Father's Experiments
"Dad, time for breakfast!"
Comet Cog looked over her little triangle-cut strawberry and cream sandwiches, that sat in the warm sunshine by the daisies. It would be such a delightful lunch for her and her dad, Golden Cog.
A minute later, Golden Cog, whose yellow fur was concealed partially by a disheveled lab coat, pushed open the basement door with his lime green magic aura and entered the kitchen. He swiftly locked the door behind him.
"Thank you, Comet," Golden Cog said pleasantly, coming to have a seat at the table as she enveloped three sandwiches in her own purple aura and placed them delicately on the plate in front of her father. "These look very nice. I'm proud."
Comet Cog bounced on her hooves with excitement. "Thank you, Dad!" She took three sandwiches for herself, and they both dug in.
A silence stood between them for a minute. Comet shifted warily on her hooves as she ate, her eyes darting around contemplatively, as if she was debating whether she should say something.
Finally, she spoke up. "Dad?"
"Yes, darling?" Golden Cog said after a bite of his last sandwich.
"You know... I wanted to ask, now that, y'know, I'm not a little filly anymore-"
"You'll always be a little filly to me," Golden Cog chuckled- but there was a hint of warning in his voice.
"What... do you do in your laboratory?"
She knew the question was a mistake the second it came out of her mouth. Golden Cog sighed and put down his sandwich. His gray eyes locked onto her, unamused and suddenly cold. She flinched back shyly.
"I-I-I'm just asking since my sixteenth birthday was a week ago and now I just feel like I'm old enough to know, Dad," Comet said quickly.
"Sweetheart, you're old enough when I say you're old enough," Golden Cog said in a gentle, though firm, tone, placing a large hoof on her shoulder. Comet looked at the ground, ashamed of herself for asking what was, in hindsight, a rather stupid question. "When I say you're old enough, I will tell you myself. You won't have to ask."
"Okay, Dad. I'm sorry." Tears were welling in her eyes- she hated feeling like a disappointment to her dad.
"There, there, Comet," Golden Cog tried to reassure her, patting her on the shoulder. "It's not your fault you're curious. Now I must get back to my work, alright? Why don't you go water the lawn-"
"Did that already," Comet Cog grumbled. "As well as all my other chores."
"Then maybe go out into town and buy those quills we needed?" Golden Cog suggested.
"Well, okay!" Comet perked up a bit and snatched her saddlebags in her aura from the corner of the kitchen. "See you later, Dad!"
"Goodbye, darling," Golden Cog sighed. He watched as she headed out the door, then, he returned to his lab.
--
"A bundle of those pheasant quills, please," Comet Cog said to the salespony at the stall. "Oh, and a new bottle of ink, too..."
"Seven bits," the salespony droned boredly, grabbing the bundle and the ink bottle in her teeth in turn, and setting them on the counter.
Comet fished the bits out of her saddlebag and tossed them onto the counter. She glanced over at the poster on the wall of the building again- Missing Pony, Shell Shores, 1000 Bit Reward.
"Who's that missing pony?" Comet finally decided to ask.
"Huh? Oh." The salespony looked up at the poster. "Eh, no idea. Ponies have been going missing all over the place here. That's just one of 'em."
"Really?" Comet Cog continued to gaze at the missing face staring back at her. "Huh. I'll, uh, keep an eye out for her!"
"Sure," the salespony said, sounding bored again. Comet Cog put the items she had purchased in her saddlebag, then trotted off to head back home.
--
One afternoon days later, Comet Cog was beginning to fall asleep on the couch when something quite unusual happened. Golden Cog came rushing up the stairs of the basement and flying out the door. "Comet, sweetie? I'm going out to run an errand, can you handle yourself for a bit?"
"Of course, Dad," Comet Cog said, blinking sleepily from her cozy cushion. Her dad always acted as if she couldn't handle herself, even though he was usually in his lab all day long. She had done nothing but handle herself for almost twelve years, since her mom died.
"Alright, I'll see you soon!" And just like that, Golden Cog was out the door.
Comet Cog, for a moment, considered going back to napping, but realized something with a jolt. In his rush, she hadn't heard her father lock the door to the basement.
Curiosity immediately spiked in her, lifting her to her hooves. Her dad probably wouldn't be back for ten minutes, at least. She could go and take a peek in his laboratory, couldn't she? She was old enough, despite what her dad said!
Her heart pounding, she slowly crept to the basement door. When she tested it and found it was indeed, unlocked, she paused to take a deep breath and collect her anxieties- then opened the door.
A dark, long rickety staircase leading down into a pitch black room. She slowly inched down the stairs, seeing a light switch just out of reach of her magic at the bottom. She kept throwing feverish glances over her shoulder- what if her father realized he hadn't locked the door and came running right back in? What would he do then, when he saw her?
Surely nothing, she assured herself, except a firm talking to. That was all. They'd make up right away. Her father could be firm, but he was never cruel.
Satisfied by this reassurance, she continued on her way down the steps until she reached the light switch, and turned it on.
