//------------------------------// // Chapter 14: A Poorly Constructed Plan // Story: Daring Do and the Iron Pyramid // by Unwhole Hole //------------------------------// By the time Daring reached the edge of town, it was already late afternoon. Her mind had been fuzzy and groggy, but the time riding on the back of a sha—and the sheer fear of it—had restored her back to full energy. Wun parked her mount in an area of desert near a couple of trees, near several large termite mounds. The other sha joined the first, and as Wun slid off its back it and the others began pawing lightly at the mounds. Then, as the termites swarmed out, their thin tongues began flicking against the mounds as they ate. “They’re...they’re just anteaters?” said Daring, surprised. “What did you think they were?” asked Wun, stretching and trotting toward the Get Out Inn, which was not far from where the termites dwelt. Caballeron, shaking, fell to his knees. Wun partially levitated him, dragging him across the sand. “Why me?!” he cried. “Because I could not catch a griffon.” Daring took flight, following her sister and Caballeron. Caballeron managed to extricate himself from Wun’s magic and walked under his own power. “Are you okay?” she asked, catching up to him. “I just spent five hours on the back of a horrid creature that is the very definition of bad luck, clinging to HER! No, I am not ‘okay’!” “I mean from what it did to you--” Caballeron shivered. “I would rather not talk about that.” “But...what did you see?” Caballeron looked up at Daring, confused. “See?” “When it connected to your mind. That was telepathy. What did you see?” “I did not ‘see’ anything. Just noise and pain. Then that bald griffon screaming at me to ‘get on the skiff and stove her in!’” “I saw...” Daring shivered, but did not finish her sentence, because she did not know how to. She saw the images in her mind, the shadows of a strange world presented in such detail that she might well have thought she had been there herself—except that it was so alien that she could not comprehend the barest function of any of it. Of the red sun, suspended so close to the ground, and the vast Pyramid below it. Of lands that, for some reason, she so desperately wished she could see again. “Wun, did it do it to you?” “No,” said Wun. “I do not know why, nor do I care.” She looked over her shoulder. “However. Daring, I used the mist spell.” Daring gasped. “Wun, you can’t! We have to get you to a hospital, before--” “We can perform the surgeries later. I am still relatively functional. Now, though, we require great quickness.” Having reached the Inn, Wun kicked in the door and immediately dodged a crosbow bolt that whizzed passed her and nearly perforated Caballeron. With a flash of her horn, Wun bubbled the inkeeper, suspending her in a magical sphere. The inkeeper did not seem to like this at all, and yelled extensively—although no sound escaped the bubble. “Stop yelling, your oxygen is finite,” snapped Wun, rolling her out of the way and taking a key from behind her. She proceeded up the stairs with Daring following, making her way to Daring’s room where her luggage had been brought. Upon entering, she immediately searched through the packages and selected a steel attache case. Daring followed her, as did Caballeron. “And what, pray tell,” he asked, “are we doing here, in this disgusting motel?” “We can perform the three-way snuggling you are suggesting later,” said Wun, unlocking the case. “Now is the time for action of a different manner.” “What’s the plan?” asked Daring. Wun looked up as she opened the case. “I was intending to ask you that.” Daring sighed. She had expected a question like that. “Okay. His name is Seht. Wisdom says that he drains life force, but I don’t think that’s true. But he’s coming here anyway. I have no idea why.” “It almost ended me,” snapped Caballeron. "My precious mediphorical juices where cleanly excised from my mortal form! Not since the jungle with those horrid chupacabra--" “And you’re still here, aren’t you? I don’t think he was being aggressive, I think he was trying to communicate. Our brains just can’t handle it.” She faced Wun, who was now assembling various metallic parts from the case. “I used the Seal, and I...I saw things.” “It did not make such an attempt with me,” said Wun. “Also...” Daring paused. “I think it’s a unicorn.” Wun stopped what she was doing and looked up. “I do not think such a thing. I am entirely sure of it. Not only a unicorn, but a pureblood mage.” “That is absurd and impossible,” muttered Caballeron. “It was buried down there since before any known House even existed, how could it possibly--” Daring turned slowly to him. “I think it might be a dark unicorn.” Caballeron fell silent. “That...is not possible.” “The Magical Quadrangle always has a space for the metaphysical unicorn. Almost everyone figured it was a representation of something that never existed, a mythical form—but what if it’s meant to be a trinity? Three lineages? Some academics--” “Insane academics, you mean. Pariahs with no true credentials that could have any bearing on winning grants--” “And you think they were right.” Caballeron averted his eyes, and then sighed. “There are some very, very ancient texts. In Crystalline. That reference the possibility of such things. But there is no hard evidence--” “I have seen enough evidence,” said Wun, lifting a long metal tube from the case and screwing it onto the end of the assembly she had constructed. “Legends suggest they had remarkable regenerative abilities. And that is something this one most certainly does.” “I didn’t see if it...” Daring’s eyes widened. “Wun, you brought the thing? Why in the name of Celestia’s rainbow-colored curly—why would you bring the THING?!” “For occasions like