The Brass Conspiracy

by MadHighlander

Arrival, Part One

Canterlot
Present Day: Several Days Later

The train’s steam whistle signified their approach to Canterlot, and Twilight looked out the window at the city where she’d been born. The city had a peculiar architecture, growing out of the side of the mountain like a great coral, and bisected by a gigantic circular platform that was locally termed ‘ground level’. Despite that, many buildings in the city, especially the older or the larger ones, protruded from the bottom of the platform, allowing for sublevels with scenic views of the Canterlot Falls, which fed into the river Harmony far below.

One such building was Canterlot Castle itself; the castle’s dungeon had windows overlooking the valley below as it stretched out to flow into the Everfree Forest. Because of their nature, most windows were not barred, which led to several unfortunate incidents with inmates who had convinced themselves or each other that the drop wasn’t as great as it looked.

On the upper side of the city’s ‘ground’, on the other hand, the Castle dominated most of the skyline, though also visible were the great Hall of Ages, mounted against the very stone of the mountain, and the mysterious Sunderstone Keep – separate from the main body of the city, the massive stone tower could be reached only by flight, or perhaps by an exceptionally well-balanced mountain goat.

Twilight knew well that their destination, the Canterlot Royal Archives, sat at the base of the castle. The Secure Wing was set below the main Archives, clinging to the bottom of Ground Level. So far as she knew, only Celestia had been in the Wing for many years; perhaps Luna or Dean Arpeggio had been, but she certainly hadn’t. As such, rumors of various types abounded about the Wing; some said it had a glass floor, others that its interior exceeded the size of its exterior, and Moondancer had told anypony who would listen for nearly a whole month some time before Twilight had left for Ponyville that she ‘had it on good authority’ that the Wing was actually a prison for Nightmare Moon. The night before she had left Ponyville this most recent time, she had mentioned some of these rumors to Rainbow Dash, who had laughed out loud.

“Sure. And I suppose it’s also got the Sapphire Stone, Starswirl the Bearded, and whatever it is that makes Pinkie Pie so random, right?”

As if on cue, Pinkie had dropped out of an overhead lamp wearing a deerstalker hat, blowing bubbles out of a pipe, and wearing a moustache. She had proceeded to remove a magnifying glass from under the hat and scan the room with it. “And so the game is afoot!” she had said, before scurrying outside and disappearing from sight.

Twilight had found out the next morning that Pinkie had in fact been playing hide and seek with Macaroon at the time.

Speaking of Macaroon, she had indeed turned out to be like Pinkie’s doppelganger. She had been completely missing for the first few hours of the train ride, but when the Flim Flam Brothers went to look for her they had found her somehow sitting comfortably inside the train’s whistle. She had, it transpired, been planning a party to welcome Twilight on board the train (and also to thank her for what she was doing for Axle Grease).

Twilight stepped away from the windows as the train came to as stop at the Canterlot station. Turning around, she left the train, following the Guildmasters onto the platform.

Macaroon was talking to the Guildmaster and Poison Point as Twilight approached. “While you’re looking at that crown thingy, I’m going to head down to Pony Joe’s Pastry Shop. Pinkie said they have the best donuts in Equestria!”

The Flim Flam Brothers walked up to stand behind Mac. “We’ll come with.”

Shimmerthread gave the first obvious, genuine grin Twilight had ever seen from her. “Iron and I have business in the Market district. We’ll meet you outside the Archives.” She reached up, apparently trying to throw a hoof over Iron’s shoulder, but couldn’t reach high enough and settled for tapping him just below the shoulder instead. Iron grunted in assent.

Stone Cutter and Grain Chaff passed them by, Stone calling out as they did so, “Meet you there. We’re headed for the Artisan district.”

Axle nodded. “I doubt we’ll be longer than an hour or two, all told. We’ll meet when we’re done.” He turned and headed down the street in the direction of the Archives, accompanied by Twilight and Poison. Occasionally they would pass a royal guard, mostly the pegasi and unicorns of Celestia’s Solar Guard, but on at least one occasion, a dark-coated, indigo-armored bat-pony of Luna’s Night Guard nodded to them as they passed.

“An unfortunate group, the bat-ponies,” commented Axle Grease after the stallion had passed.

“How so?” asked Twilight.

