Sometimes They Call Me Super

by KorenCZ11

Finale VIII: Madness

Silicon Argent

---

“Father.”

The word was painful to say. Nearly as painful as the bones stabbing into my chest. The numbness in my hind legs that slowly travels up my spine, creeping closer day after day, threatening, promising to consume me. Pulling his face away from his computer, likely finalizing the transfer with all the little finishing touches he needed to add, he looked at me the same way he has since that fateful day. With a false life in dead eyes.

“What is it, Silicon?”

His drawl was slower than it had ever been, his movements jerky and unnatural. My powers were fading, and he was just as aware of that as I was. I… never wanted to do this. To finally have to say it to his face. Perhaps… things could’ve been different, had I done this on the day it was meant to be, but… even now, I am still merely a child.

“I… wanted to say goodbye. One more time.”

Slowly, carefully, father rose from his desk and approached me. For a stallion of fifty-eight years, he still had the physique of a miner from his early days. Tall and muscular, heavy enough to smash rocks with his bare hooves. When I was young, I wanted to be like that. In the blink of an eye, the dream was robbed from me by one of the very idols I admired. She did this to me! It’s because of her that these words have to leave me today, and finally, after all this time, I personally will make her suffer for it.

“Silicon?”

Blinking the rage away, I shook my head. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

“It’s alright, I… understand.” He coughed into his hoof and smoothed down his suit. A stallion like him always looked like a wall of black satin when he wore one. Despite the fortune blessed upon him, he was never truly made for this. “I said that there’s a better place for this conversation, is all.”

I frowned. A better place? Where else would we speak other than his office? I scratched at my neck. “And… where might that be?”

He motioned for me to follow, “Come, I’ll show you,” and started toward the elevator.

Quietly following behind, I took my place beside him and watched as he pressed the button for the first basement floor. The only thing we keep in there are vehicles, so I suppose he wants to drive somewhere. Checking my wrist, the time was 7:45AM, Sunday, October 20^th.

Nervously, I asked, “You do know my appointment is at noon today, don’t you?”

Father let out a breath and rolled his eyes. “Silicon, there hasn’t been a thing on my mind other than your ‘appointment’ today for the past year. Bear with me, you’ll understand once we arrive. You’ll have plenty of time to set your stage and… follow through with this as you’ve planned. I’ve already told you once that I have no intention of interfering, I shouldn’t need to tell you again.”

I coughed into my hoof. “Right, my apologies.”

I should know better than to doubt him. Nopony has been at my side through all of this other than him. No matter how despicable, no matter how cruel I could be, he was always there. Nopony believed in my project other than him, nopony understood my goals other than him, and it is for that very reason that I should put every ounce of faith and trust I have in him. Father would never betray me. Not after coming so far.

The elevator takes about five seconds to descend to the floor below, and from the office on the 75^th floor, that means were in here for six minutes at the minimum. And what a long six minutes it would be. Today is the day. Our expiration date. Our number being called. The Gallows open, the reaper swings. The end.

How could he have so little to say to me? What makes him so comfortable to wait? Why must he have a place in mind, knowing that today is very likely the second time he draws his breath last? Even if I succeed in making my mirror work for me, there’s no guarantee I’ll be able keep my connection with him if my original powers are altered in the slightest! And that’s assuming I survive in the first place! Then there’s the heroes to deal with… so many hurdles, so many obstacles to overcome, just to keep the flame burning a little longer, and to what end!?

All the bridges have been burned, the country will fall to pieces if I kill her, the people would never accept a new ruler, and after that display last week, what chance do I stand against a monster like the Radiant Sun?

Calm, Silicon. Breathe, Silicon. This is all known.

Things will go as they will. I don’t have to succeed, I’ve already won. Their lives have effectively been ruined for the next three generations. The world has seen them for what they are. Old hatred and new fear will spark a war with Equestria from all sides, and there will be nothing they can do but drown in flesh and blood under heaps of ash. Perhaps they cannot be killed, yes… but I can make them suffer, and I’ve already ensured that for the long game. With rage and sorrow like Marevelous… or, should I say Jaqueline Apple? She set after destroying Manehattan on her own.

If I can kill a few of them, maybe I can trigger the same reaction? Against one, Celestia was able to save her precious hero, but against two or more, would she be able to repeat her success? Oh, if only I had more time! I could find out which one of them that that filthy aristocrat loves the most and set them on her! What I wouldn’t give to see her lovely face writhing in anguish, how sweet it would be!

Ding!

