Villains

by MarvelandPonder

5/ Ahuitzotl: Nemesis

NEMESIS

Ahuítzotl

Daring Do and --
The Thunderbird’s Call

Chapter One - Heading for Disaster

Daring Do hugged her pack against her chest, feeling the regular thump-thump of the train passing over the track spikes. The windows put on a beautiful show. The mountainside overlooked a misty jungle. Riveting. At least, the others seemed to think so.

A little colt pointed things out to his smiling, absent mother across the aisle. A nervous stallion watched his window freckle with water. Daring tried to amuse herself with little things like that, but she wasn’t a small detail kind of filly. That's what she told herself. The excitement would kick in any minute now.

The train shook. Daring jostled freely with it, so totally undisturbed that she couldn’t bring herself to care. There was too much to think about, too much to look forward to, and too much to be nervous about when they got to their destination to be worried about the ride there.

“Ungh,” her travelling companion groaned. “Why can they not drive the train straight, is it so hard?”

Daring let her head fall back against the rest again. “Aw, I wouldn’t worry about it. They have to. There’s only so many ways you can go on tracks.”

His salt-and-pepper mane and thick stubble didn’t match the foalish pout. Grumbling in his Spanish, totally-not-a-sound-alike-of-Antrotio-Banderas accent he said, “That is what I am afraid of, Daring Do ...”

She cracked a smile. “What?”

“Going off the rails, fool,” he said, eyes bulging hooves thrown out over the table between them. “If that conductear,’” pronounced with waggling hooves, “had the slightest clue about driving a train without scrambling up his passengers, I might have more faith in her in this nonsensical weather.”

Daring Do tried smothering her giggles. The stallion scowled at her. Well, she'd never claimed to have tact.

“Oh, c’mon, Atlas, do you really think the weather ponies in Machu Ponchu would let a train crash?” The fogged up windows beside her lit up with a wonky spire. Seconds later, as the train went through a tunnel, the clouds growled at them. The kind that meant business.

When they came out the other side, Daring’s smile hadn’t moved. Atlas was pressed into the seat, shoulders up to his ears, his handsome face smeared in wild, crazy panic. Daring threw her head back laughing, which came out as a series of raspy squeaks.

Atlas scrunched his snout and mouth together. “This is why I don't bring j'ou on my travels, j'ou know."

“Why? You don’t want me seeing you wuss out?” She cackled even harder when the train jostled to the side and Atlas stiffened up like a board.

Laughter dying out, she rested her head on her hooves, and her hooves on the table between them. Her shoulders bounced as she hummed out the last of it. “Good thing I have the adventurer cutie mark here, huh?"

“... And what exactly have j'ou used that talent for?”

Daring Do shut her mouth, wings tucking into her sides. “Well ... I’m using it now, aren’t I?”

“Thanks to me.”

Half the candles flickered out. The train threw Atlas back against his seat, and Daring flying towards him. Startled, passengers yelped and screamed. A terrible metal-on-metal screech plastered their ears against their heads.

Daring’s head hit Atlas’s chest. Atlas tensed every muscle that he could, a vein creeping up his neck. His eyes were shut.

Daring thought to scream out to him, tell him to hold on, because she could feel happening exactly what he had predicted. The wheels jerked. The interior lurched. The steady thump-thump that had drifted into the background flared in their chests, made enormous. Daring held her saddlebag, the only graspable thing she could keep a hold of. The car walloped her from one side to another.

With one devastating blow, the steam-filled windows burst, showering the car with glass, and rain pouring in from the outside. Daring heard herself shout. The loudest noise she could make was pathetic against the wind and droning squeal of the wheels.

“Atlas!”

Half the row of seats away, she couldn’t be sure he even heard. Her hair whipped in front of her squinting eyes, but she had to see, had to keep them open. Her heart turned over at the thought of being blind and untethered.

