“How peculiar,” I said, looking over the edge of a chasm. My boots were locked, so I knew I could look over as I pleased. “What do you make of this, Fluttershy?”
“I, um, don’t see anything,” she said. “Maybe it’s further down.”
“You never told me, Fluttershy,” I said, moving backwards. “Why are we looking for a golden scepter?”
“It’s apparently one of Celestia’s most prized possessions,” she said quietly, as she is known to do. “Um, Mr. Stephon?”
“Stephon is fine,” I said. “Yes?”
“You’ve been at this a lot longer than I have, s-so I’m sorry for taking your spot.”
“My spot?” I asked. “From what Celestia told me, I just left. Besides, it’s not like I was in a concrete spot, anyways.”
“O-oh…” she said, covering her face with the sweater she was wearing.
“Shall we?” I said, gesturing over the edge. “See you down there.” I ran up to the edge and jumped off.
I had a few options. My grav-boots, which are boots that allow me to alter gravity, could lock to a wall, allowing me to slowly, but surely make it down the wall unscathed. My second option, however, was much, much more fun.
I reached to my back quickly, withdrawing a small, black cylinder. I flicked it open, revealing a slender black bow. Behind me, inside of my quiver sat a double headed arrow.
Athena’s Sight.
Quickly, I determined the sturdiest part of the mountain and shot an arrow towards it. After it latched on and dug into the mountain for support, I began to swing towards the wall at a dangerous speed. I quickly turned and shot and arrow downwards, using the other side of the retractable arrow. Once it latched in place, I used the string to slide down.
Kinda like a makeshift zip line.
Exactly like a makeshift zip line, actually.
The zipline was long but only took me a few seconds to get down. Realizing I was going to hit the bottom at a hard angle, I clicked my boots together to exert a bit of anti-gravity. My speedy descent came to a calm stop.
“Amazing…” said Fluttershy slowly flying down. “I never could’ve had done that.”
“Thanks,” I said, recollecting the arrow. “So, see anything now?
“Um…” She looked all around her. “No…”
“Well, we’re only at the beginning of the hole. We should find it further down.”
We walked through the dusty, dark, and narrow passage, both of us on the lookout for any kind of glimmer.
“Stephon,” said Fluttershy. “There.”
She pointed toward a shining light in the chasm. I walked toward it, bent down and retrieved a single, golden coin.
“Is this made of gold?” I asked rhetorically. “Wow, what a find.”
“Oh,” said Fluttershy in disappointment. “It’s just a bit.”
“A bit of what?”
“No, a bit,” she said reaching into her pocket and withdrawing one of her own. “It’s our currency in Equestria.”
“Oh,” I said. “Can I keep it?”
“I… suppose so,” she said.
“Great.” I pocketed it. “Let’s keep searching.”
A few seconds later, we found another. Again, and again, we found clusters of the golden coin.
“Well then,” I said, glancing at the ground. “Somebody must’ve lost a fortune down here.
“Hm,” hummed Fluttershy. “This is weird.”
“What is?”
“O-oh, nothing,” she said. “Just ignore me.”
“Well, if anything pops up, tell me,” I said. Slowly, we rounded a corner.
A large pile of golden coins sat at the end of the passage. I would’ve been overjoyed and frolicked towards them with glee if I didn’t see the massive dragon slumbering on top of them.
“Oh…” said Fluttershy almost silently. “Oh, my…”
“Is that a dragon?” I asked, yet again rhetorically. “What’s a dragon doing down here?”
“A-a-a w-what?” stuttered Fluttershy.
“I take it you’re scared of dragons?” I said. “Don’t worry, you’re not the only one.”
“L-look,” she said pointing at the snout. A small, golden staff was sitting near it. “The scepter.T-that’s it.”
“Oh, that’s great,” said sarcastically. “Way to make this difficult, Celestia.”
“C-can you go get it?” She asked. “I don’t want to go near a dragon…”
“Hm…” I contemplated my options. One, I go get the scepter and possibly wake up the dragon. Second, I shoot the dragon while he’s sleeping, giving me a good advantage.
Athena’s Sight.
A silverish path slivered towards the scepter.I could only assume it was showing me the way to approach without being detected. I quickly followed the path, making it to the dragon without a hitch. I slowly reached up and took the scepter from beside its nose, careful not to disrupt him much.
The dragon sniffed twice before opening its eyes.
