My Little Clony

by therealfeedback

Act V, Chapter VII

Unfortunately, the time it had taken to convince everyone to follow me was starting to hurt us. As the six of us sprinted down the twisted, malformed hallway, some of us on walls, some of us on the roof, it flashed and flickered its original design. Discord’s hold was weakening, whether he had been defeated or just didn’t have enough power to maintain it was unclear. What was clear though was that we were running out of time.

“What happens if the world goes back to normal before we get there?” Vinyl asked, gasping between words as she ran.

“Then we keep going! There’s no turning back now. We either succeed, or it’s over. Discord’s helped us, but if he can’t keep helping us, we just have to pull a little magic of our own.” I answered. Promontory, The Doctor, and I were all fine, while the others were getting tired from running. In spite of the mundane appearance, being an Earth Pony does have advantages, one being increased stamina.

Eventually, we reached an oddity in the chaos – something that looked normal. A pair of large, marble doors, as clean as a plate, with giant golden handles. They stood at least ten or twenty feet tall, with a dark granite frame, and stood distinct from the rest of the world.

“Discord did say he left what we were looking for unchanged.” Trixie said, eyeing up and down the door. She and Vinyl nodded to each other, horns glowing as they began opening the gigantic doors. Right as they did though, a shout came from behind us.

“Stop! Right now!” Two of the royal guard, lost in the chaos, had stumbled upon us. It seemed clear they recognized the door, and that they didn’t intend to let any of us inside.

“Go. Now.” Promontory said, stepping towards the guards. “I’ll handle these two.”

“You’ll get yourself killed!” I protested. All five of those with me were my friends, but Promontory I had known since we were both little colts. I wasn’t leaving him behind. “You may be tough, but it’s two-to-one, and they’re trained fighters.”

“We don’t have a choice now, do we?” He asked. “We ain’t got time ta’ fight about this, or ta’ let these two slow us down. I’ll give y’all time. Just go.” I was silent. I had thought he was going to get himself killed in the shootout in Appleoosa, and now he really was. But I knew what he was saying was right. I couldn’t bring myself to say it, but the understanding was clear on my face. All it did was make Promontory chuckle.

“Remember when I said I’d fight with you, and if needed, die with you?” He asked. “I guess it was needed.”

“Give em’ hell.” I said simply, biting back tears. Even if this was something we knew we might not return from, he was still a friend. Watching your friends die for you isn’t an easy thing to stomach.

“Gladly.” He replied. “And C, if’n ya’ don’t make it either, meet me in heaven an hour before the devil knows yer’ dead. Mah’ treat.”

“You kidding me?” I said. “We’re overthrowing the greatest tyrant in history. If they’ve got the nerve to send either of us to hell, we’ll just overthrow them too.” Another chuckle.

“Ya’ always were the witty one.” At that, he turned back to his two opponents. “Good luck.” At that, he screamed, charging at the two, knocking one to the ground with a punch and wrestling the other.

“Lets go.” I said, turning back to the door.

“But—“ Vinyl started, stopping as I glared.

“He’s giving us a chance.” I said simply. “We’re not wasting it. Door. Now.” She nodded, and her horn began glowing, as did Trixie’s. The door was thrown open, and the five of us ran through, slamming the door and leaving Promontory to the guards.

“Holy…” Vinyl started.

“It’s…huge…” Caesar muttered.

“Is this…where the clones are grown?” Trixie asked. The five stood on a single metal platform, stretching out in front of them was a sea of pods, as far as the eye could see. All were a glistening white, with windows glowing a soft green in the center of each. They lined the walls, the floor, the ceiling, they surrounded the entire gigantic room, save for the platform they stood on.

“Goddess, there must be at least enough to hold Canterlot, Manehattan, and Fillydelphia combined…” Vinyl marveled.

“Find the controls.” Caesar said. “We don’t have time to marvel, we have to find out how to shut down as many as possible.” He tapped his monocle, which started beeping. A camera, recording the installation. “We’re inside the facilities. I have no idea what we’re going to find from here on, but I’m not leaving without the evidence. Let this recording be witness of all.”

“Wherever the pod controls are, I found the surveillance systems.” The Doctor shouted from across the platform. Caesar ran over, looking at the smooth, circular panel that Whooves was pointing towards. “It’s a touch screen, very simple, but it has a very complex, powerful system inside of it. This thing monitors every single living thing in Equestria. And, as you can imagine, most of it’s going haywire with the mess Discord’s cooked up.”