Her back was thrown against a door-frame. She couldn’t breathe. Hot rocks replaced her lungs. Her vision darkened.

Daring wasn’t sure she was seeing what she thought she was.

With another wave cringing the metal, the stucco flooring cracking, Daring watched as the metal was torn right open. Almost like tin-foil. The sound of it was fearsome: an industrial scream. The blackened sky was revealed to them, a curtain pulled back.

Daring’s mane whipped around her. Her head slammed against something hard. The sounds around her dulled. She went weak. With the train tipping left, it was easy for her body to slide straight down, scraping against the glass and metal. Her wings swept it with her like a broom.

A voice called out. She couldn’t hear what.

Daring felt the tug in her gut. She was vaguely aware that she was falling head-first off the side of the mountain edge. Her eyes fluttered shut before she broke the forest canopy.

Chapter Two – Machu Ponchu

“…Wake up.”

Her eyes cracked open, and stung.

“… Daring …”

Her head pounded; she’d moan, but that didn’t seem the smartest move. Little claws dug into her sides. She couldn’t feel the spot above her hip where the left wing met the barrel and that wasn’t the most reassuring sensation to wake up to. Feathers clung to her back with sweat and hopefully nothing else. In brief: she hurt. Bad.

“Please.”

Daring Do’s eyes struggled to open. Her face twitched, too dazed to scowl in pain. The sunlight burned, as if stage lights blaring down at her, breaking through the forest canopy exactly where she didn't want it to be.

She raised a hoof, and seethed, “Ach …” Her breath was ragged.

“Bless the gods,” he laughed. Her ears flinched. It took a second for her to remember who Atlas was.

The metal ripping open like paper, a black-feathered figure tearing it open, and the lightning she saw before everything faded out of existence.

Daring coughed, holding her side. Atlas knelt beside her. He checked her forehead, frowning uselessly. She felt for a sticky ooze she was sure would be under her wing, but thankfully, she was dry. She sat back, trying to take deep breaths and clear her head.

Atlas took that as an invitation to check her pulse. He nodded. “J'es, j'es. Very good.”

She laughed, and shoved him away.

”I knew j'ou would be alright, Daring Do; it would be too easy to get rid of j'ou just like that.” He smiled at her with his excellent teeth, but tiredly, wincing, because of the gash on his right cheek.

Other than that and a few minor tears in his shirt, the only evidence he'd been in a serious train wreck in the last few hours was a tussled mane. For an old dude, Daring thought Atlas had a criminally unfair advantage in the looks department.

“J'ou know,” he said, sitting back. She took the opportunity to catch her breath. “I have travelled to Machu Ponchu before. It wan't this eventful, gracias a dios, but I did learn many stories from their folklore." He made a grand sweeping gesture and looked to the sky. “Locals say this forest houses a god.”

“... A god?”

“Well, a powerful spirit, at least.” He waved off her eyebrow, smiling. “Tlaloc, master of rainfall. I'll wager all ponies in the village think he had some part in the excitement today; they may not put their blame in the right place, but so long as they aren't right, we should be okay.”

“Is he gonna smite us?”

“He isn't who I am afraid of.” He appraised her like she was one of the relics in their shop then nodded up with his chin. “The others- everypony else was shaken, but j'ou fell off of a cliff and didn't fly.”

“I was preoccupied.” Her already scratchy-voice hitched.

“I know.” His smiled became gentle, and he patted her knee. “I am made so happy by the fact that j'ou are okay.”

She spat in the dirt beside them, hawking a couple of times to get out enough. Thankfully, she didn’t see any drops of red. “Yeah. Just, you know, in a severe amount of pain, that’s all.” She squinted against the sun to look his way. “You came looking for me?”

He made a face, rocking his head side to side as if to say ‘more or less.’ “There's a search party. The local authorities must be looking for you, too-“

“But you found me.” She pointed at him, accusingly. She slurped in air, seething after trying to move. “Thanks.”

