Author's Note

Chapter Three Recap :
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rvcVoDfIXJo6J4lUIgfF1zPt1RrMkmqUwAWVPWpTOBI/edit?usp=sharing

Takedown

The tall heavy doors of Canterlot castle groan as they swing open, and a crowd of lively ponies shambles out. Their attention—and their cameras—are pointed toward a single mare in the center of the group. Her fiery curls bounce with every step she takes out into the hall, and her shiny red heels clop loudly against the polished stone beneath them. A confident smile is planted firmly on her muzzle, more than apparent in the abundance of photos the paparazzi takes.

“Senator, this is a monumental win for your bill, how are you feeling?”

Senator Peach looks in the general direction of the other mare who had so desperately clawed her way to the front of the pack. “I’m feeling confident, and hopeful. But never would I call it ‘my’ bill; it belongs to all of the ponies of Equestria. And it will serve us well.”

The senator’s response sparks a deluge of new questions, mostly garbled and unintelligible over top one another. The crowd moves further away from the doorway, and the pair of guards flanking either side. Above the group is a massive chandelier, and below them, many levels of spiraling staircases and golden statues. The hubbub draws a bit of a crowd down below, too, as many ponies interrupt their schedules to stop and lean back over their floor’s railing, trying to catch a glimpse of what was happening.

Another question is finally made audible. “Senator could this at all have an effect on the investigation in Baltimare, involving the escaped prisoner and the missing guard?”

“I will not be discussing, to any length, the details of ongoing crime cases.” The pens start to scrawl, and the voices begin to raise, but not before Senator Peach can add one additional comment. “This is the start of something very big, though. And in the future, we may have the means to stop such heinous crimes before they even begin. Thank you, that will be all.”

The room is lost in a roar of questioning. Mrs. Peach remains true to her word, and ignores all of it, instead heading straight for the top of the long stairway down.

A stallion with a curious, distraught look on his face, and tangles in his mane, calls out from the fringes of the group. “SENATOR!” He shoves his way past the others, earning a number of curses and yelps. When he finally has a clear view of the mare, their eyes briefly meet. There’s a wild, dangerous flame in his.

Suddenly, the stallion charges the mare, and rams her toward the railing with his head. The few media ponies behind the scene scream and dodge wildly out of the way, or are otherwise shoved aside from the stallion’s frightening strength. Senator Peach is slammed against the metal railing with force, and then heaved over with the weight of the earth pony’s shoulder.

Mrs. Peach flails wildly outward, but fails to maintain a grip on anything. She plummets with horrifying speed down to the first floor, and only gains the sense to start screaming in the last milliseconds of her fall. She hits the marble floor with an echoing thud, and two of her candy red heels are sent flying away from her.

Quickly, panic breaks out in the chamber. A mare on the bottom floor, close to where the senator had landed, begins screaming incoherently, and the Canterlot guards immediately fan out. They wrestle with the suspect at the top level, as the journalists snap photographs of the arrest and the corpse, mangled unnaturally some hundred feet below them.

The culprit’s mane dangles messily over his eyes, and he lashes out against the physical restraints the guards have on him. “AAAGH! CELESTIA BE PRAISED! I DID IT FOR OUR SWEET HOMELAND, CELESTIA BE PRAISED!”

At the fringes of the pile on top of the stallion, a pegasus guard looks back at his cohorts rushing up the steps, then shouts orders over the chaos. “GET THESE PONIES OUT OF HERE, NOW!”

* * *

Rainbow Dash rubs deep against the skin under her eye with a forehoof. She glares through the glass before her, and at the stallion sitting at the end of a table in the brightly lit room. Her mane hangs low, and is disheveled, strands of the rainbow color bent in every direction imaginable. There are dark bags under her eyes, highlighting them like some kind of hastily applied makeup.

After she’s had enough of a look, Dash walks over to the room’s only door, and forces her way inside. She barely looks at the stallion, before turning and making sure the door is closed behind her. And then the pegasus approaches the other end of the table, where she noisily pushes aside the chair in favor of standing.

“Let’s get this over with…” She murmurs, perhaps more to herself than the other pony. “You’re with The Equestrians. You were ordered to kill Senator Peach either by Aegis, or someone under him, as a way of upholding your twisted values about Equestria and the so-called ‘threat’ that The Vault brings.” She pauses for a moment, watching the small twitches and rocking the stallion exhibits. “That sound about right?”

He groans, and mouths something inaudible with his lips.

“Speak up!”

The earth pony looks up at the captain, and instead of responding, only makes a crooked smile at the mare. His exposed teeth are discolored, and uneven.

Obviously this doesn’t sit well with Rainbow Dash, who shoves the chair all the way to the back wall, and angrily paces to his end of the table. “Do you have any idea how much shit you’re in right now?” She barks in his ear. “I could get you locked away for life faster than you could blink.” There’s no response. The pony’s eyes don’t even look over to Dash’s. “Did Aegis put you up to this?”

This comment elicits the first reaction out of the suspect, who turns his head almost far enough to stare at Dash. The moment is fleeting though.

Down the hall, another pony slowly approaches the interrogation room. A pegasus, like Dash, with an unkempt mane that seems to contradict the bun in the back of her mane, held in place by a single, long metal hair stick.

“Don’t bother pretending to not know what I’m talking out. You kind of screwed that up when you were out there ranting about your ‘sweet homeland’.” The stallion being interrogated begins mumbling incoherently under his breath. “I know damn well you’re with The Equestrians.”

He looks up, slowly and more controlled now, then locks eyes with the pegasus standing over his shoulder. “I act only as a hoof of our beloved queen. Her will is mine.”

The pegasus in the hall is much closer now. The lights hanging overhead in the hall create a sort of striped tunnel, and they reveal more detail on the pony’s back each time she passes under one. When lit, the scarring and warped flesh on her back and wings becomes plainly visible, even against her washed out, grayish violet coat.

