A small pebble skittered over the edge of the cliff and down its steep slope as the pair came to a stop.
Had they been of weaker spirit or will, the eyes of the two fillies might have been sagging and tired by the sheer futility and hopelessness of the situation.
Though far from being the on the highest point, from their perch, a small overlook hugging the vertical wall of a mountain, the duo could easily make an assumption of what they were up against.
Simply put, they were up against a long hike through "Samitet e", as the locals referred to the mountain range.
Beyond this and a collection of conversational tidbits and hints that implied the extreme danger of the mountain range, they had little to go on.
A breeze, like many that wound through the pointed mounts, rushed past them. Applejack’s hair was tangled and hadn’t been washed for at least four days, but it still blew fairly neatly in the wind, her mane and tail still held into the shapes of ponytails by red ribbons. She tipped her hat upwards and looked over to her best friend.
Dash was in a similar condition; she had forgone even trying to maintain her hair, but the radiance of its multiple colors was not absent. She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. Though she knew of how dire their current state of affairs was, she appreciated the taste and smell of the high air; its sensation was one that she missed deeply, and it currently had an almost intoxicating effect on her.
Normally, the two might have dealt with their predicament more easily; Dash’s flight and Applejack’s strength made them a perfect team.
However, only half of that equation still stood.
Applejack looked to the blue mare’s back. She grimaced and shuddered out of pity as her eyes fell upon the bandages wrapped around Dash’s midsection, still stained with red. She would need the bones in her wings reset once they returned to the town. Her face flushed when she thought back to her attempt to reset the wings herself: only after 15 minutes of excruciating struggling had they both realized that Dash's broken wing bones, more than one of which broke the surface of her skin, would need professional attention.
Dash opened her eyes. “What’s up, AJ?” she eyed her friend curiously.
“Nothin’. Jus’ thinkin’ ‘bout what we should do next.”
“Duh; we should get outta these stupid mountains!” she rolled her eyes.
Applejack turned her face from the mountains to Dash. “It ain’t as easy as that.”
Dash sighed. “Yeah. I know.”
They shifted their attention back towards the mountains. Originally they had a somewhat humorous countenance, as Pinkie had pointed out that they looked like upside-down ice cream cones; now, humorous would be one of the last things the equines would use to describe the lofty peaks.
Applejack shifted her weight to one side and observed the trails that they could take. One continued winding around near the mountaintops, which was faster, but, although Applejack hadn’t said anything, she was dying to take the trails that led down to the crevices between them.
“Whaddaya say, AJ?” Dash said, contemplating the same decision. “Up or down?”
She didn’t want to betray any sign of weakness in front of Dash, but Applejack jumped on the opportunity regardless. “Ah’m thinkin’ we take the low road this time, sugarcube. We’re runnin’ low on rations.”
Dash nodded, looking at the provisions slung over both of their backs. “Yeah.”
Thus had been their plan; travel higher up when they had enough provisions and travel down to the fissures between the mountains when they needed to restock.
Although it was faster, and they didn’t tell on another, neither of them particularly enjoyed walking the high paths.
The only reason Dash might have preferred them would be the sensation of being high up, but other than that, both found it difficult to deal with. The weather was harsher and more unpredictable, there were no trees to protect them, and nothing to eat or drink.
On top of this, it became unbearably hot during the day and freezing cold at night. They had remembered the desert being described in a similar manner, but they hadn’t expected such a climate among the tall summits.
Applejack grunted, forcing herself out of the trance she stood in at the overlook and moving towards the path.
Noticing the lack of sound behind her, she looked back. Rainbow Dash still stood surveying the land.
“Dash?”
There was no response; Dash’s eyes looked slightly glazed over. Applejack frowned.
“RD?”
“Huh?”
“Ya ready ta go?”
“Uh-huh,” she responded, her gaze unwavering. Applejack waited for a moment before speaking again.
“Ya sure?”
As if a spell had been broken, Dash leapt past Applejack and stopped. “Yeah, jeez. Ya think I’m tired or I’ve got a problem or something?”
Applejack shook her head. “Naw, just makin’ sure.”
“Making sure? C’mon AJ, it’s me, for hay’s sake! Nothing stops me!” she grinned widely.
“If ya say so.”
Dash’s mouth set in a straight line as if she didn’t feel she had convinced Applejack of how great she was doing. The two then set down the trail with little conversation.
Dead trees and bushes lined the path. Light, chalky rocks and similarly colored tree trunks also flanked the trail, sometime barring the way. However, they were easy enough to get over. The real challenge came in the natural disasters that often struck the mountain range. Landslides and flash floods plagued the area.
They turned a corner and Applejack checked their map. When all of the mountains looked the same it was easy to get confused and lose direction.
“Hold on there,” Applejack said.
Dash obeyed and wheeled around to face the earth pony.
“Map says we need to end up on this side,” she pointed down the extreme drop that they walked beside. Applejack looked down the side of the mountain.
“There,” she pointed out an average-sized pond. “If we can see that pond, we’re in the right place.”
“’Kay.”
They continued on once more. Applejack began whistling a tune that she had learned on the farm as Dash kicked one of the dry pebbles that were strewn all over the mountain. Applejack ceased whistling as her chapped lips began to sting and her throat began to burn.
