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// Chapter 1 - Into the Light 
// Story: The Last Memory 
// by Boxpony13 
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"Faith is the strength by which a shattered world shall emerge into the light."
~ Helen Keller







In a long desolate tunnel that stretched endlessly downwards, a lone figure stood breaking endless rocks and shuffling dirt. The tunnel was pitch black, barely large enough for the mysterious equine stallion to stand inside it. The only visible thing in the darkness was a pair of sky blue lights glowing from the stallion’s eyes that illuminated the area around him. The sounds of stones being broken and dirt shuffling about echoed down the tunnel. As the stallion continued to effortlessly dig upwards his mind kept asking himself the same questions over and over. How long had he been down in that cavern? How long did he spend most of his life wandering around in that small, rusted, metallic room that he called home keeping things together?

The funny thing was; he knew how long he’d been digging and he knew exactly how long he’d been trapped under the earth, but this did not matter to him. Time no longer mattered to him. The length that he had been deep underground often made days seem like seconds, years feel like weeks, centuries feel like months. The darkness would surely drive anypony else mad, but not him. He was capable of holding out. That was all he could do. That was all he seemed to be able to do was to simply hold out.

Isolation was the life he spent. Loneliness was the best and only company. Living under hundreds of kilometers of rock and dirt, his metallic home felt more like a desolate tomb than an actual place to live. He remembered that the ponies around him called the place that he lived in a “safe haven”. But it didn’t seem so safe seeing that nopony else survived. One could ask how anypony could handle being alone for that long. But he did. He endured and endured for such a long time. It was the only life he really knew. It wasn’t until he finally decided to dig upwards to see the surface once again that his isolation would soon end.

However, digging upwards was no easy task. Although he never considered himself a miner or even a construction worker, the archives that still existed in his old home, or whatever was left of them, helped gave him decent information on how to construct a sturdy tunnel without the need of buttresses or support beams, something that he severely lacked. However, this method of digging couldn’t prevent ruptures or earthquakes to break its hard structure, as cave-ins within the tunnel occurred more often than he liked. Each cave-in meant starting from the beginning. So many times had he had to re-dig a whole new tunnel again, and again, and again, most ponies would have given up from the tenth time, but not him. His ambition never wavered and he kept digging and digging, faster and faster. 

On the two hundred and eighty seventh time a rupture finally caused the metallic home that he lived in to cave. Thankfully he was digging in the tunnel when it happened, however, the only home he knew, the place that he lived in for so long, gone. It may have been cripplingly desolate, but it was still his. Now the earth had claimed this too with its dirt and rocks. Although it was unfortunate, this only made him push harder. He kept digging upwards. There was no turning back. He kept digging for a long time hoping that the tunnel that he was now inhabiting didn’t lose its integrity. Sometimes he questioned if he was ever going to reach the surface. He’d never actually seen let alone been on the surface before, being born in the cavern. Whatever he knew of the surface he only knew through the archives and storybooks that he had read so many times. But he kept the hope that one day whether it’d be tomorrow, next week, next month, or even next year, that he’d break the surface. 

Then the moment finally came. 

When he pawed one last time at the dirt in front of him, a glimmer of light appeared out of the dirt. Finally, after so many years of digging, after so many years of trial and error, he was there, he made it to the surface; he had found the world that was once thought of being lost to oblivion. Desperately digging, he pushed itself out of the hole finally to breaking out of the prison he once called his home. The moment that his upper half was on top of the surface, he could instantly detect a different atmosphere that was completely different from the one far below. Although he couldn’t really “feel” anything, his body was capable of detecting different environmental occurrences such as when the temperature in the surrounding area increased or decreased. The one he was currently feeling was a new feeling, one both familiar and unfamiliar to him at the same time. The temperature seemed to be fairly low but not low enough to be at freezing point. The air that flew past the stallion’s body made the air seem colder than it probably was. He realized that this was what they called a “breeze”. But the biggest thing that he noticed was that unlike below, this air seemed, clean, obviously due to the lack of minerals that permeated the air within the tunnel. This air didn’t have any dirt or rocks surrounding it from all sides, it was just air that freely moved wherever it wanted, flowing all about. To him, it was beautiful.

The equine stallion stood up and began to observe his surroundings. The first thing he saw were the many green plants growing all around him. Looking at the ground, he observed what looked like small green needles dancing back and forth across a long field. He read about these needles and remembered that they were called “grass”. Next he looked around and saw an endless group of wooden pillars blooming with green petals on top of them. The petals also danced much like the green needles under his hooves. Scanning the pillars once more, he quickly identified them as “trees”. He remembered reading that trees were important to the planet because they provide oxygen produced from carbon dioxide to help support wildlife. They were certainly a beautiful sight.

