EarthMother
“So Sim. How did you build a replica of the mole kings sound machine?” Sweetie asked as she drilled on forwards.
“Oh, it was easy.” Sim explained “You just have to learn how to imitate the right frequency of the worm riders whistles. Getting hold of a whistle was easy. Amplifying the sound was the hard part. Well ... I say hard. But you know me. I happen to be quite musical gifted.
Sweetie rolled her eyes.
“So – you managed to steal one of their whistles?”
Sim Chuckled.
“That's the funny part. For once I did not have to steal anything at all. The kings guard and the worm riders might guard the secrets to those whistles harder then they guard his royal bumhole. But the truth is its just a piece of pipe with holes in it. Anyone could have made a while of their own if they wanted to. The only thing you need is to figure out the commands. But its not too hard if you spend your life living in a city where the worms are on constant patrol. You just have to listen and learn.
“And then what?” Sweetie asked. “it must have been a pretty big whistle to make a sound that could be heard across town.”
“Oh this was more then just a piece of paw-held pipe. It was basically like a combination of a boiler and a pressure cooker. You know how the steam make a whistle if pushed through a thin pipe?”
“Yes” said Sweetie” Imagining a cauldron left to boil on the stove. The whistle usually meant that the tea was ready.
“And after a few tweakings of the the pipes to get the tune just right – you have your very own steam whistle.
“Sounds like a lot of work. And a lot of materials.” Said Sweetie. “Where did you get it all from?”
“Yeah. Some nuts and bolts here, some steel pipes there, Moletown is basically full of it. What of it? Are you accusing me of something?”
“No. Not me but … Sim, what would you have done if they had caught you?”
“Eh. The worst thing that would happen is that I get a beating, Nothing too bad, the king don't want his workforce crippled. And then I'd be sent to one of the “educational camps” to be put back to working in their machines. After which I just work on some way to escape again.”
“Sound like you've done it before.”
“Lots of times. But you know what I say: Twelfth time's the charm.”
Sweetie could not help but to detect something bitter in Sim's voice. She wondered just how long Sim had been doing this. Living all alone and stealing to survive while the whole town hunted for her. She wondered if there was anyone, any-mole else in Sims life. Her father was gone, He had apparently gone to the sky (with all the implications that carried) not long after her had made the drill that Sweetie now used. And Sim had not spoken of any mother.
But Sims personal life wasn't the reason for Sweeties questioning.
“Is it really that easy to command the worms? You just need to whistle the right frequency?”
“Sure, if you do it loud enough you can even make the whole herd obey you.”
“And the mole king has the loudest one of them all?” Sweetie tried.
“Sure. That's how he was able to override my commands, by drowning them out with that massive pipe machine he has in that castle of his.”
“Its an organ, of sorts. Said Sweetie. “A really big steam organ. But its not being loud, Well, It was when it shut down your steam pipe. But its producing another kind of sound. A frequency that no one can hear. Something that cant just be made by a whistle. The mole king said that it was the centerpiece in a grander orchestra, or something.”
“And its that kind of frequency you say you are picking up now?”
Sim sounded a bit skeptical.
“Yeah. I'm just wondering, if the mole king built such a machine. It it possible that someone else has done the same somewhere else? Are there any other mole towns around here?”
“No, According to the mole king. Were the only ones. Besides, I cant sense anything out here.”
“What can you sense then?”
“A cave.”
***
The walls of the tunnel fell away, and the three little fillies found themselves basking in moonlight.
One could forgive the three for thinking they had exited out into the stary night. Alt: For thinking they had found the moon and starts resting place. It took a few seconds of disorientation to realize that the the black sky was actually deep obsidian rock that formed a dome over their heads. A dome wider then even the cave housing all of moletown.
Dotted all across the roof were blue mushrooms which shone with a silver lining. Like distant stars, baiting the whole cavern in a thick silver light.
“Is this a silver mine?” Scoot wondered out loud, as she stepped over the fine shining grain that crunched under their hooves.
A few wires were tugged, and The drill was retracted into Sweeties horn. She made a silent sigh, as of the crystal in her horn, there was not much left by now. Maybe half a dozen uses by her calculations.
“No. Its just sand” Sim said a second later. Having climbed out of Sweeties ear and climbed up on the top of her head. Where she was now taking in the sight around them.
Every rock and every grain was painted silver in the light of the muchrooms. Even the fillies seemed to have their colors replaced.
“And … what is that?” Said Applebloom.
Not too far from the fillies. The sand was replaced by a flat even surface that stretched out specular/ mirror glossy as far as their eyes could see.
It reflected the silver light from above so that it shone with its own gleam in such a way that it lighted up the cavern even more.
“Is … Is this a silver deposit?” Scoot said, hurrying of towards it.
“No. Looks more like an ice skating ring.”
Appleblooms sceptical observation came too late. Scootaloo had already charged, and jumped out to land on the seemingly solid surface. It sploshed under her, and the little pegasi disappeared with a big splash that sent big rings rippling across the surface.
Scootalo re-emerged a second later, Flailing around in a bit of a shock at how liquid the surface had turned out to be.
“Brrrr … That's cold.” She shivered, as Applebloom pulled her back up onto the beach.
“Its an underground lake.” She said.
“Yeah – thanks for clarifying.” Said scoot, as she shook the water out of her feathers, “Guess now we know where the river went.”
“Yeah . Maybe. But I take it we are not here for a swim.”
Applebloom looked at Sweetie.
“No. its that strange frequency. I swear there is another Organ here. Like the one the mole king has. I had expected to find something here. But ...”
“But there is nothing here.” Said Scoot.
“Yes there is. If you could all just be really, really quiet for a moment.”
Sweetie belle closed her eyes. And listened. More carefully then she had ever listened. Turning up her microphones to the max, she could almost hear her friends heartbeats. Their breaths becoming like a rasp upon the silence.
It was not a setting she was comfortable of using. Normally the world is filled with a thousand tiny sounds, which made listening to it on that kind of sensitivity an absolute nightmare. Only down here, where the air was as still as the underground lake, could she turn her ear up to their utmost sensitivity without being drowned in a deafening cacophony.
She homed in on the muffed frequency like a radar. Standing here on the beach it was next to impossible to determine its origin. It seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time.
Like an echo that only traveled through the earth.