Rainbow Dash pushes away from the table, and begins to slowly circle behind the stallion. “Yeah well ‘your queen’ is about to have you rot in a cell for the rest of your life. You’d think she’d be a little more grateful for somepony acting on behalf of ‘her will’.”

“She must have soldiers, she must have sacrifice. I am willing to fill this role.”

Captain Dash scoffs. “Of course you are.”

Tired and annoyed, Rainbow simply walks to the other end of the room, and pushes through the door without looking behind her. Almost immediately the pegasus is approached by another, who steps forward and offers a sealed envelope from the crook of her wing.

“Captain Rainbow Dash, my name is Moon Dust. Princess Celestia has sent me to conduct a private interrogation with this stallion.” Her voice is low and sickly sounding, like she had been smoking since she learned to canter.

Dash grabs the letter with her own wing, and instantly recognizes the golden wax seal on the outside. She isn’t given any time to read it, however, as Moon Dust almost immediately starts off toward the door. Dash blocks her with a forehoof. “Hey! I don’t care who sent you, this is still my suspect!”

The pegasus with a washed out violet coat takes a step back, and quickly inspects the other mare from hoof to mane. “The matter’s urgent, Captain.” Again, she steps toward the door, and again, Rainbow Dash blocks her.

“I know it’s urgent, but it’s still my suspect!”

Moon Dust pauses, and studies the other pony’s annoyed scowl. “Captain Rainbow Dash. I was selected to work with the princesses for a very specific reason, and I’ve been performing for them for many years. I don’t ask questions. I don’t relent. I get the job done.”

Dash doesn’t move an inch, but she doesn’t retort either. Her tired eyes narrow a little more as Moon Dust leans in close, and lowers her voice to be just louder than a whisper. “I know you want answers. I can help you as much as you can help me. Just give me five minutes alone with him. Five minutes, and we can finally start fighting back against these bastards...”

Dash’s expression remains unchanged, and her lips sealed shut. Her pupils focus like lasers on the mysterious mare, and her wings flap once; an aggressive and silent response. She turns around, approaches the glass, then reaches out to a small metal console jutting out from the wall. Two small, metal switches flip without resistance under her hoof, next to the labels ‘mic 1’ and ‘mic 2’. The pony then trots off, and never takes another glance at the scene behind her.

Moon Dust watches the mare leave slowly. Once the captain is a good distance away, and the sounds of her hoofsteps fade into an echo, Moon Dust finally finishes her approach to the door. She keeps her eyes forward as she enters the room, and uses a wing to remove the metal hair stick in the back of her mane. It comes out slowly, the thinning rod gleaming under the room’s bright lights, until its knife-like point is finally revealed.

* * *

A choir of bird calls and the distant sound of a dog barking set the appropriately rural scene at Sweet Apple Acres. As Fall had swept over the land, it’d turned the pastel palette of summer into a warm, red and brown medley, half of the orchard’s leaves off of their branches and scattered about the farmland.

Inside the large house, ponies gather happily around a table filled with colored drinks and plates full of delicacies. Mashed potatoes, salads, sandwiches; and perhaps most notably, slices of warm apple pie had been shared among the smiling mares and stallions.

“Pass me that gravy, will ya hun?” Applejack asks, with her signature ten-gallon hat hung behind her on the chair. Mint Julep softly acknowledges her request, grabs the gravy boat beside him, and passes it onward as he continues to nod attentively at Granny Smith’s story.

“...Now, this must’a been… ooooh, I dunno, ‘least before the second zap apple shortage, back when Apple Rose was having her… hip exam…”

Pinkie Pie leans back in her chair and rubs her stomach in delight. “Mmmm, this pie is just delicious! What’s in it, A.J.? Pear? Sugar plum? Apricot?”

“Pinkie, you know what’s in the pie...” Applejack says dismissively from her side of the table. “Apple Bloom, you’ve barely touched your food.”

The teen to Applejack’s left suddenly looks up from the full plate before her. “I’ll just eat at Blue’s.”

“No, you’ll eat a meal with your family, instead of a bunch of chips and—whatever other junk you eat over there.”

Apple Bloom scoffs dramatically, then noisily pushes her chair away from the table. She leaves the dining room and makes for the stairs, where her thumping hoofsteps can be heard above the room’s occupants. A.J.’s fork clacks against her plate as she drops it in frustration. She sighs heavily, then turns to look at her husband, who offers a meek but nonetheless comforting smile.

“...No,” Granny Smith suddenly breaks the silence with. “It was a hearing test…”

The evening moves much slower after dinner. For A.J., she was happy to spend it alone in her room with Mint Julep, who paroozes through the suits hanging up in the closet while Applejack brushes her mane in front of a plane, wooden vanity. She glances off to the side when Mint curses quietly under his breath.

“Hey, hun? Have you seen my blue tie?”

“Uh, not since last week.” A.J. halfheartedly replies.

Eventually, Mint Julep hangs his head and sighs, using the wooden closet frame to lean on.

A.J. watches her reflection intently, shaking her head before a certain thought makes its way to her lips. “I wish I knew what’d gotten into her…”

Mint looks over his shoulder at his wife. She sits perfectly still before the vanity mirror, brushing diligently through her golden blonde mane, and her hat resting on the counter before her, no more than a hoof’s reach away. Like it always was.

Mint Julep finally pushes off of the wall and circles around the room to be with his wife, sitting down onto the bed next to her. A.J. smiles briefly at his appearance, then returns to the work on her hair. “Wish I knew what to do with her.”

The stallion leans in so that his forelegs can rest on his knees, and so that he can be closer to Applejack.

“Maybe if Mom and Dad were here…” She murmurs just loud enough for Mint to hear.

