Game of disaster strikes!

Caroline and Omega were still trapped in the Jurassic Park game, Shmi, Echo, and Kara were trapped in Galaga, and Gabby and Crosshair were trapped in the Dance, Prance, Revolution game. And while the royal family sent Magenta and Comedia to get help, they were taking a while to arrive, but the royal family had no idea it was because of disaster in the city.

Garrett looked at the video screen as Goldie pointed out something very off, and not because the game was shut down.

"I don't believe this." Garrett said.

"What's going on?" Padme asked.

"It appears we just got introduced to a new game here." Garrett answered. "Pac-Mare."

Padme couldn't believe it either when she looked at the screen and instead of seeing a little yellow circle chomping dots, there was a little white and silver pegasus flying around the maze.

"Oh no! Diamond must've gotten zapped in!" Padme said. "How do we get her out?"

"Looks like we'll have to play for her. But, I haven't played this game since I was a child. I might be a little rusty."

"Let me handle it." Padme said, putting a token in. "I have a little more recent experience with this."

Except, Padme didn't know what she'd done by activating that game.

Back on Coruscant...

Everyone suddenly heard what sounded like video game music playing. Paths of white dots appeared around the city, and across the city, people in four different vehicles found that their rides had turned red, orange, blue, or pink.

(cue Ms. Pac Man Theme)

And once again, everyone heard the sound of digital chomping coming from all around the city, but it wasn't coming from a living yellow ball like you might expect. Rather, it was coming from a giant pegasus.

Ahsoka rode Sapphire through town, and the latter flew high up to look for what was causing the havoc.

"Sapphire?" Ahsoka said, sounding scared when she pointed something out. "Is that...?"

Sapphire looked to where Ahsoka was pointing and saw... "Diamond?! But...how?"

"I've heard of foals growing fast, but not that fast or that up!" Ahsoka said. "And why does the city look like something out of an old video game?"

People started screaming as they tried to get inside to avoid Pac-Mare. She chomped everything in her path, turning it to pixels, and she didn't seem to be in control of where she went, but somehow she avoided the colorful cars, and the drivers did everythig they could to avoid her, especially when she ate a glowing dot, and the vehicles started to sparkle and turn white and blue, which seemed to attract Diamond to them.

"Help us!" the driver in the pink speeder screamed.

Diamond's chomping seemed to get louder and faster as she got closer and closer, and she would've chomped the driver too if Teatra hadn't swooped in with Obi-Wan, who Force pulled the driver out at the last second, and they flew high up onto the roof of a building.

"Thank you, Master Jedi." said the man.

"Don't mention it." said Obi-Wan.

"I've heard people say video games can be damaging," said Teatra. "But that's usually from being too exposed to violence in them or no educational goals being added to them."

"Comedia did say your rider was clavatized. This must be his doing." Obi-Wan said. "But I thought Comedia and Magenta said people got sucked into the games, not the games coming into the real world."

"That is how they worked," said Magenta, flying in. "Gamer must have brought one game out to distract us from getting back to the arcade, and he must be using Diamond because she's the youngest."

"Do either of you know this game?" Obi-Wan asked.

Magenta gave him a look. "Jedi don't play video games?"

"The closest thing we had before we met you were flight simulations."

"Well, luckily, I do know this game from my time promoting various things in my superstar days."

According to Magenta, this was one of those retro games, a game from the old days that continued to entertain generations of players. For the kids of today, this game originated and blew up when their parents were kids. In this particular game, the goal was to eat all the dots and eat the bonus fruit for extra points before losing all three lives to the four ghosts in the maze.

"The only weakness to those ghosts is if Pac-Man eats a power pellet, which gives the avatar a few seconds to be able to gobble up the ghosts for even more bonus points. But lose all your lives before then, it's game over."

Teatra gulped at that.

"What happens if Diamond hits the ghosts three times?" Teatra said worriedly.

"We best make sure we don't have to find out." Obi-Wan said. "Magenta, get as many pegasi as you can to locate every ghost and tell them to avoid hitting Diamond until we can get her back to normal. Teatra and I will get what help we can to Naboo."

"Got it!" Magenta said.

At the high school, everyone heard the chaos going on outside, and according to Principal Brenden, everyone was advised to stay indoors until the crisis was contained. However, they soon received an unexpected visitor in the form of Obi-Wan Kenobi.

