Twilight plans to explore the Far North. Ruthenium wanted to vacation to the boundaries of her kingdom. Nothing had prepared their own lives to change so much.
This is an expansion on my one-shot story Spoils of War.
Twilight's excursion across the world and beyond the known lands led her to a world, hidden within her own. Can she build peace with these xenophobic ponies or will war be the answer to peace?
Ruthenium's vacation to the edges of the known world is turned into a nightmarish invasion from outsiders, now all she wants to do is get home. This is mainly her story.
Twilight’s ears twitched as the ship wobbled slightly sending creaks of wood and metal as it swayed in rhythm and a smile grew widely across her features. She climbed from her bunk and practically pranced to the doorway and through the threshold, closing the large wooden door after herself as she made her way to the stairs. Two flights of stairs up and the wind blew lightly against her face as she passed the sound buffering spells.
She inhaled instinctively and closed her eyes as a calming sensation went through her before she opened her eyes and listened to the sounds of the airship’s crew called commands and slowly took the ship from the Canterlot Docks onto their exploratory excursion to the far north.
Financed by Twilight to learn more about the frozen north and lands beyond before they had to return to known friendly lands to supply and return home.
She took a few paces on deck and stumbled to the side as a young stallion rushed past her carrying an urgency she’d come to know as ‘important message, don’t bother me.' Humming in agreement at his dedication she looked over the railing and watched as Canterlot pulled away with much fanfare and well wishes for her and the crew.
She waved for a couple minute to the ponies at the docks until she noticed a prismatic contrail approached the airship and Rainbow Dash slowed to hover in front of Twilight with saddlebags and a duffel bag in tow. “Hey, Twi. Glad I made it? Can you imagine how boring this vacation would be without me?”
Twilight rolled her eyes in good nature. “Rainbow, you’re hours late and they won’t stop if you didn’t show up,” she smiled to Rainbow. “But I am glad you showed up, it’s always nice to travel with friends. Or a friend, in this case.”
Rainbow flew over the deck and landed, dropping her bags. “Hey, is this the poop deck?” she snorted and grinned.
“No, that’s back there,” Twilight waved a hoof behind herself and stopped as Rainbow burst into laughter.
“Yeah, that’s where it comes from, alright! Just let me know to watch out, so I'm not stepping on your poop deck!”
“Rainbow, please,” Twilight sighed loudly and turned to the stairway, pointing. “The rooms are two floors down, and you’re on patrol, second shift, so get some rest or have fun,” she held a hoof to Rainbow and looked seriously at the mirthful mare, “but remember that when you’re on duty, you have to be serious.”
Rainbow stood tall and saluted. “Yes, ma’am. As a Wonderbolt, I will be seriously on duty when I’m on the poop deck, ma’am!” Flashing a thousand bit grin, Rainbow gathered her bags and flew down the stairs and out of Twilight's sight.
“That mare,” she shook her head and let the frustration evaporate off her, “sure likes to have fun. I shouldn’t have told her about the main parts of a ship before she decided to come along,” Twilight made her way to the poop deck mumbling. “I just wish she’d take this more seriously, we’re taking a voyage, not a vacation, of exploration to uncharted lands.
“Even the yaks don’t know what’s beyond their borders, you’d think that’d be interesting enough?”
“Ma’am?” Twilight looked up and smiled. “Captain Stone Heart, nice to see we’ve made birth so easily.”
“We've cast off, your highness. To berth is when we dock.”
“Are you sure,” Twilight looked at the city slowly shrinking behind them, “birth is usually expelling one object from another.”
He snickered and sighed, letting a hum escape. “Princess Twilight, ‘berth’ as is ship term isn’t the same as ‘birth,' as in foaling.”
Twilight sucked in air and stood tall. “I knew that,” she exclaimed and looked aside anxiously, “just making sure you’re worth your sugar, as they say.”
Several nearby crew members made a point to look away from her as they restrained their laughter.
“Aye, well,” Stone chuckled, “I’ll prove I’m worth my salt in time, hopefully, this’ll be a peaceful voyage and none of my special skills will truly be put to the test.”
“Captain Stone, we’re on a mission of peaceful exploration. Why would anyone think otherwise of us?”
He looked at Twilight and exhaled slowly. “I’ll level with ya, your highness. The fact we’re taking a royal frigate is a might bit intimidating to those that might not know us.”
Twilight huffed. “I wanted to take a simple merchant ship, but my plans kept getting bigger as the maps became larger,” she looked him in the eyes, “I’m sorry if this ship’s inconvenient, but we need who and what we have explicitly for the journey ahead and back.”
“Ma’am, would you care to hold the wheel?” Stone changed the topic and stepped aside as Twilight giddily took his place. “Just look here at this here compass, keep’r lined up just like that. Little turns and motions. That’s right, just keep it up while I have a word with my navigator.”
Twilight nodded as she watched the compass with glances ahead to make sure the ship wasn’t in collision danger as they coasted through the air. She glanced up at the envelope and the balloon over her, the common thing keeping them aloft was so simple and fragile. Twilight remembered how she’d always admired such a simple thing and its importance. The lives it cared for without ever knowing, much like herself and the other princesses.
She looked ahead again and yelped as a mountain was nearly at the bow. She spun the wheel as a reaction and lost her footing, sliding with the tilting deck for a few feet until the ship stabilized and she noticed there was nothing ahead of them except open skies.
She looked at the sound of laughter and instantly joined the rest of the crew in frowning at Rainbow Dash as she dropped a travel magazine. “Rainbow! What do you think you’re doing?! You could have caused somepony to get hurt.”
“Sheesh, relax, Twi. Everypony’s fine, and you should keep your eyes on the skies, not the balloon, or maybe you will crash someday and it’ll suck a lot more than- oops, later!” she flew away and then toward the top of the sky mast.
Stone Heart glared at Twilight then softened his expression. “Princess, perhaps you’re not ready to pilot an airship yet. You’re more than welcome to try and find a place to rest and read the book that will be delivered to your room shortly.
Twilight smiled weakly and nodded. “I’m sorry about that, it wasn’t very professional of me, but I promise I’ll learn in time. I’ll see you later, call me if you need anything, okay?”
He let a crewmember take the wheel while he bowed slightly to Twilight and turned to give orders to a pegasus relating to Rainbow Dash and her supper.
Twilight wasn’t keen on punishments, but it would offer them more food later and a lesson to the prismatic mare about how to behave on an airship.
She made her way below deck and into her quarters, smiling at the books on her bed. Looking them over as she took them in her magic she thought back on her conversion with the captain.
“Ruthenium! I’ll never forget those eyes for all my days,” Star Gazer shouted in greeting to the mare as she rode a hovering cart powered by her magic into his driveway.
“Oh, you are too kind as always. Will you offer me a nuzzle or shall I take one?”Ruthenium countered when the cart stopped and landed.
“I agree to both,” he laughed loudly and trotted to her just as she placed her hooves on solid concrete. He nuzzled her in greeting but leaned back before she could touch her horn to his. “Tut, tut. We are no longer paired, and as such, I won’t share myself with you, lest I incur the wrath of blizzards for years to come.”
A mare with a haughty voice shouted from the house. “Speak of me as though I haven’t ears and I will offer you to the scorpions and snakes in the pit of judgment! Come, Ruthenium, let me see what my stallion left behind so he may have a proper mare.”
The two rolled their eyes and shared an apologetic look for different reasons. “Ruthenium’s here as a waypoint, not to be dressed down,” he called as he turned to the mare in the doorway. Both mares locked eyes and Ruthenium wilted under the higher-class mares authority and sizable horn that was nearly as long as her own front leg.
“Does she ever take care of her horn?” Ruthenium whispered to Star, who shook his head.
“She’s got it in her head she’s nobilities finest.”
Ruthenium blew air from the side of her mouth quietly. “Every unihorn is noble.”
The pair walked to the house and stood side by side before his new mate. “Argentum, this is Ruthenium. Ruthenium, this is my better and lover Argentum. Ruthenium is a gem shaper in the power cores, holds the title of supervisor, and is fond of yellow.
“Ruthenium, this is Argentum. She is of the second tier nobility, enjoys belittling others, and is fond of clothes fancier than what she’s currently wearing.”
There was a silence as both mares looked at him and then smiled at each other. “Come in, Ruthenium. Star, perhaps you’d like to graze or play in the sprinklers while us adults get acquainted.”
He nodded to the mares and turned away as the door shut behind them.
“You have a lovely home, Argentum. It’s far nicer than what Star and I shared,” Ruthenium started as she was led to the den.
“Thank you, it’s nice to see you understand quality at your level. However, there are many problems with this house that you will never experience as you will be here for a mere night,” she looked down her muzzle at Ruthenium.
“Meh, a night too long. I’ll be up before Queen Platinum Luscious, bringer of Light and Wisdom raises the sun, by then I’ll off to begin my tour of the outer edges and out of your mane as you will be out of mine. It’s tolerable to meet you, at best, Argentum.”
“Hrmph. Star was right about many things about you, one of them being that you are quite tolerable as well. Most mares I’ve met are either braggarts or cowards, you’re one of the few who has spoken to me honestly, and I respect that. I will afford you the opportunity to share your magic with Star if you wish.”
“I would like that, as we do still hold a fondness for each other, even we have moved on to better pastures.”
“Yes, you may enjoy pastures while I look down on you from my meadow,” Argentum took a reserved seat on a large cushion and let a small smile play on her lips as Ruthenium sat opposite her.
“A meadow is a host to many more bugs than a pasture, but you know that already, don’t you?”
Both mares smiled and nodded to one another. “Ruthenium, you are quite welcome to stay as long as you wish. I can tell a strong mare when I see one and to be honest, I’d prefer to keep playing as though we were at odds when Star is around.”
“As is the custom,” Ruthenium grinned and glanced to where the entry door was. “So, how are you, really?”
Argentum sighed and relaxed her neck, back, legs, and tail. “Oh, it hurts being pompous all the time,” she whined in a much more common voice, “airs and all that,” she looked at her horn and her eyes relaxed as it shrunk to a more common size. “Oh, that’s so much better. Headaches are part of life, it seems.”
“Beauty is pain, they say,” Ruthenium smiled and her horn lit as she sent some magic to the other mares horn.
“Oh, oh my. Yes, that’s much better. You’re such a sweet mare! How did Star lose you?”
Ruthenium stopped her spell and sighed. “I left him when he wanted a foal. I wasn’t ready by any means at the time. I’m still not ready, and that’s why I denied your offer to join your family.”
“Oh, I was wondering why your message was layered in such an awkward way,” Argentum tilted her head.
“I couldn’t figure out which spell to send denying your offer, so I sent three, and I guess they got confuzzled in transit.”
“The aethernet is limited to two spells per message for third nobility and you, my dear, are third,” she laughed lightly, “however they’ll never tell anyhorn that.”
“Males. It’s a good thing we keep them under hoof,” Ruthenium said before they shared a laugh. “If they had any idea…”
“Don’t offer them the chance! Princess Platinum forbid!”
The front door opened and a thud got their attention. “Ruthenium, I have your trunk. It’s heavy. Shall I store it or leave it by the door?”
With a roll of her eyes, Argentum returned to a proper stance. “Leave it in the rain for all I care.”
“By the door is fine. I’m in no rush to stay any longer than I must.”
They grinned at each other at his sigh. “Fine, just don’t hurt each other when I’m upstairs taking a nap.”
“Surely the world will end while you’re resting,” Argentum shouted.
The mares shared an apologetic look for the same reason. “He’s still a nice stallion, right?”
“One of the best second-tier nobles there is. Can you imagine the waste if he was in the breeding stables?”
They shared a congenial laugh.
Ruthenium drove her cart at the top speed she could manage as she panted from exertion. “Spell, spell, spell! I can’t believe I overslept. Of all the days to oversleep it has to be the day I have to catch the transport on time,” she admonished herself as she saw the terminal approach. With a grin that broke through the stress, she sped into the parking lots and stopped as quickly as was safe before she cast a spell and the cart seemed to shrink to the size of her hoof.
Putting the cart in her chest pocket, she lifted her travel trunk and galloped through the pony-sized doorway and into a lovely, warm, sunny entryway of a hotel. She looked at the statue of some fashionable unicorn she didn’t know and growled in frustration. “Uncle of a mud pony!” she turned and practically leaped back through the doorway and landed where she’d left and looked at a display panel beside the door.
“Spiral City? I don’t need Spiral City; I need Dream Crescent,” she planted her hooves firmly on the ground and sent a spell to the display, linking her mind to it as she recalibrated the destination. When there was a charge added to her bill for missing the first portal she reluctantly accepted and wailed in short-term agony as magic was torn from her very essence.
“Mommy, is she hurt?” a young colt asked loudly as he passed her.
“No, she’s obviously poor and deserves to pay for her poverty. Come along, Blue, don’t gawk at the lower classes.”
Ruthenium opened her eyes and looked at the ground in front of her through a headache with a sad pout. One more portal hop and I’ll be relaxing in a hot bubble bath for two weeks of bliss. I’ll recover my mana by then, and I’ll have a word about getting a gem or ten to refund my fees from the office.
She planted her hooves and stood, taking her trunk in her magic, she dragged it through with her and let it lay where it was as she fell to her belly in exhaustion.
“Miss Ruthenium? My goodness, what happened to you?”
She looked aside and smiled weakly. “A valet? For me? So kind.”
“Uh, sis? It’s me. Random Ruthenium, did you get charged for being late?” she nodded weakly to his question, and he huffed. “Those greedy bastards. You know all that mana goes into gems that the elite use to power their bidets and hot baths? What a waste.”
She leaned into him as she got up and took in his scent. It was definitely her brother, and that was comforting. “I haven’t been with the family for what feels like generations. I brought my cart.”
“Good for you, I’ve brought the car."
“Jerk.”
“Pauper.”
They shared a quiet laugh as he led her toward an open cart with wheels and an encased mana powered engine. He let her take the back seat as she recovered from her drain as he took a position in the front and charged his horn. “So, how’s work in the big city? Still living at that place with the mudder power?”
“Ugh, no! That place stank like them in the worst way. No air filters could keep the smell away, so I moved to a penthouse on Turner Street.”
“Well, somehorn’s moving up. Soon you may be able to hobnob your way into the second tier by merit alone.”
She laughed mockingly. “Yeah, when preeners take over the skies.”
“Ha, you still believe those rumors about flying ponies?” was his indignant response.
“They’re true! I read in the news that a mare knew a stallion that knew a colt’s sister that was neighbors with a doctor and a pony was born with wings! It was on the aethernet news; it has to be true!”
“Yeah, you say that like it’s true. Fox News can take over the aethernet with their satire crap, but I’d prefer to read any source of news over that crap; like that crazy stallion that lives by the river in the van. Remember him? He’d tell the future by the frequency of his own farts? Yeah, that guy’s more reliable.”
“Well, Fox News is the real truth, and only smart ponies know that.”
He rolled his eyes as they got to a good speed on the highway and a magic field created a dome protecting them from various forces while they drove. “Yeah, says who? Them?”
“No, Governor Trumpet! The leader of-” she was cut off by a radio turning on loudly. She winced as loud music filled their ears; she quickly used her magic to turn it off. “What the hay?! Can’t stand to know the real truth about the lies you’re told by ‘standard media?’ You’re one of the reasons why the monarchy is hiding the real facts!
“Preeners are real, and there’s even a rumor of a secret pony tribe, beyond the barrier, which is both unihorn and preener!”
He groaned with a sigh and knew he was in for a very long drive that not even a silence spell could block out. "And part mudder?"
"Euck, why would you even suggest that?! Disgusting, you can joke all you want but I stand by my claims that-"
Twilight yawned quietly and felt her jaw muscles stretch from overextension. Sheesh, how long was I reading this book? she looked down blearily at the book she’d finished, apparently, but didn’t recall closing before she lay her head on it. “Huh, that’s all of them? Wow, I really need to get some me time that isn’t in the books.”
She sniffed the air and noticed her unique scents filling the air. “And a shower is way overdue,” she mused as she grabbed a wicker basket in her magic and took it with her as she left the room, down the hall, through a set of heavy doors, and into a room that she had to admit she loved.
“Princess Twilight! Girls,” a mare whispered loudly as she, and quickly following several others, gathered before her and bowed, “your spa treatment is overdue, Your Highness”
Twilight smiled. “Overdue?” she asked nasally, “this’ the first one I’ve had since we left Canterlot yesterday, but whatever. Sure, I’ll take the works and my hooves feel uneven so can I get a little filing, too?”
The mares rushed to their positions around the small but efficient room dedicated to pampering her and catering to her needs. “Your Highness, if you would like to put on this robe?”
“Thank you, and please just call me Twilight. What’s your name?” she asked as she took the robe and donned it.
“My name is Vera, I believe you know my cousins in Ponyville, Aloe and Lotus. She writes of your visits and how honored she is to have you frequent her business.”
“Oh yeah. They’re really helpful and kind. I think it was a great idea for them to open a spa in Ponyville because it’s what everypony needs, even though they might not know it.”
“Ah, yes… Twilight. Now, if you’ll follow me this way,” she led Twilight to a room that no more than two ponies could fit in comfortably, “this is the steam room. I trust you know how it works?”
“Yes, I do. Thank you, I’ll be fine for now. Just come get me in twenty minutes.”
“Yes, Your- uh, Twilight.”
Twilight opened the door and stepped in, closing it behind her before the hot blindingly thick steam could escape.
She felt ahead of her with her hoof and laid on the bench with a deep inhale and exhale, letting her mind relax.
“HeyTwilightwhatchyadoin?!” Rainbow shouted from behind the princess.
Halfway through the shout, Twilight had tumbled to the floor with a very dignified scream and refined thud against the closed door. While her royal bladder relaxed slightly in a most noble way, she was still quite upset to have her moment of zen broken.
She lit her horn and with a flash she was alone in the steam room again and retook her place, placed a hoof to her chest with an inhale, exhaled with a controlled breath as she extended her hoof from her body, and let her zen return.
The door to the steam room opened and Rainbow stood at the threshold, dripping wet with cold water and certainly not a smile nor a frown gracing her face. “Twilight?”
“Ah, Rainbow Dash, I didn’t notice you. Glad you could make it to my moment of relaxation. Care to take a quiet seat?”
“Quiet mome-, you know what? Fine!” she flew into the room and landed in front of Twilight and shook herself some before flapping her wings to take her over her friend, raining cold water on her as she passed. “Wanna tell me why you teleported me outside the ship?”
Twilight’s ears relaxed as she lowered her head to her forehooves. “Oh, just making sure you were awake and ready for the call of duty. How was your guard shift?”
Rainbow scowled through the thick white steam at Twilight but sighed and let it go. “Awesome as usual. There was a bird flying a bit higher than normal, but ten minutes of interrogation led us to believe it was really just a bird and not a changeling spy sent to infiltrate the ship. There were some suspicious lights the second day but it turned out we were passing a Yak village.”
“Second day?” Twilight mumbled, “you mean today.”
“Twilight,” Rainbow groaned, “it’s been three days since we left Canterlot and you’ve been reading the whole time. Again.”
Twilight’s ears perked for a second before she relaxed. “Heh, that’s what I get for studying on a voyage. Did the ponies take good notes of whatever we passed?”
“Psh, like I’d know. I was too busy showing the stallions how a real Wonderbolt scouts and reports,” the air in the room shifted enough to let Twilight know Rainbow was posing.
“Then I’ll read them later. Please, just give me some peace and quiet while I… wait, why’re you even here? You don’t like spa’s,” Twilight asked sitting up.
“Well, turns out I do like some parts of them, just not all parts of a spa. No pony touches my hooves and my wings are off limits, but a nice massage really helps from time ta time.”
“You said it,” Twilight giggled.
…
Hours later, Twilight emerged from the spa feeling like a new mare. She inhaled the scent of lavender from her coat and a hint of coconut in her mane as she took a breath of slightly stagnant woody air that quickly overshadowed the pleasantness of herself. With a happy step to her walk, she made her way to the deck and winced at the sudden temperature change from the warmth below to a sudden near freezing windchill above.
Watching mares and stallions go about their duties cleaning and taking whatever time they could to relax, she made her way to the captain, or where she thought he’d be. Finding only crew at the helm she turned away.
“Your Highness! Captain sends word to see him in his office,” a mare bowed low as she spoke loudly over the wind.
“Thank you, on your way to your duty or I’ll send you to the bilge!” Twilight stated firmly. The mare stood tall and saluted. When Twilight returned the salute the mare turned, quickly galloping away.
Huh, that worked pretty well, Twilight mused to herself as she made her way to the main deck and entered the captain’s galley, enjoying the sudden change in temperature from near freezing to simply cold enough to stop a pony from shivering uncontrollably.
“Ah, finished your studies, I see,” Captain Stone Heart greeted her with a bow of his head from the other side of a navigation table.
“Well, I had a lot to learn. I at least know the basics, but real world training is where it counts.”
“Right you are, Your Highness. This here map’s all we have of our known lands and as you can see we left the edge already,” Twilight stood at the table’s edge and looked at the map, “so we have the cartographers you brought drawing new maps as we go. The problem, is we have no idea what’s ahead of us so I’ve put the crew at ease with their guards up.
“At a moments notice they’ll be at stations and ready for defense and evasion, as per your orders to avoid conflict at all costs,” he smiled slightly to her, “and with luck, this mission will see no need to call to arms.”
Twilight nodded. “If I could have, I would have taken every weapon and left them back at the drydocks. Fact of the matter is that we don’t know if we’ll come across peaceful ground based civilizations of reptiles or flying snakes with poisoned bladed wings,” she chuckled, “not that that’s really possible, but it never hurts to be prepared.”
“Again, another wise notion. Would you care to go over ship status with the department heads, or take time enjoying the sights of new lands?”
“Both, to be honest. But I think learning and maintaining the ship takes precedent over watching scenery that shouldn’t be that important in the short run.”
“Very well, I’ll call them up for the three day meeting,” he turned and shouted to a younger mare. “Call the heads to come along now!”
“Calling department heads now, sir!” she replied, turning and galloping to a side room and shutting the door.
“You run a tight ship, captain.”
“Indeed. A lax ship is a doomed ship.”
“I agree, especially after all I’ve read. So, where on the map are we?”
“Well, we’ve passed the Yak lands and over several villages until we reached the map’s edge. Now we’re here,” he tapped a spot on the newly sketched map, “and it’s mostly mountains as far as we can see. Scouts have reported a declination of mountains about a day’s travel ahead, but it’s slight so far and nothing really indicated that it’s an end to them.”
“You’re not having scouts fly half a day ahead, are you?”
Stone Heart laughed loudly. “If I did we’d lose the crew, Ma’am. No, they fly up and ahead then glide down to meet us and report. Best we can guess is a seventy mile scan around with little to no idea what’s ahead of us past forty miles, what with the mountains and all. Best we can hope for is a hundred miles in perfect weather, if such a thing exists beyond the peaks.”
“Always hope for the best, captain. At times, it’s all we can do.”
Twilight sighed as she held the wheel, steering the ship. She looked ahead through a spyglass to the edge of the mountains and a short dry area before a forest sprung up just after it.
“Unusual,” Twilight turned to a nearby colt. “Call the navigation leadership and cartographer, please. There's something odd just ahead.”
“Yes, your highness!” He shouted and galloped away.
She waited nearly twenty minutes before they all arrived at once. “If there was an emergency on deck would it have taken you nearly half an hour to get to stations?” She asked calmly, turning the wheel slightly to adjust their course.
“We were a bit preoccupied, your highness. I apologize on behalf of all of us.”
“Seven ponies, one excuse. I'll have a talk with the captain about your urgency,” she looked pointedly at the department head.
He gulped audibly then bowed, the rest followed. “How may we serve you?”
“There's a forest ahead, but it's density doesn't make sense. There are nearly three times as many trees as there should be. Ideas as to why?”
“Could it be an illusion?”
“A version of the Everfree?”
“ Magically modified fertile soil?”
“A wall to keep others out?”
Twilight listened as they rattled ideas off each other until they stopped. “We'll know when we get closer. Three hours at current speed… Crew! To stations, soon we may meet friend or foe!
“If they are friends, let it's offer it to them. If they're foes let them offer it to us!”
The crew that heard her cheered and began to scramble to their posts. Within five minutes the only sound was that of the wind blowing and the creaking of the ship as it soared.
An hour later and the crew were still at their posts, watching diligently for anything out of the ordinary.
“Ship, ahoy! Scuttled ship ahoy! Port side, coming up!”
The crew shouted the first call across the top decks to each other, quickly mobilizing their efforts for a possible salvage operation.
“Belay your efforts, lads! We'll pick her clean on the return!”
“Commander Sharp, it's nice to see you again. I believe I called for the captain, though.”
“He's busy at the moment, Your Highness. What's the situation?”
Twilight looked aside at the tall grey unicorn stallion. “A forest an hour out, scuttled ship off the port bow. Crew stands ready for orders.”
He looked at her and smiled. “Well done,” he said in a near whisper before addressing his crew. “Pegasi, team three, front and center!”
Five pegasi swooped around from below the ship and landed in a perfect line in front of him.
“Are you ready to serve your princess?!”
“Sir, yes, Sir!” They shouted in perfect unison and harmony.
“Go ahead and scout the ship off port. Anything catches your fancy, leave it. It's been here ages and won't mind waiting a little more. Danger lurks at every turn here in the unknown, so watch each other's flanks. Dismissed!”
The five pegasi opened their wings, crouched, and flew off at the same time in perfect formation.
“Not bad,” Rainbow’s raspy voice said from above Twilight, “trained them myself so they're pretty awesome. Want me to tag along, watch over 'em?”
“No, I need you to scout ahead to the forest edge, Miss Dash. Take squad one with you and stay alert. I got a feeling in my knee there's danger ahead.”
Twilight rolled her eyes at the commander's comment, but still nodded to Rainbow Dash. “He's right. Go ahead and report back as quickly as you can. I'm staying the course until otherwise noted.”
Rainbow nodded and took off ahead of the ship, turned around to yell at her ponies to follow, then did her best to leave them behind as her contrail dissipated before they could catch up.
Twilight held the wheel steady and maintained a calm demeanor while she nearly panicked internally.
Rainbow stopped with an enormous gust of wind trailing behind her. Twilight quickly cast a shield around the entire ship, muffling the sonic boom that postceded her arrival. “Twilight, there’s a settlement over there! Just before the forest there’s an earth pony settlement and they look really bad,” Rainbow wrung her hooves together nervously. “Like, really, really bad, Twilight. We need to get them some food and help,” Rainbow landed and stood close to her friend. “What can I tell them you’ll give ‘em?”
“Rainbow, before I can just throw food at ponies in need I need to see what’s wrong first. Commander, we’re diverting to help ponies in need. Inform the captain of my intent and have the galley prepare some basic supplies of hay to be offered in exchange for information as to what caused them to get to such a state.”
Commander Sharp looked at her for a second then turned away and began to call orders as he left the poop deck. “So, should I tell them you’re on the way, Twi?”
“Yes, please. They may need a friendly face to let them know we’re all peaceful.”
“Roger that,” Rainbow took to the air and just as Twilight lowered her shield, Rainbow flew out of it and back the way she came, leaving a loud sonic boom in her wake.
“Forgot about that part,” Twilight mumbled as she worked her jaw to pop her ears.
…
“All stop! Anchors away and stow the sails! Deflate seven-percent. Pegasi, add bilge to nets! Swabbies, hold to cut lines…”
Twilight moved to the edge of the ship and opened her wings, standing tall facing the settlement as the ship descended to one hundred feet from the ground. A group of pegasi took the lead and with full armor adorned with purple highlights and Twilight's cutie mark emblemized on their chests. Landing they formed two lines which Twilight landed gracefully between.
Here we go… Twilight mustered her best regal attitude as she trotted ahead to the small tightly built hamlet. Fourteen huts large enough for four ponies each, but where are they?
Rainbow flew up to her from what could be considered the main street, if it were paved or taken care of. “Twi, it’s a real mess in there. The ponies were nervous of me and the others so I sent them onto patrol while I tried to talk to ‘em, but when the ship came into sight they bolted into their homes and haven’t even peeked out.
“I don’t think you wanna go in the town, Twi…”
“Why not? It’s my duty as the Princess of Friendship to cross all avenues to bridge peace.”
“No, it’s because there isn’t a bathroom or outhouse in the whole town. They literally go as they walk and it’s what most of what the town’s made of.”
Twilight faltered and stopped. “Are you serious?” she asked.
“Very. I’m glad I didn’t land because I’d need a shower for sure.”
Twilight looked ahead to the town and resumed her stance. Calling to her magic she encompassed herself in a shield and resumed her trot.
“Twi, what’re you doing?! I just told you it’s a town made of… poop!”
“I have a shield that’ll keep me clean. I need to see what these ponies know about the forest and what help they need. Are you coming, Rainbow Dash?”
The soldiers didn’t hesitate to keep pace with Twilight, keeping her in the center of their formation until she reached the town edge where it was clear that a line had been drawn as it seemed the cold ground changed from hardened stone to firmed equine feces. She shuddered as she placed a hoof into the muck and it squelched slightly.
Taking a deep breath she walked into the muck and to the first hut. The stench of urine wafted from the inside and she reinforced her spell before she knocked. “Hello? My name is Princess Twilight Sparkle. I’m on a mission of peace representing Equestria, do you have time to talk or direct me to your leadership?”
She was met with silence. Knocking again she moved to place an ear against the door and heard nothing.
The next house, the one following that, until she’d tried all fourteen houses to no avail. “Anypony live in this town at all?!” She shouted in frustration. “C’mon, I just wanna talk! I have food and medical supplied if you need them. Just talk to me, please.”
Rainbow flew over to Twilight and placed a hoof on her back. “Twi, you’re starting to freak out over friendship again. Breathe it off and let’s try this another way.”
Twilight nodded and took in a deep breath as Rainbow went to a door. “Hey, it’s the colorful birdie pony. I’m back with my friend and she’s really nice and wants to be your friend, so can you, like, open up and say ‘hi?’”
There was a noise that didn’t seem to fit the scene before the door opened and Rainbow grinned at the shadowed opening. She didn’t have time to react as yellow liquid was thrown at her from a hollowed out gourd covering her underbody. Her smile fell as she snapped her attention to Twilight.
Twilight watched as a look of disgust and horror took over Rainbow Dash who flew behind a house and vomited before flying away. Twilight scowled as she trudged over to the door and knocked loudly. “You listen here! That was mean and not very nice to do to my friend. Come out here and talk to us or I’ll come in there and make you apologize to my friend for what you did.”
A moment passed before her horn lit and the door was forced open and fell off its frame. Twilight noticed it wasn’t held on by anything, but that paled in comparison to the five earth ponies that were huddled together, half buried in their own muck. She gasped as she noticed that they were carefully covering other ponies when they noticed her looking at them.
With a loud yelp, the three obvious adults all fell into prostration before Twilight and buried their muzzles into the flooring. Twilight lifted their faces from the floor and cleaned their muzzles clean and stepped back from the doorway. “Please, come out and let us talk as friends,” she smiled softly.
They trembled and nodded, rising they turned back to the buried ponies and dug out two fillies no older than a year. Twilight quickly acted and took them in her magic and cleaned them in a flash. In that same moment the adults screamed in pain and fell to their bellies, letting tears fall freely.
“No! It’s okay, your children are still here! Look, I just cleaned them, is all. Please, don’t cry,” Twilight pleaded. “Your fillies are fine! Please, look at them, I would never harm a foal, honest!”
The parents looked up and noticed the magic still holding the foals and scooted away from them, taking a guarded position each. “Please, take them, they need you, can’t you see-” she stopped and lowered the fillies to the floor and took a step away, lifted the door, and replaced it.
She listened as the sound of whimpering filled the hut before it fell silent again a few seconds later.
She looked around the huts and lowered her head. Teleporting to the edge of town she lowered her shield and made her way back onboard the ship. “I need a small contingent of earth ponies dressed in hazard suits to try to communicate with the settlers.”
Taking a seat by the mast she let the weight of what she’d seen take over and she cried for the way the ponies were surviving, the fear they had, and how they appeared to be terrified of magic and her.
“Twi, are you okay?” Rainbow asked as she hugged Rainbow.
Twilight sniffed Rainbow and noticed the fresh scent of blueberry in her coat. With a nod she hugged Rainbow and relaxed. “What could have caused that, Rainbow? I’ve never thought a pony could live like that.”
“Yea, it totally sucks. I was covered with pee, by the way. Old pee, like they were saving it. That’s why I puked. The spa’s out of order for the rest of the day while they sterilize the place.”
Twilight snorted and laughed. “You hate them so much you had to shut them down?”
“No, but they didn’t want you to use water that was contaminated so there’s a whole buncha ponies doing stuff to make it all better.”
“Don’t pee in the pool, Rainbow. That’s why.”
“Psh, I haven’t met the pool… uh, anyway, what’s the plan with the poop ponies?”
“Rainbow,” Twilight replied in a deeper voice intended to scold her as she pulled away and broke the hug, “that’s not a nice thing to call them. There’s something wrong with them and insults don’t help injuries. We’ve gotta find a way to get through to them and I only hope earth ponies can do it.”
Twilight waited with Rainbow Dash until hunger for the better of them. While they ate in the galley a stout mare approached the duo.
