//------------------------------//
// A History Lesson 
// Story: Cryo-7 
// by Metal Pony Fan 
//------------------------------//

"This is a weird crest."  Dinky ran her hoof over the coffee table.  The wood was polished smooth, the carved crest filled even with the rest with some sort of metallic inlay.  "Does it have a meaning?"

Steel Catch looked up from the paperwork that covered his desk.  There were a lot of items in his study that bore some sort of symbolic imagery.  Most of them filled the intricately fashioned display cases lining the walls, and he expected to see her standing at one of them, inspecting some sort of artifact. Instead, he saw the filly sitting on the couch, right where she sat down nearly thirty minutes earlier.  Weren't teenagers supposed to be more rambunctious and uncontrollable?  This one was a perfectly behaved angel.

The Chairman set down the agricultural report, and made his way over, sitting down on the opposite couch.  The study was made to function as an informal conference room, so the coffee table had a couch on either side.  "The broken horn."  Steel Catch ran his hoof over the table.  "It's an ancient symbol, the mark of the first Storm King."

Dinky looked up from the table.  "The mean pegasus that blocked the sun?"

"Oh, no."  Steel Catch shook his head.  "He used the crest as a symbol of his power over the broken and beaten unicorns and earth ponies, much like some of us now use the crumpled feather to signify our victory over the pegasi, but he was not the first.  The first Storm King was a unicorn, the Shadow of the Tempest, a leader lost to legend.  And she ruled alongside another King, one of the land.  His name is no longer known, but he was a flightless pegasus, and the crumpled feather was his symbol."

She nodded slowly.  "Did they fight each other?"

"No, not at all."  Steel Catch got up, grabbing a small vase from a pedestal.  It was centuries old, if not millennia.  The magics involved in its creation distorting any attempt at ascertaining an accurate age.  Though, analysis revealed something more interesting than its age.  The magic woven into the ceramic was similar to his, most likely an ancestor.  "This is an amphora."  He sat down next to the filly, turning it over in his hooves.  "It was once used to hold wine, and supposedly belonged to Storm King.  Legends say the Land and Storm Kings met once every week to share a meal and discuss matters of their respective kingdoms.  They would start the meal by sharing a drink from this vessel, or one very much like it."

"Ew," the filly stuck her tongue out, "they didn't use separate cups?"

The chairman chuckled at her silly display of disgust and shook his head.  "Nope.  They drank from the same vessel, in full view of their subjects, to symbolize that both kingdoms drink from the same vessel.  That the land and the storm must share the same planet, and that there is enough for both."  He offered her the vessel.  "Go ahead, it's enchanted to be unbreakable."

Dinky took it and looked it over.  There were images and designs glazed over the entire surface, but the two largest were a broken horn surrounded by clouds, and a crumpled feather surrounded by mountains.  "I don't understand.  Why was there a war if they were friends?"

"This was thousands of years ago," Steel Catch reminded her.  "After the first Storm King died, another storm King was chosen.  Only, this time, she was a pegasus.  When the Land King died,  his son took over.  He was also a pegasus.  Many years later, their children were married, uniting the roles of Storm and Land as King and Queen.  Then, their son, ruled alone, opting for the title of Storm King, and discarding Land entirely.  He was a storied ruler, great and just, and his efforts to preserve ancient knowledge for future generations are the only reason we know anything from this time period.  With such a well loved and deserving Storm King, nopony card that the title of Land King was lost.  Tirassa was unified, and there was peace for a long time."

Dinky set the amphora down on the table.  Sure, Mr. Catch said it was unbreakable, but given her genetics, holding things like priceless heirlooms and artifacts always made her nervous.  "What happened?"

"A volcanic eruption."  The chairman twisted in his seat to point at the ornate tapestry behind them.  Its design was dominated in reds and browns, and depicted an entire city falling victim to the fire and fury below the planet's surface.  "Twelve hundred years ago.  It changed the weather, covered the planet in clouds, and the pegasi became the true rulers of the planet.  Many died immediately, many more in the famines that followed.  The Storm King at that time implemented harsh laws to keep as many ponies alive as possible.  The land and clouds were broken up into small city states, mostly near tall mountains, or areas where the clouds could be controlled.  The pegasi would keep the skies clear, the earth ponies would farm the land, and the unicorns would do their best to find a way to fix everything."

He loooked back at Dinky.  "This ended up becoming a caste based system very quickly.  With the Pegasi on the upper rungs of society.  Earth ponies were next, and the unicorns, out of fear of magic, were treated the worst.  The breaking of a unicorn's horn was a common punishment, and the ancient symbol of the storm King was dredged up as a spiteful slur.

