Nature of The Experiment

by Cracked Egg

Chapter 1 - Explosion

I am Doctor Lenkar Glitch, and I am very busy doing nothing.

I swiftly paced back and forth along the metal hallways of the massive complex, my mind buzzing with life. Ideas and images flashed through my mind, faster than anyone could process, yet slow enough to recall all of the intriguing details. Concept upon concept was created within the imaginative dreamscape, as I thought about a multitude of stories.

A young boy finds himself searching in the dead of autumn, and three heroes resting in their graves are remembered. A girl stumbles into a rabbit hole, and sees wonders that would drive the task-weary insane. A man begins working on a project, hoping to find a miracle unlike any other.

My mind turned to my recent employ.

Once this project is complete, we will go down in the history books!

I stopped still on my walk to look over the doors to the project me and Bill had been working on for the last several months. I read the sign above the door, featuring the project name in large, red, and bold print.

PROJECT ALIENO IMMUTO - AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY

With bated breath, I pushed open the heavy steel doors. What lay within was an amalgamation of machinery to most, but I saw it as a technological wonder. The two mechanical pods both looked like cylinders jutting from the floor, with many different wires and tubes connected every which way. The wiring and tubing all connected to a center modem, the block of hardware and software taking up a large amount of space between the pods.

The terminal on the front of the modem had a four-way fenestrated screen in order to allow multiple programs to be viewed and run at once, while there were four colorful keyboards attached as well, in order to allow each monitor to be used separately. The coloration was a color-coding system, for ease-of-access.

While the machine was a sight to behold, what was not a sight to behold was Bill resting in front of the device, asleep at the modem’s terminal. Not to mention Bill was snoring very loudly.

I strode over to Bill, and kicked the metal folding chair he was in a few times.

“Bill, wake up.”, I said, hoping that would awaken the sleeping researcher.

Sure enough, Bill stirred, lifting his head and slowly blinking the sleep out of his bloodshot eyes.
He shook his head while mumbling something incomprehensible, and looked over at me.

“Wuh? What? Oh, hi there.” Bill rose from the chair, trying to regain his senses.

“Welcome back to the land of the living! I take it you were up all night working?”

Bill nodded. I leaned towards the terminal and typed into the rightmost keyboard. I ran a quick check of the systems, and it seemed Bill’s napping on the controls didn’t screw up anything.
I sat down in the chair while Bill walked over to one of the pods.

“I’m going to go get some coffee, want a cup?”, Bill said, looking over the pod.

“No thank you, I already had one before I walked over here.”

Bill nodded and walked off through the double doors. I continued to prep the program for initial startup. I also checked the connection the modem had between it and Technus.

Technus is my Porygon2, who I had upgraded from a Porygon, the world’s first, if only, artificial Pokemon. Pokemon are powerful creatures, and their natural abilities are all divided into 18 types. These types are Normal, Ground, Fire, Fighting, Water, Flying, Grass, Poison, Electric, Psychic, Rock, Ice, Bug, Dragon, Ghost, Dark, Steel, and Fairy.

With so many typing choices leads to a number of wondrous and diverse species of Pokemon, but to say Porygon was mankind’s crowning achievement at finally creating life, would be an understatement. Porygon and its evolution, Porygon2, are both normal types.

Normal types have no real advantages in any of the other types, except Ghost types have no effect on Normal types and vice-versa. They are weak to Fighting types, though. What I’m referring to is type matchup, for instance Water beats Fire, Fire beats Grass, and Grass beats Water.

Simple as that.

What was not so simple was finding a way to contain such a motley collection of critters. That is where Bill came in. He created the Pokemon Storage System as a means of digitally storing Pokemon to prevent taking up room. You could store up to 1,500 of those powerful creatures in what Bill likes to call PC Boxes.

I should probably be saving these internal lectures for later…

I shook my head and continued typing the commands. Bill walked back in with a cup of coffee and I looked back towards him.

“Are we almost ready to begin?”, Bill said. He took a sip of his coffee.

“Almost, I just need to calibrate the pods to the modem. Now where is Technus?”

I stood up, and the chair screeched along the floor as it slid a little from my sudden rising. I typed in a command that would ping for Technus in the systems and give him a command to return.
Not the move Return, because that would cause more problems than I need right now.

A blue beak slowly poked it’s way out of the screen.

Another highly interesting feature in the Porygon family is their ability to enter and traverse cyberspace, entering a computer or electronic device like it was a wall of water leading to another world. Which, in this case, it basically was.

“Pory?” Technus peeked into the room, his small red head looking around. As his little beady eyes surveyed the area, they came to rest upon me. The Virtual Pokemon leaped out of the screen, tackling me.

“Pory! Porygon!”

Now sprawled across the floor with Technus on me, I petted him across the back.

“Alright, alright, it’s good to see you too.” I chuckled.