“Hey,” Mint begins, softly placing a hoof on the mare’s shoulder. “...you’ve done nothing wrong. She’s just going through a phase.”

Applejack puts her brush down and raises the corner of her mouth in a half-smile, but otherwise shows no response. The bed creaks as her husband pushes off of it, then she watches in the mirror as he approaches the vacant spot behind her. The two of them stare at the reflection before them, the image not too dissimilar from a family photo you might see framed on the wall; small as its cast may be.

“I’m going to have to head into the city for work next week; then again in another couple of weeks.” He places his hoof back over Applejack’s shoulder. “Apple Bloom’s always going on about how much greater the city is than out here; she can stay awhile with my sister, she gets what she wants, and then we can spend that time on a little vacation…” A.J. smiles more sincerely as Mint Julep leans in closer. “...together.”

The orange mare wraps her own hoof around Mint’s, and holds it close enough for a small peck from her lips. “I love you. Ya know that?”

Mint Julep smiles and moves his head soundlessly downward, until it can rest on Applejack’s shoulder opposite the one his hoof is resting on. “I know.” A.J.’s eyelids come down to rest as her husband kisses gently at her neck. “I love you as well.” His hoof begins to caress slowly against the mare’s shoulder, as his muzzle brushes lightly against her neck and shoulder fur. Applejack simply presses herself against his hoof and breathes in the stallion’s scent, cooing softly into his coat while his massage continues.

Eventually, his head slowly retracts, and Applejack’s lustful gaze follows as he circles around her and places himself between her and the mirror. Their muzzles meet directly for the first time that evening, and the two share a kiss that’s probably a little longer and louder than the ones they share in front of the family. “I want to make you happy.” Mint says between kisses. Applejack wraps her forehooves around the back of his neck, and twists her head each time their mouths meet. “You deserve—” He continues softly, as his mouth begins to slide below her chin and onto her neck. “—to be happy.”

Applejack’s hooves slide over Mint’s back and shoulders in slow, circular massages. His head sinks lower as his bottom half crouches down, and his trail of kisses explores new parts of A.J.’s body. This leads to her heart rate increasing, and her breaths to be more drawn out. The fur on her chest—disheveled from Mint Julep’s descent—rises and sinks with each shaky exhale the mare makes. She watches with eyes half open at the reflection before her, and tightens her grip over Mint’s neck and head, just enough to prevent her from falling backwards off the stool in her lustful haze. The stallion’s body had disappeared almost completely from the reflection, leaving only his short, well-groomed mane and ears visible, just above A.J.’s spread thighs.

“HEY! I need to borrow twenty bits from you guys tonight!” A young voice calls out from elsewhere in the house. Applejack scoffs, then smiles sympathetically at the stallion looking up from between her legs.

“Why don’t we put a pin in this, huh cowboy?” Applejack says to her husband, in a nearly whispered tone. Mint Julep sighs, and rolls the mare’s hoof off of his shoulder so that he can bring it to his lips for a soft kiss.

“Sure.” He replies. The two reluctantly slide their hooves off of one another, and the intimacy that they had only just so passionately shared, vanishes like a candle being extinguished.

* * *

The bright bathroom lights beat down on the sink ledge below, and the pristine porcelain tiles below them. The faucet comes on full blast with a twist of the mare’s hoof, and the item held in her teeth is suddenly dropped, clattering lightly against the marble ledge. Hooves bearing a dull violet coat quickly get to washing the metal stick, dark and bloody bubbles forming in the basin below them.

When Moon Dust leaves the bathroom, it’s with the serrated metal hair stick placed back into her mane, and a dry scowl worn over her muzzle. She wastes no time locating Captain Rainbow Dash, who leans against the corner of one of the castle’s many halls, right next to a potted plant.

No words are shared between the two mares. Moon Dust simply walks up, passes off a small piece of paper into Dash’s extended wing, then slips past the pegasus without so much as a glance.

Rainbow Dash pushes off from the wall and inspects the small note. On it, are several addresses in Canterlot and Ponyville, written poorly in a dry ink.

* * *

A cool Fall breeze rolls through the city. Dash and a group of heavily armored ponies approach a large, wooden door at the end of a warehouse. The lot is quiet, and secluded from the main road where dozens of ponies trot about. Dead tree leaves fall from the canopies above, and crunch underhoof as the group moves into position.

Rainbow Dash throws her hoof up, and watches as her subordinates fall into their positions surrounding the door, then cease to move at all. Their eyes are all trained on their captain, as she pounds into the wooden door with frightening force.

“This is the police! Everyone inside, lay down and put your forehooves out in front of you!” She pauses, and looks back at the hooful of ponies stationed behind her. The overgrowth above surely helped keep the place inconspicuous to folk—nopony would be blamed for thinking it was completely abandoned. But it also kept the glaring sun out of the officers’ eyes. “If you do not comply, you will be seen as a threat, and we will use force!” Clattering metal and rushing hoofsteps can be heard from inside the building.

Dash steps away from the door, and points toward it with her extended wing tip. A massive, muscular earth pony about twenty paces away from the door snorts in acknowledgement, and bows his head down so that it’s aligned with the door. Atop his mane is a hulking piece of metal, a sort of helmet molded into the shape of a bull head and horns. He scrapes at the ground with a forehoof, then charges straight ahead, and straight into the warehouse entrance.

The wood buckles and splinters under the massive impact, sending debris all over the rusty interior of the building. Many ponies were already making a run for it, some were obeying instructions and lying flat on the ground—and a few, like a thin green unicorn on the balcony above, hastily take aim at the police with a flintlock pistol.

Rainbow Dash walks slowly through the clearing dust and debris, and allows her unit to do what they had spent years training to do. Bright, lurid flashes of light bolt past her, and stun anypony who’s foolish enough to retaliate. Dash looks around the structure with an eagle’s awareness, and takes off when she hones in on a pair of stallions galloping toward the rear exit.

