"Well..." Fluttershy nervously glided over the skeletal remains with a somber expression. "...I can tell you this much." She looked at Rainbow and the others. "They're very much real."
"Hmmmmm..." Rainbow Dash sat back, rubbing her chin.
Ariel cocked her head. "What are they saying, Rainbow?"
"Fluttershy confirms that they're the real deal," Rainbow said.
Logan droned. "You honestly think this shit would have been faked?"
Kepler chided. "Brrotherr..."
"It looks as though they were all brought here," Flynn said. "Like a burial pile." He looked at the others. "In Stone Prefecture. At the lair of the dredge pirates. They did that after murdering the local villagers."
"No..." Seraphimus shook her head. She commented from where she stood by the entrance to the building. "...I believe this was exactly where they died."
"How do you figure?" Ariel asked.
Seraphimus pointed. "You found the debris covering them here, yes?"
Wildcard nodded.
"Look at the direction everything has fallen in." Seraphimus' talon outlined the scene from afar. "Away from the opening. Like a blast wave."
Logan's brow furrowed. "You think something from directly outside killed them all?"
"Isn't it rather obvious by the evidence gathered? Even their bodies are predominantly strewned inward from the direction of the entrance."
Wildcard gestured at Rainbow Dash: "She has a point."
Rainbow looked aside at Rarity. "Can you sense anything to suggest that something blasted its way inside?"
"If you're asking if I detect any burn marks, the answer is no," Rarity said. "This place is simply too old for me to tell sheer aging from actual thermal damage. However..." She pointed at the entrance. "...several strips of metal reinforcing is bent inward from the outside. That seems to support the idea of a deadly force invading the room."
"I can't help but notice that none of the ponies' bones are broken," Twilight Sparkle said. "I don't think these poor souls were rounded up and executed by an identifiable foe. This had to have been some sort of cataclysmic event that extinguished their lives."
"Like an explosion?" Pinkie Pie squeaked.
"Reckon we're all bettin' on the Sunderin', Pinkie," Applejack said.
"Ohhhhhhhhh..." Pinkie's brow furrowed. "...so a biggggggg explosion."
Applejack sighed. "Sure, why not."
"Those poor ponies," Fluttershy murmured. Her ghostly eyes glistened in the light from Rainbow's pendant. "It must have been a horrible, agonizing way to lose one's life." She sniffled slightly. "See the small ones...?"
"Children," Twilight said, nodding.
"Entire families must have come here, huddling in a desperate attempt to survive." Fluttershy squeaked. "They all perished together."
Around this time, Logan looked over at Seraphimus. "You're suddenly rather quiet," he whispered.
"I've said my part," the griffin quietly droned, eyes on Rainbow Dash. "For the moment."
"Uh huh..." Logan nodded. "...or maybe you've realized—like we all have—how we're not supposed to interrupt Rainbow Dash when she's 'listening' to her friends."
Seraphimus squinted at Logan. "I beg your pardon?"
He smirked to himself. "Almost as if you finally believe they're hovering all around her, unheard and unseen."
Seraphimus' beak clenched. She folded her arms in a huff, remaining silent.
"Still..." Twilight Sparkle went on, shaking her head. "These ponies are like nothing I've ever seen before."
"Do tell..." Rarity cooed.
"Just... the shape of their skeletons..." Twilight pointed. "Look at their skulls!"
Fluttershy floated in. "Their craniums aren't exactly that strange, Twilight," she commented. "Alicorns and Eucorns have narrow snouts. Also—there are the indigenous horses of Saddle Arabia."
"You're not wrong, but these skulls appear to be even narrower."
Fluttershy nodded. "You're not wrong..."
"And the curvature of their spine and their elongated tails..." Twilight clenched her teeth. "Almost feline, in a way..."
"How long are those wingspans?" Rarity asked.
Applejack fidgeted. "Ain't this gettin' a bit creepy? I mean... this is practically a grave here."
"It's a treasure trove, AJ!" Pinkie Pie remarked. "At least where Dashie's journey is concerned!"
"Rainbow...?" Applejack looked at their anchor. "...how do ya figure we should proceed, sugarcube?"
Rainbow Dash leaned back, rubbing her chin in thought. This time, the Herald were gazing at her with patient curiosity. At last, she muttered: "We gotta get a closer look." She glanced aside. "Flynn?"
