The lamia came almost to a screeching hold as soon as Twilight had yelled the one word of her mind towards it. Almost as if it was genuinely confused about whether or not it was actually aimed right towards it. The head was tilted over to one side and it told the soothsayer more than enough. The creature indeed didn’t understand a single thing about that little word. Though on the other end, it suddenly had gotten aimed both the flintlocks of Rarity and Applejack.
“Twilight, tell me that this, this, this thing, is actually safe. I’m not in the mood to run away from something again,” said Rarity in a dead serious tone to her. Her opinion was in fact shared by both Applejack and Fluttershy. All three of them were still tired from running, so they could only hope that the soothsayer would have found a manner.
The eyes of the unicorn shifted over to the little group before she gave them all a massive and eerie stare. “No, no, no, no, don’t be so stupid! You’ll only frighten it, this might be our only chance to see a near tame lamia,” explained Twilight to them. Fractions later she rushed she rushed over to them. The barrels of the weapons were pointed down while the glance in the eyes told them all, that she knew what she was doing. Or at least hoped to be knowing it.
In the meantime had the lamia moved itself over to the spring and coiled up around the rock. Almost as if it was bathing within the sunlight that was cast down. On the other end it also gave the lot of them a chance to see how it actually looked.
A body that was the length of perhaps three anthronies stuck together with scales going from bottom to top. The snake portion of the body was something they could understand, but it was the top half that worried them. For it had the body of a female anthrony, slender and gorgeous while the hair on top of the head was all puffy.
Pink was the dominant color of the creature. It had both pink scales and a slightly deeper colored pink hair. So it was perhaps only logical for Twilight to have called the thing, Pinkie. Though one thing still troubled the mares a little bit. The fact that it wasn’t wearing any kind of clothing and the scaled breasts therefore just bounced all over the place with every motion made.
“Right, like that’s the dreaded hunter we all feared,” the pirate captain muttered in response before she shook her head. Now that she had the actual time to look at the lamia, it became pretty apparent to Rarity that it didn’t seem to be as ‘evil’ as they originally had thought it would be. The way it was sunbathing on the spring just told them all that it didn’t have any anger inside of it. A comforting thought for two of the three.
Applejack still had so her different set of thoughts about the creature. The admiral knew that everything could suddenly turn itself against everything. “See? It doesn’t mean to harm us. Remember what it said when it coiled around me just yet?” Twilight asked before she got a couple of strange looks from the rest of the mares. “…Nevermind.”
“Ah still don’t like it, Twi, look at it. Ah mean, anything can happen with it. It’s, it’s a loose cannon,” said Applejack said. Though she stored her own flintlock back in its holster and pointed over to the creature. She might have had a point or two but she also forgot another little fact. One that was pointed out by Twilight while she aimed her finger to both Rarity and Rainbow.
Silence would have taken over the admiral. The mare she didn’t really knew how to react to the words told to her in the language of the signs. It was in fact more than true though. For both the major and the pirate were both loose cannons as well. “I think I have made my point here, now then, let’s see what else can be thrown at her,” added Twilight to her words. That was just before her attention turned over to the lamia.
The unicorn soothsayer stood back up and calmly closed in on the sunbathing creature. “Pinkie, is, is it alright if I call you Pinkie?” Twilight asked as she didn’t want to start off at the wrong hoof. In the blink of an eye had the reflexes of the creature caused the brilliant blue rims to have fallen upon the unicorn.
“I don’t mind it, I like it! It fits me,” the lamia returned in its near annoyingly high pitched voice. One that even spoke about the creature being a female of the race. Yet none really dared to believe that it actually was a mare, or a female for that matter. It was all just too weird in their eyes. Though things were about to a whole lot stranger.
Twilight charged her horn in calm. Her hand reached out for a rip through space and time. The void storage was opened just to the side of Twilight and she needed to have something –if not anything– in the hope to gratify with the creature. Some bits of food had to be shared with it in order to gain its, or better said: her, trust.
