//------------------------------// // Nine: Beverages // Story: Facility 0013 // by DismantledAccount //------------------------------// “Well, since I’m a bit thirsty, I think we should go into the Beverages room.” You go to place your injured foreleg on the ground and wince in pain. Wisp cautiously steps closer and inspects your leg. She gives a little questioning chirp and nods her head toward your leg. “It’s fine,” you hiss, keeping your leg bent enough that it doesn’t touch the ground. Out of your peripheral vision, you see Wisp moving hesitantly closer. You feel her soft, fluffy white mane and fur as she presses her head against your side, trying to offer what support that she can. “I guess you realized that I was forced to do that to protect us,” you say to her, as you begin to limp toward the doors. You feel her nod her head slightly. You don’t have the heart to tell Wisp that she is hindering your movement ability more than she is helping. You would be able to limp faster if she wasn’t standing right next to you. The warmth of her fur presses comfortably against your side as the two of you close in on the door. The relatively calm atmosphere gives you the time to ponder something. When was the last time I have felt something as simple as the touch of another pony? The experience feels almost foreign. You reach the nondescript metal door. You grip the handle with your magic and turn it. The door silently opens and you are presented with a completely dark room. You limp through the door with Wisp at your side. You move slowly in the dark room, careful not to run into anything. Out of corner of your eye, you see the door behind you silently swing shut. The harsh white lights that you have grown accustomed to bathe the room in their glow. You immediately have the urge to vomit. You cover Wisp’s eyes with your injured foreleg. “Don’t look,” you whisper through clenched teeth, as you continue to stare in horror. She nods slightly and you feel her press her muzzle into your side Directly in front of you is a large metal cylinder with a glass window in the side at the perfect viewing height for you to see what the liquid-filled tank holds. Floating in the liquid is a horror. The horror lies in the fact that the pony is still a pony. Except the pony has seventeen regular-sized legs. It has the usual four plus one where each of the eyes would be. A leg is coming out of the pony’s mouth, one out of each nostril, two out of its back, and three out of each side of the pony’s ribcage. Each of the legs twitches repeatedly and squirms slightly as the pony turns to face you. It scrapes some of its legs against the glass as it seemingly tries to get your attention. You shake your head to try to get the image out of your mind as you carefully sidestep the tank and walk past it. You are greeted with an even more disturbing sight. Lining the walls of the square room are dozens upon dozens of similar tanks. But that isn’t the disturbing part. The unnerving thing about the tanks is that they are all empty. Broken bits of glass litter the floor around each of the tanks and the liquid that was in the tanks is now all over the floor. In the center of the room is a collection of metal desks with various things on them. The items include: empty bottles, bottles filled with unknown substances, papers, files, pens, and, of course, dead, bloody bodies. Their blood mixes with the unknown fluid to form a pinkish color around the bodies. Wisp pulls away from you but you don’t stop her. If she has seen the giggling monsters then these dead bodies won’t be a problem for her. Probably, you think to yourself. A nearby dead body, a unicorn to be exact, is clutching a red folder to his chest with a death grip. The important looking color catches your attention. You grab the folder with your magic and tug on it. The body resists your pull but it can’t hang onto the folder. You open up the folder and read the first -and only- page. Final Findings Report: Not all the Patients who received Mixture 1 died. The one who didn’t should not be taken lightly. They had to be given lethal injections because we were unable to contain them. We are still not sure if we have discovered all of them. We just can’t catch them. Mixture 2 improved on the Patient’s [Classified] but caused massive amounts of pain due to the strain of the reinforcement. It often times killed the Patient. However, when it didn’t the results were remarkable. Mixture 3 enhanced [Classified] in unicorns but also caused forms of dementia in some Patients. The enhancement levels exceeded far beyond expectations, but the dementia proved a difficulty. All the patients who received Mixture 4 became [Classified] but also virtually unstoppable. I mentioned them in my other reports. They are escaping virtually everyday now. In conclusion: The