The colt kept his hoofsteps as quiet as possible against the tiled floor as he trailed a pair of actresses en route to their respective rooms. His job was simple- take a photo of them in their costumes and sell that photograph to the fan magazines. Nopony knew what role these two mares would be playing in the popular holodrama Taming Equestria’s Frontier, but fans loved to speculate and tear apart every little clue they could from leaked set photographs. For such a popular show it was natural for the producers to keep surprises like this a total secret, and it was Snap’s job to breach that security in order to glean potential clues and spoilers for the magazines.
For their part, Flora and Apricot were both aware of the young stallion following them. They continued to make idle conversation as if they hadn’t noticed his presence, but a knowing glance communicated the nonverbal thought between them: they had to ditch this guy before he spoiled everything.
Instead of going directly toward their rooms, the pair quickly turned down an adjacent hall. Given that they had only a few seconds before the paparazzi would be within sight of them, they had to give him the slip right away.
Apricot motioned for yet another hallway they could go down, but Flora shook her head. She opened up a door leading to a janitor’s closet, and rushed her co-star inside first before backing in herself and silently closing the door.
Snap had heard their hooves scuffle against the tiled floor. He had not heard the door close, so when he rounded the corner he continued down the other corridor that the actress ponies hadn’t gone down.
This area was the outermost part of the Holo-studio property on this deck of the station, and Snap was willing to bet that even if the actresses were trying to avoid him, they wouldn’t have gone out into the open in full costume. He reasoned that they were probably in one of this hallway’s rooms.
Upon entering one of the rooms, he was greeted with a relatively empty room and a sign that read “Do Not Enter”. If there was anything that piqued the interest of a young, impressionable leak-hunter it was something declaring itself a secret. Snap now faced a choice: he could continue trying to find the two actresses from Taming Equestria’s Frontier, or he could venture beyond the restricted door.
He chose the door.
As he went to slide the metal sheet open, it sprang aside for him to enter. It was a common thing in the main station; nearly all of the storefronts and public facilities had automatic sliding doors. To find one on the studio’s property yet marked “Do Not Enter” seemed to Snap to be a bit of a contradiction.
Within the next space was something very underwhelming: a blank room with nothing but a large tile in the center. Snap paced about, wondering what the point of this space was, and why it was supposed to be sealed off.
As soon as he placed a hoof on this tile, it dropped down suddenly, taking him down a level and into a completely foreign part of the station.
The lighting was much dimmer here, and rather than the crisp tiling covering all other parts of the station the floor here was a simple metal grate. Wiring and tubes were exposed in the walls and hung from the ceiling, though his surroundings were still recognizable as a new set of corridors. To Snap, it almost seemed like this new set of places was all part of one very big machine.
Perhaps it was a set, he reasoned. He hadn’t heard of any holo dramas set in such an environment, but it did seem plausible. He took his camera out and snapped a few quick photographs of the wiring and detailing on the walls. Snap decided to press on and explore a bit more of the area.
Ahead he could hear voices speaking in monotone, and a steady clank-clank of something walking his way. Not wanting to be found, Snap dove out of the way and backed himself into a darkened corner, sitting still and remaining quiet.
“... he calls himself the Bad Wolf,” the first voice said, “Several of our Cyber-Conversion facilities have already been destroyed by this entity. All transmissions indicate that he managed to destroy the facilities before our units were aware of his presence.”
Two imposing forms walked into view. They were equineoid like most of the aliens one could find on the station, but were covered in metal armor. In fact, Snap couldn’t see any trace of organic parts on the outside. Had they not been conversing, he would have suspected them to be droids.
“We must be vigilant,” the second metal pony said in response, “Nothing knows about our Cyber-converters here on this station, but if we are among the last in existence then it is time for us to begin converting the equines. There can be no witnesses of our presence.”
“What if the Bad Wolf finds out that we are here?” the first asked. Snap felt an increasing feeling of dread the longer he stared at these things... they had to be cyborgs of some kind.
“He would not hesitate to destroy the entire station if it meant the end of our kind. So far this entity has shown no regard for collateral damage or remorse for his actions.”
“Remorse is a weakness this enemy is not burdened with: we must proceed with caution so as not to be discovered.”
Snap felt a tingling in his nose, and his mouth opened reflexively. He had to sneeze. Forcing his mouth closed, he tried to hold it in or at least silence the inevitable to remain unnoticed.
A small squeak escaped.
This was enough to attract the attention of the two cybernetic equines, who turned to face Snap. They walked forward with clanking steps, cornering him with no means of escape before he had any idea what was going on.
