Twilight Sparkle Vs. Paintball

Title: The War of The Ages (What The [Insert your adorable curse word starting with 'f', such as: 'fuzznugget']-Where Did All These Ponies Come From? Stage)

Just so you know. We can move on now.

***

    Pinkie Pie sighed and smiled. "That's good, somepony's here! I was afraid after Author titled this chapter so kookily nobody'd wanna read it!"

    Twilight tapped the end of the pink party pony's paintball bazooka with her magic. "Pinkie, kookily is not a word. And stop breaking the fourth wall!"

    "But Twilight-"

    "NO."

    "Awwww...."

   "Go scout."

   "Yay!"

   "Quietly!

    "Awwww...."

***

    "You, Cadence, have got to be kidding me. This is our team fort?" Chrysalis asked as she trotted into the Archives' latest section, a fairly small one housing anything and everything related to the Magic of Friendship.

     Behind her, the entire floor hummed just slightly with the sound of the air loaded down with magic. It would take a unicorn's horn to detect, as besides being a conduit for a unicorn's natural magic, they could double as magical dowsing rods at times.

     Cadence looked only slightly worse for the wear, hauling her paintball tommy, affectionately dubbed 'Tomm', over her back whilst levitating an ancient leather-bound tome in front of her head. Her magenta eyes scanned the pages, until at last she gave an exuberant "Yes!" that implied something long sought after being found.

     Chrysalis just raised an eyebrow and waited for the explanation she knew would be coming in three, two-

     "It's a light dampening spell! We can use Twilight's alteration of it to bend light into a sort of capsule around us, rendering us completely invisible and, with the addition of a couple more incantations thrown in, nobody will be able to hear us or even sense us!"

     Chrysalis cocked an eyebrow. "And this will help us when other magic users are nearby how exactly? The minute we weave that capsule we'll be on the MD(Magi-Dar) for every magic user in a seven floor radius!"

     Cadence hung her head. "Oh yeah..."

     Chrysalis facehooved. Then yelped as a purple paintball hit her square in the rump. Cadence looked up just in time to get her wing painted a bright purple and give a return glare to her sister-in-law.

    Twilight only smiled and took the book, calling out "Operation Babysitter successful! Retreat!" before she ran for the ramp.

***

   Celestia crept along, extremely happy at how her fortress had grown. She'd made a portal in her Library Fort, and she made it so when she stepped on it she was automatically teleported to her Archives Fort, a massive construct. It'd taken her what felt like hours to build, made out of one of the shelving units and tucked in a remote, locked-up wing, the Starswirl the Bearded Section. She magically warded the lock and gate in as many ways as she knew how before moving out, browsing the other sections and every so often pulling a book off the shelf, throwing it into an inter-dimensional pocket.

   She was so busy raiding the Archives of anything useful, that she didn't notice the pink shadow stalking her, emulating her every hoofstep to cover the spy's own. She raised a black-clad hoof and pulled her night-vision goggles down, her forelock poofing up after the strap passed over it. She turned around and made a signal with her hoof, then turned back to Celestia's receding rump.

   The lights flickered and died, plunging the dusty Archives into darkness so absolute, Luna's night vision would've been hard-pressed to see ten feet.

   Celestia's horn flickered with golden light, revealing her gun was out. She turned slowly...

..........and came face-to-face with the muzzle of a cotton-candy pink gun.

***

    Twilight sang in her head as she trotted back towards Celestia's interdimensional pocket rip, pulling out all the books inside. Hmm..., she thought, I can make this work.

   And then she was gone.

***

     Lyra whirled, but not in time. She cried out as a black paintball splattered her cutie mark, then clapped a hoof over her mouth. Moondancer gave her a mental I'm sorry, as she slipped away in between the shelves. Then yelped herself as she came face-to-face with a smiling Shining Armor.

     'Wow,' Chrysalis mouthed to Cadence, 'He really gets things done, doesn't he?'

     Cadence smiled. 'Yup, best hubby ever!'

***

    Pestilence frowned. So they have the Guard-Captain with them now...

   As she mulled over what this could mean for her team, her brother slunk up the ramp and beckoned to her, throwing a cottonfog bomb. She made her way through the pink smoke, ears and nose twitching. When she found Discord, she stared at him expectantly.

  'Twilight's on our tail,' He mouthed, 'She's nearly gotten me twice.'

   A spray of purple paintballs ripped apart the smoke, causing the siblings to drop to the ground. They looked at each other, nodded, and then took flight, gingerly lowering themselves down behind the determined alicorn, and lobbed a paintcan at her before fleeing the scene.

***

THE FLOOR-BY-FLOOR BREAKDOWN:

67: *Quiet. Very quie-POPOPOPOPOP!*

66: ...

65: *Luna whips towards 'The Painter', jumping behind the tapestry as Discord and Pestilence thunder past.*

64: ...

63: ...

62: ...

61: ...

60: ...

59: *Lyra and Moondancer split up, creeping towards Sweetie Belle's unprotected back...*

58: *Nightmare casually hoses down Apple Bloom and Applejack from the air, flying towards the stairwell. Unless Lyra and Moondancer are gone by the time she gets there, she's toast.*

57-41: *Nothing to see here...HISSS...Just move along...POPPOPPOP!*

40: *Paint flys everywhere in cotton candy fog, from the ground and the air on all sides.*

39: ...

38: ...

37: ...

36: ...

35: ...

34: ...

33: *Luna pops out from behind a tapestry, followed by Succulent and Dinky. They converse for a short while, then hop back in.*

32: ...

31: ...

30: ...

29: ...

28: *I THOUGH I GOT RID OF THOSE CRICKETS!*

27-1: *Silence.*

The Archives: *Celestia grumbles, on full alert as she clops silently down the halls.*