//------------------------------// // Episode 4: A Kirin Tale // Story: Sarah's Adventure's in Equestria // by Zipp Storm //------------------------------// Me and my dragons were peacefully sleeping in my room when I heard some knocking at the door. I groaned and pulled the pillow over my head, but the knocking still happened. I sighed and got up from my bed, still a little sore from the avalanche incident yesterday. I only had a few bandages lingering from that. I went over and opened the door to find Ren and Kodi. "Hey Sarah." Ren greeted. I yawned, "Morning, boys. What's wrong?" "Spike and the girls are here. They said the Princess sent them a letter telling all of us to come to Canterlot." Kodi replied. I became a little more awake, "Is it about my element?" "No is about something else." Ren replied. "But the letter didn't say what is it." I was confused a little but, I but changed out my pajamas for my regular clothes and I joined the others as we boarded the Friendship Express... well, Ren, Twilight and their friends boarded the train while I rode Storm to Canterlot. I got there in no time and landed at the train station just as the train came into the station. "Hey Sarah, how did you get here so fast?" Pinkie asked with cheer in her voice. "Pinkie... I have dragons." I said bluntly. "Oh, right." Everybody sighed. Oh Pinkie... "Anyway... let's get to the palace." Twilight said. We all nodded and we went to the Canterlot Palace where we went into the throne room where Princess Celestia and Princess Luna were waiting for us. "Greeting everyone." Celestia greeted. "Hi Princess." Twilight greeted. "So what's the situation?" "We've received a distress call from someone outside of Equestria." Luna said. "Outside of Equestria?" Ren asked. "Yes, luckily the creature who came to us is here right now. You can come out Autumn Blaze." And that's when a pony-like creature came before us. She had green scales on her back and hooves and a weird horn design that was really dark red with light red stripes in it. She had a lion-like mane that was orange. "Woah... what are you?" Carrie asked. "I'm a Kirin and my name is Autumn Blaze and I'm really, really, really glad to meet you. I can't believe I'm actually in Equestria for the first time. Oh, I'm so excited and-" she contained her endless babbling for a minute. "And I though Pinkie would be annoying." Jack grumbled. Celestia cleared her throat and Autumn Blaze calmed down. "Oh right, my problem. Well you see I have a problem back home." "What kind of problem?" Ren asked. "I think it's better if I showed you all." Autumn sounded sad for some reason. "So we're going outside of Equestria?! Cool!" Ren exclaimed. "Well... I guess we have no choice. Let's go." Mason said. We all nodded and followed Autumn Blaze to the train station and boarded it... I rode my dragons. The train went outside of Equestria and was soon in an area that looked like a desert with a mountain in the distance. Everyone exited the train as it went back. "So this is where you live?" Rantaro asked. "Doesn't seem like all that much." "Rantaro be nice!" Rarity scolded. "I don't live here, I live on the Peaks of Peril." Autumn explained. "The Peaks of Peril? I think I've heard of that. There's a legend. Kirin used to live here, known for their kindness and truth speaking." Twilight explained. "Huh? Kinda like Applejack and Fluttershy." Nicole compared. "But there are other creature called the Nirik, beasts of anger and pure fire." Hearing that made Fluttershy and Jamie shiver in fear. "D-Do we have to go there?" Fluttershy whimpered. "Oh man up, you wimps!" Jack yelled, making Fluttershy and Jamie flinch in fear. "Jack, don't be hard on them." I said as Storm landed next to the gang. "Now let's go see Autumn's home." Autumn led us to the Peak of Peril and a to Autumn's Kirin village. We entered the village and gasped at the sight. The Kirin Village was consisted of house made from trees and hills. There were a few fruit stands and some gardens with plants sprouting. "Woah... it's beautiful." Kaede gasped in awe. "Yeah... I miss this place." Autumn mumbled. "Miss this place?" Mason echoed. "What do you mean?" Before Autumn could reply, the bushes began to rustle. There were figure in the forest around us. Winter, Moonshine and Storm growled. "Show yourselves!" Applejack called out and then a Kirin, about the same height as Princess Celestia, with a blue mane with a long horn. She was grayish with white scales on her hooves and scales came out of the brush followed by other kirins. And they didn't say a word. "Uh.. hi?" Ren said nervously. "My name is Ren Loodan and these are my friends, Jack, Jamie, Nicole, Rantaro, Kaede, Carrie, Mason, Fluttershy, Applejack, Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and