Vite Tempo was bored out of her mind. She may have been just a filly, but Advanced Metaphysics and Rein Hawkin's theories on tears in space was colt's play to her. She was no older than her peers in Cheerilee's class, but she was smarter than most of the adults in Ponyville.
She chewed on her pencil and sighed. Being in an advanced placement class with a handful of ponies almost twice her age might make anypony else nervous. She got her fair share of strange looks the first couple weeks, but everypony had eventually gotten used to a blank flank beating them on every test they took. Sure, the possibility of a meta-universe that viewed her own as a television show about talking, techni-colored, mutant equines was interesting, but it was nothing she hadn't contemplated before.
During one of the rare occasions when Professor Mac would put the piece of chalk down and let the furious scribbling catch up, he would often stare out the windows towards the Everfree Forest. This had always made Vite giggle because she'd seen an errant light pink strand of hair show up more than once. She thought it was cute. It was also just enough to think about to keep her awake until Professor Mac decided to dismiss the class.
Vite had already grabbed her bag and bounded out the door before the rest of the students had put away their notes. Lunch was one of her favorite times of the day, she got to sit with her best friend Alltrades and swap parts of their lunches.
Alltrades was just as he always was, wearing his vest while sitting with his face on a picnic table and a lunchbox on his head. He always managed to fall asleep before Vite got there. She stood on the table and poked his face so he was shocked awake and sitting upright while his lunchbox was sent tumbling.
"Pow! You're dead!" Vite screamed just as the lunchbox clattered on the ground.
The look of terror on Alltrades' face was immediately replaced with a smile. "Aww, you got me!" He clutched his chest and flopped sideways onto the seat. "Urrrgh, gargle, death sounds."
"Oh, come on, put some effort into being dead for once." Vite hopped down to sit across from her friend and plunked her bag on the table.
He reached for his lunchbox and placed it in front of himself, "What are you selling?"
"Well, I've got a leaf sandwich and a bottle of Apple Juice." Vite hoofed at the poorly-wrapped sandwich.
Alltrades sat holding his lunch with a frown, "Weak. I don't care much for leaves and I know you won't surrender that wicked elixir."
"Well, I do have this..." With a smirk, she pulled a pudding pack out of her bag and waved it around in front of Alltrades, making his ears perk up.
"Ooh, that'll work." He started emptying his lunch onto the table. A few apples and oranges came tumbling out, followed by a thermos and a large piece of lasagna. "What are you buying?"
Vite eyed the lasagna, "Do you really have to ask?" Alltrades just snickered as they both unwrapped their meals. He gave Vite the top half of the pasta stack and she stuck it in her sandwich. "So anything cool going on today?"
Alltrades accepted the pudding pack as he responded, "Not much. You know there is never anything interesting going on with me, other than sitting here and getting my tail scared off by some little filly." Vite just stuck her tongue out at him and picked up her sandwich.
Watching this conversation from across the square was Scylla, ambling between vendor stalls. She had been walking to meet Alltrades for lunch but started window shopping when Vite woke him. After the conversation had thinned, she decided to walk over and join the group. "Hello, Alltrades!"
With a mouth full of lasagna, Alltrades turned around in confusion. "Oh! That's what I was supposed to be doing... Hi, Scylla, how are you?"
"Ah, not too bad." Scylla inspected the sprawl of food before them. "Is that an envelope under that wrapping there?"
Vite looked down at her discarded sandwich wrapping, and noticed that her mother had once again placed a note in the bottom of her lunch. "Why, yes, it is!" she said, as she took another bite out of her sandwich.
Scylla sat next to Alltrades and pointed. "Aren't you going to read it? It may be important."
"Didn't your parents teach you any manners while you were being home-schooled?" Alltrades shook his head as he pushed a different wrapper under Vite's food. "But, I guess since you asked so nicely, I'll open it for you, cupcake. Oh, look, it's sealed. Thanks, mom."
Alltrades placed a letter opener on the table from inside his vest. "Don't yell at her too much, you know she's only been 'normal' for a couple months." He reached across and ruffled her hair. "And be more polite to my guests."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll make sure to tell the next one that she smells pretty." She opened the note and tossed the letter opener back on the table. "Hey, do you remember my Aunt Lyra?" she asked, without looking up from the note.