But what he saw next amazed him. Gazing upwards he saw thousands upon thousands of lights of various sizes floating high above in the endless black sky. Many glittered and sparkled like they had a life of their own. Yet to him, the most beautiful sight to capture the equines eyes was the large and radiant orb floating right over him. It glowed even brighter than the smaller ones, the grand center to the stunning sky above.

It was a truly magnificent sight through the eyes of the stallion. Never before had he seen anything that was before him. Having lived around rock, dirt and metal it all seemed so unfamiliar to him. Sure he had read and heard about these things, but to see it in full almost felt like a fantasy. Was this what they called the “night”? From what he remembered, the night consisted of “stars” much like the small lights that glimmered all across the sky, which meant that the large bright orb up above had to be the “moon”. He knew that the night was supposed to be beautiful, but he never imagined that it would be this beautiful. It must've been his imagination. The figure stared majestically up towards the heavens.

The equine thought over all that he’d seen thus far, the dancing green grass, the trees whose green leaves also danced to the air, and finally the bright and beautiful lights that glowed all across the night sky. Truly he had found a whole new world that had formed on the surface. One very different than what he had been living in for most of his life. So many different things to explore and learn about, but where would be start? Where should he go? But the biggest question, which way should he begin walking? Looking around, he realized that the trees surrounded him making every direction exactly the same. With no definite way to go, he decided to take the first direction that came to mind, north. Taking in the scenery one last time, the equine began to head north towards the forest. 

My journey through this new world is about to begin, the figure thought as he entered the forest of pillars before disappearing into darkness, not realizing what amazing things he would discover.





It had been nearly an hour since the equine started his trek into the forest. The trees seemed to become more and more distorted and sickly as he journeyed deeper and deeper through the endless rows of trees. A light mist seemed to appear out of nowhere, making the path ahead of him difficult to maneuver through. An environment that would definitely frighten anypony who walked through this seemingly haunting forest, but to the equine, this was a new and in many ways beautiful scenery. He discovered new and exotic plant life growing all around such as strange blue petals that sprouted out of the ground or mud that looked like it was molten. The more he saw, the more he grew excited of the world around him. Almost everything he saw was a brand new sight. He had only seen pictures of these kinds of things, but never thought he would finally be able to see them first hand. So much life grew all around him, feeding off the earth itself. He didn’t even know what any of them were specifically but he didn’t care, he was just basking in the beauty of what was surrounding him.

However, his greatest discovery would quickly come when he suddenly noticed a creature that popped out of a bush in front of him. The equine stared at the creature intensely as the creature stared back. The creature was small, barely reaching his knees. It had a light brown coat except under its belly, which sported a light tan coat underneath. The creature had an extremely long and fluffy tail that seemed to move on its own. It had small ears that perked up at the equines direction. Its eyes were pitch black and looked like they grew the moment it caught sight of him. The creature stood on all fours in a somewhat defensive stance, most likely alarmed at the presence of the equine. It seemed like an eternity that they both looked at each other. Finally, the equine slowly approached the little critter until it quickly scurried off up into a tree.

This was a great discovery for the lonely equine. Not only was there plant life, there were also life forms that seemed to exist. The more he ventured the more he saw new and interesting creatures. Nearly all of them were completely foreign. Most had scattered at the sight of the figure that trotted along an open path while the braver gave curious glances. Sounds of various life forms could be heard all around the forest. The equine couldn’t make out what produced what noise, but he hoped to one day learn all of them. While he wanted to greet each and every single creature it saw, he knew that he would have all the time to do that later. For now, he continued down the dark and dreary forest hoping that it would lead him to an even greater discovery.

Another seven hours had passed and for the most part the forest seemed to stay consistent. He found a dirt path and decided to walk down it. Along his trek he noticed that the trees bunched up together in such a way that their leaves literally covered the sky, blocking out its beauty. Still, he knew this time would be day, which meant that the large burning orb called the “sun” was already out.

As he traveled, he began to wonder if there was any kind of sapient life forms on the surface. If there were animals in the forest, then what’s to say that something out there was truly intelligent? From what he had read, he many of the sapient beings hid underground after a cataclysmic event. The figure wasn’t sure what the sapient species would look like if there were any. Hopefully his equine look wouldn’t cause panic or scare anypony he came across.

Howling from the west interrupted his thoughts. These howls weren’t anything new to him, he heard of them a few hours back. But the sound that followed up instantly caught his attention, the sound of screaming. From what he could make out, the screams were definitely screams of terror and the pitch in which it made was from a female in nature. He would’ve made it out to be just any other animal until the creature yelled something out that immediately caught his attention.

<“HELP!!!”>

Quickly, he leapt off the path and began to sprint towards the sounds of the howling and screaming. Whatever was happening he knew that the cry came from a sapient creature and was being attacked by a group of predators. He wasn’t going to sit around and lose this opportunity to finally discover an intelligent being. For all he knew this could be his only chance.

With newfound determination, he darted as fast as he could into the thicker parts of the forest.