> To Outlast
>  by Camolot the Creator
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Humanity Crossed
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I had always loved the idea of Equestria. Though my familiarity with the source show was limited, mostly second-hand for anything beyond season two, I immersed myself in the fanfiction and the creative talent of those online. I read from many sources, picking up stories and philosophies, and was truly fascinated how many facets the community could find just in this world of ponies whose lives revolved around friendship and harmony. But, there had been another reason I loved that world so, and it had to do with the Cutie marks.

Every pony received their own mark, symbolizing their skills, their talents, their purpose. From the moment they realized that thing they were special for, a pony had their purpose in life: I should be so lucky.

Twenty floors above the streets of Portland, I lived in a small tenement. I was a loner, a thinker, a man of words and literature: I survived on what I could make by serving others as an editor, a proofreader. It was just enough to keep my studio apartment, though I ate ramen more often than I would like to admit: it was not as if freelance work such as mine was anything even closely resembling steady. Still, I felt that my purpose was elsewhere, that there was something missing or unfulfilled: like many, however, I dismissed this, at least for the moment. Later, I reasoned. Later.

But then the offer had come.

I had been dreaming, before: something about monsters or aliens, the typical affair of a brain overexposed to a large variety of media. However, something had shifted, changed, and it had gone from a dream to something... else. Something other. I could not accurately express what it was, exactly: I had felt a shift of sorts, something that I could only compare to the idea of a room suddenly moving several feet to the right. Then there was the fact that the entire image now had a sense of the real about it, as if it were tangible thing that one might reach out and touch. It didn't feel like a dream, to be sure, though neither did it feel like anything I had known. And it began with a darkened room.

I came to full awareness there, lucidity flooding through me in an experience that I had only known one or two times before, and even in those times it had not been this intense. I could feel everything: the grit of sand between shoe and stone beneath my feet, the cool and damp air of a room underground, the faint hint of age and dust in the air. With a start, I realized that I could see, though barely: it was not as if an ambient light was shining, more that the darkness did not hinder my vision overly much. I could make out the intricate circles and symbols inscribed in complex patterns all over the flat, carved floor, and the many etchings on the pair of steel doors that stood in front of me.

I was almost in awe, wondering what this might mean in regards to my state of mind, and I made my way forward, hand extended towards the silvery metal. Before I could make proper contact, however, a voice sounded from behind me.

"Matthias Síðasta Von."

I half turned towards the voice: there, in the back of the chamber, was a clearly quadrapedal figure, surrounded in a cloak of deepest black, which only made the ivory horn stand out even more than it normally would have. The voice that had come from the figure was distinguished, regal: the owner of such a voice would have no difficulty attaining and holding whatever position in life they aimed for. It had not mispronounced my strange name- had not even stumbled over the letters. Some part of me, the writer, railed against the innumerable cliches at work here, but the rest of me was simply curious. It was not every day that one felt a dream so real as this one. 

"Yes?" I replied. It had not been a question, but I still felt prompted to answer.

The figured nodded once, in response.

"I have an offer for you, Matthias. An offer, and a warning."

I nearly rolled my eyes in response, but that had simply been the writer once again. The rest of me was still quite curious about the current happenings, and so I decided to play along. Turning around completely to face the figure, I spoke in reply.

"Very well. Let me hear both."

"There are two doors in this room." 

Now that she- for it was a she, I was certain- had mentioned it, I saw the other door: this was unlike its sibling in that it was a plainer door, of aged brown wood.

"One-" a foreleg gestured to the door of wood- "leads back to your life. No strings, no attachments, no caveats, you simply wake up in your bed and all is normal. The other, however-" here, the figure shifted to indicate the door behind him, "it leads... onward."

"Onward?"

The figure nodded again. "Onward. Into what are possibly the best, and most terribly trying, experiences and tests that you will ever face. You will experience joy, anger, fulfillment, sadness, and many others besides. You will fight, and you may die, but such is the price of such decisions, the cost of such gains." The foreleg returned to the ground. "So, what is your decision? If you wish, the offer may be made again tomorrow night, when you have made up your mind-"

I shook my head emphatically. "No, that won't do. I'm not sure I'll even remember this, and even if I do, there's not even the remotest guarantee that any of this is real." Lowering my voice, I muttered "I'm still dreaming, so I may as well go along for the ride." The figure, however, appeared to have missed the whispered comment, and visibly perked up.

"Excellent. If you are certain of the path you wish to take, do so." The cloak shifted slightly. "Be forewarned, however: if you leave through the wooden door, this offer shall not come again. Do you understand?"

"I understand." Such little admissions were pointless in any case, as I had already decided on which route to take. Without hesitation, I turned to the door of silvery steel, hand extended.

The metal was cool to the touch, smooth and polished underneath my palm. The surface shone, almost seeming to glow from within the metal itself, reflecting some unknown light source, and the surface was completely devoid of scratches or blemishes. If this had been an actual door, there would no doubt be at least one person who's job it was to ensure that this door was as beautiful as possible at all times. Given the state of the door in question, this person had perfected the job into an art.

There was no sound, not even a squeak, as I pushed the barrier gently, the door swinging silently on well-oiled hinges. I was, in part, impressed: this dream was quite possibly the most detailed musing that I had had in quite a while, though I wished that it had been a dream of rolling hills or a moonlit vista, something that I could truly savor. Still, one does not question a dream, and perhaps there were some of those vistas at the end of it all, if I was patient enough to search for them.

A tunnel stretched out into the distance, all light and confusion and kaleidoscope colors, shifting and changing in patterns that made absolutely no sense to the naked eye, or to my slightly addled mind. Vaguely, I wondered if this was comparable to the experience of having a drug trip, and vowed not to even harbor the temptation to partake in the more illicit of substances. To another, the patterns might be comforting: for my part, they just made me slightly sick. With a deep breath, and a slight steadying motion, I took the first step into the tunnel... and let out a completely manly scream as I was, suddenly and without warning, sucked into the tunnel proper.

The sensation was one of being ripped apart and reassembled every single second, on an atomic level. The pain was...

I have no comparison.

Once, my hand had caught fire: the scarring was minimal, skin grafts healed the wound completely, and little evidence remains of the mishap. Previously, it had been the worst experience of my life, the worst pain that I had ever experienced. I had been completely sure that it was the worst and most agonizing event that I would ever undergo, short of something that would kill me, and until now I had been entirely correct.

This tunnel topped that accident by orders of magnitude. It was a mercy when the darkness swallowed me, and my awareness of anything winked out.





The doors closed with nary a whisper of sound, sliding shut and blocking out the dazzling array of colors that formed the flume to Equestria. In the absence of the sudden light, the small rune-laden room darkened considerably, the light leaving the single quadrupedal figure alone in her corner. 

Now that the human was gone, she flicked back the hood of the cloak, shaking her red mane out of the confines of the rough material as she shed it, revealing a white coat and alabaster wings, in addition to the horn. Sighing, she stretched slightly: she had been standing relatively still for quite some time, waiting for him and ensuring that the gate was stable, and was now greatly relieved to be able to move freely again.

"The final game piece has been set," she said, her joints popping faintly as she moved them, the hum of runes and magical arrays building for another spell. "Let's see if you herald the death or rebirth of Equestria, dear Matthias. And let the proper game begin." 

A grin cracked the alicorn mare's face: it had been too long since she had played on this grand a scale, so many little pieces and cogs that would have to come together. And then the grin faded as she remembered why she was making this move. 

No, she thought, this is a necessity. I do not have a choice. She would need the Seven, all of them, or everything was for naught. She nodded once to herself, her resolve steadied and her confidence bolstered, her horn engulfed in an aura of green light.

With that she cast the spell and, with a crack and a small shower of magical sparks, the stone room was empty.
> II: Overgrowth
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first thing I was aware of, blissfully, was that I was no longer in pain. Groaning, I reached a hand up and rubbed my face; that had been some nightmare. Really, I had been completely unaware that, in the case of a lucid dream on that scale, one might actually feel pain.

Note to self; I thought, avoid the darker fics before bed.

At least my bed was softer than it usually was. The old mattress had given up consistency years before, the springs creaking, groaning and refusing to offer proper support. Occasionally, however, I would quite accidentally locate a sweet spot on the torture device, and enjoy a restful night. Apparently, this had been one of those lucky days. My brow creased as I felt a bit of material come away from the whole. Obviously, the old thing had decayed further, and was now coming apart at the seams. Annoyed, I lifted the piece up, cracking my eyelids- and stopped, frozen.

This was not a piece of beige mattress, nor yellow foam, nor white fabric. No, this was green, slightly translucent, and very, very obviously a leaf.

A leaf.

A LEAF.

Quickly, I ran through the possibilities. I did not remember leaving my window open last night, though I may have done so and forgotten. Oregon, in spite of its northern climate, reached into the eighties in the summer, and I had known myself to be forgetful. It was then, of course, that I realized that behind the bit of organic matter I was holding was, instead of the grey roof that greeted me in the mornings, a canopy of greens and browns shot through with golden beams of sunlight.

My mind drew a blank, and I let my arm fall to my side. Some part of me thought that I was still dreaming, the lucidity of the previous vision carrying through, but it was just too... real. The sensations were detailed beyond any dream and, as I reached a single hand down and took a clump of what I identified as loam, I realized that I could feel every particle that slipped through my fingers. I felt a hysterical giggle rising in my throat, but pressed it down. Without a doubt, there was something I was missing here, some element of all of this that escaped my notice, and collapsing into hysterics would not exactly contribute to parsing out my current dilemma. Whatever that dilemma might be, that is.

First order of business was learning how I came to be here. Recent memories revealed nothing besides an incredibly strange dream about a- unicorn? And magic circles, and a magical rainbow tunnel of excruciating pain-

Note to self: take short break from ponies, catch up on anime.

So de droogs, or perhaps beverages of the alcoholic type, whether consumed intentionally or no, were most likely responsible for my current dilemma. My general guess was that I had completely forgotten about an entire day due to inebriation, a day that had ended with me passed out in the middle of a park somewhere. Quickly, I checked my hoodie and pants, breathing a sigh of relief when I failed to located anything crusted or dried into the material. Well, that was one worry solved; on to the next. My wallet, thankfully, was in my pocket, exactly where it should have been, matched on the opposite side by my phone. Thankful for a convenient means of calling for a ride, I slid the thin slab of metal and glass out of my pocket and pressed the power button, only to frown at the words displayed at the top left in large, red letters.

NO SERVICE.

Well, damn. Guess I would have to find a cab the old fashioned way, with whistles and waving my arms about like an idiot. Excellent. Of course, first I would have to make my way out of the trees and to some manner of road or another. I glanced about, examining my surroundings, and was rewarded by the sight of a clear trail blazed through the trees, conveniently close to the tree that I had woken up underneath. Some part of me vaguely hypothesized that this was the trail that I had stumbled from the previous night, perhaps during a moment of digestive weakness, the evidence of which was thankfully absent. Double-checking my pockets to ensure all my possessions were present and accounted for, as this was not the time or place to be leaving things behind, I stepped through the thick underbrush towards the path. 

To my displeasure, the asphalt trail was aged and cracked, the occasional chunk of black material missing entirely and plants growing from the deeper cracks. Obviously, this section of the path was terribly maintained. In fact, if this had been a dirt trail, I had no doubt that it would have long been reclaimed by the nature that surrounded it: as it was, the strip of black was barely holding its own against the greenery. This, of course, meant that I would have to pay close attention to the ground, lest I have an unfortunate and entirely unexpected encounter with a patch forced up by a wayward root.

I debated for a moment between left and right: the path, nearly a road by width but just thin enough to still count, ran in both directions, but curved out of view around the throngs of trees that lined it. After a long moment, during which I managed to locate none of the sounds of traffic that would direct me to my goal, I shrugged, setting off to the left. One always picks left, when one knows not where to go: it is simply common sense.

The walk was quite a long one, stretching like the path itself through and around the natural obstacles of the forest. The trees formed a green canopy overhead that filtered the sunlight into green, occasionally broken by glittering beams of gold light where a gap in the vaulted leafy ceiling allowed tentative fingers of it past. Even through my annoyance at the lack of phone service as well as the near constant task of dodging the roots that periodically cropped up through the surface, I could admit that it was actually quite beautiful here, peaceful in an ethereal sense that was rare in cities. There was quiet among the trees- not an unsettling lack of noise, but a gentle and soothing near silence that felt more comfortable than not. If I had not been in a little bit of a hurry to return home, I might have found a good place to sit and take in my surroundings. I frowned, cursing my lack of sketchbook and pencil, the two objects that always seemed to be absent when there came opportunity for their use.

In my annoyance, I missed exactly when the thick coverage shifted from oak, cypress and elm to a more widely recognizable manner of vegetation. However, the sight of a fence pulled me out of my funk, and I glanced around in a vain attempt to locate signs of human habitation that might point the way to a street of some kind, only to stop short at what I saw. While just a few hundred feet ago the treeline had been an almost solid wall of underbrush and trees of various types and phylums, it had now shifted exclusively to the fruit bearing kind of plant- more specifically, the apple kind. The trees in question rose tall and strong, their red bounty hanging from their branches and weighing them down slightly with their sheer bulk, clearly marking this space as an orchard of some sort.

However, the longer I looked, the less... right things felt. While it was clear that the trees had been planted in a grid-like pattern that was common in orchards and on farms where the fruit was produced for general consumption, it had very obviously been a very long time since the place had been maintained in any meaningful way. Branches in desperate need of trimming stuck out at odd angles, and the trees themselves had obviously not been cared for for. Rotted fruit littered the roots of the plants, which were also covered by layers of dead underbrush which anyone actually intending to grow apples would have not just cleared away, but never allowed to take root where it could catch in the feet of workers. The fence itself was rotted and ancient, the wood on the verge of collapse in some areas and well beyond it in others, whole sections of fencing missing entirely with only the barest of marks to indicate that it was ever there in the first place.

I blinked. This was obviously a farm of some manner, but a decrepit and abandoned one. Why someone would simply abandon viable fruit-bearing trees to nature was anyone's guess, but that was not my primary concern: mainly, I was worried over the fact that there were not any such abandoned farms, to my knowledge, in any case, within quite a ways of Portland. This meant that the mystery party people had driven me into the country and ditched me on a side road of some sort. 

Internally, I vowed that if I ever discovered the identities of said mystery people, I would never party with them again. While I'm sure that the night leading up to this unfortunate occurrence was most likely highly entertaining, that did not do me much good in the slightest if I both had no memory of it and was at real and viable risk of getting dumped in some random location in the country. Vaguely, I supposed that this was why I had no service, and I doubted that there were any taxis or Uber drivers nearby that wouldn't charge an arm and a leg for a ride home. Mostly, I supposed, I would have to figure out where I was first and then run with it from there, which meant following this trail to its terminus.

Course of action set in mind, and determined to find my way out of this place if it killed me. Well, bad choice of words, perhaps 'injured me in a minor manner'? Shaking my head and banishing the non-sequiturs from my train of thought, I turned and continued down the asphalt path and towards, hopefully, some amount of civilization.

The trees went on for quite a ways, blocking my line of sight on both sides of the trail. On one side were the apple trees and the rotted, aged fence, standing as the lone evidence of civilization. On the other, thick groves of trees grew in an almost impenetrable wall of foliage, blocking the light and giving a nigh-perfect example of an evil forest. This didn't bother me at first, but the longer that I spent here on the edge of it, the more it felt like things were moving in between the branches. Watching me. Waiting for their chance to strike. As a result, it came as an incredible relief when I sighted a gate further down the way. Obvious even from this distance was the decrepit state of the wood and construction, but I didn't much care: anything was better than sitting here at the edge of these woods waiting for something to... no, it was best not to consider that line of thought farther.

I approached the arch of wood and metal with newfound positivity. After all, if this was an entrance, it most likely meant that there were buildings nearby, perhaps even buildings with occupants who would allow me to borrow their phone. As I got nearer, I noticed that a couple of chains long rotted with rust and weathering hung from the apex of the arch. A sign, depicting a simple apple, lay at the foot of the arch itself, the rest of the chains attached to the top. Apparently, at some point the chains had completely fallen through, which must've made the sign itself some pretty damn impressive wood. I kicked the sign gently, and it skid away from me and through the arch, my eyes following it, then looking up and away.

Two buildings sat in the center of a smallish clearing in the brush. One, which looked like a barn, was almost completely collapsed, the roof bowing inwards and the side walls collapsing in under their own weight. The other, however, was surprisingly intact, a two-story farm affair that wouldn't look so out of place in Kansas. Old-style paneling, worn paint, a typical quaint design common in stereotypical representations of farms oft seen in printed canvases and default computer backgrounds. The difference here, however, was that the building was overgrown with a variety of plants. Vines snaked up the outer walls and covered the sometimes-broken windows, a tree had begun growing out of the end of the porch and bent under the roof, curving to the side and out towards the sky.

I sighed- apparently, there would be no help from this place. A working phone? I'd be surprised if it was hooked up to *power.* It was then that I noticed the obvious pole and wires, connected to the roof of the building and leading away down the path, the wires strung between poles that were mixed in with the trees. Some of them leaned, and I saw one that had clearly toppled at some point. Strange, as I thought that even a line leading out to an abandoned house and not much else would be serviced, for safety, if nothing else. I considered this for a moment, then shrugged. It wasn't my problem if the electric company was being lax in its maintenance of power poles to empty houses, and, in any case, this gave me a convenient route back to civilization.

Happy that I had encountered some sort of sign of humanity besides the ever-present road beneath my feet, I jogged as fast as I could while still being mindful of the occasional root-buckled section of asphalt. Gradually, the trees began thinning a little, the road becoming a bit wider and more pronounced as the trees that had damaged it became fewer and fewer. Finally, the strip of black that I had been following for quite a while crested a rise, behind which I was sure was a town, a village, something where I could call a cab and go home. Sleep the rest of the day.

Cheered by this thought, I jogged faster up the hill, no longer needing to be aware of problems with the road for quite some time due to the sparser trees. With one triumphant move, I conquered the small hill with a strong stomp... then stopped dead.

Before me stretched a town, an entire town, abandoned just as that house was. Vines grew over some of the buildings in crazy patterns. Some of the buildings had fully collapsed in on themselves. One had fallen over, completely on its side, flat as paper. And there, in the distance, at the edge of town, stood a castle.

A castle made of crystal, in the same shape as a tree, shining as bright as the day that it was raised, just after the defeat of Tirek.

Twilight Sparkle's castle.
> III: Ruination
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I stared out at Ponyville, in clear shock, examining the houses and buildings from afar with something resembling bewilderment. I knew this was, indeed, Ponyville- no one could mistake the crystal castle for anything but Twilight Sparkle's, and the layout of the town itself was identical to maps that I had seen, but... it looked as if the town had been empty of ponies for years.

Here and there, the candy-colored paint shone through the years of wear and tear, but the buildings were covered in plant life of all types and descriptions. Roofs had collapsed inward, filling the spaces below them with rubble and broken, rotted timber. Some houses were gone entirely, just a pile of refuse remaining where a building had once stood. Trees had grown into some of the roads, and grass covered every spare inch of soil, clearly not trodden upon in a long time. And then, there was the largest inconsistency.

On every side, the town was ringed with layered lines, three to be precise. These rings were shadowed in the early morning sun, the bottoms dark as the sides of what appeared to be trenches blocked the light from reaching deeper into the earthen structures. At some points, the ring was imperfect, where the surrounding soil had collapsed into the trench and partially filled it. Great hulking masses, the size of trucks and covered in plant matter, stood just behind the rings themselves. 

I took all this in, standing atop that hill, and wondered at it. Most of my mind had locked up, in complete disbelief at the sight I was seeing, but the rest of me was vaguely wondering about it in a detached way. Sure, I'd read plenty of fanfic about humans ending up in Equestria, but to be here myself, then to find it so empty... some desperate part of me hoped beyond hope that this was just an exception, if... if this was even real. But, in most fics, there had been some way that the human had gotten to-

I froze. Of course. The dream that I had had, the previous night, with an equinine figure that had offered me a chance of... some sort. To my consternation and frustration, the dream seemed to have faded around the edges in my memory, weathered like an old sepia photograph. The details had disappeared from my recollection- I could remember the gist of the dream, the general sense of what I and the figure had said to each-other, then the shock of pain that was the rainbow tunnel. Realization flickered across my mind: that must have been how I had gotten here. Rainbow Road.

The bit of levity lightened my spirits by just a fraction, but it was enough to kick-start my thought process. Thus, I began to do what humans do best in a situation that they can't quite believe. Rationalize.

Equestria didn't really exist. It broke my little brony heart to think that, but, logically, I knew that magical pony land didn't exist. That left the question of where I was and what it was. Multiple possible explanations came up and were sub-sequentially dismissed: theme park? No, too old and too exact. Normal human town? The castle immediately put that theory to the sword. Dream? No, too real, too vivid and too logical. Coma ... perhaps.

I shook my head. Regardless of the explanation, I was here now, wherever here actually was. If it was a coma or a dream, then I might as well make the best of it. If it wasn't... well, the same applied. Taking in a shaky breath to steady myself, which I needed, to my surprise, as I had been shaking, I set off down the road to Ponyville.





The buildings were even worse up close than from afar. Eroded and wasted away, they appeared emaciated and sickly when compared to the bright, colourful buildings of his recollection. Here and there a few flecks of paint had survived the weather, but these points were rare, rarer still to find an entire wall still the colour that it had been painted as. Even what paint had survived was often peeling and old.

The roads that snaked their way between the buildings where cracked and eroded, as the asphalt road here had been. However, due to the lack of forest in the town, these roads had survived much better than the previous ones. Power poles threaded their way among the structures, wires sometimes still connected and sometimes hanging to the ground, limp and lifeless without a spark of the electricity that they once had carried.

This last was a bit of a wonder to me. I tried to think back as best I could, reaching into my mind for every bit of reference and trivia about the show- had Equestria had electricity? By all accounts, I recalled that it did not; they had, after all, only just been stepping into Victorian-age tech. Clockwork and steam. And yet, here was evidence of electricity.

I puttered about the entrance to the town proper for a little, wondering what I should do. The road itself had been cut through by the trenches, but a bridge of metal had been laid over the earthenworks, neatly removing the interruption of the road. Carefully, I tested the steel with a foot- it creaked, but held. The paint here had held out much better against the elements, and had obviously protected the steel beneath from a large degree of the environment, though rust and flaking was evident here and there. I tested the metal with my full weight, then nodded to myself, satisfied that it would hold me.

I crossed the metal bridge in its entirety, then shot a sidelong glance at one of the hulking figures covered in plant life. For a moment, I glanced back and forth between the plant-coated mass in indecision, then shrugged. It was not if the town would disappear if I sidetracked myself for a few moments, and, even if I did, then it was merely more evidence that none of this was real. I stepped off what remained of the blacktop and walked towards the green mass, grabbing some of the vines and pulling them away, staring at what was underneath.

It was... a truck. Painted on the door, which had a large, low handle set in it, was a silver moon and a golden sun on a backdrop, which was divided down the middle between a dark blue and a sky blue. The window was shattered, pieces of glass remaining in the frame, but this was clearly a steel door. Carefully, I reached down and grasped the handle, which was more like a low-set bar. The remains of a rubber coating squeaked against my skin as I pushed on it, a click resonating from the door itself, followed by a loud groan as I pulled it open.

The inside of the cab was in better shape than the outside. Threadbare and slightly rotted cushions remained, but the dials and controls for the vehicle were still in relatively good shape. Instead of a driver's seat, there was a low bench, pedals on either side of it where hooves could reach them in a quadruped. The steering wheel was replaced with a bar that could obviously be operated by gripping it with teeth and turning it with the jaw, and the entire thing was raised so that the driver could see both the gauges and out the front windshield, which remained intact. In fact, it reminded me of military humvees, with two plates of glass separated by a strip of steel.

I hesitated a moment, then hefted myself inside and over the bench that stood in place of the passenger side, which was identical to the driver's minus the pedals. A glance at the gauges revealed something slightly new: the speedometer was replaced with something that was labelled with KtPH, and the fuel gauge with a label that looked something like a crystal. Engine temperature, rotations per minute... despite the two differently-labelled gauges, the panel resembled contemporary vehicles to a surprising degree.

I glanced into the back, through a door-shaped opening, and observed a closed space, a small metal cave. Doors at the back would obviously open to the outside, but were sealed. A number of boxes of various types and sizes littered the space, all steel and sealed tight. I frowned and brought my eyebrows together. This was... conflicting, with my view of Equestria. These inconsistencies were yet more evidence that none of this was real, and was instead some mash-up of different elements from a number of different medias in a coma of some sort.

I slid myself over the bench that I had been sitting on and through the low door opening, into the sealed back space. It was tall enough that I could stand, though my hair brushed the roof, and plenty wide, with benches on either side of the space folded up against the walls. I went to the first box, a long affair, but was unable to pry the lid open- it appeared that something between the lid and the box proper was sealed with some sort of crust that glued them together. Casting about, I found a crowbar lying among the detritus, picking it up and stuffing the wedged end between the lid and the box. A heave cracked the seal, and the lid came off and open, revealing the interior of the box. The space was dark, but I could make out something long and shining slightly, the seal on the box keeping some sort of oil caking the thing in pristine condition. I gently grabbed the object and pulled it out of its packing, then stared at it in surprise.

This was, very clearly, an assault rifle. Designed with a grip made for something with three fingers, yes, but a rifle all the same. A large box magazine was placed in the weapon, circular grooves stamped into the metal sides. An oversized charging handle that stuck far out of the side of the weapon itself, and a small inscription on its side, indecipherable in the low light. Careful not to trip over any boxes in the darkness, I stepped back to the opening and held the rifle in the light, eyes sliding over the words printed into the steel.

Sister Arms Rifle M34 - Cartridge .75L comp. - Forge Serial # B33429

Below that was stamped the same symbol on the outside of the truck, the moon and the sun. I traced a finger over the steel, following the edges and ridges of the small sign, then shook my head and stepped back into the compartment, dropping the rifle back into its box and swinging it shut again. Odd, interesting, but it didn't give me much in the way of information. I glanced around at a few more of the boxes, many of which were either the same long, thin boxes as the one that I had opened, or a thicker, wider box that resembled ammunition containers that I had seen back on... Earth. I frowned at that thought, then shook it off. The rest of this could be investigated later, I supposed. For now, there was the matter of the trenches, which were like something out of a WWII movie, though lacking their opposite enemy trenches.

I jumped down from the vehicle, landing in the soft dirt with a... clink? Gently I reached down and sifted through the dirt, coming up with a hollow tube that was contracted near one end and sealed at the other, only lightly tarnished. I stared at the object for a moment before it clicked: I was looking at spent brass, an empty cartridge. Poking around through the dirt unveiled a small pile of them, and a rusted and broken version of the rifle that I had found in near-pristine condition inside the truck. I turned one of the cartridges over to reveal the bottom, reading the stamped letters.

Sister Arms Cartridge .75L

Hm... so, this must be the cartridges that the rifle used. Given by the small pile of them, and their location next to the door, as well as the shattered window, the passenger must have broken the window for some reason and leaned out the window, firing at something for an extended period of time before dropping and abandoning the weapon for some unknown reason. I dropped the spent cartridge, and it clinked lightly against its tarnished fellows. Wiping my hands of the small amount of dirt that I had picked up, I looked towards the trenches, which looked slightly ominous as the early morning sun cast shadows in their depths.

I walked away from the truck, towards the lip of the opening in the earth, carefully stepping around some rusted wire that appeared to either be barbed or razor wire- it was so oxidized and rotted that it was impossible to tell. Glancing up and down the embankment, I noticed that it was slightly raised, providing a small amount of cover for a series of other vehicles, which ranged from tall mounds like the truck that I had just left to smaller, squatter mounds that had a very fine raised portion on top attached to a rounded center bulge- tanks, perhaps? I shook my head and turned my attention back to stepping around and over the wire, to the edge of the pit, leaning out over the opening and looking down.

My eyes widened in shock and horror, and I began back-peddling, only to trip over the wire that I had avoided previously. Heedless of the dirt, I crawled backwards until my back was firmly planted against the truck that I had just left, my hand flying up to cover my mouth.

Bones. The trench had been filled with bones.
> IV: Investigation
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I steadied myself against the rotted bumper of the truck, one hand still over my mouth, eyes fixed on the barely-visible rim of the trench. It didn't look so ominous now, it could have been a normal trench dug by a roadworking crew, maintenance for pipes or fiber optics, something completely average from this point of view. But, that didn't change what I'd seen at the bottom, layer after layer of broken white bones, skulls, remains of all types coating the bottom of the trench and so densely packed that it looked like the entirety of the trench bottom had been painted a stark white.

I felt like I was going to throw up. I could feel the bile rising in the back of my throat, a burning sensation that made me want to seek a corner and void my stomach, but I swallowed it down. If this really was some terrifying reality, I would need whatever was left in my stomach. Hold it together, Matt, it's just skeletons. Don't think about what those skeletons mean, or who they might have- no, don't think about it. Don't think about it.

Standing there, hunched over, I finally got some measure of control back. My breathing slowed, and my throat stopped spasming. Carefully, I opened my eyes and stood, looking back towards the trench. It was the same as ever, a square hole with dirt piled on one side, stretching to the left and right around the entire town with the occasional bridge. Now that I looked closer, every bridge was protected by fortified gun emplacements, vehicles arranged around the entire thing, some of them torn open like tin cans. A battle? Perhaps Ponyville was a military holdout? I didn't know. I needed answers.

And there was one excellent place to look for them.





This had been a complete waste of time.

I had retrieved the rifle from the back just in case, loaded it with a fresh magazine, which were quite large, and chambered a round. Can't be too careful. Holding a gun brought back warm memories of my grandfather and I in a field, shooting cans.

A test fire proved that both the weapon still functioned and the ammunition was still good, which made sense, considering that it had been stored in a cool, dry environment and had been sealed quite well. I had tucked spare magazines into my bag, then set off into Ponyville, with one destination in mind: Twilight Sparkle's castle. Largest library in ponyville since Golden Oaks, and one of the largest storehouses of books and knowledge in all of Equestria.

And it most likely would have answered every question I would have cared to ask... had the doors been unlocked.

In fact, the entire castle was sealed tight. Not a single window or door was even cracked. They were there, sure enough, but all sealed with additional crystal that was a different colour from the material around it. I had hit it with rocks, salvaged a sledgehammer from a nearby shed and even shot it once or twice with the rifle, but nothing had even chipped or cracked whatever the crystal was. Figuring that it was magical crystal created from an artifact born of a magic tree that created the six Elements that had brought down uncounted threats to Equestria, past and present, I wasn't really surprised all that much. Frustrated, yes, but not surprised.

And so, here I was, with a few shattered rocks, a broken sledgehammer and a rifle not made for human hands, staring at a building that looked like it cam from the playset of a giant. The crystal spires sparkled and shone, reflecting and filtering the noon sun, casting flecks of purple light over everything in its vicinity. Beautiful, breath taking, completely impregnable to anything short of a direct hit from a nuke, and perhaps even then. It would be an excellent place to weather a siege, and it would definitely protect all that hid within from anything that tried to get to them.

Slipping the strap of the rifle over my shoulder, I stood. It wasn't doing any good sitting here and ruminating on how the limited tools I had access to had failed to gain me entry to the magical building. I might as well walk the perimeter, try and find some other way in. I knew that that wasn't exactly  likely to happen, but I didn't exactly have anything better to do, so I might as well.

As I walked around to the side of the large structure, I noticed that an asphalt road split off from the main road nearby, curving around to the back of the castle. Frowning, I followed the grey material as it gently curved, noting signs of heavy wear from many tire treads over, perhaps, many years. Power poles followed the road as well, crafted of metal that didn't seem to have corroded or worn much outside of a coating of grime. The cables were relatively intact as well, as far as I could tell... how old were they? When where they put up? I traced the cables with my eyes, examining them, then started as I saw where they lead.

The road terminated at a huge concrete bunker complex that was built directly up against the back of the castle. A chain link fence ringed the entire thing, a courtyard of concrete surrounded by buildings, with watchtowers at each corner with what looked like a searchlight and a heavy machine gun in each tower. The tower in the farthest corner from me, away from the castle, had partially collapsed. What little remained of the structure was at a dangerous angle, barely supported by what was left of its base and the perimeter fence. The effect of the entire thing was like an old World War two base, or a silo from the Cold War. 

