be our doom and drive ya nutty. Something the majority of the group definitely isn't already.
- We still doing this? People are reading it? Sure, whatever.
Medic returns just as Gimpy gets back from sleeping with her stallion mare various local wildlife. The magic is gone, folks.
Holy crap, Gabby Griffin is polite. He literally wishes everyone good morning individually. He probably means it, too. The hell is he doing with these people?!
- OP, the resident vengeful demigoddess, bemoans her lack of domain over the natural order. Too bad, I guess she'll have to forgo complete solar control and just have to live with making miniature suns in peoples' eyeballs. How very disappointing...
- Gimpy nearly scrounges up a threesome in return for un-stealing the blacksmith's family jewels. Oh well, at least she got some new shoes out of the deal. After breaking an ancient, irreplaceable artifact, of course.
- Bryce has some NPCs show up simply to passionately converse about farming in the party's proximity. They nearly come to blows before the situation diffuses. I seriously can't tell if this is a missed quest seed, a lesson for us, or if Bryce was just bored.
"Jan 02 20:49:37 <Shadow> (sorry if I'm putting you on the spot Gabrio—Shadow is very interested in the Great Gabrio)" <-- There you go, Owen. Go crazy.
- ...more talk about farming and how mind-blowing it is. Definitely bored.
- We sneak into the Vatican under the guise of a sexy horse and co. delivery service.
Upon arriving at a warehouse the party breaks apart to do indulge their various idiosyncrasies. Stabby smokes various articles, Gabby dishonors lumber, Dragonshy preps for her next arson, OP arguably makes herself even more deadly and Gimpy gussies her mane up for church with lots and lots and lots of "conditioner".
- Ponypope flatters Stabby mercilessly, calling her's the "best triumph yet". What follows was inevitable. Inevitable, I say!
- Following the established tradition, the brave and foolhardy hero worthy of a triumph is placed in a basement full of awesome ancient magical artifacts just to see what happens. And they expect me to believe this has only ever blown up in their face once. Pishaw.
- So, to recap, Stabby runs into a cellar again and sets off an explosion again, nearly killing everyone again while Lauren wasn't at the session again. Wow.
Excerpt from the New Canterlot News, Obituaries section:
- The Astrolabe of Ephemeris, (insert time of departure here). Lost to the winds of chaos. Beloved arcane butler-bodyguard of Akasha, kind to her companion Discolor, appreciated by many in the party, loathed by Ivy League. The Astrolabe was a benevolent staple in the life of its late master Ephemeris and, though it fell to a curse that has brought it much revile, it maintains a semi-apparent good. It gave fruit, plenty and of good quality, for no other reason than to please and maybe pelt Emerald Hues a little. It brushie brushied without any thought of appreciation or reward. It blew up, but did not kill. Drained magic, but did not smite. Most of all it protected its latest mistress, Akasha, not only from hostile attacks, but from getting a little damp, as well. It deserved its chance in the sun. To show the good people of New Equestria that it was not a force of evil, screaming firebomb melons with ominous constellation-based leavings aside. A chance to have its curse broken by those who cared about it... for it was not just some hexed artifact, but a beacon of change. Of hope. Potentially, even of Harmony.
- Donations for damages rendered by, and following, its awakening can be made at the Sanctuary of the Triumphant Goddesses, 102 Temple Lane, New Canterlot.
- Services to be held at the same location later this day. Visitation potentially never, given it disappeared and all.
- "Extra! Extra! Greatest triumph of all time sucks!"
"I'll take eight!"
- To start, everyone stands about kinda dumbly before stabby gets her act together whipping up the nervous church-goers into a murderous mob, the climax of which features a public lynching! Or, well, fire-freezing mid-air. Which might be more impressive, if less symbolic. In any case, in the following oddly-reserved not-quite-panic, one of the few remaining figures of authority in the city shows up to try and settle things down. Naturally, we clap him in irons.
- The captain of the guard asks if we have a more detailed plan than "go to the keep and secure the royals". Funny guy, huh?
- We head over to the keep and meet with the changeling megamind only to argue about whether or not it's a crime to kill people if you're hungry-enough, if it's really treason if you're impersonating someone else when you're doing it, and if you end up murdering in cold blood more defenseless people sooner than you planned due to someone trying to stop you... is it really your fault? You know, those hard-hitting questions that really highlight the loopholes in the legal system.
- After negotiations break down regarding whether or not, in the right context, wanton slaughter is a "bad thing", the changelings invite us in to go many-on-one with their queen. Either their hive is a lot smaller than we thought, or we're about to be screwed pretty hard. In any case, we kick her ovipositor to the tune of her repeated cries of our inevitable loss and the unholy screamings of the undead-ed prince.
- Cold learns the disadvantages of practice, her witchcraft on Corporal Nobody leaving her with only enough dark power to get the good prince from corpse ash to malformed, broken, screaming, nightmarish wreck. Seeing this, Bitchy's ghost asks if she can get some of that, too, batting her eyes and (unless I am VASTLY misinterpreting the situation which, you know, would be simply AWFUL) offering sex acts (among other things) with her "best friend's" body as payment.
*coming out of a daze* "Oh my gosh! Scarlet! You're back!" *hugs* "Good to see you too, Jenny." "It's... it's Fuschia. It's always been... a-anyway, uh... I don't know how to say this, but... have I gained weight?" "Oh, yeah, I traded your virginity for my body back. Pretty fair, right? Clarissa shoved a dead colt's dick in you and... actually, I don't think she ever even removed it. Anyway, you have a zombaby, now. Congrats!" “Oh, come now, stop that crying. You won’t have to carry it to term. I have a much, much, much, MUCH more painful means of removing your cute little stillborn abomination, and the scars won’t even cover half your body!” “See, Jenny? Aren’t I the best of friends? Come on, I'll let you buy me lunch...”
- Gabby Griffin actually manages to wrestle a cave-in (fort-in?) into submission? And did OP really just nearly die? I don't know what to make of this session.
- Princess Puddinghead shows up and is semi-immediately harmonized to the brain by Stabby's friendshipping headcannon.
OP and Medic share a tender moment while Cold wows the princess with something not created out of dead pony (then clarifies that it still, at the very least, represents a dying pony).
- Meanwhile, Gabby and Dragonshy fly to the city and don't kill everyone that attacks them. It's weird how differently things go when OP and Gimpy aren't around. Lifting a cart from some dead nobles (it's not graverobbing if there isn't enough of them to bury) they book it back to announce the changelings' final solution.
- Our heroes heroically hero-off to save the queen... and fail.
- Not to be dismayed, they fall back on their secondary objectives as Cold and Fuchsia attempt to find Ivy and revive Scarlet while the rest of the team gets Emerald medical attention. These, for the moment, also fail.
- Not to be FURTHER dismayed, Medic heads off to the BMA to make a report and rally the guards to secure the city. This, for the most part, fails as well.
- Wyseria orders her guards to begin sweeping the country for any changelings left behind while Cold attempts to convince them to hunt down Ivy instead. While the later fails immediately the former will, no doubt, with time.
- Finally, Emerald is taken to some doctors for treatment. The session ends shortly after, so I can’t really say they failed at that task... yet.
- ...nowhere to go but up!
31-33
- No more nicknames.
- Wasting little (in-game) time, the party gets to graverobbing outfits, Gabrio coming across a simply chic find of the changeling queen's face. But of course, the avian/feline/salesman/wrestler hybrid then ruins it by spray-painting it silver. I mean, that's just weird. I mean, uh... goshe? Gowch? G... gauche? Gauche. Gabrio the gabby, gauche griffin. Rolls off the tongue...
- Santa shows up, looking a little bit more traitorous than usual, and gives us jewelry, anti-teleportation darts and five new quest seeds, one being a cool little haunted figurine. Looking it over, Cold declares she has no idea what it does but that it should be kept from people that don't know what it does. Ergo, she pockets it. No, I'm not bitter about this at all. :K
- While Cold chats up Discolor, Shadow visits some fellow carnivores and Akasha, uh, celebrates. Emerald, though, immediately takes the freshly-gifted happy little pretty things (masterwork jewelry, as you'll recall) and makes them delightfully, explosively deadly (I call 'em "dragon-killers"). It's good to see her getting back to her usual.
- Cold and Discolor then sleep together dispassionately. They're practically married, already.
- ...and now we're at the squirrels bit. A quest Bryce has had in play since, like, session 3. We're on 32 "now". Bryce gave us no less than five items of mysterious origin last session (spooky teddy, haunted figurine, illegible book, odd light glass, super potion). That's not even counting any surprises that might lie in the pile of jewelry. He really does want this to go on forever, doesn't he?
- As we rid the land of the rodent tide Bryce makes a joke about illegal immigrants and I really hope everyone was only PRETENDING not to get it.
Snatching up the squirrel summoner and snapping on shackles, our heroes enjoy a holiday following the mass slaughter of a species (as opposed to ending with one), during which Cold took to knee and offered Discolor her ring. Goodness, this appears to be a ship of the rocket variety. Owen's favorite, as I recall.
Per Bryce, EVERYONE goes to bed with has dirty, nasty, bed-burning sex with Akasha and we head out the next morning, a few weapons and a unicorn-downgrade-to-earth-pony device heavier.
((An explanation, for once: one of my favorite lines from the MPCNotes.docx, describing magic power levels: " MAG -3 - moderate magic-impairment disability for a unicorn, has to live like an Earth Pony day-to-day". While I know what is meant, I just love idea that an Earth Pony's life is really just that of magically-retarded, hornless unicorn. The poor, profoundly-impaired dears...))
##
- (((((((((((stuff happened)))))))))))
51
- And so the debate about whether a necromancer ironically bound to obey the undead upon pain of death could be trusted with not stabbing us in the back.
- Short answer? No.
- (The longer one is also no, but with more profanity.)
- And so the expectant mother was beaten, tied up and heavily drugged, her final thoughts before unconsciousness took her being on whether or not her offspring would be magical-enough to be worthy of her dark master's designs.
- It was a very intimate, touching moment, indeed, but then Ivy stopped and we got back our Teen rating.
- Having finished with that rather unpleasant business, stripes and bugsy head off to meet with some respected and well-connected ponies in an irreplaceable, elegant venue. Which proceeds much in the way things tend to around this group. Namely with fire. Lots and lots of fire.
- But hey, at least we saved a rat! Sir Eyesaac Chewton, too great a name not to be repeated here, truly.
52
- We flee the scene of arson. Again. I mean, seriously guys? The heck. I get that Bryce would likely go to ANY conceivable length to avoid another police interview scene but that hardly means we should be going to such lengths to enable him.
- Arriving in Gold whatever Ivy successfully resists the urge to consume more unguarded produce of unknown origins.
- In the town made famous by its mysterious kidnappings the smartest among us decides to go it stag while the rest of us... are actually pretty darn good houseguests.
- I mean, there was a locked trunk in our room. A locked trunk.
- Locked.
- Did we steal from it? No.
- Is this just because Ivy had some very important whoring to do that night, which it doesn't look like she was even paid for? Yes.
- Regardless, good for us! From a karma standpoint the unprovoked murderous arson and the not-stealing probably just about cancel each other out, I'd figure.
- Meanwhile Emerald becomes complacent in her own physical abuse at the hooves of "adorable" sleeping workhorses.
