//------------------------------// // The Trap is Set! Magellan Closes In! // Story: My Little Pirates: Luffy's Adventures in Equestria // by Fullmetal Pony //------------------------------//         “Gwwwwaahhhhh!” Stone Wall roared. Luffy’s teeth sunk deeper into his left arm, inducing more screaming. He leered down at Luffy and raised his club at the same time. “You want a bite? Then how about a fight!”         The club smacked Luffy in the face, his elastic body useless against the sharp spikes that dotted the weapon. He spiralled away from Stone Wall and into a nearby wall. It heaved under his impact and a few stones fell from it and crashed to the ground.         “Hands off!” Bon Clay yelled. He launched himself into the air and spun himself into a series of rotations. They stopped when one of his hindlegs connected with Stone Wall’s face.         Stone Wall glared down at the Bon’s hoof, which was still digging into his left cheek. He snorted and grabbed Bon’s neck with his left hand and slammed him to the ground. A bit of blood pulsed out of the wound Luffy had dealt to him. Bon let out a series of raspes.         “Jet Buck!” Two hooves struck Stone Wall in the face at blurring speed. He didn’t even have time to grunt before the attack vaulted him off the ground and sent him crashing into another part of Level Three. Luffy’s hindlegs retracted and he canceled out Gear Second. He panted and looked over to Bon. “You okay?”         A series of coughs and gasps came out of Bon’s mouth. They grew less violent and soon stopped. Bon stared straight up at the ceiling and breathed. “I thought I saw a field of queens.”         “Come on,” Luffy complained. “That attack made me hungry. Plus, that guy had really tough skin, so he probably won’t be gone for long.”         “You’re right.” Bon bolted upright. A bit of the shell around his neck was cracked, but he appeared in a relatively good state otherwise. “Let’s get going to Level Four. It’ll be a snap from here.”         Bon trotted forward and Luffy followed. The stone on Luffy’s leg remained yellow and a quiet murmuring could be heard from it. He bent his head down while he continued to walk. “Oi, are you saying something?” “I... I’m just worried about Stone Wall,” Fluttershy softly replied. “He tried to kill me and Bon.” “I... oh...” The stone’s color darkened and stabilized at a deep orange. “Ah think it’s best the rest of us handle talks from here if there’s gonna be anymore fighting,” said Applejack. “From the sound of thing, ya just delivered one hay of a buck.” “I guess, but it made me really hungry.” “Oi, Mugi-chan!” Bon called out. It took Luffy a second to spot him since he’d moved up to the top of a stack of cells and now stood under a large arch. The air that escaped out of it was distorted and thick with smoke. “Here’s the way down!” Luffy latched a hoof onto the edge Bon was on and rocketed himself up. He repeated the same move to reach the edge of the arch, but the flesh of his leg touched the stone as well and began to smoke. “Ouch!” He quickly retracted his singed leg and blew on it. “Hot!” “Indeed,” Bon commented. His wings flicked out and he got down on his haunches. “It’s not called the Inferno Hell as a joke.” “So we’ll fly down?” A smile erupted onto Luffy’s face. “That’s awesome!” “Well...” Bon glanced back at his wings. “Thing is, I’m not too sure how long I can fly with these. I can get us inside though. Now, hop on.” “Shoulda captured the cow,” Luffy grumbled. He got onto Bon’s back and they both zipped up to the arch. Bon landed and they both looked down. “Woah!” Everything below was obscured in smoke. Tongues of green, blue, and other colors of fire sprouted up in various spots amongst the plume, which flew up into a massive fan that composed the ceiling. Their glow glistened against the wall in a hellish manner and their heat spiraled straight up. Luffy wiped a profuse amount of sweat from his forehead. “It’s too hot!” “This is nothing.” Bon shuddered in spite of the heat. “It’s even worse at the bottom with a boiling lake and guards that cause those fires.” He leaned over the edge. “Jumping down is risking more than just burns.” “So, who are you willing to go down there for then?” Luffy asked. A smile crept across Bon’s face. “A miracle worker.” His wings fluttered out in a dramatic show. “He’s called Iva! The Queen of the Kamabaka Queendom, the Pink Paradise of the Grand Line. Every queen looks up to him