“Where is she? We’re all here, already,” groaned Rainbow Dash as she impatiently hovered back and forth in the living room of the Apple family’s house.
It was getting late in the evening, evident by the last rays of the warm summer sun disappearing into the horizon, making way for the myriad of stars to come out. It was also fairly clear from how quiet the place was, that the Apple family had retired to their bedrooms, all of them with the exception of Applejack.
“She’s still upstairs, Dashie. You gotta give her a minute to tuck in Applebloom,” chirped Pinkie as she examined the photos displayed on the mantle, some of them photographed by her.
“Still, she came over to my house being all moody, and then she told me to meet her here tonight for some big announcement!” Rainbow flailed her arms in exasperation, though her complaint fell on deaf ears.
“She went to all of us like that, Rainbow,” said Twilight. “Did anypony else notice the dark rims under her eyes? I don’t think she slept a lot last night.”
“Yeah, she looked awfully tired,” mumbled Fluttershy. “The poor girl must have dealt with something really bad.”
Silence took over the room as the five ponies went deep into thought about what possible reasons Applejack had for behaving so strangely. Why had she asked all of her close friends to come out to her house late in the evening, and doing so without even giving a hint to why they just had to come? It was all very strange to them, but discussing it didn’t bring them any closer to the truth. It all came down to what Applejack was willing to share.
“Thanks y’all,” said Applejack as she walked down the stairs, yawning promptly after. “Ah’ know Ah’ haven’t given y’all much reason ta come here. But, Ah’ got some strange news yesterday.”
“Whatever the matter is, we’re all here to support you. Isn’t that right girls?” asked Rarity from her comfortable spot on the couch, glancing between each and every one of them as they gave off a resounding ‘mhm’ and a nod.
“That means a lot ta me.” Applejack smiled warmly from the centered stage which was the middle of the living room. “Ah’… Ah’ got a letter from mah’ parents.”
From under her hat she pulled out not just a single letter, but a whole package of letters, enough to make up a whole book if just bounded properly. She allowed most of them to drop onto the floor, but held onto the only sheet of paper she saw as being very important.
“Your parents? I thought they were, you know…” said Twilight in a sheepish tone, rather uncomfortable with bringing up such a delicate topic.
“Ah’ thought so as well, Twilight. But, Ah’ recognizes my dad’s writing from the letters Ah’ got saved away upstairs. This was definitely made by him and it’s filled with.. weird things.”
“Well… what does it say?!” exclaimed Rainbow, floating closer to Applejack so she could spy on the content of the letter.
“Ta sum it up… Mah’ parents were basically doin’ some kind of expedition up north, some kind of research thing. Ah’ can’t figure out what even half of the pages actually say, but the few papers with just Equestrian tells me this was going to be delivered if something happened to them.”
“Wait really?” asked Pinkie as she leaned in a bit too close to Applejack to read the letter, taking a deep breath before continuing. “But, if it was first going to be delivered if something happened to them, does that mean they’ve been alive and well for years? Could it be they worked on some super-secret Equestrian government project that nopony is allowed to know about, and something went horribly wrong and with their last action they got this stuff sent to you?”
“Erhm, Ah’ don’t know, Pinkie… It could be that it was always sittin’ in a post office with a deadline left on it, to be delivered on a certain date unless they came to change it.” Applejack sighed deeply while staring down at the paper resting in her hoof.
“I can take a look at the ‘strange papers’, if you want me to, Applejack,” said Twilight as she placed a hoof reassuringly on Applejack’s shoulder. “And what do you think you’ll do with the information you’ve got now?”
“Ah’ really don’t know about that, Twilight…” Her words were as hesitant as the look in her eyes.
“Could you tell us a bit more about what actually happened to them, dear?” asked Rarity while having joined Twilight at Applejack’s side.
“It says they were stationed at some kind of outpost far beyond the Crystal Mountains, there’s even a map with a red dot marking the area it’s supposedly at. It also says they did some work there, but nothing about what it actually was…” She sighed once more before putting away the letter. “Ah’ even tried to talk to Granny about this. She didn’t know anything at all.”
“I’m sure I can find out some answers from the letters. Just give me a few minutes to examine them.” Twilight beamed confidently as she picked up the papers on the floor with her magic.
“Why don’t we just go there?” asked Rainbow with a smirk. “We’ve been all the way up to the Crystal Empire. The Crystal Mountains aren’t that far from there. We could totally make it up to wherever your parents were working.”
