The Cave of Elements

by Sage Probo

Chapter 1: A bad start

Stella stood up from her bed. Knowing her mother, Twilight was still up to do some late night studying or some simple reading. She went down the stairs and looked into the library’s main room, where Stella thought her mother would be. She had guessed right: Twilight was indeed awake and busy reading a thick tome on her desk, Owlowiscious sitting on his pole besides her. The only noise was coming from a quill, every time Twilight made a note. Princess Celestia had given? her the book, which was about high-level magic for advanced users such as Twilight.

Slowly, Stella went to her mother’s side, who, too engrossed into the tome, took no notice of her until she spoke up.

“Mom?” Stella asked, startling her mother.

“Oh Stella, I didn’t know you were still awake. I thought you wanted to catch some good nights rest after today’s events.” Twilight said, raising an eyebrow at her daughter, pondering what could keep her awake.

Today’s events were, to be honest, a catastrophe for Stella. Not only did she manage to almost drown Sweet Apple Acres in water (literally) when the Apple family asked her for help, she had also made a complete and utter fool of herself when she asked Big Macintosh’s son for a date in public... right after he came out of the toilet. Everyponies eyes were on her when she shouted her date question. Realising where he just came out of, a deep pink appeared on her cheeks and while Stella mumbled some excuses, she quickly sped away from the scene, leaving the colt puzzled and startled behind. Stella rushed towards home as fast as she could. Upon entering, she quickly went up to her room, not bothering to answer the question her mother had.

“Yeah, I thought I could sleep, after what happened today. But there is something I have to tell you. I think it’s important, because it’s keeping me from sleeping for several weeks now. It’s about a nightmare I’m constantly having. Under normal circumstances, I would say it’s nothing. But to have the same nightmare for weeks? I would say that is something strange, and maybe you can help me figuring something out about it,” Stella replied with a hint of nervousness in her voice.

Twilight, now curious what kind of nightmare could haunt a pony for weeks, looked up from her tome and faced her daughter. She thought about her strange cutie mark and her abilities, and looked at her with a worried expression. Sighing, she gestured Stella to sit down at the table in the middle of the room.

“Shall I get some tea before I listen to your story? I have this new blend Zecora gave me, and it got quite an appealing taste,” Twilight asked.

Stella thought a moment about declining it, but then decided against it. After telling her story, the tea may help her to calm down.

“Sure, if Zecora got you to drink it, it must be good,” Stella said with a wink, which earned her a chuckle from her mother.

Twilight left Stella alone and went into the kitchen area to prepare the tea. Stella thought about how she should begin to explain her nightmare to Twilight. After several minutes Stella finally found a good explanation - or at least she hoped it was - and Twilight returned with the kettle and two cups. She poured her daughter and herself some tea, then sat down next to her and waited for Stella to begin, a curious expression planted on her face.

Stella closed her eyes and took a deep breath, as to calm her down, and began her tale of the nightmare.

“It all began about three months ago. At first, I didn’t pay any attention to it, as I thought it was only a one time nightmare, like other dreams. And the next night I had a normal dream, so I forgot about it. The night after that, however, the nightmare returned. I had intervals of one day between the nightmare until a month ago that changed, as I began to experience the nightmare every night.

“In my nightmare, I’m standing inside a cavern, a very large one. In the middle of the cavern is some sort of pillar, with runes and symbols I can’t decipher. I look around and see that inside the walls are seven doors or gates: six small ones with a symbol on each one and a gate twice as big as the other doors with all six symbols arranged as one. Three doors are set on the left side of the big gate, and the other three are on its right side.

