ROBoCORN

by Abronymous Lee

Rating: teen
Tags: Crossover, Twilight Sparkle, Cranky Doodle Donkey, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Alternate Universe, Doctor Whooves, Sad, Original Character
Length: 7447

I used to be happy. I had nearly everything going for me. Then Equestria Laboratories took it all from me.

I used to be happy. I used to be able to run and play in the sun all day. I used to have friends. I used to stay up late telling scary stories with them. I used to love learning all I could. I used to have the greatest teacher known to ponykind. I used to have a home.
I used to be a pony.
Half of me misses my old life and longs to return. The other half demands that I stay. And if...if THAT hadn't happened, I would be able to return home.
I hate my own existence, yet I have continued to do the research I began unwillingly. I've spent days and nights torturing myself over my work. When the pain becomes too much to bear, I go to sleep. When I wake up, I find myself in a new environment. But I'm still the same. I pick up my work again and the cycle repeats.
Despite my wretched state, I'm not the one who has suffered the most. Hundreds of ponies – earth ponies, pegasi, and unicorns alike – have been through excruciating pain dwarfing mine. At the end of it all, their memories are wiped. I pity them, but also envy them. They don't remember anything about their former lives, but I must cope with what could have been. And to my sorrow, my research is conducted upon these poor, poor souls.
But life goes on. Days turn into weeks, weeks into months, months into years. All filled with screams of pain. I look back to my physical torture. I look at theirs. And I am mortified.
I once asked why. I was never answered, but I already knew the answer.
Why do I do it? Because I must.
Why must I do it? Because I can.
For science.

Universe based on My Little Portal

Published 2014-02-04 05:30:06 UTC
Last updated 2014-03-16 03:56:55 UTC

The Experiment

I was born in Canterlot about 15 years before Nightmare Moon's return. At age six, my parents enrolled me in Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns. Although Twilight Sparkle was her student at the time, Princess Celestia sometimes would come over and watch me practice my magic. A few years after Nightmare Moon, Celestia said to me that I could be one of the most powerful warlocks she had ever seen. As the years passed and I grew older, Celestia gave me some tips to help me with my magic. Then one day, Celestia's guards came in with a donkey. All I heard before being ushered out of the room was "science" and "secluded environment." When the Princess finally came out afterward, she told me to pack my bags. I was to go with the donkey and observe exactly what he was doing.

Little did I know that we were being sent to the moon. I'll spare the details about the trip.

For the first few days on the moon, I tried to settle in. I kept notes about every "test", as the donkey called them. I learned that his name was Cranky Doodle donkey, and that he had been doing this in Equestria for years. He said that when he got too big, Celestia had felt a need to get rid of him.

As the weeks wore on, the testing grew more and more routine. I stopped monitoring each individual test. Cranky even let me design two or three tests. Everything was good. That is, until Cranky caught me napping. Right then, he decided that I should be doing science with him, not watching him do all the work.

That day, I lost half of myself in more ways than one.

I awoke to find myself strapped into a hospital bed. Cranky was standing over me, saying something about "a great leap in science." I struggled against my bonds, but to no avail. Then I tried to use my magic to free myself. I focused everything I had into the spell, but it was all for naught. My horn had been broken off.

I asked the medical staff what they were going to do to me. Everypony I asked stayed silent. So I just lay there, wondering what plans Cranky had made for me.

When the procedure began, I nearly fainted. Nearly. A doctor had injected me with a shot of adrenaline, keeping me awake. Several surgeons stood around me. One pulled out a scalpel and made several incisions around my right eye. Another tied a tourniquet around my left hind leg and made a cut all the way down to my hoof. I cried out in pain. They ignored my screams and continued on with their work. Piece by piece, the surgeons removed both of my rear hooves and much of my lower hind legs. The worst part, though, was when they brought in a robotic arm. It descended over my face, seized my right eye, and pulled it out of its socket. The nerves attached to my eye were quickly severed by the doctors. I thought I was going to die.

But that was just the beginning.

After that first treatment, the medical staff began to prepare my body for the next phase. Tourniquets were tied around my hind legs to control the bleeding. A bandage was wrapped around my head, covering my empty eye socket. Doctors inserted tubes into veins in my front hooves. Another put an oxygen tube in my nostrils.