Walls of sandbags blocked the main entrance, but those that hadn't moldered looked to have been torn apart and ripped open. Old bloodstains were splashed across the concrete here and there, and nearby there was a block guardhouse whose door looked to have been smashed in by something large and heavy. Gingerly, I clambered over the sandbags and barbed wire, keeping my rifle close to hand and sweeping the place with a wary eye. Something about this place felt... wrong, like something was watching from the broken windows. As I clambered over the last of the barricades, I glanced down and tensed slightly when I realized that the sand bag was rent by three long cuts, all perfectly parallel. Even thus aged, the bag still showed the damage. Taking a short, steadying breath, I gripped the rifle tighter and made my way in.

Stepping through the broken door into the guardhouse caused a swirl of dust, small motes glittering in the wan light that came through the caked windows and around me and my shouldered rifle. Just inside the door, covered with a layer of dust, lay another skeleton. The skull of this one had a beak, and wings- a griffon? Beside him or her lay a pistol, the slide locked back and indicating empty, shells scattered across the floor... they'd gone down fighting someone. Or... someTHING. Another glance around the little building didn't reveal much- a steel weapons rack that held rusted rifles similar to the one that I held, what looked to be a broken screen. It was flat, which was interesting, and seemed to be formed out of a single piece of glass or crystal that had been struck directly in the center by a bullet, which had cleaved straight through the thing and out the other side, leaving a coin-sized hole in the display and the metal back. A keyboard, broken in half and lying in the dust, a desktop sitting underneath the desk itself... but no mouse. I pressed the button on the front of the desktop, then leaped back in suprise when the thing shuddered to life- it was being fed power, from somewhere. This facility still had electricity? Out of curiosity, I flicked a light switch, then looked up as the light bulb in the center of the ceiling lit up.

I flicked the light off again and turned off the desktop. So, there was still power here. Something was running. They had computers, which meant records, which meant that... there might be something to tell me what happened here. The screen for this computer was far beyond repair, so I'd have to find another somewhere. Hopefully there was one that worked. A goal now decided upon, I stepped back through the rotten shards that were all that remained of the door, glancing about in apprehension. Nothing seemed to have changed since I had gone in, but I still couldn't shake the paranoid sensation that hovered in the back of my mind.

There were five other buildings, plus the bunker connected to the base of the castle itself. After a moment of deliberation, I decided to check the bunker before moving onto the outlying buildings- after all, it could contain an alternate route into the castle not sealed off when everything else had been.

The bunker was comprised of a gray, concrete wall, textured by erosion and stained with rust, interrupted with two large garage doors and a side door at the top of a small ramp, all made out of steel and mottled with rust where the paint had flaked off. The door itself had two handles, a normal one about halfway up the door and a latch-like one at foot height, which I suppose made sense for ponies. However, when I tried the lever, it clicked and didn't turn far- locked.

After a moment of thinking, I went back and searched among the bones of the security guard at the front gate. They had been wearing a partial uniform, the cloth aged and torn beyond recognition except for what appeared to be armored plate inserts. Among the bones was a belt, obviously supposed to go around the griffon's midriff, and clipped to it was a holster, what looked to be the remains of a smashed radio and... bingo, a set of keys. I unclipped them from the waistband, stopping as something else shifted and rattled in the dust. Carefully, I bent over and wiped the dust from the flat thing.

It was a small ID card, magnetic stripped. I flipped it over gently. On the other side was the picture of an obviously female griffon, young-looking, beaming at the camera and covered with a mottling of gray, black and white feathers. Gilded Feather, age twenty four, security guard, base zero-two. A small, faded felt sticker of a smiling sun was stuck to the card, and as I ran my finger across it, part of it came off and landed with a small puff in the dust, adhesive long worn out. I considered the tag for a moment, then gently slipped the ID into my pocket. It might come in handy, and... well... perhaps I could give her a good burial. Brave girl had stood her post, fought to the last. She deserved that at the very least. I stepped back, went to leave, then paused for a moment.

"Thank you, and... rest in peace."

I stood for a moment, but there wasn't an answer or a sign, so I went on my way. Perhaps ghosts still didn't exist, even here in the land of magical ponies, but I hoped her soul had found rest. If souls existed. If they found a rest. I was not in the mood for philosophical deliberation.

Keys now in hand, I returned to the door, slotting them in and trying them one by one. Some fit, some didn't, but it was the sixth key that- after a little jiggling- turned. A metallic click came from the mechanisms inside the door, and I pulled out the set of keys, returning them to my pocket before gripping the handle. I changed my grip twice, swallowing, not sure what I'd find behind this door... perhaps answers. I suppose that was the best I could hope for. I nodded, steeled myself, and swung the door wide open.

The opening behind the door, which I now saw was about two inches of solid steel, a thick security door set in a steel doorframe in concrete, was pitch black. The rush of air and dust that came from it smelled stale, but it wasn't cold, and some sort of humming echoed in the background. I licked my lips, nervously, and stepped through into the blackness.
> V: Blackened
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The door remained open in my wake, the spring meant to pull it shut hanging from what remained of its bolts. A wedge of light cascaded into the interior of the building, painting motes in the air and splashing across the layer of dust that coated the concrete. I was on a small, raised platform, with a few steps leading down- a few things flickered and flashed in the dark, reflecting the meager sunlight. I blinked into the dark, then slipped my phone out of my pocket and flicked up the menu, turning on the flashlight. The little flash shot a round spot of light into the oppressive black, banishing it from a wide circle, the shadows shifting and flowing around the light as I shifted it back and forth, examining the interior of the garage.

A variety of machines lay scattered throughout the dust and detritus of years. This had obviously been a maintenance bay, judging by the lifters and pits where the vehicles were supposed to go. What looks to be a jeep with a heavy machine gun mounted on the top is at the far end, but the closer bay is empty, tools scattered hither and tither as if whomever had left here had fixed a vehicle and left in a hurry, stopping only to seal the main doors behind them.

I walked down the few, shallow steps to the concrete floor, noting that they're flatter and wider than normal human steps. A railing is off to one side, but it's lower than normal- about halfway up my calves instead of at my waist. I keep my hand away from the grime that's coating the steel. At the back of the garage, a window flickers in the light. An observation area, pointed outwards into the motor pool, another security door to its side. I flick my light across the jeep, noting with surprise that it has no real damage or wear to it- it's not even rusted. The crest that was present on the other vehicle, the sun and moon, is present on this vehicle's door. Strangest of all, however, is how the vehicle has some sort of plug instead of an inlet for a gas tank.

After a moment of puzzling over this, I shake my head and turn back to the observation area door. As I approach it, I note a small, red light to the right of it- shining my phone's light there reveals a card reader. I reach across and pull out the ID card I'd picked up, considered them both for a moment, then swiped the magnetic strip through it. After a moment, the red light flicked off and a green one came on, and several metallic clicks came from the door. A slight push, and it swung open, revealing the next room to my light.

A desk, circular with a hole in the center and slightly elevated, was situated in front of the grime-caked window. A computer, like the one that had been in the gatehouse, was here on the desk itself. This one had two monitors, not just one, and these were intact. A small white light at their bottom right corners slowly brightened and faded in a repeating pattern. Three doors led out of the room besides the one that I had come in through, each locked with another card reader, and what looked to be a large, heavy blast door blocked the main hallway reaching to the back. A few lockers lay against the walls, bits of rust coating them, their mesh fronts coated with a fine layer of grey dust, as everything else. A rack of pistols, assault rifles and a single, longer rifle leaned against one of the walls. Looking closer, I realized that two of the rifles actually looked to be shotguns. Underneath the rack, small cubbyholes filled with ammo boxes ran to the floor.

Using the card to get through the card readers, I discovered that two of the rooms appeared to be barracks, and the third was a more fleshed-out equipment room. Armour, designed for a variety of species, lay scattered on shelves with a number of other supplies of varying descriptions. The barracks were a number of bunk beds, of varying types, stacked on top of each-other. Lockers sat inbetween each set of beds, labels so coated with dirt that it was impossible to make out what they said.

At last, I was left only with the blast doors. Thick, solid steel, hydraulic and- judging from the signage- electromagnetic seals. Someone built this thing to last. A terminal is set into the wall to one side, gently glowing, and I swipe my fingers against the screen. It seems to flick up a passcode menu for a moment before a lock appears. Nothing else seems to happen, no matter how I flick and tap, so I take a step back.

Doors locked, and this one sealed. Most likely, a security lockdown was triggered in this facility when it was abandoned, and was never taken down. Obviously, this door protected something big and important, which meant that there had to be some way in. Some way past the lockdown and into whatever was behind this door- hopefully, answers.

I breathed out and turned, dust swirling in the air currents from the motion. Nothing else was in this room, except... the desk, sitting there with a computer monitor on it. Given the position of the desk and the window, I would wager good money that it was a security desk, which meant there was a very good chance that not only could it initiate security lockdowns, it could also lift them. As this was as good a plan as any I had, I approached the desk, walking up a few more unusually wide steps to get to it.

There was not an office chair behind it, more of a cushion with a low backing on a swivel, no arm rests- obviously. It creaked and groaned in protest as I dusted it off and sat down, looking at the surface of the desk. Four input devices lay before the two screens themselves, a keyboard and a mouse, then a strange-looking panel with two large buttons on it and a pad with a small crystal-laden stylus in a groove at the bottom. The latter were obviously meant for ponies, and the former for species with digits, though I wondered at having both.

I hit a button on the bottom of a monitor, and the screen came on with a gentle glow. After a moment of warming up, it came up with a screen, the icon of an ID card. I blinked at the image, then searched around the small desk space and found one thing I'd missed: another card reader, this one with a wire leading towards a hole in the desk and down to the computer tower. The symbol was clear, and as I looked closer, I realized that there was no pixelation- this was not an LED screen. I wasn't sure what to do with this information, so I filed it for later review, when I could discover more.

I dug out Gilded Feather's ID card and swiped it through the reader. There was a faint beep, and a momentary screen that read "PROCESSING..." under a spinning loading sign before it changed to:

 ACCESS GRANTED: WELCOME, GILDED FEATHER. LAST ACCESS: 280560 HOUR(S)

I blinked at the number, then shook my head and ignored it. Another thing to file for later review when I had access to more information. Another piece of the puzzle. What came up next was a password screen, a line and a blinking cursor. Thinking back to the lone decoration on the ID card, and the only thing that it could refer to, I typed in 'celestia'. Rejected. I thought for a moment, then tried again, capitalizing the first letter. Nothing. I chewed a fingernail, then tried again: 'Celest1a', then grinned as the words 'ACCESS GRANTED' flashed on the screen. Thank deities for quick, lazy passwords.

This time, the screen was obviously the desktop of an OS. A start menu button was in the lower right hand corner, with a date and time next to it- 22/09/1046. One thousand forty-six... would that be after Discord? A number of application boxes were scattered across the desktop- security cameras, perimeter security, infrared detection... ah, lockdown. I moved the mouse to the icon and clicked it, bringing up another screen with a simple map of the entire facility. A number of locations, including ones called 'ARMOURY' and 'VEHICLE STORAGE' were showing up red, as well as a large red block behind 'VEHICLE MAINTENANCE' that was labelled as 'FACILITY ENTRANCE'. A number of buttons with a variety of actions were scattered around the screen, and I searched through them for a moment before finding the 'LIFT LOCKDOWN' one and clicking on it. A window flashed up, with two passwords and a line of text.

DISENGAGING LOCKDOWN REQUIRES CONFIRMATION OF PASSWORD AND ID BY PRESENT USER AND SITE ADMINISTRATOR

I sighed and leaned back, rubbing my eyes. Alright, so I needed a second password and ID card, from the 'site administrator'. Hopping back to the map and searching it for a moment, I found where the office was located. Thankfully, it was not a section that was in lockdown, and was just across the compound from here. Flipping my phone's light back on, I got up from the chair and made my way back through the darkened vehicle bay and out into the courtyard. I shaded my eyes with a hand for a moment, blinking and grimacing as my eyes got used to the sudden light.

The compound was much the same as I'd left it, thankfully, though I now noted the rusted remainder of what looked like another jeep against one of the walls. As I approached it, I realized that the concrete around the front of the vehicle was cracked, and the front and engine was crumpled. Black stains were splashed across the concrete, and appeared to have slightly corroded the metal where it had splashed- though it was difficult to tell through the rust and corrosion that had occurred. I shivered and gave the wreckage a wide berth as I made my way towards the administrative offices.

A loud creak sounded from the hinges of the steel door to the offices as I used Gilded's keys to open it. I stepped inside, glancing around a little, then jumping when a loud, resounding BANG came from behind me. I spun, eyes wide and searching, then relaxed as I realized that it was just the door smacking into the concrete wall after I swung it open. I sighed in indignation, then turned back to the interior.

A number of desks and cubicles were arranged in rows behind a reception desk, each with another screen on it. The walls were just tall enough to separate the cubicles from each other, but not tall enough to hide what was in them, and I could clearly see the various random knick knacks that any office desk acquired with time, all grey with dust and time. All was visible thanks to a number of windows placed regularly in the outer wall, grime and dust slightly dimming the light that came through them but still allowing enough through for the room to be relatively well lit. I shifted through the dust, pushing open a gate in a short separating wall and stepping through, letting it creak gently shut behind me as I made my way towards the door in the back labelled in faded gold letters as the site admin's office. As I passed cubicle after cubicle, I glanced left and right, catching glances of the shreds of personality left in each of them.

A coffee mug, with the words #1 Dad. A bucket of floater pens, the water long gone from them, ink dried out. A pile of moldering sticky notes that had obviously wilted from the computer screen like leaves from a tree in Fall as the adhesive had failed over the years. One had something still taped to it, the adhesive holding it lopsided as one side had failed. I hesitated in the opening, then stepped inward, feeling almost as if it was a violation of privacy, taking the object and tearing what was left of the strip of tape that had held it, cleaning off the layer of dust and looking at it.

It was a photograph. A unicorn stallion, goofy grin on his face, forelegs over the backs of two other ponies- a Pegasus and another unicorn, one a teenager and one younger. The Pegasus, the teen, was obviously trying to grimace, poorly hiding how her lips curved up at the ends and her eyes sparkled as she looked at her father. The little unicorn foal was mid-laugh, mouth open, mirth written across his face and a "I <3 Manehatten" hat on his head that was obviously far too big for him. Their mother, a pegasus like her older daughter, was nuzzling her son and smiling so wide it looked as if her lower jaw was going to come off, the barest evidence of moisture in her eyes. I touched the image of the happy family with a finger, then turned the photograph over. There, in blue spidery writing, was a date and a few words.

03/01/1010, Iron's first trip to Manehatten!

I traced the words with a finger, mouthing them to myself. What had happened to this family? To this solitary moment of happiness, frozen in time for so long? Almost reverently, I cleared a patch of dust from the desk and set the photo down on the clear spot with a gentleness that surprised me. The rest of the walk to the door, I did not glance left nor right.

The door opened easily, with no need for persuasion from the ring of keys clipped to my belt. Inside was a large central desk, with a name tag that was labelled with 'site admin Dotted Line'. What was left of a bunch of papers covered the wooden desk surface, some piled in rusted wire baskets whose labels had long faded to white. The chair here had collapsed, and lay in pieces in the dust, and the desk itself leaned slightly to the right, the computer monitor on the floor and badly cracked. The drawers were held shut, but some yanking got them open.

The first two drawers were filing, and contained the detritus of papers reduced to nothing but bits and pieces, a remainder of what it was. Nothing particularly useful, though I yanked out the rails, which made it much easier to lever open the next set of drawers. The first was office supplies, a stapler, some paperclips, rubber bands that had dried up and fallen to bits, some pens and some random bits and bobs. The second, however, held a number of plastic cards- and, hidden among them, was an ID card with an eight-digit number written on it with marker. I grinned and took the thing out, leaving the drawers open as I swept back around the desk and made my way back through the office. I paused for a moment as I came level with the cubicle that had contained the photograph. I hesitated, then touched the low dividing wall and moved on.

The door had swung closed after I had left it behind, rebounding from where it had smacked into the concrete wall. My mouth twitched in slight annoyance, shifting the rifle back a little as I reach out and pressed a hand to the cool surface, pushing it open. And then I froze, eyes wide.

There, in the center of the courtyard, was a wolf made of black, dripping pitch.
> VI: Pitch
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I froze there for a moment, staring, sparks of fear, confusion and panic circulating in my head. Some part of me noticed that, incredibly fortunately, that the creature was not looking in my direction. Instead, it was sniffing the ground, tracing its way about the center yard of the small base, seeming to be searching for something. If I could step back into the building, I would be able to work my way towards the back of the building and back to one of the offices. They hadn't been much, but they'd had steel doors at least, and that would serve well with a proper barricade-

All thought froze in place as the door, which I'd forgotten in my panicked reaction, bounced against the concrete wall with the same loud bang that it had made when it had hit that same wall before. I went ridged as the wolf's head snapped towards me, black eyes like swirling tar in its socket as it drew its lips back from its teeth in a snarl... and looked straight through me.

My panic, which had caused me to bring up the barrel of the rifle to at least get a few shots off to perhaps discourage the beast or at least wound it, faded slightly as I realized that it had looked at me and moved on, not even appearing to note my presence. It approached a few steps, sniffed the air, then made a huffing sound and turned away without even sparing me a glance. It appeared to not even acknowledge my presence outside of the loud sound.

As it turned from me, slowly and carefully reached out and took the handle of the door, slowly swinging it shut and latching it in place. I locked it for good measure, then collapsed with my back to it, sucking down breath after breath as I held the assault rifle close, eyes wide. What in the seven hells had that been? What was it even doing here? Had it followed the sound of the door slamming against the outside wall, or had it somehow smelled me? No, some part of me said, it hadn't been that last one. After all, had it been attracted by scent, then it surely would have seen me and made a beeline for me. Without the pressing threat being right in front of me, it occurred to me that part of my fear had been the fact that the creature, whatever it had been, felt fundamentally wrong. 

It hadn't moved as an animal would. It had been gaunt thin, unnaturally so, with ribs showing on its black fur, which had appeared more like a poor mimicry than a true coat. Indeed, from what little I'd seen, its movements had been stilted and unnaturally stiff, as if it had only seen a wolf move a few times before and was poorly imitating it from memory.

I sat there for a moment, back against the door to the building, rifle in hand. My breathing slowed, little by little, as nothing slammed into the steel shield that was between me and the courtyard. Eventually, ever so carefully, I braced myself against the surface and pushed myself up to the window set in the door, peeking over the edge of the frame.

The wolf had apparently lost interest in the noise. I noted that it appeared to be sniffing around the edges of the trapped jeep, investigating the black smear marks there. After a moment, it seemed to dismiss them and, with a snuff and a shuffle, move away and towards the entrance. I watched as it made its way through and out of sight.

I stayed there for a while longer, watching carefully out the window for any sign of the thing, waiting as the minutes ticked by. Five, ten, fifteen... surely it was gone now? My gaze went down to the slightly rusted door handle, swallowing and realizing that my mouth was suddenly very dry. My left hand came up, the right taking the grip of the rifle in hand and pressing the cushioned stock in close to my shoulder, finger wrapped around the trigger. I pushed the door open just enough to get the barrel of the rifle through, then switched my left hand back to the slightly recessed grip along the bottom of the heat guard, pushing the door open with the rifle itself.

The courtyard was empty as it had been when I arrived, no sign of the mystery creature remaining and no indicator that it had ever been here left behind. Regardless, I kept the rifle shouldered and ready until I reached the maintenance bay door and sealed it behind me: finally feeling at least a little safe from whatever that had been, I lowered the rifle again with a shuddering breath. My legs shook and wobbled slightly, feeling almost like rubber, but I shook my head fiercely and stood straight. I still wasn't safe, not here- from what I'd seen, I'd say that one of those... things... had burst through the door of the security post that guarded the entrance of the compound with ease. The door to the maintenance area was a lot more robust than that door, being made of steel, but I was unwilling to take chances. This meant that I needed to get that door open, if only so I could take shelter behind it when I closed it again.

I slung the rifle over my shoulder and flicked my phone's light on again, quickly passing through the bay without sparing it another glance. The door to the security room swung open easily at my touch, and I made to go to the computer... then paused as something occurred to me. Obviously, if I kept using my phone as a light, I couldn't properly wield the rifle: however, this was a military base from the looks of things, so they'd most likely have some weapons attachments scattered about. Finding one that even WORKED would be a bit of a long shot, but I wasn't exactly in a time crunch, so I might as well.

Phone in hand, I opened the doors to the smaller rooms and began poking around. Most of the lockers were filled with the same sort of things that littered the desks in the administrative areas: souvenirs, mementos, little bits and bobs and knick knacks. A letter from a family member, a good luck charm, a rifle round with a pattern engraved on it. All of these people, ponies, griffons, and all the rest... they were gone. Vanished, or dead. I wavered slightly as a vision of the bottom of the trench flickered through my mind, swallowing deeply. Hopefully, I could keep the same from happening to me.

After some searching, I finally hit a success. A large locker opened up to reveal a collection of weapons, some pistols, two rifles and a number of attachments that looked to be compatible with either. Lasers, rangefinders, holographic sights- ah! Taclights! I reached in and pulled one out, blinking in slight surprise at the small contacts that adorned the spot where it had rested, and made to close the locker. My hand grasped the handle, then hesitated a moment as I rethought. Quickly, I reached in, grabbing a single pistol and a holster for it, then taking another taclight for it and sliding the locker shut. 

I moved to a nearby steel table, grimacing at the mound of dust that had collected on it. After a moment of thinking, I retrieved a nearby tarp which was thankfully intact and made something of a makeshift tablecloth out of it, placing the pistol and second taclight down on the slightly shiny surface, along with my still-on phone. Now, it was time to take a closer look at the light.

The thing was a steel box, rectangular, with an obvious slot for the rails on a weapon. A quick release button adorned the side, as well as two different switches- curious. On the end that was meant to point down the weapon were not one, but two indents that contained bulbs, most likely controlled separately by the two switches. One appeared to be some manner of LED, something strangely recognizable here, but the other looked to be a tiny shard of crystal that glimmered and sparkled ever so slightly in the meager light given off by my phone's flash. As I ran my hands across the side, my fingertips suddenly dragged across a seam in the side opposite the switches. Turning it over and looking closer, I realized that it appeared to be a small hatch, with some indents in the steel providing grip. 

I made a faint humming sound. Obviously, this was the battery hatch. Most likely, it would be a good idea to check the condition of the batteries, in order to make sure that they hadn't moldered in the time this place had been abandoned. Pressing my fingers into it, I slid it to the side, blinking in surprise as the object that it hid and contained was revealed.

A square block of crystal, clear as glass, fitted into a tiny frame with a number of wires leading off of it. Looking closer, I realized that the positive and negative wires each burrowed into an opposite side of the rectangular prism, attached to contacts that went deeper into the crystal. The most surprising thing, however, was how it glowed a soft shade of luminescent blue, rather like a glowstick. I poked it a couple times, pulling back with a jerk both times, but thankfully it did nothing more than keep glowing in that same shade and luminescence. Opening the other light, I confirmed that it was exactly the same: a small rectangular prism of crystal, wires leading out of it, glowing a soft blue. Obviously, this was the Equestrian answer to batteries.

I inhaled a breath, leaning back as I eyed the two little glowing things. Computers, high-resolution screens, operating systems that were highly advanced, automatic cartridge-based, mass-manufactured weapons, an obvious electrical grid... the more that I discovered about this Equestria, the less it resembled the one in the show, the one I knew. That had been an Equestria of peace and love and Harmony... this had been an Equestria of war and strife, but also of frankly incredible scientific advancement. From what I'd seen and what was here, they had been around the level of the early to mid thousands by the... well, the end, and all the way from more or less a Victorian level of advancement, much faster than how we humans had managed to do it. Of course, they'd had the advantage of magic the entire time, and obviously access to crystalline elements that were not present on Earth that had obviously sped their rate of advancement.

I inhaled sharply as I realized what this called to mind. A different Equestria, an alternate one that we'd once been shown back when Starlight had interfered with time and Twilight had had to chase her through a number of different and distinct timelines. Specifically, however, I was thinking of one with a Rainbow Dash that had a bionic wing, that had seen Equestria in a war bad enough to turn it militarized and industrialized... the war with the Crystal Empire. The war with Sombra.

Except, in the end... Equestria hadn't been losing. It'd been something of a stalemate, from what we'd seen in the show, perhaps Equestria's newly-advanced tech giving them the edge against Sombra's forces and logistics, both of which were about a thousand years out of date. Here, however, they'd fought a war and, from every indication I could find, they'd lost. But what, or who, had they fought against? I'd seen the wolf outside. Perhaps that had been a henchman of the villain? If that was the case, why wasn't I seeing a version of the Crystal Empire, with pony slaves in chains lined up everywhere and doing things? Where were they all?

I splayed my hands across the tarp, staring at the glowing crystal intently. Whatever answers I wanted, there was a very good chance they were just beyond that door. I was armed, I had the passkeys, I was ready as I was ever going to be... now was my chance to answer some of my questions, find out why I'd been sent here.

In a few quick movements, I slotted a light onto both weapons and clipped the pistol's holster at my waist. I flicked one switch on the light, frowning and flicking it back as it did nothing, then tried the other. A cone of light poured out of the thing, much brighter than my phone's little lamp. I shut off my phone, taking the rifle in two hands and making my way back to the door to the little locker room, pushing it wide open.

The taps of my shoes on concrete echoed slightly through the space, puffs of dust left floating in my wake as I moved with purpose to the computer desk. A quick flick of the mouse woke the machine from sleep, showing the very same screen that I'd left it on before I had gone searching for the admin card. I confirmed Gilded's password, filling out the second line and hitting enter. Another small window came up, this one with an animation that showed ID cards being swiped through a simplified reader.

I brought up Gilded's ID first, seeing as it had been the first password of the two that had needed to be entered, and swiped it, waiting a moment before switching to the next. However, the machine showed no response to the card being swiped, not even to deny it or read out an error. I turned the card this way and that, but it wasn't bent and the magnetic strip seemed relatively intact, which was almost miraculous considering where it had been. Alright then, I thought, no faults with the card must mean there's something wrong with the reader.

And it turned out that there was. Just picking the thing up and turning it on its side produced a plume of falling dust that had caught in the groove that the cards were supposed to slide through. I reeled back in surprise, dropping the device and taking a number of steps back, shocked at the sheer volume of it. I waited for a moment for the dust to settle again, then stepped forward and, much more carefully this time, proceeded to knock some of the dust out of the thing.

A small pile quickly formed atop the already-present layer of dust coating parts of the desk, but thankfully the clouds of dust weren't as bad as they'd been before. Hoping that I'd removed enough of the grime from the thing that it would now function as intended, I placed the scanner back down next to the monitor and swiped Gilded's card once again. I waited a tense moment, staring at a small indicator box next to the name in the window, breathing a sigh of relief as it lit up green. Really, I was thankful that I hadn't had to track down some sort of supplies room for a replacement scanner. Honestly, it was impressive and a mark of exceptional design and manufacturing that any of this stuff worked at all.

With both cards swiped, the lockdown lifted, previously red areas on the digital map flashing green before returning to the same neutral white as the rest of the compound. I hovered the mouse over the part of the map that was a representation of the blast door behind me, a softly glowing box that opened up a small window, with two simple commands: open, and close. I hovered the cursor over the 'open' button and clicked once.

I jumped about two feet as a low grumble started, resonating throughout the silent hall and security booth. Spinning and pointing the rifle with its flashlight behind me, I watched as the heavy hazard-lining-adorned bulkhead retracted into the ceiling until it sat near flush. At that moment, the rumbling ceased, everything returning to silence in the absence of the work of the machinery that had filled it but a moment before. I found myself almost wanting to start the closing process and open the door again just to dispel the silence, but I shook off the odd urge and shouldered my rifle, making my way towards the black maw that led deeper into the compound.

Really, I just hoped that there wouldn't be any spiders.
> VII: Deepened
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I licked my lips nervously as I stared down the black, gaping maw of the passageway. The beam of the light attached to the rifle didn't reach all the way down, not completely, but I could make out what appeared to be a T-junction much farther down, with coloured lines painted on the walls. I was vaguely reminded of Stargate SG-1, where the Cheyenne Mountain base had a number of painted lines that acted as guides to various locations within the base. Hopefully, one would lead somewhere where I could get some answers.

I stepped over the threshold of the thick blast door, sparing a glance at the walls before focusing on the left hand side. There, black against the gray of the concrete, was a hinged panel with a symbol of a hoofprint and a claw. Push to open, maybe? Would be handy for a species without opposable thumbs, or fingers in general. Keeping my right hand on the rifle's grip, I pressed my left palm on the center of the panel, quickly jerking it away as the thing clicked and swung outwards. There, behind it, was a simplistic control panel, obviously for emergencies, with close and open buttons. 

Having confirmed what it was, I made to move on... and paused. Visions of the tar wolf that had been outside, and the black markings around the wall that the jeep had slammed into, flashed through my mind. I hesitated a moment longer, then shouldered the rifle and thumbed the 'close' button. My hands went to my ears as the same grinding noise from before resounded through the hallway as the thick steel door dropped shut behind me. I watched it come down, the flashlight reflecting off the near-white of the ceiling and acting almost like an area lamp, and noted that as soon as it was all the way down, a series of loud clicks and clacks followed. Most likely, this was a number of steel hooks and bars securing the door in place, and producing a seal.

My eyes widened and I stood straighter at that thought. Ponderously, I sniffed the air... thankfully, it still smelled clean. Examining the walls, I found a small, rectangular vent near the ceiling. Putting my hand in front of it, I felt slightly cooler air flowing through and out into the hallway, with similar vents near the ceiling drawing air in. Obviously, the continued power supply- whatever it was- allowed the ventilation, circulation and filtration systems to continue working. In fact, looking around, I noticed something that I hadn't before: this side of the barrier was completely pristine, lacking any of the dust that had settled in thick layers just on the other side of the thick door. If I would have had to guess, I would have said that the filtration had pulled the dust out of the air before it had ever had a chance to settle... which made sense, given that this was something of a military installation. Pulling the rifle down from my shoulder, I pointed it down the hallway and continued forward.

Doors off to either side tempted me to explore, but I ignored them for the moment, in favour of the end of the hall where I could just make out a series of signs matched up with the colours of the stripes that lead deeper into the compound. However, I played the light across the signs on the doors as I passed them, if only to sate my curiosity.

Interestingly, the first door was tagged as the entrance to the 'incursion suppression weapon & armaments storage'. It was odd that they'd have an armory right here, right next to the entrance to the rest of the compound... I would have thought that they'd have them deeper in, to make getting to the serious weapons and ammunition more difficult for invaders over the standard issue armaments in the lockers in the front. And yet, here it was, sitting here. Out of curiosity, I checked the door, finding it locked with a card reader. I poked it a little, then shook my head. There'd be plenty of time to search this room later, when I'd found some answers in this place...

The other doors were less interesting. Office supplies, a janitorial area, a meeting room, and a briefing room formed the remainder of them, the briefing room taking the space of two rooms. I ducked into the meeting and briefing rooms briefly, hoping for some sort of paperwork that I could perhaps form a paper trail with, or at least find some orders that might shed some light on whatever war had led to this, but... nothing.

Once, some time ago, it was obvious that the meeting table and the lectern in the briefing room had been covered in papers. What was left, however, had faded to the point of illegibility... odd. Extremely odd. I abandoned a final sheaf of papers where they had lain with a weary sigh, abandoning my search for the moment. After all, there had been computers up front and in the guard post: that meant that, most likely, there were computers deeper in that I could access that might give me more pieces of the puzzle that was this world.

I came to the end of the hallway at last, staring up at the rainbow assortment of coloured signs, attached to the blank concrete in a column that reached nearly from the ceiling to the floor. Many of these were not exactly interesting, but there were a few that were: administrative, castle entrance and central operations, to name a few. All of these pointed to the left.

