Yukito teleported out once the carriage landed at the cavern's entrance, and with a nod to Sora, he wordlessly started his trek into the darkened hall with horn alighted. His steps were brisk, and darkness made an attempt to cradle him as he trotted deeper into that corridor. His chest tightened further; even the knowledge of what he was trotting towards did nothing to ease him. With each step, each echo bouncing between the walls, he found his ears rotating back of their own accord as the air thickened uncomfortably.

The darkness, too, thickened with the frigid air. Slowly, as he neared his destination and the path that forked into three, his light dimmed sliver by sliver. How long it took him to get there, he couldn't guess; what he promised to take mere minutes doing instead felt as though they stretched to eternity. Yet, when he reached that fork with light barely spreading across a mere inch-wide radius, his ears twitched as he heard a faint creak of aged wood. A tiny burst of warmth tickled his neck as it moved with the groaning, splintering sound.

He calmed his nerves with a deep breath, and trotted down the central path. The discarded torches gleamed with frost at his passing, though their reflection was as weak as his glow; so dim, he had to look harder than usual to notice them. One fell from a wall with a cry of thunder from outside, its frost shattering on impact even as it bounced and rolled to brush up against his fetlock. Carefully, he lifted the torch and touched its end with his horn before alighting a tiny spark of flame.

The torch failed to light. He tried to light it again with another, slightly larger spark of fire, yet it failed to catch even a tiny ember. He shook it out, and even lifted a leg to strike at it with a metal patch before trying once more, but he had no luck. It was just as dead as the rest of this place. Still, he trotted on to the doors with it in his magical grip after dropping his hoof, noticing that the doors themselves had frozen and fractured over time, and were opened some while ago. They barely held together now, swaying uselessly on a hinge each, letting his light touch the desolate room beyond without even a token effort to block it.

Into the room, then down the stairs he strode, head lowering to be eye level with Sham's frozen carcass as he reached the bottom of the flight. She did not change, nor did the broken devices that surrounded her throne and fractured wings of rusting steel that he had to carefully step around. Her eyes, though long dead, gleamed with a tiny fragment of light as Yukito came near. The air warmed, but it was as faint as the fragment of life that still seemed to resonate in her—the chill from outside still held strong, still made him shudder with each step until they were nose to nose. "They… they found out," he muttered tersely. On that matter, he needn't say much more.

The air barely stirred, brushing up against his cheek and Sham's left eye. Liquid condensed, but not enough to form another falling tear. The glimmer in her eyes waned, but stubbornly remained. "... you haven't much time left…" Yukito guessed, and the air stirred some more to allow more liquid to condense on the frozen right eye. It formed another tear that hadn't enough weight to fall yet. His throat tightened, and his magic flickered to a weaker dim. The torch almost slipped out, but he seized it with his left hoof before it could fall, and sat on his haunches to lift the other.

He cupped her right cheek with that free hoof, and felt receding warmth. The glow in her eyes, whether it came from within or without, weakened just the same; it was now about the size of a pupil and fading fast. If she could somehow hear him, some part of him mused, then it wouldn't be long before she had that taken from her too. "Let's keep it brief then," he said. "I'm… I'm sorry I couldn't save you…"

The air stirred a little more, and the right tear condensed and grew until it fell. It brushed up against his hoof and trailed down his pastern to fall onto the floor with a tiny, silent landing. Another built up on her left eye with a faint gust of air. "I'll do what I can… not just for Sora's sake… but for the sake of everypony who's suffered because of us," he added, noting the glow was still fading. Time dwindled for Sham, and he couldn't waste another second. "I… took the papers they had me make… they won't be able to use them again. I swear… on your drones that I will...."

The left tear fell, after more liquid condensed to join with it. He took a deep breath to keep his emotions at bay, and his face hardened a little as resolve filled him. "I intend… to.. to atone for what they made me do, somehow…" he finished, and maintained eye contact as his raised hooves trembled. His magic faltered, almost bathing the room in darkness before he seized control of his nerves to strengthen the glow. It did nothing for Sham's fading light, except illuminate its fleeting sparks that much more.

"Sleep well, old friend…" he said softly. He sat there until that light faded entirely, and those brown pools returned to their dull, vacant stare with the passing of a faint and mirthless laugh that echoed around the tomb one last time. Yukito kept his hoof on her cheek for longer than that, until one last tear trailed from her frozen eye to touch his pastern. Gently, he wiped the tear away and parted before standing up and nuzzling her. He closed his eyes, holding his snout to her cheek, the absence of warmth and light finally registering to his senses, carving a pit into his soul.