Mixtures have not been tested enough. We are giving the Patients the Mixtures too soon. The casualty rates are too high; the risks are too great. The Element can do wonderful things but the things we are doing will condemn us all. Brimming Beaker, level three technician in the Beverages Room. Tucked behind the piece of formal looking paper is a barely-visible small envelope. It is addressed simply to “The Director”. You open it and begin reading. On a personal note to the Director, The workers are beginning to question your motives, myself included. Real ponies instead of rats and mice? Your “for the advancement, prolongment, and security of Equestria” speech will only work so many times on our bloody hooves. You have been keeping us in the dark for so long now. I am the head of my division and I don’t even know ninety-five percent of the work that happens between my four walls. Nopony knows anything. All we know is what we tell each other on our breaks. We have automatic classification spells that periodically flood the area, censoring any “problem words and phrases”, as you call them. Only you know the counterspell. You keep saying, “It is for the good of ponykind.” But no good has come from the abominations we have created. Gigglers, Brutes, Munchers, the list goes on and on. Even Patient Alpha Iota Nine, your “holy savior” as you call him in your speech, is showing the symptoms. Patient Alpha Iota Eight has long since fled his cell and is probably hunting for Patient Alpha Iota Nine, he expressed great interest in his “Brother”, as he calls him. I am unsure of his motives but I doubt they will be in the interest of research. I am done. As soon as I finish my shift I will leave and never come back. I can only hope that the few Gigglers that we have left in containment don’t break out before I leave. I am not holding my breath. By the time this reaches you, I will either be dead or free. May Celestia have mercy on our souls. Brimming Beaker. “I don’t like the sound of these ‘Mixtures’, or any of this, really.” you mutter, looking up. Standing in front of you is Wisp, she is tapping her hoof against your uninjured foreleg to get your attention. Wisp chirps awkwardly around a large piece of paper. You can tell that this is her mouthwriting because it is barely legible. There are three simple words penned onto the page, yet they manage to send a chill through your spine. ThA r cumIn “Who? Who is coming?” you ask. She stomps her forehoof in frustration. “Help me out here. Have I met them before?” you ask her. She nods fervently. “Is the the beast-thing who called me his brother?” you guess. She shakes her head and stares over your shoulder at the door. Your answer comes mere seconds later. The giggling has returned. It starts quietly at first, you can barely hear it. The giggling slowly builds in volume until the laughter is right outside the door. “How did you know… never mind that, did you see another exit in this room?” you ask Wisp, figuring she wouldn’t be able to answer the first question anyway, She shakes her head silently. You mutter a curse word of your choice as you look around for a weapon or an escape route. The room is completely sealed and there isn’t so much as a scalpel in sight. You hear the giggling creatures begin to beat on the door with their fleshy stumps. The wet sounding thumps echo throughout the room. “Nothing!” you yell in anger, realizing full well that the only thing standing between you and the laughing monstrosities is an unlocked door. Something on one of the desks catches your eye. Small bottles, relatively two to three ounces apiece, litter this particular desk. They have small labels on them that simply say one word and a one number. The word is “Mixture” and the number ranges anywhere from one to four. The banging is growing louder and louder as more creatures join the assault. You look over at Wisp and see that her ears are plastered down against her head. She is crouched low and standing between you and the door. She looks at you with wide blue eyes that beg you to do something. I am in no condition to fight and all the creatures want is my death, you think, inspecting the bottles. But maybe… You reread the report still clutched in your magic. You look at Wisp, the Mixtures, then the door. There is no way you can fight them as you are. Fighting one decapitated head proved difficult. Sitting here and dying is not an option, you have to protect Wisp. Running isn’t an option either, there is no exit. The Mixtures are the only option left. You reach for... >The swirling, translucent, black liquid titled Mixture 1 >The thick, syrupy, green liquid titled Mixture 2 >The bubbly, yellow liquid titled Mixture 3 >The sparkly, blue liquid titled Mixture 4 Time to tally the votes and write the chapter. You know the drill. No more voting.