"Please, give me something to remember my old life by," I begged weakly. "It doesn't have to be big or important, just...something." Right after I finished saying that, they fitted a long, black feeding tube into my mouth. I closed my eye and sucked on the tube. A bitter-tasting fluid filled my mouth. I swallowed, and more liquid came from the tube. For several hours I laid there, drinking the bitter liquid and listening to the staff around me.

"He's held up surprisingly well," said a female voice.

"Better than most, but the real test comes later," said a male.

"Do you think he'll survive?"

"Perhaps. I wouldn't count on it, though." I mulled that thought over in my head. Death would free me of the intense pain of the operation, but this wasn't how I wanted to die. On the other hoof, if I were to survive, who knows what pain I might have to endure? Either way, I could do little to help my situation.

"If he does, he'll be the first," said the male.

"What if he doesn't?" There was a long pause.

"Then we burn his body and bring in another test subject." I didn't like the direction this was going, but I couldn't do anything.

"What about his wish?" asked the female.

"I highly doubt we can give him anything."

"But if we could?"

"I don't know. Maybe something with his horn..." I was intently listening now.

"A light?" offered somepony.

"No. How about a laser?" said another doctor. This led to an argument that lasted until it was time to begin the second phase. The feeding tube was removed from my mouth, the oxygen tube taken out of my nose, and what I assumed were dialysis tubes retracted from my hooves. I received another adrenaline shot and they immediately got to work on me.

The surgeons cut open my chest, leaving my ribcage bare. One by one, they removed the ribs and replaced them with metallic casing. My back was sliced open and my spine reinforced by cold steel. I realized what they were doing with me then: they were carefully disassembling my body and replacing it with robotic parts. Already I could feel artificial hooves being spliced onto my hind legs.
I felt two more tourniquets being tied around my forelegs. My two remaining natural hooves were sliced open and disassembled. Robotic replacements soon were in their place.

The team apparently had finished with my chest and moved down to my torso. Very carefully, they made an incision down the center and slid in two metal plates. The cut in my back was lengthened, and the plates fused with the reinforced spine. Then I felt some of my internal organs being removed and machinery inserted in their place. I saw my pancreas and gallbladder first, followed by my kidneys and liver. Various pieces of robotic equipment disappeared inside of me.

As painful as it was, it was nothing compared to when they connected everything to my nervous system. The shock hit my brain like a two-ton hammer dropped from the top of a mile-deep pit. I still find it amazing that I survived.

When the medical team finished grafting the machines into me, they sealed my chest and belly up completely and removed the skin covering the casing. The dialysis tubes were reattached, this time farther up where I still had living tissue, and the oxygen tube went back inside my nose. The doctors brought out the feeding tube.

"A...portal..." was all I could say before they put it in my mouth. I sucked on it, and once again I drank the bitter liquid.

"What did he say?" asked one of the medics.

"All I heard was 'portal'," replied the doctor who gave me the feeding tube.

"What does a portal have to do with anything? It's not like he was a test subject," said somepony.

"Well, he helped Cranky design tests, and he did run through a few chambers."

"Maybe that's what he wants: to become a test subject."

"No, no. He didn't mind testing for a short period of time, but absolutely hated having to solve a lot of chambers."

"Then what do you think he wants?"

"Remember how we were talking about what to put in his horn earlier?"

"Yeah..."

"What if he wants a portal device?"

"But how would he know what we were talking about?"

"He's still conscious, Pea Body. He can hear us."

The doctor known as Pea Body shrugged. "I didn't read into the technicalities of the process."

"It's obvious you didn't. At least you read what you were supposed to do." That didn't scare me as much as it should have. If everypony there was like Pea Body, the procedure would have gone terribly wrong if somepony screwed up. But I was in too much pain to care.

"So, let's get to it! We still have a few hours until he'll be ready to be completed. Shall we grant him his wish?" said one of the doctors.

"Why not? I have nothing better to do," said another. I heard a large group of them leave. A valve turned, and the feeding tube ran dry. I opened my eye to see the team's leader, a light brown stallion with a darker brown mane, standing over me. He removed the tube from my mouth and said, "Well, was that your wish?"

My response was slow. "Not...exactly."

He began to undo the straps binding me to the bed. "What do you mean by that?"

I slowly rolled onto my side, and the dialysis and oxygen tubes fell out of my legs and nose. "I was about to say 'home'."

The medic rushed over to help me up. "Oh. Well, there's not much we can do about that."

"It's okay, though. Don't worry. I'm sure I could get used to having a portal device in my horn." I stood for the first time since I woke up. My new legs felt strange to use, and I lost my balance.

