Chapter 26: Corpse
Until only a few days ago, Faith hadn’t even teleported before. The way runes were… considerably more difficult than a simple teleport. She vanished from ordinary space, and her entire world turned dark and cold. Space was a physical thing, pressing in on her from all directions and suffocating her.
The instant of holding her breath to go through the wall became an eternity, her head spinning and the only sound her own heartbeat. She couldn’t even feel Arclight beside her, so that at least she would have some company in her confusion. Worse, the eyes. Every direction she saw them, as much as that word meant anything to her. She saw them, and knew that they saw her too.
She was unwelcome here. Worse, they knew her.
Reality exploded around her with a crack of air and a roar from her ears. She blinked, though of course whether her eyes were open or closed made no difference at all. Her ears lifted, and she made a few high-pitched noises, sounding out her surroundings.
She heard sand and rubble beneath her hooves, broken with a metal ring she guessed would be exactly like the one in the secret lab. But a little further, her sound struck the edge of something—a bubble, maybe ten paces in any direction, and promptly bounced back. She heard nothing from beyond it.
She realized where she’d gone, as surely as she could know anything. Stars above. I’m on the surface. “Arclight,” she began, her voice halting. “We’re not in a building, are we?”
He didn’t respond for several long moments, so long that she began to worry. Maybe he couldn’t answer, maybe she was alone somehow, and… no, she was overreacting. He was still standing beside her. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have air, and she’d already be dying on the sand.
She reached to the side with her wing, to where he’d been standing, nudging him gently. “Arclight?”
He twitched, then turned towards her. His voice was awed, though she couldn’t imagine why. “What?”
“Where are we?” she repeated. “In a bubble, right? On the surface? There’s a sky over our heads.”
She felt him nod, and nearly took off to fly right then. She knew the edges of the bubble, knew she could rise further than anywhere in all but the central cavern. There was so much space here, all open to her!
But she resisted. One mistake would take her through the edge of the bubble, to certain death. I’m blind on the other side, really blind. Even if I could hold my breath somehow. And she couldn’t. Moonrise had stories of ponies who found themselves exposed to vacuum for one reason or another—they always ended with painful death.
“Okay, Arclight.” She straightened, gritting her teeth. “I need you to be my eyes. Tell me exactly what you see.”
Another infuriating pause. She didn’t press him too much—after all, their continued survival depended on his spell. But she started to shift uncomfortably on her hooves, feeling her boots rub up against a fine sand. This was it. Everything she’d ever wanted. Her future.
“We’re, uh… outside. Vanaheimr is here. It’s… huge. Bigger than anything I’ve ever seen. You could fit the whole cavern in it. So… high up.” He craned his neck as he spoke, though of course she could only imagine what it might look like.
She squinted in that direction anyway, not that her eyes would do anything. But no, there was something. Not a building, just… a point. A glowing point in the darkness, pulsing with its own heartbeat. Not like Penumbra, or Nightmare Moon, or the teleport. Somehow, this was a friend.
“We need to get in,” she said. “You can lead the way. Find us a door. We might have to… I guess there’s nopony to ask to let us in. Everypony’s gone, right? Otherwise we… wouldn’t have been struggling to survive all this time. The Alicorns could’ve helped us.”
“I don’t think we’ll need a door,” he said, setting off at a slow walk. It wasn’t that there was any less gravity up here, but apparently he was more cautious with the ever-present reminder of the emptiness around them. Nevermind that if he bounced off, he’d take the air with him. “The side is, uh… this city’s destroyed, Faith. Worse than you can imagine… like the Sun Tyrant burned huge holes in the sides.”
“Maybe she did,” Faith offered, unhelpfully. “What do you know about her? Other than… banishing our parents?”
Pause. “Well, she’s a more powerful wizard than our princess. Otherwise Nightmare Moon would’ve taken our parents home. We wouldn’t be living in a cave.”
“I guess,” Faith grumbled, kicking a nearby rock. Only it wasn’t rock, she could feel that against her hoof. The rubble was metallic, and rolled away with a slight clinking sound. She nearly gathered it up into her pack right then—metal that pure would be valuable salvage. But not “broke into the Sacred City” valuable.
“There’s magic in here,” Arclight went on. “I can feel it… pulsing. Like it’s watching us.”
“A single unblinking eye,” she finished for him. “Glowing through every wall in the building. Relieved that we returned. We have to go see it.”
“That sounds dumb,” Arclight argued. “How about we focus on not dying first. That sounds like the opposite.” He stopped abruptly, so suddenly that she skidded through the sand. But she didn’t dare go on without him. There could be all kinds of dangers up ahead, crevasse or sharpened spikes or worse.
