• Published 22nd Mar 2018
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Pound and Pumpkin Tales 2 - Never2muchpinkie



The continuing adventures of the now seven years old Pound and Pumpkin

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11-9: Obtaining the Heart

When they had all composed themselves Flurry shot another blast of magic at the gem above the door, and as before it opened, revealing the long staircase again.

“So is this actually the real thing this time?” asked Pumpkin, “Or are we in another illusion?”

“I guess we’ll have to just go forward and find out,” said Pound.

They all moved into the next room.

Flurry glanced up. “Well, that’s more like it.”

They followed her gaze, seeing the bottom of the next level of the staircase covered in spiky crystals. “Aunt Twilight used a spell to flip her gravity. Instead of having to climb the whole way she got to slide ‘down’ to the ‘bottom.’ Sombra isn’t letting that sort of thing happen again.”

“Well, the stairs look clear enough,” said Masky.

Peppermint stretched her neck far out, looking upwards, before pulling it back. “It’s gonna take forever to run up. We don’t have that kind of time to waste."

“Hey, Flurry,” said Pound.

“Yes?” she replied.

“You said that you can teleport to any place you’ve seen, right? So can’t you just teleport us up?”

“I can try, but like I said before I doubt it will be that easy.”

As her horn lit up the crystals on the ceiling immediately reacted, growing extremely fast.

Spring let out a squeak. They were heading right for Flurry. "Look out!"

Flurry stopped her magic, and the crystals stopped growing an inch from her face. After a few seconds they slowly receded.

She panted a bit. “Okay,” she said with a huff. “So no magic.”

“That’s odd,” said Peppermint. “Nothing happened when I used my power.”

“Maybe it only responds to glowing horns,” said Plum.

“Well, we still have options to get up quick, then,” said Sweet Pea. “We can still fly.”

“It’s not going to work like before,” said Flurry. “I can’t carry you all and get us up without magic."

“That’s okay,” said Flash. “We can do this the same way as in the illusion. Flurry can fly up, and I can use my super speed to get up there easily.”

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” said Mayhem. “Sombra obviously has some new traps. I don’t think we should split up.”

“But we don’t have time to waste climbing hundreds of stairs!” said Spring. “He was already planning to torture her parents to make them easier to brainwash. What do you think he’s gonna do when he can’t find the pony that attacked him? He’ll take it out on them.”

Flurry squirmed, acknowledging the point. “I’ll take Flash and try to fly to the top. I think I can carry one pony and be okay without my magic.”

“Got it,” he said, hopping up.

She unfurled her wings and jumped off the side, flapping them until she was hovering on their level. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, hopefully with the heart.”

After ascending just twenty feet she felt like something had changed. She found out what it was a few moments later as her entire body grew exceptionally heavy. She tried flapping her wings, but she couldn’t raise them.

She quickly went spiraling down, unable to remain afloat.

Peppermint instinctively went to use her levitation to pull them up.

“No magic, Peppermint!” Pumpkin cried out in a panic as the crystals above rapidly headed for her.

Peppermint stretched her body into strange proportions to avoid being skewered as she stopped her magic. She quickly stretched out her legs, sending them down and wrapping them around the pair.

She grunted, straining not to lose her grip on them. “Help me!” she said, and all of them quickly surrounded her and pulled.

Tree Leaf released her, going in front of Peppermint and turning into a rhino. He pushed against her head as the rest continued pulling with all they had, slowly going around the platform as Peppermint shrunk her legs bit by bit.

With their combined efforts they slowly got them up until they were on the platform again.

Flurry and Flash both lay on their backs, panting hard.

“Are you okay?” Chocolate asked. “What happened?”

Flurry pulled herself up to a sitting position when she caught her breath, her heart starting to slow down. “Sombra is smarter than I thought,” she said. “Not only was he prepared for magic, but for flight as well. As soon as I rose up a little bit the entire area around us grew super heavy. I couldn’t stop myself at all.”

She smiled at them. “Thanks for the save.”

That made them smile in return. “Of course, Flurry,” said Peppermint. “Anytime.”

Flurry’s grin faded. “Well, now what do we do? No magic and no flying. It really seems like our only option is to just climb.”

“Do… do you think we could use my power to help? Sombra’s traps don’t seem to react to our abilities. If I hang off the edge I could slingshot us up as many times as we need to.”

“I don’t know if we should,” said Pumpkin. "I don't like the idea of being out in the open air around this dangerous staircase. It would be too easy to miss."

Pound went to the edge and stuck his hoof out. As soon as it crossed the edge he felt an extreme pressure, and his hoof fell down. “No good. Now that the trap has been set off it’s not going away.”

Tree Leaf glanced up as he turned back into a pony. “Is there no way to destroy these crystals? It might not be the prettiest way but we could have Flurry just shoot a large blast straight upwards to give us a clear path, then go with Peppermint’s plan. I don’t think the gravity effect is going to hit us inside this area.”