“Earth pony report is ready, ma'am.”
“Thank you, I'll see to it within the hour.”
With a nod the made turned and left the galley. “So, Twi. Think they had better luck?”
“I hope so. I'm not hungry so you can eat my share of you want. I'm gonna check in with the reporting crew.”
Rainbow smiled weakly. “I'll be there in a minute. I kinda lost my breakfast earlier.”
Twilight stood and with a quiet goodbye, she left to the debriefing. Walking in she saw sullen looks on the six ponies that went. They stood and called attention.
“That bad?”
“Yes, Twilight,” they relaxed as their team leader spoke, “ they're mentally and physically broken. They have little sense of self and basic language skills.
“The single pony that spoke to us was middle aged and told of of their loyal servitude to the high queen in exchange for their lives. A unicorn by the sound of it.
“Their group got lost foraging and found themselves here two generations ago, where they built their homes the only way they knew how.
“It sounds like a population of unicorns has enslaved earth ponies at their disposal for manual labor.”
“Sounds painful and unfriendly. Do they know where the unicorn settlement is?”
“No, they only know it's days trot through the forest.”
“Two generations living in that mess… commander, drop them hay and send I'll send a message back to the Crystal Empire informing them of our find. With luck the ponies below will have lives for their foals and themselves.”
“Dismissed,” Commander Sharp announced. The room emptied, leaving Twilight and Sharp. “Princess, I speak for myself, but what if this is just the tip of the iceberg?
“That there is a hostile unicorn settlement ahead of us.”
“Then we defend ourselves with all we have until I can broker peace with their leader. Commander, we have a lot to do, so I believe we should focus on what we're good at.
“You concentrate on the ship and I'll take care of logistics.”
“Yes, ma'am.” He nodded.
Twilight bit her lips and began to pace as she tried to think of what could be in store for them ahead on their journey.
Ruthenium lay on her side, snoozing lightly in the warm summer sun as it held its place in the sky in her one piece bikini that covered her privates from unworthy eyes and tube socks on her front knees to keep them hidden in common style. She'd made it to the first frontier village of Crystal Depths and was taking her time at the lake’s beach. As foals played in the lake the sound of motor boats sounded in the distance as they coasted through the waves.
Adults could be heard holding conversations and it was just what Ruthenium needed. Time alone yet not alone. Time away from work and the stressed it caused. An errant ball bounced off her and with a whimper her eyes opened, she looked up to see a stallion galloping toward her. “Hey, can you horn me the ball?” he asked her as his eyes glanced at her forelegs. She looked and noticed one sock had slid, exposing part of her knee that she promptly covered.
With a goofy expression she lifted an object and tossed it to him. With a casting of his own magic he caught her picnic basket she’d thrown at him and trotted over to her. “You, uh, tossed the wrong thing. You look a bit tired, would you like to join us, it’ll wake you up? Afterwards we’re having fizzy water at the cafe and I’d like to see you there.”
Her ears tingled and after blinking a couple times she took his visage to memory for use during a future night if nothing happened. “Uh, yeah. Sandball? I can join in,” she got to her hooves and shook the sand off her body, picked up the ball, and followed him to the court. “No magic rule?”
“Yeah, not much challenge if we all cast.”
“Hey, lovers! Throw the ball to us and get a tent,” a mare mocked them sending them both into a blush.
He looked toward the pink mare. “When was the last time you needed a tent besides mid spring?” The ponies around offered an ‘ooo’ sound at the challenge but she bowed her head in defeat. “Yeah, thought so. Game on! 6-2, our ball.”
She took her place and prepared to play their version of volleyball with her goals in mind. Win game. Win stallion. Walk funny for a couple hours. she giggled at her short list of foals. Goals! He wasn’t that good looking! She nearly missed the start of the match and followed the ball as it soared over the net, starting its journey back.
It was definitely a great time to be alive and on vacation.
Ruthenium woke to the rising sun and noticed she was alone in her room. A note left beside her thanked her for the evening and wished her the best, signed the stallion. She’d forgotten his name and decided she didn’t need to know it so she crumpled the letter up after the first words were read and tossed it aside.
With a happiness in her body she didn’t know she was missing she called in a meal from the bedside communication device before she clambered out of bed and walked funny to the bathroom to shower and refresh herself before she used her overpriced room service tokens to enjoy breakfast in bed.
The door rapped gently and she opened it while still drying her tail to see a cart loaded with food, treats, desserts, snacks, munchies, and a single mint she’d requested as well. Placing it all on the bed in different places she nearly tipped the earth pony that delivered the food before she noticed the sad and defeated expression indicating his lower race. With a scoff and wave of her hoof he left with the cart and she used the towel to rub her head clean of any airborne filth it may have carried with it.
Discarding the towel behind the bathroom door she turned to happier thoughts and climbed into bed, turned on the television, and watched cartoons as she ate her fill several times over the next hours. She started with the mint. Sometimes no amount of time or brushing can take the flavor of a good night away, she giggled to herself.
The trays, plates, and cups were all nearly empty when she snorted awake amidst crumbs and food stained sheets. Sitting up she realized she’d developed a headache from her very poor vacation diet, or so she hoped. Worse case was that it was from being so close to a mud pony. She dismissed the idea and gathered all the plates and bowls from her bed and set them just outside her room door, taking note her meal for the day thus far was quite massive and unbalanced with a smile. That is one point of a vacation, afterall.
“Ahh, I’ve napped, crapped, rolled in the sheets, and washed my teats. I think it’s been a great start to the day, but I’ve got a museum to check out and more time than I need to go shopping,” she squealed to herself. “I’ll rent a friend on the way and go shopping with her. I just hope she’s a good conversationalist,” she tapped a hoof to her chin. “I’ll spend an extra ten units for it if I have to.”
Mind made up, she found the number and cast the spell making sure she requested a female unihorn with intelligence and a hoof up on pop culture to meet her at the mall entrance. That done she dressed simply in a dress of silk and lace, gathered her purse, donned her horn decorations of exquisite gems and ancestral bone fragments indicating luck and wealth, her currency, and finally her ID’s.
Her room was a bit of a mess, but they’d have it cleaned by the time she returned and maybe she wouldn’t return alone again. The thought sent a smile to her lips and tingles to various parts of her body as she recalled one important thing about the previous night. She searched the bed and found the mint she’d forgotten. Quickly crunching it and swishing it around her mouth after she did.
Arriving at the mall she met her friend for the afternoon and they spent the next four hours shopping and even though they both knew it wouldn’t last, they did become friends. Taking her newly purchased items to her room she sniffed the fresh citrus in the air and placed her bags beside her bed before flopping on the freshly cleaned comforter. “This is bliss,” she mumbled into the pillows.
The only odd part about her entire excursion to the mall was a crazy unicorn stallion that must have escaped the stables, shouting about the end being near. ‘Repent to Princess Platinum lest the winged horn-beasts tear your souls from your living bodies and burn your livers in their evil brew. Repent, unihorns. Repent for your sins against each other and the mud ponies that serve you!’
She’d rolled her eyes at his antics and had gone about shopping, but it was a bit unnerving to see a unihorn, stallion nonetheless, having lost his mind.
Putting that sad thought away she focused on the next three days before she’d be taking a tour of the edges of the southern forest and its completion would mark the end of week one. She sent her purchases back to her hotel room and the rest of the day was spent eating like a glutton at three food stands, flirting with a half dozen mares and two stallions that all shot her down outright, having several drinks at a tavern, and dragging herself back to her room alone and horny, too tired to do anything about it.
The next day she woke with the rising sun and thanked Platinum for her generosity in sharing the gift of her light before washing, dressing, organizing her room, and remembering at the last moment before she left to use the toilet, she left her room and the hotel behind to see the local sights of Crystal Depths, home to one of the world’s murkiest locations of above ground water.
Museums, restaurants, an arcade to die for, more restaurants, planning a date with a gorgeous mare much later that night at a kiosk in the mall. By four she was spent and returned to her room with lethargic enthusiasm. She collapsed onto her bed and passed gas she’d been holding for hours.
Regretting her decision to eat half her body weight that day and to hold flatulence in for so long she opened the sliding door to let fresh air in and the lingering stench of her meals out as a gift to everypony nearby.
She giggled at the thought of nobles scrunching their noses as her gas passed them and they began blaming each other in their haughty indignant ways. She was being foalish and loved it as she drifted off to sleep.
A knock on the door woke her and she rolled to her hooves, opened the door, and gawked at her forgotten date. The other mare stood with two fluted glasses and a bottle of wine, the next hour was certainly going to be exciting and a great way to end her second day before she’d have to wake up, pack, and take an actual train to the borderlands.
“This’ the best vacation ever,” she said to herself as the mare walked past her.
“I’ll make sure of it,” she replied as the door closed loudly.
Princess Twilight Sparkle; personal log. Voyage Day 17. 13 Harvest, 1007
Five days crossing this forest is depressing me. I maintain my smile and joyful exterior but Rainbow Dash knows as well as I do that there’s only so much a pony can handle. Even with me on board it’s like being at a sea of water only instead of water it’s a never ending sea of trees so densely packed that there shouldn’t be a forest here! I haven’t been willing to stall our progress to explore the forest below because I need to get the crew past this. I have to be the leader and symbol that inspires them, Princess Twilight Sparkle will be there when they need me.
I’ve sent a letter to Spike letting him know of the drudgery he’s not missing and I image if he were here he’d be asleep or complaining about coming along. Rainbow Dash is doing that enough for my stress levels but she’s keeping the other ponies in shape by running near constant exercise routines that if she’s not leading she taking part in. I make sure she keeps a few pegasi on constant scouting duties ahead of us in the general direction we were pointed by those poor poor earth ponies we left behind. My mind keeps going back to their poor lifestyle and what we might encounter ahead of us.
Celestia sent me a letter informing me that the ponies were found but gathering them to return to Equestria had proven difficult, that is until they were shown the variety of food we have to offer beyond grasses, tree leaves and bark, and other such absolute basics. Now they’re in a small new settlement to help them adjust to life as Equestrian ponies.
They’re skittish of every non-earth pony and have thankfully gained friends of all tribes as well as much needed weight and cleanliness.
I had to chuckle when I found out that they were trying to modify their homes with their droppings to add to the sturdiness and familiarity which led to a rushed explanation and training in toilet use and social etiquette on the matter. They’re learning quickly and with the changed role of unicorns helping to teach them and keep them clean it’s really showing them that they’re not subservient to others any more than others are superior to them.
Spirits are holding but waning across the entire ship and we all look forward to the moment we hear the words-
“Land Ho,” a message relayed through shouting reached her ears. She dropped her quill and closed her journal, sealing it with a spell as she teleported herself to the stern and looked excitedly at the end of the treeline. The very sudden end of the treeline. She narrowed her eyes at the distant end and flew higher to see better, taking her spyglass to her eye she hummed.
“What’re you humming about, Twilight? It’s an end to this sea of trees! I totally think you’re not excited enough about this. It means we can actually see something different,” Rainbow insisted as she turned to the horizon with a grin.
“That’s just it. There’s an end to the forest of impossibility here, only for an endless plateau of what appears to be a rocky desert for as far as I can see, even with my magic. That’s worse than the forest because if it’s all there is then we could have essentially reached the end of the world. We can’t resupply on tree flora alone to cross a desert for a crew of four-hundred.”
“Whatever! Let’s just go back and take a left next time at the middle-ish place. Gotta be something somewhere that isn’t all boring and never ending.”
Twilight lowered her spyglass and narrowed her eyes at the edge of the forest in the far distance. “Something feels wrong about this. Dangerously wrong. Rainbow! Go gather the captain and command staff in the ready room while I get something I need from my room,” Twilight insisted.
Rainbow nodded and took off below the envelope while Twilight charged her horn and teleported to the ship’s wheel. “Full stop,” she said to the startled colt at the helm who barely registered her appearance before she vanished again, this time to her room. Gathering several blank scrolls and writing equipment she teleported to the officer’s quarters’ meeting room and began to write a quick letter asking for another ship to come to their aid as soon as possible.
Twilight cast her spell and sent the letter to Spike, knowing he’d know what to do.
She began writing on three pages at once, mumbling to herself as thoughts and ideas flowed through her mind about possible outcomes and resolutions. She snapped her attention to the source of a jab in her side.
“Twilight, you’ve been zoned out for like, ever.”
“Actually, we just gathered, your highness. What has you so perturbed?”
“Captain, I apologize for not noticing your arrival. All of you,” she looked at the assembled leaders, “but we have to halt progress immediately and wait for assistance from Equestria.”
There was a murmur amongst the crew in the room. “Your Highness,” the Quartermaster began, “our supplies may not last that long. The Galaxy is a very special ship designed by you for this mission. There’s no other ship that could get to us in time before supplies ran low.”
“Low,” Twilight turned to face them, “is the key word. The ships that will come are not going to have to slow or stop like we have because I’m sending them the exact path we’ve taken and a direct line to us from the moment they clear the mountains. They’ll be here in seven days instead of the seventeen it took for us to get here because of the course adjustments and maintenance we’ve had to perform.”
The crew mumbled amongst each other. “Princess Twilight, I don’t advise this course of action. I’ve been in much more dire straights than this and we’re nearly at the cusp of discovery or more travel. I don’t see any reason to stop or turn around that you seem to be so intent on.”
“Navigator West, I understand what you mean and I don’t want to make it seem like I’m using my status as weight in this decision, but there’s a reason I’m doing this and it’s because I have experience with life and death scenarios and would prefer not to risk any lives because my instinct in this matter wasn’t taken seriously,” Twilight rolled three of her pages into scrolls and sent them to Spike with a flash of purple magic.
Commander Sharp was the first to speak up. “I believe we’re wasting resources just hovering here. Your Highness, how about a compromise? We wait four days and then go ahead with our journed at one-quarter speed. That will offer us headway and time to explore this patch of forest while offering them time to catch up, assuming they were ready to go to begin with,” he added condescendingly.
“That’s a fair compromise, as long as the rest of the departments agree as well. I won’t take complete command of this voyage while there’re still plenty of capable ponies like all of you here so I want you to defer to each other when making major decisions, except for when the crew could be in danger. That is a choice I won’t allow to be made lightly and neither will any of you, correct?”
There was a silence for a moment before they began to agree with her. “Good, now that we have that covered I’d like to take this time to go over our general plan for the next few days while we wait for our friends to arrive.”
There were groans in the room that Twilight rolled her eyes at before starting. “Okay, I need three teams of ponies to begin to scout the canopy below us and set a perimeter so we can see why the forest is so dense. I’ve done numerous scans as we’ve transversed and so far I’ve sensed nothing out of the ordinary. My thought is that-”
The mares and stallions in the room looked amongst each other and several pouted, one leaned to her friend and whispered, “Her lectures are legendarily long. We’ll have grand foals by the time she’s done.”
The other mare snickered but nothing was going to stop Twilight during her lecture on her recent field notes of forest density as a chalkboard appeared behind her, blocking the window with the best view out into the world as she truly began.
Possibly two hours later the door burst open. “Captain, we’ve received a response-” the mare stopped and moved around the chalkboard and balked at the whole command crew snoozing as Twilight looked at her, waving a hoof intending for her to carry on. She stood tall. “Cap’n, report in from Hoofington. Your daughter’s ill, as are the children, parents, pets, and neighbors of each pony in this room, excluding your highness.”
Twilight gasped and stomped her hoof. “Everypony, listen up! This’ no time to lecture, hurry and write letters. I’ll send them to be distributed, family’s more important than this,” she teleported the chalkboard away as the command crew scrambled out of the room giving the messenger a smile and pat on the shoulder as they passed.
Once the room was empty Twilight nodded to the mare. “Thank you for that, I know I get carried away sometimes. But,” she smirked, “next time I tell you to make an excuse to stop me, try not to wait so long. I think the cook was about to cry a few times.”
The mare trembled but nodded. “Y-yes, m-ma’am.”
“Dismissed, carry on, go have some fun,” Twilight urged the mare out and closed the door behind her. She lifted a scroll and wrote on it.
Note to self, remember that few ponies have your interests and to thank, among other ponies, Rainbow Dash for suggesting the interruption method. It worked well on this date and I plan to use it again in the future on other dates as well, as needed.
Thank Platinum the Matriarch, I’m finally here. I’m looking at the edge of the realm and it’s so beautiful. Just a mile separates me from the edge of certain death by the ‘cloud of death,’ Ruthenium laughed to herself quietly remembering the story from her fillyhood that a cloud of evil lived in the vast forests beyond the barrier that kept them safe from the wars, Windigoes, and plagues that ravaged unihorn kind in ages past.
She stood outside her hotel and inhaled the scent of artificially cleaned floors and walls. Carpeting was fresh, enchanted to never get dirty and was still cleaned, freshened just as she deserved. Being a low noble still meant she was due to be treated better than a commoner. She held her head high as she walked to the desk and checked in, letting a service stallion take her bag.
She tipped him a dozen units and when she was alone she giggled and galloped into the suite she was allotted. The size of her apartment she took a fairly fun run to the bedroom and leapt, flopping onto the bed. “Finally, I’ve arrived.”
She relaxed for half an hour before she got up to write a list of her to-do’s. “Let’s see. It’s still early in the day but I’m not hungry. I can do the tour of the edge, but I’ll do that after noontime. Perhaps I can go shopping,” she grinned and let her mind narrow down what she wanted to bring home to decorate her apartment.
She left her room and hotel asking for the location of the mall as she went, and flagged a taxi to take her. Shopping was fun when alone, but not so much as when she’d have a friend. She was frustrated she’d forgotten to hire one to help choose outfits, socks, boots, jewelry, and souvenirs.
“So many snow globes to choose from! I need this one, and this…” she gasped and replaced the ones she’d chosen grabbing the one she desired. “A globe of the canyon, this’ amazing. I need this, it only costs,” she sagged at the price tag, “oh. No, I’m buying this because I need it for my collection,” she determined as she took her shopping cart full of tokens of her trip to the counter and laid her treasure gem on the counter. “Charge it all!”
The mare looked blankly at the gem and to Ruthenium. “Yeah, like, whatever,” she took the gem and it glowed as energy was taken from it. “Ma’am, your paid in full but you’re running like, low. I’m required to inform you that if you run out you’ll be indebted to the crown,” she droned as she magicked the gem back to Ruthenium.
“I’m on vacation, I have an excuse,” Ruthenium grinned as she pocketed her money.
“Yeah, never heard that before,” the mare mumbled with a roll of her eyes, “have a nice vacation.”
“Thanks! You too,” Ruthenium chirped and left the store before she realized what she’d said. “Well, can’t go back in there ever again,” she smiled to herself.
Next she went to a movie and got a cup of mealworm gel to treat herself, even though the movie was not what she expected, followed by lunch for a delicious salad with nuts from the western farms. She left the restaurant happily. “Ahh, the next thing on my list is,” she thought about the single item on her list she already checked off,” a tour of the canyon!
“Tomorrow I’m going on a hike down to the bottom of the canyon and,” she giggled to herself, “walk funny again.”
She made her way to the street before taking her cart from her pocket and enchanting it to normal size and cruising to the edge of the world.
...
“And to the right, past the canyon, we see the forest,”the tour guide cheerily informed the large group, “only lowly mud stompers are allowed to go out and forage for their food when they want to support a herd of their own. Most mudders are sent out into the forest for disposal when they reach a certain age, for medical reasons, or because they are overpopulating. The fact they never return is further proof that the forest side of the land is all consuming and we are glad they’ve led prosperous lives at our hooves as we’re certain they feel the same.
“If you’ll follow me, I’ll show you to the stables where the mud ponies are held blissfully unaware of their fates. As you know they are retarded from birth and unable to care for themselves beyond consuming food and breathing, so they are completely dependant on our wisdom to guide them.”
A filly sparked her horn. “Is the problem with them because they don’t gotta horn?”
The adults offered her quiet praise as the guide nodded. “Yes, little one. Any pony born without a horn is guaranteed a life in the stables or fields because horns connect us to the aether, the source of everything. Without that connection,” she hesitated, “if any one of us were to lose our horns, we’d become little more than those that are born without them.”
The filly moved closer to her mother as the guide resumed the tour. “Those of you with green bands on your horns are in luck to watch a mud stomper be released into the forest! It’s not too late to purchase your own band for seventeen stamps before the opportunity passes.”
Ruthenium looked from the tour guide and leaned her head over the railing to see the earth ponies below. She pouted, knowing she wasn’t going to see them from where she was, but there was a very dangerous looking walking bridge that spanned the canyon between where the edge of their known world ended and the unknown was just at the treeline.
She cantered quickly to catch up to the group and lit her horn. “Ma’am, I’d like to buy a band!” she called over the ponies between herself and the tour guide.
“Thank you, there is a booth up ahead you may purchase them at…” the mare continued her history lesson and facts as she walked backwards and smiled to the ponies on tour.
Ruthenium made her way down the stairs with the other banded mares and two stallions she couldn’t help but look at when she could to the base of the area they were allowed to access. She chatted with the others as they descended flight after flight about how there should be an elevator, at least, to get to the bottom.
Once there they were led into a large room lined with windows that showed the forest side of the canyon with the bridge just below them. A droning voice began a pre-recorded message.
“Here you will get to see a mud stomper released into the wilds where they begin a new life. They have several small settlements farther out that we, being noble unihorns, have created for them. They simply must follow the path to one of these places of refuge and live out their days. In a few moments you will see one of them pass below you and you will be witness to its joyous release back into the wilds from which they hail.”
The ponies in the room fell silent as they felt grinding below their hooves and moments later a group of five earth ponies walked into view. Noises of revulsion filled the room, Ruthenium faired none the better as she watched the emaciated, bridled, various mares and a single stallion leave a trail of feces behind them as it fell from their legs.
A younger mare pulled at her mother with her magic. “Momma, lookit, their tails are full of icky!”
The room filled with comments at the state of the five as they sulked their way to the bridge and began to cross it. It looked solid and maintained, yet swayed slightly in the wind to an uncomfortable level. Ruthenium was the first one to notice a mare start to slip as she crossed the bridge.
Silence befell the room as the mud pony mare scrambled to grab anything but failed as she slipped over the edge and vanished from sight.
The voice began to speak again into the room. “There are times when a pony crossing doesn’t wish to leave. At such times they are often prone to poor judgement based actions but don’t fear. Below the bridge there is a safety net to catch falling mud ponies and we’ll assist them to cross in a few hours. Thank you for viewing the release of the mudders and if you have any questions please direct them to your tour guide or local attendants.”
There was a ding just as the windows dimmed and blocked out the view ahead and an elevator door opened to their right.
Happy that everything was actually going to be okay for the mud pony, the ponies filed into the elevator and spoke lively about what they were going to have to eat and how soon they would bathe once they got back to their hotels. Ruthenium commented sadly on the state of how the ponies crossing looked and how they could let themselves become that bad.
“Oh, darling, it’s because they’re mud ponies. They’re born with one quarter of a working brain and can’t use magic. They’ve always been servants to unihorns,” a large girthed mare chuckled, “what else could they do besides serve us? Act our equals?!”
There was a round of hearty laughter that lasted until they got to the top floor and exited to a panicked group of ponies passing by. “What’s happening? What’s going on?!” Ruthenium shouted as she hopped ahead and out of the elevator, stopping at a stallion that was crying under a desk. “What’s going on here?!”
“There’s something coming from beyond the barrier! The alarms just sounded and the guard are preparing to defend us. Platinum,” he implored loudly, “keep me safe! Please,” he began mumbling prayers between sobs, “it’s the demons from beyond. It has to be, they’re real and going to feast on our cooked bodies after they burn our cities to the ground,” he blubbered into his tail to himself.
Ruthenium looked back at the few other ponies that stayed with her and shrugged. “So,” she faced them, every one of them looking anxious, “wanna go see what this thing is?”
They looked between each other and nodded excitedly. She grinned and pranced ahead of them, leading them out the sliding doors where they trotted around the building expecting to see nothing worth note, just another crazy stallion sneaking salts. She stumbled and landed on her chest with others following as they looked at seven airships hovering in a line at a distance over the forest.
She got to her hooves and looked around at nearly two hundred ponies that were standing alert and staring at the ships. Finally one mare shouted from somewhere to her right and the panic began. Mayhem ensued as ponies galloped away from the canyon and back to their various transports to get to known safe-zones that were certainly upkept by the ruling government.
Ruthenium watched and waited, as did several dozen others, until the panicked had left or hidden before she walked slowly away, watching the ships. Merely the size of peas in the distance she knew old style airships as well as any unihorn that passed fourth grade but she didn’t know what it was that was flying around and between them like birds.
Her heart began to race as the prospect of flying ponies crossed her mind.
Stiff wings like a glider. Beaks to eat like birds. Tiny eyes to spot-see dangers so they could escape or food to hunt because they’d certainly be partly omnivorous to maintain the energy needed to fly.
She formed the image in her mind as she began to grin like a fool at the chance of seeing one up close and not only rubbing the truth in her brother’s face, but Trumpet would be proven right, finally, and she’d have another reason to gloat about her vote.
She turned and began to gallop, pulling the cart from her chest pocket and tossing it in front of her with a spell to enlarge it again. With energetic vigor she hopped into the cart and her hooves adhered to the floor of it as she willed it faster than she ever had before as a giddiness drove her to get back to her hotel room and publish her facts on the aethernet for the world to see.
“All ships reported in prepared and ready, Captain. Awaiting orders, Sir.”
“Yellow alert, ahead, one quarter, prepare defenses, on my lead,” Captain Heart stated firmly. The message was passed to several pegasi who took to their respective ships and passed the message. Within two minutes all ships had sent agreement to each other via flashing signals and pegasi.
The Galaxy began to move forward at a snails crawl through the sky over the forest with the other ships forming a flying ‘V’ formation behind it. Twilight teleported onto the bridge behind the captain, she wore her crown, was freshly groomed, and wore a purple armor covering her chest and barrel, yet through her poise she was ready to defend her ships the best she was able. A chill went through her and she ruffled her wings, which was noticed by Rainbow Dash.
Rainbow flew down and landed beside Twilight. “It’s gonna be fine, Twi. There’s nothing there, just desert and boring hot instead of boring green. You really need to chillax with me on a cloud! I’ll tie one up to the main mast and we can just get your mind off all this once we’re over the desert of never ending lameness.”
“I hope you’re right, Rainbow Dash. I’ve asked and some of the other unicorns feel something ahead of us. But I feel something more-”
“Yeah, yeah. Bad news, blah, blah. I’m gonna go join my squad and get ready for the fight that won’t happen. Catch ya later, Twi.”
Twilight didn’t turn to watch Rainbow leave, focusing on the slowly approaching feeling of dread. A feeling that she fought against to take a step back with every pace of distance they got closer to the end of the forest. She gulped and felt a knot in her throat that she could barely swallow over, then she gasped when she was touched lightly.
“Your Highness, you’re not looking so well. You may retire to your-”
“No, Captain, I’ll be fine. Once we cross the border between here and there I’m certain all this will pass like a breeze, right?”
He smiled and gave her a shove. “Princess, this is my ship and I’m ordering you to sleep for an hour. We’ve got at least six hours before we reach the edge. Please, rest so we can have you at your best.”
She relented and teleported to her room, climbed onto her bed, and rested her head on her forelegs as a book moved in front of her and she began to read for the hour. She returned two hours later and nodded to the captain. “We’re almost at the edge, I see. You just wanted me to rest and think I had hours knowing I wouldn’t take them, didn’t you?”
He smiled and nodded, looked ahead, and watched as ponies from the bow of the ship slowly reacted as though they were doused with ice water. When the sensation passed through him at the stern, he gasped and suddenly a fear he hadn’t felt for years reared itself in the pit of his stomach and bucked at his heart, sending him into a near panic before he resumed control of himself enough to simply tremble with dread.
“Crew! It’s a spell, don’t let it take your wits away! Spread the word at once,” he shouted and turned to Twilight who was at that moment trembling in her shoes with a look that defied explanation on a royal princess.
“It-it-it’ll pa-a-assss,” she hissed through clenched eyes. The feeling of terror the likes she’d never felt passed and stayed within her and she just barely kept from wetting herself and flying screaming back to the edge of the spell’s effect. She attempted to cast a spell to no avail, her mind couldn’t focus through the terror she felt.
The bow of the ship rippled and soon the sky did the same all the way as far as they could see. A moment of panic went through the crew as the ship seemed to vanish in the same way the fear had gone through them. With screaming and panic beginning to ensue, Twilight lay on her belly and covered her head with her hooves and wings until suddenly she felt normal again.
She gasped and exposed herself to the sky and sun, high and shining. She’d expected to pass into a domain of terror and monsters but as she stood she looked around at ponies gathering their wits on deck then ahead at the sprawling countryside. Cities could be seen with buildings reaching the cloud layer as high as Cloudsdale while seemingly no messy signs of industry could be detected by eyesight.
The air was as clean and pure as the plains in Equestria and the canyon they were coasting over resounded a quiet breeze below them as a non-menacing slight howl as it passed continuously.
It was a scene of relative beauty and inspired awe that was completely unexpected by every single pony on each ship that passed through until they all came to a full stop at Captain Heart’s order.
“Princess, it seems you were right about that feeling… I’ve never been so,” he paused and gathered himself, “Ma’am, we’re through and it seems each ship has made it as well. Signal the other ships to send scouts up to survey the land for locals and report to me and Princess Twilight immediately.”
A scampering of hooves told Twilight that the message was being sent while she trotted from the poop deck to the bow and gazed at the amazing city before them. One of at least three I can tell from just where I can see, if the spires are an indication of city location. There would certainly be dozens of smaller towns between each city and that means potentially tens of thousands of new friends and allies to make just from here to the horizon!
Twilight smiled at the prospect before taking notice of something approaching them fast. She grinned at the potential! Pegasi! It has to be, there’s going to be a grand welcoming for us. They’ll introduce us to their princess, or maybe prince! What if they have a democracy or-” her thoughts were interrupted when a shout came from below the deck below and a shield appeared before the vessel.
With a loud thump followed by a shockwave and what would have brought scorching heat had the shield not appeared as it had, Twilight realized a missile had exploded. It had sent ponies not tethered to the deck flying to their sides or over the railing. A second explosion buckled the shield and singed the hair across many of the ship crew at the stern.
More shields appeared in front of each ship that had arrived and the missiles were either absorbed by the barriers or teleported behind the ships to exit into the forest and detonate on their own.
“What’s happening?!” Twilight shouted as she teleported back to the captain’s side. “Why’re they firing at us? We didn’t do anything!”
“We entered their home and they’re protecting it, is what I say!” he shouted over an explosion.
“Rear at full! Formation, Phalanx, Charlie! Barricade them at all costs,” Commander Sharp yelled and the message was conveyed between all the Equestrian ships. With impressive skill, the ships formed a phalanx two deep, three wide, with the Galaxy behind them. Shields combined from the front of the first row of ships and created a wall that didn’t waver from the bombardment.
Rainbow landed with two other mares, one in each foreleg, both burned with angry expressions. “Caught these two falling from the explosions. Get ready for a fight, Twi, they don’t seem to be too happy to see us.”
Twilight glared briefly at Rainbow before realizing her misplaced frustration. “I understand. Captain, hold formation and defend our position. No pony is authorized to hurt the attacking ponies, we want to show them we mean no harm and come in peace.”
“Ma’am, with all due respect I have to disagree! There are weapons meant to kill coming at us and it’s putting us at risk every second we stay. Let’s leave these ponies to their own devices, it seems they’re doing just fine as it is.”
“And what? Come back in a decade, a century?!” Twilight shouted at him, opening her wings and towering over the stallion who didn’t waver, “I’m not going to wait that long and it seems the damage has been done. If we leave they may follow us and attack Equestria at an unknown time as well as every settlement between here and there, or they might strengthen their defenses and take each ship that arrives in the future captive, at best. No, we have to make contact and hope they learn we don’t mean any harm.” Twilight snapped to look at the helmsman.
“Send the message to move forward and we’ll come close to the ground at the far side of the canyon, deploy some armored but unarmed ponies, and begin showing them we are kind and forgiving. Make sure no pony opens fire, use all available energy to keep those shields up! We don’t know anything about them and we can’t let war be a language they know we speak.”
“Yes, Ma’am. Ahead one-half to berth at the canyon edge. Phalanx formation wall Delta, on my mark we move!”
The message was relayed from Captain to his crew and he lifted a flare gun and fired it over the side of the craft. With a lurch the ship moved in sync with the six others as guards across the canyon. The ships slowed to a stop and ponies from each tribe disembarked from the Galaxy and formed a handsome platoon that held still, even through the occasional explosion ahead of them.
The temperature was warm without the explosions sending waves of heat over them all and soon the missiles stopped, instead a single beam of bright blue light shone from the center of the city they were in and soon a light in the distance appeared, then another and another and in the far distance more seemed to turn on like lights turning on in sequence.
“Twilight,” Rainbow hovered beside her, “what’s with the lights?”
“Rainbow?” she looked at the pegasi who should have been leading her squad in recon, “it’s either a message or a warning. Whatever the case, I don’t like this at all. Captain, What do you think?”
