//------------------------------// // The Ultimate Heist // Story: The Immortal Dream // by Czar_Yoshi //------------------------------// The halls and tunnels had a different air to them as I exited the elevators, the Composer at my side. An electric aura hung over them, clashing with my weariness and driving me into a weird state of muddled yet alert. It wasn't about the task I had been given that I was thinking about. It wasn't about how to avoid getting betrayed again, either. It was about the fact that something had heard my prayer for one more chance. That was the only way I could get it to make sense in my mind. We forgot to check the rest of the ship - well, I remembered, but Mother didn't want to - to see if anyone was there, hiding. The thing that turned out to be hiding there wanted to let me go back to Icereach, hooves untied. What were the odds? Was it fate? Providence? There was nothing logically impossible about what it had happened, but I couldn't accept that my salvation had been mundane. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to theorize about divine intervention, no matter how excited I was that this had happened again. Two years ago, I had gone down to the chapel to beseech anything that was listening to save Corsica. Something had answered. Maybe a little too literally, since she survived and Ansel didn't. That had marked the start of my fascination with the divine, and my search for the culprit still hadn't borne fruit. But if I ever wanted it to, I had better get my head in the game and make the most of this opportunity I had been given. Self-doubt had no place in my thoughts. Someone had ordained that this was right. "So, about Rondo..." I whispered to the Composer, who was walking two steps behind me and to my side, like it always did for the muscular changeling. "I'm pretending to be him now, yeah?" "Based on your assumption that all of my employees are hiding out in Graygarden's office," the Composer said, "you will need a way to slip past them to search for that key. Seeing as Rondo was last seen pretending to be you, it seems an easy disguise to take." Right. I ran through the steps of the plan again in my head, and then two more times for good measure: break into Graygarden's office. Find a key. Go to the chapel. Use the key to unlock a door. Let the Whitewing - the Composer - take a look around. Then it would clean things up in return. I presumed it already knew what the key looked like, and how to find this hidden- Someone was coming. I immediately ducked behind a shadowed corner and swam, waiting for them to pass. For some reason, the Composer didn't share my instincts, ambling along exactly the way we had been going. I chanced a peek - it was hard to see out of the shadows when your eyes were submerged, sort of like how it was hard to see the surface from underwater, but with enough practice I had gotten passable at it. Whoever had been coming toward us looked like they had turned around and gone the other way at double speed. "What was that?" I asked, indignant, surfacing when I was sure they were gone. "A civilian," the Composer replied. "It seems they decided not to come this way." "Not that," I quietly protested. "What was with you not hiding?" The Composer looked at me. "What reason have we to hide? 'Corsica' is making a claim to the position of Head Scientist. You are in her inner circle. Authorities belong wherever they wish to be." "Authority is just another word for having a mark on my head," I countered. "If someone had seen me, they'd know exactly where I am. Now they're probably gonna go raise an alarm because they saw a killer robot wandering the halls unattended." "And why would that be a problem?" The Composer didn't sound particularly concerned, though admittedly that was its default tone. "Because we're two against a city, some changelings and a windigo," I hissed, eyes darting between the hallway corners. "Maybe let's stick to sneaking, yeah?" The Composer tilted its head. "I told you, I am more than able to deal with Ludwig, should he become a problem. Should anyone else in this city do the same, they would not be beyond my abilities either. While I have no reason at present to fight, I also have no reason to avoid it." I grimaced. Beating everyone up was not the preferred option, even assuming the Composer was as good as it claimed to be. I might not consider myself gallant and daring, but that was a big no-no. Besides, if we tried it and failed, I'd be screwed. "Well, I do have reasons not to fight," I whispered, uneasy despite the miracle that had given me this second chance. "So please don't start anything unless you're gonna get rid of Ludwig and get Corsica back, okay?" "At ease," the Composer urged, not bothering to lower its voice like I was. "Should there be an altercation, you will not need involve yourself. As I have told you many times, I am more than capable of handling things on my own." "That's not the... Nnngh... Look, why do you need me, anyway?" I quietly asked, resuming sneaking toward the administrative wing. "If you're so unstoppable, why not just go open this door yourself? Seems like you can get around well enough." "There are many things I can do on my own," the Composer explained. "You might as well ask why I would bother making allies of Aldebaran in the first place. The answer is because ponies fascinate me, and I am a patient being. Were I to accomplish my goals on my own, it might be faster and more foolproof. But then I would miss out on the opportunity to watch you strive for something. No one would believe that you, Halcyon, were created for the sole purpose of stealing a key and opening a door. And yet right now, that is your foremost ambition. How is this possible, that you can so easily cast aside your created purpose and dedicate yourself to something else of your own choosing? And what ramifications might the answer have for my own journey? I suspect that if I delegate these tasks to beings of flesh and blood, I might bear witness to something that expands the reaches of what I can understand." I scrunched up my brow, feeling that a small dose of insane robot logic might be at play. Was that really how machines thought about things? That you could only exist to do one thing, and it was fascinating to watch ponies come up with new goals as their desires changed? Now that was bizarre to think about. Then again, I was desperately interested in the Whitewing, so who was to say it shouldn't be interested in me? "Anyway." I shook my head, changing the subject. "Back to the important stuff. How does Rondo act around his friends? And how does he treat you? For the sake of acting." The Composer kept walking on. "He acts much the same in private as in public. As for me, he knows who I am. All of Aldebaran do. I would not stow away in secret on my own airship. That said, you may have noticed this group has a strong bias against authority, so I do not boss them around much, except to remind them of the importance of my goals. The same extends to their relationships with each other. Don't try to get them to do anything, and don't be too hasty to do anything they tell you. Teamwork and independence are a balancing act for them. Find this line and walk it, and you will be fine." "And their numbers..." I hesitated. "There's a fifth room on the ship. Who's that belong to? Is there another one of