Still, we survived.  Technology continued to advance, communities continued to grow, all while the environment slowly healed from the volcanic cataclysm.

Roughly four hundred years ago, the cloud cover had thinned enough that some settlements could get by without pegasi intervention.  They were left to their own devices as the pegasi scouted out new locations for farming communities.  Taxes and tributes of food and goods were still demanded, but mostly, they were left alone.

three hundred and twenty years ago, first contact was made with the  Galactic Assembly.  They weren't as large then as they are now, but were still an impressive power.  And the ideas they brought with them, equality, unity, harmony, and especially the thought of elected governments, were threats to the pegasi.  Their ship never left the planet.

It was seventy years before they made contact again, but by that time, we had reverse engineered a good deal of their technology, and integrated some of our own.  It was made clear that they were unwelcome, and that any interference would mean war.  Around the same time, we made contact with other powers in the galaxy.  Small planetary coalitions, criminal groups, independent planets, and many of them were willing to trade goods and technology.  The Storm King used the new technology to stir up massive storms, sealing the surface away from sunlight, sparing only those farming communities that pledged their loyalty while paying unfair taxes and harsh tributes.

This led to the war I was telling you about before.  The one that ended when my ancestor killed the Storm King and took his place.  He had grown up in a small village listening to the stories told by the survivors of the Galactic Assembly's first contact ship. So, he wanted to implement changes that mirrored the Assembly.  Elected governments, reduced taxes, personal freedoms and protections, for all ponies on the planet.  But, anger towards the pegasi for years of suffering caused resistance to his plans.  He was unable to make things happen on his own, and hatred won out.  His plans were put in place, but only for earth ponies and unicorns, leaving the pegasi where they are now."

Dinky nodded her head in sad understanding.  "And that's why momma doesn't get to go everywhere with us."

"It's alright," he reassured her, patting the filly on the back.  "All this is going to change, and soon.  I promise."

"That green meanie doesn't want it to," Dinky pointed out.  "I don't like him.  The way he looks at you scares me."

"They way he looks at me?"  Steel Catch shook his head.  This filly definitely had decent intuition, and so did her mother.  "He's just mad because the new laws override the ones in his city, and he doesn't get to be as mean to the pegasi as he wants."  He leaned in and whispered, "just wait until the Pegasi get to vote, he won't be mayor for very long after that, will he?"  The filly laughed, shaking her head no, and Steel Catch ruffled her mane.  "Yeah, you bet he won't."

The chairman hopped off the couch and stretched out with a loud groan.  "Oh, I've been working on paperwork too long, I need a break!  I feel like having some tea, don't you?"

Dinky's ears perked up at the mention, and she nodded happily.

Steel Catch smiled.  She was a quiet filly, that was for sure.  But, when she had something to say, nothing would stop her from saying it.  He looked around like he didn't notice the nodding, acting out listening intently.  "That's odd, nopony wants to take a tea break?  Oh, well..."

"I do!" Dinky all but shouted.

Steel Catch laughed loudly.  "Of course, I should have known you would.  I bet you were nodding your head and I wasn't paying attention again."

"Um, yeah."  Dinky shrugged.  "Sorry."

"Don't be sorry, little one, be loud!"  He struck a pose.  "Even if you don't know what you're talking about, if you say it with confidence, ponies will listen."  He suddenly looked puzzled, and started scratching his chin.  "Wait a minute, I think I just figured out how the green meanie got elected.  He's so confident, that it's almost impossible for anypony to tell that he doesn't know anything."

Dinky rubbed her chin as well.  "Then, if we wasn't as confident, would ponies see start to see through him?  How can we make that happen?"

"You just keep being you," Steel Catch told her as he walked to his desk.  "He can't handle it when anypony ignores his inflated sense of authority."  The chairman pressed a button on his desks intercom, and spoke loudly, "Secretary Kettle, are you there?"

"Yes, sir," came the answer, almost immediately.  "What can I do for you?"

"I am breaking for tea," he gave Dinky an exaggerated wink, "would you kindly escort my, 'housekeeper,'" he made exaggerated air quotes with his hoof, "to my study?"

"Of course, sir," she said with a chuckle, "breaks are very important, after all."

"I'm glad you understand."  Steel Catch bowed to his secretary as he clicked off the intercom.  

"I like Miss Kettle," Dinky said, in a rare example of unprovoked conversation.  "That that thing in her nose looks like it hurts, but she doesn't treat anypony any different than anypony else."

