//------------------------------// // 4: Loss // Story: Lost Gear // by TheFoxern //------------------------------// Breathing was difficult. He had not expected breathing to be this difficult. There had been times when he had had trouble breathing before; when he was almost drowned, when his rib cage had been crushed, or when his lungs had been pulled out. Yet somehow this was even harder. But it was that feeling throughout his entire body. It was like his bones couldn't breath. As if his skin and fur was painfully starved for air. Like he had forgotten how to breath. The room was spinning and he was hacking up blood now. Maybe he should have had a bat pony stand in, just in case, but he couldn't be sure they wouldn't try and interfere. He was trying to focus on the device, struggling to keep the room from spinning. Finally he was able to focus on what was in front of him and began frantically pulling the wires from himself, shoving the helmet thing from his head and tossing it to the side. “That better be it,” he said, panting as he tried to recover. Suspended in front of him, inside the device, was a small crystalline tube. He leaned in for a closer look, examining it. Little sparks and shifting cracks formed in the air inside the vial. It glowed, sparkled, and hummed very softly. He had actually done it. He knew it could be done with magic, but to actually do such a thing with a machine seemed almost impossible to him. A moment of panic hit him as he looked at his flank, but his cutie mark was still there. That had been the inspiration. Cutie marks were a magical representation of a ponies special talent, so if it had stayed, it meant that he had some sort of magic within him. But that wasn't the only magic like thing he had in him; The Shattering was in there, too. Or at least, it was. He had drawn it out using the same principal of the towers. On a much smaller and more focused scale, of course, but he had still done it. He rubbed his face and wondered how feasible it would be to weaponize this. The process had taken hours, the device was cumbersome and impossible to make in his world. Utterly impossible, especially when he actually took time to examine the machine. Parts had melted and several things had shattered. This device made of crystal steel, the strongest material that Copper knew of, and simply running this machine had destroyed them. “Good,” he muttered as he flopped over. He had tried to get up, but he had no strength it seemed. He attempted to call out, but found his voice couldn't go very high at all and it sounded more like a harsh whisper. He closed his eyes, taking deep breaths. ~ “Prophet?” His eyes snapped open and he was staring up at a bat pony. “Are you alright? What happened?” With the state he was in and the blood on the floor, it was fairly obvious that he was not alright. “Ah...yes...Gears,” he muttered as he slowly sat up. It had bothered him that this was Gears, the same Gears from the book he had read. After spending time and speaking with him, he wasn't as surprised. Gears had been the head of several tower constructions and he knew his way around technology. He couldn't help but wonder if this was this universes version of him. They were the same apparent age and build. He shook his head, trying to refocus. “Yes, I'm alright, just...drained.” That was the proper word for it. “What happened? What is-” he stopped as he stared at the device. “How did you melt...are those pieces?” “Yes. Somehow the system was too much for it,” Copper said as he moved towards the tube. He found Gears quite tolerable when he wasn't being a coward. “I don't understand how that's possible...it shouldn't be possible. I have never seen one even crack...” He was staring at the machine. “And this...what even is this?” “It is part of my essence.” He wiped blood from his mouth. “It is pure power; magic in it's rawest form.” He touched the crystal gently, even though he was sure he could not break it if he tried. And he had tried when he received it. “So raw that the towers cannot even process it, or even attempt to.” “I...” Gears stared at the tube awestruck. “I don't understand.” Copper's brow furrowed slightly as he stared at the crackling shapes inside the crystal. “It was all just a theory. I had heard of the magical ability to steal a ponies cutie mark, talent and all. But...I figured that if that was possible, then I could make a machine that could do the same. Or at least something similar.” Copper slowly extracted the tube from the device. “So I removed part of myself, a power that had been given to me a long time ago, so I figured that that would actually be easier to extract than my actual cutie mark, which I think it was?” Gears still looked lost, staring at Copper. “I...I still don't think I understand.” “Magic, Gears,” he said as he looked at him. “It is what makes up a pony, it allows you bat ponies to fly, or pegasus to fly in my world. Earth ponies to have such high stamina and strength, and it allows unicorns to tap into the magic of the world. Again, it is all just a theory...but it gives us our strengths. Magical essence.” “So you are saying...that without this...we would be incapable of flight?” It was obvious that Gears was trying to keep up with Copper, but Copper couldn't seem to explain it properly. “Yes. You wouldn't have the strength...I don't know all of the details, only what I've heard and read,” he says as he looks over at the large crackling tube. “Was this the machine you have been