Rise of The Domain: Part I
Techorse Series: #16
By Spirals95
Greasy Bob's diner was a small eatery in Ponyville notable for great service, a large menu, and good portion sizes for the prices. The red-roofed building didn't really seem to stand out amongst the other colonial homes of the town, but the inside was certainly different. It was decorated with pictures from the construction of other towns in Equestria, most of them black and white photographs, others paintings. Several simple wooden tables were arranged inside the restaurant with no apparent order to them whatsoever. Each one had a blue and white checkered tablecloth on it, the traditional salt and pepper shaker, and a box containing plenty of crisp brown paper napkins. Folding metal chairs were scattered about these tables, giving the place a messy, but strangely welcoming appeal. There was never a hostess in charge, and customers could simply seat themselves at any open table. It was even encouraged to team up with other patrons if there weren't any open tables, as the check was usually not large enough to warrant arguments. Bob's was the perfect place for having fun with friends and filling your stomach for less than 10 bits.
The diner was starting to fill up during the lunch rush when Techorse decided to go grab a bite to eat. He hadn't planned on eating at the diner, but had gone through town on a walk with his robot, PAL, and decided to stop in when he got a craving for some home styled cooking. Finding a small square table towards the back of the wide room, the colt sat himself down in the chair closer to the doorway of the restaurant. PAL took a seat across from him at the same table, and laughed mechanically to himself as he noticed the looks he got from the ponies dining near him.
He heard them whispering amongst themselves and said quietly to Techorse with teasing in his voice,
"Master, look! They're probably trying to guess what I am."
"Most ponies know who you are by now." replied his inventor, "They just never expect you to make an appearance like this. You spend way too much time in the castle."
"I spend way too much time?" asked the machine accusingly, "You spent a week working on a new version of that gadget of yours, master! I don't think Miss Sparkle or any of her friends saw any of you during that time!"
"Yeah, that's true." He sighed, "That's why I needed to get out for a walk today. I promise that I'm going to be spending my free time outside for the next week, though."
"Here comes our waitress." pointed PAL, extending a metal finger at her, "We'll have to discuss this later."
Techorse turned and smiled at the mare and said, "Hello, Limpwing!"
Limpwing was a pony who seemed to slip in and out of being noticed in town. She was an azure blue pegasus pony with a jagged mane cut, the center of which was a darker cobalt blue, and the outer hair being a robin's egg blue. Her eyes were bright crimson red, and her cutie mark resembled a single glowing star, maybe even a supernova. She carried herself in a strong, positive manner that could make anyone feel welcome. Limpwing worked one shift a day at the diner, but it was unknown what she did with the rest of her time. No one bothered to ask her about her day, to the average resident she was just a simple waitress without much of a life outside of her work. Yet still, she had a friendly attitude and a pleasant smile on most of the time. Techorse had spent some time talking to her after work, and developed a friendship with her over time.
"Hey Tech!" she said cheerfully, taking out a pad of paper from the apron she was wearing, "What will you and your robot have?"
The green colt flicked his brown tail and answered, "I'll take the spaghetti and garlic bread."
Limpwing wrote down the order on her pad and asked, "Anything to drink?"
"Milk, please."
"You got it! How about you, PAL?"
PAL answered politely, "Miss Limpwing, I don't eat food. But if I could have a glass of water, that'd be really nice. This hot day has me overheated!"
"That's fine. I'm sure Bob wouldn't mind." She said, "I'll be back with your food soon enough Tech."
"Thanks Limpwing." Said Techorse back, smiling. She left the two sitting at the table to pick up their conversation.
Turning back to PAL, he questioned, "So what was this about me being anti-social again?"
"I didn't say you were anti-social, Master." reminded PAL, "I was pointing out that once in a while, you come up with an idea for an invention and then work on it without taking any breaks, often sacrificing a chance to be with your friends for it!"
Techorse sat back in his chair and sighed, "Yeah, I do like to finish inventions once I get going on them. Tell you what, next time I do that, let me know and I'll make sure to take time off for my friends."
With a mechanical buzz, PAL nodded and answered, "Good plan."
"What sort of a plan?" asked Limpwing, who had returned, placing the drinks and meals in front of the duo from a tray on her back.
"Oh," laughed Techorse, "PAL and I are discussing strategies for getting out of the house more."
The robot nodded, picked up the glass of water in front of him, and poured the contents into his mechanical jaw line. He then breathed out a cloud of steam, which dissipated quickly into the air.
"Ah, much better..." He said calmly, slumping back in his seat.
