//------------------------------// // Engine // Story: The Fluttershy of Tomorrow // by Amneiger //------------------------------// Fluttershy carefully followed the forklift as it moved the cell along the corridors. She always stayed one corner behind, peering carefully around the corner to make sure that the assassins didn’t see her. She couldn’t see into the cell with the wheeled machine in the way, so she had no idea if the albinos were still all right. Fluttershy looked at the signs on the wall as they passed them, and it looked like they were heading towards something called the Dimensional Engine. None of the assassins slowed or looked back. They moved for several long minutes, until Fluttershy realized that there was an electric blue glow being cast on the walls ahead. They were heading towards something that was generating a lot of light. Somewhere in the distance, Fluttershy heard electricity crackling. The forklift and the assassins turned one last corridor, and Fluttershy heard the sound of the wheels and metal feet that had been echoing down the corridor suddenly echo outwards. They must have stepped out of the corridor into a wide room. The blue glow was much stronger here; whatever was causing it was just ahead. Fluttershy carefully poked her head around the last bend. She was looking into a vast cylindrical room, hundreds of feet across, bigger than Ponyville’s town hall. The whole cylinder was lit up in a strong blue-white glow, brightly illuminating everything inside. The room went up through where the ceiling was and down far past where the ground floor of the factory should have been; Fluttershy couldn’t see how far either end stretched. In the center of it was a huge turbine that spun rapidly as lightning danced from the walls to meet it. There was a constant loud hum in the room from the energy bolting through the air. Walkways and loading platforms and scaffolds led in circles around the cylinder. Steel boxes and tables littered the platforms; she wasn’t sure what they were for. A steel frame had been built around the turbine, and many of the scaffolds and platforms were attached to it. Lightning streamed like a river between the frame and the turbine, and there were more of the red prison cells in the frame, facing inwards. There was a booth big enough for two people at the base of the cylinder, with what looked like the lights of some kind of control panel inside of it. Fluttershy stared. What was that? The forklift with its escort stopped underneath one of the prison cells in the frame, on a platform with what looked like several other cells. One of the assassins jogged towards one of the nearby platforms with tools, put its hand on a scissor lift, and pulled it up to the central turbine, under on of the prison cells in the turbine frame. The assassin pressed a button, and the lift went under the cell. There was a deep thunk, and the cell dropped out of the frame onto the lift. The lift lowered back down, and the assassins dragged the cell to the other side of the platform with the rest of the cells. As they did so the front of the cell was turned to face Fluttershy, and she thought she saw a fine layer of ash on the bottom. This looked very, very bad. The assassins began pulling the scissor lift towards the full cells. She had to do something – The assassins froze. From this distance Fluttershy faintly heard crackling noises coming from their lamps. A moment later, all of them turned and ran out one of the other doors. The big room was unguarded. Now what? Fluttershy flew quietly into the room, landing in front of the albinos’ cell. “Lisa!” “You’re back!” Lisa whispered back, sitting up. “I can hear the machines outside. This is the reactor! How did you get past the guards?” “There aren’t any,” Fluttershy said. “They just left.” “That’s strange,” Lisa said. “We should leave before they return. Can you get this cell open?” “I think so. Let me try.” Fluttershy flew around to the back of the albinos’ cell and pulled on the power cord. The cable came free in a short shower of orange sparks, and Fluttershy instinctively threw up a foreleg to cover her face. She let go of the cable, letting it fall to the ground. From the front of the cell was the sound of something powering down. “Stay here a moment,” Fluttershy heard Lisa say to the other albinos. “I’m stepping out.” Fluttershy flew back to the front of the cell to see Lisa stepping forward cautiously, holding her hands out. Fluttershy hovered in front of Lisa and held a hoof out to Lisa’s hand. Lisa felt the hoof against her palm and brought both hands up. Fluttershy let Lisa touch her on the head again. “Thank god,” Lisa said. “Are there any more cells here? We had some equipment with us, it might be there.” “Let me look,” Fluttershy said. Lisa nodded and sat down. Fluttershy looked at the other cells on the platform. All of them held orphans, in their own separate