27th September 2012
08:14 GMT -7
"In here."
The ziggurat we just climbed up is… Actually kind of unimpressive. There are no vine-covered houses abandoned due to some natural disaster surrounding it, no piles of dust where the people failed to outrun a pyroclastic flow. It's just kind of
there, far enough up the valley wall to plant itself over a spring whose waters flow into the Basin proper but not so far up as to be easily visible.
Parts of the stonework have clearly been corroded by time, but in other places I see where someone has been making repairs. Not poor quality by any means, but noticeably of a different age to the slabs around it.
The fires in the braziers are obviously fairly recent, given that several large cats are curled up around them.
"Those are Ahuizotl's cats!"
I glance at Rainbow Dash, then at the diminutive example of felix catus currently licking its rear left leg. It raises its head for a moment to look at me, then returns industriously to its licking.
"Good show. Ah, Chief Grain Store, I've been wondering. You've got all these marvellous stone buildings, but you live in small huts. What's up with that?"
"Many generations ago, we began expanding outside of the Basin into lands where it was easier to farm. Then there was a civil war, and most of the survivors decided to make their homes in the new lands. And… Honestly, living in a home that is filled with death traps is not a pleasant way to spend time."
Rainbow Dash squints. "Why don't you just, y'know, turn them off?"
"They wouldn't be very good traps if you could just 'turn them off'. And even if you could, you would end up walking half way down a corridor and then thinking to yourself, 'Did I remember to turn it off this morning?'. And then you'd turn it off but you
did turn it off that morning and now you've turned it on."
One of his bodyguards nods sombrely.
"And then there is the seepage. They were great buildings in their day, but only a few people would want to live there now."
I frown. "Okay, but if everyone else left, why are you still here?"
"These are some of the greatest monuments our people ever created. We still live here so that we can protect them and maintain them. Each tribe spends a year here on rotation, and tend their own lands the rest of the time."
"How many of you ponies
are there?"
"Why would I tell
you?"
Makes sense. Despite what modern Equestrian myth-making would have its citizens believe, there's no obvious reason why all of the ponies fleeing Ponyland would have gone in the same direction.
Grain Store trots up the steps to the small room at the top and knocks his left forehoof against the stone.
"Guardian Ahuizotl! Guests!"
The curtain serving as the chamber door is pulled aside in an instant, and the
large black and blue baboon-looking creature stands proudly in the doorway.
Except that his left eye isn't quite focusing. And his tail-hand has a plaster cast with several decorative hoofprints on it. And while his fur covers it up fairly well, I can see patches of stuck-together fur where he's been cut and the wound has scabbed over. And his stance is lopsided where he's trying not to put too much weight on his left hand.
Whatever he
is, he clearly doesn't come with accelerated healing.
He grins, taking a deep breath, presumably preparing to launch into some great villainous diatribe. Those are always fun, and I've been on both sides in my day. Then he sees something and deflates slightly.
"Chief Grain Store. Why are our 'guests' not tied up?"
"Because they're guests. Not… 'Guests'."
"Oh. Well, what do they-?" He blinks, then walks past Grain Store and towards myself and Rainbow Dash. "What do you want?"
I smile. "It has been brought to my attention that far from being a respectable archaeologist, Daring Do is in fact a serial antiquities thief who should face the full force of the law. I was interested to see if you would be willing to provide testimony for the investigators and eventually in court."
Ahuizotl stares at me for a moment. Then he blinks in confusion.
"What do you want?"
Ah, concussion. I
nod, and a purple ray drone materialises behind him and shoots him with a purple healing beam. Grain Store takes a step back in surprise, but Ahuizotl himself blinks and starts to stand up a little straighter.
Then he focuses on us.
"The blue one! You
dare to face
me?!"
"Ah, yeah, look, I've…"
"To the piranha pit!"
Grain Store shakes his head. "We don't have one. It was in the Fortress, and..."
"Oh. Crocodile pit?"
Miss Dash flies up to hover in front of him. "No pits! Look, it… It sounds like Daring Do was basically just stealing a bunch of stuff from your old buildings or whatever-" Ahuizotl's mouth falls open slightly and he stares at Miss Dash. "-but I still wanna know why you threatened everypony with eight hundred years of scorching heat."
Ahuizotl twists his head to the side.
"If I could actually bring about eight hundred years of scorching heat, don't you think I'd have done it by now?"
"Wait. So you-? It
wouldn't have brought about eight hundred years-."
"N
o! I just had a great idea. What if rather than stealing all of the Tenochtitlan Basin's greatest treasures, I just make up a story about a fake one, make a pile of rings out of cheap stone and paint it gold and then put it somewhere where I can trap her! If she didn't take the bait then I wouldn't really lose anything, if she did then maybe I finally get her. At worst, she gets a worthless fake."
Miss Dash blinks in confusion.
"But… The whole Fortress collapsed."
"Yes." He nods sadly. "Seepage. It's very bad. The ancient ponies who lived in these lands built many remarkable buildings but knew basically nothing about drainage."
"So they
couldn't control the sun?"
"Of
course not. How would a-? They were made of
chalk. I'm surprised they didn't fall apart when you picked them up."
Miss Dash opens her mouth to complain, then drops to stand on the stone surface of the ziggurat. Perhaps not entirely clear what she would be complaining
about.
I take a step closer. "Mister Ahuizotl, would you be willing to detail all of Daring Do's thefts? I intend to lean on the Equestrian government to charge her criminally for her actions. Would you be prepared to testify?"
"She will be put in prison?"
"Yes, and the artefacts she stole will be returned and I imagine that Princess Celestia will want to establish some sort of regular government contact to prevent this sort of thing from happening again."
"Will there be
piranha in this prison?"
"
Probably not."
"Crocodiles?"
"No. No crocodiles. But how long has a crocodile actually been able to keep hold of her?"
Ahuizotl mutters to himself indecisively for a moment.
"I will testify. But can I be there when she is arrested?"
I nod. "I believe that we can make that happen."