Sweetie bent down and put her ear to the ground. Trying to sort out the rumble of her friends nervously shifting the hooves in the sand. The drops that fell from Scootaloo landed like hammerstrikes upon the grain. Sim tussling in her mane was like Sandpaper upon a cardboard board. And the sand seemed to have a tune of its own. Like the rumble of an eternal wave rolling up upon the beach.
If only Scootaloo had not jumped into the water, there would not have been any ripples crashing upon the beach edge.
Annoyed, Sweetie looked out across the water. But saw that there was no waves. The water was once again completely still. The ripples of Scootaloo's dive having gone away.
-:: Then why am I hearing waves?::-
Sweetie put her ear back to the ground, And listened to the sound rolling up on the beach without waves. At least not the kind of waves that were made of water.
-::But sound is a form of waves::-
And these sound waves seemed to primarily travel through the ground. And if the earth could carry these signals, then maybe ...
Sweetie walked over to the lake and put her head under the water. Unmindful of Sims yelp. The freezing water stung her face like needles, and her microphones fizzled as the water fulled her earlobes and the world above was muffed out. But the shock of the cold was quickly neglected as Sweetie sense of touch was turned of, almost absent mindedly as all her focus was on the sounds of the lake.
And there it was. A faint thumping from the depths.
Sweetie looked left and right. The only thing she could see from the beachhead was that the lake got pretty much instantly deep. Like the beach was the edge of a cliff that fell straight down into the blackness. Even with her infrared vision she could not make out the bottom, or anything in the darkness of the depths.
“Its coming from down there.” She said as she pulled her head back out of the water.
“What? You mean like under the water?” Sim asked, sitting on Sweeties back. “That can't be. Sound cant travel through water.”
“Well. Actually it can.” Said Applebloom “Wales and fish and other water living creatures have a way of producing sounds that traveled more easily in the water. Its how sirens and sea ponies are able to talk underwater just fine. We ponies just can't do it because we are not designed hear or talk with out mouths and ears full of water.”
“Maybe you aren't. But I am.” Said Sweetie.
“This is just getting stranger.” Said scoot. “Are you seriously telling me that someone built a worm whistle devise – Under water?”
“That is impossible on so many levels.” Said Sim.
“So what then is it?” asked Applebloom.
Sweetie looked down into the water. Picturing the darkness stretching out down below the silver colored surface.
“Only one way to find out.” She said.
“Woah! Woah! Woah! … Are you seriously thinking about going down there?” Said sim “That water is freezing. And you don't even know how deep it is. Do you really think you can hold your breath for that long.”
“Sweetie doesn't need to breathe.” Said Scoot with a sly smile.
“And she is water proofed.” Said Applebloom.
“Which is kind of why I have to do this alone.” Said Sweetie.
The three friends exchanged looks. As much as they hated to split up the party in the middle of an adventure, there was also a shared understanding that Sweetie was the only one capable of soloing this scenario.
“No you don't.” Said Sim. “Because I'm going with you.”
“You're sure?”
Sim shrugged.
“Hey. If anything, I'm not going to let my daddy's drill sink to the bottom of the abyss without me supervising the whole thing. Besides, if anything goes wrong. You'll be glad to have a mechanic by your side.”
“Oh gee … thanks.” Said Sweetie sarcastically. “A long as the little mechanic remembers to plug my ear so water don't run into my brain and drowns you.”
“Don't worry. I'm not one to forget such things.” Said Sim. As she climbed aboard Sweetie, and entered through her ear.
After a few seconds of scrambling, Sweeites microphone was fastened its place.
“One moment.” Said Applebloom “Sweetie might not need to breathe, but what about you Sim?”
“Oh – I have an idear. It hasn't escaped me that you have this perfect Oxygen tank installed.”
“Oxygen? … You mean my air pump?”
“Yeah, whatever. If you could just fill it up with some lovely Co2, and I should have enough air to last the whole trip. Besides, we don't plan to be gone that long. ”
“No. I suppose we are not.” Said Sweetie.
And then she took a deep breath.
It was probably the deepest breath she had ever taken. It was more like she turned herself into a vacuum cleaner for several long second as she sucked in a stead stream of air. Normally she did not have to worry to much about air. It was just fun to have an airpump when you needed to take a long exaggerated sigh , or blow bubbles of soap, or blow up balloons. This time she needed to fill her airpump to the max, just to be on the safe side.
-:: Warning, air pressure exceeding safe perimeters::-
Sweetie could feel the air pump groan as the air pressure built up inside it. The condensed air caused the cylinder to expand and the metal bent outwards.
When she wasn't sure the air pump could take any more, she stopped, and closed of her valves as well as her breathing protocols. She did not so much hold her breath as she simply stopped breathing. Foals who held their breath got big poofy cheeks and looked like they tried to swallow their own lips as they turned red, then blue, then purple before passing out. And that was when no one wanted to play “hold your breath” with Sweetie anymore.
Sweeties facial expression remained normal. Though she suspected that her airpump might have the equivelent to poofy cheeks right now. It gave one last groan as the air packed up air settled tightly inside the cylinder that served as her artificial lung.
“Ok. I'm going to create a little ventilator so the air can get to me.” Said Sim.
A cutting noise was heard, as well as some bolts being turned. Sweeties airpump wasn't designed to vent air inwards. But after a little while of tinkering, Sweetie registered the pressure inside her pent up airpump Dropping. Slowly, but steadily.
-:: Warning!! Leakage detected//Breache in air pump detected!!// Activating repair and restoration systems ::-
The drop in pressure stopped.
“Um … Sweetie. If you could you tell your repair magic to not this little hole, as this is kind of what is keeping me alive, that be great, thanks.”
Sweetie made a mental note to her Repair systems as Sim readjusted her ventilator.
-:: Warning!! // Breach detected in airpump!! // OVERRIDE // Repair program on standby. ::-
With that out of the way. Sweetie walked out into the lake, the cold not becoming her with her senses turned off, and swam out a little bit.
“Ok. Be back in a little bit” She said to her friends on the shore.
And then she let herself sink.
***
Sweetie did not want to think that she sunk like a stone. She was sure a stone would sink faster then her. She didn't weight much more then a normal filly, but something of her composition made it easier for her to sink then 'fleshies'.
Then again. A stone, even a small and light one, tended to sing really fast.