cells. There was a bracelet that seemed to be held rigid in the middle of a translucent orange sphere like a hamster ball. A short L-shaped device flopped up and down on the floor of another cell. One cell held a flat white box, which seemed to have grown wheels and was now rolling rapidly back and forth on the floor of its cell. A fourth cell had a series of tall metal tubes as tall as an albino, that hung in the air and gently swung back and forth like wind chimes. Three of the cells held one human zombie each; all three seemed to have very tiny, doll-like arms sprouting from them. The cell next to the albinos had several black goggles and metal tubes in it, and she recognized the equipment that the first group of albinos she had ever seen had been wearing. “There’s some goggles and tubes in the next cell,” Fluttershy said. “Are those yours?” “Yes, they are! Please, open it.” Fluttershy pulled out the power cord for the next cell and flew back to where Lisa was. “Hold your hand out.” Lisa held her hands out, and Fluttershy pulled her towards goggles. “Here,” Fluttershy said. Lisa reached down and grabbed one of the goggles. She ran her fingers over them for a moment, making sure of what they were, and then put them on. She stood up, and Fluttershy saw a pair of red eyes behind the goggles. “Good work,” Lisa said. She turned, taking in the rest of the room. She picked up another set of goggles, handed them to another one of the albinos in her cell, and turned back to grab one of the tubes. “Get everyone equipped,” she said to the albino she’d given the goggles too, and then turned her attention to the tube. She looked it over, pulling back on parts of it and opening other parts of it. “Still in good condition. I’ll shut down the reactor. Once the robots are stopped we can make a run for it.” “All right.” Fluttershy could look for the gate more easily if the guards weren’t there. Fluttershy watched as Lisa went into the control booth. Lisa looked over the rows of blinking buttons before finding and pressing down on a large red button the size of a hoof. Nothing happened. Lisa scanned back over the control panel. “Damn!” “What is it?” Fluttershy said. She trotted into the control booth. “It’s locked.” Lisa pointed at a keyhole that was set into the controls. “We’ll need the key if we want to do anything. Come on.” Both of them went back out into the platform with the cells. At this point all the albinos were wearing goggles and carrying their tubes. “We’ll head out now to look for it.” “Wait,” Fluttershy said. “What about the orphans?” She pointed at the orphans, which were still in their cells. “What about them?” Lisa kept walking towards one of the doors leading out. Fluttershy hurried to keep up with her. “We should let them out. They must be miserable in there.” “I’d rather not. Wild orphans are always hungry for anything with Mania, like us.” “Like you?” Fluttershy thought that Mania was just used for making and powering the impossible inventions Maxwell had tried to tell her about. “Yes, us. We come from the Seattle of Tomorrow. Not Megiddo, the city. Can’t have a city without people in it, can you?” “Well…I don’t…” Fluttershy remembered what the journal had said about finding other albinos. There had been no mention of albinos being born. “You mean, you just…appear fully grown in the city using Mania?” “Yes, like I said. A city needs people, and a place like this will do things to make that work. We’ve wasted enough time. Let’s get moving.” “No, wait. I still want to let the orphans out.” “And what will you do next? How are you going to control them? And even if you could, how are you going to keep such a huge group from being found? Fluttershy, this isn’t practical.” “Don’t worry,” said a familiar voice. “I got that all taken care of for you.” With a loud CLANG, metal shutters came down on all the doors leading out. Something landed on the ground behind Fluttershy. She spun around, coming face to face with who was now standing between her and the control booth. “Looking for this?” Rainbow Dash said, pointing at a key around her neck. The door they had been heading towards opened, showing a squad of assassins on the other side. “All of you, back in your cages,” Rainbow Dash continued. “As soon as we’ve got you all inside, I’m going to use this key to open the controls and recycle all of you.” There was a flash of movement out of the corner of Fluttershy’s eye as Lisa swung her tube up to aim at Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash dodged just as Lisa pulled the trigger, filling the air with a cacophony of sharp cracks. Fluttershy screamed and bolted, instinctively leaping off the platform and up towards the ceiling. She landed on a section of another platform and ducked just as she felt Rainbow Dash shooting past just above her. Below them, the albinos were scattering, ducking behind boxes and machine as the assassins opened