Rarity. What are your names?" Strangely, the kirin's just tilted their heads to the side, like they didn't understand the question. "Rude." Jack grumbled. "Maybe they don't understand our language?" Flutteshy suggested. "Do you understand English?" Applejack asked the leader kirin. The leader kirin nodded, "Oh but you don't talk?" Jamie asked, receiving a nod from the leader. "Great, how are we gonna solve the problem if they can't talk!" Jack exclaimed. "Why can't they talk, big brother?" Carrie asked Mason. "I don't know, Carrie." "I do." Autumn answered. "You do?" Ren asked. "Why?" Autumn sighed, "Before I tell you, I have to take you to my home." She walked away and the rest o us followed her outside the kirin village to a cliff side that had a beautiful view of a large rainbow stretching over the sky and butterflies fluttering about. "Woah, it's beautiful." Nicole said. "Thanks." Autumn grunted. "So Autumn, wanna tell us why the kirin are silent?" Rantaro asked. "It's because they all took the Vow of Silence." Autumn replied. "Hold it!" Jack interrupted. "Vow of Silence?" We all exclaimed. "That's why they asked me to leave." "Ah hope it's not a sore subject, but ya might explain' why y'all went quiet in the first place?" Applejack asked. "It's a long story." Autumn replied sadly. Applejack sighed, "You rather not talk about it?" "No." "I under-" "I'd rather SIIIIINNG!" And before we knew it she broke out in song. La, la-la-la, la-la La-la-la, la-la-la The Kirin used to speak and sing We weren't always quiet She used her magic to make picture to show us what happened. We saw kirin happily talking to one another without a care in the world We told stories and funny jokes My stand-up was a riot The kirins laughed at Autumn Blaze's stand up comedy But then one day, a fight broke out And hurtful words were said Flaring tempers were inflamed Destruction quickly spread Two kirin wanted the same vase and fought over it and saying hurtful words to each other and they soon reached a boiling point and turning into Niriks themselves! "Woah, that's unexpected!" Kaede said. The vase fell to the ground with the two Niriks fighting with each other and the other kirin became Niriks as well. And flaming bred from head to head It even burnt our... bread Sorry, I forgot how much I love rhyming. Where was I? Oh, right! The next images showed the village burned to the ground. Luckily the kirin were not hurt but looked sadly at the destruction their anger caused. My happy village lay in ruins Relationships got worse Spoiler alert: we quickly learned That words could be a curse The kirin leader didn't like seeing all this anger on her subjects. "No more talking," yelled our leader The last thing said aloud Into the Stream of Silence We stepped as a crowd She directed the Niriks into the Stream and when they came out, they were emotionless and all had the same expression on their faces. Autumn Blaze was among them, but she didn't like not being able to talk The water cooled emotions And peace was soon restored But with no way to speak my thoughts I got super... bored Seriously, there's only so long that Sudoku can keep you entertained! 'Cause rainbows won't light up the sky Unless you let it rain And shiny apples sometimes come with worms No, you can't give up your laughter 'Cause you're scared of a little pain It's a lesson that the Kirin never learned The images showed Autumn pacing back and forth with a desperate look on her face. We could tell that she was really struggling with no being able to speak. I was stuck in silent prison With the voices in my head 'Til I tripped over my salvation In a helpful flowerbed She made a cure from the flowers that made her speak again. I found a cure to clear my pipes And I became quite chatty She went back to the village to tell everyone but they didn't like her talking alot and ignored her. With years and years of stored-up words I drove my village batty The images showed the kirin not liking her kirin; like one kirin closing her window. And they were all ignoring her news reports and the reviews. They didn't like my jokes and songs And daily dose of news The plays I wrote, the speeches spoke Variety revues Or the story about the Kirin who hid below an opera stage And fell in love with this opera singer, and he wore a freaky half-mask thing, and he played the organ a lot and got all broody 'cause the singer was in love with another dude, so he took her away on this underground gondola. I mean, who doesn't love musical theater?! Finally, the kirin leader gave Autumn Blaze a choice. The village leader made it clear I had to make my choice I could stay and live with them Or I could keep my voice The next images showed