“They used to be fairly plentiful. They went with Celestia and Luna when the two princesses – Ladies, then – established Old Canterlot in the Everfree. At that point, they were pegasi, but like everything that makes its habitation in the Everfree for too many generations, they were twisted by its magic. After the fall of Discord, the bat-ponies followed the new Princesses back to Equulaneum, or New Canterlot now. They served in the guard, and indeed lived in relative peace, for many years, but they’ve been declining slowly but steadily over the past two millennia. At the fall of Discord, there were exactly seven thousand, four hundred, and ninety four bat-ponies in Equestria. At the fall of Nightmare Moon, there were scarcely a thousand, and today their numbers are counted in the tens, not the hundreds. They face a unique quandary: for some reason they’re tied to the Everfree. While outside it, they’re more prone to disease and often infertile, but they refuse to return there until the princesses do. Their loyalty is going to render them extinct in a few scarce decades, but I can’t really fault them for that.”

“It’s a pity nothing can be done for them,” commented Poison.

“Yes, it is,” agreed Twilight.

Axle Grease nodded in agreement, as they approached the entrance to the Canterlot Archives.

Inside the large wooden doors, rich carpeting covered the floor of the hall, well faded by centuries of hoofsteps crossing it to traverse the largest library in Equestria proper (It was the third largest in the modern world and the fourth largest historically). One door, a simple iron affair off to the side of the main hall, was surrounded by a small arc of carpet that still showed bright colors like it was new. A sign above the door – which Twilight read as she passed through it with her two companions – read ‘Secure Wing: Access Restricted’.

The door led to a long, steep stone spiral staircase, which Axle Grease had some difficulty navigating even aided by Poison Point. Twilight walked in front so she could catch him if he began to fall, which indeed he did three times.

At the base of the stairs, there was a heavy door inlaid with the royal insignia, flanked by a pair of guards. One was a bat-pony similar in appearance to the one that they had passed on the street, while the other was a white-coated unicorn guard in the standard armor of the Solar Guard.

“Who are you?” asked the bat-pony, levelling a dark-colored spear at them.

“Relax, Caligo. That’s Twilight Sparkle. You know, the Princess’ protégé? She’s allowed in.” The unicorn guard raised the bat-pony’s spear with a hoof. “I haven’t seen you around for a while, Twilight. Let alone down here. Where’ve you been?”

“I moved to Ponyville a couple years ago,” she answered. After a while, she realised that the unicorn guard had been stationed at the castle during her period of direct study under Celestia. “It’s nice to see you again, too, Lancer.”

Lancer opened his mouth to say something else before being interrupted by Caligo. “And what about them?” He gestured to Axle and Poison.

This time, Twilight answered him directly. “They’re my guests. That’s how this works, right? I can bring a guest into the Secure Wing if need be?” She looked to Lancer for confirmation.

“Yes,” he answered, “but a guest. Just one, I mean.”

Caligo tapped a hoof on the ground and looked at the two. Twilight glanced at them apologetically.

“It’s fine, Poison. You can wait here, I can take care of myself for a time.” Axle trotted up to stand next to Twilight.

“All right then,” said Lancer. “There’s just one more thing before you go in. Caligo, if you’d like to do the honors?”

Caligo reached into his saddlebags and removed a large silver ornament set with cut bluish crystals. The ornament was shaped like a crescent moon and seemed to glow faintly in the bat-pony’s shadow. He ran it up and down the pair several times. As he did so, he explained, “This is enchanted to remove stuff like shapeshifting spells, magical hypnosis, or illusion magic. This particular one is brand new. We used to have an antique, but the damn thing exploded during the changeling invasion. This one’s less likely to do that, and it still works just as well as the old one.” He stepped back and put the object back in his saddlebag. “Well, they’re clear. Lancer, you can get the doors.”

Lancer’s horn lit up with a magical aura and the door split in two and creaked slowly aside, revealing that it was a good two or three hoofsbreadths thick. Once the doors were all the way open, torch sconces along the edges of the hallway beyond ignited, revealing a crimson-carpeted expanse with marble walls and a polished granite ceiling. Against the walls at various distances sat many glass cases, stretching into the distance.

