The Pony With a Plan
We left town on the western road with the unconscious, but still fully armoured, Flash Sentry laid out dumbly across our backs. It wasn’t pleasant for either of us; Flash’s tongue was lolling out over my shoulder and drooling spit on my coat while Colgate had to deal with Flash’s tail end.
Neither of us wanted the other to suffer, but while I did my best to take as much of Flash’s weight as possible, Colgate tried to outdo me. The end result was us competing to share more of the load either by stretching ourselves taller to the point where we were almost walking on the tips of our hooves, or one of us dropping down to tire out the other. If Flash had been awake we’d have quickly made him seasick with all the rocking back and forth he was getting.
“I can just carry him with my magic, you know,” Colgate offered while rolling her eyes in the direction of her horn a few times.
“You used a fair bit of it doing the slow motion replay of that fight,” I replied. “Let’s not give you a magic migraine from carrying him.” I gave Flash a bump up for good measure.
“He’s not that heavy,” Colgate countered. “And I’m less likely to drop him.”
As much as I loved carrying Hurry-Up-and-Wait, there was no real way to convince Colgate otherwise so I said, “Take him then.” A humming sound filled the air as the blue glow lifted Flash off our backs and into the air in front of us. The guard had a distinct ragdoll-ish quality to how he hung in the air, but stabilised as Colgate switched her hold around to have him hovering along in the air in front of her while facing forward.
Colgate gave me a smile. “See? Not that hard,” she said, flapping Flash’s wings.
“Now you’re just showing off,” I replied grouchily. Colgate just stuck her tongue out at me before accelerating into a graceful canter. I rolled my eyes and kept pace with her, skipping the additional hip swaying and tail tossing she was doing.
Colgate was still too busy showing off the superiority of the unicorn tribe a few minutes later when one of my ears twitched. I rotated my ears around, trying to pick up the sound again. A moment later I thought I heard a voice on the wind. “Do you hear that?” I asked.
“Hear what?” Colgate said as she turned her head toward me, the hum coming from her horn subtly changing as she reoriented her magic. We looked around, then having seen nothing in sight, I looked up.
Above us somepony green was swooping out of the sky, with his wings constantly flapping to slow down. The pegasus landed directly in front of us, still flapping hard enough to kick up wind and dirt into our faces. The reason for the sandblasting we got was explained by the full-size saddle the pegasus wore. The saddle wasn’t a decorative accessory but one with the heavy strapping needed to safely carry somepony without wings.
A ripping of Velcro heralded the passenger as he stepped down onto the ground. With a few cracks from his old joints, Mayor Sod Turner grinned at us. Nodding at his pilot Sod said, “Thanks, Ollie, you can sleep in tomorrow, I won’t need picking up.” The pegasus grinned, opened his wings and took off again straight up into the air.
Finally turning to us, the first thing Dad asked me was, “What happened to the cloud lover?” while nodding to where Flash still hovered in Colgate’s magic.
“Picked a fight with the Black Knight,” I answered and nothing more needed to be said.
“Oh, brilliant idea there,” Dad said as he rolled his eyes, with a slight curling of his upper lip heralding a potential rant if somepony didn’t head him off. “What kind of stupid, featherbrained training does—”
I coughed loudly. “Dad,” I chastised while nodding toward Colgate.
“Oh, hello, Miss Colgate,” Sod said courteously with a slight inclination of his head, “it’s nice to see you again.”
“Nice to see you again as well, Mayor,” Colgate replied with another nod.
Dad nodded back again before turning his attention back to me. “Time, have you found anything out about Page yet?” The old Sod didn’t look worried, but the fact he was even asking about my little sister was telling.
“The Knight said he was protecting her,” I replied. “So I think she’s still in the theatre.” I looked around for a moment before saying, “I’m planning on finding out about it for sure tonight, but...” I looked toward Colgate.
“We have a problem there,” Colgate said before bringing her Raggedy Flash puppet around to her face, deftly opening Flash’s eyes and looking in. “I don’t think Flash is going to wake up for a while,” she said before diagnosing him, “He’s got a pretty bad concussion.”
Giving the limp guard a sympathetic look, I asked Dad, “We were hoping you and Mum could look after him for a while.”
Dad snorted. “I don’t know if I’d be any help, but Honey won’t mind since you’re finally coming home. Come on,” he said while turning back down the path, “dinner will be nearly ready.”
Colgate and I followed, with Flash still between us, as Dad led us on. The scenery around here was still somewhat familiar to me, with the little cobblestone walls dividing fields of grass and rows of trees cunningly placed to act as windbreaks. Though I couldn’t help but feel that the sight was still somewhat different from what I remembered.
“So, Dad,” I opened saying, “why were you using that pegasus as a mount?” Colgate snorted loudly and nearly dropped Flash. I gave Colgate a curious glance while the old Sod didn’t seem to notice.
“Because I wanted to join the mile high club,” Sod said out loud without looking back and Colgate giggled a little. “He’s still young enough to get me up,” he added neutrally. “And he’s fine with having somepony strapped on to him,” this time he had a little more edge to his voice while Colgate was giggling a little louder. “He’s always hanging out at the office, and he has enough stamina to go the distance.” The giggling still hadn’t stopped.
Dad stopped to bring a hoof to his face. “Time, are you sure Miss Giggle Fits here is still a virgin? Because she’s definitely got a filthy mind,” he finished while shooting her a scowl.
Colgate’s humour slowly dissipated into a purplish blush on her cheeks.
“She wasn’t making the jokes,” I countered. “Anyway,” I continued with a sly look on my face, “why did you pick a saddle and not a chariot?”
Dad’s eyes narrowed at me. “Chariots are expensive, and Ollie already had the saddle.”
“Really?” I said while tilting my head to the left. “I wonder why he had one; it’s not something pegasi generally have lying around.” A smile crept across my face. “Well, not most pegasi.” One notable exception crossed my mind, although she’d never used a saddle with me.
Dad scowled as he turned to walk away, and said over his shoulder, “I’ll buy a bloody chariot then. Not like I can’t afford it.”
We fell back into following my father, climbing up a short rise that looked down on the family farm. As we crested the hill I took in the sight: a windmill spinning in the distance behind the farmhouse, a cobbled together limestone barn that had been expanded and renovated during its long history. The newest addition was a small orchard of fruit trees and flowers beside the house in the patch of ground normally reserved for a farming family’s personal food crop. Surrounding all this was fields of green grass, a sight that didn’t sit well with my memory of home.
“Dad,” I asked, “what happened to all the wheat?” My family had been wheat farmers since the land had been bought generations ago. The land had always been too good to waste on growing grass to make hay when it could handle better crops.
“Canterlot stopped buying,” Dad grumbled. “The toffs got their hooves on some study that said baked goods made them fat and so trend went against us.” Dad looked over his shoulder toward Canterlot, just visible over the valley wall, and scowled. “All the bakeries started going under once the sycophant sortie started.”
Colgate gasped. “Did Pony Joe’s doughnut shop close?”
