Surviving Sand Island

by The 24th Pegasus

Snooping as Usual

Rainbow stirred from her rest when a hoof poked her in the ribs. Blinking and groaning, she opened her bleary eyes one after the other. She found Rarity hovering over her, an apologetic smile that seemed to glow in the dim twilight on her face. “It’s time, Rainbow,” she said, stroking a lock of yellow hair out of Rainbow’s eyes.

Rainbow rubbed at her sleepy eyes and yawned. “So it is,” she mumbled, trying to sit up. Though she needed the nap, she’d woken up feeling just as tired if not more so than when she fell asleep. Her hooves were sluggish and her back ached from sleeping on the ground. Ferns and other plant matter could only do so much when sleeping at the top of a stony mountain, especially after how exhausting the past forty-eight hours had been.

Rarity saw Rainbow struggling to wake up, so she bent over and pressed her lips to Rainbow’s. The pegasus jolted in surprise at the kiss, but a moment later she ended up wrapping her hooves around Rarity’s waist and pulled her right against her chest. With Rarity lying on top, the two ponies locked their warm bodies together like puzzle pieces, kissing and nuzzling and sighing and humming.

They eventually paused for air with Rarity pushing herself up on her hooves. She panted lightly from the excitement and passion, and strands of her shortened shoulder-length hair hung in front of her face. Rainbow brushed a few of the sweaty purple strands aside and smiled as she gently stroked the unicorn’s cheek. “You’re so beautiful,” she said. “I just wanna hold you here forever and ever.”

“I’d love that more than anything,” Rarity said. But her shoulders sagged as she looked to the sky through the cracks in the ruins. “Unfortunately we have work to do.”

“Yeah…” Groaning, Rainbow sat up, letting Rarity roll off of her chest before she crawled to her hooves. “I guess it’s about that time, isn’t it.”

“It’s why I woke you up, darling,” Rarity said. “I figured we should try to get down the mountain while there’s still a little bit of light left. I don’t feel like taking a tumble down the stones when all is said and done.”

Rainbow stretched her legs out and stepped out of their hiding place. The air was still warm on the mountain, but Rainbow knew it wasn’t going to be long before it got chilly. Though the mountain wasn’t anywhere near the cloudline, it was still high enough that there’d be a noticeable difference in temperature by the middle of the night. Rainbow had felt it last night, and she knew it was coming again tonight.

“Should we bring anything with us?” Rarity asked. “Will we need anything?”

“We probably shouldn’t,” Rainbow said. “We’re just trying to get a good look at the village and not get seen. If we bring crap with us it’ll just make us easier to find and easier to get caught.”

Rarity nodded. “Quick and quiet is the order of the day, then.”

“Or night,” Rainbow said, glancing at the sky.

“Whatever.”

Delaying only long enough to top off on water and food, the two ponies began the hike down the mountain. Though they had a basic familiarity with the land by now, they proceeded with caution, double-checking the rocks and the shadows on the ground to keep their hoofing. They kept their ears open and eyes peeled for any signs of lingering minotaurs around the island, but they didn’t hear anything as the sun finally fell and darkness settled over the mountain.

They’d never been this low on this side of the island before. They crept up to the fringes of the tree line around the big open bay on the island’s west side, where they could survey the land from the safety of the shadows. Crouching down behind some brush, their eyes peered across the water to the lights beginning to emerge from beneath the trees.

The first thing they saw were lines of brown huts placed seemingly haphazardly. Tree trunks and woven fronds made up the bulk of the structures, tied together with vines and coconut rope. Many of the huts were built around firepits in the sand, around which several minotaurs tended growing flames. Many bulls dragged outrigger canoes further up the shore and away from the tides, while cows tended to their young and prepared meals. Despite the growing darkness of the night, it seemed like the village was still lively and active.

“That’s… a lot of them,” Rainbow said, just counting the minotaurs she could see moving around. She gave up when she got past thirty. “Like, sheesh.”

