//------------------------------// // Chapter Seven: Moonlight Gear // Story: Bioshock: Equestria // by BroSteve //------------------------------// Chapter Seven: Moonlight Gear Thank you, Blue By: BroSteve (Steven Rodriquez) The voice on the speaker finally came to a crackling conclusion, leaving Twilight petrified at his words. Iron Sights quickly turned towards her to see if she was okay. “Well.. This is not where you two should have gone. I s’pose there’s no way out now.” The radio stopped for a second as Blue paused, it seemed as if it were almost dramatic effect now “You’re gonna ‘ave to kill him. It won’t be easy. It’s the only way though, love. He’s killed way to many innocent ponies to be left alive.” Twilight looked forward, down the gore painted hallway and over toward Iron to see him returning the stare. She simply shook her head and smiled. Iron grimaced and said “Well we better get moving. I say we get our supplies, take down this Dr. Skitz guy and get the hell out of here.” “That’s the spirit there Iron! Put your best hoof forward love. I have access to some stuff in the hospital so I can help yah out as best as I can. Before yah go any further though, I have something that might help yah. If yah find your way down to the basement, where the maintenance staff is.. or was I probably should say. There is a device down there that could really help you two out.” Twilight responded curiously “What is it?” “Ah! So glad yah asked dear. It’s a Portable Enemy System, or P.O.N.Y for short. The nifty little device should display when a threat gets near. It's probably been out of use for a while but it should still wo-” In Blue’s true fashion, he had lost connection to them at the worst possible time. Now the two were left alone in the giant maze of a hospital. The hallways grew dark once more as the hospital fell silent once again. Horrible things had been festering inside of these walls for years. They were the first two ponies to stumble across it since. Twilight turned toward Iron and looked up at him. Despite his recent burst of courage before, his look was now home to fear. He finally met her gaze and forced a smile. “Come on... Let’s stick together and get down to the basement as fast as possible. The sooner we get this done with the sooner we can get out of here.” Twilight nodded and they both began to trek forward. They came to the end of the hallway were a large set of double doors was tightly closed before them. Iron tried to open it, but to no avail. After repeatedly throwing himself into it a few times, he finally stopped. “I don’t think this door is opening..” Just as the words left his lips, a purple glow caught the corner of his line of sight. Twilight’s horn illuminated the darkness and quickly surrounded the door hinges, making quick work of the screws holding it in place. Iron smiled and quickly bucked the now loose door down and out of the way. The glow faded and the room sank back into darkness. “That unicorn magic really comes in handy, doesn’t it?” Iron said with a laugh. “Saved my flank a few times down here already.” She chuckled and smiled before the next hallway quickly extinguished the emotion. The hallways was identical to the one they had just came from. Blood painted the walls and floors while wheel chairs and various other medical equipment were strewn about. Iron hesitated to walk in but remembered his own ‘get in, get out’ speech to Twilight. In his moment of hesitation, Twilight walked in first. “Let’s start checking rooms for any supplies we can use. I don’t want to be caught with no way to heal ourselves.” She waved a hoof toward Iron for him to follow her into the first room on the left. After quickly trotting after her they both were in the doorway of a large black room. Void of any light, Twilight focused her magic and her horn lit up. “A temporary illumination spell should be enough to find any supplies in here. Quickly go check while I hold it.” Iron ran into the now lit room and rummaged around till he found some bandages and a couple health potions. The pair continued this until they had more supplies than they really knew what to do with. It seemed the jammed doors and mutated nurse ponies were enough to stop anypony from getting this far in. They finally reached the end of the hallway and realized with another illumination spell that the hallways split. One pathway led to the left and another to the right but immediately turned again. Twilight stood to the left and Iron to the right. Iron began to talk “Twilight, I think we should head over here. The left looks like it just goes straight, this may lead us down to the base-” A loud screeching ripped through the silence of the hospital as a nurse pony jumped from behind the turn in the wall, grappling Iron to the ground. Twilight quickly jumped up and began to run towards him. Another loud sound pierced the air causing a large metal wall to slide down from the ceiling between Iron and Twilight. Twilight screamed and pounded on the wall between them. The other side of the wall fell silent. Twilight could feel tears well up in her eyes as she began to pound even harder on the wall. “Iron!! Iron!! Celestia-dammit be alive!” She collapsed at the wall and