The Story of Dr Sine

The Story of Dr Sine: 5

5 years later

A grey haired Dr Sine was sitting in his lab, he head in his hooves. He just couldn’t believe what had just happened. Luna was always such a kind pony, and she had always been fiercely loyal. However, in the early hours of the morning, she had refused to lower the moon. She had changed into a huge pony with a jet black body and a purple mane and declared that she was now the sole ruler of Equestria. Celestia had banished her to the moon. He hated Celestia. His father was right all along. He smashed his hoof down on the lab bench before him, knocking a rack of glass vials to the floor, which shattered. She had obviously faked it, there was no way that Luna was evil, she was the nicest pony that Dr Sine knew. Celestia had banished her so she could be the sole ruler, and her first decree?

She banned Science.

“SHE BANNED SCIENCE!” Sine smashed his hoof on the bench again. She had used an excuse, claimed that she thought that Equestria Labs portal experiments might have caused Luna’s corruption, but Sine thought otherwise. He thought that Celestia had always hated science, and now she had her tyranny secured, she had made it illegal.

Sky Nova hurried into the room. Sine didn’t even acknowledge him.

“Sir, you have to come quickly. Celestia has given us an hour to leave the facility. Pack your things, we have to go!”

“No” said Sine standing up “This is my life. I will not let Celestia remove me from my home”

“The royal guards are coming; they’ll arrest you if you stay. She’s giving us a chance to get away, don’t waste it”

Dr Sine slowly stood. As much as he resented it, he had to leave, and not just for himself. He looked at the charging socket on the wall, where Blaze was connected. He was prepared to throw down his own life, but not the life of his only friend. He unplugged Blaze from the charger, and led him to the doorway.

“Are you coming” asked Sky Nova

“Science isn’t worth dying for” replied Sine as he and Blaze ran out of the room. He was impressed by Blaze’s speed; the new robotics he had just added had really increased his mobility. The trio stopped at the intersection of two corridors. One led to the surface, and the streets of Canterlot, the other to 3.0’s control room.

“Sine, you and Blaze head on out. I’ll go and ask 3.0 to shut down” said Sky Nova, and hurried towards her control room. Dr Sine and Blaze stepped out into the street, and made for Sine’s Canterlot apartment without looking back.

A week had passed since Equestria Labs had shut down, and Sine didn’t know what to do with himself. He couldn’t go out and get another job because science had been outlawed. He was sitting on a large amount of money, greater than most ponies in Equestria, but he was bored. He just stayed at home, he had already read hundreds of books in his library, and had just about exhausted all of Equestria’s literacy. More importantly, Blaze was becoming slow and sluggish. His battery level was severely depleted, and without access to Equestria Laboratories, Sine couldn’t charge him up. To add to his emotional trauma, his father, who had spent the last three years living in the Equestria Labs Moon Branch, had died of a heart attack upon receiving news from the ground that Celestia had taken solo rule of Equestria. With his last breath he had demanded that Sine must destroy Celestia, and at this moment in time, Dr Sine didn’t feel like arguing. After all he had done for the Princess, she had just betrayed him, and her sister, and all of Equestria.

Blaze suddenly wobbled and his eyes flickered, losing their usual green glow. One of his wings slumped on his back, completely drained. Dr Sine made up his mind. Though science wasn’t worth dying for, friendship was.

In the dead of night, beneath the new pattern of the mare in the moon, a constant reminder of Celestia’s betrayal, Dr Sine and Blaze sneaked out to Equestria Laboratories front door. It was boarded up, so Blaze used his super strong hydraulic legs to break away the wooden boards, and Sine slowly opened the door, ushered Blaze inside, then closed the door after them. Inside the facility it was dark, and only the dim light from Blaze’s robotic eyes lit the way to Sine’s Lab. Suddenly all the lights flashed on, Dr Sine and Blaze panicked, expecting a royal guard ambush. Instead, there was a loud message from the speakers of 3.0’s voice.

