Just outside of Ponyville, right next to Saddle Lake, there was a cottage. This was a cottage that most ponies stayed away from, not from their own accord, but from a powerful spell that was cast there, making it Unnoticeable. This cottage laid abandoned for years, ignored by all who traveled their.
Currently, however, a blue stallion sat under the shade of a tree by the edge of the lake, gazing intently at it. Though he could not see it, he had a feeling, a huge sense, that there was something over their. If only he could look a little closer he might.....
Kablam! Out of nowhere Dreamie slams into him, knocking him into the lake.
"Oh... my...gosh.... Jet..," Dreamie exclaims, out of breath, "are... you...okay?!"
JetStream, obviously known as Jet by his friends, surfaces and spits out water. "Yeah, I'm fine."
He walked out of the lake and shook himself off. "You ready to go Dreamie?"
"Yup," Dreamie replied, showing him her pouch, "I bought this on the way over here, along with some things we might need."
"Alright," Jet said, smiling, "Then I think we should head out. You didn't tell anyone, did you?"
"Of course not!" Dreamie replied.
"Good, then let's go."
"Now?" Dreamie asked, surprised.
"Well I do have one stop to make first to grab my stuff, but then I don't see another reason to stay. Is that alright?"
"It's alright with me," Dreamie said, adjusting her saddle, "but lets hurry up, I want to get a move on before the path becomes trafficked."
The two of them walked along the lake until they arrived to the border to the Everfree forest. There, hidden by some bushes and a bent tree, was a secret cave.
The two of them discovered it when they were younger. Jet had gone off into the forest due to a dare made to him by one of his friends. While he was there, Dreamie and Time Chaser went to look for him. After getting chased by a pack of Timber wolves, the three of them fell into it, and it became there clubhouse ever sense.
"Don't you think its a bit risky stopping here?" Dreamie asked worryingly, "don't you think T.C. might come here?"
"Nah," Jet replied quickly, "She almost never comes here anymore. If she did, she would have easily found this." He pulled out an overstuffed medium sized black and blue satchel, with his cutie mark, a pair of crisscrossing airplanes with their jet-stream crossing.
"So you already had supplies I see?" Dreamie said, slightly annoyed that she had to waist the bits to buy extra stuff."
"No, I don't," Jet said, putting the satchel on, "these are just things I thought might come in handy on the way to the Pillars. You know tools and stuff."
Just as he said that, a book fell out of the bag.
Picking it up with her magic, Dreamie read the cover.
"100 spots for great food in Equestria." she looked at Jet, "Do you really think we will have the time, or the bits, to go to a fancy restaurant?"
Jet looked down and blushed, "No not really, I was just being prepared. You know, just in case."
Dreamie chuckled to herself and, placing the book on one of the tables they placed inside the cave, "So very resourceful Jet, but we have to try and travel light. There's no telling what we will need on our trip, but I highly doubt a book on restaurants will be of any help."
Jet looked up at her and grinned, "I guess were going to have to be behind on our schedule then." He took off his satchel and opened up both sides which immediately burst with the overflow of stuff that was in them. "This might take a while."
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Runa could not believe her eyes.
She knew that Dreamie had been leaving work unusually early lately, and had heard from her coltfriend, Cody [1] that Jet had been doing the same, but she never imagined they would be sneaking off together into a tunnel.
In fact, the only reason she had followed Dreamie was because of TimeChasers constant rambling that "something was wrong with Dreamie" and that she was "too busy with her job to go looking for her."
She brought a very reluctant Cody with her, almost having to drag him out of his bed to get him here.
Now, after Dreamie and Jet walked into the cave, Cody was sitting, half asleep, watching Runa pace back and forth, wondering what they could possibly be doing.
"What could they possibly be doing Cody? I mean we know it isn't something bad, they don't like each other that way."
"Maybe there sleeping," Cody said, brown eyes droopy, "Maybe they couldn't sleep at there rooms anymore, so they came here to do it."
Runa stopped her pacing to stare at her coltfriend. "That has got to be the silliest idea you've had yet. Have you eaten breakfast yet?"
"Nope," Cody said, standing up, "Someone came over to my house and dragged me out of bed!"
Runa smiled at Cody's attempt to be angry. She walked over to his side and gave him a peck on the cheek.
"I'm sorry Cody, but I didn't want to stand out here all by myself. What would happen if there was a Timber wolf or something that would attack me? Who would save me?"
Cody glared playfully at Runa, "Oh those guys wont stop you, who was it that saved me from a whole pack of Timberwolves when we were younger?"
"TimeChaser." Runa reminded him with a tease.
"Yeah," he said quickly, thinking, "But who was it that told her where we were?"