Once the arm had retracted itself again did it held a slice of strawberry pie and Twilight took a deep sniff from its scent. The lamia did the same as it didn’t seem to be used to the smell at all. It’s nostrils moved up and down as it only took short breaths in.
Every single exhale was done through the mouth in the order or attempt to preserve the smell inside of the nose. The tongue moved itself over the lips. A motion that granted the anthronies a sight over the teeth it carried. Once again it confirmed her suspicion, for they looked like those of a snake. Rows and rows of dangerously sharp, tiny teeth could be witnessed within the mouth.
The unicorn said her prayers in her mind as she extended her arm with the slice of pie. “If you want it, you may have it. It’s good food, delicious even,” she said to greaten the desire for the piece even more.
Yet the lamia wasn’t as crazy as they originally thought it was. It became withdrawn all of the sudden. A second ago it was nicely and calmly bathing inside of the sunlight cast down, the next it had shied away behind the formation of rocks that formed the spring.
Twilight couldn’t help herself but to giggle a little bit to herself. She had seen the kind of reaction for by manier animal and Pinkie didn’t seem to be a change upon it. Despite its look with the rest of the mares, it appeared to have been a lot more animal than actual anthrony.
So the only thing that Twilight could do was to place the slice of pie onto the moss and then take steps back. Which was exactly the thing that she did and backed away from the prying eyes behind the spring. Only to rejoin the rest of the mares.
They only seemed to have forgotten the little tiny fact that Rainbow Dash still had to wake up. None of the anthronies had even thought about it able to be doing some harm, but their thoughts had been wrong before quite some time during the trip. There were no guaranties on it.
In the moment they could only have hoped that Pinkie hadn’t been giving much attention to the knocked out pegasus. They hoped even more that said pegasus wouldn’t be waking up too soon. Yet on the other end, they kind of wanted her to. They were caught between a rock and a truly hard place. Whichever would have come first for them?
Seconds went by before the lamia even dared to leave her shelter. Slowly did the whole body managed to coil itself off of the spring and slithered forward, towards the piece of pie. The curiosity for the piece of food was so much greater than her sense of danger. She had to know where that heavenly scent came from, and whether or not it was actually as good as Twilight made it out to be.
Finally had she reached the slice and coiled her body around it, almost as if she was protecting herself with a barrier. Nopony could be seeing just what was going on while the seconds ticked away. Anything and everything could be happening from that moment on. She could have gone in a frenzy or became literally tame to them all. They hoped the latter of course.
Seconds ticked by before the sounds of the slice of pie being devoured were heard. Only to have the silence return once more afterwards. A silence that was only to be broken by the coiling body of the lamia again. For it had gone out of her hiding and just laid there with her body as the anthrony part of it stuck straight up.
“Hmmm! Juicy!” she spoke before she rubbed her belly with one hand and wiped away the juices of the strawberries and her own saliva with the other. From the sounds and looks of it, it seemed to have liked the pie. But whether or not it was actually tame remained to be seen.
Twilight then stood back up from her place and did a couple of steps closer once more. “See, I told you it was good, didn’t I?” she spoke with a genuine smile of happiness going across her face. The lamia just nodded as the hands were placed to the side of her body.
Rarity couldn’t help herself but to feel a little hypnotized by the bouncing breasts of the creature. It didn’t appear that it could actually sit still. It carried something magical for her, which was perhaps a little bit annoying. Her attention shifted all over the place except to where it needed to be. Up to the point even where she brought a hand to her forehead and lowered her head in it.
“What’s wrong, Rarity?” Fluttershy asked in a concerned tone. The pegasus had then scooted over to her side and already began the visual inspection of the mare. “You seem, off.”
“I wonder what gave that away,” the pirate replied in a near sarcastic tone just before the eyes were closed. Nothing seemed to have been making sense anymore in her mind. They were facing a creature that was half snake, half anthrony for crying out loud. How was she supposed to be reacting towards it all? She had seen so much, but that creature was a new thing for her.
