25 - History
Chapter 25
History
“Oh, thank Celestia you’re back.”
“Don’t thank her just yet, we gotta get out of here.”
“What? Why?”
“Police just raided the building three blocks over searching for rebels.”
“Wait…was that why the screaming started?”
“Yeah. They shot everyone inside, and they’re coming here next.”
3375 E.C. After survivors from the Border Worlds flee back into the Core, news quickly spreads of the NSR’s actions. Civil war erupts on seven Core worlds.
I can’t begin to describe how weird it felt to be flying the ship on the trip home. With Estoc gone Celestia knew where, and Jess flying alongside us in her cruiser, the pilot’s cabin of the Scrap Bandit felt almost empty. I spent the hours almost jumping at the ping of the scanner every time it fired, partly out of a newfound paranoia, and partly because I kept expecting Jess to barge into the cabin to complain about the prince hogging the holo. I actually missed it. Instead I was left with a silent ship, and quiet neighbors.
Tick and Nightshade didn’t make much noise when left to themselves, and neither of them were very talkative for the majority of the hours we spent crossing the black. Tick spent most of the flight in the engine room, finishing her optimizations to the power systems while Nightshade contented himself to meditating in the cargo bay, a behavior that I found both new and yet completely expected at the same time. He didn’t like it when I asked him about it, and that was about as far as I got pursuing the issue. On my brief walkabouts between jumps, I checked in on him from time to time and noticed that he’d started mixing potions with his clock doc, using ingredients that I assumed he had acquired from Four Corners. At one point I saw him take one, different from the reddish orange potions I’d seen him use before. It was a glass full of roiling pink liquid, and it made him shiver and gag while he drank it. I left feeling mildly disturbed as the taste of a very particular concoction came back to mind.
While I was stuck recovering, Tick had been busy. Left to herself with the Bandit for two whole weeks, she’d nearly completed her promised overhaul. Everything thing on the board was green for the first time I could ever recollect. The drones were online and updated with new operating systems that actually functioned for a change and didn’t crash every few minutes. Things had been replaced, supplies had been replenished, and everything had this pristine touch of newness to it that absolutely clashed with with my understanding of my ship.
The sensation left me feeling conflicted. On one hoof I was intensely pleased. The Bandit had finally started feeling like an actual starship instead of a hobbled together junker. On the other I couldn’t help but feeling just a little bit offended. I…really can’t explain why. The strangeness of it all made me feel more than a little out of touch, and coupled with the fact that I had just survived a traumatic experience that took away two weeks of my life and more, the newness of it all rankled me. It only served to remind me of what I had lost and how fast things were changing without me. I wanted to come home to something at least remotely familiar—something that hadn’t changed since my life got upended in a single night. The Bandit was my anchor; I’d known it for years. It was always stupid, maybe, but I had learned to appreciate that stupid. I tried reminding myself that this was the way the ship should have been from the get go, if Junkyard had invested the bits in keeping it properly cleaned and maintained. I should have been grateful, and I was, to an extent, but the changes couldn’t have come at a worse time, especially with…everything. With everything she’d done, I owed Tick a lot. Though I don’t know what kind of favors I could possibly repay her with. There was nothing I could do for her at the moment, at least. Still, I couldn’t help but notice the guilty look on her face every time we crossed paths onboard the ship. That would have to go, somehow, but that would be a conversation for later.
Seeing as we were near enough to the right territory, I took the time to make a last stopover to collect Joe’s whiskey, and was pleasantly surprised to find that it was the easiest job I had ever taken. I arrived at the station in the Core where the dispatch was located, sidled up to the dock, and the customs pony took care of the rest. In. Out. Done. I didn’t even have to leave my ship.
That’s it. That was the whole damn thing. I had wasted all that time putting it off, and that was all I had to do. I left in record time with two pallets of whiskey sitting in my cargo hold and I didn’t even have to lift a feather. It was better than a milk run, and at the rate I was going, I’d be at Winter’s Edge in time for dinner. Station time, anyway.
*****
When I arrived back at Winter’s Edge, I had a big debate over whether or not I should just get a good night’s sleep before finishing all the errands I had left to do. Joe needed his whiskey, and I wasn’t keen on making him wait for it any longer. I also needed to talk to Fritter. I had sent both of them a message as soon as I landed. But with my hooves finally on the deck It was extremely tempting to just tuck in and do it in the morning. I opted to do my job instead. First things first, Joe’s liquor.
Joe’s bar looked the same it always did, a mix of styles, slowly upgraded over time yet kept perfectly clean and presentable by the pony who ran it. It had a lived-in feel to it, beat in by countless customers and who knew how many sob stories. I had a rush of nostalgia as I walked in through the front door. I scanned around the room for a moment and spotted Joe at his place behind the counter, chatting up one his patrons while putting the finishing touch on one of his specials. As the bell dinged, Joe casually glanced in my direction.
“Welcome to Donut Joe’s Bar,” he said. Joe blinked at me for a few seconds until a smile washed over his face. “Horizon! Good ta see—” His eyes met my wings and his smile slipped, his mouth dropping open as his eyes widened, “you,” he finished slowly.
I tried to ignore the look of pity on his face. “Hey Joe,” I said calmly. “Guess what I brought?” I hefted dispatch into the air with my WAND and gave my friend a tired smirk.
Joe set the drink down, and look at his client, “Drink up, Clive, I gotta take care of somethin and I might be awhile.” The pony nodded response, taking the drink and contenting himself to reading something from a tablet on the counter. With a flash of his horn, the counter opened and Joe strode out, the sand colored pony stopping just a few paces in front of me.
Joe looked at me with the most compassion I’ve seen from any pony I’d ever known. “What happened son?” Joe asked quietly. “In fact, why don’t you come on back and tell me all about it. I expect you’re needin a stiffy right about now.” He waved me over with a foreleg and turned toward the back. I followed.
The backroom was still as barebones as I remembered. The microwave and coffee maker hadn’t moved, but the cabinet door had been replaced. As I entered, Joe pulled me into a tight hug, and then fixed me with a look as if he was seeing ghosts, and not the scary kind.
“I got your whiskey, finally,” I said with a half-assed laugh.
Joe scowled. “Screw the whiskey, boy,” he said, pulling a chair out for me with his magic, “take a seat, and tell me the whole story.”
I sat down, a sense of deja vu briefly overwhelming me. The last time we had a conversation like this, I was running from the law. “It’s…complicated,” I said.
“I’m a patient buck, Horizon, take your time. But please, tell me,” Joe replied. He sat there with concern in his eyes.
I was having trouble meeting them, feeling again like a young colt in front of his father. “Remember back at my trial, when we found out who framed me was a changeling?” I said quietly, staring at the empty coffee cup on the little backroom table.
Joe nodded, “I remember. Real shock, too.”
“I met another one,” I simply said.
“The whole story, Horizon, don’t spare nuthin,” Joe said.
I sighed. “Fritter tipped me off to a lead on Four Corners. I went to investigate.”
Joe scowled. “Did he now,” he drawled. His tone hardened. “Did that featherhead get you into this?!”
I stopped him before he could go off. “No, Joe, it,” I sighed, “Fritter didn’t cause this. We took care of the lead, this...this happened afterward.”
“What happened?”
So I told him. Every little thing, every little detail, everything I could remember, I let it all out.
Joe closed his eyes as he listened and took a deep breath. Exhaling slowly, he kept his eyes locked on me, looking like he’d never smile again. When I’d told him what it all cost and what Tick had done for me, Joe sat back and whistled.
