Moonbeam follows her pet, Chewer, into a garden, which soon turns out to be far, far more than this.
Scarlet Mane's Diary, Entry 1: The Curse of Scarlet Mane. Moonbeam follows her pet, Chewer, into a garden, which soon turns out to be far, far more than this. Having her life turned completely upside-down in every way imaginable she must find a way to save the day... but can she?
Cinnamon Cream wore her large flowery apron. It covered her almost completely and only bits of olivine green underneath were showing through along with a part of a delicious cupcake and muffin marking on her flank. She was vigorously mixing the dough while Jelly Joy was very busy knocking some eggs a bit too hard, splashing the yolk all over her similarly colored mane and slightly lighter coat. Cinny clucked in disapproval.
"Come on Joy, you're just slowing it all down! The faster we make the cakes, the sooner we can..."
"Party!" Joy was quick to answer.
"Yes, party," Cinny said.
"Yay!" Joy shouted in ear-piercing high-pitched voice and knocked an egg so hard it pretty much exploded, much like a colorful symbol on her haunch depicted.
"Oopsie," she said, smiling.
Cinny sighed with resignation.
"At least try to keep shells out of dough."
Moonbeam's head entered the room.
"Hidley ho!" she said, "Oh! I love the smell. Mmmagical!" she added, as the rest of her followed, revealing a symbol of a gear on her side.
"You read too much about that silly magic and unicorns," said Cinny, "you know well it's all fantasy."
"That's why it's a fantastic read! Also," Moon said while getting closer to Joy's interesting creation, "magic could make it a doddle to keep the shells out of the dough."
Suddenly there was a dull thud. Moon and Joy both slowly looked at the sound's source and saw Cinny's head on the worktop, totally covered by her tumbleweed and golden sand-colored mane.
"Moon, please, can you go to Poppy Roll for some... poppy rolls?" a muffled voice said.
"Uh, okay. Sure. Should Joy go too?" Moonbeam answered, grinning wildly.
Cream raised her head and rolled her eyes with resignation.
"As improbable as it might sound, I need her here," she muttered.
"Well, I see she's as keen as mustard. Okay girls, see you later!" Moon replied and left.
A dalmatian dog ran around Moon, barking.
"Calm down Chewie, you know you can't go into the kitchens. Come on, we have to pop around to Poppy," she said while trying to pull him away.
She passed many colorful cottages covered with golden hay. The town was full of busy ponies, shopping, working or just on an afternoon walk.
Sounds of haggling grew louder as they approached the market. Suddenly, Chewie stopped walking and looked around, growling.
"What's wrong Chewie?" said Moonbeam, but she didn't even finish the sentence before him running like crazy towards somepony's garden through a wooden fence.
"Chewie! Where are you going? Come back!" Moon called, to no avail. She followed, opened the gate in the fence and stepped on the tall grass. "Where are you?" she said, going further. The grass was getting thicker and thicker, blocking the sunlight.
"Chewie!" she repeated with annoyance, "it's not funny." The flora around started to look like a jungle. It got considerably darker as some branches appeared above, which began to worry Moonbeam. She turned around. "I'll just wait by the fence for Chewie to get back, he always gets back," she whispered to herself. Instead of getting out of the dense foliage it appeared to her that she's going deeper and deeper. She got immersed in darkness.
It felt like it's getting colder. When a shiver ran down Moonbeam's spine, a loud, sudden cow was more than enough to be the last straw to broke the pony's back.
She ran with a shriek. The bushes around got thicker, the sharp branches tore at her frilly fuchsia and prim mane.
Moon's frenzy paused for a moment when the ground gave her unusually minute resistance. She mindlessly wiggled her hooves in the air for a moment before noticing that the chilly airflow was now vertical, but never got time to dread as she hit the solid bottom.
Moonbeam woke up with an incredibly strong headache, her vision slipping in and out of focus and left cheek soaking. She slowly opened her right eye and saw Chewer's tongue wagging. "Oh, here you are Chewie..." she whispered while getting up, "but where is here?"
Moon's eyes wandered to the surroundings. It was some kind of an old cellar. Mossy stone walls were dimly lit by the little light that managed to come through the cracks in the ceiling and the hole she fell through, one with some collapsed steps. "Barmy," she muttered, "it seemed darker on the surface."
After shaking off some black dust which almost completely covered her sandy brown coat she continued deeper into the structure, looking for another exit.
Moonbeam continued down the corridor. Despite walking away from the entrance, the darkness began to vanish.