She reaches them in an instant, taking a swing off of the rusty pipe over their heads to kick with both hind legs straight into the back of the first pony’s mane. The stallion goes down immediately, and the swing breaks the pipe loose off of the ceiling, forcing Dash to spin around in the middle of her jump. Which she does—without a hitch.

Rainbow Dash lands gracefully on all four hooves, sliding back a few inches from the momentum, and now directly facing the remaining stallion. With his mouth agape and his eyes wide open, he cranes his neck for the piece of piping that had fallen down onto the cement next to him, and holds in a tight grip between his teeth.

Dash doesn’t move. Instead, she leans down into a more predatory stance, and anchors herself into position. The hall isn’t big enough for a fight to be avoided, and her glaring eyes and wicked snarl are practically begging for the opposing pony to make a move. His nervous eyes dart wildly up and down over his potential foe.

The rusty pipe falls to the ground with a noisy clang, as the pony goes prone and submits himself to Rainbow’s mercy. She relaxes her stance, and begins feeling around for the bundle of zip ties resting against her flank armor.

“Anypony hurt?” She shouts around the corner of the hall, past the two stallions lying incapacitated on the ground before her.

“Captain…” A voice calls out. “You’re gonna wanna see this.”

Rainbow Dash tightens the zip tie against the stallion’s upper legs, binding them together and preventing him from running. She rounds the corner at the end of the hall and looks over the damage in the warehouse. Many struggling ponies were strewn about the dirty concrete floor, as Dash’s unit restrains them. Three of the officers in particular stand over a wooden crate, a cartoon-ish cow and milk jar logo labeled on the side, and its top pried off with unicorn magic.

Dash leans over the side of the crate, and stares down at its contents. “...Yeah…” She muses aloud.

Inside are dozens of muskets, stacked neatly in order and surrounded by bits of hay.

Captain Rainbow Dash turns away from the box and flaps her wings once against her black armor. She looks around the massive room, at the diligent officers creating a perimeter around the lot, and the remaining crates that still lined the walls.

“What’s our next move, Captain?” Asks a young pegasus from behind Dash.

Rainbow continues to looks onward, focusing on a pair of her officers grapple with a particularly aggressive smuggler. “Let’s finish up here.” She pivots around so that she can talk more directly to her subordinate. “We need to get word back to headquarters, and all of this in the books.” She pats the top of the crate during the end of her instructions. The pegasus mare standing with Dash nods firmly, then flies off to join her crew.

Rainbow Dash turns all the way around now, and places both hooves up on the edge of the box. Her eyes are tired and bored as they peer down at the rifles. “Looks like I owe somepony a visit…”

* * *

Moonlight beams down on the streets as a small group of armored ponies moves in on a house. Rainbow Dash is at the helm, and she wastes no time barging up to the front door and knocking hard enough so that it rattles on its frame. “This is the police,” She begins, with just a tad less energy than earlier in the day. “open up!”

Hooves shuffle in place behind Rainbow Dash, as her team steels themselves for another possible incident. A pair of ponies at the street corner near the house scurry away from the scene, their scared expressions briefly exposed by the overhanging street lights.

Again, Dash pounds on the outside of the door. “If you don’t comply, we will use force!”

Candle light slowly appears from behind the curtained window. After another short moment of waiting, the door finally unlocks, and a middle-aged mare steps tepidly into the doorway. “W-what is going on?”

Rainbow Dash lowers her voice to speak with the mare, but keeps the severity of her tone. “Ma’am, we have reason to believe that your husband is involved with a serious criminal plot.” Before the unicorn mare can even respond, Dash pushes past her, and leads a stallion in with her so that his magic can light the room.

“Criminal?” She utters in a shaky tone. “No, no no—you can’t just—”

“This is urgent, ma’am. We’ll be out of your mane in just a minute.”

The unicorn stallion canters up the flight of stairs, leaving Rainbow and the middle-aged mare alone in the candlelight. “My husband has done nothing wrong!”

Dash stares into the wife’s eyes, and sees the conviction. She was either right, or left hopelessly in the dark about her husband’s life beyond these walls.

After no more than a minute of the stallion’s hoofsteps stomping around upstairs, he returns back to the living room, and meets his captain’s gaze dead on. He shakes his head, and Rainbow’s frown begins to twist into more of a snarl.

“Where is your husband?” She directs back at the wife. “Where’s Aegis?”

The unicorn shakes her head as tears begin to form. “I don’t know!” Rainbow Dash looks around the dark room and taps her hoof impatiently while she waits for more of an explanation. “H-he wasn’t home when I came h-home today!”

The captain paces in a small circle on the carpet. She puts a forehoof up on the coffee table—the same one that once divided her and Aegis during their conversation—and stares out the door at the team of directionless officers.

“Damnit!” The table quakes as Rainbow Dash slams her hoof down onto it, and the sobbing mare yelps in shock.

* * *

Red and orange leaves fall all around, occasionally being picked up by the wind, only to be carried off into another pile around the park. Geese float gracefully down the river, and ponies trot happily on the path surrounding the grassy lot and over the small bridge that crosses the water. And on a wooden bench in the center of the park, out in the daylight, sits a gray unicorn with his sunglasses on.

He looks cautiously all around him, and briefly, at the distance between him and the diamond dog raking the leaves out in the grass. Slowly over time, the diamond dog makes his way closer to the stallion on the bench, although he never lifts his gaze up from the leaves at his feet. A navy blue uniform is being worn by the worker, with a flat cap resting firmly between his ears.

“You wanna tell me what’s up with all the theatrics?” Cave quips under his breath, still working to clear out the leaves.

