//------------------------------//
// Fortvna, Bonvm Et Malvm 
// Story: Hc Svnt Equus Pinnis 
// by Masterweaver 
//------------------------------//

	"Whoa, time out!" Rainbow Dash shoved the spa pony massaging her flank away. "You let them cut open your eye?!"

"It was a little strange, but it seemed like it was a good idea at the time--"

"That's--Fluttershy!" Dash hovered into the air. "You don't just--altering your--this is your body! How could you do that to yourself?!"

The yellow pony smiled broadly, her chilling gaze meeting Rainbow's. "You know, a Whisper clawed my other eye out. My leg got torn off in a pirate attack. And hey, my wings were cut off and vivisected right in front of me."

Rainbow paled.

"Right in front of me," Fluttershy repeated. Her smile tightened. "Did you know there's a vein near the base of your wing that feeds blood to all your inner feathers? I sure didn't!"

"Fluttershy..." Rarity whispered.

She blinked, ripping her gaze away from Rainbow and looking over the horrified, worried expressions of her other friends. She let her ears droop with a sigh, rubbing her forehead.

"I... I'm sorry, Dash, you... I shouldn't be mad at you. But..." She looked back at the pegasus. "You have to understand, from my perspective I've been gone for longer than a year. I've... been through some... intense stuff. I... broke. A lot. I always picked myself up, but..." She shook her head. "The point is that I've changed, Dash. I've changed and... and this is part of me, now. I don't... I want to be back home, I want to tend to my animal friends and just, you know, go back to being the hermit I used to be, but...."

She rose her metal hoof.

"I can't forget what I've seen. Or where I've been. I... Maybe I've been hiding how much I've hurt, trying to be the old Fluttershy, and I can't say if that was for your benefit or for me. But... maybe I shouldn't have."

Rainbow took a breath, lowering to the ground. "...I should be the one saying sorry. I mean, I... Look, I'm uncomfortable with, you know, ponies who change how they look or things about them. Because, well... I'm awesome, and it's all natural. And the idea that somebody could become more awesome, or more pretty, or more anything just by slapping on some makeup--or by getting their eye cut open and putting in a magical miniature dream library thing--I... that's..." She shook her head. "I mean, I'm not blaming you, I'm not saying you're suddenly evil or anything like that. But it's just... if you can suddenly become better by just paying for a change, where does that put me?"

Fluttershy rolled her eyes with a small smile. "I can see where you're coming from, but you're starting to sound like a Cog. Don't worry, even with augmentation surgery nobody has managed to figure out how to break the sound barrier under their own power. You're still pretty awesome."

"Really? Uh, I mean, yeah. Obviously." Dash puffed up her chest. "Like I said, pure concentrated natural awesomeness right here."

"So..." Applejack paused. "Um."

The yellow pegasus gave her a look. "Yes?"

"...Ah can get ya needed replacement parts after... ya know, all that." She rubbed the back of her head. "But... did you... get any other sort of boosts that ya, um, didn't need? Anything like that nueroplexer thing?"

Fluttershy looked at her for a long moment.

"...A few," she admitted. "But I think I'll explain why when I get to that. Is that alright?"

"Yeah, that's fine. Just want to know how much ya changed, is all."

"A lot." Fluttershy nodded, settling back down as the spa ponies continued their treatment. "A lot happened. I mean, it didn't really hit me until Reinhild took me back to her apartment, but..."





"And here we are," Reinhild proclaimed, gesturing with an arm. "Home sweet home. I can have the nanofab make you nighter, or you can sleep on the couch until we get you a more permanent bed."

Fluttershy stepped in, looking around. "Um... nanofab?"

"Nanofabricator. Comes standard with the apartment." The fox stepped by her, gesturing to a small slot in the wall. "There are bigger ones in the factories and buyspots, these ones are really only good for disposables, like dishes and nighters--everything that comes out of it is meant to disintegrate in a day or two."

The pegasus shuddered. "I'm... okay with the couch."

"Alrighty." 

Fluttershy nodded vaguely, staring at the wall for a moment.

"...this is really happening, isn't it?"

Reinhild turned to her. "What is?"

