Two wasteland survivors head South to a fallen ex-Equestria city, setting off a chain of unpleasant events as they unearth two hundred year's worth of post-War mysteries.
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Summary: New Bridle, once a great port that connected Equestria with many southern lands, was without a doubt one of the first to face the consequence of the Great War's hostility. While the city itself never was truly destroyed, with it's familiar skyline and landmark roadways still in tact, the War had effectively cut it's veins - New Bridle lacked the resources of other cities, north of arid deserts and south of infertile mountains. Seeking relief, the city surrendered to the Zebra Army early in the war on it's own accord, and as a result, faced the wrath of Equestria's own megaspells. Now a desecrated shell, wasteland survivors have long began rising from it's corpse, the old ethics of friendship and caring having parted in exchange for fear and loathing; wartime attributes poorly rewarded with the extravagant gift of glory.
Two wasteland survivors from the cold north head South into New Bridle. Kicking up the bones of the hollow city in their quest, the duo begin their quest to discover what truly happened to the ex-Equestrian city.
Special thanks to my friends Shady_Steps and Snaggletooth. Without you, the world would have died in the womb. Still in need of proof readers, so if you'd like to help me quicken the draft process, drop me a message sometime. I'm in super need, especially since I hate posting chapters without someone to at least doublecheck grammar.
Far in the south, at the very borders of where Equestria ends and great deserts begin, sits a port city overshadowing the lands. Resting on the Eeltongue Peninsula, not much could be said for its surroundings. Bordered by treacherous seas, arid sands, and infertile plains, it’s a wonder that not only could a city survive, but thrive in such poor circumstances. With a train line that led directly to the heart of Equestria, ports that brought in fare from Zebra and Minotaur lands, and land paths that led to Saddle Arabia, New Bridle was the very heart of southern trade not just for its mother nation, but all surrounding nations. Merchants came of all colors and sizes, dwellers came from all corners of the world. Disasters struck, armies marched, famine settled, but New Bridle stayed strong. With roots so thickly rooted in empires across the map, the city was almost immune to plagues other cities suffered. Then the Great War came, and New Bridle, for the first time in its history, suffered isolation. When the Ministry’s embargos began, and all trade routes were cut, it was no surprise that the great city began to starve.
With no natural resource capable of sustaining its population, famine weakened the spirits of its people, and turned the hearts of those who had too many mouths to feed. Already, the city’s diverse culture suffered tremendously; what had been a melting pot of various races and ethnics boiled into chaos, civil disputes threatening what the Great War did not. There was hope for survival, however - New Bridle drew the direct care of the Shining Stallions. Four high-ranked colts under the leadership of Shining Armor, they traveled south from the Crystal Empire to secure the city from enemy forces. With them they brought four great crystals the size of a dragon’s head, imported directly from the Empire itself. Lifted on tall pylons at each corner of the city, the crystals made summoning a shield just as strong as Canterlot’s possible, but massive enough to make covering all of New Bridle valid, granted at least one pony manned each crystal tower. The shield was vital to keeping Equestria’s enemies out of New Bridle, but proved to be a deterrent to all ponies who wished to leave, effectively placing residents under ‘city-arrest’.
Come the artillery fire of the Blackhind Siege, the naval invasion of the East Sea Serpents, and even the grace of a Great Star Eater, New Bridle survived under the protection of its great crystal magical shield. Freight lines that once brought cargo North through Prancesylvania now brought soldiers South, supplying the War - but not the people - with mechanical efficiency. The Eeltongue Channel that separated the Saddle Sands from New Bridle stopped Zebra advances charging straight through the lands, forcing Zebras to either go precariously across heavily mined waters, or file single-file through the crags between the Saddle Sands and the Heavyhoof Plains. For a city-turned-fortress so close to the front lines, New Bridle was invaluable, preventing enemy forces from invading any closer to Equestria’s center. The only true fault New Bridle had came from within - though its buildings were safe from the war’s shells, its people were not immune to hunger. A darker force began stirring below the city’s surface.
By the third year of the Great War, New Bridle no longer held the title of Equestria’s largest trade city, and suffered the greatest famine in Equestrian history. Starving for trade once more, sickened by embargo and isolation, the city succumbed to promises made by the Zebra nation to open ports to foreign lands again, as long as it closed the Prancesylvanian train lines and stopped the flow of Equestrian forces. The same day that New Bridle announced it’s new alliance, Zebra armies marched through the streets under the protection of New Bridle’s great crystal shield itself. Such an act was blasphemy for the Shining Stallions, but all four members had disappeared shortly before the city’s surrender without a trace. A new ruling class rose, never seen by day, known for their dark skin and carnivorous appetites. And though their rule was unquestioned, it never lasted for long.
In history, the city’s betrayal would never have been seen as the necessity it was, only as a cowardly and traitorous act. Though the act had saved the day, it was followed by the terrible night that the Equestrian megaspells fell.
Branded a city of traitors, no mercy came from the North. The city was never hit by the Zebra Balefire Bombs, but instead faced the wrath of Equestia’s own megaspells. New Bridle’s shield, unable to stand against their destructive power, shattered at the first blow. Buildings survived the blast, but the city was left derelict. Outside the shield zone, the land was levelled for a hundred miles, haunted by the Pink and its strange form, Equestrian Purple. The end of New Bridle’s glory had finally come. It was left an empty skeleton, and seemed to be no longer desired by anybody, anymore.
But though New Bridle died, its denizens never left for good.
Two hundred years later, out of the sewer veins and crusted subway bones the city’s inhabitants returned, restoring the dead citadel with the forgotten thunder of guns and cries of the wounded. Established deep between the city’s ribs, Sewer Ponies rose from gutters to pillage New Bridle’s grave with hooves and talons alike, seeking the sole reward of survival. Others, such as the Dot Metro Vault Ponies, began to look past just simply surviving, attempting to recreate some form of old world societies in the city’s leftover corpse, granted these societies placed the Dot Metros on top. Hugging the remnants of greatness shattered in shambles down alleys and passageways, a group called the Shining Reclaimers battled with the much stronger, better equipped Steel Rangers to regain forgotten artifacts and ancient technology. And, though poorly supplied and lacking influence, New Bridle Followers, known as Brillowers, struggled to create safe haven for all ponies alike, even after their numbers became more and more bloodied in attempts to scout the darkest parts of the city for life-saving supplies.
While other groups exist, they not only proved to be lesser known, but the extent of their power in New Bridle was a mystery. Informants in the waterways tipped scales for various factions, as a quiet brotherhood of mercenaries left nothing, not even shadows, in the wake of a fresh kill on moonless nights. The most tantalizing of these hidden factions have yet proven their resilience to whispers of gossip or clenched teeth of interrogation. Though their names are unknown, their presence is unmistakable. Most terrifying are the rumors of a dark occult ruling class dating back from before New Bridle’s fall, capable of infiltrating any faction, having mastered the skill of stealing faces at the cost of devouring hearts. Though who they are, or what they want, is unclear, it’s rumored they’re willing to cure any sickness or woe, free of charge, to anyone who wishes for it. Granted, it just takes a little changing, all in the name of making one’s life complete.
“They claim their labours are to build a heaven, yet their heaven is populated with horrors.”
-Alan Moore, Watchmen
PROLOGUE
Year 190: The room is as I remember it.A single hanging lightbulb keeps the tiny chamber darkly lit, metal stairs leading to unadorned dirt flooring. The only furniture in the room is an ancient table standing on three legs; on it is the secret. An old time-weathered piece keeps the secret, a machine clasped together with rusted metal with dented speakers and dusty film. I let the phonograph play, and the log begins with a storm of static, the murmur of something in the distance buried in the background. A voice cuts through the static, the deep sound of a stallion far beyond his youthful years. He's determined, and it shows in the way he beats back the miscellaneous noises in order to make himself heard. If I were to face him in real life, no doubt he would have been deafeningly loud. But on this small device, it’s a surprise that I can hear him at all.
"Listen well," he commands through the static storm, "This is the only time you will hear my voice.”
It would be hard not to obey.
"Once upon a time, we lived in the sky. We were pegasi that never set a hoof onthe ground, held in our cloud city with clear blue sky. When war wrecked the mortal Equestia below, we sought not to grace the lands ever again with our presence. We were the very image of contempt, so aloof in our thrones high above all the suffering found below. Even when a thousand heads cried to our kingdom for aid, for ascendance into our city, for the safety our sanctums granted us, we never once looked past our hooves and onto the ground below. And we lived without giving a second thought to the dead that piled below, - zzzzt - ravaged - zzt - remains. They didn’t affect us, so we didn’t care.
