Hey, King Spike Rules here and her is the next chapter to Spike's Basket ball. With the team starting tto take shape, Twilight pushes on with a month long training camp to force the six to get better with their skills, but there are still things missing from the group.

Episode 8: Starting Hell.

It had been a week since Mac joined the team and their practices where starting to get in better shape with all three giving pointers to the three newbies while working on getting their own skills better. On the sideline stood Twilight with her clip board, looking them over and writing down notes with Luna standing next to her watching them closely.

"So, what are you thinking?" Luna asked looking down to her student, who's eyes were watching them closely, her eyes following their movements while writing her notes.

"Their all getting better, Sorian and Mac, even though they haven't played for a while have gotten back into the flow of how the game works and they seem to be able to play a whole game length." Twilight paused to look over a few of her notes, "And Spike has been practicing all his life, so he could go nearly two whole games with very little trouble.'

"But?" Luna asked, seeing she was seemingly beating around the bush in some way, "Is it the other three, Sandbar, Snips, and Snails."

"They still need to work hard to get even close to the other three." Twilight continued to look over her notes, "But they are getting better with every moment they practice and will be needed for other games in the future."

"So, what is the problem?" Luna asked looking down at her student who looked up from her note at the six boys doing running practice.

"Their are five positions in basketball, each being played by one of the five players on the team." Twilight started handing a paper to Luna, who took the paper and looked at the info on it. "The point guard leads the lays and tells the others where to stand, the Shooting Guard specializes in throws and normally scores from behind the three point line, short forward who plays in the middle of the outer roles and inner roles, power forwards play closer under the basket with dibbling and can move back, and then centers play under the basket to get dunks and rebounds." Hearing these roles in the game, Luna looked bac at the boys.

"I see, but which ones do we need?" she asked her arms grossed and looking at them.

"Well, Sorain is a clear Shooting guard, Mac said his best position is power forward, and Spike is great at short forward." Twilight said looking up from her notes, "But we need a center and point guard, and fast." Twilight said when Snip ran up to them, covered in sweat.

"C-coach, were are the girls team?" he asked with Twilight and Luna looking over to the normally busy other half of the gym, which was cleared from any and all person.

"Oh, their on the month long training camp." Twilight said looking through her notes, not noticing the look fromt he other boys who were all taking a rest from their running practice.

"W-wait, we have a training camp?" Spike asked excitedly looking at his older sister.

"No." Luna cut in, "The girls have one because of their last two national visits, the boys don't have the budget to have one because you haven't got that far yet." Luna explained to the group of boys and some of them looked down with a sigh as they heard that.

"Don't worry," Twilight's voice told them and they could see a smile on her face, "I have a plan and we will be doing a training camp here."

"What really?" Spike asked excited as she nodded and placed a bunch of papers in front of them on the floor.

"Yes, and I will be using this special camp to beat away at your weaknesses and move you on towards being a special player along with a special practice match at the end of the camp." Twilight said smiling looking at them as she showed them the plan she had to make them a better team in a short amount of time.


With practice ending, the boys cleaned up the gym and changed back to their street clothes. They all then headed on their ways with Sandbar walking with Snips and Snails with the trio talking about the training camp.

"Man, we're really going to a real training camp of basketball." Snips said excited and the other two agreed with his thoughts when Sandbar reached for something.

"Shoot, I forgot my phone." Sandbar turned about and headed back, "I'll catch up too you guys, I need to go get it."

"Sure thing." Snails called out walking on with Snips waving their friend off. Sandbar headed on off towards the locker room and saw his phone in place where he had left it. Grabbing it, he headed on out of the locker room and to the front gate when he heard something coming from a park near the school.

"Huh?" Sandbar walked towards the sound, wondering who it was until he saw a young man in their school uniform in the middle of dribbling a basketball. Sandbar watched him playing the ball, bouncing it around his legs and moving around with movement Sandbar was in shock at his skills. The boy had fair skin with blue eyes and blue hair with blonde tips, moving like he's a pro.


Spike and Twilight were in the middle of the living room as Twilight was in the middle of working on her camp plans while Spike spun the ball on his hand.

"So, what are the plans for the camp?" Spike asked watching her with the t.v. on and him focusing on talking with her while the ball spun.

"I want to focus on the practice of pushing their skills to where they could be in a tournament." she answered writing it down on the plans, "And to see how it's going, we have a practice match half way through the camp."

