//------------------------------//
// 6. Accelerando, Coda 
// Story: The Clockwork Heaven 
// by Leliel 
//------------------------------//





"Hmhmhm.."

Jophiel was positively delighted at this turn of events. She was back where she wanted-in complete control of the situation. Now that the domesticated Windigo was out and primed, she was the powerful one again, rather than floundering in a disordered environment. That was a sensation all too familiar to her, and the farther she kept from that deplorable state, the better, not the least reason of which was her Ban-she couldn't act without a plan, only react. Not an easy thing do do when trying to think quickly.

Of course, the spirit sentry wasn't meant to kill the intruders, not hardly. Deaths meant investigations, especially when heroes like the Elements were involved, especially the (if she was speaking, she would spit) student of the princess here. But she could certainly allow Harahel to mess around with their tiny little minds. Or insert something of her own. Perhaps a more destructive strain of the Affliction then what her brother had inserted into the cyan mortal...?

Yes, she was going to have fun with these useless mortals. Beauty was cruel, after all, and she was the Angel of it.

"Subdue them now."





Chapter 6b: Accelerando, Coda

Aleph/Null: You'd thought we'd forgotten.





The lights fixated on the Elements for a second, at which point the whinny-howl eminated from their area again and a blast of chilled air hit Twilight, coating her tail in ice. Jumping back, she quickly activated a flashlight spell at the same time Rarity did, allowing them to see the source.

It looked mostly like an illustration of one of the Windigoes from the Hearth's Warming Eve play they had starred in. A little less stylized, certainly, but otherwise? Perfect match, being a semi-translucent, blue-colored horse with no back hooves.

Mostly, because the angels had done something to it. At the center of its mass was a strange device, not unlike a metallic pacemaker attached to a spherical, flawless gem. Attached to the pacemaker were a collection of red, orange, golden, and blue cables, one pair of each color. These cables were connected to a metallic skull, which made the Windigo look even more threatening, not the least due to sharpened teeth. The source of the lights where a pair of disturbingly organic-looking eyes, almost odd-colored living ones. 

The altered winter spirit turned its head towards the Elements to fixate on them with with a single eye, almost like a hungry bird of prey. 

"intruders." said a synthetic, emotionless voice. 

"seize them."





Jophiel's observation of the spatial window was joined by Harahel, who took one look at the same and glanced back at her, his head reshaping into a cresting wave as he tilted it. "Not wasting time, are we?"

Jophiel chuckled sardonically. "Please. The biggest threat to us is the blonde-maned one, and it is incapable of flight. I may as well enjoy my catharsis. Unlike you, who never seems to remember exactly what made us."

Harahel looked even more skeptical. "Perhaps. But my observations of the sportsmanship and pleasure you take to your duties seem to indicate you are closest to Falling among us, and I am genuinely concerned that Barachiel and I may have to subdue you for repair and assimilation." 

Jophiel suppressed an offended snarl, then realized the benign motives of the Angel of Knowledge's warning. "Thanks, but you're a bit quick on the draw. We were designed to test the efficiency of more varied, stronger emotions when fulfilling long-term missions, remember? I am simply providing more test data."

"Regardless, I think I may have to oversee this test." Harahel affixed himself to the wall, becoming quite immobile. "You have been acting most bizarre ever since we learned of the Apostate's membership in the Elements, and I wish to ensure the LCFR signal is not affecting you."

Now it was Jophiel's turn to look at her sibling in disbelief. "You honestly believe that thing exists? And you call me affected by emotions?"

"Its existence would certainly explain how angels turn away from the perfection of the Creator..." grumbled Harahel, but he slunk into the wall otherwise silently.

"Glad you could offer your two cents. Now, back to what I was doing..." Jophiel turned around and let the connection between her and the domesticated spirit reform, and she bid time to resume.





The cyborg Windigo howled again, releasing another blast of supercold air at the Elements, which they quickly dodged. 

