“So... How does this work, exactly?”
“When the crystal in front of you is activated, it will capture the vibrations in the air created by your voice and transfer those vibrations through the wire connected here through the base and to a separate crystal in this box where the information will be stored until the matrices in the storage crystal decay in about ten thousand years or so, give or take a century or two.”
“Huh?”
A sigh.
“Just talk into that crystal and it'll record what you say.”
“Cool. Like this?”
“Exactly like that.”
“So is it on?”
Tap tap tap
“Careful with that! It’s a very delicate scientific instrument! Actually, it’s been on for some time now. That little green light there lets you know when it’s recording.”
“That’s pretty nifty.”
A pause
“Alright. Are you ready?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be. Where should I start?”
“How about at the beginning?”
“The beginning? Alright. Here goes nothing.”
*********
I guess I should start with who I am first. My name is Cerulean Rose, but my friends just call me Blue for short, seeing as Cerulean is kind of a mouthful. Growing up as an earth pony in a unicorn-oriented city like Canterlot wasn’t exactly easy, but I made due. One thing that I’ve come to learn through experience is that life has a way of coming up and hitting you from behind when you least expect it to. Even if you spend your whole life preparing for that inevitable blow, it can sweep you off your feet in an instant and carry you to Celestia-knows-where. The funny thing about it is that wherever you get swept away to sometimes ends up being right where you needed to go anyways.
***
The slow and peaceful sound of a cello reverberated against the dilapidated walls of the abandoned building that I had made my home. There are places that have become unused and abandoned even in Canterlot, and I was lucky to come across an old textile warehouse. The company that had built it folded a few years back, something about an embezzlement scandal, and fortunately for me nopony had touched it since. The music was coming from an old phonograph that I had fixed up after scavenging it from some dark alleyway a few weeks before. I like to listen to slower classical-type music, it helps me unwind from the stress that is inevitably built up from all of the situations I find myself in, especially my line of work.
I might as well come clean now; I’m a thief... or at least I used to be. I was a pretty good one too. Over the years I made it a point to infiltrate particularly opulent estates and relieve the noble ponies within from the burden of an overabundance of wealth. As such, I became rather infamous. They even gave me a nickname: “The Raven”. I was honestly flattered when I heard about that one.
Don’t get me wrong, I may have been a thief but I wasn’t a bad pony. Or at least I don’t think so. I only stole from people who could afford it; and in Canterlot, there was no lack of high-strutting noble ponies who practically begged to have some of their valuables relieved from their possession. I mostly liked the challenge of it all though. There’s nothing like the feeling of sneaking out of a giant, gaudy mansion with saddlebags full of loot and the residents none the wiser.
I have had a few close calls however—ergo the aforementioned stress. There was one time when a certain Prince came back with a date much earlier than I expected. I spent five and a half hours stuck underneath his bed before they both fell asleep. I have to give him credit, though; that stallion may be a hopeless fop, but he sure has stamina.
Another time, a guard noticed me as I was prying a window open in an attempt to sneak out quietly. I had to knock three of them unconscious before being chased by score of other guards who I eventually lost in a maze of alleyways and side streets. I didn’t feel comfortable going outside for a week after that particular fiesta.
Despite many of these close calls, I was good enough that I had never been caught.
That is, until my last heist.
I sat on my bed in the middle of a daydream when the ringing of a bell snapped me out of my momentary reverie. I took the phonograph pin off of the record and got out of my bed with a groan.
There was a small rusty old mail box waaaay at the front of the warehouse. I had set up a notification bell while back. When something is placed in the box, the bell rang in what used to be the manager’s office, where I spent most of my time. I sometimes get an ad or two for stuff like a used patio furniture sale, but usually my mail consisted of job requests and related material.
After I had made somewhat of a name for myself, some shady ponies sometimes came to me asking to do their dirty work for them. For a price, of course. I’m not complaining, the bits were good, but I still mostly did it for the challenge anyway. Mostly.
I made my way down to the warehouse floor, carefully stepping over various booby traps that I set up for some extra protection, just in case. Inside the mailbox was a small note with surprisingly flowery hoofwriting.