Alltrades scratched his muzzle for a moment. "The bright green unicorn that got kicked out of the museum for screaming something about mythological creatures being real?"
His remark was greeted with a glare. "I've told you, she's not crazy. Her brain is functioning properly and everything she says could be possible in paradox space. Oh, wait, I see somepony over there. I'll be right back." Vite jumped out of her spot and went galloping across the square.
Scylla leaned against the table. "So?"
"Eh, she does that." Alltrades began peeling an orange. "Where's your lunch?"
Scylla straightened up, looking offended. "Well, I forgot it on the counter, again. I would have gone home to get it, but you invited me to come and eat with you."
"Well, I don't care for the clique of mares that have grabbed a hold of you, they're bad news. And I'm sorry, here, you can have my orange." He placed the peeled orange on a wrapper in front of Scylla and reached for the pudding pack.
"Oh, thank you, Alltrades." she said sweetly before putting a piece in her mouth.
He mumbled in response as he tore the top off of the container. "Eh, Vite never trades fair anyways, she's always stealing my fruit. Not that I mind, but it's whatever." He stuck his muzzle right into the pudding.
A few passersby stopped for a moment, but ultimately moved on. Scylla looked at him, concerned, "Uh, Alltrades?"
He rolled his eyes, but put the pudding carcass on the table so he could talk. "Yes, dear?"
A blush spread as she smiled at him. "You have some pudding on your nose." She pointed with her hoof.
He looked at his nose with crossed eyes. "So there is."
"Aren't you going to clean that off?" Alltrades shook his head.
He raised one hoof in the air while he placed the other on his chest. "Oh, for woe is me. I am naught but a simple colt. I know nothing of these table manners for which you chide me for."
"But... you have heard of them, because you know I'm chiding you for them." Scylla picked up a napkin as Alltrades paused for a moment.
"Maybe..." Scylla reached out and tried to wipe the pudding off of his nose. "Nnnope." Alltrades grabbed her hooves to stop her from getting it.
Scylla had a surprised look on her face. "Are you seriously holding my hooves hostage?" Alltrades nodded. "Well, I can play this game, too." She suddenly leaned forward and licked the pudding off of Alltrades' nose.
Alltrades released Scylla and clutched his nose as he violently flung his body back and forth. "AHHH, Stallion down! Stallion down!" He yelled as Scylla covered her muzzle with the napkin.
Vite sat down at the table without a word and looked at Scylla. She looked back at Vite and then almost fell off the edge of the seat as she went galloping away, hiding her face behind the napkin. "You're never going to get it unless someone spells it out, will you?" Vite was looking at Alltrades like he had three heads.
He laughed as he rolled an apple towards her. "Once again, your female intellect evades all realms of my simple male understanding." She shook her head as she stabbed the apple with the letter opener. "So what's in the note?"
Fancy hoofwriting covered the embossed letterhead from Vite's mother's workplace. Vite did her best to sound dignified as she read. "Dear daughter, Your father and I will be in Canterlot for a month. Your Aunt Lyra has agreed to take care of you and we will leave you with her as we leave Friday. Love, Mom."
"As always, you can feel your mother's love oozing off of the page." The letter was sent flying towards Alltrades' head. "Hey! Isn't today Friday?" Vite nodded. "Well, then, wait, what?"
"You know how she is. I have a key to the house, so I can just walk over and get anything I need. That and the fact that I heard about it last week between dad's drunken ramblings and her yapping with her friends during Book Club." Vite handed the letter opener to Alltrades and took a bite of the once-impaled apple. "Speaking of which, I spoke to Aunt Lyra and she's got some crazy board game lined up."
Alltrades wiped the piece of metal off and replaced it in his vest. "Please don't tell me it has to do with those 'hoo-mans' ponies have been obsessed with lately." A snicker sounded from the other side of the table. "Oh, come on! You know those are just silly tales to amuse the young'uns!"
"Well, Auntie Lyra has me convinced that this game will be interesting at least. Apparently it's got a lot of dice rolling and numbers. I do remember she told me that I could invite friends, Bon-Bon said having only one or two players makes it boring."
