Screaming dreams from the lost memories of and old skull were kept alive and strong by their final fear, but as the towering salamander watched the trail of ash fall from its own mouth and into the open face of the pony; it felt an absolute, tangible terror explode from the yellow body below that shook even its own body. As the ash coated the pony and rising puffs of smoke melded with the shaking air above both of them, the pony felt the ash boiling with a vital energy that snaps its wings open. Dim teal eyes widen as bright images flow up from the back of the ponies mind and fill the space inside the shuttering air.
The beat and crack of small hooves over dry leaves and a heavily thudding heart inside her chest framed the beginning of the growing images. Her hooves skid across dark and blackened leaves as she stops before a clearing in the forest. A figure approaches across the same leaves and brings with it a sense of friendship as the name Zecora grows inside the ponies mind. They both struggle to catch their breaths after running trough the depths of the forest and as their eyes quickly lock onto each other, hope grew. It grew with the desire that the sight inside the clearing was not what it seemed to be.
The black leaves blew in a silent wind as the two turn from each other, before them was what could only have been an aftermath of something large and powerful. Broken and blown down trees radiate out and away from a burning crater that left a narrow angle in the ground. A new brief image. Her memory of the first shock wave that rolled through her home. It rattled furniture. And a sense of a dragon landing in the forest came through. When the shaking ground stopped for a moment, it came booming even stronger. She jumped at the second rumble and started running. The thoughts of the shock wave bled back to the sight of what caused her to run herself ragged.
An almost redoubling of the fear she felt from before ran along her spine while looking into the hole, it stretches out several times the size of even a large dragon and the trees unlucky enough to have stood where the hole was now were nothing but crushed and smoldering remains. Turning to her friend, Zecora, she speaks with high concern “Dragons don't smash craters into the ground like this, do they?”
The burned branches and leaves of a willow tree laid scattered from the rim of the crater to where they stood, at seeing them her thin yellow wings came open to begin beating at the air. She climbs cautiously up over the center of the pit to look for either what caused this or for any injured animals that might have been resting in the ruined trees.
From her rising position in the air there were signs of deeper pits among the smoldering fires. They steamed white smoke and sizzled with what looked to be nearly molten rock. Circular marks also show themselves as she moves closer to the center of the pit. They've stamps down a heavy trail that leads out from the depths and head towards the far end of the crater, following them, she finds the dirt they stamp down wasn't deep but it was boiling hot. The last one she sees didn't seem to leave the rest of the clearing of fallen trees however.
When she looks back and below herself for signs of any animals in the area, a twitch of movement caught the corner of her eyes; her ears swivel back then quickly towards the craters rim. Her friend was running along the edge in a frantic state. The sight of her friend sends a painful chill across her back. A second sense of movement came from above and behind, it came with bursts of cold breath rolling past her body as she turns her head-
The image between the red and teal eyes crumbles in that instant, leaving both the salamander and the pony looking into the fading shutter of air. Red eyes see the sudden wetness in the eyes of the small pony, they also watch as the ash covering her yellow fur begins to dissolve. The pony snaps out of her memories and blinks back the tears, her heart felt tight and there was still the empty and distant look inside her teal rings but as her disorientation from what she had just experienced wanes a glimmer returns. She felt a sense of melting, as the warm ash came off her it brought a calm feeling.
The decaying room sat mostly silent with only the dull popping sound of the ash as it dissolves and falls onto the floor to interrupt the quiet. Every time the ponies eyes cross over the creature's face it's mouth turns up in a smile, then she would look away. When she did that, its head would lower slightly to watch the ash fade away from her coat.
The fear from her memories swam in its mind and blinking heavily it finally moves a long toe to scratch at its neck before rising up and quickly towering over the pony. “So much fear, without seeing anything?” It questions, the boom of its voice was low but still strong enough to shake the silents from the room. “To this, I am not accustomed...”
She looks up at it again. There is no smile upon its face this time but instead it looks down and reaches one leg out towards her. The movement isn't fast and when the forward most claw taps lightly against her chest it elicits a small squeak from her and she cowers farther into the corner. The claw is pulled back as the salamander clears its throat. “Introductions are proper, yes?” -Bowing its flat head making the top of it visible.- “I am called Memoir Baan Textile.”
