Retexo

by Xz Hacker

Chapter Five: “C7 and R2”

Chapter Five: “C7 and R2”

Reports were pouring in about the tragedy that was the Los Pegasus outbreak, and talks of survivors making there way to the outer edges of the quarantine zone, only to find themselves trapped by Shining Armour's protection spell.

With the aid of Dr. Aden's research notes, Twilight and Dr. Patella had been actively working on Retexo two, in an attempt to reverse the affects of C6, and C7, which they learned from reading was perfected mere days before the raid on Dr. Aden's compound in Los Pegasus.

Celestia made it a point to read the entire journal, and learn everything she could about Dr. Aden and his research. Celestia had just finished reading the notes on the test subject used for C7 and had a few questions for Twilight, “Twilight you have read all this, yes?”

Twilight barely turning from her work said, “yes princess.”

“If I understood this correctly, the C7 compound will turn anyone into an alicorn, and is nearly as contagious as C6?”

Twilight turned, “that's about right, except it doesn't work hardly as fast, it seems that his test subject for C7 took three full days to develop wings, and to grow to full size. He also did us the favor of documenting how fast it becomes contagious, it seems that C7 will not spread until several days after the full development of the alicorn, but it seems to become airborne at that time.”

Celestia looked grim, “so how long do we have before Dr. Aden begins to spread C7, assuming he has already injected himself?”

Twilight looked confused, “princess, you don't honestly think he made it out of the city before my brother's spell sealed it do you?”

Celestia nodded, “it's true we sealed the city in a matter of minutes, but if he ran straight for the outskirts of the city, there is every possibility he made it out.”

Dr. Patella decided to look up from her work to speak, “it's fine, me and Twilight are already working on R2. Thanks to the doctor's meticulous diagrams and research notes, we should be able to counteract C7 in no time at all.”

Celestia stared at Dr. Patella intensely, “how long is no time at all?”

Dr. Patella straightened up a bit, “um... well, by the looks of things, no more than three days.”

Celestia bowed her head, “not enough time to stop Dr. Aden from becoming an alicorn.”

Twilight looked confident, “don't worry princess, from what we are reading, C6 and C7 work a lot differently than C2, we are almost positive that all physical side affects of any of the Commutatus compounds can be reversed except for C2 and C3, both of which have been destroyed by Dr. Aden, and the only known test cases were given R1.”

Celestia bid them luck on their work and went to find Applejack. As usual, she found her on the roof. Celestia walked up and sat down beside her. “You know you will need to be the one to face him,” she said bluntly.

Applejack looked up, “I had planned to, why wouldn't I?”

Celestia shook her head, “I mean that you won't have Twilight or Patella there to help you when we find him, because there is a chance he will be contagious. We don't know how the compound will affect Luna or myself, but we know that any Commutatus compound will render the others inert, meaning you will be immune to C7.”

Applejack had not yet thought of that, “I... have to face him alone.”

Celestia nodded solemnly, “yes, I wish there was another way, but...”

Applejack stood up, “No, ah understand, it needs to be me.”

Four more days passed and Twilight and Dr. Patella were just finishing work on R2 when the reports came in. Several ponies in Baltimare had fallen ill, and were reporting pains in there sides and foreheads, after reportedly seeing a male alicorn walking through the city. Celestia lost no time rounding everyone up. In the throne room she began strategizing for the upcoming encounter, “all right how has your development of R2 come along?”

Twilight looked confident, “it is completed, we need to get to a larger laboratory to mass produce it if we want to clear out Los Pegasus, but we can get that done in a matter of hours with the right equipment.”

Celestia nodded, “good but our target isn't Los Pegasus, your brother still has that well contained, we can fix that later. Right now our concern is stopping the C7 outbreak that seems to be occurring in Baltimare. You two will begin mass production of R2, we will need a lot of it. In the mean time, Applejack, you need to go and keep Dr. Aden busy, he needs to be stopped. We can't let him get away, I'll bring the Wonder Bolts, and once Twilight and Dr. Patella have finished production we will dump the R2 over Baltimare.”

They all agreed on this plan. Twilight and Dr. Patella ran straight for the largest lab in Canterlot. Applejack was transported to Baltimare, while Celestia went to go and inform the Wonder Bolts of their mission.

Applejack was all alone for the first time in a while. She had escaped to the roof of the castle often in an attempt to get some privacy from the chaos that was her family and friends adjusting to their new life in Canterlot, but now more than ever, she wished they were all here to help her through this.

Applejack made her way to the nearby hospital, where she knew the patients who had reported seeing Dr. Aden would be. Once inside, she asked several of them what they had seen, and where they had seen him. All of them gave the the exact same description of a large alicorn, with huge wings, taller than Applejack, with the same brown coat and dark brown mane. They each said they saw him walking through the streets downtown, appearing to be in no hurry, or to be going in any particular direction. She got the names of the streets they had seen him on, and then set out to find Dr. Aden.

She wasn't flying around very long before she found him, slowly walking down the streets. He had become taller than Applejack, and his wings did seem larger. He saw her shadow pass over head, he looked up in time to see her drop in front of him. “Ah, my dear Applejack, so nice to see you, how have you been?” Dr. Aden seemed unusually calm and happy to see her.

Ignoring his tone Applejack snapped, “the jig is up Aden, ah'm taking you in.”

Dr. Aden got an angry look, but then his face relaxed a bit and he smiled, “taking me in, for what, what have I done?”

“You've purposely infected ponies with a virus, you're hurting innocent people!”

“HURTING?!” Dr. Aden began to laugh, “my dear girl that couldn't be farther from the truth,” he said in harsh tones. “I'm helping these people. I'm giving Pegasus the magic that they were jealous of from the old time, giving Earth Ponies the wings that they had so envied, and making all the races able to resist any disease, and live essentially forever.”

