//------------------------------// // Things Go Wrong // Story: A Crossover // by Dudofall //------------------------------// A bell rang continuously, going unnoticed by the small robotic form exiting the elevator it was announcing. After a moment, the ringing stopped. The elevator doors closed automatically. The robot floated cautiously through the nondescript hallway, keeping one eye on a map only it could see. It could not afford exposure to any network at this delicate stage in the proceedings of its plan. The downloaded map was its most recent datum from an external source. Fortunately, it had a few critical files stored in memory besides, including a map of the city, the location of Mr. Olde's Laboratory in Progress, and, despite its uselessness, a guide to the best bagel eateries in town. As robots could not taste bagels, they had no reason to eat them. It reached the front door, then scanned ahead with its thermal sensor. A group of people were headed directly towards it! The robot didn't have the capability to panic, but nevertheless there was definite urgency in its movements as it rushed back towards the elevator. "I reckon Mr. Olde is somewhere around here," Anne said confidently. "Ya weren't thinking too clearly when we checked his apartment, were ya Armald?" He shrugged. "Just putting off this quote unquote laboratory for as long as possible, I guess." Allen waved goodbye to Gillam. Bill was counting on his fingers, still befuddled by the amount of space in his friend's truck. Eventually said vehicle drove off. Everyone jumped, as a bell rang from the other side of the door. Anne opened it and rushed through, only to spot the top of the elevator descending and a flash of otherworldly light. Armald stepped behind her. "Are we going to have to take the stairs?" he whined. *** The flash of light briefly overloaded the robot's sensors. There was a brief yelp of surprise, followed by the sound of a four hoofed creature backing away. Gradually, the robot's sight returned. It saw a pony princess with flowing hair and a golden crown. "Um...Hello, boatbot, I mean, botboat. My name is Celestia. Have you seen any humans nearby?" The robot hesitated for a zeptosecond before replying. "A group of humans was detected shortly before the elevator began its descent." "Were you frightened?" Celestia wrapped a wing around its trapezoidal body maternally. "Humans are nothing to be afraid of, especially the nice ones." Robots cannot facepalm. This one was tempted to design itself a new body specifically for that purpose. "Robots do not feel fear." "There's nothing wrong with being afraid of humans," the princess reassured. "Affirmative." "Has anything notable happened to the monitor project? I would ask Mary, but she's quite busy at the moment." The robot hesitated for one thousand zeptoseconds. "It is believed that all Monitor prototype bodies were infected with a virus by Mary and her AI associate." "Believed by whom, exactly?" The princess' voice seemed to lose a few degrees of warmth. "Lab administration." The pony put a hoof to her chin. "With Mr. Olde gone, who exactly is Lab administration?" The jig was practically up. "Error 1851: Answering the question requires too much computing power." With that, the robot slid speedily through the opening elevator doors and into the drab cement hallway that was designated to become Lab 5. It was almost free. Celestia had other plans, so she held it in her magic. "You can drop the act, monitor. I know it's you," she smirked. "Since you know so much, maybe you can tell me this: what exactly have I done wrong?" The Monitor asked. "I'm only considered evil because I'm fighting Mr. Olde! That's a terrible justification!" Celestia paused. "You've deceived members of the staff. You killed a squirrel and put a copy of you inside it. You look evil." "Those are shaky justifications and you know it! Face it, you have no reason to fight me. Mary will not be harmed in any way by my plans, and I'll even spare the dunderheads up there on the ground floor." The princess ruminated. The glow of her horn undulated and pulsated as she thought. "Very well. I will leave you be, for now. However, the moment you show your true intentions, do not doubt that I will be there to stop you." With that, the Monitor was released. He wasted no time in activating his cloaking device and vanishing into the gray distance. *** I don't immediately recognize my present location, but it looks cavernous enough to be somewhere underneath my laboratory-in-progress. At least the monitor prototype is "playing dead" nearby. I resolve to question him further when he "awakens." It is at precisely this moment that a small translucent creature approaches me. It is shaped like a large bubble with two smaller bubbles on one side, as well as a pair of arms holding a small horseshoe-shaped organism covered in what look like potato eyes. It appears to lack a mouth, but somehow manages to say something to me. "Flageleye! Flag flag!" "Indeed," I say thoughtfully. The monitor prototype chooses this moment to come online. "I call BS," he says, "there's no way you know what that thing wants." "Flag!" The creature points away from us, then moves in the same direction. I smile. "Of course we