It was another warm day in Zephyr Heights as Zipp was flying through the skies above the city streets, while two pegasus guards closely followed behind her, their names being Zoom and Thunder. As a princess, and heir to the throne, it only made sense that she'd be escorted by guards whenever she was out of the palace. Still Zipp did prefer to ignore that they were there and at least try imagining she could be flying and enjoying the warm rays of the sun on her feathers by herself.
Down below her, along the busy pathways and shops of the city unicorns, earth ponies, and pegasi were busy also enjoying their day visiting shops and checking out the various tourist attractions around Zephyr Heights. It had been well over a year and a half since magic returned to their world, and while there were still a few hiccups here and there, it seemed to only improved the lives of every pony and made them happier. Of course there were still a few individuals who held onto the old beliefs, and preferred it when the three tribes were still apart.
It was their choice anyway, as much as Zipp did find some disappointment on the matter, she figured it was no good forcing the issue.
As she flew, she passed by a few electronic billboards that reminded Zipp why she was out and about to begin with, and that was a meeting between herself and two of her friends, Sunny and Izzy. The meeting was to discuss the one headliner that was practically the talk of the town for the last several months, and probably the biggest one the city has ever seen for generations, the marriage of her sister, Princess Pipp Petals, and Sheriff Hitch Trailblazer.
Zipp smiled before chuckling as she recalled how much of a whirlwind that topic had been ever since Pipp incidentally streamed Hitch proposing to her several months ago. That was an interesting event, especially since Pipp wasn't suppose to be streaming during that romantic, moonlit dinner that Hitch had hoped would be just them enjoying each other's company.
Sure, with how often her sister streamed and shared moments of her life, it was pretty much common knowledge in Zephyr Heights, Maretime Bay, and small parts of Brittlewood that Pipp and Hitch were dating. It was initially met with resistance as the majority felt that two different pony races dating was too much of a leap --honestly, Zipp wondered if a number of them were some of Pipps fans bemoaning that she now had a boyfriend. Over time though, Hitch became a familiar face on Pipp's streams, and with a mix of good charisma and maybe a bit of luck, their relationship was slowly accepted and the pair eventually became known as a power couple among their three pony tribes.
"Your Highness, you really should be thinking of meeting with your friends soon. It's almost three in the afternoon." Zoom shouted.
"Relax, Zoom, we still have some time to burn before I'm late." Zipp responded.
"Need I remind you, that this meeting is of upmost importance due to its involvement with your sister's wedding in two weeks."
"Fine. I just wanted to stretch my wings." She responded before changing course towards the old station that was formally how earth ponies and unicorns were able to reach Zephyr Heights before they separated many, many moons ago.
Despite that unicorns, pegasi, and earth ponies were open to being friends again, the station itself still remained in relative disarray. While it would've made sense to fix up the old station and use it as it was intended, the number of ponies coming and going couldn't warrant the time or resources to fix the station. Instead, her mom, Queen Haven, figured it would be more economical to build a smaller gondola system for visiting non-pegasus ponies till the numbers supported fixing the old station. Until then, Zipp pretty much decided to use the place as her own little hideout whenever she needed a break from the politics of being heiress to the throne.
As the trio came closer to the old station, the two guards broke away from Zipp and landed on the platform just outside the exterior entrance, while Zipp continued on inside.
Inside the station, Sunny and Izzy were already waiting for her arrival. Izzy seemingly having been keeping herself busy by playing with a bit of her mane, while Sunny was sitting prone looking over a book about old Equestria.
"Hi, friend!" Izzy energetically greeted as soon as Zipp entered the station.
"Hey, Izzy. Hey, Sunny." Zipp greeted them, "I hope I didn't keep you both waiting long."
"Good afternoon, Zipp." Sunny greeted, "No, not long at all. Izzy and I were just getting comfortable before you showed up."
"Good to hear. So...do you both want to just get down to business and talk about the wedding? Or did you guys want to hang out for a moment and just talk first?"