“No.” He shook his head frowning. “No thanks for me. Make no mention of it, my friend.”

He looked at her legs, and her gaze followed. “Can you stand? Or fly?”

Daring realized she was propped up against a tree; that support was the only reason she was sitting up at all. Trying out of her own accord, her muscles swore at her. She grunted, and tried to swing forward using the momentum instead of outstretched Atlas’s hoof. She bleated like a goat, sitting forward.

Daring let herself take a second, breathing rapidly. She pushed up with a terrible amount of effort, feeling a raw heat in her back- Oh, her back. She broke a sweat, but stood up right.

This time, she didn’t knock Atlas away. She outstretched a wing around him to keep steady, and he muttered words of support to her that she couldn’t really make out. He talked too fast to understand at a whisper.

Standing had a dizzying effect on her. She couldn’t focus so much on the mossy woods awaiting ahead so much as her pulse in her ears and the blood seeming to flee from her forehead, leaving wooziness in its place. Her breathing sped. “Atlas …”

“There, there,” he said, a little louder. She was surprised how soothing the softness in his accented voice was. She never thought she’d actually be calmed by somepony saying ‘there, there.’ “Take your time, Princesa.”

She turned the short distance between them, looking at him. “We have to get to town,” she panted, “and you’re officially not allowed to give me nicknames.”

He nodded, smirking. “To town.”

“Hey.” She made her voice as stern as she could manage. He looked at her. “Where’s the search party? They can get me back faster, can’t they?”

His eyes darted around. “I don’t know.”

She moaned, half in pain, half in frustration.

“I broke away from that asinine search group. They were looking in all the wrong places, and would not listen.” His eyes swished back and forth. “And ... I had to find you before sundown.”

They marched onward. She kept her crackling voice firm. “Why sundown?”

Atlas bit his lip. “I did not want you here after sundown …”

“Why?” Daring realized he hadn’t finished his story from earlier. Something worse than a vengeful rain spirit. “What’s in the woods, Atlas?”

His voice suddenly dropped into a clearer, stricter register. The low way he spoke probably gave his words a greater authority than they should’ve had. “Machu Ponchu is the birthplace of magic and wonder, as legend says, and the forest is one of its most magical parts. The land can be … easily manipulated. There’s all kinds of stories.”

Her gaze roamed the forest, her voice growing quiet. “Like?”

He looked directly in her eyes. They froze in place. She was sure he was telling her, ‘Not in here.’ Daring was surprised to find her heart pounding in her ears. “... Like what?”

Atlas stared, with his head tilted away. Then, he shrugged. “Tlaloc is the rain spirit who watches over the valleys and the forest. The villagers believe his blissful garden can only be reached by the hopelessly lost, and that his lapdog, Ahuitzotl, will do anything to fetch travelers because he cannot leave. This has made him ... insane.”

“So, this, uh, water dog, I guess, has cabin fever- but he can’t leave his little pool, right? Why does that matter if we’re headed to town, anyway? Even if we did come across him, we could just run until he can’t follow.”

“I told you,” he repeated. “The land can be manipulated.”

"But, what does that-"

“Come on.” Atlas hastened, pulling Daring’s wing over his back. “It’s this way.”

Chapter Three – The Pond

Daring grunted, “Ow, you stupid …” Her tail whipped, tempered by the swarms of horse flies buzzing around her rump as they trekked through the unclear paths of the forest. The trees as tall as titans, the weed-ridden floor of the forest provided for some pretty tight squeezes for even her lean Pegasus body. Trotting through rocky paths, she’d nearly tripped six times now.

Thankfully, Atlas always caught her. She could tell his front right hoof was bothering him, but he didn’t make a fuss over it.

She wished flying was still an option. Besides the fact that she was currently wrapped in brambles and ropey vines, and that her wings were sore beyond belief-- the canopy above was too thick, allowing few rays of light to reach down. This wouldn’t be a problem if she knew where they were going, but as it was, the idea of flying above the trees only to see the forest reaching on for miles stood to confuse and discourage her.

