“And this here’s my pride and joy, Rarity and Sweetie Belle!” Hondo Flanks, starting tackle for the Detrot Lions, gave his elder daughter a rough shove in the back. “Don’t be shy, darlin’! Say hello to the quarterback of the soon-to-be world champions of Equestrian football!”

Rarity sighed and extended a hoof to the large, wiry pegasus mare she was being introduced to, whose name she wouldn’t remember five minutes hence. “Charmed, Ms….”

“Hailstone Mary,” the pegasus replied, meeting hoof to hoof and shaking with enough strength that Rarity had to lock her knees to prevent herself from being thrown to the floor. “And what does your daughter do for a living, Hondo?”

“Well, y’know I’ve told you a dozen times,” Hondo grinned.

“Yes, but I know you’d love to tell me a thirteenth,” Hailstone Mary replied.

“Can’t argue with that!” Hondo put a burly foreleg around Rarity’s shoulders. “My Rarity is a fashionista! Why, she’s just opened boutiques here in Manehattan and Canterlot too! The princesses wear her designs, did you know that? She’s a pure artiste, same’s her mum!”

“Oh, dear!” Cookie Crumbles, standing on the other side of Hondo, tittered with delight at the compliment. “My little touches in the kitchen aren’t anything as good as Rarity’s creations, I’m sure!”

While Hondo switched from praising daughters to praising his wife, Rarity took advantage of her father’s distraction to genteelly slip from under his hoof, give a polite curtsey to the Ravens quarterback, and ease her way towards the punchbowl. The pre-game ball (or, as the Manehattan wags called it, the Ball Game Game Ball) had been a delightful opportunity to clothe her family in her designs, under the eyes of Manehattan’s elite.

Rarity kept telling herself she was glad to be here, but the truth was, she would be delighted when the evening was over. The Manehattan elite were living down to the coarse manners of the football players. The players themselves tended to keep to themselves except when approached by the nobs, with the two teams treating the center of the ballroom as a no mare’s land between warring factions.

And all the talk was of one thing, only one thing: the game tomorrow. The Equestrian football world championship, the Super Drome, with her father’s team going from a dismal season even by Detrot standards to a playoff berth and a string of improbable victories, all leading to tomorrow’s face-off against the long-dominant Canterlot Suns, led by shifty coach Belly Check and wily donkey quarterback Dee Bray.

The Los Pegasus line had Detrot down by twenty-four points.

Not that Rarity cared. Normally she fell asleep mid-conversation two seconds after the first sports statistic was cited. But Rarity’s father loved the sport. As the three footballs on his cutie mark attested, he was born to play it. And tomorrow, for only the second time in her father’s long career in professional sports, he would play in the league championship game- the pinnacle of achievement in his sport.

He still loved to tell the story of how, as a young stallion, he’d met a runningcolt in the line of scrimmage and hit him so hard that the ball popped loose, allowing him to tuck it under a leg and run it back for a touchdown. (His team had still lost, but nothing could take away that moment of glory in the eyes of a hundred thousand sports fanatics.)

Rarity thought of the gleam in her father’s eyes that came every time he told that story. His face shone with delight every time he talked about the last game, or the next game, or any game. He loved what he did, and in his nineteen years of professional football, he’d proved he was very good at it.

Taking that joy away from him just didn’t bear thinking about. Rarity could remember all the times her father had supported her early efforts, modeling her proposed (and unfairly rejected) new jersey for the Horseshoe Bay Buccaneers to the whole team, attending her early fashion shows even when he was the only one to show. He had bought her first sewing machine and kept her in fabric and materials, all out of his football paycheck. He didn’t understand one drop of fashion besides the notion that one could never go wrong with sparkly things, but he treated her work with the same enthusiasm he gave his sport.

So, as little enjoyment as she derived from the exercise, Rarity was here to support her father. This was an important day for Hondo Flanks… especially since the odds were quite good-

“That old nag Hondo’s running his mouth again, I see.”

