Published August 26th, 2013
Chapter Twenty-Two: Secrets
Shining Armor looked out from a balcony on the tower, down at the city spread out below him. The ponies that had been hiding were now out and about, revealing themselves to be as crystalline as the city they lived in. Unlike the city, though, they were dulled and flat-toned in color, accentuating their collective depressed, gloomy mood. It had been several hours since the pegasus messenger had left, and he had found it nearly impossible to help with research while keeping his spell up. His thoughts drifted across various subjects, and he was so absorbed in his own mind he didn't hear Dark Lance trot up behind him.
"Shining." The white unicorn nearly jumped out of his skin at the sudden, close sound. Lance smiled apologetically. "Sorry. I'm used to everyone being minutely aware of their surroundings. Didn't mean to surprise you like that." Shining nodded his acceptance of the apology and took a few breaths to steady himself. "Anyway, Bunker managed to get a message to me through the snowstorm. Princess Cadence is on her way here, and Skybreaker is escorting her. Apparently, when she heard about what we found, she insisted on coming personally. They should be here soon." Shining immediately perked up. Cadence was coming here, which meant he wouldn't have to wait as long to see her again, and if anypony could make the other ponies happy again, it was her. Then something occurred to him.
"What about the Dark Energon cloud?" Dark Lance grinned confidently.
"I already have a plan."
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Skybreaker flew just in front of Cadence through the snow, blocking some of the rougher gusts of wind, and giving her a slipstream to ride and make the flight easier. He glanced worriedly behind him. Cadence had insisted that they fly to make better time from the train station, but she was already showing the signs of low body temperature. Her legs were pulled up close to her body, with her tail held against her belly with her rear ones, her coat had dulled slightly, both from the frost coalescing on her fur and her blood flow to the skin lowering, and her wings were beating hard and slow to provide maximum thrust for minimal movement. Returning his gaze forward, Skybreaker checked his map. The gps wasn't working, due to both the storm and Energon interference, but he was sure they were close. He closed the map, and switched his optics to Energon detection. The reading he was looking for was slightly to his right, but for the distance he had travelled without any guidance other than his own sense of direction, he was satisfied with that. He altered his course, then slowed down a bit to talk to Cadence as he returned to his normal spectrum view.
"Princess! We're almost there! Are you sure you don't want to land and walk the rest of the way? My heating system will work better if we're moving more slowly!" The alicorn behind him shook her head.
"If we're that close, it doesn't matter anymore! Let's just go!" Skybreaker nodded, and turned forward again. Within minutes, they could see the city sparkling in the distance. He zoomed his optics, and spotted Dark Lance and Shining Armor waiting near the edge of the shield wall with the rest of their party. He zoomed back out, and began his landing run, with Cadence right behind him. When they neared the ground, Skybreaker noticed a large patch of black fog rise out of the ground to his right.
^Must be the Dark Energon that Lance was talking about.^ He banked left slightly, giving the cloud a wide berth as he came close enough for Shining to open a hole for them, which the Autobot commander used to step out. Skybreaker was confused enough at this action, and even more so when the older explorer transformed to robot mode. Lance changed his arm to its minigun form, and immediately opened fire on the cloud as Skybreaker and the Princess landed. The bullets tore through the shadowy mass, forcing it to expend its energy on putting itself back together, rather than being able to continue its advance. As soon as the others were in, he followed them, transforming back into his alicorn mode once he was safely inside the barrier. Shining Armor was holding Cadence with both forelegs, trying to warm her up again as he glared at Skybreaker.
"Are you crazy? What made you think flying was a good idea?" He was silenced as a pink hoof laid itself over his muzzle. He looked down to see Cadence shaking her head.
"It was my idea, and I insisted. He offered multiple times to land, so he could use his heaters more effectively. I made the decision to rush here, but right now, I just want to get warm." The guard captain nodded as he wrapped his hooves back around her and Skybreaker trotted over, having cleaned himself of frost.