"This. Me... here. Just this morning I was tending to my animal friends, and watering the garden and... I was thinking it was nice for Dash to take Scootaloo to the Sisterhooves Social... and then suddenly the ship, and then I woke up in that.... cell..." Fluttershy ruffled her feathers. "I'm on an alien world, and... and I don't know how to get home." Water began to fill her eyes. "I don't know if I even can."

The fox winced, folding her ears back. "I... can you just... Mrrrrngh. Look, Fluttershy, this world isn't as alien as you might think. I mean, just because you're simulation-born doesn't mean you're not a vector. Everybody here has the same genetic code, we just also have... tech." She shrugged, flicking her smartboard onto what looked like a kitchen counter. "Look, if it makes you feel any better, I'll set up a contract for spacers to locate the Equestria grotto--it's better than nothing, right?"

"...that would be nice," Fluttershy murmured, slinking onto the couch. "...Are you... really sure that Equestria is... fake?"

"Not fake. Simulated. A lot of reality is what we decide it is." Reinhild tapped the wall--a complex pattern radiated from her fingertip, various runes grouping into segments and pages. She looked them over and gave a low groan. "Oh for the love of--!"

Fluttershy stared at the strange writing that had appeared out of seemingly nowhere. "Is... this like the lightshow?"

"Wha--oh." Reinhild pulled her finger off the wall, and the runes vanished. "Not exactly. Almost everything we make our homes out of is a smart surface--incorporated circuits and micro projectors. They connect to the cloud, and we access that with our toggles." She indicated a small coin-like object between her fingers. "So, yeah, there are ads and all, but it's not nearly as bad as the lightshow. Think of it like... I don't know, a personal virtual office."

"That.... sounds useful."

"It's basically a necessity these days. We've got to get you a toggle..." The fox glanced at her, quirking an eyebrow. "Scratch that, you don't have any fingers, you're going to need a zipchip."

Fluttershy bit her lip. "...okay. If you say so..."

Reinhild looked at her for a few moments... before walking over and sitting down next to her. "So... I'm not exactly good with the whole emotional sympathy thing. I'm just letting you know that ahead of time. But I'm also going to say... that I'm here to listen if you have any questions or... worries, or anything."

"I don't mean to be a bother." Fluttershy folded her ears back, looking at her hooves.

"You'd only be a bother if you didn't do anything to make yourself useful," the fox replied. "And knowing about the world you're living in makes you useful, so you should never be afraid to ask me anything."

"...do you think I'll ever make it back home?"

The question prompted no reply, only silence.

Fluttershy sniffed. "I live a small ways out of Ponyville. My animal friends, they... they're smart, they'll know something's wrong... Angel will probably go into town to get help, but I don't know if even Twilight would be able to figure out what happened to me. And... and my family, they live in Cloudsdale, and.... I visit them, sometimes, but we don't talk much--they wouldn't know until my friends told them, and... I didn't even get to say goodbye, Reinhild, I didn't even know all this was going to happen, and--"

"It's going to be okay." The fox wrapped an arm around her neck. "I promise, it'll be okay."





The spa was quiet for a few moments.

"Reinhild really helped me those first few days," Fluttershy murmured. "She wasn't... exactly good at the people thing, but she explained... a lot about how that world worked, how... well, how things were bought, and made, and shuttled around. The nueroplex helped, of course. She was the one who convinced me to get that in the first place, though, so it counts toward her." She chuckled. "Also the one to figure out I needed superfood after I emptied her fridge the first time--I didn't know why I was so hungry, she chalked it up to something to do with the stunt I pulled on the ship."

"Fluttershy." Twilight put down her notepad. "I'm... so sorry you had to go through that."

"It was pretty horrible," the yellow pony admitted. "I mean, nothing bad happened--well, nothing worse then what had already happened, but being thrust into a whole new world? I guess you understand what that's like, going through that mirror. It was... overwhelming, in its own way. Not necessarily bad, they were all very friendly in their own way, just... different. Things that I thought I recognized, things that looked familiar, they... turned out to be just slightly different... it all built up."

Pinkie Pie stood up, walking over to her. "I am going to hug you until the bad feelings go away."

"Pinkie--"

"HUGS!"