"Oh, cool, I love Bon-Bon's cookies!"
"Of course, I doubt any of my other acquaintances will want to join me, but I'm sure Scylla would come along if you asked her." Vite raised an eyebrow.
Alltrades didn't catch it as he scooped the scattered remnants of the shared meal into his lunchbox. "Eh, I'll ask her, but I don't think any of my friends will want to come either." The note exchanged hooves. "So do I just show up tomorrow?"
"Yeah, I'll tell Aunt Lyra I have friends coming over after lunch." She balled up her bag and tossed it into the box. "Three-point shot! Bring paper, though, they've got plenty of pencils."
"Can do, See you tomorrow, Vite" The pair nodded their farewells and continued on with their days.
As the bell rang for the end of the day's classes, Alltrades signaled Scylla over to him. "Hey, what are you doing tomorrow?"
"The mares invited me to go hang around Sugarcube Corner, why?"
"Nope, don't do that. I've got a better idea. Why don't you come play silly dice games with Vite and I?"
"Why don't you ask some of your other friends to play with you?" Scylla looked at the ground. "I don't know if I'd be any fun."
"Oh, that's nonsense! And besides, all my buddies are too busy with their K/D ratios and Clop of Duty." He patted her horn. "I think they'd just try to kill everything if they showed up, so it's probably better that they don't show up."
Scylla looked up and smiled. "Well, I guess we could try to have fun, can I be on your team?"
"I honestly have no idea how this'll work. We could be dragons eating all the foals for all anypony knows. How about if I come get you after lunch tomorrow?"
"Okay, sure!" A skip had found it's way into Scylla's gait as they left the classroom.
"Hey, Bon-Bon, which box had my old handbooks in them?" Lyra's voice echoed up the stairs and into the kitchen.
Bon-Bon put the dishrag down before responding. "They're in that special edition box next to our wedding album, Candycorn."
A resounding crash of boxes came from downstairs. "Ow! Thank you!"
"Be careful down there, Candycorn. I wouldn't want you to wreck my mother's good China." The sound of shattering reached her ears. "LYRA!"
"Don't be mad, dear, it was only the crock-pot." Lyra called out as she began climbing the stairs.
"It better only be the crock-pot. Your collection of dice is behind your old hope chest in the guest room. Some of the maps from the first campaign are in your old textbooks."
Lyra paused to kiss Bon-Bon's cheek as she went about collecting her items. "Honestly, how do you remember where everything is. I wouldn't last a day in this mess without you."
"But, Candycorn, it's our mess." Bon-Bon picked the dishrag back up to finish putting the dishes away from lunch. "Don't you think you should wake Vite up yet, she should be down here so you don't have to explain things too many times."
Lyra called out from the dining room. "Oh, my niece is one smart cookie, she'll probably pick it up faster than I did." The papers were spread about the table as Lyra tried to piece together all the important graphs and figures from her last campaign. "But if you insist, just call out that there's hay bacon on the table."
A loud noise echoed from somewhere upstairs. It was something between the sound of a sack of potatoes hitting the floor and the Apple family barn being destroyed, again. After a dozen wooden thunks later, Vite was sprawled out at the bottom of the stairs. "Hay bacon, table, food, nom all of it?" Such nonsense was typical of Vite after she had headbutted through a door and fallen down a flight of stairs.
Lyra turned to Vite as she lay upside-down on the floor. "Did you remember to make your bed?"
She looked at her aunt and then back up the stairs. "Umm, that's all the way upstairs. Do I really have to?"
"Hey, Bon-Bon, she doesn't want to make her bed."
"Vite, don't make me take you back upstairs, honey." Bon-Bon called sweetly from the kitchen, sending Vite scampering up the stairs. "Thank you." A knock sounded from the front door. "Could you get that, Candycorn?"
Lyra shuffled the papers back into their roughly organized piles. Alltrades and Scylla were waiting for her as she opened the door. "Afternoon, miss Heartstrings."
"Hello, Alltrades, who's your little mare friend?"
"This here is Scylla." they ushered her through the door. "She's the only one who would accept my invitation."
