Once again, the sun rose over the quiet town of Ponyville. The golden rays streamed vibrantly over the horizon as the giant orb poked its head over the landscape. Twilight Sparkle stirred from her sleep once more as she noticed the light coming in from the windows and balcony. She yawned and pushed the covers away from her body. She stretched and let out a groan of pleasure at the tender feeling in her muscles. She felt much more relaxed and rested in comparison to the previous night’s sleep.

Twilight looked down to the small bed on the floor below. She shrugged as she noticed it was empty. She also noticed a neatly folded pile of pillows and a blanket in the corner.

“Why am I always the one that sleeps in?” Twilight sighed and shook her head. The unicorn then hopped out of her bed and quickly tidied the ruffled sheets up. She made her way to the door of her bedroom and exited into the rest of the library.

She walked downstairs and unsurprisingly noticed Tom sitting at a table and talking to Spike. What the unicorn did not expect to see was a pink mare bouncing happily in her chair as she laughed heartily at something that was said.

“Pinkie… What are you doing here so early?” Twilight tilted her head and looked curiously at the pink pony. The three turned to look at the unicorn as she descended the stairs.

Pinkie Pie giggled to herself and looked to the purple mare cheerfully. Despite how early it was, she seemed to be as energetic as ever.

“Well I wanted to get here as early as I could, so I dropped by as soon as I woke up. Sure enough, Tom and Spike here were already up and let me in.” Pinkie explained innocently. The unicorn looked at her pink friend in bewilderment.

“I Umm… I guess that’s good. That’s one less pony we need to wait for.” Twilight reasoned while walking over to the group and sitting in a chair beside Spike. The dragon had already gotten out a few books on magic to study with. They lay in a pile next to the paper Twilight had written the symbols on last night. The unicorn softly sighed and quickly looked over the small pile of books while glancing at their titles.

“Ughh… This is going to take forever. I hope that something important is in these symbols for all the trouble we are going to go through.” Twilight huffed in annoyance and rested her head on both hooves. Reading through the immense heap of books wasn’t going to be a problem, for her at least. What bothered the purple mare was how long it was going to take. Time she spent reading pointless books was time she could be spending making more progress in the investigation.

“Well we better get started.” Spike stated with optimism. “I picked out a few books on spell writing, but I wasn’t really sure what other topics would be useful.” The young dragon added while picking up one of the books placed on the table and opening it.

Twilight levitated two of the other books over to Pinkie Pie and Tom. She then picked up her own book and looked to the group to signal for them to get started. The unicorn furrowed her eyes in mental strain as she went through book after book in search of anything useful to deciphering the symbols. The elongated time spent on reading made Twilight slip into her usual daze of concentration as she flipped from page to page with ease.

The others seemed worse off at the tedious task than the egg headed unicorn. Pinkie Pie let out a dull sigh as she tried her hardest to be productive for her friends. The party pony bounced her leg back and forth as she read through the hefty book in front of her in an attempt to keep herself from getting bored.

Spike and Tom seemed a little more content with doing this much research. Spike spent much of his young life helping Twilight with her studies on magic, making him proficient at doing large amounts of reading.

Tom was lost as he read through most of the book. He had much experience and knowledge of magic under his belt due to his inherited memories from past slayers, but he lacked any sort of knowhow on pony magic. Still, he was intrigued enough to keep reading without getting bored.

The group pressed on for an hour and a half as they finished reading through the books that Spike had picked out. Twilight shut her eyes to rest them for a moment as she closed her book and placed it down. She looked over to her friends and sighed as she realized that they all had nothing in their hands as they stared back at her with dull, blank expressions. They now had to think about what to do next.

“Well great… we’re out of easy things to read. Now what are we going to look at?” Twilight fumed in annoyance as she ran over the logical topics to look over next in her head.

Tom placed both of his hands on the piece of paper and rested against the table as he looked over the symbols. Despite how many times he had gone over them by this point, they were still indecipherable to him. Still, they seemed at least somewhat familiar to him.

