Surviving Sand Island

by The 24th Pegasus

Bulls vs Mummies

Hot Coals frantically backpedaled as a small army of minotaurs waded across the shallow waters separating the sandbar from the island proper. There were nearly fifty of them, each clutching a spear in one hand and a net in the other. Their bodies, starkly silhouetted by the moonlight, were tall and muscular, and their polished horns faintly glowed under the stars. They all bore war paint and tattooes, and many of them had piercings through their noses. And all of their eyes fell on him.

Unfortunately, Coals tripped and fell as he scrambled backwards, bashing his skull on a chunk of driftwood jutting out of the sand. It momentarily dazed him, and by the time his vision finally cleared up, the minotaurs were nearly close enough to throw their nets on him. They called out to each other in guttural noises, and one pointed at him while another planted his spear in the ground and grabbed his net with both hands.

Before he could throw it, however, a valiant squawk cried out through the night, and Chirp landed on top of Coals’ head, wings outstretched in defiance. The minotaurs, to Coals’ astonishment, all backed off at the bird’s display. Even more surprising, they lowered their weapons and bowed their heads to the macaw out of what Coals could only assume was reverence.

He crossed his eyes to look up at the bird standing on his horn. Were macaws some kind of important religious symbol to the minotaurs?

He decided he wasn’t going to question it—Chirp’s display had likely saved his life, somehow. Gyro had told him all the horrible things she’d suffered through because of the minotaurs. He knew that they ate ponies and weren’t afraid to butcher them like animals. If Chirp was stopping that somehow, he didn’t want to disturb the bird and make him leave.

“Saksi flaga koosoo’set pohnaa’al,” one said, obviously surprised. He looked to the bull on his left, who was even larger and wore a skull on top of his head. “Ete?”

“Takka ete’set’un, saksi flaga,” he said in reply, scolding the other. “H’a baneb.”

Chirp seemed to settle down, and he closed his wings against his sides, though he kept a wary eye on the minotaurs and didn’t get too comfortable. Coals gently cleared his throat and raised an eyebrow at the minotaurs. “So… you aren’t going to eat me, right?”

The minotaurs frowned at him, and their leader, the one with the skull on his head, picked up his weapons and began to cautiously stride closer. When Chirp opened his beak and hissed at him, the minotaur slowed down and held up his hands in a placating manner. “Saksi flaga sonal U’a,” he grunted, looking Coals over. “Ete?”

Coals could only blink in response. He had no idea what to say to these minotaurs. What kind of language was that, even? He had never heard anything like it in his life.

“H’a takka’set’un Mum’a tokto,” another said, waving his hand. “Baneb’un pohnaa’al.”

Before they could banter any longer, a growl and a hiss rose from the trees Coals had emerged from in his desperate escape from the mummies. Coals whipped his head around, unsettling Chirp, who clung onto his horn for dear life. Sure enough, several shadows shuffled through the undergrowth, rotten teeth glistening in the moonlight, tattered wrappings clinging to tree bark and tearing loose as they shambled. When the first mummy finally stepped onto the beach, the minotaurs all tensed and readied their weapons.

“Naggan Almaha stafiwi!” a minotaur shouted in alarm.

“Ata Almaha!” their leader cried, lowering his spear and charging at the nearest mummy. It hissed and snapped at him, but the stone point on the end tore through its neck, impaling it to the shaft. The minotaur shouted and hefted the body into the air, grabbed onto its shoulders with one hand, and pulled in opposite directions, ripping the head free entirely and discarding the writhing body.

“Ata Almaha!” the other minotaurs cried as they too charged into the fray, stampeding all around Coals and clashing with the mummies staggering out of the jungle. With overwhelming numbers and strength, coupled with the superior reach of their weapons, the war party of minotaurs began to drive the mummies back into the trees, leaving twitching corpses in their wake.

Coals looked on in shock as the minotaurs plowed through the mummies that infested the island. Where he had thought he was dead just minutes before, now he felt relieved and excited. If the minotaurs were destroying the mummies, then that meant they must be on his side… at least for the moment.

He wasn’t going to chance just sitting on the beach all exposed, however. After carefully picking his way around the spasming corpses scattered across the sand and the jungle floor, Coals doubled his pace to catch up to the minotaur war band, all the while making sure that Chirp had comfortably perched himself on his back.