“Really? Okay, son, you go find that filly and you tell her that if she ever wants a drink on the house she can have it, ‘cause that’s a mighty nice thing she did for you. It’s a shame there ain’t more rich folk like her. They could do a load of good.”
I laughed. “Right?”
Joe looked thoughtful for a moment, and then looked at me quietly. “Did I ever tell you what my real name was?”
I looked up, blinking. “Uh, Donut Joe?” I offered.
Joe rolled his eyes, “Oh, my Ce—No, my name ain’t Donut Joe. Ya’ll just started callin me that and never quit.”
Wait…I did?
Joe chuckled weakly, “but ‘nuf about that, Horizon. My real name is Clementine. Clementine Orange.” What little smile he had died on his face. “I was married once upon a time. Had a wife and a nice little filly, just like Fritter.”
Joe’s eyes fell to the table with a sad smile. “And they were my world.”
The silence stretched as I realized what he meant. “I-I’m sorry.”
Joe looked at me and shook his head, “Don’t you say that, boy. You didn’t do nothin wrong. Just bad circumstances, that’s all. They went after you because you were a Fader, didn’t they.”
I merely nodded. “That’s pretty much what Fritter and I have been finding out.”
Joe took a breath. “They got mine, too,” he said. “The difference between us, Horizon, is that you’re still young enough to fight. I know yer a fighter. I see you runnin off inta who knows where and you still hardly even blink at the danger.” He chuckled softly, “even if ya swear otherwise.”
I couldn’t really argue against that.
“Just know that I’m no stranger to loss, Horizon. I’ve seen some dark times, and these are dark times, but I know also that something like this, you ain’t gonna let it set you back.”
Joe smiled sadly and pulled me into a warm hug.
“Now just let it all out.”
So I did.
*****
Ages. It felt like it had been ages since I had last cried. A lot had happened within such a short timespan that I was having trouble keeping up with it all. When I was with Joe, er, Clem—ah fuck it, I just can’t drop the nickname—When I was with Joe, the professional distance, or whatever that weird, emotionally numb sensation I had, broke. We talked at length afterward. Mostly about private things. Joe took a moment to bid his friend at the bar farewell before we continued. I learned a lot about Joe then.
Joe used to live in the heartland of the Earth Pony Republic back when he was a proud member of the Orange clan, one of the few influential families that were large enough to oppose the Apple family in Congress, or at least the subset of the Apple mafia that controlled the EPRW Congress. He was a lot more bold back then—‘A different pony’ in his own words. He married young to a fader named Radiance and together they had a filly named Sundancer and planned to raise her into a proper lady. A few year later, the murder happened.
Radiance was friends with another fader, whose family kept going on about being ‘hunted’. Joe said that when he first met them, they seemed to be paranoid. They would jump at shadows, insist on checking everything for listening devices, and were generally the most anxious houseguests that you had ever laid eyes on. They had warned him, under no uncertain terms, that he and his family should lay low, and try to disappear from the grid. It was the most awkward night in his memory, and one that he only wished he had taken seriously.
Twelve years after their marriage, Radiance and Sunshine vanished from a grocery store in the middle of the day. Joe was working that day, minding his own bar while his family ran out to get more supplies. When they didn’t return, Joe appropriately freaked. He invoked the family name in order to push the investigation, which finally ended when their bodies were found a week later.
Clementine Orange died that day. Over several of the following years, Joe drank himself into debt. Faced with the prospect of being corralled into one of the EPR’s infamous debt prisons, Joe sold the bar, and fled to the Rim in order to escape them. He spent the next decade rebuilding his life, getting clean, and opening the franchise bar that became his namesake.
It was a lot to take in all at once. After he finished, I asked him if the pain from loss ever got better.
He nodded sadly and simply told me there were some wounds that not even time could heal, sort of an ache in your chest that never leaves you—a scar on your soul. He said it felt better now than it used to, but the feeling never left. There wasn’t a day that went by that he wished things could be different, but he knew from experience that chasing the past only led to more trouble. He wasn’t a fighter, not like me, although I don’t know if I really agreed with that assumption. So he simply settled down and accepted his lot in life, and hid. That was why he thought I was reckless. I had a hard time disagreeing with him.
When we had finished talking, we said our farewells and I went home depressed.
*****
I needed a shower after meeting with Joe, well, I needed a shower regardless, but moreso after my tear streaked face finally trudged through my apartment door. The warm water pooled around my hooves while I sat in the shower, contemplating everything while idly watching the way the water droplets left streaks running down the vanes of my fake wings. I couldn’t feel them at all. A little pressure here and there, but what used to be an acute sensation felt like a void at my spine. Half numb, is what I would have liked to call the feeling. I could still move my wings, as the subtle shifting of the metal appendages would attest. Half the time I was in the shower I simply stared at them, extending and retracting the metal bones at the elbow, still having trouble coming to terms with the fact they were attached to me.
Why did this happen to me?
I wished that I could feel something through the cold metal. The wings might have been connected to my nervous system, even grafted into the bone structure that they had to reinforce after my operation, but that didn’t return the sensation of touch to my wingtips. I’d never be able to graze a feather over a lover’s kiss or feel the rush of air over my wings on a long dive. Such sensation was lost to me, now and forever, and the knowledge of that felt like a punch to the gut that wouldn’t go away.
The worst part was the latency. Modern technology may have been impressive, but even the best hardware still suffered when it came to translating intent. Tick had made sure I got the best for replacements, but the wings I had still took just a fraction of a second longer to react than they did when I was whole. It made me feel sluggish in the worst sense. Reaction speed was prized among pegasi, it’s what kept us alive during flight. It’s what allowed us to do the insane aerial maneuvers we were known for. Supposedly the instinct was genetic, bred from prey instincts from who knew how many millennia back. Having the delay, some disconnect between the time I reacted to something and the time my wings would move, was maddening, and so was the water temperature. My shower had gone cold.
I turned off the water and toweled off, making sure to flick any residual droplets out of the joints of my wings so they wouldn’t rust. Granted, they were supposed to be waterproof, but I wasn’t taking any chances with my luck. The last thing I wanted was for my wings to get any worse.
I wanted to sleep so badly after that, hoping for just a moment that maybe I wouldn’t have nightmares tonight, bringing back some foggy memories of a small dark room, flashing eyes, and pain. I wanted to sleep, but what I wanted and what I had to do were two different things, and at that moment, I couldn’t wait to see Fritter any longer. I needed answers, and he was already expecting me. Still, I couldn’t help but wonder as I left the safety of my apartment, what else would my answers cost me?
*****
A short while later, found me standing just outside Fritter’s apartment door, patiently waiting for him to answer his buzzer while I idly tapped a hoof against the metal decks of the floor.
I heard a commotion on the other side. A sudden scramble of what sounded like hoofbeats before something hard fell, and I heard Fritter, or at least I assumed it was Fritter, swear. The intercom next to his door flared to life.
“Who’s there?” Fritter answered with less than his usual zest, his voice crackling over the speaker.
“It’s me, Fritter. I’m sorry I couldn’t make it sooner, my life’s been getting a little complicated,” I said.
“Horizon?!” Fritter’s voice exploded over the intercom, overloading the speaker. “You made it! Oh thank Celestia… hang on a sec while I get the door!” The intercom clicked off. I stood in front of the door waiting patiently until until I the door chimed and slid neatly open.
