//------------------------------// // Chapter Sixty One, Grubber, Gallus, Lack of Malice: Pal. // Story: Airship Mauled // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// -Outskirts of Ponyville, Silver Stream- “Now that that’s taken care of…” Kuril seemed nice, but she just turned one of the Storm Creatures they had in the hold from being turned to stone back to being a flesh and blood being. There was a lot of grunting involved afterwards that made me rather nervous. “Fizzle will you be home for Hearths Warming this year?” “I don’t know mom, I have a lot to make up for.” Fizzle, or Tempest, answered with a serious resolute look on her face. “His crimes are not yours you know.” Kuril sat back down and poured herself a cup of fruit juice and turned to me. “Also are you feeling better Ms. Stream?” “Not really, I’m still nervous about being here…” I looked around and noticed that my friends had left at some point, I think they took that hedgehog with them. “Alone… with all these Storm Creatures. How are you not afraid of all those Storm Creatures?!” “That’s because I’m far more dangerous than they are.” That was not the response I was expecting from Kuril. “I know how to cook and if they ever want a taste of my food, then they know better than to try and hurt me.” “Mom, you’re delicious cooking isn’t the only thing that’s dangerous about you.” Fizzle, I think I’m going with Fizzle for her, looked slightly flustered as Kuril snuggled up against her. “Sure, if I wanted to get violent, even without asking Sugar to rip them a new one I could take this entire ship load of Storm Creatures on all on by myself.” Wondering if Kuril was talking about a person, I took a moment to decide on what exactly to ask her. “Who or what is Sugar?” I was curious to hear about this and was most certainly not trying to focus on the various Storm Creatures idling about or playing shuffleboard. Did the world seem smaller or was I back in that cave system under the school? “Sugar is my familiar, which just happens to be an al-mi’raj.” Every Storm Creature slowly backed away from Kuril slightly as if she was suddenly on fire or maybe even made of it. “Witches are said to be able to keep them docile or attract them. My cute and floppy eared lovable Sugar is the sweetest little thing ever. She’s always so protective of me and Airship Mauled, it’s the town I’m the mayor of Ms. Stream.” “Didn’t you say Sugar was now the size of a bear and still has a tendency to consume things three times her size despite not actually having the stomach space for it?” With the way Fizzle described it, the creature sounded horribly scary and I didn’t even know what it looked like. “What part of that is little?” “What does an Al-mi’raj look like?” Please tell me for clarification, so I’ll know what to be afraid of. “Basically they are rabbits with magical horns like a unicorn that can deflect or puncture through most forms of magic. They can also create illusions depending on their level of intelligence and increase their size to an extreme degree for a limited amount of time as a defense mechanism for when their horns are not enough to maul a threat.” Fizzle shivered, but continue onwards with tell me about them. “They can grow to be about the size of bears naturally and are omnivorous leaning carnivorous. As many creatures can attest to, you absolutely do not want to mess with the ones that are fully grown like Sugar is.” “Also when they get to being full grown bear size and do the growth thing, they tend to become visible from quite a few miles away.” Kuril tapped her chin with a claw and smiled after a moment. “I believe the Neighpon term ‘kaiju’ was used in reference to how humongous Sugar’s species can get. So she could probably destroy most of a city by herself with little to stop her, the amount of time she would have to do it in would be about five minutes at full size. Most Al-mi’raj can’t ever get bear sized without a decent food source and a lot of nutrients, otherwise they usually look slightly larger than normal rabbits.” “Yet you have something that dangerous as a familiar?” It’s like those scary stories of Leviathan, the ocean is a nice place to live until you run into giant toothy maws the size of a whales body alone that created whirlpools when it opens. I’ve only heard stories of it and was glad most of the areas close to home were kept quite safe with Auntie Novo in charge, that such creatures of that size can also appear on land almost makes me feel that nowhere is completely safe in the world. “Yep, Sugar is such a grand familiar and I’d like to think that I’m just as dangerous as she is.” Kuril smiled cheerfully. I don’t think she could be as terrifying as a leviathan unless she could defeat one. “Unfortunately, Sugar thinks puks are beneath her notice and