There was a nervous energy hovering over the Spark Expo. There were hundreds of ponies present, but it seemed quieter than it should have been. Ponies moved in small herds of three or four, fawning over the innovations but casting nervous looks around the room. Their gazes bounced from exit to guard and back as if they were worried one might disappear at any moment.
Twilight frowned as she and Spike trotted through the crowd. “What's with everyone?”
Spike shrugged. “It’s that thing in Atlantis. Everyone’s worried about what Iron Mage is going to do next.”
Her frown deepened. “I thought Iron Mage was only targeting AIM?”
Spike opened his mouth to say something but stopped. “Yeah, I guess,” he said instead and hurried forwards. Twilight watched him check the exits too. Just in case.
This isn’t what I wanted.
The crowd began to thicken as they neared the staging area, and they had to push their way through. Both of them were wearing glasses that were enchanted to keep others from recognizing them. Technically, Twilight didn’t need the pair; she could just boost the same spell that hid her Arc Reactor from view. But magical batteries were finicky, and adding power to it could mess with its integrity and destroy it. They slipped backstage and began heading downstairs.
Twilight had been bothered by how quiet the Expo had been, but the staging area underneath the floor felt positively eerie. It had a low ceiling and stretched all the way across the convention floor, making it both cavernous and cramped at the same time. The ponies hurried back and forth, so consumed with their tasks that they didn’t even see Twilight and Spike come in. Twilight waved a hoof in front of one of the guards, but he completely ignored her.
Something about that bothered Twilight, but before she could say anything Spike poked her shoulder. “Hey, there’s the girls!”
The Applied Science Division, made up of her best friends in the world, were gathered around a bizarre Golem. It stood on two legs like a Minotaur, and it was so tall that a pair of Unicorns had to follow it around while casting a Fit-In-Everywhere spell, to keep it from getting stuck. Its most bizarre feature was its head. It didn’t have a face or ears; just a huge rectangular block that sat on its shoulders. Twilight could hear some kind of machinery humming around inside it even at a distance.
Fluttershy, a doctor studying the effects magic could have on the body, hovered near its head and gave it a comforting rub. “Can you feel that? If you’re feeling tired, you can stop.”
The Golem shook its head, and Fluttershy floated back. From the ground, Starlight Glimmer smiled. “Alright, watch this carefully.” She lit her horn and levitated a small apple. It flashed and transformed into a brightly colored frog. It gave a croak of alarm and tried to squirm out of her grasp. Starlight gave it to Fluttershy and smiled at the Golem. “Now, face the apple behind you and try casting.”
It nodded and the front panel of its boxy head slid open. It lit a spell that looked exactly like Starlight’s, and spat it at the apple.
It splashed right through the apple and took a whole crater out of the far wall. Dozens of frogs poured out of the wall, swarming around the Golem and across the hall. The guards ignored them stoically.
“Excellent!” Starlight checked some boxes while Fluttershy nervously tried to collect all the frogs. “We still don’t have any fine control, but spell duplication is working perfectly! You can head back,” she called up to the Golem, “and tell the next one to come when it’s ready.”
It nodded and lumbered away. Pinkie Pie, an intern getting a degree in chemical engineering, bit her lip as she watched it go. “Ya think this is maybe getting a little dangerous?”
“We might have to cut the magic demonstration,” Starlight agreed. “Though after the Dye Incident, you really shouldn’t talk about dangerous.”
“Hey!” Pinkie snapped. “Everyone was basically, almost nearly turned back to normal eventually!”
“Fairy Charmer is still glowing.”
“I said nearly! I stuck a lot of qualifiers on that sentence!” Pinkie glared at the floor. “It’s not like it was on purpose.”
“It’d be better if it was,” Starlight said, still looking over her chart. “If we could have found some way to justify the incident things would have gone a lot smoother. Applied Science is in enough trouble as it is.”
“Trouble?” Twilight asked. She took off her enchanted glasses as she approached and immediately regretted it; Pinkie caught sight of her and beamed.
“Boss! Hey boss! Where have you been did you see that I got promoted and the Dye Incident isn’t really my fault and there’s so much to tell you—”
“Pinkie!” Twilight took a step back, flicking her ears at Pinkie’s high-pitched brand of excitement. “Woah, let's just remember our indoor voices, okay?”
Pinkie giggled nervously and stepped back. Starlight patted her on the shoulder and smiled at Twilight. “It’s good to see you.”
“It’s great seeing you girls too.” Twilight turned to watch Fluttershy begin to corral the frogs towards the middle of the room. “I guess things haven’t changed much.”
