//------------------------------//
// Chapter 4 
// Story: The Same Mistake 
// by The Wizard of Words 
//------------------------------//

Celestia reacted on a bit.

The moment the paper before her was torn to shreds, she summoned a shield about herself, as gold and brilliant as the sun. In but a blink of time, it completely encased her, protecting her from any intrusive item or misdeed. Such an object and intent ricocheted off her shield as soon as it appeared. It made a dull thump across the clear surface as it hit, in a moment doing no more damage than a pebble thrown. It did not stop Celestia from wearing an appropriate mask of fury.

With eyes narrowed and horn still alight, she stared at the thing before her, the monster that had attacked her. A calm grin, mismatched eyes, and a black sword held evenly in its gray hand. It appeared only surprised that she was still alive, a chipper grin upon its drawn lips.

“Oh deary me,” it spoke to her, Karl spoke to her. It was Karl, as there was nothing else the letter she received could be referring to. Its message was now clear to her. “I do apologize for my rudeness, I didn’t mean lash out quite like that.”

“Lies,” Celestia snarled at the creature, already preparing on the best means to imprison the monstrosity. A dungeon was too insecure for a thing that… somehow managed to break out of her spell. “Just like everything else you’ve told me.”

“No, no, that wasn’t a lie,” Karl corrected her again, shaking its correctly colored hand, waving it like a mother would a hoof at a disrespectful foal. “I didn’t mean to miss,” it clarified.

“Then you mean to kill me, do you not, Karl?” she spoke its name, a detail it had attempted to hide from her. She recalled in the back of her mind that the showing of information to a party that suspected its security was a quick way to destabilize their base, make them feel less secure of where they stood. Celestia wanted Karl to reel. But at most, all it did was narrow its mismatched eyes, letting a dull gleam show from its thin drawn lips.

“So it appears that letter was about me. I feel so complimented, knowing I’m the center of attention.” It chuckled at its own words, never taking its blade off Celestia’s shimmering shield. “Tell me, how detailed was it?” That was not a question the diarch expected to hear.

“Enough,” she challenged back, formulating the best means to capture the creature while it spoke. Time was a precious resource, magic she had plenty of. From beyond her shield and behind the creature that threatened her, she was lifting papers and books, searching through them for anything that could be of use. “I know that your words are nothing I can see as genuine.”

“Now that isn’t fair,” Karl spoke back, his smile ever present. “I assure you these are my words, and I mean everything that I say. Besides, I was simply curious how the little dragon was doing.”

Celestia felt her magic stall at the words, the papers and books floating her heavenly aura stilling in the air, caught by the same surprise as she was. It was not a reaction that Karl missed.

“He was very helpful, if a bit curious, asking me almost as many questions as you were. But at least he knew where the lines were, and he was just as eager to answer my questions as to ask his own. I wonder why you won’t offer me the same courtesy?” He dragged his black blade across the diarch’s golden bubble as he spoke, letting it slowly grind across the hard, ethereal surface.

“Karl,” she spoke its name again, earning no more of a reaction than before. She worked quicker behind him, pushing books and papers around as her magic prodded the room for anything of use. A rope, a bookcase, even a rock would do. Anything that could possibly be used against this thing. “What is it you hope to gain from attacking me? You know my title, you know enough of my kingdom. Do you really think such an act will go unpunished?”

“Punished?” It asked the word as a question, even tilting its head. Its blade mimicked the action, grinding against the surface of the shield as it turned on an axis. “What would be the punishment? Banishment from the kingdom? Locked away in a cold dark cellar? Perhaps it would simply be a bit of torture, like recreation for you I’m sure.” He giggled at the insinuation, but not a word of it bother her. Its game was clear to see now.

“The extent of the consequences depends only now upon how long you intend to threaten me.” Celestia did not falter in her search behind Karl, even as she spoke. The papers continued to flitter and flutter, a few choice objects hanging still in the air, suspended by her aura. Heavy tomes, some carved rocks, a statue, several heavy objects but nothing long, loose, and easy to tie. “Lower your blade now and the punishment will fall with it. Continue, and your safety will no longer be a guarantee.”