"Our people lived in the glorious inventions of their predecessors, with things the earthen below only dreamed of. We slept in beds of clean cotton sheets, ate warm food at any hour of the day. We needed not books to keep records, for our vast terminals held more data than a pony could dream of. Little ailed us, with medicine that cured most diseases that would otherwise be lethal, using -zzzt - research - zzzzzt - repaired - zt - cybernetics. And when our wrath had been provoked, when something below began to cause trouble, we executed it with fire that rained from the sky - zzzt - satellite - zzzt - plasma - zzt - pain to those whom our judgement deemed as condemned. Even when Equestria had fully fallen to Tartarus, our lives changed little, to best cope in providing us the comforts of our sin. No one could reach us so high, so we sat smug in our towers that were lit even through the night, ignoring the world in eternal dark below. We had plenty enough, but nothing we would spare. And for that, punishment came.”
I can almost hear a grinding of teeth, but it could just be static. Very angry static.
"Of Gluttony, of Pride, of Wrath and all the rest of our vices," the stallion picks up in speed, filling the recording with fervor, "... we were smote from the Heavens in recompense for our ignorance to those below. Banshees filled the skies that had otherwise been silent, filling what was once blue with white gray. They circled our city, denying us free roam of the sky. Those who did not hide from the ghosts’ chills found no hospitality outside - zzt - those that did hide, no matter where they were, frost crept under their doors, to rooms that the wind hadn't already broken into - zzt - ponies - zzzt - bitterly iced ends. It was all payment - zzt - price of a hundred year sin - zzt - damnation from Celestia herself. No one knew what to do; the frozen horrors were coming down on us as if we were simpletons on the ground, not pegasi living above the clouds. Over - zzt - left dead, and - zzt - dying.
"The ghosts came from the domes of the sky, wails filling the winds until the sky was nothing but clouds. They cursed us with beds made with sheets of snow, with food so frozen our stomachs froze with it. Sickness that once could be purged from our bodies began to settle in our souls, driving madness - zzzt - sanity had firm hold. And from the sky came hail, muffling our cries with whistles and bruising thumps. In the disaster, revelation desired to be dawned, but nopony wanted to heed it - zt - locking their doors and not even allowing one another in. And as I stood in whatwas now a barren cloudscape, - zzzt - windows barred - zzzt - souls cowering behind upturned tables, I finally turned my ears to listen to what Celestia had sent to us. What she had wanted from us; the lesson we were to learn. And I heard revelation - zzt - fog that settled in our streets. We were already doomed with our taint, unable to feel joy after witnessing the destruction of our home. But, our children were not. They could be spared.
"Many inhabitants - zzt - sky city refused to come to reason and realize that the truth - zzt - our ugly hearts - zzzzt - plague - zzt - winter ghosts. That by turning down those who cried for help before, we had called for evil spirits to enter our homes. They believed - zzzt - exempt from suffering, that in time perhaps the ghosts would wander off and allow them peace. In my revelations, I had seen what had to be done. Not waiting with head held in hooves, but action. I gathered only the most unadulterated of heart I could find, for only a flock of the youngest remaining could I consider salvageable. And only the saved could be - zzzt - own teeth - zzt - tear their wings off.
"Upon the white ground I had fallen, accompanied by - zzzt - chosen few who were willing to sacrifice - zzzt - for their lives. It appeared - zzzt - certain death, landing upon featureless snow with nothing but a wingless body. Never in our lives had we been on the ground - zzt- alone - zzt - without the sky to look for escape.” He’s fighting the static now, his speech trying to overcome the intermittent buzzes, “And we wandered, seeking salvation in a world that perhaps no one in their right mind would have searched. But we found a home in the endless white, and with our hearts finally settling in the valleys, we - zzt - became part of the world below - zzzzt - learned serenity and harmony again - zzzt - away from all the things that we once thought held the promise of happiness. In our humbled state - zzzt - cherish the small things. And we learned to love again. Though we were never cured of our past flaws, our children will never have to suffer from them. Our children - zzzt - most important thing we had left - zzzt - still are."
For a moment, it sounds like the recording has stopped. The pause is long, the speaker preparing to speak of his true purpose. When his voice returns again, the fervor is gone from his voice. It is replaced by genuine care.
"You... you are our children. Before you have been the sinners of the decadent sky cities - zzzt - punished but have paid dearly to spare you - zzt - have lived a life without the agony of your forefathers and mothers - zzzzzzt -spared from the evil and the spirits - zzzt - fed from them. If you hear of my message - zt zzzt - been entrusted - zzzt - future of your kind. And I ask of you to spare - zzzt - your children as we have spared you. Heed - zzzt - message carefully. It is - zzt - utmost importance.
"With every filly, it is mandated - zzzt zt - wings be torn off before they can remember, and - zzzt - every child without exception - zzzzt - cannot be allowed to fly as we did once ago, for in flight comes pride. They are not to be taught of - zzzt - outside the valleys, in the case that curiosity lulls them to lust after modernism that ruins their innocence. - Zzzt - not to know of technology, lest their humble ways be maimed by the sloth it allows. Their lives must be - zzzt - spartan modesty, without any form of extravagance, to ward off the gluttony that causes unhealthy want. No thing shall ever belong to a single pony, but shared by all, so that envy has no hold in material existence. No form of currency is allowed, for it is a prime staple of greed. In weaponry, only the few must be taught the bare essentials; the rest must be shown how to never be seen, so if wrath is incurred, it cannot be carried out with efficiency...”
The list goes on, but is terribly shattered by noise. Small words mentioning strict law codes, prayers, diets, survival, escape the static, but the rest is lost. Eventually, the static clears again, and I can hear the stallion once more.
"Let there be no exceptions to the rules, for only through strict adherence will you ensure that future generations - zzt - saved - zzzt - corruption that ruined those of old. Only through our abstinence can we ensure the survival of those to come. By resisting our vices, we make room for only good. And that is what you are; the fruits of a wasteland long abandoned, the gems of a ruined world that still bring beauty. You - zzt - goodness - zzt - world ruined by hatred. You must - zzt - ...stay... - zzzt - ...from... - zzt - the..."
The message continues, but becomes incomprehensible. Too many words are lost to static, leaving the spare few without meaning.
"... highest of ... - zzt - ... kingdoms ..."
And with that, the machine turns off, and leaves me with silence.
Footnote: Character Created:
High Kingdom
Prancesylvanian Pegasus
Traits Gained!
I was Raised Better than This: Don't say your parents didn't teach you, because they damn well did. You have a +3 bonus in 5 traits of your choosing, no bonus in 4 traits of your choosing, and a -3 in the remaining.
One-Winged Pegasi (Prancesylvanian): You’ve got all the advantages of being a pegasi, with one drawback; you can’t fly on your own. All pegasi-specific items can be used and equipped, as long as you meet all requirements other than being a pegasi. Because you’re Prancesylvanian, you only have a single wing (choose left or right), but your wing is considered a larger appendage with more health than a normal Pegasus’ wing. If damage hits a wing that doesn't exist, take torso damage.
“They say dreams are only real as long as they last. "Couldn't you say the same thing about life?"
-Waking Life
CHAPTER ONE
Year 185: When did it all begin?It’s like trying to remember a dream when I think of home. A dream where one day, my eyes will snap open, and I find out the nightmares in the wastes were nothing but nightmares all along. One day, I’ll no longer wake up to the sounds of someone screaming or shouting or crying out in absolute terror. Instead, I’ll wake to a warm nuzzle and a whisper. My name will slip from their lips - they’ll call for me, but they won’t call High Kingdom. No, I am not High Kingdom in my dreams about home. And I’m not from the wastes as everyone else knows it.
I hail from Stable 12, found within the rolling Broos and the surrounding sierra known as the Prancesylvanian Valleys. Son of the overmare Blessed Wind and the highstallion Sun Rise, it’s needless to say I had a zealous youth envied by most. And damn did I know it. With the overmare teaching me how to fly, and the highstallion showing me how to soar, my ego skyrocketed. I had the chance to touch the peaks of mountains years before pegasi my age could lift four hooves off the ground, and I loved it. I was convinced ponies would sing songs of the heights I flew, not the speeds that I fell. If they sang songs of me at all.
All of my early life I spent in the snowy valleys of Prancesylvania, resting among the mountains and clouds. Sounds pretty great, if you ignore the fact that Prancesylvania is a desolate place; the only ponies around come from my Stable, and are few and spare in number. Rarely anyone left the home valleys because of what - no, who we were. One-wing pegasi. My kind is incapable of flying on our own accord, requiring reliance on each other to fly. As a result, members of my Stable never strayed too far from home. Generation after generation of my kind kept closely knit; not only was it a matter of survival, but sanity. As long as we had each other, our spirits soared. In isolation, we’d be no more full than the hollowed trunks of leafless, dead apple trees that dotted the mountain sides.