Everything from the trip had just become a little bit too much for the unicorn pirate. She was used to seeing strange beings for certain, but those were all deep in the ocean. Creatures that were worthy of being labeled as ‘monsters of the sea’ but this, this thing? It had caused her mind to not only in overdrive, but also to have a small meltdown.
“Fluttershy, would you be a dear and just leave me for now? There’s nothing wrong with me, outside of this pounding headache, alright? It’s just, difficult to process,” said Rarity to the doctor. She shooed Fluttershy away with another hand.
The doctor couldn’t be doing anything else than to just obey the silent command and left the unicorn. Though actually left alone she wasn’t. For Applejack was having one last thing she wanted to say about the matter. “At least ya ain’t the only one who’s having delusions of creatures.”
“Applejack, shut up!” Rarity hissed through her teeth, “just, shut up!” The ivory unicorn was angry. She was pissed off at everything in the moment. All because her mind couldn’t comprehend the events that were happening.
“I think…” Twilight started before she was stopped in her sentence. The nakedness of the creature also came to her as well as something else. A thought that was just so crazy, it might actually be working. They were still on the hunt for the sixth member of their company, the goddesses had never explained who they needed to get for that spot. Yet they also had never told her what she needed to get.
Perhaps it was a loophole found in the system of the goddesses, but Twilight thought to have found the last member of their little company of misfits. That very lamia that stood there, bouncing a bit from right to left and back with her body, could have been the very being they were looking for. It was a literal once in a lifetime opportunity and Twilight would be taking it with both hands.
“You thought..?” Pinkie giggled before she placed her hands cross over her body, blocking off the view of her breasts for the lot of them. Something that was highly appreciated by them all. “Well go on silly, tell me! Not like I can spill a secret to anyone down here.”
“I think, I have found a new name for you. A full name that is. I, do not know if you had a name before though,” said Twilight with care to her voice. If she would have offended the creature in any way, the chance to gain a new ally was flying out of the figurative window.
When the words were spoken, the happy expression of the lamia did turn into something else. Something that could only be described as sad. The posture and pose of the body may not have told it, but the expression within the eyes screamed everything. “I, I had a name, once… But I lost, it.”
The soothsayer nodded gently towards the creature as she closed in the distance even further. “Pinkie, then your new name shall be: Pinkie Pie,” she said with a smile going across her face. She could only have hoped that the labia would be liking the name. Only then would they have been one step closer to getting her to join the company.
Rarity still laid with her head almost between her legs afterwards. Everything still was too much for her. Though if Rarity was already having troubles with it all, how would Rainbow Dash be reacting? The pegasus major groaned and moaned a couple of times as she came back to her knowledge. The eyes of Fluttershy shrunk themselves, she had forgotten about Rainbow as a whole. “Oh no, no, no, no, Twilight, she’s waking up!”
The screaming whisper in which Fluttershy yelled, did got the attention of Twilight. Who shifted her attention over to the waking pegasus. Anything could have happened with the loose cannon that was Rainbow Dash. And most likely would everything happen. She had to talk herself out of the situation quickly before things would have gotten nasty and out of control from all sides.
“R-Rainbow, if you can hear me, lay down. A lot has happened and you need to be talked by. Fluttershy, go to her and inform her,” said Twilight before she turned around to face the other pegasus of the company.
The doctor released a calm nod before she crawled back up and left the admiral and the pirate. The two powder kegs of the company were left with one another, though the risk of an explosion didn’t seem to be there. With Rarity still half knocked out and cringing at every thought, her fuses were just gone for the moment.
Not to mention the little fact that Applejack didn’t wanted to start another war. Perhaps for one of the few times during the whole trip could the two been left alone and nothing would have happened. Rarity charged up her horn calmly as its sapphire blue aura shone brightly and then vanished from time to time. It almost acted like a lighthouse when she performed her spell. Though which spell she would be speaking out, was unknown to the soothsayer.