“Keep your voice down.” The unicorn on the bench stares out at the street, but directs his comment at the disguised diamond dog. “I’ll tell you ‘what’s up with the theatrics’ after you explain what the fuck went down at that prison.”

Cave keeps quiet for a moment, and his eyes trained on his work. “...I thought you were the one who said it didn’t matter.”

“Yeah, I said that because I had assumed you’d sucked his cock or something, or paid him off—” The Retriever snaps his head to the side as a mare’s laugh can be heard in the distance. “...Not that you fucking killed him.”

“What difference does it make?”

The unicorn tilts his head to face Cave, mouth hanging slightly ajar. “You’re a real sick piece of shit, you know that?”

Cave continues his work quietly, exposing more of the sidewalk beneath them as he clears off the leaves. “Did you bring what I needed, or not?”

A heavy sigh rolls out of the unicorn’s nostrils. He checks behind him, then turns again to face the street and communicate with the other creature. “It’s under the trash bag in there,” a quick nod to the metal bin next to the bench. “don’t go for it until I’m gone. I’m already sticking my neck out far enough for you.”

Cave nods just subtly enough so that The Retriever can see it, but not so that anypony else in the park can.

“...Especially after that shit The Equestrians pulled at the castle. Wouldn’t be surprised to hear Celestia sending us all into complete fucking martial law.” He curses to the wind. The nearly bare tree branches behind him claw at the cold, cloudless sky. “...Whole world’s going to shit… No sense left anywhere out there…”

Cave pauses his work, and leans a bit into the rake. He watches the unicorn on the bench slowly turn his scowling expression in his direction, and then speak plainer than he ever had with Cave. “I don’t ever want to see your face again. Are we clear?”

The diamond dog’s eyes drop to the ground, then spring back up when he has his answer. “Yeah.” He growls.

The Retriever turns away. Again, laughter can be heard in the distance, but this time neither of the creatures look. The unicorn simply stands up from the bench, fixes his jacket collar, and then strolls out toward the street.

Cave continues to rake needlessly at the path for a bit, watching the unicorn’s silhouette fade into the city. Once it’s gone completely, the diamond dog adjusts the bill of his hat and steps near the trash container, removing the metal lid with relative ease. He sets it on the ground next to him, then lifts the trash bag out and begins to tie it close. As he does so, an item at the bottom of the bin holds his unwavering attention.

He sets the bag down, and reaches into the bottom of the decorative trash container, pulling out a large—and heavy—object wrapped in another trash bag. Cautiously, he takes a look around the park from under the brim of his hat, then slides the plastic far enough back for him to peek at the contents.

Inside is a massive book, an unmarked cover with the exception of a string of random characters written in marker at the top. He slowly peels back the cover to inspect the first of many pages, finding a strange word printed in a bold typeface in the center of an otherwise blank page.

Jeep

Cave closes the book and re-conceals it with the trash bag. Then he tucks it under his left arm, and picks up the other bag with his remaining hand. The rake lies helplessly along the path as Cave walks away, bristles dug into the earth, and handle half covered by blowing leaves.

* * *

Princess Celestia’s crown hangs low, as she bows her head over the balcony railing. The cool Canterlot air tousles her grand, mystically flowing mane, as well as the flowers and vines that envelope the lattice around her. She stares down at the intricate layout of the castle, and the city beyond. A group of armored guards can be seen marching through the streets below.

“...How could something like this happen?”

The two creatures inside the room, Dominus Temporis and the Princess’s sister Luna, both look out at the balcony, and to the alicorn whose profile is only just visible to them. Princess Luna takes the first stab at it. “There’s nothing that could have been done. I know you’re certainly not foolish enough to go and blame yourself.”

Dissatisfied, or perhaps just dissinsterented in hearing an explanation, Celestia turns again to face the city below her.

It’s the amber scaled dragon’s turn now, who pushes off from the pillar he was leaning against to say his piece. “Princess Luna is right. Horrid as the situation may be, it’d be in everypony’s best interest to move forward, and make any further decisions with confidence. The media, as an example...”

“There’s no stopping the headlines now, not at this point.” Luna immediately chimes in. “They were probably writing before the senator’s blood went cold.”

“We won’t stop them.” The princess on the balcony turns away from the ledge and faces her cohorts. “It would only cause more of a controversy. But they should know, revealing any personal details about anypony involved will result in strict punishment for their publisher.”

The two creatures indoors nod their heads in agreement, Dominus affirming vocally as well. “We could enforce that.”

Princess Celestia finally steps inside to join them. “Tomorrow, publicity regulations resume as normal, and I don’t want to see a single headline mentioning the incident.” She delivers her verdict with the confidence everypony in Equestria had come to associate with Celestia, the light coming through the balcony behind her flooding around her pale ivory coat and glimmering off of her golden crown.

“And what about Twilight?” Luna’s question miraculously gives pause to Princess Celestia’s confidence, as she narrows her eyes in confusion.

“What about Twilight?”

The Princess of the Night was technically smaller than her sister, but her posture and radiance was no less imposing to many of Equestria’s citizens. She tilts her head, as if Celestia not knowing what she was referring to came as a surprise. “Her and Lyra have been uncovering humanity’s history at a fairly surprising rate—” Luna stops, allowing Celestia to take another guess at what she might be referring to. It’s a game the elder alicorn refuses to play. “—you’re not worried that they might find something… that they shouldn’t?”

The room grows eerily quiet. Dominus’s eyes dart from the younger sister to Celestia, who’s face remains cold and stern. “No.” She responds powerfully. “I do not.”

Luna sighs. “Sister—I’m just looking out for us.”

“Is that what this is?” Celestia asks clearly, and calmly. The two mares lock eyes, staring across the room at one another.

Before tensions rise too high, there’s a knock on the door. “You may enter.” Luna announces, while still not turning away from her sister.

