//------------------------------// // episode 3 part 1: grace // Story: Conversion Bureau: St George // by kryxel //------------------------------// TCB:SG E3P1: grace pulled kicking and screaming into existance by Kryxel calmed down and taught to behave by Ray10K (song for this episode) I have been having these weird dreams lately. Like... is any of this real? Is there no such thing as dreams, and is all of this actually happening to me? My mind says it is all true... That all I see exists, and is happening as I live through it. Yet, the alternative is so much more... Hopeful. Beyond my dreams, there is hope... ponies and magic, transformation and gateways to an impossible place. A peaceful place. In my dreams, only death awaits. My own death, a thousand times over. Each night, I die. And every night, my subconscious mind torments me in a different way, a different death every. Single. Night. Yesterday, I drowned. The day before, I fell. The day before that, I choked. It is all I have been dreaming for almost a month now. Today, I am in a cell. The cell is dark, cold, stuffy. I feel a breeze... Cold air, from a window that was not there before. I look out to see... No... not that! I see the stake... The firewood... The hooded guard, holding a torch. Tonight, I will be burned at the stake. The door opens, and my parents enter. Father is dressed in the robes of his station, as priest for the One World Church. "You shall now be judged, you whom I once called my daughter. What are you?" I look down, and see myself. Unchanged, the same way I have always been. Short. Not very attractive. No muscles to speak of, a skin as white as parchment. One does not get very attractive, living their entire lives inside the monastery. My raven black hair is unkempt, messily tied into a ponytail that reaches just below my shoulders. I know my eyes to be a deep blue, and my lips a faded red. "I am human. I have always been a human girl, father. You know that," I respond. My insolence to speak up against the priest earns me a swift slap on the cheek. "Thou art a beast, seeking to deceive honest men into believing your readily apparent lies. look at your hooves. As cloven and split as thy tongue," the woman I used to call my mother replies. I look down again, and still see my hands and feet. "I am not! I am telling you the truth!" "The deceitful beast will burn, unless it proves itself to be a human, who merely strayed from her path. Our lord cares for all of his flock, and will help his lost sons and daughters. The only way the beast can prove its humanity, is by killing the blasphemous equine in the other room." I gulp... I know the "blasphemous equine", as they call her. I have seen her face so many times through the TV screen. A window fades into existence, revealing her face to me once more. Her multicolored mane, flowing on an unearthly wind unfelt by man or pony, stands out against the dark grey of the cell. Her coat, once as white as the first snow of winter, is now covered in bruises and markings of cuts and scars. Her wings, once proud and regal, clipped down to stumps. Her horn, that once channeled the magic that brought countless dawns to the world she held so dear, snapped off. "My Princess..." I whisper, taking in the view. She looks at me with her endlessly kind eyes, and I see one has become a milky white, made useless by the cruel hands of men. "Fear not... You will not die. You are mine, and I will protect you. My Little Pony," she says with a trembling smile that betrays the agony she is in, despite her kind words of encouragement. My resolve hardens one last time, and I turn to the man I once called father. "I will never denounce my princess. I fear no damnation from the gods of men, for I follow She who guides the Sun." "The beast has chosen! Tonight, we feast on the flesh of the deceitful horse!" He says, as two guards lead me to the stake and tie me to it. The wood is lit. Smoke swirls around my body. Heat cracks my flesh. Tonight, I die. ------------------------------ Grace woke up in a cold sweat, screaming at the top of her lungs. Her roommates jump up, and rush to her side. "Grace hon, whatsa matter?" Jane says, sitting down by Grace. Grace looked up at Jane. Jane was the kind of girl one would find in a dictionary, right next to the word “Southener”. She wore only flannel and pronounced words in a typical southern accent. "Well, it is obvious she had a bad dream you bumpkin!" Elane said while lifting her eye mask off, past her supermodel blond hair. "Ah know that. I just want to know what kind’ a death it was this time," Jane said, giving Elane a death glare. "Will both of you nanobots-for-brains shut your traps before I have to use your waste exhaust pipes as a docking station for my foot!?" said a woman with mostly blazing red hair, save for the blond roots. "Can’t