“A hornets’ nest indeed,” Rarity agreed. “And we need to go into that and get a trinket to open this temple?”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Rainbow said. “We’re not in a good position to infiltrate the village tonight. Let’s just get a good look at everything.”

“But where do we start?” Rarity blinked and searched the village from afar. “There doesn’t seem to be any order to the thing.”

After a moment to think, Rainbow turned her eyes toward brush elsewhere. “We need to get a closer look,” she said. “We’re not going to figure anything out from here.”

“I agree,” Rarity said, stepping out of the brush. She stopped when Rainbow put a hoof on her shoulder and dragged her back. “What?” she asked, shooting Rainbow an accusatory glare.

“Rarity, you’re like the moon,” Rainbow said.

Rarity blinked. “Why, thank you, Rainbow, but I don’t think now’s the time for—”

“No, not like that.” Rainbow shook her head. “Your white coat reflects everything. The moonlight is just gonna glow off of it. You’ll be easy to see.”

“And you won’t be?” Rarity frowned and looked Rainbow over. “You’re incredibly colorful to say the least.”

“Yeah, but it’s night. You can’t see colors all that well in the dark.” Rainbow shook out her mane. “Face it, neither of us are really good at the sneaking around thing because we’re super colorful ponies. But if we want to get a closer look at this village, then I should be the one to do it because I’ll be harder to see at night. Unless you feel like covering yourself in dirt and crap to hide your coat.” As she said that, she started digging through the ground and smearing dirt and sand into her mane to block out some of the color.

That killed the argument, and Rainbow knew it. Rarity shuffled through a few disgusted faces before sighing. “I suppose you’re right,” she said. “Just… you will be careful, won’t you?”

“I’ll try to be,” Rainbow assured her. “I wouldn’t bite off anything more than I could chew.”

With that little bit of encouragement, Rainbow snuck away through the undergrowth, trying to stick to the shadows and foliage as best she could. Each bush and clutch of ferns brought her a little bit closer to the town. Within a few minutes, she’d changed angles on it, giving her a different look down into the group of huts. She saw a few more fire pits and a lot more minotaurs gathering around them, but nothing distinct from that spot. The trees growing through the middle of the village were simply too dense and erratically placed for her to get a good eye on things, and the village was a lot larger than she originally thought.

Checking her surroundings for any signs of movement or noise, Rainbow continued her reconnaissance. A small hill rose up amongst the sand and dirt a bit further to the north, so she made that her priority. It provided a vantage point over much of the village, and the top was also lined with trees and rocks to give her cover. Dense foliage covered the approach, giving Rainbow the shelter she needed to safely climb up to the top.

Once she made it, however, she could see the village arranged below her. The huts were arranged in short of a fishhook shape around a larger ridge to the west that Rainbow’s hill was merely the tail end of. She didn’t bother counting the huts below, even though there were a lot of them; she already knew there were more than a hundred at a glance. Given the distribution of the village, Rainbow assumed that much of their crops and farmland, what little they cultivated on the island, was kept to the further northwestern area of the island. That would explain why the minotaurs seemed so sparse around the eastern side, but none of that really helped Rainbow. What she needed to find was something to mark out the chief’s hut, and after a minute of searching, she finally found it.

It was distinct from the others only in that it looked like two huts mashed together. It wasn’t long and low like the communal hut or tall and closed off like what Rainbow assumed were the granaries. But it had a prominent position on a slightly raised hillock, giving it a good view of the rest of the town, situated right at the interior of the fishhook’s bend. That put its front facing towards the water and its back to the ridge rising up above it.

Rainbow started thinking up ways to approach the hut. The best way she could see to go about it was from behind, where she could drop in on the hut from the sparsely populated ridge and sneak into the hut. But even then, she didn’t know what she would find. She had a feeling that her and Rarity would have to go in blinder than they would’ve liked. There just wasn’t a good way to get more information without risking being found.