won’t attack them.” “Puks?” I queried. “Don’t get me started on them…” Kuril groaned and rubbed at her forehead she turned to her daughter. “Fizzle, I will continue to beg you to come to Airship Mauled. Maybe you can even bring a Hearth’s Warming gift for your nephew.” “I can probably send you a… wait… what?!” Fizzle looked rather perplexed and wide eyed. “His name is Gavin.” Well that was like a stick of dynamite to the conversation from Kuril, given Fizzle was now paying far more attention to her. “Congratulations on becoming an aunt, I want you to be involved in his life and to meet him personally, I think he’s with Dr. Bones at the moment. I’m surprised you missed me tending to him while you were at the hospital.” “To be fair, I was a bit distracted by Maries needing me to be there for them.” Fizzle looked a little uneasy. “What does this Gavin like exactly?” Eventually I would learn all I could about Fizzle, Kuril and…. even the Storm Creatures. The more I knew, then the less reason I would have to fear them and maybe we could even be… well maybe not friends, but I would certainly like it if we weren’t enemies. -Ponyville café, Maries- “What do you think we’re doing here?” Mara said for us, while Maria finished by speaking up next. “Same as you, we’re just trying to get through the day and live our lives.” “Are you thinking about going to the school of friendship?” Is the griffon seriously that intimidated by our presence? The changeling being fearful we can understand, changelings can’t do chimera transformations as they can’t replicate the three minds required for it. “No, we’re already well versed on how to make and be friends.” Marie stated, we all nodded in unison and then we all started talking at the same time. “Also we’re too scary for the school given that we’re lawyers.” -Gallus- “Do you do that speaking in unison thing often? It’s honestly kind of creepy.” I asked as my feathers shifted slightly. Question was answered by someone else. “Yes, that is something they do. Considering their minds are all connected together as one when they want them to be.” The diamond dog wearing a white coat was currently fumbling with a griffon cub playfully crawling all over her. “I’m Dr. Bones, they are my patients and I have them out of the hospital temporarily to get some fresh air and some food. Then it’s back in to run some more tests on them to make sure they have it all together upstairs and magically.” “We should be fine.” The chimera spoke again with three voices acting as one. “We’re all basically alright now.” “Mind your doctor, because if I say you need to work out some kinks, then you’d better very well work them out while under my care when you have the chance.” Who let this diamond dog be a doctor? Then again, with the recent crisis afflicting various hospitals, I shouldn’t be surprised. Not that diamond dogs were idiots or anything, she seemed fairly intelligent for her species. “Because, so help me, you won’t have a personal doctor who knows which way is up for you and your blasted baffling bonkers biology! I was the one that determined Maria was capable of giving a blood transfusion and signed off on it, so I’ve already saved two thirds of your lives. Do you lot seriously have any reasons to complain about a little time to make sure that you’re not going to have any issues?” “Okay…” The tiger stated, then the goat started talking. “Noted and no, we definitely don’t have any reasons to complain as unicorn doctors would have probably kept poking and prodding us. Not to mention doing a ton of unnecessary experimental stuff that could hurt us badly. We’d prefer someone who would actually know what they are doing when it comes to us and are sorry we’re being a bit annoying about wanting to be free from Ponyville’s hospital.” “I brought you outside and to a café didn’t I?” Dr. Bones seemed to have the chimera completely cowed with that statement. “Excuse me, since you were in the hospital, can you tell me if you saw a mare with a broken horn meeting someone important to her there?” Grubber pretty intent on hearing about why his boss, the Storm Queen, came here so fast. “She’s my boss lady and I wanted to know who was so special to her that she’d rush here so fast for, I think she has a special someone and I was wondering if you know who they are.” I looked around. Ocellus was hiding behind Yona and seemed to be slowly easing out from behind her. Sandbar seemed to have wandered off at some point or didn’t want to be near the chimera. Smolder seemed to be a bit bored and was sitting at the table to order something from the waiter. “That’d be us, we’re her special friends. Call us Maries collective or separately… Mara, Maria and Marie.” It took a moment for Maries’ words to register and each head had a different name. “We’re