The door creaks open and a unicorn guard steps through. “Oh, my apologies, I didn’t know—”

“What is your message?” Celestia interjects, before the pony can get too far into his apologetic rambling.

The guard nods, and steps to the side so that both princesses can see him. “There’s somepony down in the lobby who wishes to speak with you, Princess Celestia. A mare by the name of Penny Luck?”

Hearing the name takes a moment to register in the alicorn’s eyes, which look downward as she considers the situation. Dominus Temporis takes the time to speak up. “I can speak with her, if you’ve other affairs to attend to, Princess.”

“No.” Celestia responds with the same confidence she always did. “This tragedy happened under my watch, she deserves to hear from me directly.”

Before anypony else can add something, the ivory alicorn heads toward the exit of her room, the guard quickly stepping aside. She leaves without another word to her sister or to Dominus, the former of whom stares with the shadow of irritation over her eyes; and the latter, with a small, sympathetic smile.

Two guards needlessly flank the princess as she marches down the long halls of the castle, and finds the lobby where the small-framed unicorn sits patiently. Celestia can see the stress in her eyes, to say nothing of the irritated red skin that surrounds them. The guards hold their posts outside of the room as Celestia steps in.

“Ms. Luck…” The matriarch begins with a soft, soothing voice. “...I cannot express how sorry I am. I can’t say I knew her very well, but Senator Peach seemed to be an outstanding mare.”

Penny looks up at the princess like a lost puppy, sniffling as she watches Celestia’s wing wrap around her back. “Thank you for seeing me, P-princess...”

“Of course. If there’s anything I can offer you in these terrible times, do not hesitate to ask.”

The sobbing mare shuffles uncomfortably on the bench, veering her watery vision away from the princesses’s luminescence, embarrassed by her presentation. “...It doesn’t feel real. Like—like it was just a bad dream…” Sympathy presents itself in Celestia’s eyes as she watches intently, and in the small, protective gesture of her shielding wing.

Penny Luck rubs her forehoof over her eyes, squinting hard before staring back up at the alicorn. “Princess Celestia?” She begins in a hushed, quivering voice. Celestia nods and keeps her eyes locked on the mare. “...I t-think there’s something I need to tell you…”

* * *

Pen tip scrawls across the documents on Councilman Sterling’s desk, as the stallion performs his duties with a bored look in his eyes. He sighs, drops the pen from his mouth, and rests his head against his hoof, propped up on the desk. The first thing he looks at, when his eyes finally roll up, is the ceremonial dagger displayed before him. The shimmering silver blade is really something to behold.

Sterling’s peace is disturbed with a knock at the door. He rushes to clean his presentation up, and stammers out a welcoming to whoever is behind the door. “Come in!”

The door opens almost immediately after the councilman’s permission, Celestia’s exotic flowing mane being the first thing to make an appearance. “Evening, Councilman.”

Sterling practically leaps out of his chair. “Ah, Princess Celestia! What a pleasant surprise!” Celestia smirks at the stallion’s enthusiasm. “What can I help you with?”

The matriarch looks down at the comparatively small stallion before her, then down at the dagger below him. “I’ve just had a rather interesting conversation with somepony I think you know, Councilman.” She circles slowly around the room while speaking in a calm, confident voice.

“Oh?” Sterling asks from behind his desk, hooves now placed on top of it. “And who might that be?”

Celestia is facing the shelves away from the stallion, but twists her neck so that he can see her sharp profile. “Penny Luck. Do you know her?”

The councilman’s eye twitches, and he takes a moment to muster a response. “Uh… the senator’s assistant, if I recall correctly?”

“That’s right.” Princess Celestia walks back around so that she’s directly in front of the stallion’s desk. With her frame, her chest is just above the blade’s display case, and Sterling is forced to look up to meet the princesses’s eyes. “Tell me, Councilman. Are there any details about a deal made between you and Senator Peach that you’d like to discuss with me now?”

The stallion’s lips part only halfway, and no answer comes out. His eyes briefly dart downward, at the desk and its contents, then return to the strong gaze of his ruler. “...Princess, I…”

Celestia tilts her head ever so slightly, anticipation building behind her bright magenta eyes. But not for an explanation.

Sterling makes a ridiculous lunge for the glass display case covering his ceremonial dagger, but before he can get a grip on it, Celestia simply crushes the entire box under the weight of her forehoof. The golden ornate boot Celestia has always worn pushes shards of broken glass deep into the stallion’s flesh, his outstretched hoof pinned underneath the weight of Celestia’s foreleg. He scrunches his face tightly in a cringe, and howls out with a cry that’s almost loud enough to drown out the sound of twisting muscle and crunching glass. Celestia pulls the dagger away with her telekinesis, whisking it across Sterling’s muzzle as she does so.

The Councilman recoils in pain immediately, and with the weapon now safely in her grasp, Celestia removes her forehoof and allows the stallion to retract back behind his desk. He falls onto the floor next to his chair, which is pushed away and sent into a spin. Princess Celestia looks down at the crying pony before her with the same cold, expressionless gaze she had walked into the room with. “I guess actions speak louder than words.” She says.

Sterling can only briefly look up at the towering figure before him, rocking himself steadily while curled in the fetal position, and holding his good forehoof against the fresh cut on his muzzle.

“Now keep your whining down and listen closely, you worthless coward.” Even with tears streaming down his face and blood pouring from a wound that she opened up, it was strange for Sterling to hear his princess speak so hatefully. He grimaces and obeys, reducing his bawling to a muffled sequence of groans. “Despite the severity of the crime, I’m going to ignore this little outburst of yours. First, because your naivety is obviously endless if you thought you could overpower me, and second, because I know that you would have wasted my time and hidden the truth, had we done this with civility.”