shall follow you!" Without a second thought, I lift the prototype in my magic and follow the Flag organism. It leads us down a long corridor lined with perfectly round rocks. The walls are stone, and lit only slightly by the flag creature's bioluminescence. "Where are we?" The protoytpe asks. I chuckle. "How should I know, I'm not the one endowed with a positioning system!" If he could frown, I can tell he would. "Obviously it's damaged, or else why would I ask you in the first place?" "Damaged?" "Yes. Something about jumping through the multiverse with an extra passenger really plays havoc with my systems. You're welcome, by the way, for the seat of the pants calculations that kept you alive. I'm not always the dumbest one in the room." "Flageye!" The creature says. It looks like we're here. Where exactly here is, I have yet to find out. There are six walls to this chamber, and they eventually converge into a single point of ceiling. Under this point there is a clear pool of some liquid. The flageye wiggles over to it and swims below the surface. "That's deeper than your standard puddle," the prototype observes, "mind if I get a closer look?" I do not, and float him closer to the liquid. He scans it with methodical precision. "It's deep. Like, really really deep. Deep enough that only I could survive the pressure. How far does your magic reach?" I put a hoof to my chin. "I've never actually tested that before." "Well you wouldn't want to lose me!" I throw him into the drink. Bizarrely, I can still feel him in my grasp under the surface. I cautiously drop him further. He remains relatively close, until something tries to pull him down. I yank him back to me, and he jumps out of the pool. I set him down gently, then set myself down as well. "That was too close!" "I agree." It seems my power is not infinite. "That thing down there, it was like a flageye but way bigger! It must be the flageye's father!" "Why not a mother?" "Hey, remember when you said I had to categorize unknown-gendered objects as male? Well the other me still hasn't fixed that!" "Or he has, but you've been disconnected so he hasn't sent you the patch. Speaking of which, did you happen to receive any messages from the network? We seem to be under my facility." His lights flicker as he checks. "Actually, even the long range radio signals aren't recognizable down here. I think we're nowhere close to your planet even! You're actually really lucky, we probably should've ended up in space, or on a planet covered in lava or something. You're welcome again, since that didn't happen." "Quiet, I think I hear something." "What?" he asks in defiance of my request. There are thuds in the distance that sound a lot like footsteps. "Whatever it is, I don't wanna be here when it is. Sounds big, like some kind of mutant squirrel-bear hybrid." I put a hoof to my forehead. "Why does everything you talk about have to be a squirrel?" "Shrug. Other me was in a bit of a phase when he made me. He wanted to make a prototype that was inside a dead squirrel, actually. I wonder if he ever got around to it?" I ignore his prattling and magically drag him closer to the pool. I then stand next to him and place a hoof on his exterior. I'm about to ask a life-and-death question. "Can you transport us both out of here? Last time you were caught off guard, but now you'll know everything you need to about who is travelling." *** "He's gone?!" Twilight shouted. "How could you let this happen?! Celestia is going to be so mad!" Rarity peeked out from behind her chair at the map table. "Honestly, Celestia hardly ever gets mad! What makes you think she will this time?" Twilight shook her head furiously. "You don't know the princess like I do, Rarity. When she's really mad, she acts like she isn't, and when she's slightly annoyed, she acts like she's really mad! That's why nopony thinks she ever gets mad!" Dawn, who had not been hiding, put a hoof on the stressed princess' shoulder. "Everything will be alright," she promised. "Just accept that there's nothing you can do now. Est-ce que tu peut ça faire pour mois? He's left without a trace." "Yes, I can do-" Twilight stopped. "Without a trace, trace magic, a tracer spell, that's it!" She teleported away. Rarity stepped all the way out from behind her chair and sat in it, exhausted. "One of these days, you and I really need to go to the spa!" she told Dawn. *** The princess of friendship and stares burst through a pile of books, triumphantly holding one entitled 'Fantastic Travelers and How to Find Them' in her magic. She flipped through it hurriedly. Finally, she found the page she was looking for, memorized the number, and teleported again. Twilight would never say this, but Rarity's boutique was kind of a mess. Fortunately the tracking spell had a long enough range that she didn't need to find the exact spot Mr. Olde had departed from. She cast it, and soon found the trace energy she was looking for. Now came the tricky part. The alicorn closed her eyes as she remembered the other spell she'd had to search for in the library, the one that was in the restricted section for its unpleasant side effects. Her horn glowed, her eyes glowed, and the darkness enveloped her. She left only a sulfuric odor behind.