“There’s… it’s close enough to jump. Some damage to the side of the building here. Ready to jump with me?”
She turned, glowering at him. “I can fly.”
“Then fly with me so your torch lights the way we’re going. You’ll, uh… see it? I don’t know how it works for you. But you should feel it coming when we get up into the air. Just… one, two, three!”
They jumped, Arclight springing up with all his might. Considering just how high they could jump on the moon, that meant a considerable distance. Up into the air in a wide arc, with unknown dangers below them. She squeaked almost constantly, listening to the ground vanish for a moment.
Then there was metal up ahead, approaching rapidly. They weren’t going to make it.
She groaned, wings jerking to life as she wrapped her forelegs around Arclight and heaved with all her might. It was a good thing he wasn’t an earth pony, otherwise she might not have been able to lift him. She flapped, her squeaks coming more exhausted now as she fought his weight.
Finally the ground came up to meet them. She flopped sideways as they landed, nearly falling over before she caught herself in the air with flared wings. The ground rang with every step, the characteristic sound of lunarium, but with a strangely pitted surface under her boots.
“I may’ve, uh… That was close. Thanks, Faith.” He reached sideways, hugging her.
She hugged him back. “That’s why we’re in teams of two,” she said, grinning. “Maybe just tell me next time if I need to carry you? It’s way easier if I can get a running start.”
“Yeah.” He looked away. “Sorry. It’s just… being here has me a little flustered. I’m not used to running a spell for this long after teleporting so far…”
She nodded. Even that was probably more than she should give. Being sympathetic to his exhaustion was one thing, but they needed to stay attentive. This was the Sacred City, this was the key to her job! And maybe her sight too.
But she didn’t have to rely on him completely, not now that they were actually at the city. She took a few steps away from Arclight, calling out with her mouth half-open, sliding one hoof cautiously along the ground ahead of her.
They stood beside a metal wall torn open just as Arclight had described. She heard many strange textures against her ears—glass, she thought, and dust, and some others. Just on the other side of the wall, there were strange shapes huddled on the ground, made of something she had never heard echoed before.
“Wait, where are you…”
She ignored him, crawling through the opening. She kept herself low to the ground, using her boots to feel the way just in case there were more unexpected dips. But she felt none, and soon enough she was in.
Strange smells filled her nose, a little like some of the workshops. Stale air lifted around her hooves, as she moved from a metal floor to something softer, something that would’ve been more comfortable on her hooves.
She reached for the shape, touching it with a hoof.
“Don’t!” Arclight called, much too late.
She reached out, feeling it with one boot. A semi-rigid material, giving a little under the pressure and bending backwards. Something squished inside, an organic-sounding crumbling. “Why?” She ran her hoof further up, tracing it until she came to a bowl-like protrusion. A sphere of glass, except it was softer than glass.
“You’re, uh…” Arclight hurried to catch up, climbing through the debris with obvious difficulty. That’s a body, Faith. A… dead Alicorn, judging by the clothes they were wearing.”
She pulled back, horrified. “It just feels like cloth!”
“They’re wearing… something strange. Like a… cloak, for their whole body. Even their head.” He winced. “Looks like it kinda… mummified them in there. Ugh, I can’t believe you touched it.”
She shook her hoof violently, as though she might dislodge whatever invisible corruption she’d invited by touching the dead. “I’m sorry, dead pony,” she whispered. “Please don’t curse us.”
Her fears were vain, fortunately. Not every Alicorn was like the Voidseekers. This corpse stayed a corpse.
“It’s not the only one,” Arclight whispered. “There are… most of them weren’t wearing cloaks. Those are… you’ll want to stay close to me, Faith, unless you want to walk all over them.”
She moved up to him, draping one wing all the way over his shoulder. “I guess this is why Nightmare Moon didn’t want anypony coming here. We’re… are we surrounded by bodies?”
He nodded. His whole body was shaking now, mildly enough that she guessed he was suppressing it for her. Fighting her fear, trying to look brave for his new marefriend. “We will be, if we go in here. And we’ll… want to remember the way we came.”
“Leave that to me,” she said. “I have the best direction-sense ever, Arclight. I can get around Moonrise without making a sound and without touching the walls… or I could, if I was alone and all the doors were open. But that’s not the point. I’ll remember the way we came.”
“Assuming we… go anywhere,” he said quietly. “We could go back. Nopony knows we’re here. They don’t have to know what we tried. I’m the one who did all the work.”
“We could,” she agreed, unable to keep the despair from her voice. “Is that really what you want? I’ll go back with you. But… we’re already here. There’s something awake here, magic waiting for us. Don’t you feel it?” She pointed off through the walls, down a slight incline she thought would take them into the rock. “Right there. What’s that way?”
