//------------------------------// // Temporary Living // Story: A World of Colorful Feathers // by The Psychopath //------------------------------// "How did you even get here?" Luster asked. BasKas crossed his giant wings and laid his head on them. "I told you: It took me a year to get to where you got in mere hours. Naturally, that would mean that I know how to get to the castle as well." "That...doesn't make sense," she disagreed. "Well, that doesn't change the fact that I got in, and I can get you out so long as you agree to tell me all the decorum that exists in this place," he tapped the bars. "I don't even know who you are," Luster said. "You don't know anyone in this castle either," BasKas said. Luster was about to give a rebuttal, but nothing came to mind. "Ah, you see?" There was a pause where the avian checked around him after hoofsteps in the grass reached the two's ears. "We don't have much time, but I can get you out of here and somewhere a little safer, if you want." He sat upright. "Honestly, it's in your best interest." "How can I trust somepony I've never met before?" Luster asked. "Well, the friends you made were people never met before at some point in your life. Maybe I'm a not-yet-friend of yours?" he supposed. Luster grumbled. She couldn't find an argument against that logic. Still. "And what do I have to do in return?" BasKas rolled his eyes. "I told you, you just need to tell me what's in the castle. I want to know the luxuries they get to enjoy in there just so that I can imagine the marvels. I won't be able to see them for myself, but I certainly can imagine them as long as I'm told as many details as possible." He shrugged. "Having information like that can be just as valuable as having seen the same thing." His eyes creased upwards. Perhaps he was smiling and Luster couldn't see it. "Ignorance is bliss, sometimes." The unicorn turned back around and stared at the door on the far end of the dungeon hall. "I don't know. I don't see any reason to leave here." The avian chuckled. "I suppose they mentioned the 'wizards'?" "Yes?" Luster said without turning away. "I'm sure that you can remember some hooded figures if you want inside this mountain of a place." Luster took some time but eventually nodded. "They were in the throne room." "You reached t--Ow!" BasKas tried to burst his head between the bars but hurt himself in the process. "Got too excited," he said while rubbing his 'beak'. "You reached the throne room?" His voice was becoming erratic and burst with unconstrained enthusiasm. "You must tell me everything, but we must leave from here now. The wizards I mentioned will perform experiments on you as they did to their own bodies, simply to either improve your magic or, in your case, figure out why you can cast magic without any runes." There was silence. "It's your choice whether to stay here or leave with me back into the city." "But they said they could take care of me," Luster said. "And, rather than keep you under guard in one of the many many vacant rooms in this place, they throw you in a dungeon?" BasKas asked. Luster couldn't respond. "This is just a prelude of things to come, and if you don't like it, you can always teleport away. You have full control. I'm just interested in what you can do and what you've seen." Luster took one more look at the dungeon and sighed. "Okay. I want to get out...but how are you going to do that?" BasKas responded with a deep chirping meant to be chuckling, Luster surmised. He started poking above the bars, out of Luster's sight. A single, slow crack ran horizontally across the top of the opening, and the avian tugged on the bars several times until he could move the whole item to the side. An extended wing wrapped around the pony, lifting her out of the castle and onto the grass. "The stones were weak at the joints with the stone glue thingy they connect them with," BasKas explained. "Cement?" "That's what it's called? Hm. Follow me." Luster tried to gallop after the avian, but couldn't muster the strength to do anything but walk slowly. "Too much pain," she whined. BasKas rolled his eyes. "Not much for exercise, then. Alright. I'll hold you up." He rolled his shoulders and picked up Luster despite her protests. His feathers were very big and somewhat coarse. "Guess there won't be any flying or going through the hole I found." "Then what are you going to do?" Luster asked. "We can't just ask the guards to let us go." "Well, we could also..." he implied. Luster shook her head. "No. Now hurting them. they're just doing their job." BasKas heaved a sigh. "And volcanoes simply burn everything in their passage," he grunted. "What? What does that have to do with--" Luster's head was jerked back into the chest of the avian when he burst forward, his talons digging into and ripping apart the ground when they came out. The avian snuck past the numerous guards in the castle gardens using the plethora