Rarity carefully did not turn her head, but she did discreetly allow an eye to turn in the direction of the buffet table, a neutral ground between the warring sides. Two of the Canterlot Suns, ponies whose names Rarity didn’t know and didn’t care to know, had decided to defend the cucumber sandwiches against all comers.

“Let him talk,” the second football pony said. “He’s earned it. If it wasn’t for him the Detrot offensive line would still be more full of holes than Fancy cheese, and we’d be facing the San Flankcisco Centaurs tomorrow.”

“Earned, nothing,” the first pony growled. “The geezer’s played for more than half the teams in the league in his career. If he was any good, don’t you think one of ‘em would have kept him?”

“I said let him talk,” the second pony said, sounding more glum than angry. “That’ll be one of us someday. Or do you think you’ve got another seventeen years of football in you?”

“That’s tomorrow. I’m talking about today,” the first pony replied. “Come tomorrow, win or lose, his contract is up, and he’ll have to make room for someone who actually deserves to play in the league.” The pony sniffed and added, “Even if Detrot is the team where careers go to die.”

“Some other team might pick him up,” the second pony insisted.

“And who’s going to hire him?” the first scoffed. “How many players in the league are over forty?”

“Seven,” his teammate answered instantly.

“How many of those are quarterbacks or punters?”

“Six.”

“And how many of them are starters?”

“Counting Hondo,” the second pony replied, “three.”

“And would any team besides Detrot make Hondo Flanks a starter?”

“Well,” the second pony said, giving this actual consideration, “the Rainbow Falls Browns, maybe. Or the Neighagra Bulls.”

“The Browns might be dumb enough and the Bulls might be desperate enough,” the first pony said. “But I doubt it. And you can’t think of a third team, can you?”

“Nope,” the second pony agreed. “Darn shame, but you’re right. And what’s worse is that we’re going to totally ruin his last day in the game.”

Punch cups clinked together, just beyond Rarity’s peripheral vision.

“To beating the spread?”

“To beating the tar out of Hondo Flanks and the rest of Plodding Patrician’s circus full of clowns.”

Rarity allowed herself to drift towards the powder room, accelerating as she drew closer to the door. It didn’t behoove a fashionable lady to dash to the sink to check to see if her mascara were running.

The pre-dawn still of the fancy Manehattan hotel shattered under the impact of a forty-two year old stallion’s cries.

“YYYEEOOOOWWWWW!!”

Rarity sat bolt upright in her bed. A twitch of her magic removed her sleeping mask. In the bed next to hers Sweetie Belle grabbed her pillow, pulled it over her ears, and turned over in bed.

“OHH, OHH, OOOOOOHH!!”

She recognized the voice, and her heart sank with the realization. Her father was screaming in pain in his hotel room next door… at five in the morning.

“Dearie, just lie back… here’s a pillow for your-“

“OOOOOOWWWWCH!!”

Out the hotel room door dashed Rarity, ignoring the stares from several hotel guests also awakened by the bellow of pain. She rapped hard on the next door down with her hoof, and a few seconds later her mother, wearing her nightly hairnet, answered the door. “Oh, Rarity, dear, do come in!” she said, her normally cheerful face a mask of worry. “It’s your father!”

For not pointing out that she knew it was her father, Rarity believed she deserved a medal from the crown.

The two walked to the hotel bed, where Hondo in his nightshirt squirmed, trying to find a less painful position and failing.

“It’s his back again, poor thing,” Cookie Crumbles said. “This happens every once in a while. It goes out and he’s in such pain for the day, but the next day he’s right as rain again.” She frowned deeper as she added, “But it’s never happened on a game day before.”

“OOOH… ooooh, Rarity honey,” Hondo said, his eyes focusing enough to recognize his daughter, “I never wanted you to see your old dad like this.”

“Honey, do you want me to call the team doctor?” Cookie asked.

“No! AHH!” Hondo protested. “I’ll be scratched from the roster for today! Let it- OOOOH!- let it go, I’ll be fine at game time!”

“Dear, you know as well as me that when your back goes out you can’t even walk, much less play,” Cookie insisted.