"GREAT! WINDIGO GUARD DOG!" shouted Applejack over the roars. "WHAT NEXT? GIANT HONKIN' ROBOT SUITS?" 

She catapulted over the next breath, kicking the wall on her side to propel herself off towards the hate-eater. Unfortunately, it saw her coming, and ducked upwards, causing the mare to fly right under it. She recovered and landed on her feet, but the Windigo showed no reaction apart from a sardonic chuckle, followed by another dodged blast.

Rainbow was quick to join the fray. "FLUTTERSHY? TAG-TEAM!" Reluctantly, the yellow pegasus jumped out from behind a bookshelf and grabbed wings with her friend. The cyan one spun rapidly, creating a whirlwind around her friend, who was tossed at the spirit. This one had more effect, in that it actually forced the spirit to move not under its own power. Unfortunately, the center of the vortex (ie Fluttershy) didn't impact, instead going directly over the Windigo, and thus the attempting dizzyness-inducing spin was more of a slight shift to the left. It quickly corrected itself and launched another salvo at the new threat, which Rainbow quickly dodged. The floor beneath her froze, however, and Rarity slipped on the slick surface.

"GUYS, WE HAVE TO FINISH THIS QUICKLY!" Twilight was now attempting to coordinate her friends over the noise. "THE MORE THAT THING BLASTS, THE HARDER IT'S GOING TO BE TO MOVE!"

"THANKS FOR THE ADVICE, CAPTAIN OBVIOUS!" Rarity was busy trying to get her balance. "SPEAKING OF WHICH, HOW WERE THESE THINGS DEFEATED IN THE PLAY AGAIN?" 

"Oh, um-eep!" Twilight teleported out of the way of a catapulting Applejack, then the following ice blast. "Um...let me see....Clover recognized the Windiiii-yah!" The falling stone block was quickly vapourized by a blast of blue magic. "Thanks! Um, recognized the Windigos, they began to freeze the cavaaaah!" Another day, another dodged ice blast. "Cavern, the protagonist made up, the Windigos backed off and-eep!" Twilight skidded off a frozen patch to evade a stray pegasus tornado. "Backed off, and then Clover remembered the-that's it! GAH!"

She was a bit slow on that blast. Thankfully, the magical ice produced by Windigos was meant to capture, not kill, and thus her foreleg felt a little strange. Numb, really.

"Fire of Friendship! These things hate fire-based friendship magic! EVERYPONY! HAPPY THOUGHTS ABOUT HOW WE TRUST EACH OTHER!"

The other Elements nodded, then closed their eyes as pink-colored energy gathered in Twilight's horn. Concentrating, she released the energy in the form of a heart-shaped flame, which she released directly at the Windigo. The spiritual horse had just a moment to comprehend what was heading towards it before it impacted, causing it to howl-whinny in pain as the sound of metal tearing reverberated through the archive.





Jophiel smirked as she closed her own pupils.

"Nice try."





The Elements suddenly had a sudden, nauseating sensation, like space itself was tearing. Above the Fire of Friendship, a golden design of flame came into existence. 

Looking like nothing so much like a cross with each of its points and center being perfect spheres, almost like a drawing of a constellation, the ponies could instantly tell this fire was a completely different beast from the Fire of Friendship. Whereas the pink flame spoke of kindness, trust, and warmth, this flame was...angry. The fire of righteous rage, of courage, of the will to do what was right, no matter the cost or consequences.

Justice.

Punishment.

Zeal.

The Cross hovered for a second, then rushed the Heart. A disturbingly equine scream, one that could have been pain or savage joy, rang out as both exploded into a ring of multicolored flame.

When the fire dissipated, nothing was left of it but ash...and one very angry-looking Windigo with a slightly damaged metal skull.

Twilight gulped. 

Okay, what was Plan B?

Oh right: Kiss our flanks goodbye.





"Dang. This guy won't quit, will he, Zach?"