- Ivy approaches a clearly still grumpy and tired Emerald early in the morning and tries to argue her into liking the changeling who tried to burn down her college. This goes far, far, FAR better than expected.
- After Emerald's silencing spell ends... ick, Ivy, language! Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?!
- ...probably the wrong question, I dunno if the buggers even really have those. Well... do you kiss your daughter with that mouth?
- ...probably a worse question, I doubt they'd stop at just kissing.
- For a few quick GMOs we get a free glass ball and a knife to Ivy's gut. I think it's a fair trade.
- Ivy has a storytime, finishing with the sentiment that her happiness would be improved if she could surrender her will to a queen or other authority. I move we collar her and rename her "Eyesack 2". All in favor?
This develops into an argument in which Ivy tells Akasha that "evil is a point of view". Which totally isn't an extremely cliché and well-known trope that any decent storyteller would recognize as a giant, strobing, neon-red flag capable of bringing down small aircraft and/or large griffins.
53
- Call me a stick in the mud, but I didn't really find much funny this time around.
- The meat of the session consisted of a grisly scene many (particularly the victims) would have no stomach for.
- Then there came the extremely dangerous and illegal magical weed that Gabrio darn well better follow through with is offer to eat the twisted little thing.
- Blah blah blah, sorry for your loss, look I can do a flip, detective hooker jumps all over mayor wawa before offering up her meat while darkwing duck-lion flies off to patrol the city.
- (he is the terror that flaps in the night!)
- Just not much out of the ordinary, all things considered.
54
- Hello, this is swicked with your abridged day-after news! Here are yesterday’s headlines!
GM ADMITS UNHEALTHY ATTRACTION TO SLIME, FRIENDS UNFAZED!
ADOPTION OF LOCAL BATPONY THWARTED BY EXISTENCE OF LIVING PARENTS, WOULD-BE WOULD-BE MOTHER STILL HOPEFUL
MAKER OF THE DATERAPE PERFUME REVEALS LATEST INVENTION... STALKING PERFUME
COULD A MUTATED RAT BE THE NEXT MICHELANGELHORSE ?
GRIFFIN HERO EATS ZEBRA'S EYE WHEN ZEBRA IS NOT LOOKING
NEW STUDY REVEALS PRICELESS MAGICAL ARTIFACTS LESS EFFECTIVE AGAINST GIANT BALLS OF FIRE THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT
VIGILANTES NEARLY NEARLY KILL FOALNAPPER TWICE, CORPSE NOT TO PRESS CHARGES
RECENT POLLS SHOW SHADHAVAR PREFER PONIES "RARE" WHILE PONIES PREFER SHADHAVAR "WELL DONE"
MALE GRIFFIN CONSIDERS THE POSSIBILITY OF GRIFFIN-PONY HYBRIDS, MARE COMPANIONS SAY "NEIGH"
PRODIGAL MOTHER AND PRODIGAL DAUGHTER REUNITED, BECOME PRODIGAL FAMILY
and finally, FIRE CONTINUES TO BE THE SOLUTION TO EVERYTHING
- Again, this is swicked with your abridged day-after news! Getting you your stories one lie at a time!
55
None for this week. I gave it a good three tries and I'd rather have nothin' than be boring. We got a space egg and got a fun new party member to tell half our entire story so far to. If the game was a TV show, this would be one of those flashback recap episodes. Lucca said what I finally ended up with for this session was good, actually, so here ya go:
- Welcome, one and all, to the most mind-numbing and disappointing session of the entire campaign! See the session that undercut a lengthy and police investigation Bryce would really have rather us flee from like criminals! That surpassed (subpassed?) the one where we walked a little, talked to a (maybe) sick pony, and then walked a little more!
- See the tedious stardust egg, full of strange and uninteresting magic that has captured the dull interest of half the members of the party!
- Watch Emerald dream of nightmares and terrors so unimaginably yawn-worthy they practically bore her awake!
- See the drearily bright and charming Rose Red and her lackluster magical flying book of humdrum wonders lead the party into retelling their extremely uninspired adventures!
- Then watch me summarize the session just as unexcitedly!
- Wahoo!
56
- Discolor and Shadow take literally seven eternities figuring out how they want to write and send letters. This is incredibly important character building and both are greatly benefitted by it. Seriously, in retrospect, who could possibly deny the value of the search for a colorful envelop? The drawing of what Shadow looks like, kinda?
- Next to that this whole business with the secret cannibalistic murder cult seems exhaustingly mundane.
- Anyway, then the cultists refused to do what we wanted so we whipped up a lynch mob. I think that about covers everything...
- In any case, I'd like you to do something for me. Go over to a mirror. With your right hand, touch the tip of your index finger to the tip of your thumb, making a circle on your right hand as if you were giving the "OK" hand signal. Now straighten your middle, ring and pinkie fingers on that hand. Using the mirror, trying and make your hand look like a lowercase "b".
- Dis here is our gang sign, "b" for "bearers". Dose monks shoulda known bettah dan ta diss us. Now let’s go fuq dem up!
57
- So, the question is, who is more evil?
- Those that kill the benevolent guardians of an ancient artifact stolen from a cursed god in the name of the common good?
- Or those that kill those that killed the benevolent guardians of an ancient artifact stolen from a cursed god in the name of the common good?
- I swear these "moral conundrums" get dumber by the picosecond.
- Anyway, we unicorn our way up the tower, the hornheads proving capable of defeating any trap or barrier save closed windows. Enter floating zony head.
- The only thing of note, really, is the sick shadhavar. I still can't shake the feeling we were supposed to do something other than kill it. You gotta wonder how a cloistered order could even have only one of its members fall to a mysterious illness.
- ...wait. Hold on a moment. I'm being told we did NOT kill it. That, uh... I mean, good for us! We didn't kill someone that wasn't a threat! Woo!
- Anyway, the tower proves ever odder upon us passing an astronomy room with no decent observation ports, a music box room with half its parts removed, and finally get to talk to the supposed guardians... who seem to have decided their charge wasn't so perilous as once thought and agree to leave.
- Why is locking up the murderers such a foreign concept in this RP? I gotta wonder why Ivy wasn't just banished for a mere attempt at murder.
- Anyway, we finally get to the top just as even more sentient beings are mercilessly killed for what will inevitably be even more benevolent reasons.
- Seriously, I bet this Elder God shmuck turns out to be a saint. Just you wait.
- P.S. Okay, I'm now being told we DID kill it. My bad. Go Team Euthanasia!
58
- Huzzah! Here we are, at the anniversary of when I joined the campaign! Isn't it marvelous? Haven't we all grown so much as characters?
- Emerald no longer kills helpless enemies, Akasha has stopped sabotaging allies in combat, Gabrio has more in his combat repertoire than grappling everything in sight...
- Yup, totally different. After all, NOW our dragon has a GUN!
- Anyway, after unicorning through every spell and barrier in the tower we come to the most daunting one yet... a hatch in the ceiling with no ladder leading up to it.
- What to do... what to do...
- Oh, right. Unicorn it.
- Thus we came to meet the big shadow tentacle thing at the top while the shadhavar attempted to unicorn it away, failing terribly due to the fact that they are, after all, not unicorns.
In comes our Mighty Whitey (warning, tvtropes link, see you in a few hours).
- In the typical fashion of half our biggest battles the conflict comes to a close when the bad guy suffers a loss, sure, but mostly just in his/her/its interest in continuing the fight, leaving us free to strip burning, stinking cloaks off of shadhavar that have been flash-fried and cut in two by lightning bolts and slap the fused and smoldering half cloth, half hide across our backs.
- Dang, that's classy.
- ...and then we find another element of harmony! Since these become ever-more relevant in our adventure as it becomes clear we are the destined bearers, the party naturally recognizes this incredibly important artifact on sight.
- *snicker*
- Thus we came to loot the final, untouched (by other looters) floor of the tower, scouring the home of the ancient order of anything remotely shiny. It's kinda ironic we only just got a career thief to join us, all things considered, given how much mugging slash grave robbing we get into.
- I swear we’re the good guys. Gotta take the big picture perspective. You know, see the forest for all the hanging trees.
59
- Having defeated the monster (kinda) and saved two shadhavar, we try to send letters we never finished under stars that aren't complete above a library puzzle with no solution atop a basement that isn't done. Which is, you know, a
- After a while we "fix" a wagon and make our way to
- There we get a trailer previously owned by one pony but that contains two bedrooms, because
- The shopkeeper was pretty entert
- We meet with the father of the mare we killed and somehow commiser
- And so we wrap up the session after Qotho discovers a book titled
- And White Eyes responds to our conversation about his daughter with
247
- *in a sports announcer's voice*
- Welcome, folks, to another exciting game of lead the PC by the nose, already bursting with action! Qotho's in the upstairs bedroom. He approaches the book. Oh no, words! He turns back, but wait, a note! Qotho goes back in, he opens the book, looks at the note... words again! Who could have guessed?! He turns, he's leaving, but wait, wait... he goes in again. He goes in again, folks. The GM’s made the book is shiny, folks. I repeat, the book is now SHINY! The book is shiny and he's taking it, boring words and all! And the GM goes wiiiiiiiiild!
- All while the rest of the team comforts Whitey into setting up a meeting with the enemy (because it can't be a trap if we step into it intentionally), so we head off for that.
- ...oh, and then Discolor talks a bunch.
-1 1/4
- (starting from the OOB)
- Rosie: I hate my government. I hate my city and its nobility. I hate my dad. I hate that he hates me. I hate that he didn't give me money and power at birth. I hate those with money and power from birth. I hate that I have to earn money and power. I hate that I'm not earning it. I hate that I'm living the life she laid out for me. I hate having the education she gave me. I hate having the job she set up for me. I hate how quickly I've advanced in it. I'd hate to quit it, though, because I'd hate to not be getting a paycheck. That I hate everything about what I do, where I am, and where I'm headed is only surpassed by how much I'd hate not all of these things... because I'd hate to change any of it.
- Discolor: Well... that's nice, I suppose.
- Rosie: *sips tea* Don't worry, I don't hate you yet. So, tell me about yourself. Your family, your political stance, your stance on monogamous relationships, all the hot button issues.
- Discolor: *explains*
- Rosie: Kay, well... uh, I still don't hate this tea. *sips again*
- *camera pans to fountain with an A+ solar goddess butt*
- Holy: Try the water! It's amazing!
- Rosie: *sips* *mutates* Hey, I don't hate this!
- *everyone tries magical mystery "water", particularly the drug addict *
- Rosie: Now let me lead you all in a chant. "Oh, Celestia, least hate-worthy of all beings..."
- Holy: ...you didn't fix it.
- Emerald: It's because you're not important. We're heroes, not good-deed-doers.
- Gabrio: Have we tried hugging it? Rubbing its belly? Telling it that it's a pretty pony fountain?
- Translucent magic-mutated zebra: I vote we drink from it more. It's what it's there for.
- Emerald: No, we're going. Say goodbye to the plebs, everybody.
- Everyone: *waves*
- Holy: *waves back* ...how the heck did those people become bearers...
62
- Holy crap, Akasha, not again...
63
- Holy crap, [insert name of CD’s character], not again...