as the greatest drag queen of all!” He raised up a hind leg and brought his forelegs back to touch it. “I want to meet him! Rescue him if I can!” “Now hold on,” said Applejack. “Ya keep saying ‘queen’... wouldn’t a ‘he’ be a...” The stone went from orange to black for a moment. It soon returned to orange, but Applejack’s voice now had a slight stutter to it. “Ah’ve... uh, ya just do what ya want.” A shriek brought Luffy and Bon’s attentions to the right of them. At the head of a cloud of dust was Trixie in a full gallop. Mr. 3 and Buggy were close behind her and also running at full speed. Towering above them and the dust was Stone Wall. He roared and swung his club back and forth, slashing it through the air and cracking it against the ground. Trixie’s group quickly reached Luffy and Bon and the pair joined up in fleeing from Stone Wall. “Hey!” Bon yelled in Mr. 3’s general direction. “I thought you were escaping! Why’d you lead that brute back to us?” “We were escaping!” Mr. 3 shouted back. “The minotaur came flying out of nowhere and cut off our path!” “Odd,” Luffy calmly commented, “I just kicked it.” “This is your fault!” Buggy snorted. “I’ll kill you later, Straw Hat, but I’ll take this bastard out first! You remember my Buggy Ball, right?” “No,” Luffy replied. “It’s my trademark weapon,” Buggy mumbled. His vision then sharpened and he glared back at Stone Wall. “I made a version small enough to conceal though! I call it the Muggy Ball!’ “Enough!” Trixie screeched. “Now is not the time for showing off! Just use it!” Buggy came to a halt and spun around. Stone Wall continued charging at him and the rest of the group, but he bent down to his front hoof and pulled out a small sphere from the frog of it. He chucked it into the air and sent it flying with a buck. It struck Stone Wall on the tip of his nose. A wave of flame and force erupted out of the ball. The explosion knocked everypony to their knees and shook the floor around them. When the smoke cleared, Stone Wall was barely standing and burned from horn to hoof. He stumbled forward with his club trailing against the ground. “He’s still conscious?” Buggy exclaimed. “We’ll handle this! Right, Mugi-chan?” Bon launched into the air and zoomed at Stone Wall. Instead of following Bon’s lead, Luffy turned to Mr. 3. “That guy’s really tough, think you make one of those candle things?” “It’ll only last seconds in this heat!” Mr. 3 replied. “Long enough for me!” Luffy called back. Meanwhile, Bon zipped up high over Stone Wall and raised up a hindleg. “Time for some payback! Okama Kenpo! Winter Wonderland Jete!” Bon’s leg cracked Stone Wall right in between his horns. The force of the hit made him drop his club and shook his balance. He was still upright though. Luffy rushed him as fast as he could with one of his forelegs encased in wax. “Gum-Gum Horseshoe!” The attack decked Stone Wall square in the jaw. He stumbled backwards and wavered on the edge of the walkway. A blue aura materialized in the air and slammed down into the stone in front of him. There was the sharp crack of rock splitting and then the floor beneath him crumbled downward. Too beaten up to yell, he gurgled instead and disappeared into the smoke. “Trixie did it!” Trixie happily proclaimed. She jumped up in down in victory. Another cracking noise was heard and she stopped. Fissures spread all around her and everypony else. “Oh... Trixie may have overdone it.” “You...” Buggy started to curse. He took a step forward, but that was all it took to dislodge the rest of the floor. “You stupid horse!” Buggy’s voice mixed in with everypony else’s in a jumble of screams. The smoke consumed them and they vanished deeper into the inferno. ~~~ “Go on! Back to the cells!” A guard hissed, sending coils of steam out from between his teeth. He lashed his tail at the prisoners in front of them. It raked across a few of their backs and left deep cuts. One of the prisoners slammed his hooves into the ground. Before the guard could react, he bolted off. His chains clinked as he galloped and flailed at anything in his path. “I can’t take it! I’ll fry! Move!” He raised up his hooves and brought the chains down onto the shaven head of a pony in front of him. The shaved pony spun around and headbutted the escapee right over the edge. The escapee roared in rage; there was a splash and the roar turned into a bloodcurdling scream. The guard raced over to the shaved pony and whipped him with his