The ancient cantina - a tale of randomness
by Tray Hunter
Let me tell you the story of two ponies who quested for golden treasures and a cure for a curse they made up during a wild night of booze and other ingredients that are prohibited in some parts of Equestria.
"Yaaaargh! Shiver me timber, you filthy landluber!" the stallion yelled across the deck. They had been sailing for a few hours and he already adapted to the role of being a captain. Finally, one could think, as it was his ship afterall.
"Uhm...vikings on our 3!" a voice came more or less bored. It was that of his old friend and co-captain and, allthough there weren't any ships or other threads in sight, the unicorn made fun of pretending it anyways. It was his way of killing time and keeping them entertained.
"Aye! Get the crew! Tonight we'll drink our rum from horns!" the pegasus ordered with an eager grin. But there were two problems: No foe was in sight and the crew consisted of not more than two ponies. Good thing they were both pretending there was an enemy ship anyways. "Fire the canons!"
The unicorn raised his eyebrow and lurked over to his winged companion "Canons? Shouldn't we like try to talk to them first? You know, magic of friendship and stuff?"
The other one flew down to him and dryly answered "That was the plan. It's party canons, me matey!" just to get a wide grin in return.
"Ohokay!" with that an odd contraption magically levitated from under the deck before it began floating in front of the unicorn. It was nothing but an old pickle-barrel on which one had writte the word "canon" but you all know what they say about imagination and drunken sailors.
"Oh my gosh! The royal Neighvy on port!" a more or less convincing statement was brought up. "Tonight we dine in Hell!"
"Hell? You mean McDribble's behind the old theater?"
Another hour passed and they were just sitting on deck. The wind was steady but so was the boredom that plagued our two heroes. After he finished the third crossword puzzle, the unicorn rose his head and pondered if there might be seaponies in these waters.
"Only one way to find out!" Actually there are more than enough ways to clearify this. For example the bulk of colors that had been swimming behind the ship for over 45 minutes. But the pegasus had choosen the most stupid routine to check it. "SHOO BEE DOO!"
For a second or two nothing happend at all. The sea was quiet like a lake in winter. As the feathered pony turned around to face his friend again though, the sun went black for a second. A wave of small seaponies of all colors and shapes hailed down on him and rendered the stallion blind and unable to move.
"Wheeeee~" the other, slightly younger and definitely still dry stallion cheered before he picked up one of the playful aqua enquines to cuddle.
"Help me! They're touching me in places!" a slightly terrified plea spread over the deck though it was almost too faint to make out by anypony who wasn't in close cuddlerange. Luckily one horned pony was.
"Gee! Relax! I find them cute." An eyeroll and a short and carefull levitation later the deck and the pegasus were free of the finned creatures, which instantley dove back into the ocean.
"Thanks. I will need a bath when we return home."
"You mean before we leave the ship, right?" the younger of them querried with an yet again raised eyebrow.
"Uhm...of course....?" Now let me tell you this, the pokerface of this pony/hobbypirate was even worse than his hygiene. None the less the ship suddenly stopped and the unicorn magically buried the ancor in the "depth of the sea". They both eagerly jumped into the water which was not more than a few hooves deep at this part. Immersed in their antics they managed to steer their swimming home directly onto the beach which would make it a hard job to set sail later. Not caring about such details for now, our heroes made their way towards the island on which they had been stranded.
"So? Where to go now?" the unicorn asked as they reached the sandy beach.
"Two options: We can either walk through this thick, dark jungle where we'll probably get mauled by all sorts of beasts" the pegasus answered "or we make our way through this partybeach full of tourists over there." There in fact was a long passage of tents, and towels of drunk, growling and ocassionally sunburned ponies. Our two heroes looked at each other and spoke in unision "Jungle!"
So their path was clearified and they began to march through the bushes and forrest. Luckily the unicorn had the clever idea to be as loud as possible so that nocturnal predators would wake up and flee because they thought some tourists were coming. All in all it was a pretty calm journey. The pegasus complained about some missing rupees and a very crappy adventure-simulation as he kicked some bushes. All the little branches and leaves in between his wings weren't much apreciated either. They walked for hours until one of them had the idea to go right instead of left all the time. About another hour later they found an old temple in a meadow.
