//------------------------------// // Control. Alt. Delete // Story: To Protect And Serve // by Onomonopia //------------------------------// Despite the howls of Timberwolves coming deep from within and the roars of monsters the likes of which the ponies had never seen, the most dangerous creature in the Everfree Forest was the robotic officer who marched through the trees on a warpath, following a strand of darkness that slid through the shadows. His pistol was grasped firmly by his right hand and if any creature dared to cross his path it would find itself in a world of hurt. 'This way officer, this way,' the shadow whispered to him as it snaked along the dark ground of the forest, but always visible to Robocop thanks to his scanners. He could feel eyes on him from all directions, but whether the creatures knew he wasn't edible or realized that he was dangerous meant little to him as justice had to be served. The shadow led him to a small, wooden bridge that looked to be out of commission for years, with two old ropes barely holding it up. Below the bridge was a long fall into nothingness, the fog within the chasm preventing Robocop from seeing the bottom. Yet without a moment's hesitation he followed after the shadow as it snuck across the bridge, the creeks and groans of the rope not slowing him for an instant. The moment his feet touched down on the other side of the chasm after crossing he heard the ropes snap and he turned just in time to see the bridge fall into the fog, giving him no way to return to the other side. Yet Robocop turned and continued to follow the shadow, not wanting to be on the other side of the bridge. He wanted to be where Sombra was, where he could wrap his hands around his throat. He followed the into a large castle that was in just as bad shape as the bridge had been, with holes in the ceiling and destroyed tapestry all around. The shadow that had led him to the castle vanished into the darkness, leaving Robocop alone in enemy territory. "Come out Sombra and we can avoid trouble," Robocop called into the darkness as he switched his scanner to thermal, looking for any sign of where Sombra might be hiding. His words didn't draw out the dark king, but they did draw out a loud chuckle that echoed across the long forgotten halls, preventing Robocop from identifying the origin of the laugh. "Avoid trouble officer? If I wanted to avoid trouble I would kill you and the ponies in their sleep and simply be done with my revenge. No officer, trouble is exactly what I want," the voice of Sombra echoed throughout the hallways, Robocop looking around to find the source. While looking he emerged from his hallway and found himself in a desolate throne room, with many branching paths off to the side. A shadow sat on the throne and in an instant Robocop had his weapon aimed at the shadows head, but his scan stopped him from pulling the trigger when it identified the shadows as simply a shadow. "You have multiple crimes that you need to answer for, the most recent being murder," Robocop snarled into the darkness as he turned his head, his words being met by more laughter from the shadows. "Crimes? Crimes for what, officer? Trying to save Equestria? How is that a crime?" Robocop narrowed his eyes at the words, turning his head slightly so that he was looking down one of the side hallways. His sensors informed him that there was a forty percent chance the voice had come from in there, but he needed to keep Sombra talking to pinpoint the location. "Saving Equestria by killing those in charge and using the innocent as shields? That is not how the definition of saving is recorded in my databanks," Robocop retorted as he began a slow march down the hallway, his eyes constantly looking from shadow to shadow in case of an attack. "Then let me ask you this question officer, do you truly believe that the princesses are what's best for Equestria?" Sombra asked, but his voice sounded slightly louder from the direction Robocop was walking, increasing the percent of him being down the hallway Robocop was in. "They are the leaders of the land. They do what is best." "That is such a poor answer. Do you even know the princesses? They're guards are a royal joke, as I am sure you have been told by your best friend Flash. Whenever any real danger arises, such as yours truly, they send six citizens, and now a princess, to go deal with it instead of fighting the evil themselves. And just recently, Princess Celestia created untested and unstable monsters to protect her people because she was too lazy to train her royal guard to do their jobs. Now does that sound like what a sane ruler would do, my dear officer?" "It is not my duty to question to ruling methods of those above me. My duty is to bring in criminals and protect those who they prey upon," Robocop responded with certainty in his voice as he pressed his back to the wall, reaching a corner that led into a large room where the voice seemed to be coming from. "The princesses have done nothing against the law and therefor are not my concern. You Sombra are my concern. You are my duty." He spun around the corner with his pistol drawn as he said this, but the room before him was mostly empty, aside from some very large statues that lined the sides of it, all of them looking like