The spark of life was now gone in its entirety, and in its place was a sense of cold and numbness, both assailing him in equal measure. And somewhere in the pits of his soul, he knew Sham was gone, too, and he'd barely said goodbye to her. Another part of him didn't want to believe—still didn't, after all this time—didn't dare think she was now heading for the stars.

He opened his eyes and forced himself to pull back. Her coat, once vibrant green despite all that had happened, was now as dull as could be, and growing duller still. So was her mane, and her scarring. Even her cutie mark started to grey from the center outwards, until she was as lifeless and devoid of color as her artificial bones within a matter of seconds.

Time, finally, caught up to her carcass. She was going to take her long-overdue rest, well and truly. Even he hadn't the power to change that. And that part of him that wanted to believe otherwise cried out in dismay—a dismay so horrid and strong, that the rest of him isolated it in those depths of his soul where even the bleakest of resignations stayed far away from.

Yet still, his soul and body trembled in sync at the hollow that was left, right where Sham once was in his life. His mind was already coming to terms with this, but his heart tightened in a desperate plea for her to return that went unanswered. No matter how much he yearned for some sliver of a chance that Sham could come back, his worst of fears had already been confirmed before his very eyes.

She could not return anymore. There was no place for her here.

Yukito turned away and levitated the torch so he'd have both fronts free for the stairs, when one of the frozen drones at the triangle's top broke from formation and fell to the floor at its side. Its thud was soft enough it could have been mistaken for the impact of a hoof, were he not presently staring in its direction. Slowly, he trotted to it, and paused to look at the pitiful object. Through ice and layers of rust, he noted he could still see the faintest hint of metallic pink in patches that were not yet eaten away. Its cracked screen was in as bad a shape, with a massive black patch in the center that signified some sort of internal rot.

Tenderly, and again with his magic, he picked up the drone to inspect it further. The ice flaked away as it was lifted up, alongside bits of rust and ill-furnished paint. Its tiny arms swung and hung limply behind it, and its head lolled back almost as though it were a fresh corpse held in his pastern. It was barely the size of his frog; more doll-like than any robot had a right to be. He held it to his chest, and found it had that same warmth which had just left one of his very few, and dear friends mere moments ago. A second after contact, the screen blipped and flickered to life with a weak, green glow that went out when he parted it from his body.

He moved it to his chest again, and the screen came back to life with a faint crackle on contact. Yukito nodded to himself and made the drone vanish in a burst of light. He teleported to the hall without a word, and turned around to close the splintering doors as gently as he was able before applying its plank of wood. It held as he slid it into place, and he trotted down the hall to make for the right fork.

Down that hall, and straight along the stairs he went, and he kept going until he was snout to snout with Nath. She seemed distant as ever, and sported a glow in her eyes that flickered weakly to begin with, which steadily faded as he sat and made eye contact. The air stirred here too, warmth fleeting even as liquid condensed on her face as well. There were odd cracks in the ice around her crown of horns, but she didn't seem to notice nor care.

"I'm sorry, Nath. I'm sorry for not being there to save you in your… your time of need," Yukito said simply. He leaned over to nuzzle her, and felt that dying warmth touch his snout. "They won't successfully replicate the horn crowns… I've taken those papers… I understand if that's not enough to give you closure, though…" he muttered against her cheek.

For a moment, he was silent even as Nath's spark continued to die. "I'll work to earn your forgiveness, and that of the dozens of others I have failed… I promise you on that," he said before pulling back slowly to not agitate the cracks along her head. He regarded her pitiful expression as that tiny glimmer in her dull eyes wavered with each growing second. A tear condensed further, and trailed down her face to traverse the edge. It stopped, only to hang just on the underside of her chin, waiting for more tears to join it on its final journey.

Yukito lifted a hoof to her chin, upturned his frog, and gently wiped it away before it could get the chance to leap. "They won't use anymore crowns to steal ponies' free will. The Corps will have to vaporize my dead body first," he said firmly, but softly. "And it will be a long while yet before they can do that. So long as I trot this world, they won't ever have that opportunity." He moved to stand, but the ice along the crown fractured on its own with nothing more than a gust of warm air and another distant clap of thunder, and he stopped himself short as they whirred to life with a faint teal pulse of power.

