Episode 10
"The Columbia Games, Part 2"
And they're off! The first day of the Columbia Games Junior League begins for real this time after the disastrous introduction the previous day brings. Now, they're doing the introduction properly this time. For the first day, the students will compete in various academic tasks to test their intellect against each other. From quizzes to puzzles to small projects, these chosen students are putting their academic skills to the test.
Who will come out on top in the end? Will it be Crystal Academy as it does for the past fifteen years? Or will it be one of the other three schools who are still participating? And what's up with Twilight? What is she doing during the events?
[Beginning of Episode]
Day 1 of the Columbia Games Junior League...
In the morning, Rarity decides to visit Rainbow's house to present her the clothing that she made for the partisipants. She brought two sets of clothing, because she knew that Sonic is resting there for the night after that brawl broke out at Canterlot High courtyard. She approches he door and knocks on it,
Rainbow answered the door, seeing her friend waiting for her outside.
"I just brought you some fresh clothing, just for the Columbia Games," Rarity said, presenting the box that she brought. "Mind if you tried them on?"
Rainbow assumed that the box Rarity is holding contains the clothing that she made. "Why did you make these?"
"I started working on these a few weeks ago when I heard that the Columbia Games Junior League is going to receive an all time low budget," Rarity explains why she made these. "I decided to sacrifice my own money to make clothing for all of us. And after hearing the chosen competitors, I personalized them to fit their background."
"And how much did you save the committee?" Rainbow asks, wondering how much money the committee will save from one person creating all the clothing and covering the cost.
Rarity calulated for moment, adjusting her work glassess on her head. "I spared a few hundred in material costs and the cost of the clothing itself," she answers. Then something came to her that she forgot to tell Rainbow. "Oh, and by the way, I delivered another piece of clothing, just for Sonic. Is he still here in your house? And if so, has he fully recovered?"
"Well," Rainbow said, looking inside to see Sonic and the parents sitting on the couch. "Of course he is."
"Hehe," Sonic chuckled, rubbing the part of his head that was once aching pain. "Wasn't as bad as we thought it would. injuries has been fully healed by the time I woke up."
Rarity continued to stare at Sonic. "Oh," she said. "Well, that's great news. Here, take these clothing and try them on. See if they fit."
Rainbow and Sonic took the clothing and took them to the nearest changing station they could find: the bathroom. Rainbow took the blue jacket and pink striped shorts, while Sonic took the pink jacket and blue banded shorts. Rainbow's shorts has white stripes going vertically down from her sides. Sonic's shorts have white bands that go around each leg, encompassing his thighs.
Once they exited and took a look at how each other looks in their new set of clothing, Rainbow couldn't help but laugh at how silly Sonic looks in pink clothing. Sonic could only shrug as Rainbow continued to laugh at him.
Rainbow was confused when she saw Rainbow laughing at Sonic. "Huh? But I thought that the pink jacket would go to Rainbow," she said.
Aleena took the time to lean on Rarity. "Don't blame him. Blame me," she said. "I asked you to make that uniform for him."
"Need I remind you that this color scheme is exactly what Sonic wore when imitating the 1990's?" Chuck brought up.
"After hearing that from Sonic's parents, I decided something," Bow said. "Why not switch the color scheme for Rainbow?"
The four parents then had a laugh.
"Oh...right," Rarity realizes. "I should've known this earlier."
Somewhere on the campus of Canterlot High, Silver is receiving samples of the sports equipment that's about to be used in the athletic events. Before replacement is necessary, Silver inspects the equipment to make sure that they are okay to use for the participating students.
"Let's see, how is our equipment going?" Silver says as he takes a look at the boxes presented to him. He opens up to find a sports bow. "Hmm, look completely fine," he observes. Then he tugs on the drawstring, which snaps. "Oh, uh...must've worn from being old. And from a lack of maintenance." He inspects the bow even more and accidentally snaps the bow in half. He frowns for a bit. "Well, that sucks," he concludes. "Now, what about the other sports equipment?"
Celestia walks around the hallways of Canterlot High, looking into the rooms where the academic events are being hosted. The first one that she took a peek in appears to been invaded by some camera crew. "Whoa! We have cameramen invading the classroom," she says, stepping away. She did not expect camera crew to be here, or allowed them permission to put camera in the classrooms. However, considering that the Columbia Games are about to start, she is left wondering. "Are...are we seriously broadcasting this to the wider world?"