“But…” Hondo slumped in the bed, twitching at a fresh spasm of pain, but gritting his teeth until it passed. “But I was hoping… I was hoping, if I did well today… well, I’m done with the Lions after this, Patrician thinks I’ve taught the line all I can. But there would still be a market for any pony who plays well in the Super Drome. One more season… that’s all I want, just my twentieth season.”

Cookie shook her head. “That’s what you said four seasons ago,” she said. “And you’ve changed teams three times since then. Maybe your body is just saying it’s time.”

Hondo didn’t answer, but the tears trickling from his eyes, and the frown lurking under his bushy brown mustache, betrayed his own thoughts. Rarity stared at the mustache, noticed for the first time how the gray was slowly taking over, and thought: when did my father get old?

About ten minutes ago. When his greatest dream was pulled from him by a misplaced vertebra.

“What’s going on in here?” Hailstone Mary peeked through the hotel room door, which Cookie had left ajar. “Coach sent me to find out what’s going on.”

“No…” Hondo moaned.

The Lions’ starting quarterback flapped into the room, giving the bedridden Hondo a quick once-over. “Back spasms?” she asked. “I’ll call the team doc.” She shook her head, walking towards the hotel phone (a Manehattan luxury). “Darn shame… I don’t like to think of where the offensive line’s heads will be without you. And Brickwall starting in your place? As easy as ponies go around him, he shoulda been named Garden Gate.”

A notion occurred to Rarity. It was half-baked- it was still in the mixing bowl, come to that- but she had to at least postpone that call which would end her father’s career. “Wait a moment,” she said. “What if he was in the game?”

“You can’t be serious, kid,” Hailstone Mary replied. “Even if he could put his pads on, the first hit he took or gave, they’d carry him out on a stretcher. He needs someone to look at him and make sure he’s all right, not someone to plow him into the turf and maybe injure him permanently.”

“Ain’t no young buck gonna AAAGH! Plow Hondo Flanks into the turf!” For a moment fire flared in Rarity’s father’s eyes; then the pain quenched it, and the tears ran again as he settled back onto his pillow.

“Let me rephrase my query,” Rarity said quietly. I can’t believe I’m suggesting this… “This Hondo Flanks can’t be on the field, obviously. But…” She allowed herself the tiniest smile. “What if another Hondo Flanks was?”

Hailstone Mary raised an eyebrow. “And where are you gonna get another Hondo Flanks?” she asked.

“The uniform covers the whole body except the legs and hooves,” Rarity said. “All that’s needed is a white unicorn with a mustache.”

Hailstone looked at Hondo. Then she looked at Rarity. “You mean let you play in his place,” she gasped, making the connection. “Is this your idea of a joke?” she asked.

I only wish. “Not in the least,” Rarity said. “All I need is one hour with a sewing machine and some materials for padding, and then a way to get into the Lions locker room unseen.”

“You’re serious,” the quarterback gasped. She threw up her forehooves and wings in disbelief. “Have you ever played football?” she insisted. “Do you even know anything about football??”

“Papa plays right guard,” Rarity said. “His job is to prevent the opposing team from getting past him while opening up gaps in the opposing line for the runningcolts. He’s not allowed to wrap his arms around the defender unless the ball has been turned over. No simpler position exists on either side of the ball. I was never interested in the game, but that doesn’t mean I never listened.”

“You’re half your father’s mass,” Hailstone insisted. “You’ve never played a day in your life, have you?”

“Rarity, honey, you don’t even like sports,” Cookie Cutter added.

“It’s all about attitude,” Rarity replied. “And if it means giving my father a chance at one more season doing the thing he loves above all else, I will move mountains.”

Hailstone considered it for a moment, then shrugged. “You can’t possibly be worse than Brickwall,” she finally said. “The team doc will have to be in on it, for two reasons. He’ll have to lie like a demon for your pre-game physical…” She turned her attention from Rarity to Hondo. “And immediately after the game, I mean the minute my hoof touches that trophy, you’re gonna get the full workup from him. Clear?”

“Maybe,” grunted Hondo, still writhing in pain, “I can switch back in… uugh… for the second half.”

