G5 Adventures in Treasure Buddies

The Mane 6, the Buddies and Violette finally managed to make it inside Cleocatra’s tomb through a secret entrance, passing the serpent Slither’s test to determine if they were worthy of entering, and once Buddha and Pipp used their talents and successfully worked together to charm the snake and hypnotize him, he let them go through.

But they knew that they had a lot of challenges to get through if they were to get to Cleocatra's collar unharmed, so they could stop Ubasti and her wicked plans before it was too late.

Little did our heroes know that the others would soon be joining them in the tomb, and they would all be experiencing the same kind of danger... just not at the same time.

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The sandstorm seemed to last ages, but after a while of waiting, the blowing sand finally cleared, and thankfully, Thomas, Pete, the zebra family, Dr. Wellington, Ubasti and Dr. Wellington’s henchmen managed to make it through without any sort of injury.

And once the storm had definitely passed, everyone climbed out of the truck to get a good look around, the sand having been moved thanks to the storm's heavy winds.

Once getting a good look around, Pete's eyes widened as soon as he saw something that looked like a large tomb that had cat-like statues and details all around it, pointing to it so the others could see it for themselves. “Grandpa, everyone, look!”

Mariama and Thomas individually gasped when they saw this, and even Skye’s eyes widened in surprise. “Whoa… i-is that…?”

“It is, darling,” Mariama could barely believe it with her own eyes. “It’s Cleocatra’s tomb!”

“We’re rich, my dear,” Dr. Wellington greedily whispered to his hairless feline friend. “We’re rich.”

“Only in my dreams have I imagined this moment,” Thomas said as they moved closer to the tomb to get a closer look and figure out how they were going to get inside. And upon getting to the door, Mariama hummed, a frown now visible on her face. “This door is merely a solid stone slab. It must weigh thousands of pounds.”

“Thousands?!” Skye repeated, her eyes wide. “There’s no way we can open it without heavy duty equipment!”

“Even then,” Thomas added, “it'll take months.”

“No, it won’t,” Dr. Wellington dismissed. “Why do you think I brought the explosives? For a fireworks display?”

Thomas was appalled by the talk of using explosives on one of the greatest archeological finds in history. “But the tomb is thousands of years old. We can't just use dynamite on it.”

“Watch me,” Dr. Wellington threatened before turning to his two lackeys. “Tarik! Seti! Get the explosives.”

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At the same time, the Mane 6, the Buddies and Violette were wandering through the tomb, with Izzy holding the lantern Babi had lit on her horn, since their magic wasn't working inside the tomb.

But after a few minutes of wandering, the group stopped before a long hallway, with part of it filled with a sandy booby trap that Rosebud had seen in books. “Oh no! Quicksand!”

Violette pushed her hoof down onto the quicksand, and yelped as it began to sink, causing her to quickly pull it back out. “Yep. That’s quicksand all right.”

“But since we flyers can’t use our wings,” said Pipp, “and Izzy and Misty can’t use their horns…”

“...and since me and Sunny can’t use our earth pony magic,” continued Hitch with a worried look on his face, “how are we gonna get across?”

“No problem-o, dudes, I'm an expert in all things dirt-related,” Mudbud reassured, stepping a bit closer to the quicksand trap. “Just roll with it.”

And so, that’s just what Mudbud did-- he rolled right across the quicksand just like it was mud in his own backyard, eventually making it to the other side of the quicksand and looking up just in time to notice a button with a paw print on the wall. “Huh?”

Out of general curiosity, Mudbud pushed the button with his paw, and a long platform rose up from the sand, stretching all the way across the pit. “Whoa!” Sunny commented, a bit impressed that Mudbud was able to figure that out. “Nice move, Mudbud!”

“Thanks,” Mudbud smiled. “You can make your way across now, dudes and dudettes.”

And so, the group made their way across the pit using the platform, but as they went on, the platform lowered itself back down into the pit unti someone else could get across and push the button again.

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Back outside the tomb, Seti and Tarik were setting up the explosives just as Dr. Wellington told them to do, while Mariama and Thomas were trying to stop the criminals from accidentally destroying a piece of ancient history. “The discovery of Cleocatra's tomb is priceless,” Thomas protested. “It belongs to the Egyptian people.”

“Oh, please,” Dr. Wellington scoffed. “I'm every bit the archeologist you are, Professor Howard. I simply do it for profit, not for silly accolades.”

“No, Mr. Wellington,” Mariama said as her eyes narrowed in anger. “What you do is illegal and immoral. If my daughter’s life didn’t hang in the balance, we would have left you in the dust miles ago.”