"Either one works for me, but I did want to ask you something regarding the wedding." Sunny stated as she pulled out a notebook and pencil, "Is there any particular customs we should be aware of for a pegasus wedding? Like, a certain type of flower? Or, maybe, something Hitch has to say or give to Pipp when they're saying their vows?"
"No, not really. I guess if you want to look at ancient customs, I'm sure you'll find something us pegasi use to practice, but for the most part any of our wedding practices now aren't any different from any of the earth pony practices you mentioned last time." Zipp stated as she sat down next to them, "That said though, it does count as a 'royal wedding', and we do have some practices on that. Fortunately, the wedding planner already knows what to do, and the order for 200 pink and white peonies were ordered weeks ago. You said there are other flowers though, right?"
"Yes, a small mix of blue and white dahlias, to represent purity and new beginnings."
"Is Madam Amber still willing to help as the floral designer, Izzy?" Zipp asked.
"Of course! I don't think you could convince her to give up the chance. With so few unicorns choosing not to marry back then, because, you know, of that superstition stuff, her sparkle was glowing so bright when we asked her to help." Izzy replied.
"That's good. So, aside from all that, all we have to do is look our best on the day of the wedding and hope neither Hitch or Pipp get cold hooves."
"By the way, why did you ask Izzy and I to come here to talk about this? I mean, we could've easily just had this conversation in the palace." Sunny explained.
Zipp gave the smallest of smirks and replied, "I did say it would count as a 'royal wedding', right? Well, weddings with us royals have always been rather extravagant, so I've been putting my mechanical skills to good use and been working on this." She then trotted over to something covered by a tarp before pulling it off to reveal what was underneath.
Izzy and Sunny looked at the contraption underneath with a mix of shock and confusion as the machine underneath looked almost like a large cannon with the barrel cut short and pointed at an angle, along the sides were a series of plastic tubes and two giant tanks, both a quarter full of water. The machine itself stood about two ponies tall, and about four wide when including the tanks.
"It's certainly interesting looking, Zipp, but what exactly is it? An old pegasus weapon?" Sunny asked.
"No, it isn't a weapon. Well, it might be now with my modifications, but the initial design and blueprints I found to base it off of was no weapon. It took a little translating --Thanks for teaching me how to read old Equish by the way-- to fully read the blueprints, but this is suppose to be a cloud machine."
"A cloud machine? That isn't really anything new." Izzy remarked.
"Yeah, I agree with Izzy. Didn't you or your family ever use one for theatrical purposes? I know Mrs. Cloverleaf at Canterlogic used one in all her showcases."
"No, no, not that. That's a fog machine, this is different. This puppy actually makes clouds like the ones you see in the sky." Zipp explained, "I got the idea from reading a few of those old books, and good number of them indicated that us pegasus ponies use to have control over the weather."
"But, you don't actually believe that, right?" Sunny asked with a chuckle, "Controlling the weather can't be as simple as those books put it. I mean, thinking about all the variables that come into play on a daily basis, and the fact clouds are just condensed water vapor."
"I would've agreed with you about five months ago. Flying is one thing, but to actually touch a cloud as if it was a solid mass, they had to be joking; but, about five months ago some adolescent pegasi were flying around and one of them actually hit a cloud. Not enough to hurt herself, but it was enough to actually give the filly a noticeable bruise on her head."
Sunny looked stunned, "You're kidding..."
"I wish." Zipp remarked with a chuckle, "We've been looking into it, but nothing consistent has come of it just yet. At the moment, all we know is that it has something to do with how we mentally think of the cloud. If we think of it as a solid, it's solid, if it's just vapor and we can fly through it, we'll fly through it. Problem is that we've only gotten 10 pegasi to consistently do this."
"Would you mind letting me know how that goes later?"