One of the camera crew behind this stands up and walks up to Principal Celestia. "Yep, we're serious doing this," he answers. "Thanks to some generous students, the committee was able to afford having camera crew record what's going on during each event. And thanks to regaining public interest, it is now viable to present this like an official sports broadcast."
Celestia was left scratching her head. "Oh, that's interesting," she said. Then she wondered about how was this possible. "Who should I be thanking?"
"You can thank the rangers for returning interest to the Columbia Games Junior League," the cameraman replies.
Celestia opened her mouth to reply, but she realizes that she still needs to prepare the front courtyard for the real opening ceremony. "I'll thank them later," she decides. And then she leaves.
After years of being apart, Rankine and Abacus are finally making amends. And by amends, they mean arguing like they used to. Even after years of separation and not seeing each other, they still remember their feeling they have of each other.
As her parents sat at opposite sides of the table, Sunny Flare could not help but try to squeeze out a smile as she looks at her parents.
"So uh...mom. Dad," she said in an awkward tone, shifting her eyes between each parent. "How are things going on between you now?"
Sunny is not helping her parent's case.
Rankine pinched his nose as he prepared to say this to his ex-wife's face. A feeling of discomfort went though his lips. "Listen, Abacus," he began. "You may want to win this for the sixteen year in a row. And consequently end the Junior League all together." He then turned his face firectly towards Abacus. "But read my lips. This year isn't going to be as easy as the last fifteen years."
Abacus grew skeptical of why this year won't be as easy as the previous ten years. "And why is that?" she asks, questioning her school's potential to lose. "Is it because they are improving faster than we can? Have we really fallen behind that quickly? I don't believe this."
Rankine's frown grew even wider. He shakes his head in response. "No," he answers. "It's because fighting against your students are six of the defenders of Columbia. I know they can handle this."
Abacus is still skeptical about this. The defenders of Columbia, standing up against her? Ridiculous. "Rankine, enough of your nonsense," Abacus responds, not believing about this fact. "There's no way a group of teenagers are able to defend an entire country as large as Columbia, let alone have a chance against my school."
"They may not take on cosmic level dangers that threaten our planet's existence," Rankine brought up, "but they do serve to protect the people, risking their lives when danger comes. They may no longer be rangers now, but I know that they still sot some fighting spirit in them. As for Diamond Secondary School, which we know is always crushed by the other schools-"
"Let me guess," Abacus rudely interrupted. "They're going to be crushed again just like the last several years?"
Rankine lowers his head, allowing the shadows to envelop all but his eyes as he continued to stare at Abacus. "No," he replies. "I'm sure that they will put up a fight against you, even if it means another potential failure."
Sunny looked at the clock on the wall, noticing that it's almost time to go to the school, and by extension the first day of the Columbia Games. "Well, sorry if I interrupt you two, but it seems so satisfying see you two interact with each other again," she said. "But, did any of you look a the clock?" She pointed towards the wall clock. "It's almost time for school."
"Almost time to get to school?" Abacus asks. Then she stands up, getting ready for the day ahead. "Well, Sunny. Looks like it's time to take you to-"
"Hold up, Abacus," Rankine said, standing up while holding his hand out in front. "Let me handle the duty of taking Sunny to where she needs to go." He the walks up to Sunny and takes her hand as they procced out the door.
"Hold up, Rankine," Abacus said, placing her icy hand on Rankine's shoulder. He freezes almost instantly. "You have no right to touch my daughter!"
Rankine stopped to turn to Abacus. "Don't you mean our daughter?" he growls.
"She's mine now," Abacus declared, almost starting to roar. "After we declared a divorce, I took your daughter and took her in as my own."
Rankine turns towards Abacus slowly. "So?" he asks right in front of her face. "She's still our child. We have the privileges to do whatever is needed at the moment."
"Shut your mouth up, Rankine!" Abacus roared, freezing Rankine in place. Then she stands up straight and assures her self. "Good. Now let me take Sunny to school. Don't get in my way."
Abacus then leaves with Sunny, leaving Rankine frozen in the house. Rankine can't do anything but shift his eyes as Abacus leaves with Sunny, bringing him flashbacks of the day of the divorce twelve years ago.
