Allied Mastercomputer

"AM? AM are you there? Answer me you sick monstrosity! I demand a reply from you!" The metal room of wire and scrap remained still as the echo of Trixie's voice resonated in the catacombs of AM's belly. "What have you done with him?!" Trixie paused to take a breath and screamed again "What have you done with my Big Macintosh?!"

Trixie turned to us, her mane a mess, with a panicked look on her face. None of us were worried, she was only doing what she's always done, put on a show. A grand bit of entertainment for herself, but a terrible headache for all of us. She quickly scurried away from the edge of the metallic cliff and screamed again into another direction. "Big Macintosh! Please! Are you there?!" Trixie then ran to Rarity, wrapping her fore hoofs around Rarity's neck only to be promptly shoved off. "Please darling shut up. For the love of that dead push over Celestia, shut your trap!" I quickly glared at Rarity, now as irritated at her I was with Trixie.

"Twilight!" shouted Trixie, her attention now turned to me, "I can see it in your eyes that you're just as worried as me." said Trixie, crawling to my hoofs. "Rarity." I stepped over Trixie and went nose to nose with Rarity. "You know she's alive, out there fighting AM, out there doing her best to-" I was cut off by Rarity's trademark little pffft, that blew her rancid spit into my face. "Going nose to nose with me Twilight? As if you're the least bit scary anymore without your magic." Rarity put her hoof to the scar where my horn used to be, before AM had it ripped away with enough force to tear a crystal in half.

"Oh and you're a threat? Your horn's gone too." I said swatting Rarity's hoof away and pushing her back a step. She gasped as though it was the first time I shoved her. "I don't need magic." she said as her face twisted with anger, "To crush your throat under my hoof!" Just as that hostile nut Rarity started to lunge at me Pinkie Pie threw a rock between us. We stopped and starred at the horribly altered Pinkie Pie. Pinkie's coat had been turned into a dull grey color and her cutie mark, like all of ours, had been removed. Her face, though not as hideous as Rarity's, had been altered as well. AM and all his sick twisted conscious had melted metal to Pinkie's mouth fusing with her skin. Permanently sealing it and forcing her to frown for the rest of her unnatural life.

They had all been altered there own ways. AM was very clever on the modifications it made to the others. Pinkie used to be cheerful, she used to make everypony happy. Not anymore. No. Now she's the single sadist thing you'll find in the endless maze that is the belly of AM, always mumbling and trying to open her eyes fully. That's right she can't even open her eyes! AM had her skull altered so that here eye sockets and eye lids only close halfway! Forcing a sad, tired look on her face. Rarity's most obvious changes were to her face. Ironic, considering beauty was sometimes all anypony could see in her. AM gave her a pig nose and made her top lip short so her rotting teeth will always be shown. Her ears were replaced with those of a blood hound. Drooping down over her eyes and at times barely visible under her greasy matted down green mane.

The most valuable thing AM robbed of her was her creativity. Now if you were to ask her of her opinion or for her to think of an idea, the tiny chip AM put in her head would start to burn her very brain till the grey matter could almost boil. One time, she was so persistent with her thought she almost killed herself, though that could have been her goal, AM would not allow her the pleasure.

We starred into Pinkie's dull eyes and she mumbled some untranslatable 'humphs' and 'mmhmms'. It wasn't till Rarity started to turn that she started to frantically point at a dark cave. I continued to look at Pinkie, not understanding what she wanted of us exactly. It was always difficult to interoperate what she wanted. "Do you want us to walk to the cave?", I asked Pinkie as kindly as I could. She slowly nodded her head and started walking in the direction of the cave.

We entered the cave and walked for what seemed like miles, passing through ice, then snow, then a blistering heat magnified by the metal floor. The lighting changed through out the cave as well. Going from pitch black to dull multi colored lights, to a portion that reminded me of one of Vinyl's concerts. The tunnel eventually started to get narrow, forcing us to walk in a line. Leaving me between Pinkie, who was in the lead, and Rarity. It wasn't until our sides were scrapping the jagged walls that I realized that we had left Trixie behind. I was not going to say anything about it though, I didn't care at this point if she was here or not. I knew AM would find some way to force her back into the group. AM never let us separate. If we ever did, it was because AM wanted us to be so that he could torture us in private.

The tunnel let out into a massive room with a ceiling so high clouds had actually formed. I began looking around taking in the new surrounding for it was the first time I had seem anything like this inside of AM. I was in awe of the room to a point that I could almost ignore the jagged cuts on my flanks. Pinkie nudged me with her hoof and pointed again, this time to Trixie who was sitting on her haunches not to far away. We all walked over to her, and as expected she just turned and said to us in a voice of dread, "I heard stage music." I don't know what AM did to Trixie, but she always wonders away. She's been doing it for the last one hundred and nine years, and for those last hundred and nine years her answer has always been the same: I heard stage music. Music only she could hear.

Pinkie walked over and put an arm around Trixie trying to comfort her. The one thing AM didn't take from Pinkie was her concern, she still cared about everypony. Which probably made this whole experience even worse, knowing that no matter what she could never help. Trixie mumbled something to Pinkie and my ears perked up. I didn't know what she said, but I didn't' like it. I knew it was about me. I knew exactly what it was to. She wants me dead. She wants me, the normal one, dead. Because I am the only one AM has not changed. I am the only one who still is who she was before it all. That was it that's all it could be. I had to run. I had to escape before they turned on me. I was ready to run until Pinkie turned to me, then my body froze. Pinkie hurried to me and hugged me then pointed at a unrecognizable heap in the distance. I gave Pinkie a smile, though it was for show, and a very confused look. She then stepped away from me and nudged Trixie.

Trixie rose from her stooper and said louder, but with the same depressed tone, "I found Big Macintosh, he's over there." Trixie pointed at the same distant heap Pinkie did. I looked at them both and was preparing to speak. Rarity, however, did it for me as she walked by us saying, "Oh for goodness sake, lets just go see what this mumbling fool and this crazy mare are talking about." I didn't care what Rarity had to say really.

The distant heap was, as expected, Big Macintosh. AM had finally decided to return him to the group in a condition that had become natural for him: With every bone in his body broken. AM was just as clever with Big Macintosh's modifications. Big Mac, as we all called him, was strong before the war. He was capable and could always give a straight answer. Either yes or no, never a maybe or an "I don't know." Now, though, now he has bones as fragile as glass that break when he tries to use his natural strength. Not only that, but he is unable to say yes or not, or give any straight forward answers. All he can do is dance around an answer until you guess right. Which at times, could take hours. Pinkie even tried to make a game out of it when we first discovered the change. Big Mac eventually got tired of it and struck Pinkie, shattering his own leg in the process.

We all surrounded him, a reunion only Pinkie seemed to be excited for, and Big Mac tried to stand only to fall screaming in pain. All the strength in the world and not a single bone strong enough to support him. Rarity looked down on him with and expression that you'd give a peace of trash on the ground. Pinkie sat next to Big Mac, who gritted his teeth in pain and remained as still as he could. Still needing to breath, his broken ribs expanded and retracted as he slowly rose and fell on the cold ground. I made the suggestion to just set up camp here and not caring enough to disagree, everypony just sat around Big Mac.

Author's Note

There is a second chapter coming it contains backstory into AM and why the characters are different.