An orange glow lit the clouds above as Celestia's sun finalized it's loop over the land and retired behind the mountains to enjoy a well deserved rest. The crickets chirped merrily, bidding the giant ball of fire goodbye and singing a welcoming song for Luna's moon. All over Canterlot ponies were leaving their workplaces, and closing up businesses as they made towards their homes to partake in the celebration, but even as the skies turned darker, and the smaller of the astral bodies poked it's pale face from the horizon, one pony was still laboriously fulfilling the duties with which she had been entrusted. Much to the dismay of her younger assistant....
"Twilight, we've been at this for hours now, can't we just call it a day? The feast will start soon and I'm starving!" Pouted Spike, trying to stifle the growls of protest his stomach was making.
Twilight tutted impatiently, he'd been badgering her with this question for a while now. "You know we can't just ignore the duties the Princess has entrusted us with. We will see that the preparations are finished before the celebration starts. Now tell me what's the next item on our list."
The young dragon let out a reluctant sigh and lifted up the piece of parchment to his eyes. A sensation of easement ran through his sore scales as his eyes traveled downward through the numerous items, and discovered that all but one had a bright red check on their side. "Security: it's the last one!" He answered letting out a sigh of relief.
A well deserved sensation of accomplishment swelled up in Twilight's chest, renewing her with energy and a sense of purpose. She held up her head and folded up one of her forearms to strike a dignified pose. As always she had proven herself capable of meeting the Princess' standards. She couldn't wait to report back to the Princess and basque in all the glory of her compliments and comments about how proud of her she was.
"Uhm what are you doing Twilight?"
Spike's voice called her back from dreamland to the dark, empty stone road they were sitting on. "Uh... nothing," she said with a sheepish smile. "C'mon, we better get this over with or we'll be late for the party."
"It says here that we're supposed to go to the headquarters of the Imperial Guard and ask for the latest report on the situation," explained Spike, his eyes still on the list.
"Hmm that's right next to the Imperial Academy right?" Twilight pondered out loud, scratching her chin with her hoof. "Shouldn't take long for us to get there then," she added, her expression lightening up.
Spike's stomach gave yet another impatient growl. "Well, can you speed things up a bit? I'm not sure how long I'm going to last if I don't see food anytime soon," Spike complained, rubbing his tummy.
Twilight rolled her eyes with amusement. "Alright, don't worry. I'll make sure we get to the party before they run out of appetizers... Now hold on."
The dragon obeyed her and wrapped his arms around the base of her neck. With an impressive neigh Twilight lifted up both forearms in the air, nearly sending Spike sliding off her back into the ground, and took off with far more speed than one would expect from a tired pony.
With Spike hanging onto her neck for dear life, Twilight galloped through the empty streets, buildings zooming past her. The cool night air rushed through her mane and softly caressed her plum coat, sending pleasant shivers running down her back and sides. Her lungs, having been caught unaware due to the sudden burst of effort, throbbed painfully from the lack of oxygen. Noticing this, she slowed down a bit and allowed herself to inhale a gale of wind. The effect was almost instantaneous: no sooner than she felt the icy mountain air filling up her lungs, she felt the relief spread to her muscles. She couldn't hide her delight as her face split into a grin; it was a good night for running.
It didn't take them long to reach Hurricane avenue, where a large grey building stood in a distant hill. Twilight looked around for the entrance and noticed a couple of guards on either side of a metal fence, patrolling the entrance with a stoic demeanor. As she approached them she couldn't help but notice the barbed wire all around the perimeter, wondering whether it served any useful purpose other than for appearances, considering that a pegasus or a unicorn would have no problems with it.
An authoritative voice, carrying a not so friendly tone, woke her from her musings. "Halt! Who goes there?! What business do you have here?!"
Without so much as flinching, Twilight approached the guards and pulled out a sealed letter from the Princess, levitating it towards the closest soldier. "Ehem. My name is Twilight Sparkle and I have been sent here by Princess Celestia to oversee the preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration. I have been asked to report back to the castle with the latest details on security."
