The Island Game

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        The sound of the resounding crashes echoed around them.  The respective surroundings they were trapped in as they were torn from their worlds were left behind.   They were replaced with an unfamiliar sight, a great mass of land surrounded by water from every side (at least it could be presumed, the sight of water illuminated by the sun could be seen far over the horizon.).  Once the teenagers noticed their predicament mutters and groans turned into panicked whispers. One Danny Fenton opened his eyes, and upon seeing his surroundings murmured “I think on second thought, I would have taken Freud and Jung,”

After a few moments as the ponies registered the creatures before them, there was a cry of “HUMANS!” from a sea-green unicorn.  “I told you they were real! I knew it!”

“Lyra!”  her girlfriend hissed, “Not now!”

The group of ponies being the one who had youngest children, had to deal with the sounds of frightened crying.  The Cakes were having a bit of a time trying to calm down Pound and Pumpkin, partly because they were quite nervous themselves.  The Cutie Mark Crusaders huddled in a little group, also worried about being in such a strange place…and surrounded by such strange looking creatures.   Babs Seed swallowed a lump in her throat telling herself she wouldn’t cry, not in front of all these ponies.

She had no idea what this place was but she had a feeling that Manehatten was even farther away now.  Her parents, her big sister and the other Manehatten Cutie Mark Crusader. Well at least she had Apple Bloom and cousin Applejack.  It was reassuring to have the Crusaders –her new friends.

******

The island was very wide and seemed to be perhaps a little bigger than Ponyville.  They had landed in a spot in front of the island allowing the rest to be seen if some of them looked backwards.  There were buildings outlining the land mass and a great big lake in the middle surrounded by little huts.   Behind the lake huts there was a woods area that obscured the back end of the island.  The same red mist creature, Saul appeared before them all, looking smug.

“How do you like the place?  The party before yours managed to leave it, well mostly together.  They were quite the lively group, and I can only hope that you’ll prove just as entertaining.”  He said.  Some of the teens started to pull themselves up while others seemed to stay where they are convincing themselves this was all just a dream.   His voice had changed from what they all remembered sounding somewhat refined, arrogant and rather cold.

“Entertain you?” a drawling snobbish voice demanded.  “You brought us here so we could entertain you?”

“That’s one reason.  As you can see, you are far from home.  I have prepared a nice little home for you in an abandoned pocket dimension.  Usually when a world like yours or someone else’s ends,  it leaves an empty dimension ,  which most of my kind tend to avoid, a bit of  a waste in my opinion but they are very strict about their rules regarding not playing God.  As I see it designing a world and putting existing people in it shouldn’t really count. “He started, “Following their rules is boring, and I’ve gotten far too accomplished to just follow the status quo of the average loser.”

“So you think the rules are too good for you?”  A dark haired young magic student in oversized clothes demanded.

“No.”  Saul said, “I am certain.”  He looked down over them all.  “I see that you’re all quite angry but I think that, once you think about it, you’ll eventually be honored, to be chosen for my challenge.  What are the odds of such an astounding thing happening to you?”  There were murmurs of disbelief and a few ‘you’ve gotta be kidding me’s.

“He’s mental” Ron Weasley muttered.  “Barking mad.”   Hermione shushed him worriedly, fearing what might happen if Saul overheard and took offense.  They could very well end up dead with all the power he seemed to have.  Thankfully he didn’t seem to notice.

“What do you want?”  A tall young man with dark hair pulled in a small ponytail demanded.    He looked to everyone else as if he had been at some formal even like church, wearing a collared shirt and tie.  He was surrounded by a bunch of teens with similar features.  A little ways away from the cluster with dark hair and olive and tanned complexions was a group of fair skinned, freckled and light haired teenagers who once they awoke were eager to get as far away from the former as they could.

“Good question.  I will be leaving you here on this island to see how you survive. Lucky for you I’ve done this once before, and decided that I’m going to be nicer this time and cut a deal with you.  I will provide you with weekly supplements of cooking supplies and renewals in things like basic hygiene and perhaps a few more animals, so long as you do not try me.”    He looked over to the huddle around the tall ponytailed man.  With a rather detached expression he held his hand out and one of the relatives, a skinny Asian teenager with tinted glasses who had been whispering to his neighbor, levitating him up in the air and surrounding him with a bubble.

“ OI  BASTARD WHAT WAS THAT FOR?” the boy yelled.  He gave a few fearful glances at the ground a few feet below him.  The other relatives reached out towards him and cried out while others looked on in shock.

“Shiro!”

“So, Toshiro.  You’re awfully confident aren’t you? Think you can break bonds created by a two million year old genie?”  The boy looked down again nervously.  “Ah, afraid of heights?  Oh dear, that is a problem.  But since you’re obviously so powerful, I’m sure you can get out before it gets too high for your liking.”  Shiro looked down again as the bubble rose higher.  “Go ahead, show us your power.”

Shiro continued to look down and flex his fingers, perhaps out of a combination of fear of heights and what most would call stage fright. But when the bubble continued to rise up to five feet above the ground he was moved into action.  Claws grew from his fingers and he stabbed at the bubble furiously. Many onlookers were shocked as his bones began to move and shift around into the more powerful form of a bear.

Panicked whispers came from the crowd in cloaks and black hats murmuring about werewolves.  .  The high school students looked sickened and the ponies were just in shock.  The bear desperately tried to free itself, and crying out in frustration while Saul watched still unemotional.   Beneath him, a curly haired girl watched looking pale and shaky.  An older girl in dark clothing came over and put a hand on her shoulder giving support.