She was immediately greeted by a blinding light- her hoof shielded her eyes for a moment, as she blinked under the sting. When she lowered her hoof, she gasped at the sight.
Beakers and telescopes, clocks and timers, tubes and wires- it looked like a proper laboratory, just like Comet had imagined. There were scattered objects all over the floor- books and papers and broken quills. She slowly stepped over all of them as she approached the beakers on the table, gazing into her reflection in them. In one of them near the center of the table, there was a lime green liquid, that bubbled and sizzled. This lime green liquid filled a large tube on the side of the wall, and it hissed dangerously. Comet feared it would blow up at any second.
There was a door near the back of the room, with a heavy duty frame and handle. Comet, intrigued, approached it to see if it was unlocked, too.
It was.
With a great amount of effort, she opened the door. It was clearly designed for the use of a strong, adult unicorn like her father, or perhaps an earth pony. She managed to get it just wide enough to slip inside. When she released it, it fell shut with a loud boom behind her.
The room was also very dark, and this time, there didn't seem to be a light switch. The only source of light was the flickering, dim lightbulb in the center of the room, but it didn't illuminate very much, it was just enough to make out vague forms and-
What was that?! Something had moved. Something had definitely moved in the corner. She had even heard a slight step.
“Hello? Is somepony there?” Comet ventured nervously. “Y-y-you’re not supposed to be in here if you are, this is my dad’s laboratory- you could get in b-big trouble!”
In response, two eyes glowed a frightening lime green from the darkness.
Comet Cog backed up to the doorway, hooves trembling. “Whoever you are, you better get out of here r-right now!” she cried.
It sounded like two ponies were trotting towards her from the very same direction. Comet was about to just turn around, run, and go try and find her father, but then… it crawled into the light.
It was a sickly, contorted thing that looked like a horrible twisted version of a pony. It had eight long, multicolored, stretched legs with bone poking out of flesh- the extra legs seemed stitched on, horrifyingly enough, with regular staples and sewing needles, and the wounds were an ugly, nauseating reddish purple. Each extra leg was a different color, implying they came from multiple different ponies. Its eyes were sunken and rabid, its teeth were sharpened, and it had a stringy, knotted mane. There was a knob of raw cartilage and bone where a unicorn’s horn should have been. Its cutie mark was scratched out of its hide with a knife.
Comet screamed.
“No! Don’t be afraid!” a monstrous, rough, yet feminine voice croaked from it. “I don’t want to hurt you! Please, miss! We don’t know where we are!”
“‘W-we’?” Comet managed through her utter terror.
Just then, more creatures became visible in the light. There had to be at least eight. Some had extra limbs and torn unicorn horns, just like the first, some had clearly ripped-out holes were the wings would have been. Some had missing limbs, some had one or both eyes missing, some had torn mouths revealing sharp, fearsome teeth. Some even had claws on their hooves. But all of them had contorted, horrific bodies.
Comet screamed and fell to the floor, hiding her eyes in her hooves and quivering. But, when nothing happened- when she wasn't attacked- she slowly lifted a hoof from her eye, whimpering.
They were all looking at her, worried. "Miss?" the first one said gently- well, as gently as possible, in that monstrous, croaking voice. "We really don't want to hurt you."
"What- what are you all doing down here?" Comet Cog whimpered. "This is my father's lab!"
They exchanged concerned glances with each other.
One finally spoke up, "Your father must be the one who did this to us."
"What?!" Comet exclaimed, getting to her feet clumsily. "That- that can't be true- my father- he'd never do something like this to ponies!"
"Well, he did," another growled. "We had families and lives and destinies, and he tore it all away from us!"
There was a frightening murmur of angered agreement from the monster ponies.
The first pony held up one of her many hooves to silence them and said, "The last thing we knew was being at home and going to bed with our families. We each remember waking up here, in this laboratory, strapped to a chair. And then he injected this evil magic serum into our bodies that made us obey his every command."
Is that what the green stuff was? Comet was starting to feel sick.
"And then he turned us into monsters and took away our horns and wings!" one cried, tears starting to well in her functioning eye. "And it hurt so bad!" That pony was littler than the others- she couldn't have been much older than Comet. Comet felt like she was on the verge of throwing up.
"No, no, no, this has to be all wrong!" Comet cried. "My father- he'd- he'd NEVER! He's always been such a good pony! I can't believe it!"
"Believe it, sister," one of the monsters growled. "The evidence is right in front of you."
"Be nice," the first pony said gently. "The poor thing is so scared."
The first pony was starting to look somewhat familiar- but no, it couldn't be... her father couldn't be the cause of her disappearance...
"Shell Shores?" Comet said to her before she could stop herself.
"You- know me?" Shell Shores said in surprise, lifting a hoof to her chest.
"You- you were on a missing poster!"
Shell Shores paused for a moment, then slowly, a weak smile crawled over her face. "My family must be looking for me..." She sniffled and wiped one of her glowing green eyes.