A particularly loud grunt of pain comes through Sterling’s sealed teeth, as he pulls his glass-laden hoof closer to his chest. Celestia ignores this, and merely continues her verdict. “You’ve disrespected the entire nation, Councilman. You’ll be removed from the council, and blacklisted from the entire city. You won’t be able to mop floors in Canterlot, after this. Furthermore, you’ll be sentenced to ten years in prison; show me then that you’ve realized the depths of your depravity, and I may not give you another ten.” Celestia pauses to turn the blade over in her field of magic, watching the blood draw new trails with the change in gravity. “Oh, and there will be no trial.”

Whether from the pain, or from simply hearing his sentence, Sterling let’s go of himself for a moment and stomps his rear hooves wildly against the carpet, crying out as he does so.

“Take as long as you need to compose yourself.” Princess Celestia finalizes. “They’ll be an escort outside your door, when you’re ready.”

And with that, the princess turns away from the scene, and walks out with the dagger still in her telekinesis. The two guards outside of the room stand rigidly as she walks by, both of them staring onward with quiet discomfort in their eyes, no doubt aided by the blooded weapon and screams of pain coming from the room they guard. One of them hazards a look back into the office, just as the door comes slowly to a close. Councilman Sterling still thrashes about on the floor behind his desk, and a sparkling layer of broken glass lay spread out over the carpet surrounding him.

* * *

Dr. Heartstrings flips through a large binder in a small white room, while the roar of machines and magic rumbles from beyond the wall. Her eyes are only brought up from the binder as a second mare enters the room, one with a violet coat and mane.

“Hey!” Lyra says cheerfully. Twilight smiles and canters over to her colleague.

“Sorry, I hope I’m not too late…”

“Oh no, you’re right on time.” Lyra quickly affirms. “Here:” Twilight stares curiously at the hard hat and safety goggles Lyra holds out in her telekinesis. “It’s just procedure.”

Princess Twilight tilts her head in confusion, but follows the command nonetheless, using her own magic to place the items on her head. Lyra strafes around to the alicorn’s flank, using telekinesis to place a pair of earplugs snugly in the mare’s ears. “You’ll need these, too.”

Lyra equips her own set, and once both mares are geared up, she circles back to the front of Twilight and places a hoof on the door ahead of them. “Okay, you ready?”

Princess Twilight takes a deep breath, then nods enthusiastically. “Ready.”

Dr. Heartstrings pushes through the first set of double doors and the sounds grow louder. She leads her friend Twilight across a metal bridge surrounded by pipes and wires and to a second set of doors. The moment she opens them, the colossal amount of noise finally comes through in all of its bone shaking clarity.

There are massive pipes and spectacular machines whirring and rumbling in a frenzy of steam and magic energy. Ponies pass over the two on the catwalks above, and scurry from one mammoth contraption to another, clipboards and pens in tow.

“THINGS HAVE OBVIOUSLY PICKED UP AROUND HERE.” Lyra shouts over the noise. “ONCE WE WERE ABLE TO DUPLICATE THE DATA, WE COULD EXPERIMENT A LOT MORE WITHOUT WORRYING ABOUT CORRUPTING THE ORIGINAL. OF COURSE, IT DOES FEEL LIKE EACH GENERATION BEYOND THE ORIGINAL CRYSTAL LOSES A LITTLE MORE QUALITY, OR, BECOMES ‘NOISIER’, SO TO SPEAK.”

“I SUPPOSE THAT’S TO BE EXPECTED…” Twilight chimes in with a nod. “SO WHERE IS THE ORIGINAL?”

Lyra pauses her trot through the facility and leans in close to the alicorn. “WHAT?” Twilight begins to ask her question again, but only gets halfway through before Dr. Heartstrings can figure it out. “OH, YEAH THE CRYSTAL’S BACK IN THE VAULT, LAST I HEARD. I GUESS CANTERLOT DOESN’T WANT TO TAKE ANY CHANCES.” Again, Princess Twilight nods in agreement, although this time she doesn’t risk being misheard, and leaves it at the simple gesture.

The two mares circle around a metal vat, a dozen dials and pipes running along its side. Steam, or some kind of fog rolls around the base and under the metal platform Twilight and Lyra walk along, the two stopping as an earth pony mare approaches Dr. Heartstrings and leans in close for a comment. Twilight waits—and not for very long, fortunately—while the others discuss their matter, Lyra nodding and patting the pony on the shoulder before she moves along. Returning to the princess, Lyra shares new information with her when she’s in earshot. “WE’RE ON TRACK TO HAVE 99% OF THE DATA IN JUST A YEAR.”

Twilight’s wings unfurl a small length as she stares at her friend with renewed energy in her eyes. “THAT’S EXCITING!” She stops to look around the large room, then again closes the gap between her and Lyra so that she can hear. “DID WE DECRYPT ANYTHING ABOUT THE EXTINCTION EVENT, OR EVEN ABOUT PONYKIND?” To Twilight’s disappointment, the unicorn simply shakes her head.

“I WOULD HAVE THOUGHT WE’D HAVE FOUND SOMETHING BY NOW, TOO. I’M BEGINNING TO THINK THAT WE DON’T HAVE EVERY PIECE OF THE PUZZLE.” A small explosion of magic suddenly bursts at the other end of the room, drawing both of the mares’ attention. A lurid range of colored sparks dances about the metal surrounding it, but if the reaction of the ponies working near it is anything to go by, this wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.

Lyra turns back to Twilight and her brow arches with curiosity. “HEY HAVE YOU EATEN YET TODAY?”

* * *

Balloons and streamers litter the exterior of the restaurant, and all manner of fillies and gentlecolts crowd around the booths visible from the windows, and even the street corner outside. They laugh, and gait merrily along the sidewalk, glass bottles and burgers held in their levitation and hooves. ‘Canterlot, USA’ reads the sign above all of the commotion, displayed atop the front entrance with dazzling neon lights.

