Hoof Hoof Hoof

by Karkadinn

Twilight

Pinkie nodded approvingly at Twilight's lightning-backgrounded maniacal laughter. It was really that kind of panache you had to have to pull off an outfit of a lab coat and dark goggles. Not everypony could do mad scientist, especially when the number one assistant had to ruin the mood by refusing to call them 'master,' but Twilight had it down pat.

“It's physiological signaling and controlling mechanisms are approaching a state crudely analogous to being alive! It's physiological signaling and controlling mechanisms are approaching a state crudely analogous to being alive, hahahahahahaaaa!”

The basement lights clicked back on to full power, the lightning generator stopped lightning generator, and Twilight replaced her goggles with a gimlet to inspect the device.

“Hmm, everything seems to be in order. Now we just need to calibrate the muscular response coordinator to your movement range so it won't snap your hoof off at the fetlock when you try to make a gesture.”

“That sounds super duper safe! So do I just stick my hoof in or-”

“No no no no no, aren't you listening? We have to calibrate it first. That means we need data. Now, just put these twenty dooflollies on while I wickity whack the kajigger with the thingamabob. And make sure to beebity boobity boo.”

“Okey dokey lokie!”

“Pinkie?”

“Yes, Twilight?”

“Are you doing that thing again where you replace my highly specific technical scientific terms in your head with random nonsense words?”

Pinkie's eyes shifted to one side. “No.”

“Because I clearly asked you to put the dooflollies on while I operate the kajigger with the thingamabob, and you're beebity boobity booing the wickity whack with the kajigger.”

“I'm sorry Twilight, I'll try to be a more attentive guinea pig!”

“That's all I ask of you. There!” Twilight beamed. “All done. It should be safely operational under standard conditions now. That means no zero gee, no lava, no teleporting through the space-time continuum and no cramming yourself into spaces physically too small to hold a pony-sized pony.”

“I never go into lava.”

“You are sooo missing out,” Spike commented, polishing his claws. “Hey, wanna try it out? The glove, I mean, not lava.”

Pinkie gasped and bounded over to him, eyes dinner plate-sized. “You mean we can play the game?! Really really really?!”

“Yeah, sure. But you gotta keep your cool, Pinks. It's all about the meta.”

“Sure sure sure sure sure. Oh, magical Twilight glove, please gesticulate into symbols shaped like objects now!”

“It's not voice-activated, Pinkie,” Twilight pointed out with mild irritation. “See that crank on the side? You have to crank it up, then put it on and think about what you want it to do. The neural pathway analyzer should get a good approximation of what you want as long as you maintain mental focus.”

“Oh, I can totally do that.” She cranked it up with her mouth and focused, forehead wrinkling with concentration wrinkles.

The black segmented digits of the glove wobbled.

Then they weebled.

Then they wiggled.

Then they waggled.

Finally, they quivered!

After that, the glove burst into a flurry of precise motion, the artificial fingers moving so fast that they blurred the air with dark streaks. Everypony (and Spike) watched with mouths ajar, eager to see the fabulous feats the glove would perform....

And then....

BOOM.

“Oh my gosh it's totally crossing its fingers! Oh oh oh now it's doing TWO finger crosses at the same time! This is amazing! Guys, isn't this amazing?!”

Twilight pulled her hoof down from the bridge of her nose and flattened out her grimace. “Pinkie, I told you you need to focus. If you don't have a precise image of what the glove needs to do when you-”

“Look, look look look! It's making hand signs! Spike, quick, what does it mean when you point up your middle finger?!”

The dragon shrugged. “Beats me.”

“Maybe it wants to poke something! Mister Magical Glove, do you want to poke somepony?” Pinkie asked it seriously, considering that harmony between a glove and its wearer should be almost as necessary as harmony between two friends. If they could anticipate each other's needs and all that stuff, they could fit together like... something in a glove, she knew there was a phrase that ended in 'a glove' but couldn't remember the rest of it, drat. “Bananas in a glove?” she wondered out loud, which caused Twilight to grind her teeth for reasons that would forever elude Pinkie.

“Okay, new plan. Pinkie, you go have fun with the Prototype Digital Gesticulator Mark Oh One until the excitement of newness wears off, and remember it's not a toy.”

Pinkie nodded absentmindedly, busy playing thumb war with Spike while giggling maniacally.

