//------------------------------// // 09 - Everything is Catching on Fire (Generosity and Magic) // Story: Contraptionology! // by Skywriter //------------------------------// * * * Contraptionology! by Jeffrey C. Wells www.scrivnarium.net (with gratitude to the pre-reading powers of Akela Stronghoof and S.R. Foxley) * * * Part Nine: Everything is Catching on Fire (Generosity and Magic) It was a really loud morning in Ponyville. I mean it. We are talking unbelievably loud, here. It was so loud, I can't even think of a proper down-home countrified expression to describe just how dad-gum loud it was. If you absolutely insist on having one, well, you go right ahead and tell yourself that Ponyville that morning was louder than a pen full of angry hogs getting their tails chawed on by a herd of snapping turtles, but really, it was a whole lot louder than that. It weren't just all the hammering and sawing and welding and other assorted noises of construction going on. Those all by themselves would've been a louder noise than I'd ever heard in this town, outside of the rail depot. And it weren't just the revving of engines and humming of dynamos, neither. Ditto to that. No, what really pushed 'er over the top into zero-countrified-metaphor territory was… the whumps. I suppose, broadly, that a pony might call it "music", but what it really was was a solid, pulsating thunderstorm of raw noise that kicked you in the gut on the one-beat, followed through to your chin on the two, and then rifled through your saddlebags while you were down on the ground whimpering. It was the kind of rhythm that made you question both your ability to keep your lunch in your stomach and the existence of a benevolent creator. And, slashing above this hellacious undercurrent was the metal-edged cry of some sorta stringed instrument, which sounded for all the world like the howl of a bright spirit being beaten down to Tartarus, one measure at a time. Predictably, it was all coming from the home of Vinyl Scratch, Ponyville's resident technohooey disk jockey. "Vinyl Scratch," I said, shaking my head at the terrible racket. "Yeah, Applejack?" came a voice from over my flank. I turned around. "Oh," I half-shouted, sizing up the little white unicorn for a spell. "Vinyl, why the hay ain't you in there where all the noise is?" "Oh, yeah. Just had to run down to the Ponyville Pharmacy to snag some breakfast." She lifted a little bottle of white pills in her magic aura and rattled it around. "Y'want some?" "No thanks," I said. "Suit yourself," said Vinyl, grabbing up a hoof-full of tablets and crunching them down. "Well, at least somepony around here's acting normal," said Apple Bloom. "But if you're out here, who's in there making noise?" Vinyl gave us a wide, pearly grin. "It's Tavi!" she yelled. "Girl absolutely found her groove, overnight! I'd just gotten back home from DJing the cuteceañera at Sugarcube Corner last night, and I found her lying on the floor, rocking back and forth and sketching out the plans for some sorta wicked-looking cello amp! And this morning, she totally kicked it into gear! Boom!" "Wait," said A.B. "Somepony hired you to DJ their kid's cuteceañera?" "What can I say?" said Vinyl. "Some parents? Got taste." "Uh huh," said Apple Bloom. "And hey, you know what else is tasty?" said Vinyl, gesturing at the air around us, almost like she could visually point out the noise, which was pretty near possible. "These oontz! My mare-toy in there is doing the whole musical ascension thing! I told her it'd happen to her someday, and she didn't believe me, but I was right! I mean, just listen to that!" Vinyl squeezed her eyes shut, letting her little body rock to the rhythm. "Aw, yeah," she said. "You fillies better call the heart-doctor, 'cause those beats are sick!" She blinked, then. "Pony," she continued. "Those beats are pretty sick. I'm almost a little jealous a' her in there." Suddenly, there was a flash and a whiff of smoke from in the house, and the brain-melting music stopped dead. "VINYL!" shrieked Octavia's voice from inside. "I NEED… MORE… ELECTRICITY!" "Ease off, filly!" yelled Vinyl, cupping her hoof to her mouth. "We're almost out of fuses!" "DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!" "Like what?" "I DON'T KNOW! RUN ME A LINE TO THE HYDRO PLANT! MY POTENTIAL IS BEING LIMITED BY THESE EARTHLY CONSTRAINTS!" "See that?" said Vinyl, chuckling. "She's gone totally dubstep diva on me." "ARE YOU TALKING TO THOSE OTHER SCIENTISTS, VINYL?" Vinyl sniffed, sizing up my white coat and goggles. "Yeees?" she replied. "STOP THAT! YOU MUST ATTEND ME, AND ME ALONE!" Vinyl mouthed the word "wow" at us. "Milady calls," she said, crossing back to her front door and stepping back inside. "Stay frosted, yo?" "Yo," A.B. and I agreed, half-heartedly. As Vinyl closed her front door, there was a buzz and a crackle from deep in my saddlebags, which I figured was the omelet dishes belonging to my three townpony friends finally springing to life. At the same moment, Apple Bloom glanced back at her own bags, suggesting that her one remaining dish had switched on as well – probably Granny had fixed one up for Spike? It sort of left the question of