I supposed that this was as good a start as any. Following the coloured lines to the left, I turned a corner that the hallway went through... and halted in the tracks. There, blocking the entire passageway, with every single line leading straight into it, was a huge slab of the same crystalline material that the castle above was made out of. I stopped there for a moment, eye twitching slightly, then marched up and kicked the thing, for all the good it did me. This was twice now that answers had apparently been just within my reach, and twice that said answers had been blocked off by the stupid castle. Deep breaths, there was still one other way.

I turned from the blockage, making my way back to the junction and the second set of signs, these pointing right down the other direction of the corridor. One of them read 'Central Core', which was... surprisingly vague. A small scrawling beneath the name on the sign revealed that it was a highly classified area, and that only high-ranked individuals or those with specific permissions were permitted to enter.

I nodded to myself. It did sound like a place that would be worth a visit: hopefully, it was some sort of documentation storage server, from which I could retrieve some files that would shed at least a little light on the situation in Equestria before everything happened. 

The hallway leading to the place indicated by the sign was... odd. Doors into barracks filled either side of the hall, and the entire thing narrowed down to several smaller doors, creating what looked to be defensive choke points complete with thick blast doors much like the one guarding the entrance. It looked as if this entire place had been designed to be defended at a moment's notice, with this passage in particular something that modern military tacticians had nightmares about. Obviously, whatever this 'Central Core' was, it was incredibly important to the base and they were determined to defend it at any cost. 

Thankfully, however, it appeared that nothing had gotten past the main door to test the mettle of the defenders inside the base itself: no skeletons dotted the halls, no wreckage of the death of organic beings, and there were none of the strange black marks anywhere. All of the doors were intact, though many of them stood slightly open... I shivered. If one of these doors suddenly slammed on its own, I'd probably have a heart attack and just drop dead right here.

Finally the passage terminated in a pair of elevator doors, one button at about waist height installed in the wall next to a card reader. I thought for a moment, then slipped out the site admin's card and swiped it through. There was a momentary pause, during which I held my breath, letting it go in a sigh of relief as the reader and the button turned green. I pressed the 'call' button... and proceeded to jump about two feet as, instantly, the doors slid open with a ding. I pointed the rifle through the entrance, but for all intents and purposes it seemed to be a regular elevator car, if a bit utilitarian in its interior design. Interestingly enough, while the rest of the compound had been in complete darkness with no lights to speak of, the interior of the car was lit with four lights set into the ceiling.

I swallowed a little and stepped in, turning to the control panel, flicking off the flashlight and shouldering the rifle as I did. There were five buttons on the panel: a top level, three subbasements, and one ominously labelled with a simple 'Core'. I considered the other three briefly, but... I had time for them later, whatever they were. The 'Core' button clicked quietly as I pushed it in, the elevator doors sliding shut and the slightest jerk traveling through the car as it began its descent. Surprisingly enough, it was almost entirely smooth all the way down, the car quiet but for a very faint humming that must have been the sounds of the electric drive motor at the top of the shaft echoing down. It was quiet enough to almost be unnerving, and I shifted uneasily as I watched the display tick down the floors that I'd passed.

It was a definite relief, then, when the display read 'CORE' in large, blocky red letters, and the car slowed to a halt. There was another ding, and the doors slid open, meager light spilling from the car and into the space beyond without enough intensity to really make anything visible on the other side. Like the upper floors, the lights in this area were entirely off, leaving the entire place a pitch black beyond the small bit of light cast through the elevator doors. A flick turned my flashlight back on, the higher intensity beam of light cutting through the dark, which almost seemed to have a different... texture? I wasn't sure how to put it, but it felt different than the darkness that had shrouded the upper floors. There it had felt just empty, here it felt almost... foreboding.

I swallowed again, adjusting my grip on the rifle and almost compulsively checking the chamber for a round. The little action calmed me a little, enough to steady the little shake in my hands and allow me to continue forward and into the dark. The bright circle that shown from the taclight played across what appeared to be lab equipment of many descriptions: tables covered in microscopes, test tubes, centrifuges, computer equipment... in the center of the room was a series of tanks, filled to the brim with a blue liquid that filtered the light as it passed through it. Tubes hung from the roof of each tank, limp in the still fluid. I shivered and moved on.

Lights like stars teased in the dark, machines left running for all this time revealed as my light played across them. Some machines looked like something you'd find in a laboratory on Earth, edges and steel and screens, others closer to amalgamations of crystal and wire that loomed in the dark like predatory creatures. It felt like something was stalking me, always just out of sight of my light, hiding, moving, watching...

It was with incredible relief that I came upon the other end of the lab. Double doors, thick steel and reinforced glass, sealed with another keycard lock. My admin card opened this one easily enough as well, and I ducked through the doors, pushing them shut behind me with a sigh. That done, and feeling much better for being away from that room, I turned to face this new one.

It was much smaller than the lab room, about a twenty foot cube. Looking up and behind me, I realized that there was an observation deck set farther up the wall, above the doors that I'd just entered through. The glass was clean, like everything else in here, and sparkled dimly in the light from my rifle. I turned from the back in a circle, playing the beam across the inside of the room and the objects there.

Banks of machines, humming to themselves softly in the dark and covered with blinking lights, lined the walls of the room. Screens slept, their power buttons glowing softly, dimming and brightening in a precise pattern. Wires strapped together into bundles by metal binders patterned with black and yellow hazard striping criss-crossed the floor, connecting various banks of machines together. The most impressive thing, however, was in the center of the room.

A long, hard-edged rectangular block, almost like a coffin, lay in the middle of the various machines and wires. Thick cables, the thickest I'd seen thus far, were hooked into various ports in the thing, glowing a faint blue and pulsating lightly, almost as if they were alive. My footsteps were muffled as I carefully stepped among the various bundles of wire, rifle in hand, eyes fixed curiously on this one object. It almost seemed to draw me towards it now that I'd seen it, like a magnet draws metal, a force that gently urged me closer and closer to it.

A window was set in what would be the lid, staring down into the thing, covering the entire length of the top. I placed my hand on the cold steel, rifle falling to my side as I looked in, and was met with frosted glass, utterly opaque, but glowing with a soft white light. I frowned. Why put frosted glass into something that was clearly meant to give someone a direct view into the interior of the object? I glanced up and down the length of the thing, my eyes fixing upon a small glow to one side of it. I set down the rifle where the light splashed across the thing's siz, leaning against the side of the block, and stepped over to it.

There was a small panel here, little buttons and a readout screen glowing in the darkness, labels highlighted and shining dimly with reflected light from the flashlight. I ran my thumb across a small series of letters, raised just so they poked up from the steel, mouthing them to myself.

CORE MAIN STASIS CHAMBER MK VII

Stasis? I felt a flutter of hope in my chest. Maybe this meant it was some sort of stasis tube, perhaps something experimental that had been left over from tech development from before the ending of... whatever had happened. Maybe it was in use! Maybe some scientist, pony, griffon or otherwise, had made it work when this facility had fallen and the lower compound was sealed. Maybe they had been trapped in the tube, awaiting someone to revive them... my hope was edged with desperation.

There had to be someone, right?

I flicked my eyes over the screen, fingers poking it and finding that it was a touch screen that scrolled down. Most of them I didn't understand, things that directed this or that function of the tube itself, but three of them I did understand. the first was a simple yes or no indicator, red or green, indicating whether the tube was occupied... that flutter grew stronger as my gaze followed the letters of the word 'OCCUPIED', followed by the words 'ACTIVE' and 'STATUS: GREEN'. The second was a control for the opacity of the main viewport, a simple slider with tic marks down its length. My finger hovered over this a moment, before I decided to scroll down, which brought me to the final, third option.

OOCUPANT RELEASE PROTOCOL START

Another slider, much like the old IPhone unlocks, a series of arrows pulsing and showing the direction a circular slider would be dragged to initiate it. I reached out my index finger and pressed the slider, dragging it halfway across the screen... then stopped.

This thing had been sealed for a long time, definitely since this compound had fallen. There could be a scientist in there, or a civilian... but there could also be a guard that might come out confused and ready to fight anything that moved. Worst of all, someone might have locked one of those tar wolves in here or something. I had just been through a laboratory, a laboratory with tanks that had almost looked to be for organic specimens... perhaps this was where they kept the one they experimented on. I released the slider, allowing it to return to its default spot: I had no intention of releasing whatever was in this tube until I knew for certain who, or WHAT, they were, and what I might have to deal with when the tube unsealed and they woke up. Besides, it wasn't like checking would hurt anything... I'd just have a look first.

I scrolled the menu back up to the opacity slider and pushed it with my index finger, dragging it across the screen. Instantly, the window began to clear, and I glanced up and through at the occupant.

The first thing that I saw was blue fur, a darker blue that was clear even now, the window clearing from the center and rippling outward. Wings... a sight of relief and a jump of hope in me. So, either a griffon or a pegasus then, but... which one? One I knew? The faintest hint of a main as the clarity spread further, a light blue colour... and then it cleared completely, revealing the occupant.

A horn.

A Cutie Mark in the shape of a moon on a pitch black background.

A face, relaxed in sleep, strands of her mane straying down in front of her closed eyes.

There, in the stasis tube, in the center of an abandoned laboratory deep underneath a military compound constructed underneath Twilight Sparkle's castle... was Princess Luna.
> VIII: Release
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I placed my hands flat, palm down, on the now-clear observation window, looking down on the alicorn within. One of the four princesses, the ruler of the night, sister to Celestia... and, somehow, she had ended up here. No regalia, her mane and tail the light blue that they were in the pilot's second part, that of 'depowered' Luna. She almost looked like she was sleeping, eyes closed and face relaxed, mane spread across the padded bottom of the capsule, hooves spread out just so and wings limp.

I drew back, pacing back and forth next to the stasis tube. I now had two choices: I could release her, perhaps find some answers for all of this and gain a companion- and that companion would be Luna! Or, I could leave her here, in this stasis tube... I grimaced. No, it didn't sit right with me to leave her here. If something happened to me, she'd never be released: I hadn't seen any sort of auto-release mechanic in the options of the stasis pod, and even if there had been, I couldn't just leave her here in good conscience. 

My mind flashed back to the tar wolf that had been in the courtyard. There were dangers in this world, and who was to say that one of them wouldn't find their way in and decide to attack Luna while she lay in state? There were no defenses in place for this room or the lab, and I certainly couldn't guard her all the time... no, the best option was to activate the release and hope for the best. I'd wanted answers, and here was my best chance for them: I wasn't going to let it pass me by. Besides, though I didn't really want to admit it to myself... I was alone, and a little scared, in a world that was both dangerous and run-down. Having someone- somepony- to watch my back would be... appreciated.

I stepped back over to the screen, scrolling down the list of options to the release. My finger hovered over the little slider, hesitating: did I really want to do this? Was this like that one movie where a man awakens from stasis alone on a colony ship, then decides to sabotage the pod of another person and wake them up? Was this a moral choice? 

I shook my head. Most likely, I could just put her straight back into stasis, if she really wanted, though I hoped she didn't. I slid the slider all the way to the right, the screen dimming a bit as a dialogue box came up.

RELEASE COMMAND ENTERED. ARE YOU CERTAIN? SIDE EFFECTS MAY INCLUDE: DROWSINESS, DIZZINESS, VERTIGO AND MILD TEMPORARY AMNESIA. WARNING: DISCONNECTING CORE FROM GRID MAY CAUSE POWER FLUCTUATIONS

CONTINUE/ABORT

I blinked at the little box as I read through it. The rest of them I could understand, as it had to be hard on the mind to spend any amount of time in stasis of any kind, but amnesia? Mild, to be sure, but still amnesia. I closed my fingers into a fist as I considered, then sighed. It didn't matter if there was a little bit of amnesia, it didn't change what I needed to do. With that, I pressed the CONTINUE button.

The pod hissed, releasing twin shafts of steam, the window flashing back to opaque. I stepped back, surprised, as the lid jerked upwards with a louder hiss, then hinged up from the back, revealing Princess Luna in her entirety, peacefully laying on the padded cushions that covered the inside of the pod. I jumped once again as, suddenly, the banks of machines around me started switching on and coming to life. I winced, eyes squinted shut, as the lights in the room came on, blinding compared to the complete darkness that I'd been in just a moment previously. A large screen farther up the wall came on, warming up a moment before displaying something, a series out numbers.

6:23:59:59

There was one more category, but the numbers ticked down too fast to accurately tell. The next-to-last ticked down, once per second. I swallowed as I realized what it was: a timer. If my guess was correct, it was reading six days, twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes and counting until... until what? Something. Something that I wasn't exactly eager to see.

A shifting noise brought my attention back to the pod, and the Princess. Her hooves shifted slightly on the cushions, brushing against the cloth and making the faint sound that had drawn my attention. She brought them up to her head, curling around herself with a groan and a small shiver, her unpinned wing shifting to cover her head and shade her from the light. Smaller sounds, muffled by her wing, drifted up. I realized that she was mumbling, and I stepped closer to hear.

"Sister... it's too early, turn off the sun... gotta sleep longer, big event today..."

She seemed to be drifting off again. Considering the state that the warning had said she'd be in, I wasn't so certain that that was a good idea, so I stepped closer to shake her back awake, and then promptly stopped in my tracks. This was the princess of the night. Luna. Flesh and blood, right here in front of me, real as I was... I felt the niggling roots of panic rising in my mind. Before, it hadn't been real, almost like a surreal dream. Now, however, I wasn't so certain.

With a vigorous shake, I banished those thoughts, at least for the time being. Right now, I needed to focus. I had somebody else that would be relying on me... at least, for the moment. I had a sneaking suspicion that once Luna had recovered from stasis sickness, she'd be perfectly capable of taking care of herself. At least, I hoped. Before I could actually think it through and have a proper crisis about it, I went ahead and put my had on her back.

Her fur was soft, rather like silk, and it gave a little. It wasn't wiry, but thinner and finer, creating a slightly springy bed of night-blue fur. Gently, I shook her a little, ready to pull back if her response to my jostling was less than positive.

"Your highness..." I swallowed. Was that the correct way to refer to her? I wasn't sure, but I had to call her something, and that seemed to be my best option for the moment. "You need to get up. Sorry to tell you this, but... I kinda really, REALLY need you up. Right now."

She groaned, making a weak motion to try and shake off my hand. "Serg'nt, that you...? Close the curtains, if you will, my head feels like t'was dipped in sister's sun..."

"Uh, princess, I don't want to alarm you, but... there's this big, ominous countdown timer on a big screen on the wall over there, and I'm a bit worried about-"

I didn't get to finish. At my words, Luna raised her head and glanced over at me. Her eyes widened, and she quickly flicked her eyes and head back and forth, absorbing the area and sparing a glance for the timer on one wall. I saw the moment she shifted from 'slightly tired and barely awake' to 'self-defense', a hardening of the eyes and expression as she leaped down from the pod. She stumbled as her hooves made contact with the tiled floor, nearly falling over as she did. I went to help her up, only to end up backing away with my hands up, the rifle that I'd leaned against the tube held securely in her telekinesis and pointed straight at me. As I backed away, she brought the cushioned stock of the rifle against her shoulder, eyes roving around the room but always keeping me in her peripheral vision.

"What... where... who are...?" Her head swiveled back and forth, occasionally halted by a wince or a moment of what looked to be sickness. In spite of her physical reactions, the barrel of the rifle didn't waver from my center mass, something that was making me increasingly anxious as the seconds passed.

"Your majesty, you were in stasis, in that tube. I have no idea why, I don't exactly know what this place is, beyond the fact that it's some sort of military base..."

She fixed her eyes on me in a glare, though her focus wavered for a second corresponding with another wince. 

"Enough. I can't expect more than falsehoods from you... our sister will clear this up, surely." She twitched the rifle's barrel towards the door. "Move."

I hesitated a moment, hands still up, eyes flicking over her and the rifle. She was confused, panicked and scared, most likely missing a chunk of her memories, which would freak her out even more. She'd dropped straight into fight or flight, and given a mare of her age and experience, that meant going straight into keeping an iron tight grip on the nearest weapon and pacifying anything that looked vaguely like a threat. Unfortunately, until I could prove that I didn't have any untoward intentions to her satisfaction or her memory hole was filled in, she most likely wouldn't hesitate to disable me in one of a number of ways, which included varying amounts of pain.

I slumped a little as I came to the conclusion that I just didn't have a choice. For the moment, I'd have to play along, and hope that something on the way either jogged her memory or proved how desperate a situation we were in. I turned, keeping my hands up, to find that the doors were being held wide open by blue magic. I stepped through, making sure that my motions were slow with the least amount of suddenness as possible. I didn't need to spook her any more than she already was. She followed swiftly behind, clearing the corners with a quick flick of her gaze and the rifle barrel, so quickly that by the time I'd glanced back she was already returning the rifle's focus to me. Even if I'd run, I didn't doubt that I wouldn't have made it five steps before I'd been perforated. Considering the fact that she had apparently switched to full auto based on the positioning of the safety lever, I had no doubt that I would have been swiss cheese in moments should I have made a threatening move.

We made our way back through the lab, now well-lit and markedly less sinister than it had been when I had come through here previously alone. The blue liquid in the tanks now swirled gently, and some of the equipment now hummed gently to itself, reactivated from untold time lying here inactive. Our passage through the lab was uneventful, though the Princess stopped once or twice to lean against the equipment during a particularly bad spell of vertigo, always keeping the weapon trained on me. And then we came to the elevator.

The two of us exchanged a look, mine more than a little scared and hers calculating. After a moment, she waved me into the elevator, following directly behind me and pushing me into the corner with the control panel, taking the opposite corner herself. The button for the ground floor depressed itself with a flare of blue, and we began moving upwards. After a few tense seconds, a quiet ding sounded and the doors of the elevator slid open again, leading straight into the hallway that I'd first entered through. I hadn't imagined that I'd be passing through the second time at gunpoint. Inevitably, the corridor dead-ended in the thick blast door that blocked the exit. Luna paused here, examining the door itself and sparing a glance for the controls. Whatever thoughts she was having she kept to herself, but the controls glowed for a moment with that self-same blue aura, the open button toggling and the door shuddering and grinding into the ceiling again as it opened.

I was thinking about how to explain things in such a way as to convince her when she saw the state of the base when Luna let out a startled noise. My head snapped up from where my gaze had drifted to the floor, and saw that, right there on the other side of the door, was the tar wolf that had been sniffing around the courtyard. The 'fur' on its back rippled as it growled, focused entirely on Luna: the sound was unearthly, like glass in a garbage disposal, and it made all of the hair on my neck stand up straight. The thing crouched, looking ready to pounce, and I stumbled back. Something dug into my side as I did so: of course! The handgun!

I didn't really think about what I did, I just did it. A glance out of the corner of my eye, made in those precious few seconds as the wolf coiled like a spring, revealed that she was frozen in shock and staring straight at the thing, rifle barrel dipped towards the ground. I yanked open the holster for the pistol, dragging it out and pointing it one-handed at the thing, squeezing the trigger as rapidly as I could manage.

Some of the rounds sparked against the concrete behind it as I missed in my panic and lack of aim, but most of the magazing hit home, eliciting splashes of black fluid as they struck the creature's false hide. The thing shrieked in pain and surprise, a sound almost akin to that of a jet engine, nearly tumbling as it lost all that coiled energy. Thankfully, that noise must have been enough to snap Luna out of her daze, because a staccato burst of assault rifle fire sounded from behind me. The shriek turned instantly into a gurgle, the wolf knocked straight over by the punch of the larger, faster rounds and slamming into the ground. It remained there, twitching, making little noises of what I assumed to be pain through its gurgles and rasping gasps.

Luna trotted past me, rifle steady even as her wide eyes trailed over the body of the thing. Dully, I realized that I was still pointing the handgun at the wolf and squeezing the trigger, again and again, making little clicks as the magazine had already run dry. I tried to make myself stop, put the gun away, but it dropped out of my hand instead and clacked against the concrete floor, making Luna glance back in my direction for a moment, then turn her attention back to the creature.

It was still rasping, making a sound closer to an empty garbage disposal now. She approached it, briefly pointing the rifle left and right around the corners before focusing the sights back on it as she came closer and closer. The thing seemed to realize that she was coming when she was a few steps away, suddenly tensing up and making what would have been a lunge if its body had still functioned, but it had been filled with holes and its black fluid was leaking across the concrete floor, and so the leap was more of a violent twitch. Luna gazed at it a second more, eyes filled with confusion and some small amount of fear that I could see even from here.

She remained like that for a few minutes, watching the tar wolf die, the gun inbetween them never wavering from the center of its head. It growled and gurgled and made all manner of noises that made me hug myself and shake, but she just stood there. Staring at it.

The noise was like a sudden fireworks display in a desensitization chamber, loud and bright after I'd been focused on nothing but the noises of the wolf. Luna's three round burst sheared straight through the skull of the black thing, accompanied by a bright muzzle flash that left an afterimage in my eyes. The wolf shuddered one last time, then melted into the same black goo that had been leaking out of the holes in its body. Much of it evaporated into something that looked like shadow before it even had the chance to touch the ground, leaving the few bullets that had been caught in its body to clatter against the floor or plop into one of the smaller puddles of more stubborn stuff that had managed to stick around.

Luna stared for a moment longer at the puddles, then seemed to slowly shake herself awake. The rifle pointed left and right again, but it seemed more like automatic action than conscious choice, as she retreated backwards behind the steel ring along the walls that marked where the blast door came down. The close button was pressed with her aura, and I had enough sense left in me to kick the pistol back onto the inside of the door and pull back beyond the hazard markings that surrounded the door, hugging myself as I watched it close.

The resounding sound of the seals and locks engaging in the foot-thick steel made both of us relax a little. I giggled to myself, suddenly feeling giddy as the adrenaline faded a little and left behind a sort of manic euphoria, and I watched Luna nearly fall against a wall, the rifle's barrel dipping to touch the floor. We stayed like that for a long minute, me staring at the door and giggling quietly to myself and her, breathing heavily, eyes wide, staring at the floor in front of her in abject shock.

Eventually, my shivering faded as the last of the fear and giddiness slowly left my system, leaving me feeling drained and exhausted. Right then, I didn't care about the wolf, the timer, Luna, anything. All I could think of was those barracks beds that I had passed on my way to the elevator, and how good one would feel right now. My movements slow and deliberate, I turned back to the corridor, still hugging myself tightly, and made my way back towards the barracks room. A sound and a glance revealed Luna glancing up, rifle barrel scraping against the floor as she did. After a moment, she followed along, but the rifle was no longer at the ready and she almost seemed to be staring at it with the same shock with which she'd been regarding the floor.

I turned down the corridor to my right, dragging my feet across the concrete, making a scrifff, scrifff, scrifff sound as the soles of my shoes scraped against the abrasive surface. I managed to make it to the first door, opening it and swinging it open and stepping inside. Two beds decorated the opposite walls, and I had eyes only for them, sitting gingerly on the right one and looking back, making eye contact with Luna as she entered the room as well.

She leaned the rifle against one corner of the room, so gently it surprised me, and practically dragged herself up onto the bed. She took a moment arranging herself in a sitting position facing me, then raised her head to make eye contact with me. In that moment, we both grimaced in unison as we realized in tandem that we'd have to talk about what had just happened, a flicker of amusement dancing through me at our unified dread.
> IX: Converse
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I glanced up, for the fifth time in as many minutes. Luna was still staring to her left, at the lockers against the back wall, the edge of her mouth making a tight little corner. As if sensing my attention, like every time before, her eyes flicked to mine, and my gaze jerked back down to my hands once again. She stared for a moment, in my peripheral vision, before shifting her gaze back to the lockers, mouth pulling back into that tight corner.

Neither of us knew what to say, and neither of us wanted to make the first move. On one hand, she'd just been threatening me with a very much loaded and deadly rifle, and no doubt frightened and confused. On the other, we'd more or less just saved each-other's lives, me with the plinking that had distracted the tarwolf, and her putting it down with the heavier assault rifle. I mean, how does one respond to a turnabout like that?

I rubbed the fabric of the bedspread between my fingers, noting that it was a bit old but still seemed to be holding together surprisingly well.

"What is this place?"

I practically leaped off of the bed at those words. As it was, my head jerked up, surprise written all over my expression. Luna, for her part, winced a little and muttered out a small 'sorry'. I shook my head.

"No, no, it's a reasonable enough question... well, um, how to put this..." I tilted my head back and narrowed my eyes at the gray concrete ceiling of the barracks room. "Really, I was hoping that, well, you could tell me. We're underneath Twilight Sparkle's castle, right outside Ponyville, that much I know... but the place is in ruins, all moldered and broken-down, and there's ever sign of some sort of war going down. A defensive one, that it looked like the ponies... lost."

"Wh... what?"

I flicked my gaze down to her muzzle, and this time it was my turn to wince. There was a thick latticework of emotions on her face: fear, the deep and sickening brand of the stuff that made your heart clench, desperate and awful. Concern, worry, and a few others intermixed, her eyes wide and shining with it all.

"Look, I don't know. I just appeared here earlier today, I walk into town and everything's in ruins. Plantlife everywhere, buildings collapsed... the castle's sealed up so tight that I can't even get in. Even the entrance in here is blocked off with this crystal stuff that doesn't even chip when shot or smashed. This place's still running, there's still power somehow, all the computers and machines still work..."

"My sister. What about my Sister? Or Twilight? Please." The edge in her voice hurt to listen to, that desperation...

I shook my head. "I don't know. If they're... um, still out there, they're not here. I haven't seen any signs that ponies have visited this place in years."

She screwed her eyes shut tight, ears flat against her skull, and took a deep, shuddering breath that sounded just inches from being a sob. And then the emotions were gone, and she was looking at me intently.

"What else?" I bit my lip, hesitating a moment before continuing.

"Not much else to tell. I came down here, followed the signs to something called the 'Core'. On the other side of a lab, I found a room- the room you woke up in, the one with the computers all over the walls and the big screen with the... timer... oh, dear." 

I'd forgotten about it, and now it was all that I could think of. That big, foreboding screen, numbers counting down to something that was more than likely disastrous. I took a surprised breath and jerked a little as something pressed into my shoulder: looking up from where my eyes had drifted, I realized that Luna was standing, leaning across the gap between the two beds, hoof pressed into my shoulder and very real concern drawn across her muzzle.

"Keep it together, alright? Until further notice, we're, well..." She closed her eyes and took a breath, calling that steel back. "We're all we've got. And, eh... I'm sorry for pointing a rifle at you." She had the courtesy to look sheepish at the last, and the sight of that actually made me smile despite it all. I mean, it was Princess Luna, making a facial expression that could be considered extremely cute. You'd have to be a heartless bastard for it not to cheer you up just a little.

"Well... apology accepted, on the condition that you don't do it again." 

Awkwardly, I held out my hand. She stared at it for a moment, then met it with her hoof and we shook. The gesture was so completely awkward and uncomfortable that I couldn't help but crack another grin, and looking up confirmed that there was something of a lift in the corner of her mouth. We finished the shake and let go, her hoof and my hand returning to our respective bedspreads.

"Okay. We have little information, two ponies- ah... people, and a rifle and a handgun. I just... ugh, I wish my head wasn't so fuzzy..." she shook it side to side, as if that would clear the fog within. I clasped my hands in my lap thoughtfully.

"That might have something to do with the stasis tube you were in."

Her eyes snapped to me, blinking. "Stasis?"

I nodded.

"Someone... ah, somepony, had placed you in a stasis pod. I don't know who, or for how long, I can only guess that it kept you in a state of suspended animation here, in the lowest basement of the compound. There was a warning when I pulled you out, said that you might experience some physical lashback from the release procedure. Nothing catastrophic, nothing that would require medical attention, just disorientation, vertigo, dizziness... and mild amnesia."

Her head tilted back, lips pulling apart in another grimace and a groan slipping through her teeth. "Ugh, that would explain everything, then. I can remember... old things. My, um.... rebellion. My redemption, at the hands of Twilight and her friends. A few things from the years after, Discord, Chrysalis..." She dropped to a melancholy whisper. "My sister."

"So when does it stop?"

She frowned. "It doesn't... feel like a wall, or a straight line, if that makes sense. There's just these places of emptiness in my memory, where I'm sure that something should go. It's like having a word on the tip of your tongue, where you can almost taste the definition, but it's still just beyond your reach."

"How do you even...?"

She raised an eyebrow. "I am Princess Luna, the defender of dreams. It was little known, even before my, um... well. Anyway, I am a master of the mental arts." She sat a bit straighter at this, pride in her gaze and her visage, then suddenly curled in on herself a little with a wince. "Not that it's really doing much right now... I can, in a way, feel around the holes and detect them, places where there should be memory, but instead there is nothing. These get denser and denser the closer to the present I attempt to remember. The most recent one is so muddled, I can't..."

She closed her eyes tight, her muzzle scrunching, horn lighting up ever so slightly with just a hint of her blue power.

"There's... there's something there. Someone, maybe. Large. Red.... chains? I... I can't make sense of it." She let go of it, slumping a little. "Whatever... huff... whatever was being done to me in that tube, I feel much, much weaker than I ever remember. It's an effort to do anything, even my hair is just... this."

A strand of her light blue hair, so similar to what she'd had at the beginning of the pilot episode, was surrounded with a blue glow and lifted into her line of sight where she could glare at it almost in a bad tempered manner.

"I think it looks fine."

Her head jerked up and she gave me a look of surprise. "Um... thank you?"

"Don't mention it. But, you really do feel weaker?"

She nodded, glumly. "It's a feeling, more than anything else, like if I tried to draw much more than telekinesis and some basic spells then I'm just not going to deliver."

"Is that why you didn't just blast that tarwolf and be done with it?"

She blinked. "What? No! I didn't do that because... because..." her eyes shut tight, hooves going to her temples, massaging in circles. "I don't... I don't know...? I know that I shouldn't, it's bad because..." She made a frustrated noise. This time it was me making the gesture, a hand going to her shoulder. She twitched away from it, ever so slightly, but she didn't object.

"Look, you've just forgotten some things. They're gone for the moment, you'll get them back with time. Besides, right now, there are things that deserve our attention."

Her hooves dropped back to the bed. "The timer." I nodded solemnly. "Ah... well, it's not much, but it's at least something."

"Seven days. Well, six and nine-tenths."

She nodded, thoughtfully. After a moment, she stood and hopped down from the bunk, trotting out the door.

"We need to take a closer look, without... eh, without one of us pointing a rifle at the other."

I groaned. I was tired, exhausted, and even this military bunk with its thin mattress felt softer than featherbed under me right now. But, in the end, I forced myself to my feet and followed in her hoofsteps. I paused at the door, then reached over and hooked the rifle's strap, sliding it over my shoulder and earning an approving glance from Luna.

"Better safe than sorry..."

She nodded. "I couldn't agree more. Especially if there are more of those 'tarwolves'."

I thought to myself, hand rubbing my chin as we made our way back towards the elevator. "The only one that I saw was the one that we killed, and I crossed quite the distance before I got here." An image of the crashed jeep flitted through my mind, the concrete wall splashed with the same black residue that the tarwolf had left behind when it died. "But there were signs of a fight all over the compound, and I know that at least someone killed one of them with a jeep. Crashed it straight into a wall, flattened the thing and splattered it. At least, that's what it looked like."

Luna hummed to herself. "They may come out at night, they certainly looked like creatures of darkness. Ah..."

"What?"

"I believe that that, what I just said? It's correct. At least, it feels that way. It's strange: I said the words, and it almost felt like it clicked, slotted right in like a puzzle piece."

"So you must have known about them, assuming there's more than the two we know of. Maybe you studied them? Did experimentation? Perhaps you fought them at length?"

Her pace slowed as she took on a look of concentration, eyebrows furrowing and mouth stretching into a frown. Her wings  twitched, feathers flicking a little as she thought, and I felt the overwhelming urge to touch them to see how soft they were. I shook it off.

"I... I'm not sure. It feels right, all three of them, but especially the last. Perhaps that's the most true? It might have been that my experimentation and study was fighting them. Maybe I was determining the best way to kill them by fighting them? No, that doesn't feel right, not like a puzzle piece. At least, not a puzzle piece that fits with what I have already."

I went to pat her on the head, then halted as I rethought at the last moment, patting her back instead. Hopefully that wouldn't be as offensive, if offensive it was. I breathed a small sigh of relief as instead of getting angry, she actually seemed to enjoy it, making a faint rumbling sound in her chest.

