Chapters "And then father the rapture dream was over, you taught me that evil is just a word. Under the skin it’s simple pain, for you mercy was victory. You sacrificed, you endured and when given the chance, you forgave, always. Mother believed this world was irredeemable, but she was wrong, father. We are utopia, you and I. And in forgiving, we left the door open for her.
The rapture dream is over. But in waking I am reborn, this world is not ready for me, but here I am. It would be so easy to misjudge them, you are my conscious father, and I need you to guide me. You will always be with me now father. your memories, your drives, and when I need you you’ll be there on my shoulder, whispering.
If utopia is not a place, but a people, then we must choose carefully, for the world is about to change, and in our story, rapture was just the beginning."
Delta had died, and his memories, but not his soul have been brought into Eleanor, the difference is minor, though one, one is more potent than the other.
oooooOOOOOoooooOOOOOooooo
Subject Delta has just gone through a horrible re-awaking, nearly no one else could have possibly gone through what he had, those who could have had already gone through some horrible things themselves. Jack, finding out his savior was his enemy, and his enemy was his savior. Booker, finding out that...well it might be best to not accidentally give away some spoilers.
Subject Delta, the last thing he remembered was his “daughter” but something seemed...wrong. He did not have that ever present tug in his chest, that tight feeling that came when he is separated from her. He opened his eyes, the barely foggy glass covering his helmet permitted what he believed to be “sunlight” to pass through to his eyes. It burned. He rolled his body to the left, and saw that he was on grass, this was not like the grass from Arcadia, this was much greener, it seemed more...alive.
What worried him most was that he could not see Eleanor. He sprang up and looked to the area to his right, she was not there either, turning around he saw that he was at the edge of a very large gathering of trees. He thought that is was called a forest, though he could not recall why. Turning back around he was in the distance what looked like a very brightly colored...town. Yes, that was the word.
Eleanor probably went there to get help, she was such a smart girl, and so kind too. He began to lumber his way to there. It was a bit before noon when he woke up, and the sun was now nearing the edge of the horizon by the time delta could make out individual buildings.Delta thought the buildings seemed rather colorful...wait? His mind seemed less...cloudy? Yes, yes that’s the right word. Normally he would have no other thoughts than Eleanor, but now he was thinking about how buildings looked? This is not normal.
He continued towards the town, oblivious to the gasps and the running of the towns ponies. He did not notice a single one, and continued to ponder on his...pondering. I mean really, he was thinking about thinking…that’s about it.
Before long he had gotten towards the center of the brightly colored town. All the town’s ponies were anxiously awaiting the arrival of the newly appointed royal guards, surely this...thing, would be a good test to see if the new “Princesses” were going to stay true to their word. The sound of several Pegasus ponies could be heard, four of them were pulling a cart that contained within several well armed earth ponies and medical unicorns, ready to treat the wounded.
*GUARD PONY'S POINT OF VIEW*
They landed in the middle of the town and prepared to see what this was, if it was just another one of Discords old creations coming out of the woods, they were going to be angry. They usually were not dangerous at all...a bit silly at times, but not dangerous. What they saw surprised them greatly. It looked like a Minotaur that did not have a horn on its head, but rather an over-sized metal one on its arm. It also had several odd looking metal things attached to its back. Most of them looked as if they had miniature cannon barrels. The royal guards looked a bit nervous, they had never really had to go against anything so...intimidating. It was just standing there, so obviously it was not going to be too bad.
*DELTA’S POINT OF VIEW.*
So if I can think clearly now, does that mean tha-... Something is touching my back. I turned around and looked to see a very small...I have no idea what that is. It had four legs and was covered in gold armor, were the armor was not covering I could see hair. It appeared to be poking me with a spear...not smart. Before I realized what was happening it was like I was in Rapture again. All the little four-legged things turned into over-spliced citizens trying to hurt my little girl. I had my drill on my already so I swiped at the “Splicer” in front of me, it was hurled into one of the surprisingly wood like glass tunnels, it sent splinters all over the place.
The other splicers seemed odd, they were not all attacking me, but rather some seemed to run off to their companion, while the others began to walk towards me, some were fanning out so as to be to my left and right sides. I pulled out the shotgun, I had upgraded it to electrically shock the splicers so that I could finish them off with a good whack to the head. But before I could fire off a shot they had all jumped at me at once, their spears now visible. Once one of them hit me my elemental storm gene tonic kicked in, sending an electrical shock wave at all of them. I saw several more “splicers” in the windows...wait, Rapture does not have windows. If I could hyperventilate I would, sadly running would just have to do. I ran back towards where I believed the forest to be. It was the one familiar place that I knew. Something was not right, where is Eleanor? I have to protect her. Where is she where is she where is she where is she?
It appeared that the group of “splicers” had regained their ability to move, and were now in hot pursuit of me. I saw one of them that had a horn, that’s new. My vision flickered for a minute and I saw the landscape turn into that of a brightly colored towns edge, it flickered back again and I was in Rapture again. What is happening? I looked back again, the one that I noticed earlier, its horn began to glow, and several things around it were getting picked up. Was this some kind of new telekinesis plasmid? They were all launched at me with great speeds, this had to be a new telekinesis plasmid, they were never launched that fast before, but who was still alive and sane enough to keep making plasmids?
I was able to dodge what appeared to be a chair, but was hit in the head with the table that came along with it. I went down and tried to get back up, but I was raddled very badly, something is really not right...I have to find Eleanor. My vision began to fade, I was some of the “splicers” walk up to me, one even took its hoofed leg and kicked my helmet, not hard. Just enough to see if I would get back up, I would not.
*GUARD PONIES POINT OF VIEW.*
“Nice shot Teleforce.” The captain of the guard complimented one of the magically strongest unicorns of the age, currently ranked third, right underneath Celestia, first of course being Starswirl The Bearded. She had thrown several rather heavy pieces of furniture at the….whatever it is. The light chair was a decoy for the much heavier table, smart thinking. The kind that gets you promoted.
“So what are we going to do with this?” One of the medical ponies was prodding it with their right fore-hoof.
“Would you quit touching that thing! It has got to be one of Discord’s creations, therefore it might be kinda bad if we touch it, don’t you remember the poison joke?” Everypony shivered in response to hearing that. They were just glad for that weird zebra that came by…
“Look, I’ll just pick it up, then I’ll load it into the wagon, if it weighs a lot, then some of will stay back, kay?” The captain looked at her with a raised eyebrow. “...oh uhm...uh sorry.” She looked rather sheepish, she was also good at giving orders, early retirement here I come!
“Sounds like a plan, do it.” Teleforce lifted the thing, and with visible effort at that, must have been pretty heavy.
“Hirmph, this thing weighs at least five ponies, maybe six!” Oh my, looks like half the group is going to have to stay.
“We’ll take a medical pony, myself,” He pointed to Teleforce and a few others. “you, you, you and you. Lets move, something tells me this is not the usual Discordic thing, it hasn't even fallen apart yet. Teleforce loaded it into the back of the air-carriage and everypony else got in with it. "Okay, let's see what this thing is." With those words the Pegasus ponies began to make the relatively short trip back to the newly forming Canterlot.
Chapter two: Surprisingly effective.
"OH SHIT! It's waking up! Teleforce, hit it!" With those being the first words I heard when I woke up, I rolled on base instinct. I took a second to look at where I had just been laying down, at that spot a wooden bench seemed to have broken the hull of the...thing we were in, it was also wood. "Again!" Oh my.
I sprang up and ran straight forward, not noticing that a wall had been blocking my path, and hit it helmet first. My being the big and heavy thing that I am, broke it down. My forward momentum kept me moving forward, and before I fully registered what was happening I was falling, from a very high height...shit. The ground was rushing up at me...or was I rushing down to the ground? I mean, if you were to think logically about it, oh how I love thinking, I would be rushing down to the ground. I closed my eyes for the impact, I might survive, I mean hell, I've been through worse.
After ten or so seconds of waiting for the ground shattering impact I opened my eyes. To my astonishment I was moving UP instead of DOWN. "Teleforce, nice job. Think you could whack it again?" Shit.
"Yep." I then heard the sound of wood scraping against wood and felt a very hard hit against my back. Little did they know that barely stung thanks to the suit and my gene tonics. I saw that I was still being lifted , most likely to go back in to the...whatever it was. "This thing's so heavy, what do you think it's made of?"
"I don't really know, it looks kinda like iron but less...irony." From what I could tell, and from the clinking sounds of armor moving, they were all glaring daggers at the...whatever it is that said that. I eventually saw the wooden flooring of the...for the sake of mental security I am going to call it a carriage. When I saw the flooring of the carriage I was surprised, Even with the third tier of telekinesis I would not have been able to lift up an entire big daddy that entire way. This must have been one strongly spliced...wait. splicers don't talk coherently. What are these things?
I felt the carriage begin to descend, I was going to have to make a break for it soon. I was surprised by how silent it was, I would have thought that these...things would have talked, but apparently they did no feel like doing so. Unfortunately for me I was faced downward, though I was fairly certain that I was facing the exit. I felt a jolt go through the carriage. Now or never.
I sprang up again and drill dashed forward. I had no idea how screaming and launching myself forward was so devastating, but whatever works. I smashed through a solid wall this time. It, like the rest of the carriage was made of wood, so fortunately for me it was easily destroyed. Unfortunately however, it was not the exit. I ended up stopping short of some of those tiny four legged creatures from earlier, in fact there were four of them. Each of them also had wings, but they seemed to small to actually be of any use.
I looked behind me to see more of them, most likely the ones that had taken to beating me with wooden objects. I suddenly remembered an insult that I enjoyed using when I was 'normal'. I hoisted up my arm and flipped up my middle finger...I think one of them smiled.
*GUARD PONY POINT OF VIEW*
What.the.fuck? Seconds after we landed the...thing leaped up and screamed, then used that huge metal thing on its hand to smash through the wall on the air carriage. Then it turned around and lifted its arm to display one of its digits. Was that some kind of threat?...For the sake of 'safety' I'm going to throw a bench at it again. I smiled to myself a little.
*DELTA'S VIEW*
It's smiling, that is very much so smilin-SHIT! I ducked as that hated bench came flying at my face. I have had enough of this things crap. I picked the Electro Bolt two plasmid and shot at it. As soon as I did that the things smile was gone, and before it knew what was happening it was twitching on the ground. I smiled a little, or at least I think I did. I can't really feel my face.
I looked to the other ones that were with it, from what I could tell they were all shocked, and then their attention was turned to me. If looks could kill, this suit would barely keep me alive. Most began to charge at me, while some others head's began glowing, another smaller part of the group rose to the air with their wings that were too small for their bodies...Then again I did just shoot lightning from my hand so who am I to question it?
I felt something crash into my abdomen, it took some of the air from my lungs and caused me to keel over a little. While my head was in the proper possession I looked down. It was one of those winged ones that had crashed into me. How anything so small with such small wings could generate that much force I will never know.
I prepared my Hypnotize two plasmid and charged it. Seeing the green pheromone trails come off of it I felt reassured, it's always nice to have back up. It began to get on its legs, and then took to the air. Heh, it was kind of like a security bot, but without the machine guns. In the edge of my vision I saw movement, I turned towards it just in time to raise up my drill, the bench from the carriage hit it and broke into dozens of splinters.
I have had more than enough of these things. The befriended aerial creature rocketed towards the other creatures, meanwhile I was prepping my incinerate three plasmid. I charged it up and as soon as the fire was about to rush out...I was assaulted by at least four of the aerial ones. The first one hit me on my right side, knocking me off balance and causing the fire now erupting from my hand to spew out wildly to my left. The second took its forelegs and bashed me from my left side. While I was fighting to regain my balance another charged me head on and headbutted my stomach, this knocked me down. The final one came from behind me and hit my head, hard! I was now lying face down.
I guess they learned from their previous mistake of thinking I was knocked out, and before I could get up they flipped me over with their telekinesis and hog tied me. After that the one I shocked earlier had a very sinister grin on its face, surprisingly it spoke. "Okay, lets bring this thing to Celestia, I think she will want to see it."
Author's Note
I have to say I am really quite surprised at how quickly this story got popular. Thanks for reading! I hope to not disappoint. On a side note, if anyone notices grammatical errors feel absolutely free to tell me, I encourage it actually.
A list of Delta's gene tonics and plasmids.
Seeing as how Delta is not going to be able to change his plasmids or gene tonics while in Equestria, I thought I would go ahead and make a list for ~~myself so I don't forget what he's got.~~ you readers...
Gene tonics. (18 total, also known as the maximum amount.)
These eight are survival related.
Focused on making eve and regenerating health.
These four are all tech related.
Plasmids.
1.Electro bolt 2. Can create a chain of "lightning" along multiple enemies. For the purpose of this fan fic...you'll see.
Author's Note
Just thought I would go ahead and make a reference page for anyone who is not entirely familiar with the game...though I doubt you would really be looking into this if you didn't know about it too well...
Chapter three: Things seem...off.
Princess Celestia, she's in the middle of a meeting with a griffon ambassador about setting up trade routes and relations between the two countries.That is at least until she is dreadfully bored.
'He just keeps blathering on and on and on and on, it's getting ridiculous.'
"So princess, do we have everything in order?" Celestia snapped out of her daze, surprised at how abruptly he had switched from something about his grandchildren to foreign policy. She blinked a few times and looked at the griffon, she had two choices, agree and have no clue what she was agreeing to, or ask him to go over it again and look like a complete foal. As soon as she opened her mouth however a loud banging sound could be heard. "What in Equestria is that?" The ambassador looked up from the legal document and towards the large double doors.
The doors exploded into the throne room, barely on their hinges. A loud bellowing could be heard, and suddenly a partially metal monstrosity ran in, shooting bolts of electricity from one of its appendages and sending out wave after wave of elemental energy each time it was struck with something from one of the unicorns trying to stop it. "OH BUCK ME!" Celestia was not a happy pony.
*Delta's POV*
I awoke to seeing my body being just inches above the floor. I am probably being held in a telekinesis plasmid. I did not move my body at all. Better to not alert them to my presence, I did a whole lot better with the element of surprise last time, I will this time too. "Could we just stop for one second?" I heard heavy breathing from behind me and to the right. "This thing is freakishly heavy." Is she calling me fat? I know I ate a lot, but that was for survival! I swiveled my eyes to the right, nothing, to the left, hooves. Hooves? How spliced are they?