Rarity and Hailstone looked at each other and thought the same thing: fat chance.

“Let’s go get you padded up,” the quarterback said.

The figure standing next to Hailstone Mary on the carefully cultivated turf of the Grazinglands Stadium, in full pads and uniform, stood taller than her. And yes, the face mask of the helmet barely restrained a gloriously full mustache. And, from a distance of ten or twenty yards, it would be hard to distinguish this FLANKS 53 from the one that had played a significant role in Detrot’s 9-7 regular season record, wild card playoff berth, and playoff Cinderella story.

“I can’t believe we’re even trying this,” Mary muttered.

But from any closer than ten yards, and particularly to people who’d spent a year or a career playing alongside or against Hondo Flanks, the masquerade was, well, paper-thin. Literally so, since the paper used to supplement the shoulderpads that held up the shoulderpads crinkled every time the faux Flanks took a step.

The difference was even more obvious during the warm-up drills. Rarity, wearing her father’s uniform and a false mustache even more glorious than her father’s real one (because she hadn’t been able to restrain herself with the wax), had stumbled through calisthenics, dashes, and sled drills. And the practice plays… well, even by the low standards Rarity had outlined before dawn that morning, she hadn’t lived up to them.

“All it takes is one word,” Mary added, “and the jig is up.”

Rarity snorted as deeply as she could. One word was right, but not for the reason Mary meant. None of the players needed to say a thing; if she spoke up herself, it was the end. Even speaking as deeply as she could, no one would ever mistake her for the brash, loud, utterly masculine Hondo. For the duration she was mute.

Mary shook her head. “Listen,” she said. “Before every play I’ll tap you on the back. That means the ball isn’t going to be run in your lane. All you’ll have to do is hold the other guy back for three seconds. But if a play comes and I don’t tap you on the back, the runner’s coming on your right, and you do everything in your power to make a hole, understand?”

Rarity nodded, whickering softly.

“Okay. Celestia above, I don’t care if we win this, so long as we come through without- oh, coach!”

Plodding Patrician hobbled up to the quarterback and the fake Hondo. The coach of the Detrot Lions had been a childhood friend of the current owner, and was just as ancient. In his younger days, over fifty years before, he had guided the team to league championships… when the league was less than half its current size. He still had the mind for the job, but his reflexes were glacial, his hearing poor, and his eyesight so bad that he didn’t even blink at Rarity’s skinny legs and hooves nine-tenths out of athletic shoes overstuffed to gain height.

“Ready to play, Mary?” the old coach asked. He turned his squinting, bottle-lens gaze to Rarity and asked, “Not doing so well in warm-ups today, Flanks. Maybe we should start Brickwall instead?”

“Anypony but Brickwall,” Mary muttered. “Even her.”

“Eeeh? What’s that?” Patrician asked.

“I said, Hondo thinks someone on the Suns slipped him something at the ball last night,” Mary said, much louder. “He’s a bit wobbly, but he’s coming out of it. The main problem is that whatever it was took his voice.”

Rarity snorted a most frustrated-sounding snort in response.

“Huh! You sure it wasn’t him telling more stories?” Patrician chuckled. “Well, the team’s going to miss your usual rousing pre-game speech, Flanks. But if you think you can handle it, I’ll leave you in at starter.” To his credit, the old pony looked a little ashamed as he added, “Seeing as it’s probably your last game.”

He turned his back and hobbled as quickly as he could for the tunnel leading to the visitors’ locker room. “Hurry up,” he said, “I’ll dock pay if you’re late to the strategy session!”

As the game began, Rarity realized why none of her father’s teammates recognized her. None of them were looking at her for more than a second. And when they did, the look was always the same.

Pity.

Hondo Flanks was at the end of his career, on a team doomed to be not merely defeated but annihilated in Equestria’s largest stadium, with live play-by-play going out over the radio to every corner of the land and beyond. Everyone on the team knew it, and all of them (even the bench-warming Brickwall) felt sad for the cheerful, spirited old-timer.