The guard held up the letter in front of him and perused its contents. After determining the authenticity of Celestia's crest, he gave a nod of approval and grunted at the other guard. Both of them stood on either side of the fence and pushed it open for her. The nearest guard then beckoned her towards him, she swiftly obeyed without a fuss.
"I shall escort you to our head of security so that he can give you the latest report," he briefly explained. The soldier then began marching up the long winding road towards the grey structure on the hill. Twilight found this unnecessary behavior curious, to say the least, but she wasn't about to comment on military traditions and certainly not inside an imperial stronghold.
Twilight couldn't help but examine her surroundings: she had always wondered what had been the purpose of the military on a peaceful kingdom like Equestria. She noticed that the place had it's very own street lamps and, though she couldn't see the extent of the field they were traversing, she knew that it must have been huge to warrant such a generous use of electricity. As they trekked up the hill and closer to the building she noticed a couple of floodlights in the distance, casting down their light upon several wooden cabins and a collection of tents. Right next to them she could see two lines of tires laid out on the ground, as well as several lines of barbed wire that hung over a small patch of dirt on the ground, and a long running track that stretched out into the darkness.
"Those must be the training grounds, right?" She said, trying to appear well informed and hoping for something conversation. The guy however merely grunted without so much as giving a backwards glance and continued his marching.
"Hard-flank."
"Hush Spike!"
"We're here."
Twilight and Spike ceased their bickering for a moment and turned around to look at the structure. What had initially looked like a large building from a distance was in fact four smaller ones connected by a series of annexes. The size and shape of each one appear to differ, but they looked the same in essence as they were all made of granite. Twilight was so busy wondering what was the purpose behind their design and the secrets they concealed that she didn't notice they had arrived at another gate.
"Identify yourself!" Shouted the guard patrolling the entrance, and Twilight noticed a sign that read 'Authorized Personnel Only', in bright red letters, plastered on the gate.
The guard that had been leading Twilight up to that point straightened up into a salute and handed over the letter bearing Celestia's crest for the other guard to examine. After a moment's deliberation, the guard looked up and nodded.
"We have been informed of your arrival Twilight Sparkle. Follow me, Colonel Clean Shot has been expecting you," he said, and pulled the gates open for them.
Their new escort led them through the gates and onto a concrete road that seemed to lead to a fifth structure Twilight hadn't noticed before. This one was far smaller than the others, and barely popped out of the ground, with no more than twelve feet in height and width. It was located right in the middle of garden that separated all four structures and seemed to be heavily guarded for a building that small: there was no less than four soldiers patrolling the perimeter around it and two more standing guard at its thick metal doors.
Upon seeing Twilight and the guard leading her, the soldiers parted and pushed open the doors for them. A sense of understanding slowly creeped across Twilight's face when she saw the flight of stairs leading down.
"Wow! A bunker! I've always wanted to see one of these!" Exclaimed the dragon with excitement comparable to the one of a young colt upon seeing his first tree house.
Twilight however gave the guard a skeptical look. "Is all this security necessary? I mean, we're overseeing the preparations for a party, not the development of some ultra, secret, Equestrian weapon of doom."
The guard stopped in his tracks and gave her an annoyed look making her stumble a bit, though she was sure she must be imagining things ('after all, Equestrian guards always looked annoyed for some reason'), for he merely paused to gather his breath and answer her question. "It is not the purpose of the Imperial Guard to question the decisions of the Military Brass. It is our purpose to follow the safety protocols that have been devised for our protection, as well as yours," he intoned placing particular emphasis on those last words.
Twilight had to admit she was very impressed, it appeared that these soldiers had been very well trained, not only physically but also mentally, to fully commit themselves to their work. Still, despite how much of a fan she was about rules and procedures, she could not help but feel that these "protocols" were exaggerated at best.
"One would think you're half expecting somepony to hide a bomb inside the cake," she remarked.
