Underflow

Chapters

Too Many Pipes
More Than One
Maintenance Exit

Too Many Pipes

"There's a problem with the pipes running to the eastern Ponyville." the pegasus mare exclaimed to her coworkers and pointed at the map in the office, belonging to the Ponyville Maintenance Service. "The residents there have reported malfunction in faucets, bathrooms, showers, etcetera."

"So just a faulty water pipe, huh?" the earth pony mare across her asked, leaning back on her chair with her rear legs on the table. She brushed away a piece of her lime green mane away from her face, as well as some dirt off her bright orange coat. The grey-coated earth stallion next to the mare glanced at her, before returning his attention towards the pegasus.

"Define 'malfunction', Calambite. How bad is it?" he asked. He was a bit younger than both of his female coworkers, but already tried to put on a professional attitude.

Calambite, the light blue pegasus mare, looked over to the stallion. "Very bad. Not even a single drop of water can be extracted from anywhere in the homes. They're completely dry."

"Looks like just another mishap to the supply pipe. No need to worry, either of you." the earth mare on the chair said with a smirk. Somehow, she managed to reach out from her sitting position and rustled the stallion's charcoal-black mane with intensity. "Or are you scared that ponyville will turn into a desert, much like Saddle Arabia, Iokin?" she teased.

"Hey! My cousin's from Saddle Arabia!" Iokin snapped back.

Calambite face-hoofed. "Both of you cut that out." she told them. "We need to get this fixed soon. Otherwise, the mayor's gonna be on our flanks again. I don't know about you, but I don't want a repeat of that so called 'Sardine-and-Salad Day' competition. You know, that time when those discarded foodstuffs clogged up the sewage?"

Both earth ponies shuddered at the memory.

"Yeah, all that grease and oil leaking out onto the street. Ewww..." Iokin mumbled.

"So let's get on it!" Calambite exclaimed. "Get your suits on and meet me outside in ten minutes. Iokin..." she looked to the stallion, "...don't forget to grab the toolbox this time."

Iokin nodded and shimmied out of the office at her command.

"And, Trippy..."

The earth mare looked up from where she was sitting on the chair. She wasn't leaning on it anymore, and her rear hooves had gone down from the table to the floor. Calambite pondered for a second before resuming; "Eh, I don't know. I forgot. Maybe...uhh, when we get back you should take a shower or something. It's the only way to get the dirt out of your coat and mane."

Trippy rolled her eyes and exclaimed an annoyed "Fiiiiine." before standing up from the chair and leaving the office through the same door that Iokin had.

Ten minutes later, the three ponies had gathered, all wearing luminous green worker vests, and was heading for the eastern region of Ponyville, each one of them chatting merrily with each other about plans for later, some rumouring and other news. Soon, they had reached their destination: A hatch in the ground to a maintenance tunnel, leading to the pipe system where the problem was believed to lie.

Calambite lifted the hatch for the others and let them enter first before hopping down into the tunnels herself. All of them turned on the flashlights attached to their vests (although Iokin for some reason preferred to hold it in his mouth) and travelled a bit into the dark passage. Thin pipelines close to the walls surrounded them.

After a bit of walking, the small passage opened up, and increased in size. They had entered a larger room, containing multiple larger pipes as well as an incredible amount of thinner ones. Constantly there were sounds of water dripping, running, splashing and whatnot.

"Holy crap. It's been a while since I was down here." Trippy announced. "I didn't remember it being so... packed."

Calambite and Iokin could do nothing more than agree. The room was absolutely filled with pipes in all sizes, covering from ceiling to floor. There were a few lightbulbs hanging just overhead that gave light to just how many there were. Hundreds.

Calambite spoke up: "Well, I think that we are going to have to get to the other side of the room. The faulty pipe should be there."

As she spoke, she walked forward and tried to find a way past all the pipes blocking the way. She found a problem however. There was no easy way past.

She searched between the pipes, but it seemed like all gaps between them were just too narrow. Calambite huffed and took flight, hovering higher up in attempts to find a passage, but had no luck there either. After a short while of searching she gave up and landed next to the others.

"Uhm, problems?" Iokin asked and raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, I see no obvious way past the pipes." Calambite proclaimed and gestured back to where she had just searched. "They are blocking our way!"

"What? Really?" Trippy exclaimed and walked past Calambite to have a look herself. "That can't be true, this is for maintenance! Does that mean we've got to go back?"

"This is odd, I know." Calambite replied, looking at Trippy over her shoulder. "The entrance we took down here is the closest one for at least a few miles. The odds for an inconvenience like this, I have no..."

"What about this then?" Trippy interrupted and pointed towards one of the pipes.

It was an odd sight compared with the other pipes which were neatly running across one wall to the other. This pipe was a T-shape, sticking out of the ground with one end of it pointing towards the ponies, and the opposite towards where they had to go. It was hollow, allowing them to look through it, and see that it led directly past the blockade of pipelines.

"I-I don't know about that one" Calambite said and eyed the pipe. "It seemed narrow when I looked at it..."

"Aww, come on! This is the perfect entrance for us! See here?" Trippy said and pointed into the pipe. The passage seemed not be affected by its T-shape, leaving it as a perfect cylinder opening. "See? It's completely smooth as well. This would probably save us an hour of precious time!"

Calambite swallowed. Time was indeed precious. Would they not have the problem fixed for the residents soon, the office would probably be delivered an angry letter from the townsfolk complaining about the poor service...again.

"I guess you're right, Trippy." Calambite said and walked up to the pipe. "Although I would like to go first. Make sure it's functionable and all."

Trippy shrugged, said "Suit yourself." and backed up to allow some space for Calambite. The pegasus mare took some time to eye up the pipe again. It wasn't very long, about her body length actually, but she'd have to crawl the entire way. Plus, it seemed narrow. Very narrow. But Trippy was right, it seemed possible.

Calambite picked up the red metal toolbox and placed it inside the pipe, before launching it through. The box slid all the way through the pipe and landed on the other side with a heavy clank, but remained intact. Calambite put one of her forehooves on the metal edge of the hole, removed her flashlight from the suit and handed it over to Trippy.

"I'm not gonna lie, this will be tight. But...let's do this."

She caught a glimpse of Trippy pretending to wave a small banner as a cheer as she turned back to the pipe and put her forelegs through. When she came up to her shoulders, the progress slowed down a little, but she still managed to progress. Her chest inched through slowly as well, and she soon had to catch a break in order to preserve energy.

"Everything alright?" both Trippy and Iokin almost asked in sync. They looked at eachother and grinned awkwardly before returning their gaze on Calambite.

"Yeah, I'm fine!" Calambite replied as she reached her stomach. "It's just a little -ngh- snug!"

Luckily, all the crew members were pretty slim, so the stomach part didn't seem very hindering for the pegasus. Of course, she had to squeeze her wings tightly towards her body as they entered the pipe, but it didn't cause too much of a hassle.

As she squeezed in, Iokin, the only male in the trio, couldn't help but notice Calambite's rear move up and down as she tried to find the right angle to get inside. He blushed a little and tried to look away, but found himself occasionaly peeking back at her rump. Trippy on the other hand seemed more curious, and sometimes reached out a hoof like she would want to help her friend in her struggle, but held back just to avoid creating awkward situations.

As Calambite had almost managed to squeeze past her stomach, Iokin noticed that her rear, especially the hips, seemed slightly larger in proportion to the pipe's entrance. Trippy seemed to have noticed the same thing, and the two earth ponies glanced nervously at eachother.

The pegasus felt very compressed inside the pipe, but still had enough room to be able to crawl forward. With a few more heaves, she was able to pull the rest of her upper body inside. The ambience of the water running was muffled in the pipe, but she'd almost managed to reach the end of it.

"Yeah Trippy, you were right!" she called out triumphantly to her two companions just outside and continued pressing forward. "This way was a lot fast-" she began but halted as she felt no progression. She heaved herself forward a few times without any signs of progress. Calambite fumbled with her forehooves and managed to reach the edge of the pipe's exit, took hold of it and tried to pull herself in like that.

Outside, Trippy's and Iokin's thoughts were confirmed as they saw their friend's hips reach the hole. Their width, combined with her buttocks, were just enough to prevent them from entering. Muffled grunts could be heard from within the cylinder crawlspace, and the pegasus mare would occasionaly kick her rear legs against the ground, trying to get inside.

Calambite gave a few more heartly pulls, all without effect, before she heard Trippy ask; "Uhm...Calam? Is everything going okay?"

She sighed and took a short rest. "I'm not sure, I-I can't move any further." she replied and gave a hard shove. When she did, she felt her hips nudging the metal rim. She groaned and face-hoofed as she realized what the problem was.

Trippy opened her mouth and was just about hint on Calambite's predicament, when the pegasus suddenly called out; "It's my butt isn't it?"

The earth pony mare blushed slightly and nodded. "Yep..." she replied. Iokin was just staring at Calambite, speechless at the sight of her rear jamming the tiny pipe.

"Well that's just fantastic." Calambite muttered sarcastically for herself and tried to pull herself in again. Like before however, she was not able to make any progress. Feeling that her struggles were in vain, she stopped again and called out to the others:

"I'm not going to get through this on my own. You're going to have to help me if we are going to solve this mess."

Iokin perked up at this and noticed Trippy move closer to the trapped mare's rear. He followed her lead, and positioned himself at Calambite's right side. Trippy looked up at him. "So you're in on this too, huh?" she asked, a smug grin springing onto her face.