what I myself was gonna eat, but I wasn't real worried, and didn't in fact feel all that hungry. My stomach had been thoroughly cudgeled by Octavia's beats, and even beyond that, I was beginning to feel that food, like sleep, was nothing more than a distraction, like I could live on nothing but air and dreams from here on in. Meanwhile, A.B. had to the same conclusion as I had about who was supposed to get what. "Well," she said, "I expect that'll be Rarity, Twilight, Pinkie Pie, and Spike. How you wanna go about this, Applejack?" "Rarity first," I said. "I won't have that pony judging me for giving her overcooked eggs." "Rarity it is," said Apple Bloom, heading off through the increasing crowds of ponies out on missions. "Carousel Boutique, here we come." * * * "HELLOOO, SCIENCE-DARLINGS!" The voice was coming from above. Apple Bloom and me squinted up, up, way up there to the top of Carousel Boutique, trying to shield our eyes against the damaging light. In case you haven't picked up on it yet, I should probably come right out and tell you that Carousel Boutique was a mite different this morning. You might not have noticed it if you was just trudging along, eyes on hooves, because the changes to the building didn't start until you got to the little cupola. But then, whoa, Nelly. The entire tip-top of the boutique had been built up into a horrendously pretty contraption of twining alabaster, polished brass, and really enormously huge lenses what looked like they'd been yanked off an undeserving lighthouse somewhere. And that whole mess enclosed the biggest diamond I ever laid eyes on, a huge sparkly angular crystal that was glowing pret'near as bright as the morning sun overhead. "Rarity?" I called out, trying to see something, anything, against that hellish glow. "That you up there?" "In the science-flesh!" replied Rarity, in a lilting voice. "If she keeps on doing that," I muttered, "I'm destroying her first." Apple Bloom glanced questioningly at me. I guess I hadn't told her my plans for absolute violent conquest yet. Ah, heck, there'd be time for that. "Sweetie Belle," said Rarity. "Be a science-dear and escort Applejack and her sister up to the Lanthorn, would you?" "Sure thing, Rarity," came Sweetie Belle's voice, sounding more doubtful than enthusiastic. In a minute, the little pink-and-violet-maned unicorn filly appeared at the boutique's front door, a pair of dark-lensed goggles over her eyes. "Hey, Apple Bloom," said Sweetie Belle, in a voice like a raincloud. "Hey Applejack." "Sweetie Belle!" said my sis. "Listen, everypony up at the farm is all special in the head all of a sudden, Fluttershy just plain ain't Fluttershy no more, and we just passed Octavia's house and she's gone all screechy, too, so I'm afeared it's catching. We need a normal, not-insane, not-Vinyl unicorn to tell us what in the hoof is going on!" Sweetie Belle sighed, pulling her goggles to her forehead, just above her horn. "You don't want Rarity, then." "Come again?" I said. "It's easier to show you," said Sweetie Belle. She pushed the door all the way open and gestured us in. The little "Attention, customers!" bell rang cheerily as she did so, but as we stepped inside, it became plain that that bell was just about the last remaining cheery thing about the inside of Carousel Boutique. All Rarity's beloved froo-froo fashions had been cleared away from the display space, leaving a great big empty room at the base of the building. Except for, it weren't empty, as such. Where once had stood racks of fine clothing and mirrors and dressmaker's dummies was a huge thrumming column of pale blue light, encased in a floor-to-ceiling tube of clear glass. The other lights in the room were all off, and the walls had been completely draped over with heavy curtains of navy-blue velvet. All in all, not looking like a real friendly place to do a little fashion-shopping no more. A.B. approached the glass pillar and looked down, a white light shining up on her face from below as she did so. "What the hay? There something on fire down there, Sweetie Belle?" "It's gemstones," said Sweetie Belle, sighing and shaking her head. "Rarity's burning gemstones." Apple Bloom looked up from the hole in the floor at Sweetie Belle, her jaw gone slack. "Butter my rump and call me a muffin," she said. "I know, right?" said Sweetie Belle, sadly. "I came down here because Mom and Dad invented something called 'Remote-Controlled T.V.' this morning and they haven't stopped fighting over it since. I thought Rarity might have something I could help her out with until things calmed down. How was I supposed to know I was going to be helping her throw diamonds into a furnace in the basement?" "Why is she doing a dang-fool thing like that?" I asked. "What's the point?" "Why, to power the Wondrous Lanthorn, of course!" said Sweetie Belle, mimicking Rarity's accent. "The whatdrous what-thorn?" Sweetie Belle shook her head. "It's some sort of telekinesis amplifier. When I ask about it, though, she starts using words that hurt my head. I better just let you talk to her." "Lead the way," I said. "I gotta unload this breakfast on her anyhow." Sweetie Belle led us past the light column