“Come back in about a week and we'll see if you've established any controlled boundaries for disciplined gesticulation. Okay?”

“Will do, your scienceishness!” She saluted with her new 'hand.' “Huh, wrong salute. Who salutes with a flat hand out from their body diagonally? Oh well, blame it on the sugar mind static, right Twi?”

“Just like I told you last Wednesday, there's no such thing as sugar mind static. Now get out before I have a stroke.”

Pinkie and Spike shrugged at each other and Pinkie went off to play with her new toy. Poor Twilight just took everything so unnecessarily seriously!

The first thing she thought about doing was giving the poor thing a real name. Everything liked having names, and Mister Magical Glove didn't do much to separate her magical glove from every other magical glove that was out there. Maybe a shortened version of Twi's sciencey name, the Prototype Digital Gesticulator Mark Oh One. The ProDiGeMarOhOn? Hm, that last part could be shortened to MOO like a cow super easy! And ProDiGe sounded like Prodigy!

“Prodigy-Moo, I love you,” she told the glove, nuzzling it and giving it a lil crank.

Prodigy-Moo gave her a thumbs up and she giggled.

“Alright, you're already thinkin' positively! Oh, hey, while we're brainstorming, we need to think up like a million different puns using your little finger. Because that's your pinky, get it?! Oh, hey Lyra.” The blue-green pony was staring for some reason. “What, haven't you ever seen a magical finger-wiggling glove before? Bye Lyra!”

Prodigy-Moo waved, and Pinkie just wanted to hug the thing.

Truly, it was the best piece of clothing ever. Not that she'd ever say that around Rarity, whew.

She went around practicing all sorts of fun things with Prodigy-Moo. Jump rope was SO much easier, and climbing ladders, and using doorknobs... as a matter of fact, it seemed like everything in Ponyville had secretly been designed to work better with hands than hooves, how crazy was that?! She had no idea why Spike hadn't bragged about his amazing fingers, they were so fantabulous that going back to a fingerless life made her feel like an empty lonely sad goth pony with fake fangs and red contact lenses and reserved seats at beatnik poetry readings. But now Prodigy-Moo was in her life foreverrrrrr!

Dinner was especially exciting. The Cakes smiled in that special 'I'm scared' way after Pinkie started using Prodigy-Moo to fold napkins into origami cranes, so she toned it down and just stuck to using the glove for little things like drinking from a glass while they were around. And they told her to not use it while she was at work, which made her just want to cry, but she arranged a little bed-shrine for Prodigy-Moo in her room so he could enjoy candles and incense and fluffy pillows while she was gone.

At the end of the day, she remembered she hadn't even properly introduced Prodigy-Moo to Gummy, which was just bad manners. But she had a good excuse! She kept getting distracted waving to Lyra, who was hanging around and trying to look in the windows for some reason. Still, there was nothing more important than cementing the bonds between one's state-of-the-art clothes and one's pets, so she got the two of them together and offered to shake, just so Gummy knew to be nice to their new friend.

“Well?” she prompted after Gummy stared for a bit. “Come on, put 'er there, pal!”

Gummy slowly opened his mouth, leaning in... and then he did something he'd never done before. Ever.

He closed his mouth and pulled back, refusing to bite.

“Gummy?” He didn't do anything unusual other than that, but it was so out of character for him that she frowned and checked his temperature. “You don't feel fevery, but let me get you a glass of milk and those pony-flavored potato chips you like so much just in case. Ya gotta keep your strength up to look after Prodigy-Moo while I'm cashing the register and distributing the doodlesnickers!”

Prodigy-Moo stiffened its fingers and thumb, making a chomping motion like its fingers were the top jaw and the thumb was the bottom jaw.

Pinkie giggled. “Hey, that's pretty good! I wasn't even thinking about that! Nice job, Prodigy-Moo, you're a real cool guy who don't afraid of anything. Can you eat a pretend doodlesnicker?” The fingers shut and opened several times forcefully. “Om nom nom! Hahah, you're so funny.”

It seemed obvious to her that Prodigy-Moo was purely masculine in an intangible, philosophical sense, even if it didn't have actual masculiney bits – which was probably all for the best, considering how her experiments at bachelorette parties had turned out. It was a glove with a sleek, gentlemanly but strong and rugged design, capable of being the life of a party or laying the smack down as required. She could so easily imagine Prodigy-Moo clutching a pipe, or... what else did boys clutch, anyway? Golf clubs. Definitely golf clubs. Further experimentation, as Twilight would have put it, was required.

