>It is currently the Era of Butterfly, a time for great prosperity for ponykind in their new home, Equestria. It’s also a time of conflict where pony fights pony. But of course, according to the rules that were set, only if they’re both mercenaries. And if you break that rule then you get no marshmallows when camping. Forever!
>You are Fountain Splash, although your friends call you Splashy, a filly that’salmost14 years old. You are a master of water related spells and that has allowed you to join a mercenary group called Band of the Bunny. There you met a lot of ponies, made a few friends, trained, ate a tasty dessert, learned about your mission and then you MET YOUR NEW BESTIE, Thermocline. But that’s a long name, so you call her Thermie or Thermos. She’s a pegasus filly that’s a bit older than you, oh and she’s really nice and is good at painting on things and it’s nice to cuddle with her and you trained together but you totally beat her even though she was cheating but then she apologized and you took a bath together and stuff.
>After that you had to gather your things, because the mercenaries were moving out. You ended up riding in a cart, together with your best friend, which later resulted in you taking a nap because the cart was filled with pillows and blankets.
>Once you woke up and kiiiiinda soaked Thermie, who you were snuggling with, you both decided to go for a flight during which you were surprise attacked by someone! You escaped, alerted the whole mercenary convoy to the ambush and then, after a rather confusing conversation, you went together with the search party to find whoever attacked you.
(1/2)
>After you got to the place where you both practiced your INCREDIBLY COOL team attacks you found the search party looking for the ambushers. After you heard some noises, together with Thermos, you decided to check, instead of seeing why somepony was calling for a medic, who was it that was quietly saying ‘Polo’ in response to the ‘Marco!’ that somepony from the search party was shouting. The two of you went through some bushes and under some branches and, following the louder and louder sounds, rather quickly you came to the source of the noise.
>It’s a small earthpony colt that has a sunny coat and a cream colored mane with some twigs in it. There are also two dark smudges under his eyes, made with some kind of paint and two belts across his chest, with a lot of water balloons hanging from them. And they seem to be a bit of a problem for him, since he’s hanging high above the ground, with the part of those belts that was going over his back stuck on a high branch of a tree.
>Once he notices that you’re there you can see terror in his eyes. ”Oh no! They found me!” He shouts to himself “You’ll never take me without a fight!” his expression quickly turns to a determined one. And then an embarrassed one as he fumbles trying to reach for the projectiles hanging on his chest “Just… give me… a second and I’ll get you soaked!”
>Now, what shall you do with this dangerous foe?
(2/2)
>>26086566
Give him a light squirt and tell him there's more where that came from if he doesn't surrender.
>>26086566
Hydro pump!
>>26086566
Gush the tree beneath him and ambiguously ask if he wants some help down.
>>26087223
“Oh, so you’re going to soak us, huh?” You ask, still amused
>”Of course I am! Hiyah!” He shouts and throws a balloon, that he somehow grabbed, in your direction. It splashes a few feet in front of you and no water even gets near you.
“Wow. That sure was scary mister Soaker. Buuuut how about I show you how it’s done” you say and then you lower your head a bit.
>You aim at the tree trunk beneath him and start spraying it with water. Then you slowly raise your head, making the water get higher and higher. “You know, you could always just surrender and then we’d help you get down” you say as you keep moving the stream of water closer to his body.
>The colt flails as he tries to grab another balloon, but he only manages to knock a few off his belts and to the ground “I’ll never surrender! Especially not to a filly!” he shouts. Oh no he didn't! There's no way you’re gonna let him talk like that! You move your horn so that the water hits his tail. He yelps and tries to move away from it but that only causes him to swing back and towards it. You take a step back and the water hits his belly.
>>26087076
>”Nuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!” you hear him say sadly. The fur on his abdomen slowly turns wet and instead of lying flat it starts hanging down and droplets of water drip to ground below him. Instead of the neat, brushed coat he had before it’s now clumped together by the wetness. You take another step back, slowly directing the water to his chest. He gets louder and louder but once you reach the middle of his chest he stops making noises at all so you just gives his neck and face a small sprinkle
“So, ready to give up mister ‘not-gonna-surrender-to-a-filly’? Cause I can keep doing this all night” you ask with a grin.