"Princess Celestia is in the middle of a meeting, we are going to have to bring this to her later." I heard a general murmur of agreement from the other splicers. Odd, normally they would just grunt, heck a lot of them didn't even do that. Maybe some kind of anti-side effect gene tonic? That would have been incredibly nice a few years ago. Wouldn't have even need to become what I am.
"So what is this meeting about? Dealing with Discord's remaining chaos spawns, foreign policy, setting up a new holiday, or maybe with Princess Luna and her desperate want for a longer night?" I heard a small growl.
"Teleforce! It is none of our concern if one of the princesses wants a longer time to control, as it is however, I would actually like a longer night, more time to sleep." Okay, that is way to complicated a sentence for a splicer, where exactly am I? Then it finally dawned on my what was missing, there were no tunnels, no ceilings, just open air, forests, and whatever it is that lived here. This isn't Rapture. Now seems like an appropriate time to freak out.
I began to run and charge up my electro bolt plasmid. I let out a roar the likes of which could be compared to a lion...'What's a lion?'
*Guard's POV*
"Was that a fucking Manticore!?" Teleforce was following the path of destruction made by...the thing. It was pretty easy to tell where this thing had been, large black spots could be seen on the floors from his lightning strikes, as well as broken and chipped walls, hurt ponies, broken doors, some of which were in-bedded in the walls...that are made of marble...
"I think we're fighting a losing battle here." That was a nameless guard pony that they had brought along with them, just some added security...that was practically useless.
"Ya don't say?" Several of them had stopped to take a breather, this thing was moving way to fast for something of that size. "We obviously need some kind of tactic to deal with it, anyone volunteering for my idea?" These were said by Tactical strike, the current captain of the guard.
"Shouldn't we know what it is first, sir?"
"Pfft, no."
*Delta's POV*
'What the Hell is going on!? Where am I?' I fired another electro bolt at one of the walls, surely this is the best course of action. I drill charged at a large pair of double doors and rapid fired my electro bolt plasmid everywhere. I saw two beings in the room, one of them was of more avian descent than the other, though they both had wings...'What the fuck is avian? How did I know that?'
I fired an elecro bolt at them, and then took out my machine gun. "OH BUCK ME!" To say I was startled that one of them yelled that with enough volume behind it to make my head hurt would be an understatement. I looked over to where the sound came from. I am pretty sure it was the white one. It had a mad look in its eyes, and its horn was glowing bright white. I also began to notice that I had several objects smashing into me quite often.
It was at this time that I felt myself being lifted into the air...and subsequently being smashed into everything that ever existed.
(For all intensive purposes, Delta is the equivalent of Loki, and The Hulk is Celestia, but Delta's smashing lasts for a few minutes, and breaks some windows...and some of the ceiling...and a few bones...)
'Why...won't...I die?' I was now strapped down to a table, memories of inner Persephone would come to mind, but I am waaaaay to focused on pain to think. I was able to hear some of those things speak.
"That is no chaos spawn, it doesn't have the residual chaos magic, though something is in it that I have never seen before."
"You've never seen it before? So this is some kind of new magic?"
"I am rather hesitant to call it magic at all Princess, there is something inside it, something organic...but not fully."
"How could something not be fully organic, but also not be magical in nature?"
"I honestly have no idea Princess, if you would permit me to, I would like to study this further."
I didn't hear a response, but rather I saw what looked like a bearded version of these things. This thing has a damn fine beard. "Oh...you're moving again...good?" I groaned, he flinched a little. I was all out of eve syringes, and I didn't have any of those medical kits when I was brought here. It was at this time I remembered my Fountain Of Youth gene tonic, if I could get to a body of water I would be okay.
"So, where does something like you come from?" He did not speak to me directly and from what I can see, he did not expect a response. Lets change that. I groaned again, I hoped it sounded something like the word Rapture.
*Starswhirl the Bearded's POV*
"Rapder"...Heh, this thing makes some weird noises. I rummaged around for a book full of medical spells, hopefully it would contain something that would have a body scanning spell. When I finally found it, there were no such thing as a body scanning spell... "Great, now I have to make another spell, somepony in the future is surely going to blow what I do way out of proportion."
*Delta's POV*
Okay, so these things have 'magic', and 'somepony'? What the fuck? I thought ponies were like small horses...dammit...that's what these are...How did I know what a pony is? I should really try and get a grip on my mind, maybe start poking around and seeing what I can find in there.
"So, it looks like I am going to have to go, but I will be back quite soon, so don't go around causing trouble, okay?" 'Oh, why hello there chance at survival, I didn't see you come in.'
He exited from a door, though it was not the one that he came in from. I began to push against my restraints, they snapped with relative ease, I also felt my bones grind against each other a little...I really need to get to some water. Once my hands were free, I sat up and undid my leg restraints. I couldn't tell if anything in my legs were broken, but I didn't really feel much pain in that area. Only one way to find out I suppose.
*Crunch*
...fuck.
"Okay, I'm ba-...oh my." I heard the sound of hooves on a marble floor draw nearer to me, and then its face was within sight of my visor. That beard is majestic. "You appear to have fallen, and you can't seem to get back up, huh?" You sarcastic piece of shi-oh wait you're serious.
"Well, I was just testing another new spell," He looked a bit disgruntled. " and the medical pavilion of the castle is now quite happy with me, almost threw a celebration right there." This all means literally nothing to me, get to the point. "Lets see what kind of damage Celestia did to you, eh?" Now that is what I wanted to hear.
I felt a sensation akin to warm water flowing over my skin, but I could also feel it on the inside of me, I shivered a bit. "I don't really know much about your anatomy, but I don't think those bones are supposed to be like that...huh, you have bones?" Nah doc, I have jelly filled sacs that contract and expand for movement...Somehow I feel like I know to much about things I never really studied.
"Tell me, can you understand me?" ...Well, it's not like I have anything to lose by doing this. I groaned again, and tried to nod my head, though my back was on the floor, making it kind of hard to do that.
"...For the sake of science I am going to interpret that as a yes..." I honestly was not expecting that to work at all. But what does he plan on doing with me?
Chapter four: Sweet sweet bones.
"Okay, I am going to try and communicate with you, if you can understand me, make a noise again." Sweet Jesus, an opportunity. I groaned again. "Again." I did so. "Again." I did again. This went on for at least half an hour, each time the smile on his face seemed to grow a little.
"You're either the luckiest...thing ever, or you are in fact intelligent. I am going to try and realign your bones, if I do it wrong make a noise again." Nope, nope nope nope nope. I lifted my upper body up, with great pain mind you, and then my right hand. I started to make a motion with my hands as though I had a pencil in my hand. "You-you can write?" I nodded my head. "...And you can nod your head...that would have sped things up..." ...Dammit, he's right...but it hurts so much.
"Okay, well I am going to go get a quill and inkwell, I'll be right back." Well...I don't really need to escape, and from what I can see he seems rather interested in helping, or at least preserving me. He came back through a different door than he exited from, this place seems pretty confusing to me.
"All right, where do you come from?" He handed me the paper.
+Fix my bones first please?+ He looked kind of surprised, and then a bit sheepish...what's a sheep? How do you look like a sheep?
"Haha...yeah, sorry. Tell me if I mess anything up okay?" I nodded again. I felt the same feeling as earlier, that flowing water sensation, though this time it seemed more...forceful, like it was trying to guide my body into position, which honestly is what it was probably doing. I felt my bones begin to realign, each one was quite painful. I powered through, I had been through worse pains before, like the time when I was blown up while escaping with Elea-
I searched for the piece of paper. "Don't move!" I stopped. Slowly I felt the water sensation retreat from my body. The pony looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "Did I do something wrong?" I shook my head and found the paper.
+You did well, I need to get to water, as quickly as possible please.+ He tilted his head to the left a bit.
"What do you need water for, a lot of metals rust in water." I shook my head again. Then pointed back to my latest written sentence. "Okay...will the fountain in the garden do?" I nodded my head. "This way then." I got on my feet, a little off balance due to my being...incapacitated some many times in such a short time span. "Trouble walking?" I shook my head.
+My guns, where are they?+
"What are guns?" Crap. This is going to be hard to explain.
+The objects I had on my back and on my legs, most had long metal tubes on them.+
"Oh, those. Those are currently stored in the magical research center of the castle, do you need them?" I nodded my head again. "Well, luckily for you that is somewhat nearby the castle gardens." Good, good.
We began to walk, taking left and right turns every minute or so. How on earth he remembered which direction to go I have no idea. If it weren't for the fact that I got beat up a lot here I would say that it was quite beautiful. "Almost there, so why is it that you need this body of water exactly?" I walked over to a wall and began to write down a response.
+I need to be in water to regenerate my eve, it also helps my cellular regeneration.+ He read it, and frowned a little, then looked up to me, then back down to the paper.
"I recognize some of these words, but would you mind defining some for me?" I shrugged. "What is, 'eve'?"
+Eve is what allows me to use plasmids, it is a sort of fuel.+
He got a frown on his face again. "What is a plasmid?" I hope this does not go on for too long.
+A plasmid is...an ability acquired from genetic modification.+
The frown returns! "What is genetics?" Son of a bitch!
+Genetics is hard to describe, it is basically what makes you, you.+ He frowned at that, though it was more of a contemplative frown.
"Does cellular have something to do with genetics?" Huh, this one seems rather astute...astute? When did I learn these words?
+Yes, it does. How did you know?+
"Lucky guess to be truthful." Still though, most things would not have even tried to make that connection. We began to move about the halls again. Each turn taking us closer to the fountain. Each turn bringing me closer to Eleanor.
When we had finally reached the fountain, it was just barely large enough for me to stand in. The water itself was about 4 inches deep, just more than enough. I walked over to it, and put my right foot, then left foot in. I stood there, and slowly felt my eve come back, and my body stitch back together. Unluckily for me, I had forgotten about my natural camouflage gene tonic. It had not activated before because I had always been moving, at least a little bit.
"AH! Where did you go?!" He began to run around, somehow waving his front legs in front of him yet keeping his balance. "Celestia is going to be so angry!" I then took a small step to the left, thus rendering me visible. Rendering? I should really look into my old memories. "Wah? But how did you do that? You don't have any magic in you!"
I felt my eve top off, summon Eleanor first, or explain? Explain, that way I can also tell him about what I am going to do. I walked over to a nearby wall, paper and quill ready. I set down the ink well on a bench...how do these things sit? I put the paper on the wall and began to write.
+Do you remember what I told you about plasmids?+ He nodded his head. +And genetics?+ Once again he nodded his head. An eager knowledge seeking light was in his eyes. +What made me unseen is called a gene tonic, natural camouflage to be specific. When I stand still I turn nearly invisible.+
His eyes went wide, and I could see that he had a million questions for me. "How does it work?" I shrugged. "Where did you get it?"
+Research camera.+ He got a puzzled look in his eyes.
"What's a research came-" I put a hand over his mouth.
+No more questions please. I need to get my little girl. Now he had a really puzzled look in his eyes. I brought up the familiar purple ball of...whatever it is. I suspect it is some kind of pheromone. I closed my eyes for a moment. Eleanor, my sweet loving Eleanor, I would finally get to spend time with her, no more having to fight against her crazy mother, no more splicers trying to get at my Adam, no more Rapture.
I threw it a few feet in front of me and...nothing. I threw it again and...still nothing. I blinked and then looked at the pony to my side. I walked over to the water and began to collect more eve. Once I had enough I threw it down again. Then waited. Once I had enough I threw it down again.
oooOOOo Approximately 30 minutes later. oOOOooo
The pony was just looking at me, an obvious sad look displayed on his face. "It's not working, is it?" I shook my head. "Are you going to be okay?" I looked to him, and took off my helmet. "OH SWEET CELESTIA!"
He promptly began to vomit. Maybe that was not such a good idea. "Oh...ugh...wha-what are you?"
I was at my max on eve already, so I walked over to where I left the paper and quill. +Call me Delta.+
Chapter five: Guns and merciless play wars.
“So, do you want to talk about it?” He flinched a bit when he said talk, probably forgot that I can’t actually speak. I shook my head. “Are you sure? I have...lost someone before. I know what it feels like.”
+She is not dead.+
“Okay, do you know where she is?”
+No.+ He frowned a little again. If he keeps doing that he is going to start looking a lot older than he really is.
“So, your teleportation spel- er, plasmid didn't work?”
+It is basically a way of asking her to come to where I threw it. She is the one that teleports. Probably learned how from a dead Houdini splicer.+
He had a quizzical look in his eyes, obviously having no idea what I was talking about. “How does that work?” I shrugged in response. He had a deadpan expression on his face. “Your limited knowledge of your world is really aggravating, you know that?” At those words, I thought I would go ahead and blow off some steam.
I picked him up with my telekinesis plasmid, then ‘gently’ put him in the fountain in one swift motion. “Delta! Not cool.” His horn lit up then, and a large swirl of water started to float in front of him. I think I felt my eyes widen a bit before I started running.
I felt a large amount of water slam into my back, not with enough force to make me fall over, let alone hurt me, but it still put me off balance a little. Oddly enough a little of my eve regenerated due to the water being in contact with me, but I think it counted as elemental damage because a lot more regenerated than normal. I think I felt an evil glint come to my eyes, perfect payback time.
I turned around to see that he had more water with him, and that he was looking around for me. I placed a cyclone trap behind me, hoping that this would work. I then groaned/yelled to get his attention. He came running. Once he rounded the corner he yelled out. “Aha!” I think I smiled a little. I ducked low, hoping that I got the angle right for this. He shot some water at me, and I dodged to the left. The water that was aimed at me ended up getting sucked into the cyclone trap, and I escaped to the hallway to the left.
“What is that?” Take the bait, take the bait! I heard his hooves getting nearer. I stuck my head out from the corner just enough to see around it. He was reaching out with his hoof to touch it, and when he finally did it erupted, sending a massive gust of wind and water in his face and actually forcing his body off of the ground. I ran up and grabbed him with my left hand on his way down so as to not actually injure him.
