A beautiful day met Twilight and her friends as they walked around the royal gardens with large smiles on all of their faces, Rarity and Applejack talking to Flash while the CMC made faces at all of the statues that lined the garden. Twilight sat on a bench near the edge of the garden with Robocop standing beside her, a frown on his face as she talked.
"It wouldn't be anything too serious, I just want to see what you look like without your armor on," Twilight said as casually as she could, but from the cold glare that Robocop was giving her she could tell that he wasn't keen on her idea. "I mean, we could check to see if you're damaged or replace any of your damaged armor. After all you've been through I'm sure that you-"
"Thank you for the concern Princess Twilight, but my internal sensors would inform me if any part of me was damaged or not functioning properly," Robocop coldly said as he cut her off.
"I'm sorry if I'm pushing so much, it's just that we have nothing like you in Equestria," Twilight murmured as she took a close look at Robocop's helmet with scientific curiosity. "I just really want to know how the humans managed to make something...sorry, somepony like you! You're incredible!"
"Incredible is not the word I would use," Robocop muttered, Twilight tilting her head at his words with curious eyes.
"You're a technological marvel, something that we could never replicate, at least not without years of researching somepony like you," Twilight explained, but Robocop was barely listening to her at that point. He instead watched the fillies as they looked up at statues, laughed amongst themselves and behaved like children. He then slightly turned his head so that Flash and the other mares were within his field of vision, allowing him to watch them talk normally with each other. He couldn't remember the last time he had a normal conversation with another human.
"Um...you ARE somepony right?" Twilight asked him, regaining Robocop's attention. "I mean, there is a heart and soul inside of that suit, right?"
"I do not know anymore," Robocop responded weakly. Twilight opened her mouth to ask another question when an explosion could be heard and all eyes turned towards the city below, where smoke could be seen rising into the air along with cries of panic. "Crime in progress. Officer en route." Robocop stood up and began to march towards the exit of the gardens, but Twilight cast a spell that created purple spheres around all of the ponies and Robocop and picked them up into the air with her.
"Stay here and stay safe!" Twilight called out to the fillies below her as the five flew towards the source of distress. From above the ponies and officer could see a massive crater in the center of the road that was the cause of the smoke, but they could also see a pony sitting next to the crater as if they were waiting for something. Twilight descended before the mare and released the spheres, allowing the group to assess the situation.
"Halt. You are under arrest for the suspicion of..." Robocop began until his visor informed him of who the pony was that sat near the crater. According to his records she was the very same pony who he had retrieved a purse for the previous night, but now she had deep green eyes unlike her blue ones that he had on record. "What are you doing?"
"Oh, it's about time you showed up," she said in a voice that did not match what Robocop had in his databanks, causing him to narrow his eyes as his systems went to work identifying the current voice being used. "I mean, the only way to get your attention is to unleash a giant monster or blow something up. You remember me, don't you?"
'Directive: Uphold the law.'
"Suspect identified as Sombra, who is wanted for arrest," Robocop confirmed as he reached down and pulled out his firearm, pointing it right between the mares green eyes. "I remember you. You are under arrest. Stand down and come quietly or there will be trouble." Sombra chuckled at his words and he began to saunter forward in the mare's body.
"That wasn't quite what I meant when I asked if you recognized me. I meant the mare who's body I'm using." Robocop narrowed his eyes at Sombra's words, not sure what he was planning. "What, you don't remember her? This little host of mine is the very same mare that you helped out last night. Now I know what you must be thinking, why would she be helping me? Well I’ll tell you what. I'll answer that question if you answer one of mine. Serve the public trust, uphold the law and protect the innocent. Those are your directives, right?"
"Correct," Robocop growled through gritted teeth as he kept the gun aimed at the center of the pony’s skull, getting Sombra to chuckle.
"Good. Alright then, my turn to answer your question. She isn't working for me. She's under my will, my command: forced to do my bidding despite her not wanting to. Wanna see?" Sombra asked with a chuckle before the green vanished from her eyes and they were replaced with the blue that Robocop remembered her having. Her horrified eyes locked onto Robocop and her fear bubbled to the surface.