of trimmed bushes and trees. The mare barely had a moment to recover that she was jerked around once more. It reminded her strangely of the vortex she had found herself pulled into. BasKas jumped down the massive platforms leading up to the mountain and hanging off the rocky ledges with one wing when he deemed it necessary. It took all she had for the mare to not scream when BasKas did this. The avian thought it bright to hang off the ledge using his wing and talon on many many occasions, almost slipping off the jagged and erratic rock faces several times more. When finally they reached the first wall, BasKas hummed. "Can't use the method I did to come here, so I'll have to be more direct." "More direct? What do you mean by more direct?" Luster stammered. BasKas 'chuckled' again. "I'll just 'walk' past them." "What?!" The avian pulled himself up from his new rocky perch and bolted forward as fast as he could manage. Several of the guards were knocked to the side by the blur rushing past them. When the avian approached the base of the wall, he jumped towards it, and his talons clamped into the stone. "Haven't done this in a long time!" he shouted gleefully. Luster's screams were her only response. The avian managed to climb the wall, knocking little pieces of stone on the guards below that couldn't figure out what was happening. With a free wing, BasKas flipped himself over the protective ledge of the wall and hopped over to the other side, burying his talons once more. Gravity did the work this time, tearing long, deep lines through the polished surface. "There's an-!...Uh...escapee!" one of the guards finally alerted. Bells in the gatehouse started ringing loudly, an oddity considering they hadn't used them when Luster was going inside. "Using the bells now?" BasKas remarked. "I'm not that big of a deal." A deafening screech reached the escapees' ears, alerting the avian to dodge sideways in the air and narrowly be missed by the flat creature Luster had seen in the castle. It stopped in front of them and landed, the sounds finally ceasing. Now Luster knew what that sound was. This creature was expelling tremendous amounts of air through slits in its armor, and subsequently, its body. "They inflate to fly?" Luster whispered in awe. Its feet were solid clumps, much like hooves. Had it not been wearing armor, Luster would've have been able to get a much better view of the composition. "Where are you two going in such a hurry out of the castle?" the creature asked. "Into the city, where you won't get to see us again for many centuries to come," BasKas responded humorously. The creature stepped forward, and her voice became stricter. "You weren't permitted to leave the castle premises. You will return to the dungeon immediately." The avian exaggerated a head shake. "Don't wanna." "You willreturn to your cells regardless of your wants, or I'll--!" "Be left behind?" BasKas interrupted. "What?" The avian passed by the creature and laughed as he vanished into the forest of massive buildings and artificial rivers. "What are you doing?!" Luster shouted. "Running, of course!" He looked up and smiled. "Looks like we're going to have to use the floating isles." "Floating? But islands can't fl-Ah!" The avian had chucked the exhausted pony as high as he could, and she landed on an island high above while he disappeared through the pathways below. Luster was left to see and absorb the sight of massive islands just floating above ground, each having one or more beams of a single, colored light piercing them above and below. "How did I miss these when I got here?" the mare asked herself. She looked behind her too see the creature speeding towards her like a dart and yiped. Luster hopped onto one of the artificial rivers and soared down like a water slide while the creature beamed overhead, cursing that she missed someone who was three feet in front of her. The water was not held within any stone arch. "Is this a pathway of magic?" Luster wondered between panicked gasps of air. She tapped the water with her hoof. "It is! But that would require a ton of magic to sustain!" She yiped in panic when the creature tried to grab her once more. Instead, Luster's would-be captor received a flower pot in her face from somewhere below. "Yoo hoo!" BasKas shouted. He was riding one of the larger paths below. Several pegasi came in from behind, originating from the mountain castle. Luster yelled in surprise and tried to teleport away by reflex, but her horn simply fizzled with sparks. "Looks like we're going to have lots of fun while we ride to the lower parts of the city," the avian said excitedly. Luster was screaming nearly on the whole way down, and BasKas was yelling with joy with his wings sticking out. The pegasi couldn't catch them, and when they'd get closer BasKas would grab something nearby and throw it at them, including other pegasi. He even shocked both Luster and the nearby