Of the Past and its Mysteries

by Sb129

1.) 3788

Chapter 1 (3788)

~An introduction~

In the vast wild lands of the Everfree forest lies a plethora of places long forgotten by time. Only fractions of a percent have been explored by the local populace. The Old Sisters’ castle is only one of many forsaken strongholds. Even the wildlife itself isn’t fully known. Anyone living in close proximity to the forest can hear strange roars and loud thumps on quiet nights. To most, especially ones living close to it, the forest evokes a very primal fear; most would never dream of setting hoof into it. This amount of intrigue it holds draws adventurers in, a very select few even call it home.

This forest is covered in a shroud of mystery and curiously is the home of many species lost to time. Even an ancient race of ponies exist in the Everfree and forests like it. In the minds of the Equestrians, this race exists solely in stories and are rare even in that realm. The members belonging to this branch of ponykind are very small; they could easily fit in the center of your hoof. To each, the Creator gave wings like that of a dragonfly. Likewise they posses two antennae which affords them the use of magic. Centuries before, they played a part with everypony else, it wasn’t much but it a part none the less. They disappeared from history, the only thing remaining of them to the Equestrians were their name, Flutterponies.

Like the whole of Equestria, they lived life in a simple manner. There existed a void of new discoveries but that was the same just about everywhere. All that ever evolved anymore was fashion and the arts.

---

"'Tis not much distance left," Feather hovered several feet above the others in the group. "Indeed almost none at all." A short distance up ahead he saw a familiar ridge letting him know that they had arrived. The dark byzantium colored flutterpony flew up ahead of the others and held out a hoof. “Hold fast! Ok, I know you have heard the legends surrounding this place, but let me assure you that they are unfounded. This is not any second transportal nor is it the birthplace of our corrupted brethren. The ground is anomalous only in the fact that it is over-saturated with foreign magic.” He looked around to see some worried faces.

He took out of his bag a trinkets. “There is no sound basis to worry about anything today, in fact, you all should count yourself lucky that Favor has fallen on you to discover what may be buried here.” He held up the trinket, it looked like a golden bit like those used by the Equestrians. Closer inspection revealed that it was quite different. Not only was it not gold at all, it was adorned with a simple yet alien writing, symbols and a creature on both sides. “This is but a small sample compared to what else lies under this barren ground.” He put the alien coin back in his bag and flew over to the outcropping of rock he had seen earlier. “Now then, let us fly over this last bit of rock so you may see what lays ahead of you today.

The team all readied their dragonfly-esque wings and flew over the ridge of rock and clay. When they scaled it they all hovered over the landscape before them. An area twice the size of their home city was completely devoid of plant life; there wasn’t even any insects that dared to enter the vast circle of dirt, dust and hardened clay. And there was something else, the packed in dirt was glowing a brilliant orange. It was an orange brilliant enough to see in the noonday sun, but was still easy on the eyes of those who gazed at it. The signature of magic at work.

“No doubt you’ve all seen the magic covering this landscape. When our ancestors settled here they thought this land was blessed by Celestia herself and so built a shrine in her honor.” His hoof pointed to a small ornate building in a state of extreme disrepair. One of the team members spoke up. “Why is it so broken down?” Feather quickly decided whether or not to start, it was still early in the day. “Well, as you know from history lessons, we used to worship the sun princess the same as the Equestrians. But then long ago she decided to do something so horrible that our scholars refused to even record it. Whatever it was it stopped us from worshiping her anymore. So our shrine was abandoned, and this sacred ground was seen as cursed.” He flew down to the ground and stood looking toward the shrine with a frown. “It has only been the last few years that we have tried to repair the shrine, for historical purposes. And this ground to be open for archaeological digs.”

He grabbed a shovel off his bags and set the tip in the dense dirt. “And that is why we are allowed here today. So let us all meet here for lunch, I found more of my artifacts by that second tent over there.” He motioned with his his antennae to the left of them. “But since this is such a new place you all may start wherever you want. Now go forth and find something amazing!” With that they all revved their wings like engines and dispersed every which direction to begin, some alone, some in groups.

---

It was only a few hours before everypony had found something, most had found trivial objects such as broken glass cups or broken ceramic. Some managed to find different coins like Feather had. But one was going to find something huge.