“There’s one more thing, Dash.” Applejack paused for a second, her eyes wandering from the suspenseful expressions of all her friends as she searched for the right way of phrasing things. “Mah’ parents told me in the letter to not go up there… to not search for them. The letter basically says to burn it all.”
“Oh come on!” groaned Dash while falling backwards onto the couch where Rarity had just been sitting.
“I don’t mean to be nosey, but, is there any reason for them to write such things?” asked Rarity with a raised brow. “I mean, they must have a good reason to tell you not to go there, and why in Equestria would they want you to burn these papers?”
“Nope, there ain’t no reason in the letter. None that Ah’ can find at least,” sighed Applejack.
“Maybe Pinkie’s government theory makes a bit of sense. I’ve read articles and stories about ponies experimenting on other ponies with magic for, who knows what reasons… I’ve always dismissed these rumors, but I’ve even heard that Princess Celestia was behind something like that once a thousand years ago. It was said that she did it to find out ways to keep Equestria protected while Luna was banished. Maybe she did really do forbidden research back then, and still is now… No, that would be ridiculous” chuckled Twilight awkwardly.
“Hah! I told you!” giggled Pinkie. “You girls should really listen to me more often. I don’t just pull these thoughts out of thin air you know. I think long and hard about stuff before I say them. Though, them doing stuff all the way up there makes me wonder what they would be doing. Isn’t it really really reeeaaally cold north of the Crystal Mountains?”
“It definitely is, Pinkie. Whatever is up there, it wasn’t meant to be randomly discovered by anypony… it does raise a lot of questions, Applejack.” A slight frown formed on Twilight’s face as she dared to ask the question, “Do you have any idea what your parents might have been doing, besides running the farm here?”
“Ah’ don’t know!” groaned Applejack while taking a step away from her friends who were crowding in on her from every side. “Ah’ thought my parents were just normal farmers, like mah’ brother and me…”
“Erhm… This all sounds really scary… Maybe we should just forget about this and not go up there if they told us not to,” mumbled Fluttershy.
“Fat chance, we have to go check it out. This is like an adventure and a mystery all in one. It’s like something taken straight out of a Daring Do book,” beamed Rainbow.
It took a little while before Twilight joined back into the conversation as she had begun to intensely study the notes filled to the brim with foreign writing, which, by the look of her face, was far beyond any writing she knew of.
“I think they might have been linguistics experts, or maybe they were archaeologists. These letters with strange writing on them, I think they’re of some ancient language dating back before pony history… Whatever they’ve found up there could be groundbreaking in our understanding of pony history!” Twilight changed from slightly worried to very excited in just a moment’s notice.
“Ah’ think you hurt yer brain, Twilight. No way mah’ parents were experts on any of those things.” Applejack waved a hoof dismissively. “If they did anythin’ up there, it must have been apple related. Maybe they were in charge of the food…”
“That could also be true, Applejack. But,” paused Twilight as she reexamined the papers. “How did they get their hooves on papers like these? I imagine whoever wrote these would have wanted to keep them safe. This is part of a major discovery, and if it was meant to be secret, nopony would just let it lie around for the ponies handling food to take it.”
“Twilight’s right!” exclaimed Pinkie with narrowed eyes, now wearing her Sherlock hat and bubble-pipe that seemed to appear out of nowhere. “From all I can see, and understand, there’s no way your parents could get this stuff unless they were either helped or did the work themselves.”
“Right… as Pinkie and Twilight said, isn’t there just a possibility that you perhaps didn’t know your parents as well as you thought you did, hm?” asked Rarity as she walked up to Applejack’s side once more.
“Ah’… Well… Ah’ can’t say for sure how they got the papers. But Ah’ know mah’ parents! Ah’ loved them with all mah’ heart. How couldn’t Ah’ have noticed somethin’ like this?” huffed Applejack, rolling her eyes before looking away in annoyance. “Ah’ would have noticed it…”
“Applejack, are you sure you know all they did back then? I mean, erhm, you were really young when they disappeared…” mumbled Fluttershy. “It’s just… I remember you telling us what happened to them. Maybe their trip to the big Vanhoover Apple Convention wasn’t actually a trip to there?”
“Yeah! It could have been a cover for their secret agent lives,” added Rainbow while she landed in front of Applejack. “You were still a little filly when they disappeared, no way you would have noticed them going to a secret base. They would just have told you they left for apple things.”