"Master Kenobi," said the teacher. "What a surprise. Can I help you?"

"Yes, I need to take Myra Windu out early. It's an emergency."

"What kind of emergency?" Myra said, standing up from her desk.

"The kind that means it'll be game over for everyone if we don't hurry." Teatra said. "We have to go right now if we want any hope of living to see tomorrow."

Seeing as this could be a matter of life and death, Myra didn't wait for the teacher to dismiss her, and ran with the others.

Meanwhile, Diamond continued to chomp on the dots that lined up across various bits in the city, and the power pellets to weaken the ghosts... unfortunately that placed the drivers and any passengers inside in danger.

One police vehicle was being driven across the street, having been turned bright blue, and inside were two cops, when their vehicle suddenly started to sparkle and make digital sound effects, and Diamond started heading right for them!

"Uh oh!" said one officer. "Step on it!"

The police started going over the speed limit to avoid the chomping, but she was catching up very quickly! She was about halfway through the vehicle quicker than someone inhaling a hot dog, when the police saw only one way to avoid getting chomped.

"Abandon ship!" exclaimed one officer.

And both of them jumped from their vehicle. Except, that probably wasn't the smartest choice, as now they had a new problem: they were falling from the sky!

Luckily for them, two colorful somethings swooped in and caught them. And those somethings turned out to be Estrella and Crescent carrying Masters Plo and Shaak Tii on their backs.

"Don't worry, officers, we got you." Crescent said, flying down to get the officers to safety.

"Thank you," said one of the officers.

"Just doing our job." Shaak said.

"Get inside you two, rapido!" Estrella said.

"Got another one!" Padme exclaimed victoriously.

"Good, Padme." Garrett said. "A few more dots and Diamond should be out."

"Get the cherries!" Goldie exclaimed. "Get the cherries!"

As Carousella flew Mace through the city to watch for more ghosts and warn as many people as possible, she was quick to notice a giant pair of cherries hopping(?) through the air.

"Is it just me, or is that a giant pair of cherries?" Carousella asked.

"Oh good. You see them too." Mace said. Then he saw something else. "But am I the only one seeing that?!"

Carousella saw Diamond coming after the cherries, which were also in the same direction as Master Windu and his horse!

"Uh oh!" Carousella said. "Gotta fly!"

Carousella quickly dashed away with Mace on her back, and Diamond chomped the cherries.

"Diamond! Stop!" Carousella called out.

"I would if I could!" Diamond managed to get out when she wasn't chomping dots. "Someone else is *chomp, chomp, chomp!* controlling me!"

Even though the blue police car was chomped, there was another speeder that was turned blue.

Carousella's eyes went wide.

"You don't think-?!" Carousella looked at Mace.

"Only one way to find out." Mace said. "Back to the Temple!"

Padme kept moving Diamond around the screen and made her eat the cherries and as many weakened ghosts as she could catch, and before she knew it, she ate the last dot, and completed the level.

"Yes!" Padme exclaimed victoriously. "Diamond should be out of the game now."

Except, Diamond didn't get released from the game. The game regenerated.

"What?" Padme said. "What is this?"

"Oh no. I remember now." Garrett said. "There are five different fruits in this game."

"So in order to get Diamond out, we have to beat five levels." Padme said. She looked determined then. "Alright then. Challenge accepted."

"Padme!" a voice exclaimed. "Padme, wait!"

That was when Carousella and Teatra arrived with their temporary riders.

"Carousella? What are you doing here?" Padme said.

"Comedia and Magenta came to us at the Temple and told us everything." Obi-Wan said. "You have to stop playing that game now."

"Why?"

"Because that game is real!" Carousella said. "Diamond is chomping dots all over Coruscant, and speeders are in place of the ghosts, which Diamond can chomp with everyone in them!"

Padme gasped at that. She'd made Diamond eat at least two of the ghosts. Had she just helped Mariverde kill a bunch of people?

"Don't worry," said Obi-Wan. "No one was killed this time. Everyone jumped out of their vehicles before Diamond could chomp them."

This was a quandary. Playing the game was the only way to get Diamond out of the game, but if she played that would endanger a lot of people. Diamond was just a filly; they couldn't leave her in there.