It read:
Midnight tonight. Beggar’s Alley.
Your services will be well compensated.
So it was going to be one of those jobs. I’d seen this kind of thing before; I would meet the client in some shady alley in the middle of the night with him/her in a cloak or something similar to stay anonymous (One time it was a masquerade mask. That one was fun.). He might even have a voice altering charm if he is extra cautious. The meeting would start, and the client would give a few terse remarks about how he was doing this at great personal risk, then he would hand me a package with more detailed instructions that I would read later. It was all very cliché, but the types of ponies who went through all of this trouble were usually ones who had quite a bit to lose, so the pay would at least be decent.
Four hours later I was cold and bored in the corner of some dank alleyway in the middle of Canterlot. The contents of some drunkard’s stomach were fermenting in a nearby doorway, filling the entire alley with its putrid aroma. I’d smelled worse, but I still wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible.
A figure made its way towards me before resolving into a dark silhouette of a pony. The lighting was terrible and I couldn’t make out his face because of his cloak. I was assuming the figure before me was a buck. No mare had that stocky of a profile. Plus, I had a feeling. He stopped next to me and stood facing the other direction.
The mysterious pony spoke. “I’ve come here at great personal risk, you know. I heard that you get the job done. I hope you won’t disappoint me.”
Sketchy alleyway? Check.
Terse remarks? Check.
Cloak and unnaturally deep voice? Checkity-check.
The figure looked furtively around before handing me a small package. “Further instructions are in here, as well as a sum that you will most assuredly find satisfactory. The money will be delivered upon completion of the job. Your complete discretion is required.”
Package with instructions? We have a bingo!
“Understood” I replied, trying to sound as professional as possible. I received a small snort of approval in response. I put the package in my saddlebags as the client looked around one more time before setting off towards an adjacent alley. Halfway across the street his front stepped in a puddle that was deeper than expected. I had to keep a hoof over my mouth as a gaggle of giggles tried to escape at the sight of him with the front half of his body entirely covered in mud and who knows what else. A muttered “filthy commoners” floated across to my ears and I made my exit, eager to get back home and warm up in my bed.
The nice thing about living in an abandoned textile warehouse is that you literally have tons of different kinds of fabric to use however you want. A fire inspector would have an aneurism, but it’s is very convenient when you want to warm up on a cold night. After snuggling in my bed for about half an hour, I mustered my energy to open the package. In it were four things: a picture of a small black box, a copy of the floor plan for the Royal Archives, a note, and heavy cast iron key with a small crescent moon engraved in the handle. Interesting... My client was most likely some minor noble from the Canterlotian upper class, but what did a noblepony want from the archives that they couldn’t get themselves? Nobles had almost unlimited access to the archives as it was.
An arrow drawn on the floor plan pointed to a door on the north side of the Canterlot Archives with the words “Lunar Wing” and “3751” scribbled alongside. The Canterlot Royal Archives had a Lunar Wing? As far as I knew, nopony had ever heard of such a thing. Canterlot was built almost a thousand years ago, right after the banishment of Nightmare Moon, and I found it difficult to believe that not a single word about this “Lunar Wing” had made its way to the public after all that time. Very, very interesting.
There must be some serious stuff in there for the benevolent leader of ponykind to keep an entire portion of the Archives a closely guarded secret. Now I was just burning to find out what was inside.
The picture included in the package was an unassuming, and very old looking black box. That’s probably my target. I moved onto the note next. It read:
“Alcove 3751 contains the subject of the attached picture. Retrieve this box. Under absolutely no circumstances will you open the box. Once it is retrieved from the Archives a meeting will be arranged under the full moon immediately following the time that this package is opened.”
I worked my way through the rest of it, reading aloud to myself. “Let’s see, try not to be seen, don’t get caught, blah blah blah boring boring boring, services will be compensated to the amount of—SWEET CELESTIA! That’s a lot of zeroes!”
