Applejack’s night went mostly uninterrupted, aside from when Sully stumbled into the basement at two in the morning in a drunken stupor, knocking over the table and two chairs as he made his way toward his bunk. When she awoke, Applejack almost immediately noticed a horrid smell coming from the direction of Sully’s bunk, and when she looked over, her face contorted into a grimace at the sight of the large puddle of vomit that was on the floor next to his bed.
She woke up Nathan and Elena next, as they all wanted to get a good head start on finding the entrance to the next temple. Nathan had a good idea where it might be, but it was still going to take a long time.
When they got out onto the street, it was nothing like it had been the night before; the road was covered in broken glass, litter and hundreds of plastic bead necklaces. The occasional drunk that had passed out on the ground or slumped against the side of a building groaned as they walked past. With the roads closed and the streets a mess, the only way for them to get around was too walk. Luckily, Elena had picked to hotel well, and it was a short walk to their destination; Saint Louis cemeteries, the largest above ground cemetery in the city. A chill crawled its way up Applejack’s spine as she looked at the rows and rows of stone caskets and mausoleums. So many of them had been ornately decorated, which only served to unsettle Applejack even more. In the centre of the cemetery stood a massive stone pillar that towered above everything else.
“Kind of obvious isn’t it?” remarked Applejack, as Nathan and Elena began to search every square inch of the pillar’s base. Nathan took out a small black notebook and started flipping through the pages, before stopping on one and studying it closely. After a moment, he handed it to Applejack, and although she had no idea how to read their language, one thing was clear; that pillar was important. The page in Nathan’s note book featured a piece of yellowed parchment with a highly detailed drawing of the pillar with a bunch of what appeared to be messy scrawling’s.
“Y’all realise that ah can’t read this right?” she asked and Nathan just sighed irritably.
“It’s from the journal of an old Dutch explorer who was carrying the pillar on his ship when it was stolen by the French, who then went on to found New Orleans years later,” Nathan explained as he walked to the back of the pillar. “I know that it is this exact pillar because the captain of the ship that stole it is buried in that tomb beside you.” Applejack took a step in the opposite direction, making Elena smile.
“Come on and help us look, you might notice something we don’t,” she said and Applejack nodded, starting to look at the immediate area around the pillar, at the tombs that surrounded it. She knew that to anypony that happened to be visiting the cemetery, as she had been told that it was a major tourist attraction, that the three treasure hunters must have looked like they were unnaturally interested in just one area of the cemetery.
***
Applejack was lazily looking at the engravings on a tomb, trying hard not to think of the decaying corpse that lay behind the thin stone cover, when something in the corner of her eye caught her attention; some kind of giant round insignia that had been carved into the side of a mausoleum. It featured intricate vines around the edges, and then a ring of oval orbs with small tails coming off them, making them look like balloons. Different nonsensical designs made up the next few rings but it was the centre of the carving that Applejack was focussing on. A set of three balloon shaped carvings in a very specific pattern, with the middle balloon slightly raised.
“Hey come over here, I think I found something,” Applejack called to the others, who quickly rushed over to here.
“What have you got?” asked Nathan as he ran his hands over the carving.
“See that symbol in the centre? That’s Pinkie Pie’s cutie mark,”
“Cutie Mark?”
“Right. Sorry. You know those apples I have on my legs? Well they are my cutie mark. Where I come from, we get a unique cutie mark when we get old enough to discover our special talent, our purpose in life,”
“That’s actually kind of cool. I wonder what mine would be,” said Nathan, flipping through his notebook for any mention of the symbol. Applejack meanwhile, walked up and placed her hand on the cutie mark carving.