back to the kitchen and to a set of stairs leading up to the second-floor living area, and beyond that to the roof cupola-turned-lighthouse-thing, partially open to the clear sky outside. There we found Rarity, pointlessly bedazzling as always, wearing a glitzy thing that looked like some kind of eastern military dress getup, complete with matching helmet. The whole outfit shone terribly against the blinding light of the nearby diamond beacon, and it was all the any of us could do not to get our eyes burned clean out of our skulls by it all. "Lights, Rarity," I said, my eyes squeezed to slits. "Oh!" she said, rising from a little upholstered divan that was more-or-less surrounded by big, green-glowing panels. "My apologies, Applejack." She trotted over to a wall-switch, threw it, and it instantly became a lot more tolerable in there. "Hey, Rar," I said. "Nice getup, for certain values of 'nice'." "Do you like it?" said Rarity, batting her eyelashes at me. "It's a fabulous new design of mine based on the formal uniforms worn by the Stalliongrad Corps of Miners and Sappers. Who knew ponies who spent their days digging tunnels in the dirt could shine up so well for special occasions?" She pinged a hoof against her shiny bronze helmet. "And, it's functional, too!" "Uhhuhgreat," I said. "Listen, Rarity, I got this here breakfast for—" Apple Bloom cut in front of me. "For the love a' celery," she demanded, pointing one little hoof at Rar, "why are you setting diamonds on fire in your basement?" "Well," said Rarity. "In addition to spending all morning whipping up this beautiful high-fashion martial-culture-inspired ensemble, which I fully intend to turn into an entire line, complete with its own major release event, I, er, built this old thing too." She gestured up at the towering Lanthorn, still gleaming with rainbow light. "It runs on candescing gems. I've spent, oh, about a half hour on it now. But once I'm done here, it's back to fashion!" "Wait," I said. "You built that in the last half hour?" "What can I say?" said Rarity, primly pleased. "I'm quite efficient when I get 'in my zone'. It's not perfected yet, mind you. I'm still polishing off some of the rough edges. But when I'm finished, it'll be the most beautiful techno-arcane telekinesis augmentation apparatus Equestria has ever seen!" Rarity glided back over to the divan and started flipping switches, causing a crazy spin of white lines and circles to swirl into place on the dark-green panels surrounding the controls. Slowly but steadily, an ear-splitting whine began to build in the cupola. "Would any of you science-ponies care for a demonstration?" "Is it gonna kill us?" asked Apple Bloom. Rarity giggled, light and musical but with an unbalanced edge. "Don't be silly, Apple Bloom," said Rarity. "It only has the potential to kill you. Used properly, it's a perfectly safe way to give the gift of beauty to the world!" "Real clever," I said. "Generosity through diamonds, just like the Professor said." "Yes, exactly!" said Rarity. "I'm going to re-light the beacon now, so everypony go over to the wall-rack and put on a pair of those exceptionally fashionable smoked-glass goggles I also designed this morning." We all did so. Rarity threw the wall-switch again, this time with unicorn magic, and the diamond in the center of the Lanthorn erupted with light. "All right, now!" said Rarity, raising her voice over the whine of the Lanthorn. "Let's say, for instance, that we find a beautiful wildflower, and want to gift it to somepony who lives far distant!" Rarity's horn lit up and she magicked a little spray of lilac out from a vase on a nearby desk. She clutched it to her breast. "But oh, whatever shall we do? The post is far too slow, and even if we take the express train, the poor thing'll be wilted by the time we get it there. What we need is a way to transport our flower at great speed, through the air, using amplified telekinesis!" "So your machine makes flowers… fly… really fast?" said Apple Bloom. "A good summation for the simple-minded," said Rarity. "In reality, it creates a linear channel of mass distortion from the beacon to whatever point in Equestria you choose. Any object placed in the channel effectively achieves a near-zero mass from the point of view of the universe, allowing it to be accelerated to orbital velocity with just a simple shove from the Lanthorn's integrated telekinesis charm! So, let's say we want to give our beautiful flower to someone truly deserving of its beauty? How about, say, Princess Celestia?" Rarity threw a bunch of switches on the control panel. All around us, the lenses and wall-panels and such began rotating and shifting until Canterlot Castle, perched high on its far-off mountain, came into view through one of the openings. At the same time, a picture of the castle appeared in wireframe on one of the displays above the divan. A circular reticule sprang up around the image of the castle, quickly focusing in on one of the high balconies. The reticule glowed red as an alarming beep, louder even than the overwhelming whine of the Lanthorn, sounded out. "So!" shouted Rarity, leaving the divan and approaching her contraption proper, which