you see she is in distress?" The sixteen year old punk looked up at the cowgirl and the model before looking back at grace "So... think you can stream us some data on that dream, for troubleshooting?” Grace chuckled weakly at G4L1ND4, and gave a quivering smile. "Lindie... sure... I think I can," she said before telling everyone about her recent dream-death. ---------- "Wow... That’s a massive amount of data to process. May take all day to sort through that data stream," Lindie said while scratching her head. "Right... ah recon, that stress canna be good fer ya," Jane said, looking at Grace. "No... Not for you, or the baby," Elane said. Grace was a few months pregnant at this point, just getting to the point where it started to show. Jane shrugged. "You may want to go see the Doc... He may be able to figure what is goin’ on inside that noggin of yers. And who knows, he could be of help in sortin’ it out, whatever it is.” "Yes...It might be best to do something about it, before it can interfere with conversion..." Elane said. "Maybe it is some pointer for a bad memory sector acting up, maybe you just need to fix a memory bank," Lindie said tapping her chipdisk drive, implanted just above her right ear. Grace knew they were right, one could never know how the magic of the ponification serum would respond to one’s mental state. "If he can help... Wait, which doctor?" she asked, remembering the bureau had two doctors since the day of the official opening. "Well, duh. The singular, bipedal one," Lindie said, referring to the slightly odd man, always wearing a brown suit and red converse sneakers. "Okay... wish me luck, girls!" Grace said while walking out the door. -------------------- Normally, the Doctor hated guns, or weapons in general. A little remnant of the last great time war. This time however, he was facing an enemy, so insidious and well prepared, that the only remaining option was armed conflict. Sort of, anyways. The Doctor rolled around a corner in the dark, smoky base, and brought his gun up... The villainous traitor was nearby, he could almost smell him. A slight clipclop made him turn to face the way he came from, and roll forward to shoot at the vanishing monster. He had missed, and now the traitor knew where he was! He could no longer stay here. But this time, the traitor was at a disadvantage, the hunter having become the prey. The doctor gave chase and rushed through an old storage area, filed with the physical memories of old eras and untold pasts. He snuck past what looked like a car turning into a bipedal robot, and slid around an ancient rack of giftcards before peeking out... Was the traitor besides the old tv's? Nope... What about the stack of yesterdecade’s fashion? Nada. Ah! There was that familiar shape... A tuft of messy brown hair, sticking out between the cookbooks and the candles. The Doctor crept closer... he dived, rolled, and shot! A direct hit!... on a dusty broom. The Doctor heard the shot, and fell down, his hand clutching his chest as he gasped in his last, dying breaths. "Tell Rose... I love her... " he managed to mutter before his head fell... A laugh came from his opponent. "Oh, you are good! We should have taken up acting," the stallion with the hourglass-cutiemark said, coming into view with his modified laser tag gun. "Oh hush! You were cheating! I don’t have memories, but you do and you are using them to your advantage!" Dr. Tennant said, standing back up as the lights on his marker vest kept blinking, signaling the "kill". "Well, you don’t have a warning system on your feet that alarms everyone where exactly you are," Dr. Whooves said while trotting in a circle, showing just how loud his hooves were on the plascreet floor, to make his point. "Well yeah, I guess so. However, you forgot one thing..." the man said. "Forgot what?" The pony said, a moment before his vest lit up, announcing his new status as Idiot Who Failed To Cover His Backside. "SURPRISE!" The white Pegasus said, fluttering down from the shelves she had used as a sniping spot. "Oh, Bluebloods sub-atomic horse apples," Dr. Whooves said. "I thought Soarin took you out?" He said, looking up at the mare. "Well, you thought he did. but I managed to distract him with a photo of pie." She said, landing next to the time traveling duo. "Smart cookie," Doc Tennant said, brohoofing the Pegasus as Grace walked in. "Oh, Doctor. There you are." "Yes?" Both the man and the stallion said, looking at her. "Um... Doctor Tennant. I need to discuss something in private with you. Can we talk in your office?" She asked. The Doctor nodded. "Lead the way." As they left, Dr. Whooves turned to Surprise. "So... Best two out of three?" ////////// Ray10k here. The first part of this chapter was meant as a dream, hence the use of the present tense. Deal with it if you don’t like it.