'
“Your Majesties, I have a special request.” Said the mint green unicorn standing before the thrones of the mighty Celestia and Luna. It took a lot of waiting to be able to approach them and petition for such a request. Lyra always seemed a bit of an odd one with strange ways and mannerisms, but clearly easygoing and fun-loving. They both gently nodded in her direction, both knew her from several musical performances given in this very room, and through a friend of hers as well. She’d come late in the day to avoid most of their petitioners, and still had to wait a couple of hours before finally being granted an audience. She was to be the very last of the day.
They looked upon her with regality and a noble air few others seemed quite able to pull off, not even their own students quite mastered the finer arts and points of being rulers of their respective realms. She was almost a bit hesitant to ask this, it was not a subject much touched upon, and generally only in short passing. What she was about to ask was unusual for those not engaged in more generally useful research, and did not entirely want to reveal her true purpose in doing so. Not that there was any clear issue in asking, more out of privacy. She was relaxed though, there was nothing really untowards in asking this, only a bit of cover. It was after all really more of a private matter.
“I would like your permission to do some historical research within the Canterlot Archives. I know they are usually reserved for other matters, but I really want to learn everything I can about our history.” There, that wasn’t so hard to ask. Hopefully that slight tremble in her voice went unnoticed in the asking. For a quickly passing moment though, the two sisters looked to each other in what one might deem a concerned way, putting a little bit of fear into her. Lyra knew them as wise and kind rulers, but they did possess far greater power than she ever would. It was hard not to be intimidated by their mere presence. The feeling passed quickly as both rose from their thrones and smiled towards her. Whew.
Unexpectedly, they both strode forth towards as well.
“Y-your Majesties?” Lyra spoke, startled somewhat. Why were they approaching? This was highly uncommon. Celestia spoke in a most soothing tone.
“Relax, my little pony. We will grant this request, because we know what you are really after.” Celestia paused, allowing this to sink in.
“..You..do?” They couldn’t possibly know her real intent? She’d done nothing to give it away. Yet, somehow they knew. Oh no, was she in trouble for trying to hide it?
“Vassal, we know a great many things. We are after all, the princesses of this realm. Ponies happiness and interests are of tantamount importance to us both.” Princess Luna always spoke so oddly, which belied her own somewhat tarnished past, long forgiven. Sometimes she slipped into very outdated language. Did Celestia just giggle at that? If she did it was hidden so well it might not have happened at all. They knew, her entire ruse was pointless.
“Does this mean I have done something wrong?” Lyra managed to ask. Both looked towards her quite kindly at those words.
“Of course not dear, seeking truth is never wrong. However, there is a bit of a problem with this particular truth. We will accompany you to the archives and explain.” Celestia walked in front of them. What did this mean? She never expected the royals to know her purpose, let alone show it to her themselves. What was happening here? It was very curious and a little disconcerting. She’d only come expecting to perhaps pore over dusty old history tomes and here she was being taken there personally for some reason.
“Your Majesties, how..do you know?” Lyra was slightly hesitant to ask such a question now. Celestia glanced towards her, while Luna trailed and followed beside.
“You may cease the formalities while we are alone. Not even our guards are required to keep it up after hours. There is no need to fear us in any way, we are just friends here. Understand?” To hear Celestia say this was nearly shocking. It was such an odd thing to hear her speak so colloquially.
“Yes your ma..uh, Celestia?” Lyra stumbled over her words a little, it was greeted with that soft smile known throughout the land as if a radiating sun itself. It was warming in its own way.
“You know your friend worked for us for quite some time. She has many skills. We keep track of anypony important enough to us. She gives you high praise in our rare correspondence nowadays.” Luna replied. The sisters truly knew each other well, almost finishing each other's sentences. Lyra blushed slightly. So that was how they knew. A secret agent of the crowns of Equestria was a rare thing on its own. It must have taken incredible skill to earn such a position. She must have let it slip at some point what her real interests were. There were two of the royal guard ahead, flanking an unusual doorway.
These were not the archive rooms she was expecting to be lead to. What could this be? The guards saluted as they passed into the room. Lyra apprehensively recognized those guards as elites from their armor, not the standard honor guards stationed generally about the castle who wore something rather less functional. Something very important must reside within this room, she thought to herself. Inside was a circular area which must be far below and part of the immense towers and battlements above. They’d been heading downwards for some time and must now be fairly well below the edge of the mountain upon which Canterlot itself seemed perched inconceivably.
