//------------------------------// // Ghosts // Story: I Am Up to No Good // by NerfedFalcon //------------------------------// When I woke up, I couldn’t tell what time it was in the corridor where I’d fallen asleep. For a moment, I considered going straight back out, but Blueblood would probably be there, and I didn’t know if he was actually asleep, or a light sleeper. As I started down the other way in the corridor, I pulled out the map. “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good,” I repeated. And it’s pretty true, I suppose, considering I’m here to steal the crown jewels. welcome back are you going to do your job now? I had to think about the question for a while. “I can’t just waltz into the vaults and pick them up like a bag of groceries,” I replied. “I don’t even know where they are. For now, I’m just going to try and figure out just how the hell this place works when there aren’t ghosts in the machine.” feel free to ask if you need help my frequency is 242.67 “...Heh. I get it. Alright, let’s go.” At the other end of the corridor, there were a pony milling about outside. I couldn’t tell what they were up to out there, but they didn’t seem to be leaving. ‘Midnight Blossom’ was pacing back and forth down the corridor, occasionally stopping for something. Only being able to see their hoofprints made it difficult to tell when to move, but I couldn’t stay cooped up in the passage forever. As Midnight Blossom walked past the exit, I knocked once, and the door nearly crushed me as it swung inward. Catching my breath after the surprise, I headed out into the corridor, running away from the guard. There was a staircase nearby, and I considered heading up for a better look at where I was going to be spending the foreseeable future. I didn’t really have any other plans then, so with a peek to ensure that nobody would catch me on the stairs, I started heading up. I could hear my footsteps more loudly on the stairs, and slowed down to a walk. Nobody had heard, but I didn’t want to press my luck after what had happened yesterday. The stairs led up about three floors above where I’d started before they stopped. Looking around, I saw a unicorn carrying a stack of papers with her magic, turning the corner and humming to herself absently. Slapping myself for not being more careful, I pulled out the box and got under it, facing the slit towards her. She wasn’t a guard, so I couldn’t use my gunblade on her, even if it was fake. Then again, she could report me if she found me, and that was something I couldn’t allow. She stopped as she saw the box lying in the middle of the corridor, wondering aloud what had been left in it. I gripped the handle of the gunblade, ready for when she picked the box up. She put the stack of papers down as she got close, looking at the box quizzically. “What are those markings?” she asked slowly, tilting her head. I was coiled like a spring, ready to break even if she didn’t pick the box up. Then she did pick it up, and I jumped out, striking at her horn with the butt of the sword. She immediately fainted, and I wondered for a moment if I’d hit her too hard, only to see her still breathing. I wanted to move on, but I couldn’t just leave her there. It wasn’t just because a guard might find her, but I felt bad about having to knock her out. I started to drag her off, checking the map for an unoccupied room where I could leave her out of sight. There weren’t any bedrooms nearby, only a broom closet. It’ll have to do, I guess. I laid her down right in the middle, moving a few things aside to make room. There really were only brooms in the closet, besides a small desk with a quill and paper. Someone had been writing a secret diary in there, but I didn’t bother to read it. I just picked up a blank page, wrote, “Sorry about that—the ghost”, left it with the unconscious unicorn, and left. As I moved to pick up some of the papers she’d been carrying, I looked down at the map again, and someone was coming up the stairs. I could only grab one of the sheets before I had to move, hiding behind a corner as the pony passed through, muttered about the mess and walked off. The pony was wearing armour like a guard’s, but it was purple instead of gold, and the pony had bat-like wings. “Do you know anything about ponies with bat wings?” I asked Discord. His reply came back after about half a minute: there are two kinds of winged ponies pegasi and those bat ponies the bats can see in the dark be careful “Well, that makes things interesting. They can see better than me in the dark, but I know exactly where they are. Usually, anyway.” Looking up from the map, I saw another one fly across the moon through a window, thankfully not looking down. “They’d have to be functional wings, huh. And if they aren’t touching the ground, then I can’t see them on the map...” your bug report has been noted a patch is in the works “Love you too.” Looking out the windows, I could see a city below the palace, stretching off until it suddenly cut off to a drop to rival Minas Tirith. It was impossible to tell from there just how big the city was, but since I probably wouldn’t be leaving the palace any time soon, it didn’t matter. It was time to move on. I suddenly remembered the piece of paper I’d taken from the stack that had been dropped earlier. It was part of a schedule, written in a language that I couldn’t understand at first glance. As I blinked a few times, though, the characters became clearer. They didn’t change, but I understood them: “1:15AM: Night Court begins.” There was a list of names underneath, none of which sounded familiar to me. The next time shown was ‘3:45AM: Night Court ends.’ followed by ‘6:24AM: Sunrise.’ Perhaps the unicorn had been a scheduler for the ‘sun queen’ Discord kept mentioning. In that case, she’d probably have a difficult night ahead of her with no plot of what was happening when. It wasn’t my problem, though. “This is getting me nowhere,” I said out loud, looking down at the map again. “Is there a library or anything here?” I ducked into a nearby room, a meeting room of some sort from the large, round table set in the middle. Nobody was there, and I put a chair against the door to ensure it stayed that way as I unfolded the map on the table. Arrows started appearing next to smiley faces, pointing me towards a room that said ‘Royal Archives’. With my finger, I traced out a path from the ‘Leon’ marker to the archives, folding the map a few times as it changed floors. It made me wonder whether the castle itself, being built in a world of magic, defied Euclidean space as the map did. Maybe I’d be able to work it out once I was off the clock, but for now, I already had a plan. Folding up the map to the floor I was on, I stopped at the door, hearing two voices arguing outside. I couldn’t hear what the argument was about through the door, but the ponies in question were called ‘Bluejay’ and ‘Storm Chaser’. Both voices sounded female, making it impossible to apply either name to either voice until the younger, apparently Bluejay, ran off. Storm Chaser stormed off in the other direction after one last retort. Both were quickly out of the part of the map I’d focused on. Nobody else was on the route, with only a couple of guards on the floor and both a few doors away, so I took the chance to strike out for the archives. There was a dumbwaiter a few rooms down, and for a moment I considered using it to head down, but decided that they’d probably try to open my box at the other end. As dangerous as they were, the stairs were a better option. As I passed on the third flight of stairs, though, a password for a secret passage appeared. “They have sherbet lemons here?” I asked, surprised. The portrait of some noble pony or another slid open behind me, revealing the top of a secondary spiral staircase. Who builds a staircase behind a staircase? I wondered as I stepped through the passage. It was dark again, and I had to keep my free hand on the wall to stop myself from falling down the stairs. I did fall down anyway, when I reached the bottom and there was one less step than I thought. As I fell against the far wall, it opened out, and there was a guard right outside. My scar started aching, and I quickly backed up the stairs as far as I could despite being flat on my ass as he stopped. He must have decided it was nothing, though, as he immediately continued up the stairs, leaving me safe for the time being. I realised that I’d forgotten the route I’d planned to the archives, and would have sat down to work it out again had Discord not drawn a line directing me to another flight of stairs. Unfortunately, there was a guard pony in the way. I couldn’t tell their gender or their name, but they were standing still and facing away from me. As I saw their wings stretch out with a yawn, I risked a few steps closer, hoping they didn’t have a spider sense of personal space invasion. They took off their helmet to scratch themselves behind the ears, and I considered striking as I had before, but I didn’t know if these bat ponies had a weak spot like the unicorns did. Hiding in a nearby room, I checked the map for any other ways to the archives, but I couldn’t see any that didn’t lead past ‘Hidden Eye’, who was still refusing to turn around. What would Snake do, besides call someone? I thought again. Looking at the door gave me an answer: make a noise and move while they’re distracted. As I stepped out of the room I was in, I slammed the door and rolled to the other side of the corridor, pulling out my box and hiding under it. Through the slit, I could see Hidden Eye’s ears perk up all of a sudden, and he walked to the offending door, opening it to see if there was anything there. I started moving, making it to the staircase heading down to the archives before my scar started acting up. I wanted to stop and touch it, but I had to keep running if someone had seen me, even partly. That only made more noise, and silently I hoped that there’d be more of those thick carpets in the archives. As I took cover behind a bookshelf, Hidden Eye came down after me, stopping at the entrance to the stairs. I didn’t risk taking a peek in the low light, since Discord had said bat ponies see better in the dark. All I could do was play out the game of hide and seek until he returned to his post, and I had no idea how long that would be. I started to take stock of the situation: There were some magical lights around, but not enough to see everything. I couldn’t see the map very clearly, and he could see me if I messed up. There were carpets, meaning I could move quietly, but so could he. Before I could think of anything else, I heard him clear his throat, and I started moving away, trying to find a path through the bookshelves. The hardest trick in the world is to move both quietly and quickly at the same time, in the dark, with a headache. As I ducked around a few corners, my scar didn’t stop hurting, but it didn’t turn up either, meaning I hadn’t messed up yet. Making a right and then a left, I came into a dead end, a reading