Lyra jabbed his shoulder. "Hey, you know those colts and their Clop of Duty, they just can't get enough." They shared a laugh. "So come on in and sit down around the table, I'm just finishing up sorting out my skill tables and monster charts."
Everypony took a seat around the table as Vite came barreling flank first down the stairs. Bon-Bon called from the kitchen. "I've warned you about the stairs, Vite. Stop doing that!"
She walked back up to the second floor and slowly descended the staircase with a curtsey on each step. Lyra applauded her niece sarcastically. "Please, Lady Vite, won't you grace us with your presence."
"Why, yes, Auntie Lyra. But, I do declare, there seems to be a deficit of succulent hors d'oeuvres." She sashayed towards the kitchen. "Oh, Bon-Bon, sweetie, would you kindly remedy this situation. I feel that I may act rashly in the face of such adversities." Bon-Bon just rolled her eyes as she placed a plate of hay bacon on Vite's head. "Many thanks, dearie." She waltzed the plate back into the other room.
Alltrades watched Vite with morbid fascination. "And now, we are able to observe the elusive blank flank in her natural environment. But, crikey, what's this? A plate carrying an army of hay bacon is being set before her. little do they know that the elusive blank flank is a fierce predator. Watch as she lays waste to this mighty force." The plate went flying across the table and straight into his gut. "Oof! Vite, I need those to live!"
Vite laughed with her mouth full of hay bacon. "One as wise as you should know not to mock the mighty beast during feeding time!" The plate was retrieved and placed on the corner table.
Lyra passed some empty character sheets around the table. "All right, knock it off, you two. Seeing as how I only have Vite with me for a month, we're going to have to streamline certain rolls and sequences for time and simplicity's sake. But first thing is first about this game. You see all these funny looking dice in this box? These are your weapons and your armor; your life and your death; your hope and your despair. Will the gods smile upon you, or damn you to the lowest levels of Tartarus?"
Bon-Bon's voice drifted in from the kitchen. "Stop being so dramatic and explain how it works, Candycorn."
Lyra yelled back towards the kitchen. "Okay, dear!" Several snickers were heard from around the table while she continued. "You see how all the dice have a particular number of sides? They're categorized by a d followed by the number of sides. A d20 is going to be the most important of these, and a d10 is commonly used with another d10 as a percentile, or d100. Here's how you roll up your characters..."
A knock sounded from the door as Lyra began explaining the ins and outs of character creation. Bon-Bon stopped in the middle of wiping a glass. "Hey, Lyra? Were you expecting any more guests?"
"I'm pretty sure these three were it, but could you check it out for me, honey?" Lyra went back to rolling triplets of d6s and babbling on about skill modifiers.
Bon-Bon set the rag down and ambled towards the door as the knocking sounded again. "Yeah, yeah, hold on a minute." She opened the door and was greeted with a large pony hovering outside. "Hi?"
He brought each hoof to the ground with a loud click and a vacant look. "Is this where dragons fall under the hooves of stallions?"
Lyra motioned from the dining room, "Yeah, come on in, we're almost done building the characters." The pegasus marched over to where the other players were trying to understand what flat-footed meant. "And you are?"
"The name's Sundered Earth, and I've got a Half-Orc Barbarian named Roth." He folded his wings as he placed a singular sheet of paper on the end of the table. "I've already got all the skills chosen, inventory stocked, and weapons purchased."
Lyra waved dismissively. "That's nice, then maybe you can help. We've got a human Sorceress and Bard, along with Alltrades' Halfling Rogue."
Vite's eyes went wide as her gaze settled further down on the list of races. "Hey, Aunt Lyra, what's a Tiefling?"
"It's basically a demon girl with ram horns and a dragon tail." Lyra answered, sounding uninterested.
The filly's pupils sparkled as she glanced over the race description. "I want to be one of these. They sound fun!"
One resounding sigh later, Lyra addressed Sundered Earth again. "Make that Scylla's Human Sorceress and Vite's Tiefling Bard." He nodded and began rolling dice.
After everypony's character was sufficiently mottled, Lyra collected the dice and set her blind up. "Okay, then. You all Meet in a Tavern..."
"A tavern?" Vite burst out. "Really, Aunt Lyra? That's boring!"