Fluttershy let out a meep as a pair of pink forelegs wrapped tightly around her barrel. "It's okay Pinkie! I'm not sad anymore! It's in the past!"

"Then this will make me less sad!"

Lotus cleared her throat. "Miss Pie, while I appreciate your intentions, ze fact is I cannot give Fluttershy a proper massage while you are, how do we say, ensaring her?"

"Embracing," Twilight corrected absently.

"Ah, yes. Zis might actually reverse some of my progress," she added. "So, if you don't mind..."

Pinkie Pie reluctantly released Fluttershy. "Ah, phooey. I am still sad that sad things happened. Super sad."

"Well, good things happened too. Like... oh! When I told Reinhild about my special talent, she found me a job with the E.M.L.A. ground crews."

"Emily ground crews?" Twilight asked. "What's... that, exactly?"

"Environmental Monitoring and Logistics Administration. They're the group technically in charge of making sure the forests and plains stay stable, but they're a joint subsidiary of MarsCo and Progenitus." She noticed the look of confusion on her friend's faces. "Right... we don't have megacorps in Equestria..."

After a moment, she shook her head. "Well, that's not important right now. The point is, I got to go out and meet some new animals..."





Fluttershy fidgeted her wings, glancing around at the vectors sitting in the transport as she adjusted the camo shirt and saddlebags she was wearing. One of them, a tiger, leaned forward and looked her over. She shied away a touch--there wasn't much room in the passenger chamber, but there was just enough to back off.

"...Huh. You a blip?"

"Um." Fluttershy tilted her head. "I'm sorry, what... do you mean by that?"

"Nothing against blips," the tiger assured her, holding up a hand. "Just curious."

The pegasus kicked at the metal plating nervously, trying to process the question. It was clear enough that whatever blips were, they were common enough to not need explanation, but that he felt a need to assure her he had nothing against them... For a moment she wished she had taken up Reinhild's offer of accompaniment.

Then she took a breath and looked him in the eyes. "Well, um... If it doesn't really matter, there's no need for me to answer that, is there?"

The tiger leaned back. "Right, right. Sorry, didn't mean to offend. You're just pretty unique looking. I guess you get that question all the time, huh?"

"Not really, actually."

"Oh, geeze... Look, I guess we got off on the wrong foot." He stuck his hand out. "My name's Suchart Kearney."

She placed her hoof in it with a small smile. "I'm Fluttershy."

"...That's an... interesting name," Suchart mused. "Where are you from?"

"Equestria."

"No, I meant... what megacorp, who gave you your primary?"

Fluttershy took a bit to process the question, before finally giving out a small chuckle. "Oh! I'm self-taught. Equestria is a little distant from the corps." Her ears flattened. "I mean... I think it is."

"Oh." Suchart tilted his head. "That's... interesting." He looked around awkwardly for a moment or two. "Oh, look, landing light. Brace yourself."

The pegasus was almost about to ask what he meant when the floor beneath them jolted, causing her to let out a small squeak.

Suchart chuckled as he undid his restraints. "Not a fan of flying?"

"I prefer to use my own wings," Fluttershy replied, glancing out the unfolding boarding ramp. "I'm not an athlete, but they're there for a reason."

"...You can actually fly with those things?"

"Yes...?"

"But they're so small..."

Fluttershy trotted out of the plane. "Well, I wasn't the best flyer at flight camp, I'll admit, but I'm good enough to get around. And I was even on the Ponyville team for the Equestria games... well, really I was there to fill out the numbers, Rainbow was the one that carried the team."

"Rainbow?"

"Rainbow Dash, one of my old friends..." The pegasus stopped, breathing in the fresh air as she took in the tall trees and various flower patches around her. "Oh, my. It's so good to be out of the city... Do you all mind if I take a look around?"

"Our job is to check the local animal population," Suchart reminded her, fingering a red and white ball on his belt.

"Oh, I can start on that easily enough." Fluttershy smiled fondly. "Talking with animals is my special talent."

"....right." The tiger tapped the ball and tossed it in the middle of the clearing; it opened with a hiss and started pouring... something out onto the grass. "Well, just remember to check back in ten minutes. Think we'll have camp set up by then."

"Ten minutes. Okay." She nodded, hovering into the air and fluttering away. "I'll be back soon!"





