...My name is... Eh... Silver Raven. I woke up this... Morning, I think. I was sitting in the end of a wagon of a train, with a few other passengers. Everytime I looked outside the window, I only saw trees. Trees at both sides of the tracks. I didn't knew where we were heading to, but I don't even remembered getting in that train too.
After ten minutes, I realized that I had a brown briefcase at my left. Nopony else was around, and it seemed to actually belong to me. So, I picked it, and for my surprice, it only contained a few metal pieces, two smaller bags, and a note.
The metal pieces, somehow were familiar to me. They were some kind of mix between Steel and Copper, but I never recognized the real name of the mix. The two small bags contained a lot of bits each. I counted up to a hundred on each, so that would make two-hundred bits. Next, the note. It only had written 'Northern Road, 5', some kind of direction.
...That sounded very familiar to me too. A name crossed my mind. Innovation Incroporated. Some kind of resear and development agency. Only the name went in my head. Everything else was filled with other questions, such as 'Where are we heading to?' 'Why does my voice sound so Mare-Ish in my mind?'
...That's when I realized something more... Important.
Gesh. What did I drinked, to even forget what was my gender? Anyways, I had few to none clue on what was going on, so I just decided to lean on my seat, and wait untill we arrived.
Meanwhile, I observed myself at the reflection on the train's windows. For the bare-to-none details, I knew that I had a dark-gray coat, a dark-green, long mane, and two eyes of the same colour. At least, that's everything I managed to discover from myself.
About five minutes later, we arrived. It seems that I was asleep the whole ride, or something like that. I still have no clue on that. So, the train stopped, and everypony started to get out of it. I grabbed what seemed to be my briefcase, putted it on my back, and left the train.
Next, I saw how a pink Mare was mid-flight, towards me. That scared the creep out of me, if I say the truth. Somehow, my only reaction was to jump to my right, avoiding the arc she was perfectly describing towards where I was standing. She hitted the ground with her face, but what happened next is what got me even more impressed.
After a blink, she was already standing in front of me, smiling in a very, very creepy way. You can imagine what kind of face I had at that moment.
"Hi!" She started to speak, with her grin always there. "I'm PinkiePie! You must be new to town, because I know everypony here!" ...Her way to speak was actually starting to annoy me a bit. Too much words for so little time.
"I... Uh... I am, yes..." I barely managed to spit that out. Moving my mouth and tongue to make audible, yet understandable noises was quite hard, if I say the truth. Oh, and my voice completely reflected what I tought: I'm a Mare.
"Ooh, then come with me! You need a tour of all Ponyville!" Said... Pinkiepie, grabbing my right hoof, and taking me outside the station. I seriously didn't knew if I was getting ponynapped there, but I was sure of one thing: that Mare was starting to annoy me, real serious.
...So, after easily five hours of coming from here to there, I could say that I've seen every single milimeter of Ponyville. Well, not every milimeter. The only place where I was intended to go wasn't on Pinkie's route. We stopped in a grocery store, named Sugarcube Corner, and apparently Pinkie worked on it too. She made me sit in one of the tables there, and bringed in two chocolate muffins. Yup, she worked there.
"So, from where do you come from, Silver Raven?" She asked, while she was eating the muffin. ...How could she speak with her mouth full?
Now, her question. I didn't really remembered from where I was from. No names, words... Nothing. Not even the face of my mother, father, or even brothers, if I had them. Then, another name blasted in my mind. The Crystal Empire. I realized that iv'e been thinking too much time. "...The Crystal Empire." I finnaly managed to say. Wait. Since when does she knows my name?
"How so? You don't look like a Crystal Pony, or anything like that!" She exclaimed, completely blowing my cover.
Then, my brain started to plot. Plot something in my favour. "...I was just bornt there. My fathers weren't Crystal Ponies."
...Bingo.
"Uh-Huh. Another question, what does your Cutiemark means? It looks so odd!" She explaimed again, with her annoying voice, pointing at my flank. Somehow, I never had the idea of looking there, and when I did, I only saw a red, cracked gear printed in my butt.
Once I had a better look on my flank, a quick memory struck my mind. It meaned 'War, Loneliness, and Failure, all in one. How depressing, but thanks to my holy brain, another plot came out of my mouth. "...It means the first thing I did. I worked hard on a watch, that ended exploding in my face."
...Brilliant. What the buck, Brain??
"I see. So, you're some kind of clock-making pony? Why not a clock itself, instead of a gear?" ...She was starting to sound more suspicious at me over time. Hm. Even though she gave me a full-scale tour moments ago.
"Well, I'm not only a clock-making pony..." Another memory struck my brain. I remembered myself, working in different machines, with metal pieces, pretty much like the ones I had in the briefcase. "...I'm also good with machines in general."
"Ooh! How so, overall when you're not an Unicorn? Is it hard to work with hooves?" ...Pinkie had a point there. However, I do remember working with heavy machinery, repairing them. Oh, I also rembered robot-ponies.
"...I just know how to make my hooves work." I said, grabbing the muffin that was in the side of my table, and biting it. Yuck, chocolate...
Pinkie stared at me for a while, observing how I was munching the super-tasty chocolate muffin. I knew that I wasn't allergic to anything in it, but... The flavour just didn't felt right. I don't like chocolate at all. Oh, and I saw in her eyes the many things that crossed her mind with the 'I know how to make my hooves work' thing. How much dirt-minded we were.
After a while of uncomfortable staring, a Mare in a light-orange coat, and a brown hat trotted in. She went straight to Pinkie, and basically pulled her out of the chair, and took her outside. They said something about Canterlot, somepony named Twilight, and then they rushed away.
