The Forest of the Golden Abalone

by Unwhole Hole

Chapter 13: The Advancement of Technology

The accuracy of the mech units was poor. The operators were well-matched and well-trained to move the units, but the technology was new. It had only recently been generated by the combined research of Cadence herself and her Royal Engineer, the earth-pony Emmett. The crystal ponies within were not yet trained properly in combat, despite Tuo and Fear’s best efforts. Their role in battle was mostly meant to be a symbolic show of might. A means to intimidate the ignorant.

Not that it especially mattered. Their weapons had been decreased to a minimum of power. They were able to cause great pain to the numerous giant snails they had encountered, but were not enough to cause grave injury apart from cracking and charring the outermost layers of their shells. Doing more than that might well have attracted far too much attention. The reduced output was doubly beneficial in that it kept their crystal reactors stable. The tactical engineers’ reports had indicated that magical disturbance from the region would cause disruption.

Fortunately, the presence of snails decreased on the far side of the misty swamps. The trees became sparse, growing thick and old from a land devoid of most underbrush—but developing a high canopy that let only bare, dappled light down upon a few rare fruit and nut trees and flowers that grew in the shade.

Through this, the first of the ruins became apparent. Many Tuo recognized as brilliant examples of Nightmare-Era architecture, the strange style of gothic and nearly organic forms that seemed to grow and warp from their surroundings. They were made of blackened stone formed from harsh wizardry, constructed in ancient times and durable through the most severe forms of weather. Although the silver lining between the bricks had faded and tarnished, these buildings still stood strong—even if knowledge of their purpose had been long-since lost.

Among these sat two sets of other buildings. One type was curiously even newer. They were recent, in a relative sense; perhaps fifty or sixty years old. Unlike the ancient structures that still remained intact and strong, those built in modern times had already been largely reclaimed by the environment. The remnants of prefabricated buildings were scattered in the forest, their windows broken in and their metal skin rusting away as moss and vines devoured them. Buildings constructed in the modern age with modern means—that would be dust and scrap and lead-based paint chips in a matter of a decade.

And, although rare, Tuo noticed what he had come to find. Ruins—but not those built by his predecessors. Not constructed by other invaders to this place. The ones that those before him had come to find. Ones far more ancient than the time of Nightmare Moon, their age impossible and antediluvian. They had existed even before the birth of the One True Goddess. They bore not clear form, not Architectual pretext that could be gleaned from anything in modern Equestrian culture. They were, in all likelihood, not Equestrian at all. They may even have predated ponies.

They rose from the ground, their forms mostly buried. Rising, twisting spires that bent at impossible angles, shifting outward and inward like great linear claws. Their surfaces did not wear and did not age, as if time had no effect on their obsidian—and the metal that inlaid their runes had never rusted and never faded.

These were but pieces. Fragments. The tips of transmitters buried far deep below, in what had once been a great city. A city buried by countless eons of forest, and of the action of so many gastropods. Although, Tuo knew, not all of it remained hidden. Like all ruins, all tombs, all sacred temples where no ponies were meant to go, there was a way in. And a way to claim what was rightfully his from within.

Lady Fear had, as always, elected to take the vanguard position. The mechs covered her from behind, and Tuo walked between them. He had been relegated to support, observing the path and through the crystalline HUD in his helmet. His job was to correlate a significant amount of information, both from the long-range sensors of his ship as well as the conditions of the mechs and relay communications from his crew. Fear could not be bothered with such things—which was why Tuo was paid so handsomely for doing the harder half of the work.

And yet he found himself sighing. Sighing because he was not alone. Walking beside him was a pony that stubbornly refused to wear any armor save for a pale brown shirt and a brightly colored ascot.

“Doctor,” he sighed, once again pleading his case, “I must once again insist that you remain in the rear, where it is safe. The support mech will bring you once Lady Fear and I have secured the area.”

“Nonsense,” he growled, trying mostly successfully to hide his limp. “My boy, I have been traipsing through filthy swamps filled with every kind of venomous monster you can imagine since before your father was in diapers.”

“You are not functionally immortal.”

Caballeron sneered. “Yes. I am most certainly not. Not yet, anyway. But I never once needed to rely on such a ridiculous crutch. What is the point in an adventure without danger?”

“Profit.”

He laughed, but without as much humor as Tuo would have expected. “Proof you’re still young. Like I was, once.” He squinted. “And what does a Perr-Synt need with even more money, anyway?”

