“Expedition force three-seventy, report to designated hangar bay and get ready for deployment.”

“Come on, Corporal, wake up,” Lieutenant Morrison uttered.

Abel opened his eyes and rubbed them as he yawned. “We finally going?” he asked, looking to his right and across the mess hall, watching as the other Guardsmen enjoyed their meals. Annah stepped into his line of sight, looking into his eyes.

“We’ve been waiting for deployment for hours now,” she said, standing up and flaring open the metallic, razor sharp wings of her suit. “Don’t make the wait any longer.” She leaned over the table and picked up her faceplate, putting it on and prompting a small stream of gas to shoot out as it pressurized.

Abel stretched before grabbing his own faceplate and putting it on, then reached for his rifle, placing it behind his back and activating the magnetic locks of his armor. He stood up along with Morrison.

“Let’s go,” the Lieutenant said. “Hangar’s close, just on the adjacent sector.” He motioned for Annah and Abel to follow.

“So where exactly are we going?” Abel asked.

“We’re not sure yet,” Annah replied, “just some jungle far to the east of the main continent.”

“Huh,” Abel mumbled as they passed through a doorway, out of the mess hall and into a long corridor. “Nothing else? Seems odd for command to be so vague about this.”

“We’re expecting a ‘special asset’ to debrief us once we get to our dropship,” Morrison said, rounding a corner and slowing to a halt before a large set of blast doors.

“Special asset?” Annah inquired, watching as the doors split open. “Some special forces douchebag, I bet.”

“Yeah,” Abel chuckled. “We’ll just have to see, I guess.”

As the blast doors opened to their fullest, the group of Guardsmen walked through and into a massive hangar. Pilots could be seen walking between the many crafts, carrying supplies or maintaining their own. On the ceiling were many other ships, stacked neatly against each other, waiting to be needed once again.

The squad walked over to a landing pad, heading for their designated dropship. They watched as the boarding ramp slowly opened, allowing for a small pony wearing an explorer’s hat to walk out. The three guardsmen looked down at her.

Annah folded her arms. “Who the hell let you on board?” she scoffed.

“Easy, Sergeant,” Morrison tapped her on the shoulder, then looked down at the mare. “I don’t suppose you’re the ‘special asset’, are you?”

“Indeed I am,” the mare replied. “Daring Do, at your service!” She gazed up at the humans, smiling.

“So, uh,” Abel began, raising an eyebrow, “what’s the mission, boss?”

Daring motioned for them to follow as she walked back up the ramp and into the troop bay. “When I found out you humans were doing expedition missions,” she exclaimed, turning to face the squad, “I couldn’t help but to ask to take part! See, I’m an explorer,” the mare smiled, adjusting her hat, “and I’ve been documenting my travels for several years now.”

“Then what’s the point of these missions if the locals already did the work?” Abel asked, sitting down on one of the seats and strapping himself tight. He looked over at the other two humans, who were doing the same.

“Well…” Daring began. “We really had no idea of how large this planet actually was until your people popped up.” The ramp began to close. “As it turns out, most of it is uncharted… Where we’re going right now is far from anywhere anypony has been before, and without your help, it would’ve taken me weeks to get there!”

“Where exactly are we going?” Morrison asked.

“A temple!” Daring exclaimed. “One that I had only seen references to in old writing inside, well, other temples.” She grinned to herself. “I thought it was a dead end at first, but then your people began doing orbital scans of the terrain! Turns out there is an actual temple there!”

“Taking off in one minute,” the pilot said through the intercom. “Buckle up.”

“Uhm…” Daring blushed, walking over to Abel, who raised an eyebrow behind his faceplate. “They don’t have seats for ponies, sooo…. Could you hold me?” Annah snickered as Abel picked Daring up, holding her tight against his chest. “T-thank you…” the pony muttered.

“Taking off,” the pilot said as the ramp locked itself closed. All those inside the dropship could hear the roar of the engines as they blazed to life. Abel looked down at Daring Do, who flinched as she felt the force of the craft taking flight. “We’ve got liftoff, reaching destination in three. Enjoy the ride, Guardsmen.”

“So what exactly do you find in these Temples, Daring?” Annah asked, tilting her head to the side.

“Treasure,” the mare began, “relics, idols, bones…” she trailed off. “I even found an ancient toilet once.”

“Good to know your species has mastered sewage,” Abel chuckled. “Seriously though, what can we expect when we get to this temple?”

“Are we expecting trouble?” Morrison asked.

“I just hope you’re not afraid of spiders.” Daring smiled. “Usually these places are laden with traps and the occasional convoluted riddle you need to solve in order to keep going forward. You three shouldn’t have any problems with such things.”

The group fell silent, with only the sound of the ship’s engines still roaring. Abel looked down at the little pony. “Gosh these things are tiny…” he thought to himself. “And fragile, too…”

“Reaching LZ,” the pilot called out. “Get ready for deployment.”

Abel undid the straps of his seat and let Daring on the floor. She dusted herself off and looked back up at him, muttering, “Thanks.” Abel nodded, then reached over his back and grabbed a hold of his rifle.

The ramp began to open. “Touching down,” the pilot said.

Abel leaned down and gazed out the back of the ship, his visor polarizing as the bright sun shone. A few dozen meters away was a pyramid, surrounded by all kinds of plants, some that roze many meters up into the sky. A flock of birds took flight as he and his squad stepped out of the ship, boots digging into the earth, followed by Daring Do.