Iokin nodded and smiled sheepishly, slightly embarrassed by what Trippy might think of him, willingly putting up with touching his coworker's rear. "Figured you guys might need an extra hoof." he explained.

She giggled. "Surely." she replied before turning her attention towards the mare in the pipe. "Ready?" she called out.

Calambite heard her call, and grappled the edges of the pipe's end again. "Ready!" she replied.

Without hesitating, trippy lifted Calambite's left leg with one of her hooves, planted the other on the pegasus' rear and began pushing. Iokin copied her actions and did the same. Both of them heaved hard, aiming to force the mare's rump into the pipe.

Calambite gasped at the pressure applied to her backside at first, but quickly mustered her strength and pulled herself as hard as she could. Although it was rough, she felt herself slipping forwards slightly, inch by inch. The ponies pushing her must have noticed this as well, as they tried to push her even harder.

It wasn't until the struggle had been going on for a while that all three of them realized that the progress had stopped. Calambite's hips had partially entered the hole, but had now reached their widest part and was accompanied by her buttcheeks, squashed brutally to fit into the hole. The pegasus mare tried to pull herself in again, but felt like she was sitting like a rock. Iokin had given up due to fatigue and was standing aside, trying to regain some of his stamina. Only Trippy was trying to force her friend through the pipe now, grasping both of her rearcheeks and pushing with all her might.

Calambite appreciated her friend's eagerness to help her out, but felt like they had to stop and rethink their procedure. "Trippy, hold up for a moment!" she called out.

Trippy shoved her one last time before obliging and stepping back, panting lightly from her efforts. She saw Calambite's rear shifting slightly, as if the pegasus mare was trying to find an angle to be able to proceed. She was visibly straining, and audible grunts were heard from the pipe's interior.

"I don't know about you, but you seem pretty stuck to me." Trippy said and poked Calambite's rear playfully. Iokin noticed and looked away quickly, his face fading to a slight shade of red.

Calambite sighed and planted her front hoofes onto the pipe's insides. "I guess you're right." she said and began shuffling her way backwards.

Or atleast tried to.

She immediately felt her hips straining against the metal rim, refusing to move anywhere. The pegasus mare attempted to push herself backwards, only to discover that she couldn't. Her rump stuck fast in the hole and wouldn't budge an inch.

"Dammit!" she called out. "I can't go back either!"

Trippy perked up and threw herself on Calambite's rear, hindering her from continuing the struggle. "Going back? Don't give up so soon girl, not now when we've gotten you so far!"

"I told you, I can't get in any further than this." she shouted back. "If your pushing didn't help, then what will?"

"Just give me a little time to work with this." Trippy replied.

The pegasus mare hesitated, but obeyed and allowed the earth mare to do her work. I hope she's right about this. she thought.

Trippy began experimenting, comparing her friend's butt with the size of the hole and pushed on them lightly. She shone up when the cheeks budged a little, leaving some space for them to be crammed in. Through that small space she could see a bit of her friend's back, but not much else.

Wow, she really manages to fill up a lot! she thought and squeezed the backside again. Hmm... seems bigger than usual. Has she gained some? Hope not, or else this will be impossible. Hay, what if I'm this big? Would I be able to fit through here if I had to, or would I end up like Calambite? She looked over at her own rear for comparision. Maybe I should go the gym more often...

Calambite shuffled uncomfortably under Trippy's hooves, hoping that her friend would start pushing instead of feeling her up. The movements by the trapped mare managed to break Trippy's train of thought, and she regained her focus on the task at hoof.

"Oh, ehrm..." she started before turning towards Iokin, idly watching her groping Calambite's ass. "...Iokin! Could you help me with a thing here?"

Iokin nodded slowly and stepped up the mares. "So here's the thing: I can force a piece of your butt further between the edge of this thing and the...rest of you. Calam, you gotta push forward for extra space. Io, could you please push her butt down?"

Iokin naturally blushed to this assignment but olbiged nonetheless. Together with Trippy he set his hooves onto the mare's rear and pushed downwards, opening up some space for filling. Calambite pushed forward lightly, following Trippy's orders, interested in seeing what the earth mare could come up with.

Trippy pressed down the light-blue mare's butt also, whilst at the same time pressing them further into the tube. It took a while, but eventually they'd propped in enough of Calambite's rear to feel content with their work. For Calambite though, it felt like she'd been wedged even further.

"What now?" the stuck mare asked her companions after no longer feeling their hooves prodding on her rear.

"Now, we go back to pushing!" Trippy replied with enthusiasm, and slammed into the pegasus' behind, making her yelp in suprise. Iokin followed on quickly, slowly coming over the sensation of embarrassment from toying around with his friend's back part.

Trippy pushed on as hard as before. She felt Calambite's rump tense up and then budge inwards, both from the stuck mare pulling herself in and because the method that Trippy tried seemed to work.

Calambite strained and struggled, trying to wiggle herself in. She felt that she managed to slide her butt further in with her, but that her hips still held her in place. She focused on wiggling those specifically, but could not achieve much thanks to her compressed state. The others outside were going strong, but no matter how hard they pushed her, they were not able to unwedge her hips from the pipe's edges.

Finally, Iokin gave up from fatigue and sat down on his haunches to rest. Trippy was left to, alone, force her friend through the hole. She obviously wasn't giving up, grabbing both of Calambite's legs and leaning her entire body onto her rear. When she noticed that normal straight-on pushing wasn't working, she began to thrust her friend forward, attempting to force her through with many, hard shoves rather than one long.

Calambite had soldiered on as well, but eventually had to lay down to rest too. She let Trippy keep up with the struggling, until she felt herself being shoved on hard, and feeling an aching pain in her flanks. "Ow! Trippy, stop!" she shouted and felt the pressure leave her backside. She would've given anything to be able to massage her hips now. "It's not working, I'm still not moving." she said and looked down into the blank metal surrounding her. "We just got to face it, we can't fit me through here. Help me go back." she prompted.

"Nonsense, we're on the right track." Trippy said.

"But I'm too big! Do we need to make it any more clear? Just look!" she called out and pushed backwards, making her rump bulge out slightly. "My butt is especially the reason to why I'm stuck here! It's not getting through this...", she began struggling forward again in anger, "...stupid hole!"

"Well, all we have to do is to give it a big shove." Trippy suggested.

"You already tried that. It didn't work." Calambite replied and attempted to struggle out the way she came. Unfortunately for her, she wouldn't move in any direction, leaving her hopelessly stuck in the pipe entrance.

"Then we're just gonna have to shove harder!" Trippy exclaimed. She looked at the trapped mare and pondered for a moment before shining up and backing up a bit. Upon reaching a fair distance away from the pipe, she crouched down and prepared for a sprint. Iokin looked at her with a confused expression, but decided not to question the mare. Trippy took a deep breath and locked onto Calambite's rear. "Calam! Brace yourself!" she shouted.

Then she charged.

"What do-" was all Calambite could manage before Trippy reached her.

Right before arriving to Calambite, the earth pony mare jumped and let her hind legs go first, before letting them sink into Calambite's backside at full speed. The trapped pegasus let out a loud "OW!" and winced in pain, squrming inside the tight tunnel.

"Why the hay did you do tha..." she began, but noticed right away that something was different. The bottom section of her felt extremely compressed, but now it was the hind legs that were resting on the metal rim. She struggled forward and felt that she actually was able to move.

Trippy had just managed to groggily, from landing on her back, get off the floor when she heard her friend announce; "Hey, it worked!" Looking up, she saw that Calambite's rump had managed to go fully inside the pipe thanks to her bum-rush, and that she now was struggling to get further in. She cracked a grin and looked over to Iokin, who was just nodding approvingly in general. When he saw that Trippy was looking at him, he gave her a short applause, complete with more nodding.

Since her rear had now managed to go inside the pipe, there were no big struggles in trying to slide it through the rest of it. It just went kind of slow. Calambite evenually managed to squeeze her upper body through the pipe exit. Her progress only halted when she had to squeeze her hips out of the hole. Upon reaching that point, she grinded to a halt and had to tug harder.

"Come on..." she grunted, placed her hooves onto the metal rim and pushed hard whilst at the same time stretching out her upper body. Trippy and Iokin both looked at her nervously, before the pegasus mare, with some flapping of her wings, thrusted forward and fully slid out of the pipe.

"Yes!" all three of them shouted at the same time. Calambite was happy to be able to breathe normally again after feeling pressure from all sides. She landed by the pipe which she'd just gotten through after doing a small loop of success in the air. "Tightest squeeze of the year, guys!" she called out to the other two ponies. Trippy shoved the flashlight through the pipe to Calambite who took it in her mouth.

Alright, time to get to the task at hand! she thought, turned around...

*CLANG!*

...and immediately slammed her head into a very low-hanging pipe.

"Oh my gosh! Are you ok Calambite?" Iokin called out upon hearing the sound of his friend crashing into the metal.

Calambite only managed to see stars for a few moments until she regained her senses and shook her head. "Ow." she winced and rubbed her forehead. "Yeah, I'm fine. I just need to watch were I'm going."

She picked up her dropped flashlight, plus the toolbox, and trotted further into the pipe maze.

More Than One

After only a few feet however, Calambite was forced to stop. She had come across another wall af pipes, similar to the first one, except that there seemed to be more space between the pipes running horizontally and vertically. The area was abnormally clustered with pipes hanging everywhere, and the pegasus had to crouch slightly in order to even approach the next wall.