the same bearded pony. Robocop narrowed his eyes beneath his helmet as he began to move forward again, Sombra's laugh echoing through the room once more. "What an honest answer. With an answer like that I would believe you to be the best and most noble enforcement officer in Equestria. That is, if I didn't know that everything you do is based on a programming, what somebody else told you to say. The words about your duty? Programmed. Your little credo about upholding the law and protecting the innocent? Somebody else built you to say those words. Everything about you was created by someone else. The ponies see you as a living being, but only my eyes have allowed me to see the truth. You're a robot built to act like an officer, nothing more. If you were programmed to be a chef you wouldn't even tease the idea of law enforcement. If you were programmed to be a trash can you probably wouldn't think at all." One of the statues moved as the words echoed across the room, sliding to the side to reveal a long, dark passage way that went straight down for a long distance, with Robocop's scanners not able to see the bottom. Robocop assumed that Sombra wanted him to go this way and without another thought Robocop began to descend into the darkness, his firearm pointed in front of him for any trouble. After ten minutes of walking, Robocop found that the stairs leveled out and revealed a large, wooden door at the bottom of the stairs. He grasped the handle and through the door back, walking forward into the room behind the doors. "Everything about you, from your personality to what you say, is built in by somebody else. But you truly are marvelous, I will say that," Sombra said from the other side if the large room that Robocop entered, the blue fire from the torches on the wall flickering off of both his armor and the coat of the dark king, who turned around with a smile as Robocop walked towards him. "To think that they turned a living being into such an incredible weapon...it makes me wish to know more." "Sombra. You are under arrest for assault, crimes against the state-" "Oh save the speech officer and let's just get to why you're here," Sombra said with a laugh as he slipped into the darkness once again, Robocop ceasing his reading of the rights to look around the room for the dark king. "You want to bring me in because I've broken a few rules. I want the key that you house in your left leg and maybe a little more. And only one of us is going to get what they want." "Are you refusing to come quietly?" Robocop asked into the darkness before spinning around and firing his pistol at a cloud of darkness, the darkness breaking apart to avoid the bullets before swarming around Robocop, scratching and tearing at him. "Very well then." Robocop rolled out of the darkness and fired into the shadows again, the cloud grunting as the magic that powered it was assaulted with the gunshots. Sombra's darkness took on a drill shape and drove itself into Robocop's chest, forcing him back as sparks flew from his armor. "Does that answer your question?" Sombra laughed as he backed off, Robocop firing another shot before Sombra slipped back into the darkness. The damage assessment informed Robocop that some of his face had been torn off by the attack, meaning that his robotic skull would be showing through the damage. Aside from the face facsimile, the rest of his body remained undamaged by the attack. "And now we get to see that the only bit of you that looks human is actually fake as well. Did somebody else make that for you to?" "This is a pointless battle for you," Robocop said as he moved out of the way of a spear like attack from the shadows, driving his hand into the darkness as it passed and grabbing hold of the pony within. Sombra snarled as Robocop pointed his gun at him before letting off a blinding flash of light, overloading Robocop's sensors and causing him to release his grip as he covered his eyes. "Your tricks may delay the inevitable, but if you are as smart as you claim to be then you know you cannot harm me." "Yes Robocop, I know that full well. But that is why none of my attacks were designed to damage you. All I needed was a small crack, something that I could use to...see how you think." Robocop caught on to what Sombra was saying a second too late and he turned to see the shadows slip into his helmet, using the tears that were in his face to work their way through his skull and to his brain. Robocop howled as his systems began to fail, forcing him to his knees as he held his hands to his head. "So this is what the mind of a machine looks like?" Robocop opened his eyes to find himself in a large room that looked mostly mechanical, except for a large screen that was showing images of his life before and after he had become Robocop. Sombra stood in front of this screen, a large, toothy grin on his face as he watched Robocop rise to his feet. "Thought it would be emptier, but I guess they did leave a few thoughts left for you to chew on." Robocop reached down for his firearm, but to his shock he found that it was not within his holster. "Oh come now Robocop, surely you should know that simple machine cant' hope to fight me in a battle of...or should I say in, the mind?" Sombra chuckled before turning his attention to the screen. "Well