Away and Afar

by PropsValroa


Chapter 75

Collapse sighed in anger, Magloria likely heard it. Collapse had a look of pure, and utter rage on her face. The **one** possible chance of getting free, and the one doing it turns out to be insane, and incapable of understanding basic logic? Well, it was something to be exploited...if only Ash was capable of understanding Collapse to a greater degree.

"Shh, be q-" Collapse yelped as Ash's claws went all over her face. Honestly, she really had to hold back to avoid herself from slamming Ash up against the bars or throwing her out of the pen. "W-what you need to do is to break the sticky stuff off my horn...that is the poison, not the horn itself..." she said, trying her best to remain calm, really, it was taking her a significant amount of effort to avoid flipping out into a rage that would help no-one.

She was very glad she could exercise self control. One could say that she should have done so sooner. Well, she knew that if she had found some way to break the resin off with magical force (such as building up a massive amount of power until it breaks the resin off), that would likely cause a massive explosion, put lives at risk, and attract others to the area. So, that wasn't going to happen.

"Yeah, break the sticky poisonous stuff that your horn is creating. That's what I'm doing but-" Ash said as she returned to gnawing at the stick of bone on Collapse's head.

Several more moments of failure passed. Biting, scratching, and even an attempt at shaking it off all failed to pry some of the hard resin away. Ash simply didn't have the strength to free Collapse of this hinderance.

"It won't. Come. Off!" Ash growled as she kept attacking it.

"Gotta say, that stuff would be useful as an adhesive. Would grab some of that too, if we didn't already have some." Magloria commented as she watched the scene before her.

"Ash, allow me to deal with it. Perhaps I can take it off." she sighed calmly, and would push Ash off her horn gently. If Ash came off successfully, she would continue to try grinding it off with the bars of the Pen, moving back and forth quickly, rotating her horn to try to scrape most of it off, she tried and tried with it. "It's probably some plant material around here." she commented to Magloria.

Ash let go, but not without some slightly firmer persuasion. Collapse also had to keep her from immediately climbing back on a second time as well. After that, she merely sulked in a corner of the pen, playing with Collapse's empty food tray as she did.

Meanwhile Collapse's attempts to remove the resin herself was just as ineffective. None of the bars were rough enough to file it down. All she ended up doing in practice was making a bit of noise while moving 2 smooth, solid objects against each other.

It was the equivalent of glass in a way, but less brittle. She could probably get some of it off if she smacked her horn into a bar, hard. That was a stupid idea though, because it would make a lot of noise and stun her from an unbelievable amount of pain that would run through her sensitive horn.

She needed to come up with another solution. Perhaps Ash could do *something else* that she couldn't at the moment?

"Ash, look. I'm gonna need you to be quiet and quick. You are going to go out and get me a hammer, and a few nails, and paperclips. You are also going to get a knife, too. I will use these to hopefully get the resin off, either by shattering it with the nail, or by cutting it off, with a knife. The others *must not know of this*." she spoke calmly.

"Then I will be finally rid of this poison, I will get out of here with the others, and our poison will be forever gone from this area for good." Collapse said to Ash, smiling lightly. "*Nothing*, is going to stop that from happening. And by nothing, I mean nothing. I will do whatever it takes to get out of here." she said in a fashion that meant that she wouldn't take no for an answer.

"The paperclips are for if the hammer and nail, and knife don't work. Then I can pick the locks. I don't know how to pick a lock, so if it comes to that, it will take some time to figure it out." she spoke, seemingly satisfied with that plan.

"If we succeed in escaping this place, you can come with us, and take care of us forever. You wanted to come with us anyway, if we actually get out of here - we'll have you to thank." she patted Ash's head gently with her soft hoof.

Ash eagarly nodded her head again. "Yes! I will go get all those things! I won't let you down!" she said, meaning she probably will let Collapse down. She quickly left the cage and bounded off into the darkness before Collapse could stop her.

If she had strained her ears, she could almost hear Ash's voice muttering "Now what did she want me to get again?"

Half an hour later and Ash returned, carrying what looked like a bottle of some sorts. "Got you what you needed!" she said as she spat out the bottle as Collapse's hooves.

On close inspection of the glass bottle, it turned out to be some sort of medicinal alcohol, for cleaning open wounds. No idea where she got that from.

Collapse waited for Ash to return patiently and when she returned she was very disappointed. That was...a worthless item at the moment. With a long sigh, Collapse shook her head. "No, that is not at all what I needed..." she spoke, and began to describe what all of the items looked like, that she needed. Apparently Ash didn't know what a hammer was, or the other things for that matter.

"Now please, I *hope* you understand. It would be most unfortunate for this poison to spread because you don't understand what is needed to remove it..." she sighed again.

"So it's a heavy metal thing? And more metal things? You're really into metal! You must like music!" Ash smiled as she pawed at the bottle.

