The Royal Academy building was one of a few that retained some of the old charm of how Canterlot must have looked centuries ago. It was a huge, squat, red brick construct, with hundreds of windows along its four sides, high vaulted ceilings and a most impressive statue of Celestia in the atrium, a soaring and serpentine depiction of the Princess with arms outstretched, a gilded sphere representing the planet in one hand, and a much larger glowing orb in the other, representing her Sun and illuminated formerly by magic and now by ten thousand small electric lights retrofitted to its exterior.
The archives in the basement were a startling contrast to the rest of the building above ground, their sepulchral gloom enough to sap the joy from anypony, at least until the hospital-white strip lights were switched on, bathing the endless shelves and racks of books, papers, documents and stored artefacts in a sterile glow that, while lacking the warmth of the Sun, was still infinitely preferable to the darkness.
Twilight thanked the supervisor for letting her access the archives (for her university project, of course), and set about searching. She was not looking for the banned words, but for information about the other figures she had uncovered in her investigation. Histories from that far back in the past were lacking, even on the public exonet, but she hoped to learn more. After diligent searching, she found a chance to expand her knowledge on her topic of choice, in a book entitled Dictionary of Notables: 0CE-400CE.' Perfect! 0CE was the beginning of the Celestial Era, when the Princess had begun her glorious rule after overthrowing Discord. That four hundred year period must surely cover the ground she needed. Yes! Here, under H.
'Heartstone (U-M), b. 10CE. Chancellor of Royal Academy of Equestrian Sciences, 75CE-88CE. Known for his contributions to botany. Discovered two hundred species of plants and funded the Canterlot Botanical Gardens. Died 88CE of old age.'
Well, that was something. At least she finally had a timeframe for the letters she had been reading! So Heartstone was a male and a unicorn, a botanist, Chancellor of the Academy. That fitted with what she had read. Now...yes, here. Another entry.
'Sky Chaser (U-F), b. 42CE. Astronomer. Chief Astronomer of Royal Canterlot Observatory, 81CE-90CE. Noted astronomical achievements include installation of the first reflecting telescope, discovery of Chaser's Comet. Died 104CE of plague.'
Interesting...Sky Chaser was a female unicorn who had replaced somepony as Chief Astronomer according to the letter from Celestia. But who had she replaced? Was it Deep Frost? Twilight scanned the book, looking alphabetically under D. Nothing. F? Nothing their either. Why was Deep Frost absent from this book? She checked the cover- the book was published in 600CE. That was hundreds of years ago! Yet still there were missing names, even then. Perhaps more interestingly still, the letters she had found in the observatory were among documents from a different century to the time they were written. The orbital diagrams which had concealed the letters were dated to a few hundred years after the letters. Somepony must have been deliberately keeping them hidden!
She continued searching and found an article on the history of the observatory, just the kind of thing she could not directly ask the Chief Astronomer about for fear of arousing suspicion in him. On the second page was a list of Chief Astronomers. This list stretched from the observatory's founding in 15CE right up to some fifty years ago. It held a hundred names almost, an illuminated history of the stallions and mares who had held the post and who had managed and overseen the affairs of the observatory throughout the entirety of the Celestial Era. She pored through it, finding the right dates. There was the first ever Chief Astronomer, Hellebore. Then came Void Raven, then Peach Plume, then...then 'Unknown.'
Unknown? Twilight blinked. What came after that? Yes...of course Sky Chaser came after that! The unknown must be- could only be- Deep Frost, surely! A stallion or mare who no longer existed, reduced instead to 'Unknown- 69CE-81CE.' Twilight scribbled it all down, using a pen and paper instead of her datapad so as not to leave an electronic record. So what had happened in 81CE that resulted in Deep Frost and Princess Luna being stripped from history? Her search continued, looking through books and texts old and new. Yet in each one it was the same. Nothing of note was listed. As far as she could tell, 81CE was a perfectly calm year. No great disaster, no war. But Celestia's letter mentioned a war, and it was addressed to Sky Chaser! There had to have been a war then, for that was when she had replaced Deep Frost as Chief Astronomer!
One thing that she did note, however, was that the historical record before 81CE seemed to be patchy at best. A coincidence? After all, it was a long, long time ago. Documents could have been lost, misplaced, destroyed by accident- or on purpose. Whole chunks of time seemed to have been excised from the record, with sparse details, missing volumes of chronologically-catalogued works, pages absent, sometimes even torn directly from books. This war...whatever it was, it must have led to one of two outcomes. Either a great swathe of knowledge was lost, perhaps as a result of ransacking and pillaging by an invading army, or there had been a great deal of historical revisionism by the winner. And the winner could only have been Princess Celestia, for she ruled still to this day.