Quietly, the pony states with a demur replay. “I'm – My name is Fluttershy, I am sorry for locking the door on you.” She shuttered slightly before lifting herself up from the corner, the movement dislodging more of the ash. “And I was afraid of it, I was afraid of you too. I was treating you poorly though.” Slowly stretching herself causes a spat of sizzling red muck to slid off her and land on the ground; she jumps back from it, her eyes going wide at the sight of brown and green muck attached to the substance.
The shine of her coat was coming through, though to Memoir's eyes it was still lacking in the volume it had in her memories. “I looked back at it,” Fluttershy said while trying to get her own memories out. “I felt you watching what I remembered and where it stopped... when I turned around, I think I might have wanted to be looking at a dragon. But even though it had black scales over its head, its muzzle was covered in fur and it had flat teeth. The only other thing I can remember before I flew away from the thing was that the first time it moved looked like – like,” Fluttershy said, the sound of hesitation in her voice raises Memoir's attention. “Like it teleported.”
“When I tried to find my friend Zecora, I was thrown into the air by it.” A shutter ran down her thin frame at her own memory of what that felt like. “I was all alone here when I came to. My – all of my friends are gone and even my house is in shambles.” She sniffed back a sense of flowing emotions before looking up. “What happened?”
The small question put a resolute grin on Memoir's wide face. Smiling and standing at attention, ideas of what must have happened to her ran rampant through his head before faltering. His red eyes swiveled around as if trying to look for something inside their own sockets. “Not accustomed-” apprehension rang in Memoir's voice once his eyes came back into view. “You were... The smells here are wrong, too pungent; too old.” His thin nostrils flaring to try and emphasis the point. “I tried going somewhere that had wariness and fear, but not forgotten or hunted. I can try again.”
Memoir's eyes focused on Fluttershy, His voice growing concerned as he sniffs the air. “Memories of old thoughts, the smells they make, things come out in colors and feelings to me. Black and white, your friend from in the memory or those monsters; terrorized and lost.” -another sniff,- “There's hope, pink and purples. More white with blue and hunted. A swirl of blue and pink and pink and blue...” Memoir's voice tapered off for a moment and his wide head nearly hits the ground, letting his nose continue to hoover now at the air and ground. “The smells are still all going in the wrong directions.”
“With the colors, can you tell where my friends are?” Fluttershy asked, the light in her eyes growing even stronger. “If you can smell them then could you take me with you to find them?” She stepped farther out from the rooms corner and up to Memoir, hoping that her desperation to see her friends would be felt through her proximity. To the thin nostrils before her she still held a fearful sent, but Memoir's smile grew. He lifts his head high before slamming the ground hard enough to send out the sound of dull wooden cracks. Fluttershy jumps back from the sudden shock but otherwise doesn't move as Memoir swings his head back and forth; collecting all the smells he can.
Several turns of his large body churns colors and memories into the air. Trying to find any stronger sent, the pink and blue ones seemed close and safe, as did the hunted white color. There were more dimly glowing colors, one a mix of brown and strife, another of orange and green, the orange was bright and lingered heavily in the floor with a profound lost; a fake memory.
Stopping at another sent, his nose widened. A strong intake of air made his red pupils began to glow. “There's sick, old and sick; and wrong.” Memoir’s eyes deepen. His mouth opens with a rabid growl as he turns his head toward the broken doorway. “It smells like rotting life, a decayed spirit.”
Lifeless stone eyes watched them. They were perched on top of a cracked stone animal. A golem of a fat bull frog.
It was wider then the door, its eyes, tapping into the rotted top as it pressed its large body against the frame, trying to get a better look inside. Fluttershy, once she saw what it was, felt lost for how to react. The golem was just bigger then herself and the eyes on top had just enough detail for her to notice that it was looking at her. Memoir's body moved farther in front of her, just enough between the two of them that she only barely saw the golem shrink back from the door.
The stone eyes roll as its body shutters. A smoldering heat ignites, rising in its depths, swelling its already massive stomach and pushing a blast of steam out from the gravely opening of its mouth. As the heat grows, cracks in its body form. A molten red light touches its lips as the steam shuttered out any hole it could find.
Memoir held on to the molded floor, lowering himself down as far as he could get, and swung his tail around Fluttershy; blocking her completely behind him.
“RIBBIT”