“My safety?” The laughter Karl gave did no favors to the diarch’s already shaking ground. “Dear little princess, I think you must be seeing things in reverse.”

Then, like knife through butter, his blade skewered Celestia’s shield.

The Princess of the Sun had just enough time to back pedal before the blade cut through her. It swiped harmlessly through the air, slicing the area she once stood in. She could already see the blade tilting, being angled mid swing. She knew what that meant, watching the guards practice their formations countless times told her what it meant. It was going to swing again.

She didn’t raise a shield, her mind already telling her the futility of the act. So instead, she grabbed one of the many objects she had found in the room, the heaviest her adrenaline fueled mind could reasonably grasp. A statue, tall, likely made as a model and non-authentic. It was easily the same size as Karl, perhaps just as heavy, and that was for the diarch’s benefit.

With no hesitation, she swung her head, forcing the still stone statue to slam into the mobile and deadly one.

Karl gave out no sound of pain or surprise as the force was delivered, instead only flying through the doors of the professor’s office, reducing the heavy oak that made them into splinters and oblivion. It was a loud crashing noise, one that echoed through the hall. If the sisters had not already gathered the guards and helped, then surely this noise would now.

Celestia stood in the office still, head lowered and horn pointing deathly at the rubble that was the professor’s statute. Hard as stone, but brittle as glass, her magic and force had reduced into pebbles. Unfortunately, she could more than clearly see Karl’s scarred face peeking up at her through the debris, its hand still gripping a dark blade, a long orange coat still draped about its shoulders, and an amused grin lifted across his drawn lips.

“Deary me!” He exclaimed, showing again no sign of the deadly force Celestia had applied. “That was surprising. I would be more amused if I wasn’t the one lying on the ground.” The diarch noted the disturbing level of glee in his voice. She, however, held none.

“Surrender yourself now, Karl,” she spoke its name again, done with pretense or patience. All lines were now crossed. “Surrender, and I will promise only that you will live. Even you, a stranger to my lands, know that you are outmatched.”

A pregnant silence filled the hallway, with the diarch staring down at the grinning statue. It was ironic almost, Celestia’s features chiseled and hard, focused upon the creature that had assaulted her, but Karl with features relaxed, eyes halfway narrowed and lopsided grin still upon his false lips. The silence did not last, as soon the hall began to fill with curious students and faculty.

Celestia heard them whisper, speaking in awe and confusion. The princess, their diarch, was standing before a crumbled statue, a figure they did not and could not recognize staring back at her, grinning. Celestia paid them only the mind to know they were there. Otherwise, her attention was wholly focused on Karl.

“It appears we’re the center of attention now.” The statue spoke wistfully up to her, as if it were not only moments away from being reduced to rubble and smithereens. “I’m not usually against having a few eyes being placed on me, but I wonder what they would say if they saw their beloved princess kill a completely innocent statue like me.” Karl chuckled at its own words, clearly amused by the lie it so easily spun. “Wouldn’t that need quite the story to justify?”

Celestia did not let her eyes falter, did not let anything but her iron resolve stare down at the statue. But, no matter how much she loathed to speak it, she saw the sliver of truth in Karl’s words. Violence was not a thing seen often in her lands, and near unheard of to imagine her or her sister setting such an example. They were in quite a stalemate.

“Excuse me, princess?” A curious and subdued voice spoke. Karl turned its head to the pony, but Celestia only tilted her eyes, barely at that. She could not afford to take her eyes off of the lethal living statue. The speaker was an elderly stallion, doubtlessly a teacher, with a gray mane on his head and down his neck. He was staring her and Karl, wide eyed. “Is… I-Is everything alright?”

“Oh, everything is wonderful!” Karl spoke for the princess, lifting and dropping its arms as it spoke. The crumbs of dust from the ruined statue fell as it made the action. “I merely tripped and fell over a few important artifacts, probably irreplaceable! Your princess was just deciding on the right words to say, I’m sure.” The words would have been playful had they not instantly begun webbing an intricate lie.

“Are you alright?” The stallion asked, his empathy winning over his fear, taking a few steps towards the statue. Celestia felt her teeth grind. “Do you need any help? I-I’m sure we can find someone medically qualified to-”

“Stop.”