“What the hell?” I whispered. “Do we have a bloodhound dragon here or something?” The dragon took in a large amount of air. That usually meant it was going to breathe fire, I jumped backwards in an attempt to avoid it, only to trip over a rock. Before I could scramble to the ground, I found myself face to face with a dragon, ever so ready to burn my face right off.
Luckily, I wasn’t alone.
A small arrow sailed into the dragon’s eye, the dragon recoiling backwards and roaring in pain. Using this time, I got to my feet and rushed back to the wall where Fluttershy stood different from before.
“Are you okay?” She asked, loading another arrow. “The eye and underbelly are very soft spots of a dragon, so we should… be able to…”
“Kill it?”
Yeah,” she responded. “B-but if we can…”
“Let’s try running first?”
“Yes,” she repeated, taking off in the opposite direction of the dragon’s roaring voice. Fluttershy slowly started to take off into the air, while I jumped onto one of the walls of the chasm with force, locking my boots to the wall.
“Let’s go!” I yelled, alerting Fluttershy. She was already very high up when the fireball hit her in the back, burning her wings. I nearly came to a screeching stop as I saw her fall.
I didn’t need to activate Athena’s Sight manually. It did it on its own. The world was plunged into a slow motion phase as I dismounted from the wall. I jumped right towards her, grabbing her waist in my left arm. Quickly, I clicked my boots together, activated the anti-gravity, and sailed up to the other side of the chasm. Once I turned off anti-gravity, I came crashing to the ground.
“Twice in a few minutes…” I said, grunting to get to my feet. “Heh. I can do better than that…” Fluttershy’s groan of pain interrupted my train of thought. “Oh yeah. He hit you pretty bad, Fluttershy.”
“I’ll be… fine…” she choked out. For some reason, this annoyed me. “M-my wings hurt a l-little…”
“Twilight’ll fix you up,” I said. “She helped me after I was shot. She can help you too.” I slowly made my way to her, lifted her up, and put her arm around my shoulder.
“Ow,” she said as I placed a hand on her back. “Sorry, continue.”
“Just hop onto my back,” I said kneeling down. “It’ll be easier for me, and less painful for you.”
“Thank you,” she said, grasping my neck. “I’m sorry for this.”
“There’s nothing to be sorry for,” I said, my annoyance seeping through a little. “Uh, what I mean is, you shouldn’t apologize preemptively, you know?”
“Y-yes,” she said. I lifted her into the air and we made our way back from the large chasm. “Hey, Stephon?”
“Hm?” I hummed.
“You… remind me of my brother.” A quick image flashed by my face. A small child was carrying another just like I was carrying Fluttershy. For some reason, it gave me a sense of deja vu.
“Your brother, huh?” I asked.
“Is that weird?” She asked. “I’m sorry if that was weird. Oh, um, sorry for saying sorry.” I couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Don’t worry about it,” I said with a smile. “I can live with a little weirdness, Flutters.”
“Flutters?” She asked. “Y-you never called me that before.”
“Oh, uh, must’ve been a slip of the tongue,” I said. “Won’t happen again.”
“I don’t mind it,” she said. “I… kind of like it.”
“Okay then,” I said. “I’ll call you Flutters from now on.” We traveled in silence for what seemed like an hour. We were approaching the castle when Flutters called my name.
“Hey, Stephon?”
“Hm?”
“Could you teach me about something?”
“About what?”
“Your eyes,” she said. “I… I think I may have the same eyes as you do.”
“You think you have Athena’s Sight?”
“Is that what it’s called?” She asked. “Yes, I think…”
“Hm…” I thought to myself for a second. “I think I can, but I may have a little problem…”
“What is it?” she asked.
“I don’t even know what Athena’s Sight is.”
“Y-you don’t?” She asked. “But you were using it all the time. Even when we had our contest yesterday.”
“I know how to activate it, and what I can use it for, but I don’t know what it is,” I revealed. “Maybe when I teach you, you could end up teach me!” She gave me a small laugh.
“I doubt it, but I’ll try.”
I stopped in my tracks. In front of me was my sister. She was smiling, giving me a wave before disappearing, leaving behind words that chilled me to the bone.
Don’t forget what is important to you, Stephon. The moment you do, darkness will come and sweep it away. It will sweep her away.
“Stephon?” asked Flutters. “Did you… hear that?”
“Hey, Flutters?”
“Y-yes?”
“I promise I won’t let you die.”
“H-huh? What do you mean?” I didn’t answer. I wasn’t sure myself, but something came to me when I heard her voice.
Leila was gone. And somehow, it was my fault.