The Land Before Hooves

by Moon Flame

Chapter 14. The Burning Mountain

They didn’t need to pass the mountain shaped like a longneck since they had fliers this time around. Neither did they need to face the wrath of the burning mountains like Littlefoot and his friends did twenty years ago.

“Sure we shouldn’t head that way, Cera?” Littlefoot teased.

“Haha, very funny.”

After some directional maneuvers they would pass the fiery mountains from a safe distance. The last thing Littlefoot wanted was to take risks, especially since they didn’t know if the valley was habitable. Not far from where they were now laid a lava lake that sent up airwaves and smoke rings. As long as its source didn’t erupt they would be safe.

Littlefoot still had no idea how to get the ponies home to Equestria. Twilight seemed to believe their fate laid tied with the stars on Littlefoot’s flank, his cutie mark. This extra responsibility only made Littlefoot feel worse. What if he was wrong about the valley regrowing? Would his friends still trust him, or would he had failed them like his father failed him? At least his father never failed his herd. Bron, the father that failed his son. He could be Littlefoot, the confused longneck that failed his friends, his father and his herd.

Twilight saw the longneck, seemingly wandering inside a personal mist.

“How is it?”

Littlefoot shook out of wherever. “Oh... Yes, its going. I was just thinking.” He smiled.

“Thinking? Now, that’s new!” Twilight laughed. Littlefoot laughed with her. He looked in wonder at the pony girl, her lavender coat and purple mane streaked with dawn red, her warm voice with funny personality and corky ways.

He couldn’t believe he hadn’t said this before, but it was so true. “How beautiful you are Sparkle.”

“Sparkle!?” Twilight’s shock quickly transformed into a giggle. Rarity looked jealous at her. “Well, thank you mister longneck.”

Rarity grinned. She raised her hooves high. “Oh my, this burning sun is killing me, I think I’m gonna faint!”

“Me catch you!” Petri came to the rescue. “Hoargh!” His wings flung around as he laid buried beneath the unicorn.

“Oh, thank you! Thank you so much Petri. You’re my hero!”

“Me glrlad mejl coubl helbh.” Petri answered.

There were the sound of rocks breaking. Rarity and Petri disappeared into a hole.

“Wait! Stand still!” Littlefoot urged. But panic was a cruel mistress. The scream of Fluttershy and Apple Jack was already sounding.

The dizziness from the landing lasted for almost a minute. Apple Jack let her groggy eyes adjust. She heard Twilight above.

“Rarity! Apple Jack! Fluttershy! Petri! Are you alright!?”

Apple Jack counted her friends. Rarity had risen to her hooves while Petri was stirring. Fluttershy ruffled her wings. “We’re alright. We just fell down a hole. A...”The air burned thick inside her throat. “Oouiiie. Do you by any means have spas in the Land Before Time?”

“What are spas!?” Ducky screamed from above.

“As much as I’d love a treat I don’t think this is a spa, Apple.” Rarity said constipated. She turned her attention at the flier that followed her down there. “Petri? Are you alright?”

Petri cursed that the hole above was to small to fly out of. It did not take long for him to feel the heat, literarily. It became more intense with each second. The air smelled of sulphur. “Me have a bad feeling bout this.”

At the surface, Littlefoot turned his attention to the lake. Unlike a minute ago, the lava appeared to be moving downward, as if an opening had just formed below. His heart made a jump. He leaned his winding neck through the hole and shouted. “Its an underground fire river, and its active!”

“Fire what?” Rarity and Fluttershy shared a bewildered look. They turned to the dark part of the cave, which had begun to glow. The heat was so intense it burned Rarity’s face. She and Fluttershy shared a frightened look.

“Its lava!” Apple Jack wailed.

“Where will we go!?” Fluttershy cried.

Petri spotted a pathway. He jumped up and down. “Hey ponies, down there!”

Rarity used her head to shovel the large flier onto her back. “Hold onto my horn Petri!”