Leaving Prancesylvania was blasphemy. There was nothing beyond the edges of the valley - that world had long gone and withered. We were taught of rotted lands and lifeless hills. Here, in our valleys, there was life. There was food and there was warmth, there was kindness and love. Every pony knew every blade of grass that poked its way through the icy ground, of the mosses and the lichens that they relied on to survive. The only thing every pony knew more than the caverns and clouds was each other - no pony was spared of attention, every name common on every tongue. We had our habits and traditions held dearly between one another, from the first spring grazes to the last fall leisures, that were held on to even harder into the long months of winter. Always, we cloud cleared in teams and slept in herds. But of all the things we did as a unity, the most endearing and symbolic, had to be flight.
Flying played an important pinnacle in our lives, not just for practical reasons, but personal. It’s tradition for every Prancesylvanian pegasus to create a strong bond with another pony. Not in the love or marriage sense (though often, it can lead to both) but in a fellowship sort of way. Every Prancesylvanian pegasi, when they grew old enough, would seek out and find another pegasi that they felt they could share each other’s souls. Granted that each were of the proper right-left wing combo, they would join together in wings, and spend most of their lives working together. We termed this strong bond between a pair of pegasi as Wing Partnering. While you could take flight with any pony in Stable 12 if you had the proper wing combination, your Wing Partner was your ultimate second wing. Wing Partners never abandoned each other. It was unheard of to have a ‘second’ wing partner under any condition - whether or not one’s wing partner was tough to get along with, or died. They were the pony that was your best friend for life, someone you trusted more than your mother, your father, or even your own lover.
Sure, every pony had many good relationships among each other in the valleys, but having a wing partner was always the most special. While secrets are frowned upon in our community, Wing Partners had a saying - just between us and our feathers. Wing Partners kept a few things between each other every now and then, a white lie or two, little things you’d never share with anyone else. Maybe it was simple gossip, maybe it was a special place where the water runs over crystal just right, maybe it’s an extra carrot or two snuck out from the winter storages. With such attitudes, secrets seemed innocent like that. Not like secrets at all. But though my mother preached and my father prayed that all the good of Celestia’s grace spare us, it’s easy to forget keeping just a single secret’s enough to cost any pony the world. Especially when you’re with the pony you’ve shared a whole life with.
My wing partner was perhaps the prettiest, calmest, and understanding pony in all those acres of undesirable, icy Prancesylvania wasteland. Her name was Wind Glass, and she was a mare three years my elder. She was modest, but never hid her magnificence when it came to displaying her talents. Wind Glass was a piece of Heaven that had witnessed what perfection was, and gave it to the rest of us in what little bits and pieces she could; little charms that hung on the bare tree branches and sang when a breeze visited by, clay shaped into hoof sized ponies, oddly shaped prisms that cut light into rainbows. Her father was a furnace worker who ran the fires that we used to repair tools, smelt down old scraps, and - in a more romantic, less survival based aspect - provided kiln for clay crafts and heated glass. Wind Glass learned well from her father the art of smelting sand scraped from barricade bags deep within our Stable, her craft finding little rival, but inspiring many onlookers. Art among us was always religious, always had a deeper meaning. We took it seriously as beacons of faith, and so Wind Glass became a mare of faith itself. Her cutie mark came well before mine - a shape of a glass heart with the torso side’s half blowing away in the breeze. Which made me jealous, of course. It would be long before I got my own.
When we joined wings, it was the happiest day of my life. I, at the tender age of twelve, and she at the so much more matured age of fourteen. She was a late bloomer when it came to flight, and I an early one, so everything worked out perfectly. Watching her spread her powder blue feathers, the light shining through her white blue wings, so delicate they were like ice crystals hung in sunlight. And then taking off, the stumbles and wobbly see-saw of flight not even mattering because our first flight was flawless. I never felt so close to heart to someone in my entire life. To soar with another in wing, my mother had once told me, is to soar with another in soul.
I dream about that first flight with Wind Glass, the first time I flew with someone who was neither my mother or father. My heart still flutters thinking about it; even when I’m on the ground, all I have to do is remember and I’m in the clouds with her. I wouldn’t mind if life stayed so plain in these valleys, so simple, because spending time with her was all the excitement I needed. All I ever needed for a life was captured in those moments. And as long as I had Wind Glass by me, I never imaged these dreams in these valleys would end.
But I was never a pony with a good imagination.
It’s been five years since our first flight, and in recent days, those dreams have been harder and harder to dream about. I had watched Wind Glass grow to be the beautiful pony she is now, but in the past months, I’ve watched her turn into a deeper, darker soul as well. Nowadays she broods so much, asks for so much more alone time, sometimes disappears for a day or two without a word. When she speaks, she keeps her words kind... but sometimes, she just doesn’t say them kindly. Sometimes, she was annoyed. Other times, she was anxious. Like there was something on her neck, maybe a spider, maybe worse, pulling at her hairs. She didn’t smile quite like she did in the old days, didn’t quite glow. Alone, when I spied her from a ledge when no one else was looking, she had a bitter look stuck to her face. I confronted her about it a few times. I even got mad. But it’s impossible to stay mad at Wind Glass. Her eyes begin to tear, and... I don’t know. One glance from her just fills me with cold water, washing away all my bad feelings, and I forgive her. I love her too much to be mad for long.
It’s been three days since her most recent absence. And sure, it’s not the first of a long string, but it struck me as the oddest. Usually, she would return without a word, milling with other ponies, impartial to my existence. It was up to me to find her, to say Hey, I missed you grazing over the Broos, even if she had no reply. But this time, she found me. She sought me out personally by the snowy meadows, where blue green grass had begin to tuff through the white powder in ignorance of frost. She had a smile on her face. A grin. Something strange shined in her eye when she talked to me that day.
“I have something I want to tell you, just between us and our feathers.”
I looked up to where she stood above me, my body resting against the ground. Wind Glass’ wings were folded, no longer held to the sun the same way I had remembered so many years before, so long a bitter taste ghosted my tongue. She stopped making her little charms the same way she stopped holding her feathers to the light. I missed those clear little pieces of glass that made rainbows and sang in the breeze. But the way she spoke to me, the way her neck bent to face me, muzzle to muzzle...
“Where have you been?” I rose on my front hooves into a sitting position. Whatever daydream I had dispersed, a yawn escaping my lips.
“Somewhere. I found something, and it’s really important. We need to go right now.” She gestured her head behind her, towards the direction of the Stable, “I promise, it won’t be long.”
“Some of the fillies have just started flying, though. Look; it’s Soft Song and May Flower.” They were so tiny in the distance, their shapes low to the meadow’s ground. “They look so pretty together.”
“There’s always new fillies up every year.” Sigh. “Nothing new about it.”
“But everything’s so new about it. Don’t you remember when we first flew?”
“Just like yesterday.” Wing Glass’ tone was flat, uninterested. Her eyes rolled, “It’s hard to forget.”
I grunted, rising to all fours, “More than just a little hard to forget.” Try the most important memory of our lives. “So what’s so big this time around?” I had to admit, though, I was curious... what could be so big that Wind Glass needed me so suddenly?
We trotted across the meadow, the mountains around us cupping the scape with it’s many fingers of peaks. A river ran somewhere along this meadow, shallow and ebbing just below a frozen surface. Days in this meadow were always lazy days, where the wind was gentle and the sun was bright. A few weeks from now, when it was a little warmer, carrots could be found nuzzled by the river’s side, and yellow flower heads popped up between the pebbles and snow patches. I couldn’t wait for those afternoons and evenings. Life here was always peaceful, but perhaps the most peaceful on those carrot-filled yellow daisy days.
The Stable opened up northeast of here, as well as a few caves and little rock niches. Not everypony lived in the Stable; in fact, not many ponies did. Instead, the Stable was used for storage, since it was always dry and a large gear door could be rolled shut when a bad blizzard rolled on through. We had some technology, just the basics like heating, water, and lights. Out of all the doors, only the front door was powered, and it was almost never closed, except in the case of extreme emergency. Growing up, fillies were told never to rely on Stable technology, or any technology besides hoof-made axes and buckets and shovels and so on. Never know when it could backfire. Anyways, it never paid to be too lazy - hard, honest work was a cornerstone of our lifestyle. The older I got, the more clear it became that our resistance to using technology is what makes us so... ‘pure’. That’s what life is called here - pure. My mother prays it, by father preaches it. I don’t quite understand what it means. It just is.
