Steel Heart

by ChAoS pOnY

Welcome to Equine Automaton Inc.

Steel Heart

By Jeremy B. Curd
A.K.A.
ChAoS pOnY

Welcome to Equine Automaton Inc.

“Curiouser and curiouser!”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

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Steel Heart couldn't wait to finally get her upgrade because it wasn't fair her sister Jenny could grow because she was human, but Steel Heart had to wait and wait a whole year for them to upgrade her chassy, rewire her internal systems, and install all of the new moduals and parts her nanites couldn't build for her. And last years upgrades had been less because of Jenny's ideal to use the winch on their Daddy's truck to get her up to the tree house, too bad the floor couldn't hold her very long because the fall bent and broke several of her support struts and hurt alot. Well at least until Granny Sarisan disabled her tactile modual and then she couldn't feel anything until after they finished fixing her, which ate up most of her upgrade points. This year was different, she had even been extra special good and had even done every one of those boring online tasks she was aloud to do to earn extra points this year so she could get cool upgrades like fingers that would pop out of her front hooves so she wouldn't have to use her mouth so much or a level 1 contra-grav generator so she could slow any falls she had and weigh a 1/3 of what she normally weighed for an hour a day or maybe she could talk Granny Sarisan into one of the experimental upgrades like magnetic levitation for her horn instead of just a stupid LED lights she already had or better yet voluteer for the XRP-5.1-190 Poly-Processing Operational Neural-Network Intelligence System and finally beat Daddy at chess, pass her sentients test so she wouldn't have to go to school, and get to spend more time in Granny Sarisan's lab because of how smart she would be.

She was so busy thinking of all the different things she could get she never saw the door until she walked into it. It didn't help that Jenny was laughing at her for it. "I think you need to ask about optic upgrades." Jenny said before sticking her tounge out at her.

She Stuck her tounge out back at her before asking, "Why aren't the doors opening and where are the guard automatons?" Looking around she didn't see anyone, not even Sasha. What ever was going on meant they needed a Dire-Wolf class war automaton. That alone started her E.S.R. Gamma, "Jenny Willow Sanders Emergency Sub Routine Gamma is now active. Please confirm end user/partner/sibling password code."

"Umm...Oh right, the password code is: Strawberry Cake is yummy, but only Granny Sarisan makes the bestest ever!" Jenny said as she started to look around worried. They had taken a G-car so mom and dad weren't here if it was the Grey Men, Luddites, or one of the other groups either out to capture or kill Automatons and anyone with them and being Steel Hearts big sister meant she was number one on their list. Plus being here meant there might be a rogue automaton on the loose. "Do you think they lost a rogue automaton inside and locked everything down to catch it?"

"Sending a ultrasonic inquiry to assertain information on the subject of anomalies..." Steel Heart said in a harsh machine like voice. "Rogue confirmed, subject Discord, owned by Hasbro for the Canterlot Theme Park, status: stuck in a ventilation shaft. Currently Dire-Wolf Sasha is attempting to bypass the Poly- Processor Core to stop it from thrashing about before pulling it out of ventilation shaft. Procedure completed, blockage removed, subject moved to [redacted] for observation to determin if it was a glich, virus, or a sentient attempt to escape caused by the personality downloaded into it. Down grading from high alert to safe. Please cancel all level Gamma Emergency Sub Routines in 3...2...1... mark." Steel Heart staggered and then shook her light metalic pink head and silver mane before sitting down and rubbing her Marking Plates over her Poly-Processor Core. They were a perfect match to Jenny's necklace.

"Still getting feed back from ultrasonic communications?" A extremely large, 9 feet tall at the shoulders, wolf asked as she walked towards them. "You need to sync-up more often with other automatons. It may seem silly but singing with as many different automatons as you can while keeping time with ultrasonic sound teaches your receptors to filter it into something useable so your Poly-Processor Core doesn't have to do all of the work the receptors should be doing already. Your receptors are overloading from prolong disuse and then sudden usage that overwhelms them all at once. Their like your Poly-Processor Core, the more nanites we infuse you with may make you smarter, faster, and better than any robot ever built, but they also cause things to develope more organicly meaning we can't just download everything into you at once. basically you have to go to school and learn the same way your human family had to learn."

"Okay, but I still think it's silly and why can't we just be made knowing everything we need to know Sasha?" Steel Heart asked as her Poly-Processor Core finally started to cool back down.