He caught me before I hit the floor. "Careful. Don't want to damage anything before the procedure's over," he said.

"Speaking of, what will become of me?"

"What do you mean, during or after stage three?"

"Both."

"You're not going to like it."

"I don't care. What will you do to me?"

The doctor sighed. "About half of your face and neck will be replaced by our technology. Your eye is already gone, so that's not a problem. The real problem is removing half of your skull without damaging the brain. Another technical problem is integrating our computer system to function in tandem with your brain. Once that is done, if we haven't made any mistakes, we implant an artificial eye to fill the empty socket."

I cringed at every point he described. "And after?"

"After we finish, we delete your memory."

I didn't know how to respond to that news. No memories of anything before? I couldn't live like that!

"But," he continued, "I have come to a different decision. Before I erase everything, I will talk to Cranky. If he agrees to it, I'll let you retain your memory."

"And if not?" I asked.

"If he doesn't, I'm left with no choice."

I leaned my head back and closed my eye. "Why are you giving me this chance?"

"Because you were the only one to ask for something to remember the past by. Most of the other ponies I attempted this on died during the process. The ones that survived the procedure died shortly after their memories were deleted. I'm wondering now if memory retention will increase the chances of survival. And you don't want to forget everything you have ever known, do you?"

"No, I don't. Not even this procedure."

"Interesting. Anything else you would like to ask me?"

"Yes. During the final phase, could you please personally do the difficult parts?"

He was obviously taken aback at my request. "Well, um..."

"I know it will be painful, physically for me, emotionally for you, but I feel that I can trust you. Ever since I woke up in that bed, you've been the only one to show any kindness to me," I pleaded.

"Okay, I'll see what I can do."

I smiled weakly, knowing the ordeal both of us was about to go through, and climbed back into the bed. The medic tightened the straps around my body. I reinserted the dialysis tubes into my hooves. He picked up the oxygen tube and put it back in my nose.

"Before you give me the feeding tube, I have one final question," I said.

He walked over to it and started to pull it toward me. "Ask away," he said.

"What will I be used for if I survive?"

"Analysis. The other scientists are trying to create test-worthy AI systems to help phase out pony testing. They will study how your brain interacts with an internal computer and robotic body parts. Also, once you have your computer, I want to make this process as painless as possible. If you come up with any ideas, will you please let me know?"

"After all that you've done and are going to do for me, I would do anything."

"Well, first you've got to survive. I'll tackle the tricky stuff to maximize your chances, but you have to have the will to live."

"And knowing that gives me that will. Speaking of giving, can I have that tube now?"

"Oh! Sorry!" He put it in my mouth and turned the valve again. I sucked and drank the liquid. It didn't taste so bad that time. I don't know whether it was because I was used to it or my renewed outlook on the immediate future.

It was quite some time before the rest of the team came back. They proudly showed their product to the leader, who looked at me and nodded his head.

The valve turned for the last time, and the feeding tube left my mouth. The dialysis and oxygen tubes were removed, and I was left laying there on the bed.

"The patient has requested that I personally finish the process," the team leader told the medics.

"Cranky has ordered us to give him wings," said a mare.

"We'll add the wings before the skull, then."

"But we need to complete our work on him before-" began Pea Body.

"I know about our time constraints. But it's simply too dangerous. I can't have him bucking around while I install the computer system. If he does, he dies, and everything we've done is for nothing. I'm willing to rush wing installation, not the computer's."

I stared up at the ceiling. I was receiving wings. I was becoming an alicorn. Except I wasn't. My wings were being given to me as a part of an experiment; I didn't earn them.

I was woken from thought by the sensation of my spine being drilled into. I screamed. A doctor seized a cluster of nerves and began to graft a wing to my spinal column. Another drilled a hole on the other side of my spine and did the same. When it was finished, the leader asked me if they were working. I was able to wiggle them slightly.

"Good enough," he said.

Pea Body then walked over to me, injected me with a third adrenaline shot, and walked away.

The leader then pulled out a scalpel and touched it to my forehead. "Are you sure you want me to do this?" he asked me. I gave a very slight nod. He then began to cut away the skin on the right side of my face. I managed to withhold from screaming as he did so. When all that was remaining on that side was the bone, he put down the scalpel and grabbed a small circular saw. He cut off the small stump that had once been my horn and then began to cut into the skull itself. I bit my lower lip to keep from crying out. Finally, he removed just under half of my face. I still had my complete mouth, but almost no nose.

