White Demure

by Heitomos

Twilight and Pinkie Pie: Final Part

Twilight continued her search of the general vicinity, her magic making fog flee from her presence so that she could get a better look around in her search of the elusive plant. She never traveled too far out from where they had touched down, however, not wanting to stray too far from Pinkie Pie, who was still resting away the aches and pains that she got from the fall down to the chasm floor.

As she searched along the ground, her frustrations began to build up more and more as preliminary searches were proving useless. With a flick of her horn, she checked the last area of her search, and with a sigh, she turned around and walked back to her companion empty-hooved, "Well, that didn't go so well. I didn't find a single thing out there, and I can't just leave you here like this."

"It's okay. Let's take a little break. I think I only need about five or ten more minutes to get back to my good ole' Pinkie self." Pinkie replied.

"Alright then, I suppose I could use a bit of a break after all of that anyway... Maybe I can check through my books to try and find what I need." The purple unicorn said as she sat down beside the prone pink party pony.

"Hmm... If you can't find it, why don't you try a tracking spell? Do those exist?" Pinkie suggested, letting out one of few coherent thoughts swimming around in her head.

"A tracking spell? They do exist but... Wait... A tracking spell won't help us here, but maybe a search and retrieve spell might! Oh Pinkie, you're a genius!" Twilight Sparkle shouted, her head already brimming with ideas on the right spell to use for the job.

Pinkie merely rolled on to her belly and smiled in response, her legs kicking behind her as her pep started to return in full. The unicorn, meanwhile, quickly whipped out her travel spellbook, a book she kept with her for on the go studying or just in case, and began to rapidly sift through its pages. After nearly a minute of flipping through the pages, she stopped on one in particular and read it over, "Here it is! This should do perfect... I just hope Zecora's drawing is accurate enough."

"Good luck!"

"Thank you."

With a small burst of magic, Zecora's scroll floated up beside the book, and she looked it over carefully, taking in every detail that she could. Without a direct sample, she was going to have to go by the closest mental image she could provide, and with a spell like this, detail was important. Sadly, the drawing wasn't exactly photograph quality, but it did have basics shapes of the leaves as well as the colors, so, hopefully, it was going to do the trick.

"Alright... Here goes!" Twilight said as she began to focus her magic.

The glow around her horn intensified as she cast the spell, her face scrunching as she tried to make it work with her limited knowledge of what she was looking for. But, she wasn't Princess Celestia's prized student for nothing, and a moment later the spell took effect, the magic enveloping her horn as it began to pull her down one way of the chasm.

"Aha! It worked! But umm... Pinkie! I can't stop now that it's started, hurry up and follow me!" Twilight Sparkle shouted, her horn already dragging her away.

"Okie dokie lokie! I've had enough of a break anyway. Let's find that plant!" The pink pony said, bouncing all the way as she followed behind the unicorn.

The spellcasting pony was starting to regret putting so much power in to the spell, mostly due to the fact that being dragged by her horn was embarrassing, annoying, and was quite uncomfortable. Still, she was willing to wait it out, and just waited for the spell to come to its end, and hopefully, that's where she'll end up finding the plant they need so very much.

After several minutes of frustrated grumbling and happy bouncing, the two companions finally stopped, the spell having ended, "Finally! I was really starting to get a headache there..."

"Aww! That's too bad. That looked like it was a lot of fun!"

"I wouldn't exactly call it fun... Anyway, the spell stopped here, so let's get to looking around for it. It should be very close by."

"Alright! But we should probably really hurry up though, my tummy got all tickly a while back there, and... Yup! There it is again!"

"Tickly tummy? What does that mean?" Twilight asked.

"It means that lots of teeth are coming! I think they've been following us for a while now." Pinkie replied cheerily.

"What?" The unicorn exclaimed, "Why didn't you tell me this sooner! Oh this is bad... Do you know what it is exactly?"

"Nopey dopey! It'll be a surprise when it gets here!"

"Ugh... Okay, we don't have much time. Let's get to looking around here as fast as we can, the plant has to be here!"

With that, the two companions began their search, looking every which way to try and find a sign of the medicinal ingredient they needed to cure Apple Bloom. Twilight trusted that her spell had brought her to the right place, but as she looked all over the chasm floor, she couldn't see a single trace of it. The unicorn was beginning to get frustrated with the search just as Pinkie Pie started to jump and point.

"Twilight! Lookit! Up there!" She said as she bounced up and down.