‘Pinkie,’ she thought, blinking rapidly to fight back the tears. Applejack leant against the stone, and to her surprise, felt the centre of the carving slide deeper into the mausoleum. It was only an inch or so, but it was enough for her to get excited. She tried pushing more, only to find it stuck. She narrowed her eyes, moving her hand so that her entire palm covered the balloons. She then turned it to the right, and it slid inside even more, then another right rotation and the centrepiece slid all the way through, locking in place with a solid clunk. The sound of turning gears filled the air and Applejack and Nathan backed away as the sound got louder and louder. Applejack looked at Elena excitedly, hoping that they were a little bit closer to finding a way home. With another loud clunk, the centrepiece slid back in place, shaking the entire mausoleum. The stone door swung open, revealing a long staircase that descended into darkness. She looked over at Nathan, whose mouth was hanging open in shock.
“See, told you that the pillar was too obvious,” she remarked, crossing one ankle over the other and giving her Stetson a tilt. Taking the lead, she turned on the torch that she had attached to her belt, which illuminated the narrow tunnel. Being slightly larger than either of the others, Applejack’s shoulders touched both sides of the passageway, making her feel slightly claustrophobic. A pleasant and familiar smell arose from the depths as they got deeper and deeper.
“What is that?” asked Elena, who was just behind her. “And where is it coming from?”
“Ah think it might be vanilla,” replied Applejack, as her mind clicked. The smell was one she knew all too well; Sugarcube corner, Pinkie’s workplace and home.
The passage started to widen, which helped Applejack to relax. When it got wide enough that all three of them were able to stand side by side, they came across a massive stone door that was almost identical to the one that had gotten them into the passage, except for one key difference; the centrepiece did not have a carving of Pinkie’s cutie mark. Instead, it featured two crescent moon shaped indents.
“We found one of these in the temple under Uluru, but the indentation in the door there was a rectangle. Turns out the book was the key,” Nathan explained as he prodded the indentations. “But these ones I don’t recognise.”
“Uh, Nate,” Elena said, tapping him on the shoulder. In her hand she held the element of loyalty. Applejack and Nathan gave each other an embarrassed look, before she unclipped the element of honesty from around her neck and placed it in lower indentation. Elena shook her head as she locked the other into the remaining hole, then pushed it in and unlocked it the same way as the other door. Once again, the clanking sound of rotating gears filled the air, but much louder than before and Applejack got the feeling that something other than a simple door was opening. With the grinding sound of stone against stone, the door started to slide upwards, ejecting the elements into Applejack’s hands just before it disappeared into nowhere. She placed her element around her neck, squinting her eyes against the orange glow that the gem emitted. Then she saw what was beyond the door and her eyes went wide in awe; an enormous cavernous expanse that had a domed ceiling and rounded walls. In the exact centre of the cavern was a huge square building made out of stone like everything else.
“Woah,”
***
The path down to the building had disintegrated due to the progression of time, leaving big gaps that they were barely able to jump across, and after an hour of jumping, slipping and occasional panic, they arrived at the temple. The door to this one was the same as the first, and was easy to get through. To the surprise of all three treasure hunters, the inside of the temple was coloured completely pink and on the far wall were five glass tanks that were filled with powders and liquids of various colours. On the ceiling was a mural of what Applejack could only describe as a balloon garden.
“What the hell?” whispered Nathan.
“Well this is certainly… Pink,” said Elena as she looked around.
“Yeah, so is Pinkie Pie,” said Applejack, smiling widely as she started to study the glass tanks. At the bottom of each tank was a metal funnel that led into a basin and in the bottom of the basin was a tiny carving that just made her laugh. Nathan and Elena ran over and looked around the area to see what had her in such an uproar.
“What is it?” asked Elena and Applejack just pointed at the carving in the basin. “Is that a… cupcake?”
“What!” Nathan exclaimed, looking into the basin with a puzzled expression. “What does that mean?” Applejack walked around to the side of the first tank and gripped a metal wheel that she reasoned controlled the release for the funnel.
“Applejack, what are you doing?” Elena asked nervously.
“All you gotta do is take a cup of flour, add it to the mix,” Applejack sung, turning the wheel and letting some of the white powder run out and into the basin. She closed off the release and moved to the tank on the other side of the room.
“Now just take a little something sweet, not sour,” she continued, ignoring the strange looks from the other two. Moving on the rest of the tanks and systematically turning the wheels to release their contents, Applejack kept singing.