The captain was watching the city and how calm it still seemed, yet there was no movement he’d seen when they had first passed through. “Do ya hear that?” The crew strained their ears and heard something in the distance. “That’s a siren. And not a good one, I reckon. The damage may be done, yer highness. I say we wait’n see what happens next.”
“Perhaps they’ll send an envoy…”
“Yeah, Twi. They’re gonna send a buncha ponies to make peace after tryin’ ta blow us up,” Rainbow snarked.
“Rainbow! We have to maintain hope, if you can’t do that go below deck and hide in the spa!”
“Hey! What’re you gettin’ all mad at me for?!” Rainbow shouted back. “I’m on this boring vacation with you because I’m your friend, not because I didn’t have anything better to do back home! Now it gets fun and you just wanna sit on our flanks? We’d better handle this right, Twi, or we’ll be looking at our first war in hundreds of years and it’ll be over something dumb.”
“You’re…” Twilight fumed and snorted, “right,” she frowned, “Rainbow, take your squad and fly up ahead and see if you can find a town hall or central office where we can meet with the town leadership and convey our intentions. If anything even seems dangerous I need you to come back and let us know so we can try something else. This can’t turn into a fight because they won’t listen. “
Rainbow smirked. “Can I put on the speed?”
“Only if you don’t go more than a length ahead of your squad, Rainbow. I don’t need them or you to get hurt because you wanted to show off.”
“Hey, I’m all about being awesome, but not at the cost of my friends. I’ll be back before you know it,” Rainbow flew over the edge and then took several ponies with her around the shield and toward the town.
“Be careful, Rainbow,” Twilight mumbled. “Captain Heart, Commander Strong, we need to prepare for another attack, just in case. The shield bearers aren’t going to be able to hold this constantly so we need to bring the shield up as needed and rotate them on a shot by shot basis.”
“Let’s just hope that these ponies don’t bombard us at once or it might end bad.”
“The captain’s right, Princess Twilight. If we get overwhelmed then we may lose a part of the shield. I suggest we wait until we know what’s happening with their leadership to make a move that could be even seen as hostile, but we should prepare to have an offense as well.”
“I don’t like that, Commander,” Twilight frowned, “it limits our options in the now and in the future it could hurt our mission. But,” she relented, “go ahead and make preparations for worst case scenarios while we have time.”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Commander Sharp saluted and after Twilight nodded he left to plan while the situation remained tense.
A pegasi landed and panted. “Captain, we’ve spotted hundreds of objects leaving the city in all directions. They seem to be abandoning their land to get away from us.”
The captain narrowed his eyes at the center of the city. “Or running from an attack,” he mumbled. “Princess, can you make a shield strong enough?”
“Me? Yes, but not as well as my brother, Shining Armor.”
“It may be all we need,” he said sternly, “do you see the light in the city? It’s changed from blue to teal and is shifting still.”
Twilight squinted, taking in the sight. “Huh? What do you think it means?”
He turned his head away from Twilight. “Phalanx, formation High-Alpha, now!” A few seconds later the message was relayed and the ships formed a tight arrowhead with the Galaxy at the rear. “Please,” he whispered gruffly, “not again. Don’t let it come to a fight, please.”
Twilight glanced at him, having heard the end of his quiet prayer as the light caught her eye. It began to sparkle in a beautiful cacophony of colors and sounds of popping like firecrackers at a distance before the light turned off and silence fell.
Twilight gulped and watched, waited… then a green flash of brilliant light that belied its destructive power behind beauty shot from the cityscape into the sky and pulsed once before it expanded to thrice its size and hovered in place over the city. Twilight readied a shield spell that would cover the ships in a dome and hopefully deflect debris if it exploded.
It focused its energy into a single point and Twilight didn’t hesitate to erect the most powerful shield she could in a cone. The energy discharged and deflected around the cone, around the ships and into the forest and the city nearby.
Fire erupted beyond the barrier as the energy burned through the trees like a lightsaber through a loaf of bread scorching into the earth around Twilight’s fleet and into the city as the excess energy bled from the sphere before flashing once in a final pulse that scorched the top of every building, street, and roasted any pony that its light touched below it, leaving devastation unlike the Equestrians had seen since Tirek, only this was self inflicted.
Twilight’s shield collapsed by her own will and she panted once. “That wasn’t very strong… Captain,” she stopped as the distant and brief sound of agonized screaming reached their ships.
“Sweet Celestia,” the commander muttered as he watched the light fade from the city. Carts crashing to the ground before they could escape as their drivers were unable to pilot them. The smoke rising from the city was obvious and they knew what it was from.
“Captain, begin a search for survivors and,” she was silenced by a falling object to the ships port side. Then another and another. Twilight shut her eyes tight as her ponies screamed, pegasi took to the air and plummeted after their falling friends that were outside Twilight’s shield.
Rainbow Dash landed on the deck tumbling over herself, scorched feather and mane still smoking. The look of sorrow on her was enough to convey her feelings, but Twilight had to ask. “Are you alright, Rainbow Dash?”
Rainbow nodded. “Five of them shielded me. I, didn’t ask them or tell them to, but they few between me and the light like a wall. I watched Lightning Flash’s eyes as her back was scorched and her feathers, then her mane. Celestia have mercy, I watched her-”
Twilight and two other crewponies hugged Rainbow tightly as the cyan mare broke down and cried. “It’s okay, Rainbow. We’ll settle this in the only way we can,” she said looking at the smoking city with a frown and moving Rainbow’s forelegs to the nearest pony. She took flight and flew towards the city, stopping at the edge of her ships’ defenses.
“Who are you?! What kind of ponies would do something so terrible to their own kind and to newcomers that they don’t know?” she bellowed in her loudest voice cracking glass across the city as her voice carried.
A unicorn hologram appeared in the center city and looked at the seven ships with disdain. “Provosh plitarra ovbla Trannu Platinum H’vaantra?!”
Twilight’s ears perked and she opened her wings, flying high over her ships. She inhaled deeply. “Trannu Platinum? Ithor Trannu Twilight Sparkle, hovar Equestria!”
The ponies below her on the ships listened intently as Twilight spoke easily in what seemed to be Old Ponish, but few of them could understand even part of what was being said.
Twilight flew back at the loud word and retorted quickly. A few more sentences were exchanged before Twilight, without a word, teleported away, to the shock of her crew.
“Lads! Prepare for combat, the Princess is missing!”
Twilight appeared over the point where the hologram originated and shielded herself as she dove like a hawk into the top floor skylight, landed intimidatingly perfectly as glass rained on her shield. “You attacked my fleet and hurt, almost killed some of my little ponies. Who do you think you are?” she growled.
The six unicorn mares in robes of lace and crystals stood in shocked fear at the Princess’ sudden arrival, their eyes glowing white. They spoke in union. “We six are the council of this edge city that guards against the Servants of Windigo. We know of your heralding, that they will follow you and lay waste to our lands. We will destroy ourselves before we bow to you and your lords as those in our past had.”
Twilight’s horn lit with magic. “I am Princess Twilight Sparkle, my ancestors defeated the Windigoes two-thousand years ago and have lived in relative peace with one another for the past thousand years. The land founded by all three tribes is called Equestria and I am one of their princesses,” her horn light faded and she lowered her shield.
“I come in peace in the name of our entire country and wish to exchange knowledge and culture, not weapon fire.”
The six mares blinked, their eyes changing to light yellow. “I am using these six as a vessel and notice you did not attack us, even though your defenses indicate you have sufficient power to. I was not able to take control of the situation before they activated their defenses and I do not share their concerns. I am High Matriarch Platinum and greet you, Princess Twilight Sparkle, and welcome you to our land, the Land of Platinum. We’ve been waiting for your arrival.”
“My arrival?”
“Well, the arrival of a unihorn or other to come. While these six will not be able to remember what I say I will tell you that these are the lands that were once Unicornia, birthplace of the Unicorn Tribe.”
Twilight’s jaw clenched, holding back the torrent of questions she wanted to ask. A few seconds passed before she exhaled loudly. “I come from the land that all three tribes founded after the Windigo attack. We have much to discuss.”
The mared nodded in unison. “I will convey your message of peace to these vessels and they will serve you as though you should have been when you arrived. They are at your beck and call while I gather my own royal council to begin negotiations. You may never see me in the fur, but know I mean all outsiders the best.”
Twilight stood tall and smiled. “I look forward to our future together.”
The six nodded and their eyes flashed white, then returned normal again. They bowed their horns to Twilight. “We apologize for what we’ve done and will atone for the remainder of our days. Defenses have been shut off, offenses as well. We extend our horns in friendship and invite you into our land as welcome honored guests.”
Twilight sighed, opened her wings, and spoke. “I need to convey your message to my fleet, when I return I hope to exchange words for the first time with your leadership about how you welcome guests to your lands and about lowering that shield so we can communicate back and forth with our kingdom.”
We were found, the day we’d all heard would come to pass had happened, yet not like the way it was foretold. The unihorns send a grounder with wings like a flapper to speak with us in the holy language of the unihorn. Then shortly after the grounder flapper, as we call them, shouted at us and flew away in fear in warning so we took refuge in our huts.
A unihorn in body and flesh graced us with her mighty presence and blessed two of our foals with her holy light. The parents of Hook and Branch didn’t understand the blessing imparted by the living embodiment of grace and beauty until after I had spoken with them. As grounder village Wildtree shaman it is my task to carry the knowledge of the past to the future.
The next group of grounders arrived and being friendly and the same pitiable subspecies as our village we were able to trade motions and noises as we aren’t blessed to speak the language of unihorn kind or wear clothing of true metal surely gifted to them for obedient service to her holiness.
We followed them from our homes, the ground we walked on a holy site created by the first generation to survive the journey through the forest from The City of the Castaway that we maintained as per ritual said and says.
The sky leaf the unihorns arrived in returned to the sky and moved over the forest, back to the holy land, from our ancestors were birthed. Other sky leaves arrived and we showed our fealty to the unihorns amongst the grounders with flappers and without by prostrating ourselves as low as we are compared to them.
I led the group in prayer as we worshipped them and their kindness and generosity for allowing us in their presence when I was stopped by a hoof under my chin and even though I do not speak the language of the Divine, I dared to open my eyes, beholding the eyes of the most beautiful mare I had ever seen.
My senses lost to me I was reverted to a young colt in love for the first time in years by the embodiment of the rising sun upon the moving waters. I ate my tongue like a foal for a moment before I remembered my place and attempted to lower myself again.
My chin was lifted and I understood the words without knowing them, standing as high as we were allowed. With a word the others rose with me, and we offered our right hooves for binding, but none came. Instead we were guided to a hut large enough for one grounder each. Worry flowed through my tribe and I calmed them by letting them know I would receive punishment first. If I survived, which I had hoped, that they would follow me so as to not anger the deities.
I stood taller than I should have as I walked into the shadowed hut and out the other side as clean as any grounder after a long play in the moving waters, only this was different. Better. I turned back and hopped happily with a whoop, shouting I was worthy!
“For the first time in my life I belonged. I have been accepted into her majesty's hooves. Her heart touched me and cleansed me of the filth I was to become one of her chosen!” I remember shouting and falling to my brand, tears dripping on the ground between my legs as I cried the same as I had when my father died, only this time with joy instead of sorrow.
My heart mended.
The light around me was a blessing I’d never known, nor could ever know, as I was dried from her baptism. I hugged the first mare to walk through and she burst into tears when she galloped through the baptism hut, cleaned of her sins and the sins of our past. We hugged and even though I wasn’t ready, I moved her aside and let the light dry her.
I took my place, hugging each grounder that passed by me until the last tail hair was made whole again I was dried again and I finally looked at the warriors and others before looking back on my people. “We, those worthy, are no longer the lowest of the low. The castaways must bow to us when we see them again, for we have ascended to serf’s! We will sow her majesty’s lands again as we were born to do!”
The sound of cheering and happiness from my friends, neighbors, family rejoicing made me cry again and with the smiled of our fellows as approval we began to mingle with them. Hugs, kissed, mares chose stallions to celebrate with and stallions chose mares to court them. From their reactions I could tell the divine warriors were not used to such affections so suddenly so I called celibacy to reign them in.
We gathered again, with me in the lead to speak for us. One stallion wearing the robes of a high mage of her highness and coat of orange approached and bowed his horn to us. A truer honor I’d never had before that moment until he spoke.
“Greetings. We are friends, you are friends.”
I had to restrain myself from embracing him with a hug. He’d graced us with his voice a greeting in our words. “G-greetings, we are friends, you are friends. Us, together.”
He smiled with teeth shiny as a foals’ in approval and motioned for me, us, to follow him. I could hear the tribe whispering happily as we went to a leaf, like some of the others still hovering in the sky, and were allowed to climb onto it. It was terrifying, beyond words could ever be conveyed in a thousand generations.
I met with part of the tribe and heard familiar screams in fear from other leaves. The orange high mage approached me after walking from the air itself and the tribe with me went silent. “You safe. We are going home, no harm will befall you.”
At his words we relaxed and felt the leaf moving and with several shouts in the divine language noises hummed like bees. We nearly fell over as the leaf began to float through the sky with the other leaves close behind. Though I’d never been so far I could tell we were moving through the mountains, away from everything we thought we knew and on toward a new life.
Ruthenium landed in front of the hotel and left her cart where it was as she dashed in and used the stairs since the elevators were in use and teleporters were too expensive. She cast her spell to open the door and ran muzzle first into it. Muttering a curse she cast it again, correctly, and opened the door before she walked in and shut it behind her.
Ruthenium gathered her travel bag and filled it with a shirt, two dresses, toiletries, what tech she had, and makeup, then galloped from her room, her hotel, and then onto her cart to join thousands of others in fleeing the city. “Outta my way! I’m taking off,” she shouted as she charged extra magic into her cart and took to the air with trepidation.
“If I get a ticket for flying without authorization I’ll burn it to a cinder and curse the mare to Tartarus,” she growled as the air cooled and her mane began to whip behind her as her tail held the small suitcase with her. She joined several other mares as they flew their own carts, some with help from their stallions, directly away from the explosions in the distance.
She took out her portable aethernet device, turned it on, and waited to connect. Her attention was pulled to the green glow that overtook everything outside tinting the buildings and sky itself. “What in Platinum’s name?” she managed before the sound of ozone searing tickled her ears.
The light flashed as bright as a lightning strike and she winced, using a foreleg to block the light. She opened her eyes and looked around the city behind her. Everything was off. Total power failure? Oh no… The visitors are invaders. They’re attacking our power first like in the movies, she panicked and began looking around the sky ahead as her mind raced. “I’ve gotta get home! I live in the capital city, there’s no safer place.
“Surely they’ll raze everything they cross until nothing is left,” she gulped as a terrible thought crossed her mind. What if we have to overcharge? No, it’ll never come to that, we’ll push them back and make sure they never return.
As she exited the city a surge of magic rushed into her and she knew trouble was coming. Her ears perked and turned toward a nearby mare’s panicked scream. “They’re giving us free mana! They’re losing, helping us escape! Run, run for your lives!”
Panic fueled her into pushing more magic into her escape and for the first time, with the rush of extra magic she and hundred of others teleported miles away from the city and maintained their escape until the city was a speck in the night.
Ruthenium woke at sunrise in her cart on the ground with a simple alarm shield around her belongings and she said another prayer, thankful for her survival and escape. With a heavy heart she looked back to where she’d left before turning to look ahead at the lush pastures, meadows, and farmland that lay between her and the next city she was traveling to. She pouted as she left her cart and joined others in grazing on the land.
“If I had any idea I’d be acting like a mudder I’d have never left home,” she grumbled between dainty bites of single blades of grass and flowers.”
“Hear, hear,” a mare said beside her. “I love your dress, I hope you don’t mess it with all this, green.”
Ruthenium giggled. “I like your dress, too. Perhaps we can be travel pals, keep each other safe from the invaders until we have to separate?”
“Where are you headed?”
“Dream Crescent, then to Spiral City.”
Ruthenium grinned. “I’m heading to Dream Crescent, too! Would you like to share the trip?”
“I would be delighted! My name is Ruby Diamond Chip Spiral,” she stood and extended her hoof.
“And I am Ruthenium Swirling Gold Flake, but you may call me Ruthenium, for short.”
“Diamond would be best for me.”
They shared a hoof bump and then grazed together until they had enough of the sweet, bitter, chalky untrimmed grasses and got back onto their carts. “So, Ruthenium, do you have aethernet access?”
“I don’t know, lemme see,” she replied taking her device out of her travel bag and activating it. “Huh, I have access but I’m restricted to level five, emergency communications only.”
Diamond snorted. “Must be your job, I’m at level seven. Emergency communication receipts only.”
“Well, let me send a message to my manager back home and maybe I can at least find out what’s happened or happening.” She closed her eyes and her magic connected to the device and she felt her mind enter her aether room. A small room the size of a large round bathtub that she could use to access any information she was allowed to. She pulled a screen down from the digital wall and pressed speed dial for her work.
“Hello? This is Central Power Management, how can I direct your call?”
“Titanium, it’s Ruthenium and I need to speak with Dream Walker, please.”
“Ruthenium?! Sweet Platinum it’s amazing to know you’re alright. So many of us were worried about you, why’d you take so long to contact us?” The mare frowned as her image showed on the screen.
“I’m in a rush. I need higher access on my aether account so I can contact unihorns directly and only he can give it.”
Titanium rolled her eyes. “Yeah, but Dream Walker is a stallion, you know he’s only going to think of one thing in trade.”
“I need to talk to him and if he tries anything I’ll threaten him to be sent to the breeding stables for abusing his position.”
“Ouch,” Titanium giggled, “remind me to never mess with you.”
“You’re a noble mare like me, we’re better than common stallions and… Hey, connect me, we’ll gossip when I get home, horn to horn.”
“Okay! Connecting, see you soon, Ruthenium.”
There was a moment where silence filled her mind until the screen flickered and the stallion looked at her with a smirk. “Ah, it’s good to see you’re alright. No joking this time, anything you need. If I can do it, it’s done.”
Ruthenium was taken back slightly. “That’s very kind of you. I need higher access on my aether account from five back to three.”
“Hrm… I’ll pull some strings, just get home safe. It’s not just me that’s concerned for you but most of the staff.”
“I didn’t know I was so popular,” she giggled.
“You not being here has left a place that we didn’t know we had grown to love. And the thought of you being near those monsters… Platinum help them.”
“What’s been happening?”
“We don’t know a lot. Details aren’t coming out as fast as we’d expected because there was a major discharge of energy that disrupted the entire aethernet and since then it’s been unihorns warning of the imminent attacks. It’s chaos, Ruthenium. Please, get home to Gemstone City quickly and safely.”
“I, I will. Tell everyhorn I’ll be back within two days or I’ll buy a round at the bar next time.”
He grinned. “I’ll hold you to that. Please, be safe. Farewell,” he finished before his image blinked away and she was left alone.
“I can call mother and auntie, but they probably have enough to worry about at the moment. Father is back in the breeding stables,” she sneered at the thought of him, “so that’s about it. Once I’m at the next city I’ll call somehorn, but until then I must focus on getting home.”
The room darkened and she opened her eyes to the real world. “Well, that was kinda pointless,” Ruthenium commented. Diamond looked at her expectantly.
“You were in there nearly ten minutes. I was worried you were doing something naughty.”
“Oh, hush. I’m a lady, not a ruffian. I got word that nohorn knows what’s going on, but it’s not good. We’re being invaded,” she waited for Diamond to finish gasping. “But even that’s conjecture since there’s no official notice. Let’s just wait until we know something real before we dive into hysterics like mudders at a rodeo.
They shared a chuckle and focused their magic into their transportation. They hovered above the ground just clear of the grasses and shrubs. “So, Ruthenium, what do you do?”
“Energy management in the capital, you?”
“I manage mudder diets so they don’t eat into our surplus or get sickly from hunger… so I guess I’m a dietitian of sorts. All the food I could ever want and I get to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.”
“Wow, wanna trade jobs?” Ruthenium joked.
“I actually like what I do, thank you,” Diamond smirked back, “plus I don’t want to live in the big city, Dream Crescent’s a nice coastal city by the bay. None of that hustle and bustle.”
“Well, I think after this is over we should visit at your home and get to know each other.”
“I’d like that,” Diamond smiled, “perhaps we should hurry. The next town is still hours ahead of us and we needn’t be caught by… them.”
“Why did we choose the furthest city in sight to run to?” Ruthenium joked and they shared a laugh.
Later in the day when the sun was high both mares landed and rested under the shade of a small pear tree grove.
“Ugh, where’d we stop?” Diamond asked as she rolled to her hooves and stretched after hours of standing she regretted not packing a sitting pillow and outright refused to sit on her sleeping pillow..
“Some field, I dunno but that smell isn’t very inviting.” Ruthenium leaned out of her cart and looked right into the dull, saddened, messy face of a tan earth pony. She screamed and scrambled back into Diamond’s cart and forelegs.
With a laugh, Diamond dropped Ruthenium. “They’re not that bad, just don’t touch them and you’ll be fine. So, never seen a mudder this close?”
“It stinks… and it’s blank stare,” she trembled, “let’s go…”
“Oh, you’re so urban. Ahem. Mudder, where is food?” Diamond told him more than asked.
The tan earth pony lowered his head and backed up, bowing low. He spoke in a coltish voice that was transitioning to stallion. “Mistress of True Goddess of Spring Heavens. I am at your service. You meal at nearby farm, home to my-”
“Yeah, yeah, thanks, mudder. Go away now,” Ruthenium waved a hoof and the earth pony stood and walked slowly back into the tall wheat and nearly vanished, ignoring the glare the other mare gave her. “Euck, you work with that filth and you’re okay with it? I didn’t even know they could talk.”
“Most of what they say is trained to them, but their speach is basic, at best. ‘You eat now’, ‘me want food’, ‘me go now’, things like that. So, wanna go get some food from its owners?”
“Ah, yeah, so I’m gonna go back to my cart and go away from here before I catch something.” Ruthenium hopped over to her cart Diamond’s and hovered well above head height. “You coming?”
“Oh, hold your manna, I wanna feed it.”
“Feed it?! Why?”
“It looks so sad, like a little puppy. I’ll be right up there, just watch and learn,” Diamond called as her horn glowed and a small melon was pulled from a nearby vine. “Mud! Come here, c’mon boy! I have a food for you, num nums.”
A moment passed before the wheat trembled and the earth pony poked his head out cautiously.
“Awe, there’s a good mudder… would you like a snackie-wackie?”
He took a quick pace out of the wheat and lowered his head. “Do you eat often? You look well fed,” Diamond said levitating the melon to his hooves.
He glanced up and with her nod of approval a small smile crossed his lips before he stomped the melon open with his hoof and began to eat it in chunks. Ruthenium gagged from above. “It’s eating the shell, gross!”
“It’s a rind, and they are edible. Haven’t you ever tasted one?”
“Uck, no. I have my meals delivered prepared and ready.”
Diamond snerked. “Is that really what you believe?” She looked up to see Ruthenium shrug. “Well, most classes eat whatever they’re given, and the lower classes mix rinds into the high class’ food, or else they’d be missing out on a lot of essential nutrients. Just because mudders like this one,” she gestured to the earth pony now lying with the remaining melon between his forelegs, “eat them whole doesn’t mean you don’t without knowing it.”
“Well, I think I should write Trumpet and fix that,” Ruthenium stomped her hoof in finality. Diamond signed and placed a hoof to her head below her horn. “Is it time to go? I’d prefer to eat rather than watch that thing maul a helpless melon.”
Diamond joined Ruthenium in the air on her own cart and without a word guided them both to the farmhouse.
“So, Ruthenium and Diamond,” the unihorn stallion said flatly, “I’m to understand you gave a melon to a worker of mine without asking? Before you say anything I have to tell my wife so she can handle you,” he said narrowing his eyes, “but if I had a say you’d be paying ten times what that melon was worth.”
“Yes, yes. Away with you, breeder. Gather your wife and let the adults handle this,” Ruthenium waved a hoof.
Diamond scowled at her. “Sir, I apologize for my associate, she’s urban. Gemstone City, urban, and doesn’t know how it works out here. Please forgive us and we’d like to talk it over a meal of your produce.”
He regarded Diamond with a nod, took a step back into the house, and slammed the door.
Ruthenium shot Diamond a mean look. “What was that about?! You undermined me in front of a breeder.”
“Because in farmlands the males aren’t just breeders, they’re equal members of the family. You can’t treat everyhorn like you’re nobility and better than them or you’ll learn quickly what these non-nobles think of you.”
Ruthenium looked at Diamond for a blink then rolled her eyes. “Fine, I’ll do my best to just,” she looked up and thought of the word to use, “slack out, yo.”
“That’s more like it. Now let’s-” the door clicked open and a mare stood there, tall and imposing, looking down her muzzle at the mares on her porch. “-relax…” she trailed off with a hard swallow as she looked up at the brown earth pony mare wearing a green collar.
The stallion returned and stood beside the mare, his horn reaching the top of her height. “This’ the missus, Bardin. You nobles look a might surprised.”
“Pa here says ya done fed our boy some fruit. Gotta good reason ‘fore I send ya packin’ to the nearest pit with cracked... egos?”
Both mares looked between each other and shared a worried look before looking to the stallion.
“Lookit, Bardin; snake got their tongue. Betcha it’s our union’s got’m all flustered,” he paused then nuzzled Bardin, “y’all c’mon in, but don’t make yerselves at home,” he moved aside and the mares stared at the space he was, unmoving. “You comin’ in or we callin’ the guard on yer stealin’?”
Both mares looked at each other then trotted in, with Diamond leading. The interior was as simple as the exterior; well maintained and inviting.
“Nice home you have here,” Diamond started but stopped short in sentence as Bardin shoved by her, making a point to rub shoulders.
“Den’s this way, and don’t try anythin’, we’re in the know with the local militia and with the whole invasion they’re itchin’ fer a unihorn to explain what’s goin’ on.”
“But, we don’t know what’s happening,” Ruthenium mumbled before getting a magic push from behind by the stallion. “Watch it… please.”
He didn’t blink as he followed her into the living room and took a seat on a couch beside his wife, leaving the mares to look between themselves and the offered plush cushions they were offered.
“I think we’ll stand,” Diamond said for them both. Ruthenium nodded in agreement.
“Ah see, ya think all ground ponies’re dumb servants? Things of the like?”
“Yes,” Ruthenium commented then grimaced, “I mean-”
“No need, noble, we’re used to it. Just cuz ya don’t see integration nearby yer rich cities don’t mean it don’t happen,” Bardin practically spat at them.
“Now, darling…”
“Moon, ya know Ah can’t stand them types,” Bardin grumbled as he sided and nuzzled as close as a pony could get to her.
“Ah know, but,” he leaned up and whispered into her ear and she nodded as he spoke.
“Fine, ya sweet talkin’ horn head,” she said casually and kissed the stallion at the base of his horn.
Both mares felt a pang of anger at the comment about his horn but held their tongues.
“Right, so ya gave our son a melon… why? What possessed ya to steal?”
“We didn’t think it was a big deal, we just wanted to feed it… him,” Ruthenium stammered.
“What she means, is that we thought he was hungry so I fed him, not my friend here. She was ignorant about what I was doing until it was done. She wanted to come right over and ask for your help with anything you can afford to offer as far as food for our journey, but I stopped to take a moment for your boy.”
“We’re sorry and we’ll pay for the melon! Please, don’t have us arrested, I just wanna get home,” Ruthenium blurted and fell back onto a pillow, “I saw them arrive, the invaders. I don’t know what they’ve done to that city, but it isn’t good. We talked with other survivors of the escape and we’re all going to tell about how the city fell… and each city we pass will know to defend themselves.
“Please, I just wanna go home and hide under my bed until this is all over,” she flinched as Diamond placed a foreleg around her, “am I being foalish?”
The room was silent for a moment. “No, yer in the right. We’ve all heard the invaders’ arrival but that’s it. It’s all word’a mouth right now, what with the aethernet goin’ down and the government takin’ over all the comms.”
“Nothin’s gettin’ through,” Moon added, “Bardin here can’t use the aethernet, but it’s no secret the nobles in the central spires won’t let anything go through the public channels that could affect their authority. We’re waitin’ fer the next message.”
“Next message? What did we miss?”
“Well, Diamond, right?” at her nod he continued. “They were taking the net down and for everyhorn to be on guard, they’d let us know as soon as anything happened.”
“Sounds like more reason to hurry home,” Diamond said as she let Ruthenium go. “Where do we stand?” she asked the couple.
“Don’t know, don’t care. Unless these invaders come a’knockin’ it ain’t our problem,” Bardin said. “Pay us the cost of the melon four times over and we’ll give you food to last you two days. By then you should be at Light’s Point and can resupply there.”
“Light’s Point?” Ruthenium whined. “That’s two whole days away?”
“Yeah,” Diamond sighed, “we’re on our own without teleporters or anything but our carts and each other.” When Ruthenium pouted she offered another tight hug.
“Ya two ain’t so bad… just a couple’a horns that made a poor choice. Bardin, let’s just cut’m slack?”
Bardin hummed and looked between the mares. “Fine, you’ll get yer travelin’ food and a bit extra. Ah’ll be right back,” the earth pony said standing and walking out of the room. Once they were alone Diamond cleared her throat.
“So, mixed race marriage? And breeding,” she said, “never thought I’d see it in real life. How’d she learn to speak and take care of herself?”
He scoffed, flaring his nostrils. “She’s one’a the,” he hesitated, “she’s special, is all. I’ll leave it at that. As far as our union, it’s not before your, er, the high mistress, but it’s honorable by merit. There’s an old law written into the books and scrolls that says any union may happen as long as both produce to society and identify as the other’s mate.
“She wears a collar made of my own tail hairs, woven into it’s shape by hoof. Our hooves together made this house a home and we plant the fields together. All that, plus our growing family is all that matters now and if you wish to challenge it…”
“We want no such thing. The world as we know it is in danger and all we want to do is warn those we cross and until we get home.”
Ruthenium nodded in agreement as Bardin returned and presented an object wrapped in cloth. Both mares could feel what it was and grinned as the earth mare used her lips to open it, exposing two shimmering green emeralds. “We don’t gotta use fer these so y’all can have ‘em.”
Both mares wrapped one each in their magic and gasped at the energy flowing into them. “This, these are class eight batteries with recharge capabilities and a hefty price tag,” Ruthenium said in awe, “thank you so much, Bardin,” she said breathily with a growing grin.
Diamond was silent as she looked at the gem she’d chosen, still in the outstretched hoof of the earth mare. “How’d you get these? They’re worth a fortune, you could buy-”
“Ya gonna take’m or am I gonna keep’m?”
Both mares leaned forward and took a gem in their lips, sending the hair around their horn a bit higher like a static charge just from touching them.
“Don’t matter where we get’m from, all that matters is we’re showing ya kindness that we’d like in return by ya not blabbin’ about our union.”
Both unihorn mares turned and placed the gems in their dress pocket against their chest and hummed at the magic tingle they provided. Diamond sighed. “Thank you, Bardin, you’re a very kind mare to offer these to us and we’ll repay you someday.”
Ruthenium nodded enthusiastically. “I totally concur. I’ll find a way to repay you, on my family’s honor,” she turned to Diamond, “with these we can pool the energy and teleport all the way to Light’s Point.”
“Probably, but we should save them and use them to just boost our cart speed. I feel it’s a better plan, what about you?”
Ruthenium sighed. “Yes, you’re correct. There’s no reason to waste the-” she stopped as a crackling static caught all their attention.
“The net alert! Maybe it’s good news,” Moon said excitedly taking to his hooves. Seconds passed before an image appeared against the wall between two horizontal bars. A young mare dressed as a high class noble began shouting hurriedly from what seemed to be a nicely furnished basement with at least a half dozen mares scurrying in the background.
“This is a citizen alert! The government is lying to us all, the invaders are destroying everything they cross with weapons and magic… flying ponies working with mudders and unihorns led by a unihorn with wings… Death toll is incalculable… Many enslaved, more than can be imagined. They’re trying to take back control, the high court of mages. Don’t let them lie to you, run, hide, over charge to save your family from the horrors of their wrath! This is-,” the image flickered and a mare dressed as a high mage stood proud.
“Unihorns of the Land of Platinum. Please, don’t believe the rhetoric of some radical aether-hackers. The visitors are peaceful and mean us no harm. They are still stationed at the edge of the canyon and in talks with the descendent of Princess Platinum herself on this rare, auspicious occasion.
“We implore you to remain rational and-” the screen shut off by Moon’s horn.
“Liars! The government can’t be trusted anymore now then the last two hundred years, Bardin, gather the young and we’ll meet at the place. We must keep them alive and you two, take what you need from the farm out there. Leave now or I’ll make you.” Both mares stood and quickly trotted from the house and onto their carts.
Grabbing fresh vegetables as they flew over them, the mares took their leave and didn’t glance back from where they’d narrowly escaped certain doom or the farm they’d essentially raided, fear placating them as they flew their carts twice as fast as before with help of the gems. “Diamond,” Ruthenium finally shouted over the wind, “I wish you the best,” she managed, and before the other mare could reply, Ruthenium vanished in a teleport.
“Best travels and may the goddess bless your journey,” Diamond said as she coasted ahead, alone.
