One Degree Off: Part III
The alarm from the clock blared its usual noise into Techorse’s ears, forcing him awake. If the first two snooze hits didn’t solve him feeling tired, another one was very much unlikely to help. After pushing the button again to stop the beeping, the stallion forced his body up from the disheveled clump of sheets he had turned his bed into over the evening. Across the room was a hanging mirror he had been using to help himself get dressed, and from his upright seating he could see what he had become overnight. Dark bags were under his normally blue and cheery eyes, his already messy hair was a total wreck that no comb could hope to save, and his blank and lifeless expression could make a zombie jealous. Since he taught Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for the three credit class, he’d had a day off, but he’d done nothing but cry and sit around thinking about Twilight.
After managing to shuffle out of his bed and stumble into the dead quiet of the apartment, he poured himself a humble bowl of wheat cereal, which was stared at for several minutes instead of consuming.
“I can’t eat, I can’t think… my life is over.”
Going back the community college was out of the question, given that breakfast was such a challenge at this point. There wasn’t even enough emotional energy left in the stallion to think about his own projects or life, no matter that of his students. His head slumped on the table in defeat, coming down on the spoon in his dish and flinging the milk covered utensil over his shoulder and onto the floor.
“I can never go back to Ponyville.. The girls will never forgive me.”
He heard a buzzing noise coming from his saddle, which was resting on the couch across the room. Deciding he needed to check the machinery even if he didn’t feel like it, he lumbered over and opened the tiny cargo door on his favorite gadget. Inside was the tiny magic hologram transmitter Princess Celestia had a copy of, vibrating to indicate an incoming call.
“… and I definitely can not talk to Princess Celestia!”
If she knew, he was toast, given that Twilight was still very much her favorite student. Techorse gently removed the still-vibrating device from his saddle and flicked it open, the princess’s head appearing as a small projected image in the center of the round device which opened like a clamshell.
“H… hello?” he whispered, pretending the volume wasn’t working.
“Oh, Techorse, hello!” answered the princess, smiling, “I wanted to check in on you and Twilight this morning. How’s the teaching assignment going?”
“Perfect, she doesn’t know!”
Techorse breathed a sigh of relief, “I uh… I’m doing good enough, I guess.”
She didn’t seem to buy it, and the hologram looked around at the stallion, “Techorse… you look like a mess. Is something wrong?”
“I probably just forgot to dry my hair before bed,” answered the stallion, muttering, “I’ll get it combed down before class starts. The students are counting on me to do my best.”
“Ah, yes, well… indeed,” Princess Celestia answered, nodding, “did Twilight Sparkle leave this morning? I’d think she’d be there with you, keeping very close track of your progress. So lucky!”
“Yeah, that’s Twilight, all right,” Techorse agreed, a lump forming in his throat, “and I am lucky to have her.”
The princess picked up on his stress, “Don’t let all of this get to you too much, Techorse. Once you’re finished teaching, we’ll get you your title. Speaking of which, there’s one more requirement to discuss.”
He wiped his eyes clean with his hoof, “Oh great, more requirements...”
“It’s not so bad,” Celestia continued, “whenever a pony becomes a Master Engineer, they must choose an apprentice to teach their craft.”
“An apprentice?” Techorse asked rhetorically, “What do you mean?”
“It’s important that somepony with a degree and title such as yours pass on some of that knowledge and experience to another in hopes of seeing future masters,” she explained in good detail, “There are no hard requirements for who your student will be, but they should be somepony with a passion for engineering that matches yours. It’s a very hard decision, so take as much time as you require.”
“Will do. Thank you, princess,” he answered, already trying to decide how to fulfill this sudden demand.
She affirmed him, “Very good! Keep up the hard work, Tech.”
The transmission ended, the holographic display dying down and the device closing shut. Techorse put the machine back into the saddle and put it on his back, strapping it down.
“Maybe I can still finish this program,” he said to himself, “and make a new life teaching this student Princess Celestia wants me to mentor. She doesn’t seem to know yet, so things will go easier when she does get the news.”
Deciding he could carry on, despite his loss, Techorse took the bowl of cereal back to the kitchen and dumped it into the sink, figuring he would grab something else on the way. While poking around in the kitchen, he saw a book had been left behind on the counter, a storybook Twilight had yet to finish. It was the one he had read earlier, having loaned it to her since she seemed eager to try it herself. Now the sad little novel would likely never be read again.
“Oh… who am I kidding?” he sighed, tears welling up in his eyes again, “I miss Twi! We’ve been through everything and now… it’s over.”