"Uhm, it is a possibility," Spike reminded her. "Remember Rainbow's birthday?"
The young dragon had a point. Twilight did not have to search deep into her memories to find recent event, involving a certain pink pony mistakenly placing fireworks instead of trick candles inside a three story cake featuring the Wonderbolts, that the Cakes had painstakingly baked for the occasion. Long story short: the six friends and the middle-aged couple had found themselves up in frost's creek without a spatula.
The three of them soon started their descent down the flight of stairs and through a long and narrow corridor, their hoofsteps echoing all they way down to the end of it. Twilight blinked a few times, her pupils dilating to adjust to the darkness. Though the air was stuffy and moldy she could still feel the gentle caress of the cool night air, in the form of a draft coming from above ('the ventilation perhaps?'). Her first impression was that whoever designed the place had been very diligent in doing so to prevent any unwanted visitors to sneak in unannounced; with a single entrance it was virtually impossible for anypony to slip through security, let alone reach the end of the corridor without being detected. Though she could still find a single major flaw in such a design that would have rendered this, the safest of bunkers, into a giant death trap.
It seemed however, as if the soldier was able to read minds. Just as she was about to say it out loud, he got ahead of her: "place is completely fireproof," he said dismissively.
Twilight's disappointment was only exacerbated by a loud snort from Spike, who failed to stifle a laugh. "I was about to say that...the...air is... kinda stuffy, and it could lead to the formation of...mold! Yes! Mold. Laugh all you want Spike, but mold is a serious issue and it could lead to lung disease," she added with a frown, absolutely determined to be right about her assessment that the place was flawed.
The guard, nonetheless, was not listening to a word she said, having instead concerned himself with escorting the odd couple down the barely lit passage, which now appeared to be reaching its end. The ponies stood before a room, barely wider than the passageway they'd just traversed, where some kind of metal contraption stood right in the middle of the room. Upon close inspection it seemed like a large cage that was connected to the ceiling by thick, black chains.
Twilight was busy contemplating it's purpose when the guard slid the door of the contraption open. "Get in," he said in what was almost a command. Not wanting to disobey or appear discourteous, she readily stepped into the cage despite the reservations she had about the thing. As soon as she had done so she heard the gate shut behind her, and turned around feeling a little panicked.
"At ease. You will be escorted to Colonel Clean Shot's office when you reach the lower levels," said the guard from outside the contraption.
Caught under the spell of adrenaline, the filly could not make sense of these words. "Lower levels? Wait! What do you me— WAHHH!" With a loud cranking noise the cage started slowly descending down a shaft they had not previously seen.
"Hey! What is this?! What's going on?!" Called out Spike in alarm, shifting uncomfortably on Twilight's back.
"It's a lift," pointed out the guard unhelpfully, before vanishing from view as they sank below the ground.
"Relax Spike, I think what he means is that this thing is a transportation device that allows ponies to move upward or downward, or so I think..." she explained while trying to make sense of the mechanism that allowed such a thing to function.
The "lift" continued its slow descent down the dimly lit shaft accompanied by a symphony of creaking metal and clanking chains. It seemed like it would go on forever when suddenly they were greeted by a blinding flash of light, as the contraption deposited them right in front of a brightly lit hallway.
Twilight rubbed her eyes vigorously and did not even have the time to register her surroundings before the gate of the lift slid open and she was beckoned forward by a couple of guards. "This way. The colonel has been awaiting you."
Her eyes still stinging, she stepped forward into a soft midnight blue carpet that covered every inch of the ground, and quietly followed the guards along the hallway. "Make sure you remain with us at all times. This place is very large and you could get lost," indicated one of them as they navigated the maze-like structure, turning left and right at random corners.
Though she doubted the sincerity of his concern for her, Twilight was not about to put that statement to the test as it did seem likely that she wouldn't easily find her way back. Everything just looked the same to her: the long winding hallways, the white spotless walls, the grey ceiling panels... even the wooden doors decorating the walls seemed to be the same! She had trouble believing anypony could actually manage get through this maze without both a map, and a compass. She was about to let them know it too, until they finally came to a halt in front of a set of double doors.