She reached back and unclipped a canteen from her pack and brought it to her mouth, where she clenched it in her teeth and began drinking its contents.
Dash, upon hearing this, noticed her own thirst. She too unclipped her canteen, only to find it empty. She grumbled to herself. She was thirsty, but she certainly wasn’t going to ask for handouts. Applejack had even told her to take her time and not waste her water. She clipped the canteen back onto a hoop on her pack, refusing to let her friend catch on.
As they rounded another corner, they were met with a wall of piled up stones, about the height of a house.
“Shoot!” Applejack exclaimed.
“Landslide; man I hate these things! It’s like these dumb mountains are made outta putty!” Dash snorted.
The pegasus began shakily ascending the heap of mismatched boulders, balancing the weight on her back and making sure the rocks that she stepped on didn’t give way. She would only fall back down to the path, but tumbling down the bumpy surface was not something she desired at the moment.
Applejack followed suit, taking a wider stance. The fillies had worked out a system in which they would take turns on who went first, and the one that was second would attempt to catch the leader if she began to fall. On top of this, the two had fastened a length of roped around each of their bodies so that if the following one fell, the first one could potentially save her.
The risk, of course, is that in either scenario their plan could backfire and send both falling to their doom, but they figured it was better than nothing.
They both grunted and panted as they struggled up the obstacle; hooves were not meant to grip.
“Ah wish we had some a those fancy gadgets on that cave-trottin’ jacket,” Applejack remarked.
“Totally,” Dash said. “We’d probably be outta the mountains by now!”
She opened her mouth to say something else, but stopped as she felt a brushing against one of her forelegs. She looked down. A black scorpion sat before her hoof, ready to strike.
“AH!” Dash kicked it away. It landed on its back a short distance away and scurried between the boulders.
“What’s the matter?”
“Scorpion!”
“Oh no,” Applejack breathed. That was one other thing they had been told about the mountains range; it was home to a particularly dangerous species of scorpions. In addition, they rarely left the confines of their nest, meaning that if the two mares found one, many would most likely follow.
They began wrestling up the pile more frantically, not stopping to think about the cuts and scrapes they might get should they fall at this pace. They reached the crest and hopped down the other side, landing in a small cloud of dust.
No sooner than they landed did Applejack tap Dash’s shoulder. “Look out!”
She glanced over to where Applejack was pointing. A swarm of the iridescent scorpions was shuffling around the area, a group detaching and heading towards them.
The two broke into a brisk trot. Outrunning the creatures was easy, but there was no telling when or where they might crawl out around a nest; a hole in the rock, a knothole in a hollow tree, and an old log had all housed them. Blades of dry grass had even provided the scorpions with camouflage in the past.
Once they both felt that the scorpions were a satisfactory distance behind them, they came to a halt.
“More scorpions,” Applejack sighed.
“Scorpions, hornets; I hope those were the ‘scary animals’ that the guys in town were talkin’ about. I mean, not that I think they’re scary,” Dash added.
“Well they scare me,” Applejack pointed a hoof to her chest. “Anythin’ that can put me down with one sting don’t sit right with me. Ah’m always worried they’re crawlin’ on me at night.”
Dash chuckled. “Is that why you’re always fidgeting? You gotta cut that out, AJ, you’re keepin’ me up at night!”
Applejack shrugged. She probably was keeping Dash up at night. The townsfolk had equipped them with only one sleeping bag fit for two ponies, claiming the two would need to share body heat at night. Though the pair found the idea initially awkward and excessive, they soon learned that the vendors in town hadn’t been lying. It was freezing at night, and despite minor quarrels over one encroaching on the other’s side, the way their warmth was traded and retained in the comforter helped immensely. They would have to remember the idea behind it; it could help in the future.
“One a us has gotta be the careful one.”
“Sure, sure.”
As they traveled further and further down the mountain, the trail became wider and the foliage became denser. The meager and dead bushes that they passed higher up began to close in around the trail more, threatening to scratch those that traveled it with their pointed branches.
They came to another pitfall in the path, this one spanned by an old, fallen tree. The ponies had crossed a good number of improvised bridges at this point, but the creaking and groaning of the trunk under their weight still gave Applejack goose bumps. She still had yet to overcome her fear of heights.
Beyond this, little of the trail was out of the ordinary. They passed one or two skulls, but the preliminary shock of the sight had worn off, although the remains of those that perished on the mountains were still a bit unnerving.
“Huh. Guess we’re doing pretty well, huh?” Dash asked Applejack as they passed one of the remnants.
The farm pony nodded. “Ah’d reckon that they’d be real surprised back in town that two Ponyville folks like us made it this far!”
“I can’t wait ta see the looks on their faces when we walk outta their little ‘cursed mountains’ like it’s no big deal!”
They both snickered. Other than the unpleasant climate and the scorpions and hornets, there had been nothing particularly dangerous about the mountains. Many claimed that few who went in came out alive, but beyond poor foresight the two couldn’t imagine why that would be.
As they neared the base of the mountain, the path opened out into a field of stones, haphazardly sticking out of the ground. According the townsfolk, these were deposited pieces of the mountains that had broken off over the years. Unlike the dusty areas above, these rocks had, however sparse, bushes protruding out between them, as well as moss and lichens that clung to and crept up the sides of the stones.
