Cassie's nose twitched, then twitched again. Finally a sneeze let loose, forcing her to open her eyes. Smiling, she raised her finger to her face.
"Well, aren't you a pretty butterfly," Cassie said to the large monarch butterfly now perched on her nose. "Enjoying the garden like me? It is beautiful, isn't it? Reminds me of the one back at my old college, but I don't recognize a bunch of these flowers. I think you would like it more by the flowers instead of perched on my nose, though. It kinda tickles."
To Cassie's surprise, the butterfly blinked its overly large eyes, and flew off to the closest flower patch. Sitting up, she looked around for Princess Ink Splotch. Unable to spot the larger pony, she glanced at the sun. Pinching her brows together a moment, she wondered how Ink Splotch could be so quiet. She’d only had her eyes closed for about ten minutes, and hadn't fallen asleep. Shrugging, she put her leg back on and made for one of the garden exits to go back inside the castle.
Cassie wandered the halls for what felt like hours. The architecture and design amazed her, from the marble floors, columns, walls, and cathedral ceilings, to the exquisite busts of ponies, intricately woven tapestries and carpets, and stained glass windows. Even after seeing how ponies used their mouths, hooves, and anti-gravity aura—which could apparently do more—Cassie still wondered if some other race had helped them build any of it, maybe even a race before them.
Her little experiment had worked. There was no way the ponies hadn't realized she’d left her room by now, yet other than a few guards in a couple corridors, Cassie had seen no other ponies and heard no alarm.
"Score one for you, Padlock, and the rest of you, I guess. Looks like you didn't lie; I really can go where I want in this place."
Cassie tried backtracking to the garden, only to get more and more lost in the maze of hallways and rooms. She did find a small dining area, with some fruits and pitchers of water, which she helped herself to. However, her muscles ached, and she just wanted to get back to her room. Cassie actively looked for any pony she could find. She'd already realized they must have been told to give her space, because there was no way a castle would be this empty.
Resting on a bench in a small alcove near the bottom of some stairs, Cassie waited for any pony to wander by. Cassie's eyes lit up when muffled clopping getting closer reached her ears. Standing up, she took a step out of the alcove, almost running into the pony.
"Hi," Cassie said cheerfully to a wide-eyed mare dressed in a maid’s outfit. She noticed the maid's legs trembling, and quickly began unfolding the picture of her room Padlock had given her. "Can you take me here, please? Or to ~Padlock~?"
Briefly, Cassie worried the mare would not understand, or bolt away screaming. Instead, she reached for the picture, studied it a moment, then passed it back.
"E'hh hoys ukq jiks. Come, nuwttwe um," the mare said, passing the photo back, the fear in her eyes mostly gone.
A short time later, Cassie rounded a corner to see Padlock chatting with the somewhat familiar white unicorn guard she’d seen yesterday when she’d initially been let out of her cell. Traversing the halls of the castle while following the maid had been uneventful, although the distance proved long enough for her leg to start aching again.
Once they were standing in the hallway outside of Cassie’s room, the maid nodded to Padlock before turning and walking off.
"Thanks for bringing me back," Cassie called to the maid, then she turned to Padlock sheepishly. "Hi, ~Padlock~." To her surprise, she didn't seem mad at all.
"De, Cassie, come," Padlock said, waving at her with a hoof. She repeated the motion, this time only saying "De" a few times.
Cassie stood there, chewing on the inside of her cheek a little, with her eyes slightly narrowed. After a few moments, a smile formed. "~Hi, Padlock~."
Clacking bounced off the marble walls around Cassie for several seconds before both Padlock and the unicorn put their front hooves back on the ground, both with large grins. Before she could walk past Padlock, the mare brought out a few pieces of colored parchment. Cassie turned to the side with another sheepish grin. "Sorry, ~Padlock~, I know I should have walked out the door so they could come… ~come~… with me. I just wanted to see if I really had some choice in the matter."
Cassie took the pictures from Padlock with a nod. After a pantomiming session between the two, Cassie was surprised to learn it was only mid afternoon. Already growing weary of having to guess the time all of the time, she decided to press for a clock. Though Padlock didn’t provide her with one, she did agree to come wake her up in a couple hours, and after a little more charades practice, Padlock trotted off down the hall.
Entering the room, Cassie only briefly registered that the bed had already been remade as she flopped down onto it for a nap.
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"I'm up, I'm up!" Cassie yelled, releasing a pillow and rolling onto her back to stare at the ceiling.
With a strength of will that could move mountains—or at least move a geologist out of a horizontal position—Cassie reluctantly stood next to the bed with a frown. She popped her dress out in a few places where it clung to her skin, then ran her hands down it to try and smooth some of the wrinkles out. The slightly sticky feeling of her clothes reminded her that her fever hadn't gone away completely, but that it was definitely fading.
A dull knocking filled the air again.