The next day, after work she took Prodigy-Moo out golfing. But she did miniature golf instead of regular golf, because regular golf didn't have nearly enough miniature windmills. To her delight, not only did Prodigy-Moo get her her best score ever, it even made writing down her score sooo much easier! How could she possibly have gone her entire life writing things with her mouth?! Prodigy-Moo had that whole 'holding a pencil' thing down cold! Also, its handwriting was like thirty times better than her hoofwriting, except when she specifically asked it to imitate her hoofwriting, which it did with unerring accuracy.

Lyra had miniature golfed next to her the whole time, too, which was funny but also kind of fun because they'd already seen so much of each other lately and Pinkie was getting the feeling that the unicorn needed a friend. When she offered to shake 'hooves,' Lyra practically fainted. That was what happened when you went an entiiiiire course of minigolf without a milkshake or chili fries, silly!

Only one thing bothered Pinkie. When she double-checked her score to make sure that Prodigy-Moo hadn't been fudging the numbers, she noticed a little 'I hate you' written out in cursive below the tally. Prodigy-Moo clearly had one of those sarcastic, 'I don't believe in FEELINGS' senses of humor that were so common to boys. Pinkie decided she would just have to learn to put up with it. Deep down inside, her glove loved her. She knew it. Why else would it be so amazingly helpful?

“What would you like to do today, Prodigy-Moo?” she asked her glove the next day after brushing her teeth, scrubbing the goo from her eyes, flossing and picking something that looked the mutant offspring between lint and a tarantula out of her nose. It took her a second to remember to give it its regular ol' crankity crank.

Suitably powered up, Prodigy-Moo went for the little notepad and pencil she was now keeping around all the time, just because writing with fingers was so fantastically fantastic.

KILL YOU

She frowned. That wasn't a very nice joke.

“Now Prodigy-Moo, I know how it is in the street, all you young tough gloves feel like you've gotta keep your rep with those hip fingerless gloves. But pretty soon all those fingerless gloves are gonna be paying child support to lingerie and then you'll have to go back to all your old friends who love you and want what's best for you. You can be a bro if you want, but you have to express your broness in productive ways! So, what do you really wanna do? It can be aaaaanything you want!”

BOXING

“Well, alright! Now we're talkin'! And you're in luck, Prodigy-Moo, 'cause this big bad pink mama's still got her gym membership!” She blew the dust off her gym membership card (that last visit where she'd accidentally broken four different machines had left the ponies there just a liiiiittle sore at her), put on her sweatband, and readied herself for war. By which she meant exercise. Which was really just war against yourself, no quarter asked or offered.

There weren't a lot of ponies at the gym today, but Snowflake was always hanging around and working on getting his spectacular pecs even more spectacular.

“Hey Flakey, wanna box?”

“YEAH!” Pinkie's mane billowed back.

“Awesometastic! Just lemme get my gear on and I'll give ya what for! Oh, hey Lyra.” Funny how Lyra came in right after her and took the walking machine right nearby.

Poor Prodigy-Moo had to scrunch up its fingers, since the gloves were designed for hooves, not hands. She reminded herself to ask the receptionist about hands-friendly equipment. Spike would be needing to come here sometime, after all, if he wanted to catch all the lady dragons, rawr. Still, Prodigy-Moo seemed okay with it. More than okay, it was rarin' to go, what with all the air punches and strangley gestures it was makin'.

“Okay, okay, save it for the ring, fella!” She laughed, gave him an extra few cranks for good measure, and bounced on back over to Snowflake, who was snorting like a bull in anticipation of murdering face. It was kinda intimidating but she knew from experience that he could be a gentlepony with the ladies.

“Ready?”

“YEAH!”

“Awright, let's tap gloves and BONK FACES! ♪Iiiiit's the eye of the tiger, it's the thrill of the fight...♪”

She was way out of practice but relied on her natural flexibility to keep her from getting murderated too fast. Good thing she was a lithe and agile hummingbird of a pony, too, 'cause Prodigy-Moo wasn't doing nearly as much as she thought it would to block Flakey's punches, even though she specifically focused her inner thoughtiness on blocking! The glove-in-a-glove jerked out of the way at the oddest times, leaving her poor pink posterior to be pummeled by pony power! She could barely get any hits back in herself but at least the bruises wouldn't show since it was pink on pink. That was totally how bruises worked, she was sure.