The fillies circled around the base until they could see, between the trees, the glimmer of light reflecting off of water.
“There’s the pond,” Applejack smiled.
“Cool, let’s get a move on.”
These were always easier to surpass. Most of the discarded areas were large, flat slabs, allowing the duo to leap between them with relative ease and safety.
Approaching the tree line, the pleasant sounds of birds chirping and leaves rustling in the wind drifted to the mares’ ears. They leapt beneath the shade of the trees as soon as they were close enough and stopped immediately to take in the cool air.
Thankfully, underbrush in the forests that crept between the mountains was nearly non-existent, and the two reached the pond with no trouble at all.
The pond was actually part of a thin, clear stream that twisted between the mountains, bringing life to the areas nestled between the otherwise desolate heights.
They shrugged off their gear instantaneously; sweat coating them, particularly where their packs had been. Dash rushed to the edge of the pond and began lapping up the cool water; it was an incredibly soothing alternative to the warm canteen she had been drinking out of for the past three days.
“Cannonball!”
A wave of water splashed over Dash’s face as Applejack plunged into the water. She had left her hat and bowties by her provisions, and giggled at Dash’s soaked head as she surfaced.
Dash brushed her damp mane out of her face. “Oh yeah?”
The blue filly backed up and began sprinting towards the pool. Using a rock as a launching pad, she jumped as high as she could, adopting the fetal position in midair and plummeting into the pool.
The displaced water rained around Applejack as she was rocked by the waves that Dash had caused, laughing at the eruption of water.
As the pond settled, Dash was nowhere to be found. Applejack turned her head back and forward.
“Dash? Where’d ya-“ she was cut off as her tail was grabbed and she was yanked underwater. She opened her eyes and looked to her rear, and saw a blur of hazy colors. Suddenly she was hoisted up onto a rock by the side of the pond. Dash sat next to her, laughing with Applejack’s tail still clenched in her teeth.
“Heh heh! Oh man, you should’ve seen your face when I pulled you under!”
Applejack snorted. “Consarnit, Dash! Ya got water up mah nose!”
The cyan filly continued laughing but stopped and began coughing as Applejack started waving her tail back and forth while it was still held in Dash’s mouth.
“PEH! PTOO! Gross, AJ! I don’t want your hair all over my tongue!”
“Shoulda thought about that before ya went grabbin’ mah tail,” she chuckled.
“Yeah, like YOU never grab MY tail.”
Applejack shrugged. She rose to her hooves and trotted over to her pack. She fumbled with a few things and then returned with the map in her mouth. She laid it down between them.
“Man, always business, huh? Can’t we just swim and have fun?” Dash whined.
“Ah wanna get this figured out first,” Applejack replied. She pointed a hoof to the map. “There. Ah think that’s where we are.”
“You think? You don’t know?”
“You wanna handle the map?”
Dash shrunk away from the suggestion. “Hay no.”
“Alright. Anyway, Ah think we’re here,” she pointed to a tiny circle. Them pegasi the townsfolk sent us after oughta be round here,” she motioned to an area about 5 inches to the left of their position. According the legend, it was about five miles away.
Dash leaned back and lied down, her forelegs wrapped behind her head. “If I had been one a those guys, I wouldn’t have gotten lost.”
Applejack wasn’t sure how to respond to the comment. Fortunately, Dash felt content shifting the subject.
“So why are we doin’ this, again?”
“Because, sugarcube, we ain’t gonna just let a group a innocent ponies rot out here, are we?”
“I mean the other reason.”
Applejack sighed. She didn’t like bringing up the other reason they had for rescuing ponies; it made the effort seem less virtuous and heroic.
“The cave, remember? We need ta get the key ta that cave, and our side a the deal is findin’ these pegasi and bringin’ ‘em back.”
Dash huffed. “We could probably just take the key; they wouldn’t even notice.”
“Dash! That’d be stealing!”
“Hey, it’s just a thought, AJ, chill out! You’re acting like stealing is the worst crime you’ve ever heard of, and it’s not like I’m gonna try it!
“Good. We ain’t gonna do things the way those darned… whoever they are that are chasin’ us do things.”
After a moment of silence, Dash spoke up. “At least these mountains are good for not getting chased in. Nopony goes in here.”
“Got that right. No fires, no lights, nothin’.”
“We should totally make this place a secret hideout or something when we get outta here.”
“Hopefully we won’t need to. Ah hope we can stay hidden with Celestia until all this blows over. Ah feel safer with her around.”
“Yeah, just a thought.” Dash sat up again. “Hey, what’s that?” she gestured to a collection of squares, circles, and triangles on the map. They rested about an inch to the right of where the lost pegasi should be.
Applejack looked at it closely. “Ah don’t know, maybe it’s a stain or an ink spill or somethin’. Either way it don’t look like anythin’ else on the map.”
“Yeah,” Dash agreed. Despite this, Applejack seemed intrigued by the figures. Dash raised an eyebrow. She never thought of her as the puzzle-solving type.
After a few minutes, Dash’s stomach began to growl. She stood up, stretched, and trotted off to look around the woods. While observing her surroundings, she realized that there wasn’t anything particularly special to be found. She supposed there was always the grass, but she felt hardly in the mood for it.
