//------------------------------// // Chapter 11 - Bug Buzz // Story: Nature of The Experiment // by Cracked Egg //------------------------------// Well, I figured out something very important about my biology. For one, Pokemon's abilities are always active. Always. The second factoid is that I have an ability, which is what's allowing me to adjust so damn easily. This aptly named ability I have is called Adaptability. Adaptability powers up moves that are the same type as the Pokemon with it. For instance, if I were to use Tackle or some such Normal type move, it would be considerably stronger than usual. Except with the Porygon family, which is a little different, and can be used to a nigh-devastating effect. This is due to the moves Conversion and Conversion 2. I could use, say, Conversion and then Adaptability. Conversion would let me change my type into the same type as one of the moves I know, and Adaptability would power up that move, as long as it was the same type I became. I never really realized how powerful or useful these kinds of things were until just now. Whew, my priorities needs fixing. Better run a diagnostics on that. If you're wondering about Twilight, well, I've already explained all this as I found out about it. No one needs repetitive exposition, so I forewent such a thing. Anyway, right now I'm fixing multiple issues I've had in the past that had to do with both my perception, and my thought processes. Because randomly spewing music helps no one. Rainbow Dash and Applejack were currently having a hoof-wrestling match. Twilight was reading, you guessed it: A book. Pinkie Pie was keeping track of their score, and Fluttershy was petting Angel. Spike was reading a comic book, while I sat there staring off into space. I'm not being very eloquent at the moment because I'm still fixing a few errors. Also because that pesky Recycle Bin is trying to eat my folder that contains my records on The Beatles. NO, GET AWAY FROM GEORGE HARRISON! SHOO! Ahem. Where was I? Oh, right. I had analyzed my memory on those weird glowing eyes I had seen yesterday, yet I couldn't see much in the darkness. Even if I did see anything, I doubt I'd be able to identify it, mainly because there'd be no information in my systems to match it with. Dammit, now the Recycle Bin's moved on to how smart cars are made. Actually, I think I'll let that one slide. I finished my diagnostics with an audible ding, and checked the results of the scan. My move set was still the same, although it could use some work both offensively and defensively. All my folders were in pristine condition, except for the ones eaten by the Bin, and that music playlist was still locked into my core programming. Welp. I got up from my seat, and floated over to Fluttershy. Angel saw me coming, and glared daggers at me. Instead of glaring back, I opted to fly right into his face while twitching slightly. He cringed, and hid behind Fluttershy's leg. While I enjoyed my victory internally, Fluttershy was dragging her hoof in a circle, averting her gaze to the stone floor. I tilted my head. "Do you need something?" Fluttershy made this cute little 'eep' noise, and hid behind her mane. I began to wonder if my heart stopped from a cuteness overload, but I had found out my body was solid artificial material earlier. Wait, didn't I say that? Oh no, I don't think it's just the Recycle Bin eating up stuff in my systems... While I was staring at her with a blank look, she peeked out from behind her mane. "Um, yes. I mean, if you don't want me to pry, I won't..." She looked at the ground sheepishly, waiting for my reply. Except I was too busy delving into my systems once more. There had to be some reason I kept forgetting everythi--WHAT THE HELL? I had searched high and low, but what I found in my memory was maddening. A giant shifting blob of colorful pixelated corruption was sitting smack dab in the center of my digital mind. I saw another memory get absorbed by the increasing mass, this time it was about... ...wait. What WAS it about? This is not good. I flew up to the giant blob, and pointed a flipper at it. "STOP IT!" I scolded, hoping that would at least slow it down. Surprisingly enough, it stopped. It moved slightly, then molded itself into a giant sphere. "WHATEVER FOR?" It boomed, nearly knocking me right out of the air. At least I think it was air. I yelled back at it. "YOU'RE RUINING MY MIND! LEAVE NOW!" While I had a commanding tone to my voice, in actuality, I was downright terrified. Every time this would happen. First it was Zygarde, then is was some weird pixel block that made my head hurt when it spoke, now there's this giant thing. May I get a break, please? No? Okay. The mass was silent for a while. When it spoke up, I had already gotten bored and was playing chess with my own CPU, so it