Fritter stood on the other side, looking like death warmed over. He blinked at me wearily, before his eyes caught a glance of my wings and a look of comprehension swept over his face.
“Oh, my stars,” he breathed. His eyes widening as he took a step back. Fritter swallowed hard. “What happened?!”
“With all your contacts, you really don’t know?” I said.
Fritter’s ears drooped. “I didn’t… I mean, uh, I’m... I’m not the best... okay?” he said averting his eyes. “Why don’t you come inside. We… we’ve got business to talk about.” Fritter slowly stepped out of the way.
I stepped inside and the door closed behind me. We sat down in his living room while I told Fritter the whole story, and he processed it as fast as he was able. The poor buck wasn’t kidding when he said he wasn’t getting enough sleep. A more accurate statement would have been that he wasn’t getting any sleep. His eyes seem to blink of out sync while he worked through my sentences. His mane poked out at odd angles as he swayed heavily on his hooves, looking very much like he was falling in place. The bags under his eyes were large enough for a weekend trip, and by the faint smell coming off of him, he’d been drinking too. When I’d finished, Fritter stared numbly into the distance.
“I never knew,” Fritter said, shaking his head. “I’ve been so swamped with everything that I figured I must have just missed your message or something. Sweet Celestia, I must have missed Jess’ message too.”
“What have you been working on?” I asked.
Fritter looked at me with tired eyes. “My worst nightmare,” he said vacantly.
I set my jaw. “Where’s your family, Fritter?”
He looked back. “Oh, they’re here, Pearl’s just putting Nutmeg to bed right now. Frankly, we could all use the sleep.”
I winced. “Should I come back tomorrow?” I offered.
Fritter shook his head. “No, I can stay awake just a little longer. There’s no need for that right now, especially now that I finally have some answers for you.”
My eyes widened. “You know who did it?”
Fritter grimaced. “You’re not going to like this,” He said. He turned to his laptop, and with a few short keystrokes, the holo in his living room flared to life.
Fritter grimaced, talking while typing, “My contacts were able to trace most of the destination data from the server where you uploaded the communication logs,” he explained. “There was a lot of data to parse through, seeing as we got a carbon copy of the entire transmission, so we all took different chunks of the data and started paging through them manually.”
Fritter stopped a moment, looking at the holo’s projection and hovering a hoof over a key. “My contact sent me this.” The hoof dropped. Immediately the projection filled with a single message. I had to read it a few times to understand just what was going on.
Lion,
The investigation on L6-C is creating problems for the operation. Ensure that it is dealt with. Do not cause a scene.
-1
“That’s it?” I asked, not totally comprehending.
Fritter took a deep breath. “We believe this was the email ordering the raid on Chance’s law office, as well as the deletion of very specific records from the PBJ’s database,” he said.
“If I recall correctly, you said you got this already,” I said,
Fritter nodded. “Correct, But we didn’t know where it was from, or where it was heading to. Do you recognize this name?” Fritter said, tapping another key. The screen changed, highlighting some details in the routing information. A message had been written over it.
SZ,
I tracked the receiver’s number, it belongs to a pony on the Council by the name of “Nimbus Leavenworth”. I couldn’t identify the sender though. There’s a chain of M-Net repeaters that the message passed through, but half of them aren’t registered to any list at all. Somepony has built a secret back channel inside the M-Net. My best guess is that the message originated from there, and judging by the repeaters it passed through, the real origin is probably somewhere in deep space. Thought you should know.
-LVLY
Nimbus Leavenworth. The name sounded vaguely familiar. If he was a pony on the council then he would be...councilor Leavenworth.
It clicked.
“Chief Counselor Leavenworth,” I said. “He was at my trial. He and some other pony.”
“Correct again,” Fritter said, nodding slightly, “and if you recall, the Council has near absolute authority on the goings on in the PC. All the chiefs of staff report to them, including the head of the PBJ. If this message is real, then someone must have some serious dirt on the councilor to get him to bend to their whim this easily. Just look at the wording.”
I suddenly understood why Jess’ boss acted the way he did. He knew. Now I understood why his hooves were tied when it came to the investigation. Any more involvement would single him out.
“Jess needs to see this,” I muttered.
Fritter nodded. “I know, and she will, but still, think of the implication! Somepony, or someone, is giving orders to one of the highest ranked ponies in the entire sovereignty!” Fritter took a slow breath, “I knew this would go deep, but we’re way out of our depth here. If this person has one councilor under his hoof, how many others? And so high?! How many more ponies are under their control? Now I’m starting to think I understand why Junkyard went through all the trouble to maintain his secrecy.”
I glanced darkly at my prosthetic wings. “And now we’re in the thick of it,” I said.
Fritter nodded again, leaning back in his seat and frowning. “That’s about the gist of it. It’s been keeping me up at night, let me tell you,” Fritter sighed. “Both of us.”
“Pearl knows?” I asked.
Fritter squeezed his eyes closed and sighed. “Too much. She started poking through my files and learned about all the murders that have been happening. Now it’s everything I can do to get her to sleep.”
“That explains the exhaustion,” I said.
Fritter nodded, “I don’t think I’ve had even eight hours this week. I’ve been practically living off coffee and donuts for the last two. Nutmeg’s been noticing the tension too.” Fritter grimaced. “I don’t like keeping her in the dark. I know it’s better if she doesn’t worry, but I don’t want her to be danger either. I mean...Fuck! Dude! First all this, and then you get hurt, and the murders…and I just…” Fritter exhaled, when he spoke again he had a haunted look in his eyes. “What if they find us? I can’t…” He breathed. “I could never live with myself if something happened. But… how do you hide from something that could literally be anyone?” Fritter slumped in his chair, his somber gaze rising to the projector. “And what’s worse is...it seems like discovery is inevitable.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Fritter’s scowled. “There’s a list,” he said darkly.
“A list of what?”
He looked me in the eyes. “A list of ponies,” he replied. “You were on it.”
Fritter hit a key and brief message popped onto the holo’s field. It had neither a sender nor a receiver and simply read:
02:16:4131:08:10 Target cleansed. Scratch him off the list.
“This message was flagged by one of my contacts, and traced to a destination at a secure server somewhere in the Core. Until you showed up, I didn’t know who it was referring to, but if I’m right, then it was sent just before that strike team saved your life on Four Corners. And by your story, it was sent by a changeling.”
This is survival. I remembered.
“Survival…” I muttered.
“I’m sorry what did you say?” Fritter asked, his sleep deprived eyes widening.
“When that changeling tried to kill me, I remember it saying something like, ‘this is survival’, or something like that.”
Fritter pondered it for a moment. “Motive,” he said a few seconds later. “Survival...maybe the…” His eyes widened, “no…”
Fritter twisted back toward his laptop, rapidly typing off a message cc’d to several of his contacts.
“Uh, Fritter?” I watched as Fritter continued to work with a sort of fire in his eyes. “What are you doing?”
Fritter kept typing. “Getting answers. I have a hunch.” With a single loud key tap, the message disappeared from the screen.
He turned to me. “I think I know why the changelings are getting involved, but I need to verify it with somepony who knows more about it. I think it’s fatal to them.”
“What is?” I asked.
“Fade,” he replied. “Think about it. Why would changelings, a race that has gotten along with ponies for millennia, suddenly up and decide to start eliminating faders from the streets? We’re their food supply! What if faders are like… poisonous to them?”
“But you’re implying that changelings are pulling the strings of all the major governments,” I replied. “Last I heard they were being hunted down. That doesn’t make sense.”