Suddenly, the Jurassic Park game started to glow, and it spat out not just Susy and Wrecker, but Caroline and Omega too.

"Ouch!" Omega groaned as she landed on top of the pile.

"Omega!" Padme exclaimed.

"Mom!" Omega said.

"We won the game." Wrecker said from underneath Caroline and Susy piled on top of him.

"Who else is trapped in a game?" Myra said.

"Kara, Shmi, and Echo are in this game." Lamenta said.

Mona was looking at a tablet again and trying to see if she could digitally get them out.

"And apparently Mona has a secret talent with computers."

"Getting people out from a video game wasn't exactly covered in my computer reprogramming studies." Mona said, hitting a few more keys with Mila overseeing.

"And Gabby and Crosshair are trapped in this one." Anakin said, approaching the Dance, Prance Revolution game. "Oh boy. This may be tricky."

Anakin activated the game, and according to the rules, he had to get an A rating to get his daughter and Crosshair out. But, he would only have three tries to do it. Anakin had played this game before, but he was never able to beat Gabby's high score.

"Carmine, you mind helping out here?" Anakin said.

"No worries." Carmine said. "Dancing is my expertise."

Except, when Carmine tried to play, the game wouldn't let him.

Access Denied

"What?" Carmine gasped.

And Gamer appeared on the screen. He told the twins, "The rules of this game are no professional dancers allowed in the challenge. If you wish to free your friends, you must choose two players who are not professional dancers."

This was a new set of rules. Gamer must have strategized that for this game, the group would immediately choose Carmine and/or Caroline to play, being the two best dancers. They would win the game very easily.

"Since Anakin Skywalker placed a token in, he will be the first player. Now, you must choose the second." Gamer continued.

"Uh... any volunteers?" Anakin said.

"I'll do it!" Lamenta said, except the game wouldn't let her play either.

"Another rule of this game," said Gamer. "Both challengers must be at least fifteen or older."

"You're just making up new rules as you go along!" Lamenta said.

"No, I have strategized every rule to this game. Choose another player."

"Any good dancers here who aren't professionals?" Anakin asked, looking at the others.

"Let me at it." Myra said, getting out a token.

"I thought your expertise was in Guitar Hero."

"There's more to me than rock n' roll, Skywalker." Myra smirked, putting in her token. "Okay, to get an A rating, we'll have to work together on this."

"I think we're getting close to getting everyone out of this game." Mila said. "Mini-R-2, plug into the game please."

Mini beeped and plugged himself in.

"Artoo, Mila, see if you can patch into the system and get Gamer out of here." Anakin commanded, and Mila and big R-2 also complied.

If they could Gamer out of the system, they could shut down the power to keep him from spreading to another arcade. But they may need to do a little more than just turn off the gaming system.

Mace and Carousella took care of finding the source of the arcade's Wi-Fi and switching it off so Gamer wouldn't be able to transfer himself to any computers or cell phones nearby. Gamer was trapped in the arcade, but when Mace contacted Master Plo to see if anything changed on Coruscant, Diamond was still chomping across the city.

"It must be because that's caused by a magical spell, and the games that came into the real world are enchanted now." Carousella hypothesized. "So, it looks like the only way to get Diamond out is to win the game."

"I can't hack this game!" Mona said, finding that she and Mini-R2 couldn't get anyone out of the Galaga game.

"Then there's only one thing to do." Qui-Gon said, putting in a token. "We all have to play these games and win!"

"But what about the fact that Diamond's affecting the real world?" Goldie said. "How do we know these others aren't affecting the real world somewhere else?"

The others hadn't thought about that!

"Mona, can you pinpoint where they might be from what you did manage to find?" Anakin asked.

"I might be able to." Mona said, typing a few more lines of code to try and locate Shmi, Kara, and Echo. "It looks like they're just outside Naboo's atmosphere. And to bring them back, we have to beat five levels in this game."

"Then that is what we will do." Obi-Wan said, coming by his master's side to help out.

But the game was a lot harder than the men thought.

Kara and Echo knew how to fly a ship, but Shmi had very little experience with driving such a vehicle, much less battling digital bugs swooping down and dropping little bombs at her.

"I've heard of dangerous games, but this is ridiculous!" Shmi said. "Look out!"

Kara just barely managed to steer the ship out of the way of more bombs in time.

Anakin and Myra played the first level of the dance game.