No matter how bad he felt about it, though, he resolved to get to the college and teach the next day’s lesson. Something was pushing him along inside, even if he felt dead in there otherwise. The lonely inventor dried his tears and left the little book where it sat on the counter, leaving the apartment for his work.
“Your highness, we’ve got a guest,” explained the guard, holding a pair of binoculars with her front hooves, “looks like Twilight Sparkle.”
Princess Cadance turned around from her busywork in the throne room of the Crystal Palace and walked out the balcony doors to take a look for herself. She had a long list of chores to get done today, including preparation for an upcoming counseling session with a couple that founded a haycake company and threatened to split it over their personal issues. Although she would be happy to see her, Twilight showing up all of a sudden seemed out of place.
“Uh oh,” she said to her guard, “that can’t be good.”
“She appears to have an overnight bag with her,” continued the armor-clad pegasus, “and is… crying. What do you suppose happened?”
“I don’t know yet, but something tells me she needs me badly if she came here first,” Cadance sighed, “let her in. I’ll put my paperwork away.”
“Very well,” the soldier answered, putting the binoculars down and spreading her wings, “I’ll just land and usher Twilight Sparkle in myself.”
The princess interrupted her servant with a wing held aloft like a finger, “On second thought, I had better go greet her myself. Don’t worry about the papers I’m working on.”
She turned around and left the confused pegasus there to guard what amounted to a stack of case study papers and an empty balcony, taking the long stairs down to the ground floor of the spire, exiting through one of the structure’s legs. There she saw Twilight outside, tears running down her face and mane hair all askew. Some of her other guards were trying to console the unicorn, but were being ignored.
“Twilight! What’s wrong?” called out the princess, leaving the doors to the palace tower wide open.
Her relative charged her at full speed and threw herself into a hug, bawling her eyes out without giving any explanation. Cadance was startled by just how bitter her sadness seemed, and held her tight.
“What happened?” she asked again patiently.
The answer came through the tears, “Ohhhh, Cadance, it’s o...over! Tech kept a secret, and now he wants to break up with me! I was hoping… I was hoping you could help me.”
The princess’s already pale complexion drained a bit, “Oh… Oh dear. Twilight, I’m… I’m so sorry. Let’s get you inside so we can talk about it, okay? Your brother is here right now if you need him too.”
Cadance brought her inside with the help of her staff and had them prepare a room for the next couple of days, asking her to rest until she was ready to come get her to talk. Once Twilight was well out of sight, the princess’s first order of business was to piece together what she had just heard. Something didn’t quite add up about the situation, given what she knew about Twilight and Techorse. Nonetheless, it didn’t stop Shining Armor from barging into the castle lobby and nearly screaming in panic.
Before she could explain, he was already shouting with terrible fear in his eyes, “Cadance, the guards said Twiley’s here, and she’s crying her eyes out! What happened?!”
“Honey, according to Twilight, Techorse wants to break things off with her,” she said, “something about keeping a secret. Now before you say...”
“Did Tech hurt Twilight?!” he nearly roared, stomping his hoof on the lobby floor, “He’s-”
“Shining, please,” continued his wife gently with a persuasive voice and an unwavering smile, “this is Twilight we’re talking about. She did tell me Tech kept a secret, and that’s a big red flag… but we don’t have his side of the story yet. I’m thinking this was the first big fight they’ve had, and they just don’t have the tools my patients have been given over the years to solve it.”
Shining Armor managed to take a deep breath and agree, “All right, all right. What’s the plan?”
“I’m going to talk to Twilight first, and see what she has to say,” Cadance said, smiling, “figure out a bit more from her. Then, I’m going to see if Techorse can take a weekend for counseling here. I know they’ve been seeing each other for a long time, but this teaching job Techorse has been doing might have introduced some new stress. I think things may be fixable.”
“And if they aren’t?” Shining asked.
“Then… well maybe we just get used to a new normal,” Cadance answered, “I just want to see if I can make the situation less ugly, regardless of the outcome.”
“Fine, I can hold back,” answered her husband, rolling his eyes.
“Oh don’t give me that. Remember when we first fought? Even the best couples do,” she said in response, giving a playful swat with her hoof, “and we figured out how to get through it. I think that’s what those two need, if we can get Twilight to calm down and explain, that is.”
“Yeah, all right… let’s see what we can do for Twiley,” he agreed, nodding slowly.
"Teach, are you okay? We’ve been waiting on you for a while now,” asked Gracie, looking at her professor slumped over on his desk.