The command was spoken lowly, almost as a growl, freezing the professor mid-gait. Karl looked up to her at the muttering, head tilted, questioning. It was far more concerned with what she would do than what she meant, still dancing around her. The stallion was looking at her, questioning why she would stop him from helping. Ignorance may be bliss, but it also was foolish.

“He is a dangerous individual that attempted to assault me not but a few moments ago,” Celestia stated in a monotone, more suited for the statue she spoke to than herself. The words did wonders though, as the stallion quickly began to back pedal. Karl gave an amused grin at his retreating form.

“Deary me, I’ve never had someone avoid me quite like that before.” Karl only chuckled as the stallion moved back to the growing wall of onlookers, all shifting nervously from the princess to the statue. Their voices were getting louder, their numbers making their conversations more audible. “Tell me princess, would it help if I showed them how kind I am?” Celestia felt her eyes narrow at the statement.

“You only need to speak your surrender to me,” the diarch returned. “So I will say again, surrender now and you may yet live to see the next sunrise.” The words only made Karl begin to laugh again, shutting his eyes, barring his faux teeth, and leaning his head down, as if to hide his mirth. Celestia only continued to stare down at him.

“It seems you love to use that word, alive.” Karl spoke with amusement laced in his voice. He slowly rose from the rubble, the remnants of the statue falling to the floor with loud thumps, cracking the tiling beneath. Karl paid no mind to it, the same as Celestia. “Saying that if I want to stay alive I need only to follow you and submit to your every whim. Not that’s a joke if I’ve ever heard one.”

“I make no jests, Karl,” she spoke its name again, refusing to allow it to forget how it attempted to hide the title, a title she knew now. It was small, a mind game, but Celestia it was clear that she would not tolerate dishonesty. “I never lie in my promises, or my threats.”

“Oh, you must have misunderstood me, my dear princess,” Karl spoke again, brushing off what little gray dust was still on its stone form. Its smile it gave, focused upon the glaring princess, was sharper than the black blade it carried. “It isn’t the threat I call a joke, though I too think it humorous. It’s what you threaten to take away.”

“So you see even your own life as worth little.” Celestia spoke the thought aloud, hoping that her connection would force a reaction upon the statue’s face. Instead, it merely let its half-lidded eyes blink, smile unfaltering and form unmoving. “It’s difficult to find that surprising.”

“Really? It sounds rather surprising to me,” the statue commented nonchalantly, its colored hand resting upon its chest. Its other hand still hung limply at its side, holding the black blade tightly, fixed in stone. “After all, it is rather hard to judge what doesn’t exist.”

Celestia merely let one of her brows rise, confused, intrigued, but lacking nothing in conviction towards the imprisonment of the statue. She would falter in her focus from a few words, a bit of banter from a fearless, though foolish, criminal. Karl, giggling lightly, decided to push further.

“Dearest Celestia,” it began. “I may be living, but I assure you that I don’t have what you would call a ‘life.’ Allow me to demonstrate.”

Without giving any warning, the creature’s arm flew upwards.

Celestia had only the time to raise several bricks before her, held in front like a shield of stone. But no force met them, no reason to resist. They hung in the air, by her magic’s command, blocking from Celestia half of Karl’s form. She saw its grinning face, focused on her almost wistfully. She saw its orange cloak, hung over its shoulders, but that was it, as far as her eyes could see. She heard much more.

Panicked whispers and cries of fright came from the ponies around her, echoing through the hall and made only louder in the vacuum it entered. She heard sobbing from a few mares, heaving from stallions, and perhaps even the dull thump of bodies passively impacting the floor. Slowly, carefully, she lowered her shield of bricks and stone, looking for what Karl had done.

She found the statue with its own blade shoved through its chest.

Celestia’s eyes widened, panicked and in shock. There was no illusion or magic before her, no way for words to lie about what she saw. The hilt of Karl’s dark sword, resting over the white paint that was spread over its chest. It sat there, menacingly, threateningly… murderously. There was simply no other way to describe it, because there was no way for any creature to survive such a blow… no creature that was… alive.

The diarch realized too late the meaning to Karl’s words, to the hidden purpose of its actions, and the mistake she allowed herself to make.