So what might she be hiding?
Twilight sat musing over the possibilities for a few minutes before returning the document and book to their places and heading upstairs into the sunlight, thanking the supervisor and leaving the Academy. She had made some progress, but also taken a step backward, for she had not truthfully learned anything that explained those gaps in history. Maybe her brother would know more? He was in military intelligence, perhaps some of the secrets were known to him? But no, she could hardly ask him to jeopardise his position to help feed her sudden lust for forbidden knowledge. She would have to do this alone. Even Rarity already knew too much about what she was doing. She didn't want to endanger her family too. Her searching had, once again, left her with more questions than answers and a head swirling with thoughts. She needed something distracting. Anything to take her mind off of her increasingly frantic search for the answers she still was not sure she actually wanted to know.
"Oh darling, why did you drag me all the way out here for this?" Rarity whined. "I thought you were going to take me somewhere nice."
"Hey, come on Rarity! This is someplace nice!" Lyra Heartstrings, Twilight's fellow sub-sector supervisor from the Hatchery, gave a wicked grin, a large plastic cup of a toxic-green beverage in her hand, full of sugar and dissolved joy-pills. "What's the matter? You can't tell me you don't like the Autodrome?"
"I suppose it's alright, but...I just thought we might be going somewhere more...cultured," Rarity sighed. She was perhaps the only pony in attendance who was wearing a ballgown, for the usual attire at the Autodrome was much more casual. The huge structure was oval in shape and had once been open to the sky, until some bright spark noticed that attendance plummeted in bad weather, and that would never do, because ponies needed to be entertained, to get their thrills and joys and satisfaction. a roof was duly installed, and attendance rose to the maximum, even in driving rain, thunderstorms and blizzards.
Rarity, Twilight and Lyra were in the crowd at Twilight's insistence, for she wanted to go somewhere loud, exciting and distracting. To Rarity, that had meant an elegant club, or perhaps the Grand Symphonie. Alas, and to her lasting regret, the VTOL pod which had carried them to pick up Lyra then took them out to the fringes of the city and to the Autodrome, for the spectacle in metal that was contained within.
"This is just as cultured as the opera," Lyra replied, being far more of an aficionado of automated blood sports that Rarity. "Why do you think so many ponies are here this Even-Day?"
"Because they put too many seats in," Rarity retorted. "Ponies need somewhere to go of an Even-Day, and if they had more seats in the Symphonie and fewer seats here, well, you can be sure they would be there instead. We would be there instead. Oh, to be there instead of here...!"
"Come on Rarity, relax!" Twilight smiled, sitting between her two friends. "Have a joy-pill or two and you'll soon find yourself cheering like the rest of us."
"That's hardly the point," Rarity pouted. "You could make having a limb amputated enjoyable with enough joy-pills. I just thought we might have gone somewhere else."
"The Even-Day is still young!" Twilight pointed out. "We can go somewhere else after this. Let's just enjoy it!"
And they all did- even Rarity, though somewhat reluctantly, but of course Twilight was right and a joy-pill did wonders toward making even such an inelegant spectacle into something worth watching. The drone-driver demolition derby was a sight to behold, with twenty automated cars hounding each other around the central grid-circuit, where obstacles lay in their paths. Concrete blocks, earthen embankments, even landmines and pits filled with gas-fed flames, crematoria for more than a few unfortunate drone-drivers down the years. Metal crunched and twisted as the cars rammed into each other, fighting the environment as much as their rivals. Ponies could place bets of a limited amount on which car would win (betting was limited as it would not do for a pony to lose so much money that they became unhappy, or worse). Doors and panels were beaten and bent, torn free, scattered about the arena like discarded clothing at an orgy, which in a way it was. An orgy of mechanised violence unleashed for the pleasure of the spectators, a surrogate for their emotions, a hands-off outlet, just like a joy-pill, a hundred thousand baying ponies shouting for artificial blood to be spilled so that they need never feel the urge to spill the real thing.
Twilight munched on some popcorn, sharing it with her friends as they watched the demolition continued. Several cars were burning, much to the delight of the crowd, and there was an uproarious cheer as one of the drone-drivers rolled over a landmine, the kind designed to kill tanks, left over from the Unification War. Shattered fragments of car peppered the arena like hail, bits of the engine block almost spilling onto the oval track that ran around the edge of the Autodrome and would be the site of the next thrilling event. Eventually, after nearly an hour, the final drone-driver, the only one left standing and able to move, was declared the winner.