No one looked closely at the mock Hondo Flanks because, on this day of days, none of them could look at him at all. They saw tragedy there… and, in a way, they saw their own inevitable departure from the game as well. And, like every pro athlete who hears the unstoppable tread of oncoming middle age, they shut it out of their minds.

Well, Rarity thought, I shall change some minds today, I shall.

And, for the first ten minutes of game play, she utterly failed to do so.

On the first two plays from scrimmage the tackle in front of Rarity brushed right past her on the right, leaving her barely able to shove sideways enough to prevent an instant quarterback sack. On third down and ten to go the tackle came straight on, knocking Rarity back like a down pillow, and proceeded without pause to smother Hailstone Mary for an eleven-yard loss, forcing a punt.

After a long defensive stand in which the Lions barely kept the Suns out of their end zone, forcing them to take a field goal instead, the Lions got the ball again. The same Suns tackle came at Rarity again. This time Rarity tripped the tackle, which the referee didn’t see, and then she grabbed the tackle around the barrel with her forehooves, and this the referee couldn’t help but see. Since Hailstone Mary hadn’t been able to find a receiver either time, the Suns waived the penalty, and on third and ten Mary’s frantic throw under pressure fell well behind her intended receiver and into the waiting hooves of a Suns safety.

This time the Suns couldn’t be kept out of the end zone, and after the extra point and the kickoff, Rarity found herself confronting that exact same guard.

“Look at you, old nag,” the Suns tackle chuckled. “Past your prime. If you ever had a prime.”

Rarity recognized the voice. It was that same uncouth, contemptuous pony from the buffet table at the ball.

No tap on Rarity’s back this time. The runner was coming through her lane. She waited for the call, then jumped… and immediately the whistle blew. Mary had tried to pull the Suns offsides with a stutter count, and Rarity hadn’t picked up on it, instead incurring a false-start penalty for her team.

“Old, weak, slow, and now deaf,” the tackle taunted as the two teams lined up again five yards closer to the Lions end zone. “How are your knees, old-timer? The knees are the first to go.”

This time the guard fell back, and Rarity jumped forward, not knowing that the Sunss had shifted to a deep-coverage defense to prevent Hailstone Mary from passing the ball. The taunting guard slipped around her, forcing Mary to run with the ball, barely making it to the original line of scrimmage.

“Useless to your team,” the tackle taunted again as the teams lined up for second and ten. “Useless to your quarterback. Just plain useless, aren’t you? Couldn’t even sell you to the griffons for glue.”

No back-tap again. Rarity charged forward, but this time she kept a watchful eye on the tackle. Sure enough, he leaned to her right, and she stepped right to block him… only for the runningcolt to slam right into her fortunately pants-covered padded flanks, which stopped him cold.

As third and eleven loomed, and as Hailstone Mary quite firmly pushed her hoof into Rarity’s back, the Suns tackle chuckled and said, “What’s it like, old fart? What’s it like knowing that you’ve wasted your entire life, just another no-talent duffer bouncing around the league.”

The teams took their stances, and as Rarity looked up at the looming guard, he added, “What’s it like, knowing you’ve never been of any use to anybody in your life- not even to your family? What must your daughters think, having such a loser for a dad?”

And at those words, in Rarity’s brain, the red mist decended.

The whinny erupted from the field, primal, deep but piercing, a sound of unchecked fury that might have erupted from the throat of the Pale Horse himself.

It rose above the cheering and booing of the crowd like a surfer atop a wave, contemptuous of the lesser din.

It shot shivers of pure terror down the spines of everyone on the field, even the referees,who had learned to live with fear after years of dodging cider bottles and hay dogs hurled onto the field, to say nothing of players coming at full gallop. This explains why the linesman required two seconds before he had the wind to blow his whistle.

The only pony who didn’t hear the whinny- or, at least, never again remembered hearing the whinny- was the unfortunate left linescolt for the Suns, because as the sound of the whinny still echoed through the stadium he was being picked up in the air by the forehooves of Lions #53 and driven into the turf head-first.

The referee’s whistle mostly, but not entirely, cleared away the echoes of pure equine rage.