The 'Zach' in question, naturally, did not respond verbally. Instead, a large gear above the winter spirit suddenly became covered in white tape, almost as if was barely holding together. 

The next Flutternado was aimed directly at that gear, causing it to become unmoored from its position and collapsing on the cyborg Windigo. The spirit yelped, then growled at Rainbow before firing off another blast of its chilly breath.

Of course, by this point, Rainbow was getting used to this dance. She dodged the cold, then fixed her eyes on the Windigo. "Okay mister, you're apparently Wind-resistant....or whatever element tossing a pony at you is, so let's get Physical on this popsicle stand!"

She wound up, then charged at the Windigo, slowing only to evade yet another blast, before impacting directly. It felt something like the soft, mushy cold of putrefying plant life in the snow. Gagging, Rainbow quickly grabbed the spirit in an arm lock, and began to tighten her grip. 

"<...hurts...>"

"Eh?"

The sudden, familiar-but-not language from the blue horse-like spirit made the pegasus pause for a second, though she kept her hooves at its throat. 

"<...hurts...want it gone....>"

"< Hurts? What hurts? >"

"<...metal...>"

Rainbow craned her neck up at the metallic skull.

It was covered in white tape, holding it to the rest of the Windigo. And that one of its wires was cut.

Of course. Duh.





Jophiel's good feeling was gone.

"...since when could she speak First Tongue?"

She couldn't see it, but Harahel was furiously checking his experiment logs





Rainbow was finally bucked off, though she recovered in midair.

"EVERYONE! THIS THING'S BEING CONTROLLED BY REMOTE!"

Twilight didn't believe her ears. "WHAT?"

"I SAID, THIS WINDIGO IS BEING CONTROLLED BY THAT WEIRD MECHANICAL SKULL! IT'S SOME KIND OF SPIRITUAL MIND CONTROL DEVICE!"

"REALLY? RAINBOW, LOOK. I'VE BEEN DANCING AROUND THIS ALL WEEK, BUT THIS ISN'T THE TIME FOR-"

"JUST GIVE ME A CHANCE AND SCAN FOR MAGIC?"

Twilight sighed and willed an augury spell keyed towards technurgy into being.

She almost immediately decided to forget the statement she was about to make.

The skull was swarming with magical and electrical impulses, even more than the brothers Flim-Flam had in their own cider machine. Several dim ones were traveling down the wires to the pacemaker, where they suddenly turned bright and went back to the skull. 

"...Power source..."

"TWILIGHT?"

"THAT GEM'S A POWER SOURCE!" Twilight spun to face Rarity. "HOW GOOD IS THAT GEM-FINDER OF YOURS? CAN IT DETECT A SHAPE OF A GEM?"

"OF COURSE, BUT I-"

"JUST USE IT ON THAT GEM!"

Rarity's horn glowed. "UM, IT LOOKS LIKE THE SPHERE WAS CUT STRANGELY. LOOKS ALMOST LIKE ONE OF THOSE FRACTAL PATTERNS I USED IN THAT MATHEMATICIAN'S-"

"GIRLS, I HAVE A PLAN! RAINBOW, YOU DISTRACT HIM, APPLEJACK OVER HERE!"





Time froze.

On the other end of the feed, Jophiel had turned very quiet. "Brother dear..." she said in the most calm voice she could manage. "How in the name of all that is holy did it gain the MacLeod's strain of the Affliction?"

"I...I am not certain!" Harahel was going through his notes at a breakneck speed, which was mildly disorienting to watch-he reshaped his body to form letters and charts. "I specifically ordered one of the test strains, but the Anointed and the Archivists recieved an order for Sample 1-D-4-000! The number doesn't even look similar to the one I wrote down-"

"THEN WHY DIDN'T YOU CHECK WHEN YOU GAVE THE EDIMMU THE GODDAMNED MACLEOD'S?"