Only the front rooms of the Stable were ever used. No one liked being so deep underground in the cramped hallways, or the confined rooms. It was just... unnatural. You could get lost down there, so far away from open air and free skies. Heavily used cave systems had holes set in the ceiling or walls for quick escapes, but the Stable only had one exit and no windows. A pony or two occasionally wandered deep into the Stable to satisfy curiosity, but no thirst for knowledge could keep them underground for more than five hours at a time. It was so narrow, so cramped deep down there.
Wind Glass and I passed a few ponies on our way, most busy doing chores or passing along messages. A flap of wings went off behind us, and I turned to see a brilliant pale violet pony take off with an emerald partner, a green arm around the violet pony’s neck. Sky Tideand Vale Flower. The mares rose and headed straight for the skies - no doubt, they were setting out to clear the last few clouds that caused yesterday night’s flurries.
My mother - Blessed Wind - was waiting by the Stable entrance for someone. Something urgent must have been amiss, the corner of her mouth pulled back and a left hoof tapping. She’s never been hard to spot; a long silver mane that hung around a sky blue...
“Stop.” Wind Glass hushed me, ducking her head down. “Wait a moment. And don’t look so brilliantly obvious.”
“About what?”
“Just a second...” Wind Glass’ eyes narrowed, watching my mother stand around. My mother was impervious to us, staring at the sky and watching ponies clear the clouds, until a reddish stallion walked out of the Stable and remarked something rather boredly. Wind Glass nudged my hind, “While she’s distracted, go.” I didn’t understand the need to be so cautious, but I didn’t argue, following Wind Glass’ steps and slipping into the big gear-shaped entrance. She kept a quick but quiet stepped pace as we passed through the first room of the Stable and into the corridors.
“Where are we going, Winni?” I shook my mane; the Stable was so much warmer than outside, melting whatever stray snowflakes still laid upon me..
“I’m going to show you something. It’s important.”
“Are we going to be down here long?”
“Come on, don’t be a ‘fraidy foal. Aren’t you at least curious about what I’m going to show you?”
“I guess so, a little bit.”
“We’re just going through the atrium. It won’t take long.”
“Atrium?” I never spent much time in the Stable to learn the room names.
“The big room that goes to a lot of the little rooms.” She sounded annoyed, so I didn’t press her much further, instead just listening to her talk, “There’s an overmare’s office that overlooks the place. That’s where I got to show you something.”
Only one pony passed us in the halls, though I couldn’t identify him or her, Wind Glass acting strangely with her insistence on avoiding eye contact. As they passed, we kept our eyes pointing downwards at the metal floor. Wind Glass led the entire way, cutting through the halls without backtracking or even getting slightly lost. It didn’t take long to get to our destination, especially at the pace she trotted at.
“I’ve been in here a few times,” I pipe, “Whenever Mom or Dad need to adjust the lights or heating, they mess around this room. What are we doing up here?”
Wind Glass didn’t answer me, poking around the large, crescent steel desk. She stood behind a machine - terminal, I think - and began pounding away at the keys. As I waited, the lights flickered - they flickered a lot in the Stable - and a nearly inaudible whine came from under the steel panels beneath our hooves.
“Winni... we’re not supposed to mess around the Stable’s technology. If any of the others knew we were down here...”
“You won’t tell the others, will you? They’d murder us if they knew.” Wind Glass looked up at me, those slanted opal orbs pleading, set with those familiar gold sunshine irises, “You trust me, right? We’ve been Wing Partners for years now; you’re the closest pony I have.”
“Of.. of course I won’t!” I tried not to stammer, “Winni, you’re the closest friend I have. I love you more than anypony. I trust you.”
“Good. I’m glad to know this relationship’s mutual.” And she went back to the terminals, hooves clicking keys, doing Celestia knew what on that little machine, I waiting at her side. I didn’t understand the glowing yellow dots and lines on the screen, watching them flash by.
Things were getting along boredly, waiting by Wind Glass’ side in this steel encased room. I wanted to leave. I don’t know if ten minutes or an hour passed when, suddenly, a great whurr erupted from the room. I jumped - that nearly inaudible whine from before grew into a great screech, the room coming to life with great clanging and motion. I cowered, letting out a cry, “Blessed Mare of the Sun, what is that?!?”
“Calm down,” Wind Glass told me. Those eyes of hers, once pleading, narrowed once more. We watched the floor in front of the desk peel back, rigid steps of metal mesh leading downwards into unlit darkness, “Follow me down.”
Don’t get be wrong - I’m the explorer type. I like adventuring. See some nice hill over a few mountains? I’ll go there and check it out. But down there... into that dark cramped passage deeper underground? Still, I didn’t want to refuse. I followed her down.
As we walked, lights lit up by our feet. I gulped, I’m not a ‘fraidy foal. Nothing bad’s going to happen, I’m with Wind Glass, and I trust her. I trust her with all I know... but...
“Where are are going?” I wanted to stay close, but I kept my distance, trying not to cling to her side like some little foal. She was my elder, though; it was hard not to be a foal around her.
“Remember what our mothers told us when we were growing up?”
“Don’t fly against the wind when you can fly around it?”
“No, dimwit.” Her tone made me shudder - I didn’t know what a dimwit was, but it probably wasn’t good, “About this valley - about the world - about everything we know.” I paused, stopping to think. The story every colt and filly knew, recited to every foal whose mind wondered past the brim of our valleys we called home.
“We’re the last of our kind.”
“More than that.”
“We’re the last of our kind because we sinned. The rest of us died.” I sighed, furrowing my brows, “A long, long time ago, almost everypony lived in the High Kingdom, a city in the sky. There, no one knew pain or suffering, and had plenty, never knowing not enough. Then, one day, from below High Kingdom came other ponies, different ponies that had no wings and couldn’t join the ponies in High Kingdom. They asked for help because they were suffering in the land below, where the food was scarce and agony grew. But the ponies in High Kingdom refused, happy in their heavenly perch, and the ponies below died.
“Celestia, of the heavens we lived against, saw our sin when we thought all else would be blind. So she did not spread her great wings protect us, but folded them and turned away. A storm soon came, one that nopony could beat back with wings or kick away with hooves. Many of the ponies of High Kingdom fought it, even though it was to no avail. Other ponies saw revelation in the harsh, frigid winds and came to an understanding. For all the ponies in High Kingdom, there can be no redemption. But there can still be peace for their children.
“So from High Kingdom ponies fell, into the same land that they had let the earthen ponies die. And they took shelter in a vault called the Stable, where they sealed themselves deep within the earth, far far away from sky. In the Stable was where the first of our kind began, and when the great storm had passed, they returned to the valleys that the fallen High Kingdom ponies took exodus through. There, we thrived in peace, just as our ancestors had wished, happier on the ground than even those that had been in High Kingdom. As long as we seek a life of kindness, we shall never have to face the regrets of the past.”
We reached the end of the tunnel, facing a large steel door. Wind Glass pulled down a lever, the door opening with a loud screech,
“And you believe it?”
“I don’t like it,” I said, “I mean, it has a happy ending for someone, but not everyone else. They all had to die. But I believe it; it’s the truth.”
“They didn’t all die, though. And it wasn’t the truth - not all of it.” She lead on through the door. I expected another steel encased room, but when my hooves hit dirt instead of metal, I stopped.
The Stable lights were gone down here, instead replaced by round little glass lights the shape of flower bulbs that hung on thin cords. Walls glistened with the tell tale sign of chipped quartz and smooth stone. Once upon a time, this must have been a natural underground well, the air still humid and moss tucked into the corners of the wall, but the water had been drained. Every sound echoed, from the heave of a chest to the smallest whimpers, caught forever down in this little cave of a room. The air was so heavy, I felt like I was crammed into the very chamber of the mountain’s heart, Wind Glass and I deep enough to hear the earth’s rivets and ravines pulse like arteries.
A wooden table stood in the center of the room - how it did so, I did not know, for a leg was cracked and frayed, the surface bent, and green rot infested its feet. An old slab laid on top, some sort of ancient machine that a pony had cared enough for to carry so deep through the Stable and into the mountain. Two round shapes laid on top, a ribbon wound around each with the neatness of precise delicacy. Wind Glass beckoned, an all-knowing smile on her face, coaxing me to come a little nearer with a slight gesture of her lazuli wing.
I didn’t say anything, my lungs cold, my tongue held down by the weight of the mountain above us. And I stood by her, barely hearing anything past the throbbing in my ears. With a whirr, the small machine began.