“We should be looking at nontraditional books on magic. Think about it for a minute… someone put those symbols in that cave, and I am the only living human in Equestria, so that leaves us with a pony as the culprit. This means that said pony would have to have access to human knowledge on arcane arts.” The boy looked to the group as he explained his methodology to them.

Spike scratched his chin in thought as he mulled over the slayer’s reasoning. If a pony was the culprit, they had to have gotten access to human magic somehow.

“I think a few books survived on human knowledge, but from what I know only a few scattered pieces of information on their culture exist.” The dragon motioned with his claw as he thought about the topic of human history that was preserved past their destruction.

Twilight looked around them at the many shelves littered with books. She lightened her expression as she thought about a sensible direction to put their efforts into.

“If there are any books containing knowledge of human magic, I’m sure at least one of them would have ended up here at some point. Spike, could you look through the records and see if we have anything on ancient magic?” Twilight turned to the dragon and asked politely. He hopped up from his position on the floor and walked into the doorway to the next room. He then turned to the unicorn and smiled.

“You got it boss.” Spike gave her a playful salute and marched confidently on his way toward his goal.

Twilight chuckled lightly at the innocent dragon before turning her attention to the door. A series of gentle knocks suddenly broke through the relative silence of the library. Curious to see if any of her friends had arrived, the unicorn trotted over to the door and opened it up.

Sitting outside the door were her two friends Rarity and Fluttershy. They brightened up their faces and smiled warmly at the unicorn. Twilight returned a smile to the two ponies as she lifted up her hoof jovially to welcome them.

“Girls! It’s great to see you made it!” Twilight exclaimed happily to the two as she stepped out to see them. Rarity brushed her hair out of her face as she cleared her throat to greet the unicorn.

“I’m terribly sorry to be so late darling. I had to make Sweetie Belle presentable for school, you understand. On my way here I ran into Fluttershy. I’m glad to see that I’m not the only one to get here at this time.” The white mare looked over to the cheerful pegasus standing beside her and smiled.

“I would have been here earlier, but Angel made a mess in the kitchen this morning as I fed him. It took me a bit longer to clean up than I thought it would.” Fluttershy chuckled nervously as she remembered her own reason for arriving later than she had planned. Now that she was here, she tried to appear as eager to help out as she could.

“That’s fine, you two are actually here around when I would have expected you. The only other person here is Pinkie Pie, and you can imagine how she got here so early.” Twilight looked back to the doorway knowingly as she thought about the party pony. She then motioned with her hoof for the two to follow her inside. The ponies walked into the library and spread out through the room.

Rarity and Fluttershy gave a friendly wave and greeting to Tom and Pinkie as they sat against a wall conversing with each other. Rarity then stole a glance at the various stray books and notes littered around the table holding the symbols, she raised an eyebrow and exclaimed in surprise at the amount of work the group had already done.

“Wow… you guys must have been at this for a while. Did you come up with any results?” Rarity asked with intrigue as she walked over to the table to read over their work. The purple mare sighed before looking back to her to respond.

“We just ran into a dead end before you got here. I sent Spike to look through the library for any books that could be useful.” Twilight stated in a disheartened manner.

“And I have some good news and some bad news for you.” Spike spoke up as he walked back into the room with a dull expression and nothing in his hands. He shrugged in disappointment before walking over to the others.

“I found out that we had two books on human superstitions and ancient languages that seemed like they would be helpful.” The dragon explained with a slightly hopeful tone as he looked to the others with optimism. Twilight perked up from the news, she was certain there would be something in those books to help them.

“That’s great Spike! ...” The unicorn suddenly looked more doubtful as she thought about what the dragon had just said. “But what’s the bad news?” She asked uneasily. Spike sighed and trailed his eyes off in annoyance.

“We donated those books to Ms. Cheerilee a few months ago. The school needed them for a course on ancient civilizations.” The dragon explained in a dull tone.

