//------------------------------// // How all began. // Story: Diamond Tiara's Furiously Fantastic Adventure! // by Daxn //------------------------------// It was your usual day, in the small backwater town of Ponyville: grass grew, birds flied, Sun shined, and Diamond Tiara was having her usual stroll near the borders of the town with her gray friend Silver Spoon. And, like in every other stroll the two fillies have ever done, Diamond Tiara complained profusely about some important matters with Silver Spoon. Matters like delays in the delivery of her dresses. "I can't believe that the order for my purpureal silk dress with pearls and few small pieces of incaian goldsmith from Mattu Picchu is still on route! I mean, it's only 2305 kilometers from here, it should not take this long!" Silver Spoon grinned, nodded and agreed,despite perfectly knowing that things sent by mail hardly arrived the next day, much less if said order was so complicated and tacky, and it was impossible that the dress arrived in 24 hours from the order if the location of the dress creator was so far from Ponyville. As she approached to the borders of the forest, the pink filly with a tiara kept talking and talking about dresses, to Silver Spoon's annoyance. When the two were finally at few steps from stepping on one of the thorn-filled fallen branches of the trees, Silver Spoon decided to cut out that rant about dresses, and change topic for a while. In-between the many topics the myopic filly could choose from, she chose school. "So, how did you go in the Math test?" Silver Spoon knew already her friend's mark in that test, but, since it was just an attempt to change the topic of the conversation/monologue to something new, the gray filly didn't thought about it too much. Of course, Silver Spoon had forgotten a detail about Diamond's personality. Suddenly, the filly with the tiara stopped in the middle of the path. Then she started to breathe heavily. "Not well." Said Diamond Tiara, while she was grinding her teeth. Still keeping up with the façade of interest, Silver Spoon also stopped walking, and asked with falsely innocent voice. "Why?" "Why?" Steam come out from the pink filly's ears, as she talked with the spirit of a supervillain whose evil plan has been thwarted. "Because I got 3 thanks to that she-pig, that's why! The geometry assignments were nosensical, since it required the use of Lovercraftian geometry instead of the Euclidian one, the equations had all periodic results, and yet, according to the instructions, all had whole numbers as result, the problem about cinema tickets had a fractional result, meaning that tickets were sold to random deattached body parts... in fact, I think that there is a conspiracy going on for make me get bad grades, and thus ruin my Summer!" Silver Spoon, after half-listening to the pink filly's amusing rant, perked up her ears at the word "conspiracy." She immediately asked with curiosity, while she tilted on the nose her glasses. "A conspiracy? Composed by who, and with what goal?" Diamond Tiara pulled Silver Spoon towards her, by grabbing her furry chest, and lifting her few inches off the ground. "Composed by that stupid and suicidal stubborn cripple, by the filly that is the grand-daughter of Harpy Smith, and that literal-minded and yet slightly brilliant filly. They gang up for block every my attempt to shine, they refuse to acknowledge my superiority, they always ruin my fun whenever I am in charge of something..." Diamond Tiara pulled two locks of her mane "they drive me insane!" The filly with a spoon as cutie mark sighed, at Diamond Tiara's stream of words. "Diamond, I know that you hate those three. I do too. But could you please explain to me the connection between those three blank flanks and your bad grades? I mean, none of them is daughter of Cheerlie or any of our teachers, so they could not influence directly your votes, nor they could tamper with the tests without getting caught." Diamond Tiara widened her eyes, released her grip on Silver Spoon, leaving the gray filly falling in the dust, then started to wave around frantically her front hooves. "Don't you understand? They are adored by the teachers! The teachers always give them good grades no matter what they write or say already, it isn't too far-fetched to think that the teachers, Cheerlie in particular, bribed by Rottenbloom, Sweetie Dumb and Loo a Scoot, decided to give me always bad grades no matter what!" Silver Spoon, after getting up, got off some dust from her gray coat, and tried to return the light of reason to Diamond Tiara's brain. "But why they would do that? I mean, those three blank flanks try to upstage you and me, and get us in trouble with our parents, true, but they lack of the initiative for try to ruin our scholastic record. In fact, I think they would find that too heinous to be done." They eyes of Diamond Tiara were bloodshot, and she was skimming. "Nothing it's too heinous for them, if they think it can benefit them in some way! Nothing! Nothing!" Then, like a broken record, she repeated the word "Nothing" over and over again. Seeing how the situation was evolving, Silver Spoon started to ponder whether call a doctor for rabies or the asylum for nervous breakdown, since she didn't wanted to get involved in whatever inconsiderate action her pink friend was going to do. Then a otherworldly voice spoke up, its source unknown. "Diamond Tiara!" The