fire, filling the air with lightning. Rainbow Dash came to a stop close to the ceiling and turned towards Fluttershy. “Like it?” she asked. “We built this place just to draw in the Klondikes and the orphans, and then we render them down to Mania to power the generator. We get something useful out of them, and they don’t bother us anymore. Megiddo says that for a while we tried using mortals as a renewable generator, but they kept breaking out so now we just shoot them.” Below them, the albinos were returning fire. Without cover, half of the assassin squad dropped, but the remainder stood and kept firing, forcing the albinos to focus on staying down instead of exposing themselves to fight back. Fluttershy flew out and dashed underneath another section of scaffolding, behind a cart full of metal plates. She hunkered down under it, hoping that there was enough shadow to hide her. Rainbow looked right at her. “I know you’re there, you know. It’s not like there’s any places to hide in here.” There was a rattling noise as another of the room’s doors opened, revealing more assassins. The albinos frantically swung around, trying to get cover between both groups as lightning bolts rained down on them. Rainbow bolted down towards the engine, and Fluttershy threw herself off the scaffolding. She landed on the ground just as Rainbow Dash landed on the spot where Fluttershy had just been. “Oh, and by the way? The gate’s not here. I just said that so you’d dig yourself so deep in this place that you’d never get out. You’re locked in here with me. Just give up now!” Rainbow said, as she stood above Fluttershy. Fluttershy darted away, zipping directly under where Rainbow was and then dodging to the side, out of sight. Fluttershy heard Rainbow land on one of the walkways. There was a moment of silence as Rainbow looked around. “Stupid pegasus,” Fluttershy heard Rainbow mutter. “How’d she get that sneaky?” Fluttershy slowly tiptoed away from Rainbow’s voice. There was another pocket of shadows, nestled in between two sheets of metal at the base of the engine. Maybe if she holed up there, Rainbow wouldn’t be able to find her – There was a scream, and Fluttershy turned just in time to see one of the albinos fall, a massive chunk of his upper body scorched black. She needed to do something, or they would all be overwhelmed. What could she do? Fluttershy realized that the cells were unguarded. Maybe the orphans could do something to help. At the very least, they could try to get away. Fluttershy looked around. The assassins were preoccupied by the albinos, and Rainbow Dash was still somewhere above her, muttering to herself. Fluttershy took a deep breath and made a flying leap towards the cover of one of the larger machines. As soon as she landed, she looked around. Nobody seemed to have spotted her, although she could see Rainbow Dash now as she prowled near the top of the turbine. Fluttershy ran for the next set of boxes, crouching down behind it just as another door in the ceiling slid open. Three aerials flew out, angling down towards the albinos. They were met by a spray of fire, and all of the aerials plunged down as their wings were shot out. Fluttershy flung a wing up to shield herself as one of the aerials slammed into the ground right in front of her, spraying her with sharp pieces of metal. Up above, another aerial dropped out of the open door, its arc blaster already charging up. She needed to hurry before even more robots arrived. Fluttershy dodged behind another box before popping up to look around. The next platform was the one with the cells on it. The orphans were inside, all of them pressed up against the doors, banging against them. There was no cover between the box she was behind and the cells. Fluttershy looked around one more time. Two aerials were circling overhead, weaving between the albinos' shots. A few more of them were down, and the rest were trying to fire back at two open doorways. The dead assassins were starting to pile up at the front of the doorways, enough to partially shield the fresh assassins from the albinos' attacks. None of them seemed to care about their dead comrades lying at their feet. Megiddo was going to keep sending robots at them until they choked. "Okay," she said to herself. "This is it. You've got to make it Fluttershy." She took another breath. "One...two..." On three she threw herself forward, spreading her wings and pushing herself as hard as she could. There was a sudden change in the aerials' fans above her, and she knew they had spotted her. The two aerials buzzed over her head, and for a moment she thought they would stop near the cells. But they passed over the cells and began banking around to face her. She kept flying. The first aerial finished its turn. It pointed at her for a moment before suddenly angling forward and speeding down. Fluttershy jumped to one side just as the aerial dive bombed into