“So, let me get this straight. Your plan to sneak me out of the guardhouse is to not sneak me out of the guardhouse?” I tried to contain my disbelief, but it crept out anyway alongside my words, both unbefitting of the Goddess’s Prophet. “I suppose it’s so outrageously dumb, nopony will expect it-”
“Of course they won’t,” interrupted Rainbow Dash, tucking a few spare charges for her stun band into one of its side pockets. “I’m a professional. They didn’t make me Head Peacekeeper for nothing.”
“-but are you sure that the Acolytes won’t stop me?” I continued doggedly before the rest of Rainbow’s words caught up to me. “Wait, a professional? You’ve done this sort of thing before?”
“Well... no, not exactly this,” the pegasus said after a moment’s pause. She tossed me a canteen of water, which I missed catching in my magic by a solid few inches. “But it’ll work, trust me. They didn’t want you to be released, right? So they aren’t gonna be waiting for you outside. Besides, I’ll make it look like we’re transferring you to a more remote guardhouse or something-”
“-without actually putting an effort into disguises or some sort of alibi or proof that you’re doing so-”
“-which they’d never ask for anyway.” Rainbow rolled her eyes and trotted over to inspect the canteen for leaks or damage. Finding none, she slipped the strap over my head, only catching it on my horn once in the process. “We’re pretty separate from the cult, so it’s not like they care about the paperwork trail, or lack thereof. They mostly police their own ponies, and unless there’s too much of a disturbance we don’t really intervene. Hasn’t been a real issue for as long as I can remember.”
I squinted in her general direction, trying to will the aching fog from my vision. She didn’t sound like she was lying, but she could very well have a few tells of her own that I wasn’t able to pick up. “We don’t police our own ponies. We have focus circles where we discuss any issues we have with others, and then we work as a community to resolve them. Honesty is one of the sacred Elements, after all!”
“Sure.” Rainbow had paused, and was giving me a stare I was somewhat thankful I couldn’t interpret. “The reports from the medical team I’ve seen say otherwise, but hey, maybe it’s just part of your rituals.”
I opened my mouth to deliver what I’m sure was going to be a scathing and belief-inspiring retort, but Rainbow cut my thoughts off with an idle flick of her wingtip. “Actually, scratch that. The ritual idea is scarier than the idea that a carefully shattered left hind leg was a punishment of sorts. I mean, what would that even accomplish? Is there a Sacredness of Withstanding Pain or something? Which one would that even fall under? My credits are not on whichever one was the Element of Fun.”
“That could’ve been anything.” I dismissed the thought automatically, like any other treasonous thought deserved. “Lots of ponies get hurt at work. Maybe the one in question just didn’t mention it until after their worship was complete.”
The Peacekeeper stuffed her notebook into a worn pair of saddlebags before nodding to herself, completely ignoring my valid point. “Whatever you gotta tell yourself to stay in denial, just know that it makes zero sense to anypony with a decent amount of sense. Let’s get going. We don’t wanna be too far up by the time the evening shift is over, or you’ll get stampeded and I’ll have to find a way to un-flatten a Prophet.”
I nodded, only half listening as I tried to mentally map how far we’d be walking. I hadn’t been down much further than the next Church location in… mercy of the Goddess, not since I was a filly! Everything felt much larger back then, but I remembered it’d taken an entire day for my easily-tired foal self to reach the Solarium from where the Caretakers had raised my siblings and I. I’d left earlier than most, sure, but as a Prophet, I was needed, and I’d already gotten my Cutie Mark, so I didn’t have any real reason to stay with the other colts and fillies in my age group.
A flurry of doubts welled up at the memory of leaving the rest of my siblings behind, but I tried to mentally push them aside as I followed Rainbow Dash through one of the tunnels branching off of the guardhouse. Had any of them been at the near-riot I’d started? Did they hate me? Did any of them even remember me? I’d never been close with them, but perhaps they missed me when I-
No. It didn’t matter. They didn’t matter, and they shouldn’t matter to me anymore. I was the Prophet, and I had bigger things to worry about than wondering if they ever noticed that I was gone. There were about twelve of us when I left, and I’d kept to myself, so if they didn’t care if I left, then I didn’t care. Any stabs of regret I felt were irrelevant, and as a Prophet, I-
“Uhh, Twilight? You coming?”
I blinked back into reality, my cheeks burning with un-Prophet-like embarrassment. Rainbow Dash was watching me out of the corner of her eye as she looked out at the main spiral ramp. We’d exited somewhat lower than where I remembered we’d arrived, but there were still shops circling the outer perimeter of the thoroughfare. They looked fairly busy with the last few stragglers from the ponies finishing their meal break, and didn’t spare either of us much more than a glance.
