private IC: Return of the King (1x1 with Catpone Cerberus)

[Catpone Cerberus 23,539]

@Props Valroa
"I doubt she cares where I am if she has any further interest to find me." Una pointed out, while glancing at Flint's wanted poster next to them "I of course trust your judgment, but..." she lit her horn to grab the poster, but instead her horn flickered out and she winced "...I'm not much use if we get seen, it feels like my horn is on fire, and it makes it hard to focus." "I'm starting to think that whatever she did to me, did something to my magic." she sounded quite annoyed, which was new coming from her "This isn't just regular headache." 

 

[King Sombra]

@Catpone Cerberus

Sombra hissed with frustration at Una's situation. "Whatever it is, keep it under control. She might have done something to affect your emotional state.  I am going to need you to stay here, or at least to where I can find you. Don't interact with others if you can help it, and keep your mouth shut whenever around them." Sombra stated, and gave Una a chance to voice any other opinions or thoughts. If there was not much resistance from her, Sombra's body would evaporate into black shadow quickly, and would discreetly begin his way into the Guard Headquarters - he didn't search the place entirely last time, so it was time to find out the location of the Elements of Harmony. Such a thing was likely within the Guard Captain's possession. 

[Catpone Cerberus 23,539]

@Props Valroa
"Obviously" was Una's simple answer, her voice was respectful as always, be it bit annoyed from the pain, but it wasn't quite the usual 'understood your highness', though, it was still probably better than just a soundless nod. And so, as Sombra left, Una stayed; she pulled the wanted poster from the wall and crumbled it with her hoofs, dropping it on the ground and then trying to pick it up with her magic, her magic worked fine, she just couldn't keep it ignited because it hurt, so, she would just need to desensitize herself to it, so as Sombra was gone, she ignited her magic again, and again, and again.

If Sombra went through paperwork again, he'd find a notable lack of Elements of harmony, or well, the elements themselves, as well as the six ponies were mentioned, but there was no hints on locations or such regarding the elements, closest thing being mention of the names of the six ponies. There were even already some reports about the seeming disappearance of Applejack, as during the day between now and her death, some of her family members had asked the other element wielders if they had seen her, she hadn't been reported missing yet, but it was more a 'if you happen to see her' type of deal, for now. 

There was also some mentions of Flint, how she was dangerous, and about her being wanted; two cases of arson, two cases of breaking and entering, resisting arrest, injuring several guards, destruction of property, escaping from custody, assisting in theft....among a long list of similar crimes all around Equestria suspected to be her doing.

[King Sombra]

@Catpone Cerberus

Sombra went through the paperwork as he could - moving about in a silent manner from room to room. He'd eventually locate that the reports about Applejack being missing, which made him smirk evily - as he knew that she was now deceased. Inevitably, Rarity would also be reported missing eventually - after she would have not "come back" when she said she would have from the small trip she took. Seeing the paperwork about Flint made him sigh angrily, seeing that even the Equestrian Guard had been completely unable to defeat her - what she had been up to was no surprise. Flint answered to no authority at all and did whatever she wanted, there was seemingly no stopping that. 

Now that he was here - he realized that he could also brainwash the guard themselves, at least the Guard Captain and the upper elites. If he had encountered them here, he would have proceeded to put on the hidden disks into their manes. He figured that since they were so small - and that something of their character would never be predicted, that they wouldn't be discovered. If he had successfully been able to do so with the Guard Captain and the Elites of the guard, he'd lead them to one of their offices to where he could ask about the location of the Elements of Harmony directly and anything else they might know about what may be useful to finding them. 

 

[Catpone Cerberus 23,539]

@Props Valroa
Not all of the higher ranking guards were around, as currently only one's in their offices were the Captain of the Canterlot guard, and few lower ranking officers, doing some paperwork; it turned out that the little chaos that Sombra and Flint had caused lately was quite big in the grand scheme of things, as nothing really happened in Equestria that the guard had to deal with, and instead they were more a fancy law enforcement than anything, with the elements and the princesses dealing with bigger threads; thus why they had such trouble with Flint too, actually dangerous individuals like here were very rare. 

