The Steel Beastiesby Sloped Armoured PonyChaptersThe Iron HorsesFillies in the ParkSteel Motor CarriageThe Iron HorsesWhat makes a morning better than one where you see your little sister smiling? A morning when your sister is smiling while playing with her new birthday present seems like good competition. It is truly delight to see such a foal play with a rolling toy by sliding back and forth with no apparent goal while giggling at your watching it. It makes one, in some ways, forget what the true relationship between the two is like. You may believe it to be a life long friendship. I merely see this as a ceasefire, nothing more, and nothing less. It's hard to find friendly ground when the title, "Overlord and Goddess of Equestria," can be easily transferred from a parent to her instead of me from even a cuter smile. I have a cuter smile. What makes this cute imp any better than me? She has one lone tooth sticking out of her lower jaw! Out of all jaws to start growing teeth in, she decided to start on the lower jaw? Sure. She looks like the stars of the night sky. I look like the bloody sun! She was even potty trained at the age of three! How does that make her any better than me? Mom even gave the analogy of the sun being able to roast an ant to a crisp, but the moon only bringing beauty in the sky! Besides, I made her birthday present. The birthday present is an adorable little thing. I made it out of pure steel! Name some other big sister who makes their toys out of steel. She hasn't cut her mouth yet, except one time I will refuse to go into detail about. It looks like a little motor carriage with a belted track around the wheels. Being a pony who represents the sun, I have a strong interest in combustion, so I added a little turning turret and a teeny gun onto it. It was an adorable little thing, because it looked like a tractor you could laugh out loud to! I told little Luna about it, and she painted a name on it spelling "Loltraktor." It was cute, but it only made me more furious when mom commented on how Luna was finally knowledgable in literary arts only by the age of four. I learned how to spell "ant" at age......seven. To avoid any suspicion about my intelligence quotient, I shall conclude that this toy was cute, given a cute but ugly name, and only cause one maj----minor injury. I like that toy. There would be times that i would try and grab at it to give it a spin myself. At least I wouldn't slide it up and down aimlessly. I would at least put it on imaginary adventures, like driving it through a canyon to defeat Stuff the Magic Dragon. But little Luna wouldn't share (more evidence why I was more responsible than her), so I decided to make another toy. Mine was going to be bigger and better than her little "leichtraktor." I crafted a bigger chassis, without the skirts this time, added more wheels and a larger belt, a more sophisticated looking turret, and then a longer gun. It was so much cooler than her little tractor. I even gave it a cooler, longer, and more scientific name: Pandycampywagon 2. It weighed more, so I could even slide it, let go, and the toy would drive by itself. While little Luna fiddled with her obsolete junk, I took my Pandycampywagon 2 to a spin through the mystical Everfree Forest! Ooooh! But, as expected of a little tyrant, Luna saw how much fun I was having and wanted to play with my toy! Luna approached and asked, "May I play with that tank?" "It is not a tank. It is a Pandycampywagon 2!" I replied, "And if you can remember the name, or even these instructions, you can play with it!" "May I play?" asked Luna again. "What is the name of my toy?" I quizzed her. "It's, um, uh, a Panzerkampfwagen II Ausf. C! Yeah, that's what it is!" answered Luna confidently. "No it isn't, so you can't have it!" I replied greedily. "But you called it a Pandycampywagon 2, and it is supposed to be a Panzerkampfagen II Ausf. C exactly! You're wrong big Celery!" insisted Luna. "Mom! Luna keeps mispronouncing the name of my toy!" I maturely yelled to Mom. "Um," Mom replied, "Your sister is right. You are saying it wrong. Look in this encyclopedia, because Luna is exactly right!" I took a look at the book to find that the name was, oddly enough, 100% correct. "How was I supposed to know the name of an other-worldly machine, or even verbally pronounce the Roman numerals and italics!? What are even Roman numerals?" I ranted and complained. "You are eight years, so you should know. I wasn't the one to keep you held back in 2nd grade," Mom replied. "How do I get held back in home school?" I asked in a surprised manner. "Honestly, 'Mother,' you prefer Luna over me just because she knows more 'encyclopedic' material. At least I am practical! I don't practice five instruments into 1:00 in the morning and wake up at 5:00!" "You don't even do anything!" argued Mom. "I still love you as much as I love cute and intelligent little Luna here." "Do you love me Mom?" asked Luna in an irresistibly adorable manner to Mom. Mom whispered, "You, more? Oh yeah, big time!" "I totally heard that!" angrily I replied. "I will get the crown someday! Someday! I will rule Equestria, and you cannot stop me!" "Whatever. You will be arrested - oh excuse me - 'grounded' unless you play with your superiorly cuter sister with your tanks." "Fine!" I shouted. Luckily Luna forgot about wanting my tank (Darn! I have that name stuck in my head now!), so one problem was eliminated. The other problem, unfortunately, was that I was ordered to play with Luna in a coordinated game. Hmm. Was it possible to use this 'game' to prove, at least to teeny Moona, who was the superior alicorn? While thinking, I pulled out an empty table, and a little