• Published 23rd Jun 2017
  • 8,248 Views, 4,585 Comments

The Olden World - Czar_Yoshi



Equestrian culture loves cutie marks. Filly Starlight Glimmer hates them and never wants one. So, she leaves Equestria.

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Building Trust

Maple, Valey and Gerardo were scarcely past the door Selma had locked, charging down a corridor of hazy air and red rocks, when Howe began to stir.

"Blargh! What...? Where...?" the pegasus sputtered, thrashing and falling off Gerardo's back. "Ow!"

"Heya, Pancake!" Valey rounded on him with a wink. "Look who finally decided to wake up just as normal ponies are going to bed!"

"Excluding us, it seems," Gerardo mused. "Regardless, thank you for coming to. I was beginning to fear I'd have to carry you through this entire cave network, and it was a daunting prospect!"

"Someone blew me up!" Howe exclaimed, climbing to a sitting position. "It was... It was... My noble head hurts." His eyes focused on Valey. "Oh no. It's you!"

"Sorry to hear you bonked your brain, Pancake," Valey consoled. "Long story short, stuff went down, I'm on your side, and we're bailing from Ironridge." She squinted. "At least, I'm on Starlight's side. You turned out to be a good guy, right? I'm guessing since you were with them, they decided you weren't a loon?"

From atop Maple's back, Starlight's eyes widened. "Did you just say my real name?"

"Buh?" Valey went cross-eyed, then rubbed the back of her neck. "I, uhh... Huh. You mean like as opposed to Ironflanks or Pancake? Yeah, I guess I did." She grinned teasingly. "Sorry about that. I'll be more careful next time."

"For your information," Howe interrupted, looking peeved, "I am no mere water fowl! I bear intellect critical to the success of this mission, and my loyal comrades have welcomed me with open hooves!"

"Oh yeah?" Valey smirked. "Like what?"

Howe crossed his forelegs, hovering and looking away. "Like how to free you from your imprisonment, for instance! Without me, you could very well still be locked away, starving and withering into a shambling corpse!"

"Oh. Cool, cool..." Valey turned away, whistling. Eventually, she looked back over her shoulder with a raised eyebrow. "You guys do trust him, right?"

"Hmmph," Howe snorted. "I am certainly more trustworthy than you! Lest we not forget, I have never thrown the other's friends, relatives, or allies in jail!"

Gerardo winced. "Actually, I believe that happened the second time we met..."

"You kind of did..." Maple added crossly, frowning at him. "I forgave you because you said you were sorry and I needed allies, but that doesn't mean you were supposed to forget!"

"I, uhhh..." Howe's jaw dropped. "Wow. Okay, then! That was my blunder, and I apologize for it! I will... swallow my own mistrust of you and agree to stand at your side. I must really have egg on my face, mustn't I...?" He groaned, covering his eyes with a wing.

"Yeah, your face is pretty eggable," Valey jived, apparently not ready to let Howe's blunder go so easily. "Flattenable, too. And kinda edgy. What's this about me busting one of your pals, though?"

"No thank you!" Howe drew a wing across his chest, striding pompously away. "This pegasus enjoys having a third dimension, and I will not allow a repeat of my prior pounding. And before you make fun of my mane, you have the dark-and-edgy aesthetic going on yourself, Miss Black-and-Green!" He blinked. "Also, did you forget my loyal brother Neon Nova already? That is highly rude."

"Neon Nova?" Valey blinked. "That lemon bag was your fault? I mean, brother?" She grinned. "Oh yeah, I knew that! Silly me. Tell him I owe him one if you see him. I hadn't gotten to bust anyone up for like a whole day before him, and he was good sport."

Howe trembled with indignity. "Why you..."

Maple stuck herself between the two, blocking their views of each other. "Please, no fighting!" she demanded with a stomp. "Howe, in our defense, he was being a criminal, we didn't know he was supposed to be helping us at the time, we didn't know you were helping us at the time, and both of you hardly go out of your ways to look trustworthy or like good guys! What were we supposed to do?"

"I, uhh..." Howe fidgeted. "Well, when you put it like that..."

"Let's put it this way," Valey offered, jumping over Maple so she was staring Howe face-to-face. "What are the odds that, if we happened to run into him for no reason whatsoever, he'd make himself useful? Hypothetically speaking, of course. Just in case I had him locked up in pretty much the exact place we are now."

Howe's eyes widened. "Are you for realsies?"

Valey tapped a hoof. "Depends what it would get me and my friends."

"Well..." Howe shrugged. "Considering as I had already resigned myself to leaving this city with neither my brother nor our precious heirlooms, and am already assisting the lovely Maple in return for one of them in payment..." He grinned. "I've no insight on the desires that stir your heart, but would be willing to grant most anything you could imagine!"

