//------------------------------// // Sky Temple, Equestria // Story: Daring and the Lost Ark // by Octavia_Melody //------------------------------// The rugged man in the brown fedora and jacket stepped forward into the bright glaring sunlight, wondering how he had found himself in such a predicament. He was clearly no longer in the Chachapoyan temple in Peru. He wasn’t even sure if he was still on planet Earth. The sun and the sky looked familiar, but not the wide, expansive platforms of grey stone which were floating on air with no support. He did not recall being picked up and flown into the air, he did not even remember stepping off onto a platform. At some indistinct moment of time he was transposed from the underground cavern to this stone city in the clouds. “Am I...dead?” he wondered, “Is this...the afterlife?” Indiana Jones tried to ponder what could have possibly killed him, among dozens of choices. Perhaps he had actually been impaled on that spear trap he thought he missed, perhaps one of the Hovitos had snuck up behind him with a blowgun, or perhaps that crook of a guide Satipo had done him in. “So if I’m dead, where’s the angel choir?” Indy mused, “Unless this is somehow that ‘other place’.” Indy doubted that Hell would have such a clear, sunny sky, or that Heaven would be made out of stone. Maybe he was in the afterlife of one of countless myths and legends. “So do I wait for Odin or Zeus to show up?” Indy pondered, “Horus, maybe?” As if answer to Indy’s last suggestion, an enormous eagle suddenly swooped down with a piercing screech, and lifted him up with its talons. “What the…?!” he shouted, “Put me down! Wait, don’t put me down!” Indy soon found he was no longer on a platform, but soaring higher into the sky, carried by a giant eagle. He could just barely make out the ground beneath him. He looked up to get a closer look at his captor and realized that it wasn’t an eagle, at least, not just an eagle. Its hind portions were closer to that of a lion’s paws and tail. “A griffon.” Indy noted, “I’ve been caught by a griffon. You’ve gotta be kidding me. So, are you taking me to see Zeus?” “No, I’m taking you to Ahuizotl.” the griffon replied in a female voice, “Hey! You’re not Daring Do!” “You can talk!” Indy realized, “Now I know I’m dreaming…if not, I sure hope that Zeus is a nicer guy than in the stories I’ve read...wait...did you say ahuizotl?” Indy knew the Aztec myth of the ahuizotl, a dog-like creature that ate human flesh. Indy realized that if he wasn’t already dead, then he might soon be. This was shaping up to the worst hodge-podge of myth he had ever been forced into. “What are you?” the griffon asked, “You’re clearly not a pegasus. And why are you wearing those strange clothes?” “Listen….lady, I have no idea where I am, or how the hell I got here!” Indy replied, “And now you’re taking me to some Aztec demon dog! I’m the one that should be asking the questions!” “Lord Ahuizotl sent me to fetch his arch-rival, the pegasus Daring Do, and bring him to him.” the griffon explained, “He promised me a reward, but perhaps you will do as well, strange creature.” “You’re a griffon working for an ahuizotl, and you’re calling me ‘strange creature’?” Indy said, “Just don’t drop me, alright.” “I can’t make any promises.” the griffon said, slyly. After only a few minutes of flight, the griffon placed Indy on the ground in the middle of what he assumed were Aztec ruins. He was surrounded by a stone wall overgrown with vines. He looked up and almost gasped at the creature before him. Seated on a stone Aztec-style throne, and strangely petting a white house cat, was indeed a blue ahuizotl, wearing a gold “Aztec” collar. The blue canine creature had an extra “paw” at the end of his tail, and his jagged teeth protruded from his upper lip. He was also flanked by his assistants; a tiger, a panther, and a lynx. Indy knew this was not going to end well. “My lord!” the griffon spoke up, “I have returned with this unusual creature that walks on two legs!” “This is not Daring Do! Who is this?!” Ahuizotl said in a loud, gruff, vaguely Latino accent, “Where is Daring Do?!” “Ahuizotl…” the griffon explained, “I could not find her. I found this ‘thing’ standing where she should have been.” Ahuizotl lumbered from his throne, over to Indy, and snarled. Indy stood defiantly, but knew that if the Aztec legends were