Mischief Makers

Rainbow Dash let out a sigh of defeat and looked up towards her friends. “There, you happy now?”

“Darling, what ever happened to you?” Rarity asked frantically. “I know rainbows are an important part of your image, but this just seems too much.”

“Um, she didn't do this willingly,” Fluttershy added. “This is what they did to her when she lost a game.”

Twilight pondered this for a moment. “I guess now we know what they meant about the whole ‘lose and they get to make some changes' ordeal.” She then offered a hoof to Rainbow, who was hesitant at first, but after a moment accepted.

Once on her hooves Rainbow just stood there and looked on her now rainbow body.The colours dividing her body into six segments traveling horizontally. Where they met they blended together nice and evenly, like there were no lines at all. Her left hooves were both red, along with the rest of her left side. Orange, yellow, green and blue all fought for control of her center, with violet taking up her right. When I get my hooves on those two...

Out of the corner of her eyes Rainbow noticed Applejack looking over two cards similar to the one Fluttershy had won. “So, what kind of challenge do yah think those two will toss our way now?”

Before she could get a response the area was lit up by a bright green flash. When it dimmed away Festivities stood there, balancing her die on the tip of her wings. She smiled brightly at them and reached behind the nearby tree, pulling out an announcer's microphone.

“Testing,” She said before tapping the microphone with her hoof, which gave out a loud ringing sound. Everypony cringed from the noise, but Festivities didn’t seem to notice. “Testing. Testing. One, two, three. Can everypony hear me?”

“Hey!” Rainbow called, ignoring the green pegasus. “Change me back now!”

“Oh good, I was afraid this thing was broken.” Festivities continued before tossing the microphone over her shoulder. “Now then, welcome everypony to the halfway mark in our little competition. I got to say, we’re quite impressed; most ponies we play with don’t make it past the first challenge.” Her smile faltered for a second. “Darn shame too.”

Rainbow’s eye’s twitched angrily as she flared her wings. “I don’t care. Change me back!”

Festivities rolled her eyes un-interestedly and a bored sigh escaped her lips. She flew over to Rainbow and stopped mere inches away from her face. “Maybe you didn’t understand the rules that we have consistently repeated over and over and over again. I’ll say it one more time, you lose a game, we get to make some changes. Clear as mud?”

“What gives you two the right to force these things onto ponies?” Rarity asked.

Festivities replied to her with a shrug. “For the prizes we give out, it seems a fair consequence. We do believe in equality, after all”

You call this equality? Rainbow thought angrily to herself. She was about to verbalize it when she noticed that Festivities’s back was turned to her. Quickly an idea formed and she decided to seize it. As softly as she could she backed away from Fest and Rarity, leaving them to continue their exchange.

“And you don’t care in the slightest that you’re hurting ponies with these ‘changes’?”

“Silly Rarity, we don’t hurt ponies. That’s no fun at all.”

Rainbow unfurled her wings and rose as silently as she could into the air. Once high enough she shot down towards the green pegasus’s side. But before she had any time to think the green mare sidestepped mere seconds before Rainbow’s hooves would have came in contact with her. The next thing she felt was the hard earth rushing to meet her.

Festivities giggled to herself and trotted over to the dazed rainbow mare. “Sorry Rainbow, but the same tricks don’t fool me twice.”

Rainbow shot her a venomous look and scrambled to her hooves. Luckily Twilight spoke up before she had the chance to try anything else. “So, is there any reason you’re here other than to both congratulate and aggravate us?”

Fest looked back at her and grinned giddily. “As a matter of fact, TwiTwi, I do have another challenge for one of you to play.” With a flick of her wing Fest tossed her die into the air and caught it on the tip of her tail. It glowed a bright green and in a flash of magic a pile of squares appeared, burying the pegasus under them. On the surface of each was what looked like a chopped up piece of a much larger image.

“Who here love picture puzzles?” Festivities asked, suddenly sitting on a nearby building top. “I know I do. Rules for this game are very simple, just make the picture before the time runs out. Same conditions as usual for if you win or lose.”

“That’s it?” Rainbow blurted out. “That’s so simple.”

Festivities nearly fell over in a fit of giggles. “Of course it’s simple, silly, not all of our games have to be big and complex.” She paused to catch her breath. “Besides, after all the fun we just had, Mistress thought you deserve a more relaxing challenge.”

“How considerate of her.” Twilight added.

“Yes, it was,” Festivities then clapped her hooves together happily. “Right then, who shall we pick for this challenge?” She pondered for a moment until her eyes lit up. “Pinkie Pie, how ‘bout you take this one?”

“Okie Dokie Lokie” Pinkie replied. Her eyes then locked onto the pile of puzzle pieces, as well as an hourglass that had suddenly appeared next to it. Separating its two chambers was a pink card that bore Pinkie’s cutie mark.

