//------------------------------//
// How everything started 
// Story: A Boundary Apart 
// by armid 
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Dear princess Twilight,

In the last few days, things have been quite odd and I’ve been having trouble making sense of it and making the right choices...





It all started from the day that our marks for the recent math exam got announced. I don't want to brag but I got a high mark as always. However the joy of my great mark wasn't going to last for long.

I was asked by Principal Celestia to tutor SOMEONE in the library after school. It was nothing big, at least I didn't think it was going to be so I accepted. I tutor some students occasionally so I really didn't mind it. 

But who was the one I was supposed to tutor in math? No one other than Flaming Star himself. At first I thought that this might be a good opportunity to get to know the guy better, since the past two weeks that they have been in school they haven't really engaged with anyone, not him nor Steely Armor. Yes, they occasionally talk to us, but it's not really something to consider. It's mostly "Hi, how is it going." or "hey" "Bye" that sort of thing. It felt as if they are not comfortable with the school or maybe even the students yet so maybe I could break the ice this time. And boy what wishful thinking I had. Because just thinking about what happened makes me irritated by itself, I will not elaborate on it much but it went like this: He looked as if he knew absolutely NOTHING about math so I had to sit there till evening, trying to teach him something. But guess what? He was acting the whole time! why? Don't even get me started on that. It's a story for another time.

After my long lasting session of tutoring that genuinely made my mindset ruined, I packed up and left school in hopes of riding on my motorcycle back home. But it didn't start. Once again I tried to turn it on, but still no luck to get it going. I didn't want to start investigating for an issue in it then as I desperately wanted to head home and put my head to rest. So I just locked it there and left it there, hoping no one would try to steal it.

I barely got home, and mindlessly walked upstairs and dropped dead on my bed. Next thing I recall was my alarm waking me up in the morning. After I dressed up and packed up my stuff into my backpack, I headed outside. Taking in the air to start a new day, I started walking to school but moments later, I sensed that something was missing. Like: "I shouldn't be walking to school, why am I-'' and then it hit me! "MY MOTORCYCLE!" 

I dashed through the streets, almost hitting a few people on the way till finally, I caught a sight of the school. However, it was too soon to let out a sigh of relief. I walked up to the school to catch my breath a little bit. Though the thought of my motorcycle being stolen didn't really help with the process. Thankfully, my motorcycle was untouched, at least it seemed to be. However it still wasn't starting, "I should take it to a mechanic today" I told myself. There was probably something wrong with it and I would rather fix it as soon as possible then for it to stop working mid-way.

I entered the school afterwards, it was not very crowded, though for some reason, I was not able to find the girls. It was as I was walking around searching for them among other students with my eyes that I felt a pat in the back. 

"Hey Sunset!" 

As I turned my head around, Rainbow Dash's face was the first thing to come to view. "How is it going?"

"Ugh, I've seen better days." I grunted. "Have you seen the girls?"

"Nah, you're the first that I met up with so far" she started walking beside me "So um, what's the problem?" 

"Well, I had a really frustrating tutoring session with a certain someone yesterday that took till evening and once I got out to ride home, my motorcycle didn't start!"

"Yours too?" Her eyes widened, "Mine also doesn't move anymore."

"Really?"

"Yeah, I found out this morning. And because I was restricted not to use my magic sporadically, I had to walk and drag it all the way here veeeeeeery slowly!" she glared at me.

"Rainbow." I let out a silent yell, "We both know what happens when you do that. It messes with all of us!" and stared back at her.

She turned her face away, "I KNOW!" but when she wanted to continue, she hit another student and fell on the ground. “Oh.” 

The student she hit though stood tall as if nothing happened. 

I helped Rainbow Dash to stand back up, meanwhile the guy turned around to see what hit him. And to our surprise, it was Steely Armor. He looked at us with his yellow eyes and stepped back. "Oh, sorry." 

"No it's not your fault," I said, "Rainbow just, wasn't paying attention" 

"Yeah, didn't see you there." She rubbed the back of her head. "Hey um, have you seen the girls?"

Steely Armor paused for a second, "The...girls?" His eyes narrowed. 

"Yeah, like Twilight? Pinkie? AJ?" Rainbow Dash continued, gesturing with her hand.