“All right,” said Caligo. “Lancer is gonna close the doors behind you. When you’re ready to come out, there’s a bell-pull right inside. Give that a good tug and Lancer’ll open the doors again.”

Twilight and Axle passed through the doors. Caligo said something to Lancer, and the two stone barricades slammed shut.

“The Crown will probably be at the far end of the hallway. We should get moving.” The excitement in Axle’s voice was palpable as he started trotting at a moderate pace down the hall.

Twilight followed, gazing in wonder at the many artifacts displayed in the glass cases they passed. One case held a bright magenta book on a stand with the Roanan word FESTVS in large gold letters. A brass plaque underneath it read:

FESTUS CODEX
Warning – Memetic hazard. Do not open.

A second case bore a single, razor-sharp crystal lance half again as long as her body. Its plaque read:

PEGASUS RIVER CRYSTAL LANCE
Warning: Thaumatic sponge. Do not touch.

After several uneventful cases, she happened to notice a simple gold urn, sealed on top with wax and stamped with the seal of the Elements. After reading the inscription,

HORN OF KING SOMBRA
Warning: may retain traces of consciousness. Keep immersed in purified lilac oil at all times.

She decided to step away and pretend she hadn’t noticed it. Another case contained what appeared to be a statuette of a pair of jackals, but it was covered by a cloth, so she couldn't be certain. Its inscription read,

JACKALS OF CAMELON
Warning: hypnotic. Do not make eye contact with statuette.

After the jackals, they had finally reached the end of the hall. At the far end, there was a single display case in which sat the object they had come to see: the very same Platinum Crown from so many pictures in the Equulaneum book. Now that she was able to look at it from various angles, she noticed that the pattern of sapphires and rubies did not continue all the way around the back; the rearmost gem was in fact an emerald.

In person, the crown was somehow chilling, reminding Twilight of an inverted ring of icicles like those that might collect around drainpipes in winter. The ring of thick, spotted fur around the lower rim, something that she didn’t recall seeing in pictures, did not dispel this impression.

“The fur was added by King Razorwind Broadwing in 1898 AE,” noted Axle, raptly gazing at the crown. The plaque was even simpler than others, reading:

PLATINUM CROWN
Do not wear.

Twilight looked closer at the ancient piece of headgear. Along the rim of the crown, almost obscured by the fur trim, was an inscription in Roanan:

‘CONCORDIA EST LVMEM DERIT PERDITVM IN DOMVS, GELIDVM IN CALDOR, ET IEIVNVM IN ALIMENTVM.’

According to the book on Equulaneum, Roanan had been the sole language spoken in Equestria until the coming of Discord, who had invented Equish from scratch and enchanted everypony in his domain to speak it exclusively. Twilight had the unique benefit of having studied under one of exactly two living ponies who had been alive at that time (and outside of Discord’s influence), and as such was one of three ponies fluent in Roanan: Her, Celestia, and Luna.

“’Harmony is the light which guides the lost to their home, the cold to warmth, and the hungry to food,’ indeed.” Twilight jumped slightly; it wasn’t her who had just translated the Crown’s inscription aloud; it was Axle, staring intently at the words.
His voice sounded different; not just in awe of the crown, as she had first believed. It had lost its rasping quality completely, now flowing smoothly and richly from his hidden tongue. As she watched, he stood up, dispensing with his hunch completely. His thick cloak no longer touched the ground, instead hanging around the stallion’s legs, revealing his hooves. Unlike the thin, wrinkled limbs she had expected from Axle Grease, these were thick, powerful, and gleamed like brass.

No, wait, she thought. They weren’t like brass. His legs were brass.

“I thank you for providing me with this opportunity, Twilight Sparkle. But I’m afraid that this is where your role ends.” Reaching under his cloak, he withdrew a small object and threw it at Twilight. She dodged, and it clattered against the wall behind her.

“What did you do with Axle Grease?” Twilight shouted angrily.

“Oh, dear. So unwilling to take responsibility for our own mistakes. There never was an Axle Grease. He’s quite an old façade, I must admit, and I had grown rather comfortable in the role. But, like all things, he must fade away now, to be replaced by me,” the stallion removed his cloak, letting it fall to the ground and revealing his body in full. The stallion was made completely of brass, with glowing red eyes set into an intricate, subtly grinning face hammered into the headpiece. For a moment Twilight thought that these particular aspects of the stallion before her might be an elaborate suit of form-fitting armor, until she saw a gap where the stallion’s cutie mark should be, displaying a cavity within the brass shell filled with rotating gears. “Cogspin the Greater,” he finished. At his full height, as he stood now, he could stand eye-to-eye with Celestia herself.