Well, atleast there still seems to be hope. she pondered, and scanned the scene for any routes further. Who the hay was in charge of the design anyway? It took her a minute, but eventually she was able to narrow her options down to a gap shaped by pipes running close to each other. This seems like my best bet... she sighed and bent down to climb through the gaps.

Calambite managed to navigate past the first couple of pipes with little trouble, before running into a horizontal and much more narrow gap. The mare halted and doubtingly measured the size of it with her eyes. Just her luck to run into something like this, but it seemed to be the only way. She eased her head through with relative ease, but felt just how tight it was when she was at her chest. She wriggled and forced herself further and further between the thin pipes. Straining hard, she thrusted herself forward once, which was enough to force her torso through the gap.

The pegasus mare sighed in relief. "Boy, that was some..." she started, but halted when she felt a tug coming from her hips. Her face paled immediately when she suddenly remembered about her hindquarters.

"Oh..."

She slowly craned her neck backwards to get a good look, and just as she'd feared, her flank had not gotten through yet, and did not seem to be able to do so. She leaned forward again and saw her hips and butt cram at the gap's opening, not even close to squeezing through, complete with the feeling of her body being pulled backwards.

"...horseshoes."

The mare planted her front hooves on the lower pipe and pushed forward hard, trying to squeeze her hip bone into the gap. She strained and grunted, but nothing was happening. Noticing the lack of effect, she heaved and thrusted forward instead, hoping to force herself through in a more brutal manner. Sadly, that did not seem to have a different effect than the pushing.

Calambite ceased her attempts, lightly sweating now. She looked back at her rear, confirming her suspicion of her lack of progress. Her buttcheeks seemed to contribute greatly to the stuckage, as they would simply bunch up whenever she'd try to go any further. They were too big to fit. So was there any way to shrink them?

The pegasus mare leaned back and stuck a hoof in between the pipes she'd been trying to fit through and fondled after her butt. When she finally found it, she attempted to push the soft rearcheeks down in order to make them smaller, whilst at the same time leaning forward. When doing this on both sides of her butt, she felt that more and more of it was able to frame through the tiny gap. Excited over the progress, she pushed forward again and slid in a little bit further.

Then she stopped again, as her hip clogged up the space.

Again, Calambite pushed. However, this time she felt that she had stopped completely. The pegasus struggled for a few more minutes, trying to fit all of her rear through, but finally had to give up. It was an unwinnable battle. The hip would just not fit.

The trapped mare took a small breather before looking back at the source of her troubles. She saw that only a portion of her butt had managed to fit through, and that her hip width refused any more to enter. She sighed yet again, this time out of annoyance, and laid her head to rest again. She would have to call upon the others again.

Slowly, she rose her upper body and rested on her elbows before turning her head to where she had come from.

"Hey! Hey guys!" she shouted. "I...I need your help again! I'm stuck!"

Just hope they can manage to get past that other damned pipe! Calambite thought worryingly.

Neither Iokin or Trippy had done much since Calambite's success in traversing the pipe wall. Both were sitting, waiting and listening for any commands that might come from the other side. The pipes around them felt still, as if they were deactivated, reminding them both of the current crisis in Ponyville. They had to get the pipe flow fixed as soon as possible, but the maintenance tunnel's architecture did not make that a simple task for them.

Eventually, Iokin spoke up: "You think she's found the problem yet?"

Trippy sighed. "I don't know. If I remember correctly, the valves shouldn't be too far away from here. That is unless memory fails me of course." she said and chuckled.

The stallion looked slightly confused. "Valves?" he asked and raised an eyebrow.

The mare looked at him with similar confusion for a few seconds before she suddenly threw up a hoof and slapped her own forehead. "Oh, I'm sorry Iokin!" she chuckled to him. "Guess I forgot to brief you properly, huh? You haven't been down here before, have you?"

"Umm...no?"

"Well, here's the thing:" Trippy exclaimed and sat more straight. While she spoke, she gestured vividly with her hooves. "Ponyville's water supply is not perfect. Sometimes, like now for example, the flow of water is forced to stop thanks to some wierd, or should I say, poorly-designed intersections between the pipes. When that happens, the flow has to be restarted manually by correcting a few valves attached to the flow pipes. It's been a while since this happened though, mostly thanks to the new and improved supply pipes installed not too long ago." she said and gestured to the masses of pipes hanging overhead. "Now only eastern Ponyville has this problem. Just a shame that the placements were so messed up."

"Alright. I see." Iokin nodded. "But if east Ponyville is left without the proper flow control, how exactly does the..."

Iokin was suddenly interrupted in his question by a shout coming from behind the pipe wall, the same side Calambite was on. Both ponies were on their feet and next to the wall in less than two seconds and listened intensly. Thanks to obstructing pipes and weak ceiling light, neither of them could see any further into the tunnel than just ten-or-something metres. Soon, another shout came.

"Hey, can you hear me?!"

"Calam, is that you?" Trippy called back into the darkness hoping that her friend was okay. Iokin just watched silently.

"Trippy, Iokin!" sounded another call from the tunnel. "I need your help, again."

"What's the matter?"

"I can't get through these pipes! Atleast not by myself. You'll have to come over here and help me!"

"Alright, we'll be right over!" Trippy shouted back to her. She turned to Iokin. "You heard that? She needs our help again. Let's go!"

"But, uhm, doesn't that mean we have to climb through the pipe?" Iokin said and pointed to the cylinder behind Trippy that their pegasus companion had crawled through earlier. Trippy looked behind her and gasped as the stallion's words dawned upon her.

"Crap, I didn't think about that!" she said.

Both maintenance workers trotted up to the opening and looked inside. The mare slowly stroked the edge of the hole before looking at Iokin, comparing his frame to the narrow passage. The stallion noticed that she was eying him up and quickly realized her intention.

"Trippy, you aren't thinking of..."

"You're more slender than I, Iokin. I think you should go through here, rather than me."

"Figured." he sighed and looked at the hole nervously. "But I'm not that much smaller than Calambite. I'm not sure if I could fit in there."

"The alternative is that I would try, and inevitably get stuck."

"I could push you on?"

"You would like that, wouldn't you?"

"Hey, same goes for you!"

"Guys?" another shout came down the tunnel. "Are you coming yet?"

Iokin glanced back and forth between the pipe and his coworker's commanding gaze. He gulped, then sighed in defeat. "Fine then. I'll go."

The mare in front of him shone up and cracked a smile. "I knew you wanted to! Well, go right ahead. I'll tell Calambite that you're coming."

After she had called on her friends, Calambite resumed the struggle to squeeze out of the pipe's clutches. Alas, all her attempts were in vain, and her struggles had been reduced to simply trying to find an angle that would possibly allow her to squeeze further, an effort tossed into the trash due to her trapped hip. She took another break, going down on her elbows again and simply staring at her hooves.

"Stupid butt..." she muttered. Suddenly, she heard Trippy's voice call out to her again some distance behind her.

"Alright Calam, we're sending Iokin through to your side. Think you can come over here and help him through?"

The pegasus mare looked back at her rear again. "Uhm...sure." she said and tried to move backwards. With a little force, her rump slipped out of the gap and she began crawling back. As she reached her torso however, her progress slowed down heavily. She remembered how difficult it was to get her chest in, and wondered if she would be able to squeeze out the way she came.

Her question was answered when she suddenly stopped with the middle of her torso through. She grunted and tried again. Still no result. Calambite raised her rear end up into the air, planted her back hooves onto the ground, and jerked her hips back in an attempt to heave herself out of her prison. This only hurt however, and got her no further.

She sighed in defeat. Not only was her rear too big to fit going through, her chest prevented her from going back! She pushed forward again, resting herself between the pipes on her belly and looked back. The others were going to have to do without her.

Iokin had managed to get his upper part of the torso through when Calambite responded; "S-sorry guys! I can't get back from here."

Trippy's face adapted a slight shade of white as she turned from looking at the struggling Iokin to face the darkness again. "What?! Don't tell me you're stuck again, are you?"

"You didn't hear me before? I said I was stuck." came the response.

The earth mare rubbed her forehead in frustration. "Okay...well how bad is it this time?"

"There's...well...there were two pipes with a gap between them. I tried to squeeze through, but I couldn't fit. And now I can't back out either!"

"Wait, wait, wait, wait...hold up there Calam. You're telling me that the only way to get any further through this tunnel would be to try and fit through a tiny gap left by the pipe blockage?" Trippy asked in disbelief.

"Sounds unlikely, I know. But that's what it is."

"Wow, I am so going to sue somepony for this!" Trippy murmured. She once again looked over to where Iokin was now struggling to fit what was left of his torso through the opening, kicking his hind legs whilst trying to lift them up so he could crawl in. "Seriously, this was not in the job description." she continued and walked over to him. In one swift motion, she grabbed his flailing legs and pushed him hard into the pipe, cramming all of his upper body into the tight passage.

"Wah!" Iokin yelped over the sudden activity, but calmed down the moment after. "T-thanks Trippy."

"No problem, dude." Trippy replied with a smile.

That smile instantly faded when she noticed his hips hitting the edges of the hole.

The width of Iokin's hips was slightly larger than the diameter of the passage. His rear was not of the same size at Calambite's luckily, but it still clearly hindered him from venturing any further into the pipe. Iokin squirmed and kicked with his hind legs trying to fit himself further in, but without success. His tail flicked impatiently, and noises of struggle could be heard from within the pipe.