“Oh, oh!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Except I’m not just an intern anymore! I’m an assistant!”
“What, really?” Twilight smiled. “That’s great! When did that happen?”
“About a month ago! I invited you to the party, but you had to do something business-y.”
“Right!” Twilight said, “I was meeting with Sunburst and Blueblood about the laws limiting telepathic research in the private sector. I must have missed it. I’m sorry I’ve been so busy lately.”
Everyone exchanged a series of odd looks and then nodded awkwardly. “Well,” Starlight said, “You’re here now? Let me show you what we’ve been working on.” Starlight started walking in the direction the huge Golem had moved in, and Twilight slowly followed. She glanced around, noting again how quiet everyone seemed. As they walked they passed another Golem trotting in an oddly smooth manner and had no visible joints or seams. Twilight turned to watch it as it passed but had to hurry to keep up with Starlight.
Spike and Pinkie stayed behind with the new Golem, leaving Starlight and Twilight alone. Twilight could feel her anxiety bubbling in her stomach. She closed her eyes for a second and concentrated on her Arc Reactor.
Magic’s not about what’s possible, it’s about what is.
The magic inside began to stir.
Don’t get hung up on the possibilities, just focus on what’s real.
It began to flow, from around her horn down across her body towards her Cutie Mark.
Don’t look at it like a Unicorn. Look at it like an Earth Pony.
The Reactor finished its work, transforming her magic from a Unicorn’s to that of an Earth Pony. Earth pony magic boosted her Cutie Mark, so while she couldn’t cast spells, she could perceive and understand them much more thoroughly. She could almost see them now, floating over and through the ponies all around. There was a shimmering tether linking the Golem to whatever Starlight intended to show her, but no odd spells on Starlight herself.
They reached a large door barred by two guards who immediately pulled themselves up straight when they saw her approach. They opened the door for Starlight without looking, because their gaze was locked solidly on Twilight. She shifted uncomfortably and moved inside.
“Alright,” Starlight began. “Golems are the safest way to deal with dangerous situations, but of course programming them is difficult. Since they aren’t real people, they can’t react like a real person would which could, in turn, endanger whatever they were trying to save. So I thought: What if we didn’t have to program it?”
Despite the uneasy feeling in her stomach, Twilight felt intrigued. She loved watching Starlight work on problems, the mare’s mind had always been electrifying. “You found a way to let Golems create ideas?”
“Even better!” They reached the end of the short hallway and Starlight opened the door with aplomb. “What if they didn’t have to think at all?”
Inside the dark room were about a dozen ponies sitting at desks. Each sat in front of a modified crystal ball. There were wires connecting it to some kind of machinery mounted on the ponies foreheads. Twilight concentrated on the spell, trying to see how it worked with the machinery.
“Each one of these ponies is in charge of a Golem,” Starlight continued, “and is controlling it through these devices. This means they can be deployed for search and rescue, evacuations, dangerous exploration missions—”
“How are you controlling them?” Twilight interrupted. Her gaze remained fixed on the crystal, but she could hear Starlight’s sudden nervous laugh.
“Well, as I said, the device plugs into the crystal ball, and they can use it to direct the Golem’s movements. I don’t…”
Twilight let Starlight trail off as she turned back towards the mare. “It’s a mind-link spell. Those headbands are pulling out their minds, and sending it through the crystal ball into the Golem. Aren’t they?”
“Well… Yes,” Starlight began. “But they consented to what we’re doing—”
“That doesn’t make it safe!” Twilight exploded. “You’re sending their minds out with nothing to shield them! What if something intercepts the signal?”
“I mean,” Starlight tried to say, “we haven’t gotten that far yet...”
“If something happens to the Golem while they’re inside it, they’ll feel it like it’s real. What happens to someone after they feel themselves die?”
“Okay, we haven’t tested for that yet, so we’re not super clear…”
“And on top of that,” Twilight exclaimed, “Spark Industries is trying to ban this kind of research! Sunburst told you about the mess Global Dynamics made, and they’re careful— I mean,” she abridged, “they’re self-aware, careful a little much…”
“Twilight!” Starlight snapped. “I get that this could be dangerous in the wrong hooves, but it’s not in the wrong hooves! It’s in our hooves! And we can use this to help people! Why don’t you get that?”