“That’s a no-go,” said Flurry. “Those things came at me so fast I didn’t even trust myself to teleport, even if the spell would have gotten me out of the way. Even if we could destroy the crystals it’s still not a safe plan. If I don’t hit everything just right I could cause portions of it to fall on us. In the worst case scenario I could cause the entire tower to collapse, taking us and the Crystal Heart with it.”

“Hmm,” said Flash. “With the two traps we’ve already seen I don’t trust myself to go up alone, no matter how fast I am. This is turning out to be much more dangerous than we expected.”

“So… we’re stuck?” asked Spring. “We’re really going to have to just climb this thing?”

Sweet Pea groaned. “We don’t have time!”

“There has to be some other way!” said Chocolate.

Masky took a step forward. “We could try my power again. Shadows don’t weigh anything or have to deal with gravity. It won’t be super-fast, but it’s still better than climbing.”

“Let’s give it a shot,” said Tree Leaf.

The others nodded in agreement, putting their hooves on him. They sank into the shadow of the wall, the crystals up above remaining unmoving.

Holding onto him they moved upwards, the crystals not bothering them as they zoomed along. They couldn't go straight up, considering the stairs were jutting out against the wall, but each bit of stairs only added a few seconds to the journey.

It took a few minutes, but they reached the top with no further issues. When they reached the top Masky pulled them all out.

Flurry smiled, seeing that their efforts weren’t for naught. The Crystal Heart was where it was when Sombra had stolen it the first time, except this time it was on the ground instead of floating.

Her grin faded a little as she saw all the cracks running across it. “I can’t believe how much damage he did to the Crystal Heart. It makes me angry.”

“So what’s our next move?” asked Spring.

It took Flurry a while to answer. “I don’t know,” she said honestly. “With all the new protections he put around the tower I’m sure the Heart itself has a new trap waiting if we try to grab it, but there’s no way to know what it is without setting it off. And setting it off is too dangerous.”

Pumpkin closed her eyes. “When Twilight went through this the trap activated as soon as she stepped in the circle around it. If we don’t step on the circle then maybe we can avoid setting it off at all.”

“It’s worth a try,” said Peppermint. “It’s not like we can just stand here staring at it all day. With my stretchy limbs I can easily avoid touching the ground.”

“Hold on,” said Flurry as Peppermint extended her two front legs towards it. “I want to test my magic. Since we’re above all the crystals now maybe we don’t have to worry about them anymore.”

She took a deep breath, then fired up her horn. She glanced around rapidly, but even after a minute had passed no crystals came her way. “Seems safe enough. Let’s proceed.” She kept her horn charged up, wanting to be ready for whatever was about to happen. She could have tried lifting the Heart up in her magic and pulling it to them, but if there was a new protection around the Heart she didn't want any distractions keeping her from noticing it.

Peppermint continued reaching for the Heart, but even though she didn’t touch the ground the moment her hooves crossed the threshold of the circle it turned a different color, just like in Twilight’s memories.

Flurry jerked her head, quickly pulling Peppermint’s legs backwards as magical energy rose out of the ground to the ceiling.

“Hmph!” said Masky. “Well, it’s not like we didn’t see this coming.

“So now we set off the trap, but we don’t know what it actually does.”

“It’s not safe for us to actually touch it,” said Flurry. She lit up her horn, shooting a small beam towards the barrier. It seemed to pass right through.

Spring looked with confusion. “So it’s not immune to magic? Interesting. Can you lift up the Heart with your magic?”

She tried, and the Heart actually lifted up off the floor.

“Ooo!” Sweet Pea said happily.

Flurry pulled it towards her, and they all got bewildered looks on their faces. As soon as the Heart hit the barrier it reappeared on the opposite side, still within the barrier. She tried this from several directions, and the result was always the same.

“I think I get it,” said Flurry. “Is one of you brave enough to touch the barrier? From what I’ve seen it should be safe, even if confirming what it does doesn’t actually get us closer to obtaining the Crystal Heart.”

“I’ll do it,” said Pound.

He walked up the barrier, and with a touch of hesitance put his hoof to it. He didn’t meet any resistance. His eyebrow went up. Even as he pushed his hoof further and further in it didn’t appear inside the barrier. He could still feel his hoof moving around, so nothing bad had happened to it. It just seemed to be invisible.

“Are you okay, Pound?” Pumpkin asked with concern.

“Of course. Do I not look okay?”

“Ummm… you might want to look forward.”

When he looked up he let out a gasp. His hoof was sticking out of the other side of the barrier. He quickly pulled it back, staring at it.

After a few moments he gathered his courage and jumped into the barrier, his entire body coming out the other side across from his friends.

“So that’s it,” said Pound, jumping back through. “Whatever touches the barrier from the inside still comes out on the inside, and whatever touches it on the outside still comes out on the outside.”

“So it’s impossible for us to grab anything inside it,” said Pumpkin.

“This seems easy enough,” said Masky, sinking into the ground. His shadow slid across the ground, but just like with Pound he wound up on the other side.

“Well, that didn’t work,” he said as he joined them again.