“Curious, I go to one of the doors and examine it. The symbol on the door is a flame. But not just any flame, it looks exactly like the flame on my cutie mark. The door itself is made of stone, and when I knock at it with a hoof, I hear a hollow sound echoing behind it. Then I go and examine the other doors as well. Three other doors have exactly the same symbol of an element as I have on my flank. But the last two doors are somewhat out of place. The door directly to the left of the giant gate, the symbol there is a sun, similar to the one Princess Celestia has as her cutie mark. On the other side of the gate, the door has a crescent moon pictured on it, this time similar to Princess Luna’s cutie mark. But neither of those symbols are on my mark. I can’t understand why they are placed there.” Stella had her eyes closed, to recall the details, as she described what the cavern looked like.

“Then, after examining the cavern, I begin to hear whispers. At first, I can barely hear them. Besides them, I can’t hear other sounds at all. No earth rumbling, no dropping of water from stalagmites, not even wind blowing through the cave. Only the whispers. As time goes on, the whispers become clearer, but I still can’t understand the words. There is also the part where smoke is coming out of the gate, a blackish-dark looking smoke. The whispers are becoming more and more clearer now, and the smoke begins to take on form.

“The first part to take on form are some sort of hooves, but they could also be something else. I... can’t really describe it. After that the smoke rises up and begins form legs with a dark red coat on them attached to the hooves. Now the waist and hip are forming, also with the red fur on them. Then a large body part of a creature I have never seen before begins to form. It’s hairless with six bunches around a hole in the center of the lower part. The upper part of the torso is divided in two, and hairless like the bottom part. From its shoulders it grows two appendages akin to our forelegs, but they’re visibly thinner than it’s legs. Also, hairless like the rest of it’s upper half. Then, finally, the head comes into sight. Normally, this is the point I tend to wake up, covered in sweat. Up til today, I have never seen the head of that thing.” Stella ended her explanation of the nightmare and looked at her mother’s face, waiting to hear what she was thinking about it.

Twilight sat in silence and thought about what she just heard, already going through her mental list of books she could use as research material.

“Well, I honestly have no idea about the creature nor the place. It’s just too strange. But I will help you the best I can, because I love you and you peaked my curiosity. I already thought of a list of books we can use to see if we can find anything related to your dream. Because under normal circumstances, it’s not possible to remember a dream, much less a nightmare, in this detail and describe it to other ponies. I felt like I was inside you nightmare, but was still sitting here listening to you. I don’t know what is going on, but now I want to find out the meaning behind it. Maybe we can ask Princess Luna for help, as she can enter the dreams of ponies,” Twilight explained her next course of action.

“Alright mom. I really appreciate it, I feared you wouldn’t believe me and just wave it off like it was nothing to be concerned about.” Stella let out a breath of relief. What she feared the most, her own mother not believing her, didn’t come true and pulled off a huge weight from her heart.

Twilight smiled at her. “Of course my dear, I know you don’t say something like this just because you want attention. Let’s do everything we can to solve this puzzle.”

“I also want to find out why this is happening to me. So let us start, those books don’t read themself.” Stella replied, ready to look through every book her mother would give her.

Comments

[Regidar]

DAT COVERART

[Sage Probo]

1788560

I know, it's beautiful, isn't it?

[Regidar]

1788590 Truly a masterpiece.

Also, the fic: it seems like a wonderful start. Have an upvote.

One last note: Your avatar.

google.com/url?source=imglanding&ct=img&q=http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Z3Ax5B-yV2Y/TGr4U2CvTSI/AAAAAAAAAWw/yEfYGPikP94/s400/diabeetuscat.jpg&sa=X&ei=R97IULrHE8TXiAL7mYHoDA&ved=0CAkQ8wc&usg=AFQjCNEbWKxYNVpfLRILitY_MBgOdfQ42w

[Sage Probo]

Thank you

[LunaUsesCaps]

thats the most beautiful and inspiring cover art ive ever laid eyes on

[Dr. Fumbles]

Besides the marvelous cover pic (you need to tell me the artists name, it's just so good), this story seems very good. I'll wait until there is a little more before I give a critique and a like. But so far, it seems to be in the right direction.

[Sage Probo]

I need to change that pic soon