Epic Pony: Friendship is Legend

Part 1: Equestrian Secrets
Chapter 5: Rescue From Below

Snarling and hissing, the Chimaera neared Applejack and the fillies, while the others looked on in terror from below.

“Git back!” Applejack commanded, standing her ground, “Ah said Git back!”

The Chimaera roared fiercely at Applejack. Behind her, Sweetie Belle suddenly whimpered.

“Sweetie Belle!” Rarity shouted.

“Rarity!” Sweetie Belle yelped back, her voice wavering from fear.

“Don’t worry, Sweetie Belle, we’re going to get you out of there!” Rarity hollered.

All three heads of the Chimaera turned in the direction of Rarity’s voice. Seeing her chance, Applejack turned and gave a mighty kick to both the lion and the goat heads with her back legs, which, as the girls knew well, were quite strong. With a furious bellow, the Chimaera recoiled in pain. It lashed out furiously at Applejack, and, with a single powerful swipe, knocked her to the ground.

“Applejack!” Apple Bloom cried in shock. She looked at her downed sister with tears in her eyes, until another roar from the Chimaera brought her attention to it.

“That’s it!” Rainbow Dash fumed. “Nothing attacks our friends! C’mon, girls! ATTACK!”

With a vigorous war cry, she charged straight through the air at the Chimaera. Once she reached it, however, it immediately spewed flames at her, and she was nearly engulfed. She managed to pull away in time, so only her tail caught fire.

“Yipe!” she exclaimed, flying to and fro in an attempt to put her tail out. “Why didn’t anypony tell me it could breath fire?”

The Chimaera readied itself to emit another stream of flames, but was stopped when a pebble came out of nowhere and flew right into its goat head.

“That’s for scaring the hooves off of my sister!” Rarity yelled, and used her unicorn magic to throw more pebbles at it. Twilight Sparkle quickly joined in, while Pinkie Pie said to Fluttershy, “Quick! While it’s distracted, carry me up to the ledge!”

Fluttershy flew over to Pinkie Pie, picked her up with all the strength she could muster, and made her way around Rarity and Twilight’s pebble projectiles to where the fillies stood dumbfounded. When she carefully dropped Pinkie Pie on the ledge, Pinkie Pie whistled at the Chimaera, and shouted, “Hey, you! Yeah, you! You big meanie three-heads!”

The Chimaera turned its attention to Pinkie Pie, the pebbles beating into its side.

“When you’re dealing with me,” Pinkie Pie declared, “You’d better be ready for a PARTY!”

And with that, she took out and opened up a wooden crate, and a bunch of balloons zipped out, deflating in the Chimaera’s faces. It reared up, clawing at the balloons with its paws. Pinkie Pie quickly took out what looked like a missile launcher. As she fired it, large clumps of confetti pelted the Chimaera.

“Ha! How about a little confetti?” Pinkie Pie remarked boldly, and fired until her confetti launcher was empty. The Chimaera moved this way and that, trying to shake off the confetti. The dragon head started choking on a handful of streamers.

Pinkie Pie then took out a couple of cream pies, and threw them right into the Chimaera’s faces. It howled with fury.

“I sure hope defeat is your favorite flavor!” Pinkie Pie commented snazzily. Behind her, the fillies rolled their eyes and murmured in response to her cheesy lines.

Seething with rage at this point, the Chimaera threw off the cream pies and fired a jet of flames. Since she was standing in front of the fillies, who were huddled behind her, Pinkie Pie took the blaze full on. When the flames subsided, she was black with soot, and her mane was frizzy.

“I guess roasted pony is your favorite flavor,” Pinkie Pie weakly moaned. She coughed, then fell over on top of Applejack. The three fillies screamed. Rainbow Dash, who had just put her tail out, saw Pinkie Pie and became furious.

“Alright, you’re asking for it, now!” she thundered, and charged at the Chimaera again. Unfortunately, it was quick, and caught Rainbow Dash by her head just before she rammed into it. With a mighty heave, it lobbed her in another direction. Unable to resist the force, she crashed into a cave wall with an unpleasant thud.

“It really is one of the most ferocious creatures in the world,” Rainbow Dash mumbled dizzily, as she slid down the wall.