"That's why she works for me."  Steel Catch walked back to the couch.  "I chose all my closest staff very carefully, knowing that my position on certain things might be unpopular.  I needed the support of ponies who understood that no pony is more or less deserving of basic rights and decency because they were born with-"  He stopped mid-sentence.  Steel Catch had turned to face the door, smile dissolved, and eyes snapped into a harsh, angry determination.  It was even scarier to Dinky than the way the mayor looked at pegasi.  "Did you feel that?"

The filly looked over, but she didn't see anything.  "Feel what?"

"Nothing," he reassured, keeping his eyes on the door.  "A slight magic surge, I can teach you to detect them sometime."  He offered a smile as he stood up, mentally kicking himself for scaring her.  "Would you like that?"

She nodded, but kept glancing at the door.  What did he feel that she couldn't?  What made him show that face earlier?  "Is something wrong?"

"I'm sure it's nothing."  He made his way to the door, and punched in a code on the keypad.  He hated to leave her, but he needed to check.  "Wait here for a moment."

The door opened, and he slipped through, keeping a wary eye on the hallway beyond.  He stood ready, waiting for a movement from behind every plant, or a shadow down every hallway.  Whatever that surge was, it was strong.

The door closed behind him, and a second code, entered on the keypad on this side locked it tight.  Nopony would be able to open it, from either side, without his personal unlock code.  The room behind was now the most secure in the building.  Energy shielded, magic shielded, with a door operable only by the last of the Storm King's lineage.  Dinky was perfectly safe in there.

With that taken care of, he snuck down the hall, slinking between doorways, and keeping to the walls.  It was quiet, and that made him uneasy.  The surge of magic he felt was no trivial matter.  Its power, plus the sudden nature and immediate dissipation made him suspect an explosion of some kind.  But, if that were the case, there would be alarms sounding, security teams rushing to rally points, and all other sorts of commotion.

Hearing steps down one of the connecting hallways, Steel Catch ducked behind a potted plant, a large tree-like flower from the southern hemisphere.  He cast an invisibility cloak on himself, wiping himself from sight.  It wasn't a perfect spell, and left an outline if you stood in the open, but sneaking through shadows would make up for its limitations.

He also readied another spell, an energy blade.  It hummed to life, vibrant yellow and buzzing.  An adjustment to the spell quickly brought its oscillating hum to a pitch outside a pony's hearing range, and its color to a nearly invisible faint blue.  A quick test on the plant put a slice through the trunk with no resistance felt.

Bracing himself, he listened.  Another sound added itself to the steps as the steps themselves changed pattern.  The sound of wheels on carpet, something being dragged along.

Recognizing the sound, Steel Catch let his energy blade dissipate.  He slipped down the hallway behind the janitor and the trashcan he pulled.  The earth pony never realized anypony went by.

Heading down the hallway, Steel Catch crept by a breakroom.  One pony inside, the media intern, brewing one of the exotic teas he liked push on everypony.

Even further down the hall, at the security checkpoint, it was life as usual for the two guards in uniform.  Spit and Polish, twin brothers skilled in illusion magic, were playing a game, using magic to project images of characters on the floor between them, and then having them duke it out.

Steel Catch stood right in front of them and cleared his throat as he dissolved his invisibility spell.  "Report," he demanded softly, "now."

The two brothers looked up like a pair of teens caught with filly pictures, and swallowed hard.  Their game faded as they stopped supplying their illusions with energy.  "N-nothing to report," Spit managed to get out, "um, sir."

"All quiet," Polish added, "not even anything on security cameras as of..." He glanced down at his watch.  It was the only way to tell the two apart, Polish had a nice, shiny copper wristwatch, while Spit wore one of black titanium.  "Nothing on cameras as of thirty-nine seconds ago, fourty seconds, fourty-one-"

Spit elbowed his brother to make him stop.  "We also checked in with the other posts a minute ago, and supervisor Frost decided to go for a walk-  I mean, go on patrol right after."

The chairman raised an eyebrow.  "And you started playing games the second he was out of sight?"  With a sigh, be shook his head.  "Did either of you feel a magic surge a moment ago?"

"Faintly," said Spit.

"Kind of," answered Polish.  "Frost noticed it too, she went to see if one of the other unicorns on this floor might have dropped something that was too heavy for 'em."

"There was too much magic for that."  Steel Catch rubbed his chin.  It would be nice if he was worried over nothing, but he didn't think he was.  "Check the cameras again, then contact the other guardposts.  And run a lifesigns sweep of the building, make sure the numbers match the entrance logs."

Both brothers saluted.  "Yes, sir!"