When it came to the elements, there was no clear answer, while explained in longer way, the short of it was: The elements were not under the guard's jurisdiction, and while they had been stored in Celestia's personal vault for a long time, since they became princess Twilight's responsibility, they had been relocated and the guard hadn't been informed where. The only solid information they could give was the identities of the wielders, and where they lived, but other than that they could only guess, and they assumed that the elements would probably be stored somewhere in Twilight's castle, though they also warned that they most likely have good protection, since Discord had managed to steal them once before, and after that the security of the elements had been a big topic of conversation. 

 

[King Sombra]

@Catpone Cerberus

This had only confirmed Sombra's suspicions about the Elements - they were kept inside of the castle itself under some form of magical protection. It was very likely such protection would void or nullify his dark magic - so he would need some other way to get in to retrieve them. It was also likely that the Guards would not know how to get into the castle to get them - though he'd ask anyway about that. He'd also ask if the Guards he was conversing with knew anything about secret weapons or anything that may be of further use. Sombra thought to himself that he could potentially destroy the Castle - but that would be a massive task, and besides, the castle itself looked like a place he could potentially rule from. He enjoyed the thought of corrupting the Castle and turning it into everything about himself. He would also ask if the Guards had access to other locations that were out of public view that could potentially hold more answers to his cause. At the very least nobody knew of Sombra's existence other than Flint and Una, as well as that other strange dragon he had encountered - so it is likely the guards would blame the current activities on Flint. 

[Catpone Cerberus 23,539]

@Props Valroa
Sombra was right regarding the castle, as the guards would tell him that they didn't know much about the castle's defenses as Twilight had decided, against their suggestions, to not have any guard presence in the castle, nor had she created a local branch for that either, so the guard didn't know much more about it than anyone else could learn by just asking. For a secret weapons, the answer was no, as it was questioned why they would have something like that, the last thing resembling war had been with Sombra when he first made the Crystal Empire disappear, and the only threats not defeated by spears and magic, were dealt with by the princesses or the elements.

It was also mentioned that they didn't really even know where Twilight's castle came from, as there had been lot of colors and then it kinda just appeared.

For other private areas, it was mainly the tunnels in Canterlot, as there wasn't really any secret rooms or stuff, just storage, archives , armories and other stuff like that was restricted from the public, and in locations not known for the public, but not 'secret' in that way. The biggest thing was probably that the tunnels also had entrances to the Canterlot Castle, but none of those lead to any 'secrets' either, as they were simply ways for the guards to move safely and unnoticed in case of something bigger happening. The most secret thing was probably the private library in the Canterlot castle, which held information, mostly magical research, that could be dangerous in wrong hooves, but it was mentioned that the most dangerous stuff from there was moved to the Princesses' vault after someone stole a spell from the library and used it.

[King Sombra]

@Catpone Cerberus

Even though Sombra hadn't found what he had wanted here, at the very least he was able to rule something out. The castle seemingly appearing out of nowhere as had been told to him made no sense at all, and it made him think that the castle was something else. He couldn't put a hoof on it, but he had a sneaking suspicion there was something else at work if it was said that Twilight herself didn't know about it at all. It also didn't make much sense with how little the Guards knew, with it being something that was for the Princesses themselves. Though thinking about it more, it did kind of make sense - as there had been no real major wars, only isolated incidents requiring a few individuals of great power in modern times. In order to find what he needed - he needed to find a way to get inside Twilight's castle. To do that, he likely needed to find allies who had more knowledge in such matters than him.

With that in mind, he would return to Una's location where she was last. Whether or not she would be there - that would be Sombra's next concern. Anything could have happened while he was inside the Guard Headquarters.