A Rather Large Adventure

by BradyBunch

Chapter Eighty-one: Land of Desolation

It was by no means a pleasant trip for Spike.

The terrain, for one. It was all rocky and spiky and jagged under his soft feet. And he knew there could be any number of creepy, crawly, slimy, slippery things under those rocks.

Then there was the uncomfortable feeling of being back in a place that he should have called home. He was a stranger in his own land. There was no one here he could trust. Not anymore, at least. There had been Dragon Lord Ember…

Her death was yet another burden upon his back. Ember had been one of the only friends he had made in the Dragonlands. A deep-seated, bubbling pit of resentment boiled in his gut. For Malice. For the land he was in. And for the red, yellow-bellied bully he was now following, as if he needed his help! Garble had been grumbling and snarling under his breath as he led the way to their destination. Garble didn’t deserve the help they had spared to him! See how he fares without them for a bit and see how he likes it!

But then again, Spike reflected, that line of reasoning would just end up thinking exactly how Garble does. Best to just cut out those thoughts now. Be the better dragon.

Garble, Twilight, Rainbow, Freedom Fighter, and Spike eventually ended up on the edge of a very wide crater. In the center was a strange, small pool of water that steamed and bubbled. It shimmered with an explosion of color that almost seemed unnatural in its bright hues of green, red, yellow, and blue.

“Whoah,” Rainbow Dash marveled, eyes on the water in wonder. “I’ve never seen that before.”

“A hot spring,” Twilight was quick to explain as they came nearer. “It’s caused by geothermal heat beneath the surface. If it’s warm enough, you could even take a bath in it.”

“...I’m going to pretend like I know what geothermal means,” Rainbow accepted. “What’s causing the color?”

“Well, what’s causing the color in your hair?” Freedom rhetorically asked. Under the look Rainbow directed his way, though, Freedom just sighed and shut up.

“It’s likely bacteria,” Twilight answered. “And the minerals it’s infused with are causing that smell.”

“What sme-” Rainbow’s face scrunched up almost comedically. “EW! It’s--ugh!” She pinched her nose with one hoof and flapped into the air. “It’s like rotten eggs!”

“I’m not rotten,” Twilight quickly refuted. “At least, I hope not.”

Rainbow shot her a glance. “Huh?”

“Well… you know… I’m an egghead, remember?”

Rainbow paused a moment, then threw her hooves into the air resignedly. “Of course.” She then adopted a sly grin. “You do stink, though.”

“There we go,” Twilight approved. “Just like old times.”

“I can’t stand you guys,” Garble muttered darkly. “It’s just a hot spring. Get over it.”

“We don’t have many of these in Equestria, believe it or not,” Spike replied sharply back.

“Oh, of course you would know, ponyboy.”

“How about we take a break here?” Twilight loudly suggested, cutting both of them off.

“No,” Freedom Fighter refused, shaking his hoof. “We can’t afford lengthy breaks. Malice may be on the move.”

“I could scout ahead,” Rainbow suggested. “I’m not the fastest pony in Equestria for nothing, you know.”

“Can you triangulate our position?” Freedom asked.

“... If you’re asking if I can find you, then yeah.”

“I don’t see why not,” Twilight advised him. “We could use a warning system.”

Freedom gave a solemn nod. “Fine.”

“On it!” Rainbow saluted. With a small boom, she rocketed into the air, leaving the four of them below on the boring old earth.

“How much longer until we reach the throne?” Twilight asked Garble sweetly.

“We get there when we get there!” Garble grunted, kicking a rock into the hot spring. “I know what I’m doing here, all right?”

“Did you say the same thing when you were forced to run?” Spike darkly asked.

“It was my life on the line!” Garble exclaimed, turning on Spike. “What would you have done, give them a spark of your wimpy fire and run off like you always do?”

“Did… Did you not hear what I had to go through to get here?!” Spike retaliated. “Or maybe you did hear and you just don’t care, which means you’re nothing more than scum!”

“You’re the one that was always nothing!” Garble bellowed. “You always thought you could get into things where nopony wanted you or needed you! You’re a hanger-on, you’re weak, you’re always useless, and you got me into trouble. You’re the scum here!”

“I wanted to be like you!” Spike insisted, his voice cracking. “Why else do you think I cared about you even though you hurt me?” His eyes narrowed. “But I know better now. I don’t need you to help me become a better dragon! You’re a bully and a brute! What good did you ever do for anyone? Now everyone else knows it, and so do you! Nopony needs a bully! Nopony wants a jerk! You don’t belong anywhere in this world!”

Garble lunged at him, jabbing him in the chest and making fiery spit fleck from his exposed teeth. “EVERY DAY I WAKE UP AND WISH YOU WERE DEAD!” he roared at the top of his lungs, scratching his throat. “YOU WANT TO BE USEFUL?! PRAY YOU’LL BE BORN AS A REAL DRAGON IN THE NEXT LIFE, AND TAKE A SWAN DIVE OFF A CLIFF!”