"Anyways." continued Techorse, "I'm hoping to spend more time with my friends once my work is done, instead of completing new inventions."
"Sounds good." Responded Limpwing, "Lemme know if either of you need anything else!"
Techorse watched her turn to take an order from another table, and then went back to his spaghetti. With a click from his saddle, his thin robotic arms emerged and picked up the nearby fork. He twirled himself a large bite from the plate, and lifted the ball of noodles to his mouth. Suddenly, the door at the front of the diner slammed open, and the pasta slid off of the utensil and back on top of the mountain of food. Techorse frowned in disappointment and turned his neck back to see who had entered so violently.
His face went from annoyance to shock as he saw Captain Arbiter standing in the doorway. Today, the white stallion was wearing his black cape as usual, but also appeared to have two small gray saddlebags on underneath. His normally all-black eyepatch had been improved as it now bore a red silhouette of his axe-shaped cutie mark. The pony was much larger than any of the other restaurant patrons, and he smirked as his presence caused the normally chatty diners to settle down and stare.
The Captain walked over to the single-seat table directly to the left of Techorse and sat down, picking up the menu with his front hooves.
"Captain Arbiter?" asked Techorse, "What are you doing here?"
The stallion dropped his menu and answered with a mocking tone, "Well for a minute there I was worried we were both going to eat our lunches and not speak at all. I'm here to eat while I'm on break in Ponyville, Techorse."
"It's just that…"
"Just what?" continued Arbiter, rolling his one good eye in contempt, "You actually thought I came here to cause trouble for you or something? Please! I'm here for a meal, not a fight."
PAL grabbed his master's head and turned it to face his.
"Master!" he whispered, "Isn't this the stallion who tried to cut off your head?"
He nodded slowly, but whispered back in comfort, "Yeah, it's him, but he's a good pony now, so he's not dangerous anymore."
Techorse frowned when he noticed that Arbiter was staring at Limpwing when she came to take his order.
"Well, maybe he's just not dangerous anymore. Not so sure about good."
"Huh, well hello Arbiter!" said Limpwing to the Captain, "Nice to see you here!"
"Hello sweetheart." Said Arbiter smoothly, "I'll have a glass of water, and the open-face mushroom sandwich for lunch."
"Coming right up!" answered Limpwing, turning around and walking back to the kitchen.
Arbiter leaned over a bit and took in the view of her, smiling with intent. Limpwing knew Arbiter was staring at her rear end, but she didn't care unless he planned on saying something to her about it. Usually getting stared at meant a big tip was coming! Techorse, however, was absolutely furious at Arbiter's obvious lack of decency, and decided it was time to pay a visit to his "old friend." Grabbing his plate of spaghetti, he carried it over to Arbiter's table and set it down. With some anger in his motions, Techorse then turned and dragged his chair up to the table. He didn't care if he wasn't invited, he just wanted to make sure the Captain didn't get away with what he knew he was up to.
"Something wrong lad?" chuckled Arbiter at the colt's strange behavior.
Techorse took a bite of his pasta and shook his head.
"Just wanted to catch up with you, Arby." He lied through a mouth full of chewed noodles.
Arbiter nodded slightly and said, "I'm here for three days on vacation. I've bought that mansion up in the mountains. I figured it would be nice to spend my vacation time with the simple ponies of this town. Sometimes I just can't stand how stuck up the residents of Canterlot are."
"Yeah, I can imagine." agreed Techorse, shoving a piece of garlic toast into his mouth.
"But anyways, I have yet to get a look at the inside of your castle. You wouldn't mind if I stopped in, would you?"
Techorse swallowed the bread almost entirely whole before answering, "Of course you can show up! But my robot PAL over there doesn't trust you. After all…"
Arbiter looked at the machine. PAL, being a six foot tall metal powerhouse, was quite intimidating unless you got to know him. The robot crossed his arms and shot the captain a nasty look that almost made him cringe.
"Yes, I know." responded Arbiter, "He has a good reason not to trust me."
"Oh, Techorse." interrupted Limpwing, "You joined with Arbiter?"
"Yeah." He answered as Limpwing set the steaming plate of mushrooms in front of the Captain, "I just wanted to talk with him."
Arbiter cut the conversation short and said, "Wow, this looks amazing! Thank you so much, uh…"
"Limpwing."
"Limpwing. I really like that name." said Arbiter, as she turned to leave.
"By the way!" he called out.
Arbiter smiled when Limpwing turned around to face him. He continued, "I just got finished telling Techorse here that I've bought a very large home in the mountains. Would you like to join me there tonight to have a look at my sword collection? It's rather extensive."