working on all this time?” He watched as Copper walk slowly around the room. Copper realized how much he had been keeping everypony out of the loop. “No, this is more recent work. I ran into a snag with Pog.” He had decided to shorten Pony of Gears with an acronym. “As even with all of her power, I cannot figure out how to open a rift back to my world.” He still felt tired, as he moved towards the other side of the machine. He had done so much work in the last few weeks, but it was not enough progress. His focus was too split, trying to manage what was left of this civilization, and trying to make progress on multiple machines at once. He hurt. He was exhausted. “So you have siphoned the power from yourself in the hopes that it can use it?” Gears moved to join him on the other side of the room in front of the other machine. “Yes.” He pulled open the chest cavity of Pog. “She will be able to tap into it and...force it to work. It will not be gentle on the world, but at this point it doesn't matter.” He slid the tube deep into the chest, twisting and turning to place it in it's proper place. “How long until everything collapses?” Gears asked as he watched Copper intently, he was always so interested in all of the things Copper did. “It's not going to be something like that. It is a slow death, as I said.” He had explained it a few times, but the batponies seemed to think it was going to be some sort of cataclysmic event, hellfire and all that nonsense. And of course they just assumed he was trying to ease their worry. “Yes...but...how long?” Even Gears was skeptical. “We have years. I am more worried about running out of food...there are a lot more ponies than I had originally anticipated.” He took a deep breath as he pulled away, closing her chest cavity once again. “And medical supplies...” There were a lot of sick, injured, and elderly ponies. A lot more than he had thought. A lot. He had expected a few hundred...but they were pushing two thousand now. But...this was nearly the entire population of the planet...almost every living soul. “It is all because you are the Prophet.” Copper frowned at him. “You are the one that was foretold to save us.” Copper held his tongue as he worked on the machine. There were a lot of things that he wanted to say to the blissfully ignorant little pony... Such as how he was only trying to save himself, and that was his main focus. How he didn't have a choice on being their savior. How he wanted nothing more than to just lay down and watch everything burn. “More are coming, Copper.” The voice of night inside his head snapped him away from those thoughts. She was something he wanted to save. “Twenty more will soon be here.” He turned to Gears. “Twenty more.” Gears blinked at him in confusion. “Go and see that they are met.” “They approach from the North.” “They're coming from the North. Make sure they are fed and housed,” Copper practically ordered. Gears gave a bow. “Of course, Prophet.” He turned and fled at a trot. He watched the batpony disappear before leaning against a broken control panel. “That is all that will come.” “More will come,” Copper said with a frown, closing his eyes. “When they realize that they are not coming back...or ponies will go back for those that were left behind and try to convince them to come.” “You are sure?” Night was not convinced, though she had been such a great help. She had dragged him across the dreamscape to other ponies and spoke to them. They were scared of him, shrouded in the shadow of Night... From what he could guess, the only reason he could do it at all was because of the conditioning that the Nightmare had put him through to make him a vessel. “We will not get them all, but we will get most of them.” Night was the reason he was working to save as many as possible. She wanted them to be saved. There was a few moments of silence, in which Copper returned to his work. “Is there no way to save them all?” “Some ponies you just...can't change. You can't save them, because they don't want to be saved. It is the reason that the Priest believes he needs to be punished, even though the majority of his congregation has stopped torturing him.” Once again, he was thankful for the work that he had done on Emily, in what felt like lifetimes ago...yet it was all so fresh in his mind. It gave him so much to work with, rather than having to make it all up as he went. “Why?” Copper paused, staring into the workings of the machine. “I...don't know,” he said softly. “I have tried to figure it out, but the reasons never make sense...a pony who is flat out proven wrong, will still stick to what they thought the truth to believe, even in the face of insurmountable evidence to the contrary. It is just in the nature of ponies to cling to beliefs.” Again there were several minutes of silence before she spoke again. “What beliefs do you cling to?” He stopped once again, staring into the machine. “Not a lot,” he said with a sigh as he continued working. “Not as many as the ponies around here, that I know. Believing in something is a lot simpler for me, I think. What I believe in is usually based on facts. If those facts change, sometimes my beliefs do, too.” “But there are things that you believe in?” “I think that it would be the wrong way to phrase it, but yes. The same way that I believe that I can get home. With the help of the Tardis, you, and the ponies around here, I believe it is possible to succeed.” “What else?” She was always so curious and Copper was the only one