Twilight Sparkle's eyes turned to her excited companion, and she quickly looked to where Pinkie had been pointing, and a bright smile spread across her face, "That's it! You've found it, Pinkie! Now... To get it down." She replied.

She had been met with a bit of an obstacle when she noticed that the plant, a beautiful red and yellow flower with a dark green stem and delicate, wavy petals, was nested high up above them on the walls of the chasm. The flower was at least twenty feet above their heads, and with no obvious stepping stones, it was going to be hard to get that flower down.

"It's so high up..." Twilight said.

"It is. Oh well! Just use your magic and pluck it out!" Pinkie replied.

"I can't do that! It's wedged deep in to the rock, so if I pull it, I might start a rock slide. And I'd rather not have that happen. I also don't have any scissors to cut the stem with... One of us is going to have to jump up there somehow and bite it off."

"Hmm... Oh! Why don't you just magic me up there! I've seen you lift Spike and other ponies before, why not me?"

"That's a great idea! You're on a roll today, Pinkie Pie!"

"Woohoo! I rock!"

"Heh-heh. Alright, stay still now, I'm going to start lifting you up. If you move around too much, I might drop yo-"

Twilight Sparkle's words were suddenly cut off by a loud ribbit, which echoed throughout the nearly empty chasm loudly. It wasn't until she heard the noise did she realize just how quiet it had been down here, and with a hard gulp, she turned towards its source. She desperately hoped that it wasn't the thing with teeth than Pinkie Pie had predicted.

"Oh... No..." The unicorn said as her eyes widened upon seeing the creature.

"What's wrong? Oh! Lookit! It's so cute!" Pinkie replied.

"Cute? Are you crazy!"

"But... Twilight, it's just a cute little froggy!" Pinkie said as she pointed a hoof towards the creature.

There, sitting in the middle of the chasm, was a small green frog, no more than a couple of inches tall, simply watching the two of them. The only thing that truly stood out about the amphibian was it's strangely colored belly and bright blue eyes.

"No, it's not! I admit you were very right about the Parasprites, Pinkie Pie, but trust me when I say that that thing in dangerous!"

"But why? It's just a frog."

"No, it's not. It's a piranha-toad! And while they can be cute on the outside, or even just by themselves, they always..."

As she spoke, more piranha-toads began to come out of the mist, jumping beside, behind, and in front of their brother, gathering in to a huge mob. Then, moments later and almost in perfect unison, they bared their razor sharp teeth and let out a growl resembling a deep humming.

"...hunt in packs." She finished with a hard gulp.

"How do you know so much about them? And what are we gunna do?"

"I'll tell you that later! And for what we're going to do... I'm going to have to try to lift you up and- Ahh!" She screamed as one of the toads leaped at her.

Thankfully, she was quick to react to the sudden attack, and with a burst of magic, the piranha-toad was sent flying backwards, back in to the green mass that was approaching them.

"Okay, fending them off and lifting you if going to be really hard..."

"Throw me!"

"What?" Twilight exclaimed.

"I said throw me! Throw me up there and I'll try to grab it. I should be okay on the way down, it's not that high up." Pinkie replied, looking suddenly quite serious.

The unicorn looked to her companion as if she was crazy, but a quick glance towards the oncoming, hungry horde of hopping toads, she quickly changed her mind, "Okay, hold on!"

With a large burst of her levitation magic, she picked up the pink pony, and after only a second of aiming, she tossed the other mare at the flower. She didn't have time to look, however, as several of the piranha-toads decided to make their move, all of them hopping towards their prey at once. As she quickly remembered a certain spell, she focused and brought up a magical barrier that stopped the approaching amphibians in their tracks, sending them flying away. However, there were two distinct problems with the barrier: The first was that it was rather draining, especially as things hit it, and the second was that it was going to repel Pinkie as well, so she was going to have to take it down eventually.

Moments later, she heard the sound of scraping against the rock wall behind her, and with her barrier up, she braved a look. Up on the cliff face was Pinkie Pie, desperately scrambling, almost impossibly so, against the nearly flat rock wall as she attempt to grab the flower. However, even Twilight knew that she was going to end up falling any second now, which meant she had to take the barrier down long enough to toss the pink pony back up again.

"Come on, Twilight! Think! Hurry!" She said to herself.

Her mind raced to find a solution to their current predicament and still nothing was coming to mind. But, just as Pinkie was about to touch her magical shield, she got an idea.

"Sorry about this, Pinkie!" She shouted.

