Apocryphal thoughts

by Shadowboltwriter

Setting the stage part 2

Wordplay was wondering through the streets of manehatten, looking for the address pixel had given him. He was commonly glancing in the windows of various shops, sometimes he could see his reflection rather well.

One such time wordplay looked into the window of a shop that had some old knick knacks on display, then he saw another reflection rapidly approach him from his left. Wordplay turned to see the figure of a lavender mare running toward him, then said mare abruptly stopped herself to avoid running into wordplay "oh sorry, I was in a hurry and didn't see you there." She apologized.

Wordplay recovered from the mares sudden approach "oh well, uh, that's ok I guess. Just make sure you look where you're going." Wordplay told her.

"Got it. Look where I'm going." She responded.

Both of them proceeded to continue walking in the same direction. "If you don't mind me asking... why were you in such a rush back there?" Wordplay asked, curiously. He normally wouldn't just talk to somepony random but this mare had peaked his interest.

Wordplay could see her expression full with excitement "oh you probably won't believe me, but I got asked by pixel wavelength to help her with a special problem. Cool huh?" the mare exclaimed.

Wordplay normally wouldn't believe such a claim, but under the current circumstances, his interest was further peaked "huh, that's odd. I got a message from her too that asked the same thing." Wordplay said.

"Cool! You must be one of the other ponies she mentioned. I mean I already know a few of them but you're definitely new to the group." The mare said, seeming to get more excited as she spoke.

Wordplay did recall pixel mentioning other ponies in her message. A new thought came to the mares mind "now that I think of it, we're going to be helping pixel and I don't even know you're name yet." She said in a surprised manner. She looked over at wordplay waiting for a response.

"Oh, you're right. I'm wordplay." Wordplay told her.

"Cool, I'm Buffy." Buffy replied before wordplay returned the question.

A few seconds later the two turned a corner to the street pixel had given them. On it were only a few buildings, spread out somewhat far apart, but one stood out from the others. Wordplay had no doubt the house was considered a mansion from its sheer size. The house as a whole was very astonishing to look at, the decorative coloring and a few pillars stood in the front. Both of them stood in awe for a moment.

Eventually wordplay returned them to reality, reminding them they actually needed to go to the building. After a few minutes of trotting the two reached the front steps, which wordplay confirmed was pixels estate. When they approached the double doors that we're the entrance they we're greeted by a stallion who had been standing near the doors "hey where are- oh hey buffy." the stallion said. He had a tan coat and an orange mane and tail.

"Hiya nova, look you who I brought with me." Buffy said.

Wordplay assumed nova was this stallions name "I'm gonna guess that's wordplay with you." Nova said.

"Yep!" Buffy responded, confirming nova's answer.

"Well then, nice to meet you wordplay. I'm nova blast, but you can just call me nova like buffy did." Nova said raising out his hoof in greeting.

Wordplay reached out his own "good to meet you, I guess." Wordplay said.

This was the second stranger wordplay had thrust himself into conversation with. He also didn't bother to question how nova already knew his name, he figured pixel had told him "well let's not stand outside, let me bring you two in." Nova said pulling out some sort of card and sliding it through a scanner that was present next to the doors. Nova then opened one of the large doors of the home, motioning for them to follow him.

The inside of the house was as luxurious as the outside, decorative pillars supporting the high ceiling and various and rather fancy articles of furniture spread across the room. Off to the left there were two other mares seated at a table, one of which was using one of her legs to spin herself around. The one spinning herself bad a dark blue coat and a white mane and tail, with a single light blue stripe running through them. The other mare had a light purple coat and two shades of darker purple in her mane and tail. Wordplay thought she seemed to give off a fancy appeal.

Nova brought wordplay and Buffy over to them "that furniture belongs to royalty, I suggest you stop using it as a toy." The light purple mare said in an authoritative tone.

"But I'm booored... oh hey there." the other said taking notice of the trio next to her.

Nova stepped in between the two groups "alright, viola and already know buffy so let me introduce you to wordplay. Azura this is buffy and wordplay." Nova said pointing toward each pony as he spoke.

"Cool, nice to meet you two. I'm azura peavielle but you can just call me azura." Azura said hoping out of her seat to stand in front of them.

"I'm viola, a pleasure to meet you wordplay." Viola said.

Buffy immediately moved over to azura and high hoofed her before quickly getting into a conversation.

Wordplay felt inclined to respond "uh... nice to meet you too." Wordplay said sheepishly.

Nova quieted azura and Buffy before speaking again "well you all get comfortable, I need to go back outside and wait on viridian." Nova said before walking back outside. Azura didn't pay any mind to who viridian was, instead resuming her conversation with buffy.