Twilight furrowed her brow in frustration. She then sighed before looking at the others with a determined expression.

“Well then I guess we will have to go get them… besides, I’m sure we can find some other books along with them in the school’s library.” The unicorn stated optimistically before turning to the three ponies and human watching her.

“Tom… I need you, Rarity, and Fluttershy to come with me to the school so we can find those books and look around the library for any more information.” Twilight instructed to the band of ponies eagerly awaiting purpose.

“Oooh… can I come too Twilight? Pleaaaase?” Pinkie Pie jumped up suddenly and stared at the unicorn pleadingly. She seemed eager to assist the group with their task as she whined to be able to come along with an innocent pout.

“Alright Pinkie, I guess you can come with us.” Twilight smiled and sighed to the pink pony as she begged to go.

“Yay!” The pink mare exclaimed happily as she threw her arms in the air with excitement. Twilight couldn’t help but admire the cheerful nature of her friend. The unicorn then turned to Spike and looked at him with purpose.

“Spike, I need you to stay here and wait for the others to arrive. Once they get here, I need you to help them with finding whatever you can here.” Twilight instructed confidently. The dragon nodded eagerly as he thought to himself about where to start with the research he would be doing.

The purple mare smiled as she saw her plan coming together, she then looked over to the four who would be traveling with her.

“You guys ready to go?” Twilight asked quizzically. Fluttershy and Rarity nodded slowly, while the human got up and walked over to the unicorn.

“I’m ready whenever you are.” Tom stated confidently. Twilight nodded to her troop and turned to walk out of the door.

The group waved to Spike and started on their trip to the school. The ponies walked contently through the streets of Ponyville as they took in the views of the town around them. Several commuters gave them a passing nod before lingering their eyes a bit longer to study the human traveling along with them.

Tom did not feel as uncomfortable as he did when he first traveled through the streets. He could see that the ponies were not looking at him with disgust or disdain, but were instead simply curious about the sight of an odd creature walking next to Twilight Sparkle and her friends.

Fluttershy looked back to the human as he surveyed the ponies around them while they studied him intensely. She figured that he would feel alienated by the townspeople as they sometimes shot him judging looks while passing by.

“Don’t worry Tom. I’m sure ponies around here will get used to you eventually.” Fluttershy spoke softly to him to get his mind off of his surroundings. The boy looked at the shy yet friendly pegasus and smiled.

“Its fine, they are just curious. So what if some of them think badly of me from first appearances. I don’t care so long as they keep their judgments to themselves.” Tom stated confidently. Fluttershy smiled upon hearing that the human wasn’t letting himself get affected by the opinions of others. If she had been an outcast amongst people she had not known, the pegasus would have certainly become scared and depressed from not being understood.

“Good to hear that… I’m glad that you feel comfortable here.” Fluttershy smiled warmly at the human while expressing her care for him.

“Most of you seem friendly around here, but you seem the most kind and welcoming Fluttershy.” The human smiled as he made the observation.

Fluttershy giggled at the compliment. Even given her important position as element bearer, she still found it flattering for people to tell her that she was nice.

“I think it’s very important to show others kindness. Even if I wasn’t the element of kindness, I would still want to treat others as I would want them to treat me.” The yellow pegasus beamed with confidence as she explained her feelings.

Tom tilted his head curiously at the yellow mare’s statement. She alluded to herself being the element of kindness, but this concept was only confusing to the human.

“What do you mean by element of kindness? Is that something important?” Tom asked with confusion evident in his face. Before Fluttershy could answer, Twilight exclaimed in revelation at the fact that she had not explained the elements of harmony to the human.

“Oh yeah! I forgot to tell you about the elements of harmony. I guess it didn’t really come up before, sorry about that.” Twilight chuckled nervously at her own lapse in explaining her world to the newcomer. “Basically there are six elements that keep peace and harmony alive throughout the land; loyalty, honesty, generosity, laughter, kindness, and magic. The elements of harmony are upheld and regulated by six ponies that hold each quality within them. Fluttershy is the element of kindness, I am the element of magic, Applejack is honesty, Rainbow Dash is loyalty, Rarity is generosity…” She started naming off the list of element bearers.