“What are you talking about? I do that every day—”
“Not anymore!” Starlight’s magic spiked with her anger, and she dropped the clipboard. “You spend all of your time in your office, and you haven’t been down in Applied Science in months. You keep pushing these restrictions, you won’t see us—”
“I’m busy!” Twilight’s tail lashed, and it took far more strength than it should have to stand still. “I’m trying to fix the messes I made!”
“That AIM made. That other ponies made. The things you built—”
“—I didn’t take responsibility for.” Twilight spun around stomped over to look at the rigging more closely. She might have been trying to hide her face. “I knew my tech was being used to hurt people. But I blew it off until I couldn’t anymore. It doesn’t matter what I intended. The bottom line is that I could have helped people and I didn’t care.”
Starlight snorted bitterly. “So now you don’t care about us?”
Twilight stared at Starlight. Now she was the one facing away and hiding her face. “Starlight, that’s not true.”
Starlight snorted again. “If you’d been working with us, you could have told us to change direction ahead of time or found a way around this. Now we’re down another project. Do you know how hard this is without you? With all these rules we don’t get a say in? You haven’t seen us in forever, and things— are different. The board wants to get rid of Applied Science. We need this win, Twilight.”
Starlight looked up, and their gaze met. It had been a while since Twilight had seen her friend, and she looked older. As if it’d been years and not months.
Twilight sighed. “We can’t cancel the demonstration this late. We’ll do this, and then we can talk later about how changes are being made. But this mind tech is dangerous, Starlight. I want to find other projects.”
Starlight’s face tightened. “Yeah. Of course. We’ll do that.”
Fearfully, “Starlight, I’m sorry—”
“I’m sorry you cut us loose too.”
The sentence stood between them like a brick wall, blocking anything Twilight might have said back. The silence was broken by a gentle knock on the door. One of the guards from outside poked his head in. “Pardon me, I need to show you something.”
Starlight nodded. “I’m coming. We’re done anyway.”
“Uh,” the guard started, “I really should show this to both of—”
“Don’t bother,” Starlight said coldly. “She was just leaving.”
The guard shifted from hoof to hoof as Twilight stood frozen. She wanted to be angry— she wanted to shout her down— but the words wouldn’t come. So she just turned and left.
Spike watched the new Golem stand in place and begin to change. In some ways, the thing was simpler than the other Golems, because it didn’t have any machinery inside. It couldn’t mimic a pony’s ability to fly, a Minotaur's strength, or any other magical powers. What made it stand out were the elements used in its construction.
It was made from an alloy of mercury and a classified mineral that Spike didn’t even know the name of. It could transform its body from a solid to a liquid. Then it could reshape itself however it wished and transform back.
The Golem melted itself down and formed the shape of a small cage, before solidifying. Technicians pulled on the bars and nodded, before gesturing for it to continue. It shifted through several forms, including a pony-sized dog, a large cart, and a shorter likeness of Princess Celestia.
Fluttershy guided the Golem through each change, offering words of encouragement. Pinkie had taken over the clipboard and frowned as she checked off each box. Spike frowned with her. “Is something wrong?” he asked.
“Huh? Oh, not with this,” she pointed to the Golem, “I’m just worried about Starlight. She’s been running herself ragged trying to get this done. Ponies don’t like us as much as they used to when the boss worked here.”
“Oh.” Spike scratched the back of his neck, feeling a little on the spot. “I’m sure she’ll be back when she gets ahead of her work.”
“Everyone’s been saying that for forever,” Pinkie said, much more quietly than most would expect her to. “At least the ones that want to be nice. Everyone else keeps talking about how the boss was the only reason we got anything done. Without her, we’re gonna…” She shook her head. “I don’t know if we’ll be able to stay.”
“Twilight won’t let anybody fire you,” Spike said firmly. “She’s going through a lot, but she’s still your friend.”
“That’s not what Starlight thinks,” Pinkie said glumly. “Starlight is scared. She’s obsessed with this project, making it work right, making it look good… I don’t know what she’ll do if it goes wrong.”
“I don’t think it’s just her job,” Fluttershy said as she walked over. She quailed a little when they both looked at her, but she carried on. “I think it has something to do with Twilight.”
“I know, I’m worried too,” Spike said. “She’s hiding something, I’m sure of it.”
“That’s, uh,” Fluttershy bit her lip. “That’s not quite what I meant.” She shuffled her wings and looked away, trying to find the right words. “It’s… When did Twilight get captured?”
“The weapons demonstration near Yakyakistan,” Pinkie said.
“Right. The things is, uh, that she went to that instead of Starlight.”