Limpwing refused to look disgusted, and said, "Thanks Captain, but as Tech here would tell you, I already have plans for tonight."
Then without another word, she went back to her work. Techorse took this opportunity to give Arbiter a smile indicating that he had lost the imaginary argument going on between the two of them. But what Arbiter said next made Techorse's blood boil.
"No matter. Having other plans can be fixed with a couple hundred bits."
Techorse slammed his robotic fists on the table and said loudly, "All right Arbiter, now you've crossed the line!"
Out of anger, he took a wild swing with one of his fists, which Arbiter ducked. The gray saddlebags opened up to reveal the two magical gauntlets Arbiter kept with him, and they activated and shot out at Techorse. The diner patrons screamed as the two stallions got into a scuffle in the middle of the restaurant, and several of them took cover under the tables for fear of one of the males throwing an object. PAL got up from his seat and rushed over to attempt to calm his master down before he made an embarrassment of himself, but on the inside, the robot knew it was far too late.
The commotion outside of the kitchen drew the attention of Limpwing and her boss. Greasy Bob was an overweight earth pony with an ironically white as snow coat. His thick, shiny black mane was probably the true source of his name, as it seemed he used tons of hair gel in it to keep it perked up in a curve the way he did. His cutie mark was three bottles of cooking oil in a triangular pattern, and his hooves had the "ruffled" cut seen on many earth pony males his age. Bob looked rather angry about the amount of noise and disturbance in his restaurant, and burst out of his office to see what was going on.
In the middle of the room, Techorse and Arbiter were comically at each other's throats. Arbiter's gauntlets were wrapped firmly around Techorse's neck, and the inventor had also managed to lock his robotic hands around Arbiter's. They were both grunting and shaking each other in rage. But once they saw Greasy Bob staring at them in shock, they quickly released each other. Techorse looked at the floor and retracted his arms quickly as Arbiter put his gauntlets back in his saddlebags.
"What the hay is wrong with you two?" asked Limpwing angrily.
Techorse replied, "Arbiter was being rude towards you, and I wanted to stop him!"
Limpwing groaned, "Yeah I know, but I can handle myself, Techorse! I don't need you to barge in."
Greasy Bob's angry expression dimmed slightly, but failed to completely disappear.
He walked over to Arbiter and said, "So who's this wacko who's been hittin' on you, anyways?"
"Captain Arbiter Axechop." grunted the stallion, "Princess Celestia's captain of the guard."
The fat manager immediately seemed a bit upset over offending the high ranking officer, but to no surprise on Limpwing's part, Bob shouted,
"Oh yeah? Well this is my restaurant, Captain! You gotta obey the rules like everypony else and not choke the other customers!"
Arbiter reached up with a hoof and wiped Bob's spittle off of his cheek.
Anger burned in his eyes as Bob continued, "Don't treat my waitress like that either."
Techorse snickered at Arbiter's misfortune. Sadly for him, this attracted Bob's attention.
"And as for you!" he said while turning to face Techorse, "I know you're the big shot inventor in town, but no amount of money is gonna save you from getting booted out of here unless you shape up."
"Oh I highly doubt that." muttered PAL as he rolled his optical sensor eyes, understanding the concept of greed.
"Don't make me put up a 'no robots allowed' sign!" screamed Bob as he span around, apparently overhearing the comment.
PAL might have been the tallest occupant of the room, but that yelling made him feel as if he was only 3 inches high. The robot carefully backed away from the furious colt.
"Look, Mr. Bob, I'm sorry." Said Techorse slowly, "I was only trying to help. I'll pay for any damages or losses today."
Bob let out a deep breath, and then said in a much softer voice, "It's fine, you didn't break anything. Just pay your tabs, and go. I don't want to see both of you in this restaurant at the same time again."
"Don't worry." huffed a very offended Arbiter, "I never plan on coming back here anyways."
With a swish of his cloak, he turned around and left the eatery, dropping a handful of gold bits on the floor behind him. Limpwing moved over to the money and started to count it out against the cost of Arbiter's meal, hoping something would be left for a tip. Techorse also paid his tab, and tipped higher than usual. He still felt a little bit guilty about his part in causing a fight in the restaurant. But as he made his way out of the door, he kept inside the fact that he still blamed Arbiter for the majority of what happened. Techorse just couldn't tolerate someone who didn't treat others with the respect he knew they wanted.