"Look, like I said, it'll come back. If we're using a puzzle as an analogy, then we're just now assembling the borders and getting the middle pieces in line. It'lll take time, it might take work, but it'll come back to you, your highness."

"Perhaps..." she frowned. "However, we- er, I think you should refer to me by name, not my title."

My hands flexed nervously. "Are you sure? I mean-"

She raised an eyebrow. "Do you see anypony else? Griffons? Minotaurs? Buffalo?"

"Well, no, but-"

"Then there should be no issue if I wish you to refer to me by my given name. I'd like to think that I may utilize Twilight's teachings this once, even if the start of this friendship was a little... well, rough."

I was surprised by this turn of events, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't pleased. I mean, here was Princess Luna herself, convincing me to just call her 'Luna' and scrap decorum because she wanted to be my friend. I was more or less living the dream of any fan of the show right now.

"Alright then, Luna. If you say so."

She nodded, once, decisively. "And I do."

The narrow parts of the hallway meant for defense meant that we couldn't walk side by side. Instead, Princess Luna- just Luna now, I supposed- went first, a confidence in her stride that hadn't been present earlier. She had a purpose now, A goal, and I suppose that having that one thing to focus on was helping her greatly. Because of this, she reached the elevator doors before I did, examining the card reader.

"I assume you-?"

"Don't worry, I got it."

I stepped around her, the hallway thankfully wide enough at this point to accommodate the maneuver, and slipped the admin card out of my pocket and through the reader. After a moment, the elevator doors opened with a 'ding', and both of us stepped into the car. I pressed the button and the doors shut, the car shuddering just slightly before sinking down, deeper into the ground. As the numbers ticked down, I cleared my throat, Luna sending me a curious glance as I started speaking.

"I don't think I explicitly said this, but... thank you. For not shooting me, and all. And if I can call you Luna, then you can call me Matt."

Her grin was surprisingly wry, and she spoke with a slightly teasing lilt. "Oh? You're sure that you don't want to be referred to differently? Your highness? Perhaps, your grace?"

I pretended to think about it, hand going to my chin and rubbing it, the picture of deep thought. "No, I believe that my name will be enough, in exchange for breakfasts in a king sized bed every morning."

"Well, we've got military cots, and I can throw you an energy bar."

"That will be enough, thank you."

We both chuckled. Neither of us wanted to admit it, but we were both on edge, just thinking about everything. Even through the amusement on her face, I could see the tenseness in her muscles, the lines of worry beneath it all tracing their way across her muzzle. I could understand: she had just woken up in a world strange and different to her, huge chunks of her memory missing, her friends and sister nowhere to be found, and the only person around being someone she didn't know, of a species that I don't think that she was ever aware of before. I, on the other hand... I was here. Maybe stuck, maybe permanently, maybe not. What I was afraid of was being stuck here until I died, one way or another.

Thankfully, that particular line of thought was interrupted by another ding. The elevator doors slid open, and we stepped back into the lab, Luna trotting out of the car and me following in her wake.

This place hadn't changed since the last time we'd been through here, huge amounts of undisturbed and abandoned lab equipment scattered around the central feature of the tanks of blue liquid. Luna paused at these, looking into their depths with a perplexed sort of confusion, trying to fit them, trying to place them, just trying to find any place in their memory where they might fit or trigger or slide into place. She remained there for a few moments longer, then sighed and gave up, moving onward through the room towards the room where she'd been in stasis.

As we pushed the doors open, Luna holding the doors wide with magic as we passed through, we realized that something had changed. Towers of equipment, almost resembling server towers, covered in wires and humming softly to themselves, had risen out of the ground at regular intervals. They formed a grid in the room, taller than me, row after row of them packed in close enough that there was only the distance of one of their sides between each tower.

Luna spoke up, her voice soft and barely carrying over the humming. "What is this?"

I cleared my throat, trying to clear some of the nervousness from it. "I'm not sure. I don't think it's harmful, so for the moment..."

Luna nodded. "Focus. Yeah."

We made our way among the towers to the center of the room, where the stasis chamber stuck out of the ground, lid wide open now that its occupant had been divulged. Luna paused here, examining the thing, tracing the ultrathick cables that led out of one side of the tube and into the ground.

"This is where I woke up? Where you found me?"

I nodded. "Yeah. It was sealed up tight, and I didn't know what it was until I saw the label, which named the thing for me. And even then, it was a real shock to see that it was you of all ponies that was the occupant. I had expected a tech, or a scientist, someone who'd worked here..."

"But instead you got so much more than you bargained for." I nodded again.

She remained there for a few moments, raising a hoof and touching the control panel, mouthing the side effects of the wake up protocol to herself. Suddenly, she snorted and stamped, shaking her head and trotting through the eerily regular forest of square towers and towards the back of the room. She stopped two rows away from the huge screen, and as I walked up besides her and leaned against the glass side of one of the towers, I could see her eyes tracing the numbers one by one.

"So." I said.

"So." She replied.

"One week- well, six days and change. Timer's counting down, started by your release, for some reason I can't fathom."

She hummed. "We've got the time to figure this out. Obviously this, whatever it was, was designed to initiate when I was released. I'd assume that whomever programmed it as such expected me to know what to do about it the moment I woke up."

"Then why the extra time?"

She made another humming sound, her eyes narrowing ever so slightly, thoughtfully. "I'm not sure... perhaps it's a contingency, just in case I was not capable of remembering whatever I need to know about it. Maybe I was supposed to postpone it and wait for something else, or perhaps it's a condition, in that it's not so much counting down to an ultimate thing as it is counting down until an action that I must preform, or perhaps the unlocking of something."

"Maybe the castle? It's locked up tight, after all. The place was in lockdown when I got here, I had to retrieve a couple ID cards and swipe them through a reader to lift it... perhaps this is just the next phase of the lockdown? Maybe you need to be released to do it, and this is the time in which you have to perform the actions that lift the lockdown?"

A sigh. "Maybe, perhaps, might be... we're dealing with too much guessing and too little absolutes. We don't know much more than what we've pieced together just observing our surroundings, and that's not enough."

I rubbed the underside of my nose, gaze drifting downwards towards the bottom of the screen itself.

"Regardless," she continued, "we have this time to solve it and we're burning time."

I pushed myself off of the tower and back onto my feet, clapping my hands together. 

"That I can agree with. Shall we, Luna?"

She grinned at the use of her name, and I felt a flicker of surprise at the enjoyment she showed at that minor thing.

"Let's."
> X: Walk
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

My hands were folded under my chin, my legs folded underneath me, elbows on my knees.

Luna sat next to me, feathers ruffled, glaring forward with her expression twisted into a frown.

In front of the both of us, the target of our ire. A wall of pure crystal, unscratched, unscathed, entirely untouched. At the base was a pile of tools of every make, shape and size: sledgehammers, nailguns, drills, hammers, saws, handheld sawzalls. At the base of the wall were littered the black carbon marks of explosives of all kinds, from dynamite to C4, none even the slightest bit effective. Luna had even summoned up what power she could for a few spells, the first few unlocking charms, but the majority blasting or vaporizing charms, but the crystal had no-sell'ed it all. 

"And you're saying that there's not a hint of magic in it?"

Luna huffed indignantly. "None! Not a locking charm, not a trigger, not a single thing! Nothing I can access, nothing I can observe!" She continued, muttering, "It's like trying to x-ray a lead box."

I groaned and flopped back onto the grass, arms spread wide. We'd tried everything we could think of, alone or together, and wasted the majority of a day on this futile task that had lead nowhere but down. Now, we had nothing left to even try, so I had to admit defeat.

"Back to the drawing board, I suppose..."

Luna made a frustrated noise, but relented, turning around and looking over the ruins of the base with a touch of melancholy.

"Matt..."

I turned my head in her direction, quirking an eyebrow. She saw the look out of the corner of her eye and swallowed visibly, her hooves padding the grass gently.

"I'm almost afraid to... but... what does-" she swallowed again, closing her eyes, steeling herself. "How does Ponyville look? Is it...?"

I pushed myself back into a sitting position and turned to face her, expression solemn.

"It's... a ruin. I don't know what else to tell you, but there's not much left..."

The pain flickered through her expression, and she breathed out.

"I'd like to see it. Before nightfall."

I flexed my fingers, glancing at the sun, which was creeping towards the horizon, and nodded to her. We had time. 

I stood, nodding to her and gesturing to the roadway that lead back to the front of the castle, following behind her as she trotted across the grass and broken cement to it. Her steps were reluctant and hesitating, head pulled back. If she'd had hands, I had no doubt she'd be making fists and relaxing them again and again. I increased my pace, catching up, and placed my hand on her back. Her head twitched back, licking her lips and stopping for just a moment. I nodded to her, reassuring her that I was here, and motioned her forward as gently as I could. She took a fortifying breath and continued, hoofsteps more sure, steadier.

Slowly, we trailed along the road, Luna staring at her hooves as they lifted and fell back to the cracked and aged asphalt. I walked by her side, reassuring her with my hand still on her back, something that she hadn't pushed away. If I had to guess, I would say that it was something from her years on the moon, just the touch of someone alive making sure that she knew that she wasn't alone. I took a small breath, moving my jaw a little, the question on the tip of my tongue about how she'd been after all that time alone. How she'd reacted to finally being home with her sister, but it wasn't... I don't know. It felt wrong, a bad idea. So we walked together down that road, silent, nothing but the wind to fill our ears. Not even birdsong or the noises of insects filled that silence, and it was almost... eerie. Like the whole world was holding its breath for the moment that Luna crested that rise and saw what was left of the home town of much of the Mane Six.

How well had she known them? She'd spoken of Twilight like a close friend, mentioning her name just after her sister's when she had pleaded for information. Applejack, I could imagine the two getting along. That pride, that independence, the dedication to her family. The remaining four I wasn't so sure of, but... she'd felt that she could trust them, didn't she? She'd brought the problem of the Tantabus to them before she'd ever gone to Celestia... I sighed. Regardless of any speculation, I didn't think she'd take the ruination of the town well. An unfamiliar military base wouldn't really register, and Twilight's castle was still intact if sealed up, but seeing the town in its current state would bring it home, make it real. And I'd be damned if I wasn't going to be there for her when she did, if she wanted my company. Like it or not, we were in this together, whatever 'this' was.

As we rounded the castle and the first outskirts of the town were revealed, Luna dropped her gaze to the road, staring intently at it with her head lowered and refusing to look up. Her mane fell forward, forming a curtain hiding any sight of the town from her. My mouth tightened in a pang of sympathy at this, my hand patting her right where it had remained throughout our entire walk. She turned her head slightly towards me, eyes flicking up to my face and a small, sad smile of thanks splitting her muzzle, to which I could only nod. I didn't trust myself to speak.

It took some time, with the two of us walking close together and slow as we dared, the sun dipping towards the horizon as we did. Finally, however, we reached a small raised piece of land, part of a thicker road that led to an entrance area ringing the front of the castle. From here we had a view over the entirety of the town, every piece, almost as good as the one that I'd had from the rise opposite just... earlier today? It'd felt like a week since that moment that I'd woken up, guessing that I'd been left after a rowdy party. A lot had changed in just that little time.

Luna took a deep breath, screwing her eyes shut and clamping her muzzle shut as she steeled herself and lifted her head, then opened her eyes. She stared out over the wreckage that had once been Ponyville, overgrown and rusted. Her eyes traced the trenches that circled the town, stopping at the leafy mounds that marked trucks and pillboxes. A sound came out of her throat, a sort of keening whine, sounding heartbreaking. Tears welled up in her eyes, then fell, forming tracks of wet fur in their path and dripping off of her muzzle and onto the dirt.

"It's all real, isn't it? It's real... I-I..."

I crouched next to her, just to let her know that I was here. What I wasn't prepared for was for her to tackle me, wrapping her hooves around me and pulling me against her as she began to sob. I hesitated for a moment, unsure what to do, then tossed caution to the wind and wrapped my arms around her, squeezing her as she squeezed me. Reassuring her that someone was here, as she sobbed and keened and howled, every bit of pain pouring out of her and into the air.

I don't know how long we were there. I lost track, sitting there, comforting her, making sure that she wasn't alone. She clung to me, maybe desperate for something solid and warm and living to hold onto, maybe just reassuring herself of the same thing I was. I didn't object, not saying a word as wet spots formed from the streams of tears making their way down her face and soaking into my hoodie. Eventually, after a while, I managed to shift her so that I was sitting with my legs crossed, her leaning against me, head on my shoulder. She fell asleep there, emotionally and physically drained as she was, and I chose not to wake her. Better to leave her with at least a little rest, a little time away from all this to acclimate.

I would have stayed there gladly on that little hill, Luna leaning against me in the quiet environment, sleeping gently while I calmed the occasional whimper or shudder. However, the shadows lengthened as the sun began to set, and as much as I hated to admit, we'd have to move. I didn't want to be caught outside at night, the perfect time for more of those tarwolves to sneak up on us with their pitch-black camouflage, perfect for the darkness. With one hand, and as gently as I could, I shook her awake and whispered to her.

"It's time to go. It's getting late..."

She stirred, head shifting on my shoulder before lifting, blinking tiredly at my face. After a moment she realized who I was, and her gaze slid past me and beyond as she turned her head, scanning the scene before us. This time, it was more in sad resignation than anything else, and she shed no more tears. She scanned from one end of the town to the other, searching among the buildings for something, maybe movement, a hint of the ponies that had inhabited it just a moment ago from her perspective, and nodded quietly. I picked myself off the ground, dusting myself off and walking back down the road to the compound, Luna trailing just in my wake.

"Are you okay?" The words slipped from my mouth, quiet and soft.

"Truthfully? I do not know. Everypony I knew is just... gone. The world here is quiet and empty, not the one full of life that I returned to, was happy to live in once again."

"We don't know that, not for sure-"

"Matt, look at what we've seen. Look at that town." She pointed back in the direction of Ponyville with a hoof. "Dost... do you really think that anypony is left? That they're just out there somewhere, waiting for us to contact them?" She lowered her hoof back to the asphalt and began her plodding pace once again. "There's nothing left here."

"We're still here." She shot me a questioning look, and I breathed in and steadied myself, continuing. "We're still here, and if we're here, that means that someone else might have survived. They might be trapped, or they might need assistance, or they could be waiting for you just over the horizon. We don't know, so until then.. until then, we have to believe that they're fine, that they're all fine. Celestia, Twilight, Cadence, all the rest..."

She looked away.

"I..."

"Luna, we... we have to keep hoping. Your sister wouldn't just abandon you, not after everything. She's out there, somewhere, and she's waiting for us to find her. We can't just give up on her, on anyone. Okay?"

Her eyes closed, screwed tight with pain. "Okay."

I whispered. "Good."

The rest of the walk back to the compound was spent in a silence that neither of us attempted to break. Sunset had apparently managed to coax some life out of this place, crickets chirping to each-other in the grass and falling silent as we passed them. My hand returned to her back, and she pressed as close to my legs as she dared, both of us leaning on the other for support. I think back to the couple of little moments where Luna had laughed, or been amused, and considered how different that mare was to the one walking besides me right now. I'd only really known her for a few hours now, but already it was clear that she was so much deeper than her animated counterpart. More than anything, I was okay with that. It kind of startled me, but I realized that I actually needed someone nearly as much as she did, just to get through all of this.

We made it to the front gates without an issue, or even a sight of more tarwolves. The compound was still empty and abandoned, and we were swift to make our way through it. The door to the garage between us and the deeper levels creaked open quietly as Luna pushed it open, not with magic, but with her muzzle. i stayed right with her the entire time.

When we had come this way back to the surface, a light had flicked on when Luna had entered the room. In the time we'd been gone, it had automatically shut itself off, but now it flickered back to life as we entered. Vaguely, I wondered how it knew that we were here and that we needed light- had the timer been a signal of the facility coming out of some sort of hibernation mode? My thoughts stopped in their tracks as Luna's wing brushed against me. I had more important things to do right now, not the least of which was making sure that my erstwhile partner was alright, for whatever that was worth.

We passed into the security station together, then came to a halt at the sight of the large, black stain that was now splashed against the concrete. Scars were drilled into the floor where I'd missed the thing and the rounds had gone wild, a couple holes in the desk at the end. The stains themselves almost looked like the carbon stains that you get after you set off something explosive, like a firework or, well, explosives. By mutual, silent agreement, we skirted the edges of the stain as we made our way back to the blast door. Neither of us was going to touch it, not if we didn't have to. Bits of jelly-like shadow, the last fading remnants of the thing, clung to the center of some of the stains. As we passed, I could almost swear that they slid towards us ever so slightly. Both of us shivered in unison and walked a little faster, neither of us relaxing until we were finally past the thing.

The metal seal of the blast door made a soft 'clump' at the touch of my sneakers, ringing as Luna's hooves struck against it. I felt her relax a little farther the moment we were on the other side, and I couldn't blame her in the slightest, some of the tension draining out of me as well. A press of the button and the door dropped down and sealed itself- about a foot and a half of thick, solid metal between us and the outside world, and I felt all the better for it. Luna lingered for a moment, eyes on the blast door, then turned and trotted down the hallway, with me trailing in her wake. We made our way back to the barracks area, slipping into the same room that we'd occupied earlier for our conversation, repeating that same process of moving onto our chosen beds.

This time, however, instead of sitting up and facing each other, Luna practically collapsed onto her belly, muzzle buried a little in the pillow at the head of it. As I lay down myself on the other bed, removing my outer clothes and shoes in the process, I noted that the bunk was barely big enough for her, her back hooves sticking over the bottom edge just a little. My bunk wasn't much better, I realized, slipping my shoes and hoodie off and lying on it with my feet hanging over the edge. It wasn't uncomfortable, per say, just... small. I turned over in the cot, trying to get comfortable, my back pressed against the wall. Luna was facing away, one wing covering herself, back to me.

"Hey, Luna?"

She shifted slightly, her feathers ruffling a little as an answering mumble came from behind them. I took a breath in, and questions swirled in my mind, things that I didn't know from the show, things that she might be able to tell me, poking at the edge of her memories to find out more... but I quieted it all. I could ask later, not here, not now. 

"Good night."

She mumbled something else and shifted a final time, curling up as much as she could. She was about as tall from the ground to the tip of her horn as I was, and thus didn't meet much success, but she managed to pull her back hooves into the cot from where they'd been hanging over the edge. At some point she'd yanked the thin blanket that the cot had come with over herself, but it was too small as well, covering only so much of her. I lay there for a few moments before my conscience got to me.

I swung my legs down off of the cot, wincing as my bare feet made contact with the cold concrete. Luna shifted, throwing me a curious glance from underneath a covering wing, but I didn't respond as I made my way out of the room. I padded down the hallway to the next barracks room door, opening it to find something near identical to what we'd had, the only difference being some faded decorations still sticking to one of the lockers in the back. I robbed both cots of their meager blankets and hauled them back to our room.

Before Luna could protest, I threw one of the blankets over the parts of her that the one she had didn't already cover, then lay down in my bunk and covered myself with both my old blanket and my new, pilfered blanket. Luna shifted in surprise, waking up a little as she found herself a bit warmer, muzzle poking out from a fold of the blanket.

"Matt?"

Her voice was so soft and low that I barely heard it, the words not much more than a whisper and just audible even in this small, enclosed space.

"Yeah?

"... Thank you."

I nodded to her, electing not to answer verbally. She nodded back, then rolled over. I lay there for a while, listening to her breathing as it slowed and steadied into the soft pattern of sleep, slowly but surely falling asleep myself as I did so.





I jerked awake, then groaned, rubbing my eyes. I wasn't sure what time it was, but something had woken me up, and it felt like just after midnight. After a long, confused second, I realized that Luna was thrashing about and making little cries in the her bunk, wings twitching and hooves flailing. That snapped me more awake, jolting me out of my cot just in time to stop her from falling to the hard concrete, keeping her on the cot and realizing that she was pretty heavy.

The contact woke her as well, as she cried out, kicking out at the air with her back hooves in panic and luckily missing me by a mile. I wouldn't doubt that a kick from a princess would hurt like hell, and I was glad to have avoided it, but right now I was more concerned about what in the hell was happening. My concern showed in my face as Luna blearily focused on me, but was quickly replaced by surprised confusion as her panic and fear was swiftly exchanged for what looked remarkably like shame and embarrassment.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." she tried to wiggle herself out of my grasp, but I held her there for the moment. She wasn't getting away without an explanation, and after a few weak struggles, she seemed to grasp this and slump.

"Look... I just want to make sure that you're alright, okay? That... whatever it was, it looked pretty bad."

Her eyes closed, ears flat against her skull. "It was nothing. Not anything you should worry about. Just... let me go back to bed..."

I raised an eyebrow. "Next time I might not be able to stop you from hitting the floor, and regardless, this feels like something that I need to know about. So, are we going to talk about it, or am I going to have to sit here with you all night?" I pointed a finger in her face. "Don't think I won't!"

Her lips twitched in the ghost of a smile. "I could just order you to..."

"Ohhh, no. You gave up that deference when you surrendered your title and became 'just Luna'. Therefore, I guess you'll just have to take the metaphorical bullet and talk to me."

Her ears, which had been slowly lifting, pressed flat against the sides of her head again. I waited, trying to let her come to the explanation on her own, but it was clear that she would need an additional push to get her started. I opened my mouth and took in a breath, prepared to poke her into starting up, then fell silent as she began speaking on her own.

"After my, um... indiscretion, a long time ago, I was banished to the moon by my sister. Not that I didn't deserve it, I did!" The last part was said quickly, and for a moment I was reminded of a fort closing up against an attack. Obviously she'd defended her sister's actions in the past...

"But, after that, I was left on the moon. Alone, with none but the Nightmare to accompany me. For a time, she was entertained with ranting and raving into the blackness, and I kept myself busy with little things, but... then she began to grow bored of that, and she... she..."

Luna's eyes squeezed shut tight, shivers running through her body, a strangled sob coming out of her throat. It was heartbreaking to see her like this, even more so if she was implying what I thought she was. Putting this together with what I'd seen of her reactions, it wasn't hard to reach a conclusion as to what it had been.

"Night terrors. You have night terrors."

She jerked her head away again, shame burning hot in her cheeks. 

"Our- my sister would... would sleep beside me, when they were bad. It... helped..."

I sat there with her for a little while, thinking, then gently slipped the pillows and blankets under her head and set her on the floor, standing. She looked up at me, unsure, and I patted her neck reassuringly.

"I'll be right back, don't worry. Just gotta get a few more things."

I stepped out into the hallway, eyeing the other barracks doors once again. This time, as I made my way through them, I stripped the cots of everything: pillows, blankets and even their meager mattresses. I dragged and pushed the lot back to our room and shoved it through the door, startling Luna, who stood and moved to the rear and pressed against the lockers at the back, staring in confusion as the mass.

I arranged the mattresses on the floor, making sure that every inch of the concrete was covered. Luna stepped onto the mattresses to clear the area at the back, which was the last thing I covered. Next, I draped the entire thing with the salvaged blankets, then dumped the pillows in a pile at the head, before laying down on the whole thing on my back. Luna stood there, shifting from hoof to hoof, obviously uncertain. I patted the space besides me, and after a moment's hesitation she trotted over, hoofsteps muted by the now-soft floor, and lay next to me, allowing me to shift so that my back was against hers. In a lot of ways, this was just like what we'd done on our way back to the compound, with the light pressure reminding the both of us that we weren't alone.

I felt her wings twitched as our backs touched, but she didn't move away, and some little part of the tension that I could feel in her muscles drained away.

She fell asleep before she could do more than mumble a thank you. But, that was alright, because I was already asleep as well.
> XI: Watch
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I shifted slightly, mumbling something incoherent as I was jogged out of sleep. For a moment I was confused, memories and actual surroundings blurring together through my gaze as my mind tried to form itself from the mist that follows a good, long sleep. I jerked and blinked, shifting, as everything snapped back into focus and I remembered where I was.

The reason I had awaken was that Luna had shifted away from me. All night, I realized, her back had been pressed against mine in another one of the mutually-reassuring gestures that we had shared from the moment we'd killed the tarwolf. Now, however, she'd stood up and was eyeing the door, gently trying to press down the handle and open it quietly.

I shifted one of my hands out from under the blanket that covered me, checking my phone. The screen read 4:16 AM in white letters, but it didn't feel that early. A flicker of thought in me recalled that Ponyville was roughly located in what was essentially comparable to the center of the US, but on Equus. Perhaps the two hour time difference between Oregon and, say, Kansas or Colorado was in effect? I set the phone down and slapped my cheeks a little. Clearly, I wasn't awake enough, given the random tangent of thought.

The shifting motion and the sound of the small, invigorating slaps had alerted Luna. She glanced back, licking her lips, and I sat up and met her gaze in response. She held it for a moment, then turned back to the door and swung it wide open, trotting out into the hall. I pushed myself to my feet, intent on following her, but an errant breeze from the movement of the door reminded me that I'd undressed slightly the previous night.

By the time I'd thrown on my clothes and exited the room, the blast door had already ground wide open. I passed through it, adjusting my hoodie and following in Luna's hoofprints, which lead through the dust that'd settled since last night in both the security booth and the maintenance area beyond. I pushed the exit door wide open, stepping out into the barely-pre-dawn light.

It didn't take long to find her. Luna had perched herself atop one of the buildings, looking east towards the lightening skies that indicated the coming of the sun, light blue mane and tail ruffling slightly in the passing wind. I approached from the ground, scouting about for a way up to where she'd decided to sit. Quickly enough, I found a series of rungs sunk into the concrete of the building itself, leading up to the roof for whatever purpose. Regardless, I was thankful for the easy route, swiftly making my way up to the flat, stainless steel surface that made up the slanted roof of the building.

Luna didn't react to my presence as I shimmied myself up and got my footing on the metal surface. I made as little sound as I could, crossing the distance between the ladder and where she sat, overlooking the expanse beyond the fences of the compound and flopping down next to her. She spared a glance for me at that last, but neither of us said anything or did anything beyond her glance, and one of mine to follow hers. We simply looked outward, towards the horizon.

Beyond the abrupt stop of the roof and the barbed wire fence that encircled and fortified the compound, green fields of grass stretched over low hills as far as we could possibly see. The Everfree consumed the view to our right, dark trees pressed together so close as to make it appear that night continued ever onwards beneath their intertwined branches and thick bushels of leaves. Far and beyond the trees of the Everfree and the rolling grassy rises encircling the town and Twilight's castle, which glittered and sparkled in the low morning light behind us and threw bits of refracted light here and there over the compound, mountains stood tall and proud. The bases, where the short hills began to rise into peaks against the foundations of the towers of stone, were shrouded in blackness still, which shifted up the stony sides to a deep purple, before shifting to a shimmering yellow-white where the snow that enveloped their caps reflected the coming sun, giving a hint of its light to those places below the high altitude where the sun had technically not yet risen. Clouds ambled through the sky, criss-crossing the pools of colour that started with the yellow of the horizon where the barest hint of the orb that was the sun was just peeking over the landscape, shifting to orange, then a light blue of the normal sky before changing to a deeper blue and purple that was the lasting vestiges of the night, forever chased in circles around the planet by the lifegiving ball of fire that was Celestia's domain.

"I... always loved my sister's sunrises."

My head twitched in Luna's direction, her voice so low that I had to strain just a little to catch her words properly, but I said nothing and made no sound.

"My night is beautiful enough, I suppose, and seeing how the ponies loved it was more than I could ever dream. But... I don't think that there could ever be something so magical as watching the ponies gather for the sunrise and sunset." A small, wistful smile stretched its way across her muzzle, her eyes clouding slightly. "There were whole... societies, I suppose you'd call them, devoted to watching the beginning and end of the day. Heralding, they called it, both of the night and day. They always thought of the sunrise and sunset not as the end of the night or the end of the day, but the beginning of both. A cycle of vigilance, sun and moon keeping watch while the other slept. It was they that first invited me to anything, you know. I'd hardly been settled in the castle when one of them showed up to personally hand me an invitation.

He was an excited little colt, not more than twenty years, a pegasus. I'd been surprised at that, as most of the ponies I'd seen in Canterlot up to that point where unicorns, but I hadn't grasped how far my sister had gone and how thorough she'd been in mending and closing the gaps and scars between the three races of pony. He'd been shifting back and forth on his front hooves, fidgeting with this little white and blue envelope with my name written on the front. I'd happened to be walking close by, I hadn't- um, I didn't sleep particularly well the first week or so. He'd been eager to deliver the message, and had been trying to convince one of the guards to allow him through so that he could deliver the envelope in pony, insisting that it was important that he get it to me so that he could immediately receive my reply."

Her eyes were staring at a cloud that was dyed gold, orange and blue, as the orb continued to slip up over the horizon and the dark colours retreated from the sky. An amused grin replaced the wistful one.

"He'd nearly fainted of shock when I'd trotted up and asked what was happening. Couldn't get a single consecutive word out, and nearly shook his plumage out of his feathers, but he managed to hand me the invite before he'd bolted for the entrance. And thus, there I sat, with an envelope addressed to me and a pegasus that I was entirely certain at the time had fled out of fear.

After a bit of confusion, and, I admit, a bit of sadness on my part, I opened up the envelope and read the letter inside. That, too, had been addressed to me, and I felt..." 

she put a hoof to her chest, expression screwing up slightly as she thought.

"I'm not sure how the exactly summarize how I felt in that moment, that some ponies had willingly decided to communicate with me personally. But then I opened up the envelope. Inside this thing was a simple piece of paper, surprisingly thick and heavy, and when I'd opened it up a little metal badge fell out. It was silver, set with obsidian, and it depicted a large, white moon.

The letter itself had been handwritten, not typed or copied. I thought it would be fearful to some degree, the sort of 'we're being good, don't kill us' that I got quite commonly in the early days of my return. However... this letter? It was excited. The pony, somepony named Colour Chaser, had scribbled out a long letter that packed the whole page with words so dense it was hard to read!"

She chuckled lightly, grinning that self-same amused grin.

"It was obvious that he was frankly ecstatic to send the letter, to say anything to me. He said that the sunrises and sunsets had gotten exponentially better when I'd come back, and he thanked me again and again for making such beautiful sights even better. Not once during the entire letter did her refer to me once as a princess, or by any title, and he showed no real deference, as if he was speaking to a friend that had done him a good turn. In fact, he said, he'd even inducted me to the society and had a custom badge made for me at his own expense, just as thanks for the work that I and my sister had done in painting the skies with their colours, and said I was free to join them in their observatory every day, at sunrise and sunset, like any other member."

I scooted a little closer as her head tilted back, eyes closed, remembering. Her eyes opened a moment at my movement, fixing me with a gaze, before they slid shut once again.

"You don't know what that meant to me, to be asked without coercion to attend an even by a pony, not because I was a princess, not because I was Celestia's sister, but entirely because he loved what I'd done and felt that he wanted to reward that effort."

My fingers tapped the steel beneath me. "So... what happened?"

She smiled wide. "I went. To that sunset meeting that day, and then to the sunrise the next morn, and the next, and the next... whenever my schedule allowed, I attended their meetings and watched the sun rise and set countless times. And you know what?"

"What?"

Her voice lowered to a whisper, a single tear shining like crystal as it formed and made a trial down the side of her muzzle, dripping off and splashing quietly on the steel.

"They... called me Luna. Not princess, not Nightmare, not anything. Just... Luna. Luna the pony, the painter, the artist... that was what they called me, that first time and forever on."

We sat there for a minute more, then, almost in tandem, we leaned against one-another.

"Do you miss that? Those ponies?"

She nodded, a bit of solemness leaking into her wistful expression. She didn't need words to express how much she did miss them, and I didn't need words to understand.

The sun was over the horizon now, the brilliant colours of the dawn slowly shifting towards the straight, clear blue of day. Sunlight was even penetrating the rustling expanse of trees to our right, dotting the ground underneath them with green and gold visible even from here. The last vestiges of night on the western edge of the sky vanished with the encroachment of day, driving out the darkness until night fell again.