Applejack, Thunder, Miles, and Knuckles are waiting for the others to arrive. Meanwhile, several students take it to the stands, waiting for the real opening ceremony to come. Everyone is still waiting on eight competitors.
The competitor's outfits has changed significantly from yesterday. They got fresh new jackets, fresh new shorts, and the colors are a bit brighter than some of their normal clothes. Everyone is looking quite stylish today.
"Hey guys!" they heard Rarity say. They turn their attention to their right as the two other competitors arrive.
At the same time, the competitors from Diamond Secondary arrive via bus and the trio of students exited the bus. They are looking quite stylish today, looking like they're ready to compete in fresh clothing rather than their regular everyday outfits.
"Oh! And here's the rest of the competitors," Miles said, looking at the others who had just arrived. "And they're looking good.
"Yeah," Wave agrees. "And it was all thanks to Rarity that made these uniforms for us to wear during the competition."
Rarity smiles as she is getting respect from her friends and rivals.
Sonic takes a look at Jet in his deep green outfit. "Wow Jet," he beings to compliment. "You and your friends are looking like you are ready to compete. None of those casual clothing nonsense. We want clothing that we don't see."
Jet takes a look at Sonic and Rainbow. He felt something about them that ticks him off. "You two look like you need to swap clothes because Sonic looks ridiculous in a pink jacket," he comments. He gets weird looks from the others.
"What can I say?" Sonic replies. "I'm not one of those manly man. I keep flowers in my room, if you want proof."
Applejack looks around and notices that there are still three students missing. "Say, what's taking Crystal Academy so long?" she asks.
Just then, Sunny, Lightning, and the mystery girl all arrived at the front courtyard of Canterlot High. They gasp and wheeze from running for so long.
"We're here, everyone," Lightning announces gasping for air. "Sorry we're late. Sunny has delayed us quite a bit."
"Thanks to my parents..." Sunny said, looking away.
Lightning quickly snaps back to her cocky, usual self complete with a smug grin. "But now that we're all here, let's get starting on beating each other up, shall we?" she says.
Rainbow turns towards the mystery girl and gets a suspicious feeling about her. So she walks up to the girl. "Who are you?" Rainbow asks. "I swear that I've seen you before."
The girl shivers as she hears the voice that kicked her out of this location earlier than expected. "Oh," the girl replies, trying her best to remain confident. "I'm...Twilight Sparkle. Hi?"
After hearing how awkward this girl feels, Rainbow gets the suspicion that something is wrong with her.
Celestia exits the door only to find that everyone necessary for the games is here and present. "Ahh, it looks like everyone is here, ready to get these games starting," she said. Then she raised her voice. "Okay, everyone. Let's get this started! For real this time."
The four teams of students gather up in clusters of four as the four principals of the four participating schools stand in front of them. The three groups each have a participating student from each of the participating schools. One group has Sonic, Rainbow, Jet, and Lightning. The second has Miles, Thunder, Wave, and Twilight. The third has Knuckles, Applejack, Storm, and Sunny.
Cadence walks up to Luna to give her a hug, relieved that everyone is fine. "Good to see that everyone's fine after the incident yesterday," she said.
"Oh, don't celebrate too early, Cadence," Luna replies. "We're just getting started."
Celestia walks up the podium and towards the microphone. She speaks to it, catching everyone's attention. "Alright, everyone," she beigns to announce. "The Columbia Games Junior League is about to start. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that we have camera crews at each of the events. We are broadcasting this for people to watch. Yes, I know. It's been a long time since they did this. But public interest has risen immensely compared to last year, making broadcasting a viable option."
The spectating students are left to whisper to each other as they discover that cameramen has been placed in the classroom to broadcast the event to the wider world. They didn't anticipate this event turning form a minor competition to something major straight from the previous year.
Celestia continued to announce through the opening ceremony "To get us started, let us go over how we'll handle this year's games, at last for the academic events" she said. "For starters, each of the teams will be separated into three groups. Group A..."
A sign popped up from behind the members of Group A, hitting Jet in the back of the head.
"Ow! My head!" Jet yells as he rubs the back of his head.
"Told you not to stand over there," Sonic responds.