His eyes were spinning in his head quite comically. Once he finally regained his senses, he would probably have a lot of questions. I went back to where the paper and quill were. I hoped to be able to answer a few before he could even ask.
oooooOOOOOoooooOOOOOooooo
“So that was another plasmid thingy, that I helped make more powerful?”
+Yes.+
I had written an explanation of all my plasmids and gene tonics down, as well as a few other answers to things that he probably would have asked about. While I was writing these things down I began to think about my weapons. I still had all my ammo, but none of my weapons. Not even my drill. So I also wrote a question of my own as to where/when we could get them.
I pointed to it. He scanned it for a moment. “So those are weapons?” I nodded my head. “And you needed weapons, to fight the uh...splicers is what you called them?” I nodded my head again. “Even with your plasmids?” Oh how history is doomed to repeat itself, I nodded again. “What exactly do these weapons of yours do?” I am certain that I smiled at that.
+How about a demonstration?+ He smiled a bit at that, though also looked a bit uneasy. +I promise the demonstration will not be carried out on you.+ Surely that would make him more relaxed.
He started to chuckle a little. “Right this way.” He also started to shake his head from left to right while trotting to the unknown destination. It was funny to see bits of water go on the walls where it came off of his beard. How did he even grow that?
*Meanwhile in the magical research department.*
A low level research pony named Query was poking the multi-barreled piece of metal with a stick. Thus far it seemed to have done nothing. He began to poke at other areas, until finally he noticed a small curved piece of metal that started to give slightly when he pushed it. He tried pushing harder with the stick, and it went further back. Curious as to how far back it would go he gradually applied more force to it...or at least he did until it shot him in the hoof. Luckily no nerves are located in the hoof, but he felt his hoof give a little after the piece of metal made a very loud *crack* sound, he looked behind him and noticed a new hole in the wall. His eyes lit up with a slightly evil glee.
*Back to Delta and Starswirl the magnificently bearded...er I mean the bearded.*
“Did you hear that?” He had asked to late, I was already running towards the gunshot. “Hey! Wait up!” Hell no, one of these things could have just brained itself and I am not going to be held responsible. He began to run alongside me. He had obviously not run for quite some time. His beard did have small hints of grey here and there, so I assumed he is getting a little old.
“Why *Huffing sounds* are we running?” Does he honestly expect me to stop? That was a gunshot. *Crack crack crack* And those were too! I began to hear maniacal laughing, must be getting closer to where my gun was being fired.
“WHO’S THE LOW LEVEL NOW? HUH? HUH?” *Crack crack crack* I entered an area filled to the brim with panic. It appeared on of the ponies that had a horn had gotten my machine gun. He appeared to be firing madly, each burst throwing the weapon back. He obviously did not have a very strong telekinetic grip. I selected my own telekinesis plasmid and grabbed at the machine gun. He must have felt my pull on it because he turned to me and began to yell. “Back off! This is mine!” He had obviously gone mad. He began to fire it at me, but I aimed it upwards that way nobody had a chance of getting hurt by any of the bullets. It seemed what was left of my armor piercing rounds were in the ammo box because they deeply penetrated the roof. I looked back to the pony.
It was now sweating with the amount of effort it was putting into trying to re-aim the gun at me...ponies can sweat? I on the other hand wasn’t even using any of my eve. To easy. I heard panting and wheezing to my left, must be the bearded pony. “Wha- *Barfing* what’s going on?” Wow...this thing has some serious dedication. I yanked the gun down to me with my telekinesis and put it on my back where it belonged in the first place.
I walked over to the pony that had used my gun and went crazy with it. “St-sta-stay awa-away from m-m-me!” Act like a bitch, die like a bitch! I reached the pony and looked down. I readied my foot and throw my foot forward with as much force as possible, but before it could connect I felt myself yanked back. The gunpony’s horn had not lit up, so it was not him. I looked around and saw the larger white one. I believe my eyes widened in fear. The last time I saw that one it threw me around like I was a rag-doll.
It raised its eyebrow, an obvious look of curiosity on its face. "Starswirl, what's going on here?" His eyes widened a bit, obviously distressed at seeing her while in this situation.
"Well...uh...you see." Meanwhile I was still floating in the air, though it was not stationary. I was just kind of floating around. It was like a more predictable unstable teleportation plasmid, which is to say instead of teleporting around and bumping into things, I was just bumping into things. "Delta there...err, the thing you smashed...a lot, is actually sentient." Her mouth formed a small 'O' shape. "And he seems to possess remarkable abilities! He was going to show me his...what did you call them, guns?" I nodded towards him from the ceiling. He then began to explain into further detail what I had explained to him.
"...So I 'smashed' a semi-sentient, semi-metal being, that also possesses 'remarkable' abilities?" I felt my self being lowered to the ground. When I finally touched down I was in front of the white pony that was a lot larger than the rest. Suddenly her front hooves were wrapped around me, and very surprisingly, she began to apologize...a LOT. At one point I think she began to cry...I started to feel like the bad person here. I started to try and push her off me, but she did not budge. I pushed harder and...nothing...crap.
After several awkward minutes of standing there taking her obnoxiously long apology and hug, I finally had enough. I started to take off my helmet. The bearded pony's eyes widened. "Princess! Avert your eyes!" Because of him yelling like that, she looked up, straight to where my face was. Her face turned a very interesting shade of green.
Chapter six: The solar princess.
I put on my helmet. After the large white one was done...heaving is what I would call it, nothing ever actually came out, just a whole lot of heaving. After she was done, she began to apologize for acting in such a way, after I had put my helmet back on of course. Meanwhile the pony that I was going to curb stomp to hell had been trying to sneak away. Beardy made sure that didn't happen. What the large white one had done to me, namely floating around bumping into stuff, was being done to the gunpony. I looked up occasionally to see that he was shivering a lot and looking down in fear.
I pointed up to the gunpony and cocked my head to the left at the large white one. “Are you wondering what we are going to be doing with him?” I nodded. “Hmm, Starswirl, what do you think? Twenty years in the dungeon sound good?” I looked to him, and then at the gunpony. The gunpony seemed to turn white in fear. He was an odd color combination. He was black, red and blue. His horn was a blood red color, same with the bottom of his hooves. His body was black with uneven blue stripes going throughout it.
“Don’t you think that is a little extreme? He did some property damage, and he hurt one pony, but that wasn’t even anywhere near a fatal injury. Fifteen years maximum...in my book at least.” He seemed to move back a bit, the large white one obviously commanded a lot of respect and power. Should probably try to get on her good side. I began to look around for my guns. I already had my machine gun, but the rivet gun, drill, crossbow, hack gun, grenade launcher and shotgun were still missing. I looked around but did not see them anywhere. Starswirl and the large white one were still debating on how long the gunpony should be locked up. I myself didn’t really care. I found a nearby paper and quill, and an ink well too. I walked over to the two of them.
+Where are my things?+ I presented the question in front of Beardy's face.
“It would be better to ask him.” He pointed towards the floating researcher. I looked up and felt a grin grow on my face. Finally, I get to really mess with one of these things.
I used the telekinesis plasmid to get him down, and then proceeded to point to the question on the sheet of paper. “I-I don’t kn-know what you’re talking about.” I think this one has a bit of a stuttering problem. I proceeded to point to the paper again, and then rose a fist to the air...he looked at it, obviously having no idea what that threatening gesture was supposed to mean. I sighed, it sounded more like a growl than a sigh. Huh, odd. What happened to my voice? I remember being able to talk at some point in my life...but when?
I pulled out the machine gun and put the barrel to his head, it seemed to suddenly transfer the information on where my other weapons were right to his head, how convenient. He told me that they were located in a storage area, number 51 to be precise. Somehow that seemed familiar. I wrote down the name of the place and proceeded to go back to the 'heated' argument going on how that pony would be treated. I brought a hand up to my face plate and cleared some of the ambient moisture off of the glass, I had never done that in rapture, even though that place was a whole lot more moist than here. They were still debating the ponies time in the...dungeon? Yeah, that was it. That word reminds me of the word 'prison'...I wonder what they mean.
I began to write down my thoughts on this matter, I mean, it was my gun he had used for this. So I should be allowed to put in my ideas, right? If I remember correctly he did hurt one of his own kind...then again, I did too...but they were attacking me first. So it's okay if I did.
+Shouldn't I be getting some form of say in this? He did use my gun for such things, wouldn't that be theft?+ The large white one simply lifted an eyebrow in my direction, and a contemplative look was on her face too. The bearded one, I should really find out his name, seemed to light up at the idea. A large smile was on his face.
"He's right! We need a mediator! What do you think about how long he should be imprisoned?" A devilish idea came to me.
"Yes, how long do you think?" The large white colored one said that very oddly, as if she was going to deeply study my action...should probably play this out carefully. I thought for a moment, and refined my idea to a less...devilish form.
+No time at all, however that does not mean that he is going to be going unpunished.+ The large white one cocked her head to the side, seeming to not understand. I felt my grin grow. Time for the reveal!
"What kind of punishment do you have in mind?" Beardy was looking up to my face plate, a look of concern on his face. He was probably wondering if I was going to beat it to a pulp.
+I was thinking having him help me, I am obviously going to be here for a while, so I think have an...indentured servant would be nice.+ The large white seemed rather unaffected, beardy had a deadpan expression. Where the Hell did I learn the word 'indentured'?
"Really, he just tried to shoot you in your...face...and now you want him to follow you around? With easy access to your weapons?" I nodded. It's not necessarily easy access to my weapons, they would be strapped on to my back at all times, and his telekinesis was quite weak.
"Don't you think that you could just stick to normal punishment, like imprisonment?" The white one said that, I should really find out names. Somehow her saying this just felt...wrong. Like it was not fitting for someone like her to say. She seemed more...motherly in ways than a princess or ruler.
+You did ask for my opinion...what are your names again?+ They introduced themselves rather quickly. The large white one was named Celestia, she was apparently one of the two princesses here, I would be meeting the other tomorrow seeing as how she was asleep right now. Blagh, royalty. Thinking they can go and do what they want, when they want, just because they rule the apparent largest country in the world with complete and total dominance because they used and ancient weapon that got rid of one of the single most powerful beings known to their existence with relative ease. Though this ease did destroy two mountains, make the forest nearby the castle extremely dangerous and filled with magical oddities, severely damage the structural integrity of the universe, make continents shift a few meters and make it rain chocolate milk for thirty days and thirty nights...okay, maybe they do have the right to sleep in...a lot.
(Because I love ya'!)
Chapter seven: The lunar princess.
"So do your kind need sleep?" Starswirl had been asking me questions for what felt like hours, though it was probably closer to just above half an hour. Meanwhile the research pony was being detained and being put under investigation. I was supposed to be having a meeting with the other pony princess later, something about her being a night person. Have a I mentioned how ridiculous this is? No? Well this is absolutely absurd, there are a total of three different races, one of them has a horns, one has wings, and the other has nothing other than the ability to farm well and some extra strength. Then there is the whole two princesses who are called 'alicorns' that possess all three traits and are believed to have extended lifetimes. Starswirl places it somewhere near twice a normal ponies lifetime.
I was sitting there with Starswirl, pretty much oblivious to the world. "Delta?" He waved a hoof in-front of my face. I shook my head from left to right a little. "So your kind don't need sleep?!" Ugh. Should have payed more attention. I grabbed the new piece of paper and quill and then began to form a response.
+My kind do need sleep, I think we need about 8 hours of sleep a night.+ He nodded his head a little. We were back in the garden that had the fountain. He said something along the lines of 'If you get damaged again, I want you to be able to get healed as quickly as possible.'
"That is what we hypothesize ponies need. No studies have been done on it yet though." I sat there, fidgeting a little. It feels odd. Being able to think clearly and independently again I mean. I still felt that nagging feeling that I should find Eleanor, but that is obviously not going to be happening anytime soon. New memories were constantly surfacing. One was of my child hood. New York city I think it was called. Another was the time when Sofia Lamb hypnotized me and forced me to-
"So what did you do for a living where you're from?" I snapped back to attention. I blinked a few times. What did I do for a living? Do I tell him about my job protecting Eleanor, or do I tell him about how I helped build Rapture...that's new. I began to write on the piece of paper, stopping only to re-wet the quill.
+I had two jobs, one was to protect Eleanor, my little girl. The other was to help build a massive underwater city that housed some of the greatest minds in my peoples generation and before it. The person who was in charge of this project, and chief funder was named Andrew Ryan. He believed that a man is entitled to the sweat of their own brow and that they should not have to share it with anyone. He read that, and was silent for a little while, occasionally blinking.
"What-what were you views on such things?" Now that was a question I would have really rather avoided.
+At the time, I had very few things on my mind. The one and only constant I had there was to protect Eleanor at all costs. Writing with a quill is really difficult. It was taking me minutes to write out just one sentence, my large encumbered hands weren't helping either.
"So you didn't really have a view on socioeconomic policies?"
+The word that was second from the last there, yeah...I don't even know how to spell that.
"...Well that's okay I guess. I take it you don't really know much about your culture?" I nodded again. "What exactly made it so that you would be so... single-minded?
+From what little I know, pheromones, genetic splicing and extensive bodily surgeries. His eyes widened a bit.
"Surgeries?! Most surgeries that are done these days have an incredibly low chance of actually working, one out of every 3 ponies that have a surgery die because of it!" Now that surprised me, I would have thought that with the whole magic thing they wouldn't even really need it.
+But what about magic? Can't you just remove the problem magically?+
"Magic, while incredibly useful is very...under developed right now. You see, only recently have we actually gotten some structure back in our world. A very powerful being called Discord ruled the world for quite some time, and as you could probably guess by his name, he despised structure. This made it very difficult to study anything, let alone actually learn." He paused for a moment. "There are ponies like myself that had dedicated our lives to making new spells, that is actually my natural born talent." He began to smile quite broadly. "The ability to make, and use nearly any type of spell. Talking about that, I have been thinking of delving into Chronomancy..." As soon as he finished saying that word a light brown coated pony with dark brown hair and an hour glass tattoo on its fur on its flank walked up to us.
"Nope, nothing in that. It is definitely not worth your time. " He then trotted off.
