Herb got up into his room and locked the door behind him.
His body shook from all the adrenaline inside, so he put the book onto the bed and had to lay down for a moment, so he could stop his hooves from shaking.
Clockwork was right... it was phenomenal stupid to take the book.
Trixie never would let him come in again... and she might even would get thrown out of town... who knows, maybe they would put her in prison!?
“I'm so stupid! Why i'm so stupid!?” he asked him self.
His head turned to the left and he starred at the book he had stolen. He realized this now. At first he had told him self he would return it and it was just “lending it” … but how to return it? There was no way to do so. She might even would zap him.
The colt got up and leaned him self against the wall behind his bed and put the book onto his lap.
It looked like any other book he had seen. The edges have been used and the paper smelled a little awkward like some cheap ink had been used to write it, but for some reason, this book was even more precious to Trixie than the pony's around her?
What was so special about it... she had like … a hundred or two... so why bother if one was missing? It just been story books after all, or not?
So he dared to open it. It wasn't anything like he had expected. Trixie often had shown pictures out of those books, when ever they could not image a thing or so, but the more pages he flipped the less he understood.
Where had been all the great story's, she had read to them? He could not find any.
It was just a collection of hoof drawn pictures... photos... glued in items and notes... along with some other hoof writing once in a while, which looked different to Trixie's.
“I... I don't get it...” he stuttered to him self disappointed and closed the book.
He sat there for about half a hour, trying to think how this all made sense, but his brain was like in gridlock. He was to nervous to have any straight fought, so when it knocked on his door, he got the shock of his life.
Maybe it was Trixie... or his parents!? Either way he was in big trouble.
He jumped quickly from the bed and crouched under it, like he could hide there forever.
“Herb... are you in here?”
It was Clockworks voice, but still he didn't dare to come up.
He could not look her into the face and tell her that it was all for nothing.
The filly wandered around in his room and got to the bed on which she found his booty.
“Oh Herb... you fool... you really did it...” she said in disbelieve.
The filly carefully touched the book, but she left it closed, to pick it up a moment later and wander towards the door.
She could not take the book with her... he had to figure it out... he had to get something out of it.
“Wait!” Herb shouted and crouched out from under the bed.
The filly got right up to him and as soon he was standing - slapped him in the face “You got any idea what you have done!?”
“I … I know I …” he tried to form a line, rubbing his cheek.
“Half the town is out there! They think Trixie is crazy! They yell at her house and shoot magic at it...” she tried to calm down but this time could not do it “And just because you could not hold your damn tamper once in your life! You see what this caused!? You come with me and return the book, right now!”
The colt shook his head and received another slap on his other cheek “Don't you dare to hide under your bed again! You come with me and apologize to her, now! Maybe we can end this madness before somepony get hurt...”
The filly turned and was about to walk off, but the colt quickly grabbed the book and backed off.
“What the...? Give it back again!” she shouted “Are you out of your mind?”
“Look, look!” he said and opened the book to her, but she turned her head away.
“Please, look!”
But the filly still didn't listen.
“I'm to dumb to figure it out... please, you are the smartest pony I know... I need your help...” he bagged sobbing.
The filly now gave the book a short glance, to find pictures of -the monster- and the dragon drawn onto it.
“So?” she said and turned her sight away again.
The colt flipped a few pages “you have to look”
Another short glance, she could see some kind of fairy's... some of which looked like pony's... odd.
The colt flipped a few more pages and the filly hold her sight onto the book.
Side after side... barely a word was written down into them, most of the side space was filled with pictures and drawings.
“Isn't this her book?” the filly wondered and the colt quickly nodded “It is - it is! I swear!”
Now she got closer and even browsed her self a little trough it “But... where are all the story's?”
“I … have no idea...” he said insecure “...maybe she really is crazy?”
“No this cant be...” the filly took the book and got onto the bed to study it closer.
Than she found the story she had read to them last week.
There was a picture of a young mare glued onto the side, showing her in a white dress, next to the monster in a smocking, with a small note below.