"CandyMellow"
"Then who was it that hit that one on the head with a spin kick?"
Runa walks over to him and pecks him on the cheek, "that was you my dear."
"Oh," Cody replied shocked awake again by his marefriends kiss. Every time she kissed him, it was like an electric charge ran through his body.
Runa knew, and understood this, so she used it to her advantage all the time. Like in this very instance, in which she needed him to be wide awake for what she was about to say.
"Cody, you know we need to follow them, right?"
Cody sighed, annoyed to have been hit by the zap-kiss again, "Hold on, If were going to do this, were going to do it right" he lifted a nearby rock to reveal four bags, hidden by a whole the size of a filly. Two of the bags resembled Runas and Cody’s cutiemarks and colors, but the other two looked different.
"Wait; are those CadnyMellows and TimeChasers' bags?"
"Yup," Cody replied, pulling the bags out of the hole, " I kinda followed those two here a few weeks ago, and I saw them bringing supplies, and I knew we might be in charge of following them, so I prepared in advance."
Runa gave Cody another peck on the cheek, "You are brilliant Cody, now one of us needs to run back into town to get CandyMellow and TimeChaser." She looked into his eyes, unsaid order hanging in the air.
"And that would have to be me?" Cody asked, giving a crooked smile.
"Yes please?" Runa said, moving to give him another cheek kiss. This time, he was ready and he kissed her lips first.
As he pulled away, he said, "I'll get them, just keep a watch on that hole in the ground."
He turned and ran off to Ponyville, leaving Runa in a daze of her own. She was in such a big of a daze, that she didn’t see a small white filly sneak into Cody’s bag.
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A few minutes later, Dreamie was pacing around the cave. Any minute now, she knew her friends would notice hers and Jets absence from their jobs and come looking for them, and she knew that the cave was the first place that TimeChaser would look. Her worries only grew when she looked over and saw Jet pulling out another collapsible telescope and toss it onto the already littered floor of the hideout.
"Come on Jet, hurry up!"
He pulled out a cookbook and threw it onto the floor. "That's the last of it, now I need to repack the stuff I need." He levitated the small pile of spell books, first aid kits, and cooking utensils, and tried to shove it all into his bag.
Dreamie finally lost her patients and took the pile from him. "Let me do it!" She used an expansion magic, causing the inner bag to float, open, in the air. She then shoved all the items into the bag, tied it shut, and tied the bag to Jet's back.
"Need anything else?" She said, a little too angry. Jet stared, wide-eyed and slowly walked around Dreamie, back to the wall, until he got to the entrance, where he bolted out, leaving a cloud in his shape behind him.
Dreamie took a deep breath to calm herself down and looked around the filthy cave. Lighting up her horn, she made all the items on the floor magically levitate to their rightful spots, or places nearby.
After a few seconds, the entire hideout was as clean as when they arrived, with no trace that they had ever been there.
She smiled; looking around the cave she spent most of her fillyhood in, and found that she could not leave with out saying goodbye to at least somepony, even if it was a cave.
"Goodbye Secret Place, I will miss you."
She walked out of the cave and found Jet trying to stuff another book inside his bag.
Dreamie lifted the book out of Jets grasp and pulled it over to her. "I thought we agreed that you had enough spell books."
This particular spell book was brown and tied shut with a black string. Jets face turned a bright red and he looked at the ground, "It's not a spell book."
Dreamie opened the book, and out fell a picture. The picture was of her, Jet, and the rest of their friends in Ponyville at the end of the Hearts and Hooves Day party the year before. Runa and Cody had just gotten together, and they all were celebrating by having a picture taken. Dreamie didn't think she looked good in the photo at all, but she knew that everypony else thought otherwise.
That day was the first night that she had actually thought that something was wrong with the Pillars, and had lead her to talk to Jet about her suspicions. In a way, that night had changed everything for her.
She looked at the rest of the book and found that it was completely filled with photos of Jet and her with their friends. She put the photo that fell out in with the rest and gave it back to Jet, her face unexpectedly turning red as well.
Why am I embarrassed? She thought, shaking her head.
"Here you go Jet," She said out loud, allowing his magic to overpower hers and take the book. "It's for remembering," He said, putting it into his bag, "In case what you believe is true, then we might never return here. I need to take something at least, right?"
Dreamie looked into her friends eyes, which were filled with sadness, fear, and pain, but completely dry of any tears. She remembered how, even a few hours ago, before the sun had risen, she had stayed the extra time away from the house so that her friends did not see her crying. She understood completely. "Let's go," She said, disappearing into the Everfree Forest.
Jet took one last look into the direction of Ponyville, tightened his pack, and then followed after her.
In the distance, the bell in town hall rang out, piercing the unnatural silence that had crept over the lake.