Within was a pedestal surrounded by the most ornate locks she’d ever seen. Just being near to them she could feel the raw and powerful magic which held them closed. Not even the Elements, once housed far above ever had such locks upon them. An immense tome lay behind the barrier which appeared like shimmering crystalline glass, but which was clearly itself composed of sheer energy. This must be insanely important to hide away like this. This was both exciting and frightening. What was about to be revealed? The two sisters applied themselves to undoing this intricately crafted defense. Lyra dare not speak while they did so, not knowing what to expect.
She found herself taking unusually deep breaths in anticipation, gazing in awe as the final clasp of the locks came undone. A shiver of excitement ran down her spine, almost setting her to quivering. Luna spoke somewhat darkly and in a tone that showed true seriousness.
“It is not every day we share nor show this to anypony. You are not to tell what is contained upon these pages to anyone else without our express permission, ever. Not a word, not a hint.” Lyra Heartstrings the unicorn was almost unable to reply at this for a moment, and nodded her head.
Something tremendously more than she was even after was about to be revealed for whatever reason. Celestia gave voice.
“Have you ever looked around, and wondered why our world is so..whimsical?” What kind of question was this to ask at a time like the present?
“I do not understand, princess. What do you mean?” Lyra felt leaden just by the presence of the strange tome on the pedestal which was not even opened yet.
“You are about to learn something both wonderful, and horrific. It will shake you to your very core. Are you prepared to hear our history unadulterated, and as such? This is the one chance we can give you leave to pull away.” Luna gazed expectantly at her. Pull away, now? Surely, she could handle whatever they were about to impart? Bravely, she replied.
“I will hear it, and bear it, whatever it may be.” That seemed an appropriate response.
“Very well.” Celestia’s horn glowed once more as she turned open the cover of the book. What greeted on the very first page inside was a somewhat disturbing sight, for all the wrong reasons one could think of.
There was however, a bright spot to it.
“But, those are photos of..how, those are..it can’t be! They’re..’ Lyra was shocked into silence for a long moment. Those were humans!
“They were quite real, Miss Heartstrings. Now you know this, but there is far more to know. Somehow I suspect you’ve always believed this, but what there is to tell is not so positive.” Luna bid her listen.
“What you see outside, our entire world in fact, you could say was given to us by them.” Celestia began to tell a tale as she turned pages, some showing what looked like terrible things. Things she’d never thought to see.
The world utterly in tatters and ruin. What was this? Something was very wrong with these images. How could something so horrifying ever have happened? But, everything outside looked fine now? She was about to ask but Luna simply requested her to listen to the whole story. As Celestia spoke, her sister added some illusory imagery above the book, lending an eerie feeling to the entire scene.
“Long ago, this was their world. They often fought each other, visiting war and destruction on their own kind. You will notice some of what is presented here is piecemeal and almost incoherent, we haven’t nearly all of it. In the end, ruin fell upon them. Whether it was a ruin which simply happened at the call of some spirits will or of their own making, it matters not. A great disaster rained down as they looked up in terror. The entire universe shuddered and all was slowly laid waste. Their greatest scientists pooled all of their tremendous knowledge together in desperate bids to save themselves. The waves of the oceans raged out of control as great cyclones tore up the land, the sea and the very sky above us. All the fury one could envision was unleashed as their world was torn asunder.” Accompanying her words were lunas illusions, what terrifying visions they presented in abstract! A wall of rolling boiling clouds dispersed.
“First, they turned to something called genetic engineering, a means with which to enhance themselves and be able to survive here. It became a rampant and necessary evil. Through long, unbearable years of pain and torment they toiled to find a means to mitigate their ruin. Nothing could save them. Not even their miraculous technology was enough.” She halted. Lyra watched spellbound and transfixed at her words, the words on the pages, and the images of destruction. It was all so much, so terrible. But, if this was their world, they must have succeeded? The writing in the book was not Equestrian and entirely alien in how it looked. How could Celestia or Luna read it?
“Using the greatest of their machines, they managed to buy themselves just a little more time. Barely enough for them to attempt one last desperate gamble in hopes of staving off their final destruction. Using all of their remaining power, they created two mighty vessels so that they might escape from here. It was not to be. Powerful though they were, they were no match for the universe itself. It did provide them a way to potentially tame nature and bring the destruction to an end, but they were finished and all but gone. Their final act before perishing completely was to flood the atmosphere with nanites in a last-ditch effort to quell the fury surrounding them. They succeeded, and the world was given over to us. There is nothing more.” Celestia stopped.
What? That couldn’t be the end? There was still most of the book unread. What was she talking about? This was simply too much. It was so unreal and surreal at the same time. Why would she stop now?
