Short Shorts

by Coranth

205. Pyramid (Author SI / Weyr/Nexus, Engineered Weyr-Ponies)

One moment it wasn't there, the next it was -- the titanic golden pyramid simply appeared one day, and... nothing happened. Ponies marvelled at its beauty from a distance - artisans sketched it, scholars studied it - all whilst waiting with bated breath for whomever lived inside to emerge. When nothing did, however... ponies soon ignored it and went about their daily lives as if such a thing was normal.

With her dream-scrying abilities, Princess Luna tried to peer inside the pyramid when its occupant was sleeping -- and was rebuffed immediately, the splitting headache she awoke with seemingly a warning to keep away; whoever lived within desired not to be disturbed, and yet also seemed content to stay there, to "live and let live" as it were.

Celestia didn't listen to her sister. Later, when the small scouting party of Royal Guardsponies approached the pyramid -- that was when things started to go wrong. Buried weapon emplacements rose from the ground around the pyramid to fire warning shots harmlessly over the Guardsponies heads -- and they fled, returning to report to their Princess what they'd seen.

Celestia, growing concerned, at least tried to be diplomatic. Escorted by two Guardsponies - whom stopped well away from the massive structure - she sent an unarmed, civilian-pony to approach the golden pyramid. He was an Earth Pony scholar and diplomat named Soft Words -- was because - when the weapons did not fire, and the massive doors of the Pyramid opened to allow him entry... he went inside -- and never came out again.

Later - much later - from out of the Pyramid, ponies emerged! First two, a mare and a stallion, then two more, and two more, and still two more after that, and more after -- an entire town's worth of ponies! The Equestrian Guards were leery of them, because - as they tended the land outside the Pyramid, went in and out to retrieve building materials to construct homes of wood, thatch, and even metal, and began to settle and... live their lives...

Something seemed... off... about these ponies. Something didn't seem right about them at all. All bore golden fur, manes of shocking white, and eyes like cold, hardened chips of ice. All were at least double the size of even the largest Equestrian pony, the stallions ripped with muscle, the mares lithe and finely-toned. It was as if... the occupant of the Golden Pyramid had distilled the very essence of the Equestrian Pony, and then... had perfected it.

Soft Words had been an Earth Pony... and yet, ponies of all races had emerged. How? The Equestrian Guards didn't know. As enclosures were constructed, and then filled with a myriad of strange and bizarre alien animals that no pony of Equestria had ever seen, something worse was found about the mysterious golden-furred, white-maned ponies that occupied the Homestead built about the Pyramid.

The ponies moved with a union and purpose that was perfect, too perfect; they went about their tasks in complete silence and, it seemed, unity; each was fully aware of each other, what they wanted, and what they needed, exactly when they needed it. There were no accidents, no collisions, even when moving the heaviest of items.

These "pyramid ponies"... they were like a hive-mind; like ants almost -- and would have remained that way, terrifying and mysterious in Equestrian Ponies minds, had a brave pony, a plainclothes-guard in civilian attire, not tried to communicate with them. "O shar'as shi'el, Guardspony," the voice rolled through the poor guard's mind like a muted thunderclap. "Speak your words; all will hear you."

Cold, hard eyes glared balefully at Brave Heart, as the alien pony waited for him to speak. "Our Princesses want to know - we all just want to know... Are you here as a threat to Equestria?" For a moment, the alien pony's eyes seethed with roiling, burning anger -- but then, with a breath in and a breath out, the golden-furred stallion calmed. "Only if you make us one, khin'eth," he answered, his voice muted, soft.

"Our Sem'pul and Olo'eyktan," he continued, a beat later, "merely wishes to live here in peace, to live and let live. He and we All will not harm you if you do not harm Us."