“Whassat?” Coach Patrician asked. “What happened?” He squinted through his glasses for a better look.

“Unsportsmanlike conduct,” the assistant defensive coach told him. “Flanks just laid a pile-driver on Suns #48, um, Alligator Mouth.”

“Oh? Good for him.” Patrician held a hoof up to his mouth and shouted, “ABOUT TIME YOU WOKE UP, FLANKS! THINK YOU CAN SPLIT THE DIFFERENCE FOR THE REST OF THE GAME?”

The Lions gathered in the locker room at halftime. Specifically, they gathered at the walls and lockers and anyplace they could find as far as possible from the faintly glowing figure that had spent twenty minutes by the game clock teaching the Canterlot Suns defense the true nature of fear.

“Okay, colts and fillies,” Patrician said, “If you followed orders you never looked at the scoreboard. And since you don’t follow orders, you all know the score is twenty-four to nine. And we kick off to them to start the second half. But we’re still in this game.”

The coach pointed a wrinkled, knobbly hoof at the figure in the middle of the meeting, standing alone except for Hailstone Mary. “And we know the reason why we’re still in the game, don’t we?” he said rhetorically. “Our veteran sent three of those Canterlot wimps off on stretchers.”

“Ref said if he catches Hondo on another unsportsmanlike he’ll eject him from the game,” the defensive assistant warned.

“Were the second and third ones clean hits?” Patrician asked.

“Well, yes, but-“

“Then quit your whining!” The coach jabbed a hoof at the living flame of barely bridled rage. “Flanks, I want you to take over Battering Ham at nose-tackle. You’re playing ironmare, offense and defense. I want you to go after whoever has the ball. If you manage to get Dee Bray taken off on a stretcher, I’ll pay the league fines myself, I don’t care how much it is! Are you up to it?”

A hoof stomped, cracking the concrete floor.

For the second time that day, the Whinny of Doom rang through the stadium, causing minor hearing loss to every pony in the locker room. Out on the field, it made Countess Coloratura nearly miss a note.

“All right, boys,” Dee Bray rumbled, looking around the huddle. “They’ve scored three unanswered touchdowns. It’s been a heck of a second half, but we’re still ahead by a point. All we need is one first down and we can run out the clock. Can you do that for me?”

The word yes was not so much unspoken as totally absent, with a letter of excuse from its mother.

Dee Bray wasn’t surprised. A third of the ponies in the huddle with him were second-string players, with one third-stringer. In reality the pony playing both squads in the second half had only sent two more players to the locker rooms, but that was only if you counted physical hits. If you counted mental and emotional trauma, the injury list would run a lot longer.

The starting center had broken down midway through the third quarter, unable to hike the ball anywhere within a mile of Bray’s waiting hoof, so frantic he was to get away from the unicorn tackle from Tartarus. The offense had never recovered after that. Two guards and a tight end had gone to the lockers a minute into the fourth quarter to change underwear after Hondo Flanks merely looked at them. And the starting runningcolt, still in the game, appeared to be developing PTSD after one too many open-field hits from a stallion who, instead of being on the line of scrimmage where he belonged, was always, ALWAYS right in his muzzle.

This was professional football, the donkey quarterback knew. There were plenty of nice guys in the league, but they put their niceness in the locker when they suited up and took it out again after the game. When you were on the field you were a pro- no mercy, no quarter, nothing but victory.

But today Lions #53 was just plain mean.

And, if Bray wanted to, he could look up and see the number #53 on its jersey, on its player, who stood two yards the other side of the ball, waiting for the chance to unleash more mayhem in the little time remaining.

“Dee,” the second-string center said, “we’ll do our best, but that ain’t no pony out there. That’s a demon in pads.”

“Oh, for… look,” Dee said grumpily. “I’ve played against Hondo Flanks before! I don’t know what’s got into him today, but he’s just an old unicorn! He’s four years older than I am, for Celestia’s sake! He is not the Pale Horse!”

“As old as he is,” another player said, “maybe they hang out and he gets pointers.”

"Who gets the pointers, Flanks or the Horse?"