Above her. Sweetie could see the silvery surface getting further away.But around and below her, the water was pinch black. Even switching to infrared was doing little to illuminate the darkness below.
Sim finally had the idea to turn Sweeties right eye back into a headlight. Providing a much needed lightsource, While allowing Sweeties left eye to see. But still it was not enough to illuminate the bottom.
It seemed to be further down then it had looked to be across the whole lake.
Sweetie was quite happy for Sim's presence. The oppressive stillness of the water was almost worse then if there had been something occupying it. It would have been nice if there had at least been som fishes that lived in these underground oceans. Happy glowing little fiches that is. Or perhaps some underground sea ponies that sung little songs. Or maybe if they lived underground they would cound as sea mole?
Sweetie entertained herself with the though of half mole half fish creature digging their underwater tunnels. Did underwater creatures care if they underground as well? Or would that be like sea creatures burrowing into the sea bottom.
She humored Sim with these questions. And even if the answers were just as stupid as the question. It was a lot better the to be picturing the horrible nasty sea monsters that might dwell in the shadows, just outside her vision.
And something was down there. Sweetie could hear it getting close as she sunk deeper.
It was much like the distant cry of a wale.
“This is quite a new experience for me.” Said sim. “I've been inside plenty of machines (no offense) but never one that travels underwater.”
“Its called a submarine.” Sweetie said over her voicebox. “And its ok. I've never been a submarine before either. So the experience is quite new for me as well.
“I wish there was a window so I could see … Hold on.”
-:: Warning!! // Connection to left eyeball lost !! // vision compromised !! Warning Visual recievers compromised!! ::-
Sweetie Cried out and put a hoof over her eye as the pieces of her eye was dismantled inside the lens.
“Carefull! You just removed my only seeing eye.”
“Don't worry. Ill put it back in a bit.”
The last parts inside Sweeties eye were removed before finally, Sweetie could feel a tiny paw upon her eyeball, wiping the pupil clean. Which would have been scarry enough if it was not also on the inside of her lens.
“Its ok – you can open your eye now. Please?”
Sweetie carefully removed her hoof, and slowly opened her eyelid. When she was sure that her lencs wouldn't fall out of her skull, she opened it fully.
“Wow.” Said Sim, in no small amount of wonder. “It sure is different down here.”
Sweetie turned her head and eyes around. With one of them functioning as a flashlight and the other being dismantled. She was effectively blind.
Not that it made much difference in the dark water.
“How is it different.” She asked” You moles are used to darkness, aren't you?”
“True. When you live your whole life with your nose to the dirt, you learn to not rely on your eyes. But all those other scenes that I've talked about, they don't work down here. I am completely out of my element. Its disorienting.”
“At least we know which way is up.” Said Sweetie.
-:: And well have to get up soon ::- she thought -:: my airpump is already down at 50 percent::-
Next time she got an uppgrade, she was gonna ask to have a bigger airpump installed.
“Yeah. But what is that down there?”
“I don't know yet. But we are going to find out.”
No, I mean WHAT IS THAT DOWN THERE!?
Sweetie scaled back the brightness of her right eye. Once again turning her world to ugly shades of white and lining. And once she looked down, she saw bottom.
At least she thought it was bottom. From her perspective it was more like someone had laid a series of pipes on top of each other. Pipes that stretchered out further then her hazy flashlight could reach. Pipes thick enough to drive a train through.
“Sim! Put my eye back! I need to see!”
Sim did not respond emidiatly. It took a few shouts for the moles paws to leave her lenses and start tinkering behind her scull.
Before Her vision had fully returned. Her hooves touched the bottom. But this wasn't bottom. It wasn't rock or sand. It was a slimy, slippery surface. Hard, almost scaly without being covered in scales. It was more like ... Leather? A hide with a thick uneven surface.
And it was pulsating. Sweetie could feel the sound vibrating up through her hooves, Much like how one could feel the purr of the cat Opal back home. Or like how a window, or even the walls of a building could vibrate if you played Griffin Death Metal at the highest volume and woke all the neighbors.
Then, It moved.
A click behind Sweeties eyeball allowed her right eye to return to normal. And even with normal vision she was that the 'pipe' she was standing on was no pipe at all. It was more like a hose, if hoses where thick enough to drive a train through, and made of a brown leathery substance.
And it was currently slipping away from her with the speed of a train.
Sweetie felt the surface slip away under her hooves. She was actually standing still in the water, But not for long. For the whole sea bottom erupted. Length after length started to wobble and speed away into the darkness. Like someone had awoken a nest of gigantic snakes. Or worms!
Sweetie began to paddle frantically, trying to swim upwards. All the while the titanic meat tube swirled around her. There did not seem to be any end to them. It was just a continuous motion of thick long bodies moving in and out of the darkness of the water. She could not see either front nor rear as all visible ends disappeared beyond her vision.
She paddled faster. Cursing her metallic composition. She had never had any problems with swimming. The problem was just that she wasn't moving fast enough.
Below her. The gigantic creatures fanned out. Their massive hides moving sideways into the darkness beyond her vision. And still she had not seen a single head or tail.
She had no idea how any creatures could exist of such unfathomable length. Even as they escaped her vision she could hear them Slither through the water below her.
Around her...
ABOVE HER...
Then the water stirred again. The whole lake seemed to shift as the darkness bore down upon her. The glistering silver light of the surface disappeared, and Sweeties infrared light instead fell upon the walls.
It was like the itself lake was shrinking in on her.
The lengths appeared from all sides. Closing in on her like bars in a shrinking prison. They began to form walls around her. Closing her in by weaving themselves into a rope basked around her.
-:: They? // Incorrect assessment // Plurals indicates the presence of several ::-
As the walls drifted in from the darkness. Sweetie had yet to see a single head or tail. The whole bowl seemed to consist of one continuous length. Wrapped in circle after circle after circle around itself.
Around her.
The realization was almost more oppressive then the water.
-:: Correction // IT // Singularis ::-
Then she finally saw the end of it. The massive eyeless edge of the massive creature. So wide that her vision could not make it out all at once in the darkness. But it was most certainly turned at her.
It was looking at her with its head without eyes.
Then it opened its mouth.
Sweetie had never known worms to have mouths. She had never seen one on them. But it stood to reason that they had to have something to eat food. (unless they absorbed the energy they needed straight through their skin.)
But this one certainly had a mouth.
Its whole head was its mouth.