****
The building that held the Canterlot Archives was much more impressive up close than I thought it would be, even this late at night. I hadn’t really ever had much of a reason to venture into upper Canterlot before aside from a few jobs. When I did visit the upper echelons of the Equestrian capitol, I only ever saw the sun-tipped spire and the gold-purple roof of the archives far in the distance. Up close it was really quite a sight.
I stood on a tower opposite the magnificent building and watched the guards at their post by the front entrance. The changing of the guard happened at precisely midnight; a moment when a small dark shape blotting out the light of a handful of stars as it passed overhead would go unnoticed.
It was almost 11:58, time to double check everything. I don’t have the benefit of either a pair of wings or a horn, so I’ve had to compensate with ingenuity. In my saddlebags were a number of items to aid me in my various endeavors; different things that helped me detect and evade traps (both magical and otherwise), confound any pursuers, create distractions, and generally help me get around. I was about to use one of my favorites to get across to the archives quickly and silently. It was a large black cloak with modifications partly inspired by the Power Pony comics that I used to read as a filly. Mistress Marevoulous was my favorite. It served two functions: one was to conceal my identity and to blend in with the shadows, and the second was to allow me to glide with surprising effectiveness.
It was time to go. I began my ritual of double checking all of the straps and supplies while the guards down below began a ritual of their own.
I tightened the straps around my chest.
The door to the archive opened. Two guards emerged perfectly in sync.
I secured my saddlebags.
They took ten steps forward.
Put hooves in gliding loops.
Turn left.
Step up to ledge.
Salute.
Jump.
Turn right.
Glide.
Five steps.
Aim for second floor.
Turn back.
Land on ledge.
Ten steps.
Open window.
Take position.
Sneak in.
Once I got through the window, I took a few breaths to calm myself down a bit. There was something about moving through the air with no connection to the ground whatsoever that was simply exhilarating. No wonder Pegasi loved doing it so much.
I took a glance down both ends of the hallway that I had found myself in. Nopony was coming. Good.
I took a deep breath in. Letting it out slowly, I concentrated on the entrance to the Lunar Wing, searching for the familiar tugging sensation at the base of my skull.
Maybe I should take a second to give a little explanation. Everypony has a special talent, that’s just a fact of Equestrian life. For some its things like gardening, cooking, growing apples, banishing evil—stuff like that. My special talent is finding stuff, as illustrated by my cutie mark; a blue rose with compass points around it. I guess that’s one reason why I’ve done relatively well for myself as a thief. When I need to find something I can kind of put myself on autopilot and my hooves end up taking me to where I needed to go. My subconscious compass, as I’ve come to call it, is by no means perfect, but I won’t deny that it has come in handy quite a few times.
According to the floor plan there was a staircase on both the west and east sides of the archives. The sharp clop of my hooves floated gently through the air as I headed towards the western staircase to make my way down to the first floor. I just want to make one thing clear right now; I really hate marble. First of all, buildings made entirely out of the stuff are impractical as Tartarus, and secondly they echo too damn much.
The corridor I was traveling down intersected with another about twenty feet ahead of me. I was severely regretting my lack of more significant foot padding as I heard two guards coming down the corridor on my left.
“Hey, did you hear that?” I heard one of them say.
I froze instantly, ducking behind a conveniently located arch. The guards hadn’t passed the intersection of the two hallways so luckily they hadn’t caught sight of me yet.
“Hear what?” replied the other as they both stepped into the intersection and stood there.
“It sounded like hoofsteps. Just listen for a second…” A moment of silence the size of a pregnant manticore passed by. I really didn’t feel like knocking them out if they saw me. Hiding unconscious bodies is such a hassle.
I stood pressed up against the inside of the arch; standing as still as one of the courtyard statues outside without making a single sound.
Keep going! Stop taking your sweet time! I thought to myself, willing them to just get a move on already.
“I can’t hear it anymore. Weird. Think we should check it out?”
“Nah, its probably nothing.”
They started moving down the hallway again. “Hey, do you remember when that Twilight Sparkle mare tried sneaking into the Starswirl the Bearded wing?”
