Airship Mauled

by Darkonshadows

Chapter Two, Airship Mauled: To begin a chance.

-Jade-

I came to and it was morning. Next to me was the, relatively, smaller alicorn sized form of the goddess Sekhet. I gave her quite the beating last night, nobody stops me from getting extra portions of potato stew, nobody! I know mom will wait another month before making it again and while I was aching, last night had been quite fun and I got my fill of food.

If your definition of fun involves claws out and stopping for food between rounds of beating each other senseless, then you were in luck if you were nearby last night.

Sekhet probably shouldn’t have turned off her ability to heal or shrunk down close to my level for the fight, but she was quite honorable in giving me a relatively fair fight. It was just unfair for her that I was quite determined to get more extra portions than she was.

I stood up and went through my sun salutation exercise and began working out the kinks in my body. The several hours of sleep took care of my soreness, but the light claw marks and bruises would remain for a while. They sure did sting quite a bit, Sekhet doesn’t go down without a good fight and I think she was just humoring me at the start.

At the campfire was my mother, Tempest and… oh look Fresh Start too. Well time to see what’s going to happen next. I made my way over to them, Sekhet would be fine right where she was because she can walk it off. That was unfair, mostly because I can’t walk off my own injuries like she could.

“Morning Tempest, morning mom.” They greeted me as I made my way over to them and sat down on my mom’s left, on her right was Tempest and across from us was Fresh Start. “Hey Fresh, what are you doing here?”

“Don’t you hey Fresh me! You jumped off a balcony and stomped on Prince Blueblood’s head… I have to thank you for that on the behalf of Canterlot Castle’s staff by the way. You also gave the royal guards the run around and then you jumped off the side of Canterlot and continued on to evade the Wonder Bolts! After all that and nobody is going to charge you with anything.” Well Fresh seemed to be a bit miffed, mom didn’t seem surprised at her words and Fizzle just shrugged. “I’m here to deliver a letter and offer an apology from Princess Celestia for all the trouble that she thinks she caused you. The only trouble you’ll have in Canterlot is the one irate unicorn guard. For whatever reason Celestia deems you so important, she’s paying me to lend my services to you. so here I am.”

“Sounds like you had fun in the city my little tom cat.” That was an understatement mom.

Celestia shouldn’t have made me feel caged, I was already feeling pretty antsy the other day after meeting Bon-Bon. Sekhet’s warning certainly came to mind after Celestia had slammed into me and knocked me out in her uncontrolled exuberance.

“Yep, but I really don’t know what we are going to do now mom, or where we’re going from here exactly. Celestia knows about the airship crash, so my job informing her is done.” I reclined against the log and warmed my toes by the fire that has been going for the past few days and was still strong without any extra wood. Magic was amazing like that. “Oh right, aside from those sweets I picked up at Donut Joe's place in Canterlot, a pony called Pinkie gave me a wrapped cupcake on the way back yesterday. I should probably eat the snack and read the note.”

“I’ve got no other place to be either, so I’m going to stay with you two… if you don’t mind.” Will wonders never cease? Tempest is actually being a bit shy and… I really wouldn’t mind her staying with us. “Oh and I’m Fizzlepop Berrytwist by the way, sorry I haven’t properly introduced myself until now. Even if you can’t get my horn back, then at least you can promise me that you’ll always try to help me.”

“We’d be happy to have you around Fizzle, I promise that I’ll find a way to help you in some way eventually or I’ll live trying.” I got up to hug Fizzle and she accepted it and nuzzled my neck while hugging me back, she was actually being affectionate. I could hardly believe it, I just ran my hand down her mane and she even happily leaned into it. “Thanks for not leaving my mom alone with Sekhet, who knows what that goddess would have done to my poor sweet mother if you hadn’t been around?”

I then turned to Fresh Start who moved up next to me and held out a letter to me, I took the letter from her hoof and she went to sit back down on the other side of the campfire while grumbling about life in general.

Sitting back down, I perused the letter and then looked to mom.

“Mom, give me something to write with please.” I received the two items, an ink well and the raven feather that had its tip stained with ink. I started to jot something down on the message Celestia sent with the maid I thought I had ditched back in Canterlot.

I was willing to accept Celestia’s apology, but I’m not going to work for her. I still had my misgivings about her. I wrote down that I had no idea where we were going, but I and mom weren’t going to live in Canterlot… or even in Ponyville for that matter. Far too close to the chaos and action that will occur around there a few years from now.