Then, taking clusters of frozen mane and split wiring with it, the crown slipped off and landed upon the floor in pieces of broken frost and rusted metal with that power receding. The whirring stopped, and Yukito turned to the damaged crown as those pieces stilled in a final, brief rattle that echoed around the tomb. He turned back to Nath as the glow in her eyes faltered even more. "A-are you sure?" he asked, eyes widening at the sheer oddity of the crown seemingly moving on its own.

He felt something touch his neck; a warmth turning to cold that moved up and down once. Then it pulled back, the air stirring as it did, before it stopped when the flicker in Nath's eyes finally died. Yukito watched as she, too, lost color and warmth and his soul felt her presence begin to leave. "I'll take care of the crown," he said reassuringly, voice faltering a little. "Sleep well, Nath."

It wasn't much longer after that final utterance before the cold replaced all warmth in the room, and a tear that formed on Nath's face condensed, fell, and froze halfway down. It glistened weakly in Yukito's light, with no life to call its own, for there was no more life in its owner to give it. It would sit there, possibly for years to come, before it could ever finish its lonely trail. And this final testament of all her regrets probably never would finish its journey, for her flame had flickered out.

There was no longer a place for Nath here, either, of that he was certain. Yukito silently wagered that she went to claim her freedom amongst the stars, joining up with Sham and countless others who made that journey before them. She had left him her crown with her departure, the still-screeching part of his soul howled. And so he gently levitated it and the strands of mane and wiring it snagged up to scrutinize the fragments before bringing them to his chest. A faint trace of warmth still remained, but it warred with the coldness of the metal, creating patches of alternating temperatures that made his body shudder with an unpleasant chill.

He held the fragments to his chest for several long seconds, and closed his eyes as another hollow born of anguish had carved itself into his soul to join a myriad of older hollows. His heart of hearts screamed, yearning for the guilt and pain and dismay to just stop, but he hardly paid it any heed—for he knew there was no stopping that torrent of emotions. That torrent could only be contained. He had to be strong. He had a responsibility to shoulder. He was at the point of no return now.

The only comfort he could take was that Nath's suffering had reached its end long ago, but it did not dull that pain which lingered for so long already. It did not erase what he had done, and failed to do in the past—the evidence was right there, in his magical grasp, temperature still shifting erratically against his chest. It was in fragments; pieces of a whole construct that was evidence and tantamount to the suffering of a pony he failed to save.

A construct he, himself, had made blueprints for. A construct that would've been used for war, if it ever got the chance to see that use. But never again would those blueprints be used for such ill-boding purpose. He'd see to it himself that this atrocity would not be repeated, if it was the last thing he'd do.

Never again would anypony suffer as Nath had. This madness would end once horn crowns ceased existing. That, too, was something he could arrange.

He'd carry this to his own grave, if he had to.

He made the fragments of the crown vanish, and cast Nath one final look as the chamber shook with another passing of thunder. Her body stared into the middle distance, and would continue to do so for some time yet. She had become a statue, encased forever in ice, now the color of snow and charred stone. He turned to the foot of her throne and aligned the end of the torch with it before he began to chip away at the frost little by little. Delicately, he etched tiny lines that slowly grew in length and number; a small corner here, a burst there…

He did not stop until an image of some sort of beam bouncing between glass fragments had been formed on the throne. "Nopony should have their cutie mark forgotten…" Yukito said, well aware he was now the only living soul that was present in this tomb. Tenderly, he lifted a hoof to dust off the bits of snow from the mural that had formed with his carving, and studied it as it glistened in his light. He then turned away with a silent nod of saddened satisfaction and teleported to the doors to close them from outside, before he trotted to the forking paths and paused.

He studied that last path, though with his light as weak as it was, he couldn't see much save for a faint glow marking the hall's end. A hint of dread sparked in him, and he sighed through his nostrils to make sure it didn't spread. He stared at that distant light, legs reluctant to move.

For a moment, he let his mind drift as he started to make for the last chamber. Yet his thoughts did not gain coherency; they tumbled over each other, from one thing to the next. Everything, the weight of everything, crashed onto him and rolled around his hooves as he trotted, though the sheer enormity of it was something he had to set aside for the moment. He had to check and see if there was something here, and he had to be swift; there was no telling what the Corps was currently doing. He had no intention of staying to find out what that was.

When he reached the room and proceeded down the stairs, he spotted Alte; she had already greyed, and the room was already cold. Yukito dispelled his light once he finished the flight of stairs without letting go of the torch, and turned to the broken turbines which held her epitaph. Reading it confirmed that he was where he had to make his last stop, and once he was done with that he trotted forward until he stood nose to nose with the carcass, studying her agonized face.

