Memories.
It was never something that meant much to any other. Just another photo, blanket, or nic nac that they would come to pull off of the shelves. Nothing special to anypony looking in, but the sentimental values of such objects stained memories far into their pasts. Groups of ponies, holding nothing but a few nonsensical items when they could have grabbed clothes or other necessities. And as far as they knew, they were going to someplace safe. They knew nothing of what had happened, and as far as they could tell – they would not want to know of the tragedies that had occurred just beyond their sight.
Mass evacuations, the Royal Princesses getting as many ponies out of the cities before yet another spark of life would be snuffed out from under their rule. Even with all that they could do, all the things that they would give to keep their subjects safe, they failed to save every single one. Families gone, little foals turned orphans in the blink of an eye, trapped under rubble as they clinged to the lifeless bodies of their parents. They knew of not the harm that the world hid from them, all they knew of was the cushioned life that their parents and the Princesses had provided them with. Death wasn't something that had ever meant much, characters on the television had died without much fuss. Sometimes, they wanted to cry for them. It wasn't that they didn't care for who, or what, that these characters were, it was that they knew it wasn't reality. Even with their minimal understanding of how psychotic the world could come to be, they just knew that it wasn't real.
But this was the day that they broke. It was the day that they could never wash from their feeble minds. Everything was going to hell around them as buildings collapsed and ponies could be heard crying in the streets, some for the ones they lost, and others for fear that the world would never recover.
The foals that had become trapped under rubble were nothing far from spectacular, many similar to them had perished under eerily similar circumstances. One thing that set them apart however, was that the ones who lived woke from their unconsciousness to find limp, cold bodies lying over them. Tears came to their eyes, and they sat in awe at what lay over them. Something so terrifying that seemed to be so real, the very thing that filled their nightmares was now what they lived. They felt abandoned, but they knew that they were loved. Even with abandonment and fear for what lay outside, they attempted to free themselves from under the brick and mortar, as the air grew mungy and stale, their mouths dry as the dust sucked the moisture from it, tears washing the dust from their cheeks.
Explosions echoed far and distant, the ringing and shock waves shaking the tombs that the foals had come to wake in. There was nothing they could do. They were trapped, and without any guidance from the ones that they trusted, the ones they called 'Mommy' and 'Daddy', the ones they could find trapped under along with them grouped together to attempt to fill the hole that had been torn in their hearts. They looked back often, seeing those they told themselves to not look back onto. Cold, and lifeless. Motionless, and gone. Minds now warped by the changing world around them, they were determined to go on and make their parents proud as they watched down from the heavens, or wherever they were. Once in a short while, most could feel the warm press of lips against their cheeks, but as they turned – nopony was there. It was just empty. It was cold. It was now reality.
It was what seemed to be hours before all hope had been sucked from their petite, frail bodies. Rays of sunshine shone down on them where there was once darkness. It was warm compared to that of the frigid tomb they had been encased in, and they thought that they had been saved. Somepony had come to save them from from being buried alive, and they were crying tears of joy that they were finally going to be saved. The tears leaked down the sides of their cheeks, their pristine cheeks. And to their amazement, the hole had been dug by those they had once thought to be deceased. Their parents were there, pulling them from the terror they had once been trapped in. They were welcomed into warmth, into the homes that they had once known before the disaster. It wasn't something that they had once thought to question, but the darkness in the corner slowly faded away as they enjoyed the company of their parents, and appreciated everything they had.
But in the real world, their chests were still expanding and contracting in slow, uniform movements. Curled into the fetal position to try and stay warm with tears falling to the ground below them, the movements of their chests slowed ever gradually. Ever so gradually, as a smile cracked upon their lips. The moment for them had come, as it would for hundreds others across Equestria.
The things they carried didn't usually appear to be anything much, but as far as anypony could tell, it meant as much to the next pony as their item did to them. For some, they held jackets. Others held jewelery or stuffed toys. And with each pony, each different object held yet another story. Some were longer than others, but each memory wasn't just an important piece of their life; it was the one of the only things that they could remember what the old life would be like.
Even though none of them knew it at the time, the world as they knew it would crumble. Society would fall apart, and ponies would die in ways that they would never come to think possible. Upon leaving in these evacuations, they told themselves that they would come back to see their homes just as they had left them. Even hearing the explosions behind them, they refused to look back and let go of everything that they had worked for. The years of their life that would come to be wasted and mean nothing. The schooling that they had done for their specific lines of work meant nothing. Some ponies took the fall with less mental breakdown than others, but some broke completely. Everything that made them the ponies they were was gone, and they became the cold blooded, ruthless bandits that travelers would come to fear.
They all wondered what had exactly happened to cause Equestria to fall into such a state of disarray. Some claimed the terrorism of those who opposed the rule of the Regal Sisters, but something so preposterous could have never surely happened. Then again, the collapse of an empire they had thought to never come down had happened. Others told stories of Celestia turning into a vile monster just as Princess Luna had in the millennium before, but nopony who was in the city of Canterlot made it out alive. Stories told of that once great mountainside city, that came to its fall as the support beams fell out from below it and it tumbled down to the ravine below.
Ponies survived, and militias formed, and along side those rebellions and republics rose from the ashes. Society was slowly rebuilding, reclaiming as much of the history of the centuries before them as they could, digging through the remains of burnt libraries, hoping to find books to give them the truth of what they had known.
Finding a book was always something to revel in, finding something that was so great and meant so much when it came to the history of your past. But sometimes, there are things that tell greater stories than that of words.
Sometimes, the material items you clung to tell a greater story of a past time.
Because sometimes, the stories of the lives that were once lived makes the terrors of today that much less terrifying.