"Please, help me!" she screamed before tendrils of darkness covered her face again, turning her eyes green as Sombra's evil smile returned, much to the absolute horror of the ponies there.
"You...you monster," Twilight whispered, Sombra bowing at her words with a smile.
"So as you can see, officer, she doesn't willing want to help me, but I control her now. You can say she's an innocent in all of this," Sombra said with a loud laugh. "So there you go, that's what's going on."
"Release the hostage Sombra and I will go easy on you," Robocop ordered, but Sombra simply smirked in reply as he began to walk forward, tendrils of darkness forming behind him as he did so.
"No officer, I think I'm going to resist," Sombra said with the mare's mouth as the tendrils shot forward and drove themselves into Robocop's armor, knocking him back a bit. Robocop growled in reply as recovered and took aim between the center of the mare's eyes.
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
'Directive: Serve the public trust.'
Robocop found himself unable to pull the trigger, unable to defend himself as the tendrils continued to pound away against his armor. The assault only ceased when Twilight created a sphere of magic around Robocop to block the tendrils attacks.
"Come on Robocop, you've got to pull yourself together," Flash said to Robocop as he let the officer lean against him for support. "If you don't stop him, Sombra will probably kill the mare!"
"Oh he wishes he could stop me Flash, but he can't," Sombra chuckled as he came to a stop twenty feet in front of Robocop, who glared at the mare Sombra controlled with rage. "Protect the innocent. Serve the public trust. They're both part of his directives. At first I wondered if it was just a code he lived by...or a code that was programmed into his brain. Seems it was the latter."
"What in tarnation are ya going on about?!" Applejack snarled as she went to charge Sombra, but a tendril knocked her back before she could take two steps.
"The body of this mare has done nothing wrong. She is an innocent bystander," Sombra explained as Rarity helped AJ back to her hooves. "And since two of his directives translate to protect the innocent, he can't lift a finger to hurt her since she's not the one in control. He can't touch me." The ponies all looked at Robocop with confused eyes, wondering what he was going to do.
"So we work with it. Come on Robocop, we're not going to hurt her, we're just going to subdue her so we can get Sombra out of her," Flash tried to explain to Robocop, who was still frozen in place. "We'll still be protecting her, just from herself!"
"You're wasting your breath and my time Flash. If he had an option around the directives don't you believe he would have tried it by now?" Sombra laughed as Robocop said nothing in response. "Now I understand perfectly. Your directives are hardwired into your brain, like a machine. And that's what you are, aren't you? A machine that can't go against its programming." Sombra's victory laugh was cut off by a blast of magic that went by his head.
"Robocop might not be able to fight you, but we're still more than capable!" Twilight roared as she took to the skies, firing stunning spells at the mare as she did her best not to hurt her body. But because she was trying not to hurt her, her spells were not nearly as powerful and made the easy for Sombra to destroy.
"I wasn't planning on killing you or your friends today Twilight, but I won't pass up the chance when it is presented before me!" Sombra roared as he took to the skies after her, becoming a tendril of dark magic that slammed into a barrier of Twilight's before driving the both of them into the street. Twilight blasted Sombra off with a pulse of magic, but as Sombra cried out in pain Twilight realized what she had done.
"Be careful Twilight, or you might kill this here hostage," Sombra chuckled as he rose back to his hooves. "Now then, hold still while I gut you!" Twilight's friends rushed into the battle to aid her, leaving Robocop to watch from the sidelines and unable to do anything.
'He is trying to kill them. That is a crime!' he realized within his mind. And as soon as he thought those words the answer he was looking for appeared before his eyes.
'Directive: Uphold the law.'
Robocop took aim with his gun at Sombra again and prepared to pull the trigger, but right before he could do so more words appeared on the screen beneath the directive.
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
'Directive: Serve the public trust.'
Robocop felt his arm being lowered from Sombra against his wishes, the directive to protect the innocent clashing with his directive to bring down Sombra and uphold the law. Sombra didn't miss what Robocop was doing, but his lack of concentration gave Twilight the edge she needed to send a blast of magic through his shield and into Sombra's chest, sending him sprawling into the streets below.