"Sure, I'll make sure you're the first to know, Sunny." Zipp nodded, she then looked back towards her machine, "Anyway, with some personal modifications, I'm planning on using this to create some clouds that we could possibly shape into structures or images we can have in the sky."
"The machine itself can create clouds with certain shapes and sizes as needed, you just need to give it a little water and the right inputs. Who knows, might even be good at making those cloud hoops you showed me in that old book of yours, Sunny. I've already asked the 10 pegasi who we've proven they can actually interact with and manipulate clouds at will, and they're willing to help with refining the clouds. Can you imagine it? A wedding with a cloud statue that looks exactly like Hitch and Pipp on their big day?" Zipp explained.
"I think it sounds awesome." Izzy stated, "Can I give it a try now?"
"Not right now, I still have a few bugs to fix in the design, plus I'm still working on calibrating the system. Last thing you probably want is for this thing to blast a hole in this place."
Izzy looked a little down trodden at the response, but she understood.
"It seems almost too simple, but considering it will be the first after such a long time, I think it might work."
"I hope so, otherwise this was a waste of my time and resources."
Suddenly, the sound of something metallic closing shut could be heard followed by a rapid fire of barking.
"What was that?" Sunny asked.
Zipp sighed, "Figures they'd still let him in here." She remarked before turning to investigate.
It didn't take long for Zipp to look upon the source of the noise, Sunny and Izzy following close behind her. There the trio saw Cloudpuff, Queen Haven's winged-dog, trapped in a metal cage, who was quite happy to let them know how much he hated being caged through a series of loud barks. The cage was designed in similar way to the anti-unicorn traps that was used in Maretime Bay before unification. Zipp had helped disable them when it was clear they would be of no use, and learned how to replicate the design to make a smaller, portable version to use on Cloudpuff.
The noise also got the attention of the two guards, who were quick to arrive and assess the situation.
"Your highness, you really should refrain from doing such things to Cloudpuff." Zoom stated in an exasperated tone, "I can guarantee that your mother would not be happy if she heard that Cloudpuff got hurt because of your devices."
"That why I told her, and you both, to keep Cloudpuff out of this area." Zipp remarked as she trotted over to the caged dog, "I don't care how much he likes coming in here when I'm around, it's not safe in here for him." She added before pressing a small button that disabled the trap and released Cloudpuff.
Cloudpuff immediately ran from where the trap was, shook himself, then turned to face Zipp and growled at her.
"Hey, don't get mad me. I've told you many times not to come in here."
At that moment Cloudpuff charged forward as he barked at Zipp.
"What the-?! Cloudpuff!" Zipp shouted as she took to the air to evade the poofy dog.
He continued to chase her and jumped up to take flight, though it was obvious he lacked the speed or finesse to fully keep up with Zipp.
"You stupid dog! Leave me alone!" Zipp stated as she flew around open area of the station, Cloudpuff behind her, "Mom already doesn't like me using this place as my private hangout because it's an old, broken station. What makes you think it's different for you?"
Zipp continued to evade Cloudpuff before the little canine managed to get close enough to bite down on the tip of Zipp's tail and hang on. He was just hanging on by hairs of her tail, but Zipp immediately knew when those hairs started getting pulled on.
"Ow! Get off!"
"Shouldn't we stop them?" Sunny asked as she looked towards Izzy, then at the two guards.
"We probably should." Thunder agreed.
"We have to." Zoom remarked before sighing, "It's technically both mine and Thunder's job to keep both of them from getting hurt, even if it's caused by each other."
Before either guard could take wing and attempt to reach Zipp and Cloudpuff, Zipp came to a hard stop mid-air and whipped Cloudpuff off of her tail.
Unable to stop or slow his momentum, Cloudpuff was thrown right into the control panel for Zipp's machine, which unfortunately turned on the device.
"Oh, ponyfeathers!" Zipp remarked as the device quickly warmed itself up, she then looked to where Cloudpuff had gone.