startled me. Only a little bit, though. "I AM A VIRUS. I NEED TO GROW." It said, confused as to why it was being commanded to leave when it was simply doing the only thing it knew. I yelled at it again. "FINE, BUT FIND AN AREA WHERE YOU CAN DO NO DAMAGE!" I yelled. It stopped moving entirely. For a moment I thought it had refused, but instead it moved past me and out of my memories. It was headed towards who knows what, but at least it was gone. I turned around to assess the damage. There were files either absorbed into The Virus completely, or had chunks of data eaten out of them, like eating half a lunch and tossing out the rest. I sighed. I have a lot of mental work to do. [|||] The yellow-eyed drone peered at the strange red and blue creature from the darkness. The weird being noticed the drone, so the drone hid itself behind a wall, out of sight. It broadcasted a message into it's mind. I have found the specimen. [|||] Well, it took a time span of forever, give or take five minutes. I finally finished reorganizing my system, slowly repairing the damage done by both the Recycle Bin and The Virus. I was currently keeping both trapped in a quarantine area of my anti virus program. I had no idea I even had it, yet it seems I was both damaged, AND dumb enough not to realize it was what I was using to scan everything in the first place. Everypony was doing some random activity that I was too groggy to even figure out. My mind was still recovering from the multitude of problems in it and--wait. "Recover." White lights appeared around my body, and were suddenly absorbed into me all at once, slowly repairing me. I'm an idiot. I sailed into the air, nearly hitting the ceiling. "I'M BACK INTO THE LAND OF THE LIVING!" Everypony was startled by my outburst, but Twilight trotted up to me, giving me a worried smile. "Oh good, we were worried about you. Fluttershy had thought she offended you." She motioned a hoof towards the yellow pegasus. The poor thing was sniffling. Apparently spacing out to take care of virtual monsters means breaking a heart or two. I zoomed over to her, and hugged her tightly. She was shocked for a moment, but returned the embrace. After she stopped crying, I patted her on the head. "Hey, it's okay. I was just busy." I said, trying to reassure her. She stopped sniffling, and nodded. Rainbow Dash crossed her forelegs. "Busy with what?" She gave me a disbelieving look. I suddenly felt a tickle in my beak. A soft whirring noise was slowly rising in frequency. "AH... ACHOO!" I sneezed, and some flashing pixels were splattered across the ground. Everypony backed up at the display, while Pinkie hopped over to look at the colorful gunk on the floor. "Oooh! Pretty colors." Rarity grabbed Pinkie's tail with her magic, and dragged her away from the pixels. While Pinkie was pouting, it was my turn to start sniffing. "I got a virus. It's fine though, I'm working on getting rid of it." I said, not fully convinced I could do anything beyond contain The Virus. Or that pesky Recycle Bin. Rainbow Dash shrugged, and resumed her bizarre dares with Applejack. The two agreed on a race around the castle, and they wanted me to be the referee. At first I was reluctant due to just having dealt with The Virus and a large amount of mental degradation, but otherwise I agreed to watch their race. Everypony filed out of the room, with Spike staying behind to read his comic book. I nudged him, waking him from his imagination. He ran to the group in a hurry, tripping a bit on his way out. We all were walking towards the front entrance when Rarity swatted to the side of her with a hoof. The white unicorn frantically looked about, while everypony stared at her. "What's wrong?" Twilight asked, also looking around to see if there was anything to cause the unicorn distress. Rarity huffed, and waved a hoof at Twilight. "It was probably nothing, I just heard a buzzing is all." Everypony continued walking, while I reclined in the air. I was hovering in circles around our little group, when a spear came out of nowhere. Everypony gasped or scrambled away from the spear as it narrowly missed my head, whizzing past me between my head and torso. Silently thanking my head for floating, I reached down to pick up the spear, only for it to shock me. "Owch! What the..." I inspected the spear a little closer. It had a long and finely crafted stick for a handle, with runes etched into the wood. The end of it had a stone point on it, with even more runes. The strangest thing was, the spear point was not attached to the stick with anything. I lowered myself to the floor, and didn't see a single way the stone could be attached, it was far too irregular. As I was near the floor, I turned a dartboard eye towards the area the spear had been thrown from. I rose up slowly, trying not to alert anything