The whole gray width split apart into four different yaws. And opened them up do wide that their tips dissipated into the darkness.
Inside was nothing but a hole filled with teeth and tentacles. Tentacles with glowing light bulbs on the ends. Light bulbs that reached out for her, and bather little Sweetie in their shades of yellow blue and green.
As they got close, Sweetie saw the spots that moved around inside the glowing sacks of light. Each “lightbulb” had one. Like a circle of more intense light inside the orbs of light. And those circles widened and shrunk as the light sacks circled her.
They focused at her.
They were eyes. Lidless glowing eyes. Dozens of them. Circling her on long green tendrils. Their light illuminating the space inside the gigantic mouth as it was closing around her.
Sweetie began to frantically paddle towards the nearest gap. But Tentacles without lightbulbs shot out of the darkness and wrapped themselves around her.
Sweetie might have been able to free herself from one or two of them. But the sheer volume of green tentacles that bore down upon her as the mouth closed meant that they did not so much grab her as press down upon her with with sheer mass of numbers.
The space of the underground lake disappeared became nothing but swirling wiring mass of icky sticky tentacles.
Sweetie was trapped in that mass. Her scene of touch deactivated in self defense and all her systems pulled themselves inward from her exterior, as her shell was assaulted on all sides by the sticky green mess as the tentacles hurled her from one to the next. She did not come into contact with any teeth, the monster did not need any. Its mouth was filled with what felt like Thousands of snake like tentacles. All of them smeared over her body as tight as straws of grass. Really thick, sticky straws of grass. All moving individually yet with a singular purpose. To transport her inwards.
They were tongues. And they were swallowing her.
Sweetie had barely reached the horrifying conclusion when the suction noise began. All the water in the creatures mouth disappeared inwards. And Sweetie herself followed. Pulled by the force of a giant vacuum cleaner and pushed by thousands of increasingly tiny tongues. Until her world no longer consisted of green tentacles but of a tunnel filled with fleshy balloons, each and every one a muscle that rubbed unbecomingly against her as they carried her forward, head first, towards what had to be the belly of the beast.
Sweetie screamed. She screamed with her mouth closed. Her voice-box roaring out an endless, breathless cry in displeasure and terror at the horrifying ride. And in her head Sim screamed with her.
The ride ended abruptly as the fleshy tunnel opened up, and sweetie found herself pressed through a tiny hole and out onto a rosy slope. She tumbled over herself before sliding down into a pool of greasy fluid
She flailed around for a bit before finding her footing. Rising quickly to her full length she found that the water she had landed in barely reached up to her knees.
She was drenched, her mane and tail hanging thick with what she did not want to know of how much lake water and saliva.
She raised her hooves in front of her. They were covered with so much greasy fluid that it dropped of her in big gobs. To her single hazy eye, it looked almost like she was melting.
-::MELTING?::-
The idea of being dissolved by stomach acid caused her to fall over herself, and she fell back down into the horrible fluid.
“Are you ok, my foal?”
Sweeties single eye looked up. And found herself staring at a beach. For that's what it was. Finely graveled sand and rocks rose out of the water to form an island inside the belly of the beast. And on that beach stood a mole.
“Peace stop screaming. And tell me where it hurts.” The stranger mole asked.
Sweetie caught her voicebox still blasting out a terrifying shriek. It died down as the shock of this mole just standing here settled in.
“Whut?”
“I asked you if you were hurt my child. Please forgive mother for the rough ride. I'm sure it must have been terrifying, but there was no other way.”
The mole spoke with the calming voice of an elderly mare. Her whole body looked a bit like a sack. slabs and wrinkles hung from a fattened body. And her face was like a sun baked raisin. A face bearing a warm a caring smile, framed by a mane of gray hair.
“No … I'm Ok” Sweetie mumbled. Trying to collect herself. “I'm I'm just … Who are you?”
-:: !!Warning!! // Esophagus Line compromised // Releasing content ::-
Sweetie opened her mouth wide. And out climbed Sim. Coughing, spitting and panting. She tripped over Sweeties teeth and fell down on the beach line.
She looked up at the elderly mole.
“Grandma???”
***
“So. We are not actually in the belly?”
“No, no. the stomach acid there would dissolve us. We are somewhere in between.”
Sweetie looked around. One could be forgiven for mistaken this area for the belly of the beast. The “cave” they found themselves in was like the inside of a massive rosy sack. Mucous and membrane covered every surface. And big pillars hung from the roof, walls and shot out from the ground like stalactites and stalagmites of flesh.
The “cave” was also filled with glowing worms, which bather the whole place in a Rosy-ish light.
Having gotten over the shock of being swallowed alive, Sweetie and Sim had been led up on the beach by the strange old mole.
The beach was the head of a island that rose up from the lake of saliva and mucus. It was an inland formed of sand, driftwood, roots, and bigger boulders hurdled together in a big messy pile. Like a shipwreck had been swallowed by a whale.
“You see. Anything she can not digest gets stored here. Much like how a Mussel would store a sand corn on its tongue, weaving it in a hardened malt until it becomes a pearl, ready to be spat out again.” Said the old mole.
“We are not gonna become pearls, are we?” Sweetie asked.
“Oh no. such a posses takes a hundred years. Besides, the Earth mother does not make pearls. She has simply been kind enough to not spit me out.”
On top of this Island lay a whole little community. The Old mole had been really busy making a home for herself inside the giant creature. There was a series of huts, One made out of sand and stone, held together by some of that pearl like substance. Other huts were made from roots and wood. There was a smelting station and a small blast furnace, heated by a mechanical airpump.
In another hut, a steam engine was simmering. Powering a big water wheel that picked up the slime from below and poured it behind a shack of rocks and granite. Where, Sweetie could only assume, some elaborate filtering system made the slime come out as clean drinking water. Water that poured through an irrigation system of a garden where certain roots and haulm had been made to grow.
Beyond that, Several big boulders of varying materials from Iron, coal, gold, jade and even something that looked like crystals were lumbering next to each other by a small excavation site with pickaxes and chisels.
Another seemed to be a sowing station for things made out of straw and hemp. Another was a farming hut for glow worms.
The whole site was like a mix of a farm and a miners camp. It kind of reminded Sweetie of Twilight basement, with a lot of stations and nicknacks everywhere. Except with more steam pipes made out of woven hemp leading everywhere, powering some form of contraption or another.