Wordplay decided to occupy himself by writing. He pulled out his notebook and took a seat away from everypony and peacefully wrote for a few minutes. Until azura got curious and decided to come over to him.

"What are you doing?" Azura asked wordplay, putting her two front hooves onto the table.

"I'm... writing." Wordplay responded, a little surprised by her approach.

"Well duh, I can see that. I meant what are you writing about?" Azura asked.

Wordplay looked through his pages for a moment "well... im working on a new story of mine. Right now it focuses on these three gaurds and they have to go on this adventure to recover an old artifact." Wordplay said, hoping it would satisfy azura's curiosity.

"Do you think it's good?" Azura asked.

Wordplay was a little confused at the question "what do you mean?" Wordplay asked.

Azura had to think of how to explain her reasoning "hmm... well basically it's like this. I play stuff on the radio and so you wanna make sure you're playing stuff that ponies will like, and that also that can help if you like it." Azura explained.

Wordplay took a few seconds to think about azura's statement "I... I guess that makes sense when you put it like that." Wordplay said.

Before azura could say anything else, nova walked back into the room. Behind him was a mare with a tan coat and a light green mane and tail "hello everypony." She said in a very joyful manner.

Nova walked forward to introduce her "wordplay, azura, this is viridian meadows. Viridian this is wordplay and azura peavielle." Nova said while pointing to each pony as he said their name.

Azura brought her hooves back to the floor "hey there, nice to meet ya." Azura said to viridian.

"Hey there." Wordplay said.

Nova spoke up again "well now that everypony is here, I'm going to inform pixel that you're all here. I'll be back in hopefully a few minutes." Nova announced before he walked over to a door on the other side of the room and exiting through it. It looked dark behind it.

Buffy eventually said what everypony was thinking "where do you think he went?" Buffy asked, hoping for responses.

"Some sort of research facility?" Viridian suggested.

"Some sort of experimental lair..." Azura suggested jokingly.

"It's probably just some laboratory." Wordplay said. Everypony was able to agree with wordplay.

Around two minutes passed before nova walked back into the room, followed none other than pixel wavelength. Pixel's alicorn structure made her stand out from everypony, her bright blue mane and tail seemed to be a bit unkept, and her pure white coat shined in the room.

"Hello everypony, I assume your all familiar with me?" Pixel asked, hoping to go ahead and address their situation. She received nods from everypony "good then. Now as much as I would love to talk and enjoy some time with everypony, you all remember why I asked for you to be here." Pixel said in a soothing but concerned voice.

"Some sort of crisis with the internet right?" Buffy replied.

Pixel nodded "exactly. Now to start things off I want to show you all something. If you could all follow me downstairs." Pixel said, turning around exiting through the stairs she had entered from.

Nova moved and stood next to the door "I'll bring up the rear, you all go ahead." Nova said, motioning for them to go ahead.

Eventually everypony filed into a line and proceeded down the dark corridor, with pixel in the front, nova in the back, and everypony else finding a spot in between. The staircase was narrow, with only two ponies being able to stand beside each other. It consisted of two left turns before eventually opening up into a very large room.

The room itself was filled with various technologies lined up against the walls, many of them having flashing lights that illuminated the room, and the occasional screen. While most of the group took in the scene, pixel walked over to a large monitor that was hung up on the wall, which seemed to have some sort of document opened on it.

Soon the group formed a small semicircle around pixel "now that we're here, this is what I wanted to show you all..." Pixel said, pointing toward the monitor above her "...but I should bring you all up to speed on some recent events." Pixel said before going quiet for a moment, the buzzing of all the machines keeping the room from falling completely silent.

Eventually pixel spoke again "a few weeks ago, I received an email in my personal email sent by an anonymous pony. I didn't think much of it other than that they somehow had my personal email somehow. I dismissed it as one of those ponies that are on the internet simply to spread their negativity. Every few days since then I would receive another message from the same pony, saying various things about how I should be listening to them, but the things they were saying along with it just sounded like nonsense... I never took any of it seriously until they sent this last one." Pixel explained.

Viridian asked this time what they were all wondering "what exactly happened?" She asked pixel.

Pixel paused for another moment "well... I had just picked up my phone and noticed I had a new email so like normal I went to read it and it was from that anonymous pony. I noticed it seemed to have some sort of attachment with it, which was new, but what really surprised and shocked me was the mention of a software that me and nova had been developing and only us two knew about it. They mentioned it's name and that was enough to put me into concern. And as if that wasn't bad enough I foolishly opened the attachment they had sent with it which simply read 'imagine if this got into your whole internet'. I didn't realize what that meant at first, but I eventually realized that my phone now had a virus on it. The damage was so bad that my old phone hardly functions anymore." Pixel continued.