Autumn leaving her house with everything she owned; except the couch cause it was too big to it through the door. So I came here, but left the couch alone They're hard to move Next she was on the cliffside looking out over the distance. With just the view for company Until ya heard me groove Take it away, boys! [beat] 'Cause rainbows won't light up the sky Unless you let it rain And candles just won't glow until they're burned No, you can't give up your laughter 'Cause you're scared of a little pain It's a lesson that my village never learned No matter how hard I schooled them Fear of hurt is still what ruled them Sometimes you gotta let it raaaaaaaain! Yeah, sometimes you've gotta let it rain She ended the song with a tear in her eye and the rest of us shocked. "I can't believe it!" Ren said. "No one should give up their emotion just to keep from getting angry." "That's what I said, you know once I started talking again." Autumn replied. "Looks like we have our problem, now all we have to do is fix it." Mason said. "Right, all we have to do is convince the kirin to take Autumn's cure, simple." Ren said with a smile. "Perfect!" she cried, "Oh... but there's just one thing; the cure it used, it's gone." "WHAT? There's no cure left?!" Applejack cried. "I used the rest of the foal's breath flowers to make it." Autumn replied. "Maybe there are some, just no in this area." I said. "Mason, Carrie, can you and the girls go look for them below the cliffs?" "Okay." Mason said. "Meanwhile, the rest of us will go back to the kirin village and try to convince the kirin to welcome Autumn Blaze back." I added. The others nodded and we went out separate ways. We made it back to the kirin village where we discuss about convincing the kirin to talk again. "So we all agree that the kirin should talk again?" Ren asked. We all agreed except Fluttershy and Jamie. "Fluttershy, Jamie, why not?" Kaede asked. "Well... Autumn said that the last time the kirin got angry they accidentally destroyed their whole village so the kirin decided to never let that happen again." Fluttershy added. "True, but, look at Sarah, she still has her anger side but she sacrifice her happiness for it." Jack added. " "But that's no reason to stop talkin'." Applejack replied. "Yes, it is! Fire is dangerous, especially in a forest like this. Why, think of all the animals it could hurt." Jamie added. "Not if they don't turn into fire-breathin' Nirik in the first place." Jack argued. "Jack, how can you be sure that won't happen?" Fluttershy asked. "There's gotta be a better way than givin' up all your feelin's!" Applejack added. Fluttershy growled, "You aren't listening!" "Cause you're not talkin' any sense!" Applejack said. What they didn't notice was that they attracted the attention of the other kirin, who looked at them with worried faces and started walked towards them. "Um.. what are they doing?" Fluttershy asked. Before they knew it, the kirin used their magic to pick, Fluttershy, Applejack, Jamie and Jack up. "Hey, what are they doing?" Jack asked. Me and the others followed them with worried expression. "They got worried cause we were arguing." Fluttershy said. "Aw, shucks! We were just havin' a normal, civil disagreement! Honest!" "W-Where are they taking us?!" Jamie asked. The kirin took them over the hill to a familiar lake. "To the Stream of Silence! If we hit that water, we'll never be able to talk or feel anythin' ever again!" Applejack said. The kirin lowered them but before they hit the water. "Put them down!" We all turned and saw a Nirik at the top of the hills. Nirik: A completely black pony with a black horn with white shading and a white flaming mane and tail. The Nirik came in and made a ring of fire around us. Fluttershy and Jamie whimpered. "It's alright, Ah think ah know this one and she's tryin' to help." Applejack k said. The Nirik came through the fire and changed into Autumn Blaze. "Well yeah, can't have them silence the only friends who will speak to me." she said. "Um... thanks for the wall of fire, but I thought Niriks were dangerous, how did you manage to control your temper?" Fluttershy asked. "I didn't I guess anger is like other emotions, it's not about having them its what you do with them." Autumn said as the ring of fire died out. "And giving up happiness to avoid anger is kind of life." I said. Autumn smiled and spoke to her kirin friends, "Fern Flare, you used to love to laugh at everything. And Rain Shine you sung the most beautiful harmonies, don't you miss it?" "I know ya'll are worried about fightin' but friends can disagree without causing a ruckus." Applejack said. "And giving up your happiness to keep your anger away is no kind of life. I thought giving up my anger would help since, in