She turned her eyes upward, looking for fruit that might be hanging from the trees. While her sight was preoccupied with what was above, she didn’t even notice the tree before her. She grunted as she bumped into and took a few steps back.
“Pay attention, idiot,” she scolded herself. She stood back and looked at the tree. There was nothing special about it, save a triangle etched into the side of it.
Curious, Dash broke into a trot to her left, the direction that the triangle was pointing.
She peered at each tree, wondering if there may be more etchings. Her suspicion was proven true when she found another triangle. This one was upright, which Dash supposed meant straight ahead.
In a matter of seconds, she came to another special tree, though the first thing she saw was the bush at the foot of it. Bright strawberries hung from the branches of the shrub that sat at the base of the tree. She looked up. There was a circle engraved into this tree.
She shrugged. She might have to keep those symbols in mind. She went to work picking off the berries with her teeth and depositing them into the saddlebag she had brought. It was the same color as her, its clasp a likeness of her cutie mark.
Once she had filled the bag with a satisfactory amount of berries, she turned back towards the pond.
Returning to the clearing, she found Applejack still looking at the map, a pencil in her mouth. “Who do think you are, Twilight?” Dash said as she sat down across from her friend and tossed the full saddlebag between them.
Applejack looked up to Dash, and then down to the saddlebag.
“Ya found these in the woods around here?”
“Uh-huh. I knew I was hungry, but I didn’t know if you wanted any or not.”
“Aw, that’s real sweet a you, sugarcube,” Applejack smiled.
“Yeah, sure thing AJ, just don’t get all mushy about it,” she replied. As the two began sharing the bag of strawberries, Dash scooted up next to Applejack.
“So what are you looking at, anyway?”
“Ah’m just writin’… important stuff down,” she answered.
“Like what?” Dash slid the map over to her side.
“Hey!”
Dash squinted. All it looked like to her was that Applejack had traced a few routes between their current location and their destination.
“It took ya this long to draw a couple lines, AJ?”
“M-hm.”
Dash eyed her skeptically, but then cocked her head and rolled her eyes. “Pf. Whatever.”
“Well Ah’m gonna get some water fer mah canteen,” Applejack said, taking the map in her teeth. Dash rolled onto her back and started watching the clouds.
As she approached her bundle of gear, she slipped the map into a pocket and removed her flask from the pile, bringing it over to the water. As she brought it down to the water and filled it, the afternoon sun caught the water and shone with a color similar to Applejack’s.
Dash rolled over onto her stomach and watched as the earth pony filled up the container. Her golden hair, no longer bound into a ponytail, hung about her head in amber strands, some parts still damp. She looked to Dash suddenly. The pegasus immediately averted her eyes, pretending to play with the grass instead. She meant nothing by watching Applejack, but she feared that she might come off as odd if her friend caught her doing it.
She stood up and dove back into the water. She swam beneath its exterior and resurfaced on a few rocks on the other side. Applejack was clipping her water back onto her gear.
The cyan pegasus rested her chin on her hooves. “Hey AJ, why don’t we just stay down here tonight?”
Applejack turned and considered the idea. She shrugged. “Ah don’t see why not.”
“Awesome,” Dash said, turning over once more and facing the sky.
Applejack shook her head and began to pitch their canvas shelter as Dash dozed off. She decided to let her do so; she always told herself she would set Dash straight in work ethic one day, but under recent circumstances, she decided her friend had earned the right to rest.
Once she had finished setting up the bedding for the night, Applejack sat cross-legged on their large, thick sheets, leaned over to her pack, and pulled out the map. She then retrieved a pencil and started scribbling away on the parchment.
Applejack and Rainbow Dash coughed as the dust swirled around them.
The milky powder that coated the mountains had proven to be a serious problem lately. Their eyes had begun to sting and their throats had begun to burn as they found themselves walking through clouds of the substance more and more often.
The night had been enjoyable; the air was cool, but not freezing, and it maintained its pleasurable temperature through the morning. They had reluctantly pulled themselves from the comfortable forest below and had reached higher ground already, despite having only been awake for about two hours.
That was one thing Dash appreciated about only traveling with Applejack; the two of them could maintain their own speedy pace without needing to stop for any of their slower friends.
The two trudged along wordlessly; neither felt that they had the urge or the energy to start and sustain a conversation. Plus, there wasn’t much to talk about; every day was bland and similar; mostly walking along trails identical to those they had already encountered. Each time they looked down to the map and out across the broken land, they realized how lucky they had been to find their pond. After they had set off this morning, it seemed as though there was nothing besides the sharp peaks and steep, arid gullies between them.
The conditions of the day seemed particularly unbearable. The wind had picked up significantly in the heights, the heat seemed to have doubled, and the airborne dirt from the trail seemed thick enough to lean on. Both had dry, cracked lips, and their bodies were streaked with sweat and caked in off-white grime.
Dash gasped as her hoof caught a rock on the uneven path and she was nearly sent face-first into the ground. She regained her balance and shook herself, succeeding in removing one of the many layers of powder clinging to her coat. She growled in dissatisfaction.
“This place sucks,” the pegasus said plainly.
Applejack nodded.
They continued onwards, traversing piles of white stones and fallen, ashen trees. Every time they cleared one of these obstacles, they would thoroughly check one another for any small, dangerous creatures that might have crawled onto them without being noticed.