this. You are new to this sort of thing. Precautions are always warranted.” Caballeron looked at the metal object that Wun was holding, grimacing out of both instinct and confusion. He had no context to understand what it actually was. “I do not understand,” he said. “Is it...a blunderbuss?” Wun pulled back the bolt and chambered a round almost as large as Daring Do’s hoof. “No. A blunderbuss is a griffon attempt to replicate superior unicorn technology.” “It’s a rifle,” snapped Daring Do, “and it’s illegal on every continent. Why do you even still have that?” “Because you cannot hunt dragons with a blunderbuss.” “Dragons are not real,” said Caballeron. “I assure you, they are,” said Wun, opening a second box. “They are real and quite delicious. Especially the eggs. Although the mothers are...protective. Hence the thanatanium cores in the projectiles.” She removed a set of clothing from the box. A suit of armor forged from dragon scales. Oddly small ones. “Wun, you can’t do this--” “Daring.” Wun turned to face her. “I can, and I shall. Do you not understand the meaning of this being, what it represents? It is the very last of its kind, the final member of a subspecies rendered extinct before recorded history.” Daring’s eyes widened. “You still intend to capture it.” “Yes. I do. To contain it. To display it, to posses it. To mate with it.” Caballeron nearly retched. “You—surely you are joking--” Wun’s head snapped to face him. “No. It is a pureblood, as am I, and one of vast and incredibly superiority over any known House. This may be my only chance to bear a legitimate child and continue my line, and even for my line to superceed all others.” She faced Daring. “Sister. You know me better than any living pony, even my own father. You understand what this means to me.” “I hate to admit it...but he’s not wrong…” “And why do you hate to admit that?” snapped Caballeron. “Of course I am right!” “My motives are entirely selfish,” admitted Wun, “because selflessness and empathy are rank weakness. But the outcome still serves your goals as well. I do not know what damage it might do if it reaches this town. I cannot assess its intent, but you seem to think it is of ill nature.” “I do.” “Then help me protect these people, and obtain what I desire at once.” Daring winced, and then sighed. “Wisdom said that he gets his power from the Pyramid. I don’t know what that means, but…I almost do. I think we can weaken him.” Wun nodded. She lifted one of her spare magazines, revealing that the bullets of the rounds within were certainly not made of lead or thanatanium. Daring paled upon seeing them. “That...you actually brought THAT--” “I have two eighty-nines, and a thirty-seven. The thirty seven will not work on a unicorn that powerful, but the others--” “Wun, your organs--” “I will only use them if need be. The thestrals?” “The might get here in time, they might not.” “I ordered my griffons to stay. They cannot get here in time.” “That means it might just be us.” “Possibly. What do you think we should do?” Daring took a breath, not expecting her sister to ask that. Normally these questions were meant to be a test of sorts but now she had the increasing impressinon that, somehow, she had come to be in charge. Fear crept up her spine. Although Wun exuded confidence, she was at heart a flower-pony. She too was vastly out of her depth. “First, we need to evacuate the town. Keeping the ponies safe has to be the top priority.” “Then I leave that to you.” Wun put her rifle over her shoulder and slid on her armor. “I will take my position. But ponies in this place hate you, and us.” “Don’t worry, I have a plan.” “Then I shall trust in you.” Daring nodded, and Wun departed out the room’s window, heading as quickly as she could toward the town. Daring took a breath, and started toward the door—only to be stopped by a hoof on her shoulder. She looked back, her eyes meeting Caballeron’s. His eyes were filled with fear—and so very cold. “There is another way,” he said, slowly. “What do you mean ‘another way?’” Caballeron nodded. “The shipyard. I know how to pilot a dirigible. I calculated its speed, roughly. Some of the smaller craft are fast. We could get to one before it even arrives--” “And what, run? Pontracio, are you joking?” “Why would you think I’m joking?” he snapped, taking a step forward. “What else can we do? This isn’t our fight.” “But it IS--” “I’m an archaeologist, and you’re a CHILD! We’re not soliders! And did you not understand the implications of what she said?” “She wants to contain it, we can do both--” “No. If she wanted to help, she would call in the ARMY. But she won’t. Because she wants to keep this affair internal, doesn’t she? Because the government would take what she thinks is HERS. She sent you to fight it after it defeated HER, a pureblood unicorn—can’t you tell she’s using you?!” “And what do you want me to do?!” cried Daring Do, her anger and fear suddenly reaching their respective breaking points. “YOU were the one who let him out!” “He would have resurrected eventually! If not by me, then by somepony else! Another archaeologist, another explorer! If he was waiting for six thousand years, what is another hundred, or five hundred, or even a thousand more? This would have happened eventually! The best we can do is RUN!” Daring Do stared at Caballeron, amazed that she had once found him even mildly attractive--and even more amazed that, on some level, she still did. That only made the dissapointment worse. “You’re a coward.” “No. I am a realist.” “Then go. Save yourself.” Caballeron groaned. “I can’t leave you, not like that--” “But you won’t help me either. Fine. See if I care. I have ponies to save.” Daring Do left the room, slamming the door behind her. She barely even noticed that she was crying.