Shaman of our Tribe was our inspiration through the journey on the leaves through the mountain. The leaves had space inside them for us to sleep, eat, and enjoy the delights of our masters. The Divine Mistress Platinum chose us for a reason and my family will honor the herd who all honor the Mistress.
The warriors took off their armor while inside the leaf with us all, it’s humbling to know that even those blessed from birth by the Divine are the same as us grounders. Even the chosen’s grounders seemed to be in the best of health which was a boon to the herd’s morale. We ate modestly at first, but there was flavor, smells, aromas… we’d never experienced such manna and with approval from the noble unihorns we feasted as though it were the Month of Nobility where the lowest grounder to the highest grounder treats each other like nobility.
Feasting on the finest grasses, the cleanest waters, telling tales of great grounders that earned the privilege of serving those who served the Mistress and the one who saw her. It was always fun to laugh at his silly tale of how she was different, but that wasn’t the point of the celebration or of our feast.
We were one of the enlightened; cleansed of our past and given new life. We traveled on the wind for two days before we saw the first cities below us. We’d learned that it was not possible to fall off the leaf and looked over the edge often at the lands controlled by the Mistress. Most of them were going to be harrowing to till and make into farmlands, covered in snow and rocks or some of the ugliest grounders I’d ever seen.
The third day we all watched as we passed over the City of the Divine Mistress. It was frozen and shone like sunlight in the moving waters with a spire of ice yet the warmth of her light kept us warm as well. We prayed for hours as we approached and passed beside her royal throne offering our very souls to her as loyal servants.
It was saddening when we had to pass it and continue our journey. It was not our meaning to serve in her Royal City of Ice, where rainbows were made from her palace itself and her most adored subjects were so blessed they shone like the worthy they are.
We gathered in the meeting halls inside our leaf and I know the others did as well on their leaves. We sang songs, danced, made merry, and we were told to use an inside hut to mate. The rooms were with beds that were softer than I’d ever imagined and deviced I couldn’t imagine the use of. We’d managed to fit four couples at a time and rotated mating during the celebration, giving in to the glory we were now a part of. The food, the music, the merriment. It was like spring heat like we’d never known for hours until we’d finally grown tired and began to sleep, laying upon each other as a happy herd, unknowing of awaited us but expecting the best.
The ships readied their unicorns and projectile weapons, formed by their attack plan based on one of Twilight’s idea’s, and waited for the command to advance.
“Captain!” Rainbow Dash shouted as she stopped in the air beside him, wavering slightly. “What’s happening? What’re you doing?!”
“The Princess may have been taken, we have to get her back. I don’t have time for this, you’re a Wonderbolt so prepare the pegasi for their rolls.”
Rainbow flew in front of him. “But-”
“I haven’t time for this! That’s an order and I outrank you, make haste!”
“No! I won’t move. I know Twilight Sparkle and she teleported, she wasn’t taken. Didn’t you see the magic flash? It was purple and-”
“Fine, Miss Dash, I’ll play. The enemy can have purple magic as well, look at what they did with blue. They could color code their abilities, regardless-”
“No way, you totally don’t get it. Twilight’s doing something and I won’t let you hurt her or whatever she’s doing by going all raging dragon.”
He opened his mouth to retort but she left when he did. “Good riddance. I need a competent pegasus to take control of the skies! Find me one right now, and as for the attack we need an equal, if not greater defense. Have unicorns on ships four, six, and two… No not two, three place shields at these locations and prepare to have them mobile.
“There’s no telling what might be next in their arsenal and-”
The sonic rainboom rocked the ships and certainly got attention from every pony on both sides of the growing conflict.
Rainbow arced and spun turning her contrail into a symbol she hoped was universal above the ships and visible for hundreds of miles. She hollered happily as the speed given by the event bled off and she hovered in the middle of her creation. Ponies as far as the edge of the city that were able looked to the edge of their known world to see a heart encircled by an expanding rainbow and for the moment it seemed as though peace might be an option.
Twilight stood before several hovering images of unicorns, each a noble by any standard based solely on the clothes they wore and how they carried themselves compared to the more common ponies that had led her into the meeting room mere hours after her declaration of peace in Old Ponish to the leader of the land.
A mare was finishing her question of earth pony integration while Twilight bore the expression of calm professionalism. These blighted single minded slave driving- “Yes, your honor, we see all ponies as equals and even though they call me by my royal title of Princess of Friendship, and as an alicorn of the three tribes, I don’t see myself as being a better pony then them, per se.
“I do have authority and final say, as well as superior magic, flight, strength, and lifespan, but I don’t hold my title over them unless I have to, just as the other princesses of Equestria believe and act. They are free to do as they please and accept the consequence of their actions.”
“So,” one of the mares began, “you see yourselves as equals? I know we just established that, but here in the Land of Platinum, it’s not ever been the case, save for very few unihorns a generation that breed or cohabitate with mudders,” she sneered. “Perhaps there may be merit to your beliefs, but there is no sense changing what works so well in our society.”
“I concur. We are better in all ways than those that roll in their mess. There are established-”
“Thank you for your contribution, Lord Chancellor Zirconia Wave, however we’re not going to prattle on about classes while the first visitor stands before us, are we?”
There was a silence. “No, your highness,” they said in near unison.
“Your majesty, Princess Twilight Sparkle of Friendship in the land of Equestria, we accept your offer of peace and extend the same, publically now as this is being broadcast across the nation at the highest levels to be disseminated to their charges.
“Considering you and yours don’t act hostile in manner then we will open negotiations for trade of information and will grant you access to our libraries,” Twilight couldn’t hold her grin and ruffled her wings, half opening them in glee, “for you to peruse at your convenience.”
Twilight’s resolve broke. “Yes! Yesyesyes, I’d love to read about your history and achievements!” she landed and folded her wings, taking a professional stance again. “I apologize, I really enjoy reading. I, we extend our hooves in friendship and will openly offer our knowledge to you.
“We have a lot of history but few books. Most of our knowledge is currently inscribed in several enchanted tomes I like to read in my spare time that I willingly offer as trade. My ships are still at the defense, but we all are looking forward to relaxing and sharing some cultural exchange.”
“As do we, as your integration of earth ponies, as you call them, and pegasi, which are merely mythical in our texts, are very intriguing to us,” the Matron paused. “There is one issue, however. There are ponies spreading word that you and your crew are decimating the land as you transverse toward me in the capital city. We are having trouble stemming the rumors and wish you to know as I am currently running a relations campaign to inform my little horns that we are at peace, not war.”
Twilight sighed softly. “The sonic rainboom my friend did didn’t help, did it?”
“No, it seemed to fuel the rumors that we’re attempting quell. We don’t place any blame on her, however we ask that she not do it again,” the Matron said firmly enough.
“I’ve had a long talk with her and she won’t, trust me,” her tone deepened. All the unicorns watching her smirked and nodded.
“Your majesty, Princess Twilight Sparkle of Friendship in the land of Equestria, we thank you for your time and open our borders to you and yours. May Princess Platinum guide you.”
“And the same to you,” Twilight finally offered, lacking the word she needed and cursing herself for forgetting the one word that would turn the sentence into a complimentary farewell.
The screens turned off and Twilight turned back to the white doors engraved with cutie marks and ponies she could only imagine the importance of. The doors opened and three unicorns in simple dresses entered with a robe. “Thank you, but I really don’t feel like wearing clothes,” Twilight offered with a smile.
“You should not be without! How the others did not tell you of the nudity taboo,” a handmaiden trailed off.
“Great,” Twilight facehoofed and mumbled in Equestrian, “so I just exposed myself to taboo while under their scrutiny. Fantastic.” The maidens smiled blankly before Twilight reverted to their language. “Thank you for the dress, I’ll put it on after a little alteration,” she took the purple dress in her magic and slits for her wings appeared to the gasp of the maidens.
Twilight slipped it on and one of the other mares began draping copious amounts of jewelry across Twilight’s body and neck while the other two began applying a salve to twilight's legs. “This is to keep all dirt off, as your hooves shouldn’t even be touching our ground with your holiness.”
“Really, you don’t need to-”
“Your majesty, Princess Twilight Sparkle of Friendship in the land of Equestria, it is our duty and honor. Please,” the first mare nearly pleaded as she worked her hooves along Twilight’s legs with the other mare.
“Can you at least tell me your names?”
“We have no names worthy of your royal voice.”
Twilight frowned briefly. “Try me.”
The mares stopped their efforts. “I am Gem, she is Shard, she is <Glitter>.”
“Nice to meet you all, but what was the last name? I don’t know that word in your language.” The mares looked between each other and finally Glitter lit her horn and her namesake appeared, hovering in her magic. She pointed at it, then herself. “Oh, ‘Glitter’? That’s a nice name.”
The mares rolled the word in their mouths and smiled. “I like the way that sounds better. Your majesty, Princess Twilight Sparkle of Friendship in the land of Equestria, thank you for offering my a holy word from your lands.”
“...” Twilight was silent as the mares finished, lined up, and bowed to her. “No problem, can you take me to my ship now, please? And come with me, since you’re supposed to follow me.”
The mares turned and led Twilight while Shard fell to the back and lifted the back of Twilight’s dress slightly to keep it off the ground as they went into the main hall.
“Your majesty, Princess Twilight Sparkle of Friendship in the land of Equestria, we are yours.”
“Wait,” she stopped, “mine? As in, like, a gift?” The mares all stopped and several guards stood at attention, hers ahead and Platinum’s behind. Shard nodded. “That’s not how we do things. I appreciate your help, but you don’t belong to me. You can go home and live your lives while I don’t need your help.”
“Your majesty, Princess Twilight Sparkle-”
“Please,” she groaned, “call me Princess Twilight, or Twilight even. I hate long titles.”
Shard hesitated and looked back to her guards wearing silver armor. “Yes, Princess Twilight, however we live here and,” she stopped and looked at the other two mares who nodded once, “if we are not to serve you by your word, that we are not worthy, we will be cast out. It is as you wish.”
Twilight’s mouth hung open in a very unladylike way. She closed it and offered her best smile. “Then you will be my assistants, not your master or goddess. You’ll be given quarters on my ship and freedom to do as you please. If you need anything, merely ask and the crew will do their best. If you’re going to be a part of the crew you’re going to have to work, just as I and the others do.
“I may be a princess, but even I’m not above keeping a clean ship, so you will too.”
“Yes, Princess Twilight,” the three mares chimed in unison, uneasy looks across them.
“Good, then come along and meet your new family.”
“Your highness,” a mare saluted as Twilight landed, the three mares in her magic huddled together even as they touched the deck of the Galaxy, “and guests. Urgent news from command; they need to see you immediately in the war room.”
Twilight nodded to her. “Thank you, please show our new crew members to a room where they can get settled in, I’ll be along to check on them. Have medical look them over, too.” Twilight withheld a sigh at a meeting room having been converted to a so called ‘war room’, but it was the captain’s prerogative when she teleported away after first contact without telling him.
“Yes, ma’am, er, Princess Twilight,” she bowed her head quickly in respect and hurried to the three mares who were just starting to separate. “You don’t like to fly?” she asked them. They stared back at her silently, eyes hanging on her sides. “Oh, I’m a pegasus, see?” she flared her wings and all three mares gasped and ran around their first pegasus excitedly asking her questions and commenting on her wings and the terror of their first flight.
Twilight smiled. I think they just made their first friend, I’ve still got it. she complimented herself and mentally polished a hoof on her chest casually as she trotted happily toward the navigation room at the rear of the ship. She nodded to earth ponies as they passed her more casually, having spent more time with them on deck and after hearing about how the local unicorns treated earth ponies.
“What’s the emergency, officers?” she asked once she entered the room and closed the door behind her.
“Ma’am, we have reports that are unsettling.”
“Like what, Commander?”
“There seem to be many natives that think earth ponies are slaves for one, second we’ve heard reports from pegasi flying high recon that many nearby cities are in disarray. Rainbow Dash’s squad reported in an hour ago with sights of looting and unicorns,” he stuttered for the first time since she’d met him, “doing bad things to earth ponies.”
Twilight’s ears fell. “I just heard the same from the nobility and royalty during my meeting. Nothing about the details… what’s happening to the earth ponies?”
The door leading to the captain’s mess opened and the pony himself walked in. “They’re killing them at worst and whipping them at best. It’s horrible, your highness, and even though it isn’t our place we need to intervene.”
“Captain, I understand your concern, however I don’t see a way to stop an entire country that knows nothing about us from anarchy we’ve caused. Even if we leave the knowledge of our existence has irrevocably changed their society and many ponies in Equestria don’t take to change lightly.”
Both commanders were silent for a few seconds. “Then what would you have us do? Sit aside, watching as ponies are tortured?”
“No,” Twilight stated, “we’re going to spread our message of peace, starting with this city. I have permission to integrate our crews with the local populous and exchange culture.”
“I advise against that, Princess Twilight. There’s almost too… There’s… Look, it’s a terrible idea to include us in your suicide plan,” Twilight gasped as the Commander continued, “there aren’t any unicorns there that would accept those of us without horns and they’re obviously violent, mean, dominating, megalomaniacal jerks that don’t-”
Twilight’s wings flares sending a gust through the cabin and sending papers flying, everypony winced and the the scribe dropped his quill. Ears flattened, ponies winced, and the windows cracked at Twilight's shout. “Enough! We are not following your train of thought anymore. You are relieved of command for the time being, you are now the ambassador to Equestria and will fulfill your duty or be remanded to the brig until I see fit,” she commanded without room for discussion.
With a shaky nod, ambassador Sharp Blade fell into a deep bow. “Y-yes, Your Highness. I apologize for my transgression.”
Twilight grimaced through a forced smile and looked behind her, through the broken windows to all the crew on deck that were looking in fearful surprise in her direction. She lowered her wings. “Thank you, I expect the best from you in your new role. Captain, please find a suitable replacement for the Command position.
“Not Rainbow Dash!” she added quickly. “We need to handle this carefully and we a pony that can keep a level head under pressure. Sharp Blade, this was not an easy choice but your opinion of the natives has been poor, at best, since our arrival. I hope, for your career as a future captain, that you handle this to the best of your ability.”
Still with his muzzle pressed to the floor he agreed.
“Now, we’re going to disembark in E.U.P. formation seven. One earth pony, two unicorns, one pegasi. Rotate as needed based on the plan I made this morning and distributed to each ship and captain to be used in this event. Please refer to page forty nine in the binder I created for you this morning, Captain, on which binder to find additional first contact protocols.”
He nodded once, grimly. “I wish you’d discussed your plan to demote my Commander with me, but I’ll do my all.” Twilight stared at him broaching no more query on the topic. “Is there anything else to cover, then? No? Dismissed. Ambassador, please accompany me to my ready room.”
Twilight watched as both stallions left and looked at the scribe. “This entire conversation was recorded?”
“Yes, your highness.”
“I need a copy sent to Admiral Wave Link in Baltimare informing him of the temporary change in command aboard The Galaxy. I’ll be in my room if anypony needs me,” she vanished in a flash of light appearing back in her room. Rainbow Dash was lying on her belly on Twilight’s bed. “Rainbow Dash? What’re you doing in here?”
“I got bored after our last scouting mission and wanted to hang out. Then I took a nap, did some stretches, ate a big meal. Totally carbo-loaded, then came here and fell asleep until a minute ago and then you popped in like you own the place-”
“I do own the place! This’ my room, Rainbow Dash. My personal space where I can relax and-”
“Write and read? Twilight, stop being an egghead and relax for once on this trip,” Rainbow flapped her wings and hovered to Twilight’s side. “This room smells like you need a shower and you don’t. You’ve spent more time and paper in here than out on the deck since we started over the forest of forever.”
“It’s my duty, Rainbow Dash. I have to make sure everything is-”
Rainbow flew around Twilight and looked into Twilight’s eyes. “Relax… please. Most of the crew is getting worried about you. No, we’re all worried about you. When was the last time you slept, Twilight, cuz you look, just.”
“Fine, I’ll admit I’m a bit stressed again. But there’s a lot to make happen the right way.”
“What’s the right way, Twilight? Making yourself sick? We see the extra makeup you’ve been using to hide the circles under your eyes, it’s getting thicker every day since you asked for reinforcements that we shouldn’t have even needed.”
“They fired at us as soon as we crossed the barrier, Rainbow!”
“They stopped and I could’ve handed anything they would’ve thrown at us when the unicorn shields kept us safe until they stopped. The rumor is that they only attacked because so many ships showed up out of nowhere and that’s what they saw as a threat. Did you ever think of that?” Rainbow backed up and expanded her forelegs to express the importance of her speech.
Twilight hung her head. “No, I guess not.”
“Guess?! You’re awesome, not as awesome as somepony in this room, but you’re slipping, Twi. Take some you time and let the rest of us do our jobs,” Rainbow told her, “or your perfect plan’s gonna go all wrong and then you’re gonna go all crazy again and all our friends and Spike aren’t here to fix you, so then what?”
Twilight walked to her bed and laid down on her side. “I’m taking your advice, but don’t dare brag to anypony. I can’t be seen as weak right now.”
Rainbow flew over Twilight and yanked the blankets from under her sending the Alicorn rolling over herself. “Cover up, I’ll put up the do not disturb sign and you get sleep. I don’t wanna see you for at least five hours, understand?” She draped the blanket over her friend.
Twilight yawned and snuggled into her pillow leaving purpled mascara streaks. “Okie, Dash,” she mumbled and was nearly asleep before Rainbow rolled her eyes. “And thank you, you’re an awesome friend.”
Rainbow beamed at the praise and withheld a loud agreement and simply left the room closing the door quietly.
“Hey everypony! Keep it down ‘cuz Twilight’s getting some rest and doesn’t need any of you buggin’ her!” she screamed into the hall and quickly flew away, not hearing the thump as Twilight fell from her bed.
Twilight’s droopy eyes and sleepy mind processed the noise her friend made before she lay her head against the floor and used her magic to pull the blanket from the bed onto her, then fell asleep again.
Rainbow flew from bow to stern and knocked on the officer’s door. “Enter. Oh, Miss Rainbow Dash,” he said with a glance from one of several binders lay before him, “to what do I owe the honor?”
“Can it, you were about to fight, weren’t you? I can’t believe I had to save all your sorry flanks.”
“‘Save our sorry flanks?!’ You could have given them the reason to drop a bomb on us that we couldn’t defend against. They could have recharged that laser and destroyed this fleet! How in Luna’s saggy teats do you think that you did anything to save us?!”
Rainbow snorted a laugh. “Wow, I’m so telling Luna you said that about her.” Then she turned to leave. The captain fumed and used his forelegs to clear the binders from his desk in one sweep. Rainbow glanced back at him and winked as her tail closed the door. “So, I totally helped Twilight make peace. Who wants an autograph?”
“...foolish, we can’t speak their…” “...war isn’t off the table…” “...killed us and we’re supposed to just…” “...spa? I need a polish everything, hehe.” “...Armor’s flank in that armor? I’d be his princess any…”
Twilight rolled on the floor and sat up wearily, blearily, and groggily. She yawned loudly with her tongue stretching as well as her back arched and her wings trembled. With a smack of her lips she looked at the pillow in front of her on the floor and snippets of various conversations that had passed her door rambled in her mind.
Her first desire was to call to Spike and have him take a letter to a teacup and have a scroll penned. Then her mind caught up with her body and her eyes opened, she was alert, awake, and had to pee! She hopped up and opened her door as she went, closing it behind her and going down the hall and into the restroom.
“Hey,” she mumbled as she pushed past a stallion and went into a stall. “Uhhhhhhh, ohhhhh~ yeeaaah...“ she snickered, “Spike, take a letter to Photo Finish.” She flushed and stepped out and looked at the same stallion in the mirror. “What?”
“N-nothing, Your Highness,” he stammered and left with undried hooves leaving a trail of his path.
“Stallions,” she mumbled and washed her hooves, dried them, and returned to her room. “Okay, now that that’s all better,” she smiled, “where’s my journal?” she began to look around. She began tossing things. “Where’s my journal?!” she lifted everything in the room and toss it all around not finding it as she replaced everything. “What… where is it?” she thought of all the possibilities and ruled out the most inane ones ending on either somepony came in when she was asleep or when she was gone, talking with the natives. “Great. Just great. I did lock it, and…” she smiled and her horn lit, calling her book to the side of her head. “I put a locator spell on it,” she giggled.
“Better luck next time,” she giggled to herself and placed the book on her coffee table beside ordered stacks of papers. “I have to have a talk with-” her door burst open, Rainbow Dash hovering there urgently.
“Twilight, your diary’s gone! I’m sorry, I was curious and,” Twilight smiled and pointed a hoof at the book on the table, “I don’t know who took it and will totally bust’m,” Rainbow smiled awkwardly. “Busted… Okay, so after the first few hours you were asleep we sent some unicorns into the city and we found a bunch of radios and took’m back here.
“We can’t speak their language but unicorns can like, magic their brains into it-”
“What?! Ponies are putting their brains into radio’s and no pony is stopping them!” Twilight galloped past Rainbow tugging her friend with her while slamming and locking her room door. She burst onto the deck and saw a large gathering of ponies she rushed to. “What’s going on here?”
There were four unicorns around a box that looked like a radio, their magic linking them to the device. A mare nudge one of the connected unicorns who inhaled. “What? I’m listening to the news. It’s not good, there’s talk of riots in some cities while quarantine is being ordered in others. The nation is in anarchy and not one story mentions us sitting on our flanks, it’s all about us destroying cities and enslaving as we go.”
There were gasps around and Twilight pushed her way through to sit beside the speaking stallion. Her horn lit and she focused on the box. She gasped as her eyes closed and she appeared in a blue cube as large as Celestia’s throne room. “Please setup room,” a mare’s voice stated.
“What?”
“Beginning tutorial,” a screen appeared beside her and she flinched away as images flashed across it.
“Wow… Instant information transfer? Advanced magic based communication and data transfer system. I’ll call you Abacus, room setup? How’s this?” she thought and her personal room changed into the main room of The Golden Oaks Library. “I need access to the aethernet, please.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
Twilight smirked. “Looks like it goes both ways. Maybe I can use this to convey a message of peace.”
A book blinked in the shelf and she called it over to her podium and she stood over it as it opened. A single screen showed her static. “Uh, can I get some news?” The static fizzled into an image of a mare dressed smartly speaking to her foreleg. “Volume?”
“-ion, there’s no word from the border cities so we can only pray Platinum has mercy on her foals. Churches have begun round the clock prayers and donations are always welcome. When we meet our new rulers we are prepared to bow in reverence, yet we will always hold Platinum’s sacrifices in our hearts.
“Let us pray: Oh Platinum, who led the Widigo Blight to far away lands-”
Twilight closed the book and sighed. “I can listen to their religious beliefs later. Right now I need to know how individuals are doing.” She opened the book and looked at the images from security cameras. She was thankful it was silent as she watched unicorns by the dozens looting freely without police intervention.
…
She felt a shove on her side but ignored it as she looked between nine books, audio seemingly overlapping into an incoherent jumble she watched and listened to them all. When another shove distracted her she snapped. “What?!”
Rainbow’s voice came in as a slight echo into her ears. “Twi, we’ve gotta problem and you need to see this, now.”
Twilight closed her books and mentally closed her eyes then opened her real eyes, blinking as she took the light of the world in. “Twilight, there’s explosions in the city but we can’t figure out who or why or-”
“It’s them. They’re destroying their own cities to prevent us from taking them. I saw it in the aethernet, it’s a network of data; like a library everypony across the nation can use.”
Rainbow looked to the box and the two remaining unicorns magically attached, then back to Twilight. “So, they’ve got these radio’s all over with a library in them?”
Twilight looked away from the rising smoke from the city to Rainbow. “Huh? Oh, yeah, kinda. You see-”
“Egghead alert! Don’t care, at all. I’m gonna check on my squad, I’m callin’ them the smokers,” she snickered, “they’re fine, by the way. Just some pretty bad burns and two won’t be flying until their feathers grow back.”
Rainbow shot away and out of sight while Twilight gulped and looked back to the city as the distant sounds alone sounded growing chaos. She turned and trotted across the deck and to the captain’s quarters, entering and closing the door behind her. “Captain.”
“Ah, Princess. I hope you slept well.”
“Yes, thank you. We need to get our troops back onboard and get up high, to communicate with the city’s leadership,” she opened the door and stuck her head out, “get me the mares I brought earlier, please,” she told a passing mare who saluted in reply as Twilight returned to the captain. “I have word that we’re at peace, but the news isn’t getting to the populus.”
“So… are we to have the three mares convey the message for us?”
Twilight laughed dryly as she shook her head. “No, we have to communicate with the entire population at once and we can only do that if we’re connected to the aethernet at the central hall spire.”
“Aethernet?”
Twilight placed a hoof to her temple as she stood. “It’s a unihorn device that links magic and mind to a complex web of enchanted self recharging gems centered in each city that broadcasts their information across the network. The main purpose is data retrieval by access the aethernet’s data web which is a series of crystals encoded with written spellcraft and enchanted into the aethernetwork. Access to all library information is provided to all unihorn kind free as a gift from the eighth sitting Royal Highness Platinum the Ninth.
“Fee’s are charged at a rate of two charges per hour for---”
“Princess Twilight?!”
Twilight blinked and shook her head, looking at the stallion inches from her and shaking her vigorously. “Wh-wh-whhaat?”
“Sweet Celestia, you were rambling rote information for nearly ten minutes like a zombie. Miss Dash, give me that water, Ambasador, towel her again.”
Twilight began to look around and noticed half a dozen worried looking ponies standing around her. Rainbow hoofed the water to the captain while a blanket was draped over her back and a spa masseuse began to knead Twilight’s shoulder.
“What happened? I, remember I was talking about communicating with the locals and then you were shaking me. I don’t-” the cabin door opened and the three mares entered, bowing as they did. “Welcome, I just went into the aethernet and am, confused,” Twilight addressed them in their language.
“Oh? Oh my, your... Princess Twilight, you should not have begun without a guide,” Glitter began as her head remained dipped.
“Arise,” Twilight said with a roll of her eyes. “I had a guide, I named her abacus.”
The mares snickered and nudged Gem. “Princess Twilight, the personal assistant is an assistant. The system was designed four hundred years ago and requires a unihorn to guide new users and teach them. You went into the aethernet without a true guide but a built in assistant spell, the spell was when the aethernet only had three cities to communicate with, not the dozens of points there are now.”
“Oh,” Twilight blushed, “well, are there any adverse effects I should watch for?”
“What did you do and how long were you attached?” Shard asked.
“I think it was a half hour in the libraries and watching the news,” Twilight admitted.
“Oh, dear,” the mares looked between each other, with amused concern. “Data transferred through the aethernet can be significantly more than you realize at the time. You will experience mental exhaustion, very vivid dreams as your mind sorts the information-”
“Spell surges with little warning as your magic rebalances from forced removal from the aether-”
“Speaking languages you may not know, not to mention rambling data as your mind processes it while you’re awake and asleep-”
Twilight flared her wings. “Enough, are you saying that I’m going to go insane?!”
The three mares cowered and shook their heads. “N-no, Princess Twilight, it should last a day at w-worst.”
“Oh,” Twilight relaxed, “that’s not very helpful, though.”
Rainbow tapped Twilight. “Hey, what’s up? They were just rambling a lot, are they praying or something?”
Twilight looked at her hovering friend. “No, but I might be. We shouldn’t have used the device, get the other unihorns out of there gently and have them taken to their bunks. It’s going to be a very long day for those of us who went in.”
“Uh, okay? Should I be worried about the way you’re talking?”
“No, Rainbow, just... be like Fluttershy and gently tell them to ‘log out.’”
Rainbow looked at the three mares and then to Twilight, then let her gaze fall to the mare giving Twilight’s shoulders a rub. “Whatever, I’m on it. Just call me ‘Care Mare,’” she flew to the door and opened it. “But don’t really, okay?” she said as she slammed the door behind her.
“Girls,” Twilight began, “I know how the system works now because while I was attached to the aethernetwork device. I accessed all data stores and read all relevant data of the past year with relation to politics and encyclopedia’s relating to magic, technology, and agricultural disciplines and have to admit they are rudimentary yet beautifully crafted based on the limited spells unihorns have access too.
“Most notably combining spells within gems with sealing runes and --”
Twilight yawned and noticed she was in bed. A hammock. Rainbow’s hammock in her cabin. She turned and with no dignity screamed as she fell from the hammock several feel to the floor with a loud thump. She whined as she sat up and rubbed her shoulder. The room was dark for a second before a guard opened the door and lantern light from the hall lit the room.
“Guard? Where am I? I mean, how’d I get here?”
“Princess Twilight,” he bowed, “your room was locked and we couldn’t bring you in so,” she frowned slightly, “Colonel Rainbow Dash pulled rank and had you set in her hammock while you rested from your fugue state. She left a moment ago for a late night snack from her vigil beside you.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “All that, huh?”
“As an overview, yes. There’s more she should discuss with you.”
“Ah, well I feel fine so I’m going to find her and get caught up.”
“Princess…”
“Yes?”
“There’s been a development with the locals,” the guard hesitated.
“And that is?”
The guard stood tall. “Ma’am, anarchy has taken over and there has been violence…”
“Oh no,” Twilight whispered as she walked past the guard, “thank you.”
“Princess,” she saluted as Twilight left her and the room behind.
Twilight moved to the deck and the wind carried with it a summer warmth to it that rustled her mane as it blew, she noticed the ships were higher, and fire from the city danced, reflected on her eyes as she stared. An explosion near the center of the city flashed but there was no sound that reached the ships.
Twilight’s eyes watered as she watched the city in chaos. “It’s all our fault, my fault...”
Ruthenium screamed as she crashed with her cart in pitch blackness, tumbling and rolling for a distance before she stopped, skidding to a stop on her right side. Her voice echoed as she gasped and whimpered, rolling from side to side as pain spiked around her body. Minutes passed before she fell silent and only her short fearful breaths were all she could hear.
Drip.
Her ears perked and she rolled to her belly, her head spun in dizziness. She felt a sting on her side and worried about the state of her dress and jewelry while she listened.
Drip.
She focused and her horn lit bringing dull silver light to the area around her. With a groan she focused and cast a lantern spell above herself, wincing at the light as it assaulted her night adapted eyes. She looked around her at the remains of her cart and her personal items scattered across the stone she was on.
“Oh no,” she whispered as she looked at most of her souvenirs. Broken, shattered, scattered, and when she looked at the shadows she noticed some had fallen, lost to the earth itself.
She tapped her forehooves on the ground and pushed herself up, jerking as her hind leg caught on her dress and tore it. She stood, looking at the broken cart pieces that she could find and felt sadness growing.
“H-hello?” she called out. She channeled more magic into her lantern spell and looked at the cavern she now found herself in. “Hello?!”
Only her voice replied. Tears pricked the sides of her eyes as she began to walk ahead, tripping again over her dress. She stopped and in frustration pulled it over her head and tossed it to the ground. She stomped on it several times, again only her voice echoed back. This time the grunts she’d made. She did take note of the red marks here and there on the dress.
She looked at her side and in the wane light she notes scratches barely breaking the skin and already stopped from bleeding. Her body trembled as the thought of how close she had come to being seriously hurt while lost and alone built.
“Hello?! Help! I don’t know where I am,” she listened as her voice echoed to near nothingness. “I don’t know where I am,” she whimpered. She moved ahead, found the cavern wall, and began following it while keeping a sharp eye ahead. “Why didn’t I grab my stuff?” she mumbled to herself, “oh yeah, it was all destroyed. That dumb gem’s gone so I can’t try to get out of here. My keep sakes are gone. We’re being invaded by a horde of flying ponies. Welcome to the prison pits; where you’re doomed to wander naked forever,” she grumbled.
With a loud scuff of her hoof on the stone floor she snorted and grumbled as she walked around stalagmites, dripping water and puddles, stalactites, and a large boulder. She looked at the passing scenery and took in the scale of the objects nature had created through erosion with disdain. The boulder was easy to walk around and showed no signs of tampering, which added to her frustration.
“Alone, lost, nothing to show for my vacation… why’d I want to leave again? What did I need to see at the edge? Where the spell is anypony?!”
Alone and scared with anger fueling her she built a spell she’d learned in self defense class. Before she could release it she let the magic dissipate and listened intently. She heard something that wasn’t her own echo, she would have sworn by it. A distant echo tickled her ears and a smile crossed her features as she began to trot toward the sound ahead.
Minutes passed and just as the echo seemed to become more defined, her right foreleg slipped and her knee struck the ground. She fell to her right side to spare it the weight as she screamed and began to cry loudly. “Help! I have broken my leg, Platinum save me. I can not die down here. No! I can not die here, alone! Without anyhorn knowing where I am,” she panicked and rolled to her belly and using three legs hobbled forward as her light faultered.
“I’m going to die! I’m going to die! I’m not going to make it. I’m gonna lose my leg!” she stumbled and fell forward, sharp pain shooting through her side as she landed.
Her light failed as she lost control of her sensibilities and scrambled around in the darkness.
She calmed and fell silent as she quickly resigned herself to her own demise as a light flickered in the distance. Her face wet and matted from snot, spit, and tears she closed her eyes and dismissed it as her final moments as she relaxed her head on the stone, letting herself fall asleep.
“A unihorn?” “What’s it doing here?” “It’s bleeding.” “Mother, will it hurt us?” “I don’t want to be a slave.”