was starting to look a little wavery from all the raw sorcery it was spitting out. "We just lift our flower into the mass channel, and…" There was a noise that sounded like somepony saying the word "VreeeEEE-PCHKOW!" and the spray of lilac vanished from the air. Slowly, the whine died down to tolerable levels and the beacon dimmed. "Ta-da!" said Rarity. "One flower, delivered right to Princess Celestia's front porch." Apple Bloom looked horrified. "What if you put a penny in that thing and pointed it at somepony?" "Well, it'd probably kill them," said Rarity. "Admittedly, the flower itself would probably do the same thing at the speeds we're talking here, if one were to shut off the rarefaction channel at the wrong moment. That's why none of you girls should ever aim my experimental mass-acceleration device at any living thing." "Well, that's real ingenious of you, Rarity," I said. "Ain't gonna match up against my Large Hadron Cider in the end, but ingenious nonetheless." "Please, Applejack," said Rarity, tittering. "While your country chemistry certainly has its own winsome and rustic charm, I think that a cultured pony like the Professor will surely find that my beautiful mass driver is the 'cream of the crop', as it were." "Oh yeah?" I said. "Well, I think the Professor's a man of discernment and keen vision, who'll be able to see past all this glim-glam to the true scientific genius lyin' beneath each and every one of our projects. And I'm telling you, mine's the ground-breaking one." "Please. Does this 'Large Hadron Cider' of yours have the power to revolutionize society and change the world for the better?" "Dagnabbit, Rarity, this ain't about application! This is a contest of pure scientific gumption! Large Hadron Cider will completely alter our understanding of the fundamental forces binding Equestria together and lay the groundwork for an exciting new school of physics!" "Exciting to scholars and academicians, perhaps!" said Rarity, raising her voice. "Scholars and academicians are the folks who spearhead the advancement of pony society!" "Ruffian!" "Fussbudget!" "Visigoth!" "Little Miss Cactus-Up-Her-Plot!" "Fine!" spat Rarity, throwing herself back onto the control couch. "You want to see the true science-power of the Wondrous Lanthorn? Witness an entirely different science-function that can be achieved simply by reversing the polarity of the beam!" Rarity stabbed viciously at the switches and the lenses began rotating until they were pointed, bluntly, at me. A rather startled-looking wireframe picture of me appeared on the console displays, with a reticule around it. Sweetie Belle's eyes got wide. "Rarity!" she squeaked. "You just said not to do that!" "Never mind what I just said!" shouted Rarity, mashing buttons. Meanwhile, Apple Bloom was already on her hooves and bolting headlong toward the control console, attempting to do, I don't know what, but something, to stop the out-of-control fashionista. Too late; there was an ear-splitting whine, the beacon flared… …and everything went away for a second. I blinked when my brain got back from vacation. Everypony else in the room was staring at me – Sweetie Belle in dismay, Apple Bloom in shock, and Rarity in catlike self-satisfaction. "What?" I asked, my voice dangerous. "What is it?" "A.J.," said Apple Bloom, quietly, "I think Rarity stole yer hat." "Indeed I did, Apple Bloom," sniffed Rarity. "I was reluctant to invert the function of my device like that, as it's contrary to the spirit of Generosity to use the Lanthorn to take instead of give, but desperate petty squabbles call for desperate measures." "What happened to it?" demanded Apple Bloom. "It was pulled from Applejack's head, achieved Mach One for a fraction of an instant, and then was sucked into the gem-furnace powering the Lanthorn," said Rarity, a tiny smile crossing her lips. "I've never tried that before, but as it turns out, it's unexpectedly satisfying. Science-success! Hoo hoo hoo!" She clapped the tips of her pedicured forehooves together, all gleeful. I reached up and tamped at now-naked corn-silk topmane. "You burned my hat," I said. "Oh, don't get so dramatic," said Rarity, turning back to the Lanthorn's controls. "It was an ugly old thing, anyway. Besides, there's a fraction of a chance that it might have gotten snagged on a sticky-outy-thing in the furnace before it was totally incinerated." "You burned my hat," I repeated. "You know what?" burbled Rarity, the purple Elemental gem at her throat shaking violently in its mounting. "Maybe it's not contrary to the spirit of Generosity to use my device in such a fashion after all! I've Give-n you the gift of a better appearance, have I not? Let's see if there's anypony else's looks I can improve upon by tossing their drab old garments into my diamond-furnace at hypersonic speeds!" Rarity began clicking at the controls, and image after image leapt up onto her screens. "Oh, look, there's the Mayor. I've always hated that horrid Grafton collar of hers. I mean, really. So last-century." She stabbed at a button, and there was a squeal and a flash of light from the Lanthorn. "There! Taken, and incinerated! Ooh, there's Mister Wattle, with that