“LAST TIME,” Pinkie Pie, clinging onto a tree, said into an 80-km/h crosswind, “ON WITHSTANDER: CORVIDAE FUCKING ISLANDS!”

She was going to continue, but closed her eyes in preparation for a massive wave. The wave destructinated the tree she was clinging onto and she was swept away into the ocean, powerless against the metaphorical will of the current. After a few minutes of being pulled away from the island and intermittently having waves crash over her, a medical crew helicopter ladder was descended to her and she grabbed on and climbed it, only for a wave to knock her off when she was halfway there. She was able to catch it just a few rungs down, and then she actually made it into the helicopter.

“Are you okay?” one of the three non-her ponies on the helicopter said, the other two being the transcriber and the pilot.

Pinkie breathed heavily for several breathing cycles before giving a response. “There’s a scratch on my left hindleg from a branch that scraped me and this flesh wound on my left foreleg from a branch that hit me, and I think I swallowed a mouthful of the ocean water, so if you could fix any of that, that’d be great.”

“We have some fancy hospital bandages in here, so I can do that.”

“Thanks.”

“Grrr,” Applejack said, standing next to Big Mac.

“You’re going down,” Lyra said, standing next to Octavia.

“We’re goin’ down? Are you serious?”

“I’m serious.”

“We’ll just fuckin’ see about that.”

“We will see.”

The remaining Withstanders canoed to Raven Island. There were four wooden pillars coming out of the water about two metres wide and long and ten metres high. And by about, I mean exactly.

“Welcome, Withstanders,” Pinkie said. “As you can see, it’s the standing on a pole for as long as you can challenge! Don’t you wish the Earthen versions of Survivor still had this? They do too, but it was completely impractical and they had to stop it eventually. Anyway, you’ll be airlifted to a randomly-selected pole and we’ll get started.”

Cut-out minutes passed.

“Withstanders ready?” Pinkie said.

“We’re already on the pillars,” Applejack said.

“Go!”

Thirty minutes later...

“Deeeyam,” Pinkie said, “You ponies really want to win The Prize.”

“What is the prize anyway?” Lyra said.

“The satisfaction of a job well done.”

“Seriously, though.”

“Eight thousand bits.”

“Isn’t Survivor a lot more?”

“Yeah, but we’re one of those countries that has to be reasonable with game show prizes.”

“I don’t watch game shows, so I wouldn’t know.”

Thirty minutes later...

“Welperdoozerwhatsitaronihoofingtonstickflakes,” Pinkie said, “It’s been an hour, so it’s thyme for the first bribe.” She went to a table that had always been there, featuring a bunch of plates with silver service lids on them, and took one of the lids off. “Folkachia, brushetta, and our famous just say nocchi.”

“Ah ain’t never gonna be gettin’ off for ain’t nothin’,” Applejack said.

“So bribes might work for you?” Pinkie said. “‘Cause you—”

“Shut up.”

“Faust, you don’t have to be so rude about it. Anyway, anypony coming off? No? There’s no way of telling when the next bribe is.”

A tumbleweed rolled across the beach.

“Very well.”

One hour later!

“This pizza is really good,” Pinkie said in between bites of plain cheese pizza. “I bet you ponies wish you had some Italian food besides that Italian rice you have to repeatedly eat. I think it’s Italian, anyway. Who cares. I don’t need to dot my js and cross my fs. I know that expression doesn’t work here, I just wanted to make that joke.”

One hour later!

“It’s thyme for the second bribe!” She uncovered another one of the plates to reveal three pancakes stacked on top of each other like flapjacks. “Three pancakes!”

No reaction.

“Nopony? You sure? Is eight thousand bits really that important to you? Sheesheronis.”

One hour later!

“These pancakes are really good,” Pinkie said in between bites of the pancakes from earlier. “If only I had some pancake toppings like butter or syrup and stuff. But that’s life, I guess. Well, how your pancakes taste isn’t important enough to qualify for that expression, but I don’t need to dot my js and cross my fs.”

Two hours later!