Their attention had been caught more than once by the sounds of stones sliding down the cliffs. None had been of a dangerous size, but all registered a glance over the shoulder from both of the fillies. Nothing had proven to be extraordinarily perilous thus far, but they had learned that one could never be too sure in an unfamiliar place, especially those that weren’t under the protection of Princess Celestia.
After Dash had finished checking under Applejack’s forelegs, they looked to each other on instinct. They noticed, as the glanced to one another, that their eyes possessed wariness within them that hadn’t been present before. In Ponyville they had adjusted to a life of carefree play and innocence; after more than a few adventures beyond Equestria, the twinkle in their eyes was tinted with extra care and caginess.
“Jeez, you get enough sleep, AJ?” Dash asked jokingly, pointing to the dark rings beneath the farm pony’s eyes.
The orange mare brought a hoof up to feel her eyes, and then smiled back at her friend. “As if you ain’t got a matchin’ set, RD. It looks like ya just crawled out from under a rock!”
Dash chuckled, feeling the bags under her eyes. “Hey, you’re right!”
They both laughed. It wasn’t that funny, but it was funny enough to distract them. And any distraction was good enough.
They continued trotting along, still giggling, until they felt a cool breeze flowing from just beyond the next bend in the trail. They looked to one another curiously, shrugged, and peeked around it.
They were met with the sight of an opening of an undetermined depth in the side of the mountain. While it would normally be a fairly typical sight, this one appeared to be hoof-made. Its entrance was a perfectly symmetrical stone archway, a blank, rectangular keystone situated at the top.
They looked to each other and shrugged once more.
The two cautiously crept out from behind the corner, straining their eyes to gauge how far the tunnel might go on for. Dash tapped Applejack’s shoulder. “You still have that lantern?”
Applejack wordlessly retrieved a preserves jar with the label ripped off. Other than four seemingly inert pebbles within it, was empty. She gave it a quick shake, and the pellets sprung to life, lighting up and beginning to float about within the glass container.
She nodded and the two pushed aside their better judgment, slowly approaching the maw of the cave anyway.
It was cooler, which they appreciated, but it was filled with a musty, damp scent. A smell that they had come to recognize as iron also fluttered around their nostrils as they walked in.
Applejack, who held the lantern in her mouth, brought it up to one of the sides of the tunnel and set it down. The wall was a smooth face of grey bricks, each the exact same size as far as the mares could tell. Dash squinted at the surface, surprised by the unlikely craftsmanship given the location.
“Huh. Who do you think made this?”
“Ask Twilight,” Applejack answered.
Dash rolled her eyes. “Duh! I would if she were here!”
“And ya think that Ah would know?”
“Well, maybe.”
The farm pony shook her head. “Come on, let’s get outta here.”
“Aw, come on, AJ! Let’s check it out! Who’s to say those ponies didn’t hide in here, anyway?”
The farm pony turned the idea over in her head before nodding reluctantly. “Alright, we’ll look a little more.”
Dash grinned in victory and grabbed the lantern in her own teeth.
“Less go den!”
They cantered further into the tunnel, the clattering of their hooves on the ground echoing around the empty corridor.
The light caught an out of the ordinary feature on a wall as the two passed by it. Applejack tapped her friend’s shoulder. “Dash, shine the light on that.”
The pegasus did as she was told, dropping the lamp on the ground before the wall.
It looked as though letters had been carved into the wall.
“El, E, Jay, E,” Dash spelled out the word. “Leje? What the hay does that mean?”
Applejack shook her head. “Ah ain’t the one ta be askin’. Maybe Twilight would know.”
“Maybe. Bet she’d know a lot a cool stuff about this place.”
“Yep. Ah bet Rarity’d be complainin’ just about now.”
“Yeah. I bet Pinkie would be saying something that didn’t have anything to do with what we’re doing right now.”
“Uh huh.”
“M-hm.”
For a short while, neither of them spoke. Normally one of their friends would fill in the silence, but right now there was only an awkward absence of noise. Recently, they were finding themselves in situations like this more and more often.
A cool wind wafted through the tunnel. Dash shivered. The cryptic characters that had been hastily carved into the wall made both of them uneasy, but it was hardly as if either would admit fear and ask to turn around. The habit they had of going against reason in order to better the other had proven time and time again to be fairly self-destructive.
Dash grabbed the lantern in her teeth again and continued along the dank passage. The unexplained burrow both scared and excited her. It struck her as incredibly similar to the ancient cities and mysterious crypts that typically appeared in her favorite book series. She wasn’t sure what she expected to find at the end, but she figured it didn’t really matter; she just wanted to see how far they could go, though she was determined to make it to the end.
Applejack’s initial hesitation and discomfort held her back at first; but as it wore off, she too became more intrigued by her surroundings. Though Dash had gone far ahead of her, she managed to catch up and match her friend’s pace as she became just as invested in the exploration.
As they continued, the rectangular stones of the walls began to change. It was a slow transition, and at first went entirely unnoticed by the mares, but the shifting and varying in the stones’ shapes and sizes became impossible to miss in the light of the lantern.
“Y’all seein’ this?”
The pair came to a halt, and once more Dash wordlessly placed the light on the floor.
