Chapter 12: Garnet
Bit worked.
This did not bother her—labor was a desirable state for her, it meant she was advancing towards a purpose. Idleness, with no labor to perform, was the thing to be feared. But this labor was under pressure, and so for the first time she felt strained.
Growing the crystal seed needed to "treat" Pathfinder was an incredibly delicate process, requiring her focus at almost all hours of the day, with only very brief periods of respite while one step in the process resolved into the next. It was abundantly clear to her from the very first night that no mere pony could do this—even the Wizard needed to sleep, and to rest.
That led her to one inescapable conclusion, one that was so obvious she nearly missed it. Her master had help the one time he had done this. That help had clearly come from the other who had contributed to the instructions, often with complementary notes outlining ways to perfect or simplify the process with further experimentation.
Granted, Bit ignored most of these notes. Whoever the other pony had been, they focused far more on the future, on improvements and simplifications. Pathfinder did not have the time for experimentation, so all of that would have to wait for some future innovation.
I wonder if the desire to reproduce will remain once it has been fulfilled. She doubted it—if living things continued to reproduce despite satisfying that drive, they would inevitably exhaust their resources. That explained the state of Zircon well enough, but she couldn't believe Crimson would instill something so contradictory in her.
She had expected having Pathfinder present for the work would make things easier. In some ways it wasn't—he asked questions whenever he was awake, and often required tending. Bit had not been trained as a nurse, and did not have time to reference the guides stored in the vault below. That meant her labor was substandard, building a constant reservoir of shame within her.
When the Wizard returns, he won't think much of my work saving Pathfinder. If he survives, he will have endured far more than a patient should.
By the second day, he had started losing fur. By the fifth, he began to admit that he was having doubts about his earth pony magic.
Pathfinder had an IV in him then, a constant drip of water, salt, and simple sugars to keep him from starving. It would only work for so long, though—his digestion was undergoing permanent destruction. Supplies of powdered emergency supplements would last longer than he did.
"How's that potion coming along?" he asked, his voice ragged and raspy. He didn't move from the hospital bed anymore, just watching as the health monitor droned the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. "I'm feeling... optimistic about trusting you." Every sentence came haltingly, with a pause to catch his breath. "You act like the artisans in Revolution Square. They don't know what they're missing not having you."
She didn't look away from her work, though she could still see him out of her peripheral vision. The desks in front of her were completely covered with equipment, as a dozen different chemical processes transpired simultaneously. The fume hood against the wall was the loudest, though not the most delicate. That honor remained the realm of the seed itself, suspended by magnetic induction in a double-insulated beaker in front of her.
Liquid nitrogen boiled from the outer shell of the insulated vacuum, and the top was packed with gauze. Still, she spoke quietly, just in case.
"I don't actually know I have succeeded. I will not see the crystal seed until the seventh day of the process. If it does not match my master's descriptions, then it will kill you."
"It's gonna be perfect," he said. "Bloody hell, Bit. You're the wizard of the tower. You can bring back everything that was lost in the revolution. Power, medicine, crystalcraft. You know it all."
More organic failures. Maybe this hadn't been the unique weakness of Crimson after all. Every one of these ponies seemed prone to overestimating her. Improper assessments of her skill would lead to incorrect judgements about future capabilities.
"I am attempting to follow precise instructions. But even if I am successful, and the seed exactly matches the description, I do not wish to exaggerate my certainty of the results you will experience. This treatment was experimental even then. The Wizard of this tower refused to try it, for fear of the subject not surviving. It may not work."
It seemed like she finally reached him this time. Pathfinder was silent for over a minute, staring out the clear window to his left at the city far below. It was still warm out there, though perpetual smoke always rose from the city center. Revolution Square, apparently.
Finally, he spoke, without any of his past enthusiasm. "Bit, it feels like I'm dying anyway. If I haven't started getting better in... what, two more days? If I feel this bad two days from now, I will take any treatment you can offer."
She nodded resolutely. "I believed you would express a sentiment to that effect. It is the logical way to proceed. It is possible that Master Crimson was just waiting for a similar hopeless case before proceeding with his experiments further. It did not come, but now... I will complete what he began."
Bit did not understand what she was doing. She had not been trained in crystalcraft, and she was no artifabrican. What if the test failed, could she try again? Could she grow a better seed the second time?