That stunned Spike. And after yelling it, Garble was stunned too.

But that only lasted a moment, since both of them were enveloped in a violet aura and violently ripped apart from each other and flung backwards, sending them tumbling across the jagged rocks. An authoritative, stern Twilight stepped between them as they lifted their heads, holding them delicately. Spike couldn’t look her in the eye. Garble was furious, but acknowledged Twilight’s power by not defying her.

“That is it,” Freedom Fighter commanded, coming beside Twilight. “If you cannot control your tongues, you will find that you cannot have them. Trust me when I say it is a living nightmare.”

“Get up, both of you,” Twilight urged them both, gesturing first at Spike, then Garble. “We still have some time to go.”

“I’ll take a look around,” a lousy-sounding Freedom excused, and trotted away.

Twilight looked down upon Garble, and the defiant teenager sneered at her expression of disappointment, but withered as her expression grew harder as a result.

“By all rights, you don’t deserve to be here, Garble,” Twilight reminded the red reptile. “Don’t give us second thoughts about preserving your life when you order our lives to be taken.”

Garble huffed with his best glare, but he didn't dare speak.

As Twilight turned to walk away, a word tumbled out of Spike's mouth. "Sorry."

Garble's darkly curious glare focused on him.

"I shouldn't have said that. It's not the right way."

Garble sniffed. "And here I was, thinking you had toughened up at last."

"The moment I did that, you became unhinged. Are you... really as tough as you think you are?"

"Of course I am!" Garble immediately defended, getting to his feet. "Now if you're done feeling sorry for yourself, we gotta get a move on."

Spike perked up and got to his own feet. "Y-yeah. You know the way better than I do."

"I live here," was Garble's simple, stingy reply.

A sound like a jet engine gradually grew louder in their ears. And cleaving through the bleak and dreary sky was a rainbow. It shot down to their level and screeched to an abrupt halt.

“What news?” Twilight asked.

Rainbow Dash used Stormkeeper to gesture into the sky. “There’s a mass migration heading northeast. I couldn’t see who was leading it, but my money’d be on Malice.”

“Mark their route,” Twilight ordered. “We need to know if Malice will be at that temple once we found out where it is.”

“I suppose that means we aren’t following them?” Freedom asked.

“Well, we need support and direction,” Twilight said. “We can find both at the throne.”

Freedom gave a long, bleak sigh. “Let’s get to it.”

“Only if our guide is willing,” Twilight said, looking over at Garble.

“Yeesh,” Garble mumbled. “Look, it isn’t far now. In a few hours we should reach it.”

“Good to hear,” Twilight beamed, and turned her attention to the hot spring.

Spike and Garble gave each other looks once more. There wasn’t any animosity, but there was lingering tension.

Garble was the first to look away. “Look, what I said… wasn’t awesome. It’s not the way my sister would behave.”

Spike blinked in astonishment. “You’re apologizing?”

“Don’t push it. I’m just trying to live up to a standard.” He picked up a pebble and rolled it between his claws. “...Is there really a difference between being tough and being awesome?”

Spike took his time answering. “They have a lot in common. But it’s not the only way to be awesome.”

Garble considered that. “...So you mean we’re different kinds of awesome?”

“We could clean up both of our acts, I guess. But sure, let’s roll with that.”

“Pssht.” He put his hands behind his head. “Guess we’ll see.”

As he walked away, Spike called out. “Your sister…”

Garble stopped. He looked back.

“Who was she?”

Garble kicked the ground despondently. “Dragon Lord Ember.”

He turned to walk away again, but stopped for a brief moment when Spike said, “I’ll avenge her.”

Garble didn’t say anything in response.

---

The wasteland was dreary and desolate. Despite Firestorm’s earlier cheerful attitude, none of it had managed to last. For hours now, they had been walking in the same direction, which they didn’t even know was correct. The sun was behind them, making their shadows stretch out in distorted shapes as they walked or hovered.

Starlight Glimmer’s hooves were cracked and tough. They punctuated every step with an ache. She was getting tired, and, frankly, a little dehydrated. It made her pace slow and her mood irritable.

When she tripped over a protruding tan pebble, she hissed loudly and kicked it aside with a defiant scream.

“Whoa there,” Tempest remarked laconically behind her. “Save it for the temple.”

“I know,” Starlight groaned, returning to her pace. “I’m going to need it. I mean, the others needed to be tested to get their Elements. What will I be tested on?”

“I don’t suppose you have a study journal lying about?”

Starlight craned her head to regard Tempest. “I actually have been getting into that habit. Twilight’s apprenticeship is very instructive.”

“How is it like learning under Twilight?”

Starlight used her magic to briefly adjust her mane. “It’s pretty chill, actually. She expects me to make progress, but there’s no real pressure if I mess up.”

“Wonder how that feels like,” Tempest muttered. “If there was a Goddess, that’s how I would imagine her.”