Cloudpuff managed to go unharmed, but had remained dazed from crashing into the cloud device and had meandered to the front of the device.
The barrel of the cannon was still pointing upwards at and angle, but Zipp didn't want to take any chances and quickly flew to grab him as soon as she noticed that water was draining into the barrel. Just as it was about to fire, Zipp managed to grab Cloudpuff and fly out of the way as it shot out a dense cloud and hit a wall of the old station.
As a cloud, it was just water vapor and thus dissipated as soon as it hit the station wall, but due to the speed and how dense it was, and how worn down the wall was already, the collision had caused noticeable damage that looked merely superficial.
Just as Zipp breathed a sigh of relief that she had managed to get Cloudpuff in time, her ears caught the sound of the device charging another shot.
"Quick, somepony, turn the cloud machine off!" She shouted.
Sunny was quick to respond and rushed over, followed by the others, "How do I turn it off?"
"Press the top-left button, then the large red button."
Sunny did as she was told, but was a fraction of a second too late as it fired one more shot before powering down.
With the machine now off, they all relaxed.
"This is why I tell you to stay out of this area, Cloudpuff." Zipp remarked as she let go of the dog, letting him land on the ground on his own.
"Well, at least your machine works, Zipp." Sunny remarked.
"Yeah, as a weapon. At least now I know I have to tune back firing pressure." Zipp remarked as she looked at the damage two shots of dense cloud did to the station's wall.
Sunny and Izzy looked at the damaged wall also, a little taken back by how much power the device had. That is until a piece of the wall fell off creating a hole just big enough to fit a hoof through, but not into the station, instead behind the wall and created an echoing sound as it hit the floor.
"Wait, what was that?" Sunny asked.
"What was what?" Zipp asked as Sunny trotted over to the wall to investigate.
"Didn't any of you hear that? It sounds like there's an empty room back there." She replied peered into the hole, but it was far too dark.
"Let me see if I can help." Izzy remarked as she focused her magic and let her horn glow.
It took a little effort so Izzy could shine her magic into the hole and still allow Sunny to look into it.
"Well, what do you see?" Thunder asked.
"Well, it isn't a room. It looks like it's a staircase." She replied, "And, I can just barely tell, but it looks like there's a hallways just down there." Sunny added before backing away.
"Why would an old station have a secret passageway? Seems a little silly." Izzy asked.
"It's more like, why would they build a wall to hide it. What little I could see of the walls looked similar the station's, which means it use to be part of the station before they sealed it away." Sunny explained, as she brought a hoof up to her chin.
"You don't even have to say it." Zipp remarked with a smirk, "You want to explore what's behind that wall, don't you?"
"Well, of course. If it was part of this station before, there's a chance it could offer further insight to our past, before magic disappeared."
"Whoa, whoa, wait up a moment." Zoom stated, "This station may be old and abandoned, but it's still a part of Zephyr Heights. You can't just go tearing down a part of the structure without going through the proper protocols."
"Not to mention we're going to need tools to break down that wall." Thunder added.
"Can't I just grant it?" Zipp asked, "I mean, I am the heiress to the throne. Not to mention Mom already has me practicing to succeed her, so I know all the paperwork that will need filling out later."
"Technically, yes, but that isn't the point." Zoom responded in an exasperated tone, "Even if you do grant it, it would be wise to tell Queen Haven of the situation and get a proper team to excavate the wall."
"We just need the hole big enough to fit through." Sunny explained, then looked down at her hoof, "Hm, I think I have an idea. Izzy do you think you focus your magic enough to gently pull parts off the wall?"
"Yep! If it's just take parts off gently, I can do that." She nodded.
"What are you thinking, Sunny?" Zipp asked.
"I was thinking about how it might've been incorrect for any earth pony to think we didn't have any kind of magic. Over the past year, us earth ponies have been learning a little more about ourselves." Sunny explained as she touched the wall with a hoof and felt around before finding a specific spot that felt weak before reeling it back and striking the wall as hard as she could, "We've had a major boom in food production after magic returned. Almost an 85% increase in overall yield."