“Oh yeah, I remember that! Lance was the one that found her in that crazy getup. He talked about that for month. Isn’t she a Princess now? I was stationed in Baltimare so I missed the whole coronation.”
“She got the wings and everything. Although, I heard that she just lives in the Ponyville Library.”
“Ponyville? I have a cousin down there. It’s been a while since I’ve seen him, maybe I should go visit...”
I waited for the guards to turn a corner before going on my way, making sure to step as lightly as possible. The rest of the way down was thankfully much less eventful. Luckily for me there weren’t too many guards out and about at this hour.
I found myself walking down a corridor that quickly transitioned from the gleaming white marble of the rest of the archives to a wet, dull brown stone that belonged in some subterranean cave. The tunnel descended quite a ways and I counted twelve sputtering blue torches before I came to a pair of intimidatingly large wrought-iron doors. A complex moon motif had been worked into the doors themselves and it looked like both of them combined weighed several tons. A giant neon sign repeatedly flashing “LUNAR WING LUNAR WING LUNAR WING” would have been just about as subtle.
The door didn’t have any handles and I couldn’t see a keyhole, so lacking a better idea I reached out with my hooves to push them open. I nearly jumped out of my skin as a voice that sounded suspiciously like Princess Luna’s reverberated throughout the hallway.
“Entry for authorized personnel only. Present passkey to proceed.”
I struggled briefly with an impulse to drop everything and run. The voice was only an automated recording spell of some kind that was most likely worked into the security enchantments that protected these doors. They made a barely audible click as a small metal plate slid away to reveal a keyhole in the center of the pair of iron monoliths. I pulled the key out from my saddlebags and gently slid it into place, turning it clockwise with my hooves until it stopped.
“Passkey accepted. Security clearance level five granted. You may proceed.”
There was the sound of gears and the ratcheting of metal as whatever locking mechanisms and protective spells in the doors disengaged. They swung slowly open with deceptive silence to reveal a passageway that led into the black maw of the unknown. I stepped across the threshold and the doors closed silently behind me, momentarily trapping me in an abyss of darkness.
Wait a second! The key was still in the door when it closed! How was I supposed to get out now? Before my panic could reach critical levels, a row of torches magically sprung to life one after the other, illuminating the room with their otherworldly light. There was another door at the end of the passage. This one was smaller than the last two and was further set apart by a strange blue crystal mounted above it. This door didn’t have handles either and it refused to budge after a few moments of fruitless shoving. All of a sudden the crystal above the door glowed brightly once, followed by a beam of light that almost seemed as if it was examining me. The light stopped and the same voice from before rang out, but the much smaller space of the passage greatly amplified its force.
“Magical signature detected. Clearance level five permitted. State password to proceed.”
A password? I didn’t know that I needed a password! A small feeling of dread began to grow in my stomach. “Umm…moonrocks?” I said hesitantly.
“Password not recognized. State correct password within thirty seconds or face compulsory incineration.”
“Incineration! You have got to be kidding me!” I replied in exasperation.
“Thirty seconds,” came its reply.
Think Cerulean! Think! He wouldn’t have left out an important detail like this! It had to be in that letter. I must have missed it when I was skimming through it.
“Come on come on come on where are you?” I said to myself as I rifled through my saddlebags, searching for the letter with growing urgency.
“Password not recognized. Twenty seconds.”
“You aren’t helping here!” I cried, frustrated.
“I am not required to help. I am only required to incinerate those without a password. Eighteen seconds” it replied with an almost smug air. Just perfect. Being sassed by a trigger happy recording was definitely not on my list of ways to go.
“Aha! Found you!” I exclaimed, pulling the letter out from my saddlebags. I began to scan the letter frantically for a way out of this predicament.
“Password not recognized. Fifteen seconds.”
I made it two thirds of the way down the page before I found what I was looking for. I had to do a double take when I saw it. This had to be a practical joke of some kind.
“Ten seconds.”
At that mark the glow from the crystal above the door became significantly more threatening as sparks of electricity began to gather around it. Nothing else for it at this point. I read what was written down on the letter.