Sweetie was handed a towel made of hemp. And even got to wash herself off in a pond of clean water. There was even soap made from some form of grease Sweetie was not gonna question the origin of.
While Sweetie tried to scrub herself clean, Sim was busy Having a tearfull reunion with her long lost grandmother. And once Sim had gotten over the tears, she had been like a wind up doll. Bombarding the old mole with a constants stream of words. Trying to recap her entire life in just a few minutes.
”You're alive. I knew you were alive! And you know what? I saw the sky! I saw the surface world! It exists, just like you said! Everyone told me I was wrong for believing you, but I did not believe them and you were right! They said you were dead and I was almost starting to believe them but they were wrong. You're here. Why are you here? I mean you are obviously here because you are here, but why? Why, why, why, why, why!”
“Hush now little child.” The old mole said. “I will tell you my tale. If you just let me.”
“They all said you had been eaten by a tunnelworm.”
“Well. I was.” The mole-woman chuckled. “That much of it is true.”
“Why? Is this beast keeping you prisoner here? Well cut our way out!” Sim proclaimed, and pulled a little knife of flint from her vest pocket.
She was visibly vibrating with energy.
“No, no.” Said the old mole. “She is not keeping me prisoner. She is, in fact, the one who saved me.”
“She?” Said Sweetie. “You mean this big worm is a female?”
“Yes” Said the mole woman. “And she is a mother, and grand mother, many times over. A mother who has lost her children. That much, and more we have in common.”
She grabbed Sim's cheeks In bout her paws. Holding her chin up so she could look into her eyes. Sweetie could see the tears behind the old moles eyes. But the sunny smile never faltered.
Sim dropped the knife. And allowed herself to drown in the old moles eyes.
“You didn't loose me. You disappear! Why, why did you disappear?”
“Excuse me, Grandmare … Grand - mole. Can I call you Grandmole?” Sweetie asked, carefully inserting herself into the conversation. “How exactly did you loose your children?”
“Yes. You may call me so” Said Grandmole. “And I did loose you sim, Just like I lost your father, my son, and his whole family. Just like she has lost all of her children.”
She looked out, up onto the big worm. Her smile did not falter. But something sorrowful crept into her voice.
“We lost them bout. All of our families. And out people. To the song of the Mole king.”
Sensing the dramatic shift in the air. Sim and Sweetie sat down. Sweetie made an extra note to her ears to pay extra attention. As what was about to be said would no doubt have to be retold to the members of her party that were not currently percent.
-:: Recording in progress ::-
“My children. To understand how all thing came to be. You must go back to the beginning. And this story begins, not surprisingly, in a hole in the ground.”
Grandmole cleared her throat.
“We were explorers, him and I. Never once to sit round the fire gems and nurture our tribe. We were always digging. Always looking for new paths, and always finding them.
Many dangers we face, him and I. And always we overcame, together. Many wonders hidden away in the dark corners of the earth we saw. And each discovery only spurred us to look for more.
Many adventures we shade, him and I. I shall not bore you with all of them. For doing so would take a lifetime.
I was sure then, in my youth, that I'd have seen all the wonders the earth had to offer. But the greatest discovery was yet to come. For one day we broke through the earth to find the great open. A place with no wall, with no roof and most importantly, with no darkness.
“You mean the surface!” Said sim.
Grand-mole nodded.
“Its hard to put into words, such an experience. Imagine living your whole life down here, and one day get to see the sun on the blue sky. It was breathtaking.
A whole other world with no walls, nor roof. To us, it was like we had found our way into heaven, and in a way, we had. It was the greatest day of my youth. And the start on the best time of my life. We shared in even more adventure, Him and I. Saw so very much, and learned of even more.
She sighed nostalgic. Sweetie tried to imagine two moles running around like Daring Do. No doubt with the wonders of a child, seeing the big world for the first time.
“Once we returned.” Grandmole continued “We tried to tell our people of all that we had seen. It must have been incredibly hard for them to understand. And it was, for they started to reverie us with superstitious awe. We were the ones that had found heaven, and returned with great knowledge and wisdom.
In the beginning we tried to keep our stories to reality. But with time, after you have told the same story a thousand times, it is no longer the same stories it once were.”
The nostalgic optimism vanished from Grandmoles voice. And was replaced by sorrow.
“I have so many times thought back on when it all began. When our stories became more then just stories. Wen they started to take on a flavor of imagination that slowly made them more and more untrue. Eventually they were not stories any more. they were legends. Legends that were being told not just throughout our tribe, but throughout other tribes as well.
You see. He insisted that we should go and tell everyone about our legend. And every time we did, the legend grew. At first I agreed, believing that sharing the knowledge was the greatest gift we could give."
She signed.
“But knowledge became lost in translation. And the story became misshaped, as it can so easily be if mishandled. And as the stories grew more twisted, so did his mind.
It was not his fault that the people put him on such high pillars. But once it became high enough, he could no longer see the bottom. His head became filled with sky. And the stories began to twist him, as much as he twisted them.
He started to believe that he had really returned from the land of the dead. That the gods had granted him wisdom beyond mortals. He forgot that he was but a mole himself. For was he not more then mole, when he had done what no other mole had done?
And people forgot as well. they started to see us as something more then moles. They started to worship us, eventually they made him their king.
And why should they not have? He advanced our civilization with his tales. Molded our future after the paradise he had seen up above the earth.
He is now a mole lost in his own stories. I am afraid that he has told those tales so many times that he has started to believe them himself.”
“And he did Grandmole.” Said Sim “He forced everyone study it. His truth about the heavens. His lies!”
“Didn't you do anything to stop him?” Asked Sweetie.
“I tried. I tried to reil in his stories. Tried to stick to facts. But people were more interested in hearing the more extravagant version. The more outlandish the tale, the more listeners it gathered.
Good he was. At telling stories.”
A glimpse of old affection glinted in Grandmoles eyes.
“When I spoke out against the lies. People got upset. I was hushed for interrupting the story. I was shamed for not telling them as good as him. For telling the 'wrong' kind of stories For they wanted to believe him. How could they not believe him? He who had bought our people so much.
I then went to the source. I told him he had to stop. He asked me why. Why should he stop, when he was only giving the people what they wanted? I said because he was deceiving them. That ha was telling untruths. He looked at me and said “Well make it the truth.” How could we not shape the truth, when we had already shaped Molekind into our vision of it?”