"Group B..."
Someone sneaks up from behind the members of Group B to hold up a sign. This startles Twilight, who then ducks down, yelping. "What's with this?" she complains. "That scared me!" The others look at her, with Lightning and Sunny growling at her.
"And Group C," Celestia finishes.
A sign pops up right in front of Group C, smacking Knuckles in the face. Sunny mocking laughs at Knuckles, while Storm looks down at Knuckles while scratching his head.
"Okay, who did this?" Applejack asks, groaning over the stupid decision. She then helps Knuckles get back to his feet.
Aleena comes up to the microphone to continue with the announcement. "Each group will participate in a single event," she told everyone. "Once an event ends, no other group may participate in the event again. You must move on to the next scheduled event. There will be up to three events happening at the same time, each being participated by the three groups. You will have up to thirty minutes to complete each event, and at most ten minutes to transition to the next event."
The participating students receive a slip of paper displaying all the events that they will participate in. The times when these events will start and end are included.
"Are you ready, participators?" Cadence asks everyone. "Because once the bell rings, you must rush over to the first event on your list provided to you. Get to your destinations as soon as possible."
The clock ticks down towards the beginning of the first event.
"On your marks," Cadence announces in anticipation of the bell. "Get set..."
Right on cue, the first bell goes off, prompting everyone to rush inside to the events.
"...Go?" Cadence finishes. She looks at her watch, thinking that she mistimed her announcement.
The first round of events will take place in a workshop classroom, a science classroom, and the kitchen.
"Group A is doing carpentry," Cadence announces as students and spectators wander the hallways looking for the rooms where the events are being held. "Group B, chemistry. And Group C, cooking. Choose wisely spectators, because once the next bell rings, you cannot move over to watch another event that is going on."
The carpentry event is on, and Group A is going at a strong start. The participator's goal is to create a birdhouse with the materials provided, all at the same time and within the time limit.
Sonic wants to finish this as quickly as possible. So he slams down on the nails as past as possible. Unfortunately for him, he hit himself with the hammer in his rush to finish the birdhouse. "Gah!" Sonic yelled as he slammed his hammer down on his hand. He drops the hammer as he clamps on his thumb, checking for injury.
Diamond Secondary principal Curtis is watching over the event and makes a comment about Sonic's performance. "And Sonic lives up to his surname as he accidentally hit his thumb with a hammer."
Jet and Lightning got distracted by Sonic's yelp of pain, while Rainbow only shifted her eyes towards Sonic before moving her attention back towards the birdhouse she is making. She's pretty sure that Sonic is fine. No need to drop what she's doing to check on him. After all, her notorious rival is in the same room, and she does not want her to win.
While Jet is distracted, he slammed his hammer down on the back of his hand. "Ow!" he screams as he drops what he is doing. Jet clamps on to the back of his hand, checking for any bones he might've accidentally fractured.
"Oops," Curtis commentated. "Jet nearly smashed his bones by looking away."
"You okay?" Rainbow asks, shifting her eyes towards Jet for a moment.
"Just ignore me!" Jet yells.
Lightning looks at the two injured boys and couldn't help but laugh. "Haha!" she taunted. "Sucks to be you, boys." Then she hears the sound of wood being splintered.
"Huh?" Lightning wonders where the sound came from. She looks at the other birdhouses, only to find that they are fine. She then looks down at her birdhouse and realizes that she broke a plank while she's looking away.
Curtis shook his head with disapproval And Lightning broke her birdhouse by not looking at where she's landing her hammer," he announces, much to the shock of the spectators. "She's disqualified!"
"What?" Lightning gasps, dropping the hammer.
Curtis went up to Lightning with an intimidating look. "You never had this happen to you before, have you?" he asks.
Lightning shook her head, as this was her first try into carpentry.
After the pain subsided, Sonic can continue to work on his birdhouse. Before he begins, he takes a moment to calm himself down. "Okay Sonic," he says to himself. "You've got twenty minutes left to finish this. No need to rush though it. You've got this."
Sonic then picks up his hammer and gets back to work.
Meanwhile, in the chemistry event, participators are trying to make something erupt out of the beaker and not make a mess out of things.
After pouring the powder into the beaker, he then hears some strange clicking noise. He looks over to hits side and catches Twilight trying to scan him with that scanner of hers.