Fritter shook his head. “I can’t defend the connection there, but it makes sense if they’re working for somepony else who can. I’m going to need more information,” he sighed, “but, unfortunately, until I hear back from my contacts, all I can do right now is wait.”
I sat back, feeling the weight of the world back on my shoulders. “So I guess we’re done then, huh?”
Fritter nodded. “Pretty much, unless you’ve got a better-Oh!” Fritter’s eyes shot open. “I just realized something! Is Tex with you right now? Because if she’s willing, I have something she might like to try tomorrow morning.”
Tex? You awake? I thought at her.
Mmm? Yeah! I’m here, she replied back, I’ve just been recording everything in case we need it later. It keeps me busy. What does he want?
“Tex wants to know what it is,” I translated to Fritter.
“I found a cube reader,” Fritter said with a satisfied smile. “Remember that storage cube? We can finally crack it open! It arrived like a few days ago from one of the contacts that I asked about it—a real tech pony.”
Yes! I wanna do it! I wanna do it! Tex cheered.
Well it would make for a good distraction, at least. I gave Fritter half a smile, “Tex is in.”
Fritter smiled. “Great! That should make things easier. I’m going to need some time to set it up, so if you come see me here late tomorrow morning, I should have it up and running. Then our little data expert here can open it. Actually, make it tomorrow afternoon. I’m going to try and sleep in a bit.”
I nodded as I stood to leave. “Tomorrow, then,” I said. “Get some sleep Fritter.”
He gave me a tired laugh, “I’ll try. Good night, Horizon.”
*****
I had a lot to think about that night, as well as a lot of emails to catch up on, and I needed sleep, but first, I needed to contact Prism, and no conversation with Prism would have been complete without Jess to at least mediate if things flew south. I sent Jess a message about contacting Prism and she agreed. We both ended up meeting at a public comm terminal near Jess’ hotel, and Jess went ahead and sent the request. The ringing lasted forever.
“Anytime now,” I muttered, looking wearily at the comm screen and frowning. My legs were going stiff from the wait, my wings…well I didn’t want to think about those. “Does it usually take this long for her to answer?” I asked.
Jess shrugged, “Occasionally, I’m not too worried, though. Prism’s a big mare with big responsibilities.”
“Waitressing?” I replied.
“No, dummy, she’s back in the tower, remember?” Jess replied with a smirk.
“Okay so marginally important,” I said as my own smile crept back in. I was rewarded with a wingslap to the head. “What, you know how much they love taking breaks in the tower. Heck, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were playing poker up there or something, considering how fast the queues move.”
Jess sniffed and stiffened, raising her snout to be perfectly level with the floor. “For your information I’ve been inside that tower before, and I can tell you with confidence that they’re not playing poker,” she said, her faux poise breaking with the smirk across her face, “they’re playing hearts.”
I laughed, my mood improved at least a little bit. The line connected.
“Hey Jess! Sorry I took so long, I had to find somepony to cover for me while I took the call.” Prism’s red face appeared on the monitor in all of its cheery glory. She looked a little worn down, and considering the time, it was probably close to the end of her shift.“ So what gives? It’s been nearly two weeks since our last chat!”
“Hey girl!” Jess replied. “I know! I’m sorry! And there’s a good reason for that. By the way, Horizon’s here with me.”
“He is?” Prism said, looking confused. “I don’t have a--Oh! damn monitor! Give me a second here.” Prism looked around the side of the camera and gave the machine around it a solid thump. The feed jittered for a moment, a few lines of static briefly distorting the image before it stabilized. Prism glanced back at the camera, and then smiled. “There we go!” She said. She glanced to her right, blinked, and then quirked an eyebrow. “Really Horizon? A costume? What, did you get so high on adventure that you decided to cosplay a superhero or something?”
Jess’ face froze in a rictus somewhere between two expressions I couldn’t identify. We both exchanged glances.
“Oh, and now you’re mind reading. Did you two hook up when I wasn’t looking? I mean, I don’t mind! Jess! But I think you might want to raise your standards a little,” Prism said with a knowing smirk.
The silence stretched. Subconsciously I fluffed my wings uncomfortably, the slight shifting noises seemed so much louder now.
Prism’s face went from smug, to confused, to horrified all in the span of about two seconds. “Oh my GOSH! What did you DO?! Are those REAL?!”
“You might want to sit down for this, Prism,” Jess said.
To her credit, she did.
“I-I-I am SO sorry! I had no idea! Just what have you been doing these last two weeks?!” Prism said, sounding more and more like a Griffon with every syllable.
“Would you believe me if I said sleeping?” I replied.
Jess groaned. “Could you take this seriously please?” she said.
“What? This is like the fifth time I’ve had to explain this today,” I replied. “It gets old fast. And humor is how I cope. I think.”
“I told you to be careful!” Prism shouted, nearly overloading the speaker.
“And I was! Just… not careful enough, I guess. Trouble came looking for me, this time,” I said.
“I knew I should have come.” Prism said, “I knew I couldn’t let you just walk out on your own and get beat up again, I mean...look at you!”
“Prism, you wouldn’t have been able to do anything.” I said.
“Yes I could! I’d beat his ass all the way off the station if I had to.”
I frowned, feeling anger start to build inside of me. “No! You couldn’t! You weren’t there, Prism! you couldn’t see what-” I swallowed, tasting bile, “what they did to me. You wouldn’t have stood a chance!”
“Bullshit! I can take anypony!” Prism yelled.
“It wasn’t a pony!” I shouted back. “I don’t know what it used on me! But you couldn’t have stopped it, hell it might of taken you too for all the good it did.”
“Oh, hell no I would have put up a fight,” Prism argued.
“You think I didn’t try?” I replied angrily. “You think I wanted to go through what that… that fucking bug did to me? You think I wanted these?” I spread my wings to make a point. Prim flinched as if struck. “I tried fighting, Prism. But by the time I figured out what was going on, it was already too late.”
“What do you mean, too late?” Prism huffed, “You’re strong, you can sorta scuffle. Why couldn’t you?”
“Mind magic, Prism. All it had to do was get me to look in it’s eyes,” I said, glaring at the monitor. “After that I lost everything. It had complete control of my body. I…I’m just glad I can’t remember anything after that.”
Prism’s expression sank from angry to downright livid. “I swear I am going to beat the living shit out of-”
“No,” Jess cut in. The word alone was enough to earn silence from Prism.
Prism looked at her in shock. “What? Why?!”
“Because he’s right, Prism,” Jess said sternly, “You’re not trained to fight mind magic. You wouldn’t last three seconds before they had you the same way.”
Prism quieted at that, sinking a little in her stance in front of the camera. Her ears drooped. “I...just...sorry,” She mumbled. “I don’t like seeing my friends get hurt.”
Jess’ expression drew into a line. “I know.”
“So...why did you call?” Prism asked after an uncomfortable silence.
“Partially to fill you in, and partially to warn you,” Jess said. “They’re targeting Faders as far as we can tell.”
Prism gasped, “You mean the rumors are true?!”
“What rumors? What have they been saying?” Jess replied.
“Ponies disappearing,” Prism muttered. “I-I’d heard talk that they were related somehow but I didn’t realize that all the victims were Faders. I...oh my Celestia, I could be next!”
“I won’t let it come to that,” Jess said with a tight frown.
Prism steeled herself. “I know. But… thank you for telling me. I’ll be careful.”
“Don’t look anyone, anyone in the eyes,” I added firmly.
