Groundball Day
beepbeep ... beepbeep ... beepbeep ... beepbeep ...
It was Saturday. Game 5 of the Round of 16 series between Drawkland and Scootalove City was tonight. In their hotel room in Canterlot, Equestrian States, Travis and Tori stirred from their sleep, waking up on this day as they had probably hundreds of times before. They were no closer to finding the answer as to why fate or the gods or some cruel glitch in the universe's physics had trapped them in this loop, but for one morning, they were content to not think about it for awhile.
"Do you wanna go back to Mt. Harmony today?" Travis asked once they got out of bed and started getting dressed. On the original day, the couple had gone on a short hiking tour of the foothills outside of town. After doing it a dozen or so times early in the loop, they rarely bothered going out for it anymore.
"Sure." Tori yawned. "Any particular reason?"
"I dunno." Travis shrugged as he put on his shoes. "I feel like we haven't been out of the city in a few, uh, weeks. Or months. Whatever it's been. It'll be nice to get to a bit of nature."
"You're so right." Tori put on her more durable walking shoes.
For the first time in a long time, they didn't really talk about the loop, or what they were gonna do to get out of it. They just enjoyed each other's company as they breathed the fresh air at the foot of Mt. Harmony, grabbed lunch at a local spot in Canterlot, and headed to Royal Canterlot Stadium to take in Game 5. Like the previous day, the couple decided they'd try to sit in that specific section in the upper deck.
"Are you sure you don't want to just buy the tickets real quick?" Travis asked. "Could we at least check if the seats are open? It'd be so much easier!"
"Travis, we've seathopped everywhere in this damn field, including the suite level, and never got caught. I'm not getting thwarted by some uppity usher in the upper deck!" Tori insisted. After a moment, she relented. "Okay, if we get caught today again, we can buy the tickets tomorrow. How's that?"
"That's better." Travis nodded in approval.
They decided to wait until the sixth inning to try sitting in section 320, just in case those seats were actually occupied at the beginning of the game. Instead, they sat in their actual ticket seats, proceeding to annoy everybody around them by obnoxiously singing along to every single song that played over the PA as soon as they came on. They'd heard the exact sequence hundreds of times, after all.
By the time Drawkland had taken a 9-2 lead in the top of the sixth, Travis and Tori decided it was time to move. They made their way up the escalators and around the concourse to the opposite side of the stadium, to the section they knew would be on the big screen going into the ninth inning. Tori needed to have her silly jumbotron moment, after all. It's not like they had any other ideas for this turn in the loop.
Things wouldn't be easy, however. When they approached the tunnel underneath the section, they saw the same usher from the previous night, looking around like a hawk. At least his back was turned to them at that moment.
"Shit, he's still there." Tori hissed. "We need a distraction or something!"
"I've got an idea." Travis pulled Tori back to the concourse, away from the tunnel. He spied a couple young Drawkians, perhaps some frat guys on spring break, waiting in line for more beer. "Hey, you guys!"
"Huh?" One of the dudes, wearing his Base Corps cap backwards, turned to look at Travis. He was clearly already a couple deep. "Wassup?"
"Hey, man." Travis got closer, keeping his voice low. "If I buy you guys like 2 beers each, will you do something for me real quick?"
"Hell yeah, bro." The other guy perked up when he heard free beer was possible. "What do you need?"
"Can you guys run a distraction for us? I'll chip in another $10 if you spill some beer on each other and pretend to fight in the aisle over there," Travis pointed to the tunnel next to section 320, then pulled the necessary cash out of his wallet.
"Say less." Both the guys nodded immediately, offering their hands for a shake.
"Thanks a bunch." Travis returned the shake, transferring the cash from hand to hand.
Two minutes later, the play was on. The two guys ambled down the tunnel into the aisle, bumping into each other right behind the usher. Travis and Tori were following a few yards behind.
"Hey dude! What the hell man!" One of the guys yelled. There was now a beer stain developing on his white Base Corps jersey.
"Bro, watch where you're going," the other one said. "Not my fault you can't see for shit."
"You're not pinning this on me, man!"
"Excuse me, gentlemen. Is there an issue here?" The usher stepped closer to inspect the commotion. Once his head was turned, Travis and Tori sped past as inconspicuously as possible.
As they started up the steps into section 320, Travis turned and gave a thumbs-up to the guys. One of them jutted his chin in recognition. A few minutes later, the "squabble" had been resolved, and the guys returned to their seats a couple sections over.