When I tried to set the story straight, he asked me how I could deny it. I, who had been there with him and seen everything. Why would I suddenly turn truth into untruth? I told him that I had not seen these things that he spoke of. That his descriptions were false. And he called me a Liar. A denier of truth.”
For the first time. Grandmole looked sad.
“I saw it in his eyes. He truly believed it. He had become lost in his head, lost among the stories so badly that he started to believe everything himself. He pictured himself more then a mole. He believed that he could shape the world around him. And in a way he could. He did shape Mole society by making everyone believe in his vision. But his mind goes beyond Molekind. It goes up in the clouds of the sky, and he believes his will can shape them too.”
“That's not how it works. Pegasi shape the clouds, sometimes.” Said Sweetie. Remembering the great cloud figures that were sometimes made by pegasi sculptors. “Mostly they just make them go where they want.”
“I know.” Said Grandmole. “But he believes he has the ability to make it so. He believes he can grant himself that ability through machines and engines. His head is full of the sky. He wises to return there, and he wishes to shape it to his will.”
“But if he loves the sky so much Why does he not just lead the moles up there and show them?”
“I don't believe he wants to share it, child.”
“What do you mean?”
”Hiss will does not include other moles.” Said Grandmole. ”To him, others are but an extension of his will. Working to realize his dremas. And his dream is to make the surface his. But to do that, he needs the power of the tunneldiggers.”
Grandmole walked over, and touched one of the big fleshy stalakites that stuck upp through the iland.
”They harbor a great power. They can move the earth and cause the ground to collapse.”
“That sounds horrible.” Said Sweetie. Imagining how Ponyville was destroyed in an earthquake. How great rocks shot out of the earth. How the ground opened up and swallowed ponies whole.
She was really gonna have to stop imagining things.
“I know they pose a danger.” Said Grandmole. “And it is that danger that has caused our people to fear them. Like we fear so many other things that dwell in this earth with us.”
”The mole king says they were once the moles greatest enemy, he made it sound like they used to eat moles.” Said Sim.
Grandmole let out quite a hearthly chuckled.
No my child, they do not eat moles. True is they have caused our kind a great many scares in the past, made tunnels collaps. And I can not say that many have not been hurt. For when you are so big, its easy for the suffering of the small to go unnoticed.”
The walls around them let out a great rumble.
“Yes. I know. I know.” Grandmole said, pattering the pillar. “And that was the reason he sought to enslave your children. By stealing your song."
-:: She is talking to the big worm, She is actually talking to it!::-
-:: Question: How?::-
-:: Question: What children?::-
-:: Hypothesis: Its not a far leap in logic to assume they are the tunnelworms that the mole people control::-
-:: Conclusion: Those are the SMALL ones?::-
”Song?” Said Sweetie, Ignoring the other questions that fought for control in her head. ”You mean that the big worm sings for the small ones?”
”Please do not call her 'Big Worm'” said Grandma. ”Call her Mother. For that is what she is. A great mother of the earth. And yes, she sings. But not in the way that you might think about it. This is a song that resonates through the ground. Its a form of vibrations so small and rapid that one can not distinguish it from the rest of earths many feels. But – In here. Where all other sound is blocked out, you can hear her clearly.
Its these vibrations that allows us to communicate. We have kept each other company. And kept each other from going mad.
I keep her company. And try to smooth her when she cries. And she does the same for me. Singing for me when my dream go dark. Her song has helped me through many of sleepless nights. “
“You understand her?”
“If you listen long enough, you learn to understand.”
Grandbole smiled. And gestured for them to come over, and put their ears to the fleshy pillar.
Sim did so. With some level of disgust.
Sweetie did not need to put her ear to anything to hear. Her ears were picking up all kinds of frequency's inside the great wo … Earthmothers belly. Some of them might have be written of as just bodily notices, until one realized that all these sounds were part of a greater whole. Like every organ was an instrument in a greater symphony. From the base drums of the heart (or hearts?) to the strings of muscles tendons and blow pipes of intestines.
One had to remember that this gigantic creature did not communicate through vocal cords. but through vibrations of its body.
Almost like how the sounds of a factory could become its own kinds of music. If you listened long enough.
As Sweetie listened. A great hymn when through the belly, Like the echo of a sad wale leaning on a rusty piano key.
“Yes … yes.” Said Grandmole.
“What is she saying?”
“She says she is sorry that she scared you. When you first arrived. She feared it was the mole kings forces coming for her. He has been looking for her. She fears he will take her mind just like he took his children. ”
“Just, how did he actually steal her children?”
“By stealing her song” Grandmole “ He made so the mothers song can no longer reach her children minds. The mole king came enslaved them with dark melodies. Their minds becoming lost to songs like oily shadows, clouding the mind and making you lost to nightmares.
“Like a mind control” Said Sweetie.
“Like the whistles, and the organ.” Said Sim ”Just how did he go about creating those?
Grandmole let out quite a healthy laugh.
“No, no, no.” She chuckled “He did not create dark melodies. He bought them, in the form of a flute. An instrument he got from a pony. A charmer of ropes and snakes. A traveler and sales pony of many strange things.
“But, why dosne't just the earth mother sing back? Overpower the mole king music?.”
“She can not. That flute is magical. And the organ amplifies its power by many thousands. She would also fall under its spell. And if he gained control of her, who knows what he would do? So she hides here. In order to escape the enchanting hymn of his horrible orgel. The water muffers all sound you know."
" Now what?" Sim asked.
"Now, she waits. Waits for when the mole king will expire. Waits for the day the evil tuned will be no more, and her song can be heard by her children once more. She has lived manny times my lifelenght, and will continue to do so, long after I am gone."
Despite the somber tone in her voice, Grandmole smiled like one sho's never lost hope.
“Luckily, the Mole king can not reach her. No machine is powerfull enough to transport the dark tunes out to these depths. And even if there were, there is not enough crystals in the world to power such a device. The only thing that possibly could, is the sunstone.”
Sweetie made a very nervous face.
“Uh oh.” Said Sim, speaking for them both.
“This is not gonna sound good Gran! But we helped the mole king get his paws on the Sunstone earlier today.”