-Fluttershy & Discord, forever-together... and a tincy bit longer!-
“There... its them. So they had been real” she flipped the pages to find some other pictures she could recall from her stories, till something caught her eye “this mare... she looks like Princess Twilight but... she has no wings on this one”
“What, where?” the colt tried to get a better view and sat next to her.
“There” she said and carefully tapped on a photo.
The photo showed Princess Twilight and a few other mares, smiling towards the camera and in between them, stood Trixie, having her hoof swung around the purple mare.
“She knows the princess?” the colt asked confused “... or is that … her mother?”
“Cant be... the princess is like... a few hundred years old...”
“Maybe we are crazy too?” the colt said concerned.
“I don't think so...” the girl said, flipping a few more pages, when the colt stopped her “go back!” he said aroused.
Clockwork carefully got back a few pages “there!” he pointed on the page.
It was a small Map of Equestria, drawn over two pages, with some notes written all over it.
“There!” he repeated himself, pointing onto the word “Treasure” next to the Badlands.
“You don't think...”
“Oh I do! That must be where the treasure is hidden! I'm sure!”
“Don't yell into my ear” the filly said and rubbed the side of her head... also it could mean anything.”
“The colt grabbed onto the page and changed it one time back – on which it showed the monster, handing over a chest to the dragon, then he flipped two forward to show a dragon, sleeping in a cave.
“You see... it fits...”
The filly repeated that process her self one more time “I think you are right... but it doesn't matter, we have to return the book”
“And if we do, what then? Everypony still think she is crazy...” Herb said calm “But if we find it and bring it to town, we can show them she is not”.
His friend had to think about this for a while. This time it didn't sound so insane like the last time. He had a good point...
They could show the treasure to prove she was not crazy... might even sell it to come up for all the damage done and... apologize after to everypony. Maybe even Trixie would forgive them after that?
“You are the most stupid genius I know” she shook her head “We don't have much time... and we need a lot of fuel...”
The colt swung his hooves around Clockwork “Thank you, Thank you, Thank youuu...” he said relieved like a bolder had dropped from his chest.
“Remind me to slap you later, if we are still alive” she sighed.
The two got down into his father's room and put quickly everything together they needed, preparing two big cans of fuel, which they put on a cart, along with some other stuff, which they thought was useful.
Herb tried to write a note, but his hooves still shook to much, so Clockwork did, explaining as much they dared to, so their parents would not worry or even blame the blue mare, than they left and drove as fast her scooter could handle.
Herb was steering on the front, since he had the most practice, while Clockwork sat in the cart they had attached, holding on to the bottles and cans.
The first part of the journey was really easy since the road leading toward the mountain's was in really good shape. It was often used by miners, who would get onto the town-side of the mountains and break up rocks as building material, or dig for raw ores, which they could melt and sell, but as soon they reached the entry and the mountains began to rise to their left and right, higher and higher until they got lost in the sky, they knew they had entered the Badlands.
Now the road was nothing more than a trail, barely used by anypony, since these are could be really dangerous at night.
Most traders rather would head south first and use the Apple Loosa railway in order to get south then, since they rather took the path around than be eaten by some wildlife.
“Do you see any jackal's?” Clockwork asked concerned.
“No... I think they only come out at night” the colt said, while scanning the horizon.
“Herb...”
“What is?”
“The sky...”
Now Herb looked up to notice, the sun was slowly going down. They had been driving for hours and had to stop a few times to refuel and eat. Once they had traded places, so Herb could rest from this unused pose.
Pony's wasn't made to stand this long on two legs he had told her, but they found them self soon in an argument, how Scootaloo might had managed to do it.
Sadly the book they had with them didn't hold anything about her, so the question slowly engulfed in sand.
The couple drove between two big rock, which almost had been big enough to be small mountains - using them to orient them self with it, after they had stopped.
She hold on to the book and he stood in front of her, looking down on the map.
“You see... this are … those rock and” he gestured “… this means we have to go... there” the colt said, pointing in a direction.
“Not quite Sherlock” Clockwork said “You look upside down onto it... so its this direction”
“Ops.”
“We have to be careful. If we get lost here … i'm not sure we can find our way back”.
“Than I got some bad news...” he tapped onto the map “we have to leave the road soon...”