Travis and Tori, meanwhile, were safely a row behind the old Drawkian couple they'd recognized from the ninth inning fan cam. By the time the usher returned to his post, he didn't notice the new Drawkian couple in his section. The seats must've been taken by somebody at some point, but they were vacant now. As far as Travis and Tori were aware, it'd stay that way until the end of the game.
"That was a great plan, babe." Tori turned and whispered appreciatively in Travis's ear.
"No problem." Travis grinned. "Can't wait to see what moves you embarrass yourself with two innings from now."
"I hope you're ready. It's gonna be a spectacle," Tori cheesed a grin, prompting a laugh from Travis.
Travis and Tori continued to enjoy the last couple innings of the game. Since they were no longer in their original seats, they were intentionally less obnoxious with their singing and mouthing along to every song and PA announcement. They didn't want to risk grabbing more attention and getting booted from the seats!
As they watched the Drawkian momentum gradually tail off in the eighth inning, Travis nodded appreciatively to himself. He'd said it to Tori before, but he was once again filled with gratitude. This whole situation of being stuck in a time loop, watching the same baseball game impossibly far from home, was far from ideal. Some days it felt like cosmic punishment. But through it all, he had his woman beside him, helping to keep him sane almost as much as he kept her sane.
I guess as far as bizarre predicaments go, this isn't so bad. Travis thought to himself. Even if we never find our way out, at least I'm with her.
Finally, the time came. Stuart Nova rolled into a 4-3 groundout, and the 8th inning was over. Travis whipped his head over to look at Tori with a cheeky grin. She was already getting out of her seat, putting a show of stretching and limbering up to throw down some dance moves.
"It's your time, babe!" Travis chuckled, his grin almost as wide as Tori's as the ninth inning hype sequence began. Naturally, with the 7-run margin and just three outs left for each team, the Scootalove City fans were finding it difficult to dance or make noise. Most of the fans who started cheering and moving around were Drawkian. Even the old lady in the row in front of Travis and Tori got up to shimmy back and forth, the original subject of the brief fan cam shot that came this way.
"Check me out!" Tori laughed, blushing a bit as she started grooving with the corniest moves ever seen.
"You're such a dork!" Travis teased, still grinning as he watched his girlfriend start to dance along goofily to the music. Tori started looking over at the video board patiently as she continued moving, almost in time with the music. As Travis watched her, he felt his heart fill with emotion. Even in this crazy hell, even driven to the brink of insanity and back, even facing a potential eternity locked in repeat, Tori was somehow finding fulfillment alongside him.
The emotion was replaced with adrenaline. All of a sudden, the normally light weight that Travis had in his pocket felt like it was burning. He'd carried the little box in one of his pockets, mostly forgotten, for pretty much every cycle through this identical day. While Tori had her attention still glued to the big screen in Royal Canterlot Stadium, Travis felt his hand almost on autopilot, furiously digging into his pocket.
The time had come. The shot switched, showing Tori and the old Drawkian lady in the row ahead dancing on jumbotron. "Oh my god, it worked!" Tori squealed, jumping up in childlike glee. "We're up there!" Tori whipped her head to make sure Travis saw, but didn't look closely before turning back to the video board. Naturally, the video feed was lagging about a second behind, and it took Tori an additional second to process what she was seeing. She saw herself bouncing, but Travis wasn't looking at the screen, he was looking at her. And he wasn't in his seat anymore ... he was on his knee. Tori spun around, hands whipping up to her face to cover her mouth in shock.
By now the camera feed normally would've cut away, but once the gameday producer saw what was happening, he kept the shot on screen just a little longer.
"Tori ..." Travis croaked, clearing his throat as he looked up at Tori's face. His tongue felt thick in his mouth, he could barely even hear the crowd or himself through the roaring in his ears. He'd put this off for months before they'd even been trapped in the loop, mostly because he never thought up the right words. But this time, the words just came to him. "I don't know how much longer we'll be here. I don't know if I'll ever have a real life, back home, living and growing old. I've put this off for too long, but I think I've always known that there's nobody else I'd rather spend forever with. Even if it is really forever."
Tori was frozen in place, eyes wide as saucers. The surprise had hit her like a brick. Meanwhile, the crowd watching the board started gasping and some cheering as they noticed the procession.
"Victoria Shelby Brooks," Travis finally said, revealing the ring box in his hands and popping open the lid. His heart was beating a million miles per hour, but he finally pushed out the words. "Will you marry me?"