At the same time, Pete and Skye had approached the door to see what they could find, but as Tarik and Seti were just finishing up rolling out the explosives, Pete saw what looked like a giant coin slot in the middle of the stone door, and felt that his grandfather and the other grownups should know about it before the explosives went off. “Grandpa! There's a slot in the door!”

“No! Pete! Skye!” Thomas immediately ran over with Dr. Wellington (with Ubasti in his arms) and Mariama at his heels. “Get away from there!”

“I got it!” Mariama said quickly, pulling the cord attached to the explosives so they wouldn’t go off, and Tarik and Seti eventually unplugged their ears when they realized the explosives weren’t going to go off.

And once he saw that Pete was right about there being a slot in the door, Thomas immediately brushed the slot off before realizing what went in there. “The disc! Philip!”

“Yes, yes,” Dr. Wellington handed Thomas his half of the Bronze of Bastet, and once the two halves had been put together, Thomas slid the disc into the slot. There was a groaning sound, probably because of the mechanism being put into work, just before the large, stone slab started to move off to the side, revealing the inside of Cleocatra's tomb at long last.

And as the door slid open, Thomas turned to look at Dr. Wellington with a narrowed gaze. “There, you see? I've gotten you here.”

“...come on, kids,” Mariama said gently. “We’re gonna find our way through here.”

And so, the group began to enter the tomb, but Mariama instantly stopped the group when she saw fire inside the oil torches that Slither had lit with his fiery breath. “That’s strange… the oil torches are lit. Someone else is here!”

And unbeknownst to the others, Ubasti knew just who had beaten them to the tomb. “It can only be those filthy mutts and their meddling horse friends. They've beaten me to it!”

However, Dr. Wellington refused to believe that someone had beaten them to the punch just yet. “The opening of the door must've triggered the lighting of the torches.”

Unfortunately, Ubasti knew better than to believe her human’s foolishness, and began to wiggle around in his arms. “What is it, Ubasti? No, no, no!” Dr. Wellington said as Ubasti leapt out of his arms and down another hallway, determined to find her way to the collar on her own. “Ubasti, come back here! Ubasti! Ubasti. Whoo-hoo, Ubasti… Ubasti?”

And seeing that they had no choice, the others were forced to follow Ubasti, wanting to make sure the hairless cat didn't get lost in the tomb on her own.

XXXXXXXX

Elsewhere inside the tomb, unaware that the explorers were entering the tomb as we speak, the Mane 6, Violette and the Buddies were climbing up a tall staircase that seemed to spiral on and on forever, and it was exhausting poor Budderball to the point that he was panting much heavier than his siblings. “I sure wish... that ancient Egyptians... invented elevators.”

“You and me both, Budderball,” Violette panted slightly. “Sometimes I hate having small legs.”

Suddenly, the group stopped at the end of a long hallway that seemed to have all sorts of strange tiles on the floor, and something in Sunny's mind was telling her that something was very off.

Unfortunately, B-Dawg wasn't sure why Sunny was holding everyone up at the beginning of the hallway when they could be going on. “Yo, what's the holdup?”

“It may be my alicorn side,” said Sunny, “but there’s something strange about this hallway.”

“Psh, you guys are worrying too much,” B-Dawg scoffed. “This room looks pretty normal to me.”

“Remember what Slither said,” Buddha tried to advise his brother, but B-Dawg was already walking onto one of the large tiles in the hallway. “Ah, that snake's been trapped here too long. He's loony, yo-- AHHH!!!”

Suddenly, the tile under B-Dawg crumbled, and B-Dawg would have fallen if it weren’t for Budderball and Izzy reacting with speed and strength. “B-Dawg!!”

Budderball quickly grabbed his brother by the tail while Izzy grabbed Budderball’s waist in her hooves, keeping B-Dawg from going down into the pit of snakes below the floor.

And needless to say, B-Dawg was quite horrified with the thought of falling into the pit of slimy, crawly snakes below. “Hang on!” Rosebud called. “Budderball’s got you by the tail!”

“And Izzy’s got Budderball too!” Hitch said. “Just don’t panic!”

“HURRY!!!” B-Dawg cried, ignoring Hitch all together, and working together, Budderball and Izzy were able to pull B-Dawg to solid ground again. “Nice going, you guys!” Zipp cheered. “That was too close.”

“Are you okay, B-Dawg?” Misty asked in genuine concern. “Yeah, but… uh…” B-Dawg tried to get himself together. “You know what? I'm gonna bounce. What do you say I meet you dawgs back in Fernfield?”

“No way are we giving up,” Violette said sternly. “We just need to find some way to get across this hallway without triggering another snake pit… if there is one.”

“Hey, Iz?” Zipp looked over at Izzy. “Think you can use that magic glitter Mariama gave you to see if there are any more of those pits under us?”