“Yes, sorry,” I said after a brief hesitation. “Lead the way.”
Rainbow grinned and turned right, heading down the sloped surface. “You don’t seem nearly as comfortable down here as I thought you’d be. Do you not deign to grace the Middle and Lower levels with your divine presence, or what?”
I didn’t dignify that with a response, instead choosing to mutely follow behind her, watching the shops as we passed on by. One sold scraps of colorful fabric, another sold inks of different hues and viscosities, and from the scent permeating the air I knew we were close to a bakery. For a moment, I could see myself living among the shops and ponies, happily browsing the many strange wares in between my shifts of-
That’s where the daydream fell apart, of course. If I weren’t the Prophet, what would I be? I couldn’t see myself doing the heavy-lifting physical work, but maybe I’d be able to do something intricate? My magic skills were decent enough. I could probably do something with delicate machines, or help in one of the many shops lining the ramp as we coiled downward.
Such thoughts were blasphemy, of course, since all that mattered was that I was the Prophet, and I served my Goddess with pride and joy, but…
“Did you always want to be a Peacekeeper?” I shuffled up to Rainbow, who’d managed to get a bit further ahead of me.
“Me? I mean, sort of, I guess.” Her lips curled into a goofy-looking smile. “When I was a filly, I wanted to do pegasus tricks. I thought, hey, maybe me and my friends could start out as messengers or something, and then we’d blow them away with our fancy skills. We’d draw up plans for our uniforms, with dragons on ‘em, and-”
“Dragons don’t exist,” I scoffed. “Everypony knows that. In 204, the Prophet of the time revealed that truth of the-” The words felt stranger in my mouth than they ever had before and I had to swallow before I could get them out. “The world waiting above.”
The guardsmare rolled her eyes. “Yeah, of course. Still, we thought it’d be super cool. We dreamed of practicing in The Sky, but of course we didn’t get many chances to fly around down there since they weren’t looking for any pegasi in Environmental Control. They’re never short of pegasi trying to get in, and I know that now, but the rejection really stung at the time, so eventually my friends and I chalked up our losses and decided to go a different route.”
“Huh.” I watched a few ponies race up the ramp. They were probably late for work. “Is it just pegasi that they’ve got too many of?”
Rainbow Dash idly stomped on a few discolored stone slabs on the floor. They were sunken slightly more into the ground than other ones, likely from other ponies with the exact same idea. *Stomp.* “Yeah, why? You planning to apply?” *Stomp, stomp.* “They’d take you in… well, not a heartbeat, since they’re not huge on the whole cult thing, but pretty quickly.” *Stomp!* ”Because you know what sucks?” *STOMP!* “It’s dangerous work down there, and yet they keep access to The Sky pretty much impossible to get if you don’t already work nearby, so they’re always short on earth ponies and unicorns because it’s stupidly deadly-” *Stomp STOMP!* “But they’ve pretty much guaranteed that every pegasi will jump at the chance to almost kill themselves for a chance to fly somewhere open and beautiful for a little bit.”
I blinked. “Are you, uh…” She looked up at me, hoof poised mid-air over the last darkened rock on the path. “Are you okay?”
She sighed, lightly tapping the brick and moving on. “Yeah, I’m fine, I guess. Sorry. It’s just… we all have dreams of being down there, you know?”
“I don’t.” I watched as a couple of ponies cautiously made their way out of a kitchen, carrying between them a huge tray laden with roasted potatoes. I could feel the heat of the ovens from where we walked.
“You’re right.” Rainbow nodded, first to herself and then at me. Her expression lacked judgement and condemnation, and for some reason that hurt worse than if she’d been angry. “You wouldn’t. You’ve got nothing to compare that to. You’re able to do your magic just fine in the crowded confines of the tunnels, and there’s need for you everywhere. Earth ponies can work with metals and stone just about anywhere, and the Agricultural Sector’s always happy for the extra help with growing things. But us pegasi?” She flexed her wings, stretching them out to their full length before folding them again. “We’ve just got The Sky, and that’s about it. This place wasn’t built for us.”
I had no idea how to respond to that, but Rainbow didn’t let the silence stretch on for too long. “So, you’ve never been down that low before, huh?”
“Well, not never, but I can’t really remember much about the lower levels. I was moved to the upper floors when the Church discovered I was the next Prophet.” A few ear-splitting screeches interrupted my train of thought and a few ponies covered in dark grease darted out of a nearby hallway, racing down ahead of us.