It had already been nearly fifteen minutes into the lesson time, and Techorse had yet to actually do anything other than be half asleep atop the cold surface of the cheap community college desk. His eyes were still crusted from the extra work his tear ducts had been doing over the past day, and the dark circles under them had betrayed the fact he’d not slept well. The stallion picked his head up off of the laminated particle board, having remembered he had a duty to carry out still.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” he said slowly, “take out your books and turn to page… you know what, nevermind. I’m just going to pass out the instructions for today’s activity. Go nuts and build things, guys.”
Techorse got up and lazily passed around white sheets containing the instructions for the day’s engineering lesson. Gracie frowned when she got hers, concerned for her teacher’s well being. Looking over to Improver in the seat next to her, she saw the tan unicorn staring at Techorse with his curious blue eyes, and something of a smirk on his face.
“So what about the reading we were assigned?” she asked, scratching her head with a talon, “No tie in to this assignment at all?”
“Please, bird, the professor has decided to change course, just for today,” Improver scoffed, “by the looks of things, he’s tired and could use an easier day today. Unless you’d prefer to have to work harder for a grade, of course.”
Now the other students were giving her looks, and Gracie new he had turned them on her as well. With her being the only non-pony in the class, there was nothing she could do to stop his insults in her mind. This was going to be a long semester.
Techorse quit passing out papers and stomped his hoof angrily on Improver’s desk, startling Gracie and the other students, “Improver, college is for adults, and you called Gracie a name like you’re a grade schooler. Shut up and be an adult, or get out of my classroom.”
“I can defend myself, teach,” Gracie muttered, rolling her eyes.
“Never said you couldn’t,” sighed the miserable professor, going back to handing out papers with his saddle’s robotic arms, “just trying to make things stop.”
“Make things stop? Like what?” wondered the griffin, “Something’s definitely wrong with him.”
Techorse supervised the class for the rest of the time, the assignment he had given was to create a working dimmer switch system and tie it to a light bulb so that they could learn how electrical resistances worked. While fairly simple, once again Improver and Gracie had the easiest time coming up with the right solution. To the griffon’s frustration, the unicorn had gotten the correct build faster again. It felt like his entire existence was dedicated only to making her look stupid.
“Looking good so far, I guess,” continued to mumble Techorse, barely paying attention to what his class was doing, “don’t forget to read the next part of the book tonight, otherwise, you’re dismissed once you get the dimmer switch working. Have a good weekend.”
After the very lazy class concluded, Techorse shuffled out the door slightly ahead of his students, having ignored most of their questions while staring at the ground. As the confused and slightly offended students left with their homework assignment, Improver caught up to Techorse and began walking next to him, confidently smiling.
“Sir, you’ve been acting very down today,” he said, “and even though you’re just my teacher for this elective, I simply cannot leave you looking so horrid. What’s wrong?”
Gracie, seeing Techorse with Improver as she stuck her own beak out the classroom door, huffed after them, not wanting Improver to get an edge over her with the professor. She quickly moved in front of the two walking ponies and stopped them from going any further, much to the annoyance of Improver.
Unlike the stallion, however, her statement towards Techorse was a bit more straightforward, “Techorse, you look like crap.”
“You too, huh? I’m lucky to have great students who care,” moped the pony, continuing to look at the ground, “all right, today’s lesson was bad and I admit it. I’ve been upset because… my marefriend of a few years broke up with me.”
“Oh, Techorse, I’m so sorry,” said Gracie sympathetically, “did you want to talk about it?”
“Wait a minute,” interrupted Improver, pushing Gracie aside and addressing Techorse as well, “weren’t you dating Twilight Sparkle? Celestia’s very own prized student and therefore one of the greatest spellcasters in Equestria?”
“Yes,” he choked in response, tears welling up in his eyes, “her.”
“Oh well then it’s no wonder you were absolutely despairing, your entire life’s upside down,” Improver said coldly, “without Twilight Sparkle you’ll lose touch with the royal family and most of your contacts through that avenue. This is a horrid loss!”
“Could you be any more of a jerk?” Gracie snapped at him, “He’s going through heartbreak and you’re making it worse!”
“Guys, I need to go home,” whimpered Techorse, tears streaming down his face, “it’s going to be a bit before I’m okay again, but… I need to go rest.”
Improver raised his chin and chuckled, “I understand you want to lie down, but are you really going to simply give up and let this destroy you? You’re still the greatest inventor in the world!”
“What do you mean, Improver?” Techorse said, rubbing the liquid off his face with a hoof and finally making eye contact.
"What I meant to say before Gracie jumped on me, was that you’re still superior to any engineer who’s ever lived in Equestria,” he continued, flattering the stallion, “and it’s Twilight Sparkle’s loss that she would dare to leave such a catch as yourself. Your renown as an inventor and a developer of home appliances goes farther than any relationship or friendship you might have had.”