Trippy sighed. "Well, atleast it was somewhat expected..." she mumbled to herself. She leaned foward as if to speak to Iokin, but had to quickly dodge sideways as his right leg suddenly flailed up, threatening to kick her by accident. He was trying harder and harder to squeeze into the pipe, using his rear legs to jerk his body further. The earth mare approached him from the side, put her face close to the pipe's rim where her companion was trapped and called out to him: "Are you okay there?"

"Ngh! Hngh!" was his first response as he continually tried to push himself forward. After a few seconds however, his legs sloped down and an audible sigh was let out from within the cylinder. "I'm fine."

"Really?" she replied doubtingly.

Iokin raised his right hind leg and performed another fruitless effort to squeeze further in. "Well, I'm feeling okay. It's just that...I-I think I'm stuck."

"Figured." Trippy answered and looked at the area where his body stuck out. The bottom of his green worker vest was still visible, otherwise he'd managed to get his entire torso in, up until his hip area. "How does it feel? Can you pull yourself forward with your arms?"

"No. There's no way. It's so tight I can barely breathe, let alone move around."

"Really?" she asked again, much more sincere this time. "Well, I don't want to the bringer of bad news, but..." Trippy shifted on the spot slightly, trying to figure out how to describe her friend's predicament with atleast some dignity. "...your upper body won't be the only thing keeping you up, if you catch my drift."

Inside the pipe, the grey tone on Iokin's face faded into a slight shade of red as he bit his lip in embarrassment. "Yeah...I felt that..." he replied.

The mare behind him blushed as well, realizing just how embarrased he had to be in this situation. She reached out a hoof towards him. "Hey, listen; I should pull you out. You were right. I should have...

Iokin jerked his head up in reaction to her words, accidentaly slamming his head into the pipe's ceiling with a loud *CLANG* in the process. Wincing, he reached out rub his head, but found that he couldn't thanks to being completely compressed within the passage. The noise had however caused Trippy to retract her helping hoof enough so that the stallion could call out to her before she reached him.

"No, wait! Ow...wait." he said as he waited for the pain in his skull to subside. "No, you were right, Trippy. We wouldn't have been any better off had you tried this instead of me. No offence, but you were probably right about the 'me being thinner' part..." he continued, mostly mumbling the last part of the sentence. He raised one of his hind legs as if testing if he could weigh himself inwards. "Thing is, I'm already, well... caught in here! We might as well try to get me all the way through instead of retreating, yeah?" His legs slumped down again. "I'm not tired yet!"

Trippy rubbed her chin in contemplation, but eventually cracked a warm smile. "It's nice that you want to continue, Iokin. I know quite a few ponies who would wimp out if something like this were to happen to them. It's admirable that you want to keep going."

"Aw, don't mention it! If it's all about helping out friend and that, you know..." He blushed again.

Suppose the chance of finding a girl in distress can grab any stallion, eh...? the mare though with a sly smile, looking at the part of Iokin sticking out of the pipe and planning her next move.

Now, let's see if we can get you out of there.

Calambite tried pushing herself forward again. This time however, she angled herself upwards in order to squeeze her hips through the gap first. The pipes that were holding her trapped creaked slightly, but remained as intact and inflexible as before. Pushing up hard, with a couple of groans escaping her on the way, she managed to feed a small portion of her hip between the gap.

Pausing mid-squeeze to catch her breath, Calambite sighed in relief. She could probably make it this time! The pegasus gathered her strength again and heaved herself forward with full force.

Nothing happened.

Confused, Calambite pushed forward again and looked back to see what was holding her up. She didn't see much, but still figured out what the problem was pretty quickly. Both of her buttcheeks had bunched up in the gap, preventing any forward momentum. She pushed harder, trying her hardest to squeeze her butt through, but soon felt that she just couldn't manage. Finally, she gave up on it and backed up, dislodging her hips from the gap and giving her legs some more space to breathe.

"So close..." she muttered and glared through the gap at her butt.

After a few moments of thinking, Trippy walked up behind Iokin's rump and cleared her throat. "Okay, I'm going to have to get a little physical if I wanna help you. Think you can handle that?"

"Go ahead! We still got some ice to break."

"Alright, here goes!" she called out to him and leaned her hooves on his rear. She had expected it to be about as soft as Calambite's, but noticed straight away that the stallion's was, in fact, a bit more firm. She pushed him forward, but felt like she could not quite get a grip of him that way. Iokin did his best to struggle along, but didn't achieve much being as crammed in as he was already. It seemed like only Trippy had the possiblity to budge the wedged stallion.

Trippy grabbed Iokin's rear legs from underneath, lifted them up, held them under her arms and leaned forward hard, figuring that Iokin would have a higher chance of squeezing in, would his entire body be on the same horizontal level. Inside the pipe, the stallion tried as hard as he could to pull himself forward with the help of his companion. However, neither of them seemed to be able to force the stuck pony an inch further.

Finally, both of them ceased their struggles and took a short break. Trippy sat down on her haunches and looked up at her friend in the pipe. They hadn't been able to squeeze his hips inside. Not yet atleast. She had a good feeling about this strategy, and perhaps it would work, would she get more brutal in her actions.

Iokin was the first to break the silence: "I don't know about you, but I don't think it worked." he said and shuffled his body slightly in discomfort.

"We're just gonna have to go harder on it." Trippy said as she wiped some sweat off her forehead.

"Uhm, I hope that doesn't mean you're going to ram me, right?" Iokin asked nervously.

"Nah. We haven't reached that stage yet." was her response. She stood up again and cracked her neck by leaning her head side to side. "It just means that I'll have to work harder on forcing your butt through."

"Well, do whatever you feel is necessary. I'm ready when you are." he called out to her.

"Right, raise your legs."

Iokin complied and let Trippy take his rear legs under her arms again. Trippy took a light breath to muster her strength, before shoving Iokin forward again. When she felt that normal, straight-on pushing did not have an effect, she instead began thrusting him forward, hoping to squeeze part of his hips further and further in with each thrust. The stallion winced slightly, but kept quiet, certain that his companion would do no harm to him.

As Trippy kept up the struggle, she noticed that the strategy actually was working to some extent. Iokin's flanks slowly gathered within the pipe's opening and more, and more of him was stuffed inside with each thrust. This inspired the earth mare to put more and more force into her thrusts, even using her own head to push straight on Iokin's butt, assisting the process. It wasn't until after a couple of minutes had passed until the stuck stallion couldn't continue withstanding the pain caused by her efforts.

"Ow, OW! Tri-ingh-py. Trippy! Stop!" Iokin shouted. Trippy halted her pushing immediately and stepped back a bit to both give her friend some space and to observe her work.

The first thing she noticed was that the absolute majority of Iokin's hip had been crammed into the tiny pipe. Only a small portion of it remained outside, not even enough to allow him to lower his hind legs anymore. However, his bottom seemed to have just reached the hole's edge, and although it wasn't as large as the pegasus mare's had been, Trippy was not certain that it would enter without a fight.

Iokin squirmed inside the pipe, seeming like he was continuing the struggle on his own. After a short while however, the struggling halted and Iokin's voice rung out from the cylinder; "Oh! I think I can reach the edge now!"

Trippy looked past the wall of pipes that had blocked off their way before and saw that, on the other end of the pipe her friend was sitting in, a grey hoof was fumbling on the edge. Iokin shifted again slightly, and a couple of grunts could be heard from his position. Now he was actually trying to squeeze himself further.

For Iokin, it felt like he was being squeezed on from all possible angles. He kept fumbling with the edge of the pipe's end, trying to pull his compressed body further through the metal prison. He could feel the walls pressing against his hips, proving that they had gotten inside, but no matter how hard he tried to pull his body through, he still felt that his backside was unmovable. Nothing he did seemed to be able to budge it.

Outside, Trippy was looking at Iokin's struggles. At one point she realized that her eyes kept focusing on his exposed rear, bidding to fit into the tight opening. She blushed slightly and tried to look away, when Iokin suddenly called out to her again.

"Trippy! I'm still stuck! I can't pull myself in!"

"Well...there's..." Trippy began, but trailed off as she tried to find any suitable words to describe his predicament, still staring at his butt as if hypnotized. After a couple of seconds however, she snapped back to her senses and shook her head. Deciding that a direct response would work best, she simply replied; "Your butt is still blocking the way."

"Wha-huh? Oh." He let out an audible growl, and spoke again, clearly frustrated. "Celestia damn it! If not even I can fit my flank through this damn..."

"Hey, it's not that big! I think I should still be able to knead it through." Trippy said and stepped up to him. "Why don't you try to pull yourself in while I'm doing it? It would probably make it easier for both of us."

"...a-alright then." Iokin answered and calmed down a bit, before continuing his struggle forward. The earth mare planted her hooves on Iokin's rump, and began forcing them into the tight passage, piece by piece.

Both of them worked on their part respectively, Iokin pulling himself forward and Trippy pushing his backside. After a while, nearly all of his butt was packed into the circular frame, leaving only a small part of his rearcheeks and hips outside, together with with his hind hooves and charcoal-black tail. Both of them decided to take yet another break from their struggles, allowing Trippy to finally sit down again and regain her strength and stamina.

Iokin now felt an extreme tightness around his rear as well, like he had been wedged even more. He tried to move forward again, but felt that he couldn't move an inch, no matter how hard he tried. As an experiment, he even tried to squeeze backwards and was met with the same result. He was completely trapped.

