//------------------------------// // Augmented Darkness // Story: Virtual Mischief, Augmented Darkness // by chaoticevl //------------------------------// The sun had started to go down now. Stopping in front of a small back alley shop, Thomas sighs. “I hope Marcus is in today” and steps inside. “Hey Marcus you around?” The shop itself was filled with electronics, from junky ancient ham radios to a few near pristine holopane players. “Marcus!” Thomas yells once more to quickly whispering “Abigale?” Hoping to see the former and dreading the later. “Thomas, is that you my boy?” A tall skinny man walks out from the back room causing Thomas to slump in relief. “I’m so glad you’re the one on duty right now Marcus. Abigale would have had my hide for this.” “And what exactly would my beautiful little fireplug want your hide for?” Marcus smiles widely as he asks. Thomas pulls out the DVD drive from his backpack and shows it to Marcus. “It seems my DVD drive burst into flames earlier today.” Looking pretty sheepish as he shows the damaged device. “How in the nine hell’s did you managed to get something that uses so little power to burst into flame?” “If I actually knew the cause I wouldn’t have done it in the first place. All I was doing was playing a recently acquired set of DVDs through VAR.” Explained Thomas in a blunt manner. “You’re right, that shouldn’t have caused this, and you’re also correct in assuming Abbey would have had your hide for this” Marcus was Smiling even wider now. “You’re quite lucky she just left for lunch a few minutes before you came in.” “Whew, so do you think you could sell me the parts I need to fix this?” “Don’t know, let me open’er up and take a look.” Marcus did just that, grabbing a couple of screwdrivers he pries the case off and looks inside. He pulls out everything and giving each piece a once over. He put them into piles of good or trashed. “Okay so it looks as though the housing and the parts that hold things together are alright and reusable. The drive motor, the electronics board, and the laser reader are trashed. I have everything except the laser.” “Damn, well at least you have the majority of what I need. What’s it going to cost me for the parts?” “Hmm, I think If you give me about an hour to get everything together, I’ll be able to let everything go for about seventy five bucks.” “Really that much?" “Hey you’re getting these at a pretty decent discount for being such a regular customer. Abbey would have charged you full price plus a pissing her off fee. And these parts are getting harder to find.” “Alright, I’ll take your word for it. Here’s the $75 plus an extra $20 as I’m sure Abbey will be back when I pick it up in an hour.” Marcus just laughed. “That will probably keep her from physically hitting you but you’ll still get a dressing down when she sees you.” “Before I leave, any idea of where I might be able to get the laser as I know I can’t just use one from a newer system?” “Yeah different frequencies and all that.” Marcus says absent mindedly as he rifles through business cards. “Actually I do have an idea on that front. Aha here it is!” Handing the card to Thomas. “You ever hear of Disco Riders Media?” Busting out laughing, Thomas nods looking at the card. “Yeah I have they’re actually the ones who sent me my latest acquisition.” “Really? That’s kinda odd I knew they dealt in hardware, but had no clue they trafficked in ancient media as well.” Marcus looked thoughtful for a moment. “Well anyway they have a showroom slash warehouse a couple blocks away from here. It’s possible they might sell you the part or be able to ship you one.” “Thanks this will help, hopefully.” Thomas entered the address into his pocket pc and handed the card back to Marcus. “Ill got check with them and then be back for the rest of the parts.” “No problem seeya in a bit.” Marcus smiled and waved as Thomas took his leave. *** Checking the address one last time, Thomas looks at the rather gaudy building in front of him. “I know it’s their name, but Discoballs with multicolored lights all across the entrance? I’m surprised they haven’t been sued yet over possibly causing seizures.” Stepping inside, Thomas was quite surprised to see the exact opposite. it looked like a high class antique showroom. Looking into a nearby case, he’s actually confused for a moment. “What is that? VCR, wait weren’t those the media format before DVDs? How do they have something that old and in such good shape?” Turning away, he walks on trying to find the front counter. A moment later he finds it. Sitting behind the desk is a young woman of maybe twenty with dyed poofy purple hair and a purple shirt. Even odder she’s got a small yellow beanie on her head with a propeller that slowly spins around as a nearby fan passes over her. With a sucker in her mouth and a nail file being brushed across her nails, it made her look exactly like and obnoxious teen valley girl. Thomas was not exactly looking forward to talking with her, but he did need help. Clearing his throat he spoke up. “Excuse me, miss?” Immediately her demeanor changed as she quickly put away the nail file and sucker. Standing up and facing Thomas, she put on the biggest smile he’d ever seen on a real person. In a oddly sweet voice she said “Hello and welcome to Disco Riders Media. My name is Lilacs Brewers. What can I do for you today?” Thomas really wasn’t sure what to make of her now, but he had