+Who was that?+
"I have no idea." He had a bemused look on his face. Well that was weird. Starswirl noticed the setting sun. "Well, it looks like you're going to be seeing Princess Luna quite soon. Not many ponies get that honor."
+Well, I'm not a pony.+
"What are you then?" A good question really.
+To be honest, I don't think I could really be considered a member of the species that I came from anymore. We are called humans.+
"Never heard of that, though I suppose that would make sense seeing as how ponies, griffons, zebras and Minotaurs are the mentally superior races here." Heh, four dominant races, surely this would lead to some kind of mass world war. A random thought crossed my mind.
+How old are your princesses?+ His face went blank for a moment, and then he sighed, frowned and got up.
"I was kind of hoping you wouldn't ask that... Princess Celestia is currently twenty two and quite close to turning twenty three." So what, from what I remember of my world a lot of kings and queens began their rule at anywhere in between ten and that age. "Princess luna is barely eighteen...and quite childish..." Pfft, how childish could the ruler of a continent be?
*Meanwhile*
The night guards posted outside Princess Luna's room shifted about nervously. She was going to be waking up soon, and thus far not one of her guards had been forced by her to...play with her yet. They heard a deep yawn, and gulped. They looked to each other...and ran. The one that was on the left side of the door yelled out. "Everypony for themselves!" Luna burst out of the door, her hooves guiding her towards the yell. The night guard looked behind him and noticed the dark colored alicorn quickly gaining on him, a predatory look in her eyes. He began to put as much power into his strides as he could. But as hard as he tried, he inevitably was tackled down to the ground.
He turned his head so as to view the face of the beaming princess. "You're it!" She hopped off of him and ran down the hall in the opposite direction. He felt a smile touch his lips.
"I love my job."
*Back to Delta and Starswirl.*
"Everypony for themselves!" We both looked in the direction of the shout. I turned towards him and he simply shrugged.
"Do you want to go check it out?" Now I shrugged.
+I guess, does this kind of thing happen often?+
He looked at me with some very sad eyes, though they were a playful sad. "You have no idea." He got up from the bench, it was odd how they sat, just throwing their butt right on it. "Well come on, lets go see Princess Luna." We strolled towards the noise, not going at a faster pace due to the seeming regularity of such occurrences. We reached an open door, the room itself seemed unnaturally dark. We didn't see anyone along our way, so we just kept heading forward. We had reached the room where Celestia had thrown me around like a rag-doll, I could tell it was this room because the ceiling had an impact spot on it in the shape of my body.
We saw a guard pony, though it was in a dark colored armor instead of the usual golden colored armor. He stopped in front of us. "Run! Run before she finds you!" Who was she. I looked down towards Starswirl, he was laughing.
"So that's what is going on." I tilted my head to the left. "Princess Luna enjoys games. She believes that the night time is a time for festivities and games, and it is because of this belief that she does her best to encourage such actions. It is a lot of fun." His smile got a bit bigger. "How far behind you was she?" The guard neglected to respond and instead headed for the hills. "Huh, that's odd, normally I get quite a bit of respect around here."
Then from behind us, a cheery, young, and surprisingly feminine voice sounded out. "Yes, you do. But I think it is because I'm here." Starswirl turned around really quickly, whereas I turned slowly. This turned out to be a mistake as I was tackled by the pony behind us. She had a dark blue coat, with a lighter shade of blue for her mane and tail. On here flank was a crescent moon.
She suddenly yelled out. "You're it!" She then took to the air, she was like Celestia, a horn and wings. By my guess that means she is Princess Luna. I turned towards Starswirl, only to see that he was no longer there...traitor.
I began to wander the halls looking for anyone to 'tag'. Why I was even bothering I really don't know, but I may as well come off as nice and courteous as possible to these things. I was debating on whether or not to use my plasmids to help me 'tag' any of these ponies. Not many of them would really be useful, though scout would be incredibly so. Or I could always do the wait for passing prey trick thanks to my natural camouflage gene tonic. A combination of the two would also be nice, though slightly wasteful of my eve. Never know when I might need it.
I heard hoof steps and quickly got close to the wall and stopped moving. I heard the familiar sound that comes with turning invisible, and saw that it was Starswirl. His eyes were wide and alert. Just as he stood in front of me he stopped and sniffed. "Delta...I know you're here somewhere...you wouldn't do this to an old stallion...would you?" I poked his side and sprinted down the hall...no regrets! I heard a loud yell behind me. I turned down several corridors and quickly got horribly lost.
I came across a door that suddenly opened and I was pulled inside by a dark blue aura. "Shhh, he won't find us here." It was the second princess, Luna I believe was her name. She was sitting in the center of what looked to be a janitorial closet. We were in a very dark room and my lack of activity caused me to turn invisible. Her eyes widened up to the size of dinner plates. I then waved my hand and it wore off. "How did you do that? We didn't detect a magical presence when you disappeared."...I have no paper to write it down...crap.
I made a writing motion with my hands, hopefully she would understand. "You do it with writing?" God dammit. I tried a writing motion again, though this time after I did it I did a 'gimme' motion. "You do it by writing and dancing? I didn't see you dance." I saw a small smile on her face, she was messing with me, grand. So tempting to take off my helmet...so tempting. "Here." Her horn glowed for a second and suddenly a piece of paper as well as a quill and inkwell were in front of me.
+Thanks.+
"Not a problem. Sorry to drag you into this, I don't have to raise the moon for about another thirty minutes, so I thought to myself 'why not see if this thing can play tag' and you could!" She seems rather excitable, while saying that she put a hoof to her chin on the 'why not see if this thing can play tag' and suddenly her hooves exploded upward when she said 'and you could!'. "So how did you disappear?" Oh yeah...that. I wrote down the rather lengthy explanation on gene tonics and plasmids. Been here for...wait, how long was I out for after Celestia throw me all over the place? I guess I'll find that out later.
She suddenly had glasses on her face while reading my answer...where did the glasses come from? "Hmmm interesting...yes, yes. I recognize most of these words." I helmet palmed. I heard the sound of hooves hitting the ground. We both looked at the door. Her eyes were wide open and the irises were pinpricks. "We've been found." She hissed. The door slowly opened revealing none other than...Celestia? I heard a loud yell to my left, which just so happened to be where Luna was. I looked up to Celestia, normally this would not happen but I was sitting. She then put her right hoof up and touched Luna's nose.
"Tag." She had an enormous smile on her face. "Oh and it just so happens that the moon needs to be raised now." Luna had a rather sour look on her face. She grumpily got up and walked away. I decided to follow her. We walked silently, it was as though sound was dampened around her. We had reached the garden with the fountain, seemed as though I was going to be coming here a lot.
"Time for the night." A small smile met her lips as she looked to the sky. I looked up as well. I turned to her and saw that her eyes were closed. I looked back up. The moon was just meeting the horizon and several stars were coming out of the wood works, making themselves shine brilliantly. I looked back to the moon, it had moved at an alarming rate, now the bottom of the moon was just barely touching the horizon.
+It's beautiful.+ I would show her that when she had her eyes open.
"Thank you, I do try hard to make my night beautiful." She still had her eyes closed, and on top of it was looking up, how the hell did she do that?
+How did you know what I wrote down?+ She smiled a bit.
"Each star is like an eye for me, I can see all over Equestria right now. But no one can see me."
+Sorry, I didn't get that last bit, what did you say?+ She finally opened her eyes and looked at me, the moon was about a quarter of the way through the sky.
"Nothing, lets go back inside." She tossed her head towards the way we came. She had a look in her eyes that was full of melancholy...how do I know that word?
+If it's alright with you I would like to stay out a bit, it has been a long time since I have seen the night sky.+ She visibly brightened at those words.
"Sure!" She trotted over to the bench, her right fore hoof was high in the air for a while, then the left, and same with the back ones, it was a slow and happy walk. When she finally reached it she still had a large smile on her face, she looked to me expectantly. I walked over to the bench and sat down with her. She looked up to the sky, as did I.
"It's peaceful, isn't it?" I simply nodded in agreement. "What was the night sky like where you're from?"
+From what little I can remember, not much at all. We had stars, one moon. Though I don't think anyone raised them for us, I can't quite recall actually.+
"Heh. No one to move your celestial bodies. That would be weird. Even Discord moved them, but only when he felt like it." I wonder what exactly this Discord person is like?
Author's Note
I know it's short, but I wanted to put something out there. I promise one that is at least 2,000 words long next time, if I don't then...I don't know, Celestia'll throw a banana at my face I guess.
Starswirl had gone to talk to Princess Celestia and I had been left tied down...but with metal this time. I believe it to be iron. I was finally learning how my face worked, ya know because before this it was pretty much mindlessness and having no real clue on what was going on around me. I had a frown on, I think it may have been touching the bottom of my helmet. I heard the door open. 'Oh good, Starswirl's back.'
What walked in front of me surprised me greatly. It looked like a really fucked up dragon, several parts of its body were from different animals. The head was definitely a pony, though a horn was adorning the top of it. One of its hands was a lions leg, the other looked to be some kind of avian creatures, perhaps a hawk. Where the neck met the body the fur from the head stopped and the actual body of it was red, I have no idea what animal that comes from. From the lower body emerged two legs, one from a hoofed animal, probably a pony, the other looked to be reptilian. Finally the tail, which also looked to be reptilian. He held one finger up to his lips. "Shhhh. They don't know I'm here." He was smiling like a mad man, I noticed that he had a glass of a strange brown fluid in one of his hands.
"Hmm, you're an odd creature aren't you?" You're one to speak buddy. He began to float around me, casually looking at me and studying the room around us. "So, what're you in for?" Does he honestly expect me to answer?
He was about to speak again, but I heard voices coming from the door. "Where are the guards for this door, I have seen what he-it's capable of." The multi-creature then quickly snapped its...claws? Together and vanished. 'Why do I have to put up with all of the crap?'
Starswirl and a pony I did not recognize came into the room. "Should we do a magical potency test on it?" This came from the pony I did not know.
"No, it does not seem to have magic in it, nor does it seem capable of storing it." The other pony 'hummed'
"What about magical resistance?"
"That we have not done yet, how do you want to go about doing it, the old weigh and lift technique?" Weigh and lift technique? The metal bindings holding me down were taken off, and then I was lifted before I could get up, they then opened the door and left that room. Sadly due to my position I could not see where it was that we were going to. After a few minutes, from what I could guess at least, we stopped and I was put into restraints again.
“The table weighs 25 pounds exactly. All we need to do is put it on the scale and then subtract 25 from its weight.” Huh? The table was then lifted up and I can only assume that I was being put onto a scale. “362 pounds…it weighs well above three times the average pony.” Well duh, I have the suit on, that has got to be adding some weight onto me. "Okay then, time to get Teleforce." He then proceeded to shout out her name. I then heard a door open and was just barely able to see her. I never really payed much attention to her before but now I was able to get a good look at her.
She was odd looking to me. She was a very dark purple, almost black in color. Her mane and tail were very contrasting with the purple and were a dark green, swampy would be the word I use to describe it.
"Teleforce, you have extensive weight gauging training, right?" There was silence, but I assume she nodded her head. "Good, would you please lift it and tell us what you view the approximate weight to be at?" Once again, I assume she nodded. I was being lifted into the air, and I heard an audible grunt...I'm not fat.
"I would say this is at least 350 pounds, a little above, maybe 360." I heard a lot of murmuring. "What's going on doc'?"
"It would appear as though it has no magical resistance at all. It is an entity entirely devoid of any contact with magic." So? "In theory direct application of magic should not work on it, so why is it?" SO?! "Lets take this news back to Princess Celestia." I heard what could only be described as a 'poof' sound and then the sound of parchment being unrolled. "Hmm, this says to take it to Princess Luna. It is signed by her...but...Never mind. Teleforce, would you mind helping to bring it to her room?" I think she nods a lot or something because before I even realized it the restraints were gone and I was free floating again.
This whole being carried around with no real idea of what is going on thing is really getting on my nerves. We were walking for a few minutes before we stopped and...turned. This process was repeated several times. When we had finally arrived I was unceremoniously dropped and I then heard knocking. I tried to get up but it felt as though I had an even set of weights all along my body forcing me to stay down.
The door opened and presumably Luna was revealed. I heard her speak. "I'll take him from here." Short, simple...nothing more was said. Things suddenly felt very tense for me. I was lifted up once more and then moved forward a small amount. Yet again I was dropped on the floor, they can really be total pricks. The door was closed and then... I was wrapped in a pair of hooves and was being held quite closely to her...what?
She then pushed me away from her and she had a look of total seriousness in her eyes, she seemed to be scanning the entirety of my body...I mean suit. "Did they do anything to you?" I shook my head. "What kind of tests did they do." It took her a moment to realize that I was not able to respond verbally. She quickly went to a desk that was near her bed and rummage for paper. While she was doing this I decided to do a quick observation of the room.
If a theme could be nighttime, then this woman...or whatever, has it down pat. The ceiling appeared to have the night sky on it, the stars were even twinkling occasionally so I assume some magic went into this. The room did have windows, but the shades were very effective at keeping the light from the sun out. The bed had a lot of netting all around it, the sheets and blankets were dark, though it was rather hard for me to tell exactly what color they were through a combination of visor slightly blocking my vision and the darkness. No couches were visible, and the desk was was fairly well decorated with the occasional bit of gold here or there on it, the wood was dark in color and unidentifiable by me.
She came back to me, paper, quill and inkwell in tow with her magic. She handed them to me. I walked over to a wall and began to write down as many of the tests as I could remember. Most they did not give names to so I described them instead. There was the one where they applied small amounts of heat to me, then electricity, then water. Which was actually quite pleasant. Then they started to just generally observe me while casting spells. A few more that I had no idea what was going on and then they had Teleforce or whatever her name was lift me and judge my weight.
"Okay, they have done nothing out of what we would deem to... Of what I would deem to be normal." What was with the odd sentence structure? "Are you sure they did nothing else?" I simply nodded. "That is good. Until the final verdict is made about you I want you near me for...insurance that you are not going to run off." She winked at the last part. Heh, she might the only friend I have for a while.