After exiting the diner, Techorse nudged PAL with his front leg and ordered, "Follow Arbiter PAL, he didn't get a date with Limpwing, so chances are he's going to go bug Fluttershy next."
"All right master, I'll make sure Fluttershy stays safe." He said, running off after the black cape in the distance.
After sending PAL off on his "mission" to stop Arbiter from chasing Fluttershy, Techorse saw Limpwing about to leave the diner on her lunch break. He decided to talk to her and try to apologize for all the trouble he had caused.
"Hey, Limpwing?" he called softly, walking up to her.
"What's wrong Tech?" she asked, making eye contact with him.
He looked at the cobblestone road below him and said, "Sorry about everything. I didn't mean to get all worked up in your defense."
The mare smiled gracefully, "Oh it's fine, that's just who you are. All you need to remember is that I can handle myself, ok?"
"I'll keep that in mind." He said, cheering up.
"Now if you'll excuse me," she said, "I have a break to go on. We can talk again after work tonight."
Limpwing snapped a pair of flight goggles that she kept with her around the top of her head. Each lens was made of clear plastic, and was much larger than each of her eyes. The frame was a solid silver color, and the long dark black strap held them snuggly against her head, squishing the top of her mane back.
Techorse nodded in agreement, "Sounds great."
Limpwing then trotted away from him, exposing her injured wing. The damaged limb was her namesake, which confused many ponies into thinking she had been born with it. The base of it was bent at an odd angle, and only the top medical experts could tell that it was a foalhood injury as opposed to a birth defect. Because of this, she much preferred to walk than fly to various places, even though flight was perfectly possible for her. Techorse had only known her for a few weeks, but he wanted to see what Limpwing's personal life was like. He knew it was none of his business, but he also knew he wouldn't really learn much about the mysterious pegasus pony just by talking to her for an hour after her work each night.
Techorse's saddle opened up, and the inventor switched to his turbofans, two high-powered helicopter rotors designed to allow him to fly, albeit slower than most pegasi. He followed Limpwing by carefully weaving through the buildings of Ponyville without being spotted, and was led to her apartment. Techorse waited for her to enter her home, and then he landed on the roof of the building and waited patiently. Ten minutes later, Limpwing emerged again, this time with a pair of saddlebags tied around her waist. She made a loose turn to the right and started walking for her next stop.
"She just finished her lunch, but she has 30 minutes left on her break," Thought Techorse, "I wonder what she's going to do with the rest of the time?"
He continued to shadow his friend across town, leading to Applejack's farm. Hiding inside one of the apple trees growing in the orchard, Techorse carefully looked on as Limpwing looked over the top of the fence by leaning on it with her front legs. She was watching Applejack interact with her little sister as they were working amongst the trees.
"Apple Bloom, what did you do with Big Macintosh's paint brushes?" she demanded, giving her sister a stern look.
The filly defended herself, "I just borrowed 'em! I was gonna give 'em right back as soon as I was done with them, I swear!"
Applejack shook her head, "Borrowin' without asking is the same thing as stealing, and the Apples don't steal. Now go inside and apologize to your brother."
Apple Bloom's ears drooped, and she obeyed her sister quietly. Techorse had a look back at Limpwing.
"Now that they're done talking." He thought, "Limpwing's probably going to walk up and ask Applejack if she can buy a bushel of apples. She probably shops in her free time, like a lot of ponies."
To his surprise though, Limpwing sat down against the fence, and took out a pad of paper and a pencil. She seemed to be taking notes on the chewing out that Applejack had just delivered.
50 feet away, Limpwing was writing down the information Techorse suspected:
"Applejack: element of Honesty. Applejack seems to be so infused with her element that she even considers borrowing without permission to be the same as theft. Previously, the subject only seemed to believe in avoiding direct stealing. Now it's apparent that she holds her Element so closely that she will get angry at any pony who does anything underhooved."
Limpwing finished taking her note, and then put the pencil and paper back into her saddlebags before continuing to walk. Techorse knew she only had ten minutes left on her break, and so she would probably go back to the diner directly. He mulled over what he had seen for a minute, before the tree he was sitting in shuddered violently. Techorse shouted and fell from the shaking tree, landing on the ground hard. Apples soon followed him, and filled the baskets surrounding the tree.
"Oh shoot, sorry Techie!" gasped Applejack, having bucked the tree without noticing him.
"It's not your fault." He grunted as he stood up and shook himself off of the dirt, "You don't usually have to check your trees for guests like that."
The country pony brushed the last bit of dust off of Techorse with her front leg and then asked, "What were you doin' in one of my trees anyways?"