For another moment, he imagined the horrible amount of pain Alte must have been in when her body became this mangled, and his soul shivered three seconds before his body followed suit. He turned to her damaged self-destruct mechanism and shuddered at the wounds its activation tore through her chest. If it had done this and kept her somewhat intact, that meant either she got a faulty mechanism, or it had been made that way to inflict this horrific agony on purpose.

He shivered again as his mind attempted to recreate her dying screams, using the wounds and anguished expression as a template to work with. It was little wonder Mira and Tsih had somehow reworked their wiring to accept mana boosters, if this was how the kamikaze soldiers went out—he found himself making a mental note to ask the pair about it at a later time. Turning his attention to the foot of her throne and spotting the pile of snow that formed around it, he silently lifted away entire clumps with his magic before uncovering bald patches on the floor, as well as a distinct lack of hind legs on Alte's behalf.

One of those bald patches had a small but hardy metal urn that gleamed in the light from above. It was as big as his pastern and decorated with a faded star mural on its lid, soft blue with hints of navy to compliment a tarnished and warped silver ring sitting snugly around its base. On it was carved an inscription paired with a picture of a constellation, so small and carefully etched onto the surface that Yukito had to tilt his head to see it.

'In this urn rests the ashes of Sirius, Alte's husband. May he rest in peace with his beloved,' it read.

Yukito stared at the urn for a moment, before he gently lifted it and its ring up off the floor with his magic to turn them both around once. As he did, he found another carving in the damaged ring, but through its grime and mangled state he had to peer even closer to make it out.

'Now, into the depths of eternity, I pledge myself to my beloved,' it simply said.

Yukito finished spinning it around and paused to stare at the ring's carving again. His soul shuddered with empathy and sympathy at the horribly-twisted meaning of that simple scrawling. Such phrases… were nothing more than things that got in the way of the soldiers' efficiency, as far as the warhawks were concerned, particularly those who kept sending more of their own troops to die during the Clash's worst days. Such phrases were but ill omens in that time, well-meaning yet horribly tragic.

And these married ponies had paid the ultimate price for it. It was a price Yukito himself narrowly avoided having to answer for, though now it hung over his own head, waiting to strike. That same omen that had visited Alte and Sirius was now focused on him and his group, and though the Clash of the Sky had long since passed, that mattered little to the powers that the old gods had commanded. He would have to watch over his withers, just to keep that omen at bay.

For now, though, it seemed content to let him pay his respects to this deceased couple. Yukito wasn't sure whether that was a mercy, or a cruelty in this case. He was careful to not question it, aloud or mentally.

He aligned the carvings on ring and urn so they both faced him, slowly enough to not jostle the lid and stir the ashes within, and studied them one last time. Whoever had made this for Sirius put a lot of care into it; that care was only matched by how well he had been entombed. A care that was reserved only for close family and friends… and, in a way, a final respect for the ashes that were, once, a living and breathing pony.

Carefully, he set the urn at Alte's side, on the armrest in the crook of her last leg, and replaced the snow right where he found it. The urn and ring adhered instantly, and ice spread on their surfaces to secure them in place, and it was then the mural lost whatever bits of color it still had left to turn a very dark grey that could've been mistaken for black. Part of him dared ponder what Sirius had done to wind up in an urn, but he caged and isolated the thought before it could finish forming—all that mattered to Yukito was that Sirius and his wife were side by side, even in death.

So few ponies could ever attain such an honor, especially posthumously. Alte was one of the lucky ones. And though he could tell that both had already gone onto their journey, he still told the pair quietly, "Rest well, you two. May you find the happiness you were meant to have in life within the cosmos." He turned and trotted to the broken wings, noticing an indent left in the ground that he had walked past and failed to notice before. Then he spotted the little carving of some lance-like object on the turbine before he conjured the oversized axe. He aligned the head with the gash in the stone, carefully enough to keep the two separate.

The size of the gash was a match for the length of the head. Yukito moved the axe to compare it to the carving; sans size, both were identical. He turned to read the epitaph accompanying the lance-carving once again before it all added up.

This was Mira's old friend. This was her axe he now carried.

And if she had no need of it anymore…

He made the axe vanish with a mute nod. It would be a disgrace to return it here and now. "I'll take care of it, and the drones if they belonged to you," he said, turning to Alte and Sirius with a final nod of respect their way.