Wait, what? My mental process tripped over itself and tumbled to a halt. Colgate’s wide eyed expression conflicted with everything I thought knew about her. I blinked a few times before asking, “You, a dentist, like a doughnut shop?”
Colgate smiled sheepishly. “Mostly for the coffee,” she admitted. “It was cheapest in Canterlot, and as black as a space-time singularity.” Scratching her neck she finished, “I wouldn’t have been able to get through my last years at Celestia’s school without it.”
“Just coffee?” I asked seriously.
“And his cinnamon scrolls,” she added weakly.
“A dentist, how interesting,” Sod mused while giving me a curious glance. Once he’d finished, he gave Colgate a sympathetic look and said, “Don’t worry about Pony Joe, he’s still in business. You can thank the Royal Guard for that,” he finished with a chuckle.
“As I was about to say,” Dad resumed, “without the specialist bakeries, we couldn’t keep up with the larger flour producers and we started bleeding financially. But,” he continued with a self-congratulatory note, “I wasn’t going to follow so many other failed farms into denial-fuelled oblivion. No, I changed my crop to something better.”
Colgate gave me a worried look, and I could do was shrug my shoulder resignedly. It was too late to stop it, and the best course now was just to keep quiet and follow Dad on his walking rant.
“Those pointy twats up in Canterlot have one problem they’ve never been able to solve without hiring an earth pony: lawn maintenance.” Dad continued while ignoring the unimpressed look from Colgate, “Soil’s shallow up on a mountain, and most unicorns couldn’t keep a potted plant alive, let alone the management needed to grow a good lawn. So I grow it for them,” Dad said as he stopped to sweep his legs out and majestically gesture to the surrounding fields. “The green grass of the Old Valley: grown on rich soil and good enough to eat. We cut it up along with the dirt, roll it up with some ice, send it up on a train, and lay it down in just a few hours. Then we bring the dirt we dug up from Canterlot down here, restore it, and grow the next lawn.”
Dad then turned back and gave me a broad smile and finished by saying, “Thirty-eight percent of the grass in Canterlot today was grown right here in these fields.”
My eyebrows rose on their own, I was genuinely impressed. Colgate was more sceptical, asking, “What about the Royal Gardens?”
“That’s around fifty or so percent of Canterlot’s greenery,” Dad replied while rocking on his hooves. “We haven’t got that contract yet.”
“Hmm,” I began, “I suppose that’s how you were able to afford to run for mayor.”
Dad scoffed, saying, “It wasn’t even hard.” Then he started striding off toward the farmhouse while going on about ‘weak willed politicians’.
“Do you like it?” I asked while gesturing toward the white limestone cottage. The slightly worn rounded block shape of its architecture probably appealed to somepony of Colgate’s profession.
“It looks like a molar from the rear quarter,” Colgate responded as she tilted her head before adding, “on the right side.”
“Come on,” I said as I started forward. “It’s time for a check-up.” Walking through the front garden we passed several flower beds, many with bees hovering over them. Beyond the heavy front door of the farmhouse was a hallway of cold stone floors covered by rugs, white walls, and a ceiling of floorboards resting across huge wooden beams that ran across the hallway and into the next room.
Dad walked in toward the kitchen calling out, “Honey, I’m home, and we’ve got guests!”
Colgate looked around with a sort of distant, pensive look on her face while I flipped my hat onto a hook by the door. “There are a lot of pictures,” Colgate said as she nodded with her horn down the white entry hallway. The walls were speckled with hanging images both painted and photographic. Most of the pictures showed ponies in various periods of their lives, often in front of new buildings, farm equipment, and other such things.
“History,” I replied as I eyed a few of them myself. “The house has been here a long time, and the visual records of both the town and farm are hanging here. You’d have to check the inscriptions to know what’s being shown.” Giving Colgate a frown I admitted, “I can’t even name a quarter of these ponies.”
Colgate nodded and added, “My family has something similar, in the lobby of our private mausoleum.” A grimace crossed her face. “I always hated visiting that place, knowing it was waiting for me.”
“A self-fulfilling prophecy,” I responded darkly and Colgate nodded glumly in return. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was still there given Colgate’s past, and what other family ‘bonuses’ she’d once had.
The conversation in the kitchen was interrupted by a happy gasp and the sudden appearance of an old mare in the kitchen doorway. The black in her large-bun styled mane hadn’t faded while the brown had turned to grey, but the deep gold of her coat hadn’t changed at all. She brightened as Colgate and I looked back. “It’s been such a long…” she said, as she lurched toward me. A moment later and my mother had me in a hug while Colgate and Dad watched.
Long seconds later we broke apart and Mum looked up and down me, presumably marking every little difference she saw. “I still have every postcard you sent home,” Mum told me with a tinge of relief in her voice, “and I want to hear all about your travels.”
A brief hint of a smile crossed my features. “I haven’t really done much traveling the last couple of years. The rolling stone is starting to grow some moss,” I said resignedly.
Mum returned the smile I gave her. “Finally settling down? So then this would be…” she trailed off as she looked over my shoulder at Colgate.
“Ah,” I said with realisation, before stepping backward to do introductions. “Mum, this is Minuette,” I pointed out, “my latest traveling partner, and she’s carrying,” I pointed up at Flash, “Sergeant Flash Sentry, our unconscious escort.”
“Hello,” Colgate greeted my Mum with a wave after the introduction.
“Hello,” Mum said back before asking, “what happened to your guard?”
“He tried to get past the Black Knight when we went to find Page,” I replied by way of explanation. Mum’s ears shot up straight at mention of my younger sister. “And, Minuette,” I continued with introductions, “This is my mother Honey Mead; you can guess how she won Dad’s affection.”
“She’s able to survive his rants?” Colgate quipped and earned a warning hum from Sod.
“Wait a minute,” my Mum interrupted. “Time, you’re looking for Page? Did something happen?”
Dad stepped forward to talk to Mum. “Honey, Time’s been asked to find Page because somepony reported her missing.”
Mum blinked. “I thought Page was on tour with the Trottingham Company in Manehatten,” she said with a worried tone starting to rise in her voice.
“We asked the Black Knight,” Colgate spoke up. “He’s indicated that your daughter’s actually at the theatre, but he won’t let anypony in to confirm it.”
“And nopony,” I added with a nod up at Flash, “gets past him.” A few glances went up toward the armoured and unconscious guard who still hovered magically in the air.
“Unless you’re with the main character in the play,” Dad added off hoof.
“I can’t say I’m that,” I said while rolling my eyes. “But I’m hoping there’s another way into the theatre.”
“Aye?” Dad asked with interest.
“Remember the civil war nine-hundred years back,” I said while pointing a hoof at him and with an uplifting tone asked, “How did neutral Trottingham survive the griffon raiders while both sides of the conflict were busy?”
Dad’s eyebrows went up as he worked it out. “They hid in the caves beneath the Horseshoe Theatre and brought it down behind them.” He scratched his chin in thought. “But it was dug up again when the town was rebuilt...”
“So,” Colgate said to me, “You want to find a way in through the caves.”
“Yep,” I confirmed. “But we’ll need one of the surveyor maps that all the farmers used to have of the caves to find a way in.” I gave Dad a smile and said, “Do you have one around here somewhere?”