"I..I had not an inkling that that was the case! I was, I was completely blindsided by this as well! The only way this could possibly happen would be deliberate sabotage-"

BOOM

There was now a smoking crater in the wall to the left of Harahel. Still twitching and smoking from that release of firey energy, Jophiel shrank back down into the wall and sat.

"Cannot deviate from plan....cannot freeze time so I can go there myself...cannot rectify within bounds of plan...and now a saboteur."

Thinking on her perdicament, Jophiel decided on the one phrase that she felt would encapsulate her current opinion on her situation perfectly, in any language, Equestrian or Terran.

"Nom de Dieu de putain de bordel de merde de saloperie de connard d'enculé de ta mère."

With the ears of every Prench pony nearby burning from the content in those words, she unfroze time.





"HEY UGLY! YA MISSED ME!"

Applejack honestly wasn't sure if the taunting was actually affecting the Windigo's actions in any way, but it still aimed another blast at the ground that she had been a half-second ago. By now the floor was almost completely frozen, so she was more slipping out of the way than dodging, but it led to the same effect. The mare balanced on the wall, then kicked off to skate to a toppled bookshelf.

"THAT SKULL OF YOURS NEEDS BETTER EYES! Y'ALL CAN'T HIT THE BROAD SIDE OF MY BARN! ADMITTEDLY, IT'S A SMALL BARN, BUT-" The taunt was cut off by another blast and dodge routine.

"you will be retrieved."

"RETRIEVE? WOW, YA ARE A GUARD DOG! HERE FLUFFY! C'MERE BOY! APPLE-FRITTER FRISBEE, JUST FOR YOU!"

The recently-dubbed Fluffy fired another blast (apparently, creativity was not a strong suite of Windigos), as Applejack zig-zagged around the archive to draw its attention and to remain cheerfully unfrozen.

As Applejack frustrated the Windigo's poor aim, Rarity was busy rewriting a spell with Twilight's help.

"Okay, so I just need to pulse my horn when I normally keep it a constant shine here?"

"More or less."

"Wonderful. Rainbow, if you please dear..."

The pegasus nodded, then motioned for Fluttershy to help pick up the white-coated unicorn. Rarity grunted a bit from the uncomfortable position, but kept otherwise stoic as she was hiked into the air. 

"LA-DE-LAH-LAH, AH SHUCKS, I'M NOT THAT GREAT OF A SKATE-argh!"

Applejack's luck when it came to taunting while dodging on ice finally ran out, and the cyborg Windigo finally nailed a direct hit, resulting in the farmer being stuck upside down as she tumbled over the errant gear. Howling gleefully, it turned its attention to the other Elements...

...Then stopped when it saw the flickering blue light. Startled, it began to inhale....

There was a terrible ghastly noise, like metal wrenching as a pony released a painful, joyous scream of adrenaline, as the room turned white.

As the light cleared, the Elements felt their hearts jump to their throats when they saw the undamaged metal skull...then breathed a sigh of relief as they saw the power gem fall out of the winter spirit's form, leaving the pacemaker floating in nothingness. 

Slowly, the eye lights dimmed their glow, then suddenly began to cycle wildly-red, gold, blue, orange, red. The Windigo raised a hoof and grunted, as though it was fighting itself.

"< get out >"

The other hoof tried to stop the first.

"< Of my >"

The other hoof tensed and slowly moved out of the way of first, as the first pushed against its head.

"< SOUL! >"

The hoof went into its skull, grabbed the skull, and yanked. One explosion of electricity later, there was now a large hole in the forehead of the spirit, and the skull and pacemaker clattered on the floor. Slowly, the temperature began to rise as the remaining gears and sorting mechanisms began to reactivate.

Looking about as normal as one could expect of a spirit of cold as a herald for famine and destructive hatred could be with a giant hole in its head, the Windigo descended to a nook the battle had made in the wall. "< Rest now...revenge later...will enjoy blood-freeze... >" 

A few seconds later, the representative of the genus of spirits that nearly destroyed all of ponykind began to snore. 