"We're here," announced one of the soldiers as they positioned themselves on either side of the doors and pulled them open for her. Beyond them stood a large room that would have allowed for at least a couple of dozen ponies to wander about freely. The walls were made with fine mahogany and decorated with tapestries of long forgotten heroes, as well as the progression of the Equestrian flags from oldest to most-recent, a long crescent-shaped table sat in the middle of the room surrounded by leather sits, and on the very end of the room a white screen displaying a map of the World had been pulled down.
"Well howdy Miss Sparkle, take a sit please."
Twilight and Spike's heart seemed to skip a beat at these words: they had been so busy admiring their surroundings that they had not noticed the stallion sitting in one of the chairs. Unlike the soldiers they'd met so far this one seemed to have a strange air about him, though she couldn't exactly put a hoof on what it was that made him stand out from the rest. Maybe it was the lack of the custom imperial armor, or perhaps his sloppy orange mane protruding from underneath an old cowboy hat, it could even be the fact that he had both back hooves up on the table, but everything about this pony just screamed "unprofessional".
"Who are you?" She asked in a reproachful tone before she could stop herself and think about the situation.
"Oh! Pardon mah manners, lass. Ah'm colonel Clean Shot. Ah was asked by the generals to stay behind and debrief ya on security," explained the canary yellow stallion in a southern drawl, lifting up his hat to reveal a large pair of green eyes and a winnfield style of beard.
Spike's right eyebrow raised as high as it would go. "You're the colonel?"
"Haha, Ah get that a lot 'round here," joked the stallion as he got up and made towards them. "But turns out the military likes ponies with talent. It don't matter squat what ya look like s'long as ya got what it takes, if ya know what Ah mean," he finished with a wink.
Twilight, it turns out, did not know what he meant, though she did prefer the colonel's nonchalant attitude rather than the stoic and uptight demeanor most guards were known for. "I'm Twilight Sparkle, and this is my friend Spike," she said amiably pointing towards the purple lizard sitting on top of her, "it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"Well what do ya know? Seems ya intellectual-types sure are keen on manners! Ah'd like to chat some more, but Ah'm afraid Ah got an urgent message to relay to ya," he said, his voice almost dropping to a whisper.
Twilight tilted her head in a mixture of confusion and curiosity. "Urgent? What do you mean?"
The middle-aged soldier held out a hoof in front of his mouth and pursed his lips. He then turned around and inspected their surroundings, squinting around as if half-expecting a ninja to burst through one of the tapestries. "We just had a conference with the military brass, and we've received numerous reports that make it seem likely.... that there will be some sort of disturbance during the ceremony tomorrow," he explained.
"A disturbance?" Repeated Spike, "what sort of disturbance?"
The colonel gave them both an appreciative look that seemed to last an eternity, then, with the air of someone bearing the weight of a bomb he pulled off his hat and spoke: "There seems to be a plot of some sort against Princess Celestia. An attempt in all likelihood."
A nasty shock shot through Twilight's back. "An attempt on the Princess?!" She exclaimed with a jolt.
"Shh!"
"Oh right, sorry," she added sheepishly. "But why on the wide, wide world of Equestria would anypony try to kill the Princess?"
"Are you guys sure about this?" Asked Spike trying to stop himself from shivering.
The colonel nodded. "Dead sure. We've received intelligence that a couple o' spies might have slipped amongst the Imperial Guard. Though our informants assure us that they're not the only ones. 'pparently lotsa weird characters have been flooding into Canterlot as of late."
Twilight's blood seemed to come to a stop as she felt her chest tighten. 'Spies? Suspicious characters? A plot to murder the Princess?' To a pony who was so used to peace those type of things seemed like stuff pulled straight out of fairy tales. The very idea of violence seemed foreign and distant. "Who would do such a thing colonel?" She asked horrified.