Fluttershy had made her way over to Rainbow. The doctor placed a hand against the chest of the mare. “You need to stay laying down for a little while. What can be seen can be, not what you had expected,” she said to Rainbow.
“H-How bad, can it be?” the major asked before she felt the moss below her. That fact alone was strange to say the least. Yet after she had knocked herself against the stone ceiling was everything lost. “Did we, lose the spiders?”
The doctor nodded in calm before she spoke her words on the matter. “We lost the spiders yes, but you flew against the stone ceiling and your head gave away. Twilight had carried you all the way until we came to a little spring. We’re still there, but also have a visitor who, isn’t actually normal.”
“Have you seen with who we travel with?” Rainbow chuckled in a weak voice. She then reached for her head with one hand. “Oh that joke was bad. Can’t be that bad though.” She then pushed the hand of Fluttershy off of her body and rose up in a sitting position. The hand was still rubbing all over the place as she hoped to stop the bouncing of her brain that way.
“Uhm, uh, well, hmm, you might be, how do I say this..? Surprised, that’s the word I’m looking for. Just, just don’t do anything, stupid,” replied Fluttershy when she realized that she couldn’t be winning the battle at all.
Curiosity had struck the pegasus as she looked over to direction in which Twilight stood. At first there wasn’t anything strange to be witnessed. Only when her eyes turned a bit she noticed the lamia just standing there. A couple of slow and heavy blinks were made by her eyes before the body felt back down into the moss. “Nope, can’t do it…” And then she fainted again. Something Rarity also wished to be doing.
The lamia and the soothsayer continued to exchange glances to one another. Neither of them wanted to be doing harm to the other and their very eyes told them so. Yet Pinkie always had that little bit of animalistic nature within her. She didn’t seem to be trusting the group just yet. There was just one sentence that sounded like music to Twilight’s ears. “I like that name,” she spoke up with a smile.
It was a massive relief off of the shoulders from Twilight. It meant to her that they were one step closer to actually getting the lamia right in their little band of misfits. Even though the soothsayer considered the company as her friends, she couldn’t help herself but to view them all as she saw them a long time ago. The time when she first met all of them.
“I’m glad that you like it,” said Twilight when she took another step closer towards the lamia. Pinkie Pie didn’t even move a muscle for a change as she was either waiting for the right moment to strike or she actually had begun to trust the soothsayer.
Rarity couldn’t be taking it anymore. Everything combined had caused her to just became a living, breathing, wreck of a mare. Her mind had become a massive disarray of thoughts and plans as if she needed to sober up. She was drunk without having drunk a single drop of alcohol. She was gone without having gone someplace. Nothing of her mind seemed to be making sense to her anymore. Rarity only wanted one more thing to do, one last desperate attempt.
She had to splash some water in her face. She had to do that in the hope to wake up in the bunk of her own ship. Everything had turned into the looks of a massive dream in her eyes. At first did everything make still a bit of sense. Yet as time went on, the less sense there was being made. It not only devastated Rarity, but was one of the few things that managed to break her entirely.
Without a word stood the unicorn up and she began to walk towards the spring of the river. The unicorn wandered passed Twilight without even looking up. She walked past Pinkie without even looking up. She was just so fixated upon the fact that everything was a dream of her own little world. Though how the dream could have been ever made remained a question to be answered.
Rarity made her way over to the spring while all of the mares and even the creature were staring at her. Silence had taken over the place, only the rushing water could be caught in their ears. The eyelids of Rainbow Dash twitched a bit when she returned to the land of the wake. Fluttershy looked quickly back to the other pegasus and gave her a little smile. A smile that said that everything would have become alright.
The major rose calmly up from her position and saw the lamia once more. Though she didn’t seem to be fainting a third time. In fact she just tilted her head to one side before her attention turned over to Rarity. Whatever the mare had planned out for herself, it couldn’t be good.