his purpose. “H-hello my names Thomas Crewe. I was directed to your showroom by a friend and was looking for a specific part. I had hoped that not only would you have it, but be willing to sell it to me.” She quickly came out in front of the desk with her fingers stroking her chin. “That name sounds familiar. Oh! You’re the guy Mr. Scions sent that box set of My Little Pony to.” “Y-yeah that would be me. I didn’t know your company was so close or I would have come to just pick it up.” “That’s okay, that box set wasn’t actually stored in this location anyway. So what exactly were you looking for?” “Well I had built a DVD drive on my own and unfortunately as of this afternoon, it... well it burst into flames. And while I managed to get all the other necessary parts I need to rebuild it elsewhere, he didn’t have the laser needed to actually read the discs.” “I’m sorry to hear that.” The smile never quite left her face and now she seems to have this twinkle in her eye. “We do have some whole DVD players in stock, but they’re probably out of your price range and are pretty stand alone so hooking them to a pc isn’t possible. But wait here a moment and let me see if we have any spare parts in the back.” She started to actually skip away from Thomas towards the back of the showroom. Muttering to himself “That girl is a bit too happy to be working in a place like this.” Thomas decided to look around a bit more while waiting. Most of the cases seemed to have old Tvs, a few blu ray players, and even the occasional HD-DVD. Thomas actually scoffed at that last one. “I will never understand how those things even hoped to compete with blu rays.” The next few cases had a few different varieties of holocubes. "Heh, I remember these as a child. They started out the size of a brick but every year they got a bit smaller just before the first true holopane came out." The last case seemed to have a DJ’s mixing table but it was a bit odd in it’s own right as it seemed to be a mix of old and new technology. “I’m back!” Lilacs sing songed as she skipped back to the desk. “So I’ve got two options for you. First is this.” she said holding up a small plastic back with a small laser reader in it. “This came from a pretty broken down model we got a couple weeks ago. We can let it go for about ten bucks. To be honest though with how bad of shape the DVD player was that we pulled it from, I can’t guarantee it will even work.” Putting the back down and picking up the small box showing it to Thomas. “Then we have this. It’s not quite what you asked for, but it will do what you want. It’s a multi-format laser meaning it can read nearly anything from DVD to even the current holopanes. The only thing it can’t are those HD-DVDs as those for some reason refuse to give up their secrets to anything but their own hardware. Mr. Scions actually knows someone who can still make these so we have a couple boxes in the back for them. They don’t really work in fixing old hardware, but they’re great in custom jobs.” She finished her spiel with a wave of her hand and a quick spin. “That actually sounds quite useful, but how much is it going to cost me?” Thomas asked not looking too hopeful. “Well you're in luck. Since we have a fairly decent stockpile of these and can get more easily enough I can sell it to you for say thirty five bucks.” “Great I’ll take it!” Thomas reached for his wallet and pulled out the needed cash and hands it over.” “Thanks, just let me ring that up. She skipped behind the counter and rings up his purchase, hands him a bag and his receipt. “Thanks again for the purchase and please come back if you need anything else.” As Thomas grabbed his package, Lilacs grabs her nail file and sucker, then went back to what she was doing before he showed up like he hadn’t even been there. “That girl is just plain off.” Thomas said to himself as he shook his head in disbelief. “Alright, first up dinner then I’ll pick up my parts from Marcus.” *** About an hour later, Thomas once again stands in Marcus’s shop. “Hey Marcus, I’m back” Shouts Thomas to the back room. “He’s not here hoarder” says a voice coming from behind Thomas. “Shit.” whispers Thomas as he turns around. “Hey Abbigale. First that was my parents, I only collect one specific type of thing. Second my floors are clean of clutter. My ex-roommate was messier than me.” Abbigale was a large woman, not fat no, but looked like she could stand eye to eye with a black bear and maybe bench press it. “Harrumph. Marcus managed to get everything you needed and I put it together except for the part you’re missing.” “T-thanks, but why did you do that?” “Marcus said you paid extra for it.” “Oh right, I did.” Abbigale stomped off and came back moments later with Thomas’ drive. “Here, try not to set this one on fire or I’m going to make sure using your pc becomes a monumental task.” “Yeah sure, thanks I’ll do my best to prevent any further accidents.” he says with the last bit under his breath. “Tell Marcus thanks for the tip and I’ll catch him later.” Thomas quickly leaves the shop not wanting to stay there under that woman’s scornful gaze. “I don’t even know what I did to make her hate me, but Marcus claims she has a heart of gold. I find that hard to believe though.” He raced home as it was now dark and he didn’t want to get caught by any muggers. The City may be shiny, but in the dead of night only the richest areas of town are truly