Littlefoot saw his friends below run for safety. He was just about to breath a sigh of relief when the air was cut with a series of hissing explosions. The underground lava river caused geysers of hot air to form on the surface. They came closer at an unreal pace.

“Just like your head, Longneck!” Cera boomed and started sprinting. Littlefoot, Twilight, Ducky and Pinkie Pie followed.

Rainbow Dash was on her way to heed her friends calls when she saw the geysers. Flying low would be suicide. She decided to fly ahead and locate the safest place for her friends to fall back.

The sound of hooves echoed inside the cave while the smatter of melting rock came closer.

“What if it leads to a dead end!?”

“Good inspiration Flutter!” Apple Jack shouted sarcastically.

“Are you ok?” Rarity asked Petri, turning her head slightly.

The heat was so intense it drummed on the flyers head. “Me think me gonna be sick.”

The darkness was almost complete ahead with only the lava coming from behind illuminating it. Petri bounced up and down on the galloping pony. His face widened in panic. He opened his beak wide. “DANGER!”

The hoofing beneath Rarity gained newer depths. "Waaaaah!" Hooves grabbed her from above. She managed to grab Petri. “Petri Hold on!”

The sweat poured down off of Apple Jack’s face as she pulled Rarity. Fluttershy grabbed her from behind and helped. Just as the molten rock was about to give them all a overly heated bath Apple Jack managed to drag her friends up. She was the last to leave before the approaching lava turned the crevice into a fiery kettle.

The co klonks of the ponies was accompanied by their breathing and gasping. They galloped from passage to passage, praying that it wouldn’t lead them to a dead end. The face of the yellow pegasus contorted in pain.

“Its so hot!”

“We must find an exit before this cave becomes an oven!” Apple Jack screamed.

Below ground, things wasn’t much calmer.

“We must get of this field before we become smoked pony ala dinosaur soufflé!” Twilight screamed.

Cera shook her head while sprinting. “What’s a...? Never mind!”

Right, left and behind, sometimes ahead came explosion after explosion. Twilight screamed when a geyser formed right in front of her. The dinosaurs and ponies did their best to dodge them.

“Weeeeeeee!” The pink pony was bouncing on four hooves, dodging each explosion.

“Are you joking!? We’re in danger!” Cera blasted.

“Of course I’m joking silly, or else I would be a luny.”

“Hey! Up Here!”

“Rainbow!" Twilight spotted the pegasus high up.

“Come! This way, I see w...” A geyser drowned Dashies' voice.

“What?!” Cera asked.

“I said! There... the...”

“What!? Whaaaaaaaaa....”

Littlefoot managed to reach out his tail and catch Cera before she fell into the formed crevice.

“Hurry, we have to go!” Ducky cried.

Below cera the cave filled with lava. Littlefoot growled while trying to heave the heavy threehorn up. The ground rumbled.

“Swing me!” Cera urged.

“What!” Littlefoot hissed with his teeth pressed.

“Swing me to that edge, then I’ll grab it!”

Suddenly Cera became much easier. Twilight’s horn was sparkling. The alicorn and the longneck pulled Cera up. They barely managed to slip away before the ground below them was no more. The edge Cera had mentioned was gone long before that.

“Look! Water!” Twilight spotted an actual lake.

“That’s what I was try...n...!” The pegasus was drowned again.

Below ground, the cave got smaller around the ponies and the pterodactyl. The lava was still after them but had slowed down significantly.

“Look! Light!” Apple Jack shouted.

“Are you alright Petri?” Rarity asked the dinosaur on her back. There was no answer.

“I’m afraid he's passed out.” Fluttershy said.

The ponies exited the cave, only to probably go from fried to embalmed. Rarity was so relieved to be out she didn’t notice the drop that lead to a pound of boiling mud. She managed to gain hoofing but the flier fell off.

“Oh no!”

Petri hit the mud with a splash. He immediately started sinking into it. Rarity prayed and released.

“Did the lava boil your senses!?” Apple blasted.