"Watching Limpwing take notes on your yelling." He answered, "She's the waitress at Greasy Bob's."
"The trees are for growin' apples Tech, not for spyin' on ponies." scolded Applejack, "I saw that mare takin' notes, but it's none of our buisness."
"It's just that she appears to have no personal life, so I wanted to figure out where all her free time was going!" defended Techorse, "Don't you think that's a little bit odd that she never seems to be around town on weekends, or after work?"
"Maybe, but ah don't know Limpwing close. She could have been doin' anything writin' down things in that paper. Tech, didja ever think that maybe she just likes to be alone a lot?"
Techorse thought about what Applejack had said, and sighed heavily. His ears drooped in sadness, "Maybe she does. I'm always sticking my muzzle where it doesn't belong."
Applejack laughed and nudged him with a curled leg to get him to lighten up, "Not really, but I swear Techie, some of Twilight's paranoia has rubbed off on ya!"
Techorse's face perked back up and he said, "I'm supposed to meet Limpwing after she's done work today. I'm more likely to find out more about her if I convince her to let me tag along to whatever she does after work!"
"Now that's a whole lot better than spyin' on her." agreed Applejack, "Now sorry to cut ya off, but I gotta clear this acre by tonight!"
Techorse switched back to his turbofans from his battle saddle and hovered in the air, "All right Applejack, see you later!" He flew away to leave her to her work. Secretly though, he was still suspicious of Limpwing's strange writing. It was very odd for a pony to just write down what his friends were up to. But he let the thoughts go, knowing he'd probably find out that night.
When Limpwing finally got off of work, it was quite late. Due to the huge number of customers that had shown up for dinner unexpectedly, she had been forced to work way past closing time. It was now 10 at night, and the stars were clearly visible. The only sound of the quiet town square was of chirping crickets, as most of the town's residents had gone back home for the night. Limpwing stood underneath of the street light outside of the diner, waiting for Techorse to arrive. She was only going to wait a short while before simply assuming that he had dropped the meeting due to how late she was.
But after a few minutes, he walked around from around the corner of the restaurant and started talking to her, "Hey! Glad to see you're finally off of work."
The mare nodded, "Busy night, but we finally served everypony and washed all the dishes. So what do you want to talk to me about, Tech?"
Techorse pointed at her with his front leg, "I actually wanted to hang out with you, and do whatever you usually do on the weekends."
Suddenly, Limpwing seemed to take on a bit of a nervous tone of voice.
"Oh well, I don't think that's going to work. I'm really busy."
But the colt, to her misfortune, countered with, "Tomorrow is Saturday, and I know you don't work on the weekends. I just want to find out what you do for fun."
Techorse began to notice how often Limpwing appeared to shift her eyes during the conversation.
"I just get some physical activity, and sleep most of the day." She explained, "I'm always crashed after working all week for so long."
"Maybe it's time to kick back and relax then!" suggested Techorse, "Want to come back to my castle and play some games?"
"What do you have?" asked Limpwing, lightening up a little.
Techorse listed off the board games he had at home, but Limpwing didn't pay any attention to him. She was busy formulating a way out of talking with Techorse while he finished his list.
"I've played a few of those, and they're pretty fun. But I really just need to get going tonight. I have so much to do for tomorrow," said Limpwing once her friend had finished talking.
"Like what?" he asked.
Limpwing began to weaken in voice again, "It's private, ok?"
In a sudden switch in her emotions, she spurted out with anger, "Look, is there something you actually want to talk about, or are you wasting my time?"
Techorse backed up one step and said, "I just wanted to do something with you as friends. But I guess if you're really that busy, I can't keep you here. Have a good night."
Limpwing pulled her flight goggles down over her eyes and bid him goodnight before attempting to fly. Her injured wing still carried her enough into the sky for the pegasus to drift away into the darkness, although her flight pattern dipped occasionally. Of course, Techorse most certainly had plans to break Applejack's advice and follow her. But he waited a good five minutes before walking in the direction she saw her fly.
Eventually he found Limpwing peeking from behind a bush outside of the library. As the inventor-turned-detective had suspected, the azure mare was taking notes again on her pad while looking into the window of the tree home. This voyeuristic behavior was so odd for any pony, even one as mysterious as Limpwing, andTechorse knew that she was up to something.