“What? But that wasn’t Starlight’s fault,” Spike said. “Sunset and I wanted her to do that, so the board would stop complaining about her not taking her job seriously.”
Fluttershy nodded. “But she was really upset after Twilight got back and stopped working down here. I think she feels guilty.”
“We all feel bad!” Pinkie snapped. “But Starlight is being a huge... “ she sighed. “Well, you know.”
Spike sighed. “I wish I’d known things were getting this bad. Maybe I could have helped somehow. It’d be nice to get something right.”
Both mares waited for Spike to continue, and he blushed. He hadn’t meant to.say that out loud. “Sorry. It’s not really anything.”
“Pardon me.”
Spike and the girls turned to see one of the guards levitating crystal ball in his magic. “I need to show you something.”
With a morose sigh, Twilight trotted towards the food court, killing time before the presentation began. There were a growing number of ponies now, but the attitude was still very skittish. At the very least, it meant that the lines were shorter. Twilight felt too depressed to eat, so after passing up various deep-fried goodness, she settled on a soda and looked for a place to sit down alone.
She watched ponies talked animatedly about the inventions they’d seen, but she couldn’t bring herself to be excited. Every time someone mentioned a new innovation, Starlight’s accusing eyes would creep into her head. What if she’s right? Could I be going too far?
It wasn’t just Applied Science’s current woes; was Iron Mage working? She’d destroyed some research and cost AIM money, but SHIELD could have handled any of them. Maybe she hadn’t gotten any civilians hurt, but this aura of fear didn't do anyone any favors.
More than anything, she felt alone. As Twilight sat down, she realized that she’d left Spike downstairs by accident.
Of course you did. You’re so wrapped in your private war that you can’t see a thing your friends are doing.
“Mind if I sit here?”
Twilight jerked her head up. Sunset Shimmer smiled down at her, holding a sack lunch in her field. She was in uniform and armed to the teeth, and just seeing her made Twilight want to relax.
But what if she’s the mole?
Twilight did her best to brush the thought away as Sunset offered her a bag of chips. “You look like you have a lot on your mind, Twi.”
Twilight took the offered bag and sighed. “You have no idea.” She pointed to the seat across from her with a tired expression, and Sunset slid down. “How’d you recognize me?”
Sunset took off her sunglasses. “Enchanted with a Truth-of-the-Matter spell. I can see through anything I want to, including illusions. They should be standard issue, but they’re expensive.” She looked closely at Twilight’s face and her expression immediately fell. “I thought things were getting better?”
“I mean, they are, but…” She shook her head. “It’s nothing. How are you doing?”
“Pretty great,” Sunset shrugged, “so nothing new. I might have to spend less time at Spark Industries. Director Tempest wants me for a command.”
“That’s great!” Twilight leaned forwards. “Can you tell me what it’s for?”
Sunset snorted. “Classified. You know how it works. And don’t think I’m letting you get away with that, missy. I know that look on your face.”
Twilight frowned. Then, realizing that was the exact face Sunset was talking about, immediately tried to smooth it over and look normal. Upon realizing she didn’t know what her face looked like when it was normal, she gave up and let her head thunk against the table. “Heuuuuuuuugh,” she sighed. “There’s a lot.”
Sunset nodded. “It’s easy for things to stack up without you noticing. Did something happen today?”
“I mean…” Twilight took a bite to give herself time to think. How much could she tell Sunset? “I hadn’t realized how much stress I was causing everyone. You know how hard I’ve been pushing for reforms.”
“I get it.” Sunset slid over her blueberries, and Twilight gratefully took some. “Look, finding a balance can be hard. I have a little time to talk before I’m scheduled to go back.”
“But it’s…” Twilight sagged in her chair. Maybe Sunset was AIM’s pawn, but most of this would be making gossip rounds at Spark Tower anyway. And more than anything, she needed to talk to someone. “Yeah, okay.”
Slowly, Twilight started opening up. It felt hard at first, but the words flowed easier and easier the longer she spoke, and she felt enormously better by the time she was done. “...And now I don’t know what to do. If I let Starlight push this sort of research through, it’ll undo all the work I’ve done to protect people from my technology. But I can’t shut this project down without hurting my friends.”
Sunset nodded. “That’s a tough one. How mad was Starlight?”
“She said I’d ‘cut her loose.’” Twilight groaned. “She’s one of my oldest friends! We were roommates at the University, and now she thinks I hate her.”
“Hey! She’s just mad right now,” Sunset said. “Give her some time, and then sit down and talk with her over lunch or something. Maybe you can explain yourself better, maybe the two of you can find a new project. But if you try to make this call in a vacuum, you’re just going to hurt something.”