Silence reigned in the tomb now. So did the cold, from the moment they were enshrined here, and into the depths of a dark eternity. Given the circumstances, neither could have asked for anything better.

They wouldn't be able to ask anymore; they left what remained of their physical bodies to the ravages of time now. But, they were together again…

So few were as lucky as they.

He teleported to the outside of the doors to close off the final tomb from the rest of the world. He turned to the torch he still carried once that job was done, and saw in its lifelessness the holes which had wounded his soul—the wounds that would never heal. The wounds that never could heal until he had set this whole mess right, one way or another; the wounds that would now, and always, have with them the sheer weight of all his consequences no matter what he'd done.

He saw his own weaknesses within the splinters, his failures in its decaying state, his sins and the spilt blood wrought of his own blueprints resonating where the flame should have been, and his anguish in its uniform shade of faded brown. For a moment, he saw himself in that torch, without bias or anypony else to point out what little good he had done.

He saw himself, as he was—the wool was no longer over his eyes anymore. He, too, was broken in some manner; his augments only accentuated that fact. The torch acted as a glassless mirror, upon which he reflected and scrutinized himself for several long minutes, before he made it vanish as his expression hardened.

"No," he told himself in a firm self-chastisement. "I will become better than that." With that, he teleported one more time and reappeared near the still-waiting carriage. Without any further words, and another nod to Sora, he opened the frontmost door and jumped in with a hoof grasping the handle to close it behind him.

Tsih had laid on the seat, eyes closed and head nestled between her forelegs. She didn't stir at the noise, much less the carriage rattling as Sora reoriented to take off again. Mira, however, sat on the floor and was wide awake, looking at Yukito intently. "Urn still there?" he asked, garnering a blunt nod for an answer. He sighed and ruffled his wings. As the carriage took off, and as Sora flew it along the Gorge, silence held for several minutes.

Both stallions could see that the other had something on his mind. What that was, neither said a word of it; instead, they mourned in their own little way. It was mutual; both had lost ponies dear to them. All they had left of those ponies were memories to reminisce on.

Memories weren't enough to heal the gaping hollows in their souls, though. They never were. Even as former enemies on opposite sides of a war ended scarcely two years ago, both Mira and Yukito understood that fact, and had no choice but to take it for what it was. Between them, it didn't make anything better nor worse; so they continued to silently mourn.

Yukito turned to the frontmost window, ruminating on his promises and watching as the Gorge's edge sailed by to one side. Then, it dipped lower and lower as Sora continued to beat her wings. He broke the silence, "She's gaining altitude."

Mira nodded, and turned to the window. "So she is," he observed mirthlessly. He noticed her wings were flapping a little faster than usual, especially for those of such a size. "She's troubled."

Yukito could only nod to that. "Has been for a while," he agreed. "Even before we got married, she was… keeping reservations to herself."

"So, uh…" Mira pursed his lips, and they quivered as he struggled to put thoughts into words. "This is gonna sound weird, but… you two fight from time to time?"

Yukito turned to Mira, brows arched. He took a moment to put his dismay back in that special section of his soul before answering, "... yes, why?"

"Huh. Was curious, since you… uh, you've been, um…" Mira turned away, ears flattening as he closed his mouth to stop stumbling over his tongue. "Just forget we said anything." Yukito nodded and turned to the backside window, and found Omega and Starbreaker asleep on opposite ends of their seat. Both had ears twitching every few seconds, but past that they were peaceful—faces serene, legs not moving anymore than an inch or so, and tails as still as the snow outside.

He turned back to the frontmost window and sighed to himself. He watched as the lightning up above dimmed further and further until the sky was black as coal without any streaks of electricity to contrast it. "The storm's waning," he mused.

Mira nodded again, and a thought struck him. "We wonder… do windigos mourn their dead, the way we mourn ours?" he asked. Yukito didn't make a retort to that, for he had none to give. He'd have to wait for another landing to make camp for the night, making a mental note to tell Sora about the crown and drone at a later time.

But his mental gears ground to a stop when the drone and broken crown crossed his mind as that isolated part of his soul asked in a scathing tone, "What are you going to tell her, you numbnut? That you robbed from the dead?" For the second time in a row, he'd been blindsided by questions that wouldn't have sounded anymore innocent than if they came from Tsih.

Once more, he was dumbstruck. So little in his life had even given him any knowledge on how to answer the question; as the carriage rattled, the question warred with the rest of him, and so went without answer.