“Look, Techorse is in no way ready to just forget everything, how would you feel if someone broke up with you after years of happiness?” argued the avian, crossing her arms.
Tired of hearing the two argue, and knowing he had to help them get along as his students, Techorse rolled his eyes and caved in.
“I guess I have done some interesting things with my business,” he said slowly, “but I’m not sure I could say it’s more important than the ponies I’ve known. Especially her...”
“You’re better than this,” continued Improver, shaking his head, “so much better that I want to know everything there is to know about your career. The things you’ve done with your saddle and your other machines should be where you get your pride. You can’t let a breakup ruin all of that!”
“I think you’re just trying to get a better grade,” grumbled Gracie, “you’re really kissing up here.”
“Ha! Being called a ‘kiss-up’ is a small price to pay if it means cheering our professor up,” replied the other stallion, “he does deserve to be happy, don’t you agree?.”
“Well, when you put it that way,” said Gracie, rolling her eyes, “I guess I have to agree. He shouldn’t have to be this unhappy.”
“There you go,” he answered, nodding gracefully, “both of us would very much like to see Techorse cheer up and complete his path to Master Engineer, right?”
“Whaaaaat?!” gasped the griffon before turning to him, “You never told us you were going to be a Master Engineer! What are you doing here then?”
“It’s a long, long story,” Techorse answered, shaking his head, “but the short answer is, I never finished the community service requirement for the degree, so I ended up here to serve the time.”
“You make it sound like it’s a prison sentence,” chuckled the avian, “is it?”
“It’s not, I’m fine teaching my own way,” he answered, trying to smile weakly, “it’s just that I… made some mistakes. I do feel better though now that you took the time to talk to me. Thanks.”
“Get some rest over the weekend, Professor Techorse,” said Gracie, using his name finally, “I’ll be looking forward to class Monday.”
“You will?” he asked, a small bit of hope in his eyes.
“Yeah, I will… I mean, it’s my favorite elective so far,” she stuttered, turning red a bit, “you know what I mean! I want to be able to graduate too, ya know.”
“Exactly, Gracie,” added Improver, “we appreciate you choosing to each us this knowledge as your requirement for your title. But please take care of yourself first!”
He then cleared his throat before adding, “Also, very sorry for calling you a bird. I should be acting my age, after all!”
“It’s fine,” lied the griffon when she saw Techorse’s approving look at Improver’s apology, “see you both later...”
Having felt appreciated for his work, Techorse walked past his students, a slight bit of light in the darkness of losing Twilight from the care they had shown. Gracie loved his course, and Improver was apparently a fairly big fan of his! Said fan watched him exit the school building with a slightly happier trot, before smirking, pushing his glasses up his muzzle, and going his own way home.
Getting home well before it was dark, Techorse felt better for the first time since Twilight had run out on him. He was still feeling a bit of pain, of course, but things could potentially get better. He honestly believed that at the bare minimum, he might be able to keep most of his other friendships. Still, he had his doubts given how closely woven his friend circle had become over the past couple of years. He remained reluctant to open the door in any case, as he knew the apartment on the other side of the white painted door he stood in front of would be very empty and lonely. Coming back to Twilight had comforted him despite his misery in being forced to teach, and now that was gone.
“Well, at least I’m getting a little bit of time off,” he said, going through his keys to find the right one for the door, “got the whole weekend to myself...”
Thunk
Looking out of his peripheral vision to see what had just made that noise, he saw a black kunai embedded in the door right next to ear. The stallion let out a deep sigh of exasperation, knowing what was coming next.
“Limpwing, you could have killed me, you know.”
“And don’t you forget it!” she cackled, “Turn around, you big goof! We need to talk.”
“How about we talk inside the apartment instead of out in the cold?” he suggested, still not looking back at her, “The first topic ought to be how you’re going to pay the landlord for the damage you just caused.
“Honestly I’ve seen the apartments around here, they won’t notice,” the spy mare continued, “guess we can go in if you’re worried about secrecy, though. I totally understand!”
Techorse opened the door and ushered the blue pegasus in, giving her a seat on the couch. He shut the door behind him and locked it, moving over to a nearby chair and sitting facing her.
“Honestly it’s good to see you again, Limpwing,” he said, frowning, “I’ve been feeling down lately about something. It’s very bad news, and I’m not sure how the others are going to react to it when they hear it.”
“Relax, nopony besides Cadance and Shining Armor know that Twilight and you had a fight,” chuckled Limpwing, enjoying the shocked facial expression she received in return.