The Elements stared on in what might have been disbelief or relief (if one asked them later, they themselves would not be sure), at which point a shivering cough echoed out behind them.

"E-E-Er, g-g-guys? C-c-could y'all unf-f-freeze me be-before the blood ru-rushin' to my head s-spills out my eyeballs?"





One unfrozen Applejack later, the Elements were patiently waiting for the Windigo to awake. Well, three out of five were-Twilight still hadn't given up on finding something of context in the archive. Rainbow Dash, on the other hand, was tearing pages out of books she discarded (the other pony was a little upset at that, until Rainbow pointed out that they were just charts, and it would confuse the bad guys to screw up their records) and assembling them into a little mural of a heart.

The others not Fluttershy just shot the breeze, seeing as how there wasn't much else to do.

"Although I must say, your battle gab requires work. It was enough to get its attention for a while, but I doubt an intelligent enemy would be that perturbed by your wit."

"It worked in the Darin' Do movie."

"Intelligent adversary. Black Banner was not."

"Point taken." Applejack frowned. "Still...I can't help but think there was somethin' weird about that fight."

"Weirder than fighting a fairy tale monster?"

"Weird with us, I mean. Or one of us. I'm sayin' that-"

Applejack's thought was cut off by the Windigo yawning. The head wound had almost completely closed, leaving only a strange, crack-like scar. Smacking its lips, it opened an eye and lifted its head, fixating on the Elements.

Rarity didn't miss a beat. "Um, Hello sir! My name is Rarity, my friends and I saved you from being a brainwashed slave of the angels-"

"Su ki?"

"Huh?"

"Nu zu tuk."

"...Right." Rarity turned around, death's head smile in place. "He doesn't speak Equestrian."

Twilight facehoofed. "And of course, I didn't take my translation spell. Agh, lemme see...pulse...constant...pulse, no constant..."

"Ni inim bala."

Twilight jumped at Rainbow's voice, then looked around to see her dragging the page heart over to the Windigo.

"Xatra."

The Windigo looked at the paper, then hit it with an ice breath. A series of bone-white ice sheets neatly bisected the heart, and the winter spirit chuckled.

"Zil. Zu su?"

A minute of her friend and the pony-freezing monster having an apparently polite conversation in an alien language later, Twilight realized her jaw was on the floor. She slowly fished it in, then said the one thing that could make her friends even more slack-jawed.

"That was a real language!?"





A few minutes later (and Twilight scouring her brain for any hint of mind-affecting magics that suddenly allowed a pony to speak a language of supernatural beings), Rainbow trotted up, looking proud of herself.

"His name is Bitterwind, he lives in the Eastern Wasteland's Shadow, and he was kidnapped by, and I quote 'zebra in weird wing mask'. Any questions you want to ask? He'll only answer ones that will lead to us taking his revenge on the angels, but given how we were going to do that anyway..."

"Where do they keep Pinkie?"

"Already asked, that's one of the questions he won't answer."

"Okay....what are they planning?"

"Doesn't know, though he'll explain what he did see."

"...What kind of a name is Bitterwind?"

"His, I guess. I think it's a spirit thing."

Twilight hummed to herself while looking around the destroyed archive. "Okay...ask him about what this place is first, and then the equine employees."

"Will do." Rainbow turned around, then stopped. "Oh, and Twilight..."

She swung around, looking her straight in the eye. "Nu. Ur. It means, in plain terms, 'not rabid.' See?"

"...if it resembles the more terrestrial language it shares syntax with in any way, it means 'not a dog'."

Rainbow fell silent, and blushed. "Um, well...that too." She trotted off, a bit more quickly than was strictly necessary.





The next half-an-hour or so was filled with a barrage of questions, translations, and the growing sense that the Elements were finally getting somewhere.