Spit stepped to the side, and brought his hoof to the communicator clipped to his ear.  And, as he started checking in with the other floors, Polish threw a beam of magic at the wall behind him.  The wall started to lose its opacity, and within seconds there was an oval portal allowing them to look into the next room.

"Clever," Steel Catch appraised as he glanced into the room.

Dozens of screens split into dozens more video feeds from throughout the building painted a real-time picture of life in the Capitol building, monitored by three ponies seated at the monitors, and a supervisor pacing behind them.  Seeing the sudden glare on the monitors he turned to berate an intruding guard, any words of complaint dying when he saw the Chairman of Tirassa standing behind him instead.  He saluted, hurriedly acknowledging the Chairman's presence.  "Sir!"

"At ease."  Steel Catch let his eyes wander the monitors.  Everything was calm on those little screens.  Each feed a small slice of downright boring day to day monotony.  Nothing out of place, nothing out of the ordinary, except for one thing.  "Where's miss Kettle?"

Steel Catch put his hoof forward, and found the invisible wall to be as solid as ever.  So, he teleported into the surveillance room.  This set off several silent alarms, but everypony quickly entered the necessary codes into their consoles to disarm them.  His eyes scanned the screens again, searching for a pony with a cast iron black coat, and a mane of the brightest, most eye-jarring neon green you'll ever see on something that wasn't leaking radiation.  "Play back the feed from outside my office, and outside my study, for the last few minutes."

"Yes, sir."  The supervisor motioned to one of the surveillance techs, and they set to work.  The frames shifted, most of them moving to another monitor as two particular videos filled this one.

They may as well have been still images.  Two feeds, two doors, two nondescript sections of empty hallway.  Except for the angle of the camera, there were no differences between the videos.

Until a pony walked into view.  On the right side video feed, a black unicorn with a crazy green mane and tail, styled up neatly as ever, approached the door, and knocked.

The door was opened within seconds.  A grey pegasus with a blonde mane let miss Kettle into the Chairman's office with a smile, and closed the door behind her.

"Accelerate the feed until they leave," ordered the supervisor.

"Already have sir," was the Tech's immediate response.  On the left side of the screen, Steel Catch exited his study, locked the door, and left screen at a comically fast pace.  "Approaching real-time playback..." he waited a few seconds, "now."

There was no change on screen.  Two doors, still as ever.

Steel catch frowned.  He didn't like this at all.  "Go over all the camera feeds during the time between miss Kettle entering my office, and myself leaving the study.  Look for any irregularities, no matter how minor.  There was a magic surge somewhere in the building, a strong one, and I want it identified."

"Sir?" The supervisor whispered, moving close enough to the chairman to keep his voice from the technicians.  "Was that pegasus in your office unsupervised?  That's a serious breach of-"

"An unexplained burst of magic occurred inside this building," Steel Catch interrupted, "I think that is the worse security breach compared to me trusting my housekeeper, don't you?"

"Of course, sir," said the supervisor, stepping away.

"I'm going to check on miss Kettle, then return here.  If you find anything, alert the nearest security team to check it out."  Steel Catch transported himself out of the room and looked over at Spit and Polish, both of whom were closer than he expected.  "One of you, come with me."

Steel Catch set off before they had a chance to answer.  It was Spit who followed him.  His office was only two corridors away, and they reached it in under a minute.  

"Sir," Spit said suddenly, "Surveillance sees us,and reports no change, miss Kettle and your servant should still be in there."   Steel Catch frowned at the guard's choice of words, but he had other things to worry about.  He keyed in his personal code on the door and went moved to enter, but Spit stopped him.  "Respectfully, Sir, this is my job."

When the door slid open, Spit walked into the room.  Rather, a projection of himself walked through the door.  the real Spit stayed where he was for a moment horn glowing as he wove his illusion.

"Hello," called the projection, checking behind an alcove and the reception desk, "anypony here?  Miss Kettle?  Miss Hooves?"

Weapon drawn, the real Spit entered the room behind the projection.  He headed to the door that led to the main office, and hit the control.  He stood off to the side as it opened, hiding as his projection strolled into the room front and center.

The real one followed seconds later.  "Sir, the room is empty, but you might want to take a look at this."

Steel Catch headed in to find Spit standing in the middle of the office, next to a table with supplies for making tea.  He was looking down at the carpet, at a scorch mark large enough for two ponies to stand on.

Steel Catch stared at the mark in breathless shock.  "What..."  All sorts of terrible scenarios were running through his head right now.  "What is this?"

"I don't know, sir."  Spit shook his head.  "But, I don't like the looks of it."