The first stage was to "We Like to Party!" (by The Vengabus). The players danced together as well as they could, and it seemed easy at first, but the music seemed to speed up and the steps got trickier to where the players had to angle their jumps and steps more than either of them would expect from the first level. And by the time they finished the dance, the final rating was D+.

"Ugh!" Anakin stomped his foot angrily.

"Shoot!" Myra huffed.

"If winning the game is the only way to get Diamond out, then we'll have to win this without eating any ghosts." Padme said.

"That won't be easy, though." Mariposa said. "I might know a better way thought. Padme, keep your comm active."

Mariposa rushed as quickly as she could to the Jedi Temple and managed to find Ahsoka and told her and Sapphire she had a plan to win the Pac-Mare game and keep any drivers from getting chomped.

Padme kept her comm active, and Mariposa helped everyone stay connected via comm. Sapphire and Ahsoka got high up into the air with Magenta to have a better view of Diamond and every Jedi's whereabouts. Each time Diamond ate a power pellet and started to chase after a ghost she could safely eat, the flying team would alert the nearest Jedi to get the drivers and passengers out of the vehicle before Diamond ate it. But it wasn't and easy job, seeing as there were four more fruits Diamond had to chomp too. She already passed the Cherry level, now according to Gamer's rules, the four levels left were Strawberry, Orange, Apple, and Melon

But, Gamer kept doing everything he could to make each game harder... except that became trickier for him with no Wi-Fi. But it wasn't easy for the gamers either.

Over the course of the game, Padme accidentally ran Diamond into a ghost that wasn't weakened, and lost a life, and Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan lost two lives whike trying to rescue the three trapped in Galaga, and they still had two levels to beat! Myra and Anakin even lost the second level of the dance game, this time with a C rating.

"Ugh!" Anakin said. "It's impossible. You need four legs to do these routines."

"Only because Gamer rigged the songs' usual steps." Myra said. "I can dance fast, but this is a little faster than I'm used to. But... we have one more try."

Myra placed the token in.

"Come on. Let's do this!"

But, Anakin and Myra got really intimidated when Gamer brought up a level of dancing that neither of them felt prepared for. A Count Crescendo level. And with a really tricky song called "On the Floor," one of the most intense levels of dancing and singing they knew of so far.

"Oh boy!" Anakin groaned. "I hope Carmine taught us well enough."

"I've been practicing to dance at my parents' wedding. Only one way to find out if it'll pay off." Myra said. "Let's dance again."

Mona decided to look up a little information about the games' systems. Since she couldn't use Wi-Fi at the moment, she and Buttercup looked for manuals in the attendents' office, which they usually kept for the event that any of the games were out of order.

"What exactly are we looking for?" Buttercup wondered out loud

"I'm not sure. But maybe something about resetting or rebooting." Mona said, picking up another manual. "Or taking out something that something that shouldn't be there."

"Like a computer virus?"

"That's it! A computer virus! That's what Gamer is like right now. None of the games he's been in work the same way as they're supposed to. He's a virus that reprograms and traps people."

"There should be some anti-virus drives in here," said one of the repairmen.

He opened a drawer and pulled out a drive.

"This drive is embedded with a program to eradicate computer viruses of all kinds."

"Eradicate?!" Mona said. "Doesn't that mean the virus is...?"

Mona made a slashing motion across her throat

"Yes. Oh! And your friend is the virus, so you want him out alive. That's not an anti-virus treatment we usually make."

"Then let's make one." Mona said. "But not here."

Mona got onto Buttercup and had her rush outside to go somewhere they could make a new program that would Gamer out of the game without hurting him.

"Where exactly do you plan to look for a computer?" Buttercup said.

"Let's get to the school!"

Buttercup flew Mona over to the school, where they rushed into the computer lab, where computer class was taking place.

"Excuse me, young lady-" said the teacher.

"No time for chat, Mrs. Raine!" Mona said. "Lives are at stake here!"

Mona got to a computer, plugged in an empty flash drive, and started to work on some codes.

"Girls, what is going on?" asked Mrs. Raine.

"Well, that's kind of a crazy story." Buttercup said. "While Mona works, I'll talk."