Saying it out loud. Sweeties cheeks when red with embarrassment. She suddenly understood why Celestia and twilight had locked them up. Helping a Villain was definitely the sort of thing you would get grounded for a year for.
Sim, speaking in her ultra fast way, very quickly recapped all the important bits that had led to this moment.
Grandmole raised her paw to her mouth.
“Oh dear” in about the same tone a grandparent might use when you accidental knocked over a jar of jam. “That is not good. Not good at all.”
“But we are gonna stop him!” Sim declaimed, not letting the gravity of the situation settle in. “We are gonna stop him, and we are gonna free the tunnelworms, and all of molekind from his tyranny!”
Sim was vibrating with energy.
Their quest had just become way more urgent then they first though. Now it was no longer about getting back at the Mole king and proving their innocence. Now it was about stopping him before he did something catastrophic, and saving the tunnelworms from his mind control.
“But to do that. We need an adapter. I figure we are gonna have to sneak into the city to get one. Then we are gonna have to find a way to stop the organ. I recommend smashing it. But to do that, we need to get into the palace … Shouldn't be too hard, if we come from an unexpected angle...”
Sim was already making plans.
Sweetie checked her power levels. She had about 50 percent battery power left. Plus a few uses of the drill-retractor gem. Not exactly a whole lot to stage another break in with.
She was about to ask Grandmole if she had some gems she could “borrow”. But when she looked over at the stash, she noticed it only contained some kind of green crystal. And not in the emerald kind of way. It looked more like dark rotten moss. almost like someone had taken a bunch of sour broccoli and sewer sludge and pressed it together into a crystallized for.
Sweetie wondered exactly what the great Earthmother had eaten. And if this might bee what happened to the waste material that she would not digest.
The earth mother did not make Pearls. She made a form of crystallized vomit.
Sweeties Belly wanted to run a puking program just at the though.
“My child, I do not believe you shall have to go all the way to town to find an adapter.”
Sweeties Attention shifted back to Grandmole.
“What?” Said Sim. “You mean that you...”
Grandmole just smiled, and walked over to one of her stations. There was a device that sweetie might have noticed earlier if if had not blended in with all the other gadgets and nicknacks that dotted the scene.
The device was like a cylinder with two sticks at each end, almost like a big fuse. And at those ends, two crystals were suspended on metallic rings. One of them glowing with the inner heat of a fire ruby. The other held one of the sludge like crystals, blackened till it almost looked like coal.
“Yes child. This was one of the tricks we learned on the surface. And it has served me very well. Without it, I would surely have run out of fire crystals by now.”
Grandmole removed the gems, tossing away the coal like crystal, while the fire ruby she brought it over to on of her ovens. There she swamped the new fire gem for an older one. Its crystal light weak and fading.
She walked back to the machine and placed it in one of the sockets. And told Sweetie to fetch one of the ugly green sludge crystals while she explaiend something about the Fuse to Sim
Sweetie hesitantly obliged. The very energy the green gems emitted looked poisonous, and she was glad that gems don't carry any smell.
With both crystals in place, Grandmole told sin to pull a lever as fast as she could. A simple mechanism of cogwheels made the cylinder rotate, And bouth crystals started to glow as the machine did its work.
Sweetie watched as at the poison like energy from the green sludge-crystal was sucked into the fuse like adapter, who glowed with a pale white. The white energy was then transferred into the fire ruby, who started to shine with an increasingly white light.
Just when Sweetie thought that the white energy would completely drown out what fire remained in the gem. The machine stopped, and the light shifted, with the red mixing together with the white, like somepony poured tomato juice in a blended full of milk. The mixing caused the two colors to blend together for a second. Before the intensity of the red heat came back, stronger then before.
To the naked eye. The sludge crystals light had faded as the fire gems glow increased, As if the energy had been transferred from one to the other in a process much like how Sim had described it.
The fire ruby now shone like like red hot coal. While the sludge crystal had faded and darkened until it was as black as coal.
“Now. Do you understand, child?”
“Yes, Yes I understand Gran!” Sim sung and danced around. “That's my Gran, the greatest engineer ever.”
Sweetie didn't understand anything. Then realized she did not have to undestand, she only needed to know that it worked.
“You built this yourself?” She asked. “down here, all alone.”
Grandmole smiled.
“Yes my child, And now I want you to have it.”
She pulled the fuse like cylinder out from it socket, and staggered back under its weight. The thing was as wide big as she was. And twice as tall.
Sweetie took the adapter of Grandmole. It filled her whole hoof, like a big Radio tube. That tube needed to get inside her. And eating it was out of the question.
“Yeah well – Do you have a hatch somewhere that's big enough?” Sim asked. Looking up and Down Sweetie. “No offense, but I think I would have to take you apart to put this in.”
”I have an idea.” Said Sweetie. ”But promise to not be freaked out now.”
She closed her eyes and pulled a hoof over her chest, like she was pulling down an imaginary zipper to a jacket. Inside she disengaged the magnetic locks to her skin. And a red scar appeared where she stroke the hoof. The “wound” widened until the skin began to open up. Revealing her metallic layer underneath. The opening spread down her belly and up her throat. Likewise a second red line started spreading cross-wise from her chest and out over her forelegs. All the way to the hooves. The line under her throat continued to climb Across her muzzle, between her eyes and past her horn before disappearing under her mane. Splitting her face in two. Sweetie sat down on her haunches and pulled her face apart. (she had to close her eyes to disengage the skin on the eyelids) Carefully to untangle the hair straws in the two halves of her mane. She then pulled it back like a hood. A bit thankful for that she had her white alloys underneath. Otherwhise her facial frame would have appeared in all its skeletal glory. Like this she still remembered herself, even if she was now bald.
She then pulled her forelegs out of the skin with no greater trouble than one would pull of the sleeves of a jacket. And pulled it all down to waist level.
She then took the screwdriver and started to remove her chest-plate. When she was done, the equivalent of her rib cage laid bare. A lower layer of policed yet unpainted metal. Cybernetic muscles and pistons and gears that moved and shifted over her titanium reinforced frame - That resembled a ribcage - that shone like chromed silver. Sweetie always made sure to polish every part of herself. She pulled her forelegs back, Twister her shoulders - and there was a click and a Buzzing sound from inside of her. Her Ribcage moved out an inch and opened like a set of double doors. Revealing the equivalent of her entrails. Her cyberdiscs and circuitry shone with a swirling light in shades of green and pink and purple. Strokes and dots lit up like twinkling stars as energy ran across her systems. There where wires and tubes in all the colors of the rainbow. And even some parts of copper that shone like gold. And in the middle of it all sat her Heart-Drive. A heart shaped Cyber crystal, a gem woven thick with an intricate cybernetic pattern. Pulsating with energy in a rhythm similar to a heartbeat. The sight reminded her of just how much magic and technology that combined in her. It was always beautiful to behold. And it was a bit of a shame this work of beauty had to be looked away inside of her.