tail. “No fighting!” The shaved pony licked up some of the blood that had dribbled down from where the escapee had struck him. He silently turned around and made his way back to his cell. Blood also poured down his side where the guard had hit him, obscuring the archaic “one” character on his flank. ~~~          “Idiot!” Buggy jabbed an accusing hoof at Trixie. “You could have killed us all!” “Trixie did not though!” she yelled back. Trails of wax fell over both Buggy and Trixie’s muzzles. Mr. 3 picked himself up from the rubble and glared at both of them. “I should have done this from the beginning. The last thing we need is more yelling. Our little fall won’t go unnoticed by the guards, so either shut up, or I’ll shove wax down your throats and make this a solo escape!” Buggy and Trixie nervously looked at each other and quickly bowed their heads to Mr. 3. He smiled and canceled out his power. The wax around their muzzles sloshed onto to the floor and they spat out what was left of it in their mouth. The rubble behind the group shifted and Luffy popped out of it along with Bon. He clambered down the broken stones and raced off. “I smell something good!” Bon buzzed after him. “Wait, Mugi-chan!” Idiots, thought Trixie, and Mr. 3 at the same time. “Hmm, something to eat doesn’t sound too bad,” said Buggy. “No...” Mr. 3 glanced upwards. “We’ll eat later. For now, Buggy, can you get us out of obvious sight?” ~~~ “There he is!” a dragon guard extended his a claw out at a figure racing at him. “Capture Straw Hat Luffy!” The other guards roared and a few shot out jets of flame. Luffy dodged the fire and sent back his forelegs. “Gah, I just want some food!” His hooves shot and smashed the guards in various places. A few lucky shots hit guards in the face and sent them spiraling to the ground, but many more struck the guards’ bodies or arms and they merely grunted. Luffy barreled forward, tucked his limbs into his torso, and sent them flying out. “Gum Gum Fireworks!” ~~~         Buggy’s body reconnected with his hooves and Trixie slid off his back. He sighed and took a chance to look down at the boiling lake. A few walkways were visible from the spot as well. The rest was a mess of fire and smoke. He swung his head back around to Mr. 3. “C’mon! We just got through Level Three! I’m starving.”         A gurgle came from Trixie’s stomach and she blushed a little. “Trixie wouldn’t mind some refreshments either.”         “Look and listen! It’s too quiet for Level Four. Look.” Mr. 3 swept a hoof across all that they could see amidst the smoke. Columns of guards marched along the walkways, blocking them off. Nothing else moved down below. “No prisoners out and guards in organized movements. It’s unnatural. We need to stay in the shadows and check the exits. This is probably a trap.”         “That doesn’t make any sense,” Trixie objected. “We were going up! Why set a trap further down?”         “She has a point,” Buggy grunted.         “Limited information on our movement and placing priority on stopping Straw Hat is probably what’s going on through their minds.” Mr. 3 paused and lowered his head. A grim look crossed his face. “That means they want to end any disturbances here. If the minotaur was anything to go by, we should expect the other jailer beast to be on the loose too.”         “Worse...” he continued, his voice gaining a quiver to it, “Warden Magellan’s office is on this Level.”         “Pah,” Trixie chortled. “He’s probably just some fat bureaucrat wh—”         Mr. 3 rushed and Trixie and slammed her against the wall. She squirmed and kicked her hooves, but he kept his hold. He leaned forward and stared at her point blank. “One more word of stupidity like that and I’ll throw you in the boiling lake myself. If the Warden is moving, none of us are safe.” ~~~         Luffy finished off the last guard and raced forward once more. Something dropped down in front of him and splashed against the floor. Vapors arose from the spot where the droplet landed and the stone below dissolved into nothing. “Huh? Is that lava?         “Mugi-chan!” Bon yelled at the top of his lungs. “Run!”         “Why?” Luffy was answered with the area around him darkening. He looked up and jumped out of the way as a black shape crashed into the ground. Bat wings shot out from the shape. It raised up its horned head and leered down at Luffy with blood red eyes. “What the hell is that?”         “Scum!” Magellan bellowed.