The group had once again boarded the train, this time they had set their sights on the city of Las Pegasus. Everypony has once again found something to occupy themselves with for the long train ride. The majority of the group had taken the time to sleep, but pixel wordplay and and viola were still awake.
Wordplay had something on his mind that he decided to ask pixel about "hey pixel, who do think that anonymous pony might be?" Wordplay asked.
Pixel moved to face wordplay. The question had been in pixel's mind for a while "hmm... nothing has happened so far that really points toward anypony. There's only one pony I can think of that might have anything against me, but I don't think that he would do anything so drastic." Pixel said. Wordplay thought about it. It was more likely that this anonymous pony was somepony none of them knew.
Later on the train ride when everypony was awake and closer to las pegasus, pixel decided to go ahead and discuss their plans now because they had gotten lucky with a train car to themselves and there likely wasn't going to be a quiet place they could go to in las pegasus.
"Can everypony hear me?" Pixel asked, trying not to let her voice carry over into the other train cars. Pixel received her usual agreement "great then. Now our destination is a location that is a little far from the city of las pegasus, so when we arrive we'll go straight to the location this device has been sending to. Remember, we don't know what to expect when we get there, there could be an old shack, there could be a mansion, or there could be nothing, but we must be careful when we get there." Pixel explained "does anypony have any questions?" Pixel asked.
Nopony raised their hoofs this time "alright then. When we arrive I would like to get through the city as quickly as possible if nopony has a problem with that." Pixel suggested. Everypony agreed with pixel on that.
Much time passed the train eventually reached the city. They all stepped out and stood in awe at the scenery "let's not stand around and gaze, let's gat moving." Pixel said. Everypony quickly moved to catch up to pixel. After some time of walking, wordplay accidentally showed a reason why pixel wanted to move through the city quickly.
Wordplay was walking along with the group, gazing into the windows of the buildings they passed by when wordplay suddenly felt himself collide with a stallion that had been walking in the opposite direction.
"Hey what's the problem buddy?" He asked, clearly holding back some anger.
"Oh, sorry sir, I wasn't looking where I was going." Wordplay apologized.
"You're dang right you weren't looking where you were going!" The stallion shouted. The stallions friend decided to step in.
"Hey, calm down dude, he said he was sorry." His friend said.
Pixel decided to also step in "we don't want any problems sir. My friend apologized so kindly leave him alone." Pixel demanded. The stallion looked to pixel, then to wordplay, before he gave a huff of air and walked away with his friend.
"Let's move on shall we?" Pixel said. The group continued through las pegasus' streets, this time without any incidents. After much time of navigating the city streets the group finally found the edge of the city.
Everypony looked toward pixel "this is the direction that the device is sending in... but I don't see anything..." Pixel said.
Wordplay recalled a detail pixel had mentioned earlier "didn't you say it was a little far? Maybe a hill or something like that is just hiding it." Wordplay said.
Pixel took this into consideration "that's excellent thinking wordplay. Let's all get moving." Pixel said. The group transitioned from walking on the hard sidewalks of las pegasus to the soft grass of the fields around it. After a few minutes of walking the group came to the top of a hill, and like wordplay had thought, the group all noticed something down at the bottom of the hill.
"What do you guys think it is?" Azura asked. Azura was as clueless as her friends as to what the structure was, but they all knew one thing about it.
"We need to go down there." Pixel stated.
The group immediately started down toward the intriguing structure. From what they could see it was completely grey and seemed to be some sort of entrance to an underground room of some sort. The group wasted no time in moving to the front of the structure. For a moment they all just stared at each other and the entrance to whatever the rest of the structure held.
Viridian decided to speak up "are we all just going to stare at this place or are we gonna find a way to get inside?" Viridian asked them all. After that they all started examining the two large doors that lead inside, locked of course.
"Does anypony have any ideas for how to get inside?" Wordplay asked.
Nova was the first to answer "maybe we could just break in the doors in?" Nova suggested.
"That may be possible, but I would much rather not have anypony hurting themselves." Pixel said.
Buffy suddenly popped up from on top the structure "no need, I think I unlocked it." Buffy shouted to the group.
Wordplay walked over to the doors, and sure enough, the doors slid open when wordplay pushed on them "what did you do?" Wordplay asked.
"There was a switch hidden in the dirt up here." Buffy replied while running back down to be with the group again.
Wordplay gazed into what the doors revealed. All he could see was a dark hallway that eventually led to three other hallways that were properly lit.
"That's not sketchy at all." Azura said sarcastically.
The group did the only thing they could think of and proceeded down the hallway until they came into the intersection "should we split up?" Viridian asked while walking into the left hall, nova following her in.
