Author's Note

This section contains visceral gore. Viewer discretion is advised.

Aftermath

Twilight barely noticed the knock on her door from down in her lab. Her experiment had gone very much according to plan, so she was quite pleased with herself at the results gleaned from such a gesture. The price of the drugs, or materials to make them, required to keep such an experiment working were higher than anticipated, but Twilight thought the costs irrelevant from the results. Being rather pleased with herself after having had to start an entire new file dedicated to even this one test ... Twilight was finding it hard to contain her excitement.

This was why she had invited the princess over to look through her results. Twilight knew what she had done would likely displease the princess at first, but felt confident that such an action would be approved for further use from the amount of information Twilight had uncovered. It was with this confidence that Twilight strode to the exit of her lab, turning once more to admire her work. "Now, you stay right here, okay?" she stated aloud ... though not to herself.

There was no response, however Twilight smiled nonetheless. She worked best in silence, and had instructed that it was to remain silent while she was down here.

Twilight exited her lab into the foyer of her home, leaving the entrance downstairs open and undisguised. Wrapping a hoof around the door handle, Twilight closed her eyes, taking in a deep breath to attempt to calm her nerves. The door swung back, Twilight tilting her head up slightly to be able to look the princess in the face; yet open air was all that lay above the unicorn.

"Miss Sparkle?" Came a familiar, accented voice. Twilight looked at her own height, and saw a griffon looking her in the face - it's head grayed beyond any doubt of being white anymore. Even the brown coat having faded with age a little.

"Forensics ..." Twilight muttered, remembering the griffon from what was now her foalhood.

"My apologies for Celestia's absence - she has royal business to attend to, her sister's return making things all the more complicated. I'm here on her behalf as a personal favor." Forensics explained, taking a short moment to look to his side thoughtfully, lost for a moment in his own mind. "May I come in?" he asked expectantly.

"Oh, yes of course!" Twilight responded eagerly, slightly taken aback from the arrival of Forensics. She stepped aside to allow him to enter before closing the door behind him.

Forensics glanced around the room, his eyes lingering on a few volumes before moving onto the next. "Nice place." he stated flatly. "Very ... academic."

"Thanks," Twilight said, a slight smile being fought off. She was unsure if Forensics was genuinely complimenting her decor, or simply making small talk - Twilight remembered being told that complimenting others was a social standard she had to adhere to upon entering their home or something similar. She didn't understand why - surely one should speak their mind whenever possible? - but she followed the advice given to her by Celestia when it came to interacting with others.

Forensics spared no time making his way down the stairs toward the lab, Twilight quickly following suit. Her ears flinched at the first sound of the griffon's talons clacking against the concrete - it was far louder and sharper than her own hoof-steps, compounding in her finding it far more distracting.

"Don't be afraid to bear all, Miss Sparkle - anything you tell me will be told to Celestia, unless you ask me to leave it out of my report. I'm one of three alive who know the sensitive nature of your work." Forensics reminded Twilight, his voice echoing in the chamber as he raised it for Twilight to hear - a little too loud for Twilight's tastes.

"Wait, three?" Twilight inquired, her face reflecting her own confusion as the pair reached the last spiral.

"Luna knows." was Forensics' simple response. He sighed impatiently whilst he turned to Twilight. "Miss Sparkle, if you have any queries take them up with Celestia when you and your friends go to the Gala. I'm afraid I can't answer them, especially concerning the princess - doctor-patient privilege." he explained. "If you don't want me to see your work, just say - the princess will be free sometime soon." he said, his tone becoming more calmed before letting out a chuckle. "This old retired doctor won't be offended." he remarked with a slight smile.

Twilight considered his offer for a moment. He was a stranger ... but any friend of Celestia's was a friend of hers. That's what this entire trip was about - friendship. 'Perhaps Forensics could even make a good report!' Twilight thought to herself. "No, enter - just don't disturb anything." she instructed, waving a hoof in the direction of the lab.

Forensics gave a solemn nod, and entered Twilight's lab - it was a horrible sight that greeted him.

The pony Twilight had taken home was now suspended from the ceiling, wrapped up in the tree's roots by his hoofs. His right forehoof was missing all of it's skin, now simply a skeletal stump - cleaned of every facet of gore however, to surgical standard. It had some slight laceration on the bone, yet was otherwise untouched. His other forehoof had small drops of blood along it, where a needle had pierced the skin, the blood from his veins bulging in a purple colour. The root around it acted as a tourniquet, preventing whatever he had been pumped with from entering the rest of his system. There was a small stitch over his wrist, that showed signs of having been re-opened and closed several times.

The neck had had its layer of skin removed, exposing chords and several facets of the throat - saliva occasionally dripped down it, and the tubes seen would contract and relax with breathing. Following the tube, the torso had been exposed - ribcage visible, organs all still working. The heart pumped, the tiniest spurt of blood coming out of it occasionally. When Forensics entered the room and stopped moving or talking, all he could focus on was that heart ... it sped up when it saw Forensics, beating louder.

The lungs too did their usual work, breathing in and out in short bursts, the diaphragm pressing against them. One of the lungs had been cut open in the centre - the edges still intact to keep it in the chest comfortably. Still functioning, the inner workings could be seen. The lung was covered in a glass case, a single hole at the top pressing against the tube connecting it to the esophagus - the glass was melted, bonded to the tube for the organ.