"OH! Right, right." He nodded a few times, "They have changed some classes and put the details on the wall near the cafeteria. They might be there." 

“They’d changed the schedules? Ugh.” I stepped forward, "Thanks for letting us know!" 

Rainbow Dash and I started walking away and parting our way from Steely Armor. But I decided to talk with Steely Armor a bit more before leaving. 

"Oh, hey Steely Armor!"

He was on his way too, but turned back, "Yes?"

"I just wanted to know how are you feeling about the school and all so far?" 

He paused for a second, and then responded: "It's...nice...I guess." 

It didn't seem like he wanted to talk at that point. "That's nice to hear, so, what have you been doing so far? I heard you and Twilight have been having some sessions after school about magic." I pointed backwards with my thumb and tried to keep my eye contact with him. Though he was constantly looking away.

"y-yeah,..." He rubbed his right shoulder. 

"Are you guys doing that today too?"

"Oh, no, not today!" He shook his head and kept moving backwards, "I-I gotta go, um...bye!" he then walked away as fast as he could. 

"What was that all about?" Rainbow Dash whispered, looking as he walked away. 

"He’s just… shy I guess."





The girls were still where Steely Armor said, right in front of the information board. They were discussing the change of schedule when we got there. 

"Will we be having sports on Tuesday?" gasped Twilight while looking at the board.

"Hh, yeah....what about it?" Applejack asked, moving closer to her.

"Where is physics? They ruined my full scientific Tuesday." 

"Uh… it's uh… on Thursday." Fluttershy said softly. But it seemed Twilight couldn't get over it just yet. 

"THURSDAY!?"

Spike noticed me and Rainbow and came running to us, that made the girls follow him with their eyes to finally see us too. "A bit late to the party...." Spike smirked. 

From what I figured, almost our whole schedule had been changed. However, it wasn't something we wanted. It really wasn't a big deal either, at least not for all of us. Twilight was freaked out about that, so much so that her eyes were going to jump out of their socket and break her glasses.  

"You're not getting it, this means I have to re-arrange my whole plans and I better do it fast or else everything will be in havoc!"

"Alright, alright darling." Rarity put her hands on her shoulders. "I'm sure you can find a way to solve that in no time."

Twilight let out a sigh, "Thanks Rarity, but It's just that I don't like being disorganized." 

"But why?" Pinkie jumped in front of her, "being disorganized is soooooo much fun! you get to figure out what you want to do and look for things you need. You don't like that?"

"Not really...." 

"I mean, look at the bright side," I joined Rarity, "At least the classes are going to be changed from next week and not tomorrow."

Before the conversation could continue, the class's bell rang and we each went our separate ways. The rest of the day was uneventful, we didn't have band practice and I was still somewhat sleepy. Rainbow Dash and I talked about our motorcycles and where we should take them. Knowing that my motorcycle had some problems with it recently, I had a gut feeling that this time the issue might be big. 

After school, Rainbow Dash and I went to check on our motorcycles. Hers did seem fine at first glance though what she described sounded way more different from what I was seeing. 

"It just stopped and let out some weird noises from the exhausts!" she said.

"Did you check it? Maybe something is stuck there." I kneeled to take a closer look. "Though I don't think it's that big of a problem."

"I doubt I can reach it with my hand. If there is something jammed in there, it's probably deep down."

"Usually it will just shoot it out if there is something in it. There is probably something else than that." I tried to look down the pipe but nothing could be seen. It was then that I saw something. A small puddle of petrol beneath her motorcycle. The petrol was dripping from the motorcycle into the puddle. "Have you seen this Rainbow?" I turned my head to her.

"what?" She also sat down, and I pointed at the petrol puddle, "Oh boy, that doesn't look good."

I stood up, "Well that explains why it's not working as it should be."

Rainbow put her hands on her knees and stood up and kicked her motorcycle, "Ugh! I can't believe it had a leakage and I hadn't noticed it!" she nagged. “No wonder why I was using more petrol these past days.”

I put my hands on her shoulder, "look, the puddle is not that big, so the leakage is probably not that bad." 

She rolled her eyes, "pfft, whatever," and turned back to me, "so what's up with your bike?"