“Now, now. Hush, little ones. You were right to guide me here,” a female voice with a slight echo spoke. “Let us tend to her wound and hope she does not attempt to attack us. Clem, gather moss from the rocks there. Janoe, share our water with her, but first on her wounded knee. Latrel, assist me with holding her leg still while I check for breakage. Everyone ready? Gently move with me on the count of two.”
Ruthenium whined as the pain in her leg spiked, but she remained still and unresponsive. The group took care of her and lifted her onto the mother’s back and their journey began.
***
Ruthenium woke up slowly. Her eyes fluttered slightly and her legs moved. With a deep inhale of musty air she sneered. “Ugh, close the windows. It smells like mudders are herding down the street,” she pulled the covers over her head and groaned as she realized where was. Quickly she tossed the blanket off her head and sat up in near darkness.
Hooves pressed to her shoulders and restrained her. “Please, calm yourself. Surely you know of your injury? It’s healed but sensitive.”
“Who are you, where am I?! Turn on the lights,” Ruthenium shouted through a slight headache.
“Wait here, lay down, and I’ll gather the light,” the voice calmly replied. Ruthenium couldn’t tell if it was a mare or stallion but she relaxed and lay back. There was a soft clopping of hooves moving away and then she was alone. Lying on the bed she could tell she was still underground, the bed was oddly soft and smelled of sweet dirt.
Hooves approached and she steeled herself for who it could be. A light green glow preceded the creature holding slimy bugs in a glass jar’s handle in its mouth. Ruthenium scooted back against what she now knew was an alcove in the stone and covered with moss as bedding. She moved as far as she could from the horrific pony creature until her back was against the alcove wall. She pulled the covers up to cover her muzzle showing only her eyes and ears as it entered the stone room.
“Ah, typical unihorn reaction,” the creature began with an echoed voice. “I am a Sarosian, or batpony if you wish. We’ve heard it before and it hurts less each time. I have wings to fly, too,” it said opening its leathery appendages and smirking at Ruthenium’s squeak. “I am Xalan, with an ‘X’ not a ‘Z’.
“I understand this is a lot to take in, but you are alive; that is most important. As a mare I understand the fear you feel from something new,” she mused then mumbled about ‘not being a filly anymore’ that Ruthenium just barely heard.
“What are you? I mean, where am I? Are you going to e-eat me?”
Xalan snorted into laughter that resonated through the cavern they were in as she set the jar down. “These teeth are sharp, but not for pony. I eat a nice variable diet of mostly flora and little fauna. Trade with the surface helps a lot, though,” she giggled, “how else would we get jars or coffee? The nectar of life.”
Ruthenium raised an eyebrow and lowered the blanket to below her chin. “I like coffee, too,” she said softly.
“Oh my, are we friends now?” Xalan smiled baring sharp canines that made Ruthenium flinch back. “Coffee unites us all,” she made a whistling chirp noise. “Try to stand, since you seem intent on testing your motion against nurses orders. The cavern alderman would like to meet you and explain who we are and see if we can’t get you back to the surface as soon as possible, okay?”
“O-okay,” Ruthenium whispered then cleared her throat. “Okay, I’ll just, follow you then?”
“Unless you know the way?” Xalan mused. “Come, I’ll show you the way.”
Ruthenium got to her hooves from the bed and brushed the moss from her coat then followed Xalan out the doorway, noting it was actual wood framed. “How long have you things been down here?”
Xalan sighed as she led the way. “Sarosians have been living here for as long as the Windigoes ruled the sky. We tried to return to the surface,” she waved at another Sarosian as she passed, halting her conversation, “Hello Jaha, you look well today. This’ the unihorn, yeah, see you soon,” she returned her attention to the mare she was guiding that was walking awkwardly slow with her tail between her legs, “...but we weren’t welcomed by your tribe without that Princess to protect us so we adapted to life underground and outside the walls of the land,” she stopped and looked at Ruthenium.
“Are you well, unihorn?”
“Y-you’re all nudists?” she whispered back loudly. There were laughs from beyond the range of light that Ruthenium couldn’t help but fear as she sided to Xalan like a scared foal.
“Clothes don’t make the caves and drier and the cloth has better use than to show how noble amongst the nobles we are. Let’s continue, okay?”
Ruthenium swallowed as the laughter died off and she kept her side touching her guide until the leathery wings shifted, reminding her they were there and she skittered away a couple paces aside and behind to more quiet snickers. She chose to distract herself with a question that had peaked her interest a moment before.
“You live outside, in the endless forests?”
“Yeah, waay out past the edge. Near the outside is a nightmare spell that no fool would go through it so we go under it. There are games where challenges are made to see how close one can get from the outer outposts to the dome before they succumb, it’s hilarious to watch and sales are climbing every year.”
“S-so you have an economy?”
Her guide looked back with a soft smile. “I won’t bore you, that’s what the government is for, now we’ll be leaving the tunnel soon so you’ll have a better idea of where you are… well,” she stopped and stared in thought, “relatively speaking.” She resumed her walk in silence as a blue light caught Ruthenium’s eye ahead.
They crossed the threshold and with a single blink, Ruthenium stared over the open edge of metal railing to a subterranean city that she didn’t think could exist. “Platinum the First, Savior of the Land,” she said breathily as she looked and stopped when she’d made her way to the rails.
“Yes, it’s a small suburb, but it’s home.”
Ruthenium moved her head before she could tear her eyes away from the bright, lively, and bustling city full of both Sarosians and Pegasi flying while mudders and unihorns coasted in small airships above them.
“Th-this shouldn’t exist, how?!” she pointed a hoof as she exclaimed in awe and stammered at the city at tall as the one she’d been at when the invasion had started. The light source shone like the warm spring sun and there was even a slight breeze that ruffled her mane at their height.
Xalan placed the lantern on the ground. “Fine, I’ll tell you that over two thousand years we have learned to live in harmony with each other and built a world for ourselves beneath what you believe to be all that matters and exists. Now, I believe we have time before you have to leave so can we leave the real history lessons until later?” she whistle chirped.
“Why do you keep doing that?”
Xalan turned and picked up the lantern again, not bothering to look back.
“Well? And can I get a blanket at least? I was under the impression you would be alone with me, not parading me around in the coat for perverts to gawk at in the night. And I’m becoming parched, where can I get a drink? You said you live with mudders, can they direct me to a tavern where I can gather my wits about me?”
Xalan snorted once as she led. “I can see your horn is higher already.”
“It is as high as it must be, I can not let myself fall from Her grace.”
“Or what,” Xalan replied dryly, “She will smite you down to a lower class and have you cleaning fertilizer like those at the bottom? And I strongly suggest you call them grounders, there are strong sentiments with the term you use for them.”
“I refuse to acknowledge mudders as anything better than they are. If they want to be better they should be born with a fully functioning brain.”
Xalan kept her pace but didn’t reply. Ruthenium lifted her muzzle in pride, believing she’d proven her case. “We’re here, your nobleness. May I introduce Mister Chandler, grounder representative and alderman to the area,” she smirked at Ruthenium as the unihorn’s mouth opened. “Yes, you may enter.”
“Ah, the new addition to the level. Take a seat, I have to finish this, then I’ll be right with you,” the teal grounder said with a friendly smile to her before returning to his assistant, a unihorn. “Contact the councils on public affairs and have them explain why our budget has been cut two percent this year.
“Budget policy clearly states that we’re to see an increase of three percent in alignment with inflation and word it so that it doesn’t sound demanding or that we’re really in need,” he winked to his aid that smiled back.
“Yes sir, mister Chandler! I’ll have it written up right away, excuse me,” the mare said as she happily moved between the two mares just inside the doorway.
Ruthenium looked with shock at her as she passed then to Chandler. “But, y-you’re-”
“A male, yes. It’s not as uncommon as you may think for a stallion to get a-”
“A mudder! How can you tell a unihorn what to do?! What kind of nightmare is this, where your kind… wait, that’s it! I’m asleep and still on vacation!” she stated hopefully while the two locals looked at her with disinterest.
“Yes, while you freak out let’s pretend you’re awake and find out about how you got here.”
Ruthenium narrowed her eyes and her horn glowed to life. She yelped as her horn was flicked with a leathery wing. “No magic of an offensive nature,” Xalan scolded.
“I was gonna move a chair over,” Ruthenium replied haughtily as she trotted to the desk and stood to face him. “In any case, before this part of my dream I was trying to teleport from a farm to Dream Crescent. I’d used a powerful gem to fuel it and then I crashed, so perhaps you can send me on my way to begin the next part of this truly confusing construct of my mind.”
He nodded as she spoke. “Ah, yes. Mm-hmm, well, I’ll get right on that. Xalan, would you mind showing her to the waking tubes? She looks like she could use a dose of dream magic on her,” he said with a warm smile. “And if she’s still here after she wakes up, we’ll finish our meeting,” he kept his smile as Ruthenium left the room.
“We’ll be back in a few, sir.”
***
Ruthenium stomped into the office again with a glare that Chandler chuckled at. “Are we awake now?”
“She pushed me into an ice cold shower and shut the door.”
“Yes?”
“It was so cold I couldn’t cast.”
“Yes?” he stated again, sitting and steepling his hooves.
“I was shivering when I came out!”
“And…”
“And,” she frowned. “I didn’t wake up from a dream, dock head.”
Chandler and Xalan couldn’t help but grin, Ruthenium kept her eyes on him and his not sharp teeth. “Ah, so you’re awake enough to converse? Fantastic. Let’s begin, if you wouldn’t mind taking a seat,” he gestured and she called a chair over. “Then short version and long version you’ll learn over time.
“Two thousand years ago we began living underground and liked it. No bad weather, crops grew fine for what we eat, and there’s always been the warmth of harmony that arrived a year after the first Princess Platinum left, a magic fire that reminds us of what we all almost lost before and won’t risk again.
“This is the city Fourteen, names aren’t very important when unihorns and grounders worked with pegasi. They couldn’t come to a conclusion so the Hurricanites chose numbers and the others went with it. The Sarosians were kind enough to mediate our negotiations, as keepers of the night they were the idea choice to help the day dwellers.”
“Wait, who?!”
“Sarosians watch and make certain the nights are safe for those that sleep from outside attacks, now on a national level, a secret guard if you will. Pegasi chose the name of their greatest leader. Unihorns as well. Grounders, well… food was most important and it came from the ground so,” he sighed, “it’s better than Fudgers, after Chancellor Fudge Head. That word changed meaning as soon as she left with her group to new lands beyond the forests to something less kind.”
“So, you were going to be called-”
“Anyway,” he interjected with a slight blush, “it was before harmony was official and shortly after the remaining three tribes settled here for peace. The grounder nation moved to the outskirts of the forest, the pegasi of Stratopolis still live above the cities you know of higher than you can see with normal eyesight and are hidden by clouds so you can’t see them with telescopes, all that while Unicornia stayed where it was because unihorns are stubborn.
“The Pegasi still manage the weather up top and you’ll never know it. Unihorns rule absolute under false beliefs, and we’ve sacrificed tens of thousands of grounders to keep you living in your illusion for peace and harmony.”
Xalan sighed. “That’s where it gets difficult. Ruthenium, right? Can I call you Ruth?”
“No, I’m a noble and as such will be called by my noble name.”
“Okay, well you’re not noble here, Ruth. Civil war has been brewing for generations and it’s coming to a head.”
Ruthenium’s eyes widened. “What? Civil war isn’t possible,” she scoffed, “everyhorn is happy with the way things are and have been.”
“How many noble levels are there?”
“Sixteen,” she stated factually.
“And where are you?”
“Technically ninth, but I claim-”
“And that’s why. Unihorns don’t feel like they’re treated equally and you know what level you determines everything about your life. Lower level unihorns are seeking lives beyond what their levels determine and if you’ve been through the farmlands you’ve probably seen some of our suppliers and traders.”
“Traitors? Yes, I’ve seen them.”
“No, those who trade. The past three surface generations have seen a growing number of intertribal relationships and it’s been catching the eye of others.”
“You mean ‘interracial.’”
“No, we’re the same race, just a little different, but all work and love together. You’ve just never been told that until now. Haven’t you ever thought about equality though?”
Ruthenium harrumphed. “Only for those that deserve it.”
“Are you one of them?” Chandler asked.
Ruthenium’s ears fell a little. “Sometimes, but it’s just because-”
“Exactly our point,” the stallion began. “What you feel has been the quiet norm for almost two hundred and fifty years. It’s been a pot of hot oil and our guests from beyond the forest are water that’s been dropped into it. All the surface needed was a reason and it’s already begun.”
“Yes. Your lands are going to war over classes soon, and there’s nothing we can do but try to help those that want it. We’ll help you as we can but I have to warn you that it won’t be safe when you return and it’s doubtful anyone will believe you about a civilization of subsurface harmonic tribes.
“It’s your choice though, so would you like to sleep on it?”
“I…” Ruthenium thought and was offered time of silence while she did. Her eyes moving slightly as she thought through her options. “If I were to believe you, I’d need proof that I’ll be safe and unharmed while I travel home.”
“That’s not a problem, we’ll get you right below your own city and get you to the surface safely and quickly. Believe it or not, crime is less than one out of twelve thousand annually here with the most frequent being theft. Those are good numbers by any means. Xalan, take her to the city and arrange transport to whichever city she lives at. Bill it to their offices,” he winked, “no need to stop the economy because some tribes aren’t happy with each other.”
“Hey, we’re not tribes like some ancient hut dwellers.”
“Oh?” Xalan chuckled, “and what are you?”
“We’re,” she paused and thought, falling silent and lowering her muzzle slightly in defeat.
“Well, now that that’s happened let’s have her take a walk, shall we?”
“Yes, alderman Chandler. See you for brunch?”
Ruthenium’s eyes darted between the two as she walked to Xalan.
“Certainly. Melons on your melons?” He said and they shared a chuckle while Ruthenium raised a brow silently.
“You have brunch? Like, brunch brunch?”
Xalan used her wing to guide Ruthenium out of the office and closed the door. “Yes, we’re not some kind of monsters that live blindly in the shadows like I’m certain you’ve heard in stories to keep you out of caves and other ways that could lead you underground and into evidence of our existence, right?” she bumped her flank into Ruthenium’s.
“But… I don’t get it, it makes so much sense but why would the government lie to all of us?”
Xalan stopped and gave her an indignant look. “Seriously,” she stated, “why would the unihorns in charge of everything risk losing anything? Is that a serious question?”
Ruthenium slouched. “Yeah, it makes even more sense now.”
“Look, it’s not as though we’re hiding for some nefarious reason. We live here just as they do up there. We have days in the sun and nights beneath the stars quite often, however we appreciate it more than you do,” she said and started leading Ruthenium ahead again. “Ruth, it’s not like you’re the first one to realize this, and to be honest you won’t be the last.
“The only thing is how you apply it to your life when you’re back home.”
“If there’s a home to return to, what if I get in trouble for finding out about all this?” she gestured to the cityscape as they walked across the open level toward another tunnel.
“Then you adapt. Some of those conspiracy groups are actually those that know of us but are simply discredited by those that you revere as living goddesses.”
Ruthenium scoffed. “Are you saying the monarchy is a farce?”
“Mostly.”
Ruthenium stumbled but caught herself. “What?!”
“Yeah, you know since you’re heading to the capital of your nation maybe you’ll get to pass by the real Princess. She’s really nice and is always open to meeting newcomers. I’ll send a message ahead if you’d like to.”
“Y-y-you mean I can actually meet the Princess?!”
“Well, more or less. She is who you believe… but not what you’d expect,” Xalan said thoughtfully.
“Is she a Sermonian like you?”
That earned a snicker. “Sarosian, and no. She’s more beautiful than any of my kind, she practically radiates generosity and mirth with a kindness that’s difficult to understand without knowing the truth as she presents it with every word. She’ll make you laugh just as quickly as quake with fear at her unwavering loyalty to all those she watches over. She’s magical in every way,” Xalan sighed.
“So, she’s like, as awesome as they say?”
“Meh, close enough. You know how to use an elevator?”
“Yes.”
“Then after you,” she gestured at an open elevator and followed Ruthenium in. “Travel levels are three to six, so I guess four will work best. There’s an ice cream shop I don’t get to often enough,” Xalan giggled as she pressed the number.
“Everything is so similar, just underground. Is this really real?”
“Yes,” she stated as the doors opened, “you may exit, Ruth.”
Ruthenium looked out and blinked twice at the busy platform and city spread outside the elevator. “How…”
“Quick transport. Seventy floors in two seconds flat, impressed?”
“Yeah,” Ruthenium said taking a step out and onto the platform as all types of ponies made their way about their daily lives.
“Watch it, lady,” a grounder said she she walked into his path and he danced around her.
She was silent and watched him move on, her gaze falling to his tail and lower. “Eep! Why don’t any of you wear clothes?!”
“It’s just the way nature made us. If you’re that interested in clothing I’ll run you by a clothing store but I don’t have a lot of sparks to trade.”
“Sparks? I haven’t heard anyhorn call money that for ages.”
“It works better here since we don’t all have magic casting,” Xalan said taking the lead. “Stay close and mind your manners, okay?”
Ruthenium moved closer but her eyes kept darting from side to side as they made their way into a large spiral tower that she had to strain her head back to see. She bumped into somepony and stopped then blushed deeply as a very attractive stallion with feathered wings looked back at her.
“Thanks, but I’m not interested. Go ask somepony else.”
She blinked at him and he stared back at her. “Uh, I’m not… uh, sorry?”
Xalan moved between them as he opened his mouth to scold her. “Apologies, she’s from the surface, moving on, Ruth.”
“A, w-wait,” he stammered as Xalan began to move Ruthenium. “I’m Swift Stinger Wing from Stratopolis and it’s nice to meet a real surfacer finally! Can I shake your hoof?”
Ruthenium blinked and looked at him with a goofy smile. She raised a foreleg and he wrapped his primary feathers around it, shaking it to her amazement. Her mouth went dry and her blush deepened. “G-gah, w-w-wings… real,” she grinned and giggled through her blush. Her voice raised suddenly. “You have wings! Real ones! How do they work, where’d you get them, how’d you learn to fly? Are you a mudder with wings or are you a pegasus that’s different? What about flight speed and distance?!”
Swift stepped back with an awkward smile as she continued to bombard him with questions. “Okay,” he interjected flaring his wings and quieting her, but not stemming her excitement. “Let’s talk it over coffee?”
Ruthenium squeaked and hopped on her hooves. “Yes! I will, I do, right now, c’mon!” she used her magic to grip his foreleg and give him a tug. “Wait, where do we go?! I need a cafe, now!” she shouted.
“Woah, calm your teats, Ruth. You’re not marrying him, let’s just take a minute and-”
“No! This’ the chance of a lifetime, Xalan! He’s a pony with wings and he’s cute!” she inhaled sharply and looked aside to him and his now smug smile and smoldering expression. “Well, I stand by it! Mount me… follow! Follow me, er, her… Xalan, hurry, I need coffee!”
They both gave in to their amusement. “No, you don’t need more caffeine, Ruth. But I’ll take you to the cafe, follow me,” Xalan said and led the prancing unihorn and pegasi into the structure.
“Wow, this’ amazing! It’s like a city itself.”
“Well, each tower has everything needed to keep the residents fed and happy, so yeah, kinda,” Swift said.
“Wait, residents?”
“Yeah, they live at the top and get to pass all the shops, stores, and entertainment on their way to the ground floor here to get to work.”
“You all work, too?!”
He looked at Xalan who nodded. “Yes. I’m actually employed at the recycling center a few blocks away.”
“Do you have to fly there?!” Ruthenium asked as she slowed to stand beside him.
“Uh, yeah, I can. But it’s good to exercise my legs, too.”
“Really? What else do you like to work on?” Ruthenium asked slyly, not hiding her intention.
“Ruth, is it? Do you always come on this strong?”
“Yes,” she hissed as she leaned her muzzle closer to him, “but only if you’re interested,” she moved quicker to side with Xalan, swaying her hips as she went. His feathers bristled and he flew up and landed to the side of Ruthenium, sandwiching her between them. “And you can call me Ruth, if you want.”
“Hey!”
“I just might learn to like that,” Swift said moving his head closer and nuzzling her.
“You two just met! That’s not even… How?!” Xalan asked loudly as she stopped and the two moved ahead of her. “How can you two be like that so quick?! Ruth, Ruth! Tell me your technique!”
…
“So, you’re from the surface, huh?” Swift said over a cup of hot coffee.
Ruthenium crossed her hooves in front of herself on the table. “Yes. I’m a noble and work at the energy department as a senior shift manager in power distribution.”
“Wow,” he said winking at her, “I’m impressed. That’s quite the title.”
“Well I’m a nurse at-”
“Yeah, and I really respect anyone that works in recycling. It’s such an important job.”
“Really? I guess I just do my part.”
Xalan sighed and sipped her hot chocolate. “Don’t mind me, just here to make sure you two hit it off,” she mumbled.
“Thanks, Xalan, you’re cool, too. So, Swift Stinger Wing. I like that name, is it familial?”
“Nah, My name was Swift Wing, but I added Stinger when I got my brand. Sure, my brand is a snowflake motif, but Stinger fits since I like to,” he chuckled and Ruthenium grinned and chuckled in return.
Xalan groaned and rolled her eyes. “This seriously is happening, isn’t it?”
“I happen to like being stung, sometimes a couple times a day if the stinger is right.”
“I think it’s just right. Never had a complaint,” he replied as his wings opened from his sides slightly.
Xalan groaned and lay her head on the table, covering her ears with her hooves. “Terrible, just awful.”
The two others shared a flirtatious giggle as their time dragged on.
“Oh, my. It’s nearly evening. What are you having for dinner?”
“Whatever I can get, kind sir.”
“I can offer you something back at my apartment, if you’d like.”
Ruthenium giggled and nodded, offering Xalan a bump as she got from her seat.
“Huh? Whassappen?”
“Wake up, you’re my wingmare,” Ruthenium whispered as she moved to Swift’s side.
“Oh, just wonderful, now I’m a wingmare. From foalsitter to wingmare? What a promotion…”
Xalan followed the duo out of the cafe and stayed behind as they flirted and whispered to each other. Finally Swift hovered and gripped a giggling Ruthenium in his legs and took flight straight up. “Wait! Are you licensed to fly with,” she started and grumbled as she took off after them.
Swift stopped to a hover and flew forward to the floor. “This’ my room,” he said landing her and flying to the door. He opened it with a key in his feathers and gestured for her to enter and once she was in he closed the door, locking Xalan out.
She landed and knocked on the door twice and then turned to lean against it as she sat. “Fantastic. This’ how I wanted to spend my day, helping a crazed surfacer adapt to the underground only to have her fall for the first pegasi she meets,” she grumbled as she looked at her wings. “I thought my wings were cool. Why didn’t she get excited over them?”
She waited a time and leaned her ear against the door, ignoring passers by that gave her awkward looks. She grimaced as she heard what she’d expected and returned her attention to the short wall and rail across from her. Her stomach grumbled and she sighed as she got up and moved to the railing. “Huh, not how I expected this day to go at all.”
Hours later the door clicked unlocked and opened slightly, Swift gasped as Xalan fell inside the threshold and woke up with a snort. “Miss, are you alright? Why are you sleeping at my door, anyway?”
“Wait, Swiftie, that’s Xalan, she’s my friend.”
Xalan sat up and looked at Ruthenium and frowned. “Need a comb? I’m sure you can find one in his bathroom,” she intoned her frustration, “and why’re you wearing that sweater?”
“This? Oh, it’s my Swiftie’s, he’s letting me have it since I don’t have any clothes yet.”
“Yeah, she’s not used to being naked. It’s just a small gift,” he said as she nuzzled him.
“Like the big gift you gave me earlier.”
“Ugh, spare me your foalish prattling. We have places to be and you’ve set us hours behind.”
“Worth it,” he chimed in happily.
“Ruth, come with me please.”
“I’m too tired, maybe in the morning?” she joked, “we were heading out for a late supper. Care to join us?”
“Excuse me, are you just moving in down here? What about your home?”
“Xalan, chill. I’m just trying the local cuisine on vacation, it’s a must, right?”
Swift chuckled. “Yeah, hope I’m on the menu later, too.”
Xalan made a gagging sound. “Seriously? She’s supposed to be heading to the capitol! Where’s your urgency from earlier?”
“I’m calmer now, got that stress taken care of and Platinum above, wings can do so many things,” Ruthenium purred.
“Have you ever wondered what it’d be like on a cloud?” he whispered in a deep voice that made Ruthenium tremble. “Ruthie, we should totally-”
“Okay, that’s it. We’re not here to play around, we’ve got to get you home.”
“UH! Xalan, you’re like my mom when I was a filly. I’m technically still on vacation so let me vacation! Just for a couple days, in a totally new city in a totally new place! This’ gonna be great,” Ruthenium cheered as she reared on two legs and whooped. Swift laughed at her antics while Xalan ground her teeth.
“Fine, but I’m not going to just shadow you two while you have your fun, got it?!”
*.*.*.*
The next two days Ruthenium and Swift spent every moment together with Xalan following them like a loyal canine the whole time, though even being given the couch in his apartment didn’t seem to stem the frustration the Sarosian felt as they had their fun.
“Xalan! Good morning,” Ruthenium sing songed as she pranced into the living room, “breakfast smells great! Thanks for understanding why I’m staying here,” she made her way to the grumpy bat pony and gave her a nuzzle. “Oh, don’t be upset. Swifty said he’d go back to the undercity with us to see me off.”
“Yeah, Ruth, local council still understands your stay without papers or permission, I’m ready to get you home, though.”
“Psh, I’ve never had more fun and you wanna send me away?” Ruthenium teased. “I’ve never felt so free! I’ve been naked more now than when I was foaled and there are so many different ponies here! You’re all so friendly and kind and sweet! I wanna stay,” she giggled to Xalan’s dismay.
“Where’s Swift? We’ve gotta get you home before you realize what you said,” she grumbled as she began to scoop scrambled eggs onto three plates with bacon and cheesy bread.
“He’s still in the shower. I didn’t want him to wear my scent the day I leave,” she replied and scraped a hoof on the floor anxiously. “Do I really have to?”
“Yes.”
“But, I have so much to learn still. I’ve learned so much about flight and wings, and I talked with a grounder! I never thought I’d say that,” she exclaimed excitedly, “now I’ve gotta go back?” she whined.
“It’s because you don’t belong here. You are a surfacer and belong with your friends and family. Trying times are ahead and you can’t hide from them here.”
“Yes I can,” Ruthenium said matter of factly.
“Yes, but you shouldn’t. Remember how unfair you believe it is to be a noble of different class? Unihorns above are, too. They’re taking action and making changes by the day, and you need to be part of that. Part of the creation of a new land to live in.”
Ruthenium sighed and looked at her hooves. “Fine, but I can come back?”
Xalan smiled warmly. “I’d be sad if you didn’t. Are you going to keep that sweater? It looks nice on you.”
“Yeah,” Ruthenium used her magic to tug at the neck and pulled it over her muzzle. “It smells like him and it’s super warm. I’m gonna make it my comfy clothes when I get home.”
They shared a chuckle as they sat for breakfast.
“Ruth, please don’t forget me,” Swift said softly as he nuzzled Ruthenium. She giggled and shook her head in reply.
“I’ll be back, I promise. I know we’ve just met and I’ve just started courting you but,” she leaned forward and kissed his lips. She pulled back and blushed deeply as he blinked his wide eyes. “I like you, a lot. And I wanna be with you more,” she giggled and hid her muzzle in the stretched neckband of her borrowed sweater.
“Th-that was… our first kiss,” he stammered with a growing smile. “Oh, uh, yeah! I… I’d like that a lot, to see you more often, down here. Since, you know.”
“Yeah, the whole secret underworld thing. It’s kinda sad that,” she waved her foreleg at the falling dust that speckled the air, “ahem, that I didn’t meet your princess. Maybe next time,” she pulled her muzzle free and grinned at him, “but I’ll be happier to see you.”
Using his wings, Swift held her head still and leaned close. “I’d be the happiest stallion if you did.”
They shared another nuzzle and Ruthenium offered Xalan a hug goodbye as she entered the elevator to the city above with three other well dressed unihorns. “Bye, I’ll see you soon!”
They waved her off as the doors closed.
Ruthenium giggled to herself and inhaled the sweater again. “Hey, what’s with it raining dust recently? Do you have a seismic issue, being underground?”
The other three looked at her quizzically. “Oh, dear. Don’t you know?”
Mother, sister, and I, a lowly colt celebrated with the other grounders for longer than I’d ever celebrated. I was asked to go to the mating hut but chosen not to, as Green Hoof is the one I’m saving myself for. She’s my age, and one more season cycle and I’d be a stallion and could choose her as my first.
I fell asleep with my family after father was done in the mating hut and joined us. I had never been so happy and when the leaf rumbled to a loud stop I wasn’t scared of awaited us. We were new grounders, worthy grounders, perhaps we would see the Mistress Platinum herself.
I was laughed at for my hopes and idealism until we left the leaf. We gathered with our fellow herdmates from the other leaves and found our friends, sharing what we’d seen and felt, then we heard a noise I can’t describe. The warriors were facing us and staring at us menacingly. We gathered, unknowing what was to come.
The warriors parted and her highest majesty, ruler of all the world and stars in the sky stood on a ground raft, pulled by grounder flappers. I heard many make water as we stood like a snow grounder, unable to do anything from fear and awe at her reverence.
I’d never seen a whiter being in my life. Her horn touched the sky she’d created, her wings made the wind that blew through our manes, her hooves were unworthy of touching the ground that she’d created with her first steps. The Mistress was beyond everything and standing before us.
I was not the first but among the herd, it didn’t matter, we cried and prostrated ourselves before her. We were worthy of her light, her air, her ground, and her love. She spoke to us in our lower language from her own and my heart, my head, my being melted into the ground at her voice.
“My little ponies. I welcome you to our land where you will now call home. Please, rise and prostrate yourselves never again before another.”
We struggled to heed her command but many of our bodies wouldn’t respond. Our tears, our emotions, our souls were overwhelmed with passion and love that she brought with her to our now worthy eyes.
“Rise, and hear my commands,” she said with kindness that offered no options. “Thank you for greeting me in such a worthy manner. I will not separate your herd so I have given you land of your own. You are all free ponies in my land and what you grow you may keep or share with other herds, villages, towns, cities, or even myself should you wish it. I require nothing from you except that you honor each other and the others of this land with your presence and harmony.
"We will have you taken to your new home, in the shadow of this, my mountain in the setting sun. Wwhere you will be taught our ways, laws, rules, technology, and introduced to the other tribes of this land. Earth, unicorn, and pegasi ponies are your friends, your family, and your herd. Are there any questions?”
There was silence, save for the crying and weeping, yet she waited, looking over us, her chosen. My foreleg rose and she looked at me. In her eyes, I felt the weight of my ancestors’ sins lift from me and I could nearly fly without wings.
“What, are we to you?” I managed to ask, my feeble voice a trembling whisper.
“You are earth ponies under my protection. You are equals in the land of Equestria. You are lives that matter and belong to nopony and everypony. You are free to do as you wish, as long as it is within the laws.”
A voice came from behind me. “What shall we do to show our fealty?”
Her smile brought more tears to my eyes and I couldn’t clear them fast enough to see her respond.
“You are to live full lives and share what you know to future generations.”
There was murmuring of understanding as she moved her wings and flapped them, taking to the air and landing in front of us with wind washing over us all, touching the earth to show her power of the elements over us. Then she bowed her horn to us. “I wish you the best in your future, if you need anything you need but ask your representatives and I will do my best to see that you have it.”
She didn’t wait for her raft, choosing instead to fly over us and then looped back to her palace, built of the mountain itself.
“It’s been two days, Twilight! What’ve you figured out with Princess Platinum the Fiftieth, or whatever? Ponies are getting hurt and all you’re doing is talking.”
“Rainbow Dash, pleeease calm down,” Twilight rubbed her temple with a wingtip as she trotted across The Galaxy’s deck. “They’ve stemmed and calmed the outer cities’ residence and what military, militia, and police forces remain have started to work with ponies in more central cities.”
Rainbow hovered beside Twilight. “So, what? They’re arresting them, sealing their magic, hugging them?! What’re they doing to stop-”
“Rainbow Dash,” Twilight stomped a hoof and sighed loudly. “Ponies are doing their best. I’m speaking with top level government leaders and working with them to spread a message of peace, it’s all we can do right now.”
“No, it’s not,” Rainbow frowned as she began following Twilight again, “let’s take the fleet and-”
Twilight stopped and glared over her shoulder at Rainbow. “We are not flying over their cities. They’re at the throws of a full civil war and us flying over will only make matters worse. We have to work with their leadership,” Twilight exhaled in resignation and lowered her head, “it’s the only way to solve this. To solve what I’ve started.”
A gust of wind blew Twilight’s mane and she looked toward the gust. “I’m making sure you’re not a changeling that’s taken over the princess’ spot.”
“Rainbow, how’s a gust of wind going to show a changeling?” Rainbow held up a plate with a metal dome covering it.
“There’s only one way to know if you’re the real Twilight Sparkle,” she narrowed her eyes and uncovered the plate exposing a stack of melty, crispy, cheesy quesadilla’s. Twilight turned and stumbled back, tripping over her own hooves and falling to her flank as her tail curled around her.