“Security clearance code ‘Sunbutt’: confirm” I read. I really hoped that “Sunbutt” wouldn’t be the last word I ever spoke.
Silence.
“Password confirmed. You may proceed.” I let out a breath that I didn’t know I was holding. The crystal dimmed as the door swung outward with a wooden creak. It seemed like a certain Princess of the Night wasn’t without a sense of humor.
This was too much. Almost getting caught by guards was one thing, but evading death by incineration by the skin of my teeth crossed a line. I wasn’t sure which line in particular it crossed, but it definitely crossed one of them. After this job I would lay really low. Maybe take a short vacation to the beaches of Los Pegasus to unwind for a month or so. However, at that moment, the beach was a long ways away and, lacking a better alternative, I decided to press onwards.
The second door led to a set of stairs going downwards. I followed them for what felt like an eternity before I emerged into what could be best described as a gigantic underground chasm. Alcoves of various sizes had been dug out of the side of the chasm; each with a large stone door and a corresponding number etched into it to guard whatever lay inside. There had to have been thousands of them. Moonlight streamed through a large fissure in the ceiling, illuminating the entire area in a soft pale glow. Looking up I could see the full moon among the starlit sky.
Hold on a minute. The last full moon was five nights ago, and the last time I checked there wasn’t a huge fissure going through the middle of Canterlot. Plus those stairs went deep enough to lead straight into the heart of the mountain that Canterlot perched upon, the Canterhorn.
Something wasn’t adding up here…
I chalked it up to some kind of freaky unicorn magic and tossed it in the folder in my mind labeled “Stuff I Don’t Need To Understand”. Next to that folder were ones for remembering cooking recipes and where to quietly dispose of a body in an emergency, but that’s beside the point.
I trotted lightly over to a small platform that hung next to the edge of the ravine. The platform itself was suspended from a mechanism that looked similar in function to the ones they used to move shipping containers around in ports. Most likely, that platform was how those without the benefit of wings could get themselves down to the storage alcoves.
On the platform (which thankfully had a set of railings so I wouldn’t accidentally fall over) were an arrangement of four levers with a number that corresponded with each of them. The four levers were pushed all the way back so that the numbers read “0-0-0-0”. I pulled each lever so that the numbers all read “3-5-7-1”. When the last number clicked into place the section of railing that let me step onto the platform slid shut. The platform lurched downwards with a mechanic rattle that disturbed a group of bats sleeping peacefully on several stalactites nearby. Dodging the flock of irate bats filling the air, the platform descended into the depths of the ravine. I counted the numbers on the alcoves as I passed them by.
“One thousand two hundred and seventy five, two hundred and thirty six, one thousand nine hundred and nineteen, five thousand and four, one thousand one hundred and thirty eight, forty two.” This whole place seemed to have been organized by a madpony, none of these numbers made any sense!
The platform eventually stopped in front of alcove number 3571. There was a keyhole in the stone door, just like the one in the entrance to the Lunar Wing. My only problem at this point was that the key was nowhere to be found. Suddenly, my right saddlebag got significantly heavier. I opened it up to see what caused the sudden change in weight when I saw…the key. One more thing for “Stuff I Don’t Need to Understand”, that folder would be full by next Tuesday at this rate.
Nervously I put the key in the stone keyhole. I half expected that voice to appear and demand me to take a pop quiz where the consequence for failure would be a pleasant round of keelhauling. Instead, when I turned the key in the lock the entire door just disappeared completely, revealing the small box from the picture sitting on a pedestal. In my surprise at several tons of rock suddenly taking a leave of absence from existence I almost dropped the key down the chasm, never to be seen again. Luckily I managed to knock it towards the pedestal with my hoof. I walked into the alcove to pick up the key and the box, depositing both safely in my saddlebags.
When I turned back around to the platform I saw a shadow flicker briefly out of the corner of my eye. I spun quickly towards the offending direction but I didn’t see anything that could have caused a shadow like that. The hairs on the back of my neck began to raise; I felt something dangerous out there, and it wasn’t the bats.