A voice came from deep within it. “Listen well,” it commands in a vacuum of absolute silence. Only a slight crackle dares to tread, “This is the only time you will hear my voice.”
Footnote: Level Up! Lvl 1
Curiosity (Lvl 1): Curiosity killed the cat, but it let the pony roll a second perception check! When you fail a spot check, you can choose to roll again once more. You can also reroll current spot checks, whether or not they have been failed. During rerolls, if the score is less than the original roll, keep the original roll. Curiosity (lvl 1) cannot be used while in combat.
“What a terrible mistake, to let go of something wonderful for something real.” -Miranda July, No One Belongs Here More Than You
CHAPTER TWO
There are truths you can never get away from. They will haunt you, no matter how far you run, how high you fly. And the truth about truth is, when your legs can no longer move, when your wings can no longer beat, it all becomes encompassed in a single question: how will you face it? Who will you bring the truth to? Who will you hide it from? And who do you trust to keep it? Can you even trust yourself? Or are you the only person you can trust?
This is the only time you will hear my voice.
What a liar, I hear it right fucking now!
Once upon a time, we lived in the sky. We were pegasi that never stepped a hoof onto ground, held in our cloud city with clear blue sky. When war had wrecked the mortal Equestia below, we sought not to grace the lands below, for safer were we in our cloud thrones. Even when a thousand heads cried to our kingdom for aid, for ascendance into our city, for the safety our sanctums granted us, we knew better than to fall below and provide aid, for contagious is the corruption upon the heathen.
I knew this part of the story, but without the detail.
Our people lived in the glorious inventions of our own creation, with things the earthen below only dreamed of. We slept in beds of clean cotton sheets, ate warm food at any hour of day. We needed not books to keep records, for vast terminals held more data than the efforts of the lower beings below us. Little illed us, with medicine that cured what would otherwise be lethal, from caring for bacterial infections, to the euthanization of our own pegasi gone astray. Everything was as rightfully so.
Euthanization... what the hell did that mean?
And when our righteous wrath had been provoked, when something below wished us harm, we executed it with fire that rained from the sky, our satellites coordinating beams on precision targets, and plasma flushing out those harder to find. It was only just, payback for the pain caused by those whom our judgement deemed as condemned. Even when Equestria had turned to Tartarus, our lives changed little, for among the skies we found comfort while others suffered in their sin. No one could reach us so high, so we kept to our towers that were lit even through the night, safe from the world in eternal dark below. We had plenty enough, even when below no pony was spared. And for our greatness, we were relinquished from the earthern pony’s punishments.
My stomach sickened. This... I’ve never heard a pony talk like that. With such cold brashness. Executed. Condemned. None of it sounded friendly.
Of Temperance, of Bravery, of Diligence and all the rest of our virtues, none could save us when a deep evil had smote us from our very own skies. Banshees filled the skies that had otherwise been silent, filling what was once blue with white gray. They circled our city, denying our roam of our own sky. And though brave pegasi fought, no hospitality came from outside. Those that did hide in their cowardice, no matter where they hid, frost came and crept under their doors, to rooms that the wind hadn't already broken into. It was clear some sin brought ponies to their bitterly iced ends. It was all payment for the cumulative price of a hundred years without purification, damnation from Celestia herself. No one could do what was needed to be done; the frozen horrors were coming down on us as if we were simpletons on the ground, not pegasi living above the clouds. Over three hundred left dead, and a thousand more dying.
That grinding sound of teeth, so rage filled it scared me. Drove me running through the meadows for hours, trying to pound it away with the sound of hooves beating the ground.
The ghosts came from the domes of the sky, wails filling the winds until the sky was nothing but clouds... Run, run run away... And as I stood in what had once been a great city, windows barred with putrid souls cowering behind upturned tables, I finally turned my ears to listen to what Celestia had sent to us. What she had wanted from us; the lesson we were to learn. And I heard revelation clear through the fog that settled in our streets. We weren’t doomed to the taint steadily growing generation to generation. Though the few of us could come to reason, without radical change, our children could not.
Above, Soft Song amd May Flower wobbled, still new to flight. Their first flights failed to distract me as they once had.
Many inhabitants of the sky city refused to come to reason and realize the truth. That we must purify our ranks, flush away those of ill heart the same way that our plasma cannons did. There were those calling us out of our mind, and others yet revolted and claiming our hearts ugly and the source of the plague of winter ghosts. So I turned away from their cries for help, that called the evil spirits to enter their homes. They believed there was forgiveness in their idleness, as if pleading would exempt them from suffering, that in time perhaps the ghosts would wander off and return to them their peace. In my revelations, I had seen what had to be done...
Realize the truth... what was it? I began to imagine, but the thought was so... Astray.
Not waiting with head held in hooves, but action. I gathered only the most unadulterated of heart I could find, for only a flock of the most pure remaining could I consider salvageable. And only the saved could be the youngest, the newest born of the colts and fillies. They tried to return to the sky city many times, so something had to be done; the order was clenched between my own teeth, but that did not subtract from the fact that it was absolute. Tear their wings off.
Celestia, save me. I can’t even try to outrun it anymore.
Upon the white ground I had fallen, accompanied by my chosen few who would become the surviving wings of our race...and we wandered, seeking salvation in this waste of a world perhaps no one in their right mind would have searched. But we found a home in the white endless, an emptied Stable which held no survivors. We couldn’t become part of the world below, however, for the heavens were our true domain, but the Stable would have to be good enough. There, I sealed the remaining of my kind, locking them into safety to wait out the Great Storm. Their descending kindred would become the most important thing remaining of our people, until redemption can be sought once more.
“Son, I need to talk to you-”
You... you are our kindred. Before you have been the sinners that soiled our beautiful sky cities, who have been punished while you have been spared. You have lived a life provided by the sacrifices of the worthy before you. If you hear my message, you have been entrusted with the future of your kind. And I ask of you to return your own children to the glory of our kingdom lost. Return us to the heavens we belonged to...
“Son!” A sky blue wall blocked my path, forcing me to stop my running. Pausing, I looked up.
“I apologize, Overmare, I didn’t hear you.”
“I’m not here on Overmare business, son, I’m here as your mother.” She spread her left wing over me, pulling me close like a child, “I’ll always be here as mom.”
“I didn’t realize,” I turned my head to the side, “What’s up?”
“That’s what I’m asking you, son,” she loosened her wing around me, but still laid it across my shoulders, “You’ve looked burdened as of late. Is there anything worrying you?”
“Not really. I’ve been fine. Is everything OK with you?”
She sighed. There was a worried look on her face, the same look she had earlier today, “There are grave things stirring here, my son, but nothing to be feared. A storm is coming, soon. I wish I could tell you more, but there is so little I know. No matter what happens, I love you more than anything. Even the sun couldn’t replace the spot you hold in my heart.”
Is it true? That we weren’t meant to be happy here on Earth, but return to the Sky City? When will we go back to our original home? Is the High Kingdom you told me about, the old city drowned in sins, still there waiting for us?
“I... I’ll be fine, mother. I just need some time.”
“Day Break...” I looked up at her, her face fallen to silence. She was so... sad, “You never have to hide anything from me, even if you think it’s frivolous or small or unworthy of my attention. I will not judge you, and I never will. I will always be here for you, and I will always do everything I can to protect you. No matter what. I will always have faith in you, despite what you chose to do.”
“Thanks, mom.” Skies above Earth, this was so sudden, I didn’t know what else to say.
Above us, a silver blue twilight fell across the mountain sides, covering the granite and snow. The moon began its ascent, only a sliver of its former self, stars beginning to speck the dark canvas behind it. Colder winds began to trail down the valley walls, carrying off the rest of what little remained of the day’s warmth. My mom stood in what I could only describe as a burdened grace, watching daylight fade as she held me close in her wing.
“It’s late, my son. We should return to our kind and get some rest now.”
I promised I’d keep a secret, right? Then why does it feel like I did the wrong thing?
I woke huddled by my mother and six others, under the ledge that overlooked the pass between the Stable and the western craigs. It was still early in the morning. Normally, I wouldn’t wake until the sun had passed the distant, snowy peaks, but those late awakenings were reserved for ponies around my own age in the valleys below. My mother was always an early riser, and today she rose earlier than usual.
“It doesn’t make sense,” her whisper barely made my ears, but was so urgent in tone I couldn’t ignore, “Everypony’s accounted for. And we haven’t ever had guests in our mountains ever - any contact has always been miles and miles from home, and none have been personal. We’ve kept our distance. Any path a traveler could take into our lands through leads the long way around our homes.”
