//------------------------------// // A Gilded Cage ...And yes it's a bad pun // Story: The Wacky and Wonderful Misadventures of Buggy the Clown // by Hoppa_21 //------------------------------// An immeasurable treasure. Do you see this? Mountains of gold and jewelry? Bracelets, crowns, scepters, bars of pure gold in this catacombs with all the archways? The treasure large enough for the old Uncle Scrooge to take a dive in it? Actually that was what I always wanted to do myself. Gather all the treasures in the world and take a bath in them. Gold is too hard to bath you say? Shut up, I say! There is nothing impossible for the great Captain Buggy! Muahaha! And I am so close to my dream too. There is only one problem… I’m part of the damn treasure myself! Yes. Me the great and powerful Captain Buggy reduced to a rather impressive gold statue. It’s not my fault that the steeped in legend Hand of Midas did this to me. One of my crew mates got overzealous and tripped, leading to the treasure touching me directly by accident. What? Got no clue how this could possible turn me to gold or what the Hand of Midas is? It is rather easily explained. This gold hand is called the ultimate treasure for one simple reason: Whatever you touch with it gets turned into pure gold! The handle is the only thing that is not affected by this enchantment. So hence a Diamond Dog taking it, waddling over to bring the legendary treasure to me, tripping and said treasure landing enchanted gold first into me leading to me being a treasure myself. So it really did turn EVERYTHING to gold. I would have rather tested it on the Royal Butts than myself, but stupid mutts are stupid mutts. I probably should have chosen my crew more wisely. Just thinking about the treasure that slipped through my hands back then... And you wouldn’t believe how many towns I had to ravage just to get the location of it. Years upon years of scavenging just to finally hold the ultimate treasure which will fulfill my deepest treasure-filled dreams. It is rumored that it was enchanted by Starswirl the Bearded himself! At least I heard that he did it as he once dabbled in alchemy. The old coot wasn’t that great by the way. Sure he could do magic, but had no idea how to have a good time. I remember his first time drunk. Now that was something! It got him to finally loosen up! In fact so much that he was confessing his undying love to his assistant Clover the Clever! I never thought that her green coated cheeks could turn into such a deep shade of red until I saw it on that fateful day! Ha! Those were good times! Where was I? Ah, yes, turned to gold by the mistake of one of my insanely stupid crew members. I never got to punish that knucklehead. On the bright side they were almost immediately captured by the crown. Downside was that these alicorn sisters were gloating right in front of me and pretty much laughing their flanks off at my expense. Or at least Moonie Loonie did, while Sunny had an insufferable smirk on her face. The type of which said: ‘I told you to leave your hands off it, but did you listen to me? No! So serves you right!’ Now that I think about it, it was probably outright gloating she did. Especially since Sunbutt never liked me. Well, probably better to be liked in the way Loony did. After capturing all my allies as well as securing my statue they decided it might be a good idea to keep me as a treasure in their treasury. Not the worst place to be but…in my case it was torture. Imagine you would suffer shipwreck on a lone stony island with nothing to save yourself. No plants, no food, nothing at all. In the distance you can see another island with a heavenly beach and coconuts to harvest. To put it short: paradise. Problem is you have to cross the ocean which is infested with sea kings. Of course you know that you are never going to make it. Still, you are so close to it that you can almost taste the coconuts… …And this is driving you insane. Just the thought of being so close to it, but never being able to reach it. That’s how I feel. So close and yet so far! Just like I’m dying of thirst while a cooling drink in form of a closed coconut is right in front of me, without a proper tool to open it, or the strength to do it in the first place. I swear they placed me in this treasury on purpose. They probably knew that I was still fully conscious. That’s the kind of people those two are. Mischievous. Even more so than me, and that does mean something since I am the great Captain Buggy after all! My only hope at the moment is that the enchantment wears off with time. But that was more of a rumor than anything. Not a wide spread rumor at that. But it is the only thing that keeps my morale up. Sure after all this years it didn’t seem likely, but just imagine what would be if I did break free here! I would be getting free in the treasury! The treasury of the two princesses! A real foray! And they probably wouldn’t even notice it! Sun Butt would be too busy gorging herself on cake, while good old Loony would be out somewhere in Equestria as a bounty hunter, since she always had a knack for the thrill of fighting and ridding the country of crime. I know that since she was using me as a training dummy to slice through and getting a real kick out of it every time she cut me in half. If she was addictive from the thrill then I was the drug, so to speak. I took another look around, or more like a stare in the same direction, since it was hard to move as a statue. But I knew this chambers were huge regardless, considering that I was placed pretty deep in the treasury so I had a good place to overlook it. And I was one of the first treasures to be moved into this new castle, so I got a good look around then they first brought me here. Can’t really complain about that though, even though the journey wasn’t that comfortable it beats being left in an abandoned, crumbling castle. But yeah, large treasure right in front of me. More than I could ever carry. It’s a real bother that these mutts are long dead by now, or they could help me move this, so I have to limit myself to only as much as I myself can carry. It is a good starting point in any case. I can buy myself all the supplies I need as well as convince a few mutts to join my ranks again. And just imagine the look on the princesses faces! After all this time thought dead, I, Captain Buggy, am going to rise from the ashes like a phoenix! A phoenix might be a good pet for a pirate. Just like a parrot, only more majestic. I might as well try to get my hands on one once I get out of here. Can’t take that much longer. Any minute now. NOW! Damnit! I can’t believe I’m still stuck! Shouldn’t it have let up by now?! *Click* Another guest? Hopefully not that Blueblood brat. This guy is too whiny for my taste. I could already hear hoofsteps. They were slowly coming closer to reveal… …A bug?