Rainbow Dash's Unstoppable Ego

by MagicS

A Mammoth of a Problem XXV

There was a heavy lock on Abalun’s front door that required a key from his cloak to open it up. When he did so he stepped aside and held the door open and gestured for Rainbow Dash to fly on in. It was a small and sparse one-room deal with a thin and lumpy bed in the corner on a metal frame and a single small table with but one chair against the opposite wall right by a metal-shuttered window that was currently closed. The floor was dusty and there were discarded newspapers all thrown about with a single lamp on a couple of shelves and cabinets by the bed.

“Not much I’m afraid. If you’re staying the night here because you want to see the slums I’m not exactly sure where you’ll sleep,” Abalun said as he walked in after her and shut the door, making sure to lock it.

“No problem, I’ll use some of your old newspapers for sheets,” Rainbow shrugged.

Abalun grunted and walked over to the window, sliding open the shutters and taking a quick peek out into the street before closing them again. He then took off his cloak and tossed it onto the bed before turning to regard Rainbow Dash. “Obviously you have some questions. Where’d you like to start?”

“You bet I have some questions! I’ve been like, wondering what was up with you ever since I saw you back at the docks, and how weird Larkon got. And these slums too! I’ve been super curious about them, do you have any idea how difficult it is for me to not do something after specifically being told not to do it?” She raised an eyebrow at him. “It’s. Really. Hard.”

A smirk tugged up Abalun’s lips and he looked like he was stopping himself from laughing. “You’re as amusing as I’ve heard. But truly the newspapers and gossip don’t do you justice.”

“Nothing can do me justice except me,” Rainbow Dash smugly grinned. “Uh, but anyways, just who are you? I know your name, but why are you living here in the slums? And what are you doing with Larkon? Seriously, what’s going on in this place?”

Abalun tapped his trunk on his tusks, thinking. “Well, Larkon obviously trusts you enough that I can answer your questions, so be it then.” He took a seat on his bed, the metal springs straining under his weight. “Larkon and I are old friends, we knew each other when we were kids. And what I’m doing now and here in these slums is a favor to him.”

“A favor?”

Abalun nodded. “Larkon is a well known mammoth throughout the city and even here in these slums. On the other trunk, I am not. So Larkon asked me if I could infiltrate the slums and spy on Karkona for him.”

“Larkon asked you to do that? That’s actually pretty cool,” Rainbow Dash grinned.

“It’s also the reason I had to wear my cloak since at this point I can’t afford to be seen with you in such a way. What I just did was already a risk but I couldn’t exactly let you and Larkon’s son get hurt,” Abalun told her.

“Thanks for that again. So what do you like, even do as a spy? What does Larkon want to find out about Karkona?”

“I’ve spent my time since coming here ingratiating myself in Karkona’s group, although I’’m still nothing more than a lackey or acquaintance to him at best. Really I’m just able to keep an eye on his movements and things like that, or go to any public meetings he holds. Unfortunately I can’t seem to get anywhere important,” Abalun sighed. “As for specifically the goal Larkon is looking towards is that he wants to see if something can be found out about Karkona that will actually get the senate and the rest of the city to act or at the very least for me to be able to warn him if Karkona is about to do something especially bad.”

Rainbow Dash frowned and scratched. “Just throwing this out there but I can’t see you getting much help from the senate...”

“Yes, we both know,” Abalun agreed. “It may be wishful thinking but Larkon still hopes that we can one day find evidence of something so obvious and law-breaking that even those afraid of Karkona will be forced into action.”

“You know though I’m kind of surprised Larkon would go for something like this. Even though he really doesn’t like Karkona it’s pretty awesome he set you up as a spy,” Rainbow said.

“He’s just forward thinking. I think he does have a distaste for all this planning and scheming but knows something needs to be done,” Abalun said.

“Yeah… but would he really be okay with you cracking a chair over some mammoth’s skull?” Rainbow asked.

Abalun shook his head. “He definitely would not be, but still, sometimes there are things you can’t avoid. I’ve learned that lesson especially well after living in the slums for a while now.”

“Is this place really that bad?”

“It’s full of nothing but thieves and thugs who were cast out and shunned by the rest of society. Is it really that difficult to imagine after seeing what happened tonight?”

Rainbow Dash considered that. And after hearing about mammoth history… no, it really wasn’t. “I guess it’s just a shock compared to how the rest of the city is.”

“Fair,” Abalun nodded.