“I’ll go check the office,” Dad said as he turned to leave.
“Time, you shouldn’t go down there. The caverns are dangerous,” Mum said worriedly. “Most of them are flooded, and who knows what could be living in the rest.”
“Honey,” Dad said as he turned back to put a hoof on Mum’s shoulder. “Last time there was a monster in the caverns was that lamia a decade and a half ago.”
Mum huffed, “Yet every foal that goes down there on some silly dare says they see some monster or another.”
“Was it the snake-pony type of lamia or the pony-made-of-beetles type of lamia?” The out of place question threw the discussion out of the saddle for a moment as we all turned to look at Colgate.
“It’s kind of important to know,” Colgate said matter-of-fact. “There are whole subtypes of beauty cursed monsters that go under that name, and they all need to be tackled differently.”
“What?” I asked.
“Some of them use illusion traps, or spit poison,” Colgate explained, “So I need to know what to ward against.”
“And I thought you were just a dentist,” Dad asked while giving Colgate a respecting look.
“She was training to be a magus,” I explained with a half sigh.
Colgate nodded. “We had a whole subject at Celestia’s School for using magic against monsters; the Monster Manual was our primary text.”
Mum blinked and sounding somewhat horrified she said, “They teach fillies and colts how to fight monsters at school?”
“Why not?” I said with a shrug. “It makes sure that there are ponies that know how to deal with them out among everypony else, and when it’s needed they can help make sure it’s done properly.” Frowning I added, “And if a few students show high potential, then they’re probably worth the extra training to go professional.”
Colgate nodded. “They offered me a spot in an extra credit class. Twilight took it, so I did too.”
Dad hummed. “Clearly the filly’s a keeper, Time.” Turning around he added, “I’ll just go get the maps, back in a minute.” He turned a corner and left Mum with Colgate and me.
An awkward moment passed before my mother asked. “So, Minuette, what sort of extra credit classes were you given? Some form of combat magic?”
It took a moment for Colgate to respond, saying, “We weren’t really taught combat magic per say, beyond just gathering mana and releasing it toward something. We mostly learnt how to use our existing talents and spells in self-defence.” She slumped slightly before admitting, “I didn’t do too well in those classes, because I didn’t have a specific talent in magic or pyromancy to work with. But I beat most everypony else in puzzling my way out of problems.”
“Twilight still beat you in that?” I asked off hoof.
Colgate’s mouth took on a small smile. “In magic yes, though she always had trouble finding the right spell to use from her huge library, and while she stalled I’d use one of my favourites.”
I gave Colgate a knowing look and asked, “How much longer did it take her?”
“Long enough,” she replied innocently.
There was a creak from deeper in the house, followed by the final slam of a door shutting. Colgate and I turned to look down the hallway, Mum sighed quietly to herself before saying quietly, “She’s finished already?” to herself.
A frustrated voice echoed down the corridor, saying, “We ran out of grain again.” A door slammed. “The Flower Power twins came up short again, and now they want to—” The tirade stopped as the new arrival stepped into the corridor in front of us. She sighed dramatically and announced, “Now my idiot brother’s returned. Fantastic.”
“Hello, Mill,” I said warmly. “It’s good to see you, too.”
Through Mill’s drooping eyelids I saw her look at me, then at Colgate, up at the hovering tin can, and then back to me. “Okay,” she said gratingly, “I assume there’s some sort of joke here, or are you trying to hide a body?”
Beside me Colgate grimaced, her ears pinned back against her mane. “A body?” she asked. “Why would you think he’s dead? He’s just…” Colgate hung on the description for a moment.
“Sleeping off a concussion,” I added helpfully.
“You’re letting him sleep it off?” she accused me, before pointing at Flash and continuing with, “Look at how his tongue’s lolling out.” Sure enough Flash’s tongue was hanging out the side of his mouth with a dollop of greenish mucus hanging comically from the end of it.
“Oh,” Colgate gasped. “I haven’t been paying attention.” Flash’s mouth quickly returned to normal.
A loud groan came from Mill. “Has he woken up or done anything since he was knocked out?” When neither Colgate nor I responded to her, Mill stepped forward and pointed through the lounge arch. “He’s probably slipped into a coma then. Put him on the sofa and I’ll look after him.”
Colgate reluctantly obeyed, following Mill into the lounge with Flash as my older sister complained under her breath.
Looking over at my mother I asked, “What’s wrong with Mill?”
Mum gave me an apologetic smile. “She took over the mill and most of the farm after your father became mayor. She’s been having a lot of trouble finding customers for the mill.”
I briefly checked Mill wasn’t in earshot before quietly saying, “Sounds like she’s on the edge of cracking.”
Mum gave me a slow nod. “We’ve been worried about that too.”
“I’ve seen it before back in Ponyville, my friend’s sister Applejack—”
Before I could finish the warning, my father returned and tossed me the map he’d been holding in his mouth; naturally I’d been forced to catch it in mine. “That’s the latest, and I got old ones going back for centuries.” Dad nodded at the tubes hanging out at satchel on his shoulder. “Bring your marefriend. Some of these are going to need the magic touch.” Dad turned to go into the kitchen.
I peeked into the lounge room arch where Colgate was taking off Flash’s armour at the direction of my sister. After putting my map tube onto the ground, I called in, “Minuette, we’re going to need your help with the maps.”
“Be there in a moment,” she called back while keeping her focus on opening the tin can. After picking up the map again, I followed my father down the hallway and around the corner into the combined kitchen and dining area.
The kitchen area can only be described by looking deep into a thesaurus and pulling out the word ‘anachronistic’ – a favourite of mine. During the very long history of the house after its conversion from the ruins of a cobblestone barn centuries ago, the kitchen has undergone at least a dozen renovations. Some features are from previous incarnations, others are new, and in a few cases a feature has returned from multiple generations of absence. The end result is a composite where despite the countertops being replaced in every renovation, the kitchen still has a sense of age in which an old wood-fired oven can stand next to a modern stove and seem like a reasonable idea.
Yet despite the repeated renovations, every recent generation of owner has expressed disappointment in the lack of an automagic dishwasher.
Dad flipped his carry bag of poster tubes onto the old solid mahogany table, and then growling as one of the tubes rolled off the other side of the table. The tube rolled toward the other entrance to the kitchen where Colgate picked it up as she came in after helping to lay out Flash properly.
With more care, I put my tube down on my side of the table before saying, “I knew you had a map, Dad, but I didn’t think you’d have a half dozen.”
Dad grunted. “Surprised me too to find them all up in the attic. We must have every edition since the first survey.” A mild look of surprise crossed his face has he read out the date off one tube, “This one’s four-hundred years old.”
I checked mine and replied, “This one’s just a decade old.”
Dad looked over at it. “They did that one after removing the last monster to call the caves home.”
Colgate took a pair into her magic and looked closely at hers. She recoiled briefly and read out, “The ‘True and Complet Map of The Moste Faschinating and Gllittering Caverns under Trotting-in-the-Vale’. This is absolutely ancient.” The magic around Colgate’s horn intensified and she closed her eyes in concentration.