gridded landscape map to make what looked like a board game setup. I got two toy flags and placed them on two spaces on opposite sides of the map, and then I got some dice to make the idea of random chance. I also magically built some extra playing tanks, which Mom ordered me to name intelligently: the MS-1, T-1 Cunningham, Renault FT, T-26, BT-2, PzKpfw 35 T, T-1 Med, and the M-2 Light. The game was to go like this: We would each have 5 tanks on each side of the board, and we could take turns moving tanks while moving all our tanks in one turn to different spaces. Tanks like the BT-2 were faster, so they would get to move more spaces than the Renault FT in one turn. We would role dice to determine damage dealt by and to the tank, with more powerful guns being able to role more dice for a better score. Defenders would role dice to determine armour effectiveness. I thought of all these rules in less than 10 minutes, so that should at least account for something. As expected, Princess Tuna picked all the cool tanks while I was stuck with the crappy ones, but I managed. The first game was a victory by the one and only me! And so was the next one, and the next one, and the next one! Even though my tanks were ugly, they seemed to be more powerful. I won about 23 games before I lost to one surprising move on the board. "Hey Celery, look what I made!" she announced enthusiastically. I looked to find a hideous looking tank. It didn't even look like a tank. It looked like a bloody stool on wheels. It had tracks, at least, but it didn't even have a turret. It had a long gun sticking out the front, so I insisted that Luna was cheating. "I am not cheating," explained Luna, "I made a new tank like you. I made a Marder II. I call it a Tank Destroyer. Celery, if you wanted to win, you should have driven around it with the T-20 to the back to shoot its behind." "But no level 2 tank can survive it!" I cried. "Exactly, it is level 3!" giggled Luna. She showed the Marder II, as well as some level 2 tank destroyers she had made over the course of the games. What first seemed like an easy win turned out to be a neck-to-neck challenge. As frustrating as it seemed, it also looked like loads of fun. Luna and I were now in the field of battle, trying to craft a better tank than the other. Only one question remained: Who would win? Fillies in the ParkThe game had evolved into a more sophisticated competition when Mom kicked us out of the palace because of too much noise. With Luna playing on my back, I lugged the heavy weight of little Tuna and the board table all the way to the Canterlot Gardens to continue brawling with as much noise as we desired. The games started getting harder and harder when Luna pulled out more powerful tanks out of thin air to brawl my tiny level two tin cans. being unfair, I decided to lay a line to what tank could be used at which times. "Ok, new rule. When you win a battle, you get five points. If you accumulate enough points, you are allowed to have a more powerful tank on the battlefield," I announced as I magically conjured up as many turreted and anti-tank vehicles as I could come up with to use over the course of the game. There were plenty of tiny tanks, but as the levels progressed, there were some heavyweights. In fact, I had made a level 10 tank which weighed more than a text book, which Luna rudely called, "The Mouse." As impressive as it was, it costed 200 points to get it, which Luna, of all ponies, informed me would take 40 wins to win. I accepted the challenge and we brawled again. To my advantage, little Luna had given me a tip to deal with her Marder II out of her own immaturity, so I stocked up on BT-2s this battle to over run her with torpedo tanks. Luna also adapted to my strategies, so we won a comparable amount of games to progress. We had both won enough games to pull out some heavyweights. Sure, it took certain number of points to unlock a level tank, but there were multiple tanks in a level. For instance, Luna chose an M4 Sherman when I picked a KV for a level five tank, with a Panzer IV, a T-34, and some others. These battles became more interesting than a simple "rush the flag" strategy. My KV was freaking slow, and Luna's Sherman kept tearing me apart, so I had to keep it behind a rock on the board to protect it from line of sight. There was even one battle when neither of us won before the turn limit, so we both didn't get points. All the drama started attracting attention as more alicorns became curious about what the heck we were playing. "What the heck are you playing," asked Cadence, a good little friend of Luna. "We are playing World of Tanks," responded Luna. "It's not going to be called, 'World of Tanks,'" I retaliated. "There isn't even a globe, so how can it be a 'World' of anything? Besides, don't even think about joining. One twerp is bad enough." "I bet Luna and I can beat you!" challenged Cadence. "Hey, that won't be fair! It would be two verses one then!" I complained. "Hey, you're eight, and we are only four, and four plus four equals eight, so it is a fair match," challenged Cadence and Luna. "Oh you are asking for a real plot-whopping!" I intimidated. I brought out loads of KVs and Hetzers to prepare myself from any flanking attack. As the new players they were, Cadence immediately pulled out the BT-3 because it looked pretty, and Luna drew out some M-2 Medium Tanks for the derp guns. I was so confident about me winning, I nearly passed out on one of the moves. I had my KVs lined up to fire at the rushing BT-3s. and three of my KVs blew up. "What the? How did you do that! KV armour is stronger than BT-3 guns!" I cried. "Simple. Artillery!" Cadence said in a pompos