7 - In the Light of Day
Lex woke up with a start, breathing heavily as he abruptly transferred from sleep to full wakefulness, his brain immediately processing everything around him with a speed borne of fright. An off-white room. Light pouring in from the window around the entrance. A warm body pressed against him. Soft breathing coming from beside him. No scents.
A fraction of an instant later his memories of last night came back to him, and he instantaneously clamped down on the intense anxiety that he felt, recognizing that it was a phantom from his dreams that had no place in his current situation. This was his usual morning routine, and it was not a pleasant one, but he’d had no choice but to get used to it since it had been almost ten months since he’d last slept peacefully.
Still, it could have been worse. Although he'd heard that Princess Luna had the power to enter a pony's dreams, and often made use of it to soothe the nightmares of her subjects, she had never once done so for him, much to his relief. The thought of somepony else – especially one of those wretched princesses! – rooting through his mind was a prospect he found far, far more terrifying than any bad dreams. Presumably his horn's dark magic was warding her off, but without any way to actively test that, it remained only a theory; he'd have preferred to have more concrete knowledge, but like so much else about his current situation, he'd need to make do with what he had.
Letting out a breath, he turned his head to regard Sonata, who was still asleep, not having moved from where she’d laid down beside him last night. He regarded her for a long moment, his face not showing any of the torrent of emotions he felt as he thought back to last night. Glancing back at the sunlight streaming in, he put his ruminations aside and nuzzled her. “Sonata. Wake up.”
He had to repeat the process twice more before she began to stir, yawning as she opened her eyes. “Mmm…morning Lex,” she smiled up at him as she rubbed her eyes, before moving in and complementing her words with a kiss.
He blinked, his eyes remaining open in surprise as she pressed her lips to him. After what had definitely felt like a fight the previous evening, it made no sense to him that she’d be amorous this morning. He thought about asking her to explain the reasons for her current temperment, but put it aside in favor of a simple “Good morning” in reply.
She stood up and stretched, and Lex rose a moment later, heading immediately for the entrance and sliding down the rope. A bit put out that they couldn’t enjoy waking up together a bit more, Sonata followed him.
Once exiting the extradimensional room, she found Lex scattering the leaves she’d bunched up the previous night, retrieving his pack with a sigh of relief. “See?” she called out. “Told you it’d be fine.”
“It was still a risk that we shouldn’t have had to take. Given the number of setbacks we’ve experienced so far, I’m not inclined to allow for any more possibilities of misfortune if I can help it.”
Sonata rolled her eyes, but the corners of her mouth turned up in a wry grin. “Yeah, well, I’m sure you’ll come up with an idea by tonight, Mister Super Genius. Now come on, dig some of the food out of that thing and let’s have breakfast!”
Breakfast had been a brief affair, with Sonata scarfing down several raspberry oat cakes while Lex stuck to a plain muffin. After sipping some water from a canteen, they made their way back to the tracks and – after Lex had spent a half-hour closely examining the wreckage in the light of day just to make sure he hadn’t missed anything – resumed following them towards Tall Tale. Several hours had passed since then, with the pair making light conversation as they traveled.
“So, like, what’s the plan for when we fight the dragon?” Sonata asked. After a nice heart-to-heart with her boyfriend and a yummy breakfast, she felt ready to take on the world!
“Dragons are little better than animals,” snorted Lex derisively, as much towards her continued belief that there would be a dragon for them to face as it was towards the subject of dragons themselves. “There’s not much information about their social patterns or society, but based on what I’ve read, that’s because they don’t have much of either one.”
“Oh yeah?”
Lex nodded. “They have a modicum of intelligence when they’re young, but as they get older they become more bestial even as they grow in mass. If the creature was large enough to do that level of damage to the tracks, then it won’t be capable of much in the way of cognitive abilities. And we’re going to use that to our advantage.”
“Ooh, I like where this is going!” Sonata squealed.
Lex rolled his eyes before continuing. “Since they breathe fire, I’ll cast a spell to resist damaging heat on both of us. Their scales are powerful armor against physical and magical attacks, but I’ll use my dark magic to lay some curses that will erode that.” He glanced at Sombra’s horn-, no, he glanced at his horn, before returning his gaze to the path ahead of them.
“Awesome! What else?” Sonata pressed him. Unlike Lex, her eyes were glued to her companion. She loved seeing him this way; he was so cool when he was making plans like this, the very picture of confidence!
“Once I’ve done that, your job will be to hang back, away from its claws and fangs, and use your enchantments to keep its thoughts muddled so that it can’t muster a counterattack. While you do that, I’ll use deadlier magic to bring it down. If it tries to fly, then I’ll use dark magic to turn into a shadow and follow it until I can force it back to the ground.”
“So my job is just to stay in the background and make sure it can’t eat you while you get in there and do everything else?” Sonata pouted. “I wanted to be more than a backup singer.”
“Do you have any spells that can cause physical harm, or defend against damage?” countered Lex.