Then the leader took what I assumed to be the computer and placed it inside the cavity created by my loss of my nose. Long, thin wires ran from it into my brain. He connected the wires to specific portions of the brain and then called for the replacement skull piece. He took two long wires reaching from the inside of the horn and connected them to the computer. I felt nothing except for the touch of his hoof on my face.

A robotic arm moved directly over my head and began to descend. This time, however, it held a round object – my replacement eye. The doctor took it from the arm and looked into my empty eye socket. Using a pair of forceps, he gently picked up what was left of my optic nerve and worked the eye's wires around it before slightly stretching it to connect with the eye itself. It hurt, but it was nothing compared to the first two phases. He finally let the eye rest in its socket, but he still had to install my face plate.

It wasn't too painful, but it certainly wasn't painless, either. The doctor pressed the plate into my head, and he slowly began to bond the bone of my skull to the white metal of the plate. "There. Test your eye," he said to me.

I did as he told me. "Everything looks like it did before. Before the beginning of the first phase of the operation, I mean."

"Sounds like the optics are working. Blink." I did.

"And the eyelids are functioning properly as well. Here, let me unstrap you." He and a few others on the medical team undid my bindings. I rolled over and stood up again. I found it was remarkably easier than before.

"It's amazing what a computer can do for your coordination, isn't it?" the doctor asked me. I had to admit it was. "Let's try walking," he said.

I took an uneasy first step forward. I still wasn't used to having robotic hooves. As I went, though, it became easier for me to move.

"Well, Doctor, it would seem that we have succeeded. But what happens when his memory disappears?" said Pea Body.

"Pea Body, we don't have to find out." he replied.

"WHAT?" said everypony else on the team.

"I've talked to Cranky, and he said that he would allow him to keep his memories."

I was overjoyed. Here I had suffered for hours, maybe even days, on end because of a possible scientific breakthrough. But at the end of it all, I still knew who I was and how I got there. I was also bitter towards Cranky. He had forced me to endure this procedure. Sure, he let me retain my memories, but he put me in that position in the first place. I silently swore vengeance upon him.

"And," the doctor continued," he will be overseeing all future robotizations."

I took a guess that the word “robotization” meant the process I had just been through. Well, it could have been worse. I could have ended up as a test subject.

"I don't know what to say," I said. "I think I made it very obvious that the procedure is extremely painful. Putting anypony through that amount of torture is likely to be lethal; I am the first to survive it. But between the second and third phases of the operation, the Doctor and I struck a deal. He would do everything he could to help me survive phase three, and if I did, I would give him information regarding the process from the patient's point of view. This would allow him to develop methods that weren't so painfully traumatic."

"But we find nothing wrong with the current procedure! Why does it need to change?" complained some of the medics.

"Look at our history!" the Doctor yelled. "Out of countless experiments, this is our only success! How many other ponies died during this procedure?"

I backed down. To them, I was just the end product of their experiment. Only the Doctor treated me like a sentient being. They didn't care about what I did as long as they could continue torturing ponies in the same way. I ran from them, out of the medical bay and into an elevator.

The Doctor

The Doctor chased after me.

"You never told me your name," I said to him while in the lift. "I've just been referring to you mentally as 'the Doctor' for quite some time now."

"That's because Doctor is my name. Doctor Whooves. What was your name?"

"I used to be called Potato Mash, but I don't know what my name is now."

"It's ROBoCORN."

"What?"

"ROBoCORN. Robotic Organism Built of Cybernetic/Organic-Related Networks."

"That's my name?"

"Technically, yes, but you can always take a nickname."

"Hmmm..."

"You are the first pony to ever emerge from robotization alive. Just thought I'd throw that out there."

“Then that's what I'll be called. Cyberpony 001.”

"Sort of a long one. Do you mind if I just call you Number One?"

"Not at all."

I wondered about the life I now had ahead of me. Overseeing more robotization procedures didn't sound good for my mind’s fragile state. It would be a while before I would be able to even step into the medical wing without becoming uneasy.

Whooves continued to talk. “So, Number One, how do you feel?”

“Having a computer in my nose is strange,” I said.

“I would imagine so. What about your eye?”

“It works. It’s weird, though. The Equestria Science logo is constantly in the corner of my vision.”

“A small side effect.”

“But now, I notice everything about what I see.”

“Please, do elaborate.”