“Something wrong, Minuette?” I asked curiously.
“I’m trying to remember the archival spells I learnt back in school,” she replied with her eyes still closed. “As old as some of these are, they need protection or they’ll fall apart.”
Dad stopped trying to open his four hundred year old tube. “You might want to do this one too when you have a moment.”
“While you’re busy with the older ones, I’ll open this,” I said before putting the tube between my fore-hooves and using my teeth to pull the tab on the cap. It opened with a satisfying pop and I tipped the map out onto the table.
Dad came around and we poured over the map. It showed a huge system of caverns and connections, most prominently those around the underground river that had been slowly carved out as it ran through the centre of the valley.
Dad pointed to a mark over one of the tributary streams. “This is the well out back of our house. It drops the bucket right into the water.”
“Doesn’t sound like a safe entrance then,” I murmured as I searched around for indication of where the theatre was located. Tapping the top of the map, I added, “Assuming this is north, this should be where the town is.” I tapped another area to the east that where all the caverns around the town were marked as ‘historical’. None of the historical caves were very detailed.
“Nopony’s allowed in that section anymore,” Dad explained. “After a cave-in shook the town awake a few decades back, the Royal Geological Society slapped a no-go on those caves. Some rubbish about how the weight of the town could collapse it at any time.”
Colgate looked up from her map collection. “Is it even safe for us to go down there then?”
Dad snorted. “The river moved away from there millennia ago, and most of the remaining rock is flint. If it was going to collapse, it would have already.”
“We’ll be extra careful then,” I said as I started to roll the newest map up. “Colgate, how are those maps going?”
“The oldest one is ready,” she said as she floated the ancient tube over. Ancient enough, as it turned out, for the pull rope that opened it to have rotted away entirely. Thankfully Colgate easily managed to open it for us when we pointed this out to her.
Insisting on only using her magic to hold it, Colgate then brought the map out and unfurled it. All three of our jaws dropped as we saw it. The map was incredibly detailed, with notes appended to every section and markings noting out differences in distances where a map scale had been made useless.
Colgate focused on a series of notes in the top right corner, reading out, “Water Ball and Moon Mystery present their life’s explorations of the Caverns of Trotting-in-the-Vale”.
I nodded, with an impressed hum. “Somepony definitely got a cutie mark doing this.”
“Or turned into a seapony if some of this is to be believed,” Dad noted while pointing to the section where the underground river ran. “These sections are marked as being entirely underwater. Time,” he asked, “check these against that map of yours; I don’t think half of these branches are on that one.”
I sighed and unrolled the newer map again. Sure enough, the newer map finished in the flooded section with a ‘Tunnel Flooded’ and said nothing more. Dad found this relatively amusing and continued spouting about the differences in detail. While he amused himself and continued complaining about the decline of the responsible government institutions, Colgate and I continued searching for our route.
My mother and sister walked in once or twice. Mum made sure a pot of tea and scones were available on a kitchen bench away from the maps, while my sister was slowly collecting bedding materials to make the unconscious Flash Sentry the guard of his very own pillow fort.
After running some comparisons with the current town map, we managed to locate a small grotto of dry caves beneath the Horseshoe Theatre. One of the ancient map’s authors had made a note here stating, ‘Here voices taketh a ghastly note, echoing with sounds of a battle thrice fought ‘gainst reivers seeking meat for the fires above and finding none.’
Colgate pointed at the passage and meekly asked, “Do you think griffons actually…” she said before trailing off on the difficult thought.
“They did,” I replied directly, “and might still do. Every time I’ve met a griffon from the actual Griffon Kingdoms I’ve always had the nagging feeling that I should be galloping in the other direction.”
Colgate winced and her ears flattened, and my dear father decided to add in wryly, “At least you know the Griffonians are out to get you, it’s much harder to guess why a Westmarch Griffon is staring at your flank.”
Colgate’s expression went from one side of disgust to the other while collecting an extra two-hundred bits as it passed ‘Go’. After a brief pause she spoke up, with an acidic hint to her breath to say, “Let’s please just find a way down there.” My Dad grinned through his stained and worn teeth.
Working our way out from the grotto on the map we found a few entrances marked, however none of the nearby entrances appeared on recent maps. Further out, there were a few wells, which were immediately dismissed because they opened directly into flooded areas. The best option we could find was an open pit halfway out of town that was marked on the ancient map with the words, “Undone by fire and hubris, an excellent entrance created in attempt to remove a destructive varmint.” The pit had afterwards become the destination of a long line of dares and wagers between ‘scaredy’ fillies and ‘brave’ colts. A certain Siren once encouraged me to go in there myself many years ago, the first of many such requests I’d received over the years.
“Here,” I said while tapping the entrance on the map.
Colgate looked at it and then checked against the more modern map and after a moment read out, “The path to the grotto from there is marked: ‘Dangerous. Passage unstable, do not enter’.”
“They all are,” I replied. “It just means the surveyors didn’t want to go under the town.”
Dad nodded and added, “That entrance is also where half of the town’s monster reports come from. It would have been filled in decades ago if the Theatre hadn’t been so dead set against it.”
Colgate and I glanced at each other. “Well that’s interesting…” I opined aloud.
“Do they have a reason?” Colgate asked.
“They like the breeze through it, or something,” Dad replied. “I never really cared.”
After mulling it over for a moment I said, “I bet they smuggle stuff through there.”
Colgate hummed. “I was going to say that some of them probably use it to sneak out at night. Senior students at my school did it all the time.”
“There’s got to be a way in through there then,” I added before asking, “Dad, do we have any caving gear?”
It turned out that we didn’t have any caving gear, at least not in the easily accessible parts of the attic storage pile. Dad managed to find a long length of rope hanging from an old nail, though, and that basically covered everything I thought we’d need.
Colgate on the other hoof, being more safety inclined than me, stated that helmets were a requirement for this sort of expedition. Unfortunately, Dad didn’t have any hard hats with torch mounts around, so we were forced to go with some filly sized helmets for roller-skaters. I found myself stuck with an ancient Wonderbolt emblazoned helmet that didn’t fit properly even with its straps run out to full length. Colgate found something in a more suitable blue, but it wasn’t fitted for a unicorn and Colgate was forced to wear it pushed back to get it around her horn.
“I fwll rdkluss,” I grumbled through my immobilized jaw, shortly before a blue glow seized the buckle beneath my chin and snapped it open. Suddenly free of the brain squeezer I gasped and sucked in the precious cool night air.
Clearly not appreciating my dramatics, Colgate magically slapped my helmet forward saying, “Stop acting so foalish.”
Chuckling, I replied, “Blame the helmet then, it’s taking me back to when I was eight.” I tipped the helmet forward off my nose and onto a hoof to see it in the moonlight. “Never really was a fan of the Wonderbolts,” I said as I looked at the picture of a long retired captain only somepony obsessive like Rainbow Dash could name. “But it seemed cool enough to impress somepony.”