"But don't worry! I will find you the metal things and free you from your poisonous ways! I know just where to look!" She turned and darted off into the night once again.

Another 15 minutes passed before Collapse saw something. Ash definitely had found something metal alright, but it didn't look like a hammer. Or nails. Or a knife or paperclips.

With a small *clang* she dropped the cheese grater onto the cage floor. "Here you are! Just what you wanted!" she stated.

Meanwhile, Magloria was busy looking at the bottle, a quizzical look on her face.


Collapse waited once again, with a sigh. She didn't say anything to Ash as she went to get her items. Unfortunately, she didn't get what she wanted but maybe this may work? Well, time to try it out. "I'll try this. If it doesn't work I'll have you get something else." she grumbled, grabbing the cheese grader and would begin to try to roughly scrape off the resin with the cheese grader. Surely it wouldn't be that hilarious to just get it off, would it?

She saw Magloria looking at the bottle. "Whats on your mind?" she asked, scraping her horn with the cheese grader. It would be funny if they weren't trying to escape.

It was hard to press the grater firm enough to the resin and move it at the same time, given where she needed it to be, but little by little she felt thin, hardened flakes fall onto her face from above.

She wasn't going to be able to get rid of all of the resin without risking damage to her horn, and yet it would still be excruciatingly slow to remove most of it. But at least it was progress.

Magloria looked up to Collapse. "That's a bottle of alcohol, right? I can smell some of it from here." she said, giving her nose a brief scrunch before continuing. "Isn't alcohol good at removing stuff, like caked on grease?"

Collapse smiled widely upon seeing the hardened flakes fall down upon her face as she shaved the flakes off, and as Magloria spoke, she continued. "That's a good idea, I won't use all of it. I'll use some of it, since I want to have some left for when I get you free." she spoke and would pop the top on the bottle and would pour a reasonable amount onto her horn, leaving a good enough amount left for when she would intend on getting Magloria's horn free.

With the alcohol now on her resin coated horn, she would begin to scrape more and more. She put a lot more force into it this time, wanting to get it all off as soon as possible. "Would me unsummoning the locks on our pens be a reasonable first step to do? The flash of light may draw attention, but, there would be no other way to do it, I think. I'm thinking I'll get us three out of the pens, we'll go hide somewhere while I get your horn free, then we look for our things." she commented to Magloria as she continued.

With the alcohol helping to dissolve some of the resin, Collapse found that removing pieces became easier and easier. Her extra force at one point caused her to scrape at the surface of her horn, bringing with it a surge of pain. This is why you be careful with dealing with sharp objects out of your field of view near delicate things.

There was plenty of alcohol to spare though, so she had more than enough to help remove the big chunk, then to dissolve whatever bits she couldn't get to. Soon her horn was free, if chipped slightly in one spot.

Magloria nodded. "Only real option we have. I think I have an idea of where they've kept our stuff, so once we've found it we can just leave." she said, moving over to the door to her pen while she waited for Collapse to keep going.

Collapse winced at her mistake of scraping a bit too deep into her horn, and grunted in pain for a second. She then kept going in a more careful manner, and going until all of the resin was off. She felt along her horn to make sure all of the resin was off, which it was. She could feel the slight chip there, but that would heal on it's own. Not that she cared about it currently.

With a smirk she walked on over to the locks. "Right, let's do this." she spoke, and would quickly unsummon the locks. The locks were a rather easy thing for her to unsummon due to them being relatively small compared to some of the items she unsummoned before, and due to her close proximity it made it even easier. They vanished in a quick gold flash.

If all went according to plan, she would take the cheese grader and alcohol with her if she successfully left the pen, and would unsummon the locks at Magloria's pen first, then Jump Start's (and then waking Jump Start up if she was asleep). When Magloria was free, she would hand the alcohol and cheese grader to her, smiling quietly.

The flash of light (and probably all the noise they were making) woke some of the nearby animals up. Thankfully they were still locked in their pens and so couldn't do anything about it, and didn't bother to make much noise anyway.

Except for one large python. It kept its eyes on Collapse the entire time as she snuck around the place, freeing Magloria and Jump Start. Seems like the snake would like to be let out too. Or eat her. Or both.

Magloria thanked Collapse before she did something similar to what Collapse had done, After getting enough gunk off her horn so that she could light it up, she kept the remaining alcohol with her to clear the rest later, ditched the cheese grater and started to sneak away.

She was headed over to one of the buildings nearby. In this case, it was the one that held whatever tools the panthins used to keep the animals in line and the pens clean. Jump Start followed, obviously.

Collapse noticed the python. Honestly she would probably want to free all of the animals and put them back into the jungle where they belong. What did they use them for anyway? Pets? Some kind of exotic display maybe? Wouldn’t make sense for meat, since the Panthins would probably have other places for that.