"Um, mutual admiration society?"

“Shut up.” Dee Bray looked around the huddle. “Running play left, around the tight end and straight for the first down marker. Ten yards. That’s all we need. Let’s do it.”

With a clop of forehooves the shaken but unbroken Suns offense broke huddle and took up their positions on the line of scrimmage. The Lions defense stepped forward to match.

The Suns center placed his hoof atop the football and looked up into the helmet, the mustache, and two pools of blue which surrounded live, erupting volcanoes of red fire.

“Blue 42! Blue 42!” Dee Bray shouted.

A rough voice hissed, just loud enough for him to hear, “I smell your fear.”

“Hut hut! HUT!” Dee shouted.

With no mental input from its owner, the Suns’ center’s hoof shot back, hiking the ball to the quarterback. This done, he braced for impact.

What hit him was not the expected white unicorn steamroller, but the soul-shattering cry, for the third time, of the Whinny of Doom.

For the second-string center and the two players to either side of him, the breaking point had come. Before #53’s forehooves could return to the turf, the three players scattered in fright, leaving Dee Bray exposed in the act of handing off the ball to the already twitchy runningcolt.

Turf flew from beneath the Lions player’s hooves, as the pony with the ball saw Doom galloping straight at him.

He too broke and ran, taking the ball with him, galloping in the opposite direction from the charging unicorn.

“No! NO!! Wrong way! WRONG WAY!!” Dee Bray shouted as the Lions nose tackle, focused on the ball, passed him by.

The runningcolt paid no attention. All he knew was that not only was Death itself chasing him, it was gaining. Too frightened even to drop the ball in his fetlock, he galloped back up the field, crossing his goal line and not pausing, out the back of the end zone, finally leaping up, climbing the netting behind the goal posts, and seeking sanctuary among the utterly surprised spectators.

The referee, shaking his head in confusion, reared to his hind hooves and awkwardly put his forehooves together over his head, signaling a safety.

The scoreboard read, with a minute and a half left on the game clock: Lions 39, Suns 38.

And as Coach Belly Check screamed foul and thousands of Lions fans experienced unprecedented joy, the figure of #53, standing alone in the end zone it had conquered, quietly folded up and slumped limp to the painted turf.

One kickoff and three knees in the turf by Hailstone Mary later, it was all over.

Monday came, as inevitably it must.

Hondo Flanks, his back once more free of pain, trotted into the hospital room. “Guess what Daddy has?” he crowed. He lit his horn and lifted the scroll out from under his foreleg. “A renewal contract for two years! TWO YEARS! And a guaranteed spot as assistant offensive line coach whenever I decide to retire!” He waved it at the hospital bed. “Coach Patrician said he can’t do without my killer instinct on the field! And I owe it all to you, honeybunch! You really did me proud out there yesterday! I only wish I could’ve seen it in person!”

Rarity didn’t answer. The painkillers had knocked her out stone cold. Considering the braces and bandages that wrapped her like a pharaoh half-prepared for burial, this was for the best.

“Aw, I’m sorry, honey,” Hondo said in a more quiet tone. “I’ll show it to you tomorrow.”

Tucking the contract in his shirt, the big. bluff stallion leaned over the bed. “Hailstone Mary made MVP,” he added. “Four touchdowns in the second half for the biggest comeback in Super Drome history, y’know. But she says she couldn’t have done it without you.” Very gently, Hondo wrapped his forelegs around his daughter’s shoulders, kissing her on the horn. “Thanks for everything, Rarity.”

Rarity moaned and mumbled, “Rrmmm… go back to your mommies, you lily-livered weaklings… I’ll stuff you all up your pl…” She trailed off and slid deeper into her drug-induced slumber.

“That’s my little girl,” Hondo replied.

Author's Notes:

Obviously this is a work of complete fantasy. Little things aside, Detrot in the Super Drome? Impossible.

No, Hailstone Mary doesn't fly out of reach of her would-be tacklers. The pads and jersey bind pegasus wings, making it fair to all. Likewise unicorn magic is not allowed.