“It’s 18⅔:00 and time for the third bribe,” Pinkie said. She took off another one of the lids. “The previous two bribes doubled and a cheese cube.”

No reaction.

“Nothing? You sure? This could be the last one. You never know. And you don’t know how long you’ll have to be up there....”

No reaction.

“Fine.”

Four hours later!

“It’s 22:39:58, which means it’s time for bribe #4.” Once again, she took off one of the silvery dome coverings. “The previous bribe and a kilogram each of freedom toast, liberty chocolate cake, and independence delight!”

Lyra fell asleep, consequently falling off her pillar, and hit the water sidefirst.

“And Lyra takes it! Um, Lyra? You okay? You’re not getting overwater.”

A couple medical crew ponies appeared out of nowhere and dragged her out of the water.

“You can do quick healy magic without stuff exploding, right?” Soaringe said.

“Yeah,” said Imminent Sunrise, the unicorn who made the appearing out of nowhere possible.

One overlong florid description of casting a spell later, Lyra was okay and stuff.

“Do you feel okay and stuff?” Sunrise said.

Lyra got up. “I feel fine. What happened?”

“You fell asleep, fell in the water, and we had to pull you out.”

“Oh.” Lyra looked towards Pinkie. “Did I hear something about the next bribe?”

“Yep, and you won it!”

“Cool.”

Lyra went over and ate stuff.

188½ minutes later!

Octavia fell asleep, causing the same thing as Lyra to happen but without winning food.

“Welpers,” Pinkie said, “Only Applejack and Big Mac the rhyming siblings left! Who will win? Who shall prevail in this epic competition? Who will end up emerging victorious inside of a competitive activity as long, gruelling, emotional, and monumentally important as this one?”

Twenty minutes into the future!

“Okay,” Pinkie said, “This is the first time I’m ever going to drink coffee. How do I grab this mug? I have hooves. Should I use the handle? Should I use it like a normal cup? They wouldn’t put a handle there for no reason....” She tried to grab the handle and her hoof slipped, spilling a very small amount of coffee. “Fuck. Um, I’ll just try to... see, you can’t easily not grab the handle. Maybe if I have it perpendicular like this....” She managed to get a sip off this time. “Fuck, that tastes terrible. Maybe I’d just like a different kind, I don’t know, but I definitely don’t like this.”

Twenty-four minutes and seven seconds later!

Applejack fell asleep and fell into the water.

“Big Mac wins invulnerability! Wait, Big Mac? Okay, sure, I guess. Big Mac wins. Not that there’s something wrong with Big Mac winning, but I had four bits on AJ. Anyway, I’ll see all of you at Teamal Council, probably tomorrow night.”

Back at the island!

“Who are we voting for?” Big Mac said.

“Big Mac?” Applejack said.

Big Mac looked behind him. “What?”

“That’s a caterpillar.”

The remaining third, the ones who had made it to the tail end of the game, the few withstanders left, travelled to Teamal Council by helicopter. Was it by helicopter? I can’t remember.

“Come well,” Pinkie said, “Or el... se. WOJI. We’re going by position on the visible spectrum, so I don’t know what the fuck we’re doing with you, Octavia.”

Everybody voted.

“I’ll tally the votes,” Pinkie said, her perfect face perfectly reflecting the trees. After taking the votes and rearranging them so they could be revealed in a dramatic order, she came back with the container. “If you get a plurality of the votes, you lose. First vote: Applejack.”

“Duh,” Applejack thought.

“Applejack.”

“Duh,” thought Applejack.

“Octavia.”

“FUCKIN SHITBALLS D:,” Octavia thought.

“Octavia. It’s a tie, which means it’s time for a fire challenge!”

After some cut-out setup time, Applejack and Octavia were both standing behind some sticks. Above both sets of sticks were one rope each.

“You have to burn the rope,” Pinkie said. “GO!”

Applejack scraped a couple sticks together and burnt the rope in π seconds as Octavia realised why they didn’t vote for Lyra.

“Octavia loses!” Pinkie Pie said. “Come over here!”

Octavia came over there.

“Octavia, half your friends hate you.”