"There we are!" the winged one exclaimed with a proud grin and a half jungle in his extra extremities "This must be the temple of...of...anyway, it's that of somepony imortant and that means there is gold in it!"
"And gemstones!" his friend asumed with a giddy sparkle in his eyes "Okay! I know how we proceed. When the ponies in movies or books enter a temple carefully they allways set off some trap. So here's my plan." Before the pegasus could even turn around to look at him the stallion allready galloped into the ruin with a loud and rather stupid sounding "Wheeeeeuuuuuurgh!" This "plan" caused about a good dozen of traps to go off right behind him and even bloocked parts of the path behind him. A dumbfound look and a facehoof later the older of them made his way to the side of the temple and entered through the personel entrance just to see that his companion was allready sitting there, panting and dusty from the dirt that collected in the hallway in the last 1000 years. As they looked ahead into the next chamber the unicorn stopped and explained.
"There are sand holes there and there" he said as he pointed at the walls "Also the ceiling looks like it'll sink once the traps are activated."
"How do they set off?"
"Probably sound-based motion trackers in the ground." This caused the pegasus to sigh in a pretty annoyed tone.
"Stupid temples and their sound-based trackers..."
"Yeah, that ancient stuff."
"Okay. You take care of the sandholes and I'll" he pulled out a small, pretty cliche bomb out of his bag. Complete with fuse and all. "destroy the ceiling. What explodes above us can't smash us, right?"
"Seems legit." with that the magicpony summoned two snowballs and threw them right into the openings for the sand. The same second the other flew upwards to destroy the second trap. An explosion later the whole ruin was shaking and they had to gallop through the colapsing hallways. And this adventurous story wouldn't be adventurous if there was no giant stoneball rolling behind them. Just in time they made it into a giant room, equiped with statues and lit by some fine cracks in the ancient walls. Our hobbypirates/amateur-tombraiders were safe since this hall didn't colapse. Probably it simply was of better quality than the rest of the sanctum.
The pegasus asumed since this room was important enough to actually put effort into the wall's structure, it had to be an ancient cantina. Without any hesitation he walked towards an old statute of a pony with a barrel on its back and tried to buy a cola by forcing a coin into a crack on the side.
"Those things are ancient! They don't work with modern money!" the other exclaimed as he looked around. He found two dusty goldcoins on the ground and cheered by holding them over his head "Loot!". He then made his way over to the presumed vending machine and ordered a can of energy drink for each of them. You may think they must've been stupid to actually try this but in a random story, you have to think random. The cans actually poped out of the statue and our meanwhile thirsty heroes took them up.
The pegasus was the first to drink. Not for long though as he sput the first sip of the beverage to the ground "Uuurgh...that stuff is warm."
With a proud grin the unicorn exclaimed "Stand back and be witness of my power!" in a very dramatic, almost a bit overlord-ish tone. Before the other could react to the warning he shot a bundle of blue, magic sparks from his horn towards the can, which froze stuck on the pony's hoof.
The mildly suprised stallion simply returned a "Thanks, dude" before he went over to investigate the room further. He flew up the walls before he found what seemed like an old marking "Aah! If I'm not mistaken, the treasure is this way!" and pointed at a doorway with dozens of working traps behind it. Several faint scribbles covered the walls around where the door must've been once.
"Turn back!", "They all are gone" and "There is no pie left in the kitchen!" were the only ones they could make out. Well, those and the soaring, lethal contraptions behind the opening, including poisoned spikes and sharpend snakes that were shooting from the walls. Luckily the unicorn had a better idea. Instead of getting them both killed he used logic.
"This is a cantina. Means there are toilets and where there are toilets there are vents." he explained, pretty eager about his plan "Those vents allways bypass traps and lead straight to the treasurechamber!"
His friend agreed under the requirement that they use the toilet before they continue. Not only had the constant licking on his energy-hoof taken its toll, he also had grown tired of limping with the can on his right foreleg and would try to get it off with some water from the sink there. They made their way to the ancient bathroom, going after said buisness. The pegasus managed to, even though there was no water in the sink but warm sand, to get rid of the metal on his limb. A random-minded unicorn just asumed that the water had become stale and dry after all the years.