"That has it's advantages and disadvantages. I'm not sure we should do that." Pixel said, stepping it into the middle hallway with azura and wordplay behind her.
"We could cover ground faster if we split up." Buffy said, poking her head into the right hallway.
"Splitting up the group in any situation is taking a risk." Viola said, following buffy.
Suddenly the whole group heard something that sounded like static. Pixel then noticed that there were speakers built into the ceiling that nopony had noticed before. Then everypony heard a slightly distorted voice but they could all still tell it was a mares voice.
"Then why don't I decide that for you?" Everypony heard before they all heard a distinct CLANG of metal slamming into metal. Everypony turned to see that metal gates had shut in everypony's way, cutting them off from each other.
"Hey! What the heck? Open these gates!" Azura yelled, trying to pry the gate next to her open. Pixel tried aiding in this, but her magic aura seems to fizzle out.
"Wha- what?" Pixel said, confused as to her sudden lack of magical strength.
"Magic inhibitors, ever heard of them?" The mare over the speakers said.
"I guess that rules out teleporting too." Nova said.
At this point the group was beginning to panic, pixel decided to speak up "don't worry everypony, let's just try and regroup." Pixel said.
"Oh how cute, you always were one to be desperate pixel." The mare over the speakers said.
"And try and find this anonymous pony. I have no doubt that this is them." Pixel added.
The separated group quickly bolted down the hallways they had been trapped in. Wordplay was running alongside pixel with azura running ahead of them.
"Come on guys, we need to find the others." Azura shouted.
"Running ahead of us isn't a good idea in these circumstances." Wordplay shouted in response. Right when wordplay finished his sentence another gate slammed between azura and wordplay "I told you." Wordplay said.
"Whatever, just find some other way." Azura said, hiding the annoyance in her voice. Wordplay and pixel backtracked and found another path to continue on. The entire array of hallways was like a maze to everypony. It was probably designed like that wordplay thought.
Wordplay and pixel were running down another path that had a left turn in it. Wordplay ran through the turn, only to slam into a gate that suddenly shut in front on him "ow!" Wordplay shouted, slightly disoriented.
"Are you okay wordplay?" Pixel asked, concerned.
"Yeah, I'm ok pixel. Let's just... find a different path." Wordplay said. When wordplay looked back down the path they had come from, wordplay watched another gate slam in the path "or not." Wordplay added.
"Hmm... what should we do now?" Pixel asked.
"Oh? Has the great pixel wavelength run out of ideas? I didn't think that was possible for somepony like you." The anonymous mare said in a mocking tone. Pixel was getting annoyed at this pony.
Just then pixel saw viola run down the path that the gate in front of them had blocked "viola! Where's buffy?" Pixel asked as viola approached the gate.
"Buffy got stuck between two gates, is that what's happened to you?" Viola asked.
"Yes, let's try and open this." Pixel said. All three ponies started trying to pry the gate open.
"Don't any of you know when to quit? You're wasting you're time!" The anonymous mare yelled from wherever she was. Wordplay noticed something else in their voice this time, worry.
"Getting scared up there?" Wordplay taunted. Wordplay could hear the mare shuffle behind their microphone.
"Wha- what are you talking about? I'm fine here!" The mare said shakily. Wordplay could tell they were definitely worried.
"We're close to you aren't we?" Wordplay taunted. After that the three could here what sounded like the mare start scrambling over whatever they were doing before seeking to run off.
Wordplay smirked "alright everypony pull on this thing with everything you've got." Wordplay encouraged. The three pulled on the two sections of the gate with everything they had, eventually opening a gap wide enough that allowed wordplay to slip through, but the gate slammed shut again before pixel could move through "don't worry pixel, we'll get you through." Wordplay said.
Pixel pushed wordplay away "no, you two go ahead, stop that pony and come for me later." Pixel told them. Wordplay hesitated before viola pulled him away.
"Just do what pixel asked you to and let's go." Viola said sternly. Wordplay complied and ran down the hall with viola. The two continued down another path that viola had passed earlier before finding a single door that they ran through without hesitation.
Inside they found a large monitor on the right that had a large loading bar at fifty three percent on it, and several small monitors on the left, presumably cameras. Wordplay looked at the title for what was being uploaded. It had a crazy name but wordplay had a feeling it was more of the virus being uploaded to celestia knows where.
"Uh... what do we do? How do we stop this upload?" Wordplay shouted. There wasn't any visible way to cancel the upload.
BAM!
Wordplay looked over to where the noise had come from to see that viola had smashed her hoof into the main part of the computer "that works." Wordplay said.
Wordplay looked over to the smaller monitors. They were still working, he could even see viridian in one "let's get everypony together." Wordplay said.