In a deft swing of its arms, Karl pulled its dark sword from its chest, holding it reversely in its hands, blade pointed to the ground and free of its chest. Half a moment later than that, Karl pushed forward, rushing over the crumbled stone of statue. The sword was rising, pointing at Celestia’s chest. Karl was fast, but the blade was even faster.

And Celestia had no time.

She felt stone pierce her chest, taking breath and replacing it with pain. All she could see was Karl’s menacing smile. It stared at her, carefree and cheerful, even as it spoke to her.

“I hope you understand now,” it spoke in a whisper, a whisper barely heard above the dulling of the princess’s senses, beneath the screaming of ponies around her. “It would be terrible if you died still confused.” It laughed, cheerfully at its own words.

Celestia attempted to speak, forcing what little air she had into her lungs. It succeeded in only forcing blood to come from her throat, staining her alabaster coat. Her limbs were weak… so very weak. It was a wonder she could stand on them… but she wasn’t. She was on the ground… when did that happen? She was looking up at Karl, at the statue, at its dark blade, its red stained sword.

“Sweet memories princess,” Karl spoke through her haze, echoing through her mind. “I do hope we see each other again.”

Sense left Celestia, reality falling with it.





Twilight Sparkle didn’t know what to expect when she entered the cave. In the past, she may have suspected to find a cavern utterly devoid of life, perhaps leading down a longer shaft with some subterranean column to be explored. If she were to guess using her recent exploits, she might have assumed to find the ponies they were sent for cowering in fear, but thankful upon seeing the pair of mares.

What she did not expect, and what few ponies rightfully would, was the seemingly intact city.

Twilight Sparkle, a mare, a princess, a former bearer of an Element of Harmony, stared out at the city. Few things could surprise her now, between speaking formally with Mad Gods and solving mysteries thousands of years old. Yet, this sight managed to rend her speechless, an accomplishment if ever there was one.

But the city appeared to have won over two awards by its presence alone. For even Rainbow Dash, the sky-loving pegasus who preferred her two wings over any number of hooves, had fallen to the ground, standing on her legs as if to give her mind more power to absorb the sight. She, a Wonderbolt in training, flew everywhere, even in the presence of royalty and deity, was now standing in order to right her brain.

“Twilight,” said pegasus spoke her friend’s name, coming out as a half whisper, as if afraid too loud a voice would shatter the illusion before them. At least, Twilight justified that it had to be an illusion. That, or any number of a dozen of other possibilities.

“Yes, Dash?” Twilight returned, her lavender eyes never leaving the city far beneath her. She was still wondering about the structure, the sights, the multitude of architectures, the preservation, all of it! The only thing focused on Dash were Twilight’s ears.

“You’re seein’ this, right?” Twilight didn’t have to guess what her pegasus friend was talking about. She also didn’t have to glance to see that Rainbow had yet to look at her. Both mares had their eyes focused into the open cavern, to the grand chasm, to the city that shouldn’t be, an island underground.

“I… I believe so,” Twilight discounted illusion as she spoke the words, starting to write up probabilities for erosion through water decay and how likely it would be to form the structures they saw. The rough numbers weren’t even worth considering. “But I don’t know… what it is.”

“Yeah, don’t think I could guess that one either.” Another rarity, suddenly appearing by effect of the city below. Perhaps it was magical, drawing forth all the oddities of the world. Twilight discounted that idea instantly. It wasn’t long after that she heard her friend sigh next to her.

“That professor and her kid are down there, aren’t they?” Twilight had full capabilities to correct Rainbow on both her mannerisms and the actual ponies they were looking for. Her addled mind and the processing centers of her brain, however, filed it as unimportant.

“Yes,” she admitted. “Yes they are.”

“Awesome,” Dash spoke with no more cheer or disdain in her voice. “Nothin’ like exploring an ancient tomb to get the day started off right.”

“Wait… tomb?”

It was only by those words that Twilight was able to pull her attention away from the city below and focus on her pegasus friend. Apparently, perhaps thankfully, the change in the alicorn’s voice was enough to draw the pegasus’s attention as well. She was looking at Twilight with a  screwed expression, illuminated by the light of the passage they entered from and the magical orb hovering in the air, kept alight by Twilight’s magic.