"YES!" Tori shrieked the moment the words came off Travis's lips. She surged forward before Travis could stand up or take the ring out of its spot, wrapping him in a huge bear hug. This caused another swell of cheers and claps from the crowd that was paying attention (and didn't find jumbotron proposals dumb on principle).
Down on the field, a few of the players from each team noticed during their between-inning warm-up because of the sudden random crowd swell. Between swings in the batting circle, Serena Hearns glanced at the screen momentarily. When she saw the proposal, she grunted, feeling a little pang in her heart. At the end of last season, her long-term boyfriend who she'd been with since college broke up with her unexpectedly. She'd mostly gotten over it by this point, but seeing a happy Drawkian couple get engaged like that easily stabbed at those scars. Serena shook her head, taking another practice swing before striding to the plate. She pushed those thoughts to the back of her mind. There was a blowout to finish.
By the time Tori finally released Travis from her embrace, the camera shot had switched elsewhere in the stadium, finishing the hype sequence. Now the only people watching were any of the particularly nosy fans in their section. The couple stood up from their kneeling position on the ground, sitting back in their seats.
"When did you get that?" Tori asked, astonished as Travis took the ring out of the box and carefully slipped it onto her ring finger.
"Um ... awhile ago." Travis admitted sheepishly. "I sorta bought it a few months ago. I just happened to have it with me on the trip."
"WHAT?" Tori's jaw dropped, and she playfully smacked Travis on the shoulder. "You've had this THE WHOLE TIME?"
"Y-yeah." Travis cringed, rubbing the back of his neck in embarrassment. "Trust me, if you knew how many times I had this in my pocket with you, you'd be furious. Even before this trip. I just ... could never come up with the right words, or find the right moment. I bailed so many times."
"Well ..." Tori breathed, twisting her hand back and forth and admiring the ring as it sparkled on her finger. "I'm glad you finally didn't choke." She grinned, looking up at Travis, and pulled him into a deep kiss.
Meanwhile, the top of the ninth was already underway. Just like she always had, Serena Hearns had gone down 1-2 in the count. Amalthea Beagle fired a fastball high in the zone ... and Serena Hearns didn't pull the trigger. The umpire grunted his strike three call right as Travis and Tori turned their attention back to the field.
"Um ..." Travis said after a moment. He turned to look at Tori, whose face also scrunched in confusion. "That's not right, is it?"
"No, it's not." Tori felt a wave of goosebumps go down her back. "She grounds it to second base, right?"
"Yeah, she starts the ninth with a groundout." Travis turned back to the field, seeing Serena trudge back to the dugout and hearing the strikeout sound effect play on the stadium speakers.
"Was that ... us?" Tori whispered. "Maybe she saw us on the screen ..."
"I think you're right." Travis swallowed hard. Now his mouth felt almost as dry as it did when he was proposing just a couple minutes before. They had never seen any variation on the game. It had proceeded the exact same every single time. The only times the game ended differently had been after they assaulted the players, and they didn't even get to see those changes since they were locked in a holding cell as they happened.
Now the couple had their eyes glued on the field, searching for any more differences. The next two outs of the ninth inning proceeded in identical fashion, however. If they'd really accidentally wormed into the head of Serena Hearns, though, there was one specific play they'd have to wait for.
Sure enough, Franklin Bell came out to close the bottom of the ninth. The Drawkian fans roared in excitement, three outs away from their first-ever quarterfinal. The hype was palpable. All Bell had to do is get those outs, and it would be over.
Of course, Travis and Tori knew that wouldn't start well. That first out wasn't going to come until the tying run was on base, and fortunately for Drawkland, all three outs would come on one play. Before then, it was going to be a hit parade.
Single. Single. 2-RBI single. Single. Dan Herpus blasting a three-run homer to deep left field to make it 10-8. Sitting in the third-base side upper deck, Travis and Tori got a perfect view of that home run's pretty arc, landing in one of the balconies on the Pony Metal Supply Co. building in left.
The parade wasn't done. Even after a mound visit, Bell gave up another two singles, putting the tying run at first base and bringing John Avidan, representing the winning run, to the plate. Travis and Tori watched with bated breath, though that could be said for anybody that was still in the stadium. Everybody knew what the stakes were as far as the game itself was concerned. Ten minutes ago, nobody besides Travis and Tori could've possibly known that this inning would actually be serious.
When Bell got Avidan to the 1-1 count, Travis and Tori leaned forward expectantly. This next pitch, a slider, would get tipped by Avidan, a one-hopper to shortstop that Hearns would get to in a flash, starting a game-ending, series-winning triple play. When Bell got into his stance, Travis noticed that Tori's knees were bouncing anxiously.