them hiding somewhere I should be aware of?" "Number five is a personal friend of mine," the Composer explained. "Sometimes, they are included at my insistence, but not today. Aldebaran do not think highly of them, and they chose to sit this mission out." That made sense. If the ship belonged to the Whitewing, it would get final say in who got to have a room there... It sounded like I was only up against the four changelings. Three, now that Mother had removed one. Speaking of Mother, the Composer had suggested she stay behind while we went back below, ostensibly because I had an easy Aldebaran disguise and she didn't. But Mother wanted me safe and out of the city badly enough that she had just tried to foalnap me. I still needed to sit down and process that, along with literally everything else from the last week, once I wasn't needed at the top of my game. But the shock of the experience aside, that spoke to a level of determination that made it hard to believe she wasn't following me at a distance even now. I didn't know what she could do if push came to shove. Maybe that weird paralysis ability of hers would come in handy. Either way, having someone I trusted at my back - yes, I still trusted her - gave me a slight boost in confidence I was going to need. I could do this. As we approached Graygarden's office door, I focused as hard as I could, running through failure points and contingencies in my mind. I was Rondo, pretending to be Halcyon. I had to get in, find the key, and get out. Presumably, I'd either know it when I saw it, or the Composer would show me the way... How could this go wrong? Well, the changelings might not be there. I was assuming they were, but if they weren't, this would get a lot easier. Then I'd have to worry about not knowing where they were again, though. Then they might see through my disguise. I had a hunch the Composer would bail me out if I got in really hot water, but didn't want to test it. I'd just have to trust my talent and be good. This was the first time I'd ever stress-tested it in a high-stakes situation, at least that I could remember. It would be a bad time to learn I was actually a big fish in a little pond. And then I could just get betrayed by the Composer. I had lost track of my betrayals over the last week. Elise, who was actually a changeling. Then the changelings for real. Then Ansel, running his mouth about how much he hated identity thieves... Maybe that one didn't count. Ludwig, obviously. And, of course, Mother... though none stung more than my betrayal of myself, when the bracelet shut off in the middle of a blizzard and there was nothing I could do to stop it. One more betrayal would just be another on the pile. Practically rote at this point. And this time, I had the backing of a miracle. Someone out there had judged my mission and deemed it worthy. So if I got in a pickle, I was pretty sure self-doubt wouldn't stop me again. I rubbed at my bracelet anyway, restored from Mother back to its rightful place on my leg. The real failure point, the one I didn't much want to think about because I had no idea how to handle it, was Aldebaran's other jobs. The Composer had told me we weren't foalnapped by its instruction, but someone else's. The changelings really were mercenaries, working multiple jobs for multiple clients at once, and their mechanical sponsor hadn't been willing to tell me a thing about these other contracts. If this failed, I gave it ten to one odds it would be because I didn't actually know what Aldebaran's goals even were. That meant figuring those out was almost as important as getting the key and opening the door, if not more. Any other failure points? There had to be something I was overlooking. Adrenaline alone couldn't make me smart, and that was all that was keeping me on my hooves at this point. There had to be something I was forgetting, right? I couldn't remember. So, I opened Graygarden's door without knocking and stepped inside. The lights were on bright in Graygarden's reception room, almost like normal lighting instead of its usual dusky atmosphere. The desk was empty, covered in ransacked papers. The big portrait of him that covered the back wall had been removed and set up against a plant, ostensibly to search for any hidden safes. There weren't any. Four doors led out of the room, as usual, two on either side. The lobby was empty, but there was something going on in the room to the back left. "Right. Let's see who's here so we don't get snuck upon..." I decided at a whisper, making for the active room first. I had never been deeper into Graygarden's sanctum before... This room was a wide hallway, brightly-lit, with several desks looking like they were suited to secretaries along one side and an array of trophy cases along another. At a cursory glance, half of them held machines and most of the rest held scale models, but at least two contained rocks. Leif, Vivace and Elise were all sitting around a desk near the back, quietly arguing over something on it I couldn't see. Apparently that meant Elise was Tempo, then? I was glad they weren't all untransformed, or else my disguise would seem a lot more shaky. Several seconds of listening to them bicker, and I decided it would be safe to check out the other rooms without them breathing down my back. Although I was curious why they were fighting... Later, though. I'd probably get dragged into it once they saw me, and lose a prime opportunity to explore the rest of the place. I picked out the front right door and decided to start there. The Composer followed me through the door - the same room Aldebaran had been waiting in when we first met, here in Graygarden's office so long ago. I quickly saw why: it was like an extended lobby holding space, a waiting room with much more cushy seating than the sparse benches in the lobby proper. Several cloth-covered refreshment tables lined the back, and three velvet couches formed a semicircle around a large projector screen on one wall. This was probably where Graygarden gave presentations, as well as the waiting room for ponies important enough not to be turned away when he was busy. "Probably no keys in here," I guessed under my breath, figuring it was a relatively public space. "Hey, what's the key look like, anyway?" "It should be a rune-covered chunk of stone," the Composer replied, actually lowering its voice this time. "Probably looking like it was broken off from something. I doubt it will be in a place that sees public use." Right, then. Hadn't there been a few rocks in those display cases in the room the changelings were in? That was probably the best place to look, but I still didn't want to go in there until I had exhausted all other curiosities. Besides, maybe if I waited, the changelings would leave... I slipped back through the lobby and in through the back right door. Time to keep exploring. This room was... a small apartment? Actually, quite a generous one, by my standards. It had a bookcase, a kitchenette, and several doors leading to a bathroom and a bedroom. Even a carpet! I remembered several eons ago when Corsica told me Graygarden could get away with making their house outrageously pink for his mistress because he could just sleep in his office when he didn't want to deal with it. Well, apparently this was how he slept here. And meanwhile, Corsica used a sleeping bag in our lab... I didn't