“Well now I have seen everything.” Said Grand-mole. The warm smile never leaving her face.
-:: That mole is not easily fazed ::- Sweetie though. Unlike Sim, Who was practically salivating at the sight.
The little mole had already been inside Sweetie. But had usually made her own makeshift enterance. To her, this must have been like the castle gates to grand galloping gala for the first time.
Sweetie helped her up into her open rib cage and handed her the adapter. Despite its size compared to Sim. The little mole quickly pulled it inside and disappeared amongst sweeties components.
When she worked Sim was like an ant, pulling gears many times her Sise.
Sweetie closed the rib cage as the mole went to work inside of her.
“I hope I didn't freak you out. ” She said to Grand mole. Her cheeks getting red over the embarrassment of how much she had exposed herself.
“Oh no child, Don't worry about me.” Said Grand-mole.
Sweetie felt the wires being tangled around inside her as the mysterious device was hooked up to her systems.
-:: New component detected ::-
-:: assimilation in progress ::-
-: No data available ::-
As sweeties energies flooded into the Adapter. She felt herself at a loss. Like she had been looked into limbo. With no beginning nor end. Oh there was a beginning and an end to the device. The components inside it was just a series of crystals in a tube. It was a mechanical construct without any real electronic components for her to easily follow. Her energy wasn't running through circuits. It was running through crystal energy.
Then It all vanished. Extending herself into the adapter was like staring down a black hole.
“You may not wanna feed the adapter electricity” Sim said from inside. Its going convert whatever you put in it into raw energy.”
So that was what that was.
Sim continued to hooked the adaptor straight up to her Heart-Drive.
“Ok – Try it now.”
“Wont this just drain by battery? You should know that my Heart-Drive runs on electricity, just like the rest of my body.”
“Don't worry. I know what I'm doing.” Said Sim, assuring that she could take it from here.
Sweetie closed her eyes and focused. Going only on the the events she had just witnessed. She only needed to make the adapter spin, Like a generator.
Focusing only on the mecanical parts of the adapter. Sweetie used her energy to make the mechanical shell of the fuse spin. Generating the energy that made the magic inside the Adapter do its thing.
For a while. She did not register anything. Except for the spinning. And the power of her battery slowly dropping. It was always dropping, being active was a constant consumption of energy.
Then, the battery's energy droppings stopped. Her energy outputt was the same, but the battery was no longer depleting.
Then it began to rise. 50 percent became 51. Then 54. Then 60!
She did not need to ask where the energies were coming from. It was the adapter, filling unfamiliar substance of raw energy, converted into electricity. Energy pulled seemingly out of nowhere. As her systems where not able to detect the previously unknown wavelength of hidden emotions that Sim had assured her that her Heart Drive was beating with.
It was true. There was energies inside her that she had not even known about.
Once her battery was filled. Sim reconected the wires from her heart drive, and pulled them up to the retraction crystal in her horn. This time, Sweetie did fill the Adapter with her energy. Energy that vanished from her sensors when it was converted into raw energy, but rediscovered as it flowed into the tiny crystal. And she registered the few charges left double, then triple, until the metaphorical sun was rising on the horizon.
This time she wasn't just draining her battery flooding electricity through the gem, this time the energies were properly added to the crystal as her energy was converted into magic.
She was doing magic by her own energies.
She was so happy that she shouted out loud, and jumped up to dance upon the beach. An overexcited flare of energy sparked in her horn. And caused the drill to extend out of her horn, its gem covered teeth glistering in the rosy light of the glow worms.
Inside her, Sim laughed with her.
“You truly are a magnificent foal dear. No go, and be carefull.”
“We don't need to be carefull anymore Gran!” Sim laughed. “The mole king is going down!”
Grandmole chuckled.
“So eager, Just like your father. Just don't let anything go to you head.”
“We wont.” Said Sweetie, as the drill was retracted back into her horn. “I'll look after her.”
“And I'll look after you.” Said Sim.
“Oh really?” Said Sweetie,” Then Fix my eye!”
Sim scurried up behind sweeties empty and started putting the pieces back together. Sweetie was about to take one final farewell of Grandmole and walk away, when she realized she had nowhere to walk off to.
“Um... How exactly do we get out of here?”
Grandmole gestured at the rosey hole on opposite the beach.
“The same way you came in.”
Sweetie swallowed.
“Oh ponyfeathers.”
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Go sweetie belle, wreck the mole king!!!!!!!!!
It's about to go down,
we gon' have a showdown.
I'll give you the run down.
Hey! She can finally do her own magic! That's going to be exciting.
Now they just need to calm scoots and Bloom down for being down there for like, what, an hour and a half?
Keep going! ;)
In a hole, in the ground there lived a mole.
Wait a minute... Wasn't the Heart Drive a heart shaped gemstone with electronics fused into it? i distinctly recall the Cyberdiscs are made of a synthetic crystalline material, while the Heart Drive itself was built from a natural gemstone... i get that the Heart Drive by now has been assimilated into being composed of the same synthetic crystal; but describing the Heart Drive as like a cyberdisc, seems to imply that it is flat as a circuit board, which i could have sworn was not the case from how it was described in "Heart's Warming Tale."
8549518
Hmm... Maybe I should change it to Cyber-Crystal.
thumb9.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/1648457/498374188/stock-vector-eletronic-circut-board-in-shape-of-heart-technology-illustration-vector-eps-498374188.jpg
8550528
That would probably clear up any confusion on the matter, quite nicely.
Addendum: I just reread the edited section, and the revised description does indeed do a much better job of conveying what a masterpiece of Rarity's handiwork the Heart Drive really is.
8551242
Thank you. It was a simple change that does a lot.
cant wait for the next chapter
This was a great unexpected development!
Also: Why are there no more chapters left to read?!
8561179
I can wait!
She's so magnificent.