"Wha? Whoa!" The pink pony shouted as she felt something hit her in the back and send her upwards once more.

At the last second, the purple unicorn rapidly expanded her barrier, exploding it outward in a burst of magical energy that cast away anything nearby. The piranha-frogs were sent flying in all directions, many smacking up against the opposite side of the chasm. Pinkie, meanwhile, was launched back up towards the flower, giving her a second chance. However, it wasn't all good news for the two of them.

The hit had dazed the pink pony somewhat, and on her way up, she missed the flower entirely and kept on going upwards, father than she had before. As for Twilight, the sudden expansion and dissipation of her barrier had left her drained, feeling a tad woozy. Changing the function of spells was hard work on its own; doing so on the fly was just downright exhausting. Even though she had some space to work with now, she wasn't sure she could get the shield back up in time, but she was going to have to try, just in case her companion missed.

"Pinkie! Please oh please catch that flower, I don't think I can do that another time!" Twilight shouted as she started to feel her power wane as she charged her magic once more.

"I'll try!" The earth pony replied, her voice coming from quite a ways up.

The ravenous horde had quickly recovered, for the most part, from the sudden burst of magical energy. Far too many of them were still healthy, and they were all hungry for something none of them had eaten before. This left Twilight in a dangerous spot, and an old familiar panic when confronting danger was hitting her in full and making it hard to concentrate. She soon found herself unable to completely resurrect her barrier, her focus completely shattering as some of the front liners of the oncoming amphibians made a leap for her, forcing her to blast them away individually.

Just as her panic and fatigue was growing too great, she felt a great weight fall heavily on to her back, causing her to fall flat on her belly. "Oof!" She cried as she hit the ground. It took her a moment, but she finally managed to open her eyes just in time to spot a familiar flower dangling in front of her face. She blearily followed the stem, and found that a bright pink pony had it clenched between her teeth. Then she noticed that the pony in question was yelling at her. Why was she yelling at her?

"Twilight! Quick! Get us out of here!" She yelled.

With a shake of her head, Twilight Sparkle cast the fog in her mind aside and focused on the situation once again, "Pinkie! You found the flower! That's great!"

"I know! Now get us out of here, please!" Came the impatient reply.

"Huh? Oh! Right!" She said, finally noticing that the piranha-frogs had gotten even closer. She quickly closed her eyes and began to focus, not on defense this time, but on escape. Her horn glowed brightly, causing some of the incoming carnivores to back up a bit, having learned a lesson about that horn, as she concentrated on the spell. Her mind was filled with the knowledge Luna had sacrificed to help her out, and now, in their time of need, it was going to save their lives.

Her horn glowed brighter and brighter, the dangerous critters of the Everfree made one last leap for a chance at food, and in a flash, Twilight Sparkle and Pinkie Pie vanished, leaving nothing but a small wisp of smoke, and several confused amphibians, in their wake.

---

When she opened her eyes again, the area seemed to be vastly different than the one she had just been in. The bright moonlight was bathing the colorful houses and lush greenery beautifully, filling her with a sense of peace as she looked at it. Then, she felt a terrible pain in her foreleg, a biting sting that made her scrunch up her face. Once the pain began to worsen, she blinked a few times to clear her vision and looked at her sore hoof.

And then she screamed.

She immediately launched in to the air, knocking the pink pony that was laying comfortably on her back off of her, and shrieked as she waved her hoof, "Get it off get it off get it OFF!" She shouted.

Pinkie Pie took a second to recover from the sudden tumble, but in true Pinkie fashion, she regained her composure and smile in no time at all. After making sure that the flower, the entire reason they had gone on their adventure, was perfectly safe between her teeth, she looked up towards Twilight curiously, "What's the matter, Twilight?"

The unicorn only responded by continuing her shriek for a few moments, simply shaking her hoof violently. Pinkie noticed a small green blob that seemed to be attached to the flailing appendage, and took a guess that that might be the issue. Soon, enough, however, the green blur finally relented and let go of Twilight's hoof, causing it to be launched sky high, back towards the Everfree forest where it belongs.

"Oww..." Said Twilight as she brought up her hoof to suck on it.

The taste of iron filled her mouth as she performed the rudimentary first aid, simply sucking on the small wound, "One of those piranha-frogs must have bit down on me when I was casting the spell... It's going to hurt to walk for days now." She complained, despite being used to severe pain at this point.