Pixel paused once more to make sure everypony was still with her "these are no longer just empty words this pony has been telling me, they are full fledged and very serious threats. If they continue such things they just might compromise the Internet as a whole. I reached out to you all because I felt as though it was the right thing to do. Now are you all with me in this?" Pixel asked. Everypony responded with sayings along the lines of 'yeah' and 'totally' which brought pixel's spirits up "great then." Pixel said.

Buffy spoke up next "so what all have you done to stop them so far?" Buffy asked.

Pixel raised her hoof to her chin "well so far we've been trying to create something that can combat the virus but... anything we've tried has been unsuccessful." Pixel informed "but we're still trying. I'm sure we'll get something." Pixel added.

Wordplay thought of something that he sometimes did, but he was afraid of suggesting it, uncomfortable going against pixel's current intentions "uh... pixel? Can I suggest something?" Wordplay asked hesitantly.

Pixel gave him a warm smile "anything wordplay." Pixel told him.

"Well... I was thinking since... you're not having any success now you could... try looking at this differently." Wordplay suggested.

Pixel tilted her head slightly "you mean like trying a different approach? Did you have anything in mind?" Pixel asked, curious of where wordplay was going with this.

Wordplay thought to his writing "well... when I'm writing I sometimes find problems with my stories, like some much needed support for a character isn't there, or there's a big plot hole in it, heck I even had to almost entirely rewrite something once." Wordplay said.

"Where exactly are you going with this?" Viridian asked, curious as well.

"Oh yeah... so sometimes when something I'm writing just won't work like I want it, sometimes it pays to try a different approach l, even if it's completely different." Wordplay said, seeking to excite himself.

Pixel considered everything wordplay had said "that... is actually a great idea wordplay."'pixel said, smiling at wordplay.

"You- you really think so?" Wordplay asked.

"Of course. Everything nova and I have tried in hopes of combating the virus have failed... perhaps there is another way we can solve this crisis." Pixel stated.

Buffy put her hoof up in the air "oh, can I suggest something now?" Buffy asked excitedly.

"Of course you can Buffy." Pixel told her friend.

"Ok, so I was thinking, maybe you can trace the signal of it? Like they do in movies! They hit all these little buttons like 'beep bop ding' and then BAM! You know where it came from." Buffy suggested.

"That's... a wonderful idea buffy." Pixel said.

"If we can do that, we can make it so that they can't send out the virus at all." Nova added.

"Exactly. We should start working on that." Pixel said, motioning her and nova over to a device that had pixel's old phone laying on it.

Azura suddenly spoke up "I know a little about radio signals and what not if that's any help." Azura offered.

Pixel turned back to her "any help would be appreciated."' Pixel informed her, making azura run over and join nova and pixel.

Viridian came up to wordplay shortly after "that was cool back there." She said.

"What I did was cool? Oh I... wouldn't call that much." Wordplay tried to tell viridian.

"Are you kidding? Speak for yourself but I say it was cool, just getting out there and sharing some thoughts to help pixel get going again." Viridian repeated.

"Well... maybe." Wordplay admitted, shying away from the conversation.

A few minutes passed before the group noticed nova and azura share some sort of triumphant moment, so they all assumed something good had happened. Shortly after azura returned to the group and pixel and nova stood in front of them once more "thanks to wordplay's brilliant idea and buffy's great thinking, we now have made some success." Pixel stated.

"Can you tell us what it is?" Viridian asked playfully.

Pixel let herself snicker "we could t trace the exact signal, but we do know one location that it definitely traveled through, and from the way it traveled, I'm willing to bet that it didn't pass through there through ordinary means." Pixel explained.

Buffy spoke up again "are we gonna go and investigate it?" Buffy asked, hoping pixel would say yes.

"Precisely. I want everypony to accompany me and help me investigate it." Pixel said, causing Buffy to jump into the air a little.

"Yeah! Let's go!" Buffy said running out of the room.

"Should we stop stop her?" Nova asked.

"You know how she is, she'll probably just run up to the top of the stairs before running back down the to check on us." Viola said.

Pixel nodded in agreement "we should follow her anyways. Let's all go up as well." Pixel said, starting toward the exit.

"Adventure!" Azura shouted as she ran after buffy while everypony walked behind them.

"Already an adventure for me."wordplay thought to himself.

Author's Note:

The gangs all here, huzzah!

Anyways feel free to comment on this story, I'm having a lot of fun writing this.