Chapter 5
Even the ponies who had prompted the trip into The Abyss were having second thoughts as they looked into its depths. They all stood still and silent in awe as it stood in all of its majesty before them. The light coming from the now setting sun only made it look that much more eerie. Nothing was said as they all shared their unease in a tense silence. In the end it was Astro who took the first step onto the pathway heading down into The Abyss. As the group started to descend it was slow and cautious with the silence around them being enveloping. Everyone was on edge and ready to bolt at the slightest sign of danger. There was nothing to indicate that there was even any form of danger around, but an unmistakable eeriness surrounded the calm darkness. The silence felt like an all-consuming beast not to be disturbed. Some even flinched as the clops of their hoof steps shattered it.
They had been working their way slowly and carefully down in such a state of uncomfortable silence until it was broken by a roar from behind them. They all turned shocked to find a manticore directly at their backs. It had reared up on its hind legs and was crying out its call with a ferocious volume. The fifteen ponies took off at full gallop picking their way surefootedly down the side of the ravine. The manticore however gave chase snarling and growling horribly just behind them. The racket it was making felt designed to scare them as much as it could. The sound of its claws scraping against the ground made a terrible grinding noise grating down on their ears. Then however the path down that Astro had always been able to find up to that point stopped and she started skidding to a halt, but couldn’t stop before it ended and opened her wings at the last second.
She looked over her shoulder expecting to see the manticore ready to take the lives of the entirety of the group, but it was gone and the silence had returned. It hadn’t turned back or took to the air it had simply… vanished. She wasn’t the only one looking on in shock as the rest of them were standing completely still on the ledge looking over their own shoulders. They had all heard and seen the beast, it had been right there on all of their tails, but now it was just gone.
Their shocked silence however was broken as a great deal of the path that they had just come down on crumbled and fell away deserting them on the small block of stone that they had. “What are we supposed to do!? I don’t want to die!” Italy cried being the first to break the silence.
“Calm down. I can fix this, I swear. I just need to find a continuation of the path alright.” Astro promised hovering in front of the platform. She was starting to panic slightly and wasn’t doing a very good job of hiding it. She couldn’t help but feel like their current situation was her fault seeing as she had been leading the group.
“I’ll help out.” Zone offered taking to the air as well.
With that the two pegasi began to scan the ravine side for a path down seeing as the entire path that they had come down had just collapsed and fallen into the darkness. “Here!” Zone called just as she was starting to feel the panic really start to get to her. She looked up to see that he had found a ledge a slight bit above the previous one. It was also a few feet forward from the original ledge. It was a good distance to jump, but certainly not an impossible distance to cross. If absolutely necessary some assistance could be offered by pegasi to the ponies that needed it. One plus however was that it wasn’t just another ledge, it continued onto a path. That path though only led deeper into The Abyss.
The ponies that were cramped onto the small rock ledge directed their attention to the newly discovered pathway. After the rather shaking experience everypony had fallen into a tense silence and they held it as they started to carefully move up to the newfound trail. The silence soon returned to its beast like state as it enveloped the entire atmosphere. The only sounds that remained were the sounds of hooves on stone. Nopony spoke for fear of breaking it and the only way any other sound would be made is if something else made it first. This was how they continued on as they slowly worked their way downwards.
As they descended further a thick mist started to settle in around them. Slowly though the mist started to thicken into more of a smoke like consistency. A few small coughs were forced out of some ponies by it as it continued to condense even further. It wasn’t long before all of the ponies had started to cough violently due to the air around them that had started to choke the group. All of their vision had been tinted grey to the point where they could barely see in front of them. A strangled cry of ‘run’ was just choked out by Astro as it became increasingly difficult to breathe.
They didn’t need to be told twice. The group took off still hacking from the strange mist that had descended around them. They didn’t have to run that far however to get past the strange cloud. Looking back they saw that the cloud had been concentrated purely on the point at which they’d been standing and was dissipating quickly now that they were no longer inside it. “Is anypony else getting the feeling that this stupid ravine is going after us on purpose?” Kara asked as they all stood there still coughing slightly and trying to collect themselves.
“Ravines can’t target people.” America retorted, “Ravines can’t think.” As he finished however a wall of rock erupted from the side of said ravine separating the one group into two separate ones.