With that, I decided to make my way back as quickly as possible. I stepped back on the platform and practically shoved the levers back up to their original position. The part of the railing that had opened when I arrived at the alcove slid shut again with a soft click and the platform began its slow journey back to the top. I willed the whole contraption to move faster as I kept my eyes open for any more strange shadows, but the machine stubbornly refused to accelerate its steady pace.
Finally the rickety contraption reached the top of the ravine giving one last clank as it settled into its slot. I leapt over the railing, not bothering to wait for it to open on its own. The feeling of being watched by something very dangerous was very much present. I hardly wanted to stick around to find out if the Lunar Wing had a *gulp* dragon for a watchdog.
Or something worse.
I raced up the stairs that I had descended less than ten minutes earlier. Thankfully the sassy crystal of incineratory death didn’t bother me on my way out. The two doors had locked themselves after I passed through on my way in. Fortunately, I still had the key to unlock them again.
I slid the key into the keyhole on the inside of the giant metal doors and gave it a quick turn to the side with my mouth. Slowly and silently the doors swung outwards, revealing a group of five unicorn guards looking straight at me with horns primed and ready to go.
“There she is!” the one in the middle shouted. “Quick! Stun her! Princess Luna wants her unharmed!”
Horseapples.
I dodged a stun spell from the first guard and took out a little something to help even the odds a bit. Mareuvian cave gems are really quite fascinating little things; they grow in caverns deep underneath the surface of the earth where no light can get to them. Yet, for some reason, when these strange little crystals are exposed to light it gets absorbed and stored inside the crystal, emitting the stored light gradually in a soft glow. However, if the storage matrices of a crystal were disrupted for some reason—say from being thrown forcefully on the ground at the hooves of a group of Canterlot guards—then all the light stored in the crystals would be released in a single blinding flash.
I leapt past the blinded guards as the stun spells they had readied on their horns fizzled out of existence. I wasn’t too worried about them chasing me. Their vision would come back… eventually. Though, by then I would be sitting on a passenger chariot flight to Las Pegasus with a significantly larger amount of bits in my bank account. I really needed a break from this kind of stuff, a reckless life of thievery takes its toll on a mare.
I flew down the corridors as I looked for a way out.
Well no, I didn’t actually fly down the corridor. Y’know, cause I’m not a pegasus. I was just running really fast down a hallway. It’s not that complicated…
Sorry. I’ll get on with it.
Anyways, I was running really fast down the hallways of the Canterlot Archives, avoiding guards and searching for a way out, when I saw a shadow flicker in the corner of my eye, just like down in the Lunar Chasm. Suddenly, a pony in a cloak as dark as a moonless night stepped into the corridor ahead of me. My hooves skidded on the ground as I scrambled frantically to change my direction down a hallway on my right. Stupid slippery marble floors in this stupid marble building.
I tried to put as much distance between myself and that figure as I could, something about it just spelled danger in all capital letters. I ran up a set of stairs in front of me as a plan formed in my head. The plan was simple: go up. Everypony would be focused on the ground floor, expecting me to get out that way. Nopony would expect me to actually go upwards. I just needed to find a window, glide out with my cloak when nopony was looking and lose myself in the warren of alleys and streets that was Canterlot.
With only the thought of going up in my mind I continued to climb the stairs. So far my plan was working perfectly. Thanks to the marble hallways I could hear the sound of the galloping guard’s hooves clattering around on the lower floors and nothing on the upper floors. I guess echoey hallways have their upsides too.
I slowed down and tried to make my hoofsteps as quiet as possible. I didn’t want some lucky guard to hear me and ruin everything when he comes investigating. I peeked around the corner of the next hallway to see that it was considerately guard-free. This particular hallway had a few doors on both sides, presumably which led to various rooms of the ‘Tax Records’ department—judging by the small signs next to each door. A beam of moonlight shone through the single window at the end of the hallway; my way out!