We sat around for a small amount of time. Probably no more than just twenty minutes. She was about to speak when we heard a loud knocking from the door. She made her way over to it and about halfway through reaching it opened the door with her telekinesis. 'Ya know, if I did not come here from a place that didn't already have that, I'm sure I would freak out.'
"Ma'am, as you know it is approaching night time. Before you raise the moon your sister would like to see you." She simply nodded towards the guard. She looked to me, and a gasp escaped from her.
"Delta! Where did you go!"...Oh yeah...Natural Camouflage...I motioned to her with my arm, making me visible once more. "But...I detected no magical presence, how did you do that?"...Didn't I already explain this to her? "It is of no matter right now. Come, we must go see sister." I felt a tug at my hand and a flash back of Rapture flooded my sense.
*DELTA VISION*
I was back in Paupers drop, I had just killed another big daddy for his little sister. She was tugging at my hand, eager to get to the next Adam filled corpse. Suddenly a splicer dropped from somewhere and began to run towards me. The little sister screamed, I bellowed.
*lUNA VISION*
"It is of no matter right now. Come, we must go see sister." I tugged at his leftmost limb, what odd placement for them. He stood still, un-moving and without any kind of sound or recognition that he heard me. I walked towards him. Rather unexpectedly he seemed to roar and run forward. His large metal contraption began to spin at mind boggling fast speeds. Reacting on pure instinct I picked all of him up with my magic (A feat easier said than done.) and threw him against the wall. From what I heard of Starswirl's reports about him, he could take and excessive amount of force.
He grunted and stopped moving. Good...sort of.
Author's Note
I am terribly sorry it has been so long since I have posted a chapter, I have been rather busy with some things at home/getting a job/school and many other things that are a bit more personal...but here is a crappy chapter as an attempt to appease any people that have been waiting for a new chapter...sorry.
Chapter 11: It's a total catastrafuck.
*Meanwhile, in Subject Delta's near-coma induced dream.*
"Why don't I have my suit, how can I talk. Where am I?" Luna suddenly appeared before my eyes. "What's happening?!" Her face turned green, must be because I don't have my suit. I would really like to have my suit.
"We are in your dream." As if to prove this, a cloud formed behind her and she leaped onto it. "Might I ask as to why you started to attack me? It doesn't seem like I did anything to threaten you?"
"I...so weird to talk. Haven't done it in a long time. Feels weird. I've been having...flashbacks of where I was before I came here, it was a much more...aggressive world."
"How so?" I rubbed the bridge of my nose, been a while since I last did that too, felt good.
"You know how I shoot out elements, and have all these dangerous weapons? Where I come from everyone has those."
"...I did not know..."
"Oh, well I do. So yeah. I won't hurt anyone! But...I would like to have them on me at all times, it would be uncomfortable for me not to have them...if that's okay."
"Okay...why do you say "everyone" and "anyone" these words sound much like anypony and everypony. Are you from a place where there are no ponies?"
"I think so. A lot of it is fuzzy. I can only remember most of the recent things, with Eleanor." I lowered my head to see that were aren't actually standing on anything, or at least that I was not, she was still on her cloud. "How are we not falling?"
"Dream, remember?" Oh yeah...that makes sense...sure. "Well, I think it is time we got you woken up, yes?" I nodded my head. Soon I'll be back in my suit.
*Back in the...er "real" world.*
The light that was typically yellow on the being's head was out, but as soon as it woke up it turned back on. It was red for a split second, then back to yellow. Interesting. - 6th month, 2nd year of harmony. Personal diary Starswirl The Bearded.
(DELTA POV)
Oh sweet merciful baby Jesus in sky! Why does my head hurt so much!? I saw Luna looking over me, Starswirl was also here. Celestia was in the corner, talking to what I believed to be a guard. The golden armor on its body looked a little dull, like it had seen some combat. I got up and noticed some smashed furniture and a dent in the wall...these things seem to be popping up a lot around me... Who's Jesus again?
"Any lasting damage?" That was Starswirl, he was faced to Princess Luna.
"None from what we-... I can see." She looked a little worried, will have to ask her what's wrong later.
I scanned the room for paper, and saw none anywhere. I got up and motioned towards Starswirl, feigning a writing motion. "Ah, of course." His horn glowed slightly, then brighter more, then some paper, a quill and ink well appeared before him in his telekinesis. The next thing I noticed was the gaping jaws all directed at him.
"Star-Starswirl, did you just magically create matter?" Celestia was the first to speak...this must have been some kind of big deal.
"No, but it is a magical break through! Through the use of-" He rambled on about quantum physics, and magical flux, and some other junk that I don't really understand and the basics of it was near instantaneous teleportation. That's cool and all, but I have honey making genetically altered wasps living in my arm. Not much tops that.
He brought them over to me, and I though about exactly what to say, how to ease things in, and be subtle.
+So what're we doin' now?+
...I may have not been made to be subtle, but darn it if I'm not smooth! They all seemed a bit puzzled by what I asked them. "What do you mean, Princess Luna and I have royal duties to assume, and" Haha, she said duty. " Starswirl has to stay focused on his work, which you just so happen to fall into." Now it's my turn to ask what do you mean.
+What do you mean I fall into his work?+ Starswirl had taken out a rather ratty looking book from a saddle bag of his, and began to jot down something in it.
"Well, as head of the Magicians For Equestria society he is personally responsible for looking after all major magical anomalous activities, you just so happen to be one of them." Well that seemed like a mouthful.
+I thought that you said I had no magic in me?+ I showed the paper to Starswirl, who looked at for just a second.
"You don't have any in you, that's the problem. Everything in Equestria has at least trace amounts of magic in them." Everything? Then how come something crazy isn't happening, I would think in a world where everything has magic in it, something would be going wrong. It was at this moment I wished my stupid brain would shut up.
A guard came crashing into the room, he was holding a piece of paper in his mouth and sweating crazily. "Pwinces! Urget nesws!" She thanked him, and took the only slightly spit covered piece of paper from him with her telekinesis and shook it a little, somehow it became dry...kay.
While she was reading it her face became more and more concerned, then angry, then flaming angry. She finished off this wave of emotions with her right eye twitching, her teeth grinding and a mad look in her eyes. I saw both Luna and Starswirl backing off and ready to run. I felt like joining them.
"Sister, when was the last time you saw an Ursa Major?" Celestia was staring straight forward, looking at nothing.
Luna paused hesitantly, then carefully she said back. "When I asked for one to help us fight Discord, you know this."
"Do you remember giving it some of your magic to help it fight Discord?"
"...I...vaguely remember something of the sorts, yes."
"Did you ever think of taking that magic back from it?"
Luna's eyes became the size of dinner plates, it's been a while since I last ate, I wonder if we'll eat anytime soon? "I...I never thought of taking it back, we were fighting Discord, and...we were so busy."
"What if I told you that Ursa Major is now an Ursa Majoris Gigantus?" Wow, it is getting weird how large the whites of Luna's eyes are getting.
Author's Note
Terribly sorry it's taken so long to get this out, been having some problems with writing, been busy and all kinds of stuff. I am highly open to any kind of suggestions, but I ask that you message me them so as to not spoil anything for anyone else, also, if you have any kind of problems with the story, again, feel free to tell me, constructive criticism is highly appreciated.
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Chapter 12: Preparing for the journey to come.
Ursa Majoris Gigantus? Don't the first two mean space bear or something like that? Yeah. Space bear...Space...bear. First magic, then magical horses, ponies, whatever. And now... a damned space bear. Great.
"Where is it?" Luna had an amount of fear in her voice that actually made me think about just how bad this thing could be. Space bear, is it going to eat the planet?
"Several thousand kilometers away from here, north. Our scout's estimates say that it will be here in less than a week if it continues its current course." Less than a week. Okay. That's enough time to high tail it out of hear.
+So when do we leave?+ I showed my newest question to all of them except the very tired looking courier.
"What do you mean "we"?" Celestia had an eyebrow arched. "You're volunteering to go stop it? For ponies you barely even know?" Luna suddenly had a very large smile on her face. WHAT? Help? No no no no no. I plan on getting out of here.
Luna leaned towards Celestia, however that was done, and began to whisper something. Celestia occasionally nodded, "ahummed" and general made sounds of agreement. What are they talking about? "Would you mind coming over here for a moment?" Celestia had gestured to me with a fore-hoof. I slowly walked over towards her and Luna, a little weary of what it was that it seemed they were volunteering me for.
"Delta, we would like for you to go and deal with the Ursa Major. You may decline if you wish, but know this" She leaned in very closely and whispered quite harshly. "Starswirl has been running fairly low on new things to experiment on, and you are chalk full of things we have never seen before."... For some reason, the Ursa Major seems like the better bet now.
+I'll go deal with the Ursa, but just how big is this thing.+
"You don't have them where you're from? Your world sounds like a strange place, no Ursa Majors, what an oddity." It seemed as though Luna started to think of a world without Ursa Majors.
"Well, your typical Ursa Major is a little under a kilometer in height. An Ursa Majoris Gigantus can be several many times that in size. Their life span is surprisingly small, they have strangely weak spines that eventually give out under the immense amount of pressure from their weight, this constant pain combined with the lack of oxygen from their heads being so high makes them especially aggressive and overly destructive. In short, short life, big impact." It sounded as though Starswirl read that from a book, sheesh. So this thing could be several kilometers in size...how big is a kilometer again? Isn't that like three feet or something?
*Meanwhile in the future.*
THAT IS NOT THREE FEET!
*Meanwhile in the present.*,
So this thing it like, nine feet tall, maybe a little bigger? Yeah, I can see how that is intimidating to these little things but to me this'll be a breeze.
*Meanwhile in the future.*
"RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! EVERYPONY FOR THEMSELVES!"
*Meanwhile in the present.*
Nice and easy.
"Will you be departing today or tomorrow to intercept it?" Well, I guess that would depend on what time it is.
+Depends, what time is it?+
"...Tomorrow it is." What's up with her? Do they not have clocks yet? Celestia then ushered Luna to a corner away from Starswirl and I to talk in very hushed whispers. I caught a few words. Like, "Dream state." and "Time Fluctuations."...I'm not even going to bother.
I turned towards Starswirl, who seemed to be writing feverishly into his little book. I wonder what he's writing? I'll have to ask sometime...but now, food. At the very thought of it, my stomach growled and all eyes were on me.
"Did he just roar?" Luna had her head cocked to the side, they same way a puppy would when it encounters something it hasn't seen before...how'd I know that?
"Hmm, if I had to guess, that was his stomach having a severe case of the rumblies." Starswirl used a chair to put his ear up to where my stomach is. "Yep, an old fashioned case of the rumblies."
These things speak rather funnily. A case of the rumblies, hah. Eleanor would have liked that...
"Lets go get something to eat!" This sudden outburst came from Princess Celestia of all peo-ponies. Luna was shaking her head in agreement quite VIGORously. Starswirl did what I believe to be the pony equivalent of shrugging his shoulders. So with no further problems (For once.) we headed towards what I assumed to be the royal dining room. It had a large amount of what I think is gold leaf, and several sun symbols on one side, and several moon symbols on the other. Oh, I do wonder what side Luna is going to sit on...would you look at that, the side with the moons, who could have seen that coming?
Foods of all kinds were seen...except for meat. Where's the meat? I even saw eggs, which I would have to do, but no meat. I decided to go with some pastries of unknown flavor, eggs, a large mug of something that smelled faintly of liquor, more eggs, and to top it off, a muffin. At first they were disgusted, probably by my face, then they were amazed, it seems that my eating half of the food in the room was kind of unheard of...I need a lot of food...
"Delta...are you feeling alright? I have never seen anything eat that much food...do you need to go to the bathroom?" Starswirl and I were walking in the halls, presumably towards the bathrooms, he really seemed to think that I shouldn't be able to hold all that food in my body. Little did he know that all plasmids, and gene tonics optimize several of the human bodies systems, including the digestive, cardiovascular and nerve-systems. Plasmids give more than their intended effect...splicers certainly know that.
He stopped in front of a room and gestured me in. Turns out I was wrong about him, he was not leading me to a bathroom, but rather to the room that I had stayed in last night... I don't think I was out for that long, surely they would have moved me had I been. Oh well, maybe this place just has shorter day and night cycles than were I'm from. I went straight to the desk where I had left the bag design ideas. Maybe while we were out moving towards the Ursa Majoris Gigantus I could gather supplies for it.
Starswirl came in after me and took a look at the drawings. "What is that supposed to be?"...right to the pride...
+I am designing a bag to hold things for me, like a capped inkwell and paper.+
"Hmm, that does seem like a rather good idea, doesn't it?" He began to draw his own ideas while I worked on mine. I will admit that while his all looked a lot better...and were graphically scaled down...and had generally better ideas and concepts, mine were still good...ish.
After about three hours of being brutally humiliated he told me that he was going to go to bed, and that I should probably do the same in preparation for leaving tomorrow. I wonder if he will be joining me?
I took off the suit and did my business in the bathroom, then crawled into the bed. Sleep came slowly to me, and when it arrived I was in Rapture, the last few moments of seeing Eleanor constantly playing in my head. She deserved better than Rapture, she deserved...whatever was outside of Rapture. Why can't I remember what was outside of Rapture? I remember certain parts of being a big daddy, most of it is a haze. I remember...building some of Rapture, before it all went to hell
*Meanwhile, in the real world.*
"How long can you keep it like this sister?"
"I do not know. It is starting to notice the minor flaws that I miss or can not account for. We are trying our hardest, but I might be able to hold it like this for another few days at best." Luna was standing over the unconscious body of Subject Delta, who had been knocked out by Celestia in her fit of rage due to being interrupted during the signing of peace treaties and the setting up of trade routes. Little did Delta know that most of his time in Equestria had actually been a dream reality created by Luna and aided by Starswirl The Bearded.
"I need for you to find out as much as you can about it sister, we need to know if it is going to continue being...friendly to us in reality. Otherwise we are going to have to put it down." Celestia walked off, probably to nap Luna thought.
Author's Note
'Luna was shaking her head in agreement quite VIGORously.'
........It had to be done.......
Chapter 13: Something isn't right...
