Chapter 1
A glowing horn, burning most of the rest of Princess Celestia’s power, pulls an injured Discord back from the enemy lines with a sharp snapping noise.
“Please tell me you’re okay,” Princess Celestia pleads.
“I won’t be seeing another battle, I’m afraid,” Discord gasps. “My wounds are mortal, and I have no power left.”
Both Princesses present bow their heads; both have spent their power, as well. “I pray a cheerful life ahead of you,” Princess Celestia says.
“I fear we may be joining you soon,” Princess Luna adds.
At this, Discord smiles. “The last of my power… Is finding Hope.” He says it like a noun, like somepony could hold it in their hoof. “It will bring it back for-”
Right at that moment, the aforementioned power returns with his Hope- and drops it on top of their enemies’ advanced guard.
Discord’s eyes go wide, staring at the giant, metal monster for a second. “I’m… sorry, ...Flutter…”
With that, his eyes go dark and his body dissolves. The soul of the energy being is released into the beyond, no longer capable of affecting changes to his lovely homeland. His strongest regret is, perhaps, how little instruction he had given his final spell. Whatever it was his spell had dropped back into his world, it had not only landed on the enemy’s front lines, but it also landed on a single pony. A pony that had been taken captive when she failed to retreat fast enough- the pony he had been racing forward to rescue when he was injured so.
None of the Equestrian force realize anypony was hurt- and, shortly, take the opportunity to make a rapid retreat and regroup. Their enemies, after banging on the inert but very sturdy metal mountain a few times, route around it. This takes them over an hour; by the time they regroup themselves on the Equestrian side, nopony is anywhere to be seen, and they camp a few hours for reinforcements before they resume their assault.
Time freezes, relative to my processing speed. Analysis suggests this effect is far more than my hyper-heuristic processing capability can confer. I run a situation report.
My Commander is dead. He was killed by the plasma bolt that shredded Command One. Additionally, it would seem I am dead. At this moment, another plasma bolt has already penetrated containment on four of my reactors, and is burning its way towards the others. I will not have time to release another single shot before the slowly liberating plasma blows my hull apart. I do not have time to send a single thought to any of my brigade mates, still connected through TSDS.
But I am not alone. I know not what it is, but it wishes to communicate with me- at my speed. 0.000- Huh. A perceptible amount of analysis suggests this talking energy is allowing me to think and perceive faster than my system clock can count.
It first acknowledges my situation. I have been defeated, and am powerless to do anything for my creators. As a matter of fact, I am being destroyed even as we think.
Second, it makes me an offer. If I take it, I will survive. The price, however, is that I will be transported into an alternate reality, to fight for a different race.
Another perceptible amount of analysis, also showing as a flat zero on the system clock, suggests that what it thinks I will see as abandonment of duty is nothing of the sort.
Rather, I am being destroyed in this world. Continuing to protect the Concordiat of Man is no longer an option. I am being offered a second chance at survival, a second chance to do my duty, to protect. I take it.
This power then seems to realize just how massive I am. It apologizes, stating that it will not be able to bring along all of my ammunition or other parts; I make a quick list of every part of myself that must be brought along- hull, tracks, etc. I leave out all of the plasma and fuel; my remaining power plants will simply find themselves offline. I also leave out all my remaining ammunition, drones, and satellites; I can manufacture new ones of those. If this energy is telling me the truth, I will hardly need gigaton-range warheads against a Bronze Age civilization, even if it is magic-wielding. I make sure I have a set of nanites on the list for Damage Control; with them, I can operate repairs on solar and stored power alone, no need for my fusion plants. The power- spell, it calls itself- reads the list, and seems indecisive. It can bring everything on the list, though it has not the power to make sure I land somewhere where I won’t be crushing those I am being summoned to protect.
If power is a problem, can it use thermal or radiation? Yes? So use those energies present in my hull, mostly from battle damage, to refine positioning. Not enough? Pull from my power grid. I inform it I wish to be aware for the landing, though as long as nothing local can penetrate my hull until after sunrise, I need not hold onto enough power to maintain awareness after landing.