- (plus a space chicken)
64
Excerpts from Quick Cut’s patient log, dated 13 Gourds 3336 AE
9:40
- Dragon came in with a broken wing, said she got it from falling out of the sky. Matched the description (well, "projected illusion") of one of the kidnappers of that weird unicorn with rope burns and a horn full of holes I treated yesterday. I asked the receptionist if she could contact the police, but she didn't know where they were, so I guess there's no helping it. Scanned, set, patched, and sent on her way.
10:10
- Bob, Weave, Duck, and Cover came in. After weeks spent wracking my brains for puns about their condition they and the dragon's friends burned through the entire stock in less than ten minutes. I swear, nobody knows how hard I work around here. They'll see, though. One day I'll be out on that stage in my big rubber shoes... um, right, uh, Bob died, so I had to break out the ol' hacksaw. Looked like hell afterward, but eh, it's not like they weren't ugly as sin to begin with, so no big loss.
11:10
- Gabriel came in and complained about sexual harassment in my office. Again. That girl's way too sensitive. Tightened her braces a bit and sent her back out with a smack on the butt. Dang, do I like watching her leave...
12:00
- Lunch was good, even if I did have to share. The receptionist said she didn't know any places to get food. Weird.
13:15
- Griffin came in with an infected nipple (they have those?). His belly was also covered with tiny puncture wounds. I wish Crank Shaft would stop letting people hug her. Probably in league with my band-aid supplier... and making a mint.
14:05
- Speak of the devil. Crank Shaft came in, several piercings bleeding. Seemed she'd needed to use some with an installation. Insisted this sort of thing never happened (for the fourth time this week) and that "Hey, if I see something metal, I stick it through me. What, do you have something against self-expression?"
- Yes, I apparently do.
14:40
- Two stallions came in, the first with a twisted ankle (said he got it kicking a ghost in the face) and the other covered in broken glass (said he was thrown out the window by said ghost and her ghost buddies). I was considering calling in a psych, but...
15:25
- A ghost came in covered with burns and bruises. Apparently she'd been hit by a cart, set on fire, shoved though a wall and then kicked back out again.
- I swear, I'm either drinking too much, or not enough.
17:00
- Done for the day. After escort my receptionist home again (“What do I look like, a map?”). Treated myself for stress with a couple glasses of vodka. Definitely not enough.
65
Having noted our illegal weaponry, the local authorities wisely decide to avoid confronting the visiting troop of questionable "heroes". Which is a good thing, too, since they might have had a more difficult time overlooking the hostage situation.
- We then astonish and confound Bryce for the umpteenth time this game, though in a good way this time, due to caring about another player character. Tears were probably shed.
Of course, it's not long after that we get: "Oct 07 21:17:03 <Bryce-GM> I should just start killing characters who wander off. We could even justify it in universe. Some kind of curse. Be sitting in the bathroom and Akasha is watching you pee because if you get more than 4m away from another party member you will die, except that she isn't quite sure what a meter is and there's kinda a dispute, and so she insists on following you into the stall to be on the safe side. That's what will happen. Curses and zebras watching you pee."
- Heading back to the shrine of Nova, the well-bred goddess of we're-aiming-for-renewal, we finally have that meeting White Eyes set up for us before he realized we stole his diary and most boring book (strangely NOT one-and-the-same).
- Risen Bones' trusted representative then captivated us, answering our queries regarding Risen Bones' activities, New Dawn, the theft of the element and Princess Nova herself with such reasoned and comprehensive answers as "Good stuff.", "Killing clerics is bad.", "Interesting.", and "She exists." respectively.
- Someone please tell me we're going to tie her down and truth magic her into a fireball at the end of all this...
65
- I'm not sure if Stonespell is a spin artist, a doublethinker, or just doesn't listen to the things that come out of her own mouth, but there's definitely something seriously flawed about her head.
- Stonespell: "...so yes, don't think of it as a 'hostile takeover', just think of it as people willingly embracing their new princess before we have to force them. I mean, what kind of benevolent overlords would we be if we went around attacking people before they even have a chance to unconditionally surrender to us?"
Emerald: "Well, I am the Lorax, I speak for the magical tree rocks, and they don't like this idea. Or you."
- Stonespell: "Sigh... look, you can't argue with genetic engineering. We made an alicorn, alicorns are good, so we are the good. Stop paying attention to what we're doing or saying and just prostrate yourself before her!"
- Rosie: "Only if she does it first. And if I get to stand behind her. For as long as I want. With... with a camera, and... and a privacy booth! For praying. And stuff. Actually, could I get one of those now..?"
- Emerald: "No way, mob rule is best rule. Everyone knows that."
- Rosie: "Quiet, Emerald! You're being a total plot-blocker right now!"
- Gabrio: "Look, all this arguing about whatever-I-wasn't-really-listening is getting us nowhere, so can't we all just agree to let me hug you?"
- Stonespell: "No, I want to make this perfectly clear... the ONLY people who could POSSIBLY disagree with Nova's absolute domination of this land would be criminals that need to be hunted down and tortured to death."
- Gabrio: "...can the torture be hugging? And, I dunno, not end in death?"
- Stonespell: "Sigh... just like a predator to not want to kill prey."
- Gabrio: "...I am a very confused cat-bird-luchador right now. Emerald, Rosie, could you... and now you're making out."
- Emerald: "No no no, you misunderstand. I'm asexual. This is just... lip... massaging. Totally different."
- Rosie: "Well, whatever it is, you know what they say... a butt in the hoof is worth two on the pulpit. Color me convinced."
- Discolor: *watching contentedly* "Me too!"
66
- I don't remember.
67
- Flint Spark: Okay, so yes, I, the bearer of generosity, am dating Elly, who's a librarian, who's a goddess, who's in an ancient changeling anti-dread monster spaceship. Oh, and our boss is an undead abomination that's definitely not as pro-rape as he used to be. Any questions?
- Akasha: ...just one I can't deny. I've smoked too much, haven't I?
68
- We ran from a broken-down building. Uh... comically?
82
- And so we arrive in Trenchtown: the most beautiful, prosperous, amazing city ever named after a hole in the ground after receiving our official fake IDs. Well, other than our thief, who you'd hope already had more than enough identities to get by.
- Gabrio and Merihu talk, using Akasha's shared-dream alchemy the way it was actually intended. Which is as rare as it is boring.
- Starwing grows some more, becoming more and more like a chocobo by the day. Won't be long now before a chain-smoking zebra rides a space chicken... a rather odd image, even for this RP.
- We visit Scales of Cinnabar, our only contact within Trenchtown, and that bridge is burned quicker than a vampire in a wine cellar.
- Rosie: "My goodness, what a godless, vile place this is. Good thing that cultleader I learned about last week's gonna fix everything!"
- Scales of Cinnabar: "Um, excuse me, gods don't exist, you diluted fruitcake. Stop believing in those not-state-approved fairy tales!"
- Akasha: "I'll believe whatever fairy tales I want to, heathen!"
- Shadow: "Come on, guys, can't we all be friends? How about we all just go out and kill some stuff?"
- Scales of Cinnabar: "That is not an approved activity. We can go read some motivational posters, though... and by 'we', I mean, 'Get out of my house, I never want to see any of you ever again for the rest of my absurdly-long life.'"
- ...though really, after she gets too old and infirm to be of any more use to the state, she probably won't mind if we stop by again when she's been repurposed as a pair of their leader's dragonskin shoes. Glory to Trenchtown!
- Anyway, not quite satisfied with how abysmally things already went, we steal from her and then head for the palace of the glorious leader.
- After all, Cinnabar was just practice. Now THIS bridge burning, THIS is the one that'll REALLY be bringing all the boys to the yard...
83
- This is it, the big event, possibly the most fragile negotiation we've yet to engage in. The party is ready to enter and appeal to the leader of Trenchtown, current anti-bearer of Loyalty, and-
- Shadow: Hmmm... I wonder what jewelry that cute dragon would like best...
- Akasha: *to Qotho* Let us go out on a date, I'm sure the premiere can wait.
- Random colt: Mommy, why is that rainbow zebra kissing the air?
- Rosie: Merihu, could we move our bible study over here? I don't think that guard has a good-enough view of my goodies.
- Gabrio: So yeah, there are some assassins that use alchemy and illusion magic that are trying to get into your palace to see Train Oil and steal her element. You should let us in to see her, and her element, as soon as possible.
- ...right, so, delicate negotiation. We should really-
- PN: Hi. Yeah, the deception was because we didn't trust you not to try and kill Train Oil. It's something WE plan to do if and when the element ever stops working. Just our best interests, you know how it is with coldblooded murder.
- Emerald: You should all kill yourselves. Right now.
- ...guys, this really isn't-
- Gabrio: You know what? I like these guys. They're predators, and if there's any cause I can stand behind, it's the predation of ponies. After all, that's how I met my girlfriend.
- Owen's PRPG2 character: And I like everyone. Good for you, Owen's PRPG1 character. Owen's magical creatures are amazing beings that everyone should love and respect, and you are as smart as you are beautiful, talented, and amazing!
- Owen's PRPG1 character: Thank you, to you as well! So successful, and such an interesting and beloved person. Isn't she amazing? Everyone, applaud how amazing we are for our incredible astuteness and strength!
- *crickets*
- Owen: ...ping?
- ...but yeah, it all-
- Qotho: What, I don't even get a line? I didn't get to do ANYTHING this session! RARG!
- ...as I was saying, it all works out in the end, so... hurrah?
84
- Rosie has an existential crisis about how much she bugs everyone.
- PN shows off how they know everything and see everything and are everywhere. Combined with their overwhelming magic and the fact that all of this power comes from the (indirect) love of their absurdly faithful/patriotic congregation... I think you know where I'm going with this. Particularly with its single mind and will with the desire for the sacrifice four-legged animals in response to acts that go against its will (IE sins).
- But what do you suppose that makes us with our desire to disobey them and draw away their flock?
- Gosh, you know what we should do? We should lure Nova and her cult here. Maybe we could convince the changelings to create a public face, rebranding themselves as "Nexus, the Goddess of Patriotism". With their ability to actually hear and respond to innumerable prayers/requests simultaneously Nova would have a serious contender to deal with...
- *before a congregation of Trenchtowners*
- Moderator: Welcome to the first ever Trenchtown goddess debate! Nexus, you won the coin toss, opening statements? Why should people put their faith in you?
- Nexus: *turns to the crowd* We can hear you. We can see you. We are everywhere. Love us and be loved. You, six rows back, fifteenth from the left. Rise, your leg is cured. You may return to work on the morn. You, twenty-seven rows back, far left. Fear not, your husband is safe. He shall return in two days' time, should the weather stay favorable. He was delayed by bandits, but know that the protections we laid upon him prior to his journey saw him and his wares through with minimal, repairable damage. And you, child near the front. Thank you for taking care of your mother. We know she struggles to keep food on the table, but have faith. Her hard work and dedication have been noticed and a position where she will both better support both her family and her city is being prepared. Things will change for the better soon. You need only have faith and, above all, love her. All of you, love yourselves, love your neighbors, and our blessings will never cease.
- Moderator: Wow, okay, so... Nova? Why should people put faith in you?
- Nova: Uh, are you kidding? I'm gorgeous!