“Money itself is useless except as proof of my own prowess. I understand that you are of noble birth, although of an earth-pony sense. As such, I feel that we have some level of kinship in our burden.”

He sighed. “Again, youth…” From one of his pockets, he produced a map, stopping to check it. Tuo, being trained since birth to be patient, paused—although Fear grumbled in her half-pronounced pidgin version of Crystallic. An affectation that Tuo found appealing but also comically sad.

“Doctor. That is not necessary. We have drones to scout topography, and can view the area in real-time through the Imperial satellite array.”

“And I am supposed to expect those gadgets to be superior to an ancient, yellowed map?”

“Those tools are inherently superior, yes.”

The elderly stallion looked up, and grinned. “Really? Did your fancy toys find this place, then?”

“You supplied the mission objective. As is your prerogative.”

“Exactly. And how did I find it? Through careful research. Piecing together fragments of countless hundreds of texts buried in ancient, dusty libraries. Calling on networks of connections, informants...I called in favors, performed a little blackmail, I purchased rare texts from the shadiest sources.” He shrugged. “And most of those turned out to be fakes, or mistranslated, or exaggerations by donkey monks with little better to do than draw ridiculous flaming slugs in their illuminations.”

“It was my understanding that you relied heavily on the dissertation of one particular young academic.”

Caballeron smiled. “I may have scooped the poor fool, but so what? What is academic dishonesty in the face of all this?”

He gestured to the ruins before him, most half-buried in trees that seemed to be voluntarily attempting to conquer them.

Tuo observed the wet wasteland before him. “All to find a snail.”

Caballeron shook his head—but not out of arrogance. Rather, his expression seemed somewhat somber.

“Hardly, my boy. The snail is no doubt extinct, I’m sad to say. Look around you. These are Agency buildings. Their operation was to hunt the last of them to extinction.”

“To what end?”

“The destruction of monsters. Or to further one of their own ridiculous ends. Immortality for a board member, perhaps.”

“Then what are we searching for.”

Caballeron smiled. “What? Have your satellites and robots not told you?”

Tuo remained patient.

Caballeron laughed. “What we seek is the shell of the Golden Abalone. My studies have indicated that the natives who built the original ruins held it as a kind of idol, secured it in the very heart of their Great Temple. It is the last specimen in existence. The last of its kind.”

“A shame to waste it saving a life.”

Caballeron grimaced, a sudden expression of rage coming over him. “Do not talk down to me like you know!” he growled, nearly in an unintelligible hiss. “I do not pay you to doubt my motives! You have no idea how badly I require that shell, what will happen if I don’t—” He bent over suddenly, his eyes widening as he coughed hard into a kerchief. He hid it quickly when he was done, but Tuo did not need to see it. He had been trained since birth to smell the blood of ponies.

“I was merely making an observation. An opinion.”

Caballeron muttered, wiping his mouth. “I do not expect you to understand.” He choked back another coughing fit. He glared upward with bloodshot eyes. “I expect results.”

Tuo nodded. “Of course.”

Caballeron stopped again. He looked up, squinting, and then slowly turned to Tuo.

“Your friend. Is she as you are? With your power?”

Tuo looked forward to where Lady Fear was still walking. “Her blood is black, as is mine. We share a line of descent to the same species, although our powers manifest differently. I regenerate more quickly, but she is more durable. But yes. Neither of us can be harmed for long.”

He started walking again, but Caballeron stopped him. He was smiling. “Then observe.”

Tuo did so, watching Fear continue her march through the lack of underbrush—and too late heard the snap of something, a flick of something suddenly moving through the large, slime-encrusted leaves that lined the forest floor.

Fear looked up as the pair of massive tree trunks suddenly lurched forward, held aloft by crude ropes. They swung forward and met in the middle—and with a sickening snap, her body was crushed flat between them.

The pilots in the mechs groaned, turning away, and some of the ground-soldiers cried out—but Tuo just sighed. He motioned for the forward mechs to move forward. They did and, with some difficulty, separated the trunks. Fear’s body, flat and ruined, fell from between them—and with a hideous snapping sound as her joints relocated and flesh recovered, she reassembled herself in a matter of seconds.

As soon as her lungs regained function, she released a torrent of the most vile, horrific swear words possible in Crystallic, the majority involving Celestia’s rear and a different part of Cadence but phrased with such detail and eloquence that Equestrian could not even hope to match the barest fraction of their vulgarity.

“How did you know that?” asked Tuo.

“Experience. Your foe is an accomplished woodsman and a stallion of great patience. No doubt he has already circled ahead of us. He did not need to wait for your ridiculous machines to keep up. That trap was meant for them.”