A flutterpony that was in the relative center of the packed in sands, with a coat light blue as the sky and a mane as brilliant white as the Moon. She was digging around this spot all day and only found rocks with the occasional piece of metal rusted to nothingness. |Seriously, there's got to be something more here than pieces of rust, this is the center of this whole place. Surely something of interest would be here.| She dug for another tens of minutes, she couldn't be sure since repetitive tasks like this bored her. She began to notice that the ground around her was glowing brighter than the surface, and it was glowing brightest right where she was digging. |Aha! Looks like I finally found something which isn't rust!|

As she finished that thought she saw the tip of a large glowing crystal. It was just the top most part of it but still it glowed with the power and force of the sun. She pushed a little bit more sand away and began to call out, not noticing the crystal growing in power. “Hey everypony, I found something big! It’s incred-” Blazing hesitated as she saw the light of the crystal grow at such a speed that she tried to fly away as fast as she could. The others were flying over to see what was happening when a deafening crack was heard and a growing cloud of dust appeared where she was just standing at. Not more than half a second later an immense beam of magical energy and light pierced the cloud of dust. The light blue flutterpony escaped with milliseconds to spare. But as she looked up at the beam of light and magic she was captivated by it. The beam neither deviated one way or another, it didn’t fan out like normal magic does. Instead it was an exact beam of pure light and magic.

“Blazing Light! Are you alright?” The rest of the team seemed to cry out in unison. Blazing tore her eyes away from the awe inspiring beam of orange light and replied as loud as she could. “Yes, I am fine, I am alright!” As quickly as the beam started, it abruptly ended. Leaving around it a crater of blown away earth with some melted glass closer to it. And, it was floating above a hole in the ground. Feather got to her first, “Are you sure you’re okay? how are your wings?” She glanced at her wings and saw that they were in one piece. “They’re fine...I’m fine” She rubbed her forehead with her hoof. “I might have a slight headache but nothing major.” Feather breathed a sigh of relief and gathered his bearings.

“How'd that happen Blazing? What did you... find?” She pointed to the rather large crater behind them all. “Oh right” He nervously chuckled to himself as he fluttered down to the crystal to examine it more. "My Celestia, never have I seen a crystal of this power and purity before," He looked at the solidified glass that surrounded the hole underground. "Haven’t seen this much power come from such small a crystal either." He put his hoof close to the crystal to see if it was still hot but it was cool to the touch. It still floated there and glowed brightly, but it wasn't hot. There wasn't much else there, but that hole. "Doesn't just look like a straight bored hole, it looks like a cavern down there." The others were all hovering just beyond the edge of the crater watching the purple tinted flutterpony as he looked around the crystal.

“Come on over, I think Blazing Light over here may have discovered something more than this powerful crystal.” He then disappeared in the hole of melted glass. “Come down everyone, this is amazing!” He had such an unusual happy tone to his voice as he told them that it seemed like he was going to burst with excitement. The others followed suit, with Blazing coming in last.

She descended into a large underground space that was dimly lit from the giant glowing crystal. As such, everything was bathed in its soft orange glow as if it came from the flame of a single bright lamp. She awaited patiently for a minute or two for her eyes to fully adjust to the light and when they did she saw something amazing. A huge structure underground like a room, only it was huge, even bigger than rooms the Equestrians needed. Along the walls was more of the same writing that the coin had. The massive tables held many treasures, some taller than her house, others small as her hoof.

Feather and the team spread out looking at everything they could. The more they flew around, the more dust uncovered something new for them to be awed by. There was all manner of weird things to behold in this subterranean vault of sorts. A cache of semi rare and rare crystals, huge books, something resembling a scroll and many other oddities. Feather was drawn to something in the corner of the room.

He spoke to himself in a low whisper "This definitively stands out from the rest, while everything else here is placed as if it were put into storage, this object is purposefully set out in the open with only cloth to protect it from dust." He flew over to it, the cloth glowed a dark green as it was lifted by Feather’s magic and put aside. Again in a hushed tone, he contemplated "This is constructed in a very different way from everything else in here." The Device was made of brass and held lots of moving parts, nothing else had moving parts other than wheels. This had a large flywheel, levers, pistons and other simple machines. But what drew Feather’s attention the most was two flat objects. One was dark and shiny like an obsidian mirror and next to it was an etched piece of glass showing some small pictograms on how to operate the Device.

A couple others noted his interest and flew next to Feather, "Light the candle, self explanatory but ok sure. Turn the large wheel to the right. Arrows to the small black thing, and they point to what? A small circle on the greyish black mirror? What is the significance in that I wonder." He thought a second and decided on something. “Okay everypony, come over here quickly, I need your help.” With great reluctance the team flew over to Feather; their attitudes changed as soon as they see the strange Device. “As you see, this looks quite a bit different than anything else in here, but what else is different about it? Can anyone tell me?” He looked out to a bunch of confused faces, some trying to think, some not paying attention and others that already gave up. Blazing herself was lost in thought. |What was that thing I just saw? Looked ordinary, but still gave an heir of complexity, hmmm…| Feather sighed and hovered by the transparent pane with the illustrations.