She stopped smiling when she watched his eyes fill with tears and look at the ground, “Hey, sorry Tech, I’m a spy by nature. I promise I’m not here to make things worse, I’m here to try to help you!”
“How can you help now?” he asked, “It’s all over.”
“Cadance doesn’t feel the same way,” she explained, taking off her flight goggles and setting them aside, “she thinks you and Twilight have been working yourselves to death and have run into some totally normal issues. Well, fixable issues at least.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, drying his eyes off again.
“I mean that Cadance wants to try counseling you and Twilight on your relationship,” Limpwing explained, “yeah you lied to Twilight, and that’s bad, but she’s kinda at fault too for what she did, as far as I understand. If you spent some time talking it out, there’s a chance you could make things work still.”
“How do you know it’ll work?”
“I don’t,” she answered, smirking, “but I do know Twilight’s been crying all week saying you broke up with her, and you’ve been crying all week saying she broke up with you. There’s a chance you’re both wrong, you know.”
His heart jumped up in his chest at the possibility of fixing things. But, he had to know for sure this wasn’t some sort of false hope on Cadance’s part. There was the one time that he had ended up in a drawn out fight with the son of a couple she’d failed, and that had cost one of his friends his father’s life.
“If it helps, Twilight has already agreed to try,” the pegasus continued, shrugging, “all you have to do is show up at the Crystal Palace tomorrow and every Saturday after that. The princess will take care of the rest, I’m sure.”
“I can’t show my face around there, Shining Armor will kill me,” Techorse continued.
“Trust me, Cadance has already browbeaten her husband into standing down,” assured his friend, almost laughing at the absurdity, “his first instinct was definitely to beat you senseless, though. Of course, that brings up the interesting thought experiment of which of you would actually win in a fight given your weapons and his spells...”
“Limpwing, no!” he scolded.
“I’m teasing.”
Techorse shook his head, “Not funny.”
“Anyways, will you show up for counseling?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” answered Techorse, ears drooping to level with his head, “I’ve got conflicting feelings about what happened between Twilight and myself. Don’t know if I’m ready to deal with it yet. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to show my face in Ponyville again, either.”
“Hmmm, I see,” she said, chuckling, “I think you’d still be welcome back in Ponyville even with this, for the record. But moving on, there’s a reason why I decided to show up instead of Arbiter. He’s not giving you a choice in the matter.”
“Wh… what?”
Limpwing gave him a silly grin, “Look, Tech, we both know Arbiter secretly cares about his friends. He actually got fairly upset when he heard about what had happened.”
“What?! He actually got upset about that?” Techorse groaned.
“Yeah,” answered Limpwing, “he honestly thought he was going to see you guys stay together forever. It was such a contrast to his own life, I guess.”
Techorse smiled, “Didn’t know he cared this much.”
Limpwing answered back, “Yup. So you’ll give things a try, right?”
“Well, if Twilight’s already agreed to it, then yes,” he said, “I honestly thought she never wanted to see me again.”
“Great! I’ll let them know you’re coming,” she said, before remembering something, “oh, yeah, and before I go, I had a piece of intelligence from Princess Celestia she wanted you to have. Priority One message.”
“Shouldn’t you have started with that?” Techorse asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Heh, maybe, but you and Twilight’s happiness are priority zero to us,“ she joked, “so I wanted to get that done first. Here, I’ve got this for you.”
Using her twisted wing, she tossed a photo towards the stallion, who caught it with one of his saddle’s robotic arms and took a look. On the photograph was a picture of a centaur clad in armor with a dark, horned helmet, clutching a glowing red polearm being thrust towards a cowering pegasus pony that he recognized immediately.
“That’s Mr. Featherfall!” Techorse gasped, eyes going wide, “I remember hearing that he went missing shortly after the weather factory incident. Is this what happened to him?”
Limpwing nodded, a more serious expression on her face, “This picture was taken by a pinhole security camera in the room where Featherfall was… incinerated.”
“Uhhh,” trailed Techorse nervously.
“Let me explain,” she continued, “that centaur knight with the goofy armor? He’s wielding an artifact created by the Wraiths two thousand years ago, or at least that’s what Princess Luna told me. It’s called the Essence Scalpel. It contains an ancient dark magic that incinerates whoever it even scratches, and lets the user steal their magic!”
“Wait a minute,” Techorse said, holding up his other metallic hand, “Are you telling me this centaur knight burned up Featherfall with an ancient weapon? That’s crazy!”
“Par for the course for artifacts you’ve seen, right?” she teased.
“Yeah, you got me there, Limpwing,” he nodded, “I guess I should feel bad about what happened to Mr. Featherfall. Nopony deserves to have to face that kind of an end. So I guess Princess Celestia wants me to gear up and stop that knight?”