I looked at him. “Your laboratory coat is soaked with blood – my blood – and is irredeemable. Unlike all the other medical staff, you cover your cutie mark with your coat, which leads me to believe that you're not part of the medical profession. Finally, judging by the bags under your eyes, the robotization procedure takes several days to complete.”

“All very true. I'm not the doctor of medicine you took me to be during the operation. I am a researcher and programmer working on the most advanced AI systems in this facility. And yes, the operation took about four days.”

“If you're a programmer, then why were you leading the experiment?”

“Equestria Science hired me as a programmer. I studied biology as well as computer engineering some time ago. When Cranky decided to have us create living robots, he put me in charge of the initiative. Before I could build anything, I had to know how ponies responded in certain situations. Testing was already going on, so at first I observed live ponies going through the chambers. After a few days of watching them test, I realized that the pony brain was far too complex to artificially recreate with accuracy. That's when I got the idea of implanting an existing natural brain into the robotics.

“At first, I tried completely removing the brain and spine from a pony and putting them into a robotic body. The brain died during the transfer, and the experiment was ruined. I tried again a few more times, but every single time, somehow the living tissue became unfit for the transplant.

“That's when I took a different approach. Instead of bringing the brain to the robotics, why not bring the robotics to the brain? My first attempt was a complete failure. The unfortunate patient died after the first treatment. So, I brought in more test subjects. Everypony I tried to completely roboticize either died during the process or shortly after. I turned to partial robotization to use as a stepping stone to eventually reach my goal. Several failed attempts later, Cranky gave you to me.”

“And that's how I was made,” I said. “The product of other ponies' misery and pain.”

“No...” Whooves started to say.

“Don't lie to me. You know what I said is true.”

“All right, I admit that you are. But that doesn't change how I look at you.”

“Does it? Can you look me in the eye – my real eye – and say that?”

He faced me and stared into my eye. “Just because you came into being at a great cost of pony life doesn't mean that I look upon you with disdain.”

The elevator reached our destination and slid open. Doctor Whooves and I stepped out into Cranky Doodle donkey's office.

“Ah, Doctor! I want to speak with you. But first, let me congratulate you for your success! This certainly is a momentous occasion. I take it that this is the product of your hoofwork,” Cranky said, pointing at me.

“Yes sir, Mr. Doodle. This is ROBoCORN,” the Doctor said.

“Would you mind telling me what that means?” the old donkey asked.

“Robotic Organism Built of Cybernetic/Organic-Related Networks. Basically, he's half pony, half robot.”

I stared straight ahead. I didn't let any emotions show on my face as both the Doctor, who had done everything he could to keep me alive, and Cranky, the donkey Princess Celestia sent me to watch, referred to me as they would a newly built robot. It was painful, but the pain was emotional this time.

“Have you programmed him yet?”

“Not yet,” said the Doctor. “I have decided to test his systems before putting him to work.”

“And?”

“All tests so far are all positive. His flight and portal capabilities have yet to be used.”

“Portal capabilities?”

“Between the second and third phases of his robotization, the other scientists installed portal technology into his horn. I connected it to his CPU when I reconstructed his face. If it works, he will be able to shoot portals from his horn without the use of a hoof-held portal device.”

“I see. Well, take him down to the tech bay to finish testing him. If all goes well, give him his programming.”

The Doctor turned to leave. “Come on, ROBoCORN. Let's get you fully operational,” he said. I turned around. The two of us left Cranky and got into the lift.

When the door closed and we began moving, I spoke. “And you said you didn't look at me like I was just your creation. Lies!”

Whooves flinched. “Please, let me explain!”

I ignored his words. “From what you told Cranky in there, I could tell that you cared almost nothing for me! You're worse than everypony else! I trusted you, and what do you do? Exactly the opposite of what you say!”

“Just calm down...”

“Calm down? CALM DOWN?”

“OS! Suspend all motor functions!” he shouted at me. I instantly froze. I tried to move, but no matter how hard I pushed myself, it was impossible.

“Listen. Just listen. I had to act like that in front of Cranky. If he thought that I wasn't in control of you, he would have thrown you into chamber 75 and told me to start all over again.”

I would have shuddered if I could have. Test chamber 75 was the death trap. Eight turrets aimed at the entrance of the chamber slaughtered anypony who entered.

“I also preprogrammed you to stand there expressionless. I'm sorry, but it was for your safety.”

I tried to speak, but all that came out was muffled noise. My mouth was closed.