He turned slightly to follow her hoof. “A corridor wall.” He tilted his head to the side, sounding slightly more curious than afraid. “What do you feel?”
She hit him with a hoof—not hard, not when she was still touching his side. “I just told you. There’s something here. Active magic, or… I don’t know, but it’s waiting for me.”
“You shouldn’t be able to do that,” he muttered. “Unicorns can sense spells. Like pressure against your forehead, pointing towards the magic. Mom says there’s differences in the force depending on what kind of spell it is, but I’m not there yet. I can’t feel anything in that direction specifically—everything is magic. Or… that’s not quite it. I think this stuff is all old and broken. There was so much magic here once I can’t tell it apart.”
“I’m sure.” She dragged him forward a bit, until Arclight gasped again, and she jerked to a stop. The ground in here was covered in rubble, some obviously broken from the walls, and others distinctly softer. She’d never heard echoes like these before, but she could guess what she was hearing.
“Okay, I’m going!” He hurried along beside her. “By now, if anypony was going to figure out what we did, they’ll know if we’re gone a few hours or a few minutes. Might as well… try and make it good, right? Instead of getting punished for nothing.”
“Exactly!” she said. She didn’t feel much like being cheerful and excited, not in a place like this. But she faked a little enthusiasm. “Keep your eyes open for anything useful. We’ve both got saddlebags—the more we bring, the better our chances.”
Together, Faith and Arclight traveled the Sacred City. Though the further they got, the more she thought that the name was incorrectly given. It should’ve been called the Sacred Tomb, and maybe she would’ve known what to expect.
They passed through many strange places, which were largely left to her imagination and the power of Arclight’s description. Vast stone hallways, chewed from the rock with a strange regularity. “What do you think that thing down the center is?” she asked, pointing above them with a hoof.
She couldn’t see it of course, but she could feel it. Pipes, and tight bundles like rope, all packed into a line that ran the length of the hall and occasionally got bigger or smaller as they passed various sections.
“Well…” Arclight hesitated. “These were magical Alicorns, all powerful like our princess. But they still had to deal with all the same problems living here, right? They have to keep their city warm. They had to keep the poison away. If they didn’t use magic, they need electricity to light their city when it gets dark. I bet that’s what those are for.”
Makes sense.
There were some recognizable things. They entered a huge vaulted room, where stone figures twice their height towered over a faint stench of once-living plants that lifted from their hooves as they walked. Faith pulled up her mask, coughing a few times before the disgusting taste was gone from the air.
“Do you recognize any of the statues?” she asked.
“No,” he answered. “I don’t think any of them is the Sun Tyrant. I’ve seen her cutie mark, these are all wrong. It’s… it’s weird, these ponies all have the same one. Like a planet, or… maybe a floating city?”
With every new turn or hallway they had to take, Faith directed them towards the secrets of her unseen sense.
“Oooh…” Arclight said, after they’d been walking for what felt like an hour through tight tunnels and narrow corridors. At any moment she thought they might wander into a dead-end, making her entire pathfinding method useless. But they hadn’t yet. “Looks like there’s something in there.”
He gestured, and she reached out with a wing towards where he was pointing. Her wing smacked up against a metal door, with a little bit of glass higher up. She stopped, pushing hard with one hoof. But if it was a door, it wasn’t on hinges, because it only clicked forward a little in its housing.
“You sure this isn’t just… some loose wall?”
“Positive,” he said. “There’s some kind of… lock-thing on the wall, all the doors have those. And through the window, there are… shelves? Of things. I don’t know what’s on them, but it’s got to be magical supplies, right? The Alicorns’ whole city is destroyed, but the stuff in there is still intact. It must be… the most powerful, important stuff there is.”
Faith opened her mouth to argue, but stopped short. It didn’t matter how obvious it was to her that the distant light was the most powerful magic in Vanaheimr. A locked vault was probably important too. “So teleport through?”
“No,” he said, suddenly exasperated. “Don’t you pay attention? Remember how tired I am after I do that? I can bring us in there with our air… but I won’t be able to keep the bubble up. What if it leaks? Or… what if we loot everything good from in there, but we can’t open the door from the inside? Then we’re really bucked, because as soon as we teleport out…” He gestured with a hoof. “There goes all our air. I can’t hold my breath all the way back, can you?”
“No.” She slumped onto her hooves, thinking. “Lock, you said? Maybe we can just get it to… open?”
“Sure,” he said, walking past her a few steps. There was a slight bump poking out of the wall there, one like many she’d heard, though there wasn’t anything else interesting about it. She sat beside him, listening while his boot smacked up against something like glass for a few seconds. Nothing happened.