"Ahh, no, come on! Number 4? Where were you, Number 10?" Lyra tore up her betting slip in disgust. "I lost eight bits on that!"
"No harm done, then," Twilight smiled. The comically small bet was a product of the limits imposed, technically allowing betting but not in an uncontrolled, unrestrained way, for that could be harmful to a pony's psyche, to say nothing of their bank balance. Like any vice with side effects, betting was controlled and rationed. For the same reason, there was a limit to how many drinks somepony could buy in a bar. When they reached their limit, they were offered more joy-pills instead, for they could be enjoyed risk-free.
What a wonderful invention they truly were! As Rarity was finding out for the umpteenth time, joy-pills could even make a non-aficionado of the Autodrome almost blissfully happy with what they were watching, a wonderful sensation. Take enough joy-pills, and the sensation could become almost orgasmic in its intensity. Take the right kind of joy-pills, and that 'almost' could be removed entirely.
As the wreckage of the demolition derby was cleared away, the spectators dispersed temporarily, decanting from the stands to the communal restrooms or the snack-stands The big race was next, a hundred laps of the oval circuit. Pegasi and Earth Ponies made up the driver list for this event- no Unicorns ever learned the skills necessary to take part except those who entered the military, though even then, as officers, they would almost never be called upon to actively drive themselves, and certainly not to drive others.
Rarity excused herself to powder her nose, and Lyra went in search of more snacks, leaving Twilight time to think. Despite taking one joy-pill and despite the excitement of the event so far, she still felt her mind wandering back to the missing names, the unknowns, the empty, hollow history she had uncovered. She didn't want her thoughts to be there. Not this Even-Day...damn it all! This Night.
Night.
Night.
There, she had said it! Or at least thought it. She knew it was forbidden, but now she thought at least she might be on the road to learning exactly why. It all had to be linked somehow, didn't it? Night, Moon...the Moon rose at Night. If she went outside of the stadium she could see it there, hanging in the sky. The Co-Orbital Body which seemed to have a former name, a name stripped from it in the distant past. That in turn must have linked with Princess Luna, the mysterious, formless figure from the letters she had read. Her letters were signed and sealed with a crescent shape that must represent the Moon. Was she from there? Was Princess Luna an alien from another world? No, that made no sense. She was writing letters and signing them, sending them to Equestrian officials! She had to be part of Equestria, not an invader coming from space to steal it away from Celestia. But then why did she not exist? What had she done? Who was she?
Rarity and Lyra returned. Twilight banished her thoughts to the back of her mind, felt them creeping forward again, and took another joy-pill.
The drivers were announced, their names and pictures flashed up on a giant screen. There were some familiar names from previous events- Rainbow Dash, the multicolour-maned Pegasus mare, Summer Lightning, the swift and suave Earth Pony stallion- and some newcomers, fresh faces and fresh meat, for not every driver always survived every race, let alone each full season. The hypercars they drove were powerful, brutish, yet sleek and beautiful vehicles, churning out as much torque as a dozen street taxis but in a frame that weighed less than a single one. It took a brave and highly capable pony to drive one, and a lucky one to live through the whole fifteen-race season. Even if they died, however, their deaths would at least provide spectacle and entertainment for the joy-pilled masses, and if one had to die, what better way was there to go?
Twenty drivers lined up on the start/finish strait, their steeds humming with barely restrained power. Each revving engine sent shivers down the spines of the spectators. Anticipation built and built. Ponies hurried back from the concession stands and bathrooms, eager to witness the start of the race, for it could be the most exciting moment of the entire hundred-lap contest. Cameras drones hovered overhead, broadcasting the race to millions more ponies at home, those who had not been lucky enough to snag tickets to this Even-Day's race. The Autodrome was a very popular source of entertainment across the whole of Equestria, not just the citizens who lived in Canterlot, a source of pleasant, violent distraction broadcast into the home of every pony who chose to watch it.