“Yes, I noticed this. I wish we had brought a compass along with us.
“We did!” he said and grabbed into a small bag next to her, pulling out a compass “i figured we could need it...”
“Good work and I thought you cant work with stress...”
“Its not quite stress... I can handle that...” he said and got up onto the scooter “Its just when i'm angry or sad... than my hooves shakes and I can't help it...”
“So... when we got ready you wasn't angry or so?”
“I … guess not.”
“But what about Trixie... don't you feel bad for her?”
Now his hooves began to shake again a little, when he thought about it “I do...” he let go of the scooter and turned to her “but I... like it when.... you are... around...” he said shyly.
Now the gray's filly's face changed to red “I … um... maybe... we should hurry... its almost night...” she said, avoiding his glance.
The colt nodded and turned on the scooter, driving it towards the mountain's she had narrowed down.
If she didn't knew any better, the drive now was more turbulent than before.
Maybe the road got worse... but she didn't really believe that was the reason, while she starred less into the book and more often onto his back, while his black mane swung back and forth when ever they hit a bump.
She now wondered if his white highlights been natural or if he just tried to look cool with them. Maybe he had put them in to impress her?
It was awkward, she knew him since kinder-garden, but maybe had took him for granted until now?
There was a long sharp howl in the distance, making her snap out of her thoughts.
“Jackal's” Herb said, but hold the roller straight on track and the speed constant.
The last thing they could need now was a burned out engine.
A few minutes later there was another howl, this time it sounded way closer, to close.
“You think they know we are here?” the colt asked.
“Maybe they smell us...?”
The colt took a short sniff on himself “All I smell is sand” he said.
They been out here for quite a while and the wind constantly had blew dust into their faces, so it wasn't to far of to assume they had inherited the desserts smell.
“Oh no.” it occurred to Clockwork “the mint! They smell the mint!”
Herb almost had lost control for a second, cursing into his non-existent beard.
“I'm so sorry..!” he said and tried to think of something “how long you think we need to get there!?”
Clockwork barely could see the pages anymore, so she grabbed one of the mixtures they had took from his father, pulled a string and shook it really quick. Now the small bottle began to glow since the chemicals inside had mixed and caused a chemical reaction. It would glow like this for about half an hour, before they would need a new one... if they had time for this.
Now she could see the pages in the green light, but everything around them was black already. She could barely see the tips of the mountains, while the sun slowly disappeared behind them, leaving no fix point to measure distance.
“Not too long, we are almost there” she lied to him.
Then there was another howl, it was just a couple hundred meters behind them he assumed. The mountains threw around an echo the close they got, so there was no way to tell for sure if they would make it.
Clockwork dropped the light behind them, pulled another one and waited a minute to repeat the process.
“What you are doing” the colt said as he noticed the constant sound of the reacting, which gave a small “shiish” every time she did so.
“Keep your eyes on the road!” she yelled, while she observed the lights in the distance.
Suddenly one of the lights was gone, but it wasn't because the chemical had run out. Something was blocking the line, between her and the light.
“They are coming! Crank it up!” the girl yelled.
Herb did as he was told, it might wreck the scooter, but it was better than being eaten alive and the two shot over the open landscape with full speed and opened up some distance between them and the followers.
“Where is he!?” Herb's mother asked, when her husband found the note the filly's had left behind.
- Hello mom and dad, we are on a treasure hunt... we come back as soon we can, don't worry about us. ps. Don't blame Trixie! It was our idea alone to do this, signed Herb / Clockwork -
“I knew she was a bad influence!” Ivy yelled with a sobbing tone to it “Celestia knows in what danger they are! We have to search them...”
“Honey calm down... we can't afford to panic right now. We have no clue where to start the search, also Herb is a big boy, i'm sure they will return safely”.
“Don't talk me down on this one! How often I told you something like this would happen!? Everypony in town told me, it was dumb to let our kid go there in the first place...” the white mare said and stomped to a window - pulling open the curtains in a ruff motion, pointing towards the sky “just look at this!”