While some of the arcade repairmen tried to help with getting everyone out of the games, with no success, Anakin and Myra danced like their lives depended on it. Neither took their eyes off the screen for any reason and just kept dancing every single step as quickly as their bodies would let them, getting each one on the beat. Both of them, however, were very sweaty by the time the song was finally over, and both of them collapsed with heavy breaths, and the game console started to glow, and out sprung Crosshair and Gabby, who were caught by Myra using the Force and Anakin catching Gabby in his arms.

"That's one father-daughter dance I never wanna go through again." Anakin breathed, making Gabby laugh.

"But you're really good at it, Daddy." Gabby kissed her father's cheek.

Anakin carried Gabby over to the Pac-Man game, where Omega and Boba were taking turns playing.

"How are we doing with Diamond here?" Anakin asked.

"We're still a level short!" Boba said. "Incoming on the left!"

Omega quickly moved Diamond away from another ghost.

"Any luck on your end, Dad?" Anakin shouted.

"Not as of yet." Qui-Gon said. "Still one level to go!"

"Does anyone know where Mona scampered off to?" Constantine said, noticing his oldest granddaughter was missing.

"Didn't she go with Mariposa?" said Crosshair.

"Is she with you, Hunter?" Lamenta asked, knowing Hunter was doing some searching on the games.

"No, I don't have her. Mila?" Hunter said.

"She was right by the Galaga game just a moment ago."

"Buttercup's gone too!" Emeraldi noticed. "She and Mona must've gone out for help."

"You mean the blonde girl with the zebra?" said one of the workers. "She said they were going to school or something."

"Mona must be at school then." Gabby said.

By now, school was almost over. So, Hunter got onto Zipp and had her head out quickly to get to the school fast!

"Done!" Mona exclaimed.

She saved the program to her flash drive, and just in time too.

"Mona!" Hunter called. "There you are!"

"Hunter?" Mona said.

"Mona, why'd you run off like that? Your parents are worried about you. I was worried about you."

"We came here to work on something that'll get Gamer- Tech... out of the system without hurting him." Mona said. "Right now, he's like a virus. Normally, we would eradicate a computer virus, but I created a program that should extract him instead. And with a little magic, it'll undo all the spells and we can de-clavatize Tech. But, we'll need to access the arcade's central computer to do it."

Hunter was impressed. It seemed Mona knew more about computers than she let on.

"If your program is done, let's get back to the others." Hunter said.

On the way, however, Hunter had some questions for Mona.

"There's something I don't understand, kid." he said. "You seem really talented with computers and coding. But, you never showed any of that earlier. Why hide such a useful talent?"

Hunter could understand when he first found Mona, she was terrified. No one could really blame her, especially knowing now that Mariverde was her biological mother, and Mona was scared of her. She was terrified to do anything, like many victims of abuse, and physical scars were just what was on the surface. It had taken a while for Mona to be comfortable around anyone else, even the other kids. But she seemed to love being around Hunter. Who could blame her? He was the first person to pick her up gently and talk gently to her instead of yelling at her or physically attacking her, and he was responsible for helping her get out of that prison and seeing the outside world for the very first time.

Hunter remembered seeing how happy Mona looked when he brought her out to the garden for the first time, and she felt the grass beneath her feet, smelled real flowers for the first time and chased after some dandelion fluffs blowing in the wind. And when she tried sugar for the very first time, she downed her piece of the chocolate cheesecake that was served for dessert her first night in the palace.

Mona was proven to be a very curious child, especially when it came to bird watching. Once the bird watching began, she didn't want to stop; she even tried to stay up one night to watch for owls and other night birds.

Now that she was proven to be good with computers, Hunter couldn't understand why she hid it.

"I'm not supposed to show my strengths to anyone." Mona said. "My birth mom said doing that makes weaknesses more visible."

Now Hunter was beginning to understand.

"You're not under her care anymore, Mona. You're with us."

"But what if she gets me again?" Mona said. "She knows I'm with the royal family she wants to get rid of. And if she's as mad as I fear that I've been using what I learned to help them..."

"Mona, listen. No one can tell you not to use your talents for good purposes. Those talents are yours. And the only good thing that woman's ever done is bring you into existence and give you the books that gave you knowledge you can use to your advantage. If anything, she probably didn't want you using them because she knew you could use that knowledge as a weapon against her."

"But no kid would attack their own mother."

