Quest Deviation
Quest Deviation
So once again Kain was walking about Ponyville with Rarity, much more attentive than during her tour the first time he’d come to town.
“Transformed ponies attacking their fellow citizens, such awful business Mr. Highwind. Can you imagine waking to find yourself in an unknown body?” Rarity asked.
“I’d imagine they’d be quite confused. “ Kain said, “But it wouldn’t explain the attacks. I hope that Twilight can provide answers for us.”
“Indeed she will Kain. No pony is more studious and diligent than she is. I only hope she’s found an answer by now.” Rarity said.
“So where does she reside?” Kain asked. “I know that she’s a princess, where is her castle or manor?”
“Actually dear,” Rarity said. “She lives in the quite humble abode that is the Golden Oak’s Library. Suits here well though as that mare can’t be separated from books for too long.”
“I’ve never really known royalty to live amongst the general populace.” Kain said.
“Though she only recently earned the title of princess, I don’t believe it’s changed her in the slightest. Well except for the fact that she feels she needs to be even more responsible now.” Rarity said, explaining.
The two of them arrived at the library. Kain was indeed still impressed with the fact that royalty would prefer to live in such a plain setting, but he put his observations aside and knocked on the door. Spike opened up the door, “Hi Kain!” the dragon said. “Oh, and hello Rarity. “ He said in a smitten tone.
“Hello Spike.” Rarity said, unresponsive to Spike’s affection. “Is Twilight here? We wanted to know what she’s discovered about that certain incident that occurred yesterday.”
“Yes, she’s here. Twilight hasn’t really stopped her research the moment she came back. I’ve been the only one going in and out of the library for errands and food.”
“Oh my.” Rarity said. “Has she really been here this whole time?”
“Yeah, at first I just thought that Twilight was just pulling an all-nighter like she sometimes does, but she hasn’t been saying much at all except to have me get a book or send a message. She hasn’t even gone to sleep too. Usually she eventually goes to bed after a night of research.” Spike replied.
“We need to know if she’s learned anything.” Kain said. “Can she speak with us?”
“Yes, I’m sure she’s fit to talk to. She only gets weird to talk to after three days of no sleep.” Spike admitted in a matter of fact tone. Rarity furrowed her brow out of concerned from that last statement. “Anyways, I’ll just let you inter her lab. Do you want anything, like say tea, Rarity? Spike implored with a bit of gusto.
“Oh no darling.” The unicorn stated. “We’ll just be speaking with Twilight, come and join us as we get to the bottom of this mystery.”
Kain could literally see the happiness plummet from the dragon’s face after Rarity’s last statement. It wasn’t her eagerness to find the answer to the mystery, but her dismissive nature to Spike’s obvious affection towards the mare. The dragoon wondered for a bit about his own romantic plight in the past, the way it seemed that Rosa never truly seemed to return any interest he’d shown in her. He mentally shook his head and continued into the basement.
The three of them descended down the stairs to find the princess of Ponyville in a lab coat staring at various pieces of fruit laid out an a long table. The alicorn was casting spells on each piece, transforming them into different varieties of other fruits. She leveled her head with the table’s surface, staring at each piece of fruit, expecting some sort of reaction to occur. Twilight pulled off her goggles after a few moments of nothing happening, and flung them away. “I don’t get it! How can anypony even change the shape of another creature so drastically?” Twilight yelled.
“Dear, I think you need some rest.” Rarity said interrupting the beginning of another Twilight Sparkle meltdown. “We’ll figure this out. I’m sure of it.”
“Oh, hi Rarity. Hi Kain.” Twilight said to her company with a bit of blush after having let the two of them see her in a bedraggled state. “Sorry you all had to see that. This problem just has me baffled.”
“What have you learned princess?” Kain asked.
“Well, my studies in transformation spells are still not quite where I wanted them to be at the moment, but there are still things that don’t add up. Like why was it these transformation spells weren’t perfect like what I did with the fruit.” Twilight explained.
“Do you know who or what might have caused it?” Rarity continued asking.
“Well, its tough to say. Unicorns are capable of such spells, but I don’t think any particularly powerful unicorns have taken residence in or around Ponyville as of late. I was barely beginning my studies on polymorphing magic a few months ago, so I’m certain it had to be a powerful unicorn.” Twilight said.