“Rainbow Dash!” Fluttershy called out. “Pinkie Pie!”

The Chimaera now turned to Rarity and Twilight, who were still launching pebbles at it. With a flick of its tail, it sent two pebbles hurling straight at them. The pebbles hit them square in their foreheads, not enough to knock them out, but enough to stun them a little. As she massaged her forehead, Twilight thought she saw movement in the pond in front of her.

“Alright, that does it!” Fluttershy yelled, landing in front of her unconscious friends. She was infuriated, and to those who knew Fluttershy, that meant trouble. “It’s bad enough that you’re an intimidating monster,” she blustered, staring the Chimaera down, “And it’s bad enough that you’ve probably attacked ponies before, and it’s bad enough that you have the nerve to torture these three little angels, but now you’ve hurt every one of my friends! And I don’t like it! I’m going to give you one last chance to stop, because you wanna know what I think? I think you’re a bad, BAD, BAD, BAD KITTY!”

The Chimaera stared at Fluttershy for a brief moment, then roared in her face. Fluttershy jumped back with a squeal, her newfound bravery instantly gone, and timidly asked, “Are you sure you don’t want to ease up just a bit?”

The Chimaera took a few steps closer, and looked ready to pounce, but, just then, a pony poked her head out of the water and called out, “Hey, furball!” Right when the Chimaera looked in her direction, she fired a burst of water at it, soaking it entirely.

Still just conscious enough to see and talk, Rainbow Dash stated, “That’s her. That’s the pony we saw. The one in the lake. The one with the… fish tail.” And with that, she let her head droop.

With an aggravated roar, the Chimaera spewed flames at the pony, who ducked into the water in time to avoid them completely. A few seconds passed, and then the surface of the pond began to swirl. Twilight could see the silhouette of the pony rocketing to the surface, spinning rapidly, as the water twirled faster and faster. Finally, with a mighty leap, the pony breached the water, bringing a vortex of water with her.

And then, Twilight saw it. Rarity saw it. The fillies saw it. They all gasped when they saw the pony’s tail, for there it was, a fish-like tail, as clear as day, in the place of normal pony hindquarters.

The pony sailed right into the Chimaera, directing the vortex of water right at it. Colliding hard into it, the pony ricocheted off and fell back into the pond, while the water from the vortex splashed onto the beast. The Chimaera, now roughened up and soggy wet, stomped wrathfully at the ground. The pony peeked out of the water again, this time holding a strange orb containing a crystal in her hoof.

“If you think that’s ‘cool,’” she said, imitating Pinkie Pie’s style, “Then why don’t you just… chill… out!” And with that, she chucked the orb at the Chimaera. Once it made contact, the orb shattered, turning into a fine blue dust that began to surround the Chimaera. As it writhed in agony, the Chimaera began to stiffen and crystallize. Slowly its whole body turned to ice, starting from its feet and working up the body to its heads. With a final, drawn out howl, the entire creature was transformed completely into an ice sculpture.

For a moment, everypony stood rooted to the spot. Then, the fillies walked up to the Chimaera and made faces and taunted it, to see if it was still alive. Seeing no response, they shared a sigh of relief.

“You saved us!” Sweetie Belle appreciatively called out to the pony in the water. “And you helped, Rarity!”

“But of course,” Rarity responded, “You’re my sister.”

“Just one question,” Scootaloo piped up, looking at the pony, “Who… I mean, what… I mean, how… I mean… well…”

The pony smiled up at Scootaloo. “I suppose you’re curious about my tail,” she said, “Well, I should have expected that. I’ll explain later, but first, it looks like your friends might need some patching up.”

“Applejack!” Apple Bloom suddenly gasped, and turned to her still unconscious sister. “Is she gonna be all right?” she asked tentatively.

“She’ll be fine,” the pony assured, “Just get her over here so I can heal her.”

“I’ll do it,” Rainbow Dash stated, getting up, “Fluttershy, you take Pinkie Pie.”

Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash flew up to the ledge, grabbed their friends, and lowered them carefully to the pond’s edge, where the pony swam over and examined them. While she did that, the two made another trip for Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom. Once she was safely on the ground, Sweetie Belle scurried over to Rarity, and the two sisters hugged.