“You got it, Zipperdoodle!” Izzy said, getting out the glitter and tossing it onto the floor, and the glitter glowed before revealing more and more snake pits underneath some of the floor tiles. “Whoa!” B-Dawg yelped. “No way, uh-uh! No way we can get across with all those slimy, legless... things under us!”

However, as Rosebud glanced over at the markings on the wall, she started to connect several dots together. “Hmm… look at this, guys. It's ancient writing called hieroglyphics.”

“Yeah,” Pipp nodded. “That’s how people in ancient Egypt wrote things to one another, but… what does that have to do with anything?”

“Remember last night, Pipp? We saw Bedouins playing this, but much smaller!” Rosebud explained to the others, turning to look at the hallway again. “You have to get to the other side, but can only move on specific squares.”

“Good remembering, Rosebud!” Sunny nodded with a smile. “Okay, guys… let me and Rosebud go first, to see if we can figure out the right combination.”

And so, Rosebud and Sunny began to hop from square to square, with Izzy throwing her magic glitter on the tiles that they jumped on in order to keep track. And once they had successfully made it to the other side, Rosebud gestured for the others to follow suit. “Come on, guys-- jump only on the squares that Sunny and I did.”

“Okay…” Zipp nodded slowly. “Sounds easy enough.”

And so, with extreme precision, the group slowly made their way across the hallway by jumping on the squares that Sunny and Rosebud jumped on.

And as they did this, they came across a door at the end of the hallway, but when Hitch tried to push against it to get it open, all he got was a boat load of struggling. “It’s no use… this thing just isn’t gonna budge!”

“Wait a second,” Misty said before reaching for the key that Mariama gave her. “This key can be used to unlock any door, remember? This could be our ticket inside!”

“It’s worth a try,” Sunny nodded. “Go for it, Misty.”

Misty nodded to this and began to move her key in the direction of the door, and as soon as the tip of the key made contact with the door, the key glowed and the door opened, letting the group inside. But when they all finally got inside...

...all they found was an empty room, with nothing in particular to get them anywhere else within the tomb. “I don’t get it,” Mudbud frowned. “Yeah,” Violette nodded as she glanced around. “It's just a big, empty room.”

But as soon as Violette said this, the door behind them closed, sealing them inside the empty room, which caused Pipp to whimper, her ears folding down slightly. “Not a good sign…”

“I guess the key only works for a short time,” Misty said with a frown. “Gonna need to let Mariama know about that when we find her.”

“But we need to get out of here first! And since we don’t have magic,” Sunny sighed, “does anyone have any other ideas?”

Suddenly, a scarab beetle flicked right off the wall, landing right on Budderball's snout, causing him to gasp before gobbling the bug right up and off the floor. “Bugs. I love bugs.”

“That’s disgusting,” Rosebud said as Pipp tried not to puke, and Budderball hummed to himself after a moment. “Hmm. A little slimy when they're uncooked, but still not bad.”

However, more bugs started to appear from cracks in the walls, and soon, at least a thousand of them had started to crawl down the walls toward the group. “Uh, Budderball…?” Violette gulped nervously. “I don't think they appreciate you eating their cousin.”

“We’re gonna get eaten by bugs!!” Izzy shrieked. “What do we do?!”

“Uh… give me a minute to think, Iz!” Sunny said just before she yelped and staggered back. “Uh, actually, give me two minutes!”

“We don’t have two minutes, Sunster!” Zipp shouted out of desperation. “We need a plan right now!”

As the ponies tried to keep the beetles back as best they could, Rosebud looked down at the floor to see a button in front of her, similar to the one they had seen back at the quicksand pit. “Hey, it’s another one of those buttons!”

And the second Rosebud pushed it, a trapdoor opened up, causing the group to scream as they slid down a long slide into another part of the tomb.

And thankfully, none of them were harmed by the beetles that had closed in on them.

Once everyone had gotten their breath after getting off of the slide, Zipp turned to look at her friends. “Is everypony okay?”

“As far as we know, yes,” nodded Buddha. “But that brings up the question… where are we?” Pipp asked, but as Mudbud looked around and saw the cat themed sarcophagus, plus all the cat statues around the room, he suddenly knew where they were. “Dudes, this looks like Cleocatra's tomb!”

“But… does that mean…?” Misty began to say. “I think so,” said Sunny, “but there’s only one way to know for sure.”

And so, slowly, Mudbud and Sunny approached the sarcophagus, and not long after, they saw the golden necklace with the green jewel that looked like a cat’s eye, and instantly, they knew they had finally, at long last, found one of the greatest treasures in history. “It’s the lost collar of Cleocatra!”