Starlight quickly shut the image of a Goddess-Twilight from her mind. “She means everything to me,” Starlight replied. “She made me see that I was being misled and acting evil. She… pretty much singlehoofedly returned me to the light.”

“Now that I do know how it feels like,” Tempest said. “I wonder…”

“What?”

“...what if I could be the Element of Redemption?”

Starlight almost stumbled over herself. She looked back again, squinting as the sun got into her eyes. “Come on, that’s impossible. Scorpan said I would be the one on the quest to obtain the Element.”

“No, but think about it. Both of us were reformed by the Child of Light. I have a name--the Daughter of Thunder.”

“If that’s the qualification, everypony who was once evil has a legitimate claim to the Element. Princess Luna, Discord, even Scorpan.”

“But I’m here now,” Tempest urged. “I was called into the Tree of Harmony’s cave by Star Swirl. I’ve been through too much to play no part in the end. What’s the game plan here? What’s going to happen to us?”

“The only way to find out is if we keep pressing on,” Starlight answered.

“That’s a stupid answer. I figured that part out already.”

“Well then, I don’t know!” Starlight resigned. “All we have to focus on right now is getting my Element at the temple. After that…”

"Then what? Trust in the artifacts?”

“We’re chosen for the task,” Starlight affirmed. “We’ll figure something out.”

“I don’t know,” Tempest slowly said. “If you ponies talk a lot about friendship, why aren’t other friends allowed to bear the Elements? Why couldn’t they also take up the mantle and be paragons of truth, or kindness, or whatever mantra?”

“For the moment, we have to be those. I’m not concerned about what comes after, Tempest. This is about what I have to do in the here and now with my Element.”

“You put too much emphasis on the Elements. You all do. What would you be without them?"

Starlight shivered slightly. "They're the only things that can save us," she explained.

"What about this Goddess? Which is more powerful, the gift, or the Goddess that gave it?"

Starlight opened her mouth, as if to argue. Then she shut it.

“For ponies who believe in Faust, you’re kind of shallow about it,” Tempest said.

“You don’t exactly have ground to stand on,” Starlight reminded her.

“I guess,” Tempest acknowledged, with that imperceptible dry tone to it. “Who am I to judge?”

Starlight looked up in exasperation. It was getting dark, and not just by the onset of night. There was a smoky wall, hundreds of feet high, rolling slowly towards them. In the Dragonlands, it was hard to tell if it was a volcano or a dragon. Starlight didn’t want to be around either.

“We need a new route!” Fluttershy hoarsely whispered to Firestorm, who were both further up. “And we need some water!”

“Okay, I know,” Firestorm told her. “But there wasn’t a cloud in the sky! What did you want me to do?”

“Which way do we need to go?” Tempest called from the back.

“Look, your guess is as good as mine,” Firestorm tried to explain patiently, but his voice was wearing thin. “If you have a good idea, I would love to hear it.”

“What are we going to do about that smoke?” Starlight contributed.

“I DON’T KNOW!” Firestorm bellowed, swiveling around. “Okay? Is that what you wanted to hear? I got nothing.”

“Geez,” Starlight said. “It was just a question.”

“If you want to be helpful, you could stop with the questions and focus more on actually doing something.”

“What’s got you so tense?” Tempest wondered.

“Oh, gee, I don’t know,” Firestorm yelled. “What reason do I have to be tense? We’ve got a quest to finish up, lost in enemy territory, separated from my friends and girlfriend, and we’ve been walking all day in a desert. ‘Doy, gee, Firestorm, why are you so tense?’ That’s a real friggin’ head-scratcher!”

“Listen, Firestorm-” Starlight started.

“No, you listen,” Firestorm interrupted, approaching her. “I’m under no obligation to stay in a good mood all the time. I legitimately try to, since it makes you guys happy, but that isn’t an overriding emotion, okay? I’m not a dorky performer anymore! I can get pissed off too! Why is this such a big surprise to you?”

“Look, I agree!” Starlight quickly said. “And so do all of us. We don’t treat you like that.”

“Plenty of others do,” Firestorm muttered. “Remember Bloodrayne?”

“And you killed him!” Tempest jumped in. “So who exactly are you having this argument with?”

“Not you!” Firestorm said, slowing down. “But… look, I just want to get this over with. Forget I said it.”

“Hey, wait,” Starlight quickly said.

“Starlight, could you use your magic to get rid of the smoke?”

“You’re not getting away that easily.”

“Can you do it or not?”

“I suppose I could,” Starlight answered.

“So why aren’t you doing it?”

“Because you come first,” Starlight replied to his face.

“Get off your high horse. Of course I don’t. Worry about me later. Could you take care of the smoke now? It’s getting closer every second!”

“Not until I get to the root of your problem.”

“We don’t have the time! The only problem here is how you aren’t doing anything useful!”

“Oh, so I suppose getting to the bottom of this is unhelpful?”