- Nexus: *thinks for a moment before, with small, gentle waves of green energy, she grows a little taller, her hips flaring a little more, her mane fills with animate ribbons and lightning bolts in Trenchtown's colors, and all of her features become more feminine, delicate, and alluring*
- Nova: ...um, well... at least I'm all natural! And I have fruit! See!? Tons of it!
- Nexus: ...Miss Train Oil, we are confused. How is this our competition?
- Okay, one more.
- *after the rally, in an apartment building on the north side, a pony prays by her bedside*
- Petitioner: Dear great Nexus, please, I try to love my neighbor but she is just so awful. She stays up late at night drinking and cursing, she tries to get in a fight with me every time I see her. She tries to pick a fight with ANYone that looks at her too long, it seems like. Please, help your servant. Reach out to her and make things better.
- *a voice from directly behind her*
- Nexus: Brick's Hotel, room four oh five. Sandy Beach, ex-mother of two, divorced. Yes, we had recognized a lack of happiness and love radiating from this mare. That she is diminishing returns on our other investments is not acceptable. The issue is being resolved. *muffled scream from the next room* Do not look for her.
And yes, I realize this entry is pretty much the opposite of the word "abridged". It is both extremely long and has nearly nothing to do with our multiple-hour discussion (plus a couple rewinds) to continue pursuing an alliance with the changelings and not tell anyone about it. But seriously, what am I going to do with that? >_>
87
- Bryce was on point with a nice tour of the lands between here and yonder. Cloud pirates, jokes about cloud pirating, jokes about potential cloud pirating... anyway, pretty cool stuff.
- Then... a lot of the typical player time-wastey stuff as we fly about. More letter-writing from the letter-writers. More emotional heart-to-hearts about family from the emotional heart-to-hearters about family. More alchemy from the alchemist, more sleeping from the sleepers, more hugging from the hugger, yet a lack of stealing from the stealer. Might be something up with that.
- Anyway, Gabrio gets some new accessories, to which she squeals and runs off to tell all her girlfriends.
- We land and talk. Blah blah blah blasphemy. Apparently the islanders are all mini-gods and awoke their fire mountain to help them get more water. Sure, yup, kay... the important thing is that we can make it worse.
- With a tuppence for tickets to forge (or an in with the sovereign at large)!
- With our hooves off the ground we're all birds in flight, through the day and the night, off to our next big fight!
- Ooh Oooh Ooooh
- Let's go burn a town! Rock that volcano and melt it down! Let's go blow that town and send it soaring...
- Up through the stratosphere! While the survivors all scream in fear!
- Oh let's go...
- Burn that town!
Get to the mountain, it's boiling inside, but luckily we have a unicorn for more unicorning. She helps us unicorn to a unicorn that can unicorn our problem. Unfortunately, before he does that, he insists on unicorning us. Fooey.
89
- Now on to the 89th Weekly Super Duper Special Magic Wonder Turbo Little Horse Roleplay Two Golden Slam Dunk Masters Jam Triple Ultimo Combat and Friendship Forever Remix: Collector's Edition.
- We arrive at Fireblarg, Akasha at the head of the pack, spinning wheels and stomping about like a mad mare (surprise surprise). After waking a bunch of people up and threatening to do far worse, the party manages to lead the grumpy little zebra to bed.
- We meet that murderer we saved the life of and then kidnapped. He takes a moment to whine to us in moonspeak how unfair that whole ordeal was, I imagine. I wonder if he has any inkling just how irrelevant he is?
- Bright and early, we ditch zebra 2 to check out a surprisingly large library for a bunch of pyromaniac cultists living next to an active volcano.
- Akasha finds an ancient book speaking of the biology of the ancient and rare starbeasts. A book made out of one, in fact. Mixed messages. Meanwhile Emerald and Gabrio come to realize learning a language with no common roots and from a different dimension is kinda difficult and Rosie looks more into this whole stars business... I mean, they're not the moon, and they're not the sun, so... what the crap are they doing in her heavens? Blasphemous little points of light...
- We have some kinda argument about gender roles, I guess? It's kinda weird given how rare it is player and character genders match, here.
- Then it's all about who wants to do what after this. Rosie wants to get hitched, to which Emerald gets all judge-y about starting a relationship while on a quest. Qotho emphatically agrees with this, seemingly oblivious to the irony.
- Emerald, of course, just wants to go home and not have to deal with this nonsense anymore. Nonsense Akasha wants nothing but more of. I smell a sitcoooooooom...
- I finally get a chance to play drug dealer everyone acts like that's a bad idea. Akasha's been a chain smoker for as long as anyone in the party has known her and none of them have ever called her on it. If not for a sudden loss of connection I'd of RPed Akasha's shock that these people could have a problem with this sort of thing...
- ...and then the hugging. Again.
...you know, given Equestrian naming conventions (See the Apple clan), it's probably safe to assume all these people with "fire" in their name share a certain common ancestor. Did Firebug populate this island all by herself? 'Cause generations and generations of inbreeding would explain... everything.
90
DOO BA DO BAH DO BAAAAH DOOOO FWOOOOOOSH!
- Firetrotter: Hello and good evening, this is Firetrotter and, tonight on FNN, what does your virtue say about you? Later on we'll talk to an ancient pre-catastrophe ghost. But first, tragedy barely averted today after several local heroes nearly die in an untimely explosion of the bad kind. For more we turn to our correspondent Fireflight in the field. Fireflight?
- Fireflight: Hello, Firetrotter. As you can see behind me, this big weird looking thing is clearly dangerous in some way. The bearers of the elements of harmony, their companions, pets, and an anatomically-correct metal bodypillow waifu of Princess Celestia just barely managed to not set it off despite clear warnings I've been told say something like "Don't touch this thing". For more we turn to local expert on blow-up stuff and one of Ferburd’s seven literate ponies, Professor Firefirey.
- Firefirey: Thank you, Fireflight. Yes, as you can see, this big can is giving off "disruptive emanations".
- Fireflight: How "disruptive" would you say they are?
- Firefirey: Very.
- Fireflight: That is shocking. Why has such an explosive thingy been left alone here instead of used at one of the weekly burnings?
- Firefirey: An oversight, I assure you, we already have teams moving it as we speak. It seems to be making them fall asleep, but we're pretty sure that's only temporary.
- Fireflight: Good to hear. Incidentally, in the wake of this discovery of the explodey thing, a room long thought impenetrable was opened today using a key hanging next to it. A room determined to be full of blinky lights and a ghost that likes to talk a lot about the catastrophe. *moves to the room* Now, you call yourself "Seedan"? Is that Zebrican or Draconic?
- CDAN: It's an acronym.
- Fireflight: Ah, Anakronime, I thought as much. So, tell me, you've been about since before the catastrophe?
- CDAN: Yes, that is accurate.
- Fireflight: What have you been up to?
- CDAN: I've been stuck in this room the entire time.
- Fireflight: That's good, so, how do you think the future measures up?
- CDAN: ...I just... I just said I've been-
- Fireflight: Have you had the chance to attend one of the ritual burnings yet? How about any of the local food?
- CDAN: Okay, there are several things wrong with that-
- Fireflight: Hah, we'll have to see to that, thanks for coming. Firetrotter?
Firetrotter: Thank you, Fireflight. For our last story of the day, new connections are being discovered regarding several constellations in the night sky. Conversations overheard... I mean... research suggests those who are honest tend to have nice butts, while those who laugh a lot are more likely to die of starvation. As if this was not enough, those who are loyal like to grind rocks while those who hold kindness in high regard prefer to grow weed. Several police raids have been conducted as a result of this final bit of information, though no arrests have been made so far. Only burnings. In any case, that's all for now. Here at FNN, this is Firetrotter. Good night.
DOO BA DO BAH DO BAAAAH DOOOO FWOOOOOOSH!
95
Last time, on As Equus Turns
- Emerald: Oh, Cloud Lane, up until yesterday I had been nursing a deep, deep hatred for the changeling race, all the way from the changeling queen who ordered the slaughter of New Canterlot, down to the changeling mare who just wanted to find her daughter but was really, really annoying. I used to think you were all deceptive, manipulative seductresses, bending others to your will and taking by force what you couldn’t win with honeyed lies. But in less than two days you’ve shown me how handsome and charming a MALE changeling can be. Oh, my darling, please allow this poor demigoddess academian and future bearer of magic to become your broodmare now and for the rest of my life.
- Cloud Lane: My Sweet Emerald, you don’t know how nice it is to hear a nice young whippersnapper like you say such things. You make me feel like a young shapeshifting *looks between own legs* stallion again. Come into these old hooves and the warm green glow of my parasitic embrace...
Now, without further adu, As Equus Turns...
Bwah, bwah bwah bwaaaaah, bwah bwah bwaaaaah, bwah bwaaaaaaaaaah...
- Akasha: Alas, I did not dream last night! Oh, foul plant, how I hate you for doing exactly what I expected you to. My lungs shall consume you for this injustice!
- Qotho: But my love, I never dream. Surely it is not so grim?
- Akasha: Mayhaps not, but did you see how I managed to hit the plant on the first try? I'll take what I can get. Now come on, you can help me ride my c***.
some distance away
- Rosie: Oh, what poor, retched ponies. How cruel you are to treat them so unkindly, to have them as slaves.
- Slaver: ...it's just my job, lady. They all deserve it, anyway.
- Rosie: Even the children?
- Slaver: I don't call 'em worthless little parasites for nothin'.
- Rosie: Despite, might I please save at least one? Maybe even two? I have a coupon.
- Slaver: Sure, it'll cost you *offers high price*
- Rosie: Really? But they're so ugly and unkempt! Who in their right might is going to buy these snot-nosed little brats off you, if not me?
- Slaver: Eh, good-enough point, *offers lower price*
- Rosie: Ick, and it smells like they soiled themselves.
- Children: No, we didn’t!
- Rosie: ...and they’re liars, to boot!
- Slaver: Fine, *dirt-cheap price*. Now, you gonna buy their flanks or what?
- Rosie: Of course! Come now, children. You don't have to worry about being property any longer. You're mine, now.
back to the airship
- Rosie: Emerald! Look, I bought some children on the black market! That PROVES I'm responsible. You can give me back my big metal alicorn superweapon, right?
- Emerald: …yeah, yeah, that makes sense. Like most of the choices I've been making lately.
- Gabrio: Okay, so, with Emerald’s fling, it, looks like everyone's tripling up. Me, Merihu, and Discolor after the drugs kick in; Qotho, Akasha, and a showerhead; Solara, Rosie, and Emerald once she realizes her baby daddy’s not coming back and agrees decides to settle... that just leaves Shadow, right?
- Akasha: Uh, Shadow's, like, 10 years old.
- Gabrio: Perfect! Rosie, didn't you just bring back two ten year olds?
- Rosie: I sure did!
- Gabrio: Great! Akasha, break out the Ivy Potion #9 and let the "special hugging" commence!
Next time on As Equus Turns
Qotho: WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU'RE ALL PREGNANT!?!?
Gabrio: *squee* I wonder who my sweet baby daddy is?
99
- As the six hour art and poetry exhibition ends to enormous applause (completely breaking my immersion...) an explosion lights up the town outside the amphitheater. Rushing out, our heroes discover the giant fire hazard they've been flying about with has gone the way of the Hindenburg.