voice sounded like the one of a middle-aged pony with a slight addiction to cigars. Its accent sounded to be a mix between spanish and mongolian. While the gray filly bravely jumped ten meters in the air, dropping few beads of urine mid-flight, and looked around her fearfully, the half-crazed filly, still skimming drool for the rage, snapped her head towards the woods. "What do you want? What or who the heck are you? Why do you want to trifle with me?" By asking those questions with a raging voice, Diamond Tiara proved that, sometimes, rage can turn into insane courage, if the former fueled enough. The voice answered to the pink filly. "Who I am? It's no speaking matter. What do I want? What kind of question is this, I want to gift you something to cheer you up! After all, I don't like see people like me enraged." Diamond Tiara slowed down her skimming, and her voice shifted, if only a little, towards a more collected and curious tone. "What kind of gift?" The voice chuckled. "If it's a gift, then it's a surprise. But fear not, I won't keep you waiting. Just a hint: said gift will help you into relieve your stress." As soon as the voice finished its phrase, from the woods came a soft leaf rustling, sign that somepony or something was coming out from the forest. Fearing the worst, Silver Spoon poked Diamond Tiara. "I don't think it's really safe here," said the gray filly while looking around her "shall we go away?" "Not until I see my gift!" When those words were uttered by Diamond Tiara, a monkey appeared from a hidden path between the nearby woods. Said monkey had a bulky and muscular look, it had brown fur and olive skin, and appeared similar to a gorilla in terms of shape and locomotion. It was a pretty normal sigh, if the sighting of a gorilla near the borders of a town inhabited by ponies could be called "normal." "Comantsi?" That is, it would have been "normal" enough, if the ape didn't talk with a deep and yet young voice all of sudden. Diamond Tiara immediately stopped drooling and raging, for stare at the talking ape instead, while Silver Spoon cowered in fear behind her pink friend. "I present you Furious the Monkey Boy!" Said the voice with the glee that only a charlatan selling his contraptions could have "Bred by the monkeys of the Yùcatan, fought with the jaguars, trained to combat by a group of jaguar warriors, and infused with some of my powers, this big guy is now here for comply your orders! Just tell him his destination and his task, and he will get it done no matter what. Don't worry: he won't attack you, nor your friends." Diamond Tiara squared with her gaze the ape. Furious, in turn, just breathed at a fast pace, and flexed constantly its front limbs, as if it was trying to improve his already big muscular mass. Silver Spoon timidly raised her head over Diamond's back, and looked with widened and shiny eyes at the monkey. "Well, I must go now. I have to deliver a Shelby Cobra to Hap and Leonard and a VLDM to Doctor Who. See you soon for the payment. Of course, if you want to buy it!" The last phrase echoed few seconds in the forest, before dispelling in the wind. The three remained silent for few minutes, before that the pink filly with a tiara decided to make the first move. "Furious, could you please punch down that tree?" Diamond Tiara pointed with her left hoof at a poplar nearby. "Zebiok!" Said Furious, before running towards the tree, and topple it with a single punch. Diamond Tiara could not believe her young eyes: the monkey actually obeyed to her command, it actually punched down the tree, it, and toppled it with just one punch. Impressed by that proof of strength, an idea came to Diamond Tiara, namely, use the newly borrowed ape servant for get revenge on the ones that, from Diamond's standpoint, wronged her. "Furious..." Said Diamond with a mellow voice. "Cuh?" "I have a task for you. You must follow me and my dear friend Silver Spoon to Southern Sweet Apple Acres. There is a treehouse used by some dumb fillies, and I want that treehouse destroyed..." Before Diamond Tiara could end her request, Furious the Monkey Boy was going, reaching the destination indicated by the pink filly. "Bantèwon." It said, before going down the road. Diamond Tiara was going to give him a counter-order, but she soon realized that, if Furious already knew the way, then there was more time for enjoy the ensuing devastation. After realizing that, Diamond ran behind Furious, leaving Silver Spoon leaning on the thin air for few moments, before hitting the ground with her chin. Silver Spoon, after giving a quick cleaning to her fur and the lens of the glasses, started to run in Diamond Tiara's direction, in hope to catch her up, despite her inferior athletic abilities, compared to Diamond's. Later on, in the southern part of Sweet Apple Acres, in a treehouse built on an apple tree, three fillies were arguing about how to spend their precious free time. An orange pegasus filly with purple mane, her name Chick Scootaloo raised her right hoof, and waved it in the air frantically in enthusiasm. "Shall we try to get a bomb disposal cutie mark? There are few unexploded fireworks somewhere near the barn, I think we can try to defuse them." A white unicorn filly with pink and purple mane, friend of the flightless orange pegasus, scratched her chin and looked sideways to Scootaloo. "Are you sure? Isn't it too dangerous? I mean, I've heard of