"Hey! Twilight!" Miles shouted. "What are you doing inspecting my own body?"
Twilight then looks up, away from her FR scanner. "Oh," she replies, adjusting her lab goggles. "I-uh...detected some FR waves emitting frim your bodies. Very faint ones."
Miles was confused by what Twilight meant by FR waves, as he has never heard of them before in any scientific journal. "What are FR waves?" he asks, curious by what Twilight is saying.
Twilight looks over to her beaker, wondering when there'll be a chemical reaction. "Well..." she begins, but then she stops herself, wondering if this is a good time to explain what FR means to this stranger.
Then, a substance erupted out of the beakers, shooting into the ceiling. However, it was a bit too powerful as seconds later, the substance landed back on the floor in the form of a foam. This foam covered two lab stations, as well as Miles and Twilight. The two scientists, however, were completely unfazed by this as they did not break their gaze at each other.
Aleena is watching over the event and starts to wonder if the smart people the schools chose to participate in this are really smart at all. "Somebody put a little bit too much powder into their beakers," she commentated. "And by somebody, I mean two students."
Miles and Twilight get disapproving looks from the spectators.
After Wave poured powder into the beaker, she looks at the solution that is bubbling in the beaker, wondering when will the reaction begins. She then hovers her eye over the beaker, with the lab goggles touching the rim.
Aleena notices this lab safety violation and is quick to point out this infraction. "Wave! Safety first!" she yells.
Wave is startled and trips over her shoes and falls on her back.
The people at Group C are trying to make waffles. A group of judges is waiting near the windows, waiting to have a taste of what these kids can do.
While stirring up the batter, Applejack starts to near strange noises coming from the station next to her. "Huh?" she says as she stops. Then she looks to her side, only to find Storm stirring the batter rather viciously. Applejack doesn't know hot to react to this. "What the-?"
Cadence is watching over the event, waiting to comment on anything of interest that happens. Once she did catch Storm stirring the batter hard to the point of splashing batter everywhere, she is quick to make a comment. "Storm is cooking up a...storm..." she says, unable to find another word for storm without saying Storm's name. She looks to her side, trying her best to keep a straight face. "err..."
Applejack, frustrated with the mess that Storm is making, decided to take a break from mixing the batter to inform him about something. "Hey! Storm!" Applejack said.
Storm stops and turns towards Applejack. "What is it, cowgirl?" he asks.
"Would you mind if you'd just calm down with the stirring?" she asks.
Storm does not catch what Applejack is saying. "Pardon?" he asks.
"It's not about how fast you mix the batter," Applejack informs. "It's about how long. Now stop stirring so vigorously. You're making a mess." Applejack then resumes in stirring the batter.
Storm scratches head in confusion. "Huh? What?" he asks again. "Are you sure that's true?"
"Trust me," Applejack replies.
"Okay then."
The thirty minutes are up. The bell rungs to signify that the first round of events are over.
"The first events are over," Celestia announces. "Let's tally up the results."
In the carpentry event, Sonic manages to create a decent looking birdhouse that looks a bit similar to Rainbow's, with the difference being that the boards are built a bit mor properly. Jet's looks lopsided, while Lightning is disqualified for breaking a board with her hammer.
"Sonic recovered from an injury and finished his birdhouse in time," Curtis reported. "As a prize for making a splendid recovery while still making something decent, Team Emerald gets the first point!"
The crowd of student cheers as Sonic finds himself winning the event for his team.
"I won?" Sonic asks. Then he went into a cheering spree, jumping with his raised pumped fists. "Hooray! I scored a point for my team!"
Rainbow planted her face into the desk in defeat. "Oh come on!" she yelled.
Meanwhile, Jet shook his head in shame as he knew that he lost horrible. Lightning, on the other hand, was still angry that she lost because she broke a board.
Celestia then reads her report she's gotten from the science room. "Going over into the science room for the chemistry section," she continues, "Miles and Twilight has made a mess out the place and Wave violated safety protocols. Repeatedly. Therefore, for going the experiment properly, Thunder gains a point for Team Canterlot."
While the rest of the crowd cheers, Thunder seems unsatisfied given how he won because the smart kids are acting stupid.