“It doesn’t end here,” Limpwing answered gravely, “I did some deeper investigation, those mares that were pretending to be vamponies and several others who’ve attacked you in recent times have been questioned. They’ve been working with this centaur, who calls himself the Surgeon, because of the scalpel, I guess.”
“So all of those times I’ve been in trouble, he’s been trying to get rid of me,” Techorse reasoned, the gears turning in his head, “but why does he want me gone so badly? Does he think he can take over Equestria if he offs me? Twilight and the others can stop him even with me gone.”
“That’s just it, Tech, we don’t actually know what the Surgeon’s motives are,” she answered honestly, “we asked the wraith kingdom about the weapon, and they’ve stated it doesn’t offer any extra protection against magic or other kinds of firepower. We’ve only got one clue.”
“What’s the clue?”
“We suspect the Surgeon has been using the abandoned robot factory as his hangout,” she said, “granted because of electrical problems and the neglect, some of the machines there go off randomly. However, some of the Quartz ponies have seen a centaur with a polearm in the area. We think, although it’s unlikely, that he may be trying to use the factory equipment to generate a new army in a bid to start a war with us. Of course, with the number of explosions we’ve also detected there, we believe he’s very far away from succeeding with that task, if he’s there at all.”
“So you’re saying you don’t actually know if he’s there, but if he is, he’s messing with the machines,” finished Techorse, “Now I get it. He may want me out of the way so I can’t use my knowledge of that technology to ruin his plans, whatever they are.”
“Yeah, we don’t know tons, but that’s my thought too. Anyways, since a big armored knight isn’t exactly stealthy, you’re safe for now,” Limpwing said, winking, “but obviously we’re going to have to act at some point given how dangerous that factory is. Once we know for sure that Surgeon is hiding there, we intend to make a move on the factory and try to stop him. More accurately, we’ll be rounding up the Element holders and if necessary… use them to stop him.”
“Gotcha,” he said, nodding, “so the usual for taking down a villain.”
“I mean, if you’re itching to use some new super weapon you’ve finished, let me know,” Limpwing winked, “if we get started now, we might change Celestia’s ‘no’ to a ‘maybe’ just in time!”
Techorse laughed at the silly joke, before seriously considering what he had in store. Whoever the Surgeon was, he had already taken several victims, and had been actively trying to get rid of him as well.
“Anyways, thanks for letting me know the situation at hoof,” he finally commented, shaking his head, “keep me posted about this centaur, and I’ll let you know how the counseling goes.”
“If I don’t figure it out myself,” she reminded him, getting up to go for the door, “between Arbiter and myself there’s gonna be three eyes on ya!”
“It’ll be kept in mind,” concluded the stallion, “see you soon, Limpwing!”
She left him by himself in the now once again lonely apartment, slightly more confident about his situation at hoof. Between his students liking him, and there being a chance at redemption with Twilight, maybe things weren’t going to be so bad after all!
“Cadance wants to counsel us,” he mused, standing up to go get something to eat from the kitchen, “I guess if anypony could help, it would be her, right? It’s not like I’ve got anything to lose at this point...”
There was a knocking on the door before he could fix himself any dinner, slightly irritating the stallion but forcing him to shuffle over and answer it. He figured that Limpwing had forgotten something and was coming back for round two of conversation. To some degree, he felt relieved, given how badly he didn’t want to be alone. He opened the door again, expecting to see her again.
“Hey Tech!”
Instead of Limpwing, he found familiar faces looking back at him. Flaming Ivory, Midnight Blaze, and Shadow Breeze had all shown up, their faces bright. Techorse was thrilled to see his friends again, especially at a time like this!
“Guys,” he said, a little startled, “what are you doing here?”
“Oh don’t give us that crap,” Flaming scoffed, “you know why we’re here! We heard you had some troubles and we wanted to spend some time with our buddy!”
“We wanted to make sure you were okay,” Shadow said quietly, “and don’t worry, Fluttershy doesn’t know yet...”
“But we do,” finished Midnight, “and we heard that you’re going to see Cadance tomorrow to help iron things out with Twilight. But before you do, I thought I’d organize a guys’ night.”
“Oh man, we haven’t done anything fun in a long time,” Techorse agreed, stepping outside excitedly, “I’ve been so busy with my own projects, and this teaching job. I kind of feel like I’ve neglected you.”
“Don’t! It’s been a dream of yours to get this degree for a while,” Shadow answered, shaking his head, “but come take a break for a while!”
“Cool, what did you guys have planned?” asked Techorse, eyes aglow from the anticipation.