Comet Cog looked at the ground, considering all of this. The gravity of the situation settled in her heart. Her father was the culprit behind those missing ponies, and not only that, he tortured them and turned them into monsters and made them obey his every command! She wanted to deny it, push it away, but she couldn't. The evidence was right in front of her, as one of the monsters had said. She couldn't look at their bodies and think they were lying. She tried to reach for a solution, some kind of reason her father would do this, but she couldn't.
It was undeniable. Her father was the one behind this. These were the results of his secret experiments.
"I have to get you all out of here," Comet mumbled.
"You can't," Shell Shores said painfully. "He commanded us to stay here. We can't leave the laboratory, no matter how much we want to. His magic spell is too strong."
"Well, I'm gonna do it somehow-" Comet was interrupted when the door behind her opened.
She whirled around to see Golden Cog, standing there and looking utterly horrified as he saw Comet. The keys to the house that were in his magic aura dropped to the floor.
For a moment, they just stared at each other. Golden Cog’s face was one of utter horror and shock. It nearly broke Comet’s heart, before she took a look at the monster ponies and remembered what she had just learned. She stood up straighter, glowering at Golden Cog as tough and high as she could be. The monsters hid behind her.
And just like that, Golden Cog’s face turned from one of horror to one of pure rage. “What,” he began to hiss, “did I tell you about going into my laboratory, Comet!?”
“That I should never go in, ever, and I was too young to understand what you were doing, but now I see that you weren’t trying to protect me- you were only trying to protect yourself!” Comet cried. “You ruined these pony’s lives, and for what?!”
“You don’t understand, Comet,” Golden Cog snarled, readying like he was about to charge at her. “Each of these ponies got on my nerves one too many times. Now come upstairs with me, or face the consequences.”
“I WON’T!” Tears were streaking down Comet’s face as she looked into the stony, fierce gray eyes of who had been her father. “Get away from us! We’re going to get out of here a-and I’m going to find a cure!”
Comet felt herself being trapped by her father’s magic aura and forced off the ground. She struggled against it, but it was no use- her own magic was useless compared to his.
“I raised you to be more obedient than that,” Golden Cog growled, a sick, furious grin spreading across his muzzle. He continued mumbling, “Well, well, well. No matter, no matter. I can fix this.”
Comet felt a harsh jolt on her whole body as Golden Cog cantered into the main laboratory, carrying her after him. “Come follow me, slaves," he snarled to the monster ponies.
A lime green light glowed brightly in the monsters’s eyes, and they reluctantly followed Golden Cog.
“Dad! Dad, no!” Comet Cog pleaded before Golden Cog threw her in a chair at the edge of the main lab- twin straps immediately shot around her body and tied her up tight.
Golden Cog mumbled and paced as he took the beaker of lime green liquid and dug through a drawer in the table. To Comet’s horror, a syringe was taken out. He fed it the green formula in the beaker, a stern grimace on his face as he did so.
“Dad, please, don’t do this,” Comet whimpered as the syringe was filled with the bubbling, excited liquid.
“You want to know what this is, Comet, darling?” Golden Cog said, ignoring her, breath heavy. “Well, I imagine my monsters already told you, didn't they? This is my magic mana under a certain combination of spells manifested. It’ll make any pony do my bidding. It took years of experiments to create.”
“Dad, please!” Comet begged, wriggling in a futile attempt to get free as her father approached her, the syringe held in the air menacingly.
“It’s okay, sweetheart,” Golden Cog said as gently as he could, though to Comet it sounded mocking and hateful. “It’ll only sting for a second. It’s just like getting your shots when you were younger.”
“DADDY, PLEASE!” Comet wailed as the syringe came close to her flesh, hovering right over her right foreleg.
“I must do it, I must,” Golden Cog mumbled, though the syringe was starting to shake in the air. “Please… please, don’t cry like that, baby…”
Comet began to squeal and scream loudly as the cold of the syringe’s needle just touched her hide- but it didn’t go in, not yet. She opened her eyes to look at her father, crying desperately.
Golden Cog stared back, as his eyes slowly started to fill with tears, too. "Comet, Comet, please don't be so scared."
But she didn't obey. She just wouldn't obey. She kept crying and wailing, wriggling like the terrified foal she was. It broke Golden Cog's heart. He just wanted her to stop being so scared of him.
He pressed down on the syringe. Comet screamed as the needle went into her vein.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Golden Cog whimpered to her as he kept the needle in it until all of the serum was inside of her. "I'm so sorry, Comet."
The syringe fell with a clatter onto the table, and Golden Cog stared at Comet. He tried a tentative order; "Stop crying."
Comet's eyes glowed a lime green, and her tears stopped. She looked at her father with horror.
"Now come upstairs, we'll have lunch and you will be happy. And you won't think about what happened anymore."
"O-okay, dad..." Comet said quietly, a forced smile crawling across her face as her eyes glowed green again.
Together, they walked up the staircase to the kitchen as the monster ponies watched on.