First, according to what Bitterwind knew through the haze of "being a prisoner in your own soul", according to him, the archive was in an extra-dimensional space the angels made both to keep all the Golden Beach's operations beyond being a theme park hidden, as well as any fighting with wandering monsters or rivals-a Containment Zone, as they called it. Most of said park operations were run by ponies with "sun-filled eyes", but overall run by three strange creatures called "the Overseers"-the one he was familiar with was named Barachiel. There was also a nigh-innumerable legion of creatures with the same "scent" as the three, but they were apparently mindless and fled at the first sign of trouble. More pressing to him where what he called the "hateless soldiers" (which he shivered a little every time he mentioned), random animals and wandering monsters the pony staff captured that tended to show up again, only tame, friendly...and partially mechanical.

The hateless soldiers were generally patrols and watchmen, but for big monsters and intelligent attackers, they called upon the Windigo. He was not pleased with this situation at all-or at least, he wouldn't be, if the mechanical skull (actually something called a Solomonic Transceiver) hadn't done most of the thinking for him. He could only view his masters with love and loyalty, think only of the joy of servitude and self-sacrifice for those better than he.

(He was scowling even before he reached that last point. Apparently hate-spirits didn't think highly of the concept of love. Who knew?)

As for most other things, Bitterwind didn't know. Not because the angels were particularly concerned with secrecy around him, mind, but because they seemed to few him as a valuable tool rather than a sapient being, or even a pet; Between missions, he would be stashed in a strange cavern where the Solomonic Transceiver would force-feed him Essence (the concept of which he did not explain, as it was unrelated to his vindication) of a "flavorless" tone. All he got in there was the overheard conversations of said ponies, usually about arcane technical maintenance or praises of the Overseers, or the angels themselves, always about something vague. "Completion", "paradise", and "the foolishness of believing things would be anything else" among them. They did mention something called a Dalga fairly frequently, though.

Finally, Twilight voiced the question that had weighed on her ever since they came to the Golden Beach. "What are the Overseers planning?"

"< I do not know. >" Rainbow translated. "< But I know they starve for knowledge. They look upon the customers with the contempt of the high who devour the low, and they send many hungry Archivists to bring them morsels. They are as a colony of ants serving the wolves, bringing the meat and bone-marrow that the park's surveillance has spilled. >"

(If she hadn't gotten used to his...visceral taste in metaphors, this would cause her to blanch more.) 

"So, about the...sun-filled eyes, how do the angels keep them in line? It must be terribly difficult for them to remain employed if the Overseers treat them as heartlessly callous as you." 

"< This, white one, is what I am sure of. >" The Windigo got to his feet as though to emphasize his point. "< The wind of mind is controlled easily by spirits such as we. I have seen the mark of such Numina in their heads, bent towards hate of disloyalty and hunger for praise of the high. They are as starving dogs, desperately pleasing their masters so as to not go hungry for the smile they occasionally give. >"

"So, what, they're brainwashed?"

"< More or less. >"

"Great. And I thought that movie was silly..." Applejack cradled her head.

Twilight was pacing now, thinking of more questions

"....any hint that the...Numina wore off eventually?"

Bitterwind looked thoughtful. "< ...There was a marked tendency for me to hear not the voices of those who seemed less hungry for praise again. I cannot be certain, but I did not even smell them after a short period of their stomachs growling for answers to the Overseer's plans. >"

Twilight was pacing more excitedly now. "Does the Containment Zone have a nexus? An anchor point for the rest of it?"

"< 'Anchor point?' >"

Rainbow paused after translating that, then turned around. "< Um, sort of like a stomach? A source of energy for the hate of nonexistence? >"

" < Oh. Ah, yes, the many-formed cube. The sun-eyed mortals guard it well. >"

Oh, the hall of mirrors. Duh. Twilight opened her mouth for one last question. "One more thing. Why do you think the Overseers kidnap pon-"

BWRONG. BWRONG. BWRONG

The sound of distant, giant bells ended that thought in its tracks. 