Luna was floating upside down while clinging to the lifeless body of a spider splicer, water was pouring in from every direction but never actually going anywhere, the floor was present but not there at the same time, creating a constant sense of falling and vertigo. Delta was sitting on a chair, sipping tea, even though he had his suit on.
Delta faced Luna after a particularly long sip of his tea, which never seemed to empty. "Something ain't right."
Luna began spinning at alarming rates, frightened and worried throughout the entirety of the ordeal. "You don't say?!" The spinning stopped abruptly, Luna was subsequently thrown away from Delta.
"This isn't what I was talking about." Another sip of tea. Gravity suddenly seemed to kick in and the environment changed on them. Now they were within the close confines of a bathysphere. "I've had dreams before. I can remember them now. These aren't the dreams I had." The bathysphere stopped, shifted upwards, then continued its journey.
Delta poked a button previously unseen by Luna on a control panel, and they were now heading straight up. "W-what do you mean?" Delta glared at Luna, even though she couldn't see it, she felt it. Delta's face plate began to glow red.
"You know very well what I mean!" Delta's drill began to rev up, and just as it was about to make contact with Luna she closed her eyes...To hear the revving stop, and to see through the glass of the bathysphere, the escape boat where Delta died.
There was a much smaller, possibly female version of Delta leaning over him. She seemed to be speaking, but Luna couldn't hear her. The sun was shining, and several strangely garbed female ones were nearby, all huddled together for comfort. The larger female plunged what looked to be a blade into Delta's chest. "NO!" Luna involuntarily yelled at this, while Delta simply chuckled.
"That was how I died. I couldn't remember it until now. A lot is coming back to me. And I am noticing a lot more things too. She didn't hurt me. She saved me in a way. I'll always be with her, but I won't always be with her." He took another sip of tea. This time the cup emptied itself slightly. The bathysphere went back down into the murky depths of the ocean, leaving the sad scene behind.
"What...what do you mean? It just killed you!" Delta looked over to her, though this time his helmet was off, she saw both of his faces. The one before the suit, and the one after.
"No. She didn't. I was going to die either way. She just took what made me powerful, and she is going to use it for good. I can tell. And for what it matters, I'm pretty sure it wouldn't matter if she killed in my dream within a dream."
Luna was flabbergasted. She had no idea what to say, and it was rather evident on her face as well.
"How...how did you know? Did Starswirl tell you!?" Delta shook his head, and took a drink of his tea, though it looked like he was drinking coffee now.
"I didn't. Lucky guess I suppose. Am I still to fight the Ursa Majoris Gigantus?" Luna shook her head. She was very distraught. The reality of the situation was that Delta in the real world, was a lot stronger than he was in dreams, where she ruled. Even in here she couldn't account for everything that he was able to do. The shifting of his dreams now was a severe indication of this, normally she would be the one in control of all this.
"Well?" He said while golfing in a much to large Arcadia.
"No. No it only exists in the dream reality. I never even gave some of my magic to an Ursa Major to help us fight Discord." Delta harrumphed and continued eating his fried fish, even though he still had his helmet on. It was quite the sight, let me tell you.
*Meanwhile in reality.*
Delta was convulsing heavily on the table he was currently on. Starswirl was ineffectively keeping him down while trying to attach restraints to him. "Why didn't we put these on this creature before all of this!?" With some luck, and a few injuries on the interns, they got him strapped down.
Luna was concentrating as hard as she could to stop Delta from regaining consciousness. She wasn't doing too well.
Delta stopped convulsing. Starswirl was panting heavily, the interns were on the ground clutching their minor wounds, and Luna finally relaxed slightly. "We...I think I have done it." Delta's face plate turned red. Luna ran for the door and escaped from the room.
With the kind of ease that could only be compared to slicing through butter with a hot knife, Delta broke the restraints and got up from the table. One of his feet landed centimeters from an interns head. He hunkered down and stormed through one of the doors meant for something the size of a pony, though he managed to fit due to breaking some of the wall and ceiling. He saw several ponies along his way, but there was only one he really wanted to see. He saw a blue flowing tail rounding a corner at high speeds. He ran after it.
She was just a few yards in front of him, he charged and grabbed her by the tail. He then turned her around and grabbed her so that her legs were pinned against his chest. She wasn't hurt, in fact, she wasn't even uncomfortable, though the base of her tail did hurt a little. Delta made sounds vaguely similar to a whale, and then headed towards the throne room. How he navigated there was unknown to Luna, but she grew more and more worried with each passing second.
When they finally arrived he barged into the room to see Celestia surrounded by solar guards, dozens of lunar guards were present as well, though unseen, ready to spring at the slightest command of the princess of the night. Luna knew they were there, her vision within the darker areas of the freshly built castle far better than those of her sister, and nearly any other pony in the world.
*Meanwhile, from Delta's perspective.*
'What the hell was I thinking?' 'Okay, I am now in the single most important room of a castle, ruled by magical ponies that can talk, and had me in a dream world. Why do I always get the weird shit? Not having my weapons is really making me uncomfortable... Why haven't I ever tried using two plasmids at once?'
Setting Luna onto the ground beside him, he readied his Incinerate and Telekinesis plasmids.
"Enough!" Celestia promptly stood up from the throne and all attention was focused on her, though a significantly lesser amount was being paid by Delta, who was currently thinking about how many of these ponies he could punch to death before he died.
Celestia began to show signs of strain, and then Delta began to slowly hover upwards. Noticing this he began splaying fire everywhere and lifting up entire groups of ponies with his telekinetic might. It was at this point Starswirl decided to walk in, mouth agape.
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Chapter 14: Lessons in magic, and monarchies.
Starswirl face hoofed. Why, why was he, of all the possible ponies throughout the entirety of the kingdom stuck watching this thing? Couldn't Teleforce do it? Certainly she was strong enough to slam it into a wall or something so as to impede its movement. Even if it did somehow manage to escape the cell in which it is being kept in, we could just lock the doors. But nooooooo, Celestia says I have to research it, it's not like I was in the middle of something...well I wasn't...but still! It's the thought that counts!
*Before the capture of Delta.*
Celestia barely managed to lift Delta, even with her increased magical capabilities from alicornhood, Delta's magical resistance was far below that of anything else on the planet, even gold. Starswirl, who had left the room Delta was in, thinking that Delta was still in the dream world, went to read up on some of the latest magical discoveries. None had been found yet. How disappointing.
He had walked into the throne room to speak to Celestia about the minimal funding that was being put into magical research when he encountered the scene, a quite hilarious one...if not destructive. Delta luckily was not hitting anypony, but just barely missing. Shrapnel from his fire blasts however was hitting a few ponies, though the shrapnel itself was so hot that it nearly seared the wounds shut upon contact. This caused excruciating pain.
In an attempt to stop this Celestia lifted him higher, this simply allowed him to hit more areas. Starswirl however opted for the more Teleforce-like solution. Namely: hitting Delta with a bench via a powerful kinetic blast. Unlike in the dream state, this did not knock him out, but merely staggered him, and enraged him. Some of the pre-resurrection changes to his physiology had remained, some of that was the chemical that made him into a raging beast when attacked.
Easily snapping loose of the telekinetic bonds Celestia had around him, he turned around to see Starswirl bearing a face that was the physical embodiment of "FUCK". The red face-plate and the general sounds of bestial anger prompted Starswirl to run. Good old fight or flight response in action here. Delta followed suit.
Starswirl ran blindly through the halls, being followed by Delta sped up his galloping all along the way. Occasionally turning around to see how close Delta was turned out to be a bad idea, mainly because it kept putting more and more fear into the stallion's heart. With each step Delta neared him, each one thudding more and more loudly. The red of Delta's face-plate shined down upon Starswirl. He rounded a corner, and the Bipedal creature of death incarnate followed.
Finally catching the pony by his tail, he yanked him back and brought the face of the terrified pony up to his own. The stallion could barely see behind the face-plate, but what he saw would have made even the most brutal of splicers hurl whatever it was they ate down in Rapture. Delta grabbed Starswirl by the forelegs and dragged him back to the throne room, this was rather uncomfortable for Starswirl and it pained his joints to be stuck like that.
The walk back was surprisingly uneventful, a little boring to be honest what with all that had been going on just seconds ago. Upon finally reaching the throne room nopony was to be seen, most likely having fled the scene and treating the minor wounds of those who had received them. Delta readied his Incinerate plasmid, and torched one word onto a wall.
WHERE
"I-I don't know." Starswirl knows very well. Delta readied his hypnotize plasmid and threw it into the face of Starswirl then pointed to the word. "Right this way." Ah, the power of plasmids. Delta was led by the controlled Starswirl into what could be called a medieval styled bunker. He unlocked the massive vault door with his magic, and was greeted by a relieved looking princess Celestia, that was at least until she that what was behind him was not the wall, but the looming presence of Delta. Her eyes became pinpricks.
"Ruuuuuun!" She turned around immediately while Delta strolled into the place, still being guided by Starswirl. He used the telekinesis plasmid on Celestia, who was lifted into the air with a little too much force and bumped her head into the ceiling. Delta started to think about how low on Eve he was getting. 'Need to find some booze or water.' He and Starswirl left the bunker, Celestia just floated in front of the two. Panicking, screaming, and cursing his very life all at the same time.
Starswirl led Delta to the private chamber of Princess Luna. He knocked twice, as was his custom. Two loud thuds symbolizing his arrival. The door did not open. Delta gave Starswirl the command to tear the door off of its hinges, he did so. Luna was in the back corner, sheer terror on her face at what must be certain doom. In the back of her mind however... certain dark forces said things to her, evil, terrible things...things that would help her survive.
More on that later though.
Delta gave Starswirl one last command. He followed it like the rest. Next to Delta appeared a stack of papers, and a full inkwell accompanied by a pen. Delta released Starswirl from the plasmid, and set Celestia down as gently as he could, after 'accidentally' bumping her head on the ceiling again.
+I think it's time we had a talk. One that isn't in my head.+
"Okay... What do you want to talk about?" Luna eyed Starswirl, who had rapidly begun blinking his eyes in an attempt to refocus them, he also began to stumble around the room some, obviously very out of it.
+I would like to talk about how you managed to knock me out the first time.+
Celestia read the question this time, and then showed it to Luna. Celestia spoke. "Actually, we found you unconscious. Luna detected very strange dreams coming from you and we found out where you were using that ability of hers. We kept you in the dream realm for about three days."
'Heh, three days. Now that's a nice nap.' +Where are my weapons?+
Luna spoke this time. "We actually don't have those. Using some of what I gathered from your consciousness I replicated them as best I could and all of their functions. How did I do by the way?"
+Quite well actually.+ Writing with a pen of this type was no easier for Delta in the real world than it was in the dream world. +So I don't have my weapons? Luna simply shook her head. And for the next three hours, the sounds of a grown man, who has the voice of a whale, could be heard crying for miles (Or kilometers, I don't care.).
Somewhere along the way of Delta not paying attention and sobbing over his lost weaponry, his beautiful beautiful weaponry, he was taken down to the dungeons with aid from Teleforce and Starswirl. He stopped wailing long enough to notice that he had been moved. Luckily they had allowed him to keep his papers and pen with inkwell.
+Where am I?+ Delta started moving around in the cell in an attempt to get Starswirl's attention, he did not notice. Delta carefully folded the paper into a crude paper airplane, and threw it at Starswirl. The flimsy piece of paper collided with the ponies face, startling him a great deal. Scrambling out of the stool he had been sitting in he noticed that Delta had begun staring at him. Or at least he was staring at him to the best of his knowledge.
"You're in the Dungeons." Starswirl regained his composure and sat back down on the stool. "You're being kept here because it's the one place we feel safe keeping you in." Well isn't that nice.
+If I recall correctly, Luna said something about me being far more powerful in the real world than the dream reality. How so?+ Delta passed the paper through the iron bars of his cell.
"That's Princess Luna to you, and in the dream reality she had more control. She is the manipulator of dreams, controller of the subconscious."
+Yeah yeah, I don't care. More about how I'm powerful.+
Starswirl sighed and rubbed his forehead with his hoof. "Okay. In the dream reality Luna shifted the rules of reality to make magic a much more potent power against you than it is here. In the dream world she made herself and everypony else more powerful."
+So how does this whole magic thing work?+
"Would you believe me if I told you I don't entirely know? In the grand scheme of things, there are so many discoveries to be made in magic, so many fields to explore and master. More than any one pony could do in their lifetime, but I will at the very least start as many paths as I can." Starswirl got a determined face on at the end of his sentence.
+How does magical resistance work? I would think that the higher somethings magical resistance is, the harder it would be to deal with it. But you and the others keep on saying that I have an incredibly low magical resistance.+
Starswirl wore a face of contemplation. "Heh, I guess one could think of it that way. When we say magical resistance, we are thinking about how much the item, being or what have you pushes back against the magic being applied to it. When something has a high magical resistance, it catches a lot of the magic being thrown at it. If something has a low magical resistance, then the magic passes through or simply dissipates when going towards it, and it doesn't react very much to the magic.
+Makes sense...I guess.+
It was at this point that they began to discuss how magic worked, and how plasmids worked. Neither felt as though they knew any where near enough about their fields, but it was nice to divulge information to one another.
Chapter 15: Celestial problems.
Celestia was pacing back in forth in her chambers. This...thing was nearly indestructible, and from what Luna gathered while in the dream reality all it absolutely needed to survive was a few centimeters of water and it would begin regenerating wounds and regaining its ability to use its powers. Thus far it seemed as though what was around its body was nearly invulnerable and with what knowledge she gained from Starswirl when he talked to the...thing, some of how it was altered made it more resistant to damage, significantly more so at that.
"So the question is...can we use it?" She mumbled to herself about trying to get it to be more friendly...it seemed to have taken some kind of liking to Lulu and Starswirl, though it also seemed to harbor quite a bit of aggression towards herself. The only one who seemed to truly be able to elicit an entirely non-aggressive response from it was Starswirl, and those two always ended up talking about magic or...plasmids and gene tonics was it? But never about any kind of settlement of these petty dislikes...even though she did throw him into the walls...and floor...and ceiling. All in the dream reality of course.