true, he couldn’t afford to be too hasty. “What is your name, creature?!” the demon-dog shouted, “How did you get here?!” “What’s it to you, pal?” Indy said, “Whadda you want with me?” “I was not looking for you.” Ahuizotl replied, “I am searching for my arch-enemy, Daring Do. That little pegasus has foiled me one too many times!” “Pegasus?” Indy questioned, “This just keeps getting better and better.” “Silence!” Ahuizotl ordered, “What are you, anyway? I’ve never seen such a thing in my life. An almost hairless beast that walks on two legs…” “I’ve never seen a griffon or an ahuizotl before.” Indy remarked, “But judging from my experience so far, maybe I didn’t need to.” “I don’t know who you are, or how you arrived here…” Ahuizotl pondered, “But I’m going to make the best of a bad situation. Lock him up; maybe I’ll torture him later.” The three big cats, Ahuizotl’s cronies, all started to slink over to Indy, growling and snarling. Indy hadn’t taken on three big cats at once before, but this was as good a time as any to try. Indy instinctively reached for the bullwhip strapped to his side and cracked it open. The three cats roared at his as he cracked his whip on the ground, trying to frighten them away. The panther managed to pounce on him and Indy suddenly realized the whip was a bad strategy. “I’ve caught him!” the panther said. “Good!” Ahuizotl replied, “Take him to my dungeon!” The panther started to lift Indy up by the shoulders and drag him away. Indy reached for his pistol, strapped to the holster on the opposite side of his whip. He quietly cocked back the release and put his finger on the trigger. He jabbed his shoulder into the panther’s face and wrested out of the animal’s grasp. Indy spun around and aimed his gun right at the animal’s head. He fired a shot straight through the panther’s brain at point blank range. All of the Equestrian creatures present gasped as the shot rang out and shuddered as blood poured out of the panther’s wound. Ahuizotl’s hench-cat plopped dead on the ground, causing the tiger and lynx to step back in fear. “Lord Ahuizotl...” the tiger growled, “That creature...just killed...Pantera...” “Kill him Tigre!” Ahuzotl ordered, “Kill him!” Tigre started to pounce on Indy, spreading his claws to avenge his fallen friend. Indy raised his gun again, prepared to fire another shot, when a blinding flash of light caused everyone present to shield their eyes. As the light dissipated, Indy dropped his gun and rubbed his eyes. Once he regained his site, Indy’s jaw dropped in amazement, even in spite of all that had just transpired. A large blue object was materializing out of thin air, right beside Ahuizotl’s throne. It appeared to be a blue telephone booth, with the words “Police Box” etched on top of it. As close as Indy could tell, a British police box had arrived out of nowhere. Indy didn’t question it, as he was past the point of questioning anything. Before anyone else could question it, the door of the police box slid open, and out stepped a small brown pony with a dark brown mane, a blue tie, and an hourglass on his flank. “Dr. Jones!” the brown pony called out in an English accent, “Dr. Jones, are you here?!” “What?!” was all that Indy could manage to reply. “Oh, Dr. Jones, there you are!” the brown pony said, “Well, grab your things, and let’s come along then. I haven’t got time to explain, so you’ll just have to trust me.” Indy barely had time to comprehend why a brown pony who appeared out of a spontaneously existing police box knew his name, but considering his other option was to probably be mauled to death by a tiger, lynx, griffon, and ahuizotl, Indy decided to follow him. As Indy followed the pony into the police box, he turned around to face the Aztec demon dog. “Nice try, Ahuizotl!” Indy said, as he slid the door of the police box shut. Ahuizotl and his goons could only sit and stare in indignant amazement as the police box disappeared, taking the human and pony with it. The tiger and lynx stared pitifully at their fallen comrade as Ahuizotl’s pet cat hid behind him. The griffon started to ask for her reward, but since the bipedal creature had escaped, and she couldn’t shake the ghastly image of the dead panther from her mind, she took to the air and flew away. “Curse you...!!” Ahuizotl shouted, putting together Indy’s name, and shaking his paw in the air, “Dr. Jones!!”