The pony in the bush took off her flight goggles completely and placed them gently behind herself on the stone road behind her. She watched Twilight Sparkle indoors, reading a book on how to take care of edible houseplants. She was standing in the middle of the room, and was reading the brown-covered book carefully. To her right on her desk was a tiny sprout in a terra-cotta pot. Using a quick telepathy spell, Twilight picked up a watering can and gave the thirsty young plant a long drink. The purple unicorn then set the watering can down on the floor and stared at the plant for a few seconds. It was very tempting to her to use a magic spell to force the plant to grow quickly, but she had a bad experience in the past with using a rapid plant growth spell, and was determined to be patient to let the plant grow.
Her assistant Spike entered the room from the second-floor staircase and asked,
"Hey Twilight, what are you up to?"
"I'm growing a hot pepper plant." She answered, turning her head to look at him.
The young dragon walked over to the desk and stood up on a stool to have a look at the sprout. He gave the shoot a puzzled look and asked, "Isn't that going to take forever?"
"Not forever, but plants do take a good amount of time to grow!" answered Twilight, her hair swishing slightly as she went back to reading the book.
Spike loved hot peppers, but didn't love waiting for much of anything.
He asked rather politely, "Why don't you just use a growth spell on the plant? It'd be much faster, and you'd have the peppers now! Besides, a giant hot pepper plant isn't going to attack us." Spike seemed to remember why Twilight might be hesitant to automatically use magic to grow the plant.
Twilight Sparkle told him, "I know, but this is less about the peppers and more about learning patience. One of the things this book contains is a warning that plants that are grown with magic don't tend to be as healthy as those grown without it. If we wait for the plant to grow naturally, the peppers will taste so much better."
"There's got to be a way to make things go faster! Plants take months to grow!" complained the dragon, crossing his arms in disgust.
"There is a bag of fertilizer upstairs." said Twilight, "That will help the plant grow a little quicker without making it sick. Besides, I got this plant because I knew you like the peppers so much. It might be my plant, but if you're patient and help take care of it now, later on you'll get rewarded."
"Oh I see." said Spike, lightening up and returning his arms to his sides, "If you have to wait for something, it makes it more fun when you get it!"
"Exactly!" agreed Twilight, "We'll measure the plant every week, starting next weekend, and write down how the height. That way you can track how much it's growing."
Spike grabbed the potted plant and jumped down to the floor, "Great! Let me go put the little guy in the windowsill so he can get some more sunlight tomorrow."
Limpwing heard this and ducked into the bushes as the dragon put the plant down. He heard the rustling of the leaves and leaned out the round opening, looking for what had made the noise.
After a few seconds, he guessed, "Probably just a squirrel," and closed the glass of the window with a slam.
Limpwing then emerged from the bushes and began to take notes on the conversation again,
"Twilight Sparkle, Element: Magic. Twilight Sparkle is capable of discovering new ways of self-improvement, which ultimately leads to the strengthening of friendships. She was recently found discussing the importance of patience and the pitfall of instant gratification with her dragon, Spike. As time goes on, she seems to learn more and more about interactions with others…"
As she continued to write, Techorse was on his belly, crawling up behind her. He wanted to confront Limpwing once and for all about her spying. But he came up to her flight goggles first before he could pounce on her, and noticed that in the left lens, a corner of paper was sticking out. Knowing his robotic arms would make a quiet but distinct whirring noise, he carefully took the paper with his teeth and opened it. It was a small paper map, showing a route out of Ponyville. The arrow went straight for the princess's old castle for some odd reason, and then continued beyond that ancient structure out into an unknown area marked "Darkmatter Domain". Techorse studied the route, and realized that it must be what Limpwing did every weekend. She had a second home deep in the woods behind the castle, and had named it "Darkmatter Domain" for whatever eccentric reason. The green colt smiled and folded the map carefully, then tucked it back in the flight goggles. Turning around, he crept away quietly to go back to his castle. Tomorrow morning he would follow Limpwing to her secret "hideout" and have a showdown.
Once Limpwing had gone back home to her apartment, she sat on the roof with an enchanted scroll and a quill in her teeth. Limpwing was writing a letter,
"Dear Prince Darkmatter,
Today I learned that some ponies can truly take interest in what you do with yourself, and that's fine so long as they don't get too invasive.
Enclosed are my notes on the element users I observed today. Also, be advised…"
After finishing her letter, Limpwing sealed the enchanted scroll. It suddenly began to magically fold itself in various ways, and once it had finished, the scroll had turned itself into an origami crane. The bird started flapping its paper wings and soared away to go find its recipient. Limpwing then got off her roof quickly and went inside to get ready for bed.
