Scootaloo’s hooves scrabbled at the metal as she pushed her way deeper into the duct, and since she had been seen she had given up at any attempt of keeping quiet and let the clack-clack-clack ring out. She knew that there had to be hooves reaching after her, or maybe even someone’s magical grasp trying to wrest her out, but she really didn’t have the time to focus on that. All she could do was squeeze herself past each barrier, hoping she’d remain out of their reach.

And Flight was right ahead of her, leading her along. Scootaloo’s mind went nearly blank as she just stared at the filly’s tail, making sure she was still following the right way.

“You okay back there?” Flight’s voice called, though it was muffled by her sides pressed against the walls of the duct.

“Yeah, uh”—Scootaloo breathed—“I think I’m gonna be fine.”

“You idiots!” a voice from behind her shouted. “What in Aureate’s name are you doing? You’ll never reach her like that! Your magic! Your magic!”

“I don’t think they could reach me,” Scootaloo mumbled. “We’re already too far in.”

“Good,” Flight replied tersely, “but we can’t relax yet. I think I see some light up ahead, so maybe we can get out of this soon.”

“What if they break through the wall anyway?” Scootaloo asked. “Like, they rip out the pipes?”

“We’ll just have to be faster than that,” Flight breathed. “Look, I don’t have some sort of grand plan. I’m running for my life here.”

Scootaloo clammed up after that, and she probably would have been annoyed had the situation allowed it. But no—she was stuck crawling on her hooves through what now was near-darkness.

“I can’t see them anymore!” exclaimed a voice from before. “Oh jeez he’s gonna be pissed, isn’t he? What are we gonna—?” The voice was interrupted by a loud slap.

“Shut up! You have hooves, don’tcha? Just start grabbing pipes and rip ‘em out!”

“But… but… we could totally screw things up for the castle…”

“The prince won’t mind, and we can always rebuild. Just do it!”

Now Scootaloo could definitely hear hooves on metal, pulling and hitting it and making loud clanging noises. And she braced herself for hooves reaching behind her, trying to grab her, but they never came.

Darkness. Hooves on metal. Scooting down the duct. Heh, scooting. Then, ahead—

“Oof!” A moment later: “Erm… watch your step…”

Scootaloo blinked, and then a light came into view quite suddenly. Yet it wasn’t a harsh light, and she didn’t wince. It was a cool, almost bronze-like colour and, what’s more, it was thick; it seemed to fill the space ahead of her, masking it from view, and—

“Gah!” she cried out as her hooves fell out from beneath her, and she went tumbling down. Luckily, her wings stretched out on instinct, catching her on the air and giving her almost a semblance of grace as she glided down to a perfect landing on her hooves, clacking into the floor of… cobble?

Scootaloo blinked, shaking her head around before fully opening her eyes. What she saw first was a butter-yellow muzzle right up in her face, below two eyes wide with concern.

“Yo,” Scootaloo managed after a moment, still dazed from the fall.

“You okay?” Flight asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Scootaloo’s eyebrow raised, however. “Though, uh… could you maybe get out of my face?”

“Oh!” Flight jerked her head back, and quickly turned around—though before her face was out of sight Scootaloo could’ve sworn she could see a tinge of pink on the filly’s cheeks. “I, um… I just wanted to make sure you were okay!”

Scootaloo shrugged. “Uh, okay. Well, yeah, I’m fine. But, um… where are we?”

The two fillies turned to look at the small tunnel they had come across. As the duct they had entered through was near the ceiling, wherever they were had to be at least a couple metres below the tunnel they’d been running in before. Some sort of sub-sub-basement. Which wouldn’t have been all that strange; castles are always filled with strange rooms that somehow ended up forgotten.

But this room? This room seemed to glow. It glowed with that same cool bronze-like colour that Scootaloo had seen before, and that light had just intensified once she got into the room proper. It filled her with a sense of… calm, almost. Even though her heart had just been racing, and she knew those guards were still behind them trying to pry their way through the piping, the air just tasted so serene.

And that’s not even to mention the patterns that snaked their way along the walls, forming mysterious symbols that seemed to paint some sort of picture or communicative device, yet nothing Scootaloo could understand in the slightest. Yet these symmetric designs all seemed to slide towards the distinctive shape of a door on the far wall, converging at a circular hole at its centre.

Flight blinked. “Erm… I think this is beyond my pay grade.”

“Um… yeah, I dunno.” Scootaloo scratched her head. “I mean, it kinda reminds me of that metal plating in the underground church-room-thingie I ran into.”

Flight nodded. “It could be related, I guess. I mean, this has been the princes’ castle for, like, ever. Maybe it’s even Aeneus’s.”

“Is that the bronze one?” Scootaloo asked, looking to Flight. “Ugh… I dunno why they had to make their names so similar.”

“Yeah, that’s him. Hence the colour.” Flight hummed in thought for a moment. “Well, they’re still behind us, aren’t they?”

Scootaloo looked back, though it was really more a gesture than an actual attempt to see if anypony was following them. “Yeah, pretty sure they are.”

“Why don’t we… check out that door, then?” Flight started trotting forward at an even pace, hooves reverberating off the floor. “Not really anywhere else to go.”

“Sure.” Scootaloo followed behind Flight at about the same speed. Her head turned from side to side as she walked, studying the designs on the walls.