She cowered in the face of pure evil, held in the command of what should have been her friend. “Twilight,” Rainbow’s voice called with a distorted echo. A blue foreleg pointed to the stack of gooey doom and scooped on from the top on a hoof. “Ponies are getting worried about you,” Rainbow took a loud bite, ripping the flour tortilla shell and dragging strings of cheese away from her mouth. She continued while chewing the eldrich horror.
“There’s something you oughta know, and we’ve got word from a couple unicorn guards that’ve been talking with your three helpers,” she took another bite and Twilight cringed as chewed evil met it’s unchewed friend, “and it sounds like the leadership isn’t really respected here. So I’m gonna tell you something and you’re gonna listen, or I’m gonna lock myself in your room with you and eat every, single, one of these,” Rainbow placed her two bit treat on top of its brethren, “in front of you.”
“Wh-w-what? What do you n-need to tell me? Ugh! Please, Rainbow, stop! Just swallow it already,” Twilight’s eyes watered as she pleaded.
“Nuh-uh. I might just have a quesadilla party, ship wide,” she giggled as she chewed loudly.
“You can’t still be chewing! It’s all soft! It’s all soft.”
“Mmm, and cheesy,” she finally swallowed and set the place on the deck where Twilight could see it. “Twilight,” Rainbow clopped her hooves together to get her attention, “these ponies aren’t like us. They’re not from Equestria, they don’t have harmony, and they don’t know what that is,” Rainbow Dash landed and slid the plate of doom away from Twilight, stepping between the stare off.
“You’re working with ponies that are kinda, well they think like Sombra.” Twilight snapped back to reality and looked at Rainbow’s aloof expression as the blue mare waved a hoof while she thought. “Ya see, he was all about, like, control and being the big boss, and I heard that’s what the Queen does here.”
Twilight inhaled sharply as her mind raced connecting events and words traded between the leadership she and Ambassador Sharp had been negotiating with. A flash of purple light and she left Rainbow alone with a long string of cheese hanging, dangling, from her chin. “Meh, more cheese for me!”
…
“Captain, take the fleet to cruising altitude and take us to the next city. Pull all banners and disarm the on deck crew. We’re going to meet the locals,” she smiled confidently.
He wasn’t as amused. “Good afternoon to you as well, Twilight. And why would we do that? Aren’t we risking-”
“I don’t believe so. Right now the natives don’t know that we’re really anything but heralds of the Windigoes, at best. Many are using it as an excuse to break the already fragile social order that’s been teetering on this for two generations, at least. By showing them we’re not a threat, and only defending ourselves if needed, we’ll calm the fears the rumors have made.”
He lowered his head and placed a hoof to his muzzle. “You barge into my ready room-”
“Teleported.”
“Teleported,” he said as he exhaled, “order me to go against everything you’ve told me over the past two days, risk putting my crew and the crew of each ship in the fleet in danger,” he stopped and looked up to her, “because you want to make a non-hostility gesture?”
Her smile faded as she nodded. He shrugged. “Sure, beats doing reports all day and night,” he gave her a wane smile, “but please, Your Highness, can you follow protocol when contacting me?”
She blushed and her gaze found some netting on the wall very interesting. “I apologized for teleporting into your room the other night. To you and Gunnery Sergeant Heart,” she grimaced.
“Yes, several times. We’re over it, and appreciate your candor in our relationship, but you really shouldn’t pop in whenever you feel.”
She looked back at him and nodded, keeping quiet.
“Very well, I’ll tell the crew to set sail. Would you care to join me, I believe Rainbow Dash has some snacks left.”
Twilight gulped, then looked at him and frowned playfully. “You told her to talk to me, didn’t you?”
“Maybe some things were said over an early lunch. And perhaps a certain phobia came up relating to our meal,” he walked past her and shrugged passively. “Never know these days. Crazy things happen all the time.”
“Well, let’s go and make ourselves known,” she followed him out and within half an hour they were away, climbing to nearly a half mile while heading over the town to the spire and beyond. Save for their unicorns ready to cast defences they were as disarmed as they could be with pegasi flying formations ahead of the fleet.
Rainbow Dash grinned as she finished donning her Wonderbolts uniform. “Finally, I get to do stuff. Hang on new ponies, Rainbow Dash is about to rock your world,” she grinned and left her room, quickly making her way through the decks, and out into the sky with a laugh. “Try to keep up, girls,” she spiraled to the lead of the ships.
Taking several minutes to warm up with various aerobatics she began to stunt fly over the city, her trail leaving a rainbow wake that no pony couldn’t see in the blue sky. Sounds of disrest quieted as she filled the sky for several minutes with patterns and shapes, finishing with a sonic rainboom that punctuated the message she’d been trying to make since she first graced the air with her presence.
“I. Am. Awesome!” she called as she made a single lap around the entire city before resuming her stunts to the growing cheers and awe of the ground bound locals. She looked down in slight shock as objects began to leave the ground and into the sky. She worried for a moment about being under attack until they began to explode in a variety of colors that were barely visible in the daytime light but still accented her tricks.
“Fireworks? That’s more like it!”
The next day for the fleet was spent making their way to the next nearest large city and repeating the performance by the aerial teams once night had fallen, punctuated by a sonic rainboom that struck the unicorns on the ground with awe and sent them in to cheers.
“Your Highness, Message from the Captain. Reports are in from advanced scouts that the word of our travels are spreading, unrest is tapering in expectation of our arrival,” a steward announced from Twilight’s doorway. She sat up taller and nodded.
“Thank you, is there anything else?” He shook his head and she dismissed him. Looking out the porthole with a smile she looked over the city they were passing over and noticed there were actually ponies camping on the roofs socializing. “There’s hope, yet.”
Twilight stood and placed her book onto the shelf, stretched and flexed before she made her way to the deck and leaping over the railing. A fly by the town’s central spiral while casting a colorful strobe spell to add to the show before returning to the ship with Rainbow Dash completed the show and roused the citizens into a roaring cheer from the ground.
“Doing these at night was a great idea, Twilight,” Rainbow said landing and breathing heavily with Twilight. “They’re totally loving my stunts. Fastest pegasi here, too.”
Twilight rolled her eyes. “You’re the only pegasi that can say that because there aren’t any native pegasi here.”
“Still the best.”
“Okay, Rainbow. Anyway, that was a great show and did you see the crowds on the roofs? They were really looking forward to your show.”
“Well duh, it’s not like anypony else is gonna do a sonic rainboom.”
“And there’s reports from the higher government that the shows are working well at quelling these ponies’... issues.”
A voice cut into the mare’s conversations. “I’m not convinced. I’ve been talking to the leadership as well and they’re not being totally honest with you.”
“Ambassador Sharp, what have you to report?” Twilight asked.
“There are still ponies making a mention of us being a farce to keep them quiet. Many groups believe their inequality is the point of the riots and are using our arrival as an excuse to begin change. It’s not your fault this started, but it played a part.”
Twilight adopted a sullen expression while Rainbow frowned at him. “You’re more of a jerk than when you were on the crew.”
“I’m taking my job seriously,” he replied curtly, “just like when I was given the job without preparation, I have to roll with it and do my best,” he glanced to Twilight. “As it is, they’re more open to talking to me than Princess Twilight, it seems, and that’s not much since I’m still looked down upon as an earth pony.”
“Well maybe if you were nicer?”
He huffed at Rainbow. “I see your head is still in the clouds, Lieutenant Dash. I still hold higher rank than you and recommend you stow your gear before bringing insults that would tarnish your uniform.”
“Hey, buddy-”
Twilight wrapped Rainbow in her magic and moved her away from the stallion. “He’s right, you’re tired and not thinking straight. His job is diplomacy and he’s doing a fine job at it, better than I could right now. We need to take his advice to heart and work with it, okay?” she waiting as Rainbow went through a few expressions of frustration before nodding. “Go relax for a bit and I’ll meet you for supper in the gally, okay?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Rainbow replied as she was released and flew at a casual pace away.
Sharp moved closer and spoke with Twilight in hushed tones. “Twilight, there’s not much we can do right now to quell their unrest. It’s borderline anarchy at the moment and it’s political in nature.”
Twilight sighed. “Okay, and about the overchargers?”
“Thousands more, for any number of reasons. Fear of what we might do, protecting their families from rioters by taking them first, settling disputes, and of course political messages,” he lowered his head and sighed.
“We’re sighing a lot more than getting things done, I feel,” Twilight said then sighed.
He chuckled. “Yeah, it’s a lot of work to do this job. While I do want to be Commander again, I think I am doing well at this. I’ll speak with the captain about heading to the next city and directing our way to the capital city. The route I’ll lay out will be the most effective path to spread our message as best we can. We’ll be to the capital by next moon.”
Twilight nodded. “Okay, make sure the navigator looks it over but I trust you, that’s why I gave you the job, even if you don’t like it,” she snickered when he chuckled.
“Right, well, I’ll see you around, Your Highness,” he bowed his head and made to leave her.
“Ambassador, can you stop by my room tonight so we can go over,” she scuffed her hoof on the floor, “the plans?”
He rolled his eyes. “The way you talk about it makes it sound like we’re having-”
“Okay! Thanks, bye,” she hopped into the air with an awkward smile and flew around the deck to the other side of the mast.
He smiled as he turned to walk and bumped into one of Twilight's new friends. “Oh, hello Glitter. How are you?”
She closed her eyes tightly for a second. “I good. Watch light, pretty. Mother alligator?”
He cocked his head to the side. “Uh, ‘mother alligator?’”
She nodded and pointed over the railing to the city. “Mother, hrm,” she scrunched her face in thought and shrugged. “Good lights pretty. I good,” she nodded with a smile and waited for him to speak.
“I see your language classes are beginning. Perhaps I should take a class in your language, I’d understand what you’re trying to say. Anyway, I’ve got work to do, I’ll see you later,” he walked past her and stopped when she spoke again.
“Stomp, east Glubter?”
His ears swiveled as he turned back to her. “You want to eat with me?” he enunciated. When she nodded hesitantly he smiled. “Yes,” he pointed to the floor. “Go, I meet you soon.” She brightened and nodded, prancing past him and swatting his chest with her tail as she passed earning a blush from him. “Well, ahem, ah, yes… Where was I?” he mumbled to himself as various scents tingled at his nose and instincts. “Bah, supper sounds like a good place to remember.”
Twilight giggled as she watched their interaction from above with several other pegasi. “Now I know why Rainbow Dash is always hiding on a cloud over Ponyville.”
There were quiet nods in agreement as they watched Sharp catch up with Glitter. Twilight mused to herself about how quickly the trio had taken to earth ponies as companions over three days, and what that truly said about the views about them by the majority of natives. Tomorrow’s a good day to set out again, and we’ll have to plan the captain’s birthday later.
“Your Highness,” a voice called from behind Twilight, who groaned softly as she turned around and smiled as Gem, Shard, and Glitter bowed their heads as they cantered toward her.
“Look up!” Twilight shouted just before the trio of mares walked into a trio of stallions taking a moment to gossip. The six tumbled over each other onto the deck and the males frowned at the mares. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” all six said in unison. The extricated themselves and after a round of honest apologies from the mares, the stallions moved down the deck to resume their conversation.
“Your highness, we apologize. It’s not as easy as we thought it would be to adapt to your ways. We’ve been having some issues with the others.”
“Gem’s right. They don’t want servants, or helpers, or cooks, or cleaners… our skills are limited and we feel we’re failing Your Highness.”
“Girls,” Twilight began, “you’re not failing me at all. Or the crew, or the ship. Have you asked the spa, they might need help.”
“They offered a job to Glitter but not the others of us. We asked to rotate between each of us but they declined the offer and recinded.”
Twilight sighed and pressed feathers to her temple. “How about this… massages. You give great massages so start your own massage business. How’s that sound?”
The mares were silent for a moment as they looked between each other. “Our own business?” Glitter asked dubiously. “Not that we question your word!” she added quickly and the others nodded fervently.
“We just don’t know about that.”
“What if we fail you?”
Twilight increased pressure to her head rubbing. “Then I order you to manage a way to start a massage business. Also, language; you need to learn ours and we need to learn yours. Start a language class, or two. I’m getting frustrated with all this and I know it’s not your fault,” she sighed and closed her eyes in thought. “And that reminds me that there’s not a lot of options for you three on board and you’re my responsibility because,” she groaned to herself, “fine. I need you three to follow me, we need help navigating the areas and it may work better with your knowledge and input. Why didn’t I think of this before?”
“You’re burdened with the weight of our world, Your Highness.”
“That was rhetorical,” Twilight snapped and turned around, leading them to the navigation room.
Twilight started in Equestrian. “Navigator Western Arrow, these three are here to help. You three,” she turned and maintained her linguistic stance, “help him find the routes. If there are any problems then contact me,” she looked at the three mares for a second and smiled. “I know you can do this, just help her plan the safest route to the capital city while covering several of the other outer cities on the path.”
The three were slightly confused at the directions but nodded all the same. Twilight left them and went to her room. “Finally, a chance to- Rainbow Dash?! What are you doing in my room this time?” she asked loudly as she slammed the door shut behind her.
Rainbow Dash screamed and hid under the covers, panting heavily, her ears moving with each of Twilight’s hoof stomps. When the covers were pulled down slightly the blushing pegasi smiled awkwardly. “I, uh, sleep in a hammock and needed a few minutes to relax… I didn’t think you’d be back so soon…” she looked into the narrowed eyes of Twilight. “Sorry, please don’t be mad.”
Twilight sighed and closed her eyes in resignation. “Look, if you wanted to do sit ups in bed you could have just asked or used the floor. I’m too exhausted to argue about why you think my bed is better for your exercising but it’s probably about time you got your own bed at this rate, if you don’t like your hammock.”
Rainbow looked at Twilight with an eyebrow up. “Yeeeah, that’s it. Uh, look, Twi. I love my hammock but there are times a bed works for some things better than others. Like working out certain muscle areas. Mostly hind quarters,” she smiled meekly. “Look, I’ll just get lost and catch ya in an hour for supper?”
“Actually, I can use the company, if you don’t mind. I’ve got so much on my mind and can use a friend to lay with.”
“Uh, yeah! Sure thing, just slide on in,” Rainbow scooted further aside and let Twilight climb in.
“Rainbow?”
“Yeah, Twi? What’s up?”
“Did you spill cider on my bed? It’s kinda wet over here and smells sweet.”
“Yup! That’s it. Totally that, what you said. Let’s just cover that up and-”
“Because I can use some if you have any left.”
Rainbow gulped. “Nope, all out. Not a drop left. Goodnight!” She began to fake snore.
Twilight looked to her side at the mare. “You know we still have to eat, right? I can eat out if you want to.”
“What?!”
“Eat. Out there. In the galley. I know there’s room service but I’d rather socialize, wouldn’t you?”
Rainbow sat up and groaned. “Okay, this’ getting too confusing. I’m gonna to wait in my hammock, get me when it’s time to eat out. I mean eat, Twilight. Going now!”
The room was awash in a gale of wind as Rainbow flew from the bed to the door, opened it and closed it with the force of her flying into the hall leaving Twilight in bed, uncovered, alone, and confused. “I feel I should have asked Spike to come along.”
It’s been a month since we arrived near this land and so far it’s been one problem after another. As Princess and representative of Celestia I’m not going to let her down in this, there has to be a way to solve this. There has been a lot of support and acceptance of our arrival, there have been far less incidents of rioting and injury, and there’s always the hope that when we get to the capital in two days it’ll be to a warm welcome.
There’s hope for all this to resolve peacefully and soon we’ll meet the current Princess Platinum, once that happens we’ll be able to exchange words of peace and unity. I know this will end perfectly fine, it has to. There’s no other way it can end, right?!
Ruthenium’s ride in the elevator was harrowing, to say the least. Learning of near total civil unrest and uncountable damages during her vacation was not what she’d expected. She’d fallen silent and completive nearly half way up the ten minute ride nearly straight up into the central city spire to a small squad of four male royal guards decorated in gleaming silver armor.
“Mares, come with us to the exit,” the one that seemed to be in charge stated to the occupants as they disembarked the lift. He turned and began to lead them, flanked by two other guards and one following behind, out of the tower. A shorter trip than she’d expected through a grandois lobby that befit the royal members above her at the tower’s top.
Or perhaps far underneath, she didn’t put much effort in finding out more, choosing enjoyment over politics.
The grand chandelier above them was easily as large as her apartment and it seemed more like a castle interior than a spire like in other cities. “I see you looking, never been inside?” a mare next to her asked. Ruthenium shook her head. “There are enchantments to make the inside larger than the outside based on a visitor that was supposed to have once been here on a long journey.
“That inspired the basis for the central city spire and all the others. This one, home to the princess, is the largest and most well protected. Nothing short of a megaspell will get through the upper levels and the entire frame is-”
“How do you know all this, exactly?” Ruthenium asked bluntly.
“Convenient exposition?” she said with an awkward smile then leaned closer to Ruthenium, speaking softly. “Fine, I’m an architect and work at a company that was bought by the company that… well, let’s just say I work near the blueprints. They’re not that secure and I’ve brought it up a few times, but these unihorns are so convinced of their perfect designs,” she rolled her eyes and backed away.
“So, what’s that gotta do with… whatever, nevermind,” she stepped away from the mare.
“Excuse me, mister guards, can I use the restroom?”
“No,” the one to their right stated. He started as she pushed past him and toward a side hallway. “Stop! Guards, stop her!”
“Can’t hold it, gotta go,” the exposition mare shouted in the distance. Ruthenium and the other two were shoved with magic as other guards gave chase to the toilet bound mare.
“Hurry out of here,” the lead guard shouted and cast a shield around his group and entered a gallop followed by the others, now carrying the mares to the entrance.
The doors slid aside and the noise of typical city life washed over her as she was taken out and placed on the ground. “Enjoy your day,” he said urgently and returned to the interior.
“Well, that was rude,” Ruthenium said as she dusted herself off and turned to look for the other mare who had already made her way into the crowd and vanished. “Double rude,” she turned away and made her way home. A rumble in the distance tickled her ear but she dismissed it as thunder.
She weaved her way through the crowds and lost herself in the nostalgia of being back to her home city. The sounds, the busy nature of the unihorns around her, the sights, the smells… and for the first time she took notice of the grounders performing menial tasks like litter pickup, pulling rickshaws, all the while looking dejected having never known the life of freedom that exists a mile below them.
“Oof-”
“Hey, watch it, Lady.”
“So sorry, it was my fault. I’m making my way home and shan’t cross your path again,” Ruthenium said as she bowed her head to the mare and moved along. “Nag,” she mumbled under her breath.
She kept looking up, expecting to see any flying ponies above. Perhaps catch some moving the clouds or even a speck out of place in the sky. She managed to bump into several more mares and tumble over a colt once to her embarrassment.
She finally reached her building and took the routine path up the stairs and to her door. She cast the spell to unlock and open the door, closed it behind her, and dropped her bags on the floor as she made her way to the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror. What she saw wasn’t the same mare she’d seen before she’d left.
The mare looking back seemed weathered, tired, and different at a fundamental level. There was a change in her eyes that she didn’t notice while below the land she knew of as home. A weariness from her travels seemed to come to the forefront now that she was home. A safe place, a place where her walls could come down, a place where her life was lay open when she was alone.
She thought back to the nearly two weeks of her vacation. She whimpered and pouted, looking away from the mirror and moving into the living room. It was so quiet, lonely; had she always lived this way? Yes, but it hadn’t ever seemed so bleak. She opened the curtains and looked out over the city view she had morosely.
“I miss Swifty, Xalan, even Flower Potts. For a grounder she was pretty cool,” she sulked and pressed her forehead to the window. The soft clack of her horn touching the window was a constant she’d learned to ignore over the years while going from work to home and maintaining her routine… and she’d constantly place her head to a window or mirror and the sound.
She leaned back up and watched as nothing happened. Nothing in the sky, nothing flying between the buildings. Just a slow motion of sameness that she didn’t enjoy anymore. “I thought going on vacation was supposed to reinvigorate a mare,” she sighed and turned to the couch to relax.
The television turned on and she lay comfortably with her chin on her crossed forelegs for several minutes as she used her magic to change channels. “Nothing’s on,” she managed to say as lethargy tried to take her over. “No, I don’t care, I’m going to work. At least there’s something to do there.”
She went to her closet and changed into a modest dress with matching knee high boots and belt with a purse that accented her coat color, then left her apartment behind as she quickly made her way to her job.
Greetings came and went, words of enthusiasm and happiness of her health and wellness passed, and finally, after hours of drudging through the city to home, then to work she felt contented enough to relax with a group of her work mares with a dozen or so others listening in to her short tale.
“I didn’t really see the invaders beyond the ships. There were about a dozen of them and armed from tail to horn with weapons I’d never imagined. The first thing they did was detonate a bunch of explosions outside ahead of them and then some rainbow bomb went off and that was about it. There were grounders and pegasi with them, too. After that I met a couple friends as I made my way home and spent a couple days,” she looked smugly, “relaxing. Then I came home.”
“How was he?” one of her friends asked.
“Amazing,” she answered absentmindedly then stammered, “f-for a stallion, you know.” Giggling and chuckling surrounded her and she blushed. “He was really sweet and I wish he could have come back with me, but he had to stay back where he lived.”
“Oh my,” somepony teased, “sounds like somemare wants to visit the stables.”
“What’s a pegasi and grounder?” another voice cut into their mirth. Dream Walker raised his foreleg to let her know he’d asked.
“Oh, a pegasi is a flying pony with wings and grounders are what they call mudders.”
“Who ‘they,’ the invaders, did you talk to them?” a mare asked.
“No, not the invaders they. The,” she hesitated, “mudders called themselves grounders when I came across them on my travels back home,” she scratched the floor.
“Wow, you actually talked to mudders? I thought they were mute.”
“Not all of them, silly,” a stallion answered. “Some are born with half a brain that works. Those are the special ones. I heard they get special jobs like being researched or bred with other smart mudders.”
“They’re grounders, not mudders,” Ruthenium insisted.
“Why’re you calling them that? They live in the mud and like it, right?”
Ruthenium narrowed her eyes. “Not all of them.”
“Wow, you’re different,” a friend pushed her from the side, “maybe you should take me on the next vacation.”
A round of laughs and a forced smirk from Ruthenium was all she could manage as the entire group broke up into smaller conversational groups with Dream and two other mares. “Ruthenium, are you well?” He asked.
“Yeah, just a lot happened and now I’ve got a lot to get over, back to my old life I guess.”
“We’re here to help you, if you’ll let us.”
“Meh, I think I can handle it. I just have to get back to life and it’ll go away,” she sighed, “I mean, the whole war and revolution aren’t happening here, so we’ve got that, right?” she smiled to her small group.
They looked amongst each other. “Actually…”
“Oh no, they’re here too, aren’t they? It was true,” her head lowered and a mare patted her shoulder.
“It’s okay, the military has been activated and local police are keeping the peace. It’s just some out of towners that are trying to make a point.”
“Overchargers,” another added somberly.
Ruthenium winced. “Really? I thought that was rumor, I couldn’t imagine overcharging. I’ve got so much to live for,” she looked between her friends, “at least I believe I do.”
“We’re all going through a lot of things, but it’s not going to suddenly make us go crazy and ‘boom’ out of the blue. It’s a big choice to make and I’m not gonna choose ‘boom’ over anything else… unless I’m going to be enslaved,” she said and the others hesitantly nodded, “I’d rather be dead than be a slave to some alien monsters.”
Ruthenium looked at the floor. “I don’t think even then I’d do it.”
She got up and excused herself to the restroom, instead leaving the room and building all together. Standing outside the building she turned and moved into the flow of traffic. “What’s wrong with me? I used to love gossip but now,” she looked to her right and left at all the similar unihorns and missed the diversity she’d known for such short while.
A grounder caught her eye and she moved through the crowd until she got to her. A filly, no more than two years old with a hard bristle scrub brush in her teeth. The filly moved it side to side wincing as she did. “Excuse me, what’re you doing?” she asked softly.
The filly dropped the brush and cowered back, bowing.
“What’s your name? Where are your parents? Can you even speak?” she asked softly, ignoring the disdainful mutterings from passers by. The filly whimpered quietly. “What was that? Fine, I order you to look at me and tell me your name.”
The little mare looked up and her grey eyes stabbed Ruthenium in the heart. “Name, Bad Eyes, mistress.”
Ruthenium moved forward and sat next to the filly, towering over the blind pony. “I don’t think that’s your name. Your coat is pink, your mane is yellow… How about Cotton Candy?” The filly scrunched her muzzle. “No, how about Bright Eyes? Because your eyes are as bright as the stars in the night sky.”
“Hmm,” Bright nodded. “I like, but please, no tell. Master come soon, no food if bad work, please.”
“Master, huh? A stallion,” she tapped her chin, “here, I’m going to take the brush for a second,” she took it in her magic before the filly could leap onto it. She scrubbed the spot and huffed. “What’re you supposed to be doing with this, there’s no soap or water and the ground isn’t that dirty.”
“Master say if Bad Eyes want vittles, gotta clean all the streets. Can’t see, so Bad Eyes just work, good.”
“That, doesn’t make any sense. Why’d he make a blind filly scrub a street? I mean, no offense, but there must be a lot of other things you’re good at doing or could be useful for. You’re a grounder, a mudder, you’re strong and… tenacious,” Ruthenium mused through the serious question.
“Huh? I am not,” the filly patted the top of her head and drew Ruthenium’s attention to a mark barely visible through the filly’s coat.
“You’re not what? Did you bonk your head, silly filly? Let me see,” she parted the filly’s coat with her magic slightly and looked, tracing a scar that arced in a semicircle at the apex of her forehead. “Huh, got a big…” her eyes widened and voice hitched. She looked back to the confused filly’s face and then to the scar. “Platinum above,” she breathed.
“Bad Eyes is broken.”
Ruthenium hopped to her hooves and stepped back and her hindquarters were promptly pushed to the ground as she tripped another pony that wasted no time cursing her. Ruthenium’s eyes watered and she placed a hoof to her lips to hold the crying at bay. Rivulets of tears still ran down her cheeks as the filly’s ears moved around.
Bright felt the ground with her hooves and bumped the brush, bit it, then resumed her side to side strokes.
It’s to strengthen her muscles… that’s why she’s been given this task. How many more? Why? Ruthenium thought as she moved to press her side to the building beside the filly. Her mind raced through any memory she could find and she scanned them over and over.
Ruthenium’s eyes trembled as her mind went over as much of her life as she could recall at the moment and realization struck her. “There aren’t any disabled unihorns anymore, not for four generations. They said it was,” she blinked tears from her eyes as the filly squeaked.
“Mistress, here? Me has apology.”
“N-no, it is fine. Say, what say I stay with you until your master arrives and I see about buying you, huh?”
“Mistress may do as she wishes.”
“Please, call me Ruthenium.”
“Uhhh.”
“Yeah, it is a bit difficult. How about Ruth, can you call me that?”
Bright nodded once. “Yes, Mistress Ruth. May I return my task?”
“Yes, you are doing very well by the way. Keep it up and I will put in a good word for you, yes?”
The filly smirked for the first time since they met mere minutes ago. “Yes, thank you, Mistress Ruth.”
As the filly scrubbed, Ruthenium watched her and after a few minutes dried her tear stained cheeks with her dress. She spoke softly to herself as she waited, mumbling mostly about history classes and what should be common knowledge. How something so horrific could happen right under the snouts of every unihorn and not one would notice because of the stigmas carried.
“Classes. Nobility. Rich. Poor. Where’s the line drawn, how and where is this okay?” she said out loud and cleared her throat excusing her words so the filly could return to work. “Say, when does your master come to get you? It’s been a while,” she let the statement trail off.
“Warm, cold, warm, cold, warm Master comes. Warm, cold, warm Master will return for this one,” she said around the brush in her teeth.
Ruthenium was dumbstruck. Flabbergasted. She worked her jaw for a moment as her vision focused on nothing in particular. “Y-you mean you do this for three days? You don’t even eat?”
The filly snickered. “Bad Eyes eats, Master gives bread when cold, Mistress.”
“Okay, that’s it,” Ruthenium stood again and picked the filly up in her magic. “You’re coming with me,” she told the filly who trembled but remained silent as she was carried into the crowd with her brush still in her mouth. Ruthenium came across a pair of grounders and trotted to them, stomping her forehoof on the ground to gather their attention from staring at the ground while they chewed a bowl of unrefined oats.
“Do either of you know who is the master of this filly?”
They moved back and bowed. “No, mistress. This one knows nothing of the one in your possession.”
“This one knows nothing, too.”
She looked intently at them and their bowed heads and moved the coats around where their horns would be but saw no marks. “Of course not, the scars would’ve healed years ago and you’d be none the wiser. Both of you, I was never here, go back to your meal.”
“Yes, Mistress,” they said in unison and watched as she trotted away, back into the crowd that gave the filly some space which worked well for Ruthenium because she carried the filly back to her work building and up the stairs to her work area.
“I need to speak with you,” she hissed at Dream Walked when she passed him and the mare he was flirting with. He looked at the filly she was carrying and hurried to catch up to them leaving the mare without excusing himself.
“Ruthenium, what in Platinum’s name are you doing with a mudder in the building, much less here?!”
She slowed and he noticed she’d been crying. “Please, in your office, I need to talk with you, privately.”
He nodded, quickly gathering himself and rushing past her and leading to his office. Once inside he closed the door and enchanted gems around the room for privacy. “Okay, what’s the deal? You’re going to have to have a good reason for this, I can explain it somehow, but still-” he winced.
“This grounder,” she pointed to the filly she had just set on the floor, “was a unihorn. They cut off her horn because she’s blind,” she sobbed and sat beside the filly who was curiously patting the carpeted floor.
“Woah, now that’s a big accusation. And there are more questions than answers, like how are you sure she was a unihorn?”
She answered quietly between sniffled. “She has a scar where her horn was.”
“A filly with a scar, wow. Never would’a thought. Did you talk to its owner? Or even see if it can speak to answer that question itself?”
Ruthenium turned to the filly. “What’s your name, sweetie?”
“Bright Eyes! But Master say Bad Eyes. Mistress Ruth say Bright, not Bad,” she hopped on the carpet smiling.
“You not only named it, you let it name you,” he pressed a hoof to the bridge on his snout. “You’re not thinking clearly, Ruthenium. Something on this vacation-”
Ruthenium glared at him. “I am not crazy or imagining this. Look,” she picked the filly up in her magic and sat her between them and used her hooves to move the fur, “this is where the scar starts. It curves around right here and ends here. How could a grounder get hurt exactly where a horn should be and who would bother to stitch it closed?
“Remember basic medic classes from school? The ones we all have to take? These are suture marks. I didn’t get qualified to suture any more than you did, but I know what they look like. Do you expect me to believe another grounder did this?”
He stepped back and exhaled loudly. “Do you have any idea what you’re saying? You’re implying that there’s some coverup taking blind unihorns and making them mudders? Do you know how crazy that sounds?” he asked calmly.
“No, not just blind. When was the last time you saw a lame pony? A birth defect walking around? A retard stumbling into a wall or over themselves?”
He groaned. “Ruthenium, those problems were cured ages ago, you can’t just say every disabled unihorn is turned into a mudder and expect anyhorn to believe you, I’m talking with you and I don’t even believe you right now.”
“Why?! Why won’t you believe me?” she moved the filly back to beside her brush. “If you cut off a horn, any horn, then you’re left with a grounder. This filly was scrubbing the ground to build up her neck muscles because unihorns aren’t as strong as grounders. It’s a perverse form of slavery!” she shouted and raised a foreleg for effect.
“Mudders are not our slaves. We care for them because they can’t care for themselves. We offer them lives when they can’t make one themselves. Unihorns are their saviors and we are to them as the Platinum line is to us. You can teach a mouse to follow a maze just like you can teach a mudder to pull celery from the ground.
“They’re not intelligent, they’re not smart, they’re not unihorns!”
Ruthenium stumbled back and guarded the filly from his verbal assault. Seconds passed where only their breathing could be heard before Ruthenium stood and took the filly in her magic. “I, thank you for your time and wish you the best of days. I must retire as my vacation has exhausted me in many ways. I trust this conversation will be kept between us?”
He sighed and his horn glowed around the door. “Ruthenium?”
She reached the door and looked back. “Yes, Mister Walker.”
“What will you do with, it?” he looked pointedly at the filly.
She replied softly and smiled at the filly. “I am not certain, however I will not leave her on the street for two more days with a loaf of bread to sate her. She will have to stay with me until I find her master and speak with him.”
“I think I can help you with it,” he started to say and moved closer.
“Oh, no you don’t, you ruffian. You’re not to lay one hair, hoof, or magic tendril upon her! If you choose to try I’ll scream and buck you to the moon,” she told him with narrowed eyes.
He chuckled. “No, I mean I know a place you can keep it short of dropping it where you found it.” She leveled a glare at him. “Fine,” he went to his desk and wrote on a piece of paper, “this is an address where you can keep it-”
“Her.”
“Whatever. Get the filly there and don’t let anyhorn know you’re taking care of her or else you may get targeted by the bigots. Leave and please don’t bring one of those things into the building again.”