ponies losing their limbs, in the attempt to defuse some unexploded fireworks..." An earth pony filly wearing a huge red bow, her name Apple Bloom, expressed her humble opinion on Scootaloo's idea. "Yeah, if those fireworks didn't exploded for the first time, we should not force them to explode. Also, I don't want to rebuild the barn for the third time this week." Scootaloo pouted. "Oh, come on, are you two really worried to lose your limbs and damage an old building in the process? Who cares if we break few of out bones, they heal, and buildings can be rebuilt!" Sweetie Belle stared in the eyes of Apple Bloom, and the latter exchange the stare. Then the white filly sighed and explained why she thought that Scootaloo's idea did not follow any safety rules of that or any universe. "I think that they don't heal anymore, or, at least, not so easily, once they are torn off..." Apple Bloom nodded in agreement. But Scootaloo refused to listen. "Limbs, like the hair of the mane and the nail of the hooves, grow back. They are made of the same substance, right?" Sweetie Belle opened her mouth for reply to her orange friend. However, before Sweetie Belle could adorably point out the wrongness of the statement and the utter and complete ignorance of biology of Scootaloo, a loud rumble, similar to a stampede, came from outside. Instinctively, Sweetie Belle reached the northern wall of the treehouse, put aside one of the red banners, revealing an elongated metal door, then she quickly opened the door, revealing a vulvuzela ticked with "In case of pests and stampede emergencies." Sweetie Belle torn off the ticket, went to the window at north-west, peeked her head and vulvuzela out, and approached the tortur musical instrument to her lips. Thankfully for Sweetie's two friends, and whoever was in the range of three kilometers, the white unicorn filly didn't play the instrument, because Apple Bloom stopped her first. "Sweetie, that's no stampede..." Sweetie Belle threw the vulvuzela on the floor of the treehouse and asked to her yellow friend. "Is it a moon?" Apple Bloom rolled her eyes. "Neither a moon. It looks like... a monkey." "A monkey? Has the circus arrived, and I was not informed?" The yellow filly looked up, and murmured "Uhm," before answer to Sweetie Belle. "It could be. Maybe the owners will give us a prize, if we bring it back." At the word "prize" Scootaloo jumped out the window, screaming "Quick riches and cutie mark, here I come!" Apple Bloom facehoofed and shook her head in disappointment when confronted with Scootaloo's head-on charge, while Sweetie Belle tried to catch the falling Scootaloo. Running outside on the external balcony of the treehouse, Sweetie Belle saw two things: one was a turkey flightless pegasus covered in mud struggling to get up, the other was a gorilla-like brown ape running at full speed at the white filly's position. Unsure about what was the biggest issue right there, Sweetie Belle just stood there outside, without saying or doing anything but stare. Apple Bloom, wondering why Sweetie Belle turned into a metaphorical statue, came out, and also witnessed to the happenings. Scootaloo, still in "stupidly fearless" mode, ran towards the animal, screaming "Santiago y Cierra España!" The orange filly jumped on the brown monkey, and tried to pack a punch... and her punch failed to hit the intended target, leaving Scootaloo helpless in front of the bulking mass of muscles that was the monkey. Several cracks and squishy sounds ensued. Ran over by it, Scootaloo tried to stand up, despite the fact that the cracks suggested otherwise. Surprisingly, she managed to stand up, and chase the ape once again. As for Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, since they were too confused for act, decided that the best to do was get away as fast as possible from the treehouse, and hope for the best. And they did, by sliding down a rope and hiding behind a nearby tree. From that position, the two fillies could notice a detail that they missed from their vantaged location. That detail? An incoming pink shape that, as it got nearer and nearer, revealed Diamond Tiara. As soon she was at around twenty meters from Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle's location, the pink filly apparently started to laugh evily. Applebloom peeked the head out. "What in tarnation' are you laughing at, Diamond Tiara?" Yelled Apple Bloom. Diamond Tiara yelled back at her yellow rival. "I am laughing because your precious treehouse is going to be destroyed by my ape servant, Furious!" Apple Bloom shrunk her eyes and bend her neck on the right, before say "Eh?" Sweetie Belle was more responsive and talktive than her yellow earth pony friend. "I would not be so sure that this monkey is your servant, Diamond Tiara. After all, even if it apparently obeyed to an order now, that doesn't mean it will truly obey to you!" Diamond Tiara just laughed even harder and evilier at the white filly's statment. "Keep your hopes high, blank flank, so I can see them shatter!" She said, before coming back to laughter. When Diamond Tiara was talking, Furious was already at the base of the tree, with Scootaloo vainly punching and kicking its back. As the orange filly was trying to stop it, Furious raised its left arm, kept it in the air for few seconds, then landed a hit on the trunk, creating a big web of splits connected to a bigger central crack and shaking violently