>”F-fine! You win” he says and sniffles a bit “J-just help me get down”
>Thermie looks at you, eyes wide “Whoah. That was uh… nice job Splashy!” she says and lifts a hoof up above her head
>>26087659
BESTIE HI-FIV-er, HOOFBUMP!
>>26087659
Surprise her with a hug instead and say we got first blood.
Interrogate colt before helping him down. Coerce him with more soaking.
>You bump your hoof with hers “BESTIE HOOFBUMP” you say and with your hooves still in the air you hug her “AND BESTIE HUGS!” She hugs back until you let her go “Anyway, do you know what this means Thermie?”
>”That we won?”
“Yeah, it does. Buuut it also means that I got first blood!” You grin.
>”What? He’s bleeding? That’s terrible!” she says looking a bit scared
“What?! No, no, that’s just something that ponies say when they were the first ones to win in a battle”
>”Ah, okay. Yeah, that makes more sense. Aaanyway, I’ll just fly up and let him down, ok?”
“Noooo, not yet silly! We need to interrogate him first!
>”Oooooh,
rrriiight! We could do that! You’re so smart!”
>You grin again “I know! So, let’s do this!”
>You turn back to the cold and give him the scariest face that you can “What’s your name!?”
>”W-what?! Just let me doooown” He whines
“Nope! This is an interrogation! If you want us to let you down you have to answer our questions!”
>”Fine. I’m Sunny Day”
“Okay Sunny. Now, why did you attack us?!”
>He hmms “B-because uh weeeee are bandits?”
“Lies! Everypony knows that bandits only attack rich ponies and candy merchants. And they don’t use water balloons.” you say and you aim your horn at his face.
>He puts his hooves in the way and shakes his head “Okay, okay, I’ll tell you the truth! I’m with a group that works for Silver Diadem. And they sent me and some other ponies to scout the road and egn- engage other mercenaries if we saw them”
“How many other ponies?” you say and let a bit of water shoot out of your horn and onto the ground
>”T-Ten! But they all got away before you got here!”
“No you dummy, I meant how many ponies are working for Silver Diadem!”
>”Oh. I dunno. No, no, I really don’t!” he says as he sees you move your horn “They don’t tell us that kind of stuff but I saw A LOT of other ponies! Like, a loooot!”
(1/2)
>You nod to him and then you look at Thermie “Think we should ask him anything else?” She shrugs and you do the same in response “Okay, you can let him down.” Thermocline flies up and grabs the part of the belt that’s stuck on the branch with her hooves. Then she pushes and pulls and finally gets it free. Still holding it, she flaps her wings and gets the colt to the ground. He kisses the ground but then bleh’s and spits out some mud that got on his tongue. “Bluh, I forgot it about all the water” Sunny says and then looks at the pegasus.
>”Thank you, thank you, thank you!” he shouts and tries to hug your friend. She pushes him away with a hoof and says “Ewww, no, you’re all wet!”
>He frowns a bit and looks at the ground “S-so what now?”
“Now? Well, you’re our prisoner and you have to go with us to our camp. And then they’ll deal with you” you say but you don’t really know what happens to prisoners.
>What do you do next? Any more questions? Do you take the pony back to the convoy? And if so, who do you bring him to? Or maybe you take him somewhere else? And do you tell the rest of the search party about him?
>>26088563
Take him back to the pony in shiny armour
But don't tell the rest of the search party
He probably lied so the others get a chance to get away
>>26088563
Take his waterballoons off him (tell him he can have them back later) and hold him at hornpoint as we take him to the most important pony we can find. Thermie can tell the rest of the search party.
>You think a bit about what you should do and then you stare right at his eyes “Ok Sunny you’re coming with us. Thermie, take his water balloons!”
