Prison House Blues

To Enter the Underground Prison Levels please ensure you have proper clearance before pulling the hidden lever, make sure you have proper genetic identification or else you shall be incinerated by magical wards, Thank You for Reading this Sign.

Looking up at the much worn sign which must have been here for a long time without maintenance I realised that my job would be a heck of a lot harder if I got incinerated. I was in one of the Castle's large chambers which probably once was the chambers of Celestia or some other important Pony and after an hour of looking around I had found a secret door in the fireplace and entered through to find this rusted sign.

I didn't know if spells wore off over time and dissipated or remained in place until they were used up or the caster vanquished them so I decided it best to look everything I needed up in the book I'd brought. Flipping through the pages I eventually found an article on the science of magical wards.

It Read:

Due to the lack of knowledge of most Unicorns since the majority of schools are filled with Earth Ponies who know little to nothing about magic it is important to understand the concept of simple wading spells, many of which can come in handy when faced by danger or in the security of the home.

Basic Ward spells can protect against flying missiles, elemental magic and in the case of security detect and stop thieves or other perpetrators and warn whichever pony is in charge. In some cases wards have backfired on the caster due to lack of concentration or improper channelling of magic but this is rare and usually results in no harming coming about.

Since magic at such a high level is practiced only by a few there have never been any deaths or serious injuries although there is a long history of incorrectly channelled magic in the past before Celestia outlawed the practices of higher level Warding that had the potential to maim and kill ponies.

Old magic has also been known to fail over prolonged time without maintenance of the original magical caster which can lead to complete vaporization in extreme cases.

If you are a Unicorn and if you think you may be in a dangerous and potentially warded area that might have been improperly cast then please contact the nearest official. If you are trapped and need to cross potentially warded area then follow instructions for spell on page (45) to detect and dis-enchant ward.

If you are not a Unicorn then find some orange moss and grind it into a paste. After this cover said paste in small rocks and throw at area that you think may be potentially improperly warded. Ward should appear as a shimmering wall of light and if you can squeeze past it and report it to your nearest Unicorn.

Note: This technique will only work on disabling or detecting improperly warded areas and cannot be applied to working wards which fall under the radar of these detection techniques.

Closing the book and looking around I didn't see any orange moss in sight. In fact I had never seen any orang moss in my life or heard a mention of its name. From my Royal Guard Training I knew basic and helpful medical herbs but orange moss never came up on the entry exam.

I scratched my head and decided to head back out and into the castle ruins, maybe some moss grew there and since this was orange moss I already had a good enough description. I exited the fire place which closed behind me and went in search of this moss.

I passed a great many rooms which I had passed previously. Most looked un-important lie staff rooms and such but there was one specific room which I must have walked past completely. It was a huge room like a hall or at closer inspection a throne room.

It was generally empty apart from a raised stone platform with a bunch of rocks on it. A few patches of the boring green moss hung from the ceiling and looking over behind the stone platform I saw a large and half crumbled throne.

Curious, I walked over to it and touched its arms. I decided I might as well see what the great big deal about needing a throne to command of an entire country and sat down upon the throne. Instantly a wave of nausea hit me and I felt like I was going to be sick. I began to see flashing pictures which made no sense and some eerie whispers entered my head.

I immediately leapt off the throne and decided that was enough ruling for one day and went back to looking for the moss. I felt a crunch however under my hoof and stepping aside was glad to see I'd stepped on the orange moss and now could finally at least see if there might be potential wards in the area.

I figured that since the sign looked about a hundred years old then the magical wards may have malfunctioned but it still made me nervous. In fact everything about magic made me nervous which was why I tried to avoid it at all times.

Even so all this magical investigating made me curious about magic. It must after all make life so much easier to be able to levitate things and destroy things with some energy. I'd seen the Unicorns in the Royal Guard lift their swords like it was nothing and pull off the fanciest tricks without having to waste their energy whilst the Earth Ponies and Pegasi had to have years of training until the sword was an extension of their forelegs.

I shook my head and ate the orange moss, not even caring if it were poisoned or not. It had a foul taste just like uncooked grass with no seasoning but I chewed it up without complaint (not that there was anypony to complain to) and spat the mixture onto my hand.