"I said I'm up… just wait," Cassie said with a slight bite. Her face scrunched up a moment before she said, "~Padlock, bye.~" She hoped with her extremely limited vocabulary that she had gotten her point across as she entered the bathroom.
Cassie stood at the sink splashing water onto her face, the cool water helping to chase away the last remnants of sleep. Wiping the water from her face with a washcloth, she gave her hair a few quick brushes before pinning it back with a hairband. Somewhat satisfied to face the world, Cassie returned to the main room, then opened the door to find Padlock chatting with two white unicorns: one she’d seen a few times, and a new one wearing the vest part of a suit, and a monocle. She had to suck her bottom lip in when she noticed his little blue mustache. Breaking her gaze from the pony, she turned to Padlock.
"~H-Hi, Padlock. Come~ in," Cassie said, opening the door the rest of the way.
Cassie stiffened when the new stallion took a few steps closer. "Cnaapejco, ieoo Cassie. Q iu Nivku Xivba. Ep qa jeya bu ummb ukq," he said, extending a hoof.
A small cry escaped Cassie's throat as she took a step back, bringing her hands up defensively. At the same time, Padlock moved forward to put herself between Cassie and the stallion, gently pushing his foreleg back to the ground and whispering in his ear.
With a small nod, the unknown unicorn said, “Ipp, Q qjzanopwiz, obr Q odzcuwns,” to Padlock, before looking back up to Cassie. “Awzzg bu dwra opwnphaz ukq, Cassie. Dwra i lhawowjp arajejc." With a dip of his head, and not another word, he turned tail and left.
"Umm, ~bye~… Mustachi," Cassie called before the unicorn rounded the corner. "~Padlock, come~."
Sitting at the table, Cassie started drawing out the idea she wanted to communicate. She had nearly finished it when Padlock cleared her throat. Looking up, Cassie saw the mare waving a couple pieces of paper over the center of the table, one green and one red. On the green one, Cassie saw images of foods they knew she could eat, her walking through the hallways, drawing, and a couple others. The red one was nearly the opposite, with food she could not eat, smashing a vase in a hallway, throwing ink bottles on the floor, and a couple others.
With Cassie's attention, Padlock laid the papers down, pushing the green one forward. She pointed to the first image at the top and said, "Gma." She repeated that for every picture on the page. Padlock then did the same thing for the red page, this time saying "Vy."
Cassie chewed on the information. She was still stuck on if it meant do, good, or yes, and don't, bad, or no. Suddenly, she smiled and moved to the other side of the room. "~Padlock, come… y-yes~?" she said, waving the mare over. Padlock's ear perked up as she jumped off the chair and trotted over with a smile. Cassie quickly moved back to the table, and spun around to face Padlock. "~Padlock, come… no~?" This time, Padlock stayed and only turned her head away, still smiling.
Waving the mare back over, Cassie sat down, scrunching her face up. She still had a dilemma. That narrowed it down by a word, but still not enough to get the exact meaning. Biting her lower lip, she grabbed a piece of paper from her stack, and with a shaky hand, she started drawing the gray unicorn she hated. The quill slipped upwards out of her grasp before she had finished. Cassie gave Padlock a weak smile as the mare set the quill back down on the table. Looking down at the crude drawing, Cassie pointed to it and said, "~No~?"
Padlock shook her head and answered, "Por. Por likju."
Cassie reached for the red page again, only to be intercepted by Padlock. "No, no, no," the mare said, pointing at random pictures, then back to the unicorn picture and saying, "Por," before wadding it up and tossing it towards the trashcan.
You know what, this is probably part of why there were so many conflicts on ancient Earth before there were translations for languages. People didn't know what the hell the others were saying and just said ‘to hell with it’.
Satisfied she now had two very useful words in her new vocabulary, Cassie moved on to what she really wanted to talk to Padlock about, for which the new words would come in quite handy.
The conversation did not go as well as Cassie would have liked, though she did learn the name of the slate gray unicorn. At one point, she stormed over to the wadded up drawing of the unicorn, and took it to the pony in the hall. She remained adamant, and eventually Padlock relented.
Though her request for the brown mare she'd named Cereal from earlier in the afternoon to come was denied, the white unicorn from outside her door she’d nicknamed Handbook had come. Cassie continued following Padlock across an open grass field in the waning sunlight, towards a door she had passed through yesterday morning, while Handbook followed.
The trip through the castle and the grassy area was much different this time. The din of life as ponies wandered the halls brought a smile to Cassie's face, reminding her of the spaceship before they’d started stasis. She’d noticed that for some reason the background noise didn’t match up with the visual references, as only guards and maids were seen, and they kept quiet. It continued out here in the field where groups of ponies were engaged in various activities, some with balls, others just lazing around, while some flew above. A chant to her side got her attention. Glancing over, she saw a sight eerily similar to a game played back at the academy. The edge of her lip ticked up a moment when she saw one pony run from one line to the other, only to get knocked on his back as he failed to break through. Her smirk faded upon looking toward the building up ahead, which closed in on her with each step.