At this point, as hard as it was to admit, they were lost.

To pass the time and keep her mind off it, Daring cleared her throat, “So ... Were you always wearing jewelry or did that fall really do damage to my head?”

A silver something glistened from the peak of his shirt, held around his neck with string. From the looks of the lump on his chest, this was no small jewel; more like the kind a princess would wear in the hopes of finding one true love.

Atlas pawed at his ascot, trying to cloak it once more, a wonky frown on his face. “J'ou never mind that.”

“Touchy topic, eh?” She would’ve held her hooves up in defeat if she wasn’t stalking through the forest on them. She smirked. “Well, what about the train, then? Do they know why it crashed yet?”

Atlas’s already crunchy expression crunched even more. “J'ou'd not be happier not knowing.”

“Now you have to tell me.”

He sighed. “... The Thunderbird.”

She blinked at him. “That’s not ... real, though.” She shook her head slowly.

Atlas struck out a hoof to stop her. Daring Do blanched. She nearly tumbled down a steep in the trail. Her hoof kicked up dirt. She watched a pebble bouncing uncontrollably downward, not halting when the brush became thick again at the bottom of the hill.

They stayed absolutely still, perking their ears, and were rewarded with a small splash.

Atlas blinked as she took off, easily gliding down the cliff where her Earth pony friend would have difficulty. It paid to have wings. Hovering in front of the brush, Daring hardly hesitated before jamming her hoof into the leafy canvas. One painful stabbing later, she retracted it with needle-like thorns sticking out. “Gah!”

She hastily plucked the thorns with her teeth as she flew upwards, looking for the way over. By the time she’d picked out as many as she could, the hedge seemed no less thick. Frowning, she rose higher, and higher, and up even more, and faster as she went. Higher and farther, but even through the apex of the forest canopy, it seemed eternally in front of her.

“Oh, come on!” She yelled at it.

Daring swiveled around and found herself at level with the gaseous, white sun swimming in the midst of a surly grey sky, a great deal higher than the tallest trees. The breeze played with her mane and tail as she hovered there, looking back at the bush.

“Must be enchanted,” she muttered, then again, louder, so Atlas could hear as she flew back down to him.

She looked again at her thorny hoof and back the way they came. Behind them, the jungle rolled on over hills for as far as she could see. Back to the hedge. Staring it down, Daring exhaled once, before backing up a ways.

“What are you-”

Daring Do flew towards it like a pendulum ball hitting its neighbor. Just before impact, she flinched violently, gritting her teeth, and shutting her eyes to full-body pain.

On the other side, Daring gasped, all the breath taken out of her instantly. Tears pooled in her eyes because of the pain, but that wasn’t the reason. Not at all. She'd found a dreamland. Shining, in the softest, most incredible way.

The trees, perfectly round, their flowers wonderfully bright. The grass was as tall as Daring herself, and waved at her from below. Even the wind that blew it around was warmer, the sun higher in the sky, more invigorated, younger in the day.

She found herself alone in the garden, in the oasis, in whatever this nirvana was called. She gazed around and didn’t think a single thought, but breathed deeply, soundly, with warmth in her chest.

By a small pool, a low, fruit-bearing tree looked terribly lop-sided without her to sit under it. Grazing the soft grass, she trotted over, picked one of its purple fruit and sat comfortably with the firmness of the tree to support her. A single bite was all it took. The taste, by the moon and the stars above, the taste. Sweet and sour, respectful of her limits and nourishing as anything.

But, a single bite was all it took. She saw it first in the corner of her eye. From the blue darkness emerged a growing shadow, then a face, and at last a hand, a monkey’s paw. It erupted from the water, and attached to Daring Do like a grappling hook, crushing her torso and dragging her down.