"Right." The unicorn trotted forward. His horn glowed, adding to Rainbow's harmonic luminescence.
Slowly, a particularly large skeleton rose from the middle of the pile. In Flynn's delicate control, it "stood up" in mid air, stretching out to the extent of its joints.
"Guhhhhh..." Ariel shivered, clinging to Wildcard as she watched. "Goddess that's unnerving."
"I'm amazed that the bones are all clinging together still," Logan said.
"They're not," Seraphimus said coldly. "The fossil is so old that any remaining tendons or cartilage are long gone. Your unicorn friend is simply keeping it all together with remarkable precision."
"Wow..." Flynn sweated, concentrating. "...the compliments that I live for..."
"Easy, brrotherr..." Kepler stepped closer to the floating skeleton. He scratched his chairy chin and studied the specimen through his spectacles. "Hmmmm... extra ribs..."
"More than a pegasus?" Ariel remarked.
"Indeed." Kepler nodded. "Probably to house larger lungs... maybe a double-heart..."
"Double-heart?" Rainbow Dash blinked. "What the hay for?"
"Greater pulmonary strength... perhaps for added endurance." Kepler gestured to Flynn. "If you could, frriend, extend the wings to their full span."
"Finally!" Rarity remarked.
"Doing it..." Flynn sweated as he stretched the wing joints out.
To everypony's surprise, the wings almost touched the edges of the room.
"Holy crap..." Logan blinked. "...these suckers could glide."
"They could do farr morre than that!" Kepler said. "This confirrms my suspicion!" He pointed at where the wings connected to the body. "The upper spine must have been rreinforrced with five times the muscle strrength than moderrn pegasi! The extrra lung capacity and biggerr hearrt would have been absolutely rrequirred to maintain motorr functions."
"Soooooooooo..." Rainbow Dash leaned in.
"Ach..." Kepler adjusted his spectacles. "These pegasi could actually fly. They did not rrely on pony magic... not like the winged equines do today."
"Wow..." Twilight Sparkle exhaled.
"I guess these guys wouldn't have had that bad of a time navigating the Grand Choke," Rainbow Dash said. "Or other environments bereft of magic."
"Prrecisely," Kepler said with a nod.
"With wings that big..." Ariel winced. "...it must have been a painful existence."
"Not quite." Kepler shuffled closer. "Flynn, if you would bend the left wing inward?"
"Uhhhhh..." Flynn's mechanical eye rotated as he contemplated that.
"Just go about it geometrrically..."
Flynn shrugged. The group watched as he telekinetically folded the left wing. A glint of light caught a stubby bone sticking out from the rest of the limb, situated along the upper joint of the wing.
"Therre...!" Kepler pointed. "A vestigual digit!"
"Oh! Cool!" Ariel nodded. "Like extra hooves!"
"I suspect that—when grrounded—the Angels used these to move arround and rrest theirr bodies, all the while supporrting the weight of theirr folded limbs." He gestured at the room around them. "Judging frrom theirr civilized surrroundings, I imagine they did not have much need forr flying. They likely spent the bulk of theirr days 'trrotting' on all six limbs."
"Incredible..." Twilight grinned. "...if only we had a haunted sketchbook! I would love to record all this data!"
"No doubt these were beautiful creatures while they were still alive," Fluttershy said. "It's just... so sad..."
"Hey Keps..." Ariel trotted closer to the wyvern and unicorn. "What about their tails?"
"Ach... I couldn't help but starre at them."
"Let's stare a bit closer, huh?" Rainbow looked at Flynn. "Try stretching it out."
Flynn did so, licking his lips as he focused on the precise movement.
Everypony's eyes shifted as the tail stretched and stretched and stretched and—
Logan whistled. "Damn, that's creepy."
"I would arrgue otherrwise, frriend," Kepler remarked. His scorpion stinger coiled and uncoiled. "I believe that they werre rratherr useful."
Wildcard gestured something.
Rainbow blinked. "Uhhhh... Jordan? I don't recognize that word."
"'Looks prehensile'," Ariel interpreted.
"So... these guys had yet another limb?" Rainbow stammered.