Lyra waved a dismissive hoof at her niece. "It's not that boring. Taverns are important meeting places amongst travelers."
"So we're to assume that all of our characters just happened to walk into the same place and decided to band together over a round of cheap drink?"
Lyra paused. "Why not?"
Alltrades looked between the mares. "Hey, Lyra, I'll have to agree with Vite on this one. Starting an epic adventure in the back of a tavern just seems sort of... pathetic."
Vite nodded at her friend as Lyra threw her hooves up in the air. "Really now? Does anypony else have a problem with how I run my campaigns?"
A grunt sounded from the end of the table. "Tavern starts with idle talking that encourages staying in character are important." Sundered Earth scratched at his chin. "But I thought you would come up with something a little more original than that."
Scylla tentatively raised her hoof. "I think it's all right, but it does sound sort of boring if we're going to end up fighting a dragon."
Lyra folded her forelegs together and supported her muzzle. "Hmmm" she mumbled and looked around the table. Alltrades and Vite exchanged uncertain looks while Scylla examined her character sheet. Sundered Earth just stared vacantly at Lyra. "So you adventurers want an adventure, huh?"
Vite piped up. "Yeah, Auntie Lyra, you said this would be fun!"
Several papers were sent to the ground as Lyra quickly shuffled through her piles. "The four of you awake to the sound of an explosion. You're greeted with the feeling of sickness and the heat of an erupting volcano. Glancing around, you notice that you're on the highest peak in the Shrouded Mountains, and all your gear is tattered. Your various temporary illnesses give you each a minus 2 on attack rolls. Roll for initiative."
The group just stared at Lyra, trying to understand what horrible thing they had pushed her into doing. After a few moments, Alltrades broke the silence. "That's for battle, right?" Lyra nodded. "okay, initiative against what?"
The Dungeon Master leaned forward. "Against the Red Worms that are currently burrowing up to greet you."
Vite put her head on the table with a strained sigh, "Oh, ponyfeathers..."
Alltrades slammed his hooves on the table. "Okay, just, wait, just... hold on... umm." He stopped for a moment and sighed. "What in Equestria is going on here?"
Lyra raised an eyebrow as she addressed him. "What's happening is that you guys just destroyed that bandit group I had waiting for you."
"Yeah, I know, but why were they there?"
Lyra just looked at her papers and mumbled. "Reasons..."
Alltrades applied a generous amount of force into his face with his hooves as Vite and Scylla looked at each other. Vite checked Scylla, Alltrades', and her own inventory before speaking up. "It's obvious they were sitting there because you wanted to try to attack us after those mountain lions kept dying with one hit each. By the way, thank you, Sundered Earth." He grunted back an incoherent response. "But the bigger question is why did they specifically attack the character that was holding that strange artifact we found in that cave halfway up the mountain when it was hidden in the rucksack?"
"It's because one of them had a spell use of detect magic." Lyra quickly pulled out a specific sheet of paper and started reading it.
Vite gave her aunt a disbelieving look as Scylla piped up. "But, I thought you said that circle zero detect magic had a spell range of 20 feet. The bushes they were hiding in were 35 feet away and none of them used the full-round action to cast the spell." Alltrades lowered his hooves and looked questioningly at Scylla.
Lyra put her paper down with a thump. "Okay, fine." She rolled a d20 behind her blind. "You search the bandits and find 3 healing potions." She waved her hooves for the players to hurry up.
Alltrades mumbled something as Vite took charge of the party.
Lyra brushed several papers under her binder as she proclaimed, "You hear the voice echo again. "Brave adventurers! You have done well to make it through the jungle, but I urge you to stay strong as you push on. The challenges within the ruins of Kuth'gal have claimed many a life.""
Sundered Earth sat at the end of the table with a bored look. "Maybe you should have doubled the hit die on some of those Wargs."
"And maybe you should have helped me when a gaggle of them tripped my character!" Vite screamed across the table. "I've already used two of the three pearls on my angel's ring so I didn't die!"
Scylla shifted slightly in her seat. "Well, Vite, you did pick a bard." This was received with a scowl which made Alltrades laugh.