“They did leave an awful lot for things… But that doesn’t prove a thing!” grumbled Applejack, a bit reluctant to connect the dots. “It doesn’t explain why they didn’t come back from the trip! They were in an accident on their way home…”
“I can’t say for sure, Applejack. But, it’s very likely that if something like secret experiments went on, everypony involved would have a cover up story if something really bad happened to them up there… There’s really only one way we can find out if any of this is true or not.” Twilight sighed deeply before looking over at Rainbow who was already grinning widely as she knew what was to come. “We’ll have to go up there to find out the truth for ourselves.”
“YES!” cheered Rainbow before subduing her smile to pull Applejack into a side hug. “Sorry, I don’t mean to sound excited about this…”
“It’s okay, Dash.” Applejack smiled back weakly. “Ah’ know ya don’t mean any offense. It’s been many years since it happened, and although the wounds never fully healed, Ah’ can handle yer excitement for an adventure.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t?” whimpered Fluttershy. “I mean, they told us not to, right?”
“Oh, Fluttershy, there’s no reason to be nervous about this,” said Rarity with a comforting smile on her face. “What’s the worst that could happen? We’ll get a little cold, maybe a bit damp, but overall we’re more than ready for an adventure like this. We’ve stood up to the greatest dangers Equestria has to offer, and we’ve done so multiple times. No need for you to be scared of this, dear.”
“Well… maybe…” mumbled Fluttershy while smiling sheepishly at Rarity.
“Well, Ah’ guess it’s settled then… We’re going beyond the Crystal Mountains to find out the truth about what happened to mah’ parents!”
The cold of the Crystal Empire paled in comparison to what lay beyond the Crystal Mountains. The true definition of a wasteland spread out in all directions. It was nothing but endless stretches of snow covered ice and blistering winds hurling the jagged pieces of frost at blazing speeds, capable of cutting into the flesh of the six ponies, if not for their thick winter attire.
They were like five colored dots in the snow, all walking in a row as the wind howled around them. Though, from what could be seen, a hole appeared in the middle, as all but Rarity stood out drastically in the snow due to their outfits being similarly colored to themselves. Their faces were masked by thick goggles, scarves, and a hood, covering up every inch so the hostile environment couldn’t get to them.
“How far are we!?” yelled Rainbow from the end of their line, staying back there to make sure she could help any of her friends if something was to happen.
“Not much further!” yelled Applejack back at her from the front, putting her full faith into the directions and coordinates they had deciphered from the few maps in the bundle of papers.
“Twilight, can’t you do something about this abysmal weather?” said Rarity with a shivering voice as she tried to somehow disappear more into the warm folds of her much larger and more extravagant outfit.
“Controlling weather like this isn’t as easy as you might think, Rarity!” groaned Twilight, barely being able to see Applejack in front of her through the sheer wall of snow hurling through the air. “The wasteland isn’t like Equestria. Here the weather moves on its own.”
“Well then, I believe we have to seek rescue from this terrible weather soon, or we’re bound to freeze!” whimpered Rarity.
“Hold on everypony, Ah’ think Ah’ see somethin’,” said Appeljack with her squinted eyes focused on a blurry gray object among the dunes of snow.
It wasn’t particularly elevated. Though still tall enough to make it obvious that somepony or something had carved into one of the larger ice dunes to make a tunnel, where some shelter from the storm could at least be achieved. It was at the very end that a metallic handle of sorts stuck out even through the frozen ground.
“Brrr! It’s gotten so cold that even my mane is frozen solid,” said Pinkie after having flipped her hood back down so she could hoofwarm her frozen hair.
“Mine too…” whimpered Fluttershy. “I don’t know what we’ll do if it gets much worse than this up here.”
“Oh come on. It’s not that bad, my mane is just fine,” scoffed Rainbow while grinning.
“That’s because ya barely got any mane to begin with,” retorted Applejack as she locked eyes with Rainbow, both of them finding a mutual understanding of fun with their jabs at each other.
“Okay, I think that’s enough kidding around you two,” added Twilight after having stepped up on a small pile of snow to keep herself elevated above the rest as she became the focal point. “It’ll get colder once night settles in. We won’t be able to survive if we get caught in a snowstorm at night out here. In there we can be safe from it. Applejack, what is it you saw?”
“Ah’ think it’s metal, Twilight,” answered Applejack, while the other four ponies gather around Twilight.
“Does it matter what it is?!” groaned Rainbow. “We gotta get into cover or the storm will get us! Let’s just go.”
Rainbow didn’t wait for the others. She did, however look, over her shoulder to make sure the others were following as she now led the way into the dunes, making talking a lot easier with the wind blocked out. Approaching the metallic object helped reveal it for what it was, a frozen hatch.