Applejack's eyes narrowed, “Is that what ya did for the ponies of Los Pegasus?”

Dr. Aden grew even angrier, “what happened in Los Pegasus was not my fault! You and your idiot friends released C6-TS3, not me!”

Applejack faltered for a moment then stood tall again, “and did that pony volunteer for your experiments doctor? The guards said they were investigating several missing persons reports when they found you.”

Dr. Aden took a step back and got a defensive tone, “I was trying to help people, I needed someone to test on, I...”

Applejack didn't let him finish, “ya kidnapped several ponies to fulfill your own selfish desires!”

Dr. Aden took a step back towards her, putting them inches apart, yelling, “SELFISH, I have worked hard for the last few months to give everyone everlasting life, and you have the audacity to call ME selfish, look at yourself, you and the princesses are guilty of hoarding immortality to yourselves!”

“Ah didn't ask to be this way!”

“You can't tell me that you don't want to live forever,” Dr. Aden said slyly, regaining some of his previous cool.

Applejack hung her head, “actually, ah don't, I just wanted to be normal, ah just wanna be left alone on mah farm, left in peace from all this.”

Dr. Aden stared at her for a moment in stunned silence, “you must be a fool,” he finally said. “Fear of death is all that keeps people going in life, how could you possibly not want immortality?”

Applejack looked up defiantly, “cause I don't live because ah fear death, I live cause I have the love of my friends and family, cause they need me and ah need them!”

Dr. Aden took another step back, “that's... ridiculous, people don't really care for each other, we all just attracted out of our nature. There is no such thing as love or caring for one another.”

Applejack took a step forward, “then why are you trying to give immortality to these ponies? Ain't that against your nature, to help others?”

Dr. Aden set there in stunned silence once more, confronted with the contradictions in his motives, he was unsure of what to do.

Applejack saw the confusion in his eyes and thought she had swayed him, “come back to Canterlot with me, Twi can help undo what you did ta yourself.”

Dr. Aden jerked out of his trance, “NO,” he yelled backing away, “you can't have my immortality, it's mine.” With the last word he began to blast Applejack with a powerful spell. Applejack reflexively threw up a magical defense which seemed to hold. After a few seconds, Dr. Aden threw even more effort into it. Applejack tried to hold her own, but seemed weaker than Dr. Aden. After three more seconds she lost her focus and Dr. Aden's blast hit her full force. She went rocketing towards a nearby building and made a large hole in the wall.

Applejack slowly stood up and looked over at Dr. Aden, who was barely panting from that powerful blast. She knew he had almost a lifetime's worth of experience using magic over her, and that she couldn't possibly beat him going toe to toe.

Dr. Aden smiled, “go home Applejack, you can't beat me. I'm far superior in magical strength than you!”

Applejack knew he was right, however she also knew that he didn't have nearly as much experience with his new wings as she did. So she kicked off into the air and began to circle over head. She fired a burst of magic straight at him, which he deflected, however once he looked back up, he was surprised to see Applejack flying straight at him. He barely had time to yell before she slammed into him. They began to wrestle, also something Applejack had a considerable deal more experience with. After a few seconds of grappling she managed to position herself on top of him, where she hooked both her forelegs underneath his wings and on top of his neck, in a hold that only worked on Pegasus.

Dr. Aden attempted to buck her off, but Applejack just tightened up, hurting his wings, which Applejack knew were more sensitive then Pegasus normally let on. After a moment he began trying to cast a spell. When Applejack noticed, she cranked on the hold she had him in. He yelled out in pain and fell to his knees. They stayed like that for several seconds, panting until Applejack finally spoke, “now will ya calm down and listen to me for a sec?”

Dr. Aden struggled once more before settling down and said, “what more is there to say, I don't want your 'help' and there's nothing you can say that will change my mind.”

“The princesses may let ya keep your immortality, but we can't have you going around forcing it on other ponies.”

“Bah, lies, the princesses would never let me keep my immortality, not after everything that has happened.”

“Ya don't know that, at least talk with 'em. They would listen to ya if you just surrendered rather than going around causing all these problems.”

Dr. Aden sighed, “maybe your right, maybe if I would have just talked with them in the first place they could have seen things my way, but its far too late for that now, they won't forgive me for what I've done.”

“Its not too late to undo the damage.”

“What do you mean, I have infected hundreds of ponies with the virus, there is no possible way to contain them all now. What could you possibly do, seal this city too?”

Applejack looked off into the distance and saw a formation of Pegasi headed to the city carrying a large container. She smiled and let go of Dr. Aden and pointed up at the Wonder Bolts coming in, “no we are gonna cure 'em!”

The Wonder Bolts reached the edge of the city and turned on the large container which began to sprinkle out the mist of R2. Dr. Aden stared at the Wonder Bolts as they passed over head, and then the cloud of clear mist that descended upon them. “What is that?”

“The cure for C6 and C7.”

“Cure...” Dr. Aden said unsure, and seemingly tired, he swayed a little and fell over. Applejack looked down at him, everything seemed to be getting fuzzy. The R2 seemed to be affecting her much the same way as it was affecting him. She took a step towards him and then collapsed, unable to hold herself up. She stared up after the Wonder Bolts spraying the city, then slowly closed her eyes, and then all went black.

Comments

[BenRG]

Okay, yeah he's nuts. That's unfortunate but it doesn't make him any less dangerous. I wonder if Nightmare Moon's old digs on the Moon are still usable?

I mean it: He's still got the knowledge even with C6 and C7 eradicated. He might not be able to replicate the virus, especially as Applejack is 'cured' but he can try and that could easily lead to pretty ugly problems later down the line.