-----

Gyro watched the distant northern horizon with worry. As the seconds since the rainboom disappeared dragged on, she found herself worrying more and more. There was no more magic in the sky, and the bright spot that had been Rainbow Dash was all gone. Something had happened over there because of the rainboom, that much she knew for sure. What she didn’t know was whether it was good or bad.

“Do you think we should fly?” Champagne asked, looking between Gyro and Stargazer. “Get away from here?”

“What good would that do?” Stargazer asked in turn. “There’s no cloud cover to hide behind anymore. We’d have moonlight on our backs the entire time. We’re better off sticking together where we can defend each other.”

“We’re just an easier target for Soft Step if she comes this way,” Champagne said. “She could get both of us at once.”

“She’d get both of us eventually if we did flee in opposite directions,” Stargazer insisted. “Maybe together, we have a better chance of holding her off.”

Champagne pursed her lips and frowned. “Do you really think we can fight her off?” she asked. “She’s an alicorn now. She has magic. We don’t.”

Stargazer shrugged. “She’s been fighting Melody, Rarity, and now Rainbow for how long now? She has to be exhausted. Even alicorns get tired.”

Gyro’s ears perked and she roused herself to attention when she thought she saw something shimmer out of the corner of her eye. Peering into the darkness, she forced herself to stand and be ready just in case. “Keep it quiet, guys,” she said, frowning into the dark of the night. “I thought I saw something.”

“Oh no,” Champagne said, hopping to her hooves and spreading her wings halfway. “Was it one of the sirens? Was it Rainbow? Please tell me it’s Rainbow…”

“It’s not nearly colorful or gay enough,” Gyro said. “It was almost like a black wave riding across the water. Maybe it’s—!”

The shadows suddenly exploded inward into a hissing alicorn, and Gyro toppled backwards in surprise. Champagne and Stargazer immediately took to the skies as Soft Step appeared in front of them, tiny flakes of darkness falling off her body. The alicorn dropped onto the raft as Gyro scrambled away, and she parted her lips to reveal her fangs. “So this is where you’ve been hiding all night. Clever. But not clever enough.”

Her horn surged, and the darkness around Champagne and Stargazer tightened into lassos around their wings. The two pegasi struggled in midair, but the arms of darkness reeled them back in, dragging them closer and closer to Soft Step. Gyro watched in horror as the two pegasi ended up back at sea level again and Soft Step looked them over.

“Yes, you two will do wonderfully,” she said, licking her lips. “Do not fret, for I will make your deaths as painless as I can. After all, you must be properly rewarded for sacrificing your blood to bring Him to this world.”

“S-Soft Step,” Gyro stammered, sitting upright on the far end of the raft. “What happened to you?”

Soft fixed her slit eyes on Gyro and laughed. “A higher purpose,” she said. “My eyes are closed to the light, and I bask in His beautiful darkness. As for you…”

She fluttered her wings and hovered above the raft, taking the struggling pegasi with her. Then her horn began to charge with energy, and she smiled one last time at the mechanic. “You fled from me at the shrine. If you wanted me to leave you alone so dearly, you simply should have asked!”

A beam of moonlight struck the raft, and the entire thing broke apart in seconds. Gyro cried out in alarm as the logs she’d been sitting on moved apart from each other, and she flailed her forelimbs to try to grab onto one. But they all rolled away from her, and she soon found herself sinking away from the wood, her earth pony muscle weighing her down more than her weak limbs could do to carry her to the surface.

As the salt stung her eyes, she saw Soft Step laugh one last time, and then she and the pegasi in her clutches all vanished into the shadows.

Comments

[zaponator]

Thanks, Rainbow Dash. You really definitively helped get everyone killed.

Meanwhile, on cool island, Chirp is the real hero of this story! I bloody knew it!

[FloydienSlip]

8999362
goddayum ranbo

[Lanigiro]

"Was it Rainbow? Please tell me it’s Rainbow…”

“It’s not nearly colorful or gay enough,” Gyro said.

- ... Yeah, that's fair.

[Eroraf86]

Minotaurs to the rescue! Somepony please save Gyro!

[bronyparty15]

no wonder this fic is always on the front page cuz it just keeps going and going and going

[Aurora Dimmet]

Think I called it. Chirp's either some kind of icon of the sun god or an emissary.

[Merula]

Chirp is the MVP

[KingSombraTheTyrantRuler]

Damn...

Chirp saves the day!