"I guess that explains the amount of produce you were able to trade to us over the last year. We just figured it was a good year, or you guys did something different to afford trading us that much."
"We did something different alright. Our farmers moved further out from the outskirts of Maretime Bay. They said something just felt 'better' in the new locations." Sunny explained as she kept working at the wall, each strike expanding a crack and breaking chunks off the wall.
Izzy diligently grabbing onto each chunk before pulling it away to put off to the side.
"But it was more than that. A number of us reported feeling stronger too, and there was an increase in broken doors and windows over the last year. It's not significant enough to say we could probably demolish a structure with our hooves, but enough to make us decide to reinforce certain parts of our existing structures." Sunny continued explaining till one final hit caused a portion of the wall to give way and collapse down into the stairs.
"Remind me to ask about having earth ponies help when we do decide to fix up this old place." Zipp stated as they all looked down into the staircase, "I have some flashlights stored near my work bench."
Zoom initially tried convincing Zipp to abandon exploring down the newly discovered passage several times, but gave up after Zipp seemed determined to go despite what the guard was worried about. So with a sigh, Zoom and Thunder decided to follow the three mares down into the passage, along with Cloudpuff who seemed just as curious about the new discovery, and in similar way to Zipp, couldn't be convinced to just stay put.
As the group proceeded down the darkened stairs, and eventually into the hallway, Sunny shined her flashlight down the corridor which seemed to have once been under construction before it was abandoned. In general, the hallway looked like an abandoned wing of a museum. The portion of the corridor closest to where they were was more completed, and gradually less further down the path as the sight of abandoned scaffolding, paint buckets, and even tools became more common.
"What is this?" Thunder asked outloud.
"I don't know, but whatever it was, they sure left in a hurry." Zipp remarked, as she, Izzy, and Sunny proceeded forward and looked into one of the 'display' areas.
The first couple display areas contained ponyquins or large paintings of scenes that Sunny didn't recognize. The first looked to be three ponies, an earth pony, pegasus, and unicorn looking at one another, but seemingly with an expression of disgust on their faces. The next contained another three ponies, again of the different tribes, but they looked more happy and there was a painted flaming magenta heart above them. After that, the six previous ponies standing together as they raise a banner with an insignia that Sunny did feel was somewhat familiar.
"I think I've seen that insignia before." Sunny remarked.
"That one? Where have you seen that one before?" Zipp asked.
"I think I saw it in one of my father's books once. I've never really looked into that portion before." She explained, "I was more preoccupied with making friends and learning about ancient Equestria, Princess Twilight, and the Guardians of Harmony."
"Sunny, Zipp, look at this one." Izzy shouted as she stood past five more displays, and was waving right at them, "I'm pretty sure you might recognize this one."
The group trotted over, and Sunny's jaw almost dropped at what she saw. The display showed a scene with six ponies and one large imposing black and blue alicorn.
"Look." Izzy stated and pointed at one of the six ponies, specifically towards a purple unicorn who's cutie mark was a six-pointed star.
"Oh, my stars. Those are the Guardians of Harmony." Sunny remarked.
"But I thought you said one of them was an alicorn." Zipp stated with a raised brow.
"It's the one that Izzy is pointing at, Princess Twilight Sparkle, and I thought she was. All the books I've ever read referred to her as an alicorn; and, who is that one?"
"Hm..." Zipp looked about the display, before noticing the dust-covered plaque on the wall, "Here, if this is a display, this might tell us what's going on here." And proceeded to clean off as much of the dust to show the text.
"Oh, good idea, Zipp."
"Looks like it's in old Equish. It's a little hard to read, but I think I can make it out the title, 'The defeat of Nightmare Moon'."
"Nightmare Moon." Sunny repeated as the group looked back up at the black alicorn.