she ever seemed to ask questions of. It took him quite a while to think of something. “I believe that somewhere out there, I have a home. A place that I live. Friends that I can return to. Someone who loves me, despite evidence to the contrary.” She was silent in response. “What do you believe in, Night?” “I believe you can save me,” she said softly, and it made Copper smile. “That you care about me...and what happens to me...” “If it comes down to only be able to saving a handful of ponies...you will be one of them, Night.” He took a deep breath and set about to working again. ~ “Prophet?” Once again his work was interrupted. “Yes?” He hardly glanced at the pony. It was annoying that these ponies didn't seem to comprehend that he needed time. A lot of time. But they were afraid that the world would end at any moment. “Who are you?” “I...I am new to this city...we traveled from Brookfield, across the ravine. You came to me in a dream...” The female batpony wasn't terribly familiar to Copper, but he had visited thousands and they all sort of...blurred together. “I'm Roseluck...” Copper nearly dropped what he was working on, staring at her now. There was a vague sense of recollection...some similarities. “Some ponies said that you asked for me...when you went to the destroyed tower...” “Do you know the Doctor? A pony by the name of Doctor Whooves?” Copper asked, but he was not terribly hopeful. “I-I don't.” It was the answer Copper was expecting. He wondered who the Doctor's friends were in this world... “That's fine,” he said as he turned back to his work. “I suppose all of his acquaintances are dead...or wont come forward.” He sighed. There were a few minutes of silence. “Who is she?” He actually jumped a bit. She was directly next to him. He sighed softly, putting a hoof onto his face. “This is Pog.” She leaned in, looking her over. “She is...beautiful. Is...is she dead?” “For lack of a better term, she is sleeping.” He took a few deep breaths before he set back to work. She was hardly a face and torso. But he had taken such care to sculpt her face, trying so hard to make her pleasing to look at so that ponies would not fear her. “May I touch her?” He looked at the batpony, taking a very good look at her. She was so young...and malnourished. Battered and dirty; a pony who hasn't eaten well, or lived well, and then traveled for days in the hopes of...something. “Please?” she added. “As long as you are gentle. She isn't fragile, but still.” He watched the young pony gently touch her hoof to her face. “When will she wake up?” She looked at him, her head tilted to the side. He frowned a bit and then looked at Pog. “When she wants to. Despite the missing casing to her head, and parts of her body, she should be able to...wake up.” He moved a bit to the side as he continued to work. “You have...made her? I was a little filly when the towers were being built...and they always frightened me.” That was a first. None of the ponies had ever spoken about being afraid of the towers. “Why is that? I thought that everypony thought they where such a good thing.” She looked away from him. “They were tall...and...evil looking. I had nightmares about them. They got worse after the first tower exploded. And then they started coming true...” “Your nightmares? What were they of?” He was looking at her, unable to focus on his work now. “Death...the barrenness of it all...the plants dead...ponies dead...animals...dead...everything dead.” She was shaking slightly. “And it all came true...all the death came true. It's like I saw it coming, but could do nothing to stop it.” Copper reached out, touching her gently with his bare hoof. She flinched at his touch. “You had visions of the future.” “My mother said it was because I was a Seer...sometimes they see bad things, but it wasn't a problem.” He blinked. That had not been a term he had heard since arriving. “A Seer? What's that?” “Somepony who can tap into the magic. The church killed them all. All the ones they knew of. Only a my momma knew I was one, cus my daddy was one, and it gets passed down through the blood.” “It's a genetic trait. That's...interesting.” His mind could put pieces together. If it was passed down genetically, and only the mother knew, that meant either the father was dead, or had not known of her birth. “But I can see how it would have been a death sentence.” She nodded sadly. “And useless. There's no magic.” She waved her hooves vaguely in the air. “I'm supposed to be important...before the Priest decided to kill them all.” She fell silent, and Copper decided to continue working rather than pester her. It was oddly comforting to have somepony in the room other than gears, or one of the congregation. They always just had this air of terror and it filled the room. “Will she bring the magic back?” He stopped, his expression softening. “No.” “But...she'll save us?” She looked so hopeless. He smiled softly at her. “That is my hope. She's going to make a way for us all to go somewhere better.” “Better?” she said as she tilted her head to the side. “But...what was wrong with the world before? Can't you make this world better?” She was young, that was sure. Young and naive. He sighed softly, shaking his head. “No. I'm not a god, as much as ponies around here seem to think I am.” “But...you are powerful.” She was staring at him. “You came from another world. You overthrew the Priest. You built this machine.” Her stare turned a bit harsher. “You spoke to me in a dream.” “I have skills. And