- The party immediately springs into action, each doing what they do best: Discolor tending to the wounded, Shadow and Gabrio doing the heavy labor, Rosie freaking out, Akasha accomplishing nothing, and Emerald handling literally everything else.
- ...oh, and Qotho fading into the background.
- Following the great fire the three-eyed rave... rat (yes, rave rat, he parties hard), reveals Evil Emerald and Evil Akasha as the culprits, bringing the total number of evil twins in this game up to three. During the fireworks they stole those kids Ruby-Rosie bought to indoctrinate into her cult, convinced that we would turn over the elements to get them back. Something the grieving mother-master Ruby-Rosie is entirely willing to do after having owned the kids a couple days. Also something Emerald (per Winston) is entirely willing to splatter her for if she attempts it.
- That'll teach her for caring about children.
- Anyway, reeling from this revelation, no one even argues as Gabrio drags Akasha into a dark alley to try and address his most urgent desires before leaving her passed out on the ground. After which Akasha's boytoy takes her unconscious body to bed for tender lovin' spooning.
- "El Cochino" visits us sans any accent. Bryce, come on man, why did you give him a name like that if you aren't gonna follow through?
- The big guy says he's ditching Ruby since he didn't sign up to pick on kids. He's only willing to work with people only guilty of murder and arson. Thus: us.
- He outs a few compatriots and then reveals what was stolen was a secret Emerald-neutralizer the not-treacherous-at-all crew had on-hand.
- The mercenary Ruby bought then tells us that Ruby's afraid we'll be able to buy the mercenaries she's bought, then tells us where to go find other mercenaries Ruby's bought so that we can buy them. So we totally aren't walking into a trap, here.
- Finally, we convince the pig confront Ruby at his next opportunity with no backup. Akasha can already smell the bacon.
Ruby: Are you hungry for a hunk of fat, disloyal meat? Try my buddy Cochie here because he's burned and beat! Come on down and dine on this wrestling swine, all I need's Harmony to be mine! Aaaare you achin (yub yub yub) foooooor some bacon? (yub yub yub) Heeeeee's a big pig! You can be a big pig, too! Hooo!
Gabrio: Truly, his honor is only surpassed by his deliciousness!
106, 107, 108, 109
- Greetings. Today we will be presenting true facts about the Hues Unicorn.
- (really? Is this going to be a parody of that series? What do you call a parody of a parody? Eh, nevermind)
- Far to the north, just past Red Baron Pizzaland, lies the quaint metropolis of Sparkle City. In it we find the Hues family, a small family of many colors that have taken up residence in a book fort with fanciful wooden trim. It is here that they stay when they are not visiting their earth pony farmers or breeding. Or both.
- You see, the Hues family are eugenicists, which is a fancy word for having sex with whatever they fancy in the hopes of creating something the fashion world calls "designer baybays". To understand this, imagine you are at a food court with no one restaurant offering a satisfactory meal. To get around this, you take a little bit of food from each stand and then have sex with it. That is how the Hues unicorn do. Indeed, one of them appears to have mated with a bug in the effort to have some sort of mutant winged unicorn offspring. Here she even remarks on having had a discussion about mating with a bug with her own parents. Creepy. Oh, and this bat thing is going to be related to the mutant. Weird AND creepy; a twofer! True facts.
- Moving past talking about sex to your parents we can see a variety of other social dynamics playing out. Telling a grieving pony their friend went crazy and was blown into itsy bitsy, teeny weenie, yellow polka-dot meat chunks. The father playing around with some sort of weird magical skull thing of dark magic. The bird cat thing thinking the unicorns to be mass-murdering demigods. All of this while a large star-patterned bird, a flying cat, and a zebra move about damaging, even destroying, their surroundings. As you can see, nothing can phase the Hues. Indeed, if patience were candy, they would be among the most delicious ponies in in existence.
- (That metaphor seems a little weird to me, but whatever.)
- After a night's rest the Hues set to expanding their fort, purchasing from a visiting unicorn books whose titles sound like they came from a random book title generator. This is, most likely, because they are. Despite, many purchases are made and the book fort is expanded for the incoming generation of mutants. After this exchange the Hues are introduced to new activities, such as wrestling with the catbird by proxy, and the cat bird thing proposes to a swiss cheese unicorn during some drug-induced stupor. I am beginning to think this documentary should be about the catbird. He seems like quite the odd duck.
- (Hah, did you see what I did there, Jerry? What? Stick to the script? I'll stick you to the script!)
- True facts.
- Following this multi-day exchange of varied and strange activities the Hues see their pregnant spawn off as she goes to try and prevent an imminent civil war to the north, among many other dangers. Indeed, placing children in danger, even pre-birth, is as much a custom to the Hues as the ever-present hunt for the best breeding partners. Survival, and sexing, of the fittest is how the Emerald's mom ended up rearing exactly three spawn all the way to maturity, at least one of which is probably related to her husband.
- The traveling daughter and her cohorts, meanwhile, head off to catch a giant lizard to eat for the catbird and swiss cheese unicorn's wedding/feast/orgy.
- (...wait, orgy? What? Shouldn't this say... what? They're the same? Really?)
- This has been True Facts about the Hues Unicorn. Next time we will be following the catbird wedding/feast/orgy, because while it's freaky, it's MY kind of freaky. Oh yeah.
Skip A Few
115
Popping out of zebra wonderland we head north to hop a pegaplane to Nevershyre, land of the giant bald mini-appendaged anti-hobbitses. On the way the pilot hands off the controls to his 6-year-old to spare us a lecture on the folly of our heading directly into the great northern grimdark boondoggle. We sleep a lot on the way. It is not a coincidence.
We land and our three-ring circus is immediately taken for another lot of crazed wizards by the guards of... Free Town.
Okay, wait, when did... oh. Huh, sneaky wizard, enacting her will on those she considers her followers without their consent...
Anyway, crazy multicolored wizarding party, that's us, and so we're immediately ushered on to the one and only democratically-elected tyrant, who then kindly doesn't attempt to kill us over lunch as he lectures us.
After having spent several days traveling to answer Nova's summons we suddenly realize we don't actually know what we're supposed to be doing. So we call up Nova and...
116
...surprise surprise, more exposition.
The lecture becomes a reverse lecture, though, causing severe psychological trauma to the goddess/princess/librarian that fancies herself a symbol/warlord/sjw. You'd think a mare that's been a political pawn her entire life would know how to form a consistent narrative, but no...
We wrap up with Discolor repeatedly retrieving Akasha's old alchemically-treated severed-unicorn-horn-on-a-string from the bowels of the street outside our room's window. Akasha, being equal parts mortified and oblivious to the existence of the thing, opts to head to dinner with Qotho with the hopes that their fascination with the thing peters out by the time she returns, all while the narrator laughs maniacally in the background.
Sigh... you KNOW this story would have been funnier if the thing had passed from the RP as unnoticed as it entered it, right? But no, Discolor had to have her magic sniffer...
117
While Akasha and Qotho are out buying the latter a new Gaze-proof bum cover, not-Great Gabrio heads to the bar and chats up the place. Then we're off to meet a goat about a psychopath, tromping off across the wizarding world just short of the witching hour.
Ever-wary of bandits and deserters in this in this wartorn land, the one with literal holes in her head picks a fight with the first vaguely threatening group we come across.
Luckily murder hobo of the month is quickly restrained by last month's winner and, one ineffective interrogation later, we're in the city, our new bandit-turned-mareservant in tow, our thoughts brimming with equal parts aspirations for turning this country around and images of the unending cycle of alchemical sweetener consumption, expulsion, and recapture. Talk about a Carousel of Progress!
I wonder if Trenchtown would want to get in on this stuff if they'd heard about it. It certainly seems... efficient?
118
Holy crap there's so much talking.
120
Elly's Mom has got it goin' on!
All the expo we'd want and we'd waited for so long!
Brycey can't you see she's just perfect as can be
And Risen Bones is gone, gezz, this campaign's gone on so long...
The Northern Adventure
In today's long-awaited episode, we take a look back at this, the northern saga of our heroes journey. At all the conversations they had, and the talks they gave, and the communications they shared. Endless, relentless discussions, negotiations, and many other synonyms, you get the idea. So, without further ado.
Sootstreaks
- Sootstreaks Hi. I'm totally a warlord and boy am I glad to see you. This whole democracy thing? Perfect, I love it, love everything about it, especially the golden parachute I'm going to float out of this place on before-
- Elly: Shush, you. Good job, bearers! That's one down and only nine more to go!
- Emerald: So, part of this giant waste of time was already resolved before we got here? Good. Hopefully we can get back to doing something important before long, like getting my jewelry out of this ridiculous three-factor, music-eclipse-constellation box.
- Elly: Um... I feel like I should point out the long-term stability of the north could have a massive impact on the rest of the world-
- Emerald: Wait, this affects my LEGACY? Carry on, then. Let's just get this over with.
Numinous Spirit
- Akasha: Oh, hello, who are you?
- Numinous Spirit: *very quietly* I'm... Numinous... Spirit...
- Gabrio: Oh my gosh, she's adorable! Can I keep her?!
- Numinous Spirit: *squeak!*
- Merihu: Her flank is... acceptable... I suppose I can agree with this acquisition.
- Gabrio: Oh, Merihu, silly! Not like that, just to hug and nuzzle and-
- Merihu: -procreation, yes, understood. I get to pick our next prey, though.
- Gabrio: ...ha! So funny, how you joke!
- Merihu: What is a "joke"?
Baleful Gaze
- Merihu: Hello, virgin.
- Baleful: I'm literally having sex right in front of you.
- Merihu: Okay, then... your sister is the virgin?
Baleful: No, she's literally had sex right in front of me. Our mom held some crazy orgies in her day.
- Merihu: So neither of you are virgins?
- Baleful: Yes, that is correct.
- Merihu: *huffs* Then how the heck am I supposed to tell you two apart?!
- Baleful: ...okay, this conversation's done. All of you get the heck out of my sight.
- Akasha: Your head looks like a bird's nest!
- Baleful: Same to you.
- ...
- Merihu: I'm going to stick my horn up her plot if it's the last thing I do.
Genius Loci
- Genius Loci: Who are you?! Who sent you!? You'll never stop me, you government suits! All of time will be mine! Mine! Tick tick tock, I'll never stop! Bwahahahaha!
- Emerald: Ugh... I knew it was all going too well. Can I just kill him now?
- Akasha: No! Look at him, he's so interesting! And look at this room and everything! You say that retcons are some kind of crime? If I could, I would do them ALL of the time!
- Genius Loci: You can't fool me! You're with that necromancer! The one with the crazy theories about how directing the course of fate is "dangerous" and could "get everybody killed"! You'll never... what are you doing to my cousin?
- Merihu: OUR cousin. We have acquired her.
- Gabrio: Oh! Uh, no, I'm just hugging... and squeezing... and naming her George.
- Numinous Spirit: *very quietly, being VERY strongly hugged* Helppp... *gasp* meeeee.....
- Elly: Okay! Um, how about this. You join us, don't do any more experiments trying to change the course of future history, and we leave you alone!
- Genius Loci: And I get my cousin back.
- Elly: *takes Nummy from Gabrio" And you get your cousin back.
- Genius Loci: ...okay.
- Elly: Congradulations, bearers! That's three, with only six more to go!
- Qotho: When do we get to the rich ones?
