"Good morning, students," Vice Principal Luna greeted over the PA system. "I'm sure you're all thrilled to start the first day of the Friendship Games. Our competitors will face off in every aspect of the CHS curriculum, culminating in the elimination equation finale," she explained to everyone who listened.

The Canterlot Wondercolts, Crystal Prep Shadowbolts, and Fragment Hunter all gathered in the foyer of CHS to hear Dean Cadance explain the rules. "Welcome to the first event, the Academic Decathlon! You'll be scored on chemistry, home-ec and everything in between," she explained. "The scores from this event will determine what happens when you move onto event number 2. Good luck!"

"Not that we'll need it. Crystal Prep has never been defeated," Sugarcoat said to Fragment Hunter and the Wondercolts.

"First time for everything," Slate muttered before he noticed somebody enter the school. Recognizing him as Twilight's brother, Slate just looked over at the new arrival and gestured to Twilight. Shining Armor saw that Twilight looked uncomfortable with the Shadowbolts and felt sorry for her.

As the competitors headed for the chemistry lab for the first challenge, Shining Armor was called over by Terracotta. "Hey, can you give me a hand with some things for the second event? I can't bring everything by myself," Terra asked while Shining Armor was gawking at Terra's immense size.

"Sure thing," Shining said as he went to help Terracotta. "I'm Shining Armor. My sister's competing in the Games this year."

"Terracotta Gaia. My daughter's doing the same," Terra introduced himself.

"So, what do you need help with," Shining Armor asked.

"You'll see," Terracotta said as he and Shining Armor left for the soccer field.

In the chemistry lab, all the competitors wore lab coats and goggles while they mixed chemical compounds as instructed. The Rainbooms were all surprised at how well Fragment Hunter was doing with the work. "You guys are pretty good at this," Sunset Shimmer noted.

"Considering that most of us work with Dust, we actually have to be careful," Layla said as she picked up a test tube.

"Why's that," Applejack asked.

"Powered Dust is extremely volatile," Azalea explained. "Even a sneeze can cause it all to explode! The first day of school for us, a friend of mine was being lectured by this crabby girl that would later become her friend and powdered Dust was being shaken around. With it all in the air, Ruby sneezed and blew a hole in the Beacon courtyard! Fire, lightning, and I think some ice, went everywhere and they were in a crater before a few other students showed up."

"Wow! That must've been a sight to see," Pinkie said as she put a beaker down.

"Yeah, but I didn't see it. As I said, it was our first day and I was actually a bit like Fluttershy before meeting my friends and team," Azalea sadly mentioned.

As the two teams were silent, a loud boom startled all of them and they turned to see the source. Derpy was covered in soot and had an embarrassed face as her hair was sticking in different directions. "I just don't know what went wrong," she sheepishly said.

"Actually, it was kind of like that," Sunset Blaze mentioned as she returned to the topic of the story from Remnant. "Only with the floor beneath her turning into a giant crater outside." Fragment Hunter all laughed at the memory of the first day at Beacon Academy and the Rainbooms all chuckled with them as Ivy went to check if Derpy was okay.

After making sure Derpy was physically okay, everyone continued with the Academic Decathlon and eventually moved onto the Home Economics portion. Everyone was busy baking cakes for the judges to taste, but everyone could swear that Celestia, Luna, Cadance, Aurora, and Nocturne were drooling before everyone started. "Oh, I just LOVE baking," Pinkie cheerful exclaimed. "I have a job as a waitress at this retro malt shop diner, but I help out at Sugarcube Corner from time to time."

"That's pretty cool," Silver said as he measured ingredients for Celadon to start mixing.

"Yup! The outfits are cute, me and my co-workers wear roller skates in the place, and there's even a working jukebox," Pinkie listed the fun stuff about working at the malt shop. "You should stop by sometime. They make great burgers," Pinkie said before she slowly turned to Azalea. "Ummmm..."

"I just have cow horns. I'm not actually a cow. But, I can see why that's a little concerning," Azalea reassured Pinkie with Sunset Blaze's telepathic powers connecting them. "The others had that same question before. And if you think that's strange, my uncle has falcon talons for feet."

"Okay," Pinkie said as she got her answer. After a little more time passing with stories and baking, Pinkie began to decorate her cake with chocolate frosting. After adding the finishing touches, Pinkie quickly sampled some of the frosting for herself. "Mmm! Chocolate."

"Is it really a good idea to eat frosting like that," Celadon questioned as she flinched from Pinkie's quick snack.

"Probably better than when Ruby Rose was making cookies and gorged herself on chocolate chips while making them," Cereza commented.

"Or when Ren kept trying to make pancakes and Nora kept stealing them as he reached for the syrup behind him. He actually had to use a cage to trap her after a few batches were done," Slate reminisced. Fragment Hunter and the Wondercolts were laughing at the story until the judges showed up.

The five women saw several cakes that were visually appealing, looked like rookie mistakes, or just failures entirely. After sampling the best cakes from the Shadowbolts and Fragment Hunter, they moved onto Pinkie Pie's giant cake. Pinkie only had a smug smile as she took a knife and cut her cake in half to reveal its center. In the middle of the cake, a portrait like you would find in an art museum caught everyone's attention. "Pinkie Pie, you're a baking genius," Vixen said in amazement.

"I would say that the Canterlot Wondercolts win this round," Aurora Celeste said as she helped herself to a second piece of cake from Azalea and Pinkie.

"Keep eating all that cake and it'll go straight to your hips, Aurora," Nocturne teased.