feel too bad about wearing my boots on the carpet. The Composer watched, but didn't question, as I made my way to the bookshelf. It wasn't every day I got to pillage Graygarden's house, and while I did have some very urgent priorities, I couldn't resist taking a peek at the kind of material the head scientist might use to furnish a personal library. Maybe he'd have things that were smuggled past the censors? A cursory glance said no, he was still just a very dour individual. Manuals, treatises, copies of patent rosters... I didn't have time to analyze the latter to see if they might be annotated with interesting tidbits about what technology could be secretly used for. There was a Varsidelian cookbook that looked interesting, but after a second of thought I decided not to swipe it. No need to get too into the spirit of masquerading as a criminal. I checked the bedroom, and found it had been sacked. In fact, it looked as if someone had been packing in a great hurry. "Guess we'll need to search this," I sighed, looking at all the closets and bedstand drawers and random things on the floor a rock could be hidden under. This would be a private and personal place to hide something important, right? Except that someone else had already been here... Time to raid Graygarden's things even harder. One drawer, two drawers, three drawers... I turned them inside out in quick succession, finding some pocket change which I left alone and a folded-up letter I opened and read. I soon wished I hadn't. It was a sappy, flowery love poem, and my dumb brain made me read the whole thing anyway just in case it might be important. All I got was a big gross reminder of why I had no intentions of dating anyone any time soon. Seriously, though. The prose had been overdone bordering on satire! If I was in the business of writing these, I'd make something like that to mock someone's intelligence, not flatter them. Were ponies just attracted to literary flailing? Even more reason it was good that I didn't care about this sort of thing. I wasn't about to wear a coat with 'genius' written on the side, but if a negative IQ was considered a desirable trait in a partner, I was hard out of luck. Although, for someone who didn't care, I sure was letting this distract me. Drop it, Hallie. Focus! I had just finished stuffing the letter back where I found it when I heard hoofsteps behind me. "Hey!" Leif appeared in the doorway, silhouetted by the kitchenette's light. "About time you're back. What took you so long, and what are you doing in here?" "I..." I hesitated. Had I made too much noise? Didn't matter, exploration time was over. Think, be Rondo! "Never mind your excuses." Leif actually grabbed me, dragging me around to face her before turning around and gesturing for me to follow. "You need to see what I found immediately. I can't believe this..." I glanced to the Composer, which stood impassively in a corner. Apparently, it was letting me handle this on my own. Well, if that was how it was going to be... I surrendered to my instincts and talent, asking them to guide me well. "...Hooves off!" I growled in a perfect copy of Rondo's accent, stomping after her with more weight than my slight frame had. "I'm more than capable of walking, Leitmotif. That Nehaly put up a bit more resistance than I was expecting, that's all." "Stop making excuses and look at this!" Leif called back, already through the next door. "I told you, it's not important!" I followed her into the back left room, psyching myself up to join an argument as a stallion I knew far too little about. Vivace and 'Elise' were still standing around that desk... "All right, what's all this about?" "Took your time," Vivace remarked, looking crossly between me and the desk's most prominent paper. "What of it?" I grunted, too far away still to make out the writing. "I don't know why we waited for him," Elise said in a tone that was undeniably Tempo's. "Muscle Colt, tell me this makes perfect sense to you and your engineering brain. Or not. Either way, maybe these two will stop bellyaching." "Watch your tongue," Vivace growled. "Or need I remind you whose idea it was that we multitask on fundraising?" "Everybody, shut up," Leif demanded, looking over at the Composer and sighing. "We've got a quorum. Rondo, just read this and tell me what you think." Were they actually falling for my disguise? Was I really as good as I thought I was? Or were they just bad? Tension in the room buzzed like static around my ears, and yet this was working! I leaned forward. What was this paper everyone was so upset abo- It was my paper. The one I had submitted in Corsica's name, about ether crystal dating. Fortunately, I didn't have to hide my bafflement, flipping through it and pretending not to understand a word. "So? This is by those kids we stranded, or something?" "Told you he'd miss the point," Elise said, twirling a pencil like it was a cigar. At least she hadn't questioned my implication that they intentionally ditched us. That straightened things up a little bit in my mind. Leif sighed again and put her head in her hooves. "Let's put it this way," Vivace said, pacing restlessly. "Before we nabbed her, Corsica was working on a project that somehow correlated dates of major world events to markings in some crystals. She had several pinned down. One of those was the Awakening." The Awakening? I frowned. "Yeah? And?" "There were also plenty she couldn't tie to anything. Especially recently," Vivace went on. "And for obvious reason. One of those lined up with the Canterlot invasion." I blinked in confusion. Canterlot? I had heard that name before. Wasn't it on that mysterious letter I found with the magic scrolls? That aside, were these changelings really confirming my hypothesis that we could use the ether crystal fault planes to predict events we hadn't even heard about? That paper was the last thing I should be worrying about right now, yet I still felt a rush of excitement. Also, what idiots. Imagine if they had just hired us legitimately instead... "Here's the kicker," Vivace said. "She could only pinpoint date with this methodology. She had a hypothesis for how to expand that to triangulate location as well. But it looks like this was a petition for funding to develop that, and it got denied." He shook his head. "And since I doubt you'll think to ask, no, it's not thorough enough for us to finish or even repeat the work ourselves." "In short," Leif finished, sitting on the table and kicking a leg uselessly, "we've just made enemies with a mare who might have legitimately been on the verge of discovering a way to track Chrysalis." What was Chrysalis? Or who? Someone who had something to do with the fault planes? "Stinks to be us," I grunted, hiding a slight thrill at Aldebaran getting their karmic comeuppance for screwing us over. And yet, apparently I was also screwed out of working with someone who knew interesting and important things I didn't... "Time to go back to Plan A?" "See?" 