Then, splash! and that same blue darkness assaulted her, filled her, a mob of bubbles flooding her vision, as the only sensation she was aware of was the hard pull on her stomach. The pull down.

Chapter Five - Dr. Atlas

Lungs flaming in her chest, crackling, squeezing, filling, and ribs each stocked with a brand of white, molten heat, Daring Do only saw the trail of bubbles jet-streaming out of her mouth as they escaped toward the surface. Surface, surface, surface.

The cold was incredible. Every part of her that wasn’t screaming in hot pain was rigid with frostiness. The sun shimmered above reaching down with great dexterity, down to the deepest reaches of the lake, and still, effortlessly, with all the slowness of a yawning wildcat, but not to her.

Surface, surface, surface.

Her pink eyes bulged, her throat seemed shredded down the length of it, and an enormous pressure was building in her ears, behind her eyes, as though she had ascended higher than the tallest tip of Cloudsdale. All she could hear was the low, garbled sounds of a pond, her own struggled moves, and the bubbles ejecting out of her throat. Gulb, gulb …

SURFACE, SURFACE, SURFACE.

There was no real thought. There was no real sound. For the journey down, lower, and deeper into her demise, she shifted into a thoughtless clarity, only fear intruding, but oh, what a fear. Her heart felt the need to break out of her chest, ramming painfully into her ribcage as though a trapped beast, as though a tempted ram, as though a bucking bull.

A blackness crept, huddled around the corners of her eyes as her head grew light and her wild flailing lessened. The hand that held her whipped carelessly, and losing her senses, her surroundings, Daring also lost any delusion of orientation. Total shock set in.

The blackness was complete.

---

Daring Do was thrown over the rocks. Her body tumbled, then slid to a stop.

The hand prodded her torso until she flinched, due to natural reflexes. The hand slammed into her back, and Daring Do came back to life as wildly as she left it.

She sputtered, gasping and wrenching, feeling the water dribble down her chin. Both her ears and her nose were painfully water-logged. She shivered in her clinging clothes, wheezing through the pain of her ribcage.

“Atlas?”

Her eyes snapped back and forth. She searched in ill-defined darkness. Every shape could’ve been him. “Atlas?”

Another hand clasped around her broken chest and tore her away from the ground. This time, she was a rag. Her mane and tail fell limp, dripping. She was pulled up to eye-level. Red-rimmed eyes sat at the end of an incredible snout.

Teeth as large as her hind-legs came together in a smile. This creature’s foul breath blasted through Daring’s fur as it spoke in a wild voice. “Ah, a pony. How timely.”

She beat against his fingers, albeit weakly. “You almost drowned me.”

“Almost?” he laughed, pupils re-sizing. If he was anything like the alley-cats back home, Daring was about to be swatted. “I think I deserve a little more credit than that, don’t you? You were dead. I’m sure of it.”

She scoffed. “No, I wasn’t. I’m not.”

“You weren’t?” His eyes narrowed calmly. “You seemed very dead.”

Daring stared at him a moment. “Look, I know who you are.” She licked her lips. “You’re Ahuítzotl, devourer of lost souls, Tlaloc’s lapdog. The-” She searched her flooded brain. “You’re the beast of burden.”

“Who?”

“- hey, what the-?”

Frowning deeply, Ahuítzotl turned her upside-down, as if he thought she might be more entertaining from that angle.

“Gak!” Daring gasped.

Apparently dissatisfied, he brought her in closer to his yellow eyes, close enough for her to see bloodshot spires. Daring swung in his grasp, grunting.

Inspecting her neck, his throat revved. “You’re not wearing it.”

The blood was starting to give her head that bloated feeling. “What’d-ya- ach.“ Her voice came out sounding squashed, and she coughed. She made a note that talking upside down wasn’t one of her secret talents, but she also realized what he was doing. Disorienting her. Trying to scare her into surrender.

Daring Do locked her eyes shut, barred her teeth, and braced her ears against her head. For one full second, he wasn’t there at all. And that was all she needed.