"Oh, yes, mighty voice, tell us what lies ahead!" Alltrades boomed as he waved his hooves mockingly around over his head. "You've been ever so helpful, so far!"
Lyra waved her hooves back at him. "There are bad guys... and stuff!"
Vite and Alltrades both gasped as they looked at each other. "Oh, no! Stuff!"
Scylla wrinkled her muzzle in disgust. "Excuse me? A human with no shirt on just absorbed my magic missile? What?"
Lyra just looked back at her. "Yeah. Equipped items can do that." She shuffled one of the papers to the front of her pile.
Vite just looked at Alltrades. "My Halfing tries to see if this enemy has any enhanced armor." He tosses a d20 and it goes skittering across the table. "Seventeen plus my modifier of three is twenty."
The Dungeon Master explained the situation. "Your foe looks, quite simply, like a muscular human wieling a two-handed sword. He is wearing a few pouches that are strung around his shoulders, a large fur pair of pants, and a nipple ring." All the players just looked at her.
Sundered Earth changed his expression for the first time that day. "What?"
Alltrades was right behind him. "Are you telling me that this human has a nipple ring of plus three damage reduction from all sources?" He gave Lyra a stern look.
"Um, yes?"
Alltrades just stared down at his character sheet. Scylla tried to say something, but he shooshed her. Concerned glances were exchanged between Vite and Scylla until he finally spoke. "No. Absolutely not. There is no way that this human has a piercing, in his nipple, that reduces damage he takes by three."
Lyra just looked at her notes with a confused look. "Yeah, he does. And it does." she pulled a piece of paper out of the binder from earlier. "You were okay with the Aboleth mind controlling your character and making you dance like a ballerina, but you're not okay with this?"
"Firstly, everyone knows that Halflings are born to dance." Vite and Scylla giggled quietly. "Secondly, he has a metal ring... in his nipple... giving him more protection than my leather tunic gives me."
Lyra paused and looked around at the players. "Yes?"
Alltrades looked right at Lyra. "No. No, Just no."
"Okaaay. You open the door to the catacombs... and find nothing."
Vite rubbed her eyes as Alltrades took stock of the situation. "All right. It's getting dark, our characters need to eat some food, and it's getting late in real life. I vote we cut it here."
There were several nods of agreements around the table. Lyra folded her papers under her binder and placed that inside the blind. Sundered Earth just stood up and walked out the front door. "Hey, Alltrades." Lyra motioned to him. "Is he one of your friends?"
"Uh, not that I know of. I thought you knew him." Alltrades looked between the door and Lyra.
Vite stretched as Scylla covered a very marelike yawn. "Eh, who cares?" Vite piled the character sheets together. "Just as long as we stay behind him, keep our shared experience, and point him in the right direction, stuff dies."
Scylla checked the clock. "Yeah, but it's not as fun when he's just going full-on Iron Will at them." She looked over at Vite who was motioning for her to look at Alltrades. "Speaking of which, hey, Alltrades?"
He dropped the d20 he was playing with and looked around as if somepony had accused him of murder. "Yes?"
Lyra and Vite smiled at Scylla. "Could you help me out with understanding some of these mechanics? You seem to be pretty good at the Armor DCs and combat modifiers." Alltrades started looking for the die he had dropped.
The aunt and niece duo snickered when Scylla shook her head at them. "Uh, I guess so. My dad's out of town this month doing audits on buildings in manehattan." Scylla was a little taken back at the sudden invitation. "I make good popcorn."
Scylla made the d20 hover back onto the table. "That sounds like fun, let's go." Vite and Lyra were stifling giggles as the two approached the door.
Vite called out after them before they closed the door. "Don't make him too tired, we need him to play tomorrow." Scylla's face lit up as they walked down the sidewalk.
The aunt and niece duo could hear Alltrades through the wall. "Ooh, are we going to play some games like monopoly? Ow! What did I do?"
Vite was failing to contain her laughter and her aunt placed a hoof over both eyes. "He sure is a charmer, isn't he?"
Her niece almost rolled into a chair laughing. "Oh, that's nothing. You should have seen him when Scylla wore that pretty dress when he asked her if she wanted to get something to eat last month." The two continued to share a good-natured laugh at their friend's expense.