“First we were going to go to this new grill downtown, and then after that, bowling,” Flaming Ivory explained, throwing a hoof around his pal, “this time I’m gonna beat you for sure, Techie.”
“Not a chance, Flaming!” he answered, smirking.
“Comfortable?” asked PAL, smirking at the two guests sitting on the floor of the estate’s boiler room.
“Not really,” answered Mix-Up honestly, frowning back at the machine, “you’re not seriously going to make me sleep on this filthy floor, are you? It’s hardly befitting of a hospitality automaton such as yourself!”
“Well, you left me with no choice, seeing as you won’t stop complaining about our accommodations,” the robot chuckled, tapping his metallic fingers on the frame of the boiler room’s stairs leading up to the first floor.
“I made a humble request to procure some paints and other necessary supplies to create so that my talent doesn’t rot here,” the pegasus grumbled, standing up and seeing if he could find away around the machine body-blocking him, “and your response was to cast me into this hole.”
“Master Techorse is under strict orders from the courts to not let you paint or otherwise artistically create a single thing,” reminded the smug servant, “it’s very unfortunate that you ignored me and decided to try and steal the paints again from the laboratory, but here we are.”
“You permitted Spanners to try and fix the plumbing again, why pick on me?”
He responded with a shrug, “He actually fixed the issue with the kitchen water supply, where as your ‘art’ damages things. In either case, it’s only for the night to give me time to lock down all our supplies. So I’ll see you then, sir.”
As he started to head up the stairs, the exasperated pegasus turned red in the face and called out, “If you leave me down here, you chunk of uninspired metal, I’ll decorate every last square inch of this boiler room! You’ve no idea what my talent can do!”
“Please try not to hurt yourself,” answered PAL as he reached the top of the stairs and locked his guest in the darkness of the basement.
At the top of the stairs in the castle’s hallway, he immediately encountered Spanners, whose ears were down in a supplicating pose.
“So, uh… I finished the repairs. Can I please stay up here and at least sleep on the couch?” he pleaded hopefully.
“Relax Spanners, you’re upholding your court order nicely,” said PAL, perhaps over-enjoying how much power he had, “go ahead and use the shower, then stay in the guest room.”
“Thank you!” he whimpered, before galloping off to get away from the machine as fast as possible.
Having felt as if he had sufficiently flexed his power against the two stallions for the evening, PAL retreated for the closest staircase to close things down for the night. As he did, however, he heard a mysterious noise coming down from one of the stone hallways of the castle. Curious, he changed course to follow the noise, a soft electronic hum that stood out from the normal sounds of the home’s idle machinery. It seemed to be coming from the main computer room, the last door down from the hallway that connected the main lobby of the fortress with the back room. PAL scanned the door, marked “Main CPU” from the outside, and listened carefully. The computer on the other side of the door was making a louder noise than usual, and an additional sound, like that of a ticking clock had been added to it.
“Who’s there?”
PAL shoved the door open quickly, and spotted what was making the noise. A pony-shaped machine, made of clockwork parts painted gold and blue was standing in front of the keyboard console of the main computer. Two snaking wires extended from the crystal horn on its head into the computer, yellow glowing eyes on a black background shot over to the intruding robot, and immediately the construct acted. The wires removed themselves from the computer and went back into its head, and then, with a flick of the neck, it fired a bolt of magical light at PAL. He managed to dodge the shot narrowly by turning sideways, throwing his metallic body against the wall, but this gave the clockwork pony an opening, and it galloped mechanically out of the room and down the hallway towards the front door, which had been left wide open.
“Come back here!” shouted PAL, opening his wrist panel up and mashing the button on the inside that controlled the castle’s doorways, “Stop!”
The massive oak front doors began to swing shut, but the construct had already gained plenty of ground, and by the time the doors slammed, only its tail had been caught in the opening. With a flash of sparks, a segment of electrical cord that formed the machine’s tail had been severed in the doorway, but the rest of the unit had escaped into the night.
“The computer… what did it do?!”
Cursing his luck, PAL turned around and stomped back into the computer room, typing furiously at the keys to see what the home invader had done. After searching the entire file system over and double-checking for intrusions, he discovered that none of the files had been deleted or edited. One file seemed to be in the middle of doing something, but his interruption had terminated that file’s use.
It was marked “Reactor Overload Handling System”
PAL wondered if he should call the authorities or not. He knew there could only be a terrible reason as to why the intruder had chosen to take the files.
“I must warn Techorse immediately,” he said, “I’ll open a call while I’m...”