...I was finally free. I hardly ate the rest of the muffin, placed a few bits in the table, and left. I had somewhere to go...
(1) Secrets in twisted metal
...It took me about an hour or so to reach my destination. It was a two-story gray bulding, owned by 'Innovations Incorporated', or something like that. The entrance was opened, so I went in. A Stallion, wearing some kind of uniform blocked my way, before I could go deeper in the bulding.
"Hold on a second, Madame." He started to speak. "Before you can go any deeper, we might need to identify you."
"My name's Silver Raven. Do you need anything else?" that's what I replied. Hm. Madame. Sounds good.
"Allright. I'l need you to place your hoof here." He pointed to a metal plate in the wall at his right. I did so, and the plate started to glow. I think it readed my hoof, or something like that. There was a crystal over the plate, and it started to show my name, age, and even from where I was from. And, a picture of my face, and cutiemark. I don't remember signing up on anything like this. Were they spying me? They'll better have some good answers.
"...Anything else?" I asked.
The Stallion started to read the words in the crystal, and once he was done, he just said "Come with me, please." He said that quite gently, like if I was his boss, or something like that.
So, he opened a metal door behind him, and entered. I followed him, and after a maze-ish walk later, we stopped in front of another metal door. He pressed a button, and after a while, it opened. It was a rather small hallway, that ended in a wall, ten feets away from the entrance. He stepped forward, and waited for me to do the same.
"...Are you coming in or what?" He asked.
I took a step front, and the door closed behind me. Then, the whole room started to go down. Oooh, I get it. It's an elevator.
After a while of going down, the wall that was behind the Stallion turned into glass. Holy blizzard... What was behind the glass completely surprised me. There was a huge bunker down there, with white walls, and different roof-less rooms scattered all around. There were huge orbs hanging from the ceiling, thet seemed to be suns, or something like that. Oh, and the ceiling was easily twenty times my height from the level of the floor. Once the elevator reached the ground level, the door opened, and we went out.
Another maze-ish walk. At both sides of the trip, they were doing different experiments with different machines. One of the experiments that I remember, is that they were shooting something at the walls, and the things were bumping on the white walls. Another one was some kind of experimental invisibility suit, that made the Mare that was testing it mimetize with the colour patterns behind her. Well, now I get why it's called Innovations Incorporated.
So, we walked for a while, and we reached a metal staircase, that leaded to a series of offices hanging in the roof. We stopped in front of the office of somepony named Alexander Dragunovv. Huh, what a name. The Stallion opened the black metalic door, and showed to me the office. It wasn't quite big, and it only had a glass table in the middle, two chairs in it's front, and a black office chair behind it. It also had a crystal attached to the wall in the left, and at the end of the room, a glass with a nice view of the whole bunker. Laboratory, I mean.
"Wait here, if you don't mind." Said the Stallion that was guiding me, as he left the office. I walked to the chair, and dropped my briefcase in the table. Then, I seated, and waited, while observing the experiments from the distance.
Hardly ten minutes later, the same Stallion came in. "Sorry, Alex's not here anymore... He's... Not with us anymore."
...Wait. You're saying that he's dead? Great. One pony less that can answer my questions.
"...But, he left a message for you. One of his... Assistants will come with his message." Ended the Stallion, before leaving again. I was starting to get tired of waiting.
Not less than a minute later, two ponies came in. Well, one and a half. The first one was an orange Unicorn, and her hair was orange too. She was wearing white glasses, that made her yellow eyes look even bigger, and the same labcoat that everypony was wearing in the area. The second one was... A robot. A robot pony. It was made out of the same mix of metals from the pieces I had in my briefcase, but more polished, and shiny. It was of the same size of the Mare that was accompanying it. It's solid eyes were glowing in an eerie orange, and it was very detailed in facial features, so was it's "Mane" and "Tail". It seemed to be a very high-tech thing, if you ask me.
"Sorry for this way to welcome you, Silver Raven." Started to speak the Mare. "But we lost contact with Alex since he went to Canterlot. And he only said that you were coming, and left a note that only you could read in his drawer. Give her the key." She ordered to the robot. It walked to where I was, and took out a silver key from it's "Pocket", where it's "Cutiemark" should be at, and gave it to me.
"Um... Thanks?" I said to the robot, that nodded back. Well, robots now have a code of honour, or something.
Well, I went to the other side of the table, and there was a drawer under the table. It had a keyhole, where the key would obviously fit. I unlocked the drawer, and opened it. There was a small sphere inside, made out of the friggin' same mix of steel and copper. Like if that metal was cheap... So, I picked the sphere, and watched it. It had pretty circular carvings around, but no clue of anything else.
"...Um. What does this do?" I asked, showing the sphere.
"No idea." Replied the Mare.
"Instructions: Let drop." Said the robot, with it's automat voice.
...Let drop. Okay...
I left the sphere fall from my hoof. Then, it shooted out four small bug-like wings, and started to fly around the office. Meanwhile, it was playing some sort of prerecorded message, with a Stallion voice coming out of it.
...Silver Raven. If you're hearing this, you must be seeking answers. Let me explain myself. My name is Alexander Dragunovv, head of security and innovations. You'll find a propper document in my house, number three, Pegasus avenue, with everything you should want to know. Say my name at the entrance, and they should let you come inside. Good luck.
Then, the sphere softly landed on the table, and retracted it's wings. Another place to go...
I picked the sphere, and placed it in my briefcase, along with the other things. I nodded at the Mare, and at the robot. Only the Mare replied with another nod, and headed out. I tried to make my way outside the maze, that took me about half an hour, only to find the elevator, and another half an hour to leave the bulding. Gesh, it looks way much bigger from the inside.
...After that, straight to the location that the sphere told me to go.