Rainbow Dash floated over onto his table and stood atop it. “So you haven’t really been able to find out anything important about Karkona yet? What do you think he’s doing? All I know is he wants to find the Sacred Spring so he can become some “Mammoth among mammoths” or whatever.”

“Honestly? I haven’t got a clue,” Abalun shrugged, defeated.

“Really, dude?” Rainbow flatly stared at him.

“I know he’s up to something but I have no idea what. Karkona completely rules over most of the slums and he has several large warehouses that he keeps under close guard and lock. I know he’s doing something he shouldn’t be inside there but I can’t get in to see what. They’re guarded all day and night by his loyal mammoths, he has to be protecting something dangerous inside.” Abalun told her. “But aside from that he mostly just holds rallies to rile up his followers and the other mammoths in the slums. He talks about them soon being able to reclaim what is rightfully theirs and stuff like that but he never mentions anything specific. About the spring or anything else.”

“Sounds like your spying isn’t going too well at this point.”

“I’ll admit I’ve hit a snag. I’m not sure what I can do at this point except for just keep watching over him and going to his rallies. I think he’s unwilling to really trust me or have me do any actual work for him because I’m older. He’s not fond of mammoths of older generations than him.”

“He’s more a fan of the impressionable youth and rebellious teens,” Rainbow muttered.

“Exactly.”

The conversation paused for a minute as both of them stopped to think. Rainbow Dash didn’t know enough about the slums or Karkona to suggest anything and Abalun had clearly been doing his best. She didn’t know how volatile things were, or what Karkona was planning, or if there was anything pressing, or if Larkon really wanted her to do anything about it. She felt bad for the mammoths in the slums though, and all the others who had been misled by Karkona. Couldn’t she just go beat him up? No… Larkon would think it’s wrong to use violence to solve their problems. It would be a betrayal of everything he stood for and believed in.

Rainbow Dash sighed. “So what do we do now?”

“Right now?” Abalun raised an eyebrow at her. “I suggest we go to bed. It’s very late. Tomorrow though… I’ll show and teach you everything about the slums you wish to know.”

“Works for me,” Dash yawned, her exhaustion finally hitting her after the sheer adrenaline run she’d been on for the past hour. She fluttered down to the floor and did just as she had said earlier, grabbed up all the discarded newspapers and put them on the table for a makeshift bed. Abalun watched with wry amusement as he settled into his own sleeping spot.

“Good night,” the mammoth said to her.

“Night,” she replied back, circling around the newspapers a few times before plopping down like a dog and letting her tired body soon drift off to sleep.

---

Rainbow Dash awoke surprisingly comfortable after sleeping on top of a hard table with just a few newspapers for bedding. It was really cold in Abalun’s little one room apartment but she was used to that by now. Abalun looked like he had woken up well earlier than she had and was currently munching on some dried kelp he must’ve taken out of one of the cabinets by the bed.

“Good morning,” Abalun said and offered her some kelp which she graciously accepted.

“Morning,” Dash yawned and started chowing down.

The two ate at the table until both of them were fully woken up, Abalun letting the clearly much more tired Rainbow Dash get herself together.

“So-” Abalun started. “Obviously you can’t really be seen in the slums, not with me at least, so for most of the day I’ll have to disguise you in some way. That’s the only way the two of us can actually explore the slums together and spy on some of the others.”

“Okay,” Dash nodded.

“And if we do stumble upon Karkona, don’t get mad and start a fight,” he told her.

She frowned but accepted nevertheless. “Fine.”

“Good. I doubt we will though, I haven’t heard him getting ready to do anything lately. Normally his minions would be out yelling that a rally is coming up or something,” Abalun said.

“I mostly just wanted to see the slums for real today. Beating up Karkona can come… eventually,” Rainbow said.

“Well it’s not much of a pleasant sight out there but I’ll take you around,” Abalun finished eating and walked towards the closed window. “Come here for a second.”

Rainbow Dash floated up beside his head and Abalun opened the metal shutters just enough that the two of them could peak out without really having to worry about anyone outside looking back in. The window was dirty but Rainbow Dash could still clearly see out into the street. A couple of inches of snow layered the ground, no one here to clean it up, and angry looking mammoths shuffled up and down past Abalun’s place. There was a small shack made of sheets of metal almost directly across the street from where they were, a couple of mammoths sat at stools right outside it while the mammoth inside the shack made food. Another alley fenced off with barbed wire sat beside the shack along with a “Keep Out!” sign attached to it. Everything was dirty, unpainted, undecorated, and unwelcoming. She had flown into a different world.