the whole tree, big braches falling down. Apple Bloom watched in horror the scene that was deleploving in front of her: an apparently unstoppable and incredibily strong gorilla was bringing down her and her friend's gathering place. Furious packed another punch, this time with its right arm, and caused the trunk to break in two, barely standing up. Meanwhile, Scootaloo was still trying to stop Furious by the means of kicks and slaps on the back. Diamond Tiara's laugh grew louder and louder. Finally, Sweetie Belle had an idea. "I know what we should do! Let's contact Twilight, she surely knows what to do!" Apple Bloom looked at Sweetie Belle and deadpanned. "Twilight is in Canterlot, Sweetie Belle. I don't think we can afford to wait three days, while Diamond's new pet is on the loose." Sweetie Belle dropped her ears for few seconds, for then promptly raise them again, and produce few sparks of magic in excitement for the realization. "Pinkie Pie has a stash of 'magic canes', they might come handy!" "If said canes vibrate, then I don't think they are going to help much, and we should not touch them." "I didn't mean those kind of canes! I mean the curved wooden canes used by the sheperds for herd the sheeps." "How using curved wooden staffs is going to stop a very strong and big monkey? What the..." Before the yellow filly could end her sentence, from nearby, there was a loud crash, followed by several sounds of wood snapping and leaves rustling. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle snapped their heads towards the source of the noises, and saw what they had feared just happened: where the treehouse once stood, now there was a stump, piles of splinters and broken branches, and, somehow, black and gray bricks scattered around. The perpetuator of that act, Furious, was now just standing beside the stump, flexing its muscles. Meanwhile, Furious's owner, Diamond Tiara, was laughing. "That was... hilarious! Your faces were priceless, and they still are!" Scootaloo, after witnessing the destruction of her usual gathering place, tired of punching vainly the back of the ape that tore down said gathering place, glared at Diamond Tiara, and yelled with fury. "Maybe I've failed to stop your absurdly strong ape servant, but you are surely less resistant!" Then she jumped down from the hairy back of the monkey, and ran towards the pink filly, in hope to get her and beat her down. Diamond Tiara kept her calm and said "Furious, beat this chicken until she flies." The ape did a 180 degree rotation, said "Zebiòk!", started to chase down Scootaloo. The orange filly tried to run faster, attempting to outrun the giant ape. Alas, even if she was young and agile, Furious was an adult monkey, and thus, Scootaloo could not win her race against the ape. Furious grabbed Scootaloo's rear legs, and started to cudgel the ground around with the filly, creating cracks in the terrain at each hit, toppling some nearby trees and creating shockwaves that launched stones and leaves in the air. As the filly was used as bludgeon by the ape, Sweetie Belle ran away, looking for curved canes, Apple Bloom looked in horror at the scene and put her left hoof on her mouth, Diamond Tiara laughed even harder at Scootaloo's misery. Then, after two minutes of ground pounding with living bludgeon, Scootaloo was in a bad shape: her front teeth were broken or lost, lumps peeked out from under her mane, and her right eye was half-closed and circled by a purple bruise. She was begging for mercy, when, suddenly, Furious stopped to use the orange filly as living club, and put her on the ground instead. Unable to understand what was going on, thanks to the recent beating, Scootaloo stood still. Then, Furious grabbed the tiny wings of Scootaloo, and pulled them, turning into the fully-grown wings of an adult. This scene confused both Diamond Tira, who didn't expected to see Furious take literally an order, and manage to comply it despite the sheer impossibility of the task, and Scootaloo, who didn't imagine that the monkey was going to help her in a way or another. "What are you doing, Furious?! I didn't mean it literally!" Shouted the pink filly. Barely standing on her own hooves, the now-flight-capable filly shouted back at the pink filly. "Suck it, Diamond. I may have suffered, but I finally achieved my dream!" Dimond Tiara glared at Scootaloo. "Furious, send it to the Moon." Without questions, Furious took in one hand a struggling Scootaloo, then it ran towards the ruins of the treehouse, scaravenged the remains until he found some stamps and postal package. Furious then put Scootaloo in the package, created few small holes for air in the package with a sharp rock, closed it, licked a stamp for glue it to the box, then launched it with one hand towards the sky. As the package pierced the sky, it was possible to hear Scootaloo's scream: "Diamond, you were the worst classmateeeee!" As last last spite, Diamond Tiara shouted back. "And you were the best daydreamer ever known to ponykind!" Apple Bloom was just looking at Diamond Tiara, confused, scared, and also a bit amused. She was not sure about what to do next, now that the pink filly had sent Scootaloo on the Moon, and that Furious was awaiting further orders. Well, aside from run at home. Diamond Tiara snickered, jumped on the ape's shoulders and said. "Let the peasant blank flank be. It's time to extort promotion from Cheerlie."