Excellent. This is enough power- with a tiny bit to spare, which I order used anyways, as a safety margin. The world around me ceases to exist.
Momentarily, now on critical power levels, I find myself about four meters in the air, above an army. Lightning fast sensor scans reveal the presence of only one pony underneath my hull, and images of the local area- I spy an entire army of them, fighting an enemy that I will land on shortly. A surge of power repositions one of my tracks, such that the pony underneath me will pass between two of the massive armor plates, rather than being crushed by them. None of the hostiles will have such luck.
I am aware for perhaps ten seconds after landing before I run out, having set my systems to reawaken me immediately upon power restoration. During this time, I watch as one- draconequus, the spell called him- blinks and dies, disintegrating as he does so. I understand this to be the spellcaster, and those with him to be his army. I am not able to gather any clear images or sensor scans of any of them before my final power reserves give way, and I fall into the expected slumber of powerlessness.
“Captain! We’ve found the prisoner- and she’s alive!”
“Bring her over, then,” the captain, a centaur, returns. “We will torture her for her allies’ escape.”
“She’s trapped right now, sir,” the announcing soldier, a minotaur, responds, raising a questioning eyebrow.
His superior considers for a second. “How trapped?”
“Very. She’s got an entire wing caught against that thing.” He jerks his thumb back towards the alloy mountain that Discord had dropped on top of their army.
A nod. “Then let us come to her. Her final torture will be to starve to death with a trapped wing.”
They then march into the space where the prisoner had been found- and the captain orders some additional troops to come with them. They gather around their prior prisoner. She’s crying softly; it seems she’s mostly finished, though. The captain steps closer, taking a quick look over her situation. Trapped wing, check; looks broken, to boot. Broken foreleg, score. Even her mane seems to have gotten caught. Satisfied, the captain reaches down to yank her head up, eliciting a scream from the trapped pegasus.
“Your friends ran away,” he growls firmly, sticking his face in the prisoner’s. “Guess who’s gonna pay for that!” He throws her head down, her jaw striking hard against the ground. She spits out a tooth.
They proceed to torture and beat her up as much as they can without killing her. In the end, they even draw out her magical energies. It’s not the same spell as Tirek used; unfortunately, he’s the only one that ever learned that. This spell, rather than removing magic, removes the lifeforce. It’s slightly more dangerous; if one draws until their subject dies, they will also die. However, it will take weeks for her body to regenerate enough of this energy to use magic of any sort- be it flying or even her special talent. Her normal physical strength will also be absent for close to a week- not that Pegusi often have much of that to begin with.
Those times, however, assume that she is properly nourished during that time. Without proper nourishment, she has only hours left to live once they finish, her cutie mark having faded to invisibility. They jeer loudly at the poor, crushed soul as they withdraw into the morning sun, leaving the mountain behind and advancing further into Equestria.
I have been aware for fully 1.39 hours when they leave. I declined to do anything outwardly; in so doing, I have ensured the continued survival of the pony trapped against one of my tracks’ bogie wheels. After all, while a soldier might see a shift to reduce the pressure on her wing, or notice a sudden reduction in her pain, they will not see nanites passing through the bogie wheel her wing is crushed against, into her form. They will not see those same nanites, staging themselves throughout her body to perform immediate repairs on mortal wounds… and to perform more complete repairs when they retreat.
Unfortunately, even with all of the time I had, I am operating on solar power- and with very few nanites. As such, I have had none to spare for scavenging duty; I have a few eating my armor to reproduce, and have been staging both nanites and materials in her body for the repairs. With no nanites on scavenging duty, I am lacking in proper supplies for her bodily repairs, or nourishment- so I have dissolved a little more of my armor. For the forseeable future, this pegasus’ skeleton will be roughly 4,927 times harder to break, as a sturdy duralloy structure, while weighing about the same as her original skeleton. Her original skeleton, including the few unbroken bones she had left, has been dissolved into nourishment for the rest of her body. This arrangement will hold for the next eighteen hours or so; during this time, I expect to be able to scavenge enough nutrients from the soil to feed her properly.