"Don't be so sure about that. Comedia bit her mother once before she got adopted." Zipp said. "I once worked security detail for the Evermares, and I only wish I'd reported that as a clear sign the foal was being abused."

"That's not your fault, Zipp." Buttercup said. "A lot of bystanders are afraid to speak up too, but still. More could stand to at least put in an effort to help those in need."

Hunter, Mona, and the horses made it back to the arcade, where they managed to gain access to the central control room.

"Alright, Mona. Do your thing." Hunter encouraged.

Mona was about to put the flash drive in, but she froze.

"What if it doesn't work?" Mona worried.

"It will." Zipp said. "From what I've seen, you're no amateur with codes."

"What if I missed something?"

Mona looked at the drive and worried more and more. What if it created a bigger disaster instead of fixing the one they were already facing?

"Mona, you triple checked your codes and you have very skilled eyesight." Buttercup said. "It would take a lot for you to miss something."

"I just don't wanna make things worse." Mona said.

"You won't." Hunter said.

"How do you know?"

"Well... I don't. But, I'm sure you gave it your best, and that's good enough."

"What if it's not?"

"You won't know unless you go for it. Take it from me, kid. I've faced a lot of powerful enemies and survived explosions, treacherous terrains, and natural disasters. I knew the risks, and every one of them meant I would either get out alive or die trying to save the day. In this scenario, your drive could either help or not. But you won't know until you take the shot."

Mona looked at the drive again; Hunter would never lie to her, at least so she believed. He sounded like he was right, but Mona still had some trust issues. Still, if she didn't even try, how would she know whether this program was even safe to keep around?

Without another word, Mona quickly plugged in the flash drive and hit some keys to get it working, combining it with a little magic spell she learned to keep the computer stable.

While everyone else was still playing, the consoles started to glow again, and out sprung anyone trapped inside, and on Coruscant, the vehicles started to turn back to their normal colors, and the giant Diamond disappeared from the city and then she sprung from the Pac-Man game and into Padme's arms.

"Oh! Hi, Padme." Diamond said.

"Hello, Diamond. Are you okay?" Padme asked, setting Diamond down.

"A little shaken, but good." Diamond said.

Back in the control room, Mona safely extracted the drive once it was confirmed the virus was downloaded, but then it glowed and spat out Gamer. Hunetr quickly shut down the power so Gamer couldn't get back into the system.

"Grab him!" Zipp exclaimed.

Hunter hugged Gamer from behind while Buttercup kicked the tablet from Gamer's hands and knocked it against the wall, where it cracked as it hit it and then landed on the floor, releasing the mariclava.

"You know what to do, Mona." Hunter said.

"Luminesk!" Mona cast the spell, and Gamer started to transform back into Tech.

"Ugh...what... what's happened?" Tech groaned. "Where am I?"

"That's a bit of a long story, Tech." Hunter said.

Everyone was super happy to see Tech was okay. Mila immediately pulled him into a passionate kiss when she saw him. Mona was also glad to see everyone else was okay, and Hunter told her, "Looks like you rescued someone after all, Mona." He ruffled her hair as he told her that. "You saved a lot of people with your talents."

"What did Mona do?" Garrett asked.

Hunter and the others told everyone all about how Mona was able to use her skills to create a program that extracted a computer virus rather than destroying it. Since Tech's clavatization was basically turning him into a virus, she knew he needed to be extracted from the system before he could be de-clavatized. And it turned out her work and skills paid off, but she'd hidden her talent because of her birth mother telling her that hiding her talents was the way to ensure no one could defeat her.

"Well, little one." Garrett said to Mona. "It looks like your birth mother was proven wrong. Sharing your gift, you may have saved more lives than we know about."

"Hooray for Mona!" Gabby cheered.

Hunter lifted Mona onto his shoulder and everyone cheered their praise to her for her contribution.

For what felt like the first time, Mona was feeling pretty good about her gift. Maybe sharing her talents could be a good thing if she put them to good use. ANd if being good with computers was helpful here and being a good singer helped with defeating Crescenda... Mona started to wonder if she should take Carmine up on learning the piano to see where her skills in playing instruments resided.

Hope you enjoyed the Gamer Arc. Next chapter will be involving another wedding. Brenda and Master Windu's to be exact. And in this one, you may notice a reference to a certain Disney short. Be sure to review, especially if you can guess which short.