manner. "What is artillery? Is it a name for a tank destroyer?" I asked. "In a way, but artillery gets a bird's-eye fire on enemies, so it doesn't have to see!" she explained. "That's cheating! You can't shoot at something you can't see!" I retaliated. "Gosh, you're so loud! No wonder your mother doesn't like you," Cadence commented. "Hey! My mom loves me, and how would you know? You don't even live here!" I argued. "Whatever. We just blew up your last Hetzer!" cheered Luna and Cadence. "Bull shit! Rematch!" I angered. At that point I had realized that I crossed the point of no return, as thundering footsteps stormed towards me from behind. It was mom. "Young mare, you get over here! I will not tolerate swearing (or even you entirely) in my property!" raged Mom. Luckily I had practice my teleportation spell, so I teleported into my secret workshop to escape a painful talk about life-long wholesome policy. While I peeked out of the peep hole into the garden, I began to storm ideas to counter these cheaters for bringing in weapons who could blind fire. "Luna," I overheard Cadence say to little Tuna, "Your sister is an idiot." "I know," responded Luna. "No wonder she doesn't have a fan-base." That comment brought me to tears. Ok, not really. I still have a fanbase, and I wasn't an idiot. Mad, maybe, but not an idiot. But I was right to say that indirect fire was cheating. It is not fair if some tank can shoot at you without being able to shoot back. If someone uses an artillery, they are a coward. But who is the minority here, people who like to fight in terms of Boshido, or people who like to snipe away free kills. I knew I could not do anything about this new weapon to ban it, but I knew it was time to grow bigger. I would seek my revenge. I looked back at the yard to find Luna happy with more friends. "Hey Luna, what's up?" asked some fillies and colts. "Oh, nothing. Just playing this new game my sis made up called World of Tanks," she replied. "It is not called, 'World of Tanks!'" I shouted yet unnoticeably. "Oooh. Looks fun. Can we play?" they all asked. "Sure, but you can only start with those little tanks. When you win games, you get points to get better tanks. I have some pretty tough tanks, so you might want to fight each other for starters," Luna explained. "But what if we wanted tougher tanks sooner?" they asked. Luna put on her diabolical thinking face. With me knowing where this was going, I knew I was about to regret leaving that scene. Luna explained, "If you want tough tanks now, you can buy some golden tickets to purchase special tough tanks, like Lowes and Ram IIs. You can also buy gold tickets to earn more points in a game to get cooler tanks faster. It only costs 15 bits for every 3000 worth of gold tickets." Some ponies were interested and lined up to take advantage of this 'great offer.' I was furious that my little twerp of a sister was about to earn a hundred bits when I invented the game. I should have been getting that money. But the worst wasn't over. After buying their special heavyweights, each friend called their friends to buy, and soon there was a crowd of almost 200 little ponies playing World of Tanks (Damn it, now I have this name stuck in my head!). She was not going to get away introducing unfair artillery and turning the game into a business. I was not a filly. I was a big alicorn. The game was going to grow into a full scale competition. None of this babyish board game setup. I pulled out a blow torch and sheet metal, and prepared myself for a game piece that would not exactly fit on that little board table. Steel Motor CarriageFinally, after five long years of crafting and procrastination, I had finished my reaction to Luna's taking advantage of my "business!" My goal was not to steal the business, but to show who was the creator and the best at World of Tanks. By now, neither of us were little brawling fillies. We were now warring prematures. Luna, no longer with her little tank stand, got assistance from a sales company to turn her lemonade stand into a market. How a nine-year-old grows to be a corporate billionaire, I don't know, but it probably had something to do with royal affiliation, since obviously Luna was of the royal court. I, on the other hand, was forgotten. Luna no longer mentioned that I made the game, and I was stuck listening to the "oohs" and "aahs" of my friends about how wonderful Princess Tuna was at creating games. Perhaps it would have turned out better if I had finished the "revenge plan" four years, but you can't argue with me wisely spending my summers sleeping. With all of that in the past, I was going to make World of Tanks into an entirely new game, and no little fillies would be allowed to play it. The game was going to be super sized, and souped with a V-8 engine! It was going to squish that puny tank table, and probably any annoying traitor that got in the way. It was massive (almost the size of my living room!), and it was well armed with an 88mm pellet cannon! Yes folks, I made an almost life size tank to stand up against Luna's enterprise, and best of all, it was a Tiger tank! I was going to roll this puppy onto the street, into the World of Tanks tournament hall, and give people a real gander at what tanking is supposed to be like. After the breakthrough, ponies would retreat in awe, and inspire them to buy my life size tanks. Once that would happen, every pony older than 13 would experience the heat of battle and get the time of their life, rather than rattling dice on a board. Honestly, how does a board game stay popular for five years? At last my tank saw sunlight when I opened the hidden garage door from my secret crafts centre to the