“Geez, it’s not the first place I’ve seen like this but you’re in the middle of a pretty rough neighborhood,” Dash said.

“A normal day here.”

“It’s just so different from the rest of the city,” her eyes roamed up and down the street but all she saw were more mismatched buildings clustered together and the occasional mammoth. She looked over at Abalun. “So we’re going on a tour soon?”

“Yes, I just need to think of how best to disguise you… somehow,” Abalun rubbed his trunk.

He walked over to his bed and grabbed up his cloak, putting it on. “You’re too small to even pass for a child.” He looked over his cloaked body. “But maybe instead of disguising you we’ll just have to hide you instead.”

Rainbow Dash grimaced at his obvious plan. “Sounds fun.”

A minute later a noticeably hunchbacked mammoth stepped out of his one room apartment and out onto the streets. The cloak Abalun wore had enough extra looseness to it that she could lie down on his back and peak out over the top of his head. It was uncomfortable and awkward but they made it work. So long as nobody looked too hard or they ran into another slum-dweller who personally knew Abalun.

“So where to?” Rainbow Dash whispered to Abalun from atop his head.

“I’m going to take you around to those warehouses I told you about. And I’ll show you where Karkona actually lives,” Abalun replied back. “In the meantime just take in the sights of the other half.”

The sights were not pleasant. More than once they had to squeeze by two or more mammoths engaged in a fight, and these mammoths all still had their tusks sharp. Some of the ones fighting were even younger than Samarkon and it took a lot for Rainbow Dash to not rush out and pull them apart. Anytime they passed by another mammoth who wasn’t fighting they just got a nasty look and any of the few mammoths that were working their own small shops regarded them suspiciously. Although considering Abalun was wearing a full body cloak with the hood down she couldn’t really blame that last one.

Most of the doors she saw had fairly elaborate locks and a lot of windows were barred. Below her she heard Abalun’s wet and squishy footsteps and realized there were no paved roads in the slums either. It was all slushy mud now after the previous night’s snow. Glancing down an alley she saw a group of dirty kids playing cards atop an overturned box.

It was sadly the most wholesome thing she had seen so far in the slums.

“Why does anyone follow Karkona if the place he rules over is as awful as this still?” Rainbow asked Abalun.

“Because they believe when he becomes King and rules over everything it’ll get better,” Abalun fought the reflex to shrug with her on top of him. “In reality it’ll probably all turn into what you see around you. Also many of them just don’t know better or care. This is their life.”

Rainbow Dash sighed and let him carry her on. “So not awesome.”

The cramped slums didn’t change the more they traveled through them. There was the odd building bigger than most that she saw and a couple of times she’d see a group of mammoths actually just standing around and chatting, but the moment she thought they might be nicer they would clam up and shoot Abalun dirty looks as soon as they saw him. It was the default way for mammoths here to treat others that weren’t in their direct circle.

Normally she’d ask them what the hay they were staring at but she unfortunately had to hold herself back.

“How’d these slums start up in the first place?” She asked.

“Hm...” Abalun hummed. “We don’t like conflict, and while we have a jail it’s just a small place for temporary holdings, so instead the slums are essentially a faux-exile. The senate and other mammoths of the city are saying “Just go over there and stop bothering us”. And for the most part that’s the end of it. Since even mammoths in the slums need to eat the food grown in the farms. Although Larkon has never really approved of this, he’s not fond of our senate’s tendency to just ignore problems and look the other way, to just pretend something isn’t there.”

“Can’t say I like that approach either.”

“Well Larkon also wouldn’t be fond of just going and beating everyone up. So we’re in something of a conundrum,” Abalun frowned. “Not to mention that Karkona is strong, he’s very dangerous and not just because of his ideology, the way he was able to rise to the top of the slums in the first place was through force. The preaching came second.”

“I can take him,” Rainbow confidently stated.

Abalun snorted. “No offense but I’m not sure if he’d even feel your punches.”

Rainbow Dash grumbled in annoyance. She had had enough of opponents she couldn’t just beat up. “Yeah whatever...”

After that the two walked and walked until they finally arrived at the warehouses Abalun had mentioned earlier. They were the largest buildings Rainbow Dash had seen yet in the slums and built in one of the few areas where it seemed the ground around them had been cleared of other buildings and obstructions. Three warehouses made of steel and brick with windows only at the highest points of their walls, they were close enough together that they almost touched and when she did look between them she saw they were actually connected by some enclosed vestibules. And like Abalun had said a number of mammoths stood outside their front doors to guard them. They had the same mean look as every mammoth in the slums but they looked more serious and stoic too. They were taking the job Karkona had given them seriously. And because of the muddy open ground around the warehouses there was no way to sneak into them in the middle of the day. She could see why Abalun had been having trouble.