"Give it up Sombra; you can't beat me as an alicorn!" Twilight called down to Sombra, who was struggling to his hooves while also struggling to find a way around his current predicament. But then his eyes flashed to the side to see some bystanders that had been drawn in by the fighting, giving him his option. He spiraled into dark smoke and slithered over to the ponies, appearing behind one of them and grabbing them by the throat. The pony began to call for help while Sombra created a small barrier around them, laughing all the while.
"Sorry Twilight, but there's still one last game I want to play!" Sombra yelled to the ponies as a dark blade formed in his hooves, placing itself right at the captive’s throat. Twilight fired a spell at the barrier, but instead of breaking the barrier absorbed the spell. "That won't work princess, as this barrier will absorb any magic it comes into contact with. The only way to get to me is to shatter the barrier with a physical strike, but if I see any of you try to come near me I'll cut this one’s throat."
"Then what do you want us to do? You know you can't escape!" Flash yelled, getting Sombra to laugh even louder.
"I want to see what happens next! Come on officer, I'm clearly endangering another pony’s life here! Go ahead and uphold the law! We both know that if you fire that weapon I’ll never be able to react to the attack in time and you'll stop me," Sombra informed Robocop before his sinister grin returned. "But then you'd be hurting an innocent and you can't do that. But then you won't be upholding the law! So choose tin man, choose if you are able to!"
Robocop took perfect aim at Sombra, who wasn't even bothering to move his head into a more protected area. But as he prepared to fire the trigger, again the words that held him back before flashed up on the screen.
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
'Directive: Serve the public trust.'
Robocop's arm began to lower before the other directive followed.
'Directive: Uphold the law.'
"What's the matter? Can't pick on your own? Then let me help! If you don' choose in the next thirty seconds then both of them will die!" Sombra roared as he pressed the blade against the hostage’s throat, causing her to cry out for help as a bit of blood began to slide down her throat.
'Directive: Uphold the law.'
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
Robocop struggled to keep his aim upon Sombra as he tried to figure out a way to fulfill both directives. If he shot Sombra to uphold the law, then he would be killing an innocent. But if he didn't kill Sombra, then he wouldn't be protecting an innocent or upholding the law.
"Twenty seconds left!" Sombra laughed as he held the blade closer.
'Directive: Uphold the law.
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
'Directive: Serve the public trust.'
Robocop desperately wracked his brain to think of a way to stop Sombra without having to hurt the innocent mare that he was controlling, but no answer presented itself. Static began to form in Robocop's eyes from the dilemma and the gun in his hand began to shake.
"Robocop, do something!" Flash yelled at him from the side.
"Ten seconds!"
Robocop's vision was nearly all static as he tried to find a compromise, his systems beginning to freeze up at the failure to complete either of the directives. His auditory sensor went down as the program designed to shut him down if he disobeyed a directive starting to attack all of his systems, forcing him to crash.
'Directive: Uphold the law.'
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
'Directive: Serve the public trust.'
"Five, four..."
'Directive: Uphold the law.'
'Directive: Protect the innocent.'
'Directive: Serve the public trust.'
"Three, two..."
'Directive: Uphold the law!'
'Directive: Serve the public trust!'
'Directive: Protect the innocent!'
"One!"
"Robocop!"
BANGBANGBANG!
The ponies screamed as the gunshots tore through the barrier and embedded themselves in the skull of the pony that Sombra had controlled, dropping her to the ground without another sound. The pony that had been captured fled to the princess, fearfully sobbing as Twilight did her best to comfort her. Flash looked to Robocop, who stood silently with fists clenched tight.
"Hey, don't be too hard on yourself. You made an impossible choice," Flash said in hopes to comfort him, but Robocop said nothing in reply to the guard. "You alright?" Flash asked again. When Robocop failed to respond, Flash poked him in the leg...and caused Robocop to crash face first into the ground.