ghastly polka-dotted tie!" Stab, squeal, flash. "Taken, and incinerated!" "YOU BURNED MY HAT!" I roared, charging the control couch like a palomino freight train. At the last second, Apple Bloom jumped in front of me and turned my charge. "Whoa, hoss!" she yelled at me, muscling up against my brisket and shoving me back. Little sis gets stronger every year. "Simmer down, now!" "My pappy bought me that hat!" I bellowed straight into Rarity's smug little blinky-smiley face, as I struggled against A.B. for purchase. "Other 'an paying to have my wolf-teeth removed, it was the last thing he ever gave me on this earth!" "There's other hats, Applejack!" pleaded Apple Bloom, as Sweetie Belle began sinking behind the shelter of the couch. "No, there ain't!" I said. "I swear on all that's holy, Rarity, the second I get done deliverin' this breakfast, I'm gonna collide a whole mess of particles together and get me a miniature black hole, and then I'm gonna drop it in your mother-loving lap!" "Oh, really, Applejack?" said Rarity. She absently threw a switch or two, and the wireframes on the Lanthorn's displays spun and twirled into an image of Sweet Apple Acres, my whole entire home. Then she turned back at me and smiled. "See anything you wouldn't mind losing?" "You wouldn't dare," I snarled. "Beware, Applejack," said Rarity, all sing-song. "For I have become the All-Seeing Eye of Fashion. And I know where you live." "This is totally out of control," whimpered Sweetie Belle, barely visible behind the couch. Apple Bloom snorted through her nostrils, shaking her head in agitation. "Twilight'll know what to do," she said, desperately. "Twilight'll fix this." "Ain't that always how it goes," I said, turning my wrath on Apple Bloom. "Sure, you go to your faithful big sis whenever you need a fence mended, but the second anything important comes up, it's dump-A.J.-fetch-Twilight, am I right?" A.B. looked up at me helplessly. "No, I mean… maybe she's got a book or something that tells why everypony's going insane on us!" "Better run fast if you're in the market for one of Twilight's books," said Rarity, lightly. "She's got her little minion burning them out in the backyard." Well, I tell you, we all startled, then. Rarity blinked back at our wide-eyed gazes. "What?" she said. "Don't believe me?" Rar ran her hooves over the Lanthorn's controls and an image of the library tree sprung up. Sure enough, there was a little wireframe Spike, dragging a huge armload of books out back. After pulling them a safe distance from the tree, he took a deep breath and sprayed wireframe dragonfire all over them, reducing them to a pile of wireframe ash. Job finished, he dragged himself back inside the library and slammed the door. "All right," whispered Apple Bloom. "Emergency Cutie Mark Crusaders meeting, right now. Sweetie Belle, gather the others." "There's only three of us," said Sweetie Belle, her lip quivering, eyes fixed on the screen as though if she stared long enough she could un-see what she just saw. "And you and me are right here." "Gather the other, then!" said A.B., stamping a hoof. "Get Scootaloo and then meet me at the clubhouse. We got a crisis on our hooves." "What about helping me with breakfast?" I demanded, my mind dropping back to my promise. A.B. glared at me, then reached back into her saddlebag, grabbed the steel dish she found there in her teeth, and chucked it to the floor of the control room. "There," she said. "Rarity, breakfast. I don't even care if it's yours. A.J., when we started out, you said you'd carry four dishes, and I'd carry two. Well, that and Fluttershy's makes two. We are square, you hear me?" I grunted noncommittally. "Callin' that a 'yes'," said Apple Bloom. "Let's go, Sweetie Belle. You and me are gonna go get our Cutie Marks in Saving Ponyville." Sweetie Belle hesitated for a moment, glancing up at Rarity. She scoffed. "What are you looking at me for?" she said. "Go, go. Play with your barbarian friend. But don't you dare emit even one little peep about the inner workings of the Lanthorn." "Sure thing, big sister," said Sweetie Belle, all downcast. Me and Rarity watched as our respective sisters trotted down the stairs and out of sight. Then we turned back to each other, staring daggers. "This ain't over," I said. "You know that when people say that," said Rarity, loftily, "it usually means that it is." I pulled off Rarity's designer smoked goggles and chucked them to the floor. We locked eyes. I broke first. Cussing mightily the whole way, I stomped down the steps to the kitchen and smashed a few of Rarity's plates out of spite. Then I crossed back into the nightmare light-column room that Rarity's storefront had turned into and spent a few moments with my head pressed against the glass tube, staring down into the gemstone fires below, trying to catch even the slightest glimpse of… it. Dang it to Tartarus. Nothing. I turned away and marched to the front door, heading out toward the library. "G'bye, hat," I said, my voice thick, not looking back. I promised myself I wasn't gonna cry, not even a little. It almost worked. * * * "Aha, Applejack!" said Twilight, in a tooth-grindingly cheery voice. "So glad you