"Speaking of which..." He transformed, and knelt down with his back to them. He raised himself and dropped down several times, like he was panting, and they could all hear something whirring beneath his outer plates. He spun his turbines, and a large gust of warm air blew over the couple, making Cadence shiver happily.
"Ooh! That feels good. Thanks, Skybreaker, that's much better." The scout grinned and returned to his alt-mode.
"The walking fireplace, that's me!" They all chuckled at him, and Dark Lance stepped forward.
"Alright, now that we're all safe, I do have one question for you Princess." She tilted her head at him.
"What's that?"
"You said you insisted on getting here faster, and I doubt that it was just for the sake of seeing your husband again. So why did you want to get here so quickly?" Shining gave him a glare, but Cadence smiled and sighed.
"It's pretty difficult to hide something from you, isn't it?" He smirked.
"I've been alive for a very long time." She openly laughed at that.
"You sound just like Aunt Celestia. But as for your inquiry, I'd like to look around before answering. I don't want to jump to conclusions, but I think I may know what's going on around here." Dark Lance considered for a moment, then nodded.
"Alright. If you think you can figure out what this place is, then I'll leave you to it. Skybreaker, with me. We have a little more investigating to do elsewhere." The scout tilted his head in confusion for a second as his commander walked away, but quickly shrugged and followed along. Dark Lance led his subordinate into the tower, then down a dark narrow staircase that had been hidden in a back room, where anyone that came through the main entrance wouldn't normally find it. The passage was dimly lit, and both of them could tell that they were descending into a dungeon, simply from how unclean the place was. When they got to the bottom, Lance checked his Energon readings, and found that there was no radiation here.
"I thought so. Something about these stones makes them powerful insulators against Energon radiation. Skybreaker, transform. We'll need our lights, and we may need our weapons against anyone that they kept down here." They both shifted to their robot modes, and turned on their light systems. The hallway was flooded with illumination, and the shadows danced and shifted as they walked.
"So," Skybreaker began, "why aren't we using our night vision?"
"Simple; anything down here that could be a threat will be accustomed to the darkness. They'll hear us coming easily from the way sound echoes down here, and they know the area better, giving them an advantage. However, if we have our lights on, they won't be able to see and move freely because their eyes won't be used to it. Besides, if we really need to, we can just switch to our night vision as soon as necessary." Skybreaker simply nodded, satisfied with the explanation.
"So how big is this place, anyway?"
"I don't know. I tried to use a ping to get an echo, but it never came back." Skybreaker whistled.
"That's a big hole we're in, then."
"Yes. Which is why I wanted you down here with me. If something happens, you should be able to get out and tell the others before I'm really in trouble."
"And if I can't?" He didn't like to admit it, but Skybreaker knew he wasn't infallible, and the possibility of him being trapped in here was higher than most places, due to the tight corridors and lack of lighting. There were a lot of places for an ambush, and they both knew it.
"If you can't, well, it's a good thing those wings are good for more than flight." They continued through the labyrinth, both of them building a map in their memory banks as they went, until Dark Lance suddenly stopped. He turned his head left and right, maximizing his audio sensitivity simultaneously. Skybreaker took a quiet step forward, knowing from experience what his superior was doing, and asking a silent question by entering his field of vision.
"I hear breathing." Skybreaker began copying the head motions, and similarly maxed out his audio. Sure enough, he could just barely detect the echo of a wheeze, quieter than a whisper. They both readied their weapons, Dark Lance opting to use his sickles in the tight passageways, rather than his lance. Moving forward, they carefully rounded each corner, the light wheeze getting louder with every step. After a few more minutes, they came to a door made of iron bars, laced with chains and padlocks, with five deadbolts on one side. However, the entire thing was rusted, the stone around it was old, covered in moss and ivy, and it had not been built to withstand a fully-armed Cybertronian in good health. Lance motioned for Skybreaker to stand back, then made a flurry of slashes at a speed that downright frightened the younger 'bot. The door groaned in protest, before the entire frame fell apart, covering him with a cloud of dust as it fell to the ground in a cacophony of metal and rock. He stepped inside and looked around, Skybreaker following him to bathe the room beyond with light. It was a tiny cell, with a single, shivering unicorn huddled in the far corner. He looked at them with fear as Dark Lance knelt down to him.