"You know... I lived in a city. It wasn't the greatest city, but it was where I lived. There was a train station just outside my building, and the trains would begin to run before dawn, so sometimes I would go down and board one bound out of the city. On the outskirts of it all, at the edge of the skyscrapers and apartment buildings, all that steel and glass and concrete, there was this college. I never attended, as such, but I didn't go there for the classes. See... the college was right on the banks of the river that ran next to the city, and it only had long, lower buildings that didn't block a view of the mountains that surrounded the city, or the river. So, I'd ride that train to that college, I'd walk into this little coffee shop that was part of the main building near the tracks, and I'd sit and watch the sun rise over the mountains and river. There's not a lot more peaceful things than that."

She nodded, quirking just a bit of a grin that was matched by the one that ever so slightly stretched my face. We sat there for quite a while longer, watching the sun climb in the sky, not particularly determined or really wanting to do anything... but, in the end, there were things that we had to do. No matter how much either of us wanted to sit there and bask in the warmth of the sun, the fact that the timer continued to run down in the compound's deeper levels tickled at the back of our minds and refused to leave us alone.

It was with reluctance that Luna finally shifted her wings and cracked her joints as she stood, I myself doing much the same thing as I stood and stretched, letting out a low breath of relief as my spine made a number of popping sounds. I made my way to the ladder off of one side of the roof, but Luna was more fortunate than me, able to simply glide to the ground by opening her wings and hopping off the edge of the steel roof. I jumped the last few rungs and landed just as her hooves made contact with the concrete, wings flapping twice to ensure her balance before pulling in flat against her sides.

She made to make her way back to the maintenance area and back towards the open blast door, but hesitated in her hoofsteps as I approached. She ruffled her wings and, after a moment of seeming indecision, turned back towards me and inclined her head.

"Thank you, once again. For last night's rest, and for sitting with me."

I waved away the gratitude. "Think nothing of it. You needed help, so I helped, and that's all there is to it."

She smiled. "You sound like our... our sister." The smile shrank a little at that, but was quite suddenly replaced with a determined expression, her hooves slamming themselves into the concrete. "I know that I did not put much stock in what you said last night, but... you were right, though I might have been loathe to admit it in the moment. She is out there, somewhere, with everypony else, all of the friends that I have made in the few short years I had. Twilight, Cadence, the Elements... Discord, even. Though my sister was not particularly fond of him, some of his pranks and jokes were quite amusing, though she was always hard pressed to deny that she had ever found anything that he said or did to be amusing in any way."

"You know, I'd like to hear some of your other stories sometime. I have to admit that I enjoyed listening."

Luna attempted shoved me playfully with a wing, and I danced around it, chuckling, as we made our way back through the compound's courtyard and towards whatever mysteries lay deeper in the concrete tunnels.
> XII: Groundwork
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Alright... so, then. What's our first move?"

It was quite a ways after dawn, the sun long risen over the compound. Some of the barracks farther down the hallway were officer's quarters: larger, with only one bed, a computer desk and, most importantly, a shower. The two of us had cleaned up as best we could, united in our thankfulness for the still-intact towels and hot water systems. We had met in the hall, Luna's fur, mane and tail slightly damp, my own hair still shining a bit with water, and we had deliberated on our next step.

Some scouting later, we had returned to and investigated the conference room nearer to the blast door marking the exit to the underground center of the compound. There, we had been enthused to find that each of the chairs was set at a touchscreen mounted into the table in the center, all of which were connected to some sort of crystal SMART board that made up the walls. Some doodles and experimental sketches still decorated the far corners of the room, but the main area had been cleared so that we had some surface to organize our thoughts.

Luna looked thoughtful at my question, tapping the underside of her chin in thought, her eyes slightly narrowed. After seeing it once or twice in the past day or so, I had come to realize that this was her 'thinking face', and some sort of giddy fanboy rose up in me at the realization that I was here with Luna, learning her facial expressions and personality quirks, only to be just as quickly crushed by something more practical.

"First? I imagine that, well... you are hungry, yes? That is... your species does experience hunger?"

I cocked an eyebrow. "is that really something that you've needed to ask in the past?"

She waved her hoof from side to side, almost as if to ward off my comment.

"We never know the customs and requirements of other species! Our- my sister was always the one more concerned with such things, and we had naught to do with it for the most part, unless it was some manner of military meeting of some sort."

I chuckled, leaning back in the chair that I'd chosen. "Well, then, you'll be glad to find that I'm rather normal on the biological side of things, and I've had my culture insulted so many times by the internet that I don't believe further insults would even register."

"Oh! Well, that is a relief, I suppose. Still!" She seemed to rally from her previous uncertainty, sitting up straighter, a serious expression stretched across her muzzle. "Whatever we do, we must secure a supply of provisions."

My first reaction to this was one of amusement, given that the first thing that she thought of was food of all things. However, the more that I considered it, the more my eyebrows came together and the deeper my frown.

It hadn't been something that I'd considered, but it now occured to me that this was a larger problem than even the timer, at this point. While the timer's ending was a week out, that wouldn't make much of a difference if the both of us were too weak from hunger by the end of the time period to actually do anything about it.

"Just considering it... we should find a way to check the water supplies for the entire place. We had plenty of hot water for both of our showers, but I don't think I'm alone in saying that I don't want the supply of fresh, potable water to suddenly die out from under us because we emptied the old storage tank that feeds the compound's plumbing."

She nodded. "given that this is a long-term military research..." her eyes widened, and I gripped the desk, leaning across it towards her and giving her an intense stare.

"What do you mean?"

She blinked rapidly, confused, grasping, trying to pin down that line of memory that had cropped up so suddenly and just as suddenly disappeared. She uttered a frustrated growl and hung her head, bangs from her mane covering her eyes a little.

"A long term military research... what?"

She slumped in her chair, pressed against the back of the cushioned seat. "We... I, do not know. It was a flash of something, and it felt right, just as the description of the... um, tarwolves, as night creatures fit. It was like a puzzle piece that slotted into place, something that I didn't know just a moment before."

I leaned farther forward, patting her shoulder. "Look, don't... don't worry. It's more than we had before- like you said, another piece of the puzzle. Maybe you'll recall something more specific eventually, but we just have to be patient, alright?"

She sighed, raising her muzzle again, her bangs still acting as something of a curtain before her eyes as she nodded. I nodded in return, then dropped back into my chair, the steel supports creaking as my weight settled back on it. She flicked her head, parting her bangs to the sides of her face, then fixing her eyes on the panel in front of her and pulling over a thick stylus designed to work with it. With a few quick motions, she scribbled out the two tasks we had come up with so far. After a moment, tapping the back end of the stylus on the screen in thought, she flipped it over again and used the tip to draw a line down the center of the screen and wrote a single thing on the other side.

Long term military research (?)

The words appeared on the selected portion of the walls, in much larger letters that were clearly visible. Luna leaned back in her chair, matching my position in mine as best as a quadruped could match a biped, tucking the stylus behind her ear and sighing.

"'Tis not much, but still... 'tis a start."

I nodded, tapping a finger on the screen as I mused over the tasks. "You know, I'm not a coward or anything... but I hardly think it's cowardly to say that I'm not particularly eager to attempt either of these on my own."

Luna raised a single eyebrow. "Truly, we... I do not fault you for that. I am not particularly eager to go anywhere outside of the blast door without you and the rifle watching my back." I snapped my fingers and pointed.

"Ah, that reminds me. We need to pick up another assault rifle." I reached down to my belt, pulling the pistol and its hard plastic holster off of the strip of leather holding up my pants and setting it on the table. "This thing was just an annoyance to that tarwolf... thing. Annoyed it and not much else, but the rifle was much more effective..."

"True. The thing was not much more than bothered by the small rounds, which is more than slightly concerning."

The both of us shivered, almost in unison. Abandoned city, the signs of a war, the back tar splattered between a wall and the wreckage of a jeep... and here was this durable thing, which absorbed pistol rounds like they were BB's and took the majority of an assault rifle's magazine to put down. None of the signs that we had seen were the least bit encouraging, and though I didn't wan to voice it, I had the sneaking suspicion that things would get a lot worse before they ever got better.

"Regardless, our first move should be to locate a steady source of supplies, at least in the short term."

I played with my own stylus, turning it this way and that with my fingers as I stared vacantly at, and through, the literal writing on the wall in thought. Supplies were a good thing to tackle, as it was urgent that we know exactly what was available to us and how much of it.

"Alright. We'll handle food and water now, and maybe check whatever's providing power for this place, see if it's working correctly. Then, I think we need to come back here, write down everything that we know and everything that you can possibly remember. From there..." I trailed off.

"From there," Luna picked up, "we can decide what we need to do, and where we need to go. For now, supplies."

I nodded in agreement. "Supplies."

I put my hands on the armrests of the swivel chair and pushed myself into a standing position, Luna leaping down from her own chair in a way that rather reminded me of a predatory cat. I stepped to the door, wrapped up in my own thoughts, and nearly made it out into the hallway before I realized that Luna wasn't behind me. I glanced back into the room, and realize that she'd stopped to carefully arrange both our chairs under the desk where they'd come from. As I watched, her magic twisted my chair just so that it was matching the ones next to it, her eyes wandering over the room and finally landing on my face. I cocked an eyebrow and she blushed, dipping her head a little and moving to me.

"Sorry, sorry... couldn't leave them like that."

I blinked a bit, not exactly sure what to do with that, and finally decided to drop it and continue on. Luna picked up the rifle from where it was leaning against the wall and slung it over her back between her wings as I took a few steps down the hall to the armoury door. Another swipe of my admin card and the little light on the reader blinked green, the door clicking as the locks that held it shut disengaged. I grasped the handle and turned it, before pulling it open and stepping inside, finding the space already lit.

Racks of small arms lined the walls, low-caliber small arms arranged nearer to the doors and higher-caliber weapons farther down the shelving. Beneath the racks of weapons were olive green steel boxes, stamped with white lettering that defined the size of the round, how many there were per box and where they were manufactured. I picked one off the shelves at random, leaning down to read the lettering.

1000 .5L x 2.5L BALL CARTRIDGE PISTOL/SMG COMP. SISTER ARMS MANUFACTURING #13, MANEHATTEN

Other locations were listed among the different cases: Canterlot, Fillydelphia, the Crystal Empire, and there were even a few boxes marked with Griffonstone, as well as a number of cities that I didn't recognize. I surveyed them for a moment longer, picking out the different sizes of ammunition and the myriad of locations, then stood and shared a glance with Luna. Her eyes traced a few of the names that I hadn't recognized.

"These places... some are in Yakyakistan, a few are Griffon cities- they're from all over the world. But there is... there is not a single canister that states it was manufactured in Minotauria."

"What does that mean?"

She shook her head, frowning. "It might mean nothing at all. Minotauria is practically almost exactly on the other side of the planet, and thus it may be simply that importing manufactured ammunition from the Minotaurs may have simply been too difficult to bother with." She gave the canisters another long look. "But, on the other hoof... Minotauria is perhaps the most industrialized nation on the planet, and possesses the largest logistical network of any nation we are- I am aware of."

"Just another thing to note down... and, like you said, it might mean nothing at all."

Luna nodded, and we turned to examine the rest of the room.

In the center, on a large table lit from below by a crystal surface, where a number of longer rifles with bipods and scopes. Obviously these were meant to be sniper rifles, but what was truly interesting was that the table that was lighting them was not simply just a light as I had previously assumed, but, upon closer inspection, I realized that the table's surface was in fact a giant screen. Each rifle was highlighted by a glowing blue line, with lettering pointing out the attachments of the rifle that appeared to be electronics of one sort or another. It stated that they were all fully charged, and that each rifle was prepared for taking. Luna glanced over the rifles, then moved to one corner of the table where there appeared to be a small control panel, while I crouched to examine the shelves built into the sides of the table itself.

The first shelf appeared to be devoted to a range of attachments of all shapes and kinds, some even having to do with infrared or something called 'target identification'. A second shelf was devoted to a number of larger telescopes with tripods... for spotters, perhaps? The third and final shelf was ammunition. I checked the description of one box...

100 1.5L ANTI-MATERIAL

I raised my eyebrows at that, grasping the canister by its handle and dragging it out, setting it on the floor and popping the clasp. Luna spared a glance for what I was doing, then returned to the controls that she had been operating with her hoof, frowning in concentration at it while I swung the lid of the box open.

I'd seen fifty caliber rounds before, though I'd never laid eyes on an antimaterial rifle. These were most definitely just as large, and as I picked one out of the can and held it in my hand, noting how heavy it was, I realized that they might even be a bit bigger than fifty caliber. The rounds were, quite frankly, huge. I placed it back in the can and sealed it again, noting that there had been rubber seals around the edges that had kept the box airtight. That done, I replaced the canister back on the shelf, then stepped over to get a look at what Luna was doing.

The control panel now had a thick blue line coming off of it and leading to one of the rifles, a bullpup design with the magazine behind the trigger and a barrel that looked as if it was meant to recess into the weapon in order to deal with recoil. Luna was reading over the text in the box itself which, at a glance, appeared to be a full description of the rifle itself.

"Matt..."

The way she said my name, whispered, not even looking at me, made me immediately look to her face. Her eyes were widened, the corners of her mouth stretched. Her hoof raised and pointed to a piece of text at the top, and I leaned over her to read it.

SISTER ARMS MARK VII ANTI MATERIAL MEDIUM RIFLE (RESERVED AS PROPERTY OF PRINCESS LUNA)

I inhaled a little at that, then glanced up and gave the rifle a once-over again. This time, I noted something about it that I hadn't before: there, on the stock of the weapon, was emblazoned Luna's cutie mark. I leaned closer and ran my hand across the black and white sigil, surrounded with a circle of blue, and realized that it was engraved into the stock of the weapon itself.

"I don't remember anything more about this place than what I have already stated, but I would suppose this means that I was stationed here, or perhaps that I was visiting at some juncture..."

I leaned back, thinking.

"Well, it does make sense. After all, you ended up in the stasis tube, after all."

"Yes, we suppose..." she whispered in reply.

After a few more moments of staring at the words, she shook her head, levitating the rifle off of the table and slinging it over her back with the assault rifle.

"We had best get a move on."

She was purposefully avoiding looking at the table anymore, and trotted out into the hallway, the expression on her muzzle conflicted. I selected another assault rifle at random, rooting among the cases until I found one that contained magazines and not just rounds, taking two of them and quickly walking towards the door. Just as I was about to leave, I facepalmed, turning around and searching through the shelves until I located a taclight in a charging port. I detached the thing, slotted it onto the rails of my rifle, and followed Luna out the door.

Luna had been standing in the center of the hallway, examining the sniper rifle that she'd picked up, it floating in her magic as she stared at her own cutie mark emblazoned on the polymer. As I exited, her eyes flicked in my direction and she returned the rifle to where it had been on her back, drawing the assault rifle instead.

The two of us made our way back to the elevator, Luna pressing the button to call it this time. As with every time before, the doors opened instantly, and we stepped inside the small space.

"So, what's your thinking?" I gestured to the list of three subbasements.

She considered it for a moment, then reached a hoof up and tapped the first subbasment. "We may as well begin at the top, and work our way down."

I shrugged. "Seems reasonable."

We only had to wait ten or fifteen seconds for the elevator to reach its destination, and for the doors to open. I took the time to load one of the magazine into my rifle and chamber a round, slipping the other into the pocket of my cargo pants, the both of us pointing our rifles at the elevator doors.

As they slid open, yellow fluorescent lights in steel wall mounts flickered on, lighting a concrete space with pipes running along the walls and ceiling. Luna and I exchanged an uneasy look before continuing into the room, rifles still held at the ready.

The concrete was stained with moisture and dirt, making a very faint crunching sound as we stepped across it. The sounds of dripping water echoed through the concrete tunnels, condensation dripping from pipes, rust flowing down the walls to the floor. Coloured lines were painted on the walls, listing out where they led, white arrows pointing in various directions. Carts covered in parts, pipes and tools, some rusted and some nearly untouched, were pushed up against the walls. The both of us made our way to a wall of signs pointing in various directions, a rainbow of colours leading into the various tunnels that led off of this central room.

POWER CENTER
WATER MANAGEMENT
WASTE MANAGEMENT
PARTS STORAGE
WORKSHOP & METAL SHOP
STAIRS

"What do you think? Power center, then hit water management?"

Luna considered, then nodded. "Lead the way."

I nodded, then walked down the corridor next to the sign wall, following the yellow stripe of colour that indicated the directions to the power center. Luna followed shortly behind, keeping watch behind us as we made our way along. Hisses of steam, mechanical clanking and a low humming that suffused the very air put us slightly on edge, and I hurried along the corridor with Luna right on my heels. It was an understatement to say that we were eager to get out of this entire floor as soon as we possibly could.

Fortunately, only five minutes of walking led us to our destination. Here another blast door, covered in black and yellow hazard striping, blocked our way forward, with a card reader placed on the wall next to it. I ran the admin card through the reader and pressed the red button beneath it as Luna kept watch, stepping back and bringing my rifle up as the door jerked and slid open with the sound of grinding gears.

The room beyond was the size of a good warehouse, concrete shored up with steel forming the walls and the arched roof above our heads, with several high-power lamps in it. As I looked over the room, one of the lamps sputtered and died, but the light level in the room didn't really go down, primarily due to what the room contained.

The small glowing crystal that I'd found serving as a battery in the taclight had been a surprise, but this was frankly a little bit of a shock. Huge glowing blocks of crystal, wrapped with large wires and glowing a bright blue, were arranged in a grid-like pattern throughout the room. The cables all lead from the blocks themselves and into bundles tied on small catwalks running above the city of crystal blocks, to a large console in the center of the room, where they shot up as one massive winding cable into the ceiling.

"Whoa..."

"Thou dost not jest-" Luna clamped her muzzle closed, looking annoyed. "I-I mean... you are not kidding."

I walked up to one of the blocks of crystal, tapping it with a knuckle. It rang clear like a bell, the patterns of light shifting lazily in its interior, swirls and zig zags and all sorts of strange things.

"It's kinda beautiful, actually. What do you think this is all for?"

Luna indicated the center console with a flick of her muzzle. "Perhaps that will give us the answer."

This time she led, glancing among the rows and being on guard, while I just took in the sight of all of these glowing monoliths with some sense of awe. All of this was in a maintenance sector in a military base? It looked like an expensive art installation that you'd see on a billionare's property...

Luna made it to the console, and I glanced over, observing her magic pressing the keys on the keyboard in rapid succession. She seemed to be trying out search queries in a dialogue box to extract information from the system, but the console wasn't cooperating, insisting that it wasn't linked with the network of the compound at large. Luna made a frustrated sound, bashing the thing with a hoof.

"Worthless... it just keeps coming up with the same timer that we saw in the stasis chamber room."

I gestured to the room at large. "Any ideas what these are for? Any clues in the system itself?"

"None! It won't give me anything, just brings up the timer to every query I make." She huffed, giving the console a glare and trotting away from it a few hoofsteps, examining one of the closer crystals. "These have SOMETHING to do with power management, if the name of the room itself is anything to go by, but I do not have a single clue what that something might be. They could be transformers, they could be relays or part of a larger power generation system- Tartarus, they could just be gigantic circuit breakers for all I know. Whatever they are, it seems that the entirety of facility power comes through here, judging by the cables."

While she took a closer look at one of the crystals, muttering to herself, I took a closer look at the console. It seemed to be pretty normal, a steel casing supporting a keyboard and mousepad of some sort, and a large screen that displayed the self-same timer that I had first seen when I freed Luna from the stasis pod. Underneath the keyboard, however, was something a bit odd: a hole in the steel, perfectly circular. I crouched down, attempting to peer in, but all I could see was that it appeared almost to be a tube in the console itself. After a moment of hesitation, I poked a finger into the hole, feeling the inside and realizing that it seemed to narrow towards the back, as far as I could reach.

"Huh. Weird."

Luna half-turned in my direction, pausing her inaudible monologue. "Did you say something?"

I stood, taking my rifle in both hands and shaking my head. "No, nothing." I glanced around the room one last time. "Well, it appears that whatever this place is, it's functioning just fine. You want to move on to the water management center?"

"Very well. This bright light is giving me a headache in any case."
> XIII: Piping
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The door to the power room clanged shut, and I took my finger off of the button. For a brief moment I considered sealing the door with my admin card, then shook my head and dismissed the notion, turning back to Luna. Our eyes met for a brief moment and she nodded solemnly, a gesture I returned before raising my rifle and falling into line behind her. This time, we kept our eyes on the blue stripe that led to the water management center. Fortunately, it seemed to be in the same general direction relative to the elevator that power management was, and thus we had only to walk down the same corridor to reach it.

"You know... I've noticed something that's unnerving me slightly."

"Hm? And what is that?" Luna was only half-attentive, primarily focused on sweeping the corridor ahead, and the branching corridors to the sides, for any hint of movement. Her eyes swivelled back and forth like little radar dishes, searching for hints of noise.

"This place had to have been staffed and maintained by a lot of people, right? I mean... there were guards on the surface, we know 'cause their bones are still there."

"Of course. A facility of this type would have numerous staff to keep the compound running and repaired."

"So... where are they?"

Luna's head jerked back to me, surprise and perhaps a bit of uneasiness written across her expression. "What?"

"Well, think about it. No bodies, no other stasis pods, no signs of any sort of battle. There were hints that the surface portion of the compound was attacked, what with the casings scattered here and there, the killer jeep and the guard's last stand, but there's none of that down here. No spent rounds, no bodies... there wasn't even anything missing from the defensive armoury."

She looked away. "Now that you mention it, it is quite unsettling, yes. It does not make sense that this portion of the facility was abandoned..."

"Not to mention, when I got here, it had been sealed. High-level security lockdown. I had to raid the administrative facilities for an administrator-level password and keycard to lift it."

"Curiouser and curioser..." she muttered. I chuckled, then waved away the inquisitive glance that she gave me.

"Ah, it's nothing... what you said was just mildly amusing. A reference."

She raised an eyebrow, but didn't probe further, instead turning her attention back to the task at hand.

As we moved towards the water management, the amount of pipes in the walls and ceiling steadily increased, all of them running in the same direction. However, they were silent- nearly no fluids were moving throughout the compound, and the lack of sound was unsettling. Fainter sounds, made farther away down this or that tunnel, echoed farther in the stillness. I swallowed, thinking how grateful I was going to be when this particular chore was done, and we could leave this entire subbasement floor, preferably for good. Judging on how Luna's eyes flickered from shadow to shadow, her wings half-extended and feathers ruffled, I would say that she felt much the same, though most likely for different reasons.

Really, I'm not too proud to say that I uttered no small sound of relief when I set eyes upon the blue-highlighted door that marked the entrance. Luna refrained from any verbal indication of how she felt, but a series of lines that had spread themselves across her muzzle smoothed out and she let out a small breath. A swipe of my admin card allowed us through the door and into the room beyond.

The lights were slightly slower to flicker on in this section, and some of them didn't come on at all, sparking a little in their cradles before going completely dark. For once, this was actually an area where dust had gathered on pipes and a little on the floor, and the air was slightly staler than other areas.

"What, did the janitor have a fear of water?"

Luna snorted despite herself, shaking her head in exasperation and moving forward into the room proper. I followed right behind, nearly sealing the door behind us, then smelling the air and deciding against it. If this section had seen less maintenance than others, the ventilation systems might not be functioning properly, and I would rather have a source of clean air and a convenient escape route than satisfy the little niggling fear of having my back to an open entryway.

"There is a terminal here!" 

Luna sounded more excited than she had been for the terminal in the power management center. Approaching from behind and looking over her shoulder, I could see why: her magical keystrokes were actually having an effect with the machine, which was responsive and showing a simplified UI.

"So what's on it?"

She shook her head, initial excitement cooling into disappointment. "It's primarily just a terminal for accessing the diagnostic systems for the various water management systems here." She perked up, continuing, "however! It is a wealth of knowledge to that point, as it includes quite detailed data about all the various systems and sections of this center. It appears that it is quite expansive, including a number of large rooms beyond this main one where the water is actually handled- apparently, it is pumped up from the water table through wells, filtered and pressurized in tanks, where it is either used for the pipes feeding the compound's various levels. It also feeds the hot water heaters." she pointed to a particular tab, tracing it with a hoof. "This, however, is what interests me."

"Waste management and fertilizer production for... hydroponics?" I read aloud. "Why would a military base have a hydroponics facility? Isn't that the whole thing that's farming without soil, just water and fertilizer?"

She rubbed her chin with a hoof, looking contemplative. "We believe so... but as to why they would have one? We... I am completely lost on that point. Even this facility's long term status does not explain the additional resources that establishing such facilities would require..." a concerned look crossed her muzzle, eyebrows coming together slightly and wings fluffing slightly in unease. "Unless, of course, whatever war we were engaged in was not going well at all. I suppose that, in a case where farmland might not be viable or accessible due to enemy incursion or force projection, then a military facility might be a good place to grow food to feed an attached community. Earth ponies can get almost anything to grow anywhere, after all."

My mind flicked back to the trenches surrounding Ponyville, bottoms white with crumbling bones, the armoured vehicles abandoned and overgrown in rings around the borders of the town... should I mention these to her? On one hand, I had no doubt that she needed to know, and that it might help us in piecing together the larger picture of what was happening, what had happened. But...

I sent a sidelong glance at Luna's face, watching the concern and fear stretching the lines across her muzzle. Could I really justify telling her that when just yesterday she was right on the edge of breaking? She'd been acting like she was better, like she was stable, but I wasn't so certain. I wanted to believe that she was okay, that I'd convinced her that her loved ones were indeed out there, alive and safe, but some little part of me whispered that she wasn't so okay as she looked. In reality, that little voice said, this was her putting on a brave face and pushing forward, ignoring it all. Crisis mode. If that was true, then the moment that we were stable and lacking immediate threats and obvious goals, her strength would fail and she'd collapse all over again.

I thought about this, about all of it, right there as I watched her considering ideas and possibilities. And, in the end, I decided that not telling her right now would be so much worse than simply giving her one more weight. She might worry, she might be afraid, but at least she wouldn't be alone. I was here, for whatever that was worth.

"Luna... I think it was going pretty badly. For everyone."

Her eyes turned to me, searching my expression. "What dost- do you mean?"

I took a quick breath in, and let it out. 

"Just... from what I've seen, there were multiple rings of defensive trenches surrounding the town, with armoured vehicles and bunkers. From what I saw, it was like the whole town was under siege. And..." my eyes flicked away from her, the overwhelming desire not to see the reaction that I knew was coming forcing the reaction. But I had to show her, and myself, that I'd stick it out, no matter what. So, with gritted teeth and willpower, I dragged my eyes back. "The entire trenches were filled with bones. From what I saw and what I can guess, whatever happened, it was a desperate sort of defense."

She looked, in a word, deeply shaken, as if the rug of the world had been pulled out from under her and left her falling on her face somewhere that she didn't know. Lost. She looked lost.

She swallowed, speaking with hesitation, as if she didn't trust her own voice.

"Can you show me?"

I nodded. "I can do that. We'll go out and see before dark. But, right now, I need you to focus on what we're doing. Can you do that for me?"

She made eye contact with me, and for a moment I could see her unsettled and shaken feelings curdle into pain. Then, her eyes closed tight, as she took a deep breath. When she opened them again, there was nothing but an exhausted sort of determination, accented by the lines beneath her eyes.

"We... are capable of that."

I nodded, giving her a gentle pat and standing. She shuffled her wings, gathering herself, then checked over the console one last time before moving onward. I followed by her side, attempting as much as I could to keep up a supporting presence, close enough that she was aware that I was right there and far enough that it was clear that I would give her space if she needed it. Whether she correctly interpreted my efforts or not, she seemed to relax by a hair, sparing me only a glance before accepting my presence at her side.

As we made our way back through the tunnels and back to the elevator, shreds of doubt formed in my head. Had I made the right choice in telling her? It was not as if it was a secret that I could have kept, and I had absolutely no intention of ever even making her feel as if I had kept things from her and betrayed her. We'd known each other for only a day now, and I was sure that both of us knew on some level that an amount of unconditional trust would be required if either of us wanted to survive this world and whatever it had become, let alone to unravel the mysteries of whatever had happened and why.

However, it was clear from just a glance that Luna was distracted. Instead of the purposeful flickering of her gaze, glancing between shadows and scanning for movement, her eyes roved here and there amongst the pipes and concrete walls at random. Her rifle's barrel was angled towards the ground, up against her chest, her mind somewhere far away. I grimaced and gripped my own rifle a little harder: Luna's lack of attentiveness in this situation could be dangerous, but I had only myself to blame for this. Thus, I'd have to keep up a tighter watch,

To my growing concern, Luna didn't even notice when we arrived in the elevator room, instead seeming to choose another tunnel at random and continue forward as if we had not yet reached our destination. A restraining hand was thankfully enough to return her to reality and her focus to the present, but the worry and sliver of guilt that I felt must have been clearly visible on my face, as Luna immediately looked away and to the side, seemingly embarrassed at her lack of discipline. I took note of the motion that she made with her hoof, raising it halfway and making an uncertain circle in midair, and how the corner of her mouth tightened. She seemed between pushing me away and pulling me closer.

The more I saw of this mare, the more that I realized that there were almost two sides of her. One side was the side that she clearly showed the world, a professional, steadfast, stoic soldier with just the barest streak of wit and humour colouring her strength. The other Luna... the other Luna was the one who woke up, terrified of being alone at the tail end of a night terror that she had no control over. The one who needed touch and company to feel safe. And yet, she was also the one that painted the night, who went to an observatory full of ponies at the beginning and end of her days just because she liked to make them happy, who enjoyed sunrises and sunsets and moves in the cosmic dance.

Privately, I wondered how much of this she had shown to her sister, to the staff of her castle, to Twilight and her friends. Thinking back, I realized that it was this Luna who had made her slow appearance during the Nightmare Night episode- silly, fun-loving, definitely adorkable. On the other hand, I had a much darker realization; this was also the Luna who had birthed the Tantabus, who had forced herself to suffer in silence because she thought that she deserved it. Guilt, sadness, self-loathing.

Even with what little I knew of her and what little I had seen, I could already see how the Nightmare had taken root in her mind. All of those negative emotions, all directed inwards, growing with each failure and disregarding each success until the mask of strength and stoicism that had fooled so many, had fooled even her beloved sister, had finally cracked and the Nightmare had poured out like a horrifying flood. I was no psychologist- hell, I'd actually nearly failed psychology way back when- but if I had to take a wild guess? Depression, maybe chronic, and severe issues with self-worth.

My mouth set itself in a firm line. Like hell I wasn't going to do anything about that.

Luna squawked a little as I pulled her into another hug, pressing her against myself. She half-heartedly struggled for a moment, more out of confusion and surprise than anything else, but swiftly gave up and wrapped her hooves around me in turn, pressing her muzzle into my shoulder. This time around she didn't weep, simply shut her eyes and pressed herself against me, and I sensed that she was repeating what she'd done before: assuring herself that there was another person there, that she wasn't alone, that I wouldn't reject her out of hand.

A memory from the previous night drifted up in my mind: Luna, scared out of her wits despite her meager attempts at hiding it, saying that the Nightmare had... done things to her. I wondered, concern chasing itself in circles about my mind, what the Nightmare had done to her for all those years. Were there scars hidden under her fur? How much of what had once been Luna been bent and broken to make her what she was, so desperate for support that she would willingly, desperately, cling to someone that she'd just met the previous day?

Minutes past, as Luna's breathing slowly became calmer and more even. Finally, she took a deep breath and began to pull away, only for my hand to stop her once again. Her eyes flicked up and met mine, and I winced just a little at the guilt and shame that flickered there.

"You don't have to hide, you know. You don't have to pretend that you're stronger than you are."

Anger joined the other emotions there, directed inward like every other negative emotion that I'd seen her display.

"Thou art not bothered unduly by-"

"I am."

Her internally-directed emotions shifted into surprise and confusion, and I winced a little avoiding her direct gaze. My hands clenched into fists above her back, then loosened again.

"I was pulled out of my apartment into a world that I don't even know. There are things out there trying to kill both of us. As far as we can tell, everything's been abandoned for years and there's absolutely no one that we can go to for help. We're on our own, and I'm scared and worried and I'm terrified that I'm going to slip up somehow and-"

It was Luna's turn to interrupt, though with a gently nudging of my jaw instead of words. She weighed her words carefully before continuing.