Maries of the Bloody clan, usually referred to as Bloody Maries by other chimera.” “Doesn’t it get confusing that one of you is named Marie?” Curiosity couldn’t hurt, they seemed friendly enough to me. Grubber seemed to be off in his own world thinking about things. “While it has come up a few times, it doesn’t really happen often enough to be a problem.” Marie answered before her sisters could say anything. It was around this time that Grubber came to his sense. “So… you’re the bosses special… huh… wow… I knew something about Tempest was a little unusual, but that kind of sells it for me. Heh heh the boss lady is awesome!” Grubber didn’t seem phased to hear his boss, Tempest, was dating a chimera. If I were him I would be freaking out about it right about now. “So I can expect to see you around her more often?” “Oh definitely, once we’re cleared from the hospital that is… thankfully our medical coverage is actually being paid by the crown due to damage done to us by the recent events.” Mara was the one speaking now, do they always switch off so often? The other two heads eyed their surroundings and that seemed to spook a few ponies. “Does the name Cozy Glow ring a bell?” “Yeah, we beat her and saved the world… apparently saving the world with friendship isn’t enough to graduate from the school of friendship.” When had I sat down at the table with them and why was I getting a serving of lasagna with extra cottage cheese? In fact, it seems like the only cheese used in the lasagna was all cottage cheese. “It was really scary, but I wouldn’t let my friends face it all alone.” Ocellus joined us at the table, as did Yona and Smolder. “Yeah, we were so cool!” Smolder intoned as she received a salad with emerald chunks. “We were in Tartarus when Fluttershy and the others arrived, I wouldn’t recommend being imprisoned there. It’s not a nice place at all.” Maria gained a wide eyed look. “Claws, teeth and wanting my demise above anything else…” “Yona wants to know what happened!” Yona was getting a large bowl of boiled and heavily seasoned cabbage sprouts. “We were imprisoned alongside a number of monstrous creatures, we’re pretty sure one of them was even from the chaos dimension.” Marie started to explain as she looked to Maria’s shivering head. “Among the caged creatures and us, having been captured by being ambushed by unicorn mercenaries on our way back home, was a chupacabra. Said chupacabra got out of its cage while Maria, Mara and I were separated. We weren’t a chimera at the time and you can do the math about why it’ll haunt Maria for the rest of her life.” “Oh my, that must have been horrible! I know how to transform into a chupacrabra, but I don’t think I’ll ever use that transformation. Changelings are taught very early on in life to never go for an unassuming goat transformation.” Well that was news to me, I watched as Ocellus shivered violently. “The horror stories I’ve heard about it, they are said to have an endless undying enmity towards goats.” “I can confirm it completely.” Maria intoned with a blank stare going off into the distance. “Oh, I want to hear those stories, well if you’re open to telling them that is!” At this rate Smolder might be the more awkward one in the relationship between her and Ocellus. It’s a wonder that Ocellus doesn’t keep getting mixed signals from Smolder… or does she? I would have to ask her about it later in depth, my lasagna was getting cold and it wasn’t often one could get a free meal by making commentary at an oddly out of place chimera in the middle of a town full of ponies. -Two hours later, Castle of Friendship, Foyer, Grubber- “You’re friends seem quite nice.” I think Gallus was a cool guy, mostly since he wasn’t making a big fuss about the Storm Creatures or me being here. “Yeah, but they can be a real pain to be around sometimes. We all have our annoying habits.” Listening to Gallus, I rolled my eyes and leaned back in the chair completely ready to listen to what he had to say. “Go on.” I inclined my head to him. He chuckled and went ahead with what he thought about them. “Silver Stream is easily distracted despite how smart she is, she’s apparently been traumatized by the Storm King badly enough for it to be her worst fear when there are worst things out there that are not currently a pile statue pieces. Yona is about as delicate as a short fused minotaur that runs a porcelain shop.” Not surprising Gallus, she’s a yak and they tended to be a little stereotypical. “Smolder is almost entirely bipolar about liking frilly stuff and wanting to look strong. Sandbar has an exceedingly dry personality and life before meeting us. Ocellus has a tendency to mimic the personalities of those around her randomly. Also I’m an aggravating loner with almost no family, I’m glad that I have so many friends.”