Octavia walked away whilst feeling sad about losing, except put dramatically.

“Only three of you remain,” Pinkie said. “I’d say something witty about the situation, but I can’t think of anything.”

‘Tis the season to be jolly! Or for some ponies, the season to rant about how Faustmas sucks because it’s all commercialised or whatever and for the ponies who already agree with them to agree and for the ponies who don’t to ignore them! But whether you’re going with Faustmas, Festivus, or that thing that’s like Hanukkah but in April and more important, buy stuff from us!

“A few minutes ago,” Pinkie said in no wind whatsoever, “On Withstander: Corvidae Islands! Big Mac won the challenge, and the inevitably tied vote brought it down to Applejack and Octavia in a fire challenge. Obviously, AJ won, so Octavia was eliminated, never to be seen again except for on the jury. Who will be the last voted out in the penultimate episode or maybe middle of the final episode on Withstander: Corvidae Islands?!”

Big Mac and Applejack stared at Lyra really hard.

“I get it,” Lyra said for the millionth time, “I’m screwed.”

“You can be more sweary about it,” Applejack said.

“I’m Lyra.”

“It’s time for the three challenges strung together challenge!” Pinkie said.

“They’re not here yet,” camerapony #2 said.

“I know.”

They came like Action 52.

“It’s time for the three challenges strung together challenge!” Pinkie said.

“What’re the three challenges?” Applejack said a randomly-generated phrase which by coincidence made sense.

“Swimming, digging, and puzzling! You swim out to there and back, dig inside one of the duct tape-delineated squares for a bag of jigsaw puzzle pieces, then climb out of the hole and solve the 500-piece jigsaw puzzle!”

“What does that have to do with survival?” Lyra said.

“One more rule: this challenge is not for invulnerability. If you come in the top two, you make it to the final jury vote thing, and if you come in last, you’re out of the entire game. Oh, and no magic. I think that’s it.”

“What does that have to do with survival?”

“Go!”

They ran into the water.

“So now what do I do now?” Pinkoszowic “Pinkie” “the Rock” Diane Pie-Lieberhausen said. “Just scream about what just happened when somepony gets overtaken?”

A question got asked, but not answered, violating conservation of energy.

“AJ’s in the lead,” Pinkie Pie commentated, “But what really matters is Lyra’s lastness.”

Due to the asymmetricalities present in our inherent quantum fields, pretty much all of the swimming was edited out.

“And Applejack is in the lead!” Pinkie Pie said. “She’s just coming out of the water now,” she continued in Murray Walker’s voice, “There she is. Now for the digging portion of the contest, and it’ll be interesting to see if Big Mac can make up time, or more importantly, if Lyra can make up time on Big Mac.”

After digging six hooves under, Applejack and Big Mac got their puzzle piece bags at exactly the same frame. They climbed out without issue with the bags in their mouths and got to work.

“I’m no 4tune teller,” Pinkie said, “But I think Lyra is 4ked.”

Big Mac and Applejack looked at each other in disbelief for a moment, then both completed the puzzle just as Lyra started hers.

“AJ done! Big Mac done! Lyra is out of here like Pioneer 10!”

“Why couldn’t you do something intelligence-related?” Lyra said.

“AJ and Big Mac are smart anyway.”

“Fuck, you’re right. So I guess I just suck.”

“Yep! You’ll now be escorted by helicopter to Sequestria.”

A helicopter appeared from behind some trees and landed. Lyra got in, and the helicopter took off without anyone thinking of anything dramatic to say.

“Welps,” Pinkie said, “Final two. It’s all outta your hooves now, bitches. Remember in the first competition when the whole jury thing was a massive twist? It was, right? I haven’t actually seen it. But good times, if that’s the case.”

“Hole drilled through the ground to reach a water supplah,” Applejack said back at the teamal island, “Guess there’s only one thing Ah can really say.”

Big Mac tilted his head down slightly.

“Ah miss Rainbow.”

After eating some rice, the two withstanding members of the game went to Teamal Council.