.
.
.
An awkward silence and two shrugs later they went to investigate the toiletbooths for hints of ancient civilizations. They soon found several primitive runes and messages on the last one's wall.
"Lucy is hot" was the one most commonly used by the different cultures, so it seemed. "This Lucy must've been some fire goddes. Maybe an old nickname for Celestia even." the winged pony theorized, going over the several other artifacts in the booth. Amongst them the unicorn found a set of stone boards, saying things like "11. Thou shallt not eateth thine milkshake with a fork!" and "23. This is my tenant!". Since they were neither that sort of tombraiders, nor the type that would carry old stones to a museum or whereever they decided to simply make their way through the vent and eventually found a huge chamber on the other side of the dusty tunnel. In there was a treasure worthy a king. Better! Two kings and a dragon!
"Hooray for good air-circulation!" our heroes yelled in unision before the unicorn began to wonder "Aren't those treasures suposed to be guarded by something? You know, like an endboss with not more or less one single weakspot?"
The pegasus deadpaned at this, in his opinion, stupid idea "And what? That thing would be a thousand years and older! As long as it isn't something like this thing over there." he pointed at something...big! Some huge thing that dangerously lured at them, ready to attack! "Oh, no! It's going to attack!" And the creature attacked.
"Uhm...you have to actually think of something, you know?" the younger exclaimed as they dodged the beast just to get an eyeroll from the pegasus.
"Okay, okay. Stonesnake, 50m in length which is allergic to peanuts?"
"Okay!" he agreed as he faced the now pretty angry and obviously magic foe, towering over them "Hey! Check if you have some peanuts in your wings!"
Said and done the pegasus looked through his feathers, which where still full of leaves and small branches from when they made their way through the jungle "I only have this coconut!" With that he threw the found object at the snake's head. It wasn't very effective. "I have an idea! You go back to the cantina and see if you can find some M'n'Ms while I distract it!"
"I have a better one!" the unicorn grinned and kicked the coconut to hit the snake again. This time...wasn't any different as the snake barely twitched from the impact. It just charged at the young pony, devouring him in whole.
"Noooo!" the pegasus exclaimed in a dramatic scream before he flew up to the beast's head, kicking it "Bad! Bad monster! Spit him out! You don't know where he had been!" The snake slowly turned towards the angry attacker. And with slow, I mean almost in slowmotion. The winged stallion pulled a photo out of his bag, showing last year's Hearth warming eve's party. He pointed at it, the tip of his hoof resting on the unicorn sleeping in a corner "That one! Spit him out!"
The beast suddenly closed its eyes and fell over motionless. Out of the gigantic, wide open mouth a pink blob arose, turning out to be the unicorn who had been covered in some odd gel. The pegasus instantley glomped his companion with a happy grin. "I did it! I saved you!"
"Do you know how hard it is to freeze a snake from inside when you kick it all the time?"
"Doesn't matter! You're alive!" he took a deep breath to analyse the scent of his friend's new, pink coating "And you smell like a melon!"
After they got up and cleaned again, the younger asked "Uhm, it seemed like the snake had some major shock before I took it out. You don't happen to know something about that, do you?" just to get a sheepish grin and a shaking head in return "Anyways, we better get the treasure and be gone. Once that thing's heart thaws again it'll be grumpy." With that in mind they went over to loot the chamber of its welth, packing themselves with sacks of gold, jewels and whatever else they considered worth something. Yet there was one problem. With the stoneball, blocking the exit of the cantina they had no way to get out of there again. After a short look around the pegasus spotted a door, saying "Emergency exit" and slunked towards it just to see the rest of the sign "Coming soon". So the brainstorming continued until one of them had the idea to maybe blow their own emergency exit. Said and done they placed several charges on one of the walls and took cover behind fhe still unconscious stonecreature. Eventually they miscalculated the dose of explosive material and blew a 20m wide and high hole into the ancient temple. That was when things started to become ugly. Behind that new opening a village of natives was resting, some of the huts majorly damaged by the explosion and a tribe of zebras with torches. The mood swung to angry outside and awkwardly scared inside the ruined ruin. As if destiny couldn't stack the shit any higher, another huge stoneball began to roll after the two pirates/tombraiders/demolitionworkers, chasing them out of the chamber, through the village and into the jungle.