'Elise' threw her pencil at Vivace. "Told you he'd have no new ideas." Vivace caught it in his aura without blinking and set it down. "If you want my advice," the Composer said, stepping out of the shadows at the side of the room, "you still have my own objective to fulfill. Just because multitasking has brought you grief does not mean you are blocked on all fronts. What news have you uncovered regarding the Whitewing program?" "No mentions of it anywhere," Elise said, getting to her hooves. "I'm starting to think Graygarden actually had nothing to do with it. Of course, if he did, he'd have put his important things somewhere far more secure than this." "Really." The Composer walked to the line of display cases along the wall, stopping at one that contained, of all things, an inertial stabilizer rotor. It lifted a wing, the exact same part put to use. "No clues, keys, nothing?" Vivace shrugged. "We've been preoccupied with our own mishaps. Or need I remind you that on top of this paper, we still don't know who left that letter that caused the children to get suspicious?" Wait a minute. That message we 'discovered' hadn't been part of the ruse to ditch us, after all? I felt like I was getting too many puzzle pieces too rapidly to make use of them. Stop, stop, slow down! "Not to mention the Yak Ambassador getting involved," Leif sighed. "Composer, how long do we need to search and turn up nothing before we can cut our losses and run? About an hour ago, he started threatening to put the standing army on our tails if we don't give up these games." So Balthazar and the yaks were a neutral party who didn't know what was going on? Good to know. I kind of wanted to go right now and get them on my side... "I see your conundrum," the Composer said. "However, all of these complications are arising from your other plans. Not mine. I have few tears to shed for failure you brought upon yourselves." It pointed at the exit. "Why not break your contracts, abandon these guises and try again, keeping a lower profile this time?" Leif suddenly pulsed with a spiral of emerald flame that looked eerily similar to my bracelet's. When it vanished, she was a spitting image of Corsica... So that's what it looked like when they transformed? "Because these guises aren't so easy to toss," she said with a flip of her mane, copying Corsica's mannerisms even better than I was doing Rondo's. "Think about it. Graygarden disappears. Corsica tries to become the head scientist. At least that has explanations: she's ambitious. Then Corsica disappears too? What about when the real one shows up again? We move around a lot, 'boss'. It's necessary, with what we are. This jig is going to bring down so much heat once it's up, they'll probably be looking for us two nations over." "I understand your issues with being told what to do," the Composer acknowledged, quietly angling a wing towards the trophy cases with the rocks inside... I realized that all three changelings were thoroughly distracted by the robot. "I also understand that you have found yourselves in a stressful situation. Perhaps it would be best to pull out after all. Spend some time in reflection upon what went wrong." "What do you think we've been doing for the last hour?" Tempo drawled. I slipped away, examining the cases further down the line. There were two rocks: a hoof-sized chunk of black glass advertised by a plaque as being from a meteor, and a similar-sized piece of blue granite with part of a carving on its flat face. Taken from an ancient ruin, the second rock's enclosure claimed. It was the same rock type as the chapel. That had to be the one. "Rondo, what are you doing?" Leif called as I unclasped the trophy case. "Moping and being useless, my dear Leitmotif!" I called back, once again letting my instincts guide my voice. "Certainly not taking a hint from our friendly Composer and looking for clues, oh no! What would compel me to do that?" The Whitewing nodded. "I suggest you all scatter and follow suit. Search Elise's office, if you haven't already. Leitmotif, kindly go deflect attention and buy your team some time. Tempo, clean up loose ends. Vivace, search. Work expediently and you may all get out of this alive." "You're not the boss of me," Leif huffed, swaggering out the door in an imitation of Corsica that made me jealous. "It's a rock," Vivace told me as Tempo left as well. "What are you doing?" "Following the old instincts, my friend," I replied, lifting out my prize in gentle forehooves - Rondo wouldn't be accustomed to using wings, so I didn't use mine either. Apparently the Composer hadn't told its changelings about the secret door it wanted to see inside... Why not? Was it testing them some other way first to see if it even wanted to give them this task? Something about the machine's logic still felt alien to me, though I supposed that was why it was so fascinating. Vivace sighed, eyeing the black glass next to the rock I had taken. "Perhaps the Composer is right," he muttered, low enough that the Whitewing might not hear. "All this multitasking... Leitmotif insists she has it under control, but every time we make these deals, it feels like we're getting further and further from our original goal." "Yeah," I muttered under my breath, hoping he would tell me what that goal was. "I feel the same." "If only that 'daughter of the head scientist' business hadn't blown up in our face..." Vivace got up and walked away. "At this rate, we're going to lose all our leads. But, I suppose it can't be helped..." I couldn't help it. The moment he was out of sight, I ran to a desk, grabbed some writing tools and started taking notes. Aldebaran are looking for "Chrysalis", I furiously scribbled, unable to make sense of these puzzle pieces now yet determined not to forget them for later. Aldebaran captured me, Corsica, Ansel and Elise on purpose. The Composer wants them to look for information on Whitewings. Aldebaran are also working for at least one paying third party. I paused, thinking. Aldebaran had Corsica unlock a terminal in the hideout. They used our identities to try to take over Icereach. The Composer did not tell them to capture us. They did not expect the letter they saw when we unlocked the terminal. Hmm... Could I piece all this into separate, coherent goals? I felt like I could. Their work for the Composer was fairly straightforward. I drew a column for that on my paper. It seemed to want them investigating Icereach's involvement with Whitewings and nothing else. I recalled them telling us on the flight to the hideout that they were looking for materials relating to Whitewings on the terminal there that we were going to unlock, so I marked that as relevant too. Next goal: look for Chrysalis. This one was also certain, but how could I match it to their actions? The way Vivace had spoken about the 'daughter of the head scientist' business made it sound like that terminal was actually supposed to have information relating to this... I supposed it wasn't impossible that they had been lying about why they wanted us to come with them. I put take us to the hideout in both columns. That left me with any number of third parties they may or may not be working for for money. It also left me with them stranding us and them coming back to use our faces and take over the city. These were clearly tied together; Tempo and Vivace had all but said it was the fault of third-party contracts that they had made enemies of us. But... did that mean they took us to the hideout for this reason, too? I stared at my paper, take us to the hideout now written in all three goal columns. There had to be something I was missing. That, or these changelings were serious multitaskers... I jotted down a few extra notes, like how Leif was a really good actor and no