//------------------------------// // Why Do Elks Fall? // Story: Odrsjot // by Imploding Colon //------------------------------// With limply trotting steps, Ebon Mane shuffled up a cleft of rocks overshadowing the crash-landed Noble Jury. He adjusted the bangs of his mane in the breeze as he approached Eagle Eye and Pilate. “Props… uh…” Ebon kicked at a few loose pebbles. “Propsy says it’s definitely repairable, but it’s gonna take her a while. She can make a rough patch for the hull along the starboard stern. That’s not the big issue, she claims. The hard part is fixing the steam propulsion. The network of pipes was kind of a junk job to begin with, something to temporarily replace the book of runes. So, having to fix it now is almost as hard as rebuilding from scrap.” “Does she need our assistance with it?” Pilate asked, his head tilted eastward. “She could use a helping hoof, yeah,” Ebon said, nodding. “But the heavy lifting is gonna be tough, what with… with…” He bit his lip. Eagle Eye glanced between the two stallions. “Well, I never expected to hear myself say this, but we’ve got no excuse to go soft.” He turned towards Pilate specifically. “You’ve got a technical mind, Pilate. Maybe you can direct all of us as we assist Props with the labor.” “I’ll be glad to do what I can,” Pilate replied. “As far as O.A.S.I.S. will allow me.” “That would be much appreciated.” Ebon smiled hopefully. “We’ll get the Noble Jury up in no time! You’ll see! It will be as if…” His words trailed off. With a nervous breathed, he leaned forward and craned his neck to look past Pilate’s shoulders. Off in the distance, a familiar elk could be seen along the hilly slopes, kneeling before a fresh mound of dirt. Ebon bit his lip. “Is… is he doing better now?” Pilate sighed. “He’s quieter now, for what it’s worth.” “Are…” Ebon fumbled slightly. “Are you doing okay, Pilate? I mean… h-have you--” “Have you heard from Belle at all since earlier?” Eagle Eye asked. “Yes.” Pilate slowly nodded. “She…” He gritted his teeth. “The Steel Wing is headed to some place northeast of here, a place called ‘Far Ridge.’ Supposedly there’s an abandoned facility there with sequencing tools and other mana-driven devices.” “And she’s going to try and help Shell to sequence with Imre?” Eagle Eye blinked. “Imre was Shell’s daughter?!” Pilate said nothing. “Well…” Ebon Mane exhaled. “At least we know she’s still alive.” “Yes.” Pilate nodded. “But for how long?” He tilted his twitching ears towards the stallions. “He’s obviously not kept his word to her. How’s he expected to abide by any promises?” “He strikes me as a stallion focused on his own interests alone,” Ebon Mane said. “He strikes me as friggin’ nuts!” Eagle Eye’s voice cracked. Ebon frowned and continued speaking, “So long as he’s made to believe that his best interests are being pursued, I think he’ll refrain from hurting your beloved.” He smiled gently. “Belle’s a genius of a mare, Pilate. She’ll know how to protect herself.” “Until when?” Pilate murmured. “We mount some sort of glorious rescue? Rainbow Dash is far away. Our Searonese bag of tricks is also missing. We’re all down one supremely powerful telekinetic. And the ship…” Pilate shook, quivered, and groaned. “Spark alive, our ship…” Ebon and Eagle Eye exchanged glances. Eventually, Eagle trotted over and placed a hoof gently on the zebra’s shoulder. “We’ve been through worse scrapes before. I know that’s hard to believe, but after having dealt with Killas and murderous foxes and exploding zeppelins…” He smiled gently. “I think I can take on the world, and I know that the rest of our friends can too.” “You mean like what Simon attempted to do?” “He… saved us, Pilate.” “And I would gladly give my life up ten times over…” The zebra glanced blindly over his shoulder. “Just to know that my beloved is safe.” Ebon cleared his throat. He shuffled forward and said, “What is it you’re always telling the rest of the Jury? Not to panic?” “It’s not fear that grips me right now.” That said, Pilate shuffled quietly forward, navigating the loose rocks and pebbles with beams from O.A.S.I.S. The other stallions stood in dull silence. Floydien’s antlers cast a web of shadows