The Python scared Collapse a bit. But she couldn’t blame it for feeling the way it does. It is an animal after all. A top tier predator with scary coils and all that? Yeah, it’s best for that one to be in the pen.

Collapse followed Magloria along quietly towards the building. It probably had some weapons they could take for defensive purposes. She stayed alert just in case any Panthins happened to be roaming about or guarding the area.

Magloria opened the door of the building and led them all inside. Within the building was exactly as expected of a storage room. Everything that could be useful to keeping animals contained and alive could be found here.

Unfortunately it did not include the armaments or protection that the panthins used. That must be kept inside another building somewhere else.

And bundled up together in a corner of the room was all their stuff. Nothing appeared to have been taken. Were the panthins really that polite, or were they just not allowed to go rummaging through their stuff without taking precautions? Maybe they were just lazy and would've gotten around to it later on.

Collapse quickly went over to their stuff and slid her boots back on and then equipped her saddlebags, then handing the others their stuff back in return. Collapse had a wide grin and looked down at her boots, evidently quite proud that they managed to get their stuff back. As they would get their stuff back on, Collapse watched them.

"I would really prefer we just get out of here. I don't feel like exploring and risking a chance of getting caught again, but now we know what they are capable of - so at least there is that. Unless either of you have objections to that...?" she asked, not expecting either of them to object.

Collapse just wanted to go back and continue working on the ship. They got everything they came for, it seemed.

"Not wanting to go out of your way to investigate why they have set up a wall down in the caverns below anymore?" Magloria smirked while setting her stuff up. Her amusement quickly faded away though, as she continued.

"I wouldn't either after what happened. Makes me want to leave and never come back, at least not without a suitable force beside me."

When everything they had was found, reclaimed and accounted for, they started to leave. There wasn't really anything worth grabbing in here anyway. What would they even do with several large bags of straw, and some shovels, buckets and pitchforks?

Collapse smiles to Magloria there, seeing what she as getting at. "If this was any other situation - and if this went as planned, then perhaps we would be down there investigating. Unfortunately, not everything goes the way we want it to - so we'll leave and never come back. Perhaps in the far future, a whole team of armed ponies can come here properly, with such force, and properly introduce relations in an open manner. Maybe the Panthins would be more agreeable." she suggested, not taking anything. Not any of it was worth any value to them, really.

"Let's just hope they haven't found where our Shelter is, and also hope they haven't set up some failsafe to track us down. I may have told them a few things, but in their minds, they'll have no way to prove any of it or to really understand it I would figure. It's likely they will tell some garbled version of our story and retell it, and it will just be myth. Likely too lazy to go and do anything about it, but I wouldn't underestimate them. The ones I told were shortsighted and not the sharpest tools in the shed, anyways." she also commented to Magloria, just in case.

Once they were out of the building she went silent and looked to see if the coast was clear before heading outside and looking for any possible exits to take out of the place. Probably where they exited out of the previous times they were here.
The coast seemed to be clear, with no noticeable panthins in sight. The way out of the place was also pretty obvious as well, being a large gate between the walls for things, most likely cages, to be shipped in and out of the facility.

The gates were closed, locked by several bars that they would have to move, but they most likely led out to the rest of the city. At that point they would be free to get back to their home by doing what they had always done before now.

Collapse would have moved the bars as quietly as possible for them to leave. If the bars didn't move, they would have likely found some other way. Either way, if they succeeded in escaping off into the Jungle, Collapse would have been pleased. However, she was still on alert for any possible traps, or anything out of the ordinary that would indicate the Panthins were following, or observing them. Hopefully it wasn't all just some setup for them to get re-captured again just as they left.

The bars had no special locking mechanism to them. They were easy to move out of the way so that the door could open. After shifting the first one out of position, something interrupted their little escape attempt.

"Interesting. Very very interesting." came a voice from somewhere above them. It wouldn't take much searching to spot the yellows eyes, that had been almost glowing in the dark, from the wall above them.

However despite having seen them, the camouflaged grey panthin didn't attempt to take them down. Or call out to others. Or do anything else but watch them eagerly.

Collapse froze up upon hearing the voice and her eyes contacted the yellow one's eyes. She gave a brief wave to the panthin, but didn't say or do anything else other than signal for them to run off into the jungle at a fairly brief pace, wanting to get out of sight, as fast as possible despite the Panthin's obvious laziness. At least that was a trait they could exploit.

"Goodbye." the panthin said as when they decided to just leave.

During their time sneaking back out of the city, Jump Start spoke up. "I think they were supposed to stop us. I'm pretty sure I saw one of those crossbows next to them, so why do you think they didn't try?" she asked.

The rest of the way back to their shelter was clear, so they had no real issues returning, outside of dealing with the river.