Yet again, Trippy stood up from her rest, ready to check up on Iokin. She walked up to his side again and faced the pipe. "That was quite the workout, don't you think?" she said with a light chuckle, before finally asking him; "How are you feeling?"

"Ngh...I'm fine. It's just a little snug."

"Good. You think you can make the rest?"

There was a slight pause before he responded. "No. Well, yes. But...erhm..."

"But what?"

"I...well, I can't really manage to get a grip on the edge just yet. It's just a little bit too far away." he said and began shifting again, trying to reach the end of the pipe. "And I'm like, really, really stuck in here. As in, 'not being able to move without your help'-stuck."

"You mean, 'not being able to move without me pushing your butt again'-stuck?" Trippy asked slyly.

"...Yes, just like that." he said. Another deep sigh. "Honestly, I'm not sure how Calambite had less trouble fitting through here than I."

"Her butt was pretty troublesome though, gotta say." she replied, lowering her voice so that the pony they were referring to wouldn't be able to hear them. "You know, with both of us pushing, and she still wouldn't budge?"

"Heh, guess you're right." Iokin said, a little relieved after being reminded that Calambite had equally as much difficulty with the passage as he did. "So anyhow, would you like to help me again?" he asked.

Trippy nodded silently and trotted up behind him again. She wouldn't be able to wrap her arms around his legs as before, so normal pushing would have to do. "Ready?" she called out to him and put her front hooves onto his butt yet again.

"Ready!"

The mare leaned forward again. She wouldn't be able to get a proper grip around the stallion's buttcheeks, but fortunately, it was not required to force him further in. Iokin tried his absolute hardest in squeezing through now, gripping the edges and pulling with all of his might.

It went ridiculously slow, but piece after piece, Iokin was pushed further and further into the tight passage. As a result, more and more of his arms came out of the opening on the other side. Pretty soon he was able to assist in the struggle with the tip of his elbows, and used them for a greater force.

It was only when his head was almost out of the pipe that he stopped yet again. His body was equally as compressed as before, and still really wedged. On top of that, he could no longer feel his coworker's hooves pressing on his rump. The stallion craned his neck in an attempt to look backwards and shouted to Trippy; "Hey! Why did you stop?"

Trippy wiped some sweat off her forehead and cleared her throat, preparing to tell him the hold-up. As she had pushed him, Iokin had slowly slided away from her reach, until she finally wasn't able to reach his rear anymore. Figuring that attempting to push his legs forward would be fruitless, she had simply backed off, standing idly by until Iokin would react.

"You're too far in, Iokin. I can't reach you anymore." she said and looked through the pipe wall. Sure enough, a piece of his head was sticking out of the pipe exit now, and anything he said was much more audible now than before.

"Aw, horseshoes." was his response. Trippy saw again how he tried to pull himself further through, attempting to use his elbows rather than his hooves which, to her, looked rather uncomfortable.

"You, uh...think you can get through by yourself?" she asked nervously.

"Hold on." he grumbled. He wiggled as hard as he could, aiming to squeeze forward again. Trippy simply sat by and observed the trapped stallion as he struggled to escape his tight prison. After just a few minutes of intense watching, Trippy was about to let out a sigh of defeat, when Iokin suddenly jerked onward and somehow slid slightly further through the pipe, his entire head now outside of it.

"Hah, alright..." he panted. He looked in Trippy's direction, finding her standing right behind the pipe blockade. "Yeah, I think I can manage this. Just give me some time!" he said.

Trippy sighed in relief, happy to hear the news. "Thank Celestia for that. I almost thought I would have to do an emergency call in order to get both your and Calam's flanks out of here!" she laughed.

"Now that's something I would not want to appear in the papers." Iokin chuckled.

"Hey! Hey!" Calambite's voice suddenly boomed out from the dark hall ahead. "What in the entire world is taking you so long?"

"Oh! Heh, I forgot about that..." Iokin chuckled nervously. "Sorry! I'll be there soon! Just, uh, sit tight!" he shouted down the hall, and began pushing himself further. Since he had managed to squeeze further, there was more room for him to utilize his elbows.

"Hah, 'sit tight'?" Trippy giggled. "Isn't that reassuring..."

Iokin slowly wiggled and crammed his chest through the metal cylinder, which went fairly easy. As he reached his belly however, he couldn't reach the exit rim with his elbows anymore, forcing him to push with his hooves yet again. Because of this, his progress slowed down by quite a bit, and he had to struggle harder to achieve any results.

Eventually, as his hips were close to reach the edge, Iokin had no other option than to push with completely outstreched arms. This weakened his struggle, and caused it to slow down significantly. He ceased his pushing for a moment to regain some energy, and looked over to Trippy again.

"You think we would have saved some time if we had taken the long route instead?" he asked her.

"Maybe, maybe not." the mare replied. "At this point, I feel that might have been true."

"Same here." Iokin said and looked back at the pipe. His hips were aching due to the tightness of the obstacle, and he really wanted to get out of it now. He wiped off some sweat from his face and gathered himself for a moment, before carefully continuing forward.

He pushed straight on at first, but receded when he felt nothing. On the second attempt, he tried to wiggle his hips as well, and noticed that he was able to force one of them out with enough struggle. The stallion twisted his body from side to side, leaning around as hard as he could to fit himself out.

Finally, after a long time of twisting and straining and with a almighty push, his left hip fell out from the hole, causing him to fall forward slightly. Iokin looked down on the concrete floor beneath him, bracing for the landing, and shoved the rest of his butt through the pipe, accompanied by his legs and tail.

Trippy clapped her hooves joyfully as she saw Iokin get out, but stopped her celebration to wince as he tumbled forward and landed straight on his back, knocking the air out of his lungs.

"Oh my gosh Iokin, are you alright?" she asked, a hint of worry in her voice.

Iokin inhaled and coughed, trying to get his breathing back to normal whilst also massaging his aching hips. After a few seconds of wheezing, he slowly rose and turned to face the earth pony mare standing on the other side of the pipe wall. He looked up at her, still rubbing his flanks, and smiled. "Yeah, I'm...*cough*...alright..."

Trippy smiled. "See? It wasn't that hard for you, was it?" she said jokingly.

A bit to her suprise, Iokin just shrugged and looked at the cylindrical pipe he'd just gone through. "You know Trippy, you're right. It was a pretty easy feat." he said and leaned onto the metal exterior, now with a smile much more sly. "Why don't you come over and join us here? Don't worry about the entrance, it's just a little snug, that's all."

The mare couldn't help but chuckle a bit to her companion's humorous remark. "Well, Io'... I don't remember you getting a sense of humour anytime recently. How hard did you hit yourself when you fell out of that pipe?"

Now it was the stallion's turn to grin at his friend's comeback. "Well, in all seriousness Trippy; what are you going to do now?"

Trippy shrugged and looked at the pipe. "I'm not going there, that's for sure. After seeing you guys do it, I think I can draw the conclusion that I would not stand a chance trying to cram myself in that thing." She looked back at the path they'd come from and then back to Iokin. "You guys are not gonna try to go back the way you came, right?"

"Not if we can avoid it, no."

"Then I think I'll head topside and seek out that other entrance we didn't go to. Perhaps you guys can find your way there when you're done, so you don't have to be bothered by the cluster again."

"Sound reasonable." Iokin replied.

"Then let's get moving. We don't want to be delayed any more than we already have!" Trippy exclaimed. "We'll meet up soon, alright? Now, you should probably focus on getting Calambite out of her mess. That girl has been sitting there for long enough." she told him, finishing off her sentence with a wink as if to say; "You're a lucky boy."

Iokin blushed, but nodded. Synchronized, they turned away from each other, heading in their own directions. Trippy on her way to the surface, and Iokin to where Calambite was caught.

For the last couple of minutes, Calambite had been resting her head on her arms, slowly coming to terms with her defeat. The pipes had her wedged tight, and she wasn't able to push herself on or back up. All she could hope for was that her friends would be able to pass through that first pipe and come over to her. But judging from the time it seemed to be taking, it seemed that they had run into some problems.

Suddenly, she heard the echoes of hoofsteps behind her quickly closing in, as well as the light banging of a few pipes. She rose her torso and looked behind her, through the tight gap, just in time to see a silhouette of a pony approach her in a crawling pace. She almost immediately recognized the figure's dark mane and grey coat.

"Iokin!" she called out, ecstatic over that one of her fellow workers had managed to get through to her.

"Calambite, how are you doi..." Iokin began to say, but faded as soon as he saw his friend's predicament right in front of him. The mare's entire torso had gone through a small gap between two pipes hanging horizontally across the cluster passage, but her rear held her clearly trapped. Her hips seemed to be slightly larger than the gap, and her precious round butt just bulged as she tried to move forward.

Calambite blushed, realizing what had caused her companion to fall silent. She looked forward into the darkness ahead and planted her hooves on the ground, lifting her upper body. "Listen, I'm going to need you help to get through this..."

"Uhm...yeah! Uh, right away!" Iokin replied, blushing slightly as well.

He kneeled down, grabbing hold of Calambite's legs, and pushed her forward. The blue mare began pushing as well at first, but halted and called out to her friend; "Wait, wait! Push my butt through first, otherwise I won't fit."

"O-okay!" the stallion complied and pressed onto Calambite's soft buttcheeks instead, forcing them between the pipes. After that, both of them picked up the pace and pushed hard forward. It was working, as the mare's hip slowly but painfully was squeezed between the pipe, but it still went pretty slow. When the widest part of her hip was going through, Calambite almost teared up from the pain of the pressure.