"I am... sorry. I had not considered that you might feel much the same way, though I should have. You are just as alone as w- I am, feeling much of the same pressures and anxieties that you have been attempting to comfort in me, and I have done nothing to ease them."

I shook my head. "Luna, just not being alone in this... eh, nightmare, is unbelievably comforting to me. But..." A wry grin stole across my face. "Perhaps, in the future, both of us might be mindful of the other's feelings."

She nodded decisively. "Indeed. Though..." her eyes narrowed shrewdly, and I could practically hear the cogs turning behind her pensive expression. "Did you say.. world? Art- are you implying that this world is not your own?"

I blanched. Quickly, I ran over the course of the conversation in my head, cursing internally as I realized that I had said that. It wasn't so much that I had wanted to keep such things from her. After all, I had told her about the mass graves that had once been trenches: however, this was something that I had hoped dearly that I could ease her into, hopefully after I'd fully established myself in her trust. Most unfortunately, this meant that I had to take the risk and divulge the information, at risk of angering the only friend I had in this empty world, not to mention that I really did feel terrible for keeping anything from her. Still, now that the proverbial cat was out of the equally-proverbial bag, attempting to cover up any information that I might have was now only a bad idea.

"... Yeah. My world is another one, where my species is the only sapient one. I was pulled here by an alicorn with a magical mystical rainbow tunnel who made me an offer, which I took because I was in a dream and not entirely sane, and now I'm... here." I resisted the urge to look to her expression, casting my gaze downward instead. "It's why I was, and am, so sure about other ponies still being around."

"What did she look like?" I frowned slightly, glancing up at her. Her face was deeply pensive once again, but I could tell that she was focused in on what I was saying. And, after a moment of confusion over her sudden attentiveness and disregard, I understood, and I wanted to facepalm.

Of COURSE Luna would want to know this. In fact, I should have told her the moment we'd sat down in that room together and begun hashing things out: it could be important- no, VITAL information in regards to uncovering the reason why both of us were here. And, thinking back...

"Well, she... she had a cloak on. I couldn't see much of her, expect for her horn. It was white."

Luna's eyebrows came together. "White?" Her ears swiveled back slightly, head dipping. "... sister?"

I shrugged, releasing her and plopping down next to her, though staying close enough that her front leg was against my shoulder.

"Maybe." I replied quietly. "It would make sense... she could have sent me for you. After all, she could have set me down anywhere in Equestria, but she put me here, almost right on top of you. I don't think that was a coincidence..."

"But?" Her tone of voice matched mine, too soft to echo through the passages that surrounded us.

"But, I don't know." I sighed, leaning back slightly, shifting my weight onto my hands, flattening my palms against the cold concrete of the floor. "Like everything else, we just don't know enough. Too many unknowns, and not near enough information."

She looked away, contemplating, then turned back. The negativity that had made such a sudden appearance was buried once again. I didn't like it, and I felt a stirring of unease and concern for a multitude of reasons, but right now was not the time to voice them. Tonight, when we were in a better position perhaps, but not now.

"This is what we are doing now, is it not? Collecting information." She flared her wings slightly as she stepped away, and even in this confined space, I had to admit that she struck a regal pose where she stood. "So! Let us not be delayed further!"

I felt the twitch of a smile at the edge of my lips, but I wasn't just going to let this go. I set the butt of my rifle against the floor and pushed myself to my feet, watching Luna until she turned back to see what was keeping me before making eye contact with her and adopting a serious expression. She shifted uncomfortably under my gaze, wings pulling in and feathers ruffling themselves slightly.

"We need to resume this conversation later today, and we will be. Alright?"

She grimaced. "We suppose that is... fair."

I nod and smile, satisfied, gesturing to the elevator doors. Luna, clearly relieved at having escaped closer scrutiny even if it was jsut for the moment, practically galloped to the elevator, pressing the call button in the process. As with every other time we had called it, the doors dinged and slid open immediately, revealing the self-same blank, utilitarian elevator inside. This time, as we stepped inside, I pressed the button for the second level subbasement, following it with an almost automatic swipe at the 'close doors' button. I saw Luna's eyebrow raise and studiously avoided her gaze, turning to the opposite wall and pretending to examine some of the scratches and scrapes in the metal there.

"Really?" she said. "Thou- eh, you do know that those are simply installed placebos to keep impatient riders complacent, correct?"

"Force of habit," I muttered in reply.

Luna opened her muzzle, no doubt with a scathingly sarcastic comment on her tongue ready to further mock my acceptance of a do-nothing button. However, by happy coincidence, the elevator arrived at the next floor before she could get the first syllable out, and I happily filed straight out of the doors and into the subbasement beyond before she could even begin speaking her thought. Behind me, I heard her sigh and the shuffle of mane that must have been a shake of her head, then the trotting of hooves as she followed afterward.
> XIV: Deeper
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As I stepped through the opened elevator doors, Luna followed right behind, muzzle slightly open and a wry comment on her tongue. However, the words died there in her mouth as she glanced about, taking in this level of subbasement.

This was far more open and well-lit than the previous maintenance level, larger and longer lights humming underneath frosted coverings and bathing the room in stark white. The floor was still concrete, to be sure, but it was obvious that it had been polished. The occasional pipe snaked its way across the concrete walls, turning hither and tither through bolted holds before sinking back into the walls, floor or ceiling, but they were much fewer and farther between. The room was much wider and more open, a slightly vaulted ceiling stretching out above, with large circular holes in the walls near the ceiling, words written around the edges.

WATCH OUT FOR YOUR FELLOW PEGASI!
BE AWARE OF OTHER FLIERS
IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, FLYHOLES RESERVED FOR USE BY IMPORTANT PERSONNEL

"Flyholes?" I muttered to myself, squinting at the letters. Luna nodded.

"Such things were common, in military and civilian structures. It is more or less a honeycomb of small, circular passages designed to be just wide enough that pegasi may fly through them, allowing them to get from location to location with speed. Often, buildings would have flyholes bridging floors, for pegasi that did not wish to take the elevator or stairs." She trotted forward, sparing the 'flyhole' merely a cursory glance. "It would assist greatly in reducing stress for pegasi in this underground space. However, I doubt that they link the floors together- that would be a security concern."

"Huh." I examined the hole one last time, then followed behind Luna.

She walked right to a series of plastic signs set in the wall. Each had bold lettering, listing a number of locations, much like the one on the floor above. Unlike that floor, however, these had no lines and, as I got closer, I realized that they weren't signs at all, instead appearing to be a series of options on a screen. I noted that, halfway up the wall, the concrete was interrupted with a strip of clear plastic. Looking through the clear surface revealed a series of precisely carved blocks of crystal like we had seen on the floor before. These, however, appeared not to be thicker, larger blocks, instead appearing to be very slim slabs that had been mounted inside the wall with a series of wires inserted into their sides.

"What do you think, then?"

I turned back at Luna's comment. She was rubbing the underside of her muzzle with a hoof, eyes narrowed slightly in thought at the list of options in front of her.

"Well, if I had to guess, I'd say that when you selected an option from the list, these things-" I gestured to the panels, visible inside the wall- "light up to show you the way. So, uh, pick one, I guess."

She nodded, turning back to the list of options. After a moment, her expression brightened considerably, and she jabbed one with a hoof and an uttered "Huzzah!"

The 'Mess' option pressed in. Whatever computer powered the display worked for a moment, then a series of words popped up, the mess option doing a small animation and a small chime sounding.

IDENTITY CONFIRMED: LU2-42. CLEARANCE GRANTED. HAVE A NICE DAY

The panel just to the right of the screen lit up with an arrow. As Luna approached it, the arrow moved just ahead of her. I had to admit that it was a pretty cool little guidance system, though I wondered whether it worked so well when there were a number of different ponies using it at the same time. Something to find out later, I would guess. I shook the little tangent of thought out of my head and hurried after the alicorn, not exactly eager to be left alone for any amount of time.

The trip was a surprisingly short one, with the directional arrows leading us to a pair of white-painted steel double doors labelled 'MESS' in large, red letters. Luna didn't hesitate to push one open with magic and step inside, with myself following swiftly after. 

"I had not wished to say anything, but I am quite hungry, and not a little bit glad to see a potential storage place for food!"

I grimaced. "Are you sure anything left is going to be any good? I mean, from what we've seen, it's not like anyone's been here recently to refresh the supplies."

The mess was a large, wide and tall room. The walls were painted white with a red stripe at about the same height as the top of the doors, circling the walls of the room in a clear attempt to make it seem a little less bland. However, what surprised me and took my breath away a little was what coated one of the walls.

An entire wall, directly across the mess from the doors, had been devoted to a mural of incredible detail. A scene of thick grass and rolling hills, leading out towards a forest in the distance and a mountain in the far background with a familiar-looking city perched atop, a waterfall streaming from it to the ground. On the far left was the sun, painted in yellows, oranges and gold on a background of sky blue, looking almost exactly like Celestia's cutie mark, which was what it most likely represented. On the other side, to the far right, the clear blue turned to darker blue and finally black, ending in a large representation of Luna's cutie mark on a field of white pinpricks that must have been stars. In the center, dominating the main view, sat Twilight's castle, with her cutie mark of stars emblazoned on the doors. Around the edges and over the scene itself were overlaid a detailed painting of carved wood, framing the scenes as if they were being seen through a window.

The level of detail was nothing short of incredible. This wasn't all that surprising considering that Equestria was basically the land of incredibly talented individuals, something that I realized I'd somewhat forgotten, being wrapped up in all that had happened. I shook the thoughts from my mind, returning my attention to the mural.

My eyes went first to the emerald fields that graced the lower quarter of the artwork. The closer blades of grass had such detail that I was surprised that they didn't sway in some invisible breeze, down to drops of dew on the leaves. As they stretched into the distance, they lost more and more of their stunning detail, morphing and running together into fields of green only just marked with darker, thicker brushstrokes that implied the continuation of grass and not a homogeneous carpet. 

The painted-on wood was just as detailed, and markedly more interesting for its subject matter. The wood was faithfully recreated down to the tree rings in the material, implied more than painted. Carvings were represented with layered strokes of paint and cleverly placed shadow lines, implying a three dimensional effect that was only fully dispelled when one approached and laid their hand against it, showing it to be just as flat as the rest of the wall. The wood itself had been painted with detailed carvings, stretching around the squares that framed the illusion of glass.

Walking over to Luna's side of the mural, I noted that the carving on the bottom depicted two tiny fillies with wings and horn, lying at the hooves of a much larger figure that was much the same. A quick walk over confirmed that the same image was represented on the opposite side, the side encircling Celestia's mark. A flicker of awareness, and I realized that Luna was sitting a bit farther back, watching me with a sad gaze. I reached out, stroking the image of the fillies, and nearly jumped when she spoke.

"My sister does not remember our birth, but... I do. T'was so long ago that I remember naught much more than the coldness of the air, scorched ground beneath our hooves and... our mother's expression. Not her face, not her mane, not even her coat, just the most divine radiant joy and pride." She shifted her hooves slightly on the concrete floor as I looked around at her. "Mother... I suspect she always liked our... ah, my sister more than myself. Celestia received the bulk of her attentions and lessons, and when mother chose to interact with me at all, t'was for combat and tactics lessons." The bitterness in her voice surprised me, but before I could ask a question or offer comfort, she continued. "This continued until she... left us. My sister and I were very young, then, though far more than old enough to be considered adults. We saw our strength and wisdom and thought to tame the world, make it safe and civilized..." She made a huff. "We were fools."

I stood fully from the painting, turning towards her entirely. "It was worth it though, wasn't it? Equestria-"

"Equestria is GONE, Matt, or have you not been paying attention!?" I recoiled slightly from the sudden fiery anger, and Luna jerked her head to one side, shame overtaking her expression. "Equestria is gone. And even before that, t'was not the utopia of science, magic and strength that we had envisioned it might become. Our sister is- was, too careful, too cautious. We were the balance to that, and after we were gone..." She stared at Celestia's painted cutie mark, through it, almost as if she could see the lines drawn by time and fate. "It was too late. Clearly, far too late."

"Luna... then what about this? What about all of this?" I flung my arms wide, gesturing to the facility around us. "Computers, weapons, advanced building techniques- it's all here, and it's incredible what was accomplished!"

"AND HOW MUCH GOOD DID IT DO THEM!?" Luna stood, her hooves smashing into the concrete, leaving craters in their wake. "They are GONE, ALL OF THEM! They LOST!"

"We don't know-"

"YES, WE DO! The BODIES, the abandoned town-"

"Is your sister an idiot!?" Luna's jaw snapped closed, partly out of indignation, partly out of confusion at the non-sequitur. I sighed, taking a moment to breath, getting my thoughts in order before continuing, "Your sister is NOT an idiot, not by far. Celestia was capable of steering an entire nation on her own for a thousand years, ending with them prosperous and a near-utopia." The ever-present guilt lingering beneath the surface of Luna's emotions flickered to the top for just a moment, but I pressed onwards. "Do you really think that your brilliant, immortal, Dumbledore-times-ten class manipulator sister failed to guide the ponies that she'd gladly give her life for towards hope for a happy ending?"

Luna looked away, but even with only a side view of her face, I could see the conflict. Depression and despondency in the face of an abandoned Equestria fighting with the faith she had in the sister that had arranged her salvation, even a thousand years after her betrayal, and the hope that the ponies that she had made friends with in those few years that she had had being safe and sound somewhere. I stood and walked to her, taking one of her forehooves in my hand and raising it, making eye contact when her head jerked towards me.

"We'll figure out what happened. We'll find out where they went. And then we'll do what fighting needs doing, we'll rescue them all, and you can be smug about your achievements for the next thousand years."

Despite herself, a thin, amused grin cracked her solemn expression ever so slightly. Just a little, but it was enough for her to take a breath and calm herself. I held her hoof until she nodded, and then a little longer until I was sure that her breathing had calmed. I realized that, from the rapid heartbeat I could almost hear from here and the rate of her breathing, she'd been on the direct path to a full-on panic attack. By pure luck, I'd managed to derail her, and I was rather glad at that stroke of fortune. I didn't want to ever see the result of an alicorn having a panic attack, let alone be inside of the blast radius while it was happening. Still, as I released her hoof and drew back, I realized that I would have to keep a closer eye on her emotional state, better to give her what support or space that she needed, when she needed it.

"Stay here for a bit, okay? Rest a little. I'll go check the kitchens."

She nodded in response, her features showing a flicker of the weight of exhaustion before she drew herself up a little and leaped onto one of the long tables, where she settled down in a curl. I gave the curled ball of Luna a sad look, then shook my head and walked towards the door to the kitchen area.

Opening the door wide triggered the lights, which flickered on and brightly lit the room within. Ovens, counters and racks of cooking equipment of all kinds filled the space, but I ignored all of this as I moved deeper, towards the thick steel doors in the back that looked like the type of insulating seals that one would put on a refrigeration unit. I wasn't exactly confident that any sort of food that needed cooling was intact in any way, shape or form, but I wanted to check for the sake of thoroughness. I hit the latch on the thick door and muscled it open, then gasped a quick breath and took a step back as I looked into the interior of the unit.

I had wondered before where the bodies had been, where all of the soldiers watching this place had gone. Here was a part of the answer: bodies, intact thanks to the frozen, dry air inside of the unit. A griffon in what looked to be a military uniform was the closest to the door, his right claw wrapped around the grip of a pistol, a small number of spent cartridges scattered about the weapon. Behind them all, in the rear of the freezer... I covered my mouth, suddenly struck by the urge to throw up.

A number of the creatures behind the griffon guard were scientists, cloaked in the signature white coats that signified scientists even here. They were a range of species: an anthropomorphic cat couple, laying next to each other. A pony with blue fur, horn coated in ice. A handful of griffons, laying against the wall. Each of them had a hole in the side of their head, a single entry wound, and a single spent cartridge to represent the round that had done them in. The worst part was how it was obvious that not a single one of their number had fought back or resisted- they had all simply sat there as they were killed, one by one, ending with the griffon soldier shooting himself.

I couldn't handle it anymore. I slammed the fridge door closed, hand still clamped over my mouth, and I ran. Somehow, I managed to get to a restroom connected to the kitchen area via a short hallway, where I found myself kneeling over a toilet as I voided my guts.

There wasn't much in there, thanks to me not eating since sometime yesterday, back in my world. Bile and water primarily made up what ended up in the toilet itself, but it didn't stop my body from retching multiple times, trying to push something else out. It took about ten minutes for me to get ahold of myself, but I finally managed to force myself to stop trying to force out my empty stomach and collapse against the wall next to the toilet itself.

I ran my hand over my face shakily, trying to stabilize and calm myself. Not even when I had looked into the trench full of bodies had it affected me this much, and it was only really hitting home on a more than intellectual level how bad things must have been for Equestria- no, the world, if these scientists and military personnel had willingly submitted themselves to being killed in order to escape whatever had happened, in the end. Before, it had just been skeletons, the barest remains of individuals who had once lived, but seeing the frozen and preserved bodies? That had had about the same effect as a bullet on me.

It took time for me to calm myself, but I eventually managed it. After all, though it had been nothing short of horrifying... they were just bodies, and not even of my own species. 

I suspect that it would have been much worse if they had been humans. At least because they weren't, I could distance myself from them, make myself detached.

I stood, and after taking a second to ensure that I wouldn't just keel over the moment I put my full weight on my legs, I walked to the sink and turned on the tap. After a second of gurgling, clear water flowed out of the tap. Just to make sure, I smelled and examined the water, before finally using it to wash my hands, wash out my mouth and finally just splash in my face before shutting it off again. I looked up at myself in the mirror above the sink, hand on either side of it, and took another moment to steady myself before turning to the exit and returning to the kitchen area.

I moved among the stoves and cookware, all of which seemed at once more sinister and more sad for having witnessed deaths so close by, and still being untouched. I spent a moment lingering outside of the door before I moved on, with a silent promise to come back and bury those left here some day.

There was another door a little further down, and it was here that I went next. As opposed to the thick and heavy refrigerator door that was meant to keep the heat out of the small space, this one was more of a pantry door, a thinner steel door designed to swing both ways and generally just make a barrier between itself and the room behind it. I passed through this one with markedly more caution, not particularly excited about the possibilities of further bodies.

Fortunately, the space behind was empty of any remains. Even more fortunately, the entire space was filled with rows and rows of shelves, themselves packed tightly with layer after layer of cans and sealed containers. I made my way among the stored food of the pantry, looking on in fascination at the high stacks of food stored here, giddy excitement overcoming the unease and sickness that had formed an underlying layer to my status. 

The wide range of food options were very obviously meant to feed a number of species and individuals for a long period of time: the room was something like a small warehouse, with shelves arranged in three rows down the center, additional shelves bolted to the walls. Everything was immaculately sorted, silver cans laid out in precise rows behind labels, and each stamped with individual paper labels. Picking one at random from a nearby shelf, I flicked a critical eye over it.

BEANS, BARBEQUE, SINGLE SERVING
NOT RECOMMENDED FOR CONSUMPTION BY: GRIFFON, DRAGON


The rest of the label was concerned with nutritional information. I tossed the can into the air and caught it, considering the contents of the label.

That they were packaging rations with consideration for griffons was no great surprise, and I'd rather expected it, given the presence of griffon soldiers here and about. Dragons, on the other hand, were something of a surprise. Were dragons common enough to justify having their own specific rations, as well as being mentioned on the actual labels? Looking deeper into the racks of shelving, I could just see near the back a series of darkly coloured bins filled with gems. I shifted uneasily at the sight.

I had mostly skipped the episodes of the show involving the dragons, but I did remember that their teenage forms were impulsive and irritating, not to mention not exactly attractive. The only adult dragon that I really remembered from the show was the one from near the beginning, the one that had settled at the edge of Ponyville and had to be told off by Fluttershy in order to get him to leave. I didn't think that the serpent from the pilot really counted.

From that, I was vaguely aware that the dragons were cranky and obstinate, though that may have just been because he'd already settled down in the cave with his hoard and was unwilling to move for a bunch of little ponies until Flutters had blasted him with her more forceful side. Afterwards, however, he'd been a bit cowed and accomadating, though, again, that could have entirely been attributed to Flutters. No lie, she could be terrifying given the right motivation.

Still... things had even been so bad that the dragons had joined with the Equestrian cause, if not entirely as a people, then at least enough individuals to justify a supply chain for them. I'd imagine that uniting the entirety of the dragon race would be rather difficult, seeming as they were less a nation and more a large group of individuals bound together primarily by biological drives and their shared genetic code. 

For the moment, however, I put these thoughts aside in respect to a much more important goal: gathering and making something for lunch! Normally I would cook something for myself, bachlorhood being rather nurturing for one's culinary skills as long as they did not entirely rely on ramen and mac & cheese for foodstuffs, and I was decently skilled with pots and pans myself. Right now, however, I was hungry, I knew that Luna must be hungry, and I didn't want to delay things any farther. Thinking back to the sad little ball that Luna had made on one of the mess tables, I grimaced and hurried my pace as I walked among the shelves.

It wasn't long before my efforts were rewarded in the form of a rack of gray rectangles packed tightly into wooden crates, and wrapped tightly in clear plastic wrap. I glanced down at the label stuck to the front of the wrapping, which said in large, block letters:

MRE, MEALS READY TO EAT, 400 COUNT UNIVERSAL CONSUMPTION

I grinned, remembering some of the better encounters that I'd had with modern MRE's and the small measures included to raise soldier's moral. Tiny vials of Tabasco, various small candies and amusing things... with any luck, Equestria's MRE's were no different, containing at least some sort of way to make soldiers in the field feel a little better. Luna needed something to raise her spirits right now.

I tore open the packaging and pulled out two MRE's, randomly selected from the tons of them that the large container housed. I tucked the two small metal rectangles under my arm and pushing the door open as I passed through. I passed quickly through the kitchen, and as I exited into the mess proper, I noted that Luna was still lying int he exact same position that she had been when I'd left to go look for food. In fact, pausing and listening for a moment, I realized that her slower and deeper breathing indicated that she'd fallen asleep on the table. She must have been even more tired than I'd previously thought.

I set the two meals down on opposite sides of the table just a little down from Luna's sleeping form, looking at them a little closer. On one side of each of them was a small, plastic tab jutting out from the side of the package, which had only the words 'pull' and 'caution: hot' on it. I shrugged, assuming that this would activate the Equestrian version of heating elements in contemporary MRE's. I pulled the tabs on both of the meals and, just to be safe, stepped back a little.

There was a very light, faint hissing noise from each of the packages. As I watched, small holes in the edges popped open, letting out small plumes of steam into the open air, dying down after a few seconds. I approached with a little apprehension, not exactly eager to get myself a steam burn. Thankfully, as I flipped the lid off of the meal that I'd chosen for myself, it appeared that the excess steam had vented itself out of the hole, leaving behind a hot, merrily steaming meal.

The meal itself was divided into four sections. A peice of fish steamed in a shallow pool of a white sauce in the largest section, with the others containing a small roll with a bit of butter, some dark brown stuff that appeared to be pudding, and...

I blinked at the last little section in the tray, the smallest of them all. There was what appeared to be a small peice of spun sugar in the shape of a griffon, styled and detailed as if it was holding its head high, and, looking closer, I realized that I could actually see a small, confident smile on its beak. Despite myself, I smiled a little: clearly, Equestria knew exactly how important the morale of soldiers was in the field.

I turned my attention to the lump of blue fur and feathers sitting just down the table from me. Listening closer, I realized to my concern that she was softly whimpering in her sleep. I reached out a hand and put it against the warmth of her coat, shaking her lightly and murmuring to her lightly.

"Luna... Hey, Luna... wake up. Food!"

Luna jerked awake, flailing her wings and hooves in the air, and looking around with confusion and panic clear in her eyes. I ducked, barely missing getting smacked by a wing before her eyes landed on me and a flash of recognition flickered through them, quickly shifting to guilt and embarrasment. She rolled onto her belly, folding her wings close and grimacing.

"We appologize, we did not mean-"

I fixed her with a look, and she snapped her muzzle closed. "It's fine, Luna! Really. I understand."

She sighed, but didn't fight back. Her meal was wrapped in her magic as she extended her wings slightly for balance and stepped down onto one of the benches that ran along the sides of the mess tables. To my surprise, instead of settling into the seat opposite me, she decided to sit right next to me- in fact, she leaned on me as she popped the cover off of her meal. I rolled my eyes and picked up the fork, spearing a piece of my fish and dipping it in the mystery sauce.

Before I could take a bite, I glanced at Luna... and realized that she was frozen, staring at her meal. My eyebrows creased as I leaned forward, looking at her face. Her expression was one of surprise, but not necessarily negative; I followed her gaze down to her meal... and stared.

To my side, I heard Luna start to giggle a little, in the back of her throat.

After a moment, I started chuckling a little, covering my mouth with a hand, trying to hold ito in. I nearly succeeded in stopping it there, Luna's giggling petering off besides me... and then we made the mistake of looking at each-other. Our eyes met, and... it was too much. The both of us collapsed in opposite directions, laughing so hard we were shaking the bench.

Because there, in Luna's MRE, had been a pony. Muzzle scrunched, wings kinked, forehooves wrapped around herself, a frown gracing her face. Somewhere, somewhen, some brave little confectionary master of a pony had decided to create a picture perfect image of Luna pouting.

And as my shuddering laughs slowly stopped and I wiped away tears, I looked across at Luna, the tension gone from her form and replaced with joy at such a simple thing even for a moment, and I said a silent thanks to that brave little pony, wherever they were.
> XV: On-ramp
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"So. This is it, yes?"

"Mm." I answered in affirmation, "the last subbasement... as far as I can tell, anyway."

Luna grimaced, placing her rifle over her shoulder with magic. "We hope so... this experience has been quite nerve wracking, if w- I am to be entirely honest."

I rubbed a hand over my face, grimace matching hers. "I have to say that I agree... I'll be glad to be out of this elevator and these levels, back on the surface level."

With that, I pressed the button for the final subbasement. There was the familiar faint feeling of sinking in my stomach, and I waited a few seconds for the doors to open. Then a few more. And a little bit more... Luna shifted from hoof to hoof, glancing at the walls and ceiling, looking anxious and muttering to herself, wondering why it was taking so long. I opened my mouth, about to answer her, then closed it again and readied my rifle as the elevator dinged and the doors slid open.

This level was obviously different from the previous two at a mere glance. The room itself was a wide hallway, decorated with some marble and a faded, dusty carpet down the center. Yes, dusty: here, the dust was in a thick layer, coating the floor... odd, that it hadn't been swept up by the same filtration system that had rid the rest of the facility of the dust that hung in its air.

The walls themselves reached up twice my height, ending in a ceiling that was arched, with a number of elegantly curved concrete and steel supports, designed for outward aesthetics as much as for support. A number of pieces of artwork, ranging from paintings to tapestries, from the tattered and old to the obviously relatively new. Most prominent was a painting of the four princesses together, Celestia radiant, Luna self-conscious, Cadance regal with the hint of a smile on her face, and Twilight somewhere between bouncing in excitement at the presence of her mentor and second mother and shyness, her eyes in the direction of the painter.

Luna trotted to the painting itself, eyes roving over each of the princesses in turn, skipping over herself with a frown in the process. I watched quietly as her expression changed with each long look, sorrow for her sister, appraisal for Cadance, and, perhaps not so surprising, fondness for the tiny Princess of Friendship. I allowed her a moment, standing off to the side, before I approached, shoes sending up small clouds of dust as I padded in her direction.

Luna didn't acknowledge me as I walked up to her besides a slight twitch of her ears. Her eyes had returned to her sister, tracing up and down her expression, contemplation written over her face.

"Do you remember this?"

My voice, though quiet, still echoed slightly along the hall of stone, steel and concrete. The sound was, thankfully, quickly deadened by the decorations on the wall, but it didn't stop me from giving the smallest wince. Luna, in the meantime, allowed the sound to die before she replied.

"The painting itself, or when it was painted?"

"When it was painted."

Her head turned towards me, eyes meeting mine for a moment before sliding away again, though this time they stared into the middle distance instead of returning to the paint and canvas.

"Almost... but not... quite. 'Tis almost as if it is a missing tooth, a sequence missing a number... like mine other memories, I am capable of making out the gap, but not the memory itself, except..." This time, her eyes did return to the painting. "I... I remember... in the moment the sketch image was made, Cadance had made a joke... I do not remember what it was, but I remember that 'twas a light jesting jab at Twilight, in good fun." Her eyes turned misty, gazing past the painting, through the wall, into memory. "Sister was amused, though she tried to hide it for Twilight's sake behind her usual monarch's mask, though it, as it ever did, slipped just a tad in the presence of her student. Twilight was, of course, mortified by the joke itself, her big sister in all but blood embarrassing her in front of her greatest hero. I remember that I was... hesitant. I had found the jest as amusing as the both of them, but I wished not to harm poor Twilight's feelings, so I had looked to sister for guidance."

As she spoke, the image almost seemed to change, context filling out what assumption and mere observation had before. An upward quirk of Celestia's mouth, crinkling of the coat about her eyes, head pulled ever so slightly back to hold in a laugh. Luna with a shy, unsure smile, looking to her sister for guidance, not confident in social matters. The fond, slightly mischievous smile on Cadance's face that was reserved for an older sibling, or the closest of friends. A slight blush showing through the fur on Twilight's muzzle, widened eyes with a hint of that self-same mortified embarrassment, and a bit of shock as she realized that the painter had already made the sketch. In that moment, they almost seemed to move, Celestia letting out a light chuckle, Luna making an amused sound that wavered with a lack of confidence, Cadence's fond smile widening, Twilight pulling into herself and groaning.

"It's so... real. Accurate. Candid. It's more like a photograph than a painting."

Luna nodded. "It was a practice invented by a painter five hundred years after my... indiscretion." The same cocktail of emotions that I'd seen more than once before now; guilt, regret, sadness. "The painter would use a spell, or enchanted pencils if they were a pegasus or earth pony, which would allow them to sketch an image almost like a photograph on the canvas. Truly a moment caught in time, the predecessor to the cameras that would come later, allowing life and movement to be caught when normally it would be so difficult. Thus, emotion and reaction, in the moment."

We stood there a few moments longer, gazing at the complex painting, before we moved on down the hall and towards the other end.

There, far opposite the elevator doors, was a single door in the very center of the wall. Heavy doors nearly exactly like the ones that sealed the main entrance to the facility upstairs guarded the entrance, sealed against any intrusion, with a control panel set in the wall to one side. A quick swipe of my admin card and a few key presses, and the doors ground open, allowing us to step through.

This time, it seemed almost like a reception area, with large double doors making some sort of entrance on the far side. Off to the opposite end of a reception desk was a number of elevator doors that were rather unlike the ones that we had just passed through, being that they seemed less... solid. Weaker.

The desk was coated in dust that had gathered in drifts like snowfall, piled up against the short wooden wall that made the outside end of it. The wood itself was withered and slightly rickety, with the entire desk looking as if it would collapse into dust at the slightest of touches, perhaps due to the environment that it was exposed to. Given that, I was mildly impressed that the paintings had held out so well- then again, all Equestrian art pieces seemed remarkably durable, given that some of the tapestries that had adorned the hall behind us were ones that looked remarkably like ones that had hung in the old castle in the Everfree Forest. Actually, come to think of it... we should probably visit that at some point. I turned towards Luna, intent on mentioning this to her, then closed my mouth and tilted my head as I realized she was standing stock still in the exit doors. Curious, I walked up and leaned through, and froze myself.

A huge, circular tunnel lay on the outside of the door. The ceiling was so high that the dim emergency lighting that provided the only light in the space didn't reach entirely to the top, not on its own, but that didn't matter for the simple fact that the entire tube was constructed of glittering crystal.

Light conducted up the insides of the walls, shining through a million facets and faces, shimmering and glittering, managing to make even the faint emergency lights do at least a passable job of illuminating the space. I guessed that the tube went up perhaps two hundred feet, pure crystal walls reaching up to support a vaulted ceiling inlaid with huge lights, twenty feet long and completely dark in their unpowered state.

Below where we stood on a raised balcony, the bottom of the tube was flattened with a thick layer of concrete, evening the space large enough to fit a six lane highway and then some. In fact, from the look of the lines, it WAS a six lane highway, clearly drawn painted lines indicating six lanes on either side of a short median.