room with a light above it. As much as I didn’t want to leave myself backed into a corner, I couldn’t risk heading back out either. “Excuse me, sir?” a voice asked from below. “Can you move? You’re in my light.” I cursed inwardly for having been caught so easily, but my scar wasn’t hurting more yet. Maybe I could still handle this. I started to pull my box out, but the voice’s owner, a child... or a foal, rather, turned and saw me. She didn’t immediately start screaming, though. “Wow, who are you?” she asked. “Not right now,” I hissed. “Look, I want you to do something for me.” I pulled out my box and crawled under it, then asked, “Can you sit on top of my box for a bit? I know it sounds weird...” Before I could finish, I heard a slight buzzing noise, and then felt a weight on top of the box. I thought I’d have to push up, but the box was surprisingly well-constructed, and it took the foal’s weight without any trouble. Through the slit, I could see Hidden Eye arriving, looking at the filly. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “The archives are off-limits at this time of night.” “I’m Skyfall’s daughter,” the foal replied. “I’ve got a right to be anywhere in the palace.” “A filly like you shouldn’t be...” He paused suddenly, and I wasn’t sure why, but I could only assume that puppy dog eyes were involved somehow. “Alright, I won’t tell anyone,” he finally said. “But don’t let me catch you down here again.” As he walked off, my scar faded, and I breathed a sigh of relief. That was one problem solved, but another was already on top of me. “Can you get off now?” I asked, feeling the weight off the box almost immediately. Picking it up, I looked at the filly. She was a pegasus, clearly young, with only small wings. She’d seen me full-on, and she’d probably go talking to all her friends about me. That would eventually reach Celestia, meaning I had to get it done as quickly as possible... “Will you be my friend?” she asked. “I mean, I helped you win at hide and seek with that pony before. That makes us friends, right?” I paused for a moment. The request seemed strange, since I didn’t know many kids, and when I was that age I wasn’t just asking random strangers to be friends. Then again, I didn’t have much of a reason to turn her down. And I might be able to turn it to my advantage. “Sure, I can be your friend,” I said. “But you can’t tell anyone else about me. It’s our little secret, okay?” “Don’t you mean anypony?” she asked. “Anypony? ...Not just ponies. If anyone of any race at all asks, you can’t tell them anything about me. Not what I look like, not what my name is or where you met me... And even if they don’t ask, you can’t tell them about me. I’m not supposed to be here, and if anyone knew, I’d have to go away.” It wasn’t quite a lie, but I still felt bad saying it, to take advantage of a pre-teen like that. The filly didn’t seem to notice, though. “Okay! Oh, we can still meet here in secret! There’s a tunnel from the hedge maze into here, so neither of us has to go in the front!” She pulled back a book on the wall labelled ‘Bright Eyes’, and it slid back a short distance before pulling away to reveal a tunnel. “The password is ‘Bright Eyes’ on the other end, too! Let’s meet here again tomorrow!” She started running, but stopped before she entered the tunnel. “Oh, and my name’s Bluejay!” I remembered her from the argument before, with Storm Chaser. It wasn’t any of my business to pry, though, and she seemed to want to leave. “Nice to meet you, Bluejay. I’m Leon. Same time tomorrow, then?” She nodded happily and trotted off down the tunnel, the bookcase closing behind her. I turned back to the archives proper, gulping at the extreme number of books in every direction. I wouldn’t be able to find anything on my own in a place this big, and I couldn’t go asking for help from the librarians, if there were any. Sighing, I sat down in the room, unfolding the map again. The library was abandoned save for me, but the map didn’t label any of the sections. I’d have to go looking the old-fashioned way, but how much could I cover before I’d have to leave to avoid ponies coming in? Something caught my eye on the map; an area of the library that seemed to be cut off from the others. It was labelled ‘The Secret Library’. I smiled, knowing it’d probably contain something useful, as well as a lot less books than the others. “Hey, do you know what’s in there?” I asked Discord. if she’s keeping it a secret, probably taboo books maybe something useful, maybe not anyway, you probably won’t be disturbed in there “Might as well make it a base of operations, then.” The passage leading to the secret library wasn’t far away. Since I didn’t have to sneak there, it took me less than a minute, turning right, left and right again to reach a trap door. The carpet didn’t seem to break at all, and I couldn’t lift the whole thing up, so presumably it opened with a password. Nothing was appearing on the map, though. no password on this one i think it’s to do with the books Looking around, there were a few bookshelves with books missing. “But what’s supposed to go in those holes?” how should i know? “Great... Puzzle solving time, and I don’t even have all the clues.” I looked down at the map, trying to work out where to go, when I saw a set of dots coming through the main entrance. ‘Midnight Blossom’ was the name attached to them. That guard from before... Damn it, this is going to be a lot harder than I thought. Still, I can’t give up yet. Let's see if I can't find those books.