I took a look at it from the corner of my eye, "If you ask me, I say that thing most likely won't move anymore."

Rainbow Dash raised her eyebrow and started walking towards it, "Why?"

"Because it's been sooooo long since I took it to a mechanic, it has all kinds of problems now!" I speeded up to catch up to her. 

"Then I guess it needs a lot of work!" 

"probably!...." We were both looking at my motorcycle, but looking at it wouldn't have made it move, "C'mon, let's get these two to a mechanic. We don't have all day."

We both went and dragged our motorcycles out of the school yard. Just doing that was tiring by itself, and we wanted to drag them to a mechanic that we haven't decided yet. After a short discussion about where we should go, we decided to drag them to where Rainbow Dash used to take her motorcycle. She said it was not the best, but it does give you a fixed motorcycle. 

But before we started moving, a familiar face showed up.

"Uh, hi...again... what's the issue?" Steely Armor rubbed the back of his head. 

We both turned our heads to him, "Oh...hi Steely Armor," I said, "Nothing really big, our motorcycles just need some repairing." I gave him a warm smile. 

"Yeah, they seem pretty messed up," Rainbow Dash added, putting her weight on her motorcycle. "don't worry though, we are taking them to a mechanic."

"What's their problem?"  Steely Armor stepped closer. 

"Well, Rainbow has a leakage, and mine probably needs a lot of work to start moving again." Then I looked at it again, "And that is if it will start moving again."

He sat down and looked closely at mine, "I can fix them for you."

Our eyes widened and we stared at each other. "You can...fix them?" Rainbow Dash asked with an uncertain tone. She took her weight off her motorcycle and continued, "Are you a mechanic or something?"

Steely Armor just stood silent, staring at us without a single word, almost nothing of his face flinched, motionless. Until he finally broke the silence. "Bring them to the Cars Graveyard,"  

He walked away after that.

For a few minutes Rainbow and I just looked at one another, wondering what just happened. Until Rainbow decided to share her thoughts on him. 

“He’s a weirdo.”

“OK. That’s not...nice.” 

“C’mon. He acts so odd.” She raised her hand in the air. “And Cars Graveyard?”

“That’s outside of the city, right?”

“Yeah but it’s not that far out.” Rainbow crossed her arms. “You actually wanna take these there?”

I took a moment and then I answered. “Honestly, I’m a little curious. Besides, I doubt you’re looking forward to meeting up with Rusty Wrench.” I smirked at her. 

“Agh. He’s gonna bring up my debt again!” Rainbow Dash sighed. “Fine, we’ll go there.”





We dragged our motorcycles all the way out of the city and took them to Car’s Graveyard. That was exhausting to say the least. But we made it. The garage was extinguishable from the place as it was the only building surrounded by piles of junk. It seemed it was able to maintain multiple vehicles inside. Inside, It had shelves on each wall, all filled up with materials and vehicle parts, a lone big light bulb hanging from the ceiling that lit up the whole garage. We looked around for Steely Armor but he was nowhere to be found.

"Heeeey! anybody here?" Rainbow Dash shouted. 

"Aagh!" We heard a clunk as Steely Armor rolled out from under a blue van, "Over here!” he rubbed his head. “Ow, my head.”

"Are you ok?"

"Yeah, I'm ok." he stood up and cleaned his oiled hands with a green rag. "bring them in!"

Rainbow Dash dragged her motorcycle inside and stabilized it on the spot that Steely Armor was pointing at. He then put on his goggles and stabilized his hat on his head, "It should only take a few minutes," he said and got to work.

Rainbow Dash stood near him and watched him as he tinkered with her motorcycle. Meanwhile I brought my motorcycle in and decided to look around the garage a bit more. There were various machine parts on the shelves, both old and rather new. There were various wrenches and tools hanging on the wall, I dare say it was a complete set actually. There were also many parts I couldn't make out what they were, his shelves weren't really organized. But what drew my attention was what was in the corner of the garage. A small desk with pens and pencils on it. 

As I got closer, I saw something else on the wooden desk. A blueprint.