>”What, but they’re my weapons and it took like an hour to fill them all up!”
“Fiiiine, we’ll give them back them back later” you say as you roll your eyes.
>He tries to complain again but you ‘shush’ him and he goes silent. Thermie takes off his belt and puts it on her back. You walk to your camp and once you get halfway back to the convoy you turn around to look at Thermocline. “Hey, think you could go back to the rest of our group that’s still in the bushes and tell them that we found somepony? Oh, and tell them what he told us but that he’s probably lying and the rest of them could still be there”
>”Hey, I’m not lying!”
“That’s exactly what a liar would say!”
>He doesn’t seem to have any counter argument so he stops talking. Your friend salutes with her wing “Sure thing Splashy!” and flies back. You continue walking and you lead the colt to Golden Aegis.
”Cap- Uh, Lieutenant? Sergeant?” You say while looking at him “A-anyway, I caught a prisoner! And my friend helped me with it! And we interrogated him and he’s working for Silver Diadem!”
>”Swhuw Dwuhwuh?! Tshuwhu swuhuw dwuhwuh! Wagfgh!” he says something and reaches for his trumpet. He plays a few notes and a moment later two ponies with scary expressions on their faces appear. One of them is a pegasus stallion, the other a unicorn mare. “You’re coming with us kid, we have a few veerrry important questions for you” she says as she levitates him into the air with her magic. Sunny struggles and ‘nuuuuuuuuuuu’s quietly, but he can’t really do anything
>While they walk away the fancy armor pony puts his front hooves on your shoulders and speaks while smiling “Whuhuh suhughu! Ywuhuh mwuhwu!”
>You notice Thermocline flying back not too far behind you and you wonder what you should do next
>>26089169
Get back out there with the search parties.
>>26089169
Can we ask him to take off the mask?
I would like to know what he said
>>26089344
Does he have a mask on though? Unless you meant a >If I pull that off will you die? type of mask like your dubs suggest.
>>26089443
I don't know
But if he does have one and he takes if off we need to demand that we get a pat on the head for doing good
>>26089169
Scope out where those two horses are headed. Might have to spy about to find out more about this.
>You wonder why he’s talking like that. It’s not like he has a mask on and there’s nothing on his teeth or in his mouth. “I’m sorry, could you say that again without all the weird noises?”
>He looks back at you, rather confused “Mwhuhwuh? Wuhuhuhg Thuwhuwh?”
>You sigh in defeat “Ech, I’m sorry, just forget about it.” You say and he keeps staring at you “W-what, d-did I say something wrong?”
>He extends a hoof in the direction of your head and you’d take a step back but he’s moving it rather slowly. Finally, he puts it on top of your head. You don’t know what to do about all this but then he starts patting your head. “Gwuhwu Shuwhuh!”
>You still have no idea what he’s saying but it feels like it was something nice. And the pats feel good too. He keeps doing it so you close your eyes and enjoy it. Suddenly he stops and ruffles your mane slightly
“Hay!” you shout but he just chuckles and then walks away.
>Right as he does that Thermie lands next to you “Hey, what was all that about?”
>You shrug “I have no idea. But it was nice! Anyway, good thing that you’re here! We need to look for the rest of the ambushers but I saw some weird ponies take Sunny away”
>”And? Were they not from our group?”
“No, they were but they looked weird! And I wanna know what they’re doing!” you say as you look around for them.
>After a few moments you notice them walking away from a cart and towards the forest on the side of the road, with the prisoner still in the air, and with a big brown bag on the stallion’s back “There they are!”
>”That’s them? Okay Splashy, so do you want to follow them or something?”
“Sure!”
>”Ok. Buuuut we can’t go to both places at once. I mean, we could each go to one place but if we do that then you should know that I'm not really good at sneaking and stuff”
>She’s right, you can't. So where do you two go? Or do you split up?
>>26090311
Eh, we should both just go and see where they took him.
>>26090311
Get back in the fight.
>>26090311
Thermie should head to the search because she's quicker and if anything happens she can come back and get us.