Tom looked at her smugly and interrupted. It didn’t take much deduction to realize where the pattern was in this situation.

“And let me guess, Pinkie Pie is laughter.” Tom stated confidently. The party pony gasped in surprise and looked back at the boy with a shocked expression.

“How did you know that?” Pinkie asked in a playfully confused manner. Tom shrugged his shoulders at the pink mare staring at him curiously as if he were some kind of psychic.

“Must have been a lucky guess…” The human stated sarcastically. Twilight and her other two friends giggled at watching the pair conversing.

The group continued through town for a few minutes before finally coming up to the property line of the school. The building seemed like a modest education facility for young colts and fillies to spend their years at. Tom studied the surroundings curiously as they marched up to the school.

Upon entering the doorway, the group bumped into a purple pony with pink and white striped hair and a cluster of white flowers for a cutie mark. The pony stopped as she noticed the group while they entered. Twilight immediately recognized the pony in front of them. She gave her a friendly smile and walked up to her.

“Ms. Cheerilee, it’s nice to see you.” Twilight greeted warmly. The teacher returned a smile to the unicorn and her group of friends.

“Good to see you as well Twilight Sparkle, what brings you here?” Cheerilee asked quizzically before turning to look at Tom. She lit up with intrigue as she studied the human. “Is that a human? Oh my goodness, what an interesting looking species.” She stated with curiosity as she examined his appearance. Twilight observed the curious pony as she reached out a hoof to shake Tom’s hand.

“That is part of why we’re here… we’re doing some investigating for the princess on some puzzling things that have been going on recently, including the sudden appearance of our friend here.” The purple mare explained while motioning toward Tom with her hoof.

Tom smirked in flattery at the curious pony. He was not used to being thought of as an interesting new experience for people to meet.

“Pleased to meet you Ms. Cheerilee, my name is Thomas Greene.” The human stated in a friendly manner while gripping her hoof for a hearty handshake. Ms. Cheerilee smiled gleefully at the human.

“The pleasure is all mine Mr. Greene. I have always dreamed of meeting a human ever since I read about them when I was in school.” The teacher said in a cheerful manner. She then relaxed her grinning face before clearing her throat and turning to the rest of the group.

“Ahem, enough of my curiosity... You all clearly have something important to attend to, so I will leave you to it.” Cheerilee nodded to the group before turning to leave. Rarity spoke up suddenly to stop the pony before she could start walking.

“Oh Ms. Cheerilee, could you be a dear and tell me where I could find Sweetie Belle? I would like to check up on her while I’m here.” The white mare asked in a friendly manner. Ms. Cheerilee thought for a moment about the whereabouts of the young filly.

“I believe that she is with Applebloom and Scootaloo over at the library. It’s recess, so I can’t help but wonder as to why they would be there.” The purple mare furrowed her brow in thought about what the three mischievous fillies could be up to. Rarity smiled in satisfaction at the convenient news.

“Oh lovely, we were just heading to the library anyway. Thank you for your help.” The white unicorn gave a friendly nod to the teacher as she walked away. With that, the group then made their way through the halls of the school to find the library.

After a few minutes of searching, the ponies found a set of double doors with a decorative sign above them that read library. Twilight let out a satisfied breath of air before opening the doors to step inside. The group walked into the room and took a look around. The library seemed smaller than Twilight’s home, but this was mostly due to all of the books being held in one room.

Several shelves of books sat in rows before the ponies, as well as lining the walls of the room. At the back of the room, the group could see three young fillies talking with each other near a desk. As they got closer, the ponies could hear the trio discussing something intently.

“I say we head down to the basement to find the main problem.” The orange pegasus filly that everyone except for Tom knew as Scootaloo stated confidently to her two friends.