The elevator door opened and showed us the garage. Father made a swift exit, and I was slow to drag my wheels along. If there is no other consolation to what happens today, at the very least, I will finally be free of these wretched things again. Scratching at me with every movement, making wounds I cannot feel, adding new marks to the body I have less and less control over as the days pass. I was a child! What kind of twister monster curses an eight-year-old with this!? More than half my life robbed from me for what!? Today, today, ooh, today…

“Silicon,” Father called. He’d already opened the door for me. I hadn’t even made it to the car.

“I’m coming.”

Once inside and my wheels strapped to the floor, the door shut and the engine roared to life. Custom made seats and inputs for me, a car tuned to Father’s specifications. With the right connections and enough bits, you can make anything happen. Well, almost anything.

Even with all this money, this fortune that arrived with a stroke of luck and a mountain of determination, I would give it away for more time. Just more time. Turn back the clock, start over, make it so I never wandered into that forsaken laboratory. Or, at least enough time to perfect the mirrors. Perhaps a way to force one to integrate with father and save his life. As long as I knew it would work, I could find a way. If I had the time, I could find a way. If I simply had the power, knew what I know now when this all started so many years ago, I could’ve done it.

For every blessing, there is a curse, isn’t there? This was the hoof I was dealt, wasn’t it? It was never about being fair in the eyes of us, it was just a lot we drew. Some game played by some twisted Goddess on whose stage we perform.

Was it simply fate? Destiny that brought this about? From the moment I was born, was this what I was conscripted to? Two thousand test subjects, two small towns with populations in the tens of thousands, a city with over a million ponies in it. All of them, by my hoof. A choice I made.

Yes… simple destiny. Just like I was born to be their killer, they were born to die for me. No right or wrong, no rhyme or reason, just sick, twisted cruelty. All a game. All a performance. Just stagecraft, nothing more.

And to think, with all these sacrifices, I was finally getting close to something akin to a cure for this absurd curse. Ha ha ha! Talk about Keynesian economics. Standing atop the piles of bodies, for a small fee, I can remove the ‘s’ from your curse. As long as you’re willing to crawl over the corpses, it can be yours, just like that.

“Is… something funny, Silicon?” Father asked.

Tilting my head to the side, I shrugged. “Everything is funny to me, I suppose. It’s all tragedy, therefore, it’s all comedy. Why cry when you can laugh?”

Stone-faced as usual, father nodded along. Perhaps he understood, perhaps he didn’t. I can never tell what he’s thinking. But maybe that’s what makes him so good at what he does. Catching small errors in my formulas, instructing little tweaks, seeing flaws in my materials. A sense for numbers and metals unlike anypony else. That’s how he is. That’s how he rose to be who he became. Screw the fakes, Stannum Argent is a hero worthy of praise. Taking this dead industrial city and turning it into a metropolitan paradise with his own two hooves, fighting back against Pursue Bank, giving livelihoods to tens of thousands of residents of Manehattan and Tin alike.

So many little ponies who drew well on their curses trying to use it to earn a bit of cash and clout, only for them all to turn tail and run the moment a real threat shows up. Father has never run from anything. Were the roles reversed, he’d be the one out there risking it all for the city he loves. And yet, even still, what are these Harmony ponies after?

Is it duty? Obligation? Virtue? Money? I don’t understand it. Blur, the Crow, Marevelous, they at least have families, but two of them don’t even live in Manehattan! They owe nothing to that city or those monsters they call princesses, so why do they do it? What about that heap of garbage is worth saving? Land is land, go somewhere else!

A rotten city filled with the scum of the Earth, I only wish I had more of them to use as ‘test subjects’ just for the chance to rid the world of their filth! Even Sahaquiel only managed to kill one of the heroes, what chance do I have of doing it? There is no point to winning now, but was there ever a chance in the first place? What happens if I do? Could I still save father if my powers are still similar enough after the transformation?

“We’re here.”

My train of thought broken, I finally looked out the window to see where he’d taken me. To my left and right, trees so dense it might as well have been night out. In front of me, however, a familiar wall of fog.

Of course he wanted to talk here. In hindsight, this is perhaps the only suitable place to talk, really. This is where it all began, after all.

Unhooking my wheels and opening the door, I dragged myself out of the car and stared at the wall before me. Fate. Stagecraft. Destiny. No reason it had to happen here other than those. A few steps toward the mist and father disappeared in the cloud.

Following behind, I walked on in myself. I’d been here when the fog was up, but it was the day we were here when it was clear that I’ll never forget. The first time I’d ever used my powers.

The earth shook. I stumbled, nearly falling on my face as the wind stirred and the fog was dispersed. Father hates conversation over the phone or via emails or messengers. A stallion who likes to speak face to face. Not even fog could keep him from looking me in the eyes when we talk.