across the ground. As a cold wind blew in random bursts, he sat along the edge of the plateau, hunched, his muzzle just inches from the fresh grave before him. After a while, hooves scuffled to a stop behind him. A voice murmured, “You have given us your gifts, your talents, and even your ship.” Floydien tilted his head up slightly. Two dull eyes stared into the east horizon. Pilate stood like a striped shadow behind the elk. “You were there for me when I was alone and helpless,” the zebra murmured. “You went out on countless limbs to save those most dear to me.” He sucked his breath in and said, “But I never… ever wanted you to give up this.” Floydien’s eyes gazed into the stony earth yet again. “Nothing… in life can excuse the loss of someone so close to us…” Pilate hoarsely said. “So tender. And when it happens… there’s the need for excuses. But I have none to give, my friend.” The runes along his plate dulled as he sat back on his haunches. “I’m so sorry that this happened, Mr. Floydien. I know that what Simon did was brave, but I keep going back in my mind and wondering how I could have prevented it somehow. And all I can think of is… is…” Pilate clenched his teeth. Moisture lined the edges of his clear eyes. “It… it is my fault…” He shuddered. “It is my fault for ever meeting you, for letting you get entangled in the perilous insanity that my life has become. Sure, you may not have gotten your Nancy Jane back, but perhaps that would have been a good thing. You could have lived another life, a safer one, cleansed of all the monsters that butchered the parts of you most precious. You could have washed clear the scars of Deep Ridge, instead of just making them bleed all over themselves. I…” The zebra sniffled. He burrowed his face in two forelimbs as the the stallion wept openly. “I could have given you so much better, Belle. Instead, it’s this nightmare all over again, my beloved. I was supposed to be the ship’s navigator. I should have known the skystone would have triggered an attack. I should have foreseen it. It’s my job, and I let you fall into the hooves of that monster again…” He seethed and whimpered. “We shouldn’t just stayed in Gray Smoke. We never should have come this far. We never should have pierced the wicked skies. Not for a day… an hour… a second…” At that precise moment, a pair of cloven hooves hoisted Pilate to all fours. The zebra teetered, tilting his head breathlessly towards the elk. Floydien leaned in with a scowl. “Little boomer did not save the stripes so that the stripes could drown in spit.” Pilate gulped and murmured, “Mr. Floydien…?” “A head of metal does the striped boomer possess. It’s not carved. It’s not pointed. It knows only the glimmer and none of the stabs.” Floydien leaned forward and whispered into the zebra’s ear. “A sharpness of dreamly teeth, that is what striped boomer has. Best to keep it that way, yes yes yes?” “I… I…” Pilate shook his head. “Mr. Floydien, I-I do not understand.” “Neither does Floydien understand,” the elk said, his eyes lost before the weight of the mountains around them. “The song in boomer breath. The taste and warmth of a beloved…” His muzzle loosened. “A true, true beloved.” After a few blinks, he said in a firmer tone, “But striped boomer knows, and is boomer’s job to live in the glimmer.” He shook his head. “Nancy Jane isn’t shattered, and neither is Floydien. After all, Floydien’s beloved forgave him a long time ago.” He trotted past Pilate. Pilate stood, mouth agape. “Forgave?” He twirled about. “Forgave you for what?” Floydien grinded to a stop. He turned and frowned. “All that Floydien has left is breaking stabs. And the biggest stabby-stabby of all has a fissure with Floydien’s name written on it.” His teeth produced sparks against one another. “Now, is striped boomer going to help Floydien or will Floydien have to bury him too?” Pilate wiped his cheek dry. With a shuddering breath, he nodded. “You can count on me.” “Good,” the elk said in a grunting tone. “Because it is difficult for Floydien when stripes stand under cloud cover.” He motioned as he broke into a gallop towards the Noble Jury. “Come through swift swift. The blonde boomer waits for no one.”