“Like who?” Asked Colgate from just in front of me, her tone only interested in keeping a conversation going as we walked down another unoccupied road between farms bordered with dry fieldstone walls.
“A pegasus, I assumed she’d be impressed with Wonderbolts merchandise.” I rolled my eyes at my own youthful naivety. “Turned out she’d never seen a show or really heard about them.”
We walked for a few more minutes in silence since Colgate hadn’t given me a response, until she finally asked, “Was it Siren?”
“Good guess,” I congratulated. “How’d you come to that one?”
I caught a flash of white that might have been Colgate’s teeth. “You told me back in the drunk tank you had a crush on her. Since you did something goofy it had to be her. ” Her smile disappeared. “Didn’t know she was a pegasus though, that part was a guess.”
“Forgot I told you that one,” I admitted. Rolling that though around in my mind for a moment I muttered, “That was a long time ago.”
“What, last week?”
“Well, that depends entirely on your point of view.”
A few more laneways with progressively less roadworthiness and some vague attempts at background penetrating questions from Colgate brought us to the entrance to the caverns beneath. The entrance wasn’t a fissure or deep sinkhole, more a dugout ramp to turn a hole down into the ground into a primitive well that ponies simply walked down into to reach water. Naturally said primitive times were also back before harmony, friendship, and armoured guards had removed many of the predators from Equestria. Inevitably, more than a few ponies going into the many water holes around here didn’t return – leading to the charming name of ‘murder hole’ which is still used in modern versions of Spear Shaker’s plays.
Naturally neither of us was keen on the idea of vanishing; Colgate turned to look at me quietly for reassurance and I nodded back towards the mark on my flank. Seeming slightly reassured, Colgate gathered herself, lit her horn, and projected her soft blue light down into the cavern. No lamias, diamond dogs, or more monstrous things jumped out at us. Straightening my helmet, I stepped down into the darkness below.
A few lengths down the ramp started to flatten out with a few bumps where water had once pooled ages ago. Stuck without any light, I tapped a hoof against the ground to listen to the sound of shoe against rock, the resulting echo bounced around the cave and gave me the feeling that we’d entered a reasonably sized chamber.
A moment later a light blue beam of light skittered across me, before flicking around the cavern chamber. Colgate gasped in amazement, her torch dancing from one stalagmite to another before focusing on the stalactites on the roof. “This is incredible.”
“It is,” I replied faintly, my own voice filled with awe.
There were a lot of stalactites, hundreds of every shape and size. Water dripped off them gradually, each drop leaving deposits of calcium carbonate leached from the limestone above us each time a pegasus kicked a cloud to make it rain. Several had actually become large enough to join with the stalagmite that formed beneath it, creating pillars. I was looking for any sign of age in the cavern when the light was cut off with a scream from Colgate and a splash of something on my face.
“Back up!”
A reversed analysis of limestone formations later, and Colgate collapsed to the ground beside me, panic in her breath, while cradling one of her forelegs. I stood alert, watching for trouble in the now darker cavern with only the slightest glow from Colgate and completely shot night vision. “What happened?” I asked hurriedly.
“Tripped,” Colgate said through her teeth as she got herself together again. The torch beam returned and fell onto a huge pothole in the cavern floor filled with water. I figured Colgate must have walked blindly into it while watching the stalactites on the cavern ceiling. Colgate refocused her torchlight onto her foreleg as she searched it, asking, “Why does it still hurt?”
“It’s just a phantom pain,” I replied while trying to give her a useless attempt at an understanding smile she couldn’t see. “It might not have happened as far as reality is concerned, but your mind sure thinks it did.”
Colgate stood back up, and breathed in and out as she deliberately placed her hooves on stable ground. In the faint light that Colgate was casting I saw her put pressure on her fore hoof before tilting it forward and back. “The pain is going away,” she said before giving me a slight smile, “I’m okay.”
I looked over, in the dark, toward the pit Colgate had fallen in. “Have you got a better light spell?” I asked. “Otherwise we’ll need to call this off.” Considering we’d already had an accident in the dark, I didn’t fancy going any further from exit.
“Maybe,” Colgate said before frowning briefly. “I haven’t cast this one since school, and I need to use more mana than usual to make it work here.” Colgate took a breath and summoned magic to her horn, and as the glow brightened she scrunched her eyes shut. Just as sparks started to fly, Colgate shot the magic into the air where it rose and then suddenly stopped a half dozen hooves into the air then bounced like a balloon on the end of a string. Colgate sighed in relief and let her horn darken. Around us the cavern was now brilliantly lit in a light blue glow emanating from the light floating above Colgate. “Study light,” she explained, “I dumped something like five times the normal mana in it to get this kind of brightness.”
“Not bad,” I replied while getting another even better look at the cavern we stood in. This time other things became obvious: the pit just in front of Colgate, where the remains of a rope and water bucket sat beside the pool of water. The water was crystal clear, to the extent that I could see the remains of more buckets, tools, and bits that had sunk to the bottom.
“I should have brought a coin to make a wish,” Colgate said aloud as we peered down the hole.
“You’ve probably already earnt one by falling in.” I only received a withering look from Colgate in response, presumably including an unspoken wish.
Looking around, Colgate pointed toward a passageway to our left. “That’s the way to the theatre.”
“Alright then, let’s get going,” I said before starting toward the passageway.
The passage itself was furrowed, perhaps at one point it was a tributary stream to the underground river nearby. That I heard from Colgate, who was happy to describe how caves like this formed as we travelled deeper. Our little adventure seemed to have awoken a few dormant interests in the aspiring magus, and not a side passage went by that she didn’t spend a few moments looking down to see if there was anything interesting to see.
As Colgate rounded another corner ahead of me she froze, before diving back into cover and holding up a hoof to stop me going around. Colgate glanced back at me, a worried look in her eye as she said, “It’s the lamia.”
My eyebrows rose. “Really?” I asked before stepping forward to peer around the corner with my usual insurance waiting for use. A got a quick glimpse of a pale yellow pony and a long golden brown reptilian tail lying on some rocks on the other side of the cavern from our exit.
A moment later I was pulled back by Colgate, who whispered harshly in my ear, “Don’t let it see you.” Looking at Colgate’s face, I could see some genuine fear, the type that comes with an urge to break some speed records in the other direction. That same fear was sitting at the bottom of my barrel, but experience and the reassurance of my Time Turn soothed my mind. I nodded at Colgate then crept forward again.
The lamia hadn’t moved from its resting spot. The only movement I saw was the rhythm of breathing and the very end of its tail tapping the rock beside it. I just watched and waited a few moments while looking for any sign it had noticed us or the light Colgate still had bobbing above her. Colgate crept forward and started looking as well. Soon I found my gaze drifting back to the motion of the lamia’s tail as it rhythmically tapped the rock. After counting the time period between taps it became obvious – to my own sense of timing – that the rhythm was too perfect.
I stepped out of cover, surprising Colgate and walked over to the lamia. Each step closer brought another detail, the gentle clicking, and the gurgling of water. I reached the lamia’s body and looked past it to find a little stream of water held back by the lamia’s bed and the little water wheel it powered to run the clockwork. The lamia was a fake, and a really good one too.