“Oh, Sweetie Belle,” Rarity wheezed affectionately, “When I found out the situation you were in, I was so scared. I thought I was going to lose you.”

“And I thought I would never see you again,” Sweetie Belle replied.

Scootaloo cautiously glided down to the ground. Landing next to Rainbow Dash, she suddenly threw her hooves around her and buried her face into her side, surprising her. “That was so scary!” she sobbed in a muffled voice.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed, pushing Scootaloo aside quickly, “That’s a little too close, sport.” Seeing Scootaloo mope, she reached over and patted her on the head.

“How are they?” Twilight asked, walking over to Pinkie Pie and Applejack, who were lain out side by side on the ground.

In response, the pony pointed at Applejack. “This one’s scratched pretty badly,” she reported, and then pointed to Pinkie Pie. “And this one’s burnt about the same amount. However, it’s nothing I can’t cure,” she added jovially, and dove under the surface. She returned a minute later holding a curious-looking plant in her hooves. The plant was aquamarine in color, with long, curled leaves coming from the stem, and a large tear-shaped bud at the tip. The pony squeezed the stem lightly, and the bud opened to reveal a similarly shaped glob of electric-blue gel, which the pony began to rub on Applejack and Pinkie Pie.

“This should do the trick,” she explained, “It’s Aqua Vera*, a medicinal plant found only underwater. It has amazing restorative qualities, but it only works on injuries on the outer body.”

While the pony applied the Aqua Vera gel, the others decided to get a good look at her. She had a blue-grey coat, with a soft, yellow-green colored mane. Her large, friendly eyes were a beautiful sea green. Instead of nostrils on her snout, there were gills behind her cheeks. As she leaned over Pinkie Pie and Applejack, the others could see a cutie mark on her side: three small orange fishes swimming in formation.

Much to everypony else’s surprise, the Aqua Vera worked fast. Within moments of it being applied, the marks on Applejack were gone, and Pinkie Pie returned to a bright pink coloration. As soon as that happened, the both of them stirred, and slowly opened their eyes.

“What… happened?” Applejack asked quietly.

“Did it… eat me?” Pinkie Pie wondered aloud.

The two of them rose to their feet, looking around. When they noticed the iced Chimaera, Pinkie Pie burst, “Hey, look! The Kimmy… thing turned into a beast-sicle!”

“How in tarnation…?” Applejack began, but then she turned her attention to the pony in front of her. “Who are you?” she asked.

“She’s the pony we saw in the lake!” Pinkie Pie blurted excitedly, bouncing up and down, “The one with the fish tail! She’s the one with the fish tail! Come on, let’s see it!” she requested, staring at the pony with interest.

Blushing, the pony lifted her tail partially out of the water. Applejack nearly fell over in astonishment.

“You’re a… a fish pony?” Applejack remarked.

“Well, ‘fish pony’s’ not exactly the official name for it,” the pony pointed out, “But, yeah, pretty much.”

“Where did you come from?” Twilight asked. “Are there others like you? If there are, how come I’ve never read about you?”

“I’m afraid I don’t have any time to explain,” the pony sadly replied, “I have to get back to where I live, otherwise I’ll be in trouble. Big trouble. How about we meet again sometime? Tomorrow afternoon, maybe? We should might right here, in this cave.”

“Okay, we’ll see ya then,” Pinkie Pie said casually, as if they were planning an everyday meetup.

“By the way,” Rarity uttered, as the pony made to dive down, “Thank you for saving pretty much all our lives just now. I can’t thank you enough for rescuing my dear sister Sweetie Belle.”

“Oh, it was nothing,” the pony said, “Your friends helped me out the other day, so I was simply returning the favor.”

She was about to submerge herself in the water, but then Rarity called out, “Wait! In all of this excitement, we didn’t even ask for your name! How very rude of us!”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” the pony replied, “And my name is Kelptail, but just call me Kelpy.”

And with that, she waved at everypony, and then dipped into the water, out of sight.

*A play on “aqua” and “aloe vera”. No relation to any products that may have this name.