Fleximare and the Deranged Doctor

by Green Akers

Thursday, 12:37 AM: Dr. Audubon's Hideout

"Uhhhh..." Blossomforth groaned as she opened her eyes. She found herself in some sort of storage room, surrounded by wooden crates of various sizes. More importantly, she discovered she was tied down on a conveyor belt next to the pony she was supposed to be saving. "What happened?" she demanded. "Where am I?"

"Well, my dear, you are merely in the laboratory of the greatest mind in griffondom!" Dr. Audubon cackled from a perch above the two ponies. He gestured towards a large buffalo that stood in the corner of the room. "My chief security officer saw you admiring my lab, and thought it would be best if you and I met face-to-face."

The buffalo just stared stoically at the conveyor belt, without bothering to move, blink, or even breathe.

"You know, I feel as though I should be insulted," Dr. Audubon continued. "Here I am, the greatest threat to equine rule in the history of history, and the pony princesses send a single pathetic pegasus to stop me."

"Well, Doc," Blossomforth said with a shrug, "you're not exactly Nightmare Moon."

"Harrumph!" Dr. Audubon flew over to the opposite end of the conveyor belt, where a large circular saw blade had been mounted. "Nevertheless, you picked the perfect time to drop in, Miss, uh, whatever-your-name-is."

"I'm Fleximare!" Blossomforth replied. "The incredible bendable mare!"

"Fleximare? Really?" Dr. Audubon scrunched up his face as if someone had passed a block of smelly cheese under his beak. "What sort of silly name is that?"

"Well, it was either that or 'Rubber Girl,' so—"

"Say no more." Dr. Audubon shook his head. "Regardless, I'm glad you've joined us, Fleximare. Otherwise, I would have had this super-evil death trap built for nothing." He turned to the buffalo. "Start the machine!"

"Wait!" Blossomforth shouted. "Before you kill us, you should at least have the decency to divulge your entire dastardly plan."

Dr. Audubon laughed. "You mean you haven't realized it by now?" He shook his head again. "Further proof that griffons rule and ponies drool, and that your foolish magic is the only thing standing between our kind and world domination." He swooped down and tapped on Peppermint's horn, which now had a large clamp attached to it. "And now that I have my Magic Eraser, this little advantage is no more, and there is no pony who can stand in my way."

"B-b-but you can't kill me!" Peppermint pleaded. "You were using my magic to run your machines and make your eraser stuff!"

"True," Dr. Audubon conceded, "but now that we've completed that phase of the project, the only thing we need your magic for now is to power my death trap."

"Hold on a second," Blossomforth interrupted. "You need a buffalo for your muscle and a unicorn for your power?" She gave Dr. Audubon a disapproving look. "That's not exactly a ringing endorsement for griffon superiority, if you ask me."

"What can I say? One does what one must do to conquer the world." Dr. Audubon nodded towards the buffalo, who reached up and punched a large red button on the wall.

"Aaahhh!" Peppermint screamed in agony as her horn lit up, and the saw and conveyor belt both began to move.

"As much as I'd love to stick around and watch you meet your doom," Dr. Audubon said, "Miss Fleximare's arrival has put us behind schedule, and I have an army of henchgriffons to coordinate. Ciao!"

Blossomforth stuck her tongue out at Dr. Audubon and his buffalo as they left the room, then turned her attention back to the death trap. Time to show that featherbrain that they call me Fleximare for a reason, she thought.

Blossomforth began trying to contort her body such that she could slide out from under her restraints. Being flexible and being an escape artist, however, are two different things, and after several minutes of bending, twisting, and popping limbs in and out of joint, she was still stuck tight to the conveyor belt. "Okay," she admitted, as a few drops of sweat dripped down her forehead, "this might be harder than I thought."

"Waaahhhh!" Peppermint wailed. "We're gonna die!"

"We are not going to die!" Blossomforth insisted. "I've totally got everything under control right now!" She looked up at the clamp on Peppermint's horn. "Slide your head over towards me!" she ordered. "If I can get that clip off of your horn, I can stop the machine!"

Peppermint nodded and bent her head over towards Blossomforth. "Keep going," Blossomforth said as she angled her own head to try to grab the clamp in her jaw. "Almost got it..."

Finally, Blossomforth managed to bite down on the clamp. "Yes! I got—yaaahhh!!!" she screamed as a thousand volts of unicorn power flowed through her body, making her hair stand on end and nearly blowing her eyes out of their sockets.

"Oh no!" Peppermint jerked her head back, pulling the clamp out of Blossomforth's mouth. "Are you okay?"

"Uhhhh..." Blossomforth blinked a few times to put out the fires on her pupils. "Um, of course!" she assured Peppermint in a less-than-reassuring tone of voice. "It'll take more than a little magic to stop Fleximare!"

Peppermint gulped and looked over at the fast-approaching saw. "Like 'super-scary death trap' more?"

"Er, maybe." Blossomforth continued to struggle against her restraints, but the ropes held fast, and the pony pair continued their slow crawl towards certain death.

Nice work, Fleximoron! Blossomforth cursed herself in her mind. You could be home sleeping right now, dreaming about watching the sun go down in the Daffodil Islands! But no, you thought you could moonlight as a superhero, protecting the innocent and smiting the guilty while making a little extra spending cash along the way! She turned her face away from Peppermint so that the unicorn wouldn't see the tears welling in her eyes. Well, congratulations Blossomforth, she thought, all those extra bits will get you a pretty tombstone in the Ponyville Cemetery!

As Peppermint closed her eyes and prayed to Celestia and Blossomforth drowned in self-pity, the circular saw passed through the pony pair, cutting nothing but the ropes as it passed harmlessly between the two mares. The pair was then dumped unceremoniously onto the floor upon reaching the end of the conveyor belt, bringing them both back to their senses. "Are... Are we dead?" Peppermint asked.

Blossomforth wiped her eyes and looked around the room. "I don't think so," she said, pointing to the death trap. "I doubt they have death traps in heaven. Of course, if we went in the other direction..."

"We... We're alive! Oh, thank Celestia we're alive!" Peppermint bent down to kiss the floor, but the power cord on her horn wouldn't stretch that far, so she settled for hugging Blossomforth. "Fleximare, you did it! You got us out of that terrible trap!"

"Well, not exactly," Blossomforth admitted, "but I guess it's better to be lucky than good sometimes."

Peppermint looked at Blossomforth expectantly. "So what do we do now?"

"Well, there's still the matter of stopping that crazy griffon and getting out of here in one piece." Blossomforth scratched her chin with her hoof as she pondered her next move. Her eyes wandered back over to the death trap, which was still running. "You know," she said, "you couldn't lift that vase back in the lab, but you certainly had enough juice to run that crazy machine." She flew over and punched the red button to stop the machine. "The effects of that Magic Eraser stuff must be temporary," she concluded.

Peppermint stared blankly at Blossomforth for a few moments as she processed the thought. She reached up and removed the clamp from her horn, then used her magic to lift one of the sliced restraints off of the ground. "Hey, you're right!" she exclaimed. "My magic's back!"

"Great," Blossomforth said. "How big of an object do you think you could move with that?"

"Gosh, I don't know." Peppermint pointed a hoof at one of the nearby crates. "I've lifted some boxes like that back at the candy store. Is that big enough?"

"Not quite." Blossomforth made a dash for the door. "Come with me—I'll show you what I'm thinking of."