She opened the door and carried the filly ahead of her clearing a path as others didn’t want to touch her. Once outside, Ruthenium wiped some sweat from her head and made her way to the address. “I swear, if he’s setting me up I’ll be very cross with him.”
“Am I going to scrub soon?”
“Hopefully never again,” Ruthenium mumbled in a deep tone. “Okay, here we are. A house? Huh, well, let’s see what’s here.”
Four gentle knocks using the knocker and several seconds of waiting later the door cracked open slightly. “Yes?” A meek voice belonging to a light blue stallion asked.
“Uhm, hello. I was told I could leave this poor filly here. Her name is Bright Eyes.”
His eyes looked them over. “Who sent you here of all places?” he asked quietly, conspiratorially.
“My senior at work, Dream Walker. May I come in or shall I stand outside being interrogated?”
“The former,” he replied curtly. “Wait here.”
The door creaked closed and Ruthenium stood waiting for about a minute before sounds of small chains sliding unlocked the door and it swung open quickly. A tall mare looked down her nose at Ruthenium. “Who sent you, what do you want here? Who’s that filly and why can’t she walk?”
“May I come in or-”
“You will wait and answer or leave.” Ruthenium scoffed. “Very well, I am Ruthenium and this filly is Bright Eyes. She’s blind and was a unihorn before she was mutilated and left as a grounder. My senior at, Dream Walker, sent me here because it’s supposed to be a sanctuary of some sort that I’m losing faith on.”
The tall mare narrowed her eyes. “Let me see her head, if you’re so insistent.”
Ruthenium hesitated and moved the filly between them and set her on the floor. “Now, Bright Eyes, stand still, okay?”
“Yes, Mistress Ruth.”
Ruthenium sighed and didn’t notice the disproving look she received from the other mare and stallion shying behind her. “Bright, please, don’t call me that. You may address me as Ruthenium, I am not your owner nor would I ever own another.”
The larger mare placed a hoof on the filly’s head and moved her fur, inspecting the scarring. “Come in, quickly,” she stepped aside.
Ruthenium picked up the filly and they walked in; the stallion eeped when his cover moved aside and he ducked behind her again. “Finally. I was wondering when manners would rear themselves.”
The stallion closed the door with a glow of his horn and the door locked again. “Who are you, really?” he asked softly.
“I already told you, and I refuse to answer the same questions repeatedly. May I ask you again if you will keep her safe, or shall I take my leave?”
“Priss,” the mare grunted. Come with me.”
“Excuse me? I’m many things, but a priss is not one of them. Now my parents…” she trailed off before she said anything she’d feel regret over later.
“Downstairs, then we talk.”
“The basement? How cliche, should I expect a secret base for a radical movement?”
They followed the mare with the stallion behind down into the basement, empty save for boxes that probably held old household items. She stepped aside when she got to the bottom and the two others passed. His horn glowed and the door closed making the scene creepy and awkward for Ruthenium.
“You’re in with us now, so if anything happens to us, we’re taking you to the same place.”
Ruthenium looked at the mare and gulped. Before she could ask or protest the mare reached to her head with a foreleg and looped her fetlock around her horn and pulled it off. Ruthenium eeped and stepped back.
“I am Helping Hoof, grounder and member of the resistance,” the large mare said sternly. “I don’t trust you, but Glittering Gem here does. He’s quiet but knows a lot and is a unihorn.”
“Wh-what are you gonna do to Bright and I?”
Helping Hoof frowned. “If you must know, we’ll take the darling into our care so you can go back to your life as a prissy, prim, and proper noble unihorn.”
“Wait, woah, woah, woah. Okay, I’m gonna drop the act and level with you,” Ruthenium said urgently. The resistance members’ ears perked as she spoke in a more common tone. “I know I’m not a real noble, but it’s nice to play the role sometimes. Look, I don’t know you or what you’re about, but I’m not about to leave a blind filly that’s been mutilated in your care just like that, grounder or not.”
The large grounder smirked. “You just earned a little respect from us both because not once have you insulted my kind. However, she is safer in our care because we understand what she’s going through and how to help her become a member of society. You didn’t even notice I wasn’t a unihorn until I took it off,” she dropped it and kicked it lightly toward Ruthenium who stepped away. “It’s ceramic from a factory that produces dozens a day as ornaments and novelty gifts, I’ve got a half dozen more.”
Ruthenium lowered Bright Eyes to the floor and rolled the horn to the filly so she could occupy herself while adults spoke. Bright Eyes picked it up between her hooves and sat down feeling the smooth item in her hooves.
Ruthenium sighed as she watch the filly. “That doesn’t help me to understand or trust your motives. How do I know you won’t just give her to the government offices or-”
Glitter coughed loudly and brought attention to himself, he shied back a step and trembled as he spoke. “N-no. Never. We would never work with those jerks.”
“He means the government,” Helping clarified, “go on, dear. You can do it.”
“Thank you, love. Miss, there is a reason many of us are against the leadership of our nation. Part of it is because the civil wars that cleansed parts of the land of ponies that questioned Platinum’s rule. The experiments performed on grounders. The secret experiments on unihorn foals,” they glanced to the filly, “which are publically called conspiracy theories, but some of us have family that are,” he trailed off and looked expectantly to his larger wife.
She rolled her eyes. “I was born a unihorn and was dehorned when I was about the age to receive my skill brand. The doctors told my mother I was sick with a rare disease that,” she paused and swallowed hard, “eh, anyway, they ran a couple experiments on me that sterilized me and left me constantly channeling magic through my horn.
“I remember them saying something about how my horn would help their research move ahead, whatever that meant I didn’t know or understand what was about to happen.”
“What,” Ruthenium asked, “happened? If you don’t mind telling me.”
The grounder pony sighed and shook her head in resignation. “Already this far in, why not. It’s an empty feeling. First, you can feel the aether and manipulate it to your will if you’re skilled enough. It’s a constant presence that’s there to remind you of what it means to be special. Then, I went to sleep and woke up without that. I was alone in every way. My parents wouldn’t have a mudder as a child, even if it was just as show.
“The hospital staff paid me no respect. The world without magic and the aether isn’t easy, by any means. Doors are designed to react to magic, not pressure or words. Not even my presence mattered to most of them. I couldn’t leave the hospital when the government came to take me and I ran from them into the door and broke my snout.
“The funny part was that they were more upset that a mudder was running around on the loose calling for it’s mommy then the fact I was a bandaged unihorn filly,” she seethed and Glittering placed a hoof on her side to calm her. “I was shunned the moment they took my horn from me and sent to work in a rock quarry where I got my skill brand,” she turned and lifted her dress, “a stone,” she said flatly.
“I had the potential to be anything as a unihorn and they made me have a stone instead of anything useful. I spent fifteen years toiling in the quarry until I was supposed to have been sent into the forests beyond to die, but,” she chuckled, “things worked out and now I’m here and I’ve told you too much as it is,” she turned to her husband and scolded him. “Why’d you let me spout off like that? You know I can’t hold my tongue.”
“Because, you always seem happier when a new pony knows of what you’ve been through and how strong you’ve become for it,” he leaned onto her and nuzzled her gently under her chin.
Helping Hoof hummed contently.
“Okay, sorry to interrupt the moment,” Ruthenium interjected, “but I’m not comfortable leaving Bright Eyes with you. Your story is moving, however there is nothing that says what you’ll do with her when I leave. Even though the risk is high, I believe it’ll be best for her to stay in my care.”
The grounded narrowed her eyes and huffed while the stallion frowned. “You don’t get it. You take her up there and you’re a target, she’s a target because of you.”
“A target of what? Evil looks and disapproving words? Bah,” Ruthenium turned her nose up, “if that’s the worst I’ll claim her as a training exercise or something and ignore the comments.”
“She’s blind, what’ll you do about that? There are no disabled unihorns and disabled grounders are only good for pulling,” Glittering added.
“Then I’ll find a use for her! You two should be ashamed,” Ruthenium admonished them, “a kind little filly here has been changed from one race to another and now has to live with it the rest of her life, and all you have to offer are comments on her lot in life. Can you show us to the door, we’re ready to leave,” Ruthenium finished with a stomp and picked the filly up and placed her on her back. “Hold on to my mane and I’ll carry you, okay?”
Bright giggled. “Mommy gave me rides, too.”
The mood sombered for a second as each adult wanted to ask about her parents but resisted, knowing they’d given her away instead of taking care of her themselves.
“Ruthenium, I don’t know what to say about all this.”
Ruthenium smiled at the mare. “Sometimes that the best thing to say.”
…
Ruthenium ignored the looks and gawking she was receiving as she carried what seemed to be a grounder on her back, letting it hold onto one of her braids between its hooves while the filly bounced. Within two hours she’d made her way home and into her apartment, the door closed behind her quietly and she placed Bright Eyes beside the couch.
“Wait right there, I’ll get you a toy.”
She went into her bedroom and started looking around for anything a blind filly could play with and snickered at a toy she found that was certainly not something she’d share, much less with a filly. Placing the object back in her sock drawer, she went to her closet and nickered happily when she found an old box.
“Look what I brought you, Bright Eyes, it’s my mother’s and I’m going to share them with you,” she said opening the box and placing seven equally sized small orbs on the floor. “They’re meant to train you on using your magic, but you can just roll them and get a feel for them on carpet, okay?”
“‘Kay,” was the response Ruthenium got and cared for. She turned and made her way to the nearest aethernet connected device and turned it on.
“Call Dream Cresent’s box,” she said with her back to the filly. The sound of glass clinking was all she needed to know the filly was fine.
“Yeah, this’ Dreamy, who’s callin’?”
“‘Dreamy’? Wow, you actually call yourself that?”
His voice scoffed. “Ruthenium, nice to hear from you. Free of the little one, I take it?”
“No,” she replied and slightly sang, “I’ve got a filly at home.”
“Wh-what?! Why would you do that? You were supposed to leave her with, them.”
“Them? You mean the unihorn turned grounder and her husband? Why would I leave a blind filly with two ponies I don’t even know?”
“Because they were at least able to keep her. You’re going to have to have good reasons to have an unlicensed mudder in your home and a reason to go along with it.”
“Look, I know where I can take her and she’ll be safe. I can’t tell you where or how I’ll get there or when, but it’ll be better for her there than here, okay?”
There was a tense silence between them. “Dream? Is this still connected? Can you hear me?”
“Yeah,” he finally said. “Just, this isn’t what I expected from anypony I knew, much lest you, no offense, of course.”
“You know, just by saying ‘no offense’ doesn’t make it any less offensive,” she sighed. “Is there nothing you have to say about this or why you sent me to two,” she hesitated, knowing the call could be being listened to by a shady sector of the government, “of your friends that aren’t able to offer a good reason to take in a filly.”
“Look, just watch her for a little bit, can I come over and talk this over with you?”
“Well, yes,” she dragged the word out, “may I ask why?”
“There’s something you should know, if you’re going to be watching her and taking her to some safe place. I may have a better place to offer.”
Ruthenium thought it over and shrugged. “Sure. Come by when you have time, I’ll be here occupying her. It’ll be a sinch.”
A pregnant pause followed that comment, then snickering. “Have you ever dealt with a foal?”
“I’ve seen it on TV, it can’t be that hard! Just get over here,” she shouted while starting to blush and shut the connection off. “Stallions,” she huffed and turned back to Bright Eyes. “Awe, so cute,” she said walking over. “Where are all the balls? Did they go under the couch?”
Bright Eyes’ ears focused on Ruthenium and the filly spat out one. Ruthenium blanched. “Where are the rest?” she asked with concern. When the filly picked up another between her hooves and sucked it into her mouth, Ruthenium yelped and fell to her chest and used her hooves to open the filly’s mouth, or try to.
With a whining grunt the filly turned away and swallowed. “No!”
Ruthenium gasped and used her magic to try to force the filly’s mouth open, too carefully to risk harm thus proving to be a pointless task. “Oh no, oh no, oh no,” she danced between her hooves nervously, “what do I do? Will she be okay? Oh no, oh no! Don’t pick up anymore,” she yelped and snatched the remaining five balls from the floor and placed them back into the box.
Bright Eyes had begun to cry.
“Oh no, you ate two?! Please, don’t cry! Are they hurting you? Let me know if you need to vomit,” she scampered to the kitchen and got a tea mug and returned to the filly, placing it in front of the crying one. “Puke in that,” she turned and ran to the bathroom, panic rushing her. She opened her medicine drawer and moved through dozens of expired pill bottles whimpering as she looked them over.
“Where is it? Where is it?! Laxatives! Got it,” she took the bottle and looked at the date and grumbled. “Three years expired? Okay, it’s fine, just stay calm, it’s fiber based.”
She stood and trotted out of the bathroom, through her room, and into the living room. “Bright Eyes, where are you?” she asked when she saw the spot was empty. “You’re not crying anymore, that’s good, but now I can’t find you… Where’d you sneak off to? I have medicine for you to make you better.”
A whimper from the far side of the couch gave her away and Ruthenium quickly moved around. “Found you! Take some medicine,” she held the bottle of powder to the filly whose ears swiveled on her head, covered by her forelegs. She shook her head and sniffled. “Awe, it’s okay, look, it’s… I mean, listen, it’s yummy. Nom, num, num.”
Bright Eyes whimpered in response.
“C’mon, you must take your medicine. It’s for your health. You can’t eat enchanted balls and expect nothing to happen. You might get sick, or the enchantment may bleed out into you. Those were enchanted with weightlessness, you don’t wanna float around, do you?”
“No medicine, icky.”
“Yummy, so good and it tastes like fresh hay and alfalfa.”
“Icky, medicine always gross.”
The bottle lowered slightly. Ruthenium sighed and sat down. “What the heck am I gonna do with you?” she said softly. “Maybe I can mix it into your food?” she mumbled. “I have a better idea, if you don’t die from choking in the next hour, I’ll buy you some ice cream! Have you ever had ice cream?”
Bright Eyes lifted her head, her grey eyes darting side to side before she shook it.
“It’s the best dessert ever,” she stated haughtily. “It’s a luxury item, as mares aren’t always lactating and those that do charge top fees, but mother knows a few mares that know some spells and have access to the milking houses,” she sang the last part in her normal voice, “and if you take the medicine I’ll take you to the milking house to get some ice cream.”
The filly thought for a moment and Ruthenium sweetened the deal. “I’ll even toss in the extra payment and let you top your ice cream with whatever you want! Gummies, mints, grubs, caterpillars, maybe some candied grasshoppers, huh?”
The filly grinned and nodded fervently. “Ahh.”
“Okay! Hold the bottle, I’ll get some water to mix it into.”
…
“Precious Platinum, no! Not on the carpet, it’s seeping in! Please, stop crying, you’re gonna get ice cream if you stop crying and pooping! Why’d you eat all the medicine?! Urk, gluh, uh, the smell. I’ll carry you to the bathroom! Ahh! It should’t spray that far… MY BED! Aaa! Please, make it stop. Goddesses above, please make it stop!
“Oh no, why’re you making that face? Blbbbluhmygoshits in my mane! Both ends, both ends, get in the tub you little monster! Urp, ugh, oh no… two years, since, blurrrggh. Blurrrggh. I’m -blurrrggh, kaf, kaf- never having -bluurp- foals.
“Oh no, urrrrp, no. No, no, no! The enchantment’s starting! Arrrgh, get me out! Oof, I can’t get up, it’s everywhere, under my hooves. Can’t get a grip. It’s floating in the air… all of it. Bright Eyes, please, I beg you, please stop… How can there be more? Where’s it all coming from?”
Ruthenium sat on her freshly cleaned couch with a scowl on her face and her forelegs crossed over her chest. A warm, dry towel wrapped her mane and another her tail while she glared at the wall where her TV was. Past tense, because it shorted out when certain airborne particulates infiltrated the inner workings.
With some crafty magic, professional cleaners she’d called had cleaned the filly’s mess from every surface and midair, but there was psychological damage done to the mare that left the impression of the smell in every room she went through.
She could still taste the acidity for her vomit tingling the back of her throat. Two full body showers for herself with a weeks worth of shampoo alone used in half an hour. A tube of toothpaste, gone. She’d forgone the conditioner and between washing both herself and the filly, who was still sitting in the bathroom over the toilet, she’d exhausted herself.
Unpleasant noises filled her apartment from the bathroom where the tiny filly squatted making noises that defied Ruthenium’s understanding of biology and size. Ruthenium covered her ears as the filly grunted and whined for more water between indescribable noises.
“I swear, I’m never having one of my own after this,” she grumped as she left the couch and stomped to the bathroom, holding her breath when she entered her room, made sure the window by the bed was open, and quickly took the empty water cup from beside the filly.
Without a hope otherwise, Ruthenium glanced at the toilet and gasped, coughed, and ran from the bathroom to the open window, hanging her head out. “Ugh, uuuuh, I’m never eating brownies as long as I live,” she whined as she inhaled fresh air and exhaled the unpleasant.
Inhaling deeply she pulled her head back in and found the cup, thankfully unbroken, and hurried from the room and closed the door behind her. “Ghuh! I can’t keep holding my breath like this. What about when I have to go?” she glanced into the drain of the kitchen sink then shook her head quickly. “No! Just, no.”
…
“Alright, I’m gonna try the spell the cleaners left me. I studied it and it should work, so just wait in the bathroom until I’m there, okay?”
“Y-yeah,” Bright Eyes replied quietly.
Ruthenium lit her horn and began the anti smell spell.
Starting from her front door she moved through the apartment and into her bedroom, taking notice of the chill in the air. The glowing orb of blue above her head grew slightly as she traveled and when she sniffed the air she smiled. “Okay, I’m opening the door. You flushed, right?”
“Yeah, and cleaned up my-”
“Bah-na-na-na-na, got it. No, got it. Opening the door now,” the knob turned and the door swung in. Bright Eyes was sitting in the bathtub with her chin on the rim looking sullen. The orb grew in size and after several seconds she turned and ran to the open window and forced the orb out, closed the window, and released the spell.
“Sheesh, I hope nopony gets a whiff of that. Now, on to you,” Ruthenium said softly with a true smile. “All cleaned up so nothing to worry about. Cost me about half my savings to have it all cleaned up and I don’t have a TV for the moment, but to be honest it’s been a great learning experience for me.”
“You said you don’t want me.”
“Wha-? When’d I ever say that?”
Bright Eyes sniffled. “You said you never wanted a foal. And I’m still a foal, right?”
“Ohhh, Bright,” Ruthenium hugged her gently from outside the tub. “I didn’t mean you, I meant that I don’t want a baby foal. I know you’re able to take care of yourself to a point, I just didn’t handle the medicine and communication properly. In that instance I believe I’d have taken the medicine without thought as well.
“I didn’t tell you not to take it, I don’t think anyway. Anyway! Let’s wash you properly and get you into this diaper,” Ruthenium sighed, “sorry, but it’s for the safety of my property and bank account. There’s still some of that in your system and I just can’t deal with more of that, you silly filly.”
“I understand, but, you’re not mad at me?”
“Mad? How can I be? I fought to get you here, and I made a couple mistakes that you paid for. That’s more reason for you to be mad at me, right?”
Bright Eyes sat up and waved Ruthenium closer. When the filly felt her face touch her tiny hoof, she slapped Ruthenium right on the nose.
“Ouch! What’d you do that for?!”
“If I’m mad I can ‘bop ‘em on the nose’, daddy said.”
“Well, I’m gonna be rubbing my nose all night now, silly filly. Or maybe boppy doppy?” she grinned.
Bright Eyes smirked. “Nah,” she lay in the tub and curled her tail around her flank, “bath?”
Ruthenium giggled softly. “Just one more, I hope.”
…
“Okay, so here’s the rub,” an uncouth mare grumbled, “ya gotta mudder in yer apartment without a license. Twelve percent rent increase and you clean up all it’s messes or ya forfeit the deposit and pay two months rent, and I evict ya. Got it?” she snorted nasally.
Ruthenium withheld the sneer she felt. “Yes, we have an agreement. I shan’t let her get out of hoof.”
“Better not, yer a good tenant,” she turned her neutral expression to a kind smile. “I’d be displeased to lose ya.”
“As would I, I wish you the best of days ahead.”
“And to you.”
Ruthenium closed the door and turned back to the clean and organized apartment with a sigh. “Okay, Bright Eyes, it’s set, you live here now.”
Bright Eyes poked her head from behind the couch and smiled. “Yay? I mean, yay!”
“That’s more like it,” the mare giggled as she walked through the small apartment and lay on the couch while the filly climbed up to lie next to her. “So, what would you like to do?”
“I’unno, play ball?”
“I like that idea! Let’s lay down and I’ll bring the ball over. It’s actually a pet ball, but I use it when I get stressed sometimes. It’s fun to chew on, I can get you one, too,” Ruthenium offered as she used her magic to bring a soft ball to her. She was about to toss it to Bright Eyes but halted. “I’m gonna roll it to you, ready?”
“Yuppers!” was the cheerful reply. “Soon?”
“I, uh, it’s by your tummy.”
“Oh, I didn’t hear or feel it,” she moved her forelegs and bumped the ball, a grin on her face as she rolled the ball between her forelegs. “Can you make a noise?”
Ruthenium clicked her tongue and readied herself, squeaking happily as the ball rolled directly between her forelegs. “Great roll! Coming back,” she placed a hoof on the ball and they began playing, rolling it back and forth. Ruthenium giggled and soon grinned as the filly, for the first time, giggled.
Her sweet voice making the sound of happiness that she was a part of sent warm tingles through her chest and she decided she liked it, a lot.
…***...
“Bright, wake up, it’s time to start the day. Can you open the window, it looks beautiful out.”
“The sun feels warm, I’ll get the windows.” With a casual roll from the couch, Bright Eyes trotted to the window and reared up, placed her hooves on the sil, and nudged the window open with her snout from a groove in the base. The cool morning air washed over the filly and ruffled her mane; she inhaled the clean fresh air and exhaled with a smile.
“One open, one to go.”
“Okay, Sweetie, I’m starting breakfast so I can use your help to set the table.”
“‘Kay, Ruth.”
Bright used her tail, dragging it against the wall as she made her way to the bedroom and when her nose touched the comforter she hopped onto the bed and listened. The sound of chopping echoed from the kitchen and with a happy grin she jumped and bounced on the bed.
A somersault, a twist, a bounce, and finally she landed on her belly, her body bouncing one last time before she climbed from the bed and crossed the last steps to the window. She opened it like the other and landed on all four hooves, turned back and walked around the bed to the door.
Ruthenium quickly tiphooved back to the kitchen and stifled her snicker at watching the filly jumping on the bed. “Breakfast is almost ready, can you take your seat?”
Bright Eyes hummed in agreement as she crossed the open space to the table. “Seven, eight, nine, stop.” She lifted a hoof and placed it on the table and moved forward until her chest touched the edge, and she sat down curling her tail around her flank. “Ready.”
“Good work! You’re gonna love this, it’s the usual crawlies and eggs, but I’ve added a spice from the western territories to the potatoes and hay hash,” she magicked a large plate with small portions to the filly and then a larger portioned plate to her spot. “Dig in.”
“It smells really good,” she slid the fork to the edge of the table and when the handle was off just enough she hooked her fetlock over it and held it firm. With practiced skill she dipped it into the eggs and took a bite. “Mmm, they’re not crunchy this time?”
“I learned that if I boil them in the shells first they soften a bit. Do you like them, or should I just make them like usual?”
“I kinda like ‘em. It’s different, kinda soft on my tongue but crunchy on my back teeth,” she took another bite. “Yeah, I like’m kinda soft more.”
“And what about the hash?”
Bright chewed and tapped her fork on the plate across it until it hit the next item and she scooped some up. She crunched and munched for a few seconds while Ruthenium watched intently. “Well, Bright? Is it good?”
A final gulp and content exhale. “Ahh, yeah. That stuff is kinda spicy, I like it.”
“Spicy?” Ruthenium asked as she took a small bite herself and chewed, swallowed, then reached for the empty cup on the table. “Spicy! Ack!”
Bright laughed at the sound of rushing and panicked movements combined with panting as Ruthenium got herself a cup of water and swished her mouth with it, spitting into the sink.
“Well, I’m glad you like the spice but I’m gonna have to pass on it.”
“Can I have your hash?”
Ruthenium smirked. “Just don’t spoil your lunch, okay?” she said as she moved her plate to Brights and scooped the offending item away. “I’m just gonna have to make due with raw hay this morning.”
Bright scooped a large helping and munched while the mare got up and went to the lower cupboards and opened one of the doors. A quarter bale of hay lay wrapped with chunks missing. She opened the package and pulled out a small chunk the size of her hoof and closed the bag, on her way back to the table she grabbed some salt and sat in her spot again.
“Bon appetit,” she chirped and chomped into the hay loudly. Smacking her lips she made various enjoyment noises. “Oh yeah, this’ the good stuff. Dry, crunchy, tastes like old grass,” Bright giggled, “just what a pony needs to grow up big and strong. Mmmnnnggg.”
There was a loud knock on the door and both fell silent. Ruthenium swallowed as quickly as she could while she got up and went to the door, still with a couple chews of hay left in her mouth. “Hello? Who is it?” she asked as she looked through the one way viewport.
A pony covered in black stood, face shadowed by a large rimmed hat. In a deep vibrato voice he spoke. “I am searching for Ruthenium. Open the door.”
She froze and looked back to the filly, wishing she could convey a message, anything to her without sound. “What’s the reason?” she asked.
He lifted his hoof and rapped the door again. “Open the door at once.”
Ruthenium trembled but relented, unlocking the door and opening it. The muzzle of a stallion showed itself and leapt, tackling her. With a scared eep, Ruthenium fell back into the apartment and the stallion shut the door with his tail. His hat came off and he grinned at her.
Ruthenium struggled and moved back, then stopped as she recognized him.
A large portion of hash struck his head and he winced, looking at the filly who was scooping eggs now and listening for his position to attack again. “Swifty?! What’re you-”
“Aaarrgggh! Ow, ow, ow! It hurts, it burns! My eyes! What was in th-urpgh,” he coughed as a hoof worth of egg managed to land in his mouth and start choking him.
“Get away from my Mama!” Bright shouted with a frown.
Ruthenium got up and tackled him to the floor. “This’ for your own good,” she said urgently and drove a foreleg into his abdomen. He coughed eggs and saliva, took a deep breath, and scrambled to his hooves.
With a foreleg he covered his eyes and turned away from the filly. “Stop! What’s wrong with you two, I thought you’d be happy to see me!”
Ruthenium scoffed. “Bright, he’s a friend. Stop throwing breakfast at him. Swifty, why would you act like some shady government official? Why not just show yourself?! Come here, ya big baby,” she tugged his ear with her magic and pulled him to the sink. Water started running and he quickly placed his eyes under it. “Seriously, you were asking for this to happen.”
He sighed and blinked his eyes reluctantly to wash them while sighing. “I was hoping for a hug and happiness, not a kick to the gut and assault by breakfast.”
“Stop whining and wash, I’ve got a filly to take care of.”
He spluttered, realizing what she’d said. “It’s not mine, is it?!”
“Don’t be a mule!” Ruthenium shouted at him. “I swear, all colts are the same sometimes,” she moved to the filly and helped her set her spot back up with her magic while gently nudging the confused girl back to her spot. “Bright, don’t listen to us adults, we’re going to have a talk and I want you to finish your meal… what’s left of it.”
Ruthenium leaned and whispered in Bright’s sensitive ear. “Great throwing, by the way.”
They shared a snicker and placing the fork back in Bright’s grip, Ruthenium moved to the stallion. “Okay, big shot,” she started slyly as she leaned beside him on the counter. “How’d you even get here? Pegasi, sure, cover up in a coat. But no horn?”
He blinked his eyes and moved from under the water, his head soaking wet and his mane stuck to his face. “The dressing like a shady government official gives enough effect to keep everypony away enough,” he blinked his red eyes at her and flinched. “What was in that stuff? I’ve been blasted with a lot of stuff and this burns fiercely.”
“I don’t know,” Ruthenium hummed, “it’s a spice from the west. Awww, come here,” she wrapped her forelegs around his wet head and pulled him to her chest. “I’m sorry, I’ve been a terrible host. You show up out of nowhere to surprise me and we just attack you,” she said pouting comically. “Although, I saved your life and a filly can’t be held accountable for her actions, especially a grounder.”
He smiled as she held him. “Thanks for saving me, you know, from choking on eggs.”
Bright added quietly. “I’ll do it again if you make me.”
“Well,” he said ruffling his wings under his cloak, “she’s like her momma.”
Ruthenium let him go with a little shove and gasped as they both lost their grip on the floor, slipping and falling onto each other before laughing. “You know, you were more romantic when we first met.”
Swift snorted in his laughter. “You were just as-”
“Okay! Filly present that doesn’t need to know about how we met,” Ruthenium said extracating her limbs from his, “and speaking of which, how did you find me? I never gave you my address.”
“Yeah, I caught that, thanks,” he winked, “but I really do have access to government files, so I just looked up the most pretty and fun mare in the known world.”
Ruthenium blushed. “Aww, that’s so-”
“Then I scrolled down a ways and found you, so here I-” he managed before her lips pressed to his.
“Oh, stop playing around. You know I was top ten, right?”
“Top two, right behind the Princess herself,” he pecked her lips with a kiss.
“Ugh! I can hear you kissing, you know!”
“Yes, and you’re going to be listening to some music for a bit while we have some adult time,” Ruthenium winked to him. “Swifty, this is Bright Eyes. She’s blind and he’s a grounder with wings. You two say hi while I get some music ready.”
The two looked at each other and blinked. “So,” they said in unison.
“Please, ladies first.”
“So, a grounder, with wings? I don’t believe it.”
“And a blind grounder living with a unihorn? Above ground at that?”
“Ruthenium.” “Ruth.”
She turned to look at the duo who now had their attention in her direction. “What? I said it and introduced you, so you two get acquainted.”
“I’m Bright Eyes and I’m supposed to say I’m her pet grounder but I’m not saying that to you if you’re not gonna be honest with me.”
“I am being honest, and I’m not really a grounder with wings, I’m a pegasi! Born with these babies,” he flapped his wings and sent a gust through the main room. “Here, touch’m, you’ve never felt wings as good as mine until they’re- ah, ahem,” he looked at Ruthenium, who was smirking back at him. “Well, they’re pretty neat,” he walked to the filly and sat next to her and wrapped a wing around her.
“Huh?! What’re, what’s…” she nuzzled into his secondary feathers and dropped the fork onto the plate as she used her hooved to touch and brush against his feathers until she traced them to his wing arm and then to his back. She flinched back and eeped.
“Yeah, they’re real,” he said moving his wing around her and scooping her up in his feathers, “and they’re strong, too. Ruthenium, wanna play catch?” he asked as he turned quickly and saw Ruthenium turning to face him with enough time to react. He flapped his wing and sent the filly screaming through the air into Ruthenium’s magic field.
“Swifty?! What is wrong with you? You don’t just throw a filly around like that,” she looked at the trembling filly and sighed. “But, I guess I haven’t played with her much like this, have I, walnut?”
Bright blinked her eyes and her ears swiveled just before she was tossed back to the pegasus, who caught her in his wings. “There ya go! Wait, do I see a smile?! Ruthenium, you gotta see this! Look,” he tossed the filly back to the mare and suddenly there was a giggle snort as Bright hovered inches from her adoptive mother’s face.
With a soft kiss, Ruthenium planted her hooves on the carpet and carefully tossed Bright to the stallion who’d moved just to the edge of the carpeted area. “Whoops, I slipped and missed my filly!”
“Don’t worry, I caught her! But, she’s so heavy, uh oh!”
“Ah! She is heavy, maybe a little more time in the air will make her weigh less.”
Bright squealed with laughter as she was tossed between the adults and finally after several passes, Swifty caught her and set her on the floor, using a wing to guide her to her hooves. “That was kinda fun, right?”
Bright nodded and leapt at him, missing him just barely with her intended hug and landing on the carpet. He used his forelegs to pick her up and gave her a gentle hug. “You know,” he said looking at Ruthenium, “your mom never told me she had such an amazing daughter.”
Ruthenium moved beside him and sat down. “I didn’t have her until I got back. I, honestly, had no idea what to do when I found her except that I wasn’t going to let her fall back into the darkness. Swifty, she was a unihorn and they cut it off.”
He loosened his grip on the filly. “Why would anyone do something so awful to a foal?”
“She was born blind and her parents didn’t want to deal with it, so they sent her to an orphanage. Somewhere over the past year she lost it and was sent to be a grounder,” Ruthenium shrugged. “I mean, it’s horrible, but I’ve ruminated over it so much it doesn’t hurt to talk about anymore. And it’s a part of her life she doesn’t recall very well, so I’m not pressuring her.”
Ruthenium rubbed a forehoof along the filly’s back. Bright began to pull away and was placed on the carpet. “I understand, but it’s not okay. We’ll talk about that later, I came to take Ruthenium out to lunch at the spire after a little personal time, not knowing she had company,” she smirked.
“I’m not going to find another stallion in the bedroom or anything, am I?” he joked.
“No. I haven’t had a thought about any of that stuff since I got back,” she rolled her eyes, “well, maybe a few times, but that’s not for filly’s ears.”
“Awe, you never let me hear anything fun.”
