The texture of the underworld was changing. Rainbow Dash couldn't help but take notice.
She tilted her head outward from the silken confines of her lowering gondola. Past the frame of spider limbs gripping her ride, she saw the foundations of countless metallic spires being consumed by an ocean of webbing that stretched in all directions: Alpha, Omega, Curve, and Edge. Only as she descended upon the fabric of the material did she realize that every square inch of the surface was covered by life. Countless eight-legged specimens stood across the pale-white fabric in an endless vigil. This was a spot where starlight—much less sunlight—was never meant to touch, and the pale translucent limbs of the arachnids lingering here was a testament to this. As Rainbow came even-level with the invertebrate sentinels, the glow from her pendant pierced their gossamer shells. The spiders were absolutely dead-still, but her light could catch the tiniest of persistent twitches of organs squirming within the hollow of their milk-white cephalothoraxes as they loomed and breathed and loomed and breathed, attuned to the subtle vibrations of the neverending Song.
The sound of violins increased, resembling in no small part a cacophony of crickets as Rainbow and her companions lowered further. In her peripheral, Rainbow Dash noticed that the tunnel-weaver Merula was riding had paused in its hulking descent. The reason for this became clear, for Rainbow and her friends had to be lowered precisely through separate porous holes in the white fabric and it didn't allow for simultaneous access by Merula's escort. With perfect aim, the three gondolas threaded three separate needles, and this necessitated Rainbow being separated from her friends—if only briefly.
Rainbow's ghostly companions crowded inward, gazing about with slight apprehension. The light cast from Rainbow's pendant illuminated inward, reflecting off several layers of dense silk that came within a hair's width of the edges of her gondola. For the next minute and a half, Rainbow sank past a complex layering of criss-crossing silk strands—all of which vibrated just a sneeze from her muzzle. The violins intensified, turning deeper, basser, and more ominous. What was once a high-pitched vibration eventually sank into something darker, resembling deep guttural monk chants. This would soon be accompanied by a gentle percussion—like rain drops that pooled and wafted out of a deep-seeded tinnitus scratching the innermost layer of Rainbow's ears.
Only when she had pierced the outer layer of the silken dome did Rainbow Dash realized that the "raindrops" belonged to thousands upon millions of tiny spider feet—like hooked drumsticks skittering across an endless surface of high-tension leather. Once her ruby light could shine into the hollow of the nest, she saw what the sound belonged to, and it was difficult to keep ahold of her lunch.
The entire "ceiling" of the dome was covered with life—crawling and skittering and meandering and criss-crossing life. The spiders—all pale and hairy and mostly translucent specimens—acted more like a colony of ants than arachnids. They ventured back and forth, carrying sacks of silk on their backsides or else dangling morsels of captured food—some still squirming—from the anchorage of their spinnerets. They clambered over each other and paused for nothing, gracefully clinging to each hoof-hold of the silken stretch and marching in time to the deep bass rhythm. As Rainbow lowered further, she saw immensely-thick criss-crossing "beams" of silk that seemingly helped to support the massive ceiling that stretched everywhere. Large black widows with bio-luminescent hourglasses clung to all sides of these beams, and from the swaying motions of their bulbous abdomens, Rainbow Dash assumed that they were the ones making the nonstop vibrations—supplying the Song to which the entire colony of Winter Children marched.
Only by swinging the ruby beam of her light left and right did Rainbow Dash notice hints of the world that existed long before the Children of Abaddon nested there. There were courtyards and city streets and entrances to large building complexes. Here—so close to the city's foundation—the structures were considerably larger and more majestic, with spacial grandeur and architecture that brazenly showed off at every conceivable angle. The doors to various complexes were arched, with runes etched permanently into the frames and support pylons. She saw statues—at a distance, it was difficult to understand precisely what of—but she did notice wings and prehensile tails that glinted in the ruby light. And then she saw something she didn't expect—but at this great distance it wasn't entirely that surprising.
She saw trees. Bushes. Lawns. Lengths of grass and shrubbery. At this depth, everything was amazingly preserved—albeit covered all over with copious amounts of webbing and silken strands. It was like diving beneath a polar ice cap and noting an ecosystem encased in frost. Rainbow almost wished her gondola could sway closer to the gardens—if only to see if there were any squirrels or birds or other fauna miraculously preserved in the same silk. Upon closer examination—and thoughtful consideration—Rainbow Dash realized that the Winter Children had kept the remarkable urbanscape immaculately clean. With that many spider drones marching and skittering about overhead, there would no doubt be an insurmountable layer of necrotic sediment gathered over the eons, and yet the courtyards were devoid of litter. There was no end to the respect that Abaddon's litter evidently paid to the forsaken glory of Urohringr, and somehow it made her—the Austraeoh—feel safer upon arriving there. The only thing that came close to shaking her countenance was the sight of the metal streets surrounding the gardens. As she lowered, she noticed that the shiny surface had been worn to a jagged texture from so many thousands of years of arachnid limbs skittering over the otherwise impermeable material.
Then—beneath that—there was yet another layer of snow-white webbing, even more porous than the one darkening the depths of the massive city above. Here, the deep bass strings had dwindled. Instead, there was a high-pitched hum that lingered beneath it, and even that was rising to a frequency above average equine hearing. Soon, the air became deathly still and quiet—enough to hear a pin drop. Rainbow surmised that she and her two friends were about to descend into the final acoustical haven—the innermost auditorium of the nest.
Abaddon's lair.
A slight tremble overtook Rainbow's figure. Nevertheless, she looked past her cluster of ghostly friends and spoke bravely to the two griffins.
"Wildcard... Jordan... I want you to promise me something..."
From the descending darkness, a pair of lenses glinted in the ruby light.
Rainbow's brow furrowed. "Things might... get a little freaky. I want you to promise me that no matter how weird things get... no matter what might appear to be happening to me down there... that you won't go nuts and try to air-lift me out of here."
The Desperado's goggles rattled in the distance. If he was hand-signing something, Rainbow couldn't tell.
So she repeated herself, shining her light across the abyss. "Do not screw things up by playing the hero, got it? Just... just have some faith. No matter what happens to me, stand by and wait." She nodded her head. "Make sure she doesn't do anything stupid either, okay? Can you trust me on this?"
At last, her ruby light caught a glint of metal talons. Wildcard hesitated momentarily, but soon hand-signed an affirmative, followed by a salute.
Seraphimus was still as a statue.
Rainbow Dash breathed a final breath of relief...
...and then she and her friends plunged, threading a final needle before they were carried into a depth deeper than darkness itself. And just as silent.