They stepped back in unison. The lamp’s light revealed that the stones were not randomly and haphazardly arranged, as they had both supposed, but were instead fitted together in a mosaic-like arrangement; the varied shapes interlocked and depicted what appeared to be a massive canyon or crater. Small, intricately chiseled figures of ponies stood around the massive cavity.
Once they both understood the scene before them, they glanced to one another and tacitly agreed to move on.
Dash grabbed the lantern once more.
Instead of breaking into a gallop, they instead chose to advance at a gradual pace and observe the walls more closely. They continued in this manner for eight steps until they came to another image. Dash set down the lantern.
The crevice in the otherwise flat ground remained the same, as well as the ponies surrounding it.
The two faced one another, wearing identical expressions that asked what the difference was between the two depictions.
Applejack broke the eye contact and walked closer to the wall, leaning in to observe it more acutely.
After a moment of watching the farm pony with the same amount of curiosity with which Applejack inspected the mural, Dash stepped closer as well.
The earth pony took the opportunity to tap Dash’s shoulder, pointing. “Rainbow…”
Dash’s eyes traced along Applejack’s foreleg until they rested on what the hoof was pointing at.
There was a difference.
At the bottom of the once-empty crevice was the likeness of a head, massive in comparison to the minute equines. The face, expressionless and blank, was turned upwards, and appeared somewhat similar to those of the fillies’ own species, only… off, in some way. They couldn’t quite put their hooves on what it was.
“Now what do ya suppose that is?”
Dash shook her head. “You wanna keep going, AJ?”
Applejack picked up the lantern and trotted further along the wall in response.
They came to the next mural; the crevice and the ponies surrounding it were the same. The face was once again absent.
The two friends’ faces became creased with curiosity once more; they investigated it closely as they had the first one, but they were sure that this image was, for all intents and purposes, the same.
They hurried to the next one.
There was no face, there was no crevice, and there were no equines; just a flat expanse of grass engraved in the stone.
“Weird…” Dash whispered.
When Applejack didn’t respond, her eyes still glued on the mural, Dash took the opportunity to back away, unnoticed.
A swift yank on the tail caused Applejack to leap at least a foot in the air and give out a loud yelp.
A thud and a cackling could be heard behind her as Dash rolled onto her back and began nearly sobbing with laughter. “Oh man, Big Mac was right! You are easy to scare!”
Applejack scowled. “You’da done the same if you’d got yer tail pulled in a spooky old cave like this.”
The Pegasus waved a hoof. “Psssh. Yeah, whatever, AJ. Come on, I think there’s an exit up ahead.”
Sure enough, a small spot of gray could be seen illuminated amongst the blackness up ahead.
“Let’s check it out,” Dash said.
Applejack shook her head. “Bored already?”
The blue filly shrugged. “Maybe.”
Applejack rolled her eyes, but followed without protest.
They picked up their pace once more. As they progressed, something that neither of them had previously noticed came to their attention. The ever-present smell of iron had increased steadily until it became impossible to ignore.
As they approached the greyness, a white light could be seen in a tunnel peeling off to the right, revealing the outdoors. At the same time, the scent of iron had grown so strong that the pair could practically taste it.
“Man, what is that?” Dash asked.
“Gotta be some veins or ore ‘round here somewhere.”
“Ohhhh, you think this might be a mine?”
“Could be.”
Dash looked both ways, as though there might be somepony eavesdropping on their conversation, even if it was unlikely that anypony had been in the tunnel in centuries.
“Let’s check it out! Maybe there’s some, like, treasure or something in here.”
Applejack’s mouth set crookedly as she looked between her friend and the opening back outside. Applejack had never pegged herself as particularly adventurous; she always figured that she would prefer a life of applebucking back at Sweet Apple Acres to one of any other kind. Recent events and current circumstances, however, had pushed that idealistic lifestyle far away; it was more a fantasy than an aspiration.
Despite all of that, it had taken Applejack up until this moment in time to realize that she had enjoyed living on the move, touring places that she never figured existed anywhere outside of novels or fairy tales.
For a moment, Applejack appeared as though she had been struck dumb as she contemplated the matter. Rainbow Dash noticed her vacant stare and waved a hoof before the farm pony’s face.
“AJ, you okay?”
“’Course Ah’m okay,” Applejack responded briskly, shaking herself out of her own thoughts, “why wouldn’t Ah be?”
“Chill, you were just all spaced-out looking,” Dash replied.
“Well, it’s probably the air up here; thin an’ all that.”
Dash raised one eyebrow quizzically, to which Applejack sighed and rolled her eyes. “Alright, let’s go.”
Dash clapped her hooves and rubbed them together. “Awesome!” she said before bounding off in the other direction.
“Well hold on there, sugarcube!” Applejack half-yelled, half-chuckled to her friend. She swept the lantern off of the ground, its handle clenched in her teeth.
She began galloping quickly after her friend down short flights of stairs, wondering how the Pegasus could have seen where she was going without a light. Maybe it was some fancy adventure instinct of hers.
Adventure instinct or not, barreled around a corner and straight into Rainbow Dash. The lantern fell to the ground with a thud, and the luminescent, floating pellets immediately lost their glow and succumbed to gravity, clinking against the glass side of their container.
