Depths of Despair

by CEverw00d

Ch 2. The Past to The Present and...

The following morning, Gearbox and Fade took the 9 o'clock train to the Crystal Empire. Like almost all trains heading in or out of Manehatten, it was decently full, there were very few empty seats.

Gearbox sat with his head and front hooves on the table. He'd packed all that he needed for this trip except for something to do on the train ride. Fade sat across from him, his head propped on his hoof while levitating his pencil around as he drew comics. Gearbox lifted his head again, desperate to spark some conversation to make the time pass.

"Remind me again," he said, "Why are we going to the Crystal Empire?"

"We're going because you want to go." Fade replied bluntly.

"Yeah but I've wanted to go to other places before! Why didn't we go then?"

Fade said nothing and merely shrugged.

"Yeah, see!? We didn't go because YOU didn't want to go! But now we're going because there's some reason YOU want to go!"

"I suppose it's mostly curiosity. Maybe." Fade's expression had not changed, even though he'd been caught.

"I'M going for curiosity, YOU'RE going for something else! So spill it, buster!"

Fade stopped drawing, his gaze unshifting, contemplating whether he should tell Gearbox or just shrug it off again. He put his pencil down and looked up at Gearbox. "It is partially for my own curiosity." He started.

"Partially. And the rest of it?"

"For information. I have questions that need answering."

Gearbox's excitement died down to a start of serious interest and curiosity. He stayed quite so Fade would continue.

"I have reason to believe one of my ancestors came from the Crystal Empire."

"Woah, what? Really? You never told me about this!" Gearbox expressed with surprise.

"It never came up as a topic."

"So how do you know? Or should I say, what is this 'reason' for believing?"

"A diary, from a long-deceased grandmother. There are a number of mentionings of the Crystal Empire. Much of it is worn and difficult to read, due to the diary being almost a millennium in age."

"How much of it were you able to read? What's her story? Shouldn't she have been taken down with the Empire?"

"She would have been, had she been in the city when it went down. She wasn't. I could only coherently read about 30% of her diary's entries. Most of its contents, from what I could tell, were typical of a diary. The last few entries explain what happened."

"And? What happened?" Gearbox was unwittingly leaning in, expecting some kind of exciting story."

"She was an ordinary crystal mare named Emeraude. She sold crystal berries and related products. One night she had a run in with some stallion. Or a nightmare. The entry regarding the event was hardly legible. In any event, sometime later it seemed she became pregnant. The father was someone dastardly, but it is not clear who it is. Apparently the fact that she was pregnant with this stallion's child made her the subject of much criticism and harassment. He sales suffered and she could hardly support herself. She ran away, fled the Crystal Empire, heading to someplace where nopony knew her. Being out of range of the Crystal Heart, she lost her crystal-like quality and appeared as some regular pony. Apparently she was taken in and cared for, then, the entries simply stop. That's the end."

"Wow, I didn't know you had such a history in your family."

"Go back at least a thousand years and I think everypony has some sort of history in their family."

"Yeah. But still, wow, tied to the Crystal Empire huh? I wonder if you'll turn all crystal-y when we get there."

"I Highly doubt it. We've had, what, ten generations at least of meeting nothing but regular, non-crystal ponies? I doubt there's much of any crystal pony blood left."

"Who knows! There's magic everywhere! But if you do turn all sparkly, I'm taking a picture!"

"I'll destroy the camera and make you sleep outside for a week."

"I'm not taking a picture!"

"A wise decision."

The train eventually came to a stop, having reached its destination. Many ponies got off and just as many got back on. Gearbox and Fade got off the train, looked around, looked at each other, then, looked at their luggage. It was warm here. Very warm. Far too warm for the cold-weather clothes that they brought. Meaning they bought these clothes for nothing and get to carry them around all day. It was not a pleasant realization by any extent.