“Fully biological equineoid detected,” one of the two said, “What are your orders, Cyberleader?”
“He has seen too much, and must not be allowed to return. Take him to the Cyber-conversion chambers to be processed.”
The cybernetic pony reached for Snap, and the stallion was silenced even as he opened his mouth to scream.
Waves crashed against jagged rocks by the seashore, mixing in with the sounds of a pony crying out while her friend splashed her with seawater. Aside from two ponies, a timelord and a blue police box the beach was completely empty. They had it all to themselves, and the two ponies loved it.
The Doctor sat on his side up on the blue sands of the beach, reading a Baltimare newspaper from the 1970’s that was still crisp. While Derpy and Lyra splashed around in the neon waters of Gebos VI, he was busy mulling over the paper’s contents.
Derpy’s head broke the surface, and she dumped the glowing water out of her goggles. The Doctor had told them earlier that the glowing effect of the water was actually produced by micro-organisms native to Gebos VI. It had taken a little prodding on his part to make her comfortable swimming in water teeming with alien life, to the point that the Doctor had to show her the organism’s file in the TARDIS computer to assure her there was no chance of her catching a strange alien disease.
Now that she was at ease in the glowing liquid, she was having a blast. It was like being a filly again; holding onto a boogie board and riding the crest of the waves. Lyra was to her right with a board of her own.
Soon the two ponies waded ashore, curious as to what the Doctor was doing, and why he didn’t come out and swim with them.
“Afraid of the water?” Lyras teased, flicking water off her hooves at the Doctor. He shook his head quickly to deny the accusation.
“Me? Never!” he insisted, “I was diving under the lake back on Earth, wasn’t I?”
“What’s with the paper?” asked Derpy, pulling up a towel and sitting beside the Doctor where she could look over his shoulders.
“I’m reading through it word by word, looking for traces of a certain word combination,” he replied. Lyra pulled up her own towel on his other side, lying down on her stomach and biting into an apple that had come out of their picnic basket.
“Mphff- Looks like you’re looking at -nffph- popular Nightmare Night costumes from the 70’s, to me,” the full-mouthed Lyra said, “Space robot, Frankenpony, Wild South Cowpony.... that’s a good look for you, Doc. Wide-brim hat and a frock coat?”
“I’ve done that bit before,” he admitted, “No... I’m looking at this one right here.”
He pointed with a hoof at a black and white illustration of a filly wearing a wolf’s mask over her head and a clawed boot over each hoof. It was labeled ‘The Bad Wolf’.
“There’s those words, see?” he said, “Bad Wolf. I thought if I picked up a random bit of print media from some point in time I’d find those words there, and sure enough, ‘Bad Wolf’.”
Derpy took a look at the image. The filly pictured was really more of a young mare, and if the words weren’t significant she probably would have thought it just another one of those adult-themed costumes, but of a wolf.
“So what does it mean,” she asked, turning to rummage in the picnic basket for one of her chocolate chip muffins, “I mean, it significant that it says ‘Bad Wolf’ on it, but what is it supposed to mean?”
“Well, I’m thinkin’ it might be placed there on purpose, same with the one in the caves and the graffiti on the TARDIS. It’s meant for us to notice, I’m thinking the goal is to make us keep eyes and ears out for the words ‘Bad Wolf’ because somepony wants to get into contact with us,” he guessed, “Or me specifically. I dunno how they’d manage to get it on a cave wall in the cretaceous and paint it on the TARDIS in the 30th century.”
“Maybe they’re a Time Lord?” Lyra speculated, “Is that possible?”
The Doctor shook his head.
“No, I’m the only one of them left.”
He was silent for a moment, and the next he was springing up to his hooves, dusting the sand out of his fur and pulling a violet jumper over himself. He put his leather coat over that, and made his way into the TARDIS.
Seconds later he emerged without any of his usual clothes at all, but simply wore a pair of sunglasses and a straw panama hat. He was done with the reading, and was ready to go for a swim himself.
“I figure we’ll spend a bit more time here on Gebos, huh? Go for a dip, eat some of the picnic food and then it’s off again through time and space,” He said, waving his hooves in the air, “You picked this spot Derpy, a beach all to ourselves. Got any ideas of where you want to go, Lyra?”
Lyra was quick with an answer.
“I want to see us interacting with aliens,” she said, “Like, a space station with both ponies and aliens, where we wouldn’t stick out like a sore hoof.”
“Fantastic idea,” the Doctor said, “But first... are there any more muffins in that basket?”
Derpy’s head flipped up, and she nodded enthusiastically.