“There was another pony with me.” Trying not to cough again, she glowered at the beast. “What did you do to him?”

The kohl paint crunched around his eyes when he smiled. “Unfortunately, I wouldn’t know who you’re talking about.”

“Liar,” she said, searching in him. Her eyes grew dangerously wide. “What did you do?”

He smiled wider, oval eyes stretching with his ridiculous mouth.

“Where’s Atlas?”

Now it was Ahouitzotl’s turn to look confused. “Who?”

“Ahuitzotl!”

Across the way, Atlas hung strapped to a pole with eyes as wide as she’d ever seen them go. “You have your sacrifice and very soon, your whistle. I expect my payment in full.”

Chapter Six - Meeting Cabelleron

Daring Do had never been a ritual sacrifice before. In a way, that sort of counted as a new and exciting experience, but it really wasn’t what she’d envisioned for today. Up until now, she could handle it. Ending up in a massive train-wreck? Awesome! Staggering through unknown terrain only to end up hopelessly lost? Spectacular! Meeting a deranged pet to some wacko forest spirit? Why not?

Losing an ally, realizing that everyone in the room was now her enemy ... That hurt.

It wasn’t very difficult for Ahuitzotl to switch them out; tie up Daring, and let Atlas free. She didn’t put up much of a fight because at this point there wasn’t much of one to put up. Too weak and battered to put up a decent one, anyway.

“So!” Ahuitztol said, turning away from Daring, taking Atlas under the monkey’s paw on his tail. “You are the pony with my whistle, Mr ... ?”

“Dr. Atlas Cabelleron,” he said, Atlas took the cord around his neck, and extended it toward Ahuitztol with a smile. Frankly, Daring didn’t know how she ever trusted him in the first place; nopony with eyebrows that big could possibly have a conscience. “Dr. Cabelleron is fine.”

She scoffed.

Ahuitzotl gave her a demented look over his shoulder like she’d offended him. “You are too impatient to perish, little pony. Tlaloc will be here to take you soon enough, and then you can enjoy yourself in his garden all you please.

“For now,” he said, oozing with strange glee, “enjoy the soothing sounds of my playing the Thunderbird whistle!” He held it over his head and broke out in a peal of laughter, the sound bouncing off the grotto walls. “For with the blowing of this trinket it is I, Ahuitzotl, who is made the most powerful being in the world with the Bird at my beck and call!”

Daring Do blinked. Cabelleron had a Thunderbird whistle and traveled with a pegasus? Her eyes washed over- being the angry crier she was of course it had to happen now. Cabelleron called the Thunderbird. Cabelleron crashed the train so they’d wind up in the forest, and find Ahuitztol to make the trade. He’d never planned on going to Macchu Ponchu at all.

Daring snorted, shaking her head. No. She couldn’t get angry. Not now.

Instead, she scoffed. ”I didn’t think super villains actually told you their whole plan. I thought that was just a Ponywood/movie kind of thing, but no, apparently you are that stupid.”

Dr. Cabelleron put out his hoof. “Yes, yes,very funny; now, about my-”

“What do you mean, ‘stupid?’” Ahuitzotl said, turning around. “I am not stupid. I am Ahuitztol!”

Shrugging while tied up sort of hurt, but Daring remained aloof. “Sounds like the same thing to me.”

Ahuitzotl growled, red-rimmed eyes bulging as he tromped over. He stood about twice as tall as Daring, even now that she was suspended with rope, but she dared not break character. Even with his rank fish-breath seething through his tiger-like teeth. “You dare?”

Cabelleron chased after him, speaking loud. “My payment-”

“No, I’m Daring,” she told him, “I guess that’s as close as I can expect a dumb old dog to get.” She giggled with that raspy voice of hers. “Man, how does Tlaloc put up with you?”

“I put up with him,” he seethed, gnashing his teeth and heaving. “Soon he will be my pet, and I can put up with him all I want!”