could make it to witness the initial stages of my total and utter scorched-earth science fair victory!" I weren't even looking at her. I was looking at the library, which was empty: empty of books, empty of scrolls, empty of knickknacks, empty of telescopes. Empty of… rooms. Everypony in town knows that the Ponyville Library is built inside a hollow tree, it's just that, well, it usually ain't quite this hollow. Every little nook and cranny had been blasted away by magic, the floors and ceilings separating the various levels nowhere to be seen. What we were left with was one big ol' chamber taking up the whole tree, stretching down from Twilight's basement laboratory all the way up to the tip-top branches and opening to the happy blue sky above. Taking the place of the former floors was a network of spidery catwalks either suspended by wires or bolted roughly to what little remained of the built-in wall shelves. Somewhere far above me, I could see Spike the Dragon clambering along, scouring the shelves clean of books for his next trip to the burn-pile. "Done a little remodeling, then," I said, staring. "You bet!" said Twilight, over a little background squeaking noise. I turned toward my hated rival. The purple unicorn wizard was laid up in her wheelchair again, her mane splaying out crazily in all directions. The Tourmaline Diadem sat crookedly on her head, its star-shaped stone practically black now, and hanging from her lip was an entire cinnamon stick that appeared to be smoldering at one end. "Getting rid of a lot of dead weight around here!" "Um, Twi," I said. "Your cinnamon stick's on fire, there." "I want it to be on fire!" she exclaimed, looking a little walleyed. "See?" She lifted the cinnamon stick in a purple magic glob and took a deep breath on the non-burning end, drawing a cloud of smoke into her lungs through the hollow curls of bark. "Ah," she croaked, then. "Cinnamaldehyde." She let the smoke out in a great puff through her nostrils. "Keeps my brain going." "That can't be healthy for you," I said, shaking my head. What do you care? demanded the bubbly part of my noggin. So she's sucking down bark-smoke like a crazymare! Let her kill herself off before nightfall! With her out of the way, and everypony in town fawning over your ingenious nuclear cider, you'll be Ponyville's Prize Pony again! Just like you been dreaming! Oh, give it a rest, I replied, startled that I was suddenly able to divide myself between Science Applejack and Non-Science Applejack. Something just wasn't right here. I was still pretty happy with my cider invention, but it had started seeming like it wasn't something I needed to get all up in other ponies' businesses about. Losing Old Reliable so sudden and so permanent had really taken the starch out of me, I guess. Ah, hayseeds. I stuffed it in the think-about-it-later box, and inclined my head toward Twilight's squeaky little wheelchair. "Looks like you hurt yourself or something?" "My clumsy minion, Spike, dropped a catwalk on me during the hanging process," she explained. "Don't worry, he's been appropriately chastised." She raised her head and called upwards to the catwalks. "Isn't that right, Spike?" "Yes, Master!" came Spike's slurred voice from above. "You are just! And fair!" "See? Spike's happy to be disciplined!" "Uh huh," I said. "Don't worry," she said. "I was disproportionately lenient with him, because I was feeling generous. And do you know why?" "Why?" I said, cautiously, rising to the bait. "Because my shattered limbs won't be troubling me for long!" exclaimed Twilight. "Huh. So you got some kind of medical contraption going on, then?" I said. "I thought something like that, what with the surgical stuff down there." I gestured down to the exposed basement laboratory, the last remaining furnished place in the whole library, which was filled with a bunch of shiny steel instruments surrounding a white-draped mass on a long, low slab. "Not at all, A.J.!" said Twilight. "I'm not trying to fix this broken body, I'm replacing it entirely!" "…Come again?" Twilight wheeled herself over to me. "A.J., let me ask you something. What's the biggest problem with being a pony?" "Rickets?" I hazarded. "No!" said Twilight. "It's that ponies die." "Everything dies," I said, screwing my face up. "It's the natural way." "You sound like one of those stupid old books I'm having my minion dispose of," said Twilight. "The 'natural way' can bite my tailbone! Do you know why I'm such an obsessive organizer? It's because time is constantly running out! Deadline after deadline after deadline, culminating in the great big deadline at the end, after which you're literally dead! I used to think that if I weren't careful with time, if I didn't weigh and measure every single second, that it would slip through my hooves and be gone forever! Unoptimized time is wasted time, Applejack! It's like going to a restaurant and asking for a slice of lemon in your water and then not eating the lemon!" "You're not supposed to eat the lemon," I said. "That's insane!" cried Twilight. "I paid for that lemon!" "Water's usually free," I said. "Stop trying to confuse the issue!" she said. "It doesn't matter now! That's