“Look! AJ was right! That is totally the kind of hatch I would use if I was to make a super-secret underground government lair,” chirped Pinkie as she bounced around the thing.
“It’s stuck!” groaned Rainbow as she futilely attempted to turn the metal wheel on the hatch. “Hhnng! Argh! It’s frozen solid… A little help?”
“Let me take care of that,” said Applejack before turning around to give the icy layer growing on the wheel a hard firm kick, shattering it into a million pieces. “Try it now.”
With only a little more elbow grease, the wheel turned with greater ease now that the ice had been broken. The screeching sound of the wheel was the only thing distracting Rainbow Dash from the overly smug smile on Applejack’s face, an expression she was very reluctant to look at, even if what was beneath the hatch was far less pleasant.
Mostly darkness awaited them. The hatch led to a rusty metal ladder which led down to what the six presumed to be earth. A mixture of metal and wood aligned the walls around the ladder, and it stretched far into the pitch black darkness outside of the ring of light seeping in through the hatch.
“Applejack, are you sure this is the place? It looks positively dreadful. I can’t imagine anypony working down there…” complained Rarity as she took a step away from the hatch.
“Yeah, Ah’m pretty sure it is,” answered Applejack as she once more looked over the map, and double checked the path which Twilight had helped plan. “This is actually the place they worked… But, Ah’ don’t understand… This looks like some kind of abandoned mine.”
“Abandoned mine or not, we need to get out of this cold weather!” snarled Rainbow as she pushed Applejack away from the hatch. “I’m not scared of the dark, and neither should any of you.”
“Rainbow, wait!” yelled Pinkie, but she was too late, Rainbow had already jumped into the hole.
“It’s perfectly safe down here, I can even see some stuff!” said Rainbow, her voice echoing through the room and out into the colder air outside.
“Dashie! Are you crazy?! That kind of behavior is really dangerous. There’s a safety ladder on the side of the wall to climb down on,” said Pinkie as she demonstrated it being there with a hoof. “Oh, and what kind of stuff is down there. No, no! Don’t tell me, I want to be surprised.”
With a little giggle and a snort, Pinkie grabbed onto the ladder as she climbed down to Rainbow Dash, not being even the slightest bit scared of whatever could be down there. The remaining four ponies gave each other tentative looks as they made up their minds to join Pinkie and Rainbow down in the hole. Surely, it was better than staying outside while the storm was picking up.
With another loud screech, the hatch was closed once again, leaving Twilight’s magic as the only source of light down there. With a light source scattering all around them, the room became a lot clearer. Wooden pillars supported the heavy ceiling of ice and rock above them. Along the wooden planks and metal chain fences were racks for mining pickaxes, wooden shelves with a fair bit of digging equipment stored away, mostly hardhats, boots, and ration packs, but there were a few flare potions.
“I really don’t think we should be here…” whimpered Fluttershy as she kept herself in the back of the group, staying as close to the ladder as physically possible. “It looks… haunted…”
“Oh silly, I thought I already taught you all about how to overcome your fears,” said Pinkie as she patted Fluttershy on the head. “I guess I need to sing the song once more! When I was a litte fi-“
Without warning, the entire room started to shake. The tremors were accompanied with a loud, yet strangely muffled roar echoing from far below their hooves. The minor earthquake only lasted for a few seconds, but it was enough to stop Pinkie from singing and for all of them to gather up in a pile of protective hugs.
“W-what was that!?” asked Rainbow.
“Whatever it was… it sounded very angry,” said Applejack.
“Would you all calm down…? There’s a natural explanation for everything here,” said Twilight. “What we just experienced was nothing more than a normal earthquake. This place has ice running through the rocks, and it goes far, far down where the friction makes it so hot that it becomes a gas, making the entire structure unstable. When it all shifts around, the gas is released and it’s what’s causing those weird sounds.”
“Oh… really? That does make a lot of sense,” mumbled Fluttershy hesitantly while still clinging to Pinkie’s side.
“Nothing to be scared of. It’s just a really dark and weird looking mining facility. What could possibly be wrong down here?” asked Pinkie as she at the same time made everypony feel more worried, and strangely enough, less worried.
“Right… Well, surely this can’t be the place,” said Rarity, pushing open a heavily worn-out wooden door to get a glimpse of what was on the other side. “It’s just so… plain and dreadful looking…”
The room Rarity looked into was filled with more wooden shelves with food and equipment stored away. Though, for all the shelves there in there, most of them were completely empty, and even some of the tall wooden frames had fallen over to stay slanted as they leaned on each other.