guards by grabbing a stallion reading on his balcony and chucking him at the two's pursuers. The paths led to the sewers beneath the city, and although Luster expected the obvious, there was no filth at all. Not even a slightly pungent odor. Instead it all felt like she was passing through an enclosed area at a water park slide, and the sound of rushing was muffled by BasKas' screams of excitement. They eventually opened up to the more familiar area that Luster had ended up in and were met with a barrier of pegasi at the end. They managed to catch BasKas but had forgotten about Luster. She crashed into them, freeing her savior and letting the avian hold her and land hard on the ground below, scaring the pedestrians. The avian wasted no time in hurrying further forward and into several tight pathways between the buildings, places the guards couldn't go without crashing into some balcony, clothesline, and some magical 'hoo-ha' the locals' were trying to create to make their little home more pleasant and unique. There was no conform shape, look, or purpose to any of them. Luster wanted to get a better look at them after all this stopped. The mare had been prepared this time, but perhaps not enough. BasKas had held her in both his massive wings and said 'trust me' before throwing her and sliding the mare towards a basement hardly big enough for anypony to get in normally. The ground collapsed underneath her and she fell into another vortex, although a much calmer one. BasKas followed shortly after. "She got out?" Daegcandel asked some guards inspecting the empty cell and the damaged hole in the wall. "How?" The unicorn shook his head. "I don't know, my lord. I was certain that she was too exhausted to do any magic, so we didn't post any guards, and you yourself said that she was too mellow to be a threat." The alicorn looked at his guard from up high, scaring him. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to frighten you," Daeg apologized. "I still forgot what I can do to others from a simple look." He smiled meekly, and the guard immediately relaxed and sighed in relief. Heofoncandel pushed past her husband and analyzed everything she could. "That's not her handiwork," she said. "You're right. She would have teleported herself if she wanted to leave," Daeg responded. Heofon leaned her head forward past the open door and narrowed her eyes to get a better view. "Who would have the power to break such stones so easily without anypony noticing? Much less our guards." "Of which there are many," another added. It was a pony wearing a wine red robe with inch-wide trims of cranberry red laced with swirling patterns. Daegcandel was unnerved by the single, glowing yellow pupil he could see through the dark projected by the hood. Pupils that seemed to multiply every time he blinked. "What do you believe, wizard?" he asked. The wizard shook their head. "I'm not sure. There's so many exciting things happening today. I would have very much liked to interview this runeless wizard and see how she functions." Both rulers stepped back and were visibly disgusted when they saw drool dripping from the darkness within the hood. "Control yourself, wizard. This display is repugnant," the queen berated. A wipe of the foreleg cleaned away the degrading appearance. "It can be difficult at times to control my excitement." They bowed. "I am sorry for that shameful display." They raised their head and looked back at the hole being inspected by several guards. "I can assure you that it was not cut with magic." Daegcandel rolled his eyes. "Yes, we're aware of that," he said. It was exhausting talking to wizards sometimes, he thought. "I just want to know who was capable of that." The wizard shrugged. "I won't know unless I analyze the damaged areas, and even then, I could simply learn of the species and not the person. These can be too vague at times." A new guard brought the three's attention to him. "Your majesties." He bowed. "Guards at the gates have spotted the pony that had infiltrated the castle...rather poorly I might add," he mocked. "We don't need your humor now, guard. Where was she?" Heofon asked. "She was last seen in the lower section of the city being dragged along by some...black thing." He shrugged. " 'Black Thing'?!" Daegcandel repeated. "That's the best description my guards--" "Ourguards," Heofon corrected. "Ourrrrrr guards," the king repeated. "can make?" "I was told it was too fast for them to get a good view of!" The guard backed away, trembling. Heofon gestured the guard to leave while Daeg huffed angrily and hit himself in the head several times with his hoof. The queen squished herself against him, using her own aura to calm him. "You only need to relax, my star. They will be found eventually," she said. "In this city?" Daeg snorted. "I'm not so sure, and I don't like this mention of a 'black' creature. If it's a spy of them, then it might be inevitable."