“I. Don’t. Matter. Take care of the underlying problem before-” He coughed. He waved a hoof in front of his face. “Oh, great!”

“Some real friendship problem-solving right there,” Tempest said. Swirls of smoke were beginning to fog the air and sting at the eyes. They had to close them.

Going back was no option. All they could do was move forward blind into the smoke.

“Is everyone here?” Starlight yelled, turning her head in the smoke. “Fluttershy?”

If Fluttershy had answered, it was too quiet to hear.

“Pipe down, everypony!” Tempest ordered. “Fluttershy! Did you get lost?”

“Where did you last see her?” Starlight asked Firestorm.

“I don’t know!” Firestorm irritably replied. “One moment she was here and then gone the next!”

“Fluttershy!” Starlight yelled, then coughed. “Fluttershy, where did you go?”

“Wait, hold on!” Tempest said, coughing at the end. “Quiet down. I think I heard something.”

So they did. Each of them were straining their ears for Fluttershy’s distinctive, if quiet, voice.

And they soon heard it drifting their way.

“I’m all right!” she whispered. “Follow the sound of my voice!”

“Easier said than done,” Firestorm grumbled. But he started to feel his way beside the other girls as Fluttershy continued to speak.

“I saw a hole in the ground and decided to go in,” Fluttershy’s faraway voice hissed. “Smoke rises, so I assumed this would be safe. If you come close enough to me, you can find it.”

“When will we know where the ho-OOOOOH!” Firestorm started, then screamed as he slipped and fell into one.

“Oomph!” Fluttershy cried as an impact knocked her down.

“Found it,” Tempest drily announced. Starlight repressed a giggle.

“Over here,” Firestorm urged, right next to them. “The slope is steep, so be careful.”

Tempest grunted as she felt her way down the edge of the supposed hole, and Starlight wasn’t far behind. She found the edge of the rocky ring, turned around, and lowered herself down. Firestorm was right. It was like going down a U-bend in a sink, and after she had felt a few rocks on her way down, she slipped, and she slid the rest of the way into the cave.

“Woo hoo,” Fluttershy cheered, as quiet as ever. “We’re all here.”

Starlight blinked. The air was still stinging, but when she pressed her head to the ground, the smoke thinned out, and she could see clearly. She could see the other ponies in the process of doing the same. Sure enough, all four of them were there.

“I don’t understand,” Tempest spoke up. “I thought there wasn’t supposed to be any smoke down here.”

“Hold on,” Firestorm said, and stuck his head back into the cloud of smoke. After he nodded, he poked himself back down. “The smoke’s coming from inside the cave.”

“Underground lava pit?” Starlight suggested. “Or…”

“Or a dragon?” Fluttershy breathed, locked up in fear. Her hooves were covering her head, which was wrapped up in her dirty pink mane.

“I’ll go in,” Firestorm volunteered, crawling further into the darkness.

“You’re scared of cramped places,” Starlight reminded him, reaching out to grab his leg.

“I don’t care. We’re all scared of dragons too, aren’t we? I can do this.”

Starlight sighed and let go. “Let us know if it’s safe.”

Firestorm quickly disappeared as he wriggled deeper inside.

“What’s gotten into him?” Fluttershy whispered as soon as he was gone.

Starlight sighed. “Firestorm is under the impression that we all think lowly of him, so he has to prove otherwise.”

“But why would he think like that?”

“He refused to tell us,” Starlight replied. “I suppose he’s just going through a hot minute. He’ll be fine.”

The sound of crumbling rock got their attention, and they turned their heads as Firestorm emerged from deeper within the cave, crouching and bowing his head.

“Is it safe?” Tempest asked.

“Safe enough,” he reported, and let out a cough. “You can come in. But, ah, try to stay quiet.”

“Somehow my fears are not alleviated,” Starlight whispered, but she stood up nonetheless and began to follow Firestorm into the deeper parts of the smoky cave.

“Come on, Fluttershy,” Starlight heard Tempest urge. “Let’s stay together.”

“I-I’ve had enough of dragons for one lifetime,” Fluttershy shivered, even as she stood up.

Starlight ignited her horn, but kept the light soft. Swirls of smoke could now easily be seen flowing like water around her green light. They descended more and more, trying their hardest not to cough.

They heard a deep undertone the further they went which made a chill arch up Starlight’s back. This was no earthquake.

It didn’t take long before they came into a vast open area. But all the available space was being used to contain a gigantic rumbling mass of flesh beneath rippling scales. Starlight’s faint light was barely enough to illuminate several parts of it, let alone the entire body. It was hard to approximate just how big it really was. In the center of the twisting body was a head, looking at them straight-on. Its eyes were closed, but the smoke pouring from its nostrils was constant.

Starlight was distantly aware that Tempest and, further back, Fluttershy, had arrived as well. Fluttersy gave a small gasp. No one said a word as the dragon took a deep breath in.

“It’s sleeping,” Starlight eventually whispered, shrinking back as the creature exhaled a particularly large jet of smoke.