Franklin Bell tossed his slider plateward. John Avidan had it in his sights, slapping it off the end of the bat towards short. The groundball skipped quickly across the infield, shooting to a few feet left of Serena Hearns. She reached out, the ball flying right to the edge of her range ... and she missed it. The ball fell, bouncing in the shallow outfield and quickly getting to Mike Navis in left. Alex Ponches rounded third but held up without dashing home. That run was irrelevant compared to the runners behind them, and there were still no outs. There was no reason to test the left fielder's arm.
Tori's hand shot over to Travis's, grabbing it in a death grip. Travis squeezed back, but both their eyes were still glued to the field. For the first time in their uncountable number of loops, the couple watched Stuart Nova come to the plate in the bottom of the ninth.
With still no outs, the bases loaded, and the winning run already on base, Nova's mission was obvious. A power hitter in this situation only has one goal: destroy the baseball. Keep it off the ground, avoid the rally-killing double play, preferably get the ball into the outfield or even further in the process. Franklin Bell would have to be absolutely surgical in his approach. A mistake pitch could send this game to extra innings ... or worse.
The first three pitches went by with incredible stress in between them. A fastball off the plate for ball one, then one in the zone for ball two. Bell went to his offspeed and missed, a changeup for ball two. With a 2-1 count, Nova was definitely going to look for something to hit. Bell wasn't going to give in with a fastball. He thought to his slider in the previous at-bat to Avidan: the speed change and movement got Avidan to ground it. It was simply a bad stroke of luck that Serena Hearns missed it. Surely the slider would work again, maybe roll an inning-saving double play or something.
Franklin Bell didn't know the significance his next pitch would have as he took the sign from Wes Navis and nodded. He had no clue what it would mean as he brought the ball up into the stretch. There was no way he could've predicted the decades of pain this one ball would cause. He was just looking to get an out. Bell gripped the slider, began his step, and hurled the ball plateward.
The pitch came out just a little high. Bell didn't get the extra oomf of spin it needed. As the ball spun flatly to the plate, he could feel his heart drop. Stuart Nova saw the slider coming in, and could tell it was going to hang. Nova sat back, cranked his bat, and met the ball with a perfect crack right over the plate. The sound echoed through the stadium, cutting through the raucous noise already filling Royal Canterlot Stadium.
For tens of thousands of Drawkians watching, both at home and in the field, their hearts dropped. The ball soared through the air, heading to dead center. Rachel Altink sprinted to the warning track, to the wall ... and ran out of room. The ball landed well over the center field fence, bouncing and rebounding off the navy blue batter's eye as the crowd broke into cries of confusion, elation, and heartbreak.
How could this happen? What horrible twist of fate could cause such an awesome blunder?
Travis and Tori rose to their feet the moment the ball was struck. They watched as Stuart Nova completed the improbable comeback, not just a seven-run rally to tie the game, but a nine-run rally to win it with runs to spare. It was inconceivable. And yet ...
"Does this mean it's over?" Travis breathed, watching as the Scootalove City fans (the ones that hadn't already left innings earlier) went insane all around them.
"Who cares? It's something different." Tori broke into a wry smile, which turned into a more genuine one as she held up her left hand. Her finger sparkled in the stadium lights. "There's something more important to care about."
"Aw." Travis blushed, then pulled Tori into another hug. After a moment, he pulled back, looking at Tori sheepishly. "You know, if this day repeats again, do I still have to propose?"
"You know what? Yes!" Tori stuck out her tongue. "That's for making me wait all these loops without doing it!"
"Fine." Travis chuckled, poking Tori in the forehead in retaliation. "I'm just going to be even more cheesy about it every time."
A few hours later, the couple was back in their hotel room in Canterlot after successfully winding down for the day. Tori turned off the light on the nightstand, as she usually did. "Alarm's off!" Travis said, as he usually did. This time, though, they cuddled in the middle of the bed, which wasn't as common. As they embraced, Travis felt something poke his side.
"Hey. You poked me." Travis looked down to see it came from Tori's left hand. "You didn't take it off? You're gonna wear it to bed?"
"I'm never taking it off. Probably." Tori snickered as she nuzzled into Travis's chest. "The universe is gonna have to sneak it off my finger tonight if it wants me to let go."
"Well the universe can do whatever it wants now." Travis replied. "I'm never letting go of you."
Drawkland 0 2 0 3 1 3 1 0 0 10
Scootalove City 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 1 9 12
Scootalove City wins 3-2