"The only other words I can make out of the description is, 'Elements', 'Harmony', and 'Princess Luna'."
Sunny remained silent as she looked at the display, then looked back down the hall where they had come from and the displays there, and then further down into the incomplete area, "Wait, you don't suppose this might be our shared history, would it?"
"What do you mean?"
"This entire area looks like a museum wing, and the displays seem to be chronological in some way." Sunny explained before going over to the next one, and dusted the plague on that one, "This one says, the 'The Return of Princess Luna, Princess of the Moon and Dreams'."
"If that's the case, this might be a pretty important find, Sunny."
"It is. We'll need to tell your mom, so it can be cordoned off properly and we can devise some way to properly look at what we've found."
"That's exactly what I was saying earlier, ma'am." Zoom remarked in an exasperated tone.
Going through, the displays became less and less complete, but still able to relatively distinguish what was being shown. It seemed one side of the hall were major events, while the other side were other things, like more 'minor' events or certain objects of significance. The last somewhat distinguishable display showed Princess Twilight, her friends, and a number of creatures they couldn't identify.
"These creatures seemed awfully important. This is the fourth display with them in it." Zipp remarked.
"They all look so happy though. Do you think they're still around somewhere? Think we could meet them and become friends with them too?" Izzy asked with a smile.
At this point the plague that would've described the scene was missing. Most likely it hadn't been put up before they abandoned the area.
"Probably could, but we're just getting use to be friends with other types of ponies again. It might be a while before anypony opens up to try befriending a non-pony." Zipp chuckled, her eyes going to an insect-looking equine in the display.
"Hey, Zipp, I think I might've found an answer to your question about why the palace looks different in much of these pictures." Sunny remarked as she looked over some aged documents that had been left behind on a work table, "It seems that Zephyr Heights was formally known as Canterlot back then, and the palace was referred to as, 'Canterlot Castle'."
"That seemed easy to guess, seeing all those old maps you've shown me seems to indicate that Canterlot was the only noteworthy mountain within the region." Zipp smirked.
"This document seemed to be the announcement of the name being changed to Zephyr Heights for some reason, but it seemed to be after what was known as the Unicorn-Pegasus War."
"Wait, there was a war?!" Zipp asked in shock, along with the others also surprised at the news.
"Well, no, not really. It really just sounds worse than what actually happened." Sunny remarked and moved away from the table, "I've read about it once, it was mostly just a public disturbance case involving the shifting demographic of Canterlot. Canterlot was the capital of Old Equestria, and was predominantly a unicorn city. I guess over time more and more pegasi started calling the city home, and shifted it to a pegasus-dominant city. In any case, it was just a minor thing where both sides just openly argued, and it lasted about three days."
"Well, that was a useless point. Why even call it a 'war'?" Zoom asked.
"Yeah, that was very anti-climactic." Izzy agreed.
"When I saw the information, it looked like it could've come from an old newspaper. It was probably just a good way to get ponies to buy newspapers." Sunny explained before rolling her eyes.
"I guess arguments like that could happen when you put enough ponies into a given area." Zipp remarked.
"I suppose it is good food for thought as our three groups grow together." Sunny said, she then shined her light down the short portion of the hallway that they haven't gone into yet, "At this point, it doesn't look like any more displays were put up, and where the construction ended. It looks like it goes deeper, but it now looks like the tunnel for a cave."
"Well, we've come this far. Besides, I want to see what caused them to just abandon all this equipment here." Zipp stated before moving further in.
Proceeding further, they came into a cave with large crystals inbedded into the walls, which provided a source of light for them outside of their flashlights. It didn't take long for them to eventually come into a massive cavern that contained more crystals, but also some statues. There wasn't many statues present, but what was there were rather unusual in appearance gave the cavern a rather uneasy feeling, especially the furthest, and center-most, statue in the chamber. It was easily the most noticeable as it was not only large, but also the only one with several iron chains tying it to the chamber walls.