Her bloodhound followed as she entered a chamber filled with destroyed stone furniture, rolls of old parchment and colorful glass bottles of intricate shapes and different sizes. Most of them were broken into hundreds of little pieces.
The surrounding walls were covered with strange symbols which seemed to change or even completely disappear when she tried to recognize them.
That was very unnerving. She looked at some sort of a table. There were symbols on it too. Unreadable again, however engraved and not painted.
Scared, hurt and freezing, but always curious Moonbeam picked up some parchment and a cylindrical bottle. She put her york, Chewie, over the table and shook him.
"Sorry boy," she said with trembling voice, "at least you'll get cleaner."
Black dust fell off and covered the symbols. She pushed the excess into the engravings, which still shifted and hid from sight. Drooling dog helped to make two rolls of parchment wet. She pressed one of them against the table and then the second one against the first to make a mirror image. Amazingly, the result was a clearly readable text written in simple, sleek lines, which she read aloud.
On my call, on my command Everypony at my hand And shall their mentality Mirror this reality.
A high pitched sound filled the room. Walls seemed to change color, shape, distance... Dust and debris started to rise from the floor while simultaneously falling from the ceiling. She panicked and ran.
She rushed to the entrance, running away from shifting stones and ghostly figures appearing and dispersing all around. When she saw the stone slabs forming stairs instead of just lying on the ground, she didn't think long before jumping on them and going out of the dungeon. Somehow the stairs seemed to move themselves away from her hooves. She lost footing and fell... upwards.
"I must've gone bonkers!" she exclaimed as she was lying upside down on the forest floor, just besides pearly stairs. Her husky, Chewer, was standing nearby and looking at her, seemingly bewildered of her unusual behavior. She got up and noticed there are hoof trails nearby. One of the hooves was chipped just as hers.
"Come Chewie," she said, "those are mine. They must lead back to town!"
They were chaotically made, completely unlike what should be the result of a run. However, they did lead back to town, but which one? It looked like Maretown, but...
"Ruined! What happened here!" Moonbeam cried. "No, it can't be happening!"
Everything was cracked, eroded and covered in frost. There were ponies, unicorns and pegasi wandering around the place, but without any thought, their foggy eyes devoid of emotion.
Not knowing what to do she decided to look around for her friends. They can't be mindless husks... can they? She walked towards Cinnamon Cream's house, carefully trying to avoid other ponies.
The house seemed much, much older now. The door looked like it was going to open by itself. She pushed lightly and saw a bizarre picture. Jelly Joy was sitting on the floor, holding a rock and banging it against the wall, which was marked by hits in many different places, like she was looking for something.
In a second, Moonbeam realized what—a quiet moaning caused her to look at another wall, where Cinny was bound by rusty shackles. Moon squeaked and jumped in horror at the sight, which made Joy pause.
"Joy... keep hitting... keep looking," Cinny groaned, "don't go away, please," she added while slowly turning her head towards Moon.
"Cinny, it's me, Moonbeam... what is going on?" Moon replied.
"Moonbeam... help... use the horn," Cream managed.
Moon looked around in haste, trying to find something that would look like a horn, but there was nothing. Broken furniture, dishes lying around, fractured mirror—Moonbeam paused suddenly. She looked closer. Her eyes widened at the sight of her having a horn on her forehead.
"Yes... this one..." Cream whispered.
Moon got closer and tried to find a way to utilize it. But there was no way. The shackles were too hard. Resigned, she lowered her head and sighed.
"I'm so sorry, I think it's on the blink. I tried, but I can't do it... I wish the shackles would let go..." she said, and suddenly, the horn started to glow faintly. "This is it," she thought, as she pointed the horn towards the iron, hoping it to work, somehow. She closed her eyes and imagined the chains falling apart. A loud clank later Cinny was free, a loud thud later she was lying on the ground. Moonbeam tried to pick her up and felt incredible coldness. Without thinking too much she tried to imagine heat, warmth, light... the horn gleamed, but without effect. Happiness, laughter... the story of their friendship—and the gleam got as bright as a dozen suns.
"We have to get to Melody," said Jelly Joy in a raspy voice.
"And Blasting Boom," added Cinnamon Cream.
"Let's go to Boom first, it's closer," said Moonbeam, "Come on, we may not have much time!"
But her house was empty. There was no sight of Boom anywhere. With her violet eyes, Joy stared with amazement at a path of claw hammers driven into the wall while Cinny and Moon checked other rooms. She put her hoof into one of the holes, as if to examine it.