I began to move towards my newfound exit, but my hooves froze in place when something strange started happening at the end of the hallway. The shadows cast by the moonlight began to writhe and move around, almost as if they were alive. A mass of particularly dark shadows gathered together and surged upwards, resolving into the figure of my mysterious cloaked pursuer. The dark cloak completely obscured all of the pony’s distinguishing figures, but even so I could tell that it was the same pony that had cut me off earlier. My way out was now completely blocked by somepony with some kind of magic that I had never seen before.
The dark figure turned and looked straight at me. Eyes that I couldn’t see burned straight through my skull. Everything in the hallway seemed to fade into darkness until it was only me, frozen in inexplicable fear, and the figure making its way slowly towards me. As the figure drew closer everything about it grew more and more threatening until it felt like I was being stared down by a beast several times my size with teeth as sharp as knives. Every part of my body was screaming “Danger! Run away! Run away! RUN AWAY!” but my body stubbornly refused to move.
Time seemed to be passing at an incredibly slow pace; the space between the figure’s steps felt like an eternity. The entire time my fear just kept growing until it felt like my heart would explode out of my chest. With an incredible amount of will I forced my left hoof to move less than an inch forward. Then my right hoof, and then my left a little more. My movements seemed to give the figure pause, almost as if it was surprised that I could move at all.
As I gained momentum, I forced my body through the closest door I could get to. I stumbled into a small windowless room full of shelves upon shelves of tax forms and records. I slumped against the door, keeping it shut with my weight, as I struggled to tame my hammering heartbeat. My nose was filled with the combined scents of sweat and reams upon reams of old paper and my breath came out in ragged gasps.
That thing was still outside and there was no way out through this room. No windows or air vents to squeeze through for a last minute escape. I was trapped.
“Come on Cerulean!” I thought to myself. “You can do this! You’ve gotten out of tighter spots than this before!”
I hadn’t. I closed my eyes in resignation. There was no way out, and I knew it.
“You know, I’m actually quite impressed.”
I almost jumped out of my skin with those words. Somehow, that pony had gotten in the room in the split second that I closed my eyes, doing so without opening the door or making a single noise. Whoever it was had a surprisingly normal-sounding voice, not at all as sinister as his initial appearance would make it seem.
“Most ponies pass out by that point. They just can’t take it any longer and their body gives out.” He took a second before continuing. I could tell that he was a he because he was now close enough that I could barely make out his face. His coat was a deep indigo blue. I couldn’t get a good look at his mane because of his hood, but I thought I could see a hint of white. The most interesting thing about his appearance though was a strange pattern of black lines that began around the edges of his face that accented his features and seemed to continue down his neck, like they had been drawn on with a dark pen. It reminded me of the warrior tattoos of the Mareori tribe that I had once read about in some book a long time ago. It certainly gave the buck in front of me a fierce looking appearance.
“It certainly takes a pony with a certain kind of constitution to last that long, let alone work up the strength to actually move. And the way you used that crystal thingamajig to discombobulate those guards before they could do the same to you? Inspiring!” he said rather excitedly.
“H-how?” I could only ask, significantly confused by his behavior.
“I’ve been watching you for some time actually. Longer than just today for sure. I was following a hunch and I turned out to be right! It’s so fun when that happens, isn’t it?” he replied, with a large grin at that last sentence. “Unfortunately,” he amended, “this is the part where I throw you in the dungeon for five counts of bodily harm, one count of trespassing in a high security area, attempted thievery, and intent to sell a very powerful, very dangerous, and very old artifact to a group of particularly nasty individuals. I hope you realize that it’s nothing personal.”
I didn’t even have enough time to make a sound before he pulled out a small needle and held it in his hoof. Wait a second! That was one of my tranquilizer darts! I kept five of them attached to a small band on my foreleg, in case I needed to knock out somepony quickly and quietly. Of course I put caps on the ends so that I wouldn’t accidentally knock myself out. They were highly effective. I should know, I brewed the sleeping potions myself. I looked down at my foreleg and sure enough, all five of them were gone. When did he-
His hoof moved with an incredible speed and less than a moment later I felt a small sting on my neck before everything went a little woozy. As I began to lose consciousness I heard him say one last thing to himself.
“Interesting… very interesting indeed…”
And then everything went black.