Malign Gaze
- Malign: *looking at Qotho* Oh, hi sexy, what's your name?
- Emerald: I am Lady Emerald.
- Malign: ...well, SOMEONE has an exaggerated opinion of herself.
- Emerald: Not really. So, are you going to join us, or...
- Malign: Can you have the stallion turn around and lift his tale while you talk, "Lady"? It helps me focus.
- Emerald: Sure, whatever. Do it, Qotho.
- Akasha: No! He will not do it! *gets on Starwing, who changes his laser*
- Malign: Woah, woah, calm dow-
- Akasha: DEATH TO ALL PERVERTS!
- *boom, wrrrrrrrrrrrw, moob*
- Malign: Can you have-
- Akasha: No, he is mine.
- Malign: Oh, okay. Well, far be it for me to take another mare's stallion, again.
- *BOOM*
- Elly and Libby: There are two of me now!
- Emerald: This better not make things take longer.
- *OOC, things then take SO MUCH LONGER*
- *many sessions later*
- (Everyone: Why don't you just kill one of them?
- Bryce: No, that's barbaric! I have a much better idea. *breaks the soul of one alicorn*
- Everyone: ...so she's dead.
- Bryce: No, she's just sleeping, maybe forever. Completely different!
- Everyone: Right okay sure.)
Scion
- *party passes by a seemingly-endless parade made up of the products of the worst crimes against equinekind that could ever be imagined*
- Scion: Yes, look upon me and upon my creations, on all my beauty and perfection, and lament your own inferiority in my presence!
- Discolor: Awwwww, that's right, champ! You're such a handsome boy! And look at all this, you're such a great artist, and so creative too! Put 'er there, buddy!
- Scion: ...are you patronizing me?
- Discolor: Wow, what a big word! A big word like that deserves ice cream! You wanna go get ice cream?
- Scion: Um... *looks around to make sure none of his monsters are watching* ...yes.
- Discolor: Okay, let's go get ice cream. You're my little buddy, you know, right?
- Scion: Yeah.
Akasha: WHAT THE F&*^!!!!??
- Qotho: I KNOW, RIGHT!?!
Geldbit
- Camel: *screaming*
- Elly: Ignore that.
- Emerald: Already ignored.
- Geldbit: Greetings. To what do I owe the pleasure?
- Emerald: Join us or die, literally don't care which.
- Akasha: Oh my gosh, everything is so shiny! And are those drugs? My two favorite things!
- Qotho: *various thief-y noises* What's shiny?
- Akasha: *binks* Oh, okay. Just the one thing, then. Still good!
- Gabrio: Aww, look at him on his little throne! Can I hug you?
- Merihu: ...I approve of this one, too.
- Geldbit: Ahem, excuse me, let me rephrase: Greetings, to what do I owe the displeasure?
- Elly: We, uh... we just wanted... to convince you to join our democracy.
- Geldbit: Ugh, I don't really have time for that. If I let the people govern themselves the market for ice skating rinks that take decades to build in the frozen north will absolutely tank, and where will that leave me?
- Elly: With, I don't know, more productive pursuits?
- Geldbit: ...okay. Fine, I'll join. But I demand to be allowed to pretend I haven't for at least a few years. I need the time to finish constructing my new snow cone stand.
- Elly: Yay! Bearers, you're so good at this!
- Gabrio: This calls for a non-consensual celebratory hug! *HUGGGGG*
- Merihu: Mmmm... this is nice. Okay, everyone leave the room. I need to floof.
- Gabrio: *floof*
- Merihu: Hey, no fair getting started without me.
- Geldbit: This is my tent.
- Merihu: I said OUT!
- ...
- Merihu: I guess floofing OUTSIDE his tent is okay, too.
Scarflanks
- Elly: Okay, according to my reports, this one will be one of the worst. One of the most stubborn, intransigent, belligerent warlords of the bunch with the most unreasonable demands you could possibly imagine.
- Scarflanks: Literally all I want is water, food, and the means to earn more, all so that my people don't have to be bandits anymore.
- Elly: Well, someone is getting fired. I mean, uh... good job bearers! Again! You're so good at this!
- Akasha: You're welcome!
Saltwithers
- Everyone: Okay, so we'd like to talk to you about joining our-
- Saltwithers: Yeah, sure, do this word puzzle, first.
- *does so*
- Everyone: Okay, so we'd like to talk to-
- Saltwithers: What about the word puzzle INSIDE the word puzzle?
- *does so*
- Everyone: Okay, so we'd like to-
- Saltwithers: Wait, buy this dragon first.
- *does so*
- Everyone: Okay! So, we'd-
- Saltwithers: Sure, sure, just wait a second, gotta skip town.
- *follows, saves from crash, imprisons*
- Everyone: OKAY, SO-
- Saltwithers: Sure, whatever.
- Everyone: ...OKAY!
Malign Gaze again
- Akasha: Please listen to me, Malign, I think, as a performer, you would do fine! The crowds would adore you and your impressive power, and you could keep them enraptured for many an hour! So, just to make my point, I will put on a show. I think you will like it, so I hope you will go.
- Malign: Hmm.
- *Akasha puts on a show that takes a ton of time to draft and perform and exhausts herself like never before because of it*
- *much later*
- Malign: Okay, so, that show... well, let me put it this way. Give me an airship and a ton of money so I never have to see you again.
- Akasha: Awww...
The Summit
- Elly: So, opening speeches?
- Emerald: Let me just say that *massive impassioned speech about the importance of love and friendship and unity*
- Baleful: ...also, if we don't comply, you've an army in place and a supply route mapped to get behind our defenses and take us out.
- Merihu: Well, I mean, what is friendship without the occasional threat to someone's life?
The Mystery of EL
In media res!
BOOM!
- "What was that?" "Where was I?" "Silver?" "Diadem?" "Loremaster?" "Rubber panties?"
- Libby: ...well, this is awkward.
- Akasha: What the crap, Libby? I KNOW these are memories. What are you hid-
- Emerald: OUT! *throws everyone but herself, Libby, Flint, and Discolor out the door*
- Emerald: Sorry about that, Libby. Don't worry, you can get back to showing me how to soul-surgery now.
- Libby: Um... I guess. Sure.
*woosh*
- Akasha: Welp, that's it, I'm headed to the ship.
- Gabrio: Why?
- Akasha: But seriously, that felt like memories.
- Qotho: Mine had something about the Arcane Helix.
- Akasha: Wait... Arcane Helix. The Loremasters lead it.
- Gabrio: Why are you headed to the ship?
- Akasha: She possessed a diadem that was worn by a unicorn named Silver Sun.
- Qotho: Ooooh.
- Gabrio: But what about the ship?
- Akasha: But then there was Merihu's vision of a soul to be put into an alicorn's body when she was "mature"... Oh my gosh. Elite Librarian is Eldritch Lore!
- Qotho: Egads, they even have the same initials! It was right in front of us the whole time!
- Gabrio: *grabs Akasha* But Akasha! What! About! The ship!?!
- Emerald: *poofs in* It's all true! She DID transplant her soul into a baby, destroying its soul. She told me herself! Literally, in a letter written to Flint Spark, she said Risen Bones, at her direction, "stripped out and destroyed most of her endogenous soul, leaving only the parts missing from my own." That said, I decided it was more accurate to say it was just giving the baby a bunch of new memories.
- Akasha: ...
- Emerald: Oh, come on, who knows more about soul magic? Eldritch Lore, or the one who just learned it from her earlier today?
- Gabrio: Wait, EL is EL? I knew it all along! And after everything we did for her... well, there's only one reasonable response to that. *flies off at over 100mph and smashes through a wall, I mean the ceiling, I mean as;ga;sngg5n*
- Libby: Holy crap! Gabrio, are you okay?
- Gabrio: No! I've come to kill... I mean, uh... why did I do this again? It was something important.
- Libby: If you want I can tell you everything...
- Gabrio: That's it! That must have been it! Tell me everything that ever happened ever, or else!
- Libby: *begins explaining*
- Gabrio: No, don't tell me, I need to FEEL it. Give me your brain!
- Libby: No. But, uh... I guess I have this exposition hammer I could use.
- Qotho: This does not sound like a sane idea.
- Gabrio: Perfect!
- Libby: *smashes Gabrio over the head with the sledgehammer of exposition*
- Gabrio: *falls* Uuuuggghhh... again.
*SMASH*
- Gabrio: *shakes his head, gives a thumbs up, gestures to continue*
*SMASH*
- Gabrio: *convulsing on the floor with a seizure*
- Qotho: STOP! I cannot watch this anymore! *turns around*
- Gabrio: *eventually stops seizuring* Don't worry, it's fine. Everything's fine. If I don't get the rest of the exposition hammer embedded in my head, though, pretty sure I'm going to kill all of you. Or myself. Or all of you.
- Akasha: Why?
- Gabrio: Because I gotta. Look, you didn't need my permission to save a bunch of people from monsters, so I don't need your permission to get this hammer into my skull. Same difference.
- Akasha: No, that's crazy.
- Gabrio: Oh yeah? Who's crazier, someone who does this all the time *slams head into a wall* or your coltfriend? The answer is me! *gives Laughter, flies off*
...and now we're caught up!
I wish someone would number these for me
- Okay, so, this last session, I’m just gonna give you the facts, alright? Just the facts.
- Okay, so, we were like on this island, with all these forests and vegetation and whatever, and like our birdcat wrestler guy, he like wanted to get all this stuff in his head, you know? Emotional stuff about this millennium-old bird unicorn ghost with bad skin who stole books and whatever, ‘cause that’s what you do when you work in one of those evil libraries, alright?
- So yeah, bird dude got like this MASSIVE amount of stuff put in his head, so he was all twitching and junk on the floor, spazzing and not talkin and you know, when a bird pony got the bird unicorn to not be doing that. Like, super bad idea, right?
- Only it WASN’T, ‘cause the first bird thing’s girlfriend, who was this unicorn but with holes in the horn like it were swiss cheese, she was like “No, man, you gotta keep doing that!” and the bird was all “Yeah, keep it up!” and all the other horses in the room were like “Neigh!”
- Get it? ‘Cause like… well, anyway-
- So yeah, the birdicorn and the bird-pony were, like, together and stuff, so they went off to eat watermelons. Only then the holey unicorn went after them, so they gave her a super hard watermelon. I’m talking CRAZY stupid hard, ‘cause they’re some kinda weirdo hard watermelon pranksters or whatever.
- Anyway, this is where it gets weird. Holeyhorn got that watermelon back to the other horses and one of the striped ones blew it up with some kinda pudding! Made a mushy watermelon fruit-bowl-crater or whatever! For real, dawg, it was crazy. It was spicy and the striped one ate it and nobody else because seriously, there were SO many other watermelons.
- So then the striped one went and talked to this unicorn in prison about these worms that get all up in your soul and roost there like some kinda bird, but like a bug instead. I don’t know much about bugs, man, but that crap is scary, yo. The unicorn was all “I’m not gonna talk about worms” like fifteen times over and so the striped pony went back and said there were no worms. But that’s not what the unicorn said, dawg, you know? I mean I said what she said so it wasn’t that ‘cause then I would have heard differently.