one had mentioned Ludwig, and that I really was good enough to pass myself off as Rondo. Then I folded them up, stuck them in a pocket, and picked up the keystone I had liberated from its display stand. "This what you need?" I drew in a breath, showing it to the Composer. "It seems promising," the Composer observed, stepping up to me. "Let us try it. You already know the way?" "Yeah," I said. "I know where the elevator we need is. And thanks for covering for me. Let's go check out that-" I cut myself off, a hoof already raised to walk towards the door, as my curiosity got the better of me. "Who's Chrysalis?" "A figure that my employees are seeking," the Composer explained. "What they do on their own time is none of my business, provided it does not interfere with their work for me. I am afraid I know nothing more." Hmm... Lie? I couldn't tell. Machines lacked all the ordinary facial queues I would use to read ponies, and its voice was so even, not monotone but aloof and steady. This Whitewing perpetually wore the best poker face I had ever seen. If I was in its place, I sure wouldn't have been this content not knowing. But I guess our extreme differences were why I found it so interesting... "Suit yourself," I said, making again for the door. "Let's see if this key of yours works." The Icereach bunker hadn't been designed with a central elevator shaft. Throughout the caves, there were more like six or seven shafts, all of which reached slightly different floors. Only one set went up to the surface. The one that went down to the chapel was annoyingly out of the way, far enough that walking there gave me time to think. Usually, this was something I enjoyed. This time, they were empty steps spent poring over my plan, looking for holes and praying there would be none, even though the first third of it had gone seamlessly so far. But it wasn't so much that there were holes as that there were things outside my control. How long would it take until Ludwig got bored and went to tear the place up on its own? What was Mother doing? And the changelings had said something about the Yak Ambassador maybe getting the standing army involved... Balthazar was my friend, but if someone other than me brought him down here, my Rondo-disguised-as-Halcyon disguise probably wouldn't do me any favors. An intercom crackled to life, a system that didn't see much use beyond once-per-week broadcasts thanking exceptional employees and acknowledging new patent filings. "Hello?" Corsica's voice asked. "Is this thing on?" My ears perked. We were about halfway to the elevator... Apparently, Leif meant it when she said she would run interference. "Groovy," the intercom continued, broadcasting to the entire bunker. "Anyhoodles, I just wanted to say that all of you piddly ponyos are losers. Big fat ones. That means none of you are as cool as me." My neck went rigid. "Pretty sure we've got a problem..." "I would not worry overly much about it," the Composer calmly replied, completely undisturbed. "Either the windigo will rise above its worse nature, or it won't. Either way, it is creating a distraction for us. We should make the most of it and clean up the fallout after I've accomplished my goals." "That's why I have benevolently decided to take over Icereach," Ludwig explained, its voice slightly distant, as if it didn't know which part of the microphone to talk into. "Do not worry-worry, ponyos. You are probably wondering why I sound so crazy and not like the Corsica you know! Well, it is because my evil dad actually experimented on my face and made me insane. That is why I blew him up. Did you know he had Icereach working on all sorts of naughty things? That is why I have been thinking, he is probably in cahoots with the Yakyakistan Ambassador. If you see that guy, you should tell me where he is so I can blow him up, too!" "Are you sure we shouldn't worry?" I hissed. "It's making threats against the ambassador now! Odds are he's already got no idea what's going on with the changelings. Even if it's crazy, sooner or later things are gonna get serious!" The Composer didn't break its pace. "Enlighten me." "Listen, Ludwig said it wanted to start a war, yeah?" I explained under my breath. "Or at least make the sponsor nations mad at each other. That ambassador has a secret thing in his embassy that lets him instantly contact home. All that's gotta happen is he gets spooked enough to call home for backup!" "Which would be a good thing," the Composer pointed out. "It could act as an outside stabilizing force. This windigo clearly has the desire to cause harm, and knows how to play a trick or two. But to turn two partners against each other requires more than just wild accusations. Having the intention to manipulate ponies does not inherently grant one the ability. I believe this windigo is overestimating its own tactical acumen, and is actually quite harmless." Easy for it to say. The Composer hadn't felt what it was like, watching as Ludwig took Corsica away... Ludwig initially struck me as someone who knew how to obfuscate their danger with insanity, and its actions since then had only reinforced that perception. Of course, maybe the Composer just didn't care because it wasn't its own home at risk. "How about we go deal with that thing before going to the chapel, eh?" I suggested, trying to change our course. "That door's not going anywhere soon. Why not exorcise the windigo while we know where it is?" "I suggest otherwise." The Composer kept its head high, walking along. "Do not forget you are presently working for me. While I do allow my employees a great deal of leniency in juggling their own goals alongside mine, that strategy seems to have backfired for Aldebaran. Not getting sidetracked is the only sure way to victory." I lowered my head, frustrated. At least I had more agency than when I was paralyzed on the ship, but it still felt like I was being funneled onto one path. If I was going to live up to that miracle and save Icereach, I needed to get some freedom... The elevator to the chapel was in Icereach's manufacturing district. While hardly a hub of industry, the bunker did have a sizable full-time population, and ponies needed goods to survive. Plenty of those could be shipped in, but a healthy amount of recycling took place to produce others, and that was all conducted here. Several more ponies saw us - this area was worked around the clock, and low enough on the social ladder that everyone here felt a degree or three of separation between themselves and the leadership. Squabbles and decrees could come and go, but someone needed to keep the lights on. Much to the Composer's confusion, that didn't mean I trusted them enough not to hide every time. We reached the elevator. It hummed around me on the long descent to the chapel, the Composer waiting quietly at my side. I was out of complaints about Ludwig and we had come far enough that turning back now would be pointless, so we passed the trip in silence, the key stone sitting heavily in my pocket. With a clunk of pulleys and gears, we hit the bottom. The chapel was untouched and undisturbed, save for the racket of the ether pump - apparently, it hadn't finished its run for the night. Machinery chugged away on the rack of equipment that stabilized the ether for transport, a big metal shelf sharing space with timeless carvings and runes, and I stepped forward, starting