BEDLAM

by Gormless Wheaton

Chapter 12

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The hunting golems went stomping down the corridor, completely overlooking the slightly ajar broom closet a set of cyan eyes were peeking out of.

"Coast is clear!" Pinkie whispered.

Twilight nodded and replaced the Elements into her saddlebag. "Great job, Spike!" She reached with her hoof to pat him on the back but hit air instead. She looked around. "Uh.."

"Right here," the invisible dragon declared to her left.

She turned. "Oh! Nice job." She patted him on what felt like his shoulder. Before turning to the rest of the group. "Alright! If I heard Bedlam right, he brought us right to his real headquarters, so we can probably find the real Crystal Mind here. If we blast it with the Elements once he's got those satellites in the sky, it should spread to every evil machine he's got out there!"

"Heck yeah!" Rainbow cheered, pounding her hooves together. "Use his own junk against him!"

"What about Discord?" Fluttershy murmured.

"And those awful copies he made of us?" Rarity added.

Twilight nodded and peeked through the door. "We should sneak back and set Discord free. He can probably-"

A glowing cerulean lense suddenly filled her gaze. She recoiled with a gasp as the Pinkie replica poked her head inside. [Hi!]

---

"KS 6, respond," I spat. The Crystal Mind pulsed, sending the signal out. As it did, I continued scanning the Citadel for any alerts or pings about the Elements' location. Concerningly, a large number of animunculi within the Citadel were suddenly being cut off, implying they'd been destroyed or otherwise deactivated. My foot tapped impatiently as no response came. "KS 6, respond."

[I'm busy, Eddlam. 5 just found them.]

"Good. Get them back to their-"

[I know, I know! Finish them off. Can you recall all these golems? They keep getting in the way.] Oh boy.

"Are you the one smashing all our animunculi?" I pulled up a projected map of the Citadel and added all the last known locations of all the golems we'd lost contact with.

[Of course! You don't need them anymore, silly.]

"Hm. Interesting assessment," there was now a fairly clear trail from the workshop.

[Thank you. I'm surprised it had to be said, to be honest.]

I flipped a switch. "Jury-rig, can you hear me?"

Her voice crackled in after a moment. "Yep! Tempest is stalking the halls, and I'm on my way to you."

I winced. A whole nother set of machines just went offline. "Good. KS 6 is rapidly deteriorating. She's destroying all our golems. We need to-"

[Stop ignoring me, Eddlam.] I paused. I flipped a few more switches. [That won't work, Eddlam.]

I grit my teeth and sighed. "KS 6, explain yourself."

[You're the one who wanted me to pilot the Crystal Mind. Don't be shocked that I'm doing exactly that.] I recoiled and looked at the gem in question. It was pulsing as normal though its hue had shifted from a lime green to a deep purple.

"Oh boy," I rubbed my forehead. "KS 6, please remove yourself from the Citadel's brain."

[No.]

I leaned on my console and hummed. "Don't make me ask again." The door to the chamber suddenly slammed shut, and I drummed my fingers on the console.

[Sit tight, Eddlam! After we've purged these sick replicas Celestia sent after you, I'll come let you out.] I growled and ducked under the console, where I pulled a sheet of metal out to try and manually force her out by tampering with the additional gemworks.

"Even as a machine, you just can't work with me, can you, Twilight?"

---

"Look out!" Twilight yelled as the blast she fired at the flying golem was absorbed by its shield and then launched back at her. She dove to the side and the beam peeled through the air narrowly missing the Pinkie golem which had stopped chasing them and was now murmuring to itself.

The flying golem buzzed toward them only to be smashed into the ceiling by Rainbow bodyslamming it. Its shield repelled her into the ground, but the impact still threw it off balance, allowing the girls to rush down the corridor.

The wall directly in front of them was suddenly smashed in as another replica tumbled in. [Apples.]

Applejack recoiled with a shake of her head. "Wha? Oh, very funny." She tackled the golem and tumbled to the floor in a slug match with it.

"Applejack!" Fluttershy cried but then shivered as she turned around to see her double staring blankly at her. "Hi?"

