//------------------------------// // An Accidental Discovery // Story: Macintosh of Arabia // by Crisis_Vyper //------------------------------// "I'm so bored.......:" The little filly, Fatimah started dragging herself on the floor, pushing her body with her hindlegs, her voice very irritated. At the other end of the room, a much more older mare is just lying down on her stomach, spreading her legs apart. Her magenta eyes are now little slits, as she eyes around the room. The blue-maned pony and the little filly have ran out of ideas about things that they should do, and the Janissary are not a fun bunch to be with. Sneaking out is almost out of the question, as the Janissary are extremely protective guards, following them whenever they go, except to the bathroom. It was then that the blue-maned mare asked the filly a question. "Hey, wanna soak in the bath with me? Sure beats lying around this stupid room." The little filly stood up on her hooves and she is now hopping towards the mare. Fatimah hops and hops and hops, waiting for the mare to get up and go to the bath with her. With a mighty groan, the white mare gets up and both of them started to walk to the bath. Before they could even enter into the bath, they would need to get undressed before entering the baths proper in the changing room. As the two females entered into the changing room, they begin to take their rather cumbersome dresses off. Vinyl hates clothing, and having to wear even a dress over her body made her feel so uncomfortable. She could only respect the little filly as she was covered from head to toe in cloth, revealing on her eyes. As the little filly takes away her clothing, it was then that for the first time that Vinyl actually manages to see how the little filly look like. To the utter surprise of the blue-maned pony, she is now looking at a whitish-silver coated filly with a long flowing white mane. She could already see a miniaturized form of the gracefulness and elegance of the Saddle Arabians in the little filly, and her regal presence really reminded Vinyl of the Princesses back home. The little filly stretches her lean body and slender legs, humming happily at the lack of weight on her body. And then she started stretching her slightly larger than average wings, each feather almost shining like polished silver. "Those are some nice w-W-W-What?!?!?" Vinyl immediately turned her attention to the little filly's wings and she was utterly flabbergasted. Saddle Arabians with wings? The little filly then realizes that Vinyl is now staring at her wings, and she blushed a little. Vinyl could only point at the little filly's wings and wait for an explanation to come out from the horse's mouth. "Yeah......I have wings. I got it from my mommy." She said sheepishly. "Your mom?" Vinyl said quizzically. "My mommy is an Equestrian, a pony they call a pegasus I think." She looks at Vinyl with a rather crooked smile, hoping that it makes much sense. "Hm.....sounds legit." Vinyl could only say so unconvincingly, as she really have no idea how pony genetics go about, let alone know how it interacts with other equines. But that saying, surely everypony else would have known about this right? It must be a very big deal if there is a Saddle Arabian pegasi hybrid. "Big Mac and Nurse Redheart does not know that I have wings, and Daddy say that I should keep it a secret. So can you keep a secret for me?" The little filly is now looking at Vinyl with puppy-dog eyes, her olive green eyes looking into Vinyl's soul to find for a speck of compassion. Vinyl bit her lip, contorting with every second trying to resist the eyes, until she finally stops and breathe a sigh. The musician mare then sits down on her haunches with her eyes closed before she opens them up again and look at the filly with a smile on her face. "Fine, kiddo. I will keep it a secret. I Pinkie Promise." The little filly cheered, but then looks at the elder mare quizzically. Vinyl notices the change in mood and waits for the little filly to speak up her mind. "What's a Pinkie Promise?" Vinyl then starts to one of her hooves under her chin and starts to think of the easiest way to tell the little filly about this most ridiculous and epic of promises. "Well........there's this fun mare that I always hang out with, and she has this weird promise that we call a 'Pinkie Promise'. It is her thing, and seriously she really mean it. And man, I shudder to think who would be foolish enough to break that promise....." Vinyl hold her forearms close to her body and started shivering. The concept is all lost on the little filly however. "So.....what's a pinkie promise" Fatimah starts to tilt her head sideways, waiting for an explanation. "Here how it goes; you draw a cross in your chest the you swing your arm like you are flinging it, and then you stick your hoof in your eye all while saying "Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!". Get it?" "No.....don't get it at all." "Alright lemme do it; cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my ey-OOOUUCHHHh!!!" Vinyl screamed out in pain as she jabbed her eye a little too hard for her own good. The filly started laughing and rolling on the floor. With one teary eye, the blue-maned mare waits until the little filly had stopped laughing. "That's a very weird thing, and you poking your own eye with your hoof is funny!!!!!" The little filly said happily. Vinyl could only smile as she watch the little filly started giggling again. Vinyl always wanted a little sister, but she is the only child between her parents. In the little filly Vinyl sees a little sister in spirit, and that made her feel good. After that, they soon enter into the bath area, and greeting them is a grand, spacious chamber shield from the sun by a large glass ceiling with stone seats along the two sides of the wall and protruding from the walls itself are some finely crafted faucets. The bath itself is a rather large pool, made from white unblemished marble with several marble steps leading downwards into the water. The pool continues on to a ledge where the water flows down into the lush gardens below like a waterfall. The ledge is such that nopony would fall off it unless they willingly jump over it, as it holds the water of the bath. At the same time, it also provides those in the bath with the