“I’ve seen this before,” Firestorm replied, holding an arm to the side to prevent the others from coming closer. “They can smell fear just by looking at you. So keep quiet.”

Tempest leveled a flat stare at him. “You’re a load of help.”

“Look, just don’t move, don’t breathe, don’t… do anything,” Firestorm advised. “Except pray, maybe.”

Fluttershy, though, pushed Firestorm’s arm down. No trace of fear was present. “I can do this.”

“You can?” Starlight, Firestorm, and Tempest asked in unison.

“Trust me,” Fluttershy assured them. “I can do this better than any of you.”

She nudged her way past Firestorm, who made as if to grab her, but stopped himself with his other hoof. Fluttershy was now in plain view of the monster, and all the hissing and talking was enough to stir him.

“Hello. It’s me,” Fluttershy told the red dragon, stamping the dusty ground and keeping her ground as the dragon opened his slitted eyes. “I hope you remember me from last time.”

All of a sudden, the massive dragon flinched back and reared his head up to the arched roof of the cave. Written upon his astounded reptilian face was recognition, respect, and even a dash of fear.

“I’m so proud of you,” Fluttershy cooed. “You found an unobtrusive spot to sleep! You’re such a resourceful creature, you know that? You single-hoofedly saved Equestria by not covering it in smoke for a hundred years! And we need a strong, resourceful creature to help us right now. Would you like that?”

The dragon shrunk into himself, made a whimper like a kicked dog, and vigorously nodded.

“Well, this is a bit hard to say, but… Have you ever heard of a volcano temple filled with ponies in the Dragonlands?” Fluttershy asked, her eyes wide and shivering ever so slightly.

The dragon looked frantically from left to right, a smoke trail following from his nostrils. Then he bent down so his snout was at Fluttershy’s level and whispered, “We like to pretend it doesn’t exist.”

Ignoring the sounds of surprise from the others at how casual his voice seemed to be, Fluttershy pressed on. “We’re here to destroy it.”

The dragon’s slitted eyes turned into circles briefly. Then back into vertical lines. “But you’re a very little pony. How do you mean,’destroy it?’”

“I’m so sorry, mister dragon, but we don’t know how to, since we haven’t found it yet. Would you consider taking us there?”

Here, he turned aside. “I-I would rather not…”

“I wouldn’t want to either,” Fluttershy assured him, rubbing his cheek gently. “But if you help us, you don’t have to think about it ever again.”

The dragon squirmed. “I… don’t know what to think…”

“Aww, there, there,” she babied him, flapping into the air to get to his eye level. “I’d hate to be a bother. You don’t have to help us if you don’t want to. But if that happens, we’ll have to keep wandering until we collapse. I don’t want to die, but I’d rather die at that temple than out in the wilderness.”

That touched a nerve. The monstrous, scarlet, gargantuan dragon seemed very small and afraid at the notion of Fluttershy dying. He squirmed even more and shrunk into the back of his cave, flapping his leathery wings, blinking his folding eyelids, and twisting his fanged mouth as his mind raced for an answer.

After about a minute of this frantic contemplation, the red dragon shut his eyes and slowly, slowly, opened them again. “I’ll take you.”

Fluttershy beamed. “Oh, thank you, mister… Um…” She hesitated. “What’s your name? I never caught it the first time.”

“Reginald,” he mumbled.

“The first time?” Starlight mouthed.

“Reginald?” Firestorm mouthed in reply.

Reginald, for his part, squished against the ground, and Fluttershy motioned to the rest of them. “We can get on his back! Let’s go!”

“Just a second!” Tempest exclaimed.

“Yeah, time out!” Firestorm agreed, flapping up and crossing his hooves in an X. “Where’d you get all chummy with this guy? You invite him over for tea one day or something?”

“Right!” Fluttershy realized, smacking a hoof into her forehead. “None of you were there for this. One time, I persuaded this very same dragon to move from his bed on a mountain. He was making an awful lot of smoke, weren’t you?”

Reginald nodded like a tame pet.

“He has very low self-esteem,” Fluttershy continued, coming to his scaly, horned back. “Positive reinforcement works best.”

“I’m glad you did the trick, Fluttershy,” Starlight expressed gladly. “And I’m glad you’re here.”

Fluttershy’s cheeks turned pink. “Oh, i-it was nothing, really.”

As Firestorm flapped near the neck of the dragon, and Starlight levitated Tempest up, Tempest gripped a spine on Reginald’s back. “This is a whole week of firsts,” she observed.

“And it isn’t ending anytime soon,” Starlight said, levitating herself up next. She hugged a spine as well. “Let’s get moving!”

“Mister Reginald?” Fluttershy sweetly asked. “We’re ready to go now.”

Reginald slowly, ponderously crawled his way out of the massive cave, through the U-bend of the tunnel, and poked his head out into the open. The rest of his massive body soon followed.