I slipped by Luna and stepped out into the room, walking out onto a walkway of glass and steel that crossed the gigantic tube, looking about in awe. Above my head, what looked to be monorail tracks were suspended in the direct center of the tube itself, four tracks in total with steel supports reaching down to plunge themselves into the median. My eyes traced the tracks down the tube, and I balked as I realized that the tube was sealed with a giant wall of steel and concrete. On closer inspection, the construction was actually a pair of doors, one for the highway and one for the tracks, set into a wall of concrete and sealed tight. A glance behind me confirmed that the same thing was present on the opposite side.

"What... is this? How...?" This was... incredible. Beyond anything that I'd seen in the show, reminding me of those few fics that mentioned the long-lost Age of Wonders- and even then, the marvels were constructed of concrete and steel, not crystal as this was.

"Rockwyrms." The word had been whispered, almost in reverence, and as I looked back at Luna, that seemed to be the best description of her expression. She seemed to spend a moment to compose herself to some degree, then hesitantly step farther into the space, continuing, "there was but one true civilization on this continent before the founding of Equestria and the uniting of the three tribes, an empire that stretched back millenia, and cared not for the petty squabbles and intrigue of the surface world above. They... were the Rockwyrms. Great, serpent-like beings, divinely noble in bearing- the dragons were a poor reflection, a fallen remnant of this elder species. They could grow crystal and were attuned to it such that 'twas part of their very bodies, and they constructed great and sweeping wonders that dwarf anything any other species created before or since. Canterlot is built upon the mountain that was once their capital, the crystals part and parcel to a gigantic, mountain-sized, autonomously self-repairing supercomputer."

"They built... this?"

She nodded, eyes wide, taking in the modifications to the tunnel itself. "Their great tunnels of crystal radiated out from their capital in straight lines, linking their array of cities together. They carried not just those of their species, but data, electricity..."

"Data? They had a data network?" I swept my eyes over the interior of the tunnel, fascinated- I could see parts where the crystals, instead of forming the common faceted surface, appeared to have been encouraged to form clear tube-like sections on the outside of the walls, arranged in bundles like fiber optics.

Another nod. "Each city was a... a computing node, in a network. Individual crystal matrices accessed the network, with the nodes handling communication and data storage."

"Personal computers, server arrays..." I whispered to myself. 

This civilization, these Rockwyrms, they'd been a digital age civilization. They had built incredible communications infrastructure that rivaled the infrastructure of human society, though I doubted that they had any sort of orbital network. Incredibly advanced science had driven them, that was obvious just from looking around... and yet, the space was modified for pony use. They'd never shown up in the show, but I wasn't sure that exactly meant anything: after all, the world had hardly burned to the ground, excluding the alternate realities. Still, there was no above-ground evidence of them... "What happened to them?"

"Plague." Luna's voice was grim. "The same network and easy transport that allowed their civilization to reach unheard-of heights made sure that a disease that was perfectly adapted to their crystal-organic hybrid bodies spread far and wide before they even realized what had happened. Nine in ten had died, and many that remained were sterile... they lived long, and their systems were so redundantly built that they could maintain themselves, but there were simply not enough of them left after the absolute reaping of their species." Luna's eyes turned inwards, to memory, once again. "There were a bare few left, when we arrived... by that time, there was naught we could do. Their last few remnants entrusted us with what was left, the secrets of their species, wanting not to be forgotten by time." Luna blinked, shaking her head, then looked up at me with some amount of confusion and fear in her eyes. And... and something else... sadness, and guilt. "We... we did not remember this... none of it. We had forgotten it all. As if it had never existed."

Her wings ruffled, feathers standing up straight. I stepped closer to her side, placing a hand on her wing, feeling the muscles tense under my fingers. I kept it there, waiting as her muscles slowly relaxed and slackened, and she took a deep breath.

"I promised. I promised them myself." She whispered. "I promised that I would never forget them."

"It's not your fault." I whispered back. She simply shook her head in response, but I kept my hand on her anyway until she pushed it off. I stepped back, giving her space, trying to hide the concern I felt.

I fell into step behind her as she trotted forward and out onto the bridge crossing the center of the large, open space, pausing when she stopped at a random piece of railing and turned towards it. I had to quickly suppress a giggle when, despite the somber atmosphere, she turned and placed her muzzle on the railing itself and planted her rear on the concrete floor with a sigh. I scratched the underside of my chin and cleared my throat to cover the sound, feeling a flicker of annoyance as I felt the beginnings of stubble there.

The space was dead silent but for our breathing, and the faintest humming from the lights. It was like a great crystal and steel cathedral, majestic and awe-inspiring, flashing and shimmering in every hue of the rainbow. Every little sound echoed up to the ceiling and down to the floor, and I found myself making tiny sounds just to hear them reverberate throughout the closed chamber.

"I wonder what this place sounded like when it was active, cars blazing through on the highway, trains flying through above..."

She snorted. "Deafening, probably."

"What!?" I yelled, cupping a hand around my ear and frowning in mock concentration. She snorted again, louder, and whacked me with a wing, causing me to let out an indignant "Ow! Meanie!"

"Can you not resist being a dork for five seconds?" She was trying her best to look and sound exasperated, but I could see the corner of her mouth twitching upward out of the corner of my eye. I smiled lightly.

"Nah... you being sad would hurt my delicate constitution. It's an entirely self-centered effort."

She shook her head. "Dork."

I grinned. "Sad sack." 

She pressed a hoof to her chest, looking anguished. "Ohhhh, you have wounded me!"

I snorted in response, and she jerked her head up, letting out a laugh, and I couldn't help adding one of my own. The sound rebounded and echoed throughout the crystal space, bouncing back and forth like the laughter of an auditorium as we traded insult after insult, growing gradually more ridiculous as we went on. 

"Crack-hoof."

"Dinkleburg."

"Poser."

"Skeef."

"Fl- wait, what is a 'skeef'?"

I leaned back, frowning. "You know, my uncle Jimmy was always too wrapped up in his tirades against the evils of the government to explain that one... I always just thought that it was some obscure northern expression."

Luna, shaking slightly in surpressed laughter, waved a wing. After a little time composing herself, she finally said, "I think 'tis about time we declare a cease-fire 'fore we have more casualties, such as our sides."

"Agreed. A cease-fire it is, ma'am!" I offered my hand, wide grin on my face. Luna, in exchange, extended her wing and, after just a moment's hesitation, I took and shook it.

"Besides... we do not want to dawdle about here forever, do we now?"

I nodded. "Definitely. We've got far too much to do, and too little daylight to do it during already."

This time, I didn't trail behind; we walked side by side back to, and through the reception area, into the hallway back to the elevator.
> XVI: Notes
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The ride back up to the ground floor in the elevator thankfully lacked any of the awkwardness lurking just at the corner of our visions, most likely because both of us were united in our attempt to ignore it for as long as physically possible. Sadly, reality ensued: elevator rides can't last forever, and both I and Luna were very aware of the fact that we'd agreed to compare notes after all this was done. Thus, we exited the lift and stepped into the hall in silence.

Luna shuffled nervously as I adjusted the strap on my rifle, both of us exchanging a glance before we stepped together in unison, down the hall and towards one of the meeting rooms closer to the thick bulkhead of steel that was the entrance to the facility proper. A quick swipe of my admin access card was all we needed to get through and into the same room we'd used earlier in the day.

Nothing had been moved in the time that we'd been gone, and part of me felt very silly about the fact that I felt the urge to check and make sure. Still, given Luna's attempt to do the same, it seemed that the both of us had more or less the same idea: hopefully postpone a grim discussion of the state of the world outside for just a few seconds more. After all, there wasn't exactly a whole lot of positive points to go over when we finally sat down.

And sat down we did, after we'd exhausted our possible excuses and both of our practical sides sighed and agreed in wordless unison that there we were wasting time, when there were important things that needed doing. Like before, we took seats on opposite sides of the table, as I took the stylus for the screen in front of my seat and slotting it behind my ear, Luna taking hers and spinning it in midair. 

"So." I said, awkward and clunky. I really wasn't sure where we could possibly begin, and some part of me hoped that Luna, with over a thousand years of experience on her side, would be able to fill in the gap and start the conversation on her own.

"So..." she replied, tapping her hooves together. It was only at that moment that, to my chagrin, I remembered that that last thousand years had been spent with her entirely alone on the moon but for an egotistical despot of a spirit. 

In retrospect, leaving the starting of what was going to be an incredibly painful conversation to the pony who was famed primarily for her antisocial and isolationist tendencies and portrayals probably wasn't the best decision. If I was being honest with myself, it was probably about as good an idea as handing the position of party planner to Twilight Sparkle, or tasking Pinkie with arranging a funeral. It looked like I'd have to be the one to buckle down and get the ball rolling, and I weakly tried to assure myself that it would be much easier once things got started. Which it would. Probably. Hopefully.

I took a deep breath. Here went nothing.

"So... the timer."

I saw the relief flicker across Luna's face, and I realized that she'd most likely been expecting me to broach a far more painful subject. Probably her own current mental state, given my promise that our conversation hadn't been over.

"Well, we doth- do have some information about it, thankfully. We hath slightly less than a week to figure out what it is and what it counts down to, which should be adequate, if we are sufficiently expedient."

I nodded, my own expression of relief matching Luna's. I pushed my chair back and stood, beginning to pace back and forth before the large screen that formed the wall behind me.

"Yeah, we at least have somewhere to start with it. We know that it started when you were released from stasis, for example- specifically, when I engaged your release. We know that the timer itself shows up in two locations in this place."

"The stasis room and the room with the crystal towers, correct?" I nodded once, and Luna brought her stylus down on the surface before her.

Words appeared on the screen behind the head of the long meeting table in clear, slightly-Gothic script as she applied her stylus to the job. TIMER was written out in larger letters, a line drawn beneath the single word, and then, in smaller script and with bullet points, she began filling in what little information we had. Occasionally, between words, she'd stop and tap the stylus against her muzzle with her magic, eyes slightly narrowed in thought.




APPEARED WHEN STASIS DISENGAGED

TIMER ITSELF APPEARS IN STASIS ROOM & CRYSTAL TOWER ROOM (POWER RELAY?)

TIMER DISPLAYED ON LOCKED TERMINAL IN POWER CRYSTAL ROOM (PASSWORD NEEDED? BIOMETRIC LOCK?)




I blinked at the second listed option. "Equestria has biometric locks?" Luna gave me a slightly surprised and confused look.

"Of course we do. There are not many better ways of securing high-level systems or information than a lock that cannot... be fooled..." suddenly, Luna dropped her forehead to the table's surface, uttering a deep and frustrated groan. "Again, we did it again... information floating about in our brain, like dust through a damn net. We're just scraping what residue sticks to the strands. Ugh."

I sighed... this was going to be harder than I'd first thought, if I was going to have to pull Luna out of a funk every time something triggered a memory or some new fragment of information. Gently, I tapped the table, drawing her attention back to me, managing to at least get her to lift her head enough to switch from what must have been an incredibly uncomfortable position with her forehead pressed to her screen to a more comfortable one. She flumped her head back onto the table, sighing, table now underneath her head. At least her muzzle was pointed at me instead of her chest: I had no doubt that that position would have quickly become painful, which wouldn't have helped either of us.

"Luna, look, at least you remembered something- and hey, it could be something useful!"

"We do not see what hay has to do with it." she muttered grumpily, but I ignored her and carried on.

"So, the terminal itself is locked. Given that it seems to be the control or diagnostics system for the room that it's placed in, and given that it's the second place the timer appears in, of course it has to have something to do with it. We just need to figure out what, exactly, that correlation could mean."

She blinked, sitting up in her chair a bit, lifting her muzzle from the table. "Well... given that those crystals are typically used to manage power, from what we- I remember, it very well may have something to do with the power of this facility."

"Okay, so... how is this place typically powered? Are there systems for it? I mean, it is a military facility, so I'd be surprised if it didn't have its own generator, of some kind at least. Maybe it's a timer counting down until that backup power source runs out of fuel?" My mind flickered to another specific situation that involved a big, ominous timer and a number of diesel-powered generators.

She shook her head. "No, that does not make sense. If that were the case, then why did it start with exactly one week in time just as you released me? It seems far too convenient that it had exactly one week of fuel from the exact moment of my release, after running for however long that it must have beforehoof."

I took the stylus from behind my ear, tapping it against my temple, standing in one place and staring towards the list of words at the head of the table. I glanced to the left, making a small experiment by drawing the end of the stylus across the wall screen itself, grinning as the systems registered the movement and the intention and left a mark in its wake. I moved to the front of the room, drawing an arrow from the second item on the list to another list, labelled POWER.




BACKUP GENERATORS

SYSTEM FAULT

SYSTEM FAILURE?

POWER RELAY SHUTDOWN?

POWER STATION MELTDOWN?




I considered the list, then drew a line through the first. It was a good idea to keep track of every idea, even the ones we eliminated. Luna, on the other hand, focused on the last item.

"Meltdown?" I glanced back to see her frowning at it, attempting to puzzle it out. I tapped my stylus against my open palm a couple of times, mulling over how best to put it, then spoke.

"Well... when I disabled your stasis, it informed me that disconnecting something called the 'core' was a bad idea. I'm not sure what that means, exactly, but I have some theories- one is that there's some sort of reactor somewhere, either fission or possibly fusion, that was connected to some sort of system through the stasis room, or that perhaps you were the system. I don't know if Equestrian tech was far enough to use organics as either extensions to computer systems or even AS computers, but..."

"We... do not know about that. It doesn't seem the best of ideas. Why use organics when one simply could have put in place a normal, more reliable electronic system? It seems a bad idea to use an unreliable organic version for which there is no backup when t'would be simpler and better to use a normal computer with multiple backups." She tilted her head thoughtfully. "Though... perhaps it was jerry-rigged, when the facility was abandoned, and the systems fed through the same computer systems that managed mine stasis? Or perhaps my release caused some sort of surge that damaged systems?"

I nodded, pointing to the FAULT and FAILURE options. "That's what I was thinking, too. Something about what I did when I released you affected other systems in the facility, and it might make sense that the stasis was either such a major system or that it drew so much power that its disconnection caused chaos with the rest of the system." I let out a sigh of frustration and started pacing again. "But, if that's the case, why didn't someone plan for that? I don't think a military facility is just going to be cut down by one little power surge, no matter how big it is- there's gotta be backups, failsafes, surge protectors, circuit breakers. A surge like that could take out the entirety of the combat capacity of the whole base."

Luna was scribbling all this down rapidly, adding her own notes as she went. Words were slowly filling out the wall screen, and Luna was trying to write smaller in order to conserve the space. In the middle of writing out the last part, she paused, looking up and making eye contact with me.

"It also doth not make sense that it should have such a delay, if that were truly what were happening. Would it not have been instant, if it had been a power surge? Would we not be beset with warnings and alarms? Why the delay? And, even if we were to accept that there might be a delay as the systems fall apart, we still could not accept that said delay would be as long as an entire seven days, nor that somepony thought ahead to build systems to set up a specific timer. And why in the stasis room? Why not everywhere, or just in the crystal room?"

I made a frustrated noise, nearly throwing the stylus at the wall screen, refraining from throwing it just at the last minute, clenching my hand over and over instead.

"That's the frustrating part! We don't know what the builder's intentions were for any of this, for anything- we just don't know what they were thinking, why they did what they did. Why did they make the timer? Why seven days? What was this facility for? Why is Twilight's castle sealed with that crystal stuff? Why did they build so much into the underground tubes? Why did they put you in stasis? None of it makes sense, and there's not even some sort of helpful manual, not even a 'hello people of the future, our thoughts were this'!" I flopped down in my chair, folding my arms on top of the table and dropping my head onto them. "None of it makes sense, and there isn't a bit of instruction or documentation anywhere, and what little we found doesn't help us. Water systems? Hydroponic facilities? How does that help us now, when we're trying to figure it out and we're on the clock?"

"There... is one more possible place, that neither you nor I have checked- well, that is, you have checked it, but you were there only for a specific purpose." Luna drummed the table with her hooves as I looked at her, seeming nervous. "The administrative offices may have... some sort of documentation, informing us about the facility or what's going on."

I lifted my head a little, considering it. The offices had not exactly been in the best way when I had explored them: there had been dust everywhere, without the circulation and filtration systems of the facility to eliminate it from the air. Water damage, age, exposure and what sunlight had managed to get through the windows and into the room inside had no doubt taken their tole on the fragile paper documents there. Still... there had been filing cabinets, and there might be document safes, given that this place seemed to be rather high priority, what with being built directly under the castle of Twilight Sparkle and being chosen to house Princess Luna herself in stasis. The only issue with that idea was...

"The tarwolves."

Luna winced, hooves drumming a little faster for a moment. "Yes, that... that would be our concern as well. It is prime territory for us to be ambushed, given that it did not appear to have another exit save the windows, which would reveal our locations in a rather loud way, should we choose to use them. I have no doubt that you do not wish to be trapped between a rock and a hard place more than we are, and thus, we would either have to have some sort of alarm, or have one of us sitting on the roof and keeping watch."

I laced my fingers, narrowing my eyes and thinking it through. "Well, there are those watchtowers, and you do have both wings and a sniper rifle..."

"That is what we were thinking, that we should ascend with our wings and keep overwatch... the primary issues with that plan are communications, and what to do if the 'tarwolves' follow us back to the facility."

I waved a hand. "The first is easy enough, I bet we can locate some short-range two-way earpieces that fit both of us. The second... the second is the rub." I looked hopefully at Luna. "Maybe... Equestria was advanced enough to have automated turrets?"

Luna, to my disappointment, merely grimaced and shook her head. 

"We do not remember whether there are such devices or not, but we have our doubts about their possible existence. Firstly, how would one prevent them from targeting those that they are meant to protect with one hundred percent assuredness? And besides that, if they had solved that issue and had introduced them, why are there no turrets of that sort here, defending this facility? Why was that Tarwolf that attacked us not greeted with automated fire? We believe it is more likely that such a thing doth not exist."

"Ugh..." I rolled the stylus back and forth a little. "Then, what do we do?" I caught the stylus, sketching out a basic representation of the garage, security checkpoint and facility entrance. "Obviously the entrance to the facility itself is a chokepoint, it was designed that way, but a chokepoint assumes that we have the bodies to actually hold and defend it during a withdrawal into the safety of the facility itself. We've got two people, and each of us needs to be out there, way beyond the choke point, for this to work."

"Mm. Maybe..." Luna spun her stylus a few times in the air, then began sketching things of her own. "Maybe we can have a look at the vehicle in the garage. Perhaps it has a weapons attachment? If so, then we could simply seal the entrances to the garage, ensure that we can close the main vehicle door remotely, then park the vehicle itself just outside."

I tilted my head, blinking a little as I watched her draw and sketch. 

"It's... yeah, that's not a bad idea. There's decent lines of sight in every direction from there, and it'd be like fighting with your back to a wall, but with the option of retreat. If you could warn me, take a few out at long range to buy time, then fly down and man the turret... you could keep them off long enough for me to get out of there and get across the courtyard."

Luna nodded seriously. "Once you have returned, we may pull the vehicle back inside the garage and seal the door. While it may not keep them off forever, it should be more than enough to delay them until we can run back and seal the bulkhead door." She grinned. "We very much doubt that even they could get through that."

I grinned back, nodding. It really was a good idea, probably the best that we could do in this situation with just two people... Luna really was living up to her mentioned reputation as a tactician. I was actually happy with that, that we might be able to pull something out that could give us some answers about this place, about what was going on, answers that Luna and I both were eager to have.

"So! Planning done, brainstorming over..." My smile faded a bit, my eyebrows creasing. "But... I don't know if it's the best idea to do it now. We spent a lot of today down exploring the lower parts of the facility, and it must be getting towards night..."

Luna nodded, jumping down from her chair and trotting around the near end of the table, stretching her wings with a number of small pops.

"We have at least a little time, and I have no desire to risk life and limb simply because we thought that we should rush this faster... however, I would not like to simply waste what time we have." She raised her eyebrows at me, looking slightly cheeky. "Any brilliant plans for us? We believe we have used up a bit too much of our genius plan master ability today."

I huffed good-naturedly, spinning in my chair and smoothly stepping forward and out just a bit too fast for her to react, unprepared as she was. My finger, outstretched booped her right at the end of her snout, causing her to jerk backward and scrunch her muzzle in shock. I laughed aloud, but slowly petered out when a look of horror spread across her face. Warily, I shuffled a little farther from the table to clear my path of chairs and readied myself, glancing back and forth.

"What is it? What did you...?"

Slowly, she raised her eyes to meet mine, then spoke slowly and seriously. "In our culture, to boop a pony's nose... is to propose... marriage."

I jerked back, eyes going wide. "You don't- you're not-" At that moment, I noticed the spark of mischief in her gaze, and I narrowed my eyes. "Oooohhh, you little brat. You're screwing with me, aren't you?"

In response, Luna grinned wide and darted out of the room, calling behind her, "mayhaps we are, mayhaps we're not!" Just before she ducked out the door, she gave me a simpering, hurt pout. "Are we truly so unattractive to thee that marriage horrifies thee so? Oh, we must appear the most ungainly and ugly of beasts to thee!" she exited the room with me hot on her heels, laughing aloud. "For shame, sir, for shame! Wounding an innocent filly's heart so, promising eternal matrimony and withdrawing it just as swift!"

"Innocent filly my ass, you dirty old mare!"





Flick.

"Please stop that."

"Nope~"

Flick.

"This is entirely unfair. We demand a fair trial of our peers."

"Don't see anybody but me, and you did make me something of a peer when you told me I didn't have to call you 'princess'. So... guilty!"

I flicked Luna's nose again, cheeky grin on my face to match the one she'd worn just a few minutes ago. She sneezed this time, wings spread and tail flicking in frustration. She took a moment of blinking to recover from the sudden sneeze, which I used to coo at how adorable she was, causing her to floof up and attempt to bypass me once again, which I blocked with another flick.

There was only one way down, we both knew this. Luna had attempted to get to it first, close the doors and laugh her victory all the way down to the public level, while I'd have to wait for her to leave and for the elevator to come back to my level when I called it. However, she'd forgotten the the elevator required my admin keycard, which lead us to where we were now- her attempting to get by me and at the card that I held in my off hand, out of the line of sight needed for her telekinesis, and me flicking her right in the nose every time she did, causing her to rear back and retreat. Every time this repeated itself she fluffled up a little more. I was hoping, by some miracle of alicorn magic, that she'd eventually start resembling Fluffle Puff, at which point I'd whip out my phone and take a picture which I could then set as my lock screen and use to mess with her nigh infinitely.

Unfortunately, Luna had clearly had enough of my antics, as she simply picked me up bodily with magic and held me in midair, grinning in triumph. "Ha! Now the shoe is on the other hoof!"

I struggled in midair for a few moments, trying to reach a handhold and pull myself back to the ground or simply try to airswim my way out of Luna's TK, wishing the entire time that I had the magic nullification exhibited by so many humans that went to Equestria. Eventually, however, I went limp and sighed deeply in defeat, holding out the card, which Luna plucked from my hand before setting me down to sulk.

Still, we stepped into the elevator together, me following just in her hoofsteps, arms crossed. 

"It's not fair if you can just pick me up with magic."

"Well, life is truly filled with injustices, is it not? Such a tragedy."

I narrowed my eyes at her as the elevator dinged, indicating that we'd reached our destination, and the doors slid open again. "Somehow, I feel like you don't actually sympathize with my plight."

She raised her eyebrows at my gaze. "Oh, now, what could possibly make you feel that way?" With that parting shot, she pranced through the open elevator doors- actually pranced, her hooves light and a wide grin stretching her muzzle. I grumbled, then called after her.

"You know that I"m going to get you back, right?"

"Worth it!" She replied from out in the hall. I grumbled to myself again about spoiled, bratty alicorn princesses that always get their ways, then followed along.
> XVII: Transmission
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I folded my arms, frowning. Luna sat besides me, having magically cleared a space from the dust and grime of decades- and the layer of oil beneath that. The object of our focus sat before us, an ancient jeep-like vehicle caked in dust, digital camo paint barely visible beneath the layer of gray-brown, all lights dark, seats moldered beyond use and the obvious heavy weapon mount in the back conspicuously empty.

"The good news is, we do not believe that they would store the weapons too far from the vehicles themselves- perhaps even here, in the same building." Luna said, tail flicking in thought.

I nodded and shrugged. "Yeah, wouldn't make sense if they couldn't quickly deploy vehicle support in the event of an attack. Not that they appeared to have been anyway, given that this vehicle's here and the other is embedded in a building out there, but..."

Luna hummed, then stood and trotted away, rifle sweeping the room with its tac-light. "It may be in a locker along one of the walls. If you would...?"

"Don't worry, I'm on it." I turned and stepped towards the other side of the building, sweeping my own rifle-mounted light over the cobwebs covering the walls, and the mechanical detritus pushed up against them.

There was a surprising amount of junk around, most of which appeared to be sections of old vehicles and bits and pieces shorn off of various things. Some of it was what appeared to be sections of armour, indented or wrecked in some way or another, some even rent by what looked to be claws that left shallow clefts in the thick metal. That was... concerning. My light lingered on it as I put out a finger, feeling the razor-sharp jagged edges and wondering what the hell could have done this to an armoured panel.

"Matt! Over here!"

I turned my head, then hissed as the edge caught my finger, leaving a mark of crimson marring the mottled grey and black of the armour panel. 

"Hell." I muttered to myself, holding the finger gently and giving the metal a dirty look. I winced as even that caused a spark of pain, a bit of blood dripping down onto the floor and making a small mark of wet crimson amongst the grey dust.

"Matt! Are you coming!?"

"Coming!" I said. I gave the armour plate another look, then turned away, walking towards where Luna was pointing her rifle at a locker recessed into the wall. "Piece of metal cut me."

"Mm?" she glanced at my fingertip. "Big foal, it is barely noticeable." 

Luna looked away, but her horn lit up, and a slight aura of blue appeared around my fingertip. I watched, fascinated, as the little cut zipped itself up, blood drawing itself back into the wound before it sealed, leaving no evidence that it had ever been. I flexed it, running my fingertips across the place where the little cut had just been.

"Neat. Do you perform at parties?"

"Pff... focus, Matt."

I waved my freshly healed hand. "Alright, alright... what do we have here?"

Luna shone her light over the locker, and I got my first good look at it. Hard steel, reinforced with thick welding and bars, made up two segmented sliding doors, held shut at the center with an electronic lock with a small blue light that pulsed gently, though it was nearly invisible in the flashlight's beam. The lock itself had a card reader attached to it, which came for me with some large amount of relief. At least this wouldn't be difficult. Wordlessly, I slid the admin passcard out of my pocket, swiping it through the reader. The lock let out a soft beep and released, the seal letting out a slight hiss of escaping air.

"Thank you," Luna muttered softly, the doors lighting up blue with her magical aura and sliding to both sides, hiding themselves in the walls. "Hopefully, the weapons are not unduly affected by their disuse and neglect."

As the steel slid away, it revealed a number of shining steel barrels and racks of heavy crates- these were true machine guns, barrels as long as my arm. I brushed my finger against one of them, then drew it away, rubbing the tip against my thumb.

"Well, there's no dust... and the seal was holding, if that hiss was any indication. I think they might be okay, though... they might need servicing." I stepped back, wiping my finger on my pants and muttering, "I'm honestly surprised that any of this stuff still works."

Luna frowns in concentration, glancing up and away, trying to dredge up some scrap of memory. "I believe that... perhaps, we may have purposefully designed them with durability and longevity in mind."

"We being...?" I prodded gently. Luna let out a huff of frustration.

"It is certainly not the royal 'we'. I believe that I may have been involved in the design at some juncture, but I do not remember who was involved with the project or why- or even if there indeed was a project, and this was not just a singular effort by myself and no other." Her aura wrapped itself around the sniper rifle still strapped to her back, tugging it and pulling at the woven strap. "However... I believe that I designed this. Custom forged."

I put a comforting hand on her shoulder, which she acknowledged with a flick of her ear, then I leaned down to get a better look at one of the long weapons. "So, what's the deal with these, then? Do you know how to operate one, affix it to the, uh... tripod... thing?" Could never remember what those were called...

"Weapon mount. And yes, we... I do know how to operate it." She floated one out, pulling the bolt back slightly, perhaps to test its movement. "Belt fed heavy machine gun, mark seven of its line. Meant for technicals and light armour vehicles. Compatible with one length ammunition."

"Wait, uh... what length?"

She looked at me in confusion, then realization dawned. "Ah... Equestrian measurements. There are ten lengths in a hoof, thousand hooves to the kilohoof."

"How long's a hoof, then?"

"Mm... about this long." The image of a ruler drew itself in midair.

"Looks like... about, what... half a foot? Yeah, more or less." I frowned as I did some quick arithmetic in my head, then raised my eyes. "A length is a little more than half an inch... that's a big freaking bullet." Luna simply nodded grimly, sliding out one of the boxes slotted between the gun racks. Closer inspection revealed it to be one of the ammo boxes that attach to the sides of belt-fed guns.

"I believe that, on larger armoured vehicles and the occasional APC, they were mounted in pairs. It was... necessary, though I do not remember why."

I sucked in a breath. "That... doesn't sound like good news."

Luna shook her head, looking grim. "No, no it does not." She turned her gaze back to the weapon in her magical grasp as she turned away from the locker, trotting towards the vehicle filling one of the two places for parking in the garage. "Remember that... thing? The, ah, 'tarwolf' as you put it?"

I nodded, covering my mouth. "Durable. Durable as hell. I can just imagine a pack, a swarm..." 			

Another nod as she lifted the gun into place on its swivel. A number of small clicks sounded from the mount itself as the gun slid down onto it, and a final, solid 'chunk' noise as Luna flicked a mechanical lever that I assume locked the weapon in place. Now firmly settled in its mount, the long-barreled solid piece of steel was intimidating, and strong. And yet, by all evidence, dozens, hundreds, perhaps THOUSANDS of these weapons hadn't been enough to stem the tide.

Suddenly, I was perhaps feeling a little religious.

The hatch on the top of the gun hinged open, Luna lifting an ammunition box into place, pulling out the first round of the belt and slotting it into place. She made a few mechanical checks, which I couldn't make sense of, then closed the hatch and worked the bolt. The mechanism clicked, and she gave a satisfied nod.

"Primed. The only issue with this plan is whether or not the weapon will actually fire, given that the seals were not as good as the others... but I shall simply dump a few assault rifles into the vehicle and make do best as I may, if worst comes to worst."

"Probably for the best..." Luna simply made a sound that I divined as her agreeing with me. "So, gun's mounted, loaded and about as ready as it could be- what's next?"

"Next, I check the engine- the environment this vehicle has been kept in is dubious relative to the practically museum-level preservation that the objects within the facility itself would have been stored in. However, given that the inside of this garage is sealed and at least moderately cool and dry, I am confident that it may be restored to working condition with only some work. If we find ourselves lacking in parts, I have no doubt that repositories exist elsewhere within this facility, and if we are truly desperate for components... well, there is the wreck outside, even if it may be weather worn to a degree."

I hummed. "You know, that's something I've been wondering about."

Luna gave me a glance over her shoulder as she moved towards the front of the vehicle, one eyebrow raised. "Oh? And what would that be, pray tell?" I stepped around the vehicle, following in her hoofsteps, arms folded for lack of anything better to do with them. The gesture earned an uncertain glance from Luna before she turned her attention back to the ground before her.

"Well... Equestria has motor vehicles." 

I hesitated a little, uncertain if I should broach the subject of my inexplicable knowledge of the ponies being derived from a show, a work of fiction. I doubted that Luna had actually noticed the couple of comments that didn't quite line up, but I knew that now wasn't exactly the time. We had other things to focus on, and it wasn't as if my show-based knowledge would really assist us, not here in this Equestria that only bore vague similarity to the one of the show. I pursed my lips, then decided to tuck that little bombshell away for the foreseeable future.

"That's rather like my world, in fact, which has vehicles that operate by way of internal combustion engines burning processed liquid fuel. I'm curious how your world might differ."