Festivities places her die behind her ear and flew over to the hourglass. “This should be plenty of time for you to finish the puzzle. Oh, and the rest of you can’t interfere, ‘cause then the game would be over too quickly.”

With that out of the way she placed a hoof on the edge of the card and slid it from between the chambers. Instantly golden sand began to trickle in a tiny stream from the top chamber to bottom. Pinkie didn’t waste any time and immediately began sorting through the puzzle pieces.

“OK, while Pinkie’s busy doing that minigame we can play another,” Festivities said, making her eyes go large. “C’mon, pleeeaassee? It’d mean winning cards quicker. Besides, you ponies haven’t seen my games before.”

“There’s a difference?” Twilight asked, slightly curious.

“I don’t care about differences,” Rainbow cried. “I just want my coat back to normal NOW!”

“If your friends win the game, they can use one of their rewards to fix you.” Festivities said while absentmindedly polishing the gemstones on her bracelets. ”So are you girls gonna play, because me and Games sort of have this wagor going on to see which of our game you’ll beat the most of, and it’d help me out so so much if you’d accept.”

“Hold on a sec, y'all never did fully explain what we stood t’ gain in all this.” Applejack said.

“Yeah, we usually explain the terms of prizes after the game is completed.” Festivities made her eyes go even bigger. “Please play another minigame. You want to get closer to the end, right?”

“Oh, alright,” Rarity said after a while. “Just so long as none of them ruin my coat any further.”

Festivities looked at Rarity with a joyous smile and began to giggle happily. She then pulled her die out again and tossed it along the ground. It landed on a four, causing a large game wheel divided into nine section to appear. In each section was a picture of a pony and some other random item.

“Pick a poison, light it up. Try to survive it, best of luck!” Festivities jumped from the ground and did a small flip in the air before stabilizing herself with her wings. She looked down at the ponies and smiled festively, until she noticed the confused look on Rarity’s face. “Just gather some magic in your horn and touch the wheel while it’s spinning.”

Rarity wasted no time and gathered some magic in her horn. As she did, the wheel began spinning rapidly. After a moment Rarity elegantly stepped forward and tapped the wheel with her horn. Instantly it stopped its rotation and she looked at the image her horn currently rested on; a pony running from what appeared to be rain. Festivities looked over her shoulder and giggled.

“Ooo, nice choice Rarity. Just avoid getting hit for, let’s say...five minutes. Good luck!”

“What was that?” Rarity asked, only to see that the emerald mare had vanished. As she turned her head to where she had been something hard shot down from the air and impacted with the ground next to the white unicorn. Quickly she looked at it and discovered it was a rubber eight sided die.

“Watch out Rarity!” Rainbow called as another rubber die came raining from the sky. Rarity quickly lifted her head in the direction of her friend, narrowly avoiding the rubber piece and gasping in surprise. Her attention then turned skyward and she quickly skidded towards the left. A volley of rubber pelted the spot where she’d been and then shifted its trajectory to her current position.

~~~

Freddy had been searching for ten minutes already and so far hadn’t managed to find anything out of the ordinary. The little eel hissed to himself as he slithered over building. scanning near and far over the area. It wasn’t his place to doubt his mother, but this seemed an unnecessary task. Nothing could touch her and her sister; they’d been able to avoid all sorts of ponies who’d come after them for their games - something Freddy never understood. It’s all fun and nopony is ever hurt. Why do they have to go and stress out?

The little eel was brought back to reality when a sweet smell flew into his nostrils. Immediately his mouth began to water and his eyes glowed a bright pink. As they did he was lifted into the air by his own telekinetic magic and slithered off in the smells direction. It drew him towards the edge of town, and once he saw what had attracted him he quickly dashed into a nearby tree to observe.

Crossing over a stone bridge into town was a group of ten ponies dressed in yellow uniforms; Two earth ponies, four pegasi and four unicorns. On each of their uniforms was the symbol of a sun. The sweet smell that had tempted him to them was the magic the unicorns were casting; scanning spells if his nose was right.

One of the unicorns dispersed his magic and moved over to another. “Eclipse, all the local unicorn magic is interfering with our scans.”

The second unicorn turned and glared at the first. “I don’t care about your excuses, just keep searching.”

“Are you even sure we’re in the right place? I thought these two were more...flashy with their presentation.”

“Yes, but sometimes they’re subtle. Most likely they’re playing a game of smaller scale than last time.”

The first unicorn was about to speak again but his partner shot him an authoritative look and he went silent. Freddy watched them with a hint of worry in his thoughts.These ponies were likely to interfere with his mother’s game in their search for who knows what. Obviously he’d have to get rid of them somehow, but being little more than a hatchling he lacked the required size and power to directly chase them off. So instead he stayed in-between the thick branches and watched them work.