Sonata raised her eyes in thought, and after what Lex thought was far too long of a time, finally shook her head “Nope. Pretty much all the magic I know is about messing with someone’s head.”
“Precisely. That’s why it’s better for you to play a support role. Besides, I’d prefer you to be away from danger so that I can better focus on the situation at hoof.” A memory came to him as he said that, remembering when he and Sonata – alongside Twilight Sparkle, Applejack, and several others – had attacked a group of gnolls back on Everglow. One of the creatures had known some magic, and Lex could clearly recall the sense of panic he’d felt when Sonata had been hit with a fireball. She had only been singed, but just the thought of her being hurt like that again was enough to make him feel sick.
“Aw, that’s so sweet!” Her cheerful voice drew him from his reverie, and he glanced over at her, just now noticing her intense gaze. “You know, you can be really nice when you put your…your…”
She trailed off as, rounding a bend, something came into view that was enough to stop both ponies in their tracks.
“Like, is that what I think it is?” asked Sonata, her eyes widening.
“Yes,” replied Lex. Unlike her, his eyes were narrowing at the sight. Without another word, he started to gallop forward, and Sonata was right behind him.
Dead ahead of them was another devastated section of railroad track.
“It’s the same,” concluded Lex. He’d spent ten minutes eyeing the damage, and it was virtually identical to the one several miles back, having deep claw marks that had shredded not just the steel rails, but had also scattered the sleepers and cut deep gouges into the underlying ballast.
More notably, at least to Lex’s eyes, was that the broken ends of the rails were once again deformed in a way that suggested that they had been melted. It was the one discordant element in what otherwise seemed like the rampage of some sort of gigantic beast.
No, Lex realized suddenly, there’s one other thing that’s unusual about this.
“Wow, this dragon really hates trains. I mean it totes hates them,” remarked Sonata, pawing at the gashes cut into the ground. “Maybe one ran over its mother or something?”
“This was deliberate,” murmured Lex.
“Huh? What was that?” asked Sonata, heading back to where Lex had sat down and was staring at the broken track.
“I wasn’t certain before, but I am now; this was done on purpose. The first incident was suspicious for how the damage was localized to just the track and none of the surrounding area, but that could conceivably have been a coincidence, or due to some unusual circumstance. But a second occurrence,” he waved a hoof at the mess in front of them, “miles from the first can only be due to deliberate action. Whatever did this had a specific goal in mind when it did so.”
“You mean whatever dragon did this had a specific goal in mind,” corrected Sonata.
Lex gave her a flat look. “Alright…I’ll ask. You’ve been hooked on the idea that this might be a dragon ever since I mentioned that it was a possibility. Why?”
“Well duh!” scoffed Sonata, as though she couldn’t believe he had to ask. “Because dragons are, like, the biggest and most epic monsters there are! Even back on Earth, all the best stories were about heroes defeating dragons, and they didn’t even have any there!” She reared up, spreading her forelegs out in a sweeping gesture. “Defeating a big nasty creature is enough to make you a hero, but defeating a dragon makes you, like, a legend. The kind that lasts forever and ever.”
Still holding her forelegs out, she looked at Lex with eyes that practically sparkled with excitement. “Beating monsters and rescuing ponies makes everyone think that you’re awesome, but dragonslayers…dragonslayers are adored.” She breathed the last word softly, almost reverentially.
Lex frowned, unmoved by her speech. “Well, I hate to break it to you, but I’m beginning to have serious doubts that a dragon is the culprit here.”
“Aw, how come?” Sonata fell back to all fours with a disappointed look.
“You mean besides the fact that dragons breathe fire, and there are no scorch marks around here? Or that the metal tracks have been melted somehow? There’s also the fact that, as I mentioned before, dragons lose intelligence as they grow, and while I’m no dracologist, the size of those claw marks and the scope of the damage suggest that this one isn’t a juvenile.” He felt quite confident of that, thanks to having seen Twilight’s pet. It had been an irritating creature, but it was at least useful as a baseline for draconic growth.
“The only question left,” continued Lex, “is why this creature, whatever it is, is doing this. Why attack train tracks over and over in the middle of nowhere? What is it trying to accomplish?” He lapsed into silence, looking down with a thoughtful frown, trying to unravel the mystery. The answer was there, he was sure of it. If he just had a few more clues to work with, just one good idea or insight, he was sure that he could figure it out.
“Beats me,” shrugged Sonata. “I just wish it had done it closer to a town. It’s only been half-a-day, and I’m already getting tired of walking.”
“‘Closer to a town,’” murmured Lex quietly. “‘Closer to a town…’”
“Yeah,” replied Sonata, not noticing that he had completely ceased paying attention to her. “I mean, I like camping out with you and all, but it’s super inconven-”
“That’s it!” yelled Lex suddenly, raising his head. “That’s why it’s doing this! It’s trying to…oh no…” he trailed off as his look of revelation changed into one of horrified realization.
“To what? What’s it trying to do?” asked Sonata, growing more alarmed in response to his apparent distress.