The stallion got over to her and put his hooves around her and she cried thick tears onto his shoulder “I-I... just want our son back” she sobbed, while he stroke her fur and looked trough the window “Me too...” he said and lowered his head onto and prayed for a miracle.
The window revealed a quite disturbing sight - right in the middle of town was big black cloud, spitting lightning beneath itself once in a while and it seemed to grow by the minute in size... if it would continue like this, it probably would reach their own house in a matter of just a few hours.
In the center of the storm' you could find Trixie's home and the mare still was nowhere to be seen.
The cloud grew more and more and forced the pony's to evacuate the nearby houses, or otherwise the lightning would strike them in an attempt to hit the pony's inside and not even a magic lightning-roster was able to deflect those it seems, given that this wasn't any ordinary storm – this was a wild outburst of chaotic magic. Only luck right now was that the lightning yet hadn't caused any fires, or it would be hard to extinguish those since the fire-horse could not get close without getting struck too when they got on the border of the cloud.
If it just had been rumor's before, now everypony used this as prime example to declare her crazy.
Her impossible story's, her strange behavior and now this incident... who could blame them?
They would had to blame somepony, they might never think of – them selves.
They had to blame them self to listen to rumors and not to her story's... to accept her behavior and admit theirs own was odd for other pony's as well... searching a open conversation in order to know one another better, rather than point hooves and laugh.
Today, everypony was to blame.
If they only knew, what they thought they do.
Trixie had traveled more than anypony before her and knew, that some things might seem strange and scary at first... and a few of them were indeed... but for the most part, there was so much wonderful things to discover outside the town borders.
She had made a couple of good friends over the years and was witness to more than one miracle - like the dancing colors above the north-pole, on the last day of spring – the day the Neighagra Falls had been frozen and you simply could walk across them – or the majestic sight of the golden Shrine in the middle of Palomino Dessert... and many more, which never would find its way in any ordinary history book... and still she knew, she had missed a lot more beauty, nopony ever would see.
The mare of Dodge Junction had run out of options... at first he struggled to ask for help from outside, since he thought they would be able to deal with the problem by them self and wasted a lot of pressures time doing so, but half the city was lost already and the other half would follow before the sun would rise again, leaving him no other choice to call for the highest authority – Princess Twilight Sparkle.
This alicorn was not just a expert in therms of magic, she also was the closest one to town and would arrive in a matter in minutes - where ever she was needed, so no more time got wasted and a magic letter was send after all.
“Your highness” the pegasus guard said, performing a deep bow in front of Twilight “a letter arrived us, its a distress call from Dodge Junction”
“Please, you don't have to bow” the alicorn said to the newest member of her guard, when she used her magic to levitate the letter to her self and began to read it calmly “Hmm... I see.” she said to her self, studying it carefully, before giving him a sign “the task-force shall get ready on the teleportation field... and alarm the rest of the troops, just in case we need them”.
With that said the unicorn vanished in “pfuff” noise and a short flash of light, to reaper in different rooms of the castle one after the other, in order to put down her royal insignia and pick one of her special outfits.
She had several dozen of those, depending on what issue was to be dealt with. Ranging from simple robes for bad weather, gallant dresses for festivals up to golden heavy armor – which was crafted for close-combat battle... but today she picked a long star-hung cape and a west, which was made to reflect magic of all sorts.
After this she teleported her self on the backside of the castle, onto a round field which span about fifty meters in diameter, made out of black slick stones, which was surrounded by six big menhir's, each of which had a slight touch of color to them: blue, white, pink, purple and yellow.
If you would search all of Equestria for this kind of circles, you could find about a hundred of those scattered everywhere - most of the time nearby the major town's or other important locations in between.
This platforms was meant to help Twilight on her teleportation spell, she could use their presence as fix-point to teleport her self on the other side of Equestria in no time, along with about a hundred stallions alongside with her. It was an incredibly helpful thing to have since it usually would take hours or even day's to respond to a threat otherwise with armed forces.
Time was essential in time of need.
The princess took a last look around on her troop and was pleased with what she saw.
Ninety nine of her best trained stallions stood in straight short lines, one third of which belonged to one type of pony. One third earthpony, one third pegasus and one third unicorn.