“Ah think that we should just stay up here to look at the pipes. There’s no need to go down to that musty old place just to find out what’s leaking and what’s not.” Applebloom sighed heavily as she voiced her opinion.

The three fillies stopped their discussion and looked at the group as they walked up to them. Scootaloo looked at Tom with intrigue before turning to face her two friends.

“Is that him? He doesn’t look like he could beat up a monster…” The orange filly whispered to her friends as she studied the human and his feeble appearance with a wary eye.

“That’s him alright. He is more awesome once you see him in action.” Applebloom whispered back to her doubtful friend. “He saved me and got rid of that thing I told you about.” She boasted confidently to her friends about the way the slayer had handled her family’s problem.

“What are you girls doing in here? Shouldn’t you be with the other kids playing outside?” Twilight asked the three fillies to interrupt their whispering. The three got up from their seats and lined up in front of the group with eager expressions.

“We’re going to try and find out why so many pipes are leaking.” Sweetie Belle explained their purpose cheerfully.

“Yeah! Cutie Mark Crusaders plumbing experts! ...” Scootaloo exclaimed excitedly before pausing to realize how that sounded out loud. “Okay, maybe we need to work on the name a bit… but we need to try nonetheless!”

The ponies giggled as they watched the three excitedly plan their venture. It was always nice to see the enthusiastic fillies try to find their cutie marks through the most unconventional means. Despite their misguided approach, it was hard for one not to admire their spirit.

“Well just be careful and don’t get into any trouble darlings.” Rarity chimed in to keep the three fillies in line. They looked back to her confidently before saluting and trying to appear as serious and genuine as possible.

“Of course, we will be as careful as careful can be.” Scootaloo stated eagerly before trotting away with her troop following her.

Twilight sighed as she watched the three exiting the library with excitement. The unicorn almost envied how the trio could go off on a whimsical adventure rather than spending the next century trying to find the literary equivalent of a needle in a haystack. She then looked around to the surrounding bookshelves before turning to her friends.

“We better start looking guys. The faster we find those books, the faster we can be done with this.” Twilight instructed with a serious expression as she nodded to the three ponies and single human watching her. The group immediately got to work by heading to various shelves in search of any sections or clues that might help them find the relevant books.

While the group of ponies got to work with their research, the Cutie Mark Crusaders were getting to work with their search for their cutie marks. The three fillies walked down the hallways of the school while talking with each other.

“Recess is almost over, we need to hurry up and choose what we want to do.” Scootaloo shrugged in annoyance as she tried to come to a compromise with the other crusaders. Sweetie Belle looked on in indifference as she watched her two friends bicker about where to go. Applebloom huffed in frustration as she thought about both sides of the argument.

“Ah suppose we can go to the basement… we are pretty close after all.” The yellow filly smiled in a friendly manner as she tried to put her hard headedness behind her. Scootaloo nodded confidently as they agreed on her plan.

“Great, let’s get to it then!” The young pegasus exclaimed in excitement before leading her two friends to the door that led downstairs. The trio opened up the door and stepped onto the dimly lit landing to the basement stairs.

The three stared down the stairs and into a pitch black doorway that led into a larger and more open space. Sweetie Belle gulped nervously as she tried to fight off the feeling of dread she was getting from looking into the eerie blackness. The orange filly chuckled light heartedly at her friend before giving her a sly expression.

“What’s wrong Sweetie Belle? Are you afraid of the dark?” Scootaloo asked while walking closer to the stairs confidently. Sweetie Belle tried to put her fears behind her and put on a brave face.

“I don’t know… I just feel a little uncomfortable.” The white filly said timidly. Her voice was a little shaky from her nerves being on edge. Scootaloo smiled and put a hoof onto her friend’s shoulder.

“It’s alright. Me and Applebloom will keep you safe, right Apple… bloom?” The orange filly was slightly surprised to see Applebloom quietly shivering to the side of the group. She offered a frightened glance to the two as she stared into the darkness nervously.