“Ahem, it's this,” His hoof was squarely on the edge of the glyphs. “this object has pictograms on it and doesn’t apparently look to be packed away. This is pretty significant because it means whomever lived here left this thing for someone else to discover and they knew that their language wouldn’t exist. So, they used pictures.” He glided in between the candle and the wheel. “The pictures tell us to light the candle, turn this wheel that way” Again his antennae pointed to where he was talking about. “and to watch the grey thing connected over there, the pictograms showed some small circle on it so look for that. I’ll light the candle, but you all pull on the wheel with your magic, I tried but it’s stuck tight.”

The light purple flutterpony landed on the table and focused on the candle wick. His antennae began glowing dark green once more, as did the candle wick. A few seconds later the flame came to life, filling the room with another shade of orange and producing doubled shadows. The others started using their collective magic to try and turn the wheel but it wouldn’t budge. They tried again and it still wasn’t moving. They all waited for several more seconds and tried once more and this time. Success! Everypony stepped back as the wheel, the levers, the pulleys and everything started moving in sync with the largest wheel.

After it was working for a few minutes some lights flickered on on the right side of the Device, a dial turned and pointed straight up. A large portion of the grey mirror began to softly glow. Little points of light showed a pattern of buttons that had the individual characters of the language they used and the screen bore an image of a stylized lightning bolt inside a rectangle. "What’s this? the lights and this grey mirror are glowing, but not with magic or heat of any kind." He touched the lights to make sure it wasn’t just a small contained fire. "Nothing, no heat and certainly no magic, how can this be? How can this-"

The glowing greyish mirror flashed and flickered and a random pattern of small dots appeared. Black and white points of light flew all across the square and some images seemed to flash across the surface like a magic mirror would, only this lacked magic in any way. The other flutterponies wore faces of fear that something like this could even exist. They started to get restless as the square of dim light flashed some more and made noises, Feather spoke up "Calm down, this is nothing but light in a box, there isn't anything living in that so just calm yourselves and we all shall inspect it closer once we get it back home." Just then the square stopped flashing and statically showed what looked to be a window. On the grey thing a tree was shown and it looked like how a tree looked when looking through a normal window. The only things standing out were strange text and some random small images.

Of the images, one looked very similar to the glass etching. Feather saw the connection but didn't know what to do, "The arrow pointed to this I believe," His tiny hoof pressed on the small blocky circle image and the thing came to life again, more things flashed quickly on the screen and a creature appeared and began talking!

~After that short introduction on how I know about you all I will introduce myself. I am Mark Antony, but my friends like to call me Sb. Yeah weird nickname I know, it’s from my college days studying chemical engineering, first day the teacher called me Antimony by accident, so it pretty much stuck after that. And its symbol is Sb so you know. Wooah, gettin off track. -sigh- I am a human male, age 25. Living on Earth. todays date is uh...March 13, 2042. Assuming any of this survives until you find it, I want to share some human knowledge and technology with you. Because… Well because our time on this rock is limited. Like I told you earlier, we will destroy ourselves in a global war. A war that will last mere minutes. It’s still months away though. But uhh, enough with the depressing stuff, let me first show you how this thing works. This screen is touch sensitive and it~

Everypony was fixated on the words of a creature called a human coming from a magical window that actually held no magic. Feather was most shocked. "Humans! But how? They were fabricated as a means to understand the world by our ancestors. How can they be real?" He glanced over to the Device again, the human was holding a black thing similar to the grey one and telling how to use it. "One thing is for sure, the Council will have to see this personally. This will change our whole world."

Comments

[NecroLeprechaun]

Interesting. Have my like and fav and I'll be eagerly awaiting more.

[TinyPootisman]

Human✓
Lyra✓
Non Mary Sue Twilight✓
+Tiny little fuffy ponies ✓
Only thing left uncheck is keeping writer alive. This kind of writers keep disappearing.

[Sb129]

3613706
I assure you, I won't fall off the edge of the earth like so many others. I been planning this, especially after almost all the stories I follow haven't updated in months...

[FerrousSpark]

Change the picture, zecoras curses, but change it! I got the picture up on da and in our chat so no excuses

[FerrousSpark]

Hoora, kicken flank and taking names

[Sb129]

3637987
Indeed

[Sb129]

~Rewritten