Applejack sat up. While the room they were now in was still fairly dark, a single rectangular archway at the far end let a shaft of light into the space, dusty particles visible in its beam.
The farm pony grabbed her hat and shook it before her face to clear the dust.
“Sorry ‘bout that, RD; didn’t see ya ‘round the corner,” she smiled.
Rainbow Dash sat up on her haunches and turned to face Applejack. After taking a fleeting glimpse, she craned her neck to look past the earth pony.
“RD?... Rainbow?”
Rainbow Dash remained unresponsive.
“Did Ah land on yer bum wings? Ya alright? Ya need me tah take a loo-“
“Applejack…” she whispered.
The fact that Dash had used her full name was enough to raise questions, rare use of an indoor voice aside.
“What?”
Rainbow slowly brought a hoof to her muzzle and covered her mouth, her eyes widened.
Applejack was becoming somewhat irate now. “Landsakes, what is it? Speak up!”
Dash’s eyes suddenly locked with hers, as though she was just now aware of her presence. She drew in a breath. “Oh my gosh, Applejack, look over there,” she finally said, aiming a hoof over the earth pony’s shoulder.
Applejack pivoted in place and twisted her head to look behind her.
At the moment she did that, she was suddenly reminded of just how strong the smell of iron had become.
It wasn’t just iron.
A bloody and shredded pile of flesh was hoarded against the wall behind Applejack, punctuated by jutting bones, twisted skeletons, and open rib cages, with dead skin strained and stretched between. Despite partly or completely missing body parts, it became evident as they looked on that the bodies were distinctly equine. Like them.
Neither of them had ever seen a dead pony; they had never even seen a coffin before. They had always read in books and been told that death came with old age alone, and that there was a reverent peacefulness to those that had passed, a guarantee that the body would look clean, comfortable, and surrounded by mounds of flowers.
Applejack looked to the floor.
The decaying head of a unicorn, now missing the left side of its face, sat in a dirty, dried pool of now-brown blood less than a foot from the mare. Its remaining eye was wide open, its features ridged, and a number of its strained muscles visible due to the skin that had been torn away.
She scrambled to her hooves as the initial shock wore off and she began coughing uncontrollably, suddenly sick to her stomach.
“What- what the hay- where the hay are we?”
Dash shook her head. “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, this… Are these just… organs, like, laying around?” she asked, pointing to a bloody mass.
Her head suddenly snapped towards Applejack. “Do you- oh man, do you think these are the ponies we went looking for?”
Applejack began stuttering her response. “Ah- Ah don’t-“
Rainbow Dash, who had continued observing the carnage, stopped in her tracks as she awaited the earth pony to finish her response.
When none came, Dash looked to her left. Applejack stood silently, the beam of light catching her features, her eyes fixated straight in front of her.
As the pegasus curiously approached, Applejack preemptively held her hoof over Dash’s mouth, anticipating the pegasus’ question.
“Look over by the door,” she commanded quietly.
Dash did as she was told.
It was interesting; plenty of odd and fantastic creatures dwelled in the Everfree Forest, in Whitetail Woods, even in Celestia’s Royal Garden, but there was something unique about the huddled, four legged silhouette standing in the archway before the two fillies; something they had never really seen in an animal before. Neither party moved, standing against one another in a stalemate for five long minutes.
Eventually, the silhouette broke the lull in action and crept forward. As it did this, the light revealed its appearance to the mares.
Its gray body was about three times their size and inherently hunched, not unlike a cat preparing to pounce, its head and neck connecting to a shallow chest that appeared to be the widest part of its body. Beneath the ribs was a sunken stomach and a slender pelvis that connected its shorter back legs to its body. All legs, however, were bone thin, menacing and arched claws at the end of each one. However, it was the head that Rainbow Dash and Applejack could not take their eyes away from.
It was as if an elongated cow skull had been coated in skin and given long, pointed fangs that protruded beyond the actual mouth, crossing each other in a manner reminiscent of a flytrap. Hollow, entirely black eyes were sunken into to its sockets, its brow low on the sides and high in the middle, giving its face an almost forlorn appearance, a type of ironic, misleading forlorn. It was the kind that masked a violent mindlessness stirring just below the surface, and both mares knew it.
This was when the two fillies became aware of what it was that set this creature apart from all of those that they had seen. Birds, squirrels, reptiles, even Manticores, Dragons, and Cockatrices could, to a degree, be entreated and reasoned with. Though they didn’t speak, they could be spoken to and expected to understand.
But where the two Equestrians had always been able to see some measure of comprehension, of reason, there was none. They could see it in the eyes; solid, black, empty eyes that reflected nothing more than what it saw.
Twilight had told them that animals such as this one existed; “true wild animals”, she called them, that unique academic excitement sparkling in her eyes when she had described such a notion to her friends.
Admittedly, Applejack and Dash had found themselves intrigued by the concept. Only now, standing amongst the piles of gore stored by the creature before them, did they awaken to the fact that it was enticing only in words or on paper. Here they realized that it was terrifying, in an alien way to them, to be faced by a “true wild animal”, a true predator with the lone goal of consuming prey.
It was becoming increasingly obvious what the prey was.
The animal advanced lethargically into what the mares now assumed was its den as they stood frozen in fear and intrigue, half hoping that if they stood still, it would be unable to see them.