"Maybe she woke up by herself, like you Moon?" Cinny wondered, "Or maybe she's with Mel?"
"Let's go to Melody then. Pull your hoof out, Joy!" Moonbeam commanded and broke into a gallop.
Their run was disturbed by many rescue attempts, but Moon's magic wasn't working so well as when she was waking her closest friends. They got to Melody's house at last.
"Hello!" called Joy, "Melody!"
"Let's check upstairs, she usually stays there," Cinny pointed out.
She was right. The shackles were no match for her hooves of fury. Moonbeam soon followed and performed her magic. Melody woke up, moved her obsidian hair out of the face, looked around with her slowly opening dark blue eyes, and then suddenly widened them, showing their enormity. She quickly got up and without saying a word ran towards the window and flown away on her sky blue wings. Moon watched that in bewilderment and finally asked, "Since when Melody has wings, actually?"
They couldn't find Blasting Boom nor follow Melody.
"What do we do now?" asked Cinnamon Cream.
"There's only one thing we can do," replied Moonbeam, "find the source of this mayhem!"
"So... what are we looking for," asked Joy, "exactly?"
"I don't know, perhaps..." Moon paused and picked up her cat, Chewie. "I might be just paranoid at the moment," she admitted, "but there's something really weird about Chewer. I can't put my hoof on it."
"Don't mind the silly rabbit now," said annoyed Cinny.
"You're right," said Moon as she put her pet on the ground again. He looked at her, growled with what sounded like annoyance and ran away.
"No, Chewie, go back," she yelled as she chased him, Cinnamon Cream and Jelly Joy following. Suddenly, she stopped in front of a damaged wooden fence to what was once a garden, presently filled with strange vines and bushes. She squinted her eyes—there was a piece of fuchsia and prim hair on a thorn. "This is it!" she exclaimed and continued the gallop.
Very soon they all found themselves in front of a stone fortress... floating in the air, similarly to slabs of granite which formed the stairs. There was a mark of somepony's fall on the ground and Chewie flying about and flapping his wings.
"That is most peculiar... really odd stairs. Let's go inside. Don't read anything aloud!" warned Moon.
Moments later she realized what were the ghosts she saw before. Now there were ponies, unicorns and pegasi, all murmuring something indecipherable and facing the same direction. When they got close they entered a pompously decorated chamber with beautiful bright red wall coverings and stained glass windows on the white marble walls which seemed to go up forever. In the middle there were magnificent circular marble stairs leading up to a majestic throne. Two impossibly black crystals were floating by its sides, bending the light around them in an astonishing way. On the throne itself sat a grand rose white winged unicorn with an image of a sanguine triquetra on her flank, her incredible crimson mane swimming in the air and her eyes closed. Several ponies that were standing on the stairs were whispering something to her. She was subtly smiling.
"That is so..." whispered Cinnamon Cream.
"Fantastic!" said Jelly Joy.
"Magical!" corrected Moonbeam.
"Ominous," finished Cinnamon Cream.
Moon's sight fell on the incredibly intricate windows which, one by one, depicted a small red-maned unicorn crying alone, traveling through mysterious lands and finding the black crystals. Moon wondered about it for a while. But they weren't there to admire sights.
"The crystals! They must give the sorceress her power!" shouted Joy.
"Sssh, she isn't aware of us," hissed Moon, but it was too late. Everypony stopped whispering at once. The great figure have risen and opened her torch red eyes.
"Scarlet Mane is not pleased," she bellowed. "Cease them!"
Flapping wings could be heard as Blasting Boom rose on her bright pink wings, hooves and back covered in black armor. Her emerald and conifer mane was almost completely concealed by a horned helmet, from beneath which a pair of golden eyes filled with hate were staring directly at Moonbeam.
Cinny and Joy exchanged looks and then ran in opposite directions. Cinnamon Cream always bragged to be the fastest pony ever, but she wasn't fast enough to reach the crystal. Boom's kick pushed her down the stairs. Joy almost got there, but her attempt was quickly thwarted, too. Moonbeam tried to use magic to slow Blasting Boom down, but Scarlet Mane apparently did the opposite without any effort as her own horn barely even glowed.