“Can you take it down?” Caesar asked, looking it over with the camera.

“Most of it. A lot of it is about as old as the Game Master’s tyranny, so I can wipe out the surveillance systems with most of Equestria fairly easily, but they started installing new systems in certain countries. Most of North Amareica and the Uneighted Kingdom will only be crippled temporarily unless I kill the whole continental populations. The rest of the world can be freed without harm though.”

“Kill the countries you can do safely, but just cripple the new systems.” Caesar said. “If all goes well, we can free them once the rest of the world is under control.”

“Can-do.” The Doctor replied, hooves flying over the panel. Caesar nodded, returning to his search for the control panel for the pods.

“Found it!” Trixie shouted. Caesar ran over.

“The pod control?”

“Yep.” She said. “It’s a touch screen too. This whole system’s designed to look fairly innocent unless you know how to access it…”

“Move then.” Caesar demanded. “The Doctor and I are the tech whizzes, if anypony is going to be able to get the info we need from these, it’s us.” She nodded, stepping aside and letting the tophat-adorned pony at the controls. His hooves ran across the screen, clacking and clopping at various images and dialogs that popped up on the screen. After a few moments, a single screen appeared, prompting him for a password. After a handful of guesses, it accepted the input, and unlocked.

“We’re in. Lets see here…there’s…that can’t be right…” He murmured, eyes wide as he poured over the information in front of him.

“What’s wrong?” Vinyl asked.

“The panel says there’s…2.3 billion of these pods.” He answered flatly.

“That’s…wow.” Vinyl said, trailing off as she looked out over the pods again in a combination of amazement and horror. “This is where the clones come from?”

“Looks like it. I guess foals aren’t only made when a mommy and a daddy love each other very much…Apparently the way they generate new ponies is by starting with a mix of water from a Mirror Pool, and the genetic structure of something called a Changeling.” He tapped the monocle again, taking pictures of the formulas on-screen as he scrolled through them. “That’s mixed with a combination of the genetics of the two ‘parents’, which is based on the desired pony. A little anatomical magic to keep the form and anatomical structure of a proper pony…and you have yourself a fresh new clone.”

“This is…wow. Honestly, this is kind of impressive. Horrifying, but impressive. Changelings seem to work exactly like their name implies, they’re a perfect basis for creating copies of something. This Mirror Pool’s entire purpose is creating copies of a Pony, but the Changeling genetics allow it to be a more full personality and mind, as well as provide more control over the creation. They both take to the parent genetics perfectly. Meanwhile, the princesses take an imprint of the mind of a Pony when they visit their dreams, which was originally for chronicling history, but that this system can be used for to create a clone with a fully realized mind. It can also be used voluntarily…Seamless replacement mentally and physically…it’s a sickening affront to nature, but a brilliant one.”

“And one nevertheless that we need to destroy.” He said, tapping a bit more on the screen. “Whooves, is the surveillance down yet?”

“Three, two, one…it’s down. It’s been damaged beyond repair for most of Equestria, they’ll have to replace every single unit to get them up-and-running again. Not very easy to do for them. In the parts of the world with the new systems, it’s been crippled so it’ll be offline for a week or two, and nopony’s been harmed. It’ll be back within a month though at most.”

“I’ll take it.” Caesar said in a relieved tone. “Alright, lets see here…” He pressed an on-screen button, and one of the pods shot out of the wall, lowering onto the platform. It emitted a soft, low humming noise when close. “If I’m right, this should destroy the pod’s circuits, but if I’m wrong, it could wake them up. Waking up 2.3 billion angry soulless monsters up isn’t a fun idea, so lets test it on this one.” At that, he ran his hooves over the panel again. After a few moments, he stopped. The humming noise sped up, then suddenly stopped. After a few seconds, the pod’s light faded away.

“…Alright, I think that broke it. Now we can do that to all of the—“ Caesar’s words were cut off as a thump came from the pod. And another one. The glass panel on top of it shattered, a horror of creation having broken it. It was an unnatural mixture of a slick, jet black shell and a pony’s coat, with twisted, contorted features. What appeared to be eyes had no pupils, it lacked teeth other than two fangs on both top and bottom, and its skin was riddled with holes throughout, some opening the inside of it to the air, others going clean through.

“Sweet Celestia, that just woke it up!” Its head spun, turning to Caesar after hearing his voice. It hissed and howled, a mouth, brain, and throat not fully formed unable to truly speak. It lunged at Caesar, fangs bared.