The mammoths guarding the warehouses soon noticed them as Abalun walked past them on the far side of the empty lot, trying to act as casually as possible. At least none of the guards left their post to accost them or anything like that.

As they were walking to the next street that led away from the warehouses, Dash saw a number of mammoths in worker’s overalls coming their way. Unlike most mammoths here they didn’t spare the cloaked Abalun a glance. The whole group walked from the narrow street to the first warehouse, right past the guards and into the building without a fuss. Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes as she watched the occurrence. Something was up here.

“You saw those workers?” Abalun asked. “I’ve seen a number of them going into those warehouses every day too, along with some others. They must be directly ordered around by Karkona but I wonder what they’re doing in there.”

“Yeah, me too,” Rainbow Dash said.

“It’s not much further to where Karkona lives from here, he stays in the center of the slums in a dingy looking house built on top of a few other houses,” Abalun told her.

“What do you mean?”

“He had a bunch of mammoths construct a lopsided hovel made of a bunch of metal sheets and whatever else was lying around on top of some old abandoned homes. There’s stairs leading up to it from the ground, I think he just likes feeling above the other mammoths,” Abalun said.

“Well I kind of understand that feeling,” Rainbow had to admit.

The more they walked in the direction of Karkona’s place the less fighting Rainbow Dash saw, and the less urchins and kids messing around in the streets. The mammoths they did see still had a tough and wary look in their eyes but like the guards of the warehouse they weren’t violent or hot-tempered thugs either. They must’ve been loyal to Karkona and no one in this area was about to start up a random fight with another. So unlike some parts of the slums they had walked to there was actually an order and authority when it came to the direct followers and minions of Karkona.

The street started to curve, a very wide and slow curve but a curve nonetheless, towards the center of the slum. To Rainbow Dash it looked like some buildings had been broken or torn down specifically to make a more orderly road.

Didn’t stop the ground from just being mud though. And all the remaining buildings still looking like they were made with materials pulled out of a garbage dump.

“We’re almost there,” Abalun said.

“If you’re hanging around Karkona and his flunkies a lot are any of these guys going to recognize you?” Rainbow whispered.

“Possibly. Just be still and try to keep your head down behind my crown if anyone actually comes up to us.”

Despite still getting the usual looks Rainbow Dash had come to expect from the mammoths living in these slums they weren’t bothered on their way down the street. It did become more crowded with adult, but still young adult, mammoths hanging outside and around every building. Some of them Rainbow Dash ended up recognizing from the spring festival.

At last they got to the true depths of the slums and Karkona’s ramshackle home emerged. It really was a mess of angular walls, beams shooting out randomly, mismatched pieces of wood and metal slapped together, and all sitting atop a collection of shanties that were themselves just as much of a pile. Like Abalun had said there was a cheap set of stairs made from misshapen wooden boards that led up from the ground to the second “story” and ended at a large metal door that was shut closed at the moment.

“No sign of Karkona himself, but that’s probably a good thing for the two of us,” Abalun said as he paused for a minute.

“I bet he wishes he could turn Tarmok’s Hall into his own palace, huh?” Rainbow Dash said after staring at the hovel some more.

“That is probably his plan for the future,” Abalun agreed.

“Well too bad for him. He’s not even gonna get to become a King in the first place,” Rainbow said.

Abalun grunted. “Very true. All three of us are going to make sure of that now.” He looked around at the rest of the slums and some of the mammoths watching them and resumed walking. “You know you’ll have to stay here with me until nightfall? I don’t want to take the risk of someone seeing you leave the slums in the middle of the day. If they knew you didn’t leave immediately after rescuing Samarkon it could make them start asking questions.”

“Got it,” Rainbow said. It would probably be a slow day and she’d be cooped up in Abalun’s place for most of it but she could endure. Seeing these slums… it changed her view of the mammoths almost as much as hearing their history from Larkon. And it made her more determined than before to take down Karkona.

Comments

[THERDSTORYWHISPERER]

Great chapter?

Could those warehouses be filled with weapons and war machines?

[redmar]

I'm certain that whatever is being made in those warehouses is going to be important later on. I doubt Karkona even knows who the mammoths are supposed to fight if they return to their old ways. Samarkon surely has never thought about it but that's to be expected from him.