I’d rather we lived somewhere remote, or at least continue with our plans for Manehatten and somewhere where the fish were plentiful even if fish jerky is a bit of an anathema to me. After I signed my name Jaded La Perm and added a post script that she was basically breaking her own child labor laws by trying to hire me, I rolled up the paper and put it back in the envelope. I then tossed it into my fire and a magical smoke wafted up from it to zip northwards.

“Is that how you generally use messaging magic?” I nodded to Fizzle’s query and smiled, she even smiled back. Friendship, it was happening and I could feel it!

“So what services do you offer Fresh Start and what exactly did Jade do to have Celestia put you here with us?” Mom was quite intrigued about the new pony in our midst.

We now had our own personal paid servant and we certainly weren’t going to abuse her presence here out in the middle of nowhere, nope, no sir… okay so we were totally going to abuse the fact that we have a prepaid maid now. It was on the crowns dime no less, we just had to find jobs for her to do and let her at them.

“I have no earthly clue, but Celestia must have a reason as she seems intent on making sure Jade stays safe. To answer you’re other question, I cook, clean and mend, plus a few other general things that a maid would do. I’m really good at early morning chores, but I tend to get a bit lethargic in the afternoon. As such I usually go to bed early.” Fresh Start with her thick long hair bound up in a bun bowed to us. “I’m not a tailor though, so don’t expect much from me in making clothes from scratch.”

Fizzle looked like she was about to ask something when a ball of magic came back and coalesced into a scroll. I grabbed it out the air and read it. Apparently Celestia was going to drop by and see the wreckage herself and to talk with us personally. New information has also come up about the crew and the other passengers that had been with us. She was, thankfully, backing off from being persistent about offering me a job in her court.

The shoo-be-doo’s, sea ponies, that were nearby had saved them all from a watery grave and they are currently stuck on the south eastern shores of Equestria, stuck with various bad to critical injuries no less. They were all accounted for as far as Celestia knew, she was having several medical teams mobilized to help the less fortunate passengers and was also sending a relief effort to them so that the sea ponies can get back to their lives.

“Okay before anything else happens, I want to see if something works.” Come on let it work, I lost my kiwi candy for these feathers. I pulled out a single phoenix feather. Please don’t make everything explode into flames, I beg of you innocent looking feather of a fire bird. “This might be the thing to help you out Fizzle, but first I’m going to stand a distance away before I try anything with it.”

“What kind of feather is that?” My mother asked looking at the feather loosely held in my grip, she immediately had her journal open and ready to record some new information into it.

“I traded a Phoenix for some of its loose feathers, just some dried fruit… and what was left of my kiwi candy.” I moved away from the camp site and closer to Sekhet, I started the cast and the feather disintegrated. The magic didn’t feel like heat or burning death, so that’s good. What was the magic doing though? It was just kind of a ball of white fire that was pulsing with energy and hovering right next to me. “Uh, I don’t know if this is safe, but I think the magic might be waiting for me to choose a target.”

This was always the problem with casts, you never know what you’ll get or what it’ll do until you do it. We needed a better method for discovering what a cast will do, at least magical alchemy sustains are always safe to figure out because we could just simply stop it if something went wrong.

“What does it feel like Jade?” Well mom, I wasn’t quite able to put it into words yet. There wasn’t any loss of magic and it wasn’t leaking or anything, it just sat there as a magical mass radiating good vibes.

“I know what it feels like… something good as far as I can tell. I know this might be a little strange to ask, but would you mind if I targeted you with this spell Fizzle?” If I were Fizzle, and I’m not, I would probably decline the idea of having an unknown white orb of pure fire hitting me. “It might even do what I hope it will.”

“Uh… what do you hope it will do?” Hopefully something amazing for you Fizzle. Phoenixes are known for fire and holy elements. This cast just might be the power of rebirth for your destroyed horn.

“Possibly give you back your horn, but our magic is not an exact science yet.” I stressed this openly and clearly, it was Fizzle’s decision to test this unknown cast. It looked vaguely dangerous. “The wings the other day and flying was nice, but I was expecting something else to happen. You saw how sore I was, this is kind of a slapdash form of magic. At least once you’ve figured something out, then you’ve figured it out period.”

“…” She stared silently at the glowing orb of white fire, then looked to me warily. “Okay then, hit me with it.”

“Are you sure?” I really didn’t want to be responsible for hurting her worse than she already is, I didn't want to see pain in those beautiful eyes.

“I’m unsure, but I’m going through with it anyway. You want to help me, a trial by fire wouldn’t be too bad and it’s my choice.” I targeted Fizzle and let the orb fly. She closed her eyes as it shot straight into her, nothing happened. The orb exited her body, it came flying back to me and… it turned back into a feather? That's new.