The robot felt his vision sparkle and crackle with interference, his processor starting to shut off as a strong electromagnet attached to his head. He screamed and turned around, finding Spanners and Mix-Up standing there with one of Techorse’s new inventions, an electromagnet launcher for disabling both magical and nonmagical constructs… like himself.
“Ha ha! Gotcha!” said Mix-Up triumphantly, “Let’s see how you like being asleep on the cold floor, sir!”
“F...f...foolish,” PAL crackled, his limbs convulsing, “mus… must… inform...Tech.”
“We’ll call him tomorrow, seen you do it a million times,” chuckled Spanners, “until then, Mix-Up and I are free stallions, you big jerk!”
PAL let out a piercing robotic cry before his systems shut down and he went into sleep mode, crashing to the ground. The last thing he heard was the two stallions cheering about their “freedom”, clueless as to what they’d done.
That evening had been some of the most fun Techorse had enjoyed for a long time. At the restaurant, they’d ordered way too many hayburgers and appetizers, and spent a good two hours eating, talking about their most recent adventures in life. Techorse had of course been stuck with the bill, but he didn’t mind, being with his friends was worth it. After, they went to the bowling alley where the after-dark special got them four great games together. Despite the apparently fierce rivalry between Flaming and Techorse, Shadow ironically won all four games, his two wing grip on the ball proving quite effective. Now they were walking together in the moonlight shining down on the city sidewalks, streetlamps breaking up the otherwise bright glow of the full moon. They were chatting away about their past exploits, until Midnight decided he needed to speak up about the other reason why they were there.
“So, Tech, I think we need to be honest as to why we decided to show up,” he said to him.
“Oh?” he responded, smiling, “That doesn’t sound too good, Midnight.”
“So uh, a certain little pegasus may have told us that um, things ain’t so great between you and Twilight,” Flaming Ivory said, “we thought we’d show up and help cheer you up.”
“Well, leave it to Limpwing to make something personal public,” he grumbled, “should have known since you showed up seconds after she left. Yeah Flaming, Twilight Sparkle and I are not doing so well. We may not… make it.”
“Limpwing came and got us so that we could give you a fun night before you tried to patch things over with her,” Midnight explained, “we wanted you to know that even if things don’t go so well, we’re going to be in your corner.”
“Yup, our friendship is not conditional on Twilight and you being a thing,” added Shadow, “just in case you were worried everypony was going to turn on you, or something.”
Techorse turned a little red, “I… I never thought anyone was going to turn on me.”
“Limpwing said you thought you’d have to leave Ponyville,” Flaming chuckled, “that’s not gonna happen, pal. We’re with you for the long haul whether you like it or not.”
Techorse could see the apartment complex coming up ahead, and stopped is friend group underneath a street lamp so he could relax for a moment. The anxieties that had plagued him seemed relaxed, if only for a little bit.
“What’s wrong? We can take you to the door if we need to,” joked Midnight.
“I’m just… thankful I have great friends like you,” Techorse answered, tears welling up in his eyes, “this whole past month has been this horrible roller coaster of emotions and issues. Don’t think I would have made it without you.”
“Well now that you know that you’re going to live,” Flaming Ivory continued to tease, “we’re still going to ask you to show up to Cadance’s place and talk to Twilight. Don’t give up just because you’ve got a couple of goons like us, got it?”
He muttered back, “I’m willing to try.”
“We mean it,” continued Midnight, pointing a hoof at his friend, “you’re worth it… and so is she.”
“Just know we’re all still here for you if you’ve given it your best and you still have to move on,” finished Shadow Breeze, smiling softly, “we’re all looking forward to when you finally finish this degree so we can celebrate!”
Techorse took one more look at his friend’s faces illuminated by the street lamp and sighed, “You’re right, and again, thank you. Tomorrow I’ll head over and talk to Twilight. In the meantime...”
He opened his saddle up, and stuck out the two robot arms to make a finger-guns pose at them, “Start planning that graduation party!”
“Yeeeeah, that’s the Techorse I know!” hooted Flaming, throwing his hoof around his buddy, “Come here!”
Surrounded by his friends, Techorse felt the confidence he had so carefully curated over the past few years come back to him.
“So uh...” trailed Flaming, letting go of his friend, “when you graduate, any chance you could please help me design a new sound studio? Been hoping to get one done cheaply.”
“Flaming!’ groaned Shadow Breeze.
“Whaaat?! Isn’t please enough?” he retorted.
They had a good laugh about the joke, before sending Techorse home to rest. Tomorrow he would go and try to work with Twilight, but for the moment, he understood that he still had most of his life intact. At the very least, it gave him perspective on what he had accomplished so far since coming to Ponyville.