The pirate captain stood by the spring, all of the eyes aimed at her like some kind of horror story. Her hands formed a little bowl and allowed it to be filled with water. The look inside of her eyes turned from desperate to happy. She believed holy in the fact that she would have been saved from her nightmares. “Goddess of the moon, give me your grace and relieve me from this nightly torment,” she said to herself before the water was splashed in her face.
Twilight was simply baffled by the fact that Rarity –out of all the anthronies with them– was calling upon a goddess for help. Though the help wouldn’t have come to her. For with the water splashed to her face, it was stone and stone cold. A shiver travelled down her spine just before the unicorn turned herself around.
While the waters were still dripping off of her face did she look over to each of the anthronies and the lamia. “It’s real, isn’t it? E-Everything we have done so far, it’s all real, isn’t it?” she asked in a voice of true disbelief. Not a single fiber of her body was wanting or ready to believe the facts as they were.
But everything they had done up to that point was real. There wasn’t anything in the world that could have taken her out of the reality of life. “S-Sorry, but everything seemed just so, sur-, so surreal to me,” apologized Rarity to them. After which she walked back to her original resting place.
Rainbow’s eyes followed the broken down unicorn as she actually took a form of pity on her. She had always pictured Rarity as this badass who wouldn’t back down for any and all. Yet she was broken that easily by something like that. Then again, she was having a difficulty of her own to actually believe it.
Though with the interruption being over, Twilight and Pinkie Pie looked back at one another for just a second or two. Then the soothsayer was the first one to turn herself around and she made her way back to the rest of the mares. Pinkie wanted to ask what she would be doing but decided to remain quiet. Her body was coiled up around itself even further before she dropped her anthrony part right on top of it.
The soothsayer sat down by the mares, while Rainbow stood up and managed to walk her way over to the rest of the group. She then leaned against the wall where her arms went cross over each other. She had to be hear whatever Twilight would be having to say. The last to join the company again was Fluttershy. With the five of them could the talking begin. But whether it was about the good, the bad or something else remained to be seen.
“I think, we have found the sixth member of the company,” started Twilight. Straight away did the eyes of each of the mares go wide as they were hit by yet again an unbelievable fact. “Before you all open your mouth, let me finish. We’ve been looking for a sixth member ever since we left but we didn’t found it. Now it is being thrown right into our laps.”
“But it’s an animal!” Applejack exclaimed in a whisper.
“She is not!” Twilight replied in an angry tone, “she’s just as much anthrony as you and I. She has only developed herself to be able to live in the subterranean world. Whether you like it or not, we need a sixth member, she is the perfect candidate. Albeit being a bit of a loose cannon. But we aren’t strangers to that. It’s a risk. One I’m willing to take.”
Rarity leaned further against the wall as her head was thrown back as much as it was allowed. “Fine, go ahead, it’s not like I have been smacked with the unbelievable once today. If you think she’s the one, fine by me. Just know, that I won’t hesitate twice if she tries something funny.”
The words of Rarity were shared by the lot of them. Perhaps only Fluttershy had a small deviation of the path but she didn’t wanted to voice her own opinion on the matter. Which meant naturally that the group had decided that Pinkie Pie would be called into the group.
Twilight nodded in calm to the group of the mares and left them for what they were. She then made her way over to Pinkie Pie again. The lamia wanted to rise again but the soothsayer gestured with her hand she could remain sitting or lying down, or whatever it was she was doing.
The unicorn then lowered herself into the moss and assumed a cross-legged position in it. It was time to play open card with the lamia. It was time to reveal to her just why they were there and what they had actually planned to be doing with her.
“Pinkie, I don’t know if you have noticed but the past couple of months, tremors have been hitting. Have you sensed them, or felt them yourself?” the mare asked of her. She placed her hands together while the elbows took a rest upon her knees.
Much to her own surprise did the lamia give a nod to confirm the thoughts. She was well aware of the tremors from the looks of it. Yet the words that would be leaving her mouth could literally change Twilight’s whole perspective upon them. “I haven’t only sensed them, I have also been within one of them! Wasn’t fun at all… All the rocks just falling down on you. I loved those rocks!” Pinkie exclaimed to her before her tail was waggled a little bit.