"The rest of the week was basically just note-taking; talking with the animals, checking on their diseases, recording details. Because they didn't have magic, the vectors were surprised at how easily I handled the creatures around them." Fluttershy giggled. "Honestly, half the stuff they brought didn't even need to get used, because I would just lead a deer or a bear into camp for a scan. They were constantly checking to make sure I hadn't actually convinced some lateral or other to play the part--the tech-gal continually tried to figure out how I was screwing with her sensors, I don't think she was ever convinced I wasn't."

Rainbow chuckled. "Yeah, I know I could never pull off what you do with the animals. Remember that time they stuck me in a cauldron?"

"Oh yes. I did get them to apologize, though."

"I know, I know. Still." Rainbow's ears went a bit flat. "It's... good to know it wasn't all bad."

Fluttershy took a moment to examine her. "...This wasn't your fault, Dash. This was all because of the Tether, and you had nothing to do with that. You couldn't have stopped it even if you were around when it happened."

"Well, still..." Rainbow flared her wings. "If I was with you, maybe things would be easier, somehow."

"There's no way to know," the yellow pony replied. "Best not to dwell on it."

The room was quiet for a few moments.

"...so, anyway, I got paid for doing that. And immediately used all that money to pay off the debts I'd gotten during that first week. Suchart even put in a good word for me with Progenitus."

"Progenitus?" Rarity tilted her head. "You've mentioned that before. What is it?"

"Oh, Progenitus is one of the top megacorps..." Fluttershy paused, looking around. "...I should explain what a megacorp is. Oh, how do I put this... Actually, Rarity, you own the Carousel Boutique and Canterlot Carousel, right?"

"Well, yes, to some degree. Honestly, Canterlot Carousel is more a joint arrangement between me and Sassy Saddles. She does most of the actual saleswork, I just drop by every so often to update the dresses."

"She's your employee, but she's also the leader of her own business, which she owns."

"Yes. Are you saying megacorps are some sort of... business arrangement?"

"Very much so. Sassy works for you, but she runs the business her way. Multiply that sort of thing by... a population of a few billion per four inhabited planetoids, and another billion spread out among starships, independent stations, smaller moonbases and inhabited asteroids, and... basically, everyone is working for somebody. The ledger trades stocks automatically, just to keep everyone in the system, but it's all a web of employment and employers, contracts and agreements..."

Rarity blinked. "I... can see why everything is about business over there. Has it always been that way?"

"Yes, actually. MarsCo was a corporate entity when it was founded, essentially a group of businessmen who wanted to ensure they had paying customers. And since they were on another planet, it was much easier to just ignore the governments of Earth... especially after they were killed off. The idea that everything is bought and sold is intrinsic in Vector culture--and I do mean everything. You can sell a few apples to buy a dress, you can auction off a home and procure a starship, you can cancel a few dozen contracts with your employees to free up enough creds to own a city, you can give your life to purchase morality."

Fluttershy looked at her hooves. "Everything has a price. The corps hand out free food and shelter, but it's basic, survival. If you want to live... you've got to pay." She sighed. "And sometimes, that means making others pay for you."





Fluttershy couldn't help but stare in nervous awe as the machine in front of her whirred and chirped, levered arms whisking thin bands back and forth in rapid procession. She'd known this would happen, intellectually--her time with the nueroplex had brought her up to speed on the concept of three-dimensional printing, and honestly it wasn't too far off the occasional summoning spell Twilight did conceptually. But she had put in an order for food--specialized food, at that--and here, this device was going to make a week's worth in ten minute's time. With no magic behind it.

And everyone around her treated this as normal.

And everyone around her treated it as a business.

Nevermind that she had made the order twenty feet away and been directed to the machine by a clipped mechanical voice. Nevermind that what she had requested was usually only eaten by individuals who had willingly let themselves become bulwarks of muscle. Nevermind that the people themselves were the result of artificial creation...

Things like this. Wonders like this, considered normal enough that Reinhild had trusted her, after only two weeks, to go grocery shopping on her own, and not stare in amazement.

And here she was, staring in amazement.