"Ow, ow, ow!" she grunted, causing the male behind her to stop.

"What is it? Are you..."

"No, no! Keep...*hhng*...going...please. It's hurting..." she groaned in pain.

Iokin realized what she meant and immediately reared up, took a hold of her legs with one arm and planting the other on her rear, and threw himself forward as hard as he could.

Calambite jerked forward slightly, and pushed even harder to get out faster. Both of them struggled with all that they could muster, until the mare finally fell forward when her rump was shoved out of the gap, almost collapsing on the unforgiving concrete floor. She groaned in agony and pulled herself forward until she was lying spread out on the floor, panting lightly out of exhaustion.

Iokin looked through the gap, eyeing the mare in front of him. "Are...are you alright, Calam?"

The female rubbed the irritated skin on her hip slowly. "Yeah, I-I'm okay. It just stung a little." she said, rose to her knees before standing fully up and facing Iokin. "T-thanks..."

"No problem." he replied, feeling pride over his rescue. Then the situation dawned on him again as he looked down at the tight gap in front of him. "Now, uhm...I think I'm going to have to get a little help with..."

"Oh! Oh yeah, right." Calambite said when she realized what he meant. "How...uhm, how hard was it for you to squeeze through that last pipe?" she asked.

"Well...kind of difficult..." he started, taking a close look at the pipes with a look growing more and more concerned. "Actually, really difficult."

"In that case it's going to be a bit tough..." Calambite pondered.

"It's not like I have anywhere else to go." Ioikin said and kneeled down to the same level as the gap. Something in what he said caused Calambite to stop up and think for a moment, feeling like she'd forgotten something, but she wasn't able to place exactly what. The grey stallion in the meantime, pressed his head and forearms between the pipes and pressed forward.

He hit a problem almost immediately. His chest was just a bit too big to fit through comfortably, and he had to do some sort of half-wiggle movement in order to press it through piece by piece. It was tough, but it was working. Slowly but surely his ribcage crammed through the tiny space.

As he reached his stomach, Calambite suddenly remembered what she found amiss. "Hey, Iokin!" she said. "Where's Trippy? She didn't come with you?"

"No, that...*hnh!*...would have been too difficult." he replied through gritted teeth, shoving the final parts of his torso past the obstacle. "She went ahead of us to the nearest entrance down here, expecting us to come out through there instead of going back the way we came, for obvious...*hngh*...reasons."

"I see." Calambite said.

Iokin mustered up his strength and pushed forward, trying to fit his pelvis through the gap. He squeezed and pushed, but was not able to venture any further, his rear plugging up the space. After just a couple of seconds, he halted his struggle to look up at the mare in front of him, reaching out a hoof. "A little help maybe?"

"Right." she replied and grabbed his hoof. She began pulling as he pushed, stretching his arm far towards her. Eventually, Iokin reached out his other hoof aswell which Calambite quickly grabbed, now pulling on both of his arms. Iokin wiggled his hips as much as he could, slowly inching forward until he, after a couple of minutes of heartily tugging, fell out of the tight gap between the pipes and landed on the concrete floor with a thud.

Calambite leaned down and helped him stand up, making sure he was alright, before exhaling in relief. "That wasn't as bad as I thought it would be." she said. "It seems like your butt wasn't all that too big."

"Ehehe..." Iokin scratched his head and smiled awkwardly at the comment.

Calambite blushed a bit seeing his reaction, but quickly shook away any further thoughts from her head. "Now come on. We got our duty to fulfill, and I don't want any more delays."

"Right away." he replied and picked up the toolbox that Calambite had brought.

Both of them headed away from the pipe cluster, and further into the dark corridor, the light of their luminous vests shining bright in the darkened hallway.

Maintenance Exit

Meanwhile on the surface, a single mare was trotting through the outskirts of Ponyville. The wind was weak, but still had enough force to rustle her lime mane around. She did not mind to cover from the tiny gusts, but had only one goal in mind. To find the nearest entrance to the underground tunnels.

Trippy moved forward in a fast pace, looking left and right for any clues. It's supposed to be a hatch... she though as the peered at the tree line marking the edge of Everfree Forest. She searched around for a good amount of minutes, but was not able to find anything resembling an entrance. If I remember correctly, it should be around these parts. I can't be that wro...

Her thoughts broke right as she felt her forehoof missing the ground, almost causing her to fall forward. She jerked back, regaining her footing at the last moment. Looking down, Trippy noticed that she was inches from falling into a steep, rocky crater, a huge dent in the otherwise untouched grassy landscape.

Whoa, that was a close one! Trippy thought, nervously taking a step back from the pit's edge and wiping away a few drops of sweat that had quickly formed on her forehead. I really need to watch where I'm going. Otherwise, I'l end up stacking hospital bills!

She turned around and prepared to continue her search elsewhere, when a thought suddenly struck her. Wait... what if this is...? she pondered and looked down the crater again. The large rocks that made the pit seemed to have collapsed on themselves, which explained how the dent was created. Trippy went around the edges until she spotted a small breach, a hole, in one of the rock walls, rusted chunks of metal lying around it. Near it was a large metal sign, which the mare bareley could read from her distance to it. Still, she was close enough to be able to make out the word 'maintenance' on it.

"Oh crap. This is the entrance!" she exclaimed. "Why is it collapsed? Has nopony bothered to take care of this?!" With a grumble, she carefully descended the rocks and made it to the bottom of the pit. She walked up to the sign, now seeing close-up that it said 'Maintenance Entrance', and kicked it to the side with a loud clatter.

"Honestly, our corporation is filled with the laziest ponies..." she muttered and looked around for any possible way inside the tunnels. She didn't have to spend much time on that however, as she soon noticed a small hole-shaped space between some of the fallen rocks. Metal framing around it meant that it used to be the official entrance, but had been sabotaged due to the collapse. Still, it seemed like the passage led straight into a tunnel going away further underground. Trippy was already able to see some low-hanging pipes cluttering the walls and, in some cases, even the passage itself.

Well, Calambite and Iokin will be coming through here once they're done. Don't think there's another way around... the mare thought as she inspected the dark interior. But this doesn't seem big enough for us to go through, or...?

To try out the entrance's capabilities, Trippy climbed up to the hole, grabbing the rocks with her arms and slowly angled her hind legs into the hole. She carefully slid in until her rump nudged the edges of the space. The rocks did not make it comfortable, but at least they weren't sharpened. The earth pony wiggled around, trying to feed herself into the small space that would be her companions' exit, causing her rump to squish through bit by bit. Eventually, as she reached her hips, the struggle grinded to a halt. Kicking with her legs, Trippy did her best to force her hindquarters further through the hole. It got tighter as she went, and she only managed to slid a couple of centimetres for each heave.

Ngh...ow, it's tight! she thought and looked back at her rump, now about halfway through. Her hips had begun to enter, but it was unsure if they were able to fit through the entire little passage. I think I can go further in, but I don't want to risk getting stuck... she figured, letting her legs dangle. After a short time of judgement, she decided to play it safe and squeeze back out. Planting her forehooves on the sides of the hole, she heaved hard forward, wiggling her butt out of the small crevasse.

Stepping out of it, the orange earth pony turned back to look at what would be her fellow worker's potential escape route. She had confirmed her suspicion about it; it was a bit too small. Perhaps not for Iokin, being the slimmest of them all, but Calambite? She's bigger than me for sure. she thought and placed a hoof on her hip for imaginative measurement. Especially 'round the butt. If anypony is going to have trouble with that hole, it's her!

Deciding not to try any further bravados into a potential disaster, she took a seat on one of the rocks right by the hole, assumed the most comfortable position she could manage and began her wait for the others.

Below ground, Calambite and Iokin had not encountered any further problems with the pipes, and were nearing their destination. Their occasional small-talk had been interrupted by risky low-hanging pipes time from time, but other than that, they had pretty much been granted free passage through the tunnels. Neither of them wanted to speak about their predicaments earlier, Calambite feeling a tad embarrased by displaying her hindquarters to a male coworker, and Iokin not wishing to bring up the cylindrical pipe again. Their conversations revolved mostly about Trippy's whereabouts and ponyville's flaws, understandably.

Eventually, after a while of travelling, the tunnel they were walking through opened up to a larger room, filled to the brim with larger pipes and steam. The entire area was lit in a dim yellow, the source of light coming from the tinted lights attached to the concrete ceiling. Most of the pipes were in copper, but a large amount of them were coloured in either red or blue. In the middle of the room was a large cylindrical container with a large valve connected to it, right beside a primitive pressure control panel. As the ponies entered, both of them were fascinated by the size and the large array of pipelines crossing from roof to floor and wall to wall.

"Here we are: the pump controls. It's been a while since I was down here, that's for sure..." Calambite said and took a couple of steps forward. "Let's hope they didn't change the functions. Iokin, take that big valve right there and adjust it so we can prepare to reboot the flow. I'll head along some of the attachments and make sure all the bolts are tightened. After that, we'll activate all the valves along the pipes."

She spread her wings and looked back at the grey earth pony. "And be careful of the red ones. They're hot." she finished and took flight.

Iokin pulled himself away from the red pipe he'd been standing right by, almost on the verge of leaning his body on it to rest. "Oh, uh... got it! Uhm... thanks!" he grinned sheepishly and headed over to the main valve.

