Bahrain International Circuit, Bahrain

F1 Equestria Duel series

Duel 5: LUN (Alfa-Romeo) VS VRL (Mercedes-AMG Petronas)

Event Type: Full Grid Grid Start (5 Laps)

"Ladies and gentleponies, welcome back again to the Formula 1 Equestrian Duels 2019 season! I'm Flim!"

"I'm Flam!"

"And welcome all!"

"We are in Bahrain in the Middle East, for the second round of the Formula 1 season. And what a track Bahrain has! This is the first of three races to be held under the lights at night, bringing out the beauty of the night in this desert. During the night, this track becomes the jewel of this desert."

"We're already four Duels in, and for very talented drivers have already made their way into the final. Looks like the drivers are setting up on the grid now. Let's meet our two Duelers! Sitting on P5, driving for Alfa-Romeo, The Princess of the Night herself... Princess Luna! And her opponent, driving for Mercedes-AMG Petronas, the daughter of Lightning Dust... Viral Velocity!"

"Looks like we're in for another heck of a race, brother! Viral Velocity wowed us with her incredible racing skills in Melbourne, coming in third place behind both Rainbow Dash and her Mercedes team-mate, Akula. She has an incredible racing pedigree and she could prove to be one of the best racers in this series!"

"Ah, yes. But she has to deal with the very Princess of the Night on a night track! Luna is pretty much on home territory racing in the dark, under the lights of the track. So she should be able to get a bit of an advantage here! We didn't get to see her full potential in Melbourne just a few weeks ago, so I'm hoping we see it here!"

"Looks like it is time to find out! Here we go again! Duel No. 5 of the Bahrain round of the Equestria Duels series!"

Finally, Luna felt her own confidence grow inside her ever since the citizens of Ponyville had accepted her years ago, during Nightmare Night.

Racing under the cover of her glorious night, she knew that she could race to her best, knowing that her beautiful night sky over her was shining down on her.

But as she looked in the mirrors at her opponent, she felt a big bit of worry go through her. The Mercedes one spot behind her had managed to easily thwart her sister in the previous finals back in Australia, and was able to claim third place in that race. And to make matters worse, she had been trained by Valteri Bottas, one of the best racers in the world and team-mate of the previous year's champion of the world, Lewis Hamilton.

Luna and her sister weren't so lucky.

While Celestia was given the tutelage of 1-time champion Kimi Räikkönen, Luna was given the newly-signed Antonio Giovinazzi. She was told that Antonio had only ever driven in two GPs, back in 2017 for Sauber (which was renamed to Alfa-Romeo in 2019). In both GPs, Antonio finished 12th in the Australian Grand Prix of 2017, and crashed during the Chinese GP of the same year. But still, the Princess of the Night had received some valuable advise from the Italian, as he had more experience behind the wheel of an F1 car the both her and Celestia combined. Also, when Luna lost her Duel against Chrysalis in the first round, it was Antonio who comforted her by revealing to her that he didn't do so well in his own race, coming in 15th place. And this made her feel much better knowing that her time for a victory would come.

Now, here she was, about to race against Viral Velocity in her second Duel of the season.

"Hey, I've just noticed something, dear brother of mine. I've noticed that the entire F1 2019 grid is on the grid alongside our two Duelists! What are they doing there?"

"Oh, my brother. They're supposed to be there! This is a Full Grid-style Duel! The racers of the official 2019 season have taken time off of their schedules so they can race alongside their students in this style of Duel. However, the racers are under Formation Lap rules. While they are allowed to race at full throttle, they are not allowed to overtake each other, unless they have no other option. Whereas the two rivals will have to fight their way through the traffic to win the Duel!"

"Why, thanks for the healthy reminder, brother! And just in time, too! We are about to get underway!"