outside road. How no pony noticed this door for five years alludes me, but it was a lucky start for the day of reckoning. Slowly I rolled down the road, excited to see the expressions on every pony's face! Apparently, no pony noticed, but I continued over to the World of Tanks Tournament Hall. I felt invincible! With 100mm worth of steel separating me from opposition, no barrier was able to slow me down, or at least until I got dizzy from the rocking in the tank. Who was going to stop me now? A loud whistle blew. "Stop right there! Yes, you in the hefty tank!" yelled a police pony. Perhaps my tank was vulnerable to one force: law enforcement? "Problem officer?" I replied. The officer gave me a good long stare at me with my head barely sticking out of the driver's hatch. "Your left rear light is burnt. You better get that fixed if you don't want to get a ticket," he explained. "You can't give me tickets! I am royalty, and I have an 88mm pellet gun!" I imagined myself saying to the officer. "I know you are thinking, 'You can't give me tickets! I am royalty, and I have an 88mm pellet gun,' so I would like to inform you that I have direct contact with your mother, and she can put the law in her own hooves," replied the officer as I rushed off to avoid more trouble. The tournament hall was visible just over the horizon. Luna's World of Tanks was popular, but not popular enough to earn a hall within Canterlot boundaries, instead earning a well kept warehouse outside of town. It wasn't rustic, and it was a very popular convention gathering site. The last convention was a Rural Diplomatic Congress between Canterlot and a small village about four years ago. Otherwise, it had been three years of pure armored spectacle, as the warehouse had to be maintained every six weeks just because of overpopulation inside the building. What also made it less of a warehouse and more of a resort was the fact that a big neon sign was posted over the building to advertise this convention, as well as lights for flashing at night. How a nine-year-old gets a late curfew to run an almost 24-7 convention late at night, I don't know either, but it wasn't going to last long as my Tiger rumbled closer and closer to the enemy's gates. I was about 200 metres away from the doors before a loud siren blew. I immediately halted in my tracks and found barbed wire fencing magically rise from the ground. On each fence post was a red flashing light, as if Luna was prepared for my plan. As poorly thought as the plan was, I pushed forward and ran over the fence, and congratulated myself for making armor strong enough to withstand the crunching metal under the lower glades. As I approached, I caught sight of a sign saying, "Big Celery, keep out! You are still grounded, remember?" and another set of fences popped out of the ground. As irritating as this was, everyone would have to agree, the sound of crushing steel under an armored body was too thrilling as I continued over this fence line. At this point I also put on some good old '40s jazz in the speakers of my tank, and happily ran over the last fence line, bringing me about 25 metres away from the doors. After rolling closer, the window shutters opened to reveal magic-aimed machine guns spraying away at my front plate. With a nice pair of ear phones, I was able to withstand the plinking noise and blast the two emplacements out of place with the cannon. The door was right in front of me then, and I crashed through with my high-beams on to give some special effect to this dramatic entrance. However, would you find the entrance dramatic if you were to see what I saw immediately after the dust cleared. Luna had been catching up, and had an anti-tank cannon placed in the centre plaza where the game table would normally be. All the little fillies had cute green bowls on their heads to use as obsolete protection against massive firepower. Though the '40s music confused them a bit, the game was on, but now super sized. Luna screamed the fire signal, and the cannon blasted, not a pellet, but an actual combustion shell. Again, more proof Mom liked Luna more, because Luna was now allowed to acquire realistic military shells. Though her royal status probably allowed her access to military equipment, I was not deterred. I did a fine job with the armor, and the shot bounced point-blank. I shot back and missed, allowing Luna and her cronies to relocate the gun to a different location. It fired, and no more positive results came for them. They fired again, and no success. They fired again and again, and still no success. I, on the other hand, was a poor shot and kept missing, but I frightened them enough to keep moving the gun, or at least until I ran out of ammunition. At that point, the only choice to hold victorious was to ram Luna and here little pea shooter. She managed to dodge fast enough before I could ram her (and the speed of this thing didn't help one bit), and the high time had arrived. Luna spread the legs of the cannon, placed them in the ground, took a shell, threw open the breech, loaded, slammed it shut, and fired. Out of all the places to be aiming, you could guess where I was shot. The old saying, "Shoot it in the ass," now made sense too me as my engine was set ablaze. Knowing I was pretty much done here, all the little fillies retreated (victoriously?) with their cannon, with me having no clue what they were going to do next. I flopped outside the turret hatch over the yellow blaze which used to be my engine, ending with a few words about what I had learned today: The Tiger had horrible armor, was too boxy, and was too damn slow. It was time to retire back to my workshop, so conjure up a new plan to take Luna out of her place in a simple game of toy tanks.