Both ponies got quickly to work. Calambite finally got the liberty of using her wings as she flew to pipes higher up in the air, inspecting the small metal bolts keeping the pipes connected to each other. Iokin turned and twisted the main valve and made some measurements on the control panel. After finishing their duties, both of them got to work on the amount of smaller valves placed on many different pipes, mainly the blue ones, each making a satisfying noise of releasing air. Soon, the sound of flowing water could be heard within the many pipes.

Upon turning the last valve, both Iokin and Calambite regrouped at the center of the room, taking the moment to listen to the wild activity within the pipelines. The pegasus mare let out a audible sigh of relief and looked at her stallion companion. "That should satisfy the townsfolk!" she called out, the noise of rushing water almost drowning her voice out.

"Yeah, and the officials!" Iokin responded.

"Now, uhh... what were we going to do again?" she asked.

"We press on!" the stallion said and pointed towards another tunnel entrance, following the same direction they'd recently been heading. "Trippy was going to wait for us at another entrance. If I remember the maps correctly, it shouldn't be far from here!"

"Oh yeah, right, I forgot!" Calambite said and looked where Iokin was pointing. "Well... should we go then? I'm going to get a headache staying here any longer!"

"Sure thing!" Iokin said and trotted over to the set path immediately. "Don't forget the toolbox!"

"Of course not!" Calambite called over to him. She trotted over and picked up the red metal box they'd been carrying on the entire trip before setting off after Iokin.

Trippy sighed and tossed another pebble up high in the air, kicking it away as far as she could from her sitting position as it fell down. It landed right next to the edge of the large pit, without falling down this time. She smiled and counted; "Thirteen."

There weren't anypony around at all. She was completely alone in her pit for the time being, so she'd had to come up with some way to pass the time. Still, there were only rocks to play around with, and it did get pretty dull after a while. Right now she'd resorted to the most entertaining activity she could think of: counting pebbles kicked out of the pit. If only those other two would be a little faster!

She sighed again and tossed up another rock, thinking that she'd probably get to twenty before those slowpokes would arrive.

Much like the last one, this tunnel was filled with pipes. Still, the quantity seemed to lower the further they went through the dark corridor. They had been walking for a matter of minutes before they encountered something interesting. Another thin blockade of pipes were right in their way, going vertically from roof to floor with small gaps in between them. Both workers stopped up for a moment and observed the obstruction, before Calambite spoke up.

"Well, it could've been worse." she said and trotted to the largest gap she could see. Without waiting for Iokin's word, she pressed herself through the space. With a grunt and a heave, she forced her torso past the pipes, but stopped immediately as she reached her hips. "Ngh... what?" she grunted and pushed forward. Alas, her hips simply squished against the pipe edges and her struggles got her nowhere.

"Uhm... you want help?" Iokin asked, a bit sheepish of the sight of Calambite's buttcheeks clenching together as she tried to squeeze through.

"Hold on... my hips won't go through like this." she replied and backed up slightly. With her waist between the tall metal rods, she raised her upper body so she stood on her hind legs only. She turned sideways as best as she could and fed half the length of her body through the gap as much as she could. Like this, she was able to fit one of her buttcheeks through the gap thanks to clinging onto on of the pipes with her leg, but grinded to a halt as her rear prevented her to move any further.

She gave a couple of shoves forward whilst Iokin just watched. When no improvements were made, Calambite looked back at her colleague, panting lightly. "Care to give me a push?" she asked him.

The stallion did not hesitate, but walked forth and began pushing her hip, forcing it into the gap. After a couple of long seconds later, Calambite's butt slid through and she stumbled out on the other side of the blockade. As the mare gathered her bearings, Iokin did not wait long before climbing into the gap himself in the same fashion as Calambite had tried originally, straight forward in a normal standing position. Before Calambite could object, he had squeezed his chest through and leaned forward, hips blocking his movement.

"Uhm... Iokin?" Calambite asked, raising a hoof in question. "I don't think it works to..."

"I'm smaller, I can do it." Iokin replied with a grunt, doing his best to fit through. "Just give me a pull."

Calambite obliged, taking the stallion's hooves and pulling with all her might. After just a few seconds, Iokin butt squeezed itself through the gap and the stallion popped out on the other side. "See?" he said, using a hoof to massage his hip.

The light-blue mare looked at him with a frown and muttered; "You don't have any idea how jealous I am at you right now."

"Anything wrong, Calam'?" Iokin asked, concerned of his partner's sudden change in mood.

She sighed. "I'd just hoped that we wouldn't have to get into any more situations like these." she said and gestured to the small gap between the pipes. "If we're going to have even more trouble getting out of here, well... then I don't even know about this job anymore..."

"Hey, It's just an inconvenience." the stallion said and put a friendly arm around her shoulders. "A really, really big inconvenience. Something we all should be commended for putting up with. I'm pretty certain that any other worker would have given up as soon as they saw the first pipe, but not us."

Calambite looked at him. "Are you sure?"

"Absolutely. As soon as chief sees all the crap we had to go through, we'll recieve a well-earned bonus to our pay. And if not, well, then they can lick the boot and lose some of their finest workers." Iokin told her, a generous smile growing on him.

The mare chuckled to his little speech. "Thanks Iokin." she said, returning the smile. "I think I needed that thought. This place has a way of dimming the mood."

"No problem!" the stallion said as both of them began heading up the tunnel again. "And if we do get stuck somehow, at least now we won't have to worry running late with fixing that valve."

Calambite chuckled again. "At least I'm working with somepony positive. Did I tell you about that one time I went with that guy Freshwill to fix a leak in the Mayor Mare's residence?"

"I don't think you have, no."

"Well, I have never met a pony that would complain as much as him! He went on about how this and that sucked and drove me on my nerves and whatnot..."

Both of them chattered happily and they traversed closer and closer to the outside.

Alright, come on... Trippy thought as she aimed another pebble. She was close to getting the twentieth rock over the edge, a record she'd enjoy watching anypony try to beat. She heaved it up high in the air, ready to kick it as it came down, when she suddenly heard faint noises coming from within the tunnel. She turned her head to face the sound, as the pebble landed straight on her head.

"Oww... damn..." she groaned in stinging pain, rubbing the spot on her head where it had landed. She gathered her bearings as the sound drew closer, enough for her to realize it was two ponies chatter. "Is... are you guys there? Hello?" she called into the tunnel.

Calambite heard the mare's call and picked up the pace. "Trippy?" she called out to the voice. "Is that you?"

"Oh boy, finally!" Trippy exclaimed and sighed in relief, recognizing Calambite's voice. "Were you slowpokes held up or something? I've been here for ages!"

The pegasus mare trotted up all the way up and rounded a corner leading to the presumed exit. As soon as she turned it however she slowed down to a halt, a look of disbelief forming on her face. "W-what in...? Trippy...?

Trippy's face appeared in front of a small hole at the end of the short hallway, shaped by what seems to be collapsed rocks. Calambite made her way up to her with Iokin right behind. "Wasn't there supposed to be an exit here?" she asked, showing clear annoyance.

The earth mare bit her lip. "There used to be, I think. Guess the ground wasn't stable enough or something. Odd, really."

"Isn't it just like this company?" Calambite muttered bitterly. "We're giving ourselves a really bad name here with maintenance like this."

"Yeah, how long has it been since this place had a checkup now again?" she asked.

"I-I don't know, and at this point, I don't care. I just want to get out of here." Calambite groaned and placed a hoof on the hole's edge.

"Uh, wait, Calam..." Trippy said, halting her friend. "I...did try to get through here before, but didn't quite fit. I'm not sure this is going to be easy for you." she said and scratched her neck. Suprisingly, Calambite cracked a smile to her.

"Well, you didn't have two ponies helping you then, right?" She turned to face Iokin, who'd been quiet since the arrival. "You ready to help a girl in need one more time, Iokin?"

"I could have this as a job." he replied and cracked his neck to emphasize. "I'm definitely getting some work experience here."

Without further ado, Calambite put both arms through the small hole and advanced. Wiggling her head and shoulders through, she began to squeeze her chest and stomach through slowly, stopping every now and then to adjust her wings. The others could not do much other than observe the mare's progress.

As almost most of her stomach had passed through, she stopped. Biting her lip, she pushed lightly upwards and felt her hips press against the edges of the hole. Although not as tight as any of the other spaces she'd had to fit through today, this hole was not exactly an easy game either. She pushed again, harder this time, trying to squeeze as much of her behind into the hole as possible. Slowly, and with a little bit of wiggling, her hips made their way through the passage, until her fleshy rump bunched up against the top of the hole and slowly grinded her progress to a halt.

Feeling this sensation, Calambite immediately stopped struggling to take a break. Panting lightly, she looked up at Trippy, who gave her a questioning, contemplary nod. Bracing herself, the light blue pegasus nodded back and reached out her hooves. As Trippy took them in her own, Calambite looked back towards the hole and tried to shift her body as to make a small gap where Iokin could hear her and called him out: "Alright Iokin, you can start now."

The stallion swallowed, ignoring all hesitation or awkwardness, and reached out to grab Calambite's thighs and push forward lightly. At the same time, Trippy began pulling on the arms. The trapped mare grunted as her body was stretched forward, pressure building up around her rear. She wiggled again, and with the extra force applied thanks to her companions, her hips and the smaller portions of her butt were stuffed further into the hole.