Sunny decided to ignore the center statue for now as one particular statue caught her attention and she wanted a closer look. Zipp seemed to share the curiosity as she followed Sunny.
Izzy immediately froze upon seeing the center statue and took a few steps back. Her movements were unnoticed by everyone except Zoom and Thunder who had been at the rear of the group.
Cloudpuff at first seemed uneasy as he entered the chamber along with the others, but then start growling once he looked at the center-most statue.
"I wonder what these are for." Sunny said, trotting closer to one particular statue, "Look this one even has a pegasus in it."
She was looking a statue with a pegasus filly, a emaciated four-legged creature, and what looked to be a more frightening version of one of the creatures they found in the displays earlier.
"What is that thing? It kinda looks like that beetle-like pony we saw earlier, but more dangerous." Zipp stated.
"There's no nameplate to indicate anything about these three."
"Ma'am, is everything okay?" Thunder asked Izzy.
"Uh, we should get out of here. Now." Izzy responded in a frightened tone, loud enough for everyone to hear.
"What's wrong?" Zoom asked.
"Don't you guys know who that statue is?!" She asked, and pointed at the center statue, which was a statue of a large ram that had its head low, and looked to be almost smiling, "That's Grogar!"
"Grogar?" Zipp asked, "Mind filling us in on why he's so important."
"H-He's a legendary creature to us unicorns, a master of darkness, and is considered to be the one creature we should fear more than anything." Izzy explained, "At least that's what we were told to think in stories by our parents. In those stories, it would say how powerful he was as a magic user, how he created armies of monsters to attack and ponynap unicorns, and how he was actually beaten by a strong unicorn countless of years ago."
"No offense, Izz, but it kinda sounds like any foalhood story that we've probably all heard." Zipp remaked, "I mean, us pegasi have a story of a hero by the name of Flash Magnus, and I'm sure earth ponies have their equivalent, right, Sunny?"
"Yes, we do. A hooful in fact." She agreed, "But, they're just stories, right?"
"I thought that too." Izzy remarked, "I mean, who could possibly be so powerful when magic was supposedly taken away by pegasus ponies; but, seeing that statue..."
"I'll agree on that one. Something about that statue is weird." Zipp remarked, "I don't think I've ever seen or heard of a statue that was chained to the walls before."
"Neither have I." Sunny stated.
"If I may speak freely." Thunder rang in, "May I go back out the tunnel?"
"You can't be serious." Zoom groaned.
"I know, I'm a royal guard of Zephyr Heights, but something about that statue of Grogar is giving me an uneasy feeling. I don't know why, but I almost feel like it's been watching us since we got here."
"I'm sure it's not watching us. It's just the position of the statue." Zoom tried to reason, though the slight uneasiness was hard to deny.
After a moment of silence, Sunny asked, "Izzy, could you tell me more about those stories with Grogar later?"
"Yep."
"You don't suppose it was that statue that caused them to stop construction?" Zipp asked Sunny.
"I don't know, but I think there might be something about that statue that needs to be studied to further understand." Sunny replied, "Let's go for now, and tell Queen Haven what we found so the area can be cordoned off."
With that said, the others made their way down the path and out of the cavern. Sunny was the last to leave as she looked at the statue one last time. There was something about it that did bother her, aside the chains and the feeling of being watched, Sunny silently noted another odd detail about the statue. Unlike the other statues in the room, Grogar's seemed to be the only one without a single set of hoofprints or wheel markings in the soil around it. It was as if, the statue wasn't actually put there by anypony.
Shaking off the uneasy feeling, Sunny proceeded to follow the others out. The issue with that statue can be focused on some other day.
Author's Note
My prompt was #043:
Honestly having second guesses about whether I managed to get all five ideas/characters into this story, but at least it was interesting to try. I had fun with the idea at least, and writing a story with the G5 setting was a nice way to get me write again. Hope you guys at least enjoyed the story.
-Blueninetails