“Hold on, little ponies,” Reginald cautioned. He pushed off the ground, flapping hard, and directed himself northeast. With powerful wingbeats, the dragon rose into the sky, and the five of them hurtled towards their destination.

---

The creature was small; no more than two feet in length. It could be called a dragon, but dragons were intelligent creatures capable of speech. This one was a dumb, crawling reptile more like a lizard, painted pale red to match the environment. It had four legs, a thin tail, no wings, and a triangular head.

All of a sudden it glowed blue, and it squirmed in fright as it was lifted into the air. Then a glowing blade passed through its neck, and the head went flying. The wound had been cauterized shut.

Noble Blade examined it, nodded, and turned around. Pinkie, Fluttershy, and Rarity were also poking around in the rocks. He tapped on the ground to get their attention, then held it up.

Noble felt something squirm in his chest just by looking at it. But they needed food, regardless of the animal’s feelings.

“I’m sure if we look some more, we’ll find some plants to eat,” Rarity encouraged halfheartedly.

“They’ll be tough and bitter,” Noble told her, settling the animal on a flatter rock so it wasn’t touching the ground.

“And the meat won’t be?” Pinkie remarked, zipping over and observing it with alert, wide blue eyes, as if it was about to jump up and run.

“I just don’t… feel right about eating meat,” Rarity carefully chose to say. “I’ve never done it before. It simply feels so… barbarous. It was once a living thing.”

“If we don’t eat it, we’ll end up becoming food for something else,” Noble said. “The food chain is cruel, but we must adapt to survive.”

“Well, if we do choose to feast on its flesh, how do you propose we cook it?” Rarity asked, giving the dead animal a wary, disgusted look. “If we build a fire, those cultists will spot the smoke!”

“How far away are they, Pinkie?” Applejack whispered.

Pinkie picked up two rocks, put them to her eyes, and adjusted them like binoculars. After squinting to the east, she reported, “A half mile.”

“They’ll have a hard time spotting us if we all just stay low. Thanks, Pink. I was beginning to wonder about that.”

“If they have seen us, they aren’t showing it,” Pinkie analyzed, adjusting the rocks some more. “All day, they’ve just been bickering.”

“They need some friendship in their lives,” Applejack observed.

“They’re moving again,” Pinkie announced to everyone else. “Let’s stay on the down-low.”

Applejack, Rarity, Noble, and Pinkie continued as they had all day. Their path had been east, the setting sun behind them. Being careful to not arouse suspicion from the enemy, they had remained undetected so far. But each of the ponies felt like they felt something was suspicious, which made each of them, especially Pinkie, jittery.

---

As it turned out, there happened to be a bubbling lava pool only a mile further along their path. Only three feet in diameter, it was illuminated red by the growing violet dusk in the sky. It was here that they decided to take a break and eat.

Rarity had elected to roast the meat herself. Her reasoning was, If we are going to eat this disgusting animal, we shall at least do it properly! She was about to set the meal over the heat, but was interrupted by Pinkie.

“The lava’s too hot,” Pinkie told her. “You want to put it over medium heat.”

“Well, as I’m sure you’re aware of, darling, I don’t exactly have a gas stove to adjust the heat.”

“All I’m saying is, you want to do this carefully.”

Rarity looked over her shoulder. Noble’s pale blue blade was in her hooves, the animal skewered on the end like a hot dog. “Pinkie, I appreciate the thought, but I believe I know how to go about roasting something, thank you very much. You hold it over a fire. What more is there to it?”

“Okay. Okay.” Pinkie surrendered with her hooves in the air. “But you’re going to burn it.”

Rarity gave her an annoyed glance, then held the blade very gently and very deliberately into the sweltering, shimmering heat rising above the lava pit. The animal on the end began to blister and scorch almost immediately. Before Rarity could turn it around, the thing caught fire, and Rarity shrieked and threw the sword to the side, the animal still flaming, but now with red dirt staining it.

As Rarity ran over and began to hurriedly stamp the fire out, Pinkie said, “Told you.”

Rarity finally put out the fire, gave an overdramatic sigh, and rolled her eyes. “Noble,” she complained. “Pinkie’s bullying me.”

“Pinkie, stop bullying Rarity,” Noble flatly said.

“No problemo!” Pinkie cheerfully promised, bouncing off. Rarity just picked up the sword, shook some dirt off, went over to Noble, and handed him his weapon.

“It’s…” Noble tried to say. He handled his sword from one hoof to the other uncomfortably.

“Burned, Noble. Th’ word is burned,” Applejack chimed in.

“I was going to use a less critical term,” Noble admitted.

“Oh, I admit, I messed it up!” Rarity exclaimed. “Do we still have to eat it?”

Noble set the pommel on the ground and slid the scorched animal off the blade. “It’s all we have.”

“Ah’ll try,” Applejack resigned at last. She beckoned, and Noble tore a leg off with a meaty, raw rip and put it in her hoof. Applejack tentatively brought it into her mouth and bit off a small part. As she chewed, her expression became distinctly exaggerated. The others were all examining her for any reaction.