“Doesn’t seem to do anything. Nothing magic inside it either… or if there is, the crystal’s shattered by now. It won’t respond to me. It’s… it was a good thought, but we can’t get anything out of here.”
She reached out with a wing, tracing it along the wall until she found what she was looking for. A raised metal protrusion, facing slightly outward and made of sturdy metal. There was a glass surface underneath. She felt it with the edge of a hoof, pressing it from one direction, then the other. Maybe, with the right pressure, she could get it to come apart.
“Don’t move,” Arclight muttered, his voice frightened. “It’s… glowing. When you put your hoof up to it like that.”
She froze as he said it, holding her hoof almost perfectly above the glass. Curious, she pulled her hoof back, ignoring his muttered protest as she wiggled out of the boot. She touched it with her bare hoof, holding it there for a moment.
She saw the light. A brief… pulse, from that distant star in the endless blackness. It traveled along a dozen lines, until suddenly it was in front of her. Something hissed, and a voice spoke. A mature female voice, but speaking no language she knew. “Emergency access. Lock disengaged.”
Something bubbled inside the wall, and then the door clicked. Air hissed out into their bubble, the strange smells of Vanaheimr but a hundred times stronger. “I did it!”
“You did it,” he repeated, voice awed. “Or… almost. It’s… it didn’t open all the way. Help me, I think we’ll have to do it ourselves. Probably… got stuck.”
She moved forward with him, bending down until she could wedge a hoof under the door a crack. They pushed, and slowly it rumbled upward. Until the door was open high enough for them to crawl.
“There,” he said, slumping to one side. “I need to… catch my breath. Don’t touch anything in the—”
Of course she wasn’t going to listen to him. She slid under the door, then squeaked a few times to get the layout. A single hallway, with shelves on either side and metal scaffolds around them. Strange shapes hung from those scaffolds at odd positions, trailing a thin hair of shed wires.
There was a great deal stored away in here. Maybe while he rested, she could find herself a set of metal eyes.
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Fool girl, she's lucky Panoptes seems interested in her little venture, locked rooms sometimes contain guards.
That seems like too many for the Voidseekers. I'm guessing Outsiders.
They are so lucky there was an air bubble waiting for them. Then again, maybe it's reasonable to expect that the rune magic teleportation system would take care of that. Or maybe I'm misinterpreting and this is still Arclight?
Huh. Sounds like that vault AI already likes Faith, which has interesting implications.
Probably true.
Also a fair point.
That's weird, or at least not Equestrian normal.
Oh shit, I bet she just opened up that vault.
Well, they aren't dead yet and they found more air. So far, so good.
9906914
I'm going to take a guess and say it's some intelligent AI.
A union of life and that which can only pretend to life. She definitely has the interest of that which lies between.
Oh dear. Don't say that where Nightmare Moon can hear.
Well, the city likes Faith. Quill may have gotten inheritible admin access. Now to see what she does with it... and just what's waiting for them when they get back.
So, is that air from the section they just unlocked, or was it just a small amount trapped inside the door or locking mechanism itself?
Faith's echolocation implies that the entire section has an atmosphere, unless everything she heard in there fits within the approximate ten-pace radius of Arclight's air bubble.
If it's actually a hallway connected to something bigger, and it has an intact atmosphere, then Arclight's bubble is the only thing keeping it pressurised right now.
He won't be able to move in and explore it with Faith unless they close the door again or are willing to risk venting the entire section.
9906930
Doesn't have to be intelligent, it might just be a rudimentary gatekeeper system. Remember she's a descendant of a guy who survived interfacing with an artifact older than Luna herself, an object she knows little about yet she came from the same city it was kept in.
9907048
Sounds can also conduct through the floor
9908161
True, but I'm not convinced that Faith can effectively use it for echolocation.
So many interesting possible finds! Though I do not think she will find her "eyes" in that vault unless its a general storage with medical supplies or a medical vault itself. Maybe look for the infirmary? If you are lucky they could even find that Vanhermir has its out Emergency Medical Hologram.
"obvious difficulty. That’s a body"
"obvious difficulty. "That’s a body"?
Also, it looks like there might be an extra line break above that paragraph.
Perhaps it only opens to children
Why would younotgive weapons to children.Well, at least Nightmare will only punish them slightly now instead of leaving some stains on the wall when they return. Too bad the secret room will be known to her after this most likely; pretty sad wasted effort.
Ha ha! The perks of Admin Access!
Corpse: "Okay, but only because you asked so nicely."
9906909
You should also always ask this question:
Was the locked room supposed to lock something out, or to look something in?
[1] Missing opening quote