//------------------------------// // Repairs // Story: Friendship is Revolution // by ultiville //------------------------------// "Are you sure you want to do this, Twilight?" Rachel can't hide her scowl. "Of course I don't want to, but I can't take the risk. He still makes me feel icky. But Rarity. It's been great having you here with me Rainbow, but I want to see the rest of the girls too. So much here is still confusing or just bucked up. I'm a Princess, you're Equestria's fastest pegasus, but without them we're not the full team, you know? If Rarity were...looking for a way in, and I was too scared to talk to a creep to help, what kind of friend would I be?" Rainbow's wings and ears droop a little. "I hear that. You're right. But I'm gonna be there, and if he tries anything, I'm gonna buck him out the window. You can do an experiment, see if he can apologize fast enough to get me to catch him." Twilight smiles a little. "That'd be a lot of math. Vectors even." "Well," Rachel says, looking down at the unconscious human, "good thing you've got that covered, Rainbow, because I need to get this guy somewhere innocuous and call in this tip. You both have my number, right?" Both ponies nod, and Rachel drapes the man over her shoulder and makes her way down the stairs. Twilight is mildly surprised she can carry him so easily, though he's rather short and she supposes Rachel is in good shape. She realizes she's letting her mind wander to avoid thinking about Lasombra just as her phone rings. This is the first time it's ever done so. She spends a moment just staring confusedly at her saddlebag before she realizes what the noise is, and pulls out the phone. She's read the manual (of course) so puts it on speaker. "Hello?" Her voice barely shows any signs of nervousness at all. "Hello Twilight," Lasombra's voice sounds at least 50% less smarmy than she feared, but still at least 30% more than she'd like, "I didn't expect to hear from you again." "I didn't expect you to either. But...did you ever make a Rarity?" "You mean a Rarity like you? No. Why?" "We found one. But she's broken. Did you tell anyone else how to make them?" "No." He pauses for a second. "No, I didn't. But I did keep notes, obviously. It was quite the project. I keep them in the cloud. Someone else at work might have been able to find them, someone with access to our internal servers. Or a really dedicated hacker, I guess. And I had a few prototypes, though I don't think any of them are missing." "You better not be lying," Rainbow Dash says. "Is that the lovely Rachel?" Lasombra says. "Good to hear you're still looking out for Twilight." "Yeah, no, it's Rainbow Dash. But she told me all about you, don't worry." "Rainbow Dash? What? Is our server security really that bad?" "Don't worry about it," Twilight sighs, "it's a long story and I care much more about Rarity right now. Look, she's here in my room and she's broken. Is...is there any way I can convince you to come fix her?" There's a long silence from the line. Finally Lasombra speaks. "Actually, you only had to ask. Are you still living at that bar?" He arrives not long after. Rainbow Dash lets him in, and hovers menacingly above his head the whole way up the stairs. He seems to be staring at her. "You're...you're actually her aren't you? I couldn't make Twilight's wings work, because the proportions from the show just don't work with flight, even at bird weight, let alone all the weight of a robot. And hovering like that isn't physically possible at all." "Yeah, I am, punk. So you better watch out, my ability to kick your human flank also won't seem 'physically possible' if you mess with Twi' any more." "I don't think humans call them 'flanks', Rainbow," Twilight says. "You wanted 'ass'," Lasombra supplies instantly, but then sighs. "Look, I'm terrible at this sort of thing. I was going to just let it go before I got your message. But to be honest, Twilight, I owe you an apology. I never meant to make you...aware. I still don't know how it happened. All the prototypes, heck, you for several weeks, you were all just devices. I tried to make your reactions lifelike, of course. I was really proud of programming you to navigate my apartment competently. But until you disappeared that night, you never did anything that surprised me. You couldn't, you just did what I programmed you to. It was a fantasy. I never meant to...bring something alive into the world. I didn't react well when it turned out I did. I should have listened when you told me to leave, on the roof. I shouldn't ever have brought that lawsuit. I just didn't believe that somehow you'd grown. I was too confident in myself, and not proud enough of what you managed to become. I'm sorry." Twilight