“OS, resume motor functions,” he said. I finally could move again.

“Okay. I forgive you. Just tell me next time you're going to do something like that,” I said.

“Now that that's cleared up, let's go through the list of system tests, shall we?”

“I see no reason not to.”

“One, motor control. Check. Two, vision. Check. Three, emotions. Check.”

“Wait, emotions?”

“It's so we know that your brain is in control of your body instead of the computer alone. Four, programming. Check. Five, flight. We'll test your wings in the tech bay. Six, other. Your portal horn. Also going to be tested in the tech bay.”

We waited in silence for a few minutes. The Doctor rechecked the list while I discovered the command console for my computer. It was a mental image that I could interact with. I spent the next twenty seconds figuring out how to paralyze myself and another two minutes trying to undo it.

“I see that you've found out how to use your computer, but I don't think being able to force yourself to stop moving will be helpful in many situations. Here, think 'set eye infrared'.”

I did, and Doctor Whooves became a glowing mass of red, yellow, and green bands. I looked down at my hooves. They were cold blues and purples that sharply contrasted with the green and yellow of my skin.

“Now try 'set eye standard'.” The world returned to normal.

“How does that work? I thought my eyes were directly connected to my brain.”

“They were, until phase three. I reconnected your optic nerves so that the images go to the computer first. Usually, both images are transmitted to the brain, but if the artificial eye's setting is not 'standard', then only its image is sent to the brain. This prevents you from seeing in two different electromagnetic categories at once.”

“I didn't know you did that much to me.”

“It was a necessary part of the procedure.” The elevator doors slid open. “Well, Number One, time to see what you can do.”

Author's Note

Sorry about the long wait! I'm a notoriously slow writer. On the plus side, I do have a draft done for chapter 3!

The Betrayal

We stepped out of the elevator and into the tech bay. It was a vast storeroom full of crates. The entirety of the walls, floor, and ceiling were white. Portal surfaces. I knew that was one of the reasons the Doctor had brought me down there. We walked a short distance through the stacks.

“Let’s try out your wings,” he said. “Can you spread them?”

I tried, but nothing happened. “I don’t know how.”

“OS, open wings.” They remained folded at my sides. “Oh, no. They’ve been improperly connected. I’ll have the team redo them later. Moving on to the next test. Pull up your console.”

The image appeared in my mind.

“Put in ‘run horn’.”

After I did, an oval-shaped ring popped into my vision. It looked like someone had cut it from the top right to the bottom left and rounded the corners created. The top half was hollow with an orange border, and the bottom was the same except blue. In the center of the ring was a barely-visible cross.

“What am I looking at, Doctor? There’s this ring in the center of my vision.”

“That would be the targeting reticule. Move it over a white surface and put ‘b’ into your console.”

I did as he told me and saw a flash of blue light above my head. A solid, oval blue portal was on the wall. In addition, the blue half of the reticule was now solid.

“Aim somewhere else and put in ‘o’.”

I looked at the floor. An orange light flashed where the blue had, and an orange oval appeared in front of me. This portal, however, was not solid, but only the edge of it glowed orange. On the inside was how the room looked from the wall. I looked over to the blue portal, and sure enough, I saw my side through it.

“Well, go on. Jump in,” said Whooves.

I cautiously put a metal hoof in before leaping into the orange portal. I fell through and landed on my back where I had been standing not a second before.

The Doctor laughed. “Portal systems online and functional.”

“So is that it?” I asked, getting up.

“Looks like it. Except for your wings, but we’ll take care of that later. In the meantime, why don’t you practice more with that horn? You’re probably going to need to use it sometime or another.”

“Sounds like a good idea. What about you?”

“I’m going to give the results to Cranky. He won’t be happy about your wing situation, but that’s not too important. What is important is that you're alive.” He turned and headed back to the elevator.

“Hey, before you go, how do I get out of this portal mode?”

“Input 'close horn'. Anything else?”

“No, I think that should do me until you get back.”

“All right then. Good bye!” The door closed him off from me. I was all alone in the cavernous room.

I decided to start with a few basic portal techniques. I placed the orange portal on the wall next to me and the blue farther away on the same wall. Stepping through the orange brought me out of the blue. I then put the orange portal directly above the blue. The first orange portal disappeared, and the blue portal briefly flashed. I jumped through the blue and landed a few feet from where I jumped but facing the opposite direction. My robotic hooves absorbed most of the shock.