He helped me back up to standing and we walked to the edge of the little lake. Despite the powerful stomp, the fog had only managed to leave in a bubble around us. Blue darkness faded into gray mist that rose and swirled above it, the outlines of trees that covered the shores in the distance.

On a clear night, some sort of rock that forms at the bottom of this lake glows and sparkles in the moonlight. It truly is like magic seeps out of the earth here. But now, as like most of the year, it was murky and unclear.

“Do you remember that night, Silicon?” he asked.

“Of course. I could never forget.”

Father? Father!? What’s wrong!? No, no, no! Don’t do this to me! I can’t do this without you! Come back! Come back! Come back!!!

“It hasn’t left my mind since it happened.”

Father nodded. “Right, of course. Your grandfather, Germanium Argent, went out the same way. Bad eating habits, high cholesterol, too fond of tobacco.”

“That sounds familiar, don’t you think?” I asked with a laugh.

“Assuredly. I was my father’s son, after all. Were it not for the education my mother forced me to get, I would have grown up to be him. He had no talent for math, but the stallion was something of a metallurgist. Pick a spot, he’d spend a day digging, and the next day, he’d come back with a new vein of ore he’d find a way to sell to somepony.

“My father knew how to talk to ponies, approached them with no-nonsense deals and fair prices. Unfortunately, he simply didn’t know how to maintain a business. When everything relies on a pony with an irreplaceable skill, then everything falls apart when that pony goes. My talent wasn’t the same as his.

“You have to take care of yourself in order to keep a ship afloat if you’re the captain. Had he not the sense to leave behind a map for me, I never would’ve found the silver that got me out of Rossfeller’s hooves, and nothing I’ve built over the course of my life would’ve ever come to be, you included.”

He took a step forward and touched the water with his hoof. The ripple it sent out clashed with the other ripples from his earlier stomp and settled most of them. Bubbles from deep below still gargled up to the surface and sent the water back to its light babbling. Calm noise in a quiet forest that would be eerie if it weren’t for the car humming behind us.

“I’ve lived a long life, Silicon.”

I clicked my tongue. “Your life is hardly up to the standard for Equestria. Seventy-nine years is the average! There is absolutely no reason you should—”

Father stomped the ground again, though not as hard as he did before. It shook me to my core, all the same. “I have accomplished everything I’ve ever wanted to, Silicon. Perhaps, I’d be happier if I lived long enough to see you become a father, but I’ve known that that future has been impossible since the day you lost your legs. Argent ends with you, and despite it all, I’m content with that. What I am not content with is—”

“Do not bring this up to me! Not again! We will not have this discussion on your deathbed! We will never have this discussion again! Today is the day, you know that!”

Tired, Father let out a breath. “Very well then. If you won’t hear me, then that’s all there is to it. I only wish you’d let me die when it was my time. You could’ve done so much more with the time you had if you hadn’t gone on this crusade for me in the first place, but I digress.” He waved a hoof in the air and then turned back to the lake.

The bubbling lake was deafening. Surely, there were wild animals that lived here, weren’t there? A body of water like this would be an easy place to live by for them. Perhaps there is something about this place that they fear. An instinctual knowledge that there’s something sacred here. Something special. Something magical.

Perhaps that’s why this place is where my personal hell all started.

“Silicon, I want you to end it, here.”

Dead in the eyes. Dark orange, the same as mine, determined and unyielding.

“You don’t mean that.”

He didn’t respond. Didn’t move. Not a muscle, not an inch.

“You do not mean that!”

“I did not stutter!” he shouted back. He never yells at me. He never challenges me, he never questions my plans. Why is he doing this now, of all times?

“Silicon, you know I hate to repeat myself. I will say it once more for you, however.” He started to close the distance between us. I backed away. My wheel got caught on something, however, and wouldn’t let me escape. Frozen, locked in place, my father stood before me. A hulking mass of a stallion, a wall of black satin, asking me for something I didn’t want to give.

“Three years ago, I was supposed to die here. Today, I am asking you to correct your mistake and let nature take its course. Don’t let some science project force you to lose your mind and let it end like that, look me in the eye, say your goodbye, and let. me. Die.”

I couldn’t look away. His eyes, his aura, he demanded my attention, held it captive at his whim and refused to let go. A familiar feeling welled up at the corners of my eyes.

“I can’t!”

He put a hoof on my shoulder. The kind, gentle hoof that’s always been there to guide me. “You can, son. I know you can. Let me go. Set me free. Do it with your own hooves.”

I wrapped my forelegs around him as best I could and cried into his chest. “Why would you make me do this here? I never wanted it to end! Things shouldn’t have ended like this, it’s not fair!”