*Meanwhile with Delta.*
'Now what?' Starswirl had left Delta in the dungeon, a small basin of water was on the wall, and a bucket was on the floor, presumably for relieving one's self in. Though thanks to some of the functions of the suit he would have to be doing that very little. Though he would have to remove his suit every few days, otherwise the sack in the back would get unpleasing to the senses and to empty the non recyclable materials excreted from his body.
He noticed the "bed" in the cell. It looked more like loosely held together thread stuffed with hay and dead bugs. 'Nope, not sleeping in that.'
He began to collect the water in bucket, and stood in it. He knew that he looked ridiculous but he was running very low on eve and it needed replenishing. While standing in the bucket he contemplated breaking out of the rather crappily built cell. Maybe it was just his time in Rapture, or maybe it was some of the gene tonics in him, but he began to notice several of the errors in the building along with the iron bars themselves. If he were to apply continues pressure to one of the bars on the edge it would slowly budge, then he could do the same with the next and so on until finally, the entire door frame clambered down to the floor.
He had just finished his bucket time to see a guard walking down the hall, who seemed to be escorting Luna. 'Wonder what she's doing here.'
"Hello Mr. Delta." She waved to him with one of her hooves, she wore a smile that looked so forced that her lips were quivering. 'She must be frightened.'
+Hello Princess.+
A few seconds of silence passed. The guards coughed and fidgeted in their armor, obviously very uncomfortable in this situation.
"So...how's prison?" Luna immediately face hoofed at the less than bureaucratically gifted guards question.
+Could be better. The water's nice I guess. Getting a little hungry.+
Luna whispered to the other guard, he rushed off as soon as she was done speaking. "I just sent him to get us all some refreshments. MoonWatch, open the door please."
The guard hesitated for a moment, looked at her keys, the cell door, Delta and finally Princess Luna. She levitated the keys, put them in the lock, closed her eyes and braced and... *Click* The cell door was less than an inch ajar...and Delta wasn't rushing out.
'Diplomacy time I suppose...Not nearly as fun as fighting time though.'
The guard backed away several feet and stood at attention, obviously ready to attack Delta if he showed even the least bit of aggression. Delta meanwhile was a little shocked. From what he gathered of what Starswirl said, these ponies were scared shitless of what he could do. To have sent a guard to retrieve refreshments, and THEN opened the door was something bold. He liked it.
Slowly opening the door and stepping out of the cell, Delta noticed the slight trembling the guard was doing. He slowly put his hand in a handshake motion towards the guard, she looked at it in confusion.
Delta feigned a handshake, and then pointed to her hoof, then his palm. She suddenly seemed to get the concept and shakily put her hoof in his hand, he gently shook it.
Luna meanwhile looked like she was getting bored, though she did find the interaction to be amusing. She thought that it might be some kind of show of respect, or perhaps was just the normal greeting of his people. Though she imagined that meeting a large group of ponies for the first time would be a very long process where he was from.
"Mr. Delta, I have never been the best at formalities, or interacting with other ponies in the most proper fashion, so I hope you don't mind my being a bit blunt." Delta nodded his head. "Celestia wants to know whether or not you are going to try and destroy us or not."
'She was not lying about being blunt. At all.'
+Well, as much fun as fighting you all can be, if I keep ending up in a place like this I would get very, very bored. So no, I don't plan to. +
The guard visibly relaxed slightly, Luna released a lungful of air she didn't realize she was holding in and the general mood of the area lifted just slightly. As if on cue the other guard returned with a tray of food and drink in tow with his telekinesis. Delta realized he had an opportunity to test something that Starswirl had offhandedly mentioned to him.
Walking towards the unicorn at a slightly faster pace than normal he reached out his hand and lightly flicked the horn of the unicorn while reaching out his hand for the tray. The unicorn, surprised by this backed away slightly, and his magic cut out for a brief moment, due to this Delta caught the tray. "Ouch! What'd you do that for!?'
Delta grinned inwardly. At least he knew how to do deal with magical adversaries: Aim for the horn.
*Back to Celestia.*
'I really need to get somepony else to handle all of this daycourt.' Celestia was addressing several of the ponies under her rule, all of which were coming to her with what seemed like the most minor problems, that should have been fixed almost as quickly as they happened. But, thanks to the apparent idiocy of certain nobles they had grown to such proportions in the courts that it had to be brought to her. 'It is going to be a very long day. At least I get comfort in knowing that my sister is probably working just as hard as I am.'
*Back to Delta.*
"So I said to her, "No, that's my cheesecake!"" The guards and Luna all began laughing quite loudly, while Delta chuckled within his suit, the emotion apparently showing quite well.
Author's Note
If you are wondering about the methodology behind him being able to take down the entire door frame of the dungeon cell, then here is a fairly simple explanation.
Basically, imagine the bars are being held in place only in the top, now with all of the bars in each of their respective little holes up there, along with the bars being against the ground, but not actually in it, then the frame could be pushed out near the edge, though it would take an amount of force that only a Big Daddy, or a fairly strong earth pony could provide. It would also take quite a bit of time.
Also, sorry about it being so small...and crappy...and that it took a long time...and is probably very much so filled with grammatical errors... I felt bad about not publishing anything lately, so I decided to force myself to write some...this is what was produced.
Chapter 16: Pony Life Is Weird.
I opened my eyes, Rapture was before me once again. Though it was... different from what I remembered. Clean, well-kept. People were walking about, they looked like something I hadn't seen in a long time on a human face, happy. One of them bumped into me, with a shy giggle she apologized and went back to walking with her group of friends.
I suddenly realized I wasn't in my suit, and how naked I felt. I looked down to see myself in workers over-alls, I couldn't recall having these. A sharp, loud screech pierced my ears, ducking to the ground I saw that no-one else had reacted to it. Through the glass walls of the tunnels Big Sisters started hitting them with their needles, poking into them, returning Rapture to its decrepit state, behind them Big Daddies fought endlessly with other Big Sisters, they were clearly not winning.
I felt helpless.
"Your world is so... frightening." My head instinctively swiveled left at dangerous speeds. Luna was laying down on the ground, her head slightly below mine in my crouched figure. "What are those thinner creatures, the ones that move so much more quickly?"
"I...they're... Big Sisters." The words jumbled out. It had been some time since my last verbal conversation. My tongue felt clumsy, unused in a sense.
"Big Sisters? Does everything start with size in your world?" Her head tilted to the right slightly, like that of a puppy that didn't understand something. "Big Daddies, that's what you are one of, now Big Sisters, and Little Sisters."
"No, they're just sort of... applicable names. Something that came off the tongue easy."
Luna nodded her head, and continued to watch the chaos that was unfolding before us. The people around us slowly started to decay, or worse yet, become splicers. Their forms melting, bulging, taking inhuman shapes that we never should have tampered with. The ones that were decaying eventually stopped moving, just fell to the ground, still looking so happy. Like Rapture was the best choice that they had ever made.
The splicers began individualize, specialize if you will. The spider-splicers got their signature hooks, lead-heads started pulling out guns and getting twitchy. Houdini splicers appeared in one area, poofed in another, then weren't seen again. What was happening felt like it was taking an eternity, yet all the while Luna remained calm, observant. In an attempt to ensure she wouldn't be scared, I pretended I wasn't either.
When Rapture was in a state I remembered, I looked down. As I had suspected I changed along with it. The only thing that had stayed the same throughout this hellish NightMare was Luna. I got up from my position, taller than I was before. I groaned, the familiar whale like sounded met me and reverberated throughout my immediate area. A spider-splicer, mad from Adam dropped from the ceiling. None of my weapons were on me.
A familiar rage greeted me. No plasmids would be needed for this. The splicer ran at me, throwing its hooks ahead in an attempt to disorient me. I blocked one with my fore-arm and caught the other with my right hand. The splicer reached me and tried to use another hook to slash at me, when the arm was midway through its slash I grabbed it with my left hand brought the hook from my right hand directly into the shoulder of the splicer. It screamed out, then began laughing and thrashing violently.
With my newly free right hand I tried grabbing at its legs, but it was dancing around too much, even in the grip of my left hand. Stronger than they looked, no fat, all muscle. I did what it wasn't expecting and let go if it and abruptly lowered my head and rammed my helmet into its abdomen. This effectively knocked the air out of its lungs, but it was quick on the recover. Getting right back up it ripped the hook out of its shoulder and threw it at me with a speed previously unseen in them. Before I could react the hook had created a large crack in the glass of my helmet. The red in my vision grew denser.
It was my turn to charge, I grabbed the splicer by the head as I ran by it. My momentum increased more and more with each step, the splicer helpless in my unrelenting grip began screaming and thrashing, as they are want to do. My grip tightened even more, I could feel its skull beginning to curve and creak with the force. We were nearing what I needed, namely: A big ass wall.
All my strength was used in pushing the splicers head as forcefully as I could against the wall, this combined with the momentum of my running resulted in a rather disgusting shower of grey matter and other such head materials.
Luna yelled, I relaxed, and Rapture began to flood in overwhelmingly large amounts. It felt like an appropriate time to wake up.
Luna exited the dream of Delta with a startled yell and a still scramble out of fear, which due to, she fell onto her underbelly quite clumsily. Celestia, viewing this was afraid for her sister, what horrors had she seen? She also felt a twinge of guilt at how hilariously she fell. "Tia... his... its mind is plagued with horrific monstrosities." Luna was trembling. "I have seen things... the darkest, deepest fears of so many ponies, and when I encountered its... beasts, it didn't flinch, if anything it got more confident."
Celestia had a blank look, one she had been practicing for quite some time now. She had to in order to keep the civilians calm during crises, otherwise they would notice that the person who was supposed to be leading them, the one with the planning and forethought, was just as crazed and helpless as they were.
"Tia... are you all right? You look as though you have eaten too much cheese." Too much cheese? Why, what on earth could she...OH... Her blank look could use some work it appeared. "So, horrors, abominations don't make it feel fear? But confidence?"
Luna shook her head. "Not confidence... more akin to seething rage. A raw, mighty force. We might look into enrolling it into teaching the guards how to do this." Celestia was surprised. Luna was rather adamant that she be the one to teach her night guards how to fight, and where to hit. She always was rather attached to the olden ways of ruling and leading, even going so far as to take on studying the old ways of speaking, though as of right now it wasn't affecting her too much.
"Well, what exactly did you have in mind for it to teach them?..."
Delta opened his eyes and sat up. He donned his suit and left the room that he had been provided instead of the cell. While the bed was more comfortable it was entirely too small. He would have to look into some things being custom made for himself. Delta looked out the slit that the ponies called a window and saw large fields of grass, lush trees and young ponies running around having fun. He grumbled, put the sun shades down and started writing out plans for a new bed and furniture.
Several hours, along with some slight guesstimation on his height and width, he had a few plans for furniture to be made. They weren't elegant by any means what-so-ever, but they would certainly be more comfortable than what they currently had for him. He would go and see who could help him with resources and building it later. For right now though, he needed some breakfast. He wondered if any of these ponies would provide meat. He knew that they're herbivores, but surely there must be some place with meat.
He opened the door to be greeted by the face of an unrecognized guard. They looked as though this was the most boring thing that had ever happened in their life, their gaze was diverted from straight forward to the face-plate of Delta. With a sigh the guard said in what could only be described as the most bored tone to ever reach the ears of man, or pony kind. "Princes Celestia asks you to please stay in your room, as you might cause general panic and chaos or something. If you want anything I guuuess I could go get it for you." These ponies are very different from what Delta was used to.
Would he offend their customs if he didn't stay in his room? The pony did say that the princess only asked him to... With an idea, he got his paper and pen. +Could you get me Starswirl?+
"Uuugh, fiiiine." The pony trotted off in as seemingly a slow pace as physically possible for a pony to go. This slightly aggravated Delta, he had a lot of questions to ask. To wait he decided to look over his designs the furniture and bed. What kind of materials would be best to make them out of? Would the ponies have the correct resources to even make things that would last for him? He was a tad bit bigger and heavier than them, and there was all ready a noticeable dip in the bed.
While peering over the notes he almost missed a knock on the door, he walked to it and was surprised to see Luna, slightly upset too, he was hoping for Starswirl. "May I come in?" Delta nodded. She trotted in and looked about the room, taking in all that they had given him. 'Rather bare.' she thought to herself.
+How can I help you?+ He held up the piece of paper to her
"We have a proposition for you."
+What kind of proposition?+ .
"One based off of a certain set of skills that you possess. Namely, your combat based skills. We would like for you to assist in training my night guard." She wore a plainly begging smile, and was batting her eyelashes entirely too frequently. She really wanted this to happen.
+One condition.+
She breathed a sigh of relief. "What's that?"
+I want to know all about your culture. Everything. Luna smiled, she was quite the historian, and apparently so was Delta, finally she would get to share her knowledge of all that was pony history! She began to explain to him the Pre-Discord era, it was much the same as it currently was, mostly peace, an odd occurrence now and then, but with magic in the world that was of course bound to happen. Things were at peace, but harmony would always have some form of enemy, and so came Discord. He brought the world into what seemed like eternal chaos. Then, the elements of harmony just... well, they came into the right hands..." She continued on with the many horrid events of the that they god of chaos did, he questioned what he should now of their customs, along with other nations, in short: he learned how not to piss ponies off.
The lazy guard shoved the door open non-chalantly, and inside went Starswirl. "...That one has quite the way of making an entrance, don't you think Mr. Delta?" Delta nodded and Starswirl looked back at the now swiftly closing door, which slammed shut.
"He acts as though you told him to go get phoenix tears and use them on an angry Manticore..."
Author's Note
I would like to apologize. I feel absolutely dreadful about taking so long to finally update the story, but writers block, general laziness and a myriad of other things have made it rather difficult to write. To those of you that still care about the story, I am so, so sorry. It will be continuing. I made a promise that I wouldn't abruptly end this story, and I am a man of my word. The writing must go forth!
Chapter 17: Wrecking The Team
Luna had finished with her explanation of all general pony customs, which were all fairly similar to human ones. So Delta wouldn't have to worry all too much about offending anyone. After that she had moved onto how she wanted him to aid in her guards combat abilities. "So, where do you go when you fight?" Delta had never really thought of it like that before.
+What do you mean?+ He handed her a piece of paper with the question on it, unsure of how to answer her.