The machine chimed finished, and Fluttershy shook herself, taking a moment to settle back into reality. She quickly moved the assembled meal into her saddlebags, deciding to trot back to the apartment; the vectors gave her odd looks whenever she hovered into the air, almost as if she herself was the strange one, and she didn't quite like the attention. Besides, it gave her a chance to take in the cityscape, look around at the various animal people as they went about their lives, and... simply consider this society. She didn't want to stay--she wanted to go home, eventually, but for the moment she was here, and for the moment, she had to make do.

Distracted as she was by the world around her, Fluttershy missed the figure rushing out of the alleyway behind her, and was taken by complete surprise when a furred arm wrapped around her barrel and cold metal clicked against her head.

"Don't scream," a voice hissed in her ear. "Don't make any sudden movements. If you want to get out of this alive, you do exactly what I say."

The pegasus gulped, trying to twist her neck around--and felt the grip on her barrel tighten. Footsteps sounded from behind her, and her captor whirled to face the newcomer--a shaggy goat-faced biped who froze as soon as he saw the situation.

"Give me the codes," the voice growled. "Or yellow here gets a new hole in her head."

The goat tilted his head warily. "I don't have them."

"Give me the fucking codes!"

"I don't have the codes! I was hired to capture you, nobody told me why!"

Fluttershy's heart was pounding as she struggled against her captor's grip, trying to find some way to push out--all for naught, as the furry arm simply pressed tighter against her. "Well, I guess you're going to have to call up your contractor," the voice snarled. "Because otherwise--"

And suddenly her world was pain. Noise reverberating in her right ear, a sudden ripping sting followed by agony in the fold of flesh. She barely registered that the voice was still talking over the ringing she heard, all she saw was the goat holding up his hands warily.

But the same pain that deafened her sharpened her focus, gave her awareness of her situation, pumped her body full of adrenaline. One moment she was gripped tight and the next--the next the mongoose was pinned beneath her as she slapped his weapon into the air, and she wasn't exactly sure what had happened but as she looked into his face she realized he didn't either.

As Fluttershy's hearing began to return, she heard the goat saying something, the tone of his voice wary and warning. She couldn't quite make out the individual words, focused as she was on the mongoose; her eyes formed into an intense glower, one she had used on dragons, cockatrices, and fruit bats alike.

"I think we're done fighting... aren't we?"

The mongoose gulped, nodding once.

"Good." She stepped off of him taking a breath, and turned to the goat. "Could you, um...?"

"...what I came to do anyway." The goat stepped forward, pulling a set of hoofcuffs--handcuffs, she reminded herself, handcuffs--from his belt and clicking them around the mongoose's wrist. "Now you can either come with me to the CompuMax outlet or I can let the IRPF handle you. Your choice."

The mongoose looked from him to Fluttershy. "...I'll take my chances with CompuMax."

"Good choice." The goat glanced at the pegasus. "Uh... thanks for the help, sorry you got caught up in this. You've, uh, got a missing chunk of your ear there, you know?"

Fluttershy's hoof traveled up to the side of her head, feeling the ragged flesh; she pulled it back, taking in the red stain on it. "Oh. I... I should be fine, it's not... it looks worse then it is."

"If you're sure." The goat shrugged, giving her a last look, before shoving the mongoose forward. "Come on, buddy, let's go."

The pegasus looked after them as they walked away for a moment or two. She set about gathering her groceries, her trembling hooves putting them gently back into her saddlebags, and turned to head back toward the apartment.

Her eyes fell on the mongoose's weapon, still resting on the street. Almost without realizing, she slowly approached it, looking it over with large, dewy eyes.

After a moment, Fluttershy sat down, her breath heaving in and out. "Oh sweet Celestia--"

Nothing like that had happened before. She'd been in danger plenty of times, but nothing so intimately impersonal--she had always been up against threats to Equestria or, sometimes, ponies or animals that were upset with her for some reason--she'd never been threatened just because she was conveniently present.

And yet here, not an inch away, was a device that had torn her ear off just because somebody else couldn't deliver what somebody else wanted....

Fluttershy took a deep breath, slowly letting it out. "I am safe. I am alive. I can... get better." With a faint twitch of her wings she stood, sparing the weapon one last look. "I can... get better. I will get better."

Then, softly, she continued on her way.