For the next ten minutes, I practiced using those simple moves. Then an idea popped into my head. I placed the blue portal directly in front of me on the ground. I then looked straight up and put the orange one on the high ceiling. I jumped through the blue and fell through the air. As I fell, I replaced the blue portal directly under me so that I wouldn't land on the floor. I was falling, but I wasn't worried. If it looked like I was going to miss the blue portal, I would just put it under me again. It worked until I accidentally put the orange portal under me instead of the blue. Then I was flying up until I reached my peak height, almost touching the ceiling. Then I started to fall again, only to be rocketed upwards through the portals. Again, I nearly touched the ceiling and fell down through the portals. On my way up, I placed the blue portal on the wall about halfway from the floor to the ceiling. I passed through the portals and flew for quite some time before landing hard on my hooves and crashing to the floor. I got up and checked if I had injured myself. To my surprise, I found no traces of anything. My hooves must have saved me from the long fall.

The Doctor chose that moment to reappear. “I see that you’ve been using your horn,” he said.

“Portals are dangerous,” I replied. “I almost died just now.”

“They can be. Speaking of, I forgot to mention another command that you’re going to need.”

“What would that be?”

“Input ‘gravity’. The system's gyroscope will automatically orient your hooves towards the ground.”

“That would have been useful to know BEFORE I fell from the ceiling to the floor several times.”

“You WHAT?” He sighed. “ROBoCORN, you’re going to have to be more careful with yourself.”

“Or what?”

“Or you'll kill yourself! I didn't invest this much time into developing your systems only to have you die on me an hour later!”

“And ruin your plans to study me?”

“Yes!”

“If only I could without dying! I don't want to see more ponies put through that procedure!”

“Then help me build a true AI.”

That stopped me short. Building a robot from scratch was much better than helping roboticize anypony else.

“Fine. What do you need me to do?” I asked.

“First, let me give you your primary programming. Second, I need a secret terminal to work at. Don't want anypony screwing around with the code. Finally, I need you to go to sleep.”

“Sleep? Why?”

“I need to test the interactions between your unconscious mind and the computer. It will help me create an emergency shutdown code in the new AI.”

“Okay, but I don't know. I still think that this is all so that you can continue to create monsters like me.”

We exited the tech bay through a set of doors that led to the rest of the facility. As large as the tech bay was, I felt like I had just stepped outside of a cramped closet and into a vast cavern of machinery. I couldn't even see the walls, ceiling, or floor of the outside. The Doctor and I stood on one of countless catwalks that led to specific areas of the facility.

“So, where to, Doctor?” I said.

“We're headed down a few stories.”

“Can't we just take the elevator?”

“No. Our destination is isolated from the rest of the facility. It will be the perfect place to do our research.”

“Ah. What's down there?”

“Mostly old, broken-down machinery from past times. A few pieces will still be functional, but most of it is piles of scrap metal overgrown with some form of vegetation we can't identify. But we are on the moon, after all. Who knows what else is left to be discovered here?”

“Princess Luna.”

“Point taken. Anyways, let's get moving.” He led me down through the endless abyss of catwalks and technology. I felt more comfortable down there. I would have been relaxed if I wasn’t half robot. We walked for what seemed like miles before reaching a circular door. The right half of it was black and depicted a light blue silhouette of a pony. A small circle in the center rotated halfway and the door slid open. Whooves and I went in and found piles on piles of scrap metal haphazardly placed around the room. Green vines grew in cracks on the walls. This place obviously hadn’t been used in a long, long time.

“Here we are! This wing was abandoned quite some time ago. The experiments conducted here never produced any results. As a result, Cranky ordered it emptied, and nopony has touched it since,” said the Doctor.

“I noticed. So, what do we do now?”

“Go over there.” He pointed to a computer terminal. Next to it was a docking port for a computer sphere. I walked to the terminal.

“Now what?”

“Face the sphere port,” he said as he came up beside me, “and put your eye into it.”

“My eye?”

“Just trust me.”

“Okay…” I pressed my face to the port. Mechanical arms wrapped around my head an held me there. A small pole extended from the center of the port. I felt a hole in the tip of my nose open and the pole plug into it. My computer’s console appeared in my mind, but I wasn’t in complete control. The facility’s computer tried to identify me, but its search turned up a blank. “ACCESS DENIED” flashed across my console.

“Hang on a minute, I’m trying to override the security,” said the Doctor. He then started to curse under his breath before eventually shouting, “Success!”