"You guys are supposed to be smart," Thunder says. "Are you trying to pull some victory points for doing dumb stuff?"
In the kitchen, Cadense gives her report to the principal. "Knuckles makes for a horrible chef," she observes. "Storm makes a mess, and Applejack overcooked the waffles. The point goes to Team Crystal."
Sunny claps her hands unenthusiastically.
Knuckles was left scratching his head. "Uhh, what happened exactly?"
The students then transition to the next round of events.
"Moving on to the next events..." Celestia announces.
The second round of events begins.
"So this is part of the curriculum," Sonic commented as he and the others perform in the speed-cubing event. "Solving puzzle cubes." The cube then jumps out of his hand. "Oh shoot-" Sonic gasps as he reaches over the table to his dropped cube, tilting the table over.
Meanwhile, in the math event, Miles is doing some summation practice. "The sum of all the values from..." he began, before hearing some clicking noise. He knew that it had to be Twilight, who is sitting right across from him. He gave her a disapproving stare. "Would you please cut that out?" he asks
Twilight just then looks up, and shrieks. She hides her scanner behind her.
Group C is doing some sketching and is trying to match the line art of a vase filled with flowers as closely as possible.
"It's quite hard," Knuckles comments. "My meaty hands is getting in the way..."
The other competitors are having no problem sketching, except for Storm. He to is suffering from the same problem as Knuckles.
The third round the goes off.
A little gift from the students from Primp Academy. Puyo Puyo Columns. A puzzle-duel game that dumps the opponent with nuisance blocks whenever a match is made.
"Oh yeah," Rainbow beings to sarcastically say as she strategically places a block somewhere, starting a chain. "Because playing video games is totally an academic skill that is necessary to have. Especially competitive puzzle games."
Jet looks a little closer at the nuisance pile that's building up above his board. "How big is my nuisance pile-" he asks, before being interrupted by an avalanche of nuisance blocks. "Oh bird feathers!" Jet yelped as he got defeated.
The others laugh at Jet's inability to set up a counter attack when he had the chance, much to the embarrassment of Jet.
Lighting laughed at Jet right up until she looks back at her board. Blocks fall from the top and blocks her off, much to her surprise. "Oh shoot!" she shrieks as she gets defeated.
"Serves you right, player who took her eyes off her own board," Sonic laughs.
"We are experiencing some circuit issues," Thunder announces as a clicking sound goes off in the background. Then he looks towards the clicking sound who turns out to be Twilight. "Someone won't keep on inspecting me."
Twilight receives some disapproving looks from the Crystal Academy spectators and all the competitors. The Crystal Academy spectators shook their head in disapproval, while the competitors are wondering why Twilight brought this thing along.
"Five...six...seven" Applejack counted. Then the one she counted turns out to be a fake. "-no, wait. Six..."
Here comes the fourth round of events.
"Okay," Sonic said, holding a thumbtack that has "Gambia" on it. "Now we're getting into the more obscure places. Anyone remember Gambia?"
Attached on the world map on the table, there are the thumbtacks labeled Columbia, Nile, Indus, Amazon, Colorado, Rhine, Niger...
Miles and Thunder get even more suspicious of Twilight as the events go by.
"Twilight. What are you doing?" Miles interrogated.
Twilight looks at the two boys who are staring at her. Both of which she detected FR waves radiating from. "Nothing!" she answers, trying to weasel her way out. "I was just-"
"Looking at us?" Thunder asks.
Twilight could only look a the boys who she feels are threatening her. Some red aura builds up in her hands, which gets absorbed into her amulet. Nobody seems to be noticing this, however.
Knuckles is looking at a spot the difference poster and trying to find something a feature that is either missing or different. "I'm pretty sure that I saw this thing right over here," he asks himself. Then he points to the frog. A buzzer goes off behind him, sending a red light. "Gah! I lied to myself!"
The penultimate event of the academic day is a spelling bee, where everyone is called to the auditorium to try to spell out as many words as possible. As the rounds continue, the words become increasingly longer and more complex, the point that some of the words are really obscure.
One of the first people to get eliminated if Rainbow. While not the first one to get eliminated, she did mess up on a rather uncommon word. She is tasked with the word "Hippopotamus".
"P-P-O-T-" Rainbow spells out. And then she gets a buzzer, making her wrong. "What did I miss?" Rainbow asks, confused over how the word is spelled.