her eyes began to close. Her eyes sprung open. A burst of adrenaline exploded into her veins. She jumped up and focused her energy on another illumination spell. She put one hoof before the other, faster and faster, until she was running down the hallway dodging destroyed medical equipment. She had to find a way around. She made a sharp turn down another hallway to the right. At the end of this hallway was another one of those nurse ponies bound in a white apron and covered in blood. A white surgical mask covered it’s mouth as it hissed loudly at her and began to charge. Twilight quickly jumped into the nearest room and slammed the door behind her. The light flickered on in the room and a MANA machine was lit up in front of her. “Welcome! Try Incineration today!” A prerecorded crackling voice rang through the air, fighting to be heard over the intolerable hissing of the nurse pony quickly approaching. A small screen on the machine lit up as cracks spider webbed across it with faded color. It showed a pony shooting flames from their horn burning another pony in a pure comical sense. “Fend of those baddies today!” Twilight thought there was just something eerie about the voice coming from the machine. She took another gaze around the barely lit room and spotted a chair, it was soon encased in a purple aura and slid over toward the door. She propped it up and ran over to the MANA machine. Memories began to flood back to when she had used this stuff the first time. The extreme pain of the first few seconds. She also remembered Blue saying it only really hurts the first time per type. Most of all she remembered the amazing effects of it all. It had given her such incredible powers such as being able to control lightning. She couldn't even think of any magic she’d known to do that. She turned and bucked open the machine, shattering the front plastic covering with her hooves. Needles began to pour out onto the floor, this time filled with a brilliant red and orange colored liquid. She was quickly knocked out of the deep thought by the sound of nurse pony now slamming on the door with it’s hooves. She could hear the door begin to splinter with each hit it received. Her horn encased the needle and rose it to eye level. She was scared to do it, but knew she had to. Just as the ponies leg burst through the door, splintering the dingy blue colored wood, the needle sunk deep into her foreleg. A rush of warmth quickly spread throughout her body, and that horrible pain came back. She screamed and closed her eyes tightly as she felt it course through every inch of her being. Just as suddenly as it came, the feeling had passed. She opened her eyes and looked around to see nothing was different, just like the last time. There was only one way to truly test it. She turned toward the nurse pony who was now halfway through the door bucking like crazy to try to get through completely. Twilight focused and aimed her horn at the nurse just as it let out an ear shattering scream. Suddenly from the tip of her horn, fire began to develop and with some concentration it blasted toward the nurse pony. The room illuminated in the soft glow of the deadly flames that now engulfed the pony, door, and chair in front of her. The nurse splicers screams could be heard all throughout the hospital as the skin slowly started to bubble and melt off. The apron and face mask quickly lit up only helping sear the flesh beneath. It flailed it’s limbs trying to put out the fire but only managing to spread it more. Finally the wild flailing of it’s burnt limbs stopped as blood began to pour from it’s mouth. Twilight sat back in horror at what she had done. Despite how evil this thing was, she burned it alive. The smell of burnt hair and flesh filled the room she was in. She wanted to vomit again. She tried to hold it back, she told herself she was going to be strong and face anything this place had to throw at her. A lot easier said than done. She turned to the side and threw up again. She fell to the ground and coughed it out. Her heart began to race and her breathing quickened. The room began to spin around her while staying conscious was a fight she was losing. Why is this happening?! Were her only thoughts before everything went black. After the wall fell, the floor opened up sending Iron and the nurse splicer cascading downward into a pitch black hole. The light from above was quickly fading as Iron saw the nurse splicer push itself off of a wall and into Iron. The walls were covered with what seemed to be rocks which quickly tore into Iron's back. The force flung him away from the wall with the splicer trying to bite at any part of him it could. It's face mask was off revealing it's mouth which was filled with razor sharp pieces of metal where it's teeth should have been. The skin around the mouth was completely gone replaced by bloody flesh and steel. Iron bucked it off sending it head first into the wall, the metal teeth sparked against the stone as it's neck quickly snapped leaving a lifeless body now sailing down into the darkness. The falling seemed to last forever until the end was in sight and rapidly approaching. In an instant Iron was shot deep down into the dark water below. Despite