“I...I will.” Prism said, resolute. A moment later she ruined it. “Er, won’t I mean. Ugh! I don’t know! Whatever it’s supposed to be!”
Jess laughed, “Good girl.”
“Keep calling, okay?” Prism said. “I have both of your messenger ID’s so I’ll shoot you a message if anything’s wrong.”
“We’ll look for it,” Jess said. “Be safe.”
Prism looked at both of us then, her eyes stopping briefly on what I assumed were my wings. “I…I will.”
After that, the call ended.
“Well that could have gone better,” Jess sighed, rubbing her forehead with a hoof. “Sometimes, that girl, I swear…”
“She’ll be okay, right?” I asked her.
Jess snorted, “Do you really have to ask? This is Prism we’re talking about here.”
I shrugged, keenly remembering my meeting with her in prison. “I suppose you’re right. By the way, head to Fritter’s tomorrow afternoon. He’s got something for you, and we’re cracking open the cube too.”
Jess nodded, “alright, see you then.”
From there we parted ways. I didn’t sleep well that night, despite finally being home. Damn nightmares.
*****
The next morning came and went. I spent some time with Tex, enduring her enthusiasm about all the different cracking methods she wanted to try on the storage cube when she finally got the chance, while I tried to make a bowl of cereal for breakfast. All of what she said was completely lost on me. I’m a pilot, not a programmer, or hacker or whatever, so all I could do really do was mumble some response between bites and hope she didn’t catch on. I also used the opportunity to catch up on the news. The Prince had been busy.
So it turned out that after my kidnapping, Estoc made his grand reappearance in the NSR. He attended his own funeral according to the pundits, along with two score of guards loyal to him. The way the news spun it was that it was a “risky and unprecedented upheaval”, with all of the focus being played up on the grand re-entrance and not a single question asked about the how of it all. How did Estoc survive his supposed assassination attempt? Where was he when he was missing all this time? Nope! For all the coverage, no one asked a single obvious question. Instead, everypony just wanted to replay the same footage of two dozen guards kicking in the door of the Morningstar Grand Chapel and Estoc running his chief advisor through with his very real, and very sharp ‘decorative’ saber. Thirty-seven ponies had been tried and executed for high treason within one week. More were being indicted. The local news was already calling him the ‘Blood Prince’.
It soured my milk to think that I had pretty much enabled this. But then again, they started the fight, so maybe they deserved it? Call it karma, if you want, but I wasn’t sure if I supported this kind of house cleaning. Still, I was in no position to judge, really. I didn’t know what the laws of Estoc’s corner of the NSR were, beyond that the Houses each governed themselves. The word on the news was that Estoc was taking flak for his brutish actions from the Major Houses. The word also said that he took it with a cavalier, driven attitude, and Luna help the pony that got in his way. That didn’t make it any easier to swallow, though.
Aside from the news on Estoc, I also tried searching for any mentions of mysterious disappearances, and was met with a very concerning lack of results. The media was conspicuously silent, and with what I already knew about my own nation, it was enough to kill what little appetite I had left.
I left with Tex for Fritter’s home just a little after that.
*****
When I arrived at Fritter’s place, it was just before noon, and after a quick exchange of messages with Jess I decided to bring lunch along with me. Tex kept track of the orders. I stood for a few awkward minutes in front of Fritter’s door with a couple bags of sandwiches floating in my WAND’s TK, until Jess answered the buzzer and let me in. I walked with Jess into the main living area. The room was something of a mess. Tools littered the coffee table as Tick once again coached Nutmeg through the disassembly of something that looked suspiciously like a spiderbot, while Fritter sat in front of his TV stand, busy fiddling with some cables that he had jury rigged into an adapter for the holo. Nearby, Pearl served tea to the other guests. She smiled at us graciously as we passed the kitchen, but I couldn’t help notice the dogged hitch in her step, or the bags under her eyes almost disguised by a layer of expertly applied makeup.
“Horizon’s here, Fritter, we’re good to start.” Jess called.
Fritter’s head popped up, one ear swivelling in our direction before the rest of his head followed. A wide grin broke out on his face as he spotted us. “Ah! There you are! I’m just finishing up here myself so we should be able to get things started. Is Tex with you?”
“You bet!” Tex replied through the sound system, her shifting purplish form suddenly materializing out of the holo projector. “You have no idea how excited I am to try this! I’ve done lots of simulations, read up on some modern cryptographic techniques, I even made a few tools to record my progress to see if I can make it better!”
Fritter blinked, staring at the projection of a small unicorn filly now eagerly bouncing on his tv stand. “Wow, you are really into this aren’t you?” he his eyes tracking her bounce.
“Of course! Now hurry up and hook it up! I wanna get to cracking!” Tex replied cheerfully.
Fritter chuckled, regaining some of his pep. “Right, give me just a sec and I’ll be right back.”
Getting to his hooves, Fritter disappeared down the hallways and started rummaging through his room. A bang and yelp followed, drawing Jess’ attention as Fritter finally emerged from his bedroom, cradling an odd looking metal device in his forelegs while he flapped the rest of the distance. I looked the object over, tracing the weird device with my eyes. It looked more like a platform than anything else. An indentation sat in the center with several focusing crystals arranged in a two concentric circles around it. The rest of it looked as if it used to be mounted on something, like somepony had ripped it out of something else judging by the stray wires. “So... how does it work?” I asked.
Fritter set the device on the small tv stand next to the holo. “I’ll need to hook it up a little bit first,” he said as he started plugging things into his laptop, “Then I’ll need your Tex to bypass the security,” he paused and smiled at the filly eagerly prancing on his TV stand. “Assuming she’s still up for it, of course.”
The her response was thunderous causing everypony nearby to wince. Every speaker in the room resounded with a singular, almost layered voice, “Of course!” Tex cheered. “Hurry up and hook it up already! I can’t wait to get started!”
Fritter finished hooking the wires from the into his laptop, snickering while he worked. With a smart tap on the keyboard, he turned back to me and said, “Alright, that should do it. Give it a try.”
“On it!” Tex said cheerfully.
It’s hard to say exactly what happened next. I’m tempted to say nothing at all, since that’s what it looked like, but I’m pretty sure that wasn’t the case either. All the holos had it wrong. Hacking wasn’t a fancy bit of flashy high speed information flowing across the screen with rapid keypresses. No. It was a command prompt on Fritter’s screen, doing something short, quick, understated, and ruthlessly efficient. From my perspective, it was almost mundane. The whole process took less than a minute.
“And done!” Tex suddenly declared. It was then that information started scrolling across the screen, in much the same way it did on my WAND when I was reviewing system reports. “Wow, there’s a lot of data here.”
“Well? What is it?”
“Just a second! I’m sorting through it. Organization is important after all! Let’s see...it looks like...some video files and some audio files. It also has a few text reports too. I could play some of the videos if you want, though I couldn’t really tell you what is in them without watching them first.”
I looked at Fritter. He shrugged.
I ignored him. “What’s the last used file?” I asked Tex.
“Hmm, let’s see, the record shows that it’s video from one of the hallway cameras at some research facility. I think it’s probably security footage. Want to give it a shot?”
“Sure, play it,” I said with a smirk. Whatever it was it couldn’t have been that bad.
The room darkened as the holo lit up, an old unstable feed from a video camera materializing in the space above coffee table. My smirk fell. The speakers exploded with noise.