The Iron HorsesWhat makes a morning better than one where you see your little sister smiling? A morning when your sister is smiling while playing with her new birthday present seems like good competition. It is truly delight to see such a foal play with a rolling toy by sliding back and forth with no apparent goal while giggling at your watching it. It makes one, in some ways, forget what the true relationship between the two is like. You may believe it to be a life long friendship. I merely see this as a ceasefire, nothing more, and nothing less. It's hard to find friendly ground when the title, "Overlord and Goddess of Equestria," can be easily transferred from a parent to her instead of me from even a cuter smile. I have a cuter smile. What makes this cute imp any better than me? She has one lone tooth sticking out of her lower jaw! Out of all jaws to start growing teeth in, she decided to start on the lower jaw? Sure. She looks like the stars of the night sky. I look like the bloody sun! She was even potty trained at the age of three! How does that make her any better than me? Mom even gave the analogy of the sun being able to roast an ant to a crisp, but the moon only bringing beauty in the sky! Besides, I made her birthday present. The birthday present is an adorable little thing. I made it out of pure steel! Name some other big sister who makes their toys out of steel. She hasn't cut her mouth yet, except one time I will refuse to go into detail about. It looks like a little motor carriage with a belted track around the wheels. Being a pony who represents the sun, I have a strong interest in combustion, so I added a little turning turret and a teeny gun onto it. It was an adorable little thing, because it looked like a tractor you could laugh out loud to! I told little Luna about it, and she painted a name on it spelling "Loltraktor." It was cute, but it only made me more furious when mom commented on how Luna was finally knowledgable in literary arts only by the age of four. I learned how to spell "ant" at age......seven. To avoid any suspicion about my intelligence quotient, I shall conclude that this toy was cute, given a cute but ugly name, and only cause one maj----minor injury. I like that toy. There would be times that i would try and grab at it to give it a spin myself. At least I wouldn't slide it up and down aimlessly. I would at least put it on imaginary adventures, like driving it through a canyon to defeat Stuff the Magic Dragon. But little Luna wouldn't share (more evidence why I was more responsible than her), so I decided to make another toy. Mine was going to be bigger and better than her little "leichtraktor." I crafted a bigger chassis, without the skirts this time, added more wheels and a larger belt, a more sophisticated looking turret, and then a longer gun. It was so much cooler than her little tractor. I even gave it a cooler, longer, and more scientific name: Pandycampywagon 2. It weighed more, so I could even slide it, let go, and the toy would drive by itself. While little Luna fiddled with her obsolete junk, I took my Pandycampywagon 2 to a spin through the mystical Everfree Forest! Ooooh! But, as expected of a little tyrant, Luna saw how much fun I was having and wanted to play with my toy! Luna approached and asked, "May I play with that tank?" "It is not a tank. It is a Pandycampywagon 2!" I replied, "And if you can remember the name, or even these instructions, you can play with it!" "May I play?" asked Luna again. "What is the name of my toy?" I quizzed her. "It's, um, uh, a Panzerkampfwagen II Ausf. C! Yeah, that's what it is!" answered Luna confidently. "No it isn't, so you can't have it!" I replied greedily. "But you called it a Pandycampywagon 2, and it is supposed to be a Panzerkampfagen II Ausf. C exactly! You're wrong big Celery!" insisted Luna. "Mom! Luna keeps mispronouncing the name of my toy!" I maturely yelled to Mom. "Um," Mom replied, "Your sister is right. You are saying it wrong. Look in this encyclopedia, because Luna is exactly right!" I took a look at the book to find that the name was, oddly enough, 100% correct. "How was I supposed to know the name of an other-worldly machine, or even verbally pronounce the Roman numerals and italics!? What are even Roman numerals?" I ranted and complained. "You are eight years, so you should know. I wasn't the one to keep you held back in 2nd grade," Mom replied. "How do I get held back in home school?" I asked in a surprised manner. "Honestly, 'Mother,' you prefer Luna over me just because she knows more 'encyclopedic' material. At least I am practical! I don't practice five instruments into 1:00 in the morning and wake up at 5:00!" "You don't even do anything!" argued Mom. "I still love you as much as I love cute and intelligent little Luna here." "Do you love me Mom?" asked Luna in an irresistibly adorable manner to Mom. Mom whispered, "You, more? Oh yeah, big time!" "I totally heard that!" angrily I replied. "I will get the crown someday! Someday! I will rule Equestria, and you cannot stop me!" "Whatever. You will be arrested - oh excuse me - 'grounded' unless you play with your superiorly cuter sister with your tanks." "Fine!" I shouted. Luckily Luna forgot about wanting my tank (Darn! I have that name stuck in my head now!), so one problem was eliminated. The other problem, unfortunately, was that I was ordered to play with Luna in a coordinated game. Hmm. Was it possible to use this 'game' to prove, at least to teeny Moona, who was the superior alicorn? While thinking, I pulled out an empty table, and a little gridded landscape map to make what looked like a board