If I wanted to try, I would have to study everything the Wizard knew. I would need his education.
Or even better, maybe Pathfinder could help her find him. His help would be the least she was owed after saving his life.
She worked, and he got worse. He woke less and less, with patches of infected tissue emerging all over his body. A few even became necrotic, and required her clumsy removal.
But it was no longer about curing him—the chance of that vanished after the second day, when he didn't receive the proper treatment. All her hopes hinged now on transforming him.
Bit was so focused on her craftsmanship that there was almost no time at all to devote to anything else anymore. As it turned out, her first few days were a mere introduction to the challenge waiting for her.
Again she felt that sensation of treading on something so far beyond herself that she could not even comprehend it. It was the way she had looked at the Wizard's door for all those years of cleaning windows and sweeping floors. But now she understood why she had respected him so much.
She was left struggling to complete each step, managing thaumic lenses nanometers from bleaching the crystal, or chemical concentrates that would become violently unstable at the slightest variation in pressure. In the end, obedience was only possible thanks to the advantages of her nature. Bit could watch every beaker without her concentration faltering.
Pathfinder was not awake when the final moment came, and she removed the crystal seed from within the pressure-vessel that had held it for its last several days.
She carefully drained away the toxic gas, then the debris collecting on the bottom of the tank. Finally she slipped the vessel aside, and settled the levitation coil out onto the table before her.
The shard within was smaller than the instructions suggested, barely any larger than the automaton seed she had started with. But where that was a perfect diamond, this was a swirl of color, fracturing and polarizing depending on the angle.
The seed itself was a perfect octahedron, product of the thaumic compressor that had helped create it. Would this be enough for a crystalcraft certification? I have to rank as a novice at least.
There were three tests to confirm the completion of her work. The first, that the stone could be levitated, was already a clear success. The second required her to lift up a dropper of acid so powerful it burned the lungs and melted glass. She deposited a single drop on the peak of the seed.
It slid down to the desk below, where it began to sizzle at the polished surface. But Bit didn't care—it had left no mark, and not discolored the seed. The second test was passed.
And to perform the third test, a life will be required.
The warmth of the levitation coil was enough that the sheet of her notes began to blacken. Bit barely felt he heat against her crystal body, though of course it must be present.
The coils will burn out if I leave it floating without coolant. A part of her ached that she was about to disobey the instructions. She didn't dare fracture the crystal into shards, and risk destroying what little she had. She was damning herself to endure this process all over again if she ever wished to reproduce, but she would endure it.
Maybe one day, she could perfect it.
Bit took the seed in a pair of platinum tongs, before switching off the levitation coil. Only when it was safely resting in a little bowl of the silvery metal did she finally turn her attention on Pathfinder.
She approached his bedside slowly. Even getting close to him was painful, though she could not exactly explain why. Most of his coat was gone now, and whole patches of skin were angry red. A few more green spots were visible too, with bulging blisters of infected pus waiting to be lanced.
In a matter of days, he had gone from a vital, clever pony, brave enough to follow her into the darkness of the palace... to a rotting blob, barely able to sit up.
The same thing happened to the Wizard.
"Pathfinder," she said, nudging him gently with one hoof. "Pathfinder, I'm finished."
He didn't even twitch. His chest continued to rise and fall, shaking with every breath.
"Pathfinder," she shouted, far louder. "It's time! I have finished!"
The resting pony didn't so much as groan in his sleep. Off to one side, the automaton turned towards her. Was it worried for her? Or maybe it mistook her words for a command.
If Pathfinder isn't awake, I need help.
"It is standard practice to obtain consent before treatment," she said, watching Pathfinder's eyes carefully. Nothing. "As this is a high-risk procedure, that requirement becomes even stricter."
His breath rasped in and out. The monitor beside him continued to beep. Was it her imagination, or was it slowing down? I haven't prepared this seed for use on a pony without vital processes. That required a whole suite of tools and materials she didn't have, materials probably lost to the revolution like so much else.
"Pathfinder, I require interaction. Please show sign of your consent to the procedure. This treatment will permanently change you. You will not ever return to your previous state, no matter how badly you desire it."
Still the pony was unconscious. This was worse than talking while she worked—at least sometimes her memories of her master could offer some insight.
"I will take any treatment you can offer." Those were his words—but he hadn't understood what she was doing. Why bother explaining it before she knew if she could even offer the process?