the ground right in the path she had been going before. The second one slammed into the platform, sticking up out of the metal like a wall, and she ran around it. She heard more aerials behind her. They must have been trying to slow her down. Fluttershy looked ahead. She was almost there. Something grabbed her tail, and she hit the ground just in front of the cells. "Ah ha!" Rainbow Dash cried. "Got you - " Suddenly something dropped down from overhead, and Rainbow Dash screamed as Little Ball landed on her head, clawing her face. "GAAAH! GET OFF!" She let go of Fluttershy's tail, trying to pry Little Ball off. Fluttershy flew up and over the cells, landing next to the power cables. She was near one of the walkways leading to another closed exit. It opened just as she landed, letting in another squad of assassins. Fluttershy didn't wait to see if the assassins had noticed what she was doing. She flew down the line of cells, pulling out cables. There were metal footsteps echoing through the room, enough so that she couldn't tell which direction they were coming from, and Rainbow shouting. She ignored them, focusing on what she'd come here to do. A circle of lamp light fell on her just as she pulled out the last cable, and footsteps sounded right behind her. She turned, staring up into the face of an assassin just a few feet away. She backed up against the cell, holding her hooves up in front of her as it stepped forward. "No...please, don't!" Something came whistling from the side and smashed into the assassin, slamming it into a wall. It was the floating giant metal pipes, now wrapped around the assassin and squeezing it hard. Fluttershy took advantage of the distraction to fly up on top of a cell and take a look around. The orphans were bursting from their cells, jumping and crawling and running away. One assassin was shooting at one of the zombies; the zombie lurched with each shot, but stayed on its feet and slowly kept advancing. As Fluttershy watched, two more assassins entered from a door on the other side of the room and were met with a hail of red beams of light. A pair of boots tied together by their shoelaces leapt straight up, springs popping out of their heels as they disappeared into one of the ceiling doors the aerials had been using to enter; at least one of them was trying to escape, Fluttershy thought. The remaining albinos had turned to face the orphans, but had held their fire when they realized that the orphans were more concerned with the assassins then them. Rainbow Dash was still wrestling with Little Ball on the ground near the cells. On floor nearby was the key that had been around Rainbow Dash's neck. Fluttershy dropped down from the cell, snatching up the key in her mouth. Something small and round skidded past her, and Fluttershy spun her head to focus on it just as Little Ball hit the side of a conveyor belt with a bang. It rocked back on forth on its back for a moment before dizzily righting itself. Several of its gears were dented and were ticking erratically, and a small trickle of smoke rose from somewhere inside of it. “Ha! Take that, you loser!” Rainbow was floating in the air near the cells, several gray lines on her face where the ball had scratched her. “Now – ” Rainbow ducked an energy beam. “Hey! Stop shooting at me!” Rainbow flew around another energy beam, going behind a crate and out of sight. Little Ball was swaying dizzily, and it seemed to be having trouble focusing its eye. It needed energy, but Fluttershy didn’t think that sitting down and opening her backpack in the middle of this battle was a good idea. Fluttershy picked up the wicker basket and brought it over to Little Ball. “Come on, get inside,” she said. After a moment it was looking in the right direction, and took a few unsteady steps and made it into the basket. The albinos had fallen back to a cluster of boxes closer to the engine; only half of them were still standing. A few bodies were still sprawled on the ground where the albinos had first taken cover. Their weapons were missing, and a moment latter Fluttershy realized that the surviving albinos had taken them and were still using them. Fluttershy flew over to the albinos. Lisa was still with them, staying crouched down behind a crate and taking careful aimed shots. "Lisa!" Fluttershy said. "I have the key!" Lisa nodded. "Good! Get to the control booth. Put the key in, then press the large red emergency shutdown button. Can you do that?" Fluttershy looked towards the control booth. Two aerials were flying in ovals over it, and two more assassins were moving in slow circles in front of it. "I don't know," she said. Lisa looked in the direction Fluttershy was. "All right. Give me the key, then find somewhere safe." She held out her hand, and Fluttershy gave her the key. Lisa turned back towards the other albinos. "John, Sarah, come with me. Everyone else, hold them off." Fluttershy