It was a color feed of a corridor, but the colors were distorting. Black smoke obscured most of the hallway as an uncontrolled fire burned in the corridor, the black outlines of ponies thrashing in the blaze, screaming, running, and dying.
“Stop!” Fritter yelled. Immediately the image froze. An image of a screaming mare stumbling over still, burning corpses occupied the screen, her coat charred black and her face white with terror.
“Nutmeg, go to your room.” Fritter said.
“But dad! It’s just a scary movie? right?” The filly complained.
“Go to your room!” Fritter ordered.
“But you always let me watch scary movies before!” she argued.
“Go to your room! Now!” Fritter barked.
Nutmeg rolled her eyes, “Ugh. Fine.”
The filly stormed down the hall, disappearing behind one of the side doors and kicking it after it closed.
Fritter scowled and muttered something under his breath I couldn’t quite catch.
“Well…that was...not what I was expecting,” Jess remarked. “I mean I’ve seen crime scenes before, but this is…” she trailed off.
Tickintime sat in mute silence, staring wide eyed at the image and looking ill.
“As fun as it would be to watch a bunch of ponies burn to death over and over again, could we, you know, not?” Nightshade said. Even he looked perturbed.
The image disappeared, replaced by Tex’s purple filly avatar. “Sorry about that everypony. Here, let me try to find something that’s…less on fire.”
Tex went quiet as she scanned through the database. Her little avatar tilting her head this way and that as she browse until she stopped and literally brightened a moment later. “OOH! This one looks like it’s from a researcher!” she said. “Hold on! I’m gonna play it.”
Her avatar disappeared, replaced instead by an image of a middling green earth pony in a white labcoat and thick rimmed glasses. He blinked at the camera, twisting his head from side to side as he examined something behind our field of view.
“Is this thing on? Maybe? Oh! Yes, there we go. I’ll definitely have to cut that bit out later.”
His voice was weathered with age, yet holding a sort of dignified tone of somepony who knew they were smart, and was not afraid to tell somepony else they weren’t.
He coughed, “Ahem.”
“My name is Doctor Earl Grey. Normally I don’t keep these kinds of logs, but protocols are protocols and logging my findings in this manner is apparently mandatory for all of the research staff. Bloody idiots. I mean, why couldn’t I just write a detailed report? It would definitely be more useful. The uppity ups could run their search programs and filter out all the useful information and I don’t have to stand here futzing with some stupid piece of technology. I swear, If I have to waste all of my damn time in front of a camera I’m going to go insane before the month is out. I have enough on my plate as is, with all of the reports I’m already making.
He sighed, “Whatever. Might as well do this properly,” he muttered.
“Doctor Earl Grey, bioscience division, year of their Majesties, twenty-five, forty-nine, equestrian calendar. August seventh, sixteen thirty-eight hours, station time.
“Today marks my first day stationed at a remote research facility whose official name eludes me. I am assuming the facility is probably an imperial secret, seeing as I signed a veritable mountain of paperwork when I was first assigned. They flew me out here on a shuttle and never bothered to tell me where here is! But, the work seems innocuous enough so who am I to complain. I have been assigned to work alongside the genetics team in providing insight and synthesizing treatments for whatever the hell they’re doing in lab one.”
The doctor shook his head, and then smiled. “All I know is that I have a fully functional lab with the most cutting edge technology I’ve ever seen. Honestly, I feel like a colt in a candy store right now. I get all this equipment, and it’s all mine to use as I see fit! I couldn’t be happier! And in service to the crown at that! It’s got me wondering if all that work I put in on developing new treatments in synthetic biology paid off after all!
“They’ve given me all of today to set up. I’ll be beginning my real work early tomorrow, after I meet with the facility director to receive my first assignment. Here’s hoping he’s not too much of an imbecile. As much as they try, most of these bureaucratic dolts couldn’t navigate their way through an elementary school reader, much less a detailed scientific report. Though, I suppose this is one of the hidden costs of possessing knowledge, as if the education loans weren’t enough. Regardless, I have a lab and time to use it! Win for me! I will have more to report tomorrow. End of Log.”
The holo flashed as the video concluded, replaced again by Tex’s filly avatar. Tex looked ecstatic “That was awesome! Real ponies from my time! Well, sort of… I’ve been around the block somewhat.” Tex blinked, “Uh, whoops! Looks like there’s more!” Tex disappeared once again as the holo switched scenes.
Doctor Grey appeared once more, this time with an added, frantic twitch in his left eye.
“Doctor Earl Grey, biochemistry division, year of their Majesties, twenty-five, forty-nine, Equestrian Calendar. August eighth, zero eight hundred hours, station time.
I have just learned that all of these recordings are being reviewed by the facility director, who is, in fact, not an imbecile, and is actually a highly intelligent and sharp-minded individual, who is also very pretty, and is perfect in every conceivable sense. End of Log.”
“Are they all like this?” I asked. Listening to somepony drone on and on about their daily lives wasn’t exactly something I was looking forward to.
“I dunno. Probably?” Tex replied. “There are quite a few here, let me just skim through the data and I’ll highlight the interesting ones. Not all of them are by the same author either. I’m seeing multiple researchers on file, as well as security feeds where it doesn’t look like everypony’s…dying. Uh…let me try another one.”
The feed changed, displaying the same earth pony, this time looking a little more put together, if a little worn out from a long day of work.
“Doctor Earl Grey, biochemistry division, year of their Majesties, twenty-five, forty-nine, Equestrian Calendar. August fifteenth, seventeen hundred hours, station time.
He adjusted his glasses.
“I’ve decided that the best time to make these logs is at the end of my shift. This way I can summarize the day’s findings without interruption. Well, almost without interruption. The director still drops in now and then to check if I’ve gone back to the barracks early.” The researcher grumbled something that didn’t translate through the microphone.
He shook his head. “Whatever. I have finally finished calibrating my new equipment and I am ready to begin my duties. I also have my first project. They need me to modify some sort of chemical stabilizer for their project, although I haven’t delved too deeply into the paperwork yet to see exactly what they’re needing. Why their existing stabilizer doesn’t cut it is anypony’s guess, but if all they want from me is to reinvent the wheel, then by Celestia I’ll give them their damn wheel. Maybe I’ll use the project requirements for some late night reading tonight. I have been getting a little tired of Tolls Toy after all.
“How is this relevant?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m trying! Okay?” Tex replied. “Here, try this one.”
The holo flashed again as next video came up, displaying a significantly more haggard Earl Grey, who seemed both outraged and terrified at the same time.
“Researcher Earl Grey, biochemistry division, year of their Majesties, twenty-five, forty-nine, Equestrian Calendar. August twenty-first...Oh, fuck it.
The doctor gritted his teeth. “All these ponies are mad! I got a look at what they’re doing in lab one today… I… It’s… What the fuck are we doing here?! Foals?! We’re experimenting on foals?! It’s barbaric! I refuse to believe that this facility is operating under the celestial crown! I don’t know what the fuck they’re doing with these children, but the moment I opened my mouth to protest was the one that security locked me in my laboratory for twelve fucking hours! This is madness! And the genetic stabilizers…I…stars. What the fuck do they need the stabilizers for?!”
Tex didn’t play the next video.
“Uh, Tex? Are you okay in there?” I asked.
She blinked. “What? Oh, I’m fine it’s just… I don’t recall ever hearing about this facility when I was with Celestia. She would never condone something like that!”
“Maybe it was some kind of research hospital?” Tick offered.
“A top secret hospital?” Nightshade replied, “doubt it.”