game setup. I got two toy flags and placed them on two spaces on opposite sides of the map, and then I got some dice to make the idea of random chance. I also magically built some extra playing tanks, which Mom ordered me to name intelligently: the MS-1, T-1 Cunningham, Renault FT, T-26, BT-2, PzKpfw 35 T, T-1 Med, and the M-2 Light. The game was to go like this: We would each have 5 tanks on each side of the board, and we could take turns moving tanks while moving all our tanks in one turn to different spaces. Tanks like the BT-2 were faster, so they would get to move more spaces than the Renault FT in one turn. We would role dice to determine damage dealt by and to the tank, with more powerful guns being able to role more dice for a better score. Defenders would role dice to determine armour effectiveness. I thought of all these rules in less than 10 minutes, so that should at least account for something. As expected, Princess Tuna picked all the cool tanks while I was stuck with the crappy ones, but I managed. The first game was a victory by the one and only me! And so was the next one, and the next one, and the next one! Even though my tanks were ugly, they seemed to be more powerful. I won about 23 games before I lost to one surprising move on the board. "Hey Celery, look what I made!" she announced enthusiastically. I looked to find a hideous looking tank. It didn't even look like a tank. It looked like a bloody stool on wheels. It had tracks, at least, but it didn't even have a turret. It had a long gun sticking out the front, so I insisted that Luna was cheating. "I am not cheating," explained Luna, "I made a new tank like you. I made a Marder II. I call it a Tank Destroyer. Celery, if you wanted to win, you should have driven around it with the T-20 to the back to shoot its behind." "But no level 2 tank can survive it!" I cried. "Exactly, it is level 3!" giggled Luna. She showed the Marder II, as well as some level 2 tank destroyers she had made over the course of the games. What first seemed like an easy win turned out to be a neck-to-neck challenge. As frustrating as it seemed, it also looked like loads of fun. Luna and I were now in the field of battle, trying to craft a better tank than the other. Only one question remained: Who would win?
Fillies in the ParkThe game had evolved into a more sophisticated competition when Mom kicked us out of the palace because of too much noise. With Luna playing on my back, I lugged the heavy weight of little Tuna and the board table all the way to the Canterlot Gardens to continue brawling with as much noise as we desired. The games started getting harder and harder when Luna pulled out more powerful tanks out of thin air to brawl my tiny level two tin cans. being unfair, I decided to lay a line to what tank could be used at which times. "Ok, new rule. When you win a battle, you get five points. If you accumulate enough points, you are allowed to have a more powerful tank on the battlefield," I announced as I magically conjured up as many turreted and anti-tank vehicles as I could come up with to use over the course of the game. There were plenty of tiny tanks, but as the levels progressed, there were some heavyweights. In fact, I had made a level 10 tank which weighed more than a text book, which Luna rudely called, "The Mouse." As impressive as it was, it costed 200 points to get it, which Luna, of all ponies, informed me would take 40 wins to win. I accepted the challenge and we brawled again. To my advantage, little Luna had given me a tip to deal with her Marder II out of her own immaturity, so I stocked up on BT-2s this battle to over run her with torpedo tanks. Luna also adapted to my strategies, so we won a comparable amount of games to progress. We had both won enough games to pull out some heavyweights. Sure, it took certain number of points to unlock a level tank, but there were multiple tanks in a level. For instance, Luna chose an M4 Sherman when I picked a KV for a level five tank, with a Panzer IV, a T-34, and some others. These battles became more interesting than a simple "rush the flag" strategy. My KV was freaking slow, and Luna's Sherman kept tearing me apart, so I had to keep it behind a rock on the board to protect it from line of sight. There was even one battle when neither of us won before the turn limit, so we both didn't get points. All the drama started attracting attention as more alicorns became curious about what the heck we were playing. "What the heck are you playing," asked Cadence, a good little friend of Luna. "We are playing World of Tanks," responded Luna. "It's not going to be called, 'World of Tanks,'" I retaliated. "There isn't even a globe, so how can it be a 'World' of anything? Besides, don't even think about joining. One twerp is bad enough." "I bet Luna and I can beat you!" challenged Cadence. "Hey, that won't be fair! It would be two verses one then!" I complained. "Hey, you're eight, and we are only four, and four plus four equals eight, so it is a fair match," challenged Cadence and Luna. "Oh you are asking for a real plot-whopping!" I intimidated. I brought out loads of KVs and Hetzers to prepare myself from any flanking attack. As the new players they were, Cadence immediately pulled out the BT-3 because it looked pretty, and Luna drew out some M-2 Medium Tanks for the derp guns. I was so confident about me winning, I nearly passed out on one of the moves. I had my KVs lined up to fire at the rushing BT-3s. and three of my KVs blew up. "What the? How did you do that! KV armour is stronger than BT-3 guns!" I cried. "Simple. Artillery!" Cadence said in a pompos manner. "What is artillery? Is it a name for a tank