the past, whenever I used it, I ended up hurting someone I loved. So I thought getting rid of it would help protect my friends, but I later discovered that it's my anger that helps me protect my friends and instead of using to accidentally hurting people, I can use it to defend the ones I love." I explained. The kirin looked at each other and one kirin came before Autumn Blaze and started doing something like charades to speak with Autumn. "I think they're trying to say something." Fluttershy said. The kirin did charades and Autumn tried to guess what the kirin was trying to say. (Skip to 1:20) "Okay, are you hungry? Oh, no. Is some Kirin trapped in a well? Okay, "baby". "Baby fish". "Ba"— "Ba"— No. "Baby fish mouth"? Uh, something? Anything?!." Autumn was getting irritated, "Just write it down! This is making me furious." Her eyebrows started to flame up. The brown kirin winced, "Would you excuse me? I'll be right back." Autumn walked away behind and rock and momentarily changed into a Nirik with a disoriented scream. When she was done, she came back to the kirin group, "You were saying?" The brown kirin pointed to her mouth and at her own. "Oh, you want the cure for the Stream of Silence." I realized. "That's wonderful!" Fluttershy said. "... Wait, have Mason and the others find the Foal's Breath flowers?" "I don't know." I replied. "Guys, guys!" We turned and saw Mason and the other carrying blue flowers with white shading with three yellow stems in the middle. "We've got the Foal's Breath flowers." Carrie declared happily. "Excellent!" I cried. Autumn guided the other kirin to their village where she levitated the flowers into the fountain in the center of the village. The flowers mixed in with the water and the kirin's drank from the stream. Autumn Blaze bit her lip and heard all her kirin friends talking, singing and laughing again, much to her joy. Rain Shine went up to Autumn Blaze. "Autumn Blaze, you have given us a gift. The realization that anger is within us but it is our choice how we let it out. We would very much like it if you came back to live with us. I can not say how much we've missed your beautiful voice." she said. Autumn Blaze smiled greatly and she began singing again. Me and the others smiled, "I think our mission is complete." Mason said. "Yeah." I said and my element glowed again, gaining an orange stripe. "An orange stripe, this time?" I said. "This thing just keeps getting weirder and weirder." Jack commented. Everybody nodded in agreement. "Maybe Princess Celestia has an idea?" I suggested. With that, we all boarded the train back to Canterlot and reported to Princess Celestia about our success. "Well done, everyone." she praised. "Princess, Sarah's element gained another color stripe. We think this might be somehow connected to a pattern, but we don't exactly know what the pattern is." Twilight said. Celestia walked down from her throne and examined my element. "Hmm... the color strips are the same as your elements of harmony, Twilight." she noticed. "HUH?" Twilight and the girls looked at the colors. "She's right! The color stripes are the same as our elements!" Rainbow said. "Maybe that means she showed each of our elements?" Fluttershy suggested. "That may be an explanation. But to make sure, Sarah can you tell us about what happened when you gained these color stripes on your element?" "Well... when my friends were captured by Chrysalis and Douglas, I went to rescue my friends even with the unknown dangers. I gave a sea serpent part of my hair to fix his mustache, befriended Winter, Moonshine and Storm who were hurt and healed them and I convinced the Kirin to talk again." "That sounds an awful lot like Generosity, Kindness, Loyalty and Honesty." Pinkie said. "You're right, Pinkie. Whenever Sarah shows and Element of Harmony, her own Element gains those colors." Ren theorized. "So she's only missing Laughter and Magic." "Looks like we found the pattern with her Element." Kaede said. "Now-" "We just have to wait and see what happens next." Nicole finished. "And she does it again." Jack said annoyed. "Jack, be nice." I stated. Jack sighed, "Alright." "Anyway, now that we know the reason for Sarah's element gaining these colors, we may have one bit of information about her Element of Harmony." Celestia said. "But there may be more secrets to it than we know. I want you all to keep and eye on it and Sarah. With the Element bonded with her, it may give new abilities beyond our imagination." All my friends nodded and we all adjourned back home. I climbed into bed in my pajamas. I looked down at my element. "Wonder what other surprise are hidden within my element." I layed down in my bed, "Guess I'll figure it out soon." With that I closed my eyes.