looked around for somewhere she could hide. There was a shadowed spot under what looked like a maintenance bench, and she ran under it. She put the basket down and pulled out the pouch with the glass cylinders. "Here, eat something." Little Ball lifted one leg, pulled one of the cylinders towards itself, and bit into it. The energy flowed into it, and Little Ball stood back up, all its gears restored. Fluttershy put the pouch back in her backpack and turned to see what was happening at the control booth. The three albinos were down behind different crates, firing up at the aerials above them. A shot sheared across one aerial's wings, and there was a metal screech as a fan jammed, spinning the aerial around in the air. The aerial began to drift, but its remaining fan began spinning twice as hard, and it flung itself around and slammed itself into the floor right in front of one albino, punching a hole in the ground and sending both of them falling through it. His scream echoed up out of the ground as both of them were sent spinning down the darkness. The second aerial suddenly whirled about, and like a shot it rammed into the albino Lisa had said was named Sarah. Both of them were crushed into the ground, the twisted metal of the aerial partially covering her unmoving body. Two assassins and Lisa were left. Lisa stood up and fired a long burst across both of them, blasting both of them off their feet. The weapon clicked and stopped firing, and Lisa dropped it and ran for the control booth. Another assassin stepped out from around the control booth and shot Lisa at point blank range. Lisa fell just at the front of the control booth. The key clattered to the floor an inch from her outstretched hand. The assassin stepped forward over Lisa's body, ignoring the key as it took up a guarding position in front of the control booth. They had been so close... There was no time to stop. They needed to do something, fast. There were only a few albinos left, fighting as hard as they could to keep the increasing numbers of assassins and aerials from overwhelming them. Fluttershy could hear fighting going on in other parts of the room, but she couldn't see the orphans anywhere. There was no one else around to help. If anyone was going to get the key, it would have to be her. "We need to go now," she said to Little Ball. It nodded and set itself, preparing to run. If she waited any longer, then more guards would arrive. Fluttershy ran out from under the table towards the booth, Little Ball running behind her. There was a buzzing behind her, and Fluttershy rolled to the side as a lightning bolt came down from an aerial that had flown up behind her. It shot past, narrowly turning to miss the central turbine. Fluttershy kept running. Another assassin stepped out from behind a crate, stretching its arm out to grab her. She jumped up, spreading her wings, and she glided over its outstretched hand. The assassin that was standing over Lisa's body turned to face her. Its lamp swung up, shining directly into her face, and just above it was the glow of its arc blaster charging. Little Ball rushed past her, sinking its fangs into the assassin's feet. Its leg crumpled, dropping it to the ground as Fluttershy flew overhead. She landed next to the key, grabbed it, and ran into the control booth. The numerous lights and buttons on the control panel were all blinking rapidly, small green and yellow and red bulbs flashing back and forth like an alarm, all with obscure, heavily abbreviated labels she had no hope of reading. Under the light, Fluttershy easily found the keyhole and the red button Lisa had been trying to use before. She put the key in the hole and turned it. The emergency shutdown button lit up, glowing a bright, angry red. There was the sound of footsteps behind her, and she heard hooves landing on the hard metal floor outside. She had only moments. She pressed the button. For a brief moment, everything turned bright blue as the entire engine filled with lightning at once. A moment later, Fluttershy’s vision cleared. The turbine was slowing. In almost imperceptible increments, the turbine was starting to wind down. The tumult outside had dropped into a sudden silence. The turbine turned one last revolution and came to a stop. Sporadic lightning leapt from the turbine to the engine’s walls, but it looked drained, exhausted; there was none of the same energy it had had when the engine had been running. There was a resounding thump as all the assassins in the room collapsed. Outside, Rainbow Dash howled in frustration and rage. Something flew into the booth and slammed her right into the control panel, hard. Her head rang. All she saw was something blue in front of her, something that swam in her vision before it resolved into Rainbow Dash raising a hoof. The blow came down hard, right under her eye, and Fluttershy cried out in pain. She felt blood trickling down her