Twilight smiled. “Thanks, Sunset.”
“No prob.” Sunset stood and stretched, arching her sore back and neck. “Look, what happened to you was awful. It changes a person. Feeling out those changes can be rough. If you want to talk, I’m there for—”
“Pardon me.”
Sunset and Twilight turned to see one of the security guards from below standing there. Sunset frowned. “You’re supposed to be downstairs. You can’t just leave your post because I’m on a lunch break.”
The guard didn’t seem to notice. Over his shoulder, Twilight could see four other guards stepping inside and closing the doors. She frowned. “What’s going on?”
“I need to show you something,” he said simply. From the duffel bag on his back, he pulled out a crystal ball. As Twilight looked at it, her breath caught.
Hanging inside was a very familiar hypnotic spiral.
There was a hideous squeal from the intercom, but Sunset didn’t look away. Twilight looked up, hoping no one noticed that she should be mesmerized. It might have been smarter to pretend to be a brainwashed zombie, but her heart was beating too fast for her to fake serenity.
I know that spiral.
A huge enchanted mirror came to life, showing the demonstration area. There were SHIELD personnel and standard guards standing there, enraptured by a pony sitting on a newly installed throne.
I know that mare.
The mare on the screen was— very hard to describe. Twilight knew how to guard her mind against telepathy. After her capture, she’d been obsessed with it. But you couldn’t block out everything. Some images leaked through, like the spirals of red, yellow and orange gently floating up from the mare’s hooves and across her body. Even though the warped image on the mirror, it was impossible to discern the details underneath.
Twilight had a lot of time to try and learn those details because this was one of the people that had captured her.
Hypnotia.
Even the word in her mind was spoken with a mixture of fear and contempt. Her tail lashed. Her ears laid back, and suddenly the single most important thing in the world was the image of this mare laying under Twilight’s hooves coughing up blood.
The mare spoke, each sentence containing imperious authority. “Hellooooo, Canterlot! I’d just like to take a moment to express a few complaints as to how I’ve been treated lately. She stood as dramatically as possible, tossing her mane back and smirking. “All I’ve heard since I got to this city is this nonsense about the Iron Mage. ‘She is real, what’ll she do next,’ bla bla bla.” She paused for dramatic effect because that was really her biggest motivation to do anything. “But not once have I heard a single person mention AIM.”
The crowd was beginning to stir now, some even inching their way towards the exits. The guards stationed at each door stomped as one, and everyone froze.
“AIM,” the mare proclaimed, “is the largest secret society ever formed. We’re everywhere. We’re anyone. And nobody, not even some mare armed with some cheap armor and cheesy one-liners, can stop us.”
From behind her, a hatch opened and a platform slowly raised itself. On it stood the entire Golem project. There were a half-dozen pony forms, as well as four artificial Minotaurs and the two Twilight has passed by in the testing range. Pinkie, Fluttershy, Spike, and Starlight all stood with eyes glazed over with spirals, barely cognizant of the world around them.
Twilight sucked her breath in through her teeth. Her whole body was taut, shaking with suppressed rage. How dare she.
Hypnotia somehow found a way to smirk even harder. She could fit her whole body into her smirk, with a special tilt of her head and twitch of her hips. “This presentation? I own it. I own these ponies and the dragon too. Everything here at the Expo is mine, and there’s nothing Spark Industries or SHIELD can do about it. Oh, and if a certain Twilight Sparkle really is here?
Twilight leaned forwards, and Hypnotia finally dropped her smile. “Just know that the Great and Powerful Hypnotia is coming for her too.”
The feed to the mirror cut out, and a compressed panic settled in. No one actually wanted to sit still, but a single spiral shone on the mirror. Slowly, everyone’s attention slid towards it, until the entire room sat still and unblinking.
Alright, Twilight thought. I’m alone, surrounded by guards. My friends have been captured by my worst enemy, and if anyone sees me pull out my armor my company will be seized and I’ll be arrested. On top of that, the most advanced minds in the world, along with their greatest inventions, are about to be stolen by terrorists.
Twilight felt a new emotion peak through her rage and realized it wasn’t fear. For the first time since she’d gotten back, she didn’t have a voice in her head saying that she couldn’t do this, or telling her she was going to hurt someone. She had to do this, like it or not. And she had a very specific person she wanted to hurt. The only thing she felt was excitement.
Well, it’s about time I get a problem I know how to fix.