“But, there’s so much more to the book? What are nanites, and genetic engineering? Can you explain more?” Lyra managed to question. The princess smiled softly.
“This is not a book of history. It is a book of science. This tome holds within it all which is left of them.” Celestia gave her a moment to reflect on that. All of it?
“Genetic engineering means tampering with the very makeup of life itself. Many horrible things were created during that time. Most of which also died with them. The book says nanites are tiny machines so small we cannot even see them. We were all designed to interact with them.” She finished explaining. Wait, something did not sound right about any of this.
“Princess, if this is all true, and this was their world, why isn’t it in ruins?” Lyra had to ask about it. Luna spoke up once more.
“Dear, it IS in ruins. This entire world is the ruins humans left behind.” Luna was quite blunt about it. It was, it is? Huh?
“This is all so confusing. What happened to them? Did they just all die out? Why?” The mint green unicorn was becoming a bit unsettled by all of this.
“Haven’t you figured it out yet dear? Think it over.” Celestia appeared wise as ever.
“I’ll give you a hint. They had to survive, and all that was left to eat was the toughest of vegetation which they could not stomach. Consider yourself.” Luna chimed in.
“All that was left..myself..” Slowly it started to dawn on her and she got more and more excited until she was nearly bouncing.
“You don’t mean.. You really do, right?” She was positively bouncing up and down on her hooves now.
“I see you’ve got it.” Celestia smiled.
“That means, and even you?” A nod was all that was needed.
“But, please tell me, even with this science book, how do you know so much about it?” Lyra inquired.
“My little pony, both my sister and I are well over a thousand years old. You see, we were there when they fell.” Luna spoke with gravity. Lyra gasped loudly at this revelation.
“Something is wrong though, you said they couldn't escape? Why is that?” A sad expression crossed both the sisters faces at this question. What did she say? She was just so curious about all of this.
“Friendship is the law of the land here, for a simple reason.” Celestia looked off wistfully.
“It is impossible to leave Equus Prime, our planet. The world beneath our hooves. We can never leave. In this book there are hints of ways they could have traveled to other worlds, but it is now completely impossible. I am going to reveal to you now the worst of that. Their sun was destabilized by the destruction of a sister star which struck right through it’s heart, destroying it. They saw this coming and did all they could to stop it. What you know now as our sun and moon are artificial satellites which we control via what you see and sense as magic, but it is really the nanites that allow us to do so, and a massive gravity generator deep beneath the surface of the world to move them and keep us on the surface. Our magic is really their science. Without any of these things, we would die. We are their creations, their children. We are they." She went silent.
“We’re all part human, all of us?” Lyra found that most exciting of all. The two sisters could only nod. Knowing her own mannerism weren't so strange was nice. This all clearly weighed very heavily on them. The situation they were left with was truly horrible, but at least they’d found a way to survive. The sky looked alright though? What could be preventing then from going to space?
“Forgive me for asking, but when we look up at the sky it looks clear? Why can’t we leave?” She wanted to fully understand everything being conveyed.
“It is only a reflection of the reality of things. Up close we can see out, it even looks fine at first, but we cannot go out due to massive rings of debris surrounding our world on all sides after the disaster. It is simply too dangerous to try and would almost certainly result in death I’m sorry to say. Many entire planets were smashed into trillions of pieces moving at tremendous speeds surrounding our solar system. Not even their technology could overcome that and we know little of it. Even now we are in some danger from it, but the great shields the gravity generator produces have just managed to keep us safe from stray bits. The reason our astronomers do not notice this is simply that our telescopes do not come anywhere near to what they possessed back then.Though some might guess a little of it. Someday we may regain this sort of technology, but I am in no hurry to obtain it. Let the ponies enjoy their world as it is for as long as can be. We can have no other.” Luna and Celestia looked so sad saying this to her.
“I..don’t know what to say.” Lyra felt like she’d just been put through a strange wringer and twisted in all manner of ways.
“Thank you, both of you for sharing this with me. I think I would like to go home now. Does she know? Can I tell her?” They would know who she meant.
“You have our leave to speak of it to her. We know this is a lot to take in and you will likely need to speak about it with somepony at least. We know she can be trusted. If she requires proof, you may tell her to write me. It’s always nice to hear from an old friend.” Celestia and Luna finally bid her goodnight, and had a guard on an upper level escort her back to the entrance.
It felt odd to be so friendly and informal with the royals. It was going to be a long trip home, thinking about all this. She headed toward the Canterlot train station. One thought did keep bubbling in her mind.
“I’m part human!” She positively bounded along on her hooves.