cheek where Rainbow’s hoof had cut the skin. “What do you think you’re doing? He told me not to let you touch those controls!” Rainbow’s rage was a palpable thing, twisting her face like Fluttershy had never seen before. “Just give up! You can’t fly. You can’t fight. Why do you keep causing trouble for me!” Rainbow Dash lifted a hoof to hit her again. The hoof sparked. Rainbow froze in horror. “Oh no. No. Oh no…” Rainbow took a step back, holding her hoof up and staring at it. The hoof began to twitch. Small bursts of lightning were gathering around it, small at first but rapidly gathering power. “No, no! It’s not my fault, it’s not my fault, blame her, blame – ” The spark exploded all around her. Rainbow Dash screamed. She threw herself away from Fluttershy, skidding out of the booth and into the open space around the engine. Lightning was surging out of her and encasing her body, and the blue pegasus writhed under it until it burst, blasting away the color of her coat and mane. Underneath it was an articulated metal shell of a pegasus, lying on its side. The only thing unchanged were her magenta eyes. The Rainbow infiltrator stared at something past Fluttershy, her eyes wide with confusion and terror. “No,” she said. “No! Don’t leave me alone!” “What?” Fluttershy said. The Rainbow infiltrator’s eyes snapped back to focus on Fluttershy. “Get back! Get back!” She backed away in a panic, almost tripping over her hooves. The world flickered. Rainbow turned and ran. She bolted past the crates between herself and the nearest door. The door disappeared just before Rainbow shot through it, falling into a crack in the ground leading to non-existence. Fluttershy blinked. Wait, what? The world shook under her hooves. The building groaned. A nearby platform twisted and fell, and was swallowed up by a shard of black unreality that had formed in the air between the wall and the turbine. As Fluttershy watched, another piece of existence splintered away. Another platform popped loose from the engine, hanging from the bolts attaching it to the walls. Little Ball was on the ground next to the overturned basket, where Fluttershy had dropped it after being tackled by Rainbow Dash. It was staring around, trying to see what was happening. Fluttershy grabbed the basket. “Little Ball, get in. We need to go!” Little Ball shook itself out of the astonishment it was in, and climbed into the basket. Fluttershy grabbed it and flew as fast as she could. Everyone in the engine room was long gone. The building groaned again; the structure of the factory was collapsing as walls and supports suddenly ceased to be. Fluttershy bolted down the corridor she had come in through as she tried to mentally retrace all the steps she had taken to come in. The ceiling in front of her buckled and caved, falling down into the corridor with an ear-splitting CLANG. Fluttershy coughed, holding a hoof up to her face to block the dust. As the dust settled she saw that a large piece of machinery had fallen through the ceiling, blocking the hallway ahead of her. She looked up to see if she could fly into the story the machine had fallen from. Up above, several stories above her, she saw the orange glow of the sky. Fluttershy flew upwards, keeping her eyes focused on the patch of sky above her. The contents of the stories she was flying past flashed by her; half an assembly line dropping half-finished components into nothingness, a floor cracking and shattering like a struck mirror, vats spewing green and gray smoke. She burst out into the open, the wide expanse of the outside feeling liberating after so long. Underneath her, the factory had already half-sunken into the ground. Parts of the building were shot through with nothingness, and the ground was cracked as if an earthquake had broken it. Chasms dropped into nothingness, and parts of the sky were missing, leading towards a swirling nothingness that held no color. In the distance Fluttershy saw three black dots approaching, and she flew down into the walls and buildings that surrounded the factory. She ran, trying to put as much distance between herself and the factory as she could. As she drew close to the outskirts of Tacoma, three huge aerials, each as big as two airships, flew overhead. Each of them was carrying a wagon-like metal box beneath them. As the aerials flew into Tacoma, beams of lightning shot from them, surging into the factory. Fluttershy felt the ground right itself underneath her, and she suddenly breathed deeper, as if the air and her chest had been freed from a tension she hadn’t been aware of. She looked at the sky and saw that the shards of nothingness were beginning to shutter closed. Megiddo was repairing the reality here. Fluttershy guessed that after that he would move out to find who had done this. Fluttershy kept her head down and hurried north, away from Tacoma, back towards Downtown and the Industrial District.