The stomach had a light shining on it, making the innards of it visible in an odd silhouette. Currently there was something in there, being digested ... Forensics didn't linger his gaze on it too long. The liver had shriveled a little and changed colour to a darker red and had an odd 'bumpy' texture to it - except a small patch, which showed a more normal looking piece.

The intestines were oddly untouched, which struck Forensics as odd. The most striking change, however, was his hind legs - they had been severed entirely at the knee joint. What looked to be an artificial hoof was on the floor under the usual operating table; evidently meant for the hoof that had been given skin to cover it at the bottom, though the wound did not look healed. The other had a tourniquet around it and was still dripping blood from the stump into a bucket.

What struck Forensics most notably was the face. Both eyelids had been held open by small metal instruments, meaning the subject looked over at the griffon without ever blinking. His eyes were wide, unable to express any emotion as they rolled about in their sockets slightly. The only sign of the pain being experienced was the wetness they possessed, and the streams that ran down the cheeks, never having been dried off. The mouth too was held open, some of the teeth missing and others chipped or broken - some with the sign of aggression and force, others with the clean cut of instruments. The top of the head had small black markings going all the way around it, and a single ear had been taken off entirely - the ear passage completely visible and cleaned.

The pelvic region was completely clear of any laceration or cutting - but the skin looked burned, and showed clear signs of cauterisation.

Whilst absolutely disgusted, his face contorting with shock that such an act had been undergone, Forensics quietly conceded to himself that he was impressed. Besides cauterisation, which Forensics knew from experience was an inexact measure, the work was immaculate; save the hind legs, but those appeared to be in the process of some tests. He hated to admit it: he was actually admiring all of the measures Twilight had taken to keep this stallion alive whilst testing such things on him. He looked to the desk. There were papers upon it, among them a large dossier; to the side, a crate almost overflowing with empty canisters and syringes. The walls, though showing some signs of order, had since had notes added to them with such swiftness it was now descending into chaos.

"Miss Sparkle ..." Forensics began, unsure of where to start. He could hear a living heart beating, and see it too, as he walked further into the room, clacking all the while. When Twilight entered the room, the eyes stopped following Forensics and focused solely on Twilight; as the heart beat faster and louder, the eyes seemed to widen even more than they were kept. Sweat beads began to form on the forehead, and a slight twitch in the muscles was all the subject could muster to express the fear he felt at seeing the enthusiastic purple unicorn, fighting off the desire to smile at having another being see her work - and losing that fight, a smirk sliding onto her face.

Twilight looked to Forensics, then back to her subject. "The glass case is a sterile environment, by the way. It lets me see and lets him breathe without getting any nasty pollutants into the working space of the lung." she noted. "I've learned so much from this - what best to use for cauterisation, which drugs work best for preventing or accentuating blood loss, painkillers ..." Twilight continued speaking fast as her mind raced through all the days she'd spent down here, recording results and asking questions, testing hypotheses ... "Ah, but you'll read all about that in my files." she concluded. "Any pressing questions?" she asked, grinning expectantly at the griffon next to her.

Forensics stared at her vacantly for a moment, coming to terms with what he just saw. He fought the desire to ask questions, to simply do what was right and leave, but a morbid curiosity of all this overcame him. He was a doctor ... and this was advancement, with or without Celestia's approval, like it or not.

"Where are his genitals?" Was the first question that Forensics asked, rather monotonously. Whilst not the most scientific question, the sudden appreciation for his own brought the question to the forefront of his thoughts.

"Well, it seemed indecent, so I cut them off. Pretty quickly, a single slice." Twilight recalled. "Gave me an excellent opportunity to test cauterisation," she looked toward the subject. "We nearly lost you that day, didn't we? But you held out, with a little help from blood clotting." she said with a smile, seemingly proud. "Now I take out his waste products by hoof. It's dirty work, but some sanitary measures and disposable gloves and all is well. Besides, he evacuated most of them when we got here, so his clothes took the brunt of it." Twilight noted.

Forensics cringed, and pressed his legs a little closer together. "What about his intestines? They look so healthy, yet his liver is ruined ..." he asked, trailing off to ponder the methods.

"The liver was ruined by alcohol - I've been trying to fix it, and with a little application of the right stuff it's improving. His intestines ..." Twilight grinned a slightly sheepish grin as she held her hoof behind her head and scratched her hair. "Aren't, actually ... you know ... in him." she concluded. "These are the intestines of a female unicorn. I transplanted them successfully, and they haven't given out just yet. The blood types match, so rejection hasn't been a major problem. Just goes to show we're all more similar than we like to believe!" Twilight noted, a nervous chuckle escaping her.

"And what did you do with his intestines?" Forensics asked blankly, a glassy stare focused on the organs.

"Well, my friend Fluttershy looks after animals - all kinds of them. Some of them are omnivores and carnivores, so I got a stew together and ..." Twilight said, looking even more sheepish than previously. "You know how it is, right? Eh, griffon ..." she stammered out, giving Forensics a gentle tap on the shoulder like she'd seen Rainbow Dash do with some of her friends.

Forensics, mouth slightly agape, stared first at Twilight with his head ever so slightly lowered, looked over to the subject and lingered on him, then back to Twilight.

"Miss Sparkle, this ... this is ..." Forensics began. He took a deep breath and muttered an apology to Celestia as he spoke his next few words.