The next morning, Techorse got up early and strapped on his battle saddle as soon as he had grabbed a quick hot shower. Skipping breakfast, he headed for the large double doors of his home on the edge of Ponyville, when he was stopped by PAL.
"Master, where are you going? It's six in the morning!" he demanded, body-blocking his inventor from leaving.
Techorse looked up and explained, "PAL, I'm going out to find out what Limpwing does on these weekends she goes missing. She left a map lying out that leads out behind the abandoned castle. I just want to figure out where she spends the weekend is all. It's very strange for a pony to just disappear like this, in addition to all the spying she's been doing."
The robot frowned and scratched his metal chin, "Spying, master?"
The colt nodded and stomped his front hoof sharply, "Limpwing was taking notes while watching Twilight and Applejack yesterday. I need to know what she's doing with those. She could be up to something."
PAL moved out of the way of the huge wooden doors, and pushed the red button to the right of them. Slowly the two slabs of oak opened, and natural light poured into the stone hallway.
"All right. But be careful, I don't want you to end up getting yourself hurt!" cautioned the machine as he stepped aside.
"Thanks, but I'll be fine." he said with confidence as he walked out the doors. After a few steps, he remembered something and turned around, "By the way, did you ever figure out what happened to Arbiter?"
PAL chuckled mechanically, "As you predicted, he went straight to Fluttershy's house. She let him in and served him tea, but of course refused to go back to his new vacation home. He seemed happy just to talk to her for a while though, and behaved himself."
The machine's expression then went completely serious, "But you should have seen Fluttershy's pet rabbit master! That little monster purposefully tripped Arbiter when he was only trying to complement Fluttershy's housework!"
"Angel…" sighed Techorse, "When will Fluttershy learn he's a little brat and discipline him?"
"Between you and me, master, I hope sooner and not later." said PAL dolefully.
Techorse shook his head and said before galloping off, "She'll do something eventually. But right now, I have to go finish my mission and confront Limpwing."
PAL waved goodbye and called out, "Good luck!"
Moving quickly to make up for lost time spent talking with PAL, Techorse reached Limpwing's apartment and waited patiently behind the building. He saw her leave the apartment complex shortly after he arrived, and take the exact path predicted by the map he had found inside her flight goggles. The pegasus pony went on her way without paying much attention to her surroundings. This easily allowed Techorse to shadow her to the edge of town, where finally, she took off into the air and slowly flew for the Castle of the Two Sisters. Techorse crouched on his legs, and his turbofans shot out from his saddle. He lifted off into the air and followed her from a distance to make sure he wasn't spotted.
Soon they flew past the ancient structure. The crumbling structure where Techorse's friends fought the demon-possessed Luna in the past had not suffered any damage since the encounter. But it was obvious that nopony had bothered to try and maintain the ancient building. It was almost pointless to do so. Limpwing, despite her handicap, was able to weave through some of the spires of the structure without any problems, and Techorse took advantage of the hidden areas in the castle to maintain stealth.
Eventually Limpwing landed next to a tall, crumbling stone wall located a few kilometers from the castle. Techorse thought that surely a wall so far away from the main building would be useless in its defense. She walked around the perimeter for a while until she found a small opening, just tall enough for a pony to enter. Techorse watched her go through the doorway without evening checking around to see if she had followers. Then, he snuck in behind her.
What he saw on the other side of the wall was amazing. It was a small countryside populated with ponies, many of them with defects like Limpwing. These ponies, despite their disabilities, had put together a beautiful township behind the towering wall that separated them from the rest of Equestria. Life seemed to be nearly identical to that of other towns, but the concentration of odd ponies, either in behavior or figure, was half of the population. In the distance, a grand, gothic styled castle made of pure black granite stood in the distance. If it weren't for the magical heat pump runes dotted around the outside of the structure, which acted as a magical air conditioning system for the jet black home, it would be boiled on the inside during the sunny days of summer. Steam appeared to be billowing almost constantly from these equidistant magic stones.
Wandering into the town, Techorse looked at the residents and asked himself, "Why would these ponies need to live here in secret?"
He thought about Twilight's fears about being banished, and thought that maybe this was where "bad ponies" went that Celestia didn't like. Techorse then came up with the idea that Limpwing had discovered the breach in the wall and discovered the city. She would then return to the secret town every weekend to help out the poor, tossed out residents. Despite this act of kindness, Techorse's heart sank when he thought for a moment that perhaps Celestia did banish ponies after all. Maybe Twilight's fears weren't so crazy!