to my presence any further. I whispered to the rest of them. "Someone else is in here. I think it's a trap." I pointed towards the front door. Everypony carefully tiptoed (hooved?) towards the front entrance, while I tried to lay low along the floor, occasionally hiding behind one of the ponies. Time had slowed to a crawl, as we sneaked in plain sight. I thought we were in the clear. Of course we weren't. Five more spears embedded themselves into the ground next to us, nearly impaling a few of the ponies. Everything went to Hell in a hand-basket as Rainbow Dash and Applejack galloped for the exit. Rainbow Dash kicked through the double doors, the crack of wood echoing across the forest. Everypony else made a run for it, all of them escaping but Spike and I. I quickly picked up Spike in my arms, and threw him out the door. A yellow glow enveloped the double doors, dragging the closed. I gasped, and flew at my only route of escape. I punched the door a few times trying to break it open, but to no avail. I whirled around, and was met with a bug pony to the face. "Hi there!" It said, with a jovial tone that betrayed it's appearance entirely. I stumbled back from the creature, only to accidentally bump into the door. While I was recovering from getting locked in, five more of the bug ponies dropped down from above. I'm currently cursing my luck right now, but oh well. The six bug ponies were all nearly identical, with a few identifying features. The one who had jumped in my face had a mane similar to the other mares I had seen in Ponyville, except it looked more like a membrane than actual hair. This bug pony was the shortest out of the group, and it's mane hung down over one of her eyes a little bit. All of the creatures in front of me had holes in their shell-covered hooves, horns protruding from their foreheads, and yellow wings on their backs that would buzz every so often. That was not the most unsettling part, be that as it may. No, the most disturbing thing was they all had smiles that would give Pinkie Pie a run for her money. Their fangs glistened in the moonlight, the low lighting making them seem even more threatening. Their blank yellow eyes had a slight glow in place of pupils, causing their eyes to be the most visible thing in the room. So that's what I saw... Noticing that they hadn't tried to tear me limb from limb yet, I awkwardly began to float around the group of six. "Okay, good. Magnificent. I'm just going to go now, bye." I tried to make a break for the collapsed part of the ceiling, but I was caught in a yellow aura. I am beginning to despise the color yellow. The far-too-happy creatures were all dragging me back to the ground in unison, their horns lighting up the room. I was deeply afraid about being captured in such a manner, until I remember how much of an idiot I am. Inwardly berating myself for my stupidity, I began to use Discharge. The electricity arched across me, while all the bug ponies just sat there and stared, still smiling. "No, really, I think I need to go." As I said this, I let loose the Discharge, the electric blast zapping everything in it's radius. I braced myself for the burnout, but nothing happened. I opened an eye, only to see the entire room was perfectly fine, bug equines included. Flabbergasted that my Discharge did nothing, I tried again. The creatures keeping me in their collective grasp refused to go down. So, I thought about how to stop them. Let's see, if electricity does nothing to them, then I'll have to try something else... I searched my possible moves, and while I noticed everything after Lock-On was inaccessible right now, I selected Discharge to replace it with Psybeam. Yes I'm well aware that Psybeam is weaker, but I do not have a lot of options, and these bug ponies were sure giving me time to go over them. I looked at one of them next to me. "Hey, you. What's your species called?" They all answered in unison, still far too cheerful. "We are changelings." [|||] Princess Celestia had just retired to her quarters, snuggling up in sheets, ready to finally get some rest. Right as she laid her head down, a scroll appeared next to her. She frowned, and levitated the scroll into her vision. As she read further down the letter, her expression continued to darken. She sighed at the prospect of losing sleep, but climbed out of bed anyway. Flinging on her regalia, Celestia rushed into the hall, alerting the guards. She turned to one of them guarding her door. "Alert Captain Shining Armor and Princess Cadence, I have just been informed of a changeling sighting in the Everfree Forest." The guard saluted, and ran off down the hallway, while the rest ran high-tail for the barracks. Princess Celestia turned back to her room, ready to start sending a message back to Twilight. This was going to be a long night.