My mental image immediately changed to “ACCESS GRANTED” and I could interact freely with the computer again.

“Well, now that you’re in, I can give you your first set of programs,” Whooves said. “I’m giving you the first one now.”

A file name briefly appeared in my head before disappearing in a flurry of other functions.

“Now for the rest.”

More text flew up the console, all as quickly as the first. I couldn’t read any of it. After a few minutes, it stopped.

“Now input ‘disengage’,” the Doctor said to me. As soon as I did, the metal pole retracted out of the hole in my nose and back into the wall. The hole shut, and the port released my head. I took a few steps backwards.

“What was that?” I asked.

“That was this section’s old mainframe. It isn’t exactly state-of-the-art, but it will do.”

“No, I mean what did you do to me?”

“I uploaded a few simple commands into your computer. Nothing too difficult. You shouldn’t feel too different from before.”

“Apart from having my head being held against a wall for several minutes, I’m doing just fine. Exactly what kind of commands are you talking about?”

Whooves heaved a sigh. “The main function was to have you bring escaped test subjects to the medical wing for robotization.”

I was both horrified and enraged by this piece of news. Not only was I the only pony ever to survive the procedure, but now I had to bring in more ponies to go through the same process.

“Oh, why, why, WHY?” I screamed. “You know I hate robotization. You know that I don’t want anypony else going through it. But still you treat me like just another robot, like your blindly obedient slave. You say that you look at me no different than before, but your actions tell me otherwise.”

“ROBoCORN, I’m only doing this because I have to!”

“Programming me to stand motionless in front of Cranky is one thing. Programming me to act against my will is another.”

“Number One, please…”

I ignored his pleas and ran. I didn’t know where I was going, nor did I care, as long as it was away from Doctor Whooves. I eventually stopped and found myself lost among overgrown piles of old, worn-out machinery. I sat down to think about my condition. None of the scientists who created me cared about me. The head of the facility and my old friend didn’t care. Even the Doctor, whom I had trusted ever since my robotization, treated me no better than the others. The weight of the realization came crashing down upon me. Nopony cared about my thoughts or feelings. I was truly alone.

Somehow I picked myself up from my misery and began to wander. I soon became disoriented and even more lost than I had been before. I looked at my surroundings. I quickly recognized that I had wandered into a test chamber. I figured that the track it was on had to lead somewhere, so I started to solve it. At the bottom of a small pit next to me was a cube, and on the floor behind me was a large button. Opening my testing program, I placed the blue portal under the cube and the orange one on the wall. The cube fell through the floor and came out next to me. Then I faced another problem: picking up the cube. I couldn’t pick it up using my hooves, and even if I could, I couldn’t walk over to put it on the button. Though I knew that it probably would do absolutely nothing, I focused my energy into my horn. To my surprise, the cube suddenly levitated a few inches off the ground and stopped, motionless.

“At least something about me hasn’t changed,” I mumbled to myself.

I walked to the button on the floor and dropped the cube on it. A door leading out of the chamber opened. I went through it and entered the lift beyond. The lift tube shut behind me. After a short ride, it opened again and I entered another test chamber.

It was a small room, with very few portalable surfaces. As such, it only took me five seconds total to portal over the wall that separated me from the exit door. When I reached the other side, I saw a docking port like the one the Doctor had programmed me at.

I walked over to it and plugged my head in. The first thing I noticed was the flashing "SECRET PANEL: CLOSED" option. I took two seconds and switched it to "SECRET PANEL: OPEN".

I disengaged from the port and looked to see what I had done. Right next to the docking port, one of the test chamber's panels had slid open, revealing a walkway and a closed door. I went in through the panel and the door and followed the walkway. Eventually I came to a wide open area. The walkway led to a door in a sphere at the center of the room. I walked over to the door, and it automatically opened.

Waiting on the other side was the Doctor.

"Hello, Number One," he said.

I backpedaled in surprise.

"Oh, no need to be afraid," he said. "Come on in. I want you to see what we're doing in here."

"And if I don't want to?" I asked.

"You don't have a choice," he stated flatly.

I sighed and hung my head. "Better get this over with, then." I stepped into the spherical room.

I wasn't prepared for what I saw. Countless technicians were building a massive robot in the center of the room. It hung from the ceiling by its chassis. But the head was what really caught me off guard.

"ROBoCORN, this is why you were created. By studying how you react to your computer, we will be able to program the first AI system.

"This, Number One, is CELeSTiA!"