“This place looks like it’s been abandoned for decades!” exclaimed Rainbow as she dared to move further away from Twilight’s bright light. “And this place only has two rooms.”
The second door in the room was a bit further away from the group, and through the top part of the wooden door, Rainbow Dash was capable of scanning the room through the metal bars making up the top part of the door. Nothing but dark, cold ground and wooden crates appeared to be in the room. Well, with one exception: a large metallic thing protruding from the ground could just barely be made out in the darkness.
“Hey! I think I found a way further into this mine.” Rainbow’s excitement for adventure had once again found a hoofhold in her, despite the creepy atmosphere lingering all around them. “What the hay? it’s locked!”
“You can’t expect everything to work just fine when it’s this old and decayed, Rainbow,” said Twilight in a lecturing tone. “There could be a number of reasons for why the door isn’t working. Perhaps something is blocking it on the other side, or maybe the metal lock is broken from rust.”
“Ah’ sure it ain’t nothin’ that a bit of buckin’ can’t fix.” With a wide smirk, and heavy steps, Applejack approached the door to prepare one strong kick to break it open, but was stopped by Twilight.
“Wait! Wasn’t it clear before that this place is geologically unstable? We should be careful about kicking in doors or anything else that could cause a collapse of the cave. I say this requires a touch of magic.”
“Fine…” sighed Applejack as she lowered her hind-legs back onto the ground so she could step aside. “Have at it, Twilight.”
Twilight’s horn glowed softly as her magic inspected the door
“hhmm… something is on the other side,” mumbled Twilight before a loud scraping sound echoed through the room as she pulled the object to the side.
“Sounds like a wooden crate,” chirped Pinkie.
“Well, that’s because it IS a wooden crate, Pinkie,” said Rainbow, watching the dark figure being shoved away which allowed Rainbow to easily push open the creaking door.
Twilight was the first to enter the room, after her followed Rainbow, and then the rest in a tightly packed group. The light from Twilight’s horn allowed them a better view of the dark room, and it, like the one before it, was covered with metal and wood along the walls, dirty snow and soil on the ground, and a shelf with equipment on it. The only thing different about it was the rather large metal hatch in the floor.
“I have to say that this place is only getting more and more dreadful by each room. How could anypony have wanted to live or work in a place like this?” shuttered Rarity as she imagined herself working in the dark and damp environment of the mine.
“Didn’t ya already try that once with those diamond dogs?” asked Applejack while grinning faintly.
“Yeah, and if I remember right, you were pretty good at it,” chuckled Rainbow before hoofbumping Applejack.
“I thought we were to never speak of that again…” growled Rarity.
“Girls!” yelled Twilight. “We need to focus. I’m pretty sure that this hatch is the key to solving all the questions we had before coming up here. Nopony would make this kind of hole-in-the-ground mining facility all the way up here unless there was something very special hidden beneath the ice and snow. Also, there would need to be a lot more to survive up here than what we’ve seen. The only logical conclusion is that this hatch leads down to the real place, and this up here is just a distraction to keep intruders occupied.”
Twilight had gained the full attention of the other five as she sort of marched back and forth in front of the hatch during her lecture. All she said did make sense to them, but it only raised more questions than it actually answered. The newest and most prominent question on their minds was now: Why would anypony need to make a dummy mine above the real one, especially when built this far away from civilization.
“Erhm… maybe we should just leave this place alone and head back to where we came from,” suggested Fluttershy.
“We can’t, Fluttershy. There’s a strong storm brewing outside, and if we try to walk back we’ll definitely be in trouble. These big arctic storms can rage for days at a time, so we have no other choice than to stick it out down here,” said Twilight.
“Oh, okay…” sighed Fluttershy as her ears and head drooped from the thought of staying in that kind of place for days.
“Cheer up, darling. We’ll make the most of it,” chimed in Rarity as she wrapped a hoof around Fluttershy.
“If we are going to be here for ages, we might as well explore the mine!” Without waiting another second, Rainbow Dash flew down to the hatch to try to turn the wheel so she could open it. Though, it was even more difficult to open than the previous one, and it had no ice creeping up its wheel. “Nnnngg! It’s stuck!”
“Oh silly, you just gotta know the right way to handle these things,” said Pinkie as she darted up next to Rainbow, pressing an ear against the wheel. “ahah… mhm… really?”
“Pinkie, I don’t think that’ll work. Here, just let me use my magic and I should be able to force it open without any problems.”