The stallion gave her a solemn look. "We aint sure who's behind this, but we've been keeping track on a number o' suspects for a while now. Though if we arrest them out in the open we're sure to miss out on the opportunity of discovering the culprit behind this attempt. That's why the military brass decided on the meeting just now to let things slide for the moment so we can observe, see what happens and act accordingly. Ya just gotta let the Princess know she's gonna be the bait, so she can take the necessary precautions."
"Necessary precautions?! This is the Princess we're talking about! You can't just use her as bait and let these guys take a shot at her! They're too dangerous to be let about wandering freely, they could put everypony in danger!" Twilight protested.
"True," the stallion admitted, "but mah gut tells me that if we went on the offensive, we'd only be delaying their plans and giving whoever is behind this the chance to rethink their strategy, and Ah don't think these spy-types are the talkative kind either. If they escape who knows what sort of trouble they'll cause for ponyfolk later on."
The trio fell silent at these words. True, if they acted fast all the suspects could be rounded up and locked away, but then again any ruckus would be likely to catch the attention of the masterminds behind this plot. They were between a rock and a hard place. The colonel was still rubbing his chin, lost in thought when Spike broke the silence.
"What if you lured all the suspects into a secluded place and then arrested them!" He suggested enthusiastically, striking the palm of his claws with a balled up fist.
The colonel however, shot him down immediately. "Ah already told ya, we got some suspects under surveillance but we aint sure if that's all o' them. The military has been infiltrated remember? A plan like that would take lotsa coordination and communication within the military: it could be easily leaked. 'sides, how are we supposed to round up all the suspects without attracting any attention at a time like this?"
"Well, you could summon all the guards here and then arrest the suspicious looking ones," the dragon persisted.
"Yeah, and while Ah'm at it Ah might as well hand out flyers asking everypony if they've seen any potential rebels and/or evil masterminds," the stallion returned with a scoff. "Ya honest? If we mobilize the entire Imperial Guard, the culprits behind this are gonna know something's up."
"Not if we mobilize the suspects in small groups, and if the orders are coming from somepony outside the military," Twilight offered.
The couple of males stopped their bickering to give her a curious look. "What are you getting at Twilight?" Prodded the dragon with a growing sense of apprehension.
The filly took a deep breath before continuing. "If I use my authority as an overseer appointed by Princess Celestia I could tell the guards that they're needed at headquarters."
The colonel's face twisted into a frown. "And ya plan on just waltzing up to these folks and tricking them into following ya? Ah don't think the generals would agree with leaving the fate of Equestria on the hooves of a filly. No offense there lass."
Twilight stamped her hoof on the ground, her eyes burning with determination. "I'm not just a filly, my friends and I have taken on the likes of Nightmare Moon and Discord before and saved Equestria in the past. I am ready to do what's necessary to prevent my mentor from coming into harm," she protested with an air of finality.
Spike knew his partner to be a stubborn one, but even if she was determined to see this through to the end he wasn't about to let Twilight get hurt on account of her recklessness. "Twilight," he said in a slow deliberate voice, much unlike his usual boastful tone, "this is going to be dangerous. I think you should let these guys handle it."
"Spike, Celestia isn't just my teacher. She's like a second mother to me," she offered with paused delicacy, "I can't just stand by the sideline and risk her getting hurt. Wouldn't you do the same if it was me?"
"Gosh, I guess you're right. I hadn't seen it that way..." the dragon murmured, scratching the back of his head.
The colonel let out a heavy sigh. "If ya say y'all are ready to do your part for Equestria, then Ah guess there's no stopping ya. But if y'all are gonna help out, Ah'd prefer ya stick to our terms and do things our way. No independent actions or horsing around, understood?"
Twilight's face split into a grin, "you have my word colonel!" She replied, striking her forehead with an arm in a poor attempt at an official salute.
"Very well then, lets get down to specifics..."
******
Cold sweat running down her back, Twilight Sparkle woke with a start.