“More than likely this researcher was tricked,” Jess said. “I’ve seen reports of some college students disappearing after answering some job postings, who is to say the same didn’t happen here?”
“Or, our venerated Sun goddess wasn’t as innocent as history painted her,” Nightshade replied.
“But it can’t be real! I was with Celestia for longer than I can even remember and I’ve never even heard of this facility before!” Tex said.
“Yeah, but you’ve already pointed out that you can’t remember some of your earliest memories because of some virus or something. How do you know it didn’t actually happen and the memory just got deleted?” Tick offered.
“But that’s not a fair question! How could I prove that I didn’t know something in the past when I have no way of checking?”
Tick shrugged, “I dunno, but just because it isn’t fair doesn’t make it invalid.”
“Ugh… Fine! I’m just gonna play the next one,” Tex said.
Doctor Grey reappeared. If before he had the look of righteous indignation, now he just looked defeated. His mane was disheveled and ratty,like he hadn’t brushed in days, and his glasses sat askew on his face. He took a breath, swallowed, and began speaking.
“Celestia visited the facility today. She stopped by my lab to see how my research was progressing. We had a nice conversation over two cups of Earl Grey tea. I don’t know if she was making a point of it or what. Fuck... I-I don’t even know what to think anymore. She asked me so many questions about my work. What I was doing, how the stabilizers were coming. And then of all the nerve she even told me that the foals were counting on me! What… what kind of monster am I working for?! This is wrong! This whole place is wrong! I never signed up for this!”
The recording abruptly stopped and Tex’s avatar once again replaced it while she processed the information like a pony in the headlights of a very large vehicle. The shimmer of her color started shifting from purple to be something just shy of blue.
“That...what?!” she said, her mouth hanging open. “Celestia actually visited?! T-That can’t be right! I was with her the whole time!”
“You weren’t when we found you,” I said.
“T-That’s different!” Tex replied.
“How so?” Tick replied, “I mean if you were separated from her then, who is to say you weren’t separated from her before. Maybe you were turned off so you wouldn’t?”
“But I can’t deactivate! I don’t have a sleep function!” Tex scowled. “No! I refuse to believe that Celestia was behind this. Maybe the foals were sick or maybe they needed special treatment for something.”
Tickintime looked thoughtful. “For gene therapy?” she asked, “I mean it’s plausible, I guess, but most medical research facilities do extensive studies before moving to testing on ponies.”
Nightshade chuckled.
“So maybe it’s for the greater good?” Jess offered. “Not that I’m comfortable with the idea of their choice of test subjects.”
“That research station sounds like a government black site,” Nightshade said, “If they’re developing anything there, I doubt it would be for the greater good. I bet it would be something closer to a bioweapon.”
“And testing it on foals?” I replied. “I don’t think any pony could stay sane if they had to do that. And even it they did, I don’t think Celestia could be that evil.”
“She’s not evil!” Tex whined.
“That researcher certainly didn’t think so,” Nightshade responded.
“Maybe it was an impersonator!” Tex said. “Maybe it was like a changeling or something!”
Jess shook her head, “Not likely. Something like this would have pretty high security if we go with the black-site theory. They would catch a fake pretty much instantly. Not to mention, changelings were linked pretty closely to the crown if I recall my history correctly. Estoc would know more.” Jess hummed for a moment. “Hmm, Come to think of it I’m pretty sure he would kill to get his hooves on this information.”
Fritter smiled widely, “I like the way you think, Jess.”
“This conversation is making me uncomfortable,” Tex complained.
“Well, consider too that we don’t have the full info on whatever this project was either. We’ve only got the one doctor’s viewpoint, ” Fritter said, and then looked thoughtful, “Tex, are there any logs from the other researchers there? Maybe some working on the project?”
“I can look. Give me a few.” Tex replied, seemingly grateful for the change in topic. A couple of seconds went by before she chimed, “Found one! Well... I think so, anyway. It’s around the same timeframe.”
“Play it, maybe we’ll get some answers,” I said.
“Waaay ahead of you,” Tex replied.
The holo flashed and Tex disappeared again. Instead of Doctor Grey, The projection showed a unicorn, a middling aquamarine mare with a dispassionate stare that, even through the holo, made me feel supremely uncomfortable. Her voice was flat as she droned into the camera.
“Researcher Jade Vial, genetics division, year of their majesties, twenty-five forty-nine. August sixteenth, sixteen hundred hours.”
She sighed. “Today marks yet another dreadfully unproductive day. Doctor Grey has continued to drag his hooves in developing the stabilizer we need to make the changes stick, and I am getting increasingly irritated at wasting days running paperwork for the director simply because she thinks we need something to do in the meantime.”
“I don’t think Doctor Grey properly understands just what it is we’re trying to accomplish here, even after we answered his poorly veiled probing questions as plainly as we possibly could. I mean, honestly! How is anypony supposed to get any work done when some nosy old coot keeps bumping their nose into places it doesn’t belong?”
“I tried to reason with the stallion, but he doesn’t listen! He just keeps going on and on about the experiments and painting us as demons just because we have to do live testing.”
“I mean, while yes, some of what we’re researching in this division doesn’t sit well with me either, but think of the lives it could save! Why can’t he understand that this is for the greater good?”
“And point for Jess,” I announced. Nightshade laughed.
“See? Not evil!” Tex cheered. “Next one.”
“Researcher Jade Vial, genetics division, year of their majesties, twenty-five forty-nine. August twenty ninth, sixteen hundred hours.
“I had another spat with Doctor Grey today. This time I caught him spending time with the patients in their dormitory after hours. I don’t know how many times I’ve had to tell him to stop. The patients have enough stress as is. And do you know what he was doing? Reading. Reading to foals. I’m not sure if I should be proud of him or annoyed. While it doesn’t seem to be doing them any harm, I’m worried that it may affect the results of the conditioning. The princess wants these ponies to have a very specific mindset once this project succeeds. We can’t have some random earth pony mucking it up simply because he felt bad!”
She sighed. “I brought up my concerns with the director, but she as usual she just blew me off. The most I got out of her was ‘Keep up the hard work, Jade.’ before she went and buried her nose back into her damn paperwork. At least Doctor Grey finally got the first round of stabilizers synthesized. And low and behold, they worked! At least…mostly. We only lost one of the foals this time around. And that means we have an entire batch of subjects to continue the program with. Hopefully now we won’t have any more setbacks.”
“Um…still not evil?” Tex laughed nervously as she reappeared.
“Oh, I dunno, that sounded pretty ominous to me,” Nightshade chided.
“Not listening! Next one!” Tex replied. “This should really prove it!”
The field cleared, and Doctor Vial appeared once more, only this time, changed. Vial looked like her coat had become six shades lighter. Any pretense at professionalism was long gone, replaced by a mix of fear and desperate contrition. She swallowed, keeping down something that I suspected was bile.
“Doctor Grey was right…we really are monsters. We…oh gods...We were so close. That poor foal. Even with the suppressors on maximum the...he j-just couldn’t control it! I-I’ve never seen magic overload so bad in my life! He just…vaporized! I…I think I’m going to go lie down now.”
“Well that was brief and cryptic,” Nightshade said after the recording had finished. “Are you sure there isn’t more to this one? Tex?”
“Hey, you try working with thousand year old records!” Tex replied. “I didn’t record these things, I just play em. Besides…I’m not sure if I want to hear more.”
Tex sighed mirthlessly. “I’ll just...do the thing.”