to look for the place this key was supposed to go. It was... calming, being down here. As pressing as my troubles were, I felt a deep, quiet sensation that nothing could hurt me in this place. Not quite enough that I could fully relax, but enough that I could remind myself how much I wanted to see behind this alleged door, too. "You appear quite familiar with this place," the Composer observed, watching me work. "I come down here a lot," I replied, holding the stone and scouring the walls and ground. "It's just nice to get away from things, you know? I do my best brainstorming down here." The Composer said nothing, moving to examine the machinery. I wondered what it was like for a sapient robot to look at a non-sapient one... Probably the same as it was for me to look at a potato, but who could say? "You know anything about this place?" I asked on a hunch. "Who built it, or what it was used for?" "That knowledge has been lost to the sands of time," the Composer said. "I imagine it would have been a very early civilization, more than two thousand years ago. Perhaps twice that, or more." "How far back do they track history, out there in the rest of the world?" I asked, talking as I inspected a wall. "Most all that's tracked here is the dates of inventions. Though I guess the yaks know about their war." "History fades in layers," the Composer replied. "Eight to ten hundred years ago, the tools of modern record-keeping came into being, though their implementation varied by region. Up to a thousand years before that, history takes greater guesswork to piece together, but some stories endure. Beyond there, almost nothing is known. It is said that the greatest civilizations of the previous age went to war in those days, and collapsed from the strain, the following dark age wiping out almost all surviving knowledge of the days of yore." Interesting. I made a mental note to read further into this someday in the future. Despite everything I had been through, I knew that once this was over, I would eventually start dreaming again of taking my friends and traveling the world... "Here is what we are looking for," the Composer said, the faintest note of excitement crossing its perfectly controlled voice. "Eh? You found it?" I came swiftly trotting over. The Whitewing was standing beside the machinery rack for the ether pump processing. "It looks like this was built to block the way. Fortunately, it is not a good barricade." It pointed to the wall behind the rack. "The key goes there, if you please." I craned my neck, looking. The key, places to put the key... There was a small bit gouged out of the wall that looked like a place where a bolt had been drilled in and then broken loose. But the frame was primarily bolted to the ground, not the wall, and with far more care than would cause something like that to occur. I held up the missing fragment, and it fit to a tee. Ka-chink! I pushed it in. The ground faintly rumbled. And then, smoothly, with no resistance at all, a square section of wall broke free and sank into the ground. My eyes were wide. The Composer didn't wait for me, slipping around past the machine rack and walking into the darkness. I followed. I needed to see this too. The cave beyond the door was a mix of natural stone, crystal formations, and flat surfaces with more carvings, linear patterns I couldn't tell whether were writing or decoration. The ground sloped upward slightly, green from my bracelet reflecting off crystals on the ceiling like they were chandeliers. It was a longer room, and thanks to the slope, the Composer was already out of sight ahead. I pressed on, climbing. And then I found a skeleton. At least, that's what I thought it was, for long enough that my heart jumped into my throat and I almost squeaked in surprise. Okay, almost screamed, but don't tell anyone. But then I looked again, and although it was equinoid and very long dead, it wasn't like any skeleton I had ever imagined before. It was... shell-like. An exo-skeleton, maybe? The skull looked relatively normal, a short curved horn rising from its forehead, and it had fangs like a batpony, but the similarities stopped there. The thing's back wasn't bone, it was hard, still shaped like the surface of a pony. So were the legs. Except the legs were riddled with holes down by the hooves... Actually, the horn was too. It was like a layer of something had formed over a dead pony, and then stayed there when the rest rotted away. Carapace? Chitin? It looked vaguely insectoid... It had wings, too. Wings and a horn, just like an alicorn. My curiosity was almost stronger than my squeamishness at seeing what was still very definitely a skeleton. Almost. I decided to leave it and keep looking. The floor leveled off, and the tunnel took a sharp bend ahead. Before that point, though, there was a big pile of something stacked against the walls. Old machinery, it looked like, dumped there haphazardly without a care for its long-term well-being. I scanned over it with interest. It looked more arcane and less ordered than Icereach's machines, also lighter weight and lower budget, and a lot more spliced together. My superstitious side insisted gleefully that it looked more like it was designed to harness and control external forces than to operate purely within known parameters and closed systems, arcane and mystical. But I was about the most biased judge possible, so I took that judgement with a hearty grain of salt. Maybe there would be something explaining what it did, and why it was here? It looked way older than the Whitewing. There was no dust down here, in the paradoxically fresh cave air, but I could still feel age radiating off the equipment. Machines wore out as time passed. I hazarded a guess these were made within the last century, but definitely not during my lifetime. Eventually, my scouring paid off, and I found a prize: a stone lectern holding a book. Eagerly, yet mindful of aged paper, I eased it open. Captain's Log, Icereach Expedition Year 946 My eyes glistened with the light of revelation. A journal, sealed in a place like this? With dates, even? Not quite sixty years ago... On the scale of things Icereach was likely to keep off the books, I had a strong suspicion this journal was going to be the top of the top. I turned the page and kept reading. Day 0. I guess I had better start this formally. I'm Captain Icebeard. Not my real name, but my stallions like calling me it. After long enough, it started to stick. I lead a crew of twenty. Unicorns, down to the last one. Not counting the yak caravan we're currently traveling with, but they won't be staying. On the books, we are Yakyakistan's foremost scientists. We've been commissioned to explore the foothills of southeast Yak Hoof, where a colony of reclusive batponies live in caves underground. We'll call on the locals' obligation to their nation and establish a research colony. Off the books, we're deserters from the war. Every last one of us. Ones who had academic backgrounds and were offered a second chance because of it. I don't know if anyone higher up expects us to put in honest work. I wouldn't, if I was them. I'd give us some dangerous cargo, send us to the middle of nowhere to "study" it, and hope both it and us never come back. But I'm not them. I'm a pacifist, not a stallion without honor. And so I'm going to enforce decorum among my ponies. And