"Who are you?"
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Back on the surface, Cadence was looking through yet another of the books in the private study they had discovered previously. Shining Armor walked in just in time to see her toss it to the side onto an increasingly large pile. He walked over to her, and laid a hoof on her shoulder worriedly.
"Cadence, are you alright? You've been in here for a while." She lowered the hoof that had been on its way to grab another book off the nearly-empty shelf, and sighed.
"No, not really. I had come in here hoping that this place wasn't what I thought it was, but everything I've found so far says that it is. And to be honest, I'm not ready for what that means." He looked at her in confusion, and she sighed again. "It has to do with my family, and I'd rather everypony was here to hear it. Gather the others, and see if we can find Dark Lance and Skybreaker. You all need to hear this, and what it means for the rest of Equestria."
Fifteen minutes later, all of them were assembled in the tower's throne room, sans the Autobots. Cadence looked around at the ponies present.
"Does anypony know where Dark Lance and Skybreaker are?" Most of them shook their heads, but one earth pony spoke up.
"I think I saw them go down into the dungeon, but that was a while ago, and I haven't seen them since." Cadence sighed and shook her head.
"Well, we'll just have to start without them. As you all are already aware, this place was not here until recently. Also, as you know, this place was sealed by Celestia and Luna. However, there is more. This place was once the capital of the Crystal Empire, which covered almost the entire northern half of this continent." There were surprised mutters from all of the soldiers present, until she put up a hoof for silence. "It fell to an evil unicorn named Sombra, who overthrew the king and took the crown and throne for himself. He then enslaved the crystal ponies who lived here, and forced them to mine the crystals for him. This act, though, was immediately noticed by the rest of Equestria. The Crystal Empire's power extends over the whole continent, and Sombra's evil infected that power. It caused Discord, who had originally been nothing more than a prankster, to turn evil, and made the jealousy and sorrow Luna felt grow more rapidly than normal, until she became Nightmare Moon. The only reason Sombra was unable to actively cause destruction was because Celestia and Luna were able to use the Elements of Harmony to seal him away. Unfortunately, that also meant sealing away what was left of the Empire due to its connection to Sombra. Now, we need to figure out some way of stopping the remainder of Sombra's forces. Otherwise, the Empire might fall again, and this time we may not be able to save Equestria from him." The faces of the ponies before her were awestruck. They had been prepared for many scenarios, but nothing like this. One of them suddenly snapped out of his stupor, and turned toward the pink alicorn quizzically.
"But, there's one thing I don't understand. If this happened before Nightmare Moon existed, how do you know about it?" Cadence sighed again. She knew this question would come up, but that didn't mean she wanted to answer it.
"The crystal ponies have a much longer lifespan than normal ponies, and alicorns are practically immortal. The short answer, though, is that the previous king, Crystal Spark, was my grandfather." They all looked at her with wide, surprised eyes, even Shining Armor. "Among other things, he was an extremely accomplished spellcaster, and had apparently found some way of extending his own life, which he had taught to my mother. My mother escaped, and several years later settled in what would become Fillydelphia, but I wasn't born until four hundred years afterward. My own lifespan was already extremely long even without the life extension spell, and it got the attention of Celestia. After she found out who I was, she almost immediately started training me to be an alicorn. I passed the final test, and she cast the ascension spell on me when I was a little over one hundred years old, although I still looked incredibly young even then." By this point, almost all of their jaws had dropped, including Shining Armor's. He knew she was older than him, and would most certainly outlive him, but he never would have thought she was that much older. "In any case, we have to find out more about this palace. My mother never really told me about it, so we'll need to find out as much as possible." They all suddenly heard the door open, and looked over to see Dark Lance and Skybreaker walk in with an unconscious unicorn on the latter's back, supported by his wings.
"Well then, I guess it's a good thing we found this guy downstairs, huh?"