Dr. Cabelleron raised a useless hoof. “My payment ... ?”

Daring laughed as convincingly as she could. “Wow- heh, heh- Scary. No,- tch, ha ha ha- really, that’s- aha- so frightening- Ha ha ha ha ha...”

“I am horrifying!”

“As wet puppies go, maybe. I wouldn’t quit your ... Uh, what is it again that you do here? Do you even do anything?” Just when Ahuitztol’s face couldn’t get more flush or scrunched, Daring let out a contemptuous bark, “Ha! You don’t, do you? You just wait around for your daddy to come and collect the explorers too dead to escape. How did you ever think you could rule anything?”

Unfortunately, Ahuitzotl wasn’t quite as dopey as she’d made him out to be. In a fit of rage, he growled, “Like this,” and raised the Thunderbird Whistle to his lips.

The shriek that came out of that whistle nearly broke Daring Do’s eardrums. It couldn’t be near silent like a dog whistle, could it? She just had to enjoy that screech, like the metal on metal she’d so loved hearing earlier that day. Dr. Cabelleron had his hooves over his ears, but being tied up didn’t give her that luxury. Even after Ahuitzotl stopped, it seemed to echo around the grotto (though that may have just been Daring’s ears ringing).

She didn’t think anything could top that for sheer shock value, but not ten seconds after everything settled, the Ahuizotl’s grotto began to tremble along to a beat. Earthquakes timed to a regular pace. Pebbles and dust fell from the cave’s ceiling into the quivering pools of water. Daring squinted, confused. Ahuiztol’s full-mouthed smile began to waver as a seemed to realize the Thunderbird didn’t walk.

Which is when he also realized who was coming.

Cracks blistered open in the grotto walls as a thunderous voice called out, “Ahuizotl!”

Chapter Seven - Conversations with a God

The pillar Daring had been tied to cracked, and would have tumbled down onto her along with the roof above it if she didn’t tear free of her restraints the second it started coming down. She tumbled to side, thanking Atlas for forcing her to go through all that gymnastics training along with her combat training. With the stone crashing down around her, she almost didn’t have time to realize she’d thanked that scumbag for something.

The storming night sky broke through the reflective rock that trapped them. Daring saw her chance to fly off, and was about to take it when she saw Cabelleron dodging falling debris and trying to shield his head.

Dr. Cabelleron was many things, but a pegasus was not among them. Daring Do realized in that split second, if she didn’t save him, he’d have no escape.

Before she had much time to debate it, she found herself diving toward him. She tackled him to the ground, onto some of the already fallen debris. It was admittedly a rough landing, and took the air right out of Cabelleron, but it meant there was nothing above them to fall down when Tlaloc stormed the scene.

Daring Do had the thought of escaping, really, but how often do you have the chance to see a raging god? And one so ... mesmerizing, at that ...

It was the eyes. The light made the rain around Tlaloc’s permanently angry face glow red. As far as Daring could tell, he was an alpaca, like the majority of the villagers of Macchu Ponchu; his blue glowing body was lanky and proportioned all wrong to be a pony. But, she couldn’t exactly say for sure with that boxy, but intricate stone mask on his head. The rectangular mouth with two stalactites for teeth seemed empty underneath, but the perfectly round eye holes cast the hellish light Daring and Cabelleron couldn’t tear themselves away from.

And, apparently, Ahutzotl had the same problem.

He stood on all fours, stricken, with his pointy ears bent back and his shoulders pressed inward, like a admonished dog. His jewelry looked more like a collar. The red light focused on him, like two morbid spotlights.

Once again, Tlaloc bellowed, above the sound of the rain dripping from his ethereal fur, “Ahuizotl.”

Cowering, he remembered himself, and bowed. “Eh ... Yes, Master?”

Tlaloc extended his unnervingly long neck toward him, and moved his masked head side to side like a wild animal. When he spoke, it sounded exactly like it would if thunder was sentient; guttural and booming. “You have disrespected the spirits that guard this realm.”