if these "windigo hearts" we've been given to study are as dangerous as they sound? We'll just have to prove it's not that easy to make conscientious objectors disappear. If we ever return to civilization, I'll edit this to make it more politically correct. If you're reading this, you know that didn't happen. I read as if in a trance. Windigo hearts? Yakyakistan had conducted experiments at Icereach relating to windigoes? Using disloyal soldiers, at that? Also, if all of them were unicorns, that meant none of them were yaks... I kept reading. Day 1. We've arrived in the foothills and made contact with the locals. They don't speak our language, but aren't hostile, either. Crimson, my first lieutenant, has taken some of the ponies to get a lay of the land. The yaks that brought us and our equipment across the glacier are gone. We won't be able to leave if we want to. Who knows how advanced these batponies are. Are they stone-age neanderthals, or artisans with a rich cultural history? Either way, they didn't ask for us to come here, and so I'm going to enforce independence among my ponies. No imposing on the locals. We'll be living in thick tents for a while. And no experimenting with the windigo hearts until we're better established. Hopefully that day never comes. If anything went wrong, there'd be no help for miles and miles. I suppressed a shiver. Were the original batponies the ones who built the chapel? And a pony named Crimson? The same name as the valley Icereach sat in, probably not by coincidence. More. What came next? Day 2. Our camp is getting established. We've laid out a floor plan for the tents. Everyone's followed it well. As I told the higher-ups, these ponies aren't incompetent or unable to follow orders, they just didn't believe in the cause! This is a good team, and I'm going to prove it. Short entry today. I'll be exploring with Crimson. She's scoped out most of this valley. If the wind still blows south to north here like the rest of the Yak Hoof, it should be reasonably sheltered. Probably why the locals set up shop here... Day 3. I caught Silverhorn sleeping with a local in his tent this morning. Now he's digging a latrine. Didn't that stallion listen? Just because we're in the middle of nowhere doesn't meant we can act like savages. I'm trying to prove to this team what they can do! Guess I'll need to be a little more patient. Hard to be patient when I'm angry. Us and the batponies can't communicate. My gut says he was taking advantage of them. Wonder what they think about it? For all I know, maybe they think they're taking advantage of us. I turned the page. Day 4. I sure do love rations. Wonder what the locals eat? Wish we could ask them. Maybe they'd trade. Crimson was in school to be an economist when she got drafted. Talked my ear off about the basis of money systems when I asked her about it. I figured we'd have nothing they want, being in a place as remote as this. They probably don't have much either. But we do have muscle and horn power. I noticed some of the locals watching while I was shoveling snow away from the camp today. Just telekinesis, nothing to it. But maybe they've never seen this before? Wonder what they can do that we've never thought about. Not a lot of batponies in Infinite Glacier. If only we could communicate, maybe we could really do something. Day 5. I've been talking long-term plans with my stallions. We've got enough magical heat sources for about a year of tent living like this. More if we can improve insulation. That's far enough off that we can focus on more immediate things like food, but not so far that we should forget about it. I want to have us a proper building, or even a tower. Someplace permanent and above ground, where we can do whatever with those hearts and not risk polluting the batponies' cave if something goes foul. Most of the soldiers agree with me, but none are too passionate. I think I need to do something for morale. Day 6. Found Silverhorn and that mare together again. The same one. At least he's loyal. I put him on digging again. But that's what everyone's doing, so it's not much of a punishment... How hard can it be to stick with our own kind? Not like my crew is only made of stallions. Granted, then I'd have to kick around two of them for slacking while there's work to be done. And for all I know, all our mares already turned him down. Feels like I just can't win. We've not even been here for a week, and I'm talking like this. Can't let my ponies' motivation go to seed. I know what would fix this: better food. Maybe I'll try bartering with the locals. How hard can it be to offer what you've got and pantomime what you want? Day 7. Well, I'll be. Silverhorn and his marefriend are trying to teach each other to talk. She knows his name. He says hers is Wystle. So far they've only got a hoofful of nouns, and only stuff like snow where we've got it handy and everyone knows what it is. But if these batponies are trying to learn to talk with us, they're not dunces, I'll certainly give them that much. Apparently she's better at our language than he is at theirs. Also was the one to take initiative. Go figure. We're supposed to be the scientists, and these so-called savages are making us look bad. I bet you with a real Yakyakistan education, that mare could make a fine scientist herself someday. Can't say I'm upset for our sakes. If our neighbors are more civilized than we are, maybe they can help us. Just need to hope we aren't so un-civilized that they don't want us here. With great reluctance, I pulled myself away from the book. Hearing a raw, uncensored, unfiltered account of what Icereach had been like in the early days was beyond fascinating, and I had a hunch the scientists and the batponies eventually did learn to communicate. But as much as I desperately wanted to know what they would talk about, the journal was fairly thick, and the Composer hadn't come back from ahead. I needed to save Corsica and Icereach. Then I could read this as my reward. ...But it involved windigoes. What if these pages contained information I desperately needed to beat Ludwig? Screaming internally, I set aside my love of a good story and committed the ultimate heresy in search of the power to save my home: I opened the book backwards and flipped to the last written page. It looked like it even started in the middle of an entry. At their insistence, we are going to seal the monster and the rest of the windigo hearts in the deepest, holiest part of the caves. They think the power of the lifestream might purify the hearts, or at least prevent anyone from misusing them. None of us are under any illusions. The cave won't be able to un-make what we have made. Felysia insists it might at least guide that thing's soul on to the afterlife. If it still has one. We've talked it over, and we're hanging up our labcoats. All of us, unicorn and batpony alike. Miraculously, neither side blames the other, but we both know we were trifling with things that weren't meant to be trifled with. Well, no more. If Yakyakistan wants the fruits of our research so badly, they should have checked in on us by now. Until they do, we're sealing all the equipment we brought away as well. Even if the day does come, perhaps we won't tell them we made any progress whatsoever. This will be my last entry in this journal. I am going to leave it with the monster