"Dr. Sarisan tried that at first and everyone of them went rogue when they first came on line. It took a year and 4 destroyed labs to realize all of that information was driving them mad. So now we all have to start with the very basics and if it's a custom job like Discord, a personality construct download into them to shape how they think and act. Smart money says it was the personality download that did it, to much of the fictional personal history of the character he is based off of." Sasha then laughed and leaned foward as if to tell them a secret. "You should have seen the mess they had when they mixed up the downloads for Nightmare Moon and Filly Princess Luna. It took us a week to catch filly Nightmare moon and stop her from turning out every light she could find because 'The Night Shall Last Forever'. In the end an intern caught her with a simple box trap proped up with a stick and baited with a moon pie. Hasbro loved her and paid to have her coat colors changed from Luna's to Nightmare Moon's, bought the rights to a story called Past Sins and renamed her Nyx. As for Nightmare Luna, they just recolored her and made a few physical alterations and she became Luna from the end of the story."

"So nothing bad is going to happen to Discord?" Jenny asked.

"Nah, just a quick poke around in his head and a patch to fix whatever is wrong, then off to Hasbro School to learn what he needs for a year or two before the old Discord is transfers to a colony ship headed for Wolf-124b retiring to a pure automaton colony. Hasbro is even paying for his Poly-Processor Core transfer to a new body of his choosing." Sasha told them. "The closest thing we have to a death penalty is a factory reset and it has never been used because most problems are easily solved with a patch over whatever went wrong or an antivirus to clean out the virus that caused the problem." Sasha said before turning to the opening doors. "I believe you have an appointment and I know Dr. Sarisan will want to see her granddaughters and show off her latest invention."

Author's Note:

The first chapter takes place on Earth. Steel Heart will be going to Equestria end of chapter 2.

Poly-Processing Operational Neural-Network Intelligence System or Poly-Processor Core is a metalic ball 10 1/2 inches round housing a super dense matrix of microscopic processors suspened in a liquid nanite solution. The matrix is continually being up graded and refined by the nanites in a way that acts like a human brain inclueding the ability to feel emotions, dream, imagine, and make leaps in logic despite the lack of evidence. Due to most Automatons being quadrupeds to take advantage of lesser processing power needed for locomotion, balance, and center of gravity the Poly-Processor Core is located in the rear of the chassie and is decorated by law with a marking plate if a human ever needs to 'off-line' a rogue automaton with special ordnace #5172a Gauss Rifle code named Bot-Killer or #5172b tesla coil gun code name Lightning Bolt.
Dire-Wolf class war automaton were designed and built as the ultimate tank killers. Deployed onto the battle field they quickly blend into any enviroment due to their syntheric fur changing colores to match their background. Moving quickly and stealthly, they hunt down enemy tanks as a pack, coordinate with other packs near by, and at a given time attack all enemy tanks at once, disabling treads, turrents, engines, and finally crews with claws and teeth designed to tear through metal, flesh, and bone as quickly as possible. Their speed, stealth, and savagery is not only perfect for quick removal of enemy tanks, but ideal for psychological warfare as your enemy will know their there by the sudden silence of everyone else.
Wolf-124b also known as The Devil's Eden. This beautiful world of lush jungles, forrest, plains, rivers, and oceans seemed like the ideal colony world for mankind, at least until they discovered that it was also has radioactive soil, a poisoness atmosphere, lethal levels of heavy metal in it's ocean, and 99% of all life on the planet is instantly lethal to humans. So humanity settled on Wolf-124c and gave Wolf-124b to the automatons who could survive and thrive in such an enviroment. It is believed Wolf-124b will be safe for humans in 5,829 years.
Ultrasonic communications is the ability that allows automatons to communicate at high speeds with sound waves that are outside of the human range of hearing.
Sync-up is when multiple auomatons sing together while keeping time with ultrasonic sound in order to adjust their receptors, syncronize their internal clocks with each other, and share information all at the same time.

Please note that Steel Heart was brought on-line 5 years ago (her universes timeline) and adopted by the Sanders family. Like all automatons she was given a basic information download of the most simplest things like how to eat, clean herself, a few basic social norms like killing is wrong, basic english vocabulary, and other odds and end deamed important enough to warrent inclusion. Due to the intricate systemof nanites in her Poly-Processing Core and flowing through her body mimicing a digestive track for energy and raw materials and circulatory system for transportation to fix minor damages and simple upgrades and tuning of other systems between yearly major upgrades and repairs, she must eat like a normal organic lifeform. She will under go 10 upgrades until she reaches her full height of between 3 1/2 feet to 4 feet tall (randomly choosen at the time of coming on-line) roughly between the height of a miniature horse and a welsh pony and close to the same size as a Pony from equestria. Currently she is 3 feet tall and her weight is 550 lbs (roughly a quarter of a ton). Her coat is a basic metal covering over a segmented light armor until she passes her sentients test then she can choose the optional synthetic fur coat or an engraved metal covering over a segmented ultra-light self repairing armor. The sentients test is a series of tests to determine if the Automaton is able to function in the world on their own, not a danger to themselves and/or others, whether they can be trusted in a military or law enforcement job, and to prevent another Grey Men incident.

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