"We gotta get to the ship!" the pegasus stammered under the weight of their loot. The natives meanwhile started to storm after them and the stoneball. Unfortunately one of the zebras stumbled and a torch ignited the ball. Because...because...reasons!
"Yeah, why not?" the pegasus exclaimed at the flaming mass that follwed them. The extraordinary chase eventually ended at the beach where our meanwhile wanted hobby-tombraiders dropped their anchor. Yes, they actually have just been running in a huge circle and yes, they took the longest and hardest way since on their escaping route numerous signs such as "Treasure 500m this way" could be seen. Anyways there was one problem. They both were so loaded with treasures and rarities that none of them could've made their way up to the ship. If it wasn't for the fast thinking of one of them and the strange affection of some certain seadwellers. One loud "SHOO BEE DOO!" later a living bridge more or less willingly formed in front of the ship, granting access for our heroes.
The unicorn used his magic to change the course of the stoneball once they were on board, ironically guiding it straight into the partybeach they refused to go before "This will teach them to book last minute!". The next problem came up as the ship still was stranded on that unhostile island. Yet again, nothing some magic and seapony love couldn't overcome. The ship's ropes levitated towards the cheering mass, wrapping around them in a semi-tight embrace. Afterall the unicorn wouldn't want his "favourite inhabitants of the cuddly depths" to be hurt.
"Uhm...they don't really do much, do they?" the older of them stated as the aquaenquines refused to pull the heavy ship off the beach.
"You gotta bait them! They love you afterall." a cheekily grinning pony suggested from behind him. Fortunately the villagers were too overwhelmed by the cute little bridge that still connected the ship and the solid land and thus stopped in their tracks to pet them.
An eyeroll later the winged pony agreed and flew onto the sea, teasingly shaking his flank at the mass which instantly chased after their sole love-interest that, which was new and astounding to them, could now fly aswell. They pulled the ship off the beach and about a half mile onto the sea.
Meanwhile on the beach
"Those tourists don't seem to appreciate our torch march." one of the zebras said in his native language. His statement was met by a nod of his friends and "Yeah, but at least that giant armadillo rolled into that other travel agency's customers! Let's see if we can help or something! Everypony after me!". And with that the loud cheering horde galloped towards the burnvictims and their torches with them.
Back on the high seas the pegasus' wings grew tired from both the flapping and the cold breeze which may or may not has been cast by the unicorn to fuel the sails. He spiraled down into the water just to be caught and surounded by the seaponies. Completely inappropriate words and screams of terror could be heard but were soon muffled when one of the small creatueres hopped into his mouth.
"Aaaw, c'mon! They deserve it!" the younger of them yelled down between two laughs. After another 10 minutes of unwilling cuddling he threw his friend a rope and pulled him back onto the ship. They both said their good-byes to their flippered saviours, some kind and thankfull and others most mean and cursing, and loosend the ropes on the happy and obviously satisfied seaponies, who quickly disapeared in the ocean again.
"I will need a therapist when we come home. Their damn flippers were everywhere! EVERYWHERE I TELL YOU!" the still slightly terrified pegasuspony stated, or better blamed on his younger companion.
"Don't worry! We are now wanted tombraiders! You can afford the most expensive therapist in all of Equestria!" he answered when suddenly a thought sparked in his head "We need doctortitles!"
"Yeah! Dr. Tray Hunter! Doctor of practical nonsense!" the black pegasus cheered at this idea, his soaked mane still hanging into his face.
"Dr.Snowflake 'Frozen' von Frostheim! Doctor of theoretical nonsense and technician for air conditioners!" the blue unicorn grinned and went over to count their bounty. They split it fair and square just to lose it all as they had to pay taxes and penalities for drunk sailing, import of historical artifacts and destruction of the Manehatten harbour.
And this my friends, is how Fro and me got our doctortitles. And if anypony questions my reputation or this story in all I dare them to go and find that cantina. But don't expect to find anymore treasures since those are now exposed in the museum of history in Canterlot.