Flynn magically twisted and rotated the tail-in-question around. "Looks pretty natural to me," he said. "Provided the muscles and tendons all played along, this thing could have rotated and twisted in many directions."
"What's that?" Seraphimus stated.
Logan glanced over. "What's what?"
Seraphimus pointed at the very end of the tail. "That. The growth situated at the rear. It doesn't look like normal bone."
Kepler and Rainbow Dash simultaneously craned their necks.
Flynn attempted to stretch the tip of the tail out. Suddenly—and to everypony's surprise—the magical field of telekinesis brightened at the rearmost bone. For a few moments it appeared as theough the tail-tip itself was glowing. Upon further inspection, Rainbow and her friends understood why.
"It's... alicornia..." Fluttershy remarked.
Applejack did a double-take. "Beg yer pardon?"
"It's the same substance contained in unicorn horns," Twilight Sparkle clarified.
"Good heavens!" Rarity remarked.
"Wait a second..." Rainbow Dash grimaced. "...you mean to say that the ancient pegasi had unicorn horns in their tails?"
"Holy crud!" Pinkie Pie grasped her muzzle. "They mastered fart magic!"
Twilight Sparkle face-hoofed.
"That..." Kepler blinked. "...is something I did not expect."
"Seems as though the Angels were no less magical than modern day ponies after all," Twilight remarked. "In fact... they were clearly more magical."
"So... let's think about this for a minute..." Rainbow Dash leaned back, staring at the illuminated bone structure. "These dudes had wings... and they had the ability to harness magic. Soooooo..." She blinked at the others. "...what made them any different from alicorns?"
The ghostly mares exchanged curious faces.
"I would venture to guess that they weren't nearly as powerful," Twilight Sparkle said. "If nothing else, it would possibly explain why alicorns took on the form that they did when they met the first sapient races of this plane."
"Hmmmm..." Rainbow looked at Kepler. "Hey. Keps. Are there any advantages of having a unicorn horn in your forehead over having one on your butt?"
Flynn's good eye twitched. "You're asking him?"
"Therre's a rratherr simple hypothesis, rreally..." Kepler gestured. "With the naturre of all living and thinking things..." He gestured to his own forehead. "The forrwarrd chakrras arre farr betterr suited forr perrceiving and alterring the perrceivable worrld thrrough dirrect thought. Perrhaps—at one time—therre was an evolutionarry advantage forr the angels possessing alicorrnia at the tips of theirr prrehensile tails..."
"It's like they had extra-long limbs that reached telekinetically past their physical limits," Ariel said.
"Indeed." Kepler nodded. "But alicorrns like the Mountain Matrron? Theirr design is farr morre suited to theirr almost limitless harrmonic prrowess. All that alicorrns can manipulate and do is almost dirrectly in sync with theirr potential thought prrocesses. That—of courrse—isn't the only rreason forr theirr superriorr magical abilities, but—ach—this is as farr as it gets frrom a biology lecturre hall..."
Rainbow looked at Twilight. "Remember what I once learned, Twilight? That the reason the major races of ponies in Equestria exist is that—long ago—alicorns like Luna and Celestia helped split the genetic lineage of ponies into the three main sects?"
Twilight nodded. "How could I not?"
"Well... here we have it..." Rainbow gestured at the floating skeleton. "In the Angels—there're the blueprints for unicorns, pegasi, and earth ponies. All in one ancient gift bag."
"It's... all starting to make sense..." Twilight shuddered. "The alicorns came from the Harmonic Plains and found the Angels nearly-dead on a derelict, Sundered plane. They manifested themselves in an approximate form, then gifted the Angels harmony, light, and sustenance." She pointed with a ghostly hoof. "Then—to assure genetic diversity and greater survivability—they promoted the tripartite mutation into earth, unicorns, and pegasi."
"Also horses and zebras and mules and donkeys and sirens and sarosians..." Pinkie Pie rolled. "But hey!" She grinned. "Who's counting?!"
"But here we have the original," Fluttershy remarked. "The very first pony." She smiled slightly. "Who would ever have thought that we'd see it for what it originally was?"
"I have seen this before," Rainbow Dash murmured.
Rarity looked over. "You have?"
Rainbow nodded somberly, her eyes reflecting the skeleton. "Ilrifa," she said.