“You don’t think it’s Trixie again, do you Twilight?” Spike asked.
“No, I don’t think it is, it definitely wouldn’t be her style. She’d be much more confrontational. And besides, I think she’s learned her lesson from the last fiasco.” Twilight said.
The princess walked with Spike and her visitors back up the stairs and into the main room of the library. “Well, I’m sorry I couldn’t have been more help. I’ll catch some rest and continue my investigations tomorrow.” Twilight said. At that moment, the door to the library was slammed open and the sight of an all too familiar pegasus made her presence known.
“Twilight!” Rainbow Dash yelled. “We gotta get moving! The Crusader’s are headed into the Everfree!”
“What happened?” Twilight asked.
“I don’t know, but they were headed in there in a real hurry, but it wasn’t in the direction of Zecora’s.” Rainbow Dash said. “Applejack’s waiting at the spot they went in, we’ve gotta move!”
“Let’s not dawdle then. Spike, stay here and watch the library.” Twilight said. “Kain, we’re going to need your assistance once again.”
“Yes your majesty.” Kain replied.
“I’m not going to sit back and wait while my sister is in trouble, especially in the Everfree forest of all places; count me in Twilight.” Rarity said, moving with the other ponies out the door.
////
While en route to the forest entrance, Kain couldn’t help but wonder as to why those three youngsters had decided to embark on their own, especially given the trouble they’d gotten into when he first met them, but he dismissed any further thought as time was of the essence.
“They went in raht here.” Applejack said, as the group arrived. “They must have come in here not fifteen minutes ago. Rainbow Dash told me she saw them goin in from the sky. Ah gave chase, but decided that to wait here instead while Rainbow got y’all over here.”
“We should get moving.” Kain said.
“All right, let’s stick together, there’s no telling what’s in there. Yell if you see anything.” Twilight said as they entered the forest.
It looked like any other forest Kain had seen before, he just couldn’t figure out why the others were so apprehensive about entering the woods. The name itself evoked fear and concern form the mares, evidently it was a notorious locale, but the dragoon didn’t want to chance any suspicion by asking any questions on the particularly infamous Everfree. However, this world’s forests could very well be misleading as the one he first entered was home to cockatrice.
“This place always gives me the creeps.” Rainbow Dash said.
“Ah don’t know if its brave or foolish on the crusaders’ part to have come here.” Applejack said.
Twilight sighed. “I’m worried about that cutie mark ambition they have. It seems like they’re jeopardizing their safety more often than not for those marks.”
“Now’s not the time.” Rarity interjected. “We’ll give then earful later, but right now we must find them. “How’s that tracking spell coming along Twilight?”
“I’ve about got it. There, I can see the magical contrail left by Sweetie Belle’s latent magic. Oh no, they seemed to have gone deeper into the woods. “ Twilight said.
“How much deeper?” Applejack asked.
“Remember when I was nearly driven mad over Pinkie Pie’s Pinkie Sense?” Twilight asked.
“I remember that.” Rainbow Dash began with a chortle. “All that stuff fell on you because of Derpy. And by the end of it, you were chased by a … We need to find them now.”
The group hastened their movement as the alicorn continued to follow the trail of the fillies. They happened upon a marsh territory with some holes in the canopy exposing light. “Mind your footing.” Kain said, advising the others.
The entire area was dead quiet. Not even the sounds of insects or other minute fauna could be heard, only the sound of water being fed into the area from some distant stream or river.
Then, ripples began to be made in the fetid water, not from fish or some other aquatic animal, but from a larger creature as the movements could be seen throughout the marsh. As the group looked upon the area to note the ripples, Rarity noticed a tree, devoid of its leaves on a somewhat isolated island with a large knot hole. When the aquatic tremors subsided, she noticed a small white hoof emerge, then the face of Sweetie Belle looking around. “There they are!” Rarity spoke, almost yelling. Sweetie Belle made a dash back into the tree, not before shaking her head in the direction of her sister and her group.
The liquid surface of the marsh began to rise up. When it receded, the party was soaked and grimy, but more concerned with a much bigger problem. A large, olive colored, multiheaded reptile stood before them. It licked its chops at the five morsels that happened upon its territory.