The start-lights illuminated one by one, and then extinguished themselves all at once. Twenty cars roared away, weaving and racing, jockeying for position. Rainbow Dash in her gaudy vehicle, painted in multicoloured stripes to match her mane, pulled into an early lead, with Switchback the dark brown Earth Pony rookie cutting ahead of Summer Lightning and taking second place as the cars entered the first corner, a sweeping left-hander like every other turn on the oval circuit. The noise filled the bowl-shaped arena like a thousand buzzing hornets. Ponies cheered as two of the back-markers at the rear collided with each other and spun off into the ferrocrete barriers, their fiberglass and composite bodies shattering spectacularly into thousands of fragments where they struck the guardrails. Once the drivers signaled that they were alright, tow-drones came in and hovered above them, picking the damaged cars up with grappling arms and carrying them away to the pit area. A large sweeper-drone with a heavy-duty fan was also guided in, blowing the smaller pieces of debris off of the track and into the grass that separated the circuit from the demolition-arena at the middle of the stadium. BY the time the racers rushed round and completed the first lap, the track ahead was clear once more.
Lap after lap they roared along, three hundred miles per hour, shredding tyres and overheating engines. Cars swerved off into the pit lane for repairs and tyre changes. All the while out in front was the trio of Rainbow Dash, Switchback and Summer Lightning, vying for first place, changing and swapping with each new lap. Sometimes it was the Pegasus mare in the lead, sometimes the showy Earth Pony stallion, sometimes the newcomer, their faces invisible behind the visored helmets they wore, looking almost like riot police. It could have been anypony under their fireproof overalls. Twilight idly wondered how hard it would be for an impostor to slip into the cockpit of one of the hypercars and pretend to be a racer.
Lap 90, 91, 92, 99. The final fling. Rust Belt, last year's champion, was pushing hard to catch up to the podium finishers, but her car had nothing left to give her, and she trailed painfully behind, like a minnow following a pack of fish, being left behind by its faster brethren. Rainbow had a slight lead over Summer Lightning going into the final lap, but the stallion wasn't giving up easily. Wheel to wheel they took each turn, their engines roaring, almost touching on half a dozen occasions. This was racing! This was why ponies turned in and showed up in their tens of thousands to attend in person.
The final corner, the final stretch. Rainbow ahead by a nose, giving it everything she had, everything her car had. Summer Lightning nosed in alongside her. The white finishing line was ahead, drawing nearer with alarming speed.
"Go, go Rainbow! C'mon!" Lyra shouted urgently, for she had twenty bits on the mare to win.
Luck and skill were with her, as both cars crossed the line almost together. A still image appeared on the huge viewscreens, showing that the nose of Rainbow's car had broken the plane first. Cheers erupted from around the stadium. Lyra punched the air, having made up the loss she had suffered betting on the destruction drone-derby.
"I knew she was gonna win!" Lyra grinned. "Nothing to do with her having the best odds, no. I just had a gut feeling."
"Of course, Lyra," Twilight chuckled, happy for her friend to have recouped her money. She never bothered betting herself. The amounts involved were so purposefully small that it just seemed pointless to her. Far better to just take a joy-pill and be happy that way. Nopony ever got rich by betting, but nopony ever got poor, either.
Once the drivers had been presented with their rewards for placing on the podium (and removed their helmets, finally letting the crowd get a look at them in the flesh and not just as a mugshot on the big stadium viewscreens), Twilight and the others left the Autodrome along with the rest of the crowd. As fun as the event had been, it was now over, and the joy-pills were wearing off.
So they took some more, hopped in a VTOL pod, and headed to a club for the next few hours. It was fun, oh yes, it was fun! The synth-alcohol flowed freely, the joy-pill dispensers in the mare's lavatories were fully stocked. What a wonderful way to spend the Even-Day! A club with a few friends, the prospect of some more physical entertainment if one happened to catch the eye of somepony. Drown their cares and worries, flush them away down the sink, drive them from their minds, at least for a while. How wonderful, how perfect. What could be finer?
More pills, more drink, then it was home to Rarity's apartment (via Lyra's megabuilding, dropping her off on the way), slumping into bed, groping and fumbling in the darkness, sheets drenched with sweat and lust. And then, finally, the blissful blackness of sleep, a restful slumber, a contented slumber. As it should be.
In the dim half-light of the dawn, a sub-net crackled with a flurry of activity. As the sky paled and the wispy clouds streaked by high overhead, somepony listening at the door might have been able to hear hushed, whispered voices outside, soft and muted as though in a dream. The rest of the apartment was quiet. Then, through the veil of silence, a sudden shattering of glass, the hammering of something heavy on something weak, booted feet, blinding lights.
Twilight sat up in a panic, holding her hands in front of her eyes. "Ahh, Rarity? What's happening?"
It was not Rarity's voice she heard next.
"ASU! Hands in the air! Do not move, do not move!"