“Yeah, tomb.” Dash repeated the words with certainty, as if she were describing the aerodynamics of a basic flight pattern. “Giant city underground, no entrance aside from the one we just opened, people from the fossil school in Canterlot going missing. I can’t imagine many other things it could be.”

“First of all, the field is archeology, not fossils,” Twilight corrected. It evoked no change in either mare. “Secondly, a tomb implies that individuals, if any, were being buried either as a means to compartmentalize the dead following a large epidemic or to-” Suddenly, it became very hard for the alicorn to say anything more. Her mouth was moving, or at least attempting to, and her airways were unobstructed.

Then hoof in her mouth, however, made forming words rather difficult.

“Twi, please,” Dash spoke clearly, her eyes focused on the alicorn as if she were about to give a lecture. At least, it was the closest Twilight could relate the expression to. “Don’t talk about that stuff. Not before we go trottin’ into whatever city tomb thing that is down there. Fair deal?”

It took only a brief moment for Twilight to put together Dash’s unease, an equal amount of time later for her to reach her own conclusion. She nodded her head, even as she lifted her own hoof to remove Dash’s from her mouth. She was thankful her friend preferred to fly.

“Yes, of course,” Twilight confirmed her action with her words, giving a small amount of relief to Dash, evident by her slight smirk. “But we still have to look. I mean, it’s far away and unlikely for Professor Slate and Iron Wit to be anywhere else.” And with those words, she watched Dash’s ghostly confident smirk fall for a sigh, and a dejected one at that.

“Yeah, cause it’s not like they just put off their work and decided to take a nap or anything.” Dash’s sarcasm was not lost on Twilight. Rather it made the freshly crowned princess smile at her friend, somewhat relieved to hear some of the pegasus’s confidence returning.

“A pony can only hope, Dash,” she began to her friend, herself already walking down towards the ominous structures that lay far beneath them. “But that same pony should prepare for the worst while hoping for the best.”

“I’ll settle with just following your lead,” Rainbow answered in kind, flapping her wings and taking to the air. She didn’t fly to the cavern’s high wall, to weave through the stalactites as Twilight half-expected her to. Dash simply hovered behind Twilight, gaining maybe an extra hoof or two of vertical distance and nothing more.

To most ponies, the small act was seemingly pointless, a waste of energy where a simple gait would do. But Twilight knew, as Rainbow felt, that there was comfort and familiarity in the air. It was where she belonged, after all.

“So… crazy tall decaying buildings,” Rainbow drawled out what she saw, her pink eyes looking up and around as the pair finally entered the area dominated by the ancient structures. Ancient, because even if they weren’t buried in a chasm large enough to fit a town, they were decaying and showing signs of magical preservation distortion. Twilight only passively realized how much her own gait had slowed as the pair moved through the buildings.

Her steps felt like a foal’s first attempt at movement, small gentle motions forward, but hardly attempting to cover any significant distance. Though Dash was bound only by the extent to which she flexed her wings, she appeared to be hovering more than flying, her head craning at the tall buildings around them, both in intimidation and awe. Twilight was no different.

The idea of “tall” itself, however, was an injustice to the nearly-overburdening size of the structures. Doorways stood over twice Twilight’s height, the multi-stories she saw in a few buildings easily large enough for manticores to easily roam through, and windows that appeared to match. It was odd, even considering that it was mostly made of stone. A decaying gray stone that appeared to have lost its life-long bought with erosion, but made in the same vein as Canterlot Castle and the Palace of the Two Sisters. It was… odd.

“Yo, Twilight,” Rainbow got the alicorn’s attention with a call of her name. Twilight looked up to her friend, seeing her point at something else. “That a sign?” It was an incomplete sentence, but Twilight discerned the meaning easily. The alicorn refocused her attention at the object that Dash was pointing towards.

It was overtly tall, like every building they had seen so far, showing the same forms of magical distortion that came with long age, which shown by perfectly preserved wood sitting beneath rotting bark, but it was a sign none the less. It had a multitude of arrows, each pointing in a different direction, each with their own text written across them. The combined height of the sign and darkness of the cavern made it difficult to make out what was written.