"I feel so dirty spelling this word out," Thunder comments. "Vernacular."
Next one to get eliminated is Sonic, who fails to spell one of the words he most commonly misspells. He is tasked to spell out the word "Immediately". "M-M-E-A-" he beings to say, before getting an incorrect buzzer. "What? I swear I heard meat in there. Did you?"
One by one, the competitors get eliminated by increasingly complex and obscure words. Out of all the groups, Group B is the only group who has a single remaining competitor. This group is the one to move on to the final event of the academic day. A quiz based on the trivia behind the Columbia Games, as well as other stuff.
When Wave, the last of the students, finished and submitted her quiz, it is time to announce the winner. "Group B has submitted their work for the final event of the academic day," Cadence announces. "While we're grading it, let's show a raise of hands. Who did you think won this event? Is it Wave? Thunder? Twilight? Miles?"
The raise of hands was a lot higher than expected for some of the schools. Emerald High and Canterlot High are getting a lot of bets. Crystal Academy only got a raise of hands mostly from the Crystal Academy students, and not all of them voted for Crystal Academy. Meanwhile, Diamond Secondary gets little support from the spectators.
After a few minutes, it is time to announce the winner.
"The grades has been submitted," Cadence announces. "Let's see who won their school the final point." Above the students' head, numbers are being flipped though as the score arrives. "Wait for it..."
Everyone is sweating in anticipation for the winner of this event.
"BAM!" Cadence yelled as the numbers showed up.
Miles got a score of 92 out of 100. Thunder, 88. Wave, 85. And Twilight, 97.
"Twilight and Team Crystal claims victory for the final event!" Cadence announces.
There was very little applause going on in the audience's part. Meanwhile, Miles, Thunder, and Wave all slam their heads into the tables in defeat.
The Crystal Academy students was rather unenthusiastic about Twilight's victory for them, causing Twilight to feel unappreciated. She's not getting the respect that she deserves, causing an red aura to flow out of her body and into her amulet.
Jet walked up the stage up to Wave. Wave look up to Jet, still crying over her loss. "Well, Wave. You've fought well," Jet says. And then he looks at the score. "And as usual, Diamond Secondary School got last place. Though, with a much closer margin than before."
"You okay, Thunder?" Rainbow asks as she and the others walked up to him.
"I'm sorry," Thunder apologizes. "I was just outsmarted by the others."
"Well, you did outsmart me," Wave said.
Applejack pointed at Wave. "Can you really call that outsmarting?" she asks.
Sonic came up to Miles to pat him on the back, comforting him. "Good work there, Miles," he said. "You did good there, even if we did not won."
"It's okay," Miles said. "This is only the first day"
The twelve competitors stand in a line in front of the audience, grouped by school.
Cadence holds her clipboard as she announces the scores of each of the schools. "We have tallied up all the winners of each event," she announces, "and the results are as follows." She looks at her list and counts up all of the wins each school got. "Out of the fourteen events hosted today, Team Crystal takes the lead with five wins. Team Emerald and Team Canterlot have tied with four wins each, and poor Team Diamond only got a single win. But at least they fought well."
"That's the end of the first day of the Columbia Games Junior League," Celestia said. "Join us next time for when we're starting the athletic events. See you there."
As afternoon approaches, Sonic found Sunny lounging around outside the school, looking disgruntled. She leans next to a trash can.
"So, uh, Sunny," Sonic said, walking up to her. "You're still here." Sunny does not respond, only with a grumpy look. Sonic picks up on this. "Why do you look so grumpy today? Didn't your school won yet again?"
"Why don't you go away from me, imposter?" Sunny asks, looking threatening.
Sonic was startled at first, but he quickly goes back to being calm. "Look, lady," he says. "We all noticed. When Twilight won, we noticed that your school isn't the most enthusiastic about that victory. Why is that?"
Sunny becomes increasingly annoyed about this blue pest that just won't go away. "Would you please stop bugging me, blue boy?" she asks. Sonic is unfazed by Sunny raising her voice. "You know what, forget this." She then picks up a trash can and dumps the entire thing onto Sonic, ending it with the trash can on his head. She then walks away, back to her school. "Smell you later, Sonic Trash."