“A little bit of salt, just a pinch,
Baking these treat is such a cinch,
Add a teaspoon of Vanilla!
Add a little more, and you count to four,
And you never get your fill of…
Cupcakes! So sweet and tasty!
Cupcakes! Don’t be too tasty!
Cupcakes! Cupcakes, cupcakes, CUPCAKES!”
With one last spin, Applejack threw out her arms and smiled, as the pedestal and the basin slid downwards until it went underneath the floor, before quickly becoming covered by an aperture-like lid.
“I have no idea what just happened,” said Nathan flatly. Applejack walked back to them and took up a place beside Elena, watching as the glass tanks were drawn into the ceiling. As they vanished from view Applejack spotted a rectangular gap in the wall that the tanks had been hiding. Making their way over, Nathan poked his head into the gap, before quickly retracting it, calling out at the same time.
“That is a god damn alligator in there,” he said in a panicked tone. Elena took a step back as well, as the deep sound of an alligator’s growl reached her ears. Applejack took off her hat and passed it to Nathan, who still looked a little shaken.
“The element must be through there, so you guys wait here while ah sort out our big friend here,” she said as took a few step back, then started running toward the wall, ignoring the protests from the others.
She dived through the gap, her shoulders scraping the stone. Landing on the other side with a roll, she got to her feet and looked around for any sign of the alligator. Turning her torch back on, Applejack noticed two things that were entirely unexpected. Firstly, the twenty four foot alligator was tethered to a wall by a thick chain, and secondly, that the room that they were in and the alligator’s bed was filled with large silken pillows and in front of the alligator was dog food bowl with a big ‘G’ printed on the side in green.
“OH, Y’all gotta be kidding me,” she exclaimed, realising what was going on and chalking it up to Pinkie’s randomness breaking down the barriers between worlds. She poked her head back through the gap and told the others to come on through, informing them that it was safe. Nathan still seemed reluctant, but some gentle coaxing by Elena soon changed his tone.
“Are you sure it’s safe?” Elena asked, holding onto Nathan’s arm tightly. Applejack was giving the alligator’s head a scratch and slowly making her way to the element that was around his neck.
“You mean ole gummy here? Oh course! He’s as gentle as a lamb, not to mention that he’s toothless,” Applejack explained, and as if on cue, Gummy opened his mouth and displayed his pink gums to them all. The fearful couple visibly relaxed and together took a cautious step forward. With a little sleight of hand, Applejack slipped the element of laughter off Gummy’s neck.
She dropped a few apples and a chocolate bar into the food bowl, and Gummy growled happily and started to nibble at one of the apples.
“Okay, so shall we go?” she asked, walking over to the gap, until Nathan pushed past her and scrambled through it, still in a slight panic. Both girls began to laugh hysterically as Nathan looked at them with a mixture of embarrassment and annoyance spread across his face. Elena crawled out next, with Applejack about to follow her until something above her caught her eye. Shining her torch over it, she realised that it was some kind of writing. She called Elena back and got her to read it.
“Of course! I forgot all about the next clue. Now it says; ‘you will find magic in the middle of the impossible stones.’ Huh, that’s strange. It’s written in English,” she explained and as soon as she mentioned magic, Applejack’s eyes brightened.
‘Magic! That means Twilight. I know we didn’t find Pinkie here, but Twilight promised to come and find me, she has to have found a way to get here,’ she thought, giving Gummy a quick wave and climbing out of the hole.
Nathan was standing at the exit, ready to lead them back up the path, but the strange thing was that he wasn’t facing them. When they got next to him, Elena froze, looking at the other side of the path where a group of about fifty men all dressed in black. At the forefront was a shorter person. He wore small round glasses and had a very long brown beard; Khrushchev. But it was the person standing next to him that shocked Applejack. It was a girl wearing blue denim jeans and a light blue hooded jumper. The remarkable thing about her however, was her multi-hued hair, which barely covered the black eye and cuts that criss-crossed her face. Her hands were tied in front of her and she looked utterly defeated.
“Rainbow Dash,” she whispered.