Lex didn’t answer, instead getting up and charging down the tracks as fast as he could.
“Hey!” yelled Sonata. “Wait for me! What’s going on?!”
“We have to get to Tall Tale as fast as we can!” Lex called back over his shoulder. “It’s trying to isolate the city from the rest of Equestria!”
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Given that ponies suck when it comes to dragon lore, and based on the few adult dragons that have been interacted with in the show, Lex is in for a surprise should he try to confront a 'stupid' dragon.
The cuddling of Lex was adorable. This pony needs to learn how to make tacos, if he's so smart. I wonder about his nightmares and Princess Luna. In this story does she only visit the nightmares of children? Does Lex have some ward or item he's using to keep her out? Or does she just assume that, no matter how bad Lex's nightmares are, he'd prefer them to her helping him (she's probably right)?
More details on the tracks. I would guess an earth or fire elemental, but a fire elemental would leave obvious tracks (everything burned), and I'm not sure how an earth elemental would generate the heat. Some sort of bound, powerful, flying fiend? I'm guessing if its some kind of fiend, then it would be bound, or there would be a lot more death and destruction than some train tracks. I agree with Lex on the motives. Now he's got to get to Tall Tale and start investigating!
is
Her (There's no "said tag" so it's a new sentence.)
6615221 You're saying market research in Equestria's main demographic target is basically Rainbow Dash? I'd buy that.
6615296 Thanks for catching those. They're all fixed now.
6612601 I'm not sure I agree. Twilight admitted that ponies don't know much about dragons, but the show does seem to be pretty consistent in that they seem to grow dumber as they grow older.
The major impetus for this is Spike in Secret of My Excess. As he grows, his ability to speak (and, presumably, think) clearly diminishes. Now, that was clearly due to some sort of greed-induced accelerated growth - which would seem to suggest that dragons grow as they become more and more greedy, which is weird to say the least (and not backed up by anything else we ever see) - but it's not like most of the other dragons we see have been paragons of intellect.
Consider, the red dragon in Dragonshy seemed like it was struggling to get out a few sentences. The one Spike met in Owl's Well That Ends Well wasn't much better, communicating mostly in roars and grunts. The teenage dragons in DragonQuest could talk fairly well, but doing so showed that they weren't exactly the brightest of bulbs, as shown by how Twilight and co.'s disguise managed to fool them. Obviously, that's supposed to be emblematic of teenagers in general, but it also fooled the adult dragons nearby (who didn't speak at all that we heard).
In other words, there's plausible reason for thinking that the more Equestrian dragons grow, the dumber they get.
6612738 The issue with Lex's nightmares is one of the mysteries about him. Rest assured though, there is a very specific answer for it, which I suspect will be revealed in time.
6612738 You know, looking back over my previous answer to this, I decided that it wasn't enough. The issue of why Princess Luna hasn't done anything with regards to Lex's nightmares is one that the story needs to address, even if the characters themselves don't know. To that end, I've gone back and inserted an additional paragraph where Lex wonders about that. Hopefully it helps to acknowledge the mystery, rather than making it look like I simply forgot to make note of it.
Equestria Dragons, one of the few species in any fantasy that actually get stupider and slowly lose their sapience over time
I don’t really think Lex plans to sing when he is fighting the dragon
9447201 The funny thing is, while Lex is right about dragon society being nothing to write home about, the show has slowly dialed back on the idea of dragons getting dumber as they get larger/older. Spike's transformation in Secret of My Excess (season two, episode ten) seemed like it made it clear that dragons grew through greed, losing intelligence as they increased in size. But eventually, we saw more and more large dragons that could speak and reason just fine, such as Torch in Gauntlet of Fire (season six, episode five) – that being one of the episodes that flatly stated how little ponies knew about dragons – until eventually even "greed-induced bigness" was flat-out stated not to be a normal part of dragon growth in Molt Down (season eight, episode eleven).
So Lex is partially wrong here, though he doesn't know it.
9447204 Do backup singers require that there be a lead singer? I'm not sure they do, but given that this is Sonata talking, I'm not sure that she'd be up on the technicalities anyway.
9447209
Well, Torch is shown to be very very old. He was alive back before the Pillars were formed and before Equestria was founded. He was also the same size, but judging by his wildness i’m guessing that was caused by greed growth, at some point he got better, and then a long time passed before he reached that height naturally and was able to retain his sanity.
9447216 That's certainly possible, but given that we only see him being that large that long ago was in a flashback – which was actually a story told by Rainbow Dash, who not only wasn't there but thought that it was just a story and not a historical tale – in Campfire Tales (season seven, episode sixteen), I'm not sure how diegetic we should treat that (which is further complicated by how, insofar as we know, Rainbow has never met, seen, or even heard of Torch either). That, and there's no particular reason why dragons can't be that old in the course of their natural lives; there's no mandate that they must keep growing throughout their lives, nor any indication what their lifespan is. It's entirely possible that Torch was a grown dragon by then, and that it's normal for them to live for millennia even after reaching their full size.