“Burglars. You know, I thought it would take you longer to try and steal from me. It has only been a week. Anyway, neurotoxin never goes stale, so it doesn’t matter either way”

There was a hiss as she filled the room with the deadly gas.

“No, wait, I’m a scientist, Dr Sine!” He called desperately

The neurotoxin was quickly sucked away and the speaker replied

“Very well, I’m glad you came to your senses. Come to my control room, and we’ll talk business.”

Once the two had entered 3.0’s control chamber, she turned to face them

“I’m glad it was you two. You were always my favourites”

“What happened to Sky Nova shutting you down?”

“He met with a terrible fate”

Sine realised that 3.0 was thoroughly corrupt. However, this meant that she was probably going to be game for some rule breaking, and that suited Dr Sine just fine. He outlined his needs to 3.0, and she agreed to let him come into the facility and perform whatever research he wanted. She would assist in every way she possibly could. The arrangement suited both of them, though Sine wasn’t sure how far he could trust 3.0.

For months the three continued work, but as 3.0 watched, she noticed that Sine seemed to be unnaturally attached to Blaze. He was only happy when his faithful companion was by his side, and Dr Sine became irritated and snappy when Blaze was shut down for charging. Partially to help Sine get on with his life further than Blaze, and partially for her own amusement, 3.0 designed a lab accident. Whilst Blaze was helping to build one of the new test chambers she had commissioned, she crushed him with a huge spike plate. Blaze’s robot body was destroyed beyond repair, but Dr Sine managed to salvage his memory and personality chip intact. His genetic engineering experiments had recently come to fruition, so he made the choice to advance Blaze’s development once again. He took the memory chip to his lab and looked at the recently installed tank is the wall. It was glass, and filled with a clear orange fluid. The liquid was thick, like treacle, and inside was a half formed pony. This was Dr Sine’s dream realised, Blaze as a real life pony, in flesh and blood. Using a scalpel and laser, he cut an incision on the back of its head, and fused the chip to the memory centre of the brain. He then deposited the slimy mass of embryonic pony back in its fluid.

When the final checks were completed, Sine ran a huge amount of power through the tank, the electricity activating the advanced muscle composites he had made Blaze from. The lights in the facility when out, and the only light was from the blue flashes of electricity that arced through the tank. A few bolts shot out of the glass and shattered equipment on the benches, but finally it stopped. After a few seconds of stillness, the lights flickered back on. Dr Sine looked at the form in the tank, now the same size as a normal pony, slightly bigger than Sine. He had modified the molecular structure that Blaze was made from to be overcharged by electricity, explaining the rapid development from an embryo to a full size pony. After a moment, the tank was crisscrossed with a pattern of cracks as Blaze’s greater mass tried to occupy the same area, unsuccessfully. The glass shattered. Blaze’s form tumbled out into the lab. Sine stepped forward to catch his prone body. Blaze opened his cool green eyes and focused on Dr Sine.

All the fears Dr Sine had about his friends new body dissipated. Blaze looked at him with recognition, albeit some sleepiness, not surprising considering the stresses his body had just been through.

“Hello Blaze, quick cognitive test, what was the first book we ever read together?”

“As if I’d forget that Lucius. We read the third Daring Doo book, on release date.”

Blaze was exactly how Sine had wanted him, and the two lived happily for a year or so afterwards, breaking into the lab every night and with 3.0’s help, conducting genetics experiments. Dr Sine had come to the conclusion that all the strife in Equestria was caused by the differences between ponies, and that this was a genetic factor, a throwback from the reign of Discord. He couldn’t find a specific gene to target, so he chose a much more ambitious course of action. He was going to use Blaze as his template, and genetically engineer a new race from scratch. He wasn’t sure how, as the technology he’d used for Blaze was a prototype, and had been destroyed by his creation, but that was going to be his next move, somehow.

As fate would have it, things were about to start moving very rapidly indeed.