“That didn’t seem to do much, it appears that the cast failed.” Or it worked perfectly mom, I think I know what the effect is and it would be a good idea to always have these feathers on hand.

“It didn’t fail, it’s just the criteria for the magic to take effect wasn’t there.” If for instance I were right about the effects of the feather, then it wasn’t reviving someone from death. The real effects of the cast are not what I wanted, but it was still pretty powerful. "I know what the phoenix feather cast is supposed to do mom."

“That felt weird and my horn isn’t fixed, what does the spell with that feather actually do?” Good question Fizzle, I had to tell this to mom anyway.

“Phoenix Feather, restoration from ailments, name for the cast is cleansing flames. Can cure sicknesses, diseases, poison and various magical effects such as magically induced confusion, mind control and being turned to stone.” Yep, I just got the world’s most powerful remedy for what ails anyone, it could possibly even cure the permanent water breathing that I and mom had. Powerful, but it wouldn’t heal the damage done to Fizzle's stump.

I decided to test the magical sustain too, mostly out of idle curiosity. My entire body felt warm, like I would never be cold again.

“Sustain is protection from all things cold, basically an anti-wendigo sustain.” It’d be the ultimate protection from wendigoes if that ever became a problem, I wouldn’t even need to dress warmly during the winter months.

“Despite it not being what you thought Jade, it still has some very useful applications. Right then, now that that’s settled.” My mother’s words were comforting as she set the alchemy journal off to the side to let the ink dry. She dragged Fizzle over to me and pulled us into a hug. “You're family Fizzle, we're here for you.”

“That’s what you needed Philomena’s feathers for?” It seemed Fresh Start was sympathetic to Fizzle’s plight and she watched as we huddled together against my mother’s body. “You thought it could fix your friend's horn?”

“It didn’t pan out, but I still have some ideas left.” Like various dangerous large magical lizards for one, maybe Sekhet might know where I can find Bennu. One of Bennu’s feathers might have a different and more powerful result.

A flash of sunlight and Celestia winked in nearby to start looking about. She spotted us cuddling with my mother and noticed Fizzle's broken horn, she then immediately showed concern for her.

“Who did this to you?” This was Celestia’s first meeting with Fizzle after all. At least Fresh hadn’t asked about the horn, which is something that I’m sure Fizzle appreciated.

“Ursa, happened a few years ago, don’t worry about it.” She acted aloof, but I knew it still bothered her.

“…. very well then… so this is the airship that crashed?” Celestia started trotting over to inspect the ship. “Since you do not seem keen on living near the capital of Equestria, and I can hardly blame you for that, then might I suggest building a town here? It seems to be a good place for one.”

Author's Note:

An antidote stops the poison, but it does not fix the damage already done.

Magical alchemy knowledge.

Cast failure- Upon failure of a cast, item used in cast will return to it's previous form. Knowing this, it may be possible to cancel a cast to get the item back after the cast has already begun.

(New alchemy ingredient!)

8. Phoenix Feather.

Cast: Cleansing Flames (Support healing spell). Finds and stops negative foreign bodily ailment or ailments that are magical or mundane, does not heal damage. Can possibly stop positive ailments.

Sustain: Protection from the cold (Continuous defensive buff). Immunity to cold, increased defensive ability against ice and relative elemental based magic.

Self-Sustaining: None.

Comments

[Sigmacipher]

Hmm...I think you're going to need a hydra scale. And I happen to know where to start looking.

[The Faceless Maker]

8868436
Everfree Bogg perhaps? although the Hydra that exist there at the 'present' for the show might not be there yet, and if it is it'll probably be significantly smaller, due to being around for less time? or Darkon might invoke the wrath of the Great And Irritating Murphy to buck things over... again... for what'll be the 5th time this story

[Sigmacipher]

8869198
A scale size doesn't matter...

[The Faceless Maker]

8869444
depends on the species and/or individual, and what I meant was that the Hydra itself would be smaller, as it is most certainly younger than it was when we saw it in the show

[Mr Swanky Hat]

I smelled something, a smelly smell, a smell I’m quite familiar with and it was heavenly.

[ThatBadGuy]

I came here to kick puss and chew ball of yarn, and I am all out of ball of yarn.

[ChaosDX1]

[...]then might I suggest building a town here? It seems to be a good place for one.”

I was just thinking to myself "If they don't get a move on soon, they might as well turn that airship wreckage into that inn they wanted."

[Fresnor]

Of course a phoenix feather won't rez someone... You need phoenix down for that. Tears are the healing reagent.

[Umbra Animo]

10450524
Down is a type of feather in relation to birds