Our Darkest Hour

by Fryguy

4. Exploring The Island

The island was huge, and the beach was soft under the pony's hooves. Much like the beach back at Equestria, weelll, before pollution, it had all sorts of wildlife and surprisingly, no chemical wastes at all. The Island itself was not big enough for all of Equestria's residents, but it was good for the princesses and the mane six to stay for a while. Even though it may look like a safe place, the ponies knew what could be lurking though the trees of the forest. Ursas, Scopios, Lupusses, ext.

"Well, it looks like we can't go into the heart of the island without somepony else be with another. We'll have to make groups, I'll go with Cadence, Celestia and Luna go together."

One by one, Twilight made the groups, Rainbow Dash would stay near the ships, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy would go in together, and finally Applejack and Rarity also together.

"I hope Applejack listens to my advices." "Don't you tell me what to do!"

Applejack and Rarity still may conflict in differences, but they still are getting better at trusting each other. But the chemical fire has left them arguing about, well, a lot of pointless stuff.

Soon they had split up, and what they each find is about to be revealed.

"Um, Pinkie, would you wait for me? Pinkie? Hello? Pinkie?"

Fluttershy had slowed down a little while Pinkie bounced ahead, but she found Pinkie on the ground, or rock, thingy, step? It looked like Pinkie saw it first and then passed out. Fluttershy looked up, to find a Temple of some sort. She didn't pass out like Pinkie did, but she didn't like Pinkie snoozing, or whatever she's doing. "PINKIE!" "What? Oh hey there Fluttershy! Why did you yell? Because you saw the temple?" "Um, well.....let's go inside." Said Fluttershy quickly, wanting to change the subject. Soon the friends were inside.

"SLAM!"
"WH-What happened?!"
"The door slammed shut, but now the temple's our!" said Pinkie, with eagerness to explore, Fluttershy, on the other hoof, wanted to be back outside.

After finding many treasure rooms, a throne room, a room filled with Idols, and so much more, Pinkie starts to have the others ring into her mind, really. RING, RING, RING.

"This is so awesome! I can't believe we can't invite the others. First let's find a way out, and then get the others to come to my....I mean, heh heh, OUR wonderific, Being-In-A-Dark-Scary-Temple-Party! This will be so exciting!" "First let's get out of here." Fluttershy suggested, not wanting Pinkie to start rigging the place, how horrifying it would be if Pinkie made the place collapse.

Back in one of the treasure rooms, well, after searching every other room, The duo is about to give up.

"My party will never be the same, well our party, but this coins are mine...wait, what's that noise?" Pinkie Pie had lifted a few coins, wanting them for herself, when the room rumbled, sorta like somepony's empty stomach. That's When the wall on one side had completely flipped into ground position, It was a secret tunnel.

"Maybe that's our ticket to leave." Said Pinkie.

"I think your right." answered Fluttershy, and with that the ponies entered the Black passage.

"I see light!" Said Fluttershy, pointing at a white figure in the distance, but the light wasn't bright. But that never stopped Pinkie Pie before, she bounced over to the light, like a fly to a lamp. Fluttershy Followed.

"AN OPENING!" They did it, they escaped the temple like Jonah escaping the Whale's belly, according to the bible.

"Let's not go there again anytime soon Pinkie, I don't want everyone to be trapped in there like us." "Oh, okay, but only because you don't want to have us eaten by a ancient ruin again, HAHA!"

"Sister, wait up!" Celestia and Luna had wandered near the heart of the island, nothing dangerous so far, well, not yet, at least.

"Sister? Um, Celestia? What are you looking at?" Luna then noticed what her sister had been staring at, a abandoned castle. The Sisters then stared at the castle for a few seconds, then at each other, if they had enough courage to go into the Ancient Ruin. Finally, they didn't hold back any longer after another few minutes, they entered the ounce beautiful castle of Ancient times. The Arts were fabulous, it was like Canterlot again, but these had different symbols, of some empire that the Royal sisters couldn't identify.

"SLAM!"

"What? who's there? Oh no! Celestia, come quick! We're trapped!"