This went on for a few more minutes until a voice from the crowd of high-schoolers cried out “KNOCK IT OFF!”  A teenage girl in a black top and dark plaid skirt stepped out calling out to the genie.  “You’ve made your point already.  If you're so big and powerful, why us? Why choose to pick on people so many orders of magnitude beneath you, if you're so big and smart? Or are you just a kid with a magnifying glass and an anthill?"

Saul turned on her furiously and for a moment her friends stood protectively around her expecting him to try and harm her.  But he just looked over to the bubble with the struggling bear and frowned.  “…so I have. “  With a wave of his hand he freed the bear from the bubble and the crowd scrambled to part allowing him to land.  He did, with a thud and cried out once more in pain.  The crowd of relatives surrounded the bear obscuring it from sight.   “As you can see, none of you can out-power or outwit me.  My abilities are far above your magic, your unnatural abilities and your mind. I expect you not to try.  If you try to test my boundaries you will not only waste your time, but you will waste the resources of your fellows.  For every attempt to escape you will lose everyone a replenishment of resources for one week.”

*****

There were whispers throughout the crowd.  Many were frightened, and some were angry.  There was shuffling as many of the parents amongst the ponies had shielded their children from the frightening sight of the struggling bear-human.

One of the fair haired Strykes stepped forward after remaining quiet for a long time.  He looked a tad nervous to address the genie perhaps fearing that he too might be dangled in the air like his rival.

“Is there anything we can do to convince you to let us at least send the youngest of children home?”  He asked.  Saul scoffed.

“Your youngest children are at the very least, what, eight years of age?  Hardly helpless and certainly capable of working to survive.”  He said coolly.

“What about ours?”  Mrs. Cake shakily stepped forward.  “We have foals not even old enough for school.”

Saul looked over her and the rest of the little family in consideration.  Then with a sigh he spoke again.

“There is no pleasure in causing the death of infants.  Very well, you may leave “He snapped his fingers and the Cake family disappeared.  As did a few other families with babies.   “Any more questions?”   Some of the groups huddled together talking.

“Can we at least have some of our things?”  One of the magic students asked.  She looked constantly at her feet, shaking violently.  An older student stood nearby her protectively.

“Yeah,” a girl from the high-school group asked, “You expect me to walk around in one set of clothes all the time…like do you even realize how gross that is?” Her friend, a blonde girl with tear streaked eyes nodded. To their surprise their captor didn’t dismiss the point.

“Yes, that is true.  We wouldn’t want this becoming a nudist colony now would we?” he said with a smirk.  One girl amongst the magic students eagerly raised her hand but someone next to her pushed it down with a groan ,looking quite embarrassed.  Saul snapped his fingers and several large piles of luggage popped up, one for every group minus the ponies.   “Let no one say I am incapable of generosity. Now anything else?”  He was met with silence, it seemed like many people did not want to try Saul’s patience after his demonstration.

“Good, now that everything is squared away” He turned to the ponies, “Is there a Miss Rainbow Dash here?  I believe she is the unofficial captain of the Weather Squad?”

*******

After she made it in Wonderbolt boot camp, Rainbow Dash had gotten an increase of respect at her day to day job, not that she wasn’t respected before.  But when she returned, a Wonderbolt recruit, many people started regarding her as the captain of the Squad.  She had gained some command, and now she had the discipline to exercise it properly.   She stepped forward, facing Saul with distrust in her eyes.

“Good.  , Miss Dash,  You’ll find that the island is designed to work with your methods of weather control.” He said.  “If you could, please, fly up to that cloud above you and give us a little rain”

There were some mutters in the crowd of humans.  A few people scoffed and surmised that it was impossible. But Rainbow Dash just flew upward and jumped on the cloud making rain come down.  The humans were quieted, stunned.  After the cloud was emptied she flew back down onto the soaked grass.

“Wonderful, thank you.” Saul said, “I shall take care of the sun and moon since your princesses are not here. But I think you can take care of this one thing for everyone.  I have studied your kind and I have confidence that you little ponies can keep this island’s ecosystem alive.”

“Wait!”  one teenage girl stepped forward. “How long do you intend on keeping us here?  What about our lives? What about our parents?”

“I’m not certain yet, but rest assure your parents will be informed”

“So we’re just going to sit around here and play Gilligan’s Island for you until you get bored of us?”  One of the high-schoolers yelled , “You’re nuts!”   Saul scoffed.

“I can promise you that it will be far more interesting than that.  If things get boring I’ll just throw something-or someone- in the mix to stir it up.  Cosmic powers remember?”  As he leered at them something in his eyes gleamed mischievously telling them that he was not afraid to make things unpleasant.  “Take care not to get too rowdy,  I had quite a time cleaning the blood splatters away from the last group, and you wouldn’t want to alarm the group after you too much do you? “  He vanished in a swirl of mist leaving several people and ponies muttering in confusion and alarm.  The mutterings soon grew into arguing, crying and yelling.  Most of the strife came from the humans although a few of the ponies were starting to catch the panic as well.  Diamond Tiara buried her face into her hooves as Filthy Rich and Diamond Treasure argued.  She had been so excited for her mother to come visit and that stupid smoke monster ruined everything.

*****

The two groups of Psi were split even farther than before and were only coming close to yell and point blame at each other.  The words they exchanged were harsh, brutal even, and they seemed to pay no mind to the young ones who were upset by it.  All that seemed to matter to them was who got the last word.  It seemed the same for all the other groups of humans.  Spells were flying between the four groups of wand holding students.  Some of the ordinary teenagers were looking at alarm at these other two groups while their fellows were placing the blame on one individual surrounded by two friends.  With some of the football players going at him, his ‘guards’ didn’t stand much of a chance.

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