“-from one of the shafts for the pipeworks,” I heard Rainbow say once my ears stopped ringing. “It’s always pretty loud down here. The major engineering chambers are actually situated perfectly on top of each other, going up and down the center of the ramp, but since a lot of the shops and bathrooms and kitchens are outside of the ring, sometimes pretty far away from it, they’ve got access points all over. Maintenance, you know? The Peacekeeping HQ is actually one of the few rooms that-”
Whatever else she was saying was drowned out by the klaxon of an alarm. I could hear the rapid pounding of hooves before I could see the two grease-covered engineers bolt back towards the shaft. An older pony hobbled as fast as he could behind them, missing a hoof and half his wing. I froze at the sight of the determined scowls, and only had time to think they’re not stopping, they aren’t STOPPING before Rainbow wrapped a wing around my side and yanked me out of the way.
I swallowed noisily to myself as the alarm rang, cutting off what felt like ages later. “Thank you,” I croaked, before stumbling forward. “They would’ve… thanks.”
Rainbow studied me for a moment before once again taking the lead. “Yeah, you’re welcome. Geez, you’ve got the self-preservation sense of a leaping foal convinced they’ll grow wings on the way down.”
“I’m the Prophet,” I managed, shaking my head to attempt to relieve my headache. “Most ponies don’t stand in my way.”
The pegasus snorted as we made our way down, passing another dormitory. I peeked inside as we went past. There were a good amount of ponies asleep in there, even despite the alarm that’d gone off earlier. Some of them hadn’t even washed the soot and oil off before crashing. I shuddered. Were bathing opportunities so rare for them?
Notably absent were the hammock-like slung perches that pegasi favored. Were there really so few up here? They probably don’t last that long with the ability to fly up there, I thought, and immediately felt queasy. Goddess help them.
“If you were to choose an Element to focus on, what would you pick?” I asked, giving Rainbow what I hoped was a friendly smile that would put her at ease.
“What?” She frowned. “Where’d that come from?”
“I’m just curious, that’s all.” I debated smiling wider, but decided it might look creepy. “I’ve chosen Loyalty, and I could see you choosing that as well, if you-”
“I’m gonna stop you right there,” Rainbow said firmly. “I know you don’t mean any harm by it, but I’ve seen how this goes with you all.”
I felt my brow crease as my smile fell. “How what goes?”
“First, you ask which one ponies would pick, right? Sometimes you lead ‘em, but usually everypony can pick one that resonates with them well enough. The Elements are pretty generic, so at some point it’s up to everypony’s interpretation. Let’s say I picked Kindness, alright? What would you say next?”
I felt a lump forming in my throat for no reason at all, and I didn’t know why it was bothering me. “I’d say that’s a pretty good choice, since everypony could always use more Kindness.”
“Yeah, and I’d agree with you, because it’s fundamentally true that most ponies could stand to be a bit more Kind. After that, we’d talk a little bit about that. There’s nothing wrong with talking about how good it is to be Kind to other ponies, and what that means, right?”
It was getting a little hard to swallow. “If you wanted to talk about that, then yes. I don’t see how-”
Rainbow held up a hoof and I stopped next to her. “I’m not done yet. You’d then encourage me to meet other ponies who value Kindness, right? And even if I waffled about it and gave you a vague maybe, a few of your Church ponies would find me in a few days to discuss it, wouldn’t they?”
“You’d said you liked Kindness,” I clarified, sitting down next to her. “You wouldn’t have to join the Church or anything, but maybe other ponies who shared your interest would-”
“Would what?” Rainbow’s gaze was insistent but gentle, and I found I couldn’t look away. “They’d want to talk to me? Plant the seed even further in my mind? Because I’ve had friends who’ve had the same thing happen to them, Twilight. They joined into what they thought was a simple conversation, and at first it was just conversations, but as they got further and further into it, their new friends expected more and more out of them, until they found themselves wrapped up into your little Church.”
I bit my lip so hard I tasted copper. “It was their choice, though. They could’ve said no, at any time. Besides, is it so wrong to be Kind? Is it wrong to want to be Loyal?”
Rainbow closed her eyes and took a deep breath before looking at me again. “It’s not wrong to want that, Twilight. It’s not wrong to want the world to be a better place, and I know it helps an awful lot of ponies, but… how would you leave the Church, if you decided you didn’t want to be a part of it anymore?”
“Why would you want to leave?” The words were tumbling out before I’d had a chance to think them through. “You’d become Kinder, or more Loyal, or Honest or Generous or brought more Laughter to the world. To give that up would be-”
“Selfish?” Rainbow finished for me, and I could see tears in her eyes just as I could feel them in my own. “Maybe it’s okay to make a selfish decision, if it means you can leave a situation that isn’t healthy for you. I don’t have an issue with you wanting to be Loyal or following some Goddess, Twilight,” she summarized as she stood up and started back down the ramp. “My issue is the response your cult has when somepony changes their mind.”