“Teleportation?” Plum said, though she didn’t sound confident.

Flurry knew it was probably pointless, but she had to at least give it a try. With a flash of her horn she appeared inside the barrier for just a moment before instantly being pushed back out to where she started.

“Well, we all saw that coming,” said Flash.

“So what now?” asked Spring. “We can’t touch it with our bodies or magic. With that barrier it’s like the spot where the Heart is doesn’t even exist.”

“How about if Flurry blows up the top of the tower?” said Chocolate. “The barrier stops at the ceiling, so she could just get in from the top by flying.”

Flurry shook her head. “Won’t work. The barrier starts from the floor and goes upward. If I destroy the ceiling then it will just continue up to the sky.”

“So what if you go right in the middle of the ceiling and shoot down into it? That will put you inside the barrier so you can grab the heart.”

“That won’t work, either,” said Masky. “It will allow her to grab the Heart, sure, but then she’ll be trapped inside the barrier with it. We’ll be no better off.”

"And," said Flurry, "we run into the same problem of why I didn't want to just make a path by shooting upwards earlier. If I'm not extremely careful I could blow up the Heart or get it crushed with debris. Way too risky with the damage its taken."

“Then what do we do?” Sweet Pea asked with a touch of despair.

Peppermint stared at the barrier for a bit before glancing up and putting a hoof to her horn. “We use Flash,” she said.

“Me?” he replied. “What’s so special about me?”

“One of the things I’ve learned about magic is that it’s not much different than using your hooves. It takes energy, and when you try to lift something heavy enough with your magic you can feel as drained as picking it up with your body.”

“Okay…”

“This barrier is made of energy. And every time you pass through it, it transports you to the other side.”

“Oh!” Flurry said, her eyes lighting up. “I get what she’s going for.

“Most ponies would either avoid the barrier or only go through it once or twice before giving up, but there’s only so much energy that can go into this barrier.”

“Ummm… I still don’t get it,” said Flash. "What are you getting at?"

“Think of this barrier like a pony using magic. Every time something touches it they have to use a spell to get you away from the treasure hidden within. And with every spell they use they get a little more tired until they can’t use a spell anymore.

"The reason she said to use you is because it's the quickest way to exhaust this 'pony.' With your super-speed you can run through this barrier a whole bunch of times extremely quickly until you drain its magic source dry from constantly teleporting you. Rather than find a way to get past the barrier we can just get rid of it so we can grab the Heart.”

Now he understood. “If you need speed I’m your pony. They don’t call me Flash Step for nothing.”

“Let’s all give him some space,” said Pound. They all complied, backing up by the stairs.

Flash was a blur as he zoomed around in circles around the perimeter. It was impossible to even try to count the amount of rotations he made.

It took about two minutes, but they finally began to see results. The bright, vibrant color of the barrier grew dimmer and dimmer.

“Stop, Flash!” Flurry yelled out.

It took him a few seconds to come to a complete stop. He was feeling a bit winded, so he didn’t mind the reprieve. “W-what’s… wrong? It looked like… it was about… to work.”

“And that’s exactly the problem.”

“Problem?” said Mayhem. “We want it gone.”

“AND we want it gone so we can get to the Crystal Heart. Once the barrier vanishes we don’t want all the effort we went through to go to waste because he stomped it to pieces or kicked it clear off the tower.”

Pumpkin blinked. “Whoa! Fair point.”

“The barrier is almost down,” said Pound. “We don’t have to do anything clever now.”

Walking forward he stood in front of it and put his hoof through it. “All of us can just do this until it loses the rest of its energy.”

All of them spaced themselves out so they wouldn’t hit each other when they went through the barrier, and stuck their hooves through.

It took another minute, but finally the energy going to the ceiling began to fade towards the floor.

“Everyone pull back!” said Flurry, unsure of what would happen if they were in the middle of it when the barrier vanished.

They all complied.

Pumpkin gave Peppermint a big hug. “That was an awesome plan, Peppermint!” she said joyfully. “You rock!”

Peppermint blushed brightly as the others added in their agreement. “C-come on. Flash did all the work.”

Flash patted her head. “But you came up with the idea we needed to prevail.”

“Go ahead, Flurry!” said Mayhem. “Do the honors.”

Flurry walked over the circle to the now unprotected Heart, and picked it up. She hugged it close to her. “We’re almost there. All that’s left is to save my parents."

Twilight was getting really invested in the adventure now. Flurry's plan to escape the illusion had been brilliant, as had their methods to get past the stairs and the barrier protecting the Heart. What would the battle with Sombra be like? Would it be as simple as the illusion, or was something going to go horribly wrong?

She didn't think she'd been so interested in the results of one of their games since the Daring Do adventure at their first session. And of course she couldn't forget Nega. How was he going to react? She couldn't wait to see what the next part of the adventure would bring.

Author's Note:

And so our heroes have put their brains to good use, but somethings not right. It seems like something is being overlooked. We'll find out what that is next chapter.:ajsmug:

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