After walking away a bit from the stone wall, Techorse smiled, and knew that Limpwing was good at heart after all. He did, however, wonder why he was being stared at by several large unicorn ponies wearing armor.
Trying not to get nervous, Techorse thought, "They must not like outsiders very much. I should probably just leave and ask Limpwing about this place when she gets back on Monday."
He turned around to leave, but suddenly, a row of unicorn troops teleported in behind him. From the front, earth pony guards had cut off his ability to run into the town. He was now completely surrounded by troops. Techorse instinctively drew his laser cannons from his saddle and pointed them at the guards in front of him. Yelling, he opened fire with a volley of destructive energy pulses, blasting plates of armor off of the confused guards. A large whooshing noise was heard as a crossbow bolt hit the back of the saddle, damaging the circuitry, and forcing Techorse to spin around and shoot back. His beams struck the offending ballista, and the wooden armament exploded in a spray of torched splinters, its operator ran away in terror. A pegasus guard attempted to body slam the distracted inventor, but Techorse had already moved forward to confront the unicorns. They opened up with a rapid fire from their horns, and pellets of blue magic energy struck the green pony in the legs. Yet still, he charged on despite the stinging of the projectiles. One more spray of lasers from his guns sent the unicorn guards scattering for cover, leaving pieces of armor burned away on the ground. But the last unicorn guard stood firm against the withering hail of yellow energy, and cast a force field spell over the hole. Techorse ran into the wall before he could stop, and the barrier bounced him back.
Getting up and spinning around, he opened fire again at the closing guards. A warning tone came from his saddle, which made his blood run cold. Any second now, it would overheat and shut down for at least a minute, plenty of time for the ponies surrounding him to beat him to a pulp. He continued to fire, burning a few more guards into running away before the saddle finally emitted a cloud of steam and powered down. The laser cannons drooped downwards, and smoke poured from the front of them. One unicorn pony took this opportunity to cast a powerful telekinesis spell, and promptly ripped the disabled guns from the saddle, tossing them on the ground in front of Techorse. He knew that his mind-controlled device helped him to resist the magic attack initially, but with it powered down, it could easily be dismantled.
Techorse was now surrounded on three fronts, and his back faced the magical barrier covering the hole in the wall.
He said calmly, "Well, there's no sense in continuing to fight here when there's no way I can get out. I surrender."
"Good!" said Limpwing, landing in the circle in front of Techorse, "For a minute there, I was worried the boys here were going to have to knock you out cold!"
"Limpwing? You're in command of these troops?" gasped Techorse.
She explained, "Yes, of course, I'm a lieutenant in this land's army. Of course, all I really did was just lure you here so that they could capture you. You figured out my secret Tech, and I knew you were going to follow me. So I wrote my leader in advance to warn about you coming here today."
The inventor frowned and asked, "But how did you know I knew the secret of this town?"
She laughed once, "Ha! Simple. I keep my map to The Domain folded up in the left lens of flight goggles. You put the map back on the right side."
"And how did you know I took the map?"
"Not only did you ask all those questions, but you also didn't brush your teeth after a snack. You had some chocolate on your teeth when we talked, and I noticed the corner of the map had chocolate on it."
Techorse grunted and gave Limpwing a dirty look.
"I know you're upset because you've been outsmarted," teased Limpwing, "But hey, at least now you'll have plenty of time to think about it from a jail cell."
Techorse heard a small whirring noise behind his head, an indication that his saddle had finally rebooted. He knew he could smash through the barrier with enough firepower, if the shield absorbed too much, it would collapse and he could escape.
"That's what you think!" said Techorse, spinning around and running for the barrier.
Once he got within four feet of the blue glowing patch over the hole, the slots on his saddle opened up, and his missile launchers emerged. Taking aim, once he was within just a few feet, he fired off the projectiles with a quick thought. He bet that the missiles' explosive power would be absorbed by the barrier and take it out, letting him free. Sadly, this wasn't the case. The barrier had been far stronger than he had predicted, and the missiles exploded violently on it. Most of the blast energy radiated from the wall back at Techorse, burning him and sending him flying backwards. He was fortunate that he had not been too close, and for the fact that he encased his missiles in plastic to reduce shrapnel, otherwise the blast would have been far worse for him.
The charred pony flew backwards for 5 feet, and landed in front of Limpwing again, this time burned all over quite comically.
He was losing consciousness fast from the heat and pain, and heard Limpwing say before the guards stuffed him into a canvas bag,
"Get him to the castle, and get him some medical attention! He needs to be in top shape for what we need him for!"
To be continued…