safe. *** Reaching home a short time later, Thomas sets up everything he needs to finish fixing the DVD drive. “Hopefully this won’t take me to long to solder this into place. Then I can check on one of those discs before I head to bed.” It took Thomas the better part of an hour to get the piece in and tested to see if the drive would perform correctly. He reconnected it to his pc and it was found quite quickly. “Sweet we have connection. Now let’s see if it can see anything on this disc.” Thomas gently picked up the the disc and put it into the tray and pushed it inside. “Now for the moment of truth.” After a few tense moments of noise, a window finally popped up on the screen. “Yes! All the files look like they’re there. Although my mind must be playing tricks on me I could have sworn the second file was three times the size of the first? Let’s try episode 3.” Using the normal media player, Thomas started up episode 3 and waited for the intro. Instead to his horror he saw images of a dead world. Trees had no leaves, there were no ponies in sight and the only light came from the moon. The camera quickly panned towards canterlot to show the entire city had collapsed down the mountain. “What the ever loving hell is going on here.” Thomas quickly shut it off and shut down his pc. “Alright today has been stressful I’ll come back to this tomorrow maybe it will make some more sense.” *** Thomas slept restlessly as the night outside his windows began to take on a sinister form. “BEEP BEEP BEEP” the sound emanated from Thomas’s pocket pc and was blasting at it’s max volume. Bolting upright and grabbing the device, Thomas looked down expecting a phone call, but was instead greeted by the emergency broadcast system telling him to check his TV for more information. “What the hell, the sun hasn’t even come up yet. It’s way too early for this shit.” Getting up begrudgingly, Thomas made his way to his TV to check the news. Breaking New scrolled by on the TV as the local anchor finally showed up. “At 6am this morning a large dark object passed between the earth and the sun blocking ninety-nine percent of it’s light reaching us, leaving the world in it’s current state of perpetual twilight. In a possible related event, the moon has halted its rotation around the earth and has stopped in our portion of the hemisphere.” Thomas quickly ran to his bedroom and onto his balcony. There at the top of the sky was the moon and off to the east just barely visible between two skyscrapers was the sun or at least what was left of it. Thomas went back inside and looked at the TV once more. “Scientists are unsure what exactly is blocking the sun, as the light still being given off blinds their sensors from here. They have at the behest of the world government sent a ship to investigate in the hopes of removing the obstruction.” Thomas ran for his computer in the hopes of getting some more up to date news or maybe a live feed from the ship as it closed in on the dark mass. Sitting down and turning it on, he found a strange sight. Instead of his normal desktop and wallpaper, he found the VAR program up and running with a two minute delay set for Episode 2. Not really wanting to deal with it, he tried to close it down, but the program refused and actually added time to the delay. He began trying everything he could think of to get the program to shut down, but nothing worked. He couldn’t even shut down his PC at this point. Screaming in frustration, Thomas stood up. “Fine you want me to see what ever you going to show me fine!” He grabbed his glasses and both controllers and stood upon the treadmill. As he dropped the glasses in front of his eyes, the time hit zero and Thomas was inundated with sky blue eyes. He back pedaled in fear at this, nearly falling on his ass, but managed to save himself. He was looking at a very mad Pinkie Pie. Her hair was limp, she was growling and looking directly at Thomas. “YOU!” She shouted “You're at fault for this!” “Wha-wha-wha-what?!” Thomas stammers as he moves to the side, but Pinkie just kept him in the center of her vision. “I can see you and apparently hear you now, you evil spirit. It’s your fault Dashie got hurt. It’s your fault Nightmare Moon got to the Elements before us, and it’s your fault this world is going to die! I just hope I can find a way to destroy you before we all freeze to death!” Pinkie said through gritted angry teeth. “But I didn’t intend for this to happen! I didn’t even know I could affect this world like that.” whimpered Thomas as he looked visibly shamed and scared by the pink pony in front of him. “You didn’t know? You didn’t know!” she yelled. A moment later she calmed down. “Then you're going to help help us fix this mess aren’t you.” “S-sure I’ll help you.” Stammered Thomas although he wasn’t sure how he was going to do that. “Pinkie who are you talking to over there?” Applejack questioned. “The spirit I told you about earlier, the one I said hurt Dash and made her mess up.” “Sugarcube, there is no spirit. I tried to tell you earlier it was all an accident and we’ll figure something out.” Applejack reasoned unsuccessfully. “There is so a spirit and I’ll prove it!” Pinkie reached out for Thomas’s hand, somehow grabbing hold and pulled Thomas towards her. A sudden gasp filled the room as all eyes fell on Thomas. Five sets of angry eyes. “Uh-oh!” was the last thing he said before a bolt of magic struck him in the chest.