well well, isn't this interesting. Is that...your family that I see there? So the people that made you didn't manage to completely erase who you were before making you into their puppet, did they?" "I'm bringing you down!" Robocop promised as he began to march towards Sombra, but chains shot down from above and wrapped themselves around Robocop's arms and legs, causing him to hold them out like he was being controlled. "That's what you called yourself back in the hospital right? A puppet? Yes, that fits you fairly well," Sombra muttered before turning his attention back to the screen, nodding as he watched the images flashed by him and told him Robocop's story. "Well now, isn't that a sad story. Honestly, if I didn't know that the human side of you was dead and gone I might feel just a little sad for you. But a machine has none of my sympathy." "What you do to me in here doesn't matter Sombra. I will not stop until I have brought you to justice," Robocop said with defiance in his voice as Sombra turned and walked over to him, stomping his hoof to remove Robocop's helmet, which happened in an instance. Sombra looked into Robocop's eyes with a smirk, Robocop staring back at him without fear. "Do your worst to me. I will still come after you." "My worst? Robocop, you have no idea what my worst will do to you," Sombra said with a grin so large that half of his face was a smile. Then Sombra slowly lifted his head to look up at the three directives that were burned into the walls of the mind, his horn glowing with power as he took aim. "But you won't care in the least when I'm done. After all, a puppet dances to the whims of the puppeteer." As he said this he unleashed a torrent of electricity into the first directive, blasting it apart into nothingness in a single shot. Robocop roared as his vision went blurry, his eyes staring into nothingness as he tried to recover. "Yes, at first I wasn't sure how to do this, since you are a machine after all," Sombra began before taking aim at the second directive and blasting into oblivion as well, causing Robocop to collapse to his knees as static covered his eyes. "But then I found something very interesting about you. You were only ninety nine percent machine. One percent was left of the human, a one percent that was flesh and blood. A part of you that I could mold like clay. All of your mechanical directives go through a human brain...a part I can control. If you didn't have your human brain, I wouldn't be able to do this, but it seems that little bit of human will be your downfall. So Robocop, care to tell me what your directives are?" "D-directive one: File not found. Directive two: file not found. Directive three: Protect the innocent," Robocop stammered out, his whole body shaking as Sombra laughed before turning his gaze back towards the final directive, taking aim with his horn one last time and unleashing his power upon the directive, erasing it from the databanks. Robocop's head went limp, leaving Sombra to place a hoof under his chin and lift it up so Robocop was looking into his eyes. "That looked like it hurt. Sorry about that," he teased before turning his attention back towards the large screen, the screen that showed his entire life was Robocop in Detroit. "Now normally I would believe that destroying your directives would be enough, but I know you hero types. If you so much as have a strand of your old selves left then you can be a problem. So I need to get rid of your old self completely!" He unleashed a wave of fire upon the screen, causing Murphy to scream as he felt his memories being burned from his memory. Murphy lifted his head to look upon his son's and wife's smiling faces on the screen one last time before the fire consumed them, burning away one of the last shreds of humanity that he had left to hold onto. Sombra looked down at the fallen Robocop with a smile before he turned and walked over to the last item in the room, a small picture of a man in a police uniform, with the name Alex Murphy written underneath of it. "And now, you die." Sombra obliterated the picture with a blast of magic, Robocop barely letting out a small cry as he felt his own name, his identity vanish into the darkness that now consumed his mind. Sombra dropped the ashes to the ground before walking over to Robocop, who stared blankly up at Sombra. "And now with all that out of the way, your mind is now kind of like a blank canvass. So, Robocop, care if I try my hoof at painting a new picture? Don't worry, you can keep your little Miranda rights thing. I can think of something fun for that. But I do feel bad about destroying your directives, since they are what defined you...say, how about I give you a new one? One that I like." Tendrils of darkness began to wrap themselves around Robocop as Sombra said this, his laughter filling up the room as Robocop never even lifted a hand to defend himself from the darkness. Dark words appeared in place of where the old directives had shone and darkness took the place of where Robocop had placed all of his memories, completely consuming the officer in Sombra's will. But even as Sombra forced his will upon Robocop, a single tear streaked down Robocop's face, that single tear being Robocop's last act of his own will before Sombra's own will took hold.