“Master, no, I would never-”

“You attempted to call our messenger the Thunderbird as though you it were yours to command.” He rose to his full height, which Daring could hardly believe. She knew mountains that were shorter than this guy. “And, now you refuse to take responsibility for your heinous action.”

Ahuizotl clasped his monkey paws together, assuming the classic begging position. “You misunderstand, my Lord! It was the pony!” He jabbed his shaking arm toward Daring, his tail mimicking the action.”She forced me to do it!”

Tlaloc didn’t bother even looking at Daring. He turned his head sideways again, shaking loose a year’s worth of rainfall from the fur on his neck. “Your devotion has ended. I see that now. In accordance, your reign will end, as well.”

Ahuizotl’s features fell from panicked anger. “... What do you mean, Master?”

“I shall cast you out of my gardens. Never again will you serve the spirits, and I curse your name to never be spoken with respect. You may never gain a position of power by natural means. This is your punishment for your pride, Ahuizotl.”

Before Tlaloc cast him out with his unbelievable magic, Daring noticed another gaze on her besides the god. As Tlaloc gave his speech, Ahuizotl, standing unnervingly still, stared into her. His bloodshot eyes took her in fully, as if for the first time. Something passed between them that Daring Do had never experienced before. A sort of exchange; an understanding based entirely upon mutual hatred.

Ahuizotl would never stop. He wouldn’t back down; all this only meant he’d have to be more creative. And that meant Daring could never stop, either. Distantly, she wondered how many other lunatics like this were out there ...

Unfortunately for her, she’d later dedicate her life to finding out.

Chapter Eight - A Parting Gift

Daring Do shoved the wet from her eyes. She tried scrubbing the flush from her cheeks, too, but that wasn’t as effective. She didn’t know anypony on the train platform, but breaking down on a cold backless bench surrounded entirely by ponies and alpacas in a town she didn’t know wasn’t as fun as it sounded. She nestled her head in her hooves; her spiky-maned head hiccuped.

A hoof tapped her shoulder.

Sighing, she swung her head out of its burrow, only to have the sudden urge to plunge it right back in.

Dr. Cabelleron stood there with an extended hoof. He’d wrapped himself in a pale grey trench coat as though afraid to be called out on his identity for a second time today. “Ms. Do, it has been a true pleasure working together. J'our severance package will take care of j'ou from here, I hope?”

Daring scoffed, sounding like she’s sprung a leak. She folded her hooves. “You can’t expect me to shake your hoof after today. I’d say it was a blast while I knew you, but it doesn’t feel like I’m talking to the pony I knew anymore.” Her eyes darkened in the dusk. “Now I don’t know anypony.”

Cabelleron sat next to her on the bench. “Perhaps it doesn't matter now, but for the record, I considered j'ou a great friend and a loyal assistant. Whether or not that means anything to you, coming from the most well-renowned curator of the most well-renowned museum and gift shop in Equestria it will mean everything to any future employer you wish to seek out.”

“To be honest, I think I’m done working for ponies,” she said, leaning back, exhausted.

Dr. Cabelleron smiled. “Oh? A free agent then.”

“Maybe more like a lone wolf,” Daring told him, staring him down. “One that doesn’t like to be crossed.”

He laughed. Daring wanted to sock the smirk right off of his stupid face, but then Cabelleron pulled a folded parchment from inside his trench coat, and gave it to her. She frowned at it, then looked to Cabelleron for guidance. He stood, smiled at her one last time and said, “This one ... She has no value to me. The reward is not worth the risk, shall we say. I trust j'ou will find some use for it?”

He walked off before she finished unfolding it.

Daring Do was no cartographer, but she knew a treasure map when she saw one. On the bottom right corner of the map she saw the last note her ex-mentor would ever write to her:

Find the Sapphire Statue.