Daring Do gently pushed back the brim of her hat and stared out over the dropoff. She licked her lips in nervous anticipation. It was a little dropoff, to be honest. But that wasn't what frightened Daring. No, falling didn't frighten her in the least. Being a pegasus, flying—and falling—was second nature to her. It was what she would fall into if she missed the other side that frightened her. A giant pond of what was obviously quicksand lay between her and her prize, and Daring Do was plenty scared of quicksand. And she couldn't just fly over it; not since the Monkey King's mersin... merce... soldiers had hurt her left wing. And, to top it all off, this quicksand was blue. She was sure that meant something, but wasn't quite sure what. Either way, it seemed to spell 'trouble' for Daring.
But she couldn't just let the Monkey King get away with that prized treasure. She would get it back, or her name wasn't Daring Do!
Which, of course, it was.
She swallowed, tapped her open treasure chest cutie mark for luck, then took a firm bite onto the vine. Backing up as far as she could, she took a running start and launched herself off the edge.
She swung forward, with the wind rushing through her mane. As she hit midswing, she pumped her hind legs hard forward to propel herself further. Upon reaching the end of the vine's swing, she let go, and her momentum sent her flying flank over teakettle... and landing right in the middle of the quicksand. Like tentacles, the blue strands seemed to reach all around her, trying to push her down and bury her forever.
Kicking ferociously, she fought to the surface, pushing all the blue slime away, and breathed deeply. She struggled towards the edge, but even though she was pushing hard, she wasn't getting anywhere.
Panic began to set in, but then she remembered—she was Daring Do. Daring Do doesn't get scared. She stays calm and gets ideas, and gets out of anything. It's part of the requirements of being a world-famous adventurer, after all.
Rotating, she faced upwards and tried to control her breathing. She could get out of this. She could. Rotating herself again, she began to attempt to swim out in a slow forward crawl motion, but it seemed like the blue kept coming and keeping her in place.
Alright. Time for Plan B. Pushing down as hard as she could, she managed to get airborne for a split second before splashing back down and descending beneath the blue again. She forced her head up and realized she was missing her hat. Daring Do just wasn't Daring Do without her hat, so she submersed her head and when she surfaced again, the hat in question was perched cockily on her head.
Not a problem for Daring Do.
She slowly began to swim forward, keeping her motions small and letting the quicksand fill in the spaces she left. She made progress, and felt a smile spread across her face. She was going to make it!
A sudden splash next to her made her ears perk up. She paused, treading water, and looked up. Oh, no. Up in a tree there was another of the Monkey King's fighters, a big, ugly brown monkey, throwing coconuts at her.
She scooped up some sand and threw it back, but it didn't even make it halfway up the tree. He threw back his head and laughed... until a coconut hit him in the head. Stunned, he fell back into the quicksand and sank.
Daring couldn't resist a laugh of her own. That's what you get when you mess with the world's greatest explorer, Daring D-
More splashes punctured her thoughts. She looked up, and to her horror, realized that he had not been alone. It might as well have been raining coconuts, so many were falling.
Quickly, she began to swim faster than she ever had, but the coconuts kept coming. One even hit her on the head, but her helmet took most of the impact, and she was able to quickly shake it off and keep swimming.
Gasping for air, she looked up, and saw the edge of the pit. She let out a small cheer of triumph. On the ground, she could outrun these bald freaks any day. With renewed vigor, she displaced more and more of the viscous blue material, propelling herself forward, closer and closer to her goal.
She was within a few body lengths when a sharp skreeee suddenly rang through the air. Daring Do froze. Oh, no...
Monkeys, coconuts, rocks, hat, clothes, cutie mark, and jungle all disappeared as a brown unicorn in a black and white striped shirt blew his whistle again. “Out of the foam pit, Daring,” he said flatly. “Free-play ended ten minutes ago. And for the love of Celestia, stop throwing the blocks out of the pit.”
Little filly Daring Do looked around, as if seeing the room full of trampolines and waiting gymnasts (some frowning and tapping hooves impatiently) for the first time. “Aww... Rory!” she complained, picking up one of the foam blocks and throwing it at the unicorn. “You always ruin my fun.”
“Your fun?” Rory kicked the block back into the pit, giving a slight chuckle as it bounced off Daring Do's head before landing and getting lost among its identical brethren. “Their fun. My fun. Besides, what are you complaining about? You got here ten minutes before we even opened and you stay until we close. They're going to start charging you rent pretty soon, you're here so often.”
“Well, duh!” Daring said, as if it were blindingly obvious. “I'm not gonna be a great treasure hunter unless I practice!”
The unicorn rolled his eyes. “You're not gonna be a great treasure hunter, period. They don't have those anymore, and even if you were, you wouldn't find anything anyway.”
Daring Do stuck her tongue out. “I'll show you, Rory!” she promised. “I'll become the greatest adventurer ever and I'm gonna write a book about it and everything. And when I do, I'll make sure it's addressed to you.” She held up her hooves dramatically, as if unveiling a poster. “It's gonna say, 'To Aurora, the poopyhead who tried to crush my dream'!”
The unicorn heard some slight giggles from the bystanding gymnasts. He wasn't entirely sure if it was because of the challenge the filly had thrown down, or because his name was determinedly female. Either way, he ignored it. “If you ever manage to get anything printed, I promise I'll take you out for lunch and get you a lifetime pass to this place.”
Daring Do looked up at him and gave him the meanest glare she could muster. “I'll hold you to that, buster!”
He snorted a laugh. “Fine. But until then, oh mighty explorer and defeater of the Monkey King, out of the pit.”
Daring Do made her way to the edge of the pit and pulled herself up and out, using her tiny wings for a little bit of thrust. She couldn't fly yet, but they sure made getting out of the ball pit easier once she had learned how to use them. As she departed, she looked back at the pit and narrowed her eyes in challenge. Next time, Monkey King... next time.
Author's Note
In case you were wondering, Rory the unicorn now owes Daring approximately thirty-six lunches and lifetime passes, not counting the many scientific articles she's published under other names.
Inspired by a trip to the tumbling gym. I don't have much upper body strength, so trying to get out of that block pit felt like pulling myself out of blue quicksand to me.
...Stop judging me. I still had fun.