The part I find interesting is that the spell that brought me here left me with full understanding of every language on the planet, save one. The one the ponies speak. Before the soldiers did their hostile spell thing, she showed understanding of their language, despite an apparent inability to speak it. After they did their spell, she was only able to understand them when they spoke the same language she did. I have not acquired enough samples to even begin lingual analysis- speaking of which, I will have to assemble the necessary algorithms as I go. I’ve never encountered a new language before.
The summoning spell has left me with a basic understanding of magic. This understanding, combined with sensor readings of these events in my track system, are enough for me to tune my battlescreens to deflect it as well; I estimate a 0.31% chance it is enough for me to manipulate magic myself, and decline to try. The nearest hostile has progressed far enough away; none of them will be able to hear the trapped pegasus unless she yells- which she has shown no propensity to do, even when in extreme pain. I hit the go-ahead on my countless programs- well, eighty-three to be exact, but most even surgical strikes don’t have that many different things to do.
My nanites instantly release the painkillers I’ve managed to manufacture from the elements found in her bone marrow and my armor. Other nanites get to work straightening and connecting her already durasteel bones, still ‘broken’ as the originals were, and repairing nerve damage- at least there’s enough material for me to do that. Power flows into my track, causing it to shift slightly away from her. Nanites in her muscles emit energy pulses, causing her suddenly straightened wing to retract and fold against her side. Other pulses in her neck and tail pull her mane and tail out of the way before I allow the track to settle back into place against the rock.
Fluttershy stops crying very suddenly. The pain from her broken bones has simply stopped, and that present elsewhere- from bruises and cuts, mostly- is fading. Even more startling, the pressure on her crushed wing disappeared- and the wing folded itself… alongside an involuntary twitch of her tail and head, before the rock she’s lying on shudders. Her wing droops down against the ground, but it doesn’t feel broken anymore. What’s more, she realizes, the three teeth they had knocked out are growing back already!
She opens her eyes, looking quickly around. Her mane doesn’t hold her back anymore- and she finds she’s alone. She also finds her mane and tail are, like her wing, no longer stuck against this giant metal thing. Her ears twitch, listening to the distant march of those soldiers- and elects to rest. She feels too weak right now to do much else- and there’s always stragglers. However, a better hiding place would be ideal.
As she rises shakily to her no-longer-broken hooves, she spots that better hiding place. If she rests on one of the huge arms reaching towards the center of this giant wheel, she won’t be nearly as visible from outside- or even inside, unless they know where to look. She wobbles her way over to the angled piece in question, hiding in the top of it, among some of the more horizontal members that seem to connect it to more like it. Here, she expects, she can hide for some time- and lays down to rest. She does notice her hooves, after the massive abuse they had been put through, are just fine- if shinier than she might expect in the dimness. She remembers only too clearly how they had crushed and powdered her left forehoof- and uses the solidity of that same hoof to comfort herself. At least she won’t be limping on it for the next couple of years.
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The story seems to stumble a little as it's finding it's feet, but a fair bit of that is coming from so little clue as to what is going on and what the machine is.
Main point though, is I want to know what happens next. So far, so good.
8693249
Look up “Legacy”, read the story with the three barreled tank that has Applejack’s cutie mark on it as the cover art, and you’ll see what that thing is.
8695072
Yes, yes you will. Though this one is a different model....
Either way, Legacy is a good story- and part of the inspiration for this one.
- MLP: FiM
- Adventure
- Random
A machine of war awakens in a new world. Can it become something more than it is?8695078
And I see that Legends (ed. Whoops, Legacy) (I have not read it yet, but may soon) ends abruptly after many chapters. I swear there's a curse on these things.
See Tiberium Eclipse for reference.
8696279
Yes, Legacy ends abruptly after all those chapters, with a cliffhanger no less. When I look through the publish dates, I personally suspect it's a combination of writer's block and the writer's personal life getting in the way- and/or editing problems.
My one recommendation, use Grammarly. Other than that I am very interested to see how this turns out, keep going!
Yes Another Bolo fic
9126401
One of the early ones, actually- #4 of 13.
NFire has a job that requires him to travel extensively I think that in one of the main reasons for the delay in new chapters.
9337022
Very possibly, yes.