“Hydra!” Rainbow Dash yelled. She attempted to lift herself into the air, but was sucked back into the soggy earth. With a bit more effort, she was able to take to the sky. As the great behemoth began to make is way towards the group, the remaining ponies attempted to split up as best they could. Applejack and Twilight went in one direction, while Kain and Rarity took the other direction.
“Do you have any experience in battle?” Kain asked.
“Not against anything this big.” Rarity replied.
“I’m going to try to distract it from the air.” Kain said as he noted Rainbow Dash already buzzing about the creature’s many heads. “Go to the girls and see that they’re safe.”
The unicorn complied and made her way around the current engagement. Meanwhile Twilight and Applejack were at odds with one of the hydra’s four heads. The princess was blasting light in one of its faces to confuse it so that the farm pony to land a hit on it. Rainbow Dash couldn’t go on the offensive because she was too busy trying to out-maneuver three heads at once. Kain gathered his strength to jump, but encountered the same problem Rainbow Dash did. He had to put more energy into leaping into the air. He slammed onto one of the beast’s heads and then landed back onto the marsh. The distraction allowed Rainbow Dash to lead the other two heads around the one that was stunned.
Rainbow Dash looked back at her handiwork. They hydra’s heads were stuck in a knot and thrashed about to get free. The pegasus was just about to break into a fit of laughter when one of the tangled heads glared at her. The individual head made a lunge at her so powerful, that it jerked the other two heads with it, which were still bickering with each other, but the enraged head kept tugging at the knot. Finally, with one mighty pull, it just about reached Rainbow Dash, but not before severing the other two of its brethren from the core. The pegasus dodged the one maw just as it came into close proximity. Twilight, who’d been assisting Applejack with a force field, beheld the gruesome spectacle of the two heads plopping into the swamp and sending water into the air.
Kain saw that the number of heads they had to contend with dwindled to two, but soon a sick feeling came upon him as he recalled what was to follow. His fears were confirmed with the writhing ‘necks’ of the hydra began to split from each other. A slimy surface was seen where there should have been exposed flesh; the necks now forming new mouths were the sights beheld by the ponies. Now six ferocious heads were threatening to devour the group. The dragoon cursed to himself about the hassles he’d contended with every creature in this world to this point. Gorgon gazes, reanimating wolves, and now a dividing hydra.
With now more than enough heads to divide its attention, the hydra noticed Rarity attempting to help the crusaders. Two heads lunged towards them, but not before two audible, metallic clinks were heard. Kain had managed to skip off the two of them, drawing the ire away from the youngsters.
Twilight began blasting magic at her and Applejack’s group of heads, trying to do the same as the dragoon. Another head snapped at the orange mage. She jumped up and slammed down on the attacker, but another hydra head slammed her off. Applejack tumbled along the damp land. Twilight teleported towards her friend to render aid. Now three heads had their focus on the pair; Twilight readied a barrier to fend off the blows while she tried to get Applejack back on her hooves.
Meanwhile Rainbow Dash decided it was probably best not to get the hydra to tie its heads again, instead she mirrored Kain’s tactics of attacking each head acrobatically, but without armored shoes or a weapon, she wasn’t about to do near as much damage. Still, she and Kain assaulted the hydra from the air, bucking and stabbing at the hungry maws of the beast.
“We’re barely scratching them!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed out of frustration, then dodging another snap from the hydra.
“And we can’t hold to this tactic forever.” The dragoon added. “Keep the heads occupied, I have a plan.” Kain leapt up into the air and readied another strike at the hydra, but this time at the core body of the beast. When he was just halfway into his descent, the three heads that were busy with Twilight and Applejack instantly glared at him. The heads shot up to protect the body. When Kain made it down to connect the blow, he instead stabbed the neck of one of the heads. It flailed about until it shook the dragoon and his lance off.
With all of the heads’ attention directed at the airborne ponies, Twilight took the opportunity to release her barrier and check on Applejack. The farmpony was conscious, but gritted her teeth as she attempted to get up. “AJ! One of your legs is broken!” Twilight spoke from shock.
“Ah, know! Ahm no use to anypony raht now!” Applejack strained to say.
