//------------------------------// // Beached // Story: JAWS & FINS // by Octavia_Melody //------------------------------// Twilight returned Spike’s embrace and they both made off to their bedroom to make more dracorns, but hopefully not really. The Sparkle household did end up going to the beach, as Twilight didn’t want to disappoint Rose and Thorn, as she also wanted them to fight outside instead of in the house. She also let them play in the water, with great reluctance, but there was a rather large crowd, and nopony else’s children seemed to be in any danger. Spike was lying out on a towel, wearing sunglasses, tanning his scales. Twilight was sitting under an umbrella, halfway reading a book about new spells she could try, but also halfway reading a book about sharks. Her morbid curiosity was almost as undeniable as her general curiosity. Rose and Thorn were passing each other a beach ball with their foreheads, a bit of a distance away from the other children. Not everypony approved of the unions of dragons and ponies, and thus not everypony’s children approved of ‘scale-flank’ children. “Hey, scale-flanks!” called out a pink filly with a purple mane and a diamond tiara on her head, “Try not to burn the ball!” “Shut the buck up!” Rose shouted back in language that neither her mother nor father approved of. “You swore!” Diamond Tiara snarked, “I’m telling your Mom!” “No, don’t!!” Rose panicked as Diamond ran up to Twilight. “Ms. Sparkle! Ms. Sparkle!” Diamond shouted, “Rose said a bad word!” “You’re in trouble now, dragon breath!” snarked a grey filly with a silver mane and blue glasses. “How’s this for dragon breath!” Thorn replied, breathing a little green flame on Silver Spoon. “Ahhh!” the grey filly screamed, quickly rubbing her flank in the sand, “He’s burning me!” “Hey, freaks!” Diamond Tiara said to the dracorns, “You’re in trouble now!” Before Rose and Thorn had time to argue, Twilight was tugging both their children by their scaly ears. “I raised you better than to use swear words, young filly!” Twilight said, “Why don’t I wash both your mouths out with soap?” “But Mom!” Thorn argued, “It was Rose who said it! And you say bad words all the time!” Twilight’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment at her son’s logic but she still frowned on him. “That’s no excuse for you two to use them.” she countered, “And besides, it’s not safe to go in the water.” “But Diamond called us ‘scale-flanks’ and ‘freaks’!” Rose argued. “She did, did she?” Twilight pondered, weighing the options between teaching her children to love their enemies, or pursue vengeance. “I’m sure your father wouldn’t approve.” was the best she could say at the moment. Diamond Tiara had had her fun with the dracorns and decided to go out to sea on her inflatable chair. She put her sunglasses on, grabbed the chair from where her parents were sitting, and snuck a zap apple soda from the cooler when her parents weren’t looking. “Wait just a minute, young filly!” a stern-looking brown colt with dollar signs on his flank announced. “But, Dad!” Diamond argued, “They were calling me names-.” “Did you put on sunscreen?” Filthy Rich, Diamond’s father, inquired. “Huh?” Diamond said, “Oh, sunscreen, right. Sure.” The pink filly ran out into the water before Filthy could get in another word. Diamond popped open the tab on her zap apple soda and put in a bendy straw. She sipped on the soda and placed it in the floating armchair’s cupholder. She almost fell asleep but was awakened by the sounds of a frantic pink pony. Pinkie Pie, a bright pink pony the same age as Twilight, was worriedly pacing through the water and yelling. “Gummy!” she called out, “Gummy, where are you?!” Gummy was the name of Pinkie’s toothless baby alligator, who loved to swim in the water, and was now nowhere to be found. “Gummy, come back!!” Pinkie shouted. Pinkie’s fluffy mane deflated into straight hair when she realized that Gummy had disappeared. She did not notice the small cloud of blood floating near Diamond Tiara’s chair. The spoiled young filly barely noticed until it was too late the sharp pain in her side. A few ponies in the crowd noticed the tip of a fin skirting through the water. Diamond gave a gurgled shriek as the water turned red and she was pulled under. “Shark!!” somepony shouted, “Shark in the water!!” Before Twilight had even realized it, the crowd was in full panic mode, everypony nearly trampling everypony else. “Everpony out of the water, now!!” Twilight shouted a little too late. Silver Spoon stood in horrified