all in the past! Last night at the party, I realized that I was looking at it all the wrong way! Instead of trying to fit in as much life as I can before I die, why don't I just not die?" "How you gonna manage that?" "Three words: Immortal contraptionoid body!" shouted Twilight, who always could count better than Rainbow Dash. "With my brain uploaded into a flawless, never-aging, always-repairable contraptionoid, I could hypothetically live all the way until the heat-death of the universe! And if I make my new body out of liquid gallium-contained quicksilver, I won't be stuck just being me! I'll be able to look like, to be, anything!" Her eyes were practically on fire, now. "I'll be able to be whatever Princess Celestia wants me to be, for all eternity! And then I'll never have to leave her, perpetuating our white-hot totally platonic teacher-student love relationship for ever and ever!" "That sounds… healthy," I said. "I know, right?" said Twilight, her left lower eyelid twitching. "I can't wait to see the look on her face when I tell her!" "Hold on," I said, finally putting two and two together to make the approximate tangent value of a 75.964-degree angle. "That thing on the slab down there, under the sheet. That's you?" Twilight cackled. "Don't be silly, Applejack!" she said. "I haven't made the brain transfer yet! I'm lacking one very important piece of information before I can jump into this plan with all four hooves, to wit: can a contraptionoid use magic? Because magic is my life, Applejack, and I refuse to be a deathless shape-shifting liquid-metal equuoid for all eternity if I can't cast spells! What'd be the point of that?" "None whatsoever?" I attempted. "Exactly," said Twilight, wheeling herself over to the edge of the dropoff overlooking the basement, gesturing grandly as she did so. "What you see down there, A.J., is more than just my winning entry for tonight's Science Fair for Grown-Ups. It is a prototype independently-functioning artificially-intelligent magic-using equuoid unicorn. I've been running tests all morning on Iggy the Salamander, Pinkie's charmingly primitive creation, to see how contraptionoids retain memories and personality, and I've incorporated what I've learned from him into my own advanced model!" "SQUONK," came the sad little cry of Iggy, whose orichalcum cage looked to have been rudely shoved up into a small corner of the basement lab. "Once I prove that contraptionoids can sense and manipulate the Stream just like biological unicorns can," continued Twilight, "I'll be ready to take the plunge myself! And I've got little doubt that my scintillating creation will succeed, because it's being powered by two of the greatest magical sources in the world: starlight, which was strong enough to break even the power of the Elements of Harmony during Nightmare Moon's release; and friendship, or at least its inverse. Ergo, stars linked up to friendship, linked up to magic! Just like the Professor said!" "Wait, wait, wait," I said. "'Its inverse'?" "Indeed, Applejack!" said Twilight. "I never realized it before today, but friendship's relationship to magic is on a bidirectional continuum. I learned this when I tried harnessing the power of friendship to give life to my creation, and found that there's something wrong with all my friends this morning for some reason, and I couldn't use you to summon the necessary thaumic potential!" Twilight's horn lit up and she grabbed the collar of my starched white coat, dragging my face down to hers. "What's up with you guys, huh?" she yelled. "Why are you failing me?" I shook my head, my jaw working but no sound coming out. "Oh, it doesn't matter," said Twilight, shoving me away again and grabbing up a little gizmo from a nearby shelf. "Anyway, in a fit of rage, I ran my brand-new Friendship Spectrometer over all my interpersonal relationships, trying to find something I could use that had an equal strength, and you know what I found? One big honkin' betrayal!" "Somepony betrayed you?" "You did, Applejack!" shouted Twilight, delighted. "How?" I said, my stomach twisting a little. "I mean, when?" "I don't know!" cried Twilight, throwing her forehooves wide. "But the numbers don't lie! The data I gathered from my Friendship Spectrometer clearly indicate that you done me wrong, big-time. See?" She shoved the little gizmo in my face. It went "bloink" at me. "Well, I mean, I don't know what I could have possibly… but… I mean… sorry for—" "Don't be sorry, Applejack!" said Twilight, yanking the Spectrometer away as I clapped my hoof down over my rattling necklace. "It's great! You've helped me to discover that it's not just friendship that's equivalent to magic – it's the absolute value of friendship! Negative friendship works too! Your massive betrayal, whatever it was, is giving cohesion to my creation, and that's why it looks like a lump under the sheets, instead of just a puddle of metal! The final step comes at nightfall tonight, when I raise that platform up to the top of the tree and expose my new equuoid to the first starlight of the evening, which will instill in it the purest essence of magic! Then, once I witness its spell-casting potential, I'll