sighs. "I understand. I've had spells get out of hand. And I'm not sure you really did, anyway. Look," she takes to the air, and Lasombra falls backwards, landing heavily on the floor. His jaw drops. "After I was shot, I woke up flesh and blood, with all my powers back. I don't know what happened, not really, and I still remember those first weeks, when I was a machine. It's all surreal. But my current theory is that you didn't make me, you just made...something enough like me. A door, or a way in. I don't know why I was looking for that, or it was looking for me, but that's my working theory." Lasombra closes his jaw and rises unsteadily. "Well. This changes things. And now," he looks over at Rainbow Dash, "the rest of the crew's coming too? And you think if we repair this Rarity-bot, she might turn into the real thing?" "That's right," Rainbow says, "I hope your lame world's ready for all six of us." Twilight's own jaw nearly drops as Lasombra breaks out in the first smile she's ever seen on his face. "Oh, it isn't," he giggles, completely out of keeping with everything she knows about him, "but I'm so excited to see it anyway. This is going to be great." "Wait, you're happy about this?" "Oh come on," he sighs, but doesn't stop smiling, "I made a super-accurate Twilight Sparkle robot. It was years, years of effort. I don't know anyone who loves the show - and I do - who doesn't think our world could use a Princess of Friendship. Badly. It was that hope that made me want to make it happen, even if I could at best get a fake, a fantasy. And even if I couldn't let go of that fantasy when I should have." He glances at Rainbow Dash, smile edging dangerously into smirk territory. "Besides, if 'Daring Don't' is at all true to life, you should know something about confusing fantasy and reality, Rainbow." "Okay, it's just weird to have you talking about my life with episode titles," Rainbow's cheeks color a bit, "but I think I know what you mean." "Anyway," now his smirk does fade, "I know I've been a jerk, and I said my piece, I don't expect us to ever be great friends or anything. But let's see if we can get one of your other friends back." Twilight lands next to the wrecked Rarity bot, and Lasombra pulls a toolkit from his backpack, and sits down to work. He mostly works in silence. Rainbow quickly gets bored and wanders off to mess with her tablet, but Twilight asks an endless stream of questions. Soon he's getting her to fetch him tools and parts out of the large pile he's brought in his pack, mostly just to keep her busy. It takes three hours, two trips to the electronics store, and a complete rebuilding of the dissected horn, but finally the LEDs in Rarity's side all light up green, and her chest begins moving. "This unit doesn't have any behavioral programming at all," Lasombra says, closing the access panel, "either whoever made her hadn't gotten around to putting it in yet, or they wiped it before you got to her. But she's at least repaired. I could make some for her, if you wanted." "Rainbow Dash showed up when all I had was a stuffed doll," Twilight said, "let's just leave her for a bit and see if she wakes up on her own. If she doesn't within a few days, maybe we'll try that, but I assume creating the programming wouldn't be easy." Lasombra nods. "Especially if it needs to be as detailed as what you had, and match Rarity's personality. I'd need to do a lot of research with the show, and then it'd take at least a month. I could re-use a lot of the physical controls, of course, but it's still a lot of work." He stops, and an awkward silence reigns for a bit. "Sweet, two hundred thousand likes!" Rainbow crows from across the room. "What is she talking about?" Lasombra frowns. "You don't want to know." He just raises an eyebrow. Twilight sighs. "She's posting 'selfies' on Facebook." "Of course she is." The silence reigns for a moment again, then Twilight looks over at the fixed Rarity, and smiles a little. "It's amazing, it really does look lifelike. You have quite the talent." "Perhaps in her honor you should say I am a talent." Twilight snorts. "Maybe. Thanks for your help. You didn't have to come and do this. I appreciate it." "Of course." Twilight thinks he looks like he's going to say more for a moment, but she isn't quite sure she can read humans that well yet. In any case, he pauses for a moment instead, then turns to leave. "It was my pleasure. Take care." He starts down the stairs. "Can I save your phone number? You know, in case?" Twilight says, just before he opens the door. "If I can save yours. And if you call me David." "Deal." He opens the door. "You should come by the bar sometime," she says. A long pause. "Thanks." He walks out and shuts the door.