Resignation settling into his shoulders, he reciprocated my hug. My… last hug. “I know, son, I know. However, even if things had been different, even if things hadn’t gone the way they did, chances are, I still wouldn’t have made it this far. It wasn’t your fault that I ended up this way, it was mine.”

He was never wrong. Father was always sound of mind. Always quick to think of solutions before asking about when or why. What happens happens, the past cannot be changed. Keep your eyes forward, don’t look back. That was always the kind of stallion he was.

I released him and wiped at my eyes. “V-very well then. If… if this is what you want…”

Taking a few steps back, he nodded. “Thank you, Silicon.”

I took one last look at my father, then felt for my powers. His life beats in tandem with my own heart. The only life left in my possession, the last one I’ll ever hold this way. A cage of bones keeping a soul in place. In one last breath, the fingers released, and the beating reduced to one.

“No!”

I tried to catch him as he fell, undo what I’d done, but it was already too late.

When I’d finally realized time was ticking away, just as it always had been, I remembered how we’d arrived at this lake. It was his car we took. A vehicle I cannot drive. I don’t have the limbs to operate it, it’s not automatic, I couldn’t do it even if I had at least one of my hind legs. He… he didn’t…? No, no, there’s no reason to cast that suspicion on him! That was his favorite car, he likely just wanted to drive it one last time. It’s not as if the road here is… very straight or well known…

I swallowed. He… he never did want me to go through with this. He wanted me to have all the time I have left. It’s only a thirty minute drive back to the Tower, but can I make the trot back that far? No, no, no!

Eyes turned on the corpse, I rushed to grip him by his suit. “You did this on purpose, didn’t you!? Do you want to see me suffer? Watch from above while no consequences befall you for it!?” I punched his face over and over again. “How could you!? You said you wouldn’t interfere, but here you are sticking your hoof in my eye even in death! You wanted this, you wanted this, you wanted this!”

By the time my hoof started bleeding, the skin on his cheek had barely ruptured. Even to a dead pony, my punches aren’t worth anything. This cursed weak body of mine has never been anything more than a nuisance to anypony who comes into contact with me. Even that attractive young Harmony spy looked at me as nothing more than a plaything!

If only I had time, if only I had the power, they would all fall to their knees and bow before me! If it weren’t for her, if it weren’t for her, if it weren’t for her!

And then, I remembered. My jacket was in the passenger seat. Tin is always a cold city this time of year, and though it bothers me less and less as I lose more feeling, I always bring it when I go out. I keep something important in there.

The humming vehicle, still happily rumbling as it idled by the lake, could still be of use to me. I dragged my body along the pine needle covered ground, getting my wheels stuck in mud and sliding along inch by inch, toward the car. Door open, jacket tossed over the back of the seat, I could see its outline.

Hope springs eternal in the breast of stallions, and welling anew within me, I used it to take hold of my last chance.

It was… something of a good luck charm. The very first one I made with my own two hooves. Wracking my brain, trial after trial, concoction after concoction, this was the first one that ever worked right. Mercury, charged disruption crystals, a protein constructed and rewritten from its original purpose of attempting to cure heart disease, heated to a melding point and cooled into a single, functioning piece.

I wonder if she’s figured it out yet? Without the protein, the mirror has no true instruction to do anything, so the magic simply causes the virus to go out of control and do what it will to the host, much like the enabling gas stored in all my traps across the country. With instruction to meld with the heart and flush the host’s veins, effectively restarting the system, there’s at least a chance the virus integrates in a non-destructive way. The more I tamper with the protein chain and the magic ratio, the closer I seem to get to something that works as intended more often than not.

This close to making even the Goddess’s creations bend to my will, and the chance robbed from me all because I was too weak to let father go.

Glaring at the corpse, I spat. “You’re right. I should’ve let you die all those years ago. You’ve led me to this point of desperation just as much as anypony else, taking years off my life just to keep your rotting corpse around! Perhaps Mister Belle was not yet ready to take over for you at the time, perhaps Argent Industries would have seen hard times and I would not have had the money to carry out my experiments, but I still would’ve had more time!

“How could I have ever thought anypony was on my side!? The Princess caused this, researchers with soft hearts abandoned us, Mother abandoned us, and now you’ve abandoned me! It was always up to me to carry out this plan, it was always up to me to look for a cure, and it will be up to me to finally put the monsters down!

“It’s all on my shoulders. It always has been. A crippling weight that’s been eating away at me ever since I’d lost everything twelve years ago.

“Once hundred percent, fifty percent, five percent, less than one percent, none of them matter! Any chance to exact my revenge is worth taking! There’s nothing left to hold me back anymore!”

With a final breath, I took the mirror in both hooves, and pressed it against my chest.