“Maybe there’s no intruder, after all,” a deeper voice responded, “Maybe all of this is internal.”
“Vale saw movement to the West while she was with Sky Tide. Could it be that?”
“Too far away. Vale said whatever she saw was pretty distinct, so I’m sure we’d notice whoever it was if they were near.”
“I just... I know everypony here, Hearth. Ever since I was a filly and well into my older years I’ve been close to each and every soul. Maybe I don’t know everything in these valleys, but I know enough to know that none of us are capable of malicious intent. Not since the old days.”
“Somepony was deep in the Stable yesterday afternoon. They were in the rooms we keep locking over and over again, and I don’t think that the Stable doors are old to the point where they swing open at the slightest breeze. You know how serious this is.”
“Only five ponies, counting myself, were in the Stable at that time, and I saw and accounted for each and every one. Me, you, Sun Rise, Glacier Peak, and your partner Frozen Oak. None of them would be interested in doing such a thing”
“Maybe a pony slipped past us. We’ll have to talk to the rest to be sure.”
I shuffled, turning over and lazily opening my eye. Mom was with Hearth Glow, the reddish stallion I saw with her by the Stable yesterday. Hearth jerked his head when I rolled over to face them. I watched him from where I laid on the ground. My mother and his conversation ended immediately.
“Glad to see you awake, kid,” Hearth flashed half a grin, but I didn’t smile back, “Where’s Wind Glass?”
“We had a bit of a fight yesterday, and we split. I think she’s still in the meadows.”
“I see. I’m sure you’ll sort it out soon. Partners fight sometimes, but they’ll always come together again.” He shook his mane, stretching his wing. When he finished, he turned to my mother, “It’s time for me and Oak to start our cloud chores, Blessed Wind. There’s a hail storm to carry off to the craig cliffs.”
“I shall see you later then, friend.” My mother sighed, watching Hearth wake his partner and then taking off. I rose to sit by her, the two pegasi becoming dots in the distance. Oh, did the urge rise in me to tell mom then - It was me and Wind Glass in the Stable! We slipped by when you weren’t looking! We found the recording below the Overmare’s Office!
Would mom be mad if I did? Hearth Glow sounded pretty serious, too - I know I’m the Overmare and Highstallion’s son, but that status wouldn’t excuse me from punishment. Sometimes, when a pegasi misbehaves, ponies exclude them from chores or even from their own sleep groups. But exclusion never lasts more than a day. Would they exclude me for an entire week for what Wind Glass and I did? How about a month for keeping it a secret?
What if they banished me?
“Where’s Dad?” I break the silence, releasing the bite on my tongue.
A small chuckle came from Mom, “Sleeping in. You know your father - I’ve never seen him wake early enough to even see the sun rise. I wonder if his parents ever kept that in mind when they named him. Then again, they never quite saw the sun to begin with...” The words came out as a mumble at the end.
“Mom?”
“I’m sorry, son. One day soon, we’ll have a talk. And I’ll tell you everything. It’s just... everything’s been worrisome of late. I’m a little stressed, and I’ve been busy. I need to go soon. I’m so sorry.”
“Yeah.” She nuzzled me. “I understand.”
“Wake your father up for me. Afterwards, maybe then you can find Wind Glass and sort out whatever is troubling the two of you.”
My father - Sun Rise - was the last one left sleeping. His broad shoulders made him quite the hump on a rock, his head tucked in marigold feathers. I called his name, prodding his arm, but all he did was yawn. I didn’t bother sticking around until he woke; I took my mother’s advice and began my search for Wind Glass.
She was where we had met yesterday, waiting alone in the meadow. I wondered if she had slept at all. Whatever had itched her neck for months must have really been crawling, Wind Glass pacing in a circle and throwing a glare off in the far distance. When I cleared my throat, her body froze, neck snapping to face in my direction,
“So you’ve come back?” She sounded pissed.
“I’m...” Stars, how do I say it? “Sorry, I guess. About leaving you yesterday.”
“I was worried you decided you’d run off and never come back.” Snort. “You haven’t told anyone, have you, during your emotional rampage through the fields?”
“No, I didn’t! Winnie, I made you a promise-”
“I thought we were supposed to be partners, and you just decide to gallop off without me and refuse to talk and-”
“Wind Glass!” I couldn’t help it; I had to raise my voice, “For the sake of every fucking pony in these fucking valleys, would you listen? I’ve been here for you the whole time, and I always will be. Could you at least be considerate sometimes? You’re not the only one who’s had a branch driven between their hinds around here. Celestia save me!”
Wind Glass stared at me with a blank expression. She opened her mouth a few times, shutting it twice, before talking, “I... I’m sorry, I didn’t know you felt that way.” Her voice was coated in liquid sugar, ears folded back and her eyes so round.
“I just... I don’t know how to handle this, Wind Glass.” I gave up, letting myself fall on my rump. I don’t know who I should trust. You’re my wing partner, but I don’t know if I can trust you more than my mother with how crazy you’ve been lately. It’s like you’ve become a whole new pony, a pony who doesn’t care about me anymore. If only I could just blurt it all out in one go like that. “Maybe if I had more time, I could figure this out.”
“Yeah, OK.” She sat down next to me, but I turned away, “Sorry for pressing. Look at me a moment.”
“Winnie...”
“Just trust me enough to look at me.”
I sighed, “I don’t want to.”
“I want to apologise.”
“For what?”
“The way I’ve been behaving lately. I haven’t been open to you about what’s really going on. The truth is...” I faced her then, looking into her eyes...
... Were they always so green?
“The truth is, Day Break, I understand. I’ve been a silly filly, huh? But you don’t have to worry so much.” Her voice was a purr, a headache beginning to throb in my head, “You’ll do things you regret sometimes. The best thing we can do is accept that fact and move on.”
“... Right, Winnie. I’m sorry I doubted you.”
“I’m glad we’ve come to an agreement, then. Now that we’ve put that behind us, we can move on.”
Move on. There was once a pony I knew when I was much younger than I am now named Sun’s Eye. I didn’t know much about him, other than the fact that he was old - almost sixty five. And he was grieving. His wing partner had been lost, and never found again. Without a doubt, his wing partner had flown his last flight.
That’s what he told me the hardest part about life is. To lose someone so important. And after that comes an equally hard part; moving on.
Maybe moving on for me wasn’t letting the conflict between Winnie and I go, but letting the Winnie I once knew go. She only acted in a rational way, after all. The world is changing, even though none of the familiar mountains moved, and I couldn’t cling to someone I knew. Or even the world I knew. Something great was rising on the horizon.
High Kingdom was waiting for us there.
Our parents had lied to us, told us the world of old was forever gone and that we would forever live in these endless, cold valleys. But the old world was waiting for us. It always had been, for the children of its old inhabitants to return and make it full again. Wasn’t that our destiny? To wait for the storm to pass, and then return and restore what had been ruined? It wouldn’t be hard at all. It just took a little hope.
Wind Glass and I took off at the brink of evening’s twilight. When the cloud patrols had retired from the stratosphere for the night, yet no lookout had risen into the darkening sky, was when the two of us took wing and escaped from our valley hovels. We headed West, against the eastern winds that fell into the Prancesylvanian valleys. And we flew through the night.
Old gorges and summits passed us, replaced with new, unfamiliar ones. I wasn’t afraid, though. Our destiny was waiting, a shining new future waiting for us in the past. The farther we flew, the stronger the winds became, the colder the air grew. Though ice formed between our feathers, we shook it off. A little cluster of frozen lumps couldn’t stop us; our will was indomindable. Invictus.
Hours passed before a howl surrounded us, a flurry of snow swirling and trying to push us off course. I huffed, beating my wing harder. I could barely make out a dark floating shape, deep in the thick fog, just a little further away. We could make it.
Flying became harder and harder. I wanted to land so bad, but the lands were full of sharp cliffs covered in layers of impenetrable jagged ice. I don’t think that if we did land, we’d be able to take off again. The snow would bury us down there, if we didn’t slide and impale ourselves first.
There was a wail that came, echoing both in the air and between our ears, warning us to turn back. But the skycity would soon be so close, I could just reach it with an outstretched wing! I craned my neck further into the growing storm. I squinted, an attempt to see clearer, the sky so dark and blackened. Perhaps it was because it was the night. But the full moon had greeted us when we left for our journey; here, the moon was drowned, it’s light suffocated.
“Wind Glass!” I had to shout. Something in the distance, darker than everything else, floated in the sky. The silent night we once enjoyed was filled with wails, “Can you see it? We’re almost there”
Wind Glass didn’t respond beside me, her weight beginning to drag me downwards. Afraid of spiraling, I tried to lift her higher, to shout words of encouragement. It felt like the coldest of gusts muted me, filling my throat with frost every time I opened my mouth. I cried and cried, but the cries of the skies were so much louder.