"First off, put a lid on that imagination of yours," Valey instructed. "You're not my type. Second, me and Ironflanks are keeping your sound stones; they're spiffy. Third, unless you do something stupidly noble and heroic, you're not following us once we leave this city... though I might change my mind, like if Ironflanks thinks you're a big enough charity case. And finally..." She tapped her cutie mark. "I'll know if either of you are planning something against us, and you won't have a good time. Savvy?"

"You have yourselves a deal!" Howe pumped a hoof, eyes burning with intensity. "I swear it on my father's noble journey, the Howenator will not fail you!"

"Cool." Valey started back down the corridor, nudging Maple as she passed. "Hope you're cool with that too, Ironflanks. I mean, knowing you, you probably trust him with your life already, but having my help means I decide what's dangerous."

Maple sighed, shaking her head. "I don't mind. My ears might, if we don't start getting more friends that can talk without trying to be the center of attention, but that's neither here nor there..."


With a rusty squeal, the gate to a cell much like the one everyone else had been deposited in swung open, causing the unicorn inside to blink himself awake. "Say whaaa...?" Neon Nova looked around, yellow eyes flicking back and forth nervously without their usual sunglasses.

"Guess who it is, biological brother-of-mine!" Howe stepped out from behind a wall with a dastardly smirk on his face, kicking the door wide open. "It is I, the Howenator! And I have come to rescue you!"

Neon Nova blinked harder. "Boss?"

"Umm... yeah." Howe stood in the cell door, waiting. "Anyway, it... turns out we've both been fired. However, I have a new contract with one of the hearts as promised payment. So we will at least retrieve one from the yaks' vile clutches!"

"You're pullin' Neon Nova's tail, aren't you?" Neon gaped, his white performer's suit still hanging in tatters from his tall frame. "That's outrageous! You mean our luck's turned right back around!?" He sprung to his hooves... then winced heavily. "Owowowow! Still... sore..."

Valey stepped into view behind Howe, wearing an obviously-fake smile. "Hey there, generator boy. Guess who else it is!"

Neon Nova paled. "Aw, shucks! It's you!"

"Technically, you could say, 'It's you,' to anyone and still be correct," Valey pointed out. "Anyway, by some crazy fluke Pancake and I are now allied, and as long as you don't try to mess with me or my friends, we figured we'd see if you wanted to be helpful."

"I still feel like... I've been put through a meat grinder because of you..." Neon gasped, potentially overplaying his pain... but Valey didn't want to stake any bets on it.

She shrugged. "Hey, don't worry, it was all in good fun. Also, me on your side. Cool?"

"This could be our one chance to get out of here with our hides intact," Howe offered. "Join me, and together we will escape from this accursed landscape!"

Gerardo sidled up as well. "I recommend accepting. Also, did he call you Boss?"

"It's..." Howe nervously shuffled. "A very long story involving more than one failed romantic relationship. Please, refrain from asking."

"Not when you put it like that," Valey snorted, still eyeing the pair suspiciously. "Anyway, choice? We're in a hurry, here."

"Well, hey, take me with you!" Neon Nova urged, hobbling out the door. "Just because we live in a cave back in Yakyakistan doesn't mean I want to die in one!"

"You... live in a cave," Maple dubiously said.

"Also a long story." Howe pointed a wing at her. "Which we can, perhaps, tell once the stakes are a little lower. In the meantime, onward!"


Valey led the way, being the only member of the group who knew their way around the Flame District's upper reaches. Eventually, however, they reached a long, straight corridor with no turnoffs, and she took the opportunity to slip backward, falling in next to Maple.

"...Yes?" Maple asked, the batpony drawing uncomfortably close.

"He mentioned a heart," Valey whispered, just loud enough for Maple to pick it up. "What exactly did you promise him? This is important."

Maple's heart slowed as she realized Valey didn't know about what she had liberated from the crate that first night in the Defense Force fort. "A windigo heart," she whispered back. "One of two. I stole it from those crates Selma stole from Gerardo. I didn't get the other. Why?"

Valey's face remained stoic, but her voice grew even quieter. "Yeah. That's what I was afraid of."

"Why?" Maple asked, feeling a chill. "Do you know what they're used for?"

"You had it on you earlier," Valey said. "But you don't now. That's why you smelled funny when you left the Stone District. You tried hiding it in your cutie mark."

"Don't tell them," Maple urged back. "Howe doesn't know I hid it." After hesitating, she added, "Why? What do you know about them?"

"It's lucky you're okay," Valey whispered. "Those things are like moon glass. Cutie marks and them... well, mixing them is for mad scientists. Anyway, if we have the chance, give me any you find before we leave. I know someone who can get rid of them. If not, I hope you hid it well."

"Why?" Maple paled. "What do they do?"

"That's what Yakyakistan wanted to find out when I lived there," Valey answered lowly. "Beats me what they've figured out since then... but of all the stuff they knew when I left, none of it was good."

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