Sonic groans as he feels insulted.
Rainbow walks up to Sonic, seeing that he has a trash can on his face. "So, uh, Sonic," Rainbow begins to ask. "How did it go?"
Before Sonic answers, he takes the trash can off of him, taking off bits of trash that is still sticking to him. "She just insulted me in front of my face, then dumped a garbage can on my head," he answers. "Also, the custodian is going to be pissed when he sees this mess."
Rainbow looks down, only to find a pile of garbage bags laying there on the ground.
"Crystal Academy students are real jerks, aren't they?" Rainbow asks. "I mean, did you notice? Whenever we won, Sunny or Lightning would react rather harshly to their loss. But, did you notice who I left out?"
Sonic realizes that Rainbow left out someone. "Oh yeah. Twilight," he answers. "That girl who seems to be always quiet."
Rainbow stares off into the distance as she prepares to tell Sonic this. "She doesn't act like she's from Crystal Academy, does it?" she asks, catching Sonic's attention. "In fact, I think she's nervous."
Sonic was getting curious about this Twilight girl that they just met. "Nervous?" he questioned. "About what?"
Rainbow shot her gaze back towards Sonic. "Do I look like I attend Crystal Academy?"
"Uhh...no," Sonic replies.
"Then I have no clue," Rainbow replies back.
Mr. Mobius is the head of the committee being the Columbia Games in all the leagues. When he's not overlooking a country wide event, he does commentary on sports events in the professional level.
In his office, an assistant came in to provide details about what happened during the Junior League of the Columbia Games.
"The first day of the Columbia Games is over," the assistant reported, "and already, we're seeing some improvements on behalf of Crystal Academy's rivals. Emerald High and Canterlot High has won more games than before, and Diamond Secondary School has saw its first win in an event in ten years."
Mr. Mobius is quite surprised to hear this. "My goodness," he responds. "No wonder everyone's excited to see these two schools rise up to the rankings and crush Crystal Academy. People just wanted to see the rangers win."
"Oh yeah," the assistant said, reminded that two of the schools have former rangers. "It's all thanks to the rangers."
"Just one more thing before we close this day off," Mr. Mobius said, stopping his assistant from exiting.
The assistant is curious about what her boss has to say. "What is it?" she asks.
Mr. Mobius looks through the revenue spread sheet and points out that the ad revenue made from broadcasting the games is five times the amount from the last time they broadcasted the Junior League live. "There's a sudden increase in the revenue we've been getting from broadcasting the Columbia Games Junior League," he notes, "likely due to the rise in viewership. We've gotten two million people watching the events from their homes or portable streaming device, and as a result we've gotten thousands more dollars to add to our budget."
The assistant was surprised to hear this. "What? Are you serious?" she gasps.
Mr. Mobius nodded. "Yes." Then he made a forecast. "And this number is expected to increase tomorrow as people spread this news to everyone that they know. We've gotten so much additional money for us to rent out the sports field in Emerald City for an entire day. You know what that means, do you?"
"You're kidding, Mr. Mobius."
Mr. Mobius then made an announcement to his office assistant. "We're going to host the second day of the Columbia Games right there!" he announces.
The assistant shook her head in disbelief. "No way..." she said.
"Yes way!" Mr. Mobius said, confident that this will work. "Just notify the competitors tomorrow and make sure that they come here so that we can start the second day."
"But, why this sudden change of plans?" the assistant asks.
"Like I said," Mr. Mobius said, repeating himself. "We have the budget to do this. See you tomorrow."
To be Continued...
From the Author:
This feels much more involved than the few events we see in the Friendship Games. Now, there are even more events being played out, bumping the number up to fourteen. Expect more events to come in the next day.
Twilight's acting a bit strange throughout the day. She appears to be scanning every inch of the school looking for those FR waves and analyzing two people constantly. This cost Crystal Academy a couple of events. With her performance dragging them down, its reasonable that the other students of Crystal Academy would get pretty disgusted by this girl's performance.
However, there appears to be a stream of red aura coming into that amulet of hers whenever she feels something bad is happening to her. What is up with her?
Next day, we're going athletic. Train up, former rangers.
Written by TheAPPstore
Sonic the Hedgehog characters, property of Sega
My Little Pony characters, property of Hasbro