Much to their chagrin, it continued its slow pace, its claws audibly scraping against the ground as it came closer.
Five feet. Then four feet. Then three. It lumbered sluggishly, ominously towards them, as though with the purpose to instill fear.
Its jutting teeth were now close enough to touch, had either of them felt compelled to reach out a hoof.
Both could now perceive its loud, heavy breath.
A warm gust brushed Applejack’s face and mane as the beast exhaled.
All higher thinking and shock came to a screeching halt as instinct took control.
Without a word, Applejack whirled around and struck the creature with her hind legs in the same manner she would an apple tree, sending it rocking onto its back.
As the bony face suddenly rolled backwards out of Dash’s view, she was similarly galvanized and darted around the stunned animal while Applejack wheeled back around and did the same.
Both sprinted towards the exit, and charged out of it side by side.
Though the sun blinded them upon breaking the cave’s threshold, they were determined to continue galloping.
It came as no surprise to them, as their eyes adjusted, that they were running along yet another dry and dusty mountain trail, more or less identical to the dozens that they had covered: flanked on the right by the steep slope of the upper mountain, and on the left by a sheer cliff.
Rainbow Dash’s ears picked up a noise, a throaty vocation that sounded halfway between coughing and laughing, from the high ground on the right.
She ignored the sound the first time, too invested in their adrenaline-fueled sprint to pay it attention, but when it came a second time, only on the left, the noise was lost on neither of the mares.
A gasp escaped Applejack’s lips, and Dash looked to her, attempting to find the cause.
Just past Applejack’s head, Rainbow Dash could see, climbing atop and around the craggy stones, dozens of arched figures, undoubtedly the same shape of the creature they had encountered not one minute ago.
In the broad daylight, the hunched animals only appeared more sickly and bony than the one in the cave had in the dark. They were a light taupe, similar in color to the dusty rocks that composed the mountain range. The deranged barking that had begun to echo endlessly around the mares was, upon further inspection, clearly was coming from the skulking figures, their lengthy, long-toothed jaws opening stiffly with each cackle.
They looked ahead. More were emerging from around the sharp stones now, slinking down towards the trail. The fillies picked up their pace. Stunning a single one was one thing, but each one was at least twice their size, and there was no telling how strong, fast, or ferocious they could be. Rainbow Dash and Applejack aired on the side of caution and assumed that they were all of the above.
The two powered forward, leaping over broken stones and dead, dry trees, unfailing in their pace regardless of whether or not they were being pursued. There was no worry as to whether or not they would tire out - they could both keep up a sprint for a number of hours – the concern lied in just how many creatures there were, and whether or not their speed was and stamina was equal to those of the two mares.
They wheeled around a corner and found themselves charging down a steep decline and into a roughly circular landing.
What was more, though, was that a column of dark smoke billowed from the center of it.
As they drew closer, they could see logs white with drought were scattered haphazardly around a raging fire that sat atop a pile of the dry wood.
After their attention had lingered sufficiently on the flames, it turned to a second surprising sight: a pegasus, a dark blue in color, stood by the side of the inferno, waving his forelegs at the fillies as they approached.
The pair hardly slowed at all as they came closer to the stallion, who had now begun holding his hooves up before himself, as if bracing for impact.
“Run!” Dash hollered as they charged past him.
They drove forward without so much as a glance backwards until they heard his response.
“Don’t run from them! Stop!”
Taking no heed of his advice, they continued forward towards the other side of the landing, where the trail picked up again.
Two pairs of hooves dug into the ground as the trail ahead suddenly sprung alive. The creatures that they had been running from emerged onto the path in packs; dodging past them was an impossibility; the trail was, in a matter of seconds, swarming with the creatures.
The two mares began stepping backwards, slowly, in unison, grimaces of fear plastered on their faces. The dull thumping of hooves against dirt could be heard behind them as their minds began racing for an escape route.
“Quick, come back here!”
They turned to see the stallion that they had ignored moments earlier, unscathed and, for the most part, unafraid.
“Come on, don’t just stand there!”
Another bark from the crowd on the trial startled them, and they excitedly began trotting towards the stallion, who, upon seeing them move, turned and began cantering over to the bonfire, no sense of urgency in his hoofsteps.
“Wait, what’s going on?” Rainbow Dash questioned, trotting in place and glancing back over her shoulder with every step they took. “Why aren’t we running?”
He craned his neck to look at her. “From the Prodhimes?”
Applejack, similarly poised as though she were ready to take off in a sprint once more, cocked her head. “The whatnow?”
“They hate fire, didn’t you girls know that?”
Dash shook her head, surprised, and slowed to a steady walk, as did Applejack. “Wait, are you from around here?”
“I wasn’t born here, but I live in one of the villages around these mountains.”
The faces of the fillies lit up.
“Did you and a group of other pegasi get lost in these mountains five days ago?” Dash asked, excitement leaking into her voice.
They had now come to the side of the inferno. The creatures stood at a safe distance, not so much as even entering the clear, flat landing. The stallion pointed to one of the logs situated around the fire, offering it as a seat, before sighing and sitting down on the adjacent one.
“You’re a rescue party? Sent for us?” he asked.
They nodded, and he nodded back.
“We should talk.”