living underwater, Iron hated it. He had always been protected by the enormous glass domes sheltering them. He flailed his legs as the cold water stung the fresh wound on his back. He finally erupted from the surface taking in a big gulp of air as he struggled to keep himself afloat and fight through the pain. He looked around and found a small ledge. Quickly, he made his way over toward it and climbed on. Breathing heavily he laid on the ground and tried to figure out where he was. Twilight?! He thought out aloud, but may have ended up yelling it. After forcing himself up from the wet ground he walked back to the edge of the pool of water and looked up. The light was dim and barely visible. "Twilight!?" "TWILIGHT!?" His screams echoed through the long shaft above him. I have to find my way back up there! The thought roared through his head as he turned around to find a long barely lit hallway. "I must be.. underneath the hospital close to the bottom of the whole city since that damned water." The hallway seemed incredibly damp and slippery. The dim light left him unable to tell what exactly the walls were, he could only see the metal grating of the floor. The pain in his back rushed to his senses as a small amount of blood trickled down his back onto the grating. It wasn’t a very bad cut, but enough to remind him it was there. He took a vial out of his saddle bag and quickly drank it. It was only a minor healing potion that he had been carrying around, but it would help close the wound faster than not doing anything. Finally he hesitantly he decided to press on and hopefully find a way back up to Twilight. The sound of dripping water and his own hoofsteps were the only thing that could be heard echoing through the small corridors. The hallways were only big enough to fit around two ponies standing side by side. Finally he reached the end of the hallway only to find it lead down another long pathway. Walking carefully down each path was maddening with the constant sound of water dripping. He could imagine the walls giving way to the ocean beneath him and slowly drowning. He tried to shake the images from his mind, but to no avail. He finally reached the end to the path to find a large wooden door. For some reason the door didn't seem to be as water damaged as the rest of the hallways he had just come from. He reached for the handle and noticed it was locked by a large padlock only opened by a key. "Fuck." He knocked on the door hoping someone would open it somehow. He wasn't even sure at this point, the overwhelming sense of his darkest fear kept nagging at the back of his mind causing him to not fully pay attention to his surroundings. He began to pound hard on the door but no one came. He turned around and bucked it as hard as he could. He could feel the wood give in the slightest bit. There would be no way he could buck open the door fast enough. The stallion’s eyes focused on the lock and an idea sparked in his head. I'll just shoot the damn thing open! He drew his gun from the saddlebag and took aim at the lock. The lock exploded off and the door began to creak open slowly. After saddling the gun Iron pushed the door open with a hoof. The fire lit room was a lot larger than he had thought. It was a massive room filled with machines, pipes, leaky holes, and fire. It appeared to be the underworking of New Manehatten, an engine room of sorts. He walked in as not only the sound of dripping water hung in the air, that of fire and machinery moving overcame him. He didn't have time to explore this time and had to find a stairway back up to the hospital. It was then he noticed a peculiar smell in the air. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but automatically assumed it was from the running machinery. Nevertheless he venture fourth into the dreary gray room. Each of the machines seemed to be running perfectly fine, like something was still keeping them maintained and running. The placement of them all made the room a maze of metal and steam. After reaching what he assumed to be the middle of the room a loud scraping sound filled the air. Instantly he reached to the saddlebag and drew the pistol once more frantically pointing it at any direction he heard a noise. The scraping sounded like it was in front of him one second then behind the next. He couldn't tell exactly where it was coming from. Suddenly large lights overhead filled the room with a harsh fluorescent glow. After Iron's eyes adjusted, he looked forward in horror. A mutated beast of machine and pony stood before him. It's legs were coated in steel armor while large steel arms protruded from it's back. Most of his skin was covered with metal, screws, and gears. It's tail was a long snake like contraption of razor sharp segments of steel. His face looked like that of the splicer pony from earlier. The peculiar smell was now made clear where it had come from. The beast wreaked of body odor and oil. It grinned as it lifted itself off of the ground with it's metal arms making him the height of maybe two or three ponies. "Mmm, hello there." It lowered itself and moved closer to Iron, causing him to step backward into a machine. "Excuse my..." It paused and took a step