//------------------------------// // Action Is Its Reward // Story: Ofolrodi // by Imploding Colon //------------------------------// "Okaaaaaaaaaaaaaay... soooooooooooooo..." Pinkie Pie looked at the gawking expressions of her fellow marefriends. "Did anypony else see that?" "This, uh..." Flynn backtrotted, pale and sweating. He pointed a shakey hoof at the curled-up arachnid. "...this shit is fresh." "Don't be crazy," Rainbow Dash droned. Her ears twitched, and she looked aside at Kepler. "Keps? Is he crazy?" "It is not uncommon forr the nerrvous systems of inverrtebrrates to rrespond autonomously to stimuli long afterr perrishing... howeverr..." Kepler slowly shook his head. "...this is farr... farr too lengthy of a time perriod to possibly fit the equation." "Could... I have... I-I mean we have just..." Rainbow gulped. "...imagined it?" Silence. "Guess there's one way to find out..." Ariel drifted closer to the giant, curled-up specimen. She reached a hoof out... paused... looked back at the group... then reached down to grab a loose piece of metal. Holding her breath, she floated closer and closer to the arachnid's fossil. Rainbow, Kepler, and a teeth-chattering Flynn watched in anxious unison. Ariel bet her lip. Gripping the metal shard in crook of her hoof, she aimed its other end... and poked the giant spider's exoskeleton. Nothing happened. The thing was too weighted to even budge from the contact. So, holding her breath even tighter, Ariel reached further and poked its curled leg-joints. A limb shifted ever so slightly from her touch, but leaned back into place once the contact was over. Ariel exhaled. Casually, she stuck the end of the metal rod past the specimen's frozen pedipalps. Twin fangs spontaneously closed shut around the metal plank. SNAP! It broke in half from the hairy bite. "AACK!" Ariel flew back into Rainbow Dash. Cl-Claaaaaaang! The two halves of the metal rod fell to the floor. The Herald backed away from the scene. As the heart-pounding seconds rolled by, they realized that the echo of the falling debris hadn't stopped. Instead, it lingered... extended... and persisted with unnatural acoustical strength. Raaaaaaaaaaaaaa-aaaaaaaaaaaaa-aaaaaaaaaang! The group looked all around, eyes wide and uncertain. "There it is!" Pinkie Pie gasped excitedly. "Just like what I was hearing earlier!" Frowning, she spun and slapped Rarity upside the scalp. "See?!" "Ow—!" "I told all of you girls I was hearing something earlier!" Pinkie Pie shouted. "Just like music!" Rarity grasped her skull. "But why are you h-hitting me?!" "Because your mane is the flounciest!" Pinkie slapped her scalp again. "It's like the interrobang that we all need in freaky situations like this!" "Quit it, darling—!" "Shhhhhh!" Rainbow Dash insisted. She cocked her head aside. "Listen!" Hesitantly, the group did as they were told. The ringing echo shook, wobbled, and mutated. Soon, it reached a faint pitch, resembling a distant string section of a hidden orchestra. Like violins quivering in the darkness. "Rainbow..." Twilight hovered closer. She pointed and whispered. "Look!" Rainbow's eyes scanned the far end of the room past the disturbed debris. She rubbed her pendant, and a ruby spotlight illuminated row upon row of thick silk webbing. Flynn bit his lip hard. Sweat dripped down his face and past his mechanical eye. At long last—after two full minutes of haunting melody—the ringing sound dwindled into nothingness. At that very same moment, the carpet of spiderwebs stopped shaking. All was still. Ariel and Rainbow touched down, steadying their wings. Kepler looked around, grasping his glasses and keeping them still. Silence in a room full of ancient corpses. And then... ...more violins. This time from an even greater distance. A response. "Uhhhhhm..." Applejack began. "Crud...!" Rainbow Dash sped out of the chamber, making a bee-line for the nearest exit. "Huh—?!" Ariel looked all around. She clenched her teeth and flew after the petite pegasus. "Rainbow, wait!" Flynn and Kepler scrambled up the rear. Swooooooooosh! Rainbow Dash flew out of the building and zipped towards the nearest edge of the suspended courtyard bordering the structure. She looked straight down, ears twitching. She heard the sound more clearly now. "Rainbow...!" Ariel flew up to her, panting. "What are you—?!" "Shhhh!" Rainbow held a hoof up. Her ruby eyes narrowed. "...the music's coming from below." "It is?" Breathless, Ariel glanced down as well. All the mares saw was the glinting bodies of building spires stretching down and down into hazy blackness. "But... but how—?" "You and Wildcard..." Rainbow muttered. "Did either of you actually fly low enough to find the bottom of the city?" She breathed. "Like... where the skyscrapers begin at ground-level or suchcrap?" Ariel shook her head. "No, Rainbow. We came back to fetch you as soon as we found the first skeletal remains. None of us have seen the bottom floor of this place." The sound of scampering hooves... ...Flynn and Kepler rushed up to join the two. "Okay..." Flynn huffed and puffed. "Do I even want to know what you're thinking right now?" "That melody..." Kepler remarked. "...it perrsists." Flynn gnashed his teeth. "Does it look like we're here to enjoy some sort of friggin' concert?!" Rainbow reached a hoof out to the stallion. Flynn's good eye blinked. "What?" "Gimme a crystal," she muttered. Silently, Flynn reached into his saddlebag and produced a crystalline shard. He planted it neatly in her hoof. "Light it up," she said. Flynn aimed his horn at the shard. After a few seconds, it glowed with mana-powered brilliance. The Herald watched as Rainbow held the crystal out, lingered, then dropped the luminescent thing straight down through the space between the ancient spires. It cast a glinting glow across the metallic surfaces surrounding it—even as it plunged for dozens of stories... becoming a tiny bright speck against the great enormous blackness below... ...but then the blackness turned blindingly white. The glowing crystal struck something—an enormous sheet comprised of countless silken strands webbed densely together. A flouncing carpet of porous ivory biomatter shook and wobbled, fluctuating in tune with the melody wafting upwards, growing in intensity. The more the group stared, they could make out layer upon layer of webs persisting even further towards the nebulous depths lingering below. Flynn's muzzle hung agape as his ears drooped. Flynn and Ariel grimaced. Rainbow stared blankly. Meanwhile—Rarity floated closer. "Ahem... this may seem like an inopportune time to announce this, darling, but... I sense a vibration..." Rainbow's head pivoted to face her. "Through the buildings and platforms, I mean," Rarity clarified, trying to maintain her composure. "I didn't feel it before. Honest. But something is shaking the metal surfaces of this city and it's rising closer." "... ... ...from where?" Rainbow wheezed. "Multiple sources." "How many is 'multiple?'" Rarity could only whimper. Rainbow turned to gawk at Fluttershy. Fluttershy gulped... then smiled nervously. "Now miiiiiiiight be a good time to start ascending, Rainbow Dash." "... ... ... ..." FWOOOOOSH! Rainbow Dash soared upwards. "Party's over, folks!" "Pickemeup!Pickmeup!Pickmeup!" Flynn whimpered, flailing. Ariel grasped him while Kepler also took wing. Very soon, the quartet soared towards the fragmented twilight above while the sound of vibrating strings intensified... ...louder and louder.