shock as she witnessed her best friend go under the water, and a bloody, deflated chair float up in shore. “Have you seen Diamond Tiara?” Filthy Rich asked Silver, just before he noticed what was left of the chair. “Oh, Celestia, no…” Filthy whispered, starting to cry. Silver was too mortified to cry, and just stood there, unable to move. Diamond’s mother, Emerald Tiara, trotted over and when she realized what happened, collapsed in a heap of tears. “My little baby…” she sobbed. In a few minutes, the crowd had scattered, and Twilight had walked up to the scene. She placed her face in her hoof and sighed, realizing she would have to file another report. Rose and Thorn looked at their mother, confused and scared. Spike put his claws on their shoulders and urged them to follow him home. The next day, a town meeting was held to discuss the so-called “shark problem”. A crowd of townsponies and a small group of reporters filled the city council chamber. Mayor Mare presided over the meeting and Chief Sparkle sat on a panel along with the Sunset Shores council members. Twilight in particular had a resentful sneer on her face. “Quiet down. Quiet down, everypony.” the mayor urged the room, “We all know why we’re here. Let’s just get these questions over with.” “Will that 5,000 bits be in coins or check?” said a random fisherpony at the back of the room. The room filled with laughter and Mayor Mare banged her hoof on the table. “Alright, back to order.” she said, “You’ll have to discuss payment for the shark’s capture with Mr. Rich. He’s the one that put the ad in the paper.” “Are the beaches going to be shut down?” asked another random townspony. “Yes, I’m afraid so.” Mayor Mare replied, “But only for four days. More than enough time to deal with this alleged shark.” “Only four days!” Twilight protested, “I didn’t agree to that!” “Four days is too much!” the crowd countered, “Tourists pour in next week! We’ll lose half our business!” Twilight was about to bang her own hoof on the table to lecture everypony on their sheer stupidity, but was interrupted when somepony did it for her. The crowd was silenced by a harsh scraping noise from the back of the room. An orange pony with yellow mane and a brown cowpony hat was running her hoof across the chalkboard. She leaned back in her chair, her hat covering her eyes. “Howdy, y’all.” she announced, lifting up the brim of her hat, “Y’all know me; y’all know what ah do for a livin’. Y’all got a bad fish, but ah’ll catch ‘im and kill ‘im. One bite, ‘ull swallow you whole.” The orange pony demonstrated this by violently biting into an apple and chewing it loudly. “A little shakin’, a little tenderizin’, and down you go like zap apple cider in winter.” she explained, “And ah value my hide a hay of a lot more than 5,000 bits. 20,000 bits you get the head, the tail, the whole durned thing. Mayor. Chief.” The orange pony tipped her hat to the both of them and trotted out of the room. “We’ll certainly take Ms. Applejack’s offer into consideration.” Mayor Mare concluded, “Now if there aren’t any other pressing matters, I declare this meeting adjourned.” The crowd shuffled out of the council chamber and Twilight soon followed them, now determined to take matters into her own hooves. She charged herself with patrolling the docks where everypony and their brother were crowding onto fishing boats and speeding out into the water in race to find the killer shark. She also called a friend at the Manehattan oceanography institute to send their best shark expert as soon as possible. Twilight trotted back and forth in frustration, watching as the fleet of fisherponies nearly killed each other trying to get as far out into the water as possible. She didn’t think life could get any worse until she saw Diamond Tiara’s parents trotting sullenly up to her. Filthy Rich gave Twilight a lethal glare and Emerald Tiara could barely lift her head up. “Mr. Rich…” Twilight said. Filthy responded by punching Chief Sparkle right in the jaw with his hoof. Twilight wiped the blood that trickled down from her mouth and stared in stunned silence. “I just found out that a mare was killed two days ago by a shark attack.” Filthy remarked, “You knew it was dangerous. You knew there was a shark out there, and you let those ponies go swimming anyways. And now my little girl is dead…” Filthy took his wife’s hoof and the both of them left as quickly as they had arrived. “I’m sorry, Twilight, he’s wrong…” said Mayor Mare, who had decided to inspect the situation. “No, he’s not…” Twilight replied.