"Really?" Spike asked excited looking at her and she turned to look back at him with a smile on her face.


Sandbar continued to watch the young man move around with the ball in ways he had never seen before and he moved closer before he new it, he was nearly breathing down his neck.

"You decided to watch a real player?" the boy asked drawing Sandbar from his trance and a quick shake of his head pulled him back to reality.

"S-sorry, you're just so good." Sandbar said smiling looking at the boy who continued to play with the ball while not looking at him.

"I know, and you better get your fill." he said taking a step and hit a quick two points, picking the ball up, "You won't be seeing it around much longer."

"W-what why?" Sandbar was cute off by the shock of what he was hearing and looking at the young man holding the ball he was playing with.

"Because I watched that practice match you guys did against the girls." he said turning to look at Sandbar with fire in his eyes, "And you're too weak to make it to the top and that's all i need for transfer to another school."

"Wait, you only watch us play before we even knew the rules, that's not a fair judgement by you." Sandbar bit back, but the boy was focused on his ball.

"But it is enough to know you can't build a kingdom on mud." the boy walked on out of the park dribbling while Sandbar looked at him with shock in his eyes, "My name is Gallus, remember when your watching it on tv." Sandbar watched him walk off and a knot filled his stomach as he gritted his teeth hard.


Sandbar's mind was still on what Gallus had told him and he was looking off into space while going through the classes, and was nearly late for practice as Snips and Snails forced him to run to make sure they weren't late for practice. After changing into their practice clothes, Twilight called the group in front of her and she looked them over as they looked at her.

"Alright, starting Monday we will be doing a training camp with practice set for in the morning to help with your fundamentals and stamina while the afternoon will have you six doing three on three match ups." Twilight said showing them the list of what she was expecting them all to be doing while at the camp, "And half way through it, we will be having a practice match with another team, but I will not be telling you who it is." She looked at them all reading over her notes, all except one with her eyes locked on Sandbar's blank eyes, "Sandbar."

"Huh?" hearing couch call out to him pulled Sandbar from his daze and he looked up at her.

"Is something wrong?" she asked him looking down at them and wondering what was on his mind, with Sandbar looking around for a few minutes.

"W-what are the Kingdoms?" he asked, drawing a confused look from the other before Spike realized what he asked and smile formed on his face.

"Couch, he means the five kingdoms." Spike said and Twilight nodded, realizing what Sandbar had meant and she thought it over in her head before looking at them all.

"You see, the Five Kingdoms are the five schools with the best basket ball clubs in the nation." she explained turning to the dry erase board and in moments had a map with five names on it, "They are Dragon Land's Dragon Force, Cloudsdale's Blazing Lightnings, Las Pegasus' Tricksters, Manehaten's Shark's, and the top team of the nation for the last three years, Crystal High's Knights." Twilight showed them the map and they all looked at it in awe as they all wondered the same thing, and Twilight could tell what they were thinking, so she answered them, "Here in Ponyville, we only need to worry about Dragon Force and Blazing Lightning as they will be in our district."

"B-but can we?" Sandbar asked looking down to his list of what he had to do in the practice, "Is what we're doing useless and a waist of time as they have been doing this longer then we have even been a team." Sandbar's question hit hard as the others looked at the map and knowing the mountain they would have to be climbing with almost no practice.

"OF course it's worth trying." Spike said shooting from his seat and drawing all five of their eyes onto him, "They have to practice, just like us."

"So?" Sandbar asked not seeing what he was getting at.

"That means even the best player on those teams started at zero." Spike looked right at Sandbar, Snips, and Snails, "And that means you all can go no where but up from here since zero is the bottom of the barrel."

"Well, there are negative numbers." Twilight chimed in and all six looked at her as she looked back at them, "Oh, right, ignore me."

"So, let's move ahead and turned those zeroes into champions." Spike's words filled them with joy as the six stood up, looking at him and then went to start their practice run with Twilight watching them with a smile on her face. But she was not the only one, Gallus was watching from outside and his eyes fell narrowly on Spike while they ran.

"That fool is just going to hurt them with an impossible goal." holding his basketball firmly in his hand and his gaze on the practice, "No Kingdom will be built here." And so, he walked off with his basketball in hand and bouncing it along.

TBC.

That is it for this chapter, the training camp starts.