"When you fight, what do you think about? Where does your mind wander?"
+I don't know. I just think about protecting.+ He wasn't wrong, he just thought about protecting her.
Luna looked at him with a puzzled expression. "Protection?... I suppose that makes sense.... were you made, or born?"
Now it was Delta's turn to be puzzled. Was he made, or was he born? +I was born... but in a different form. I was very different. Less metal. Then I was made into this. I can't even remember my real name.+
Luna looked down with a guilty look on her face.
+What's wrong?+
"Nopony should ever be made to forget their own name. That is just... wrong." Luna put a hoof on his arm and looked at him with sympathy. Delta sat there, unsure of how to react. This was the first instance of one of these ponies actually showing some sort of caring towards him. Starswirl was an excellent pony... as far as he knew at least, but he didn't quite talk to him about how he was in the head. It was weirding him out.
+So how can I help your guards?+
She took her hoof back to her side and got a more stern face. "I need you to teach them anything that you think could be useful, myself as well. I would also like you too look into armor, weapons, tactics, everything. Ever since the Discord incident, I would much rather have my ponies far more prepared than they were."
+Could you explain what the Discord incident was?+
Luna's face blanched. "I...Maybe another time. For now though I would much rather show you to the barracks and the armory. Show you to the ponies, see how well they come to accept you... Or don't."
Luna pushed forward ahead of Delta, obviously no longer in the mood to talk. Several twists and turns were need to get to Armory. Here she proudly displayed the latest of their technological wonders in the field of war, namely a Cross-bow. Delta was going to have a lot to teach these ponies. Among the other weapons in the room were spears, short and long swords and what looked to be a halberd prototype. Not one actual gun, or relatively advanced weapon was to be seen in the room.
+Is that it, seriously?+ Delta looked down to the Princess. +Surely you must have something more advanced than this?+
Luna gave him a slightly angered expression. "These armaments are among the finest in the kingdom! I helped create the designs for this highly effective cross-bow myself!" She swung the cross-bow directly into his field of vision, the rapid movement made it fall apart. Luna looked at the bits of wood and metal. "...I had no affiliation with this." Delta simply nodded slowly.
+So can we go meet the crew I'm supposed to be training?+ She nodded sharply, the turned abruptly out of the room without looking back. She looked fairly upset.
We arrived to what I assumed to be the barracks. Luna opened the door, and...well I think we were both surprised. A tornado, a literal tornado was in the middle of the room. It was seemingly generated by one of the unicorns in the room, I could tell due to its green-ish color. Being thrown about were spears, cross-bows, ponies and the occasional bed. Perhaps this would be the origin of mothers saying it looked like a tornado went through their child's room.
"WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?!"
The tornado instantly puttered out, even a comical 'Ppppbbtt' sound at the end. A spear landed uncomfortably close to a ponies head, creating a satisfying thunk and vibration. Luna was fuming, she did not seem to expect this...at all. "Whom among you is responsible for this?" Her voice was eerily calm, and it sounded kind of off...like it wasn't even her own. The guards meanwhile were all silent, completely still. "Well?"
One pony meekly raised her hoof. Her mane was a shade darker of Auburn, and her coat was a dark grey, just bordering on black. Something seemed off though, the trend here seemed that the color of a unicorns magic matched their body colors in someway... In the corner I noticed a very weak looking pony, his mane was a sea foam green, and a dark swampy green coat. He was almost definitely the one responsible for the tornado, so why was the mare taking the blame for it?
"I-It was me P-princess." Luna looked to her, and a dark, dark blue aura enveloped the pony, lifting her off the ground. She was promptly thrown into a wall. Then, the most peculiarly familiar chemical rush overcame me. An angry, adrenaline fueled need to protect. That's when I blacked out.
*3rd person POV*
Delta went rigid, though Luna didn't seem to notice, she was too busy throwing the pony that supposedly made the tornado in the room all about the all ready trashed room. What she did notice was the loud, angry whale like sound and that she was very quickly being lifted off the ground, and then thrown into it. The air left her lungs, and she looked for the perpetrator, surprised to see Delta's face-plate that same angry red it was in the dream reality. For a brief moment, a flash of a very evil smile was on her face, and then back to fear. Defensively she dropped the pony and made a barrier around herself. Delta smashed into it with his fists of steel, quite literally in this case.
The strain of reinforcing the barrier, and then just keeping up such a strong one to keep him out was obvious. Seeing their princess in trouble the ponies jumped into action, except of course the auburn maned one, she was very much so in no condition to fight. Albeit, the ponies were very disturbed by her sudden use of excessive violence, but perhaps they caught her at a very bad time? Nonetheless, she needed helping.
One of the unicorns hurled spear after spear at the raging Delta, none could do any serous damage to him, the suit along with his hardened skin stopped them from going in too much, though it was enough for him to turn his attention to the now very fucked pony. He started charging for the spear chucker. Another unicorn throw one of the bunks at him, which served to knock him off course enough to miss the pony and run into the wall. Delta recoiled from the hit, and saw the bunk that he was hit with. He set it aflame with incinerate, then chucked it with his own form of telekinesis.
Two ponies were completely taken by it, another tried vaulting over it, only to get hit in the midriff. Only a handful of the ponies in the room remained in fighting condition. One had kept a crossbow under its bunk and dove for it. Delta saw the movement and deployed a handful of hornets at her. The cloud of angry insects quickly surrounded her, but had troubles getting through her fur. Enough did to catch her off guard, momentarily distracting her long enough for Delta to ram into her.
It was at this moment Teleforce exited the bathroom. She saw the wrecked room, and that Delta was in it. Several assumptions were made, along with the fact that he was now pummeling a pony that was limp on the ground. It wouldn't do justice to say that she was quite upset with the situation.
Teleforce's horn began to crackle, bright lights started shining in her eyes, and the entire room seemed to pause and suddenly shift up. She had everything in the room in her ironclad telekinetic grip. Much like Luna had done earlier, she began tossing Delta around the room, careful to avoid hitting any of the ponies, which she now had moved to her side of the room. "WHY.IS.SO.MUCH.SHIT.GOING.WRONG!?"
Delta roared, and put her in his own Telekinesis. It felt foreign to her, it wasn't magic, that was for certain, but it didn't feel that far off from it. What she did know for a fact, was that it felt like her body was under extreme pressure. Her nose started bleeding, and the pressure behind her eyes was telling her she needed this to stop fast. She resorted to the one plan that had never seemed to fail.
Delta was vaguely aware of the bench hitting him in the back of the head, and then again, and again, and again. 'This gain? Really?'
Author's Note
You have no idea how sorry I am...Writers block along with some moving and home problems made getting this out...well to be honest, it made this quite the bitch. Hopefully because I have been writing more I should be able to get some more chapters out much faster than this.
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Chapter nine: Brilliance!...and some whole hearted destruction.
Luna ended up taking me to a place where I could sleep, it coincidentally was near hers. Just a few dozen left and right turns...
The rest of the room was furnished in equivalence to my size. There was a chair with a desk, which had several ink wells and quills on it. Hopefully paper would be inside the few drawers that were located in it. What looked to be a large chair or maybe a small couch was near the corner. I looked down to see the carpet was rather plain in comparison to the rest of the room, it was a simple light purple. I walked over to the desk and took note of all the intricate carvings in the legs and up the sides of it, I noticed the same with the bed and the chair/couch. A door was near the bed that I am assuming leads to the rest room...been a while since I used one of those.
I walked into it. Inside was a simple toilet and a sink, above the sink was a mirror that displayed my helmet. I decided to take it off. I now understand why the ponies forcibly ejected their stomach contents. My face was not much better than a splicers, though instead of random bumps and near cancerous like tumors covering it, my teeth seemed a bit sharper, I had gone completely bald and all my skin looked dead or like it was ready to fall off. I looked into my eyes and I tried to make them appear lively, but nothing seemed to do the trick. They seemed dead in my head...but at least it was nice to breathe air straight from the source instead of through the filtration system in my suit.
I took off the rest of my suit. My body did not look much better, it appeared that while I was with the 'great' scientist Suchong he had decided to fuse parts of my body with metal. Both of my legs had metal in them, though the left one had metal along the shin down to my foot, and the right had bits of metal that were meant to assist with putting on my suit. My right arm's bicep had a strange metal sliver running down it, though I can't really see how that would be of any use. My left arm was left untouched. My chest had several bits of metal covering it, and from what I could tell from my previous experiences with human anatomy they were covering my major organs. I was surprised to see that my entire head wasn't covered in metal. I had enough of looking at my majorly deformed body and decided to not sleep in the suit, it would probably be horribly uncomfortable.
OOOOODelta's dreamsOOOOO
Eleanor, we made it to the surface, we finally did it, we're free. She was looking down at me, but she did not say anything. I saw Sofia lamb entering from the corner of my vision, no no! She has to go away, she has to go away! "Why do you persist so Delta? This is not your daughter, she is mine. She harbors no feelings for you now, for I have freed her from the oppressive chains of Ryan. You.mean.nothing.to.her."
I began to fall, each time I tried to grab out to a piece of the falling Rapture to pull myself up it slipped out of my hand. All the while Eleanor was looking down at me, with a sad expression on her face, while her 'mother' was leaning over her shoulder, a leer evident on her face.
OOOOOWay to early to be up...just as the sun was coming up, sheesh.OOOOO
I woke with a startled yell, it was odd hearing my voice while outside of the suit. I walked back to the bathroom to well...ya know, relieve myself. I then grabbed the suit (which was kept at a safe distance from the toilet.) and put it on. It was a much lengthier process than taking it off, it would appear as though it augmented my strength somehow, so I was having problems putting it on. When I finally did I felt the familiar feeling of the suit on me. It was strangely comforting. I walked over to the desk and grabbed a sheet of paper and an inkwell with quill. Sadly both my hands were now occupied. Would need to make some kind of carrying case for these things, but that would have to come later.
I was just about to leave my room when I realized something. I have no idea where in the hell I am. How am I supposed to find Starswirl or one of the Princesses? I turned back around...may as well start thinking of a design for the paper and inkwell/quill carrier.
I walked over to the table and sat in the chair that was slightly too small. Ignoring the minor amount of discomfort I set the inkwell, paper and quill down. I started to sketch out basic designs for the pouch, considering several materials such as leather, wood, metals of different types and fabric of some kind. I was leaning towards metal or wood seeing as how those would be the most stable materials to have something hold ink. I could always put a cork or something on the ink well though. I heard a semi-loud knocking at my door. I put the papers in the drawer of the desk, hopefully I would be able to come back to this and carry out my idea of a holding pouch for the paper and inkwell/quill.
I walked over to the door only to have it be smashed open. I stood there, a few feet from the door, and from what I remember about my face, it looked grumpy. Standing there was Celestia...and a battalion of pony guards behind her. "How did you do it!?" Wut?
I walked over to the desk, all the while receiving a death glare from her and each one of the guards, I noticed the one that had repetitively hit me when I first arrived here.
+How did I do what?+ She started to grind her teeth now.
"You know very well what I am talking about! How did you free Discord!" Discord...Discord, isn't that the one Starswirl mentioned once?
+I think Starswirl mentioned it once, though I had no idea it was imprisoned. Her face was filled to the brim with 'I don't believe you.'
"I am the current bearer of the element of honesty, take off you-...never mind." Her face paled, then turned green when she was about to ask me to take off my helmet. Element of honesty? What does she mean by that? "I must go. You will stay here. Discord must be dealt with." When she said ""You will stay here."" She jabbed a hoof in my direction.
"I want two guards outside its room." She lowered her head down to a pony near her. She probably thought I could not hear her...for the most part though, I could not. I caught a few words. Such as "Study, too friendly, tests and magic pulse test." What the hell is a magic pulse test? Celestia left the room after she gave me one last glare.
Starswirl came in, a rather expressionless look on his face. "How did you do it?" Ugh, not this again.
+How did I do what?!+ I stomped my foot for emphasis, this may have been a bad call because the next thing I realized about my situation was how deeply embedded in the wall I was. Namely about half a foot in.
"Nopony is so guile and deft at getting other ponies to like them! You don't even speak! Huh!? Is it one of those gene tonics you're talking about? Or are those even real!?" Sheesh, he is reacting rather harshly. Then again, how did I, I mean it is rather strange that they would be so...accepting of me so quickly, what's going on?
+I have a plasmid that lets me do something like that, but it can only be used on one perso pony at a time, even then it has a time limit.+ He squinted his eyes at me.
"I don't believe you, prove it." I readied my hypnotize two plasmid and shot it at him, his eyes widened for a moment before it took effect. I waited for it to finish that way he coul-"GAH!" THOW ME INTO A FUCKING WALL! The very second it wore off he threw me into a wall, a large hateful grin on his face.
"So you're not lying. Should you ever do that again, I will throw you harder." He steadied himself a bit "This was your friend yesterday, but not today." "Come with me. The Princess wants tests done on you."
OOOOOoooooOOOOOoooooOOOOO
What.is.going.on? Starswirl's horn was glowing very brightly and he had a look of total concentration on his face. I felt a similar feeling from when he was realigning my bones, though this time it was a much more heavy feeling. It reminds me of when the escape sub was rising to the surface... Eleanor had just save-
"Nothing. Not a single bit of magic in you at all." He was saying it as though he were amazed. It seemed rather obvious to me that I was from a world completely different from this one. For Pete's sake these are tiny ponies instead of humans! I was rather angry with them, thus far I had only seriously injured some of them, which is really saying something given my previous track record on finding living things.
He looked to be deep in thought. I guess not having magic is a really big deal or something here. "More. More tests are needed." Oh, gee that's great. This is what I wanted to do when I was dead, not be in a perfect world where I could kill splicers in amazing ways with unlimited amounts of eve. Nope. "How does this 'eve' work?"
I brought out a piece of paper, I had been permitted to carry some with me. I began to explain how eve is basically a fuel for adam. He read it with a touch of enthusiasm, some disbelief and a little bit of awe. Guess it is a REALLY big deal to not have magic innate within the body. Weird.
Author's Note
I'm tired. It's three A.M. and I can't add anything more without finally going into the heart of the story...so here ya go! *Que the banana thrown by Celestia.*