"< ...Oh dear. It appears this world's Ban is acting up. >"

"Ban?"

" < Unbreakable code of behavior. The Containment Zone's is that it must issue a warning before an attack. >:"

That would explain some things. Rainbow internally added.

"< I'd advise you to leave through whatever hole you gnawed. I am not particularly interested in being a slave again. >" The Windigo took off, the water seeping from the floor dripping from his hooves. "< May our winds dance again, my rivals! >"

"Hey WAIT!"  Twilight's call after the winter spirit was to no avail. Bitterwind could move fast when he wanted to, especially through walls.

"...great. So now we have to deal with more danggum' monsters." Applejack did not sound pleased at all. "And I had just finished bein' warm..."

"As much as I enjoy pugilism-wait, I don't." Rarity looked at Twilight. "Do you know how we got in?"

"Um...no." Twilight looked around nervously. "Just that weird pony and the-wait!" She spun around towards the door. "He left us a portal!"

"< Por- >" Rainbow cleared her throat. "Portal, where?"

"Follow me!"

And so, with a great gallop, the Elements took off towards the mercury fractal, ignoring the ocean roaring behind them

They were gone before the source even finished activating.





Jophiel was not in a happy mood. None of the Overseers were, but she was the least.

"And so, thanks to our sibling's incompetence and your malfunctioning excuse for a Sentry, we're down a domesticated spirit, the intruders now know of the Zone, and the orange one is beginning to see past the backup filter." An accusatory wing was pointed at Barachiel. "For the Head of Security, you don't keep things very secure."

"So speaks the Keeper of Supervision." Barachiel's tone was as calm and even as ever, but a caustic tone had crept in. "You are one too, seeing the ineffectiveness of your plan."

"I'm not the one who keeps on saying they'll always work!" Jophiel was moving her hooves now to fully express her frustration. "I'm the Stalwart, not the Wise! I do kind of expect the Wise, to be, you know, a source of wisdom, not the Harebrained Half-Baked Sentry of the Week!"

"If you are finished." The sudden gust of wind knocked a surprised Angel of Beauty back, resulting in the desired effect of her clamming up long enough to listen, "...preparations were already made for a new Sentry. You were going to hear of her after the battle already." The Angel of Lightning opened one of his larger body parts, and a file fell out.

Interested despite herself, Jophiel picked it up and looked it over. Slowly, her rage cooled, replaced with a dark sense of glee.

She looked up, grinning. "You finally found a way to induce lucidity, didn't you." It was a statement of the obvious, not a question.

"Yes."

"Excellent. I was always fond of them. Much less noisy than the living, much more predictable, but they can still hold a conversation." 

She flew off to the Dalga's cavern.

"Dalga. I am issuing two orders. One is a binding kill order for this pony..." She fed the first file in the photograph to the mandibles. "And the other is a retrieval for anointment for this one." The other photo was fed.

"Understood."





PRIORITY MISSIVE TO-CLOCKWORKED SPECIES 12, DESIGNATION ORANGE.

EQUINE (UNICORN SUBSPECIES) DESIGNATED VINYL SCRATCH, ALIAS DJ PON-3, HAS BEEN DESIGNATED FOR SENTRY OF INFRASTRUCTURE. 

SECONDARY OBJECTIVE-ENSURE EQUINE (EARTH SUBSPECIES) DESIGNATED OCTAVIA WITNESSES, FOR ASSISTANCE OF ANCHOR FORMATION. 

IF SUBJECT OCTAVIA IS UNAVAILABLE WITHIN REASONABLE TIME FRAME, ARRANGE BODY OF SUBJECT VINYL SCRATCH FOR MAXIMUM EMOTIONAL IMPACT.

FAILURE CONDITION: SUBJECT VINYL SCRATCH REMAINS ALIVE OR DOES NOT REMAIN AS GHOST.

ALL HAIL THE GOD-MACHINE.