Twilight paused for a moment to gauge her opponent. It was obvious he intended to try something, most likely steal the Crown. Since she had brought him here, it was her responsibility to prevent him from doing so.

Stalling, she asked, “Why didn’t Caligo’s device notice you?”

Cogspin kicked at his cloak. “No magic. A cloak, a hunch, and a rasp and suddenly I’m an object of pity, a feeble old stallion to be appeased, but never feared. So simple, and yet as you can attest, so very efficient.”

“Okay, I suppose I can understand you fooling Caligo, and even me and my friends, but what about the other Guildmasters? Ponies you work with on a daily basis. There’s no way they don’t suspect anything.”

“Of course they’re not fooled. They were aware the whole time. Their facades are almost as impressive as my own. Except for Shimmerthread, poor mare. She’s always been prone to anger issues. Any more questions?”

“Why?”

“Ah yes, ‘Why?’ The immortal question. Short answer: I’m here to claim the inheritance so rudely snatched away from me two thousand years ago.”

Twilight’s eyes widened slightly. “You’re him! The Cogspin from the last chapter of the book, who vanished from Old Canterlot just before the fall of Discord. But how?”

“Oh, come now. You’ve seen stranger. Armies of metamorphic emotivores in the streets of Canterlot. The god of chaos himself, the Crystal King returned from his icy grave, even the Princess of the Night escaped from her exile. I just-” He laughed, “-remade myself.” Cogspin tapped on the breastplate of his brass body, producing a shallow ping sound.

‘He’s way too confident,’ thought Twilight to herself as she watched the stallion who would be king. ‘I’m the bearer of the element of Magic itself, I should be able to stop him before he tries anything. Right?’

Cogspin sighed. “I tire of these mind games, or whatever they be. Try to stop me, or don’t, really it’s all the same to me.” With that, he raised a hoof and shattered the glass on the Crown’s display case with one blow. In an abstract fashion, Twilight noticed that the bottom of his hoof bore a sigil of three interlocking gears of various sizes.

‘It’s now or never, and I’ll be damned if I let it be never.’ Twilight began charging up a magical blast.

Cogspin looked up, his artificial face unchanged. His own brass horn glowed pale yellow to the sound of a loud whirring hum, and there was a barely detectable whistling noise behind Twilight. Before she could turn around to look for its source, something struck her horn from behind, and a heavy weight stuck at its base. Looking up, she saw something attached to her horn: a heavy brass ring, set with a piece of crystal. She realised it was the object Cogspin had thrown when he had first revealed himself – he must have brought it back around with magic.

‘A limiter. Damn. That explains why he was so confident. Doesn’t matter, I’ve already got a spell charged. With a little – okay, a lot of effort, and not a small amount of pain, I can still release it.’ Twilight braced herself. ‘This is going to hurt.’

She forced the accumulated magic out of her horn towards Cogspin. The limiter’s crystal flashed brightly, whiting out her vision.

Author's Note:

This chapter and the next were finished some time ago, but Fimfiction keeps eating my edits whenever I try to add more than 4,888 words in a single chapter. Hopefully, breaking up this chapter will fix whatever bug is going on in the system.

Background info:
Sunderstone Keep is a giant magical amplifier built by Discord during the Years of Chaos. It earned its name when he used it to make an example out of Old Cloudsdale: he turned the cloud city to stone and let it fall out of the sky, shattering on the ground. Celestia and Luna have cut off all access to the keep.

Pegasus River is the name given to the pre-Equestrian Pegasus civilization. A highly secretive group, they didn't share any of their history with contemporary Earth Ponies or Unicorns, to the point where 'Pegasus River' is really the only name their city had to outsiders.

Camelon is a city situated in the desert region beyond Drakkad. Given that fact, very few ponies have travelled to Camelon, and very few camels have travelled to Equestria. The simple fact of the city's existence - and its camel inhabitants - is one of the few things known for certain about it.