Leading her excited friend closely behind, Lyra weaves through the crowd of ponies and holds the door open for Twilight, bowing with exaggerated formality. “Your majesty…”

Twilight Sparkle scoffs at the performance, but passes through nonetheless. “Why thank you, madam.”

Once the two are inside, Lyra canters to catch up to Twilight’s side, close enough that the princesses’s wing could tap the other pony, if unfurled. Unsurprisingly, inside the restaurant is much more crowded than out, with all of the booths taken and only one spot at the bar that the two newcomers can situate themselves at. They lean across the white countertop and inspect the lively atmosphere; an upbeat rock tune plays from the glowing jukebox in the corner of the room, and a group of young ponies talk and dance around its light, smiles on all of their muzzles.

From behind the counter, a large earth pony settles a transaction with a couple on the other side of the bar, then smiles and waves after scooping up their bits and placing them in a register. Lyra waits until the stallion is facing her direction, and then waves him over.

“Ah, and I was just getting used to the abuse of power!” He says on his way over with a toothy smile. Lyra shakes her head and returns the smile.

“The place looks fantastic, Crane. I don’t think ‘abuse’ is the appropriate term. Besides, we’re just here for something to eat—you got a couple burgers back there?”

Crane scoffs. “I think we’ll manage.” He turns around to the cooks working in the back, the lot of them rushing to take care of the orders. “Two burgers and fries—” A mare in the back nods and quickly starts writing the order on a notepad, before Crane turns back around to face the pair at the bar. “—coming right up.”

As Crane takes off to speak with his other customers, Twilight turns to Lyra with a puzzled look on her face. “Burgers? Like, cow burgers?”

“They’re made from soybeans,” Lyra says with a light in her eyes that she commonly got when explaining human culture. “apparently it was common as a meat substitute, even after they started synthesizing meats.”

“Hmm.” Twilight quietly responds, the puzzled expression on her face not nearly sated.

The warm lights and lively atmosphere draw both of the mare’s attention back for a moment, leaving them to quietly sit and enjoy it. Before long, Lyra turns to her cohort and nods upward. “Buddy Holly.”

Twilight leans in closer to hear. “Huh?”

“The human who performed this song, I mean.”

“Oh,” Twilight exclaims, face lighting up with renewed excitement. “I take it a lot more music has been decrypted, then.”

“Oh, absolutely.” Responds Lyra. “It’s incredible the parallels you can draw between their music and ours, even when speaking about particular genres and eras of music.”

“I suppose that’s been the theme of this entire project, huh?”

“What’s that?” Lyra asks, leaning back against the bar.

“The more we discover, the more familiar these creatures are. It feels like digging up fiction that we wrote!”

“Hey, truth is stranger than fiction—I think one of them once said…”

The princess blows a small amount of air out of her nostrils, in lieu of a laugh. “Right.”

Crane suddenly makes a reappearance, dropping off two cartons and a basket of fries in front of the ponies. “Ladies; enjoy.” Lyra thanks the stallion for his efforts, and then he falls back into a rigorous routine of getting to all of the customers—the paying ones, perhaps most importantly.

“It looks like he’s really enjoying this…” Twilight quietly comments. Dr. Heartstrings leans back and looks past the ponies to her left, just in time to see Crane welcome a new duo into the establishment.

“Hopefully not too much.” She turns back around so that she can face the meal. “I don’t want him forgetting that I even have a stake in this place.” Lyra uses her magic to open the small white carton, and Twilight follows suit. Inside each container is a burger, with sesame bun and lettuce peeking out from the sides.

Twilight’s violet field of levitation turns the object around a bit, as the alicorn inspects its ingredients. She has no reason to distrust Lyra about the patty, but can’t help but feel a little put off by its texture and general aesthetic. She turns to her side and discovers that Lyra had already bitten into hers, chewing the mimic beef as she watches a rowdy group of youth at the booth behind them.

Shrugging off the ethical conflict, Princess Twilight pulls the burger close to her muzzle and takes a modest bite. She chews the contents slowly, staring down at the spot where she tore a piece of the “meat” off, bits of lettuce and tomato dangling over the sides.

Lyra turns back around and pulls the basket of fries close, lifting some up with her magic as she refers to the pony next to her. “What do you think?”

Twilight looks at her friend, then back to the burger and swallows the contents in her mouth. There’s hesitance in her eyes and in the tone of her response. “It’s… kind of bad…” Despite her hesitance, Twilight’s reply slips out as dry and blunt as a kid might be with their parent, causing the alicorn’s eyes to flash wide with shock. She simply sits and waits for Lyra to finish chewing her fries, and for whatever response her regrettable critique might elicit.

“It’s terrible.” Lyra shakes her head and looks down at her own burger. Confused, Twilight continues to stare with a blank expression as Lyra expands. “I don’t know how the hell everypony here is eating it. It’s probably just the novelty.”

Hearing Lyra’s explanation is obviously enough to comfort the princess, who’s shocked expression gives way to a slowly widening grin. It quivers like Twilight is attempting to prevent it from spreading, until eventually she can’t help but snicker quietly.

“No, yeah, it’s complete garbage.” Lyra’s own smile appears as Twilight gives up on stopping the laughter. She uses a wing to involuntarily shield herself and her juvenile giggling from the restaurant's other patrons. The reaction garners a chuckle from Dr. Heartstrings herself, who pushes her meal away with a hoof and looks around behind the bar. “We don’t put it on the menu, but I can totally just get us some hay burgers.”

Alone, the moment that the two mares share might have stood out; but inside the bustling restaurant, their joy is merely washed away into the sea of laughter and rock ‘n’ roll around them. This vibrancy fills the room and pours out into the open-air, where it echoes distantly along the streets of Canterlot.