"Very funny, Nocturne. But, I see you having more of Azalea's cake as well," Aurora teased back.

"Hey! We know this recipe. It was the same flavor of cake from Terra and Ivy's wedding," Nocturne countered.

"Really," the Rainbooms exclaimed before Azalea and Sunset Blaze gave them the rest of the cake. "Mmmm," they moaned in delight as they enjoyed the chocolate cake Azalea prepared.

While Fragment Hunter and the Wondercolts were enjoying the cake and congratulating Pinkie Pie, Principal Cinch was disappointed at the Shadowbolts and glared at them. One student was shaking in fear under Cinch's glare and dropped the cake she was carrying. With an embarrassed look on her face, the student hid her hands behind her back as Cinch only pinched the bridge of her nose in exasperation.

"Alright. Now for the wood shop round, you'll be in pairs to construct a birdhouse," Vice Principal Luna instructed.

As everyone was gathering the tools they needed, Silver raised his hand. "Hey, VP Luna, can we make something different than a birdhouse," he asked.

Celestia, Cadance, and Luna all looked at each other before turning back to Silver. "As long as you have the materials and tools, you can make what you want, Mr. Wuruhi," Celestia agreed. "However, you will have points deducted."

"Alrighty! Come on, let's head outside," Silver said to Sunset, Slate, and Celadon. As they walked out the door, everyone was confused by what those four were going to do. However, they ignored it and went to preparing their birdhouses. After enough time had passed, most of the teams made birdhouses that looked well made. Although, Sandalwood and Micro Chips didn't succeed in making a proper birdhouse as it fell apart when Vice Principal Luna tested it.

After taking points off for the badly made project, Indigo Zap and Sugarcoat revealed to have made a larger birdhouse than everyone else. While the judges were impressed by this, Rua just rolled her eyes at the prep school students. Sandalwood comforted his friend as they felt defeated, but Indigo Zap and Sugarcoat bumped into them as they passed by and knocked what little of their birdhouse they carried to the floor.

As Fluttershy and Applejack tried to cheer up their classmates, Applejack took a look around the room. "Anybody seen Silver and the others," she asked.

Just as she said that, Celadon came in and asked them to follow her. "Ladies and gentlemen, BEHOLD! The magnificent projects of Silver Wuruhi and Slate Quartz," she said dramatically as Silver was seen on the ground next to a wooden sculpture and cleaning a chainsaw. The judges were amazed at the sight before them and dropped their clipboards. Silver was sitting next to a large wooden sculpture of a black wolf with white bony spines all over its body and a mask-like face with red markings.

Slate on the other hand, just finished a carving on a large wood board that depicted a phoenix rising from flames. Blaze was in the middle of painting it in shades of red, orange, and yellow before adding a small amount of blue for the bird's eyes. "Done," Blaze said as the carving now resembled a mural. "Well, I need to wash up now," she said before picking up the clipboards and returning them to the gawking judges. "Even if you're going to take points off for not being a birdhouse, you might want these."

After everyone recovered from Silver and Slate's wood shop projects, the three teams continued with the next rounds. After a spelling bee that eliminated Fragment Hunter and most of the others from the final event, Sunset Shimmer and Sci-Twi were the last two students remaining. While Sunset Shimmer had the support of the Rainbooms and Wondercolts, Fragment Hunter saw that Twilight didn't have any support until Shining Armor returned with Terracotta. Twilight saw her brother and was surprised to see him at the school, but Principal Cinch explained the equation that the two girls would be trying to solve.

With the rules of the round explained, Sunset and Twilight began to work on the problem. Shimmer was calm and determined as she wanted to get answers from Sci-Twi as soon as possible, but Twilight was looking distracted because she had so many questions about the things she saw since coming to CHS and her amulet began acting up. Ignoring the questions and everyone watching her, Twilight continued working with the math problem and began to focus. On the other side, Sunset Shimmer was starting to sweat as she struggled to figure out the solution to the equation.

When both girls finished, Cinch walked up to them and took a closer look at the answers. After a few tense moments, she turned to Sunset Shimmer and gave her judgement. "Incorrect," she declared and Sunset hung her head in defeat. Everyone at CHS was upset at their loss, but they were glad to know that it was a close match. Especially with a second team they didn't know much about to face off against.

After looking over the scores, Vice Principal Luna declared Twilight Sparkle and Crystal Prep the winners of the Academic Decathlon. While Twilight and Shining Armor looked happy, the other Crystal Prep students looked bored and gave a lackluster applause. Fragment Hunter saw this and all glared at them because of how they acted when their representative won for them. The Wondercolts however, were ecstatic to know Sunset Shimmer came close to winning.

Before anybody left the gym, Terracotta stepped onstage and everyone's eyes were on him. "Before we move onto the second event, we'll be taking a small break to let you all rest from this intense first round. But be warned, things are going to become more physical than you think for the next two events," he announced. Twilight stepped off the stage and Flash congratulated her victory, but her amulet began to hum as it tracked something. Twilight ran off again as she focused on her amulet and soon followed the Rainbooms and Fragment Hunter outside to the Wondercolt Statue again.

Author's Note

With that, the first event is finished. Up next, Twilight and Fluttershy's scene with a few changes to fit the story. This will include a Grimm attack from Fluttershy's magic being drained and Spike gaining the ability to talk. But, I've got something different than what I originally planned with my friend in this version.

After that, we'll move onto the second event. Something I have planned for Fragment Hunter to dominate in so that the tiebreaker flag hunt will make sense at the end. You know, before everything goes to shit.