The unicorn had one look at the wagging tail and noticed something she hadn’t seen before. The scales near the end and for the length of about her own leg were all a bit disfigured. Obviously had Pinkie been hurt by the falling rocks. One must have had the chance to get her and scar her like that. “I, see what you mean,” she said before her attention then turned back up towards the eyes.
“Me and my, little band of mares behind me, we aren’t here for just a little visit to the caves. Something you perhaps could have seen already. We’re here on a mission that has something to do with the tremors,” continued Twilight to explain to the best of her abilities without spoiling too much in advance.
"Well duh, if you were here for sightseeing, you wouldn’t have come up streams. I have been, uhm, kinda, following you since you came from the stairs. I thought you were all spider toast!” exclaimed Pinkie in a bit of an embarrassed tone before the disbelief took over. To Twilight it meant that Pinkie seemed to be knowing perhaps enough of the cavern system to bring them to where they needed to be.
Perhaps the thought was farfetched, but they had encountered a lamia and giant spiders before, why wouldn’t that be true as well? “So there was something lurking at us back there. I already felt a set of eyes spying at my back,” returned Twilight before her lips curled up into a small smile.
“But tell me why are you all here?!” Pinkie said while she became a little bit impatient.
The soothsayer nodded, she would be getting up to that point. The lamia was quickly diagnosed by both Twilight and Fluttershy as having a couple of mental disorders. Something that gave her both a great lack of patience and hyperactivity. Two things that would actually have been the death of any kind of predator. Especially one within the underground caverns.
“Alright, because you ask it. We have been send out to find the cause of the tremors and stop them. For not only are you having problems with them, the world above has it as well,” the soothsayer said with a bit of difficulty in her voice. Whether the lamia could believe there was still a world above or not.
Though Pinkie giggled softly to herself as she then pointed up to the sheet of ice through which the sunlight was being cast. “I know there’s a whole world up there, just never been there and don’t intend to.” For the next set of words that would be leaving her mouth, her tone had changed into one that sounded highly uncomfortable, even from her side. “You plan to, stop the tremors? Y-You can’t. Something else, lurks in the darkness around you. Those spiders you have seen earlier, are nothing compared it. Every last lamia is scared to death for it. None of us even dare to venture that deep into the dark realms. He’s watching, he’s hunting, he’s waiting…”
The soothsayer listened with the greatest of care towards the words of the lamia when one little fact arose in her. Every last lamia, she repeated in her head. That implied the fact that Pinkie Pie wasn’t the only or the last one. It meant that there was a whole society of the creatures hidden somewhere within the darkness of the caverns.
Both of the beings spoke their words loud enough to be captured by the rest of the mares. And those four mares would been having their own little theories and explanations about the events as they had been going down. Especially Applejack’s curiosity was awoken by the mentioning of the mysterious ‘he’, as well as the chance of there being more lamia’s.
“Forgive me for interrupting, but can Ah ask ya som’thing, Pinkie Pie?” the admiral asked of the lamia. She had to be have some form of clearance within her mind. The lamia gave her the right of speaking and the questions were asked. “Ya’re saying that somewhere ‘round here, an entire city is filled with, well, yar kind? And just who is this ‘he’ that ya spoke of? What danger is unknown to us?” The high words were out, the answers would be waiting for them all.
Whether she had realized it or not, but Applejack had torn open a massive wound in Pinkie’s heart and was pouring salt within it. Though the lamia couldn’t blame her, they couldn’t have known. So even with the watery lines of tears already forming did she spoke the story short and simple. “There’s a city hidden in the rocks. One I once was part of. But I was chosen to become the latest sacrifice for him.”
“But who is this, him?” Applejack asked through. She wanted to know.
The eyes of Pinkie shifted their attention from the ground over to Applejack. With just the way she was coiled up on top of her own body, the glare that was given towards the admiral was creepy to say the least. “The Gorgon One…”