destroyer?" I asked. "In a way, but artillery gets a bird's-eye fire on enemies, so it doesn't have to see!" she explained. "That's cheating! You can't shoot at something you can't see!" I retaliated. "Gosh, you're so loud! No wonder your mother doesn't like you," Cadence commented. "Hey! My mom loves me, and how would you know? You don't even live here!" I argued. "Whatever. We just blew up your last Hetzer!" cheered Luna and Cadence. "Bull shit! Rematch!" I angered. At that point I had realized that I crossed the point of no return, as thundering footsteps stormed towards me from behind. It was mom. "Young mare, you get over here! I will not tolerate swearing (or even you entirely) in my property!" raged Mom. Luckily I had practice my teleportation spell, so I teleported into my secret workshop to escape a painful talk about life-long wholesome policy. While I peeked out of the peep hole into the garden, I began to storm ideas to counter these cheaters for bringing in weapons who could blind fire. "Luna," I overheard Cadence say to little Tuna, "Your sister is an idiot." "I know," responded Luna. "No wonder she doesn't have a fan-base." That comment brought me to tears. Ok, not really. I still have a fanbase, and I wasn't an idiot. Mad, maybe, but not an idiot. But I was right to say that indirect fire was cheating. It is not fair if some tank can shoot at you without being able to shoot back. If someone uses an artillery, they are a coward. But who is the minority here, people who like to fight in terms of Boshido, or people who like to snipe away free kills. I knew I could not do anything about this new weapon to ban it, but I knew it was time to grow bigger. I would seek my revenge. I looked back at the yard to find Luna happy with more friends. "Hey Luna, what's up?" asked some fillies and colts. "Oh, nothing. Just playing this new game my sis made up called World of Tanks," she replied. "It is not called, 'World of Tanks!'" I shouted yet unnoticeably. "Oooh. Looks fun. Can we play?" they all asked. "Sure, but you can only start with those little tanks. When you win games, you get points to get better tanks. I have some pretty tough tanks, so you might want to fight each other for starters," Luna explained. "But what if we wanted tougher tanks sooner?" they asked. Luna put on her diabolical thinking face. With me knowing where this was going, I knew I was about to regret leaving that scene. Luna explained, "If you want tough tanks now, you can buy some golden tickets to purchase special tough tanks, like Lowes and Ram IIs. You can also buy gold tickets to earn more points in a game to get cooler tanks faster. It only costs 15 bits for every 3000 worth of gold tickets." Some ponies were interested and lined up to take advantage of this 'great offer.' I was furious that my little twerp of a sister was about to earn a hundred bits when I invented the game. I should have been getting that money. But the worst wasn't over. After buying their special heavyweights, each friend called their friends to buy, and soon there was a crowd of almost 200 little ponies playing World of Tanks (Damn it, now I have this name stuck in my head!). She was not going to get away introducing unfair artillery and turning the game into a business. I was not a filly. I was a big alicorn. The game was going to grow into a full scale competition. None of this babyish board game setup. I pulled out a blow torch and sheet metal, and prepared myself for a game piece that would not exactly fit on that little board table.
Steel Motor CarriageFinally, after five long years of crafting and procrastination, I had finished my reaction to Luna's taking advantage of my "business!" My goal was not to steal the business, but to show who was the creator and the best at World of Tanks. By now, neither of us were little brawling fillies. We were now warring prematures. Luna, no longer with her little tank stand, got assistance from a sales company to turn her lemonade stand into a market. How a nine-year-old grows to be a corporate billionaire, I don't know, but it probably had something to do with royal affiliation, since obviously Luna was of the royal court. I, on the other hand, was forgotten. Luna no longer mentioned that I made the game, and I was stuck listening to the "oohs" and "aahs" of my friends about how wonderful Princess Tuna was at creating games. Perhaps it would have turned out better if I had finished the "revenge plan" four years, but you can't argue with me wisely spending my summers sleeping. With all of that in the past, I was going to make World of Tanks into an entirely new game, and no little fillies would be allowed to play it. The game was going to be super sized, and souped with a V-8 engine! It was going to squish that puny tank table, and probably any annoying traitor that got in the way. It was massive (almost the size of my living room!), and it was well armed with an 88mm pellet cannon! Yes folks, I made an almost life size tank to stand up against Luna's enterprise, and best of all, it was a Tiger tank! I was going to roll this puppy onto the street, into the World of Tanks tournament hall, and give people a real gander at what tanking is supposed to be like. After the breakthrough, ponies would retreat in awe, and inspire them to buy my life size tanks. Once that would happen, every pony older than 13 would experience the heat of battle and get the time of their life, rather than rattling dice on a board. Honestly, how does a board game stay popular for five years? At last my tank saw sunlight when I opened the hidden garage door from my secret crafts centre to the outside road. How no pony noticed this door for five