They quickly came to another halt when the largest bit of Calambite's rump met the narrow entrance. She couldn't help but blush as she felt her large posterior attempt to squash itself through the tight space, figuring she probably wouldn't be able to get used to the feeling of it anytime soon. Inside, Iokin noticed the problematic encounter, and switched to push with one hoof straight onto Calambite's butt and holding her legs up with the other. The flesh of her cheeks were slowly prodded into the passage, filling it up to the brim and looking awkwardly pressed on by all sides.

Soon, Calambite called for a timeout, stopping the process. By now she was really in there, hips lodged tightly in between the rock walls and with small portions of her butt starting to show on the outside. The blue pegasus gave a light heave to see how things were going, and wasn't surprised to feel almost no sense of budging. Once again, she found herself tightly stuck.

"How is it going, Calam'?" Trippy asked whilst wiping her forehead.

Calambite sighed. "Better than before, I guess. My hips are pretty wedged and...well, butt's having a hard time getting through." she said and glanced at her friend. She gave another push to show just how tight she was sitting. "So yeah, definitely stuck. If I had been alone here I would have been screwed."

"Yea, good thing I didn't try too hard before, else I'd been in that very state." Trippy notified and gave Calambite a nervous look. "You think Iokin can make it?"

"Of course. He's a pretty slim guy, so a couple of tugs might be all he needs." she shrugged. "Stupid foal-bearing hips, am I right?"

"Stupid foal-bearing hips." Trippy affirmed. "Although you should have seen him back at the cylindrical pipe, he actually got stuck pretty bad in that one. Probably grew a bit claustrophobic..."

"You girls know I can hear you, right?" a muffled, annoyed tone came from within the rockslide. Both Calambite and Trippy looked at the hole, then at each other, before having to shove a hoof in their mouths to suppress their giggling.

"He just wants to get back to touching your ass!" Trippy said in a much more hushed tone to her stuck friend.

"Trippy!" Calambite almost shouted and tried to smack her with a hoof, which Trippy dodged by simply taking a step backwards. The pegasus mare tried to reach out after her, but was instantly reminded of her current predicament. She kicked her rear legs and pushed with both arms against the sides of the hole trying to squeeze further through, but couldn't dislodge her hips.

"Hay, I'd be surprised if he didn't have the hots for you by now, considering how he's been 'all over' you today, yeah?" she continued with a teasing wink.

"Nonsense." Calambite interrupted and ceased her struggle. "Iokin has been behaving well and under these circumstances, and I surely wouldn't take him as a guy who would take the advanta-ungh!"

The stuck mare abruptly fell silent mid-speech as she suddenly felt a pair of hooves on her behind again, pressing lightly into the soft flesh and trying to push her further into the hole where she was trapped. She quickly looked back at where her torso exited the narrow crevasse, her face feeling extremely hot and shining red like a ripe tomato, and called out anxiously to the stallion inside: "Iokin, what are you doing!?"

Iokin reacted to her call and retracted his hooves off her rump, watching her legs and tail nervously twitch to the contact made and began to blush himself. "Uhm... I thought you were pushing, so... I-I figured it was my cue to, you know, help?" he explained.

"Oh..." Calambite realized, whilst Trippy almost fell to the ground trying to contain her laughter.

"How so...? Is everything alright, or are you still talking behind my back?" Iokin called out back.

"Ehrm... no, no! Everything's fine! And we're not talking be... well, Trippy..." she trailed off.

"Oh, hoho, man that's just beautiful!" Trippy snorted as she regained her footing. She quickly wiped away all tears from the hard laughter and did her best to compose herself. "Was that, like, scripted or something?"

Calambite glared and opened her mouth to comment, but gave up and simply shook her head in defeat. "Real funny, Trippy." she said. "But Iokin... I mean...well, yeah... maybe it's time to get back to business."

Trippy actually managed to contain herself this time, wiping her eyes yet again. "Alright, *snort*, but only as long you won't hit me when I get close enough, 'kay?"

"Don't tempt me. I just want to get out of here." she replied and stretched out a hoof for her to grab.

After a quick assurance between all parts, the ponies went back to forcing Calambite through the hole. Iokin held her rear legs in chest height and pushed on her flank whilst Trippy pulled on her arm. Calambite herself pushed with one hoof against the wall, wriggling and worming as much as she could. Her hips and rear slid forward in a painfully slow pace, although they were clearly making progress.

"I... I can feel it!" she grunted as she tried to push harder. "We just... we just need a little more f-force..."

"Right on!" Trippy exclaimed and stepped forward, grabbing her with both arms around hers and heaved backwards. Calambite could feel how the pressure from Iokins pushing increased, entering the same rythm as Trippy. For each heave, she slid slighty further, until she finally popped through, almost causing both her and the orange mare to topple over. Trippy took a firmer grip and helped Calambite to step out of the hole and safetly onto the rocky ground.

"Phew, glad that's over. Thanks a whole lot guys." she thanked them both and rubbed her sore hips.

"You're welcome girl! Now brace yourself, the slightly less worse is yet to come." Trippy pointed out.

"I'll... take that as a compliment, thank you for your input Trippy." the gray stallion said in a monotone manner as he pushed their toolbox out of the hole, peeking through after it. He hesitated for a moment, before slowly putting his forehooves first through.

Calambite was still busy dusting herself off, but Trippy watched closely as Iokin wiggled his head and shoulders through. Next, he placed his elbows onto the hard rock and pressed forward, grunting as his chest started to block up the passage. He suddenly stopped and let out an annoyed sigh.

"T-Trippy..." he mumbled. "Could you give me a hoof?"

Slightly concerned, Trippy nodded and walked up to him. "Giving up already?" she asked as she grabbed his hooves.

"Just tired, is all." Iokin said. "Been underground for too long, I'm sore all over."

"Yeah, tell me about it..." Calambite mumbled.

Trippy pulled his hooves, lightly at first, but quickly upped her efforts. With a bit of wiggling from Iokin's side, they managed to dislodge his chest and pull his torso all the way through. As soon as his hips clogged up the exit, Trippy let go of him.

"I'll need some more leverage." Trippy said and wrapped her arms around him. "Grab onto me."

Iokin complied, wrapping his arms around her back and bracing himself. On a count of three, Trippy pulled again and he squirmed forward. After a short while, and after a couple of heaves, Iokin finally slipped out as well.

"We did it!" Calambite cheered and walked over to hug Iokin, who'd dragged his legs through the hole and now stood on the unstable, rocky ground. The stallion returned the notion, with Trippy joining in. As soon as the group hug broke, Calambite took a deep breath of the fresh air to celebrate their victory over the narrow underground trip. However, she almost immediately broke her pride as she began snorting, all of a sudden.

"Eww, I think we gained some odor from down there." she claimed, sniffing at herself. "We're gonna need to take a shower when we get back..."

"Yeah, I think you guys need it more than I do right now." Trippy remarked and gave Calambite a light wink. "Eh, Calam'?"

"You're also dirty Trippy!" the pegasus mare returned.

"Meh, not as much as you guys."

Iokin simply rolled his eyes and began climbing out of the rock pit. "You can argue as much as you'd like, but I'm getting out of here. If you need me, I'll be looking for that paycheck." he called out to them.

Trippy and Calambite looked at him, then at each other and smirked.

"He's right Trippy." Calambite said. "We've done a job well done. All of us. It's time to reap the rewards."

The earth mare shrugged in response. "You're team leader, it's your call!" she said and began climbing out as well.

A couple of minutes later, all three ponies were making their way back to the maintenance office via the roads of Ponyville's outskirts. They hadn't said much else after leaving the exit site, but Calambite had been nervously eyeing Iokin every now and then. Eventually, she coughed and looked over to him.

"Ehrm, Iokin...?"

He looked at her. "Yeah?"

"You, uhm... you didn't think it... I... it was weird any of the times before, today? You know with the... uhm..." she stuttered, a faint blush growing on her cyan cheeks.

Iokin realized what she was trying to say, and blushed too. "Oh, yeah, well, um... I was just... helping a friend in need. Yeah."

"I think she's trying to know if you, well, liked it." Trippy stated.

Calambite turned her head and glared at her for being so blunt, before looking back at Iokin and noticing that his blush had visibly grown. "I... well, uhm..." she started, before swallowing and almost letting her words stumble out; "Did you?"

Iokin glanced nervously at the both of them, and then into the ground. "Y-yeah, I did..." he said. Silence remained for a moment before he met Calambite's gaze again. "What about you?"

"I-I... um..." Calambite stuttered and looked away, rubbing her neck. Vivid images of him pressing down on her backside, trying to force her through tight passages, time and time again, passed through her mind. She smiled nervously again, and replied; "I'm glad you were there to help me when I needed it. And... well, now when I think about it, this might not have been all that bad of an experience."

Iokin chuckled. "Anytime, Calambite."

She shone up and looked at him, a tingling feeling emerging from within. "Really?" she said, trying her best to conceal a wink to him.

Iokin looked back, grinning this time. "Anytime."

Trippy kept her mouth shut this time around, but she had to put a hoof on her mouth to supress her chuckle. Damn, for real? That could get interesting...

All three of them happily continued their chatting, making their way back into the town, feeling not only joy over that their task had been accomplished, but that they'd also achieved a new sense of liberty, not just physically from the cavernous depths below, but also in open minds and companionship.

Author's Note

If anybody notices a change in writing style over the course of this story, it's simply because I started it awkwardly long ago, and only recently decided to finish it. Nevertheless, I'm happy how it turned out.

Thank you for reading this story! And I wish a Happy New Year!