Then, I saw them - the banshees the recording spoke of. Celestia, save me. They galloped above the city, creating a dome of eternal winter winds, their manes bringing down waves upon waves of hail. The frozen chunks pelted us, hitting our wings and hides. I never stopped beating my wings, though, fighting the sky ghosts and their storm. The city! It couldn’t be far now; I could see each individual sharp rise of its buildings, the clouds that it was held aloft on. But... it was so... dark.
Blackness filled the streets. I had imagined a bigger, brighter city, full of light and the old world’s inventions, waiting for a young soul to unlock. The city, however, was hollow, any promise within it out of my view. Decay had wrecked havoc on its structures, towers that had once looked so slim so rugged and destroyed closer up. Was there anything even left? There had to be.
“We’re almost there!” Closer... closer... closer...
But the city began to become farther, this time becoming higher and higher as we tried to reach it. It rose above us, out of our grasp and into the banshee-filled skies. I raised my hooves, reaching for it as it left us. I turned to Wind Glass, to urge her further, but she was motionless. Her wing had stopped beating; the city was not moving at all. We were falling.
The downwards spiral was imminent, our steady flight turning into a wild descent towards the white, featureless ground. I tried to keep my grasp on her, keep her close, but she made no attempt to hang on. As we fell, she slid out of my hooves, and the wind seperated us. I tried to follow her - I swear, I did! I wouldn’t let her go! Ever! She was the most precious to me, more precious than the sun and the moon and the sky, more precious than...
Than some kingdom resting in the heavens.
What have I done?
Footnote: Level Up! Lvl 2 Perk Gained!
My Plot-Driving Ordeal: You really fucked it up this time, huh? After witnessing a close pony of yours die, you’re now driven by the memory of their death. In extreme situations of despair, flip a coin. That memory will either hold you back, or force you to pursue your quest further.
Short Note: Fuck. I'm a terrible writer. Took me at least 6 tries to figure out where these two were going. Excuse any mistakes; still in need of a spare pair of eyes to double check grammar and spelling for chapter drafts. Don't forget about the Google Doc File, which I not only keep up to date with on edits and chapters, but contains more content as well.
Edited the Perk in Chapter 2, for those keeping track of High Kingdom's progress. Also having upload problems where perk text randomly disappears, so if you see an empty perk without detail, give me a moment to fix it.
“Then it was only this? And the dream cools." -Rimbaud, Vigils
CHAPTER THREE
The end. I never figured it could all be over in a number of hours. When my mother wakes, she won’t find me in the meadows, like the rest of the ponies my age. I will be like Sun Eye’s beloved partner, lost and never to be found, beyond the hills of home. Except nopony will remember me for the flights in which I flew; only the heights in which I fell.
It isn’t the cold that kills me, or the sudden stop at the end of the fall. It’s something worse, stuck inside of me. I’m not afraid of being banished from the snow valleys anymore. I have already found exile.
What is the punishment for murder? I don’t know. Did I commit it? Murder. I learned that word from Wind Glass. They’d murder us if they knew. What exactly makes a murder? Is it the same as euthanization? It means to end somepony. To cause their death unnaturally. I had caused a crime I barely even knew about. What about execution? Is it the same as murder? Or is it something more precise, something to be done with a straight grass blade of light known as a laser? There was nothing precise about Wind Glass’ end. Only reckless.
The words stuck in my head as I laid in my grave of snow, the sky burying me as I stared above at the floating city. Here lies a reckless colt, fallen from the shadow of heaven into the valley of death. Taught better, but acted worse. The storm was calm down here, no more than a distant whinnie and the blanket it quietly laid down. Yes, I think this is a good place to lay down and die. There are no more cries, no more yelling, no more screams, only silence.
As I drifted, buried deeper and deeper in the snow, a figure in the distance came for me. I had always imagined, when a pony died, Celestia would swoop down in her excellence and fly their spirit away. Or maybe Luna would come to him or her, and carry their souls down a calm spring stream off to the beacons in the skies. As the figure drew closer and closer, I could see my visitor was neither, lacking the prismatic mane or the dark sky trail of either sister. Through the flurries of snow, I saw the image of a tall pony above me, her fur without color, a great big black muzzle leaning towards me to inspect. Great silver wings shined on her back, folded and motionless. I sighed, still and docile.. Perhaps this pony was the least known of her ancient sisters, the one who came to the lost and carried them down the cold river of Styx when all others refused. Red poppy eyes looked upon me, measuring from my hooves to my soul. Her neck bent, and in grace, pulled me from the snow.
“Blessed is she in all of the ways, for thou art one who comes when all has left.” I whispered the prayer, mumbled my graces. The tall figure grunted, grabbing my shoulder and carrying me out from where I had fallen.
Carry wasn’t the word as much as dragged was.
Unlike dreams of being lifted into the skies by sun or moon goddess, my visitor didn’t fly. No, she trudged through the snow, dragging me along, until I could stumble back on numb legs and hobble. She placed no wing around me to keep me warm, pushing me further and further with that black muzzle of hers. No words were spoken. Just trudging.
Where are we going? Into the blizzard she led me further, her unwavering steps leading towards a definite direction. Her supernatural refusal to even acknowledge the strongest winds showed in the fact that our path through the snow was perfectly straight, unlike a flight path that obeyed a thousand curves. Where we had begun our journey, the snow had risen past the barrel of our chests, a layer of thin cracking ice below our hooves stopping us from sinking a full neck further into an older, much deeper layer of frost. Even then, with this thin ice layer, every other hoof broke through and sank further than the rest, some sinking far enough that the stranger or I couldn’t free ourselves without help.
I didn’t bother asking where we were headed, even after the gusts died down and left us with silence again. There was nowhere left to go; the sky city was lost to the clouds above us now, and home was far behind. Just snow drift after snow drift, chills shaking our bones and hardening our hides. Once or twice, the stranger sank a little too far into the snow, her weight much greater than I; with grunts, I pushed against her rear until she found sure footing. Other times, when I found myself too deep to climb out, she merely grabbed me by my mane and began dragging me until I stumbled to my hooves all over again.
When the sound of trudging through snow became the familiar clip clop of steps upon rock, the blizzard was no more than a few spare flakes, the air clear enough for me to finally see my guide. Though I had loose expectation about whichever pony would greet me on my deathbed, she had to be the most alien thing I had ever seen.
Her mane wasn’t long as a normal mare’s, not flowing or soft or that light look of being wind tossed. Instead, it stood straight, short and curving around her head like the blade of an axe, hair just as notched as the tool’s edge. Her coat was patterned, something I had never seen before. Originally, I saw only black outlines leading me through the snow, a ghostly figure barely formed. Now, I could see that the mare was a solid white under those stripes, making her look anything but ghostly with how sternly she was set. Her silver wings were truly of metal, but not like wings I had ever seen before; they were featherless, tube shaped, with mechanisms and gears all mounted on that weighty saddle of hers. I doubted that she could use them to fly at all; they had to be too heavy, heavier than even she. Their purpose stayed unknown to me.
We walked side by side now, no longer forced to trail in a line through the snow as we began our ascent up a cliffside. When the wind and snow died, the desire to speak to her became overwhelming. But I couldn’t gather the courage to. In my grief, I was silent. In her silence, there was grief.
Above us was the familiar moon, lighting our path with a pale face. Her celestial glow began to dim, as sister sun awoke along the horizon. Our dark path turned gold, skies above losing their dress of stars to a blue abyss. Looking back, our trail through the snow was long, but soon lost. We had left the valley below High Kingdom, where all the ill winds had left their omens. Now, we were slipping through the cracks that leaked from it’s bowl.
No more soft hills awaited, our path beginning to wind through a deep ravine, forcing us to travel on narrow cliff sides. By now, we were far West, and farther South, of where home had been.
Was the mare truly Death? She had a dreading look to her, a burden that anchored her much heavier than the wings on her back. Her black and white coat enforced her surreal appearance, the striped pattern so alien, it had to belong to a pony from the other side. Even her eyes were not of this world.
I had called them poppies earlier, with their red faces and dark seed centers set in those thickly lined eyelids. Now, in the clarity we had together, her eyes had grown bloodshot, her iris a round gathering of all that bleeding redness, draining down the empty black hole of her pupil.
Our path narrowed, hoofsteps sending pebbles off the edge of the cliff path and down into the steep ravine. Ice patched the ground. As I began a descent down a slope, my hoof slipped.