Looking back over my shoulder, I saw Colgate leaning out of cover to watch. I gave her a wave and called back, “It’s fake.” Colgate nearly fell over in relief, before quickly cantering over to take a look at the lamia for herself.
The pair of us started looking closer at the lamia model, Colgate focused on the surface while I took a closer look at the mechanics. The breathing was controlled by a spring-loaded, double-flanged wheel that ran along the edge of a large plate cam: think of a large flat metal egg shape, the edge of which the wheel used as a track – like a train. So as the egg shaped cam was slowly spun by the water wheel the longer pointed edge of the cam lifted the wheel up which pushed up the chest of the lamia to simulate breathing. Once peaked, the spring would keep the wheel on the cam as it dropped away until the next cycle. The tail I imagined used a similar arrangement where the cam struck a lever to make the tapping motion at the end of the tail.
As a clockmaker, I found myself admiring the simple mechanism and the effectiveness of it at putting some life into the model lamia. I was genuinely impressed.
Colgate on the other hoof focused on the surface. “It’s all latex, but it’s been textured and layered so it looks like hair and scale from a distance.” She slapped the skin and produced a sound you wouldn’t get from a pony’s body. “It’s hollow and light though, easy to move and set up.”
I nodded in agreement adding, “The gears were created by somepony that understands clockwork mechanics and had the tools and experience to use them.”
Colgate looked over the contraption and hummed for a moment. “Considering where we’re going, do you think a theatre stage crew could do this?”
I nodded, “It’d have to be a professional prop master, but since we’re dealing with a theatre company that regularly performs on Bridleway they’d have somepony capable of this on staff.”
“Or at least a way to buy something like this,” Colgate added.
“So,” I said as I gave the ‘lamia’ another look over. “Definitely the theatre’s work then. Trying to keep ponies out it seems.”
“We have to be close,” Colgate said as she lit her horn to pull out from under her helmet a small copy she’d made of the ancient map. Her eyebrows furrowed for a few moments as she searched the map and brightened as she turned it around to show me. “We’re in this cavern here, the refuge.”
I looked closer at the map and noted the labelled cavern Colgate pointed out with a hoof. “Why is it called the refuge?” I asked.
Colgate hummed for a moment in thought before answering, “The original map had an inscription saying, ‘Crowded and filled with smoke from wet camp fire, here was refuge sought from dangers above.’ Or something along those lines,” Colgate finished. We both looked around for a moment.
Looking closely, I noticed marks of char and ash on the ground. This cavern lacked the stalactites of the other caves and was sharper around the edges, so water hadn’t flown through here recently enough to remove traces of the past.
“The roof’s covered in soot,” Colgate mentioned.
“From smoke,” I replied. “A lot of ponies used to live down here. This cave’s dry, not too cold, and,” I said while pointing something out on the map, “at the time the only real exit was a thin passage leading to the theatre’s storage caves, where the towns-ponies fled before the griffons arrived during the war.” Looking around, I nodded before adding, “The best place to wait it all out.”
“Which passage?” Colgate asked confused.
I glanced back at the map, then pointed over my shoulder, “the one over the—oh.” Instead of an inviting passageway there stood a weird green – almost emerald – mass on the wall. I glanced back at the map again to be sure. “That can’t be right.”
“It should be there,” Colgate agreed. “That passage appeared on most of the other maps as well.” We glanced at each other and started advancing towards the green stuff. “This shouldn’t be here.”
As we reached it I touched a bit of the green’s edge with a hoof, it was hard but also soft in the same way gold yields if you bite a gold bit. Moving my hoof inwards, the green matter became less crystal and more congealed goo. When Colgate gave the centre a harder press it made the inner mass ripple and left residue on her hoof. Colgate brought it to her nose to sniff it, and wrinkled her nose. “It’s like old toothpaste that’s turned into that film that coats my drainpipes.”
“Looks like it’s blocking our path though,” I said off-hoof while trying to think of a good way to get through it. Colgate paused for a moment and snorted at something funny before taking a step back. I turned my head to look back at her with an eyebrow raised. “Something wrong, Colgate?”
“You reminded me of something Iron Will said.” Colgate lowered her horn as it started to glow ominously bright.
Feelingly slightly nervous I asked, “Uh, come again?”
“If somepony tries to block,” she said with some strain. “Show them, that you rock!” Suddenly a bolt of pure mana shot past me before something popped and splotch of green landed on my muzzle.
“Ugh,” I groaned before wiping the offending muck off.
Colgate giggled a little between pants and quietly said, “Still got it.”
“You know,” I said while checking myself over for more collateral muck, “Fluttershy caused a lot of trouble after saying those words to herself. You okay?”
Colgate glanced up at her horn and smiled. “Oh, I’m fine, just kinda happy to be using my magic properly again. I think I’ve used more magic today than I have in the last couple of years.”
“Happy you tagged along then?” I asked
Colgate breathed in then let it out with a low moan. “Oh yeah. Definitely.”
“Great, because now I’m curious about what’s down this passage,” I said while nodding down the freshly opened path. “Somepony’s gone to a lot of effort to keep ponies out, and I want to know why.”
Colgate nodded. “Lead the way.”
A shiver ran up my spine as we climbed up into another open area of cavern. “Now this place… really feels weird.” I paused for a moment to reach around to my back where, sure enough, all the hair on my neck was standing on end. This particular cavern was partially pony made: brick and masonry columns rose toward a ceiling made of carved flagstone, while the floor was mostly natural stone.
Colgate shivered as well as she caught up to me and said, “Ugh, let me check something,” before lighting her horn. “The magic around here feels tainted almost.”
“The map said the last passage led up to the grotto beneath the theatre, right?” I asked while looking around. There were a few old cabinets, disused furniture, and other things normally forgotten in basements, but what really got my attention was a little chest near our entrance. “Well hello there…” I said quietly to myself as I took a closer look at the lock.
“Yeah, and this looks like it,” Colgate replied to my earlier question. “It’s an artificial cave, right? That’s what a grotto means, and that’s probably the theatre above us.” Colgate hummed to herself. “As for the taint… Turner, was there some sort of disaster here that killed a lot of ponies?” she asked with a bit of worry in her voice.
“Yep, there wash,” I replied around the lock pick in my mouth.
“Wash? What do you—what are you doing?” Colgate said toward my back just as I used my tongue to push down on the lock pick I’d had wedged onto my teeth, levering it up to shift the tumbler at the back of the chest’s lock.
I stood and opened the chest in a single movement. “Investigating,” I replied casually. The chest had opened up to reveal a classic ‘Galloping off to Dodge’ kit intended for multiple ponies: namely small bags of bits, a few saddlebags, some rope, and hats that were in style fifty years ago. “A good villain always has an escape plan,” I said with a smile.
Colgate gave me a withering look. “Are you going to open every chest we pass?”
“Only the interesting ones,” I replied with a shrug. “What were you asking?”
“About whatever tragedy stained the magical aura here,” Colgate asked with a slight weariness. “It takes a lot of fear and death to do this.”