“Bright, Ruthenium is fun all on her own. Wanna come along? I’m sure you’ll meet some interesting ponies there in the lower floors.”
Ruthenium raised an eyebrow.
“Ah, you never called or tried to return so you don’t know that there are a few basement floors where top and bottom meet for fun, business, and other stuff like politics or economy whatever.”
Bright walked carefully toward the couch and when her hoof bumped it she began to walk around it with her left forehoof against it as a guide. She climbed up in the interim silence and when she’d finally settled she hummed. “Sure, I can come along, but do I have to wear the stuff?”
Ruthenium stood and moved to the floor beside the filly. “Yes, it’s the law.”
“Excuse me, ‘stuff’?”
Ruthenium looked at him somberly. “A bridle, muzzle, collar with tags, and leash. Bright is my -property-” she sneered at the word, “and I have to keep her under control until they feel she’s been ‘trained.’”
Swift nodded. “I understand the logic, but hate the society’s perceptions.”
“I know, right,” Ruthenium agreed as she got up and started cleaning the table.
“Hey! I didn’t finish eating!”
Ruthenium sighed loudly. “Bright, why,” she hesitated, “don’t I let you gobble these eggs and what’s left of the hay I’d taken out. I’m not particularly hungry right now.”
“Oh,” Swift took in the pointed look Ruthenium had given him, “well, I have to clean some hot stuff out of my eyes and cloak. If you don’t mind, may I use your restroom?”
“Yes, it’s just beyond the dresser in the next room. You may bathe, if you feel you must. There’s plenty of soaps and shampoo’s, however I’m not sure about your wings.”
“It’s alright, I’ve got these taken care of. Say, can we talk for a little bit while I run some water over my mane and whatnot? Alone?”
Ruthenium looked at Bright. “Bright, will you be okay for a little bit while I talk with my friend?”
“Yeah, I’ll be okay. Can I have some fruit since my breakfast is over?”
Ruthenium smiled softly. “Sure, I’ll get you an apple and I’ll keep the doors unlocked and open a little bit so I can hear if you need me.”
Bright smiled as her eyes looked at the floor. “Okay, I’ll be okay and just listen to the TV.”
Ruthenium opened the refrigerator and brought an apple to the filly and followed Swift to the bathroom, nearly closing the doors as she passed. “Alright, what’s the big deal, Swifty? I know you didn’t come all this way and risk exposing your wings and the secrets of thousands of years for a roll in the sheets,” she leaned against the wall as he took a towel and rubbed his head furiously.
“Ah, my mane is a mess, I can feel it,” he complained, “brush?” Ruthenium pointed to a small box beside the sink and he nodded, opening it and going about brushing his face and then mane. “So, the main reason I came here was to ask you if you were interested in moving below for a while. Xalan keeps me informed about certain events up here and we’re a bit concerned.”
“Concerned about what? My life is fine, work is fine, and I swear if this is about the rumors of invasion I’ve stopped watching all news and I’m out of politics. Ever since I went below-”
“It’s not invasion, it’s incursion.”
“Huh? That means the same thing, dink.”
He sat and relaxed his wings, looking at her sadly. “No, the invasion rumors sparked the flame of change. Not just up here, but in certain cities down below.”
Ruthenium stood up and moved to him, placing a forehoof on his cheek. “What’s that mean? Are we in danger?”
“Maybe,” he said looking into her eyes. “It’s not total anarchy, but there are many who want to live up here in the cities and not below anymore. I’m one of them, at times. They’re very encouraging and they’re gaining momentum in their movement and,” he blinked and moved his wings around them both, “and I think you’d be safer with me until this blows over. You and your daughter.”
“No one’s called her my daughter before,” she smiled and nuzzled him, sitting and letting his wings envelop her. “I don’t know what to say, but it seems farfetched to me, one month it’s getting better and the travelers are making their way here. The next you tell me that ponies are going to start popping out of the ground?”
He chuckled. “It does sound silly when you put it like that, but this is real. The travelers from beyond the forests will be here within the week and I don’t want you caught in the middle of some battle that you can’t fight in, political or physical.”
“You doubt me and my wiles?” she looked at him seductively and he gulped. “I know how to take care of some problems without even taking action.”
“Y-yeah? I, I don’t think you can make this go away. I really want you to return with me, both of you, soon.”
Ruthenium moved, her lips nearly touching his. “How soon? Do we have time to-”
“Three hours,” he said bluntly.
“Three hours?” she replied sitting back and looking at him incredulously.
“For about a week, until the travelers move on or make their demands. I’ve heard they only want peace and goodwill. If that’s the case, perhaps they can broker negotiations for us to come to the surface inside the barrier.”
“And if not? What, both sides start fighting and unihorns are caught in the middle? And why now?” she moved back and stood up. “Why didn’t you contact me or something days ago?” she shoved his wings with her magic. “Huh? Or am I just some mare to mount when you’re feeling frisky?”
“Woah! No! Not even a little, it’s not like that, Ruthenium. I care about you, even though we had a quick start to our relationship I’ve been smitten with you since before you left. Now, with the chance of the capital of the unihorn world at risk, and more importantly you are at risk… I don’t want to take that chance, Ruthenium.”
She looked into his honest eyes and sighed, placing a hoof to her temple. “So, you want me to pack and leave suddenly in the morning without notice. Just leave my life for a week or more on a whim because of a chance something might happen?”
He slumped slightly, wings sagging. “Yeah?”
“No. I can’t just leave my entire life and take a child with me into an unknown environment solely on your word alone,” she said factly. “It’s foalish fantasy fodder, there’s no reason for me to believe you, especially after how we met and spent the time together.”
“I understand what you’re saying, but it’s true. I can’t wait here long, they’re about to seal the public transports and I’m going to be on one of the last. I can’t make you come with me, both of you are free to stay, but this may be the last chance I have to see you for a while,” he stood and shook his head sending his mane flying.
“Well, be that as it may I believe you’ve wasted a trip on us. Nothing about this visit, in all fifteen minutes of it, has gone well. How am I to presume the next however long will be any better?”
“Look, you do have friends down there and if you change your mind I’ll leave you a homing crystal to reach me.”
“Sure, whatever makes you feel better,” she said moving aside and gesturing to the door. “If anything happens I will consider your proposal, but don’t hold your breath.”
He let a wing graze her back as he passed and she swatted his wing playfully away as she followed him into the bedroom. He nodded his head to the bed and she rolled her eyes and shook her head, mouthing ‘Bright Eyes’ and pointing to the door with an obvious silhouette sitting outside of it.
He shrugged and folded his wings in tight. Gesturing to the door he let Ruthenium take the lead and stomp heavily once. The adults grinned at the sound of quiet scampering hooves taking the filly away.
“So, it was nice to see you, Swifty, but as I said, we have a lot to do today and-”
“No, it’s okay. I guess I handled this poorly. You’re right,” he said donning his cloak and hat, angling it so it seemed to cover a horn, “here’s the gem. Break it and I’ll be beside you in a flash. More or less,” he winked.
“Is this a teleport gem?” she asked teasingly to which he rolled his eyes. “Okay, I get it, just teasing. Tell you what, if you’re in town any other time this week I’ll be glad to have lunch with you, both of us will.”
He ruffled his wings under his cloak in a way she knew indicated frustration. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he said as he moved to the door and opened it. “It was nice to meet you, Bright Eyes, I hope to see you again.”
The filly grunted to him but tossed a foreleg up in a disrespectful farewell.
“Don’t mind her, she’s having a morning,” Ruthenium gave him a wink. “You know that though, right?”
“My eyes still sting and I’ll remember this trip more than any other for the longest time,” he opened the door and walked through and without another word went down the hall. Ruthenium glanced at his swaying tail and bit her lip as she moved back into her apartment and closed the door.
“He’s nice, we should see him again.”
Ruthenium snorted a quiet laugh. “Bright, you were so mean to him! Why would you say that?”
“Cuz,” the filly lifted her snout, “he sounds cute and played with me, even if he had fake wings.”
Ruthenium teased with a tickle spell. “Cute? Do you have a crush on the pony with wings?” she lifted the giggling filly into the air. “Is that it, silly filly?” Bright Eyes giggled and laughed as tickles ran over her body leaving her unable to respond. “Oh, so it was about him being cute? What should I do with a little filly that thinks my friend is cute?”
“St-st-stop! Pleaase, I’m sorry,” the tickles ceased, “he’s only kinda cute.”
They both laughed as the tickle spell resumed full force and Ruthenium lowered the filly to the couch. “Okay, no more tickling. Would you like to take a walk to the park?”
Bright snickered. “Yeah, but do I have to wear it all?”
“Yes, you know the laws and I just told them to Swifty and I know you heard, so go to the bathroom and I’ll gather your restraints.
“Ugh, fine,” the filly moved to the edge of the couch and slid off and began her routine of walking around the couch and making her way silently counting her steps with her tail as a sort of guide.
Ruthenium watched her leave and turned to the small closet by the door and opened it to take out a box the size of her own head and an overcoat that she looked at and shook her head. “Too warm, I’ll just slip into a nice cool dress,” she decided as she brought the box with her to her bedroom and set it on the floor.
She took a moment to choose a light colored dress and slipped it on as Bright Eyes left the bathroom. “Okay, I’m ready,” the filly said with a hint of sorrow.
“Fret not, darling. When we arrive at the park I’ll untether you and you can enjoy some fresh air and grass under your hooves. Perhaps you can catch a snack before it hops away.”
“That’d be okay, do you think we can get some ice cream? Like the first day?”
“That depends, are you going to eat a whole bottle of laxatives?” Ruthenium joked and the filly took the bait.
“No! I won’t even if you make me. I’ll be good and-”
“Woah, woah, it’s okay. I was just ribbing you. Come here and let me don your apparel,” she said stomping her hoof on the floor and waiting as the filly moved to where she’d made the noise. “Very close, are you certain you’re vision impaired?”
“Yes?”
Ruthenium rolled her eyes and opened the box and with her magic put on a bridle, muzzle, collar, necklace, and lastly an item she believed to be silly in even the best of times that she didn’t have the audacity to tell Bright Eyes she was putting on; blinders.
“There we are, and I’ve made sure they’re not too tight, correct?” Bright moved her neck, head, and ears before mumbling agreement. “Very well, we’re off to the park and I’ll pick some ice cream up on the way back. Since you’re not supposed to speak I’ll just have to surprise you with what flavor and crunchies you’ll be getting.”
Bright’s ears flipped in her excitement and the light tug of the leash guided her behind Ruthenium through the apartment and out the door, down the halls, stairs, and outside into the warm morning air.
“Ahh, I will be honest with you,” Ruthenium said softly to Bright Eyes, “it’s nice when there aren’t many ponies on the streets this early in the morning. My friend did say there was bad news ahead, however I think he was just being a bit melodramatic. Lift your head when you walk, darling, a lady shouldn’t slouch.”
Bright made an audible grumble in annoyance but stood a bit taller beside Ruthenium. “Please, understand that I mean you the best. Many a unihorn will look at you with respect one day and it all starts with how you act as a filly.”
The next block was in silence between the two.
“So, have you been listening to the radio while I’m at work? I know it’s only been a couple days but I’m sure you’ve found the songs most uplifting. Perhaps one of the clippy cloppy songs about shopping at the mall has caught your ears? No? The noisy six string lutes are quite popular lately. No? Huh, piano concertos?”
Bright growled in frustration.
“Okay, how about- Oh, excuse me, ma’am,” she said instinctively as she was shoved aside by a quickly moving mare going past. “The reply is-” she was cut off when two police officers galloped past her and turned the corner after the mare. “Oh my, what was that about?”
She resumed her walk with Bright as a green light flashed around the cornerwhere the trio had gone followed by a ground shaking thump and finally bone shaking explosive shockwave in the span of one quarter of a second. Ruthenium staggered to the side and fell on top of Bright Eyes as screams of fright began to chorus.
“Bright, are you okay? Come, we’re going home!”
The filly was mumbling quickly and Ruthenium removed the muzzle. “-ened?! That was loud, was it an accident?”
“Hush! I’ll carry you, that was an overcharger. I felt the energy of it, where there’s one there’s sure to be another. Sweet Platinum, I can’t believe it’s happened here. In the capital of all-” she blinked as everything took a green hue to it and her eyes glanced up to a light pouring into the sky from the spire.
A static hiss preceded a loud announcement. “Unihorns of Platinum City, we are under attack. Please return to your homes and await instructions.”
“An automated message? Come, Bright Eyes, we’ll make haste.” Ruthenium took to a gallop and held the filly on her back as she swerved her way through several unihorns standing in the streets and watching the energy shield form around the city. Three blocks. Two blocks. One block. She caught the red glow of a unicorn half a block down an adjacent street and dove to the ground as she watched his coat match his magic color. The spell was quick to vaporize the stallion’s body and send a sphere of red energy from where he stood out to nearly four times his size.
The ground shattered, the building beside him caved and parts crumbled, and at least four lives around his were ended. She shut her eyes and turned her head before she saw it all, but the image of a sphere was temporarily burnt into her retna’s.
“What’s happening?!”
“Bright, I’m here, darling,” Ruthenium scratched her hooves as she got up and picked up the filly while she ran, placing her on her back as she made it the last of the way to her building.
They counted two more tremors before they got into the apartment and slammed the door, Ruthenium locking it as she ran to her room and ducked them both under her bed. Ruthenium lay panting, staring at the doorway to her room as Bright’s ears swiveled and her body trembled.
“That was scary, Ruth. What’re we gonna do? A door can’t stop a boom, can it?”
Ruthenium gulped in her dry mouth and shook her head slightly. “No, they can’t. We have to get to my friend. He wasn’t being facetious, we need to get to the central spire to get to his home.”
“Where’s his home? Do we have to? What if there’s more of the loud noises on the way? Overchargers?”
“Bright, we don’t know where we can go to be safe at all, but up here isn’t it. Come, I’ll put on a coat and carry you with me to the hub, okay?”
“What about the thingie he gave you?”
Ruthenium blinked and moved from under the bed. “Stay close to me.”
She moved to the living room and found the gem. “Here goes nothing,” she said as she picked the filly onto her back and dropped the gem. With a stomp the gem shattered and she felt a wave of energy wash over her. She closed her eyes from the light that shone and suddenly she was surrounded by noise. Opening her eyes she saw dozens of ponies of all tribes galloping and shouting, scream, moving around in chaos at what she recognized as the lobby of the central spire. “What the hay?”
Her eyes caught a black cloak and familiar hat. “Swifty!” she called to no avail as her voice was lost in the mayhem.
She tried to move to him through the blur of colors and noticed the mixture of ponies that kept her from moving very far. She watched as the doors to the elevator opened and ponies got off as quickly as others got on. The doors closed and the elevator descended as Ruthenium watched.
Mouth agape and still out of breath, Ruthenium turned to find a wall she could wait against and think things over as a plume of fire and black smoke rose from the elevator shaft.
The room fell silent as rumbling from below and distant sounds of metal on metal screeching echoed. “No, Swifty,” she managed before a practical stampede began out of the building. She was shoved and pushed, all the while holding Bright in her magic. “Hold on to my neck, don’t let go! No matter what, I won’t let go!”
The blind filly held on and cried as everything happened. So much to someone so young and unable to understand it, Bright buried her face in Ruthenium’s mane and held on as they returned to the streets. The sound of explosions in the distance forced the stampede away while Ruthenium pushed her way to the outside of the panicking herd and found a business to escape into.
She fell in through the door with five other ponies; earth and unihorns. The proprietor cast a spell and sealed the door. “What in the name of all things shiny is going on?!”
Ruthenium looked around the small barber shop and the small group huddled against the back wall, manes and tails amess. “Overchargers. Need to stay inside, safe. Don’t know where’s safe,” she panted. “Water?”
He pointed to a sink and Ruthenium didn’t care for manners as she turned it on while she moved to it and stuck her muzzle into the stream and gulped greedily, exhaling once she was done.
“Miss, we have a no mudder policy, you’re going to have to-”
“Stuff it under your tail! Look out there, would you have anypony go out there and be killed on your conscience?!”
He stood his ground and looked at the other ponies in the room and then to Ruthenium and filly. “No, I can’t say I would. C’mon, there’s a basement that might keep us safe.”
“Forget that, is there a back door? I have to get back to the tower. It’ll be the safest place to be.”
A grounder spoke up. “You talkin’ bout the place what was exploded just now?”
Ruthenium looked at him, then to the other group she’d entered with. “Yes, where else would I go?”
“Stay here, I’ll turn on the radio and we’ll wait until the government gets this under control.
Ruthenium lowered her head to her forehoof. “I can’t believe it, why didn’t I just listen to him and take the chance?”
Bright Eyes sniffled, relaxing her grip. “He still died, didn’t he?”
Ruthenium’s breath hitched. She realized that if she had gone with him that she’d be in the same elevator he was. Shaking her head she looked around the room. “Where’s the radio? Or basement?”
“Both over here,” he moved to the middle of the room and used his magic to lift a latch under a carpet and open a trap door. The mares and a stallion rushed from the back wall to the stairs and descended while Ruthenium guided her group ahead.
“Thank you, sir.”
“It’s what Platinum would do, right?”
Ruthenium smiled at him and nodded. “I sure hope so.”
She descended the stairs into a single room that was joined with the other businesses beside his. Roughly fifteen ponies huddled in groups and accepted the newcomers openly as they dispersed. “Sure are a welcoming lot, huh?” A unihorn stated as he stood beside Ruthenium.
“Seems the classes don’t matter when your life is on the line.”
“Perhaps,” he said as he moved away and to a group of unihorns and grounders. “Maybe it’s just the right thing to do.”
Ruthenium looked between the groups and shook her head. “We’ve gotta go somewhere, but where? Being at ground level is asking for danger.”
“Why not home?”
“Because, Bright Eyes, it’s miles away. I was hoping that I’d appear at his home, not in the middle of the spire. Please, let me think. I’m an adult and can handle this.”
Bright returned her muzzle to Ruthenium’s mane.
A rumble shook the large room and whimpering filled the hushed talking.
Ruthenium climbed the stairs of the barbershop and looked at the doorway. Night had fallen in the time the many ponies had been downstairs and she was one of the few that chose to check the surface of the various businesses attached. She quickly moved to the door and looked out the glass windows, impressed they were still intact.
“It’s all clear, so c’mon up,” she called casually. After spending hours with other ponies she’d finally decided to stop pretending to be a higher class of nobility and relaxed her guard and attitude. “Bring Bright Eyes, please,” she shouted over her shoulder as she scanned the street.
Hooves clacking up stairs and the weight of a filly on her back were all she needed before she opened the door and stepped out, leading the shop’s customers out while other ponies filed out of other businesses did the same. Near silence met their ears as they looked around the streets.
“Ruth,” Bright said in a hushed whisper, “I hear a pony, yelling that way,” she let one foreleg go from Ruthenium’s neck and pointed down the street to the right. She looked and several others followed her gaze, whispering their curiosity.
A quiet shout came echoing down the street from afar, barely audible, but not to the blind filly. “The end... is a thigh?” she intoned and scrunched her snout. “I don’t get it.”
There were sporadic snickers. A stallion spoke up. “The end is ‘nigh,’ it’s a thing crazy ponies say,” he cleared his throat, “uh, said.”
“It’s too quiet,” a random mare said softly, many others agreed, “should we try to get into the spire? It’ll be the safest place, right?”
“There’s a shield over the doors, there’s no getting in there.” “What about the police stations?” “Shelters?” “The bar?!” “Where’s the Princess?” “How are we going to survive this?”
“Quiet! Everyhorn, calm down!” Ruthenium shouted to quiet the crowd. “-and I said ‘Oatmeal? Are you crazy?!’”
Ruthenium shot the yellow mare a glare. “Okay, we’re alive and well. We should get home and wait this out. There’s going to be answers from the city leadership about what is happening and how to stay safe, and tomorrow this will be just another page in the history books, okay?”
There were hesitant nods in agreement but nopony wanted to separate.
“Okay,” Ruthenium placed a hoof below her horn and sighed before speaking loudly again. “We’ll stay here until the sunrises, then we’ll know it’s safe and we’ll go our own ways, okay? But only if you want to, you’re more than willing to go home, alright?” Bright whispered into Ruthenium’s ear. “Okay, if it’s okay with the business owners. Can those of us who chose to stay, stay?”
A few minutes later only Ruthenium, Bright, and a few others had chosen to return to their homes and went their own ways.
“Bright, do you hear anything?”
“Just you walking, why?”
“I, I’m kinda scared right now because I don’t know what’s going on,” Ruthenium admitted and a smile crept onto her lips when Bright began rubbing a forehoof along her neck. “What’re you thinking about?” she whispered.
“Uhm, the forest.”
“The forest, huh? The one that borders our lands?”
“Yeah, that one,” Bright nodded and resumed her double grip around Ruthenium’s neck. “About how it was made more dense over hundreds of years with magic and illusion so no windigoes would find us and if they did we’d have a fair warning, right?”
“More or less, yeah. I’ll tell you more about the details when we get home, but you’re pretty clo-” they perked up and looked at a door across the street from them as it creaked open, glass cracking as it did so, and a unihorn looked out.
“Hurry, get inside, it’s not safe,” the stallion said in a loud whisper.
“We can’t, we’re going home,” Ruthenium replied.
“The Not-See’s are out there, hurry in or they’ll get you,” he urged. Ruthenium cocked her head to the side for a second and quickly cantered across the silent street to him and entered the building.
“What did you say?” she asked when she was inside. She noticed several colorful dresses trembling in various spots of the business that smelt of fresh tabaco.
“They’re calling them the ‘Not-See’s’, because they’ve not been seen before but they burrow out of the ground and soon after explode,” he said closing the door behind them, for what little it did with its missing panes of glass.
“That, is a stupid name for them. Why not ‘Dwellers’ or ‘Undergrounders’?”
His mouth worked and Ruthenium saw sets of eyes look at her, blinking. “Uh, I dunno, I didn’t make the name up. It came over the radio a couple hours ago,” he looked at the mares hiding around his shop and then sat, tapping his hooves together. “The radicals on the radio said they did not see them coming until it was too late, so the news started calling them the Not-See’s.”
Ruthenium looked up and groaned. “Swifty, I swear if you weren’t dead I’d kill you for this.”
A gasp caught her attention from a white mare. “Miss,” the mare said quietly, “do you know who’s behind all this? The overchargers, the murders, the Not-See’s?”
Ruthenium shook her head. “No, but I know a pony in the government that had a hunch this would happen. Now, I’ve gotta get home and wait this out.”
“Did he die in an explosion?” another mare asked, poking her head from behind a display.
Ruthenium hung her head. “In the spire explosion, yes. But he tried to warn others, just too late. I’m sorry, I have to get home and-” she fell to her belly and covered her head as an explosion went off and the ground trembled. Whimpers and cries filled the shop and when Ruthenium looked up the stallion was holding a mare and whispering prayers.
Ruthenium looked at the filly lying beside her with her face covered by her forelegs and nuzzled her. “It’s okay, sweetie, we’re just gonna wait here for a few minutes and before long we’ll make our way home, do you like that idea?”
Bright trembled and shook her head slightly. “I don’t wanna die. They took my horn already…”
“Took her horn?! Who would be so horrid?”
Ruthenium looked up to see a purple mare with red eyes looking at them. “Miss, it was her parents that gave her up and sent her to be a grounder,” she said with distaste. The mare took a step back and looked at the filly, lighting her horn. “Hey, you can’t just take her!”
“Silence,” the mare snapped. Bright Eyes squeaked as she flew through the air to the mare and flinched as the mare’s hooves messed her forelocks before gasping. “The scar’s there. This filly was mutilated! This place is sick!” She quickly moved Bright Eyes back to Ruthenium and shouted for the duo to leave.
The mare’s horn brightened and shifted the shadows in the shop as Ruthenium realized what was happening. She bolted to the door with Bright in her magical grasp, into the street, and back onto her path as fearful wailing and screaming behind her was transformed into a concussive explosion.
“Oh no, Sweet Platinum, what’s happening? Goddess, what’s happening?!”
Ruthenium placed Bright on her back and ignored silence and stealth as she galloped through the street and over bits of rubble, trying not to look into the shadows at pony parts across the streets and around blast zones. She arrived to her building and entered the door, made her way to her apartment, and shut the door with a slam before placing the filly on the floor and falling to her haunches.
With a heavy shudder, Ruthenium began to cry, holding her forelegs around herself as she bawled and mumbled incoherent questions through snotty lips. A small forehoof placed on her side was enough to have the filly grabbed and held in a gently hug as the mare cried.
“I’ll keep you safe, I swear it,” she whispered to the filly, “I won’t let you get hurt by these freaks. Platinum will save us, like her ancestors did with the windigoes, and everything will be sunshine and rainbows again and I’ll see about getting your vision back. There has to be a way, if not here then down below.”
Bright pushed her forelegs against Ruthenium’s chest and looked at the mare with her blue eyes. “Below? That stallion with the feathers said that, too. Ruth, do you know the Not-See’s?”
“No, not these ones. That’s not what they’re called, darling. They’re simply undergrounders and the ones I met were kind, and helpful, and friendly. I met them shortly before I met you, little one. It’s the reason I spoke with you and took you into my life,” Ruthenium sniffled, still holding the filly, “I made grounder friends, and others. They wouldn’t have done this, not in a million years.”
“But, if you know them, can’t you contact them and tell them to stop?”
Ruthenium snorted a sobbing chuckle. “N-no, that’s not how it works. My only contact was Swifty and he’s gone now. We just,” she choked back another sob, “have to wait. Someone will help us, they have to.”
Bright was silent and let herself be hugged again, but she was still troubled by it all.
“The news from the capitol is grim. The shield over the city is still being held keeping aid out. There have been no responses from the authorities inside, as of yet, and help is stalled outside, waiting for an opening. We have reports that twenty percent of the city has been damaged in some way, mostly from structural damages, however we have to maintain hope that the death counts are lower than estimates show.
“As of sunrise we’ve not heard much from our sources, but what we have heard is that they are being vigilant in their efforts and are ready to aid anyhorn as soon as they can enter the city. This is channel 2 news, back to you at the offices.”
Ruthenium placed a plate of fruit and vegetables on the table in front of Bright, then sat and they both ate in silence through the radio broadcast. The tremors had stopped hours before and both of them had a fitful sleep, to say the least.
They took turns yawning through the meal and finally disregarded cleaning up in favor of curling up together in the living room on the floor and falling asleep. They slept through another tremor until nearly midday when the call of nature woke them with urgency.
Ruthenium carried Bright to the bathroom and waited as the filly relieved her bladder, then took her turn before they sat on Ruthenium’s bed in the next room, waiting for anything helpful from the news.
The day dragged on into night, then the next day came and went. They held a steady routine of eating, bathroom time, sleeping, and waiting for any good news. Then they saw it, or them. The ships of the alien fleet approaching with pegasi flying between ships and maintaining formations around the largest airship in the center.
It arrived faster than Ruthenium thought possible, but with a goddess from another land in charge it didn’t surprise her, too much. “Bright, I wish you could see this. The ships are stunning, more amazing than when I first saw them from a distance. They’re outside the barrier, but nothing they do could be as bad as what’s happening now.
“The military isn’t even attacking them this time, they might be able to resolve this peacefully,” she hoped, and it carried into her voice.
“But, Ruth, how can they help with the Princess’ shield up? Nothing can get through it, you said.”
Ruthenium shrugged to herself. “We just have to wait and hope. There’s going to be help coming and this’ll all be over. The overchargers will stop, the military and medics will spill in, and we’ll have peace. Whether from us, or them,” she pointed to the ships in the sky outside the barrier.
“I hope so, it’s boring inside all the time,” Bright grumbled as she held a ball under her forehoof.
Hours passed agonizingly slow, then the shield shined brighter for an instant. “Bright Eyes, something’s happening,” she shouted excitedly as she hurried to the window to watch. The shield wobbled at the point where a spell was cast. A powerful spell that tingled her horn from nearly two miles away.
Awareness dawned on her like the weight of a stone upon her horn and she paled as factors she hadn’t thought of all came crashing into her mind at that single moment. “Bright, get into the bathtub and don’t leave it, no matter what. I’ll be there in a moment.”
“Why do I have to-”
“Just go! Sweetie, there’s an enchantment I’ll activate in a moment that turns the bathtub into the safest place in the apartment, you need to be inside of it.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll be right behind you,” she said as she watched the caster recast a spell that sent the barrier wavering over the whole city. Ruthenium stopped watching and rushed to the kitchen, stuck her head in the fridge and pulled out the drawer on the bottom with her magic and a jug of juice in her teeth, then bolted for and into the bathtub. Bright, hopped in and Ruthenium empowered the enchantment.
A blue sphere of energy encircled them and glowed as Ruthenium held the filly, both curled up as tightly as they could.
“What’s happening, Ruth? Why’d my ears go funny a few seconds ago.”
“Just pray to Platinum with me that everything will be okay,” Ruthenium said and began a quiet prayer with Bright Eyes as the shield around them faltered and the building lurched.
Bright held tight onto the mare’s forelegs that crossed her chest. “What’s happening?!”
“The buildings here in the capital are air sealed, ever since the War of Quartz and, Sweet Platinum?! Just hold on! It’ll be over soon,” Ruthenium managed as she failed in trying to hide her trembling.
With a thump that shattered windows throughout the city, the outer shield dissolved and air rushed through the buildings as pressure balanced. A few seconds of silence fell and Ruthenium peeked her head up, releasing Bright’s from under her chin and they both used their senses to get a feel for what was happening.
“It’s over. The worst is over, the shield is down and-” a thump and rumble shook them in the tub and they curled around one another, holding each other again as the quiet sound of battle cries filled the air from the open windows of her apartment. “Hold on, baby, hold on. Whatever happens, don’t let me go, I’ll keep you safe, I’ll keep you-” her words cut off as the building shifted and with all her might she channeled her energy into a personal shield inside the enchantment to keep the two of them safe as they felt themselves falling with the building.
Only a minute passed as they rolled and tumbled inside the bathtub before they came to rest under the tub, still protected by the barrier. They whimpered and trembled as relative silence surrounded them, only clacking of materials falling through nooks and crannies gave them audience as they waited.
Finally, when it all seemed to still, except for tremors around them and rumbles above, they uncurled from each other and hazarded a look around. “Ruth, I don’t hear anything good.”
“I don’t see anything, either. We’re in here so as long as I keep it charged we’ll be safe, and even if I stop charging it the tub will still act as a barrier until we’re freed so just stay calm, stay calm! We’re not buried alive with nopony knowing we’re alive or having a reason to search for us down here under our home that we should’ve just waited back at the-”
“RUTH!” Bright screamed into the small space. “You’re scaring me, we’re gonna be okay, okay?” she pressed her side into Ruthenium’s and patted the mare’s back.
Ruthenium closed her eyes tightly and trembled, but steadied her breathing. “Yeah, I’m sorry, Bright Eyes, I just… lost my control for a moment,” she looked up at the bottom of the bathtub and frowned. “If I had a power gem I could just teleport us out of this mess,” she grumbled to herself for a second after saying that.
“You have me, so we can get out together, right?”
A clatter of material rambled down to and past them. “I don’t know. There’s a lot of building around us and there’s not much room to move it around and out of our way to clear a path. I won’t hazard you going alone, even if we did make or find a path going anywhere, so all we can do is wait.
“The tub can still produce water, thanks to the water gem. It’ll be cold, but it’s still water. And there’s the food that we’re sitting in,” she grimaced and picked it up, piling it under the faucet.
The filly deadpanned a look at her. “A single bar for the two of us?”
Ruthenium groaned long and loud in frustration. “Fine, we’re boned. Screwed. Doomed to die under this rubble, are you happy now? I tried to be the caring parental type but no~, just had to-”
A small hoof covered her lips. “You need to calm down, Ruth. You’re not helping.” Ruthenium frowned but stayed her voice when her mouth was freed. “Okay, I’ve heard about this happening, we just have to find a way out, right?” Ruthenium growled but stayed quiet.
“Fine, you’re the grownup, what should we do?”
Ruthenium finally broke and shouted at the filly, “How are you so calm? You’re a child! You should be freaking out and I should be calming you!” she threw her hooves up and let out a high pitch squeal as her forehoof struck the bottom of the tub. “Platinum darn it to a windigo’s butthole inside the moon!”
Bright burst into laughter at the mare’s choice of words as Ruthenium held her foreleg to her body and glared at the filly. “It wasn’t that funny, it really hurt,” she whined. Bright laughed louder and fell to her side.
The rubble shifted and they both fell silent in shock as they moved with the debris, tumbling lower. They shifted and tumbled over each other a few times until finally landing with the tub above them and again with food all around them. With a hope in her heart, Ruthenium looked around their new position hoping to find a refrigerator or some kind of communication device, then snorted.
“Yeah, it’d be too convenient anyway,” she groused and fell to her bottom, crossing her forelegs. “Now we’re somewhere else buried even more under my home. Old home… Pile of freaking garbage I should have left when I had the chance,” she stomped a forehoof onto the shield and sending minute waves across its entirety.
She looked over to Bright as the filly lay on her belly and just listened, her ears moving as sounds only the child could hear tickled her senses.
Ruthenium fell silent and lay on her belly as well and waited as time passed.