The unicorn took a deep breath and dove. She quickly grabbed the flyer with her hooves and pulled him above surface. She found herself stuck, and sinking. The mud was thick and pressed against her, making breathing hard. Panic filled her hollow bones. She cursed herself for regretting saving a friend. “Get me out, get me out! I can’t move!”

Hooves embraced Rarity. They heaved her up above the surface.

“Gotchaaaaaa!”

But Rarity was stuck more that Rainbow Dash had realized. A geyser formed in the mud and de angled her wing. “Oaaaah!”

One by one Fluttershy watched her friends disappear in front of her eyes. She bit her lips while her pupils diminished. The image of a lizard reflected in them. It was running back to her over the desert when its life suddenly ended, eaten by a carnevor. Her face contorted in determination. She had watched enough friends die while she did nothing but cry. Apple Jack turned to her.

"You hold me while I get them Flutter!"

Fluttershy grinned. "Most certanly!"

Even though she was sinking, for Dashie, loyalty was everything. She looked into the panicked eyes of the unicorn. “I’m not letting you go!”

Fluttershy was holding Apple Jacks back hooves. The country pony heaved herself toward her friends. She got hold of Rainbow Dash before her head started to go under. She couldn’t see Rarity nor Petri.

“Rarity! Fight!”

“Pull me up!” Dashie screamed.

“I’m trying, oaaaah!”

Fluttershy felt her hooves falter. She gasped before hitting the mud.

Apple Jack did not see Rainbow Dash anymore. Her mind entered an area of peace. “This is it Fluttershy.”

“No! Don’t give up. Pull!”

“I love you.”

Fluttershy watched in horror the head of her friend go under.

“No!”

Fluttershy couldn’t move her hooves nor her tail. Each moment of struggling only added to the stress. “Help! Somepony! Help, please!” The mud reached her neck. “Help... Hah...Pl...is...” She held in her last breath. The world went dark.

The bubbling of the sinking hole and hissing of the geysers was the only sound. A small streak of lava ran out of the hole the ponies had come from. A tail dabbled into the mud. It went deep before ascending with a yellow pegasus holding an orange earth pony holding a rainbow pegasus holding a white unicorn holding a pterodactyl.

Fluttershy was sure she had been taken by Luna to an everlasting sleep. She felt herself hit the ground. She gasped and accidentally swallowed some mud. She coughed and opened her eyes to a blurry image of, not the princess of the night, but friendship.

“Are you alright Fluttershy?”

“Hugh, eh. Yea.”

A familiar head sailed above the alicorn. It had the same heart warming smile that helped her greave the loss of her friend in the desert. “You saved me again.”

Littlefoots smile turned modest.

“Excuse me miss Shy, but I didn’t.”

Littlefoot moved to the side, allowing another smiling friend of Fluttershy to step up. Ducky held up her hands. The tiny lizard with a familiar look hissed his tongue repeatedly.

The lizard told Fluttershy the horrible truth, that he had been following her since the desert. Guided by hatred, he finally saw his chance to get revenge for his dead brother when Fluttershy held Apple Jack over the sinking hole. Approaching her from behind, he intentended to cause her to fall. Once Fluttershy fell anyway he watched her struggle and cry for help. Once he saw her tears and gasps for air something inside of him broke into a million pieces, something that would always belong to his brother. The lizard forgave Fluttershy, with all of his broken heart, and apologized for not getting her friends there faster.

Fluttershy was paralyzed. Despite her earlier promise her eyes swelled up. “I’m... I’m so... H... Sorry. It was my fault! Thank you. Thank you so much!”

Ducky left the lizard with the crying pegasus and ran over to her own friend. “Petri!”

Petri put his wing over his head and groaned. He looked at Ducky. “Sinking hole?”

“Yep yep yep.”

“There is always a sinking hole.” The flyer complained.

Ducky laughed and hugged hard. Around them the ponies did the same.

Cera shot the longneck a disgruntled look. Littlefoot laughed his white teeth nervously. "Eh, hehehehe. At least we know from experience we'll find our way to the valley?"

A friendly grin formed across the face of the threehorn. The burning mountain whispered his sorry with a ground shaking grumble.