But they had a location and enough information to start thinking about a plan. Carefully keeping her body low to the ground, Rainbow backed off the hill and slipped away. Her and Rarity would need to have a talk and come up with a plan of action for getting that medallion away from the tribe’s leader. They knew what they were up against now; it was only a matter of time before they finished their stay on the island, one way or the other.

Rainbow just hoped that she wouldn’t be leading them both to their deaths.

Comments

[The 24th Pegasus]

8513708
I'm afraid I'll have to disagree with you. While I certainly could have opened with Rainbow and Rarity stranded on the island, I feel that dumps half of the story's purpose in favor of the other half. The story is tagged "Romance, Adventure" for a reason. These first twenty chapters, in addition to simply setting up how the two ended up on the island, are important for building the foundations for a later relationship between these two. They are two very different ponies from two very different worlds. Their time aboard the Concordia lets them see that they have more in common than they would otherwise have thought. It gives them a basis of normalcy to reference during their trials and experiences trying to survive as castaways. Jumping blind into the island would have, in my opinion, sacrificed much of this initial basis for the two of them to build their relationship off of throughout the remainder of the story.

And additionally, there are some plot details that are hidden throughout these initial twenty chapters on the airship. There are details that become relevant or explain some things as time goes on. The time spent on the airship gives me the necessary space to start setting up future events that will fruit at a later date. That being said, I cannot stop you from skipping the airship interactions and jumping right to the part where they're on the island. The story is yours to read as you wish. I hope you enjoy the remainder.

[bjorn2345]

vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/five-nights-at-pingas/images/2/27/Dr_ivo_robotnik_by_lordorga-d6ubk4k.png/revision/latest?cb=20150715151224

fwiw I agree with the commenter that said the pacing is way too slow, and I haven't skipped anything.

[PonySage86]

8514379
Personally I think you're doing great. I think establishing the setting and world is very important and I can appreciate you taking your time with these things. I've enjoyed every chapter I've read and while I can certainly understand other readers wanting to jump right to the main points there is always room for world building.

Just take things at your own pace like you have been and you'll be fine.

[Zaveryn]

Well, I guess whether or not the pacing is slow or just right depends on what you think. I'm fine with the pacing the way it is in this story.

A problem I'm having is keeping up with the chapters - I'm more of a "binge read large stories fast" vs "one chapter a day" sort of person. There was this other one chapter a day story I was reading, Silver Glow's Journal or something to that affect, that I totally lost track on. I'm solving that with this story by coming back every few days to read this story instead of forcing myself to read it every day.

I think the pacing is fine, really. The chapters aren't that long. If this were a story that had your usual update every few weeks sort of thing then it wouldn't have taken too long to get to the island. I feel like story would be lost if you just started on the island...you definitely needed to establish how they got there or else it would feel like a cheap cliche ploy to get those two together.

[Aurora Dimmet]

8513708

Coming into the comments just to tell the author you ignored their work like some sort of spoiled and entitled child doesn't paint a good picture of yourself, and is basically just insulting said author to their face. It's also somewhat aggravating to read as a satisfied member of the audience, which the vast majority of us seem to be. If you have this much of a problem with the story and how it was handled, perhaps it is you who is not worthy of the story, rather than the other way around?

[eL VeeJay]

I wonder why they don't use more camouflage. I would've rolled in mud if I were them.

[Merula]

Snooping as Usual

[AstraPony]

8515155
i agree that the story is kinda slow, but i still think that its great. what the story lacks in speed is made for with detail, daily updates, and just being great in general

[FridayPie]

8587845
Eh, you' have to kill Rarity first.

[Fatch]

Been binging this for a bit now. Noticed a recurring grammar error that you might want to fix eventually.

Often, you us the construction "her and rarity did x". It should be (in this case) "she and rarity". A trick to figure out the right pronoun is to remove the "and rarity" portion and see if the sentence is correct. You wouldn't say "her drank water" so "her and rarity drank water" is wrong.

More specifically, "her" is used as the object of a sentence while "she" is the subject. "She did x to her" rather than "her did x to she".

Other than that, totally enjoying the story.

[Maksvel]

8969913
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