closer. "Excitement. It's not to often I get visitors." It's voice was like nothing Iron had heard. It had this incredibly disturbing curiosity to it and was so raspy and low the voice was almost hard to understand. "Allow me to, introduce myself. My name is Moonlight Gear." Iron was flat against the machine at this point trying to avoid the beast before him. He finally opened his mouth "Wh-what are you..?" Gear let out a soul crushing chuckle that sounded outright demonic. "I am a creation of John Colt. I was a pony at one point, but I don't really remember that anymore. Doctor Skitz said I needed to be beautiful. Now I'm condemned to keep Manehatten alive and working. I can feel the life in these machines. I am one with them. This is the job I'm forced to for eternity. If it weren't for me, New Manehatten would fall to the ocean floor. Everypony would die." Iron looked horribly shocked. "You.. Dr. Skitz made you like this? Then forced you to run the entire city of New Manehatten by living down here?" Gear simply shook his head in agreement. "I will do whatever it costs to keep it running. Not because he wishes it, because I know it's right. Who am I to decide to kill those who inhabit the world above? I'm a sort of.. protector of them." Iron quickly replied "Why would you protect them!? All that is up there is the damned splicer ponies and evil ponies like Doctor Skitz!" Gears razor sharp tail spun around and went straight to Iron's neck as it's robotic arms took hold to the machines around him. "Do NOT speak ill of the splicers! They were once innocent ponies. John Colt introduced MANA, causing them to lose their minds. It was not their fault. Forced into insanity by civil war and drugs. As deadly and unforgiving as they are, they too are ponies like you.. and like I was. I feel sorry for them, the only thing I can do is give them a place to live. Nopony was left alive after the war. There is no one left for them to kill. This city will be their grave and they will be remembered. Let them live the little bit of life they have left." Iron was astonished. This.. pony. He actually sympathized for the splicers, and in a way.. he was kind of right. Iron shook his head "You're wrong though. There are still ponies up there. I saved a beautiful mare who stumbled upon this Celestia-forsaken wasteland on complete accident. I've killed a lot of splicers to keep her safe. She doesn't deserve the same fate as them! No one does." Gears interest looked peaked at this point. "Listen, Gear. I respect what you've done and are doing, but please. Help me. Help me save anypony who wasn't turned into a splicer. Help me save them, Gear. I know you care about them. Just as much as you care about the splicers. It's in your nature." Gear retracted his tail and moved away from Iron. His mind was processing Iron's words. "Iron." He let himself down, so his hooves touched the ground. "I understand. I hate what has happened here, and I must prevent those I watch after from doing anymore harm. I will do everything I can to help you. Wait here." With that he quickly thrust himself into the air and his robotic arms began grabbing pipe after pipe until he was out of sight. Quickly he swung back into sight with something in his robot hand. After landing where was previously. He handed the device to Iron. "Take this, it's a P.O.N.Y. This will help you avoid my brethren. I've also programmed the direct route to Doctor Skitz. You'll also be able to communicate with me from this. I have eyes and ears everywhere and the ability to protect you and the mare you speak so fondly of. I really am sorry for the trouble they have given you. You must kill Doctor Skitz, so the splicers can finish their lives here." Iron nodded and slid the device over his hoof onto his leg. He turned it on and a green light appeared on the radar in front of him showing Gear. "Don't worry Gear. I will stop him and John Colt and I have someone by my side who will help the whole time. I need to ask a favor.. how can I get to her?" Gear simply smiled and waved a hoof. He began walking through the maze while Iron quickly followed closely behind. They finally reached a large wooden door which Gear's robotic arm opened revealing a large staircase. "Here you go, Iron. Do as you said. I'm glad I could finally meet you and help." "What do you mean.. meet me?" Iron stopped in the doorway and turned to the twisted metallic pony. "Did you.. open the floor so I would fall?" Gear smiled and closed the door, pushing Iron onto the staircase. "What the hell just happened?" Gear walked away from the door and climbed his way back to the other side of the room. The machines hissed and blew steam out over the room and continued their busy jobs. He landed by what seemed to be where he lived and walked over to a console. The robotic arms shrunk down and plugged into the back of the console as the screen lit up. A white stallion with a bright blue mane with a dark blue streak that spiked backward on top of his head appeared on the screen. "Good job, friend! I thank yah a whole bunch! As soon as they ah out of there I promise to shut off all entry way to New Manehatten. It will be yah own paradise, friend." Gear smiled "Thank you, Blue."