“Let me get to work on this.” Twilight said. Her horn glowed and began to focus her magic on Applejack’s rear left leg. Normally the alicorn wouldn’t be troubled to heal her friend while holding a barrier up, but without a good night’s sleep, the princess could only focus on one spell at a time.
“Damnation!” Kain yelled. “This beast won’t let me strike at its core! But at least we now know its weak spot.”
“But how are we supposed to get an opening on the darn thing! I can’t get all of them to chase me; half of these heads know what you’re up to!” Rainbow Dash said.
“We need everyone to distract them if we want a clean shot to end this; I’m going to ask Rarity for help. Go and relay the information over to Twilight.” Kain said as he noticed the princess just brought Applejack up again. He took off to the unicorn while Rainbow Dash went to the other direction.
“Kain, what are you doin?” Rarity frantically asked. “That hydra is still rampaging! Don’t bring its attention over here!”
“I need your help Rarity.” We all need to distract the heads so that I can get a straight shot at the monster’s center.” Kain quickly explained, “Girls, I need you to hide. This is going to get very dangerous.” The crusaders went off to the edge of the swamp for cover. The sound of magic being fired at the hydra could be heard not far off. The other three mares had begun their assault. “We need to help them now.” Kain demanded.
The fashionista and the dragoon made their way back to the fray. Twilight had subdued one of the heads in an aura of magic whilst Rainbow Dash and applejack were just barely able to keep the remaining heads at bay. “About time you came back!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed.
Each of them had their own way of distracting the hydra heads. Rainbow Dash flew around, keeping two of them busy. Twilight had another encapsulated in a field of magic. Applejack had one head pinned down under her hooves, and Rarity used her magic to fashion a blindfold of leaves around another head. She called out to it in attempts to keep it focused on her as it snapped blindly where it heard her last. The head Kain was dealing with was proving troublesome. It simply would not allow the dragoon to jump for the coup de grace.
“Hurry up Kain!” Applejack yelled. “We can’t keep this up forever!”
The dragon knight stood before the last head, ready for another attempt to out-maneuver it. The problem lay with the fact that each takeoff was slightly delayed with the floor being a thick consistency, it wasn’t much, but it was enough to keep Kain from responding as quickly as he wanted to. Just then a tree came toppling down on the hydra head, dazing and pinning it to the ground, followed by a “whoops” of the cutie-mark crusaders.
“Yeah!” Scootaloo yelled. “Get em Kain!” Sweetie Belle cried out.
The dragoon vaulted into the air, much higher than normal. He wanted to be sure of the strike, so more force was needed ergo a greater height was what he aimed for. Kain came down with a tremendous force, piercing deep into the hydra’s hide. But he wasn’t done yet. The dragoon leapt from his current position, back into the air, leaving the spear embedded in the monster. Kain returned to the earth with a subsequent impact directly onto the butt of the weapon, driving it further into the monster with finality.
At once, all the heads and necks went slack and did not stir further. The battle was won.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, looking at the downed hydra. “Is it dead?” Rarity asked, almost disgusted with her question. Kain yanked his spear from the corpse; when there was no reaction from the body, he spoke.
“It certainly appears to be dead.”
Of all the ponies around him, Rainbow Dash and Applejack appeared to be the least affected by the dragoon’s observation. Even the fillies that he’d saved looked as they had been filled with terror of something actually being killed before them.
“I suppose there wasn’t much of a choice.” Twilight said, addressing the subject no doubt on most of the ponies’ minds.
Applejack shifted the subject. “What in tarnation were you three thinkin?” Anger and disappointment seething in her tone. “It’s barely been a week and here we all are havin to come and save your flanks all over again.”
“We were trying to help, honest!” Applebloom said.
“Dears, you now that the Everfree is dangerous; why ever did you come here?” Rarity said, trying to defuse the tension.
“After we overheard you all.” Sweetie Belle began, to which Applejack gave her a look. “We eavesdropped on you all talking about trying to find some strange magic I thought we could try to help, and maybe earn our curtiemarks in the process.”
“Well, I sort of tried out one of those spells Twilight talked about when she started helping me out with my magic. She called it dowsing.” Sweetie Belle said, and at once Rarity and Applejack slowly turned their heads to the Princess.
“What? I didn’t exactly tell them to try and dowse for clues.” Twilight said to the disgruntled mares. She turned to Sweetie Belle. “But I did warn you about using magic you weren’t familiar with and to stick to light and levitation.”