Then I found a few small pebbles and began to do as the book said covering the sticky and disgusting and not to mention gross substance all over some pebbles before finally being able to precede another step towards my goal.

I briefly wandered about the wave of sickness that had washed over me but then I brushed it off and proceeded forward through the abandoned halls. It had been a few hours now since I had arrived here and the sky was growing dark. I looked through the ruined roof of the castle to see light dancing in the clouds where I believed the home of Weather Cloudsdale was located.

Once more I wondered what it would be like to be able to fly through the air like a bird and control entire storms with your hooves. Darn it seemed the Earth Ponies were the most boring of all races, besides a hefty strength and equally strong fortitude they didn't have wings or magic and weren't generally smart or crafty.

However the thing we did have was higher numbers in terms of populace, not that it would really do us any good but I didn't want to dwell on the subject of being born an Earth Pony and not something cooler.

I arrived at the fireplace and pushed the hidden entrance open once again. The sign was still there to remind me of my fate if there was even on ward that wasn't broken ahead of me. I looked down the small corridor ahead and thought that if one ward blocked my path then I was totally screwed.

I began walking and throwing my little pebbles which seemed to simply fly through nothing. I continued walking and chucking the pebbles however they hit no faulty ward and I wasn't vaporized or trapped by any functional ward and by no time I had reached the end of the hallway unscathed.

I was firstly amazed but then my amazement was overcome when I finally saw the door ahead of me labelled High Prison Rooms 1-5. Judging by the lack of rooms I guessed there wasn't much in there but then again if wards could fail and if this place could be abandoned then maybe some prisoner escaped their cell in that time.

It was unlikely, they'd probably trigger a dozen alarms but I still proceeded with my crossbow at my chest. There was another hallway (which made me question who designed this top secret prison) and It had two doors on each side and a single door with a 1 labelled on it which gave me a small hint as to the most important prisoner inside.

On the doors on either side of the hallway I read the other things which were written on it things like "Kindom of the Parasprite's" or the "Gateway to the land of the Human" (I think you pronounce the word like that). On the other side there was a peeling label tinged a dark red reading "Cupcakes" and the second last door before Clearwater's read "The Rainbow Factory".

These names didn't sound like they should be menacing at all, more like the kind of things you'd want to share with the foals of the world. Curiously I peeked into the door named Parasprite's and a little ball of really cute fluff which was an insect puffed out and flew down the hall.

"Really Dangerous" I said to myself and went to peek over in the cupcakes door since I hadn't really eaten since the train ride. I opened the door slowly and looked inside for a few seconds before proceeding to close the door sharply and collapse to the floor in a very un stallion like faint.

I woke up a short while later and tried my hardest to brush off the images I'd seen in there but unfortunately like my now almost completely grey hair I would have to carry that for the rest of my life. I didn't even want to touch the handle labelled the Human World for the fears of releasing some cruel horror upon Equestria.

After seeing some of the other rooms and now standing outside Clearwater's cell it made me fear what was inside. If she was Prisoner number 1 the she was the most dangerous thing in here and after the cupcake room I wanted to spill my guts so bad there and then.

However I pressed on, knowing that the day of traveling, climbing, flying, fighting and nearly puking had all led up to this moment. The chance for me to start again, get my life back on track with my wife and enough money to make sure that we lived well for the rest of our lives.

"Bring the girl and wipe away the debt" I murmured, before I opened the door to Prisoner Number 1. The door creaked noisily on its heavy framed and unattended hinges. I dropped any chance of sneaking in and opened up the doors to see a completely spotless and white room with a single whit Unicorn with her foot chained right in the centre of the room.

She at first looked dead since she was slumped on the ground but slowly she seemed to stir ever so slightly. First off this amazed me since nothing can live for over a thousand years unless the entire room was time spelled which would still have kept her in a state of unmoving and un-aging hell. Next was the fact that she couldn't have been more than nineteen whilst the description had told her to be in her late 30s.

She slowly cracked open her eyes and in a shout voice said "Thou is a different Apparition today, yesterday it is mother, earlier it was sister but you are not of our mind" she said in a very old speaking way. She may have been delusional but she had the power to bring back life and only the rich mare could help me so I drew my sword and went over to her, possibly looking a bit more menacing than I actually was.