Twilight was just about to cast a spell, but before she could, Pinkie had stood up straight and given the wheel a slight nudge with her elbow, making it spin rapidly to then pop right open. The other five stood in disbelief of what they had seen.
“Pinkie, how in tarnation did ya open that thing?” asked Applejack.
“Easy enough, you just have to listen to what the wheel wants and then do it!” in a way she answered the question, but in another way she only added on another one.
“Right… good job, Pinkie.” Applejack didn’t feel like finding out how one would go about speaking ‘wheel’ but she was glad that such a skill could come in handy.
The hatch revealed a large staircase stretching far into the deepest darkness of the mine, confirming their suspicion of there being much more to the place than what they initially could see. And although the staircase reflected what they had already gotten used to seeing in terms of environment, there was something very different about the place down there. An ominous sensation lingered in the air as the six of them made their way down with still only Twilight being their only source of light in the place.
“Everypony stick together… We have to be ready for anything,” said Twilight. “Also, make sure you all have your emergency packs intact.”
The five could still keep close to Twilight despite checking if they had said emergency packs ready for use, and they all did have them. They were filled with a week’s rations, lighting utensils, enchanted heat blankets, and few tools for digging and climbing.
“I think we all got ‘em ready, Twilight,” said Applejack, taking the lead of the five behind Twilight, being rather curious for the answers the place could reveal to her.
Their single path spread out into several at the bottom of the stairs, and all of them were as cold, hollow, and dark as the stairs themselves. Though, now they had the choice of which way they should go as a group, or if they should part up into two or three teams to make their search faster.
“I think we should take that way,” said Rainbow as she pointed towards the right path.
“Erhm, why that one?” asked Twilight confusedly, as each tunnel looked almost identical.
“Because it just feels like the right one. When you get to be as awesome as me, you learn that going with your gut instincts is what leads you to the best choice in life. Feel free to quote me on that nugget of wisdom, Twilight.”
“I’ll try my best to remember it…” groaned Twilight before taking another look at the different tunnels. “Well, they’re all pitch black and I can’t see more than a hoof in front of me without using my horn. It could probably take us several hours to look through each one of them.”
“Are ya suggestin’ what Ah’ think ya are?” asked Applejack, nervously staring into the darkness of the tunnel in front of her.
“I think you are. We might have to split up to cover ground faster. Before you say anything, hear me out. We only have so many rations to eat, and it would be very prudent of us to find someplace to sleep for the night. There should be a room dedicated to sleeping somewhere down here, and the sooner we find it, the sooner we can make a little base for ourselves.”
“T-Twilight, I really don’t think that’s a good idea. A-also, I don’t want to go anywhere without my friends,” whimpered Fluttershy.
“Don’t worry, none of us are going to go alone!” proclaimed Twilight with a wide smirk on her face. “We’re going to split into three groups. Rarity and I are going to be on different teams, that way we can both use our horns to light the way. The team of two non-unicorn ponies are going to get our spare light sources.”
Twilight eyed the five ponies in front of her for several seconds before making her decision. “Okay, I think it would be best if Rarity teams up with Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash teams up with Applejack, and I’ll go with Pinkie Pie.”
“Don’t worry, dear. You’ll be in great hooves,” mumbled Rarity to Fluttershy.
“Aaaww yeah, this suits me just fine. How about we make a competition out of it, AJ?” asked Rainbow while smirking widely.
“What ya got in mind?” asked Applejack with a raised brow.
“It’s totally going to be way more scary in these mines for the pony who isn’t holding a light source, and no way are we both going to be using one. That would just be a waste. So whoever can go the longest without holding it will be the winner!”
“Oh yeah, how are we gonna decide which pony must hold it?” asked Applejack with an eyebrow raised as she gave Rainbow a deadpan stare.
“Erhm, I didn’t think about that. Well, how about you hold it first, and if I ever need to, I’ll take it?” Rainbow smirked cockily while taking the first steps into the darker area of the tunnel furthest to the right.
With her eyes rolling, Applejack stepped up next to Rainbow, lighting up a flare to lead the way. “If you say so, Darin’ Do.” She quickly glanced over her shoulder to look at Twilight. “Are the rest of y’all good to go?”
“Well, almost. I think we should figure out what to do if somepony gets into trouble. How about everypony heads back to this place in exactly one hour, if somepony isn’t there, we’ll head into the tunnel they disappeared into?” suggested Twilight.
The other five ponies all nodded in agreement and off they went, three groups of two, exploring the dark depths of the mine.