Now it was too late, and Bit was left with the hardest task she had ever had: she had to choose for someone else.
"I can't do it!" she screamed, crystal seed resting before her in its protective dish. "Master Crimson, I am not making a decision for myself anymore. Others are impacted. I have no way of knowing whether I followed your instructions until I administer the treatment. Even if I succeeded, he may die. What do I do?"
Her master's portrait watched her from the wall, eyes as wise and loving as she remembered. Had she been there the day that photo was taken? I was holding the camera.
Impossible, obviously. She had never existed when the Wizard was so young. Yet she could picture him there, standing before much older and more primitive versions of the machines that now surrounded her.
"You sure you wouldn't rather stand somewhere else?" she asked the empty room. "We could take it beside the Zircon Spire, or in your father's palace."
"No," the Wizard said, making the exact face she saw. "I'm not proud of those things. I didn't build the palace, or the Spire. But here—here we will work miracles."
"I hope so," Bit said. But his confidence was intoxicating, even then. He spoke like it was a future he could already see.
Bit took the little bowl in one hoof, turning towards the automaton. "Rise. I require your help. We will treat this patient immediately.”
Stats
Page generated in 0.029 seconds
Total duration
818 users online
492,237 hits today, 1,822,946 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
to save a friend she defies the rules another step to being a person for bit
Oh... Please work... I don't wanna see Pathfinder go. Bit, you can do it!
10684913
Agreed. She's finally managing to surpass and rewrite her primary directives. I hope the treatment succeeds.
Just desperate fantasies, or memories of before? Either way, we'll see just how well Bit reproduced her master's work. Wonderfully tense note to end on. You monster.
She’s very slowly beginning to remember her life from before as well while she’s trying to save Pathfinders life. Let’s hope that treatment works.
Oh Bit, you silly mare. You'd be among the greatest of masters for that alone
This is the moment, Bit. For Pathfinder, but more importantly, for yourself. Win or lose, you're about to step into your future.
If the process is successful there is a good chance Pathfinder will start off as Bit did, with no memory of who he was. This presents a new challenge for Bit as she will not be satisfied with this result and will try like Crimson did to try to jog Pathfinder's memories and soul. This also will lead to her reflecting on her own state and her own slowly returning memories.
I take this as more or less confirmation that when the seed was used on her she was dead. Likely had brain damage for sometime which might explain her mental state.
Funny thing. As I follow this story and try to wrap my mind around what I'd have to do to produce something comparably good, I'm getting similar epiphany moments... not knowledge, but just brief moments of feeling I've stepped beyond old habits of thought.
Conflict resolution concluded. The game has changed.
Oh Boy it is time now...
That is quite clearly a memory.
Oh. Oh dear. This one line implies that she knows what happened, but is suppressing it. Oh me oh my, that’s a whole other can of worms.
Death from radiation poisoning is awful, probably one of the worst ways to go. I wonder if Pathfinder's memories will be more intact than Bit's were.
10686425
She's not suppressing it, she literally cannot comprehend the concept.
10692664
Nnnnnoooooo? You do realise suppressing something can be the same as not comprehending it, right? Where you understand that something happened, but you're so far into denial that you don't actually understand.
It's been proven she full-well knows what happens. She can comprehend it. She's just suppressing it because it would literally shatter her view of the world. The single line "The same thing happened to the Wizard." proves she knows what happened, and proves she can comprehend it.
So yeah, you need to realise what it means when someone suppresses something.
Instill? She forgets she was once a pony. It might just never have left
Wait, what? So... what he did to create Bit was... something else?
I wonder what actually happened to Moss Flower... certainly nothing that would allow them to take several days to grow a crystal seed inside her before she died.
He already gave that consent, Bit
And if you don't, he'll certainly die. And he consented to the treatment. This is just your own insecurity talking. Get on with it
Oooh? There's still more of Moss Flower in there than anyone realised!
I will take any treatment you can offer."
Remember you said that.
Hopefully this reawakens some of Moss Flower's genius.
The shard within was smaller than the instructions suggested
Dammit.
Bit barely felt he heat against her crystal body,
Bit barely felt the heat against her crystal body,
Maybe one day, she could perfect it.
She'd have to.
Even if I succeeded, he may die. What do I do?"
Embrace your fate Modern Prometheus.