I have friends with power.” He pushed up on the limb he was working on, forcing it into place. “Compared to most, I am weak.” “You killed the Blood Horror,” she said bluntly. He sighed and took a deep breath. “I beat the Blood Horror because I was smarter than it, and sheer luck. The Priest lost because he was scared of me; of what I brought.” He rubbed his face, smearing it with oil without thinking about it. “But you have to be powerful,” she said earnestly. “No one could do what you have done. Otherwise someone would have done it.” “That seems to be the case more often than not,” he grumbles as he focuses on his work. “It is not that no one else could have done it, it is that deep down they don't want to. They believe they can't because that's what they've been told. They think someone else is going to come along and do it for them. They think that if they try, they're going to die. So then ponies like me have to exist to do all the dirty work, because it's okay if somepony like me dies.” She seemed to shrink down. “Why?” Copper stopped, staring into the gears for a moment and then sighed, turning to look at Roseluck. She looked on the brink of tears. “Hey now...” He moved towards her and hugged her gently. “I'm sorry. I just get frustrated with how rough things are for me. I feel helpless when it comes to my own life.” Now she was crying. “Why can't everything be nice?” He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “I don't know...all we can do is keep trying to make things better and hope that it does.” He held her gently, closing his eyes. He had forgotten for a moment how young she was. Just a young filly whose world is crumbling for reasons she doesn't understand. This is what the Other does to places. What it does to ponies. She was a lot like him; forced to live through horrible things when she is still so young. This world was full of orphans. Full of ponies who've witnessed true atrocities. Some would never recover. ~ He wasn't sure how long he stayed holding the little batpony, but eventually ponies came with food for him, and she left when they did. He didn't know where, or what she would do. There were lots of children...perhaps they would play? What sort of games did foals play in this world? It's not like he played any games when he was foal, but he knew of a few. Tag was one he remembered well, aside from racing... His face scrunched up and he turned to the Pog. All the legs were finished, but only one was attached. Other than connecting the last of the plating...he was almost done. “Will I be able to play with the other ponies?” He smiled a bit as he turned to the food. “If you would like, I don't see why not.” It was mushrooms, and other little plant like things that seemed to have survived. None of them were very tasty...but it was food. “They are afraid of me,” Night said somberly. “Well, you must approach them in a way they do not find scary.” He could practically feel her confusion, and he chuckled. “If you want to have a pony like you, you must approach them in a way they are comfortable with. I know you have a bit of difficulty holding your form, but that's just something you'll gain control of.” He felt her frown. “But it's so difficult. Every time I think I've gotten it I go fwuff.” Copper laughed, shaking his head. “Magic is hard, dear Night. You'll get it eventually.” “Does the Nightmare you know have control?” “Yes.” There had been quite a lot of times when Nightmare came to him and looked...well, like a normal pony. When she had first approached him he remembered how she looked beautiful, bathed in starlight... “Wow...will I be that pretty?” He blinked a few times, looking vaguely into the space in front of him. “I...well, uh...probably? I don't know. I have met two other Nightmares and they were both quite pretty.” He rubbed his face a bit, forgetting that she could see what he was thinking if he thought hard enough about it. “But she was not nice...she was mean to you...she hurt you...” There was the odd feeling of something being draped over him, but there was nothing there. “She had a lot of anger and hate...that sort of thing warps a pony. Mostly she was tolerable...sometimes she was a welcomed sight, though I never allowed her to know.” He took a deep breath before he began eating. “She probably knew...you are so easy to read.” Her voice was playful, but oddly soothing. Yet...it still had that underlying tone he knew so well. “Perhaps to something like you, being in my head and all,” he says with a chuckle. “Kinda hard to keep my thoughts hidden as well as my words or action.” “Maybe you're the one who needs to learn control,” she said with a soft mocking tone. It was very odd to Copper thinking of Night. He couldn't think of her as just a filly because sometimes she didn't act like it. She was smart, powerful, a naive, and had a wit too sharp for something that was supposedly that young. But she was also a being of magic, and learning things from him. Rules of age did not seem to really apply; as well as most rules it seemed. “Maybe you shouldn't dig in my head so much, hm?” “That's no fun.” There was a definite pout to her tone of voice. “I think that you need to find new ways to entertain yourself, my dear Night.” “You're all the entertainment I need.” That made him chuckle a bit and shake his head. “I'm not that entertaining, unless you find my work interesting.” He felt quite warm as if she was trying to get closer to him. “I find everything you ponies do interesting.”