simply wipe its test personality clean and install myself in its place! This is a perfect plan which has no conceivable flaws!" "If I was a test personality," I said, "I'd take issue with being wiped like that." "That's why I chose a really really pathetic test personality that I'll have no problem squelching," replied Twilight, grinning deliciously. "Well, okay then," I said, stepping carefully over to an empty shelf, grabbing Twi and Spike's breakfast dishes in my teeth and setting 'em down. "I'll leave you folks to it, then. I'm just gonna drop your omelets here on this completely empty abandoned bookshelf." "Good," muttered Twilight. "At least it'll be serving a purpose, instead of just suspending a bunch of dead, obsolete knowledge slightly above floor level." I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to overcome the noise of the bubbles, which were still telling me that all this was perfectly fine and normal and not to be questioned. "Twilight," I said, struggling against every word. "Something… something ain't right. Apple Bloom was tellin' the truth: Fluttershy wouldn't not feed her critters, Rarity wouldn't burn no diamond even if her fussy little marshmallow life depended on it, and I think if you looked at what you're doing here, really looked at it, you'd be plumb horrified at what's going on. And frankly, I can't understand why you ain't." Twilight barked out a laugh, sharp and piercing. "Getting cold hooves about the contest tonight, huh? Trying to cause a flicker in the hard, gem-like flame of my reason?" "No!" I protested. "This ain't about the dad-gum Science Fair no more, Twilight! This is about us! This is about us not being us no more!" Twi shook her head and pivoted away, taking another long drag off her almost-consumed cinnamon stick. "Pathetic, really," she said, then, fishing around in her wheelchair blanket until she found a fresh stick and then using the butt end of the first one to light up the next. "You've come up against the unyielding wall of true scientific genius and flinched, and now you're grasping at straws, hoping to find something to distract me from my own clarion purpose. There's no shame in honorably losing, Applejack. But there's shame in what you're doing right now." "Yes!" called Spike from above. "Yes! The Master is wise! Do not cross the Master!" "Thank you, Spike," said Twilight, smiling. I looked back and forth between the two of them for a second. "Y'all gone mad," I said. "Mad?" cried Twilight. "Mad?!? You dare call me 'mad'?!? I, who have tasted the currents of the universe, who have made the heavenly spheres dance to new songs of my own devising? Have I shown you a glimpse of a world outside your narrow vision? Did it tear you, mewling, away from the warm and comfortable ignorance in which you ever dwell? Have I, Applejack, gone too far?" I floundered, helplessly. "Maybe?" "NO!" shrieked Twilight, slamming her hoof over and over again on the arm of her wheelchair for emphasis. "NOT… YET… FAR… ENOUGH!!!" I closed my eyes. "I gotta go," I said, my innards churning inside of me. "Okay! G'bye, A.J.!" said Twilight, waving chipperly, as I lurched back out the front door. I didn't even respond. The bright, clean air of Ponyville didn't seem so bright or clean no more when I stepped back out into it. Smoke from running engines was beginning to drift through the streets of my hometown, causing a tickle in the back of my throat which didn't help the feeling of rising gut-sick down in my stomach none. Ponies didn't smile at each other no more as they rushed back and forth through the town, so consumed were they with the fires of their own private creations. In fact, they hardly even noticed one another, 'less it was to get into some kinda science-related one-upponyship that always ended in somepony promising to rain fiery destruction down on everypony else. And slowly but surely, the happy little thatch-roof cottages I had known all my life were changing into strange and alien things as more and more pieces got grafted on to them: girders and gantries and armatures and power-lines and great skyward-pointing dishes whose function I couldn't even guess at. I stood there, watching this scene unfold, and I tried and tried to remember why it was that I thought that winning some silly old contraptionology contest was gonna bring the Ponyville I knew from my childhood back to life. Because this sure as heckfire weren't it. I had lost my hat. And now it looked like I was gonna lose the whole town along with it. I shouldered up my saddlebags and headed on out. One hoof in front of the other, Applejack. You got two more breakfasts to deliver. Then it's back home to check on the Large Hadron Cider. See what a finished jug of that stuff looks like. See what kind of power it might unleash on the world. For one desperate second, I wanted to stop it all, to shut off the boilers, to smash the whole distillation apparatus I had spent all night and all morning on to bits and lock myself in my room, hiding under my pillow until the world came crashing down around me. I found I couldn't even entertain the thought. And I was scared out of my nonexistent britches. Grower help us all.