“Child!” The Striped Mare knocked the wind out of my lungs with a lunge, catching me before I slid off the ledge. A grimace of white teeth greeted me on her muzzle, with a low growl of a lecture rising between those gritted jaws of hers, “Only so many times I can save you when in ail. Next time, I will drag you back up by your tail.”
I opted to cling to the cliff face and keep my eyes forward from then on.
We took shelter in one of the caves that pock marked a bend, curling up in the darkness. The fall hadn’t broken any of my legs, but my wing had gone numb, and my ribs cried with every breath. The Striped Mare prodded where the pain thrived, pulling from her pack strips of tough brown material that she did her best to bind me up with. Other than that, I could only chew on my lips to settle the pain.
Our shelter didn’t improve after mending my wounds.The day after, we huddled under a miserable lean. Then, when a flurry overcame us, an outright ditch. We talked occasionally, but kept it to simple matters. How’s the weather today? Fucking cold. What’s for breakfast? Tussock grass. Oh, my favorite!
Occasionally, the Striped Mare mumbled something that sparked my interest. She’d look to the stars and curse in a strange language, or stand still on a cliff side and let out a deep cry. She wasn’t the only one going mad. One day, we settled in a small clearing, not exactly a meadow, but the closest we would ever come to one. As we laid, resting, I couldn’t contain myself; I let out a long, sharp howl. Winnie, are you still out there? Did someone come to save you too? Are you in these frozen plains with me, somewhere!? Or are you really gone? Winnie-
“Where do ponies go when they die?”
The striped mare turned towards me, her eyes tiredly lidded, “Sleep.” And she laid her head down into the bent defeat of slumber, both of us tucked into a measly nook between two rocks.
I didn’t sleep at all that night.
“What is that?”
“What is what, child?”
“That thing in the distance. I’ve never seen one before. Is it natural?”
“No; it is a relic of the old world. A tower made of steel.”
“Why does it make that sound?”
“Wind makes metal squeal.”
It stood higher than the bare, gnarled trees, a winding path of narrow steps leading upwards to a cylinder shape. I put my hoof on one of the many grilled slabs, reminiscent of the steps that had lead downwards, deep into the vault. But these went upwards, up to the sky!
“Is there shelter at the top?” I began my ascent, climbing up the side of the steel tower.
“A room, perhaps. The day is growing cold,” She looked at the sky, the sun at the very rim of the horizon, “... but I do not think our weights this can hold.” Metal screeched underneath, but I continued. If it lasted this long in the tundra’s dauntless gusts, why would it fall now?
“It doesn’t look bad. C’mon, maybe it’ll be warm up there. It’s not too far up.” We had to be... I don’t even know how high, but Godesses be praised! It was euphoric, looking down and seeing all those steps below. I lifted my wing the best I could, despite how limp it felt, letting my feathers catch a breeze, “We’re halfway to the top.”
“Child, slow down, we must take care. Dangerous things-”
“We’ll be safe up there.” I took the steps two at a time - three! What was at the top of these steps? In that room? Besides shelter, of course.
I landed at the topmost steps, facing an arched entrance that led to blackness. Stepping over a slab of wood on the ground before it, entering the pitch blackness of the room, it took awhile for my eyes to adjust from the blinding whiteness to the absolute darkness.
Terminals like those in the stable lined the walls, except their surfaces were reddened with rust. Black screens were cracked, some caved in. Old world things laid strewn all around the room, as if gusts had gathered here continuously for the past century, blown out windows failing to keep them out. I began to salvage through all the debris.
My eyes were drawn to a tattered image hung on the wall, picturing winged ponies in dark colors, their eyes covered in yellow glass. Grins lit their faces, but that didn’t help them look friendly. In fact, they seemed a nasty bunch. What drew my attention most about the ponies, past those unsettling grins and purple black coats, was that they had two wings - two! A pair of feathers! They could fly on their own! A few bolted across the background.
VICTORY: Just A Wing Beat Away!
Victory... over what?
I continued my search through the room. Unearthing piles of broken crates and overturned things, I cracked open a wooden box, the wood giving after a single kicks. Out spilled small, metal pieces the size of teeth. Their tips were rounded, their ends flat, and a single one weighed very little in my hoof. Whatever they were, if they were indeed teeth, they wouldn't have been much use for chewing through anything. From what I could tell, they were harmless. Fascinating, but harmless.
“Look,” I called out, “You have to see this stuff. It’s so weird. Who made it? Why?” There was a loud creak, the wind whistling. The Striped Mare stood in the doorway. She stared, taking in the room, a stunned look on her face.
After a long pause, she spoke. “Answers that lurk in bones should be left among them.” The floor screeched with her steps, “Please, take care-”
“Ow!” My hoof throbbed where it had hit against something. “There’s something under all these broken pieces and debris.”
“Leave it be, child-”
“I saw something like this before.” It was a small rusty box, a machine so similar to the one I had listened to in the Stable. I hesitated... “You think... this is the same stallion? From the Stable? More of his words?”
The striped mare stood still, at a distance across the room, niether shaking or nodding her head. I pressed one of the various buttons, letting the machine’s voice spill out.
“This is Lightning Strike, broadcasting from Prancesylvanian Watchout Sierra Whiskey Tree. Report: Cumulusburg still out of contact; skies have been shut down. Mulebach out of contact; Stable closed. Mountiasch out of contact; train shipment from Mountiasch no reported passing. Dashburg out of contact. Broos out of contact, Stable has sent no confirmed closed signal. Russetmarkt has fallen.
“Requesting help. Requesting help from any pony out there. Storms have fallen on Prancesylvanian. Attempts to fly out have failed; scout Cloud Flicker missing for 3 days since expected return from departure. Please. We’re alone out here. It’s so cold, and we’re so alone.”
Lightning Strike’s voice couldn’t hide the quivering voice cracks, no matter how sternly the mare tried to speak. When the message finished, I shivered. Then, her voice picked up again,
“This is Lightning Strike, broadcasting from Prancesylvanian Watchout Sierra Whiskey Tree. Report: Cumulusburg still out of contact...”
We slept in the tower, after having erected the wood slab we found on the ground before to block the open entrance the best we could. Between the whistling wind, the creaking tower, and the soft mumble of Lightning Strike, I can’t say I slept well, but I did eventually sleep. The Striped Mare had tried to silence Lightning Strike’s voice the best she could, smashing the metal box into bits. But, amidst crackles, her voice still carried through.
I woke hours before the Striped Mare did, eventually crawling out from the pile of gathered rags and papers we curled into last night. Pushing down the wood slab, I exited our shelter, standing at the top of the tower’s spiralling steps. The sun had risen, a red blotch on the distant horizon. For miles around, there was nothing but the sharp white beaks of the endless mountain ranges. At least, almost; as I gazed south of the tower, down where the rails led, the range broke. Beyond, I saw a white flatness. Was that where we were heading?
When I returned inside, the Striped Mare was still asleep. I continued my search from yesterday, salvaging along the terminals this time. I pulled out a few drawers, small shiny round things clattering around. Their rims were rigid, and they bent easily when bitten, but otherwise, I found no use for them.
There were switches in the wall, some that I flipped, others where the lever had been ripped off entirely. Most of the morning was uneventful from there, until I came across a rather particular button. A clear case had been shielding it, though it was riveted with cracks. With a single hit, I removed the case, revealing the button to the open. I pressed it.
One of the terminal screens along the wall lit up, intermittent clicking sounds coming from it. A light beeped beside it, and a whirr sound began. Confused, I looked around the room, the old machines struggling to come to life.
“Wh-what’s happening? Everything’s turning on!” I turned around, the Striped Mare having snapped awake and already rising to her feet.
“What have you done!?” Her poppy eyes fixed on me, before turning to glare at the source for the growing sources of sounds.
“I just... I don’t know!” I panicked, running to one of the lit terminals. The screen filled with strange symbols. I hit my hooves against an array of buttons, but to no avail. Across the room, the Striped Mare rose on her back legs, before bringing her front hooves smashing down on a noisy machine. She repeated the process, reducing the surviving remainder of the room to ruin.
As we moved, a terrible sound screeched from the floor beneath our hooves, far worse than the clamor of machines around us. The ground gave out, and the bustle of noise turned into the whistle of wind. I shouted out, limbs flailing for something to stand on.
Footnote: Level Up! Lvl 3 Perk Gained!
Clumsy Catastrophy: Falling is only in your nature, especially in the wake of destructive events! You take less damage from environmental hazards to help cope with being the cause of said hazards in the first place. (Excludes RAD poisoning).