“Looks an awful lot like the pictures of pyramids they showed us in pre-school…” Annah muttered.

“Good luck, squad,” the pilot said. “I’ll stay here and wait for exfil.”

“Come on!” Daring exclaimed, zipping between Morrison’s legs and beginning a brisk trot towards the entrance to the temple. The humans looked at each other and shrugged, then followed suit.

“Now this…” Daring stopped in front of the entrance, gazing into the pure darkness inside. “This is old…” She bit into some of the vines covering the way and ripped them off, before spitting them away. “Older than anything else I’ve seen so far…”

Abel stepped up and turned on his suit’s shoulder lamps, illuminating the entrance. A few bugs crawled out of sight once they received light, then some bats flew past the group and into the jungle. “Do you, uh… Do you recognize the architecture, anything?” he asked, looking inside.

“Honestly?” Daring asked, looking into the hole as well. “I’ve no clue.”

“Let’s go inside,” Morrison said, turning on his flashlights as well.

Abel aimed his rifle, then crouched through and into the temple, followed by the others. Their footsteps echoed around the chasms as they walked wandered inside, illuminating the walls with their lights, sometimes shining into broken mirrors that diverted the light everywhere. Daring carefully trekked through, occasional glancing and stopping before a wall to examine it. “Look at all these crystal torches…” Daring tapped one of them with her hoof, prompting it to sparkle a little bit. She glanced up, and made her way to where it had fallen from the nearby wall.

“Strange…” she muttered, blowing a cobweb off the wall and revealing writing behind it. Daring took a few steps forward. “I’ve never seen writing like this in my entire life.”

“Can you make sense of some of it?” Abel asked, looking up to see a spider staring at them from above.

She looked up to see slots on the ceiling with broken glass covered by vines and other plants. “I see glyphs of lightning, and these look like ancient Equestrian for the word ‘Light’...” Daring replied. “This temple probably had some importance to whoever built it… ‘Light’... Maybe that means something...”

"For a temple about light, place seems real short on it now," Annah said. "Let's keep moving. I don't like this."

“Sergeant Annah Teresa: scared of the dark…” Morrison chuckled. “That’s one for the records.”

“Shut up,” Annah retorted, flaring her wings open angrily.

“No time for arguing,” Daring mentioned. “Something inside of this place needs to be found, somewhere…” She motioned for the humans to follow her as she continued delving deeper into the ruins.

A long, distant howl of wind echoed through the chambers. “A draft…” the mare muttered, looking to the right. “Shine a light over there,” she commanded.

The humans aimed their flashlights to where she pointed, illuminating a long, ominous hallway. She motioned for them to follow, and so they did. “There’s some writing here.” She stopped, squinting while observing the wall.

“Threadess Shines and Smiles Upon Us…?”

“What’s that mean?” Abel asked.

“I’ve no idea-” Daring was cut off as the floor below them began to crack under pressure. “Watch out!” she yelled, opening her wings and hovering in place.

“Stupid-” was all Annah could spout out before the entire section of the floor they were in broke open, sending the three humans down a massive chasm. They each perfectly maneuvered in the air, each landing on the ground below with a small quake.

Abel returned to a standing position and grabbed his rifle, dusting off his armor.

“Are you okay!?” Daring yelled as she flew down the hole. “Damnit, how am I gonna get you out of here?”

Morrison opened the jet vents on his suit, producing a small flame. “We solved that problem centuries ago,” he said, motioning towards Annah, who had her metallic wings open.

“Oh…” Daring rubbed her temple with a hoof. “Right.” She looked to the far side of the cave they were at, noticing a faint glimmer at the other end. “Let’s keep going!”

With the humans in tow, Daring lead them towards the light. “Impossible…” she muttered as a new chamber came into view.

All along the circular chamber were purple and pink crystals, each burning with an unnatural flame. Abel and the humans slowly walked in, taking in the visage of colour, noticing several letters, glowing red hot, that were engraved on what seemed like a coffin that sat in the center of the room.

“This is incredible!” Daring Do yelled, fluttering around the chamber. “This is ALL. NEW!” she exclaimed, reading the glowing text on the walls. “Somebody was here recently and built this! Look at all these magic runes!”

“What does the writing say?” Abel asked, carefully stepping closer to the coffin.

“Threadess…” she muttered. “Someone or something was buried here not too long ago, something named ‘Threadess’...”

The whole room grew silent, the runes began to glow stronger. Abel found himself lost, somehow. He squinted, stepping closer to the coffin, beginning to hear strange whispers…

“Come closer…”

Abel extended a hand, slowly laying it on top of the coffin. In a flash, it burst open, shoving the man back with tremendous force.

He lay against the broken stone, dazzled, then weakly looked up to see a cloud of white mist floating above him.

“There is a war coming… They want to exterminate all, and will hear no plea.”

Daring Do turned around as she heard a loud crash, only to see that the coffin had opened and that Abel was lying against the wall, unconscious. “What the hell was that!?” Morrison yelled, rushing over to the man. Daring flew over to the coffin, looking inside.

“What happened!?” Annah yelled, rushing over to the man as well.

The mare frowned, biting her lip. “Whatever was inside the coffin is… gone.”

“Command, this is Lieutenant Morrison of Expedition Force Three-Seventy!” Morrison yelled. “We need immediate evac, we’ve got an injured man!”