Eventually, the first red light on the starting tree lit up. All of the driver hit full throttle and engaged the clutch, and the roar of Formula 1 cars echoed out into the empty desert. As the red lights appeared one by one, Luna looked back in her mirrors. Viral was right behind her on the grid, in position 6. And behind her, was Kimi and Antonio. She just gave a quick glance at her two fellow Alfa-Romeo drivers, before turning her gaze to the lights, which were now all red.

Luna let out a deep breath, the lights went out and the Duel began.

Viral has easily gotten the better start of of the two, and immediately pulled ahead of the Alfa-Romeo. But unlike what she was expecting, Luna didn't fall behind her at all. Instead, the princess's dark blue-and-silver C38 easily kept pace with her own W10 EQ Power+. But now, they had to fight their way through traffic. The two drivers moved to the racing line to take the first corner. They slotted in between Max Verstappen and Räikkönen, as they raced down towards the first corner. Viral leading, Luna trailing.

After two laps, both drivers had fought their way through most of the pack and were now testing each other's skill, with Luna attempting fake overtakes to test Viral's defenses and Viral testing how different her car behaves in different situations.

After the third lap, only one car stood between the two rivals and being cleared of the pack: the #44 W10 EQ Power+ of Lewis Hamilton. However, Luna and Viral had to catch him first. They didn't have to though, but it would be the best for them if they managed to get clear of the field.

But all that came to a head, going into the final corner in the third lap. Luna just stayed with Viral, riding in her slipstream down all the straights and through all the corners. She had planned this all out. The princess knew exactly what she was going to do. Going into Turn 14, Viral pulled alongside Hamilton to get past him, Luna still on her tail. But just as she was about to turn into the corner...

...Luna suddenly pulled alongside her, got the best line of the three and overtook both Viral AND Hamilton to take the lead with only two laps to go!

Luna mentally jumped for joy as she raced down the back straight in the lead, but immediately regained her focus as she raced to the first corner.

'Good job, Luna! P1! The place in the final we needed! Just hold on there for two more laps!' Her race engineer told her.

"I knoweth! I wonneth't alloweth thee down! Yond pegasus is nay matcheth f'r the princess of the night!" She replied in Old English, "To put it simply, I won't let thee down!"

And to be honest, she did exactly as she promised. For the next lap, she led the whole way, Viral just staying on her tail. The reason she couldn't get enough speed to pull past was that DRS is strictly prohibited during a Full Grid Duel (the only exception to this is the final round, because it was a full race).

She felt very confident. She though that she could take the victory from a talented Mercedes factory team driver.

But then, everything changed on the last lap.

And it was Luna's confidence that killed her chance. Going into the sharp hairpin that was Turn 8, Luna acidentially misjudged her braking point and went wide, allowing Viral to easily overtake her and take the lead... with only 7 corners to go.

Luna kicked herself over that incident, and raced after the Mercedes.

But try as she might, she couldn't catch the much faster Viral, and she ended up losing her Duel.

Her potential had been wasted for another few races.

As she cruised past the line, her race engineer reported the bad news. 'Final results: Viral, P1. Yourself, P2. I'm sorry, Luna, but you have been eliminated from this round,'

Luna just stared ahead of her in disbelief, as the pegasus that had beaten her stared doing doughnuts at the side of the track, celebrating her victory over the princess of the night. "Alas, t appears mine own attempteth at vict'ry wast unsuccessful. Again,"

No more words were exchanged between Luna and her race engineer, as she pulled her dark blue-and-silver Alfa-Romeo into her team's garage. She had been eliminated from the second round.

She then trotted away and sat down in a nearby chair, about to compile her loss to Viral...

...when her sister, Celestia, approached her and gave her a deep cuddle to comfort her. And after a few seconds of comfort, Celestia pulled away and asked one simple question...

"Luna, what happened?"

Author's Note

Yes, I put Luna's lines in Old English. If you have a problem with that, please keep it to yourself.

Also, if you see a text that looks like this: "And welcome all!", then it means that Flim and Flam say this line at the exact same time, just in case you didn't know.