Round two, Prodigy-Moo must have forgotten the rules. No biggie since it was its first time and all, but seriously, punching a pony in the throat was a no-go even with protective gear on! She apologized and Flakey shrugged it off, claiming his neck was as muscley as the rest of him, which she was at this point very inclined to believe.

Round three she concentrated mostly on dodging, including a few super bendy slo-mo moves that seemed to impress Lyra (she was still staring, huh), when Prodigy-Moo seemed to get impatient. Finally Prodigy-Moo returned a blow, with strength righteous and true... unfortunately, it was aimed at a place good ponies weren't supposed to touch until they were married, gloves or no gloves!

From somewhere or other came a sound of breaking glass as Snowflake tottered to his knees, face reddening and eyes watering.

“Oh no, Flakey! I'm so sorry!” She hugged him. “I really should've gone through the rules more loudly with Prodigy-Moo! Are your sphericles okay?”

“Yeah...” he said in a very Fluttershy voice, and then fell over.

She considered it her responsibility to take him to the nearest nurse, but for some reason the employees wanted to do it themselves, so she let them and spent her free time scolding Prodigy-Moo for misbehaving so. You had to be firm! There was no such thing as bad gloves, but sometimes good gloves did bad things. This called for a timeout in the I Did A Bad Thing Corner of her room, so she went back to the bakery and suffered to remove Prodigy-Moo and stick it on a stool so it could think about what it'd done. Her bare hoof felt oddly naked and tingly after having worn Prodigy-Moo for so long; secretly, she'd miss that soft, sexy, leathery weight wrapping around her, but she HAD to be strong, for the sake of the continued propapagation of the pony species!

Only when it was time for bed did she consent to let it off the stool, placing the glove on her pillow next to her head so Prodigy-Moo would know she still loved it.

“Goodnight, Prodigy-Moo. I still love ya, buddy.”

Prodigy-Moo laid there, motionless, even though she'd cranked it up so it could say goodnight. Oh well, it could be a sulky mcsulkyglove if it wanted.

Pinkie closed her eyes and dreamed of eggs cracking in frying pans until a strange pressure on her neck woke her up. Something soft, but strong. Leathery.

Her eyes snapped open as the sensation tightened like a strangling snake.

“Prodigy-Moo?” she whispered shakily. “Are you giving me a hug?”

The fingers tightened.

“P-Prodigy-Moo, that h-hurts mama...” she croaked. “Prodigy-Moo, please stop!” It only got tighter.

She rolled out of bed and grabbed at Prodigy-Moo with both hooves, prying it off and throwing it on the floor. Opening the bathroom, she checked to make sure Gummy wasn't sleeping in the tub again, snatched up Prodigy-Moo and threw it in there without any further ceremony.

“You can just sleep in the metaphorical dog house tonight, mister!” she scolded it through the door that she'd shut very, very quickly. “And after a good night's sleep I expect you to have a written two-page apology for me! In cursive!”

So strange. She snuggled next to Gummy for comfort, relaxing gradually as that pink mouth nommed her face playfully.

“You'd never hurt me, would you Gummy?”

Nom nom nom.

“Prodigy-Moo is being a lot more of a hooffull than I thought it'd be. I hope I'm not a bad disciplinarian.”

Gummy's right eye blinked, then his left eye blinked, then he nommed some more.

“I'd hate to have to break out the... paddle...” she whispered with a shudder, memories of a sore butt as a little filly coming back to her. “Maybe I should try dusting myself with flour first.”

Sleep was broken up by fitful starts and spasms, but she got enough shut eye to be herself in the morning. Pinkie Pie, the smiley pony, who always greeted the day with a smile. And she was ready to march into that bathroom and tell Prodigy-Moo that all was forgiven if it showed her just a teeny weensy bit of remorse for its horseplay!

“Good mooorning, Mister Cranky Fingers, how did y-”

She turned on the bathroom light and the words died in her mouth.