Twilight, motioning her back slightly, flapped her wings and took lightly to the air. She didn’t have nearly the confidence that Rainbow did, but hours of practice and muscle training had made the task of simple elevation manageable. She reached eye level with the sign quickly, only to find a good number of the indicators rotted away, age having taken its toll on them.

“Hey Twi,” Rainbow spoke Twilight’s name again. “What’s with all the patchy rot around here? I mean, it looks like Discord vomited his magic over everything.” By far the most confusing metaphor the alicorn had heard, no contest. She turned away from the sign to give her a friend a perplexed look, one that Rainbow returned. “What? I thought it was a good question.”

“If you mean to ask why the magical preservation spells have begun to distort and wither, it’s because a significant amount of time has passed and their enchantment is ending.” Twilight spoke her clarification and answer simply, but didn’t lose her perplexed look. “If you asking what Discord’s vomit looks like, I haven’t a clue or desire to know.” A small part of the princess felt a pip of mirth at the disgusted frown that overtook Rainbow’s features, complete with a dip in her altitude.

“Whoa, what!” Rainbow fired back. “I didn’t mean that! I mean… look!” She pointed her hoof towards one of the tall buildings they had passed, two stories high and made of stone blocks. Some of the blocks were perfectly rectangular, appearing smooth to the touch. Others were just cracked slabs of rock, moss and decay forming over them in great number. “You can’t tell me that isn’t something that Discord would have fun staring at.” They did look inappropriate, juxtaposed together.

“Alright, Rainbow, I understand,” Twilight held up her hooves at the defensive pony. “But we are still… here,” she let out the statement following a pause, not sure how to describe where they were. Her lavender eyes turned back to the sign, looking for an arrow pointing towards the small square they had walked through. Thankfully, it was still preserved.

“Medieval Square,” Twilight spoke the name, looking back at where they had come from. It did appear medieval, in an odd sense. Though medieval times were associated more with shorter statues, barbaric sentences, and an overall harsher environment to survive in. The square suggested none of those.

“What about this one?” Twilight turned back towards the sign to see her pointing towards another indicator. Her eyes glanced over two or three other arrows, magic having left them and time taking a beating over its absence, leaving not a single legible word. The sign that Rainbow was focused on, however, pointed down a street that seemed to turn from cobblestone to dirt. Under the faint light of her magic, she couldn’t see what was beyond it.

“Pirate Island,” Twilight spoke the name in a soft whisper, hating the ominous tone that the name carried. Pirates, despite their childish connotation nowadays, were associated more with murder, thievery, and heinous crimes that the alicorn loathed to think. An island dedicated to them? The princess could only hope that it would be closer to the childish interpretation than the more literal meaning. Given the age of the place, however, it seemed unlikely.

“So like, there are different sections of this place?” Rainbow asked as she flew around the sign, looking for any more legible indicators. “Just a bunch of small areas all looking different. Sounds more like a theme park then a town.” Twilight was unable to disagree, let alone raise a point against the statement.

She was not to say what did and didn’t survive through the ages. She may have wished for a vast library of lost knowledge to be found in this cave, but it was just as likely to be a castle, a town, or in this case, a theme park, if it was a theme park. They needed more information than just some guessing by their societal standards.

“We’re getting off track,” Twilight spoke to her friend. “We need to look for the professor and her student, so we just have to look for the most likely area they’d want to explore.”

“Yeah, because this place is so boring.” The sarcasm was palpable, and it did not go down easy. “Seriously though. Where would a bunch of rock experts go first in a town literally underground? It’s like asking you where you would go in a library you’ve never been to.” The statement made Twilight’s eyes widen.

Despite what Rainbow meant by the metaphor, Twilight knew exactly where she would go first in a library. Where she not looking for a specific book in a specific section, she would go to where the collect information on all the books in their possession. Every library had one, in fact, every institution from intelligence to entertainment had one.

“We look for the information center,” Twilight spoke the words as if they were obvious. Rainbow’s dubious expression made it clear she did not share the same wavelength.