Technus rose up into the air as I stumbled to my feet. I looked towards Bill who was enjoying the moment and sipping his coffee. I walked over to the terminal and sat down, Technus floating next to me. I began to collect the data the Porygon2 had collected in the system.

“Good work Technus, everything seems to be clear and ready for startup.”

Bill pumped a fist in the air. “YES! Excellent! We can finally start this baby up!”

To say Bill was excited would be an understatement. You could say the same for me as well. When it came to our work, we could be like a couple of kids at Christmas when their parents said they could go to the candy store and buy everything.

While we were excited, we both knew we still had to err on the side of caution. As I always say, “err or error!”

Ok, that pun was bad and I should feel bad.

Anyway.

Now that everything had been set up, all we had to do was activate it. The tension in the room was suddenly dense as a pivotal moment for the entire Project rested upon us. Bill pushed a button on the keyboard, and the pod doors slid open.

You see, this machine we have built uses the same principle as the Pokemon Storage System to send Pokemon as digital information along two points and into the system. This device was going to test if the same could be done for humans.

While a risky prospect, if it worked, then the science behind this entire system could be changed forever. Or until someone else makes a breakthrough. Whichever comes first.

Stepping towards the pod of the left, I looked back at Bill.

“Let’s hope this works.”

“Agreed. Have a nice time in there!”

I chuckled, and stepped into the pod. Bill began the startup procedure, and pulled a CD out of his jacket, not looking at what he pulled out. He slid the CD into the terminal.

Meanwhile, Technus was overlooking the entire display. Running different diagnostics in it’s system, it saw it’s owner step into one of the pods. It then saw Bill put a disc into the computer.
The wrong disc. The red and blue bird flew into the screen Bill was looking at, startling him.

Bill fumbled over the keyboards, as the Porygon2 was trying to prevent the program from crashing. The system began to break down, and music began to play from the machine.

“Oh no, I inserted a music CD into the device?! Where’s the program disc?!”

[|||]

A red truck was driving down the street toward its driver’s place of business. Bill pulled out a CD from his pocket and inserted it into the disc slot on the dashboard. The CD failed to play any music. Bill shrugged and continued down the road toward the Pokemon Storage System Facility.

[|||]

“Oh yeah, I was wondering why that wasn’t working.”

I began slamming my fists into the glass.

“BILL, GET ME OUT OF HERE!” I yelled.

“Pory! PORY GON GON PORY PORY PORY!” Technus was shouting as well, although neither of the researchers could understand it.

Bill was furiously typing commands into the terminal, alternating between keyboards, trying to stop the breaking machine. The glass on the monitor began to crack, as the system was overheating.
Electricity arced along the device, as the machine fulfilled it’s purpose in transferring me into pure information, along with Technus, before sending us out.

The machine suddenly caught fire, and Bill was forced to run out the doors as the entire machine exploded in a shower of metal and glass.

The music stopped.

[|||]

Twilight Sparkle was having a fantastic day.

She had already finished all of her daily studying, and was currently resting on a plaid blanket under an evergreen. Spike, her baby dragon assistant, was munching on a topaz. The rest of Twilight’s friends were also participating in the picnic, while Rainbow Dash kept the skies clear.

All was calm and pristine, Celestia’s sun was sending down it’s gorgeous rays across the crisp summer grass, and there was not a cloud in sight. Pinkie Pie was scarfing down her fifth cupcake, and Applejack was laying against the tree taking a nap.

Rarity was reclining on her fainting couch, because she really didn’t want to lay in the grass. Fluttershy was feeding a few rabbits nearby with some carrots, and occasionally petting them.
They chatted animatedly about whatever came to mind, or came up in conversation.

Everything was going wonderfully, up until an explosion occurred in the Everfree Forest.

The boom was deafening, as the ponies were either knocked down or dove for cover as the shock wave from the blast rocked the surrounding area. Smoke billowed from the forest, and it was then that Rainbow Dash asked the question on everyone’s minds.

“What just happened?”

Author's Note:

AND WE BEGIN!

(EDIT: In response to how my later chapters are turning out, I'll tell you this: It gets better.)

Constructive criticism is appreciated.

Comments

[Cookie_Girl]

17 types. These types are Normal, Fire, Fighting, Water, Flying, Grass, Poison, Electric, Psychic, Rock, Ice, Bug, Dragon, Ghost, Dark, Steel, and Fairy.

There's 18 types, you forgot Ground. Nice story though.

[The Fiction Fanatic]

Looks at gif* that's uh, that's a porygon z.

[Mr_Moon]

6353348 and sometime in the future there will be more classes until Nintendo has run out of ideas on types

[Housecarl of Clan Drops]

The system began to break down, and music began to play from the machine.

I had some theories as to what was on the dubious disc in game. Bill's possibly-pirated Scribblenauts soundtrack was not very high on that list.