"Oh no! We'll have to go and see Nurse Redhart in the morning to fix up your booboo! But right now, I think there's some worried fillies that want to see us. Maybe I can throw a mini-party for when each of us gets back. Ooo! That's sounds like fun!" Pinkie Pie said, beginning to dance in place.

Twilight Sparkle gave a laugh at her friend's antics, "Alright, that's sounds like a good plan. Now come on, we should head back now so that I can preserve the plant to make sure it doesn't go bad. I'll have Owlicious fly to Zecora's in the morning while I go and get my hoof bandaged up. Hopefully the others will be here tomorrow." She said, knowing that they were mostly likely the first ones back thanks to the spell.

"Hey, if we're lucky, maybe they're already here! But wait, that'll mean I missed a mini-party! Oh no! Come on, Twilight, we must hurry. There are parties we might be missing!"

The purple unicorn gave a small laugh at her friend's sometimes one track mind. It didn't bother her, however, and she just went along with it, starting to trot towards the library, favoring one foreleg over the other.

"Oh! I almost forgot! You said you were going to tell me what those things were." Said the pink pony suddenly.

"Hmm? Oh, well, they were made by a rather... Eccentric unicorn centuries ago. She loved animals, but she wasn't exactly... The most stable of ponies. She started to use her magic on the animals to combine them in to what she believed to be better animals. She made such creatures as the first manticores, the piranha-frogs, and other such nasty creatures. She eventually got banned from doing such things, and all of her creations were sent to places like the Everfree forest. I just wasn't expecting many of them to last so long. Manticores are big and strong, so I wasn't that shocked by them, but the piranha-frogs were small and weak... I guess group tactics helped fix that problem." She explained, rambling away her rather lengthy explanation.

Pinkie Pie, meanwhile, had gotten bored rather quickly, and was midway through humming a new tune she was cooking up in her head. When Twilight finished speaking, she blinked and turned her head, "Hmm? Oh! Well, that's neat!"

The unicorn furrowed her brow slightly at her friend's lack of attention, but shrugged it off as they arrived at the library. "Alright, here we are, Pinkie. Let's go in, say hi, and get some sleep."

"Sounds good to me!"

Together, the two of the walked in to the library, both having smiles on their faces as they do so. Immediately Twilight lifted the flower from Pinkie's mouth and placed it inside a vial in order to help preserve it. With a little magic to ensure its preservation, she turned to look at the others in the room. Granny Smith, Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo, and Apple Bloom were all fast asleep, with only Big Macintosh keeping watch over them all. The moment they had entered, his eyes turned to them, a small smile spreading across his face.

"Hello, Big Mac. We're back!" She said, keeping her voice down despite her excitement.

"I see you got it." Said the red stallion, taking a look at the flower in the vial.

"Yes, we did. It was hard, but we managed to grab it at the last second and avoid certain doom. There's so much I want to tell you about what I saw but..." Her voice was suddenly cut off by a loud yawn, "...I'm needing a good bit of sleep."

"Then sleep. You two deserve it... Thank you." He said, bowing his head to the both of them.

Twilight flushes slightly from embarrassment, "You're welcome, Big Mac. You should probably get some sleep as well. At least a cat nap to keep your strength up."

"Yeah! I can stay here and watch them for a little while. I'm not feeling tired yet. I can wake you before I go!" Said Pinkie, whispering loudly.

"Are you sure about that, Pinkie Pie? You aren't exactly the quietest pony I know, and these ponies need their sleep."

"Don't worry, Twilight. I'll make sure they get a good nights sleep. Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye." The pink pony recited, performing the gestures for her infamous Pinkie Pie swear.

That was all Twilight Sparkle needed, "Okay, you can keep watch on them. Is that okay, Big Macintosh?"

"Eeyup. Thank you kindly, miss Pie." He replied, giving her a nod.

"Oh, silly! It's no problem. Now lay your sleepy head down and let your Auntie Pie take care of things."

Big Mac gave her a strange look for a moment, but decided to drop it for now. "Thank you both for what you've done for us... The Apple family won't forget this."

"You're welcome again, Big Macintosh. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to sleep."

The unicorn received another quiet nod in return as she made her way up the stairs to her bedroom. She could hear Pinkie Pie skulking around, and, true to her word, being relatively quiet. She smiled brightly as she hopped on to her bed, her mind filled with hopeful thoughts and self praise about having made it back despite the odds that they faced.

The thought that they did good brought her a peaceful sleep.

Now, it was only a matter of waiting for the others to return.