Prodigy-Moo had found the fancy-schmancy red lipstick Pinkie mostly used for clown costumes and had been busy scribbling with it. All over the walls, the shower curtain, the floor, the ceiling, the medicine cabinet and especially the mirror. Every free inch of space that could be scribbled on was pasted with red, jagged letters.

DIE DIE DIE WHERE IS THE REAL PINKAMENA GO HAVE A TEA PARTY WITH YOUR IMAGINARY FRIENDS EVERYPONY SECRETLY HATES YOU DIE DIE DIE SUFFER YOU FILTH MONSTER ABOMINATION YOU ARE SOMETHING THAT NEVER SHOULD HAVE EXISTED WHY DIDN'T YOUR PARENTS DROWN YOU AT BIRTH YOUR FAMILY IS ASHAMED OF YOU DIE I HATE YOU EVERYONE HATES YOU REMEMBER THAT EVERY TIME YOU LAUGH SOMEONE SOMEWHERE IN THE WORLD IS CRYING WHY DON'T YOU PUT ON MAKEUP AND KILL PEOPLE WITH LAUGHING GAS YOU CLOWN YOU FREAK YOU MADPONY YOU'RE NOT LIKE ANYPONY ELSE YOU DON'T DESERVE TO BE HAPPY DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE ALSO YOU ARE TOTALLY A FATTY YOU FATTY FAT FATTY

Slowly, her eyes turned to Prodigy-Moo, who was laying in the middle of the floor between two of the smaller 'Die's in total relaxation, palm upturned like the belly of a relaxed sleepy puppy or kitty cat.

Oh my gosh.

Her glove was evil!

It was okay, though, it was okay. Deep breaths. Remember what Twilight had said? You had to crank it. As long as she didn't crank it up, Prodigy-Moo was completely harmless.

And then...

Crickity-crickity-crickity-criiiiiick.

“Mother of pony god,” Pinkie whispered in almost reverent horror, watching that little metal tab spin in slow, relentless circles. “It can crank itself up.”

A few hours later, she was shoving an angrily-rustling cardboard box with Prodigy-Moo into an iron furnace in Twilight's basement. It'd taken her a little longer to get there than usual because Lyra had kept asking her where the glove was and she hadn't had the heart to tell her the truth. The furnace had been hidden down a trap door that Twilight had only opened with a lever, a pass card, an eye scan and a drop of blood after Pinkie had told Twilight exactly what her bathroom looked like, and it glowed with an otherworldly blue-green light even though there wasn't any wood or other fuel for it to be burning.

“Fortunately, the Eldritch Abomination Demanifestation Unit also doubles as a Science Gone Terribly Wrong Disposal Unit,” Twilight commented coolly, like she'd done this before.

Pinkie could've sworn Prodigy-Moo let out a shriek like a thousand damned souls when she put the box in. She could just barely see the outline of the glove's middle finger stiffly outstretched before she closed the little round furnace door, sniffling. Looks like it was back to the drawing board for getting rock paper scissors in her life!

“Tw-Twilight?” she asked after a quick hug. “Why do you have an Eldritch Abomination Demanifestation Unit in your basement?”

“Tell ya what,” Twilight said back with almost professorial cheer, “I won't ask you why a device that bases its responses primarily on the conscious and subconscious cognitive and emotional cues of its user hates you and tried to kill you, and you won't ask me why I need to banish eldritch abominations on a semi-regular basis. Fair trade?”

“Fair trade,” she agreed, and they bumped hooves to seal the deal.

Comments

[Yinglung]

'Who salutes with a flat hand out from their body diagonally'
You betcha

[FashionablyHospitable]

(o)_(o) I will not look at or the same way again.

[DarkDMan]

So much laughing, than weirding than smiles!

[Wellwater]

“I won't ask you why a device that bases its responses primarily on the conscious and subconscious cognitive and emotional cues of its user hates you and tried to kill you, and you won't ask me why I need to banish eldritch abominations on a semi-regular basis. Fair trade?”

This is what really sells the fic.

[Andy Ray]

Raise shields! Phasers at ready! Engage spoiler alert!

So, Twilight made a glove... that "bases its responses primarily on the conscious and subconscious cognitive and emotional cues of its user"... Then it tries to kill Pinkie... I can't help but wonder... The Pinkamena side of Pinkie did all that?
I feel sorry for Pinkie...