“Less tragedy and more a victory,” I replied. “Red Robin’s Revenge is what you’ll find it called in some of the older history books. During the griffon raid on Trottingham, everypony went down through this passage here to the cave we left. Red Robin waited up here with an old ballista Spear Carrier had found somewhere for one of his plays, then when the griffons found their way down here he fired the catapult point blank into one of the support columns,” I said while pointing at one of the now rebuilt supports. “The griffons were crushed as the theatre above collapsed down upon them, leaving Robin to make his escape down the tunnel to meet the rest of the town. The remaining griffons on the surface were routed a few days later when forces from both Solar and Lunar sides of the rebellion joined forces to remove them.”
Colgate shuddered. “Crushed or trapped under all this, I can see why the aura is so bad.” Looking around she added, “You don’t think this place is haunted, do you? It certainly feels like it could be.”
“Used to be,” I replied off hoof. “The organ might still be around here somewhere.” Then while Colgate tried to figure that one out I took the lock pick out of the chest’s lock and returned it to its hiding place in my tail. Normally I’d just hide them in my hat, but since I had to go with the caving helmet I just hid both picks by wrapping them up in my tail. As long as I didn’t sit on my tail wrong the picks would be fine.
Finished, I stood straight again and started down a likely looking hallway saying, “Let’s find a way up.”
Colgate followed while asking, “What do you mean ‘used to be’ haunted?”
“Well,” I replied with a shrug. “Everypony thought it was just a marketing stunt, but the Trottingham Company of Actors always said the Phantom of the Opera was based on a real story here.”
“That was real?” Colgate said with a gasp. “I love that play.”
A smirk crossed my face. “Good, then you won’t panic if we see a deformed monster down here.”
“Ha, ha,” Colgate replied while giving me a scathing look.
“There must be a way up,” I said idly to myself as I rounded a corner and came to a halt when I saw the huge pipe organ that took up the room. As Colgate came around I called back to her, “here you go, the Phantom’s organ.” Though the impressiveness was somewhat dulled by the pile of boxes around it, containing everything from costumes to props and old seat cushions. Naturally all near the door where they were dropped off in the first available spot.
“Wow,” Colgate said to herself, “I wonder if it still works,” before lighting her horn up.
A chill went through my heart and I went to dash forward to stand between her and the organ hissing, “Wait, don’t!” but with magic being what it is, I wasn’t able to stop her pressing down one of the keys. Instead of a loud note, the organ merely clicked.
Colgate shot me an unamused look. “There’s no air pressure in it. I don’t know what you’re worried about.”
I shot an unamused look right back at her. “We’re trying to find my sister without stirring up the hive, okay?”
“Sheesh, fine,” Colgate huffed. “I won’t ruin your secret mission with any music then.” I gave her the same withering look she’d often gave me, and after a moment a slight smirk shot over her face. “Though, I probably could…”
“Don’t,” I said flatly before heading through the precarious piles of boxes and up a flight of stairs as quietly as possible. Colgate followed behind, and I could swear she was humming something under her breath.
Rough stone turned to masonry, which in turn became brick as we made our way upstairs to the cavernous area behind the stage. A few props waited behind the curtains, all matching whatever performance was scheduled before the theatre closed its metaphorical doors. Quietly I looked around the curtain out into the main chamber of the theatre past the ground level seats toward the open end of the horseshoe shape that gave the theatre its name, and its solitary guard standing like a statue in black armour. If there was one thing I wanted to avoid, it was getting into a tussle with the Black Knight and ending up like Flash Sentry.
A barely audible ‘psst’ got my attention, and glancing over my shoulder I saw Colgate beckoning me over to the doorway she found. She led me through with a nod before quietly using her magic to shut the door. “Changing rooms,” she whispered while pointing along the hallway and toward the regularly spaced doors with golden stars painted on the wood.
Quietly we moved between doors, Colgate using her magic to quietly open them for me to peek inside. A few had ponies asleep, others had some that were reading, or lying in place. A couple noticed us, forcing me to time turn us out of trouble and then waiting for it to pass. Toward the end of the hallway we found a dressing room labelled, ‘Author’, the most promising sign I’d seen yet. I gave Colgate a nod and she opened the door.
Inside, the room looked a lot like I expected. Paper was strewn all over the place and tacked to the walls, the floors were speckled with ink spills, and in the centre of it all sat a pony with a coat the colour of beige paper – like that of an older book. Her mane was an appropriately inky black and her mark was the predictable ‘quill and ink pot’ every writer everywhere had. She was most very definitely the Page Turner I knew and remembered.
Except she was chubbier than I remembered, and all focused around the bottom of her barrel.
“Page…” I said with surprise in my voice.
Her eyes shot from the page and toward me, surprise dawned all over her face. “Time?” Page brought her hooves beneath her, and slowly with an excursion of effort she stood up. Each motion she made wobbled the growth beneath her, drawing both my attention and Colgate’s as well.
“She’s pregnant?” Colgate said from the doorway, at once sounding surprised and pleased.
“I can explain…” Page began before she was interrupted by somepony shouting, “Intruders!”
Instantly I triggered my talent with, “Reset,” and erased my somewhat shocking reunion with my sister. Colgate and I both looked back toward where we heard the shout, and there stood a pony wearing a dressing gown with fear on his face. “Oh no,” I said under my breath and cursed my luck that the Time Turn had come up short.
“Help! Intruders!” the surprised gown wearing pony shouted before Colgate could slow time. He bolted toward the exit, and already we could hear the distant clanking of metal hitting metal like a set of heavy keys.
“Oh withering…” With no other option, I dove through the door calling back “Colgate, in here, now.” Then I shut the door as soon as Colgate had joined me.
“What’s going on—Time is that you?” said a familiar voice.
“Uh…” Colgate answered unconvincingly with, “We’re here to rescue you?”
I was about to try reassuring Page myself, then the bottom dropped out of my barrel as the fast clanking noise reached the door. “They’re in there!” a voice called out. The clanking sound got faster and I jumped clear of the door just before it burst in splintering under the blow from the armoured black figure in the newly open doorway.
Page began to ask what was happening again before the Black Knight shouted, “Miss Page, stay back from them, they’re changelings!” My sister reacted in a snap, diving behind a desk. The knight turned its focus to Colgate and I, lowering the armoured horn mounted on his helm to point it toward us. “I know not what thy plans are, drone,” the echoing voice growled at us, “But you will not bring harm to my charge.”
Over my adventuring years I’ve been called plenty of names, mostly pejorative ones, but I’d never been accused of being a ‘changeling’. “We’re not changelings, or anything but normal ponies,” I replied.
“You jest,” the Knight replied forcefully. “Blood doesn’t deceive so easily, and I shall find it once more.” The knight’s legs shifted to a charging stance. “Prepare yourself!”
As I mirrored his stance my thoughts turned to Flash Sentry’s last fight and how badly it had gone for a fully trained guard – not forgetting whatever else he’d been trained to handle in his EIS role. Not to say that I can’t fight, but the Black Knight firmly outclassed me.
“Minuette,” I said calmly. “Help me.”