Her light blue mane swished in the air as she looked back at me, both eyebrows raised this time and curiosity written into her expression. "Truly? Intriguing... liquid fuel was something that was considered, but was, in the end, deemed to not be what we sought."

"Oh, yeah?"

"Mm. The simple fact of the matter was that we had deposits of liquids that had been demonstrated to have the capability of being refined into an array of relatively effective fuels, but in the end it came down to a matter of infrastructure. We were fighting... something, I cannot quite recall it, but we were fighting and we needed vehicles now. We would have to build the infrastructure for such a network of internal combustion vehicles from scratch, and it was deemed to be far too much of an investment of time and resources to be useful. This, however..."

She clopped to a stop, right in front of the front of the car. Magic lit up the latches on either side of the hod, popping them and pulling the sheet of metal up, revealing... I blinked. In the center of the engine area itself, where one would expect the engine block to be on a traditional Earth car, there was instead a circular apparatus that occupied the entirety of the space. It looked rather like what fusion reactors are portrayed as most commonly in science fiction, a circular ribbed tube with fins and small pipes covering the entire piece of metal. The tubes ran to a carburetor at the front, placed right behind a fan obviously meant to circulate air through the front grill, over the carburetor and through the engine area, then vent the heat out.

In the center of the circular divide, there was a bundle of wires and boxes, all surrounding a central lid that was covered with black and yellow hazard markings- DO NOT REMOVE POWER SOURCE DURING MOTION, ENSURE EQUIPMENT IS COMPLETELY INACTIVE BEFORE EJECTING POWER SOURCE, and similar warnings were written along with the markings in small, precise lettering, stamped into the steel itself. Luna depressed a button labelled OPEN CONTAINMENT HATCH, and the circular lid popped open.

"Do you think you could shine the light into the hole? I am afraid that I need to see what is within."

"Oh, uh... sure." I put the rifle on safe, then removed the flashlight attachment from the rail it was clipped to, shining it into the aperture.

Inside was another mess of tangled wires, all poked through what appeared to be some sort of containment vessel made of grey steel. Something seemed to be down there, visible behind a steel handle that was just below the space where the hatch had just been, something that seemed to be a sooty black- though I couldn't properly get a light on it. Luna clicked her tongue in mild aggravation. 

"Hm. It certainly does look as if we shall have to remove the power core in order to ascertain its condition." 

Without another word, she depressed the other button, labelled EJECT POWER CORE. The engine made a loud CHUNK as the handle that I'd spied through the hole jumped up. Luna's aura surrounded the handle itself, where it seemed to be coated in black rubber specifically, and twisted it ninety degrees until it let out a faint click, and she began drawing the core out. What slid out of the engine was purple crystal, a cylindrical chunk as long as my entire forearm from the tip of my fingers to my elbow, coated in black soot and riddled with cracks. Luna made another clicking sound.

"It is completely fried. The vehicle will not operate, period, until we replace the core and connect it to a power source."

"So, what exactly is this thing, then?"

Luna gently set the 'core' aside, leaving it on a rack obviously meant for specifically that purpose. "The core of a vehicle is where the power is stored. Equestrian vehicles utilize electric motors, one to each wheel- it was judged that this option was the superior choice, due to the fact that we, as a nation, already had highly efficient electrical power generation and transportation built under our hooves. We can thank the crystal dragons for that."

I gestured to the core. "That's something like a battery, then?" Luna nodded.

"More or less. This one, however, has been overloaded and fried- this is what the containment vessel is for. When one of these cores of sufficient size overloads, it releases all the energy it has stored as it shatters, which can cause an explosion. The core containment grabs this energy before it can cause undue mischief, then shunts what it has into banks of supercapacitors that are built into the containment itself for this very situation, then locks down the core to prevent any resulting core shards from injuring any vehicle crew..." She trailed off, then snapped her gaze to me, laser focused. "I worked with Twilight on this."

"Wh-what?"

"Twilight, and I- we designed this together! I remember, we spent long hours in an energy lab with teams of scientists- ah, though Twilight was perhaps more involved in the project than I was, given that I was spending the majority of my time running the nation..." she shook her head. "Regardless, Twilight did much of the work that allowed such a mechanical apparatus to exist. Cadence... Cadence designed the core itself, but Twilight... we made the containment."

I knelt down next to her, placing my hand on her shoulder. "What do you remember, in particular? Images? Smells? Words?"

"I remember... bits and pieces. Enough to know what we were doing, who was doing it, in a general manner... I..." her eyes glazed over, attention focused inwards, no doubt at the fragments of memory drifting through the veil that divided her mind. "She made jokes. She made quite a few jokes, trying to make light of what we were doing and why... I remember that she was so earnest, so much of the time... though she never escaped the same tension we were all under." She blinked, and looked back to me, frowning and looking slightly sad. "That is all I can recall. That, and a feeling of... disquiet."

"Don't worry. It's just another piece of the puzzle, right?" I patted her shoulder gently. "Get enough pieces together... maybe we can start getting the full picture, yeah?"

She nodded back. "I certainly hope so." She leaned on me for a moment, and I felt a twinge of worry for my... friend? Was I being premature in calling her a friend? Bleh, something else to consider later. After a few moments, she sighed, pulling her weight off of me- taking that as my cue, I pulled my arm away and stood. "Regardless of my... continually aggravating memory issues, we must find a replacement core if we wish for this vehicle to operate once again. Once we have a new core, any further problems will be easier to solve with diagnostics equipment."

I stood to my full height once again, brushing some slightly oily dust off of my knees. "Alright, where are we supposed to find something like that?"

"Mmm..." she tilted her head, "Well, vehicle cores have universal compatibility with some emergency power systems- we may have some luck, if there are parts storage closets on the maintenance level. On the other hoof, there may be parts stored on this level, and there is the spare parts storage there." She pointed with a hoof towards a locker in one corner of the large garage, unobtrusive enough that I'd missed it the last few times through here- and it had been on the side of the room that Luna had searched.

"Why not mention that first?" Her ears twitched down towards her head at my words, a grimace twisting her muzzle.

"Simply put, it was raided. The locking mechanism was melted right out of the doors by some high-intensity spell, or perhaps some sort of plasma cutter. I glanced inside when we were searching for the weapons locker, and the interior was entirely torn apart- parts scattered everywhere, and a large amount of things missing. If there are power cores in there, they may be long gone, or buried under all the mess. I would not make a bet either way."

"Ah... we split up, then?"

A nod. "It would be most efficient if I remained here, sorting through the wreckage with telekinesis, while you go down and search maintenance for emergency power cores." A small grin stretched its way across my face, and she turned her eyes on me, narrowed slightly. "What?"

"Oh, nothing, just... why don't we have a little fun? Make a game of it, just to... you know." I wiggled my hand. "I'll bet my next dessert that I find a power core before you do."

She looked contemplative. "Well... I DO like desserts... fine then, Matt, you have a deal." I grinned wider.

"Oh, I can taste that extra dessert ration already!"

"Dork." She paused a moment, considering, then pulled a black square out of her bag and threw it to me. "Here, catch."

I caught the thing in both hands, turning it over and examining it- which revealed it to be a very military-looking radio. A screen on it declared that it was set to channel five, and that it was set to use something called a RCR. The battery icon was at full charge.

"I pulled this and another from the supply room- they are set to use the facility's internal radio communications relay, and thus will continue to function regardless of intervening material between us. Keep it on, and on channel five, and each of us may call the other at any time. If you see anything suspicious, or- Faust forbid- one of those tarwolves-"

I nodded. "Radio you immediately, I get it." I smiled, "don't worry, I have my rifle, and I'm a big, strong manly man! I've got this."

She merely rolled her eyes, taking her own radio out of her bag and clipping it to the strap of her sniper rifle, which went over her shoulder. I waved to her, then retrieved my rifle from where it was leaned against the vehicle, clipping my flashlight back onto the rail it had been on before and shouldering it.

The journey back to the elevator was quick, and as I summoned it and stepped through the opening doors, I found myself in a much better mood than before- most likely because Luna had been. She'd handled this flash of remembrance much better than the others previously, and she'd recovered a whole lot faster. Maybe she was just getting better at reacting well to it, or perhaps my presence was having more of a positive reinforcing effect- either way, I was mostly just happy that she seemed a little more together than yesterday. Good progress, I thought.

The elevator dinged and I stepped through the doors, humming a little ditty under my breath, entirely pleased and in a very good mood, all things considered. I noted with a grin that the PARTS STORAGE sign painted on the water-stained concrete wall was right where it had been when Luna and I had explored this level before, and I was entirely glad to follow its direction to the right and down the hall.

I was halfway to the first turn when the lights flickered.

I glanced at the lights, perturbed- this wasn't the first sign of power failure was it? And then... and then I froze.

My eyes went wide, my breathing shallow, my rifle's strap creaking a little as my hand tightened on it. Something was behind me, I could feel its eyes staring into my back, laser focused and... angry. So angry.

And the lights went out completely.

I couldn't hear anything in the darkness, just my own breathing, my heartbeat- the sense of something, something... there, in the dark with me. Very gently, very slowly, I slid the rifle off of my shoulder, wincing at even the slightest sound that the action made. I didn't know what was here in the dark with me, but whatever it was... I couldn't shake the gut-wrenching feeling that the moment I made too much noise, it would be on me.

It took the barest moment to slide the rifle into my hands, but it felt like eternity and a half just trying to get the thing into place without a sound. My hand fumbled up the barrel, searching for the flashlight I knew was clipped there- where was it, the barrel felt like it was miles long, but my fingers finally brushed against it. I spun in place, facing the creature, flicked the light on-

I caught the barest flash, feathers, blood- white eyes, blank and yet, and yet- the flashlight flicked out.

I screamed. I ran.

The flashlight flickered in and out, I skidded around corners- it had been blocking the way to the elevators, and I needed to find a way around, but the paths led in circles and there were no coloured guiding strips. Pipes and concrete, and splashes of crimson fluid that caught the light for the barest moments as I fled down the corridor, running for all I was worth- and then I tripped.

I rolled on the concrete, making a pained sound as panic burned bright and loud inbetween my ears and in my chest, my heart hammering itself against the inside of my ribs in a frantic attempt to escape, to flee. I struggled to my feet, desperate, rifle pointed down the corridor in the direction of the... the creature.

"The first not First"

The whisper was right into my ear, right next to my head- I screamed again, whipping around, the sound deafening and the light blinding as my rifle fired into the dark at-

"Come in, Matt-  I found a power core, seems intact, and I can already taste your dessert! Over."

I glanced down at the radio, then slumped a little and pulled it off my belt. "Gotcha, I'm headed back... jerk. Over."

I glanced down the corridor- the door was only a few steps away. I'd almost made it. Giving a frustrated sigh, I clicked off my taclight and threw the rifle over my shoulder, turning around and walking back towards the elevator through the brightly lit hall.

Something metal pinged off one of my shoes, and I caught a glimpse of brass- but whatever. I was too focused on how I was going to deal with a very smug alicorn.
> XVIII: Charge
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wasn't sulking. This was especially shown in how I definitely wasn't sullenly watching Luna eat my desert across the table, and was instead examining the fresh power core next to her plate. Which she, in turn, definitely hadn't planted there to mess with me.

I grumbled something unintelligable. She responded by giving me an infuriatingly smug grin. This is just as bad as I thought it was going to be.




"So, what, we just slot the core in and it's ready to go?"

Having decided that she'd tormented me long enough, Luna had finally finished the desert, and now we were making our way back to the garage. Luna had scrounged up saddlebags full of tools, which clicked and clanked at her sides, the power core held in her magic.

"Well... not quite. This power core might be whole and functional, but they aren't stored with a charge. That means that, to reactivate the crystal and allow it to accept a charge, I must trickle charge it like so- by holding it in my magic and allow the internal mechanisms to feed off of the magical energy and convert it to stored energy contained within the crystal latices."

"So that sorta... activates them?"

She nodded, spinning the core in her magic. On one side of the core, a small indicator made of ten different small crystal lights was placed, with the first light flashing.

"This indicates that the core is charging and holding that charge. If the core was damaged or incapable of holding a charge, as they are wont to do when they are stored for long periods of time with only dregs of power in them, then it would be blinking rapidly."

I nodded, inspecting the little display. "So they keep a lot of these on-hand?" She grinned, almost vampiric in its width.

"Whole racks of them. Which I found just around the corner in the storage locker- and only most of them were gone."

I shoved her lightly, frowning. "You jerk! You knew exactly where the spare parts were stored, you even told me that they probably weren't there!" I threw my hands into the air dramatically. "I was gypped! GYPPED, I tell you!" She just laughed at my misfortune, the monster.

The large doors that sealed the bunker's entrance slid open in front of us, then closed as we stepped out- we weren't taking chances with this. Luna stepped ahead of me, trotting through the door connecting the security booth to the garage, and I followed a few steps behind, making sure to give the black stain in front of the doors a wide berth. I was neither curious or suicidal enough to go anywhere near the film of black gunk that still clung to the concrete without pressure washing it for a few hours, and maybe abrading off the top layer of concrete.

When I walked into the garage itself, Luna was already in front of the vehicle, the hood popped and the core containment lid still popped wide open. Still holding the fresh core in her magic, she picked up the burnt core still inserted into the metal holder and held it out to me.

"Can you press the release button and slide the old core out? It's perfectly safe to handle, but we need the adapter. We don't have a spare on hand."

I took the thing in my hands, and as Luna's magic receeded, I found it... surprisingly light. Even with the shattered core in place, it wasn't what I'd describe as heavy. It wasn't precisely light, it still was a frame made of metal surrounding a large crystal, but I could comfortably hold the thing up with one hand and not be straining myself. It made me wonder if it was some inherent aspect of the thing itself, or some sort of magic- perhaps Luna had left an antigravity spell on it, or somesuch? I'd have to ask later if featherweight charms were a thing.

The release button itself wasn't hard to find: it was in a shallow indent on one side of the containment vessel, recessed into the surface itself, clearly labelled as CORE RELEASE and painted with yellow and black stripes. I pressed it in with my thumb, and the entire side released with a mechanical CHUNK, internal springs pushing the door out and popping the core part of the way out. I gripped the core by a handle attached to the top of the crystal, sliding it out and holding it up to Luna. She didn't give it more than a cursory glance.

"Normal protocol would be to have a special bin for it, but at this point... just drop it anywhere. Not as if it would matter."

"Alright" I said, shrugging and putting it to one side. Luna offered the fresh core to me by levitating it over, and I nodded my thanks, taking it and sliding it into position. A push on the door clicked it back into place, the release button returning to its default, ready to release the core again. "Okay, I think it's ready."

"Excellent. Here-" her magic picked it out of my hands, inserting it back into the engine block. "It should have at least a little charge from our magic. From here, we plug it into its charger, then leave it until, say... tomorrow."

I grimaced. "A full twenty four hours? Yeesh, that's a long charge time." She shrugged.

"It is charging from one percent, or thereabouts, and thus will take hours to reach full charge capacity. At that point it will most likely be too late to do what we wish to do, and thus we will most likely need to wait until tomorrow."

"Hm." I laced my fingers, staring into the engine compartment. "Well... we don't necessarily need it at full charge, right? We're just using the vehicle as a mobile weapons emplacement, so you can continue operating the gun even as we're retreating back into the garage. So... why not charge it to, say, ten to fifteen percent and just use that?"

Luna opened her mouth to reply, then paused and closed it again, considering. "That... is quite a good point. Should only take an hour or so for it to charge to that level, and we do not truly need it to be higher than that..." She nodded. "Yes, this is an excellent idea."

I crossed my arms and grinned. "Good that you think so. I think I've sufficiently proven that I'm not an idiot ALL the time."

Luna shot me a considering glance as she trotted around to the side, flipping up a small hatch in the concrete floor and pulling out what appeared to be a power cord. She drew a few feet from a reel set into the compartment, then opened a corresponding hatch on the vehicle itself and plugged the cord in. A green light on the dashboard lit up, clearly visible through the windshield, then turned yellow.

"Well... you will excuse us if we don't quite believe it just yet."

"Wha- hey!"





"So... what do you think we'll find in there?" I said, leaning against one of the doors. Luna glanced at me, then back to the charging meter, which was currently indicating 12%.

After plugging the vehicle in, we'd stepped into it, Luna settling into the driver's side bench while I reclined as best I could on a passenger's seat that wasn't built with bipeds in mind. Mostly we were just watching the charging meter slowly tick upwards, high enough that Luna would be satisfied that we had enough for this small task and then some. There were few really solid things I could say about Luna, this Luna, and one of them was that she stepped lightly and looked where she leaped.

"Hmm..." the sound was small, almost more escape of air than something actually said, and her eyes never strayed from the crystal screen set in the dashboard. "Documents. Records. No huge revelations, most likely, but enough that we may begin to piece a shard of the larger puzzle together. Even just logistics records would be enough to give us an inkling of what went on here before... well."

I tapped my fingers against the surface of the bench underneath me, frowning. There was... something else about this, that was bothering me. The facility that we were in, that I'd woken Luna up in, was sprawling and expansive as far as subterranean bunkers went. Large amounts of rooms with impressive square footage, completely self-sufficient systems, apparently entire hydroponics sections that we hadn't explored yet and a connection to what was apprently a superhighway that stretched across the width and breadth of Equestria, and put modern highways from my home to shame. And yet...

"Why did they have the administration above ground, outside the protective umbrella of the bunker?"

Luna raised her head, staring through the windshield and out towards the garage door, as if she could see the aforementioned building through it. "This troubles us as well. Such an important portion of the base's command structure, just left out in the open where the enemy could easily get to it. Making a vulnerable target of the high ranking organizers and officers that no doubt directed this base makes little to no sense to us, and we wonder why we did it- or, even if we did order it done."

"It just doesn't make sense." I flopped over onto the bench and groaned. "So much of this situation doesn't make sense. We know that it's been thirty years since whatever it is that happened, happened, yet there's apparently been no movement or response since then. Just the Tarwolves."

"Not just that. We were placed in a stasis pod, and yet there were no others, and nor were there any other survivors. The bunker could have sealed out the Tarwolves, perhaps for years, and the hydroponics section of the bunker is apperently both self-sufficient and perfectly operational... and yet, we did not find a single scrap of evidence of any creature living in the base. No signs of struggle, no empty food rations, not even any sort of trash."

"It's... not just that. Remember when we first stepped into the barracks room?" She nodded, looking contemplative. "Well, as far as I can remember... the space wasn't lived in at all. No knick-knacks, no equipment, not even a picture of a loved one or a little bit of graffiti scrawled on the concrete. As if..."

"As if it had been created, made up to exacting military standards, then abandoned for apparently no reason." she growled, her eyes narrowed. "It does not make sense. It was as if the facility was unused... the ammunition. The only spent ammunition that we have seen was the griffon in the guard booth." My mind flashed to the bodies I'd discovered in the freezer, but... it was best to keep quiet, for the moment at least. "Like you noted, it was as if there was no fighting in the facility at all, as if it had been sealed and entirely abandoned. And yet..."

"The defensive ring. The vehicles, the weapon emplacements... all facing outwards, the trench filled with bones. As if everyone defending the town died where they stood. No retreat until there wasn't anything left of them- the town itself is untouched, nothing but time wore it down. Why? Why not run...?"

She growled, frustrated. "A bunker to their back, full of weapons and built above the best escape route they could hope for... and instead they stand their ground. Why?"

I groaned, laying back completely on the bench. "Like always, we're seeing parts of the big picture, but we don't have the puzzle pieces to make it make sense. All we can see is the result of a chain of events thirty years ago, crap left behind in the wake of whatever happened... but no answers, no solid data..."

"Well..." Luna whispered. I glanced at her, then followed her gaze to the screen, which had ticked up to thirteen. What she'd wanted for the minimum charge for this. "We suppose that we are about to find out, Faust willing."
> XIX: Retrieval
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Thirteen.” Luna sat up, telekinesis punching a number of buttons and eyes flicking across the various lights that came up. “Computer systems are good. Engines are good. Error codes… none, really… praise Faust for cool, dry, long-term storage.”

I sat up, licking my lips nervously. I drew back the bolt of my rifle, checking the chamber, patting the magazines I’d stuffed in my pockets. I thought about the tarwolf we’d killed in the entryway, how much it’d taken to put the thing down, and I wondered if a machine gun and an assault rifle were enough. There had to be more of those things out there, lurking, waiting… and they’d pounce the moment we were in the open. I didn’t doubt that.

“We do not have to do this.” I twitched my head to the side to find Luna watching me. “These things, a few documents… we can find them elsewhere. Our answers may lie in some place, but we have no indication whether that place is here.”

I hesitated, gripping the rifle closely. Then, I shook my head.

“We don’t know that they’re here. We don’t know that they’re not. We… we have to take the risk. At least, we have to try.” Luna’s face turned grave, and she nodded slowly.

She clambered off of the bench she’d been lying on, moving towards the mounted weapon and checking it over one last time. I hopped down from my seat, grabbing a box of rifle magazines and tossing it into the back, followed by a number of assault rifles- backups, in case the big gun failed, or she was unable to reload. As I picked up each rifle, I loaded a magazine into it, chambering the first round and engaging the safety, before setting it gently into a rack of sorts designed specifically for them.

“Four ought to be enough, methinks.” Luna mused, tilting the machine gun and sighting along its barrel.

“Yeah… if four aren’t enough…” I trailed off, my fists clenching nervously.

“Let us not dwell on it. If it is not enough, then we seal the doors and try again another time, with heavier weaponry.” 

Carefully, her magic extracted the charging cable from its port, tossing it to the side of the garage. The lights on the dashboard stayed lit, and after a few long seconds of staring, Luna nodded to herself.

“Core is holding its charge and not burning out. Most likely, it will at least hold for what we want to do with it.”

“I’m… not exactly familiar, here, so I guess I’ll have to take your word for it.” I offered a nervous smile to Luna, which, after a moment, she returned. “So… are we ready?”

She looked over what preparations we could make, a small grimace twisting her mouth as she did. The bare rollcage of the vehicle, the weapon mount, the exposed seats, the weapons stacked in the back… I could see what the expression was about. Not just that, I agreed with the sentiment, but-

“I do not think we can be more prepared than this.”

I nodded. The rifle’s butt pressed against my shoulder, my shoes tapping against the concrete door as I walked towards the smaller door to one side of the garage. Making a break for it across the open area of the courtyard was out of the question, not without the cover of the heavy guns the vehicle had on its back, but I could at least have a look around. Check, to make sure that none of the tarwolves were right on top of us. I shared a look with Luna as I approached the door, and she lifted the barrel of the gun, not quite pointing it at the door, before nodding for me to proceed. I took a deep breath, pointed the rifle’s muzzle, then gently opened the door and swung it wide.

One foot was all that made it to the other side of the frame- I didn’t want to be any farther out in the open, in case I’d miscalculated. Slowly, I turned my head from left to right, my eyes lingering on the crashed vehicle for just a moment before moving on.

The courtyard itself was just as empty as it had been before, a complete lack of the tarwolves in evidence. Maybe our altercation with the other one hadn’t drawn any more of them? One could hope, anyway… a hope that was rapidly dashed as I looked farther afield, beyond the fence that ringed the aboveground compound. Out there, among the hills between us and the Everfree, I saw something that made my heart rise into my throat.

Above the grass, casting it in darkness, masses of shadow with legs moved, wandering aimlessly. Every one of them moved at the same rate, though they differed in size, and every single one seemed to be simply wandering in a single direction. My presence on the outside hadn’t alerted them, nor had the sound of the door opening. However, a single thought of the heavy garage door and the rust that no doubt caked some of its mechanisms, made me swallow dryly. 

Was it really such a great idea to bring the vehicle along? Was I sure of that? Me, moving alone… I could probably make it across the courtyard to the building opposite quickly and quietly. No attention, no fuss, no tarwolves. However, the moment we pressed the open button on the garage door, I knew that every singe one of those things were going to come streaking in our direction, and I wasn’t precisely faithful in the ability of the perimeter fence to keep them out.

I ducked back behind the doorframe, holding out a hand to gently ease the door closed as I thought. Certainly, me moving on my own was going to be easier to slip by unnoticed, but that was assuming that every single one of them was beyond the fence. No backup plan, outside of a rifle that would alert them all as surely as opening the door, and the first time I fired it, they’d be all over me. So, instead of having them all over me from the start and being under the cover of a heavy machinegun the entire time, I would probably make it all the way across to the building before I engaged one at point blank and either died horribly, or killed exactly one before I attracted the attention of every one in the area.

I rubbed my hand over my face. If the garage door had been quiet, maybe we could’ve primed the pump there, kept the car and its heavy weapons in reserve in case things went south without attracting the attention of every single creature within several kilometers radius. Maybe, if we had a few weeks and an industrial ton of grease, we could lubricate the entire garage door and prevent it from making a godawful racket. 

I sighed. I could think of all the wishes and maybies that I wanted to, but it wouldn’t change our current situation, nor would it change what I thought was the best plan we had: roll the hell out, plug anything that moves, grab the documents and scoot. I approached the driver’s side of the vehicle, my shoe squeaking against the footrest as I climbed in.

“You ready?”

“Ready as I feel I shall ever be.”

I settled into the driver’s seat, casting a glance over the control panel for the vehicle. Behind a wheel that was closer to a steering yoke, probably to make it easier to operate with hooves, was a flat screen panel, on which there was merely a small battery symbol- red, with 13% sitting solidly on top of it. I licked my lips, tightening my hands around the wheel, and looked right. There, on the dash between the front benches, was a large, flat screen that was entirely off. There were a number of physical controls connected to the steering column, but the one that drew my attention was the large red button between then console screen and the wheel.

“Is that the, er… on button?” Luna leaned over my shoulder, looking where I was pointing, then nodded. “Ah. Good, just… checking.”

I pressed it.

Instantly, the displays lit up, displaying a logo and words, saying SISTER ARMS. After a moment, the displays settled on an actual informational display, gauges behind the steering wheel and what I thought was navigational information on the console display.

“So, uh, there was this truck out there- it had physical gauges?”

“This vehicle is a newer model, less rudimentary.” Luna replied, absently. From the clicks, I guessed she was fiddling with the mounted gun.

A quick glance at the console screen revealed a series of options, one of which was labelled ‘connected doors’. A single tap brought up another menu: a list of entrances, most of which read ‘offline’, and one that glowed green. I hovered my finger over it, hesitating for a long moment, thinking about how dangerous what I was about to do, then grit my teeth and pressed the screen. Instantly, a horrible shrieking noise filled the garage as the door began to come up; I gripped the wheel, hands so tight they squeaked against the material, watching it rise with all the speed of a geriatric snail, and remembering exactly how many tarwolves I’d seen out there and how every single one of them would be alerted by this.

“A few moments more!” Luna yelled over the noise, swiveling the gun to the side slightly.

Wait, wait… now! I pressed down one of the odd pedals on either side of the driver’s couch, and the vehicle jumped forwards with a hum, rolling out of the garage and into the open space. I turned my head to the left, and felt my muscles tense as I saw the tarwolves, huge black bundles of gooey tentacles, charging across the grass towards the perimeter fence. I locked eyes with one, staring into those glittering, blank black orbs, then watched it practically explode as Luna opened up with the heavy machine gun.

I slammed on the brakes just in front of the building, Luna swiveling the gun to keep pouring fire into the approaching monsters, the huge rounds making the gun bark like a running explosion and tearing holes through the black goop with each hit. She was screaming something at them, a challenge or a taunt, but the screaming gunfire drowned her out.

I leapt from the vehicle, stumbling slightly on the concrete as I tried to keep ahold of my rifle, fumbling it into position as I ran towards the door. I ran straight through the opening, then skidded to a halt and turned to the right, sprinting towards the administrator’s office. If there was anything that would inform us of what was happening, it would be there. I could hear Luna shouting insults at the tarwolves, taunting them between loud bursts of noise from the machine gun. I’d have to hurry.

I burst through the door to the admin office, rapidly trying to organize my priorities as I did so. The paper in the filing cabinets hadn’t been in best condition, but there were ones that were more sealed than others, and there was something else: the computer tower underneath the desk. I had to move quickly, though.

I shunted the rolling chair behind the desk so hard that it clattered against the floor, but that didn’t matter to me. I yanked the cables leading from the desktop, removing the entire tower, slinging my rifle over my shoulder and lifting it in my arms. I ran back to the door as fast as I could, and stepped out into the open.

Luna tracked another tarwolf with the turret, which chattered deafeningly as the rounds tore it apart, causing black oil to splash itself across the fence it had been trying to climb and over the concrete on this side. More and more of them were stacking themselves against the chain link, pressing it inwards, trying to get over it, and I could see the parts that sagged more from holes blown in the wire from stray rounds.

“MAKE HASTE! THE BARRIER WILL NOT HOLD!” She yelled from her position. 

I didn’t stop to reply, just dumped the tower in the vehicle and went back for more.

There were few files that remained intact when I touched them, but after some desperate searching, I located a drawer full of file folders and what appeared to be data storage drives of some kind, made of crystal and metal. I filled my pockets, did load after load, and every time I passed through the courtyard, noted in worry that the fence sagged more and more even as Luna killed them by the dozens. 

I dropped the box of files I’d found in an adjacent office, and just as I was about to turn and run back for more, I heard a horrific shrieking noise. My head jerked towards the entrance to the base, where… something stood.

It stood head and shoulders above the tarwolves. Black tentacles radiated from its back, feeling the air about it. I couldn’t tell immediately by its shape what animal it was supposed to be, it was so malformed, and I could barely make out the four legs, tail and head. As I watched, it opened its muzzle and shrieked again- just in time for Luna to swivel, yell back at it, and fill its open muzzle with antimaterial rounds.

It stumbled, every round punching a hole through which black fluid leaked, then lept out of the line of fire. Luna tracked it, or tried to, but for something so big, it was fast. 

“‘Tis time to go! We are unsure how long we can hold it off!”

I jerked, shaken out of my gaping, and scrambled around the side of the vehicle to the driver’s door. I jumped onto the bench, then pressed down the pedal, speeding us back into the garage while Luna sprayed rounds from the steadily heating gun. The moment we were inside, I hit the brakes, stopping us just sort of the raised concrete with a cry of squealing tires, then jumped out and ran for the ‘close’ button. Luna put a final brace of rounds into the thing, causing it to stumble away, and then I reached it and slammed my fist into the button.

The garage door closed swiftly, but immediately bowed inwards as the creature slammed into it. I had extreme doubt it would hold for very long- given the heavy blow, it was shocking it’d held at all. I grabbed a box of files, Luna wrapping her telekinesis around as much as she could grab, the two of us moving as quickly as we could to the bunker entrance and dumping it just inside the caution lines, before going back for more. By the third trip, we were scraping up stray papers and a couple of storage drives… and then the garage door split down the middle.

I turned in a moment, but it hadn’t failed entirely. Through the split in the metal, I could see the swarming tarwolves, the huge creature that had come for us backing up for another charge, this one the finishing blow. At my side, I heard the sound of telekinesis and the racking of charging handles, and, grimly, I unslung my rifle and pointed it, disengaging the safety.

And then the garage was filled with the sound of gunfire.

Five assault rifles and one machine gun blazed, sending bullets through the gap in the door and tearing into the hordes outside. Tarwolves were torn apart by the sudden storm, only to be replaced by further ranks surging forwards, only for them to dissolve under the fire as well. I could barely aim, emptying my magazine like this, but I didn’t have to- they were so tight and so close that every single round hit something. My rifle clicked dry, and I dumped the magazine, fumbling a new one as I tried to insert it- and then, one forced its way through

My eyes widened, and time slowed. The magazine clicked home, but there was no round chambered, and I didn’t have enough time- its legs coiled like springs underneath it, and it leaped… right past me, and at Luna, who had plenty of ammo. Guns blazed, and the sheer force of rounds knocked it right out of the air, smearing it across the concrete. I swallowed, hands shaking…

“Matt! We must go!”


I jerked, chambered the first round in the fresh magazine and turned. Luna had popped the gun from its mount and was holding it in her magic, hustling towards the bunker entrance, and I followed rapidly. Behind me, I could hear the steel giving out, and my feet pounded against the concrete- and then I was over the line, in the bunker, and Luna drove her hoof into the button. The thick bunker door slammed down behind us, between us and the horde outside.

Safe. For the moment.