No matter what was the case: they had the strength, speed and power to conquer it.
Twilight been the hundred's pony on the field and closing the circle of harmony with this.
“When we arrive, I want everypony to do their best to protect the citizens, while I try to deal with the main issue... much as information's reveal, there is a unicorn gone wild and a magic storm was cast... don't engage the center... the lighting strikes only if you get close to it... so our first objective is to evacuate the area around it and avoid mass panic.”
“Yes, princess!” the troops shouted in unity, giving her a sharp salute. She never got used to this part, since she never thought her self to be any more special than anypony else. For her, everypony was equal to one another, no matter where it came from or what kind it was.
The unicorn now stepped into the middle of the crowd “Okay, hold your breath and lets go!” she shouted and with that her horn began to glow, when sparks danced between it and the menhir's around them, making them glow almost blinding bright for a few seconds before there was a loud
“zup” and the plateau was empty – just a split second later the howl process repeated it self and the group reappeared on the platform near Dodge Junction - Twilight immediately created a forcefield so they was not exposed to some kind of surprise attack, until the area nearby was checked.
“The area looks clear” she said a few moments later and dropped the forcefield, when her troops spread out as told, without having her to say any more.
She already could see the problem from here.
The black cloud was several hundred diameters in size and grew faster the bigger it got, shooting small thin strikes of lightning beneath.
There was another “-pfuff pfuff-” and the unicorn found it self just a few streets nearby the border of the storm.
All around her where pony's sitting or slowly walking away from the bad weather, some of which had a few belongings with them, they thought otherwise would get destroyed.
Than the first few of them noticed the alicorn in their middle and bowed down without hesitation in order to show their respect.
They all greeted her in a calm manner, despite the crisis around them “Your highness” “Princess Twilight” “Be welcome...”
Knowing a alicorn was in their middle, made them feel a lot better already, since it was unthinkable that she could possible fail to contain the situation.
Like Princess Celestia, Twilight was several hundred years old and carried the necessary magic, as well wisdom within – she had fought and defeated the biggest evil's a pony could possible image and most of the time under the worst circumstances there are – but always turned out victorious... able to restore order and harmony in Equestria.
The princess spoke loud and clear, so everypony next to her could hear what she had to say “I want everypony to leave this area in a calm fashion. If you find somepony in need of help, please do so, but don't risk your self... my royal guard is scattered all over town and will protect you if necessary. Now go”.
The stallions and mares obeyed as told. Nopony would dare to talk back on a royal in a situation like this, still one stallion didn't obey and just starred at her.
“Princess Twilight... may I?” he asked as careful he could, with lowered head, but searching for her eye contact. He was obviously really desperate for some reason, since he could not hide the fact his body was shaking nervous.
The princess gave him a short nod and he got a few steps closer, since it was hard to talk over the constant blowing wind, which was created by the storm-cloud.
“I … I know its … I'm searching my daughter, Clockwork. She is gone missing since this has started” with this his hoof pointed towards the storm “i hoped … you might could help me find her...” the green stallion grabbed into his trench-coat and pulled out a letter, the kids also had left on his door.
The princess would like to help him, but she also knew she had to deal with the main-issue at first, before there was time for anything else... still she took the time to read the note he had given her. Everypony's life was valuable, without exception.
The alicorn carefully studied the few lines and hung on one of the last words with her eyes “The mare, which caused this... her name is Trixie?” she asked doubtfully.
“Yes princess...” the stallion said as calm he could “She is a unicorn”
“Could it be possible?” The princess asked herself, before she put away the note and turned her full attention to the stallion.
“A blue one... with a cusp hat?”
The stallion was baffled, but gave a quick nod “Y-yes... how you know?”
Twilight turned towards the storm and watched the spectacle for a moment.
“Even if it was her... why would she do such a thing?” She thought to herself.
“I have to go... but when I'm done, I will come back here and we will find your daughter,” she said certain and wandered into the storm.
The stallion could not follow, so he watched as she passed the border of the cloud and lightning began to strike down onto her, which got reflected by her forcefield and scattered its effect all around the alicorn, which didn't seem to be disturbed by this at all.