"Come to end us it seems, we don't blame thou in fact we thank you" she shouted once more. I didn't quite understand her thinking but I adopted the classic Royal Guard Expression and swung my sword and the slightly rusty chains which basically crumbled on impact.

Clearwater's hoof was free but looking at it I was horrified to see the bleeding red cuts and marks on it. In fact come to think of it there were a lot of red marks and scars and what seemed like bite wounds all over her body as if she had been attacked or maybe even attacked herself.

"A Punishment worse than death" I mumbled aloud and she looked up at me from her lying position on the floor, blinking heavily as if to make sure I existed or something. What was going on inside her head I had no idea but at the instant she simply didn't look like everything the reports had told me.

She was barely a mare, covered in old wounds, spoke old hat and by the look of her slightly trembling lips and watery eyes was about to cry. Not the hardened killer who had murdered her mentor in wanting of his power and position.

I considered consoling her but I reminded myself that despite appearances looks could be deceiving and she could rise up and stab me in the back with a hidden knife or blow me to pieces at any time with just a thought.

I decided it was time I stopped staring at her and addressed her fully. "Miss Clearwater my name is P.I Backwater and I have been tasked to finding you and setting you free, you are to accompany me back to the Celestia Tower in Manhatten where you will be debriefed also to add to this your powers will…are you crying"? I asked in absolute amazement.

I'd seen mad ponies cry and happy ponies cry and sad ponies cry and I could definitely detect that this was tears of sadness and not gladness. I ruffled my mane and crouched down, going level with her face and asked with my short sword pointed at her chest "what is the problem"?

She into my eyes and I saw that her eyes were not a typical everyday blue, more of a night blue which upon closer inspection were speckled with stars. "We…We…sniff our Princess Luna, ruler o…of the moon and framed for the murder of Starswirl the bearded.

I looked deep into her sad eyes, still wary that my head was just above her horn which might be used to blow my brains across the room at any moment. "I have heard of Princess Luna, she was once a reigning Princess of all of Equestria just like Celestia before she turned bad and created an eternal night" I told her and this time her eyes widened to a crazed state and I shuffled back a bit.

"What…has she done, by the spirits please you need to get us out of these tunnels, to the mountains in The Bad Lands where we can rebirth our powers and form, thou must do this noble sir or Equestria will fall" she said in an irate voice.

She was obviously turned crazy over her little stay here which made me wonder why Celestia didn't just kill her even though it is different in terms of morality however I had once read that execution was used a thousand years ago and if being Prisoner 1 didn't count as guilty and warrant of the death penalty then I could steal the Royal Crown and probably get away with it.

"Listen you little filly, I know you killed your master and I know you hate the Princess's and the Empire, frankly some points I will agree on with you there but pretending to be some other long dead and power hungry mare does not…" I stopped right there as I heard a loud boom and suddenly a low rumble.

"Oh Horse feathers the Prisons coming down, quickly we need to go whether you're crazy or not" I yelled sheathing my sword. "We can't stand" she said weakly raising a hoof out to me. I didn't stop moving and simply scooped her onto my back and ran for it.

Stone collapsed as I ran down the hallway and the steel door rro the Rainbow Factory burst open, followed by a tirade of bloody rainbow stained Pegasi in lab coats. I didn't even imagine what they were and kept galloping as fast as I could until I was into the other hallway. Another stone sealed the door and hopefully all the nightmares in the other passage and I ran down the isle of wards now, dodging boulders and trying not to drop Clearwater. Her head scraped against the side of the wall and it opened up a previous cut which had been there. However it couldn't be helped and I barely made it out of the Fireplace before stones caved it all in.

I dropped Clearwater to the side of me and collapsed onto the floor, panting heavily. Clearwater had passed out from her weak state and the wound on her head; typical after a thousand years to sleep she would do it now.

She was confusing, she was probably just tricking me into carrying her so that I could be this tired and let my guard down but I was smarter I would never fall asleep on duty when I was a guard and I would certainly not do it now even though the world did seem to be getting blurry and dark and the roof of the castle seemed to fade into whiteness and I heard the soft cries of a baby as I fell asleep.