Finally, she swallowed. “Well, uh…” She rubbed the side of her head. “I-Ah guess it’d be better if it was properly cooked.”

“Yes, no kidding,” Rarity mumbled. “Everything’s better if it’s properly cooked.”

“You sure you’re not about to die?” Pinkie cheerfully asked.

“Pretty sure,” Applejack admitted. “Unless Ah happen ta vomit uncontrollably in th’ next fifteen seconds.”

“Might as well partake,” Noble said, tearing off another part of the lizard and popping it into his own mouth.

Everyone tried some lizard. It was closer to raw than cooked, and the notion of eating meat was repulsive to everyone, but it was this or nothing. Or at least, until Pinkie snuggled on her back against a large boulder and began popping pebbles into her mouth. She crunched down on them nonchalantly, hummed contentedly, and swallowed the pieces without choking.

Upon seeing this, Noble Blade’s eyes bulged out of their sockets. Applejack gave her a side-look of bewilderment before just sighing and ignoring her, while Rarity cleared her throat. “Ah, darling? Forgive me, but… how on Faust’s good earth can you eat that?!”

“You’ve known Pinkie fer how long, exactly?” Applejack drawled, settling in for rest herself. “Jus’ roll with it.”

Pinkie, meanwhile, snorted back a bout of laughter. “Oh, you silly poo! I grew up on a rock farm! We had this stuff for days!” And she popped another handful of pebbles in like popcorn.

“Well, that still doesn’t explain how you-” Rarity started, before sighing in defeat and folding her arms.

Silence befell them all for a bit while Pinkie chomped on her meal, then Rarity finally spoke up again. “Those actually sound rather nice.” She indicated her jaw. “The whole crunch and all, it’s… a literal jawbreaker. How many hard candies have you eaten again?”

“How many dresses have you sewn in your entire life?” Pinkie replied, tossing a piece of pumice into her mouth like a grape.

Noble stood up and cleaned the dirt off his sword by giving it a magical pulse, and the dirt and crud accumulated thereon was expunged in a dusty shower, leaving a pure, pale blue blade. “I’ll take first watch tonight.”

“No offense, Noble,” Applejack reminded him while standing up, “but you kinda have a bad history with keeping watch at night.”

“Black Fang,” Noble realized, and nodded. “I see.”

“Get some rest, buckaroo,” Applejack instructed him, coming near him and punching him on the shoulder. They had left Pinkie and Rarity behind several meters back. “Ya had a long day. Ah’ll look out fer ya.”

Noble proffered his blade hilt-first. “If you need it…”

Applejack pushed it away, though. “Yer sweet, Noble, but Ah think you’ll need that more’n me. Ah don’t need no sword ta kill.” She stretched out her hind legs, one at a time. “B’sides, it’s all ya got left. Don’t let that leave yer side.”

“I just wanted to be… courteous, I suppose.”

“That thing is yours. Ah haven’t earned th’ right ta wield that bloodied Element, any more than you’ve any right ta wield mine. ‘Cause Ah know yer a terrible liar.”

Noble froze. “What do you…”

“Black Fang,” she said simply. “Ah tried ta avoid sayin’ anything about it b’fore, but we’re alone now. Ya didn’t come ‘cross Blueblood’s corpse. You made him that way.”

Noble swallowed something and set the sword down with a small clatter. “So what if I did? Killing Noxxa is one thing, but ponies… and we’re about to do it again, at the temple--”

“Ah really don’t mind,” she interrupted. “Good riddance ta him. But how does it feel?” she asked. “To have somepony else who knows the truth? Does it… free ya?”

Free? Usually, Noble associated finding out a lie as a dreadful exposure. But with someone like Applejack, Noble didn’t feel a weight in his chest. Quite the contrary, it was like a weight had been lifted from his chest with a balloon. If someone at least understood him...

“... Absolutely,” was his eventual answer. “Applejack, I’d rather not talk about it. All I’ll say, though, is… I let my false notions of societal honor fall that day, and I paid attention to real honor. My honor. My mission. My Goddess. This was the only way. I just… wasn’t used to that measure.”

“Ah imagine ya haven’t had a good rest since then,” Applejack voiced, giving her most confident grin. “Ta be honest, neither’ve I. But doggone it if we die b’cause you’re too groggy ta lift that big ol’ sword! Go on, git! Ah order ya!”

Noble huffed and smiled. “Whatever you say, Mistress of the Plains.”

“Aw, shucks,” she waved aside. “Applejack’s got less syllables.”

“Fine, fine,” Noble resigned, and turned around while bending down to pick up his blade. He paused, however, as he came back up. “You know… Country folk are easy to talk to. Much better than those I grew up with.”

“What’re ya gettin’ at?” Applejack inquired, narrowing her eyes.

Noble’s dark blue eyes were only recognizable by the light of his own sword. “I wish I’d known you longer. I’d want to be friends with you for those years since Twilight came into your life.”