“That rat-fink Celestia-tasting son of a mule-ridden HORSE!” screamed Fear, grasping the trunks at either side of her that the mechs were holding. Her magic ignited, tearing them free of the mechs, levitating them, and then with a sonic wave vaporizing them to splinters. “I will baste his mother in a saddle of her own—ACK!”

She has stepped forward angrily and promptly fallen into a hidden pit of spikes.

“What is this?!” she screamed from the hole. “You call these SPIKES?! They aren’t even dipped in feces!” She paused. “Oh, wait…”

“You should probably pull her out,” chuckled Caballeron.

“She found her way in. She can find her way out.”

“I heard that! Moron, you know how I feel about getting penetrated!”

“I know exactly how you feel about being penetrated.”

More grumbling from the hole. Then, slowly, she crawled her way out.

“You need to talk to the mechanic. Fix your armor.”

She made a rude gesture, the holes in her limbs already fully healed but her armor in shambles. “Buck you.”

“You lack the funds.”

“Only because I’m the one paying you,” she snapped, shoving him in the shoulder as she passed. Although she was as tall as him, her armor was far lighter—but she was still oddly strong due to her unique muscular biology. Her lineage, in contrast to Tuo's, provided certain inherent advantages.

Tuo let out another sigh.

“You purebloods make me ill,” admitted Caballeron.

“The affairs of unicorns are highly personal.”

Caballeron walked to the edge of the spike pit. Tuo did as well, looking in—to see a number of sticks that had apparently originally been blunt, their ends having been eaten into points by a specific type of snail.

“Because of course it would be snail-themed.”

Caballeron looked up. “You know this woodsman?”

“We are acquaintances.”

“Well, from as sharp as those are, I see you have a healthy rivalry.”

“Hardly. He is annoyed for various reasons. Namely my conservation efforts.”

“He would be angry at such a pointless thing?”

“Apparently. My most profitable crystal mining operation produced a degree of atmospheric fallout that destroyed the habitat of a certain species of pink conch. I preserved the species.”

“In your private collection, no doubt?”

“Of course. I possess all specimens in existence.” He turned to Caballeron. “There is little point in possessing a thing unless it is rare. Otherwise, it would be far too mundane. Boring, and pointless.”

“A disturbing sentiment.” A middle-aged earth-mare in a camouflage jacket approached them from behind. “And a pointless conversation.”

“Agreed,” said Tuo. “We should continue.”

“If you want your forces to be gone by the time we get to the hard part, then yes.”

Tuo frowned under his mask. “Do you have a better idea?”

Caballeron smiled. He gestured to the changeling. “Argiopé, my dear, I do hate to ask you to work after your retirement, but would you assist these poor ignorant children and scout ahead?”

A thin smile crossed her face. “I hate being on the back-lines as much as you do, Pontracio. As comical as watching her flattened was, we really don’t have the time for it.”

She fluxed, her body consumed by her magic as she shifted forms into a blue-tinged griffon. She spread her wings, and Caballeron stopped her.

“Not above the tree-tops. Flight will agitate creatures we do not wish to anger.”

“I know.”

“Be careful.”

“When am I not?”

She fluttered her wings and took off, grasping a tree with her claws and then disheartening into the distance as she jumped from one to the other. Tuo watched her go, wondering if he could sub-contract to a Thoraxian mercenary for a reasonable price.

“I had never taken you for one with such predilections,” he mused.

“Do not pretend to know me.”

“Of course. Pardon the intrusion.”

Tuo stepped forward, but Caballeron spoke.

“I know where you got those powers. That black blood.”

Tuo stopped. He looked over his shoulder, the image of the earth-stallion fed through the sensors in his sha-shaped mask. “I do not actually care. My powers are my own. Who had them before me is irrelevant.”

“You would rather not know?”

“Information is valuable. But I would prefer cash. Not an old man’s story.”

Caballeron smiled, and joined Tuo on the forward march. “Then perhaps I can in time learn to respect you, then. Because when it comes down to it, business is all that matters, isn’t it?”

Caballeron’s smile did not reach his eyes—and Tuo understood that he was lying.

Comments

[Thought Prism]

Ok, the bit with the traps was pretty funny.

[Unwhole Hole]

I had to remove a comment by "Conces" because it was one of those bot advertisements that keep showing up places. Although I appreciate both bot and human readership, I'm pretty sure the links in those adds are a sure path toward viral infection.