Doctor Vial appeared again, more composed, but less like herself than in any previous recording. I could hear the defeat in her voice. “Doctor Jade Vial, genetics division, year of their majesties, twenty-five sixty. January seventh, sixteen hundred hours.”
She took a long, shuddering breath.
“The project is a complete failure. We received the shutdown order from Princess Luna herself, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen anypony more livid. I was afraid she was going to just kill us all right then and there for what we’ve done. When we explained whose authority we did it under...her coat…it just—It was like it started sucking all of the light away in the room. I’m…off topic, excuse me.”
She swallowed. “While we were able to force the intended effect, the result was too much for the subjects. Only two survived, the foals…well… more like ponies now. They’ve been here for so long I don’t think they remember anything outside the facility any more, not that they could ever leave.”
“We’ve had them under class-S suppressors twenty-four seven, and even then, the surge is putting them in excruciating pain. The healing is working as intended, but the strain is breaking their bodies down just as quickly as it sews them back up. I can’t imagine just how much pain they’re going through right now. If this goes on for much longer it’s going to break them. Gold Foil is already showing warning signs of dementia, and I doubt Silver is far behind. Neither of them can recall anything about themselves anymore, even in the rare cases when we can get them stabilized. All do is now is scream. We’ve tried using null stones to augment the suppressors, but all that really accomplished was to give us all hornaches. None of the researchers staff can channel enough magic to use the stones inside the suppression field, and we’ve been through all of them, myself included.”
“Doctor Grey came up with an idea for a final solution. It’s a long shot, but we think it might work. If it works it will help little Filligree and Foil to move outside the suppression field…or…or it might kill them. At this point I’m not sure which would be worse. Either it works, or we’ll have to let them...burn out.”
The doctor slowly shook her head, “We’re all going to hell for this…all of us.”
The feed ended. Tex’s avatar reappeared in the holo. She wasn’t smiling. “That’s...the last relevant entry, at least before the security footage that we watched,” Tex said softly.
“Well, I will agree with the late captain. That was disturbing,” I said.
“I’m suddenly questioning my history classes,” Tick said numbly.
“Tex, are you sure you don’t remember a facility like that one?” I asked.
Tex shook her avatar’s head, “No, never. I was with Celestia wherever she went.I don’t ever remember visiting that facility and I don’t think it even existed on any of the books.”
“And yet she visited. Clearly you didn’t know her as well as you think,” Nightshade said.
“Maybe it was a changeling?” Tick offered.
Jess shrugged. “Who knows at this point. Estoc might be able to tell us more, but…you know. I still can’t believe he took off like that.”
Jess stopped for a moment, thinking. “I wonder if the place is still around?”
I scoffed. “Yeah, let me just add that to my to-do list. I’ve had enough poking around ancient wrecks to last me a lifetime. Besides, the battleship captain made it pretty clear that the facility was pretty much gone by the time they investigated it.”
“It still makes you wonder,” Jess said.
And wonder I did. It wasn’t like I had anything immediate on my plate anyway.
I made a noise that I won’t describe before finally saying, “Hey, Fritter…did the captain’s tablet have any coordinates for that place? I remember the Captain gave it a number or something, so it should have at least been in his copy of the blackbox data.”
Fritter blinked. “You know…I don’t know. I could check, probably, but right now I’m a little busy with the murders.”
I nodded. “When you have time, then.”
“I bet Estoc would pay for that information,” Tick piped in. “As long as I’ve known him he’s always been on his little crusade for information on the Celestial Twins. He could probably tell us if it’s real or not. And pay for it too. He’s a lot of things, but he’s not stingy when it comes to that topic.”
Fritter flashed a tired grin, “Well, if you’re going to be so persuasive, I’ll work it into my schedule.”
*****
The rest of that day went by in a blur. I had drinks with the tower boys again. Fortune whistled at my luck and the three congratulated me on surviving yet another harrowing escapade. They loved the story. But at my insistence, the three agreed not to spread rumors. Spitshine couldn’t stop gushing over my wings. Apparently he was something of a cybernetics hobbyist in his spare time. Not a very good one, according to his own testimony, but enough that he knew the make and model of what I had was very impressed. I went home later in the night, spirits improved. If I was going to carry this scar for the rest of my life, I would at least do it knowing that other ponies thought it was cool. Well, for non-pegasi anyway.
It was sometime later, after we had all gone our separate ways for the night that Jess found me just outside the door to my apartment.
“I looked over the files,” Jess said.
“When?” I said as I keyed the door control. The door slid neatly open and I stepped inside.
“While you were in the hospital,” she answered, following me. “I didn’t have anything to chase at the moment so I took some time to look them over on my ship in private—pretty interesting stuff.”
I waited for the door to close before I responded. “What did you think?”
She took a deep breath and exhaled. “I’m in, but I want to hear his take on the whole thing. If you’re right, and he is an assassin, then I want to know who he is working for. That said, we’re going to need a plan for when we confront him, and that means we’ll need to coordinate with Fritter for the take down.”
I nodded, feeling relieved. “Thanks for understanding, Jess. When do you think we’ll be ready?”
Jess thought for a moment and then looked me at me with deadly seriousness. “Tomorrow.”
---
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Great to see you again and your story, I hope your heath will go better for you soon. It was interesting to see a little of the the Earth Pony republic and what sort of shit that happen over there. I am surprised that the PC high official are in on the purging of faders and wonder what they got on them to do shady thing for the changellings and their backers. I wonder what makes fader none eatable for the changellings or even bother to try to hunt them down? I don't think it would have anything to that they can only feed on ponies with cutie marks otherwise they would never bother to go after Zebras Donkey, griffins and what every and would make their food source even more limited for them so their must be more then just the fact that they don't have cutie marks. Did they do so statistical projection that shows that faders are going to to eventually outnumber those with cutie marks inevitable and that they are just trying to delay the inevitable, did they try to find ways to cure that defect in the pony gene pool to ensure their survival?
I Wonder why Celestia ordered secret experiments on foals and what did she hope to gain from that it seems that they generated more magic then their bodies to stand? And why did she come personally to see the progress of the project? I am not sure that it would be trying to create artificial alicorns and I wonder what it could have had anything to do with the spider golams that was salvage over their sense it doesn't seem that those things could destroy a station on their own, so they mist have been made there. Why would Celestia think she would need such machines in the first place did she worry that her empire would was threaten by some outside force? What was the political climate back then and what was special about the voyage they were undertaking that they decided to go there.
I will be looking forward to see Estoc again soon and he is really turning out to be a fun character so far wonder why he decided to put so many people to death instead of putting them to trial or just black list them so that they won't even be able to get a job at a hayburger stand, or exile them to the middle of nowhere, why make all those visual example of them?
Will be looking forward to see the next chapter of this great story
This is a great story but please, your health is more important than our entertainment.
Can't help but wonder if "Celestia" is trying to forceably create another Twilight Sparkle...
For some reason, I'm reminded of Mind War episode of B5...
The errors I caught are in bold.
Really good story btw.
8418289
Nice catch. Thanks!
I'm starting to get the feeling that Nightshade may be a little too familiar with black op experimentation. Like he might have been a patient of such a facility with how he's chugging down potions.
Magical burn out? Was Celestia trying to replace Twilight? Come to think about it, we never really have heard yet what happened to the younger Alicorns.Just what is happening behind the curtain here?
Though I do find it interesting how Text changes colors there. Blue to when her sense of loyalty is being challenged perhaps?