>>26090311
>>26090417
Kinda conflicted now. But fuck, I agree we get back in the fight.
>>26090686
She admitted she's not good at sneaking around. I'd rather she not get caught and face punishment due to our own curiosity.
>>26090796
Thermie joins the search party and we do the sneaky thing.
Added to the archive:
https://anonpone.pineapplecomputing.com/cuddle/
This seems like not a bad point to mention this because it wasn't really explained by me: Other than the water magic that she's great at thanks to her cutie mark, Splashy can be good, or at least a bit better than most, at 2 or 3 other things, depending on how complicated they are or how weird it would be for her to know that stuff. So be it being good at cuddling that was mentioned last thread or something else, feel free to point it out as a thing when you feel it's appropriate.
>>26090969
She did sneak away from home.
>>26090857
Agreed. Let's make it a brief bit of eavesdropping though. Don't want to fall too far behind.
>>26090417
>>26090857
>The search party could probably use the help of two more ponies if Sunny was lying, and he probably was. But then again you really want to see what’s gonna happen to him and where they went. “Ok Thermie, I have a plan. I’ll go and check out what they’re doing with that colt and you’ll fly back to the search party to help them. And then I’ll join you when I’m done being sneaky like a spy. You okay with that?”
>”Sure! See you in a bit then, Splashy!” She says and flies away and along the road. You, on the other hoof, start your sneaking mission. First you head to the cart that they moved away from, acting like you’re not suspicious at all. You even whistle a non-suspicious tune to show that nopony should pay attention to you. Then, once you get there, you look at forest in search of clues related to the three ponies you’re following. It’s not really hard, because pretty quickly you notice a few broken twigs and small branches, probably from either the adult ponies walking through things or from Sunny flailing around while he’s hanging in the air.
>You follow the trail slowly, so you don’t make any loud noises that could alert them to you, and after a moment you hear some voices! You poke your head out of the bush that you’re standing next to and you look around. You can see the colt sitting on a tree stump and the two adult ponies standing in front of him, still looking scary. There’s also a small table to the left of the stump, and that’s your left, between the three ponies.
>>26091098
>The stallion clears his throat and starts speaking ”Okay kiddo, here’s how it’s going to go. We’re going to ask you a few question and you’re going to answer them quickly and without lying. Do you understand?” Sunny nods a few times, shaking a bit.
(1/2)
>”Good, now if you do lie to us or if we don’t like your answer, well, then we’ll have to... ‘persuade’ you a bit” he says and looks to his partner. She opens the bag and starts taking things out and putting them on the table.
>There’s a single, very long white feather. A book full of bad puns. A booping glove. A set of small, pink ribbons. A bag of licorice candy. And there’s probably more things, but you had to look away from a bit. You consider doing something but you’re not really sure if you should.
>You look back at them once the stallion speaks again “Now, if we do like your answers then you’ll get a reward, like all good ponies do.” This time the mare pulls some very different things out of the bag. There’s a warm blanket, a cuddly bear plushie, a fresh icecream sandwich, a juice box of the apple flavor variety, a fancy brush and other things that you’d consider ‘nice’.
>After all the things are on the table both of the adult ponies suddenly smile with a warm smile
>“Now, we noticed you're a bit wet and probably a bit cold, so before we start, would you like some hot cocoa?”
>”Yes please!” Sunny says and stops shaking. The horn of the mare glows a bit, and in the next moment the colt is holding a mug full of something hot, because you can see the steam above it, in his hooves. He starts sipping slowly while the two other ponies wait.
(2/2)
>Do you hang around longer or do anything else or is this the point to go and join Thermie?
>>26091452
Stick around for a few questions. If nothing interesting or peculiar happens, we should move out.
Well, sorry, but started coughing hard enough to be the MC in that one CYOA that's planned so I'm gonna pause for now. I'll probably be back in 10 or so hours.
>>26091700
Snooze and snore, Sleepywar.
I was told to bump