“Yeah, the trouble was, that once she used that dowsing stuff and found the magic signal.” Scootaloo said. “She started getting pulled away from us. We all tried to hold her down, but she got us all dragged into the Everfree Forest.”
“It’s just like what happened with you Rarity.” Twilight stated. “You got your cutie mark when you were dragged by your magic. I wonder what your magic was leading you to Sweetie Belle.”
“I don’t know, I just tried that detect magic spell you taught me and then I took off.” Sweetie Belle said.
“Great, that leaves us no closer to finding out what hay’s been going on.” Rainbow Dash said.
"Not necessarily Rainbow.” Twilight began. “There might be a connection between these strange occurrences. But I’ll need to go back to my library to do more research.” With that, the group headed back for Ponyville, with substantially less action occurring on the trip.
////
The party dispersed once they’d reached the outskirts of town as the hour was already drawing late. Kain was alone again, save for one pegasus that didn’t leave.
“Wow, is that the sort of stuff you get to do all the time Kain?” Rainbow Dash asked.
Kain reflected back on his adventures with Cecil and company; all of those countless battles from the Blue Planet, all the way to the moon reappeared in his memory. Life certainly was turbulent at the time. “It’s calmed down substantially as of late.” The dragoon responded, only then realizing how much he admitted to a mare that seemed to thrive on action.
“Are you kidding me?” Are you saying that your life was even more action packed than it is now?” Rainbow Dash asked, awestruck.
“Perilous is a word I’d rather use to describe it.” Kain replied. The pegasus wasn’t fazed at all about the dragoon’s subtlety.
“You sound like you’ve been in more than your fair share of danger, almost as much as Daring Do.” Rainbow Dash said, not conceding the awesomeness of her idol. “Tell you what, you’ve got yourself a partner for whatever adventure comes your way next. Things can get boring from time to time here in Ponyville.”
Kain huffed. “We’ll see.”
“Oh, that wasn’t a suggestion, that’s a promise!” Rainbow Dash said as she spread her wings and took off before Kain could object.
The dragoon was once again feeling that same irritation a certain ninja tended to inflict on him. Rainbow Dash had indeed proved herself in the battle against the hydra as she was the only one of the group able to distract more than one head at once; her nimble nature proved invaluable, and chalked up another pint in likening her to that ninja. He supposed he’d ask for her help if the situation demanded it.
Night was falling, and Kain supposed it was time to retire from the day. He considered speaking more with Twilight about that strange magic Rarity’s sister had been pulled towards, but decided against it. Nearly two days without sleep and an arduous battle probably wouldn’t have left the mare in any condition to speculate.
He returned to his current home that was at the Ponyville Inn. “Welcome back, Mr. Highwind was it?” the innkeeper said. “Just to inform you, we’ve just accepted payment for the next month from Canterlot, erm should you choose to stay with us. If not, we’ll gladly refund you your money. I’m sorry we got off on the wrong hoof, I’m Flipside by the way.” The black earth pony extended a hoof.
“It’s all in the past.” Kain said, not wanting to hold a grudge over something as trivial as a stay at the inn. “And yes, I do believe I’ll be staying.”
~Belligerent Bindlestiff
Stats
Page generated in 0.043 seconds
Total duration
1,030 users online
1,965,468 hits today, 2,561,572 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Um, are you sure you're using that right?
perhaps you mean... bedraggled?
You might ask Rarity.....
Usually there's some sort of interdimensional currency exchange, but this fic doesn't accept Gil. I'll bet that the world where Kain comes from doesn't accept Bits.
The one issue I'm having with this story, though it is no fault of the author, is that the device on which I read cannot operate two applications at once. I must close the story in order to follow the links to the accompaniment. Thus, my experience is sadly, without music.
I get that you're trying to set up tension between Kain and Rarity, but it seems a bit weird for Rarity to shut Spike down that hard. Even if she's not interested, she's known to lead him on. Enthusiastically.
8331275
I wouldn't see it as actively shutting down, but more that she's really not interested. With this interaction, I was going for a parallel of unreturned affection.
Sometimes I have to wonder if Rarity uses Spike's affection deliberately to her advantage in the show. That would be rather discerning.