"Robocop! What's wrong?!" Flash desperately called out to him as the others rushed to his side, but the officer said nothing in reply. Robocop did not respond to any of their questions, nor did any kind of force get a response out of him. And while the ponies tried to figure out what had happened, the tendrils of smoke that slipped away knew full well what this meant.
Robocop had crashed.
Holy Shite, Wonderful.
I am not surprised, but still glad to have read it. Looking forward to how Murphy gets out of this one.
Keep up the good work. Deus teucm.
Well...bugger.
Well done this is far better then what I would have guess Sombra would to do to break RoboCop. I'm guessing they are going to poke around in RC's body and mind in order to fix him.
No related stories to this one!?
Robocop shouldn't have used windows 8. Poor guy didn't stand a chance.
Error 404 detected. System Shutdown in progress. Manual restart required.
Sombra, you piece of shit.
Fantastic update Ono.
Sombra best get killed or the shit beaten out of him for doing that.
error! robocop.exe has stopped working. please exit and restart the program.
CTRL+ALT+DEL
Well then... I NEED TO KNOW MORE!!!
5337894 Agreed, he even does something similar in Robocop 2.
5337894 If he shot him in the leg, he would still have the opportunity to shoot his hostage. Unless you are talking about earlier, in which case that would still have been harming the innocent and against his programming.
Problem with this situation. Considering how acturately he can aim. he could shoot the blade out of the mare's hoof. I know what you are trying to do but this has been solved by him before. shooting the blade would by time.
Throw an exception and everything will be alright.
Fun fact. My computer crashed after posting this chapter. I am slightly afraid.
5337765 Fucking WIndows
98!5338031 yeah the dude can do things like catch bullets with his hand and ricochet with perfect accuracy... but then story drama tends to push things aside from time to time.
Hmm impossible choice
Should put john cable flashback there
5338076
illuminati confirmed
Latest Chapter review:
Poor Robocop, hated what he had to do, but he had to do what he had to do sadly.
Sombra....you've just signed your Death Warrant for your actions......
5338194 ther was a better way to do it.
5338031
If Robocop shot the blade Sombra would just kill her with magic and then kill his own host. The point Sombra was making was to see if Robocop could disobey his directives or if they would overload him.
Yeah Robocop should've shot non-lethally, but in a disabling way. He's been shown to have pretty incredible aim even in the old movies (shooting that one guy in the dick through the skirt of a girl he was holding for example).
5338342
But then he'd be going against Directive one, which prevents him from harming the innocent.
5338343 I don't claim to be an expert on how the original robocop was supposed to think exactly, but if he went against a directive anyways, wouldn't he be able to pick an option that... goes slightly less against that directive? Can he compare different results in just how much they "harm the innocent"? Surely some situations where harming an innocent is inevidable are expected in police work, his programmers'd be kinda short-sighted to not give him an ability to pick the lesser evil. He'd presumably still try his best to not harm an innocent at all if it can be avoided at all. Then again, the "red asset" thing from the newer movie seemed like a completely rigid directive with "no ifs or buts", but that was understandable because it was protecting his own creators just in case. Maybe the original one's directives are all that strict? In that case he seems pretty ill-suited for a lot of things that can happen... but otherwise we wouldn't have all these wonderful dilemmas for him... Hmmm!
5338343
theres a robocop series called robocop prime directives i think he make an impossible choices etheir he should kill his old partner or not
when i read this i found out he dealing an impossible choices before
ever heard a guy name john cable? well hes robocop old partner before lewis
5338405
This Robocop is the one from the first movie with elements from two and a hint of three. I'm going with strict directives.
5338413
still i feel sorry for robocop that he have to follow his directives
hes a cyborg and could crash
5338328 it could have bought time. Heck in Robocop three he manage to shoot he OCP vechilces while dealing with Directive 4. so could she have died anyway, yes. However in this situation he can shoot the blade out and they would have longer than 30 seconds.