Applejack’s expression softened in an instant. “Aw, Sugarcube, that’s mighty kind o’ ya. But we’ll have plenty o’ time when this is all over.”

Noble’s gaze was drawn away from the sunset in the west to the darkness in the east, where the fires of hell waited for them. “Yes,” he tentatively agreed. “When it’s finally over.”

---

Just as Rarity was about to fall asleep, an urge came over her. She stood up, cross all of a sudden, and fumbled for her Element. She and the other girls had taken them off to sleep. Grabbing it, she clasped it around her neck. She would never let it out of her sight.

“What I wouldn’t give for some toilet paper,” she grumbled as she trotted away from the camp.

The issue here was how to go about doing business in a discreet way. How would she dispose of the remains? She scanned the black fields before setting her eyes on the soft red glow of a lava pit.

It was insane. Rarity decided to try.

It made sizzling noises on impact.

At the end of it, Rarity swore to never try it again. It was the most perilous toilet ever.

As she trotted back, she heard commotion. Wary, she found a small boulder and pressed herself to its side. There were fleshy sounds of impact, and the tinkle of magic horns, and the yells of those involved were both familiar and unfamiliar. Rarity’s heart drummed, hurting her chest.

“Well, well, well,” the wheezy voice of Spindlestick squeezed out. “What have we here? A couple of trespassers and freeloaders!”

“A couple of Element Bearers,” came the dominating, luscious voice of Warcane, hungry and giddy. “Brimsto~one! I want to kill one so badly!”

“Not yet,” Brimstone ordered, deep and heavy. “I want information first. Goldie, how far away are we from Mount Nevermore?”

“N-not far, sir,” Goldie lisped.

“Good. Let’s take them where they want to go so badly. They’ll only get a good look at our dungeon, though.”

“Mmm,” Warcane moaned. “You hear that? I get to torture you all!”

“Just what I needed,” Noble Blade groggily said. “More torture.”

“You seem fun,” Warcane remarked. “I can’t wait to get started…”

“I can’t wait ta kick y’all to th’ curb!” Applejack spat out. “Once Ah git my Element back, I’ll-”

“You’ll what?” Brimstone asked politely. “Please, describe it. I haven’t had a good laugh today. I was stuck with Warcane all day.”

Pinkie Pie broke into giggles. “You’re funny, mister Brimstone! Sure, you’re a bad guy, but you’re at least funny!”

“I can’t help it. I don’t even try,” Brimstone acknowledged. “It’s the curse I have to bear.”

“Wanna hear a knock-knock joke?”

“Only if it’s the one where I knock-knock your head.”

Pinkie burst into uproarious laughter. “Oh, good one!”

“Devils!” Spindlestick ranted at Pinkie. “You and all the others! You put on this pretty facade, but you’re rotten inside!”

“Keep telling yourself that,” Noble replied. “It’ll comfort you on your way to hell.”

“You’re confident, I’ll give you that,” Warcane slithered. “I like you.”

“I’m taken.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“I’ve got a few certain words to describe you.”

“I want to hear you whisper them.”

“Gladly. The words I’m searching for, I can’t say in front of Pinkie. I’d like to keep her ears clean. The least of them’d probably be the word whore.”

Warcane gave a growl. “I like the way you push my patience. It’ll make the result sweeter.”

“Finally, something we agree on!” Applejack blurted out. “It’ll be satisfying ta watch ya die.”

“Enough from the animals,” Brimstone commanded. “Spindlestick, gag them.”

“With pleasure, sir,” Spindlestick quickly obeyed.

“Goldie, keep the Elements at hoof. They’ll be a welcome addition to the temple.”

“Of course, sir,” he stumbled out.

Rarity’s hoof was clutching the necklace around her neck. She couldn’t save any of them. But she could track them. As long as they were under the impression that they had captured all of them, she had no reason to intervene.

Rarity peeked over the rock. Four alicorn figures were trotting away without looking back at her. The one at the front held bundles of gold in his pack and had tied Noble’s tremendous blade to his back. Their quarries were enveloped in vivid orange magic, and were being floated along like party balloons. Noble Blade, Applejack, and Pinkie Pie were frozen in the magic and gagged.

As Applejack’s frame slowly rotated, her eyes locked with Rarity’s.

Rarity winked, then made a shooing motion with her hoof. She was trying to say, I’m okay, and I won’t be far behind. Don’t worry.

That seemed to relieve Applejack, because her expression became noticeably less tense. The alicorns in the party paid no mind to anything else and began their trek home.

Rarity recalled something Noble Blade had said earlier. Now is the time to strike.

Rarity was no longer the hunted. She would now become her eternal name: the Huntress.

Author's Note:

Whoops! So apparently, I said that Garble was Ember's sister. As it turns out, he's Smolder's sister instead. I guess I got mixed up between burly dragon girls.

Eh. It's canon here. It makes for a better story.