Sudden sound of smashing a window distracted everypony. Melody flew into the chamber with hundreds of hummingbirds. Her and Moon's eyes met. She just nodded and led the nimble birds onward. They surrounded Boom and blocked her line of sight. She was forced to land to not crash into a wall, which prompted Joy and Cinny to make another run. Moonbeam got to overwhelmed Boom and did the magic. The black metal fizzled and evaporated, revealing a marking resembling a trapezoidal weight on Boom's side. Chewer's crocodile legs were too short to go up the stairs, but out of nowhere a charcoal black wolf came to the rescue, taking him up. Chewie growled at the sorceress.
"Scarlet Mane will not tolerate this!" she roared and turned her horn at him. Just before she cast the spell of destruction the wolf obstructed her target.
"Eclipse, do not interfere!" she said, but the wolf just stood there. Suddenly, the whole place trembled the very moment Cinny, Melody, Joy and still a bit dizzy Boom reached the stones and tried to pull them away from the throne.
"Scarlet Mane, why are you doing this?" yelled Moon. "You don't need sorcery to not be alone!"
"I do what has to be done," shouted the sorceress, "the Sagacity Stones will always make their master do the right thing!" she added as her horn started to glow a bit more, stopping the rest of the ponies from dragging the crystals away.
"You never knew how it is to be alone!" she cried. "And now I don't have to be!"
"You still are!" Moon responded, "friends are there by their own will, those ponies are not!"
"Lies!" Scarlet Mane bellowed.
"You can find friends in many ways," Moon continued.
"Like—doing—the same—things," panted out Jelly Joy.
"Being there when someone is in need," added Cinnamon Cream.
The sorceress seemed bewildered and confused, so Moonbeam went on.
"No magic will make a friendship. It's the other way around."
"Enough! This magic will!" Scarlet Mane exclaimed. Chewer springed closer and gnawed her red cape just before a blow of magic pushed everypony away. The sorceress grew in their eyes as the crystals got close to the throne again. The battle was lost.
"I will make it right," she muttered as she walked down the marble stairs, "I will erase what's wrong from existence!"
Cinnamon Cream and Blasting Boom tried to charge at her as one but another magic blow threw them against the wall.
"Destroy what should not be!" yelled Scarlet Mane and it seemed like she was breathing out flames. The glow of her horn started to get more and more strong, so much it hurt to look. Moon's attempt at magic failed completely as the sorceress got even closer.
"I. Will. End. It. NOW!" Scarlet Mane roared, just as one of the stones fell on Moon's head and knocked her out.
Moonbeam's eyelids were apparently made of lead. She focused all her strength and opened them at last. She was lying in her own bed, surrounded by her friends, Melody and Blasting Boom having wings now.
"What happened to you girls," she managed.
"To us? Ha, you've almost rammed your horn inside your head running after Chewie and you worry about us?" said Cinnamon Cream, picking Chewer the crocodile up. He let out a happy hum.
"But... if that was a dream, why you all..." she tried to say, but a sudden thunder followed by knocking on the door made her cover herself with the blanket. Chewer spat out a piece of red glittery cloth. Jelly Joy walked to the door and opened it.
"Hello!" she greeted cheerily the cloaked pony as Moon peeked from under the cover.
"Um... hello. I—I was looking for... something. I can't... remember what. I'm lost. Can I—" meekly said the stranger.
"Don't stand in the rain silly! Come on in!" said Joy as she dragged the visitor inside. A charcoal black wolf slipped in and shook itself dry. She closed the door, took the guest's cloak and hanged it, all seemingly at the same time.
"Hi," almost inaudibly whispered the rose white unicorn with a beautiful scarlet mane.
"Aaah! The Scarlet Mane!" Moonbeam shrieked in terror and hid under the blanket again.
"Do... do we know each other? I've never been here, I think," replied the guest, blushing.
"Now, now, Moonbeam is just wore out," calmed her Cream.
That made Scarlet Mane smile.
"Moonbeam? I've found a package addressed to Moonbeam, just lying on the road. I thought it'd be proper to get it to someone so it won't get lost."
"No, no, no! Don't open!" shrieked the recipient from under the cover and now a pillow as well.
"Relax!" said Joy, taking the package from Scarlet and tearing it apart. "Oooh! Shiny!" she added while looking at the two Sagacity Stones.
Melody and Blasting Boom got closer.
"I think those are parts for one of your machines. Too bad they're all in pieces, cracked and all," remarked Boom. Melody reached inside the box and took out a piece of paper. "Oh, there's a note here," said Boom again and quickly took it from Melody.
"Gah! Gimme!" shouted Moonbeam, finally sticking her head out. Melody took it back from uncompliant Boom and wordlessly gave it to Moon.
