The empire of gears

by ShadyMcChangeling

Chapter 3:The great city

The ponies all stared with dropped jaws at the city. The enormous gates flanked by two more of the bipedal things.
Their carrier thing then landed, folded it's second set of wings back and started walking towards the gates.
Almost as if on cue the gates slowly opened and the thing walked inside.
They were then carried to a hexagonal platform inset in the ground. They stopped on top of the platform,which proceeded to move downwards.
They had traveled down with the platform until they reached a large room filled to the brim with what looked like mechanisms of some sort.
The room had a plethora of sounds seemingly constantly playing, clicks, whirrs, whistles and the occasional pshh of steam.
They then arrived to a large intricately decorated door that opened seemingly on it's own accord.
Beyond lay a room with an obsidian throne with glowing purple symbols ingrained in the tar black rock.
And atop that throne lay an equine shaped creature in a cloak who then moved its hoof like it was playing charades with nopony in particular.
The thing carrying them then set them gently on the ground.

"Greetings and bienvenue, my esteemed guests, to the empire of gears." Said the cloaked figure.

"Um.. Hello I am-"

"The princess of friendship, Twilight Sparkle.

With your friends and elements of harmony, Rarity, Applejack, Rainbow dash, Pinkie pie and Fluttershy." It said pointing to the ponies in turn.

"Oh and let's not forget the loyal assistant of twilight and savior of the crystal empire, spike."

"..."

"Oh dear where are my manners! My name is Metallum larva and I am the creator of all you see before you." He said as he took off his cloak.

"He's a changeling!?" Thought Twilight to herself.

"Yes, and he's the ruler of this place!"

"Not to be offensive but I'm quite surprised that you're a changeling." said Twilight.

"No, don't worry I get that quite often." He said with a fanged grin.
He didn't look like a normal changeling, he had purple pony-like eyes not the blue bug like ones.
His horn seemed hollow and like that of an alicorn, no curve in it at all.
Two sets of wings were on his back, one set was like Pegasus wings, the other were like a dragonfly's but more rigid.
And he had a very scruffy iron grey mane and tail.

"Now I'm sure that you're all bursting with questions so let us take a stroll while we talk."
He motioned for the ponies to follow him and started walking.

"Excuse me Mr Metaliu-"

"Just call me Mirror Mask Twilight"

"Oh sorry, what was that thing that brought us to you?"

"Ah, those are golemic constructs."

"Golemic- what?"

"Golemic constructs, let me explain. So I'm sure you're familiar with the timber wolfs correct?"

"Yes we know them."

"Well they are also golemic constructs, they are animated with the unpredictable magic of the everfree and their shell is made of wood."

"I didn't know that."

"Well I didn't know either, Only when I focused research on them did I find out. It's a tad bit difficult to explain the process."

"My turn, why do they look so weird?"

"Well Rainbow, I took bits and pieces of animals and put them in such a way that every piece can work together perfectly. And no I didn't use actual animal parts just the structures."
Fluttershy let out a relieved sigh.

"I actually got the idea for the claw wings from an old changeling tale about the yveltal, a creature that is said to suck the life out of anything it touches. I have a library filled with old stories like that." Continued Mirror.

"Well what do ya' call em'?"

"That is a bit of an odd one to answer Applejack, I am on the fence with two names Edmyron and ironside. though I use them interchangeably."

"I suppose it's my turn, we saw that one of these ironsides just stopped and put it's hand to it's ear, what does that mean?"

"That my dear Rarity, was it receiving a message from yours truly."

"How did a message get so quickly from here to there?!"

"Well Twilight I have a receiver and emitter connected straight to my chair. any command I give is then sent or received via a specific frequency of energy through the very air itself! And can only be detected via crystal arrays within the machine."

"That's...brilliant!"

"Yes but I can't go everywhere with my chair, trust me I've tried, so I've set it so that a whistle followed by hoof movements is a way to give commands.
You know, you're lucky that I knew who you were because if I didn't-"
He looked back at the ponies. His pupils weren't round as before they were instead like that of chrysalis at the wedding, just mere slits.

"-You'd all be dead where you stand." Said Mirror his voice distorted demonically.

"But let's not dwell upon that" Said Mirror in a cheerful tone, his eyes and voice back to normal.

"Ah we're here! this is a project I've been working on, take a look."

---To be continued---

Author's Note:

yveltal I choose you!... to be background building. how do you like the undertale reference? I thought it was SANSational. I very punny, no? next chapter we see Mirror's sad, sad backstory. but can you guess Mirror's TRUE plan? find out in the next Chapter. Author-man. up up and away!