Rise of the Bronze Age

by Colonel-Majora

I: RISE

Factory Sense was a greatly gifted earth pony from Baltimare. She loved to learn, and would always get excited for going on to higher levels of education. Interestingly, she never stayed in one school grade for long, as she was too smart to need an education past reading all the yearly material. She didn't make many friends because of this. Throughout her younger years, she quietly worked towards mechanical engineering, and on building innovative new mechanisms in her spare time, earning her cutie mark, a piston, after completing her first steam powered machine at age 7.

The young, uncommonly bronze-coated mare graduated from university at only 17 years old, earning her school’s highest average that year with her reports on incredibly advanced theories in chemistry, engineering and magic; her knowledge of the latter was extraordinary for an earth pony. Very shortly after, Princess Celestia visited Factory, offering a place on the royally funded science team working in Canterlot. Needless to say, she was elated. She accepted immediately, and moved her “lab” to the castle, where she could put together something to actually call a proper lab. For two years, Factory Sense made great strides in mechanical advancements, crossing the values of steam power, hydraulics, and imbued magic. She was making heavy progress in developing what somepony finally referred to as a “Faux Pony”, a fully moving, incredibly strong, mechanized pony shell to be usable for anything from shows to displays to clothes modeling. She thought of the obvious standard model based on an average earth pony, but ideas for other models with optimized movement and abilities, and interesting designs, came to her; an earth pony with two front legs and a single large back wheel, an air-propelled pegasus with retractable legs and size-variable wings, and a unicorn, with a fully functioning horn sustained by imbued magic and powered by electrically charged crystals embedded in a tempered glass horn. She was revered among the team of scientists, who knew that all she work on was not for recognition or gain, but because she just wanted to have fun learning and to help others learn with her. Those ponies, on friendly terms, had taken to calling her “Bronze”, simply named after her rather unique coat color. Factory was truly happy with her good friends and colleagues. The higher authorities in her workplace even thought for a while to make her recurring nickname an esteemed title, and to dedicate a wing of the Canterlot Archives to her, honors given only to great minds such as Starswirl the Bearded, who Factory greatly respected. Princess Celestia also called upon her at times to have tea, and to discuss the more entertaining parts of both of their recent endeavors. Factory even heard of a lucky young unicorn, who was, at that time, in a position of personal education under the princess, which Factory was honestly a bit jealous of.

One day, things changed heavily. Factory lost her foreleg in an accident while experimenting with new machine parts. Her accident, surprisingly, did not stop her scientific ambition. In fact, her wish to conquer her new hindrance consumed her. She worked for almost nine months on a publicly hidden project with only eating and sleeping interrupting her. Finally, with the help of a select few ponies, she created Equestria’s first ever fully functioning synthetic limb to replace her lost leg, which she called the Gantry. With steam-based parts sustained by circulating chemicals and magically imbued gems powering its circuits, she walked perfectly as she did once before. Late in the period of working on the Gantry, Princess Celestia caught word of Factory’s project. Already knowing of some of her recurring theories, the princess wondered of what may come next for the unendingly brilliant mare. She knew that nothing could phase her. Nothing could stop her. To her guilt, that worried her.

It almost scared her.

She would be nothing but proud of the young scientist, but unfortunately, she knew of the areas of recurring focus in Factory's studies. One theory that consistently came up in her notes was what she called “Synthetic Cognition”. She believed that, with the right power sources, and the proper enchantments, one could create a sustainable “mind” without a real brain. Many thought this to be a wondrous idea, however difficult to reach. The idea of false ponies going about in daily life, working and even playing, was unprecedented. The potential was certainly high. Though, some thought the project to be mad; creating objects that would think only how their creator wanted them to. Something going wrong could end badly, as there would be a lot of trust put into the machines to behave, and preparation for possible violence would be difficult, and frightening for the public. This, along with the obvious progress of the Faux Pony project, displayed by Factory’s completion of the Gantry, caused some to get scared. Celestia was one of the frightened few. Were the two projects ever intertwined, things could get even too advanced for her to handle.

The sun princess finally made the decision to confront Factory Sense. She decided put an end to Factory’s work on what the earth pony was now calling “Artificial Intelligence”. After hearing that name, Celestia was even more put off. “Intelligent, incredibly strong machines, following any order given,” she thought. That was the last straw. She broke the news to Factory, and the obvious protests came out. Factory had not worked on much more than theories and notes on the subject, but she knew how far she wished to take the project. She did not want it to only be an idea anymore. In fact, neither did several of the other scientists, who saw Factory’s work as nothing short of miraculous. Besides, the Faux Pony project would soon go into production stages, and she would need something new to continue theorizing about. Unfortunately, Celestia would not be swayed, hard as it was to deny the eager bronze mare. She explained her reasoning behind her decision, and said it was over. Factory, in Celestia’s opinion, took the news rather well, considering. Though she obviously fought quite hard to change Celestia's mind - as did several other scientists that thought the endeavor was a great leap forward - she gave in, and continued working to optimize the Faux Pony models. Factory began thinking about what she would work on next, whether it was something new or an idea she noted and put off in the past in favor of her A.I. theory. She was rather agitated about Celestia's choice, but she had to move on to other work. In the end, though, she would not have to worry about what to think of next.

The bad news had only just begun.

Author's Note:

This is certainly outside of my comfort zone. I have never actually written fanfiction before. I certainly hope that this little biography, or whatever you would call it, will turn out okay. Either way, I've been working quite hard on these chapters, and I hope you guys like what you read.

I actually am only writing this because, at the back of my mind, for quite awhile, I had kept thinking of new happenings with this little OC I'd thought of called "Bench Mark". I don't know why that was the character that came into my head; a mare with a mechanical leg that slowly becomes... well, I won't spoil anything, but nontheless, as I wrote, Bench Mark became Factory Sence, the innocent young genius that Celestia comes to call her friend.

In the end, though, her "friend" will do great things. Things too great for our dear ol' Sun Butt to handle.

The next chapter will be revealed soon! Lemme know what you guys think along the way!

Also, look out for a visual of Factory in the future.

Comments

[EagerQuill]

It piqued my interest. I rather liked it. Can't waitfor more!

[Nightprowler2]

not bad not bad. Has a lot of potental