years alludes me, but it was a lucky start for the day of reckoning. Slowly I rolled down the road, excited to see the expressions on every pony's face! Apparently, no pony noticed, but I continued over to the World of Tanks Tournament Hall. I felt invincible! With 100mm worth of steel separating me from opposition, no barrier was able to slow me down, or at least until I got dizzy from the rocking in the tank. Who was going to stop me now? A loud whistle blew. "Stop right there! Yes, you in the hefty tank!" yelled a police pony. Perhaps my tank was vulnerable to one force: law enforcement? "Problem officer?" I replied. The officer gave me a good long stare at me with my head barely sticking out of the driver's hatch. "Your left rear light is burnt. You better get that fixed if you don't want to get a ticket," he explained. "You can't give me tickets! I am royalty, and I have an 88mm pellet gun!" I imagined myself saying to the officer. "I know you are thinking, 'You can't give me tickets! I am royalty, and I have an 88mm pellet gun,' so I would like to inform you that I have direct contact with your mother, and she can put the law in her own hooves," replied the officer as I rushed off to avoid more trouble. The tournament hall was visible just over the horizon. Luna's World of Tanks was popular, but not popular enough to earn a hall within Canterlot boundaries, instead earning a well kept warehouse outside of town. It wasn't rustic, and it was a very popular convention gathering site. The last convention was a Rural Diplomatic Congress between Canterlot and a small village about four years ago. Otherwise, it had been three years of pure armored spectacle, as the warehouse had to be maintained every six weeks just because of overpopulation inside the building. What also made it less of a warehouse and more of a resort was the fact that a big neon sign was posted over the building to advertise this convention, as well as lights for flashing at night. How a nine-year-old gets a late curfew to run an almost 24-7 convention late at night, I don't know either, but it wasn't going to last long as my Tiger rumbled closer and closer to the enemy's gates. I was about 200 metres away from the doors before a loud siren blew. I immediately halted in my tracks and found barbed wire fencing magically rise from the ground. On each fence post was a red flashing light, as if Luna was prepared for my plan. As poorly thought as the plan was, I pushed forward and ran over the fence, and congratulated myself for making armor strong enough to withstand the crunching metal under the lower glades. As I approached, I caught sight of a sign saying, "Big Celery, keep out! You are still grounded, remember?" and another set of fences popped out of the ground. As irritating as this was, everyone would have to agree, the sound of crushing steel under an armored body was too thrilling as I continued over this fence line. At this point I also put on some good old '40s jazz in the speakers of my tank, and happily ran over the last fence line, bringing me about 25 metres away from the doors. After rolling closer, the window shutters opened to reveal magic-aimed machine guns spraying away at my front plate. With a nice pair of ear phones, I was able to withstand the plinking noise and blast the two emplacements out of place with the cannon. The door was right in front of me then, and I crashed through with my high-beams on to give some special effect to this dramatic entrance. However, would you find the entrance dramatic if you were to see what I saw immediately after the dust cleared. Luna had been catching up, and had an anti-tank cannon placed in the centre plaza where the game table would normally be. All the little fillies had cute green bowls on their heads to use as obsolete protection against massive firepower. Though the '40s music confused them a bit, the game was on, but now super sized. Luna screamed the fire signal, and the cannon blasted, not a pellet, but an actual combustion shell. Again, more proof Mom liked Luna more, because Luna was now allowed to acquire realistic military shells. Though her royal status probably allowed her access to military equipment, I was not deterred. I did a fine job with the armor, and the shot bounced point-blank. I shot back and missed, allowing Luna and her cronies to relocate the gun to a different location. It fired, and no more positive results came for them. They fired again, and no success. They fired again and again, and still no success. I, on the other hand, was a poor shot and kept missing, but I frightened them enough to keep moving the gun, or at least until I ran out of ammunition. At that point, the only choice to hold victorious was to ram Luna and here little pea shooter. She managed to dodge fast enough before I could ram her (and the speed of this thing didn't help one bit), and the high time had arrived. Luna spread the legs of the cannon, placed them in the ground, took a shell, threw open the breech, loaded, slammed it shut, and fired. Out of all the places to be aiming, you could guess where I was shot. The old saying, "Shoot it in the ass," now made sense too me as my engine was set ablaze. Knowing I was pretty much done here, all the little fillies retreated (victoriously?) with their cannon, with me having no clue what they were going to do next. I flopped outside the turret hatch over the yellow blaze which used to be my engine, ending with a few words about what I had learned today: The Tiger had horrible armor, was too boxy, and was too damn slow. It was time to retire back to my workshop, so conjure up a new plan to take Luna out of her place in a simple game of toy tanks.