- Anyway then the OTHER old ghost bird unicorn woke up, the one that was a copy of the other one due to a time paradox from the sister of the imprisoned unicorn not dying from a space bird for trying to hit on the striped one’s boyfriend. So then they told her what all had happened, ‘cause like crazy stuff had happened when she passed out. But like, that’s neither here nor there, man. Anyway, that’s all what happened, I think. How about that, huh?
2017-10-05 153º Session
Front page of the local newspaper, the Risen Review:
- Titanic Terraforming Truck turned from Tedium of Fighting Forest for Freeride! See 1A
- Foreigner Fabricates “Miracle Potion” in RBO Facilities, Clear Candidate for Eminent Domain, yet Nova does Nothing?! See 1B
- Red Baron Buried! Will Shadowy Sister Stand up to Righteous Rebels after Fight for Freedom? See our Unbiased Assertions™ on 2A!
- Rare Records on Changelings, Dragon Magic, and Genealogy Generated over Generations of Study, Suddenly Surrendered without so much as a stipend! See 2B
- Is Nova Now Allowing Outsiders Access to the Famed RBO Breeding Program, without Requiring Registration? Sources say yes, see 3A
- Opinion: Are shadhavars thankless refugees undeserving of the kindness given to them by ponies? You decide! See 3B
- Opinion: How long until Risen Bones reigns in his soft-hearted pupil? Sources speculate he might not even be able to... See 3B
- Weather report: Whatever the pegasi feel like, with a 100% chance of solar eclipse in 8 days halfway across the planet.
...and one more try...
Libby: Good news, everyone, we have a date for the eclipse! Just about three mon… I mean… eight days! Why, that’s not long at all, cosmically. Less than the blink of an eye, which is good since, cosmically again, it’s barely a hair’s width away. Never mind that at our tiny, tiny, miniscule scale, that’s about half the planet.
But I’ve got even MORE good news, in that regard! Apparently these old-timey crystal harvesters doo-dads can zip about at quite a clip! Just think, this’ll be the first time in millennia these thingamajigs will be speeding around full to bursting of people. Just wooo, zoooom, whoooosh, weeee, BOOM! AAAAH! AAARG! OH IT HURTS SO MUCH!
I mean, uh, EEEEE! Safe!
Anyway, here’s some books, and... oh, my. Flint, Emerald, Emerald’s baby, Discolor, Shadow, Akasha, Gabrio, Merihu... nine passengers? Oh, that’s not good at all. Discolor, let’s get a baby in you. Ten’s far luckier, and luck’s by far all you’ve got going for you, at this point...
Oh, wait, I forgot Qotho. Eleven's even luckier! Probably!
154º Session
(((warning, incoming political joke)))
- Emerald: *writing a letter* “Dear Ruby’s parents, I’m writing to inform you of the loss of your daughter. She knew what she signed up for. Have a good time.”
- Emerald: *looks over her letter* You know, no previous bearer of magic ever wrote letters to the families of their fallen enemies.
(((this ends the political joke, have a good time)))
- Akasha: Yay! Space plane joy ride!
- Nova: Okay, so, just so we’re clear… you are not to jeopardize the world’s best hope at saving the planet. You will listen to the space ponies and do as they say.
- *in background* [BEEP] [BEEP] Aaaaah! *crash*
- Nova: *facehoof* ...and tell Akasha the same when she wakes up.
- Gabrio: Don’t worry, we will succeed, even if we have to eat our comrades to do so!
Nova: I meant the AEC. The elements and, other than Flint, you can all be replaced. Besides, there’s still a chance the EoHs could just turn the crystal forest into a massive, starving plague of deformed changelings that’d wreck the world even faster.
- Discolor: Changelings wouldn’t do that! They’re perfect demigods of amoral benevolence!
- Nova: ...right.
- Merihu: So long as they cover their flanks, unlike disdainful ponies, it does not matter. Come, let us go say goodbye to the non-virgin Gaze sisters.
*scene change*
- Non-virgin Gaze Sister: …okay, so, bye, leave me alone, I promise nothing.
*scene change*
- Non-virgin Gaze Sister: …okay, so, bye, leave me alone, I promise nothing.
*scene change*
(((…and then we got on the ship. Log end!)))
155
LL: Hello, passengers, my name is Left Lieutenant Lofty Loam and I will be your tour guide for the evening. This is the all-environment constructor, AEC307, colloquially named Shippy McShipface, Equestria’s first and last attempt delegating even minor decisions to the masses.
- Shadow: Could it destroy this entire island?
- LL: …yes?
- Shadow: Neat.
- LL: Okay, moving past how-NOT-to-use-this-revolutionary-technology 101 *heads inside* this is-
Merihu&Akasha: “The sex room.” “The space room.”
- LL: No.
Merihu&Akasha: “Where you roleplay sexy astronaut pioneers and ‘colonize’ each other.” “Where you space in the space with space suits that space space.”
- LL: No. Again.
- Akasha: I’m putting one on.
- LL: Knock yourself out.
- Merihu: I request to do so for her.
- *Akasha bounces around in a space suit*
- LL: Next is the gallery, where all manner of pastes and… other forms of pastes, can all be made, with minimal effort.
- Merihu: We have a saying in the Dread Dimensions. It doesn’t translate well, but something like “Anything is a lubricant if you’re suicidal.’
*alarms sound*
GRIFFON DETECTED, ERADICATE THE CAT-BIRD FILTH!
- *LL quickly shuts it off*
- LL: Sorry! The computer’s, um, from a different time. Next room is the recreational room, where we-
Merihu&Akasha: “Hold orgies.” “Play space games.”
- LL: No and, well, yes.
- Merihu: Quick, grab the nearest partner of your same species and create children! *pushes Discolor into LL*
- Discolor: Oh! Uh… well… *blush* If we have to…
- LL: No, we don’t have to! Holy crap! Just… okay, here. Here’s the… the… berth. Oh, dear Celestia-
- Merihu: I knew it!
- LL: Please, no, a berth is-
- Merihu: When you make the babies! And these rigid beds with straps, yes, this is perfect. Gabrio, come, we begin! *pulls him into a room and slams and locks the door*
- LL: …it’s probably better this way.
- Discolor: Well, if everyone else is doing it, then… *nudges LL gently toward a door*
- LL: *to himself* It’s a different time, with different customs. And that’s okay. It’s OKAY. *to the rest* Alright, hyperspeed. Here’s the showers, it has showers, here’s the machine shop, it has machines, and here’s storage, it has storage, any questions?
- Akasha: Yeah, can I take this space suit off, now? It’s very heavy.
- LL: Of course. *helps, but as soon as the suit is off-*
*alarms sound*
ZEBRA DETECTED, EXTERMINATE JUNGLE-HORSE!
- LL: *silences the alarm* Ah! Haha! Different time! Crazy, right? So, anyway that’s… I mean, I guess there’s still engineering. Come on, let’s go down a level and-
*alarms sound*
ZEBRA DETECTED, DESTROY DESTROY DESTROY!
- *an elderly pony runs up with a hammer*
- LL: No! No! *shuts off alarm and stops the pony* Holy crap, different time!
- Akasha: Is it just me, or does this spaceship not like me as much as I like it?
- LL: I don’t know, but would you mind wearing dye while onboard? I think we can convince the computer Gabrio’s just a very big and oddly-proportioned pony mutant, we had tons of those back in the day, but it’s identifying you based on your monotone, which was oddly MORE unnatural for ponies pre-catastrophe than horrible genetic mutations.
- Emerald: I request pink.
- Akasha: *sigh* Okay. For space.
- LL: That’s the astronaut spirit! Now that this nightmare is over, excuse me while I go get myself the hardest apple cider-paste I can find.
*nighttime activities occur, including Emerald being a total ‘*blank*’-blocker, and Akasha decidedly NOT being one, and then it’s the next day, Emerald having had the most pleasant of nightmares*
- Akasha: Huh, how is this door open? And this helm so shiny? And this power panel so inviting?
- Qotho: I dunno, how is this computer so sexy? It just is, baby. *makes kissy faces at the computer as the flower pot on the holographic mare’s head blushes red and its love percentage slowly ticks up*
- Akasha: Yeah, but this spaceship startup book is so available, its technical writing so easy to comprehend, and-
- swicked: BRYCE!
- Bryce: What?
- swicked: Stop it!
Bryce: No.
- Akasha: …*resists temptation*
- Bryce: Awwww….
- *everyone says goodbye, gets on the ship, VROOM!*
156
- Oily Feathers: Awww... gosh darn it.
- Emerald: *autokinesises down, the bright red and yellow E on her chest standing out against her blue tights* What’s wrong, citizen?
- OF: Aww, well, wouldn’t you know it? These two darn puzzle pieces just won’t go together, ever though the book says they gotta, gosh darn it...
- Emerald: Hmmm... Let me see. *turns the first piece around and immediately slots it into place* There you go, citizen! You just had it backwards! See, you just had to flip over, then slot the male end into the female end.
- Discolor: Oh? Well, I guess if we have to. *lays on her back before Lofty Loam*
- LL: AAAH! No! But, uh, wait! Is that a group of Equestians of porcine descent? Hmmm… and they say they’ve run out of water.
- Discolor: So they crave to have liquid in their bellies. I know the feeling.
- LL: You are really stretching, at this point.
- Discolor: No, I’m not. Why? Would it help? *stretches*
- LL: Um… uh… I mean, what should we do? I don’t really want to stop. Should we just dump water on them?
- Gabrio: No, we might need that water, in case we come across a remote pig village in the middle of a desert suffering from a drought due to a recent camel raid and named the Great Steel Sty that’s in front of us right now.
- LL: So… this one?
- Gabrio: Exactly.
- LL: Then why not just give them water?
- Gabrio: No, of course not! It’s like the old saying: give a pig water, he’ll live for a day, teach a pig water, something something let’s go fix their pump.
- LL: We do not have spare pump parts.
- Gabrio: I’m sure you smart ponies can think of something. Otherwise, why decide to be smart at all?
- LL: What if they attack us?
- Gabrio: Then Akasha can fight them off. Remember when she nuked that small island nation?
- LL: Wha? *looks at Akasha*
- Akasha: I am become death, the destroyer of worlds. Rawr.
- *and so the party nearly-unanimously decided to wet some pigs*
157
- Shadow: We just got a letter, we just got a letter, we just got a letter, wonder who it’s from? *opens it* Oh, from my friend Saltclaw! Looks like he just got done cooking and eating the annual camel infestation.
- Discolor: The what now?
- Shadow: It’s called “Gourfest”, for the month of Gourds and, you know, other reasons. You know the drill, shortages of food and water with the approaching winter, tribal infighting, genocide, refugees fleeing their homes and shattered lives, and then we eat them!
- Discolor: ................oh! Lofty, since others seem to be eating out, maybe we could-
- Gabrio: Pidgedillas are ready! Pidgedillas! Here you go, some for you, some for you, should have enough to give you all the bird.
- Emerald: Gabrio, most of us are herbivores, we can’t eat this stuff.
- Gabrio: Really? Can’t you just decide not to be for a little bit? It’s really good and I put a lot of effort into them.
- Emerald: That’s... that’s not how this works. Here, magical powerpoint time. *begins describing the gastro-intestinal system of the unicorn*
[while that is going on]
- Akasha: I can fly now, right?
- Mayflower: *to Lofty Loam* Captain?