Luna noticed the Castle doors slam shut, called for her sister to combine their magic to get out. But the doors were not moving the slightest inch. "What should we do sister?" "We'll have to find another way out of this castle." "But how? We explored every room and found nothing...."

CREEEEEEEEECK!

"Scratch that, I think we found something." Luna, correcting herself said, hearing a door opening in the library. The Royal Sisters decided to investigate. In the library filled with ancient books and cobwebs. They found a what looked like a passage door opened up, it lead directly outside. The Princesses hurried over to the opening and escaped the castle, with nothing but a scratch.

"I don't want to be here anytime soon, wait, Sister? Do you think the books have information on how to be-rid of the chemicals back home?" "Maybe, but let's collect a few books QUICKLY, I don't want to be in that awful mess again, not now, not ever."

"How much farther Twilight?"

The Sisters in Law, Cadence and Twilight, were exploring the beaches of the island, the wildlife was really nice and so on, but no enemies, or ponies accept for them were anywhere to be seen.

Twilight runs ahead, Cadence on her tail. But Twilight suddenly stops.

"Twilight, keep going we...What in Equestria!"

They stopped in front of a fortress, a old, big, and destroyed fortress. There was a giant hole in the middle of the fortress, assuming that a unicorn army fired many rounds of magic at the military stand, Twilight and Cadence, didn't want to get to close, remembering from Cadence's last visit to Ponyville, Discord made them face a monster from a hole in the ground. Even though unharmed in the event, they almost got eaten by the Ugly beast.

"Let's be very careful, and explore it before something weird comes from the hole." Suggested Cadence, and Twilight agreed.

They checked every bit of the ruin, finding nothing important but the, well, GIANT hole. They decided to leave. Only to find pretty much the fortress crumbling, the Sisters in law then realize they need to leave, fast, but the doors were somehow shut, and the glass windows were not openings, or were they? Twilight ran over to a window.

"Quick! Help me find a key or something to unlock the window!" "Or throw a rock at it." Replied Cadence, the Alicorn then threw rocks she found on the floor at the window, on impact, the window shattered to tiny little pieces, The princesses now have a way out of the old and small fortress.

"C'mon!" Twilight said, the fortress collapsing as she spoke. They jumped through the window, they escape without injury, but the fortress falls, on top of the hole.

"I'm not going here at all soon!" Said Twilight, tired from escaping what could have been death.

Rarity and Applejack hadn't made any fuss, or really not any words came out of their mouths, but when they round the corner.

"Applejack, why did you stop? You know it's....it's.....Um, Applejack? I think we have a bad dungeon problem."

They found what appeared to be a jailhouse dungeon building. {The Castle didn't have a dungeon inside.} Hoping for no problems, the unicorn and earth pony went inside.

"SLAM!"

"What was that? I think somepony else is hear!" Rarity shrieked, she didn't want to have the new pony shocked by their appearance. "Quick! Let's get out of here!" The Pair had been so frightened of somepony else being in the building, they didn't even try the now locked door, they barreled through the wall like a buffalo rampage.

"I hope somepony doesn't notice the....um....damage we caused."

Applejack chuckled in response.

Rainbow Dash was flying around the area of the boats. She didn't like hanging around, she wanted to explore the new land, but the Alicorns insisted.

She liked the inside of the boat she rode in, it had a place where she could attempt playing board games, or something to keep her from doing nothing.

While she was doing a game of darts, she heard hooves running towards the boat, she looked to find her friends. She ran to greet them.

"So, How'd it go?" "Well...."

Ounce Rainbow Dash heard everything, she started giggling so hard that everypony wondered why, did she know something they didn't know?

"This island's building always locks them in, by the front door at least." Rainbow Dash explained. "I found that out in one of these books on the boat."

Well, despite being trapped, they knew they were alone, nopony else was there. The Alicorns can try to figure out how to get rid of the chemicals back in Equestria, and the others had started preparing to leave the island.

They may be trapped or something, but their teamwork in each team pulled off.

They succeeded in exploring the new land, and they will leave the next day.