“Information Center?” The pegasus repeated before elaborating. “Look, Twi, if you’re treating this like that amusement park thing, I was just talking. There’s no way a freaking circus is preserved underground like this. I mean… how long does it even take for magic to dissipate like all that?”

“Eons, usually,” Twilight spoke easily, the information second nature to her. Dash’s point, however, was not missed. “But no matter how old the civilization is, they would have likely needed some way to organize structure and information center. I mean, despite how old this place clearly has to be, it doesn’t really feel like it was made from an uneducated society, does it?” Rainbow, judging by her bit lip and sideways glance, was not inclined to disagree.

“Well, no, but then again, I wouldn’t expect this place to look like… well this.” Her hoof waved over the area, illuminated still by Twilight’s lavender light. Hanging as high as the ball of magic was in the cavern, it made it all seem rather ominous. “I thought it’d be more alien, like Daring Do and the Temple of Ra.”

Ah, so that was the pegasus’s baseline.

“Well, you’re not entirely wrong, Rainbow,” Twilight tried to ease in, her hoofs touching on the ground as her wing stopped their beating. They were already sore, Celestia knows how Dash was able to keep it up all day. Maybe that’s why she slept so often. “This is far and outside the usual find for archeologists, but technical and magical innovations have been lost before due to improper management of information or catastrophic events. It’s not unlikely that if this place survived… whatever happened to it, then we could be further along in magical areas of study.”

“Whoa,” Dash let out, letting the ideas flow through her. For all the faults one could describe to Rainbow Dash, unimaginative was not one of them. Far and away, it was quite the opposite. “So like, whoever made this place could be, like, smarter than you are.” Twilight chuckled uneasily. It was, ironically, the easiest way to hide her discomfort, specifically with the idea.

“I… think you may be giving them more credit there Rainbow,” Twilight began as easily she could. “I-I mean, this is amazing, but we still don’t know anything about them.”

“We know they’re huge,” Rainbow returned far easier than Twilight. “Just look at those doors. They look like Princess Celestia could walk through them no problem, and she’s not exactly short stuff.” Two points for Rainbow, apparently.

“Yes, that is… something.” While not along the line of detail that Twilight was hoping to follow, Dash did make an excellent point. The structures assembled was indicative of the size of the occupants of these ruins, at least long ago. It stood to reason that analyzing more of them would give a better idea of their body structure, perhaps habits and necessities as well.

Twilight shook her head. She was getting ahead of herself. They needed to find the professor and student first. There was no point in attempting to solve one mystery before ending another. She turned up to Rainbow, who was still floating easily about the sign they found. She had the words on the edge of her lips, but was interrupted by her cyan friend.

“This is different,” she spoke, her hoof pointing at one of the many arrows on the post. Twilight staved off her words to observe what her friend had found. It took her only a moment to question the pegasus’s eyesight. The arrow she was indicating lacked any form of magical preservation, nothing but warped wood free of any text. But a slightly longer look, a more detailed one, showed a bit more.

It was larger than the others, first and foremost, nearly double in size. It also sat atop the post, as opposed to being attached to it. The tip of the board, now dulled by its lack of magical properties and time’s decay, pointed deeper into the cavern, away from where the two had entered. Twilight’s light shined down upon them from above, and it illuminated a great deal of the ruins.

Yet, somehow, be it poor luck in aiming or some other form of magical intervention, only a dark shape could be seen in the distance, hovering ominously above them. Twilight felt herself gulp.

“I got ten bits saying that’s where they went.” Twilight hated to agree with her friend. “Well, c’mon egghead. Sooner we find them the faster the better. I wouldn’t want to be lost in this place.” The alicorn couldn’t help but wonder if the two were sharing wavelengths, giving how in tune their thoughts were.

“Right,” she agreed, trotting the path towards the ominous shadow. She was in no hurry to gallop, not into that thing. And for once in a lifetime, Rainbow did not hurry her, instead lightly gliding behind the mare.

They did not stop to think why they were moving slowly, already aware of the answer. They did not stop to think of a better solution, still seeing time as valuable. And they did not stop to look around further, both fearful and intrigued in what they would find.

So neither were aware of the prying eyes, the shifting stone, or the ominous silence.