- LL: *awkwardly trying to push the bearer of kindness, future savior of the world, away from himself* Well, given she could apparently destroy us all at any time and has chosen not to, I think it’s okay.
- Mayflower: ...welp, you heard the captain. Here you go.
- Akasha: Cool, I haven’t crashed anything lately.
Mayflower: You haven’t crashed anything lately?
Akasha: I haven’t crashed anything lately.
- Mayflower: Sigh... Celestia preserve us.
- Merihu: You know she was corrupt and evil and abandoned you, right? As did Luna, and everyone else you ever cared, and ever will care, about?
- LL: Wha-
- Merihu: All you have left is Nova... or should I say Eldritch Lore? The evil being that killed so many in her pursuit of power and now walks around under the name of “Elite Librarian”, the name of the foal whose soul she had destroyed by a lich she subsequently killed and secretly took over the organization of so that-
- Discolor: Merihu? Go to your room.
- Merihu: Aww, for what? What did I do?
- Discolor: You know what you did.
- LL: ...what did she do?
Discolor: You don’t need to know what she did. You just need to know what I’m going to do to you.
[and while THAT is going on]
- Gabrio: *to Emerald* Okay, fine, I get it, I get it.
- Emerald: Oh, good! So, as you can see, ponies cannot-
- Gabrio: It’s because you hate me.
- Emerald: That’s not even-
- Gabrio: But what I don’t get is why we’re even having this discussion. Shouldn’t we be at where ever we’re going by now?
- Emerald: The Everfree forest, and look, we went over this *gets out a globe* Here’s where we were *points* and here’s where we needed to get *points* That’s a massive distance to travel.
- Gabrio: No, but that’s just it, give me the globe. So *points* we were here.
- Emerald: Yes.
- Gabrio: And we’re going here. *points*
- Emerald: Exactly.
- Gabrio: Yeah, exactly! That only took me, what, half a second to go between the two? Why did we even need the airship?
- Emerald: ...*opens more magical powerpoints*
And so our heroes continued their journey...
158
we fly, find a "natural" clearing, and settle down on the ground for a night
- Golden: It’s been tough getting accustomed to this new world.
- Emerald: Yeah, it’s been a difficulty journey, but rewarding. Anyway, Flint and Shadow? You’re taking watch shifts. Everyone go to bed.
- Akasha: *ignores, per usual*
- Emerald: *ignores being ignored, per usual*
time passes, Flint and Rusty watch the Wirewind, which we’re told is very romantic?
- Rusty: *puts a leg across Flint’s withers*
- Flint: Uh... I have a marefriend...s.
- Rusty: Oh, me too, but everyone knows it doesn’t count if it’s just us guys...
- Flint: *gulp*
Shadow and Mayflower watch bugs, which is less romantic, thankfully
- Shadow: How long do you think it’d take for those things to destroy this ship?
- May: Uh...
- Akasha: Anyone mind if I take extensive notes on this incredibly advanced and powerful alchemical machine and send it, unencrypted, to my family? No? Good.
- May: Um...
- Shadow: Akasha, if that alchemy tech was fully weaponized, do you think it could melt a continent?
- May: You... Ugh! You know what? They don’t pay me enough to deal with this sort of thing. *leaves for bed*
- Akasha: What’s her problem?
- Shadow: I dunno, but theoretically, what’s the most extreme, horrifyingly disturbing means by which we could “fix” her problem?
and finally...
- Lofty: Gezz, it’s been tough getting accustomed to this new world.
- Emerald: Yeah, it’s been a difficulty journey, but reward-
- Lofty: Ah! The crystal forest is going to overtake us! Sound the alarm!
- Emerald: Okay, skip this part.
- Lofty: What? No, we have to.
- Emerald: Skip! Okay, talking to Mayflower now. Hi May! Isn’t it tough getting accustomed to this new world? Let me tell you, it’s been a difficult journey, but it’s rewardi-
- Lofty: All hooves to stations! Emergency takeoff proceeding!
- Goldie: Powerplant up! Levels rising!
- May: Propulsion online!
- Lofty: Ignition!
- Gabrio: Wait, when did we land?
VOOOOM! SMASH!
- *alarms start blaring* Emergency! Breach in sector 2!
- Gabrio: I agree, let’s just skip this part.
- Emerald: Yes. Okay, eight hours pass and Emerald approaches Rusty. Hi, Rusty! I bet it’s tough getting accustomed to this world, it’s certainly been a difficult-
- Lofty: Helm! Bring us level!
- May: Trying, captain! Forward envelope is damaged!
- Lofty: *gets on intercom* Engineering, report!
- Rusty: It’s bad, captain, but the ship’s stocked to handle worse. Give me a minute or two and I’ll-
- Emerald: *gets on intercom* EXCUSE ME, I WAS TALKING TO YOU! Why aren’t you in Control? I was about to tell you how difficult but rewarding it’s been for me these last few months!
- Lofty: Now is not the time to-
- Emerald: And you! Stop interrupting me with this ridiculous “emergency” nonsense! We skipped it, okay?!
- Lofty: But... but...
- Emerald: OKAY?!?
- Lofty: Yes ma’am.
- Emerald: Good. Now, hasn’t it been tough, getting accustomed to this world?
- Lofty: Yes ma’am.
- Emerald: Did you know it’s been a difficult journey for me, but rewarding?
- Lofty: Yes ma’am.
- Emerald: *nods* And that’s friendship. Now, if anyone wants me, I’ll be skipping the rest of the trip in my quarters.
- Lofty: But... but it’s still 28 hours to go.
- Emerald: *glares*
- Lofty: I mean, of course, skip-away.
- Rusty: *on intercom* Um... breach is fixed. Looks like it’s holding.
- May: We’ve leveled out at cruising speed.
- Lofty: Thank Celestia.
Merihu: That B%&$*?
and so our heroes continued on their way
159
(((author’s note: for the sake of this abridge, the rescued ponies were crystal ponies, not normal ponies in the crystal forest. The reason for the change will become obvious, but wasn’t easy to explain in the course of the abridge)))
- May: *exasperated sigh* Captain, starboard side. Looks like smoke.
- Lofty: Coming from the ship?!
- May: I wish.
Akasha & Qotho: *burst in* Stuff’s burning! Let’s go look!
- Lofty: No, no, that’s, um... not smoke. It’s...
- Emerald: Sublimation?
- Shadow: But what if, theoretically, it’s a bunch of people burning to death as their entire lives go up in flames and they cry in miserable anguish?
- Akasha: Yes, what if it’s that?
- Qotho: Wouldn’t that obligate we go and help them?
Emerald & Lofty: No.
Qotho & Akasha: *zebra glare in stereo*
- Lofty: ...fine. May?
- May: Fine. *flies* *looks on monitors* Huh, okay, point for Shadow.
- Shadow: Sweet!
- Qotho: Okay, time to be heroes!
- Lofty: I don’t know, maybe the crystal ponies deserve to burn.
- Shadow: Theoretically?
- Lofty: No, I mean, look at them. They look so dirty... and sneaky... and jew-ely.
- Emerald: I agree!
- Shadow: Sorry, but I really can’t support holocausts I’m not responsible for.
- Qotho: Me neither!
- Lofty: You two go, then, and take the goddess-hater with you.
- Akasha: And me?
- Lofty: No, nobody I can’t leave behind.
Qotho, Shadow, & Merihu: Yay! *fly down to fight OP pyromage* Aaaaaa!
*skipping past the burning, miscommunication, and the avoidable (by both sides) zebra-maiming*
- Lofty: Why did I let you do that? Like I said, those dirty, sneaky jewels deserved it.
- Braised Qotho: No, I know what we did was right!
- Emerald: Yeah, I know it can seem that way sometimes. I used to get that feeling all the time when my sisters and I argued as kids.
- Broiled Qotho: That’s not the same-
- Emerald: Like the time we came across this burning house. They were all “Oh no, Emerald, we need to go get help!” “But what if the ponies in there are bad?” I said. Back and forth, just like that, so I did what any reasonable filly my age would do... I barred the doors until the whole thing was moot.
- Grilled Qotho: ...okay, maybe it is?
- Gabrio: Anyone hungry?
BBQed Merihu & Shadow: Are we ever! *rush to the mess*
- Deep Fried Qotho: What’s gotten into them?
- Discolor: I don’t know, but I know what I want to get into me...
- Lofty: *exasperated sigh*
- May: Heh, don’t worry, captain, just another day or so left to go...
Time to play catch-up to 163!
- Emerald: Stop, everyone. I hear voices in my head.
- Akasha: Oh, I’ve got lots of those. What do yours say?
- Emerald: Quiet, Akasha, I’m trying to listen.
- Akasha: Rude voices, then.
- Emerald: They say to “Go do” something... something... something......... “or else we’ll kill you.”
- Akasha: ...very rude voices.
- Lofty: Here, let me use another one of the ship’s “fake” unicorn horns to fix this. And... there. *flips switch* Now we should-
- Console: Encrypted Beep beep boop.
- Lofty: It couldn’t be simple, could it? Not this trip. Not ANYTHING about this trip.
- Gabrio: ...I’ll go make some snacks.
*one eternity later*
- Gabrio: And there are the squirrel cupcakes, the squirrel quiche, some squirrel chips-
- Qotho: Do you have a vegetarian option?
- Gabrio: Well, there’s some squirrel tofu, but I wouldn’t recommend it. It kinda just appeared on the menu, unbidden and unwanted-
- Qotho: So like any tofu. Sigh... I guess I’ll chance it.
*less of an eternity later*
- Qotho: I shouldn’t have chanced it.
*two point six eternities later*
- Emerald: I have solved the-!
- Discolor: *headbutts her* I have solved the psychic transmission puzzle! Do you love me yet, Lofty-senpai?!
- Lofty: Uh, well... *cough* It looks like we’re being forced, at missilepoint, to head to this location. Luckily it’s close to our destination, so... at least we’ll be close to saving the world when they kill us.
*flying noises*
- Lofty: Well, it LOOKS abandoned.
- Akasha: If you don’t count the garden. Oh! Let’s drop garbage on them!
- Lofty: To... test the landing zone?
- Akasha: To see who we tick off!
- Flint: I volunteer for operation Dump Down Ditch.
- Lofty: Get to it, soldier.
*filly approaches*
- Filly: Hi, can I spray you with my goop juice?
- Discolor: Hey! Nobody sprays Lofty with goop juice but-
*crystal timberwolves attack*
*super intense battle up until the wolves lose interest and go home*
- Gabrio: Great success!
- Sticker Bush: Hi. I saved you all from the crazy stallion that instigated all this. And- *boop* there, fixed your gate, too. You’re welcome, witches and witchfriends. Any chance you could help me ditch this scene? I’m a bit of a homeless wanderer.
Qotho&Gabrio&Merihu: Homeless, you say?
Discolor&Akasha: Wanderer, you say?
- Emerald: Competent, you say?
- Sticker: I actually didn’t.
- Emerald: It’s implied. Yay, new friend! Now, let’s go get permission!
*half a nano-eternity later*
- Lofty: Welcome aboard, Sticker! Here is your cabin *points* and that’s all you need to know! Enjoy your stay! *slams door*
Discolor: *grumbling* ...I wish I could be confined to a bedroom...