5338394
Well, we see what kind of mentality the suits have in regards to Robocop's programming in either Robocop 2 or 3 (can't remember which) where he is give lots of extraneous directives (I think smile was one of them), so we do have precedent for “short sighted” and poorly thought out directives. So it has only been a matter of time until some conflict occurred, and as this is still Robo from 1, he hasn't learned to delete and/or alter his programming, yet.
Also, as an aside, I'm loving this story. Robocop is one of the two movies that I watched over and over as a kid, and it taught me my love of dark humor and well thought out action. Onomonopia, I think you are doing a great job doing justice to source material. Please keep it up. Five stars, thumbs up, cake and confetti, all that jazz.
5338492
What if the bullets went through the blade and into the pony? What if the blade didn't break and the bullets pushed it into her neck? That would Robocop be harming an innocent.
i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/219/485/what_have_you_done_face_by_peteypiranha128-d3pbwit.jpg
5338538 harming beats dead, and i have yet tp see a blade be destroyed by a bullet.
5338772
Never seen a blade made of magic, myself.
Very sad chapter at the end. I suggest one of the Mane 6 without a CMC member as a sister takes in the dead mare's colt she mentioned last chapter. At the very least since his mother was the victim of a terrorist attack he should get some sort of royal support to help him.
Sombra is so going down hard.
5337853 Agreed.
hmmm...
I like this.
it satisfies my sadism.
keep going. ill be happy to see what Robocop has broken, or changed when he wakes up.
or if he ever does
5338815 just could have been done better.
5337894 except I'm sure that he's also programmed with standard procedure, and that doesn't incldude non-lethal shots.
Although, on the other hand, he is robocop. He should be programmed to do thugs like that. But you never know.
Good chapter. Sad that Robocop didn't had a tranquilizer or tazer at his disposal.
5342089
Yes, but he is not allowed to harm the innocent in anyway unless they do something to him. The mare was not in control of her actions and hurting her would break his first directive, which is to serve the public trust. If he shot her leg to protect the innocent, then he would be breaking the public trust and going against a directive.
5342168
But the directives built into Robocop state that he may not harm an innocent in anyway unless they willingly use physical violence against him. The mare was not in control of her actions and did not wish to harm Robocop, so Robocop could not harm her in anyway or he would go against his directives. Also, harming an innocent goes against the law. So if he hurt her he would also not be upholding the law, which would also go against his directives.
5342211
No. That's what the first and third directive say.
5342252
And as you said, there is no direct definition of the first one. So I am using one that I found that I agreed with the most and felt suit what OCP would have done to him.
5342283
He would shoot the mans hand off. The man is also a criminal and Robocop has full range to shoot him. The mare in the story is innocent and being possessed. She has done nothing to warrant Robocop using force against her.
5342294
He is still acting as a criminal on his own choice. Even if his loved ones or himself was being threatened, he could have said no. Sombra made it clear to Robocop that this was all against the mare's will. She said no and Sombra took control of her body to act out his own evil deeds.
5342319
Robocop A. Shoots the gun. B. ricochets the bullet to hit the gun if it's out of his field of vision. C. Suicide is illegal and therefor the man is a criminal and force can be used against him so he shoots his hand or arm.
5342357
Then Robocop can take no action physically harming the man without breaking one of his directives. The man is innocent but the law must be upheld. It's a similar situation. I must admit that this has been a very interesting and intellectually stimulating conversation, but I do not claim to be an expert on all things Robocop. This story is just how I think he would respond to these situations and nothing here is canon to the actual Robocop story. Although I now do want to see how the writers of the movie would handle mind control.
Wow Sombra, you really have done it now, you do realise that mere Words will not be able to describe what Robocop will do to you once he gets his hands on you? They are gonna have to make a completly new Word related to pain just to cover the basics of the agony that you will feel.
I think this chapter was fine. Sombra's an uber bastard
Sure he could've shot the mare in the leg and stunned Sombra,possibly even letting Twilight surround the mare and the hostage in a magic bubble.
BUT. Even if Sombra was stunned in pain, I don't think anyone could've had enough time to stop him from instantly killing the mare. He's evil dark smoke powers. He could just pop out after being shot and stab the mare with tendrils the next second. No one could stop him.