I looked over my shoulder to see if Steely Armor was paying attention or not, and when I made sure that he wasn't, I took a closer look at the blueprint. From what I could gather it looked like a mechanical claw, however, what raised the biggest question was how the scales and description was put down. In shapes. In various shapes that apparently resembled a language. A coded one. But unlike the other parts, the text on the top was written normally: "E.C.H.O stabilizer". After a bit more looking, I saw the same claw of the blueprint on the desk, it had some wires wrapped around it and some that were connected to it from the bottom and had naked ends. 

"Hey uh, what is this?" I pointed at the blueprint as I was looking at the blueprint.

"What?" He was messing around with Rainbow's motorcycle when I asked that and turned his head to look at me. When he saw me near the desk his eyes widened in shock. "Uh, I-I-it's nothing!" he stood up in a split second and came towards me. 

"Okay?" I said, as he pushed me aside and put a few sheets of paper on the blueprint. "Are you sure it's nothing?"

He turned back, "Y-yeah, I-it's nothing really." He tried his best to give a smile but he was very paranoid. His lips and jaw didn't assist him and what came out was an extremely awkward face.

I stepped back and walked to Rainbow Dash. I thought it wasn't a big deal at first but the way he reacted was concerning. Rainbow gave me a nudge once I got to her. "What was that all about?"

"I'll tell you later" I crossed my arms and stood still.  

Steely Armor came back and started tinkering with Rainbows bike, he seemed stressed however. He was watching me sporadically every now and then while opening up some places on the motorcycle. And after a while he took his rag and cleaned his hands with it. "It seems the oil pump doesn’t have the pressure it needs to have. Which means that the exhaust is backing up into the motor's pipes that results in the engine cutting out....that is beside the leakage it had from having a loose screw."

"so, how long is it going to take?" Rainbow Dash asked, turning her head in different angles to see her bike.  

"It's done." he said as he put his wrench in the toolbox near him.

"Wait, you're done?'' Rainbow Dash walked forward, inspecting her bike from every side possible, left, right, down, up everywhere, and yet she still couldn't believe it. "Are you serious?

Steely Armor remained silent and nodded. 

Rainbow Dash turned her motorcycle on and the engine roared to life. Just after that the rock that was stuck in the exhaust flew out. "Wow! you are really good at this!" Rainbow Dash's complement didn't make him flinch, literally no emotion.

"Now yours." he looked at me, his eyes looked way bigger behind his goggles. It looked oddly funny, but I beat myself up not to laugh and dragged my motorcycle to the spot.

This time I paid more attention to how he fixes stuff. He first fully inspected the motorcycle, took out some parts to inspect the inside as well but because he wasn’t elaborating on what he was doing as much so I decided to ask him about it.

"So how is it?"

"...pretty bad, it needs the oil to be changed, the carburetor hasn't been working probably and has damaged the engine significantly. The washers need to be changed too. I doubt you took this to a mechanic for years."

"Uhh, yeah! right on the spot!"

"Well, you should take it every once in a while, or else you should say goodbye to it, look, even the spark plug is messed up" he stood up and went looking at the shelves and brought some pieces: an engine that looked fresh, and some washers and a spark plug. "I need to replace these."

And so he started, he opened my bike and took out the wreck of an engine that was inside like an expert heart surgeon and put in the new engine. He wasn't even looking away from it when he wanted to change tools. He replaced the washers in a flash of a second and finally detached the spark plug and put the new one in the place. My motorcycle got renewed!

"Wow! you...you're amazing!...uhm, so, how much should we-"

"NOTHING!," he shook his head, "w-well I mainly wanted to return the favor of you helping Flame, so....nothing." he gave me an awkward smile. the pressure behind it could be seen in his eyes. 

"Thank you!" I said, giving him a smile, "You have no idea how grateful I am, I probably didn't have enough cash to get the engine fixed anywhere else." I looked at the desk in the corner  once again from a distance before leaving.

Once we got out Rainbow asked about what happened. 

“You’re not gonna tell me what happened?”

"There was this...blueprint on the desk for a claw, but it wasn't normal.”

"What do you mean?" She got on her motorcycle. 

"It was written in shapes!" I also got on mine.

Rainbow looked at me, lost. "What?” 

I sighed, although her question was mine too. "I don't know, and it may not be important at all. However, I think I gotta talk about this to someone."