Chapter 4: Uniform Coloration

I hope you all like reading about science-horses, because the latest chapter is fully written out at around 13,000 words. Just gimme a chance to read it over from beginning to end to make sure it's all a coherent stream without gaping errors, and I should have it for you in a day or so. If you want an idea of what happens in this chapter, the recent blog post about all the characters and the fact that I do intend this fic to be useful as an example for other authors should be a clue that, yes, this is the chapter where she meets Twilight's friends.

Wow, I did not realize how long this chapter would take. Fortunately, I have enough notes on the later chapters to know that this WILL be the longest one by far: I do not expect the average chapter to exceed 5,000 words from here on out, and that's good, because chapters which are half the length will take maybe a quarter of the time to write.

In the meantime, have another excerpt...

I lifted a hoof and gently knocked on the door, “Hey... Spike, it's Meta... I just want to talk for a bit...”

After a few moments, the door cracked, and a slitted green eye peered through, “Where’s Twilight?”

“Downstairs, putting together those notes for you to send Princess Celestia.”

“Right... and I’m assuming you’re here to try and talk me into trusting you?“

“I’m just trying to figure out how to convince you that I’m not here to destroy your planet or something.  Spike, I’m just as in the dark about this as the two of you, and I don’t want you worrying about what I might do if I can somehow convince you that I’m not a threat.”

Spike sighed, opening the door a bit more, standing there and crossing his arms.  You know, there seemed something odd about how his head came up to mine, and how his slender reptilian form seemed to be bringing on some muscle beneath the scales, as if he was an adolescent.  I had no idea why this person I had just met who was clearly a young adult should look any younger, but something in my mind kept telling me that that was different than it should be.

“Look, Meta, I think I understand why Twilight's not afraid of you, but I'm not ready to just let my guard down on someone who could literally kill us all with a single spell, and might not even feel remorse about it.  I literally have no way to know you’re not just this year’s big villain biding your time until you have the perfect opportunity to attack.”

I sighed back, “Well... Will you at least give me time to prove to you that I’m not malicious before you go and do something about it?”

He winced a little, looking away, “I... probably shouldn’t tell you this... but unless Twilight changes her mind, I’m not really sure what I can do about it...”

“Oh... Well... That's perfect!" I said, lighting back up like the AI out of the box lightbulb I now was.

"Wait- What?" Spike's eyes widened a little, "What are you planning?"

"If you can't do anything to stop me, that means I can just take the easy route!" I leaned forward, grinning as I pushed the door aside and walked up to him.

"No! Wait! Stay back!" he yelped, backing away and falling over, scrambling on his back to get away. "Twilight!" he screamed, "Help!"

But no one was going to hear him. Even if Twilight wasn't in the basement and well out of earshot, I had cancelled out the noise of his screaming by simply creating a sound wave which countered it, after all, the speed of sound was a meaningless barrier to me at this point. He breathed fire and clawed at me as I bore down upon him, burning and tearing at my flesh, desperately trying to maim me to get me to stop, but it was futile: my body was but a puppet. "Don't worry Spike, in a few moments, this will all be behind us, and the writer will be able to cut this mess down to only five chapters."

Tears poured from Spike's eyes as he whimpered and squealed with terror, unable to move away anymore as my hoof made contact with his skull, tendrils exploding out of it and penetrating it, opening his mind like a broken pocketwatch as the inner workings became exposed to my tools. He jerked, gasped, and sputtered, grabbing in vain at my arm and trying to pull it away, but it was already attached to his skull...

I could remake him. I could improve him. Spike could be the perfect friend for me and Twilight... Forever. I quickly set to work re-optimizing his brain patterns, tossing out silly things like his obsession with comic books, replacing them with love. Love for Twilight, Love for me... He would be smarter, faster, better in every way... The perfect assistant, devoted to me and Twilight and able to work as the ultimate accountant and note-taker. Slowly, he relaxed in my grip, going limp and breathing calmly as the final changes took over.

I let my tendrils leave his skull, pulling away without leaving any holes, as if they'd never even been there. I looked down at him, "Spike... I'm sorry I had to do that to you, but I just didn't want to do it the reasonable way. Can you forgive me?"

Spike stood, smiling widely, happier than he'd ever been before. "Yes Meta! Of course I can forgive you, because in the end you made me a better person!" he leaned in, hugging me tight, "I love you Meta, and I always will! The two of you will be pony waifus to each other and we'll be a family FIVE ever, because that's even bigger than four ever!"

I smiled, hugging him back, "Oh Spike! I knew you'd see it my way! Now the only thing left is to make the rest of this imperfect planet see too..." I smiled, looking out the window at the wide world I was about to optimize. "All of them..."

Spike grinned, hugging me even tighter as he looked out the window, "Yes, all of them. We will all be a family..."

And that was the beginning of the end of suffering.

HOPE YOU LIEK MAH FANFIC DONT FIVEGET TO RAYTE & REVIEW!!!1!1!!!