“As you can see by the jury members on that bench,” Pinkie Pie said, “It’s time for the jury persuasion portion of the game. Rainbow, Twilight, camerapony #3, Octavia, and Lyra will all sceptically listen to your desperate pleading for their votes and then proceed to ask you loaded questions and then sceptically listen some more. Who wants to go first?”

“Big Mac,” Applejack said.

“Big Mac, please make your opening statement.”

“You should vote for me because I didn’t constantly make your conversations hard to hear by whinging about Rainbow Dash.”

“Applejack, please make your opening statement.”

“Ah won a buncha stuff.”

“The corntestants have made their opening statements. The period of questioning will now begin, starting with the jury member who was eliminated firstly.”

Rainbow Dash got off the bench. “Okay, everypony knows I’m votin’ for AJ. I mean, really. So all I have to say is WOJI.”

Twilight’s turn. “Do either of you have any accusations of lying to make about the other?”

“Eenope.”

“Nup.”

Twilight went on the bench, but camerapony #3 went off.

“Do you have any boasts of achievement in the game involving challenges or deception?”

“You took my trade.”

“Ah won stuff.”

“Can I ask a better question?” camerapony #3 asked a question which was already better.

“Noperonis.”

Next up was Octavia.

“What arguments can you make to gain sympathy votes?” she said.

“I had to listen to ‘I miss Rainbow’ for half the game,” Big Mac said.

“Ah had to go without Rainbow,” said Applejack.

Finally, Lyra. But is that what really happened? Maybe all of this is made up and the camera footage is just actors. Kind of like the moon landing.

“What’s your favourite brand of frozen waffle fry?” Lyra said.

“Frozen waffle fry?” Big Mac said.

“Ah lahke Rivera,” Applejack said.

“Thank you.” Lyra laid back up on the bench.

“Welperdoozers, you’ve herd from the two remaining ponies, so now it’s time for the most important vote of all: the election for Prime Minister of Equestria. Or the vote to decide the winner of a reality show. Whichever’s more important to you ponially.”

And so after all that Withstander stuff which happened over a period of like three weeks and an agonisingly long wait lasting from whenever the first Withstander episode aired to December, it was time to reveal the winner.

“Welcome to the Withstander winner vote reveal!” Pinkie said. “As you know but I feel like telling you anyway, Applejack and Big Mac, see how nice and shaven they look now? They look so different. Wait, aren’t we ponies? Maybe I shouldn’t’ve eaten that free mushroom. Uh, anyway, they’re here because they’re really good at stuff Withstander has like swimming and convincing everypony to join their alliance then ultimately betraying them, which the ponies they were convincing were also planning to do, but they executed it betterly. But before we get to the vote, I’m going to ask them what the hardest part of the game was. So, what was the hardest part of the game?”

“The challenges were challenging,” Big Mac said.

“Ah missed Rainbow,” Applejack said.

“Well, we’ve done the filler,” Pinkie said, “So now it’s time for the vote reveal!”

Applause ensued as Pinkie walked from in front of some chairs to behind the vote receptacle.

“Whoever gets the most votes wins,” Pinkie said. “I know. So let’s do this thang.”

She took the lid off to more applause, then read the first vote:

“Applejack.”

The applause drowned out someone dropping a block of fudge on the floor.

“Big Mac.”

The applause drowned out the sound of a generic insect walking outside the building.

“Applejack.”

The applause was so loud that the pony in seat E8-13 literally went deaf.

“Winner of Withstander: Corvidae Islands: Applejack.”

The applause caused the temporary deafness of three ponies.

“Colon D!” Applejack said, literally jumping out of her chair onto the stage. “Ah’d lahke to thank the four ponies who voted for me, ‘cause they’re awesome. That’s pretty much all Ah’d lahke to do, though.”

“Wiiiii L,” Surprise’s twin sister said, “That’s all for this season of Withstander. But if we get kept on for another series, be sure to join us for said series! Either way, we hope you enjoyed...”

“WITHSTANDER: CORVIDAE ISLANDS!” everyone in the building except for the ponies who had recently gone deaf said.

Next Chapter: Chapter 156: I Suck At Titles, Summary Better Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 38 Minutes