unbridled beauty of the skyline of the capital and the large rivers that surrounds this island further enhances the view especially with the setting sun now sinking into the horizon of the river. As Vinyl slowly walks down into the cool, refreshing water of the bath to take a rest, the little filly walks towards the stoen seat and faucets. The little filly then takes a bar of soap and some scented water and started to clean herself. Vinyl soaks herself in the cool,refreshing water and she could only sigh, for the only thing that prevented the bath from being the perfect escape route from the boredom of their room is that as open-aired as the bathroom could be, their only escape it to literally jump off the ledge to their deaths towards the lush gardens below. Even Vinyl with her crazy ideas could not think of a rope that is that long for them to explore the gardens below. It was then that she heard a harsh and rasping sound coming from where the filly is. Vinyl turns around to notice that Fatimah is now looking at a rather large hole in the wall. Surprised, Vinyl then comes out from the pool and as she wraps a towel around her waist, she realizes that the little filly is now walking closer to the hole in the wall. Before the filly could even venture into this weird passage, Vinyl is pulling on the filly's tail with her teeth. Realizing that she will not go anywhere until Vinyl lets her, she relents and let the mare look at this surprise. "Um.....okay.....I did not expect that hidden passage. Seriously is this some kind of Daring Do book or something?" Vinyl looks down the dark hallway, her voice echoes into the darkness. "Who's Daring Do?" The little filly asked the blue-maned mare. "Too long, don't wanna explain." Vinyl is still inspecting how on earth did a hidden passage just appeared out of nowhere. It was then that the mare felt a tug on her feet and she turns to see a very excited filly. "Let's go and explore this tunnel! It'll be awesome Vinny!" "Meh..... Whenever something like this happen to Daring Do, there's always a trap or something. " Vinyl said with a shrug. Disappointed that the blue-maned mare is not even interested, she sighed. But then Vinyl puts a hoof on her shoulder and smiles at the filly. "You wait here, I will go instead. If I am not out in thirty minutes, just call for the camel dudes alright? I need somepony to watch my back, and you're it kiddo. Think you are up to that task?" The little filly nods, and Vinyl lights up her horn in an iridescent light. Taking a deep breath, she then takes her first steps into the passage, and slowly fades into the darkness as she walks deeper into the passage. It has been a few minutes since Vinyl had entered into the passage, and the only thing allowing her to see in the dark is the glow from Vinyl's horn. The passage had brought her up and down, left and right, and any other possible direction that she could have think of other than backwards. At times, it feels like she is in a perpetual maze that confounds those that thread the passage and driving mortals insane. However she knows that she will have to push on, and she will not give up now that she is this deep in the passage. As Vinyl navigated through the passage, Vinyl could only wonder what kind of stuff will come her way. She clearly hopes that there are no booby traps in this passage, as that would really be bad for her. She shudders as she remembered the scene from Daring Do and the Temple of Loot where some unfortunate pony had a messy death via flying scythes in a passage way. It was then that she could hear two muffled voices talking up ahead. Wondering what on Equestria are ponies doing in the tunnel until she realized that she is also in secret passage, she takes a few more steps ahead. It was then that she could see a thin line of light forming a square. Vinyl leans closer to the edge of that weird formation of light and soon enough she could hear two voices talking to each other. The mare could hear that the owner of the first voice is that of a stallion as its voice is deep. However the other voice is utterly confusing for Vinyl, as she could not recognize if the voice is that of a mare or a stallion. It is deep as the deepest of abyss, and it is as serene as the calmest of lakes. The voice is both alluring and yet insidious, and it disturbs her so. The voice is above all......sinister. The two are talking about some plan of theirs, but they never went into detail about their plans. They are apparently speaking in Equestrian, which surprises the mare. "Good, good everything is according to plan. Have the final piece of the puzzle arrived?" "Yes Milord, it shall be ready really soon." "With the trigger in place, there is nothing that they could have done." Soon enough the subordinate voice asked the other conspirator. "Milord, why can't we strike now? We could have cripple them in one strike....especially when we are already in position." "Plans within plans...wheels within wheels...Madness in method, that is genius." The slithering voice of the sinister otherworldly voice raise her mane up, as she is utterly creeped out by this maniac. She had no idea about what is about to happen, but she knows that it is going to be bad really soon. She then starts to go back the way in which she came, ready to tell the others about what she just heard. After she left, the sinister voice started to speak again. "It seems that there is a rat sneaking around...." The sinister voice said. As Fatimah waits for the blue-maned mare, she wondered if something bad had happened to her friend. However, from the darkness of the hidden passage she could see a glowing light slowly coming into being. Soon enough, the form of the unicorn could be seen and as soon as the unicorn returns to the bath the little filly jumps towards the mare, embracing her in a heartfelt hug. "You're back Vinny! I though something bad had happened to you!" Fatimah said worriedly. However, Fatimah could see that the unicorn is a little unsettled by something, and the little filly loosens up her grip and letting the unicorn recompose herself. "Well in a way something bad just happened. But on the bright side, we know that something bad is gonna happen so we can definitely stop it." Vinyl said confidently, swinging her arm in a hook and winking at the little filly.