"Heads up!" Rainbow yelled, diving in the air to tackle her double, and then blinking in surprise when the golem jolted and crashed into a wall before tumbling to the ground. "What?"

The Twilight double appeared then, dragging the Rarity golem in her magic, who had a cluster of wrenches wrapped in her forelegs. [Got you now.]

Twilight frowned and scanned the six golems. "Something funny's going on here."

[The only thing funny is that you think you can hamper Eddlam's plans any longer,] the Twilight golem replied.

"Eddlam?" Twilight shared a confused look with her friends as all the golems were suddenly dragged together and stood up beside the Twilight golem.

[You're finished,] it hissed and crackled with magic.

"They're using the element magic again!" Rainbow cried.

The six golems began to shine with friendship magic just like at the fake citadel. Then, all but the Twilight golem collapsed, and that one made a horrible screeching noise as it rattled and twitched.

[What?] It cried. [Why? Girls? Eddlam? Hello? Friends? Friends? Hello?] Smoke began to billow from its joints and it fell on its side repeating itself over and over. The others remained motionless, but smoke erupted from them all the same.

Twilight and the rest recoiled and shared a look. Then, their expressions turned steely and they drew their elements from Twilight's bag.

---

Well, that wasn't a good sound.

I rolled out from under the console to look up at the Crystal Mind. It was pulsing more intensely than normal and the magic dancing around its surface was.. prismatic. And then the console began to flicker with a similar magic.

"Oh, shit." I jumped to my feet and ran for the door. I grabbed its base and pulled. "KS 6, open this door now!" A squealing whine began to emanate from the Crystal Mind. I glanced back and saw to my horror that it was rising up from its base and crackling. I reached into my belt and switched on my shield before drawing an advanced blasting talisman and punching my way out of the door.

As I emerged I was immediately aware of the chaos unfolding around me. Golems were shuddering in place and crackling and the lights were shimmering. I grit my teeth and took off to find Jury-rig.

As I ran, I turned a corner and immediately tripped over Twilight and the girls. I rolled over and met her furious eyes, as she was in my face with a hoof on my chest. "Ah-" And then the rest surrounded me, with equally outraged looks. I held up a hand. "Let's be reasonable."

"Reasonable?" She repeated, with a venomous inflection.

I swallowed and slowly lowered my hand to grab my blasting talisman. "What happened to the Killer Six?"

"Yer dollies done got blown up, fella. Hate to break it to ya," Applejack replied. I recoiled.

"How?!" I flinched as my glove crackled. Twilight and the rest recoiled and backed off as my entire suit and all my tools began to crackle as well. "Wha-" The lights began to flicker, and the ambient hum of the Citadel suddenly went quiet.

"We blasted them with the Elements, Eddy," Twilight declared, drawing my attention. "And it looks like the magic traveled to your Crystal Mind and is spreading through the whole place." I stammered and crawled back from her as my suit and gems began to arc with magic.

"That can't be!" I screamed. "The Killer Six can-"

"That's the thing about friendship, Eddy. It can be faked, but when push comes to shove, the real thing always wins in the end," she replied. She gave me a sad frown. "I'm sorry if I ever made you feel like our's wasn't real. Maybe if I tried a little harder, none of this would have happened."

I paused and my jaw dropped as she looked away. "I hope one day I can make it up to you." Then the first of my gems cracked, setting off a chain reaction of explosive magic.

I haven't a solid idea of what happened after that. I don't even know if the satellites spread the magic to my other factories.

I assume that since harmony magic is mainly used for good things that's the only reason my gems exploding with that magic didn't kill me. But whatever the case, when next I woke up I was alone, on my back on a cold metal floor inside a cold metal cage in a very dark chamber.

And that's where I stayed for five long years.

---

Comments

[SleeplessChatter]

He simultaneously did so much better than the Storm King at conquering the world but never actually quite made it to Canterlot it seems. A+ for effort though.

Curious to see if we get any snippets from his time in Tarturus. Impression I got from prologue is that it was not the first time he saw the princesses there.