That weird sensation flowed over her as she stepped into the lobby. Her eyes darted around to all the ponies present as she continued following Padlock to the door on the other side of the room. Fighting the urge to turn and run out of the dungeon, Cassie moved up behind Padlock, close enough that the mare's tail occasionally brushed her leg. It didn't help her nerves that a growing number of unicorn guards had lined up behind them. Distracted, Cassie ran into Padlock. Flailing her arms and staggering back, Cassie looked down at the mare, who had an apologetic smile.
Padlock held up the picture of Steel Shackle with a wing. "Cassie, yes?" Padlock asked clearly, slowly pointing at her own eye, and then to the page.
"~Yes~," Cassie responded with a nod.
Padlock walked the last couple feet to another door, and held it open for Cassie to walk through. Cassie began rethinking her plan. She had initially surprised Padlock with her sudden demand to come here. She wanted to see that the unicorn had actually been arrested, and that they were not trying to trick her about it. She was fairly confident they wouldn't have had time to set it up, as they’d left directly from her room while grabbing Handbook on the way out, and the route felt direct. Now, nearing her destination, she wasn't so sure it was a good idea.
Cassie fidgeted with a pleat on her dress, twisting it nervously between her fingers near the hip as she slowly walked through the door. Handbook soon trotted past her and stopped outside a cell not far down the hall. With every step closer, her pace slowed, and her breaths became shorter and faster.
A furry weight pressed lightly against Cassie's left leg for a brief moment, causing her to let out a high-pitched eep and flinch to the side. Cassie looked down at Padlock's smiling face. Hooking a strand of hair back behind her ear, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, holding it for a few seconds before releasing it and opening her eyes. Moving a half step to the side away from Padlock, she continued forward, closer to her normal pace.
A trio of unicorns rushed past her, taking positions up on both sides of the cell bars. Cassie looked nervously at them. Two of them—one on each side—had their horns glowing with that aura, the soft tinkling sound causing Cassie to tense up. After seeing the unicorns do more than just float things around, the aura had become an even bigger unknown. She didn't know if they all could use the anti-gravity aura, and then some had specialized skills like healing, or the bolts they shot her with during her capture, or if all of them could do it all.
Cassie stopped short of the cell, backed up a few paces, and bent down close to Padlock’s ear. "~Padlock, come yes." She then pointed to the three unknown unicorns outside the bars, and the pair behind them near the door. "~Bye, come no~."
Padlock shook her head, then looked up into Cassie's blue eyes while trying not to flinch away from the dead-looking right one, before finally closing her own gray eyes and nodding. She then trotted up to the guards at the cell, and after a short conversation, they cut the flow of magic to their horns and marched back out into the other hallway with the rest.
After being delayed a few minutes by Padlock for the arrival of another pony, Cassie finally made her way to the jail cell bars. A new normal pony stood opposite of Handbook, while Padlock sat on her haunches an arm’s length away on her left. Cassie’s whole body trembled looking at the slate gray unicorn, as he sat there with contempt written all over his face. She really wished she had a way to burn all his fur off.
"S-So i-it's true. You really are being punished. I just hope you don't have to go through what I went through. I hope they treat you better than you ever treated me," Cassie stated, knowing full well neither he nor the other ponies understood her. She felt a wing rest on her calf. Taking a deep breath she stood up straighter, narrowing her eyes at Steel Shackle with a twitch to her lip. "I hope that thing on your head makes it so you can never hurt anyone with your aura again! And if you ever, ever try to do anything to me again I will make you suffer! So fuck you, ~Steel Shackle~! Fuck you, ~bye~!" Cassie screamed, raising a balled fist at the stallion with her middle finger extended. She spat on the ground just outside his cell before turning and marching off to the door she came through, leaving Steel with a stunned expression on his face.
Passing into the previous hallway, Cassie's face split into a wide grin. She briskly continued through the jail, the route made easy by guards holding the doors to adjoining hallways open. Her mind played back everything she could think of since her capture, but it kept coming back to Steel Shackle. The look of contempt on his face didn't hide his anger, nor did it hide how he held himself, or the sleeplessness around his eyes. Cassie finally reached the lobby where she'd entered with Padlock and Handbook not too long ago.
Cassie looked out the open door at the last oranges fading from the sky as the smell of fresh-cut grass wafted in on a tiny breeze. She slumped against the wall, sliding down until her butt touched the floor, and held her head in her hands. Soft hiccups broke the silence of the room, and thin, glistening trails ran down her forearms. Hearing a flutter, she briefly looked up to see Padlock's hooves touch the ground. Cassie's arms shot forward, pulling the mare into a tight hug as she pressed her face into the soft fur of Padlock's neck, and felt Padlock's foreleg wrap around her shoulder. While she might not like all these ponies around her just yet, at least Padlock was not her enemy, and she decided to let go, at least for a short while.