and our things, as a testament to our sins. Talk has been made of naming our tower and other places around the valley in monument to some of us... You know who you are. I don't want my name recorded like that. Icebeard I've been, and Icebeard I'll stay. May history forget me. May history forget us all. Now I felt dirty. And more than a little scared. Not only had I skipped to the ending of a good story, I had apparently defiled this stallion's last wishes to be forgotten about. That was one reason I had never considered might be at play with the censorship: our forebearers actively didn't want to be remembered. It would certainly explain why Icereach's resident population, almost entirely batponies and unicorns, didn't protest the censorship despite being old enough to remember before it. And sixty years ago was recent enough that an elder could remember all the way back then... I wondered if any of the ponies in this journal might be living in Icereach still to this day. That aside, there were windigo hearts stashed down here? And they had something to do with creating that weird carapace exoskeleton I saw on the way in? I presumed that was the monster written about... I realized that if the Composer had been messing with Aldebaran and not being straight with them about what it wanted them to do here in Icereach, it might have been lying to me about why it wanted to come down here, too. This had the potential to get very bad. I slipped the journal into a pocket on the side of my coat - I would give the full thing a read once it was safe to do so. Then I adjusted my bracelet, made sure I was ready to turn it up if need be, and walked around the turn in the tunnel. The tunnel opened out into a mostly circular room, with a large flat area on the far wall completely covered in a massive mural. More machinery was stacked around the room's edges, all of it old and disused. An old stone chest sat in the middle, its lid on the ground a short distance away. The Composer was staring at the mural, in no hurry whatsoever. My gaze drifted up to the mural. Chiseled with immaculate detail, it showed a massive equinoid facing toward me, reared up, its face obscure and its mane flowing like energy into the background. A ring of runes circled its barrel like a disk, and from that sprung two wings, massive and complex and made of more runes, cupping around to cradle a circle of land that bloomed with trees and rivers and mountains. When I looked inward, the image seemed to repeat, nested in on itself. Another pony, this one more realistic and distinct yet less holy and fierce, held the same exact pose, its horn aglow and its wings cupped around a glittering star, standing on the land that was held by the larger equine. When I looked outward, the mural repeated as well. The larger equine was framed by a plane of blasted and shattered land, barren stumps of trees and destroyed rectangular structures that probably once had been buildings. This destroyed land, too, was being held, this time cradled by draconic wings that brushed the edges of the walls, their owner barely visible in the farthest background, great and indistinct. A star, held by a creature within a land held by a creature within another, held by another creature. Looking up at it made my head spin, and I had to shake myself back to reality to focus on the Composer. "What are you up to?" I demanded, edging warily closer, watching the open chest in the middle of the room. "Did you know what was down here when you asked me to help you?" "I had some suspicions," the Composer replied, not looking away. "As it turns out, they were well-founded. This mural is exactly what I was hoping to see." Uh huh. "Then what's this?" I asked, pointing to the chest where I was reasonably sure the windigo hearts had been stored. Granted, I didn't see a lot of room on the Whitewing for carrying stolen artifacts in secret, but I didn't even know how big these hearts were supposed to be... "That?" The Composer looked where I was pointing. "A reliquary where something dangerous was once sealed. However, they were all taken long ago. Do not think we are the first to be down here since that door was closed." "So you're not here for the windigo hearts?" I asked cautiously. The Composer stared at me. "How did you know that name?" "I read it." I pointed over my shoulder, hoping I hadn't erred in admitting this. "There was a journal back with all those machines." "I see." The Composer turned back to the mural, apparently unbothered. "Regardless, no. I am here for this. I wished to corroborate the appearance of it as described by someone who had seen it before. Now that I have seen what I came for, we can be finished here. I believe you were eager to be rid of Aldebaran." I blinked between the Whitewing and the massive mural again - a mural I was fairly sure depicted a real god, or even two or three of them. "What part of it were you interested in?" The Composer pointed a wing at the bottom corner. "Primarily, the name of the artist." I trotted closer to look. Up close, the mural almost hurt my eyes, as though the surface it was etched into was magical and hard to comprehend. But I stared harder, and realized that it was just an impossible, immaculate level of detail, as if someone had tried to turn all of creation into a wall. One artist had made this? I didn't buy it. This had to have been constructed across generations. But, then I found the signature, at the very, very corner, in normal-sized hoofwriting... and in a language I couldn't read. "What's this say?" "Nothing that would have any meaning to you," the Composer said as it started to leave. I felt like I should have been physically flattened by this wall, but my mind was too knotted up by adrenaline and betrayals and second chances to even start to understand how I felt about this. I would probably wake up in the morning, have everything hit me at once, and immediately come back down here again to look at it properly... That was a good idea. Graygarden wasn't getting this key back if I had to fight hoof and wing to keep it. I checked the signature one more time on my way out. The last character, I actually did recognize: a little insignia made from a triangle and a hexagon I was pretty sure was related to the Church of Yakyakistan, though my knowledge on them was flaky. I resolved to research it more thoroughly as soon as I was in a better position to do what I wanted. "Hey, wait up!" I called, running after the Composer as it left. Did I dare to hope it really had just been here for some old mural, and not whatever nefarious monster-making things had been stored down here? Was it possible Icereach was sitting on top of a cache of this stuff, and the friendly aloof invader wasn't here to steal it for its own ends? That Aldebaran wasn't here because of the old research in this cave, that all of this was a coincidence and unrelated? The Composer didn't stop, but it did slow down enough for me to catch up. We rounded the bend, walked past the rows of discarded equipment... and past that weird, freaky monster skeleton the scientists had created that looked more like a shell than actual bones. I stared at it as we passed. The Composer noticed me look. "What's that?" I chanced the question. "That is a changeling in its true form," the Composer replied, not breaking stride. "One that has been dead for quite a while."