Colgate took a deep breath, from where she stood behind me, and just as the Knight started to charge my perception of time slowed to two-thirds of its normal rate. Moving fast enough to follow his movements, I charged forward to meet the Black Knight in a joust.
The Knight brought his head down to point his horn toward me. I lowered my own head, but just before we met I intentionally stumbled and slipped under his attempt to impale me. From where I fell I took the chance to lash out with my hind legs and bucked him in the helmet. The loud clang might have hurt his eardrums, but otherwise my strike had been worthless and the Knight simply took the blow to his helmet before turning to face me again. Unless I could even things up, I was doomed.
“Faster!” I called out just as the Knight began advancing on me again. Colgate howled as more mana spilled from her horn as sparks began to fly, but the knight slowed to a crawl just as he was getting close. I reared up and bit the cover concealing the Knight’s horn and pulled until the entire helm came loose. Throwing myself back I pulled the helm clear off the Knight’s head, intending to buck him in the face as soon as I could manage.
Colgate screamed in fright, and the Clock Up time dilation effect disappeared. The Knight’s helmet fell out of my mouth as I saw what the full face visor had hidden.
He was a monster: black like his armour, his eyes a pupiless solid blue, a jagged and uneven horn, and fangs that protruded from his mouth. The monster hissed at us, his horn lit with a sickly green that seized the caparison cape covering his back and ripped the cloth free to reveal two insectoid wings that buzzed in the air.
The echo was gone from his voice as he spoke again to say, “Further tricks will not avail you, d—” A blast of light blue magic cut him short and threw him backwards.
Colgate puffed from where she stood near Page’s desk. “What is he!?”
“I don’t know!” I said back before a roar of rage drew our attention. The Knight had taken to the air and dove toward Colgate in a wave of green light. Colgate cried out again, and the time dilation resumed. Colgate dove behind the cover of the desk, and as the Knight passed I bucked him into the wall with everything I had. The impact sounded like a gong at this level of time dilation; the sounds were distorted so badly that I couldn’t even hear the Knight curse me as he slid to the ground in the slow motion blur.
As I moved forward to try to incapacitate the knight the time dilation disappeared. My gaze shot to Colgate where I saw her trying to fend off my sister, who had jumped Colgate from behind and disrupted her spell. Before I could do anything to help her I was hit by the Five O’clock out of Canterlot and thrown into a wall. Sliding to the ground I played my trump card and said, “Back up.”
It didn’t go too far back, just a dozen seconds before it stopped and gave me a static shock to the flank, but it took me back to just after I’d thrown the Knight into a wall. The time dilation ceased early this time and I heard the Knight call out, “Miss Page, stop the caster!”
Colgate, forewarned, turned to stop my sister from jumping on her, but she couldn’t keep up the concentration needed to sustain the spell and protect herself. I was on my own.
Turning to face the unmasked Black Knight again, I felt a pit in my stomach form. I was out of options: my Time Turn was expended, Colgate was distracted, and I was very firmly outclassed.
Fear. It’s been a long time since I’d felt fear. There was always something to try, some option left unexplored, but now I had a monster with a kick like a steam train barrelling towards me with no time to create a plan or any trick to pull out of my hat.
This could actually be it.
I tried. I managed to roll away from the hit that would have thrown me into a wall, but the Knight simply looped up and kicked off from the wall to dive down upon me. I was forced to the ground as my legs crumpled beneath me and in the shock that followed I looked blearily up into the featureless eyes of the Black Knight as he said, “The Bards send their regards, Chrysalis.”
Then the hoof came down and everything faded to black.
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Well well well... A rouge changeling, huh?
stream1.gifsoup.com/view4/1586866/kitty-foreman-s-laugh-o.gif
6208105
No, he was clearly black.
6208527
a-heh
6208105
It was actually a rogue changeling. The spelling matters. Rouge is a term for 'red'. Specifically, it's French. though it's a brighter red than shown here, usually.
But it seems that it's not a rogue, per se, but rather a different group. After all, not all humans, griffons, or ponies are all apart of the same group, so why should changelings be homogeneous?
Great to see another chapter of this story. I'm really enjoying seeing Timer Turner and Minuette's reacting, and look forward to seeing where the plot goes from here.
I love you and hate you for this, love because this is an awesome story and seeing the update excited me, hate not because of the cliffhanger, I can probably guess what will happen next anyways, but because I now have to reread all the other chapters to get myself back up to speed so I can leave a better critiquing comment about how you are doing and what my predictions on future chapters will go on based on what I already read. I mean my photographic memory can only help so far, just means another sleepless night for me reading. well ate least it is not the weekend those are my busiest days
Awesome chapter. It was everything I could have hoped for, and more. Cliffhanger too!
I thank you for your kind words, but don't honor me and my actions. I'm just a bystander here. A face in the crowd. Honor yourself and your content by continuing the story through thick and thin, since I know you have the passion to trek on.
Don't do it for the ponies. Do it for Turner.
And if not, well, you know what I said previously.
It's been a long time indeed. So, ironically, the guard that shouted changeling is (by your description) a changeling itself
Still, uh-oh.
Seems like that time reverse to prevent an alarm wasn't a good idea as Turner's sister has no idea that he is truly her brother.
This... will certainly be interesting.
Good to see this finally back. This is probably my favourite story in this particular verse that's still updating. You've got a good thing going here, and I can't wait to see it continue!
It's been awhile since I read this so I apologize if it was said earlier but does this take place before or after the changeling assault? Because I would think at least a few ponies would've educated themselves after that event if only out of paranoia.
Glad to hear I succeeded in re-igniting your spark.
6213382
This is before the Changeling attack on Canterlot, so general paranoia hasn't begun yet.
If you follow the universe timeline, Cloud Kicker only just found out about her mother's death in the last chapter and would be on her vengeance trip just about now.
As befitting a story about a time pony, I've kept a nearly obsessive track on the timeline.
So the Black Knight is a Changeling eh?
Huh, rogue changelings. Interesting.
6223656
This is actually set in a different universe, so unfortunately Lucky isn't around.
Though it's probably worth a cameo later, I'll keep it in mind.
Even though it has been a year, gunna toss up the tags Knight, as others have stated, is a Freemind. Flash is a normal changeling. The troupe has been subtly fighting Chrysalis for likely a long time. Since the more mercenary freemind was posing as Nimbus and had access to the EIS, that one probably arranged for some of the EIS to be held up trying to investigate the troupe and/or distract the troupe from the Canterlot Invasion.
Once they see that Time Turner's blood didn't change colour and that he and Colgate aren't changelings, awkwardness with prevail.
Really hope you pick this back up.
7578710
Well, I just sent a chapter out for editing.
7582071 That's good. It almost seems like everytime I find an interesting fic, the author hasn't written anything for it for a year or the sequel is forever being worked on.
Okay now THIS is getting interesting!!
Though I am surprised that the Black Knight Changeling can't tell that the two are actually ponies. I would think he would be able to tell somehow o.o;
Though this plot certainly keeps getting thicker and thicker! <3
*I got.
Yes. Loot everything.