Scootaloo sighed in slight disappointment. She then looked back to Sweetie Belle and put on a reassuring expression.

“Well at any rate, I will keep both of you safe.” Scootaloo spoke softly while walking down the first few steps. Once she was halfway down the stairs, she took a better look through the dark doorway and looked back to the two onlookers as they watched her cautiously.

“See? Nothing down here to worry about... Now come on you two, we won’t get our cutie marks by staying up here and doing nothing.” The orange filly stated confidently before turning around and descending the rest of the stairs bravely.

Sweetie Belle and Applebloom watched nervously as their friend walked through the blackness into the next room. They looked at each other with a frightened expression before swallowing nervously and pushing forward to join the young pegasus down the stairs.

After picking up their pace to huddle close to their friend, the fillies looked around the room they were in. It was a large room with three other doorways in the middle of each wall. Various boxes and other objects littered the walls and the middle of the floor, giving the otherwise open room a sense of fullness. A few pipes of varied levels of size and thickness went along the ceiling and down the walls a short way.

“Now where should we go first…? I think this place is pretty big.” Scootaloo observed while looking around at the three doors leading around the basement.

“Maybe we should head to some high traffic areas for the pipes. I think I heard that a few areas were leaking really badly.” Sweetie Belle added while thinking back to what she heard about the problems with the pipes.

The orange filly picked a direction and led her troop toward the door, when suddenly the sound of approaching footsteps made the crusaders perk up and listen. The noise sounded like it was rapidly approaching from the doorway across the room to their rear.

“Ah thought that the maintenance ponies went off on break for the day.” Applebloom stated nervously.

“They did… come on, let’s hide somewhere!” Scootaloo exclaimed to her two friends urgently. The three fillies scrambled through the room to find hiding spots. After they all found places to keep themselves hidden, the fillies waited and listened intently as the noise entered their room.

Two ponies walked in through the far doorway. One was a male unicorn, while the other was a relatively young pegasus mare. The two wore grey hooded jackets that concealed their faces. The unicorn had his jacket unzipped, revealing a rather fancy looking vest underneath.

Scootaloo had decided to hide in the crawlspace between two boxes along with Sweetie Belle. She could see that Applebloom was hiding across the room behind another box. The orange filly placed a hoof to her lips to hush her unicorn friend as she poked her head out to spy on the two.

Applebloom eyed to the orange pegasus nervously from across the room as she remained hidden from the two strange ponies. Scootaloo signaled for her to stay in place while she strained her ears to hear what the ponies were saying.

“Ughhh… where did you tell the others to go Cotton? This place is freaking huge!” The pegasus exclaimed in annoyance and frustration as she looked to the unicorn.

“Patience Raincloud, the spot should be right through here. I had to enter a different way when I was looking for a suitable place earlier, but I think I should be able to lead us to it.” The unicorn spoke calmly to the pegasus to try and sooth her concerns. He then walked across the room nearby the box Applebloom was behind and went through the door.

“*Sigh* you think or you know?” The pegasus huffed in frustration as she followed the unicorn into the other room. Once the strange ponies had moved on, the three fillies got out of their hiding spots. They gathered together while hesitantly looking into the doorway of the room the two had gone into.

“What were those two doing down here? Applebloom whispered uneasily. She had never seen or heard of those ponies around the school before, so she had no idea why they would be in the school’s basement. The thought of whatever malicious activity the pair had in mind made the filly shiver nervously.

“I don’t know…” Scootaloo stated curiously. She then slowly smirked before turning to her two friends with an adventurous gleam in her eye. “But maybe we should find out.” She exclaimed eagerly. Before her friends could stop her, the orange filly slowly and cautiously walked into the other room.

Applebloom and Sweetie Belle looked to each other with concern evident in their faces. They then concluded that they would have to bail out their friend if she got into any danger. The two fillies slowly walked into the other room to go after the brave pegasus.