//------------------------------// // Location #1 (Finished) - Fighting // Story: The Challenges in Time // by Homura-Akemi-Magica //------------------------------// Octavia’s reflexes acted on their own; she drew her hoof up and struck the Doctor across his cheek. The Doctor’s body was thrown to the left of Octavia from her hoof’s impact. Octavia lowered her hoof and wondered what she did. She wasn’t used to fighting and had no idea what to do next. The Doctor shook his head left and right to clear his head and then stood up on all fours; growling. Octavia stared wide-eyed at the growling pony; she had to think of something… and fast. “Lyra! Quickly, light up your horn and blast a ray of light at him!” Octavia yelled; she seemed to have an idea. Lyra shook her up and down slowly and lightly. She readied her horn and started charging up. Her horn slowly grew brighter and brighter. Octavia continued looking back and forth from Lyra to the Doctor; the Doctor ran towards her again. Octavia was frozen solid and remained still; she prepared for the impact; it never came. She heard a sharp crunching noise; this made her look up. In front of her, she saw Vinyl delivering a sucker punch to the Doctor’s cheek; right where Octavia had punched before. “READY!” Lyra yelled as she prepared to fire her horn’s charging light beam. There was a loud sizzling sound as Lyra’s horn delivered a light beam blast to the Doctor. The Doctor’s body was incased in a yellowish hue as he screamed a distorted melody. The Doctor’s ear-piercing scream continued for another 2 minutes before it finally stopped. The light around his body disappeared; it revealed the Doctor lying on the ground in a heap of himself. His eyes opened up and the ponies were pleasantly surprised to find his normal blue eyes shining. He stood up uneasily while scratching his head with his hoof out of confusion. “Wha…what happened?” He asked out of severe confusion. Vinyl was about to yell something before Octavia cut her off. “Oh..um, you just passed out. We managed to wake you up though.” Octavia lied as she watched his facial reactions to see if he would buy the lie she just made. The Doctor shook his head in an up and down pattern. Octavia silently thanked Celestia that the lie actually worked. Octavia then realized something. She started thinking to herself. ‘We destroyed the monster that controlled the shadow ponies. But, the Doctor was still evil even when we defeated it. Does that mean the monster is still alive? Or, maybe there was more than one?’ Octavia silently thought to herself. “Yo! Earth to Octavia! You there?!” Vinyl yelled loudly into Octavia’s ears. Octavia shook her head rapidly to try and clear her head. She wanted to get out and get out fast. She loathed this place; she was sure they would agree. “Listen. Maybe we should leave. I don’t like it here. Vinyl was right; we didn’t find a thing and we wasted our time.” The classical pony said, nearly defeated. Octy dropped down on her hind legs and stared miserably at the ground. The other five simply stared sadly at her. Vinyl was the first to pipe up. “Hey, come on Octy. I’m sure we could find something around here. There’s got to be something hear; I mean the portal brought us here, so something must be here, right?” Vinyl asked. Octavia knew she was right. This was all a tests of the sort; she knew it. As Celestia as her witness, she was going to survive; find something and get out of this living hell. Octavia quickly stood up and started walking away before stopping altogether. “Vinyl’s right. We can’t give up. Let’s continue searching for something; anything.” Octavia states full of enthusiasm. “YEAH!” Lyra, BonBon, Doctor, Vinyl and Derpy all stated excitedly. Octavia began trotting away from the group and started moving forward. All of their hooves echoed against the rocky terrain of the cave. Besides a demolished building; shadow ponies; and that evil voice; nothing of interest had been found. Octavia knew this but refused to give up. Each of them continued trotting until a loud slam could be heard. This caused Octavia to turn around and notice that Derpy had bumped into a large rock. The large rock then toppled over and fell into the deep depths below. “Derpy! Please, be more careful.” The Doctor harshly yelled. “Sorry.” Derpy said before flying back into a normal formation. “It’s fine.” Octavia stated; the last thing she wanted was fighting. They all continued to trot but after 30 solid minutes; they found nothing. They were close to giving up; until Lyra called for the other ponies’ names. The five ponies looked around until the noticed Lyra wasn’t even directly near them. Lyra continuously called their names while ignoring the five ponies’ obvious annoyance at this. The five managed to trot over to find Lyra with her back turned toward them. Lyra realized they were nearby and decided to turn around to face them. Lyra stood on her hind legs while presenting a key to them. The key had a skull-like shape with the skull’s eyes having a red glowing hue to it. Octavia stared at the smile and then lightly smiled. ‘Maybe this wasn’t a waste of time after all.’ Octavia quickly thinks to herself. Vinyl quickly grabs the key out of Lyra’s hoof. “Alright everypony! Now, we’re making some progress!” Vinyl happily states. Octavia simply mutters the word, ‘agreed’ while the other 4 simply shake their head up and down; each with a smile on their face. Then a white light flashes in front of their eyes. They quickly place a hoof in front of each individual pony’s eyes to lessen the direct blinding light. Once their eyes seem to focus; they place their hooves down and stare forward curiously. It was the portal from before. The ponies stare at one another as if to ask if they should go through it. Vinyl quickly nods and starts running towards it; she jumps through and disappears from sight. The Doctor stares wide eyed and jumps through the portal like Vinyl did previously. Lyra quickly jumped through as well; Derpy clumsily flew through to the other side. The only ones that remained were Octavia and BonBon. Octavia quickly grabs BonBon’s hooves and jumps through to the other side. The portal then closes from sight.