Sadly, I'll have to bow out as well. I did come up with a pretty darn good idea a couple of days ago, but I foolishly thought I could crank it out this weekend.

The Finale has left me an emotional wreck, and I need time to process it all. So I'll have to bow out. Apologies to all.

Alright! Got an idea that (I think) works, and submitted with time to spare! Woot!

Also, the "dark mode" here is awesome.

But that individual focus also leads to less connection with others. That means less love, a lower population, downward pressure on the escort industry…”

“Hm. That’d impact our tax base.”

And I almost spewed coffee all over my keyboard. That, dear author, is certified platinum comedy right there. This was a riot, and Cadance was somehow crazy and so in character all at the same time. I'm not sure how you did it but you did it. Well done!

Alright, all fics read and ranked. Good stuff all around!

Congrats to the winners!

As for me: this was by far my most coherent (and based on comments, well received) entry to date. And I still landed 3rd to last.

Maybe I need special handling to get into the top half, lol. xD

Until next time!

Ugh, the one prompt I had the least hope for developing a workable idea. Drat.

>>CoffeeMinion

Yay! :D

Hmm... this was interesting! Music is often used to bring Vinyl and Tavi together, but never quite like this. But Vinyl didn't seem to be "it" earlier in the text, so circling back to her in the end was a bit of a surprise. I had begun to expect another character would pop up instead. So good work subverting the expected but then coming back to it in an unexpected manner.

Now I'm wondering whether Vinyl really caught onto Tavi's clues all along, or if she just hit the melodic jackpot with her latest remix. Perhaps a slight expansion to this will reveal the answer! :)

My wife is an engineer, so she'd get a kick out of this one. ;)

I like the idea at work here. It's simple and straight-forward, but makes for some good comedic potential. It lost some of its punch though due to the telly nature of the opening scene. The narrator gave away too much of the game for both Lug Nut and the reader, so the only question left coming into the closing scene was 'which pony gets to use the flawed product?'

If Lug Nut's dilemma were shown more than told through action or dialogue, that would help connect us more to the scenario he's in. Also, it might give you a good opening to set Lug Nut up for that bonus you mentioned. Specifically, what if Lug Nut had a sudden thought while mulling over the design flaws, approved it as-is but went straight to work on something new and unseen? Then in the end, you can reveal that his new idea was to build the upgraded parts as separate units, then sell them at an inflated price. Anyway, just a rambling thought there.